Caving for infidels

[Fulk]

For a biology teacher to tell young kids that both creationism and evolution are valid theories of how we came to be here and say to them 'It's up to you to make up your own minds' is a bit like the French teacher saying 'Le chat means "cat' ? or, it might be "dog" ? why don't you decide for yourselves?'

 

[Pitlamp]

For a biology teacher to tell young kids that both creationism and evolution are valid theories of how we came to be here and say to them 'It's up to you to make up your own minds' is a bit like the French teacher saying 'Le chat means "cat' ? or, it might be "dog" ? why don't you decide for yourselves?'

Read my words Fulk; I didn't write anything like what you seem to imply in what you've just typed. Allowing students to consider something and make informed decisions about its validity or usefulness is very different from "telling" them it has equal value with other ideas.

Tony_b; thanks for your latest; what the Americans teach their children isn't something we have a great deal of influence over. My more immediate interest is how we educate our own youngsters. By that I mean teaching them to weigh evidence and think for themselves. This is something which, I reckon, Graham would approve of.

I suspect that very few folk in the UK would concur that all the Old Testament should be taken as "historical fact". (By definition, if several events happened before God created man, then details of these events can't exactly be reliable eye witness accounts.) The New Testament is completely different of course.

As for humans and dinosaurs walking the earth at the same time? But that must be true - as "proven" by umpteen Hollywood films!  :-\

 

[Fulk]

Read my words Fulk; I didn't write anything like what you seem to imply in what you've just typed.

I'm very sorry if you thought that I was somehow getting at you, Pitlamp ? that was not my intention at all. My remark was simply prompted by the general tenor of this thread, and was not aimed at anyone in particular. Apologies for any offence caused (however unwittingly).

 

[graham]

Tony_b; thanks for your latest; what the Americans teach their children isn't something we have a great deal of influence over.

Although there are those in the current government who have firm links with American evangelical types, including Liam Fox and Michael Gove.

My more immediate interest is how we educate our own youngsters. By that I mean teaching them to weigh evidence and think for themselves. This is something which, I reckon, Graham would approve of.

I would indeed, see below.

I suspect that very few folk in the UK would concur that all the Old Testament should be taken as "historical fact". (By definition, if several events happened before God created man, then details of these events can't exactly be reliable eye witness accounts.) The New Testament is completely different of course.

Why 'of course'? there are no wholly contemporaneous accounts of JC's life and works. The earliest christian texts are the (genuine - not all of them seem to be) letters of Paul, who by his own admission never actually met the bloke. To give one example:

Matthew 27: 51-53:

51 Then, behold, the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom; and the earth quaked, and the rocks were split, 52 and the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised; 53 and coming out of the graves after His resurrection, they went into the holy city and appeared to many.

This remarkable sequence of events is mentioned only in that particular part of that particular book. Pitlamp appears to regard the NT as reliable history. Me, I'd be wholly flabbergasted if a mass resurrection such as this did not make its way into other near-contemporary accounts (Josephus anyone?) if it actually happened.

Now, either it did, and yet it went wholly unremarked elsewhere, or it didn't, which tends to cast some doubt on the historical reliability of the rest.

As for humans and dinosaurs walking the earth at the same time? But that must be true - as "proven" by umpteen Hollywood films!  :-\

Visit this place. If you think that's a bit American for your tastes then visit  this zoo which is less than a dozen miles from where I sit and type this.

 

[Brains]

This is what you are fighting...

 

[graham]

Brains, indeed.

As some of you will know, I have done quite a lot of work on Palaeolithic cave art and have visited a lot of the relevant sites in France & northern Spain. A few years back, searching for one particular cave on the net, I came across an account by this American guy who claimed to have made an illicit trip into the cave and to have photographed an engraving of a sauropod dinosaur,  face to face with a mammoth, before being chased off the site by the owner. He claimed that subsequently the site had been sealed & remained 'off limits' to visitors.

Now, this is a cave I know quite well, having visited it several times & being on good terms with the then owner (who sadly died a year or two ago). It was and is open to the public, albeit on a more limited basis than some as he fitted tour guiding around his farming work. it is now owned and run by his younger brother. I therefore contacted the American chap in order to have, or so I hoped, a friendly exchange about what he had, or had not, seen and to put right the more glaring factual errors in his account. Well, within three email exchanges he was warning me that my immortal soul was in grave danger if I persisted with these lies. At that point I concluded that the exchange was pointless and annoying and broke it off.

Yup, ignorance on this sort of level really does exist and really is what we are fighting.

And that (true) story does concern caves and caving  8) :ang:

 

[Pitlamp]

Read my words Fulk; I didn't write anything like what you seem to imply in what you've just typed.

I'm very sorry if you thought that I was somehow getting at you, Pitlamp ? that was not my intention at all. My remark was simply prompted by the general tenor of this thread, and was not aimed at anyone in particular. Apologies for any offence caused (however unwittingly).

Ah - in which case, thanks for adding that Fulk.

I wish I wasn't so busy, as Graham's most recent stuff is an interesting line of discussion. If I get chance I'll come back to it at some stage.

 

[Alex]

That has to be a spoof, Brains surely no one can be that stupid. No videos or pictures well of course not, who would have blooming recorded it as nothing existed to record it. However saying that, with better technology I guess it would be possible to see it, if you can stare far enough in Space say about 8* billion light years? (* Not sure if it is 8 billion, I am sure someone with more knowlegde will tell me what the current theory when the universe started.)

 

[Brains]

On a par with going for a landing on the Sun, at night so it isnt too hot...

 

[SpeleoTrog]

Just googled the question posted by Brains and found this interesting answer -

It's always annoying when you can't tell if someone's trolling, woefully unintelligent or just plain religious.

 

[Les W]

Not sure if it is 8 billion, I am sure someone with more knowlegde will tell me what the current theory when the universe started.

Current theory (from Wikipedia, your interwebs friend  )

"According to the most recent measurements and observations, the Big Bang occurred approximately 13.75 billion years ago"

 

[Pitlamp]

In certain parts this interview includes some quite interesting reflections from a very respected and well qualified scientist.

Brian May to RT: I still feel Freddie's around

(I hope this works . . . )

 

[graham]

I haven't watched the video, however. Well qualified and respected Brain May may be, but his training is in astrophysics. That means that if you are going to accept his opinion on anything, it's either music or astrophysics. Sorry, but there is no scientific evidence, none at all, that supports either the survival of 'mind' after death, or even that a dualistic interpretation of mind/body is valid. Indeed there is quite a lot of evidence that 'mind' is an emergent property of 'brain' and is wholly reliant on the physical brain for its characteristics.

If you wish, I can go into some detail about how this argument works in practice. As the victim/survivor of a stroke, I have taken a high degree of interest in the workings of the brain.

 

[shortscotsman]

That has to be a spoof, Brains surely no one can be that stupid. No videos or pictures well of course not, who would have blooming recorded it as nothing existed to record it. However saying that, with better technology I guess it would be possible to see it, if you can stare far enough in Space say about 8* billion light years? (* Not sure if it is 8 billion, I am sure someone with more knowlegde will tell me what the current theory when the universe started.)

actually
http://pyweb.swan.ac.uk/~dunbar/PH104/lec20/wmapdata.jpg

is is thought to represent a picture of  the universe at about 100,000 yrs. [It's a picture of temperature]  13.75 Billion is
the current consensus - this number has changed quite a bit in the last 20 years (gotten longer) as systematic problems with measuring distance have been (hopefully) ironed out


Although Brian May has a phd in astrophysics I don't think he counts as a "well respected scentist".

 

[graham]

Although Brian May has a phd in astrophysics I don't think he counts as a "well respected scientist".

I think you'll find that in debates of this kind, a well respected scientist is one who says something that can used to bolster your position.

 

[Pitlamp]

H'm - he must have impressed those who had to consider his appropriateness for his PhD. This must count for something as far as his ability to think scientifically is concerned.

It just struck me, from watching the video, that he had a few interesting remarks germaine to this topic (in and among everything else).

 

[shortscotsman]

Getting a Ph.D. is like getting a license to be a scientist - becoming a well respected scientist is quite a long way beyond that.
A lot of science Ph.ds tend to be very technical and are not necessarily about thinking independently

 

[bograt]

Just think, all this started with a would-be scout wanting to go caving

 

[TheBitterEnd]

Just think, all this started with a would-be scout wanting to go caving

Well, if this thread hasn't put that foolish notion out of the lads head, I don't know what will 

He probably rather wishes he'd just abandoned his principals taken the promise...

 

[Pitlamp]

Getting a Ph.D. is like getting a license to be a scientist - becoming a well respected scientist is quite a long way beyond that.
A lot of science Ph.ds tend to be very technical and are not necessarily about thinking independently

Admittedly there is a lot of truth in that. Then again a PhD holder who has a lot of experience of other aspects of life may be worth listening to. Hey ho; time to think about packing some caving gear.