College Essay Help Please - Book Reccomendation

Zillah

Hello

This isn't strictly an A&A issue but the forum regulars are probably my best bet for advice, so an indulgence if you please. For college this year we have to produce a 15k word research project of our choosing. Considering I spend so much time thinking and arguing about this kind of stuff I've decided to do it on "The Culture of Ignorance in the United States in Regards to the Teaching of Evolution versus Intelligent Design."

So, my request is, could you please reccomend some books that cover this topic. I've already got the God Delusion and some Sam Harris is on the way, but I'd like something that relates to this topic more specifically.

Thanks.

Dave!

I don't have a book to recommend but just thought I'd point out that the appendix in the God Delusion is as long as your arm, so it'd be worth checking that out to see if there's anything of interest there.

Good luck!

pH

I read this one and it's quite good

Why Darwin Matters: The Case Against Intelligent Design (Shermer)
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Why-Darwin-Matters-Against-Intelligent/dp/0805081216/sr=8-5/qid=1172483997/ref=sr_1_5/026-5669351-2563612?ie=UTF8&s=books

robindch

Off the top of my head, here are a few non-booky things which are worth looking into:

• The Scopes Trial, particularly the reporting of HL Mencken which is available here -- "Homo neanderthalis" is a hoot. The film Inherit the Wind was also made which was roughly (but not entirely) based upon the court transcripts -- the film is very, very funny and was available for rent in Laser in Ranelagh last year.
• The 2005 Dover trial, particularly the final judgment in PDF which is available, with lots of other resources, from here.
• An article entitled Greetings from Idiot America which appeared in Esquire Magazine in 2005 (Summary: "Creationism. Intelligent design. Faith-based this. Trust-your-gut that. There's never been a better time to espouse, profit from, and believe in utter, unadulterated cr*p. And the cr*p is rising so high, it's getting dangerous.")
• And since creationism isn't getting anywhere in the universities, creationists have set up their own religious-political schools (and encouraging home-schooling) together with their own religious "universities" (PHC, Liberty University (which gave Ken Ham his "doctorate") and many more).
• The film Jesus Camp.

There's plenty more out there and I've no idea how you're going to squeeze it all into 15k words

5uspect

The original "Inherit the Wind" movie was on BBC at the weekend. Its a dramatisation of the Scopes Monkey Trial. A good movie to use I'd say when discussing the impact of evolution in American Society.

robindch

> The Culture of Ignorance in the United States

...and this article from last Friday:

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/gate/archive/2007/02/23/notes022307.DTL&nl=fix

DublinWriter

Zillah wrote:

"The Culture of Ignorance in the United States in Regards to the Teaching of Evolution versus Intelligent Design."

Bad Zilah.

I wouldn't use the word 'Ignorance' in your project/thesis title as it suggests a wee bit, ok, a truck load of bias in your presuppositions.

Better would be "Educational Ethos in the USA: Faith vs Science".

Sangre

Even; 'The attitude of the US to teaching of evolution vs ID; A Culture of ignorance?'

I think this shows you're going to be presenting an arugement forward more. You're orginal title looks like you've assumed it from the get go.

Zillah

Its not a science paper, its sociological. I'm taking the truth of evolution over intelligent design as granted. The purpose of the paper is to explore the attitudes and culture that allow people to so blindly refute objective truth and demand unsupported myths be taught as true. Its not about whether it is a culture of ignorance, but rather why it is such.

joe_chicken

Zillah wrote:

The purpose of the paper is to explore the attitudes and culture that allow people to so blindly refute objective truth and demand unsupported myths be taught as true. Its not about whether it is a culture of ignorance, but rather why it is such.

Here's hoping you can show them this undeniable "objective truth" Zillah.

Sock it to those damn Communists Creationists.

Zillah

Do you have any idea what you're even talking about? I seriously doubt it, you're just trolling, but if you do have a genuine interest in understanding why Neo-Darwinian Evolution is an objective truth then I suggest you start a new thread.



Now that I have an actual moment, thank you for the reccomendations everyone. Especially Robindch, very interesting.

joe_chicken

Zillah wrote:

Do you have any idea what you're even talking about? I seriously doubt it, you're just trolling, but if you do have a genuine interest in understanding why Neo-Darwinian Evolution is an objective truth then I suggest you start a new thread.

No, no I don't.
a) Know what I'm talking about.
b) Have any interest in starting another debate with you where you decide to *push the eject button*

I suppose what I really wanted to say, without straight out insulting you, was that you are probably one of the most arrogant, self important, closed minded people on these boards... that certainly is some achievement.

Zombrex

handbags at the ready ladies

Back to the topic, I would agree with Sangre and DubWriter that the title of the essay probably needs to be changed.

You can't really state your conclusion (America is a culture of ignorance) and then write the essay. You are supposed to write the essay and come to a conclusion, and you would probably need to use half the essay showing that America is a culture of ignorance in the first place, and even that that would be rather hard to show. As DublinWriter suggests I wouldn't used the word "ignorance" at all, since showing ignorance in a proper fashion is actually taking place is rather hard thing to do.

In my humble opinion a better title would be something along the lines of "An exploration into the effects of faith on US education since 1945" or something more neutral and quite specific.

Even using the word ignorance is a bit sensationalists for a proper essay title. If you want to mention a culture of ignorance (which there probably is) leave that to your conclusion chapter.

Dades

joe_chicken wrote:

I suppose what I really wanted to say, without straight out insulting you...

Not quite sure if your post already constituted "straight out" insulting...
Giving you the benefit of the doubt so steady there Joe. Don't want to have to lock Zillah's thread or worse.

Dr Pepper

I understand your explanation of the title Zillah but I would agree with other posters that it gives the wrong initial impression! Wicknight's suggested title is a good one and would be far more inticing to me (and I'd imagine others).

Scofflaw

Zillah wrote:

Its not a science paper, its sociological. I'm taking the truth of evolution over intelligent design as granted.

I don't think anyone here is questioning the objective truth of evolution. Your title, though, suggests that a 'culture of ignorance' is also an 'objective truth'. Given the nebulous meaning of 'culture of ignorance', I think that's a shaky place to stand - unless one plans on using sophistry and rhetoric to drive home the point, rather than logic and reason to examine it?


cordially,
Scofflaw

Zillah

On the topic of the title, its more of a working title than anything. For one, I'm not refering to the culture of the States in general as a culture of ignorance, I'm calling the ethos of Creationists a culture of ignorance. I'll ponder the title...its very tempting to confirm the working title, I'm fairly sure I could give it the right context in the introduction.

(That context being: Creationists and proponents of ID arbitrarily reject an extremely well support scientific theory, one that is supported by 99% of scientists with relevant expertise, in favour of a grossly inferior theory/assumption that has little or no supporting evidence. For this to be possible they must either not understand Neo Darwinian Evolution or must be willfully rejecting the facts. I'd comfortably call that a culture of ignorance.)

Wicknight: Whats wrong with stating my position? I discussed the project with my lecturer, we're not going for a thesis/anithesis/synthesis approach, we can state a position and support it if we like. If my argument is that the mindset of ID supporters is willful ignorance, I see no harm in being clear about it from the get go.

Either way, lets not get hung up on the title.

joe_chicken wrote:

No, no I don't.
a) Know what I'm talking about.

Given that admission I find it strange that you'd choose to respond in such a fashion. Would you not expect someone to react badly were you to start arguing with them when you have no understanding of the subject?

b) Have any interest in starting another debate with you where you decide to *push the eject button*

I tend to get quite pissy when people either move the goal posts or are playing the wrong game altogether. Given your attitude in the previous thread I think a disgruntled removal from the discussion was a very reasonable course of action.

I suppose what I really wanted to say, without straight out insulting you, was that you are probably one of the most arrogant, self important, closed minded people on these boards... that certainly is some achievement.

Well of course you'd think that, I've been quite dismissive towards you. The reason for that is that you argue in pointless circles that have nothing to do with the point at hand. "Close minded" I would certainly object to, I'd consider myself to be extremely open minded. There is, however, a big difference between "open minded" and "completely lacking in critical faculties". If someone makes a case that is well support by fact and logic I'll accept it, if they don't I'll reject it.

joe_chicken

/EDIT actually, on second thoughts *presses eject button*

Zombrex

Zillah wrote:

Wicknight: Whats wrong with stating my position? I discussed the project with my lecturer, we're not going for a thesis/anithesis/synthesis approach, we can state a position and support it if we like.

Fair enough.

It wouldn't really be the "done" thing though, an essay title is supposed to set out more what the essay is about, not the conclusion you arrive at.

Someone reading the essay would have to first accept your position, and you normally try and get them to do that in your conclusion. If they already accept that there is a culture of ignorance then they probably wouldn't read your essay in the first place.

The people who you would probably want reading your essay are the people who don't realise that the problems in America with regard to evolution are caused by a culture of ignorance and therefore you would want to invite the reader in with a title that demonstrates you are exploring the subject, and then hit them with the culture of ignorance at the end as your conclusion, along with why you think this culture of ignorance exists.

The fact that there is a culture of ignorance in America isn't really something that you can just assume the reader will accept. Where as you would be ok to assume they accept that there are issues between faith and education in America since that is recorded news.

Zillah wrote:

If my argument is that the mindset of ID supporters is willful ignorance, I see no harm in being clear about it from the get go.

Well the only harm would be that you aren't going to convince anyone who doesn't already accept that to read your essay, and if they already accept that then they probably aren't going to read your essay in the first place because you won't be telling them anything they probably don't already realise.

At the end of the day it boils down to who you want to read this essay. And if it is just your lecturer it is still no harm to think of titles like this in a general way in case heaven forbid you do end up writting something that people would on mass read

I also think the term "ignorance" is a little sensationialist a word for an essay title. It shows an initial bias of the author towards the subject matter, which again could put off some from reading the piece. It is better to come at a topic from a neutral ground and then slowly convince your reader with evidence and fact towards a position, which demonstrates that your position has support and is not just a baseless opinion.

But at the end of the day a title is just a title. Its not worth getting too hung up about as you say.

Zillah

Wicknight wrote:

and if they already accept that then they probably aren't going to read your essay in the first place because you won't be telling them anything they probably don't already realise.

Maybe I've been reading too much Dawkins

Dades

Zillah wrote:

Maybe I've been reading too much Dawkins

Will you be doing the same interview circuit?

Just don't call your essay "The Culture of Delusion in the United States..."

Zillah

How about "The Selfish Meme", a discussion of religious thinking infecting the scientific paradigm...

Son Goku

Zillah wrote:

How about "The Selfish Meme", a discussion of religious thinking infecting the scientific paradigm...

Sounds good actually. It's the only title that makes you want to read it and it fits in very well with the area.

5uspect

True, its a good title.

stevejazzx

Zillah, i think the title is fine but Scofflaw was right when he says

unless one plans on using sophistry and rhetoric to drive home the point, rather than logic and reason to examine it?

steve

pH

How about:

Monkey Girl: Evolution, Education, Religion, and the Battle for America's Soul

And I did like the title "the selfish meme" - though I was surprised to find google had 14,000+ usages of it indexed already.

Zillah

stevejazzx wrote:

Zillah, i think the title is fine but Scofflaw was right when he says

unless one plans on using sophistry and rhetoric to drive home the point, rather than logic and reason to examine it?

steve

Can't I use both?

pH wrote:

How about:

Monkey Girl: Evolution, Education, Religion, and the Battle for America's Soul

And I did like the title "the selfish meme" - though I was surprised to find google had 14,000+ usages of it indexed already.

I'm fairly sure there is a book out called The Selfish Meme...

Dades

Zillah wrote:

I'm fairly sure there is a book out called The Selfish Meme...

Are you thinking of The Selfish Gene?

Zillah

No... :rolleyes:

http://www.theselfishmeme.co.uk/
http://ndpr.nd.edu/review.cfm?id=4001

5uspect

From Scofflaws post in the " Religious Belief as a Function of Geography" thread, how about calling your essay "Joan of Ark" with some snappy subtitle to fill in the blanks.

Just a thought.

Dades

Zillah wrote:

No... :rolleyes:

Don't you roll your eyes at me...

Zillah

The Atheist wrote:

Don't you roll your eyes at me...

Oh come on, you so earned that, thinking I didn't know what The Selfish Gene was...

Dades

Zillah wrote:

Oh come on, you so earned that, thinking I didn't know what The Selfish Gene was...

I obviously thought you might be drunk and have forgotten...

Zillah

The Atheist wrote:

I obviously thought you might be drunk and have forgotten...

I was drunk, and I am drunk...but that doesn't give you the right to...make...me....what were we talking about?

Well, I'm certainly not a communist.