Comments on: The Enlightenment Goes Dark

By: Dennis Casteen

Dennis Casteen — Mon, 24 May 2010 04:10:15 +0000

Bravo for the Texas State Board of Education! Jefferson may have been an eloquent writer, but he did not contribute original ideas with respect to the Enlightenment. Ms Dunbar and the Board majority are correct.

By: Sylvia

Sylvia — Mon, 17 May 2010 19:54:01 +0000

Janice Baldwin,

BS…Jefferson was a deist who denied the Bible as divine:

http://www.sullivan-county.com/id3/jefferson_deist.htm

From the link, “Jefferson rejected the Bible as divine revelation and rejected the divinity of Jesus. In the Declaration of Independence Jefferson’s appeal was to the God of the Deist, “Nature’s God,” not specifically to the God of Christianity (see letter dated Sep. 14, 1813, to Jefferson from John Adams equating “Nature’s God” with “the revelation from nature”).”

By: Quick Roundup 515 » » Trending North News Copy

Quick Roundup 515 » » Trending North News Copy — Sat, 17 Apr 2010 22:48:32 +0000

[...] as a hotbed for capitalism a lot more if it would abolish state-run education, has instead opted to demonstrate two things very well: (1) A state-run education system necessarily results in the state promoting [...]

By: Newton Manning

Newton Manning — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 16:51:09 +0000

@Greg Petterson, good coincidence I just finished reading that book too! Loved it, especially where it discusses the fervor of Jefferson demenor at times!

By: Janice Baldwin

Janice Baldwin — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 14:25:57 +0000

I have not been able to determine if information on Thomas Jefferson has been completely removed from the textbooks or just in this particular segment concerning “the writings of -” formerly referred to “Enlightenment” segment. If no mention or information on Jefferson’s role as a founding Father is provided then there is a huge void. On another note, it is a fallacy that Jefferson was a deist. He understood that true Christianity would prosper without the aid of the civil government and history has proven him correct.

By: KAAREN REICHE

KAAREN REICHE — Sun, 21 Mar 2010 19:14:16 +0000

Write your state Board of Education. They adopt the books for their states. Tell them in no uncertain terms you do not want your children, grandchildren, brothers, sisters, cousins, nephews, nieces and your community’s children taught with these biased books. Not only because of the lies and omissions but because it will lead to ignorance when compared to education world wide. You must know science to produce scientists, engineers and thinkers who will produce the new discoveries, ideas and innovations. You must have free access to ideas on which to build. But if we get rid of the stuff that does not fit into the religious right’s way of thinking then Jesus will come, there will be rapture for the especially blessed, and the rest of us (including those in the wrong churches) will get to experience hell.

By: Texas Wins National Championship? | Colliding With The Future

Texas Wins National Championship? | Colliding With The Future — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 23:12:15 +0000

[...] The Enlightenment Goes Dark – ”We’re just picking ourselves up off the floor. The board’s far-right faction has spent months now proclaiming the importance of emphasizing America’s exceptionalism in social studies classrooms. But today they voted to remove one of the greatest of America’s Founders, Thomas Jefferson, from a standard about the influence of great political philosophers on political revolutions from 1750 to today…” [...]

By: Greg Peterson

Greg Peterson — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 19:35:43 +0000

I happen to be reading an interesting book, “Mr. Jefferson and the Giant Moose: Natural History in Early America” by Lee Alan Dugatkin. Jefferson fought for America to be recognized for its natural resources and wonders with a righteous, some might say jingoistic, fervor. If he did nothing else more patriotic than this, conservatives should still embrace him. And if he did nothing based more on Enlightenment principles than explore and observe the world, he should be embraced by the liberals who are the Enlightenment’s heirs. Despite his rather considerable flaws, Jefferson is a person who can be celebrated across the spectrum. Not to include him a textbook like this is sheer idiocy.

By: Robert

Robert — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 05:32:47 +0000

I discussed the Enlightenment in my recent blog post: The forgotten “ism” http://indytealover.blogspot.com/2010/03/forgotten-ism.html

By: Zak

Zak — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 23:01:27 +0000

Well Andy you didn’t speak for me… which is a good thing… the first post having that many expletives would be a bad sign -.-

@ Katharine I believe you are right, It is legal to deny employment based on education level.

@peter kenney – unfortunately, yes. The education children and young adults are taught is believed to be truth and if we put theistic spins on the education we end up with more people believing that we are a theistic country. This of couse leads to further bigotry which puts not only Atheists, as it is now, but other religions in a bad light when they speak up. When Atheists speak up and say X is unconstitutional we are blamed for being oppressive, when a Christian says X Y and Z are unconstitutional no one bats an eyelash.

By: NV

NV — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 21:08:56 +0000

Um, have these folks in Texas read Voltaire? They’re in for a shock.

By: ‘Where I’m from, we believe all sorts of things that aren’t true. We call it history.’ | The Intersection | Discover Magazine

Mon, 15 Mar 2010 13:57:57 +0000

[...] Details at The New York Times, Bad Astronomy and The Loom. [...]

By: Nicole

Nicole — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 13:45:23 +0000

Heads up, Jefferson isn’t the only person lost from the history books. Check out this blog post outlining some of the influential women who are no longer considered worthy of the social studies classroom. http://www.bust.com/blog/2010/03/13/2010-03-13-14-00-01.html

By: Are Ultra Conservatives in Texas Deciding What History is in Your Child’s Textbooks? « Hello, Negro

Mon, 15 Mar 2010 13:41:58 +0000

[...] are added to provide balance to the kids learning about Martin Luther King, Jr., and get this, Thomas Jefferson was removed*. [...]

By: Erwin

Erwin — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 10:05:03 +0000

This is a big win for not-the-USA. Other countries now have an extra edge in the future. As long as they don’t screw up harder. Even in that case, the damage is less.
I think anyone with a college education or higher, who learned a foreign language (i.e. not English), travelled outside the country or wears glasses might want to leave the country. Any reference to Pol Pot’s anti-intellectual revolutionary massacre is entirely coincidental. I recommend The Netherlands: we are crazy but we aren’t nuts.

By: OilIsMastery

OilIsMastery — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 05:34:07 +0000

In what way has the Enlightenment and Jefferson disappeared from Texas?

First of all, the creationist philosophers of the Enlightenment believed in things that make the Texas School Board look like Darwinist fundamentalists.

“…lest the systems of the fixed stars should, by their gravity, fall on each other, he [God] hath placed those systems at immense distances from one another.” — Isaac Newton, mathematician, 1687

Second, Jefferson is well known in Texas and all the books on Jefferson in the thousands of libraries in Texas have not magically and miraculously disappeared as far as I know.

By: While You Can’t Learn About Thomas Jefferson In Texas Schools, You Can Learn About Jefferson At This Blog « Texas Liberal

Mon, 15 Mar 2010 04:01:33 +0000

[...] From a blog in the science magazine Discover— [...]

By: Daniel Brookshier

Daniel Brookshier — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 03:33:41 +0000

Shouldn’t book publishers force Texas to pay more for fantasy?

By: Katharine

Katharine — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 00:45:07 +0000

Meh. If this persists, when I start my professoring career, I’m just gonna toss the resume of anyone who went to high school in Texas in the trash unless they can prove reasonably that they understand what was left off of their curriculum when they were kids.

This is legal, as I understand.

By: RickK

RickK — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 20:00:11 +0000

Dunbar, the fundamentalist far Right, and Fox News are a greater threat to America than all Muslim terrorists combined. Dunbar demonstrates that her hatred of America’s founding principles is just as deep as Osama bin Laden’s, and her position has allowed her to do more long term damage to the continued viability of our country than Osama could ever do.

By: peter kenney

peter kenney — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 18:31:38 +0000

Jefferson is only important if we say he is?….Is this the theory at work here? Or, perhaps Texans just do not like Virginians. The only way to describe this is DUMB. Although the Enlightenment was a body of thought primarily directed at Europeans, Jefferson had spent a good deal of time in France and certainly had been immersed in the flow of Enlightenment thought. He, like Franklin, knew many of its contemporary French proponents. To eliminate Jefferson from a list of Enlightenment figures without placing him elsewhere is ridiculous. He certainly was affected by the Enlightenment, even if he established his own and individual philosophical direction. Recently I was speaking with a woman in office in Texas and when I gave her my e-mail address, which has a hyphen in it, she asked, “What’s a hyphen?” Texas, WOW!

By: GeoWonk.com » Blog Archive » Texas conservatives screw history

GeoWonk.com » Blog Archive » Texas conservatives screw history — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 14:22:35 +0000

[...] In a 10-5 party line vote last week, the BoE rammed through a vast number of changes to the Texas state history standards, all of which conform to the über-far-right’s twisted view of reality. In these new standards, Hispanics are ignored, Black Panthers are added to provide balance to the kids learning about Martin Luther King, Jr., and get this, Thomas Jefferson was removed. [...]

By: Brenda Tucker

Brenda Tucker — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 02:20:51 +0000

I’ve been thinking about this all day and I think I finally “get it.” Thomas Jefferson doesn’t belong in that group associated with the Enlightenment of Europe, because he didn’t want America to follow in the footsteps of European countries. He didn’t want our country modeled after theirs and so his philosophy was directed towards his readers, the Americans. Since the Enlightenment occurred mostly in Europe, he is out of place with that group of authors.

By: kirk

kirk — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 20:04:58 +0000

The “unelected group of educrats” work for the Texas Education Agency (TEA). The commissioner of education is appointed by the governor. The last 17 commissioners have been avowed communist vegans who hid their true beliefs using vegan mind tricks .

Many of these fine folks are graduates of Texas A&M (for example) which has a secret underground mag-lev train to Moscow or Bejing or both.

Many of the educrats may not have been baptized.

By: J.M.

J.M. — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 18:24:30 +0000

I keep seeing conservatives mention (also in that link offered above) some other Texas board of educators trying to delete “Christmas,” “Mother Teresa” etc. from the curriculum in Texas. One blog described it thusly:

Last night, Mother Theresa, Albert Einstein, Thomas Edison, were all added back to World History. They were all previously removed from by an unelected group of educrats who were allowed to make changes before the State Board of Education votes.

Specifically the “unelected group of educrats” — who are these people? Do they have any power? This other unelected board’s official name is never mentioned in any article (that I have run across at least), and it seems like they are setting up a “straw man,” and sowing fear among conservatives so that they can push through their own agenda by “holding back the liberal hordes.”