According to the CNN link:

The standards will be used to develop student tests measuring how well schools teach science. Decisions about what is taught in classrooms will remain with 300 local school boards, but some educators fear pressure will increase in some communities to teach less about evolution or more about intelligent design.

Slocum, if I was in charge of the Kansas brand, I’d be spinning like hell over ID, but I wouldn’t be much worried (and might even be excited about all the Kansas Kansas Kansas in the news). Corporations care about taxes, infrastructure, and educated (well priced) labor. If the local religion played into corporate decisions to build factories or open centers, why do so many companies go to places with much odder ideas than ID?

Of course, if I were a Kansas science teacher, my lesson on the scientific content of ID would be very short: “there is none”. I think good teachers with any cojones will find ways to neutralize the nonsense. The real problem is the removal or watering down of standards that would insure that less well educated, motivated or disposed teachers provide their students with minimally adequate biology content.

No, I’m not casting doubt on that site in particular, only indicating that I hadn’t taken the time to look for other sources to confirm.

And do you think kids from Kansas worry about being called “laughable hicks”? Besides the fact that they’re too busy scoring higher on the ACT and getting into college to worry about being called laughable hicks, they’re from Kansas, they’re already called laughable hicks.

Well, yeah, I think Kansans have good to worry about the ‘hick’ label. Having such an image can’t be a boon to attracting employers and promoting economic development. Kansas doesn’t want to be in the situation of sending their H.S. graduates to university as a way-station on their way out of the state.

Put it this way—if you were in charge of managing the ‘Kansas’ brand, you wouldn’t be real happy with ‘Intelligent Design’ publicity.

And what of the exceptional student who, against all odds, grew up with a healthy respect and interest in scientific inquiry, despite being “taught” superstitious bunkum in schools, suffering the insults of less-intelligent classmates, etc? Should colleges just say “huh, sucks to be you”?

Visceral arguments are fun but remarkably counterproductive.

Are you kidding? The politicians would never allow that…creates too many problems.

So for all you ID hata’s out there, painful isn’t it ? They’re learning ID and are smarter than your kids ;)

But the high-performance of Kansas K-12 schools (assuming the facts in that link are legit) is something that virtually nobody outside Kansas knows about. The I.D. fiasco, on the other hand, is known everywhere and is going to completely dominate the image of education in Kansas outside the state itself (and that image is going to be, “Kansas—what a bunch of laughable hicks”). I have the feeling that any resulting pain is going to be felt far more keenly by Kansans than those of us opposed to teaching I.D.

So for all you ID hata’s out there, painful isn’t it ? They’re learning ID and are smarter than your kids ;)

Steve, if grad students stopped drinking and watching games they might get some work done and graduate in a reasonable amount of time. Say, 4 years.

Yes, Dorothy, there is a Wizard. The Kansas Board of Education has approved new standards that mandate the teaching of Intelligent Design as scientific theory.

Why, pray tell, is this on Wordlab? It’s an homage to the illuminati at Crooked Timber, a neologist noodling noology, who coined a new word for Intelligent Design as a subject taught in science class: Paleyontology.

Paley is best remembered for his contributions to Christian apologetics. In 1802 he published Natural Theology, or Evidences of the Existence and Attributes of the Deity collected from the Appearances of Nature, his last, and, in some respects, his most remarkable book. In this he described the Watchmaker analogy, for which he is probably best known.

And yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus, too.

Lying upon command.