Encyclopedia of Evolution.pdf - Online Reading Center

een wrong: His hypothesis of the comma-less genetic code
was wrong, and few scientists accept his speculations about
directed panspermia (see origin of life). Fred Hoyle teamed
up with Crick to proclaim directed panspermia. Ordinary
scientists accept such insights with gratitude, then test them
individually, keeping the ones that work. Some scientists are
specialists in their narrow fields; others are generalists, working
mostly as educators and writers; some scientists study the
ethical and social implications of scientific research and theory.
These are some of the things science can do because it is
a community of scientists.
Because science limits itself to physical causation and
hypothesis testing, it can reach definite conclusions. This is
why biologist Peter Medawar has described science as “the
art of the soluble,” and Stephen Jay Gould (see Gould, Stephen
Jay) called science “an enterprise dedicated to posing
answerable questions.”
Some philosophers have claimed that science is merely a
Western social convention. Most scientists, however, strongly
believe that the scientific method is the uniquely correct way
to truth about physical processes. Science cannot be dismissed
as a mere belief system that is no better than other ways of
thinking. Other ways of thinking can, of course, be valid for
nonphysical concepts.
Finally, one cannot help but wonder if science has
already made all of the major discoveries of the universe. In
the past century and a half, scientists have discovered the
main outlines of the history of the universe and life, and the
chemical basis of life. It seems unlikely that any new breakthroughs
are coming comparable to those of Darwin or Einstein.
Some have pointed out that all the easy research has
been done; only the hard questions remain, involving the very
small, the very distant, and the very old. Scientific research
may start yielding diminishing returns, very soon. Will society
still be willing to pay for it?
Further Reading
Bowler, Peter J., and Iwan Rhys Morus. Making Modern Science: A
Historical Survey. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005.
Center for Science, Mathematics, and Engineering Education. Every
Child a Scientist: Achieving Scientific Literacy for All. Washington,
D.C.: National Academies Press, 1998. Available online. URL:
http://books.nap.edu/catalog/6005.html. Accessed May 5, 2005.
Environmental Protection Agency. “Global warming—climate—
uncertainties.” Available online. URL: http://yosemite.epa.gov/
oar/globalwarming.nsf/content/climateuncertainties.html. Accessed
October 7, 2005.
Feynman, Richard P. The Pleasure of Finding Things Out: The Best
Short Works of Richard P. Feynman. New York: Basic Books,
2005.
Gould, Stephen Jay. The Hedgehog, the Fox, and the Magister’s Pox:
Mending the Gap Between Science and the Humanities. New
York: Harmony Books, 2003.
Horgan, John. The End of Science: Facing the Limits of Knowledge in
the Twilight of the Scientific Age. New York: Little, Brown, 1997.
Jenkins, Stephen H. How Science Works: Evaluating Evidence in
Biology and Medicine. New York: Oxford University Press, 2004.
Scopes Trial
Kuhn, Thomas. The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, 3rd ed. Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1996.
Lightman, Alan. A Sense of the Mysterious: Science and the Human
Spirit. New York: Pantheon, 2005.
Losee, John. Theories on the Scrap Heap: Scientists and Philosophers
on the Falsification, Rejection, and Replacement of Theories.
Pittsburgh, Pa.: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2005.
Menuge, Angus. Agents under Fire: Materialism and the Rationality
of Science. Lanham, Md.: Rowman and Littlefield, 2004.
Moody, Chris. The Republican War on Science. New York: Basic
Books, 2005.
Moore, John A. Science as a Way of Knowing: The Foundations of
Modern Biology. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1993.
Ruse, Michael. Taking Darwin Seriously: A Naturalistic Approach to
Philosophy. Oxford, U.K.: Blackwell, 1986.
Russell, Susan H., Mary P. Hancock, and James McCullough. “Benefits
of undergraduate research experiences.” Science 316 (2007):
548–549.
Union of Concerned Scientists. Scientific Integrity in Policymaking:
An Investigation into the Bush Administration’s Misuse of Science.
March 2004. Available online. URL: http://www.ucsusa.org/
scientific_integrity/. Accessed October 7, 2005.
Waxman, Henry A. “About politics & science: The state of science
under the Bush Administration.” U.S. House of Representatives.
Available online. URL: http://democrats.reform.house.gov/features/politics_and_science/index.htm.
Accessed October 7, 2005.
Wigley, Tom M., et al. “Temperature Trends in the Lower Atmosphere:
Understanding and Reconciling Differences.” Available online. URL:
www.climatescience.gov/Library/sap/sap1-1/finalreport/default. htm.
Accessed July 11, 2006.
Wilson, Edward O. Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge. New York:
Random House, 1999.
Working Group on Teaching Evolution, National Academy of Sciences.
Teaching About Evolution and the Nature of Science. Washington,
D.C.: National Academies Press, 1998.
Scopes Trial In 1925 a high school teacher in Dayton,
Tennessee, John T. Scopes, was put on trial for teaching evolution,
which was prohibited by Tennessee law. Since Scopes
clearly violated state law, the judge found him guilty, but the
punishment was only a small fine.
The Tennessee law upon which the Scopes Trial was
based was not the first antievolution legislation in the United
States. That honor goes to Oklahoma, where an antievolution
amendment was added to a state law regarding free textbooks
in 1923. This law was repealed shortly after the 1925
Scopes Trial.
The Scopes Trial has become the symbol of religious
opposition to the teaching of evolution, for several reasons.
First, it was the only example of prosecution of an instructor
for teaching evolution. Second, because it was widely viewed
as the flashpoint of the struggle between God and secularism,
it drew national attention, particularly when two of the most
famous lawyers in the country came to Dayton: William Jennings
Bryan, to prosecute Scopes, and Clarence Darrow to
defend him (see top photo on page 362). Bryan was a famous
politician: a former secretary of state under Woodrow Wilson,