The Texas state board of education, which earlier this year stirred national controversy with its overhaul of social studies standards, today narrowly adopted a resolution warning textbook publishers against infusing their materials with “pro-Islamic/anti-Christian distortions.” The resolution was approved by a 7-6 vote by social conservatives on the board, who warned of what they describe as a creeping Middle Eastern influence in the nation’s publishing industry.

The resolution declares that a “pro-Islamic/anti-Christian bias has tainted some past Texas social studies textbooks,” and that the board should reject any future textbooks that favor one religion over another.

The Washington Post points out that the “facts” used by the board in making the decision were not accurate; however, facts probably stand no chance against the political machine that is the Texas school board. It also raises the question of whether we should worry about the pro- or anti-religious biases of duly elected or appointed public officials. Texas wields considerable clout in the textbook publishing world as the largest “adoption state” in the U.S., where a central body approves public school textbooks rather than individual districts. It’s not clear whether the resolution will prompt textbook publishers to make immediate changes to sections devoted to Christianity and Islam.

Meanwhile, the Association of American Publishers claims that textbooks are already necessarily fair and balanced because “there is no good reason for them to submit things that would be biased”. Luckily for America, “bias” and “reason” go hand-in-hand.

Dean drew her conclusions from what she calls one of the most depressing summers of her life. She interviewed teens about their faith after helping conduct research for a controversial study called the National Study of Youth and Religion. [...] The study, which included in-depth interviews with at least 3,300 American teenagers between 13 and 17, found that most American teens who called themselves Christian were indifferent and inarticulate about their faith. The study included Christians of all stripes — from Catholics to Protestants of both conservative and liberal denominations. Though three out of four American teenagers claim to be Christian, fewer than half practice their faith, only half deem it important, and most can’t talk coherently about their beliefs, the study found. Many teenagers thought that God simply wanted them to feel good and do good [...]

[Most] teens who are articulate about their faith [...] come from Mormon and evangelical churches, which tend to do a better job of instilling religious passion in teens, she says.

What ever shall we do to stop this horrifying new generation of “imposter” Christians whose takeaway from church is a nebulous belief in a God that wants them to be nice people and feel better about themselves?

Also, if you want to follow the USU SHAFT blog but feed readers aren’t for you, we now offer a blog e-mail list as well! Just click on the “Blog Post Emails” link at the top of any page and you’ll receive a daily e-mail with the new posts from the USU SHAFT blog (note: the blog post e-mail list, which sends one message every day, is separate from our club events mailing list, which sends one message about every three weeks).

If you’re reading this blog, you probably have at least one online profile, be it at Facebook, Twitter, Google Buzz, LinkedIn, or any of the myriad social networking web sites. You’re probably also aware that the combination of Web 2.0, geopositioning technology (such as GPS, Wi-Fi location databases, and cell tower triangulation), and the explosive growth of mobile data networks has taken social networking and the location-aware web to new heights. Facebook lets you meet people and make friends with those in your same town. Many Twitter-based services show you if any of your friends are nearby and looking to catch a movie or go to dinner. Google Maps helps you get driving directions and public transit information based on your current location, and Google Latitude even e-mails you when people you know break out of their ordinary routine and are nearby (e.g., friends who have the night off, or family visiting from out of town). LinkedIn helps you get a job in your area through the power of word-of-mouth. There are countless useful applications for a location-aware web, but at what cost?

Please Rob Me is a new web site trying to bring attention to the practice of publicly posting your location on the Internet and why it might be dangerous.

The way in which people are stimulated to participate in sharing this information, is less awesome. The danger is publicly telling people where you are. This is because it leaves one place you’re definitely not… home.

The goal of this website is to raise some awareness on this issue and have people think about how they use services like Foursquare, Brightkite, Google Buzz etc. Because all this site is, is a dressed up Twitter search page. Everybody can get this information.

Public location data is nothing new — government documents have listed home addresses and other such details for years, and you can easily look across the street to see if your neighbors have their lights on or not — but the web adds time as a forth dimension. Never before has there been such vast public information in real-time about where people are located. The privacy concerns here are more interesting because this location data is volunteered by users. Is providing the world with up-to-the-minute information on where you are useful or dangerous? Should people be concerned about making location-specific data publicly available online, or is there nothing to worry about? Does Please Rob Me raise a legitimate concern or is it simply a publicity stunt? Perhaps there is an ethical question to be answered here, too: Do people realize what geopositioning information they are providing? Do you use any location-aware services and what are your thoughts?

Do you know something interesting about science? Do you have something thoughtful to say about religion? Do you want to share your expertise in sociology? Have you found or even conducted an interesting piece of research? Is there something that you’ve been wanting to get people thinking about? We’re looking for anyone interested in writing short, thought-provoking blog posts for the usu-shaft.com site. Interesting content might include thoughts, stories, or personal experiences that deal with the humanities, the natural sciences, or the social sciences. If you are interested in becoming a guest blogger, please leave a comment on this post.

America has always been a religious country. But a recent study finds that might be changing; the percent of the country who considers themselves atheists is rising rapidly. While they still make up a minority in comparison to the major religions, the current trends indicate that we may not be one nation, under God, forever.

We hope to see all of you tonight at SHAFT’s Opening Social!

In the meantime, there is a Humanists of Utah BBQ happening TONIGHT at 6 pm in Salt Lake City. This BBQ will be co-hosted by SHIFT, our sister group at the University of Utah. If you’re around or interested, please try to attend. It’s important to support and socialize with fellow secular humanists across Utah. And why pass up free food and fun, anyway? See the complete event details on Facebook.