Positive evidence for the theory of devolution

I'd heard this was coming, but I just yesterday learned for certain it had actually happened. The Cincinnati Enquirer for March 10 lets us know that the bunch of scientifically-illiterate blockheads who make up the majority of the Ohio State Board of Education have approved new lesson plans for 10th grade science classes that introduce so-called "intelligent design" into the schools under cover of "critical thinking."

"Intelligent design" is the latest fall-back attempt by those who consider the Bible to be a science textbook to undermine the theory of evolution. It argues, at bottom, that a "higher power" must have had a hand in the development of life - while claiming it's not in any way religious because the nature of that "higher power" remains undefined. (Of course, by failing to address the question of the nature of the very driving force it describes, it's also not in any way scientific, but leave that aside for now.)

Anywhere it's been introduced, courts have recognized its religious foundations and struck down the effort. So now, in a fall-back from the fall-back, the trick is to hide it inside "modern critiques of evolution" which are to be "debated" as an exercise in "critical analysis." (Evolution - surprise! - is apparently the only area to get this treatment.) The net effect (and the intent), of course, especially in any sort of "debate" format, is to set such "critiques" on an equal footing with the theory, whereby evolution becomes just one idea among many.

Now, when I say "theory" there, I'm using it in the scientific sense. When someone says "evolution is just a theory," the proper answer is "you're right, except there is nothing 'just' about a theory." Observations obtain data. An educated guess based on data is a hypothesis. A hypothesis successfully tested by verifiable predictions is a theory.

Evolution - genetic change over time in response to environment - is a theory. It's not a guess, not "just an idea," not a hypothesis. It's a theory. Not one easily tested in a laboratory, obviously, but one whose agreement with an enormous number of observations from biology, geology, and paleontology is overwhelming.

Oh, yes, there are arguments about the details, about the exact nature of the process, was it incremental change or punctuated equilibrium for example, how much of a feedback loop is involved (that is, as organisms change, how much do they then affect their environment, creating pressure for more change) - there is good healthy debate about all that and more. And it's true that strict, classic Darwinism is no longer generally accepted. But the basic principle of evolution remains and has withstood every scientific assault on it. And the more we learn about self-organizing systems - the tendency of any sufficiently complex system to spontaneously organize itself into patterns - and therefore the less evolution involves the "random change" on which its critics charge it depends, the stronger it becomes. Bluntly, while the details are still argued, evolution itself simply is no longer a matter of scientific debate and hasn't been for some time.

The drive to change that physical reality, or, more accurately, our understanding of it, comes from a collection of scientific know-nothings backed by a handful of "scientists" - almost none of who are from relevant fields - who have, sadly, allowed their personal ideologies to trump their science training. What's being advanced in Ohio is not critical thinking but a political agenda, a social and political agenda promoted by those who don't even have the courage to openly advocate what they really hope to achieve.

Shameless. That's what they are: shameless.

Footnote: Now, if the intent was really to stimulate critical thinking, the lesson plans could have been devoted to the question of analyzing why inanities such as "intelligent design" and its first cousin, creationism, both accurately described as "answers in search of a question," fail as science and why people embrace them anyway.

The very fact that the natural and immediate reaction to such a suggestion is "fat chance" indicates what's really going on.