Posted on 12/11/2002 6:28:08 AM PST by A2J
By WILL SENTELL
wsentell@theadvocate.com
Capitol news bureau
High school biology textbooks would include a disclaimer that evolution is only a theory under a change approved Tuesday by a committee of the state's top school board.
If the disclaimer wins final approval, it would apparently make Louisiana just the second state in the nation with such a provision. The other is Alabama, which is the model for the disclaimer backers want in Louisiana.
Alabama approved its policy six or seven years ago after extensive controversy that included questions over the religious overtones of the issue.
The change approved Tuesday requires Louisiana education officials to check on details for getting publishers to add the disclaimer to biology textbooks.
It won approval in the board's Student and School Standards/ Instruction Committee after a sometimes contentious session.
"I don't believe I evolved from some primate," said Jim Stafford, a board member from Monroe. Stafford said evolution should be offered as a theory, not fact.
Whether the proposal will win approval by the full state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education on Thursday is unclear.
Paul Pastorek of New Orleans, president of the board, said he will oppose the addition.
"I am not prepared to go back to the Dark Ages," Pastorek said.
"I don't think state boards should dictate editorial content of school textbooks," he said. "We shouldn't be involved with that."
Donna Contois of Metairie, chairwoman of the committee that approved the change, said afterward she could not say whether it will win approval by the full board.
The disclaimer under consideration says the theory of evolution "still leaves many unanswered questions about the origin of life.
"Study hard and keep an open mind," it says. "Someday you may contribute to the theories of how living things appeared on earth."
Backers say the addition would be inserted in the front of biology textbooks used by students in grades 9-12, possibly next fall.
The issue surfaced when a committee of the board prepared to approve dozens of textbooks used by both public and nonpublic schools. The list was recommended by a separate panel that reviews textbooks every seven years.
A handful of citizens, one armed with a copy of Charles Darwin's "Origin of the Species," complained that biology textbooks used now are one-sided in promoting evolution uncritically and are riddled with factual errors.
"If we give them all the facts to make up their mind, we have educated them," Darrell White of Baton Rouge said of students. "Otherwise we have indoctrinated them."
Darwin wrote that individuals with certain characteristics enjoy an edge over their peers and life forms developed gradually millions of years ago.
Backers bristled at suggestions that they favor the teaching of creationism, which says that life began about 6,000 years ago in a process described in the Bible's Book of Genesis.
White said he is the father of seven children, including a 10th-grader at a public high school in Baton Rouge.
He said he reviewed 21 science textbooks for use by middle and high school students. White called Darwin's book "racist and sexist" and said students are entitled to know more about controversy that swirls around the theory.
"If nothing else, put a disclaimer in the front of the textbooks," White said.
John Oller Jr., a professor at the University of Louisiana-Lafayette, also criticized the accuracy of science textbooks under review. Oller said he was appearing on behalf of the Louisiana Family Forum, a Christian lobbying group.
Oller said the state should force publishers to offer alternatives, correct mistakes in textbooks and fill in gaps in science teachings. "We are talking about major falsehoods that should be addressed," he said.
Linda Johnson of Plaquemine, a member of the board, said she supports the change. Johnson said the new message of evolution "will encourage students to go after the facts."
In the above you perhaps have demonstrated what the dispute between religion (and ID) and evolution is. Evolution says that the changes are due to natural selection, religion (and ID) say they are due to intelligent Creation. Both views propose an unseen agent being the source of biological change. However, the problem with natural selection as the source of change is that selection does not create anything it only destroys.
All your posts are low quality posts Patrick! Always insulting, placemarkering and arguing semantics. Whether you call it random selection or natural selection it is still bunk. Natural selection, the goddess of evolution, cannot create anything, it only destroys genetic information. Now randomness is as Gargantua showed, a big problem for evolution. There is much design in every organism and to say that complete biological systems arise at random is totally ludicrous.
The discredited scientist in the evolution/Creation debate is Darwin. His disproof of ID was ultimately based on his so called disproof that the eye was designed. Let's hear what Darwin and Behe have to say on the subject:
He who will go thus far, if he find on finishing this treatise that large bodies of facts, otherwise inexplicable, can be explained by the theory of descent, ought not to hesitate to go further, and to admit that a structure even as perfect as the eye of an eagle might be formed by natural selection, although in this case he does not know any of the transitional grades. His reason ought to conquer his imagination; though I have felt the difficulty far too keenly to be surprised at any degree of hesitation in extending the principle of natural selection to such startling lengths.
From: "On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life", Chapter 6
Compare the above with the quote below on the same subject:
What is needed to make a light sensitive spot? What happens when a photon of light impinges on the retina?
When a photon first hits the retina, it interacts with a small organic molecule called II-cis-retinal. The shape of retinal is rather bent, but when retinal interacts with the photon, it straightens out, isomerizing into trans-retinal. This is the signal that sets in motion a whole cascade of events resulting in vision. When retinal changes shape, it forces a change in the shape of the protein rhodopsin, which is bound to it. Now part of the transducin complex dissociates and interacts with a protein called phosphodiesterase, When that happens, the phosphodiesterase acquires the ability chemically to cut a small organic molecule called cyclic-GMP, turning it into 5'-GMP. There is a lot of cyclic-GMP in the cell, and some of it sticks to another protein called an ion channel. Normally the ion channel allows sodium ions into the cell. When the concentration of cyclic-GMP decreases because of the action of the phosphodiesterase, however, the cyclic-GMP bound to the ion channel eventually falls off, causing a change in shape that shuts the channel. As a result, sodium ions can no longer enter the cell, the concentration of sodium in the cell decreases, and the voltage accross the cell membrane changes. That in turn causes a wave of electrical polarization to be sent down the optic nerve to the brain. And when interpreted by the brain, that is vision. So this is what modern science has discovered about how Darwin's 'simple' light sensitive spot functions.
From: Michael Behe, 'Design at the Foundation of Life".
Now which one of the two is science and which one is not?????
Actually no, problem is that many, being Christians, are involved in Christmas preparations, as I have been for a few days.
How may times do I have to say siblings I mean can you even read the word siblings. Can you understand that mutations occur at the singular cellular level not in the adult multicellular creature.
So you are saying that only two individuals will carry these mutations, one male and one female, and the rest of the group will be left behind? Is that it?
The problem with that is that you must accumulate a lot of mutations to really transform a species. To say that all the mutations occurred in a single line within the group is equally ludicrous. You must remember that evolution says that these mutations are random and to propose that you can accumulate mutations from a single individual would make such transformations virtually impossible, certainly in the amount necessary to produce so many varied species with so many different mutations. Interestingly evolutionary theory contradicts itself on this point and proposes that the adaptation of entire species due to the environment occurs in whole groups also and that species gradually transform themselves into totally new species. So essentially evolution is taking both sides of the issue (as usual).
Im sorry I have given you proof and you continue to saw away with the same argument. Argue something new or dont argue can you do that say something that is actually intelligent.
Neither you nor any evolutionists has ever given proof that a single species has transformed itself into another more complex species. If I am wrong, let's see the proof. Come up with a real arguement that slams evolution can you do it?
There are many. The bacterial flagellum is one. The program by which a single cell at conception turns into a 100 trillion cells at the time of birth - with every single cell of the exactly proper kind in the exactly proper place is another. There are many more which have been scientifically proven, but these two should keep you busy for a while.
'Gradual loss of egg laying' is more easily said than done. You must remember that the you need to provide nutrition to the developing organism throughout its development - as well as after the birth until it can feed itself. To say that all these changes can occur simultaneously is totally ludicrous and you have disproven nothing. Let's see an article describing how this change occurred in detail. Can you find any? I doubt it because this is one of the things evolutionists never speak of.
The explanation would go down in flames as being "ludicrous" and "total nonsense" as are all creationist arguments.
And where did you debunk the flagellum besides in your own mind?
As to the eye spot, your article only says that because it happened more than once then therefore the eye spot could have occurred. It is not a refutation of the complex mechanism required for an eye spot.
BTW - a blog from Don Lindsay is proof of absolutely nothing. The guy cannot even give references for his nonsense.
The NSF does not speak for all scientists.
Gee, can I quote this one as well?
The revision of the root of the tree of life (which now has 5 domains, not 3, er, families, I guess) was major news in biology in the year of our lord, 2000, and I remember discussing it here at least twice in your presence.
Another lame excuse. If you say that something I have said has been refuted, give the refutation and a link to the post.
Tell you what: I'll start work on that, as soon as you show me the proof that naturalistic abiogenesis could only have occurred by the spontaneous intantaneous transmutation of junkyard piles of misc. amino acids into working prokariotes, as you and Behe insist must be the case.
Evidence? I bet there is LOTS of evidence, we just haven't discovered it yet.
:-)
If Gargantua said that concerning I.D, what would your response be?
Of course he didn't say that. Not one person posting in support of a creator on this thread has failed to cite evidence for a creator such as history, archaeology, logic and personal testimony when asked.
You, however, were not able to cite evidence for an undirected, naturalistic start to the universe. When challenged you responded by saying you "bet" there is evidence. It just hasn't been discovered.
Do you understand that in matters of science undiscovered evidence is not evidence? If you claim a faith you may be able to get away with that. If you speak in the name of science your position is not rational.
Behe's claims have not been disproved dispite what some say. His position is quite rational. He's making his claim on the basis of observations, not "there's LOTS of evidence, we just haven't discovered it yet."
Yes, if evolution were true we would see some transformations happening all the time. We would see some species in the process of transforming themselves into more complex species. We have been doing quite a lot of research for at least the last 50 years on quite a few species and in many cases trying to have them mutate, change, etc. No such transformations have been observed.
Aaaah, now you are talking about just the root, before you were talking about the whole tree. Now just note this, that the change has been towards more domains instead of less. Now if evolution were true and science was really finding evidence for evolution, then the domains should be less since domains are totally separate entities which cannot have descended from each other. So you see, you guys attack me for saying that scientific research keeps finding more problems with evolution all the time, and the above just proves me right again.
More fatuous sloganeering science bluffing from Mr. Blue.
Selection from a uniform distribution in a static environment might degrade over time from random mutational hits. However, that is not the situation in the natural world.
Selection from a distribution with a central tendency (which is what you get when you apply a selection criteria to set of uniformly distributed attributes) most certainly does build something: a population optimally selected to survive in its given environment--slowly changing the environment than acts like a surgeon's knife to shape the population.
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