Capitol bill aims to control ‘leftist’ profs THE LAW COULD LET STUDENTS SUE FOR UNTOLERATED BELIEFS. Here's the actual bill.

I am just overwhelmed by the stupidity of this. Do you think the author of this bill ever even went to college? Do they really think the college or university cannot handle hiring quality staff without this nonsensical oversight? What fantasy world do these idiots live in?

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The real news, including science news corporations may not allow on stations they own. http://www.democracynow.org/

Well, that's Intelligent Design stuffed, then.

ID is a "serious scholarly viewpoint"? In a science class?

Item 3 is what confuses me, students have a right to not have controversial matter introduced - yet that means a student can introduce ID into a biology lecture? :-s Sound to me that Item 3 should exclude anyone introducing ID into a biology class, since it's "controversial" (i.e. not science).

Bizarre. Is there any chance of it actually being enacted?

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Now while I might be amused by Cthulhians, I don't necessarily distrust them to carry out the functions of government. -- JayUtah

What's it like being a skeptic in the Middle East? Check out my blog.

Also posted at FWIS.

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"All your bias are belong to us." Ara Pacis
"A witty saying proves nothing." Voltaire

Geesh, can we find any more reasons for litigation? Several highly publicized cases, given further noisy attention by David Horowitz and his Students For Academic Freedom group, are causing people to have knee-jerk reactions, like the ones to the IMAX films mentioned in the other thread.

My feeling is this: teachers should be allowed to teach as they see fit within reason. Professors, especially, have specialized knowledge in the areas of their PhDs and thesis. Why should a professor, say, extrapolate on ID, when his thesis and study was about some aspect of Darwinian theory? College students are at college to learn something, but mainly they should learn how to think. If they don't agree with something, they have a brain, they can go pursue that knowledge by another avenue.

I was forced to go to a Catholic high school (though my family is Greek Orthodox). Freshman year Religion class was all about the nuts and bolts of Catholicism. I told my teacher that I was an atheist and she said fine, but you have to do the assignments and argue why you disagree. We were also assigned to write a paper on every Sunday's mass, but since I refused to go to church, she made me write about specific passages in the Gospels. She was cool in that way and I got an A, but only because I provided well-thought out arguments. This was tiresome for me and in subsequent years I just went along. I got A's in all my religion classes. It didn't faze me to study things I disagreed with--it was their job to teach me what they knew (besides it was a Catholic school).

In college, I had a professor who was a Lutheran Melville scholar and we studied the synoptic hypothesis. He did, in fact, mention that comparing the gospels and how they were essentially plagiarized from each other and written for different audiences, in no way denied belief. Imagine if I spent my time arguing even the existence of God or constantly disputing the professors theories; no, I simply did my work and compared the gospels as assigned. The assignments helped develop critical thinking skills. What if I argued against the professor's theories regarding the synoptic hypothesis?* The same goes for my American Political thought class; what if I argued that the textbooks didn't to contain enough accurate history or discuss alternative views of early American history? Now, I support better textbooks, but in colleges I expect the professor to infuse lessons with his or her views on the matter. What a battleground it would be if a student could sue for being not told this or that.

Imagine if in my World Literature class I argued against the beautifully written prose of St. Augustine or even Genesis? Did reading that literature turn me into a God-fearing believer? Likewise, would a God-fearing believer lose his or her faith learning about the synoptic hypothesis?

Now, I do think that often professors will grade your papers based on your "getting it" in the way they "get" the subject matter. I was told that by my Literature into Film prof. who was not an easy grader: "You came closer than anybody in understanding..." But I was at a state university and I knew for a fact that a lot of students in my class were all around clueless and if they disagreed with the prof's ideas, they wouldn't have been able to write very persuasive arguments.

From this article posted on our board in January:

Whether through self-censorship or junk education, our country's children are paying the price for the political aggression of the far right. Robert Frost once wrote, "Education is the ability to listen to almost anything without losing your temper."
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/1228-32.htm

I think Frost had it right. Do we really need our minds to be babysitted? That's essentially what this issue is all about. Or perhaps students whose grade point average is killed by a certain professor want to complain. In reading about this in the news, I always wish I could read the actual assignments and papers. It's too much a he said, she said issue. My experience is, at least at a state university, there are some really poor students.

Said professor gave me the highest grade on a paper: a B++. What the heck is the difference between a B++ and an A--? Reminds me of, is 1.0... = .999...Bizarre.

Edit article's grammar-missing "to"

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The perception of the comic is a tie of sympathy with other men, a pledge of sanity. We must learn by laughter as well as by tears and terror. ~ R. W. Emerson

Of interest:

A friend wrote:

Beskeptical, you sure know how to get a rise of out of me in the morning!

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The perception of the comic is a tie of sympathy with other men, a pledge of sanity. We must learn by laughter as well as by tears and terror. ~ R. W. Emerson

The Propogation of Ignorance has always been with us; it's just amazing that it is growing in strength when one would expect it to decline - and happening at Universities no less. Oh well, we march on. Who said the accumulation of knowledge and search for the truth was a linear path. A little dip into the Dark ages here and there seems to be part of our history.

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Don of Borg - Cool, Calm, Collective.

"Within the next generation I believe that the world's leaders will discover that infant conditioning and narco-hypnosis are more efficient, as instruments of government, than clubs and prisons, and that the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

I had this for a while in high-school.
The religion teacher was a Catholic priest, and we also compared the Greek and Latin versions of some passages. 8)

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papageno


"Why waste time learning, when ignorance is instantaneous?" - Hobbes (Calvin and Hobbes)

"It's all about context!" - Vince Noir (The Mighty Boosh)

"I've never heard of such a brutal and shocking injustice that I cared so little about!" - Zapp Brannigan (Futurama)

Alchemy, astrology, geocentrism, How about claims that the Illuminati are in control of all world history, People actualy do like new Coke. Pi is 3 or Baseball isn't boring.

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'The eye can only see what the mind is prepared to accept'

aaarrrrrrrrrrrrrrgggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh h!!!!!!!!!
(where is the pulling all the remaining hair out of my head smiley?)


And people wonder why all of our scientists and engineers come from overseas and why other countries are beating us in technology. We will have a generation of college graduates who are not smart enough to run the cash register at Walmart because the concept that 3 + 2 = 5 was against someone's personal belief structure and wasn't taught.

I feel slightly better now. ops:

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At night the stars put on a show for free (Carole King)

Well, this is the Florida lege and guv we're talking about. ... Yes.

Items 3 and 6 seem sufficiently murky and contradictory that the bill, if passed as written, could be found unconstitutional.

I'm just glad this is Florida. That lets Texas off the hook for awhile. Our lege is too busy trying to rewrite Houston traffic laws or fund schools with gambling and taxes on nudey bars to get involved in such nonsense.

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Never attribute to malice what can be adequately explained by ignorance or stupidity.
Isaac Asimov

Not that I think it matters, but I've contacted my state representative and my state senator trying to get them to vote against.

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Some try to tell me, thoughts they cannot defend,... - Moody Blues.

This will come back to bite them in the butt when students sign up for religion classes and start to debate the "oh so learned professors of faith."

You know, that statement is absolutely correct. Freedom is an extremely dangerous thing. It is extremely valuable and precious, it requires the holder to actually do some work to maintain it (like think and act) and exposes the user to all kinds of potential hazards of body, mind, and soul. It is much "safer" and easier not to have freedom; to have some omnipotent State dictate to us what to think and do. They we can just lean back and enjoy the latest episode of American Idol. Yep, ignorance is bliss.

I suspect that the state of Florida will soon be the safest place on the planet.

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At night the stars put on a show for free (Carole King)

This bill is aimed at professors who's main goal is not teaching, but indoctrination into their political beliefs.

I'll give you an example of such a professor here at the University of New Mexico, Richard Berthold. He taught undergrad social science, history, and political science. If you professed any form of Christianity you were failed in his class, no matter how well your classwork was done; no matter how well your arguments were formed; no matter how well you did on the tests; you were failed.

According to what I heard and read (newspaper articles) the only way to "pass" his classes was to agree with his political and religious viewpoint. Two good friends who graduated from UNM have told me these things.

A Western Civilization class was an undergrad requirement for almost every major and while he was not the only instructor, many students would try and schedule that particular class in a semester when another professor was teaching it.

Complaints and protests against this professor finally led to his removal a few years ago. The "straw-that-broke-the-camel's-back" was some public political statements he made, very similar to what Colorado University's Ward Churchill made back in January.

College is not a place for indoctrination, but as that bill asks for, a place for academic freedom.

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http://boinc.mundayweb.com/one/stats...033/prj:6/.png

Why would you need to profess your Christianity in a University class?

US Universities must be very different to the UK.

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'The eye can only see what the mind is prepared to accept'

And how?... :-?

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"All your bias are belong to us." Ara Pacis
"A witty saying proves nothing." Voltaire

My guess is that the story is somewhat exagerated, as most "a friend of mine told me" stories usually are. If a professor flunked every student who ever professed Christian beliefs established such a perfect pattern, he would not last long - even with tenure.

The fact that he did get ousted proves the system works.

And if the guys reputation were that well known, the kids who professed their Christian beliefs anyway need to go 3 steps back and take a remedial class - Common Sense in the Real World 001. Or maybe - How to Blow the Whistle without Getting Your Head Chopped Off 002?

Just to be clear tlbs101, do you support this kind of legislation?

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Don of Borg - Cool, Calm, Collective.

"Within the next generation I believe that the world's leaders will discover that infant conditioning and narco-hypnosis are more efficient, as instruments of government, than clubs and prisons, and that the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving