Does believing make it so?
The state of Ohio has changed its mind about the teaching of evolution, dropping a rule mandating inclusion of anti-evolution material in biology classes.
The Ohio Board of Education voted 11-4 Tuesday to discard the rule requiring 10th-grade biology classes to include a critical analysis of evolution, as well as an accompanying model lesson plan, The New York Times reported Wednesday.
The move was the second major defeat for proponents of intelligent design in two months.
Tuesday’s reversal is seen as a move to avoid a lawsuit in the wake of a December federal court decision in Pennsylvania holding the teaching of intelligent design in public schools is unconstitutional.
No kidding.
I wonder when Pat Robertson will tell the state of Ohio that god will now abandon them?
So I guess that it’s just me that’s bothered by the fact that they’re dropping it to avoid a lawsuit, and not because it’s a bunch of unscientific, obviously religious, will-never-be-proven bovine excrement.
What’s the big deal? we can’t prove either true of false.. why not just drop all teachings of origins and tell students we came from google?
woktiny
It is simple.
Evolution can be proved to the satisfaction of the Scientific community. Can it be proved 100 %, of course not, very few things we take as granted can be proved to that extent.
Can Unintelligent Design or Creationism be proved? Not at all, there is not the smallest piece of evidence to support either theory.
If we are only going to teach those things that can be proved 100% then nothing except arithmetic and the alphabet could be taught, and there might be some disagreement over them.
Adding to what Pat said, that evolution happened is a FACT. In science, a fact is something confirmed to such a degree that it would be perverse to withhold provisional assent (Stephen Gould). That evolution happen is as much a fact as the Earth being an ellipsoid. The scientific theories of evolution (natural selection, genetic mutation etc.) are designed to explain and predict how that evolution occurs. “Intelligent” design provides no such predictive power and thus provides no merit as science whatsoever.
Evolution can be proved?? Nice one! Except to the point that it’s a theory. It can be tested in theory but has not been tested in practice. As an origin of everything you’ll find that most scientists do not believe that Evolution is a useful model.
If you place Evolution in the place of God then you risk becoming as extreme as the people who think that God created the Earth in 6 literal days.
When we talk about theories it’s a good idea to keep an open mind.
paul — in a friendly way, please take a course in semantics or at least read up on scientific definitions. Please.
“As an origin of everything you’ll find that most scientists do not believe that Evolution is a useful model.”
As moss was saying evolution has nothing to do with an origin of everything Paul.
Paul
Being open minded to a Creationists means tilting your head so the wind can go straight through.
Creationism and Unintelligent Design are not even theories. They are solely an attempt to put parochial beliefs into a secular curriculum. There is nothing scientific about either.
If you want to teach superstitions or religion then go to a private school. Though, if you don’t have a solid science education then don’t expect to get into a good university.
Um, no. The “evolution is a fact” chorus makes it sound more valid based on sheer volume, but it’s not a fact. And this is a semantic, definitional reality, not just rhetoric.
This doesn’t make it wrong either, by the way. However, I will say that most of the gripe about Intelligent Design is misunderstood. What Intelligent Design is proposing is that there was (surpise) an Intelligent agent in the process that may have had a hand in everything. We consider similar things all the time, actually, within legitimate scientific arenas. It isn’t all that different than what we do in forensic science; we have an observational method that goes forward to determine what happened, but we’d be remiss to not take into account when free agents were involved in the process as well. There are guidelines set in place to make sure this isn’t abused, and ID would suggest it can be extended more broadly, as well.
Sorry Aaron, but to make such a statement shows a perverse ignorance about science. That evolution happened is a FACT. The evidence is so overwhelming that it is the height of absurdity to argue otherwise. The various scientific theories (e.g. “theories of evolution”) are designed to explain the causes, predict the speed and effect of that fact.
Let’s take your analogy of forensic science. The dead body would equate to evolution. We use forensic science to help explain how that situation (the person died) happened. However, the evidence that the person died is overwhelming and is accepted as fact. We use forensic science to help explain why and how the person died, not whether they died.
Thomas, I don’t think so, but I understand your commitment to your position. I disagree with your position that evolutionary theory, at least as a theory of common decent, is as solidified as you suggest. It’s one explanation to describe what we observe, but whether or not it’s the only good one is, of course, what this discussion is about. However, if you are talking about the micro variety, namely that we can observe changes in organisms over time, well, you have no argument from me there. I think this is well established, and I should have made this distiction from the beginning.
I’m not really interested though in hashing this out here though and bantering about whether one is “absurd” for holding their position, maingly because this particular distinction doesn’t have much to do with the discussion of whether or not ID is a legitmate way to look at science. ID is not synonmous with anti-evolution, which is part of the confusion about this discussion, I think. It’s also not synonymous with seven-day-creationism, which is always a favorite characacture used to paint the ID position. We can actually grant macro evolution and still have to decided whether or not it makes sense to grant an Intelligent agent who is involved in the process (as do other branches of science, like forensic analysis).
Aaron,
It appears you still do not understand. The various scientific theories of evolution are meant to explain the fact of evolution. Scientists accept as fact that, given the appropriate conditions, objects fall when dropped. The theory of gravity is meant to predict the effects of that fact. In order for competing theories of biological origin to survive scientific scrutiny, they too must explain the fact of evolution using empirical evidence. The theories of evolutionary biology such as Darwin’s theory of natural selection are meant to explain how it was that species evolved not whether they evolved.
In order for “intelligent” design to be treated as science, it must first be fashioned as a scientific hypothesis. A scientific hypothesis enables predictions that can be tested and measured wholly through empirical evidence. Thus, the hypothesis can be falsified by establishing that its predictions are sufficiently inaccurate. If part of the hypothesis is that a being(s) created life, then empirical evidence of that being(s) must be provided. “Default” arguments such as “life it too complex to be created any other way…” are not considered scientific and thus are rejected. Until “intelligent” design at least meets these requirements, it will never be treated as science.
“The various scientific theories of evolution are meant to explain the fact of evolution.”
“The theories of evolutionary biology such as Darwin’s theory of natural selection are meant to explain how it was that species evolved not whether they evolved”
And there in lies the rub. The “fact” of macroevolution shouldn’t be presented as an unassailable truism, as Gould and some of the broader scientific community have suggested, and you seem to be suggesting. For that matter, scientific paradigms that are constructed such that their fundamental principles can’t be questioned or evaluated have historically been viewed with a critical eye. Openness (and the ability, at least in theory, to be disproved) is a hallmark of a good scientific paradigm. If your paradigm isn’t such that it could entertain criticism, there is something wrong. The question of common ancestry isn’t on par with whether gravity happens, and should be open to critique. You can argue whether or not the critiques are any good, but you can’t close the door to them by defining away the ability to bring them up in the first place.
I disagree with yours assessment of ID, in terms of its inability to provide predictions and testing. If you grant that there is no place to consider free agency in the process, in good conscience one should also dismiss other branches of science that DO allow for this (as I’ve mentioned already), as well as the flowerbed within which scientific method developed and flourished in the first place. Newton and Locke would both be amused to know that their scientific approach shouldn’t take into account a grand designer, and that by your definition, they weren’t doing science. There is a place in science, and often has been, to ask whether or not God is involved.
I will grant that there can be abuses in any system that attempt to define where an Intelligent agent involved. I suspect that a lot of the resistance to this type of an approach is the fact that the “God in the gaps” approach has been used and abused. This doesn’t mean that it has to be abused, however, and that safeguards can’t be established.
> And there in lies the rub. The “fact” of macroevolution
> shouldn’t be presented as an unassailable truism, as Gould
> and some of the broader scientific community have
> suggested, and you seem to be suggesting.
It is as unassailable as objects falling to Earth. The evidence for evolution (micro or macro) is so extensive as to be folly to argue against its occurrence. Remember my definition of a fact: a fact is something confirmed to such a degree that it would be perverse to withhold provisional assent. Scientific principles most definitely can be questioned as long as those challenges are backed by empirical, scientific evidence. Simply put, evolution is descent with modification. To argue that this did not occur would require overwhelming empirical evidence to the contrary and “intelligent” design has none.
> Openness (and the ability, at least in theory, to be disproved) is a
> hallmark of a good scientific paradigm. If your paradigm
> isn’t such that it could entertain criticism, there is
> something wrong.
On the contrary, you are more than welcome to challenge mine or any other scientist’s paradigm as long as you understand the rules by which that challenge takes place. The very first step is to provide a hypothesis that can be tested for accuracy based purely on empirical methods. “Intelligent” design has yet to step up to even this first step of the challenge and thus is rejected as science.
> The question of common ancestry isn’t on
> par with whether gravity happens, and should be open to
> critique. You can argue whether or not the critiques are
> any good, but you can’t close the door to them by defining
> away the ability to bring them up in the first place.
Actually, common ancestry is pretty close to being on par with gravity. Recent DNA tests that show that humans and chimps share 98% of their DNA for example have done nothing but solidify that evidence. As technology advances, the evidence to support common ancestry grows.
> I disagree with yours assessment of ID, in terms of its
> inability to provide predictions and testing.
Really. So, show me a paper published in a respected scientific journal where the “intelligent” design hypothesis was used as a tool to deductively explain (meaning all other explanations were ruled out) the outcome of an experiment. If that’s too difficult, at least provide a testable and thus falsifiable statement of the ID hypothesis itself.
> Newton and Locke would both be amused to know that
> their scientific approach shouldn’t take into account a
> grand designer, and that by your definition, they weren’t
> doing science.
Newton and Locke both realized that science is not meant to deal with anything other than which can be measured empirically. Discussions about the supernatural are for another subject such as theology, metaphysics, mythology or any of a host of subjects other than science.
> There is a place in science, and often has
> been, to ask whether or not God is involved.
If it can be established through empirical means that this deity(s) thing exists, then it is not supernatural; it’s natural Second, if this deity thing cannot be established through empirical means, then it has no place in science which only deals with the natural. Just as it would be inappropriate to teach medieval French poetry in a class on auto repair, so too is it inappropriate to teach about God in a science class.
If by fact you are referring to “decent with modification,” I conceded this point earlier when I said that I don’t disagree with the idea that species modify over time. I do understand your distinction, although this isn’t a very interesting point in terms of the ID discussion, as most people, when they are referring to evolution in this debate, are referring to whether or not macroevolution, or common decent, is a sufficient theory to explain all biological/chemical reality. This is what the average person refers to as when the banter gets going on “evolutionary fact/theory,” and it looks like the disagreement is more often than no a semantic one.
“Actually, common ancestry is pretty close to being on par with gravity. Recent DNA tests that show that humans and chimps share 98% of their DNA for example have done nothing but solidify that evidence. As technology advances, the evidence to support common ancestry grows.”
It’s this kind of statement that make people scratch their heads when the word “fact” is used. Your example really is not the same thing as observing gravity. Your example shows at best a correlation between like things, and you infer a causal relationship. Whether or not it’s a statistically likely one, or if there’s more than one possible explanation, is what the discussion is about. Until all of the technological proof gets in though, I’ll suspend some judgment on the matter, and consider other possible explanations for the same evidence. To suggest that the door isn’t open here for other possible explanations strikes a lot of people as silly and as an illicit ad hoc adjustment to protect a commitment to philsophical naturalism.
In regard to other possible explanations, if there are other good reasons to think that a designer may have been involved (ethical, metaphysical, theological) there’s no good reason to think that he wouldn’t use a similar blueprint in his design. To deny this at least as a metaphysical possibility betrays a commitment against the idea of an intelligent designer. But for those who have looked at the question and have determined that there very well could be one (for other reasons other than science, as well), then it is by no means unreasonable to at least consider it as part of the equation, and to see whether or not what we observe points to one.
I suspect that you have a disdain for a broader version of ID than what I am suggesting might be attainable (I’m not talking about seven-day-creationism; and even though I don’t buy arguments that “prove” common decent, this isn’t a requirement of ID). I think that ID can allow testability and make predictions because it’s not a uprooting of the current paradigm. It operates within it, as a brilliant and valuable tool in the scientific endeavor. However, ID suggests that *at times* (and this is really the key), it’s possible that the current operating constraints of science may exclude legitimate answers. It’s more a question of *sufficiency* of the current scientific paradigm, not whether or not we should give up the scientific method. Referring back to my previous analogy, imagine trying to solve a criminal investigation, using scientific methods, without being willing to consider there may have been free agents acting in the process, and allowing questions of psychology. You don’t get the whole picture. At times, intelligent agency DOES touch science, very literally, and to relegate this reality to another discipline with no overlap creates a deficiency in the dicipline; it doesn’t make it better.
“If it can be established through empirical means that this deity(s) thing exists, then it is not supernatural.”
I’m not sure how this follows. If we can grant that a nonmaterial agent can have an effect on the physical (for me, this isn’t a metaphysical impossibility), then I can infer from events about when and where this may have happened. We make inferences of this type all the time in forensic science.
“Discussions about the supernatural are for another subject such as theology, metaphysics, mythology…”
Questions from different disciplines overlap all the time. What makes good science, and what doesn’t, which virtues should be extoled in the scientific endeavor, and questions of paradigm changes: these are philosophical questions. Boundaries that are created to keep theology out aren’t scientific questions, either; they are philosophical ones.
Just for the sake of argument, if a supernatural agent COULD interact with the physical, and it affects natural processes directly, shouldn’t science have something to say about it? My guess is that in the end, those who don’t want to answer this question either simpy have a commitment to philosophical naturalism, and this becomes a question of philosophy. And until this question is answered, we’ll be at an impass.
RE: Common Decent
Common decent is merely a logical conclusion to the consequence of humans evolving. If that were not enough, we have substantial fossil and DNA evidence to support this claim such as the fact that humans and chimps share 98% of their DNA.
RE: Chimps and humans have 98% of the DNA in common
> It’s this kind of statement that make people scratch their
> heads when the word “fact” is used. Your example really is
> not the same thing as observing gravity. Your example shows
> at best a correlation between like things, and you infer a
> causal relationship.
A fact is something confirmed to such a degree that it would be perverse to without hold provisional assent. That 98% of our DNA correlates to that of a chimp shows a correlation so high as to be absurd to argue that humans and chimps did not have a common ancestor. Let us also not forget that this is an additional piece of information on top of mountains of other evidence that comes to the same conclusion.
> To suggest that the
> door isn’t open here for other possible explanations…
Science does not work in black and white but rather degrees of grey. Technically, it is possible that there is some other explanation just as there is some other explanation that the Earth goes around the Sun than gravity. We can calculate the effects of gravity and our rotation around the Sun to a fairly accurate degree. Your argument is the equivalent of saying that because it is not 100% accurate that there is a possibility that something else is causing the Earth to rotate around the Sun. While it is possible, it is so improbable that gravity and common decent are accept as true.
> In regard to other possible explanations, if there are
> other good reasons to think that a designer may have been
> involved (ethical, metaphysical, theological) …
This possibility then is the subject for a discussion other than science. Science ONLY deals with the empirical. Just because something is not yet empirically observable does not imply that it does not exist but it does mean it is outside the prevue of science.
> I suspect that you have a disdain for a broader version of
> ID than what I am suggesting might be attainable…
> I think that ID can allow testability and make predictions
> because it’s not a uprooting of the
> current paradigm.
I have a disdain for “intelligent” design AS SCIENCE. It does not meet the qualifications of science. The first step requires a testable and thus falsifiable hypothesis. Without this type of hypothesis, “I”D is not science!
> However, ID suggests that *at times* (and this is really the key), it’s
> possible that the current operating constraints of science
> may exclude legitimate answers. It’s more a question of
> *sufficiency* of the current scientific paradigm, not
> whether or not we should give up the scientific method.
This is a “god of gaps” argument. Science does not presume to have the answers to everything. If science cannot determine an answer, then the answer is “unknown” until one can be determined. But that does not mean that you can fill-in the missing pieces with non-science and expect it to still be considered science. Science only works on what can be proven empirically.
RE: Mixing “intelligent” design and science
Just because religion grapples with the conclusions of science does not make religion scientific. Some subjects do not overlap such as medieval French poetry and quantum physics. Discussions about the supernatural do not belong in a class about science. That does not mean they do not belong. They just do not belong in a science class. “I”D attempts to fill-in the gaps of what science cannot establish. There is nothing wrong with that, but that also means that “I”D is not science and should not be taught in a class about science.
RE: Natural v. Supernatural
The natural world consists of that which we can observe and measure. Supernatural, by its very definition, is something not of the natural world. It refers to a phenomenon that cannot be confirmed to exist purely through empirical means. It also means that it is outside the prevue of science which ONLY deals with the natural world. If it were possible to gather purely empirical evidence of your deity’s existence, then that deity is part of the natural world. If we cannot confirm that your deity exists using empirical means, then it is by definition supernatural and therefore not something that science can analyze.