chron.Commons Blog | Chron.com - Houston Chronicle

1:40 - I'm back after the lunch break.

Terri Leo is amending Biology, and McLeroy intends to do so, too. Uh, oh.

Leo's Biology amendment: "(D) analyze and evaluate the evidence regarding formation of simple organic molecules and their organization into long complex molecules having information such as the DNA molecule for self-replicating life."

Bob Craig asked Leo if this amendment has been discussed with any of the six science experts. Her answer was no. The amendment carried 9-5. Agosto and one other member voted with the seven radical religious right members. Once again, a change was made to the Biology standards by a religious right member with no scientific justification from a science expert to support it. On the face of it, the addition does not seem to be bad, certainly not as damaging to science as the two bad amendments made in January, but I am still very unhappy with the process. This is very unprofessional, having non-scientists adding specific standards to the Science TEKS.

Mavis Knight has now made the motion to amend the Biology standards by striking the 7B amendment made two months ago in January by Don McLeroy: "analyze and evaluate the sufficiency or insufficiency of common ancestry to explain the sudden appearance, stasis, and sequential nature of groups in the fossil record;" Dunbar and McLeroy both objected to the motion. McLeroy called it a "very excellent standard that deserves to be supported." He mentioned Dr. Genie Scott's criticism of the new 7B standard. The vote to remove McLeroy's standard failed 6-7-1, Rick Agosto abstaining. You know where the seven No votes came from. The motion would have failed even if Agosto had voted Yes. We need him to vote Yes tomorrow or the science content of the Biology standards will be permanently damaged. The 7B standard is currently pseudoscientific.

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McLeroy has a new standard to put into the Biology's evolution section: "7(G) analyze and evaluate the sufficiency or insufficiency of natural selection to explain the complexity of the cell." This is obviously another Creationist-inspired amendment. McLeroy is citing Dr. Bruce Albert's article from 1998, "We have always underestimated cells. But, as it turned out, we can walk and talk, because the chemistry of the cell is much more complex than we ever thought..." This is completely crazy and so unprofessional. Every scientist sees that this is a contrived ploy to insert a pro-Creationist standard that questions the sufficiency of natural selection. This is unscientific on its face. McLeroy is trying to do now exactly what he did in January: get a scientifically-damaging standard inserted into Biology without the chance for any scientist expert review or consultation. This sort of process is just too stupid and unethical for words. All Texas citizens should be ashamed of some of their elected representatives.

Bob Craig has suggested a substitute motion: "Analyze and evaluate the evolutionary explanation of the complexity of the cell." McLeroy is speaking against Craig's substitute motion saying Craig's in not clear and his is supported by Bruce Albert. Pat Hardy says she has received a note from her science expert and he says that natural selection by itself is not sufficient to explain cellular complexity. Other evolutionary processes are involved. Craig's substitute amendment failed 6-8 with Rick Agosto voting No with the seven religious right Young Earth Creationists.

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2:20 - Now we have the vote to add McLeroy's unscientific and anti-evolution amendment. The vote is 9-5 to add it, with Rick Agosto and Rene Nunez voting Yes with the seven Religious Right Creationists. Science is screwed again. We need to reorganize and find out why some normally science-supporting SB members are voting with the YECs to undermine and injure Biology education. If the pro-science faction on the SBOE doesn't stick together, the Creationists will win with their debilitating individual amendments rather than S&W.

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2:33 - We now turn to Earth and Space Science. Bob Craig has a single sheet with five different amendments. These are recommended by the ESS TEKS-writing panel. They are available on the TCS website in the ESS Report linked there. Barbara Cargill mentioned me by name and mistakenly said that I wrote the amendments. In fact, the amendments were written by the eight members of the ESS panel using email discussion. Terri Leo also complained that she hasn't seen these amendments. This is false, too. The SB members got these twice by email before the meeting and in paper form yesterday when Kyle Lewellen testified. He handed out the ESS Final Report on the ESS amendments. This document contained these amendments. Cargill is taking the lead to oppose these amendments, which is understandable since she was responsible for getting the original bad amendments passed in January.

The five amendments are now being voted upon. The first four are minor changes, but the last is of major importance since what Cargill got passed is very unscientific. The first one failed 6-8 with Agosto voting with the right wing YEC Republicans. The second one failed 7-7. Mavis Knight is having trouble getting the amendments since she is in Dallas. She needs to have them faxed to her. Cargill wants the standards to suggest humility in what scientists know. She says her wording is better and suggests humility better. The third one failed 7-7. Now Terri Leo is moving an amendment to change "sources of heat" to "thermal energy sources" that passed without objection. The fourth ESS/Craig amendment passed without objection.

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Now we come to standard 8A, which is grossly unscientific since it suggests that there is fossil evidence against universal common descent. This is doubly wrong, since fossils do not provide evidence for or against common descent and there is no other evidence against common descent. The amendment failed 6-8, with Agosto voting No with the seven YEC religious right Republicans.

Barbara Cargill now has some more nasty amendments to ESS. As usual, she is springing them on the SBOE members and public at the last minute without explanation and expert evaluation. She will need a majority vote to get these passed. Will Agosto give the Republicans the vote they need to further damage ESS? I can't get a copy of these amendments right now. However, the first one she wants is to strike the current standard for the Big Bang and remove the 14 billion year old age from it. She is promoting a Young Earth Creationist view, of course. Many times in the past the SBOE has changed standards that mention millions and billions of years to simple "a long time ago." She wants to substitute a standard from Astronomy that simply adds, "add current theories of the evolution of the universe including estimates for the age of the universe" to the Big Bang standard 4A. Cargill's amendment to strip a very ancient number of years one that is equivocal about the age of the universe passed 11-3, with only Knight, Miller, and Nunez voting No. So the SBOE holds true to its wonderful tradition of stripping any date older than 10,000 years from science standards!

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Cargill has a second amendment to ESS. I still do not have a copy of her amendments. She is keeping them hidden from the public, and she and Leo had the gall to complain that they only just now got the ESS amendments of the ESS panel that Craig presented, when in fact they got them several times, including on paper on Wednesday. Her motion is to add "thought to have occurred" to 6A about the formation of the solar system. This absurd amendment passed 10-4.

I now have a copy of the amendments. The third one is not bad: it substitutes different language for the radiometric dating standard 7B that simply re-arranges the words in a not-harmful way. It passed 8-6.

Cargill's fourth and last ESS amendment adds the words "given the complexity of living systems" to the conclusion of the origin of life standard 13F. This passed 9-5 with Agosto and one other voting with the Republicans. I guess I should be grateful that Cargill didn't just delete the entire origin of life standard.

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