It's telling when the front page of a "news" site puts Entertainment and Sports in spots higher than Science, Tech and Health.

As a former science teacher I believe that at least part of the problem is the role religion in America. By the time students reach high school science classes many of them have been indoctrinated to believe that it is acceptable, in fact necessary, to reject theories based upon scientific evidence in favor of beliefs based on faith. This is particularly true in the Bible Belt and in private schools throughout the country.

One problem is that when students are encouraged to reject some fact based learning in favor of "you must believe what is written in the Bible or what I tell you to believe" too many become too closed-minded and lack the ability to separate fact from fiction in other aspects of their lives.

Religious indoctrination is, in my opinion, a particularly insidious form of child abuse.

That's a good one don97524 blame religion for whats going on in America, you can't see the forest for the trees.

Buy off both parties, silence any other alternative parties, sell your people, future and economy out on wars for the greed of a few, export jobs for slave labor and the freedom to pollute your heart out, import desperate people for slave labor, destroy your schools and teachers, dumb the people down, feed them violence and filth, create laws that make otherwise law abiding people criminals, fill your prisons with non violent criminals and send the violent criminals back out on the streets because of overcrowding. Don't forget to make guns a right and don't require any training, testing, licensing or registration then use it as an excuse to take them away from law abiding citizens. Also make it almost impossible for the mentally ill to receive treatment until they commit some horrific crime. Sooner or later you will have the public begging to take all of their rights away just to be safe, then bingo you have total control.

Actually don97524 you gave me two more to add to the list deny religion and any type of moral behavior as antiquated. Allow the snake oil salesmen to troll the media and sell their holy water in the name of religion. Could also add support corrupt leaders who will exploit their people and push them into fanaticism.

The problem with this world is that people not only don't have a clue they don't want to step outside the fantasies they have created for themselves. I guess by that forfeiture we will deserve everything that we have coming to us.

Mark

I think you got a little carried away. I did not "blame religion for what's going on in America".

The only thing I said that PART OF THE PROBLEM is that when children are taught to accept ideas about how the natural world works on faith rather than on evidence they are not prepared for studying science and technology.

I believe don97524 religion a very small part of the problem if any, I don't see kids today as being too religious if anything I see them as being too narcissistic, lazy and materialistic while feeling entitled to their desires rather then having any work ethic at all. All this no kid left behind and no bad grades to hurt their self esteem, is it a result of mass stupidity or a darker agenda of dumbing the nation down. I personally believe that all religion basically comes from folklore but I do believe that there is a lot to learn from the study of religious doctrines.I also agree that science doesn't shove anything down anybody's throat as absolute truth, it just tells what the evidence shows, unfortunately people do. Once you get into the game my truth is better then your truth, reason and rationality seems to go out the window. I don't have a problem with the study of religion, the theory of evolution or the big bang theory what I do have a problem with is people trying to shove them down my throat as absolute truth. I don't claim to have all the answers nor do I need to have all the answers.I rather keep an open mind and admit that I don't know something then make it my religion and swear I do. I just feel that once people start assuming things are absolute truth they blind themselves from looking for truth.

Mark ..... you have probably never been a science teacher in a public high school. I have. And your "analysis" of kids being "narcissistic, lazy and materialistic" is a line that has been used to describe every generation, including yours and I suggest that you do not know what you are talking about. Some are, some are not .... just as lots of people your age have the same undesirable characteristic.

I taught many high school students who were caring, ambitious and non-materialistic. I'm sorry you have not had the good fortune to meet such wonderful young people. Judging from your rants I have doubts that you are open-minded enough to recognize such positive characteristics if you did meet them.

Here is another undesirable characteristic ..... taking one characteristic of a person such as age, race, religion or social background and judging them by that characteristic. That is the essence of bigotry and does not foster rational thinking.

I never said all don97524 I said if anything and I stand by my opinion I'm not a child, when I grew up the world as a whole was a very different place, we helped saved the world from totalitarianism and the culture was way different then it is today. Somewhere along the line we lost our ideals and greed took over, kids no longer aspired to be scientists, astronauts, doctors, lawyers and even the president. Now they tend to want to be rappers, rock stars or have their own reality show. I worked hard and made a good living, unfortunately the opportunities that I had are no longer there. I am at the end of my life now and living quite comfortably because of my hard work and investments over my lifetime. I realize that there are still great kids out there who aspire to great things but I also realize the culture of easy entitlements that is overcoming this country. I don't see religion as the problem but rather a lack of the values that we had when I was a kid.

Another thought is that even though the we prayed in school and religion was not shunned like it is today, we made the greatest advancements in science and technology. So religion did not stop all the advancements that you enjoy today.

You are mixing two totally separate issues. Praying in school does not inhibit knowledge, only the right to be free from the religion of others. Rejecting science in favor of religious myths is a problem because it inhibits logical thinking and teaches children that basing beliefs on evidence is unnecessary. I am not, as you appear to be, trying to solve all of the problems of the world ..... I am merely pointing out one issue.

I'm not trying to save the world wake it up maybe but my work is done and I will go as long as my health holds out. I see the point you are making if kids were closed minded to religion, although I think it has very little effect today unless you were teaching in the Bible belt or an Amish community, I don't see religion as holding kids back from learning. The problem I see is that we tend to advert kids attention today to anything but science and education, plus what incentives have we really given them to work for?

The links didn't come thru due to restrictions...in order of topic:

(church attendance) Americans' Church Attendance Inches Up in 2010 from June 25, 2010 by Frank Newport on GALLUP Wellbeing

(percentage home-schooled for religious reasons~2 references) As Home Schooling Surges, the Evangelical Share Drops from January 9, 2009 by Dan Gilgoff on U.S.News.com &
1.5 Million Homeschooled Students in the United States in 2007 from December 2008 Issue Brief by U.S. Department of Education in Institute of Education Sciences / National Center for Education Statistics .pdf

(test & socialization results for home-schooled students versus public school students) A brief look at comparisons of standardized test results for home educated students and public school students. from 1998 by Mary Shaw for The Ontario Federation of Teaching Parents

I was hoping to get around all that copying-pasting, but...I think you can find the info from what I've put down.

Have a Great Day!

Sheila

In spite of your research, rejection of science for religious reasons is commonplace in US public schools. I experienced it to some degree where I taught in Montana. The problem is more common in many other parts of the country.

I agree that home schooled students, in general, perform better on tests. If public schools had two or three students per teacher they would perform better than than do with as many as 40 per class. However, the tests are not about critical thinking. The tests are all about recall of facts which, as any teacher will tell you, not the same as teaching reasoning ability. Students need to have strong problem solving ability to perform well in science and technical fields in college and in science/technology careers.

It is true that courts have blocked schools from teaching creationism (or intelligent design) in public schools, but the resistance to teaching the theory of evolution and other areas of science that conflict with the Bible is very, very real in much of the United States. It is also true that some of the great books of American literature are still being banned in public schools, mostly in the Bible Belt.