Re: paleonet anti-evolutionism & a flat earth

[Bill Chaisson <chaisson@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

At 10:32 AM -0500 2/4/03, Steve Hageman wrote:
>Would it be "... religious discrimination, and the very antithesis of
>academic freedom,"  for astronomy professors to require their students to
>abandon an earth-centered view of the Solar system?  or a geography
>professors to ask their graduates to understand the theory of a spherical
>earth?

Because the theory of evolution contradicts a lot of Christian 
presumptions about humankind's importance in the grand scheme of 
things, it is a touchier subject than heliocentrism or the shape of 
the Earth.

A number of people have commented that the student must have been 
looking for a fight.  In fact, I have read that the student merely 
transferred to another (Christian) college and took the required 
course there.  It was actually some Christian legal activist that 
convinced him to haul Prof. Dini onto the carpet.

The fact that the student merely transferred to another college and 
got what he needed is very much a point in Prof. Dini's defense.  The 
US is, in fact, a free country with all kinds of universities: 
state-affiliated, church-affiliated and unaffiliated.  It is this 
pluralism that allows Prof. Dini to say upfront "Like it or lump it". 
He is not actually blocking the student's progress toward a career. 
He is merely upholding his own principles and the student is quite 
free to hold on to his and take another path toward his goal.  And he 
did.

Bill

-- 
-----------------------------------------------
William P. Chaisson
Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences
University of Rochester                       ph  585-275-0601
Rochester, New York  14627  USA            fax  585-244-5689

http://www.earth.rochester.edu/chaisson/chaisson.html