The WSJ reports that anti-evolution forces have adopted a new stealth strategy to undermine the teaching of evolution in public school science classes: "academic freedom." The story reports on "academic freedom" legislation that would protect high school science teachers who challenge evolutionary theory in their classes.
The academic-freedom bills now in circulation vary in detail. Some require teachers to critique evolution. Others let educators choose their approach -- but guarantee they won't be disciplined should they decide to build a case against Darwin.
The common goal: To expose more students to articles and videos that undercut evolution. Most of this material is produced by advocates of intelligent design or Biblical creationism, the belief that God created man in his present form. . . .
Those promoting the new bills emphasize that academic freedom doesn't mean biology teachers can read aloud from the Book of Genesis. "This doesn't bring religion into the classroom," said Florida state Rep. D. Alan Hays, a Republican.
The bills typically restrict lessons to "scientific" criticism of evolution, or require that critiques be presented "in an objective manner," or approved by a local school board.
Evolution's defenders respond that there are no credible scientific critiques of evolution, any more than there are credible alternatives to the theory of gravity. The fossil record, DNA analysis and observations of natural selection confirm Darwin's hypothesis that all life on Earth evolved from a common ancestor over four billion years.
In the scientific community, while there may be debate about the details, the grand sweep of evolution is unassailable. "There's no controversy," said Jay Labov, a senior adviser for education and communication with the National Academy of Sciences.
Unlike some critics of "Intelligent Design" and other creationist theories, I am not convinced that teaching alternatives to evolution necessarily violates the Establishment Clause. That said, these bills make for horrible public policy, as there is nothing scientific about these "alternatives" to evolution. Encouraging attacks on evolution in high school science classes promotes academic fraud not "academic freedom." If school boards or state legislatures want public school students to be exposed to competing theories about the origins of life -- a question evolutionary theory does not address -- they should do it in a world religion or social studies class and leave science alone.
The constitution may give free speech, but it clearly means free speech only for right thinking people.
Those who oppose evolution oppose reality itself. Through their belief and speech they exclude themselves from the constitution and from society itself.
Their belief is a fraud. Their speech is a fraud. They blaspheme darwin. Their lives are hate crimes agaist society.
Death to those who oppose darwin! Death to the christers!
It is mythology, if there was ANY observable, or testable hypothesis, or any data whatsoever, MAYBE, but as the "evidence" for creationism consists of a multiply translated oral history from 6,000 years ago, it isn't science.
IMHO, only the truly stupid can believe that nonsense, anyway. I'm all for the individuals right to be an ignorant troglodyte, right up until they insist that their foolish notions are science.
Then the cycle starts all over.
Somehow the children of the 60s got into power in the academy and decided that no debate was authorised in a handful of theories they love (darwin, global warm or cool of the week, race abilities).
That's not science or the academy, that is a religion.
I get the feeling you'd do well to retake those high school classes on evolutionary theory...
Key phrase there being "running tests." Any suggestions for running scientific tests on creationism or intelligent design? We've been waiting for some time and this seems to be one (of many) important area where these ideas have nothing to add to our scientifically based understanding of the world.
You are correct, of course, but your mistake is to engage Happyshooter in the first place. Lost cause.
I have real doubts that humans come from one celled life.
The big bang smells like a fantasy.
Also, house cats have wanted to get into jars and cans for well over 100 years, mine try several times per day. I have yet to see a sign of an opposable thumb on their paws.
"Science leads you to killing people" and relgion does not? Both science and religion were created by man, not by anything else. And man may act in moral or amoral ways. Torquemada and Mengele would respectfully disagree with Stein's foolishness. He is really skilled at basing sound-sounding soundbites on empty nonsense.
The other confusion that people take advantage of is the concept of creation "where/how did existence begin" with evolution concept explaining how life has developed since the beginning of existence.
Newton believed in God, but as the type of being that would create mysteries for us to understand and learn from. He saw the Divine hand in the motion of the heavens, and took up science as a challenge to comprehend the mysteries in front of us. Einstein saw God as an excellent concept and as a common bond between life, but didn't see God as an umpire who made up the rules that you had to live a certain way.
Most of the religious scientists that I know subscribe to the Blind Watchmaker concept of a God and not the evangelical concept of Jesus sitting next to you at lunchtime, reminding you not to eat so many carbs.
Academic Freedom to force confusion and ignorance on children who already score poorly at math and science? Sounds like a great idea. Abstinence also is a great use of forced ignorance on children, and we see how well that has worked.
I have yet to see a cat with an opposable thumb, either. But, I bet, if there is a genetic mutation creating one, that mutation will become a dominant feature of cats within 1000 years or so, if it is useful to the cats.
That would be evolution.
As for the "academic freedom" claim, I wonder if those folks really want to travel down that path. Think of all the odious things currently plied on undergraduates, allowed and encouraged in some sense by "academic freedom." It doesn't seem to me that's such a bright idea at the high school level.
We're not talking about the big bang. We're talking about evolution.
I didn't know macro evolution had been tested. So you are suggesting we have time machines.
I don't think there is any justification for grouping intelligent design in with a reasonable alternative of teaching the shortcomings of evolutionary theory or the shortcomings of the scientific method for that matter. Incidentally I don't know the real world relevance of teaching evolution in schools. We don't teach statistics, we don't teach economics, we barely teach math, but we teach a well established but largely irrelevant scientific theory that has huge religious implications when taught with bias(by glossing over the shortcomings) to people who lack the analytical reasoning skills to understand the process of reaching conclusions.
Erm, doesn't it underpin pretty much all modern biology?
1.) Even if Creationism and Intelligent Design are total hogwash, they still ought to be discussed in the schools so that the students can see for themselves that they are hogwash.
2.) There are some aspects of the Theory of Evolution (as commonly presented) that are really non-testable hypotheses, and hence fall outside the realm of Science. For example: The assertion that life on Earth arose solely by random chance. That may well be true, and I personally believe it, but it can't possibly be proven by any kind of reproducible, controlled experiment. Therefore, it is not Science with a capital "S" like, say, Maxwell's Equations or Special Relativity. At best, it is semi-scientific speculation, and at worst it is just another belief system, the same as ID or Creationism. If it were up to me, I'd call it "The Evolution Hypothesis" rather than "The Theory of Evolution."
3.) Whatever harm might come from allowing a few religious wackos to fill a few kids' heads with nonsense is far less than the harm that comes from allowing the Government (especially the Federal government) to define what is or isn't Science, in defiance of the wishes of local, democratically-elected school-boards.
4.) I don't see where there is any logical way to disprove Creationism. If some guy wants to assert that God created the Earth, 6000 years ago, complete with fake fossils and sedimentary rocks, etc., how can you disprove that??
5.) To me, Intelligent Design actually seems easier to attack than Creationism in that I.D. seems to be logically incompatible with conventional Judeo-Christian Theism because their [the I.D. folks] "Designer" keeps making mistakes that S/he has to come back and rectify. Whereas the traditional Judeo-Christian God is omniscient and -- one assumes -- infallible.
Would academic freedom even protect a biology professor's ability to teach the students "intelligent design" in freshman bio? I don't think it would, since the department has the right to establish some minimum standards for course content and among those is "do not teach the students theories biologists universally recognize as bunk."I agree that it doesn't necessarily violate the Establishment Clause. I could imagine a nonreligious intelligent-design theory (say, that the life-forms on Earth today were designed by aliens) being pursued in a scientific way to the point where it gained sufficient credibility to merit being taught in public-school science classes. (I am not optimistic about this approach, but I think it could happen in principle.)
Back in reality, however, the only version of intelligent design anybody supports is Biblical creationism with a new name. It seems to have been invented for the sole purpose of looking secular enough to meet the Edwards test. Why is there a difference of Constitutional dimension between teaching thinly veiled religious beliefs and teaching the same beliefs outright?
You're not only free to teach what you want, you're also free to teach what the state tells you to. Maybe the solution is to get the government out of the business of giving its blessing to school curricula.
That would get interesting. I'd love to see some teacher explain in a world history class (say in response to a question) that our best historical and scientific evidence suggests that no one rose from the dead during that period of time. It could get even more interesting in an actual course on religions. I suspect most of the people supporting this bill wouldn't be very pleased to find a teacher using academic freedom to outline the evidence that the gospels were composed significantly after the fact, contain clear historical inaccuracies (no census like the one claimed was held at that time) and then underwent substantial modifications during the middle ages. These are facts that are accepted even by the vast majority of religious scholars (theologians etc..) but would drive these fundamentalist types mad.
Too bad the bill doesn't actually just grant protections for high school teachers to share scientific evidence in general.
I'm pretty sure evolutionary theory doesn't assert that. Any other examples?
Maybe by providing evidence of fossils and sedimentary rocks that are older than 6000 years?
Not only is it the basis of all biology, but also medicine. Furthermore, creationists and other religious cohorts believe that the earth was created only a few thousand years ago, so this also impacts anyone who wants to go into geology, paleontalogy, the study of dinosaurs, plants, ecology, plate tectonics, astromony and a whole host of scientific fields.
But even for those who don't go into those fields, if evolution is not taught, then students will only be taught the religion, which is that the world was created a few thousand years ago.
If you don't teach basic science, which evolution is a part of, then you pretty much concede it to the wingnuts, and that seriously deprives our students of a sound education.
How did you start out?
First off, Evolution doesn't say that life arose solely by random chance. Natural Selection which is a major factor in Evolution is anything BUT Random.
As to the second bit about it not being able to be reproducible by a controlled experiment, what isn't reproducible and you do know that by that logic Astronomy isn't Science because we can't make stars in a lab. :p
As Brian Mac pointed out, that's not part of the Theory of Evolution.
Biologists really don't know where or how life started on Earth, or even what the first life was. They have a bunch of ideas and some evidence for each, but this is still a very unanswered question. Whoever finally pieces it together will probably get a Nobel.
Lets be honest here, Darwin's theory of evolution is just that, a theory. Certainly the evidence supporting micro evolution is very strong, and even macro evolution has a good case for it, but that doesn't negate the fact that it is still only a theory. I see it as a problem when science is preached where the most commonly accepted theory is presented as the one and only fact. That's just not science. Not saying creationism should be taught in school, just that if Darwinism is taught, it needs to be taught as 'we believe this to be the case' and not 'this IS the case.'
For all we know, aliens landed on the planet 10,000 years ago, made woopie with a bunch of monkeys, and that's how man kind was formed. Anyone care to prove that theory wrong? I don't think you can, just as you can't prove Darwin wrong. It's certainly possible, maybe not plausible, but that doesn't make it any less of a valid theory.
You really can't even prove creationism false. It is possible that our entire universe was created by a being or beings outside our very narrow scope of existence and perception. As an example, I found the gravity analogy in the article a poor one at best; we know how to approximate gravity in our scope of existence fairly well, but we don't know what causes it, and we certainly don't understand it outside our perspective. Gravity does some things that we have no clue why; i.e. its effect on time or it inconsistency in the known universe. My point here is that science doesn't understand everything and can't explain everything, because we, as human beings, can not understand or perceive everything in the universe.
So, like I said, I don't advocate teaching creationism or any other religous belief in public schools, but we do have to be careful and not make science into just another religion based on beliefs. As long as teachers are required to present the commonly accepted theory of evolution and the big bang in addition to the less commonly accepted reasonings, I see nothing wrong with it, and it may even be a good thing.
Ding ding ding! We have a winner for the stupidest thing I have read in a long time.
Of course, you can think of other ways of testing hypotheses. Sometimes you can find "natural experiments"; sometimes you can find a way of creating a model of the phenomenon that will work in the lab. But in a lot of scientific fields reproducible, controlled experiments are not the rule.
Wow. Just, wow.
And right there you've demonstrated that you're not familiar with even the basic terminology of this debate. I strongly suggest you do some serious reading on the topic. You might want to start with the definition of "theory." To get you started, I think you'll find that in this context "just a theory" is a meaningless statement.
I see it as a problem when science is preached where the most commonly accepted theory is presented as the one and only fact.
Yeah, just like those damn astronomers preach that stars are burning balls of gas and plasma, and not celestial lamps hung in the sky by ancient dragons. Why do they have to preach the most commonly accepted theory as the one and only fact?
Intelligent design isn't on an equivalent footing with biology because it fails to do the same work as biology. It doesn't produce useful discoveries, it doesn't make accurate predictions, it doesn't investigate its own premises, and it doesn't result in new discoveries. It's just rhetoric.
Florida's evolution debate gets sexy
By MARC CAPUTO
Herald Tallahassee Bureau
TALLAHASSEE -- It's called the "Academic Freedom" bill and it's supposed to give teachers the freedom to teach the "full range of scientific views" about evolution.
But should teachers have the freedom to teach the "full range of scientific views" about sexual education?
Republican Sen. Ronda Storms said that Democratic proposal went too far and had it voted down on the Senate floor Thursday, saying the sex-ed measure not only didn't belong on her evolution bill, it could lead to "prematurely deflowering kindergartners and first- and second-graders."
Sen. Peter Deutch, a Boca Raton Democrat, countered that the sex-education bill had to be "age appropriate" and that it would help stop sexually transmitted diseases and unwanted pregnancies.
Adapting Storm's language in previous evolution debates, Deutch said the bill simply gives students "the opportunity to ask about the scientific information."
From there, the debate over the measure, which could be voted out of the chamber by next week, became tense.
After trying to show that Storms, a Christian conservative, is only concerned with academic freedom" when it comes to evolution, they tried to cast doubt on her proposal as a back-door way of teaching intelligent design, the argument that life is too complex to have come about without a designer. A Pennsylvania federal court in 2005 banned intelligent design from science classrooms for being religious in nature.
Proponents of intelligent design say their theory isn't religious, though nearly every adherent says the intelligent designer is God. Storms' language is based on proposed legislation pushed by intelligent design supporters.
So Democrats repeatedly asked: Could teachers teach intelligent design under the Academic Freedom bill? Ronda Storms wouldn't say yes or no.
Her answer, instead, came straight from the text of her bill that Democrats were trying to tear apart as back-door creationism: "You may teach, specifically: scientific information relevant to the full range of scientific views regarding biological and chemical evolution in connection with teaching any prescribed curriculum regarding chemical or biological evolution.' "
Storms at one point added: "The bottom line is, if it is not scientifically based and if it is not scientifically relevant, the answer is 'no.' If it is, the answer is 'yes.'"
She also pointed out that the bill says "you may not teach religious doctrine."
When pressed about intelligent design by Democratic Sen. Nan Rich of Sunrise, Storms said: "Asked and answered."
But it wasn't, said Democratic leader Steve Geller of Cooper City. When he started to ask her personal view about intelligent design, Republican Senate President Ken Pruitt of Port St. Lucie interrupted: "Senator Storms, you don't have to answer this if you don't want to."
Geller continued: "Do you believe intelligent design meets the criteria in your bill," which says scientific information is "germane current facts, data and peer-reviewed research."
Said Storms: "I absolutely believe that evolution should be taught in public schools. I also believe that we should teach the full range of critical analysis of evolution."
Storms said her bill was designed to counteract the "dogmatic" new state science standards requiring for the first time that evolution to be taught - by name - in science classrooms. She said "people are afraid. Teachers are afraid. And students, by the way, are afraid."
Geller objected, noting her bill says the "Legislature finds that in many instances" teachers and students have feared discipline or been disciplined for teaching the full range of scientific information about evolution.
When Geller asked her for names, Storms didn't have any, but said six educators who planned to talk on the topic recently weren't given the time to address a Senate committee.
We share over 98% of our DNA with chimpanzees (and a little less but still well over 90% with the rest of the great apes). If we were half alien, then only 50% maximum of our DNA would be common with the great apes.
Of course, the absolute impossibility of a fertile alien/ape cross is just ridiculous fantasy--a horse and a donkey don't even produce fertile offspring.
Next "theory"? BTW, you are not using theory in a scientific sense but a legal one (i.e., just a wild assed guess).
Did you ever hear of some guys named Teller and Sakharov? Ever hear of Eniwetok Atoll, Nov. 1, 1952?
More to the point: The fact is that we can study stars in a reproducible fashion because we can observe billions of them in widely different locations and in different stages of their development; and we can see from those observations that the vast majority of stars follow a few, simple laws of physics which seem to be universally applicable.
There was a time, 150 years ago, when world class researchers were teaching high-school. At that point you could (but they didn't) talk about the "academic freedom" of high-school teachers. Today, when many high-school teachers don't know their own subject (no need for math degree to teach math, biology degree to teach biology etc), I don't think such teachers are qualified to have opinions on the curriculum. They are not "academics" (that is, researchers), and we should expect them to teach what they're told. The post-modernist quackery of "everyone's personal opinion is equally valid" does not belong in the science classroom.
High-school teachers should have the freedom to express themselves outside of class as they please. But in class, to a captive audience, they should teach a given curriculum. University professors and students are in a different relationship. The professors are genuine authorities in their field, and the students don't have to be there -- if they don't like what the professor is saying, they are literally free to stand up and leave the classroom.
My big concern with this debate is that of the two positions, Intelligent Design seems more rational and agnostic than the more dogmatic Darwinism. Both require faith beyond the scientific ability to prove something. Only one, Darwinism, says that anyone who disagrees with its precepts is a heretic.
Just sayin...
As someone who believes in evolution, I'm not disturbed by the way ID is being treated, but as someone who values skeptical inquiry, I am disturbed.
I'm all with you if we stick to the theory, the evidence, holes in the evidence - all that "science." The BIG PROBLEM comes when you actually READ the textbooks and realize that the authors almost always make explicitly and implicitly strong statements that evolution somehow does away with the need for a God, or that evolution explains the beginning of life itself. These, my friends, are not scientific claims, and if you're going to trumpet a "science-only in science class!" argument (which is a pretty bad pedagogy to begin with), at least apply it consistently.
Now you're just being ridiculous. The theory of evolution was first popularized by Charles Darwin in On the Origin of Species. Darwin had some very definite ideas about the origins of life:
Obviously, when the theory of evolution is first presented to students in a classroom, questions arise, like where did all the evolving originate from? And teachers then give answers like the one posited by Darwin.
The origin of life is very much a scientific question, the study of which is called abiogenesis.
I believe, Professor, that your statement reflects a confusion between science, which is a method, and dogma (whether religious or secular).
My objection to ID is the same as my objection to AGW. To achieve the numbers the models each generate to support their claims, the underlying math misapplies the 2d Law of Thermodynamics. The 2d Law is applied differently for open and closed systems. For closed systems, eventually all feedbacks become positive feedbacks, which generate impressive looking numbers, based on which it is claimed that such cannot be due to chance or natural variations. The earth and its climate, however, are open systems, meaning that negative feedbacks have to be included in the model.
That ID fails to apply fundamental scientific principles in its analysis, however, does not mean that Darwinian based evolutionary theories should be unquestioned dogma. They also suffer from a fundamental flaw. Darwin published first in 1858. His theory and those based on it are "classical theories". That is, they are based on the idea that there is an underlying mechanism that can be described mathematically to give specific predictions. This was consistent with the thinking of the time. Newton's Laws of Motion are also a classical theory. This lead Darwin to conclude that there is no free will -- since it is essentially akin to a clockwork mechanism, and if you have a powerful enough computer and the right formulas programed, the outcome is pre-determined and will be predicted.
Classical theories are very useful. Using Newton, you can orbit a satellite, get to the Moon, or get to Mars. However, you cannot use the satellites to transmit data or communicate with anyone or thing going to the Moon or Mars because of the relativistic effects due to the differences in speed and gravity, minor although those are.
Darwinian theories work pretty well until you get to about the level of DNA. Among other things, at the size of DNA, quantum effects, like quantum tunneling start becoming significant. You can graft on special case fixes to account for quantum effects and other problems. However, the foundations for those fixes contradict the foundations of Darwinian theories. A similar approach was used in physics before the development of Relativity and Quantum based theories.
Teaching Darwinian theories as "the truth" is dogma, not science. Darwinian theories are the best available for now, and work well in most situations. Still, they have their limits. Teaching those limits and why Darwinian theories cannot explain the situations in which fixes are used is also science, since it is teaching the fundamental scientific principles and process which will lead to a new theory which accounts both for those situations Darwinian theories account for and those it cannot. This also teaches the method for analyzing proposed "alternatives".
Maybe by providing evidence of fossils and sedimentary rocks that are older than 6000 years?
And when your opponent asserts that God (or maybe the Devil) adjusted the Potassium and Carbon isotope levels in those rocks and fossils , along with the amount of weathering, etc., to make them look as if they were much older than they really are?
My point is that you can't disprove this stuff. You can say -- quite properly -- that it lies outside the realm of Science, but you can't disprove it. And, IMHO, it is vital for school students to learn that LOTS of important things lie outside the realm of Science: Science cannot make aesthetic and/or moral judgments, for example.
Judge Jones thoroughly documented the fraud of claiming ID as anything more than creationism in drag.
To be science, ID has to have falsifiable claims. To be useful, it has to have predictive power.
The most science I've seen out of ID is stuff like "the eye couldn't evolve without a designer," except that there's plenty of ways for an eye to evolve without some intelligence pulling the strings.
I have no idea where you got the idea that the effects of quantum tunneling on DNA have anything to do with evolution. Evolution doesn't even require DNA at all -- it merely requires that organisms have some store of genetic material (check) that controls their development (check), that this material is passed to their children (check) and that it be subject to random mutation of unknown source (check, DNA-polymerase has a known error rate). How this genetic material works is irrelevant to natural selection. It can be DNA, RNA or a set of gnomes.
I suppose you feel the same was about the dogma that the earth is round, not flat?
This is a wonderful non-sequitor you have set up. I propose, by analogy, that since there are significant unresolved problems in the field of fluid dynamics (viscoelastic materials come to mind), we should start looking for alternatives to the Navier-Stokes equation.
If he's going to flat out disbelieve all scientific evidence which refutes his claims, then no, I can't disprove it to his satisfaction.
The question of whether the Earth is 6,000 years old does not lie outside the realm of science. The demarcation of science and non-science doesn't depend on whether some nut-job wants to flat out disregard scientific evidence.
It's been proven wrong for years. Now, if you think that geology, anthropology, archeology and all other disciplines which employ sophisticated dating techniques are hooey, then nothing will convince you that you're wrong.
That's not very specific. Names, please?
Quotes, please.
What's your standard of proof? That theory is inconsistent with the diversity of DNA we have, which clearly points to homo sapiens sapiens evolving over the past few million years and specifically with the evidence that we evolved from a limited population that lived in Africa some 100,000 to 150,000 years ago.
@ semi-economist: Isn't this at least as important as banning truck nutz and making a Christian license plate available?
Whereas popular belief in global warming could lead the government to impose costly regulations that would affect my standard of living, popular belief in ID (another theory noticably lacking in testable hypotheses) wouldn't alter my daily life in the slightest. It seems like the ID crowd thinks that if they give an inch to the other side, the whole country is going to turn into hardcore atheists micturating on Bibles. On the other end, Dawkins and friends seem to act like if they admit even a minor flaw or gap in the theory that next thing we know everybody will be handling snakes and speaking in tongues.
This is just not as important as the people on either side seem to think it is.
Exactly!!! The hysteria with which evolutionists react when anybody challenges their Theory (or hypothesis, or whatever you want to call it) is unbecoming -- to say the least.
Real scientists don't act like that. If I'm, say, a Thermodynamicist, and somebody comes along and tries to convince me that he has a great idea for a perpetual motion machine, I will try to politely explain to him why it won't work. But if he persists, I won't have a hissy-fit. I'll just tell him "good luck, and show me the working model when you get it built."
But Evolutionists (like Environmentalists, also) react to their critics like "True Believers" confronting Heretics or Infidels.
The problem is, as is demonstrated by some of the woefully ignorant posts here, is that evolution is not being taught. Rather than teach evolution, school districts decide to avoid the controversy and avoid teaching anything about it at all. This deprives students of an adequate grounding in fundamental scientific principles and leads to a scientifically ignorant populace who doesn't know the first thing about science, critical thinking, rational thought, or the difference between fact and myth.
Unfortunately the purveyors of creationism and ID have been all too successful over the last 25 years or so. Even though they have unable to get their nonsense taught, they have managed to get evolution deemphasized when it should be the central topic of biology education.
But if he gets the local school board to force you to teach that his machine will work, then I bet your tune will change.
It is mythology"
thank god (no pun intended) that derbyshire et al over on the corner are at least showing some common sense in this discussion. correct. it is NOT science. creationists, or intelligent design peeps or whatever MAY in fact BE right.
so what?
it's still not science. and you can't teach (not-science) as an alternative to a scientific theory. it's too all-encompassing, and it's not... wait for it... science...
It's misleading to teach in science class what you so accurately characterise as: "simplistic and unscientific myths promoted by a conspiracy of disreputable folks who conceal their religious beliefs and intentions."
If you want to teach it at all, teach it in philosophy, although then you've got some work to do to justify why it should displace Plato et al.
I'm afraid we'll have to wait until someone does challenge evolutionary theory to judge whether you're right or not.
i think it's less argumentative and more precise to refer to ID as metaphysics. the story of adam and eve is (otoh) myth. ID is more of a philosophical system.
regardless, it's clearly not SCIENCE.
ID isn't really a myth. not that i am saying ID is correct, just that it's not really myth. it's metaphysics.
metaphysics: "a theory of the essence of things"
Well as long as tax dollars are spent on education (and as long as I am living and breathing I will fight for universal public education, the absolute best thing this country ever did, no matter how much libertarians and conservatives have tried to destroy and demean it over the last thirty years or so), there is no question that it should. If you want to teach your kids nonsense, by all means do. But realize it doesn't relieve you of the social responsibility of ensuring that all the children in the country have access to a free, adequate, public education where they learn real science, not medieval myths.
That's awesome. Now that we are giving bachelor's degree-educated instructors the "academic freedom" to teach whatever they want in biology class, there is nothing to stop someone from presenting the "evidence" in favor of eugenics, various racist anthropological "theories," et cetera et cetera. Maybe some UFO enthusiast will give his "I want to believe" speech to the class. The fact that it's not in the textbook will not hold back the "academic freedom" of individual teachers. This should end well . . .
Well, in other words, the real root of the problem is the fact that the Government (and, increasingly, the Federal government) has a near-monopoly on education. If most parents had the economic freedom to send their children to schools of their choice, instead of 'one-size-fits-all' the whole debate would evaporate.
you mean liberals. teachers union, overwhelmingly liberal - fighting merit pay, fighting fair competitition (vouchers, etc.), fighting teacher subject competency tests.
liberals: installing outcome based education and other trendy worthless academic theories about learning, discouraging competition among students etc.
not that i want to hop down this tangential bunny trail.
So instead of some standards, you want no standards. I can really see how that solves the problem.
Please. You should know by now that, no matter what's being discussed, the market is the answer!
So being the little fascist you are, you would force parents to send their little drool-buckets to a government indoctrination center?
That's a fair comment. Is there a generally-recognized, non-circular, definition of the boundary between 'science' and 'non-science'? (That's not just a rhetorical question, BTW; I really don't know if there is one or not.)
Actually, if the gov't is going to be in the business of education, then they have to provide the education that the people supporting it desire to provide. This is a government of the people, not a government of the smarty-pants elites who know what's best for everybody. Like it or not, if the people of a state are financing a public education system, they should have complete control over how it is run (or at least, like shareholders, complete control over who sits on the board that decides how to run it.) You can call the people stupid for rejecting the wisdom of their betters, but they have every right to drag the system in stupid directions when it is their money funding the system.
But I'm still hiding all the can openers.
There is nothing inherent in ID which requires believing in Adam and Eve, that the Earth is 6000 years old, etc. This is a red herring. Ditto for requiring that the designer was omnipowerful, omnibenevolent, etc. Maybe the designer was an evil moron. Critics of ID would be on much stronger footing if they didn’t have to rely on such misleading tactics.
The Law of Gravity is just that, a law; its apples and oranges to compare it with the Theory of Evolution. The Law of Gravity can be proven through experimentation, the evidence for it is not that "every physicist" says so. To often the only argument for evolution is "every biologist" says so. Arguments from authority are not science.
The real problem is that Darwinism may be true but a lot of the "evidence" for it that is taught in public schools is false. The embryo drawings have long been known to be frauds. The peppered moths and finch beaks are examples of variation within a species, not the emergence of a new species and so forth.
The presentation of the subject is too often thinly veiled propaganda for atheism. Most obviously, by its own terms Darwinism explains how species evolved once life came into existence. It does not explain how life arose in the first place. Supporters of Darwinism are too quick to paper over this difference which is crucial. Even if Darwinism is 100% true, it really says nothing one way or the other about any supreme being, aliens or what have you.
I could really care less if my heart surgeon is a bible thumping fundamentalist or total atheist. He could worship Satan for all I care as long as he knows how to fix my heart. It really does not matter what the average person believes on this subject. The time spent on evolution would be better spent making students economically literate or just teaching the three Rs. A subject with marginal value that raises First Amendment problems no matter how it is taught should be taken out of the government schools altogether.
What is this "Darwinism" you speak of?
I've never seen science in this way -- it's more procedural, in the sense of being a way to learn about things in the world. The results of using the scientific method can acquire authority as evidence accumulates and experiments or observations get reproduced, but that's the result of constantly checking an idea against reality. Reality, not science, is the source of any authority that comes about. (When someone says "trust me, I'm a scientist," we know we are supposed to laugh. That's not how it works.)
Part of this procedural view is that any given time, science may understand a certain portion of reality very well, moderately well, not so well, or not at all. Children should definitely learn this, which is not a flaw in science but merely a sign that our understanding of reality is not complete. And it's not just children, but also many adults, who should learn that the unanswered questions in scientific disciplines are exciting rather than unsettling. People need not go rushing off to supernatural explanations just yet -- but there's another place where that becomes important.
The place religion can come in is when children learn that there are some things that may correspond to current reality (as understood by science), but that we don't like and therefore endeavor to change. Finding a cure for cancer comes to mind... this involves learning a great deal about the reality of cancer, but doing so in a way that will hopefully let us do something about it to serve human goals.
Right about there, we begin to exit science and think in other disciplines. How do we determine what human goals exist, which are good and which are bad, and which of the good ones take precedence? That's not a science question, but kids should definitely learn to ask it and debate possible answers.
Religion is a powerful source of potential answers in this area. Secular philosophy, the lessons of history, and the insights of great artists are also good material to work with. That's why we have the humanities, or at least why we will have them once the sillier current trends are sent where they deserve to go. (If the humanities have lost their social status in recent years and suffer from physics envy as a result, we don't really have to look far to see why.)
The problem with trying to stuff the goals/morals/values debate back into science, where it doesn't belong, is that it wrecks both science and the non-scientific disciplines. (The same applies if you try to do it in reverse, stuffing science into the goals/morals/values debate.) On the one hand you get people claiming to "believe in" science and saying that science should determine our decisions, and on the other you get people who claim (not unreasonably) that this is an invocation of authority no different from quoting the Bible. This sort of thing muddles up both our attempts to get an accurate picture of the world and our debates about what we, as human beings, want to do about that world.
Why do we WANT to cure cancer, anyway? Why do we care about the temperature of the oceans? Science isn't going to provide the answers, no matter how much it lets us understand the problems or work towards our preferred solutions.
Sure. The ID people claim it's science when they want it taught in the schools, but when they get fired for being bad scientists, they claim it's religion, for which they can't be fired.
I'm sure you did such things at the Discovery [sic] Institute. What papers in mainstream (blind peer-refereed, I assume?) science journals would these be?
I think there's pretty widespread agreement that there's work which follows the classical scientific method at one end of the scale (science), and work masquerading as science but violating some core scientific principle, such as testability, at the other (pseudoscience). Inbetween, there's a grey area rather than a sharp boundary, but people disagree on how big it is.
Science involves falsifiable theories. As a bonus, they should provide predictive power.
ID fails at both of these. Evolution gives us a theory of how the eye evolved and how it could happen again. ID says "well, some totally external power did it, and could do it again."
If we have a bunch of black moths and a bunch of white moths, and we paint all the trees white, evolution gives us a falsifiable theory about how the gene pool will change over time.
The Law of Gravity is an equation, a terse description of the force exerted by masses on each other, as understood via the Theory of Gravity.
The "law" you quote so lovingly is a bit of math appended in the much larger Theory that you then talk about "proving".
Which just goes to show you don't know what a "Law" is in science, much less a theory. I suspect you think theories get "proven" and become law, don't you?
Theories are -- and always have been -- much broader and more encompassing than laws, which have really fallen out of favor as a term, and which in any case were used to describe universal relationships. Descriptive, but not explanatory.
And pray tell, when was the last time the infamous "embryo drawings" were included in a textbook.
So being the little fascist you are, you would force parents to send their little drool-buckets to a government indoctrination center?
Read what I wrote. You can teach your children however or wherever you want. What you do not have the right to do is expect the government to subsidize it nor do you have the right to get some kind of tax break because you are not sending your little ignorant morons to public school. I don't have any children yet I happily and enthusiastically support public education. My tax burden is actually higher because I don't have children, why should yours be lower because you choose not to take advantage of public education.
Natural science observes a phenomenon, proposes a hypothesis to explain the phenomenon, conducts an experiment to test the hypothesis, and evaluates the experimental rsults to determine if the hypothesis has correctly predicted the outcome. Replication of this process leads natural scientists to develop a scientific theory.
ID cannot get past the second step. It observes a phenomenon, and proposes a hypothesis to explain the observation. However, it neither conducts nor proposes any experiment to test the hypothesis. That's why it isn't science.
Exploring evidence that supports or fails to support Darwin's theory of evolution is simply science...There is no place for pro- or anti-. Those that would reject examination of evidence that contradicts the theory of evolution are not acting as scientists. They are adherents to the religion of Darwinism....Just as those who would reject evidence consistent with the theory are probably adherents to some religious-based Creationism. The "-ism" seems to be an idicator that science isn't really involved anymore.
Where is this evidence? Anyone?
Until very recently, Iowa had no course content standards. Standards were the responsibility of school boards. Worked very well for about 160 years.
Really, where? When someone says something obviously false and ascribes their view to a religion, and someone else corrects them, is that religious bigotry?
You do realize that not everyone's an atheist in this country? America is 80% Christian.
What does Christianity (or atheism) have to do with evolution? Do you realize the Catholic Church sees no conflict between the two? Why should scientifically illiterate people get to vote on what is and is not science? Do linguistically illiterate people get to vote on what is and is not an English word?
Darwinism is the better term than evolution. I'm assuming that one can reject the evolution of Lammarck or Anaximander on this board without being accused of being some backwoods bumpkin. Evolution and Darwinism are not synonymous.
You are correct in that what I was referring to as Darwinism should actually have been called Neo-Darwinism. Darwin believed in common descent through natural selection but was at a loss how to explain this would occur as he did his reasearch well before the discovery of DNA or even the work of Mendel. That is what provided the missing ingredient of random mutation and thus Neo-Darwinism is the proper term for what biologists believe today. I'm not sure that this distinction matter for the discussion at hand.
It is interesting that people are referring to the big bang. (An idea that is mutually exclusive to how life arose). Much of the original opposition to the big bang (first proposed by a priest) was that it was too similar to genesis in that it believed in a one-time cataclysmic creation event. Thus a lot of scientists from the 30s to the 50s rejected it in part because it seemed too religious. The very term "big bang" was actually coined as a way of ridiculing the theory. Here is a case where athiesm got in the way of science. Yet no one mocks athiests as being anti-science, ignoramuses, etc.
In addition to what Morat20 said, all of which I agree with, it's worth pointing out that the "Law of Gravity" has been proven to be false. Don't get me wrong, it's incredibly useful for making predictions in most circumstances, but it isn't exactly right. (For example, the orbit of Mercury is observably different from what is predicted by the Law of Gravity.) Einstein's general theory of relativity has replaced Newton's Law of Gravity in situations where the added complication is justified for a more accurate answer.
The Law of Gravity doesn't work at quantum distances either.
Again and again, we point to these bozos such as Railroad Gin what "theory" means in a scientific sense. Again and again, they simply refuse to understand it.
"Maybe the designer was an evil moron. Critics of ID would be on much stronger footing if they didn’t have to rely on such misleading tactics. "
Find me ONE supporter of ID who believes that the designer was anyone other than the Christian God and not an evil moran. It is you who set up the red herring.
"The presentation of the subject is too often thinly veiled propaganda for atheism. Most obviously, by its own terms Darwinism explains how species evolved once life came into existence."
So what? Darwinism exists and is a fact, and how it is twisted by others is ireelevent. Perhaps there are proponents of Darwin who are vegans, or believe the moon is made of cheese. It doesn't alter the facts of evolution.
" Even if Darwinism is 100% true, it really says nothing one way or the other about any supreme being, aliens or what have you.
Exactly. So why are you so determined to show that natural selection is something dreamed up by atheists?
Look, the whole business of ID is that you have people who believe in the absolute truth of the Bible. For them, you can't believe in God and religion unless you believe every little statement in the Bible is true. If they Bible said that the sun revolves around the earth, you can bet that they would be doing their damnest to disprove Copernicus. This really at bottom has nothing to do with science or truth, despite their protestations. This in fact has everything to do with proving the Bible 100% correct.
If, on the other hand, they were more like, say the Catholics, who don't view the bible as literally true, then they would be more likely to accept evolution, as Pope John Paul II did. It is the rigidity of a niche religion that has caused all these problems.
Now, of course, someone will retort that science is rigid on this matter. Not at all. Just the opposite. When you come up with scientific evidence that contradicts a current theory, science adjusts. They do that all the time. Theories on comets, big bang, origins of the universe -- these change frequently as new evidence comes in.
This is truly idiotic. So the benevolent Christian God did this why... to f*ck with us? Is that the God you believe in? Is that the God ANYONE believes in?
A quick reading of the Old Testament would suggest that He's done his fair share of mischief over the years...
Yep, after what he did to Job to prove a point to the Devil, I would not classify him as an all loving and good and no bad stuff God. When he did have a reason to be mad he would do even worse stuff.
As to the "why not just mention that some disagree?" folks, I say the following. When I took a science class in high school, my teacher discussed Astrology, but only to show that it had no grounding in science at all and was, basically, hokum. At some point, especially in the lower grades, students have to be told what the correct answers are. What do you want the correct answer to be about whether the earth is 6,000 years old or not?
If there was a real challenge, they might not be getting so hysterical. ID, at its _very_ best, amounts to pointing at the unexplained phenomena in biology (such as the genesis of life) and shouting "GOD, or possibly the flying pasta monster, or alien space bats, or a time traveling Dr. Orpheus, HAS CLEARLY PERFORMED A MIRACLE!" At least as often, ID proponents just get basic scientific facts wrong (when they talk about the evolution of the eye, or thermodynamics, for example).
The problem with ID isn't that its wrong. To paraphrase Peter Woit (talking about String Theory, not ID) it doesn't even rise to the level of being wrong. Its just a collection of rhetorical spitwads with no explanatory power of its own. It doesn't belong in ANY part of a curriculum, let alone science. Hell, Astrology makes a better case for itself as actual science.
ID belongs in the same intellectual rubbish bin as ebonics and the labor theory of value.
You've done well to string those three things into a coherent sentence.
I linked to it in the other thread. It specifically addresses the origin of species, not of intra-species variation. It is written for the educated layperson. It is exhaustive. And it is clearly written.
Before I had read the discussion at this site, I was an tended to believe in evolution, but I did not think it was a falsifiable theory, and as such, I was a little agnostic on the ID vs. evolution debate. Reading this site changed my mind. Common descent is a hypothesis which can be used to make quantitative predictions. No prediction stemming from the common descent hypothesis has yet been falsified, despite rigorous quantitative statistical tests of many of these predictions.
OK, everyone back to opining now.
As to the hysteria of biologists -- the problem is that these fools actually think education and science are important. Heck, some of them have devoted their lives to it!
All kidding aside, I like the idea that doctors should regularly ask their patients if they believe in evolution before prescribing anti-biotics, explaining that the DR wants to know whether the patient would prefer the most basic anti-biotic or the ones developed to remain successful against the drug-resistant bactieria that have evolved in the years since anti-biotics became widely available. It would be a valuable piece of public education, and I expect it will be much more effective than the brains-on-drugs ads.
HGB
If it were up to religious people they wouldn’t have to send their children to government schools. But through compulsory attendance laws, fighting vouchers, etc. the secularists have longed coerced everyone to go to government schools. Given this reality, religious people would be perfectly happy any perspective about the origin and development of life were kept out of the curriculum. But it is the secularists/atheists who insists that this be taught. Finally, if this is going to be taught, it is the religious people who ask that there be balance either by presenting their beliefs or at a minimum by being allowed to address shortcomings in Neo-Darwinism itself. It is the secularists who insist that it be done their way only.
The punchline is that it’s the religious who get accused of “imposing values” when a moment’s reflection shows they’re the ones having values imposed on them.
Against this backdrop, I think the fairer question is whether Neo-Darwinism is so conclusively established that it is in fact like the Law of Gravity or Maxwell’s Equations. If it is, then it probably doesn’t run afoul of the First Amendment to teach it against parents’ wishes. (I still question whether it is that important that it be taught just from a practical perspective). But if Neo-Darwinism is merely the best theory out there, but far from conc