Posted on 10/28/2005 2:36:03 PM PDT by scientificbeliever
3. Kansas Biology Teacher On the front lines of science's devolution "The evolution debate is consuming almost everything we do," says Brad Williamson, a 30-year science veteran at suburban Olathe East High School and a past president of the National Association of Biology Teachers. "It's politicized the classroom. Parents will say their child can't be in class during any discussion of evolution, and students will say things like 'My grandfather wasn't a monkey!'"
First, a history lesson. In 1999 a group of religious fundamentalists won election to the Kansas State Board of Education and tried to introduce creationism into the state's classrooms. They wanted to delete references to radiocarbon dating, continental drift and the fossil record from the education standards. In 2001 more-temperate forces prevailed in elections, but the anti-evolutionists garnered a 6-4 majority again last November. This year Intelligent Design (ID) theory is their anti-evolution tool of choice.
At the heart of ID is the idea that certain elements of the natural world—the human eye, say—are "irreducibly complex" and have not and cannot be explained by evolutionary theory. Therefore, IDers say, they must be the work of an intelligent designer (that is, God).
The problem for teachers is that ID can't be tested using the scientific method, the system of making, testing and retesting hypotheses that is the bedrock of science. That's because underpinning ID is religious belief. In science class, Williamson says, "students have to trust that I'm just dealing with science."
Alas, for Kansas's educational reputation, the damage may be done. "We've heard anecdotally that our students are getting much more scrutiny at places like medical schools. I get calls from teachers in other states who say things like 'You rubes!'" Williamson says. "But this is happening across the country. It's not just Kansas anymore."
(Excerpt) Read more at popsci.com ...
An excellent example. Quantum electrodynamics (QED) won Richard Feynman and his colleagues a Nobel Prize, but it is of little use to the electrician wiring your house.
> I would not be worried to learn that my surgeon believes that God created the earth
This is not mutually exclusive from evolution.
> so long as he is a competent surgeon.
Thjat's your choice. I'd be leery of anyone plannign on stickign a knife into my guts if he believed that healign or injury could just magically/miraculously resolve itself. I'd vastly rather have a doctor who recognized that the chunk of meat that is my body is a physical thing that obeys the laws of physics as we know them. If he believs that humans jsut suddenyl popped into existence in our modern form... then he can believe anything.
Doubtless you can post examples of "rabid secularists" saying this? It certainly isn't for example what either Dawkins or Dennett say. I am as rabid a secularist as anyone, and I wouldn't dream of saying that the clear fact of evolution proves that God doesn't exist.
Or did you just make this up or read it somewhere. I've asked for people to back up this claim up and every time all I've got is chirping crickets in response.
And what is the physical mechanism that prevents lots of microevolution becoming macroevolution? (Not that these terms are ever used by actual practicing biologists.)
As a West Virginian, I feel compelled to note dumber, flatter states whenever they call attention to themselves.
As a Briton I can feel smugly superior to rebellious colonists all over the globe.
I'm basing my observation on empirical data. Not to mention being tongue in cheek, but humor is lost on some people.
"As a Briton I can feel smugly superior to rebellious colonists all over the globe."
You mean that place where the sun never used to set?????
What’s wrong with the idea that we teach both sides? Isn’t honest debate the American way? Isn’t exploring all sides of an issue just good pedagogy? For sure – when there are two valid sides to the debate. For example, in a civics class, we could weigh the relative merits of affirmative action versus strict equality – because both sides have valid arguments. On the other hand, we don’t compare the truth of 2 + 2 = 4 versus 2 + 2 = 5. No one argues that in math class we should explore all the possible wrong answers along with the correct one. So does the ID/evolution debate more resemble the debate over affirmative action, or the ‘debate’ over 2+2=4?
An answer comes from the draft science standards just released by the Kansas School Board. Having determined to teach the ‘controversy’ about evolution — and lets specify right here that both the School Board and real scientists agree that evolution is the theory that all life descended from a common ancestor by the mechanism of mutation and natural selection — the School Board found themselves in the awkward position of having to identify some aspects of evolution that were scientifically controversial. So they came up with three ‘scientific’ arguments against common descent. The trouble is, not one of the three withstands scrutiny.
The first argument is that there are ‘discrepancies in the molecular evidence’ for evolution. In fact, this is a complete inversion of the truth. The fantastic advances in molecular genetics over the last six decades, which have revealed to us the entire genomes of hundreds of living organisms, is a comprehensive and completely independent corroboration of the truth of Darwin’s theory. If I take the genetic sequences of the smaller strand of RNA from the large subunit of the ribosome – the tiny apparatus that makes proteins in cells, and exists in almost every living creature – and I group together the sequences based on how similar they are, what I get is a ‘tree’ structure that mirrors in detail and nearly exactly the ‘tree of life’ inferred from old-fashioned, Darwinian evolutionary biology. The few minor differences between the trees are usually where some details of the older tree were conjectural anyway, and the molecular tree has resolved an existing controversy. The ‘discrepancies’ that IDers claim are either instances where lateral gene transfer happened between our single-celled ancestors – a known process which complicates the analysis for some proteins but can be identified and accounted for, or where the ID ‘scientists’ have simply goofed and tried to compare the wrong proteins. No legitimate, credentialed molecular biologist accepts these alleged discrepancies.
The second argument is the hoary old ‘Cambrian Explosion’: the assertion that most complex animal phyla appeared all of a sudden 450 million years ago. First of all, we now know they didn’t; still older Ediacaran rocks show an even more diverse fauna than the Cambrian, but because the creatures were soft-bodied the fossils are rarer and more poorly preserved. The major happening in the Cambrian may have in fact been the appearance of protective hard skeletons, in an evolutionary arms race between predators and prey, which as a side-effect left far more and better fossils.
But in any case, we know of many instances where rates of evolution have suddenly and dramatically accelerated. When finches arrived in new habitats on the Galapagos or Hawaiian islands, and found pristine, unpopulated environments to inhabit, we know they diverged rapidly to fill the empty ecological niches. Nebraska finches all look pretty much like finches. Explore the Hawaiian rainforest, and you can find finches that resemble sparrows, finches that resemble woodpeckers, and finches that resemble hummingbirds. But the molecular data says they’re all finches. Environmental stasis leads to evolutionary statis; environmental change causes evolutionary change. And, in any case, none of this is an argument against common descent.
The third argument – that embryos from different types of organisms develop differently – is truly obscure. Just because I and a honeybee might, a long long time ago, have shared a common ancestor, why should my children and the honeybee larva look the same?
So, in order to manufacture a controversy to fuel their religiously-inspired attacks on evolution, the School Board has resorted to scientifically false counterarguments. Why should that concern us here in Nebraska? It should concern us because we admit a large number of high-school students from Kansas with biology credits that will, in fall 2006, certify they were subjected to a completely bogus biology course. Usually, at our universities, we don’t examine in detail what is taught in various school systems; as long as the school is accredited, we assume biology credits are biology credits and the kids learned the principles of the field. But can we continue doing this, knowing that the Kansas curriculum contains material that is patently false? With the University of Nebraska struggling to meet recruitment goals, there are obviously pragmatic reasons to overlook Kansan curricular problems, but at the same time, is it fair that we give Kansan theology-disguised-as-biology equal weight to the legitimate biology we teach our own students? If 99% of scientists, and all major scientific organizations, deny there are legitimate scientific challenges to evolution, what do we do with students who have been taught the opposite, based on the specious advocacy of religious fundamentalists?
Great essay. Where is it getting published?
You got a problem widdat?
Nowhere yet. The local paper thought it was too nerdy.
In fact, Dawkins is one of those I had in mind. It was Dawkins who wrote that "Darwin made it possible to be an intellectually fulfilled atheist." He also said, "The more you understand the significance of evolution, the more you are pushed away from the agnostic position and towards atheism" (www.simonyi.ox.ac.uk).
Stop and contemplate those statements for a moment. Science is an approach to understanding the natural world that explicitly eschews supernatural explanations.Therefore, natural science cannot be used to "prove" the existence of God; likewise, it cannot be used to "prove" the nonexistence of God. By itself, science cannot push one towards atheism. Science is simply the wrong tool for the job—much like using a telescope as a screw driver.
But Dawkins goes much further. He has publicly attacked religion as being opposed to science and reason. For a sample of his statements, you might check the Positive Atheism web site.
Now, when Dawkins says that evolutionary theory pushes one toward atheism, I realize that he is talking religion or philosophy, not natural science. Unfortunately, the scientific community does not rise up and say so. Scientists have circled the wagons against the Creationists, whom they accuse (with good reason) of misusing science in the service of religion. Yet the same scientists are strangely silent when one of their number misuses science in the service of atheism.
Then we are in agreement.
Are you going to post an example of a claim by a "rabid secularist" that "evolution proves that God does not exist", or have you retreated to a different position (one which is entirely tenable that I wouldn't take issue with), that you disagree with Dawkins' and my dislike of certain aspects of religion? So far you haven't backed your original claim up. We are all well aware that Dawkins dislikes religion. That is not the point at issue. You need to back up your claim that secularists say that evolution proves God doesn't exist or withdraw it.
In my opinion I'd agree with you that science can never disprove the general notion of a God Creator of the universe, because as you rightly say such notions lie outside the purview of science. I also don't think that you'd have much difficulty getting Dawkins (for example) to agree with that proposition. But...
In my honest opinion, for what its worth, the general scientific discoveries over the last 200 years, inasmuch as they have revealed the scale of the universe, the age of the universe, and a reasonable secular explanation for the complexity of life on earth, do make the specific claims of most historic religions look false. There may be a God, but He sure doesn't look like the God of the Old Testament, or the God(s) of any of the other major world religions. To that extent science would tend to push one towards atheism, since I dislike the alternative hazy wishful-thinking kind of "There must be something more than this." cod-spiritualism that many people who have drifted away from specific beliefs cling to. Just my 2cents. Not trying to get into a flame war. More trying to elucidate how at least 1 atheist sees it. What really does make me furious is some religious sects pretending to take *scientific* issue with theories such as evolution when their real conflict with it is *religious*, and I think from what you've posted you may be quite close to me on that one.
Can you really be so naive?
Without pure science theory, there is no technology for the technicians (physicians, electricians, computer repairmen) to work with.
Do you seriously believe modern electronics would be possible without an understanding of quantum mechanics?
I hope the irony isnt lost here. Science has allowed you to promote your luddism on the internet rather than the street corner.
Remember Frank Burns.
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