So maybe this is a case of a little knowledge being a dangerous thing, but with all the heavy shit getting thrown around in the ID v evolution debate I thought I'd chime in. I'm referring to a article from MSNBC that's been everywhere for the last few days. (Or at least, google news.) A link to the article can be found here. It caught my eye because of the opening volley.

In his highly influential book "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions," science philosopher Thomas Kuhn presented the idea that science is not a gradual progression toward truth, but a series of insurgencies, with scientific theories constantly usurping one another.

Hey, I read that! I had that revelation! I sat on the steps of the library in the cold and thought about at least the first two chapters of that book. Let's see what else this guy has to say.

That is sometimes true. And proponents of intelligent design love Kuhn's argument. They see intelligent design (often called ID) as a revolutionary new science and themselves as revolutionaries. They envision toppling Darwinian evolution, once a revolutionary idea itself, and erecting in its place a theory about life that allows for supernatural explanations, a theory that makes God, or some entity very much like him, not just possible but necessary.

The author goes on to explain why this doesn't really work for them, citing example after example of where the ID paradigm breaks, but I can do it faster. (I think.)

Khun doesn't cover ID proponents asses for one reason. Khun was talking about the historical tendency to replace one paradigm with a new one, because of the new one's tendency to answer problems posed in the old.

Simply put, let's say there's a theory about how the world works. It's the latest theory, based on current information, and it paints as accurate a picture as we can hope for. It still has rough edges, holes, points of vagueness and other problems. Occasionally, it will be replaced as our understanding of the world expands, new data becomes available, or some lab assistant working long though the night has a flash of brilliant insight. A new paradigm replaces the old. The language used for discussing the problem becomes more refined and nuanced. The collective understanding of the problem increases. New solutions are offered and tested. New boundaries are explored, new limits tested. Where once we thought the world was flat, we now believe it's perfectly spherical, and with this new understanding are attempting to describe our situation. We're thinking about the implications of a perfectly spherical world. We're wondering if maybe the planet doesn't bulge slightly in the middle. New paradigm, new problems, better understanding.

Which is why ID doesn't fly. Genuflecting and leaving the world in the hands of our imaginary friend is not achieving a better understanding. It's not replacing old problems with new. ID is giving up. It's surrendering to our inner four year old and believing that Santa really left you that coveted new Barbie, the stork brought your baby brother, and that wasn't Dad dressed as the Easter bunny. It's willfully ignoring the string on Santa's beard and the liquor on his breath, and that doesn't help anyone. Khun's scientific revolutions are part politics and part popularity contest. That I won't challenge. But it doesn't mean that these competing paradigms are based only on politics and popularity. The people maneuvering and competing are scientists, the best in their respective fields, not Joe Bob on the street picking the fairy tale that makes him the most comfortable.

The point is, a little theory is a dangerous thing.

And I earned that "A" in Utz's class.

I went to high school in Alabama. Lucky me. I was fortunate enough to attend a magnet high school, meaning all the kids I went to school with had a passion outside of the normal high school course work. At least, in theory. Everything from theatre to law. We were not the academic magnet school. Those egg-heads were confined to a different campus. But we were smarter than the rest of the public school system. By what measure? In a system where most of the high schools were bragging if over half of the students passed the exit exam the first time, we had only one student out of a class of 151 need to retake the exam. And frankly, he was stoned so often I was amazed he only failed one section. Taking the test high and only failing one section probably means he's a genius sober. Then again, no hard feelings Jeremy, but probably not. Amazing musician though.

Like I said, this school was in Alabama. As part of the state law every high school biology textbook must have a disclaimer in the front concerning the teaching of evolution. I had my high school biology class in 1999-2000, so I had the original...disclaimer, hedging, whatever you want to call this bullshit. It was apparently designed by the Eagle Forum, brainchild of the evil harpy Phyllis Schafly. As far as I'm concerned, she's the Uncle Tom of the woman's movement. I can't wait till she dies. Anyway, they have opinions about evolution and the sticker is their band-aid. Below is a the text of the sticker.


A MESSAGE FROM THE ALABAMA STATE BOARD OF EDUCATION

This textbook discusses evolution, a controversial theory some scientists present as a scientific explanation for the origin of living things, such as plants, animals and humans.

No one was present when life first appeared on earth. Therefore, any statement about life's origins should be considered as theory, not fact.

The word "evolution" may refer to many types of change. Evolution describes changes that occur within a species. (White moths, for example, may "evolve" into gray moths.) This process is microevolution, which can be observed and described as fact. Evolution may also refer to the change of one living thing to another, such as reptiles into birds. This process, called macroevolution, has never been observed and should be considered a theory. Evolution also refers to the unproven belief that random, undirected forces produced a world of living things.

There are many unanswered questions about the origin of life which are not mentioned in your textbooks, including:

• Why did the major groups of animals suddenly appear in the fossil record (known as the Cambrian Explosion)?
• Why have no new major groups of living things appeared in the fossil record in a long time?
• Why do major groups of plants and animals have no transitional forms in the fossil record?
• How did you and all living things come to possess such a complete and complex set of "instructions" for building a living body?

Study hard and keep an open mind. Someday you may contribute to the theories of how living things appeared on earth.

I found this on the Alabama Citizens for Science Edcation page, here. The school board apparently revised it in 2001 and 2004. Eh.

So when it was time for radical, activist, opinionated me to take this class I was ready. An avowed atheist at the tender age of 15, and my first high school paper was a nine page analysis of "Inherit the Wind", with footnotes. Of course, my biology teacher was on old hat at this by the time I landed in his classroom. I have to admit, he handled the whole thing well. He read what he was supposed to read, treated all of us with casual contempt, and kept the heavy combatants on both sides appeased. That is, until he left us to our own devices.

There is one more thing you should know about Alabama public schools, if you don't already. The forcible desegregation of schools lead to an overnight bloom of private schools. The schools are generally between 100 to 500 students, with a handful of 500 to 1200 student schools, and almost all had religion on the curriculum. Don't believe me, ask google. That was what, forty years ago? My generation saw public schools that were predominately black, or at least maintained a fifty-fifty mix to avoid getting in trouble with the federal government. This means that the white students I went to school with either made the conscious choice to or had desperatly poor parents. So my white friends and classmates tended towards the wacky liberal side. There were, of course, exceptions.

This is about one of the exceptions. Her name, I think, is Kelly. She was not too bright, shaped like a trapezoid, but could apparently sing. Mr. Bennett, the biology teacher, after our first no incident evolution lesson, took us outside to the courtyard to complete our assignment in the spring sunshine. Grouped with some of my closest co-conspirators, we got down to the serious business of trashing the stupid school board. Which is when Kelly chimed in, (I have no idea why she was sitting near me,) expoused the opinion that evolution was crock and she knew because her preacher told her. I mentioned I though the Catholic church, the foundation for her break-away sect of nutters, found no necessary contradiction between the scientific theory and the practice of Christianity. She rebutted that the Catholic church was evil, and she knew it because the Pope's name spelled out 666.

This I could not respond to. I mean, what can you say? "Oh, gee. I hadn't thought of that. John Paul II == 666. It's so clear to me now!"

I'd like to refer back to Steven Soundheim as the moral of the story:

"Careful the things you say, children will listen. Careful the things you do, children will see. And learn. Children may not obey, but children will listen. Children will look to you For which way to turn, to learn what to be. Careful before you say, "Listen to me." Children will listen. "

So there it is, kids. Fight your fight, do what you think is right. But keep in mind, it's the shaping of the next generation you're arguing about. It's whether you're propelling us in the direction of an enlightenment or a dark age. The world's moving forward, no matter what. And we can move forward looking for answers about the world around us with our eyes open, or we can keep looking backwards and inwards for answers about the world around us. I vote eyes open. It hasn't failed us yet.

This is kinda old, (in internet time) but really neat none the less.

Our brains are appearantly still eveolving. They're not sure about any of the details, but they're fairly sure something's going on. And the division between the groups means something, but they're not sure what.
""Whatever advantage these genes give, some groups have it and some don't. This has to be the worst nightmare for people who believe strongly there are no differences in brain function between groups," says anthropologist John Hawks of the University of Wisconsin in Madison, US."

Anywho, it's pretty cool.
I have a headache, which I'm going to treat with chocolate and booze.

It's been a long goddamned weekend and with my upcoming nuptials clamoring for my attention I can't help but feel that the last thing in the world I care to give my limited attention and time to is this idiotic god v. science debate. So I guess I'll spend a few precious moments reminding myself why this is important.

Organized religion has it's benefits. It provides comfort and guidance to people in need. I can't begin to imagine what it must feel like to be at the end of your rope and find guidance in a thought, a feeling, that your misery is part of something larger.

Now, that being said, let's examine the downside of religion. Let's look at the crusades, the dark ages, at Galileo, Joan of Arc, Salem, the 30 years war, Oliver Cromwell, Bosnia, the Middle East...

Religion has it's place, and that place is in the private sphere. When religion gets in to the public sphere, becomes the rule of all instead of the guide of some, then we have problems. Let's look at, oh, pulling a random case out of my hat, Afghanistan until a few years ago. Okay, so that's probably going for the worst case straight out the gate, and isn't fair.

This intelligent design thing isn't about competing theories. There is no scholar hunched over a microscope observing bacteria and witness the hand of god, then writing scholarly papers about it long into the night. There's a scholar attempting to describe the system which acts on that bacteria, and he may make an observation and write long into the night about it. It may very well be that later, in a smokey bar, he'll tell his biologist buddy after a long day at the lab that he believes the system he's trying to map out is god's system. (Okay, okay I've been reading too much Neal Stephenson. The Baroque Cycle rocks.)

The difference? What he believes and what he can prove. And that is what we're talking about. Believe what you want. I can't stop you. And I probably wouldn't want to. Or care to. But personal beliefs can not be public policy. That's how we balance a shit ton of personal oddities without starting a major military action.

And in any case, is there any danger that a creationst family won't be allowed to teach their children their beliefs? Or is it more likely that watering down a science curriculum so it doesn't interfere with religion prevents a strong science class to be taught.

ID belongs in religion class. Which, thankfully, the public schools don't teach.

I met a sci fi author this weekend at DragonCon. Okay, I met several, but I only met one who wasn't a complete douche. That would be, of course, Robert J. Sawyer. He's fairly new, (younger than Harlan Ellison) and writes actaul science fiction and not the novilization of second rate TV shows. (I'm talking to you Richard Hatch and Brad Linaweaver).

Anyway, I thought his name was vaugely familiar, and it turns out Crutcher has a few of his books and has even spent some time trying to convince me to read one or two. Now I might.

One of the books he talked about was "Calculating God", which is basically a concersation between a man and a giant spider about the possible nonexistance of god. Here'sthe first chapter.

It's surprising. And good. And a relevant conversation in this day and age. I'm buying the rest to see how it turns out.

Or at least they should be.Check it out.

Nearly two-thirds of those in a Pew Research Center poll, 64 percent, say they believe ``creationism'' should be taught alongside ``evolution'' - a finding likely to spark more controversy about what is taught in the schools.

``What this basically tells us is that in contentious issues, many people take the default position - teach both sides and let people make up their own minds,'' Lugo said."

Almost half, 48 percent, said they believed humans have evolved over time. Some of those people, 26 percent of all those polled, said they believe evolution occurred through natural selection, and another 18 percent of all those polled, said evolution was guided by a supreme being.

The Pew Research Poll claims a 2.5% margin of error. That makes us officially the back woods dumbasses every one thinks we are.

Okay, okay, I should tone down the venom and make myself clear. Science decisions, decisions of the public school curriculum, should be made by educators and based on secular standards. Why? Because we have a constitutionally mandated separation between church and state. This includes the public school system. Therefore, what you believe is true about the nature of the universe is all fine and dandy, but unless you have something more that a stellar work of serial fiction to back it up, it doesn't come into the classroom. Same goes for policy decisions involving a woman's body. Or space exploration. Or fiscal policy. Or Social policy. Or any other actions of the government.