By Steven D. Schafersman
Oct. 8, 2003
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/story.hts/editorial/outlook/2145890
At the Sept. 10 State Board of Education public hearing on textbook adoption, scientists, educators and students overwhelmingly supported leaving the evolution content in biology textbooks unchanged, since none contained factual errors or omissions about evolution and all contained the necessary material to comply with the Texas science curriculum. Indeed, every Texas scientist who testified not only supported the biology books, but also objected to efforts by creationists to confuse the public and State Board members about supposed "weaknesses" of evolution. In addition, the Texas Education Agency soon after reported that the biology textbooks all totally conformed to the TEKS, the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills, as required by law.
All the scientific evidence presented in the hearing strongly supported the scientists' evaluation of the textbooks. Speakers representing the Discovery Institute, a Seattle, Wash., organization that promotes intelligent design creationism, relied on misinformation to support their unwarranted claims that the biology books were inaccurate and incomplete. Scientist after scientist from the University of Texas at Austin spoke to the board, dissecting each creationist claim in detail and showing why each was illogical and unsupported by the evidence. Thus, the overwhelming effect of the testimony was to support the accurate scientific evolution content in biology textbooks and to leave them unchanged. Nevertheless, there is concern that some State Board members will try to change the textbooks or place them on the nonconforming list.
My own written testimony was misrepresented when I compared the current crop of anti-evolutionists on the State Board to Stalinists and Nazis. The Soviet Union and Nazi Germany both had long and unfortunate histories of political interference and control of specific scientific topics for ideological reasons (genetics in the USSR, anthropology in Germany). Such interference and control of biology is precisely what some State Board members are trying to do in Texas, and scientists and educators have had to organize to stop them. While not similar in scale or murderous consequences, the motivation is identical and will result in "only" the corruption of our state's science education system.
The same tired litany of scientifically discredited support for intelligent design, such as arguments of anti-evolutionist Michael Behe, has been put forward as reliable science. However, readers are never informed of the dozens of reviews and essays by prominent scientists, including my own, that closely examine Behe's claims and show why they are illogical and unscientific. Today, there is zero scientific support for intelligent design and overwhelming support for modern evolution; indeed, evolution has never been stronger as an active scientific research topic. All the "weaknesses" that anti-evolutionists wish to have forced into biology books are illegitimate: They have already been corrected, are educationally unwarranted, or never existed in the first place.
Organized creationists, in their entire existence, have never conducted a single science experiment or made a single scientific observation. They just don't practice real science. Instead, their strategy is to use rhetorical and marketing techniques to persuade politically powerful non-scientists of the truth of their arguments, and convince them to force changes in science textbooks and curricula using the power of the state. This is what the creationist supporters tried to do in Kansas and Ohio, and now they are in Texas attempting to do the same thing. They failed in those two states, and they will ultimately fail here.
Houston readers should be aware that the most extreme anti-science advocates on the State Board of Education are from Houston and its surrounding counties: Teri Leo, David Bradley, Don McLeroy and Linda Bauer. Their efforts to subvert accurate science instruction are well-known and documented in the written and oral testimony available on the Texas Education Agency and Texas Citizens for Science Web sites. The first three members have publicly championed creationist speakers and their goals, and have announced their plan to place all the biology textbooks that refuse to make unscientific changes on the nonconforming adoption list, thus restricting their sale in Texas. For her part, Bauer appointed two creationists to the state biology textbook review panel, where they attempted but failed to have the books listed as nonconforming.
I have opposed such State Board of Education members since 1982, and the problems we have with anti-scientists on the board will never disappear until voters take the time to learn the true natures and beliefs of State Board candidates before electing them to office. The position is low on the ballot, and dedicated creationists run as stealth candidates to stay below the radar. I urge each reader to investigate this controversy yourself and begin to take a personal interest in Texas science education and keep ideologues and zealots off the State Board. The reason is simple: These individuals are neglecting our state's low standardized text scores, low graduation rates and shrinking Texas' Permanent School Fund, while devoting their time and energy to meddling with science textbook content. Instead of devoting their efforts to protecting and improving public school education, they appear to want to damage it. Some of them home-school their children or send them to private religious schools, so it is understandable that they have no stake in the system. Texans should demand that these public officials start to make the education of our schoolchildren their first priority, and we should expect them to begin by leaving science textbooks alone and not censor them.
Schafersman, of Midland, is the president of Texas Citizens for Science. He is a scientist, educator and writer.
By Stephen C. Meyer
Sept. 18, 2003
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/editorial/outlook/2108157
CYNICAL old lawyers have a maxim: When you have the facts on your side, argue the facts. When you have the law on your side, argue the law. When neither is on your side, change the subject and question the motives of the opposition. That seems to be the strategy of many Darwinists now that the Texas State Board of Education has begun to evaluate whether current biology textbooks meet state standards for accuracy in their presentation of Darwin's theory of evolution.
Consider what happened at last week's hearing of the Board of Education in Austin. There, numerous Texas scientists, educators and students asked the board to insist that textbooks comply with state law by correcting factual errors in current biology textbooks and by presenting both the scientific strengths and weaknesses of Darwinian theory.
This seemingly reasonable request elicited a torrent of personal abuse and misinformation from those lobbying for Darwin's theory to be presented uncritically. Motives were questioned. The subject was changed. Steven Schafersman of Texas Citizens for Science even compared those asking for full scientific disclosure to Stalinists and Nazis!
Some reporters and editorialists joined the misinformation campaign, warning (falsely) that textbook critics want to teach the biblical account of creation in the science classroom. And defenders of the current texts dismissed all scientific critiques of contemporary Darwinism as religiously motivated .
Yet these claims are as irrelevant to assessing the question before the board as they are hysterical and misinformed.
First, it's not what motivates a scientist's argument that determines its validity; it's the evidence. Even if all scientific critics of Darwin's theory were motivated by religious belief (and they are not), their critiques would still need to be judged by the evidence.
Motives don't matter in science. Evidence does.
If this weren't the case, then several Darwinists who testified at last week's hearing would be sorely out of luck. Schafersman, for example, is a self-described secular humanist who has written that supernaturalistic religion and naturalistic science are and will remain in eternal conflict. Does Schafersman's anti-religious motivation invalidate his support of Darwinian evolution? Of course not.
The same standard should apply when considering scientific critics of Darwinism. True, some scientists critical of contemporary evolutionary theory also favor a new alternative theory called intelligent design. Darwinists say such religious-based ideas cannot be science. But the theory of intelligent design is not based on religious doctrine. It's based on scientific evidence. For example, the leading advocate of intelligent design, Lehigh University biochemist Michael Behe, bases his case for design on intriguing new evidence: the miniature motors and complex circuits now found in cells.
Some may decide that Behe's conclusions lend support to their religious beliefs. But that does not mean that his theory is based on religion, only that it may have theistic implications. But so what? Many Darwinists, and even some Darwinist textbooks, openly state that Darwinism has anti-theistic implications. Implications don't decide the truth of theories either. Evidence does.
In any case, design theorists are not the only scientific critics of Darwinism, and those asking for more accurate biology textbooks are not asking for the theory of intelligent design to be taught. Instead, they are asking that students learn all the evidence they need to assess Darwinian theory, not just the evidence that happens to supports it.
Peer-reviewed scientific literature now documents the existence of many problems with current evolutionary theory and with the textbook presentations of that theory. For example, at least three of the texts currently used in Texas use discredited 19th century diagrams of embryos as support for Darwin's universal common ancestry thesis. These now infamous Haeckel embryo drawings allegedly demonstrate the similarity of the early embryological development of fish, chickens, pigs and humans. Yet scientists have long known that these different vertebrate classes do not strongly resemble each other during early embryological development. Why must this inaccuracy persist in Texas textbooks?
The law of the land also supports this approach, as does our national education policy. In 1986, the Supreme Court ruled in Edwards v. Aguillard, the controlling legal authority on how to teach about origins questions, that state legislatures could require the teaching of scientific critiques of prevailing scientific theories. Last year, in the No Child Left Behind Act Conference Report, Congress expressed its support for greater openness in science instruction, citing biological evolution as the key example.
Teaching both the strengths and weaknesses of Darwinian theory will engage student interest and teach them to weigh evidence -- a key skill in scientific reasoning.
As Charles Darwin himself wrote in the Origin of Species, a fair result can only be obtained by balancing the facts and argument on both sides of each question.
Evolution, creation fight will hurt students, state
Houston Chronicle Staff
September 10, 2003
Dozens of religious activists are expected to testify at a Texas Board of Education hearing today on proposed new biology texts. They want publishers to insert claims that Charles Darwin's theory of the origin of life is but a flawed hypothesis. In their view, it would be best if references to evolution as the scientific explanation for the origin of life were removed altogether. If successful, their efforts would undermine students' knowledge of science and make a mockery of Texas' science education improvement initiatives.
The high interest in the contents of biology textbooks would be helpful if its true object were to promote Texas schoolchildren's understanding of science and ensure Texas adopts the highest-quality books for that purpose. Advocates for changes in the proposed books say, innocuously enough, that they want students exposed to the strengths and weaknesses of evolutionary theory. These efforts should be seen for what they are: a well-organized, well-funded movement to replace the science of evolution in public school classrooms with some Christians' beliefs about creation.
There's nothing reasonable about that. The Bible is not a scientific document, and public schools are not for teaching religion.
Anti-evolutionists try to get around this by touting "intelligent design theory" - a belief that species evolved not by natural selection, but emerged according to a plan - as having no basis in religion. They contend intelligent design ought to be included in biology books because state law requires students to analyze competing ideas.
Whether intelligent design is a subterfuge for including creation stories in schoolbooks may be open to debate, but it is clearly not science. The theory is not a topic in mainstream scientific journals. Rather, it's a fancy version of "creation science," which the U.S. Supreme Court has prohibited in public schools as a violation church-state separation.
Nevertheless, some state board of education members are sympathetic to religion in public schools. They may not dictate textbook content, but they can reject books for "factual errors" or noncompliance with state curriculum. This threat could induce publishers to water down evolution lessons or include passages that pass off religious belief as science.
When Kansas' Board of Education voted in 1999 to remove evolution from its science curriculum, the state became an education laughingstock. And though several board members were ousted and the decision was reversed in part, the state's national reputation has yet to recover. A similar move in Texas would be deadly to efforts to entice new business and new talent to the state. Good schools are a top-tier consideration in corporate office and individual family decisions about relocating.
Worst of all, undermining the science of evolution and adding pseudo-scientific theories will throw a wet blanket on state initiatives to improve student performance in math and science, and it will hurt Texas students' chances to successfully master science in college.
Students need to learn about evolution in the classroom. The place to learn religious beliefs about the origin of life is in religious study and at home.
By Polly Ross Hughes
Houston Chronicle Austin Bureau
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/metropolitan/2093105
AUSTIN -- Jerry Springer and cockroaches managed to creep into Wednesday's episode of the ever-evolving textbook wars over Darwin's theory versus the biblical story of creation.
In the latest version of a decades-old fight concerning teaching the origin of humankind, homegrown critics of Darwin's theory of evolution have joined forces with a national think tank.
The Discovery Institute, based in Seattle, is trying to persuade the State Board of Education and others around the nation to adopt biology textbooks that point out "weaknesses" in Darwin's theory. Texas is the nation's second-largest purchaser of textbooks.
Defenders of the books -- particularly biology teachers -- accuse the critics of engaging in pseudoscience, trying to pass off religious explanations as scientifically valid.
"Biologists really stopped arguing whether or not evolution by natural selection occurred back in the 1800s," said Dan Wivagg, a biology professor at Baylor University. "There's no doubt that it's the central unifying concept in biology, and it must be in the textbooks if we're going to have scientifically literate citizenBs."
As it hunkered down for hours of testimony, the state board voted to allow only Texans to testify but accepted written statements from out-of-staters.
Before it was all over, Darwin's theory had been blamed as dehumanizing and even contributing to a rise in teenage depression and crime.
"In Fort Worth public schools, I learned that all of you are less than human. I was taught that maybe you came from a monkey," said Eddy Parker, adding he doesn't think the theory of evolution has ever been proved.
"All I'm asking this board to do is don't allow people to tamper with children's minds," he added. "All of you in here are human and a cut above roaches and rats and all such lies."
The Discovery Institute says several Texas scientists agree with the group that weaknesses in the theory of evolution are being suppressed.
Some testified at the hearing, many of them chemical or mechanical engineers rather than biologists.
Ide P. Trotter, a chemical engineer from Duncanville, said he believes his training is superior to that of a biologist in finding flaws in Darwin's theory and the textbooks that teach it.
State Board member Dan Montgomery of Fredericksburg quoted from a newspaper article in which Trotter said, "What is the educational problem today? It is to excite the interest of the students. This is a Jerry Springer world. Controversy is exciting."
"Are you suggesting we ought to include these kinds of Jerry Springer controversies in our classrooms, whether or not they have any scientific basis?" Montgomery asked.
"A good controversy would be a help," Trotter said.
Board member Gail Lowe of Lampasas congratulated high school junior Michelle Ramsey for her courage in weighing in on the subject, also by criticizing the teaching of Darwin.
"Evolution has been taught undisputed for a number of years now in the classroom. By the time high school is reached, many youth have been indoctrinated with it, not once learning of weaknesses in this theory," Ramsey testified.
Mac Deaver, who identified himself as a "gospel preacher," asserted that questions about the origin of life are philosophical rather than scientific.
He took Ramsey's connection to Darwin and teen violence even further, however, saying the theory leads to "ethical deterioration" in society.
"When you teach evolution as fact and don't show weaknesses, you are teaching children there is no ultimate accountability," he said.
Steven Schafersman, president of Texas Citizens for Science, said the textbooks are accurate as written and Texas biologists overwhelmingly support protecting the textbooks as currently written.