"In 2016, the latest year for which Occupational Employment Statistics survey data are available, 6.9 million people were employed in the United States as scientists and engineers, accounting for 4.9% of total U.S. employment."
The number of folks within a crowd of millions that does not believe in God or a 'higher power' still qualifies as 'many', especially by the loose standards of meaning that you've been eager to apply to the language whenever it suits your own purpose.
Nicely done on proving how "many" is a relative term...and notwithstanding your inclusion of "engineers", it remains irrelevant how many are government employees and how many are not. The poster clearly intendeds to infer that "many" is a significant, if not majority, occurrence to a degree that it is indicative of not just the overall scientific population, but has relevance to their performance as scientists. So while one does not even need a license to perform "science" as an occupation, it remains that a "scientist's" belief system has not been proven by the poster to have any influence on their said performance - other than the poster's firmly held, and faith based, belief that it must surely be true (insert irony here).
and for what it's worth, 6.9 million represents only 2% of US population which is ain't really "many" in that context...but i get ya, you are arguing that context is what makes almost 40% of all science prejudicial.
Seek freedom and become captive of your desires...seek discipline and find your liberty I can tell if a person is judgmental just by looking at them what is chaos to the fly is normal to the spider - morticia addams If you're not upsetting idiots, you might be an idiot. - Ted Nugent
Maksutov wrote:You choose to be Christian but you don't choose your sexuality. This is Christofascist skullfukkery at its finest and the attorneys know how to slip the shank into the thinnest crevice to pry the Constitution apart.
Hiya Mak. Which part of the Constitution do you think was pried apart here?
I'm describing the longterm ambitions of the ACLJ and many of the Federalist Society and the dudes backing Kim Davis, etc, etc. There are dominionist ambitions in America. They aren't new but they are wearing some new faces. I could refer you to the SPLC and the ACLU for the more technical parts.
“The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.”
― Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 1951
Maksutov wrote:You choose to be Christian but you don't choose your sexuality. This is Christofascist skullfukkery at its finest and the attorneys know how to slip the shank into the thinnest crevice to pry the Constitution apart.
Maksutov wrote:
Res Ipsa wrote:Hiya Mak. Which part of the Constitution do you think was pried apart here?
I'm describing the longterm ambitions of the ACLJ and many of the Federalist Society and the dudes backing Kim Davis, etc, etc. There are dominionist ambitions in America. They aren't new but they are wearing some new faces. I could refer you to the SPLC and the ACLU for the more technical parts.
I'd be interested in more detail on this.
Reading the ruling, the concurring opinions and Justice Ginsberg's dissenting opinion did not leave me with a sense that the Court was paving the way for christofascism or that it was the primary concern of the dissenting justices. In this particular case the opinions focused on the question of how the local commission behaved and impacted the baker's right to the free exercise of his religious beliefs as described in the 1st amendment. I have a hard time seeing the ruling as prying apart the Constitution given the result is narrowly focused on protecting a right described specifically in the Constitution while also stating in the ruling that protection from discrimination is an obligation of the law. Quite frankly, I see this ruling as a positive if modest important ruling protecting against mob rule. Of course I do not favor the baker's personal view point. But I have to respect that his beliefs should be protected from institutional prejudice and bias as well. There is a higher principal here than the question of same-sex marriage that I think the court got right.
No one seems pleased with the result in Masterpiece Cakeshop, Ltd. v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission. In significant ways, both those supporting Jack Phillips, the baker, and proponents of Charlie Craig and David Mullins, the same-sex couple, lost. On the one hand, the Supreme Court refused to grant unqualified protection to those who conscientiously object to providing goods and services to same-sex couples, and at the same time the court shut down efforts to assert that all forms of discrimination affecting same-sex couples should be labeled mere bigotry. The court pushed for a more pluralist approach, noting both that “gay persons and gay couples cannot be treated as social outcasts or as inferior in dignity and worth,” and that “[a]t the same time, the religious and philosophical objections to gay marriage are protected views and in some instances protected forms of expression.”
...
Justices Stephen Breyer and Elena Kagan’s concurrence and Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor’s dissent all seemed to agree, however, that there is a significant distinction between cases involving standardized, off-the-shelf cakes and those involving custom-made cakes that unequivocally convey a message that violates the bakers’ religious beliefs. Counting noses and reading the tea leaves of the opinions suggests that in similar cases with more neutral adjudications, future bakers, florists and photographers will probably only prevail if they can persuasively make the argument that they are not objecting to the customers, but that the case involves “personal expression [of a] message … that [they] could not express in a way consistent with [their] religious beliefs.”
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While those seeking broad religious exemptions are left displeased, the Supreme Court also offered little comfort to LGBTQ advocates who see only bigotry in religious-based objections to same-sex marriages. The majority opinion not only left open the very distinct likelihood that custom-made wedding services with expressive functions would be protected under free speech doctrines, but also explicitly rejected blanket hostility of state actors to religious claims. Quoting West Virginia Board of Education v. Barnette, a case involving a religious objection to a flag salute, the majority restated that “no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion.”
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Masterpiece Cakeshop thus represents significant pushback to those who would denounce religious freedom as mere bigotry while claiming to be neutral themselves. Public commentators on national media regularly and casually describe measures promoting religious freedom as “religious bigotry,” an “invitation to discriminate,” “not about religious freedom,” “a fig leaf for intolerance,” or the like. If this sort of language is used or relied on by legislators, or especially adjudicative bodies, it now can be considered clear evidence of lack of neutrality.
The world is always full of the sound of waves..but who knows the heart of the sea, a hundred feet down? Who knows it's depth? ~ Eiji Yoshikawa
I hope those who see this as a positive development are right. I'm cynical. I've been hearing for decades about the imminent demise of the Religious Right while I've watched it grow in power. The current administration is determined for that trend to continue and Congress is no obstacle.
Honor, I'm inclined to agree with the analysis in SCOTUSblog. Personally, I don't think the baker case has anything to do with the free exercise of religion. What the baker is arguing for is something different -- something like freedom of conscience. The Civil Rights Act doesn't interfere with anything that would be commonly associated with religious practice. The baker can go to church. The baker can pray. The baker can engage in religious rituals. in my opinion, including not selling cakes for uses that the baker disapproves of because they are a "sin" simply doesn't rise to the level of the exercise of religion. I think there is a significant difference between "not about religious freedom" and "fig leaf for intolerance." Then Commissioners were simply wrong to include the latter argument in their consideration of the claim.
I do think these cases present important freedom of speech issues that should be taken seriously. Free speech has been interpreted as freedom of expression. One of the leading cases we learned about in law school was one that held that nude dancing in a strip club is protected expression under the First Amendment. So, when we get into artistic expression, there is a real clash between the First Amendment and anti-discrimination laws. I think the problem may be even more significant in the case of photographers, where the artistic expression is more closely linked to the ceremony itself. There is a whole spectrum of example that range from the grocery store that sells napkins used at the reception and the minister who performs the ceremony. Supreme Court is going to have to draw some lines, but like a good court, it will avoid doing so until forced to.
ETA: Here's a link to the leading case on interpretation and application of the Free Exercise clause. https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federa ... annotation The Majority opinion was written by Scalia, who certainly was no foe of religion. I can't see how the Court could rule for the baker on Free Exercise Grounds without overturning this case. And even if the previous "compelling interest" test were applied, protection of civil rights will meet that test.
“The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.”
― Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 1951
You are much more qualified and I can only assume there are nuances to the interpretation of the law that I might miss. I should have probably focused more on neutrality in my post above rather than on free exercise.
Res Ipsa wrote:Honor, I'm inclined to agree with the analysis in SCOTUSblog. Personally, I don't think the baker case has anything to do with the free exercise of religion. What the baker is arguing for is something different -- something like freedom of conscience. The Civil Rights Act doesn't interfere with anything that would be commonly associated with religious practice. The baker can go to church. The baker can pray. The baker can engage in religious rituals. in my opinion, including not selling cakes for uses that the baker disapproves of because they are a "sin" simply doesn't rise to the level of the exercise of religion. I think there is a significant difference between "not about religious freedom" and "fig leaf for intolerance." Then Commissioners were simply wrong to include the latter argument in their consideration of the claim.
I was reading it fairly similarly. Perhaps I was reading into it, but it seemed part of the uniqueness of the discussion had to do with marriage being a ceremony that could also put it in the religious realm as well. The dissent seemed interested in the lack of inherent meaning of the cake in the ceremony that could be conceived as implied expression on the part of the baker in participating in the ceremony of marriage by baking a cake, and this seemed to me to be an argument for why it shouldn't be seen as protected speech. I didn't see anything in the ruling or additional consensus writings that would argue against that, but just as you mention that the Rights Commission acting in a way that showed bias rather than neutrality.
Res Ipsa wrote:ETA: Here's a link to the leading case on interpretation and application of the Free Exercise clause. https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federa ... annotation The Majority opinion was written by Scalia, who certainly was no foe of religion. I can't see how the Court could rule for the baker on Free Exercise Grounds without overturning this case. And even if the previous "compelling interest" test were applied, protection of civil rights will meet that test.
Thanks! This also adds to the general sense I have from reading the ruling that free exercise wouldn't be a blanket defense for refusing service in similar cases.
The world is always full of the sound of waves..but who knows the heart of the sea, a hundred feet down? Who knows it's depth? ~ Eiji Yoshikawa
"In 2016, the latest year for which Occupational Employment Statistics survey data are available, 6.9 million people were employed in the United States as scientists and engineers, accounting for 4.9% of total U.S. employment."
The number of folks within a crowd of millions that does not believe in God or a 'higher power' still qualifies as 'many', especially by the loose standards of meaning that you've been eager to apply to the language whenever it suits your own purpose.
Nicely done on proving how "many" is a relative term...and notwithstanding your inclusion of "engineers", it remains irrelevant how many are government employees and how many are not. The poster clearly intendeds to infer that "many" is a significant, if not majority, occurrence to a degree that it is indicative of not just the overall scientific population, but has relevance to their performance as scientists. So while one does not even need a license to perform "science" as an occupation, it remains that a "scientist's" belief system has not been proven by the poster to have any influence on their said performance - other than the poster's firmly held, and faith based, belief that it must surely be true (insert irony here).
and for what it's worth, 6.9 million represents only 2% of US population which is ain't really "many" in that context...but i get ya, you are arguing that context is what makes almost 40% of all science prejudicial.
Moving the goalposts now? Matters not what percentage of the total population is employed as scientists or engineers; you were requesting a CFR that ‘many’ scientists might not be as religious as the general public. I addressed that CFR for DT and note that any percentage above that average from the general population, when applied to the number of folks in this career field alone, still qualifies as ‘many’. Unless you want to tell me that millions of folks cannot be called many folks.
On the question of how a belief in God or a strong faith tradition could affect how a scientist thinks ... do you suppose that those scientists expressing a strong belief in God and choosing to interpret the Bible literally ever wrestle with the questions raised by evolution?
Res Ipsa wrote: i'd say that's very likely true. I think it's also very likely true that the average Supreme Court Justice is smarter than the average scientist.
Why do you think the Supreme Court Justices are brilliant? The New York Times reports
These questions can be answered only by understanding what the data says. Unfortunately, a report released by ProPublica on Tuesday suggests that the justices struggle with that task. Looking at a random sample of cases from 2011 to 2015, ProPublica found that the court cited faulty research or introduced its own errors in nearly a third of the 24 cases that relied on such facts. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/18/opin ... ckers.html
Our Supreme Court Justices are smart, but not brilliant. The Supreme Court allowed citizens united, the war on drugs, and many other wrongdoings. Should we really be proud of our Supreme Court?
honorentheos wrote: Anyway, I'm also curious what you think the ruling specifically said, DoubtingThomas.