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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."
You beat me to it... that's exactly what I was thinking.
Mod parent up!
I am the maverick of Slashdot
Well, if that subject didn't get your attention, nothing will.
I'm an inquisitive type. I could go either way on the whole creation/evolution thing. And actually the two aren't mutually exclusive, unless your a fundamentalist from either of the camps. If you're for complex design, who's to say it wasn't designed to evolve? hmm....
I found this collection of quotations from MANY pro-evolution scientists/believers to be quite interesting...
http://emporium.turnpike.net/C/cs/bias.htm
It left me puzzled as to why there is even a debate. We've got one faith based opinion vs. another as far as I can tell.
Fire away oh feuding fundamentalists! I know I'm surrounded, but I've got asbestos underware on.
I didn't want to have positive karma anyway!
"And given that there is no proof of such a being, apart from events and instances attributed to it, it is a matter of faith, and thus not of science."
But the same could be said of evolution. There is no proof-only evidence. I think there is evidence of God as well.
From The Morning
[FromTheMorning]
Not that I love Karl Popper on every matter of scientific philosophy, but his criterion of falsifiability is an essential component of any definition of science.
This is the problem with "intelligent design". It is unfalsifiable by construction. In ID this issue is relatively subtle; in "young earth creationism", it's painfully obvious. How can you possible falsify the following hypothesis: the universe was created 10 seconds ago, with you already reading this comment, light already on its way from distant stars, fossils already in the ground, radioactive elements already distributed to give the impression of great age of the earth, etc. The answer, of course, is that you can't.
If an intellectual construct is not falsifiable, then it's not science. Period.