The Missouri House of Representatives has passed a bill that would impose new rules on state colleges to “protect diversity” that includes this most interesting clause:
(1) The report required in this subsection shall address the specific measures taken by the institution to ensure and promote intellectual diversity and academic freedom. The report may include steps taken by the institution to:
(a) Conduct a study to assess the current state of intellectual diversity on its campus, including diversity-related criteria used in admissions, scholarship awards, and hiring which shall include racial and gender diversity;
(b) Incorporate intellectual diversity into institution statements, grievance procedures, which may include filing a complaint directly with the governing board, and activities on diversity;
(c) Encourage a balanced variety of campus-wide panels and speakers and annually publish the names of panelists and speakers;
(d) Establish clear campus policies that ensure that hecklers or threats of violence do not prevent speakers from speaking;
(e) Include intellectual diversity concerns in the institution’s guidelines on teaching and program development and such concerns shall include but not be limited to the protection of religious freedom including the viewpoint that the Bible is inerrant;
(f) Include intellectual diversity issues in student course evaluations;
I’m sorry, but this is not a bill to promote diverse views and protect intellectual freedom; it’s advocacy for the damned dumb views of religious fundamentalists. It’s an attempt to force religion into college classrooms.
Nelson, of the AAUP [American Association of University Professors], said that it was “particularly remarkable that the bill includes belief in the literal truth of the Bible under the heading of intellectual diversity.” He added that “requirements for balance in the curriculum and respect for intellectual diversity, in hiring, and in public speeches on the campus — coupled with reporting requirements — effectively mean that Missouri would no longer have any system of secular public higher education. Missouri’s fine universities would become religious schools if this bill were to be approved by the Senate.”
I do not talk about the Bible in my classes; I do not teach anything about religion in biology, and even tell students that they’re free to believe whatever they want, but that they’re expected to understand the principles of evolutionary biology. If this kind of bill were passed in my state, and I were required to allow Biblical literalism to be legitimized in biology, I’d have to respond in a fair and balanced way and include a lecture on why the Bible is biological nonsense. Is that what they want?
I’m wondering what Missouri biology teachers are going to do if students hand in introductory biology exams that give all the answers from a Biblical perspective, where the earth is 6000 years old, no evolution has occurred, and the answer to any question about speciation is “God did it.”
In case you’re wondering how such a stupid bill could pass, perhaps it was an example of “framing”.
Last year, a student complained that she was being forced to express views that differed from her religious views, and this month an outside panel that reviewed the social work program at Missouri State
found that students felt fearful of expressing views that differed from their professors, especially on spiritual and religious matters.
So maybe students shouldn’t bother expressing views on “spiritual and religious matters” to their professors. I sure don’t care; I won’t be evaluating them on what they learn in church at all. The classroom is not the place where your instructors are supposed to validate any random garbage that has found a niche in your head.
Wow! I didn’t think that the words ‘intellectual’ and ‘the viewpoint that the Bible is inerrant’ could be strung together in the same sentence, without negation of one or the other.
The Missouri House of Representatives will be a laughing stock, I hope.
I suggest that if someone brings up IDiocy, all the scientifically minded Missourians try to reclaim their state’s status as “The ‘Show Me’ State”
I live in Missouri, or “Misery” as many people call it. To steal Mr. Harris’s line above…
“Wow! I didn’t think that the words ‘intellectual’ and ‘MISSOURI’ could be strung together in the same sentence, without negation of one or the other.
If it were not for St. Louis and Kansas City as well as some great natural places I’d say burn it all!
It’s probably more grandstanding (vote pandering) than anything, but it can’t be a good omen that voting for a bill “protecting” anti-intellectualism as “diversity” seems like a good way to demagogue the issues.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/35s39o
Why can’t you be tolerant of the intolerant who want their intolerant ideas tolerated by the intolerant?!?
We have gone down the rabbit hole. There is not enough irony to grasp the situation…
Who ever said students should feel good about expressing views different from those of their professor? He’s the professor for a reason, chances are he knows what he’s talking about. What’s next? Will math students be given the right to deny Pythagoras’ Theorem?
If they were really interested in protecting unpopular, minority “intellectual viewpoints” from oppression, they would have mentioned “the viewpoint that the bible is a crock of shit.”
Hey, why they’re at it, why not mention Holocaust denial and flat earth-ism as well?!
Missouri and Kansas seem to be having a contest.
BTW, does this bill include PZ’s (or representative) right to lecture in any Missouri church to help diversity in these institutions too?
If our legislators want to protect our students, how about pulling weapons of mass murder out of circulation. I’ve got hysterical students outside my office because they can’t reach friends down the road in Blacksburg. I’m telling students that maybe friends aren’t answering their cellphones because they didn’t get a chance to grab them in the confusion. GOD DAMN IT GOD DAMN IT GOD DAMN IT
Y’know, if every student took this legislation to task by insisting that their professors respect their non-Biblically-oriented beliefs about the creation of the world (here’s a list that should allow for at least one new creation myth per lecture), I wonder how long it would last?
Elf Eye,
Did I miss something? What are you talking about?
Why didn’t they just offer to pay the wages of a couple of ACLU lawyers? Same outcome, but they wouldn’t make themselves look like fools.
Bob
Wow. Spectacularly ridiculous.
And, uhmmm, just a quick question … which bible shall be protected in its inerrant diversity? NIV, NASB, King James, NEW King James .. all of them?
Again, wow .. the stupid, it burns me. Would every test devolve into how well the student’s answer matches the framework of the particular mythology they’ve chosen to follow? Would the grader need to know this before hand or could the student justify it after the fact. It would make life interesting, if academically meaningless, in Missouri higher education.
As for me; as a Pastafarian I will answer all test questions based on the inerrant teachings of the Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. (Or maybe Dianetics ..depends on my mood)
Afterthought,
Shootings at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg.
This bill stinks of David Horowitz, that worm of a man, formerly of the Ayn Rand Institute, who likes to promote “academic freedom”. He provides outlines for state politicians who want to draft “academic freedom” bills. I suppose he doesn’t care if they are used by creationists. Horowitz’s greatest desire is to remove liberal thought from colleges.
In my opinion, if you pass thru college without questioning your religious beliefs, then you’re wasting your time and money.
22 are dead at Virginia Tech.
Good one Bob- not for the first time, I’m glad I can’t drink coffee at my desk. ;)
Wow, that Blacksburg thing is horrible.
But, I had to admire (?) the resourcefulness of this:
“Madison Van Duyne said she and her classmates in a media writing class were on “lockdown” in their classrooms. They were huddled in the middle of the classroom, writing stories about the shootings and posting them online.”
Sorry for the rant. There is a lot of coming and going between Radford and Virginia Tech. Most of my students have friends in Blacksburg. Seems like everybody is on their cells trying to track down friends at the moment.
I’m also from Missouri and I work at the university that precipitated this current controversy. Unfortunately, it seems there was some inappropriate coercion in which a student’s beliefs were not respected as they should have been. Subsequently, a blistering report about the department in question was released (I can’t seem to find the report on the web, but PZ linked to some news articles about it). Of course, this understandably lends some credibility to the “persecution” complex carried around by so many alleged Christians.
This area is very conservative and religious. However, Missouri is still filled with live-and-let-live and show-me people. I wonder where they are now. They seem to have been drowned out by the belligerent and whiny types.
I agree that final passage of this bill in Missouri will make us a laughingstock. I also agree that it should make us a laughingstock.
afterthought – there was a shooting at Virginia Tech.
It’s difficult to know what else to say.
Bob
Elf Eye: You’re at Radford? My wife is head of Tech services at McConnell Library.
Sorry, Elf Eye–I wish there were something helpful we could say or do. All I can even think to say is you don’t need to apologize for your “rant” (or venting) in the least here.
Conservatives have been coopting language for a while, now. They read Nineteen Eighty-Four and said, “Damn, that’s a good idea!” and are creating newspeak where “scientific theory” means “uneducated guess”, “family values” means “conservative Christian racism, sexism and homophobia” and “protecting diversity” means “establishing Christianity”.
It’s the nihilistic application of post-modernism in political language, roughly speaking. The fundies hated all that “relative” stuff until they realized they could USE it and THEY could say that if everything is relative then Christianity has to be advanced just like every other bit of multi-culturalist crap, leaving out the analysis that they’re at the top of the cultural and political pyramid. Roughly speaking.
Could we secularists publish our own “Bible” and claim that it should be taught, too?
Perhaps we could find a “respected” scholar who would testify that the word for “not” was considered optional in ancient Greek, and thus a modern translation could insert or elide “not” in any sentence without straying from the original intent. Something like that.
(Sorry to make a whimsical post while the Blacksburg situation continues, but it’s now or never.)
Every time you see “including but not limited to” in something like this, you know the “including” is the only thing they really care about, and that anything else will be somehow deemed not covered by the actual statement.
Whenever I travel back to St. Louis to visit family, I usually remark that there seem to be more churches per square mile than there are Starbucks and McDonalds combined. Some people have tried to tell me that the profusion of places of worship isn’t a bad thing; that it could be worse. This idiocy shows me that they’re wrong.
One of the Muslim critiques of Christian practice provides a data point to back up your point. Mosques in this country and in Europe are clearly more integrated than Christian churches are. I can look up the stats if anyone cares, although a social scientist might be able to find that information quicker than I can–it has been years since I reviewed it, although I don’t think it’s particularly controversial that churches in this country (except in Hawaii) tend to be predominantly of one race or another.
Anyway, the point of the critique is that a lot of Christian history and practice has been to keep themselves separate from the people they are imposing the religion on, while by contrast, Islam accepts other races as equal, to the point of worshipping and intermarrying. The composition of the churches here, compared to the composition of mosques, tends to tentatively bear out
In other words, if the Christians promoting this bill are really interested in promoting diversity, there is a lot of work remaining for them to do that doesn’t involve sabotaging science.
“In case you’re wondering how such a stupid bill could pass, perhaps it was an example of “framing”.”
If effective framing gets people to buy into this stupid bill, it should be even more effective to get people to buy into the truth, shouldn’t it?
Include intellectual diversity concerns in the institution’s guidelines on teaching and program development and such concerns shall include but not be limited to the protection of religious freedom including the viewpoint that the Bible is inerrant;
Sould be interesting, They will have to start teaching students an alternative cosmology: that the sun goes around the earth, just like it says in the Bible.
If the bible is inerrant which of the two creation myths in genesis is the correct one, and if the other is not true in what way is it without error?
The Tech thing is horrible.
Proposing legislation that is clearly unconstitutional should be grounds for removal of a legislator. At the very least, Missouri taxpayers should be outraged that their lawmakers are spending their money on an endeavour that violates the Bill of Rights, and if passed will be struck down in court (no doubt after expensive lawyers have argued the case).
(e) Include intellectual diversity concerns in the institution’s guidelines on teaching and program development and such concerns shall include but not be limited to the protection of religious freedom including the viewpoint that the Bible is inerrant;
This is insane! INSANE!
These people need to wake the hell up.
Believing the Bible is inerrant is not an “intellectual” position. It’s an anti-intellectual position.
Missouri’s new motto should be: Missouri is for stupid.
Who’s going to develop the programs on Biblical inerrancy at the University of Missouri?
Come on, step forward and make yourselves known!
This is about as far from acceptable as you can get.
A literal reading of 1 Kings 7:23 and 2 Chronicles 4:2 claims that π is only 3. Are we to throw out four thousands years of non-biblical math as well? Imagine if engineers, physicists and architects chose to go with the Bible’s π=3 when designing planes, buildings or electronics? Basic trig is out the window. No Fourier transforms, so no cells phones, etc.
Of course, true to form, Christian fundies are selective about their biblical literalism. They conveniently ignore the a literal interpretation when it would hurt the weekly passing of the plate in megachurch.
A literal reading of 1 Kings 7:23 and 2 Chronicles 4:2 claims that π is only 3. Are we to throw out four thousands years of non-biblical math as well? Imagine if engineers, physicists and architects chose to go with the Bible’s π=3 when designing planes, buildings or electronics? Basic trig is out the window. No Fourier transforms, so no cells phones, etc.
Of course, true to form, Christian fundies are selective about their biblical literalism. They conveniently ignore the a literal interpretation when it would hurt the weekly passing of the plate in megachurch.
Belief in the literal truth of the Bible is not in any way intellectual, unless you copmletely redefine the word. I am so sick of these idiot extremists thinking that something is so just because they say it is or because it’s written in their stupid book.
I suspect that this is a misguided attempt to address a problem that started with the Emily Brooker lawsuit at Missouri State (http://www.missouristate.edu/President/fridayfocus/200704.htm).
Hmm. Let’s see. If one believes that the bible is inerrant and contains all truth that needs to be known … why, there woudl be no need for one to go to college! After all, why pay all that money to learn about things you don’t need to know about?
Therefore, in the interest of diversity and tolerance, I propose that all college applications include a check box that reads: “I believe in the inerrant truth of the text of my particular religion.” All applications so indicated are then filed in the nearest shredder, allowing the supplicants — applicants — to continue to practice their beliefs without fear of question or challenge.
So B, how’s the weather in Springfield? Say hi to Dr. Gigi Saunders if you see her (Bio Dept.)
This is not a minority view. Most people don’t ever read it. Those that do will strain credulity to think the above.
The striking thing about this is just how closely the conservative clone of “diversity” rhetoric hews to the original. As for PZ’s title question, it happened shortly after the decision in Grutter. The realization being that if the courts accepted that racial diversity for the sake of enriching the academic experience met the “compelling state interest” criteria, the same argument could be make for diversity of ideology or religion.
When did ignorance become a point of view?
“If our legislators want to protect our students, how about pulling weapons of mass murder out of circulation.”
Cars?
Remember, if it makes the news, it’s *unusual* such as a gun death. If it doesn’t make the news, it’s yet another of the hundreds of automobile deaths per day.
C’mon, P.Z. You — YOU!!!???? — are not up to having a law requiring diversity?
Look, without this law, no communist economist will ever get hired in Missouri. With this law, each state university will have to hire at least one communist economist. Missouri will become the world’s greatest concentration of communist economists in a free market nation. That’ll bring in the students from rural Missouri, you betcha!
Cold fusion has been without a formal home since the Utah legislature cancelled the special appropriation. Shouldn’t Missouri have a crack at being the host institution for cold fusion? Cold fusion has about 100 times more papers in peer-reviewed journals than intelligent design does.
And, did I mention Islamic and Buddhist historians and sociology professors? Angela Davis is just champing at the bit to get on the faculty of a Missouri state college (is she still alive?).
This will increase employment among odd, disheveled, and unable-to-find-work professors like no program ever before!
Hey, if Davison (sp?) had a place to teach (and this law will require Missouri to hire him, won’t it?), maybe he’d spend less time blogging.
I am now officially embarrassed to be from this state and if this passes my degree will be worthless.
Ed,
Yes Angela Davis is still alive. And teaching! She’s a professor here at UC Santa Cruz.
My undergraduate degree is from a Missouri state school. I am so ashamed.
Right on the money. Yes, it’s based on Horowtiz’s bill.
But I think even Horriblewits was smart enough not to include that tidbit about biblical inerrancy in his model legislation!
Many of us Missourians have been laughing our heads off (in the if-you-don’t-laugh-you’ll-cry sense) at this nonsense for months. I didn’t think it would actually get passed. Now that it has, maybe we’ll just have to cry.
Hubris–the creationists always overreach, eventually. Too bad they do such damage in the meantime, though.
Before you draw that inference, you’d have to show that racial diversity is as destructive of academic experience as diversity of religion is; otherwise, the analogy and any inferences based on it are false.
“Diversity” is a red herring — the reason that racial minorities received special attention is because (duh) they’re minorities, that is, under-represented in the population, and historically disadvantaged by the majority culture. I fail to see how the views of approximately 80% of US citizens (and perhaps more in Missouri) could be construed as “minority” or “disadvantaged” or “under-represented”.
I’ve been following this idiotic avatar of David Horowitz since it was introduced in the Missouri house; the clause about biblical inerrancy was NOT part of the original bill. Someone amended it to include that language. As an inherent optimist, I hope that was done as a conscious effort to render the bill blatantly unconstitutional, which will doom it as it comes before the state senate.
Hi Dr Meyers,
You don’t think it is important to protect religious freedom ?
Is it really ok to surpress religious freedom as “religious idiocy” just because you disagree with it ?
If so I assume we’ll never see you complaining about “suppression of atheist ideas by religious fundamentalists” or some such because you apparently this it is wrong to protect peoples religious freedom based on the comments above.
Do you really want to go down that road ? You are your co-religionists after all are still in the minority and it would seem that advocating for the legitimacy of suppression of religious ideas because you don’t like them is likely to come back and bite you in the backside.
The Sci Phi Show:
How exactly does this bill protect religious freedom? I’d really like to know. Or, more importantly, how does the absence of this bill in the state of Missouri put religious freedom in danger?
I too have a degree from a public Missouri college. How sad that it might no longer mean anything….that’s what the PhD is for though.
What’s up with the troll btw? I don’t have to respect factually incorrect positions because they’re wrong! When did people turn cultural relativism (a good idea for practicing anthropologists) into “every opinion is equally valid.”
The bill being discussed here helps religious freedom almost as much as Stalin helped his opponents.
“the protection of religious freedom including the viewpoint that the Bible is inerrant”
Change “Bible” to “Quran,” and watch how fast the Missouri senators defeat the bill.
“What’s up with the troll btw? I don’t have to respect factually incorrect positions because they’re wrong! When did people turn cultural relativism (a good idea for practicing anthropologists) into “every opinion is equally valid.””
Are you referring to my comment ?
I don’t think every opinion is equally valid, the problem is that when you say it is ok to suppress opinions you disagree with you end up in some awful places.
You don’t have to respect positions you disagree with you simply have to show them civic tolerance (as opposed to the brain damaged notion of truth claim tolerance that people advocate as tolerance today).
If you want civic tolerance then you need to extend it.
“How exactly does this bill protect religious freedom?”
I’m not sure it does. I mainly had in view the idea that religious freedom is important and it is especially important to be tolerant (in a civic tolerance rather than truth claim tolerance sense of it) of positions you disagree with except in circumstances where they break the law.
That was all I was driving at.
I don’t see what is wrong with the Bill itself. The reference to an inerrant biblical text is just by way of example AFAICS.
Frankly given what passes for “diversity” in your average university monoculture, I suspect this bill will turn out to be a waste of time.
“The bill being discussed here helps religious freedom almost as much as Stalin helped his opponents”
Could you elaborate with an example please ?
I don’t see the problem, but then again I don’t live in missouri either I live in Sydney Australia.
But I don’t see what is wrong with insuring unpopular opinions are protected on a university campus.
Peoples real commitment to freedom of expression is something that is seen most clearly in how they deal with expression they disagree with.
Do you somehow have the impression that American universities lack an infusion of Christian culture? We have the Newman Centers, we have courses in religious history and philosophy, we have Christian student organizations, we have Christian motivational speakers, we have regular visits from crazed fundamentalist preachers. We do not need legislatures dictating that we must respect religious lunacy — it’s not as if we and our students aren’t already saturated in it.
This is an unambiguous attempt to foist religion on secular campuses. We do not need it, and seriously, it breaks a tacit truce in my mind: I do not bedevil my students with atheism. If we’re going to give special status to biblical inerrancy, though, I’m going to give it the special status it deserves: a public trashing in a science class.
Good point, PZ. Denis O. Lamoureux has been teaching courses in ‘Science & Religion’ at my university for years, specifically from a Christian viewpoint.
Not bad for a godless liberal academic monoculture, eh Sci Phi?
“This is an unambiguous attempt to foist religion on secular campuses. We do not need it, and seriously, it breaks a tacit truce in my mind: I do not bedevil my students with atheism. If we’re going to give special status to biblical inerrancy, though, I’m going to give it the special status it deserves: a public trashing in a science class.”
Fair enough Dr Meyers.
Are you sure the bill is actually giving special status to biblical inerrancy or is it just by way of example ?
I don’t know enough about the nature of US law making to know how such a mention will effect future court rulings based on this law.
Although it would be worth noting that you would be stepping over the line in a biology class to do what you suggest.
What sort of concrete ramifications do you actually see coming from this bill if it passed ? What actual difference would be made ?
People who believe in the inerrancy of the Bible do not usually contribute to diversity. They destroy it – by behaving like Falwell and Dobson and all the other nuts who regularly attack gays and feminists and other cultures.
The whole idea of clause 1.e. is a frigging joke. They might as well have added a clause promoting hate speech.
“Not bad for a godless liberal academic monoculture, eh Sci Phi?”
What department does he teach in ?
That is a good thing and I don’t see what harm would come from doing this.
“They might as well have added a clause promoting hate speech.”
They should have a clause protecting that sort of thing. The notion of hate speech is pernicious and dangerous in the extreme and borders on laws against thought crime.
Ed Darrel,
I had a sociology teacher at Missouri State that taught communist economics. He was one of the two best teachers I had there, and an atheist/agnostic to boot. Plus, he’d always uses Little House on the Prairie examples, like “Here’s Michael Landon. He’s dead.”
And to stay on topic, this is great. Nothing like trying to make an absurd idea into a law that has little chance of passing and if it does pass, no chance of staying around as a law.
It will be a very expensive mistake for Missouri, and might be just what my home state needs to wake up.
Dr Lamoureux teaches at a Christian college on campus, as was shown in the link.
I’ve never had the pleasure of taking one of his classes, but I’ve met quite a few who have.
The ones who held beliefs in line with his viewpoint always expressed a ‘Gee whiz, he kinda makes sense’ perspective.
Those who were more critical found his classroom very antagonistic and unwelcoming.
I don’t know of anyone who suggested legislating that he be more tolerant of atheists, though.
Calls for “diversity” are usually idiocy disguised. Sometimes well, sometimes poorly. But the basic concept is absurd.
What sort of concrete ramifications do you actually see coming from this bill if it passed ? What actual difference would be made ?
That’s the easy part.
Professor gives an exam. One question involves something like filling in major events on a timeline, or it’s a multiple choice regarding when mammals first appear in the fossil record, or something of the sort.
Student puts down an incorrect answer, let’s say by using thousands of years instead of tens of millions.
Student gets answer wrong.
Student complains that his/her answer is correct based on his/her belief that the Bible is inerrant and says this is the answer, therefore it is impinging on his/her religious freedom to mark it wrong, and he/she should get full credit for the answer.
Professor says no.
Student sues based on the law, and wins. Any answer that can be remotely justified by religious belief now has to receive full credit, regardless of its factual correctness.
“I don’t know of anyone who suggested legislating that he be more tolerant of atheists, though.”
The above legislation would cover that. In fact specifically in the clause that is apparently causing all the fuss.
“Include intellectual diversity concerns in the institution’s guidelines on teaching and program development and such concerns shall include but not be limited to the protection of religious freedom”
Being an atheist is part of religious freedom.
“Student sues based on the law, and wins. Any answer that can be remotely justified by religious belief now has to receive full credit, regardless of its factual correctness.”
So that would be a bad legal decision probably over turned on appeal. Such is the nature of law making. Also given the current legal climate I suspect this would not happen in practice and you are simply indulging paranoia.
And besides it has a flipside that you are ignoring. The atheist student could appeal on exactly the same grounds in a different context.
I don’t think I’d need legislation to protect my ability to successfully argue against some theistic evolution perspective. That’s the benefit of having evidence on one’s side.
Making apologetic arguments for what you think some god did or didn’t do is not an exercise in science, or even critical thinking. It’s an exercise in hubris and wishful thinking.
I’m feeding the troll apparently, but it seems to be the right thing to do.
The Sci Phi Show,
This is about truth claim tolerance as far as the fundamentalists are concerned. They think we should respect their archaic creation story as equally (or more) factual as evolution.
The goal here is to make sure that students who view the Bible as inerrant are not forced to learn facts that oppose that belief. This means that such a bill would allow students to express their religious beliefs as facts in such places as biology classrooms and geology labs at which time the instructor would have no recourse because the student would be able to claim the instructor was not respecting their beliefs if the instructor told the student s/he was wrong.
I don’t have to give silly biblical beliefs the slightest bit of respect. All I have to do is let you say whatever idiotic crap you can make up!!!!! That is what Freedom of Speech is about in the USA.
I think civic tolerance is imbedded in the Constitution and does not need to be specifically enumerated by each state. Let me repeat, this bill is not about me respection the right of another individual to practice their religion or to say they cannot voice their religious views all over campus. This bill aims to silence those who disagree with the biblical literalists.
Sometimes a belief is simply wrong. That’s it. There are no two ways about it. Creationists are wrong.
“This is about truth claim tolerance as far as the fundamentalists are concerned. They think we should respect their archaic creation story as equally (or more) factual as evolution.”
Remains to be seen. As I said IANAL, is there a lawyer around that can offer informed comment on this law.
“The goal here is to make sure that students who view the Bible as inerrant are not forced to learn facts that oppose that belief. This means that such a bill would allow students to express their religious beliefs as facts in such places as biology classrooms and geology labs at which time the instructor would have no recourse because the student would be able to claim the instructor was not respecting their beliefs if the instructor told the student s/he was wrong.”
That is the claim that is being made, but what evidence is there that this is actually what will take place ? I’m being entirely serious here. As I said i’m an aussie not an american, but it does not appear to me that the law would work like that.
“Let me repeat, this bill is not about me respection the right of another individual to practice their religion or to say they cannot voice their religious views all over campus. This bill aims to silence those who disagree with the biblical literalists.”
What evidence do you have for this claim beyond paranoia, the example given in the bill itself and your speculation ? You may be right but what evidence do you have in favour of this speculation ?
The bill does not specifically mention atheists and their rights to intellectual freedom. It mentions biblical literalists.
Sci Phi Show,
You’re either being deliberately obtuse or your understanding of American culture is so thin that you believe the vast majority of Americans give a shit about real diversity as opposed to protecting their over-glorified beliefs.
One of the consequences of pushing biblical inerrancy is that inevitably many people do assume the entire bible is bogus. I once saw a (Southwest) archaeology professor freak out when he heard that archaeologists were using the bible as a source while studying bronze age remains in Jerusalem. This is so sad. The Mideast archaeologists had good,logical reasons for thinking the part of the bible they were consulting is an early historical text– not infallible, but certainly useful in their work, in the same way that Greek archaeologists study Homer, without believing the Iliad is literally true.
If the biblical literalists want to know why secularism is the fastest growing “religion” in the United States, they might consider how much they have done to make their sacred text into a joke book.
Funny you should pick this exact day to speculate that, since I was on a conference call freakin’ early (Chicago time) about not only the tort liabilities of trying to create evidence-based clinical practice guidelines, but also the anti-trust implications.
I’ll spare you the details and just hit the high points–all of the following have actually happened to organizations I am familiar with:
* 18 months of discovery, 5 years of litigation: suit and counter-suit
* insurance premiums skyrocket
* anti-trust damages in addition to tort damages awarded
All this over publishing evidence-based health-care standards. As they say, this is America–anyone can sue anyone for anything.
And you seriously think that throwing religion into the mix will make it *less* inflammatory?
Sci Phi Show,
There is a creationist museum opening in Kentucky. I went to a public high school and college in Missouri. Evolution is already being silenced. You have to tip-toe around the issue and a surprising number of biology grads from my alma mater are creationists of some stripe.
I am basing my opinion on 26 years of living in the US and participating in the education system including 11 years in some form of Missouri public education.
If you don’t think this is what they’re trying to do, then you need to review the history of evolution/creationism in the US. Might I suggest a review of the Dover (Panda) trial and the Scopes trial among others.
“The bill does not specifically mention atheists and their rights to intellectual freedom. It mentions biblical literalists.”
By way of example. Is it significant what the nature of the example is ? I asked that question for a reason.
“You’re either being deliberately obtuse or your understanding of American culture is so thin that you believe the vast majority of Americans give a shit about real diversity as opposed to protecting their over-glorified beliefs.”
I have no doubt that your cynical perspective is true enough, look at groups like infidels.org and FFRF for evidence of this.
But the law does appear to seek to protect freedom of religious expression using an example people would be familiar with.
I’m not trying to be obtuse or difficult, I am not an American and am making the observation as an outside observer.
Sci Phi Show – I can see that it could look from the outside that we’re being paranoid and overreacting, but please be assured that the reason we think this will happen is because this has already happened, many times. In district after district, state after state, students (often with full DI backing) have tried to challenge being forcibly taught facts. Usually they don’t win, but this law is specifically written to allow them the leeway to do so.
The largest case I can think of is in California, where a fundamentalist school has challenged the state system to try and force state universities to accept their piss-poor creationist biology class credits, on a freedom of religion basis.
In other words, it’s not paranoid if someone really is following you.
One more thing, I believe that if this law passed any challenge would probably be successful in court if the judges are fair. However, someone has to challenge it (think about the time, energy and money required) and that may not be an attractive thing to most people.
“Is it significant what the nature of the example is ?”
Yes.
“If you don’t think this is what they’re trying to do, then you need to review the history of evolution/creationism in the US. Might I suggest a review of the Dover (Panda) trial and the Scopes trial among others.”
Fair enough. If that is the intention of the law as you suggest then the law is likely going to come back and bite them in the backside because if it is as widely interpreted as feared then anybody is going to be able to make an argument like the one suggested above about YEC in biology in any field.
Sci Phi Show,
I googled “truth claim tolerance” (I’ve never come across that particular phrase before) and only found one link to some Anglican church in Sydney, which leads me to believe you are some sort of religionist trolling rather than truly concerned about education in America. Therefore, I see no reason to continue to address your questions or comments.
“I can see that it could look from the outside that we’re being paranoid and overreacting, but please be assured that the reason we think this will happen is because this has already happened, many times. ”
No worries. Although it seems that a fair application of the law would be counter productive to the end you fear seeing it put too.
“I googled “truth claim tolerance” (I’ve never come across that particular phrase before) and only found one link to some Anglican church in Sydney, which leads me to believe you are some sort of religionist trolling rather than truly concerned about education in America.”
Does being a christian automatically make me a troll does it ?
I’m not overly concerned about education in American, i’m not an American and am unlikely to wind up in the education system anyway, but it does look to an outside observe like people are overreacting to a law that is likely to be counter productive to those who would seek to turn it to the ends feared above.
Okay, I’ll say one more thing
Religious freedom is enshrined in two clauses in the Constitution as is Freedom of Speech. These two freedoms should not exempt students from learning the facts of biology, a tactic that has been pointed out by Carlie.
Seriously, maybe this isn’t a problem in Australia (I admit I know precious little about politics in Australia) or maybe you think YECs need protecting, but it is a serious problem here. YECs are about half our population or more. They are not a minority in need of protection from the hegemony of the majority.
“”Is it significant what the nature of the example is ?”
Yes.”
Could you be more specific please ? What difference does it make what example is selected in terms of the laws actual application ?
Maybe we’re overreacting, but we’ve had this happen before and court cases take alot of time. Meanwhile, education suffers and this is the worst disservice we can do to our children.
The specific example matters, because it is the exact example that is driving the entire bill. It is not an innocuous example plucked from the air at random, but a specific, targeted piece that is solely designed to attack geology and evolutionary biology. It is the Wedge strategy in action, exactly as it was designed to be, exactly as the wedge documents lay out how to do it.
If you have the time and interest, read Creationism’s Trojan Horse for a history of the movement and to see the significance of that particular kind of example.
“The specific example matters, because it is the exact example that is driving the entire bill. It is not an innocuous example plucked from the air at random,”
I’m sure the example was not plucked from the air at random and reflects the concerns of those putting the bill forward, but it would not be in their interests to have such a sweeping interpretation of such a bill adopted. Bound to be counter productive.
“Bound to be counter productive.” I agree.
Counter-productive to the teaching of established science, that is.
“”Bound to be counter productive.” I agree.
Counter-productive to the teaching of established science, that is.”
But it will be counter productive to the aims of those passing the bills. Imagine what will happen when this law is asked to be enforced in some sort of theology lecture of biblical archeology lecture ?
You’re giving them an awful lot of credit to think that they would be able to project the ramifications of the bill that far.
Well, in Canada we have a law against blaspheming. I imagine that will be the next step when a student successfully sues for slagging the bible in a theology class.
I meant, sues for getting thrown out of a theology class for slagging the bible.
I too finished a MS at a Missouri University (conveniently located in the middle of the state next to Shakespeare’s Pizza). I assume that the value of the degree is still safe. Of course, getting your degree here in 5-10 years maybe not so much.
And what concerns are those, exactly? If you think actual suppression of religious views is a legitimate problem in American universities, I challenge you to find examples.
These are people whose real issue is that students will have their viewpoints challenged, not suppressed — universities are places where students tend to face challenging ideas, often from their professors. Biblical literalism doesn’t hold up well under that sort of true intellectual diversity.
“You’re giving them an awful lot of credit to think that they would be able to project the ramifications of the bill that far.”
Well it will come back and bite them if they don’t. Are american politicans really this stupid ?
A lot of politicans can be, but this seems pretty stupid even by those standards to fail to consider this as a possibility.
Well, we are talking about a group that seems pretty unaware of the diversity of non-scientific opinions out there already.
This is why so many IDists consider a criticism of evolution to be support for Xianity, and not, say, evidence for the existence of the slavic god Triglav. (Whoever heard of a three-part god anyway? That’s just foolishness.)
Missouri Republicans.
I hate Missouri Republicans.
The problem is that this bill mandates that biblical literalism is to be protected as an example of “intellectual diversity”. It is not being offered as an “example” of protected beliefs, but is being specifically included. They are specifically indicating that biblical literalism is what they want in schools.
This is a problem because the factual problems with biblical literalism are myriad. It is equivalent to mandating that geography classes also teach the point of view that the Earth is flat. (Indeed, flat earth theory is part of biblical literalism, since the bible frequently refers to the earth in a manner that assumes it is flat.)
The problem here is that this bill would mandate teaching of thoroughly discredited theories. That’s not how education works. If a theory or explanation for the world is disproved, it is not taught. We don’t teach children that the earth is flat, or that the sun travels around the earth, or that rain is God crying. These viewpoints do not represent “intellectual diversity”, they’re just wrong. This bill seeks to protect and include in schools viewpoints that simply don’t belong there.
I’m not overly concerned about education in American, i’m not an American and am unlikely to wind up in the education system anyway, but it does look to an outside observe like people are overreacting to a law that is likely to be counter productive to those who would seek to turn it to the ends feared above.
Biblical inerrancy. Say the words a few times. Let them roll off your tongue. The are protecting people who refuse to shed their stupid notions about the bible, despite the fact that anyone with half a brain KNOWS the bible is NOT inerrant.
It is now okay for a student to go to college in Missouri and get greeted with respectful silence whenever he/she spouts off in class about the inerrancy of the Bible. Every professor in the Missouri higher public education system is being muzzled by this law.
It’s beyond nuts. It’s anti everything that education stands for. It’s ignorant people imposing their ignorance on others. It’s very wrong.
Is it just me, or does The Sci Phi Show seem to want all us uppity atheists back in our closets instead of commenting on public policy? If we needed rules to make sure that the godless liberals dominating our educational system would allow the practice of religion on campus, that would be one thing. However, in the last week or so at my school, I’ve seen Christians parading their big cross through the middle of campus for Easter, Jews celebrating Passover, and Muslims publicly promoting their student organization. I really don’t think we need to be forced into tolerance by some fundy politicians. Indeed, no one’s taking me to task for my godlessness, even though I live in the shadow of the DI.
Well, no one except Sci Phi, who seems to think we’re particularly obligated to be thankful for the permission not to believe. If I didn’t suspect it to be intentional, I’d consider it profound naivete that Sci Phi takes the “Biblical inerrancy” mention for “just an example”.
Sure, the legislation is asinine and harmful to the state of Missouri. But the underlying story is complicated, and having read something about the original complaint (see http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2006/11/01/complaint ,
for example, and read the comments), I reluctantly have to side with the student to a large extent. The assignment she balked at was a standard debate-type exercise: arguing for the side you may disfavor. The problem seemed to be that the prof demanded that the draft letter (in favor of adoption by homosexual couples) be signed by the student. For a principled person, no matter whether what their views, this is not acceptable. As a commenter mentioned, a much better assignment would have been to draft TWO letters, arguing both sides. It looks as if the prof was rather an a**hole, everybody hunkered down, and all sides lost sight of the fact that there was supposed to be education going on. Naturally, the fundies ran with the ball, and Emily’s law was the result. But I have to put most of the blame (if the post I linked to above is factual) on the teacher. I would probably agree with most of his views, but what a show of insensitive blockheadedness! It makes liberal/progressives look bad, and we have a hard enough row to hoe in that neck of the woods.
In other words, let’s try to put it in context, and work from there.
The Sci Phi Show:
I wouldn’t trust our elected officials to apply laws fairly when they could be applying them in whatever way seems popular or, perhaps, at executive whim. We wouldn’t need so much specific civil rights legislation if the notion that “all men are created equal” with certain inalienable rights had, in practice, really extended to everyone.
I read your link; it sounds like a mess all around. Perhaps this is the next step after pharmacists refusing to dispense birth control, based on religious beliefs. I am not sure that social work students ought to be drafting letters to legislators restricting fellow citizens’ human rights, though, for the second letter suggested. Perhaps the code of ethics for social workers would have a relevant standard about how social workers who are against gay rights ought to conduct themselves; I don’t know.
But faced with her in the classroom, maybe an alternative assignment instead would have been fair in her case. But whatever the answer is, this law sure isn’t it.
Is there a troll blocker that works with Opera?
I wrote:
because I just skimmed the article, but on more careful reading, I see that she did do an alternative assignment, and then got in trouble later for violating School of Social Work standards.
So she got into trouble with the school’s standards for doing an alternative assignment the professor allowed her to do? What a mess.
Although as we’ve seen with the pharmacists, this is the kind of stuff that happens when people who are supposed to provide a professional service think they get to vote on the human rights of their fellow citizens.
If I may, there’s a good post at Pandagon on a quite related topic here
Interestingly, it references a study that found this:
Christian fundamentalism has three great enemies in the struggle to retain its children, judging by the stories its apostates tell: weaknesses in its own teachings, science, and hypocrisy.
So, I read the article. The fundamentalist in question was treated decently. She did not have to sign the letter stating that gay people should be allowed to be foster parents. But she was late for class some large number of times and was “unprofessional.” (A problematic statement, without a definition.) This appears to be what she was censored for. However. teh gay gave her an excuse to scream, loudly, and effectively, that she was being discriminated against. Notice the contradiction–her profession’s dismay; at her refusal to treat people as, well, people, was seen as proof that she herself was not being treated as, well, you get the picture. Your refusal to allow me to discriminate is proof that you yourself discriminate! So there.
I know of what I speak. I grew up in a rather startlingly large fundamentalist family (I have roughly a hundred cousins, as do my children) whose idea of a good time was imangining that they were being discriminated against. In a society where everyone looked just like them. Good times. I have no sympathy. She screwed up, and pulled out the persecution card.
Plus, why, as a society, can’t we choose that those whose whole personal philosophy is based on teh hate not be, uh, social workers? I mean, really. What is she going to do if confronted with a gay person, other than condemn them out of hand? I have a hard time believing that this is acceptable in any (reasonably sentient) society.
djinn
Imagining. Imagining. Imagine there’s no country, it’s easy if you try-y. No hell below, above us only sky. Imagine all the people, spelling errors none…
Government is what they do to you when you are not involved in the political process. So you can sit back and whine or you can check on the status of the Senate companion bill and if it has not gone before the full Senate yet then you contact the State Senators and tell them what a dumbass piece of legislation that this is.
Passing a bill doesn’t mean anything until the governor signs the bill into law, and the Senate versions and the House versions have to be identical. So, those of you that are embarrassed to be from Missouri at this point can make your state see some semblance of reason.
I talk to a lot of people that consider themselves politically aware because they keep up with the dirty doings of the Bush Administration and Congress. That’s easy, all you have to do is keep DailyKos or Huffpost or MediaMatters on your RSS Feed.
But they have no idea how to work in their own states and cities to shape things to be the way they want them to be. And it is easier to get influence with a State Rep or Senator than it is with a U.S. Rep or Senator.
I volunteer for a state rep. and so when something stupid comes up like the Anti-Vaxx bill, I was able to make a phone call and talk about it. Luckily I work for a guy in Minnesota who was all ready educated about that particular issue, but I also talked to an influential Republican lobbyist who checked it out and helped stall the bill.
Take some action, Missourians. Posting on Pharyngula is satisfying, I know. Believe me, I know. But it is not going to be too effective at influencing Missouri reps.
After I checked out the Missouri Senate bill search, I haven’t found a Senate Companion bill that has been introduced. Reading a bit briefly it appears that the process in MO is differnt than in MN. Once a bill is passed in one house, it is forwarded and introduced into the other house. So, there is time to get crackin’ on defeating this piece of crap. Get more info here.
It seems that Phuckhead insists on misspelling your name.
Is that an example of “intellectual diversity” or just passive-aggressive phuckheadedness?
“The road to truth is long, and lined the entire way with annoying bastards.”
~Alexander Jablokov
Hey, Will. E. Comment #5. You are a hammer on a nail. The hard part is that now we have to get used to translating “diversity” as “homogeneity” and won’t that allow a flood of claims centering on the complaint that someone, somewhere, for some reason feels a little less secure in their personal view of the world? Oh, dear.
By singling out a particular religious belief, isn’t this bill clearly against the establishment clause of the First Amendment?
Ha ha ha ha ha ha!
YES.
Whenever I read something like this, why do I always get the impression that the writer does not really mean “a variety” but “his version”? The State of Missouri could save a whole lot of money by closing the universities and sending the students to Sunday School.
I’m a faculty member at one of the MO directional schools and we are in the process of attacking this absurdity. This may very well die when passed on to the senate but unfortunately this meme gains more traction each time it is trotted out to the general public (there is much trotting of this nonsense in MO). Sadly it smacks of the kind of crap that little davey horowitz has been pushing on legislators throughout the US. Clause e is batshit crazy but even crazier are clauses f and j which gives a means of evaluating how clause e is being handled by science faculty members, and lets face it this is directed at science faculty (I teach evolution). This has nothing at all to do with intellectual diversity but is another example of religous conservatives playing the victim card in a country where upwards of 90% of the population claims to believe in god. These types of bills will continue to pop up throughout the bible belt and at some point one of them will be signed into state law (hell MO tried to make Christianity the state religion).
Those of you who were arguing with The Phi Sci Show could have spent a little more time reading clause (e) carefully.
The Phi Sci Show wrote, “By way of example.”
The text from clause (e) is, “…shall include … the viewpoint that the Bible is inerrant;”
This is not a case of an example of what types of viewpoints are protected, but a clear case of defining a particular protected viewpoint. While giving lip-service to other, undefined, viewpoints.
And of course, Mike Haubrich is absolutely correct. Expressing outrage on Pharyngula will not impede the progress of the bill. (As enjoyable as the pastime is.) If you are a resident of Missouri, e-mail your representative. If you are not a resident of Missouri, monitor local and state policies yourself or find one of the many organizations which do. Missouri is not an isolated case.
Finally, we need a long-term plan to change the public’s perception of college from a place where you get another piece of paper which might get you a better job to a place of learning. For as long as a diploma means higher pay in the business world, there will be attempts to make diplomas easier to get.
As an example, I’ve been surprised by the curriculum in the MBA program I’m in because there are clearly places where a calculus based model would be preferrable to an algebraic one, but the courses have been tailored to students who have never taken any calculus.
I can’t understand how can anyone should get a masters degree in finance without calculus-based economic models. But for economic reasons (a lot of students are willing to pay a lot of money to get an MBA), that’s how my business school teaches the courses.
How appalling. Science promoters, educators, etc. over there have my sympathies. If I can help somehow, let me know …