Letters to the Editor 09/21/2005

To the Editor:

Have you noticed the increase in traffic at Locust Street and Highway 20 since school started? I was there the other morning around 8 a.m. and inside most of the automobiles were parents taking their kids to grade school.

They were creating a huge traffic problem. Don’t they know our tax dollars pay for school bus service to take their kids to school and back home again? My kids rode the bus to school and back from grade 1-12. I did the same when I was a kid. I thought it was great. You get to read a book. Or talk to your friends before and after school. It helped develop social skills.

Not to mention the waste of fuel these parents are contributing to by not putting their kids on the bus.

I guess gas is still affordable.

Will someone please respond to this letter to justify the motive behind driving their kids to school and back home when there is a bus available?

Dale Lester

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To the Editor:

Mr. Haken is correct in saying that facts are appreciated (Letter to the Editor re: Intelligent Design, The Nugget, September 14).

The “facts” presented by Mr. Haken, however, are not peer-reviewed and accepted as true in any field of science I’m aware of (my background is in physics, astronomy and electrical engineering, though I’ve read in other fields).

Assertions were made about amino acids and protein. Astronomers have detected hydrocarbons, including glycine, an amino acid, in interstellar molecular clouds. Amino acids and many other hydrocarbons have been detected in numerous meteorites. The basic stuff of life seems to be pretty common in the universe. Is there no way for amino acids to combine without DNA? Surely if complex molecules can form in space we might allow that there could be a way for more complexity to form on earth?!

Assertions were made about oxygen in the early earth’s atmosphere. Life developed on earth some 3.5 billion years ago. Photosynthesis didn’t come into play until a billion years later, at which time oxygen in the atmosphere increased sharply. Where’s the problem?

Assertions were made about carbon dating. If any of the fossils in the line of human ancestors had been found to have significantly different dates of origin, the news would have been prominent in major media. Where are the news stories?

Related to carbon-14, which, as Mr. Haken pointed out is good for a certain age range, are the other isotopes used for dating. Potassium (decaying to argon), uranium and rubidium, among others, (all with different half lives) are used for dating minerals in which fossils are found, and their agreement is excellent. The earth is 4.5 billion years old (give or take a few). Life did exist in primitive forms over 3 billion years ago. Life did get more complex over these vast timespans.

And we are genetically very close to chimpanzees (see the article in the September issue of Science on sequencing the chimpanzee genome).

These are facts. There are also questions. Not everything is known about how life arose or evolved. To impart what is known and encourage our children’s curiosity to find out more is a wonderful thing that we can do for them and posterity. To assert that opinion should be treated as fact and that facts should be denied is doing our children a disservice.

Steve Bryan

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To the Editor:

Science is the study of observable fact. It does not exist to propagandize for theories, but to move, by systematic observation of established facts, from hypothesis to fact. When a phenomena cannot be observed, it simply cannot move from theory to fact.

Evolution from simple life forms to complex life forms is a theory. It is not science, because it has NEVER been observed.

How can we presume to teach children that this theory is science—that it is in fact foundational to their understanding of all science—when it has never actually been observed? Ever.

Human theories aside, the reality is that all human beings believe that there is a God who is the Creator of this planet. The reason they do not embrace this God is moral, not intellectual. They have disobeyed their Creator so often and for so long, that they refuse to hear Him and acknowledge He exists. They then proceed to propagandize for theories that best suit their disobedient lifestyles.

But when a person turns to their Creator, the Lord Jesus Christ, suddenly they are able to find His hand in the complex mechanism of Ponderosa pine cones, sending down their helicopters in the fall; or the impossible flourishes of color on the sides of Metolius river trout; or in the inquiring sideways gaze of a praying mantis, clinging to a shoot of fresh sage.

They say “Ahh, Lord! Thanks for making Central Oregon! Thanks for making me to enjoy it!”

Brian Thomasson

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To the Editor:

Re: letters regarding our dispute with Central Electric Cooperative: We fully support a reasonable upgrade in the Jordan Road line, but so far none has been proposed.

A few years ago, CEC approached us and asked us to sign a new easement that would allow them to widen their easement from 10 feet to 40 feet and replace the existing 45 foot wooden poles with steel poles as high as 84 feet. We politely declined. We told them that we did not see the necessity for such excessive height.

The Highway 126 line is only about 60 feet high and includes both distribution and communications lines built under the transmission line. Upon consultation with electrical transmission line design engineers, we found that CEC has no regulatory basis for the height they are asking. Our research has indicated that the National Electrical Code will allow construction of a much shorter line and still meet the area’s power needs.

CEC has claimed that it has experienced peak loads in the past couple of years of about 55 megawatts and is concerned that the Highway 126 line which replaced the Jordan Road line in 1980 will not be sufficient to cover potential peak loads that exist with its current customer base.

They can supply the area’s needs for many years to come by simply raising the Highway 126 voltage to its design load and thereby raising its capacity from 60 megawatts to its design load capacity of 100 megawatts (as confirmed by their own engineers).

Additionally, they could increase the service to the Sisters area by 10 megawatts by simply turning on the Jordan Road line.

CEC has also failed to tell the public that this is a multi-phase project that will eventually run past Tollgate on its way to Black Butte Ranch. The relatively unobtrusive line that runs along the west side of Tollgate is destined to receive the same rebuild to a much larger line.

Matt Cyrus

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To the Editor:

My wife and I saw “March of the Penguins” at the new Sisters Movie House.

It was a beautifully done film except for the silly and unnecessary anthropomorphizing of the penguins. Now I read in the New York Times that conservatives all over the place are touting the film as a wonderful example of “family values.”

It is being hailed as an example of Intelligent Design, loyalty, “love” and, get this: monogamy. Hello? These penguins change mates every year. That’s monogamy? If humans changed mates every year would conservatives call that monogamy? I don’t think so. But then when you anthropomorphize you get this kind of silliness. This is the by far the weirdest “family values” argument I have ever heard conservatives use, and I’ve heard some doozies.

R.T. Tihista

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To the Editor:

We deserve better. We deserve answers. We deserve the truth.

Ask yourself, “Why has John Roberts refused to answer over 100 questions during his confirmation hearing?” What does he have to hide?

Ask yourself also, “Why does George Bush refuse to reveal Judge Robert’s record while he was Deputy Solicitor General?” What does he have to hide?

What happened to the transparency that democracy should provide? This is America and we deserve an honest, open, genuine dialogue. Why would we want someone for Chief Justice who is unable or unwilling to provide that. We deserve better. We demand better.

Sharon Lohrmann