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Darwinism to Face Scrutiny in Ohio and Minnesota
family ^ | 02.26.04

Posted on 02/27/2004 5:55:40 PM PST by Coleus

State News

February 26, 2004

Darwinism to Face Scrutiny
by Sonja Swiatkiewicz, state issues analyst

Ohio and Minnesota have the opportunity to make a difference in how Darwinism is taught to schoolchildren.

Ohio made history in December 2002 when its state Board of Education approved changes to public school science standards requiring students to be tested on their understanding of evidence for and against Darwinism.

Just over a year later, Ohio again stands at a crossroads of sorts, while its school board seeks to establish a model curriculum to implement 2002's changes. Minnesota, likewise, has come to a place of decision — whether or not to follow in Ohio's footsteps in the teaching of Darwinism.

The Ohio school board voted 13-4 on Feb. 10 in a preliminary vote to accept "Set A" of the model science curriculum -- the curriculum that will be sent to each district to guide teachers in how the new science standards should be implemented in the classroom. "Set A" includes 42 individual lessons that deal with potentially "controversial" topics; nine of them (those slated for grade 10 life sciences) discuss evolutionary theory.

Only one of the 42, however, seeks to include the "critical analysis" of Darwinism that is now required to be taught — and that's where the rubber meets the road.

Fiercely protective pro-Darwinists are attempting to derail the new science standards before kids in the classroom ever reap the benefits of this dramatic change in policy. Critics have claimed that the "Critical Analysis of Evolution" lesson mandates the teaching of Intelligent Design.

In fact, the "Critical Analysis" lesson supports the new requirement that students be able to "describe how scientists continue to investigate and critically analyze aspects of evolutionary theory." Students will be taught that theories are tentative explanations that are subject to modification as continued experimentation demands; the differences between microevolution and macroevolution; and guided to examine the various lines of evidence for and against the theory of a common ancestry (macroevolution).

While the board had already indicated its support of "Set A" in its entirety, Darwinists are applying pressure to the board members to convince them to remove their support. A final, binding vote will be taken during the board's meeting March 8-9.

A few states away, Minnesota's Legislature is grappling with making initial changes to the state's science standards. Four members of the science standard writing committee have submitted a "minority" report, urging the Legislature to accept two standards that mirror Ohio's.

These two standards will lay the groundwork for Minnesota's schoolchildren to be taught critical analysis of evolution — which has been specifically encouraged by the No Child Left Behind Act conference report.

But first, the "minority report" must be accepted into the recommendations to be sent to the full House and Senate.

Those who support a balanced presentation of Darwinism, the evidence for and against macroevolution, must make their voices heard. The type of science education Ohio and Minnesota's kids receive is dependent on board members and legislators knowing concerned citizens care about the unbiased teaching of evolution.

TAKE ACTION

Ohio

Please contact the board members who voted in favor of the "Set A" curriculum to thank them for their support and encourage them to vote in favor of "Set A" on Mar. 8 or 9. Please contact them by March 5.

Richard E. Baker (Hollansburg), 937-548-2246

Virgil E. Brown, Jr. (Cleveland Heights), 216-851-3304, Virgil.Brown@ode.state.oh.us

Michael Cochran (Blacklick), 614-864-2338, ota@ohiotownships.org

Jim Craig (Canton), 330-492-5533, Jim.Craig@ode.state.oh.us

John W. Griffin (West Carrollton), P.O. Box 49201, West Carrollton, OH 45449-0201

Stephen M. Millett (Columbus), 614-424-5335

Deborah Owens Fink (Richfield), 330-972-8079, deb@uakron.edu

Emerson J. Ross, Jr. (Toledo), 419-248-8315

Jennifer L. Sheets (Pomeroy), 740-992-2151, Jennifer.Sheets@ode.state.oh.us

Jo Ann Thatcher (McDermott), 740-858-3300

James L. Turner (Cincinatti), 513-287-3232, jturner@cinergy.com

Sue Westendorf (Bowling Green), 419-352-2908, sue.westendo@ode.state.oh.us

Carl Wick (Centerville), 937-433-1352, carl.wick@ode.state.oh.us

Please politely urge the four board members who voted against "Set A" to reconsider and vote in support. Please contact them by Mar. 5.

Robin C. Hovis (Millersburg), 330-674-5000, Robin.Hovis@ode.state.oh.us

Cyrus B. Richardson, Jr. (Bethel), 513-734-6700, Cyrus.Richards@ode.state.oh.us

G.R. "Sam" Schloemer (Cincinnati), 513-821-4145, Sam.Schloemer@ode.state.oh.us

Jennifer Stewart (Zanesville), 740-452-4558, Jennifer.Stewart@ode.state.oh.us

Two members were absent for the Feb. 10 meeting, and should be politely contacted as well.

Virginia E. Jacobs (Lima), 419-999-4219, Virginia.Jacobs@ode.state.oh.us

Martha W. Wise (Avon) 440-934-4935, Martha.Wise@doe.state.oh.us

In addition, please contact Gov. Bob Taft and tell him you support the teaching of critical analysis of evolution. For contact information for Gov. Taft, visit our CitizenLink Action Center.

Minnesota

Please contact the chairpersons of the House and Senate Education Policy Committees, Rep. Barbara Sykora and Sen. Steve Kelley, and urge them to accept the "minority report."

In addition, please contact your own representative and senator and politely urge them to support the critical analysis of evolution when it comes to a vote.

Also, please contact Gov. Tim Pawlenty and urge his support for teaching the evidence for and against evolution. Contact information for Gov. Pawlenty is available through our CitizenLink Action Center.



TOPICS: Culture/Society; Extended News; Government; US: Minnesota; US: Ohio
KEYWORDS: creation; creationism; crevolist; darwinism; education; educationnews; evolution; god; minnesota; mn; oh; ohio; science; scienceeducation
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To: Fester Chugabrew
Why does consistency necessarily point away from intelligence?

It doesn't necessarily. But consistency with a natural process points to a natural process, not intelligence.

For that matter, why does constraint?

If the hypothesized "intelligence" is so constrained that it can't be distinguished from a natural process, what's the point of the intelligence hypothesis? Intelligence manifests by making choices. If the choice is always the one the natural process would make (in the case at hand, mutations always track the phylogenetic tree, they're never observed tracking, say functionality - "bird" mutations are not found in bats, for example, nor do whales have shark blood), the hypothesis of an intelligent agent loses its explanatory power.

This is the point of Occam's Razor.IF there are two theories that have the same explanatory power, go with the one that makes the fewest assumptions.

641 posted on 03/05/2004 5:46:01 PM PST by Virginia-American
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To: Virginia-American; js1138; PatrickHenry; ohioWfan; bondserv; RightWingNilla
. . . consistency with a natural process points to a natural process, not intelligence.

For some reason, even with several readings, I see this as a circular argument. I can understand it in a way if I am to suspend my own beliefs and opinions, but I have my doubts whether this holds water WRT reality.

If the hypothesized "intelligence" is so constrained that it can't be distinguished from a natural process, what's the point of the intelligence hypothesis?

If the designer ever had in mind a way to communicate with its produce, it would have to employ constraints that would allow communication to take place. The first choice in any design is whether to make something of it - either on paper or in reality. Further choices may result in a design beyond the capacity of the end result to comprehend.

Let me reiterate at this point that I really do not believe the Theory of Evolution to be unreasonable or extravagant. But if you bring Occam's Razor into the picture, the possibility of an almighty, omnipotent, omnipresent, eternal God brings a trump card Occam's razor cannot overcome. Think about it. Are The Theory of Evolution and the Theory of Creation "two theories that have the same explanatory power?

IMO they are worlds apart.

642 posted on 03/05/2004 6:19:49 PM PST by Fester Chugabrew
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To: RightWingNilla
All I want to know is why did the designer give me two fused chimp chromosomes?

Hope you don't mind, but my own assessment of you is much higher than that.

643 posted on 03/05/2004 6:27:30 PM PST by Fester Chugabrew
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To: Fester Chugabrew
In talking about the explanatory power of creationism, you have to distinguish between the strongest forms of literal-Genesis creationism--which make bold and definite wrong predictions [all animal species should be within a few days of the same age; geologists should be able to detect the signs of a single world-wide flood, etc.]--and the weak "God could have left it looking like that" forms which predict nothing. One has no explanatory power because it is wrong. One has no explanatory power because it is afraid of being wrong.
644 posted on 03/05/2004 6:30:37 PM PST by VadeRetro
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To: Coleus
I swear one day there will be another Monkey trial.
645 posted on 03/05/2004 6:34:09 PM PST by DaGman
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To: RightWingNilla
There presently is no other way to explain the tight knit relationship between all life on the planet (mistakes and all).

Sure there is. "We don't know to the extant we can duplicate it in a controlled setting." or "God, in His wisdom did it in someway which we may never know"

You wouldnt be able to do any study on cellular or molecular biology without appreciating the theory of evolution.

How did Crick & Watson's explanation of the structure of DNA have anything to do with the theory of evolution?

646 posted on 03/05/2004 6:36:50 PM PST by Tribune7 (Vote Toomey April 27)
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To: Tribune7
How did Crick & Watson's explanation of the structure of DNA have anything to do with the theory of evolution?

[*Sigh*] DNA has given us the means to make a detailed study of the genetic charactistics of species. This has provided us with a completely separate method of examining the common descent relationships suggested by the fossil record. It has confirmed what evolution has theorized from the fossil record alone. So now there are two independent lines of evidence, both of which support the theory of evolution.

647 posted on 03/05/2004 7:01:00 PM PST by PatrickHenry (A compassionate evolutionist.)
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To: Tribune7
In other words, if there were no fossil record at all, DNA evidence, all by itself, would provide sufficient reason to accept the theory of evolution.
648 posted on 03/05/2004 7:07:51 PM PST by PatrickHenry (A compassionate evolutionist.)
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To: PatrickHenry
DNA has given us the means to make a detailed study of the genetic charactistics of species.

Remember the answer is to the claim that one wouldn't be able to do any study on cellular or molecular biology without appreciating the theory of evolution.

It has confirmed what evolution has theorized from the fossil record alone.

As you know, I don't have a high opinion of the fossil record as being proof -- or even evidence -- of much. Evolution explains why some creatures resemble others more than they do others. OTOH, this is not a proof of evolution.

649 posted on 03/05/2004 7:14:37 PM PST by Tribune7 (Vote Toomey April 27)
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To: VadeRetro
One has no explanatory power because it is wrong. One has no explanatory power because it is afraid of being wrong.

I'm not sure what you mean here. Please expand a little in the context of your post, and I'll try to respond. Thanks.

650 posted on 03/05/2004 7:21:59 PM PST by Fester Chugabrew
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To: Tribune7
Now, where would be the geographical separation between chimps and man? How great would it have to be?

In Africa, The rift mountains. I believe they are great enough.

Like many Mountain ranges the west side remains a lush rain forest while the east side dries out becoming a grassland. The Chimps are good for their side of the mountains in the lush forest while human ancestors evolved for the savannah (i.e. walking upright)

651 posted on 03/05/2004 7:23:56 PM PST by qam1 (Are Republicans the party of Reagan or the party of Bloomberg and Pataki?)
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To: Tribune7
Remember the answer is to the claim that one wouldn't be able to do any study on cellular or molecular biology without appreciating the theory of evolution.

A semi-skilled auto worker can attach the door to an automobile as it moves down the assembly line, without being an automotive engineer. But this doesn't mean that automotive engineers have no function. Similarly, I don't doubt that a lab technician, with absolutely no education in the theory of evolution, could be trained to follow the steps needed to sequence a particular creature's DNA. But a biologist would know what that data means, while the technician (if he truly knew nothing of evolution) wouldn't have any concept of what he had done, or why he was asked to do it, or what it meant.

652 posted on 03/05/2004 7:31:21 PM PST by PatrickHenry (A compassionate evolutionist.)
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To: qam1
while human ancestors evolved for the savannah

I can't see how a mountain range would have kept the species apart for the hundreds of thousands of years required by the theory for this evolution to occur.

653 posted on 03/05/2004 7:33:15 PM PST by Tribune7 (Vote Toomey April 27)
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To: Fester Chugabrew
Geologists, back when geology was really getting started, started with the idea that the Noachian Flood was literal truth. By 1831, that notion was untenable. Adam Sedgwick was a leading light who reluctantly faced the truth.

In one of the great statements in the history of science, Sedgwick, who was Buckland's close colleague in both science and theology, publicly abandoned flood geology -- and upheld empirical science -- in his presidential address to the Geological Society of London in 1831.
'Having been myself a believer, and, to the best of my power, a propagator of what I now regard as a philosophic heresy, and having more than once been quoted for opinions I do not now maintain, I think it right, as one of my last acts before I quit this Chair, thus publicly to read my recantation.... 'There is, I think, one great negative conclusion now incontestably established -- that the vast masses of diluvial gravel, scattered almost over the surface of the earth, do not belong to one violent and transitory period....

'We ought, indeed, to have paused before we first adopted the diluvian theory, and referred all our old superficial gravel to the action of the Mosaic flood.... In classing together distant unknown formations under one name; in giving them a simultaneous origin, and in determining their date, not by the organic remains we had discovered, but by those we expected hypothetically hereafter to discover, in them; we have given one more example of the passion with which the mind fastens upon general conclusions, and of the readiness with which it leaves the consideration of unconnected truths.'

Source.

That's the strong form of creationism. Bold, definite statements, all of which were noted as wrong a long time ago.

The weak forms are all the "God could have done that, too" flavors. Can never be wrong. Can never be useful.

654 posted on 03/05/2004 7:38:57 PM PST by VadeRetro
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To: PatrickHenry
But a biologist would know what that data means. .. .

OK, how did evolution help Crick & Watson discover the double helix structure of DNA?

655 posted on 03/05/2004 7:40:18 PM PST by Tribune7 (Vote Toomey April 27)
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To: Tribune7
How did creationism help Louis Freeh track down spy-mole Hansen?
656 posted on 03/05/2004 7:44:06 PM PST by VadeRetro
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To: Tribune7
They were doing biochemistry. A somewhat unrelated field, but which provides convergent evidence for evolution. I have no idea if that was their goal. Similarly, I don't know if Galileo planned to find evidence for the solar system when he started using his telescope. New tools provide information, which is often useful in other fields. Science is rather seamless in that regard. As with geology, which isn't biological at all, but which supports the theory of evolution. As with climatology. As with physicists who developed radiometric dating techniques. There isn't any field of science which is totally isolated from all the rest.
657 posted on 03/05/2004 7:47:48 PM PST by PatrickHenry (A compassionate evolutionist.)
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To: Virginia-American; js1138; PatrickHenry; ohioWfan; bondserv; RightWingNilla; VadeRetro
Consistency and constraint. Both are necessary where design is concerned. Probably more. How can we measure the extent of these things as demonstrated in the universe as we know it?

By my own observations there is a significant amount of design throughout nature. If no design were involved in the gene pool, for example, things would have flown off the handle long before today. And design by necessity at least implies a designer.

I realize there could possibly be no such thing. When one considers that the number of possibilities are limitless, randomness in all things must be one of them.

But there is too much predicability (consistency and restraint) in all I've experienced to think it could have happened by accident. I have no need or desire of preaching further on the implications of this personal assessment, at least in this context.

That's where I'm coming from as a fellow human being, and I really think that is enough for any classroom or scientist to take into account as we struggle through the short years we have here.

658 posted on 03/05/2004 7:48:31 PM PST by Fester Chugabrew
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To: VadeRetro
Okay. I see where you're coming from. Let me think about it.
659 posted on 03/05/2004 7:52:24 PM PST by Fester Chugabrew
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To: VadeRetro
How did creationism help Louis Freeh track down spy-mole Hansen?

Creation "science" helped OJ Simpson, because the jury didn't accept DNA evidence. Or any other evidence. So creationism has its uses.

660 posted on 03/05/2004 7:55:37 PM PST by PatrickHenry (A compassionate evolutionist.)
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