Kansas Challenges Definition of Science

nysus writes "Anti-evolutionists have made classrooms in Kansas a key battleground in America's culture war. Again. The New York Times reports they are proposing to change the definition of science in Kansas: 'instead of "seeking natural explanations for what we observe around us," the new standards would describe it as a "continuing investigation that uses observation, hypothesis testing, measurement, experimentation, logical argument and theory building to lead to more adequate explanations of natural phenomena."'" From the article: "In the first of three daylong hearings being referred to here as a direct descendant of the 1925 Scopes Monkey Trial in Tennessee, a parade of Ph.D.'s testified Thursday about the flaws they saw in mainstream science's explanation of the origins of life. It was one part biology lesson, one part political theater, and the biggest stage yet for the emerging movement known as intelligent design, which posits that life's complexity cannot be explained without a supernatural creator."

Comments

What Science Really is...

[mfh]

It's nice to see they have taken "seeking" out of the definition, but it's too complicated. Science is easy. ...continuing investigation that uses observation, hypothesis testing, measurement, experimentation, logical argument and theory building to lead to more adequate explanations of natural phenomena.

Science: The overcomplication of human perception.
Effective Treatment: Unknown
Suggested reading: Carlos Castaneda, because he's a total nut!

Re:What Science Really is...

[UncleGizmo]

I posted separately as well, but I feel strongly enough to do so again...The loophole is in
the "logical argument" part of the definition.

The way it is worded, it doesn't explicitly state that you have to do all these things for it to be science. Someone could [as ID proponents do] take existing "pure" scienctific research, use it to posit that there is order to the universe and use inductive reasoning [logical argument] to "prove" that a supreme being exists.

This will move science into the realm of philosophy, and IMO, muddle the heads of schoolchildren in Kansas for years to come.

Re:What Science Really is...

[Psiolent]

Jesus, Guns, and Bigotry. All staples of an ignorant society.

Being a liberal, non-Christian Oklahoman I must agree, for the most part. However, we need to remember that even in "ignorant societies" there are many exceptions. Also, just because most people who are "ignorant" believe in Jesus, we shouldn't dismiss Jesus as a valid spiritual figure altogether (atheists and agnostics, just ignore this, because I'm not trying to convince you, only those who have spiritual inklings but have been put off of Christianity by the ridiculous fundamentalism and dogma that it has come to represent).

Here's a book that will radically change your view of Jesus and his teachings, and will be a welcome relief for the many disillusioned Christians out there. Disclaimer: the author is my father.

You know...

[daveschroeder]

...if there is a "supernatural" creator or force that has created the Universe (and the confluence of circumstances that led to its creation from essentially manifestly nothingness, and also life itself, could be considered on what I'd call a "supernatural" scale itself, but that's another topic), why must the scientific processes that describe any such events, and any potential forces that may transcend our understanding of the physical world, have to be mutually exclusive?

Many years ago, a student in my 7th grade biology class asked specifically about creationism during our section on evolution. My biology teacher gave a very short, thoughtful, and diplomatic answer. His answer, after quite a long pause:

"Well, some might say that the Bible tells what God did, and science explains how he did it."

Now, looking back as an engineer and scientist by education, I have always found the simplicity of that statement compelling, and have never had any trouble reconciling whatever beliefs I have in notions that could be described as "supernatural" with scientific fact and sound scientific theory.

I think the problem you have is with the people who literally believe that a white-bearded man in a robe literally created the Universe and Earth in 6 days around 6000 years ago, and then created the life to go on on it, and who discount valid science wholesale. Even though "creationists", and people who believe my last statement, may use "intelligent design" as a tool to further their agendas, that's not my interpretation of "intelligent design".

Personally, I rather liked Picard's response in "Where Silence Has Lease":

DATA:

I have a question, sir. What is death?

PICARD:

You've picked probably the most difficult of all questions, Data.

There is the beginning of a twinkle in Picard's eyes again. It is the sort of question that his mind loves.

Some explain it by inventing gods wearing their own form... and argue that the purpose of the entire universe is to maintain themselves in their present form in an Earth-like garden which will give them pleasure through all eternity. And at the other extreme, assuming that is an "extreme," are those who prefer the idea of our blinking into nothingness with all our experiences, hopes and dreams only an illusion.

DATA:

Which do you believe?

PICARD:

Considering the marvelous complexity of our universe, its clockwork perfection, its balances of this against that... matter, energy, gravitation, time, dimension, pattern, I believe our existence must mean more than a meaningless illusion. I prefer to believe that my and your existence goes beyond Euclidian and other "practical" measuring systems... and that, in ways we cannot yet fathom, our existence is part of a reality beyond what we understand now as reality.

Really: what's wrong with seeing the Universe and the wonderful complexity of everything from the scale of galaxies to the scale of atoms - or smaller - and our very lives as something more than the sum of its parts?

Re:You know...

[EccentricAnomaly]

seriously though, I think a lot of these people just don't understand what evolution really is. They instantly think "men came from monkeys" and thus see it as a threat to their faith, put their fingers in their ears, and start singing their hymn of choice.

What really gets my goat is when creationists go after the Big Bang theory... The big bang theory was proposed by a Belgian Priest, George Lemaitre. He was an early expert on General Relativity who saw in the equations a way to find the moment of creation as described in Genesis.

Before the Big Bang theory, most astrophysicists thought the universe had no beginning... it just always was. But Lemaitre was able to prove there was a beginning to all of existence. Which was a profound result that should have been embraced by the so-called creationists.

AND, if you sit down and read Genesis it pretty closely matches the big bang theory... the universe starts out as pure light. What doesn't match Genesis is the current ideas on how planets form... Genesis says that the Earth formed first, and then the Sun, moon, and stars formed. ...So why don't the creationists go after all of the textbooks that say the opposite?? This is a much stronger contradiction with scripture than Evolution.

Re:You know...

[Coryoth]

So what's the alternative? Either you argue for an eternal Creator that set everything in motion - or you argue for an eternal Universe that just happened.

If you want to pose questions that don't make sense and can't be answered in any rational way, then yes that's what you would say. It's a meaningless question though - you may as well ask what comes after the end of time, or what lies beyond the bounds of the universe. Reducing down to the sort of paradox we're dealing with here: does the set of all sets that don't contain themselves contain itself?

If I say "Unicorns don't exist" I could, if I want to get trapped in the language game, dig myself a hole: by naming unicorns I'm referring to a concept with a name and that concept must then exist - that contradicts the rest of my statement that the thing I names doesn't exist. Either I can wallow in the internal contradictions, or I can admit that language has quirks and move on.

As best our understanding runs, time is not some independent quantity, it is part of spacetime, part of the universe. Time was created when the universe began. Asking what came before that is just a quirk of our language. How can anything come before the existence of time when the concept of "before" requires time to make sense?

You're just getting trapped in a language game, and rather than suggesting you simply don't want to play you're trying to answer a question that makes no sense.

Jedidiah.

God's evolution and the evolution of God...

[John Sokol]

Has anyone ever stopped to think about how well evolution works? And that it's all encompassing.

It's an inescapable law of nature. Everything from our software and computer designs (meme's) to music, language and DNA based life is affected by evolution.

Not only that, it's impossible to create something not effected by it.
Even our views of God and our religions evolve. (what blasphemy)

After studying evolution for some time, I became a believer in GOD! Because only god could have created something as powerful as evolution.

My argument goes like this. If we are made in Gods image, and we make machines and tools to build more complex things. Then shouldn't God also? If God were to what would that tool look like. EVOLUTION....

So all this arguing over GOD vs. Evolution is totally stupid. No Evil.

I see science as the study of God's creation. It's sort of our responsibility to understand is and in doing this we can come to know God better

Re:Tell me this...

[eutychus_awakes]

It is that argument precisely that has lead to the philosophical concept of an "un-caused cause." Causality can be reasoned back to infinity, which is a paradox of the same flavor as Zeno's Bridge and others. The solution to this and other paradoxes is to reason that an infinite sequence of events can in fact take place in a finite amount of time. For Christians (and other monotheists), this is the notion that God has always existed, that he is "un-caused" and outside of our understanding of space and time. For nonthesists (atheists and others), they use this paradox solution as evidence against God - that there was nothing for him to do in creation, it just happened as a natural consequence of fundamental physical laws to be yet discovered and understood. However, the philosophical weight actually goes against the naturalist in this argument, as we need to know what caused the events which caused the events which caused the universe to come into being. In short, God can be un-caused, but nature can't be.

Either way, I don't see a problem with the definition of science as presented in the article. It sounds a lot like what I was taught in public school in New Mexico - a state not known for its conservative education policies.

Interesting, relevant discussion

[Council]

Last night, I read the essay A Philosopher's Day in Court, by Michael Ruse, a philosophy professor and expert in evolution called by the ACLU's legal team to the 1981 challenge of the Arkansas law mandating equal time for creation science and evolution in classrooms. It's an absolutely thrilling read and apparently it was a wonderful debate; they called in all the experts and prepared a beautiful case, putting together all the stuff that's often not available in casual debate. They had experts on radiocarbon dating, biology, the philosophy of science . . . by the time the defendents got to Stephen Jay Gould, the final witness, they didn't even have the energy for half an hour of cross-examination. Gould was terribly disappointed.

It's wonderful to read, a great story of rationality and science triumphing over ignorance and propaganda. The text doesn't seem to be available online, but you should be able to track down the essay. I found it in the collection Science and Creationism, edited by Ashley Montagu, which has a number of other essays -- including a particularly scathing denunciation and call to arms by Isaac Asimov. Great stuff.

(Note: when googling for specific text, I just learned, sometimes the "omitted results" are precisely what you want; the Asimov article only showed up there.)

Re:Fundamental Fundamentalist question...

[enjo13]

I can answer with an andecote.

During my undergraduate years I was in an honors program at a certain college in the middle of Arkansas. This honors program, by its very design, was intended to challenge the fundamental belief system of its students. It exposed students to a variety of new religious philosophies, explored the abortion debate, and took on a variety of other issues that most of the students had never been exposed to before.

The results where.. shocking. About 80% of the incoming freshman in my class had some attachment to religion (more often than not 'fundamentalist' in nature). I remember my first week there we tore into the evolution debate. I had spent the first 18 years of my life assuming that everyone had simply moved past creationism, and to my shock a large group of honors students where arguing for the 'science' of creationism. I came to realize just how blind I had been to the problem.

Over the next two years the fundamentalists went in one two directions. Some simply refused to accept what they heard, and went into a sort of isolationist denial. For the most part these kids didn't finish the program.

For the rest (most?) the classes challenged their belief system. They began to realize that the reality of the world they live in was far different from the one their preacher had laid out for them. While very few turned on their religion completely, they did begin to abandon the literal bible ideas that they had began with. Most became some sort of 'liberal' christians.

The most interesting part was the backlash from the parents of these newly enlightened students. As the change really took effect the parents literally paraded in and yelled and screamed at the programs director. For these people, simply exposing new ideas to their kids (and thus challenging their belief systems) was more or less the same as turning their kids into satanists.

I finally came to realize that these parents FEARED knowledge. Religion, to them, is a form of security. Having a convienent belief system that takes all of the complexity out of the world is so comforting and so comfortable that operating outside of that scares the living hell out of them. When you have something like that, you become almost irrational in defending it. That means that secular ideas must be avoided at all costs.. because it is those IDEAS that break down their religous beliefs. That's why there are so many Christian book stores, music stores, craft stores, restuarants, and everything else. These people NEED to be immersed in a mono-culture because without it they may find out that life isn't as convienently explained as they NEED to beleive it is.

Ignorance is truly bliss.

The Blind Watchmaker -- great book on this subject

[adrenaline_junky]

An amazing book on this subject is "The Blind Watchmaker" by Richard Dawkins. I read it because Douglas Adams recommended it in some of his writings.

The subtitle of the book is "Why the evidence of evolution reveals a universe without design". It explains in great detail and clarity how in the long run natural selection allows only the mutations that are beneficial to continue to exist, leading to lifeforms that might *APPEAR* to have been designed, even though they were not.

One of the cases he looks at is the eye, with all of its complexity. Someone naively looking at it might easily assume that it is a clear example of something that must have been designed by a creator in advance. Dawkins shows how, over millions of years, tiny incremental advances could allow the eye to develop without any creator.

The only things required are 1) that whatever mutation that started as the eye, as simple as it may have been (perhaps a cell with the ability to detect light, for which brain cells have been shown to have the potential), gave at least a slight competitive advantage to the lifeform and 2) each additional mutation that took place over millions of years gave some slight advantage to the lifeform. Over a long time, in an environment with light, development of the eye becomes almost assured.

Complex biological systems work not because someone designed them to work, but because any deviation that does not work DIES. This naturally and inevitably leads to greater and greater complexity.

Re:Religion will continue to lose...

[RichardX]

Science will never present us with a peer-reviewed study proving once and for all that you should be good to your fellow man

Actually, I really don't see any reason why not.
It's a simple enough experiment. Get three sufficiently large groups of people all equal in as many regards as possible.
Group 1 are all shitty to each other for a year.
Group 2 just behave like they do normally.
Group 3 are all nice to each other.

At the end of the year, see which group has been most productive, has the highest standards of living, has the happiest people, or whatever other yardstick you choose to measure by.

I realise your point wasn't this specifically, and more that there are things that science can't answer for, but if you think carefully you might be surprised at how little actually cannot be answered by science (mostly philosophical issues, IMO)

David Attenborough

[Thrakkerzog]

I am a fan of Sir David Attenborough, whose documentaries for the BBC are simply fantastic. In my community, you can borrow most of them from the local library.

The following is a section from wikipedia, showing his rather sharp response to questions about creationism. It is quite possibly the best answer I have seen regarding the relationship between evolution & creationism.

From Wikipedia:

... Attenborough's documentaries exposed millions to the diversity of life on Earth, including, of course, viewers who subscribe to the belief that all life was directly created by God, known as creationism. In his series, Attenborough rarely explicitly speaks about the mechanisms of evolution. Instead, he describes the advantages of each adaptation in high detail -- why flowers are shaped in a certain way, why birds and animals migrate, how mechanisms of mimicry can serve as protection or to attract insects and animals, and so forth.

As such, his work has been cited by some creationists as exemplary in that it does not "shove evolution down the viewer's throat". Others have written Attenborough letters and asked him to explicitly refer to God as the creator of life. In an interview with the Sydney Morning Herald, he has responded publicly:

"My response is that when Creationists talk about God creating every individual species as a separate act, they always instance hummingbirds, or orchids, sunflowers and beautiful things. But I tend to think instead of a parasitic worm that is boring through the eye of a boy sitting on the bank of a river in West Africa, [a worm] that's going to make him blind. And [I ask them], 'Are you telling me that the God you believe in, who you also say is an all-merciful God, who cares for each one of us individually, are you saying that God created this worm that can live in no other way than in an innocent child's eyeball? Because that doesn't seem to me to coincide with a God who's full of mercy'." [2] (http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/03/24/1048354 544138.html?from=storyrhs)

He has explained that he feels the evidence all over the planet clearly shows evolution to be the best way to explain the diversity of life, and that "as far as I'm concerned, if there is a supreme being then He chose organic evolution as a way of bringing into existence the natural world."

I'm sorry, but you are wrong.

[Kiyooka]

Please mod parent down. He speaks from ignorance.

Buddha's philosophy does not see treating other people kindly "in a negative light". Buddha would not condone seeing this in a "negative" or a "positive" light. Buddhism would not condone doing kind deeds while thinking in terms of a "negative" or "positive" light. Let me explain: Buddhism is concerned with seeing things *as they are* and seeing how the mind creates our many "life's problems"--i.e. to see how humanity's problems are not metaphysical (some ancient curse from some supernatural being because of eating some ancient fruit, etc.) but personal (are you being greedy? impatient? ignorant? letting desire overcome you? etc.). With this comes the realization that we are, despite all our differences, the same. We were all born young and innocent, and have a core that remains so despite the experiences and struggles of later years. Compassion arises naturally then, for you see the same person in every stranger as well as in the mirror. Everyone is close to you like a family.

Christianity was like this once. That is probably why they tried to preserve it by using family titles: "Father" John, "Sister" Mary, "Brother" Joe. Unfortunately, the introduction of a god into all of this puts one thing above everything else in status: an unknowable being. That is all right, because younger or "weaker" people need something to hold onto before they can start making realizations and spiritually maturing on their own. The trouble is, what was a tool along the way became a fixation. Now you don't do good because you FEEL compassion for all sentient beings, but because if you don't some powerful being will punish you and make you suffer eternally.

Note: I am only 25, and this is merely what I've learned and realized so far. I'm still maturing and growing spiritually, and know there are literally millions of you /.ers out there more enlightened than me. I humbly invite your corrections.

If you want to learn more, I would recommend "365 Tao" by Deng Ming-Dao. Don't worry, Taoism and Buddhism are, ultimately, the same thing: mere names and aspects for the same universal truth (barring cults and perversions... they pervade the world).

I'd talk about Confucius too (he was greatly misunderstood to be a strict disciplinarian who emphasized conventions, which is too bad), but I'm late for my tutorial! This is especially bad, since I am the TA!

Re:"logical argument"

[Total_Wimp]

Wish I had mod points.

One of the things I hate about a lot of sci-fi is that so many writers of the genre misunderstand the role of logic in science.

Spock was supposed to be this super scientist, but he really wasn't. Though he was the ship's "science officer" you almost never saw him testing or experimenting. Instead, you heard him pull out his catch phrase "it's the most logical explanation," to solve just about everything.

Sam Malone from Cheers was billed as a non-scientist, but you always saw him experimenting with new lines to pick up women. He constantly re-used lines that evidence showed actually worked.

Spock was smart, but not a scientist at all. Sam wasn't too bright and didn't realize he was using science, but he easily beats Spock in his intuitive understanding of scientific principles.

Logic can be very powerful and it's an extremely important part of science, but without the testing and experimenting it can be very conterproductive. Real scientists propose many brilliant, logical ideas every year that testing proves to be flat out wrong.

If misguided lawmakers actually manage to confuse logic and science in our law books, it will be a sad day indead for our country.

TW

Re:The Blind Watchmaker -- great book on this subj

[John Carmack]

I just read that book recently, and while I enjoyed most of it, I found the chapter on the theories about the emergence of DNA extremely "hand wavey". The clay mineral culture idea was only presented as one possibility, but it didn't sound very convincing. If anyone has pointers to more compelling theories, I would be interested in reading them.

I always hated biology / life science in school because most of it was name memorization, but at the molecular biology level, it all starts looking digital...

John Carmack