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    Rodrigo Borges

    The Origin of Species

    Rodrigo Borges  February 9 2009 04:48:14 PM
    This week the world is celebrating the 200th birthday of Charles Darwin, the man who changed how our children learn about the creation of the world as well as the evolution of the species. Before Darwin, all we knew was that the world began with Adam and Eve, their sons, sons' son until nowadays. On 1959, he published "On the Origin of Species", a revolutionary study about the species, where we come from and to where we will go.

    Since then the world is split on two:
    • Darwinism: those who believe that we came from a long process of evolution, not from Adam and Eve. Most of the people who follow this idea is scientist and biologist.
    • Creationism: those who still believe that God created the world, mad Adam and Eve and that we are sons of them.

    Today I was reading a magazine here in Brazil about Charles Darwin and one thing that came up to my attention was how the schools around the world handle this topic to the students. All science books have changed to teach the students the Darwin's theory. But lots of schools are insisting on on keep the creationism on their program. Most of these schools are connected to religions and they simply don't accept the Darwinism.

    I would like to hear from you your thoughts about this subject. Do you agree that the schools have to keep teaching science based on creationism instead of Darwinism? Maybe a mix between both?
    Comments

    1Daniel Scumparim  2/10/2009 4:32:43 AM  The Origin of Species

    Hello,

    You forgot the spontaneous generation theory. “The common sense of the old ones (and even of some modern) said that the Sun turned around the Land and that the flies were born of the garbage in decomposition. As this belief would exist beings that were generated by other similar beings, as we for example, and beings that appeared spontaneously of the not alive substance. This hypothesis was accepted for much people but, in century 13, it was rejected by Tomás de Aquino Saint, whom it preferred to believe simultaneously that all the beings would have been created for God. The spontaneous generation passed to be considered heretical by the religious authorities. Thus exactly, it in general continued to be adopted by the people and philosophers, atheists or not, as Renê Descartes and Francis Bacon.” Source: { Link }

    And, before Darwin, we had Galileu, Newton, Spallanzani, Pasteur, and other that proved that the spontaneous generation was not true, and that a living being could not be born from not living material (or from another living bean). And only in 1959 we had Darwing to put a end on this search.

    About your question, like all king of sciences, I believe that schools must teach all points of view, show the evidences (or the lack of they), and let children decide and think for themselves.

    I’m catholic, but I believe in the species evolution theory, what I think is that there is always a question that science can’t answer, and for that we go to a supreme being or force. In addition to that, other religious scientists believe that the creationism is more related to the soul, and not flesh.

    Concluding, my opinion is that the schools should teach all the theories and let people develop their brains ;-)

    Regards,

    Daniel Scumparim

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    Visit: <a href="{ Link }{ Link }

    2Eduardo  2/10/2009 5:49:51 AM  The Origin of Species

    I think the school itself is not right the way it is today. In my opinion, the children should learn HOW to study and how to find the answer, and not WHAT to learn. But the question regards the current school system, so my apologies.

    IMO, in the current school system, it should teach the basics, like local language, mathematics and phylosofy, and so people would be able to discern mitology from history, spiritual awareness from faith misleading and hopefully differ scientific Theory from Hypothetical thinking.

    3Luiz Mendes  2/10/2009 8:53:41 AM  The Origin of Species

    Answering your question; Do you agree that the schools have to keep teaching science based on creationism instead of Darwinism? No I do not agree ! Maybe a mix between both? No, definitely not . I will try to explain defending my point of view. First of all creationism is not a science if you or someone else would like to teach theses things MUST not be in the school.

    Many people misuse the word THEORY using in a wrong way, before to build a THEORY there are many steps;

    hypothesis - consists of a SUGGESTED explanation for an observable phenomenon or of a reasoned proposal predicting a POSSIBLE causal correlation among multiple phenomena.

    Law - It is just a system of rules. It should not explain anything it will just work defined by the law.

    After many study,tests, apply different methologies, prove using differents approachs become the theory .

    theory - is a unifying principle that explains a body of facts and the laws based on them. In other words, it is an explanation to a set of observations.

    For example the THEORY of Evolution :

    The evidence for historical evolution -- genetic, fossil, anatomical, etc. -- is so overwhelming that it is also considered a fact. The theory of evolution describes the mechanisms that cause evolution. So evolution is both a fact and a theory.

    There was many issues that science was not able to explain and now the gaps are decreasing...

    Concluding:

    The hypothesis is for guessing, as theory is for facts

    Sources:

    { Link }

    4Daniel Scumparim  2/10/2009 1:17:07 PM  The Origin of Species

    My dear Luiz Mendes. I do not agree with your approach. Besides the fact that I do not believe in creationism as an scientific fact, but most of it from a believe or hypothesis, the schools should, yes, teach it among the other theories. Let's look at the facts:

    1) there are millions of people that believe in creationism, also, there are many forms and levels of the creationism. Indeed, if anyone believe that a supreme being creates the universe (not related to the species), this person believe in one form o creationism

    2) To have the real knowledge, we must know almost all the points of view, this way we may judge for ourselfes

    3) there are many theories that was created somehow in history, them put behing, then called back after many years... See Nikola Tesla, The new findings that the chinese discover the america many years before spain, Mendel's theory of Celular Segregation was discussed only many years after his death, (nos based on DNA). Even the DNA iself was discovered only in 1953, so until this event the evolution of species was only based on observation of development, but nobody could tell for sure how that happend...

    So, concluding, I belive that schoold must teach and show all theories and believes, and let our children decide that they will choose or not...

    ;-)

    Daniel Scumparim

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    5Tainá  2/11/2009 6:38:14 AM  The Origin of Species

    Não pode ser tudo em portuguêssss???

    6Mario Costa  2/11/2009 6:46:11 AM  The Origin of Species

    I was wondering how could I answer to this topic ... and decided to go the long way. My concern with what is being teached in schools today goes beyond Darwin and the christianism.

    I'm worried about how history and geography (among others) are being teached as well. Che Guevara and Fidel Castro being described as heroes and this kind of stuff. I wonder if my three year old son will be teached in the future how wonderfull Mr. Hugo Chavez was (argh!).

    There are many aspects in the schools today coming from social and cultural aspects of our society. I guess this is ok ... I will have my son in a school that teaches what I believe (or at least I will try to do so), so he will never attend a school where creationism is named as the truth and evolutionism is discarded. But I guess it is OK to have schools teaching it if there are parents willing to have their children on it.

    So, first of all, parents should realize that the School is an AID to children education. We, parents, must take part of it, starting from choosing a school that teaches what we believe in.

    After that, I believe that Science and religion could (should!) couple better. To be specific on christianism, I believe it could be much more open than they are now. I never understood what could be so wrong on accepting evolutionism, only that the evolutionism itself would have been created by God.

    I told you it was the long way ... :)

    7Rodrigo Borges  2/13/2009 9:06:43 AM  The Origin of Species

    @1, @2, @3, @4: Hey, we have a good discussion here. I really liked all your POV. I'm sure this topic will never have an end.

    All your comments and others news I've read made me conclusion: I definitely don't believe in Creationism and never will let my son study at a school that teaches only it as the true, but I agree that our children must learn the both sides. This is because they have to decide their paths themselves. I'm pretty confident that everybody that learn both theories will see in a short time that we don't have how to believe on Creationism anymore.

    @5: I'll try to keep all post in English;

    @6: EXCELLENT comment. Few days ago I was discussing that with my wife and friends. Specifically about geography: I'm sure the schools are not teaching this discipline like we had in the past. I know a lot of teenagers that have no idea how many states we have here in Brazil, their capitals, main rivers, and this list is endless. I remember I had to know all these when I was a student. Like you, I don't want my son thinking that Hugo Chavez was a hero...

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    This work by Rodrigo Borges is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 Brazil License.