Pharyngula::Philosophers, are you furious yet?

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006

Philosophers, are you furious yet?

PZ Myers • 89 Comments (last page)

Since biologists have proven intractable, the next direction the IDists are going to take is to target other spots in the curriculum. Here's the comment that leapt out at me in an article on California creationism.

At a special meeting of the El Tejon Unified School District on Jan. 1, at which the board approved the new course, "Philosophy of Design," school Supt. John W. Wight said that he had consulted the school district's attorneys and that they "had told him that as long as the course was called 'philosophy,' " it could pass legal muster, according to the lawsuit.

Oh. So "philosophy" is the new dumping ground, the subject with no serious content, the one where you can safely present any ol' garbage and it still fits? Like the colloquial definition of "theory" (any guess), I suppose the new definition of "philosophy" is "idiots babbling".

Any doubts that this is a serious course in philosophy are dispelled by the description.

Philosophy of Intelligent Design: "This class will take a close look at evolution as a theory and will discuss the scientific, biological, and Biblical aspects that suggest why Darwin's philosophy is not rock solid. This class will discuss Intelligent Design as an alternative response to evolution. Topics that wlll be covered are the age of the earth, a world wide flood, dinosaurs, pre-human fossils, dating methods, DNA, radioisotopes, and geological evidence. Physical and chemical evidence will be presented suggesting the earth is thousands of years old, not billions. The class will include lecture discussions, guest speakers, and videos. The class grade will be based on a position paper in which students will support or refute the theory of evolution."

How about the instructor's qualifications?

Name: Mrs. Sharon Lemburg
Department: Special Education
Brief Biography: B. A. Degree in Physical Education, Social Science: with emphasis in Sociology, Special Education
Class Description: Special Education
Club Advisor or Coach? Soccer and Softball

And then there's how the course will be taught…

Board members recommended changes to the original course plan, which included 24 videos - 19 of them supporting intelligent design. They also voiced concern over scientific issues in the class, such as the laws of thermodynamics and how fossil dating works.

One weblog has a complete list of the videos and speakers, and there is also an annotated breakdown of the course syllabus by one of the listed speakers for evolution (he was not asked nor did he consent; the other one who is, well, dead…and wasn't it a little presumptuous of the teacher to expect to get a Nobelist to drop in to her little school?) It's worse than you might think: 19 are creationist videos, 1 is about catastrophism, and the remaining four are of mysterious content.

So we have here a course "taught" by a soccer coach and special ed teacher who has no training in either science or philosophy, which will consist of day after day of the teacher queuing up creationist videos (I assume she is capable of running a VCR, but there is probably an A/V department in the school to help her if not), and she's going to teach the kids the evidence that the earth is ten thousand years old.

It's a good thing that the school district is being sued over this course.

With one exception, the suit asserts, "the course relies exclusively on videos that advocate religious perspectives and present religious theories as scientific ones — and because the teacher has no scientific training, students are not provided with any critical analysis of the presentation."

…

One of the parents, Kenneth Hurst, who has a doctorate in geology and is a scientist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Cañada Flintridge, said in court papers that the class "conflicts with my beliefs as a scientist. I believe this class undermines the sound scientific principles taught in Frazier Mountain High School's biology curriculum and is structured in a way that deprives my children of the opportunity to be presented with an objective education that would aid the development of their critical thinking skills."

Hurst, who has children in 10th and 12th grades, said the class also interfered with his personal religious views as a Quaker and "reflects a preference for fundamentalist Christianity over all other religious and scientific viewpoints."

That represents reasonable cause, but I think they're missing the most important justification of them all: we ought to have some expectation of competence and some standards of quality in our public school education. This course fails to meet even Sunday School standards of rigor. The school board rushed to have a meeting about it when parents complained about the conflict between religion and state, but they weren't doing their job when they initially approved it—I would be questioning what other dreck they've allowed to slide by.

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Comments:

#57536: — 01/11 at 04:46 PM
I say: let it go through. I'd rather have stuff like this to point to when trying to keep it out of science classes. "See, you can teach this nonsense in a philosophy class if you want, it's just not appropriate for science." is better than having to defend the idea that particular ideas are banned from being taught at all.

#57541: — 01/11 at 05:00 PM
As usual, someone has responded to one of my comments by attacking a false thesis (hence my alias). I did not argue that Intelligent Design should not be "taught" in certain contexts, or be banned. I just simply refuse to grant ID the honorific title of "philosophy," especially when its advocates can't decide if their ideas are scientific or philosophical, or agree on which label would be most advantageous to their campaign. Now if you will excuse me, I have better things to do, and will no longer responde to any more comments, particularly those which are so obviously fallacious!

#57543: JMJanssen — 01/11 at 05:04 PM
Yes, I'm glad you expanded on my short post Strawman. That said, chill out a bit.

#57548: — 01/11 at 05:43 PM
i always thought creation class would have the best tests...

"Insert any question here"?

a) God
b) God
c) God
d) God

Funny how that's a negative to me, and a positive to the braindead YEC's and Incompetent Designers.

#57552: — 01/11 at 06:07 PM
First they came for the evolutionists, then they came for the etc. etc.

In case you don't know the geography of the Los Angeles area, this school district is in the north, in the foothills. Although Los Angeles has a reputation as a hotbed of liberalism, it's really only the area roughly bounded by downtown, the ocean, the 10 freeway and the Ventura freeway that is--the rest of it can be as conservative as any mid-West or Southern town (especially in the suburbs). Didn't surprise me at all that this was happening where it did.

His personal religious views as a Quaker

But....but....*all* scientists are godless infidels! It's gotta be a typical heathen trick!

#57553: — 01/11 at 06:21 PM
The next phase of the IDiots' campaign, predicted by PZ earlier, has begun tp play out. Next up: American history class. See the amazing Constitution - from God's mouth to Madison's pen! Listen to the Divine Narrative of the history of the United States of America, God's Chosen Land and People! Read about the Founding Fathers' deep and abiding Biblical fundamentalism! Hear how the Liberals lost Vietnam (and soon Iraq), and how God punishes them for their sins with AIDS and 9/11 and electoral defeats! Hear how slavery saved the heathen Negro from eternal damnation by exposing his savage mind to the Word!

How can you not see Intelligent Design in America's past? After all, history is *way* too complicated to have happened all by itself....

#57555: — 01/11 at 06:32 PM
Bokanovsky, I think I just wet myself.

#57559: Keith Douglas — 01/11 at 07:09 PM
You bet I'm outraged. I'm also reserving some amount of my ticked-offness at all those guys who said (fortunately not you, PZ) that it would be fine for ID to be taught in a philosophy class. As others have said, philosophy, like any other reputable subject matter has standards. My claim is contentious, but if you ask me sometimes philosophers are too permissive about things. The only role of ID would be to teach about a socially influential piece of pseudoscience - as a lesson on the merits of rigorous philosophy of science.

But I must add that even to suggest the next step, namely that one's philosophy should be scientific in the sense that it is a generalization and a "scaffold" for science, or even that it should be consistent with science, is a ridiculous claim to make for many of my colleagues. As I have remarked here previously, I find a philosophy inconsistent with or foreign to (never mind hostile to) science is useless at best. Up until the end of the 19th century, many philosophers did pay attention; at the end of the 20th century a few (but increasing number of) philosophers have attempted to reengage with all the intellectual culture, especial science, technology, mathematics, etc.

I might add that one thing I adopt even beyond that is that this argument generalizes: my remarks are not special pleading for science and technology (though that is my primary interest) but also apply to matters such as art and music. If you want to, say, be a philosopher of music, you'd damn well better know something about music too.

mangala, I am curious: where did you take a philosophy of science class in high school? I have never heard of any such thing happening. Though, there were protophilosophical snippets in my senior biology course mentioned on that other thread on that subject...

#57561: — 01/11 at 07:26 PM
Speaking of philosophy, here's a class that's being offered next semester at CUNY-grad center.. seems to be quite promising. http://web.gc.cuny.edu/Philosophy/S2006Desc.html#grover. Here's the beginning of the course desc.: "Like some ghastly Hollywood vampire, the argument from design refuses to die, no matter how many stakes are driven through its heart."

They're going to be reading some of Dembski's "work". Debating Design: From Darwin to DNA ed. William A. Dembski & Michael Ruse

#57562: — 01/11 at 08:17 PM
Y'know, if this dog of a curriculum got past the school board, what other crap are they teaching? Do the American history classes teach about how crestfallen the slaves were when they heard of the Emancipation Proclamation? Did the reading curriculum come from Fun-with-Phonics?

#57563: — 01/11 at 08:21 PM
plunge: Aside from the arguments from philosophers so far that they don't want ID mucking up their classes, this class shouldn't be allowed to go through because it is a poor exucse for an educational venture, as best encapsulated by Dr. Free Ride's description of it in commment #57473. It's being taught by someone who has no expertise in science or philosophy*, and oh yes, one of their proposed guest speakers is DEAD. It has Propaganda scrawled all over it for anyone with the eyes to see. There is a difference between discussing ID in a philosophy course and having an entire class devoted to rah-rah boosterism of it, with all the scientific fact butchering that it is entailing. Not all goofball notions deserve a fair shake in our education system, even in the dumping ground of philosophy (heh, sorry guys).

* I suppose I'm being naïvely idealistic by suggesting that this kind of rigor be used in the teacher selection of all high school classes. My sophomore biology teacher was a football coach who needed a class to teach, and he was quite simply unprepared to deal with the evolution-deniers.

#57566: Johnny Logic — 01/11 at 09:02 PM
Hey Ray,

That "dumping ground" spawned the sciences.

#57567: Johnny Logic — 01/11 at 09:03 PM
Hey Rey,

That "dumping ground" spawned the sciences.

#57569: Johnny Logic — 01/11 at 09:05 PM
Sorry for the double post...mea culpa!

#57570: — 01/11 at 09:11 PM

"I don't think Jesus Christ was a monkey, do you?"

I don't think he was any more real in history than Hercules, but if he was real, he would be an ape, but not a monkey. All humans, I believe, are apes, just like gorillas or chimpanzees. Does anyone here agree?

#57571: mangala — 01/11 at 09:13 PM
Keith, I took a course called "Science and Society" in an Ontario public high school (this was before the curriculum was revised 4 years ago, to accomodate a 4-year rather than a 5-year program, and it doesn't look like it's offered any more, sadly). I consider it a philosophy of science course because the focus of the course was the scientific method, the characteristics of scientific inquiry, and ethical issues in science (mainly bioethics). It was definitely the first class I ever took in which terms like "induction" were defined, and the concept of falsifiability was discussed in depth.

#57577: — 01/11 at 10:18 PM
'Twas just a joke...

#57580: — 01/11 at 10:40 PM
For reference:

Beginning in 1971, the Supreme Court has used what is called the "Lemon Test" in order to determine whether a law or governmental policy violates the Establishment Clause. That test asks three questions: whether the government's action has a religious purpose, whether the primary effect of the government's action is to promote or advance a religion, and whether the government's action forces an excessive entanglement with religion. If the government policy or act answers yes to any of these questions, it violates the Establishment Clause.

It appears that these school boards and their lawyers are unfamiliar with the basic concept of the Lemon Test, even though they were just reminded of those standards by the Dover case.

Two probable explanations for this nonsense:
1) these people are morons
2) they are counting on one of these cases reaching the new and improved Supreme Court of GW Bush where Lemon will be overturned.
OR c) both of the above.

#57583: — 01/11 at 10:57 PM
As others above have noted, there is a vast difference between teaching about a religious concept and teaching the religious concept. These California cases illuminate what crossing this line looks like, just as Dover did.

This is no accident. These and other 'faith based' initiatives are looking for a ruling on Lemon in the Supreme Court now that a 'friendlier' audience is about to come into the majority. Once they get the ruling that allows religious concept to be taught in schools then ID will evaporate ... to be replaced by Creationism. The lie that it could by any 'designer' will no longer be useful.

#57585: — 01/11 at 11:49 PM

I think that the teacher's background in Special Education will come in very handy while teaching the morons who decide to take this course.

Hey! I was in special ed for several years, but I had no problems getting into college, and even then, I wouldn't buy into this creationist nonesense. In fact, my 4th grade teacher was very helpful in convincing me to reject creationism because she was a creationist. Yes, I know it was a joke, but you shouldn't assume that all special ed students are morons who are likely to accept creationism. Sure, there are loads of exceptions, but there are also people like me who, when nine years old and in special ed, can reject an idea because its proponents fail to adequately support it.
(Disclaimer: Actually, my case likely applies more to rejecting Christianity/religion then to creationism, but my teacher did literally follow the Bible. She let her ideas leak out to us, but didn't teach them in science class. (She didn't say the opposite, though; actual biology was "outsourced" to another teacher.) In the interests of fairness, I should say that I likely accepted most of her ideas at the time, but rejected them by the time I was in 6th grade. Man, I wish I could use a smaller font for this disclaimer.

#57586: — 01/11 at 11:50 PM
"I think that the teacher's background in Special Education will come in very handy while teaching the morons who decide to take this course."

Hey! I was in special ed for several years, but I had no problems getting into college, and even then, I wouldn't buy into this creationist nonesense. In fact, my 4th grade teacher was very helpful in convincing me to reject creationism BECAUSE she was a creationist. Yes, I know it was a joke, but you shouldn't assume that all special ed students are morons who are likely to accept creationism. Sure, there are loads of exceptions, but there are also people like me who, when nine years old and in special ed, can reject an idea because its proponents fail to adequately support it.
(Disclaimer: Actually, my case likely applies more to rejecting Christianity/religion then to creationism, but my teacher did literally follow the Bible. She let her ideas leak out to us, but didn't teach them in science class. (She didn't say the opposite, though; actual biology was "outsourced" to another teacher.) In the interests of fairness, I should say that I likely accepted most of her ideas at the time, but rejected them by the time I was in 6th grade. Man, I wish I could use a smaller font for this disclaimer.

#57587: Jim Harrison — 01/11 at 11:51 PM
If I were homeschooling a kid, I'd certainly have them read the Bible even though I have no religious beliefs at all. The cultural and literary imporance of the texts makes them part of any serious education; and the Old Testament, at least, contains some great stories. In the typical American high school, however, education about the Bible or religion can be expected to be highly tendentious--right-wing thought control. Under the prevailing political circumstances, I think it's much for the best if all religious topics are avoided in public schools even though omitting this material is a real loss.

#57589: Robn — 01/12 at 12:11 AM
I think a course that discusses the actual history of design might actually work for the benefit of us evolutionists. If people could study Paley in context, and what he was responding to, in addition to the responses within the philosophical and scientific community to his design arguments, I bet it would be a good way to quash ID without ever making a direct attack. Teach them the history of the idea and they'll see for themselves where it originates and why it fails as a philosophy. In that respect, I wouldn't mind it in a philosophy class. But what this woman has put together is NOT a philosophy class.

That said, I teach evolution vs. creationism in my critical thinking classes as my example of why creationism fails every criteria for adequacy in a theory.

#57593: — 01/12 at 01:39 AM

"Evolution says we came from monkeys. I don't think Jesus Christ was a monkey, do you?"

So we came from Jesus Christ? Did the Bible "forget" to mention His monkeying around?

#57597: Bryan Trim — 01/12 at 05:19 AM
Many of us who are faithful followers of the FSM are planning on sending a few helpful letters so she has some information on why piracy is good for the environment.....Any word on when the attempted destroying of public education will cease?

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006

Philosophers, are you furious yet?

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