doug@hpcilzb.HP.COM (Doug Hendricks) (01/07/89)
mmm@cup.portal.com (Mark Robert Thorson) writes: [statement of anti-dogmatism deleted] >[Whew! That was a lot of typing. If you support this statement, read it again >and imagine you're a parent of school-age children in Germany in 1933.] What is Mark's point? I don't understand why Mark is concerned about the wording of the anti-dogmatism statement, or how a parent of school-age children in Germany in 1933 would be offended, or if they were, why I should care. Maybe I have missed the point, but it seems to me that the Germans of the 30's could have benefitted from an anti-dogmatism statement in their schools. Of course, the Nazis could claim (and did) that their views were scientifically supported, but I doubt an anti-dogmatism statement would have hurt. Ethics is not taught as science anyway; ethics is ethics. The statement is directed at science education. Mark, I appriciate your typing the statement so that we could read it. Could you now be more clear as to what you hold against it? Douglas Hendricks Know the Seven Warning Signs of Weirdness. Hewlett-Packard See Your Doctor. Santa Clara, CA
mmm@cup.portal.com (Mark Robert Thorson) (01/09/89)
>What is Mark's point? I don't understand why Mark is concerned about the >wording of the anti-dogmatism statement, or how a parent of school-age >children in Germany in 1933 would be offended, or if they were, why I should >care. > >Maybe I have missed the point, but it seems to me that the Germans of the >30's could have benefitted from an anti-dogmatism statement in their schools. >Of course, the Nazis could claim (and did) that their views were scientifically >supported, but I doubt an anti-dogmatism statement would have hurt. Perhaps I focused too much on the last two paragraphs, the part denying a place to alternative views in the schools and the part denying the option of refusing to take in such views. I happen to agree with the strong position on scientific education taken by the NCSE, but I can easily see how others could feel attacked. What if you didn't believe in the science pushed by your government? Germany and Russia have pushed theories as scientific fact which conventional wisdom now deems to have been politically inspired. If you like the proposed Anti-Dogmatism statement, I suggest you subscribe to Bookwatch Reviews, the newsletter of the NCSE. $15 for 9 issues. Their address is in my previopuus posting. They review recent science textbooks. Lots of dingbat stuff in those books. Here's some quotes: [referring Heath Life Science 1987] "On page T418, they ask the students to compare the human skeleton with that of -- what? A frog? A cat? No. An arthropod! And so the writers abandon the chance to introduce the evolutionary concept of homologous bones. They seem to insist that they must give no hint at all of any evolutionary relationships." "In the chapter about ectothermic vertebrates, for instance: "Some scientists believe that strange animals with dry, scaly skins roamed the earth 225 million to 65 million years ago. These animals were the dinosaurs." Some scientists? The only people who deny the history of the ancient dinosaurs are the fundamentalist preachers (and their followers) who call themselves "creation-scientists," but those people are not scientists at all." "The student who uses a science text will consult its glossary and index frequently. In Heath's book, the index is minimally satisfactory, but the glossary is inadequate and sometimes ridiculous. It sometimes seems to be a lampoon written by Dr. Science and Rodney ... ... abdomen: the body region of arthropods that is farthest from the head ... ... jawless fish: a class of fish that do not have jaws ... ... birds: warm-blooded vertebrates with wings ... ... species: the smallest classification of living things ... ... identifying: the naming of something ..."
ftoomey@maths.tcd.ie (Fergal Toomey) (01/11/89)
The way I see it, the difference between Creationism and Darwinism is
essentially the difference between pseudo-science and science. The nature
of this difference has been hotly disputed for years among scientific
philosophers and no entirely satisfactory method of distinguishing between
the two has yet been proposed. Just what is so scientific about Darwinism
and so unscientific about Creationism? To date, nobody has managed to pin
down this difference (if it exists).
However, in my opinion, this doesnt mean that Creationism should be taught
as science. The proper place for Creationism is in a religion class. If you
insist that Creationism is science, then why not call religion classes
'alternative science' classes? I don't see how anyone could obbject to that.
Fergal Toomey, TCD.mlloyd@maths.tcd.ie (Michael Lloyd) (01/12/89)
In article <206@maths.tcd.ie> ftoomey@maths.tcd.ie (Fergal Toomey) writes: > >The way I see it, the difference between Creationism and Darwinism is >essentially the difference between pseudo-science and science. > [some lines deleted] >However, in my opinion, this doesnt mean that Creationism should be taught >as science. The proper place for Creationism is in a religion class. If you >insist that Creationism is science, then why not call religion classes >'alternative science' classes? I don't see how anyone could obbject to that. > > Fergal Toomey, TCD. First, I wouldn`t try talking about Darwinism too much - the views of Darwin himself are hardly still current. His continuum of evolution has little experimental support - the records are a little too `broken` for that. I believe (any corrections, folks?) that the field now runs at three main theories for a mechanism of evolution. So try talking about Evolution in general rather than the views of Darwin. Secondly, _of course_ some people will object to the classification of Creationism as `alternative science` - primarily the Creation Scientists. They do not see their ideas as `alternative` at all - rather, they (as divinely revealed theory) stand as the Truth, the Whole Truth, and Nothing But the Truth (sorry- their ideas, not the CSs). People who take such a view will _never_ be satisfied with any `second place`. If they believe it that strongly, they are not going to acknowledge that you should promulgate any alternatives. I don`t really mean to flame Creat. Scientists too hard - it`s just that I find their intolerance and self-projection embarassing as a co-religionist. I really don`t feel that such groups will be happy with anything that opposes them, so I think the relevent government can only legislate them down in favour of `proper` education, and lose the associated votes. Life`s like that, you know? Mike. -- Mike Lloyd, Dept of Statistics, |"Does anyone understand what is happening? .. Trinity College, Dublin, | They tell me this is living - Ireland. | They tell me this is LIFE!" (mlloyd@uunet.uu.net) | - Michael Been, of "The Call"
bph@buengc.BU.EDU (Blair P. Houghton) (01/13/89)
In article <206@maths.tcd.ie> ftoomey@maths.tcd.ie (Fergal Toomey) writes: > >The way I see it, the difference between Creationism and Darwinism is >essentially the difference between pseudo-science and science. Which you then proceed to contradict. >Just what is so scientific about Darwinism >and so unscientific about Creationism? To date, nobody has managed to pin >down this difference (if it exists). Some clews: /-------------------------------------------------------\ | Darwinism | Creationism | --------------------------------------------------------| | Collect evidence. | What evidence? | | | (Oh, you mean those | | | dogmatically prepared | | | gedanken experiments | | | and ancient legends...) | | | | | Fit hypotheses to data. | Fit data to hypotheses. | \-------------------------------------------------------/ --Blair "I can feel myself evolving even now..."
ogil@tank.uchicago.edu (Brian W. Ogilvie) (01/13/89)
In article <206@maths.tcd.ie> ftoomey@maths.tcd.ie (Fergal Toomey) writes: > >The way I see it, the difference between Creationism and Darwinism is >essentially the difference between pseudo-science and science. The nature >of this difference has been hotly disputed for years among scientific >philosophers and no entirely satisfactory method of distinguishing between >the two has yet been proposed. Just what is so scientific about Darwinism >and so unscientific about Creationism? To date, nobody has managed to pin >down this difference (if it exists). >[...] > Fergal Toomey, TCD. On a very coarse level one may justly distinguish evolution as science and creationism as dogma because evolutionary theory is open to change while the creationist attitude does not permit any new data to alter the belief in special creation of species, etc. Ernst Haeckel, who was avidly antireligious and thus somewhat biased, makes much of this distinction in his _Naturliche Schopfungsgeschichte_ (_Natural History of Creation_). Haeckel provides a good review of the arguments for evolution and against creation, focusing especially on the presence of rudimentary organs which are never used by their possessors (rudiments of hind legs in aquatic mammals, etc.). He concludes that creationists, by sticking to their guns even in the face of this evidence, demean their own God by requiring him to hold to the classes of the ideal morphologists when he designs his creatures! In contrast, Haeckel shows how evolutionary theory has changed from the early conceptions of Lamarck through Darwin and finally to Haeckel himself. Each of the earlier thinkers had both right and wrong ideas, and the theory changed as new concepts were introduced and older ones refined. Haeckel's history is rather vulgar, but this point is clear. Since Haeckel was the foremost popularizer of evolution in the nineteenth century (the _Naturliche Schopfungsgeschichte_ was translated into every European language and Japanese) this distinction was widely disseminated and formed the basis for several defenses of evolution in the early part of this century. --- Brian W. Ogilvie / ogil@tank.uchicago.edu
ogil@tank.uchicago.edu (Brian W. Ogilvie) (01/13/89)
In article <209@maths.tcd.ie> mlloyd@maths.tcd.ie (Michael Lloyd) writes: >First, I wouldn`t try talking about Darwinism too much - the views of >Darwin himself are hardly still current. His continuum of evolution >has little experimental support - the records are a little too `broken` >for that. I believe (any corrections, folks?) that the field now runs >at three main theories for a mechanism of evolution. So try talking >about Evolution in general rather than the views of Darwin. > >Mike As a historian of evolution I must take issue with this statement. Darwinism may be divided into three essential components: 1. Theory of Variation. Organisms vary in their characters. These variations are quite small. We don't know what causes them. 2. Theory of Inheritance. Offspring tend to resemble their parents. Characters of offspring are intermediate between the characters of their parents, plus any variation which might occur (from unknown causes of point 1). 3. Theory of Natural Selection. Organisms are superfecund--more are born than can possibly survive. Hence those possessing VARIATIONS which make them more likely to survive (even minutely) than their fellows will tend to live longer and produce more offspring, and if those variations are HERITABLE the offspring will possess that character. Since these offspring will be more common than their parents, the distribution of traits in the population will shift. The process is slow but inexorable, given that the same trait is always advantageous. Mendelian heredity has confirmed the first point; while it permits large "saltational" variation, William Castle demonstrated in the 1910's that it also permitted apparently continuous variation through the interaction of a number of genes. While Darwin's "Provisional Hypothesis of Pangenesis" for inheritance has been discredited, Mendelism has provided a theory of heredity that is not too different (although it does not allow for the "Lamarckian" inheritance of acquired characteristics that Darwin thought possible). Current debate ranges around the INTERPRETATION of Natural Selection. Niles Eldredge and Stephen Jay Gould proposed in 1972 their theory of "punctuated equilibrium," which holds that species remain relatively stable for most of their existence and that species change occurs rather quickly (in a geological sense) among small populations. They made this proposal in order to account for the absense of transitional varieties in the fossil record, a fact which Darwin explained by the relative infrequency of the sedimentation processes which preserve fossils. They still believe that natural selection acts between these new species and their ancestors, but the process of speciation, due to the small population sizes involved, is governed predominantly by nonadaptive, stochastic processes. The current orthodoxy is perhaps best represented by two men: Ernst Mayr and the late Sewall Wright. Mayr, an ornithologist, is responsible for the theory of allopatric speciation, which holds that speciation occurs in peripheraly isolated populations (like Gould and Eldredge) but that selection plays a major role in the process. Wright, who was a theoretical population geneticist, had a similar theory where random drift played an important but by no means exclusive role in speciation. To sum up, the broad outlines of Darwinism are still present in modern evolutionary theory, although the details have changed and his emphasis on selection as the major force at work has shifted somewhat. In fact, modern evolutionary theory (since the 1940's) is more Darwinian than that immediately following Darwin, which can be characterized broadly as "neo-Lamarckian" or "orthogenetic." Darwinism is still a valid description of evolutionary thought. --- Brian W. Ogilvie / ogil@tank.uchicago.edu
ftoomey@maths.tcd.ie (Fergal Toomey) (01/17/89)
In article <1884@buengc.BU.EDU> bph@buengc.bu.edu (Blair P. Houghton) writes: >In article <206@maths.tcd.ie> ftoomey@maths.tcd.ie (Fergal Toomey) writes: >> >>The way I see it, the difference between Creationism and Darwinism is >>essentially the difference between pseudo-science and science. > >Which you then proceed to contradict. > >>Just what is so scientific about Darwinism >>and so unscientific about Creationism? To date, nobody has managed to pin >>down this difference (if it exists). > >Some clews: > >/-------------------------------------------------------\ >| Darwinism | Creationism | >--------------------------------------------------------| >| Collect evidence. | What evidence? | >| | (Oh, you mean those | >| | dogmatically prepared | >| | gedanken experiments | >| | and ancient legends...) | >| | | >| Fit hypotheses to data. | Fit data to hypotheses. | >\-------------------------------------------------------/ > > --Blair > "I can feel myself evolving > even now..." Sorry about the contradiction: what I should have said was that trying to formally differentiate between Creationism and Darwinism is just as difficult as trying to differentiate between science and pseudo-science. As regards the clues you mention above: Creationism's position is just a little bit , but a significant little bit stronger than you suggest. A Darwinist will take his evidence from observation, and a Creationist will take his from the Bible. Which evidence is stronger? Common sense and some healthy cynicism tells us to believe the Darwinist in preference; but how can we prove that his theory really stands on firmer ground? Religionists and pseudo-scientists of all types have often been accused of 'sticking to their guns in the face of contradictory evidence', but the fact is that many theories which have been 'disproved' are still considered to be scientific theories although no self-respecting scientist would claim that they are valid (eg. Newton's theory of light, which claimed that light is a stream of particle's, is considered scientific in nature, although disproved). So why isn't Creationism, also considered to be an invalid theory by many scientists, not thought of as scientific? But this is wandering a little too far for this newsgroup; if you want to continue this discussion, I suggest we do so elsewhere, perhaps in sci.philosophy.meta. Fergal Toomey TCD
mlloyd@maths.tcd.ie (Michael Lloyd) (01/18/89)
In article <233@maths.tcd.ie> ftoomey@maths.tcd.ie (Fergal Toomey) writes: > [continuing discussion of Darwinism v Creation Science of a very > civil nature] > > But this is wandering a little too far for this newsgroup; > if you want to continue this discussion, I suggest we do so > elsewhere, perhaps in sci.philosophy.meta. Nah - I vote you come over to talk.religion.misc - the phenomenon of the Creation Scientist would make a great discussion in the newly expanded brief of that newsgroup, which is finally trying to say things of interest to atheists, non-theists or Ammadeists! > > Fergal Toomey > TCD Mike. -- Mike Lloyd, Dept of Statistics, |"Does anyone understand what is happening? .. Trinity College, Dublin, | They tell me this is living - Ireland. | They tell me this is LIFE!" (mlloyd@maths.tcd.ie) | - Michael Been, of "The Call"