DARWINISM ISN'T SCIENCE

Yesterday the Michigan Board of Education voted 8-0 to mandate the teaching of Darwinism in science classes to the exclusion of all other hypotheses or conjectures about evolution, namely Intelligent Design.  The educrats piously committed themselves to ensuring that only science is taught in science classes.  Well, that's good.  The problem is that Darwinism isn't science.

There is a great deal confusion about evolution.  For instance, what does the word mean?  If evolution means that organisms have changed form over the billions of years since life originated on Earth, who can seriously dispute that?  Sure, there are the Young-Earthers who misread Genesis as a science text to draw the factually unfounded conclusion that our planet is only 6,000 years old.  The Board of Education rightly excludes from the classroom their psuedo-science which is refuted by the well-established facts of paleontology.

But if evolution is synonymous with Darwinism, then evolution is not science and should no more be taught in science classes than the creationism of the Young-Earthers.  Darwinism is a conjecture (not a scientific theory as it is commonly mislabeled) as to HOW living organisms first originated on Earth and then changed into other organisms over time.  As to origins, the Darwinist conjecture is that non-living matter combined in some manner to become living creatures.  As to evolution, the Darwinist conjecture is that natural selection, sometimes called "survival of the fittest", is the mechanism that forced organisms to change form over the eons.

As to whether or not these conjectures are correct, we simply don't know.  There is no evidence as to HOW life originated or HOW it later evolved into the plants and animals that now inhabit the Earth.  Indeed, the persistent failure of scientists over the past 150 years since Charles Darwin first published his conjectures to establish any scientific foundation for them suggests that Darwinism probably should be consigned to the same dustbin as phlogiston, phrenology, and the steady-state universe.

Nevertheless, the Michigan Board of Education yesterday ordered the teaching of Darwinism as scientific fact in our public classrooms.  The basis for doing so was taking testimony from experts who are professed Darwinists that Darwinism is science.  They get away with this by conflating Darwinism with evolution.  Nobody seriously disputes the facts of evolution.  There is, after all, an extensive fossil record that different creatures have existed on Earth at different times.  The Darwinists then smuggle in with this undisputed record their idea of HOW these observed differences in the fossil record occurred.  In doing so, they give their conjectures as to the origin of life and its evolution the same gloss of solidity as the facts of the fossil record.

However, what the fossil record is and what explains it are two separate subjects.  The first is science and clearly suitable for instruction in public classrooms.  The second is hotly contested and no scientific theory exists regarding it, only a lot of conjectures and a few hypotheses.*  To teach that Darwinism is the only scientifically valid explanation of the origin of life and evolution is to seriously misinform students.  Whatever one thinks of Intelligent Design (which if nothing else is asking fundamental questions that Darwinism has not answered) it is not the only challenge to the dogma of Darwinism.  Even if the American academy is strait-jacketed by Darwinism, this not so in Europe and Asia where scientists are exploiting discoveries in genetics and molecular biology to develop alternatives to the Darwinist account of evolution.  Even Lamarckianism, of all things, has gotten a new scientific respectability.

Suffice it to say that in our public schools science classes should teach science, and that science should only be that which is well-established and not seriously disputed.  Paleontology, the geological and fossil record of our planet's history, covers the basic facts of evolution and is suitable for public school students.  Darwinism and all the other competing explanations for evolution are not, at least not at the introductory level.  There is great scientific debate as to how life arose and evolution occurred, and if Darwinism is to be taught, it must be taught in its proper context:  One conjecture along with the other conjectures as to what accounts for the origin of life and its evolution.

_____________________________

* In science, a theory is an explanation for a phenomenon that has been validated by observation or experimentation, such as Einstein's Theory of General Relativity.  A hypothesis is a proposed explanation that makes claims that are testable by observation or experimentation.  The standard model of the Big Bang is a hypothesis that could be reduced to a theory once there is sufficient astronomical observation of its claims.  A conjecture is another proposed explanation, uncontradicted by any known fact, that is not presently testable by any practical means.  So-called string theory is such a conjecture.  It is a fascinating explanation of what the fundamental bits and pieces of our universe may be, but it makes no claims right now that can be tested.

Darwinism is a conjecture in this sense, because we cannot devise any experiment that would prove life could never arise from non-life (you can't prove a negative), nor can we as a practical matter sit around for a few million years to observe whether or not natural selection causes current organisms to evolve into other ones.  Interestingly, Intelligent Design (which is whole 'nother kettle of fish from the creationism of the Young-Earthers) is more scientific than Darwinism in this regard.  It puts forth the hypothesis of irreducible complexity:  The idea that the basic component of life, the cell, could not originate from the blind forces of physics and chemistry bringing together non-living matter to produce it or any predecessor to it.  If scientists ever do create life from non-life, that would go a long way to shooting down irreducible complexity and so Intelligent Design.

Perhaps if Intelligent Design marketed itself as "irreducible complexity", like Darwinism markets itself as "natural selection", maybe the educrats could judge these matters more objectively as to their scientific validity (instead of mooning over Spencer Tracy playing Clarence Darrow in "Inherit the Wind" and then fretting that Intelligent Design is a Trojan horse for all those backwoods Bible-beating stump-toothed rubes who want to extinguish the flame of the Enlightenment).  Then again, maybe those responsible for setting standards for public school cirriculum should just try to get straight the difference scientists make between conjecture, hypothesis, and theory -- and then decide whether anything more than scientific theory should be taught.

Comments

[Bridget]

Hello L.A.W. Readers...

I'm pleased Bill decided to write on the Board of Education's recent glaringly bad decision to allow Darwinism to be taught to our public school children. And ONLY Darwinism might I add. So much for diversity, variety, and choice.

The Board members clearly don't understand the history of Darwinism nor the fact that the Darwiniacs play an old-fashioned shell game with the evidence - some information makes sense (selective parts of evolution itself as Bill noted) and some does not. You shouldn't force information down our kids throats when much of the evidence is NEVER going to be found under any of the shells. School children should be taught the truth - not a conjecture with serious gaps in evidence, some fake evidence, and much completely unexplainable. Show the pros and cons if the conjecture is valid.

Seeing that you and I and every tax-paying citizen in this state is paying for this public education system, we have every right to be appalled that our kids will be taught that this pseudo-science is real science.

I will support Darwinism being taught (along with all other existing hypothesis, theories, and valid ideas) PROVIDING the following truths about Darwinism are disclosed in these classes and text books:

1) The truth about the Miller-Urey experiment in which researchers re-constructed in a test tube, in a lab, the original building blocks of life. Using certain chemicals, concentrations, and atmospheric conditions they proved how the building blocks of life began. Great, right? Unfortunately, not only were the conditions for this experiment unattainable in the real world, but the chemicals used were proven not to be present either. The next step to producing proteins couldn't be done either. Scientists disproved this experiement time and again in the 1970's. But...still the experiment gets press time.

2) The truth about the peppered moth experiement in which black and white moths were deliberately placed on trees at different times of the day/night and dark moths eventually evolved to be avoid being eaten by predators. Great Darwinian concept, but debunked when researchers repeated the experiment years later and found no moths rested on trees or slept naturally the way the earlier photographs showed them. The photos were proven to be staged. This experiment was kids at play, not scientists in search of the truth.

3) The truth about Haeckel's embryos. There were a clear fraud and he was a leading German eugenicist. Nearly everyone has seen the pictures of embryos of vertebrates like fish, humans, and chickens. We were told they were amazingly similar. Darwin himself felt Hackel's evidence was one of the most important pieces of fact that supported his theory. Great...until the 1990's when a British embryologist viewed embryos via a powerful microscope and noticed that they look NOTHING like Hackel's drawings. He published his evidence (all slides, photos, etc.) and it turned out Hackel used woodcuts for some plates and doctored others, so they all looked alike. Once again, the truth comes out and it's not science.

4) The truth about the Galapagos finches. The birds did NOT change at all since Darwin began his observations over 170 years earlier. There were 13 species over 170 years ago and guess what, there at 13 species TODAY. The environment in the Galapogos has undergone many changes during these years, yet there continues to be no new species of finches. Only their beaks changed back and forth as food sources changed. Ah...the power of natural selection is not so natural as it appears. A definite Darwinian head-scratcher.

5) The truth about the Cambrian Explosion. A vast quantity of plants and animals appeared on the scene in the blink of a geological eye more than 500 million years ago. The Cambrian period it is known as. In a stretch of time less than 5-10 million years (the maximum length of time), there was a sudden explosion of the majority of animal phyla that is in place in our world today. Even Darwin had trouble explaining the enormous amounts of strata rich fossils after the explosion. Major supporters of Darwin (such as Dawkins) even scratch their head in wonder and state it's as if things were just planted there. Unexplainable to the Darwiniacs.

6) The truth about the fossil record. The lack of transitional specices we should see over time. Unfortunately, we don't. This is contrary to Darwinian natural selection.

I could go on and on about the controversies over the flagellum of bacteria, complex celluar structures, blood-clotting mechanisms, the human eye, fruit flies, Archaeopteryx, rna/dna and so on. The point is, the evidence AGAINST Darwinism is greater than the evidence for it. That's the shocking about Darwinism being presented to our school kids. We ask them to imagine the unimaginable and we give them fake science in place of real science. A corruption of intellect occurs in our classrooms everyday and most parents barely know about it.

The refutation of the supposed mountains of evidence for Darwinism is becoming an avalanche. But the minute a scientist, palaeontologist, physicist, chemist, etc. disproves a Darwinist "fact" they are labeled crazy, incompetent, psycho, God-lover, or worse.

Is it any surprise that open-minded and curious people who have read the reports, studied the facts, and evaluated the evidence understand there aren't gaps in scientific facts supporting the Darwinist explanation of evolution, because there are NO scientific facts. But still, these people are the outsiders. The muzzled ones who are on the other side of the 8-0 vote here in Michigan and other states.

Consider writing to the state Board of Eduction and/or the local school board to voice your dissent if you feel that presenting only one side of an issue is the way you want your public school kids to learn science. If you want your kids to be well-rounded and seriously educated, they need ALL the data, all the facts, and all the evidence to make real decisions on real issues. If an idea is valid, it will stand up to scrutiny.

Sadly...the Darwiniacs fight tooth and nail for their place in the kids' text books - and ONLY their position. They keep asking us to assume what is in effect a miracle to explain what they still can't (and probably never will). Funny thing is, we do see a miracle in evolution, it's called design.

The Editor -
Bridget

[The Executive Director]

Hi, Editor.

Of course, I agree with you (otherwise I'd be in a lot of trouble when I get home ;).

Seriously, I'm glad you took the time to report to our readers that, beyond my commentary on the dubious rationale for teaching Darwinism as the one and only explanation for evolution, there has been a fair amount of clear error and even outright fraud in what are taught to kids as facts in support of Darwinism.

I think it would be helpful to say that neither you or me believe that most of the science teachers who teach these errors do so knowingly. There has been an unfortunate tendency in U.S. colleges to not deviate from anything other than Darwinian orthodoxy on the subject of evolution, so most teachers have never been exposed to any other account of evolution.

How this has happened in our colleges has a lot to do with academics sheering science from its philosophical (i.e., Aristotelian) foundation and so reducing objective knowledge only to that which material and mechanical. Thus, no account of nature is permitted except that which is materialistic. Darwinism is the quintessential materialist account of nature, and so it rules in our colleges and then trickles down into our public schools.

However, materialism (the belief that everything that exists is fundamentally physical and deterministically governed by the laws of physics) fails to explain much about human beings -- e.g. free will, morality, beauty -- and how we came to be -- as in evolution. And so the yawning gaps in materialism get filled in with "just-so" stories and a fair bit of con artistry. Because these frauds are too good to let loose of, questioning them becomes verboten, and so the beliefs they support -- e.g. Darwinism -- become dogmatic.

Consequently, among other things, Haeckel's faked woodcuts still make into modern biology textbooks and none of the teachers using those books knows to question them, let alone encourage any student to do other than accept them as fact.

Faithfully yours,
The Executive Director

[eric collier]

If you consider evolution indisputable, great. But your contention that "Darwinism" purports to explain the origin of life is wrong. This is "abiogenesis", a separate discipline. No, there is no "proof" that life arose from non-life, and it may not have, but that is no reason to consider the matter closed, or to say that scientists won't someday crack that mystery.
"Bridget" has got every one of her points pretty seriously wrong. No one claims, for example, that the Miller-Urey experiments "proved how the building blocks of life began". It was an attempt to find out if amino acids could spontaneously form in the presumed conditions of the primordial earth, based on the best understanding of those conditions at the time (1953). It turned out that understanding was a little off. Subsequent evidence suggested that the primordial atmosphere was somewhat less reducing than originally thought. The experiment was run again, with the less-reducing conditions duplicated--and amino acids again formed. What does this prove? Only that if our current understanding of primordial conditions is fairly accurate, amino acids might have spontaneously formed in the primordial earth.
I'll be happy to deconstruct each of her other points if she, or anybody else, is interested.

[The Executive Director]

Hi, Eric.

I agree that the origin of life is a matter distinct from the mechanism of evolution. Nevertheless, Darwinists, as did Charles Darwin himself, joined the two to put forth a materialist explanation for how life began and then evolved. Neither Bridget nor I argue that these subjects are closed. Indeed, there is little that science has yet to tell us -- and that is the very point of my article. We should not be teaching Darwinism AS FACT in public schools when science is far from settled on the questions of life's origin and evolution.

As for your remarks regarding the Miller-Urey experiment, I should let Bridget speak for herself, but it looks to me that you are making her point. The experiment is not the proof of life's origin from inanimate matter that Darwinists have purported it to be, but it unfortunately continues to be reported as such in many biology textbooks.

That is Bridget's objection. She does not argue against teaching about the Miller-Urey experiment. She argues only that its limits and flaws be reported to students. As for me, I think the experiment is only of interest regarding the history of evolutionary biology as opposed to evolutionary biology itself and argue that it no longer merits mention in public school textbooks.

Thanks for your remarks, and feel free to make any other comments you think will correct the record. We always welcome opposing points of view here.

Regards,
Bill Tingley
Executive Director

[The Editor - Bridget]

Hi Eric...

You stated the following:

"No, there is no "proof" that life arose from non-life, and it may not have, but that is no reason to consider the matter closed, or to say that scientists won't someday crack that mystery."

Correct. I agree with you. In my brief editorial, that is the point I was trying to make. What they should teach in the public schools is true, and if we don't know what is true, there are one of two choices:

1) We simply don't teach anything on that point or;
2) We teach all the view points on that subject (pros & cons)

But, what we should not be doing in the case of evolution is teaching that Darwinism is "THE" scientific explanation for evolution. It is not. That is my issue with the State Board of Education's decision.

Obviously from what I have written, I don't feel Darwinism is the correct answer to the question of evolution (for me and millions of others - whether in the majority or not) there is many, many questions both unanswered and also disproven by the Darwinism conjecture.

I would think even a Darwinist would see that until science does have a answer for the question of evolution, we must be careful what we teach our kids about it. We should not be closing any doors on the subject until we do know the answer to the question. Until we have the full truth, we need to teach the competing points of view.

I argue not so much on Darwinism itself, but the "policy" of what is taught. I don't claim to be a scientist or an expert in any field of physics, chemistry, biology, paeleontology, etc. I am simply a human being of this city, state and country who is supporting that there are many sides to this issue. I have no doubt you could argue every point I brought up. That is not the intent of my editorial. I believe our kids should be getting a full education not a partial one based upon upon a particular mindset of the educational authorities.

If anything Eric, my hope is that our kids are taught MORE than less so, they can truely have open minds to the past, present and future.

Regards,

The Editor
Bridget

[Edward Murray]

Well against my better judgment, I will pick the other side and state that Darwinism is science. I think the problem is that many people expect science to have the Truth with a capital “T” as being the way “reality really is” and as a truth it is universal, necessary and certain. That is not science and it is probably not religion so I am afraid scientific theories are historical in nature where better “theories” replace older theories (e.g., phrenology by neuroscience), subsume earlier theories (e.g., Newtonian by Relativity) or live with two or more competing paradigms (wave and corpuscular theory of light) for some time.

Science creates theories to describe “nature” (Mendel’s genetics inheritance of certain phenotypes) but may not fully understand what they see. “Better theories” also predict certain phenomena that we know exists (time dilation relative to gravity) and the best theories may even ontologically predict the existence of that which has not been seen at all (e.g., certain early elements missing in the periodic table) and may be found.

Take a simple example of the Copernican move of the sun to the center of our planetary system and displace the earth as the center. He was right in the position but wrong in just about everything else (e.g., the paths were elliptical not circular and the stars are not in a band around the planets!)

You raised Einstein’s relativity as a theory and you are correct that it is a theory. There was a raging debate between what was called the Copenhagen model of quantum theory and Einstein (one such aspect was causality at the most fundamental level) and eventually Einstein was proven wrong. With the advent of better accelerators physicists started finding all types of new sub atomic particles until Murray Gell-Mann felt that this was just too many fundamental particles to describe reality and that resulted in the birth of Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD) which introduced the famous quarks that became the building blocks of the “purported fundamental particles” (e.g., protons, neutrons) at that time. This is the way scientific theories change and they all change because they exist in time (they are historical) and are based on the fallibility of man. Before we leave QCD, when the accelerator at CERN starts up, they will have to find the Higgs Boson (carrier of gravity) or there will have to be major changes to current theory (TOE = Theory of Everything that integrates all the know forces in the universe). But as we speak, we have discovered dark matter and energy which are creating some problems with our current theories. So perhaps we should wait and not teach Relativity, quantum mechanics, and QCD, Big Bang, universe inflation until we are “sure” that we know the truth with a capital “T.”

Darwinism as originally hypothesized by Darwin and Wallace is in the same state. Darwin would not recognize “Darwinism” today because of all of the changes and modifications to his core theory. This is no different from Rutherford being able to recognize his atomic model that he came up with in the early 20th century.

I am afraid this is how science operates and if you want to wait for the final theory, it will probably never come. I would ask that if you don’t want to teach Darwinism or if you want to teach other theories what would you add to the curriculum. Would you add intelligent design? I am afraid there are no other scientific theories that explain the concept of evolution as well as the current theory of Darwinism. That theory will continue to undergo modifications as new discoveries are made and there are refutations of existing concepts such as the Miller-Urey experiment for the basic organic molecules (they may have come from extremophiles that live in environments without oxygen that we didn’t even know about until a few decades ago).

So if you expect scientific theories to be the Truth with a capital “T” that are universal, necessary and certain, you will never see any. Darwinism with all of its modifications and many unanswered aspects is as good as it gets but it changes every day. Who knows, it may be subsumed or even become a temporary paradigm that got us this far and becomes a relic of history such as phlogiston. For years we all believed the continents and the earth moved toward equilibrium until Plate Tectonics and then may of our beliefs of the physical world were turned upside down. When Plate Tectonics was first hypothesized no respectable journal would publish such a ridiculous “theory.” Fifty years after that no respectable journal would publish a refutation of Plate Tectonics. Welcome to the reality of science.

[The Executive Director]

Hi, Edward.

Thanks for the comments.

I think you'll find that the footnote to my article addresses the issue of certainty in science. As I said, a theory is an explanation verified by observation or experimentation. A hypothesis is a possible explanation that is, in principle, verifiable but has not yet been. A conjecture is also a possible explanation uncontradicted by established fact, but unlike a hypothesis it cannot be verified.

So education authorities such as the Michigan Board of Education do have an object basis for deciding what should be taught in science classes. Do they teach only fact and theory? Do they also teach hypotheses. Or do they teach everything, including competing conjectures?

As it now stands, Darwinism is a conjecture as to how evolution occurred. There is no definitive evidence for its claims, and there is no means of verifying it through observation or experimentation. Therefore, the question is: Do we teach Darwinism in public schools at all, and if we do, do we do so to the exclusion of all the other conjectures regarding evolution?

After all, as you say, some quite astonishing conjectures have become widely accepted as the truth in science -- e.g., plate tectonics. What we know about evolution beyond the brute fact of the fossil record is next nothing at this stage, so it seems premature to pick one popular but unverified idea, Darwinism, to teach to the exclusion of other ideas that do not happen to be congeneal to the current academic mindset.

My opinion is that the facts of paleontology should be taught in public schools, which includes evolution -- i.e., the forms of organisms have changed over time. When students asked how did this change occur, the honest answer is "Science does not know." As you say, science isn't truth with a capital "T", and I think it would be good for kids to learn that in science class.

Regards,
Bill Tingley
Executive Director

[Rich]

Oh dear.
1) Please don't conflate abiogenesis and evolution
2) If your going to use Darwinism, you might want to use Neo-Darwinism unless your personal straw man is scientific thinking from 1859.
3) We haven't seen evolution? Actually we have, please do some research.

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-speciation.html

also,please read this:

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/

you pair of nuggets.

[The Executive Director]

Rich,

Spare us the insult and re-read the article. The issue isn't whether or not Darwinism is the correct explanation for evolution. The issue is that science has not established any of Darwinism's claims. It remains a conjecture, and so should a conjecture be taught as fact in public schools? The obvious answer is no.

As to your points:

[1] It is the Darwinists who conflate life's origin and its evolution predicated upon a materialist conception of the universe. Thus, Darwinism is more philosophy than science.

[2] To the extent that there is a difference between Darwinists and neo-Darwinists, the neo-Darwinists claim that natural selection works at the level of the gene not the organism. Either way, proof of their claims continues to elude science.

[3] Micro-evolution, change within a species, is not controversial. All one needs to do is consider all the different breeds of dogs. Yet both the chihuahua and the St. Bernard stubbornly remain the same species, canis familiaris. Now if you want to count hybridization as macro-evolution, change from one species to another, instead of micro-evolution, then you've got the problem of accounting for the horticulturalist or animal breeder -- ie., the designer -- who made it happen or for the sterility typical of the few natural hybrids that occur. The facts are that hybridization is not natural selection and that macro-evolution in any manner remains unobserved. (Indeed, not even after 4,000 generations of forcing mutations in fruit flies have scientists been able to create any other species from fruit flies than the fruit fly.)

It is of course macro-evolution by natural selection that is the central, and still unverified, claim of Darwinism.

Regards,
Bill Tingley
Executive Director

[Rich]

Wrong.

(1) No, it appears to be you who conflates them. I have two disciplines, evolution and abiogenesis. Please support some references to back up your claims.

(2)What you have written shows your lack of understanding. Neo Darwinism uses mechanisms beyond RM + NS, such a geneteic drift. You might want to study before opining.

(3)Didn't I just provide you with examples of speciation? The micro evolution / macroevolution arbitrary dichotomy seems to be the plaything of creationisist.

[John]

This is some funny stuff you have written here, have you been writing humor long?

[Shygetz]

You are wrong on several points. Speciation (evolution between species) has been performed in the lab and observed in the wild. Rich provided a link to a summary that has citations of the primary literature. Additionally, there are no mechanisms that would prevent evolution beyond the species "limit" that you arbitrarily use.

Also, if you want to hinge ID on the hypothesis of irreducible complexity, then it is actually a falsified hypothesis. IC has been shown to be wrong, even by its creator Behe (who still clings to it as his only claim to dubious fame). He published a paper where he used a computer evolutionary algorithm to show that certain biological complexes couldn't arise by evolution. Even when he strained the parameters beyond standard practice to prove his point, the simulation still evolved structures that were "irreducibly complex" thus proving the fallacy of this notion. Several high-profile papers have been published showing how supposedly IC components could (and have) evolved through natural mechanisms.

There are so many pieces of evidence at all levels of organization (molecular, genetic, physiological, etc.) indicating common descent with modification (through a variety of means, not JUST natural selection) that debating it at this point is silly. Yet there are plenty of people who are either silly, or are not as informed as they like to think. Thus, they shout their ignorance to the sky and wonder why the scientists ignore them.

[The Executive Director]

Rich & Shygetz,

The issue remains that Darwinism (including neo-Darwinism) remains a set of conjectures that have not been scientifically validated. Neither of you have been willing to show how Darwinism is anything more than conjecture.

You can argue till you are blue in the face about points not at issue in the article, such as whether not irreducible complexity has any merit, or pettifog definitions thinking you can prove something by redefining words, such as speciation has been observed once we changed the meaning of species, or knock down strawman, such as lumping anyone dubious of Darwinism as science as a creationist kook who thinks dinosaurs walked the Earth only six thousand year ago.

But it's nothing but a lot of sound and fury evading the question at hand. Darwinism is nothing but conjecture, so should the public schools teach it as something more, especially to the exclusion of competing conjectures?

If you don't want to address that question, that's fine, gentlemen. I'll understand if you are not up to seriously discussing public policy.

Regards,
Bill Tingley
Executive Director

[Rich]

You wave that hand,Bill!

Species has a scientific definaition, which we're observing:

A species is a reproductively isolated population that shares a common gene pool and a common niche

So no fertile hybrids, okay.

By this criteria, speciation has been obsereved. If you have your own definition, that's nice for you, but not really worthy of teaching in school.

We can use evoultion in an experimental way:

(with thanks to Lenny Flank)

"The scientific method is very simple, and consists of five basic steps. They are:

Observe some aspect of the universe
Form a hypothesis that potentially explains what you have observed
Make testible predictions from that hypothesis
Make observations or experiments that can test those predictions
Modify your hypothesis until it is in accord with all observations and predictions
Nothing in any of those five steps excludes on principle, a priori, any "supernatural cause". Using this method, one is entirely free to invoke as many non-material pixies, ghosts, goddesses, demons, devils, djinis, and/or the Great Pumpkin, as many times as you like, in any or all of your hypotheses. And science won't (and doesn't) object to that in the slightest. Indeed, scientific experiments have been proposed (and carried out and published) on such "supernatural causes" as the effects of prayer on healing. Other scientific studies have focused on such "non-materialistic" or "non-natural" phenomena as ESP, telekinesis, precognition and "remote viewing". So ID's claim that science unfairly rejects supernatural or non-material causes out of hand on principle, is demonstrably quite wrong.

However, what science does require is that any supernatural or non-material hypothesis, whatever it might be, then be subjected to steps 3, 4 and 5. And here is where ID fails miserably.

To demonstate this, let's pick a particular example of an ID hypothesis and see how the scientific method can be applied to it: One claim made by many ID creationists explains the genetic similarity between humans and chimps by asserting that God -- uh, I mean, An Unknown Intelligent Designer -- created both but used common features in a common design. (For any IDers who object to this example, please feel free to substitute any other non-naturalistic ID hypothesis that you do like.)

Let's take this hypothesis and put it through the scientific method:

Observe some aspect of the universe.
OK, so we observe that humans and chimps share unique genetic markers, including a broken vitamin C gene and, in humans, a fused chromosome that is identical to two of the chimp chromosomes (with all the appropriate doubled centromeres and telomeres).
Invent a tentative description, called a hypothesis, that is consistent with what you have observed.
OK, the proposed ID hypothesis is "an intelligent designer used a common design to produce both chimps and humans, and that common design included placing the signs of a fused chromosome and a broken vitamin C gene in both products."
Use the hypothesis to make predictions.
Well, here is ID supernaturalistic methodology's chance to shine. What predictions can we make from ID's hypothesis? If an Intelligent Designer used a common design to produce both chimps and humans, then we would also expect to see... ?
IDers, please fill in the blank.
And, to better help us test ID's hypothesis, it is most useful to point out some negative predictions -- things which, if found, would falsify the hypothesis and demonstrate conclusively that the hypothesis is wrong. So, then -- if we find ... (fill in the blank here), then the "common design" hypothesis would have to be rejected.
Test those predictions by experiments or further observations and modify the hypothesis in the light of your results.
Repeat steps 3 and 4 until there are no discrepancies between theory and experiment and/or observation.
Well, the IDers seem to be sort of stuck on step 3. Despite all their voluminous writings and arguments, IDers have never yet given ANY testible predictions from their ID hypothesis that can be verified through experiment."

What does ID give us, beyond puff-of-smoke, god-of-the gaps, argument from ignorance?

Again, please read

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/

I don't think oyu have yet. Feel free to refute all or part of it. It's quite comprehensive.

How would ID explain ERVs for example?

[plunge]

"Nevertheless, Darwinists, as did Charles Darwin himself, joined the two to put forth a materialist explanation for how life began and then evolved."

Darwin doesn't deal with the beginning of life in his published works. In a letter, he once mused that life may have begun in a warm little pond, but he was an agnostic and deist who also many times suggested that a creator had started life. Here he is in the conclusion of the Origin: "Authors of the highest eminence seem to be fully satisfied with the view that each species has been independently created. To my mind it accords better with what we know of the laws impressed on matter by the Creator, that the production and extinction of the past and present inhabitants of the world should have been due to secondary causes, like those determining the birth and death of the individual. When I view all beings not as special creations, but as the lineal descendants of some few beings which lived long before the first bed of the Silurian system was deposited, they seem to me to become ennobled."

"Indeed, not even after 4,000 generations of forcing mutations in fruit flies have scientists been able to create any other species from fruit flies than the fruit fly."

Thinking that a fruit fly would ever have non-fruit fly descendants is a serious misunderstanding of how taxonomy and evolution work. It's as silly as saying that in all our breeding of mammals, only mammals have ever resulted. Well, yes. That's cladism. That's precisely what evolution is about: descent with modification, NOT saltation or jumping out of existing groups into a new one.

Fruit fly is not a "species" in any case. Drosophila melanogaster is a species.

Your serious misunderstanding of evolution is precisely why children need a better understanding of biology than the rushed dash they currently get.

[plunge]

Bill: "As it now stands, Darwinism is a conjecture as to how evolution occurred. There is no definitive evidence for its claims, and there is no means of verifying it through observation or experimentation."

I don't see how you can make this claim. The pattern of evidence demanded by evolution specifically is very specific and precise, which allows us to "check" it in countless ways against virtually every piece of physical evidence on the planet. And, suprise, surprise, all the physical evidence is consistent with these checks. You can't do better than that in science. Things like common descent are, in fact, better validated and confirmed than most things are in science because of the vast range of different things that can be checked in this way. The level of evdience is known as "convergent" which is the best there is, and common descent is one of the most powerful bodies of convergent evidence in all science.

"Consequently, among other things, Haeckel's faked woodcuts still make into modern biology textbooks and none of the teachers using those books knows to question them, let alone encourage any student to do other than accept them as fact."

They are not in any present edition of any biology textbook, except as examples of a past controversy. The only ever appeared without this necessary explanation in a few editions of a few high school textbooks, and the reason is simply because the basic problem with them, rather than being a gross lie, is too subtle and esoteric for the average wage slave textbook author to understand. Embroynic branching homology is an important demonstration of common descennt as ever, and it has been stronger without Haeckels ideas (which were inconsistent with what we know of genetics), which were discarded long before most people were even born.

[The Executive Director]

Rich,

You can go all day long about why you think Darwinism explains everything and Intelligent Design explains nothing. The point of my article still eludes you.

Regards, Bill

[The Executive Director]

Hello, Plunge.

I have no misunderstanding of evolution. It is the change in the general forms of organisms over time. What I do not do is confuse the evidence of the fossil record, which indicates that this has happened to life since it first appeared on Earth four billion years ago, with conjectures such as Darwinism as to how this happened.

For example, you claim that "common descent is one of the most powerful bodies of convergent evidence in all science". Common descent seems to be a reasonable explanation of the evidence of the fossil record. However, that's a conjecture. There has been no verification that common descent occurred. Indeed, the Cambrian explosion argues against it (at the very least requires explanation).

So we do a disservice to students when we do not teach them the difference in science between facts -- e.g., the fossil record -- and the explanation for those facts -- e.g., a conjecture such as common descent -- and the difference between the certainty of explanations -- i.e., theory, hypothesis, and conjecture.

And that is what I am driving at. You illustrate in your remarks how tricky this can be when it comes to public school cirriculum. You say that evolution occurs with descent with modification rather than saltations. Perhaps so, but you are surely aware of the school of thought called "punctuated equilibrium" which requires saltations. So what should be taught when the science is still up for grabs?

(And, of course, not all science underlying the conjectures of Darwinism or neo-Darwinism is up for grabs, but then it has yet to establish Darwinist explanations as more than conjectures. They may be consistent with Darwinism, but they are not exclusive to it either.)

So the issue remains what should be taught, and I have yet to hear a compelling argument that Darwinism should be taught as anything more than a conjecture, especially to the exclusion of any competing conjecture.

By the way, Plunge, thank you for your technical remarks regarding Charles Darwin, the fruit fly, etc. I am well aware of these things (as well as the other matters Rich and the others claim I am ignorant of), but I should not assume that all of L.A.W.'s readers are.

Regards,
Bill Tingley
Executive Director

[plunge]

"You can go all day long about why you think Darwinism explains everything and Intelligent Design explains nothing."

He made specific points about specific claims you made that are wrong. If what you want is an educational policy based on what you are talking about, and what you are talking about is wrong, then you are basically suggesting that we should teach kids incorrect information.

Your article is based on a very basic misunderstanding of what it means to test something in science. A scientific test is "if X is true, this disproves Y" or vice-versa. Evolutionary theory works just the same as any other science in this regard. There is no scientific category of "conjecture." When we make a claim about the world, we seek to test its implications: whether these effects are historical or future. That's what we do with elements of evolutionary theory the same as anything else.

You seem to think that anything that occured in the past is necessarily "conjecture." But that's a bizarre epistemology that almost no scientist recognizes as sensible, and even most ID theorists would reject (even most creationists). Using a theory of science that is basically antithetical to empiricism as the basis to claim that something doesn't belong in science class is, simply put, silly.

[Rich]

I see you want 'Darwinism' to prove abiogenisis. Good luck with that. In other news, meteorology can't explain Candy floss. Whoa! Theory in crisis! Scratch that, ‘theory’ in crisis! ID is a minority fringe position held by people with deep rooted theological beliefs and paid for by the religious right. It has a history of dishonesty, which brings me to my second point: Are you sure the ‘point’ of your post isn’t “there’s not enough Jesus is schools”?

[The Executive Director]

Plunge,

You're way off base in your last comment. Do yourself a favor and read what I actually wrote.

I find it interesting that people who claim to be men of science, as many of those who have made comments here, are very quick to draw baseless conclusions about what I do or do not believe. Most unscientific.

Regards, Bill

[The Executive Director]

Rich,

I have been patient with your hostility and insults as you continue to go on about everything but the public policy issue at hand. You have now descended into ridiculous fearmongering about the "religious right". Your comments will be ignored until you can get with the program -- and that includes a measure of civility.

Regards, Bill

[Rich]

Bill, what are the odds that the morphological tree of life and the molecular tree life should match so very, very closely? What does this say about ToE? Again, please read:

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/

You obviously haven't yet, and it might stop you shouting at windmills.

[Rich]

In Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District (2005), a United States federal court ruled that a public school district requirement for science classes to teach that intelligent design as an alternative to evolution was a violation of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. United States District Judge John E. Jones III ruled that intelligent design is not science and is essentially religious in nature.

SCIENCE?: NO
RELIGION?: YES

[Rich]

Oh, and Bill, your inability to deal with any science related critiques is noteworthy.