Posted on 08/21/2005 1:18:04 AM PDT by MRMEAN
Compared with fields like genetics and neuroscience and cosmology, botany comes up a bit short in the charisma department. But when scientists announced last week that they had figured out how plants grow, one had to take note, not only because of the cleverness required to crack a puzzle that dates to 1885, but because of what it says about controversy and certainty in science -- and about the evolution debate.
In 1885, scientists discovered a plant-growth hormone and called it auxin. Ever since, its mechanism of action had been a black box, with scientists divided into warring camps about precisely how the hormone works. Then last week, in a study in Nature, biologist Mark Estelle of Indiana University, Bloomington, and colleagues reported that auxin links up with a plant protein called TIR1, and together the pair binds to a third protein that silences growth-promoting genes. The auxin acts like a homing beacon for enzymes that munch on the silencer. Result: The enzymes devour the silencer, allowing growth genes to turn on.
Yet biology classes don't mention the Auxin Wars. Again and again, impressionable young people are told that auxin promotes plant growth, when the reality is more complex and there has been raging controversy over how it does so.
Which brings us to evolution. Advocates of teaching creationism (or its twin, intelligent design) have adopted the slogan, "Teach the controversy." That sounds eminently sensible. But it is disingenuous. For as the auxin saga shows, virtually no area of science is free of doubt or debate or gaps in understanding.
(Excerpt) Read more at american-buddha.com ...
I am a bit puzzled by your comments about "anti-Darwin," Is it anti-Darwin to say that he was a man of his time? He was certainly not an egalitarian democrat like Ashley Montagu who trashed Charleton Coon for advancing a thesis of which Darwin and T. Huxley would have thoroughly approved. Darwin was an excellent naturalist who advanced a thesis which found immediate acceptance because it confirmed an idea whose time had come. Wallace came up with virtually thr same thing without as much labor. But when he went to apply his thesis to human beings and their affairs, he also adopted another idea which was in the air which was that European civilization was a product of a natural evolution of a superior, more evolved "race." One can find the same sentiments in Jefferson's "Notes", so it was hardly new. To be sure, Huxley was far more guilty of rhetorical excess, since he was much more clever with words than Darwin.
CS/ID/BS.
Hey, this is fun. Anyone else want to play?
***It is the laws that are important.***
Not if the law has no basis.
***The alleged religious connection is completely bogus. ***
Really....?
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights... "
You are either going to worship God or the State.
One or the other endows your rights. There is no other choice.
Enough said?
It should be obvious by now that the alleged quotes found on creationist websites are either fabricated of snipped out of context, particularly when the scientist is supposedly saying something outrageously anti-science.
Racism has only been a social sin for the last fifty fears, but even so, Darwin stands up with the most enlightened Victorians.
*rhetorical question
The law is not the result of religion. Religion flunked that test for a thousand years.
the law has a very firm basis: Attempt to take away my liberty and I will do my best to kill you.
Multiply that by a few million armed citizens -- nevermind the sheep -- and the law has a very firm basis.
That is how the British got their Paliament, and how most of Europe got out from under Christian monarchies. Pi$$ed people with weapons.
Few of us could survive in the wild. There had to be some geniuses in pre-history.
I am talking more about pre-historic man. Of course, these people were just as clever as us. And presumably they had the same proportion of genius as we have. But the opportunity for a genius to cause global change was far smaller in those societies. And the opportunity for a genius to discover their ability in a society struggling day-to-day to avoid starvation is low. If it did come an important new invention could take millenia to travel round the world, or even die out. Hand-to-mouth societies tend, for powerful survival reasons, to be extremely resistant to change, since a failed innovation could kill the tribe. Without a written language learning opportunities were far more limited.
It is anti-darwin to lie about what he said and wrote.
Don't get diverted. But remember that Darwin lived in a society in which small boys were sent into the mines at age 8 and grew up largely underground. While your are reading, trye Disraeli's "Two Nations," if you can find a copy. The English lower classes WERE worse off then American slaves.
***As I said before, the Christian nations of Europe allowed a millennium to pass without implementing these supposed God-given rights.***
As I asked a previous poster: So you think no one had life, liberty or the pursuit of happiness before 1776?
***there is nothing Biblical or Christian about individual liberty***
Not true.
"Were you a slave when called? Do not be concerned about it. But if you can gain your freedom, avail yourself of the opportunity." - St. Paul - 1 Cor 7
"For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery" - St. Paul.
Christ's freedom begins in the heart and then spreads to the outer life. A person can be outwardly "free" but still a slave to passions or addictions.
Read on and don't be deceived by the language.
Human nature is a bear. It took a thousand years for the Church to convince men that monogamy was morally required. Then in a few decades, the work was undone.
***The law is not the result of religion. Religion flunked that test for a thousand years.***
Excuse me, but our tradition of law is firmly based on the concept of law enshrined in the Mosaic code.
***Attempt to take away my liberty and I will do my best to kill you.***
Ah! Force. You worship the State and you don't realize it.
Your rights are not endowed by a Creator by granted by whichever form of government is strong enough to currently be on top.
You are "free" only as long as the State says you are.
I think you are wrong here. Can't prove it.
As far as I know, science is the first human institution to welcome change, or even require it for membership. What government or church requires, as a rite of passage, the demonstration that you know something that the existing power guys don't.
Don't get diverted. But remember that Darwin lived in a society in which small boys were sent into the mines at age 8 and grew up largely underground.
LOL. I just had a few minutes and decided to check the end of the thread. I'll be interested in going back later and finding out how this has anything to do with the thread topic.
IOW, if I gather up a committee of the brightest minds & put them to the task, they'll be able to create a life, built on a better model?
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