News, Anti-science tactics of ID supporters on display in Texas science textbook hearings (Mormons, church)

[ParkTwain]

Texas vote leaves loopholes for teaching creationism - science-in-society - 28 March 2009 - New Scientist
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One amendment calls for students to "analyze and evaluate scientific explanations concerning the complexity of the cell," phrasing that rings of intelligent design arguments.

Another amendment requires students to "analyze and evaluate scientific explanations concerning any data on sudden appearance and stasis and the sequential groups in the fossil record." These issues are commonly held up by creationists as arguments against evolution, even though the scientific community disagrees.
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An amendment to the Earth and space sciences curriculum requires the teaching of different theories of the origin, age and history of the universe. The board voted to remove from the standards the statement that the universe is roughly 14 billion years old.

"The goal here was to make science more tentative and vague so that teachers have room to tell students, 'This is only one explanation and the scientists are not even sure about it themselves' – which is, of course, utter nonsense," says Quinn.
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Texas is one of the largest purchasers of textbooks in the US, a market publishers can't afford to lose. So they will likely have to water down the science in their books and add in creationist pseudo-science to appease the school board. "If the publishers don't come back with arguments against natural selection and common descent, the board is going to vote to reject those textbooks," Quinn says.
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The book does not explicitly mention ID, but presents its standard arguments, arguments that are precisely in line with those adopted in the new standards. That may be no coincidence: one of the co-authors of the book, Ralph Seelke, was chosen by McLeroy to serve as an expert curriculum reviewer for the Texas board. So too was Stephen Meyer, director of the Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture. The Discovery Institute's Casey Luskin also testified at the board meeting, saying, "We urge you to make students aware of these scientific debates."
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[Shibumi]

I'm thinking it should be called Intelligent Espionage, since it's hidden agenda is to bypass the required separation of Church & state with a validated scientific curriculum.

Unfortunately, intelligence is the least obvious component of ID.

[SeekerSA]

It appears the journey out of the dark ages is taking a whole lot longer in the USA.

Oh well, maybe this could be done on a national level and when the dems are in power those lucky few will learn real science and when the repubs are in power they will learn creationism. It will keep the USA lagging the rest of the scientific community.

[bluepacific]

Originally Posted by SeekerSA

It appears the journey out of the dark ages is taking a whole lot longer in the USA.

Oh well, maybe this could be done on a national level and when the dems are in power those lucky few will learn real science and when the repubs are in power they will learn creationism. It will keep the USA lagging the rest of the scientific community.

Texas is interesting. I was in Lubbock, Texas once and if you wanted to purchase beer or anything else alcohol, you had to go outside of town and find a string of liquor along the southeastern highway leading away from town with the stores all together in a row and take your pick. There was the strong influence of the Baptist church in this part of the Bible-belt south and they are the ones who created the dry counties or cities. The irritating thing about the Lubbock situation was that all those liquor stores were owned and operated by deacons of the major Baptist Church in Lubbock.

Typical

[MontanaGuy]

It sounds like they're using every tactic they can think of to undermine the teaching of evolution without appearing to cross the line in terms of the separation of church and state. Another concern is that each state doesn't have their own set of textbooks, they're using many of the same textbooks all across the country. As the article points out Texas is a very big market for the textbook publishing industry and if they manage to get their science textbooks dumbed down it could impact many other states.
As bluepacific pointed out, Texas is unusual in many ways. I've traveled all over that state and also have been to Lubbock (I even went to see Buddy Holly's grave there). It's generally a very conservative and religious state but it also has a wilder side with alot of redneck beer drinking party animals. I'm just glad that Kansas doesn't have as much clout as Texas because I think they're even worse.

[calmdude]

We are probably the only industrialized country pushing so hard to get ID into schools. I guess the object is to create excellent (closed-minded) priests, not scientists and engineers. This will certainly make our workforce very competitive and productive.

[PanTerra]

Originally Posted by bluepacific

Texas is interesting. I was in Lubbock, Texas once and if you wanted to purchase beer or anything else alcohol, you had to go outside of town and find a string of liquor along the southeastern highway leading away from town with the stores all together in a row and take your pick. There was the strong influence of the Baptist church in this part of the Bible-belt south and they are the ones who created the dry counties or cities. The irritating thing about the Lubbock situation was that all those liquor stores were owned and operated by deacons of the major Baptist Church in Lubbock.

Typical

This sounds more in the same vein of the Mormons owning Pepsi.