Originally Posted By: Mac
Bob chimed in a bit late by my reckoning, but I did know we'd be hearing from him here for some reason.

I hear tell that brother Bob's two favorite brands are Free and Free Lite... grin



--Mac



That's cause you're psychic Mac. I'm surprised you forgot that my brand is Bud Select since we talked about it on the phone just a week or two ago! wink

I couldn’t resist the joke. I actually don’t have a problem with adults practicing whatever their chosen brand of mythology/religion happens to be.

What I do have a problem with is fundamentalists who insist on taking their religious texts literally and reject any type of science that may differ from their narrow minded views.

It’s nothing new. Religion has always considered science and any other type of knowledge to be an enemy to their views since science/knowledge encourages people to think instead of listening solely to the preacher/priest. Galileo got to enjoy house arrest for life because he had the audacity to say that the Earth wasn’t the center of the universe.

Quote:
Galileo's championing of heliocentrism was controversial within his lifetime, when most subscribed to either geocentrism or the Tychonic system. He met with opposition from astronomers, who doubted heliocentrism due to the absence of an observed stellar parallax. The matter was investigated by the Roman Inquisition in 1615, and they concluded that it could be supported as only a possibility, not an established fact. Galileo later defended his views in Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, which appeared to attack Pope Urban VIII and thus alienated him and the Jesuits, who had both supported Galileo up until this point. He was tried by the Inquisition, found "vehemently suspect of heresy", forced to recant, and spent the rest of his life under house arrest. It was while Galileo was under house arrest that he wrote one of his finest works, Two New Sciences, in which he summarised the work he had done some forty years earlier, on the two sciences now called kinematics and strength of materials.


What’s really sad today is that fundamentalists would still rather have their children grow up in fear and ignorance just so the parents can perpetuate their mythology. Who knows how many generations of would be scientists, biologists, geologists, physicists, etc. have been lost to a fear of knowledge and chosen to listen to the dogma because they were taught to fear a jealous and vengeful god who would punish them for thinking and asking questions.

It’s not a coincidence that the forbidden fruit was on the “Tree of Knowledge”!

Bob
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http://soundcloud.com/bobcflatpicke/music-in-the-mountains