Thursday, March 29, 2007

Show 330 Thursday 29 March


Watch today’s show at YouTube or BlipTV.

Hi, I’m Sarah. Welcome to The Daily English Show.
Today’s song is called Creation Science 101 – I found it because it was featured on the front page of YouTube.
It’s by Roy Zimmerman.

Creation science is another term for creationism.

creationism n. the belief that the universe and living organisms originated from specific acts of divine creation

evolution n. the process by which different kinds of living organism are believed to have developed from earlier forms, especially by natural selection

So basically:
The idea that the world was created by god – that’s creationism.
And the idea that we evolved from monkeys - that’s evolutionism.

I think a lot of people have strong views about this. Last time I checked there were more than 5000 comments under that video.

As for the song – it’s comedy and I think it’s funny ... but it’s not an easy song to understand – because there are quite a few cultural references and some difficult vocabulary. So I don’t recommend it for beginners.
But there are lyrics, there are lyrics on his site, so I’ll put a link to that.

In this video Roy is pretending to be a teacher, teaching about creationism or creation science. So he thinks evolutionism is wrong.

I like the line: You ain't no monkey's great grandson.
This means: you didn’t descend from or evolve from a money.

He also says:
There might be sinners in this class
Who might believe in Charles Darwin

A sinner is a person who sins.
And to sin is to break a religious or moral law.

You might have seen in movies ... people go inside a church and sit next to a little booth with a person inside ... and say forgive me father for I have sinned.
And that means: please forgive me because I have done something wrong.

So this video could lead to some interesting discussions.
I guess you should be careful when talking about religion because it is controversial – but I don’t think you should not talk about it at all.
Just try to judge the situation.
It’s definitely possible to have to an interesting and respectful discussion about religion even if you have different views.



STICK NEWS

Kia ora in Stick News today, the cover for the seventh and final Harry Potter book has been released.

Harry Potter is a fictional character created by J.K.Rowling.
The first Harry Potter book was published in 1997. So far, six books have been published and more than 325 million copies sold.
The seventh book is called Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows and will be available on July the 21st.
Yesterday the publishers released the cover of the book.
The publishers have also announced that 12 million copies will be printed for the first print run in the US alone.

And that was Stick News for Thursday the 29th of March.
Kia Ora.



the snow report

At 6 o'clock this evening I decided to go for a walk in my neighbourhood.



conversations with sarah
#204 Do you think Harry is going to die in the last book?

Step 1: Repeat Kate’s lines.
Step 2: Read Kate’s lines and talk to Sarah.

Kate Do you think Harry is going to die in the last book?

Sarah I don’t know. I hope not. What do you think?

Kate I think he’s going to die.

Sarah Mmm. I don’t know if I’m going to be able to handle it.
I was so shocked when his godfather died.

Kate Yeah, me too. What was his name?

Sarah Um, Sirius, I think.

Kate That’s right. Sirius Black.

Sarah And I couldn’t believe it when Dumbledore died.

Kate How are you going to cope if Harry dies?

Sarah I don’t know. Maybe counseling.



questionanswer

Error correction.
Questions from this quiz by Charles Kelly.