Re: [asa] (macroevolution) The term Darwinism Inference examples

Bill,

I wasn't rendering my own opinion on what should happen. I was attempting to
say that if you put the following sticker as a disclaimer in a science
textbook in a public school:

[quote] Science is always going out on a limb, building upon what it has
done in the past, and presuming that it will work in the future. Often the
limb breaks off. So science has to climb back up into the tree, reassess,
start again, not the beginning, but from a more "secure" location.[unquote]

that a lawsuit would most likely ensue. Cobb County Georgia is a prime
example of just one such incident.

Does this alarm you? The idea that your relatively innocent proposal could
actually be banned?
It should.

-Dave C

PS,
I'd like to point out something I noticed today about natural selection.
Cleveland P. Hickman, Integrated Principles of Zoology
(Hickman,Roberts,Larson,J'Anson,Eisenhour) describes what a hypothesis is
and states that natural selection is a hypothesis. Cobb County was sued for
saying evolution is a theory, not a fact. What would happen if they said it
(or part of it) was a hypothesis, not a theory? Yet here is a a college
textbook saying one of the actual observable foundations is a hypothesis.
To me NS is observable, empirical, factual, and is also a theory, having
been well tested and well established. By what means does it get demoted
to a mere hypothesis? Yet could a school board put such a statement in a
textbook and not be sued? hahahahahaha, rofl. They would be roasted as
being religionists. If they put your statement above as a disclaimer they
would be roasted as being religionists. The point is that dissent is not
allowed. You are not allowed to doubt that "the fact of NS" is actual
"proof of macroevolution as a causative process and mechanism" even though
the latter has not been observed but is just a hypothesis. This is why it is
important that Cameron must hold science's feet to the fire on mechanisms.
Because fanatics that sue school districts to suppress dissent do that very
thing - hold school boards feet to the fire. In Cobb County students
are not told of the TE hypothesis, nor any other set of alternative ideas.
They are told that macroevolution as a mechanism is factual and explains
life, and its an all natural process, and nobody caused it, and if you have
doubts about this then you are just an ignorant savage and have no right to
hear anything but the academy's endorsed dogma.

Let me explain that I agree with Judge Overton that "scientific facts" are
"tentative" and subject to change. John Calvert disagrees with me. (BTW,
afaik Calvert authored the Cobb County Sticker). Calvert says a fact is a
fact and is immutable (cannot change). But he speaks of ordinary everyday
garden variety facts, not "scientific facts". So I think the Cobb County
board was originally correct, the "scientific fact" of evolution is
tentative and indeed subject to change, and overturning this was a travesty
of justice and deeply hurt science. To have a court say that science is not
tentative, that scientific facts are not tentative, well, this harms
science greatly. The Cobb County case was a huge blow to science. The
anti-creationists hate creationists so much they will do anything to hurt
them. They are willing to kill science if they have to in order to
suppress the creationists. What a circus side-show America is turning into.
Ireonically, what the anti-creationists don't realize is in Cobb County they
got the court to produce basically what Calvert's view is - that scientific
facts don't change. This is the opposite of what Judge Overton ruled. And
it all happened because of "science's blind spot", i.e., that naturalism
(and even materialism) must be protected by government at all costs.

The problem is the history of evolution is one thing (well established and
has status of a theory) but the cause (macroevolutionary mechanism as an
all natural process) is something else altogether and is not as well
established (i.e., has the status of hypothesis only). But the litigants
lumped it all together as if they are one and the same.

You said,
"Do you mean to say by this that unless one proclaims that science
determines absolute truth with certainity or some sort of similar Whig
version of science that one's views have no place in a public school
curriculum?"

I hope the answer is obvious by now that no, I don't go along with that, but
it is the anti-creationists whose Whig version of science you have to fear.
But it isn't just Whig science, Bill. Its Whig civil rights. Freedom and
liberty are at stake.

On Thu, Jul 9, 2009 at 6:35 PM, Bill Powers <wjp@swcp.com> wrote:

> Dave:
>
> Do you mean to say by this that unless one proclaims that science
> determines absolute truth with certainity or some sort of similar Whig
> version of science that one's views have no place in a public school
> curriculum?
>
> I can understand the tension to which you refer. Everything is seen in the
> context of one's personal demons. Still I think that a more realistic view
> of science is finding a place in science education.
>
> bill
>
>
> On Wed, 8 Jul 2009, David Clounch wrote:
>
> Bill,
>>
>> You said,
>> " Science is always going out on a limb, building upon what it has done in
>> the past, and presuming that it will work in the future. Often the limb
>> breaks off. So science has to climb back up into the tree, reassess, start
>> again, not the beginning, but from a more "secure" location."
>>
>> I understand what you are saying. But please let me ask sort of tongue in
>> cheek question, if I may.
>>
>> If a school board puts a sticker in textbooks that says what you just
>> said,
>> surely you recognize there would be an instant law suit by the ACLU
>> claiming
>> they (you) are preaching religion. You do recognize that, right? In
>> other
>> words, you, and perhaps your friends on the school board, are not allowed
>> to really believe what you just said.
>>
>> Best Regards,
>> Dave C
>>
>>
>>
>>

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Received on Fri Jul 10 11:06:24 2009