EVOLUTION IS NOT A THEORY

Monday, February 25, 2008

In science, being a "theory" is not a step below a "law." The "Theory of Relativity" by Albert Einstein is not waiting for its day in court when it graduates to "fact."
Evolution is the central organizing principle of modern biology. Just ask the National Academy of Sciences -- the group that the United States Congress empowers to uphold science in America. They have just issued a report last week titled Science, Evolution and Creationism (Wired Science covered it here). Their conclusion? "Nonscientific approaches do not belong in science classrooms."
Huckabee took Republican center stage after the Iowa caucuses, but his clever sidesteps of scientific questions are a warning sign. "Do you believe in evolution?" The short answer? No, he doesn't. People are charmed by his answers, asking why anyone should care since "[I'm] not planning on writing the curriculum for an eighth-grade science book," and "if anybody wants to believe they're the descendants of a primate, they're welcome to do it." But the real problem is, he will be signing scientific research budgets into law, he will be appointing judges that will be deciding evolution vs. creationism education cases at the state level, and he will be setting a moral precedent that it is o.k. to dis science.
YouTube has a video of Bill Maher asking Huckabee about the evolution debate question. It goes a little further then the debate and shows how the mainstream sounding "I just can't believe creation is an accident" line starts to reveal more disturbing underpinnings under scrutiny. Huckabee's main defense is "Why should it matter? It's not a question appropriate to a presidential debate" to which Maher says (1:38 into the clip),
"If someone believes that the earth is 6,000 years old and every scientist in the world is saying that it is billions of years old, why shouldn't I take that into account when I am assessing the rationality of someone I am going to put into the highest office in the land?"
Good point Bill.
Huckabee, we are actually not asking you if there is a creator behind the cosmos. We are clear that you think there is a creator behind it. We are asking if you would weigh rational scientific evidence that is subject to peer review and is reproducible in your most critical decisions about medical research, terrorist weapons threats, the environment, and education. My concern is that your answer to Bill Maher, "We just don't know [the age of the earth]" is an indication that you are not including science in your reference shelf. If you were, you would know that we do know the age of the earth. It's 4.5 billion years old.
WASHINGTON, D.C.--Prompted by recent court battles and persistent pressures to teach intelligent design in U.S. schools, the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) and the Institute of Medicine today released an 88-page booklet—-intended for wide dissemination—-that explains why evolution is science and creationism is not.
The handsomely illustrated document, titled Science, Evolution, and Creationism and unveiled here at NAS headquarters, is an updated version of two previous publications, one released in 1984 and its successor in 1999. According to Jay Labov, the staff director for the project, NAS began revising the booklet during a highly publicized 2005 court case in Dover, Pennsylvania (ScienceNOW, 20 December 2005). The judge ruled that teaching intelligent design in the science classroom is unconstitutional, but some schools are still trying to circumvent the ruling by teaching what they call the scientific "controversy" surrounding evolution.
Work on the booklet was directed by a panel of scientists and educators headed by biologist Francisco Ayala of the University of California, Irvine. The authors say that the document is intended not just for policymakers and teachers but also for anyone interested in the subject. It "better explains evolution in ways the public can readily understand," said NAS President Ralph Cicerone. It's also twice as long as the 1999 version.
Contributing to the beefed-up page count is recent research fleshing out the evolution picture, such as the 2004 discovery in Canada of Tiktaalik, a 380-million-year-old creature that represents an intermediate form between fish and four-legged land animals (Science, 7 April 2006, p. 33). Textbooks on evolution still don't have such material because revisions take so long, said science educator and panel member Toby Horn of the Carnegie Institution of Washington in Washington, D.C. The latest iteration of the booklet also explores the role of evolution in medicine, pointing out its importance in understanding how viruses such as HIV and SARS mutate. And it features statements by clergy members explaining why evolution is not inconsistent with religion.
"This book is a small start to get scientists mobilized about how they teach science," said panel member Bruce Alberts, former NAS president and the newly appointed editor-in-chief of Science. But it's only part of the solution, noted Ayala, who chastised the press for falling down on the public education front. "You, the media, have certainly done a miserable job," he said, noting that many newspapers devote more space to astrology than to science.
Physicist Lawrence Krauss of Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, welcomes the new booklet. "When candidates for president can raise their hands to say that they do not believe in evolution, it is clear that we need to do a far better job of educating people," he says. "This is precisely what the new NAS publication attempts to do."