What are Darwinists so afraid of?

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted: July 27, 2006 1:00 a.m. Eastern

As a doctoral student at the University of Kansas in the '90s, I found that my professors came in all stripes, and that lazy ideas didn't get off easy. If some professor wanted to preach the virtues of communism after it had failed miserably in the Soviet Union, he was free to do so, but students were also free to hear from other professors who critically analyzed that position.

Conversely, students who believed capitalism and democracy were the great engines of human progress had to grapple with the best arguments against that view, meaning that in the end, they were better able to defend their beliefs.

Such a free marketplace of ideas is crucial to a solid education, and it's what the current Kansas science standards promote. These standards, like those adopted in other states and supported by a three-to-one margin among U.S. voters, don't call for teaching intelligent design. They call for schools to equip students to critically analyze modern evolutionary theory by teaching the evidence both for and against it.

Some want to protect Darwinism from the competitive marketplace by overturning the critical-analysis standards. My hope is that these efforts will merely lead students to ask, What's the evidence they don't want us to see?

Under the new standards, they'll get an answer. For starters, many high-school biology textbooks have presented Haeckel's 19th century embryo drawings, the four-winged fruit fly, peppered moths hidden on tree trunks and the evolving beak of the Galapagos finch as knockdown evidence for Darwinian evolution. What they don't tell students is that these icons of evolution have been discredited, not by Christian fundamentalists but by mainstream evolutionists.

We now know that 1) Haeckel faked his embryo drawings; 2) Anatomically mutant fruit flies are always dysfunctional; 3) Peppered moths don't rest on tree trunks (the photographs were staged); and 4) the finch beaks returned to normal after the rains returned – no net evolution occurred. Like many species, the average size fluctuates within a given range.

This is microevolution, the age-old observation of change within species. Macroevolution refers to the evolution of fundamentally new body plans and anatomical parts. Biology textbooks use instances of microevolution such as the Galapagos finches to paper over the fact that biologists have never observed, or even described in theoretical terms, a detailed, continually functional pathway to fundamentally new forms like mammals, wings and bats. This is significant because modern Darwinism claims that all life evolved from a common ancestor by a series of tiny, useful genetic mutations.

Textbooks also trumpet a few "missing links" discovered between groups. What they don't mention is that Darwin's theory requires untold millions of missing links, evolving one tiny step at a time. Yes, the fossil record is incomplete, but even mainstream evolutionists have asked, why is it selectively incomplete in just those places where the need for evidence is most crucial?

Opponents of the new science standards don't want Kansas high-school students grappling with that question. They argue that such problems aren't worth bothering with because Darwinism is supported by "overwhelming evidence." But if the evidence is overwhelming, why shield the theory from informed critical analysis? Why the campaign to mischaracterize the current standards and replace them with a plan to spoon-feed students Darwinian pabulum strained of uncooperative evidence?

The truly confident Darwinist should be eager to tell students, "Hey, notice these crucial unsolved problems in modern evolutionary theory. Maybe one day you'll be one of the scientists who discovers a solution."

Okay. I'll end with this:

This "no true Scotsman" slogan seems popular with your side, but proves nothing. Jim Jones was a cult leader, not a Christian, at least by the time he formed the People's Temple and Jonestown. The marks of a cult are well described elsewhere, so I won't repeat them. The basic beliefs of Christianity are laid out in the New Testament, so you can compare them with Jones' heretical policies. The doctrines of the People's Temple were not based on the NT. Period.

Well, that’s what you say. Jim Jones said they were. Who’s right?

The Salem witch trials may have used Biblical references, because that was the cultural milieu of the time. However, it was a civil trial, AFAIK. It was a product of a benighted, prescientific era. Like many other Christians, I regard mingling of government and church as anathema, not just because it infringes on religious freedom, but because compelling church membership (as in many countries with established churches) and allying government with religion corrupts the church. Most of the great crimes sometimes attributed to Christians were committed by established churches in cahoots with corrupt governments. The Founding Fathers knew this, which is one reason the Constitution forbids establishment of a national church. (Some have said that the church is purest and most authentic when it is a persecuted minority. However, an underground church can't have much of a benevolent effect on society at large, which is what Christianity is supposed to do.)

I’ll happily concede all the points in the above paragraph. (Except that bit about Biblical references being merely part of the “cultural milieu of the time.” I think they actually believed that and that it was part and parcel of their motivation and zeal). However, what are the Discovery Institute and the Thomas More Law Center trying to do but mingle government and church? Are they churches? No. But they’re trying to inject their religious interpretations into the schools.

I’m not sure if I were arguing your side that I would be posting about how the Salem witch trials took place in a pre-scientific era. Someone on my side might then claim that the you side is attempting to turn back the clock.

If you read the recent biography of Keppler (Keppler's Witch), you can see that the attack on his mother simply used witchcraft as a pretext. The motives were personal and financial, not theological--in other words, good old envy, which also happens to be the foundation of much anti-Semitism and most Leftist movements.

I’m happy to concede all of this as well It was still a religiously-couched attack, right? You keep entering matter into the discussion that tends to prove the point I’m making: A’s religion is a wonderful weapon with which to bash B for any reason whatever.

As for lightning rods, vaccination, etc.: There is no Christian doctrine forbidding any of those things. Again, Christianity is the teachings of Jesus, not what individual self-described Christians do. Jesus spent much of his ministry healing people of physical disease. Why would he ever oppose healing people today? If I had time, I could dig up some of the names of the many physicians who were devout Christians. I have already posted about the many hospitals and universities founded by Christians. You don't paint a true picture by ignoring that and focusing on a few instances of behavior by ignorant people in cultural backwaters or long ago.

Well, that’s what you say. There are other people who appear to believe themselves devout Christians who claim differently. The claims have been modified over time, which is the point of my vaccination comment. Again, I’m referring to individuals, not entire churches. But let’s look at churches: some say the Bible forbids intoxicating drink. Others say this isn’t true. Some mainstream Protestant churches in this country won’t let their members drink coffee or dance. (The charming and vivacious Mrs. Gumlegs used to date the son of a family in one of these churches before she and I were married). You may well say they’re wrong. They say they’re right. You both use the same Bible.

Someone else accused me of bashing a whole string of scientific specialists. Believe it or not, my education and work career were in one of those fields. I have great respect for scientists, esp. if their work has some social utility and is not merely an intellectual game played for their entertainment at taxpayers' expense. I don't seek to challenge the scientific validity of the TofE. I only post occasionally on crevo threads because I get outraged at 1) the nasty attacks on fellow Christians, 2) the posting of things which would not be in the least bit out of place on some leftist forum like DU, and 3) absurdly hyperbolic arguments alleging that evolution is the keystone of modern science.

I’ll allow that there may be exceptions, but as I read the threads, attacks tend to be on Christians who want to impose their particular reading of the Bible on everyone and can’t see how they aren’t speaking for everyone everywhere. The attacks are not on Christianity in general (although they can be mistaken for that). As to the TOE’s place in modern science, many refer to Theodosius Dobzhansky’s essay, “Nothing in Biology Makes Sense Except in the Light of Evolution.” It’s not a fringe opinion.

I sometimes wonder where all the traditionalist conservatives have gone. As one myself, I worry about any further erosion of the foundations of our society, which is based on Judeo-Christian values, not on science, let alone the TofE. Yet the moral basis of good citizenship has been completely hounded out of our schools, while some people who claim to be conservatives are enraged only by the feeblest of challenges to the TofE, something which was not even considered secondary school material in my day (and not on religious grounds, either). As others have said, why must Christians always be the ones giving way? Anyone who wants to learn evolution, or teach it to his children, can do so outside the schools. My tiny village public library has several books by Stephen J. Gould, for example.

This paragraph makes me doubt the sincerity of your statement from the previous paragraph, “I don't seek to challenge the scientific validity of the TofE.” In the 21st century, it’s basic science and it needs to be covered in science class. The problem is not that there is a challenge to the TOE, it's the nature of the challenges. They’re not scientific, and they are, to take your word above, feeble.

In the dim, dark days of my own education, I seem to remember going over a couple of competing theories about the nature of the universe. They were taught as theories and as science, as is the Theory of Evolution.

A pro-evolution poster noted that evolution was too complex for most people to fully understand. I agree. That's one reason it is not really suitable for teaching at the middle school level. As you yourself say, your son's class material on evolution was cursory and oversimplified. Wouldn't it be better if he got more time spent on truly essential, basic math and science? Why not do some experiments which yield clear-cut, reproducible results right there in class, rather than teach material which relies on extrapolation, inference, and application of many basic sciences which the students haven't learned yet? "Oversimplified" scientific theories open the door to pop crackpot science, like Al Gore's hysterical stuff.

Of course science education at the secondary level is cursory and oversimplified. If it weren’t the kids wouldn’t be able to grasp it. It would be nice if the schools taught the scientific method. My son is lucky – he bumped into it on his own. But kids need to learn that extrapolation and inference are how science progresses. And the kids do run experiments that yield clear-cut, reproducible results right there in class.

Gumlegs: " … there is nothing in the Theory of Evolution that claims that man is indistinguishable from animals."

My point is that that there is nothing in that theory which DOES affirm that man is in any way different from any other animal, and the idea that he is not has been banished from the classroom, for the first time in our nation's history. Dawkins, who is a real evolutionary scientist, not a crackpot politician like Hitler, gleefully uses the TofE as a springboard for demolishing belief in moral free will, which is the foundation of civilized society. That's what I mean about radical leftists being delighted by teaching of evolution.

There’s nothing in Germ Theory that affirms that man is in any way different from any other animal, so what? It should be obvious to even the dullest child in the class that he/she’s different from animals – none of the animals are sentenced to school.

When Dawkins rants about atheism, he’s not ranting as a scientist. His scientific work doesn’t filter down as far as high school anyway. And when Dawkins is carrying on about something other than science, he’s irrelevant. Some of Einstein’s … extracurricular activities have just come to light. Do we need to stop teaching relativity because he chased skirts?

I believe the free will debate has been a theological dispute for several centuries. And whether teaching the TOE delights leftists is also irrelevant.

I really don't care if the Left sneers at "fundamentalists" for opposing teaching of evolution. They're essentially preaching to their crowd. I honestly don't think many uncommitted people are swayed by that stuff. What does bother me is seeing nominal conservatives using the exact same language, language which you would never have seen in any conservative venue only a few years ago. I think the reason is that younger posters here have unconsciously picked up ideas drilled into them by liberal faculty, or liberal media.

As for the association of Christianity with conservatism: Your citation of Jesse Jackson and some other guy isn't relevant. Any scientist should know that scattered outliers shouldn't distract you from an obvious trend. Haven't you seen the studies showing that church attendance was strongly predictive of voting Republican in the last election? (More so than any other variable they examined, IIRC. And don't get me started on how un-conservative Bush and the Rep. leaders are. They're still better than Kerry and the Demonrats.)

You’re still playing the religion song. Religion doesn’t belong in science class. If you want to debate religion, which I don’t, there are lots of religion threads. I can cite liberal clerics from now until the cows come home, and every one of them uses the same Bible you do. If church attendance correlates with voting Republican, that’s nice, but what does it have to do with science class?

"Most will never become scientists, and don't really need to know evolution. They do live by ideas, however."

Gumlegs: "Most will never become writers … mathematicians … join the NFL … You want to limit the small bits of science they do get. Why don’t I see this as a step in the right direction?"

Oh come on. You can't really think that the only reason for learning English is to become a writer. And math is completely neutral and abstract, and basic to all real science, so no one opposes that, either. Phys. ed. is not valuable for training in pro athletics, but because it promotes health and probably actually enhances "book-learning" as a result. Yours is the kind of hyperbolic argument I object to. TofE simply does not belong in the same category of basic science as high school physics, math, and chemistry. I posted elsewhere that all the potential premed and science students in my secondary school studied no biology of any kind, but took physics, chem, and math instead. It did not hurt them in the least, because biology, geology, and other derived sciences can't be taught effectively without more basic sciences being mastered first.

You seemed to imply the only reason to learn science is to become a scientist. I was using reductio ad absurdum. All scientific theories are completely neutral and abstract. I disagree that biology is somehow not as basic as chemistry or physics. In my high school, for instance, biology was taught in freshman year, chemistry is sophomore year, and physics in junior year. Biology and chemistry were required; physics was an elective.

Gumlegs: "Religion is related to the Theory of Evolution in the same way it is to the Theory of Gravity, which is to say, not at all. Want to attack the Theory of Gravity now?"

Come on. Theories of gravity imply nothing about the nature of man. Evolution does. Besides, the two theories are radically different. You can do simple experiments which demonstrate the nature of gravity, and get very precise, reproducible, quantitative results. In contrast, you can never prove conclusively that all the extinct species of organisms in the fossil record originated as postulated by the TofE. The DNA is gone, the critters are dead, and experiments would take millions of years, anyway. The case that they did originate by evolution is strong, but it's not directly verifiable in the way that most physical science theories are. It's based on elaborate, complex, indirect inference and extrapolation. I think it's better that younger students learn the simple, readily testable kinds of science, to immunize them from Al-Gore style foolishness. I repeat, evolution is not basic science of the kind which ordinary citizens need to know. American students are notoriously weak in basic math and science, so why waste time on evolution?

I disagree that it's time wasted. The TOE’s “implications” about the nature of man are entirely extraneous to the theory; they're read into it by people who don't understand it. The theory addresses the mechanism of speciation.

You’re confusing the fact of gravity with the Theory of Gravity. And you appear to have the idea that science should be nothing more than stamp collecting. As in, “Here’s this fact, and this fact over here, and that fact over there, and we have no idea how they link up or what they might mean.” How would that help students recognize the vacuity of say Al Gore?

Al Gore’s foolishness (on which we agree), is based on rather subtle manipulations of statistics and cherry-picking facts while ignoring others. The solution to our students being weak in math and science is not to limit science education, but to beef up the areas where they are weak.

Gumlegs: "Anyone attempting to convert it into a prescription for organizing society is abusing the theory."

Maybe so, but abusing theory is almost inevitable among human beings. And if you think the TofE is neutral as far as having no implications for religion and society, then you should argue with evolutionists like Dawkins.

Abusing religion is almost inevitable among human beings. By your logic, we shouldn't allow religion. The TOE does not have to have implications for religion. We’re now back to lightning rods and vaccination. They were once believed to be attacks on religion ... by religionists who perceived them as attacks on religion. The scientists involved didn't see it that way.

Dawkins is entitled to his opinions on religion; they have nothing to do with the TOE or with science in general, and taking Dawkins seriously on theological matters would be akin to heeding Alex Baldwin on politics.

Gumlegs: "Spinning off on illogical tangents and trying to tell me how those demonstrate a problem with the Theory of Evolution isn’t going to convince me of anything other than your inability to reason."

There you go, veering into the insult mode so common among the pro-evo crowd. I'll just say this: I think you demonstrate an inability to see beyond the most simplistic kind of logic. You drag up exceptional cases in an attempt to distract from powerful associations.

I disagree. What powerful associations? I haven’t seen any demonstrated.

You frame the issue as one of good science education, when there are much more profound ethical issues involved, and (as I have shown) evolution is not a necessary or proper subject for basic science education, anyway.

You've stated that, but you haven’t shown anything of the kind.

Learning evolution is not going to help us catch up with the East Asians and other competitors, who concentrate on rigorous math and physical science. Besides, I didn't mention those "tangential" issues to discredit evolution, but to deal with the public policy and ethical issues of compelling its study in public schools. Those issues are the only ones which really belong in a political forum, anyway. Instead, what we get from your side are endless reiterations of how wonderful the TofE is, how science would collapse without it, how all its opponents are drunk, illiterate, stupid, bigotted, "forcing a specific religion on others," etc.

Now who’s using hyperbole and insults? We’re not going to agree on whether students should know something about biology, so I’ll confine this part of my answer to your accusation that the pro-evo side endlessly carries on about, “forcing a specific religion on others.” You imply this isn’t what’s going on, yet I’ve already referred in this thread to Pope John Paul II’s statement on the Theory of Evolution and Catholic theology. Briefest possible summary: it doesn’t have to be a problem. So if one can be a Pope and accept the TOE, doesn’t that mean that anyone objecting on religious grounds is, in fact, “forcing a specific religion on others”?

This fanaticism in advocating evolution goes a long way in supporting the belief of opponents that the TofE is in fact a secular religion.

No. It’s only become an issue in the last few years because the religiously-motivated have started attempting to control science education. And it’s interesting that when they want to disparage a scientific theory, they call it a religion.

If teachers of evolution really don't think that evolution "is solid fact and may not be challenged," why do they raise a stink at the prospect that a few publications on I.D. might be made available as purely optional outside reading, not even covered in the classroom? That was the issue in the PA school case.

If you read the judge’s decision in Kitzmiller, it’s obvious that you’re mischaracterizing what was going on. Evolution is a solid theory, and to date hasn’t been challenged scientifically. ID does not rise to the level of scientific theory. If it did, shouldn’t you be objecting to it on the same grounds you object to the Theory of Evolution – that kids don’t need to know this stuff?

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