12/25   Why don't religious types who hate the theory of evolution cry about
        gravity being taught in high school physics?
        \_ Because 'theory' or not, gravity does not contradict anything in
           the bible.
        \_ Because they have about an 8th grade level education and it
           never occurred to them.
        \_ natural law was created by god
        \_ Because Newton was a devout Christian?
        \_ I'll vote for an overturn of gravity.  Gravity sucks.
        \_ It's hard to argue with 9.8m/s^2 in the here and now.
           it's verfiable, repeatable, and subject to continual experiments
           that can be completed within ones lifttime.
           \_ Just like evolution, gravity is a *theory* and not a *fact*.
              Schools should be emphasizing this and not teaching gravity
              as a universal truth.
              \_ Actually, Newton's gravitational theory is known to be wrong,
                 thanks to the accurate predictions of general relativity. I
                 don't think any effort is made to hide this fact.  Of course,
         at some level GR has to be wrong because of its inconsistincies
         with quantum mechanics, which in turn could only be an absolute
                 truth if God is a sick bastard.
                 \_ Newton's gravitational theory is NOT wrong. It is merely
                    incomplete. It's a great fallacy of the layperson who
                    has an incomplete understanding of classical mechanics
                    to believe that it is "wrong". If you were to argue
                    that classical mechanics is "wrong" then you'd have to
                    assume that 90% of science is "wrong" in the sense
                    that we utilize approximations for almost everything.
                    In fact, Newton's gravitational theory is what general
                    relativity approximates to in day-to-day observation.
                    Your definition of what "wrong" is is plainly idiotic.
                    -williamc
                    \_ I can't believe I'm being called a layperson by a
                       fucking sysadmin.  Newtwon's laws of gravitation
                       predict, among other things, an incorrect result
                       for the precession of the perihellion of Mercury.
                       GR gets the right answer, Newton's laws don't.
                                   \-GR gets a "better" answer.
                       Period.  The sense in which it is wrong is exactly
                       the sense in which creationists and their ilk are
                       claiming that evolution is not "right" as an absolute
                       truth.  I agree that that is a red herring which would
                       render most science wrong in some sense, but I think
                       that is precisely the point.  It is yet another way
                       for the right to try to not just fight a specific
                       scientific/political battle but to try to undermine
                       the very essence of science.
                 \_ QM has fully deterministic interpretations. -- ilyas
                    \_ Which almost no one believe.
                    \_ Which almost no one believe. I'm not saying they're
                       wrong.  I have no opinion one way or the other, but
                       these fundamental philosophical questions about QM
                       are awfuly hard to resolve experimentally.
                       \_ On the contrary, if no one believed in QM then
                          we wouldn't be sitting here typing to each other
                          on MOSFET driven devices, idiot. -williamc
                          \_ re-read the fucking post, idiot.  I meant the
                     deterministic interpretations of quantum mechanics.
                             The philosophical interpretations of quantum
                             mechanics have no bearing on practical predictions
                             or applications like MOSFET design.
                       \_ Your brain has been classified as: small.
                          \- you must pay me 5cents.
                             \_ ?
              \_ it is far more testable and verifiable via experiment than
                 evolution is (at the moment).
        \_ Biogenesis evolution is equivalent to a religious cult for
           secular extremists.
           \_ I think the appropraite response to this is "fuck you and die."
              \_ this is perfect example of cult behavior.
                 \- the comparison between the "evolution debate" and the
                    physics theories arent really comparable because the
                    anti-evolution crowd is not attacking they evolution
                    theory scientifically but are affimatively pushing a
                    crazy and non-scientific "explanation" [sic]. it's like
                    saying "newton's theory is wrong because it doenst
                    explain clairvoyance or telekinetic motion." something
                    like refining evolution from the crude species theory
                    to something more sophisticated on genes may be more
                    comparable to the "upgrade" to relativisitic theory. --psb
                        \_ from wikipedia: Since the emergence of modern
                         genetics in the 1940s, evolution has been
                         defined more specifically as a change in the
                         frequency of alleles from one generation to the next.