Recall that Todd Akin’s and Richard Mourdock’s series of unfortunate events began with needling, difficult questions that exposed their religious beliefs. Those questions, and the two men’s answers to them, wrecked their sure-fire candidacies and helped keep the Senate in the hands of the devious Harry Reid. I’m not defending them; they gave bad answers, and Akin in particular allowed his stubbornness to override good sense.
Recall also that Democrats are almost never asked needling, difficult questions that expose their religious beliefs, even though if they are Christians as they claim to be, their answers ought to be identical to the answers given by most Republicans.
With all of that in mind, take a look at this exchange in Sen. Marco Rubio’s interview with GQ, which appears in the lad mag’s December 2012 issue.
GQ: How old do you think the Earth is?
Marco Rubio: I’m not a scientist, man. I can tell you what recorded history says, I can tell you what the Bible says, but I think that’s a dispute amongst theologians and I think it has nothing to do with the gross domestic product or economic growth of the United States. I think the age of the universe has zero to do with how our economy is going to grow. I’m not a scientist. I don’t think I’m qualified to answer a question like that. At the end of the day, I think there are multiple theories out there on how the universe was created and I think this is a country where people should have the opportunity to teach them all. I think parents should be able to teach their kids what their faith says, what science says. Whether the Earth was created in 7 days, or 7 actual eras, I’m not sure we’ll ever be able to answer that. It’s one of the great mysteries.
“How old do you think the earth is?” That’s a question to ask a rising politician who has a compelling life story and is one of the most interesting and dynamic leaders America has today? It is, if you want to lay out a marker for him to defend later in the face of hostile leftist questioning. Rubio does well enough in his answer but it comes off as a waffle. He’s much more self-assured when describing what he likes about Eminem than what he understands is going on in Genesis’ first chapter. That, actually, is a common issue with evangelicals. We know what we believe, but we’re very deep on why we believe it, and we’re too embarrassed about our own culture to confidently project and protect it. Too many of us believe that science is the enemy, too, which can lead to incuriosity.
How about some enterprising reporter ask Barack Obama how old he thinks the earth is, and what the Rev. Jeremiah Wright taught him about that? I guess that’s literally too much to ask. Instead let’s ask him how cool it is to get re-elected. Rubio, however, represents an existential threat to the new order that the Democrats believe demography will hand them. So he must be needled and prodded for weaknesses, and if he pulls an Akin, he’s toast.
Just tossing this out there, but I’m an evangelical Christian who spent eight years figuratively on the prow of the ship that has done more than any other to figure out just how old the universe is. My Christian beliefs survived that experience not only intact, but enhanced. It’s fair to say that I know more than any GQ reporter and any leftist blogger knows on the subject. If any Republican officeholder or wannabe out there wants my take on this, I’m here to help.
Update: Here come the snarky, ignorant, self-assured intolerant members of the leftist blogosphere.
More: Rubio Disses New Rap ‘Party Songs,’ Gives Props to N.W.A.
– “Less than a trillion, which is what our deficit will be this year: let’s discuss the relative merits of that now.”
This.
I am both amazed and saddened by the fact that no one seems to educate Republican candidates on how to deflect irrelevant questions. There should be a class or something. Rubio’s response is so stupid that it doesn’t approach coherent thought. No wonder we keep losing; we don’t deserve to win with guys like this running.
I totally agree with Ragnar. The question was intended to make Rubio look like a fool or a waif, and it succeeded. Then there’s Jindahl who participated in an exorcism. The Republicans long ago conceded the stage to the Democrats, and they’ve been saying in effect “can I play too?” ever since. Pathetic.
The proper response: “Most scientists say several billion. I don’t know the exact figure.” The answer of an Aes Sedai, for WOT fans.
What’s hard (for you), is that your answer was wrong.
The *Earth* is 4.5 billion years old.
It’s the *Universe* that is about 13.7 billion years old.
This “gotcha” question wasn’t the only example in the GQ interview. Here’s another:
“GQ: The Republican strategy after Obama came into office was to make sure the president didn’t have another term. The Republicans didn’t have a plan and were just going to say no to everything the president put forth.”
Notice, that’s not even phrased as a question. That’s a recitation of a Dem talking point.
Perhaps you intended to reply to Pete Estherson below.
Pretty damn old, but still not old enough for all the “random” mutations to organize themselves from a single cell to self-aware humans. The odds of life organizing itself into more complex forms based on external forcing factors and random mutation are pretty slim indeed. Even a few billion years isn’t enough time to encompass evolution.
Basically the only thing evolution has going for it, is that it doesn’t require God. But what’s the difference between a theory that relies on preposterous suppositions, indeterminate time scales, and whose biggest argument is that “we are here, so something must have been responsible, and it wasn’t God”? Compare the odds of life spontaneously organizing itself as the biological record supposedly indicates, versus the odds that there really is a metaphysical intelligence. What if the odds are comparable?
What we do know is that the probability of humans evolving as we know it, is very small. If we really wanted to know if it’s feasable, we would calculate the number of discrete mutations needed to change a single cell into a human. Then divide that number into 4.5 million to get the average time needed for each change. Remember, these are only the mutations that “take”, and contribute to the final product. No dead ends are allowed for this equation. So what would be a acceptable time scale per mutation? 10 years, 100 years, 10,000 years? As far as I can tell, no evolutionists are trying to calculate this number. And the question is “why?” I think the answer is that evolution would be required to be on a ridiculous timetable in which evolution would be literally observable. Which so far hasn’t been documented in action.
The evolution people used to like to say that almost anything can happen if given enough time. Computer simulations of the million monkeys with a million typewriters that could in a million years write the works of Shakespeare, have shown that a million years don’t get you very far. Only a few sentence fragments of Shakespeare have been produced in the simulated million years.
I don’t ask anyone to become a creationist or even an intelligent designer. But be aware, that evolution has big fundamental problems.
TomT — The evolution people used to like to say that almost anything can happen if given enough time.
You have a wrong notion of the idea of randomness. A churchy type once told me that you can disprove evolution by putting 17 parts of a meat grinder in a clothes dryer and run it for 100 years, and the parts wouldn’t randomly assemble themselves into a meat grinder. Lots of people think this way.
In truth you could run the dryer for 10 million years and nobody would ever expect that the parts would randomly assemble into a meat grinder. Not once. Not ever.
If you know anything of chemistry you know what valence is and if you grasp that this explains why amino acids etc spontaneously self-assemble. What appears to be random is not.
You’re doing a lot of incorrect math. Suggest you read “New Kind of Mathematics” by S. Wolfram who explains this pretty well and covers emergent properties in a way that would help you see why your equations aren’t useful.
You believe in the spontaneous generation of life?
Bill I said amino acids self-assemble. Amino acids are found in meteorites. Self assembly and spontaneous aren’t quite fungible concepts. Spontaneous implies stuff poofing into existence for no particular reason. The point that was being addressed here is that amino acids and other components of life do not bang together at random, they self assemble because of how physics works.
DNA has 4 molecules, interesting enough the valence business I described earlier is how these molecules fit together. They do not fit together at random. This fitting of things is never random. Anything BUT.
Generally the “science is all wrong” members all make the same mistakes, not quite realising that the term “random” refers more to proximity than ability, i.e. if you have an oxygen atom and hydrogen atoms are around it will randomly travel around until such time as it bumps into the hydrogens and becomes a water molecule. The anti-science group’s argument is more akin to saying that the oxygen acquiring the 2 hydrogens itself is random.
Amino acids and other molecules necessary for life do the same thing as oxygen molecules, they self assemble due to attraction. And then these multiple molecule things attract to other multiple molecule things.
My belief about the origins of life has no bearing; there are plenty of people who look at the same data and remark — “so THAT’s how god does it.” People like you try to play your own version of ‘GOTCHA’ i.e. wow the dirty atheist rejects god, blah blah blah. (I’ve heard it all.) What’s interesting is that one could argue that it appears that life self-assembles thus answering your (snark) question to the affirmative… and yet the slightly more introspective person of faith would understand that self-assembly isn’t a rejection of “divine spark” or however the religious like to think of it.
As usual the underlying problem here is NOT that science and self-assembly conflicts with religion, but that religious fundie types go out of their way to demonise that science which offends their preconceived notion of how god works; i.e. one could argue that they’re really wanting to break their commandments and speak for god.
Ultimately there is no conflict of science and religion. The only conflict comes from those who are offended by what science reveals. They are essentially a version of the Taliban.
RandomEngineer, I’m not slamming you for your atheism.
I’m slamming you for your faith
Actually, I’m not slamming you for anything. I just saw the word “spontaneously” in your comment and that propelled the question.
I agree that science is a good thing and does not conflict with religion.
The point that was being addressed here is that amino acids and other components of life do not bang together at random, they self assemble because of how physics works.
Simple chemistry does not make life. Nobody argues that we can’t put a jar of saltwater on the ledge, and two weeks later we have salt crystals formed on the jar. There’s a huge difference between proving basic chemistry and making life. I can’t accept a canard just because it makes your theory work. Especially when we can’t prove the canard. Carl Sagan thought that making the primordial soup was important too, but it proved nothing. We haven’t a clue whether those amino acids are one step away from life, or a quantum leap. We don’t really have a clue whether life came from primordial soup, or something else. That’s just a sub-theory in your theory. But it’s the best explanation you have, so you run with it. Call me when these amino acids organize into a cell that we can call a living organism.
Maybe you’re a little vested in the theory. But if you step back, you’d realize evolution is a house of cards. You have to accept a series of unproven assertions. Explanation is poor theory, as Aristotle taught us. I’ll only touch upon the grandaddy of all deus ex machinas – punctuated evolution. Can’t explain an explosion of life forms in the pre-Cambrian era using slow and gradual forcing factors (the core of evolutionary theory)? Well, we’ll throw in “punctuated evolution” to explain the anomaly. A sub-theory that contradicts the tenet of the theory itself. Kind of reminds me of “and God said…”
What did amino acids self-assemble from? What self-assembled to form the precursors? How did meteorites self-assemble? Did the oxygen atom and hydrogen atom self-assemble before or after the precursors to the self-assembling amino acids? What self-assembled that changed the animate to the inanimate? Was the jump to consciousness self-assemblage? Before anything existed, because according to science nothing is eternal, what self-assembled to cause the big bang? Can nothing self-assemble or is it just a self-existing, self-assemblage of nothingness? If so, does that prove or refute the immutable law of self-assembly?
Dittos.
I don’t know what Rubio’s religion is, but the way to handle it is to articulate faith and understand and respect science.
The scientific consensus as to the age of the Earth is 4.5 billion years old. It is very good science that leads to this consensus, but is it a fact? Of course not. Science, unlike religion, must not be dogmatic. New observations can lead to a new consensus, especially as new technology occurs. It’s not like this has never happened before.
Maybe Rubio has a religious faith which compels him to accept a young Earth. In that case he should say: “Look, I have a faith that leads me to think the Earth is 6,000 (or whatever) years old but I don’t want to impose that on anybody or teach it in school as a fact or an answer to a true/false question. I understand that the accepted consensus right now is a 4.5 billion year old Earth and what I want taught is the methodology — mostly radiometric dating — used to reach that conclusion. But I don’t want it taught that it can’t be falsifiable as it would no longer be science then, and I don’t want those who have a faith that it one day will be falsified to face any penalty or discrimination.”
Actually, even if Rubio doesn’t have a faith that requires acceptance of a young Earth he should still say that.
Rubio was a Mormon when younger but is now a Catholic.
Science was invented by Catholics. Nothing in Catholic teaching compels anyone to accept a young Earth. Or that planets have perfectly circular orbits around the sun. Or phlogiston. Or the luminiferous ether. Or the steady state model of cosmology. I could add more examples of “crazy” stuff scientists once believed was certain but I leave that as an exercise for the student.
Science was invented by Catholics
That’s news to the classical greeks.
The Catholic Church doesn’t have an official position on how exactly the word “yom” is meant in Genesis. It can mean “day” as in a 24-hour period (but iirc from my astronomy class a long time ago, it didn’t always take 24 hours for the Earth to revolve once, and of course the Earth and Sun were not even created during the first few “days”). Of course, when you say “I’ll leave that problem for another day” you aren’t specifically promising that you will solve that problem withing a 24-hour time period. I think it’s really neat how Genesis agrees with science if you don’t get hung up on the word “yom”. It’s a poem: first there was nothing, then God said “Let there be light” and the Big Bang happened (kind of difficult if you don’t have an independent force acting upon the universe to set it in motion, and the “Turtles all the way down” theory has been kind of disproved now that we know the universe is expanding at an increasing speed). The “waters above the firmament” part is a beautiful explanation of how the atmosphere was formed, and then the creation of creatures gets the order right. OTOH, we know God has a good sense of humor (see 1 Samuel 5-6, where God cast upon the Philistines the twin plagues of hemorrhoids and mice) and I think it would be hilarious if it turned out he just put dinosaur bones in the ground to throw us all off.
I think the quibbling over whether “yom” means “a time” or “the time it takes (*or will take once it’s created) for the Earth to spin on its axis once) is akin to arguing over whether the Light Brigade’s ride was exactly 1.500000 leagues because the poem says “Half a league, half a league, half a league onward”. Maybe this is the answer: bore them with the details of all the different scenarios lol.
Republicans need to learn that all questions do not need to be answered. Letting others drive the narrative will be a losing strategy, and one that allows focus to be taken off critical matters facing us today and future generations. We need a mantra that GOP are working to not burden our children’s futures and repeat it many times in every presentation, along with the substantive rationale. More personal emotional appeal is important in sales of ideas.
I think what you mean to say is, “Republicans need to learn that not all questions need to be answered.” Your formulation actually means that Republicans needn’t answer ANY questions.
You’re spot on. They all need a Newt boot-camp on dealing with stupid pointed liberal questions.
It’s a valid question. The answer is “13 or 14 billion years old.” What’s so hard about that?
In the words of Bryce Harper “That a clown question bro”
“When did you stop beating your wife?” is also a valid question. Proposed answer: “It must have been [age plus 9 months] ago, since I have never done that in this life.
“Relevant” only in the minds of idiots who think the answer somehow impacts our daily lives (hint: it doesn’t).
What’s so hard about it? It’s wrong. According to the sciences, 13 or 14 billion years is the supposed age of the Universe. The earth itself is thought, by the sciences, to be around 4.5 billion years old. Though, since no one was there at its birth, and science is supposed to be about reproducible results in the laboratory, it’s hard to see how they can be all that sure.
For my part, they’ve probably it narrowed down pretty good, but the estimated age of the earth and the universe are, in fact, long, meticulous even painful extrapolations from various evidences, and not the easy-peasy answer some dips*** reporter thinks it is.
Signed,
An Evangelical Christian
Oops! Yes, of course the age of the earth is about 4.5 billion years. My mistake.
And if Sen. Marco Rubio had made your mistake, Pete Estherson, he’d have been held up for ridicule for that.
Now you all know why Sen. Rubio was caught off guard and struggled to avoid sounding like a dunce.
As believed by Western Science at around the Turn of 21st Century, yes. But remember, it is the glory of science to progress. Something could come along to completely invalidate those meticulous extrapolations, and if most scientific revolutions are exemplary, we would not likely see it coming. For now it seems sound enough, though what the age of the earth has to do with a man’s political beliefs is beyond me. (Don’t get me wrong. I know exactly what’s going on with this reporter’s question. Rubio must recite the Secularist Catechism or be charged with heresy.)
One of the things that bugs me most about the scientific era is the tacit (and often not tacit at all) assumption that somehow our ancestors were dumber than us. Aristotle, Ptolemy, Brahe, all would have believed heliocentricity in a heartbeat if someone had demonstrated parallax to them. Even Galileo could not conclusively prove heliocentrism, and came up with that patently ridiculous theory of the tides as one of his attempts. He also maintained the perfect Aristotlean circularity of planetary orbits when every competent Jesuit Astronomer of the day knew them to be slightly eccentric. Parallax was the surest proof, but because of the distances between us and the “fixed” stars, it would take some technological innovation to get us to measuring equipment fine enough to see it. That didn’t happen until around 1831-ish.
Yet Galileo insisted on “my way or the highway” and in the process insulted his most ardent supporters in the Church (there were many,) which was part of why he was in so much trouble. It was not foolishness to stick with what worked well enough (Ptolemaic Astronomy), in favor of what Galileo could not conclusively demonstrate, and with what our senses to this day show us. Okay, the earth goes around the sun, but relative to what? The Sun? What does it care? As far as each individual is concerned, none of us actually observes the earth going around the sun. We observe it going around us. (Robert Pirsig made a similar argument in Zen and The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, with that story about the man and the squirrel in the tree.) It’s nice that we’ve worked it out, but really how much impact on most peoples’ lives does heliocentricity have? I always thought this article summed up the options pretty well:
http://www.johnderbyshire.com/Opinions/USPolitics/doonesbury.html
It’s only a valid question to an astronomist, a geophysicist, a physicist, etc. And note, that even these sciences are not certain.
It’s not a valid question to a politician. Furthermore, it has no relevance to government functions. So it’s a stupid question.
Given the interviewer’s evident objective, it was a very smart question.
I think the best strategy is the Newt Gingrich approach: when a questioner asks an irrelevant question intended to elicit a controversial answer, Attack! Attack! It is clearly a partisan effort and should cripple the supposed neutral questioner when labelled as such.
Because it’s the wrong answer.
(The age of the universe is generally accepted at 13 billion, not the age of the Earth)
A valid question for a political figure, why? It was asked for one purpose and it was not to see if he knew the politically correct answer. Anyone thinking that is a bit naive. Rather they just come out and say it is only right that atheists be allowed to run for office in their thinking.
I like your answer.
Excellent rejoinder and not only because it’s what came to my mind, too.
I think the proper response is what Newt Gingrich said to the reporter who asked him if he wears boxers or tighty-whiteys: “That’s a stupid question”.
Next.
excellent! either that or just laugh and say “Are you serious?”
Newt has the best answers. Newt should be training all GOP officeholders and candidates on how to answer questions and avoid media traps.
Agree. That’s why I hoped Gingrich would serve as Press Secretary in a Romney Administration. (Alas, it was not to be.)
Let’s understand that the leftist media *wants* to expose conservatives and Republicans as uneducated rubes, but who says we have to play their game? None of the Republican candidates were talking about contraception when Stephanopolous brought it up. The proper response is to make the questioner look like the idiot and provocateur he is.
As to the question of creation, I think fundamentalists and evangelicals put themselves into this bind because they don’t know how Biblical text is to be understood. Jews have been interpreting and reinterpreting these texts longer than Christians have been around and – surprise! – few Creationists can be counted, even among Orthodox Jews. To the confused, I’d recommend “The Challenge of Creation” by (Rabbi) Natan Slifkin, a naturalist who discusses cosmology, evolution, and the natural sciences.
“None of the Republican candidates were talking about contraception when Stephanopolous brought it up.”
This begs the question, “Why was George Stephanopolous moderating our primary debate?”
That was our first mistake. The GOP needs to organize and operate the 16 Primary Debate not our enemies.
That is a $1M question: why do the Republicans keep agreeing to their “moderators”?
As long as you accede to meeting your enemy on a battleground of his choosing, you will lose. This is basic Sun Tzu.
Well, that was silly. You might as well have hoped that Napoleon Bonaparte would have been Romney’s Press Secretary.
Even if Romney had won, he would never have considered Newt for that position (or ANY position), nor would Newt have accepted it.
I would recommend this by a Wheaton Professor:
http://books.google.com/books/about/The_Lost_World_of_Genesis_One.html?id=6qZLAz3TckgC
It certainly clarified the issues and, more importantly, the non-issues for me.
Amen!
Ditto snork. That’s a stupid question to ask someone that wants to convince the American people he can fix the problems we face.
He should have followed it up with “go back to journalism school and learn how to ask pertinent unbiased questions.” Oh wait, they no longer teach that in journalism school.
Groan.
“About as old as your mother.”
“Take the number of men who have done your mother, divide by ten — that’s how many years old the earth is.”
“Pardon me — I think you have a little Barak on your chin.”
Insult the idiots back.
Insult them, perhaps.
But not by acting like an adolescent jock.
Not if you want to win elections.
“How about some enterprising reporter ask Barack Obama how old he thinks the earth is, and what the Rev. Jeremiah Wright taught him about that?”
And the answer will be: “that’s above my pay grade”.
Yes, and he would be telling the truth!
Obama, tell the truth? Are you serious? In think he has a pathological aversion to the truth. For example, how long after the truth about the attack in Benghazi came out was the POTUS still peddling the thoroughly discredited fairy tale about ‘a spontaneous uprising’ about an unknown ‘film’? Is breaking your oath of office considered a high crime or a misdemeanor? And if we don’t hold elected officials to their oath of office, why do we bother going through with swearing them in? This country needs to get back to the fundamentals. We have become too obsequious towards government at all levels.
No reporter has to ask President Obama how old he thinks the Earth is, because Obama has already stated it. In his autobiography Dreams From My Father he states that the Universe is billions of years old, in the context of explaining it to his daughter.
Obama has declared his position on this issue, which, by the way, is entirely consistent with those of both the Mainline Protestant and Catholic Churches. Obama is not the one trying to obfuscate and have it both ways on this – he has been clear. But Rubio is trying to do that – he can’t admit that he knows that the Earth is billions of years old because it would disqualify him with the mouth breather base, but he also can’t say that he thinks it is 5000 years old because that would be an albatross in the general election.
I’m not a Christian, but I have no doubts the majority of the media aren’t either and are out on a crusade to make it impossible to believe the Bible and be elected. Meanwhile, God forbid you disparage Islam.
More Newt, more snarky-yet-thoughtful, less “if by whiskey” baloney, por favor.
I too am getting tired of supposedly savvy politicians getting rooked into answering stupid questions — especially when such questions are deliberate insults.
1) This is as predictable as the sunrise. These guys need to practice for the top 100 gotcha questions.
2) We are going to have one candidate after another destroyed by these types of questions as long as we bring religion and lifestyle into our political dialog.
I don’t care what religion a candidate is and I don’t want to hear about it in political discussions. Separation of church and state needs to be applied to campaigns as well. Republicans have to realize that these are loosing issues every time we go there which is why the Democrat Press Corps keeps going there.
We need to focus on the economy, regulations, the out if control nanny/police state, terrible & expensive schools, runaway medical expenses, energy, and foreign policy. You know, issues people actually are concerned with.
I believe that we could have won, but Team Obama was able to scare people with the notion that the GOP is a bunch of Bible thumping theocrats, and they feared that more than they did Obama’s incompetence. The only way to shut down that strategy is to quit using politics to bear witness. Wanna bear witness and tell everyone how you dedicated your life to Jesus? Wonderful. Do it in the revival tent. It gives elections to the Democrats every time it becomes an election issue.
The truth is, the Holy Right can’t even roll back partial birth abortion. They are all bark and no bite. Their issues are election losing issues. It is time to quit talking about abortion, creation, and all other religious issues. The response to all of it should be to say, religion needs to be kept separate from politics.
You can declare that it’s time to stop talking about social issues, but the media will not obey. Look at this interview to see who brought it up. It’s not going to go away. And for what it’s worth, the Obama campaign turned out to be right to push their pet social issues. They did that while Romney ran away from them. Look who won.
People vote on more than the unemployment rate and the GDP. They vote for goodies, they vote for which candidate “understands” them better, and they vote on core beliefs, among a lot of other things. Both sides.
Who was the last Republican who won with ‘Reagan Democrats’? Were there Bush/Dole/McCain/Romney Democrats? Why not? Was Reagan a moderate? Perhaps this will never dawn on some of you!
Well, actually, yes, Reagan was a moderate. Reagan was “a man in full;” he’d come up in lefty/communist Hollywood, became head of SAG during the purge of open communists from unions generally and Hollywood specifically, was a very well-known and experienced spokeperson for what was then an iconic American corporation, then governor of California which even under Republican governments of that era was a very statist if not truly liberal state yet.
Reagan knew how to articulate that rugged Western individualism that a Nation that still wanted to be a cowboy still admired. While some of his speeches articulated conservative position and he was strongly, almost stridently, anti-communists (as is anybody who’s actually dealt with them) he governed as a pragmatist. He was demonized and caricatured by the Left even from his days as Governor – he wasn’t exactly friendly to the Berkeley Free Speech Movement – and Joan Baez sang of him as a “Drugstore truck-driving man/the leader of the Ku Klux Klan/ though Reagan was anything but in reality. The Left hated and demonized him throughout his Presidency in some ways they were more vehement about Reagan than they were at their worst about GWB. Ironically, Reagan’s cred as a conservative President comes from his enemies, the Left. Reagan was a practical man who understood getting what was on the table and taking all the moves that work in your direction, something no Republican leader since him has had a clue about.
Agree with your assessment of Reagan. However, the salient issue is that it is not what politicians actually believe that matters, it is their projected image that is the determinant! Reagan was successfully projected to be an ultra-conservative to most people and he still won Reagan-Democrats. The so-called moderate Republicans who followed Reagan did not! Go figure.
Reagan wasx an ultra conservative but Reagan had something on every single solitary issue on this planet that no one since has had.
Wisdom.
Reagan knew what he would compromise on and what he wouldn’t. What was personal issue and what was a broad issue. Most of all Reagan had all of his issues in a pecking order of importance.
Bryan is correct. I’m in Canada and the Conservative party has largely shelved So-Con ideology and activism. The media continues to act as if PM Harper will be outlawing abortion and forcing Church attendance any-day-now. It may take another decade on PM Harper before the scare tactics cease to work. Once the Conservatives gain a new leader, I fully expect that the scare amchine will ramp up again.
An important point is that the people who believe the scare tactics are genuinely fearful of conservatives in power. Overcoming fear is difficult for those who are motivated to do so. How much harder to overcome that fear when one does not perceive a strong reason to do so? That is the uphill climb the right faces.
Yes, a key factor of Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s governance is that he has refused to allow the federal government to deal with social issues. These are, he says, not the domain of a federal government.
These issues belong to the people and must be decided at the local level. In the US, this would mean at the State level. And by referendum if legal factors are involved. But never, ever, at the federal level.
The federal government must confine itself to its duties: the economy, fiscal issues, security of person and property, foreign relations, interstate or interprovincial infrastructure. That’s it.
But, as BrokenFang points out, in Canada, the vitriol against Harper, defining him as having a ‘hidden agenda’ of stripping everyone of their social rights, outlawing abortion (even though he refuses to have the topic in parliament) and so on…is incredible.
The left has nothing else to offer other than vitriol against practical politicians who are focused on real issues, other than the social welfare state. It has no economic policy to even enable a social welfare state to function! After all, increasing taxes won’t enable a welfare state to function!
That would require overturning Roe v Wade at the Federal level and doing away with the doctrine of Incorporation.
Minorities arent going for that. They see the Federal Government as protectors of their rights from the vagaries of White European Christian Males at the local level.
You are never going to win. You cant get around a hostile media to even have the conversation. And you must be perfect and perfect in your argumentation, or you will be destroyed by same media.
Stephen Harper and the Canadian conservatives can win, because they have a 90% White European population still. It’s as simple as that.
In reply to Escape Velocity, since when is abortion an interest only of minorities? And not of ‘white people’?
Since when are the entitlements of interest only to minorities? And not to white people?
No, Harper ‘gets away with it’, not because Canada’s population is primarily ‘white European’, which is untrue, but because of two reasons.
You need a leader who speaks, not with empty rhetoric (as does Obama) but with logic and reason. And one who has integrity; that is, his agenda is to do what is right not what wins votes. Obama is a vote-buyer and Harper is not. Harper says that these issues belong to the people and not to government and that they cannot be brought up in parliament.
Second, the Canadian government is a parliamentary system, which means that the Prime Minister sits within parliament (your House). He can allow or not allow an MP (member of parliament) to table a bill, and on some issues, he won’t allow the bill to be tabled.
Dude, Stephen Harper would get eaten alive if he ran for President of the United States.
Well, maybe, but I think we’re going to have to get it into the Constitution first.
These aren’t losing issues – the language many Republicans use to engage them is. It’s important to demonstrate why liberal access to abortion and radical changes such as genderless marriage are bad social policy. Religion never has to enter the picture. Point to the 145 million excess men in China and how science demonstrates that excess men leads to more war and violence. The left should care about that.
As for genderless marriage, what is the likely result? Why not ask these questioners something simple in response, like should the state have the authority to regulate marriage? And if not, how will issues of parenthood, divorce, custody, and inheritance be handled, and by whom? If so, what should the limits of that regulation be? Should marriage be limited by gender (they’ll say no), by number of persons involved? By age? By consanguinity?
The social issues are fundamental to an economic recovery. The democrats pay women to have children out of wedlock – what is the result? Even the NYT said recently that 40% of “income inequality” is due to single motherhood.
This is not rocket science. Yes – get Newt to do the training here.
The Earth may be several hundred million years old, but it doesn’t look much over 6000—and Gaia, like any woman, should be glad she doesn’t show her age.
Just for the record, more like four billion.
The hydrogen in the water in us is up to 13+ billion years old. Our gold is younger, having probably come from some supernova still more that 4 billion years ago. Creation is always evolution? No?
Just for the record, more like four billion.
Details, details.
The answer is regardless of religion – “Very very old. I don’t know what the latest research has shown, but I know that earth scientists have sophisticated means of determining the earth age, so I defer to their research”.
“the Obama campaign turned out to be right to push their pet social issues. They did that while Romney ran away from them. Look who won.”
Yes, that is because it is a winning issue for Democrats, a losing issue for Republicans. You seem to miss the point, which is the majority agrees with Democrats on social issues.
Planning to do a better job of marching into the machine gun fire next time is not brilliant leadership.
The Reagan Revolution was 36 years ago. Times have changed. To paraphrase Rummy; you run an election with the press and electorate you have. We need to redesign our message so it can be sold to the majority in the middle.
As I said, abortion is a losing issue. Birth control is a losing issue. The press brought up the age of the Earth because Creationism is Christian theology, not science, and if they can show you to be a believer in that twaddle, you are toast in an election. The majority is in favor of abortion, birth control, and teaching evolution to our kids in school. Running against the stream on these topics is foolish. What is more, they have nothing to do with our real problems.
We need to focus on restoring a free market and reigning in government so we can be prosperous and free again. We need to focus on fixing the mess in our schools and medical systems. We need to fix the mess in our courts. We need real energy independence. We need a foreign policy that recognizes that we are in a war with Islam and a cold war with China.
We need a message aimed at the real problems. We need to get rid of the weak points the Culture War gives us. The Culture war is over, Hollywood won. Let’s address stuff we can change.
The Vichy France model, if you cant beat them, join em.
“The Vichy France model, if you cant beat them, join em.”
No, it’s fight were we can win.
The economy, the nanny/police state, liberty, education, medical care, energy, prosperity, & foreign policy. Talk about how we offer a better future, not our self professed moral superiority or our religious beliefs.
Someone wasn’t paying attention to Romney’s campaign, were they?
“Someone wasn’t paying attention to Romney’s campaign, were they?”
I was and it was an insipid campaign. He did focus on the economy, but he offered few details and allowed himself to be defined by the opposition. Obama & Obiden spent more time talking about the details of his tax plan than Romney. The actual tax plan should have been in commercials and in stump speeches every day.
Here is where I think we lost:
The Primary Debates. We allowed the Democrats to run our primary debates. Their goal was to nominate Romney and get as much ammo, in the form of damaging sound bites, for the election as possible. We need to run our own debates that start closer to the primaries and are moderated by Conservative & Libertarian hosts.
Allowing Obama to run an unanswered negative campaign against Romney starting in Spring. The Super Pacs should have been hammering him in the swing states all spring and summer
The War on Women trap which was only possible because our candidates cannot resist witnessing for their faith when they are running for office. We need to quit talking about abortion and birth control other than to say it should remain a personal choice and the government should stay out of it.
Cheating, which we are working on.
Romney’s fancy high tech get out the vote scheme that failed. On this last topic, I believe we need to have the party take over building the presidential election machine and have it finished and ready to go when a winner emerges. Raise money for and organize the get out the vote program during the primaries.
But according to your theory we should also pander to the nanny state because the majority wants it. The majority could care less about the deficit or debt so we should also throw caring about that out the window.
I suspect you only want to really support what is important to you and in that, you are like us all, stupid Christians though we may be.
“I suspect you only want to really support what is important to you and in that, you are like us all, stupid Christians though we may be.”
All I want is Constitutional rule, a small government, sound money, and liberty.
I said nothing about the stupidity or intelligence of Christians. I said running on their issues is a guaranteed election loser.
What is more, you guys need to realize that the Progressives want to get rid of Christianity, as Progress is their religion, and yours competes with theirs for the moral high ground and they have a decided dislike of competing power centers.
Libertarians don’t care what religion you have as long as it doesn’t involve stuff like a plan to take over the world and kill or enslave the members of all the other religions.
I think Libertarians have exactly the winning set of issues if it could only be rescued from the wingnuts and presented by more moderate spokesmen. Liberty in your personal and economic life. Freedom from government. Prosperity. A few more years of spreading the wealth around and TSA abuse should make the people ready for just that.
Very perceptive and uncannily astute. This should be forwarded to RNC ‘leadership’. Of course, my Congressman is just as bad as a Democrat, he voted for the NDAA. And calls himself a TEA Party member.
Saber rattling China on economic issues lost last election.
Muslims arent the enemy, they are part of the electorate, and other minority groups will rally around their defense, lest they be next.
Sorry Old Guy, you really dont know the half of it.
School Choice is a losing issue. White people wanting to take money away from poor minority schools.
Our health system has been fixed, everyone gets equal access now. White people arent holding down minorities, anymore.
Government protects minorities from the White European/Christian/Male would be oppressors and abusers. That issue has already been resolved as well. Conservatives lost.
Protect the planet from the ravages of White European capitalist pigs, the energy independence issue has already been resolved, Green Energy subsidies.
Youve got nothing Old Guy. Zip. Zilch. Nada.
Culture and demography are destiny. You lost the culture war, not just on social issues, but on all issues.
Almost nothing you wrote is actually true.
Health system is “fixed” is the most ridiculous lie of them all though.
You dont get it. It doesnt matter what you think as an out of touch Conservative, but what Hollywood and the Media think, the cultural institutions. As Old Guy stated. Hollywood won. The culture war is over. What he doesnt get is that, this applies to economic issues and the role of government, not just abortion, affirmative action, gay marriage, and so on and so forth.
“Saber rattling China on economic issues lost last election.”
Really? That’s what 2012 was about? Funny how all the polls missed that.
“Muslims arent the enemy, they are part of the electorate, and other minority groups will rally around their defense, lest they be next.”
No one said they were. The enemy, one of them anyway, is Islamic extremism of the kind that foments real wars on women, destroys freedom of religion and speech, rejects civil rights and democracy, and insists on the annihilation of Israel and the subjugation or elimination of the Jewish people.
“School Choice is a losing issue. White people wanting to take money away from poor minority schools.”
…and give the money to … minority students, so they can go to the schools to which they want to go. As usual with leftists, choice is only important when it involves their sex lives. The left would rather see kids struggle in stagnant school districts than real stories of success in minority communities. It’s all about votes with them, not results.
“Our health system has been fixed, everyone gets equal access now.”
Sheesh, lay off the kool-aid. Everyone always had access, it was payment that was the problem, and guess what? Obamacare doesn’t guarantee everyone will have health insurance. It simply makes people pay a tax if they refuse to get it. (And expands government spending, does nothing practical to keep down costs, offers incentives for employers to drop health care and put employees on the government system, leaves rationing as a likely health care outcome – how’s your access now?, etc.)
“White people arent holding down minorities, anymore.”
That’s been true for a few decades now. But what have you got against white people anyway?
“Government protects minorities from the White European/Christian/Male would be oppressors and abusers.”
Your bigotry aside, the chief source of oppression throughout history is the state/government.
“That issue has already been resolved as well. Conservatives lost.”
Conservatives don’t support the oppression of people. Last time I checked, progressives were the group in favor of a more active state, controlling far more of the individual decisions of people.
“Protect the planet from the ravages of White European capitalist pigs, the energy independence issue has already been resolved, Green Energy subsidies.”
Green energy subsidies have led to repeated failures in the business world (remember Solyndra? It wasn’t alone) because wind and solar simply don’t produce near enough energy using current technologies. Now, if you want to go back to the Middle Ages as far as energy capacity, green energy can get you there …maybe.
“Culture and demography are destiny. You lost the culture war, not just on social issues, but on all issues.”
The pro-life position is gaining ground every year. Currently, a small majority of voters identify themselves in this way, and a much larger majority back limitations on abortion rights. Gay marriage only just won its first ballot box victories, barely winning in states that are bluer than a Smurf. Social science research continues to point to the need for a stable institution of marriage and away from the hook-up culture of social liberals.
And it should go without saying that the idea that culture and demography are electoral destiny is not only racist, for assuming members of racial and cultural groups all vote alike (indeed, the Democrat strategy depends on this racism), but it’s especially flawed where social issues are concerned, as African-Americans and Hispanics have majorities who describe themselves as culturally conservative. If culture and demography are destiny, our culture promises to become more conservative, not less.
You still dont get it. It isnt about reality, but the perception of reality.
Hollywood won. The Leftists control the education system.
It really doesnt matter what you do, Conservatives will lose.
Im a staunch Classically Liberal American Christian Conservative. It isnt about the arguments, it’s the culture stupid.
Yes, fiction won over facts in this last election. But, facts or reality will always and must always, trump fiction.
Obama will find that his economic policies of ‘tax the rich’, whom he defines as anyone making over 250,000 a year, will implode the small business economy. His ObamaCare will implode the small business community.
And Obama’s infamous ‘entitlements’, which offer such things as ‘free’ (heh, how stupid is he?) health care, tuition, food stamps, long term unemployment benefits, switching from unemployment benefits to disability, and so on, can’t be sustained!
You can’t borrow your way out of this exponentially increasing proportion of the population who insist on entitlements but provide no taxes to pay for those entitlements!
And since tax revenue will remove any capacity for Investment and Production in the economy, then, in less than two years, tax revenue will dry up!
What will fiction do then, when faced with the facts of reality?
With all due respect, I don’t think you get it. The stories of the GOP’s demise are highly exaggerated. The Democrats won a narrow victory with a coalition they can only count on if they can continue to convince them that big government is the answer. On the social issues, the Democrats are losing a war of attrition. Gay marriage is still a 50/50 issue at best (traditional marriage out polled Romney this year) and they are losing ground on abortion on demand every year. The thing is that economics will become destiny when the debt becomes too big and default is a real possibilty (or when the house of cards the feds have been building with the govt borrowing from itself collapses). Reality has a way of cutting through fantast, and the Democrats don’t have a “transformative” candidate in line for 2016.
“It is not reality, but the perception of reality” It is actually quite rare that the two meet in the popular mind. December 7, 1941, September 11, 2001,…
I think you are right, but not because the ‘culture war’ is over, but because culture belongs to the people. Not to a political party. And not to the government.
Political parties and governments should stay out of culture. That is, the federal government should confine itself to its constitutional duties: the economy, fiscal issues, security of person and property, foreign relations, interstate infrastructures. Period.
Social issues belong to the people. No political party should get involved. The federal government should say that social issues are vital; they belong to the people, who must decide these issues for themselves. Individually or by referendum. At the local or state level. Never, ever, at the federal level.
The Democratic Party ran almost entirely on social issues. It couldn’t run on its economy, and indeed, managed to define its economy as ‘merely a continuation of Bill Clinton’s economy’. Heh. And the Obama gang carefully manufactured their foreign policy fraud, that terrorism no longer exists, by denying its appearnace in Benghazi and elsewhere.
Since the US has, under both the GOP and the Democrats, increased the proportion of the population using ‘entitlements’, ie, social services, then this Set forms an important or large voting bloc. They don’t want to lose those ‘free’ services.
But no economy can afford to sustain such a large proportion living off other people’s taxes and not, themselves, paying into it.
The GOP should stick to the real economic issues. BUT, build up links within each of the ‘identity bloc’ communities (hispanic, black, women, gays, etc) that the Democrats have set up. I’m against identity blocs but they are a reality in this current era.
BUT, build up links within each of the ‘identity bloc’ communities (hispanic, black, women, gays, etc) that the Democrats have set up. I’m against identity blocs but they are a reality in this current era. — ETAB
Exactly. This is the current zeitgeist. And White Europeans better start playing it, else they lose by default.
Denying the reality of the situation isnt a path towards good outcomes for White Europeans, whom are demonized above all else in the USofA.
“Since the US has, under both the GOP and the Democrats, increased the proportion of the population using ‘entitlements’, ie, social services, then this Set forms an important or large voting bloc. They don’t want to lose those ‘free’ services.”
Maybe the time has come to start countering the idea that all of this stuff is free. How about sending out an annual letter to everyone detailing what “free” services they consumed that year and what those “free” services actually cost them and other taxpayers individually? That should be done for all levels of government so that everyone realizes that they get things from all levels of government, not just the feds.
An approach like this might help people realize both what they are getting AND what they are paying at all levels. Some people will probably feel that they are getting the better part of the deal while others will feel that they are very definitely getting the dirty end of the stick. EVERYONE getting such a report should learn something about what things cost and quickly learn that none of that “free stuff” is really free….
To be taken seriously and not as a partisan effort, it would need to be done in a non-partisan way, perhaps prepared by someone seen as neutral on the whole question of who is responsible for the various programs that spend this money. The Congressional Budget Office comes to mind.
Nice idea. I like the idea of sending a letter to everyone, taxpayer and recipeint of taxes, of the actual cost of the services provided to each person. Not in total, but the services to each person.
Yeah, just what we need, leaders with a wobbly moral compass who believe in unbridled, unregulated, dog-eat-dog, money=power, capitalism. Bend ‘em and stick ‘em conservatism.
Here’s a question, genius, if we need to blood-let all of the social conservatives, what’s the answer when you discover that today’s electorate don’t like our fiscal policies, either? I guess those will need to go out the door, too, then the Republican party will be just like the democrats.
Jeez.
You are missing the point. Republicans weren’t campaigning on birth control or abortion. Democrats created the birth control issue via the ObamaCare mandate and then campaigned on that. A compliant press did their blocking for them. Until you recognize that, you’re part of the problem.
At least he understand that Hollywood won. The rest will dawn on him eventually. Hollywood just didnt defeat social cons and Christians.
Na, the birth control issue was an unforced error.
The Democrats tried to STANDARDIZE on what most states already had, that health insurance covers hormones including birth control.
The Catholic bishops pushed for a fight even as the Catholic laity was on the side of the administration.
The Republicans let the bishops set the agenda, and the political resentment machine turned up the rhetoric to 11.
So it became an issue and you lost. It didn’t help that Republican legislatures all over the country (and even in congress) pushed for “personhood bills” that were written to outlaw contraception even as they claimed to be only about abortion.
If you don’t take responsibility for your errors, you are so doomed.
What the Catholic bishops pushed for, was our First Amendment rights. We lost, now we have to pay the jizyah, we get that. Stop complaining, you won the culture war against social conservatives.
You are missing the point. Republicans weren’t campaigning on birth control or abortion.
You actually believe this nonsense, don’t you?
The moment the RNC added ‘right to life’ to the official GOP platform, that’s *precisely* what they were campaigning on, and the left and the media had every right (and obligation) to go after them.
Rep: My platform is right to life, so there.
Media: So what do you think about rape and abortion?
Rep: The media is unfair! Boo Hoo!
If you want media to stop asking dumb “gotcha” religious questions (and killing you, frankly) then quit adding religious crap to the party platform. How hard is that?
Groan! This election was never ABOUT birth-control! The GOP may be stupid, but their whole thing was forcing a Catholic employer to pay for Fluke’s morning after pill! Allowing the dems to control this argument was the dumbest thing EVER!!
And I’ll YOU something, Old Guy, at the time of the Reagan Revolution, I was a democrat, who believed in pro-choice AND I voted for Reagan TWICE! Now that I’m an “Old Broad,” I believe that life starts at conception, but that abortion has to be a states rights issue.
But the point is, back in the day about 80% of the population believed that abortion was ok. Today about 60% believes it is murder.
In a nation where a bit over a third of the population votes, a discussion of what % considers abortion murder is not relevant. For a larger number of those who voted, abortion WAS one of their tipping points on WHETHER to vote and WHO to vote for. The Left gave their supporters a strong motivator on the issue to turn out. The right promised status quo, which did not motivate the 60% in the least.
This is a philosophy that I hear perpetually every election cycle. It isn’t even remotely true the left is agreed with on social issues. Take a look at Gallup, Pew, and Rasmussen polls. The majority of Americans are pro-life. Number increases every year. Republicans lost mainly due to Democrats buying those votes. AEI and Manhattan Institute have those numbers in their respective studies.
Republicans lost for a combination of reasons. Social issues was the least of it despite the fear mongering. As a social conservative so long as I am forced to pay for egregious practices I will fight to keep those issues front and center.
When people pay for their own sins completely unto themselves and exact their free will solely from their wallets then we can be free from social issues.
If that means we continue to lose elections…so be it.
The public doesn’t side with the Dems on all social issues.
When I first became a conservative in the 1970s, “social issues” included crime, welfare, and gun control. On those issues, it’s fair to say that the public ended up siding with us, not with the liberals. We tend to forget that–because we won those fights and so they ceased to be wedge issues the GOP could use to turn out its base anymore.
And as for abortion, a plurality view (according to polls I’ve seen) is that there should be abortion rights but with some restrictions. The problem with the GOP is that too many espouse a view to ban abortion across the country–even in ultra-liberal San Francisco–without exception for rape or incest. Now THAT position is not accepted by the vast majority of Americans. I very much consider myself a conservative, but I would never buy the idea that a victim of forcible rape must be denied the option to terminate the pregnancy and must instead bear the child. There, even I part company with such as Mourdock.
Looks like you fell for the LSM coverage of Richard Mourdock’s answer. His personal opinion is that life begins at conception, so that killing an unborn child because her father raped her mother is morally wrong. The difference between conservatives and liberals is that conservatives don’t do, what they think is a bad idea, while liberals ban it (see Big Gulp). OTOH, conservatives encourage what they think is a good idea, liberals mandate it.
“I have no idea. How old do YOU think it is?”
I don’t exactly know, do you?
I have always found “who cares?” to be effective, followed up by a “whatever.”
Is he listening to you?
First off, is he married? Is his wife on Pinterest? Can she make a board, and a survey, and start making fun of reporters- by name? Can she have an “age of the earth” survey, and pinterest gorgeous photos of the earth and galaxy? and say- we can all be humbled? Clip-link to the Earth in D’aulaire’s kids book of myths- clip to monty pythons galaxy, and so on? Make it about reverence? He’s not doing this- his wife is. She’ll be talking about reverence and joy, which most reporters are deficient in, but most wives and daughters ( voters) have in spades.
And, second, can he please take some “touchy-feely” NeuroLinguistic Programming classes, or something, not to get into whatever “mode” the person he’s talking to is in, but to notice it when a reporter is trying it. Most really good reporters do this instinctively- that’s why they look floppy when they aren’t interviewing. He needs to know how they are trying to gaffe him, so he can break the physical frame, basically, and stay true to himself.
And dear goodness, please have him talk to country music fans, so he knows what a normal interview sounds like, not a “icky southerner gotcha filter.”
needling difficult questions? God you guys are dum
and dear goodness, get him to a few emmaus or christ renews his parish retreats, so his ego- reservoir is entirely full, so he’s not even a little parched for attention or approval from reporters. absolutely over the top narcissism cuddling, so he’s full to the rim, satiated as an infant. It’ll keep him from that edge of hunger and need.
Remember when Democrats though Obama’s answer that the question of when life began was “above his pay grade?”
Old Guy – abortion is a losing issue, for the Democrats. When that issue is a deciding factor among voters, the pro-life position is winning. Polls indicate that Americans favor a religious exception for birth control in insurance coverage (because people can still obtain it legally).
As for Christian theology, I’ve never seen it in the top 20 of a most important issues list for voters. I did see the economy, the national debt, health care, and other issues on which our losing candidate did focus and still lost. The electorate chose a candidate with completely unrealistic views about the economy and the national debt and you think they’ll sweat one who offers some deference and respect to religious belief? Amazing.
Personally, I have zero interest in following pronouncements about the culture war from people who were never invested in the conservative side to begin with.
My answer would have been “Who cares?” Probably why I’m not cut out to be a politician.
“Google it, here I’ll show you how”
Wow, not only is the media doubling down on the slander, but the concern trolls are out in force. Rubio must really scare them.
One would think that people from both GQ or people like Mizel whose Evansville newspaper derives revenue from the private sector would not go off on stupid tangents on the beginning of life (or the beginning of the planet) and be more concerned with our economic future and their falling advertising dollars that employs their magazine and newspaper. The correct answer is not to answer a stupid question and instead maybe say, I don’t agree with sucking the brains out of third trimester babies but if it is such an important topic for your newspaper please explain why this is more important than businesses closing?
Earth is only as old as cognizant man.
Prior to that, the spinning collection of exploded stardust, didn’t have a name….and therefore, could not have been called “Earth”.
The universe…or the multiverse, may have existed prior to man’s existence, but their existence without a creature to observe, study and appreciate them …left them unopened gifts waiting to be discovered.
“Quantum existence” requires an observer. Man fills the role of making all of creation come alive. If he gives thanks to the Creator for those gifts, he shows more wisdom than if he believes that Earth, the universe or the multiverse exists without man to know the wonder and joy of them.
Careful, careful. I’d debate you, very heavily, on your comments. But this is not the place for such an extended debate. Just a few comments.
First, I don’t really agree with your view that something exists only if it has a name, ie, a symbolic ‘image’ given to it by some agent external to it. I think that a single cell protozoan doesn’t require any ‘name’ in order to exist. And its interactions with other organisms didn’t require any ‘study or appreciation’. But, I get your point about mankind naming the earth as an ‘experienced reality’.
As for quantum existence requiring an observer, frankly, any existence requires the reality of one’s own finiteness. I mean spatial not merely temporal finiteness. If that protozoa didn’t have a finite nature, by virtue of its cell membrane, then, it wouldn’t exist. I think the closure of an entity, let’s say a bacterial cell by virtue of its cell wall, puts it into a relation with an Other (observer) even if this Other is only another bacteria cell.
I do get your point; my point is only that abiotic and biotic life exists, in its own magnificence, without the consciousness of humans.
If the earth quakes, and nobody is there to be shook, was it Earth?
Or something like that. All philosophical and intellectual and all that crap.
But only if there is a Capital “O” Observer. Bishop Berkeley (for whom the city itself, and Cal-Berkeley was named) may have gotten it right:
There was a young man who said, God
Must think it exceedingly odd
If he finds that this tree
Continues to be
When there’s no one about in the Quad.
Dear Sir, your astonishment’s odd:
I am always about in the Quad.
And that’s why the tree
Will continue to be,
Since observed by, Yours faithfully, GOD.
The destruction of the Right’s spokesmen seems to me largely self-inflicted damage.
Have we not seen our leadership…
…unprepared for gotcha questions?
…unable to inarticulate and/or defensive when asserting conservative ideas?
…refusing to be relentlessly opportunistic to go on the offensive and instead being deferential in the name of taking the high road?
We just keep getting set up to be knocked down.
These kinds of questions are not difficult to deflect. I quick answer would be, “I’ll be glad to answer that question when AG Holder releases the subpeoned Fast and Furious documents.” or “I will answer that question when Sen Reid passes a Senate Budget Bill.”
If they are asked in a debate, pull a Dem trick and go on the offensive. Mourdock could have answered the abortion question by saying, “I think it is more important to realize that my opponent Joe Donnely was the key ObamaCare vote. And he assured voters that ObamaCare would not fund contraception or abortions. He gave Hoosiers his word. And he broke it.”
This isn’t rocket science.
Well, it better not be rocket science if it is going to be undertaken by folks who don’t even know how old the Earth is. Or maybe we’ll get better results in the space program if we add more phlogiston to the rocket fuel.
I guess you’ll never admit it, but aren’t you at least a tiny bit embarrassed by the gross ignorance of so many on your side? I wince when I hear Democrats talking about vaccines causing autism. Doesn’t it bother you that right-wing icons like Bill O’Reilly don’t even know what causes the tides?
My concern is not when politicians display their ignorance about science, which so many of them do, but when they display their total and utter ignorance about economics. And history.
but aren’t you at least a tiny bit embarrassed by the gross ignorance of so many on your side?
Yes.
I’m certainly embarrassed by ignorant conservatives & republicans esp when it comes to scientific facts but it works both ways. The progressives & democrats are equally dopey no matter how many college degrees are following their names.
Why in the world does it matter what anyone knows about the age of the earth (or the universe), except for scientific specialists? Sure, on subjects where a government policy may have some effect, scientific knowledge might be relevant. (But even there, who wants a politician who goes by what he knows, rather than asking an expert?) But for this question, what possible difference does it make? It’s like throwing out an obscure historical or literary question. E.g., Our Leader thinks that, before Columbus, Europeans believed the earth was flat. This is rank ignorance, but how does it affect policy matters?
“How old is the universe?”
“I’m not God. Are you? Or do you imagine yourself to be God? I don’t. That would be Blasphemy. Do you imagine yourself to have a greater understanding of how God created the Universe than the rest of us? I don’t. That would also be Blasphemy. Or do you imagine yourself to have a greater understanding of how God measures time? I certainly don’t. That would also be Blasphemy. But perhaps you are all you claim to be. If so, then you already know the answer. Prithee sir, share your infinite knowledge with the rest of us benighted and ignorant humans. After all, I am only a Lowly Conservative, as opposed to an Enlightened Liberal, an Omniscient Progressive, or one of the Elite of the the Elite, the Cogniscenti of the Cogniscenti, a Journalist – or, best and wisest and most blessed of all, a Liberal Troll bestowing his Manna on the Slime-Covered Morlocks of PJMedia.”
BTW,
Well, it better not be rocket science if it is going to be undertaken by folks who don’t even know how old the Earth is. Or maybe we’ll get better results in the space program if we add more phlogiston to the rocket fuel.
(-Jim Harrison)
Tell you what, Jim. Give me a reference to a problem from an aerospace engineering textbook (what you call “rocket science” up there), preferably one dealing with either orbital mechanics or spacecraft design, where the age of the object you’re trying launch from – that is, the one you’re trying to NOT hit – is in any way relevant, or even mentioned. Do that and I’ll concede that the Progressives may possibly have the right notion when it comes to science. Full marks for supplying all of the author, title, chapter, and problem number. Partial credit (25%) for each element. ISBN number is good for extra credit. No need to work out the problem, the citation alone is acceptable.
Until then, I think you’re fetishizing a method of investigation into a method of cultural “goodthink”-control (in an Orwellian sense); that you and yours are making it into a religion (or maybe just a supporting pillar for your One True Church – the state), that you seriously need to read Neumann’s “Cargo Cult Science” speech, and that frankly, you don’t know what the hell you’re talking about when it comes to either rocks or rockets.
I heartily applaud your grasping of the REAL issue in all levels of government, honesty and accountability. I know it is a fervent fantasy but I’d like to see a Constitutional amendment that if an elected member of the Executive and Legislative branches breaks his oath of office, specifically “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution”, he/she is ineligible to run for reelection, ever and forfeits ALL benefits gained(retirement, etc.) while in office.
I don’t understand why asking Rubio about the age of the Earth isn’t a politically relevant question. Rubio’s a Catholic so presumably the great antiquity of the Earth isn’t personally problematic for him, but he does want the support of the majority of Republicans and they do have a problem with the Age of the Earth, at least according to the surveys I’ve seen. How much a politician is willing to lie or spin in order to accommodate the more embarrassing part of his base surely has implications for how he might govern, especially since so many Conservatives are eager to break down the wall separating Church and State. Is Rubio planning to star in a sequel: Etch-a-Sketch II, the Revenge? What other nonsense is he willing to endorse?
How is it ‘politically relevant’? What does the age of the earth have to do with decisions made by a government?
As I’ve said, government has no business dictating social or scientific beliefs, unless you want a totalitarian government like that of the Taliban or communist regimes.
Government should confine itselfl to its constitutional tasks: the economy, fiscal policies, security of person and property, foreign affairs, and interstate infrastructure. Period.
Social and scientific beliefs belong to the people and must be decided by the people. Never by government.
Therefore, the federal government should not, as does the Democratic and Obama government, deal in social issues. It has no right to order churches to fund practices against their beliefs, no right to fund or not fund abortions (which must be left to the States and by referendum); no right to state its support for or rejection of gay marriage. These are issues that belong to the people. Not to a government – again, unless you prefer a Taliban style government which does indeed make these decisions for you.
Glad to read your heartfelt, if indirect, support for Roe vs Wade.
No, you are making an illogical conclusion.
Because I say that social issues must not be decided by the federal government, but by the individual, or, if legal factors are involved, at the State level and by referendum, does not mean that I, personally, support Roe vs Wade.
I don’t.
But that doesn’t mean that my view must also be held by others, or indeed, by the State. That’s what is meant by ‘decisions must be made by the people’. If no legal issues are involved, then, the decision is personal. If legal issues are involved (ie, the use of a doctor) then, the legal factors have to be made, by referendum, at the State level. Not at the federal level.
In other words, it’s not government intruding into people’s moral decisions if I decide it isn’t. Without this fudge factor, how could you not conclude that the Feds have no business outlawing abortion? The Democrats aren’t typically the ones hiding under somebody’s bed with a tape recorder. The argument about contraception and the church is about whether churches have a right to make it hard for people to acquire birth control. Absolutely nobody is suggesting that anybody has to use birth control if they don’t want to.
Even before the Confederacy, American conservatives have really been quite happy with intrusive government so long as it is local enough to ensure that the right kind of people are in charge. For them, freedom = the right of privileged groups to lord it over somebody—slaves, employees, wives, minors. If you read Calhoun, for example, you’ll realize that his complaints against the Federal government were not complaints against the power of the State at least if the State were South Carolina.
In reply to Jim Harrison, you wrote:
“In other words, it’s not government intruding into people’s moral decisions if I decide it isn’t.”
That doesn’t make any sense. Either the government makes a law that intrudes into a personal decision, or it doesn’t. Such an action has nothing to do with me.
I am saying that the federal government has no business deciding societal or personal issues. It must confine itself to its constitutional duties, which are very limited and very specific. See Section 8 of the Constitution. Not a word, not even a whisper, about societal issues.
Societal issues must not be decided by a federal government – unless you want a totalitarian Taliban style government. They must be decided at the local level, personally, or, if legal issues are involved, by REFERENDUM and at the State level.
You wrote:
“The argument about contraception and the church is about whether churches have a right to make it hard for people to acquire birth control.”
Surely you don’t believe this. The argument has nothing to do with a religion ‘making it hard for people to acquire birth control’ – which costs less than a MacDonalds meal for a month. It’s not an economic issues.
It’s about the preservation of a fundamental right, namely, religion. That’s the First Amendment in the Bill of Rights. If a particular religion forbids birth control, then, for a government to violate this belief and insist that it go against its belief, is a violation of the First Amendment.
As for your second paragraph, I don’t see its relevance to this discussion. I don’t care about continuing to fight the past, and if the GOP or the Democrats in their past years, both violated the rights of people as we know that both parties and politicians did, then, we must judge them as violators IN THE PAST.
I’m talking about NOW. And, my view is that the federal government has no business legislating societal behavior. Unless, as I said, you want a totalitarian Taliban style government.
His life is an Illogical Conclusion.
He craves attention. Deprive him of it.
DON’T FEED THE TROLLS.
So you’re against the proposed Human Life Amendment in the GOP Platform. Thanks for clearing that up.
That Amendment would ban abortion nationwide–even for some atheist woman living in San Francisco or Vermont. And it would not make any exceptions for rape or incest. A victim of forcible rape would have to bear her rapist’s child or else be found guilty of violating the U.S. Constitution. (I wonder what the penalty in law would be for that.)
Even most pro-life Americans would not dare to go that far.
“especially since so many Conservatives are eager to break down the wall separating Church and State.”
What wall would that be? You are atypical in that you talk about a non-existent wall but ignore what the Founding Fathers said about religion and morality unless it can be twisted to suit your purposes. Your answer is the same tired redundant and debunked over and over again answer that so many leftists keep repeating like it is a religion.
To be upfront, I don’t really care what the Founding Fathers did or did not think about the separation of church and state, though they were shocking free thinkers for their time. It’s certainly true that in the 19th Century, after what I think of as the American Enmerdement, American courts cheerfully prosecuted people for blasphemy and treated Christians, indeed Protestant Christians, as having more rights than others. For that matter, when I went to a public high school back in the 60s, atheists and non Christians were definitely treated as second class citizens as they still are in many parts of the country, although apparently being a Catholic or a Jew is now OK.
Thing is, I’m very much in favor of the separation of church and state in the here and now. Historical or interpretive questions about the meaning of the First Amendment are of secondary interest to me. Even so venerable a document as the Constitution is not the basis of either my politics or my morality. I respect it because much of it seems wise to this day, but its wisdom (and occasional foolishness and even evil) has to be judged in the present. It isn’t the Torah.
the answer for all you folks out there that really care is…..G-d made it in 6 days, how long ago, i wasn’t there. hollywood is fantasy that isn’t the real world. the culture war hahahah they won what? i just fixate on what they say on the view, oh my the Kardashians, snookie and the Jersey shore, and my all time favorite of reality shows, doomsday preppers. groan. all those tough guys playing soldiers, we’ve been at war for 10 years i haven’t seen Hollywood suit up for the big game, sean penn comes to mind on this one.
Many who run as conservatives fail in their speeches and their actions because they are basically not what they pretend to be and are thus weak in defending what they pretend to support. RINOs!
The best counter to a gotcha is asking why they want to know your opinion, or why they are asking. Gingrich really does need to give lessons on answering stupid questions. “Journalists” asking these partisan hack gotchas should be treated like the unserious “journalists” they are, i.e., if you’re going to ask questions that have nothing to do with the issues we face, I don’t have time to answer them. Cya. They’re going to be smeared whatever they do, its better to be smeared not stumbling over an answer to a question just meant to trip you up.
A GQ interview is hardly and attack ad. Remember this is mixed in with a group of softball questions, “Who is your best friend?”, “What’s your favorite Afrika Bambaataa song?” stuff anyone with a pulse can answer.
Rubio agreed to do this interview and wins as long as they spell his name right. On the other hand, any journalist really isn’t doing his/her job if they don’t test the boundaries and ask hard questions. Otherwise you’re writing for Parade magazine.
Frankly if Rubio’s rhetorical skills aren’t up to handling questions from a mens fashion magazine well, whose fault is that?
No, it was a fair question. And it shows that Rubio is afraid to offend the droolers on the loony right. The Roman pontiff, Rubio’s spiritual overlord, believes that the world is billions of years old; I’m sure Rubio does too. He’s just afraid to admit it.
Many twits, especially those on the Left, believe that only science has the correct answers to any and all questions. Ask a scientist a question about science, and his answer will always be about science, but not necessarily correct.
I’m still trying to figure out what was so bad about Rubio’s response. I agree that he needs to sharpen up his responses and guard against what will come, but I can’t see that this particular answer is going to be held against him down the road. Let it be a warning to him, but I actually agree with him; that’s NOT the purview nor should it be, of the politicians, not at a Federal level, and we have real problems. Yes, I understand how the Left will twist it to become a Federal problem, but…screw them.
Rubio can at least make a decent speech with a decent story and tell about conservatism. I heard his basic stump speech in Iowa a night or two ago, and it was superb, IMHO. He is working on defining the small government AND cultural conservative ideas in such a way that can be understood (I’m not saying the other side will agree; they won’t. Who cares? We still need those who can articulate our positions and not in a weak-willed wishy-washy way. I don’t care if he wants to stay away from the “Tea Party” label for now, it’s fine. It’s smart, in fact, since the Left managed to do as good a job demonizing that label as they did Romney. It’s the principles that matter, not the labels, and Rubio can speak, unlike the Most Boring Presidential Speaker in MY Lifetime Even with His Teleprompter; he can tell a story. I know it’s too early to say what will happen…but I’m glad Rubio is out there testing the waters. Trial-by-fire with asinine questions will be part of it. So, again, all these suggestions to him…hopefully, his “people” will read these things and talk with him, let him learn and let him grow).
I’m still trying to figure out what was so bad about Rubio’s response.
He used a crayon to paint a picture of himself as instant wingnut. He doesn’t understand that science and religion are not the same thing. Science says the earth is a certain age; it doesn’t tell you why it was created. Just how and when. Religion ought not try to tell you how or when, just why. How and why are different things. If Rubio can’t sort even this much out and get it right, it doesn’t suggest he can get the *important* stuff right.
In short, science and religion are not inherently incompatible; they are tools we humans have to try discover answers to different questions. I would never look to science to try to figure out why the universe was created. I would look at science to answer how.
“How” is nice; “Why” or even “What” is far more interesting.
For example, if I asked you, “what is the sun?” I assume you would reply along the lines of “a massive burning ball of gas in the sky.” My response would be, “No, that what it’s made of. Not what it is. So what is it?” Or is “what it’s made of” is the sum of “what it is?” Really? How boring.
The real question should be, why is he doing an interview with GQ? Whats next, Rolling Stone? If he does plan to become better known by doing suspect interviews with bias rags, might I suggest he come better prepared.
Lets face it, the GOP has to work ten times harder to convince the wider audience that our policies are right for America. Until we expose the media for what they are it will be a lost cause, and the GOP has done a terrible job in their communications with the media over time. Many GOP politicians appear to be scared to death of the media, and just basically agree with their ascertions. I would suggest they go back to the archives, and research how Reagan handled the so called elite media. And, you would never had seen Reagan on silly shows like Letterman, Stewart, or The View.
I have lost considerable respect for the office, thanks to JugEar.
I’d like to see some hard questions for Rubio from the Right. Then I’ll worry about whether he’s being dissed by the fluff police at GQ who only play at being print journalists when they aren’t busy trying to drink themselves into being New Journalists.
Rubio’s a trojan horse on so many conservative issues that the real problem is and continues to be the stardust blown in from the Right.
“More than 2 but less in years than our deficit in dollars, ha, ha..But seriously, Jim, we need to really focus on the problems facing this country that threatens the future of our children and grandchildren as you know, my Grandfather…” and don’t even take a breath…
These are gotcha questions the media create and share with colleagues, “how to discredit and destroy flat-headed extremist right wing conservatives.”
Katie Couric got some mileage out of this question posed to Sarah Palin leading up to the 2008 election.. “Besides Roe v. Wade, name one other Supreme court decision with which you most disagree.”
Palin stumbled of course– and the press had a field day with mock outrage at the apparent ignorance of conservative (female) candidates. But think about the set-up in that question. Not only does someone have to be familiar with the names of the many landmark decisions (which isn’t that much to ask perhaps), but then also know the details well enough to publicly disagree with the decision. One cannot simply blurt out names off the top of the head:
“Miranda v. Arizona (1966)”
“Brown vs Board of Education”
“Bush v. Gore”
I saw this same tactic used at least one other time, another liberal female reporter asking a conservative female candidate.
Here is what the conservatives need to learn about these questions: there is no
right answer (for the purpose of helping your campaign); that’s why they are gotcha questions. Learn how to *NOT* answer the question gracefully. Cleverly deflect or expose the question for being absurd.
There is indeed DUMB QUESTIONS.. by DUMB questioners. Being able to cite facts and figures of a 5th grader means nothing. Rubio is not running for 5th grade teacher of the year. What the demorats know how to do is deflect and accuse. If I were Rubio I’d have one instant response for all DUMB QUESTIONS, ‘What are you a racist? How dare you question my educational background.’ . On the other hand, as I’ve said elsewhere, all repubes should quit, go home, resign.. let the demorats destroy the country as fast as possible. I pray I live long enough to see the total destruction of the US so I can witness it’s rebirth.
GQ: How old do you think the Earth is?
A suggested challenge:
An interesting question. It does, however, not resolve whether the earth inexplicably came into being or was deliberately created. It does not address the questions that vexed Paul Gauguin when he painted his masterpiece: “Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?” No one was around to observe and science can unfortunately not give us the answer whether there is a Creator or not. Yet these are questions that Christianity, which secularism denigrates, seriously address. Since the United States were first established many Christians have worked hard to help build a just and peaceful society with strong families. We do a great injustice when we ignore their role and contribution in the history of our land.
One of the problems revealed by such ‘gotchya’ questions on the part of the MSM is that, whether you think it’s true or not, the right often tends to use biblical limitations on personal freedom and individual liberty…to enact laws which actually limit the freedoms and liberties of other Americans in the real world.
Yes, the liberals do this, as well. ‘They did it first,’ or ‘they’re worse than we are’ is not a rational or mature argument.
Remember: America is a secular nation with freedom of religion. Not ‘a christian nation with christian rulers’ (there is a difference), otherwise, we’d have cardinals and bishops and reverends and ministers and such in charge of every branch of government and every bureaucracy. (The last time human beings tried that, it was an unmitigated disaster.)’ If we do what the right often says we should do as a nation, whether openly, implied or assumed, it would be an end to freedom of association, freedom of conscious and freedom of religion…and of free will, itself.
When the goal you seek results in the end of free will, you’ve pretty much abandoned your bible, your god, and your savior. If ‘He’ knew better than to destroy free will, you might want to think it over before you try it.
Of course, you won’t listen me or anyone like me, let alone a liberal, a progressive or a Democrat. You’re wiser, smarter and better than your own god(s), let alone the rest of us poor, benighted human beings you have to put up with…
I think Rubio gave a good answer. However, because I’m a NJ punk, I would have turned the question around on the interviewer. If they think they’re so smart, let ‘em answer. “Hey, waddaya think youself. What’s your answer, and prove it, if you’re so smart. By da way, quick, how many zeros in 16 trillion?” Not fast enough. The leftist interviewers must be treated with the disrespect they deserve.
SHoot!Tthe Bible said the earth was a sphere before scientist said it was and that the earth “was hung on nothing”(space) before scientist figured it out. Scientist are just catching up with the Bible.
Not. Constitutionally. Eligible.
MArco Rubio CANNOLT be President, nor Vice-President. The Demcorats may not give two craps about the Constitution. WE do.
Do a good job as Senator, Mr. Rubio. But the Constitution says no way for PRez pr Veep.
It’s simple. The answer to that question is, “**** off. Now does anyone want to talk about the economy or foreign affairs?”
If you venture into the realm of idiots, you’re bound to be asked idiotic questions. Unfortunately, this is the realm Republicans need to engage to expand their base. In order to gain young converts you have to talk to them. Marco is trying, Marco is wise.
There are five possible answers to this question
1) I don’t know. Scientists do and I take them at their word.
2) I don’t know. Fundamentalist preachers do and I take them at their word.
3) It’s very old, billions of years. Science.
4) It’s very young, thousands of years old. Jesus.
5) Blah blah blah trying to have it both ways, talk a little bit about “teach the controversy” make it clear that while scientists have their ideas about the age of the year and priests have their ideas about the age of the earth you don’t want to choose sides because you are some kind of politician that wants to be on both sides of an issue.
Here’s an idea. Just say what you believe. You think it’s the earth is six thousand years old, say it. You think it’s billions say that.
And then explain you don’t think it’s an important issue. Voters are smart enough to vote for the whole package.
Honestly how can you defend someone who waffles all over the place because he’s trying to please everyone.
I’m not sure the answer is that important but how he phrased it is, he’s already running for the next election and you are not gonna get a straight shooing answer from here on until 2016.
4) It’s very young, thousands of years old. Jesus.
Where did He say that? Chapter and verse?
It’s interesting these media types never try to corner liberals with “scientific” questions such as:
“When does life begin? Does it begin at conception?”
The sacred biology of the pro-lifers is about as “scientific” as transubstantiation. Indeed, it has a lot in common with transubstantiation. As a 67 year old guy, I’m kinda unlikely to need an abortion any time soon, but I object to the imposition of a goofy new religion* on the country in the guise of protecting the unborn.
*Contemporary fundamentalist religions are not keepers of the ancient flame. They are every bit as ersatz and modern as Scientology. Before the pro-life industry got under way, the traditional doctrine of the Jews, Christians, and Muslims was that the soul entered the fetus at quickening. Before that, to use the language of the Talmud, the fetus is a limb of the mother. The factual claims of all religions are entirely false, of course, but at least the old view was relatively sensible compared to the fantasies of the Elmer Gantrys of the right wing.
The correct answer is, “You are asking me that question because you are anti-Latino. It has no relevance to anything political, and I will not answer it. Again, you are asking it out of bigotry.”
Unfortunately for all you wishful thinkers Marco Rubio is even less of a NATURAL Born Citizen than the USURPER is. BOTH of Rubio’s parents were FOREIGN nationals when he was born at least the USURPER had one American Citizen parent his mother, albeit UNDERAGE to pass on her American citizenship to him.
J Pousson and Pragmatist are, of course, both correct: Niether Marco Rubio–or Bobby Jindal,while we’re at it–are eligible to be President; neither are “natural born” citizens, as Article II, Section 2 of the Constitution demands. One, one of the reasons the Republican establishment became enablers (accessories) to this illegal act, is their hope that Rubio, as a presidential candidate, can attract enough latin voters to win in 2016. Neither the Democrats nor the Republican establishment, which includes every commentator, from Bill Krystol to Charles Krauthammer, as well as every republican, in or out of office has any respect for the Constitution. Only a small minority of Republican voters–let’s call them “Federalists” or “Constructionists” understand and care about this issue, the greatest violation of our Constitution ever committed. We cannot look to the courts for relief: dozens of lawsuits have been filed. Most were wrongly dismissed for procedural reasons; the decisions that judges did reach on the merits were total nonesense, at best, and many of them were intentional misrepresentations of state and federal law. We are living in a nightmare of fraud; I don’t know how we can wake up.
I disagree with your definition of ‘natural born’. The Constitution merely says ‘Natural born citizen’. It does NOT say that this means that one’s parents must also be born in the USA.
‘Natural born’ defines citizenship as aquired by being born in the US. This differentiates it from someone who was born elsewhere but moved to the US and chose to take on citizenship. Such a person is not eligible to the presidency.
Since citizenship in the USA is conferred at birth if one’s parents are resident in the USA (not citizens but residents), then, citizenship is not ‘hereditary’ but is geographic. If you are born in the USA, then, you are a ‘natural born’ US citizen.
Like tens of millions of Americans, you’ve been misinformed or misled about the meaning of “natural born citizen” in the US Constitition. The writers of our constitution used the definition of “natural born citizen” written by Swiss legal philosopher Emmerich de Vattel in his treatise of 1757, “The Laws Of Nations.” Vattel defines the meaning of a “natural born citizen” as “those born in the country, of parents who are citizens.” The writers of our Constitution were very careful to distinguish between two classes of citizens: The first is a “natural born citizen” a child born in America, both of whose parents were citizens at the time of his/her birth. (The Supreme Court has accepted and relied on this definition.) This child can become President of the US.
The second class is an ordinary citizen, only one of whose parents was an American citizen at the time of his/her birth, or an immigrant who became a US citizen through the process of naturalization. This child cannot become President. In the Federalist papers, written at the time our Constitution was written, Alexander Hamilton makes a point of insisting that a person must be born of two American citizens, at the time of birth, in order to be allowed to become President. Obama’s father was not an American citizen (he was an English citizen) at the time of Obama’s birth. This means that Obama is not a “natural born citizen” is not legally entitled to be President. Believe me, this is the truth, whether or not we like it.
Scientific illiteracy is not ok from those we hold out as spokesmen for our cause.
How can we present ourselves as the party of fiscal and national security reality when we utterly fail on being the party of scientific reality? Why do we field so many candidates who aren’t sure how old the earth is and/or reject the fact of human evolution?
This is embarrassing. All evidences suggests that a 6000 year old Earth is impossible. This is the equivalent of him admitting he’s not sure how babies are made.
We are rapidly hurtling toward an unwritten speech code in this country. It took hold on college campuses years ago and is now spreading to the broader culture. I heard a debate between senate candidates where the pro-life candidate was asked his view on abortion for rape victims. He pivoted and didn’t answer directly, clearly not wanting to give his opponent a sound bite that would end up in a campaign ad. A candidate who believes abortion is the destruction of human life and objects to it, even in cases of rape, cannot say that in public without risking utter campaign destruction (no matter how sensitively he frames his answer). Likewise, we are almost at the point where a candidate who believes in traditional, orthodox Christian views of things like marriage and the age of the earth (views that were commonly accepted a generation ago) cannot express them publicly without blowing up his campaign.
Whether or not you have a problem with these beliefs, we should all be disturbed by the repression of free speech we see coming not just from the Left, but now from our own side. I sincerely hope the intolerant comments above directed toward people who hold alternative views on the age of the earth are all from Leftist trolls rather than from conservatives.
As Rubio said, the age of the earth has nothing to do with his work in the U.S. Senate. It also has nothing to do with the vast majority of anything else in the world, including science, FWIW, except for a few fields that deal with macroevolution. Like with global warming, the ridicule and name-calling are designed to squelch debate and silence dissenters. We should always be defenders of more speech and more debate, whether or not we agree with it.
The tap dancing IS embarrassing.
Correct answer would be ‘apparently a few billion years’ and if there was any evolution/religion followup question , a good response would be something about how miraculous it is that natural laws allow lifeto exist at all and for people to be here to contemplate God’s work.
The billions answer IS correct, to the best of our knowledge, because the same physics used in multiple lines of evidence is the same as that underlying nuclear power and the semiconductors in modern electronics. This is VASTLY more sound than AGW cr@p, or ‘scientific’ Marxism.
No, the correct answer is we cannot know the answer.
Draw in a breath. Hold it for a moment. Now release it.
You can explain the mechanics of what just happened. But you cannot explain why you were able to do carry out that complex (and it is more complex than any device we can invent), or why you are here now to read these words.
Can you ever really measure Time. You can only count off the ticks of a clock whose meter you have set and found useful as a way for marking the passage of time.
Politicians and Scientists and Liberal Trolls mark the passage of time, and try to use the time allotted to them as efficiently and effectively as they see fit: to craft Policy that (hopefully) benefits as many people as possible, to every day gain a better but always tantalizingly incomplete understanding of HOW the universe works (and maybe even sometimes WHY), and Liberal Trolls to do their best imitation of Hemorrhoids.
FWIW Ive done lab experiments on radioactive decay seeing how it conformed with theory in college physics.
Because science is always about approaching the truth, imperfectly at times, any idea is just as good as another?
Next you’ll be telling me that because no one was there to hear it, the falling tree might not have made a sound.
BTW idiot, if you weren’t so busy imagining trolls, you would see my orig post implicitly made the exact same point you did– that science can shed some light on how we exist but not WHY.
FWIW I donated $500 to Romney so F off on the liberal charge.
Your experiments use units of measurement that were invented to conform with the instruments, so of course they are in tune.
We humans invented clocks and calendars. We decided how long a Second should be, and have revised that standard several time because the old one seemed too imprecise, how many Seconds in a Minute, how many Minutes in an Hour, how many Hours in a Day, how many Days in a Year, and that the Year should measure how long it takes to rotate the Sun.
Imagine if you were presented with a contract by a firm based on a planet further out from their Sun that we are from ours. The contract states you will be paid in 1 Year.
Would it not behoove you to ask whose year. Earth’s or their planets?
Can you honestly say that you have definitive proof that 6000 God Years equals 4.8 Billion Human Years? Can anyone?
The limit to how much you can know is how much of the terms of that knowledge you have set up.
I apologize for over-reacting to your post.
I really wish people understood the limits of Science.
And I have come around to thinking that the phrase “to the best of our knowledge” is an inadequate expression of the limits of Science.
It implies that Knowing has some sort of Absolute value to it.
And acknowledging this is not a weakness. It is a strength. It is an acceptance of the fact that Reality will always trump the Order we would impose on it.
“I really wish people understood the limits of Science.”
Most scientists do. The few I know are also Christians. What I want to see here is a society that allows Scientists, as scientists, to practice, in the laboratory, the Methodological Atheism that is the sine qua non of good science, but then does not insist that the method become an overarching mentality, and allows them, should they be Christians (many were and are,) to say their prayers once they’re done in the lab. Everything else is sound and fury, etc., etc. …
The Christian Church survived all the Persecution the Roman Empire could throw at them (and that Persecution was not continuous, but when it happened it was fierce and terrifying and overthrew the courage of many Christians) by BEING CHRISTIANS!
They acted like Christians, spoke like Christians (albeit with discretion when that was the better part of valor), and lived like Christians.
Conservatives can expect to be mocked and insulted. We can expect people with no real understanding that Science is a Method of Inquiry into how the Universe works and that that Inquiry does not end to use Science like a cudgel against us.
Why not answer a questions that mocks your Faith with a Reaffirmation of your Faith? Why be ashamed of believing that there are questions that only God has the answer to? Why allow yourself to be bullied by some Arrogant Twerp whose very arrogance masks the slow agony of Doubt that eats away at his or her soul? They are the weak ones. They are the ignorant ones. They are the fools who assert Incomplete Knowledge like Inadequate Power over a universe no one can fully know or wield any more power over than is adequate to control our own foolish impulses.
Represent yourselves, God damn it!
Why be ashamed of believing that there are questions that only God has the answer to?
Simple factual stuff like the age of the earth isn’t in that category.
Whether the Earth was created in 7 days, or 7 actual eras, I’m not sure we’ll ever be able to answer that.
We already know the answer, and it’s 4.5 billion years old. Period. We don’t feel we might have a kinda/sorta maybe answer. Nope. We KNOW. 4.5 billion years is known and factual, no different than the physics that governs how electronics work. Physics is physics.
I think parents should be able to teach their kids what their faith says, what science says.
Terrible answer. Nobody, but NOBODY, gives a flying wallenda if wingnuts want to teach fantasies to their own kids in the confines of their homes or churches. On the other hand this answer seems deliberately obtuse, bordering on the right of wingnuts to demand teaching this in public schools to normal non-wingnut kids.
Just a paathetic showing.
It should be a rule from now on that pretty much any stupid question like this does not have to be answered. Who made these people lords over us?
An Arrogant Twerp has just spilled the contents of his Putrescent and Diseased Mind all over the screen in response to my answer, illustrating the superiority of my argument.
I have to say, although I would prefer if Romney had won, because we would all be better off economically moving forward, it still is a liberating experience.
I feel so much less obliged to be nice or polite or even pleasant to Progressives.
They have shown their contempt for my beliefs. They have shown their disregard to anything that is Right or Good or True.
I need no longer show them any consideration whatsoever.
The age of the earth, and the universe, are irrelevant to pragmatic life on earth today. If the press insists on pressing the issue, then they should be questioned as to agenda. Rubio should have wondered aloud: “Why do you want to know what I think? Are you questioning the deeply held beliefs of religious people, or the deeply held beliefs of science-oriented people, and what is your reason for doing so?”
It is long past time for so-called “news” people to be allowed to ask questions without having to answer a few of their own.
Also, the answer to the writer’s question is: Yes, the political left (re: the Democrats) are beginning their process to destroy Marco Rubio’s chances in 2016. If he has any chance at all, he will seek ways to galvanize the Republicans into neutralizing this ugly tactic.
The age of the earth, and the universe, are irrelevant to pragmatic life on earth today.
Unfortunately for you, you’re not even wrong.
This isn’t a question of your belief. It’s a question of fact. The age of the earth isn’t a belief any more than gravity is.
Thanksgiving is coming up, so I should express my Thanks for the (well, type of – you personally and individually are really a non-person as far as I am concerned) people who are useful to me.
You remind me of what kind of sick and twisted thinking I have to fight against, why I have to fight against that depraved and disgusting kind of thinking, and how hard and with how much determination I need to fight that thinking that would destroy us all, and laugh as we all go down.
There is a special place in Hell for people like you.
Edward, Galileo was said to said to have quipped “you tell them how to get to heaven, I tell them how the heavens go” or something to this effect. The church at the time was adamant that the heavens (and the sun. etc) revolved around the earth. They were wrong, of course.
Religion needn’t collide with science. Science doesn’t answer “why” but it’s pretty good at “how.” That it collides in your case is a problem of your own choosing, not that of science.
And speaking of Galileo, the religious have been waging holy war on science since his time, and they have lost every argument. Not most. All. Even the pope doesn’t question the age of the earth or even (most) evolution (although he still holds that man is a special case.) The point is that you aren’t going to win in your chosen fight with science. Not now. Not ever. Science is not evil.
I’m puzzled as to why you choose to collide with science and simply use your religion to deal with what science doesn’t answer. That the earth is 4.5 billion years old or 150,000 years old should make no difference to your belief in the existence of a deity.
Religion has conceded to Galileo.
Now the Religion of Science wages war on Religion.
There’s more to heaven and earth than can ever be encompassed in Science.
The GQ question and the intent behind it tries to deny this.
RE, I appreciate position, and your training, but you might want to get out of the prototyping lab and read some history,: all sides, not the party line of the scientism guild as written by the likes of Washington Irving (perpetrator of that whole Columbus / flat earth nonsense,) Thomas Dewey, and on through Stephen Hawking (who is, yes, the world’s greatest living scientist, but a crap historian.) Most of what you just said in your post is Enlightenment Spin, even where you more or less have the facts right. I’ve heard it all before, and it just ain’t so. You should at least grant the other side a hearing. History is not science, because of course, every historical event is singular, and really not reproducable in the lab. Which is why History may actually be more important.
The Galileo Legend is a very complicated affair. But assuming your position for a minute, let me ask you this? If religions (or let us speak plainly of the only religion that really matters here) if Christianity is at war with science, why, did science as we know it arise only in the Christian West?
Why, upon the publication of his Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, did the Roman Catholic Church throw a party in Galileo’s honor?
(http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/204458/enlightenment-spin-galileo-myth-timess-slip-showing-media-shill-update/jonah-goldber)
Why did the Anti-Catholic Thomas Huxley a.k.a. Darwin’s Bulldog “[examine] the Galileo case and reluctantly [conclude] that ‘the Church had the best of it’?”
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/augustine/arch/science.html
Why did the matter really come to head, not when the book was first published, but some 20 years latter?
And why is it, that in fact, states that are officially Atheist (Beginning with Lavosier’s death at the hands of the Jacobins,) have actually racked up the highest total of scientific martyrs?
http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/apologetics/ap0138.html
Inquiring minds want to know. Or ought to.
They are as much questions of culture as well as science. Why have the best critiques of Darwinism come from secularist French scientists and mathematicians like Pierre De Grasse and Paul-Marcel Shutzenburger. Could it be, not the result of objective science, but more along the lines of Monty Python? (I fart in your general direction!)
Scientists are people, too. That’s why History, especially the History of Science, may ultimately be more important.
An added irony is the fact that the Ptolemaic system was not derived from scripture, but is of pagan origin.
But assuming your position for a minute, let me ask you this? If religions (or let us speak plainly of the only religion that really matters here) if Christianity is at war with science, why, did science as we know it arise only in the Christian West?
Rediscovery of the greeks — who invented science.
The war on science is the church trying to answer “how” with scripture and it should not be.
Even today the catholic position is that evolution is real except for mankind. The notion that morals/ethics/etc are an emergent properties (probably deriving from sentience) and naturally derived flies in the face of church teachings. The church today can assume this position until such time as how morals etc emerge is reasonably “proven.” And this will be. It’s a matter of time.
I can’t recall who but I think it was Stephen Jay Gould who referred to this strategy as “god of the gaps” where god is a viable answer only in the gaps of scientific knowledge. And when the morals/ethics/emergent property thing is well understood and demonstrable, the pope in that era will have to — as all the popes have before him — slowly modify the church’s official position.
If the church would confine itself to immortal souls and leave the physics and such to the scientists, things would be a lot better off. Science requires repeatable phenomenae to be viable. It doesn’t do singularities and is not suited to tell you what existed before the universe did. And it doesn’t do the immortal soul thing. No competition with the church. None. The church needs to drop the god of the gaps strategy.
I have to ask. Do you take the same position on matters of historical fact? Does Obama’s embrace of the “flat earth” lie matter? If not, why not?
I’ve not heard of this. Care to fill me in please?
Here’s the link:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/post/obamas-whopper-about-rutherford-b-hayes-and-the-telephone/2012/03/15/gIQAel6SFS_blog.html
The Hayes statement got more attention, but the big item is really the Columbus part. No remotely knowledgeable person can possibly believe the old canard about Europeans thinking the world was flat. Yet Our Leader believes it, as apparently, does most of the media. (And, I fear, many of the “fact based” scientists out there.)
Surely, historical ignorance is at least as bad in a leader as ignorance of the earth’s age. It certainly shows a cavalier attitude toward verifiable fact.
Just in case you are one of the ignoranti, Thomas Aquinas, Bede, and Dante all testify to the earth being a sphere. As did just about everyone else who considered the question. That is why monarch’s held an orb.
Yet Our Leader believes it, as apparently, does most of the media. (And, I fear, many of the “fact based” scientists out there.)
I think you’re conflating things.
The spherical earth was known to erastosthenes who calculated the diameter. This is something known to children. Roman emporers had an orb on their sceptre (where that originated.) This too is known to most educated people.
What Obama and others refer to is the notion that in the dark age — after a millenia of christian suppression — this knowledge was lost. This notion seems false on the face of it else the ptolemaic spheres within spheres business that Galileo disputed would be plates within plates.
Looks to me like a not-too-subtle dig at the church re the dark ages and not necessarily taken as their ‘historical’ belief.
“What Obama and others refer to is the notion that in the dark age — after a millenia of christian suppression — this knowledge was lost.”
I’m sorry, but that is a flat-out false statement. Your statement that this was lost and supressed is just untrue. And my problem is that you, and the likes of you, are so quick to claim that scientific ignorance is somehow disqualifying and discrediting, but do not admit that your own arrogant, confident, belief in demonstrably false statements, does not diminish your own credibility. It does.
Your very statement “in the dark age — after a millenia of christian suppression” is a good example. You would be laughed out of any meeting of historians for that one. The “dark ages” refers to the period after the fall of Rome, when pagan barbarians swept Europe. It is usually held to have ended with, or before Charlemagne. But ignorant bigots ALWAYS extend it until the Renaissance, although you cannot get a coherent answer from them exactly when that was.
Again, you assert “Rediscovery of the greeks — who invented science.” Really, even you should know better than that. It was precisely the rise in deference to Greek science which was the biggest barrier to the new. I expect you have heard of Francis Bacon. You might try finding out what he said. (Not that I disrespect Greek science; I think that in certain ways Aristotle was onto some things which we’d do well to remember. But it was Aristotelian/Ptolemaic fundamentalism, not Biblical, which Galileo was up against. Again, this doesn’t fit with the progressive narrative of history, and is inconvenient to those who worship scienceism, but it does have the advantage of being true and coherent.
You see, ignorance is widespread. The entire “god of gaps” argument is an example of this. People who don’t know intellectual history, and aren’t interested in learning anything beyond the comic book model they use in its place, find it plausible. But that isn’t really what the debates were about.
The problem, to my mind, is that science has reached a point of arrogance that science groupies think it answers all questions. It doesn’t and there is no reason to trust those who make that claim. You give a perfect example here:
“And when the morals/ethics/emergent property thing is well understood and demonstrable, the pope in that era will have to — as all the popes have before him — slowly modify the church’s official position.”
Really? You truly believe that science, which according to its own claims can only describe what IS, will answer the question of what we OUGHT to do? And we should trust scientists? Why? What in the world makes anyone think that the average scientist is even average in wisdom and integrity (a low standard, at that).
Gather round while I sing you of Wernher von Braun,
A man whose allegiance
Is ruled by expedience.
Call him a Nazi, he won’t even frown.
“Ha, Nazi Schmazi,” says Wernher von Braun.
Don’t say that he’s hypocritical,
Say rather that he’s apolitical.
“Once the rockets are up, who cares where they come down?
That’s not my department,” says Wernher von Braun.
Some have harsh words for this man of renown,
But some think our attitude
Should be one of gratitude,
Like the widows and cripples in old London town
Who owe their large pensions to Wernher von Braun.
You too may be a big hero,
Once you’ve learned to count backwards to zero.
“In German oder English I know how to count down,
Und I’m learning Chinese,” says Wernher von Braun.
The earth is however old it is. Does that make any difference as to what we do tomorrow?
Answer: the scientific consensus is that the earth is about as many years old as the dollars we have to borrow every day as we continue down the path to oblivion. Why am I dong an interview with you jackasses again?
Rubio is a politician from Miami. ‘nuf said. I’m glad he gets weeded out early.
Wow. What a dumb question.
…..but……
Dumber answer. This is going to come back to haunt him, fair or not. He seriously sounds a little dumb here.
The Post-Modern Cultural Elite denies the concept of objective truth. All truth is therefore subjective. How does it come to be that they are at the same time enforcing a Cultural Orthodoxy which demands ostracism for outsiders?
This is totalitarianism.
Some of mankind’s greatist works were created by people who believed the world was flat. Does this diminish the works or the artists?
A friend told me the other day that our founding principles are juvenile and that anyone can see that life is much more complex than that. Nuance. He also told me that the American Revolution means nothing in particular because if it had not occurred we would have just become another Canada anyway.
I’m sick of these mediocritards and their raging river of BS.
“Some of mankind’s greatist works were created by people who believed the world was flat.”
Really? Examples?
What does it say about the Republican party that this sort of question even qualifies as a “gotcha?”
What does it say about the Republican party that Rubio has to give such a long-winded and equivocal answer to avoid alienating his base?
American politics in the 21st century can be broken down into the competition between evil and stupid: stupid just lost another round.
It says that the Republican party will throw a candidate who challenges MSM group-think under the bus in a New York minute and candidates know it. It says that if a candidate doesn’t subscribe to YOUR orthodoxy on origins, he’s not allowed to say it in public. This comment thread is starting to sound like something you’d read at Daily Kos. Apparently, there’s no where left to go for tolerance.
Despite the best efforts of public schools and universities, 46% of Americans still believe that God created humans in their present form in the last 10,000 years.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/155003/hold-creationist-view-human-origins.aspx
I’m both a Tea Partier and a Republican party precinct committeeman and I don’t truck with any of this crap. I’m sickened that people are carrying on about irrelevant nonsense while our nation literally burns.
We need a balanced budget amendment. Government officials (of all parties) have demonstrated that they lack the capacity to borrow money responsibly, so that privilege has to be taken away. Until it is, things will continue to get worse. Reform is not possible as long as corrupt politicians (BIRM) tax our great-great-grandkids to pay for their re-election schemes today. Worse yet, the left is working hard to bankrupt our nation in the hope that a Marxist dystopia will take its place.
Yet what are many Republicans doing? Picking and choosing candidates on the basis of religious belief instead of fiscal reality, and thereby doing more to help the left than just about anyone on their own side. Someone should resurrect the Stalin Peace Prize and award it collectively to the Social Conservative branch of the Republican party. By failing to defend our nation where and when it really matters, and instead focusing on irrelevant nonsense, they have truly done more than their fair share in helping drag this country towards communism.
“Picking and choosing candidates on the basis of religious belief instead of fiscal reality”
By excluding christian conservatives, would you not be doing the same, just in reverse? Many religious conservatives are also fiscal hawks. Many secular politicians are responsible for our excessive debt (we call them Democrats).
I am not religious myself but I cannot help noticing that the people who are making an issue of religion are increasingly those on the Left who want to use any sign of faith among their enemies as a weapon against them. At the same time, faith in government and the state is encouraged and evidence to the contrary be damned. You have a much bigger problem than the private faith of a Republican.
How about answering that he was planning on discussing that point with the Ladies on The View. Worked fine for our intellectual president. Seriously,. there is no PROPER answer. just ask the questioner what he/she thinks and was he/she there when it occurred. Don’t get sucked into theoretical discussions. If you can intelligently answer, then do so. If not, just say, I DO NOT KNOW, but I will research it and be prepared to answer during our next interview. The very worst thing is to give the opposition party data to blow you up with in 4 years. If you don’t know, you just don’t know, unless you are Obama, and there is nothing he
does not know. Mr Rubio must learn to avoid any “traps”. There is a scientific answer to the question and a religious answer to the question, but both are subject to further evaluation and depend on what religion is being discussed. The best answer at this time is that ” I am not yet sufficiently versed in that subject to give a knowledgeable response . May we discuss a subject I have
experience with “, and more applicable to my job as Senator. I don’t think the Senate will vote on the age of the Earth this session.
Don’t let media do this nonsense. When they pull this, it’s time to get the knives out and go at them.
I don’t understand why you would shy away from what you believe.
If you really believe the Earth is ~10,000 years old, then just say it. It looks like you’re running away from what you believe.
I admire politicians that say what they mean, even if inconvenient.
I suspect Rubio knows scientifically that the Earth is >4 billion years old, and that the universe is >12 billion years old. But for some reason if he were to say that, he might not get the nomination.
As far as I know (and I can be corrected here), the Roman Catholic Church does not require the belief in a young earth in order to be a good Catholic.
And if you are a Christian, you should be confident to proclaim what you believe, boldly.
Republicans: Unserious questions do not deserve an honest answer. When faced with gotcha questions, either refuse to answer or tell them what they want to hear. My advice is to lie. Democrats have always lied about their fundamental beliefs, and their base is fine with that. Our candidates will have to do the same.
Astronomical numbers are something politicians are very good at creating, but blather into oblivion about solving.
“How old’s the earth? Older than I; How many states? 50.” would have sufficed.
(Why can’t we ever get somebody with wit…Dennis Miller or somebody)
How about this answer for Marco?
In order to help answer that question, NASA sent men to the moon to explore. That first happened two years before I was born. I was still in diapers when we sent the last one. When Barack Obama took office we had manned spaceflight. Now, we don’t. For an American to get into space, for any purpose, she has to hitch a ride from the Russians. Why that has happened, and what it signals about our direction as a nation, is the question you really ought to be asking.
“How about some enterprising reporter ask Barack Obama how old he thinks the earth is, and what the Rev. Jeremiah Wright taught him about that?”
First, we need actual reporters willing to do their job. How do you get more objective reporters into the room so they can ask the question?
To recap some of what I have been saying, and add to it.
The question was a stupid one, the intent behind it malicious.
Call the questioner on their intent rather than answering the question.
Science is not the Scientific Method. The Scientific Method is a Philosophy of inquiry, of posing questions, conducting experiments, arriving at answers, and repeating the experiments to draw out any aspect of the experiments that might have biased the results.
Science today is a Religion. A religion that forgets that we humans decided that the Base Unit of Time is to be the Second, and have revised several time standard we will use to establish that Base Unit. We then decided how many Seconds go into a Minute, Minutes into an Hour, Hours in a Day, Days in Week, Weeks in a Year. We have even decided that a Year shall be the time it takes the Earth to revolve around the Sun.
We have decided the Base Units in all of our Sciences, basing them on the Natural Phenomenon we are able to Observe, that made and continue to make best sense. We calibrate our instruments to those Base Units. With those instruments, our ability to Observe and study the Natural World is enhanced, allowing us to fine tune our Base Units. But at the heart of that fine tuning are the Assumptions we started with.
We can Learn a great deal. But our knowledge is and always will be limited by by the fact we base our pursuit of that knowledge on Constructs we impose on the natural World to be able to make sense of it.
When you have Named all the creatures of the Earth, all that swim in her (we even impose Gender on our planet)seas, fly in the air, or walk and crawl on the dry portion of her, do not lose sight of this simple fact. That cat sitting behind you is only a cat because you have decided that that creature shall be called “cat”.
So, if anyone here can see beyond the Constructs that give us a reassurance of structure that is not even necessary, let us all know.
Until then, talk not of what you have read on your instruments as “Proof” that the Earth and the Universe are this old or that old.
And do not mock people who acknowledge that Reason exists in part to tantalize us with knowledge that always falls somewhat flat until we embrace Faith and find the only reassurance that is real.
What Edward Smith (#71) says. The irrelevant-question-with-malign-intent is a classic media/leftist technique. A question like this must be rebuffed by turning the question back with a reference to Obama’s failings and how long they’re been going on.
Do not refuse to answer by saying “Next question.” You answer it quickly (and if possible amusingly) in a way that reinforces conservative messages.
This is the kind of thing that wee bitty future Democrats learn in forensics classes and debate teams in high school. It is vital that every conservative politician learn the technique and make it second nature, a la Gingrich.
Conservatives meeting the media are deep in enemy country and outnumbered, and need to become smooth and polished in dealing with questions, all of which have malignant intent.
Our task is to use every question from the media as an opportunity to damage the other side.
The irrelevant-question-with-malign-intent is a classic media/leftist technique.
But it’s not irrelevant. Not when the GOP puts religious belief front and center as part of the party platform (e.g. right to life.) The democrat platform eschews religious belief. They say simply “women’s reproductive rights.” Media asks the democrat, s/he says “we think a woman has a right to choose” and that ends it, period. If the media presses, like they did in the VP debate, the democrat says “what I think personally isn’t relevant.” Done. And this is believable; this is the democrat position, period. Conversely the republican is by definition forced to explain how it is a woman should NOT be able to choose, and saying “what I think personally is irrelevant” is a non-starter. And why? Because the democrat position is what the law is; the republican position is the one seeking to change the law. Onus is on the challenger.
If anti-abortion was the law and the democrat was the challenger then the onus would be on the democrat to explain why pro-choice is necessary/desireable.
Given that the republicans have adopted a religious stance as to their party platform the media has every right and obligation to ask questions to determine how deep seated this is. Most voters don’t want the idiot who thinks the earth is 6000 years old to have a hand in crafting technology policy *or* to have his/her finger on the nuclear button. The kook may be happy to initiate nuclear conflagration to hasten the day of the rapture for all we know.
In sum when the party adds purely religious stances to the platform the media is not only not wrong to ask, they are obligated to ask. Claims that the media are leftists out to get you for asking you to discuss your stated position is frankly dishonest. It’s a dodge. You are in the wrong. You can’t state your position is a religious one and scream persecution when queried.
You’re correct on the facts, but you’re assuming the media is playing fair when they ask questions such as this. And when a conservative treats this as a fair question, he willingly jumps into the enemy’s trap and then tries to explain his way out of it.
Foolish move: you convince no one and end up looking lame. Yes, it’s an honest answer, but when you do that, you play by the enemy’s rules of engagement. The result is to give them soundbites by the armload to use against you. (And it’s doubly foolish on your part to think they are going to play fair. Remember, history is on their side and will excuse them.)
Don Surber was right when he said that every question from the media should be turned back on the Democrats, no matter what the ostensible subject matter is.
I agree with you that conservatives should not let any religious statements into their platform. Not all conservatives are religious, and it simply gives abundant ammunition to the secular left ( meaning the media, which is their agitprop arm).
As for socially conservative policies, the best approach is to talk about how we need to strengthen families of all kinds. That covers the subject well enough.
You’re correct on the facts, but you’re assuming the media is playing fair when they ask questions such as this.
You can’t paint a big target on your back and complain when people take shots at that target. I fail to see any justification for claiming “unfairness.”
…I fail to see any justification for claiming “unfairness.”
You can’t be serious. Or you’re just not paying attention.
If the media ever ask a conservative a question, it is always with the intent of making the conservative look foolish, wrong-headed, or just plain stupid in the eyes of the media’s audience. And if this isn’t the media’s overall plan, then why does it explain their behavior so well?
Every conservative would do well to treat what the media says and writes as hostile fire in a cultural war that began roughly a century ago. They never ask questions of conservatives in the spirit of honest inquiry.
It would be wonderful to have an honest media who grilled both liberals and conservatives in power with the same ferocity. Unfortunately, that would be on a different planet.
If the media ever ask a conservative a question, it is always with the intent of making the conservative look foolish, wrong-headed, or just plain stupid in the eyes of the media’s audience.
Absurd. The media asks conservatives all sorts of questions re relevant topics (economy, policy, etc) and the intent seems to be get a rational answer. When Dana Rohrbacher speaks of space issues, for example, the media pays attention.
The only time the media asks “loaded” questions is when said “conservative” appears to be part of the wingnut faction, and they ask questions about said wingnuttery.
If you have proof of the media attending a press conference on space issues and they’re dogging Rohrbacher et al re fundie stupidity then show it.
Poor oppressed you, the big bad media is out to get you.
What the liberal was really asking was “Are you prepared to renounce God? Because if you do not embrace the religion of evolution we intend to vilify you.”
This is fun stuff to think about.
How old is the earth or the universe? Well, it depends on what clock you are using.
Einstein told us that time is not a constant, it is relative. So time can go faster or slower.
It just so happens, by using some complicated math, that when the universe was formed by the Big Bang, time was running about a billion times faster then we experience it. We know this because of the CMBR, the Cosmic background Microwave Radiation. The CMBR is the clock of the universe, formed at the moment of creation. Today, the CMBR is running at about a billion times slower than time on earth. Using that complicated math, according to the CMBR, the clock of the universe says about 6 days have passed. However, from our perspective, it looks like abut 14 billion years.
Gerald Schroeder sets forth the thinking in the “Science of God.” Interesting argument.
http://www.amazon.com/Science-God-Convergence-Scientific-Biblical/dp/1439129584/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1353431133&sr=1-1
For the sake of Good Science, we’ll have to go with our perspective.
Remember the feeding of loaves and fishes to the faithful by Jesus. The extra wine was not pressed, the grapes were not grown and harvested. The extra bread not baked, the wheat was not grown, the flour was not ground. But to the people there, they were indistinguishable from the original loaves and fishes.
If God is omnipotent, he doesn’t really need 4.5 billion years to made the world as we see it. But he can make you think it is so.
Faith is what you want to believe or choose not to. If you believe that miracle of the loaves and fishes, then you don’t need a 4.5 billion year old earth. I’m just sayin….
If God is omnipotent, he doesn’t really need 4.5 billion years to made the world as we see it. But he can make you think it is so.
I always enjoyed this argument. God did X just to f**k with you. What sort of malevolent prick would do that?
I replied at length earlier. But I have to say this: Why do you cling to such narrow, bigoted notions? Why are you so self-assured in your ignorance?
Do you even have a clue about how, say Descartes handled that? (Of course, you won’t respect old Rene. Religious fanatic and all that.)
Go away, and study up on the things you pontificate about, until you can enter into an adult conversation.
I wonder if he thinks the flat.
I wonder if he thinks the earth is flat.
I don’t think the earth is flat, but I know bad science when I see it. When it comes to bad science vs. God, I’d just as soon put my money on God.
BTW, lose the flat-earther thing. I can go up in an airplane, tap into a satellite image, or watch a ship sail over the horizon, and see that the earth isn’t flat. Evolution ain’t proving the earth is round.
I asked God how long a million years is to Him.
He replied: “A second.”
I asked God how much a million dollars is to Him.
He replied: “A penny.”
I asked God if he could give me a penny.
He replied: “In a second.”
Steve M and randomengineer, let me know when you have created your own universes. Let me know how long it took you to do it. And, sparing no detail, how you did it. Also, how long the people in that universe thought you took to create those universes.
Until then, shut your blasphemous pieholes.
Scientism is the New Religion, which must be adhered to, by the enforcers of the new zeitgeist.
There is no tolerance of the old order. But their is tolerance of dissent in minority groups and immigrant populations.
It’s about the destruction of teh old White European civilization and it’s replacement.
This is a perfect example why religion should not be mixed with politics. Unfortunately the ultra religious are adament about their form of science and their responses to questions like that are not what we want in a leader.
As a professor of biology, I think it is a tragic error for the conservative movement to align itself with an anti-science world.
No, evolution is not bad science, it is the organizing principal of modern biology.
And yes, Democrats should be asked when life begins.
“GQ: How old do you think the Earth is?”……..
Rubio should’ve said, “Is this a serious interview, why are you asking me this shit? When did I turn into Justin Bieber? I’ll give relevant answers if you ask me relevant questions, otherwise if you waste my time, i’ll waste yours”………
The reason Mr. Rubio was asked the question was because when he was the speaker of the Florida House of Representatives, he provided powerful aid to creationists who trying to water down science education.
It was asked out of context for the interview…….
Marco answered it guilelessly and gave up the easy point, but if they wanted an answer they could have framed the question about his actions in the Florida HR and worked for it. Then both players would have all their cards on the table…..’>……
Your point doesn’t make any sense. A question can’t be asked out of context. Only a quote can be taken out of context. The purpose of an interview is to get information to the public. Other than at Fox “News” or MSNBC, journalists do not prepare the subject of the stories by telling them what they are going to ask.
If a question is being asked to set you up, you shut that off and blow up the interview. You don’t give quotes that can be used against you, unless you get in an explicative or two so that anyone with a bit of sense can hear a dog-whistle touting “this is a set up question and I’m not falling for it”…..’>……
Hey you guys,
For what it’s worth, I am a center-left voter on many issues, but I lean conservative on several important issues including guns, crime, affirmative action, and foreign policy.
Because of these leans, in a sane world I would be voting for Republicans part of the time, depending on the particular candidates and the particular election. Except I can’t most of the time, because I can’t vote for a candidate that simply denies objective reality, or that pretends to deny objective reality. The Earth is billions of years old and the diversity of life arose because of evolution via natural selection. These are established facts, and if a politician is not sufficiently educated to know and be confidant of those basic facts, or is too cowardly to declare that he knows those basic facts, I simply can’t trust him to be wise in a position of power.
Until your party deals with this, you will be making yourself uncompetitive with voters such as myself. I can’t make any promises of how many of us there are, but I can’t be the only one.
Why did Rubio rattle on and on? He should have stopped at: “I don’t know, man. I’m not a scientist”. Why do pols think they have to give long drawn out answers? That thinking usually gets them in trouble. They should keep in mind what the media is trying to do to them, and give short, general, benign answers, instead of giving them ammo.
To: “Randomengineer”
“Rediscovery of the greeks — who invented science.”
They invented some of rudiments, but they didn’t get far with it. Sure, it took well enough with the prigs, but they didn’t have the technology – mental or physical, to do anything with the bit they discovered, and it certainly didn’t take among the larger whole. Something was clearly missing, and it is precisely here that religious ideas come into play and matter a great deal. To the average Greek, whose support would be needed (just as today’s scientists need the support of the society at large – i.e taxpayers), science was an abstract castle in the air. It was a matter of theology. Their gods were as conflicted, arbitrary, and as bound by fate as mere mortals. Thus nature was too. What is the point of science in a fatalistic, “whatever will be will be” theology?
It was the wedding of the Hebrew logos with Greek science via Christianity that gave us modern science. Alfred North Whitehead was very clear on this: “… modern science must come from the medieval insistence on the rationality (edit: i.e. logos) of God… My explanation is that the faith in the possibility of science, generated antecedently to the development of modern scientific theory, is an unconscious derivative from medieval theology.” (Note: Medieval, not Greek.) Or to use C.S. Lewis’s more succinct formulation of Whitehead, “Men became scientific because they expected law in nature and they expected law in nature because they believed in a lawgiver.”
“Even today the catholic position …”
I’m not Catholic. I am very, very protestant.
” … is that evolution is real except for mankind. The notion that morals/ethics/etc are an emergent properties (probably …”
“Probably?” We don’t know? This is science?
“… deriving from sentience) and naturally derived flies in the face of church teachings. The church today can assume this position until such time as how morals etc emerge is reasonably “proven.” And this will be. It’s a matter of time.”
There’s a phrase for your expression of faith. Promissory materialism. Is science based on speculation about “what will be” or on “what is?” “It’s a matter of time” is scientific proof? And even if you prophesying comes true, does explaining how something works prove there was nothing more involved? IOW, because science can explain how a watch works, does that mean you don’t believe in watchmankers?
I don’t have much in the way of a theological problem with evolution. My problems with it are along the lines of those of Pierre Grasse …
http://reformation.edu/scripture-science-stott/evolution/pages/014-rules-of-reason.htm
… and Paul-Marcel Schuztenburger.
http://www.arn.org/docs/odesign/od172/schutz172.htm
Or more informally, those of Fred Reed:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/reed/reed59.html
http://www.fredoneverything.net/NeoFredwinism.shtml
“I can’t recall who but I think it was Stephen Jay Gould who referred to this strategy as “god of the gaps” where god is a viable answer only in the gaps of scientific knowledge. And when the morals/ethics/emergent property thing is well understood and demonstrable, the pope in that era will have to — as all the popes have before him — slowly modify the church’s official position.”
Again, I’m not Catholic. I’ll let them answer for themselves if anyone is till following this. For myself, I don’t believe in a “god of the gaps.” I believe in the God of the whole show. In fact, God of the Gaps is a (bad faith, IMNHO) characterization intended to set up a false dilemma. “How” = “NO who?” As Oxford Mathematician John Lennox has said, it’s the equivalent of saying “here is an automobile. You can either believe in the principles of the internal combustion engine, or in Henry Ford. Choose one.”
Speaking of “God of the Gaps”: in my wanderings through the fields of evolutionary thought, the only field of science(?) where a plausible explanation equals evidence, I’ve discovered an equivalent phenomenon: “evolution of the gaps.” Whatever happens, evolution did it, and if we don’t yet know something, evolution explains it.
“If the church would confine itself to immortal souls and leave the physics and such to the scientists, things would be a lot better off. Science requires repeatable phenomenae to be viable.”
That’s a little bit like saying I wish the church would confine itself to breathing and let science handle air. It is immortal souls that do science. I quite agree about the repeatability thing, though. Of course, since history is not repeatable I suppose that means science has nothing to say about it.
“It doesn’t do singularities and is not suited to tell you what existed before the universe did. And it doesn’t do the immortal soul thing.”
No, but, I reiterate, immortal souls do the science thing.
“No competition with the church. None. The church needs to drop the god of the gaps strategy.”
Once again, I am not Catholic, but I encourage them to do that, if that is in fact what they are doing (and not just another bad faith characterization by tacit, philosophical materialists.) Especially if you guys will drop the “Evolution of the Gaps” strategy.