Monday, August 08, 2005

This is one of my favorite letters to the editor of the Bangkok Post today. I did not read the article referenced by this writer but he makes some important points in this controversy.
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" I really enjoyed Paul Krugman's column in Saturday's Bangkok Post and was not surprised by the degree that the US public is conditioned by misinformation and propaganda. The US still thinks it won World War Two, despite the Soviet Union taking on two-thirds of the Nazi army, and believes the US system of democracy and justice are unparalleled, etc.

However, given the fact that a significant, organised and vocal evangelical segment of the US population is pushing "creationism" from a "literal" interpretation of the Bible, does this mean that the so-called "god-given" facts from the Bible will be treated equally with science and taught in US schools?

Does this mean that "facts" such as the creation of the universe by "god" in 4004 BC and the process of creation taking seven earth/solar days, will be taught?

As for the Bible representing the unadulerated words of "god", wasn't the New Testament only compiled into 27 acceptable books during the fourth century from numerous other works after the Council of Nicaea in 325AD? Further, weren't these acceptable books actually translated from Aramaic, Hebrew and Greek into Latin by St Jerome at the end of the fourth century to form the Vulgate version of the New Testament? Or is Christian history, as well as the logic of modern cosmology, astronomy, particle physics, quantum mechanics and physics in general to be thrown out to accommodate the beliefs of Christian fundamentalists.

Clearly at this rate there will be no education system in the US soon and the 21st century will be the Chinese century.
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