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posted by n1 on Friday June 20 2014, @07:51AM   Printer-friendly
from the except-if-you-pay-for-it dept.

The UK government has banned all schools receiving public money from teaching creationism as science. Previously the ban was introduced to new free schools (that can be set up by anyone), but it has now been extended to all of them, including existing ones.

The funding agreement notes that the discussion of beliefs about the origin of the Earth including creationism are permitted in religious education "as long as it is not presented as a valid alternative to established scientific theory."

The United Kingdom's position on creationism in the classroom and public discourse is an interesting contrast to the United States', where celebrity scientist Bill Nye engages in public debate about the validity of creationism and two states, South Carolina and Missouri, saw anti-evolution bills proposed in the last month.

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 20 2014, @08:44AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 20 2014, @08:44AM (#57852)

    This will surely not appease God. He'll probably throw some natural disasters, economic instability or some national soccer losses their way. You know how he makes life difficult for the US southerners because of the gaypocolypse.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 20 2014, @08:55AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 20 2014, @08:55AM (#57854)

      Ever heard of global warming? Of course it's God's punishment for adhering to scientific theories instead of the bible! ;-)

      • (Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 20 2014, @09:09AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 20 2014, @09:09AM (#57858)

        Global warming is God's punishment for forcing God to create science. Things were so much simpler when the Bible was factually correct, but then those pesky humans used their free will to probe ever deeper into the inner workings of reality. Why, there was a time when atoms truly were atomic and indivisible, but damn scientists just had to invent the electron, and then the proton. And subatomic subdivision didn't end there, oh no. Inside protons are quarks, inside quarks are strings, inside strings is God telling you to fuck off! [smbc-comics.com]

    • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Friday June 20 2014, @09:32AM

      by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Friday June 20 2014, @09:32AM (#57865) Journal

      some national soccer losses their way

      You allude the lost of the game with Uruguay as an act of (an angry) God?

      --
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
      • (Score: 1) by Heathen on Friday June 20 2014, @02:11PM

        by Heathen (965) on Friday June 20 2014, @02:11PM (#57980)

        some national soccer losses their way

        You allude the lost of the game with Uruguay as an act of (an angry) God?

        It would be a very odd punishment as this was a UK government decision, not an English decision.

        • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Friday June 20 2014, @02:31PM

          by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Friday June 20 2014, @02:31PM (#57993) Journal

          It would be a very odd punishment as this was a UK government decision, not an English decision.

          And... what... UK govt is a non-English alien, I gather?

          --
          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
          • (Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 20 2014, @03:20PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 20 2014, @03:20PM (#58022)

            You do know England =/= UK, right?

            The UK is the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Great Britain comprises Scotland, Wales ... and England.

        • (Score: 2) by Open4D on Friday June 20 2014, @09:33PM

          by Open4D (371) on Friday June 20 2014, @09:33PM (#58168) Journal

          this was a UK government decision, not an English decision.

          But it might only apply to schools in England. I checked, and it wasn't immediately apparent.

    • (Score: 2, Funny) by q.kontinuum on Friday June 20 2014, @10:03AM

      by q.kontinuum (532) on Friday June 20 2014, @10:03AM (#57874) Journal

      He is all-knowing, he knew this was coming. That's why he created his culinary expertise the way he did...

      --
      Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
    • (Score: 2) by Open4D on Friday June 20 2014, @12:26PM

      by Open4D (371) on Friday June 20 2014, @12:26PM (#57926) Journal

      > This will surely not appease God. He'll probably throw some natural disasters ... You know how he makes life difficult for the US southerners because of the gaypocolypse.

      It's not just southern USA. In the UK, a town councillor (formerly Conservative Party, and now also formerly UKIP) informed [bbc.com] us that recent floods were God's punishment for gay marriage.

      This led to much mockery (e.g. Photoshop fun [phillucas.com] (or should I say GIMP fun?))

       
      However, it should be pointed out that the mainstream Roman Catholic and Church of England views accept evolution. So if either of those religions is the One True Religion, then Britain is safe in this regard. (But if the Accelerated Christian Education group is correct, frankly I'd rather drown [wordpress.com].)

      • (Score: 2) by Pslytely Psycho on Saturday June 21 2014, @05:33AM

        by Pslytely Psycho (1218) on Saturday June 21 2014, @05:33AM (#58321)

        That ACE link has just removed what small hope I had left for humanity.
        I hadn't heard of it before. Sokath, his eyes uncovered.

        from the link:
        "In the United Kingdom, UK NARIC has deemed qualifications based on ACE to be comparable to A-level. Ofsted routinely whitewashes ACE schools in reports, and ACE nurseries teaching creationism receive government funding.

        In New Zealand, ACE qualifications are accepted for university entrance.

        In the USA, ACE’s Lighthouse Christian Academy is accredited by MSA-CESS. The curriculum is used in government-funded creationist voucher programs in eleven states.

        In South Africa, based on HESA’s recommendation, a number of universities have signed up to accept ACE graduates.

        ACE says its curriculum is used in 192 countries and 6000 schools worldwide."

        Now that is just downright SCARY.

        After reading the questions he posted with a casual search of the program, this system would produce a person with ZERO abilities to think critically about anything.
        They would be perplexed and dumbfounded when presented with the simplest problem that did not have an immediately obvious answer, and anything they didn't understand would come down to 'God did it.'

        And this shit is accredited?!?!?

        My Sig is supposed to be a joke....

        --
        Alex Jones lawyer inspires new TV series: CSI Moron Division.
  • (Score: 5, Informative) by Open4D on Friday June 20 2014, @10:27AM

    by Open4D (371) on Friday June 20 2014, @10:27AM (#57887) Journal

    The background to this issue is that the current UK goverment is undertaking a massive programme to place a large portion of England's taxpayer-funded school system in to the hands of special interest groups, including various religious bodies. It is this that makes the creationism-as-science ban even necessary in the first place - which should make people sit up and take notice of what the government is doing. Maybe they should ban teaching that the Earth is the centre of the Universe next? The fact is, if control over children's education is being placed in the hands of self-appointed idiots for whom such rules are neccessary, those kids are screwed either way. The idiots will have plenty of taxpayers money to help them find ways around the rules, or just focus on spreading their idiocy in other areas.

     
    The National Secular Society* has been pointing out the problems [secularism.org.uk] for a while now. Here's the relevant section [secularism.org.uk] of their website. If anyone cares about this topic, they should join [secularism.org.uk] them. (Mainly for UK residents, but overseas membership is also available.)

    Also look at http://fairadmissions.org.uk/ [fairadmissions.org.uk] and the British Humanist Association's http://www.justgiving.com/nofaithschools/ [justgiving.com]

     
    Can't we send kids to the same schools as the other kids on their street, rather than labelling them with their parents' religion and segregating them on that basis for 13 of the most formative years of their lives?

     
     
    * They also broke [secularism.org.uk] the story that some of you may remember about religious idiots redacting science exams (with government approval!), which eventually led to a policy u-turn [secularism.org.uk]

    • (Score: 5, Insightful) by isostatic on Friday June 20 2014, @12:35PM

      by isostatic (365) on Friday June 20 2014, @12:35PM (#57933) Journal
      1. We used to send kids to schools based on their religious upbringing. A few (offspring of rich people) being sent to private schools to learn how to run the country.
      2. We then to send kids to schools based on their academic abilities, those acedemically gifted went to one school, and the rest of us went to another. A few (offspring of rich people) being sent to private schools to learn how to run the country.
      3. Then we sent all kids to the same schools, with a few (offspring of rich people) being sent to private schools to learn how to run the country.
      4. We now send kids to schools based on their religious upbringing. A few (offspring of rich people) being sent to private schools to learn how to run the country.
    • (Score: 3, Interesting) by kaszz on Friday June 20 2014, @02:14PM

      by kaszz (4211) on Friday June 20 2014, @02:14PM (#57984) Journal

      > Can't we send kids to the same schools as the other kids on their street, rather than labelling them with their parents' religion and segregating them on that basis for 13 of the most formative years of their lives?

      How would we then create a tense religiously polarized society? :P

      Kids: Choose parents wisely before being conceived that will tell you about reality and that will send you to a school with sane teachers and knowledge content.

      If you ended up with the wrong parents. Then get sane friends and seek out the knowledge and education that will be useful for the life you really want to live. Become independent ASAP. If it's critical, then ask for adoption.

    • (Score: 2) by opinionated_science on Friday June 20 2014, @07:22PM

      by opinionated_science (4031) on Friday June 20 2014, @07:22PM (#58121)

      you are spot on. Perhaps as a society we should start to recognize the problems with having a population that is being distracted from the objective evidence of the world around them. Perhaps religion should not be in school at all- or perhaps one time period a week with no bias (which is how ny school was).

      Creationism is the product of deluded humans, in the same way as all religious dogma. To be fair, the global warming debate versus the science is a classic example.

      Perhaps we need a good court case to sue the major religions for fraud, since they take money for something that cannot be proven....Yes naughty thinking, but it is clear that secularism has a unique place in the successful future of the human species...

      We are all human first, everything else second....

    • (Score: 1) by q.kontinuum on Monday June 23 2014, @09:01AM

      by q.kontinuum (532) on Monday June 23 2014, @09:01AM (#58921) Journal

      I was educated in a catholic grammar school most of the time, switched to another school just for the last to years to achieve my A-level. I visited physics and mathematics lessons in a couple of schools to check which one suited me best to finish my A-level, and to be honest: I didn't find any school better than the one I had to leave. For the other topics I can't say much, but our Biology and Chemistry lessons were definitely adequate. Even the religion lessons were focused on religion as a science (which books and historical persons are the different religions based on, what do they have in common, in which ways are they different, etc. There was no grade-benefit for strict believers. I was one of the most annoying pupils my teacher, a priest, had, I was the only pupil bothering him enough to actually start shouting at me, and bothering him even more by not fighting back but instead pointing out the flaws in his logic. Which earned me his respect and an A)

      That said, there were some drawbacks as well. The holy mass was mandatory once every two weeks, religion was a mandatory course, and for the focus areas I wanted to pick (mathematics and physics) there were not enough interested pupils to have these courses, which forced me to change school.

      This might or might not be typical for schools governed by a church, but it is at least for me a very positive example, even after

      --
      Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
      • (Score: 2) by Open4D on Monday June 23 2014, @02:31PM

        by Open4D (371) on Monday June 23 2014, @02:31PM (#59006) Journal

        I attended nominally Christian schools in the 80s and 90s, and it didn't do me much harm. But they were taxpayer-funded, and the taxpayers were represented in the schools' management via central and local government. These days, with extra religions being represented, and control handed over to the religious bodies, new schools don't need to cater so much to pupils of other religions, or the non-devout. So we have Muslim groups with their madrassas, and Christian attempts to emulate madrassas. It seems that Michael Gove would like to see at least one of each in every town - funded by you.

        As I say, we're moving towards a society where kids are increasingly labelled with their parents' religion and segregated on that basis for 13 of the most formative years of their lives. The added 'bonus' is that by having Muslim, Jewish, Sikh and Hindu schools as well as Christian ones, there will also be a high degree of racial segregation.

        Disaster.