Webcast quango: One-third of UK teachers are creationists

What about Science Teachers specifically

I'm not to worried if a bunch of bible bashers who took timeout from a busy schedule of arts and crafts or sociology (let alone RE!) think religion should be taught in Science class.

The important questions would be:

1/ How many Science teachers do?

2/ How many Head Teachers do?

Philosophy not RE

RE should be scraped from the general curriculum, and philosophy mad a compulsory part.

Unfortunately too many teachers are religious whackos, the profession seems to attract the fringe element.

To be honest, I would scrap all of the current set up of education, just make it 100% exam, and publish the exam criteria, job done. If they want to learn they can, if not so what. Far more economical an approach, teachers can join all us adults in the real world, and actually make a contribution to the economy, rather than leech of it.

@ Hollerith

i don't think it's misrepresenting anyone, it clearly states “....almost 9 out of 10 (87.9%) teachers take the pragmatic view that they should be allowed to discuss creationism or intelligent design in science, if pupils raise the question.”, it's also saying/showing that about 3% of teachers think it should be given the "...same status as evolution in the classroom..." , the title to the story is misleading ut thats mee-ja folk for you (I'm just hoping none of those 3% end up teaching my children).

perhaps they should

teach statistics in English lessons..

We discussed evolution in RE lessons, because this was 30 years ago though, there was a clear faith vs science split as lets face it , the discussion about evolution was done and dusted 100 years ago.

This doesn't mean that ID shouldn't be mentioned it should just be discounted as faith, the same way that miracles are discounted. You can't discuss it in the same way as flogiston or the michelson morley experiments (picking classic examples of theory debunking), because both those issues can and are disproved via experiments. ID/creationism cannot be disproved by experiment, in the same way that god cannot be.

Still , I wonder when the religious americans will finally get round to reading about plate-techtonics. Wonder what great phrase they'll invent to contradict that...

Save religious nonsense for religious education lessons.

If someone wants to discuss religious matters, save them for religious education lessons. Science lessons are for presenting concepts with actual proof to back them up, of which there is none for creationism, other than the usual bullcrap line of, 'God made it that way.'

It's a metaphor...

7 days... it's not seven actual earth days... it's a metaphor for the order by which they came about. As for if ID is viable as a theory... there is not one shred of evidence whereas there is plenty of evidence to support evolution. The idea of creation is a hangover from a time when people had not figured out evolution and needed a story to explain things and the big guy in the sky seemed pretty plausible.

It used to be thought that thunder was god getting angry and the sun was driven across the sky in a chariot but science has explained these in incontravertable ways and at some point in the future it would be nice to see proof of the origin of species.

They key difference between science and belief is that science is not blind and it's pretty fickle. As soon as a better theory comes along the open minds of science will embrace it. Religion is marred by the concept that a book written a few thousand years ago is the truth and is not subject to revision and updating when better information becomes available.

@Jamie

Orbit. The word you are looking for is orbit.

@Warren

Evolution is not fact, is that far more important thing, a scientific theory. Science should be about scientific theory. Science should not be about arbitrarily making crap up and then killing people who disagree with you. The teaching of religion (as opposed to religious education) impedes scientific learning and indeed any logic based learning.

Proof?

What sort of proof can science provide for a God who almost certainly exists outside of time?

@Jamie

Of course you can come up with an explanation you like to interpret the Bibilical creationist story in whatever you like. It's very easy to come up with allegorical interpretations or redefine the words as you see fit and, of course it's impossible to prove it is wrong.

But that utterly and totally misses the point - it's not science; any explanation that is not, in principle, falsifiable immediately identifies itself as unscientific. What might be the point is if the nature of science as a methodology was properly taught in classrooms then truly people might learn to think for themselves. They might then understand the difference between different methods of understanding.

It would be a jolly good idea if some of the more rigorous branches of philosophy were taught in schools (and to schoolteachers) and then we might not get this sort of nonsense of mixing up creationist theories and evolution as being equally valid interpretations of the same phenomena when, in fact, the former is based on an axiomatic faith system.

Forget creationism

I've come through the entire public school system with absolutely no idea how our government or legal system works.

How is MP formed?

I call bullshit...

I know a lot of teachers, including most of my family and hangers-on, many of them are Christians and I don't know a single one who thinks that creationism is anything more than a creation myth. I also don't know any of them who give a shit about TeachersTV.

If, in science class, someone brings up creationism/ID what is a teacher supposed to do? Send them out of the room? Tell them to shut up? or discuss it as part of scientific reasoning, why it may be true, why it may not.

Even Dawkins discussed creationism with a science class on his Darwin program.

Who votes wins

But how many were Biologists? "Teacher" doesn't mean "polymath" or "intellectual", and there's no reason to expect a History or Technology teacher to know any more about evolutionary theory than any random punter off the street.

Also, I worry about the methodology of this study. "Self-selecting" equates to "meaningless sample group" - those who are strongly motivated to have Creationism taught in schools are much more likely than any other type of person to take part in this study. Most Creationists are in religious organisations that are likely to treat this kind of survey as a means of promoting their particular viewpoint.

I wouldn't be surprised if this is exactly what happened here; by ambushing the vote a handful of well organised Creationists could easily skew the results.

@Jamie

"Time is relative and something which we have designed"

I do agree with the first part of your statement. Einstein himself has proven that Time is relative, so I doubt anyone can actually put those words in doubt.

However, any pretense of credibility you might have had falls flat on its face with the last part of your statement.

Nobody in the Human race has "designed" Time. If that were the case, we would have included methods to "wind back" Time and otherwise exert full control over it.

What the Human race has designed is its own understanding of time, yes. But Time will go on whether there is a human being to measure it or not.

I accept the idea that the Universe originated in the Big Bang - until a better scientific theory comes along. I accept the idea that immense and numerous stellar explosions were required to create the various kinds of matter that exist beyond the humble hydrogen atom. I accept that it probably took billions of years and untold trillions upon trillions of events to create the conditions that made life on this planet Earth possible.

And I also accept, and welcome, the idea that there is a God who, in His godly wisdom and intelligence, set the whole thing in motion and made sure to provide all the tools we needed to understand it.

The two items are not mutually exclusive, and I see no reason to consider that Science is diminishing God in any respect. On the contrary, I believe that Science simply demonstrates that God does indeed have a vastly superior intelligence to our own, and we should be in awe of what God has created and thankful to have the ability to take tiny steps in understanding it.

Because if we had designed the Universe, the specs would still be stuck in a committee and the beta version would have blue screened right after the first black hole.

INTELLIGENT DESIGN

At one time, there was nothing. Then there was a Big Bang, and a universe, complete with everything needed for everything that is, came into existence. How?

To deny there could be an intelligence responsible for this, is very unscientific.. To say in a classroom, "There are those who think there is an intelligence in the universe who created it." will not cause any harm to anyone. Except those who do not want students to believe there is moral order. To whose advantage do you suppose that is?

Creationism in science classes

I noted some cynicism in this report. Good! How many of the teachers identified themselves as science teachers? Why waste time talking about superstitions in a class on biology? Would it then be OK to discuss French grammar in English or vice versa? I think the answer to that is probably no.

I have no problem with debating religion/science/philospohy/ethics with anyone, especially as zealots of all flavours end up car crashing their rather feeble arguments in relatively few steps, but this onward march of "teachers" who aren't qualified to comment on what is or isn't on the science curriculum, piping up and adding their unwanted voices to this debate is a complete joke.

re: Ready, aim, fire

Well it's only fair: the religious nuts (such as yourself) keep sniping about things they don't understand and use that lack of understanding as PROOF that science is bogus.

Or is it only Christians who are allowed to say "you're wrong"?

re: INTELLIGENT DESIGN

You seem to be saying that the universe is set for intelligent life and this is so mindbogglingly unlikely that there MUST be an intelligence behind it.

However, that intelligence must have come about in a system that is set for intelligent life and this is so mindbogglingly unlikely that this intelligence MUST have an intelligence behind it.

But THAT intelligence must have come about in a system that is set for intelligent life and this is so mindbogglingly unlikely that this intelligence MUST have an intelligence behind IT.

...

hmmmm

@ "Because if we had designed the Universe, the specs would still be stuck in a committee and the beta version would have blue screened right after the first black hole" - yes, if humans had designed it we wouldnt have made humans with evidence of evolution (coxix {spelling??} - the little bit of your spine where a frikkin TAIL used to be. or the fact that we have things like the appendix, which serves no purpose and is a left over from our pre-human days...

@"At one time, there was nothing. Then there was a Big Bang, and a universe, complete with everything needed for everything that is, came into existence. How?" - who MADE god then? touche! always wins that one... was it mr and mrs god? is it god jr playing?

i dont mind religous fanatics but my kids will be withdrawn from any classes spouting religous nonsense - ive been an athiest since i was 5! (yes, i remember telling a teacher it was all rubbish back in 1st year infant school)

religion dumbs and numbs the mind - it stops us thinking as we are all told 'god made everythingstop dont worry your pretty little head'

i split up with my ex (who was a god botherer) after too many dumb conversations about how evolution cant be proved... ffs lol

re: Adam & Eve...

Vaughn, are you calling Adam a monkey!!!

We are not descended from apes. Apes and us descended from a common ancestor (which, to the ape would be a manlike ancestor if he were as stupid about it as some creationists). That ancestor was not an ape. Neither were they human. They were another species.

All dogs are descended from a wolf. Even Chihuahuas. And they're about as far as looking like a wolf as you can get. But we don't seem to say that the Chihuahua is descended from a Great Dane, do we, just because they have the same (different) ancestor species.

re: Proof?

"What sort of proof can science provide for a God who almost certainly exists outside of time?"

None.

Which is why God and discussions about such belong in a religious discussion, not a science one.

Why then do the christian activists seem to want to insist? you don't see scientists demanding that general relativity is taught in RE classes, or that home economics should be taught from the pulpit.

Intelligent design

There is one, and only one, supernatural entity in this universe. All hail the Flying Spaghetti Monster, for He and His allmighty meatballs are the origin and the end of all and any physical or pataphysical entity. He created the universe, and He created man to serve and adore Him. Anything else is bullshit. Burn your idols, muslims, jews, christians, for they are leading you to an afterlife of endless pain and suffering in salted boiling water (and tabasco in the eyes).

That's what I demand be taught in science class. My religious freedom is not less important than yours, biatch!

The FSM bless you all.

More seriously, do we really want to turn science classes into endless discussion on which religion has the best cosmogony? If yes, I'm sorry christian nutters, but your fairytale is much, much less appealing that the Hindu one. You loose. Now can we get back to rational thinking based on facts and the understanding of causes and consequences? You kids can go play make-believe in the playground.

re: It's a metaphor...

And God is not real. It's just a metaphor.

The Universe itself is a thing beyond our knowledge but within our grasp to understand. It isn't an intelligence, it is merely the process of the universe acting under its own nature toward an end that it neither knows, cares or drives for. It just exists because that is what it is for. To exist.

Why not? If bits in the bible are metaphor or allegory, then why must the central character be real?

Scepticism classes

RE: should be removed from the curriculum, and replaced with scepticism classes. Children would be taught to think for themselves and question the fallacy of religious beliefs of all flavours. There would then be no need for nonsense such as creationism or ID to come up in science lessons.

re: Creation or evolution

Let's just have a look at the creationist's belief here: until a few years ago it was based entirely on Genesis in the Bible. As there is absolutely no scientific proof whatsoever for what was originally written down several thousand years ago, where there is evidence of evolution everywhere, intelligent design was invented to fill the bus sized holes in the creation myth, with the basic line being 'oh, well, perhaps we weren't created by a supreme being whose existence cannot ever be proved but the complexity and variety of life on Earth means that something must have done it.'

Gene Roddenberry used to say that the alien species on Star Trek all looked human because of some star-seeding race who had travelled the galaxy in prehistory. It certainly saved on expensive makeup, and indeed predates the concept of intelligent design by 20 years or so. Intelligent design is basically the same argument, except that there isn't a successful TV franchise behind it. Is that ridicule?

@Jamie&JEAN

Your point seems to be that creationism isn't impossible, so it deserves mention in a science class. That's a gross misunderstanding of the nature of science. Science does not deal with the unknowable - and, more specifically, it does not deal with theories that are logically impossible to disprove.

The point that creationists love to make, "you can't prove that God/aliens/someone didn't create the universe/world/species", is exactly the reason for which creationism isn't science. It might be true, it might be false, it doesn't matter; it belongs to a philosophy class, not to a science class.

Evolution can, in principle, be disproven - for example, by observing the sudden appearance of a new species, sharing relatively little genes with any previously existing species. Creationism can't be disproven, as any conceivable observation can be explained as "God did it". This makes it not-science. True or false doesn't even factor in the discussion.

If a science teacher got asked this by a student, I think he should explain that science deals with testable knowledge only, and that the student should pose that question to the philosophy teacher.

re: Creation or evolution.

"It is quite amazing that these people who are so positive that evolution is correct are frightened of creationists."

Why then do creationists keep trying to get their dogma introduced into science classes? How is that fear?

If you can, then please tell me where I can get A.J.Crowley's work introduced in the Sunday Service...

Re: Creation or evolution.

>It is quite amazing that these people who are so positive that evolution is correct are frightened of creationists.

Yes, because they are scary people that cause people to die, quite often creationists are deluded religious fanatics, 5000 american women will die each year from preventable cervical cancer, but they will not recieve the HPV vaxine becuase of religious fanatics who refuse to issue the vaxine in schools (thankfully the UK is saving our daughters lives), 50% of americans are infected with HPV, think of that before you shag one.

>All they seem to able to do is ridicule creationists.

That's because they are stupid (or at least hold stipid beliefs, sod it! nahhh, they are stupid)

>They are so positive that evolution is correct they are frightened to debate creationism in the classroom.

There is no debate, creationism is just wrong, the earth is millions of years old not 6000, FACT.

>The truth is evolution cannot stand up to scrutiny.

Oh yes it does, and it has done, time and time again, go to http://www.talkorigins.org/origins/faqs-evolution.html probably the best detailed scritiny, go there and read, the answers to every question is there.

Creationists are retards

29% disagreed with this statement: "Creationism and intelligent design are not part of the science national curriculum programmes of study and should not be taught as science."

That's disgraceful. I don't care if these teachers teach science or not. They all should be fired immediately and they should not be allowed to teach anything anywhere ever again. It's not fair to students to be stuck with an idiot teacher and only idiots still believe in magical creation or magical intelligent design in the 21st century.

Religious Education?

I am quite shocked to hear that schools are required to teach religious education. I would expect that to happen in special religious schools that certain minority groups of parents - such as Roman Catholics - send their children to, not the normal public school system.

Of course, in the United Kingdom, the Church of England continues to enjoy the status of an "established church", in flagrant violation of the Eternal Law of God, as revealed in the First Commandment:

Thou shalt make no law which concerns itself with creating an establisment of religion, nor shalt thou restrict freedom of speech, nor of the press.

Oh, no; that's the First Amendment.

But then the United States violates this principle, by requiring Catholic parents to pay out of their own pocket for Catholic schools while paying taxes for public schools. We Canadians, at least, have got it right, at least in Alberta and Quebec.