Posted on 11/29/2004 6:52:41 AM PST by PatrickHenry
In a poll released last week, two-thirds of Americans said they wanted to see creationism taught to public-school science pupils alongside evolution. Thirty-seven percent said they wanted to see creationism taught instead of evolution.
So why shouldn't majority rule? That's democracy, right?
Wrong. Science isn't a matter of votes -- or beliefs. It's a system of verifiable facts, an approach that must be preserved and fought for if American pupils are going to get the kind of education they need to complete in an increasingly global techno-economy.
Unfortunately, the debate over evolution and creationism is back, with a spiffy new look and a mass of plausible-sounding talking points, traveling under the seemingly secular name of "intelligent design."
This "theory" doesn't spend much time pondering which intelligence did the designing. Instead, it backwards-engineers its way into a complicated rationale, capitalizing on a few biological oddities to "prove" life could not have evolved by natural selection.
On the strength of this redesigned premise -- what Wired Magazine dubbed "creationism in a lab coat" -- school districts across the country are being bombarded by activists seeking to have their version given equal footing with established evolutionary theory in biology textbooks. School boards in Ohio, Georgia and most recently Dover, Pa., have all succumbed.
There's no problem with letting pupils know that debate exists over the origin of man, along with other animal and plant life. But peddling junk science in the name of "furthering the discussion" won't help their search for knowledge. Instead, pupils should be given a framework for understanding the gaps in evidence and credibility between the two camps.
A lot of the confusion springs from use of the word "theory" itself. Used in science, it signifies a maxim that is believed to be true, but has not been directly observed. Since evolution takes place over millions of years, it would be inaccurate to say that man has directly observed it -- but it is reasonable to say that evolution is thoroughly supported by a vast weight of scientific evidence and research.
That's not to say it's irrefutable. Some day, scientists may find enough evidence to mount a credible challenge to evolutionary theory -- in fact, some of Charles Darwin's original suppositions have been successfully challenged.
But that day has not come. As a theory, intelligent design is not ready to steal, or even share, the spotlight, and it's unfair to burden children with pseudoscience to further an agenda that is more political than academic.
I don't want to look in another imaginary darwinite fantasyland....where...?
Bump for later read.
Pasen's theorum: The number of posts on the evolution/creationism debate on FR are inversely proportional to the number of interesting news happenings at the time of the posting.
You must be mistaking me for a proponent of creation teaching injected into scientific disciplines. Bringing creation into science is no more necessary than bringing in evolution. These only serve to muddy the discipline of observing and testing the given universe. Both viewpoints exceed the bounds of science in the strict sense when they rely upon the unobservable. If they want to incorporate notions of history into their explanations, fine, but don't call it "science" in the strict sense.
Nah, I am to comfortable around messed up people. More like Chaotic Good.
I would discribe it as being headed in the want to be good direction, but bumping on the lines in my lane regularly. ;-)
Have you checked the dates on your pamphlet material?
Tar pits, caves, and lake beds are not imaginary. Or are you claiming that all fossils we've recovered thus far are fakes? Perhaps part of some grand conspiracy?
...Dick Morris could explain it better.
Why, it does...provided you can actually show me a case where the divergence lasts for, say, 1,000,000 years, so that the teapot dog becauses about the size of the Great Dane's spermatazoa and then converges again when they are respecively upsized and downsized. Darwin and the DNA mutational clock sez--not a snowball's chance in hell. Creationists say, "of course". Neither side is putting up a slamdunk demonstration, but Darwinists do have those three annoying trees of evidence, from the geological column, the DNA clock and the continuity of fossil morphology, and a thriving micro-biology insdustry to point to, whereas creationists can proudly point to God-did-it, with, of course, no possiblility of any trail of evidence to follow backwards from that event.
As for your other examples, I'm not going to address them
I wouldn't want to either, if I were you.
, except to point out that those near-relative species do in fact exist, and can mate to produce live, if not fertile, offspring. Obviously they got that way somehow. Beyond that I will say no more, except to point you to my previous comments on this thread.
Yea, they got there somehow--byh the gradual divergence of functionally, or geographically isolated hybrids, as suggested should be the case by Darwin's theory.
Which is, of course, by itself, no garantee whatsoever as to its value, accuracy, or relevance.
very length of time required for the macroevolutionary theory to play itself out is the very thing that works against you,
For a proponent of induction, you are off on a very strange tact here. Do you think stellar astrononmy is also invalid, because it makes inferential conjectures about events that took place millions of years ago? What scientist has actually detected the production of heavy elements in a supernova?
Ok, I'm going to look for piles of fossils-in-progress on a lake bed...thanks
You mean like Gould's work? [I mean theorizing?]
Since it makes predictions that are testable, evolution is science in the strictest sense. There are observations that would cause the modern theory of evolution to be found false and either modified or abandoned. I assume when you refer to science in its strict sense, you mean that it must be concerned only with what is directly observable. If that's the case, then the heliocentric model of the solar system, the general theory of relativity, quantum mechanics, string theory, the standard model of subatomic particles and various other scientific ideas must not be science in the strict sense. If I have assumed incorrectly, then please define what you mean by science in the strict sense.
What is your definition of "species"?
Also, is "species" an attribute of an individual entity?
I was using the generic "produces fertile offspring" definition.
Also, is "species" an attribute of an individual entity?
Heck no -- individuals are members of a species, which is almost by definition a group thing.
It does bring up an interesting question, though: if species are separated by an inability produce fertile offspring, is it possible to be "the first of a new species?" If so, then it's not clear to me how that new species could possibly propagate beyond the first member.....
Note that under your definition, the ends of a "ring species" are different species. "Produces fertile offspring" (a reasonable definition) is not a transitive relation. It's possible that members of subclasses A and B can interbreed as can members of subclasses B and C, whereas subclasses A and C cannot. Were members of subclass B deleted (volcano, virus, grey wolves, fire ants, other disasters), A and C would now be separate under your proposed definition.
To the extent theories of evolution make testable predictions they are no different from any other science. I hardly think this is the issue. The issue is when evolution theories overstep their bounds to indulge in fanciful notions of history apart from any observation or testing whatsoever.
Good comment.
So then, theories of star development and continental drift theory are not science? They too deal with historical events without any direct method of testing. I am interested in what you think defines science.
donh wrote:
Well, actually, teacup size poodles have been around for about 40 years. Think it could mate with a Great Dane in the wild, unassisted by pippettes and microscopes? You guys are a tough audience--what, exactly, does a mammal need to do to be considered a separate species?
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Well actually using domesticated dogs as an example is not good since they are all members of the same species regardless of the consequences of their mating. If the teacup were to survive being mated with a Great Dane, then it is absolutely possible for it to bear a pup. It would be a mutt, and the teacup may not survive the birth, but it does not invalidate the fact that they could possibly bear an offspring.
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