Georgia Republican congressman Paul Broun tore into scientists as tools of the devil in a speech at the Liberty Baptist Church Sportsman’s Banquet last month.
“All that stuff I was taught about evolution and embryology and the Big Bang Theory, all that is lies straight from the pit of Hell,” Broun said. “And it’s lies to try to keep me and all the folks who were taught that from understanding that they need a savior…”
According to Broun, the scientific plot was primarily concerned with hiding the true age of the Earth…“You see, there are a lot of scientific data that I’ve found out as a scientist that actually show that this is really a young Earth,” he said. “I don’t believe that the Earth’s but about 9,000 years old. I believe it was created in six days as we know them. That’s what the Bible says…”
…Broun credited his literal Biblical interpretation with driving his approach to government…“What I’ve come to learn is that it’s the manufacturer’s handbook, is what I call it,” he said. “It teaches us how to run our lives individually, how to run our families, how to run our churches. But it teaches us how to run all of public policy and everything in society. And that’s the reason as your congressman I hold the holy Bible as being the major directions to me of how I vote in Washington, D.C., and I’ll continue to do that.”
The man’s a fool. I feel sorry for the people ignorant enough to vote for him. He probably expects to cure our economic problems by having Ron Paul or Mitt Romney lay hands on the door to the US Treasury and pray.
Obviously the question is “This is news?”.
>“This is news?”.
That Paul Broun sits on the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology might be of some concern to those of us who don’t wish to live in the stone age.
Obviously half the US thinks the Flintstones is a paleological documentary.
What does that matter while there are still millions of people out there who are being exposed to dihydrogen monoxide every day?
Why do you keep talking about distractions while the people who pass the strictest regulations on the gas companies are being denied access to cheap gas?
That is something they support, and they actually think it is scientifically required.
and half the US thinks the unemployment rate is a factual representation.
Obviously they must the same 50%. 😉
Amen
Someone check the drinking water in Georgia.
You may be joking, but my friend told me that Georgia has been allowing their water supply to be poisoned with thousands of gallons of dihydrogen monoxide every day.
Science is never a willing servant of dogma, and politicians who are dogmatic are never good servants of the people!
I agree; but you are missing the other side of the coin. Every life contains elements of the physical (science) and the metaphysical (faith). BTW; if you do not believe in any religion, but you do believe in things like justice and ethics, the life you live relies on metaphysics as well as physical.
Too many shallow thinkers love to poke fun at the “idiots” who try to use faith to prove or disprove science. What they fail to see is the other side of the coin. It is just as stupid to try to use science to prove or disprove anything involving faith.
This is just one in a thousand articles I have seen poking fun at someone who wrongly tries to use matters of faith to argue against science. What I never see posted on this or any other progressive site is an example of an idiot who tries to use science to attack religion.
Do you think such articles do not exist?
Yea, yea – – you are using the Separate Magisteria argument of Stephen Jay Gould. For this argument to work you have to spend quite a while defining ((in fact limiting)) the concept of faith and the real world point of the whole exercise: religion.
This OP is a good example though. Faith does not stay in its pigeon hole. It grows out of its definition and encounters/contests the real world.
Faith tells us that all prayers are answered. Science tell us none of them are. Has science defeated faith? And from that simple observed fact, we can spin as many counters to your argument as needed until we do infact return to the limited subject of faith that deals only with the supernatural.
If faith were only used to address religious issues, no one would care. When we do care, its only science that demonstrates the fiction.
Liberals are often very dogmatic about their religion (Liberal Creationism) when it comes to science that contradicts their PC world view.
“What? ‘Men and women have different distributions in average IQ which accounts for more men at the highest levels of math and science’ ?? Can’t be right you sexist! We will burn your career at the stake.
There’s no such thing as IQ!!! Except for low IQ conservatives and criminals who shouldn’t be executed.”
Thats true just as the last time I read about it blacks also score below whites who score below orientals who score below ashkenazi jews on general IQ tests while cultural bias is still impossible to write out of the tests. Still, the results are consistent.
The thing is, human variability is more relevant than racial/sexual group norms making non-discrimination the most rational position.
And that is a good thing.
There were supposedly scientists at Harvard who ran shrieking from the hall when Harvard President Larry Summers suggested maybe women are interested in different things than men.
Just the females.
I don’t know, holding prayers in front of the US Treasury is only slightly more backward than the average leftist view on economics which insists that wealth can come from creating more debt and printing more money leads to prosperity. Sky fathers or tooth fairies, if you are a progressive authoritarian you’ve got your pick.
Keep in mind; liberals do not believe in property rights, so terms like “wealth” and “prosperity” have completely different meanings in their world. What you write may be readable by conservatives; but to most liberals your writing probably sounds a lot like a grown-up in a Charlie Brown cartoon.
Bankers a few years ago were more than happy to take those dollars. Maybe they know something!
“Obviously the question is “This is news?”.”
Of course it isn’t. The drumbeat about stuupid flyover NASCAR Retards® has been long, steady, and even celebrated.
We never hear, however, that the Liberal belief in evolution picks and chooses what part of Darwin’s theories it likes and disregards the rest so that it can peacefully co-exist with biological egalitarianism. Race, gender, etc – all “social constructs” and any real science contradicting these beliefs fought hard against or pushed down the memory hole.
In short, evolution is real, you hicks, but remember it stopped at the neck. And don’t you dare notice that mountain of evidence that says otherwise, you racist, or we’ll have you fired!
What do you expect from a Republican, truth?
Please think about how stupid you think Republicans are when they say things like “Obama is a muslim”; then go back and read your post again.
Stupid is not a genetic trait; it is a learned behavior. The public school system, Fox News, and MSNBC are the primary teachers of stupid in America today.
Stupid IS a genetic trait despite your religion telling you otherwise.
And ditto for public schools. Those with a smart motivated student body are fine. Those filled with the dim and dangerous will never perform no matter how much money you throw at them.
Too bad your politics/religion blinds you to reality.
Usually it’s Democrats who take embryology to be lies. They claim life starts at birth, or the question is above their pay grade. Captain of the abortion ship blockaded off Morocco, says this is a question that should never be asked.
I hear he is standing unopposed. Anyone want to spoil his party?
Obviously the big bang and evolution are lies put about by democrats
But exactly what is the problem with embryology?
If babies don’t grow from embryos where exactly does he think they come from ? Bed Bath and Beyond? The apple store?
He considers that embryos are living beings and therefore should not be put to death. Liberals disagree with this view, and since many scientists in the embryology field believe that it should be OK to harvest embryos for profit, including growing clones to ten years of age or more and then cutting them up for organ donation, he thinks that the field is at fault.
“And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.”
Mark 16:17-18
“Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: and nothing shall by any means hurt you.”
Luke 10:19
When Georgia Republican congressman Paul Broun drinks a gallon of cyanide while stepping on a rattlesnake and speaking in tongues after healing a cancer patient, then I will believe the Earth is about 9,000 years old.
Best poster ever.
Bob Andweave made this forum worth my visit today saying:
10/7/2012 at 3:54 pm
“Stupid is not a genetic trait; it is a learned behavior.”
Thank you for that. It gives a fuller context for the emotional and psychological differences between conservative and liberal mindsets to operate.
Do you ever think about why you think the way you do?…. How you change your mind, if you ever do?
Its what makes being human the wonderful thing it is.
Yea, verily.
Liberals need to ride this all the way to the election. They tried the TrayVon Martin story, but then it got disappeared when the facts turned against them and it turns out he is a druggie. Evolution in action as his daddy Obama merely was part of a choom gang, but the son makes his own special drugs so he can avoid arrest.
Liberals should be able to use this and Todd Akin’s rape comments and Sandra Fluke, and then segway into Mormonism. They’d better hurry since Obama is down to 5-3 odds on InTrade.
Osama Broun-Laden leader of the christian taliban
white jebus must have ridden in on one of his dinosaurs and bitch slap that fool then fed the masses with five loaves of bread and 2 darwin fish
Why do Teapublicans hate science?
I just read that new MRI studies show that when the brain is confronted with evidence against a firmly held belief that it is the EMOTIONAL parts of the brain that start working overtime–NOT THE CONGNITIVE–and that when some justification/rationale for the held beliefs is found there is a discharge of dopamine.
Having your stupidity and firmly held beliefs challenged and refuted is simply a needed fix for a chronic doper.
I am currently waiting for the same mechanism to be found in liberals when a new idea is formulated.
Ain’t science great?
because Copernicus kicked god to the ground and now he has fallen and can’t get up
Teapublicans should have bought a better god
And so, what is the point? Is he any different than any other nutcase Republican? Why is this news or even interesting? Aren’t we having an election that will determine weather or not we as a nation agree with him?
Let’s hope calmer heads prevail…
They wont. If they replace him, it’ll just be with another brain dead over-privileged, over-entitled 1%er.
We need to get rid of the whole corrupt establishment, throw the skeevy bastards out and replace it with a no party system of government.
Is that a picture of Broun or Biden?
Most of our ancestors and most average intelligent people have no problem reconciling faith with science and accept both in their lives with no problem. They are not mutually exclusive. Similarly, most intelligent people are not exclusively convervative or liberal but have a combination of views. Labels are easier to work with when pushing propaganda instead of truth.
I wonder what you mean by “mutually exclusive”? As ice cream is mutually exclusive to pickles? One can choose both if that is what you mean but usually they are consumed separately as “they don’t go together” on most palates.
Or do you mean they both compliment each other as in: the earth is 7000 years old, or 5 Billion years old as if the difference is not important?
Basically–not by strict definition but in common application, they are mutually exclusively and rarely chosen together unless one or the other or both are corrupted in significant fashion.
Could be worse – who is the republican chair on the FAA ?
“This is your captain speaking, we are on final approach to JFK. The airport has turned of the godless imaginary beams and we will now all close our eyes and pray for a safe landing”
As a scientist, I feel threatened and bullied by his statements….SOMEONE ARREST HIM!
Too many warning signs to count…but let’s start the list:
1. Idiots.
2. Add guns.
3. Add religion.
4. Add Creationists.
5. Add Sportsmans Club (or any group limited by membership) – where group-think can be used as a control. It is all about conforming with the views of the lead sociopath.
6. Add Southerners.
7. Add an indifferent electorate.
8. Add money that buys elections.
Is anyone surprised by the result?
Whatever he’s selling those reindeer look like they’re TOTALLY buying it.
I usually don’t use internet lingo but.. LOL
Broun also introduced a resolution in 2009 which would have encouraged the president to declare 2010 as “The National Year of the Bible” and to “issue a proclamation calling upon citizens of all faiths to rediscover and apply the priceless, timeless message of the Holy Scripture which has profoundly influenced and shaped the United States.”
Unfortunately, some of the Biblical acts by God’s most faithful servants are considered capital murder, punishable in some states by death. If Broun really wants to govern using the Bible as a guide, he should introduce legislation to suspend the death penalty in all cases where the perpetrator received a telepathic authorization from God to commit the murder, as was the case in Biblical times. Who could argue with that?
Thank you for warning us how evil republicans are.
Democrats are wonderful.
Thank you for you inspiration posting.