A professor of biochemistry and leading biochemistry textbook author at the University of Toronto stated that a major public research university “should never have admitted” students who support ID, and should “just flunk the lot of them and make room for smart students.”
The textbook publishers’ price-gouging monopoly may be ending.Now, I usually think of myself as a socialist, so it's a little uncomfortable for me to be defending capitalism, but here goes.
For decades, college students have been exploited by publishers of introductory textbooks. The publishers charge about $200 for a textbook, and then every 3-4 years they make some minor cosmetic changes, reorder some of the problems, add a few new problems, and call it a “new edition”. They then take the previous edition out of print. The purpose, of course, is to destroy the used book market and to continue charging students exorbitant amounts of money.
Unfortunately most public schools do NOT teach about the flaws in evolutionary theory. Instead, they censor this information, hiding from students all of the science that challenges Darwinian evolution. But in a perfect world, if the evidence against Darwinian theory were taught, these would be my top three choices:
- Tell students that the fossil record often lacks transitional forms and that there are "explosions" of new life forms, a pattern of radiations that challenges Darwinian evolutionary theory.
- Tell students that many scientists have challenged the ability of random mutation and natural selection to produce complex biological features.
- Tell students that many lines of evidence for Darwinian evolution and common descent are weak:
a. Vertebrate embryos start out developing very differently, in contrast with the drawings of embryos often found in textbooks which mostly appear similar.
b. DNA evidence paints conflicting pictures of the "tree of life". There is no such single "tree."
c. Evidence of small-scale changes, such as the modest changes in the size of finch-beaks or slight changes in the color frequencies in the wings of "peppered moths", shows microevolution, NOT macroevolution.
Over the past decade, research in the field of epigenetics has revealed that chemically modified bases are abundant components of the human genome and has forced us to abandon the notion we've had since high school genetics that DNA consists of only four bases.Those who don't know history are destined to repeat it.
Now, researchers at Weill Cornell Medical College have made a discovery that once again forces us to rewrite our textbooks. This time, however, the findings pertain to RNA, which like DNA carries information about our genes and how they are expressed. The researchers have identified a novel base modification in RNA which they say will revolutionize our understanding of gene expression.
Their report, published May 17 in the journal Cell, shows that messenger RNA (mRNA), long thought to be a simple blueprint for protein production, is often chemically modified by addition of a methyl group to one of its bases, adenine. Although mRNA was thought to contain only four nucleobases, their discovery shows that a fifth base, N6-methyladenosine (m6A), pervades the transcriptome.
The most prevalent internal methylated nucleoside in eukaryotic mRNA is N6-methyladenosine (m6A). This modified nucleoside is found in RNAs of higher eukaryotic organisms (1-6), plants (7-9), and viruses (3, 10-12), and occurs at two specific sequences: Gpm6ApC and Apm6ApC (13-17).Refereences 1-5 are from 1975 meaning that in the published scientific literature the presence of m6A dates back 37 years. That's more than enough time to make it into the textbooks. It's in the textbooks.
[Hat Tip: Uncommon Descent: Is there a fifth base in RNA?]
Horowitz, S., Horowitz, A., Nilsen, T.W., Munns, T.W. and Rottman, F.M. (1984) Mapping of N6-methyladenosine residues in bovine prolactin mRNA. PNAS 81:5667-5671. [PDF]
If you haven't posted a good academic performance in high school, don't believe a university, its leadership, advertisements or admissions officers who co-sign your promissory note with no responsibility for its payment obligation. They need paying students.Who wrote this? It's Walter V. Wendler, who is listed as director of the School of Architecture and former chancellor at Southern Illinois University.
Stoking a deceitful dream on life support — an underappreciated, overfinanced, media-hyped charade — is the real deception, and the weight falls on your back, not theirs.
A shameful, elaborate sham, when one out of two college graduates this year are unemployable in their chosen field.
Look carefully at the costs and benefits of a university education. University officials may not tell you the truth: Enrollments could drop. Bankers will not tell you the truth: Interest income will fall off. Elected officials will not tell you the truth: Elections will be lost. Listen to those really concerned for you carefully.
I been interested in the efficacy of students evaluations for a long time [Student Evaluations] [Student Evaluations] [Student Evaluations Don't Mean Much]. So what is one to do? Well, thankfully, our friends the evolutionists have given us a way out. In their zeal to claim consensus on the “fact of evolution,” they have had to steamroll together such a large diversity of opinion into the single term “evolution”, that the word “evolution” no longer has the grand meaning it used to. The only real meaning everyone can agree on is “change in allele frequency over time” – and that is a definition that literally everyone can agree with.Let's see how many of his fellow creationists take this advice to heart. Are you listening Denyse?
In other words, even if you are a young earth creationist, if your professor asks if you believe in evolution, the legitimate answer is “yes”. Given the common definition of “evolution,” the only thing they are really asking with that question is, “do you believe in genetics?”
Therefore, here is how you can, and, I say, should frame yourself – you believe in evolution. However, there are a few parts of the theory that you disagree with. Don’t be obnoxious, but don’t be overly shy either. Just be frank. Do you believe in evolution? “Yes, but I disagree that common ancestry is universal.” Do you believe in evolution? “Yes, but I don’t think that natural selection alone as a mechanism sufficiently explains life’s diversity.” You don’t even have to put the “yes” and the objection in the same sentence. What do you think about evolution? “The study of evolution is fascinating!” How do you think multicellularity evolved? “I think that multicellularity is a fundamental property of certain organisms, and can’t be evolved piecemeal from the presumed single-celled ancestors.” But you do believe in evolution? “Yes, of course.” Do you think multi-cellular organisms evolved? “Certainly!” From what? “Other multi-cellular organisms.”
If someone challenges you on the definition of evolution, simply challenge them back. What definition of evolution are you using? “I’m using the standard population genetics definition of evolution as the change in gene frequencies over time.” That’s not what evolution is. “What is your definition of evolution?” Evolution means natural selection and common ancestry! “Well, that’s a pretty narrow view of evolution in modern biology. So, while I agree with evolution in general, I don’t agree with your specific view of it.” What’s your specific view? “I’m still learning! But I do find it interesting that….[put your favorite evolutionary or non-evolutionary feature of biology here]”
Back in the days of newsgroups (last century) the howlers in talk.origins developed a running joke about irony meters.
How is it that many professors in the humanities and the sciences seem unable to read an opinion they don't like and then accurately relate the argument -- say it back to their interlocutor -- before trying to rebut it? This is a basic skill in communication that comes in handy in many areas of life, including personal relationships
For many psychologists, the clearest sign that their field was in trouble came, ironically, from a study about premonition. Daryl Bem, a social psychologist at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, showed student volunteers 48 words and then abruptly asked them to write down as many as they could remember. Next came a practice session: students were given a random subset of the test words and were asked to type them out. Bem found that some students were more likely to remember words in the test if they had later practised them. Effect preceded cause.There's lots more where that comes from. Read the entire article.
Bem published his findings in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (JPSP) along with eight other experiments1 providing evidence for what he refers to as “psi”, or psychic effects. There is, needless to say, no shortage of scientists sceptical about his claims. Three research teams independently tried to replicate the effect Bem had reported and, when they could not, they faced serious obstacles to publishing their results. The episode served as a wake-up call. “The realization that some proportion of the findings in the literature simply might not replicate was brought home by the fact that there are more and more of these counterintuitive findings in the literature,” says Eric-Jan Wagenmakers, a mathematical psychologist from the University of Amsterdam.
1. Saying that there's a problem with a discipline is not the same as saying that there's a problem with every single psychologist. What I'm saying is that the good psychologists don't seem to have the same influence that good biochemists and good evolutionary biologist (mostly) have on their respective disciplines.
There’s a torrent of research demonstrating the costs and benefits of using social, mobile, and digital technology enhancements to teach; yet it’s inconclusive whether these result in higher student outcomes. Of course, there are multiple bottom lines to consider. What’s undeniable is that even though digital divides exist, today’s students expect to see some technology used in their classes. It follows that we can expect increased engagement and higher student satisfaction when profs power-up. In my experience, exceedingly positive end-of-term student surveys and reviews in my ed-tech enhanced courses document a beneficial halo effect.The first statement is true, as far as I know. There are no sound pedagogical reasons for incorporating social media and other technologies into a course. That means there must be other, not-pedagogical, reasons for change.
In order for professors to engage in podcasting or online lectures or tweeting, or supporting their colleagues who opt to publish in open source journals or participate in online conferences, they must see real benefits and an immediate, significant return on investment. Perhaps for some profs evidence of increased student satisfaction and engagement will win them over.I hope that "increased student satisfaction" will never be a primary motive for change. It may be a secondary benefit but that's not the same thing. Our job is to teach effectively. If the proper teaching methods don't "please" the students then our job is to convince them that they need to change their minds about what gives them pleasure. If they can't do that then they might have only two choices: (1) be miserable throughout their stay in university, or (2) drop out.
When Stanford University offers massively open online courses (MOOCs) in science and engineering, in one case drawing over 150,000 participants, people take notice. When the Khan Academy wins significant Microsoft funding, posts 3,000 instructional videos online, and attracts massive traffic, stories proliferate about the future of self-directed, online, informal e-learning. ... Critics ask, what’s the value of having students attend a lecture in real time if essentially the same material is covered by world-renowned professors on professional-quality video courtesy of free services at TED-Ed or YouTube Education? ... Why pay enormous fees to learn from faculty in an accredited university program, when MITx offers free online courseware with options for students to get peer-to-peer and professor feedback, assessment and earn branded certificates of achievement? What is the return on investment for students (and perhaps their parents) opting to earn their credentials at a bricks-and-mortar university when they could join the 30,000 others enrolled at the London School of Business and Finance in their Global MBA program—delivered online via a Facebook app?There's a myth here that needs exposing. The quality of undergraduate education in the sciences1 should be judged by the content of the course and not the prestige of the university that offers it. Let's not get bamboozled into thinking that just because Stanford and Khan
1. I restricted myself to the sciences because we are presumably judging quality by the ability to teach critical thinking and factually correct material. There may well be degrees and programs where this isn't important. For example, it may not be important who teaches MBA courses since the goal is just to get a degree to put on your CV. In that case the prestige of the London School of Business and Finance may be far more important than whether you are actually learning something useful, or correct.
LS4.A: Evidence of Common Ancestry and DiversityNot bad, all things considered. I'd like to add that some evolution occurs by the chance increase in certain traits in a population, a process known as random genetic drift. Drift is part of the standards in my province of Ontario.
LS4.B: Natural Selection
- Fossils are mineral replacements, preserved remains, or traces of organisms that lived in the past. Thousands of layers of sedimentary rock not only provide evidence of the history of the Earth itself but also of changes in organisms whose fossil remains have been found in those layers. (a)
- The collection of fossils and their placement in chronological order (e.g., through the location of the sedimentary layers in which they are found or through radioactive dating) is known as the fossil record. It documents the existence, diversity, extinction, and change of many life forms throughout the history of life on Earth. Because of the conditions necessary for their preservation, not all types of organisms that existed in the past have left fossils that can be retrieved. (c)
- Anatomical similarities and differences between various organisms living today, and between them and organisms in the fossil record, enable the reconstruction of evolutionary history and the inference of lines of evolutionary descent. (b)
- Comparison of the embryological development of different species also reveals similarities that show relationships not evident in the fully-formed anatomy. (d)
LS4.C: Adaptation
- Genetic variations among individuals in a population give some individual an advantage in surviving and reproducing in their environment. This is known as natural selection. It leads to the predominance of certain traits in a population, and the suppression of others. (e),(f)
- Adaptation by natural selection acting over generations is one important process by which species change over time in response to changes in environmental conditions. (g)
- Traits that support successful survival and reproduction in the new environment become more common; those that do not become less common. Thus, the distribution of traits in a population changes. (f)
- In separated populations with different conditions, the changes can be large enough that the populations, provided they remain separated (a process called reproductive isolation), evolve to be separate species. (g)
LS4.A: Evidence of Common Ancestry and DiversityI have more of a problem with the high school standards. High school students must learn about random genetic drift, especially if they are comparing sequences since most of the changes they will see are nearly neutral changes that have been fixed by drift.
LS4.B: Natural Selection
- Genetic information, like the fossil record, also provides evidence of evolution. DNA sequences vary among species, but there are many overlaps; in fact, the ongoing branching that produces multiple lines of descent can be inferred by comparing the DNA sequences of different organisms. Such information is also derivable from the similarities and differences in amino acid sequences and from anatomical and embryological evidence. (e)
LS4.C: Adaptation
- Natural selection occurs only if there is both (1) variation in the genetic information between organisms in a population and (2) variation in the expression of that genetic information—that is, trait variation—that leads to differences in performance among individuals. (a),(c)
- The traits that positively affect survival are more likely to be reproduced, and thus are more common in the population. (b),(c),(d),(f)
- Natural selection is the result of four factors: (1) the potential for a species to increase in number, (2) the genetic variation of individuals in a species due to mutation and sexual reproduction, (3) competition for an environment’s limited supply of the resources that individuals need in order to survive and reproduce, and (4) the ensuing proliferation of those organisms that are better able to survive and reproduce in that environment. (a)
- Natural selection leads to adaptation, that is, to a population dominated by organisms that are anatomically, behaviorally, and physiologically well suited to survive and reproduce in a specific environment. That is, the differential survival and reproduction of organisms in a population that have an advantageous heritable trait leads to an increase in the proportion of individuals in future generations that have the trait and to a decrease in the proportion of individuals that do not. (b),(c),(f)
- Adaptation also means that the distribution of traits in a population can change when conditions change. (d)
- Changes in the physical environment, whether naturally occurring or human induced, have thus contributed to the expansion of some species, the emergence of new distinct species as populations diverge under different conditions, and the decline–and sometimes the extinction–of some species. (d)
- Species become extinct because they can no longer survive and reproduce in their altered environment. If members cannot adjust to change that is too fast or drastic, the opportunity for the species’ evolution is lost. (d)
