stranger fruit

I’m off to Ireland for a few weeks and wont be blogging anything. I get back on the 19th of June - hopefully, I will have my internet connection back working by then *sigh*

Letter from Tom Horne, Arizona’s superintendent of public instruction.

May. 31, 2004

This is in response to the letter to the editor by Russ Miller, published Wednesday, criticizing me because of the evolution content in the science standards.

If he will read the standards, he will be pleasantly surprised at the provisions for challenging accepted theories, which is an integral part of how science progresses. For example, teachers are required to teach the following three performance objectives:

• Describe how scientific knowledge is subject to change as new information and/or technology challenges prevailing theories (Grades 6-8).

• Describe how scientists continue to investigate and critically analyze aspects of theories (high school).

• Describe qualities of the scientists’ habits of mind, e.g., openness, skepticism, integrity, tolerance, (Grade 5).

Sorry for not posting much over the past few days. My cable line is still down and I’m forced to dial-in using ASU’s 28.8 line. Yes, I said 28.8! To think we used to think that dail-in was cool

In any case, I’m being told it’s Wednesday at best before the line can be fixed - if it’s not fixed by the w/e, I’m going to shift to DSL. No reason to pay for something that doesn’t work.

Two short links to recent letters in the Arizona Republic on evolution in schools:

Evolution debate one-sided May 29, 2004
Evolution passes science test May 27, 2004

For a long time, many IDists have denied any connection with Creationism, particular YEC. As Michael Behe said at University of NM in March 2002: “I’m not a creationist. I’m a biochemist.” Interestingly, Behe is talking at this youth conference in North Carolina which aims to

introduce Jr. and Sr. High Youth to two worldviews.

1. The secular worldview which is humanistic in nature placing man at thecenter of all philosophy.
2. The Biblical worldview which looks to the Bible as the ultimate authority of all truth.

I’m guessing Behe is supporting option #2. Other speakers include: Mark Eckel (Associate Professor of Educational Ministries at Moody Bible Institute, a YEC school), Dr. Kenneth Boa (President of Reflections Ministries, a ministry that “encourages people to consider the claims of Christ and mature in Him"), Chuck Colson, and Casey Luskin (Co-president of the Intelligent Design and Evolution Awareness - IDEA - Center, a ministry focused on equipping students to promote Intelligent Design). The participants are asked to bring their Bible - not surprising, as there appears to be significant YEC leanings in that group, and lots of use for the word “ministry”.

It actually gets worse for Behe as the youth conference is an offshoot of one which has as a major focus to helping teachers

understand that the facts do not support concepts of evolution to which many of them have felt they must adhere. All teachers at the conference will be given a library of books and tapes to support their teaching protocols. They will also be advised of their legal rights to challenge Darwinian concepts of evolution and to explain the rationale for intelligent design in the classroom.

Scheduled speaker Charles Colson stresses the importance of the conference, because “the question that modern evolutionists have presented to us is this: What basis is there for human dignity? How do germs get rights? Indeed what is the basis for justice in society? If naturalism is at the root of everything, how can there be any truth?” Yes. Quite. Germs deserve rights. Nature tells us how to behave. A quick reading of T.H. Huxley’s Evolution and Ethics may help, methinks.

Once again, the other participants are interesting: Boa, Colson, Eckel, Charles Thaxton, John Morris (YEC with Institute for Creation Research), Larry Vardiman (YEC with ICR), Thomas Woodward (Director of the C. S. Lewis Society - a ministry to skeptics, students, and scholars - and Professor of Missions, Bible and Theology at Trinity College), Russell Humphreys (YEC with ICR), Finn Laursen (Director of Christian Educators Association International), and Hugh Ross (Old Earth Creationist with Reasons to Believe).

Now, I’m not saying Behe is a YEC - that’s highly unlikely for a Catholic - but he’s hanging around with some pretty (scientifically) dubious characters here, the sorts that initially the ID movement tried to distance themselves from (and Dembski occasionally still does). As Forrest and Gross show in Creationism’s Trojan Horse (Oxford, 2003), the roots of ID are very mych embedded in a matrix of YEC and traditional “scientific Creationism.”

Another letter following up from the editorial.

Who’s up for a creationism debate?

May. 26, 2004 12:00 AM

Your editorial “Faith vs. Fact” May 13 states that religion is about faith in the unseen while science is about observable fact.

This is the basic conflict of teaching evolutionism while not teaching creationism. Although both are religious philosophies about our unobservable origins, our public school systems teach the foundation of secular humanism, Darwinian style evolution, as scientific fact.

World renowned evolutionist L. Luvtrup stated: “It is a great misfortune if an entire branch of science becomes addicted to a false theory but this is what has happened in biology - one day the Darwinian myth will be ranked as the greatest deceit in the history of science.”

Since The Republic, Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne and ASU President Michael Crow have taken the public stance that evolution is science; our community can best be served by your newspaper sponsoring a public debate on “Evolution, Faith or Fact?”

I challenge anyone Horne, Crow or The Republic chooses to debate that Darwinian evolution is science. I will debate that it is a religious belief backed by multiple errors in the textbooks. I doubt if you will get any takers. - Russ Miller, Flagstaff. The writer is with the Creation, Evolution and Science Ministries.

Mr Miller is, typical for creationists, incorrect on facts: “L. Luvtrup” is Soren Lovtrup, an evolutionist who was anti-Darwinian and author of Darwinism: The Refutation of A Myth

“multiple errors in the textbooks” is a pointer that Miller will be arguing using Jonathan Well’s claims in Icons of Evolution.

“Creation, Evolution and Science Ministries” is new to me. A quick google reveals this craptacular FrontPage website which “presents evidence which destroys the religious philosophy of evolutionism, exposes the old age dating frauds and supports the Bible-Word for Word & Cover to Cover” - in other words, good old-fashioned Young-Earth Creationism. They’re based out of Flagstaff and do Grand Canyon tours. Nice to see yet another home-grown Arizona organization!

The reason that Miller will get no takers is simply that debating Creationists (particularly the YEC variety) is a futile exercise - evidenced by my encounter with Jerry Don Bauer (music industry mogul and expert on everything) over at the Panda’s Thumb.

On the good news front, on Monday the AZ Board of Education voted to pass the K-12 Science Standards. After some initial problems, we managed to get evolution and natural selection explicitly put back into the standards, and we’re overall very happy with the end result. I’ll post a link to the approved version when it goes online.

Evolution is not ‘true science’ May. 24, 2004 12:00 AM

The “Faith vs. Fact” editorial on May 13 was interesting, but disappointing.

Yes, true “science is about fact,” but macro evolution (primordial soup to today’s myriad of life) is not true science or fact. We got here by pure chance? The mathematical probability of this happening has been shown by many science and math experts to be absolutely untenable!

There should be millions, billions and even trillions of intermediate, transitional, uncoordinated, grossly looking creatures and their fossilized remains. Where are they?

Even the fantastic complexity of a single cell, the awesome design of DNA, and the human brain are impossible to explain by pure chance.

All scientists, both macro evolutionists and those believing intelligent design, find the same artifacts, fossils, various earth strata and similarities in plants and animals. The difference is the interpretation of those facts! Evolutionists say similarities show evolvement. Intelligent design says similarities show a common designer who even planned the ability to adapt in minor ways to their environment.

Who is operating more by faith - those who believe all this is possible by pure chance or those who believe it was designed? Flat earth theory wouldn’t allow challenges - now evolution won’t allow challenges! - Glen Beyeler, Sun City

From the Arizona Republic:

Science, religious deities don’t mix May. 21, 2004 12:00 AM

Granted, there is nothing inherently unscientific in investigating the possibility of intelligent design, but such an investigation has yet to occur.

If it had, the results would be documented in the primary scientific literature, i.e., peer-reviewed scientific journals. They are not. Make no mistake, “intelligent design theory” is simply biblical creationism in disguise.

No matter how unpalatable this might be to the faithful, science deals exclusively with naturalistic explanations of observable evidence. Supernatural entities, including the deities of major religions, have no place in any scientific theory, ever. So, contrary to the claim made in Monday’s letter, separating faith from fact in science education is indeed possible. - Dean Wentworth, Flagstaff

Over at the PT, I’ve posted on peer-review and ID - in response to comments Jerry Don Bauer made here.

“[E]ight in ten historians .. rate the current presidency an overall failure.” Film at eleven.

The George W. Bush presidency is the worst since:
“In terms of economic damage, Reagan.
In terms of imperialism, T Roosevelt.
In terms of dishonesty in government, Nixon.
In terms of affable incompetence, Harding.
In terms of corruption, Grant.
In terms of general lassitude and cluelessness, Coolidge.
In terms of personal dishonesty, Clinton.
In terms of religious arrogance, Wilson.”

See the article.

This discussion comment hit the nail on the head:

The Bush presidency is a failure…as will be the Kerry presidency…as was the Clinton presidency…as will be any presidency until we the US population get our collective heads out of our rear ends and actually become members of humanity instead of some sort of mega-deity of sorts.

I’m not a huge fan of John McCain, but I do appreciate that he is willing to stand up to the Republican ubermenchen. So this exchange really made me realize what idiots many politicans are.

The exchange started when a reporter asked: “Can I combine a two issues, Iraq and taxes? I heard a speech from John McCain the other day…”
Hastert: “Who?”
Reporter: “John McCain.”
Hastert: “Where’s he from?”
Reporter: “He’s a Republican from Arizona.”
Hastert: “A Republican?”

Quite the stand-up comedian is our Dennis, now isn’t he?

Amid nervous laughter, the reporter continued with his question: “Anyway, his observation was never before when we’ve been at war have we been worrying about cutting taxes and his question was, ‘Where’s the sacrifice?’ ”

Hastert: “If you want to see the sacrifice, John McCain ought to visit our young men and women at Walter Reed and Bethesda. There’s the sacrifice in this country. We’re trying to make sure they have the ability to fight this war, that they have the wherewithal to be able to do it. And, at the same time, we have to react to keep this country strong.”

Eh? “Sacrifice”? McCain? This was a man who spent five and a half years in a Viet-Cong camp.

And I’ll ignore the obvious “if Bush wants to see sacrifice…” line. Too easy.

Like his masters, Bush and Cheney, Hastert excused himself from Vietnam. According to his biography, he “is a 1964 graduate of Wheaton (IL) College where he earned a bachelor’s degree in economics. He attended graduate school at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb, where he earned a master’s degree in the philosophy of education in 1967.” “After 16 years of teaching and coaching at Yorkville High School, he served in the Illinois House of Representatives for six years before being elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1986.” So from graduation in ‘64 (at the age of 22) he proceeded to grad school and teaching government and history at High School - what a “sacrifice”. Probably just couldn’t bring himself to volunteer.

It’s worth remembering that McCain was not calling for reduction in military funding, but was calling for legislators to put tax cuts and new non military spending on hold in response to the deficit.

Hastert’s a bigger idiot than I thought previously. And that’s saying something.

Two letters to the editor following the editorial I posted a few days back. The first is from an entomologist who worked on ants and is an emeritus professor of zoology at Northern Arizona University.

Keep the faith, please May. 17, 2004

Your editorial last Thursday, “Faith vs. fact,” requires a response.

We might well agree with Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne and ASU President Michael Crow that science and religion should not be intermingled in the education process. We might also agree that evidence for the descent of all life from a common ancestor is a theory amply supported by a number of independent lines of evidence. It is a theory without any significant challenges, a theory that students should be taught, just as they are taught atomic theory and other theories of science.

The problem comes when biology teachers use the theory of natural selection to insert their own faith into the educational process. Natural selection is the apparent process driving evolution. Since science can observe nothing but chance events underlying natural selection, the claim is made that evolution is unplanned, undirected and without goals or destiny.

Obviously then, God, if he exists at all, had no hand in the process.

Presumably this is an acceptable conclusion, because it is “scientific.” When (some years back) I taught biology at ASU, there were colleagues who made this particular point in their teaching. Yet it is a faith, just as much as faith in a God who is actively involved in the world and who purposely directs events we can only observe as random.

The concept of intelligent design (completely misunderstood in the editorial) does not deny the truth of evolution. It asserts there are biological mechanisms that cannot be explained as originating through blind, unplanned, natural selection. It is not unscientific to investigate the possibility of intelligent design.

The fact is, separating faith from fact in the educational process is impossible. Better for students to look at theories from all sides and consider both the assumptions and the implications of the theories.

Anything less is less than true education. - R.S. Beal Jr. Prescott

The second is from Brad in Phoenix … who needs to lower the dosage a little, methinks.

‘Faith vs. fact’ editorial was faulty May. 18, 2004

The editorial Thursday, “Faith vs. fact,” starts off with a false assumption and then proceeds to further display the Editorial Board’s prejudice.

The theory of evolution is just that - an unproven theory. And believe me, if the secular left could prove evolution it would have the Supreme Court strike the word theory from every textbook in America.

Face the facts: Evolution will never be more than a theory because every cockeyed explanation they come up with can be shot full of holes. None of their fuzzy premises can stand on their own, and they know it.

Let’s take your other brilliant statement, “Religion is not science.” Duh.

The No. 1 definition of science: The observation, identification, description, experimental investigation, and theoretical explanation of phenomena. So how is evolution any more “science” than intelligent design?

Just admit the real truth: Science is your religion, and there is no room for God in your “logical” world. - Brad W. Taylor, Phoenix

Discuss among yourselves.

Well, after 24 hours without an internet connection, my life-line to the world spontaneously returned this morning. Go figure. I think I’ll keep the support call open until Wednesday, just in case.

My better-half, Jacquie, left yesterday afternoon to teach in Europe and wont be back until the 29th of June. Early this morning, my daughter left to visit cousins in Michigan and she wont be back until the 2nd of June. Then she and I head to Ireland for 13 days to hook up with Jacquie.

It’s already awfully, awfully, quiet in the house - just goes to show how much noise a four-year old makes

So it looks like I have 16 days at home during which time I’ll do the “hermit thing” and try and finish a few scientific papers that have been sitting on my desk for awhile.

My cable modem link at home has mysteriously died and Cox cannot get a tech over until Thursday at the earliest. &^#@*&*&^#. I probably wont be posting anything until then as I’m not in the mood to troop off to my office.

From AP:

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld authorized the expansion of a secret program that encouraged physical coercion and sexual humiliation of Iraqi prisoners to obtain intelligence about the growing insurgency in Iraq, The New Yorker reported Saturday. …

According to the story, which hits newsstands Monday, the initial operation Rumsfeld authorized gave blanket approval to kill or capture and interrogate “high value” targets in the war on terrorism. The program stemmed from frustrating efforts to capture high-level terrorists in the weeks after the start of U.S. bombings in Afghanistan.

The program got approval from President Bush’s national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, and Bush was informed of its existence, the officials told Hersh.

Under the program, Hersh wrote, commandos carried out instant interrogations — using force if necessary — at secret CIA detention centers scattered around the world. The intelligence would be relayed to the commanders at the Pentagon.

Last year, Rumsfeld and Stephen Cambone, his undersecretary for intelligence, expanded the scope of the Pentagon’s program and brought its methods to Abu Ghraib.

Addendum:

The New Yorker article is online.

At the recent ID conference at Biola (which also apparently featured a lovefest for Johnson), Wells detailed some ID-inspired research. From pastors.com:

Molecular biologist Jonathan Wells proposed potentially groundbreaking ideas on causes of cancer. Wells employed principles of engineering design to hypothesize that malfunctions in tiny biomolecular turbine engines in the “centrosome” of the cell might cause chromosomal damage, becoming a cause of cancer. Wells contended that principles of engineering design, and the knowledge that cellular structures are not limited to what can be produced by Darwin’s theory, led him to make this hypothesis. These ideas must undergo further experimental testing, but it is significant that ID spurred Wells’ research ideas.

Wells outlines some of this over at ISCID.

Intelligent Design theory (ID) can contribute to science on at least two levels. On one level, ID is concerned with inferring from the evidence whether a given feature of the world is designed. This is the level on which William Dembski’s explanatory filter and Michael Behe’s concept of irreducible complexity operate. It is also the level that has received the most attention in recent years, largely because the existence of even one intelligently designed feature in living things (at least prior to human beings) would overturn the Darwinian theory of evolution that currently dominates Western biology.

On another level, ID could function as a “metatheory,” providing a conceptual framework for scientific research. By suggesting testable hypotheses about features of the world that have been systematically neglected by older metatheories (such as Darwin’s), and by leading to the discovery of new features, ID could indirectly demonstrate its scientific fruitfulness.

Interestingly, Behe too is getting in on the research act:

Biochemist Michael Behe presented quantitative research on the amount of time needed to evolve interacting proteins. In biology, proteins interact with one-another through “binding sites,” a special lock-and-key chemical fit. Behe noted that well over 50% of biochemical pathways use three or more proteins, but it would take more organisms than have lived in the history of the world to have enough statistical chances to randomly evolve just three proteins with interacting binding sites. Many other presentations gave evidence for intelligent design from physics, cosmology, paleontology, and biochemistry.

Over at the PT, Ian Musgrave discusses Behe’s calim.

Can we expect peer-reviewed research in the near future?

Addendum: Actually I just noticed this:

[I]t is more likely that a Pubmed search, rather than ID’s “principles of engineering design”, spurred Wells’ “groundbreaking” ideas. AFAIK, the hypothesis that centrosome malfunction may be involved in neoplastic transformation is several decades old, and evidence has started accumulating since at least the mid-’90s.
See for instance:
Fukasawa K, Choi T, Kuriyama R, Rulong S, Vande Woude GF. Abnormal centrosome amplification in the absence of p53. Science. 1996 Mar 22;271(5256):1744-7.

Pihan GA, Purohit A, Wallace J, Knecht H, Woda B, Quesenberry P, Doxsey SJ. Centrosome defects and genetic instability in malignant tumors. Cancer Res. 1998 Sep 1;58(17):3974-85.

Following book flew across my radar - By Design or by Chance? by Denyse O’Leary. Access Research Network (ARN) seem to like it, so you can guess the tack it takes. Looking at the endorsments on the ARN page, we see that the ID movement’s hubris hasn’t abated - Phil Johnston describes the “greatest intellectual controversy of our time”. Wells tells us of “a major scientific and cultural upheaval” that is a “history-making controversy”. Dembski describes design as a “momentous option”. Someone should tell these boyos that repeating something don’t make it so.

O’Leary writes on “science and faith” for ChristianWeek, Christian Life London, Christianity Today and Faith Today. She describes her position as “I am probably best described as a post-Darwinian. I believe that evolution happened but that Darwinism is an inadequate explanation. The reason is simple: Darwin did not anticipate the complexity of the problems, so his theory, in whatever rebrand it now appears, is not likely the solution.”

In a ChristianWeek article she writes, “So, if defending your faith at a university, remember that the warfare thesis re science and religion is fashionable nonsense, fading away. On the other hand, there is real warfare out there. It is, and always has been, between the powers of darkness and the power of Light (John 1:5).”

According to this CNN account, the fact that Zacarias Moussaoui has Nick Berg’s e-mail password is explained as follows:

Berg met an associate of Moussaoui on a bus to school, let him use his laptop, and gave him his e-mail password. We can only assume (because the FBI aren’t telling) that this individual gave Moussaoui the password. Acccording to Berg’s father, the individual was not a friend of his son’s or even an acquaintance – “just a guy sitting next to him on the bus. Whoever was next to my son was treated with great respect and friendship. Like I said, he knew no dangers from people. The FBI were satisfied with that.”

I’m sorry - I’m not buying that. He gave his password to an individual who was “just a guy sitting next to him on the bus” ! Are you kidding me? Who else had Berg’s password? The guy working at the 7-11? And Berg ended up as a tech person in Iraq working on wireless security and transmission towers?

And he’s checking e-mail … from the back of a bus … before 2001 ? I don’t remember WiFi penetration like that back then.

And the FBI are satisfied? Wow. Either Berg was dumb as a sack of potatoes or the FBI are. Or his father is. Or all of the above. You decide.

For similarly incredulous reactions, see Fark.com - if you honestly swallow that excuse, seek professional help, and don’t talk to strangers on buses.

Semester officially ended yesterday with the Honors Convocation. Seemed to me that we easily had more students graduating than in previous years. It was nice to see students I started with four years ago, completing their degrees.

Now it’s time to regroup, plan for the summer and get some research done. Yipee!!

Following was an editorial in today’s Arizona Republic:

Religion is about faith.

Science is about fact.

The two don’t readily mix, although there are scientists who manage to balance their belief in things unseen with the careful observations that form the foundation of such principles of biology as the theory of evolution.

This is the miracle and wonder of faith and religion.

But religion is not science and it should never be mixed up with teaching science.

Two prominent Arizonans - Arizona State University President Michael Crow and Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne - deserve credit for acting on that tenet of good education.

Crow wrote to Horne about concerns that updated public education science standards under consideration were inadequate for a state with hopes of becoming a significant player in the world of biosciences and related fields.

Horne says he agreed, and the final standards are being refined to be more specific about the need to teach evolution and other important concepts.

The Arizona Board of Education will review the new standards May 24, and Horne expects them to be approved.

But it will not happen without controversy.

Across the country, religious groups are pushing something called “intelligent design” (think “creationism” by another name) as a legitimate counterbalance to evolution.

Intelligent design is not science. It reflects a Judeo-Christian belief about creation. It is one of many creation stories across a wide spectrum of sacred heritages, heritages that any American has a constitutional right to follow.

These heritages of faith are laden with historic, literary and philosophical values well worth studying in school.

But not in science class.

Horne points out the part of Arizona’s proposed new science curriculum will involve the concept that all scientific theories should be scrutinized, questioned and subjected to challenges. This is how knowledge advances. But he resists singling evolution out for particular scrutiny.

He’s right.

Arizona’s schoolchildren will be better educated if that view prevails.

Over at Panda’s Thumb, Jeffrey Shallit demonstrates that William Dembski’s production as an academic mathematician is unimpressive.

Rasmusen does it again:

The Wall Street Journal editors remind us that in their June 10, 1981 article, “Mourning the Bomb”, they were right to praise Israel for attacking Iraq and everybody else, including the Reagan Administration, [emphasis mine - jml] was wrong. How can liberals keep giving stern foreign policy advice when they’re wrong time after time? Stalin, Castro, Mao, Vietnam, Cambodia, Rwanda, Iraq, Nicaragua, Afghanistan, Arafat, Al Qaeda, … I can think of only one example of conservatives being wrong: South Africa is doing fine under black rule. Everywhere else, history vindicates conservatives, often showing their warnings to be in, fact, much too mild.

Eh? There are at least two examples in that paragraph alone. I’ll leave it up to the reader to examine what history tells us.

Note that I’m not in anyway supporting a claim that “liberals” (whoever they may be) get it right all the time. Far from it. But the arrogance of an individual assuming that their view is always right is mindblowing.

*sigh*