Slashdot Mirror
California Lawmaker Seeks Climate Change as part of Public Education
Andrew Feinberg writes "A California State Senator is seeking to mandate climate change as part of the standard science curriculum. Other members of the legislative body seek to teach an opposing view. 'Simitian noted that his bill wouldn't dictate what to teach or in what grades, but rather would require the state Board of Education and state Department of Education to decide both. Although global warming is mentioned in high school classes about weather, it is currently not required to be covered in all textbooks, said the head of the California Science Teachers Association ... teachers would have plenty to discuss: rising levels of carbon dioxide, how temperatures are measured globally, and what is known and not known about global warming.'"
Um, that's called establishing a curriculum and its no different than mandating other specific educational goals. In public schools there should be a basic standard. That standard includes at a minimum what concepts must be covered in a subject.
The Creationsts probably wish that mandated curriculum didn't exist in the first place since intimidating individual teachers in small towns is easier than school boards (Kansas notwithstanding.) However as they do exist, the creationists will use them to the best of their abilities to cripple science education and push their religious agenda.
As someone who actually studied climate science I appreciate the attempt at raising public awareness of the issue. However, I fear it will suffer the same fate as evolution education and turn into a political minefield where neither side really "wins" and the real losers are the students who end up with a half-assed and confusing discussion of a very important issue.
The biggest problem with discussions of global warming is they have become so politicized (by both sides) that the actual science is getting lost in the noise. The "save the environment" types have probably caused as much harm in getting to a real solution as the "skeptics". It's all about soundbites and rarely does the science get laid out in a sane and understandable way to the general public.
My point is not whether or not climate change is happening. My point is that whenever it's brought up in schools, like any environmentalist stuff (like when I was in school) it's always bent towards the OMG if we do some pointless exercise we'll save enough energy to (insert insignificant result here) and OMG we must do something now support this legislation. The curriculum is always bent towards supporting the fanatical environmental agenda, always has been since I was in school, and legislating more climate change curriculum despite the politician's best interests will always result in more of the same for kids to have to listen to.
What I'm saying is it doesn't matter what valid climate change data there is, it will be distorted and mistaught in our schools to support yet another draconian measure that Al Gore or whoever else will want to push upon us and that's why I'm against it. Scientists are free to do the climate control studies they want, just stop pushing it on us through the schools because the schools from my experience are the last place you can expect any worthwhile study of it.
Ok?
Sorry, I'm not seeing any religion here. Unless you're referring to a religion involving summary dismissal.
Well, climate change is an important contemporary issue in science, no matter what your opinion. I think injecting a bit more science into the whole thing would only be a good idea. Then again, judging from some of the comments regarding climate change, it seems to me that science education in general needs to be addressed.
/. written though it were gospel:
The thing that amazes me about this whole thing is that (otherwise intelligent) people seem to have been suckered by marketing. For example, companies that advertise about C02 being a harmless gas are simultaneously investing in arctic oil exploration (on the assumption that the arctic ice is melting). Maybe the biggest thing that needs to be taught in science is objective reasoning - something that seems fairly thin on the ground..
Here's something I often read on
"correlation != causation" - true, but I'd challenge anyone to name a single scientific "law" we _know_ to be caused, and don't "merely" observe correlation.
The other thing that amazes me are the number of people who believe really weird things about climate change research. For example, I've read comments alleging that climate scientists "tweak" their models to fit known weather patterns, but never verify those models on other data. This is such a patently ridiculous allegation that in any other field it would be laughed off the stage, but for some reason there is a group of people who are desperate to dis-believe in climate change no matter what the evidence.
I think this is a critical issue, but I'd rather not turn it into a situation where people are fighting over whether they get to teach the answer. Rather, I'd make it a mandate to produce students who are capable of intelligently discussing the questions.
Here's what I'd teach them:
Enough chemistry to understand what a compound is, and how atoms rearrange in order to make different molecules, and how energy is required and released in the process. One could teach this from a fairly young age, even without a full chemistry course. Just so they're conversant in the concepts and can know they want to learn more.
Enough math to know what exponents are and what the difference is between a straight line and non-linear curve is. Even if they blur the huge difference between squares and exponentials, the notion that one can't simply rely on knowing that if it took x years to do something, it will take x more years to do twice that, it would be good.
Also, again in the math front, enough math to understand simple optimization issues--nothing fancy. The ability to optimize the area of a rectangle is almost enough. They must be able to do simple things like know when it's good for a few people to do big things and when it's better for a lot of people to do little things and when neither of these will work and everyone has to do something big in order for anything to matter.
Enough math to be able to comprehend the sheer quantity of waste and pollution in the world.
Enough statistics and probabilities to be able to understand why something can happen one year, not happen another, and then happen again ... and yet still be a trend. That is, they must understand the
difference between a tendancy toward something and a promise that something
will occur.
Enough logic to understand what it takes to prove and disprove existential and universal quantifications.
Enough philosophy and morality to understand and discuss risk analysis and the general good.
Enough politics to understand how it's BOTH the case that an obviously good idea won't necessarily be adopted by the free market, and something that is forced by government won't necessarily fix a problem.
Enough economics to know how to calculate which investments are going to pay off and which are just boondoggles lining someone's pockets in the short term at the expense of the long-term good.
Enough history to revive the notion of sacrifice for the greater good and get people out of the "it's all about me" mode.
Enough biology to understand what an ecosystem is and how one thing affects another. There was a very good episode of the Wild Thornberrys where the ecosystem got upset by a small change and there was a big disaster. Required viewing of that would almost suffice in my eyes. Just enough to be able to understand the significance of the reefs going away or some plankton going away or polar bears going away in some sort of operational terms that didn't make it seems "distant and unrelated".
Enough common sense to understand that not all things labeled bio-degradable, green, or earth-friendly are actually saving people money. We don't have to teach which ones are, just that the question has to be asked and that the answers might be deliberately obscured.
And, just maybe, enough religion to understand that Noah didn't survive the Flood by sitting back and assuming it was God's will or that God would just take care of him.
And enough to know that the true meaning of Faith is that you have enough confidence in what you believe that you are not threatened by truth and science.
Bravo to the United Church of Christ for its recent "not mutually exclusive" stance on science and technology. (I'm not a member of that church, by the way. I just saw notice of this and thought it was cool.)
Kent M Pitman
Philosopher, Technologist, Writer
They might ... GASP ... learn about the scientific processes involved?
Actually no, that's what is assumed. What actually happens is that you learn a lot of fanatical enviromental hyperbole in the name of science.
The world is not going to end. Over time though certain parts of the world will become less habitable due to climate change (some places will become more habitable but that's not much comfort for the people whose children die due to an increase in tropical disease). I don't know why you think a 3 degree increase (which is on the lower end of predictions, most seem to be closer to 5 degree) is insignificant. That's actually a fairly substantial increase, especially when the ecosystem doesn't have thousands of year to compensate for the increase.
The problem here is that you need to have a faith in environmentalism to believe that human-caused global warming exists. We have good scientific reason to *expect* the globe to be warming, and to continue to warm for another two to three hundred years. We also have good evidence to expect that global warming will be a good thing. It's the global *cooling* that we need to worry about .... in two or three hundred years. Ya think anybody is going to start preparing for the real threat? If you think I'm talking smack, picture Chicago buried under a mile of ice. It happened before, it WILL happen again. A little bit of warming is nothing compared to the next ice age.
Don't piss off The Angry Economist
As much as I detest the idiots out there trying to hush-hush climate change significance, I also detest this idea that we must mandate "global warming" be taught in school. What about we just teach a well-rounded science curriculum? Why not mandate nano-science as part of the curriculum while we're at it?
The fundamental problem I have with this whole thing is that it would seem to be teaching an element of valid science for a political cause rather than for educational merit alone.
I can foresee a real problem with this. The issue has already become politicized, which can be nothing but detrimental to science (political science is an oxymoron). If the science was actually taught, then the students need to be exposed to the entire argument, both pro and con. If one really thinks an hypothesis is mistaken, the reasons why need to be addressed at a level that takes in more than a "you're wrong. Yeah , and so are you!" level of childish dispute. At the same time they will need to gain a working knowledge of what climate is, including the sad truth that the climate does nothing BUT change, that for hundreds of millions of years the planet has warmed and cooled dramatically, often within generational time spans. They will have to learn that contrary to political rhetoric, science does not operate on the basis of "consensus." A scientific consensus is meaningless in the face of one well supported contrary. Worse, once exposed to the pros and cons of a hypothesis they'll have to accept that some will accept the idea of anthrogenic climate change, others will reject it, while still others may find it a reasonable but unproven hypothesis. It would be a great curriculum taught properly, but educators and politicians would certainly get in the way of such program.
For the record I'm a member of the third group, that consider the hypothesis empirically reasonable, but badly supported (if at all). Most proponents of the "proven" view fail to adequately discuss critical data acquisition issues like how and where atmospheric concentrations are measured to name just one glaring fault. Another problem is the failure to consider climate on a long enough temporal base. Data selection has often censored periods that would "obscure" the conclusions of the analyst - believers debate the Medieval warm spell or the mid-Holocene event for example, using very poor arguments that ignore empirical facts. There are very clear geological and archaeological data records associated with both those events that "climatic" arguments to the contrary can neither explain nor deny.
Proponents of the "not real" tend to see human activity as ineffectual, not worth considering, ignoring the clear evidence from many different parts of the world that we are very much a part of what determines the "natural" environment at any given time and that civilizations may have more of an effect than tribal societies. So called "native " California grasslands vanished when autumnal burning was suppressed allowing the more quickly growing annual grass species that came in the coats of Spanish sheep to spread. The native grasses relied on human environmental effects. With curtailment of that human effect, the perennial grasses lost the environmental advantage. They were no more "natural" than the present state of affairs. In Britain a butterfly population was recently reported recovering after it was determined that they were dependent upon an ant, that in turn was dependent upon warm soil temperatures, that in turn were dependent upon grazing keeping grass short. The butterfly is DEPENDENT upon a human effect in the environment. We are very much a part of the environment and given our numbers and resource demands, we really should be interested in our interactions with it.
------ The only greater hazard to your liberty than n politicians is n+1 politicians.
the reflexive and snide referral to the principles of atmospheric science as religion indicate to me that an increasingly large group in society are hostile to science.
They're not hostile to science. It's Slashdot, it's all about teh Science. What the posts are hostile towards is *religion*, which is what the Global Warming Cult has become. It's got everything a good old school religion could want: High Priesthood whom one must dare not defy; a clear blue print designed to funnel money away from the wealthy to said Priesthood and their cronies; a vaguely mystical component ("mother earth" "gaia"); the stern, self-righteous demands from on-high for sacrifice and penitence (while priesthood and cronies fly about in their gulf streams); a complete and holistic set of rules which stretch across diet, fashion, pets, transportation, and commerce; and now more and more, really scary and dangerous zealot foot-soldiers and crusaders.
Global Warming not a religion? Dude, in two hundred years, the same schools being forced to teach it today as "science" will be teaching it as social studies alongside Christianity, Islam, and Judaism. Unless it becomes a state religion in the US and EU, in which case all mention of Christianity, Islam, and Judaism might be expunged from the curriculum (religions hate competition).
Sure it can. You can "indoctrinate" people in a "logical scientific way" because what you're proposing is to stuff students with a enormous body of information that would take a PhD in one of the relevant fields to understand. Unless you happen to be actively researching the field, either from avocation or professionally, it will be impossible for anyone to be able to gather enough expertise to really understand the data and it's implications.
And there's the rub. Climate Change / Global anything is a hugely complex issue with lots of side arguments, issues and complexities. And that's just the technical aspect of it all. Your lecture series didn't even start with the social and political ramifications of the confluence of global climate change and the rapidly expanding human population on said globe.
Your curriculum is great, more suited to a high functioning college student than random high schooler. But it still doesn't really help and it's not remotely practical for a high school education. If high school could just teach students to understand the scientific method we would be a lot further along in having a populace with some understanding of how we can possibly deal with many of our upcoming issues.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
a complete and holistic set of rules which stretch across diet, fashion, pets, transportation, and commerce; and now more and more, really scary and dangerous zealot foot-soldiers and crusaders.
C'mon yourself. That last bit is a hyperbolic reduction meant to provoke a negative response and justify the whole "religious fanatic" analogy. I'll take it otherwise the day somebody sets off a bomb, tortures someone, or mandates genital mutilation in the name of curbing human-exacerbated global warming.
The problem I have is that the people that belong to the climate change cult refuse to explore the possibility that, some, all, or even most of the present climate change could be caused by factors other than C02 emissions. Increased solar activity, methane production from livestock, and cyclical long-term climate change may all have something to do with the current climate change, but the majority of environmentalists refuse to discuss anything but CO2 emissions. In addition, I find it very worrisome that Al Gore, arguably one of the most notable individuals in the global warming movement, is so heavily involved in carbon trading. There really isn't much doubt that climate change is occurring, the question is why.
You don't make the poor richer by making the rich poorer. - Winston Churchill