Posted on 12/11/2002 6:28:08 AM PST by A2J
By WILL SENTELL
wsentell@theadvocate.com
Capitol news bureau
High school biology textbooks would include a disclaimer that evolution is only a theory under a change approved Tuesday by a committee of the state's top school board.
If the disclaimer wins final approval, it would apparently make Louisiana just the second state in the nation with such a provision. The other is Alabama, which is the model for the disclaimer backers want in Louisiana.
Alabama approved its policy six or seven years ago after extensive controversy that included questions over the religious overtones of the issue.
The change approved Tuesday requires Louisiana education officials to check on details for getting publishers to add the disclaimer to biology textbooks.
It won approval in the board's Student and School Standards/ Instruction Committee after a sometimes contentious session.
"I don't believe I evolved from some primate," said Jim Stafford, a board member from Monroe. Stafford said evolution should be offered as a theory, not fact.
Whether the proposal will win approval by the full state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education on Thursday is unclear.
Paul Pastorek of New Orleans, president of the board, said he will oppose the addition.
"I am not prepared to go back to the Dark Ages," Pastorek said.
"I don't think state boards should dictate editorial content of school textbooks," he said. "We shouldn't be involved with that."
Donna Contois of Metairie, chairwoman of the committee that approved the change, said afterward she could not say whether it will win approval by the full board.
The disclaimer under consideration says the theory of evolution "still leaves many unanswered questions about the origin of life.
"Study hard and keep an open mind," it says. "Someday you may contribute to the theories of how living things appeared on earth."
Backers say the addition would be inserted in the front of biology textbooks used by students in grades 9-12, possibly next fall.
The issue surfaced when a committee of the board prepared to approve dozens of textbooks used by both public and nonpublic schools. The list was recommended by a separate panel that reviews textbooks every seven years.
A handful of citizens, one armed with a copy of Charles Darwin's "Origin of the Species," complained that biology textbooks used now are one-sided in promoting evolution uncritically and are riddled with factual errors.
"If we give them all the facts to make up their mind, we have educated them," Darrell White of Baton Rouge said of students. "Otherwise we have indoctrinated them."
Darwin wrote that individuals with certain characteristics enjoy an edge over their peers and life forms developed gradually millions of years ago.
Backers bristled at suggestions that they favor the teaching of creationism, which says that life began about 6,000 years ago in a process described in the Bible's Book of Genesis.
White said he is the father of seven children, including a 10th-grader at a public high school in Baton Rouge.
He said he reviewed 21 science textbooks for use by middle and high school students. White called Darwin's book "racist and sexist" and said students are entitled to know more about controversy that swirls around the theory.
"If nothing else, put a disclaimer in the front of the textbooks," White said.
John Oller Jr., a professor at the University of Louisiana-Lafayette, also criticized the accuracy of science textbooks under review. Oller said he was appearing on behalf of the Louisiana Family Forum, a Christian lobbying group.
Oller said the state should force publishers to offer alternatives, correct mistakes in textbooks and fill in gaps in science teachings. "We are talking about major falsehoods that should be addressed," he said.
Linda Johnson of Plaquemine, a member of the board, said she supports the change. Johnson said the new message of evolution "will encourage students to go after the facts."
But the salt crystal is spinning, at least once a day. Shrink it down to a really, really tiny fraction of its current size--which is exactly what happens to a molecular cloud--and you will see it achieve a surprisingly large angular velocity.
The only way to have a molecular cloud with a zero net angular momentum is to arrange it that way ahead of time (i.e. fine tuning).
Sauce for the goose.
More computer power will help, but the problem will remain that giant impacts are inherently improbable, and the Solar System's chaotic nature makes it impossible to re-run history and get the same outcome. "None of the scenarios for the Moon's formation is highly likely," Stevenson says.
That does not indicate what I believe about either scenario, it just means I don't think ludicrous applies.
That is due to external causes, which I have explicitly left out. The crystal also spins once a year and once every ~220 million years among likely other centers.
Yeah, no kidding. I read that as a lark a few months ago. When I finished, I started over from the beginning, trying to poke holes in it somewhere. I remember being surprised as how well-constructed the paper turned out to be.
Nerds-R-Us :^D
All I will tell you is that RA is in no danger of losing his eyesight.
Not at all. I told you I don't buy the "Mars-sized body" idea, either. I also have an impact-parameter fine-tuning argument against the notion, which I won't bother to write up here.
Still, the Venus idea is ludicrous for many more reasons than the MSB idea. First, the MSB would either be an interloper or dislodged by an interloper, so the formation arguments wouldn't apply. In Velikovsky's (medved's) model, Venus is excreted spontaneously by Jupiter, which is ludicrous in and of itself. Furthermore, the MSB would only have to interact once, whereas Velikovsky's Venus is asked to perform tasks all around the solar system. Finally, the MSB would have done its dirty work over four billion years ago, not recently as Velikovsky would have it.
One little spelling error and it's reproduced ad infinitum. It should be spelled, perturbations. Ok fellas, now have fun with that...
Well, there you go. But assume the salt crystal isn't on the Earth, but that you place it in space somewhere. I don't care where you put it or how, but I can tell you that it is not going to have zero angular momentum unless you work very hard at cancelling it out. The placement process, whatever it may be, will undoubtedly impart a nonzero angular momentum to it.
Molecular clouds are the same way, except that there is nobody meddling with it to make sure it doesn't spin. And if it does spin, however slowly, that angular velocity will be amplified by the collapse process. You see?
That's right and the name of our private home school is the same as your screen name. We're raising our kids to be critical thinkers so they can recognize the bad science behind the theory of evolution. Sorry evos, had to get that in there.
Thanks for the Feng story. It's a great reminder of the freedoms we have here that I will fight to the death to keep.
The sauce comment was not meant for you but for those that believe the moon hypothesis and so contemptuously dismiss the other.
But you are talking about the whole enchilada when you place it. That is external reference. I know that something spinning, spins. And as I pointed out to you long ago, which you did not understand, when something moves, everything moves.
But the question is, is that same "critical eye" universally applied?
As I've long suspected, that "control room" of his is just a cover for some really kinky activities. His guise as a SETI researcher is crumbling. But I'm glad you're taking care of his eyesight.
Actually, I've always liked the idea that the Moon orbited the mysterious fifth planet, and when those folks blew themselves up fighting off giant bugs 300 million years ago, the Moon was cast free and eventually ended up orbiting our world.
Yeah, he's one of those people that if he says something that is contrary to my judgment, I immediately start cross-examining myself because it is probably me that is wrong. I remember discussing this very concept with him when he was working on the paper and looking for some conceptual feedback to flesh it out, and he fielded my objections and questions with ease.
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