A University of Texas and Texas Tribune poll has found that roughly one in three Texans believe that humans and dinosaurs walked the Earth at the same time and more than half reject the theory of evolution. According to the poll, 38 percent agreed with the statement “God created human beings pretty much in their present form about 10,000 years ago.”
Another 38 percent said human beings developed over millions of years with God guiding the process while another 12 percent said that development happened without God having any part of the process.
An amazing 51 percent disagreed with the statement, “human beings, as we know them today, developed from earlier species of animals.” Only thirty-five percent agreed with that statement.
The Texas school system has called for greater Bible reading in schools, here.
For the full story, click here
Great posts this morning Buddha, especially your first. I’m terrified about where we’re headed — I’m terrified about where we are right now — but these last two posts give me a sense of hope and peace, as I head off for a long day of work. Thanks.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vioZf4TjoUI&hl=en_US&fs=1&]
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGK84Poeynk&hl=en_US&fs=1&]
Who cares?
I’m just mad ’cause nobody accepts my theory of creation which has a lot to do with magic dust and Tinker Bell.
Yes, Byron there are. They have now evolved per Ecookie to the flying spaghetti monsters….
Duh:
I worded that wrong, I was trying to question Mr. Darwins theory.
But with that said how do you know that pigs didnt fly at some point long ago? Maybe there were flying squirrel type animals that evolved into pigs 🙂
Mea culpa, Mea culpa, Mea culpa. He did turn it down.
Pantera is Heavy Metal, head banger music. Would make even Alex Rose look good.
Used to be a Pantera’s Pizza in Austin. Not sure of they are related.
AY:
I seem to recall something about KK and West Point but I think he turned down a position there. I could very well be wrong
I left Steve Miller off on purpose, I think he’s really from Oklahoma 😀
thanks for the updates
I have no clue who Pantera is
C.
You left out following:
Delbert McClinton,
Joe Ely, (Corrected)
Marcia Ball,
Jimmie Vaughan,
Lightnin’ Hopkins,
Buck Owens,
Hank Thompson,
Ray Price,
T-Bone Burnett,
Johnny Winter,
Archie Bell & the Drells,
Johnny Guitar Watson,
Ornette Coleman,
Townes Van Zandt,
Selena Quintanilla,
Pantera,
Steve Miller,
Charlie Sexton,
Janis Joplin,
ZZ Top
I was going to dispute KK but remembered that his dad was in the Army so it possible. FYI, did you know he claimed to never have used drugs and taught at West Point?
Byron:
You skamp. You’ve found me out.
before this devolves into a major league Texan bash(although deservedly so), I would like to remind everyone of a few things.
Willie Nelson
Waylon Jennings
Kris Kristofferson
Townes Van Zandt
Johnny Winter
The Big Bopper
Roy Orbison
Buddy Holly
Johnny Mathis
Janis Joplin
Stevie Ray Vaughn
Joe Ely
Lightnin’ Hopkins
Blind Lemon Jefferson
Blind Willie Johnson
Freddie King
T-Bone Walker
Barry White
Jimmie Dale Gilmore
Bob Wills
Nanci Griffith
George Strait
Scott Joplin
Jerry Jeff Walker
Stephen Stills
Lead Belly
Sam the Sham
not George W. Bush
and…me*
are or were Texans
*although to be honest i’m not a professional musician but i do like to play the spoon
davisoftheapes1: “Maybe one of you intellectuals might enlighten me on anthropic constants, irreducible complexity, lack of transitory fossils, the astronomically “impossible” odds of information equivalent to 1,000 complete sets of the Encyclopedia Britainica being imbedded in EACH MOLECULE of DNA.”
See, the thing is, when you REALLY sit down and think about it, as Immanuel Kant did, you’ll find that the ultimate answer is outside the grasp of human reason–thus the ‘reason’ the Board of Ed in Kansas is rather puerile.
Before reading the following, you should familiarize yourself with the definition of ‘antinomy’
Here’s a taste…
THE ANTINOMY OF PURE REASON A452 B480
FOURTH CONFLICT OF THE TRANSCENDENTAL IDEAS
Thesis
There belongs to the world,
either as its part or as its
cause, a being that is
absolutely necessary.
Proof
The sensible world, as the
sum-total of all appearances,
contains a series of alterations.
For without such a series even
the representation of serial
time, as a condition of the
possibility of the sensible
world, would not be given us.
++ Time, as the formal condition of the possibility of changes, is indeed objectively prior to them; subjectively, however, in actual consciousness, the representation of time, like every other, is given only in connection with perceptions.
P 415a
Antithesis
An absolutely necessary
being nowhere exists in the
world, nor does it exist
outside the world as its cause.
Proof
If we assume that the
world itself is necessary, or
that a necessary being exists
in it, there are then two
alternatives. Either there is a
beginning in the series of
alterations which is absolutely
necessary, and therefore without
a cause, or the series itself
is without any beginning,
and although contingent and
P 416a
conditioned in all its parts,
none the less, as a whole, is
absolutely necessary and
unconditioned.
P 415
But every alteration stands
under its condition, which
precedes it in time and renders
P 416
it necessary. Now every
conditioned that is given
presupposes, in respect of its
existence, a complete series of
conditions up to the unconditioned,
which alone is absolutely
necessary. Alteration
thus existing as a consequence
of the absolutely necessary,
the existence of something
absolutely necessary must
be granted. But this necessary
existence itself belongs
to the sensible world. For if
it existed outside that world,
the series of alterations in the
world would derive its beginning
from a necessary cause
which would not itself belong A454 B482
to the sensible world. This,
however, is impossible. For
since the beginning of a series
in time can be determined
only by that which precedes
it in time, the highest
condition of the beginning of a
series of changes must exist
in the time when the series
as yet was not (for a beginning
is an existence preceded
by a time in which the thing
that begins did not yet exist).”
(continued here)
http://arts.cuhk.edu.hk/cgi-bin/cprframe.pl?query=16ant1-4.htm,415
It gets real fun when you consider C.G. Jung’s work with ‘the collective unconscious’ in tandem with the workings of quantum physics.
WHAT’S MORONIC, HOWEVER, IS TO TEACH CREATIONISM AS FACT TO A BUNCH OF GULLIBLE TEENAGERS.
Wasn’t that fun?
Byron said “I have a hard time understanding how a relatively small wolf-like creature changes into a giant blue whale without serious environmental pressure.”
LOL 🙂 Serious environmental pressure? As long as we have serious environmental pressure pigs can begin to fly?
I can buy into an argument that a fish can learn to walk using their fins, or that man will walk more erect due to environmental pressure, but much more is one heck of a leap.
I think complete removal of a creative force, having the ability to modify the end product to better fit within the environment is a conclusion that too many scientists are willing to conclude too quickly.
Mespo:
I bet you only found that link because of the Florida Girls Bikini Magazine.
davisoftheapes1:
is it possible that it is because it has to be? Since there are certain things that have to happen for life of any kind isn’t it possible that the laws of physics are the reason and it is so because it cant be otherwise?
Also couldn’t life just be a random occurrence? We just got lucky and happen to have our home in just the right place? Also think about the fact that in a few billion years our home will be cold and dead due to our sun dying.
But you are right there are some holes in that theory as you suggest. I have a hard time understanding how a relatively small wolf-like creature changes into a giant blue whale without serious environmental pressure.
for the coming barrage from Bdaman?
I hope your not waiting.
Is there a correlation with political affiliation?
Dredd at 11:28 am gave us this excellent link:
Justice Scalia dissed the Governor of Texas, a fellow to-the-righter, recently.
There is such a thing as trickle down memes …
http://blogdredd.blogspot.com/2010/02/scalia-disses-perry-few-tea-baggers.html
Here is Scalia’s take:
QUOTE A guy was writing a screen play.
His brother was a lawyer.
The screenplay was about Maine seceding from the United States.
His brother, in an attempt to help the play, wrote all of the justices of the Supreme Court to ask them what their thoughts were on the subject.
Only one justice replied. Justice Scalia wrote back:
I am afraid I cannot be of much help with your problem, principally because I cannot imagine that such a question could ever reach the Supreme Court. To begin with, the answer is clear. If there was any constitutional issue resolved by the Civil War, it is that there is no right to secede. (Hence, in the Pledge of Allegiance, “one Nation, indivisible.”) Secondly, I find it difficult to envision who the parties to this lawsuit might be. Is the State suing the United States for a declaratory judgment? But the United States cannot be sued without its consent, and it has not consented to this sort of suit.
UNQUOTE
Scalia was phoning this one in to a secretary.
Scalia did not mention that a state can constitutionally secede by constitutional amendment. Maine (or Texas) need only submit such an amendment, either to Congress for 2/3ds approval by both Houses, or to a convention called by the states. In either case, 3/4ths of the states must ratify.
The seccessionists better be careful what thye wish for. The states might let them go.
On the point of the lawsuit, the states seeking to secede would sue the OTHER STATES. The Supreme Court has original jurisdiction in those cases and could rule on this.
Under the Constitution, the Court would have to rule that the states can secede only by constitutional amendment.
Sorry, does not make for much of a screenplay, does it?
Added note to Nino: “One nation, indivisible” is not in the Constitution, so it has no bearing whatsoever on the issue.
Duh:
“I believe in a Creator(s) (because I don’t believe that we evolved from space dust), but I don’t believe that Creator(s) does much more than make design changes and then let the chips fall where they may.”
**********
Being a deist puts you in good company. The Founders took that approach. My beliefs closely align with yours in that I think the most divine thing we have are the natural laws governing the universe for which no scientific explanation exists, (e.g., why does gravity operate on objects by pulling them towards one another rather than away?) — sort of the god of Einstein or Spinoza. God-as-lawgiver, is more appealing to me than God-as-Santa-in-the-sky, though I freely admit I have no proof to back my hypothesis. The difference between me and the James’ of the world is that I am wiling to change my view based on new information, and I am not arrogant enough (yet, some would say) to believe that I have a monopoly on the mysteries of creation (if there was one) or that any old book I fancy has that quality either.
BTW, I agree about the Camaro, but the 2010 Maserati GranCabrio–truly evolutionary. See for yourself:
http://www.rsportscars.com/maserati/2010-maserati-grancabrio/pictures/12823
Mespo inquired, “could permit Haitian schoolchildren to be crushed at their desks, or imprisoned for days in caustic rubble awaiting HUMAN salvation, and still face his followers on Sunday. Any ideas?”
Only mental illness conforms to what you describe.
A sickness, e.g. Rapture, in which one is free to set aside any responsibilities for honesty, intellectual or otherwise, in this life in favor of the manufactured “next life” of the mind, in which one gets either gold streets (heaven is ABSOLUTELY level with no stairs), and/or vestal virgins (which means the bedrooms of heaven run forever red with blood…do any of these knucleheads think this shit THROUGH first?!? — oh, yes, and god CLEARLY hates women, among his other distastes) and/or Everlasting Life, which is what we have now, if we’d just pay more attention to genetics. No heaven required for life everlasting. It’s called DNA.
And I would not care about any of it. These folks used to stay home on election day because they knew their world-views were incompatible with politics, which requires compromise. But now, Rapture forms the basis of our public policy through this moment in time as we maintain two crusader occupations, drawn in cartoon form by Rummy for W to at all times to enforce the notion We Are On A Crusade. The crusade notion then became the mask for the unspeakable theft of our national and personal wealth, to say nothing of the grave dishonor our troops now face, being forced to fight based on lie after murderous lie.
The idea is to weaken our govt to the point where it can be easily toppled, and then our budding religious technocratic oligarchy will come unabated into its noon-tide.
Professor Turley (among others) warned us all, and repeatedly.
I will have no more of it. The quaint days where we do not openly and repeatedly question the magic-thinking of others are now over. Or we are. The world is too fucking small these days.
(My apologies for the Elephantitis of the Digits.)