Submitted by Elaine Magliaro, Weekend Contributor
(NOTE: Correction and Update Below)
A Missouri lawmaker has proposed legislation that would make learning about evolution in public schools “optional.” State Rep. Rick Brattin (R), the main sponsor of House Bill 291—also known as the “Missouri Standard Science Act”—introduced the bill in January. Brattin told KCTV, a local station, that teaching only evolution in school was “indoctrination.” He continued, “Our schools basically mandate that we teach one side. It is an indoctrination because it is not objective approach.”
The Kansas City Star reported that Brattin said, “…forcing students to study the natural selection theories developed by Charles Darwin a century and a half ago can violate their religious faith. It’s an absolute infringement on people’s beliefs.” Critics of Brattin’s bill say his legislation “would allow religious faith in biblical explanations to crowd out sound science.”
HB 291 would require schools to notify parents if “the theory of evolution by natural selection” was being taught at their child’s school—and give students the opportunity to “opt out of the class.” According to Dana Liebelson of Mother Jones, HB 291 “redefines a few things you thought you already knew about science.”
Liebelson:
For example, a “hypothesis” is redefined as something that reflects a “minority of scientific opinion and is “philosophically unpopular.” A scientific theory is “an inferred explanation…whose components are data, logic and faith-based philosophy.” And “destiny” is not something that $5 fortune tellers believe in; Instead, it’s “the events and processes that define the future of the universe, galaxies, stars, our solar system, earth, plant life, animal life, and the human race.”
Liebelson added that the “Missouri Standard Science Act” also requires that public elementary and secondary schools in the state—as well as introductory science classes at public universities—“give equal textbook space to both evolution and intelligent design.”
From the National Center for Science Education:
HB 291’s text is about 3000 words long, beginning with a declaration that the bill is to be known as the Missouri Standard Science Act, followed by a defectively alphabetized glossary providing idiosyncratic definitions of “analogous naturalistic processes,” “biological evolution,” “biological intelligent design,” “destiny,” “empirical data,” “equal treatment,” “hypothesis,” “origin,” “scientific theory,” “scientific law,” and “standard science.”
Among the substantive provisions of the bill, applying both to Missouri’s public elementary and secondary schools and to introductory science courses in public institutions of higher education in the state: “If scientific theory concerning biological origin is taught in a course of study, biological evolution and biological intelligent design shall be taught. Other scientific theory or theories of origin may be taught.”
For public elementary and secondary schools, HB 291 also provides, “If scientific theory concerning biological origin is taught in a textbook, the textbook shall give equal treatment to biological evolution and biological intelligent design.” After the bill is enacted, new textbooks purchased for the public schools will have to conform to the equal treatment requirement. A committee will develop supplementary material on “intelligent design” for optional interim use.
Eric Meikle, the education director at the National Center for Science Education, said that he couldn’t “imagine” that any mainstream textbook publisher would comply with the bill’s textbook requirement. Meikle said, “The material doesn’t exist.”
Brattin told The Riverfront Times that he was a “science enthusiast” and “a huge science buff.” He added. “This [bill] is about testable data in today’s world.” Meikle disagrees with Brattin. Meikle told Mother Jones, “This bill is very idiosyncratic and strange. And there is simply not scientific evidence for intelligence design.”
And people wonder why some of our students are falling behind international peers in science.
Creation Science 101 by Roy Zimmerman
Correction and Update
It has been called to my attention by Willy Kessler that HB291 was introduced in 2013 and “allowed to die.” Brattin was sponsor of another bill (HB 1472) this year which would require Missouri public schools to notify parents when evolution is being taught and to allow students to opt out of classes.
From the National Center for Science Education (January 17, 2014)
Antievolution legislation in Missouri
Missouri’s House Bill 1472, introduced in the House of Representatives on January 16, 2013, is the third antiscience bill of the year, following Virginia’s HB 207 and Oklahoma’s SB 1765. If enacted, the bill would require “[a]ny school district or charter school which provides instruction relating to the theory of evolution by natural selection” to have “a policy on parental notification and a mechanism where a parent can choose to remove the student from any part of the district’s or school’s instruction on evolution.” Parents and guardians would receive a notification containing “[t]he basic content of the district’s or school’s evolution instruction to be provided to the student” and “[t]he parent’s right to remove the student from any part of the district’s or school’s evolution instruction.”
NCSE’s deputy director Glenn Branch commented, “House Bill 1472 would eviscerate the teaching of biology in Missouri.” Quoting “The OOPSIE Compromise — A Big Mistake,” which Eugenie C. Scott and he wrote for Evolution: Education and Outreach in 2008, he added, “Evolution inextricably pervades the biological sciences; it therefore pervades, or at any rate ought to pervade, biology education at the K–12 level. There simply is no alternative to learning about it; there is no substitute activity. A teacher who tries to present biology without mentioning evolution is like a director trying to produce Hamlet without casting the prince.” Teachers, schools, and districts would suffer as well, Branch observed. “The value of a high school education in Missouri would be degraded.”
The sponsors of HB 1472 are Rick Brattin (R-District 55) and Andy Koenig (R-District 99). Both have a history of sponsoring antievolution legislation in Missouri. In 2012, Koenig sponsored and Brattin cosponsored House Bill 1276, a “strengths and weaknesses” bill, and Brattin sponsored and Koenig cosponsored House Bill 1227, which would have required equal time for “intelligent design” in public schools, including introductory courses at colleges and universities. In 2013, Koenig sponsored and Brattin cosponsored House Bill 179, a “strengths and weaknesses” bill, and Brattin sponsored and Koenig cosponsored House Bill 291, which would have required equal time for “intelligent design” in public schools, including introductory courses at colleges and universities. All died.
SOURCES
Missouri lawmaker wants to make evolution teaching optional (KCTV)
Unprecedented Attack On Evolution ‘Indoctrination’ Mounted In Missouri (Talking Points Memo)
Anti-Evolution Missouri Bill Requires College Students to Learn About Destiny (Mother Jones)
Rick Brattin, Who Wants Anti-Evolution Lessons In Missouri Schools: “I’m A Science Enthusiast” (Riverfront Times)
Missouri bill would let parents pull kids from evolution classes (Kansas City Star)
Missouri lawmaker introduces bill allowing familes to ‘opt out’ of learning evolution (Daily Kos)
“Intelligent design” bill in Missouri (National Center for Science Education)
Submitted by Elaine Magliaro
The views expressed in this posting are the author’s alone and not those of the blog, the host, or other weekend bloggers. As an open forum, weekend bloggers post independently without pre-approval or review. Content and any displays or art are solely their decision and responsibility.
davidm,
I take it the fossils you’ve dug up were no more than 6,000 or 7,000 years old.
I was in the Florida State Museum some years back. I was stupefied by a particular display. It appeared as if they were displaying a cross section of sediment showing fossils through time within that sediment. Having experience in digging up fossils, I was blown away. Where did they find this? Others quietly walked by barely noticing, but I made my children sit down and wait while I closely examined this aberration of geology. After five or ten minutes, I discovered what it was. They had fabricated the whole thing. This was NOT an actual geological cross section. This was the first time that I had seen a museum, which normally displays real artifacts, actually manufacture the geologic column using sediment and fossils and arranging them and presenting them as if that was how they were found in nature. I was a bit outraged and explained to my children that this was grossly misleading, that fossils are not at all found like this display claims they are. This was only a projection of their idealized idea of how they think fossil should be found. In nature, the evidence is very different.
This statement tells me that Mr. Dudley has spent more time reading the Bible than digging up fossils. This particular so-called evidence he presents here exists in the schematic drawings of evolutionary textbooks. It is a diagram of the presupposition of what they expect to find, not what they actually find. Every person who has actually done real science in digging up fossils knows this.
Christian Faith Requires Accepting Evolution
By Jonathan Dudley
Author, ‘Broken Words: The Abuse of Science and Faith in American Politics’
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jonathan-dudley/christian-faith-requires-_b_876345.html
Excerpt:
In the evangelical community, the year 2011 has brought a resurgence of debate over evolution. The current issue of Christianity Today asks if genetic discoveries preclude an historical Adam. While BioLogos, the brainchild of NIH director Francis Collins, is seeking to promote theistic evolution among evangelicals, the president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary recently argued that true Christians should believe the Earth is only a few thousand years old.
As someone raised evangelical, I realize anti-evolutionists believe they are defending the Christian tradition. But as a seminary graduate now training to be a medical scientist, I can say that, in reality, they’ve abandoned it.
In theory, if not always in practice, past Christian theologians valued science out of the belief that God created the world scientists study. Augustine castigated those who made the Bible teach bad science, John Calvin argued that Genesis reflects a commoner’s view of the physical world, and the Belgic confession likened scripture and nature to two books written by the same author.
These beliefs encouraged past Christians to accept the best science of their day, and these beliefs persisted even into the evangelical tradition. As Princeton Seminary’s Charles Hodge, widely considered the father of modern evangelical theology, put it in 1859: “Nature is as truly a revelation of God as the Bible; and we only interpret the Word of God by the Word of God when we interpret the Bible by science.”
In this analysis, Christians must accept sound science, not because they don’t believe God created the world, but precisely because they do.
Of course, anti-evolutionists claim their rejection of evolution is not a rejection of science. Phillip Johnson, widely considered the leader of the Intelligent Design movement, states that all he’s rejecting is the atheistic lens through which evolutionary scientists view the world. Evolution, he argues, is “based not upon any incontrovertible empirical evidence, but upon a highly philosophical presupposition.”
And to a certain extent, this line of argument makes sense. Science is not a neutral enterprise. Prior beliefs undoubtedly influence interpretation. If one believes God created vertebrates with a similar design plan, one can acknowledge their structural similarities without believing in common descent. No amount of dating evidence will convince someone the Earth is 4.5 billion years old if that person believes God created the world to look old, with the appearance of age.
But beyond a certain point, this reasoning breaks down. Because no amount of talk about “worldviews” and “presuppositions” can change a simple fact: creationism has failed to provide an alternative explanation for the vast majority of evidence explained by evolution.
It has failed to explain why birds still carry genes to make teeth, whales to make legs, and humans to make tails.
It has failed to explain why the fossil record proposed by modern scientists can be used to make precise and accurate predictions about the location of transition fossils.
It has failed to explain why the fossil record demonstrates a precise order, with simple organisms in the deepest rocks and more complex ones toward the surface.
It has failed to explain why today’s animals live in the same geographical area as fossils of similar species.
It has failed to explain why, if carnivorous dinosaurs lived at the same time as modern animals, we don’t find the fossils of modern animals in the stomachs of fossilized dinosaurs.
It has failed to explain the broken genes that litter the DNA of humans and apes but are functional in lower vertebrates.
It has failed to explain how the genetic diversity we observe among humans could have arisen in a few thousand years from two biological ancestors.
Wayne wrote: “To paraphrase: you say God created the universe; however, there is no way for one to disprove the existence of God therefore your belief system is not falsifiable.”
This is always the tenet used to claim that creation models are not falsifiable, but it is not an honest one. It is like claiming that a forensic scientist cannot give empirical evidence supporting the idea that someone was murdered because he cannot disprove the existence of the murderer. The forensic scientists has a lot of empirical evidence that he can offer that makes the existence of a murderer close to certain, pointing to evidence such as a gun owned by a particular person, evidence that gun was used to commit the murder, DNA evidence that the person was at the scene of the crime, gun powder residue on the arm of the person accused, etc. This is most of what creation science is about, looking at empirical evidence and using the rational mind to understand it and build a logical understanding of our origin.
Just skipped a Deacon’s meeting to hear Ellery Schempp speak. He was the 18 year old plaintiff in Abington School District v. Schempp, 374 U.S. 203 (1963), wherein the Supreme Court of the United States declared that required Bible readings in public school were unconstitutional.. It was consolidated with the Murray v. Curlett case involving the required recitation of the Lord’s Prayer in publis school. That would be William Murray, the nephew of and co-petitioner with Madalyn Murray O’hair.
It was a wonderful evening. Mr. Schempp enjoyed a long and productive career as a professor of physics working on MRI and superconductivity at high temperature. For present purposes I leave you with one of his llesser known efforts, “Gravity is Only a Theory.”
http://www.philvaz.com/apologetics/p67.htm
davidm2575,
You are incorrect about young earth models of origins satisfying the scientific standards for acceptance as a theory. One simple reason is the young earth idea cannot be proven wrong, it is not falsifiable. To paraphrase: you say God created the universe; however, there is no way for one to disprove the existence of God therefore your belief system is not falsifiable. You may in fact be correct, but young earth is not part of the scientific discipline. And why is it necessary for you to want your belief to be part of science? Is it because science infers a sense of truth and importance to your belief?
Examples:
Astronomy is a science, astrology is not.
A number of years ago a group of people were congratulating Einstein on his Theory of Relativity when he responded with: “I am only one experiment away from being proven wrong.” .
….”science censor any theist interpretations of empirical data.” That would only happen if a theist made the claim that the empirical results were due to an act (s) of God. And I might add that you censor scientific interpretations of religious beliefs—it works both ways.
Wayne wrote: “You are incorrect about young earth models of origins satisfying the scientific standards for acceptance as a theory. One simple reason is the young earth idea cannot be proven wrong, it is not falsifiable.”
Of course it is falsifiable. If a young earth model says the earth is only 10,000 years old, and radiometric evidence shows it is 4.5 billion years old, then the young earth model has been falsified. Most modern scientists reject the young earth model because of this test of falsification.
All dogmas are created equal. Therefore under the First Amendment Religion Prong each religion has a right to be taught. But where? Not in a public school.
Missoura needs to work on desegregating the frats at the Univ of MO Columbia. Mizzou needs to pull out of the SEC and get back with the pack in the Midwest. Kansas is right next door. Mizzou needs to require that first year students know how to read and write when they walk in the door to their first class– whether they play football or not.
Examples of censorship provided in the following movie:
Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed
http://youtu.be/V5EPymcWp-g
Science does not vilify religion, but science does censor any theist interpretations of empirical data.
Wayne, even young earth models of origins satisfy those three requirements.
Science should dominate the teaching of science; religion should not. Religion should dominate the teaching of religion. Teaching some people’s religious beliefs as science should not be part of a public school’s science curriculum. Those beliefs can be taught in a course on religion.
I am a scientist (retired chemist) and while I don’t have a problem with those expressing belief in a God or Creation by God, I do have issues when they attempt to portray their belief as science.
In order for a theory to be considered science it has to meet all three of the following criteria:
Explain the observations in question.
Make predictions that can be tested and verified.
Be falsifiable.
Religions fails on three of these and cannot and never will be considered science. By just calling a belief system scientific does not make it so.
Although I do not believe in Creationism, I am not telling others that Creationism is wrong, I’m saying that it is not science. Scientists do not vilify religion but when religious beliefs are portrayed as science then we speak out to explain the principles of our chosen profession.
Theories are never proven rather they are accepted by the scientific community. The Theory of Evolution is one of the most reliable theories in science and is a strong pillar holding up the fine traditions of science.
David,
the creationist “science” as you call it has not been accepted by anywhere near a majority of peer reviewed scientists. It is made up science in an attempt to prove God created the world. That belongs in private religious schools. They can discuss creationism all they want. But not on the public dollar.
rafflaw wrote: “the creationist “science” as you call it has not been accepted by anywhere near a majority of peer reviewed scientists.”
Yeah, that true. Not surprising since the teaching has been outlawed in public institutions. Most people are grossly ignorant of this field of study as a result.
We live in the same kind of situation as in Galileo’s time, only in reverse. In his time, the Catholic Church held power, and by edict they erroneously declared his heliocentric viewpoint to be wrong. Today, science dominates the governmental authority structure, and by edict they declare creationist models of origins to be wrong. Yeah, they do that by voting, the same way they decide about the geologic record… by voting. Many think that science really should operate by empirical proof instead of by voting, but voting is how it works in regards to viewpoints about our historical origins.
If you don’t think there is any science in creationist models, I challenge you to read Robert Gentry’s scientific publications. You might just educate yourself and change your mind.
It seems as if one solution is what I experienced “back in the day.” When I took a science class I went to to the science building.. When I took a foreign language class I went to the Humanities building. When I took Comparative Religion I either went to the Humanity or Social Science building.
There should be no problem teaching about ALL the various religions in the world along with their respective histories. But religion is not science, never has been and never will be.
Teach Religion in one class and Science in another.
Teach religion in one class and science in another class. That sounds like a good compromise.
I wouldn’t object to a separate, not science course, that included many of the religious views of the creation of the universe or even just of our tiny bit of it. I’ve got a big problem with the religious views being presented as science. I kind of like the way Pat Robertson puts it.
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/02/05/pat-robertson-implores-creationist-ken-ham-to-shut-up-lets-not-make-a-joke-of-ourselves/
excerpt:
“Let’s face it,” Robertson said, “there was a Bishop [Ussher] who added up the dates listed in Genesis and he came up with the world had been around for 6,000 years.”
“There ain’t no way that’s possible,” he continued. “To say that it all came about in 6,000 years is just nonsense and I think it’s time we come off of that stuff and say this isn’t possible.”
“Let’s be real, let’s not make a joke of ourselves.”
bettykath wrote: ” I’ve got a big problem with the religious views being presented as science.”
The problem is that religion does not exclude science, but most scientists exclude religion. If a hypothesis mentions a Creator, it is de facto considered not to be science by the pure scientist.
The truth is that some creationist work is theological by virtue of the fact that it rests upon interpreting writings considered to be divinely inspired. These rightly belong in religion class. As such, I’m not sure our legal climate would allow that in public school at all. Only private school might benefit by that level of education.
Other creationist work is scientific by virtue of relying upon empirical data, but it will be called unscientific by pure scientists because the work points toward the idea of a Creator, which is not allowed by definition to be part of a scientific theory or hypothesis. So where and when can it be taught?
It probably would work to teach creationist models of origins outside the science classroom, but a lot of students are going to be confused about why there is so much math and science being taught outside science class. And then the quandary becomes that if it really is “religious” because it is supportive of religious ideas, then according to many, it should not be allowed in public education at all. So are private schools the only answer to a good well rounded education?
I think the most reasonable path to a more harmonious society is for public education to stop censoring itself from anything considered religious. Public education should not teach the tenets of a particular religious establishment per se, but just be a little more open to discussing all viewpoints of life, whether categorized as religious or not. Even if it is to criticize and poke holes in the hypothesis. We should be able to discuss our origins without pointing fingers at each other and yelling, “that’s religion, so stop talking because it is illegal to talk about that in science class or publicly funded schools”!
Is this a surprise when one considers how anti-science some Americans are?
The Sun Orbits The Earth, According To 1 In 4 Americans: Survey
Posted: 02/16/2014
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/02/16/americans-science-survey_n_4798244.html
If you ask an American if the sun orbits Earth, there’s a 1 in 4 chance he’ll say yes.
According to a new National Science Foundation study, 74% of Americans believe that Earth revolves around the sun. The other 26% believe that the opposite is true.
Of course, it’s a fact that the Earth orbits the sun. The modern heliocentric model of the universe was first presented by Nicolaus Copernicus, a 16th century Polish astronomer. The study took place in 2012.
The survey revealed other distressing facts about science in America. For example, only 48% of Americans believe in evolution.
As NPR pointed out, European and Asian countries fared much better.
According to RT, a similar survey is taken every two years. The findings will be formally presented to Congress and President Obama.
Max, Gracias.