New Science Standards Approved in Florida 891
anonymous_echidna writes "Florida has voted to accept the new K-12 science curriculum standards amidst a storm of controversy around the teaching of evolution, which had up until now been the scientific concept that dare not speak its name. There was a compromise made at the last minute, which was to call evolution a 'scientific theory', rather than a fact. While some lament that the change displays the woeful ignorance of science and scientific terminology, the good news is that the new curriculum emphasizes teaching the meaning of scientific terms and the scientific method in earlier grades."
Florida... aye (Score:5, Informative)
I saw this guy arguing why evolution shouldn't be taught and i was literally left speechless
Evolution is not natural selection (Score:4, Informative)
Re:That's fair (Score:5, Informative)
I've noticed in my various arguments that the chief difficulty is getting them to understand the terminology behind the concepts--they simply do not have the vocabulary necessary to vocalize and understand the concepts in question.
One of those words that is most egregiously misused is "theory"--the "common" form of the word is almost universally understood, but the "scientific" meaning of the word, even when carefully explained, becomes conflated with the common form.
(Other difficulties I've noticed are: that those who do not accept evolutionary theory are convinced that evolution is directed towards some 'goal'; that all mutations are necessarily harmful; an ignorance of introns and other means by which genetic material can be added to a genome--one of the current arguments that crops up is the one about how you can't get more information into a genome by evolutionary means, which is, of course, utter bosh; a misunderstanding of the scientific method; the false notion that science attempts to be the Answer to Life, the Universe and Everything rather than a best-fit approximation; and the notion that scientists are trying actively to discourage religion)
Other than teaching the proper meaning of the word 'theory'--which doesn't work very well, frankly; the meaning that they knew first tends to stick no matter how often you teach them the proper one due to recency bias--I'd perhaps recommend a slight change in terminology when speaking of hypotheses that have withstood rigorous testing. Such a change would, of course, have to be accepted by the scientific community as a whole, so it may not be practical--but it's perhaps worth giving some thought to.
I'd almost recommend 'theorem' rather than 'theory', to leech off of the mathematician's meaning, but while that word is appealing for reasons of similarity and having the proper tone, it may not be ideal due to conflation with mathematical proofs.
Re:I accept evolution and I know God is real. (Score:2, Informative)
I don't care. Believe whatever you want.
It's not about belief. It's about what's scientifically useful; what produces useful experiments and predictions for us to better understand the nature of our universe.
In that regard, evolution is one of the most wildly successful scientific theories around. (As opposed to vehicles like Intelligent Design, which misses the point entirely and from what I've heard has yet to "reveal" anything non-trivial.)
So you can believe what you want. And good on ya for it. But when it comes to science, we're interested in what's practical.
Dan.
Re:Science board is trolling? (Score:5, Informative)
Race: "a group of persons related by common descent or heredity." Species: "Biology. the major subdivision of a genus or subgenus, regarded as the basic category of biological classification, composed of related individuals that resemble one another, are able to breed among themselves, but are not able to breed with members of another species." funwithBSD: "An individual who needs to buy a dictionary."
Re:That's fair (Score:2, Informative)
Re:That's fair (Score:5, Informative)
A fact is what you have observed. A theory is an explanation of why it is so.
In the strictest sense, the fact is that you have always (previously) observed that objects fall to the ground. But in order to link that fact to your prediction that he will fall to the ground after jumping off a building, you have to have a theory of gravity that predicts how a novel event (i.e., the grandparent poster jumping off a 42 story building) will unfold in the future.
Put more succintly: "Objects thrown off a building have always fallen" is a statement of fact. "Objects thrown off a building will always fall" is a hypothesis derived from a theory.
Re:I accept evolution and I know God is real. (Score:3, Informative)
There is no explicit statement of how long the days were.
All the quote REALLY tells you, in fact, is that it got dark and then it got light, in between various tasks attributed to Yahweh.
Re:Science board is trolling? (Score:4, Informative)
Now, remember, Gravity is just a theory as well, so why don't you test it by jumping out off of a very tall building.
Re:Jesus Fucking Christ (Score:5, Informative)
Evolution *is* a theory. Perhaps they should also teach what "theory" means.
Re:That's fair (Score:3, Informative)
Re:That's fair (Score:4, Informative)
Re:I accept evolution and I know God is real. (Score:3, Informative)
Monroe County Approved a Stronger Standard (Score:4, Informative)
From the article itself:
She said the concept of evolution is essential to understanding 21st century biology and that, in her opinion, "people who have never been taught evolution in the first place don't understand that it doesn't really undermine religion." "I'm a lifelong Methodist and I find no conflict between my spiritual life and my rational, scientific self," she said. Walker isn't alone. The Clergy Letter Project, a Butler University initiative that works to dispel the notion that religion and science are at odds, has garnered 11,183 signatures from clergy members who say teaching evolution does not undermine religion.
Re:Jesus Fucking Christ (Score:1, Informative)
Actually, there is no theory of gravity yet. There is a law of gravity. There are hypotheses about how gravity exists or is propagated. None of these hypotheses have sufficient observations in their favor to promote one to the rank of theory.
Re:Jesus Fucking Christ (Score:3, Informative)
Unless, of course, you'd like to claim omniscience and assert no such phenomena will ever be discovered.
Re:I accept evolution and I know God is real. (Score:2, Informative)
Speaking as a Bible-believing Christian (or at least aspiring Christian), who accepts creation and natural selection but neither macroevolution nor "intelligent design" (in all cases, based on my understanding of the evidence):
You don't hand-wave away any part of Scripture, if you consider it to be the revealed word of God. But you do try to understand it as best you can, taking into account that it was given in what probably is not your native language.
And unlike the Greek of the New Testament, the Hebrew of the Old Testament, including Genesis, is highly metaphorical and descriptive. Translating into English implies a degree of precision that is simply not there in the original. You get the opposite problem in the NT: Greek is far more precise than English and many Greek concepts cannot be expressed easily in English. In either case you must avoid forcing English language concepts into the original languages. If you can do a word study using Strong's, or better yet learn a little bit of biblical Hebrew and Greek, that helps a lot; or you can consult any of hundreds of commentaries written by people fluent in both.
I just don't see it as being that big a deal whether a day in Genesis meant a literal, 24 hour day or not. I personally rather doubt it, but I could be wrong.
I do consider it significant that Jesus referred to Adam and Eve as literal persons, and that people (but not animals or other life, at least insofar as recorded in Scripture) are said to be created in God's image. One's position on the validity of evolution does not change either of these.
Re:Jesus Fucking Christ (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Jesus Fucking Christ (Score:5, Informative)
These all differ from hypotheses because they are more than just a prediction of the outcome of a test, but an explanation for why we should expect that outcome.
Theory means more than one thing. (Score:4, Informative)
Def 1: "hunch" "guess" or "hypothesis". This is the sense that creationists mean when they say "evolution is just a theory". It's not technically correct to use theory this way in science, but people (even scientists) do all the time when speaking colloquially. ("If my theory is correct...") This is a problem - scientists should be careful not to speak this way, and when they do, they muddy the waters and make openings for the creationists.
Def 2: A model that explains all the known facts and has survived at least some testing. "The theory of evolution" and "the theory of special relativity", as phrases, mean this kind of theory. Unfortunately, theories of this definition vary quite a bit in their level of confidence and/or the amount of testing they have undergone.
Def 3: A set of principles, assumptions, and a body of work underlying a certain field. What exists when a def 2 theory has been confirmed so well and so long that it is assumed as true and used as the base principles for an entire field of scientific endeavor. Examples: "Evolutionary theory" is the understanding of DNA, mutation, genetics, heritability, natural selection and evolutionary descent that gives the inseparable background for all of biology. "Atomic theory" is the understanding of atom structure, valence electron, orbitals, quantum states, and bonds that underlies all of chemistry.
Science is a century past def. 2 "the theory of evolution" and long since completely employing def. 3 "evolutionary theory".
The key thing about a Type 3 theory is that it is so key to its field that it has become inseparable. Trying to understand contemporary research in biology while "rejecting evolution" is 100% as stupid as trying to understand chemistry while "rejecting the atom".
Atomic and Evolutionary theory are quite parallel: both arose as type 2 theories in the 19th century, replacing prior assumptions held by most knowledgeable people (special creation and infinitely divisible matter), and through decades of continuously accumulated support and evidence became essentially irrefutable type 3 theories by early in the 20th century. Both actually had inklings all the way back to the ancient Greeks but didn't become coherent (def. 2) theories until missing pieces and observations were filled in by Rutherford and Darwin.
When talking to creationists I often employ the analogy of a faith that demanded that atoms aren't real and that matter is continuously divisible because some allegorical section of their holy book could be read that way. It's easy to imagine:
"And on the second day, The Lord took the clay he had created and divided it in two, and again to make four, and again indefinitely until he had enough lumps of clay. And he fashioned their myriads into the earth, and the stars, and the waters, and the clouds, and every living thing, and every stone, and every grain of sand."
Suppose such a faith demanded that science classes miseducate their children with that obviously unsupportable position based on that one passage of text. That would only be conceivable to people who really don't understand the facts (if the atom isn't real, how in hell did we make the atomic bomb?), and it would be hazardous to our kids.
To anyone who understands biology, creationism is misguided on a nearly identical level. (if evolution isn't real, why do genetic drift/mutation accumulation, genetic structure analysis, morphological structure analysis, and the fossil record *all* produce a broadly similar tree of life? Why do we find literally billions of fossils of extinct intermediate species that fit that tree? Why do we find that every structure both macroscopic and microscopic looks like an adapted version of some preexisting structure that filled a different role?)
If God exists, He used evolution in the same way he used atoms. End of story.
Re:Einsteins Theory of Gravity (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Jesus Fucking Christ (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Jesus Fucking Christ (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Jesus Fucking Christ (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Jesus Fucking Christ (Score:5, Informative)
You are mistaken.
It has been proven that genetic mutations exist, and that they cause illness and deformations, but not that they have the ability to create limbs, wings, lungs, etc. in perfect working order.
You are mistaken.
One thing that I am constantly amazed about is that people implant their own logic into Evolution; DNA does not have an agenda. It does not wake up one day and say "over the next 100 generations, I'm going to grow wings and fly!".
No one says that, except the people who are mistaken about what evolution is, what the theory proposes, and how it is tested. People like the ones you got your mistaken information from.
Charles Darwin wrote....
Something, I am sure. But Charles Darwin is not the last word in evolution or natural selection, anymore than Newton is the last word on gravity. Can you at least update your criticisms to refer to science done in the 20th and 21st centuries? A lot of ground has been covered since Darwin.
It is a HUGE leap from this to saying that "We all came from fish".
No one says that. But fish and humans have a common ancestor, which was not a fish nor was it a human.
It is not correct to look at fossils and assume that one came from another because they look similar.
Of course. And no one does that.
You have some very fuzzy and shadowy ideas about what scientists do, and how they come to the conclusions they do. I suggest you do some reading of works by scientists who do evolution, not any more reading of works by preachers debunking it with folklore and thought experiments.
29+ evidences for macro-evolution (Score:4, Informative)
Perhaps you ought to have a glance at http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/ [talkorigins.org]
Mind you if you come back in 10 minutes (or anything less than 2 weeks) we will know you haven't read it. Especially if you post a random link to "Answers in Genesis".
Mod Parent Down: Dead Wrong (Score:3, Informative)
I can understand the confusion here, given the really inconsistent use of terminology (conjecture, hypothesis, theory, law) by scientists, but who the hell modded this informative??? Mods, if you don't know anything about a subject then you probably should refrain from doling out the "informative" judgment. There have been at least two successful theories of gravity and many other hypotheses with some support.
The first was due to Newton, and it was, indeed, a theory in the modern sense. Newton postulated that the movement of celestial bodies was due to a mutual force of attraction between them and that this force existed not only between celestial bodies but all bodies and was, therefore, responsible for gravity on Earth as well. So it was an idea of how to relate many observations (of planetary motion and gravity on Earth) together, not just a summary of empirical observations. At the time many people not only didn't believe this idea but found it absurd. However, Newton's theory agreed with the empirical observations of Kepler, and the idea that all bodies have a gravitational force between them was later verified (and quantified) in the Cavendish experiment. It may be confusing that we refer to this as "Newton's Law of Universal Gravitation", but that simply reflects how scientific terminology has changed over the centuries. In today's vocabulary, this would be considered a theory of gravity.
The second theory of gravity was Einstein's General Theory of Relativity. It was again a radical shift in our understanding of gravity. It agreed with then current observations, but it also made predictions: Two early successes were the observation by Eddington of gravitational lensing of light and the calculation of the precession of the perihelion of Mercury.
theory vs tautology (Score:3, Informative)
A "tautology," of course, is a statement that logically must be true, so any valid mathematical equatioin or logical proof is a tautology. Since a scientific theory must be logical, it necessarily contains embedded within it one or more tautologies, but it goes beyond that in that its conclusions constitute predictions about the physical world that can be tested to evaluate whether or not the premises are correct.
Re:Jesus Fucking Christ (Score:3, Informative)