intelligent decline
Last week there were two important battles regarding the issue of Intelligent Design versus evolution. In Kansas, the school board voted 6-4 to include Intelligent Design in public school science classes. In Dover PA however, the proponents of Intelligent Design were voted out of the school board. Since I have thought about and discussed this issue a lot, it seems like a good time to discuss it where the same few people who I have already talked to can read it again and get no new information.
First, I have no problem with the idea of intelligent design per se. I have often wondered( escpecially in my delusional, more religious years, but also to this day), why life exists, and how it came to exist out of non-living components way back when. This is a very valid question that spans metaphysics, philosophy, and religion, among other areas, but it is not science. You see, Science attempts to explain how things happen, and what laws explain the physical phenomenom that we see in the universe. We have laws of physics, which probabaly are not perfect, and in some cases we know to be innacurate, but in most cases they accurately explain what we can observe so we consider them to be true. Science is a dynamic field. As we learn more, we ammend or overrule previous theories and then move on. Is Evolution a perfect theory? Of course not. But all the evidence that we have collected indicates that it is the most viable one that has yet been proposed. We have even seen evolution occur over very short periods of time, and have been able to create some of the building blocks of life from the basic components of the primordial stew. There is no other empirical theory of how life came to exist that has all that going for it.
Biology, as with all sciences, is a study of the HOW, not the WHY of the physical universe. It studies the interactions and rules that lead to a particular outcome and allows us to explain what we can observe, and predict what we will observe. It does not attempt to apply motives to the rules it proposes and simply says that they exist. Intelligent Design seems at least on the surface to simply ask people "Why?". All of this evolution is fine and dandy, but its too complicated to occur by chance. Therefore, let's propose a reason why this all came to exist. Who/what is driving evolution? All of these are fine things to ask, and even in a biology class, I have no problem with a teacher saying:
"Evolution is a theory that has a lot of empirical evidence and is backed up by the vast majority of scientists, but no one know why evolution works the way it does. Each individual is free to come up with their own personal opinions on why life has evolved as it has, or whether they believe that evolution is a sound theory that reconciles with their own religious beliefs. After all, that is what science is about, not simply accepting an explanation, but studying it and proving to yourself that it is true. If you do not believe the theories that we will discuss in this class, then perhaps you would enjoy taking a philosophy or comparitive religion class. But this is a science class and we will only discuss science."
But the talk of Intelligent Design should end there. Science is science, and religion is a different animal. People talk about "Hearing both sides". Well the other side of science is not religion. it would be like discussing string theory in sunday school. They are different topics. An athiest can go to church and learn all about God and Jesus and not really believe it, but at least accept it as a possible reality or entertaining story. Why can't a religious kid do the same in a biology class? To accept the literal biblical explanation is to throw out science all together, and therefore it makes no sense to try and mix the two. That is not to say that religion and science are mutually exclusive. They are not if you are willing to interpret religion in a scientific context. If you can read "7 days" as Billions of years. I have to talked people who believe strongly in both christianity and evolution and have no problem reconciling the two.
It is pretty clear that intelligent design is just an in to put Christian creationism in the biology classroom, and not just to propose another scientific explanation. Oposing scientific explanations are good for progress as they drive people to disprove each other and have friendly, accademic, battles over them. But it is dangerous to sell something that is decidly not a scientific theory (and in fact under its layers of spin tries ot discredit the idea of science all together) as an oposing theory.
This is all pretty incoherent babbling, especially since I wrote most of it a week ago and just now got around to finishing it. But this is important. We are the richest, most poserful country in the world, and yet our children are being out smarted by those in countries with much less resources. Instead of giving kids the best education we can, we are underpayign teachers and arguing over whether or not we should teach the scientific standards that they will need to compete with, and work beside, those who are schooled in other countries.
Alright, honestly, I've lost the motivation I had when I started this and dont feel like trying to work in the other points I had.
First, I have no problem with the idea of intelligent design per se. I have often wondered( escpecially in my delusional, more religious years, but also to this day), why life exists, and how it came to exist out of non-living components way back when. This is a very valid question that spans metaphysics, philosophy, and religion, among other areas, but it is not science. You see, Science attempts to explain how things happen, and what laws explain the physical phenomenom that we see in the universe. We have laws of physics, which probabaly are not perfect, and in some cases we know to be innacurate, but in most cases they accurately explain what we can observe so we consider them to be true. Science is a dynamic field. As we learn more, we ammend or overrule previous theories and then move on. Is Evolution a perfect theory? Of course not. But all the evidence that we have collected indicates that it is the most viable one that has yet been proposed. We have even seen evolution occur over very short periods of time, and have been able to create some of the building blocks of life from the basic components of the primordial stew. There is no other empirical theory of how life came to exist that has all that going for it.
Biology, as with all sciences, is a study of the HOW, not the WHY of the physical universe. It studies the interactions and rules that lead to a particular outcome and allows us to explain what we can observe, and predict what we will observe. It does not attempt to apply motives to the rules it proposes and simply says that they exist. Intelligent Design seems at least on the surface to simply ask people "Why?". All of this evolution is fine and dandy, but its too complicated to occur by chance. Therefore, let's propose a reason why this all came to exist. Who/what is driving evolution? All of these are fine things to ask, and even in a biology class, I have no problem with a teacher saying:
"Evolution is a theory that has a lot of empirical evidence and is backed up by the vast majority of scientists, but no one know why evolution works the way it does. Each individual is free to come up with their own personal opinions on why life has evolved as it has, or whether they believe that evolution is a sound theory that reconciles with their own religious beliefs. After all, that is what science is about, not simply accepting an explanation, but studying it and proving to yourself that it is true. If you do not believe the theories that we will discuss in this class, then perhaps you would enjoy taking a philosophy or comparitive religion class. But this is a science class and we will only discuss science."
But the talk of Intelligent Design should end there. Science is science, and religion is a different animal. People talk about "Hearing both sides". Well the other side of science is not religion. it would be like discussing string theory in sunday school. They are different topics. An athiest can go to church and learn all about God and Jesus and not really believe it, but at least accept it as a possible reality or entertaining story. Why can't a religious kid do the same in a biology class? To accept the literal biblical explanation is to throw out science all together, and therefore it makes no sense to try and mix the two. That is not to say that religion and science are mutually exclusive. They are not if you are willing to interpret religion in a scientific context. If you can read "7 days" as Billions of years. I have to talked people who believe strongly in both christianity and evolution and have no problem reconciling the two.
It is pretty clear that intelligent design is just an in to put Christian creationism in the biology classroom, and not just to propose another scientific explanation. Oposing scientific explanations are good for progress as they drive people to disprove each other and have friendly, accademic, battles over them. But it is dangerous to sell something that is decidly not a scientific theory (and in fact under its layers of spin tries ot discredit the idea of science all together) as an oposing theory.
This is all pretty incoherent babbling, especially since I wrote most of it a week ago and just now got around to finishing it. But this is important. We are the richest, most poserful country in the world, and yet our children are being out smarted by those in countries with much less resources. Instead of giving kids the best education we can, we are underpayign teachers and arguing over whether or not we should teach the scientific standards that they will need to compete with, and work beside, those who are schooled in other countries.
Alright, honestly, I've lost the motivation I had when I started this and dont feel like trying to work in the other points I had.
posted by Unknown | Thursday, November 10, 2005
3 Comments:
*I'm not entirely playing Devils advocate here. Let's say I'm just playing Devils paralegal.*
I see your point, but the scientists have their views supported by the state: through government funded public schools, to which children are required by law to attend unless their parents are rich enough to send them to private schools. The religious, however, have to teach their children opposing views to science outside of school, all the while treading the delicate line between giving their children the education they believe they deserve and undermining the work their children have to do in school. It may be hard to tell your children that school is important, then turn around and tell them that what they are learning in school is wrong. Is hesitation to believe science being in denial of reality, or being skeptical of the devils temptations? Do you know any better than them?
I think it may help to introduce spirituality classes (not religion per se, though religions could be discussed) that brings up the point that the human experience is one of limited information and that there are many possible ways to come to terms with reality. Assuming that all views are treated fairly and the class doesn't become a bible study, there won't be a huge uproar over it. The religious will have their "Science isn't God" message, while the secularlists will still be able to bring up, in that class, the possibility that the human experience is the result of eons of the evolution of our species to the point where we can ponder our role in reality and create stories in our minds that transcend our physical world, but that at the end of the day, we all still are born, live, and die like the other living things in our ecosystem.
Think of it as epistomology with a God complex.
Oh, and your "Now Playing" image is way to wide. Put it in the header or footer.
I agree. I would even be in favor of a second class to be taught along side evolution/biology that would discuss alternate spiritual explanations so long as it is not masqueraded as "science". I am pretty sure that this is one of those issues we agree almost completely on even if we argue over semantics.
I put the "now playing" thing in the header and it looked really bad. of course when I was testing it, it was a short track name.
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