Tennessee to teach the controversy

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why would i think modern surgeons would be better if trained that way?
you are suggesting things that i am not...you have said those words not i.
good try though ;)

quantum physics is part of everything not just physics.

Are you saying that your personal feelings and personal beliefs should be taught on a global scale in academic institutions? Why yours and not mine, why mine and not Ryans? Do you see the problem here? Science is about facts, evidence and real application. I'm sorry, but we won't be curing cancer with your spirituality.

Ask Steve Jobs how he feels about homeopathy

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what has that to do with it. science never kept him alive either

Gov. Bill Haslam said Tuesday that he will allow House Bill 368/Senate Bill 893 to become law without his signature, a symbolic move that signals his opposition but allows the measure to be added to the state code.

*SixNine puts on his party hat to celebrate the new law

How could that guy have possibly sustained a campaign for Governor when he doesn't even have the balls to shoot down ******** like this? He doesn't deserve to hold office.

“I do not believe that this legislation changes the scientific standards that are taught in our schools or the curriculum that is used by our teachers,” Haslam said in a written statement explaining his equivocal stance. “However, I also don’t believe that it accomplishes anything that isn’t already acceptable in our schools.”

But opponents say that the real goal of the bill is apparent from the list of subjects it singles out. “HB 368 and other bills like it are a permission slip for teachers to bring creationism, climate-change denial and other non-science into science classrooms,” says Eugenie Scott, director of the National Center for Science Education (NCSE) in Oakland, California.

I've asked, several times, exactly how this bill might be misused. What might this bill enable that isn't already being done? No replies to that question yet.

Dear Governor Haslam,

We are writing to you regarding HB368/SB893. As graduate students at the University of Tennessee, we strongly believe that this Bill represents a step backward for Tennessee and our state’s ascending recognition for Science and STEM education. We are specifically writing to address the nature of the Bill itself, which we feel was not adequately discussed during either the House or Senate hearings and misrepresents the undivided consensus among anthropologists, biochemists, biologists, ecologists, evolutionary biologists, genome scientists, geographers, and molecular biologists.

If given a cursory reading, this Bill appears to advocate for intellectual freedom in the classroom and hence would seem prudent. However, it is abundantly clear from both a careful reading and from the testimony at hearings that the intent of this Bill is to encourage teachers to call into question universally accepted scientific principles.

In Section 1(a)(2) of SB893, the generally assembly states “The teaching of some scientific subjects, including, but not limited to, biological evolution, the chemical origins of life, global warming, and human cloning, can cause controversy;”

We agree. However, this “controversy” is not scientific. The controversy to which the Bill alludes is the reluctance of non-scientists to accept these principles due to certain religious and political beliefs. This can be the only explanation for the inclusion of human cloning in the Bill. Human cloning is solely an ethical issue. There is no scientific debate on how to clone an organism or whether genetic clones can be created. It is a fact that humans can create genetic clones. Only the ethics of the issue is at stake.

Scientific evidence supporting the occurrence of biological evolution, global climate change, and the chemical origin of life are not controversial among scientists. Scientists universally accept these principles based on their predictability and the overwhelming evidence supporting them. Among scientists, the controversy exists in the details such as how changes in temperatures will affect biodiversity or what evolutionary forces
regulate the speciation process. This type of discussion is due to the very nature of science, which requires the constant acquisition and analysis of data.

However, this is not the controversy to which the Bill speaks. The bill later states, in section 1(c), that “The state board of education . . . shall endeavor to assist teachers to find effective ways to present the science curriculum as it addresses scientific controversies.” This wording seems to imply that the controversy for these aforementioned subjects lies in the scientific realm where in reality they lie only in the political and religious ones.

We fear that this bill only ostensibly supports “critical thinking” in Tennessee’s classrooms. Instead, by implying that subjects such as evolution and global warming are “debatable”, this bill achieves the exact opposite of its purported goal. This is tantamount to encouraging educators to suggest students in science classes disregard the very nature of the scientific process and ignore factual data in favor of the beliefs of some individuals. Scientists cannot ignore data in favor of personal biases. If they did, they would be discredited as non-objective.

This Bill is a step backwards and would do irreparable harm to the development of STEM education in this state. As university educators, we continually face the challenge of losing students’ interests in science courses when they arrive at The University of Tennessee because they are frustrated by their lack of sufficient preparation. Many of them know very little about evolution by natural selection or the mechanisms of global climate change. We hope that you see that as with the legislatures who passed this bill, we too are concerned about the education of children in Tennessee.

This passage of this Bill has the potential to cost the state dearly in terms of lost revenue, a poorly trained scientific workforce, and an exodus of scientists and educators who do not wish to have their discipline diluted with non-scientific biases. We fear that calling into question scientific support of foundations to biological theory will cripple the ability of Tennessee’s students to become functional scientists, doctors, professionals, and contributing members of many growing fields.

We ask that you please thoughtfully consider our position, and veto this bill. Thank you for your time.

Signed,
Graduate Researchers in Ecology, Behavior, and Evolutionary Biology (G.R.E.B.E)
The University of Tennessee, Knoxville

[56 grad students from EEB and other departments signed the petition]

The problem is that the bill pushes for/allows science classes to teach the social controversies behind various scientific disciplines but does not have any provision to make it clear that these will purely be taught in a social sense with strong emphasis on the scientific validity.

I think it's very important for social and political consequences of science to be taught so long as it is taught purely in that context and hand-in-hand with teaching why the science is valid. It is also important to teach controversies within science but to make sure that the difference between this and the former is crystal clear. This bill makes no provision for that and given the suspect way it is worded and the history of the creationist movement in Tennessee I can't see this as any more than another wedge strategy.

The problem is that the bill pushes for/allows science classes to teach the social controversies behind various scientific disciplines ...

Where does it do that? (The bill is reproduced below for easy reference.)

What I take from it is that it says that the teaching of some scientific subjects can cause controversy (not surprising in a Bible Belt state such as Tennessee), that some teachers might not be sure of how to handle that (due to real or imagined threats from the disciples of Jehovah/Yahweh??), and that the governing authorities will help teachers to conduct unbiased presentations of scientific material, teach the scientific method, and reply to obviously social or religious based criticism of scientific theories, hypotheses, and statements of fact in a reasonable and respectful manner.

You are making assumptions about the meaning of controversy.

If a teacher finds the subject controversial for religious or political reasons, what does the bill authorize the teacher to do?

I don't know what you mean.

" ... teachers shall be permitted to help students
understand, analyze, critique, and review in an objective manner the scientific strengths
and scientific weaknesses of existing scientific theories covered in the course being
taught."