[Rudder]

Maybe these scientists really are skeptical of random mutation and selective pressures being the engine behind evolution, but they seem not too willing to provide an alternative.

Day in and day out for many, many years now, the theory of evolution has been and is tested in laboratories and field studies throughout the world. If there is a scientific alternative, I haven't heard of it.

I'm skeptical of the whole article.

[CobaltBlue]

I'm skeptical of the whole article.

With good reason. It's yet another creationist stalking horse. It comes almost verbatim from a press release from the Discovery Institute.

[Sabertooth]

Maybe these scientists really are skeptical of random mutation and selective pressures being the engine behind evolution, but they seem not too willing to provide an alternative.

Doesn't matter, does it?

One doesn't have to be committed to an alternative to be skeptical of some proposition.

I'm definitely "skeptical of claims for the ability of random mutation and natural selection to account for the complexity of life." I don't find them intuitively sufficient; also, the data set is too small to be conclusive anyway, and will be for a long, long time.

Do I think random mutation has at least played a role? Almost certainly, but I suspect that there is more to the story than that. I think the state of our understanding of evolution is probably analogous to our understanding of physics in 1870.

Do I have an alternative? Nope, not anything I'd like taught in high school anyway.

I would like to see a bit more humility in textbooks, though. I'd like to see more statements prefaced with "To the best of our scientific understanding...," and "We don't know for sure, but we think...." I'd also like the obligatory page or two on Lamarck to present his theory as "not proven," rather than "disproven."

I had a pretty savvy bio teacher in my public high school back in the 70s. He started out the evo unit with a respectful reading of Genesis 1, and a one-page synopsis on the possibility of Earth having been seeded with life by an alien intelligence. Then he said that as this was a science class, he didn't have anything to offer one way or the other on Genesis, and that the alien seed theory begged the question, so he was going to teach evolution as best he understood it, and leave questions about the other stuff to the students to work through themselves. Not sure he could get away with that now. Cool guy, lived in the Santa Cruz Mountains, but spent 10 or 15 years building a boat in Alviso that he wanted to do some trans-oceanic stuff with.

Sidebar on your #15:

Human beings are one of many species of animals.

Human beings are one of unique among many species of animals.

[gore3000]

Maybe these scientists really are skeptical of random mutation and selective pressures being the engine behind evolution, but they seem not too willing to provide an alternative.

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.