Cuyahoga Community CollegeMarch 1, 2003

Progress: What and for Progress: What and for WhomWhom

Science Progress and Scientific Illiteracy:

From the Classroom to Washington

Science Progress and Scientific Illiteracy:

From the Classroom to Washington

Progress?Progress?

• Being able to explain things one couldn’t explain before

• Being able to explore things one couldn’t before

• Being able to build things one couldn’t before

• Understanding ourselves and our place in the Universe better than we did before

• Overcoming myth, superstition, and nonsense

Progress?Progress?

Science has made unbelievable strides in the past century, leading to new insights and new understanding!

These insights have not been communicated to the public, and our democracy cannot progress unless they are.

Science Under Attack?Science Under Attack?

Scientific Ignorance pervades our society. At the same time, science is either being attacked, or at the very least marginalized at all levels, from the White House to the high school classroom.

In March 1996, Presidential Candidate Patrick Buchanan asserted ABC’s This Week, that he personally was not descended from monkeys, and he didn’t think children should be taught that they are. Not a single reporter questioning the candidate asked about this assertion, although he was subjected to harsh criticism of his positions on trade protectionism, and immigration limits---all issues about which there is much more room for debate.

• Hesitancy to offend religious sensibilities?

• Hesitancy to state that some things are NOT open for debate…

Fallacy self-evident???

Journalism:

There are always two sides to every story

Science:

Most times one side is simply wrong

Because of lack of comfort on scientific matters there is a hesitancy for many journalists to make pronouncements….

• National Anchor fears…

• NYT…

SCIENCE AS NON-CULTURE!

This makes it difficult to distinguish nonsense from sense..

FOX “NEWS”….. 50th anniversary 1997

John English, International Aerospace Hall of Fame…

Religious Sect Announces the First Cloned BabyBy DONALD G. McNEIL Jr. (New York Times)

Evolution… Human Archaelogical Record.. Hominid Species..5 million years

A religious sect that contends that space travelers created the human race by cloning themselves declared today that the first cloned human had been born

…Raëlians are followers of Raël, a French-born former race-car driver who has said he met a four-foot space alien atop a volcano in southern France in 1973 and went aboard his ship, where he was entertained by voluptuous female robots and learned that the first humans were created 25,000 years ago by space travelers called Elohim, who cloned themselves.

Some Facts and FiguresSome Facts and Figures

• The fraction of school children believing in astrology rose from 40 percent to 59 percent between 1978 and 1984.

• In a 2001 NSF Survey on Science Literacy:• 53% of American adults were unaware that the last dinosaur died

before the first human arose.

• 50% of adults knew that the earth orbits the sun, and takes a year to do it.

• 53% of adults knew that: “Human beings, as we know them today, developed from earlier species of animals.

• 30% of Ohio adults surveyed in 2002 stated their belief that the Earth is less than 10,000 years old.

In a democratic society…. Everything should be open to debate!

EXPERIMENT

….. THE EARTH IS NOT FLAT!

“It appears to me that they who rely simply on the weight of authority to prove any assertion, without searching out the arguments to support it, act absurdly. I wish to question freely and to answer freely without any sort of adulation. That well becomes any who are sincere in the search for truth.”

V. Galilei, 1574

“I believe in an open mind, but not so open that your brains fall out.”

Arthur Hays SulzbergerPublisher, New York Times 1935-61

WHY SHOULD WE CARE?

Truth blurred!….

We are too afraid of offending religious/cultural sensibilities… even when those sensibilities are wrong!!!

TOO OPEN A MIND?TOO OPEN A MIND?

• 1925 State of Tennessee convicts John T. Scopes of the crime of teaching evolution

• 1968 in Epperson v. Arkansas, Supreme Court rules that states cannot ban the teaching of evolution on religious grounds

• 1982 Federal district court rules in McLean v.Arkansas Board of Education that “creation science” is in fact religion.

• 1987 in Edwards v. Aguillard, the Supreme Court reaffirms 1982 decision. But dissenting opinion raises idea of “evidence against evolution”

• 1999 Kansas State Board of Education votes to remove evolution from state science curriculum

• 2002 Ohio Board of Education developing new science curriculum. Debates inclusion of “Intelligent Design”, and “teaching the controversy”.

Intelligent Design:Intelligent Design:

• Open-Mindedness

• Honesty

• Fairness

Intelligent Design:Intelligent Design:

• Closed Minded

• Dishonest

• Unfair!

Science is a particular way of knowing about

the world. In science, explanations are limited

to those based on observations and experiments

that can be substantiated by other scientists.

Explanations that cannot be based on empirical

evidence are not a part of science…

Science and CreationismThe National Academy of Sciences

“Science standards use a little known “Rule” to censor the evidence of design. The Rule, which is usually unstated, is often referred to as “methodological naturalism.” “

Source: Science Excellence for all OhioansSource: Science Excellence for all Ohioanshttp://www.sciohio.org/start.htm

= Scientific Method!

WHAT IS INTELLIGENT DESIGN?:

WHAT IS INTELLIGENT DESIGN?:

INTELLIGENT DESIGN HAS NEVER BEEN

SUBJECTED TO THE MOULDING AND

DEVELOPMENT THAT OCCURS WHEN

SCIENTIFIC IDEAS ARE SUBJECTED TO

YEARS OF EXPERIMENTAL DEVELOPMENT

AND PEER REVEW!

WHAT IS INTELLIGENT DESIGN?:

WHAT IS INTELLIGENT DESIGN?:

INTELLIGENT DESIGN IS SIMPLY :

OPPOSED TO EVOLUTION!

“THE WEDGE STRATEGY (1998)

Governing Goals * To defeat scientific materialism and its destructive moral, cultural and political legacies. * To replace materialistic explanations with the theistic understanding that nature and human beings are created by God.

Five Year Goals * To see intelligent design theory as an accepted alternative in the sciences and scientific research being done from the perspective of design theory. *begin attacking science teaching in public schools ….

The Scriptures are absolutely true. However, if

the Scriptures appear to disagree with the results

of scientific investigation, one should re-examine

one’s interpretation of the Scriptures.

Maimonides, A Guide for the Perplexed

Intelligent Design: Non-Science at Work?Intelligent Design: Non-Science at Work?

1. What predictions does it make?

Intelligent Design: Non-Science at Work?Intelligent Design: Non-Science at Work?

Humans designed?

• Fallen arches

• Back problems…..

• ….

The National Academy of Science

The National Academy of Science

Special creation or supernatural intervention is not subjectable to meaningful tests, which require predicting plausible results and then checking these results through observation and experimentation…

"Oct. 25-27, "Research and Progress in Intelligent Design" conference, Biola U., La Mirada, CA.: "Its purpose is to form new collaborations among scientists seeking to do research on the interface between science and faith, particularly within the context of ID.” It will cover a broad range of topics, from fine-tuning in physics and habitability to molecular machines in bacteria. E-mail:gonzog@aistate.edu"

Wesley R. Elsberry: Ph.D. candidate in Wildlife and Fisheries Sciences at Texas A&M University

BACK

Teach the Controversy?Teach the Controversy?

• 115,000 articles that used the keyword "evolution," -most referred to biological evolution.

• "Intelligent design," appeared in 88 articles. All but 11 of those were engineering articles

• of the remaining 11, 8 were critical of the scientific basis of intelligent-design

• The remaining 3 were not in research journals

In a survey of over 10 million articles in over 20 major science journals during the past 12 years:

Manufacture the Controversy?Manufacture the Controversy?

An Ohio Example…An Ohio Example…

• For the first time in the 77 years following the Scopes trial, the word "evolution" appears in the science standards proposed by ODE

• An apparently innocuous phrase suggests that students learn "how scientists continue to investigate and critically analyze aspects of evolutionary theory.”

• ODE Standards Committee: “This does not support the teaching of intelligent design in the classroom”

• Stephen Meyer (Discovery Inst): “A victory for the principle of teaching the contoversy

• Philip Johnson: “Ohio is not a minor state.. Kansas is a marginal state -- not one the Eastern establishment pays much attention to..” Ohio's decision is a victory in the battle to free science classes from the grip of Charles Darwin”.

“The First Amendment protects against the government establishment of religion, but that doesn’t mean it will protect against bad science.”

Eugenie Scott,Director, National Center for Science Ed.

BACK

Novel Scientific Novel Scientific ClaimClaim

ResearchResearch

Peer ReviewPeer Review

Scientific Scientific ConsensusConsensus

Classroom & Classroom & TextbookTextbook

Calls for the Teaching Calls for the Teaching of “ID Theory” amount of “ID Theory” amount to an attempt to Short-to an attempt to Short-Circuit the Process of Circuit the Process of Science Itself.Science Itself.

Intelligent Intelligent Design TheoryDesign Theory

Science is NOT FAIR!Science is NOT FAIR!

NOT ALL IDEAS TREATED EQUALLY!

NOT ALL IDEAS TREATED EQUALLY!

THE GREATEST LEGACY

OF SCIENCE.

After the Columbine school shootings, House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (a former biology major) suggested that the tragedy had occurred "because our school systems teach our children that they are nothing but glorified apes who have evolutionized out of some primordial mud.

These are the people who will be legislating on such issues as stem cell research!!!

On March23, 1983, President Reagan called upon “the scientific community in our country, those who gave us nuclear weapons, to turn their great talents to the cause of mankind and world peace; to give us a means of rendering these nuclear weapons impotent and obsolete.”

Science Fiction in Washington..Science Fiction in Washington..

STAR WARS!!!STAR WARS!!!

• THE SPIRIT OF AMERICAN ENTERPRISE!

• NOTHING IS IMPOSSIBLE!

ALL STARSHIPS WORTH THEIR SALT HAVE SHIELDS….

"Yeah, but 300 years ago people would have said it would be impossible to fly!"

• There is probably more we do not know about the Universe than we do know.

• BUT : WE DO KNOW SOMETHING!

• Balls fall down

• The Earth is round

• We know how electromagnetism works

• The Earth is billions of years old, not thousands!

• 1972 ABM Treaty• Intercepting the Moon?• Decoys are cheaper than missiles!• Missiles are cheaper than interceptors!• Probabilities: more reliable than any

system…. Compare to space shuttle…• AT LEAST GET IT TO WORK BEFORE

DEPLOYING! 40% success rate thus far. • 100 billion dollars at stake!!

In April 2000, the APS Council stated: "The United States should not make a deployment decision relative to the planned National Missile Defense system unless that system is shown through analysis and intercept tests to be effective against the types of offensive countermeasures that an attacker could reasonably be expected to deploy with its long-range missiles."

Now the Bush administration is proposing to exempt the Pentagon's controversial missile defense from testing!

• Would it be acceptable for General Motors to begin marketing a new SUV when trials had shown that 60% of the time it toppled over when turning a curve at greater than 50 km/hr?

• Would it be acceptable to build nuclear power plants if there was a 60% failure rate in all prototypes?

Democracy and Technology..Democracy and Technology..

• MISSILE DEFENSE

• Global Warming

• Stem Cells

• International Space Station

• Biological weapons

• ….

The National Academy of Sciences convened an expert panel to assess the Bush administration plans for examining the effects of global warming. The panel concluded that the supposed research program proposed by the administration was anything but, arguing that it lacks "a guiding vision, executable goals, clear timetables and criteria for measuring progress, an assessment of whether existing programs are capable of meeting these goals, explicit prioritization and a management plan." In short, it lacks the characteristics on which empirical science is based!

At the same time Pentagon budget planners made it clear that the proposed war in Iraq could easily exceed the $100 billion level once estimated by former Bush economic adviser Lawrence Lindsey, whose estimate was ridiculed by senior members of the administration as recently as this month. It seems that earlier, much lower figures, did not take into account the obvious requirements of money promised to compensate allies hurt during the war, or to provide what will be at least 6 months of significant US occupation of Iraq following an even short, successful invasion.

In the Wall Street Journal this week, Shirley Tilghman and David Baltimore, internationally known biologists, and the Presidents respectively of Princeton and Caltech, point out that human reproductive cloning and therapeutic cloning to produce stem cells that might be used for research are completely different biological investigations and that a wholesale ban on cloning designed to stop efforts to produce the former would have dire consequences for important biological research on the latter in this country. Yet the house passed such a wholesale ban, driven as much by inappropriate fears of science as by sound thinking.

“Political” Science“Political” Science

• The National Cancer Institute, which used to say on its Web site that the best studies showed "no association between abortion and breast cancer," now says the evidence is inconclusive.

• A Web page of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention used to say studies showed that education about condom use did not lead to earlier or increased sexual activity. That statement, which contradicts the view of "abstinence only" advocates, is omitted from a revised version of the page.

How are we to trust claims regarding the possession and possible threats from weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, or of the strategic imperative to invade at this time when we cannot trust that our government is not willing to subvert or ignore objective scientific evidence in favor of religious or political dogma in other important policy arenas?

WE CANNOT!

When we discuss a possible attack on Iraq at this time, we must understand that the antagonists include the ONLY country to have been condemned for international terrorism by the World Court (in 1986), and that also rejected a Security Council resolution calling on states to observe international law.

I refer here not to Iraq, but to the United States! Indeed, the United States has a long history of unilateral, terrorist action against sovereign nations to further its perceived national interest.

US TERRORISM..US TERRORISM..

• 1985: Reagan Admin Truck Bombing in Beirut: killed 80 and wounded 250 outside a mosque

• Supplied weapons to Saddam Hussein during period of his gassing of Kurds.

• Created terrorist army in Afghanistan• Provided arms for Turkey to crush Kurds• Clinton bombing of Al-Shifa pharmaceutical

plant…• Lumumba assassination in Congo..overthrow of

democratic govts in Gautemala in 1954 or in Chile decades later..

How would we respond if half of the pharmaceutical supplies of our country were destroyed. We should ask how we would respond if Iraq, say, introduced a new “Strategic Doctrine” that granted itself rights to attack “preemptively” on other countries if it perceives a possible risk to its own self-defense, as the US now claims the right to do. If this were the case, they would be crazy not to attack the US now…

Only when we are willing to accept the Universe for what it is, without myth, without fear, will we be able to build a just society.

Scientific ethos: honesty, open mindedness, creativity, egalitarian, full disclosure…

Science works!

THE UNIVERSE IS A REMARKABLE PLACE WITHOUT ALL THE JUNK!

Once we allow truth to be blurred with impunity in one important area of human activity, we jeopardize the very basis of a healthy democratic society.