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."
So new evidence does not come in. Old evidence is not determined to be in error. Again you are choosing your definition of proof. I use "proof" with that common meaning, so something can be proven scientifically and can also be disproven scientifically.
proof  ( P ) Pronunciation Key (pr f)n.
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Thus, you use definition 2 to hide Darwininian evolution behind the rigors of mathematical proof and use definition 3 to allow for disproof. Sweetikins.
537 votes.
A partridge in a pear tree.
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537 votes. A partridge in a pear tree. |
6212,6213,6214,6263,6259
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silly test |
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If we evolved from monkeys, why are there still monkeys? |
And heredity, variation, and selection do a fine job at generating just-so stories, such as flapping perfectly good hands to surmount inclines, instead of using them in their functional manner to grasp and balance in climbing the same incline.
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If we evolved from monkeys, why are there still monkeys? |
To help write new Darwininian theories.
Without citation.
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Why would you use the word "proof" to describe "convincing evidence"? Especially when new evidence is pouring in every day, and some of it might just turn out to be contradictory. The evidence is pretty good. The confidence level in the theory is pretty high. But there's an outside chance we're modelling or describing the wrong thing. Sort of like the theory of gravity. All mathematical proof will do is tell you is that your theory is mathematically sound, not that it's right. For example, I have a theory that says the best measure of IQ is a person's height divided by the circumference of their skull, normalized to 100. Mathematically prove my theory right or wrong.
And heredity, variation, and selection do a fine job at generating just-so stories, such as flapping perfectly good hands to surmount inclines, instead of using them in their functional manner to grasp and balance in climbing the same incline.
Neat. So what does your theory do, Honeylips?
Umm... Because without monkeys, Congo 2 will have to depend on Pauly Shore for comic relief!
Well, Molasses brain, maybe that is due to the fact that the dictionary places convincing and evidence in one of the definitions of proof.
The state of being convinced or persuaded by consideration of evidence.
Blast! And I got that answer FROM a creationist website!
Well treacle breath, your abhorrence of dictionaries may be the reason you come up with a lame excuse of discipline-specific (AKA as Darwininian Dictionary -- anything useful for just-so stories) confusion for your inattention.
You, the threesome and the hand flapping bird have your own colonic event.
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