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Review of Discovery Institute's Evolution Textbook
Darwinned writes "Intelligent Design is still a hot topic, as evidenced by recent legislation mandating that it be taught in school. Pro-ID group Discovery Institute has released an evolution textbook for use in schools, but a review shows it to be chock full of bad science and questionable reasoning. 'The book doesn't only promote stupidity, it demands it. In every way except its use of the actual term, this is a creationist book, but its authors are expecting that legislators and the courts will be too stupid to notice that, or to remember that the Supreme Court has declared teaching creationism an unconstitutional imposition of religion.'"
1 - In The Beginning...
2 - The Great Flood (Where are all the Unicorns?)
3 - Jesus, Dinosaur Wrangler
4 - Darwin, What a Jerk.
5 - The Scientific Method - Hooey or Baloney?
In the US, its not fashionable to know math or science. It's not fashionable to work hard. 'Being liked' is in. Girls are encouraged to look pretty and boys are encouraged to be force wielding leaders (to later wind up as PHB's?).
Look at kids' movies and TV shows. The message is that all you have to do is believe in yourself. Nothing else. God forbid we ask these delicate flowers to do more than the minimum.
Prosperity is being taken as a birthright. I half wonder if the outcry against illegal aliens is due to the fact that these people work hard. The complainers may one day be expected to. Can't have that!
Mainly because they don't only want to teach their children this stuff but they want to force public schools to teach every child this stuff. It is a slippery slope. Once they teach "the controversy" what else will they want to tech?
http://www.popularculturegaming.com -- my blog about the culture of videogame players
The grandparent was probably referring to Edwards v. Aguillard.
I read the internet for the articles.
What's really bugged me the most about Intelligent Design is that its proponents attacked the wrong target.
As I understand science, it's a cycle: observe, explain, hypothesize, test; and repeat. Evolution as a theory, holds to this cycle. But Intelligent Design is just: observe and explain- the explanation being essentially "God did it." There's not much reason to keep examining things when you feel you've reached that stage, is it? It's an intellectual dead end.
If *I* were in charge of promoting/legitimizing ID, I would put it up against the Big Bang/String theorists and the like. When we can't yet explain why the universe is the way it is on a fundamental (quantum?) level, *THAT's* when you can trot out the "God did it"s. Evolution is just too well researched and tested a subject to topple (logically and rationally, that is).
Were Unicorns mentioned in the Bible before Noah? (The Irish Rovers song doesn't count)
Anyway I think that the Slashdot usage of the term "Creationism" should be replaced by the phrase "Young Earth Creationism"
(YEC for short)
There are people of many Faiths that believe in Creation and a Creator, but that the Creation event was many (billions) of years ago, not 4004BC, and that the cosmos and the creatures therin have evolved over that (long) time.
Why are we fighting this? It's futile. Let them believe what they will believe, let them teach what they want
If that's the case, why are you posting your own opinion on slashdot? Let the slashdot readers believe what they will believe and let the submitters submit what they want.
You fail to understand that if they do WHATEVER IT TAKES to convince other people of their truth, those converted people will do WHATEVER IT TAKES to convince EVERYONE of their truth. If we don't do anything to stop them, soon it will be 1984 all over the country. And I'd say we're on the edge of seeing that happening.
I saw a t-shirt the other day that said:
SCIENCE
It Works, Bitches!
I thought it was funny...
"I might have made a tactical error in not going to a physician for 20 years." -- Warren Zevon
Darwin's Black Box was shown to be wrong in the Dover trial. Behe's central premise that things are irreducibly complex was proven wrong both with hard scientific data (about the flagella being irreduceably complex, but the bacterial Type III secretory system has a subset of the parts, though they serve a different function) and logically (Behe says a mousetrap is irreducibly complex, but it is useful as a tie clip if you remove two key parts).
The judge in the Dover trial summed it up by saying:
The Riddle of Epicurus
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
If God is willing to prevent evil, but is not able to
Then He is not omnipotent.
If He is able, but not willing
Then He is malevolent.
If He is both able and willing
Then whence cometh evil?
If He is neither able nor willing
Then why call Him God?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Back on topic, the Discovery institute is dedicated solely to enriching its members, any other claim is nonsense.
A learning experience is one of those things that say, 'You know that thing you just did? Don't do that.' - D. Adams
(pun intended)
i don't think you are going to find much support for this textbook on slashdot
however, what you will find is a lot "hear, hear" and then... nothing. or worse, cynicism
there's a lot of issues in this world where all you can do is whine and bitch and moan, and are otherwise helpless to effect change. this is not one of those issues
ALL of these creationist initiatives are happening on state and local levels. you CAN do something about it if you live in one of these areas
if you do live in an area creationists are making headway, do something about it, please. if for nothing than else than simple civic pride, that the residents of your {state/ town} are not all ignorant buffoons, that some of you actually understand the value of a critical mind, and even more importantly, understand the value of an involved electorate and citizens active for causes they believe in
how is it possible that such idiots can get creationism in our schools? because THEY GET INVOLVED
there are too many voices here on slashdot that will speak loudly about right and wrong, and never actually get involved to make sure their government stands up for that
please, do not feed me the standard psychological lines of learned helplessness that convinces you you can effect no change on this issue or that issue. on creationism, on a state and local level, you CAN do something about this. you SHOULD do something about this. DO IT
if not you, who?
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Ah, but the beauty of YEC is that it really can't be disproven. Any time you have evidence that the Earth is older, all they need to say is that God created it to look older.
This is fundamentally why YEC should not be taught in a science classroom. It is not disprovable and thus not science.
If you mod me Overrated, you are admitting that you have no penis.
Years ago when Georgia was going through the ID vs Evolution in school issue I saw the national media on site at a high school ask a local student his thoughts. He responded that he wanted ID taught because he knew evolution was full of holes and he could disprove it himself.
Well step up young man and claim your Nobel prize that's waiting you.
Where did he get his (mis)information from? It's not the local drug dealers. It's not the science classes. It's not video games.
It's the churches.
There are many churches that deal in lies to peddle their agenda of pushing evolution out of the classroom. It's not a conspiracy theory it's a fact of life in this country.
If man came from monkeys why are there still monkeys? People ask that because they've been told that. They've been told that is a hole in evolutionary theory so they parrot it. They aren't told that at the drive through line at McDonalds. They are only told that type of information in religious circles.
I used to argue with Answers in Genesis for years. It was like pulling teeth trying to get them to remove content that was completely non-factual or completely taken out of context. Letter after letter would be sent with references to the correct information, but it would take months or years (or sometimes never) to get them to correct their website. Even though they updated their site regularly. There was no incentive for them to provide correct information because incorrect information is the only way they could build their case against evolution.
The fact that some Christians can't reconcile their religion with a very well grounded theory that has withstood the rigors of science for over 100 years isn't my problem.
Regardless of those two examples, the entire concept of irreducible complexity is complete bullshit.
Evolution does not simply add parts. It also removes them. And indeed there is a great incentive for this to happen, as every unnecessary part is an added metabolic cost to the organism which contains it.
So let's say for a moment that some structure was discovered that were irreducibly complex. Does that disprove evolution? Absolutely not! It just means that the structure evolved from something more complex, not less.
If you mod me Overrated, you are admitting that you have no penis.
That would be very convenient for the creationists, because YEC is disappearing these days. The creationists have learned that if they make definite scientific statements (e.g, that the Earth is 6000 years old), they risk being proved wrong by scientific evidence. Instead, they've learned to say vague, fuzzy things about intelligent design, while avoiding making testable statements about facts.
Right, and those people aren't creationists. The wikipedia article gives a good definition of creationism: "Creationism is the religious belief that humanity, life, the Earth, and the universe were created in their original form by a deity (often the Abrahamic God of Judaism, Christianity and Islam) or deities, whose existence is presupposed.[1] In relation to the creation-evolution controversy the term creationism (or strict creationism) is commonly used to refer to religiously-motivated rejection of evolution.[2]" In other words, the commonly accepted definition of creationism is that it's in contradistinction to evolution, so the people you're describing, who accept evolution, aren't creationists. "Creationism" is just one of those words that doesn't mean exactly what you'd think it meant based on its etymology. For comparison, "communism" doesn't mean belief that people should live in communes, and a "Republican" in the US isn't defined as someone who's happy that our form of government is a republic.
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When I'm a decade or two older, the young people who will be affected by these decisions today will just be entering the workforce, bringing their bright new ideas into focus, and beginning to drive the next round of scientific and technological advances.
I do not want these people to believe that one of the most successful, important, and useful scientific theories in history is a lie. I do not want these people to believe that "God did it" is any kind of reasonable scientific answer. I don't want the doctors and medical researchers who determine the length and quality of my old age to be spouting off about "irreducible complexity" and other such nonsense.
You're wrong about losing the battle. Here we are conversing on a globe-spanning information network using unimaginably powerful computing machines. We've always won, and we'll keep on winning, because in the end we're right and they're wrong. But it won't be thanks to people like you.
If you mod me Overrated, you are admitting that you have no penis.
Your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
You can imply that there is bias all you want, but there is one very big difference between the two. The biologist has studied biology, the scientific process involved in researching the subject and is able to make an evidenced based critique of an ID argument.
Rebuttals from the ID camp contain no such expertise or references, and are usually based on long refuted arguments against evolution, but little or nothing that truly supports ID.
This isn't a case where he-said she-said attempts to discredit both sides will work. One side clearly has evidence on their side, and the other does not.
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Since you seem like a friendly fellow I'll save you a little money. Every issue of the newsletter just contains the same two words, in large type on the front page, and nothing else.
If you mod me Overrated, you are admitting that you have no penis.
What's unconstitutional is putting it into the science curriculum at public schools (violating the establishment clause of the first amendment). As far as "forcing people to teach ____," all public school curriculum is "forced" on teachers in the sense that it is established at the state and local government level.
And while we're at it, can we stop giving:
^ These idiots a veneer of respect by treating them as if they're rational? They AREN'T. They are functional (but nevertheless, crazy as a shithouse rat) religious zealots who do not respect science unless it serves their beliefs (see also: nuclear power, IC engine, medicine, etc.).
Piyush Jinda, Governor of Louisiana (George Bush with a funny name, if you ask me) is trying to sneak this shit right back in.
Louisiana: Last on the good lists, first on the bad lists, and determined to keep it that way.
I can say that because I'm a rare escapee from that temple to ignorance. Still, it's a lot of fun to visit the Bayou State.
I'm not sure how best to explain it so I'll try with a simple example.
Let's say the structure you're trying to evolve can be represented as ABC. The letters are different parts. Together, ABC performs some useful function. Maybe it senses light, or moves the organism, or converts energy. Doesn't matter.
Now imagine that AB and BC are both useless constructs. The stance of the IDers is that ABC would have to evolve from constituent parts, by starting with one letter and adding more until ABC is achieved. But, they claim, since both AB and BC are useless, they would never evolve, and so ABC could never come to be. Therefore, the existence of ABC in an organism is, essentially, proof that God Did It.
However, imagine if C is some sort of useful construct all by itself. The actual function of C could be completely different from the function of ABC, it just has to be useful in some fashion. Then we add D, another part which is not part of ABC, to form CD. Imagine that CD is also useful in some manner, potentially related to C, potentially not. Then B is added which gives it more of a useful function, so organisms have the useful construct BCD. Then A is added to give the final functionality in the more complex form of ABCD. Then D, being redundant, is eventually dropped from the organism. Therefore you have evolved the useful and "irreducibly complex" construct ABC from parts.
If you mod me Overrated, you are admitting that you have no penis.
They are functional (but nevertheless, crazy as a shithouse rat) religious zealots
I think it's worth pointing out - particularly to people in the US - that the Muslim countries of the Middle East led the world in science and technology, once. Why do you think so many stars have Arabic names? Why do so many words in science have Arabic roots? Think carefully...
Now think about what happened when they let the conservative religious crazies take control.
Just sayin'
So: consider the arch bridge.
An arch bridge is held up by internal pressure. Remove any part of the arch bridge and the whole thing falls into the river. An arch bridge is irreducibly complex, by the creationists' definition. It works as a whole, or not at all; take any part away and it collapses.
Does that mean, then, that all the arch bridges in the world were assembled all at once? Shipped pre-fab to the site and installed as a whole?
Not at all! When we build such things, we use scaffolding. We first build a huge, clumsy, inefficient structure, a grid of poles and joints. This structure is flimsy, it cannot bear very great weight, nor carry much traffic - but it does span the river, it is indeed a bridge. And it can be built up piece by piece - it will stand up even if the span is not complete. Then we work on the arch bridge itself. We build up stone alongside our scaffolding. The scaffolding holds up the stone and the stone braces the scaffolding. Each new stone added strengthens the whole structure.
And there comes a day when the arch bridge is completed. Now we find that the whole scaffolding structure is redundant - it can be done away with. That leaves only the arch. The irreducibly complex arch.
The same could easily go for living things. Evolution can take away as well as add, and if some older structure has been made redundant by a newer development that grew from it, then that structure can surely be done away with. Behe's notion of irreducible complexity would only be a problem if evolutionary theory only allowed for organisms to become more complex over time - but if an organism is already complex, and it happens to benefit that species to become simpler, then it will do so. And it might well arrive at an 'irreducibly complex' structure from above.
It's all a hangover of the old idea of a 'great chain of being'. It's a common misconception: men are more advanced than apes, which are more advanced than dogs, which are more advanced than... you get the picture. This is the kind of thinking where the X-Men are the 'next stage' of evolution. Evolution doesn't work that way. There's no great plan, no distant goal, no inevitable increase of sophistication. Evolution does whatever works, and if that means eliminating redundancies, refactoring, and going ahead with a simpler design, then so be it.
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
I've met many creationists who, for example, thought that fossils were put there because of the flood and they just happen to line up in what appears to be a historical record because God is testing their faith.
If you mod me Overrated, you are admitting that you have no penis.
I want someone to hit the nail on the head with creationisms, but no one seems to ever do that online so I'll give it my best shot.
/. of armchair intellectuals decrying the ignorance of the bible belt hicks, while smugly reassuring each other that they have the "best" ideology. It is through an understanding of their actions and why they do them and coming to terms with them. Calling their text book stupid isn't going to get them to stop. I don't know what the solution is, but I know what it isn't.
Evolution in no way denounces god. Even the Catholic church says the view science has on the universe and evolution are compatible with their faith: http://rellavent.blogspot.com/2008/09/catholic-church-acknowledges-evolution.html And it's pretty easy to reconcile the two: universe created in a big explosion that created light, land and heaven coalescing into stellar bodies, water and land separating as it cools, life slowly taking to the land, and man ultimately being removed from the bliss of the primordial garden by eating the fruit of knowledge. It's god, if evolution happened without his help at all, he set up the universe knowing full well what it would do. ID in the 6k year old vein makes no sense and actually is insulting to the power of god.
This brings up the problem of the creationists. Science as it is written, is not in that strong of a conflict with the bible as it is written, so why do they continue to push it?
we know the symptoms: text books, politicians, online spaming, but what causes the disease? Or to frame it in a more humanistic perspective: what do they gain by perusing their agenda? This should be the prime argument in creationism, not the symptomatic treatment that has been prevalent.
My theory is that creationism is viewed as being linked to a value system that creationists view as being under attack from secular radicals, and evolution is taken as a battle field to fight against this because Evolution is pretty removed from their day to day lives, if they chose to believe fantasy on it they wont hurt them selves like they would if they choose to believe fantasy about refrigeration. Basically they are picking ID as the place to make their stand to defend their way of life.
That brings up the other point, why do they feel their way of life is in danger? It could be politicians playing it up for votes, it could be changing social economics beyond anyones control, it could be pure paranoia, and it could be that people in the cities and scientific community actually attack them. I think its a combination of all those factors, but i also think one of the largest factors is the fact that Secular atheists do actively attack the religious beliefs of others.
I know this from having been to several meetings. The atheist community is one of the most bitter and spiteful I have ever seen and actively wish to see all "non-rational" belief systems torn down and replaced with their "belief" system on a level that matches any religion. Pure tribalism at its best, two sets of group-think throwing stones at each other. the Atheists attack christen beliefs and they attack the atheists through ID.
The solution to the problem is not the one shown on
> Now think about what happened when they let the conservative religious crazies take control.
Methinks history betrays you.
The Wahabbi extremists (Islamic versions of the US fundamentalist extremists) came to power with ibn Saud, in the 18th century.
Economic power (and scientific luminance) seeped away from the Caliphates and kingdoms of the Levant when the sea routes were broken open, most notably and astoundingly at Lepanto.
There followed a long decline. Wars, on and off, with the crusaders of Europe raiding into the Middle East. Various rulers of Arabic and Persian and Turkish dynasties competing for domination of the Islamic world. A gradual eclipse as the nations of Europe set about building their empires. And finally irrelevance, a culture respected only insofar as it provides crude oil to its betters. Small wonder that a civilisation brought so low from such a glorious past turns to its god for answers, and finds dark counsels.
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
"Therefore, the seeker after the truth is not one who studies the writings of the ancients and, following his natural disposition, puts his trust in them, but rather the one who suspects his faith in them and questions what he gathers from them, the one who submits to argument and demonstration, and not to the sayings of a human being whose nature is fraught with all kinds of imperfection and deficiency. Thus the duty of the man who investigates the writings of scientists, if learning the truth is his goal, is to make himself an enemy of all that he reads, and, applying his mind to the core and margins of its content, attack it from every side. He should also suspect himself as he performs his critical examination of it, so that he may avoid falling into either prejudice or leniency."--Ibn al-Haytham
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibn_al-haytham
This is what too few human beings do, they always trust in what they have been taught... when much of what they know is fraught with error. I am weary of anything I say as well as anything any other man says, that cannot be demonstrated. Therefore, I only defend what can be demonstrated.
The majority of people do not take the above view, they are overconfident in what they think they know when they hardly know anything at all.
Atheism is a religion.
Atheism is a religion like not collecting stamps is a hobby.
Trolling is a art,
Science as it is written, is not in that strong of a conflict with the bible as it is written
Perhaps not if you don't take the bible literally. But many do. And science is, and let's not mince words here, absolutely and completely at odds with the bible as it is written, should it be interpreted as literal text.
Now, I've never understood anybody who said they believed in the bible but didn't take it literally. What. The. Fuck.
OK, how about: "I believe in The Complete Works Of Shakespeare, but I don't take it as a literal historical document." Say what now? What does "believe in" *mean* then?!
Nah mate, science and Christianity are NOT compatible, so long as Christianity promotes any kind of belief that is either at odds with provable fact, or is not supported by any direct evidence.
And just to be clear, attributing unknown or unexplained things to god is *never* a reasonable theory because that logic requires the concept of god in the first place, which (if you spend any amount of time thinking about it) you should know is circular reasoning and therefore crap. One of the fundamentals of the scientific method is never to search only for facts to fit a theory, but rather to constantly revise the theory to fit the facts. This precludes the possibility of the concept of "god" to ever factor in to any scientific theory because there was never any direct evidence to cause the scientist to develop the concept and theory of a god.
Personally, I find religion deeply offensive, in the same way I find littering, racism, homeopathy, and liars offensive. If anybody is going to be doing any of that on my lawn, I'm going to yell at them.
Now, I know exactly the tribal mentality you mention, but that is human nature and humanity will always have a Complete Dick contingent. However, I certianly do not need smug reassurance from anybody else whose beliefs line up with mine. My smug reassurance comes from ascribing to verifiable truth, which stands on a mountain of evidence, and holds its own.
Today's weirdness is tomorrow's reason why. -- Hunter S. Thompson
if people really want to be so dense that they make up bullshit like that i say we just have fun with them....
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
Under attack?
Pro-choice people don't force abortions on other people who are against abortions.
Pro-alcohol people don't force muslims and mormons to drink the stuff.
Pro-stem cell research people don't require you to have your DNA fixed.
Would-be parents with a serious inheritable disease don't force other people to have their embryo/egg tested.
Pro sex toy people don't want to force the use of the toys on other people who think sex is sin.
Gay people don't want to force you to have sex with a same sex person.
Nobody is trying to force christians to have premarital sex.
Nobody is trying to force catholics to use birth control.
Atheists are not trying to bully other peoples' children into saying out loud brainwashing slogans such as "one nation, god is imaginary" five times a week. (You are free to do your brainwashing at home.)
Atheists are not trying to get their "ten reasons" plaques displayed in courtrooms.
Now, who is under attack and what bad things were atheists doing? Calling theists who wreck other peoples lives something you don't want to hear? How does that compare to the above list?
Xtians are skilled at turning the oppressing majority into the underdog. If theists only had confidence in their deity that it is indeed almighty, then people could be free. The theists would be confident that their deity would get back at the "sinners" later.
Bert
Freedom means free to do something without harming someone else. Now, in view of the above, try to explain "home of the free" to me.