science education

From David Klinghoffer at Evolution News and Views: The first question asked: Rate your level of agreement or disagreement with the following statement: Teachers and students should have the academic freedom to objectively discuss both the scientific strengths and weaknesses of the theory of evolution. Fully 94 percent of respondents either agreed or strongly agreed. Democrats and Republicans were very close at 93 percent and 95 percent agreement respectively. Admittedly, Republicans were a little more passionate, with 65 percent strongly agreeing compared to 54 percent among Democrats. Still, that’s clear bipartisan support. Theists and atheists were also in agreement, at 96 percent and 86 percent. Theists were the somewhat more enthusiastic, with 62 percent strongly agreeing compared to 51 percent Read More ›

From Discovery Institute: As Americans celebrate their country’s freedom this week, a new survey reveals that an overwhelming 93 percent of American adults agree that “teachers and students should have the academic freedom to objectively discuss both the scientific strengths and weaknesses of the theory of evolution.” And 88 percent agree that “scientists who raise scientific criticisms of evolution should have the freedom to make their arguments without being subjected to censorship or discrimination.” More. Some of us wonder at times about the use of the term “dissent,” as if it were something special. Dissent is, in general, evidence of thinking. There is little dissent among a herd of cows about anything that pertains to being a cow. See also: Read More ›

From Creation-Evolution Headlines: If David Johnson is right, politicians put up with conservative efforts to put up anti-evolution bills only to appease their religious constituents. Johnson, a postdoc at Rice University, looked into the outcomes of “anti-evolution curricular challenges” in various states. According to PhysOrg, only 25% of bills under consideration passed out of committee, and only two states–Louisiana and Tennessee – succeeded in getting laws passed. More. And all hell broke loose after people weren’t forced to just spout Darwin. Right? No? Remember that the next time you hear from the Ivy League. See also: The Ivy League’s Pants in Knot Follow UD News at Twitter!

From Science, where there is a paywall so I can’t swatch a bit of it for you (but you might be able to read it), there’s this big worry, via Michael Baltzley: Some students might earn credits for learning “creationism.” Would that include reading Suzan Mazur’s The Paradigm Shifters: Overthrowing “the Hegemony of the Culture of Darwin”? Or anything about rethinking evolution? Should we punish such students by forcing them to join the Pants in Knot war on creationism in Louisiana? Except, if they had any brains, they’d probably either go home (preferred option) or switch sides (well, we all gotta learn). Note: Many countries have just avoided these wars, saving the taxpayer time, grief, and money. Some fellow tried starting Read More ›

Today? Looking back on the Darwin-in-the-schools wars from the vantage point of rethinking evolution, one calls to mind textbook author Douglas Futuyma’s dictum: Darwin showed that material causes are a sufficient explanation not only for physical phenomena, as Descartes and Newton had shown, but also for biological phenomena with all their seeming evidence of design and purpose. By coupling undirected, purposeless variation to the blind, uncaring process of natural selection, Darwin made theological or spiritual explanations of the life processes superfluous. Together with Marx’s materialistic theory of history and society and Freud’s attribution of human behavior to influences over which we have little control, Darwin’s theory of evolution was a crucial plank in the platform of mechanism and materialism Never Read More ›

This time they are burning books in Portland. Read the last paragraph of this resolution adopted by the Portland School Board. Because the suppression of doubt or skepticism is the foundation of any good science education.  Right? As Robert Tracinski reports: Actually, the story is even worse than what conservative news sites have reported. It’s not just that Portland banished from its schools any active denial of catastrophic, man-made global warming; it’s that they banished any language that implies the smallest amount of doubt. Bill Bigelow, a former teacher now working for the activist group that pushed this resolution, explained its rationale in testimony to the school board: “Bigelow said PPS’ science textbooks are littered with words like ‘might,’ ‘may,’ and ‘could’ Read More ›

From Gregory Radick at Nature: The problem is that the Mendelian ‘genes for’ approach is increasingly seen as out of step with twenty-first-century biology. If we are to realize the potential of the genomic age, critics say, we must find new concepts and language better matched to variablebiological reality. This is important in education, where the reliance on simple examples may even promote an outmoded determinism about the power of genes. … What of Mendel? Some might complain that it is a poor anniversary gift to jettison him from his place of honour in the genetics curriculum. Let me suggest that this grumbling, although understandable, is misguided. If we want to honour Mendel, then let us read him seriously, which Read More ›

In my law practice I often represent charter school applicants appealing local districts’ denial of their charter applications to the Colorado State Board of Education.  Some years ago in one of these appeals a local district decided to support their case for denial by hiring an infamous advocacy firm masquerading as experts in education economics to produce a report demonstrating the terrible economic threat charter schools represent to school districts.  The firm produced the report and I proceeded to explode it by pointing out the tendentious assumptions upon which it was based. The district’s decision to use the firm backfired, because their obvious bad faith probably helped me win that appeal.  I was particularly pleased with one line from my Read More ›

See here. Bill Nye fashions himself a voice of rational thought and scientific inquiry. His shtick has gotten him into classrooms and on an endless loop of evangelizing TV appearances. Yet nearly every time he speaks these days, Nye diminishes genuine science by resorting to scaremonger-y nuggets of easily dismissible ideologically-motivated nonsense.

From the Guardian: Child psychology studies have identified a natural human bias toward the theory of intelligent design, and pose a solution: teach evolution earlier While psychologist Nathalia Gjersoe doesn’t come right out and say it, by “teach evolution,” she means teach what the U.S. Darwin-in-the-schools lobby would want: Developmental psychologists have identified two cognitive biases in very young children that help to explain the popularity of intelligent design. The first is a belief that species are defined by an internal quality that cannot be changed (psychological essentialism). The second is that all things are designed for a purpose (promiscuous teleology). These biases interact with cultural beliefs such as religion but are just as prevalent in children raised in secular Read More ›

A student kindly writes to comment on the textbook, Evolutionary Analysis, by Jon C. Herron and Scott Freeman of which, he says, I was suprised to find “ID creationism” mentioned in my evolutionary analysis textbook. While talking about biochemical designs, the book states “creationist Michael Behe believes he has found a profusion of cases”. They mention the cilium is not irreducibly complex in an evolutionary or a mechanical sense and that IC systems can evolve by natural selection. Also, “we predict that in the coming decades, all of Behe’s examples of IC will yield to evolutionary analysis”. Have they yielded any? Also, the objections they cite that ID makes are: violation of the 2nd law and speciation has never been Read More ›

From Evolution News & Views: The seminars are primarily designed for upper-division undergraduates and graduate students, but each year we try to reserve a few spaces for a special cohort of professors, scientists, teachers, pastors, and other professionals. If that sounds right for you, consider applying. … The seminar will explore cutting-edge ID work in fields such as molecular biology, biochemistry, embryology, developmental biology, paleontology, computational biology, ID-theoretic mathematics, cosmology, physics, and the history and philosophy of science. Past seminars have included such speakers as Michael Behe, Stephen Meyer, William Dembski, Jonathan Wells, Paul Nelson, Jay Richards, Douglas Axe, Ann Gauger, Richard Sternberg, Robert Marks, Scott Minnich, and Bruce Gordon. This seminar is open to students who intend to pursue Read More ›

We fancy, for the following communications position, Zack Kopplin, that young guy who was freaked because Louisiana schoolteachers needn’t shout Darwindreck at their classes any more*. But as Adam Deen tells us: When I organised evolution conference to debate the topic of Islam and evolution, there was an obscene backlash. We were labelled as deviants by a prominent Wahhabi preacher for merely having such a debate. One of the guest lecturers was even “excommunicated” for seeking to reconcile the scientific perspective with the faith. More. These guys should be way easier to talk to than a Bayou teacher who has read Darwin’s Doubt. And how about the Darwin-in-the-schools lobby’s “aren’t I good?” girls. We’ll draft them to go talk to these Read More ›

Further to: What’s happened since Icons of Evolution (2002)?, anticipating a 2016 edition, Not only that, but long-exploded Icons were still in 22 taxpayer-funded textbooks in 2011. Probably still are. Part of the reason is certainly the efforts of the Darwin-in-the-schools lobby. But there is an economic issue as well. I used to be a textbook editor, among other things. It takes a long time and a lot of work to develop rigorous new teaching materials. One must, for one thing, recruit up-to-date teachers who can write. By contrast, just regurgitating the same old same old onto the printing press, in conformity to guidelines, is easy and profitable. And if the textbook committees are not asking for any changes, it Read More ›

First, the sensible stuff: From BioLogic Institute’s  Ann Gauger Homo naledi as Spin Detector: In reading the coverage of Homo naledi, as the species is called now, it seems clear to me that the spin put on the actual bones depends on the assumptions of the writers. What do I mean? Bones can only tell us so much. The rest is a matter of interpretation, and one’s point of view inevitably tends to color that interpretation. Let me give two examples: The first example is how writers interpret skull size. H. naledi had a small brain compared to ours, about the size of a chimpanzee’s. To some writers that seems to indicate the probable lack of high levels of cognition. Read More ›