Best Liveblog of Texas SBOE Proceedings

I followed the SBOE meeting and the testimony on science standards online yesterday. The best source, with the most detailed information is at this link. Steve Schafersman is liveblogging Wed., Thurs. and Friday, with very detailed info, as well as photos. While you expect the testimony on the creationist side to be alarming, even more alarming are the remarks by certain SBOE members. Keep in mind, the anti-science board members have the votes to pass science standards which will undermine science education in Texas - science content in the classroom will be inaccurate, and far right Christian beliefs, rather than evidence-based science will be written into the TEKS and textbooks (which will be in place for the next 10 years.) Some highlights and lowlights from yesterday's proceedings are below. I skipped around - you should really read the whole liveblogging. Clearly, some SBOE members do not know the difference between a hypothesis and a theory. This is really sad and inexcusable.:

David Bradley just made the remark that he tried to get Ben Stein to come to Austin and speak in front of the SBOE, but they couldn't afford his fees! This comment is just priceless, since Ben Stein has absolutely no scientific or educational qualifications whatsoever, except his brief appearance as a public school teacher in the movie Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986). His pseudodocumentary, Expelled, has been justly decried as a fascist, ignorant diatribe against evolution. The movie producer used every dirty trick to fool the scientists who were asked to appear in it on camera. Stein himself indulges in despicable tactics to mislead and deceive his audience about the truth. David Bradley wants to do the same. ---- The next speaker, Eric Hennenhoefer, was a member of the business community. He explained to the SBOE members how their political manipulation of the science standards, and their stated intention of voting to return the phrases "strengths and weaknesses" to the standards, would have a negative effect on science education in Texas. He asked that the science standards be adopted by the SBOE in the form they were recommended by the science panels in unchanged form. Next, he strongly challenged the methods used by the Discovery Institute to mislead and confuse citizens and decision makers. He correctly observed that the DI uses PR tactics: they market their beliefs to the public using a series of non-scientific techniquest. He was very critical of the DI's methods and of their book Explore Evolution. ----- Dr. Scott was questioned at length by most of the SBOE members. The Creationists on the Board grilled her about their usual concerns developed from their reading of Young Earth Creationist literature, which they implicity believe. Ken Mercer asked about evolutionary frauds, such as Haeckel's embryos and Piltdown Man. Genie replied that these could be mentioned, but they provide no evidence or reasons against modern evolution. She said the Haeckel vertebrate embryo controversy in no way helps Creationists, and has been used as a bogus "weakness" of evolution that should not be used to misrepresent the scientific theory. Another member, either Terri Leo or Cynthia Dunbar, asked her why there has been no court ligitigation against "strengths and weakneses" if the "Darwinists" claim that it is bad for science and promotes sectarian Creationism as charged. She replied that so far the critics of evolution have failed to get their bogus weaknesses into the biology textbooks, so there has never been a reason to challenge the rule in court. If the "strengths and weaknesses" phrase is kept in the standards, and this standard is used in the future to damage biology textbooks, "you will have problems." She means, of course, that the TEA and SBOE will be sued on Establishment Clause grounds, because the entire history of the political effort to put the language into the standards and force phony "weaknesses" into biology textbooks is religiously motivated. This history and motivation make the rule illegal, no matter what the proponents of the rule state. ----- Textbooks of several science disciplines haved been adopted since 2003 without controversy because they don't cover evolution or the origin of life. If they did, the Radical Religious Right SBOE members would have gone after them. These textbooks discuss hundreds of corrborated scientific hypotheses in several major theories, but there has never been an attempt to force chemistrty, physics, or IPC to contain the "weaknesses" of their theories. In reality, the historical record is clear: keeping and using "strengths and weaknesses" is only used to attack evolution and other subjects that Biblical Literalists object to, so their effort would violate the Establishment Clause if it ever succeeded. ----- Dr. Ron Wetherington, Professor at Southern Methodist University, testified next. He is a physical anthropologist and the director of SMU's science education center. He described the difference between scientific theories and hypotheses, defining both in ways recognized by scientists that would be news to some of the Board members, who think that scientific theories can be criticized by high school students. ----- Dr. Hillis mentioned that intimidation of biology teachers is common in Texas public schools. They are intimidated by the political controversy at the State Board of Education level as well as by parents and school officials. He also said he could not understand why the SBOE members would waste one day of their time hearing testimony about this issue. They gave the task of writing science standards to the scientists and science teachers--the experts--and then they still want to review and edit their work, and not in good ways. Dr. Hillis thought this political manipulation of science is "idiocy." Barbara Cargill said she has 6,000 email messages asking her to make sure that "strengths and weaknesses" stays in the science standards. Also, she said, they ask that the science standards "show more humility" and not be so "disrespectful." Yes, science should respect and be humble in front of the great idol of willful ignorance and abject superstition.