Evolution Disclaimer Supported

The Advocate (Baton Rouge) ^ | 12/11/02 | WILL SENTELL

[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."

[Doctor Stochastic]

If I am naive, then I am in good company with Rocha, Pattee, von Neumann, Chaitin and others.

Rocha has told me he disagrees.

[f.Christian]

Basically these zoo heads are judging facts and God by human // ape standards and it is getting worse!

[Doctor Stochastic]

So, do you prefer human unreasoning?

[viaveritasvita]

Most Christian young-earth creationists would agree that it is presumptuous and dangerous for any self-apointed modern critic to reject the plain truth of Scripture in favor of some ad hoc reinterpretation based on current scientific theory. In II Peter 3:3-6, Peter warns against the uniformitarian approach to the study of earch history. Scoffers, Peter predicted, would insist that "all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation" (thus presuming that naturalism and uniformitarianism govern all scientific laws and processes), thereby willfully ignoring special creation of all things in the beginning and then the global interruption of all processes by the flood. The uniformist approach to the study of earth history can only be valid back to the time of that worldwide flood at the most. Henry M. Morris

[viaveritasvita]

The second law of thermodynamics provides a powerful agrement against vertical evolution, stating the universally observed fact that all systems tend to disintegrate with time. It seems to correlate perfectly with the implied effects of the Fall of Mankind. Yet there is a temptation to question this correlation because of the assumption that most natural processes must have been operating in accordance with the second law of thermodynamics before the Fall. Henry M. Morris

[f.Christian]

We have the leaves falling up(unnatural) crowd here proving evolution . . .

if you don't see them go up - - -

you are blind by a belief in God(natural) ? ? ?

Weird ! ! !

[Doctor Stochastic]

The second law of thermodynamics provides a powerful agrement against vertical evolution, stating the universally observed fact that all systems tend to disintegrate with time.

The second law states no such thing. The second law states things Caratheodory's (l885-l955): Arbitrarily near to any given state there exist states which cannot be reached by means of adiabatic processes. For more see Second Law Link

[viaveritasvita]

"...you prefer human unreasoning?"

I prefer room for God as well as for human reasoning. (Was the screen name Dr. Sarcastic taken?)

[B. Rabbit]

We have the leaves falling up(unnatural) crowd here proving evolution . . .

if you don't see them go up - - -

you are blind by a belief in God(natural) ? ? ?

Weird ! ! !

OR. Creationists see the leaves go up, BUT FAIL TO SEE OR FEEL THE WIND THAT MADE IT SO, and assume that the supernatural did it.

When in doubt and when science has failed to provide an absolute and perfect argument, fall back on the old 'god-did-it'.

[f.Christian]

FR is a fishing fool // pool of plasma . . . potential life - - - rescue!

[f.Christian]

- - - glob-did-it is better . . . ? ? ?

[Nebullis]

Rocha is talking about origin of life. Even Yockey suggests that we just accept the origin of life as axiomatic and move on from there. If Yockey and Chaitin et al. compute a way that life could not have originated, then, fine, it couldn't have happened that way. There are many other ways life could have originated.

But when speaking of evolution via random mutation, the replication process is already in place. Origin of life arguments don't apply to probability of novel innovation via mutation.

[viaveritasvita]

Working over a 15 year period, ICR geologists have inventoried unusual fossils called nautiloids within the cliff-forming Redwall Limestone. Nautiloids are marine animals resembling a squid that lived within long, slender shells. Billions of large orthocone nautiloids up to six feet in length occur within a single seven-foot-thick layer that extends from Marble Canyon in extreme eastern Grand Canyon 180 miles westward to Lake Mead Blvd. in Las Vegas, NV. Dr. Steven Austin of ICR's Geology Dept. presented a paper on his discovery of the fossil stratum at the Geological Society of America on 10/30/02 in Denver, CO. Dr. Austin reported his theory that billions of large nautiloids were buried by a gigantic submarine sediment flow having regional extent. The sediment flow hydroplaned westward through northern AZ into NV so fast it smothered and buried marine animals within the single layer of Redwall Limestone. Geologists have been accustomed to thinking of millions of years to deposit Redwall Limestone. ICR geologists are reinterpreting the strata to have formed within minutes by catastrophic flood processes. Technical reports will be submitted to a peer-reviewed geology journal and the National Park Service describing Dr. Austin's evidence for the regionally extensive mass kill and burial event in the Grand Canyon region. Acts & Facts, ICR, Vol 32, #1, Jan 03

[B. Rabbit]

- - - glob-did-it is better . . . ? ? ?

When scientists, astonomers and biologists of the past discovered things that contradicted religious texts they were met with scorn and arguments similar to the above. The goal is to find out why things are the way they are. "Globdidit" is an attempt to warp my beliefs to YOUR beliefs. I will never say "glob-did-it". You will indeed say "god-did-it" and have already proven your tendency to use that argument. It is an unfair spin on your arguments.

[viaveritasvita]

Wind? Explain wind.

[f.Christian]

. . . unfair spin on your arguments.

unfair spin on your spin . . . too funny ! ! !

[B. Rabbit]

Billions of large orthocone nautiloids up to six feet in length occur within a single seven-foot-thick layer that extends from Marble Canyon in extreme eastern Grand Canyon 180 miles westward to Lake Mead Blvd. in Las Vegas, NV. Dr. Steven Austin of ICR's Geology Dept. presented a paper on his discovery of the fossil stratum at the Geological Society of America on 10/30/02 in Denver, CO. Dr. Austin reported his theory that billions of large nautiloids were buried by a gigantic submarine sediment flow having regional extent.

Billions is a large number for any species so large (6 feet) in such a short period of time between god's creation of earth and Noah's flood... How could so many be alive in such a small area so quickly?

[B. Rabbit]

Wind? Explain wind

umm... wind is like, um, air that is like... um.... moving around and stuff.

[viaveritasvita]

What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow out of this stony rubbish?...You cannot say, or guess, for you know only a heap of broken images... T. S. Eliot, The Wasteland

[Nebullis]

Thanks for that link. Sober makes a good point: there are no rejection criteria provided by ID to rule out current hypotheses. Low probabilities are not enough.