There is no other way to interpret it. If you force all children to learn that all relgions are somehow equal and that not one of them is the one true religion, that is a direct attack on freedom of religion and separation of church and state. Freedom of religion means freedom to teach your children that yours is the one true religion, not one of a myriad of political correct world views based on accidents of history. There is no objective way to prove yourself right, but there is also no objective way for anyone to prove you wrong. Which is part of the reason why the government has no right to interfere (in addition to the untold misery that occurred every other time the government interfered). Of course you think you have it right this time and it is a good time for the government to discard freedom of religion and force people to learn what is obviously the right perspective, but that's what people thought every other time.

Freedom means freedom to do things that make you feel uncomfortable. That's the whole point of freedom. You can't take it away just because it makes you feel uncomfortable.

Careful Acid, you wouldn't want the government to start banning books that indoctrinate children into the wrong philosophy. The earth travels on a curved trajectory in straight space without any strings^* attached, unless you get into university in which case it travels a straight trajectory in curved space.

* String theory has also been approved by the government for indoctrination, but is not recommended for children under 15 years old and may lead to drug references.

freediver wrote on Jun 17^th, 2008 at 4:26pm:




I better keep that theory secret. Perhaps I should have written that in code for fear of being excommunicated by the church.

But the theory is sound? The turtle exist! They even a fossil of the Psephophorus terrypratchetti in New Zealand.

"The last thing you'd want is the government adapting religion to the latest teaching fad."

No we wouldn't, we have Hillsong for that.

Lighten up FD, you are on a losing horse comparing the accountability and rationality of religious belief vs scientific theories.

freediver wrote on Jun 17^th, 2008 at 4:58pm:


What theory are you thinking of? Pythagoras hypothesised that celestial bodies are "spherical" and not flat as was the normal thinking of the day. He also hypothesised that the moon was a planet and he called it the "counter-earth".

freediver wrote on Jun 17^th, 2008 at 4:58pm:


You are going around in circles (and maybe deliberately so). We are talking about theories which have proven to be true. One of the theories being that celestial bodies are spherical as opposed to flat (ie: Flat Earth theory). In this conversation, I don't care that the actual terminology of sphere doesn't accurately describe the Earth - we are speaking in layman's language. Would you prefer that I said something along the lines of "a ovoid with a depressed equator"? And in context of the discussion spherical vs flat, the interior it irrelevant. To bring it up out of context is deliberately sabotaging the conversation overloading it with irrelevancy.

freediver wrote on Jun 17^th, 2008 at 4:58pm:


FD. You really got to lighten up mate. It was a joke! Psephophorus terrypratchetti? Terry Pratchett? The discworld novels? Flat round disc world supported by 4 elephants on top of a celestial turtle?


Oh, and Psephophorus terrypratchetti does exist. They found a fossil of an ancient giant turtle in NZ. The palaentologist who found discovered it was a Terry Pratchett fan and named the species accordingly.

freediver wrote on Jun 17^th, 2008 at 5:34pm:


True, and what of the other theories since then explaining them to be round? Theories that are Wrong? Fact? Or Truth?

Psephophorus terrypratchetti

An Eocene fossil turtle.

Found in New Zealand, and considered to be different enough from Psephophorus species found in Europe, Egypt, and the United States to be given a separate classification. This turtle is found in Tertiary sediments.

It was first discovered in 1995 and named by Robert Kohler, who was a fan of Terry Pratchett.

Pratchett himself has this to say about it:

"Of course I'm proud of it. It tickles my imagination. Forty millions years ago this thing was paddling around the globe, eating jellyfish, and now there's this link to this short bald guy whose own species, at that time, was still saying 'ook'

I use it as my Human Being test. We all have such a thing, even if we don't like to think of it like that- a little test of the imagination. I mentioned it to another author who immediately said, 'Who do I have to sleep with to get a species named after me?' and she passed. It's the people who look at you sideways and say, 'Is that good?' that you know are pod beings from the planet Zog."

True, and what of the other theories since then explaining them to be round? Theories that are Wrong? Fact? Or Truth?

Wrong is a reasonable description, but not fact or truth.

Theories are supported by a preponderance of evidence, and to discount their value is unrealistic FD.

But I am not discounting their value. I am saying they are wrong. Some of the most valuable theories we have are wrong, while the less wrong ones that replaced them are more academic curiosities. This is why philosophy should be taught in school, so that people understand the difference between truth and value.

This is an excellent example of why religion and education don't mix.

But they do mix, quite well. Otherwise you wouldn't be getting all worked up about 'indoctrination' into belief systems you disagree with.