South Korea: Darwin banned from school text books

In the never-ending war between evolutionists and creationists, the latter have just scored big time, though not in the U.S. which is their main fighting ground, but in Asia. In South Korea, a petition has been accepted to remove certain evolutionist elements and references from high school text books. This is probably the first time in two centuries this has happened in a country with a scientific/western culture. That is, ever since evolutionist doctrine started prevailing, often for anti-religious purposes.

The campaign was headed by the Society for Textbooks Revise (STR) whose task it is to remove evolutionist “errors” froim text books, in order to “correct” students’ vision of the world. The Society’s members and experts include biology professors and high-calibre teachers. The petition did not ask for the theory to be removed in its entirety from text books, but specific examples instead; for example, the theories about the horse and the archaeopteryx as the ancestor of all birds.

STR is also campaigning for certain sections about “human evolution” and the “adaptation of chanffinches’ beaks to the habitat they are in and to their way of living”; this is a reference to one of Charles Darwin’s most famous observations during his trip, which led to the publication of his famous book On the Origin of Species. To give further impetus to its campaign the group has drawn attention to some recent discoveries. For example, that the archaeopteryx is one of the many winged dinosaurs and is therefore not necessarily the ancestor of all birds.

STR is part of the Korea Association for Creation Research (KACR), a larger group that promotes creationist science and the biblical history of human development. South Korea is a country where religious (Christian or Buddhist) faith, is experienced with a greater enthusiasm and this has an impact on the acceptance or not of evolutionist doctrines.

Naturally, the debate is still raging on in the U.S., where creationists have scored a number of victories against their adversaries. It is interesting to note the proportion of people supporting each theory. A new survey carried out by Gallup, found that 46% of Americans are creationists and believe that God directly created human beings in the current form, at some point during the last ten thousand years.

While half the nation shares this opinion, another 32% believes humans have evolved with God’s guidance. So a significant 78% of Americans claim that religion has played a key role in influencing creation or the formation of humanity. 15% of those questioned believe the evolution process took place without divine intervention.

Meanwhile, in South Korea, a survey carried out for a documentary entitled “The Era of God and Darwin” showed that a third of those surveyed did not believe in evolution. Of these individuals, 41% claimed there was not enough scientific proof to back the theory; 39% stated it was contrary to their religious faith and 17% said they did not understand it. Obviously South Korean evolutionists are deeply concerned about what has happened and are looking into strategies for recovering lost ground. The battle continues.

So are you predicting South Korea’s decline as an economic and technological powerhouse because of this?

Indoctrinating children with ideology instead of facts is an old technique, the goal of which is to shape society to fit the indoctrinator's idea of what a society should look like. The process takes time, but does have some effect. We only have to look at the leftist influences on our culture... for example, how mental illnesses regarding sexual orientation have been rebranded as variants of normal. Trying to indoctrinate children in an unscientific view of the world *will* have the effect of convincing them to turn away from science, and that *will* cause a decrease in the number of scientists in the long run. No country benefits from eschewing science.

Archaeopteryx is for all intents and purposes a mythical creature. Can science create him/her in a laboratory? What day of the week did the first archaeopteryx appear? Which strands of nucleic acids were the essential elements of it’s being a unique species from it’s direct predecessor? And how can any theories about archaeopteryx ever be rigorously tested under controlled conditions? How can any scientific hypothesis about archaeopteryx be put to the test?

Archaeopteryx was a multi-cellular organism. At this time, we do not have the ability to make multi-cellular organisms from scratch. Presumably, however, if I were to study the physiology of an archaeopteryx, I could recreate one by genetically modifying an existing bird species. As far as hypotheses (not theories) that can be tested under controlled conditions--well, there are plenty. For instance, I could test how well the wing structure was adapted to flight to determine if it was a true flying bird, or a gliding bird, because it is possible to build a model archaeopteryx wing. If I just want to test how the evolutionary process works, I don't need an archaeopteryx. Any organism will do.

This is a mythological realm. It will have no effect on the making of better cell phones. Nobody at LG or Samsung talks about this stuff on an hour by hour basis. Seoul National University will not be nailing 95 theses to it’s classroom doors.

Making cell phones does not require a knowledge of life sciences. Finding cures for human diseases and improving public health does. The US is still the leader in these areas--and while I'd like to see us keep the leadership spot, I want to stay there by honest competition, not by kneecapping our competitors.

I am actually pleased with Chicken Little responses to this kind of stuff. Hysterical dogmatics are funny.

Recognizing a dangerous trend and taking measures to nip it in the bud is not engaging in "hysterical dogmatics." For example: abortion was legalized when I was a pre-teen, and at that time, was mostly supported in the first trimester. When pro-lifers warned about the slippery slope--that abortion would eventually be commonplace up until birth--abortion advocates scoffed at them and claimed that it would never happen. We now have a president who supports overt infanticide. The anti-science victories now may be small, but that doesn't mean they aren't a threat to the future.

Except for the **few** experts in the field of macro-evolution, few **biologists** “talk about this stuff”!

My husband is a BIOchemist and in his entire career and education approximately 20 minutes was spent on the topic of macro-evolution and NONE of that time happen during his Ph.D. studies. Imagine that!

How odd. During the course of my studies leading up to my PhD in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, we not only talked about evolution, but spent considerable time examining the biochemical mechanisms of evolution. In fact, I used evolutionary theory to formulate the hypothesis I used to guide my PhD research; none of my research would have even been possible had I tried to pretend evolution is NOT a fundamental aspect of biology.

I suppose someone who is emotionally attached to the belief that life, the universe, and everything suddenly sprang into existence ~6,000 years ago *could* still manage to get a life sciences PhD by renaming evolutionary mechanisms as "micro-evolution", thereby mostly avoiding anything they see as threatening their faith (instead of just accepting the fact that Genesis is metaphorical, not literal). But... it's not scientific, and they only limit themselves. What's "micro" vs. "macro" evolution, anyway? Mouse vs. elephant?

Also...It appears to me that the biggest bullies regarding macro-evolution are also the biggest defenders of our compulsory government owned and run socialist-entitlement and **GODLESS** K-12 school system. Gee! I wonder why that is? ( sarc)

Really. What evidence do you have that the majority of scientists are bullies, or that scientists are any more likely to defend the public school system than anyone else?

If anyone can be labelled "bullies" in this debate, I would say it's those who defame scientists, who claim that we are liars, that we make up data, that we spend all of our time trying to prove and promote atheism, that we worship Darwin, etc., etc. For people who call themselves Christians, too many young-earth creationists are awfully quick to bear false witness against scientists in a clearly unChristian manner.

evolution
^^^^^^^^^^^

Solution: Get government out of the education business on every level and these wars over MACRO evolution will dissipate like dew on grass on a hot summer's day.

By the way, I just last week I read “The Great Bridge: The Epic Story of the Building of the Brooklyn Bridge” by David M Cullough. Guess what? Evolution , Macro or Micro, was not mentioned even once.

In your post are you being **deliberately** misleading? As a so-called “scientist” you claim not to know the difference between macro and micro evolution? ( Unbelievable!)

You are a scientist? Hm? And....You **assume** that my husband and I are creationists? Where did you get that from my post?

Finally, .. regarding defending government schooling and **all** scientists:

I can not defend a strawman or YOUR creation. My criticism was directed at those who are MACRO-evolutionist bullies. Some Macro-evolutionist supporters ( hopefully most) are not bullies. It does seem that those who are MACRO-evolutionist bullies are the biggest defenders of compulsory, socialist-entitlement, and godless K-12 schooling. Gee! I wonder why that is? Could it possibly have anything to do with atheism? ( This is my **anecdotal** observation.)

Truth: MACRO-evolution has NOTHING to do with work done in the vast realm of science or any other parts of American life and work. Even in the work done by the majority of biologists, few have anything to do with Macro evolution in their entire careers! Macro-evolution is of concern to tiny number of people who are actually working in this field. Other scientists spend their** entire** careers ( including my husband) without it being a topic of discussion even once.

By the way, my husband, the ( BIOchemist) published numerous papers in the leading journals of his field. Traveled and lectured worldwide. He was honored by the other scientists of a MAJOR chemical company as being a “Distinguished” scientist at the remarkably young age of 40. He has SIX patents for his inventions in his field that has made health care and treatment more robust, far cheaper, more portable, and more available to people even in the most remote areas of the world. In other words, his work has saved lives. He did all this with less than 20 minutes of MACRO evolution as part of one lecture as a undergrad. I hope you have done, or will do, as well.

In your post are you being **deliberately** misleading? As a so-called “scientist” you claim not to know the difference between macro and micro evolution? ( Unbelievable!)

You are a scientist? Hm? And....You **assume** that my husband and I are creationists? Where did you get that from my post?

Well... the answers to both of these are rather connected. It has been my experience that the only people who make a distinction between "macro" evolution and "micro" evolution are, in fact, creationists (mostly of the young earth variety). So the fact that you even use such language is highly suggestive of literal creationist beliefs. As are some of the other attitudes displayed in your post, the use of the term "Macro-evolutionist supporters", etc.

From a scientific point of view, the difference between "micro" and "macro" evolution is fuzzy, and could be interpreted in different ways. If your interest is in discussing details of evolution, then no qualifier is needed: it is just evolution. Question: when I construct a phylogenetic tree to examine evolutionary relationships, am I looking at micro- or macro- evolution?

By the way, my husband, the ( BIOchemist) published numerous papers in the leading journals of his field...He did all this with less than 20 minutes of MACRO evolution as part of one lecture as a undergrad. I hope you have done, or will do, as well.

As I said, that sounds really odd. We talked about evolution in intro to biology. We talked a lot about evolution in genetics class. In biochemistry class, we discussed the mechanistic details of different types of DNA mutation (the cause of evolution). Later, in graduate school, we studied the biophysics of various types of DNA mutation. Although your husband's 20 minutes of discussion of "macro evolution" is roughly 20 minutes more discussion of it than I ever had, my whole undergraduate and graduate careers contained countless hours of discussion on evolution.

Description is of course the best term, but “natural selection,” as generally understood at the time, was simplistic and weighed down by the crude materialism of the time. Darwin, of course, had no understanding of genetics, and his thinking about the transmission of physical characteristics was distorted by the knowledge of animal husbandry. Thus Darwinism and Mendelian theory were opposed to one another for more than 40 years. Julian Huxley’s reconciliation of the two was an advance, but it was superseded by the research resulting from the discovery of DNA. Even after mapping the genome, however, has not resulted in any grand theory that pulls it all together, as Newton’s work did the physics of the 18th century. I have the feeling that evolution is going to take a path analogous to the
development of atomic theory, where the original idea of “solid”atoms will be displayed by the probabilistic notions were have today. So Darwin is today as irrelevant as Columbus.

exDemMom I have you logged as predicting South Korea’s decline as an economic and technological powerhouse. Fair ‘nuff. I predict South Korea will be stronger relative to at least Southeast Asia and what we consider the West in the next few decades.

Re: knowing the physiology of extinct species meaning the theoretical ability to recreate it through...well I don’t know exactly...some sort of breeding program...I must admit I’ve never come across anyone make such a claim. I know we just have fossils, but out of curiosity, what bird species would you start with? What other prehistoric dinosaurs have ever tried to be back-engineered whether by breeding or something else?

Building a model wing based on fossilized remains of arch. doesn’t test evolution! Evolution isn’t physiology of an extant organism. The nuts and bolts of evolution has to do with mutations. There is, in fact, debate about whether or not arch. was an evolutionary dead-end. My reading suggests other possibilities for bird ancestry in the archosaurian family.

I don’t know anyone currently testing theories about arch., besides studying fossils relative to other fossils. Are we able to genetically deconstruct fossilized remains? I guess I’m pretty ignorant about that, if it is in fact going on somewhere. That would be the mechanics of truly studying and understanding evolution, not gross examination of fossilized recreations mixed with cool stories to fit a framework that just *has* to be true, by gum.

No, I'm not predicting that. As long as they keep religious fundamentalism out of science, and keep it from being taught in lieu of science, they will remain competitive in the life sciences.

We're getting to the point where we can begin to make predictions about what genotype will lead to which phenotype. We know quite about about which genes do what, for a large number of organisms and genes. By looking at the phylogenetic tree of a large enough sampling of bird species, we can get ideas about what the ancestral gene sequences were. Then it would be a matter of back-engineering the genes to their ancestral sequence. Or synthesizing the genes from scratch. If we could find enough dinosaur DNA (preferably from the bird ancestors, not other dinosaurs), we could probably patch together some genes. Some genes would have to be put together without deducing what they might have been from the phylogenetic trees; early birds had teeth, modern birds have beaks, so that would have to be addressed. After recreating the genotype, then we would have to stick that DNA--in the form of synthetic chromosomes--into an ovum from which all the DNA has been removed. Then stick that ovum into an artificial egg so it can develop.

Another approach would be to take bird stem cells, and modify just the genes that would make them look (and maybe act) like dinosaurs, while leaving all the other genes intact. Then you would want to match the bird type to the dinosaur type--carnivore to carnivore and so forth--so that the metabolic processes would be appropriate for the type of dinosaur that is the final product. Those stem cells can be injected into an early bird embryo, making a chimera, which, when it reproduces, will have baby dinosaurs.

Well, those are a couple of approaches. I could probably come up with a few more if I wanted to. The reason I said before that recreating dinosaurs could "theoretically" be done is that I'm talking about a HUGE project. Technically possible--but expensive and time consuming, and unlikely to be done because of those factors, especially considering we have other priorities, like trying to find cures for killer diseases.

If I were going to undertake a project to bring back some fossil species, I'd either start small (insects) or start with something that isn't so old that its DNA is all fragmented.

I'm not a paleontologist, so I really don't know much about what they're doing these days. DNA several million years old has been found, but it's not very good quality DNA.

The thing about the fossil record is that when modern molecular methods were developed, allowing scientists to compare DNA sequences, the phylogenetic trees developed turned out to match almost exactly the phylogenies determined by the paleontologists who had none of those modern tools. That's an extremely good corroboration of the earlier methods. We don't determine how evolution proceeds based on "cool stories"; we piece it together based on observations from a number of sciences. They show a high level of consistency, which is what we expect from an actual process.

Anyway, I know this is from several days ago. But I just remembered that you had some questions, and I forgot to answer them sooner.

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