Your Discipline, Your Teaching Career, Your Pupils

We discussed in class today whether or not teachers who live in districts where Intelligent Design is mandated should actually teach it. The class also concluded that due to the non-public nature of the disobedience as well as the presence of children, this teacher should merely go along with the status quo. However, there was the question of the "respect of the discipline --meaning that biology teachers have an obligation to teach the truths of their subject, and therefore should only teach evolution.

However, I believe that there is a different course of action that teachers should take. even though this action isn't civil disobedience. The teachers that are required to teach Intelligent Design should resign from their position as educators in these school systems. Hopefully, with several teachers dropping out of the school system, it will send a message that the actual biology community does not condone the teaching of Intelligent Design.

It may be rough for teachers to leave their profession, but they have an ultimate obligation to the truths of their discipline and an expectation to not corrupt the minds of the youth. Even though this plan of action is not civil disobedience, it still sends a similarly effective message.

Human Rights and Humanity

    We had quite the contentious discussion in class today, and the question of the removal of human rights I find very interesting. Can someone's human rights be removed; what if that person is a psychopath of sociopath? I think that the answer is no, and hopefully I can explain why.

    Understanding Human Rights is a two part issue. The first is the concept of inalienability. Inalienable means unable to be transfered. By this definition, the rights that humans have cannot be transfered away from said person. Furthermore, Human Rights are an essential component of what it means to be human. By this, I am saying that by the very virtue of being human, someone is imbued with these rights: they are not earned. When the two concepts are taken together, it is impossible for someone to lose these rights.

    When I discussed this topic outside of class with someone, they brought up whether sociopaths or psychopaths could have their rights removed. We said in class, however, that there is not enough information on these conditions to pass judgement. Well, I think I have the answer. Being a psychopath or a sociopath makes a person no less human than you or I. Last time I checked, if you were born of two human parents...you're human. End of story.