Much ado about I.D.
You may have heard about a little scuffle they're having out in Kansas. Some school governing body is holding 'hearings' to decide whether a "theory" called Intelligent Design should be taught along with Evolution in Kansas schools.
Your first question, if you aren't familiar with the issue, is: What's Intelligent Design? It's a mercifully simple idea. I.D. people note that there are certain flaws in the evolution theory, or more accurately, things we haven't explained yet. I.D. people say that these issues are, in fact, insoluble, and cannot be explained without some sort of designer. Even in millions of years, they say, random mutation cannot account for the development of life.
I should note that the ideas of Intelligent Design are not far off from my own. I believe there is a divine being running the show, and I believe that being designed, created, and is testing that design around us as we speak. I think some amount of evolution is just about undeniable, but I also can see the holes in our current theories. There are questions to be answered.
Having said that, I can say with absolute certainty that I.D. does not belong in our science classrooms, and I'll tell you why: It's not science. At best, it's very very bad science, and very bad science is the last thing we need in classrooms.
Arguments like the one about I.D. are able to happen, I think, because most people, having spent at least a few years in high school studying it, don't have a clear idea of what science is. High school doesn't touch this topic too much. The main issue is to learn facts and formulas. Philosophy of Science must seem a bit of a waste to most teachers. And with the horizons of science expanding so rapidly every day, it must seem like a hopeless battle. But understanding philosophy of science, I would argue, is the most important thing in science education. The particulars can be learned at leisure. But to do so, an understanding of what science is and how it works is critical. We're going to consider two questions: What is science, and what is good science? And why is I.D. neither?
Put simply, science is the acquisition of knowledge through the testing of ideas that can be proven wrong. There is a great myth, encouraged, I'd say, by the media, that science "proves things". Nothing could be further from the truth. Many a bleary eyed dieter has suffered this effect trying to decide if a particular food is "good for you" or "bad for you". So you turn on the news, and some sound-bite pedlar tells you "Scientists today say bran is good for you." Anyone who's read a real piece of scientific writing or research knows this is simply not so. When a scientist wants to demonstrate something, they go through a simple, rigorous process. We look at things in the world, and we have ideas as to how they work. So far, we have no science. To cross that threshold, we must construct a test. For instance, gravity. We all know that when we jump up, we come back down, but why? The greeks thought there were two forces, one called levity that helped birds fly, and gravity, which kept is down. But why is levity not working so well on us? Newton had a better idea. Matter (i.e. Stuff) has gravity. Every bit of matter has a certain amount. The more matter, the more matter. It's a force of the universe between atoms. Einstein had an even better idea: Gravity is the result of stuff actually bending space and time. Lots of matter bend space and time a lot.
Now, why did people like Newton's explanation better than its predecessor? Well, Newton made up a formula for gravity describing how much gravity a given amount of matter should have. So many years later, scientists were looking at the planets. They looked at Uranus and Saturn and Jupiter, and something was wrong. Given the known planet's size, speed, and calculated gravity, they weren't moving right. Scientists figured out that for those planets to move as they did, there would have to be another planet of a certain mass at a certain position moving at a certain speed. So they figured out where such a planet ought to be, they pointed their telescopes thither, and lo and behold, there lay Neptune!
This is an example of good science. What makes it good? Well, when Newton wrote up his theory of gravitation, he didn't know about Neptune. He was just writing about what he saw. But he predicted how things would work elsewhere. Years later, those tests were tried out in a novel situation, and worked like gangbusters. This is how we decide that a theory is a good one. If it predicts things for which it has no knowledge, and proves right, it's good.
I.D. does not predict anything. It simply notes flaws in the current theories regarding the development of life, throws up its hands, and says "Can't explaining it! It must be a designer!"
It's at least possible that this is so. But no method is provided to prove the idea wrong. If we had pointed our telescopes at where Newton's laws predicted a planet would be, and found nothing there, we would have had reason to believe that Newton was wrong. As it turns out, we do find little cracks in Newtonian gravity, and have built better explanations to account for them. But the important thing is: There was a test. I.D. provides no such thing. In fact, I.D. is symptomatic of a deeper issue in the sciences that cuts both ways.
To illustrate this issue, lot's consider a piece of cheese. (Bare with me.) Imagine we cut it in half, then again, and again. How small could we cut the cheese (snicker) before we could no longer cut it. What, in other words, is the smallest particle? Well, eventually, we'd reach cells. and then we'd reach molecules, and atoms, and protons. Then we'd find things like quarks, muons, bosons, and even more strangely named particalia.
Are these the smallest? Who knows. Indeed, how would you know when you'd reached the bottom? It's certainly plausible that you could reach the bottom, smallest piece, but there's no way you could know for certain that you had done so.
Our ability to have as good an idea of the situation as we do is thanks largely to superior tools of observation. Powerful telescopes, microscopes, and gauging devices give us an ever sharper picture of what is out there. But the tools could certainly be sharper, and one hopes, they one day will be. It's possible, indeed probable, that one day our future tools will shake up all our current ideas. And in the goodness of time, those tools and ideas will be shaken as well. It's a game that probably never ends, because much though the media, and even scientists themselves might like you to believe, science has no real end game we know of. Science is very bad at fingering ultimate truth. Instead, science chops off bad ideas, and makes an educated guess with what is left. As an ecology teacher told me in college "Science never proves, it disproves."
Most people find such a notion supremely disappointing. It is in this utterly human attitude that religion and philosophy find their stock and trade. Religion and philosophy grow ideas like a majestic vine, as science follows along, chopping off the bad branches. Without imaginative ideas, there could be no science. Without care and grooming, the vine would become a sick and tangled mess, which might not be so bad, but often tends to be.
Which brings us back to I.D. As I said in the beginning, the ideas of I.D. are closely aligned with my own. It's a fine idea. But it makes no testable claims, and that is why it is science. As we have seen, to say that because an idea doesn't have all the answers, it is therefore invalid is simply wrong. Science isn't designed to bring the answers. It's designed to narrow the pool of possibilities. Ideas that do so should be taught in a science classroom. For anything else, there are many, many venues. Hand throwing theories that say anything "must be true" belong elsewhere. Here's hoping the board in Kansas comes to understand this.
At last, better cover art
Sex and the City - The Complete Series
So I head on over to Amazon to see what the prices are like. Upon landing at the above page, I'm chided not to buy it, because, you see, HBO is going to release a premium edition. What makes the premium edition so shagadelic? Quoth a reviewer:
According to the New York Daily News: Rhea said HBO is planning a "super-premium" set of "Sex and the City" to hit stores before Christmas. "I think there is absolutely a super-premium collector's market," she said about "Sex and the City." Though all seasons have been released in separate installments, Rhea said the complete collection, including additional content and DVD extras not available on the originals, is being developed with "an eye for the collector," including new disc art and lavish packaging. "It'll be kind of showpiece that you might want to own and preserve, and not use as your everyday set," Rhea said. "I guess it would be kind of like the good china. Or the good shoes."So you can have your DVD set that you use and the special one for show. The difference, friends, is that the packaging is nicer. I'm sure the superior DVD art makes the jokes much funnier.
It was the pom-poms I tell you, the pom-poms
Texas house to ban "overly sexual" cheerleading
Social Conservatives (who can apparently be democrats now) are very worried about sex, it seems. From homosexuality to pregnant teens, some people seem to be really worried about our kids and the sex they're having. We have a lot of rules about sex in our society. Certainly we wouldn't want kids to, I don't know, figure stuff out. Most social conservatives seem to be in general panic that a human being with functioning reproductive organs would go ahead and reproduce without getting anyone's permission. I know, it's crazy. Everybody knows you fill out a WW-869 to get permission from His Majesty's Government when having sex with someone you like. But apparently some scalawags insist on just doing it, perhaps even doggy style.
At last, however, we've discovered the cause of this nightmare of depravity: Cheerleaders. Particularly erotic cheerleaders.
Edwards argued bawdy performances are a distraction for students resulting in pregnancies, dropouts and the spread of sexually transmitted diseases. Ribald performances are not defined in the bill. "Any adult that's been involved with sex in their lives, they know it when they see it," he said.That's right, friends. Pregnancies, dropouts, and STDs are the fault of those damn bawdy cheerleaders. Clearly, this must be stopped. Otherwise there might be dancing! Or Pool! Right here in river city!
I can just imagine an interviewer sitting down with a pregnant teenager.
"Tell us, dear. What led you to this state of affairs?"
[Cries]. "It was the cheerleaders. They led me down the path of moral depravity."
Side note: Apparently, during the debate, many representatives waved pom-poms. One hopes this did not result in makeout sessions on the house floor.
I was thinking today...
My girlfriend seems to know my moods before I am even aware that I am feeling them.
Those darn Jews
Yesterday was Good Friday in the christian church, the time when christians commemorate Jesus' execution. Having a somewhat progressive bent, I've come to find good friday a trial of my patience, not because I see no value in the rememberance, but because I can hardly stand the incessant harping on what the day is supposed to mean. A particular version of christianity is so prevalent that most mainline protestants (my people) would literally blink in bewilderment if you suggested that such views are one interpretation, and not The Way It Is.
I was planning on skipping Good Friday services this year, but sadly, I agreed to do the bidding prayers, so I had to go. I didn't preview them before going, (I know, bad Andre), so I got some little surprises. The bidding prayer is a sort of dialogue between the presiding minister and an assistant (me). I would give a little introduction, then the minister would give a sort of followup, then the congregation would say "amen", and then we would all think for a bit. Repeat.
One of my favorite little lines that I ended up reading was to pray for the jewish people, who are great and all, but we really hope they'd come around and accept christ.
Darned Jews, going around being god's chosen people but not accepting god's chosen Messiah. Oh, if only they'd get with the program, the jesus-equals-messiah program.
This is an aspect of christianity I find almost bizarre. Here it is, 2000 years later (give or take) and Christians are still really pissed about this. I mean, I don't know anyone from the time, nor do I know anyone who knew anyone. Yet it is extremely common in the christian realm to evaluate the value of a person's christianity, and too often, humanity, by the extent to which they believe one claim about one person who lived millenia ago is true.
This is not to suggest that one person who lived millenia ago can't be important. Obviously not. But deciding whether someone is "good" or "bad" because of a single factual judgement about said person is really strange. It's like having a group that believes a particular turtle is actually a fish, and you can only be in their group if you agree. Which is only two steps from viewing those who disagree as enemies. You're either with us, or you're with the terrorists, after all.
Which brings us back to those pesky jews. As a service to Judaism the world over, I bring a message to my christian brethren: You are actually jews yourself. Your leader was a jew, all his friends were jews. Every book you've read in your bible was written by jews, and not only that, but by people who, if you asked them, would tell you they were jews. Indeed, they'd find it quite puzzling you thought there was a difference.
Good Friday services really hammer home the atonement concept that Paul gave us, namely that jesus died "for your sins." Leaving aside the theological questions, I find it interesting that we can't just let something be what it is. We have to find a meaning, an explanation. Jesus was a guy who walked around saying we make ourselves unhappy being greedy and mean, and he offered a sort of imaginative alternative where you could be friends with the people you think you hate, but are actually just like you. He said people with power weren't really powerful, because they're just like you, and for that, he was executed. It was not an entirely surprising turn of events.
All in all, it makes me sad. I don't need a meaning to understand that. It makes me sad, because it still happens. People who say the sort of things jesus said get in trouble for it all the time. Some of them get killed. A lot are thought of as crazy. "Can't change the world," people will tell you. It's just really, really sad.
Of course, easter is coming, the great saving grace of the faith. It's in our nature to take something sad and convert it into something else, be it the atonement of mankind, or an event that, in our modern enlightenment, has no meaning whatsoever. But the claim of christianity is that you can get past all that crap, all the bullshit that people attach to pain, and cross over into something better. It's a beautiful message. I just wish christians would take their own good advice.