The Political Whore

And I ask this question because of this part of the Florida Baptist Witness news story on a group of anti-Darwinians (22 of ‘em, count them) who signed a letter to the state Board of Education requesting it not to include the word “eee-voh-LOO-shun” in the state public school science curriculum. Opponent Kim Kendall of suburban Jacksonville was quoted saying:

“There have been public hearings that were abruptly canceled; there were no press releases issued for the hearings that were scheduled or for the canceled hearings. The [Internet] survey was just too complicated and difficult to navigate for even a sophisticated user like myself.”

I mean, most of us can figure out the Internet, even the tricky parts of it (like how to delete your Facebook account.)

The new standards aren’t that different from the old ones, but do use the word evolution. One instance:

BIG IDEA 15: Diversity and Evolution of Living Organisms
A. Evolution is the organizing principle of life science.
B. Evolution is supported by multiple forms of evidence.
C. Natural Selection is a primary mechanism leading to change over time in organisms.

Well, that seems pretty straightforward. All three items are scientifically valid, as far as we know right now or may ever know. Opponents, however, want to strip such ideas out of the standards and leave wiggle room for other non-scientific explanations, including creationism and Intelligent Design. They say Darwin’s theory of evolution has too many holes in it. The only problem is that science, as a whole, doesn’t buy their argument, and science gets to decide what is appropriate for science. As I wrote about two years ago, researchers trying to bolster the hypothesis behind Intelligent Design (that all living creatures demonstrate evidence not of evolutionary changes being the driving force behind their existence but the telltale signs of the hand of an intelligent Creator) might one day succeed and move it from hypothesis to scientific theory. But that day doesn’t seem near, given the utter lack of scientific progress to date by some very determined researchers who believe that hypothesis.

The Florida Board of Education is holding its final public hearing on this issue today as I write. Updates later on what went on, but just in watching the (crappily) streamed version, I heard a lot of opponents talking about allowing competing ideas to challenge accepted scientific notions. What they don’t get is that is already going on; any scientist or researcher is free to pursue studies and examinations questioning evolution theory, and that goes on all the time. Those discussions, however, are for the scientific world to sort out, through peer-reviewed publications and rigorous testing of assumptions, new ideas, old ideas, hypotheses and theories. Teaching evolution in school doesn’t change that ongoing scientific process; it strengthens it as students learn the leading theory for how our natural world is organized and how it came about. They learn the scientific process, just as they learn faith in church or at home or in the woods gathered around a pentagram with shadowy demons dancing in the green fire.

Those children could grow up one day to be the ones who find the answer that overturns Darwin and finds out just exactly how we did come to be, scientifically speaking.

Then again, they may not.

(photo credits and copyright info here.)

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