Influx of 'Boy Racers' into the club?

[Tannhauser]

Being a biology teacher, it really riles her that she's no longer allowed to teach Darwin's theory of evolution as being "fact" because it's "just a theory" and some types get offended by it . I'm sure similar things are happening in the syllabus' for other subjects too.

 

My pedant's heart won't let this one pass. All due respect to your Mum, but no scientist has any business referring to evolution as a 'fact'. It is rightly referred to as a theory, inasmuch as it is a conceptual construct used to explain observations. You can perhaps label observations as 'facts', but not constructs.

 

Labelling it as a theory doesn't imply that it's on shaky ground. There's an overwhelming amount of evidence for it.

 

I understand your central point about teachers being forced into an excessive senstivity about their pupils' belief systems - I'm amazed that this is the case with evolution in the UK. I mean, I'm just astonished (and dismayed) by that. But religion aside, evolution is a theory, in the same way that Relativity is.

[Dave17]

Oh this thread makes me laugh! 12 pages of whinging about people's spelling and grammer. Dear God lads', let's just be a bit more relaxed, not everyone here will have been afforded the luxury of an expensive education. I agree there are standards, be they rising or falling, but we come from a mixed society, and as such i feel we should be tolerant. After all, who cares if someone miss spells "School", is it going to kill us to let it go?

[Tannhauser]

Oh this thread makes me laugh! 12 pages of whinging about people's spelling and grammer. Dear God lads', let's just be a bit more relaxed, not everyone here will have been afforded the luxury of an expensive education. I agree there are standards, be they rising or falling, but we come from a mixed society, and as such i feel we should be tolerant. After all, who cares if someone miss spells "School", is it going to kill us to let it go?

 

It isn't twelve pages of whinging though, is it? A fair proportion of the thread is debate or humorous comments. There is some discussion, also, about the reasons why English usage is changing.

 

Spelling and grammar are not necessarily connected to an 'expensive education', whatever that means. Plenty of autodidacts around.

[Rob]

4) A shift in cultural values. I think popular culture today more than ever teaches us to be mistrustful of intellectualism and education. Look at our cultural icons - they are, on the whole, reminders that you don't need brains or education to do very well for yourself. Look at documentaries and try and find one without super-slick, superfast editing - they are a rarity. All of our popular culture experience tells us that expressing ideas in a formal way is outdated and irrelevant.

 

I really wish I could find an argument to say that bit isn't true. Depressingly I cannot, and yet again my wife has returned from the weekly shop with £9 worth of "celebrity gossip" magazines.

[Gazboy]

Edit, since this is primarily a car forum, after observing another post about a mechanical problem, i think its about time that bad mechanical practice was taken to task as diligently as is spelling and punctuation!

 

After all we wouldn't want to have double standards would we:rolleyes:

 

Edit no2, just to keep the anal's happy;)

Please be sure to be equally observant in your technical posts won't you;)

 

I doubt you will get any argument here.

[RedM]

I doubt you will get any argument here.

 

Edit no2, just to keep the anal's happy;)

 

Erm...

[kins]

this is almost as much fun as the your and you're discussion. Heres a cartoon to remind you which is which...

 

Simply awesome.

 

Lets not get them started on "there, their and they're" or "were and where".... we'd be here all night lol

 

I think "its" was right by the way.

[juanchan]

My pedant's heart won't let this one pass....

 

...evolution is a theory, in the same way that Relativity is.

 

At times like this I wish I was better debater, but I've never been particularly adept at constructing a truly well thought out argument.

 

Taking your example of relativity: It's been a while since I did physics in school, but the effects of relativity can be seen and recorded. You can see it happening, given the right equipment. Exactly how it happens is still unanswered, but it does happen.

 

In my view, the same can be said of evolution. It can be seen in fossil records that it has happened. Whether someone's religion/beliefs disagrees with that is irrelevant IMO, when there are facts available to prove it. It's one of those catch 22's; It occurs too slowly in nature for us to document it in action at the present time, so it remains as a "theory". Horses and dogs, to name a couple of animals, have been bred to have specific traits over many generations. Domesticated horses now have elongated and weak backs; some dogs are small, tall, long haired, short haired etc where they used to be otherwise. In simplistic terms, that's a forced form of 'evolution' in action, and the results of it are easily identifiable.

 

The subject of evolution has recently been brought to the fore for the likes of my mum: Some scientific 'religious' author has published a book about fossils that apparently refute the theory of evolution. In it he displays fossils, each of them X million years old, of animals that are still present in the world today. It's religious propaganda at it's strongest, and there are some plain lies contained in it (one that springs to mind was a fossil of a "herring" - it had massive fangs like a deep sea angling fish. How that was ever a herring I don't know). He has, for want of a better expression, pimped his book out to schools across the country, requesting that they teach his so-called findings in preference to any theories of evolution. For those reasons, I apologise if I appear to feel quite strongly on the subject, but I find it genuinely hard to believe that people can say it's never happened

[Tannhauser]

 

You've gone to a lot of trouble with your post, but I think you're mainly defending something that I'm in no way attacking.

 

I'm not at all disputing that evolution is the correct explanation of everything from reindeer's antlers to dinosaurs. I also accept everything that you say that shows evolution in action. I think that the 'religious' author you're referring to might be William Demski - or a UK version. At any rate, it's the 'intelligent design' school of thought. If it's being taught over here, again that's outrageous. So far, we're completely in agreement.

 

What I'm picking up on is the distinction between 'fact' and 'theory' in Science. Scientists, almost universally, don't use the terms 'scientific fact' or 'scientific proof'. Instead, they talk about observations providing strong support for theories.

 

Facts are observations about the world. Theories are explanations of those observations. In one sense, evolution is a fact: for example, the observation that dogs can be selectively bred for different characteristics, we can call a 'fact'. But if we ask "How do we explain how life developed into so many forms?" and answer "evolution" (meaning Darwinian natural selection), then we are using the word 'evolution' as a mechanism by which these observations are explained. That's a theory.

 

The trouble is that in general English usage, 'theory' means something that is possibly dodgy and open to question, whereas 'fact' means something you can't dispute. But referring to evolution as a theory isn't reducing its authority at all: it's just referring to it as an explanation that is based on evidence and which makes testable predictions.

[Tannhauser]

Right, this is what I was trying to say (courtesy of Wikipedia -sorry )

 

The argument that evolution is a theory, not a fact, has often been made against the exclusive teaching of evolution. The argument is related to a common misconception about the technical meaning of "theory" that is used by scientists. In common usage, "theory" often refers to conjectures, hypotheses, and unproven assumptions. However, in science, "theory" usually means "a plausible or scientifically acceptable general principle or body of principles offered to explain phenomena"

 

Not everybody agrees with this traditional distinction between fact and theory, though, especially when it comes to evolution.

[juanchan]

 

Glad we agree on that one

 

The author in question isn't William Demski - his name isn't of European/Western descent. To the best of my knowledge, intelligent design and creationism aren't taught in schools, but Darwin's theory of evolution is now to be taught as one of many possible explanations for the varied life on Earth.

 

 

Very succinct explanation (even if half of it was from wiki )

[Pete]

It seems a lot of people are getting the recently. That won't help evolution much.

[hogmaw]

 

Very succinct explanation (even if half of it was from wiki )

 

Nothing wrong with that, he looked something up so he could make an informed comment. Much better that than religious mumbo jumbo or pub talk.

[L33]

http://www.madhousebeyond.com/?mode=txtspeak

[L33]

i persoannly cant think of any thing more annoying then when people use a lot of txt speach. cant understand a word they are saying. notice the younger kids are the ones that use it a lot more. my brother is 15 and i swear his txts are in code because of the amount of abreviations that they know. madness

 

in txt for the chavs amung us

 

I PRSNLLY CNT THNK OF NE THNG MR ANNYNG THN WHN PPL US A LT OF TXT SPEACH. CNT UNDRSTND A WRD THY R SYNG. NTC TH YOUNGR KDS R TH ONS THT US IT A LT MR. MY BRTHR IS 15 I SWEAR HS TXTS R IN CD BCAUS OF TH AMOUNT OF ABBRVTNS THT THY KNW MDNSS

[L33]

Nw we cn al us th wbst 2 al sound lke tssrs !!!!!!!!

[L33]

i will stop its annoying myself

[RobSheffield]

i persoannly cant think of any thing more annoying then when people use a lot of txt speach. cant understand a word they are saying. notice the younger kids are the ones that use it a lot more. my brother is 15 and i swear his txts are in code because of the amount of abreviations that they know. madness

 

I personally cant think of any thing more annoying then when people use a lot of txt speach. Cant understand a word they are saying. Notice the younger kids are the ones that use it a lot more. My brother is 15 and i swear his txts are in code because of the amount of abbreviations that they know. Madness.

[madwoody1]

So just checking on this if you change your car from standard factory set up are you a boy racer?

[Pete]

I personally cant think of any thing more annoying then when people use a lot of txt speach. Cant understand a word they are saying. Notice the younger kids are the ones that use it a lot more. My brother is 15 and i swear his txts are in code because of the amount of abbreviations that they know. Madness.

You missed a few.

[L33]

I personally cant think of any thing more annoying then when people use a lot of txt speach. Cant understand a word they are saying. Notice the younger kids are the ones that use it a lot more. My brother is 15 and i swear his txts are in code because of the amount of abbreviations that they know. Madness.

 

 

Sorry Rob

[L33]

So just checking on this if you change your car from standard factory set up are you a boy racer?

 

 

Thats not what is being said at all. Not many people on here have standard set up. It's just the way some people go on about racing etc and just generally being immature.

[Tricky-Ricky]

So just checking on this if you change your car from standard factory set up are you a boy racer?

 

Probably;)

[L33]

Think it was last week some gobby prat was banned from here for being a complete noob and mouthing off and then started mouthing off a super mod! Just dont need people like that on the site.

[RobSheffield]

You missed a few.

 

I am a busy man

 

Sorry Rob

 

I am going to let it slide this time, but I want to see more effort in future.

 

B-