Posted on 04/19/2006 3:57:51 AM PDT by PatrickHenry
A new article in PLoS Biology (April 18, 2006) discusses the state of scientific literacy in the United States, with especial attention to the survey research of Jon D. Miller, who directs the Center for Biomedical Communications at Northwestern University Medical School.
To measure public acceptance of the concept of evolution, Miller has been asking adults if "human beings, as we know them, developed from earlier species of animals" since 1985. He and his colleagues purposefully avoid using the now politically charged word "evolution" in order to determine whether people accept the basics of evolutionary theory. Over the past 20 years, the proportion of Americans who reject this concept has declined (from 48% to 39%), as has the proportion who accept it (45% to 40%). Confusion, on the other hand, has increased considerably, with those expressing uncertainty increasing from 7% in 1985 to 21% in 2005.In international surveys, the article reports, "[n]o other country has so many people who are absolutely committed to rejecting the concept of evolution," quoting Miller as saying, "We are truly out on a limb by ourselves."
The "partisan takeover" of the title refers to the embrace of antievolutionism by what the article describes as "the right-wing fundamentalist faction of the Republican Party," noting, "In the 1990s, the state Republican platforms in Alaska, Iowa, Kansas, Oklahoma, Oregon, Missouri, and Texas all included demands for teaching creation science." NCSE is currently aware of eight state Republican parties that have antievolutionism embedded in their official platforms or policies: those of Alaska, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Oklahoma, Oregon, and Texas. Four of them -- those of Alaska, Kansas, Oklahoma, Oregon, and Texas -- call for teaching forms of creationism in addition to evolution; the remaining three call only for referring the decision whether to teach such "alternatives" to local school districts.
A sidebar to the article, entitled "Evolution under Attack," discusses the role of NCSE and its executive director Eugenie C. Scott in defending the teaching of evolution. Scott explained the current spate of antievolution activity as due in part to the rise of state science standards: "for the first time in many states, school districts are faced with the prospect of needing to teach evolution. ... If you don't want evolution to be taught, you need to attack the standards." Commenting on the decision in Kitzmiller v. Dover [Kitzmiller et al. v Dover Area School District et al.], Scott told PLoS Biology, "Intelligent design may be dead as a legal strategy but that does not mean it is dead as a popular social movement," urging and educators to continue to resist to the onslaught of the antievolution movement. "It's got legs," she quipped. "It will evolve."
Check my post again: I said nothing about a typo. In any event, I post so many typos of my own I would never presume to cast the first stone.
My post was about the tugging sensation I felt on my leg. Maybe it's just me, but somehow when you get to uncited and absurdist claims about a 3% genetic difference between homo sapiens and an ear of corn, and go on to speak of 400 years of US government funding, it is well nigh impossible to avoid feeling we are deep into Monty Python territory.
Why not just stick to the substance of the discussion?
Indeed I have been. The substance of this thread is a discussion about 'scientific illiteracy.' MissAmericanPie is either unwittingly demonstrating precisely what the article is decrying to an extraordinary degree, or else having a lark. I suspect the latter on the grounds that her posts are too absurd to be credible.
One Trick Pony,
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Personal insults will not make the arguments I presented go away.
Be prepared to have your observation punctured by an exception. I'm not a supporter of government-run education. But I am a supporter of Constitutional government. Most states -- maybe all of them, I don't know -- require state-run schools. It will require maybe 50 states to amend their constitutions to change things. I'd be a supporter of that.
Further, most states have separation of church and state in their state constitutions. In the two recent cases, the Georgia textbook sticker case and the Dover lunatic school board case, the cases were brought in federal courts, but in each case the judge found that the local actions violated the state constitution -- as well as the First Amendment of the US Constitution.
Kitzmiller et al. v Dover Area School District et al.
Selman v. Cobb County School District. The Georgia textbook sticker case.
Is this really what you are telling us?
Why is it so hard for evolutionists to hear?
People do NOT want evolution shoved down their children's throats!
Your response just confirms my point, above:
Yet you want science censored to fit your religious beliefs? "You can study this, but you can't study that because I don't like it!"
ps. I would love to see vouchers. You're wrong on that point also.
We agree about that, at least....
"Personal attacks will not make the ideas I presented go away."
Nor will your saying you accept evolution make you an evolutionist. You no more accept evolution than the Pope is Muslim. Nice seminar-caller tactics though.
You're a one trick pony.
One-trick-pony placemarker.
"More personal attacks that do not address even one of the points I have made."
They are not personal attacks, they are observations. They are also correct. You don't like or support evolution, and your solution for everything is to get rid of government schools. You're a one trick pony. Pure and simple.
"Comparing me to a seminar caller will not make these arguments go away."
What arguments? Your only solution is to end government schools, because you can't stand evolution or evolutionists. It's not going to happen anytime soon, so in the meantime, something has to be taught. In science class that means science only; ID/creationism is out.
Fair enough?
Your "Wally One-note" act is wearing thin, and as an experienced Libertarian apparachik I'm telling you you aren't making any friends or influencing anyone in a positive way with your off-topic rants thrust into CREVO threads.
If you want to express your views on this topic, do so on the Education threads, not science threads. That's the appropriate place to fight your battle. You are undermining your stated goal by laborious off-topic posting, that is irritating to both sides of the CREVO debate, even those of us who are intellectually predisposed to support smaller, less intrusive government.
To which AndrewC replied: Without philosophy and its wisdom your "science" is nothing but an efficient means to maleficence.
Not to mention that so many prominent scientists actually turn out to be closet philosophers these days. Materialism is a philosophical doctrine, for instance. Metaphysical naturalism likewise.
The problem seems to be that there are two orders of knowledge, or ways of knowing, the natural sciences (physics, chemistry and so forth) and the sciences of the spirit (philosophy, theology, history, sociology and so forth). Each has its own methodology, and its own sphere of investigation. The fact is, even though the two are different in their methods and goals, both are needed to describe a universe. They are actually complementary in this sense.
However, post-Enlightenment, the "Naturwissenchaften [natural science] side" of the great "Cartesian divide" has sought to eclipse and deligitimate the other great epistemic branch (the "Giesteswissenchaften [philosophy et al.] side").
For instance, metaphysical naturalism holds that only those things are real that can be observed. But this is a philosophical statement (an ontological statement in fact). So it seems that some modern scientists wittingly or not are engaging in philosophy without a license and without full disclosure, while deploring legitimate philosophy as dealing with things that really don't exist -- because they are not direct observables, susceptible to scientific test.
To me, the Cartesian split is utterly false. Science has its proper domain and is sovereign there; likewise philosophy, etc., has its proper domain, and is sovereign there. It seems to me neither is "better than" the other, for both are necessary to the complete description of the universe in which we live.
What I would like to see is greater epistemological rigor on both sides. Inevitably science takes its cues from philosophy; and philosophy stands to benefit from scientific insights. Bohr said that science is not so much about the "how" of nature, but about what we can "say" about nature. Questions of why and how -- questions of essence -- really don't fall within the purview of science. At least, historically they have not. But then along comes a Jacques Monod, a Richard Lewontin, a Richard Dawkins; and the two sides of the so-called Cartesian split really get muddled up together.
Well, them be my thoughts FWIW. Thanks so much for writing, AndrewC!
Any other information about this Dr. Priestly?
There might be room for a pun about 'sucking all the oxygen phlogiston out of the room'.
I am a Christian, in the only sense in which he wished anyone to be: sincerely attached to his doctrines in preference to all others, ascribing to himself every human excellence, and believing he never claimed any other. It's that last phrase that contradicts garden variety Christianity...
Whether or not you personally endorse (say) the Nicene creed, or what have you, it still represents a pretty good baseline for most Christians...even if some don't recognize it.
Cheers!
Philosophy is a natural extension of science. A good scientist needs to be a bit of a philosopher.
After all, philosophy is basically analysis, extracting meaning from what we see, and projecting meaning out beyond what we can see. If science gathers the data, it is philosophy that analyses it and formulates the new questions for further investigation.
Its a natural part of the process, and a really good scientist, the ones who go for the big questions, have to walk on the wild side.
Its not merely ok, its the way it is. We just need to be clear when we are doing the one, and when we are doing the other, and in fact the line gets fuzzy, but there is a line. The beauty of the process is that we keep pushing the line farther and farther back, converting the unknown into the known, and handing it off to the engineers and techs who take it from there.
I certainly don't see science as in competition with philosophy. Their job is to gather the data. I'll make sense of it if I can. If I can't, clearly they need to gather more data. There are few philosophical questions that can't be settled by either time, experience, blood on the battlefield, or more data.
I guess it all depends on how one looks at the word 'evothink'...the poster I was referring to(still cannot remember who it was), used the word 'evothink', in a way, so as to denigrate supporters of evolution...however, your rational explanation, shows that 'evothink', can also be a compliment...it all depends on how the poster uses the word...
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