Skeptical News for 10 July 2008Skeptical News for 10 July 2008Archive of previous NTS Skeptical News listings
Anne Minard for National Geographic News
July 9, 2008
The discovery of a missing link in the evolution of bizarre flatfishes—each of which has both eyes on the same side of its head—could give intelligent design advocates a sinking feeling.
CT scans of 50-million-year-old fossils have revealed an intermediate species between primitive flatfishes (with eyes on both sides of their heads) and the modern, lopsided versions, which include sole, flounder, and halibut.
So the change happened gradually, in a way consistent with evolution via natural selection—not suddenly, as researchers once had little choice but to believe, the authors of the new study say.
The longstanding gap in the flatfish fossil record has long been explained by a "hopeful monster"—scientific jargon for an unknown animal blessed with a severe but helpful mutation that was passed down to its descendants.
Intelligent Design?
Ever since a geneticist invoked the hopeful-monster explanation in the 1930s, it has been the conventional wisdom for the origin of modern flatfishes.
Intelligent design advocates have seized on the idea of instant flatfish rearrangement as evidence of God or another higher being intentionally creating new animal forms. (Also see: "Does 'Intelligent Design' Threaten the Definition of Science?" [April 27, 2005].)
Intelligent design advocates often cite the relative scarcity of transitional species in the fossil record as evidence of the intentional creation of species.
Lee James Best, Jr., for example, wrote in his 2003 book, God and Fallacy in the Theory of Evolution, that neither the flounder itself nor "unplanned environmental pressures" caused the change.
"As with aimless squeezing of wet clay, without a mold or other purposeful directed pressures," he wrote, "an intended end to a construction project would not occur."
The new discovery, however, is unlikely to change the minds of many creationists.
Zoologist Frank Sherwin, science editor for the Institute for Creation Research, called the findings "underwhelming."
"We do not deny that there is minor variation that occurs within created groups or kinds," he said, adding that he fails to see the new paper as evidence of a progression from one flatfish form to another.
"Fish have always been fish, all the way down to the lower Cambrian [roughly 542 to 488 million years ago]," he added.
"We have no problem with the variation within flatfish. What we're asking is, Show me how a fish came from a nonfish ancestor."
Part of the argument is that the asymmetrical eye configuration can easily be seen as intelligent, because it is advantageous to flatfish survival.
The feature allows flatfishes to use both of their eyes to look up when lying on the seafloor—part of a suite of adaptations that includes a "top" side camouflaged to fit the fishes' surroundings.
(See photos of exquisite adaptations.)
Hiding in Plain Sight
Paleontologist Matt Friedman, the new study's author, visited natural history museums in London, Vienna, and elsewhere to study some of the oldest known flatfish fossils.
Using CT scans, he imaged the bone structures around the ancient fishes' eyes.
In more than one specimen, "one side of the skull looked normal," said Friedman, who is affiliated with the University of Chicago and Chicago's Field Museum.
"But on the other side of the head, the eye was moved up."
It's possible that even the intermediate eye position would have provided an evolutionary advantage for the fish, he said.
"Living flatfish often don't lie completely flat on the sea floor," he said—they prop themselves up with their fins.
"Once you get that extra degree of movement, having a slightly shifted eye is going to be a lot better than having no shifted eye at all," said Friedman, whose study will be published tomorrow in the journal Nature.
Fossils from excavations in northern Italy and Paris revealed that the intermediate specimens once lived together with flatfishes having both eyes on one side of the skull, he said.
It's possible that the more modern forms eventually outcompeted the intermediate versions, Friedman added.
Roving Eye
More than 500 species of flatfishes now live in fresh and salt water. They range in size from four inches to seven feet and can weigh up to 720 pounds (327 kilograms).
Though known for their odd eye arrangement, no flatfish start life that way. Each is born symmetrical, with one eye on each side of its skull.
As a flatfish develops from a larva to a juvenile, one eye migrates up and over the top of the head, coming to rest in its adult position on the opposite side of the skull.
The change leaves the young fish baffled, and they swim at bizarre angles until they adapt, said evolutionary biologist Richard Palmer of the University of Alberta in Canada.
Palmer added that the new work is "a fantastic paper" that helps resolve a mystery "that's bedeviled evolutionary biologists for more than a century.
"It's really been a major, major puzzle to evolutionary biologists."
© 1996-2008 National Geographic Society.
PARIS (AFP) — Starting with Charles Darwin, evolutionary biologists have fretted and fought over the origins of flatfish, among the handful of weird, deeply asymmetrical creatures in Nature's bestiary.
Did flatfish wind up with two eyes on the same side of a lopsided skull through a few chance mutations?
Or did this happen gradually, over tens of millions of years?
The answer, in turns out, has been gathering dust for nearly two centuries in museum drawers, according to a study to be published Thursday in the British journal Nature.
That was where Matt Friedman, a graduate student at the University of Chicago, found two fossils that clearly show a glacial evolutionary shift from normal upright fish to their bug-eyed, bottom-hugging descendents.
Each dates from the Eocene epoch, some 45 million years ago, and one -- Heteronectus chaneti -- is an entirely new genus and species.
The other is from the Amphistium genus, whose earliest known specimens date back some 200 million years.
Both are true "missing links," with one eye just below the dorsal fin on the side of the fish closest to the ocean floor.
For reasons unknown to scientists, some species of modern flatfish, such as turbot, have both eyes on the left side, while other -- halibut and sole, for example -- see from the right side.
The two fossils "deliver the first clear picture of flatfish origins, a hotly contested issue in debates on the mode and tempo of evolution," said Friedman.
There can no longer be any doubt, he said in a statement: "The evolution of the profound cranial asymmetry of extant flatfishes was gradual in nature."
The flatfish controversy has vexed scientists for at least 150 years, and even provided fodder for creationist challenges to the very notion of Darwinian evolution.
All the great figures of early evolutionary biology weighed in with theories falling roughly into two schools.
The absence of any fossils showing a halfway point between normal fish and flatfish led some to believe that change took place in dramatic leaps, a process they called "saltation".
Others, including Darwin himself, predicted that we would one day find evidence of a gradual eye migration that mirrors the maturation of living forms.
When flatfish are only days old they are perfectly symmetrical.
But they rapidly metamorphose as they grow, with one eye migrating toward the other.
Neither of the key fossils rediscovered by Friedman had been examined with modern scientific tools for fear of causing damage.
But Friedman was finally allowed to treat a single specimen housed in the Naturhistorisches Museum in Vienna with a weak acid bath, and to carry out computer-based tomography imaging of the skull of another specimens at the Natural History Museum in London.
Both fossils had been found in limestone quarries in northern Italy.
Hosted by Copyright © 2008 AFP.
In the past, I have observed that the newsmedia and scientific establishment commonly promote the Darwinist bias against intelligent design (ID), where the media "carefully selects the sources of information it will broadcast to the public on this issue." (To see how various groups in the establishment serve as checkpoints to prevent scientific information that challenges neo-Darwinism from reaching the public, observe the diagram at left.) National Geographic (NG) is doing its job as a media checkpoint, promoting biased information to the public on ID. In an article yesterday about a new fish fossil-find, the NG news headline states, "Odd Fish Find Contradicts Intelligent-Design Argument." According to the story, "Intelligent design advocates have seized on the idea of instant flatfish rearrangement as evidence of God or another higher being intentionally creating new animal forms." The article then claims that a new Nature paper has reported the discovery of a transitional flatfish fossil that refutes this "intelligent design argument" (more on the fossil below). The article not only misrepresents intelligent design by conflating it with creationism, but it fails to report about the part of the paper exposing that, according NG's own standard, the flatfish fossil record is not "consistent" with neo-Darwinian evolution.
First, NG claims that ID refers to "God or another higher being," but NG ignores the fact that intelligent design does not try to address religious questions about the identity of the designer. While ID proponents may have their own individual personal views about the identity of the designer, the theory of ID itself does not identify the designer.
Second, NG ignores the fact that intelligent design does not require special creation, and is in fact compatible with common ancestry:
"Intelligent design does not require organisms to emerge suddenly or to be specially created from scratch by the intervention of a designing intelligence. To be sure, intelligent design is compatible with the creationist idea of organisms being suddenly created from scratch. But it is also perfectly compatible with the evolutionist idea of new organisms arising from old by gradual accrual of change. What separates intelligent design from naturalistic evolution is not whether organisms evolved or the extent to which they evolved, but what was responsible for their evolution." (William A. Dembski, The Design Revolution, pg. 178 (InterVarsity Press, 2004).)
Third, NG apparently did not care about the fact that flatfish have never been an "intelligent design argument." Instead, NG refers its readers to two creationist sources--and zero ID-sources--discussing the flatfish. One source is a staff member of the notoriously young earth creationist Institute of Creation Research (a group that has, at times, been critical of intelligent design). The other source, quite frankly, I'd never even heard of before today: It's James Lee Best Jr., a non-scientist whose experience is apparently primarily in the church setting and who apparently wrote a book titled "God and the Fallacy in the Theory of Evolution." A search of the book reveals no hits of the phrase "intelligent design," but there are plenty of hits for "God" or "creation." So perhaps some creationists have talked about flatfish (specifically, the flounder)—but it seems that it is the Darwinists at NG who have sought to masquerade creationism as "intelligent design." Apparently, when Darwinists in the media want to report about intelligent design the facts don't matter: they simply consult creationists rather than actual scientists in the ID movement.
Tacit Admissions That the Fossil Record's General Pattern Conflicts with Natural Selection
As will be discussed below, these new fossils do NOT document any impressive type of evolution. But what is most interesting about the NG article is not the meager degree of evolutionary change allegedly documented by these fossils, but NG's tacit admission that fossil morphology changes that happen "suddenly" are not "consistent" with natural selection. As the article states:
So the change happened gradually, in a way consistent with evolution via natural selection—not suddenly, as researchers once had little choice but to believe, the authors of the new study say.
(Anne Minard, Odd Fish Find Contradicts Intelligent-Design Argument, National Geographic News, July 9, 2008.)
Thus according to the NG article, "gradual" change is "consistent with evolution via natural selection," but the wording implies that "sudden" change is NOT "consistent with evolution via natural selection," and that Darwinists only accept such sudden change when they have "little choice" due to the nature of the fossil record.
So does the fossil record bear out predictions of Darwinian gradual change or sudden change? Let's look at what Darwinists say about the overall pattern of the fossil record, as stated on JudgingPBS.com:
[A] textbook published just six years ago acknowledges that the fossil record has not given clues to help explain the origin of animal phyla in the Cambrian explosion:
"Most of the animal phyla that are represented in the fossil record first appear, 'fully formed,' in the Cambrian some 550 million years ago...The fossil record is therefore of no help with respect to the origin and early diversification of the various animal phyla."
But this is not the only such "explosion" in the fossil record. Paleontologists have observed a fish explosion, a plant explosion, a bird explosion, and even a mammal explosion. Abrupt explosions of mass biological diversity seem to be the rule, not the exception, for the fossil record. Transitions plausibly documented by fossils seem to be the rare exception. As leading evolutionary biologist, the late Ernst Mayr, wrote in 2001, "When we look at the living biota, whether at the level of the higher taxa or even at that of the species, discontinuities are overwhelmingly frequent. . . . The discontinuities are even more striking in the fossil record. New species usually appear in the fossil record suddenly, not connected with their ancestors by a series of intermediates."
This phenomenon exists not only at the species level but also at the level of higher taxa, as one zoology textbook discusses: "Many species remain virtually unchanged for millions of years, then suddenly disappear to be replaced by a quite different, but related, form. Moreover, most major groups of animals appear abruptly in the fossil record, fully formed, and with no fossils yet discovered that form a transition from their parent group."
(The abrupt appearance of biological forms, internal citations removed)
Indeed, in an infamous quote, Stephen Jay Gould admitted, "The absence of fossil evidence for intermediary stages between major transitions in organic design, indeed our inability, even in our imagination, to construct functional intermediates in many cases, has been a persistent and nagging problem for gradualistic accounts of evolution." Gould thought that punctuated equilibria models of Darwinian evolution could account for the data, but if, as NG admits, sudden change is not "consistent with evolution via natural selection," then what does NG's admission say about Darwinism in light of the bulk of the fossil record?
A Floundering Transitional Form?
The fossils that were found were little fish fossils that are species of flatfish. Known living species of flatfish (like the yummy flounder, sole, or halibut) are unique in that as adults, the eyes sit on the top of the head, rather than on the sides of the head, like most fish. But young flatfish DO have eyes on the sides of the head--their eyes migrate to the top during development. Now observe the meager scope of evolutionary change allegedly documented by these fossils: they have some skull features similar to known living flatfish, but their eyes remain on the sides of the head, like normal fish. As the abstract of the paper says, "Most remarkably, orbital migration was incomplete in Amphistium and Heteronectes, with eyes remaining on opposite sides of the head in post-metamorphic individuals."
Forgive me if I'm not highly impressed with the degree of "evolution" documented by these fossils. Do they explain how halibut and sole evolved to have eyes on the top? Not really. The eyes on these fossils weren't in an "intermediate" location, halfway from the sides to the top. Their eyes are on the sides on the side of the head, like normal fish. The only interesting thing about these fossils, as far as evolution is concerned, is that they share some other skull features--the asymmetrical eye sockets--that are unique to "eyes on top" flatfish.
Some other questions must be asked.
How do we know that these represent the evolutionary intermediate ancestors of flatfish? We don't: The paper reports that they appear in the fossil record at the same time as "eyes on top" flatfish, so their placement in the fossil record does not make them a candidate for being the actual ancestors of flatfish.
And do these fossils show how the "eyes on top" condition evolved in typical flatfish? No. Assuming these fossils are related to flatfish, for all we know, perhaps the "eyes on top" condition is the primitive basal condition for flatfish, and the "eyes on side" condition was evolved simply through LOSS of genes causing eye migration during early development. In other words, perhaps these newly discovered fossil fish species lost the genes for eye migration so the eyes got "stuck" on the sides of the head after the bones ossified. Genetically speaking, that seems like the easiest way to account for these fish. But in such a scenario, these fish would be descended from "eyes on top" flat-fish, and are not their evolutionary descendants, not precursors. At best, these fossils document a new morphological state that at best shows fairly trivial evolutionary change--not "major morphological transitions" (as the paper's author claimed).
In fact, the paper's author admits that according to the fossil record, we don't know where the overall clade of flatfish came from, and that many types of flatifsh (including these new finds) appear around the same time in a "sudden" fashion:
Amphistium and Heteronectes are contemporaries of the earliest members of many derived pleuronectiform lineages, including the oldest known sole. The sudden appearance of anatomically modern pleuronectiform groups in the Palaeogene period matches the pattern repeated by many acanthomorph clades. Inferring interrelationships between higher groups in this explosive radiation has proved difficult, and an unresolved bush persists.
(Matt Friedman, "The evolutionary origin of flatfish asymmetry," Nature, Vol. 454:209-212 (July 10, 2009).)
This is what we call a retroactive confession of evolutionist ignorance, where, as I've observed before, evolutionists exhibit predictable behavior where they "only admit how weak the evidence was for evolution after they have some new allegedly 'transitional' fossil in their hands." (For more examples, see Retroactive Confessions of Ignorance and Overblown Claims of Evolution: Observing Evolutionist and Media Behavior after Discovering "Missing Links.)
And what of the paper's confession that the clade as a whole appears in a "sudden" fashion where there is an "explosive radiation"? According to NG, such fossil data should not be considered "consistent with evolution via natural selection." But of course, like a good science media checkpoint, National Geographic chose not to report about the above-quoted part of the paper.
Posted by Casey Luskin on July 10, 2008 10:07 AM | Permalink
TrackBack
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.discovery.org/scripts/mt/mt-tb.cgi/7531
by DanaUllman (see all articles by this author)
(NaturalNews) Homeopathic medicine actually gained its greatest popularity primarily due to its impressive successes in the treatment of infectious diseases in the 19th century. The death rates in American and European homeopathic hospitals from cholera, scarlet fever, typhoid, and yellow fever were typically two to eight times less by percentage than those in conventional hospitals (Bradford, 1900; Ullman, 2007). As a result of these successes, at the turn of the 20th century there were over 100 homeopathic hospitals and 22 homeopathic colleges, including Boston University, University of Michigan, New York Medical College, and Hahnemann College of Medicine.
If homeopathy can have such significant results in treating people suffering from these serious infectious diseases, there is little doubt that it can be similarly effective in treating the various common infectious diseases today.
And yet, the average American knows little or nothing about homeopathy. Even many people who are passionate about alternative medicine know little about the science and art of homeopathy.
What is so different about homeopathy?
Homeopathic medicines are not just composed with different medicinal ingredients, and they are not just the use of smaller doses of medicines. Homeopathy represents a different approach to understanding disease and health.
Like modern-day physiology and pathology, homeopaths understand that symptoms are not just something "wrong" with the person but that symptoms are defensive adaptations of the human body in its best efforts to fight infection and/or to adapt to stress. From this perspective, it does not make sense to use pharmacological therapies to inhibit, control, or suppress symptoms since such methods tend to reduce the body's inherent self-healing responses.
Instead, homeopaths use medicinal agents that have been found to cause in healthy people the similar syndrome of symptoms that sick people experience. The very word "homeopathy" is derived from two Greek words, "homoios" which means Similar and "pathos" which means Suffering or Disease. This is why the basic premise of homeopathy is called the "principle of similars." Because symptoms are the ways that the body is trying to heal itself, it makes sense to use medicines that are similar to and that augment their body's wisdom, rather than suppress it. It is not a coincidence that immunizations and allergy treatments are two of the very few conventional medical treatments that help strengthen the immune system to prevent or treat disease, and they use relatively small doses of substances for conditions that they are known to cause in overdose.
What also makes homeopathy different (and sometimes more difficult) than conventional medicine is that homeopathic medicines are not prescribed to treat a specific or localized disease but are prescribed to treat specific syndromes of symptoms of which one's disease is just one part. In other words, two people may have the common cold, but one would have a thin watery nasal disease that irritates the nostrils, frequent sneezing, and a mild headache, all of which are aggravated in warm rooms. The other would have thick yellowish nasal discharge that doesn't irritate the nostrils, nasal congestion alternating with nasal discharge, a cough that is relieved in the open air, and no thirst.
It is remarkable how many normally smart people, including many health professionals, mistakenly assume that people with the same conventional diagnosis should be prescribed the same medicine even though they tend to have such different symptoms. While it may be more easy and convenient to give people with the same diagnosis the same medicine, individualization of treatment makes sense... and in homeopathy, it works wonderfully well.
In homeopathy, a medicine is not prescribed based on the disease that the person has but on the unique pattern or syndrome of symptoms that are experienced. In the above example, the first person would be prescribed Allium cepa (the common onion), while the second person would be given Pulsatilla (an herb called windflower).
Jonas Salk, MD, the famed medical researcher, once said that there were two basic approaches to treating sick people: the conventional model of medicine which seeks to diagnose and treat a specific pathology and the holistic model of healing which seeks to strengthen host resistance. Needless to say, homeopathy is an integral part of this second school of thought in medicine.
There are no "homeopathic antibiotics" or "homeopathic anti-viral agents" because every correctly prescribed homeopathic medicine has the potential of strengthening a person's own immune and defense system in a way that helps to fight bacterial or viral infection.
The Logic of Homeopathy in Infectious Disease Treatment
It is commonly assumed that bacteria and viruses "cause" disease, and it is heretical to consider otherwise. And yet, most of us have various bacteria and viruses in our body right now despite the fact that we are not sick.
The reason that some people get ill and others do not is what biologists call "host resistance" and what physicians refer to as "susceptibility." Basically, it is understood that infection is the result of two factors: exposure to a pathogen and the person's present state of health. From this perspective, bacteria and virus are not the cause of disease but at best are a "co-factor" to disease.
One "take-home" message from this logical (and obvious) analysis of infectious disease is that taking a conventional antibiotic or antiviral drug may get rid of the pathogen, but they do not do anything to strengthen a person's host resistance or immune system. In fact, there is ample evidence that these conventional drugs actually increase the chances of re-infection.
The second take-home message is that one should consider ways to strengthen his or her own immune and defense system... and homeopathy is one important way to do this.
Evidence of Success with Homeopathy
Skeptics of homeopathy mistakenly assert that there is no research that verifies its efficacy. In actual fact, skeptics who assume this are simply showing their own ignorance and their own unscientific attitude.
An impressive international study that involved 30 clinicians in 6 clinics in 4 countries enrolled 500 consecutive patients with upper respiratory tract complaints, lower respiratory tract complaints, or ear complaints. The study found 83% of patients receiving homeopathic care experienced improvement, while only 68% of those receiving a conventional medication experienced a similar degree of improvement. The study also found that those people given a homeopathic experienced more rapid relief: 67.3% experienced improvement with homeopathy within 3 days, while only 56.6% of patients given conventional medicines experienced improvement (16.4% of homeopathic patients improved within 24 hours; 5.7% in other group).(Riley, et al, 2001)
The #1 reason that parents take their child to a physician today is for ear infection. A study published in a major pediatric journal found that there were 19.9% more treatment failures in children given a placebo than those given a homeopathic medicine. The study also found a significant decrease in symptoms at 24 and 64 hours after treatment in favor of those given a homeopathic medicine.
The homeopathic medicine that has undergone a significant number of studies is the popular flu remedy Oscillococcinum. Three large-scale studies (over 300 patients in each) conducted by three groups of independent researchers have consistently found positive results in using this remedy to treat influenza (Vickers and Smith, 2005). Because conventional medicine has nothing to offer this all-too-common viral illness, it is good to know of a safe and effective remedy. However, it is useful to know that this remedy is primarily useful when it is taken within 48 hours of the onset of symptoms.
Examples of Homeopathic Medicines
There are several simple homeopathic medicines that can be used by anyone to treat many kinds of infections. The trick to using them effectively is to remember that they are not used to treat only one type of disease but are effective in treating the "syndrome" of symptoms that each is known to cause (when taken in overdose in experiments). It is also helpful to mention that homeopathic medicines are listed by their Latin name in order to be precise with the specific substance being used.
Aconitum (monkshood) is sometimes called "homeopathic vitamin C" because it is commonly used at the first symptoms of infection (respiratory infection, influenza, sore throat, ear infection, bladder infection). It is indicated when symptoms start rapidly and are intense. Usually, there is a high fever (not higher than 103 degrees), strong thirst, restlessness, and may begin after being chilled or after a sudden fright, anger, or shock.
Belladonna (deadly nightshade) is useful for various types of infections, especially when the person is feverish with flushed, reddened skin and mucous membranes, with palatable feelings of heat radiating off the body. It is indicated when the person's senses are hyperacute, and the person is aggravated by noise, touch, light, or jarring motion. The sick person may be delirious and will tend to experience vivid dreams (children will say that they see ghosts or scary things).
Pulsatilla (windflower) tends to be much more commonly given to women and children for various infections. It is particularly useful for people who are very emotional, moody, and desire sympathy. These people do not tend to have much thirst, even if they have a fever. They feel worse in a warm room and desire open air. If they have a cold or cough, their mucus tends to be thick and yellow or yellow-greenish, and their symptoms are usually worse at night.
In addition to homeopathic medicines that are composed of specific single ingredient substances, there are also "homeopathic formulas," that is, combinations of 2 to 10 ingredients. These formulas are very simple to use because they are usually made with some of the most commonly prescribed remedies known to be effective in treating people with a specific ailment, and these products are marketed based on a specific disease name (Because the FDA recognizes homeopathic medicines are "over-the-counter drugs," it is perfectly legal for homeopathic manufacturers to give a disease indication on the label, as long as the disease is self-limiting and does not require a medical diagnosis).
Homeopaths generally find that the individually-chosen single ingredient homeopathic remedy is more apt to provide faster and more certain results, but if you don't know how to select a homeopathic medicine for you or a family member, it is good to know that "user-friendly" homeopathic formula products are readily available and are often wonderfully effective.
To learn how to select an individually chosen remedy, consider getting a homeopathic self-care guidebook, such as Everybody's Guide to Homeopathic Medicines by Stephen Cummings, MD, and Dana Ullman, MPH or Homeopathic Medicines for Children and Infants by Dana Ullman, MPH. To better understand what homeopathy is and to learn about why so many of the smartest, most successful, and most famous people of the past 200 years used or advocated for homeopathy, see The Homeopathic Revolution: Why Famous People and Cultural Heroes Choose Homeopathy by Dana Ullman.
If a person experiences repeated infection or experiences particularly intense symptoms, you should seek professional homeopathic and/or medical care. Because homeopathy is a method of strengthening a person's overall immune and defense system, it should be seriously considered as a treatment of choice to people who are prone to infection.
References:
T.L. Bradford, The Logic of Figures. Philadelphia: Boericke and Tafel, 1900.
D Riley, M Fischer, B Singh, et al, Homeopathy and Conventional Medicine: An Outcomes Study Comparing Effectiveness in a Primary Care Setting, Journal of Alt and Comp Med, 7,2,April, 2001:149-60.
J Jacobs, DA Springer, D Crothers, Homeopathic Treatment of Acute Otitis Media in Children: A Preliminary Randomized Placebo-controlled Trial, Pediatric Infectious Disease Journal, 20,2 (February 2001):177-183.
Vickers A. J., and Smith, C. Homoeopathic Oscillococcinum for preventing and treating influenza and influenza-like syndromes, Cochrane Review, The Cochrane Library, 2005, Issue 4.
About the author
DANA ULLMAN, MPH, is one of America's leading spokespersons for homeopathy. He has authored nine books, including The Homeopathic Revolution: Why Famous People and Cultural Heroes Choose Homeopathy, Homeopathy A-Z, Homeopathic Medicines for Children and Infants, and (the best-selling) Everybody's Guide to Homeopathic Medicines (with Stephen Cummings, MD). Dana has served on advisory boards of alternative medicine institutes at Harvard, Columbia, and University of Arizona schools of medicine. He is the founder of Homeopathic Educational Services (http://www.homeopathic.com), America's leading resource center for homeopathic books, tapes, medicines, software, and correspondence courses.
Thursday, July 10, 2008
By John Fostr
Naked Loon Technology Reporter
Hot on the heels of a recent Louisiana victory in the fight against evolution, the Seattle-based think tank Discovery Institute held a press conference Thursday to announce their latest initiative: defeating the myth of gravity.
Robert Crowther, Discovery's director of communications was visibly excited as he detailed the Institute's plan for attacking what he refers to as the sloppy, inaccurate, and overtly biased portrayal of the theory of gravity.
"Gravity is just a theory, and a poorly-supported one at that," said Crowther.
At the press conference, the Discovery Institute introduced an alternate explanation for the apparent attraction of masses to each other. With its "Intelligent Motion" thesis, the Institute claims that the forces we call "gravity" can also be explained by an intelligent cause acting on masses, not a mysterious "natural" process.
"The so-called consensus in the scientific community is that gravity is allegedly described by the general theory of relativity," explained Crowther. "They're piling theory on top of theory here, and feeding it to us as if it were fact."
As evidence that the theory of gravity is suspect, Crowther pointed to examples in nature that seem to literally fly in the face of the accepted explanations. "Take birds, for instance," he said, "why doesn't gravity seem to affect them as they soar majestically through the air? These are the questions that the news media and scientific establishment don't want anyone to ask."
Crowther emphasized that the Institute's Intelligent Motion argument was not based on religious doctrine, but should instead be treated as a scientific alternative to the current understanding of gravity.
"Too many scientists have been afraid to speak out against the powerful gravity lobby," said Crowther. "With Intelligent Motion, we are looking forward to imposing balance on yet another heavy-handed field of science."
The Institute plans to begin their campaign against gravity by lobbying the state legislatures in Nebraska, Kansas, Missouri, and Kentucky to pass a bill stating that Intelligent Motion must be taught in physics classes alongside Einstein's theory of relativity.
Posted: July 08, 2008 1:00 am Eastern
By Roddy Bullock © 2008
Federal Judge John E. Jones III casts but a dim glow compared to the candescent brilliance of James Madison, yet just more than two years ago he found the Klieg lights of media-driven stardom sufficient to subvert the Bill of Rights into a Bull of Wrongs. Wielding Madison's magnificent contribution to freedom and the American way as a club, Jones dispensed with subtlety or nuance as he flogged a local Pennsylvania school board for establishing a religion in violation of the First Amendment of the United States Constitution. Overreacting to teachers informing students of a library book on intelligent design, Jones not only found an egregious establishment of religion, he indignantly made it a violation of the Constitution to require so much as critical analysis of evolution in the science classroom. Let freedom ring.
Yes, what you thought was science is now constitutionally protected dogma in William Penn's back woods, federally sheltered as untouchable and immune from criticism. In delivering his opinion in Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District, Jones became a hero to beleaguered Darwinists who, unable to hold off scientific criticism much longer, gladly traded freedom's ring for a protective ring of federal marshals. Turning the bench into a pulpit and the Constitution into a papal decree, Jones preached:
To preserve the separation of church and state mandated by the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment … we will enter an order permanently enjoining [the school board] from … requiring teachers to denigrate or disparage the scientific theory of evolution. …
Denigrate? Disparage? Compare Jones' words with the First Vatican Counsel's, and decide for yourself who established a religion:
But since in this very age when the salutary effectiveness of the apostolic office is most especially needed, not a few are to be found who disparage its authority, we judge it absolutely necessary to affirm solemnly the prerogative … to teach and define as a divinely revealed dogma …
Jones' salutary effectiveness, technically binding only in his little Vatican, chilled freedom nationwide. Now any talk of "critical analysis of evolution" is heard as "disparaging revealed dogma," with theophobic evolutionists alleging religious motives behind every attempt to educate rather than indoctrinate. Threatening more million-dollar lawsuits to "keep religion out of the classroom," Darwinists derail every effort to show the growing scientific evidence against Darwinism. Cash-strapped school boards, unable to challenge the supreme apostolic authority Galileo-style, have no option but to succumb.
But, thankfully, there is a Galileo in the house. Louisiana's Gov. Bobby Jindal ignored the pleas of would-be inquisitors and recently signed into law legislation allowing teachers to freely teach scientific criticisms of evolution, as well as global warming and other controversial topics. Described by the Washington Times as a "battle over science education that could soon spill over into the courts," Louisiana's act is merely an attempt to permit teachers to teach science objectively. Should we expect anything less?
Apparently, yes. Louisiana's decision to no longer keep up with the religion-baiting Joneses drew out the usual suspects of professional anti-anti-evolutionists who live to ensure Darwinism remains free of all denigration and disparagement. Such perpetual antagonism to any opposition to evolution has created a lucrative cottage industry of atheists, Darwinists and even a few "religious folk," each ready to mobilize loudly with truth-suppressing religious fervor against any exposé of their naked emperor.
This time the Darwin-only lobby failed. Professor Barbara Forrest, an unflagging mouthpiece for Darwinian hegemony, tried to mobilize a "huge network of e-mails" to Gov. Jindal's office to stop the act's supporters from "boldly introducing religion into public education." Alan Leshner of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, or AAAS, proclaimed the act "would unleash an assault against scientific integrity." And, of course, the sky would fall.
The most intriguing comment came from Eugenie Scott of the National Center for Science Education, or NCSE, an organization whose sole purpose is to "defend the teaching of evolution in the public schools." According to the Washington Spectator, Scott fears that legislation like Louisiana's might result in science standards that require students to – brace yourself – "explain why the Cambrian explosion is a serious problem for evolution." Referring to the well-documented "explosion" of life forms having no Darwinian lineage found in the Cambrian fossil record, Scott's statement makes the case for critical analysis in science education. As she knows, there is no evolutionary explanation for the Cambrian explosion, described by educator and author David Berlinski as "signaled by what I imagine a spectral puff of smoke and a deafening ta-da!, an astonishing number of novel biological structures come into creation, and they come into creation at once." Even Darwin admitted that the Cambrian explosion presented a severe "difficulty" to his theory.
Darwin is not the problem; Darwinists are. Darwinists' tactics stem from a visceral fear of what might happen if today's students are asked to do what today's Darwinists have never done: critically analyze evidence challenging Darwinism. Zealots know that if students critically consider Darwin's 19th-century theory in light of 21st-century evidence the "difficulties" would start, but not end, with the Cambrian explosion. This is not the kind of teaching Scott or any of her cohorts is equipped to do, so "teaching the controversy" must be avoided by pretending there is no controversy.
But there is another option, a brilliant solution if evolution's defenders have any integrity. Put forth by author William Dembski, "Teaching the Non-Controversy – An Immodest Proposal" sets out an ACLU-proof way to teach evolution honestly. Because the AAAS, the NCSE and other champions of Darwin-only education claim there is no scientific controversy (evolution, they claim, is as well established as gravity!), why not let students simply explain why evolutionary theory is one of the few areas in science where no controversy exists? To further help students gain total understanding of the non-controversy, Dembski recommends further science standards like the following:
Such science standards would meet everyone's needs. Dogmatists would have students engaged in the study of how and why evolution is a proven fact, explaining every important question in biology. And those who desire critical analysis of evolution would get it by default, because the standards above cannot be achieved otherwise. Moreover, successfully satisfying Dembski's suggested standards should be easy if Forrest, Leshner and Scott are to be believed. But don't expect these standards to be adopted, because in attempting to meet them students would find, as Dembski says, "that evolutionary theory is bankrupt and intelligent design is a live scientific option."
Louisiana may see the next court battle over the teaching of evolution. But making white lab coats subservient to black law robes is the business of scientific cowards – mainstream science has become sadly dependent upon federally protected and subsidized truth. But history shows that science-by-robed-decree, whether by Papal Bull or judicial bunk, is rarely sustainable against contrary evidence. The fine citizens of Louisiana sense this, and simply wish for their children to have science taught fully and honestly in an environment of academic freedom.
Why, of all areas of life, should it be such a struggle to put academic adjacent freedom in the same sentence, much less in practice?
By Lawrence Jones
Christian Post Reporter
Mon, Jul. 07 2008 07:57 AM EDT
A former science curriculum director for the Texas Education Agency, who lost her job for violating a policy that required employees to be neutral on creationism, has filed a federal lawsuit to have the policy declared unconstitutional.
Christina Comer alleges in the suit that she was forced to resign last year after forwarding an e-mail that promoted a lecture by a speaker who opposed intelligent design. She is suing the TEA and Education Commissioner Robert Scott to overturn the "neutral" policy and be reinstated to her old job.
The suit contends that the policy violates the Constitution because it amounts to an endorsement of religion.
"By professing 'neutrality,' the Agency credits creationism as a valid scientific theory," argues the court papers. "The agency's 'neutrality' policy violates the Establishment Clause … because it has the purpose or effect of endorsement of religion."
TEA has not responded to the suit.
But in a Nov. 5 memorandum recommending her termination, the intelligent design e-mail was cited as one of a "series of incidents evidencing a serious lack of good judgment and failure to follow agency policies."
One example of Comer's misconduct, according to the document, included an earlier incident in which she publicly told a body of Texas educators that Robert Scott was only acting commissioner and that there was no real leadership in the agency. Other incidents involved Comer not obtaining permission from the TEA prior to speaking or presenting materials at engagements.
Comer handed in her resignation letter on Nov. 7, just months ahead of the TEA's State Board of Education reviews of the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills, which determine what should be taught in the classrooms and what textbooks are bought.
"Ms. Comer should be well aware of her role in the TEKS revision process and the need to maintain neutrality based on the guidance provided by the agency management," stated the memo.
Columnists,
Article Launched: 07/07/2008 03:03:08 AM EDT
Monday, July 7
Celebrate the courage of Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal in the fight for freedom. He has shown tremendous courage in signing the Louisiana Science Education Bill, an important blow for academic freedom.
"Our freedom to think and consider more than one option is part of what has given America her competitive edge in the international marketplace of ideas," said biology scientist Caroline Crocker to the Louisiana House Committee on Education. "The current denial of academic freedom rights for those who are judged politically incorrect may put this in jeopardy."
Crocker was testifying on the bill allowing supplemental materials into Louisiana public school science classrooms about evolution, cloning, global warming and other debatable topics. The legislature went on to unanimously (35-0) pass the bill. Now it has become law because of Gov. Jindal's courage.
One would think legislation which allows an environment that promotes "critical thinking" and "objective discussion" in the classroom would please everyone — it did the bipartisan group of legislators in Louisiana — but such is not the case. The New York Times felt threatened by the legislation, calling it "retrograde," naming its editorial on the topic, "Louisiana's Latest Assault on Darwin." They were attempting to pressure Gov. Jindal to not sign the law, using a number of tactics including implicit ridicule, subtle belittling insults and untruths.
The law is straightforward and clearly restricts any intent to promote a religious doctrine. There is no mention of either intelligent design or creationism. Darwinism is not banned and teachers are required to teach students from standard textbooks. But the Times calls the legislation a "Trojan horse" because the state board of education must, upon request of local school districts, help foster an environment of "critical thinking" and "open discussion" on controversial scientific subjects.
This allows teachers to use supplemental materials to analyze evolution and show views other than Darwin's theory. It allows evolution to be criticized, and the law protects the rights of teachers and students to talk freely about a wide range of ideas without fear of reprisal.
The Times' fear is that objective discussion "would have the pernicious effect of implying that evolution is only weakly supported and that there are valid competing scientific theories when there are not." They called any school district "foolish" if they "head down this path."
Evolutionists use a variety of methods to silence alternate viewpoints. They say people are trying to "inject religious views into science courses." Besides calling it a "retrograde step", the Times used implicit ridicule of Governor Jindal, saying, "As a biology major at Brown University, Mr. Jindal must know that evolution is the unchallenged central organizing principle for modern biology."
Many reputable scientists and scholars disagree with Darwin's theory of evolution and certainly challenge it. Evolutionists say they don't want biased religious views forced on students. Ironically, Darwin's evolutionary theory is based in atheistic naturalism, a religious belief.
Dr. William Provine of Cornell University explained his and Darwin's shared atheistic beliefs in this way: "Let me summarize my views on what modern evolutionary biology tells us loud and clear — and these are basically Darwin's views. There are no gods, no purposes, and no goal — directed forces of any kind. There is no life after death. When I die, I am absolutely certain that I am going to be dead. That's the end of me. There is no ultimate foundation for ethics, no ultimate meaning in life, and no free will for humans, either. What an unintelligible idea."
Scientist Casey Luskin, a scholar with the Discovery Institute said, "We would like to see evolution taught in an unbiased fashion and also want students to learn how to think like scientists and to weigh the evidence for and against."
Academic free speech rights for Louisiana's public school students and teachers are now guaranteed because of Gov. Bobby Jindal's signature. Trying to strike a modicum of balance to the scientific discussion in classrooms and allow students to hear more than one view, Gov. Jindal acted wisely.
Other states are considering similar legislation. Students deserve academic free speech rights to hear alternate views, ask critical questions and debate controversial topics. This freedom will in turn strengthen our country.
Floyd and Mary Beth Brown are authors and speakers. Together they write a national weekly column distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.
By LANE NICHOLS - The Dominion Post | Saturday, 28 June 2008
A Christian group promoting intelligent design theory over evolution has sent teaching material to schools that critics say is religious propaganda and sloppy pseudoscience.
The Education Ministry says the unsanctioned material does not breach the Education Act and there are no plans to ban its distribution.
But officials stress the theory of evolution underpins the science curriculum and schools have a responsibility to teach theories that are subject to accepted scientific scrutiny.
Focus on the Family has sent The Privileged Planet CD and booklet to 400 high schools, asking that they be made available to science teachers and school libraries.
Waikato University biological sciences senior lecturer Alison Campbell says the material champions creationism - the belief that God created the world as described in the Book of Genesis - claiming the universe is too perfect to have been produced by chance so must be the work of an intelligent designer.
It represented a religious viewpoint, she said, not a scientific one, and had no place in science classrooms.
"It's an underhand way of getting creationist material into schools."
Similar debate in the United States led the Supreme Court to ban public schools from teaching creationism. In 2005 a court banned the teaching of intelligent design at a Pennsylvanian high school.
Focus on the Family's executive director Tim Sisarich said the material was intended to expose pupils to an alterative theory of cosmology.
"We're a Christian organisation so we believe that God made the planet and God made the cosmos ... Science takes a theory and tries to establish it as the truth, and that's all this is."
Education Ministry senior manager Mary Chamberlain said parents had a right to withdraw children from religious instruction.
Saturday, July 5, 2008
Roger Hule recently wrote in answering mine and several other letters objecting to his support of evolution.
The letter was long on rhetoric and short on evidence. In neither letter he's written has he presented any scientific evidence for evolution; he simply states it as an a priori fact.
The simple answer to this is that there is no scientific evidence for evolution.
Nothing exists in the fossil record, no laboratory experiment has been performed, and it has never been observed in nature.
To believe evolution, you must accept it by faith and, since there is no supporting evidence, blind faith.
In my previous letter, I quoted an evolutionist who said evolution was unproved and un-provable.
Mr. Hule never answered that statement, so I will try again with the statement of another evolutionist.
At three separate venues, Colin Patterson, a senior paleontologist at the British Museum, asked his colleagues a simple question: Can you tell me any one thing you know to be true about evolution?
At two of the seminars, his question was met with silence. At the third, one person spoke up and said, "Yes, I do know one thing. It ought not to be taught in high school."
Mr. Hule also mentions separation of church and state in both his letters.
This term is not in the Constitution, but rather in a letter to the Danbury Baptists by Thomas Jefferson.
Jefferson was reiterating what the Constitution already said: The federal government would not establish a national church that everyone must adhere to.
I wish people would stop using this straw man as an excuse to keep religion from influencing society.
Knowingly or unknowingly, our religious beliefs, whether atheistic or theistic, influence every decision we make.
Kevin Molter
Port St. Lucie
Posted on: July 5, 2008 4:04 PM, by PZ Myers
Remember Suzan Mazur, the credulous reporter hyping a revolution in evolution? She's at it again, publishing an e-book chapter by chapter on the "Altenberg 16", this meeting that she thinks is all about radically revising evolutionary biology.
I can tell that Massimo Pigliucci — one of the 16 — is feeling a little exasperation at this nonsense, especially since some of the IDists have seized on it as vindication of their delusions about the "weakness" of evolutionary theory. He's got an excellent post summarizing some of the motivation behind this meeting, which is actually part of a fairly routine process of occasional get-togethers by scientists with similar ideas to hash out the concepts. Here's the actual subject of discussion at the Altenberg meeting.
The basic idea is that there have been some interesting empirical discoveries, as well as the articulation of some new concepts, subsequently to the Modern Synthesis, that one needs to explicitly integrate with the standard ideas about natural selection, common descent, population genetics and statistical genetics (nowadays known as evolutionary quantitative genetics). Some of these empirical discoveries include (but are not limited to) the existence of molecular buffering systems (like the so-called "heat shock response") that may act as "capacitors" (i.e., facilitators) of bursts of phenotypic evolution, and the increasing evidence of the role of epigenetic (i.e., non-genetic) inheritance systems (this has nothing to do with Lamarckism, by the way). Some of the new concepts that have arisen since the MS include (but again are not limited to) the idea of "evolvability" (that different lineages have different propensities to evolve novel structures or functions), complexity theory (which opens the possibility of natural sources of organic complexity other than natural selection), and "accommodation" (a developmental process that may facilitate the coordinated appearance of complex traits in short evolutionary periods).
Now, did you see anything in the above that suggests that evolution is "a theory in crisis"? Did I say anything about intelligent designers, or the rejection of Darwinism, or any of the other nonsense that has filled the various uninformed and sometimes downright ridiculous commentaries that have appeared on the web about the Altenberg meeting? Didn't think so. If next week's workshop succeeds, what we will achieve is taking one more step in an ongoing discussion among scientists about how our theories account for biological phenomena, and how the discovery of new phenomena is to be matched by the elaboration of new theoretical constructs. This is how science works, folks, not a sign of "crisis."
You cannot imagine how pleased I was to see this — not because I was at all concerned about this meeting, but because I've been scribbling down notes for the last few weeks on the subjects I want to discuss in my keynote at GECCO 2008, and that's practically an outline of my plans. I was going to go over some of these concepts and define them and give examples; I didn't have molecular buffers on my list (maybe I'll have to add it), and I was going to say a bit about conservation/canalization vs. plasticity, but at least I'm reassured that I'm on the right track.
Published: June 30, 2008 at 1:29 PM
UPPSALA, Sweden, June 30 (UPI) -- Scientists at Uppsala University in Sweden say newly found fossils from Latvia suggest the transformation of fish into land creatures occurred gradually.
Although it's been long known that the first backboned land animals or "tetrapods" -- the ancestors of amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals, including humans -- evolved from a group of fishes about 370 million years ago during the Devonian period. But scientists had not obtained a complete picture of the intermediate steps in that transition.
But now new fossils of the extremely primitive tetrapod Ventastega, from the Devonian of Latvia, cast light on that key phase of the transition.
"Ventastega was first described from fragmentary material in 1994; since then, excavations have produced lots of new superbly preserved fossils, allowing us to reconstruct the whole head, shoulder girdle and part of the pelvis", says Professor Per Ahlberg.
Reconstructions made by Ahlberg and Assistant Professor Henning Blom, together with British and Latvian colleagues, show Ventastega was more fish-like than any of its contemporaries.
The researchers say it appears different parts of the body evolved at different speeds during the transition from water to land.
The study is detailed in the journal Nature.
By Yomin Postelnik Friday, July 4, 2008
There's a fine line between media bias and an all out smear campaign. That line was stormed by the Associated Press in one of their worst displays of cruel and malicious personal attacks. The victim of their warped campaign: One John Freshwater, two time teacher of the year, the last time being in 2007.
John Freshwater is a teacher, who is well liked and admired by his students. How often is it that we even hear of such a thing in most schools today? But that didn't stop the Associated Press from running one of the most false and incendiary portrayals of an individual ever written.
We all know about media bias and the extent of it. What most readers don't expect of the media is all out character assassination. But the Associated Press lowered the bar yet again, and defamation is now considered to be on equal footing with news reporting.
It is no secret that the average journalist is far to the left of even some of our most liberal politicians. As true radicals, they and their editors engage in tactics that all honest people would consider shameful. And in the eyes of these radicals John Freshwater had committed the ultimate "sin." He told his class that there are two theories to the coming about of the universe, and encouraged them to study up on both and to think for themselves.
The AP didn't go into the merits of either side of the creation vs. evolution debate. That would have forced them to highlight that creationists do have a scientific case, a stronger one than most people know. The AP didn't even write one of their usual one sided pieces, with their standard uncalled for insertion of opinion into news articles. As Freshwater had committed the ultimate sin, he was set up for the ultimate in treatment; false insinuations and malicious character attacks. But in his case, the extent the AP went to was heinous beyond belief.
While the title of the Columbus Dispatch, the closest daily to Freshwater's school, simply read "Teacher Disses Evolution" (itself a stretch), the AP saw more fit to run the insidious headline, "Report: Ohio teacher burned cross on kids' arms".
What really happened is that a few parents, a very small minority, complained that Freshwater had exposed their children to creationism. And while no students complained, as they never saw a reason to oppose being presented all sides of an issue, the few parental complaints resulted in an investigation, one in which Freshwater's merits as a teacher were generally upheld.
However, the report did (as all reports do), list the individual complaints specifically. And one parent, out of an entire class of students, had complained that her child and others had been "branded with cross by Freshwater."
What really happened is that Freshwater demonstrated to a number of students how a high frequency generator worked. What he did was normal for a science class, and the fact that no students and no other parents complained, although Freshwater had demonstrated the device on several students, should make that point clear.
The only complainant was a couple who strongly disagreed with Freshwater's encouragement of free thought. There also seems to have been a monetary factor, as they decided to sue the school district and Freshwater personally.
The litigating couple knows full well that all students who participated in the generator demonstration did so willingly. They also know that no other parents sought to complain.
If they had been around when I was in 7th grade and one of my science teachers had us test our blood to see if we were As, Bs, or Os, we would have been forced to endure investigations into whether our teacher was a vampire, provided that she had also mentioned something to the class that didn't meet with this couple's approval.
But while their actions seem solely designed to smear a respectable teacher whose views they disagree with (and if they can punish him a little bit more with a lawsuit, and maybe even come out ahead if the school district settles, then so be it), they are, at the end of the day, the lone acts of one misguided couple. One would expect better of the Associated Press.
The report does document this lone couple's complaint. All complaints ever launched against Freshwater are documented, as that was the purpose of the report in the first place. But to remove all context from the story is incendiary, as is titling it "teacher burned cross on kids' arms" instead of the more appropriate "Lone Couple Accuses Two Time Teacher Of The Year of Burning Cross Into Students Arms," (assuming the AP would again start capitalizing headlines).
Even the latter title should be followed with the byline, "Launch Lawsuit That No Other Parents Join In," as is the norm when reporting on any wild accusations against an individual while the accusers remain nameless. This is especially true when no one else in the class had a problem and even the alleging couple waited for months to act, which would hardly have been the case if a teacher were actually "branding students with crosses."
A mother who tenderly gives birth to her child can technically, if not accurately, be described as "forcibly shoving her child out, on its birthday!" Indeed, for this reason Freshwater should be glad he's not a woman, as the AP would have most likely added this description to his list of other fictional atrocities, because as shameful as all of the above is, the AP didn't stop there.
The journalist covering the story went after Freshwater with added zeal. It wasn't enough to tarnish him with an inflammatory headline. No mercy would be given to those who encourage free thought in the classroom, in a supposed institution of learning.
The AP reporter, or reporters, went about interviewing Freshwater's colleagues and supervisors. And the more they did, the greater their disappointment. Everyone seemed to believe that he was an excellent teacher.
But since when should a few small facts get in the way of the agenda driven AP? Instead of reporting these positive endorsements, they pressed their subjects harder. After all, if you press long enough, you can twist the words of almost anyone, or otherwise get them to give the type of quote you want. And this is what the AP did. ?When one colleague said that Freshwater is one of the best teachers they know, the AP reporter asked "What about the cross burning?" Of course, the teacher, caught off guard and without experience dealing with goons, replied "aside from the cross burning." And so the AP got their quote "with the exception of the cross burning…… he's teaching the values of the parents… in the school district," painting all of his supporters as loons, when the truth is the exact opposite, that sanity decries the gross injustice done to him.
But don't worry. The AP didn't stop there. They are the AP after all, and they must live up to their agenda. And so they went about digging for dirt among past supervisors.
Once again, the responses they received were anything but what they wished for. The man was genuinely liked. So they asked questions like "has there ever been a complaint against Freshwater before?" (One would be hard pressed to find a public school teacher that hasn't been the subject of parental complaints, even a twice awarded teacher of the year like Jeff Freshwater, especially given the "my child can do no wrong" attitude of some parents today.) To this, they received the answer they wanted.
The AP reporter pressed on, asking how long and frequent the complaints had been. When given the answer that they were few and far between, the AP reporter would ask when the first one happened. Had the first complaint been in the early years, when Freshwater was first hired? Had there been any complaints since? With these questions, the response to which would be "yes" if asked about 90% of long term teachers, the reporter could write that a former supervisor had "dealt with complaints" about the teacher over an extended period of time. That's the AP's way of saying 3 complaints in 11 years when the subject of these complaints is not to their liking.
The blatant character assassination engaged in by the Associated Press should be patently obvious to all readers. Had the teacher indeed "branded students with crosses" it should be as clear as day that no one would have waited for such behavior to turn up in an independent report, nor would this have been ignored by all students and by all parents except for one. But the AP couldn't just run a story on a teacher in trouble for presenting creationism and for keeping a Bible in class. Not when they could smear him personally, portraying a twice awarded Teacher of the Year as one would portray an axe murderer.
The Associated Press could have simply reported that Freshwater taught that creationism has legitimacy. They could have also mentioned that he kept a Bible in class (which he did not even read from aloud or otherwise share with students). Many would have criticized him for that alone, without maliciously attacking his character. I would have personally sided with him, as creationists generally win scientific debates against evolutionists and the intent of the Founding Fathers was never to ban a teacher from keeping a Bible in a classroom, as is clear to any objective reader of US or constitutional history. However, the story would have been accurate, not an act of character slaughter.
Is this what we can expect from militant leftist journalists and editors? Well, from my own experience, the most virulent, radical and dangerous groups that I've come across have been militant atheists. After my recent column on the existence of the Divine, I experienced google stalking, harassing phone calls and was targeted with computer viruses and the like. When they could not successfully attack the substance of the column, or get Canada Free Press to stop running it after launching one of their typical campaigns to stifle free speech, they took to falsely attacking my character. In the end it was all small potatoes and nonsense, but it showed me just how militant some atheists can be. The results for Freshwater have been far worse.
John Freshwater is an exceptional teacher. Just last year he was recognized as the very best in his profession for the second time. This teacher will probably lose his job, not because of the outlandish, shameful and disgraceful coverage of the AP, but because of creationism, which schools have reflexively dismissed without even looking into (in part because of the tactics of militant atheists to stifle free speech and to smear any creationist), and because he kept a personal Bible in class.
I don't know John Freshwater. But I can't help but be touched by his story, his exceptional teaching record and the obviously baseless smears launched against him.
This is disgraceful. But the fact is that I doubt that a teacher on a fixed salary, who now faces losing his job and is the subject of a frivolous lawsuit launched by a couple that took issue with his teaching and therefore sought to smear and malign him in the most ridiculous of ways, is sitting very comfortably. I would therefore urge readers to help this man out with a donation to his legal defense fund. A collection is being raised by the Community Council for Free Expression . I will be sending a check with a copy of the this column and I would urge you to send your own donations to help this man during his trying times. I would also urge readers to write the AP and to demand a retraction and full apology for their baseless and shameful distortions of a twice awarded teacher of the year.
Yomin Postelnik is the President of IRPW, a company that offers business plans, funding advice and facilitation, SBA loan applications, SWOT analyses, bold and effective marketing strategies, general business development and grant writing and research for non-profits and certain qualified businesses. Call today for an initial consultation ? (954) 946-4442 or email ypostelnik@InsidersReview.org
Saturday July 5 2008
Authors look at the evidence, and sound the alarm
AARON DERFEL The Gazette
At a clinic in Wuhan, China, acupuncture is used to treat obesity in teenagers - along with diet and exercise.
The touted cures couldn't be more outlandish: To relieve stress and other mind-related disorders, try a walnut-based remedy, because the walnut, after all, looks like the brain. For those suffering from cancer, inject fermented mistletoe extract into the body because mistletoe bears a striking resemblance to malignant tumours.
As ridiculous as these remedies are, and despite the fact that there is not a shred of evidence that they actually work, millions of people around the world swear by such alternative therapies.
In Trick or Treatment, British authors Simon Singh and Edzard Ernst expose the false claims and profiteering of alternative medicine while sounding the alarm about the dangers of many of the therapies.
The authors are well-suited for the task: Singh is an acclaimed science writer with a PhD in particle physics, while Ernst is an MD, as well as a PhD in the field of blood research. What's more, Ernst is a professor of complementary medicine who used to believe in the efficacy of homeopathy until his scientific studies proved to him otherwise.
Keeping open minds, the authors combed through the results of hundreds of clinical trials on alternative therapies (walnuts and mistletoe included) to determine whether any live up to the hype.
From homeopathy and acupuncture to chiropractic and herbal medicine, alternative health care has grown into an $80-billion-a-year industry. Sadly, with the exception of perhaps massage therapy, they found that much of alternative medicine doesn't work beyond the placebo effect.
"In general, the global multi-billion-(dollar) alternative medicine industry is failing to deliver the sort of health benefits that it claims to offer," they write. "Therefore millions of patients are wasting their money and risking their health by turning towards a snake-oil industry."
But what about the ancient Chinese system of acupuncture? Surely a treatment that has been endorsed by the World Health Organization is more than just quackery?
The authors reveal how the WHO endorsement was highly politicized and has since been discredited. They cite the latest scientific papers that show that acupuncture is useless for the treatment of addiction, Bell's palsy, stroke rehabilitation and many other ailments it purports to heal. Studies have demonstrated that it is somewhat effective for pain and nausea, but the authors suggest that many conventional drugs do a better job. And they warn that acupuncture is not without risk: there have been cases of accidental lung punctures and of patients contracting hepatitis from needles that were not sterilized.
Homeopathy doesn't fare any better. Based on the premise of "like cures like," homeopathic medicines are supposed to contain infinitesimal traces of active ingredients. But the authors argue quite persuasively that these medicines are nothing more than expensive sugar pills. Again, they warn that some patients with serious illness might be endangering their lives if they take homeopathic medicines to the exclusion of proven conventional treatments.
The sections on chiropractic and herbal medicine - which, incidentally, relate a number of Canadian case studies - are equally damning. The authors tell the story of Laurie Mathiason, a young woman from Saskatoon who died of a ruptured vertebral artery following a chiropractic neck manipulation. And they relate the case of Charlene Dorcy, a Vancouver woman who suffered from severe depression and paranoid schizophrenia. Even though she had been responding well to one of her medications, Dorcy switched to St. John's wort.
Although the herbal medicine has been shown to be effective in the treatment of mild to moderate depression, it's not appropriate for severe depression or schizophrenia and can interfere with other drugs. Several weeks after taking St. John's wort, Dorcy drove her two children to an abandoned quarry, shot them to death and then gave herself up to police.
(The authors also evaluate 36 other alternative therapies - from the Indian Ayurvedic tradition to colonic irrigation - in an easy-to-read appendix. The observations are mostly negative.)
Despite their brilliant and often amusing critique of alternative therapies, the authors nonetheless fail to recognize the irony of how mainstream medicine has contributed to the problem. The authors are quick to blame the news media for trumpeting alternative therapies, as 60 Minutes did in a piece on shark cartilage. They accuse universities of lowering their academic standards by offering programs in homeopathy, and they criticize governments for neglecting to regulate the industry.
But aside from a half-page mention of the rudeness and arrogance of some doctors, Singh and Ernst don't address how shady practices in modern medicine are driving many people to alternative therapies. No cases are reported about conflicts of interest among physicians, falsified medical research or how drug companies have systematically withheld negative results of some of their studies. Given the continuing paternalistic attitude by the medical establishment and its lack of transparency, some people could be forgiven for turning to alternative therapies.
However, before doing so, people who look favourably on
Q-rings, crystals and magnet therapy should read Trick or Treatment. Its dissection of the industry should make them think twice about popping a homeopathic pill.
Aaron Derfel is a Gazette health reporter.
TRICK OR TREATMENT? ALTERNATIVE MEDICINE ON TRIAL
By Simon Singh and Edzard Ernst
Bantam Press, 342 pages, $34.95
© The Gazette (Montreal) 2008
Posted July 5, 2008 | 04:36 AM (EST)
Read More: Bobby Jindal, Bobby Jindal Governor, Intelligent Design
NEW ORLEANS -- Aside from his recent 180 on the recent legislative pay raise bill (which spawned recall petitions against, among others, him), Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal's honeymoon period has been most severely damaged by his support of a bill allowing "scientific criticism" of evolution to be taught in public schools. (The quote is not from the bill itself, but from a supporter, a "senior fellow" at the pro-intelligent design Discovery Institute.) Jindal had openly supported the teaching of intelligent design during his gubernatorial campaign, in what was widely interpreted as an appeal to northern Louisiana's conservative Republicans.
So now comes a judicial opinion in the case of Kitzmiller vs. Dover Area School District, a decision by an appointee of George W. Bush, that rules a local school district's attempt to allow the teaching of intelligent design is unconstitutional. You might expect liberal websites to applaud the decision, but take a look at the reaction from conservative blog Little Green Footballs:
The resulting decision was an utter defeat for the intelligent design shills; star witness Michael Behe was forced to admit under cross examination that there are no peer-reviewed articles by ID advocates, and that the definition of "scientific theory" he was attempting to promote was so vague it could also be applied to astrology. (Despite this crushing blow, the ID movement refuses to go quietly into that dark night.)
The judge in the case, John E. Jones III, a Republican appointed by George W. Bush, ruled that the school district's decision was unconstitutional, and issued a 139 page decision (available here) that's remarkable for the conclusions it reaches about the origins and nature of the "intelligent design" movement, and very harsh in its criticism of the groups and individuals who promote it.
LGF includes copious quotes from the judge's decision, which are well worth reading. Has Governor Jindal ejected himself from the Veep Rocket whose trajectory seemed so impressive just two weeks ago? And has he guaranteed a court battle in Louisiana likely to echo Kitzmiller?
Posted July 5th, 2008 at 9:00 am
Guest Post by Morbo
Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal has signed legislation allowing public school teachers to use "supplemental materials" in class when teaching about evolution. This is necessary, the new laws says, to promote "academic freedom." After all, everyone knows evolution is "controversial."
What will these "supplemental materials" be like? It's hard to say because the law does not describe them. It does state, however, that these materials are not supposed to promote religion. This was thrown in as a sop to pinkos, rabble-rousers and other malcontents who actually believe the Constitution should be obeyed even in Louisiana.
Louisiana, of course, has a long history of being on the cutting edge of science. Weary of plain old evolution science, bold Louisiana lawmakers in 1981 decided to supplement it with "creation science." A law required both to be taught side by side so that the kids could decide which was true.
Unfortunately, extremists on the Supreme Court who hate academic freedom struck down the law. Louisianans quickly regrouped. Some parishes began pasting stickers in science books, warning that evolution was discussed within. But courts looked with disfavor on this as well.
So now we go to round three and the new "supplemental materials" law. But many still wonder, what exactly are these sources?
Wonder no more.
It took a long time, but I was able to use my sources in Louisiana to get a list of them from the state Board of Education. I think you'll agree the use of these "supplements" in the classroom will help Louisiana keeps its reputation as the most scientifically literate state in the nation:
1. DVDs of "Flintstones" reruns. Kids can learn a lot from these. For example, they show how humans and dinosaurs not only lived together back in the day but also demonstrate early man's ability to harness the power of dinosaurs to improve his own life. Fred Flinstone's job at the rock quarry is a good example. Dinosaurs there helped him lift and smash rocks for the betterment of all.
2. "Land of the Lost" episodes. Not everyone is comfortable using "Flintstones" reruns in class. Let's face it, the closing theme songs does promise that "when you're with the Flintstones…you'll have a gay old time," and Fred and Barney did seem awfully close in some episodes. For these folks, "Land of the Lost" is the perfect in-class supplement. This series teaches important science lessons. For example, did you know that you can use a giant log to swat dinosaurs and that there are many ways to outwit bizarre, bipedal lizard men?
3. The Special Book. The Special Book, which is not the Bible, is full of interesting old stories about the way people used to live a long time ago and this great friend they had in the sky who would help them. Although it's most definitely not the Bible, you can learn a lot by reading the Special Book because it teaches a lot about science. The Special Book teaches us so much about every topic. But don't think it's the Bible! Because it most certainly is not. No, it's not the Bible. No siree!
4. "Evolution, Schmevolution" by the staff of the Discovery Institute. This fascinating new tome by the wacky gang of Ph.D. actual SCIENTISTS who do real science at the scientifically oriented Discovery Institute, the nation's leading think tank promoting good science, scientific literacy, academic freedom and science, sciency science, real cool science, he-man science, science and super-science, explains how 99.9 percent of the world's biologists, paleontologists, anthropologists and geologists are wrong and how people were really designed by a Special Force, as fully explained in the Special Book — the book that is not the Bible, by the way.
5. Louisiana Special Science Bulletin 43.9-A, "Evolution: Not as Solid as You Think," distributed by the Louisiana Department of Education and produced by Focus on the Family in conjunction with the Louisiana Pastors' Council, the Southern Baptist Convention and the Federation of Independent, Fundamentalist, Non-Instrumental Churches of Jesus Christ in God the Holy Redeemer of the Blessed Holy Ghost (Non-Pentecostal) with input from the Pentecostal Assembly of the Holy Spirit-Thrice Blessed Redeeming Blood of the Most Precious Jesus. Comes with a special supplement for use in sex-education classes that has also been endorsed by Focus on the Family and Louisiana Citizens for Decency: "Supplemental Storks: New Findings Cast Doubt on Sperm-and-Egg Theory." Both bulletins are totally scientific, having been casually proofread by a guy who, before he entered the ministry, considered majoring in biology at Bob Jones University.
I know it's a short list, but it's likely a lot more valuable material will be added once the law really gets into effect. It makes me jealous. I wish my children were learning cutting edge supplemental science instead of boring old regular science.
Posted on: July 4, 2008 4:22 PM, by Greg Laden
From the National Center for Science Education:
Over the protests of leading scientific organizations such as the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Institute of Biological Sciences, Louisiana's governor Bobby Jindal signed Senate Bill 733 into law, twenty-seven years after the state passed its Balanced Treatment for Evolution-Science and Creation-Science Act, a law overturned by the Supreme Court in 1987. News of Jindal's approval of the bill was buried in a press release issued on June 25, 2008, in which Jindal listed seventy-five bills he recently signed. SB 733 will, according to Houma Today (June 27, 2008), "empower educators to pull religious beliefs into topics like evolution, cloning and global warming by introducing supplemental materials."
The New Orleans Times-Picayune broke the story on June 27, 2008, observing that "Jindal attracted national attention and strongly worded advice about how he should deal with the Louisiana Science Education Act," and that he "ignored those calling for a veto and this week signed the law that will allow local school boards to approve supplemental materials for public school science classes as they discuss evolution, cloning and global warming." While Jindal did not return media calls for comment, the newspaper quoted a statement of his that read in part, "I will continue to consistently support the ability of school boards and BESE [the state board of elementary and secondary education] to make the best decisions to ensure a quality education for our children."
Local teachers are concerned that the bill could open the door to creationism. As the Lafayette Daily Advertiser reported (June 26, 2008), "The possibility of the introduction of 'wacko' theories of the origins of life Carencro High School science teacher Warren Sensat." Sensat told the newspaper, "When you open the door to bring in unapproved curriculum, you can bring in some wacko stuff." Other teachers were less worried. After interviewing Tim Tate, a science curriculum supervisor for the Lafayette Parish schools, the Advertiser reported that "he's not worried about teachers using inappropriate materials. He expects teachers to only focus on the state curriculum, but acknowledges that different ideas will always be brought into the classroom."
Ars Technica's John Timmer points out (June 27, 2008), however, that "most observers are expecting the passage of the LSEA by the state to unleash a series of Dover-style cases, as various local boards attempt to discover the edges of what's constitutionally allowable," citing a letter from Alan I. Leshner, CEO of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, who told Jindal that the bill would "provoke an expensive, divisive legal fight." Timmer argues that, "In essence, Jindal is inviting local school boards to partake in that explosion without committing the state to paying the inevitable costs. In the meantime, the students of the state will be subjected to an 'anything goes' approach to science -- if it looks scientific to a school board, it can appear in the classroom."
Conservative columnist John Derbyshire echoed these fears, writing (on The Corner, the blog of National Review Online, June 20, 2008), "The entire effect of this law will be that one cartload of Louisiana taxpayers' money will go to the Discovery Institute for their mendacious 'textbooks,' then another cartload will go into the pockets of lawyers to defend the inevitable challenge to the law in federal courts, which will inevitably be successful, as they always are, and should be." Like Leshner as well as The New York Times editorial board, Derbyshire called on Jindal to veto the bill, writing, "Veto this bill, Gov. Jindal, or explain to Louisiana taxpayers the pointless waste of public money that will inevitably ensue from your signing it."
Barbara Forrest, a member of NCSE's board of directors and of the Louisiana Coalition for Science, was quoted in a story from the Associated Press (June 27, 2008) as expressing her concern that, now that SB 733 is law, "Any school board can permit any teacher to put any type of creationist supplement into a classroom and use it until they get caught." Addressing the supporters of the bill in a June 27, 2008, press release, Louisiana Citizens for Science warned, "We intend to hold you to your public assertions that no creationist materials will be used in our children's science classes and that no religious concepts will be presented to our children as science." The group also offered its support for students, teachers, and parents concerned with the integrity of science education.
The bill's opponents say that they are ready to take action should such problems arise. "We're known for suing school boards when we need to do so and we won't shy away from doing that if that's what we need to do this case," Marjorie Esman, the executive director of the ACLU of Louisiana, told WWL-TV (June 24, 2008). And the Reverend Barry Lynn, the executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, took a firm stance in a press release (June 27, 2008): "Let me state clearly and upfront that any attempts to use this law to sneak religion into public schools through the back door will not be tolerated. I call on all concerned residents of Louisiana to help us make sure that public schools educate, not indoctrinate."
LOUISIANA'S GOVERNOR SIGNS ANTIEVOLUTION BILL
Over the protests of leading scientific organizations such as the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Institute of Biological Sciences, Louisiana's governor Bobby Jindal signed Senate Bill 733 into law, twenty-seven years after the state passed its Balanced Treatment for Evolution-Science and Creation-Science Act, a law overturned by the Supreme Court in 1987. News of Jindal's approval of the bill was buried in a press release issued on June 25, 2008, in which Jindal listed seventy-five bills he recently signed. SB 733 will, according to Houma Today (June 27, 2008), "empower educators to pull religious beliefs into topics like evolution, cloning and global warming by introducing supplemental materials."
The New Orleans Times-Picayune broke the story on June 27, 2008, observing that "Jindal attracted national attention and strongly worded advice about how he should deal with the Louisiana Science Education Act," and that he "ignored those calling for a veto and this week signed the law that will allow local school boards to approve supplemental materials for public school science classes as they discuss evolution, cloning and global warming." While Jindal did not return media calls for comment, the newspaper quoted a statement of his that read in part, "I will continue to consistently support the ability of school boards and BESE [the state board of elementary and secondary education] to make the best decisions to ensure a quality education for our children."
Local teachers are concerned that the bill could open the door to creationism. As the Lafayette Daily Advertiser reported (June 26, 2008), "The possibility of the introduction of 'wacko' theories of the origins of life Carencro High School science teacher Warren Sensat." Sensat told the newspaper, "When you open the door to bring in unapproved curriculum, you can bring in some wacko stuff." Other teachers were less worried. After interviewing Tim Tate, a science curriculum supervisor for the Lafayette Parish schools, the Advertiser reported that "he's not worried about teachers using inappropriate materials. He expects teachers to only focus on the state curriculum, but acknowledges that different ideas will always be brought into the classroom."
Ars Technica's John Timmer points out (June 27, 2008), however, that "most observers are expecting the passage of the LSEA by the state to unleash a series of Dover-style cases, as various local boards attempt to discover the edges of what's constitutionally allowable," citing a letter from Alan I. Leshner, CEO of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, who told Jindal that the bill would "provoke an expensive, divisive legal fight." Timmer argues that, "In essence, Jindal is inviting local school boards to partake in that explosion without committing the state to paying the inevitable costs. In the meantime, the students of the state will be subjected to an 'anything goes' approach to science -- if it looks scientific to a school board, it can appear in the classroom."
Conservative columnist John Derbyshire echoed these fears, writing (on The Corner, the blog of National Review Online, June 20, 2008), "The entire effect of this law will be that one cartload of Louisiana taxpayers' money will go to the Discovery Institute for their mendacious 'textbooks,' then another cartload will go into the pockets of lawyers to defend the inevitable challenge to the law in federal courts, which will inevitably be successful, as they always are, and should be." Like Leshner as well as The New York Times editorial board, Derbyshire called on Jindal to veto the bill, writing, "Veto this bill, Gov. Jindal, or explain to Louisiana taxpayers the pointless waste of public money that will inevitably ensue from your signing it."
Barbara Forrest, a member of NCSE's board of directors and of the Louisiana Coalition for Science, was quoted in a story from the Associated Press (June 27, 2008) as expressing her concern that, now that SB 733 is law, "Any school board can permit any teacher to put any type of creationist supplement into a classroom and use it until they get caught." Addressing the supporters of the bill in a June 27, 2008, press release, Louisiana Citizens for Science warned, "We intend to hold you to your public assertions that no creationist materials will be used in our children's science classes and that no religious concepts will be presented to our children as science." The group also offered its support for students, teachers, and parents concerned with the integrity of science education.
The bill's opponents say that they are ready to take action should such problems arise. "We're known for suing school boards when we need to do so and we won't shy away from doing that if that's what we need to do this case," Marjorie Esman, the executive director of the ACLU of Louisiana, told WWL-TV (June 24, 2008). And the Reverend Barry Lynn, the executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, took a firm stance in a press release (June 27, 2008): "Let me state clearly and upfront that any attempts to use this law to sneak religion into public schools through the back door will not be tolerated. I call on all concerned residents of Louisiana to help us make sure that public schools educate, not indoctrinate."
For the text of SB 733 (PDF), visit:
http://www.legis.state.la.us/billdata/streamdocument.asp?did=482728
For the press release from Governor Jindal, visit:
http://www.gov.louisiana.gov/index.cfm?md=newsroom&tmp=detail&catID=2&articleID=272
For the story in Houma Today, visit:
http://www.houmatoday.com/article/20080627/ARTICLES/806270305/1211
For the story in the New Orleans Times-Picayune, visit:
http://www.nola.com/education/t-p/index.ssf?/base/news-4/1214544279127670.xml&coll=1
For the story in the Lafayette Advertiser, visit:
http://www.theadvertiser.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080626/NEWS01/806260311
For John Timmer's column at Ars Technica, visit:
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080627-louisiana-passes-first-antievolution-academic-freedom-law.html
For John Derbyshire's column at National Review Online, visit:
http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=YjM2ODY1N2E1NGZkYTJiNDEyYWMyMWQzYTQzYWYxODU
For the Associated Press story (via the New Orleans Times-Picayune), visit:
http://www.nola.com/newsflash/index.ssf?/base/news-40/121459256184230.xml&storylist=louisiana
For the WWL-TV story, visit:
http://www.wwltv.com/local/stories/wwl062408tpscienceact.37767059.html
For Americans United's press release, visit:
http://www.au.org/site/News2?JServSessionIdr009=p677zibu94.app7b&abbr=pr&page=NewsArticle&id=9913&security=1002&news_iv_ctrl=1241
And for NCSE's previous coverage of events in Louisiana, visit:
http://www.ncseweb.org/pressroom.asp?state=LA
SCIENCE SUPERVISOR CHRIS COMER SUES TEXAS EDUCATION AGENCY
Chris Comer, the Director of Science at the Texas Education Agency (TEA) who was forced to resign over a dispute involving intelligent design, has filed suit in Federal District Court for redress. Comer seeks:
-a declaratory judgment that the TEA policy of being "neutral" on the subject of creationism violates the Establishment Clause; -a declaratory judgment that Comer's firing was unconstitutional; -an offer from the TEA of reinstatement of Comer to her previous position as Director of Science; -an injunction against TEA "having, expressing, or imposing through any means, a policy of 'neutrality' with respect to the teaching of creationism in the Texas public schools, or a policy that expressly or implicitly equates evolution and creationism, or that in any way credits creationism as a valid scientific theory"; -legal fees
Comer's offense was that she forwarded an email from NCSE's Glenn Branch announcing a talk by NCSE board member Dr. Barbara Forrest, co-author of Creationism's Trojan Horse, a critique of intelligent design creationism. Administrators reprimanded her for having informed her colleagues about the upcoming talk because it implied "that TEA endorses the speaker's position on a topic on which the agency must remain neutral."
Comer's suit takes to task the TEA's policy of "neutrality" regarding creationism, a religious view. "[T]he Agency's firing of its Director of Science for not remaining 'neutral' on the subject violates the Establishment Clause, because it employs the symbolic and financial support of the State of Texas to achieve a religious purpose, and so has the purpose or effect of endorsing religion. By professing 'neutrality,' the Agency credits creationism as a valid scientific theory. Finally, the Agency fired Director Comer without according her due process as required by the 14th Amendment -- a protection especially important here because Director Comer was fired for contravening and unconstitutional policy."
NCSE will keep you informed.
For a copy of Comer's legal complaint, visit:
http://www.ncseweb.org/pdf/ComerComplaint.pdf
For previous NCSE coverage of Comer's firing, visit:
http://www.ncseweb.org/resources/news/2007/TX/950_texas_education_official_force_11_29_2007.asp
http://www.ncseweb.org/resources/news/2007/TX/141_the_comer_controversy_continue_12_14_2007.asp
For NCSE's video featuring Chris Comer, visit:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sQacQy1KJ9M
And for NCSE's previous coverage of events in Louisiana, visit:
http://www.ncseweb.org/pressroom.asp?state=TX
EXPELLED OPENS IN CANADA
The pro-"intelligent design" movie Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, starring Ben Stein, opened on June 27, 2008, in theaters across Canada. But the opening was significantly smaller than the movie's April 2008 debut in the United States, when it played on over a thousand screens. In Canada, according to the movie's website, it is screening in only thirty-six theaters in seven provinces.
Canadian critics have been as unimpressed with the movie as their American colleagues. The Toronto Globe & Mail (June 27, 2008) called it "an appallingly unscrupulous example of hack propaganda," while Maclean's critic wrote (June 26, 2008), "I found this film so distasteful I hesitate to dignify it with even a thumbnail review," and the Edmonton Vue Weekly (June 26, 2008) described it as "full of disingenuous ploys, cheap tricks, and outright mendacity."
Peter McKnight, a columnist for the Vancouver Sun (June 21, 2008), asked Stein for his reaction to the Anti-Defamation League's statement condeming the movie's misuse of the Holocaust to further its antievolution agenda, to which Stein replied, "It's none of their f---ing business." City blog Torontoist, part of the New York-based Gothamist network, also interviewed (June 23, 2008) Stein, who explained that criticism of the movie emanated from "the self-selected atheist elite."
A story in the June 13, 2008, National Post reports on a publicity stunt in which a group of protesters who left a private screening of Expelled and marched to the Royal Ontario Museum, which is currently hosting "The Evolution Revolution," an exhibit on the life and work of Charles Darwin. The leader of the group, Canada Christian College president Charles McVety, said that Darwin "taught hatred and devaluation of life and death."
For the quoted reviews, visit:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20080627.wexpelled27/BNStory/Entertainment/
http://blog.macleans.ca/2008/06/26/film-reviews-wanted-and-expelled-no-intelligence-allowed
http://www.vueweekly.com/article.php?id=8848
For Peter McKnight's column, visit:
http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/story.html?id=f022096b-6832-4ec1-929d-92e8bc337364
For Torontist's column, visit:
http://torontoist.com/2008/06/ben_stein_maybe_not_expelled_but_at_1.php
For the story in the National Post, visit:
http://www.nationalpost.com/todays_paper/story.html?id=583131
And for NCSE's collection of information about Expelled, visit:
http://www.ExpelledExposed.com
Thanks for reading! And as always, be sure to consult NCSE's web site: http://www.ncseweb.org where you can always find the latest news on evolution education and threats to it.
Sincerely,
Glenn Branch
Deputy Director
National Center for Science Education, Inc.
420 40th Street, Suite 2
Oakland, CA 94609-2509
510-601-7203 x305
fax: 510-601-7204
800-290-6006
branch@ncseweb.org
http://www.ncseweb.org
Not in Our Classrooms: Why Intelligent Design Is Wrong for Our Schools
http://www.ncseweb.org/nioc
Eugenie C. Scott's Evolution vs. Creationism
http://www.ncseweb.org/evc
NCSE's work is supported by its members. Join today!
http://www.ncseweb.org/membership.asp