I like this guy!

[Dromond]

A great quote from Matrix: Reloaded.

Commander Lock: Dammit, Morpheus! Not everyone believes what you believe!

Morpheus: My beliefs do not require them to.

---------

[Zarathustra]

I agree, that's a nice quote. I think it's an admirable quality for one to recognize that they don't need their belief to be universal or absolute in order to hold it. If one must insist that everyone else acknowledge their own personal beliefs as if these beliefs were even more true than facts, this has got to say something about the confidence one has in one's beliefs.

Back to teaching absolute truth . . . we could do this in two ways. First, we could treat school like church and teach it as a true, unquestionable dogma. Or, we could teach it like a philosophy class as something to be questioned. If (as I said before) you're teaching it from the world-view of absolute truth actually being true, then you can't question it. But if you're teaching it from the world-view of something to be questioned, then you're right back to what Rusmeister claims is already being taught: there is no absolute truth, you can believe whatever you want.

Those are the only two possibilities: either dogma, or critical thinking. If anyone can point out a middle ground, I'd like to hear it. Dogma precludes critical thinking, and critical thinking precludes dogma. You can't half-ass absolute truth. Saying that there might be absolute truth is just as skeptical as saying there is no absolute truth, because in either case you're saying that the answer isn't absolute.

So I'm not sure exactly what Rusmeister would like to do about this situation. Would he prefer our schools teach dogma? Does he think that by teaching critical thinking we're already teaching a kind of dogma? That's nonsensical. I might agree that we're teaching some dogmas in as much as we're not teaching enough critical thinking, but the practice of critical thinking isn't itself a dogma.

So it's either school or church. A church can teach school subjects (as part of a larger dogma, at least), and a school can teach church subjects (from an objective, rational perspective which does not endorse them), but in either case you've got a clear world-view from which these subjects can be taught (dogma or critical thinking).

Should all schools teach as if they are churches? You can't have it both ways. It's like trying to teach creationism in science class as if it were science; it blurs the line between science and pseudo-science. Similarly, if we didn't teach kids that they can believe what they want, that they should question everything and develop critical thinking, then we are blurring the line between education and indoctrinization.

Rus, you aren't arguing against the way education is taught. You are arguing against education itself, in favor of indoctrinization.

[rusmeister]

Not being understood is getting really boring. Worse, some evidently think they understand what I have been saying when it is clear from the responses that most still don't. They are just...responding, but not really to what I am actually saying, but only to pieces of what they see I have said.
That's an excellent reason to drop out, which is what I'm going to do for a while - maybe for good.

Parting shots -
We all hear parents wring their hands - how they can't get their children to read, and then the gasps of gratitude when some of them 'rise' to the level of reading Harry Potter.
I look at books written for readers in the 18th and 19th centuries (children's books are especially glaring) and I see writing that few have any patience to read, and that we wouldn't expect 9-10 year-olds to read at all, except as heavily adapted versions with pictures on every facing page - right now I'm looking at "The Last of the Mohicans". 1826. 3rd world backwater, my butt. Kids don't, and even can't read that today - unless maybe if they have been homeschooled or are the rare exception that really does read all the time.

I look at the fact that both of my BIL's (Russian) are hired on H1B visas to fill positions that Americans can't, because their (Americans') training in our vaunted sciences just isn't up to the levels required. And many other things you hear around us all the time.

In fact, we always complain about the results our public schools produce - until someone really says what I've been saying - and then - boy, do we rush to defend them.

Malik, I see no point in responding when my main point, repeated multiple times, evidently gets across to you in a badly garbled form.

Dogma precludes critical thinking, and critical thinking precludes dogma.

This is simply not true. It is possible that dogma can do so, but it is also possible that one can reach dogmas via critical thinking. If they reach a final conclusion VIA critical thinking, then you can hardly say that they have precluded it. Since the rest of the argument is a false dilemma, I won't respond to it. If what I'M saying is true, then the tables are turned, and it is the rejection of dogmas that is the rejection of true education.

The mixing and matching of understanding of absolute truths (particularly the ones known via revelation) and learned truths (via the sciences) is a basic bait-and-switch approach. When Christians speak about evidence we get accused of teaching absolute truth. When we speak about faith, we get accused of failing to produce evidence. We can't win. Damned if we do, and damned if we don't. So right now I am talking about schools and presenting evidence that you WERE indoctrinated into specific dogma, and that gets ignored, or passed off with statistics about it being better or whatever (justifying the dogmatic indoctrination that does in fact happen).
I've told you, from verifiable evidence and personal experience, what has been done. This is what I actually meant by people not believing, even if someone came back from the dead to tell them. You have the Gospels, hear them.

Your belief that truth is Absolute is itself a personal belief.

I rest my case. If that doesn't prove my thesis, I don't know what will.

At the very least, I hope that it has been made clear that not all of Christianity is ignorant radical fundamentalism; that it is possible to be both highly intelligent, and a believer; that faith and reason are not incompatible. IOW, don't knock the faith just because there are idiots out there. Idiots are not the whole story.

All the best,
Rusmeister

[Seven Words]

Rus--

I have NEVER asserted that faith and reason are mutually exclusive.

I am NOT being sarcastic with this, but stating something which seems ot be obvious with your last post...your definition of dogma and mine (and it seems Maliks) are NOT the same. TO me (can't speak for Malik on this, but everyone I know agrees with this definition except for some who change their tune when "religious" is put before the term dogma) dogma means a set of beliefs or rules given by an authority which it is not permissible to question. Judging by his post, Malik's definition of dogma is similar to my own. And dogma, if defined that way, IS indeed incompatible with critical thinking. Could you explain how you define the term dogma, before this semantics issue leads to acrimony?

I differentiate between evidence and OBJECTIVE evidence. Personal experiences can be evidence, but they are not OBJECTIVE evidence. I have not asked for evidence, but for objective evidence. As long as faith si not asserted as being equal to objective evidence I have no problem with Christians (or any other religion) bringing up faith. Since it ISN'T objective evidence or proof, I'm unmoved by it. You mentioned reading teh Gospels. I have. Nothing in them ahs been proven (objective evidence, etc.) TO me, this does NOT mean they are not true, there's no proof of that either. Without objective evidence and/or proof, its really rather pointless to argue about it. Just as the Qu'ran is purported to be teh Word of God by Muslims...given the absence of evidence to support or refute that assertion, I say, "Maybe it is, maybe it isn't, we don't know", because any other answer is intellectually dishonest.

[Cybrweez]

Your belief that truth is Absolute is itself a personal belief.

Which, of course, is absolutely true. Well, only to malik anyway. Or whoever believes that. Oh no, here we go.

[Zarathustra]

Not being understood is getting really boring. Worse, some evidently think they understand what I have been saying when it is clear from the responses that most still don't. They are just...responding, but not really to what I am actually saying, but only to pieces of what they see I have said.

I've only read your posts here which occurred before my first post. I haven't read the other ones, besides this one, and maybe a bit of another one about the "war of philosophies" and the fact that public schools won't ever be dismantled and rebuilt from the ground up. How many posts do you need to make your point? I have responded to "pieces" of your posts just like you've responded to pieces of mine. Language is linear. If there are pieces which you still want me to address, all you have to do is point them out. Complaining and whining about it doesn't achieve anything.

We all hear parents wring their hands - how they can't get their children to read, and then the gasps of gratitude when some of them 'rise' to the level of reading Harry Potter.

Is this the fault of failing to teach absolute truth? How will adding the doctrine of absolute truth help in any way to improve our children's reading lists?

I look at the fact that both of my BIL's (Russian) are hired on H1B visas to fill positions that Americans can't, because their (Americans') training in our vaunted sciences just isn't up to the levels required. And many other things you hear around us all the time.

I agree that our schools aren't the best they can be. But, again, how would teaching absolute truth help someone learn science better? Perhaps the problem is different than the one you've identified. Maybe it's the teachers' unions and government monopoly. I'd be perfectly fine with having the government completely removed from education, and turn it over to the private sector.

Malik, I see no point in responding when my main point, repeated multiple times, evidently gets across to you in a badly garbled form.

You keep repeating that complaint, but you never explain exactly what is garbled. Why don't you quote where I got you wrong, and then give a corrected version?

Dogma precludes critical thinking, and critical thinking precludes dogma.

This is simply not true. It is possible that dogma can do so, but it is also possible that one can reach dogmas via critical thinking. If they reach a final conclusion VIA critical thinking, then you can hardly say that they have precluded it. Since the rest of the argument is a false dilemma, I won't respond to it. If what I'M saying is true, then the tables are turned, and it is the rejection of dogmas that is the rejection of true education.

Sure, you can reach dogmas via critical thinking. But then as soon as you accept the dogma, you are no longer critically thinking about what you've accepted. I don't see the problem here. What I said was true. Reaching a conclusion isn't the problem (nor is that dogma). Uncritically accepting a conclusion without considerin the possibility that it may be wrong is the problem. That's dogma. Having opinions--even very strong opinions--isn't dogma. Saying that your opinion holds for all peolpe for all times for all circumstances, and it can't possibly be any other way . . . that's dogma. And no one who thinks critically about their beliefs can arive at such a conclusion, because once you arrive at such a conclusion you no longer think critically about it.

The mixing and matching of understanding of absolute truths (particularly the ones known via revelation) and learned truths (via the sciences) is a basic bait-and-switch approach. When Christians speak about evidence we get accused of teaching absolute truth. When we speak about faith, we get accused of failing to produce evidence. We can't win. Damned if we do, and damned if we don't. So right now I am talking about schools and presenting evidence that you WERE indoctrinated into specific dogma, and that gets ignored, or passed off with statistics about it being better or whatever (justifying the dogmatic indoctrination that does in fact happen).

You are the one trying to mix "learned truths" and "absolute truths." That's your entire thesis, here, that the problem with public schools is that they separate these two realms of study. And (if I understand you correctly), you think that school should be mixing these two "realms." My point was school teaches students things about the world. The world is an arena of contingent facts (contingent upon starting conditions, reference frame, perspective, measuring device, choice of variables to be measured, etc.). There is nothing in the world that is absolute. So why would you want to teach students things about the world from the world-view of absolute truth? The appropriate world-view to teach students about the world would be the world-view that actually reflects the nature of the world. But you are complaining about that very point.

Now, if we're educating children about things not of this world, like Heaven and Hell, then perhaps an absolutist world-view would be appropriate. But like I said, that's church. Not school. So I agree with you that empirical issues and issues of faith shouldn't be mixed. Yet, as soon as you label this as a "bait-and-switch" approach, you immediately go back to advocating precisely that: mixing understanding of absolute truths with learned truths. If mixing these is a logical fallacy, then why on earth would you want to teach school from this perspective??

I've told you, from verifiable evidence and personal experience, what has been done. This is what I actually meant by people not believing, even if someone came back from the dead to tell them. You have the Gospels, hear them.

I believe your personal account that school teaches students from the point of view of relative truths, instead of absolute truths. In fact, I've been arguing over and over that this is the only way to educate, rather than indoctrinate. But I disagree with you that this is some kind of "war of philosophies" or an anti-christian bias. It's simply the only way to teach things about the world (i.e. all the subjects taught in school, not church) without performing the very "mixing" and "bait-and-switch" which you pointed out above.

Your belief that truth is Absolute is itself a personal belief.

I rest my case. If that doesn't prove my thesis, I don't know what will.

What do you mean? If you think this is conclusive proof of something, why don't you explain it? Do you disagree that you personally believe in an absolute truth, while I personally do not? We both have two different beliefs. We both think each other is wrong. How is this possible if there is only one way to believe?

Obviously, there are multiple ways to believe. Obviously, there is no conclusive way to prove your belief is the only correct one. The fact taht you can't prove your belief is the only correct way to believe shows that your belief is personal, not absolute. How in the world does this situation prove that truth is absolute?

At the very least, I hope that it has been made clear that not all of Christianity is ignorant radical fundamentalism; that it is possible to be both highly intelligent, and a believer; that faith and reason are not incompatible. IOW, don't knock the faith just because there are idiots out there. Idiots are not the whole story.

This is a common theme of your posts. I agree that there are smart Christians. No one is arguing differnently here. You seem to proceed from a sense of victimization that isn't real. And I think this lies behind your theories of education, too. You think your world-view is being secretly targeted when it's not. You think we're accusing you of being unintelligent when we're not.

Faith and reason ARE incompatible. They both deal with realms that are completely unrelated. If reason can solve an issue, there is no need to invoke faith. Faith is used when reason or evidence cannot be brought to bear on the subject at hand (and sometimes is it clung to even when evidence and reason has shown it to be false). Reason can be used to analyze faith, but faith can only be used to dismiss or ignore reason.

I do not have faith in reason or evidence. The efficacy of these are given to me in apodectic certainty (like knowing that 2 + 2 = 4), or given in immediate objective experience. There might be something like "revelation," but neither reason nor empirical evidence can be brought to bear upon it . . . unless what is "revealed" deals with this world and it can be tested.

[Zarathustra]

Your belief that truth is Absolute is itself a personal belief.

Which, of course, is absolutely true. Well, only to malik anyway. Or whoever believes that. Oh no, here we go.

It's not absolutely true. It's a contingent fact. It's contingent upon the fact that humans are by their nature subjective beings who view the universe from a limited perspective that is defined by their reference frame, their understanding, their knowledge, and their existence as organic beings occupying a particular (not universal) place and a particular time. If, on the other hand, humans weren't immersed in these limitations by the fact of their existence (which is itself a contingent product of evolution), then their beliefs might be otherwise. There is nothing absolute about my claim. It's merely an observation of fact.

Your insinuation that my claim is an absolutist claim is like saying that "the sky is blue" is an absolutist claim. No, I'm merely looking up and noting the color of this sky on this planet. Other planets might have other colors. My claim is an observation which is made within a recognition of contingent facts, not an absolutist claim about knowledge in general.

If you or Rusmeister had lived 3000 years ago (before Christ), everything about your belief system which you think of as "absolutely true" would not even have happened yet. How can an Absolute Truth not be true for all times?

[rusmeister]

Malik, the contingent fact about you is that you don't WANT to know. I could spend the better part of the next year expounding on Christian teaching, the history of salvation, what the Old Testament and past history generally means in the light of Christ, but you really don't want to hear it. You never ask, "what is the explanation for thus-and-so?" You just condemn it without trying to find out.

That's really key. You have to really want to know; have to have the mind of an enquirer to be able to understand the thing I am defending. As long as you don't really care if you know or not, there's nothing I can do for you, and going back and forth like this is senseless. Which is why I am no longer going to do it. (In addition, courtesy is like a drink from a mountain stream; and discourtesy is like a drink from...)

7W had a couple of fair questions I'll try to answer later. I really am tired of going ten rounds, though.

[Fist and Faith]

rus, I, for one, will be glad to validate your first paragraph. (Can't quote it by itself with my cell.) As I've said a few times, for me, that's putting the cart before the horse. First, I must believe any creator exists, before I'll entertain the ideas you're talking about.

But I need not know all of that for this discussion. At least not the part I am trying to clarify. What reason is there to think the objective facts I want public school to teach should not be taught outside of some worldview? They clearly can be taught without it. If you don't know about music theory, I can teach you here. Even without hearing music, you can understand what I'm teaching. But a keyboard or guitar will let you hear it, no training needed.

What you do with it is up to you. Write Vespers or rock songs.

But you insist that it not only shouldn't be taught without telling you what it all means, in regards to man's place and purpose, but that it can't. That assertion is, as far as I know, groundless. If I'm wrong, I'd like to understand. Can you give me anything other than your and Chesterton's assurances? Can't we start one step at a time? I wouldn't begin teaching you music theory by telling you about secondary dominants, or Neopolitan 6 chords. I'd tell you what the smallest musical interval in the western system is, and tell you how to find and recognize them on the guitar and keyboard. Can't you give me Step 1 of your thinking?

[rusmeister]

Thanks, Fist,
In an attempt to wrap up what I have said, without further debate:
"Contingent facts":
1) The American school system was adopted from Prussia; specifically studied and copied in the U.S., and first adopted in Massachusetts, most specifically by Horace Mann. It was then adopted in NY and from there spread across the nation.
2) The Prussian system was designed, not for the enlightenment of young minds, but to wrest control of the populace from local rulers (aristocracy) to the king, and to ensure loyalty to him and unquestioning obedience. Un.ques.tion.ing.
This system eventually produced the people that supported Nazi Germany (and the people that supported a war in Iraq, btw).
3) This is the system by which most of you were educated. (I even went through 8 grades, myself).

Chesterton doesn't offer "assurances". He gives examples. I don't think you read what I posted:

The old unpsychological school of instructors used to say:
"What possible sense can there be in mixing up arithmetic
with religion?" But arithmetic is mixed up with religion,
or at the worst with philosophy. It does make a great deal
of difference whether the instructor implies that truth is real,
or relative, or changeable, or an illusion. The man who said,
"Two and two may make five in the fixed stars", was teaching arithmetic
in an anti-rational way, and, therefore, in an anti-Catholic way.
The Catholic is much more certain about the fixed truths than about
the fixed stars.

As to why I should give a darn about math, or music, or anything else, and submit myself to its teaching, you can't deny that a specific philosophy must be offered: Why should I care about beauty? If I don't, then teaching me music is meaningless. We must proceed from some common assumptions in order to not merely stare at each other like aliens. You have to start from a philosophy, and either impose it on a child, and correct him when he is wrong, or admit that the child's (or parents') view is equally "valid" - that music may have no value whatsoever. If you claim any truth, then you have adopted a philosophy. If you claim no truths whatsoever, then what do you have to teach me?

[Fist and Faith]

As to why I should give a darn about math, or music, or anything else, and submit myself to its teaching, you can't deny that a specific philosophy must be offered: Why should I care about beauty? If I don't, then teaching me music is meaningless. We must proceed from some common assumptions in order to not merely stare at each other like aliens. You have to start from a philosophy, and either impose it on a child, and correct him when he is wrong, or admit that the child's (or parents') view is equally "valid" - that music may have no value whatsoever. If you claim any truth, then you have adopted a philosophy. If you claim no truths whatsoever, then what do you have to teach me?

Ah! I understand.

This idea puts us at a permanent standstill, doesn't it? If it's impossible to keep a philosophy out of every aspect of teaching, and we have different philosophies, then the only answer to public education is to eliminate it. I suppose we might find that we agree on the importance of one or two subjects being taught to everyone. Reading? But even then, it's possible that you think Greek and Hebrew are more important than English, because they will allow one to better understand the original texts of the Bible. As well as the fact that the first thing we'd need to teach would be how to speak Greek and Hebrew. So we're at a standstill again.

Anyway, my philosophy would probably be a lot like V-ger's: Teach all that can be taught. Yes, impossible. But give as thorough a cross-section of fields of knowledge as we can, so that, as they grow, each person can discover what best suits them, and what fires their passion. Then they can become more specialized in their schooling.

[Zarathustra]

Malik, the contingent fact about you is that you don't WANT to know. I could spend the better part of the next year expounding on Christian teaching, the history of salvation, what the Old Testament and past history generally means in the light of Christ, but you really don't want to hear it. You never ask, "what is the explanation for thus-and-so?" You just condemn it without trying to find out.

That's a cheap shot. Oh, so the problem is with me, huh? It can't possibly be that you're wrong (never!). Or that you can't explain yourself very well. Or that you're bored and tired as you keep complaining. No, it's all about what I "want."

Why would truth depend upon what people want if it's absolute? I thought that's the whole point in finding absolute truths, that they don't depend upon people's emotions for their veracity. If you are unable to show me the truth of your view--which is apparently ordained by God himself--then perhaps it's not as absolute as you think. If I have to have "the right frame of mind" in order to see it, then it is a relative truth . . . relative to my mindset and desires. Absolute truths ought to be visible to all people at all times no matter what their mindset is, because absolute truths should transcend subjectivity and personal desires. I don't have to want to see that 2 + 2 = 4, for instance. Whether I want to or not, I can see the truth of that despite my poor, "non-enquiring" mind.

Remember what I said about a war plan? You're still fighting it even as you claim to not want to fight another ten rounds. This is just lazy and insulting. If you can't overcome my points, then fine, just say so. But to blame your inability to convince me on what I want is a cop-out.

I agreed with you that schools teach from a perspective which is antithetical to absolute truth. We're no longer arguing over that fact. Now the issue is whether or not this is intentional and targeted at Christians in some kind of sinister plot, or if instead it's merely appropriate to the subject matter at hand. My point is that since the subject matter at hand is within the realm of contingent facts (i.e. the world), it would be CONTRADICTORY to teach this from an overview of Absolute Truth. (You pointed out the fallacy of mixing Absolute Truths with learned truths. I agree.) Therefore, even if it is some sinister anti-Christian plot, it doesn't make any difference, because that's the way you should teach students about the world regardless of plot or no plot.

That's really key. You have to really want to know; have to have the mind of an enquirer to be able to understand the thing I am defending. As long as you don't really care if you know or not, there's nothing I can do for you, and going back and forth like this is senseless. Which is why I am no longer going to do it.

In other words, you can't indoctrinate people with your personal opinions unless they are docile and stupid enough to just lap up whatever you say unquestioningly. Unless they are freakin' children (which, I suspect, is why you'd like to overhaul our education system). You are completely ill-equipped to convince grown men who are educated and think for themselves.

(In addition, courtesy is like a drink from a mountain stream; and discourtesy is like a drink from...)

Is this a guessing game? Um . . . the cup of truth? The goblet of authenticity? A beer mug?

I get it, you think I've been discourteous. Still playing the downtrodden, persecuted victim, I see. I don't know where you think I've been discourteous. You are the one trying to make our debate turn upon my personality. You are the one bringing up your fatigue and boredom as excuses not to argue. You are the one implying that we think Christians are stupid and that society is waging an anti-Christian war--which isn't true. You have framed this debate in terms of a war upon you and your world-view from the beginning. It's no wonder you see discourtesy when there is only debate. It's no wonder you see this issue turning on personalities and personal agendas--because that's what it is for you, despite how you present yourself as the messenger of Absolute Truth. You are the one being driven by your desires.

I have nothing personal at stake here. I don't want to impose my world-view upon the country's children. I don't want to win over converts and spread my religion. I don't think my eternal soul hangs in the balance of whether I'm right or wrong. If it turns out I'm wrong, I would be glad. Who wouldn't want immortality and an all-powerful God looking out for humanity? I'd be insane not to want that. I'd be insane to prefer inexistence after death and a capricious uncaring universe. My entire position is based upon the acceptance of unattractive truths, because I recognize that reality doesn't depend upon what I want. It's not a wish-list of my desires. This is why your explanation of why I don't understand your position is so ironic. Between the two of us, I'm the only one prepared to accept things that I don't want. My entire position is based upon a coming-to-grips with the horrific meaninglessness and finitude of my existence. And you think I *want* that? You are the one here who is believing what he wants to be true. There is nothing more self-serving than believing that the Creator of the universerve Himself cares for you personally and is going to magically sustain you beyond he laws of physics and make you immortal after you die because he loves you and you're too precious for mundane things like entropy to get in the way of your continued, infinite existence. No, you think you're greater than death, greater than reality, greater than the universe. Paltry things like the laws of physics can't keep you down. No, you will defy existence itself because there's a father-figure in the sky who agrees with your self-appraisal and thinks you deserve infinite existence, too.

Don't tell me about what I want, and then pretend you're the one who is being courteous. Just because you have ended up believing what *you* want--the most self-serving belief system possible--doesn't mean that the rest of us make our decisions this way.

[rusmeister]

As to why I should give a darn about math, or music, or anything else, and submit myself to its teaching, you can't deny that a specific philosophy must be offered: Why should I care about beauty? If I don't, then teaching me music is meaningless. We must proceed from some common assumptions in order to not merely stare at each other like aliens. You have to start from a philosophy, and either impose it on a child, and correct him when he is wrong, or admit that the child's (or parents') view is equally "valid" - that music may have no value whatsoever. If you claim any truth, then you have adopted a philosophy. If you claim no truths whatsoever, then what do you have to teach me?

Ah! I understand.

This idea puts us at a permanent standstill, doesn't it? If it's impossible to keep a philosophy out of every aspect of teaching, and we have different philosophies, then the only answer to public education is to eliminate it. I suppose we might find that we agree on the importance of one or two subjects being taught to everyone. Reading? But even then, it's possible that you think Greek and Hebrew are more important than English, because they will allow one to better understand the original texts of the Bible. As well as the fact that the first thing we'd need to teach would be how to speak Greek and Hebrew. So we're at a standstill again.

Anyway, my philosophy would probably be a lot like V-ger's: Teach all that can be taught. Yes, impossible. But give as thorough a cross-section of fields of knowledge as we can, so that, as they grow, each person can discover what best suits them, and what fires their passion. Then they can become more specialized in their schooling.

But again, whatever you are teaching springs from one philosophy or another - whether you are consciously aware of it or not.

But yes, it does mean a standstill for public education, and yes, that's what I'm saying. That's why education ought to be dropped where it belongs. Squarely in the parents' laps - with local neighborhood schools for those neighborhoods that can come together on a common philosophy on education (it should go without saying that their philosophy ought to first and foremost, reflect what they actually find to be true, rather than merely adopted because it can unite people ('Unity for unity's sake?').

[rusmeister]

Malik, I see some genuine concerns worth responding to in your posts. Sometimes I want to say about you what Chesterton said about Shaw - that you are like the Venus de Milo - all that there is of you is admirable.

But I am strongly discouraged by what comes across, intended or not, as a rude tone, with words like "whining", "lazy", etc. It's one thing to say I'm wrong. I have no problem with that. It's just the somewhat nasty way you deliver that message.

But I think that it will probably still be impossible and actually unwise to debate with you because we cannot even agree on first principles - an essential for any meaningful debate.

[stonemaybe]

Here I go with another thread hijack.

Rus, I hope you're still reading here! Bear with me - this might come across a bit mixed up, but I hope you see what my point is by the end (and I'm trying - hard, I promise! -to look at the world through your eyes!)

From some of your posts, it seems to me that you are aware that alot of the anti-Christian sentiment here and in the world, is a result of ill-educated, fundamentalist Christians talking nonsense, and generally giving Christianity a bad name. (There's a 'bible belt' in Northern ireland too, full of multiple-generation Christians, parrot-speaking what daddy taught them and showing very anti-Christian values to any that don't share their small world)

It also comes across from your posts in The Close, that you admire the Christian Martyrs. Also, that you're an intelligent guy.

So, what I don't quite understand is this: You believe that the education system should have the absolute truth of Christianity as its philosophy. But if Christianity is taught as the absolute unquestioning truth to kids, will it not just perpetuate the type of Christianity that gives truly faithful Christians a bad press? Would you not agree that realising your faith against opposition, against the mainstream, is a more honest (is that the right word?) faith? Surely in being taught from infanthood, all a Christian is doing is showing faith in their parents/teachers/society, and not in Christ?

(Maybe I'm showing some Catholic 'baggage' here, suffering being a good thing etc )

[Cybrweez]

I think the point may be to teach from a Christian standpoint, but I don't know if rus has said at any point no one can question anything. That's mostly his detractors saying such things.

[Fist and Faith]

rus just made it clear that he doesn't think there should be public education at all. That being the case, he couldn't possibly be attempting to push a public education system with Christianity as its philosophy.

[rusmeister]

rus just made it clear that he doesn't think there should be public education at all. That being the case, he couldn't possibly be attempting to push a public education system with Christianity as its philosophy.

Yes, Fist is right (that's what I really mean). Perhaps it may have been possible at an early point in our history (before Massachusetts adopted the Prussian system) but later conflict would have arisen anyway between the proliferation of Protestant denominations.

It would be the true ideal to educate children in a holistic awareness of truth - both the scientifically provable kind and the kind that is not - but we live in a Fallen world, and it's really not possible. I think a society can erect something that will work for a century, perhaps two or three, but in the end none will hold out - not even the monster we currently have - which everyone agrees is a monster until someone REALLY attacks it.

If people here would just get curious about the history of where our modern schools come from - their design, its original supporters and the education philosophy that they established (as opposed to the "history of education" in general), it being the system that formed (most of) them, that would be a good thing.

To me it's obvious now that state education was formed over the second half of the 19th century, national control was planned in the first two decades of the twentieth (planning began much earlier, but the necessary influence was garnered later, after the NEA was chartered by Congress and got cooperation from the industrial magnate foundations (Ford, Rockefeller, Carnegie), and implemented over the next two. The so called 'sexual revolution' - and the general rebellion against authority associated with it - followed closely on the heels of the graduates of the (then) new schools. In short, it explains those phenomena. But see the preceding paragraph - get curious!

[Loredoctor]

But I think that it will probably still be impossible and actually unwise to debate with you because we cannot even agree on first principles - an essential for any meaningful debate.

No. What you keep forgetting is that the principles you want in the debate are the ones you keep trying to force on us.

[Fist and Faith]

It would be the true ideal to educate children in a holistic awareness of truth - both the scientifically provable kind and the kind that is not - but we live in a Fallen world, and it's really not possible.

Of course, the view of many of us here is that your "unprovable truth" is simply a fantasy that you believe. The world is not Fallen, only some of you are. Fallen from the ability to see outside of a very narrow tunnel.

I think a society can erect something that will work for a century, perhaps two or three, but in the end none will hold out - not even the monster we currently have - which everyone agrees is a monster until someone REALLY attacks it.

I doubt anyone here is arguing that public education is a wonderful thing. It is simply better to have all children learn to read, and some other things, than not. Public education cannot guarantee those things, but it's better than not trying.

If people here would just get curious about the history of where our modern schools come from - their design, its original supporters and the education philosophy that they established (as opposed to the "history of education" in general), it being the system that formed (most of) them, that would be a good thing.

There are probably many things each of us has studied that we believe others should study. Certainly, most of us here think you need a much broader education in many ways. But that's the way of people, eh? You have no reason to believe you should study the things we think you should, and we have no reason to believe we should study the things you think we should.

Because, when we get right down to it, you sound like a raving conspiracy theorist. Chains of stores are gigantic successes one year, and go through significant downsizing, or out of business entirely, the next. It happens all the time. Crazy Eddie; Hollywood Video; Ames; Caldor; A&P; Circuit City; etc etc. The reason is not that what those stores provide is no longer needed or wanted by the public. Indeed, many times, another store just like it opens up to take its place. They close because of things like incompetence and embezzling. It's extraordinarily difficult to run large, multi-store chains. Try as you may, the people working in them don't know how to do their jobs well, or they don't care to do them well. The chain gets big, and things start to fall apart. At the same time, a new, smaller (controllable) chain comes along and starts to take the same market. Then it expands, thinking it can succeed where the other failed. But it's not better, it just hasn't experienced the problems of being gigantic yet.

Could there possibly be a bigger chain than the public education system? I will not entertain the idea that a group of men more than a century ago molded it with such precision and strength that it still functions as they wanted; working against all the things humanity should be; in the face of generations of opposition from those of you who are wise and determined enough to want it ended; in the face of the fact that generations of people would need to be in thousands of important positions to counter those like you;... Well, you get the idea. Such a thing is not possible. Asimov's psychohistory does not exist. The Bene Gesserit do not exist. You will claim I was taught, by that very system, to think this way. I will say 7-of-9 had a malfunctioning cerebral implant, and it caused her to piece together amazingly elaborate, convincing conspiracy theories.

I will try to read this: www.johntaylorgatto.com/chapters/index.htm
I will at least look through it and see if there are any letters of Carnegie, Rockefeller, Ford, Morgan, and Taylor to each other, discussing their plans, and how it will work for the rest of the country's life.