Proslogion : Page 71 of 113 : Thoughts from a scientist who is a Christian (not a Christian Scientist)

Homeschool Graduates and Community College

mcc — Monroe Community College in Rochester, NY (click for credit)

I try to keep up on all the latest research related to homeschooled students. Unfortunately, I seem to have missed a small study that was published in the summer 2008 edition of the Journal of College Admission. The study wasn’t done on homeschooled students; instead, it was done on community college admissions officers. The authors sent surveys to them, asking about their perceptions of homeschool graduates. I found several of the paper’s points rather interesting and worthy of some discussion.¹

First, the paper reports on the results of another study I somehow missed. The study is a bit old (1998), but the results are worth noting. It examined the community college transcripts of 101 homeschool graduates and compared them to those of students who graduated from a traditional high school. The study found that both full-time and part-time homeschool graduates had significantly higher grade point averages (GPAs) than their peers. In addition, the study examined the results of the Texas Academic Skills Program, a test that all students who attend state-funded, post-secondary educational institutions in Texas are required to take. The test covers reading, writing, and mathematics. Once again, the homeschool graduates achieved significantly higher scores than their traditionally-schooled peers.²

Second, the paper discusses the admissions process for homeschool graduates at community colleges. It notes that only 50% of those that responded to the survey have an official policy regarding the admissions process for homeschool graduates. That surprised me. After all, you would think that community colleges would cater to nontraditional students, and homeschooled students are clearly nontraditional. Also, many homeschooling families are looking for ways to make college more affordable, since they generally have a number of children. As a result, you would think that community colleges would be a natural choice for many homeschool graduates. It seems to me, then, that it would be natural for the vast majority of community colleges to have an official policy regarding how homeschool graduates should be admitted.

Now while only 50% of the responding colleges had an official policy for the admission of homeschool graduates, 80% said that they had procedures in place that would allow for the admission of such students. Thus, even without an official policy, some community colleges still make it possible for homeschool graduates to be admitted. That’s good news, of course, but it makes me wonder why a school that allows for the admission of homeschool graduates doesn’t have an official policy regarding how that should be done!

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An Atheist Who Rejects Materialist Neo-Darwinism

Dr. Thomas Nagel is a Professor of Philosophy and Law at New York University. He has a long list of academic publications, which include books and journal articles. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences as well as the British Academy. He has been awarded both the Rolf Schock Prize for his work in philosophy and the Balzan Prize for his work in moral philosophy. Oh…and he is an atheist. He recently wrote a fascinating book entitled, Mind and Cosmos:Why the Materialist Neo-Darwinian Conception of Nature is Almost Certainly False.

The book is fascinating on many levels. Probably the most obvious is the fact that while he is an atheist, he speaks very highly of the Intelligent Design movement. In fact, he credits the Intelligent Design movement for stimulating his thinking on the subject of origins. He disagrees with their belief in a Designer, but he has given them a fair hearing, and he says this:

Even if one is not drawn to the alternative of an explanation by the actions of a designer, the problems that these iconoclasts pose for the orthodox scientific consensus should be taken seriously. They do not deserve the scorn with which they are commonly met. It is manifestly unfair. (p.10)

But wait a minute. Aren’t the Intelligent Design arguments fatally flawed? Don’t they rest on an incredibly poor understanding of the nature of science? Not according to this philosopher. He has read both the Intelligent Design advocates and their critics, and he says:

Those who have seriously criticized these arguments have certainly shown there are ways to resist the design conclusion; but the general force of the negative part of the intelligent design position – skepticism about the likelihood of the orthodox reductive view, given the available evidence – does not appear to me to have been destroyed in these exchanges. (p. 11)

But wait a minute, isn’t the only motivation behind Intelligent Design the desire to “prove” the existence of God? Nagel says that’s certainly part of the motivation, but not all of it. After all, he mentions David Berlinski as someone who is sympathetic to the negative claims of the Intelligent Design movement but has no desire to believe in a Designer. He also says:

Nevertheless, I believe the defenders of intelligent design deserve our gratitude for challenging a scientific world view that owes some of the passion displayed by its adherents precisely to the fact that it is thought to liberate us from religion. (p. 12)

In the end, then, religious motivations exist on both sides. Some Intelligent Design advocates are motivated by their desire to lend evidence to their belief in a Designer, but some evolutionists are motivated by their desire to be liberated from religion. This even-handed observation is obviously true, but it is rarely made by those who do not believe in God.

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The Stories Behind A Few Hymns

spafford — Horatio Spafford, author of "It is Well with My Soul." (Click for credit)

While one of my favorite things to write about is science, I do touch on other topics from time to time. For example, I have written several Christian dramas. I posted two of them on this blog (here and here), and I hope to post more as time goes on. This is my latest addition. It’s called “Sing Those Old Hymns with Feeling,” and it presents the inspiring stories related to some of the classic hymns of the Christian faith. As these hymns get older and older, it gets harder and harder for many Christians to be inspired by them. In my opinion, that’s unfortunate. I find many modern Christian songs to be inspiring, and I enjoy singing them in church. However, I find many old hymns to be inspiring as well, and I also enjoy singing them in church. It was my hope that by presenting some of the stories related to the hymns, people in my church would find them more inspiring.

I started the play with one of my favorite devices: making the congregation a little uneasy. The worship leader got up and dropped her music so it spilled all over the floor. She muttered under her breath as she knelt down and gathered up the mess of music. Then, in a very unenthusiastic way, she asked the congregation to join her in singing “What a Friend We Have in Jesus.” The pianist started playing, but the melody was “I’m a Little Teapot.” The worship leader stopped the pianist and very impatiently told her that we were singing “What a Friend We Have in Jesus.” The pianist began to play, but she played it way too slowly. The song was allowed to go on for a few bars, and then someone from the congregation jumped up and started yelling for it to stop. He then went up front to tell the worship leader that this hymn is very important and should be sung with feeling. That’s when the meat of the play began.

Through the course of the play, the congregation learned the stories behind seven of the great hymns of the faith: “What a Friend We Have in Jesus,” “It Is Well with My Soul,” “His Eye Is on the Sparrow,” “All Hail the Power of Jesus’ Name,” “When the Roll is Called up Yonder,” “All the Way My Savior Leads Me, and “Revive Us Again.” All of the stories are inspiring in their own way, but my favorite is the one behind “It Is Well with My Soul.” I have written previously about how Christians should deal with tragedy, and I think the author of that hymn, Horatio Spafford, is a perfect model for how it should be done.

Even though this script has nine characters, we used only six people for the performance. All three female hymn writers were played by one woman, with small changes to her costume for each character. Two of the male hymn writers were played by the same person, but in fact, all four of them could be played by a single man, if he is good at memorizing lines! Please feel free to use this play in any way that you like, but I would appreciate a credit if you use it (or a part of it) in any public presentation. Even if you don’t do dramas in your church, you might want to read the stories. As I said, they are very inspiring! The script is given in the following PDF file:

Sing Those Old Hymns With Feeling

The Great Debate

Last night, I debated Dr. Robert A. Martin on the question of creation versus evolution. I obviously took the creation side, and he took the evolution side. I debated him once before in 2009, and you can watch a video of that debate here. The format of this debate was a bit different from the one on the video. In this one, we each had 30 minutes to present our case, and then the audience asked us questions. The purpose of the questions was to focus the debate on what the audience found interesting in our presentations. Dr. Martin and I were each given a chance to address the question, and that usually led to more interaction between us. Everyone with whom I talked, including Dr. Martin, was very pleased with how it all turned out.

One thing I have to say up front is how appreciative I am of Dr. Martin. First, the fact that he was willing to do the debate at all is a testament to his commitment to real science education. I contacted several universities in Indiana, and none of them were interested in finding an evolutionist professor who was willing to debate. The common response by evolutionists is that they don’t debate creationists, because that would give the creationist view too much legitimacy. However, Dr. Martin realized that if no one came to give the evolutionary side, everyone at the conference would hear only one side of the story, and that’s not very good when it comes to science education. As a result, he was willing to drive from Kentucky to make sure that both sides were heard.

Second, Dr. Martin was incredibly gracious. He knew going in that this was a creationist event, so he knew that his view would be in the minority. In some ways, he was like a lion in a den of Daniels. However, he was very kind in how he treated everyone. Now don’t get me wrong – he took a strong stand for evolution. He often said things like the evidence for evolution is overwhelming, and that there is just no question about the age of the earth and the universe. But never once did he descend into the name-calling and other nonsense that is common among those who don’t care to discuss evidence. He limited his discussion to the science, and that was great.

Third, Dr. Martin was kind enough to stay longer than we had intended. Not surprisingly, there were a lot of questions, and at the scheduled end of the debate, the moderator stopped and said that we were officially out of time. However, Dr. Marin immediately said that he was willing to stay longer. As a result, everyone who stood up to ask a question was able to interact with us. Even after the debate was over, he stayed and talked with people one-on-one for quite some time. Clearly, Dr. Martin has a passion for science and science education. His demeanor and willingness to pleasantly engage people with whom he disagrees demonstrated that to me in no uncertain terms.

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The ENCODE Data and Pseudogenes

As I mentioned in two previous posts (here and here), the coordinated release of scientific papers from the ENCODE project has produced an enormous amount of amazing data when it comes to the human genome and how cells in the body use the information stored there. While the majority of commentary regarding these data has focused on the fact that human cells use more than 80% of the DNA found in them, I think some of the most interesting scientific results have gotten very little attention. They are contained in a paper that was published in a journal named Genome Biology, and they relate to the pseudogenes found in human DNA.

For those who are not aware, a pseudogene is a DNA sequence that looks a lot like a gene, but because of some details in the sequence, it cannot be used to make a protein. Remember, a gene’s job is to provide a “recipe” for the cell so that it can make a protein. Well, a pseudogene looks a lot like a recipe for a protein, but it cannot be used that way. Think of your favorite recipe in a cookbook. If you use it a lot, it probably has stains on it because it has been open while you are cooking. Imagine what would happen if the recipe got so stained that certain important instructions were rendered unreadable. For someone who has never looked at the recipe before, he might recognize that it is a recipe, but because certain important instructions are unreadable, he will never be able to use the recipe to make the dish. That’s what a pseudogene is like. It looks like a recipe for a protein, but certain important parts have been damaged so that they cannot be used properly anymore. As a result, the recipe cannot be used by the cell to make a protein.

Pseudogenes have been promoted by evolutionists as completely functionless and as evidence against the idea that the human genome is the result of design. Here is how Dr. Kenneth R. Miller put it back in 1994:¹

From a design point of view, pseudogenes are indeed mistakes. So why are they there? Intelligent design cannot explain the presence of a nonfunctional pseudogene, unless it is willing to allow that the designer made serious errors, wasting millions of bases of DNA on a blueprint full of junk and scribbles. Evolution, however, can explain them easily. Pseudogenes are nothing more than chance experiments in gene duplication that have failed, and they persist in the genome as evolutionary remnants…

Obviously, Dr. Miller didn’t understand intelligent design or creationism when he wrote that, as they can both explain nonfunctional pseudogenes. Before I discuss that, however, I need to point out that since 1994, functions have been found for certain pseudogenes. As far as I can tell, the first definitive evidence for function in a pseudogene came in 2003, when Shinji Hirotsune and colleagues found that a specific pseudogene was involved in regulating the functional gene that it resembles.² Since then, functions for several other pseudogenes have been found. In fact, a recent paper in RNA Biology suggests that the use of pseudogenes as regulatory agents is “widespread.”³

Even though functions have been found for many pseudogenes, the question remains: Are most pseudogenes functional, or are most of them non-functional? Well, based on the ENCODE results, we might have the answer. While the ENCODE results indicate that the vast majority of the genome is functional, they also indicate that the vast majority of pseudogenes are, in fact, non-functional.

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Six Alaskan Cities in Six Days

I just got back from speaking with homeschoolers in six different Alaskan cities (Fairbanks, Kenai, Kodiak, Wasilla, Anchorage, and Juneau). In each city, I gave the same two talks: Homeschooling: Discovering How and Why It Works and Life is Amazing. I gave the first talk in the morning, and it was really for parents. However, there were some students in the morning sessions, and for the most part, they seemed to stay awake. The second talk was in the afternoon, and it was really for the students, but there were a lot of parents as well. Everyone enjoyed it, because I showed some amazing animations and videos (you can find links to them in the PDF linked above) and discussed in detail the science behind what the videos were showing.

Lots of great things happened during my time in Alaska, but two of them really stand out in my mind. In the morning talks, I showed several studies that indicate homeschooled students excel, both academically and socially. After I showed these data, I tried to offer some explanations as to why homeschoolers excel. You can see those reasons in the PDF file linked above. However, I also asked the audience to come up with their own ideas as to why homeschoolers tend to excel. I got many excellent replies, but I want to highlight one of them.

A homeschooling father mentioned a study that was done in 1957 by psychologist Dr. Harold McCurdy. What the father said about the study intrigued me, so I looked it up. The author investigated the lives of twenty geniuses like John Stuart Mill, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, and Blaise Pascal. He wanted to see if he could find commonalities in their lives that might have aided their intellectual development. Who knows how effective such a study is, but I found his conclusions to be very interesting. Here is what he said:¹

In summary, the present survey of biographical information on a sample of twenty men of genius suggests that the typical development pattern includes as important aspects: (1) a high degree of attention focused upon the child by parents and other adults, expressed in intensive educational measures and, usually, abundant love; (2) isolation from other children, especially outside the family; and (3) a rich efflorescence of phantasy, as a reaction to the two preceding conditions.

By “phantasy,” the good doctor just means “imaginative play.”

Now as I said, I am not sure how effective such a study really is, so I don’t take these results to be conclusive by any means. However, what he describes sounds an awful lot like a homeschool! Homeschooled children are given a high degree of attention from their loving parents, often in the form of intensive educational endeavors. While not completely isolated from children outside the family, homeschooled students certainly have less contact with their peers than do non-homeschooled students. Finally, most homeschoolers I know severely limit the amount of television that their children can watch, which encourages imaginative play. In the end, then, it seems that homeschooling naturally provides a lot of what Dr. McCurdy thinks is necessary for the development of genius.

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Defending the Indefensible, Part 2

A blogger by the name of Emil Karlsson recently wrote an error-laden piece defending Bill Nye’s rant against creationism. A commenter on this site posted the piece, and as a science educator, I had to point out many of its errors. Mr. Karlsson responded by posting a piece with even more errors. Once again, as a science educator, I had to correct those errors. Well, Mr. Karlsson has attempted to reply to that post, and not surprisingly, he has done so with even more errors. In an effort to educate those who are interested in understanding science and how it works, I will once again correct Mr. Karlsson’s errors.

Still Trying to Get Around What Mr. Nye Actually Said

Mr. Karlsson is still trying to make excuses for Nye’s obvious ignorance when it comes to evolution denial around the world. In an attempt to explain around Mr. Nye’s own words, Mr. Karlsson sets up a hypothetical interrogation in an attempt to claim that I am looking for “ammunition” to use against Nye. Here is his hypothetical interrogation:

Interrogator: Did you smash the windshield of Mr. X’s car?

Innocent suspect: No. I mean, I don’t like the guy and he annoys me to no end, but I would never go so far as to destroy his property just because we did not get along. Besides, I was having lunch at the cafeteria when it happened.

He then says there are two ways you can interpret this. First, he claims that my way is to ignore the suspect’s statement of innocence and his alibi and instead focus on the fact that the suspect admits he didn’t like the victim. He claims that his way is to look at the suspect’s entire statement and conclude that the suspect is not guilty.

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Defending the Indefensible

Not long ago, I wrote a response to Bill Nye’s anti-science video. A commenter replied by posting a link to a blog that attempted to defend Nye’s indefensible statements. I quickly pointed out the many errors in the article, and the commenter obviously sent my response to the author, Emil Karlsson. He has now written another post in an attempt to defend his position. Unfortunately, it is more error-filled than his original post.

Here is my attempt to correct his errors, in the order he presents them:

1. Mr. Karlsson still tries to make excuses for Nye’s false statement about evolution denial being unique in the U.S.

In his reply to me, he gives Nye’s full quote from the beginning of the video. He then tries to claim that Nye was not saying exactly what he said – that denial of evolution is unique to the U.S. Mr. Karlsson claims:

So Bill Nye is not making the naive claim that denial of evolution is unique to the United States in the sense that it does not exist anywhere else, but rather the claim that United States is unique in being a highly technologically advanced society, yet have [sic] a large proportion of the population being creationist.

Of course, Nye is saying nothing of the sort. Nowhere in Nye’s statement can you find the words “large proportion.” In addition, while Nye certainly mentions technological advancement, he is using it as a descriptor for the United States, not a qualifier for his statement. Regardless of the mental gymnastics of Mr. Karlsson, Nye’s statement is unambiguously false.

However, let’s assume Mr. Nye really did mean what Mr. Karlsson claims, even though Mr. Nye said something completely different. Even if that’s the case, his statement is still a complete fabrication. Would Mr. Karlsson agree that Germany is technologically advanced? The study to which he refers indicates that more than 20% of its population denies evolution. The same is true of Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, and Switzerland. In the U.S., a larger percentage (roughly 40%) deny evolution, but that’s not drastically different from the percentage found in many other technologically-advanced nations. Even in the U.K., the percentage of people who deny evolution is greater than 15%.

In the end, then, even in technologically-advanced nations, denial of evolution is common. It is a bit more popular in the U.S., but it is certainly not unique to the U.S. Of course, the U.S. has always been on the cutting edge of science, so it’s not surprising that it holds a slightly higher percentage of people who see the serious scientific problems with evolution!

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Time to Redefine the Concept of a Gene?

As I posted previously, a huge leap in our understanding of human genetics recently occurred due to the massive results of project ENCODE. In short, the data produced by this project show that at least 80.4% of the human genome (almost certainly more) has at least one biochemical function. As the journal Science declared:¹

This week, 30 research papers, including six in Nature and additional papers published by Science, sound the death knell for the idea that our DNA is mostly littered with useless bases.

Not only have the results of ENCODE destroyed the idea that the human genome is mostly junk, it has prompted some to suggest that we must now rethink the definition of the term “gene.” Why? Let’s start with the current definition. Right now, a gene is defined as a section of DNA that tells the cell how to make a specific protein. In plants, animals, and people, genes are composed of exons and introns. In order for the cell to use the gene, it is copied by a molecule called RNA, and that copy is called the RNA transcript. Before the protein is made, the RNA transcript is edited so that the copies of the introns are removed. As a result, when it comes to making a protein, the cell uses only the exons in the gene.

By today’s definition, genes make up only about 3% of the human genome. The problem is that the ENCODE project has shown that a minimum of 74.7% of the human genome produces RNA transcripts!² Now the process of making an RNA transcript, called “transcription,” takes a lot of energy and requires a lot of cellular resources. It is absurd to think that the cell would invest energy and resources to read sections of DNA that don’t have a function.

In addition, the data in reference (2) demonstrate that many RNA transcripts go to specific regions in the cell, indicating that they are performing a specific function. Since there is so much DNA that does not fit the definition of “gene” but seems to be performing functions in the cell, scientists probably need to redefine what a gene is. Alternatively, scientists could come up with another term that applies to the sections of DNA which make an RNA transcript but don’t end up producing a protein.

There is another reason that prompts some to reconsider the concept of a gene: alternative splicing. The ENCODE data show that this is significantly more important than most scientists ever imagined.

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