One of Montana’s candidates for governor, Greg Gianforte, is being brutally attacked by paleontologist Jack Horner.
A new television ad features former Montana State University paleontologist Jack Horner saying candidate Greg Gianforte thinks the Earth is only a few thousand years old. Horner says Gianforte supports using taxpayer money to fund “private schools that obscure the truth about dinosaurs and the age of the Earth.”
“He’ll say I’m attacking his religion — I’m not,” Horner says in the ad. “We just need to make sure that our kids learn the truth. I’d think twice about voting for Greg Gianforte.”
Gianforte, a Bozeman technology entrepreneur who is making his first run for political office, is in a tight race against incumbent Democratic Gov. Steve Bullock. Gianforte campaign spokesman Aaron Flint on Wednesday called the ad silly and said it misrepresents Gianforte’s strong support of public schools and teachers.
Oh, it’s “silly”. OK. But the question is whether Gianforte is a creationist who denies basic biology. Is he?
“From his personal support of CodeMontana, computer science in every high school, support for more trades education and more — Greg is proposing increasing investments in our public schools once he’s elected governor,” Flint said.
Gianforte does not have an opinion on the Earth’s age, Flint said. Regarding Gianforte’s views on evolution, Flint forwarded a comment made last year by Gianforte in which he said, “I believe young people should be taught how to think, not what to think, and a diversity of views are what should be presented.”
Yes, I guess he is. Point to Jack Horner.
Wait, there’s more?
Gianforte has steadfastly refused to talk about his religion, and it has not emerged as a major issue in the campaign. He attends and helped build an expansion to Grace Bible Church in Bozeman and has donated millions of dollars to religious organizations in the U.S. and in Africa, according to tax records released by Gianforte last year.
He also funded an expansion to the Christian school his children attended, Petra Academy, and his foundation has donated at least $2.3 million to help students afford tuition at Montana private schools.
OK, OK, point made. He’s a religious creationist. Why are public school teachers supporting him, if they are, as he claims?
The tax records show Gianforte’s foundation also donated $290,000 to a museum that holds the creationist view that humans and dinosaurs coexisted.
Alright already! Case closed! How can anyone who supports science possibly vote for this Gianforte clown?
The best class I had in high school was US History. Not because of the content of the course per se, but because the teacher taught us how to think, and specifically, how to build an argument. One lesson I remember was on the importance of knowing dates: it’s not that the dates themselves are so important, it’s that you cannot begin to build an argument that A caused B if you cannot show that A happened before B.
You could build an argument that the Dred Scott decision led to the Civil War, but it’d be a damned sight harder to build a convincing case that Abraham Lincoln’s assassination led to the Dred Scott decision.
In other words, an important part of knowing how to think is knowing the facts.
The only valid justification (I can imagine) for presenting creationism in a school setting, is as an example to be torn apart. To examine more fully. With the unspoken goal being to teach just how ridiculous the creation claim is. Maybe inspiring some to delve into paleontology to get a better understanding of the subject.
ideally [nb]
I know that can go oh so wrong, so never mind, just speaking out of turn. carry on.
This is pretty clearly a creationist dogwhistle…aka “teach the controversy.” Anyway, he’s probably lying. He probably believes that young people should be taught to recite the Bible, rather than think for themselves.
And I wonder what museum that could be? Don’t suppose it’s in Kentucky by any chance.
The Republican candidate for U.S. House around here (Michigan 1st Congressional district), ISYN, told us in a small meeting with voters that he figured high schools shouldn’t have to teach math since we have calculators now.
He also thinks high schools need to do a better job of preparing students for jobs, which I don’t know how you reconcile with the first position in the 21st century.
@What a Maroon,
Greg Gianforte’s thinking doesn’t involve facts; he’s on record as supporting raising the retirement age, saying that retirement isn’t mentioned in the Bible and that Noah worked well into his 600th year (paraphrased from an article in the Billings Gazette, sorry, can’t search it now).
He’s also sued the State of Montana, which normally excels in its open access to public lands, to block access to a stream affronting his mansion.
@robro,
Nope, not Kentucky. That would be the Glendive Dinosaur and Fossil Museum in Glendive, MT, near the South Dakota border.
@4, inflection
Since you don’t have an exact quote it’s difficult to tell. This does remind me of a talk given by Conrad Wolfram. He criticizes the “math” being taught in schools as being out of touch with the working world, and does point out that computers do calculation for us, so more time can be devoted to the teaching of other vastly more important skills, such as how to use computers to answer real world questions.
Maybe suggest he read Asimov’s “The Feeling of Power”? Or maybe it wouldn’t help, I dunno.
He’s not even man enough to tell people about his religion; at least Ray Comfort is not so disingenuous. What are the bets Gianforte would blame his cowardice on folks like Horner and cry that he’s being persecuted?
To those asking for more specifics on the math statement, I regret that I don’t have a recording and it didn’t seem to excite much comment outside of the room. But I had the chance to ask him a one-on-one question about it, and to elaborate, he said (closer to a direct quote) that of readin’, ‘riting, and ‘rithmetic, he would replace ‘rithmetic with something more like a civics or a social studies class. He did specify that elementary schools should teach the basics.
My unkind guess is that he’s thinking of a patriotism hour, but he didn’t elaborate on that part.
I mentioned to him that I’m a math professor at the local university, Michigan Tech, but I didn’t get the chance to point out to him that most of our students are engineers and scientists, and without four years of high school math you probably couldn’t get in the front door here.
meanwhile, in his latest defense of trump against still-accruing accusations of sexual harassment, “america’s mayor” continues his unimpeded freefall into self-debasement and ken ham levels of denial …
@inflection #9:
That’s very thoughtful of him. I look forward with unalloyed joy to the bright and wonderful future he will engender for the US.
Bloody hell. I thought our politicians were bad.