Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Citizen MD [American Medical Association op-ed against Intelligent Design]
American Medical Association ^ | 12/02/2005 | Paul Costello

Posted on 12/03/2005 6:18:54 AM PST by Right Wing Professor

I’m afraid we live in loopy times. How else to account for the latest entries in America’s culture wars: science museum docents donning combat gloves against rival fundamentalist tour groups and evolution on trial in a Pennsylvania federal court. For those keeping score, so far this year it’s Monkeys: 0, Monkey Business: 82. That's 82 evolution versus creationism debates in school boards or towns nationwide—this year alone. [1]

This past summer, when most Americans were distracted by thoughts of beaches and vacations or the high price of gasoline (even before the twin hits of Katrina and Rita), 2 heavy-weight political figures joined the President of the United States to weigh in on a supposedly scientific issue. US Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, Arizona Senator John McCain, and President George W. Bush each endorsed the teaching of intelligent design alongside evolution in the science classroom. Can anyone reasonably convince me that these pronouncements were not just cynical political punditry but, rather, were expressions of sincere beliefs?

So you have to ask yourself in light of all of these events, are we headed back to the past with no escape in the future? Are we trapped in a new period of history when science, once again, is in for the fight of its life?

In times like these, as inundated as we are by technical wizardry, one might conclude that American technological supremacy and know-how would lead, inevitably, to a deeper understanding or trust of science. Well, it doesn’t. Perhaps just the opposite is true. Technology and gee whiz gadgetry has led to more suspicion rather than less. And a typical American’s understanding of science is limited at best. As far as evolution is concerned, if you’re a believer in facts, scientific methods, and empirical data, the picture is even more depressing. A recent survey by the Pew Forum on Religion and Science found that 64 percent of respondents support teaching creationism side by side with evolution in the science curriculum of public schools. A near majority—48 percent—do not believe that Darwin’s theory of evolution is proven by fossil discoveries. Thirty-three percent believe that a general agreement does not exist among scientists that humans evolved over time [2].

What if we become a nation that can’t chew gum, walk down the street, and transplant embryonic stem cells all at the same time? Does it matter?

New York Times journalist Cornelia Dean, who balances her time between science reporting for the Times and lecturing at Harvard, told me that she believes that science stands in a perilous position. “Science, as an institution, has largely ceded the microphone to people who do not necessarily always embrace the scientific method,” she says. “Unless scientists participate in the public life of our country, our discourse on a number of issues of great importance becomes debased” [3].

Others, such as journalist Chris Mooney, point to the increasing politicization of science as a pollutant seeping into our nation’s psyche. In his recent book, The Republican War on Science, Mooney spells out the danger of ignorance in public life when ideology trumps science.

Science politicization threatens not just our public health and the environment but the very integrity of American democracy, which relies heavily on scientific and technical expertise to function. At a time when more political choices than ever before hinge upon the scientific and technical competence of our elected leaders, the disregard for consensus and expertise—and the substitution of ideological allegiance for careful assessment—can have disastrous consequences [4].

Jon D. Miller, PhD, a political scientist on faculty at Northwestern University’s School of Medicine, believes that the sophisticated questions of biology that will confront each and every American in the 21st Century will require that they know the difference between a cell and a cell phone and are able to differentiate DNA from MTV. For decades, Miller has been surveying Americans about their scientific knowledge. “We are now entering a period where our ability to unravel previously understood or not understood questions is going to grow extraordinarily,” says Miller. “As long as you are looking at the physics of nuclear power plants or the physics of transistors [all 20th Century questions]…it doesn’t affect your short-term belief systems. You can still turn on a radio and say it sounds good but you don’t have to know why it works. As we get into genetic medicine, infectious diseases…if you don’t understand immunity, genetics, the principles of DNA, you’re going to have a hard time making sense of these things” [5].

Culture Wars and 82 Evolution Debates

Yet in some corners today, knowledge isn’t really the problem. It’s anti-knowledge that is beginning to scare the scientific community. Glenn Branch, deputy director of the National Center for Science Education, calls 2005 “a fairly busy year” when he considers the 82 evolution versus creationism “flare-ups” that have occurred at the state, local, and individual classroom levels so far. According to a spring 2005 survey of science teachers, the heat in the classroom was not coming from Bunsen burners or exothermic reactions but rather from a pressure on teachers to censor. The National Science Teachers Association’s informal survey of its members found that 31 percent of them feel pressured to include creationism, intelligent design, or other nonscientific alternatives to evolution in their science classroom [1]. Classrooms aren’t the only places feeling the heat. Science museums have also become conflict zones. In her New York Times article, Challenged by Creationists, Museums Answer Back, Dean detailed special docent training sessions that will enable the guides to be better armed “to deal with visitors who reject settled precepts of science on religious grounds” [6].

These ideological battles aren’t likely to vanish any time soon. If anything, an organized and emboldened fundamentalist religious movement buttressed by political power in Washington will continue to challenge accepted scientific theory that collides with religious beliefs. So one must ask, is it too farfetched to see these ideological battles spilling over into areas of medical research and even into funding at the National Institutes of Health?

Now I am not asking for a world that doesn’t respect religious belief. My education as a Roman Catholic balanced creed and science. In the classroom of my youth, one nun taught creationism in religion class while another taught evolution in science, and never the twain did meet.

Where Is the Medical Community?

The medical community as a whole has been largely absent from today’s public debates on science. Neither the American Medical Association nor the American Psychiatric Association has taken a formal stand on the issue of evolution versus creationism. When physicians use their power of political persuasion in state legislatures and the US Congress, it’s generally on questions more pertinent to their daily survival—Medicare reimbursement, managed care reform, and funding for medical research. Northwestern’s Miller believes that the scientific community can’t fight the battle alone and that, as the attacks against science accelerate, the medical community will have to use its privileged perch in society to make the case for science. “You have to join your friends, so when someone attacks the Big Bang, when someone attacks evolution, when someone attacks stem cell research, all of us rally to the front. You can’t say it’s their problem because the scientific community is not so big that we can splinter 4 or more ways and ever still succeed doing anything” [5].

So what does one do? How can a medical student, a resident, or a physician just beginning to build a career become active in these larger public battles? Burt Humburg, MD, a resident in internal medicine at Penn State’s Hershey Medical Center, is one role model. He’s been manning the evolutionary ramparts since his medical school days in Kansas in the late 1990s when he became active in Kansas Citizens for Science. On a brief vacation from his residency volunteering as a citizen advocate for the federal trial in Pennsylvania, he said education is the key role for the physician. While he realizes that medical students, residents and physicians might not view themselves as scientists, per se, he sees himself and his colleagues as part of the larger scientific collective that can’t afford to shirk its duty. “The town scientist is the town doctor, so whether we want it or not, we have the mantle—the trappings—of a scientist” [7].

It is time for the medical community, through the initiative of individual physicians, to address not only how one can heal thy patient, but also how one can heal thy nation. There are many ways to get involved; from the most rudimentary—attending school board meetings, sending letters to the editor, and volunteering at the local science museum—to the more demanding—running for office, encouraging a spouse or partner to do so, or supporting candidates (especially financially) who are willing to speak out for science. As Tip O’Neill, the larger-than-life Speaker of the House of Representatives, famously declared, “All politics is local.” Speak out for science. Isn’t that a message that should be advanced in every physician’s office?

Northwestern’s Jon Miller concedes that speaking out may come with a price, “It won’t make…[physicians]...popular with many people but is important for any profession, particularly a profession based on science” to do so [5]. Consider this: shouldn’t civic leadership be embedded in the mind of every blooming physician? In the end, doesn’t combating this virulent campaign of anti-knowledge lead us back to that old adage of evolutionary leadership by example, “Monkey see, monkey do?” Seize the day, Doc.

References

1. Survey indicates science teachers feel pressure to teach nonscientific alternatives to evolution [press release]. Arlington, Va: National Science Teachers Association; March 24, 2005. Available at: http://www.nsta.org/pressroom&news_story_ID=50377. Accessed November 21, 2005.
2. The Pew Research Center for the People and the Press: Reading the polls on evolution and creationism, Pew Center Pollwatch. September 28, 2005. Available at: http://people-press.org/commentary/display.php3?AnalysisID=118. Accessed November 21, 2005.
3. Dean, Cornelia. E-mail response to author. September 27, 2005.
4. Mooney C. The Republican War on Science. New York, NY: Basic Books; 2005.
5. Miller, Jon D. Telephone interview with author. September 29, 2005.
6. Dean C. Challenged by creationists, museums answer back. The New York Times. September 20, 2005. F1.
7. Humburg, Burt C. MD. Telephone interview with author. October 3, 2005.
Paul Costello is executive director of communications and public affairs for Stanford University School of Medicine.
The viewpoints expressed on this site are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views and policies of the AMA.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial
KEYWORDS: ama; crevolist; idisjunkscience
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-20 ... 321-340341-360361-380381-385 next last
To: From many - one.
Yeah, human heart would be hard to get so he didn't try.

Yes, suitable hearts at that age are extremely hard to get. Plus you don't know that they didn't search for a heart.

The surgeon had dedicated much of his career to finding a solution for a tragic birth defect. Hypoplastic left-heart syndrome (HLHS), a lethal underdevelopment of the left side of the heart, causes otherwise perfectly formed babies to die shortly after birth. HLHS occurs once in 12,000 live births in the United States. In such babies, the left side of the heart is usually unable to pump sufficiently to sustain life for more than a few days.

To appreciate the problem Bailey faced, one cannot ignore the historical context under which this surgery took place. It has been estimated that approximately 10,000 newborns died from hypoplastic left-heart syndrome in America alone between the first and only newborn-heart transplant (performed in 1967) and Baby Fae's surgery (in 1984). The 1967 operation was performed in New York by Dr. Adrian Kantrowitz, using the heart of an anencephalic (brain-absent) donor, a type of baby that today legally is not considered acceptable as a donor because it usually does not meet brain-death criteria. That patient died within hours of the operation. At the time of Baby Fae's surgery, heart transplantation for a newborn had not been attempted in the United States for almost 17 years.

So, to you, now the doctor's unbelief in evolution is not the failing, but that he didn't care enough for the child and wanted to attempt some stunt for fame?

361 posted on 12/04/2005 6:12:20 PM PST by AndrewC (Darwinian logic -- It is just-so if it is just-so)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 355 | View Replies]

To: Stultis
Yep, it's my answer. Scienceman isn't a superhero at all. He's just another guy. You can take that straight to Clark Kent.
362 posted on 12/04/2005 6:30:32 PM PST by Mamzelle
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 356 | View Replies]

To: AndrewC

Yes, it's conjecture. Just speculating from what is presently known from human nature.


363 posted on 12/04/2005 6:39:32 PM PST by Mamzelle
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 353 | View Replies]

To: Mamzelle
Yep, it's my answer.

So then you have no problem with teaching astrology in science classes, or pretending that Marilyn Monroe surpasses George Washington in historical importance, or claiming that our founding fathers were all racists, etc.

Since academe is imperfect, anything goes.

364 posted on 12/04/2005 6:44:44 PM PST by Stultis (I don't worry about the war turning into "Vietnam" in Iraq; I worry about it doing so in Congress.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 362 | View Replies]

To: Coyoteman
Maybe you could start your own chat room, and call It "Those Who Ignore Virtually"--"Those Who Want To Be Virtually Ignored." I'm not straight on whether the point is to be ignored or to do the ignoring and be noticed how very hard you work at ignoring. Or being ignored.

We come here to be ignored!

or is it...We come here to ignore everybody else? And you'd better notice that we're ignoring you, but don't tell us, because then you wouldn't be ignoring us.

perhaps ...We come here to demand that we be ignored! Or else.

er...Don't expect us to let you know who the Ignored Ones are, or who the Ignoring Ones are, because that'd be cheating, and we'll tell...er...we'll tell someone who doesn't happen to be ignoring us at that particular moment. Something like that.

I dunno. You explain it--or ignore it. It'd really help if ya'll got together and wrote The Ignoring Maniefesto, so that we could ignore it and make you happy. Or the Manifesto of the Ignored. Les Invisibles.

Never, since whatzisname's Cat, have so many worked so hard to convince other people to ignore them.

LOL--ya'll really ought to stop being so amusing. It's making it hard to ignore you.

365 posted on 12/04/2005 6:57:42 PM PST by Mamzelle
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 360 | View Replies]

To: AndrewC

I read the puff piece you're quoting from.

Both the puff piece and the attack article have limitations, but at least mine had some solid refs which I'm checking back on.

There is a limited amount of objective data available: genetically (documentable even if you don't believe in evolution) chimps are closer to humans than baboons, he used a baboon.

The puff piece provides no explanation for this. It does not document an unsuccessful search for a human heart either.

Doctor Bailey may be a fine surgeon and a good person, but he goofed up badly on Baby Fae. My guess is that he learned from experience. Nevertheless, the Baby Fae procedure was not justified according to any information currently available.


366 posted on 12/04/2005 7:33:42 PM PST by From many - one.
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 361 | View Replies]

To: Coyoteman; From many - one.
"No problem, we'll do a virtual ping list, like the virtual ignore list (really need that one lately!).

OK. Let's start collecting virtual names. Do we need to virtually advertise? Maybe convince Junior to add it to his info sheet?

367 posted on 12/04/2005 7:51:34 PM PST by b_sharp (Science adjusts theories to fit evidence, creationism distorts evidence to fit the Bible.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 360 | View Replies]

To: b_sharp; Coyoteman; RadioAstronomer

I'sa so confusa

Virtual pingsa or namesa?

Who found Jar Jar as noxious as I did?

Who can do the dialect better?

(RA included because he posted earlier)

I'm outta here for the night...I've got galls to id by tomorrow. There's a joke in there somewhere but I can't find it.


368 posted on 12/04/2005 8:08:44 PM PST by From many - one.
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 367 | View Replies]

To: From many - one.
Who found Jar Jar as noxious as I did?

Everyone! Outta here too.

369 posted on 12/04/2005 8:46:11 PM PST by Coyoteman (I love the sound of beta decay in the morning!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 368 | View Replies]

To: From many - one.
Nevertheless, the Baby Fae procedure was not justified according to any information currently available.

So? Your attack piece is as worthless as the puff piece you imagine the Loma Linda article to be.

First, though chimps are genetically closer to humans than pigs are, we use pig valves in heart operations, not chimp valves. Though chimps are genetically closer to humans than pigs are, we used pig and cow insulin rather than chimp insulin.

Second, as I mentioned previously, the decision was not just up to Dr. Bailey, it was a group decision. Finally, Put up. You assert that current information has determined that the Baby Fae procedure was not justified. Well, besides being Monday morning quarterbacking, you have not provided such information other than that some people didn't like it. And you have slipped far afield from the accusation that somehow the procedure was destined to failure because the Dr. did not believe in evolution. It failed because the child was very sick. The operation was performed 12 days after her birth. She lasted 20 or 21 days after the operation. That was longer that the first human to human heart transplant.And yes, the team learned from the experience. We all do.

370 posted on 12/04/2005 10:07:10 PM PST by AndrewC (Darwinian logic -- It is just-so if it is just-so)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 366 | View Replies]

To: From many - one.

Yeah I think Akyol works both sides of the fence.
As for the scientists working in their labs, some of them need to get out of their labs once in a while and shmooze a bit. What they do IGNORE may bite them in the rear.


Now sir, what of my other points, mainly the dilution of proper western education by the liberals in our public schools; I think that has had a far more damaging effect than religious folk ever will have had. Come on admit it, what has damaged public education more in the past 50 years?


371 posted on 12/05/2005 5:22:06 AM PST by mdmathis6 (Proof against evolution:"Man is the only creature that blushes, or needs to" M.Twain)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 325 | View Replies]

To: montag813
I think ID proponents are misguided. It is the SOCIAL Darwinists who are the enemy. The abortionists, the euthanists, the "animal rights" activists and fascist environmentalists. That is the real threat. Not Charles Darwin. Not the Galapogos. Not evolution.

Well stated. I wish more people would grasp this point.

372 posted on 12/05/2005 8:19:54 AM PST by Quark2005 (No time to play. One post per day.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 101 | View Replies]

To: Quark2005

hear, hear! The proponents of evolution should indeed step back to see who the real enem-
ies to science are!


373 posted on 12/05/2005 10:53:57 AM PST by mdmathis6 (Proof against evolution:"Man is the only creature that blushes, or needs to" M.Twain)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 372 | View Replies]

To: AndrewC

Let's try this again.

Dr. Bailey used a baboon heart.
Baboons are evolutionarily more distant from humans than chimps.

He has been quoted as saying that he did not believe in evolution (btw, I have another source since I couldn't dig up my natural history magazine to quote.


http://zoology.okstate.edu/zoo_fclt/lovern/antolin_herbers2001.pdf

International Journal of Organic Evolution, Vol 55 No.12 (2001) Perspective: Evolution's Struggle For Existence In America's Public Schools
Michael Antolin and Joan Herbers

"...Ethical and procedural questions aside, a troubling aspect of the story is that Leonard Bailey, the lead surgeon for Baby Fae's operation, when interviewed by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (1985),

Bailey described how he chose baboons as donors because their hearts were the right size and were available. Furthermore he said, ˜The scientists that are keen on the evolutionary concept that we actually developed serially from subhuman primates to humans, with mitochondrial DNA dating and that sort of thing, the differences have to do with millions of years. That boggles my mind somehow. I don't understand it well, and I'm not sure that it means a great deal in terms of tissue homology." *

The original broadcast was June 3, 1985, during the program Health Report hosted by Dr. Norman Swan.


374 posted on 12/05/2005 5:18:32 PM PST by From many - one.
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 370 | View Replies]

To: mdmathis6

I only see one side for Akyol, can you elaborate?

I agree it would be helpful if scientists had more political and social presonalities, but then they might not go into science.

As for public education, I am not really qualified to comment. I went to extraordinarily high quality public schools in the 40's and 50's (yes, I'm that old) where I was taught that one could not subtract a larger number from a smaller one, but otherwise got a broad and deep education.

My sons had some specific "dumbing down" issues in high school but I don't know if it was the school or all schools. My grandkids in public school are getting a more enriched education than the private school one, but, again, it may be a local situtation; the public school neighborhood is around a Prestige U. and has highly involved parents.


375 posted on 12/05/2005 5:31:12 PM PST by From many - one.
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 371 | View Replies]

To: From many - one.
Dr. Bailey used a baboon heart. Baboons are evolutionarily more distant from humans than chimps.

Yes, so what? Pigs are evolutionarily more distant from us but we use their tissues.

Here is a quote from your latest link.

In particular, consider organ transplants. Because the number of patients requiring organ transplants generally exceeds the supply of human organs, xenotransplantation (cross-species donation) is an active area of research (Auchincloss and Sachs 1998). One of the best-known cases is Baby Fae, an infant born with an underdeveloped heart who was given the heart of a baboon at Loma Linda University Medical Center (Loma Linda, CA), in 1984 (Bailey et al. 1985). The baboon donor was one of five that had been tested for immunological similarity based on three HLA genes. Three baboons showed relatively low responses to the infant’s lymphocytes, and the baboon with the lowest immunological response was chosen as donor. Baby Fae survived for 20 days after surgery with the help of the immunosuppressive drug cyclosporine, but eventually died from rejection of the transplanted heart and other organ failure. The main cause of failure was a mismatch of ABO antigens between the baboon (blood type A) and the infant (type O). Ethical and procedural questions aside, a troubling aspect

This paper is wrong. The heart was not rejected. Baby Fae died due to organ failure caused by the ABO mismatch as noted in your citation. ABO mismatch occurs even between humans, and it was considered in the decision. You will note that they thought the cross-species aspect was more alarming than the ABO problem. It was the ABO problem that was the main cause for failure.

One concern was the difference in blood groups of the potential donors and the recipient: common baboons are virtually all AB, A, or B types. The recipient was type O. Crossing the ABO barrier has historically been shunned. However, scattered reports of human kidney- and heart-transplant survival, despite ABO mismatching, were of some encouragement. The transplant team also felt that crossing the ABO barrier might be less significant than crossing the species barrier and that the baby's immune system might fail to recognize it as being as significant as the species barrier.

That was from my previous link.

376 posted on 12/05/2005 6:40:08 PM PST by AndrewC (Darwinian logic -- It is just-so if it is just-so)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 374 | View Replies]

To: AndrewC

I notice you did not address the quote.

There was a chance for a better match, unless you are arguing that chimps were somehow unavailable.

That chance was not taken because the doctor didn't understand evolutionary relationships.


377 posted on 12/05/2005 7:13:05 PM PST by From many - one.
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 376 | View Replies]

To: From many - one.
I notice you did not address the quote. ... There was a chance for a better match, unless you are arguing that chimps were somehow unavailable.

I did.....Yes, so what? Pigs are evolutionarily more distant from us but we use their tissues.. Care to back that up?

378 posted on 12/05/2005 7:21:59 PM PST by AndrewC (Darwinian logic -- It is just-so if it is just-so)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 377 | View Replies]

To: From many - one.

I was reading soem of Akyol's other writings and while he calls for peace and speaks of abhorring jihadist violence, I never get the clear sense that he names names and clearly denounces specific violence done in Allah's name. He sounds like the ANSWER and CAIR crowd..."Oh we hate violence but it's all America and GW's fault and the jews too!"

The Wahabists don't seem to have caught on that many folk do see thru their disengenuousness of speech when we compare it to their actions.


379 posted on 12/06/2005 5:40:22 AM PST by mdmathis6 (Proof against evolution:"Man is the only creature that blushes, or needs to" M.Twain)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 375 | View Replies]

To: mdmathis6

Good solid propagandist... he sounds calm and reasonable so we should just meet him halfway.. not!

During WWII it was the "German-American Friendship Bund" after all we shared a common culture and what did Jews have to do with it, we really ought to support Germany or at least stay out of the war. They were effective for a while.

And Akyol's suckered in a bunch of willing listeners in Kansas.

I have never had any problem with people of faith accepting a literal creation. The keyword being faith. It's the pseudoscience science education underminers that trouble me. Look to the background and something unsavory generally pops up: moonies with foreign ties, Islamists.

A demurrer here. Many who post here are honest and sincere in their beliefs and I'm absolutely not saying they are in bed with these guys or even advancing their cause. I believe in freedom of expression and religion, especially for folk who disagree with me ... forces me to examine my own positions more carefully.

But at least some probably are agents or the bad guys are missing an easy bet.

I keep wondering who persuaded the Kansans to call in Akyol.


380 posted on 12/06/2005 6:25:39 AM PST by From many - one.
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 379 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-20 ... 321-340341-360361-380381-385 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson