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Texas Vote May Challenge Teaching of Evolution
tboulay writes "The Texas Board of Education will vote this week on a new science curriculum designed to challenge the guiding principle of evolution, a step that could influence what is taught in biology classes across the nation. The proposed curriculum change would prompt teachers to raise doubts that all life on Earth is descended from common ancestry. Texas is such a large textbook market that many publishers write to the state's standards, then market those books nationwide. 'This is the most specific assault I've seen against evolution and modern science,' said Steven Newton, a project director at the National Center for Science Education, which promotes teaching of evolution." Both sides are saying the issue it too close to call. Three Republicans on the school board who favor the teaching of evolution have come under enormous pressure to reform their ways.
Take oil companies. Finding oil is a very important and high-stakes issue for them. Literally hundreds of billions of dollars are riding on it. When the chips are down and they need to find the most likely spots to drill - what kind of geology do they use? Flood geology, or mainstream? Which one actually delivers the goods?
Let's assume the Earth is only a few thousand years old. Where did the oil come from? Was it created in the ground with the rest of the Earth? If so, is there a way to predict where it might be found? Or perhaps it really did form from plants and dinosaurs, but about 10,000 times faster than any chemist believes it could? Any way you look at it, a young Earth and a Flood would imply some very interesting scientific questions to ask, some interesting (and potentially extremely valuable) research programs to start. How come nobody's actually pursuing such research programs?
Why don't fundamentalists put together an investment fund, where people pay in and the stake is used as venture capital for things like oil and mineral rights? If "Flood geology" is really a better theory, then it should make better predictions about where raw materials are than standard geology does. The profits from such a venture could pay for a lot of evangelism. Why don't they do this?
(It turns out some people actually are doing this - or, at least, claiming too. But it appears that deeply-held beliefs are easier to exploit than deeply-held oil reserves.)
PHEM - party like it's 1997-2003!
To a certain extent. But Newton's theory is not wrong, not by a long shot. It's just not right on the atomic scale. Newton built his theory on evidence, just as evolutionary theory is built on evidence. Academia held to Newton's theory because it's STILL RIGHT. They still teach Newtonian Mechanics in colleges for a reason. I suppose that's a great comparison, actually... there's so much evidence that evolution is right that the details are all that's left to sort out.
My blog. Good stuff (when I remember to update it). Read it.
Yes, but *where* is that "better theory"? So far none has emerged, or at least there was none the last time I took a look. Darwinian evolution may be a matter of conjecture, but that does not make the (so far) feeble attempts at science by proposers of ID/creationism any better. Nor does it justify raising doubts in the style of "hey, kids, there is no positive proof of evolution, so how about reading the book of Genesis today and pretending that it's way better than that dull British nonsense?"
Ezekiel 23:20
Except for the fact that this is really just an excuse to teach Intelligent Design (read: NOT SCIENCE) in science class. ID belongs in theology/philosophy classes, NOT biology.
6. "Although this proposal, and the people behind it, are certifiable, the idea that a theory of evolution holds some special uncriticizable position because of the 'preponderance of evidence' is just as stifling to scientific progress as the dogmatic fervor with which academia held to Newton's theory of gravitation. A theory should always be accepted as necessarily conjectural, and all efforts should be made to falsify the accepted 'best' theory and replace it with a better theory." -Me
So let me get this straight, you think we should entertain the idea of replacing the theory of evolution with the theory that the earth is only 10,000 years old and life came about in it's current form by way of a "magic man"?
How do you go about testing the "magic man" theory?
(I'm not saying you support the "magic man" theory in any way, I somewhat get your point. It's just that they don't want to replace the theory of evolution with a better theory, they want to replace it with "magic".)
Here's a vote for #5 and how about not re-defining words or procedures just because some morons feel like it?
Now, Evolution is a law of nature, not a theory. Natural Selection is a theory. I have no problem with people coming up with theories that fit the scientific method, because THATS HOW YOU FUCKING PLAY THE GAME CALLED SCIENCE.
If someone wants to come up with their own words and rules and whatever, fine, go do it. If they call it science, I'm going to have a major problem with it and the people doing it.
"It was on those streets, in those neighborhoods, that I first heard God's spirit beckon me. It was there that I felt called to a higher purpose -- his purpose." -- Barack Obama
One must first understand the story of Noah is based heavily in Sumarian lore. When civilization was first spawning it's first resou...er cities they choose to stick them in places rather convenient for growing large amounts of food and such.
One of these was near Ur and Lagash and such which just happened to be where the Tigris and the Euphrates rivers come together. Oh! By the way did you know that land there, well that land there, is a low land and in the past was prone to massive flooding.
So yes, to early civilization as the stories and tales spread out from the epicenter of humanity, the entire world DID indeed flood.
--- I do not moderate.
You're right that we can never know a theory to be "right", but it isn't for the reason you describe.
Falsifiability only requires that it be possible in principle (i.e. counterfactually) to produce a counterexample. If a theory were somehow known to be actually true, it would still be falsifiable in the relevant sense so long as it were possible to imagine a test such that if, contrary to fact, the theory was false we could make a test to figure it out.
The real reason we can never know a theory to be correct is because empirical data undetermine theory choice; that is, any set of empirical data is compatible with the truth of more than one theory.
caritj.org
there are precious few christians who have even heard of the documentary hypothesis or the two source hypothesis. most christians remind me instead of children who know how quickly every car on the market does 0-60 but don't know how an internal combustion engine works.
Hmm - nice strawman. The question was "do you believe" (which is shorthand for "do you think it is true") not "do you believe in" (which is generally reserved for the supernatural/faith/ and other unsciency thinks). I believe the earth orbits the sun - meaning I think it is true even though I will never be in a position to observe this directly - but the evidence supports it. However I don't "believe in" the earth orbiting the sun. I think this is a case where the overloaded meaning of believe is tripping us up.
A much bigger percentage than the number of Brazilians that actually won the World Cup, I'm pretty sure.