Comments on: Academic Freedom in Texas

By: NeuroLogica Blog » Texas Science Standards Update

NeuroLogica Blog » Texas Science Standards Update — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 12:08:32 +0000

[...] science bloggers have been writing about the clash between creationists and scientists in forming the Texas state science standards for [...]

By: tmac57

tmac57 — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 23:43:11 +0000

Just got an update on the results of the State Board of Education vote, and it is not pretty. Here is the link to National Center for Science Education post on it called “Science setback for Texas schools” http://ncseweb.org/news/2009/03/science-setback-texas-schools-004708

By: Timmyson

Timmyson — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 20:33:04 +0000

Calvin wins in Texas? Sorry about the double post, apparently I can't post an image.

By: Timmyson

Timmyson — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 20:31:44 +0000

By: King of Ferrets

King of Ferrets — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 03:51:16 +0000

If the no discrimination thing gets passed here, I’m so calling myself a 42ist and claiming that all questions can be answered with 42. That should be an entertaining way to protest this idiocy.

By: artfulD

artfulD — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 03:30:46 +0000

The sciece that Margulis is doing involves purposive behavior of organisms that have an effect on their evolution. Dr. Novella seems to feel such work will be of no consequence – that science based on looking for such elements of purpose in evolution is BS.

But yes, he doesn’t really get to decide that her ideas are not better than his in this area. At least not as a reason to publicly dismiss them as unworkable or unpromising.

As to her endosymbiotic hypothesis, no-one has claimed she’s the first to have one. She’s ostensibly the first to develop it as a viable theory. And are you really trying to demonstrated that she’s not a prominent scientist in her field? Good luck with that.

By: weing

weing — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 01:56:47 +0000

“And if some ideas in science are better than others, who gets to make that decision?”
Who indeed? Wouldn’t it be the scientist who uses the idea to design a study that leads to furthering of knowledge? If an idea doesn’t lend itself to studying, then it is not as good. You mentioned endosymbiosis above. That was postulated over a hundred years ago. It became testable after DNA was first found to be the genetic material and then logical when its presence was discovered in mitochondria and chloroplasts.

By: RickK

RickK — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 21:13:04 +0000

@cheeseburger

Go to the lecture. Arm yourself with the complete list of creationist claims from talkorigins. Ask lots of critical questions.

Fight the good fight!

By: artfulD

artfulD — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 19:02:25 +0000

Steven, thanks for at least looking into the reference, although I had rather you looked into the biological discoveries of Margulis and her colleagues. In any case, what I would hope someone would get out of Dorion’s essay would be a realization that purpose was something to be served as well as a means to describe a mindset, or brain-set, of you will. It’s not a tangible entity, nor does it have to be representative of a teleological will – in other words the purposes served by nature don’t have to be those of any godlike entities.
I certainly didn’t see the conclusion there that nature had purpose and people didn’t. My own position is that the only willfully directed purposes in nature come from life forms, whether people on earth, or bugs in the Alpha Centauri system somewhere.
Nor do I see that determinism has anything to do with understanding the concept of purpose – which by the way is a human concept that is then of course misunderstood by its conceptors. There doesn’t have to be a first cause to understand the concept or give it meaning.
There is a randomness in nature which does not defeat the purposefulness of its operative forces. Physicists understand this, dislike them as you may. They are supposedly operating at the highest level of abstraction because of such understanding. But I see no reason why the rest of us shouldn’t want to share this understanding.
You profess some knowledge of philosophy as well as the science it gave birth to. Put on your philosophical hat and take another look at what we humans were trying to accomplish by conceiving of purpose, and the limitations in our understanding of the material world at the time we did so. New knowledge gives new definition to concepts in use since antiquity. The concept of “life” has an ever changing meaning and understanding. You will perhaps find that the concept of purpose arose as a correlation to that of life and should, in my view, be allowed by the descendants of its conceptors to grow accordingly.
Is this, as you alluded to, an argument that is merely one of semantics? If it is, there’s nothing mere about such an argument.
You can’t be an adherent of the logical process and dismiss the importance of semantics in the bargain. The cognitive structure of meaning – doesn’t that get to the core of what your blog is all about?

And if some ideas in science are better than others, who gets to make that decision? Because one of the best ideas ever floated came from Darwin’s voyages, and yet what it may be worth is still a matter of dispute. But there should be no dispute about the need for that great concept to grow, and it can’t grow without our continuing to study the purposes that it serves and that serve it in turn.

But try doing that with an antiquated version of the concept of purpose and you might as well still pray for rain.

By: Steven Novella

Steven Novella — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 16:34:52 +0000

arfulD – the link you provided to the Dorion Sagan article is a good example of the teleological logical fallacy – it is assuming “purpose” because something has an effect that restores equilibrium. Frankly, I found it meaningless. In fact, if he wishes to draw a correlation between the “apparent purpose” of inanimate objects and life, the correlation should go the other way – not to conclude that nature has purpose but that people do not. This is the line of reasoning used by those who believe that we lack free will – our brains are just efficiently creating entropy, or returning to equilibrium.

But that aside (that’s a separate discussion) I am not convinced that he provides any rationale for concluding their is purpose in nature – unless the argument reduces to mere semantics.

Second – your point about “creative” vs counterproductive skepticism is also not compelling. This is the tired old criticism that skeptics are used to hearing. How many times do we have to write about the tentative nature of science, etc. Seriously, it’s BS.

Science is BOTH a creative and destructive force. We need to find new ideas, and always be willing to change our minds. But at the same time science requires that we eliminate ideas that are wrong. Some ideas in science are better than others.