Posted on 10/18/2003 4:43:10 AM PDT by Zender500
Some people think evolution should not be mentioned at all in public schools, while others think any evidence that may contradict evolution should not be allowed.
Both views reflect poor science, and if either side wins, students will lose. Unfortunately, that's just what might happen in Minnesota.
Although many people view Darwinian evolution as a valid explanation, others have begun questioning parts of this theory.
For example, a growing number of prominent biologists are signing on to the following statement: "We are skeptical of claims for the ability of random mutation and natural selection to account for the complexity of life. Careful examination of the evidence for Darwinian theory should be encouraged."
Written in 2001 to encourage open-mindedness within the scientific community, the statement has been supported by Nobel Prize nominee Fritz Schaeffer, Smithsonian Institution molecular biologist Richard Sternberg and Stanley Salthe, author of "Evolutionary Biology."
Minnesota is setting new content standards for K-12 science education. Committees have written a draft of these standards and, along with Education Commissioner Cheri Yecke, are inviting feedback from people like you at public hearings and through e-mail letters. (See The Minnesota Department of Education for information and a copy of the standards.)
I commend the standards committee for its emphasis on knowledge and the scientific method. However, I'm concerned that some citizens and committee members want Darwinian evolution taught as undisputed fact while prohibiting any critical analysis of this and other scientific theories. This is no less biased than those who do not want evolution mentioned at all. History reveals how such suppression of data actually hinders science, while honest inquiry promotes it.
For example, the Earth-centered theory of the solar system proposed by Ptolemy in the first century was upheld as absolute truth for 1,500 years. Unfortunately, the church suppressed the work of Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo and others who challenged this theory with scientific evidence. Isaac Newton's publication about gravity and the sun-centered theory in 1687 finally overcame this bias and exposed the Earth-centered theory as dogma, not scientific fact.
Faith in God influenced these latter four scientists' pursuit of scientific discovery, so their conflict was not with religion but rather with bias against other theories. Those who would forbid any challenges to Darwinian theory are displaying this same kind of partiality.
Instead of answering these challenges with evidence that supports their theory, some defenders of "evolution-only" are taking another tactic — accusing all critics of trying to bring religion into the classroom. However, critical scientific analysis of Darwinian evolution is not religion, and exploration of all the facts should be encouraged.
Such exploration exemplifies the scientific method, which begins with observation and leads to a hypothesis (an educated guess that tries to explain the observation). This hypothesis is then tested, and if test results contradict the hypothesis, it is discarded or revised. A hypothesis that has been tested and supported by large amounts of data becomes a theory. A theory that withstands rigorous testing by independent scientists over time eventually becomes a scientific law.
All theories and even scientific laws must be tentative. For example, who would have thought Newton's Laws could ever be contradicted? Yet, Einstein and other scientists found that these laws could not explain certain complex problems.
Quantum mechanics became the new guiding principle, though Newton's Laws are sufficiently accurate for most aspects of daily activity.
The scientific method that has been so instrumental in advancing science requires that all scientific theories and even scientific laws at least be open to further testing. We should not be afraid to question and analyze scientific evidence; data that is valid will stand the tests.
We have the opportunity to set responsible and rigorous standards for science education in Minnesota. We should help students practice the scientific method in all areas of science, including the study of evolution — let's not encourage them to violate it.
There are five categories of life forms: animals, plants, protozoa, monera and fungi if my memory from bio holds. You are a human, therefore you cannot be a plant, a protozoa, monera or a fungus.
Science is not open to democratic debate and how you feel. Just because you "feel that humans aren't animals" doesn't change the fact that that is the only classification we fit under.
Our minds notwithstanding we are hardly more complex than any other large land mammal. If you want to complain about people here being "vicious" then stop insisting on this feel good rubbish that "humans are not animals." If you want to insist on anything in that regard, try taking the more realistic view that we would be below the average species of animal given our propensity for violence and mayhem. When was the last time you saw a racoon kill for the hell of it? Or a cat rape another cat?
And creationism should be squelched in our classrooms. Evolution is only a theory, but it is a real scientific theory. Creationism belongs in a department of religion, not biology. There is not and should not be anything democratic about science. You debate the merrit of a scientific idea based on the evidence to support it, not how it makes you feel or jives or not with your worldview.
Creationists are just as whiny about being excluded for valid reasons in classrooms as the left is on talk radio. Creationism offers nothing in the way of a scientific theory. It is a "theory" based on a religious text, not mathematical proofs, observations backed by decades of followup inquiry, etc. Evolution as we know it now probably is not correct, but it is a more reasonable theory to be taught in a classroom. That, coming from a liberal creationist..
Data is not the issue.
Data, not your opinion or mine, on a subject is the only thing that matters in science. There is your "truth" and then there is that truth which can be objectively observed.
Since science is not religious in nature it should not be taught as such. That means it should not be taught as a means of promoting atheism and destroying religious belief. Science does not and perhaps never will be able to answer the mystery of life, the universe and everything.
Data has already resolved the issue - atheistic/materialistic/Darwinian evolution has already been proven scientifically false. It is time to stop teaching it as true.
Completely false. It is not genuine science, genuine science does not rely on 'imagine', 'possibly', 'maybe', 'perhaps' as evolution does at every point. As to political agenda, it certainly has one and always has had. It has an atheistic leftist agenda which is why it has been adopted by Nazis, Communists, liberals, and the NEA.
Because you and evolutionists/atheists/materialists degrade human beings to the lowest possible denominator. We are very far removed from the chimps not little better than them as Darwin and his followers claim. Man is a thinking being, his life is a life determined not by his environment, but by his own actions, something which cannot be said of any other creature.
Wrong on all counts. It does not matter if there is an alternative or not, a false theory should not be taught. In addition there is an alternative, intelligent design, which is what the last 150 years of scientific inquiry points to, not randomness.
Patrick Henry as usual firmly denying what he knows to be absolutely true.
The evolutionists everywhere are fighting against anything being said against evolution. This includes correcting textbooks for falsehoods, saying that there are alternatives to evolution, saying that the question is still open, etc.
The facts are all over FreeRepublic in numerous articles which seem to appear more often than once a week. Your repeating a blatant lie, even a million times does not make it true, it just shows your dishonesty.
You're kidding, right?
If not, then present the alternative.
You're a furry little beast in a human suit.
(Just funnin' with ya, Hank.)
Ms. Swenson shows her cards in the first sentence. She assumes there is evidence that contradicts evolution. I don't know of any, and she doesn't present any in the article.
Presumably, she is speaking of elementary and secondary education. At this level, students learn what is present-day knowledge in the field. They have to learn all that material before they can blow holes in it. There is no reason to welcome scores of creationist objections to science on the off chance that there is a bright individual among them who actually has some evidence countering established theory. If somebody has something like that up their sleeve, it'll come out in time, and most certainly not in a public school classroom.
You're kidding, right?
Nope, I am not kidding. Darwin set the following as a refutation of his theory:
If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down.
Charles Darwin, "On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life"
When written it might have been arguable that complex organs could arise that way, but even then he could not show it. His needing to use the word 'imagine' in his description of the evolution of the eye shows the failure of evolution in explaining the formation of complex organs from day one.
This failure has been made even more impossible by the discovery of Mendel's genetics which show how hard it is for new traits to spread throughout a population, by DNA which shows how complex even the simplest functions are, and lastly by the discovery of how complex is the regulation of gene expression.
Essentially what proves evolution completely false is that we know that new functions could not have arisen gradually for the simple reason that every function of an organism has to be regulated in order to be beneficial. Therefore, for each new function we are not speaking of a single change, but of a system which needs to be constructed for the new function to be beneficial. Since evolution requires that new functions have to be beneficial and they cannot be beneficial until all the parts are in place - including the regulation of the function, this makes evolution impossible.
If not, then present the alternative.
It is obvious from the above that the only alternative is intelligent design. Randomness cannot explain the construction of numerous systems suddenly as life requires.
Repeating that falsehood does not make it true. Evolution is not science, never has been. Evolution has never been observed. Favorable mutations have never been observed. The construction of new more complex functions by random mutations have never been observed. Science is about observation, not rhetoric.
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Placemarker |
Nonsense, Fletcher Christian was the executive officer on the HMS Bounty. He looked a lot like Marlon Brando.
Is an imaginary human an animal, or not?
da·ta ( P ) Pronunciation Key (dt, dt, dät) pl.n. (used with a sing. or pl. verb) Factual information, especially information organized for analysis or used to reason or make decisions. Computer Science. Numerical or other information represented in a form suitable for processing by computer. Values derived from scientific experiments. Plural of datum.
PS. I have an undergrad in Computer Science.
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