01 Aug 2005
Bible Course Becomes a Test for Public Schools in Texas

If you can't get in through the front door, waltz in the back way ...

Some of the claims made in the national council's curriculum are laughable, said Mark A. Chancey, professor of religious studies at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, who spent seven weeks studying the syllabus for the freedom network. Mr. Chancey said he found it "riddled with errors" of facts, dates, definitions and incorrect spellings. It cites supposed NASA findings to suggest that the earth stopped twice in its orbit, in support of the literal truth of the biblical text that the sun stood still in Joshua and II Kings.

"When the type of urban legend that normally circulates by e-mail ends up in a textbook, that's a problem," Mr. Chancey said.

There's nothing inherently wrong with teaching the Bible as literature (bad literature, in my not-so-humble opinion, but still literature, and worthy of serious study due to it's tremendous influence on Western culture) but when you add bogus bullshit like the above to the mix, it becomes counter-productive to an education.

A religious advocacy group based in Greensboro, N.C., has been pressing a 12-year campaign to get school boards across the country to accept its Bible curriculum.

(link) [NYT > Home Page]

00:00 /Politics | 0 comments | permanent link

Polypharmacy in children on the rise in the US

And here I thought we were in the midst of a "War on Drugs" ... I think a better phrase would be "War of Drugs".

Pediatric polypharmacy, the practice of prescribing two or more medications for psychiatric symptoms in children, is on the rise in the United States, raising concern about unknown side effects, according to a new study appearing in the August issue of the journal Psychiatry 2005

(link) [EurekAlert! - Breaking News]

00:00 /Politics | 1 comment | permanent link

Bad behaviour 'linked to smoking'

Here's another Study in Stupidity:

A team at the Institute of Psychiatry, in London, sent questionnaires to the parents of 723 identical twins and 1,173 non-identical twins.

The parents were asked to provide information on their own smoking habits and on their children's behaviour.

Behaviour was classed as anti-social if the child bullied others, often destroyed his or her own or others' belongings, had a habit of stealing things, often told lies or was frequently disobedient.

A third of the mothers said they had smoked during pregnancy. Overall, a small minority of the children had anti-social behaviour or ADHD - 4-11%.

So we have a study of something like 2000 families in the UK, with something less than 10% of the kids having behavior problems while something like 33% of the mothers smoked during pregnancy... so smoking obviously is the culprit behind being naughty!!

Of course it's not a good idea to smoke (or drink or take any drug) when you're pregnant, but we certainly don't need well funded (by the anti-tobacco lobby, I'm sure) like this idiotic one to prove it. Common sense will suffice - except I think that's become less and less common, as evidenced by idiotic studies like this!

Women who smoke during pregnancy increase the risk of their child being unruly, say UK researchers.

(link) [BBC News | News Front Page | World Edition]

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