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Using Copyrights To Fight Intelligent Design
An anonymous reader writes "The National Academies' National Research Council and the National Science Teachers Association are using the power of copyright to ensure that students in Kansas receive a robust education. They're backed by the AAS: The American Association for the Advancement of Science." From the release: "[they] have decided they cannot grant the Kansas State School Board permission to use substantial sections of text from two standards-related documents: the research council's 'National Science Education Standards' and 'Pathways to Science Standards', published by NSTA. The organizations sent letters to Kansas school authorities on Wednesday, Oct. 26 requesting that their copyrighted material not be used ... Leshner said AAAS backs the decision on copyright permission. 'We need to protect the integrity of science education if we expect the young people of Kansas to be fully productive members of an increasingly competitive world economy that is driven by science and technology ... We cannot allow young people to be denied an appropriate science education simply on ideological grounds.'"
We cannot allow young people to be denied an appropriate science education simply on ideological grounds
So that's exactly what we're going to do! Instead of getting mostly science with a bit of creationism thrown it, now it's no science at all. Good job denying the young people a science education and punishing the people not responsible.
Do you consider astronomy a soft science?
They are making a point.
Do you think the parents of Kansas will allow their children to go to schools who do not have the materials to teach science? The idea is to make a ruckus, raise the profile of the idiocy of the Kansas Board of Education, who are basically quietly destroying science education as Dorothy knows it in Kansas.
Now, if Kansas parents collectively shrug their shoulders and say,"Well, no science is Ok.", then they deserve to have their children shut out of every known college/university/whatever-you-name-it in the world (not just the US). Of course, in this case, the children become the victims. But, chances are the KBE will be voted out post-haste before they have a chance to reach this level of idiocy.
Mode (3) smart-aleck mode. Press * to return to main menu.
Sad that piddling language parsing, legalese, even copyright are what the American Thinkers have to trot out to "win" the debate with the American Believers. How did the intellectuals lose this one --> we had the religious sitting in public classrooms for decades, being taught science and certainly being taught evolution, with blind religious belief kept strictly separate from the curriculum.
Now, less than half of the U.S. "believes in evolution?"
Even I grew up in conservative Catholic schools, but I was taught evolution. It's not as if the majority of Americans were taught creationism in school. We've lost this battle on two fronts: in the classroom, obviously, where we're in complete control and we've no excuses, and then in the churches and temples across this country.
This is a massive, historic failure by American intellectuals and American education. Scientific methodology, philosophy, nay critical thinking have not been adequately communicated to the tens of millions of people who now also believe they, their country and their president "lead the world," "police the world," and are the world's "only Super Power." We have a Believer for what they call "the leader of the free world."
Here's a thought: 99% of us reading and writing here loved science and math class, we couldn't get enough of it. I still see some sigs here and there with "Jesus saved me and he can save you, too" appending an otherwise critically considered opinion. Generally speaking though, we're not blind Believers.
So I'm preaching to the choir, in some respects, except that rather than preaching I'm really saying: we've failed, failed the American people and in some regard the world, for at least one entire generation. What are we going to do about it?
It could be as simple as communication. Maybe the thinkers should learn to play organs and guitars, write some melodramatic music and stories about the origins of the universe, life and humankind. While marching around with candles and holding up portraits of Great Scientists, we can explain the afterlife (worm pudding), but in a comforting way ( maybe some of Thanatopsis?). We can discuss modding, karmatic /., and maybe Newton's third law of motion (action, reaction) so the congregation understands justice in a critically considered and organized nature.
If we dress science up a bit, teach it as Truth (not as right or wrong, but as critically considered and open minded). We could strongly recommend that all people, for all their life, attend a science class every Sunday morning.
I'm willing to propose that if families regularly attended science class together, we would all enjoy a more reasonable, and more peaceful world.
As much as we intellectuals have failed to "save" the believers, we can take a hard look at where this country has been since 2000 and say undoubtedly, that even moreso the believers have failed us all. Are not the biggest sinners walking this earth today also those most loudly denouncing sin?
BG
The problem is not the content of the philosophy of Intelligent Design. The problem is including that content in the science curriculum. It has nothing to do with science; it's proper place is in Comparative Religion, Philosophy, heck maybe even an English class.
The reason this is in the courts is because religious zealots are trying to inject their I.D. doctrine into the public school system under the aegis of "science" -- which it ain't. It's an end run against the seperation of church and state.
I don't know the origins of the Intelligent Design theory, but in it's current manifestation the raison d'etre is to get camel's nose under the tent.
As a Christian, I find the backlash against ID vaguely amusing. What needs to be understood is the distinction between micro- and macro-evolution.
I disagree with you entirely. Macro-evolution is, as you point out, a theroy, but it is a testable and falsifiable theory, and as such it conforms to the standard for a scientifi theory. ID on the other hand is neither testable nor falsifiable, and therefore a lovely theory, but not a scientific theory. Whether ID should be taught in schools or not is not the discussion point, but whether ID should be taught along side scientific theories in science class.
By all means, Kansas, teach ID as much as you wish. In some social-study class or other where it can be taught along side of Astrology, Divination, tea-leaf reading and the theory of the Abominable Snowman. Just not in science class.
I'm not aware of any fossil evidence showing half-way mutated species.
Sophistry, again. How do you prove a given fossil is not half-way mutated? Oh, and if you'd like a living beastie, how about the duck-billed platypus?
The overall problem with your reasoning is that you're saying essentially: Since evolutionary theory can't be completely verified due to the absense of a working time machine (bidrectional), therefore any other theory that is not completely verifiable is also acceptable. Never mind that ID is 100% non-verifiable and is useless for precition, whereas evolutionary theory does have predictive value.
Remain calm! All is well!
If conservatives don't believe in Evolution, then why are they so worried about bird flu? :-)
If religous zealots don't believe in Evolution, then why are they so worried about bird flu?
Ahhh...the classic gaps-in-the-fossil-record complaint. The funny thing is, whenever scientists find a new fossil that fits into one of these gaps, the Creationists don't see that as evidence for evolution. On the contrary, now there are two gaps, instead of one.
The FSM was invented for a purpose. The people pushing intelligent design claim to want to show that both facts and logic require us to conclude some supernatural force is necessary to bring about evolution.
Which force is usually left unsaid, for that would clearly expose the motivations behind ID. But we all know which force ID proponents have in mind - namely Jehovah, the god of Moses.
With the introduction of the inflammatory FSM, ID proponents are forced to show themselves for what they are - that is, supporters of a Christian, not a scientific, agenda. In other words, cards on the table.
That is true. Christian ideas are based on dogma and lore. Dogma and lore are not scientific.
No it isn't. If your scientific observation is guided by something other than a scientific process, then by definition it isn't a scientific observation.
Sure. Explore it all you want. It has been explored for thousands of years. You can explore the idea that the earth is flat too if you want. Just because some people are exploring it doesn't mean we need to start teaching that to children in science class. Teach that myth the same place we teach the other myths - in religion or humanities classes or the like.
To my mind, it's a pity that basic history of science and history of religion is not taught in schools. It might come as a shock to a lot of Americans to discover that a lot of the people who discovered that Creationism was bunk were mostly ordained clergy in the Church of England (==Episcopalians), working in Cambridge in the 19th century. As they gradually understood the geological history of the Earth and the fossil record, as they took on the ideas of evolution, the sheer weight of evidence caused a lot of them to re-think the basics of their faith. In other words, it was the people with the theological background - men who could easily read the Bible in the original, which is more than I imagine the Kansas Board of Education can do - who accumulated and accepted the evidence that the Bible could not be literally true, and had to think out their theology based on the new discoveries. The -I choose the word with care- garbage that is Intelligent Design is part of a trend of thought that any well educated student of theology will know is fatally flawed. So why is this discussion still going on?
The problem, of course, is that a lot of religion in the US grew in a cultural vacuum. It took place on the frontiers, well away from the academic world in Europe (and the East Coast.) That's how ludicrous religions like Mormonism were able to evolve: uneducated people with limited vocabularies didn't realise that prophets with names like Moron and Ether were either the result of ignorance or exploitation. It hurts me to say this, because I have relatives descended from a family member who was on the first of the Mormon treks to Utah and they are fine people. But they have also not had the educational opportunities of the English side of the family, who in recent history got their educations at Cambridge, Oxford and London and as a result regard both Mormons and Southern Baptists in much the same light as Wahabis or Hassidim. It's extraordinary that George Bush senior, for whom I have a lot of time, is an educated man who knows that Christian fundamentalism is deeply flawed, while his son claims to embrace it. But it's just like an educated Pakistani or Iranian struggling to understand why his son is picking up aggressive (and regressive) ideas down the madrissah.
Until I found that people were still taking this stuff seriously, I used to think that Richard Dawkins and Jay Gould protested too much. But now I realise that there is a huge tide of reaction in the US, and that it needs to be stopped and reversed or it will ultimately lead to new wars of religion. It's absurd to watch American politicians attacking reactionary Islam and claiming to spread democracy while being prepared, in support of reactionary Christianity, to reduce women's rights. Theologically, I suspect all fundamentalists are much the same at bottom, and they are never happier than when they are either fighting fundamentalists of different religions, or fighting non-fundamentalists of their own religion.
Pining for the fjords
Actually, humans and gorrillas branched off from a common ancestor which is now extinct, so Gorrillas are not our ancestors. The common ancestor was apparently very close to a modern gorrilla though so it's barely a correction. Besides, your argument is still correct regardless.
Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera - Jeanne D'Arc.
You claim equivalence of ID and evolution in this statement:
I'm claiming that neither should be taught as fact. Both (or neither) can be given as possible explanations for the origin of life.
You also include a straw-man, "the origin of life". Evolutionary theory does not explain the existence of the universe either. So what? It is not directed towards origin of life or existence of the universe. That does not diminish its utility in explaining and predicting how species change over time. Once again, sophistry: Look, evolution doesn't explain X! Therefore it is just as faith-based as ID! (or you could call this Chewbacca science)
As one (evolutionist) poster said earlier, ID and evolution are both MODELS.
I did not write that quote, but since you cite it I will take it that you claim ID provides a "model". Ok, what does it model--what can I use it to model and make a prediction of when an event will occur?
Finally, would you please explain what you mean by "macro-evolution"? I don't want the goal-posts moved on me if I try to respond to anything you say about "macro-evolution". Is it speciation?
Remain calm! All is well!
For a creationist: micro-evolution means whatever evolution has been shown to occur and macro-evolution everything that has not been shown yet. In that sense the distinction is completely self-consistent and it is tautological that evolution has not shown macro-evolution to occur. But of course it's a logical scam. Try to give a rigorous definition of species, I dare you.
A theory being scientific does -not- mean that it has been proven true or false. It means that it can be proven true or false, and that it is based on empirical observations of the natural world. Evolution meets these criterion, it can be tested using the scientific method. That doesn't necessarily mean that such testing will be "easy"-the existence of very many things must be proven indirectly, human beings haven't visited Mars, but we know it exists. No human or their equipment has ever been anywhere near a black hole, but we can be pretty certain that they exist. We haven't quite gotten a thermometer to the sun yet, but we can make a pretty accurate extrapolation of its surface temperature from what we know of heat, mass, and gravity. The fact that something has not been directly observed does not by any means that evidence cannot exist for it.
Same thing here. For one, the main point (speciation) which would make macroevolution possible is observable and provable. This is evidenced by everything from Darwin's visits to the Galapagos, to the unique Australian species, to yeast cultures in laboratories. That is observational evidence, and that is the definition of science. Granted, the theory can't be said to be "proven", but no scientist worth a crap ever considers a theory proven beyond any improvement anyway-just evidenced well enough to use as a working model. Evolution is to that stage.
On the other hand, ID could at -best- be said to be based on "negative" evidence-I don't believe the theories as to how this occurred naturally so it must have been designed. It offers no testable predictions (as evolution offers speciation and that the fossil record will grow increasingly more complex, both of which are testable and have been proven). It offers no evidence, other then some old books which have been in the hands of some very corrupt organizations known to have manipulated the public through religious propaganda. That hardly qualifies as a counter-argument to the fossil record in my book.
Last but not least, intelligent design -requires- creationism. Why do I say this? Well, let's look at it logically.
Anything which can come into being through the application of conscious thought by utilizing natural processes can by definition occur naturally and by chance. Therefore, any proponent of ID who acknowledges that evolution occurred but claims it was "set in motion" tacitly acknowledges that evolution could've occurred naturally. That doesn't mean that such a thing is likely (a thousand monkeys on a thousand typewriters would take a very long time to make a meaningful sentence, let alone the complete works of Shakespeare), but if that "meaningful sentence" can take things from there and reproduce and evolve on its own, it's a lot more likely. Therefore, to state that ID negates even the possibility of evolution, one -must- argue that the "intelligent designer" possessed and used abilities -outside- of the normal laws of nature.
Now, here is why that is not, and cannot be, science-there is no EMPIRICAL EVIDENCE for the existence of such a designer. Absent empirical evidence, such "theories" aren't scientific theories at all. They are conjecture, or religion, or philosophy. Not that those things don't have their place. But that place is not in a science classroom.
In closing, here are the four essential steps of the scientific method, and why evolution passes where ID fails:
ID does pass this, it observes and describes the existence of life, as does evolution.
Evolution hypothesizes that life came from extremely simple forms of life which evolved through the processes of micro and macroevolution to more complex forms. This process is testable, falsifiable, and empirical.
ID doesn't really put forth a hypothesis, in the sense that such a hypothesis would have to be testable, falsifiable, and be
To fight the war on terror, stop being afraid.
I'm sort of regurgitating some points brought up by Kenneth Miller that I saw on C-SPAN's coverage of a debate on evolution versus ID education at AEI. But he mentioned, among other things, one way in which the scientific method has been used to test evolution.
Most apes have 48 chromosomes. Humans have 46 chromosomes. Wholesale removal of a pair of chromosomes by mutation would almost certainly result in a nonviable organism. However, there is another possibility - that a mutation caused two chromosomes to fuse together into one (remember that the 46 human chromosomes are actually in 23 pairs). But this possibility presents the prediction that the characteristics of two chromosomes would be found sandwiched together in the human genome as one chromosome.
Since we now have the data from the Human Genome Project available, this prediction - stemming from the hypothesis that humans and modern apes have a common ancestor - can be tested. The ends of chromosomes consist of "telomeres", which are specialized and easily recognizable segments of DNA. By sequencing each chromosome, these telomeres can be detected. If two chromosomes were fused together end-to-end, there should be telomere sequences in the middle of a human chromosome.
Lo and behold, such a prediction was shown to be true - chromosome 2 contains the expected telomere sequences roughly in its center.
Now, this doesn't prove that humans and modern apes had a common ancestor. It does, however, lend additional evidence to that hypothesis. But that's how the scientific method works. You come up with a hypothesis, generate testable predictions based on that hypothesis, and then conduct experiments to test those predictions. The hypothesis is proven false when the testable predictions prove false. The more of these tests that the hypothesis survives, the more important it becomes as a theory worthy of acceptance into mainstream science - not as fact, but as our best current understanding of how something works.
On the other hand, ID produces no testable predictions of its own. Its survival is based on the false dichotomy between evolution and ID perpetuated by ID advocates - the claim that if evolution is tested to be false, then ID (nee creationism) must be true. This violates both basic logic and the scientific method - evolution and ID are not necessarily mutually exclusive, and in order for ID to be accepted as a scientific theory, it must produce testable predictions which, if proven false, would prove ID to be false as well. ID advocates raise no such testable predictions - all of their claims are actually tests of evolution, not of ID. Until ID can produce such predictions and can survive tests of those predictions, it cannot be regarded as a truly scientific theory.
Note that this isn't a matter of a lacking in the state of the art. Other scientific theories such as string theory can't currently be tested given today's technology, but they do produce predictions that, given sufficient advances in the state of the art, could be tested. ID doesn't even go that far.
More relevantly, the Flying Spaghetti Monster, Allah, Jehova, Menbari, Plain Old God, or Steve Gutenberg could do the creating through...evolution! Is there somewhere in the bible that says:
God created everything by snapping his fingers and saying "abracadabra", and you must take that literally. It is not a metaphor for anything, nor a simplification for easy consumption by your currently simple understanding, even though in about 2000 years folks will start to understand in more detail how God did it. This paragraph is being presented to you in 263 languages, including some that don't exist yet, so that nothing can be lost in translation for thousands of years yet...
Why can't God use effective tools such as evolution? Is it necessary for God to imagine stuff and it suddenly, immediately (even on OUR time scale) pops into existance?
I find people on both major sides of this argument to have their minds so very closed.
However, as far as teaching it in school...it is a religion, just like every other religion, and should be taught in a class where other religions are taught. To teach it elsewhere would be teaching a specific religion as more or less important than others, which is a Very Bad Idea.
Science classes are where one is taught what mainstream scientists are doing, which includes evolution, the observational approach to determining the mechanics involved in creation.
That book was written 2000 years ago, by people from that time (people, BTW, who were not JC himself but his friends and friends' friends), for people who weren't even literate, let alone able to understand advanced concepts such as hygiene or evolution.
With the advancement of science, as well as the advancement of the intelligence and cognizance (sic?) of the general population, we are in a position to understand stuff better. Why must religion remain in the same state it was 2000 years ago, and not advance with the rest of society? And why must people (on both sides) believe that accepting science means rejecting religion?
Procrastination -- because good things come to those who wait.
>I'm not claiming that ID is acceptable because macro-evolution isn't verifiable, I'm claiming that neither should be taught as fact.
h tml#morphological_intermediates_ex3
Actually, species have been created in the lab (a type of californian seaworm and many new fruitfly species) and others have speciated in the wild under historical observation - flowers, rats, mice, others. Check out the talk.origins link below, they have plenty of cited examples of speciation. Natural Selection allows both accurate prediction and domestication - we wouldn't have dogs, brocolli or corn if "evolution" didn't work.
>All that needs to be shown is several fossils demonstrating gradual change from 1 species to another.
Very well. Please observe the change from Australopithecus to the various species of Homo, currently represented by H. Sapiens. The shades of variation are so slight through the fossil record, yet obviously showing a several million year span of evolution and change. Paleontologists will fight over whether a skull is Homo Ergaster or just a big-brained Habilis, but they will all agree that the fossils show structured, reasonable, natural changes that can be predicted by applying Natural Selection. There, fossils showing gradual, species-changing modification. Somewhere (probably at change to Homo?) the human lines lost chromosomes among other radical shifts. A modern H. sapiens could not breed with an Australopith, or no moreso than with a chimp. Unless you deny the actual existence of our ancestors, this shows both micro and macro evolution.
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/section1.
The link has an example of what I'm describing, I also recommend the excellent "Extinct Humans" for further reading.
Akgoatley, I'm not sure where you fit on the opinion section, this is not personal: I don't understand where the controversy is, honestly. Anyone that passed high school biology should understand the basic processes of life, including Natural Selection and modern evolutionary concepts. "It's only a theory" is a bullshit argument, that people buy this shows the dire lack of scientific literacy in this country. This is people trying to deny reality and using fairy tales to placate themselves. If you need God to get through the day, I don't hold it against you. Don't turn this country into a 3rd-world theocracy because you're scared to know things. "Evolution" is only the first thing these American Taliban are after- they also question plate tectonics, the physics light and I'm sure plenty of other scientific concepts. I know this, because as a child I thrived at a 7th-Day Adventist school, but what they claimed was science, was not.
Science and technology drive this world. We are roadkill if we try to deny this - shame on Kansas for trying to shackle their children with theocratic garbage. I definitely support the AAAS in putting the copyright screws to them - this is effective political conflict.
Josh
We need a first generation of pioneers.
gigantino.tv - Heavy but weighs nothing.
Still, I have nothing against a disclaimer in an evolution unit saying "this is called the Theory of Evolution. It is not a law because it has not been proven, and other theories exist."
I do, because this implies fundamentally incorrect things about scientific laws and theories. Theories are never proven. Suggesting that a theory could somehow become proven and be law is dishonest. Laws are also not proven; they are simply a different type of statement in a science. Theories do not become Laws because Laws and Theories serve different purposes.
There's also the fact that no one is pushing for a disclaimer sticker for any other scientific theory, such as relativity theory, germ theory or atomic theory. Makes me question the motives of those pushing for evolution disclaimers.
STOP MISUSING APOSTROPHES, YOU MORONS!!!
Jesus H. Christ in a handbasket are you ignorant.
The theory of evolution is just that, a theory. For the lazy, a link to the word's definition http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=theory. For the stupid, what this means is that the Theory of Evolution is the best scientific explaination that we as humans have devised based upon the evidence available to us.
Your claim of the "obvious lack" of "millions" of fossil records is ignorant at best (I call it disingenious). It is based on the supposition that all mutations beget viable forms of life, which is provably false.
Having a training in science, and having therefore worked and studied with scientists, I feel safe to say that informed, rational debate concerning the "origin of life" is what most of us want of our public schools. Sure there are holes in our current explainations or maybe even they are way off, but science, in the end, will rectify that. The arguments put forward by Creationists concerning Intelligent Design are akin to sprinkling faery dust over the Theory of Evolution and saying that fills in the gaps. This is patently unacceptable to a mind that wishes to know how we, as organisms, came about and operate. This is why "Evolutionists" reject the teaching of Intelligent Design along-side of Evolution--because it is not science, it is some mysticism piggy-backing on science to explain the deficiences in said scientific reasoning.
As to the Thomas Kuhn quotation; human nature being what it is, can you not fathom how an individual responisble for one or more lives may make the mistake of ignoring pure scientific reason and allow concerns for reputation, or one's livelyhood to cloud one's judgement? When all you have is a hammer, everything begins to look like a nail.
For all you ID'ers out there I pose this question (based upon my understanding of ID): if ID were proved to be true, not by the existence of a God or somesuch, but by the fact that all forms of life on this planet were seeded with genetic material from some extra-terrestrial agent (presumably intelligent life forms), would that be vindication of your "theory" or would it cause some religious indigestion and encourage some evangelicals to leap off of tall structures (we can hope!) ? And before you say "thats ridiculous, we aren't the spawn of aliens!" I would point you back to your own "theory". That the core genetic matieral of all life on this planet was seeded by aliens is as belivable and provable as if it were done by a "God".
You can be an atheist and still not want to succumb to some weird cross-over sheep disease -- AC
And this is how the Incompetent Design nitwits are winning this argument. They've managed to convince the general public that (1) there are two major sides (in reality, there is one major side and one very small but incredibly vocal side) and (2) that the Evilutionists(tm) have closed minds. A scientist's mind should be open but not so open that their brain falls out. Allowing Intervention Divine into science class falls into the "brain falling out" category.
There is no debate here. There is a propaaganda war being waged against science by a bunch of ignorant Christian fundamentalists, who are essentially no better and no worse than the Islamic fundamentalists. They are winning the propaganda war because they have too much money, because of the $300 billion charity given annually in America, $280 billion goes to domestic Christian charities.
And I'm not picking on you. I see from the rest of your comment that you don't support Inconvenient Dribble in the science class. What I'm commenting on is that the propaganda war has been so successful that even you are saying that "both sides" have "closed minds". There are not two sides. The scientists do not have closed minds for rejecting debunked non-science. But even rational people are starting to repeat the mantra of "both sides" have "closed minds". What did that German dude say about "repeat a lie often enough"?