Museums take up evolution challenge

Chicago Tribune ^ | October 16, 2005 | Lisa Anderson

[Crackingham]

Natural history museums around the country are mounting new exhibits they hope will succeed where high school biology classes have faltered: convincing Americans that Charles Darwin's theory of evolution is a rigorously tested cornerstone of modern science. At Chicago's Field Museum, curators call their upcoming effort "Evolving Planet." The University of Nebraska State Museum in Lincoln calls its program "Explore Evolution." And here at the American Museum of Natural History, the exhibit that opens next month is called simply "Darwin."

[cornelis]

But the cycle is not independent. We upstart humans wish to interrupt it.

[cornelis]

But the cycle is not independent. We upstart humans wish to interrupt it.

[BamaGirl]

Given the myriad of evidence supporting evolution, scientists accept it as fact.

---
So do I, almost. But there is a group of people who are using evolution as a weapon to destroy any notion of God and then morality. They shove it down other people's throats as a way to kill their religion. It is these people using a scientific theory like evolution as part of their agendas that I don't like.

I also think it is wrong for these scientists to be so close-minded to alternative explanations or modified descriptions of evolution. That's unscientific! As long as these theories can be tested in some rigorous way with quantifiable results they should consider it.

I don't understand the attacks on Intelligent Design. From what I understand, all they are saying is that the number of random mutations required to get the complexity of today is in question. It's a purely mathematical argument that could be easily modeled and tested. Just because the Creationists have taken it as a pet cause to defend themselves shouldn't discredit the hypothesis itself. If you were a politician, you would embrace it, because it would be a happy medium where evolution could co-exist with spirituality.

[Gumlegs]

Twice, it would appear.

[Alter Kaker]

Earth to Alter...where is evolution going on around me? I have seen no new species. Where do you live?

If you contract bird flu, you'll understand.

[cornelis]

It's called replication.

[Gumlegs]

Send in the clones.

[WildTurkey]

When I was growing up, science told us that it was only millions of years.

When I grow up it was the teachings of the church that man had one less rib than womem. And before that that the earth was flat and the sun revolved around the earth. Before that, I think there was something about Angels transporting the sun to the other side of the earth each day so it would rise again in the East.

[BamaGirl]

But the cycle is not independent. We upstart humans wish to interrupt it.
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Yeah but almost every "interruption" we try, upon further analysis, seems to akin to something tried and proven to a very bad idea.

For example, people keep thinking we need to try Communism, discounting previous attempts as "not implemented correctly."

Pretty much the only interuption that I have found to be unique across civilizations and time is the creation of this Representative Republic. The combination of basic human & property rights, treatment of religion, our Capitalist system, etc. have been the best recipe for civilization I've seen yet.

Talk about "Intelligent Design..." :D

[WildTurkey]

I don't understand the attacks on Intelligent Design.

I don't either. After all the national leaders in the ID movement publicly state that they believe in common descent; that is, we all came from little squishy things ...

[orionblamblam]

> Darwinism is loaded with said monkey wrenches....so to speak :)

It's a complex system, beacue, unlike what anti-evolutionists such as makers of Hollywood movies would show you, genes aren't wired up to follow some specific evolutionary path. Environment drives evolution as much as the gene code, and the specifics of environment cannot be calculated.

However, just because a system is complex does not mean that it cannot be generally understood. The organization of individual sand grains on a beach cannot be mathematically modelled with anything remotely resemblign precision, yet the bulk system can be understood, and the order in it processed and understood.

Similarly, when are you going to die? You probably don't know. Nevertheless, your insurance company has a decent understanding of mortality statistics. And just because you might get conked on the head tomorrow AM by a small meteorite, and thus fall well outisde what their statistics, does not mean that their stats are just guesswork.

It's like this in *all* science, even the most rigorous physics. Chaos and randomness are in evidence at all levels.

[donh]

Maybe he lives in a biology lab, where producing
a new species is a routine grad student project.

[RightWhale]

how cyclic history is

To a degree. Somebody, I forget who, maybe Brinker, remarked that history doesn't repeat, but sometimes it rhymes.

[orionblamblam]

> But intuitively it just seems as though 5 billion years and a large number of experimental creatures is not enough time or fodder to get mechanisms as complex as the eye or liver or even a little virus.

You have an intuitive understanding of 5 billion years? Wow. Most people can't wrap their minds around a few decades and the changes that they bring.

[donh]

Yeah no kidding, that's what always amazed me! For example F=ma works everywhere, everytime! Plus it's so mathematically simple! Just multiplication, one step up from addition! Why is that? No matrices, no integrals, nothing.

Really? Than why can't it compute the outer orbits of galaxies?

[uscabjd]

Spending public dollars to convince the public that intelligent design has no merit violates the Establishment Clause as the government is taking sides in a religious dispute - this time to show religion is wrong, and the Godless theory is correct. Why not spend the same amount of public dollars to tell both sides, thus avoiding the "taking sides" problem? Where is the ACLU challenge? Where is the religious legal challenge?

[cornelis]

The necessity of politics based on a particular conception of what human nature doesn't exactly square well with a scientism that is exclusive.

[2ndreconmarine]

For example F=ma works everywhere, everytime! Plus it's so mathematically simple!

Actually, it doesn't. It is only true in the nonrelativistic limit.

And then why does it seem, the further out in scale you go, either up or down, the math gets that much nastier? Schroedingers equation you need partial derivatives to solve. You can't get closed form solutions to any of them?

Sure you can. Closed form solutions are standard for the hydrogen atom. They become more difficult only for the multi-body problem. You can derive closed form solutions for the Schoedinger equation all the way through the hyperfine structure.

[RightWhale]

When you get into classical mechanics you find that F = ma applies, but the implementation gets into all the math you have. What if you have a system of particles where the coordinate system does not have a uniform force across it but a lumpy potential field. For example, the Milky Way. The astronomy sector of physics is still having trouble modeling that system. Then somebody suggests they have to invoke general relativity. Or, suppose the potential field is electric. Force does not lie along the line between two electric charges if they are moving, but generates magnetic components in some other direction.

[cornelis]

as the government is taking sides in a religious dispute Interesting point. I think that scientist would indeed argue that it is a religious theory. But if the IDers claim it isn't . . .