Scientific Illiteracy and the Partisan Takeover of Biology

National Center for Science Education ^ | 18 April 2006 | Staff

[js1138]

Progress, indeed. For some time I've been predicting that the creationists will yield on speciation, but coin some term (e.g. "mesoevolution") to distinguish it from "macroevolution", which they will still decry.

This has already happened. The AIG folks are already talking about "kinds" as opposed to species, and admitting that there had to be some rapid speciation after Noah.

But no one has seen a squirrel evolve into a toaster. Or a raven into a writing desk.

[Mamzelle]

Let me tone down my generalization-- Evo is not remotely important to real science.

The science that gives us new medicines, treatments--the science that holds the bridges up as we drive over them--the science that flicks a comet going 100K miles/hr with a craft going 18K miles/hr--the science that is accountable--the science that provides.

The science that really matters.

Evo is just a reasonable story of what may have happened. It accomplishes nothing--nothing important depends on its veracity or its BS.

[Thatcherite]

Groups 3 and 4 also own Europe, as long as we can keep it out of the hands of the Muslim fundies. :(

I guess under your scheme the citizens of Western USA will be have to hire burger flippers and maids/cleaners from the East and South or face a dramatic decline in living standards. ;)

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"Evo is not remotely important to real science."

Not only is it important, it IS real science.

"The science that gives us new medicines, treatments--the science that holds the bridges up as we drive over them--the science that flicks a comet going 100K miles/hr with a craft going 18K miles/hr--the science that is accountable--the science that provides."

You're talking about technology, like the building of a space ship. It takes the application of scientific theories to get that astronaut up into space. A great deal of science is not related to immediate technology. Einstein wasn't thinkinbg about what could be made with his theories when he made them. He did it for it's intrinsic value: Knowledge about the universe.

[Mamzelle]

My position is that you'd do well to find the real agenda and figure out if it is going against your true interest.

The only reason I responded to this evo thread (there are so many of them, and they're always the same) is that it is moving out into the "who gets elected" partisan realm rather than the same usual obsessive feedback loop of the Grand Master and his hapless high-fiving legion.

If teachers are really worried about their autonomy (and I don't buy that at all), they can teach evo as a model and not lose a scintilla of their prestige.

[RobbyS]

Microevolution is nothing more than variation, with or without natural selection. We can see variation, but does natural selection really explain all outcomes? The old Greeks disputed over what is changeable and what is constant (if anything). If life is defined as motion, then what remains from one minute to another?

[Virginia-American]

CG: There is no higher category for a theory to go in science.

OM: Certainly there is. It is called a "scientific law", and is defined as "a statement describing an observed regularity."

No, that's not true.

For example, there are Boyles' and Charles' Laws describing how gases react to changes in temperature, pressure, and volume.

These are explained by the Kinetic Theory of Gases.

[Thatcherite]

Even the most strident creationists accept that what they call "microevolution" occurs...

Actually on these threads we frequently see "arguments" (bald assertions) similar to the following:

• Speciation is impossible
• Speciation has never been observed
• All mutations are harmful
• Any three random mutations kill their host organism
• Beneficial mutations can never fix in the population

Not all the creationists have received the microgood/macrobad songsheet. Curiously many of these arguments come from people who believe in Noah's Ark and cannot see the inconsistency of their position.

[Mamzelle]

If science is not accountable, reproducible, verifiable by double-blinds, demonstrable, hangs by that thread of cruel anxiety...it's not important.

Everyone loves a story. Cosmologists, archaeologists, anthropologists, evolutionists--tell great stories. Some are plausible, many are entertaining, a few provoke insight.

None are scientists.

If they are not ultimately responsible for what they posit, they are only spinning tales.

Look what happens when an evolutionary notion is debunked after a better notions comes along--nobody dies from a bad reaction, no bridge falls down, no piece of shuttle garbage explodes. The notion just goes to some sort of purgatory.

[Chiapet]

My position is that you'd do well to find the real agenda and figure out if it is going against your true interest.

So...was my re-phrasing an accurate statement of your position or not?

[js1138]

I am an optimist. I have seen some of the old firebreathers fall away, and I have to believe it is because they just got exhausted from being mowed down every day. On the other hand, most of the evolutionists from five years ago are still here.

Even the arguments supporting ID represent an advancement, and you can easily detect the horror that the YEC crowd feels toward ID.

[dmz]

There is no alternative hypothesis except poofism.
_______________

Are you demeaning poofists again?

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"If science is not accountable, reproducible, verifiable by double-blinds, demonstrable, hangs by that thread of cruel anxiety...it's not important."

Then you have just discounted a very large amount of legitimate science, on a whim. What is important is that science is testable and that it makes predictions. Double blind? That's not for most sciences.

" Everyone loves a story. Cosmologists, archaeologists, anthropologists, evolutionists--tell great stories. Some are plausible, many are entertaining, a few provoke insight.

None are scientists."

Says you... because, well, you just like to say it. They are testable and have predictive power. Creationism/ID on the other hand.... now that's a just-so claim.

" If they are not ultimately responsible for what they posit, they are only spinning tales."

What does it mean to be *ultimately responsible*?

"Look what happens when an evolutionary notion is debunked after a better notions comes along--nobody dies from a bad reaction, no bridge falls down, no piece of shuttle garbage explodes."

Ideas get discarded for better ones in every science. That's how it grows. You condemn all of science to irrelevancy if you expect it to be some kind of static world-view.

[Thatcherite]

There is no higher category for a theory to go in science.

Certainly there is. It is called a "scientific law", and is defined as "a statement describing an observed regularity." It is only when a statement of science reaches such a level that it represents scientific fact.

Thank you for sharing your ignorance of science with us. You should go back to wherever you got your scientific education and demand a refund. Ample explanations of the relative status and significance of scientific Law and scientific Theory are available on the internet.

[blowfish]

Evo is not remotely important to real science. The science that gives us new medicines, treatments--the science that holds the bridges up as we drive over them--the science that flicks a comet going 100K miles/hr with a craft going 18K miles/hr--the science that is accountable--the science that provides.

What you're describing is technology, which is driven off of scientific discovery. There is no such distinction between 'real' science and (presumably) 'unreal' science. We have 'science that has resulted in technological applications' and 'that has not yet resulted in technological applications'. As we invest more and more research into studying the genetic makeup of organisms (man in particular) we will certainly get more and more technical applications. Some of this research is motivated by understanding the evolutionary history on man, some isn't.

[KMJames]

Oh, I acknowledge it.

OK, good.

It's just that the moral superiority lies with science over superstition.

Also sounds good at first...but, wait...I'd rather say that "the moral superiority lies with TRUTH over superstition." I don't equate science with truth - after all, science seems to change. I think that there are eternal "truths" not dependent on man's observational abilities.

I don't know what a materialist would say about "eternal truths". Can you help me out?

[Diamond]

What kind of designer makes a number of different species with the same damaged gene, damaged at the same spot? Why is the gene there at all?

There are a number of possible answers. The question of what kind of designer makes a number of different species with the same damaged gene, assumes that the gene sequence has no function, which as I've tried to say, is unknown at the present time, and which is a claim that assumes full knowledge of the organisms history. How can one be certain that an apparently functionless structure is really functionless? It may be that we lack the knowledge necessary to appreciate its function. Alternatively, if the gene really is a psuedogene, it still says nothing about about whether it descended from a universal common ancestor, or not. It could have just as easily descended from one of many independently created organisms which had the same propensity for as a yet unknown reason for this defect.

Why is the gene there at all? I don't know. That's like asking how you get anything as fantastic as genes in the first place. Why must God fulfill my expectations of universal, optimal engineering design? Or, how do I know that these defective genes are not remmants of some earlier optimal Design that has been damaged? Why do some primates have the ability to synthesize ascorbic acid and some birds, bats and fish don't? Why doesn't the fact the some species can and some can't mitigate against the hypothesis of universal common descent? Darwinian explanation of common ancestry does not really depend on this line of evidence because it can accommodative either the evidence or the lack of it. It is therefore not, imho, conclusive proof of universal common descent.

Cordially,

[Condorman]

...neither [evolution or ID] is proveable.

But evolution is hypothetically disproveable. What would ever disprove ID?

[js1138]

I've never heard anyone but Pythons use the word poofter, and they were referring to one of their own. I guess I haven't gotten out enough. Maybe I should knock someone up.

[Thatcherite]

Michael Faraday said something apposite on the matter.

But technological usefulness aside, would Mamzelle genuinely prefer us to remain ignorant of the natural world except where it gives her convenient gadgets to play with? Isn't study of the natural world a noble calling? Understanding God's creation?