Adventures in Defending Evolution

NCSE's Josh Rosenau and Steve Newton sit down with the West Virginia University freethinking, inquiring, secular humanists, and chat about the rise of science denial, the ongoing battles with creationists, NCSE's new climate change initiative, and more. Where: Morgantown, West Virginia. When: 4/5/2011

Category:

Education

Tags:

• NCSE
• Josh Rosenau
• Steve Newton
• evolution
• creationism
• intelligent design
• science denial

[Direkin]

Oh yeah, that's something else I always thought was odd about US tests. Multiple choice? When I was in school we'd never get that; you're expected to write everything out, explain your answer to prove you know what you're talking about rather than taking a stab at a box.

[NatCen4ScienceEd]

@Direkin you're spot on, this is a big problem, and not just in science education. think of how it changes the way teachers ask questions. if you're doing M/C, you have to ask a question that can be answered very briefly; that also means you ask questions on small details rather than the bigger picture. it's the triumph of trivia over substance. but it's completely understandable, given the time management necessary to deal with growing sizes of classes

[Direkin]

What about schools using the International Baccalaureate programme? Are the same problems going on there, considering the curriculum isn't set by US standards?

[NatCen4ScienceEd]

@Direkin we have indeed encountered creationist issues in IB courses, just as we have experienced creationist problems in almost every state of the union.

[atheistram]

@types10000 Actually the guy who never heard of a god would be a pure agnostic and that person would be both a nontheist and a nonatheist.

[vgrasomni]

@NatCen4ScienceEd Thank you and good work NCSE we must preserve the right of neutral inquiry and teaching critical thinking to question sources. It would have be great for classes to teach to any willing student how to research sources to find if they are peer-reviewed or point of views,say taking popular media of a research finding.Also basic statistics so they can understand how researchers draw conclusions. It's great seeing this dialogue to raise scientific literacy.

[vgrasomni]

@vgrasomni the definition above is the technical definition of evolution. I recommend taking courses in genetics, ecology, geology and any aspect of biology for any who would like to learn how genes work in large and small populations.

[vgrasomni]

This is contingent on number of genes/individuals genes and generation times. Selection, the end result of competeion for limited resources where some individual are favoured (breed viable offspring) and proliferate their genic frequencies. This si of course more complicated as you have competition from other species, chance events in climate and disease. Look up major-histo compatibly complex often liken to the 'red queen hypothesis'between disease causing agents and host. You wouldn't care tho

[vgrasomni]

I'm not NCSE but the definition as a researcher is the change in allele frequencies in a population over generations. A species having many populations that is. Allele frequencies are the combination at a loci/gene. Mutation introduces new variation from gene copying error 1 in every million gene copies.

[debateyourfaith]

"But science is always wrong you cant be sure of anything if you use science"

Kind of hard to debate these kinds of people since they wont even listen to what you have to say, no worries, they wouldnt understand it anyways ...

[henchmen999]

Bow ties are cool!

[gardner90125]

Intelligence = Scientific inquiry

Religion = BULLSHIT

There, that should settle it...:)