Thursday, June 14, 2007

The Story Behind the Story Behind the Story

Now that the smoke has cleared somewhat following Tuesday's school board meeting, the Washington Post has some insights into what happened in the last few days before the school board's vote. In the meeting Steve Abrams accused Jerry Weast -- or somebody, anybody -- of putting pressure on the board to include the AMA, AAP, and APA materials. In the hallway afterwards, it was my impression that Abrams was saying that the citizens advisory committee had applied the pressure.

Well, I'm on that committee and I'll tell you what we did. When MCPS presented us with the results of the pilot testing, the committee members agreed that the major problems that were identified -- specifically, teachers reading a script and no chance to answer questions -- could be solved by doing something we had proposed a long time ago, which was to include some literature from the leading medical and mental health organizations. A committee member -- Matthew Murguia -- moved that we recommend inclusion of the materials, and we voted. CRC and PFOX of course voted against it, the rest of us voted for it.

That's all. The committee voted on a motion.

It did not seem that the MCPS staff who were present at the meeting were that excited by the idea, you might say, I'm sure they were hoping things would go peaceably and smoothly; but they wrote it up and presented it to the Superintendent and he sent it to the school board. Woo, big pressure. I'm almost falling asleep talking about it here.

Here's The Post this morning:
The addition of one bit of guidance for teachers to the new sex education lessons for Montgomery County public schools was a small 11th-hour victory for members of a citizens advisory committee who had felt shut out of the educational process they were empaneled to advise.

Superintendent Jerry D. Weast on Monday told school board members that his staff would add a brief passage to the new sex education lessons that also instruct teachers on how to answer a specific question if asked by a student: "Is homosexuality an illness?" The answer: It is not, according to the American Psychiatric Association.

Board members Tuesday approved the lessons, with that addition, effectively expanding the two 45-minute lessons from a six-school pilot program to full implementation in eighth- and 10th-grade health classes this fall.

The last-minute tweak was a concession to the advisory committee, and it might have helped Weast and his staff keep control of the curriculum.

Members of the committee, a group representing parents, educators and a variety of other stakeholders, lobbied Weast and board members intensely late last week to make additions to the lessons, which they said offered students too little information to counter misconceptions about homosexuality and homosexuals, such as whether sexual orientation is a choice and whether homosexuals can lead happy lives. Late Gain For Sex Ed Committee

I know there was a last-minute flurry of emails and phone calls, and these were provoked, I think, by the committee's recommendation. I think a lot of people realized this was our one and only chance, and realized that the curriculum was too compromised. The committee didn't really lobby people ourselves, as far as I know, we just set the wheels in motion.

It is an interesting observation, that the last-minute tweak let Weast's staff "keep control of the curriculum."

Look, before the citizens committee meeting I talked with some people about exactly what compromises would and would not be acceptable. For instance, the ideal thing would be: teachers have the three articles for reference so they can answer questions and students are given a handout with the five bullet points. But -- it would've been OK if teachers had the bullet points for answering questions and gave them to students. We decided we would be happy if they just made a handout with the bullet points for students: no discussion, no articles.

We would have been happy with just about anything.

In the committee meeting, it came out that the members wanted to re-state the recommendation we had made earlier. It was moved, seconded, voted, and that was that: just send the Superintendent the same thing we sent him before. We wanted to make sure he understood that we considered that a serious recommendation.

When I first heard what Weast had proposed, my first response was: this is thinner than any compromise we had even considered. He really offered almost nothing: teachers would have one of the bullet points to use, and only if a student asked one specific question.

But guess what -- we were elated. He was conceding the very least imaginable, but at least it was the most important bullet point. So in a sense it was a very smart move for him, because he got to march at the front of the parade instead of being trampled, and the cost for him was negligible.
Committee members said the lessons, which define various terms related to sexual orientation and teach the virtue of tolerance, offered little information to answer such basic student questions as whether homosexuality is normal and healthy. The lessons are tightly scripted, and teachers are told to direct student questions to a "trusted adult" if they stray from the material in the lessons.

"I can't explain it, and I don't understand it, and I wish I did, why they're not putting this information in the curriculum," said Richelle Meer, a member of the citizens committee who has a daughter at Montgomery Blair High School in Silver Spring. "We feel that these are things that kids are talking about even before eighth grade."

Sadly, even this innocuous curriculum was a fight every step of the way, with the CRC and PFOX whining and arguing over every little obvious point. You had a handful of radicals trying to disrupt this thing, and though they had no chance of actually succeeding, they did make it twice as hard for everybody who was trying to concentrate on the actual task at hand.

I share Richelle's inability to comprehend how this could happen, especially in a county like ours.
School board members faced similar lobbying in January, when the classroom materials came up for initial approval as a pilot program. After first pushing for the addition of a raft of statements more supportive to gay, lesbian and transgender students, committee members retreated to requesting the addition of a single sentence, instructing that mainstream medical and mental health organizations have concluded that homosexuality is not a disease or a mental illness.

The suggestion divided board members, who split 4 to 4 on a motion by board member Patricia O'Neill (Bethesda-Chevy Chase) to instruct teachers to provide the statement upon a student's request. The motion died.

O'Neill said this week she "felt it was not sufficient to say, 'If a student asks the question, send them to a trusted adult.' . . . That's not an answer. That's punting."

Yes, that's punting. Think about real teenagers in a real classroom, with real lives that they are trying to understand. When they have questions about sexuality, it's important to them, this is the stuff they're thinking about all day long. They need answers. Good answers. What are they going to think when the school is afraid to answer their simple questions?
In advance of this week's meeting, the advisory committee again urged Weast and board members to augment the lessons with several statements: That fleeting same-sex attraction does not equate to homosexuality, that homosexuality is neither a disease nor a mental illness, that it is not a choice, that homosexuals can live happy lives and be successful parents and that children raised by same-sex couples do "just as well" as those who are not.

O'Neill said she planned, at the least, to renew her motion of January. But O'Neill received word late Friday that Weast planned to add that language to the lessons himself. Members of the citizens advisory committee said they were pleased with the slight addition to the lessons, although they would have preferred that all of their recommendations be adopted.

That's good to know she was planning to do that. Her remarks during the meeting were inspirational and right on-target.
David Fishback, the former chairman of the committee, termed it "a very, very important step," although he said the provision of a specific answer to a specific question from a curious student would do no good for "the child who is afraid to ask."

This issue is very near to David for personal reasons, as he revealed in his public comments to the board on Tuesday morning. More than any one person, David kept this topic alive. He made sure everyone within hearing distance knew why the medical material should be included, knew all the arguments for including them and all the holes in the arguments against it. You can't say he applied "pressure" to anyone, because he is not in any position of power to do that, but he kept this on the front burner.

Now, these last couple of lines are interesting.
Opponents of the sex education lessons, who generally said that homosexuality should not be taught as a topic in sex education, said they had no objection to the added language.

"We have never claimed homosexuality to be a mental illness," said Michelle Turner, spokeswoman of Citizens for a Responsible Curriculum, the lead opposition group.

The material is not being presented in the classroom to counter claims by the CRC, it's there to teach students the facts about sexual orientation. A kid in a classroom doesn't know if it's a mental illness or not, he might feel like there's something wrong with him, and it's a good idea to tell him that's not it.

But now I'm wondering, since CRC and PFOX both voted against including these materials ... what part of it didn't they like?

30 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Message for Randi, who cannot believe in the existence of an intelligent designer because of "junk DNA":

29 papers published today, mostly in Genome Research, as part of the Encylclopedia of DNA Elements project, involving hundreds of scientists in 11 countries, have confirmed growing suspicions that "junk DNA" are not junk at all but are busily toiling at an array of previously invisible tasks.

Did I mention that Anthony Flew, one of the most prominent atheist philosophers of the last fifty years recently changed position and decided that God does indeed exist? He said the accumulating evidence of an intelligent designer is what swayed him.

June 14, 2007 9:51 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

BTW, Happy Flag Day to any TTFers who are patriotic Americans.

June 14, 2007 9:52 PM  
Blogger Dana Beyer, M.D. said...

And I'm supposed to be convinced by Anthony Flew? Are you kidding?

As for "junk DNA," most sensible geneticists have known for a long time that most of it was probably not junk. So what? None of this has anything to do with intelligent design, creationism or any other variation on that theme.

June 14, 2007 10:30 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"As for "junk DNA," most sensible geneticists have known for a long time that most of it was probably not junk. So what? None of this has anything to do with intelligent design, creationism or any other variation on that theme."

Well, Randi has repeatedly claimed that it does and I don't recall you arguing with, uh, Randi.

June 14, 2007 10:48 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"And I'm supposed to be convinced by Anthony Flew?"

Not long ago, he was the patron saint of materialist atheists.

June 14, 2007 10:53 PM  
Blogger JimK said...

Nobody here ever heard of the guy before.

JimK

June 15, 2007 7:00 AM  
Blogger Orin Ryssman said...

Jim writes,

Nobody here ever heard of the guy before.

http://en.wikipedia.org
/wiki/Antony_Flew

June 15, 2007 8:13 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Andrea- not anon
Hopefully,Orin, no one thinks Wikip is a good source of real information. My kids have been posting stuff on Wiki for some years. Not that I don't think my kids are bright but I don't use them as primary sources for basic research.

Anon- another saying from my dad- don't go away angry- just go away.

June 15, 2007 8:21 AM  
Blogger Orin Ryssman said...

Jim writes,

A kid in a classroom doesn't know if it's a mental illness or not, he might feel like there's something wrong with him, and it's a good idea to tell him that's not it.

Now will these same students be told ALL of the details of exactly how this took place (the removal of homosexuality from the DSM)?

Nope, I didn't think so...amazing, truly amazing.

June 15, 2007 8:23 AM  
Blogger Orin Ryssman said...

Andrea,

There is a divide over the use of Wikipedia in academia (read an article recently in The Chronicle of Higher Education). The History department at Middlebury College has banned its use (in papers turned in), while some Profs. at the University of Chicago are just fine with using it as a source.

Frankly I find it useful as a place to start an inquiry on a subject, or simply to assist in the recall of a date in history. For controversial information, i.e. highly contested areas, it is not the best place to go.

June 15, 2007 8:28 AM  
Blogger Dana Beyer, M.D. said...

Firstly, I've heard of Anthony Flew, and I was never particularly impressed, and he wasn't my patron saint.

Secondly, I never felt any need to argue with Randi on this blog or to discuss molecular genetics. There are other fora for that, and I don't have the time anyway.

And, Orin, unfortunately, there isn't time to discuss much of the history of medicine in class, even in medical school. It would be instructive to teach the kids the long history of homophobia in human society, as well as the history of sexism, racism, religious bigotry, etc. I imagine many are smart enough to supplement their education.

June 15, 2007 8:33 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Secondly, I never felt any need to argue with Randi on this blog or to discuss molecular genetics. There are other fora for that, and I don't have the time anyway."

Yet, you seem to have the time o argue with anons about it.

"And, Orin, unfortunately, there isn't time to discuss much of the history of medicine in class, even in medical school."

Actually, in most curricula, students are taught about the discoveries of Newton, Farraday, Einstein et al and how they happened.

The new MCPS curriculum is singular in teaching the result of a vote rather than the discovery of a scientist.

"It would be instructive to teach the kids the long history of homophobia in human society, as well as the history of sexism, racism, religious bigotry, etc. I imagine many are smart enough to supplement their education."

I'm sure we'll have a "homophobia" curriculum before long, dismissing the moral history of civilization as dastardly.

It's part of the gay agenda. Already, the NEA has proposed a Gay History Month.

June 15, 2007 9:00 AM  
Anonymous UntwistedTruth said...

Randi

As to MCPS curriculum...

And did you also lobby hard to have 'radical statements' from CDC or AMA on medical dangers endemic in male homosexual practices?

Did you push hard to have APAs and other statements on right of patients to seek help in deciding course of therapy for themselves?

Did you fight for the truth that happy and healthy exgays really do exist (reardless of what you personally believe) or kind of forget that little inconvenient truth that might be important for those children you care so much about who don't want to embrace a gay identity?

Or did you just want the part about 'normal and healthy' -- the little part of the truth you like that salves your own conscience?

June 15, 2007 9:33 AM  
Blogger UntwistedTruth.com said...

Wikipedia pretends it is gathering credibile factual information.

But when it comes to gay issues, everything is filtered through a LGTB study group to "insure" accuracy.

One internal 'editor' employed by Wiki admitted in a blog that it was he who added in Focus on the Family (without being requested to do so) as a "hate group" because he felt that a pro-gay website had implied that.

He corrected his 'unintentional error' when it was brought to his intention that the website he cited made no such claim...

...as if some private biased website making such a claim would be enough evidence to enter such an allegation in an 'encyclopedia' in the first place.

Uh-huh.

June 15, 2007 9:45 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"no one thinks Wikip is a good source of real information"

It's not authoritative but it's a good place for people like Jim- who's never heard of many key people, places and ideas- to familiarize himself with the world around him.

BTW, the No True Scotsman fallacy, which Randi has mentioned here before, was first developed by Flew in his 1975 book, "Thinking About Thinking".

June 15, 2007 9:49 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

GHENT, New York (June 14) - It is not in former Democratic Vice President Al Gore's famous PowerPoint presentation on the environment, but there are some upsides to global warming .

Northern homes could save on heating fuel. Northern cities in the United States might stop losing residents to the South. Canadian farmers could harvest bumper crops. Greenland may become awash in cod and oil riches. Shippers could count on an Arctic shortcut between the Atlantic and Pacific. Forests may expand. Mongolia could see a go-go economy.

"It's not that there won't be bad things happening in those countries. There will be - things like you'll lose polar bears," said economic professor Robert O. Mendelsohn of the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies. "But the idea is that they will get such large gains, especially in agriculture, that they will be bigger than the losses."

Mendelsohn looked at how gross domestic product around the world would be affected under different warming scenarios though 2100. Canada and Russia tend to come out as gainers, as does much of northern Europe and Mongolia.

This is largely because of projected gains in agricultural production in those areas. Many researchers believe that if the world warms up, the sweet spots for growing crops will migrate toward the poles. Some people claim the phenomenon is already manifesting itself in bountiful forsythia blooms in Vermont and maple sap flowing in northern New York in January.

"I've been betting on it for years," said Chris Loken, a New York state apple grower who years ago diversified his LoveApple Farm with an eye toward warmer weather.

Amid acres of apple trees lined up along bucolic hills in Ghent, New York, Loken planted stands of peach, apricot and plum. Frosty upstate New York winters are not always kind to those trees, but the 75-year-old farmer is counting on a trend of milder winters.

"This farm here has been set up for the future," he said.

The future may have arrived already in icy Greenland, where fishermen are thrilled by the return of cod and farmers are reporting higher yields.

"Maybe the turnips get a little bit bigger, and the potatoes get a little bit bigger, but that's important," said Kenneth Hoegh, a government agricultural adviser. "We are right on the edge here for agriculture."

Jesper Madsen, who directs Arctic research at the National Environmental Research Institute in Denmark, said Greenland's agricultural gains would seem like small potatoes economically if the retreating ice there clears the way for more oil drilling.

Currently, the "optimal holiday destination" has an annual average temperature of about 61 degrees (16 Celsius) (as in Atlanta, or Barcelona), according to a group of European researchers. A worldwide warming will essentially drive tourists away from equatorial regions toward the poles and up the mountains, said one of those researchers, economist Richard Tol of the Economic and Social Research Institute in Ireland.

Looking around the world, a list provided by Tol said the biggest winner in a warmed-up world would be - no surprise - Canada. It would see a 220 percent increase in international tourist arrivals by the end of the century, followed by Russia with a 174 percent jump, and Mongolia, up 122 percent.

June 15, 2007 10:02 AM  
Anonymous Aunt Bea said...

Congrats to Anon who finally appears to realize that global warming IS taking place.

Mr. Loken anticipated the warming trend correctly, but if there are no pollinating bees around, his apple trees won't produce fruit.

"Bee Die-Off Threatens Food Supply
Seth Borenstein, Associated Press

May 3, 2007 —Unless someone or something stops it soon, the mysterious killer that is wiping out many of the nation's honeybees could have a devastating effect on America's dinner plate, perhaps even reducing us to a glorified bread-and-water diet.

Honeybees don't just make honey; they pollinate more than 90 of the tastiest flowering crops we have. Among them: apples, nuts, avocados, soybeans, asparagus, broccoli, celery, squash and cucumbers. And lots of the really sweet and tart stuff, too, including citrus fruit, peaches, kiwi, cherries, blueberries, cranberries, strawberries, cantaloupe and other melons..."


http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2007/05/03/bees_ani.html?category=animals&guid=20070503103030

June 15, 2007 11:08 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Congrats to Anon who finally appears to realize that global warming IS taking place."

Have always gone out of my way to say that, even though the cause is unknown, global warming is taking place.

BTW, no evidence that global warming is having anything to do with honeybee disappearance. The cause is probably something artificial.

June 15, 2007 11:26 AM  
Blogger Randi Schimnosky said...

Anonymous at June 14, 2007 9:51 PM

Anonymous, its no big surprise that some of the DNA thought of as junk is found to have a purpose. What hasn't been proven is that all of it has a purpose.

As to Anthony Flew, if he's one of the most prominent atheists philosophers of the last 50 years why have I never heard of him before? And as to him changing his position, big deal - every day hordes of people become atheists. Talk to Richard Dawkins, he says every day he hears from priests and clergy who've lost their faith. In the early 1900s there were virtually no atheists, today there are close to a billion, this group is growing far faster than any religion.

June 15, 2007 1:27 PM  
Blogger Randi Schimnosky said...

TwistedTruth at June 15, 2007 9:33 AM


TwistedTruth, sex in a committed gay relationship is no more dangerous than sex in a committed heterosexual relationship.


All the evidence suggests that there is no such thing as an "exgay" - somone who has changed same sex attractions into opposite sex attractions. While there are indeed people who refer to themselves as "exgay" virtually all of them admit, when pressed, that they are still same sex attracted, they do not mean they are heterosexual, what they mean is that they've merely changed their behavior (if even that) and that they've only changed what they label themselves as.

It would be a lie to teach children that they can change same sex attractions into opposite sex attractions and this is what the "exgay" political movement tries to do. Its apparent in your use of weasel words like "gay identity". There is no such thing as a "gay identity" - gay means same sex attracted and people like you try to weasel away from that because it makes it hard for you to deceive others with your talk of "exgay identity" which merely means that person has changed the label they apply to themselves.

June 15, 2007 1:39 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Anonymous, its no big surprise that some of the DNA thought of as junk is found to have a purpose."

Actually, what happened is that they focused on a 1% sample and couldn't find much that didn't have a purpose.

"What hasn't been proven is that all of it has a purpose."

Obviously, but you were the one who previously spoke with such assurance. You should read your past comments.

"As to Anthony Flew, if he's one of the most prominent atheists philosophers of the last 50 years why have I never heard of him before?"

Must be you're not that well educated. Prior to Richard Dawkins, he was the go-to guy for atheists. His book, God and Philosophy, was required reading in college philosophy course. he travelled throughout the Western world publicly debating with theist philosophers. The No True Scotsman fallacy, always used by atheist, and which you have brought here was developed by him. When news of his conversion to deism broke, most atheists refuse to believe it. I remember reading the president of the American Atheist Association saying, "if it does turn out to actually be true, it would be a devastating blow to the atheist movement."

Basically, what Flew is saying is that the original reproducing organism on Earth would have had to have been too complex to not have been designed by some intelligent being.

"And as to him changing his position, big deal - every day hordes of people become atheists. Talk to Richard Dawkins, he says every day he hears from priests and clergy who've lost their faith. In the early 1900s there were virtually no atheists, today there are close to a billion, this group is growing far faster than any religion."

Let's see this documentation.

June 15, 2007 2:40 PM  
Anonymous Aunt Bea said...

"honeybee disappearance. The cause is probably something artificial."

No it isn't. The cause is most likely a virus, parasite, or bacteria - likely one that thrives in warmer temperatures.

USDA's top bee scientist, Jeff Pettis, who is coordinating the detective work on this die-off, has more suspected causes than time, people and money to look into them.

The top suspects are a parasite, an unknown virus, some kind of bacteria, pesticides, or a one-two combination of the top four, with one weakening the honeybee and the second killing it.

A quick experiment with some of the devastated hives makes pesticides seem less likely. In the recent experiment, Pettis and colleagues irradiated some hard-hit hives and reintroduced new bee colonies. More bees thrived in the irradiated hives than in the non-irradiated ones, pointing toward some kind of disease or parasite that was killed by radiation.


http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2007/05/03/bees_ani.html?category=animals&guid=20070503103030

June 15, 2007 2:43 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"USDA's top bee scientist, Jeff Pettis, who is coordinating the detective work on this die-off, has more suspected causes than time, people and money to look into them."

Yet, with all those suspects, TTF focuses on global warming, the new all-purpose villain. These days, regardless what happens, it's caused by GW. Cold snap, GW. Heat wave, GW. 2006 prediction of record hurricanes, GW. No actual hurricanes, GW. Two-headed fish, GW. Increasing infertility, GW.

This is kind of like when the ayatollah used to blame th CIA for earthquakes in Iran.

June 15, 2007 3:01 PM  
Blogger Randi Schimnosky said...

Anonymous, maybe global warming has overheated your brain and that's why its malfunctioning.

June 15, 2007 3:25 PM  
Anonymous Aunt Bea said...

To clarify your confusion, please note:

Aunt Bea is a woman who posts comments on this blog sometimes. (No relation to Uncle Frank.)

TTF is the organization that runs this blog.

June 15, 2007 3:26 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"TTF is the organization that runs this blog."

Organization? There aren't enough people here to field a baseball team.

Do you know any of these people?

June 15, 2007 4:43 PM  
Blogger Randi Schimnosky said...

Anonymous said "Let's see this documentation.".

Anonymous, note the pie graphs on this page:

http://richarddawkins.net/article,956,Why-the-Gods-Are-Not-Winning,Edge-Gregory-Paul-amp-Phil-Zuckerman

The number of nonreligionists…. throughout the 20th century has skyrocketed from 3.2 million in 1900, to 697 million in 1970, and on to 918 million in AD 2000…. Equally startling has been the meteoritic growth of secularism…. Two immense quasi-religious systems have emerged at the expense of the world's religions: agnosticism…. and atheism…. From a miniscule presence in 1900, a mere 0.2% of the globe, these systems…. are today expanding at the extraordinary rate of 8.5 million new converts each year, and are likely to reach one billion adherents soon. A large percentage of their members are the children, grandchildren or the great-great-grandchildren of persons who in their lifetimes were practicing Christians". (The WCE probably understates today's nonreligious. They have Christians constituting 68-94% of nations where surveys indicate that a quarter to half or more are not religious, and they may overestimate Chinese Christians by a factor of two. In that case the nonreligious probably soared past the billion mark already, and the three great faiths total 64% at most.)

Far from providing unambiguous evidence of the rise of faith, the devout compliers of the WCE document what they characterize as the spectacular ballooning of secularism by a few hundred-fold!
It has no historical match. It dwarfs the widely heralded Mormon climb to 12 million during the same time, even the growth within Protestantism of Pentecostals from nearly nothing to half a billion does not equal it.

It is well documented that Christianity has withered dramatically in Europe, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Japan. The failure of the faith in the west is regularly denounced by Popes and Protestant leaders. Churches are being converted into libraries, laundromats and pubs. Those who disbelieve in deities typically make up large portions of the population, according to some surveys they make up the majority of citizens in Scandinavia, France and Japan. Evolution is accepted by the majority in all secular nations, up to four in five in some.

Doesn't America, the one western nation where two thirds absolutely believe in God, and nine in ten think there is some form of higher power, show that religion can thrive in an advanced democracy? Not necessarily.

A decade and a half of sampling finds conservative (thought to be about two thirds to four fifths of the total of) evangelicals and born-agains consistently stuck between a quarter and a third of the population. The majority that considers religion very important in their lives dropped from over two thirds in the 1960s to a bare majority in 1970s and 1980s, and appeared to edge up in the Clinton era. But instead of rising post 9/11 as many predicted, it is slipping again.

Those who feel the opposite about religion doubled between the 1960s and 1970s, have been fairly stable since then, but have been edging up in recent years. American opinion on the issue of human evolution from animals has been rock steady, about half agreeing, about half disagreeing, for a quarter century. What has changed is how people view the Bible. In the 1970s nearly four in ten took the testaments literally, just a little over one in ten thought it was a mixture of history, fables, and legends, a three to one ratio in favor of the Biblical view. Since then a persistent trend has seen literalism decline to between a quarter and a third of the population, and skeptics have doubled to nearly one in five. If the trend continues the fableists will equal and then surpass the literalists in a couple of decades.

Even the megachurch phenomenon is illusory. A spiritual cross of sports stadiums with theme parks, hi-tech churches are a desperate effort to pull in and satisfy a mass-media jaded audience for whom the old sit in the pews and listen to the standard sermon and sing some old time hymns does not cut it anymore. Rather than boosting church membership, megachurches are merely consolidating it.

From a high of three quarters of the population in the 1930s to 1960s, a gradual, persistent decline has set in, leaving some clerics distressed at the growing abandonment of small churches as the big ones gobble up what is left of the rest. Weekly religious service attendance rose only briefly in the months after 9/11—evidence that the event failed to stem national secularization – and then lost ground as the Catholic sex scandal damaged church credibility. As few as one in four or five Americans are actually in church on a typical Sunday, only a few percent of them in megachurches.

One group has experienced rapid growth. In the 1940s and 50s 1-2% usually responded no asked if they believe in God, up to 98% said yes. A Harris study specifically designed to arrive at the best current figure found that 9% do not believe in a creator, and 12% are not sure. The over tenfold expansion of Amerorationalism easily outpaces the Mormon and Pentecostal growth rates over the same half century.

America's disbelievers atheists now number 30 million, most well educated and higher income, and they far outnumber American Jews, Muslims and Mormons combined. There are many more disbelievers than Southern Baptists, and the god skeptics are getting more recruits than the evangelicals.

June 15, 2007 5:50 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Andrea- not anon
like so many others(usually the crazier anons), I am going off -topic. When people(not me) say "Oh, but Johnny Garza is a lawyer"- I want to point out the nutcase - lawyer and ALJ!- who is suing(and crying ) for $54,000,000 over some pants- which were probably the ones he was given in the first place, a day late. I added the info on his crying because of weepy Ruth.

June 15, 2007 6:28 PM  
Blogger Robert said...

Someone said:

"Basically, what Flew is saying is that the original reproducing organism on Earth would have had to have been too complex to not have been designed by some intelligent being."

I've always kind of wondered: who designed the intelligent designer? Isn't that a basic flaw in ID, unless we conclude an infinite sequence of designers receding back in time? Does this sequence approach a limit, or is it an inverse relationship? I've always wondered the same thing about entropy and time. If they want me to take ID seriously, they're going to have to address some of these questions.

rrjr

June 16, 2007 8:42 AM  
Anonymous LOL said...

Binkley and Opus discuss the surprising trend that books on atheism "are suddenly best-sellers."

http://www.salon.com/comics/opus/2007/06/17/opus/

June 17, 2007 9:06 AM  

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