Teaching is indoctrination (no, I'm not a hippie, I think it's good).  All humans require a framework for facts (lots of reasons for this), and a teacher can only give meaning and importance to the facts he is teaching when his students understand the framework.  A good teacher can shift frameworks to give students an idea of why others prioritize different facts, but most students will sniff out the act and figure out what a teacher really believes.  As a teacher in a very conservative school, I see our students much better equipped to handle opposing points of view than their counterparts that I encounter in my other job as a teacher in a public virtual high school for.  I have a feeling that we would be more open, both because conservatives are naturally skeptical of current fads and theories, and we are more secure because we understand that the next generation can't be perfect, so we can just do good enough.  Liberals think they are just one instructional technique and an assembly away from perfecting human nature, so they can't allow anyone to break away from the herd.

I just finished this book a few months ago, it's great.

Is it rational to be skeptical of the scientific mission?  My answer to this is yes it can be.  Most of the people here who use science as a cudgel state early and often that there is no rational basis for challenging science.  In fact I think the first half dozen comments this showed up at least three times.  There was no argument for it, just dictionary definitions of what science is and a dismissing of the topic as unworthy to spend any time on.

Dictionary definitions have only tangential relationship to how the words are used.  Here and everywhere else, when science is discussed, the dictionary definition is given and then immediately overstepped and use colloquially.  So let's discuss what is actually meant by science. 

Seriously all I want is a discussion, something I find interesting, and some fun.

Let me put something in here,  R. Craigen, I agree that words aren't infinitely flexible but I also deny your assertion that how you define "science" is different than how the broader culture defines "science".  Use as many dictionaries as you want, the meaning of a word is its use, not what Websters tells us.  Debate will be clarifying, we will come to a point, hopefully, that how you use the word and how I use the word will be consummate.  But, to come to that point there needs to be discussion, because I reject the clinical definitions that have been given in this discussion so far, because those bear only passing resemblance to how the word is actually used. 

Ok, Now this is a good discussion, but this is also why I want to have a two person discussion on this subject.  There are four strains of thought all going on here, and there is some interaction, but there is no completion of thought.  200 words just isn't enough. So I would like to have posts back and forth between two of us that have room to complete an argument in all its complexity.  Perhaps I'm not the one to be on one side (Fred seems to think I'm a uneducated and brain washed fundamentalist, based on only his bias) but I'm sure that if that becomes obvious, another champion can take up my arguments

Yes, Red Feline, I want to have a philosophical discussion, but I want it to focus around science and its stated and unstated claims.

Fred,

Quite frankly you are  a dismissive jerk.  What I want to do in this debate is to talk about science.  Because science is a slippery thing, it claims to be one thing and masquerades as another.  You are one that I think would benefit from this discussion, but I will not argue with you because you are so arrogant and fairly rude.  You may see it as being forthright, but you're wrong on that front.

To say that no one  will ever have anything new for you to discuss or mull over is one of the strangest and simplistic things I have ever heard.

Michael Collins,

One of the reasons that I want to do this is to have a back and forth with primarily one person.  When we get into the comments it is hard to keep a single thread going.  I also have a hard time being interesting when I'm on my own, I'm more interesting when in a discussion.  I do want it to be a discussion of the underlying philosophical assumptions of science.

Thanks CuriousJohn, that would be great fun.

Fred,

This is why I would like this debate, you seem to think that there is no rationality, or intelligence in the rejection of science, I disagree.  Those, like you, demean the idea that I might doubt what seems to you self-evident and then assume that my system is inferior, without even hearing it.  

You say allowing "non-science" a hearing is demeaning to science and I say that is ridiculous.  Prove science defeats all comers , bare assertion is useless, argue for it.

Joseph,

I want the definition to come out in the debate, not be something agreed on beforehand.  Getting the definition right is a lot of the fun of debating.  So we will define it in the debate, not beforehand.

Again, this is what I am looking for in the debate, I don't want to define science here, I want to discuss what the definition should be, and if the definitions proposed actually match up with what we observe and how we treat science.  The debate will define itself as we go, so I just want to go.

Good questions, I want to debate the epistemological foundations of science.  Joseph, your statements are fraught with all kinds of things that I wouldn't accept as true.  But that is part of the nebulousness of what I want to do here.  I want it to be as wide ranging as necessary, so I don't want to say, "Let's discuss X.", since X is tied to so many other things. What we end up discussing will depend on where the conversation goes naturally.

I don't want to discuss specific findings of science, but rather the philosophy and understanding under-girding science.

I'm so happy that there are Prachetteers on here!  I got permission to marry my wife due to the fact that I was the only other person that my MIL had met that read him.  I don't have access to my library right now, but any and all footnotes that he puts in are literary genius. 

Here is a question for you all, which of his books do you think will live to be adopted into the official cannon of western literature?  My two are "Small Gods" due to its prescience about the clash between reason and unthinking Islam, and "Night Watch" because it is one of the tightest written novels in the 20th century.

One other question, who are your favorite minor characters?  Mine are "Slit-Me-Own-Throat" Dibbler and Foul ol' Ron.

"Oh Anna Sun!"

Skipsul,

Write your post, you will make the point better than me and a different perspective on the same point would be great.

Foxfier, the rising fear of banks is our own right-wing populism.  We can see it in all kinds of talk, the fear that the Fed is eating all our capital with its methods. 

The thing that makes it dangerous is that populists are prime fodder for the government to come in and fix things through action.  They tend to blame a system that is too powerful for individual action to overcome, so they attempt to set up a rival power structure through the government to even things out.  That should be anathema to American Conservatives.

Sorry I've been away, I had a dinner tonight that I had to get ready for, and Sundays belong to someone else.

Xennady, wow,you got me on Jackson with your first point, there has never been a bad victorious American general, so you could have stopped there.  But let me rebut some of the other arguments.  The main issue in the 1828 election was free silver.  The populists wanted a cheaper currency so that land could become more affordable.  He won mostly because of his support for that policy.  It was directed primarily against the industrialists and the bankers of the north and east.  

The Specie Circular came as a direct result of his breaking of the National Bank and his free silver policy.  Without a national bank to control the currency, every bank had the ability to make their own currency flooded the nation with worthless money.  The Circular was an attempt to stop the funny money Jackson's policies and instead caused a catastrophic cascading bank failure that led to the Panic of 1837.