Should witch craft, faith healing, crop circles, chakra, crystal healing, and fortune telling be taught in science classes?

[MrFun]

BFB??

[Elok]

I'd say "Laz," only that's what I call my boy.

[loinburger]

"Kids, this fella in the mosaic here was named Justinian. He was a peasant who became Emperor. His Empress was Theodora, this angry-looking lady here. She started out as a burlesque actress and, depending on which sources you trust, may have at one point lain down on a public stage while trained geese pecked grain off her privates. She was the main reason why he didn't trust that fellow behind the shield there--his name was Belisarius. There was one time they agreed, though. That was when they had these really bad riots from the Blues and Greens, which were like our Republicans and Democrats only they started out as European-style sports hooligans. Anyway, they started rioting and Justinian wanted to run. But she wasn't having any of that, so she had shield-dude take his boys and kill thirty thousand of those euro-chav protester punks in one day. Then Justinian sent him to take over the western world. He might have succeeded, only Theodora kept talking crap about him behind his back so Justinian didn't trust him. Also he was distracted by his wife, who was a total ho-bag. So Justinian wasted ridiculous amounts of money having losers try to do Belisarius's job. He was still a pretty good emperor, though. Moving on, his successor Justin II was literally insane and liked to have his attendants pull him around his rooms in a little cart..."

The only real problem with History is that BFB isn't teaching it. Properly treated, it's a very interesting subject.

But what does any of that have to do with the sidereal year?

[MrFun]

I'd say "Laz," only that's what I call my boy.

ah

[loinburger]

History was far more interesting than math and science classes.

Math and science are more properly referred to as "the history of hats"

[Ben Kenobi]

Well, that's certainly a lot better than asking students why there are 60 seconds in a minute.

It gets them thinking... The world back then was very different, and sometimes in ways that are difficult to anticipate if you don't know much about it. Most kids believe in permanence - if it's here today, there's never been a time without it. Sure, they understand that computers weren't always around, but the English language? How many of them have seen a greek letter? Very few. They don't grasp the significance of the reason why we use the letters we do (as opposed to Cyrillic, etc), and what that says of our society at a glance.

The 24 hour thing is actually a very interesting question fwiw. It was actually rather late that they started thinking of an hour as 60 minutes.

[Ben Kenobi]

The only real problem with History is that BFB isn't teaching it. Properly treated, it's a very interesting subject.

I'm a firm believer in teaching from the school of BFB. If I'm allowed to quote any part of the bible for any reason, that opens up quite a few avenues in terms of historical sources. Like I said, there are some important parts of the lives of the saints, like St. Aquinas and the prostitute.

[giblets]

It gets them thinking... The world back then was very different, and sometimes in ways that are difficult to anticipate if you don't know much about it. Most kids believe in permanence - if it's here today, there's never been a time without it. Sure, they understand that computers weren't always around, but the English language? How many of them have seen a greek letter? Very few. They don't grasp the significance of the reason why we use the letters we do (as opposed to Cyrillic, etc), and what that says of our society at a glance.

The 24 hour thing is actually a very interesting question fwiw. It was actually rather late that they started thinking of an hour as 60 minutes.

I don't think you can offer proof that "most kids believe in permanence" and think people always spoke the same language we speak now.

[Ben Kenobi]

I don't think you can offer proof that "most kids believe in permanence" and think people always spoke the same language we speak now.

Go up to the first 12, 13 year old you see and ask them what language people spoke in America a thousand years ago.

"IDK, English?" will be the most likely response.

[giblets]

Go up to the first 12, 13 year old you see and ask them what language people spoke in America a thousand years ago.

"IDK, English?" will be the most likely response.

Bull****.

[regexcellent]

Foreign language courses would consist of how to use foreign curse words in a sentence correctly.

In middle school I had a class which was like, count from 1-10 in a bunch of different languages. Would have owned if it were just a class on impolite idioms and cuss words in Swahili and ****.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Bull****.

Uh, sorry... I'm going to have to with Ben here. Hell, I think a good portion of 20 year olds would answer the same

[Zevico]

Well, leftists teach that scientific proof exists for a proposition if enough people agree on it. Lots of people believe in quack medicine so why not? It is perfectly consistent with leftist thinking. Who are you to doubt the experts? Witches and faith healers have been doing their work for years and you haven't studied them enough. 99.5% of witches and faith healers agree that they really do work miracles. You don't have a degree in witchcraftology do you? You're not qualified to ask for evidence that witchcraft is real. Your doubts are simple denialism!

[Zevico]

Oh, I forgot to add: the science of witchcraft is settled!

[Ben Kenobi]

Uh, sorry... I'm going to have to with Ben here. Hell, I think a good portion of 20 year olds would answer the same

I don't believe I've had a student answer that question correctly. Historical literacy right now is really low because little value is placed on teaching it.

Although I *did* get one smartass say, "that's a trick question, America didn't exist back then."

"What was it called back then, wiseguy?"

I think I gave him a candy for that one. I actually encourage trolling me. It makes classes more fun.