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."

[PatrickHenry]

3601

[Doctor Stochastic]

Well! I’ve often seen a cat without a grin,” thought Alice; “but a grin without a cat!

[viaveritasvita]

You wrote: "did blue man ever answer How Old is The Earth?"

I took pity upon PH after all those duplicate posts by him (watch for it now...) asking gore3000 (blue man?) that question, so I answered it myself: It's approximately 6000 years old.

You wrote: "...I can't keep up."

That could possibly go without saying...?

[Tribune7]

LOL.

But I don't think you're going to convince him. The Dawkins link couldn't convince him.

[Tribune7]

3065

[Aric2000]

Took me a while to find it too....

[Condorman]

Oh fer cryin' out loud!

Evolution the word is not the same as evolution the theory. This is what PH and I were talking about a few hundred posts ago.

The word evolution is generalized to mean "change over time." The Theory of Evolution refers to natural selection, variation, mutation, and successive generations of critters that ate and bred and diversified and died and formed the many and exciting species you see before you today.

Not only are Evolution the word and Evolution the theory not equal, interchangable and synonymous, they cannot even be compared. In the same way, the force of gravity is not the same as Gravitational Theory.

[viaveritasvita]

"did blue man ever answer How Old is The Earth?"

But, don't feel slighted, the number of questions and good points asked/put forth by the creationist side that haven't been addressed by the evo side far out numbers the number of questions asked by evos unaddressed by us. We understand your bafflement and confusion.

[js1138]

First, I didn't accept the arguments he laid out in The Emperor's New Mind that consciousness cannot be algorithmic.

Depends on what you mean by algorithmic. Do you consider analog computers to be algorithmic? How about A/D converters? What about the fact that neurons have a quiescent firing rate. Couldn't firing rate be a central component of neural "computing" and wouldn't this make it quiet difficult to model? Perhaps as difficult as it appears to be in reality?

Just as an aside, can you point to any example of a digital computer that has a clock rate of about 100hz, but can run rings around supercomputers in pattern recognition. Analog computers are very fast, but run out of significant digits rather quickly. Doesn't this suggest a corresponding sloppiness in wetware?

[Doctor Stochastic]

This space intentionally left blank.

[viaveritasvita]

Placemarker (I've read every dadgummed word written on this thread up to this point!)

[js1138]

What space?

[Alamo-Girl]

Thank you for your post! I'm not trying to convince him, just provide information for the discussion.

Hundreds of posts ago, various Freepers were talking about getting agreement on our terms. Since then, we've been through observer, evolution, value. It is baffling to me when one word is used in a technical sense yet another in a common sense.

At any rate, failure to agree on the words - or redefining terms in midstream - can't be helpful. Common usage is probably the most important because a lot of Lurkers come by and read a few posts, then leave. Without a parenthetical definition, they could get the wrong impression of what was being said.

[Sentis]

WELL not keeping up has to do with actually having a job and not sitting on here all day. 6000 years is of course a nonsense answer. I would debate your belief but it really isn't even worth the effort. To most anyone your answer of 6000 years gives ample evidence that any argument you insist on presenting is null and void. When a person makes ludicrous claim they should never expect to be taken serious.

[Doctor Stochastic]

He never answered the question and never answered whether his version of the Universal Law of Gravitation has a small mass attracting a large mass.

[Aric2000]

Give me a break, we are debating 2 different things.

One is science, the other is religion, they have NOTHIMG in common, except for the fact that they attempt to explain the same thing.

Creationists have fun putting up strawmen that either A: cannot be answered YET, or B: have been refuted so many time that to go over it all again is a waste of breath.

You either understand scientific method or you don't. People who choose to believe 99% of our scientists, do our best, but those that do not, don't want to, or have been indoctrinated to such a point that it is pointless to debate them. These are people such as yourself.

Who still claim that the earth is 6000 years old, even though science has proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that it is much older.

Have fun in your fanatical dreamland.

[Alamo-Girl]

Y'all might be interested in the following excerpt from Penrose's response to the Symposium on Shadows of the Mind. Beyond the Doubting of a Shadow

11.9 I should make it clear, however, that I am certainly making no claim that the mystery of mentality can be resolved merely by finding the correct physical theory. I am sure that there are vital insights to be gained from psychology as well as from neuro-physiology and other aspects of biology. Baars seems to think that I am denying the existence of the unconscious, because there is no significant mention of it in Shadows (though there was some small reference to the unconscious mind in The Emperor's New Mind). I should like to reassure Baars that I fully accept both the existence of the unconscious and its importance to human behaviour. The only reason that the unconscious was not discussed in Shadows was that I had no contribution to make on the subject. I was concerned with the issue of consciousness directly, in particular in relation to the quality of understanding. However, I certainly agree that a complete picture cannot be obtained without the proper role of unconscious mentality being appreciated also.

[Sentis]

V wrote "the number of questions and good points asked/put forth by the creationist side that haven't been addressed by the evo side far out numbers the number of questions asked by evos un-addressed by us"

As a matter of fact I answered every question put to me until the crevo relioginazis began to seriously insult me. So I strike back and they scream bloody murder. As a matter of fact no question I put forward has ever been answered logically. If you asked so many questions and got no answers it is most likely because you have mostly acted like a bunch of puffed up gorillas. If a bunch of kids acted like you crevos I would suggest a spanking but regardless when you argue from a position that is utterly senseless then you can't expect people to take it seriously. I mean 6000 years I got shoes almost that old :) and the dirt I leave on the floor after coming in from the field has got to be double that number. Grow up and leave your little superstitious nonsense where it belongs. (in the proverbial trash heap).

[viaveritasvita]

"6000 years is of course a nonsense answer."

Oh, of course, your lordship! I must have forgotten you know it all.

"I would debate your belief but it really isn't even worth the effort."

Ditto.

"To most anyone your answer of 6000 years gives ample evidence that any argument you insist on presenting is null and void."

LOL! That's rich!

"When a person makes ludicrous claim they should never expect to be taken serious."

Which is exactly why I don't take your side seriously.

[Alamo-Girl]

One more excerpt from the same link (Penrose):

15.3 As must be clear from the preceding remarks, I do not believe that any real progress will be achieved towards solving the mysteries of how mental phenomena fit in with the physical universe until there are some important changes in our picture of physical reality. Perhaps these developments will lead to a theory in which "consciousness" finds some place within the purely physical descriptions of the world. One is reminded of such ideas as "panpsychism" (like those of Leibniz, Spinoza, or Whitehead), where consciousness may play its part within the processes of physical action at its deepest levels. I do not have strong opinions as to the significance of such ideas, mainly because I have not studied them in detail. But I suspect the truth to have a much more compelling grandeur to it than any set of ideas that I have seen so far.