Texas Board of Education Supports Evolution 344
somanyrobots writes with this excerpt from the Dallas News:
"In a major defeat for social conservatives, a sharply divided State Board of Education voted Thursday to abandon a longtime state requirement that high school science teachers cover what some critics consider to be 'weaknesses' in the theory of evolution. Under the science curriculum standards recommended by a panel of science educators and tentatively adopted by the board, biology teachers and biology textbooks would no longer have to cover the 'strengths and weaknesses' of Charles Darwin's theory that man evolved from lower forms of life. Texas is particularly influential to textbook publishers because of the size of its market, so this could have a ripple effect on textbooks used in other states as well."
Re:Science includes BOTH strengths and weaknesses (Score:4, Informative)
I'm all for teaching evolution but would someone please explain to me what the issue was with teaching the strengths and weaknesses? If science teaches us anything it is that we should always continue to question and refine our studies, not idly stand by and accept them as fact.
I absolutely agree. The Scientific Method should certainly be taught as part of any High School science curriculum, and perhaps before.
But it shouldn't be focussed on one branch of science and ignored from all others. That the earth orbits the moon is as subject to the Scientific Method as evolution, as Black Holes exist and that a chemical reaction does not happen because the Flying Spaghetti Monster makes it so.
Scientific Method should be taught as it relates to all of science. Not singled out on any single branch by Special Interest Groups, whatever that branch of science, or special interest, that may be.
Re:Science includes BOTH strengths and weaknesses (Score:5, Informative)
I think that we maybe have a stronger case for gravity than for evolution...
No, we haven't. Newtons theory is just one of many plausible models to explain the physics of the world. It has it's strengths and weaknesses like all the other models.
The theory of evolution is the only plausible model we have to explain/understand the diversity of life. It's also the most scrutinised scientific theory.
Unlike gravity, we have yet to find cases where the theory of evolution won't hold.
Re:Science includes BOTH strengths and weaknesses (Score:5, Informative)
Newton's theory of gravity is known to be wrong.
It incorrectly predicts the orbit of Mercury.
It cannot explain gravitational lensing.
It assumes that gravity is instantaneous, when we know it must be limited by the speed of light.
Newton's theory is a very useful shortcut, as it is right most of the time. But it's been proven to be wrong. It's just good-enough wrong.
Re:Science includes BOTH strengths and weaknesses (Score:5, Informative)
Yes. There are well described and observed mechanisms for evolution, more so than gravity believe it or not.
Of course this is probably because evolution occurs at the smallest level on a macro-molecular scale, whereas gravity occurs at the deep sub-atomic level, making it much harder to explore the mechanisms of it.
Nevertheless, we can explain how evolution works. They why is normally more complicated, because you have to work out all the selection pressures.
Testing gravity is hard (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Evolution vs Creationism (Score:4, Informative)
Actually, even though you think you're trying to help, you're wrong.
Homo sapiens are apes. We are one of 5 great ape species (in addition to many lesser ape species). Homo sapiens descended from earlier ape species. So yes, we did evolve from apes (just not the apes people tend to think of, which is usually gorillas).
All land mammals also evolved from fish. Not the modern fish most people think of, but fish all the same.
While we're at it, birds descended from dinosaurs too.
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
Re:common sense (Score:2, Informative)
You know, even in Texas, to get a near-majority on a school board, anti-evolutionists have to basically lie by omission when running for office and not say anything about it. Very Christian, eh?
Even many Texans who don't believe in evolution themselves understand that there are going to be bad consequences for their kids' educations and the ability to attract biotech.
Re:Weaknesses? (Score:5, Informative)
This is exactly correct, IMO.
Evolution is just a theory, and the article makes it sound like there is an attempt to hide all of its perceived flaws or shortcomings. The reality is, any discussion of science should begin with an understanding of the Scientific Method, what a Theory IS, scientifically speaking, and then discussion of Evolution should include the acknowledgment that it is incompletely supported by evidence, but there is no strongly compelling evidence against it, and for well over 150 years newly found evidence has continued to provide additional support for the theory, and even influence various corrections, but has not contradicted the core principles of the theory. And that, in fact, the theory has provided usable information that has pointed scientists towards where and how to find many pieces of the supporting evidence.
I remember before the whole Creationist agenda gained its current momentum the big buzz phrase for evolution was "the missing link". There were many "missing links", all of varying sizes, of course, but THE missing link was presumably the one that linked apes to humans, or more accurately some point in that progression. Some people used it as an argument against evolution, but the argument mostly went along the lines of "evolution is fine, but humans are special" rather than a dispelling of the whole theory. However, most people seemed to see the "missing link" for what it was - a gap in the evidence, and fully expected scientists to find it eventually. It was the Holy Grail of evolutionists - everyone knew it existed, it was just a race to be the one to discover it. Somewhere between then and now, gaps in the fossil record became proof against evolution in the eyes of major portions of America.
But at the grade school level discussion of the minutia of the existing gaps is typically more advanced than any other material they are learning at that time. It'd be like getting into the math involved in quantum mechanics in high school physics classes. Even E=mc^2, which typically is mentioned at some point in high school physics is left in its abridged form and the Taylor series (required for increased accuracy as objects approach c - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass%E2%80%93energy_equivalence#Low-speed_expansion [wikipedia.org]) is omitted.
The policy is designed more to prevent both muddying the waters and confusing students with false or unnecessary information than to "cover up" any gaps in the evidence for the theory of evolution, especially by promoting or providing undue emphasis on competing theories that are not widely accepted by the informed scientific community.
ID is not a theory. It does not stand on its own without evolution as its whole purpose is as an attack on evolution. If all the parts of ID that referenced evolution were removed from ID, all that would be left would boil down to "God created the universe and all the life we see within it more or less as it currently exists." That's simply Creationism. It may be non-denominational, but it is still nothing but religion and thus does not deserve to be mentioned even in passing in a science class.
Re:Fracking Halleluja (Score:3, Informative)
In case the mention of the Babel Fish was not a dead giveaway, this is a quote from Douglas Adam's Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series of novels.
Any chance to introduce someone to the marvel of Adam's works should be pursued...