Feeling a bit verbose, a few notes about what Mike P wrote. >"In the U.S. it is possible to run a college > along religious line (i.e., secterian) and there can be an uneasy > tension between the religious orientation maintained by the administration > and the individuals working there, especially the secular faculty and > faculty with different beliefs."
I think if a person works in a Christian college then the person has to agree with the faith precepts of the institution. So I doubt there would be any "secular" faculty at such institutions, and if there are, they are clearly being unethical under such circumstances. I'm not sure what you mean by "secular beliefs". If it is true that Ari is 1.2 million years older than Lucy (and I would imagine that this is the case given the amount of remains which were found and the diversity of scholars who worked on it) then it is not a "secular" or a "religious" belief, it would simply be a fairly well established fact for those that work in Christian colleges and those that do not. The tone of your post suggested, at least to me, that from the reference you provided I expected to see a problem where a "secular minded or secular faculty member" in a Christian institutions may have problems which conflict with that institutions administration (which should not occurr on any serious level since to work there, the person should be in principled agreement with the institutions world-view requirements). ">An example of the type of problem > one encounters is provided in the following article which appeared > in the AAUP publication "Academe": > http://www.aaup.org/AAUP/pubsres/academe/2006/JF/Feat/hill.htm"; However, the author of the article is actually bemoaning the discrimination by a secular organization against a religious one solely because the institution is a religious one (something one is not supposed to do to individuals). > But many times these facts conflict with religious beliefs and dogma > and "creation stories" (I believe that the terms "creation myths" is > now politically incorrect because various groups object to having > their stories about their origins treated as myths -- why should science > have the final say on how the world was created, eh?). This aspect of your post and the other about colleges with a literal interpretation of the bible and a 6,000 year old universe. Are these colleges not in the minority (compared with Christian institutions who hold a more complex view of life, the Bible, God, and the Universe)?----[If not, then perhaps you should move to Canada, eh!] >"why should science have the final say on how the world was created, eh?). I doubt science will ever have the final say on that. God can never be ruled out of the picture. Science may be able to elucidate the various mechanisms of how this planet came to be, but such explanations still woulndn't address "how the world came to be" in the more fundamental sense that God nevertheless still created it, and so religion will always have the final say. > Do we have any obligation in evaluating the evidence for Ardi and Lucy > and, if we find it to have sufficient validity, work to counter those that > might > claim that it is a fraud, especially if the claim is made on religious rather > than scientific grounds? I doubt whether any psychologist could assess the validity of the evidence for Ardi, we would simply be trusting the authority of the people working on it. I doubt the "6000 year old universe people" would claim it's a fraud. Probably, that the dating etc., is mistaken. Shouldn't scientists "work to counter" claims of fraud from any group? (And I would say just by doing good scientific work.) Why focus on "religious" grounds for claims of fraudulance? --Mike --- To make changes to your subscription contact: Bill Southerly ([email protected])
