Bush promotes ID

I can't support Bush on this issue.ID is not scientific, and weakening K-12 science education is likely to have long-term deleterious effects on the economic competitveness and military technology and strength of the US. The latter especially needs to be pointed out to Republicans who regard themselves as "pro-military".Discusssion of ID as a political and social issue may be a fit topic for a high school civics class.However ID has no more place in a science class than astrology or alchemy, and as a Republican of the free market libertarian wing, I oppose the party advocating it.

Loaded question.K-12 science education should above all teach scientific methodology and reasoning. Where a body of facts is taught (which is secondary, IMO , to teaching the scientific methodolgy and reasoning), they should be drawn from areas that have substantial evidence and acceptance in the professional scientific community.ID does not qualify, thus is outside the scope of science education. That it isn't in the syllabus and they will not be tested on it.

Bad strategy to make analogies like this.The IDists would love nothing more than to portray evolution as something only far-left atheists accept.You need as allies conservatives who see ID as bad science. I am more upset about this than Monk, but we seem to be on the same page.Conflating evolution with left-wing social causes is like pouring gasoline on the fire the IDists are trying to light.

Let's not veer off-topic. My point is that the strongest argument against ID and the one we can all agree on is that it is bad science.

I've heard this argument made before. While it has its merits, I am more concerned about the general level of scientific literacy in the pool of people that potentially become technicians , health care professionals, or bachelor's degree level engineers.The percentage of the population that will become Ph.D scientists is going to be quite small under any conditions. I think there are other explanations for the demographics you cite than weak K-12 education , e.g. many engineers are content to stop at the MS because there is no benefit to their career in a Ph.D., even though they had the capability to complete one.But that's another thread.

Well, I think we agree on that point. We both want better K-12 scienc teaching.I was just pointing out that the demographics of Ph.D. programs in the US are likely caused by a number of factors, not all of which are even negative (e.g. the programs are attractive to foreigners because of their quality).We could start another thread, pore over NSF statistics, etc.

IMO, 150 year's worth of articles on both basic research in evolutionary biology and practical applications thereof, produced internationally, and involving billions of dollars, yen, Euros, pounds, etc., in research funds, trump such opinions as yours on this matter.It is like standing at Cape Canaveral or Baikonur after a launch, talking to a group of aerospace engineers, and telling them that you take the notion of human spaceflight with a grain of salt and regard the journal articles on it as bad science.It is like insisting that the views on human spaceflight in journals of geocentrists and Moon landing conspiracy theorists count as much as mainstream aerospace journals.Sorry, but science has professional standards, and the professionals that practice it get to make them.

Well, I think we are in agreement that promoting ID will have a negative effect on science education.As to the numbers of American-born PhDs and potdocs, I still think a number of benign factors contribute:-the demographic pool of Gen X that would be attaining PhDs now is smaller in absolute numbers than the boomers-the perpetual postdoc is not an attractive career option especially when well-paying industry positions are available in many fields.IMO, academia itself must bear much of the blame for making a scientific career extremely unattractive to a bright American, who typically will aspire to an upper middle class lifestyle and scorn careers that offer no real opportunity of such.-the MS is sufficient for career advancement in many of those industry positionsTo substantiate these points in detail would require some analysis of the NSF data. But some of your sources make some of these points as well.Cultural trends are harder to analyze and detect. In many ways the current situation of vocal fundamentalist activism paradoxically coincident with rapid technological change is reminiscent of the 1920's. It is possible that the excesses of the fundamentalists will be their own undoing, now as then, and in time they will fade out of the cultural mainstream.