evolution
stcynic | February 18, 2004250 scientists and science educators from the state of Missouri have released a joint statement pointing out the unscientific nature of "Intelligent Design"(ID) and taking a public stand against Missouri House Bill 911. This bill is the most cleverly worded and detailed ID bill yet introduced in any state. Contrast the text in the Missouri bill with the text of the Michigan bill that is sitting in committee and you'll see what I mean. The Missouri bill was obviously written with the help of top ID advocates, perhaps even written by one of the pro-ID attorneys like David Dewolf. I highly doubt…
stcynic | February 17, 2004WorldNetDaily is reporting on a new poll, taken by ABC, which says that 60% of Americans believe in a literal 6-day creation and a literal global flood. This is a bit unsettling to the scientifically literate, but it should come as no big shock. The average American is likely to get their information not from science journals but from rags like the WorldNetDaily, which is basically an online version of the National Enquirer, but with more right-wing commentary sprinkled in. The article cited above provides a perfect example. In the middle of the article is a link to another WND story about…
stcynic | February 17, 2004As a brief follow up on the claims made by Rusty Lopez concerning the "testable creation model" that is advocated by Hugh Ross and Fuz Rana of Reasons to Believe, I'd like to quote something on the subject of testability written by Doug Theobald, one of the folks who has contributed so much to the Talk.Origins Archive. A biochemist from the Univ. of Colorado at Boulder, Doug wrote one of the primary FAQs in the archive entitled 29+ Evidences for Macroevolution: The Scientific Case for Common Descent. It is at his suggestion that I am posting this, because it really does help explain why the…
stcynic | February 13, 2004Alan Leshner, the head of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, has written an article concerning the recent controversy in Georgia over evolution in science classes. What he writes seems to support my contention that all of the public handwringing over the superficial issue of whether to use "evolution" or "changes over time" was a planned distraction. He writes:In preparing draft standards, Georgia officials sought permission from the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the world's largest general science society, to draw upon our national Project…
stcynic | February 13, 2004In the midst of yesterday's Darwin Day celebrations around the world, you might have missed this little tidbit. Some folks in Australia have begun giving away the Wilberforce Award, named of course for the Bishop Wilberforce who debated the validity of evolution against T.H. Huxley at Oxford in 1860. The award is given to an individual who "through the silly nature of their arguments or actions, have inadvertently done the most to promote evolution as a fact". This year's winner was Carl Weiland, the head of Answers in Genesis, the Australian creationist organization. But as the newspaper…
stcynic | February 13, 2004Russell Husted, a fellow blogger not to be confused with Rusty, left a couple of comments in response to postings far down on my page, so I thought I'd move them up toward the top and answer them before they scroll off entirely. I hadn't noticed them until now. One was in response to my post concerning the Richard Dawkins incident. Russell wrote:You said of the question:"Can you give an example of a genetic mutation or an evolutionary process which can be seen to increase the information in the genome?", that it is absurd. Why?
You also say Dawkins eventually gave a good answer. Can you…
stcynic | February 12, 2004Charles Darwin was born Feb. 12, 1809. With the publication of On the Origin of Species in 1859, Darwin took his place alongside the likes of Copernicus, Newton, Kepler and (later) Einstein as the greatest of the great scientific thinkers. His place in that pantheon is secured by the fact that, 150 years later, the basic theory that he developed is the central organizing theory of at least a dozen fields of science. It's difficult to even imagine hypothetically what such fields as biology, paleontology, comparative anatomy, or anthropology would look like today without evolutionary theory as…
loom | February 12, 2004My wife and I have two lovely daughters: Charlotte is two and a half, and Veronica is seven weeks. And we are tired. We think of ourselves as being on the losing end of a tag-team wrestling match--particularly at about seven in the morning, after Veronica has gone through a few hours of pre-dawn nursing, squirming, groaning, crying, spewing, and nursing. Just when she has faded off into angelic sleep, Charlotte wakes up from a long restful night and wants to eat Cheerios, do some jumping jacks, and type on my laptop pretty much all at the same time. It's like the Destroyer giving the Crusher…
stcynic | February 8, 2004A couple weeks ago I referred to an incident involving myself and Richard Dawkins and allegations of creationist dishonesty and I promised to write up the whole story soon. Let me preface this by saying two things. First, I am, as should be obvious to everyone who has read any of my writings on this page, a staunch advocate of evolutionary theory and a dogged opponent of the attacks that creationists of all types make against it. I have spent many years actively fighting against creationism and defending evolution and I'm the co-founder of an organization that exists solely for that purpose.…
loom | February 6, 2004Abominable is not the sort of word that most people may associate with flowers, but for Darwin, it was a perfect fit. He saw life on Earth today as the result of millions of years of victories and defeats in the evolutionary arena. Flowering plants, by that reasoning, were among the greatest champions of all. There are some 250,000 known species of flowering plants, and the total is probably double that. The closest living relatives of flowering plants (pine trees, firs, gingkos, and the likecollectively known as gymnosperms) make up a grand total of just over 800. These numbers are all the…
stcynic | February 6, 2004There is a terrific new website designed to help teachers and students learn more about evolution that is finally up and available for public use. The Understanding Evolution site was an enormous project that has been under development for quite some time under the auspices of the University of California Museum of Paleontology (UCMP) and the National Center for Science Education (NCSE), funded primarily by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and the National Science Foundation. To quote from the site's opening announcement:The Understanding Evolution web site -- written for teachers but…
stcynic | February 6, 2004Georgia school boss Kathy Cox has backed off her announced plan to remove the word "evolution" from the state academic standards. Paul Myers speculates that the whole thing could very well have just been a cover-up for the fact that the new proposed standards water down the teaching of evolution enormously, regardless of whether the word is used. I agree with him. It's about the only explanation that makes any sense out of the whole sordid bunch of nonsense.
Think about it. She announces at a press conference that she's going to remove the word "evolution" from the school standards because it…
stcynic | February 6, 2004This is beginning to resemble a Monty Python sketch at this point. In my last post I made this statement:
"He must know that "presenting the data" is pointless if he has already decided that no data possibly COULD establish what is being disputed."
Rusty replied:
"...he has already decided that no data possibly COULD establish what is being disputed"
Where have I said that? Honestly Ed, you accuse me of dancing around the issues but you yourself give Fred Astaire some pretty good competition.
Rusty, do you not see the utter dishonesty in the way you edited my statement? You edited out the…
loom | February 5, 2004A while back I had the pleasure to join a team of scientists and teachers to build web site that explains evolution. Funded by the National Science Foundation and the Howard Hughes Medical Foundation, it charts the history of evolutionary thought (both before and after Darwin), and lays out the different lines of supporting evidence for evolution, as well as its relevance to everyday life. It addresses some of the common misconceptions about evolution, and lays out the nature of scientific inquiry. Science teachers can also find ideas for lesson plans and tips for answering common student…
loom | February 5, 2004Georgia's State Schools superintendent Kathy Cox has backed down from her ban on the word evolution.
While this is excellent news, Georgia is still left with an incompetent superintendent. For one thing, she thinks Intelligent Design is an acceptable theory to teach in schools. For another, she justified removing the word evolution from state science standards by saying: ""By putting the word in there, we thought people would jump to conclusions and think, 'OK, we're going to be teaching the monkeys-to-man sort of thing.' Which is not what happens in a modern biology classroom."
In a sense I…
stcynic | February 5, 2004In the last post, I wrote the following to Rusty:
On the issue of transitionals, you are still dodging the question. You said that appearance alone cannot prove transition. Therefore wouldn't you have to say that no fossil evidence could possibly show transition? Fossils can only show appearance, not actual ancestry. So why not just admit that no fossil evidence, regardless of what it shows, could possibly convince you that an evolutionary transition occured? That would at least be honest, but you seem to be loathe to admit that. Is there ANY fossil evidence that you would regard as…
stcynic | February 5, 2004Rusty has been leaving comments in response to various entries here, but there are two issues that I'd like to move up here to the top so they don't get lost and solicit a direct answer on.
1. Transitional Forms
Rusty has repeatedly declared that there are no transitional forms in the fossil record. I have pointed out that I think this demand is a disingenuous one (not just from him, but from creationists in general) because they would deny the transitional nature of ANY fossil no matter what it showed by either demanding that it show transition in a trait that is not preserved by fossils,…
stcynic | February 5, 2004I've just come across a group called Catholic Apologetics International, a very, very conservative Catholic organization founded by Robert Sungenis. How conservative? How about so conservative that they think Pope John Paul was wrong to apologize to Galileo and admit that the earth revolves around the sun? Yes, they are genuine geocentrists. Needless to say, they are also young earth creationists. I'm a little stunned to see this sort of thing from Catholics. The creationist/geocentrist movement in the US has been almost exclusively Protestant in makeup, with the geocentrists being primarily…
loom | February 5, 2004"Conservative board members said they wanted to make sure that schools teach sound science, arguing that evolution is a flawed theory that cannot be proven."
--"In Kansas, key decision on teaching evolution" Associated Press, August 12, 1999.
If the new fad of "sound science" takes hold in Washington, I bet we'll see creationists taking it up again as well, challenging the government funding of "unsound" research into evolution. Stay tuned.
stcynic | February 4, 2004The Talk.Reason Archive has an absolutely hilarious article lampooning the Intelligent Design movement. A few of my favorites:
Greater and greater numbers of scientists are joining the ID movement, which is why we keep referring to the same three year after year.
We're not creationists, except for those of us who are, but the rest of us won't confirm that we're not. But if you call us creationists, we'll complain to no end.
ID is a widely accepted theory in the scientific community. Just last year, over 100 scientists signed a statement which does not support ID, but does say that they are "…