No School, Public or Private, Should be Allowed to Teach Religion

I use the separation of church and state as a justification for allowing private schools to teach religion because it is not within the government's constitutional powers to regulate what is taught or practiced by private individuals. Jefferson stated it thus: "... I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their "legislature" should "make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," thus building a wall of separation between church and State."[1] Since private schools are not a part of the state, and even deserve to be loosely classed with "religious buildings", the separation of church and state provides no support for my opponent's opinion on private schools. My opponent says that scientific theories, which have not been necessarily proven, should be taught as possibly true. Nevertheless, without specifying when something becomes "proven", I am afraid this argument does not hold water. My opponent has claim previously that he is fine with schools teaching children about religions, but not teaching that they are the truth. Now my opponent has changed his position (which is similar to mine) that not even science should be taught as the truth (because scientific theories are at best approximations), but rather we ought to teach children about science and scientific theories. If this is the case, what privilege does science have over mythology? I will agree that empirical science is more useful in living our daily lives, but a lack of proof for religion does not exclude it from the realm of what private schools ought to teach. My opponent disputes the pessimistic meta-induction on the basis that science was too "primitive" in past times. But how will scientists feel in the 26th century about 21st century? No doubt, they will share the same sentiments as you do with respect to 17th century science. To them, science from our time will be primitive. As for the theory of gravity, certainly the empirical phenomenon of gravity has been discussed since the time of Aristotle (why things fall back to the Earth). However, throughout the shift from Aristotle to Newton to Einstein, the actual theory of gravity has changed dramatically: from properties inherent in the object falling to Earth (Aristotle), to a grand force pulling on the object (Newton), to a property of space-time geometry (Einstein). These theories have been introduced in education and subsequently rejected because of the change in scientific focus. There is no guarantee that these theories are correct. Although I have no problem with them being taught, to give privilege to such theories because they are certain facts of reality is wrong. The point of the pessimistic meta-induction serves simply to undermine your argument: that just because something has proof, or at least credible evidence, does not make it the absolute truth. My opponent chose to convince an atheist that God does not exist. The point of the passage my opponent chose to quote and refute was not that there is a god, but that an existence of a god is not subject to the pure reason, pure rationality, and pure logic my opponent used in his disproof. No one reads a theologian's ontological argument and suddenly believes in the existence of a god. Whether someone believes in a god or not is his or her choice, and although that god might merely exist in that person's mind, to them that is an explanation they are at liberty to teach to their children by proxy. As for my opponent's belief that less people would become religious if private schools did not teach the subject, I disagree. A majority of parents who put their children into a private education do so because of the religious studies they offer. This is clear from a large segment of the American population who pay for religious private schools when charters are free[2]. Obviously, these students must live in religious households, and so are indoctrinated with religious truths at home. If the government were to eliminate that curriculum from the private school sector, children would still be religious, regardless of the fact that they are going to school in a public school. Like I said, in a country where most of the population is Christian, and where most of the population is educated within the public school system, Americans are shockingly ignorant of Christian doctrines and the history of the Church. In my opinion, having such ignorance is far more dangerous than allowing students to attend private schools, and learn the actual teachings of Jesus Christ, not the teachings of radical or reactionary Church ministers. If these individuals are going to be theists, we might as well allow them to be good theists, not backward-looking fundamentalists. My opponent believes that an example of an atheist, quasi-socialist utopia is Sweden. As a side note, I would like for the given statistics to be cited, because according to the Eurostat survey I looked at, only 23% of Swedes are actual atheists[3]. As for my opponent's argument, it is a non sequitur. The success of Sweden on the Human Development Index means nothing for the success of the resolution in the United States, a country in which three-fourths of the population identify themselves as Christian[4]. Moreover, even assuming my opponent's argument was correct, there has been no support for the proposition that eliminating religion even from private schools will produce more atheists (who are supposedly less ignorant than their theist counterparts are). While it is true that we cannot link the failure of North Korea and the Soviet Union to atheism, we cannot logically link the success of countries like Sweden to atheism either. I appreciate my opponent's respect for my belief in the FSM, and that he will not suppress my faith. However, educational facilities outside of mandated government control cannot be subjected to the same standards as public institutions. I would have expected my opponent to support his position with arguments from the welfare of children, with Richard Dawkins having called teaching religion a form of child abuse[5]. However, my point still stands. Educating one's children falls under a basic human right with respect to being a parent. Just because a person hires another person to teach your child does not change the equation. If my opponent has a problem with religion, I suggest that we solve the problem not by violating human rights, but by appealing to the human mind instead. My opponent believes that science differs from mythology because science is composed of fact and evidence and supposedly, mythology is not. On that point, I will not disagree. But, for example, much of theoretical physics is based upon interpretations of unseen phenomena. Quantum scientists are scientifically permitted to make metaphysical conclusions about the structure of the universe, not based on what they find in a laboratory, but on their own value judgments. Science is undeniably fraught with individual scientists' value judgments about the world, and it is a tricky subject differentiating what has been observed in a laboratory from what a scientist has interpreted about that observation. Mythology is an interpretation of what has been seen empirically, just as science is. -------------------- [1] = http://en.wikipedia.org... [2] = http://online.wsj.com... [3] = http://ec.europa.eu... [4] = http://en.wikipedia.org... [5] = http://www.christianpost.com...