DOCSLIB.ORG

Adam, Eve and Population Genetics: a Reply to Dr. Richard Buggs (Part 1) - Blog Posts - the Biologos Forum Adam, Eve and Population Genetics: a Reply to Dr

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Adam, Eve and Population Genetics: a Reply to Dr. Richard Buggs (Part 1) - Blog Posts - the Biologos Forum Adam, Eve and Population Genetics: a Reply to Dr 7/22/2018 Adam, Eve and Population Genetics: A Reply to Dr. Richard Buggs (Part 1) - Blog Posts - The BioLogos Forum Adam, Eve and Population Genetics: A Reply to Dr. Richard Buggs (Part 1) Blog Posts system (system) 2017-11-03 07:09:53 UTC #1 It's impossible to prove that we didn't descend from just two individuals. But the genetic evidence makes that scenario extremely unlikely. This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://biologos.org/blogs/dennis-venema-letters-to-the-duchess/adam-eve-and- population-genetics-a-reply-to-dr-richard-buggs-part-1 Adam and Eve had Perfect Genomes (The Genetic Entropy Argument) What about embodied cognition? TedDavis (Dr. Ted Davis) 2017-11-03 13:52:59 UTC #2 Dennis, I appreciate the great clarity of your reply to Dr. Buggs–not that an absence of clarity has ever been something I would associate with your work. I hope that Discovery also tweets your reply to Dr. Buggs. They owe it to fair discourse to do exactly that much, since they are responsible for bringing Buggs’ concerns out of the academic tent and into their own, much larger tent. Otherwise, they might be skirting with the same danger that Buggs is worried about: that “of alienating Christians from science on the basis of a wrong interpretation of the current literature.” I resonate with that concern. That’s one of the main reasons why I decided to devote my professional life to helping Christians (and others too) understand the history better. Thank you for helping us understand the science better. DennisVenema (Dennis Venema) 2017-11-08 23:09:37 UTC #5 Thanks for your kind words, Ted. I’ve learned a lot from you over the past several years - I’m glad that I’ve been able to return the favour. John_Rood (John Rood) 2017-11-10 06:24:00 UTC #6 Thanks for this Dennis! The work you’re doing here is timely and invaluable. I’m glad to see you thoroughly engaging Dr. Buggs’ points, and I also appreciate the distinction between the matter of Adam’s existence and of being sole- progenitor. Many of us have, at one time or another, believed and/or put forward the idea that scripture says Adam is the sole-progenitor. I have the impression that scripture does not actually make that claim. (although, I think the meaning of Eve being the “mother of all the living” deserves some explanation…maybe that’s been addressed somewhere else on this site.) Maybe we would have double-checked our exegesis sooner if we had thought sooner about the sort of science being highlighted in this article. These implications from population genetics might not be obvious to many in my generation, but I imagine they might be obvious to many in the next generation…a generation that grows up in a world of CRISPR innovations and consumer genetic analysis like 23andMe. I really would hate to set them up for an unnecessary science vs faith crisis. For that reason, I’m especially thankful for your work. https://discourse.biologos.org/t/adam-eve-and-population-genetics-a-reply-to-dr-richard-buggs-part-1/37039/print 1/514 7/22/2018 Adam, Eve and Population Genetics: A Reply to Dr. Richard Buggs (Part 1) - Blog Posts - The BioLogos Forum I’m currently still leaning toward affirming, not only that Adam was a real person, but more specifically the “de novo” creation of him. That seems like it’s compatible with what you’ve said, assuming Adam and Eve’s children intermarried into the existing hominid population. Daniel_Justesen (Daniel Lamdahl Justesen) 2017-11-10 08:53:17 UTC #7 Awesome response I was wondering myself why heterozygosity even mattered in this discussion since reducing the human species to just two people would restrict the max. of alleles pr. gene to 4. Knowing how YECs have responded to the decay rates of radioactive isotopes (used for radiometric dating) and how light could have reached us from stars millions of light years away, I imagine their response to the data put forward by Venema would be something like this:" well what if the mutation rate were a lot higher in the past?". But wouldn’t it require a highly hazardous(if not life-prohibiting) environment to produce mutation rates high enough to account for our current genetic diversity if we only descended from two people a few thousand years ago (or even several thousands)? I imagine it would. tallen_1 (Tim) 2017-11-10 14:39:51 UTC #8 Dennis, Quick question. There’s something I’m trying to wrap my head around and I’m not quite succeeding. Richard Buggs is a biologist who seems very well steeped in genetics. He has a number of publications in plant genetics in respected journals, including one in Nature (albeit not as a lead researcher). Yet he seems to make a rookie mistake in confusing heterozygosity with genetic diversity. Which, having read your response seems exactly the case. How does this happen? How does one progress through years of study and research only to fundamentally misunderstand a basic scientific tenet in their specialized field? I’m at a loss, so hoping you can connect some dots for me here. Thanks! RichardBuggs (Richard Buggs) 2017-11-10 15:46:06 UTC #10 Hi Dennis, Thank you for beginning to reply to my concerns. I very much look forward to continuing this discussion now that you have so graciously replied to my email. As you know, I blogged about this issue, reviewing chapter three of your book on 28th October at the Nature Ecology and Evolution Community. This allowed me to tackle the issue in more depth than I did in my email to you in May. This blog has already dealt with some of the issues you mention above. I have also responded to some comments on my blog at the Skeptical Zone here which provides further information. When I have more time I will post a longer response to your blog here on Biologos, but meanwhile, would refer you and your readers to the two links above. Best wishes, Richard DennisVenema (Dennis Venema) 2017-11-10 20:55:19 UTC #11 Thanks, Richard - and welcome to BioLogos! I very much appreciate your patience in waiting for this reply. RichardBuggs (Richard Buggs) 2017-11-12 21:38:43 UTC #12 Note: I have also published this text here in order to provide a stable and easily findable record: http://richardbuggs.com/response_to_Dennis_Venema_Biologos_PartI_Adam_Eve.html Dear Dennis, I am glad that we are now establishing a dialogue about the scientific credibility of a bottleneck of two at some point in the history of the human lineage. I am hoping that during the course of this discussion we will be able to examine in https://discourse.biologos.org/t/adam-eve-and-population-genetics-a-reply-to-dr-richard-buggs-part-1/37039/print 2/514 7/22/2018 Adam, Eve and Population Genetics: A Reply to Dr. Richard Buggs (Part 1) - Blog Posts - The BioLogos Forum detail the claims that you make in chapter three of Adam and the Genome, and that you will respond to all the critiques and questions that I have raised in my email to you and my blog at Nature Ecology and Evolution Community. This Part I of your response is helpful in that it clears up some areas of potential misunderstanding between us, and points me to two arguments that are not made explicitly in your book chapter. I trust I can look forward to the subsequent Parts for your responses to the majority of the issues I have raised. I will work through your blog in this comment, seeking to be as constructive as possible in my reading of it. Scientific Confidence vs. Scientific Certainty I am happy to take your point that you do not believe that science has DISPROVEN that a bottleneck of two individuals could have happened in the human lineage. Your position is that you are as certain that it has not happened as you are certain that the earth rotates around the sun. I am sorry if I mischaracterised your position as being more certain than it actually is. 10,000 individuals? In your blog you say: “I do not claim this [heliocentric level of] certainty for the oft-cited ~10,000 figure, as Buggs seems to imply”. I am happy to take this point, but I should explain why I got the impression from your book chapter that you hold pretty strongly to the 10,000 figure. In your book chapter you argue that multiple independent methods converge on a figure of 10,000, and even predict that one method that gives a lower figure is likely to be revised upwards. Here are the relevant quotations from your chapter: it is worth at least sketching out a few of the methods geneticists use that support the conclusion that we descend from a population that has never dipped below about 10,000 individuals. Then you mention evidence from allelic diversity, and state: these methods indicate an ancestral population size for humans right around that 10,000 figure. Then you present an argument from linkage disequilibrium, and state: The results indicate that we come from an ancestral population of about 10,000 individuals— the same result we obtained when using allele diversity alone. Then you say more about linkage disequilibrium and state: The researchers found that, during this period, humans living in sub-Saharan Africa maintained a minimum population of about 7,000 individuals, and that the ancestors of all other humans maintained a minimum population of about 3,000—once again, adding up to the same value other methods arrive at.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Understanding the Intelligent Design Creationist Movement: Its True Nature and Goals
    UNDERSTANDING THE INTELLIGENT DESIGN CREATIONIST MOVEMENT: ITS TRUE NATURE AND GOALS A POSITION PAPER FROM THE CENTER FOR INQUIRY OFFICE OF PUBLIC POLICY AUTHOR: BARBARA FORREST, Ph.D. Reviewing Committee: Paul Kurtz, Ph.D.; Austin Dacey, Ph.D.; Stuart D. Jordan, Ph.D.; Ronald A. Lindsay, J. D., Ph.D.; John Shook, Ph.D.; Toni Van Pelt DATED: MAY 2007 ( AMENDED JULY 2007) Copyright © 2007 Center for Inquiry, Inc. Permission is granted for this material to be shared for noncommercial, educational purposes, provided that this notice appears on the reproduced materials, the full authoritative version is retained, and copies are not altered. To disseminate otherwise or to republish requires written permission from the Center for Inquiry, Inc. Table of Contents Section I. Introduction: What is at stake in the dispute over intelligent design?.................. 1 Section II. What is the intelligent design creationist movement? ........................................ 2 Section III. The historical and legal background of intelligent design creationism ................ 6 Epperson v. Arkansas (1968) ............................................................................ 6 McLean v. Arkansas (1982) .............................................................................. 6 Edwards v. Aguillard (1987) ............................................................................. 7 Section IV. The ID movement’s aims and strategy .............................................................. 9 The “Wedge Strategy” .....................................................................................
    [Show full text]
  • Where Did We Come From?
    Reading 10.2 Where Did We Come From? Lottie L. Joiner or a year, Martha Wise listened to presentations, vis- investigate and critically analyze all aspects of evolutionary ited constituents’ homes, took phone call after long theory.” The statement made Ohio the first state to require F phone call, and spent hours answering e-mail. She districts to let criticisms of evolution be examine din class- was often up until the wee hours of the morning, trying to rooms. However, a disclaimer insists that the board did not understand the latest issue dividing her state: the teaching support “the teaching or testing of intelligent design,”a the- of “intelligent design,” one of the alternative theories of the ory that the complex features of life are the result of intelli- origin of species. gent planning and activity. “I’m not a scientist. I don’t know much about science,” For many, it was a compromise that satisfied both sides. says Wise, a member of the Ohio State Board of Education. Some felt that it was not enough. Others believed that the “There’s nothing the intelligent design people showed me Ohio board had caved to the pressure of Darwin’s critics. that the science people couldn’t say,‘That’s not evidence,’or “Science education has not convinced a lot of ‘That’s not a fact.’ I can’t refute them because I don’t know Americans that Darwin was right,”says Charles Haynes, se- that much about it. I can’t believe either side.” nior scholar at the Freedom Forum’s first amendment The question of which side you believe is central to the Center, based at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn.
    [Show full text]
  • Eugenie Scott
    Expert Witness Statement by Eugenie C. Scott Contents: 1. Qualifications as an Expert Witness 2. The Nature of Science 3. The Scientific Meaning of “Theory” and “Fact” 4. History of the Creationism/Evolution Controversy Definitions: evolution, creationism, creation science Fundamentalism; Banning Evolution Creation Science “Evidence Against Evolution” and Creation Science Evolution of Creation Science Into Intelligent Design “Theory Not Fact” Policies Are Promoted By Creationists to Denigrate Evolution and Advance Creationism 5. History of Creationism in Georgia 6. History of Creationism in Cobb County 7. “Theory Not Fact” Policies are Pedagogically Harmful Respectfully submitted: Date: November 17, 2006 _________________________ Eugenie C. Scott, Ph.D., D.Sc. 420 40th St #2 Oakland, CA 94609 1. Qualifications My name is Eugenie C. Scott. My curriculum vitae is attached to this Declaration as Exhibit A. I have a Ph.D. in physical anthropology from the University of Missouri and honorary doctorates (D.Sc.) from McGill University, Ohio State University, and Mt. Holyoke College. In December 2006, I will receive an honorary doctorate from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, and in May 2007, from Rutgers University. I am the Executive Director of the National Center for Science Education (NCSE) in Oakland, California. NCSE is a nonprofit membership organization of scientists and others that defends the teaching of evolution in the public schools. NCSE is affiliated with the American Association for the Advancement of Science. The NCSE monitors the creationism/evolution controversy and maintains an archive of information on the recent history of the controversy, including materials relevant to the history of the creationism/evolution controversy in Cobb County.
    [Show full text]
  • Teach the Controversy” Slogan?
    What’s Wrong with the “Teach the Controversy” Slogan? WHAT’S WRONG WITH THE “TEACH THE CONTROVERSY” SLOGAN? EUGENIE C. SCOTT National Center for Science Education ABSTRACT. Teachers are often exhorted by creationists to “teach the contro- versy.” Although such encouragement sounds on the surface like a proposal for critical thinking instruction, the history of the creationist movement in North America belies this claim. Rather than teach students to analyze and evaluate actual scientific controversies, the intent of “teach the controversy” exhortations is to have teachers instruct students that evolution is weak or unsubstantiated science that students should not take seriously. Such instruc- tion in alleged “evidence against evolution,” or “critical analysis of evolution” would seriously mis-educate students, and should be resisted by teachers and administrators. EN QUOI LE SLOGAN « ENSEIGNER LA CONTROVERSE » POSE T’IL LE PROBLÈME ? RÉSUMÉ. Les créationnistes encouragent souvent les professeurs à « enseigner la controverse ». Même si au premier abord de tels encouragements peuvent ressembler à la proposition d’une méthode de pensée critique, l’histoire du mouvement créationniste en Amérique du Nord dément cette affirmation. Plutôt que d’enseigner aux étudiants comment analyser et évaluer des con- troverses actuelles scientifiques, la finalité des exhortations à « enseigner la controverse » consiste à faire en sorte que les professeurs enseignent aux étudiants que l’évolution est une science faible ou non corroborée et que les étudiants ne devraient donc pas la prendre au sérieux. De telles directives quant à la présumée « preuve contre l’évolution » ou l’« analyse critique de l’évolution » contribueraient à sérieusement inculquer aux étudiants des con- naissances erronées, et les professeurs et les administrateurs doivent résister à ces directives.
    [Show full text]
  • Why It Mattered to Dover That Intelligent Design Isn't Science Richard B
    FIRST AMENDMENT LAW REVIEW Volume 5 | Issue 1 Article 6 9-1-2006 Why It Mattered to Dover That Intelligent Design Isn't Science Richard B. Katskee Follow this and additional works at: http://scholarship.law.unc.edu/falr Part of the First Amendment Commons Recommended Citation Richard B. Katskee, Why It Mattered to Dover That Intelligent Design Isn't Science, 5 First Amend. L. Rev. 112 (2006). Available at: http://scholarship.law.unc.edu/falr/vol5/iss1/6 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by Carolina Law Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in First Amendment Law Review by an authorized editor of Carolina Law Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. WHY IT MATTERED TO DOVER THAT INTELLIGENT DESIGN ISN'T- SCIENCE RIcHARD B. KATSKEE * INTRODUCTION What if you were a consumer concerned about the wholesomeness of a product you were contemplating buying, and, in the highest profile consumer-fraud case in two decades, a court hearing claims against the product's manufacturer issued a decision without looking at the item being sold or the marketing strategy being used? Would you conclude that the court was adequately enforcing the law to protect the public interest? Or what if you were that manufacturer, and the court held you liable for fraud without even considering your proffered defenses? Would you feel that the court had treated you justly? In Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District,' the Dover school board and the intelligent-design movement as a whole stood trial on the claim that they were trying to pass off a religious view as though it were a scientific theory, so that they could market it to students in public- school science classrooms.
    [Show full text]
  • Science Class Is No Place for Intelligent Design
    Science Class is No Place for Intelligent Design At a time when the United States is in danger of falling behind in innovation, it is critically important to preserve the integrity of science education. It is critical that we prevent school boards from singling out evolution for criticism and introducing non-scientific concepts such as intelligent design into science classes. As a scientist and physician, I applaud Judge Jones’ strong and clear message that intelligent design is not science and therefore has no place in science class. Proponents for non-scientific accounts of the development of life, including creationism and intelligent design, contend that evolution alone should not be taught in science classes. Arguing that evolution is "just a theory," rather than a fact, they insist that intelligent design should be offered as an alternative to evolution or given "equal time", and that schools should "teach the controversy" surrounding evolution. Such positions are anathema to the majority of the scientific community, and seriously undermine science education. In science, a theory is a coherent explanation of natural phenomena based on direct observation or experimentation. Theories are logical, predictive, and testable. They are open to criticism and when shown to be false, they are modified or dismissed. Using this definition, evolution is categorized with other scientific theories such as gravity or atomic theory, which, like evolution, are established scientific facts. Evolution is among the most thoroughly tested concepts in the biological sciences. It is supported by volumes of scientific evidence in numerous fields, including genetics, biochemistry, developmental biology, comparative anatomy, immunology, geology, and paleontology.
    [Show full text]
  • Study Guide -- in Christ All Things Hold Together
    In Christ All Things Hold Together: The Intersection of Science and Christian Theology A Bible Study and Discussion Guide This study guide may be used alone or as a companion to In Christ All Things Hold Together: The Intersection of Science and Christian Theology, a 2015 report of the LCMS Commission on Theology and Church Relations. The headings for the introduction and six sessions of this discussion guide provide the corresponding page numbers from the CTCR report. Introduction: The Challenge of Scientism Session 1: Theological Foundations I Session 2: Theological Foundations II Session 3: Historical Context Session 4: Philosophical Issues Session 5: Biblical Knowledge and Scientific Knowledge Session 6: Practical Applications Introduction: The Challenge of Scientism (pages 5-15) Bill Nye, the “Science Guy,” said in an interview, “The scientific method … is certainly, I believe, the best idea that anybody’s ever had. So, if you choose not to accept what you discover using that method, what else are you not going to discover? I guess it threatens everything: Our ability to generate energy, to build cars, to fight diseases, to regulate traffic. So not accepting the method by which we discovered evolution, you really are combating all sorts of things you may not have intended to combat or ignore.”1 The author of an article in National Geographic writes that “evolution actually happened. Biology is incomprehensible without it. There aren’t really two sides to all these issues. Climate change is happening. Vaccines really do save lives. Being right does matter—and the science tribe has a long track record of getting things right in the end.
    [Show full text]
  • An Evolving Controversy: the Struggle to Teach Science In
    An Evolving Controversy The Struggle to Teach Science in Science Classes By Michael Berkman and Eric Plutzer Like many researchers who are interested in K–12 education, we are overall very pleased with the proposed Framework and are veryone from President Obama to the average parent eager to see it developed into a new set of standards to guide seems to agree that the STEM fields—science, technol- instruction.* And yet, as political scientists who have studied ogy, engineering, and mathematics—are critical to the America’s long-running debate over teaching evolution versus nation’s future. But, according to the National Research creationism, we bring a unique perspective to the question of ECouncil, “too few U.S. workers have strong backgrounds in these implementing any new standards based on the Framework. We fields, and many people lack even fundamental knowledge of have not only examined the history of the evolution debate as well them.” The only solution is “a new approach to K–12 science edu- as ongoing polls of public opinion, but also conducted a nation- cation in the United States.”1 Last year, the Council took the lead ally representative survey of how high school biology teachers in developing that new approach when it released A Framework deal with evolution in the classroom. We see a rough road ahead for K–12 Science Education: Practices, Crosscutting Concepts, and for teachers. CH Core Ideas. Our findings are relevant to all K–12 science instruction because the widespread adoption of standards based on the Michael Berkman and Eric Plutzer are both professors in the Department Framework will make evolutionary biology much more salient for of Political Science at Pennsylvania State University.
    [Show full text]
  • British Centre for Science Education.Pdf
    British Centre for Science Education Share Report Abuse Next Blog» Create Blog Sign In British Centre for Science Education CRISIS - WEDNESDAY, 11 MAY 2011 BLOG ARCHIVE CREATIONISM IN SCHOOLS ISN'T Blog Archive Archive SCIENCE PETITION: SIGNATURE LIST Close that loophole Mr Gove LABELS FEED The BCSE is very pleased to announce that a letter from CrISIS has today been NSS CrISIS Michael Gove Signature #2788 delivered to Michael Gove at the Department for Education formally asking him to Ekklesia BCSE (1) 21st Signature #2787 close the loophole that allows creationists into state funded schools to present Floor (5) A C Grayling Signature #2786 Creationism to our children as a valid scientific fact. (2) A N Wilson (1) AAAS Signature #2785 (2) Adam Frank (1) Adam Rutherford (1) AGW (6) Signature #2784 This is the next part of the CrISIS campaign we told you about here and here - if AIG (8) AIG UK (6) you haven't done so yet - please sign the petition. Alastair Noble (15) Alom Shaha (1) altruism PAGES (1) an evolving creation Home (1) Andrew Brown (2) Andrew Inns (1) Andrew Creationism In Schools Isn't Schlafy (1) Andrew Sibley Science - CrISIS (1) Andrew Snelling (1) AndromedasWake (2) About this Blog Andy McIntosh (4) Free Schools and Anglican (2) Anthony Creationism North (1) Antony Bush BCSE (2) apartheid (1) Downloadable argument from ignorance Resources (1) arguments from Creation Watch improbability (1) AronRa 'Explore Evolution' (3) Art Robinson (1) ASE Exposed (1) Astronomy (2) atheist An Open Letter to (1) Ayala (1) bad religion School
    [Show full text]
  • “In the Beginning” James Downard 1.6 • a Brief History of Creationism
    Troubles in Paradise “In the Beginning” James Downard 1.6 A Brief History of Creationism (Updated 16 February 2017) 1.6 Section 1: The lead up to the 1920s antievolution crusade. The Scopes Trial—Progressive antievolutionism’s last crusade 5 Hunter’s Civic Biology—Vintage eugenics and the legacy of historical revisionism 9 Neapolitan Creationism—Scoop what you will of all that Deep Time 18 The Gospel According to Henry Morris—Young Earth Creationism goes “mainstream” 23 The Inherit the Wind Weather Report—Major cold front with recirculating bursts of hot air 25 Scientific Creationism Goes to Court—Epperson v. Arkansas and McLean v. Arkansas 31 Not Crying Uncle Yet—Louisiana’s Balanced Treatment Act and Edwards v. Aguillard 35 Riding off the Rails—Antonin Scalia’s Edwards v. Aguillard dissent 38 Running with Scissors—Antievolutionists embrace the “logic” of Scalia’s dissent 49 The fireworks of religion and politics aside, the primary reason why creationism gave up its ground in the scientific battle over the evolutionary origin of life is that it never rose to the challenge of presenting a genuinely competing theoretical structure, vying for scientific or even theological legitimacy on the merits of its explanatory power. However certain early Darwin doubters may have been, they never took the fateful step of actually doing substantive fieldwork or experimentation to back up their convictions. From the start, creationism has an entirely reactive tortucan enterprise, one devoted only to justifying their disbelief in whatever new evolutionary information working scientists kept uncovering. The dearth of workable antievolutionary alternatives meant that over the next century after Origin of the Species what few Darwinian skeptics there were among active scientists suffered the “death of a thousand cuts” as their views were rendered increasingly irrelevant and obsolete, buried under a pile of discovery that persistently strengthened the evolutionary argument.
    [Show full text]
  • The Latest Face of Creationism in the Classroom
    Scientific American Magazine - December 16, 2008 The Latest Face of Creationism in the Classroom Creationists who want religious ideas taught as scientific fact in public schools continue to adapt to courtroom defeats by hiding their true aims under ever changing guises By Glenn Branch and Eugenie C. Scott Professors routinely give advice to students but usually while their charges are still in school. Arthur Landy, a distinguished professor of molecular and cell biology and biochemistry at Brown University, recently decided, however, that he had to remind a former premed student of his that “without evolution, modern biology, including medicine and biotechnology, wouldn’t make sense.” The sentiment was not original with Landy, of course. Thirty-six years ago geneticist Theodosius Dobzhansky, a major contributor to the foundations of modern evolutionary theory, famously told the readers of The American Biology Teacher that “nothing in biology makes sense, except in the light of evolution.” Back then, Dobzhansky was encouraging biology teachers to present evolution to their pupils in spite of religiously motivated opposition. Now, however, Landy was addressing Bobby Jindal—the governor of the state of Louisiana—on whose desk the latest antievolution bill, the so-called Louisiana Science Education Act, was sitting, awaiting his signature. Remembering Jindal as a good student in his genetics class, Landy hoped that the governor would recall the scientific importance of evolution to biology and medicine. Joining Landy in his opposition to
    [Show full text]
  • Article 4Of4 from ATCODK 7 2
    v7i2_p3:ECHOES fall 04 final 6/9/11 3:50 PM Page 34 SUCKED INTO THE CULTURE WAR Greg Swift Santa Fe, New Mexico he most eye-opening year of my “…people have different ways sis deserves inclusion, then a physics adult life began innocently in late teacher may insist that dispersion in T2002, when my neighbor, Dr. of knowing things, and ... wave propagation ought to be there, too. Steven Sanchez, who was the Director of As our New Mexico process evolved, Curriculum, Instruction, and Learning the scientific approach is only one of my roles became pruning away Technologies at the New Mexico the exuberant growth of each early draft Department of Education, asked me to one of those ways…” of the document, mindful that every help with revision of the “science stan- standard—every sentence in this 40- dards” that specify what every student in New Mexico should page document—would apply to all students, would have the know about science. My assigned role: Advise the force of law, would be incorporated in standardized tests, and Department about what scientific topics were important would eventually compete for classroom time with other top- enough for inclusion, and make sure nothing obsolete or ics within science as well as important topics in other disci- wrong got into the standards by mistake. That seemed simple plines such as civics and history. My pruning often consisted enough. Within 12 months, however, I was engulfed in of collapsing one full standard into a parenthetical example stressful conflict, which revolved around an interesting ques- of another standard.
    [Show full text]