I happened to be a little slow confronting the Bobby Jindal/War on Science news coming out of Louisiana, and as soon as I got my post up yesterday my email inbox was flooded with some strange news from the Discovery Institute (DI).
I highlighted in my previous post the new legislation supposing to bring "academic freedom" into Louisiana's high schools by way of allowing outside supplemental material to be brought into science classes. This new scheme though has no title, no name, and no identifying features other than to highlight the need for academic freedom, but only when the issue is evolution. The Bad Idea Blog sums it up pretty nicely:
The obvious trick in all of these bills is that they never specify a standard of accuracy that such criticisms have to meet, and they are often vague as to who is going to evaluate or enforce that standard in any case.
Scientists in general already do a pretty good job of including actual scientific controversy and ambiguity in textbooks and curricula, which makes these bills basically an invitation to introduce legally protected psuedoscience into local classrooms. If this sounds a little too much like the "teach the controversy" strategy of the original creationists, well, you and I are like the 800th and 801st people to notice that.
Whether it is publicly stated or not the DI is right now the leading public institution behind these bills and behind the majority of creationist/intelligent design/academic freedom/untitled "research" and promotion of evolution's faults. Casey Luskin, resident lawyer and cheerleader for the DI has posted an article that contains a major gaffe while trying to throw doubt on recent work by paleontologist Neil Shubin, discoverer of the transitional tetrapod Tiktaalik and the author of the excellent book "Your Inner Fish."
Here is Luskin's argument straight from his mouth.
1. Shubin et al.: "The intermedium and ulnare of Tiktaalik
have homologues to eponymous wrist bones of tetrapods with which they
share similar positions and articular relations." (Note: I have labeled
the intermedium and ulnare of Tiktaalik in the diagram below.)
Translation: OK, then exactly which "wrist bones of tetrapods" are Tiktaalik’s
bones homologous to? Shubin doesn’t say. This is a technical scientific
paper, so a few corresponding "wrist bone"-names from tetrapods would
seem appropriate. But Shubin never gives any.
Eponymous, adj: Of, relating to, or being the person after which something is named.
That quick wiktionary search just debunked Luskin's whole argument. Eponymous basically means similarly or derivitatively named, which means Shubin has given the names for the corresponding tetrapod bones (they have the same names in tetrapods as they do in Tiktaalik).
Understandably this was probably a mistake and had Luskin done the proper research (ie: get a fucking dictionary if you don't know what a word means) he would have realized his mistake, but this is one of the guy's that is going to be leading the push for so-called "academic freedom" concerning evolution. He works for an institute who's purpose is to try and punch holes in evolution and bring those holes into the public discussion.
If this is the type of "critical thinking" that the DI is trying to push into school's I think it worth people's time to see just how insufficient the DI's work is. Unfortunately this is where being a lay person and being an expert butt heads, experts are far more qualified to establish what is good and what is crap research. Lay people have trouble understanding the intricacies involved with technical jargon and statistical modeling, which is why we have experts in the first place.
I guess what I'm really trying to get at here is that the guy claiming a grand conspiracy of evolution and promoting the right to question and rethink the dogma himself cannot complete a rational analysis of the data. There is already an institution set up to monitor and judge the worthiness of a paper/journal/theory and that is the scientific community themselves. Scientists, are generally skeptical of claims made in papers. I know when I read a paper, even if I like what it says the first thing I do is scrutinize the figures and tables looking for a weakness or misrepresentation. I like to scour references to further examine the strength of the paper until I am satisfied that the author has interpreted the data correctly. And then here's the kicker; I get on the internet and search through the blogs of those guys who are experts in the field, because my opinion means very little compared to these guys.
In fact, Carl Zimmer and PZ Myers both share their thoughts on Luskin's flub in a far more meaningful way than I can. Hopefully I will one day join them among the ranks of the experts, confident that I can tease meaning away from the primary literature. Until then I must defer to the experts and simply add in my little thoughts. I would hope that the google scholars and high school teachers/administrators could understand this point. Leave the job of science to the scientists.
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So the White House issued a press release today discussing Bushie's recent talks with Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki. Apparently, everything is moving along nicely over there, but Bush reiterated his opposition to any time lines for troop withdrawals.
You can't win a war if you have an artificial timetable for withdrawal.... Artificial timetable for withdrawal send the wrong message to the Iraqis, they're seeing it's not worth it. There's a lot of Iraqis over there determined -- trying to make up their mind whether they want to be a part of democracy, or whether or not they're going to take to the hills and see what happens. Artificial timetable for withdrawal, an early withdrawal before this finishes sends the message to the enemy, we were right about America. That's what they said. Al Qaeda has said it's just a matter of time before America withdraws. They're weak, they're corrupt, they can't stand it, and they'll withdraw. And all that would do is confirm what the enemy thinks.
Oh wait, that was from
2006. Apparently, Bush has been doing some McCain-style flip-flopping. Time lines equal surrender and failure and scary things. But "
horizons" for troop reductions are just
awesome, simply the natural course of the
super-successful surge.
In the area of security cooperation, the President and the Prime Minister agreed that improving conditions should allow for the agreements now under negotiation to include a general time horizon for meeting aspirational goals -- such as the resumption of Iraqi security control in their cities and provinces and the further reduction of U.S. combat forces from Iraq.
Ok, so I have a question. I'm pretty sure that when Democrats (and other sentient beings) have called for a time line for troop withdrawals from Iraq, they we asking for something like "Down by 50% in 2 years, down to no more than 20,000 in 4 years, contingent on conditions permitting." I don't remember anyone credible demanding a time line which called for every single US service member to be outside of the Iraqi borders by June 10th, 2009 at 8 am, no exceptions. And my question is, what the hell is the difference between setting a time line, which according to Bush is tantamount to recasting the Statue of Liberty in Osama Bin Laden's image, and setting a horizon? They mean the same damn thing! They are both a tentative plan under which our leadership attempts to reduce the number of American forces in Iraq. From
Obama's website:
The removal of our troops will be responsible and phased, directed by military commanders on the ground and done in consultation with the Iraqi government. Military experts believe we can safely redeploy combat brigades from Iraq at a pace of 1 to 2 brigades a month that would remove them in 16 months. That would be the summer of 2010 – more than 7 years after the war began.
Nothing about that plan even implies a "date-certain" deadline. Seems to be another example of the Bush/McCain strategy
suddenly mirroring what Obama and other Democrats have been advocating for years.
Obviously the difference is the source. When Dems call for...well...anything, it is
treason and betrayal, but if the Bush Cabal makes the same determination, its part of their carefully planned and patriotic vision for Victory.
Obviously.
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Louisiana, with strong support from it's Rhodes Scholar Governor, Bobby Jindall, recently signed into law the "Science Education Act." The stated goal of the legislation is to allow for "academic freedom" in high schools with the respect to teaching science (more on academic freedom later), but this is in fact a cover for the true reason behind the law, to allow the teaching of religious ideals at the expense of examining the evidence and reasoning that have led to the modern synthesis of science.
Under the Act Louisiana teachers may, under protection of the law, "use supplementary textbooks and other instructional materials to help students understand, analyze, critique, and review scientific theories in an objective manner." The law is also explicitly clear on prohibiting teaching religion in the name of science, stating that its provisions "shall not be construed to promote any religious doctrine." This is the biggest lie I've seen in legislation in a while, although I understand why its there, to protect the constitutionality of the law. By denouncing religious motivation the Act will not be subject to federal separation laws, but the law itself is meant to encourage unconstitutional behavior from local school boards.
Here's where the tricky part comes in, the ACLU knows they can't challenge the law in court as it was deftly written to conform to constitutional standards, but its implications will not be covered under the law. If religion is brought into a science classroom the ACLU will sue, or parents who were irked by religious instruction will sue. This will produce a noisy, expensive federal lawsuit, followed by even noisier and more expensive appeals. Guess where a local school board is going to get the money to fight these lawsuits; the property owners of the school district. The Discovery Institute (DI), a creationist think-tank and clear leader in the anti-science movement, helped support this bill and promoted it over the state. Where will they be when the shit hits the fan and these same school boards are being sued and need the legal and monetary support?
Defending creationist school boards isn't the DI's game, they like to a) sell creationist textbooks and b) keep creationism in the news so they can keep the lecture gigs and wealthy funders going. Just like in the Dover case, where the DI's own book was put on trial, once the books were sold the Institute left the school board and their taxpayers to fend for themselves.
Hoodwinked, being played, becoming the patsy, these are all good ways to describe what the DI did to Louisiana. The motivation behind this should be pretty transparent, the DI really really wants to start selling more books in the classroom and they'll encourage state legislators and clueless governors to enact laws that tempt local school boards to unconstitutional behavior. And when the sucker school boards are spending their own tax dollars on the defense of a hopeless bill the DI will say they had absolutely nothing to do with it, they just offered support to an academic freedom bill.
Now what exactly is academic freedom? The American Association of University Professors' definition refers to the ability to do research and publish outside of the influence of administrators. The National Center for Science Education (NCSE) says that this bill has co-opted and misused the term to appeal to the public. Academic freedom is not a principle that applies to high school. Yes we want you to be able to question the evidence and understand the critical thinking process that led to the interpretation of data, but you are not doing research and publishing. High school is a place for students to learn the basics of science so that they may pursue and take full advantage of academic freedom in a university setting and beyond.
This time the DI's motivation was promoting the book, Explore Evolution, a text offering the standard intelligent design critiques of evolution. But unlike its predecessor, Of Pandas and People, which fared badly during the Dover trial, it does not use the term "intelligent design."
They're learning what it takes to pass laws that can stand the test of constitutionality while at the same time allowing individuals to perform unconstitutional acts through a false protection of the law. The DI will certainly benefit in two years when the Supreme Court hears a case that references their book many many times.
Another big problem I have with this law is the availability of students to attend a school that will teach religion. Louisiana has a multitude of catholic schools who will give your child a good religious background, but you may want to be careful because they study evolution in their sciences classes (with the support of the Vatican). Another option is to home school the kid and you can teach him whatever he wants, that's true academic freedom. Just don't expect him to be a doctor or a scientist when you send him to college and his "science" background fails miserably at preparing him for college science courses.
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Our friends over at Left of College Station blog have an interesting article concerning race relations if Obama is in fact elected President. Read it here...
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Earlier this week I blogged about the U.K.'s return to endemic measles status, which can be traced back to one man, Andrew Wakefield (the U.K. forced him to move, and guess where he ended up? Texas!). At the same time I told Jenny McCarthy to "pack her shit up and head to Europe where people have already decided to stop vaccinating their children," but it looks as if I spoke too soon.
On the back of the 'vaccines cause autism and I don't care what your fucking science says cause moms know best' crusade there has been a decline in childhood vaccination, and guess what happened?
In the U.S. since May, 127 cases of confirmed measles in 15 states has been confirmed. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has traced the outbreak to travelers who became sick overseas and then returned to the U.S. and infected others.
This is significant because in 1963 a vaccination campaign began in the U.S. to eliminate measles, endemic spread of the disease was halted in the 1980's and in 2000 the ongoing transmission of the virus was declared eliminated!
But here we are again, because people who have lived privileged lives don't understand the suffering that a contagion can cause. I don't know for sure and I can't look into medical records to prove it but I bet Jenny McCarthy was vaccinated when she was a child. Unfortunately the 250,000 children under the age of 5 that die yearly from measles don't have that same opportunity. And now that the continuity in the vaccination scheme has been interrupted and herd immunity has been undermined the chances for epidemic mechanics to set in have been brought back.
Fox News (of all the places) has a very good report on the situation and a good fact page for Measles. I'll cherry pick a few of the facts here:
-Worldwide, 20 million cases of measles still occur every year, and the disease is a significant cause of vaccine-preventable death among children.
-In 2005, 311,000 children under the age of 5 died from the disease.
-Measles vaccine can prevent this disease.
The most striking fact to me is the 20 million new cases every year. Think of how many personal interactions just one of those 20 million carriers has everyday, how many chances there are to spread to another individual. If the disease is brought back to the U.S. (which it does daily; illegal border crossings, plane, boat, by mail) then those people who were not vaccinated are at serious risk of infection. To a healthy young adult this may not mean much as a healthy body can deal with the infection and treatments rather well, but those who are compromised, in bad health, or who are very young are at a great risk of having their lives put in danger. Even if death doesn't occur, about 1 in 1,000 measles cases presents with inflammation of the brain, a condition which could affect the mental or physical capacities of someone for the rest of their lives.
Some selected quotes from the reports:
"With the whole debate about vaccines — and now parents due to their personal beliefs not vaccinating their children — what we are seeing now is that we are going to have these epidemic outbreaks throughout the country," said Dr. Manny Alvarez, managing editor of health at FOXNews.com.
"If this continues, we will see outbreaks throughout the entire developed world — something we have never seen before," he added. "What you have to remember is that 250,000 children die from this virus every year," Alvarez added. "So, vaccinations have to be a priority for parents because at the end of the day if you get measles, you can live through it, but in some particular cases you're going to have complications."
"The primary reason for lack of vaccination is personal belief exemptions," the CDC's Dr. Larry Pickering told a news conference arranged by the National Foundation for Infectious
Diseases.
"Until better global control is achieved, cases will continue to be imported into the United States and outbreaks
will persist as long as there are communities of unvaccinated people," Pickering said.
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Hokkaido, Japan was the setting for a rather unusual exchange between world leaders. As the G8's meetings on climate change and policy were wrapping up George Bush decided he would say "goodbye from the world's biggest polluter" and then pump his fist in the air and smile.
The rest of those in the room sat in silence, shocked that they had just heard that statement on the back of the most important climate talks between nations. And that is a hard thing to do, most of the people in the room were world leaders who have made a career out of speaking their mind. And maybe they were stunned because it wasn't so off-the-wall that he would say something like that.
As The Independent put it, the "remarks were taken as a two-fingered salute from the President from Texas who is wedded to the oil industry. He had given some ground at the summit by saying he would "seriously consider" a 50 per cent cut in carbon emissions by 2050."
Bush's comment was most likely an attempt at humor after a few grueling days of talks, but I think it speaks volumes about the administration's views towards environmental protection, conservation, and securing the best basis for economic growth in the future. If this was a meeting of the Coalition for Life or MADD I doubt Bushie would've injected levity about those U.S.'s transgressions, but the health of our planet and finding ways to manage it is not out of the realm of sarcasm.
To make the situation more disturbing, Bush probably has the best chance to secure an emissions and trade deal before the new President comes in. Although the Democrats can install a President who will take a more proactive and aggressive stance on environmental issues, pressure to protect American farmers during the election campaign will make it hard to secure a deal after a new U.S. President is in office in January. This fully places the issue of our nation's environmental health (which I stress includes our health, think: rivers, air, soil and crop contamination, ocean pollution, etc) in the hands of someone who has shown little respect, and even contempt, for the environmental pressures we are placing on the planet.
I feel like Bush has check out though and is coasting these last 6 months, he has had a lot of pressure on him and even the record number of vacation days couldn't keep him fresh and interested in issues that will affect his population (that he will leave to his mistake while he sips mojitos and looks for the next business venture he'll run into the ground) and its children.
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