Louisiana replaces science with voodoo

witchdoctor

Literally. A number of intelligent people have been trying to get the Louisiana Science Education Act repealed, a law that opens the door to teaching creationism in the public schools. The efforts have been stymied, though, and the Louisiana Creation Science Miseducation Act is still in effect.

One of the people who acted to kill the efforts offered an, ahem, interesting rationale.

Sen. Elbert Guillory, D-Opelousas, said he had reservations with repealing the act after a spiritual healer correctly diagnosed a specific medical ailment he had. He said he thought repealing the act could "lock the door on being able to view ideas from many places, concepts from many cultures."

"Yet if I closed my mind when I saw this man — in the dust, throwing some bones on the ground, semi-clothed — if I had closed him off and just said, ‘That’s not science. I’m not going to see this doctor,’ I would have shut off a very good experience for myself," Guillory said.

“in the dust, throwing some bones on the ground, semi-clothed”…that’s how I’m going to picture Louisiana legislators from now on.

I do wonder about one thing in Mr Guillory’s story, though. How does he know his witch doctor “correctly diagnosed” his ailment? Did he, perhaps, see a real doctor?

When science is criminalized, only criminals will do science

I hate the way chemistry has been infantilized to the point where you can’t even buy a decent home chemistry kit for kids anymore, but this story takes it a step further. A teenager in Florida did a simple experiment that made a small plastic bottle go boom and spew out some smoke (and no one was hurt, although apparently the student was surprised), and the school over-reacted: they expelled her.

It was a simple reaction: aluminum + sodium hydroxide releases hydrogen gas and the pressure ruptures the bottle. It was also a poor decision to do it unsupervised in a school yard, but good grief…kicking her out of school means that interest is now quelled. Channel that perfectly reasonable curiosity into constructive academic pursuits! This school seems to be more concerned with shutting down exploration and keeping everyone unchallenged and safe than in engaging in that dangerous business of education.

The comets explain everything

Planets

People are always sending me links — sometimes it’s to a cogent rebuttal of lunacy, sometimes it’s something advocating lunacy, and sometimes…it takes me a while to tell. For instance, here’s this site called “The Truth of Genesis”. I read this and thought for a moment that it was a site debunking creationism.

The biggest laugh comes from the “young Earth” teachers, who try to convince others that the Earth is only 6 000 to 10,000 years old. This is in direct conflict with scientific reality, and the true reading of Genesis. It’s embarrassing to see them try to add up the years from Adam (who they think only lived 930 years), on down to Jesus, who was born in 7 BC. They deny the existence of humanity before Adam and Eve, which were formed from the dust of the Earth. So where do they put Cro-Magnon and the Neanderthals? They claim that there was “no death before Adam”, but that is not found in scripture.

Those fools at Answers in Genesis who think the earth is only 6,000 years old! How ridicuolus! All those inconsistencies and their absurd methodology of toting up the ages of the patriarchs…but then I read on.

Adam was formed in about 7200 BC. The modern animals, along with the birds, were made in about 7100 BC, and Eve came along in about 7000 BC. I’m guessing that the animals lived in and out of the Garden, and Adam probably took Eve out on sight-seeing trips to lands surrounding the Garden. They did this for 2,733 years., until Eve ate of the evil tree in 4267 BC. It is then that the years of Adam’s age begins to be counted, because that is when he “began to die”. So from 7200 BC, till 3337 BC, when Adam died, Adam had lived for 3,863 years.

The reason the sequence of events in Genesis chapter one, do not agree with those in Genesis chapter two, is because Moses was writing about two different time periods. So actually, Genesis is declaring the existence of pre-historic man, which lived more than 60 million years before God made Adam and Eve. The world of science won’t admit to mankind being on Earth any earlier than 10 million years ago., which shows how misinformed they are. Or is it that they are in denial?

I don’t know about you, but I’m always impressed with the specificity of their dates, all derived from the land of making-crap-up.

It’s good to know we’ve now found the one correct creationist, rather than all those other wrong creationists. Also a brave creationist, because he’s going to reveal the truth to us at last.

Now, let us talk about the world of science. They are insane, because they would rather lie to the public, than to admit that there is a Creator. Yes, they lie, and they know it, because they have been withholding evidence from the public in order to not have to explain certain ‘phenomena”.

What is this evidence? You will be dazzled by it, but I’m afraid that as a mere biologist I am not qualified to even contemplate the author’s vision. This one is for the physicists out there. Have at it:

Science refuses to come clean about comets, especially Shoemaker-Levy 9. They know good and well that comet was never “captured” by Jupiter. Captures of comets and satellites never occur, because their paths (orbits) obey the command of God. That is why the moon Metis, of Jupiter, does not crash into the planet, even though it is only 79,800 miles from Jupiter. Science calls it a “gravitational lock”. There is no such thing.

Also, science tells the public that the nine planets of our solar system revolve around our Sun, because of the Sun’s “gravitational pull” and centrifugal force on the planets (the same excuse for why our Moon doesn’t “fall”). But that too is not the truth. If they came clean, their theory of stellar evolution, namely the origin of our solar system, would become suspect. Our planets are not really just orbiting the Sun. The Sun is actually following the planets, as they spiral around the Sun, as they all orbit the center point of our galaxy, the Milky Way, as the galaxy spirals around the center point of our “local group” of about ten galaxies. All of the stars (suns) that you see in our galaxy are moving with the rotation of our galaxy.

So when Halley’s Comet orbits around the Sun, how does the comet know where our Sun will be 75 years later, since the comet leaves the solar system in the opposite direction of the Sun’s orbital path (around the galaxy)? Where does it go? What causes it to come back? Certainly not gravity. How did comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 know where Jupiter would be two years later, when Jupiter had moved over 500 million miles since the comet’s previous orbit of the planet? Its apojove was 32,313,600 miles, so again, gravity was not a factor. For more than 4 billion years, it obeyed the command of God, until its (Divinely) staged crash into Jupiter.

Well all righty then, I guess that’s all settled now.

What I taught today: toroids!

Hox 11/13 expression in an echinoderm blastula

It was the last day of classes for us. I brought donuts.

Dammit, I just realized I missed a golden opportunity. I should have talked to them about Thrive and Pivar and Fleury and Andrulis. Crackpot fringe developmental biologists all seem to have a thing for donuts.

Rats. Well, I’ll just send all my students an email and tell them they have to come back. They don’t even realize the importance of our little snack together.

Horde meetup at Women in Secularism

partyhouse

An event has been planned for Sunday, May 19, 2013 at 1:00 PM, somewhere in Washington DC. We’re not telling you where, because this is exclusively for the elite, the cream of the crop, the best of the best, good people by invitation only. If you’re interested, you’re going to have to contact the Guardian of the Gate, OnionGirl, and beg for the information. Beg, I tell you! On your knees! Don’t even think about trying to crash the party, because it’s going to be packed with ferocious godless feminists who will emasculate you if you try.

I know where it’s going to be already, but even I am a bit a-skeered.

It’s going to be one of those days

I’m operating on very little sleep, and I’ve noticed this past week that even when I do go to bed my brain is a jumble of chaos — too much work piled up on top of everything, so I can’t even relax when I lie down and turn out the lights. I did get caught up on a lot of grading, but still…I think I need to put this sign on my door for a while.

caution-do-not-poke-the-deep-ones

IRON MAN 3! WOOHOO!

The Morris movie theater is going all out and having a midnight premier of the new Iron Man 3 movie, and I was mildly disappointed that I was going to have to postpone seeing it because I’ll be at the Orange County Freethought Alliance convention. But now I am greatly disappointed, because I have seen the trailer, and it blows my mind.

Awesome. So awesome. I hope I’m not disappointed when I finally see the whole movie, because this sets expectations phenomenally high.

A monstrous regiment of Schlaflys

This sounds so damn familiar.

The problem with feminism, I think the principal problem, is the cultivation of an attitude of victimization. Feminism tries to make women believe they are victims of an oppressive, male-dominated, patriarchal society. They wake up in the morning with a chip on their shoulder.

Oh, right. I’ve heard it a thousand times from all the critics of Freethoughtblogs…a thousand Phyllis Schlafly clones. Every MRA. Every man and woman who thinks women have a place — on a pedestal, in the kitchen, in the bedroom, where ever — and they ought to stay there, where they belong.