

How 19-year-old activist Zack Kopplin is making life hell for creationists - rmah
http://io9.com/5976112/how-19+year+old-activist-zack-kopplin-is-making-life-hell-for-louisianas-creationists

======
rmah
I did not post this article to incite another evolution over creationism
debate. But rather, because it highlighted the journey of a young man who is
trying to change the world for the better.

A young man who is not trying to enact change through destruction, hyperbole
or negativism. Nor is he simply trying to build "awareness". He is trying to
_actually_ change things in his state by using rational discourse, reasonable
publicity and rallying both popular and distinguished support.

~~~
MartinCron
_I did not post this article to incite another evolution over creationism
debate_

You're implying that there even _is_ a debate there, where there hasn't been
one for a very long time.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
Depends on who you have on your friends list. I have a few from my days of
living in Mississippi, its always quite interesting what they believe, and
maybe quite shocking.

------
AdamFernandez
It's interesting how some groups are actively trying to hold humanity back.

-edit, and by those groups I mean creationists. I don't know why this was downvoted.

~~~
rthomas6
Knowing several people who disbelieve evolution or climate change, I think
this is not really true and the wrong attitude to take. People that want to
teach creation along with evolution in the classroom _truly_ think that
evolution is a weakly supported hypothesis that does not fit the scientific
evidence. Not just because they believe it contradicts their religion, but
because they believe it's physically, literally wrong and is scientifically
falsifiable. There is a minority of disbelievers that want biblical literalism
taught in the classroom, but I think most truly believe that evolution is
probably untrue, and at best, unproven, and simply want what they feel is the
evidence taught in the classroom, instead of one unsupported or weak theory
taught with cherry-picked evidence. Yes, that's really what they think.

Obviously they are wrong, but I think if most of the evolution-deniers truly
understood the modern theory of evolution, and understood that it is separate
from abiogenesis, I think they wouldn't have a problem with it.

~~~
MartinCron
_People that want to teach creation along with evolution in the classroom
truly think that evolution is a weakly supported hypothesis that does not fit
the scientific evidence_

I think you're giving way too much credit to science deniers. There's no
amount of physical evidence that can fairly compete with the argument of
"well, the creator of the universe wrote this book and it has to be correct"

~~~
rthomas6
I'm not talking about the people that choose to deny evolution solely because
of some literal interpretation of the Bible. I'm talking about the ones that
were raised by people like that, and have been incorrectly told how weak the
evidence for evolution is. There is a LOT of money behind teaching people
this, and teaching that scientists lie to push some agenda or another.

A lot of the same people don't believe in climate change for the same reason,
that is, they don't think it's supported well enough by evidence. I think that
makes this subset of evolution-deniers skeptics at heart (At least for some
things). Beginning from first principles, I think skepticism is a great
attitude with which to teach science. I think a lot of these people could be
taught, given willingness to learn, and an absence of mistrust of science in
general, which a lot of them have been unfortunately taught.

~~~
MartinCron
I just don't think that's a worldview that anyone arrives at in an
intellectually honest way.

I'm reminded of the great example of gaps in the fossil record. If you find a
fossil that's in the middle of the two end points of the gap you make things
worse, because now you have TWO gaps in the fossil record.

Ranting aside, I have no idea how to deal with this phenomenon in a
constructive way.

------
bfe
The article says Zack was 16 in 2008 and is 19 in 2013. Has Zack been
impressing the importance of scientific literacy by promoting it from a
relativistic spaceship? Or should he also start promoting numeracy to
journalists?

~~~
jtheory
Presumably someone asked him "when did this all start?", and he said "when I
was, I think, 16? -- Louisiana passed this act and I...", and he didn't stop
to calculate it carefully.

And it looked about right, and if he was off by one it's completely
irrelevant, so quite rightly no one put any thought into making absolutely
sure that the numbers were exactly right.

------
michaelfeathers
If you read the article, make sure you watch the video. It's a rather
hilarious take down of a state senator.

------
brownbat
We could do worse than teaching Creationism in schools. Especially why it's
wrong.

I've learned more about the theory of evolution from the [Index of Creationist
Claims](<http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/list.html>) than from almost any
other source (and I studied primatology).

You become convinced of nothing so strongly as when you study the flaws of its
critics.

------
ScottWhigham
Why is this on HN with 41 upvotes (as of this writing)? Is he creating a
company? Is he building a startup? Is he writing javascript, putting together
something really interesting, or what? I see nothing here HN-worthy.

This is the kind of thing I expect to find elsewhere (and do, in fact, look
for this sort of content there). HN is a niche site for hackers,
entrepreneurs, and money folks. No need to bring excessive religious
topics/debates here - keep that on reddit/etc.

~~~
guard-of-terra
People who force creationism on us are trying to create a future where you
won't have any start-ups because you will die young, ill and poor. Therefore
the topic is important in the long run.

~~~
MartinCron
_you will die young, ill and poor_

I was ready to dismiss this as pure fear-mongering, but when you think about
it, there's something to it. Would you want to trust your life to a doctor or
medical researcher who, for non-scientific reasons, refuses to consider the
main organizing principle of all life sciences?

------
jakeonthemove
I don't mind creationism being taught side by side with evolution. But
replacing the latter with the former is plain idiotic/dumb/stupid.

Obviously, if you teach them side by side, anyone with half a brain will
sooner or later realize that creationism is simply bullsheet, which is
probably why these people want to silence the inconvenient (for them) truth...

~~~
guard-of-terra
Creationism has no relation to science so it should not be on science class.

~~~
jakeonthemove
True, but try to tell that to the millions of people who believe creationism
IS science... To make it simple, just let the kids choose and decide for
themselves...

~~~
shakesbeard
> To make it simple, just let the kids choose and decide for themselves...

No, that's not how it works. By that logic we also would have to teach about
ghosts, dwarfs, <stroke>astronomy</stroke>astrology, or just claims made by
other religions or folklore. There's a reason we teach our children sciences.
They are objective, observable, testable, falsifiable, etc. We want a rational
society, not despotism.

~~~
guard-of-terra
You meant astrology.

~~~
shakesbeard
Yep, thanks!

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cpursley
Is this reddit?

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zplesivcak
I don't find it acceptable to budle up issues of creationism/evolution and
climate change. Writer is being devious when he's doing it so lightly as he
did; especially when climate change wasn't mentioned in the title.

~~~
randomknowledge
Hardly. The Lousiana law also made allowance for "supplemental material" on
climate change, and Kopplin himself mentioned that "We don't just deny
evolution... We are denying climate change and vaccines and other mainstream
science...". Evolution denial is in the title but climate change denial is not
because evolution is the main issue Kopplin has focused his activism on.

------
rorrr
The fastest way to repeal this garbage law is for the non-christian teachers
to start bringing Islam-related supplemental materials and start teaching it
to all the Christian kids, and failing them on tests if they answer
"incorrectly".

