Aside from a few US states, where else is teaching evolution deemed controversial?

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• Speaks volumes, that does.

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  by Friartuck on November 24th, 2009

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• That's a good point. I have a BA in Sociology. I don't recall ANY discussion of biological anything.

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  by MrJosh on November 24th, 2009

• It is politically incorrect to even allow the topic to be discussed.

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  by Anonymous on November 24th, 2009

• I don't see how genetics has anything to do with political science. What am I missing?

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  by 23Skidoo on November 27th, 2009

• I wouldn't call it political correctness or political science. I think my experience stems from the nature vs. nurture debate.
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  (Warning: Extreme simplification to follow!)
  Biologists say that we are what we are due to our biology, while Sociologists say we are what we are because of our environment (upbringing). No doubt the truth lies in between somewhere, but as a Sociology major, we focused on social factors, all but ignoring the biological ones.

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  by MrJosh on November 27th, 2009

• That is an extreme oversimplification :-) So extreme that I think it loses most of it's point.
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  Read Dawkins' biology books or Olivia Judson, or any other biology book from the last... what?... 30 or 40 years? :-) Also, people like Pinker. They talk about stuff like:
  That the human capacity for language is probably genetic but WHICH language is environment.

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  by 23Skidoo on November 29th, 2009

• I have read several of Dawkin's books, but I'm not familiar with Judson. Thanks.

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  by MrJosh on November 29th, 2009

• Is this stuff ever brought up in a sociology course?

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  by Anonymous on November 29th, 2009

• What specifically?

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  by 23Skidoo on November 29th, 2009

• Dawkins on evolutionary psychology, for example. The biological basis of human society.

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  by Anonymous on November 29th, 2009

• I don't remember anything on a biological basis for social behavior, at least not in school.

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  by MrJosh on November 29th, 2009

• I don't know. But sociology is the study of social, hence learned behaviors. So, though I agree it would be interesting to discuss some of the (probably) biologically determined components, it would just be supplementary.
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  A bit like teaching the history of numbers in math class.

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  by 23Skidoo on November 30th, 2009

• Social behaviors are both learned and inherited. It would be like teaching that the area of a rectangle is a function of it's length, but omitting any mention of the importance of width.

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  by Anonymous on November 30th, 2009

• Well... Not really. Geometry is one, single discipline. The study of human behavior is quite broad. Within in one can focus on biology (how our physical bodies contribute to behavior), evolutionary biology (how evolution has contributed), neurology (how our nervous systems contribute), several others, and sociology (how our interaction with and within groups contributes to our behavior). All of them have areas of overlap, there are areas in which one can confidently say "This is most likely a learned (or physically inherited or due to neurology, etc) behavior" and others where it's not so certain or where it's likely that several areas contribute.
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  But focusing on one specialty without any or much reference to others is like teaching about Euclidean geometry without reference to the geometry of relativistic space/time.

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  by 23Skidoo on November 30th, 2009

• Sociology n. the science or study of the origin, development, organization, and functioning of human society. From my dictionary. Genetics has a huge role to play in the origin and development. It should be a significant part of the course. Yet very little to nothing will be provided.

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  by Anonymous on November 30th, 2009

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• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution_and_the_Catholic_Church#Pope_John_Paul_II

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  by Carwash on January 4th, 2010

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