BAXTER SPRINGS, Kan. —
In her column (Globe, Sept. 15), Esther Cepeda mentioned that a few teachers are substandard, but most are not.
This is an illustration of the bell-shaped curve. In any large population such as teachers, scientists or government workers, there will be a few who are incompetent and a few who are excellent. However, most will be somewhere in between. The interesting aspect of this is that it will not change. You can fire the undesirables, but they will be replaced. This is part of the fascination of statistics. In our intelligence community, it can be safely assumed that at any given moment there will be at least one individual who will betray his country, if the opportunity arises.
The bell-shaped curve is so widely applicable that it can be considered a law of nature. In psychology, for example, we can determine instinctive behavior by observing human behavior in all places and all times. There will be a few on each extreme of a given trait, but the behavior of the large majority can be considered the mean. The mean can be taken to be the instinctive trait. An example is the behavior of women. Men can take it as a good general rule that whatever they think a woman is doing, she is doing something else.
This general law, known as the normal distribution, prevents stability. Stability is death. There must be something to disrupt stability or activity and development will cease. Laws of nature such as the bell-shaped curve work to keep things moving. This gives hope that the dreaded death of the universe will not happen.
General laws of nature such as the bell-shaped curve transcend the laws of physics, which are subsumed under these laws. Because of this, consideration must be given to concepts such as intelligent design. Simply because current view of scientists do not take account of these concepts is no reason to deny that they’re being taught. To deny consideration of other views is to place blinders on the students.
Donald E. Corder
Baxter Springs, Kan.
Opinion
Your View: Bell-shaped curve
- Opinion
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Our View: Spying on us
Distrust of government secrecy has been elevated to an exceptional level with the disclosure the Justice Department covertly examined two months of Associated Press phone records to determine who leaked details to the AP about a foiled terrorist plot.
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Our View: Pass on the legacy
Forty hungry members of the 1st Kansas Colored Volunteer Infantry began gathering corn at the Rader farm near the village of Sherwood when they were ambushed by a guerrilla band of about 70 Southern sympathizers.
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Our View: Big Brother looms large
The federal government, working under the cloak of secrecy, has been having a heyday at the expense of all Americans.
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Our View: Disgraceful military assault
We want to make one thing clear: A sexual assault is not a sex scandal. Nor can the rise in sexual assaults in the military be justified in any way.
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Elliott Denniston, guest columnist: Right-to-work laws only hurt workers
Middle-class workers have been fighting an uphill battle for the past 30 years.
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Your View: Food drive efforts
Branch No. 366 of the National Association of Letter Carriers along with the National Rural Letter Carriers Association, the American Postal Workers Union and the U.S. Postal Service would like to thank all the area communities that participated in the 2013 Stamp Out Hunger food drive.
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Your View: More about tax credit
The Globe’s editorial in “Our View” (May 10) may have left readers with a few inaccurate impressions.
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Other Views: Sickening disparity
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Carol Stark: America in need of more 'momisms'
Several years ago, I attended a writing workshop where one of the sessions was called “Tell it to Mom.”
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Our View: Keep learning
Donna Maus, a biology teacher from St. Mary’s Colgan High School in Pittsburg, Kan., told a group of top students, their parents and their teachers something we think everyone needs to hear.
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