New York Times Gets It Wrong: Teaching Strengths and Weaknesses Is Nothing New

The New York Times is reporting on the scheduled review of Texas’ science standards later this year by the state school board. Seems like this must be reporter Laura Beil’s first rodeo because she gets all excited (mistakenly) about something that is old hat in Texas: textbook wrangling. Now a battle looms in Texas over science textbooks that teach evolution, and the wrestle for control seizes on three words. None of them are “creationism” or “intelligent design” or even “creator.”The words are “strengths and weaknesses.” Surely Beil did some research and found out that this battle last played out five years ago, so it’s hardly new. Back then the issue really was textbooks. This time it’s the language of the Read More ›

Now for a Film about Yoko Ono, Would-Be Censor

There are several good news stories on the recent development in the federal court case in which Yoko Ono seeks to prevent further distribution of Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, the Ben Stein film. And then there is this one from ars technica: Notice the way the writer feels obliged to abuse free speech–by misrepresenting intelligent design–even as he defends it.Read more here at Discovery Blog.

Uniting the Sciences and Humanities

There is an interesting new education project under construction at Binghamton University. According to The New York Times: Yet a few scholars of thick dermis and pep-rally vigor believe that the cultural chasm can be bridged and the sciences and the humanities united into a powerful new discipline that would apply the strengths of both mindsets, the quantitative and qualitative, to a wide array of problems. Now, we’re all for combining the sciences with the humanities. Clearly we should be developing well-rounded students. But what I fear is

Yoko Ono Copyright Suit Expelled from Federal Court

Update: Download the US District Court ruling here. The Wall Street Journal Law Blog has more on the story.According to the Associated Press: Yoko Ono has lost her Manhattan legal battle to block the use of John Lennon’s song “Imagine” in a film challenging the theory of evolution. EMI still has a state level suit in New York against Premise Media for the inclusion of Imagine in Expelled, and no word yet when that might be resolved one way or the other. Premise now looks north with plans to launch Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed nationwide in Canada later this month. [Note: For a more comprehensive defense of Ben Stein’s documentary Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, please see: NCSE Exposed at NCSEExposed.org]

How to Rebut Barbara Forrest Explained in Two Words

Expose hypocrisy. Nearly every argument that Barbara Forrest makes in the evolution debate, when applied fairly, can be turned against her. Keep this point in mind if you ever have to debate Dr. Forrest, because in my experience, this rule holds true under nearly all circumstances. I’ll give three examples from her recent talking points against academic freedom in Louisiana: Of course Barbara Forrest is entitled to track the every move of ID proponents if that is how she wishes to devote her time and her career. But she shouldn’t project her own behavior onto ID proponents, because, well, we don’t really care about tracking the “every move” of Darwinists. Rather, we devote ourselves to more important activities, such as Read More ›