permaculture

["wenshidi@yahoo.co.uk" <wenshidi@yahoo.co.uk>]

--- On Thu, 3/3/11, Toby Hemenway <toby@patternliteracy.com> wrote:

> What raised my ire here (and since I've got a bad cold, I
> am perhaps a little less tolerant than usual)

Please consider taking a herbal remedy before taking it out on me again.

> seeing someone (whoever wrote the line that
> Chris quoted) hide a political or religious agenda behind a
> plea for tolerance, using the old canard "How can students
> be taught to challenge popular ideas when they are only
> presented a one-sided view?" 

J. Marvin Herndon
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._Marvin_Herndon

I would be interested to learn what his political/religious agenda might be.  
Maybe you would care to enlighten us?

> Those theories may get tweaked, but I am willing to bet a large sum 
> that they will never be discarded.

you seem to be back pedaling here. Especially when you earlier said that 
"Theory does not mean in doubt or tentative."

I bet Galileo would have been relieved to hear that you were not judging his 
trial.

I was also intrigued to see you say "Lipton's ideas on the biology of belief 
are not well accepted--yet"

So which is more important to you, a paradigm that is based on fact, or one 
that is widely accepted?

I am surprised that nobody has mentioned Rupert Sheldrake in relation to 
Darwinism.  Perhaps you think that he too is "trying to hoodwink the 
ignorant."

>I was quite polite to Chris, yes? But I've never cared much about >getting 
>along with, or being polite to people who are doing >destructive work or 
>trying to hoodwink the ignorant. I welcome >differences of opinion, but I 
>don't welcome ideas from people who >haven't made the slightest effort to 
>know what they are talking >about or who are trying to deceive.

If you really think that this paragraph is polite, then I think that you need 
to go back and read Dale Carnegie before you read anymore science.  If 
however these comments are not aimed at me, then I am quite happy to start 
afresh, once your cold has gone and you are a bit more affable.

If you really do value differences of opinion, then might I suggest "Subdue 
The Earth" for some interesting perspectives on plate Tectonics
http://www.amazon.com/Subdue-Earth-Ralph-Franklin-Walworth/dp/0440084342

Chris