Charles Darwin published his On Origin of Species in 1859. By 1870, Darwin’s theory of evolution was widely accepted as fact (van Wyhe, n.d.). This was no easy feat, Darwin was able to provide ample evidence from his voyage aboard the HMS Beagle, Darwin successfully implanted an idea. That idea took root and expanded into a profound science. The spread of ideas is at the very heart of civilization. Some ideas survive and thrive, while others wither and die on the vine. It was Richard Dawkins who pioneered the science behind the spread of ideas, and it is to him that those who count on the spread of their ideas, such as Jonathan Kozol, pay deference.
Richard Dawkins is one of those men who people will be discussing for many years to come. A Google search for the fellow turns up countless results, with numerous postings created concerning Dawkins within the last thirty days. Of course, this is to be expected from a man with a Twitter account, who in an instant can relate his airport carry-on luggage woes (Mangan, 2013). Dawkins was born in Nairobi, Kenya, in 1941. After earning his doctorate at Berkeley in 1967, Dawkins was appointed an Assistant Professor of Zoology there. Dawkins’ tenure at Berkeley was brief though, as he ultimately returned to his alma mater of Oxford in 1970 as a fellow at New College (Richard Dawkins Biography, n.d.). Numerous scholars attempt to make the jump from academia to mainstream culture and fail; Dawkins was successful in that regard. In 1976 Dawkins published his first book, The Selfish Gene, which has been reprinted in subsequent editions. Dawkins has since published numerous books and speaks regularly across the world. According to Dawkins, one of his greatest influences was Charles D...
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...ill not die, though often proven to be a failure, is tried and tried again. With teachers so chained to a specified curriculum, their students can only suffer. Kozol notes that the mandates and recommended scripting of No Child Left Behind have led some teachers to use timers in their lessons. Kozol views No Child Left Behind as nothing more than an all out war on teaching (Mediamouse.org, 2007).
The term survival of the fittest applies not only to species, but ideas. Good ideas have the ability to spread and infiltrate the minds of many, a trait that some ill-conceived ideas can themselves employ. Richard Dawkins identified a new replicator in the world, the meme, a replicator of culture. It is this replicator that men such as Jonathan Kozol rely on. For without the propagation of ideas, Kozol’s thoughts on education reform would only be known to himself.
In Charles Darwin’s life he had helped make a significant advancement in the way mankind viewed the world. With his observations, he played a part in shifting the model of evolution into his peers’ minds. Darwin’s theory on natural selection impacted the areas of science and religion because it questioned and challenged the Bible; and anything that challenged the Bible in Darwin’s era was sure to create contention with the church. Members of the Church took offense to Darwin’s Origins of Species because it unswervingly contradicted the teachings of the book of Genesis in the Bible. (Zhao, 2009) Natural selection changed the way people thought. Where the Bible teaches that “all organisms have been in an unchanging state since the great flood, and that everything twas molded in God’s will.” (Zhao, 2009) Darwin’s geological journey to the Galapagos Islands is where he was first able to get the observations he needed to prove how various species change over t...
In the uncertainty that the modern world is, there is one law that stays petrified in stone no matter what happens: “Things change with age.” No matter if it is in history, science, or even Pokémon, things change as time passes by and this process is called evolution. The theory formulated by Charles Darwin is the belief that all organisms have come from the earliest creatures because of external factors (“NSTA.”). School boards everywhere have accepted the theory of evolution as fact, making it essential to be in the curriculums of science classrooms. However, over the years, controversy has arisen as the fact that evolution is still only a theory with flaws and setbacks, efficiently making other theories (i.e. intelligent design) a viable alternative in the classroom.
Gatto begins his article by explaining that boredom is an everyday issue in modern schooling. Teachers struggle with boredom due to the attitudes and behavior of students and find it exhausting to teach kids when they behave in an immature manner. However, students also become frustrated with the repetition of useless information, as well as being forced to fit society’s standards. Gatto shifts the focus to his thoughts on the importance of mandatory schooling. He thinks that the lengthy school days are completely unnecessary.
Charles Darwin, the Father of Evolution, was a British scientist who laid the foundations of the theory of evolution, transforming the thinking of the entire world about the living things around us (Charles Darwin (1809 – 1882)). After working on his theory for nearly 20 years, he published On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection in 1859. As soon as the book was released, the controversy began with each sides gaining followers until the climax on July 10, 1925. The idea that animals could “evolve” and change into new species, including humans, was one that challenged not only how people thought about the natural world, but challenged the story of the creation from the Bible itself. Even though Darwin himself never said that humans “evolved” from apes, everyone took it as a logical extension of his new theory. It went against the idea of argument for design that had unified theology and science for decades (Moran 5). This new threat to Christianity and the social culture of the time was one that would transform state laws on their educational curriculum.
Michael Ruse, The Darwinian Revolution, pub. 1979 by The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637
Darwin's theory of Evolution have been known by the world for many centuries. Even so, not all scientists supp...
However, it was Darwin that formalized the theory, and presented the most convincing case for the theory. Charles Darwin was born on the 12th of February 1809 (incidentally, the same day and year as Abraham Lincoln), in Shrewsbury, England. He had a privileged upbringing, and enjoyed science - particularly biology. He graduated from Cambridge University in 1831, and on December the 27th of that year, he set off for a five-year journey aboard the Beagle, a ship bound for South America. His voyage was long and eventful, including once, in Chile, encountering both an earthquake and a tidal wave in a single day!
Anyone with even a moderate background in science has heard of Charles Darwin and his theory of evolution. Since the publishing of his book On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection in 1859, Darwin’s ideas have been debated by everyone from scientists to theologians to ordinary lay-people. Today, though there is still severe opposition, evolution is regarded as fact by most of the scientific community and Darwin’s book remains one of the most influential ever written.
Keith Henson a writer in evolutionary psychology once said that “Evolution acts slowly. Our psychological characteristics today are those that promoted reproductive success in the ancestral environment.” Evolution was first introduced by a naturalist by the name of Charles Darwin. Darwin had written an autobiography, at the age of 50, On the Origin of Species (1859) explaining how species evolve through time by natural selection; this theory became known as Darwinism. “Verlyn Klinkenborg, who writes editorials and vignettes on science and nature for the “New York Times”” (Muller 706) questions Darwin’s theory in one of his essays he wrote called Darwin at 200: The Ongoing Force of His Unconventional Idea. Both articles talk about the theory of Darwinism, but the authors’ use different writing techniques and were written in different time periods. Darwin himself writes to inform us on what the theory is, where as Klinkenborg goes on to explain why Darwinism is just a theory. Today, evolution is still a very controversial topic among many. It comes up in several topics that are discussed everyday such as in politics, religion and education.
“Science proves religious people are stupid and atheists are smart.” This is a somewhat provocative title pulled from an article on a small blog called “The Moral Minefield,” run by a group of Graduate Theological Union students and graduates (Green). This statement is exactly the kind of thing, however, that one would expect Richard Dawkins to wholeheartedly agree with. In fact, he seems to imply this sentiment throughout the entirety of his speech titled, “Militant Atheism.”
Since the time that teaching evolution in public schools was banned as heresy and taboo for contradicting the Bible, most public school systems today take an opposite approach in which creationism is seldom ta...
The metaphor behind Dawkins' theory can best be described by his opening statement: "we are survival machines-robot vehicles blindly programmed to preserve the selfish molecules known as genes" (Barlow 193). Dawkins links the natural behavior of unconscious bunches of nucleic acid (genes) to human behavior and personality by calling them "selfish." His use of this term conjures up the image of a separate individual, capable of making decisions to help its own good and disregarding our needs. By calling human beings "survival machines" and "robots," Dawkins suggests some serious moral implications regarding our existence. If we were just robots, it would seem that we would be no longer responsible for our actions, as people could attribute all evil to the gene programmers who created these robots. Also, if our primary purpose were to serve as a "survival machine" for something else, life would seem insignificant. John Maynard Smith writes that Dawkins' book is just about evolution, and "not about morals . . . or about the human sciences" (195). However, the attempt to disengage the selfish gene theory from its moral implications is seriously undermined by Dawkins' metaphors.
Darwin, Charles. From The Origin of Species. New York: P.F. Collier and Son Corporation, 1937. 71-86; 497-506.
In the book, “The Element” by Ken Robinson, he discusses how different education systems all over the world are but focuses on the education system in the United States. The reason being is that he believes that there are faults that need to be fixed because it doesn’t focus on the students individually and discovering their “element” but, on academics, business and state testing. Robinson claims that education itself is supposed to be a process in which it develops all resources. Robinsons says that, “In fact, the real challenges for education will only be met by empowering passionate and creative teachers and by firing up the imaginations and motivations of the students.” (247).
Dawkin proposed memes theory by looking at the genetic evolution process and question whether there is something that happens beside genetic evolution