Bill urges Colorado school debates on creationism
Source: Washington Examiner
Bill urges Colorado school debates on creationism
February 4, 2013 | Modified: February 4, 2013 at 2:16 pm
DENVER (AP) — A Colorado Republican lawmaker wants schools and colleges to create a friendly environment to discuss what he considers controversial science issues, a move that critics say would lead to debates about creationism and evolution.
The bill sponsored by Rep. Stephen Humphrey will get a hearing Monday and is scheduled for a vote in the House Education committee. The proposal calls on public schools and colleges to create an environment for students to encourage scientific questioning on "controversial issues in science education."
The bill states that teachers should allow debates that "respectfully explore scientific questions and learn about scientific evidence related to biological and chemical evolution, global warming and human cloning."
Humphrey, a lawmaker from Severance, said he understands the concerns from opponents that the bill opens up debate on religious teachings, but he insists that's not what his bill would do.
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Here's a definition of chemical evolution from: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/chemical+evolution
Note : Many of the steps in chemical evolution can now be reproduced in the laboratory.
Note : Some scientists believe that all or most of the Earth's original organic molecules were created in space and were brought to the Earth's oceans by meteorites.
So, you see, there are some interesting scientific questions to be discussed and decided about chemical evolution.
Richard Dawkins has a 20 or so page discussion of ideas associated with the chemical origins of life in his wonderful book The Ancestor's Tale, at the point when all the ancestors have returned to 'Canterbury' about 4 billion years in the past:
A length of DNA or, under certain conditions, the related molecule RNA is a true replicator. So is a computer virus. So is a chain letter. But all these replicators need a complicated apparatus to assist them. DNA needs a cell richly equipped with pre-existing biochemical machinery highly adapted to read and copy the DNA code. A computer virus needs a computer with some sort of data link to other computers, all designed by human engineers to obey coded instructions. A chain letter needs a good supply of idiots, with evolved brains educated at least enough to read. What is unique about the first replicator, the one that sparked life, is that it had no ready supply of anything evolved, designed or educated. The first replicator worked de novo, ab initio, without precedent, and without help other than from the ordinary laws of chemistry.
Dawkins presents some of the research done in investigations of chemical evolution, for example, the Miller-Urey experiment:
After only a week in this recycling simulacrum, the ocean had turned yellowbrown and Miller analyzed its content. As Haldane would have predicted, it had become a soup of organic compounds, including no fewer than seven amino
acids, the essential building blocks of proteins. Among the seven were three — glycine, aspartic acid and alanine — from the list of 20 found in living things. Later experiments along Miller's lines, but substituting carbon dioxide or
carbon monoxide for methane, have achieved similar results. We can draw the robust conclusion that biologically important small molecules, including amino acids, sugars and, significantly, the building blocks of DNA and RNA, spontaneously form when various versions of the Oparin /Haldane primitive Earth are simulated in the laboratory.
These snippets don't do justice to the whole discussion, but at least should give you some ideas about scope of work on life's chemical origins.
I hope Colorado high school students get to learn about THIS SORT OF INTERESTING, AMAZING WORK!
Fun stuff.
For me the name strikes me as a bit of a misnomer, or at least an odd way of talking about chemicals. The phrase "life's chemical origins" is much more apt, in that words "chemical evolution" leave out the most interesting part, the tie-in to life (except insofar as the reference is implicit in the word "evolution"
. I guess it's just an expression I haven't run across before!
I'm not sure that chemical evolution is really a "controversial issue in science education," except perhaps for those who insist science conform to their prior beliefs.
and I recommend the chapter in Dawkins' book for more details and history. I am sure there are other references as well.
My point about chemical evolution/life's chemical origins being 'controversial' was intended to refer to the differing theories on earthly origin versus meteoric arrival...I should have been more clear.
Of course, differences of opinion are of great importance for the progress of science...as long as the opinions are backed by evidence and ultimately an explaining theory.
Here's one bits of evidence for extraterrestrial organic compounds: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murchison_meteorite
The National Center for Science Education is the clearinghouse for these issues.
Their executive director, Eugenie Scott, is the real deal.
Google her.
Or watch her talk at TAM 2011:
