Kansas Votes to Teach Stupidity

Associated Press
Updated: 5:35 p.m. ET Nov. 8, 2005

TOPEKA, Kan. – Revisiting a topic that exposed Kansas to nationwide ridicule six years ago, the state Board of Education approved science standards for public schools Tuesday that cast doubt on the theory of evolution.

The board’s 6-4 vote, expected for months, was a victory for intelligent-design advocates who helped draft the standards. Intelligent design holds that some aspects of the universe are so complex that their development must have been directed by an superintelligent agent.

Here’s the take on this by The Onion (link is on right for full text and other fun)

Evangelical Scientists Refute Gravity With New ‘Intelligent Falling’ Theory
August 17, 2005 | Issue 41*33

KANSAS CITY, KS-As the debate over the teaching of evolution in public schools continues, a new controversy over the science curriculum arose Monday in this embattled Midwestern state. Scientists from the Evangelical Center For Faith-Based Reasoning are now asserting that the long-held “theory of gravity” is flawed, and they have responded to it with a new theory of Intelligent Falling.
Full Article Link: http://www.theonion.com/content/node/39512

What do you think about this if you’re the head of the biology department at KU or KSU? How do you recruit professors to come to a school in the heart of American, no topology, great basketball, but with a student population dominated by local kids who think the world may really only be 6,000 years old and that the human eye must have been designed by God? Man, if I’m a parent in Kansas, I just became a big supporter of school vouchers. Vouchers are a shitty idea, but my damn kid is going to private schools that teach science in science class. And, if I do that, a thousand other parents are going to feel the same way and very soon there’s not just a digital divide, but there’s also western rationalists divided from occultists. Can anyone fucking say “Enlightenment”? Sure you can, boys and girls. Issac Newton, Thomas Jefferson, Franklin, Boyle, you remember some of these names, don’t you? At this rate, we’ll be burning witches and a new Torquemada will be grilling “terrorists” in CIA prisons. What’s that? They already torture people in secret CIA prisons? Damn. Nevermind.

2 thoughts on “Kansas Votes to Teach Stupidity”

  1. laocoon Post author

    Here’s the rant by MH …

    Dear (Friend),
    About the “theory of gravity being flawed”: Based on what I know, with some certainty, that assertion, taken alone, is indisputable and the adjective “flawed” is entirely too genial for characterizing how screwy it was from inception. My apologies to Newton, Kepler & Einstein; they did manage to assemble key fragments of the puzzle that continues to remain unassebled to date.

    I gotta hand it to the “evangelical scientists”(what?) for choosing to refute the standard gravity model we have been ram-fed by the “recognized (secular) scientific authorities” for too many generations. As the evangelical departure point for selling their laughably goofy “Intelligent Falling” theory, it’s a tactical coup of a choice because it contains that required little particle of truth so necessary for opening a convincing argument. However, beyond openers; the theory “falls” quickly off the reality cliff and only serves to further mystify the salient points of the debate conveniently left untouched behind their foggy veil obscuring their dumbing-down agendas. Secular science mouth organs pull the same kind of shenanigans to insure that anyone outside their club is fraught with enduring ignorance about what might or might not be possible. They simply operate on a different set of dangerously incomplete and pitifully unsupported principles. Like meets like, in a sense.

    Both parties to the debate about teaching evolution share something in common that seems to remain generally unrecognized (and will certainly never be admitted) by their respective spokespersons and supporters; that is, they both sell lies grounded in myths (with tiny particles of truth thrown in) all designed to perpetuate maximum confusion and ignorance about the true nature of gravity or anything else of importance to anyone attempting to earnestly sort out what squares with conscionable reason and accurately matches with inclusive observations. Meanwhile, the ongoing charade of publicly warring for the high ground on whatever issue of contention, helps to perpetuate cognitive dissonance in the “buying public” which is advantageous to both parties. Neither cabal requires unequivocal proof of their claims to continue conducting business as usual, or, to retain and recruit extorted support from their blind followers who keep pouring cash into the two war coffers to protect themselves from having to think truly original thoughts.

    Caveat emptor! Both are like used car salesmen concocting whatever flimsy excuse necessary to get that lemon out of the parking lot. This whole quagmire resembles a typical soap opera or game show on a TV that’s permanently ON and not unplug able. The sponsors keep propping open consumer eyelids with toothpicks to make sure they get their worthless advertisements across before viewers fall asleep from exhaustion trying to figure out which is the least offensive channel to watch. By my estimation, neither “combatant” qualifies for inclusion in the critical thinkers category based upon their respective claims and spurious methods.

    My enduring hope is that they will both do something worthwhile for the remnants of sentient humanity like “intelligently fall” into another dimension by the sheer mass of their induced ignorance. My sympathy goes out to the dimension that inherits them and their pitiful legacies.

    Ranting Along,
    M

    p.s. Since I’m on the topic of intentional befuddlement tactics afoot these days, I recently responded to someone who was vehemently denying the possibility of operational systems capable of engineering and modifying weather systems on large scales. “It just can’t be!” was all he had to work with. I’ve snipped part of my ranting reply to him for your further entertainment.

    “RANT ON!”
    I’ve read countless articles and studies, most notably emanating from “highly credentialed” spokespersons, touting the standard “party line” designed to intentionally low-ball the true developmental maturity, scope, and enormous potential of various energy producing systems that have long been built, deployed, and, empirically proved to function most efficiently outside of antiquated, sadly entrenched, codified “scientific” paradigms which, in fact, only weakly under gird the flimsy architecture of their epistemological boxes shaping myopic arguments about what is or is not extant, what’s possible and what’s not. I imagine hearing the Disneyland-tour-tune, “It’s a Small World, After All”, playing in the background of their sad little show as they try to shrink the infinite cosmos down to something more palatable for general consumption. Of course, no thinking required; just add more confusion.

    Certified, sacrosanct, “known limitations” have been bought from the highest institutions of learning by the academic swells, given peer-reviewed, accolades and marketing endorsements from well-funded, sanctioned-only labs and calcified into unwavering denial of any opinion expressed or proof offered beyond their hallowed halls of origin. These “thrift-store-facts” are then recycled and resold like Junior League gems by this dangerous cabal advertising their half-baked wares to countless generations of “unlicensed and unenlightened” masses. These “science” elitists have conveniently and categorically isolated the common person as not being qualified or worthy of trust to use their own brains and processes to arrive at “correct” understandings of their history or current circumstances, let alone, the true state of scientific breakthroughs consistently avoided by the common media.

    Please, pardon my iconoclastic bloviations and palpable disdain for those of their disgusting ilk, but, I’m really on my soapbox, now, and I’m thoroughly annoyed by their incessant denials of plain-sight, observable reality! I will not be deprived of the therapeutic value of questioning principles, methods, consistently believed, time-honored, half-baked deductions and other dumbed-down assertions employed to perpetuate the brain lock on humanity! I’m compelled to take umbrance with their closed franchise for dissemination of “truths”. I seek, therefore, I dig. Occasionally, I uncover a clue and pass it along for further study.

    All flies born inside vinegar jars tend to perceive the jar as the sweetest place in the world until someone using opposable thumbs twists the lid off. Suddenly, the flies therein are challenged to deal with huge volumes of fresh air and entirely too much freedom! Oh my, what to do? I now hear a blues lyric wailing about, “Musca domestica Linnaeus, down at the crossroads”, lamenting for the funky familiarity and simple confines of home while unexpectedly confronted with the bountiful freshness and scary expanse of the sweet-smelling, great outdoors. Punk rocker screams: “Should I stay or should I go?”

    If a lone fly takes the outward plunge and leaves the stinking comfort of the jar, it gets risky in terms of being able to guarantee re-captivation of that perfectly offensive acetic acid aroma of home out there in that spooky beyond where molecules of funk per square inch are less concentrated. (Read: “loose grant/job”) What will those cousins tenaciously clinging to the inside of that comfortable jar back home think if the maverick should return smelling of flowers? “Icky Poo!” “Ooooo, the heartbreak of psoriasis!”; “Look, Diptera, is that BEE POLLEN on his collar?” (pointing with accusatory antennas). “Yes, (twitching nervously) I have heard scary legends of it being a dangerous substance, free of funk and disgustingly sweet!” “Surely, he’s been contaminated by venturing outside our domain!” “Banish him from the Magic Kingdom of Flyness!”, they’d say, and, “Screw that lid down behind him, we’re all choking on that sticky-sweet cloud of yellow powder he trailed in here!”

    I’ve never claimed to have all the answers to anything; but, I’m always willing to look at the evidence and ask more questions in my sincere quest to arrive at a clearer picture. I left the jar a long time ago.

  2. John X

    How does Intelligent Design explain the existence of George W.?

    I mean, how fuckin’ intelligent is a designer who’d design THAT miswired, warranty-expired chucklehead? Half the time I can actually see the smoke wafting out of his ears, which he invariably inhales and then tries to blow up OUR asses.

    Quality control in the Intelligent Design manufacturing facility must be nonexistent.

    I get the idea that proponents of ID were themselves designed by a designer who didn’t quite make the cut.

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