[Kansas Gov. Kathleen] Sebelius criticizes State Board of Education's move [new science standards]

Kansas City Star via Kansas.com ^ | 12 November 2005 | DAVID KLEPPER

[PatrickHenry]

Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius on Friday called the state's new science standards a "step in the wrong direction."

Her comments follow a week in which the Kansas Board of Education adopted new science standards Tuesday that portray evolution as being in doubt and change the definition of science to allow for supernatural explanations.

In her lengthiest public comments yet on the controversy, Sebelius said she worries the changes will undermine science education and send the message that Kansas doesn't welcome high-tech firms and research. She pointed to the state's efforts to recruit bioscience companies, while the board votes to move "away from well-known, proven facts in science class."

Her comments also came as more candidates have stepped forward to challenge Board of Education members who approved the standards earlier this week.

Though the standards make no mention of creationism or intelligent design, they were sought by members of the intelligent design movement, which believes scientific evidence shows that nature was designed by a creator.

Four of the six conservative board members who voted to approve the changes are up for election next November. Moderate Republicans and Democrats are aiming to unseat conservatives, take control of the board and remove the new science standards before they go into effect in 2007.

In a closely watched race in Pennsylvania, voters in the town of Dover on Tuesday did what opponents of the intelligent design standards hope will happen here.

Voters there ousted most of that city's school board, which had voted to put intelligent design in the curriculum.

The latest two people to announce campaigns for state school board are Don Weiss, an Olathe resident, and Kent Runyan, a Pittsburg State University education professor.

Weiss will run as a Democrat against board member John Bacon, an Olathe Republican. Runyan will run as a Democrat against Republican board member Iris Van Meter. Bacon and Van Meter supported the standards.

Olathe resident Harry McDonald has already announced his plans to challenge Bacon in the primary election. Other candidates have popped up in other districts as well.

Bacon, who hasn't announced his re-election plans, said he's not concerned about his challengers and doesn't believe any political lessons from Dover, Pa., are relevant to Kansas. He said the Kansas school standards do not mandate the teaching of intelligent design like the ones in Dover. And he said he believes most Kansans will support the board's decision.

"There are holes in evolution," he said. "Any good scientist will admit to that."

Sebelius said she was "baffled" by the Board of Education's yearlong debate about evolution, and that as a Catholic who attended religious schools, she sees no contradiction between faith and scientific explanations of nature.

"I was taught that God created the universe," she said. "I was also taught science in science class."

Bacon said Sebelius doesn't understand that the board changed the standards to allow students to make up their own minds about evolution. He said worries about the changes' effects on the economy, public education and the state's reputation amount to "scare tactics."

[Dane]

You really ought to make some effort to know what Darwin's Theory is before you go on making such a fool of yourself in public

Go right ahead and shine your brilliance shucky, about darwin, afterall it was your hero, darwin, who wrote a book called "The Origin of Species(i.e life)).

But on this thread darwin groupies, are saying he wasn't talking about life in general.

JMO, you all are being quite hillary like.

[narby]

No prob, neo-hillary.

Is dane trying to pick a fight?

[CarolinaGuitarman]

" Is dane trying to pick a fight?"

Ya think? lol

[Dane]

Merely facing the fact that if he doesn't want to go to Kansas, then the whole team won't be going.

Are you accusing me of "cowering in fear" in order to stir up the emotion in this conversation? If so, it didn't work

I'm not stirring up anything, it was you who was stirring things up with your apparent fear of confronting/questioning the head of your "team", about the Kansas decision, because he/she is a virulent atheist, IMO.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"Go right ahead and shine your brilliance shucky, about darwin, afterall it was your hero, darwin, who wrote a book called "The Origin of Species(i.e life))."

Now your just being blatantly dishonest. As I already pointed out to you, Darwin specifically said he was not describing the origins of life. Life does NOT equal Species. Try reading the book before you make such a fool of yourself.

" But on this thread darwin groupies, are saying he wasn't talking about life in general."

Tell us exactly where in his book he WAS using evolution to describe the origins of life.

" JMO, you all are being quite hillary like."

Project much?

[PatrickHenry]

If it smells like a troll, posts like a troll, and trolls like a troll, then it's a troll.

[narby]

I don't think that either Bill or even Hillary would be foolish enough to fib so transparently.

Bill and Hill are particularly good liars. They're smart enough to remember what they told to whom.

The creationists on the Dover school board proved themselves to be very bad liars on the witness stand.

[shuckmaster]

I haven't endorsed any candidate in Kansas. I hate seeing conservatives lose because of a few trolls trying to destroy conservatism by forcing superstition and myth into science class.

[Dane]

If it smells like a troll, posts like a troll, and trolls like a troll, then it's a troll.

This is getting good, the insults are spewing(ala hillary).

[Dimensio]

But still it leaves out the penultimate question(of who or what created life),

And Newtonian physics leave out the question of who/what created matter. The origin of life is an important question in biology, but the origin of life is not a topic addressed by the theory of evolution. Scientific theories have specific scopes, and they are not incomplete or inadequate simply because they leave out issues that are not a part of their scope. Evolution covers the emergence of diversity in populations of biological life forms. That's it. If there are no biological life forms, then evolution cannot occur. The origins of life require, for at least some time, that no biological life exists. As such, evolution cannot address the ultimate origin of life because there is a step when, by definition, evolution cannot occur. Constantly repeating that it does in fact try to address the origin of life only demonstrates that you are willfully ignorant.

There is ongoing research into life origins, but that research will not affect the theory of evolution. Evolution only requires that life exist. How life came to exist in the first place has no bearing whatsover on the theory of evolution. The first life forms could have come about through molecules forming certain specific chemical bonds under the right conditions, they could have been seeded by interdimensional aliens, they could have been zap-poofed into existence by a divine agent or they could have been planted by time travelling humans from the future and evolution would still occur, without change, regardless of how those intial life forms came to be.

If you disagree, and wish to continue insisting that the ultimate origin of life are somehow important to the theory of evolution, please explain exactly how evolution is falsified if it is demonstrated that life did not ultimately come to exist by the specific process that evolution supposedly requires.

FWIW, I side on the creationist side, they are least being honest in including the question of who or what created life.

I'm not surprised that you're a creationist. You have a knack for attacking evolution for something that it is not. It is not an ultimate explanation for the origins of everything, but so many dishonest creationists want to turn it into one because they can't actually attack it for what it really is. Evolution covers a single specific process; demanding that it address more than its scope or be rejected only makes it clear that you're not actually interested in science, but instead interested in turning evolution into something that it isn't because you've already decided to reject it and are just looking for an excuse.

[Dane]

I haven't endorsed any candidate in Kansas. I hate seeing conservatives lose because of a few trolls trying to destroy conservatism by forcing superstition and myth into science class.

Uh shucky, I remember your posts. You're a buchanan supporter from way back.

LOL! I guess pat buchanan is now a darwinist.

Wouldn't surprise me since he gets a weekly paycheck from the most liberal cable news network, MSNBC.

[shuckmaster]

JMO, you all are being quite hillary like.

You're the one who keeps bringing hillary into the conversation (are you obsessed with her?) and you are the one using illogical double speak to make conservatives appear ignorant. Does hillary pay you to undermine the conservative movement with scientific ignorance?

[Virginia-American]

. I hate seeing conservatives lose because of a few trolls...

I wonder how many of these trolls are on Soros' payroll. IMO, Dane calling conservatives "neo-Hillary"s is a Freudian slip.

[Dimensio]

Huh what is so "zealot" about ID.

Well it's gotten you to consistently lie about the theory of evolution so that you can attack it for not explaining something outside of its scope.

[shuckmaster]

And I've already passed my two replies per troll limit on this one. I guess I'll move on until the next troll!

[narby]

your apparent fear of confronting/questioning the head of your "team"

There you go, imagining you understand something you have no knowledge of whatsoever.

He and I get into big, long-term discussions on environmental issues all the time. I think I'm winning the argument too, because I have the facts and he has the emotion. I have no fear of him. And he's not the head our team, only one of the most irreplaceable.

But we agree about religion and evolution. We agree that the people of Kansas look mighty foolish right now, having elected such idiots to their school board and not having the ability to keep such idiots from opening their mouths and demonstrating their ignorance while the world watches.

[Dane]

There is ongoing research into life origins, but that research will not affect the theory of evolution. Evolution only requires that life exist. How life came to exist in the first place has no bearing whatsover on the theory of evolution

And clinton's so-called "accomplishments" have no bearing on he ignored the islamofascist threat, correct, according to your "theory" stated above in intalics.

Amazing, you evolution guys, cognitive dissonace, IMO.

[narby]

If it smells like a troll

That's my problem. I can't smell over the net with this laptop. It's hard for me to detect trolls, but I'm learning other ways.

[RightWingAtheist]

Liberals claim to be the "reality-based community", but conservatives are the fact-based community. And that includes scientific facts such as evolution.

[Dimensio]

Evolution covers the emergence of diversity in populations of biological life forms.

I should add the caveat that it only addresses such emergence when it occurs as a result of imperfect replication coupled with environmental selection pressures limiting reproductive success based upon heritable traits. Otherwise a creationist might try to score dishonest semantic points by insisting that because I left it out it "proves" that evolution covers any instance where biological diversity emerges, even if it somehow emerges as a result of something other than the process I just described.