[Evolidaho] Fwd: [AIBS-Evolution-l]Evolution education update: June 29, 2007

[Resources for teaching evolution]

----- Original Message -----
From: Holly Menninger <hmenninger at aibs.org>
Date: Friday, June 29, 2007 2:25 pm
Subject: [AIBS-Evolution-l]Evolution education update:  June 29, 2007
To: evolution-l at aibs.org

>  From the National Center for Science Education
> 
> Dear Friends of NCSE,
> 
> The latest "intelligent design" book takes a walloping in the 
> pages of
> Nature, while The New York Times offers a suite of articles about
> evolution, and NCSE's executive director is honored by the 
> Society for
> Developmental Biology.
> 
> MILLER DRUBS BEHE IN NATURE
> 
> The new book from "intelligent design" proponent Michael Behe 
> continues to
> receive highly critical reviews, with the latest, by Kenneth R. 
> Miller,published in Nature (2007; 447: 1055-1056).  Miller 
> begins with the
> sociopolitical context, writing, "Michael Behe's new book, The 
> Edge of
> Evolution, is an attempt to give the intelligent-design movement 
> a bit of
> badly needed scientific support.  After a spectacular 
> setback in the 2005
> Dover, Pennsylvania, intelligent-design trial ... , and the 2006 
> electorallosses in Ohio and Kansas, the movement could use some 
> help -- and Behe is
> eager to provide it."
> 
> But Miller quickly moves to the content of the book, focusing on 
> a central
> calculation that, Behe alleges, reveals the "limits of 
> Darwinism."  On the
> contrary, Miller writes:  "at the heart of his anti-
> darwinian calculus are
> numbers not merely incorrect, but so spectacularly wrong that 
> this badly
> designed argument collapses under its own weight ... It would be 
> difficultto imagine a more breathtaking abuse of statistical 
> genetics. ... A mistake
> of this magnitude anywhere in a book on science is bad enough, 
> but Behe has
> built his entire thesis on this error."
> 
> Concluding, Miller returns to the sociopolitical context:  
> "No doubt
> creationists who long for a scientific champion will overlook 
> the parts of
> this deeply flawed book that might trouble them, including 
> Behe's admission
> that 'common descent is true', and that our species shares a common
> ancestor with the chimpanzee.  Instead, they will cling to 
> Behe's mistaken
> calculations, and proclaim that the end of evolution is at 
> hand.  What this
> book actually demonstrates, however, is the intellectual 
> desperation of the
> intelligent-design movement as it struggles to survive in the 
> absence of
> even a shred of scientific data in its favour."
> 
> Miller is Professor of Biology at Brown University, the coauthor (with
> Joseph Levine) of three widely used high school biology 
> textbooks, and the
> author of Finding Darwin's God:  A Scientist's Search for 
> Common Ground
> Between God and Evolution (Cliff Street Books, 1999), and the 
> forthcomingDevil in the Details:  Evolution and the Battle 
> for America's Soul
> (Viking/Penguin, 2007).  He is also a Supporter of NCSE and 
> received its
> Friend of Darwin award in 2003; he testified for the plaintiffs in
> Kitzmiller v. Dover, the case in which it was ruled that it is
> unconstitutional to teach "intelligent design" creationism in 
> the public
> schools.
> 
> For Miller's review in Nature (subscription required), visit:
> http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v447/n7148/full/4471055a.html
> 
> For NCSE's story on previous reviews, visit:
> http://www.ncseweb.org/resources/news/2007/US/291_behe39s_latest_scrutinized_6_12_2007.asp
> 
> EVOLUTION IN THE NEW YORK TIMES
> 
> A treat in the Science Times section of the June 26, 2007, issue 
> of The New
> York Times:  a suite of articles devoted to 
> evolution.  Evolutionary
> developmental biology is a central theme.  Carol Kaesuk 
> Yoon writes, "Just
> coming into its own as a science, evo-devo is the combined study of
> evolution and development, the process by which a nubbin of a 
> fertilizedegg transforms into a full-fledged adult.  And 
> what these scientists are
> finding is that development, a process that has for more than 
> half a
> century been largely ignored in the study of evolution, appears 
> to have
> been one of the major forces shaping the history of life on 
> earth."  Also
> on the evo-devo front, NCSE Supporter Sean B. Carroll discusses 
> evo-devo in
> a video, and is also taking questions from the newspaper's 
> readers, while
> Douglas F. Erwin ponders whether evo-devo amounts to a paradigm 
> shift for
> biology.
> 
> Carl Zimmer discusses evolutionary experimentation using 
> microbes, such as
> Richard E. Lenski's pioneering work with E. coli; in the 
> eighteen years and
> 40,000 generations of Lenski's work, Zimmer writes, "the 
> bacteria have
> changed significantly.  For one thing, they are bigger -- 
> twice as big on
> average as their common ancestor.  They are also far better 
> at reproducing
> in these flasks, dividing 70 percent faster than their 
> ancestor.  These
> changes have emerged through spontaneous mutations and natural 
> selection,and Dr. Lenski and his colleagues have been able to 
> watch them unfold."  On
> his blog The Loom, Zimmer notes that "these experiments are also 
> meaningfulto bio-engineers who manipulate microbes to churn out 
> useful molecules like
> insulin or ethanol."
> 
> Human evolution is also covered, with John Noble Wilford 
> explaining "The
> Human Family Tree Has Become a Bush With Many Branches," 
> emphasizing the
> convergence of molecular and morphological approaches to 
> paleoanthropology,and Nicholas Wade explaining "Humans Have 
> Spread Globally, and Evolved
> Locally," emphasizing research on recent natural selection in 
> humans.  And
> under the rubric Basics, Natalie Angier writes about parasitism -
> - "an
> evolutionary force to be reckoned with, a source of nearly bottomless
> cunning and breathtaking bio-inventiveness" -- and Cornelia Dean 
> examineswhat implications evolutionary biology and cognitive 
> neuroscience might be
> thought to have for the idea of the soul, quoting theologians 
> John F.
> Haught and Nancey Murphy as well as NCSE Supporter Kenneth R. 
> Miller in the
> process.
> 
> For the Science Times section of The New York Times, visit:
> http://www.nytimes.com/pages/science/index.html
> 
> For Carl Zimmer's post about his story in the Times, visit:
> http://scienceblogs.com/loom/2007/06/26/a_feast_of_bugs.php
> 
> NCSE'S SCOTT RECEIVES AWARD FROM SDB
> 
> NCSE's executive director Eugenie C. Scott was awarded the 
> Viktor Hamburger
> Outstanding Educator Prize for 2007 from the Society for Developmental
> Biology, during the First Pan American Congress in Developmental 
> Biology,held June 16-20, 2007, in Cancun, Mexico.  The 
> prize, established in honor
> of Viktor Hamburger, a preeminent embryologist and developmental
> neuroscientist of his era, recognizes individuals who have made 
> outstandingcontributions to developmental biology 
> education.  Previous recipients
> include Robert DeHaan, Bruce Alberts, Leon Browder, Lewis 
> Wolpert, and
> Scott Gilbert.  Founded in 1939, the Society for 
> Developmental Biology
> seeks to promote the field of developmental biology and to 
> advance our
> understanding of developmental biology at all levels.
> 
> For information about the Hamburger Prize, visit:
> http://www.sdbonline.org/awards/hamburger_award.php
> 
> 
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