In the past I have argued that historians of science probably need to get more involved with the fight for good science education. Michael Barton has brought my attention to historian Abigail Lustig giving testimony before the Texas Board of Education.
More like this
An out of this world Year in Review item:
One day, the Emperor sentenced a man to be beheaded, and the man was executed immediately. However, it was not entirely clear that this was an act of justice or an act of anger. The historian recorded the event:
There is a story written in ancient Chinese documents that goes something like this:
Over at Framing Science, Matt notes that the WaPo is running a series of pieces by historians putting Bush's presidency in historical context.
I recently co-authored a paper that discussed the utility of history of science for science (Isis 99: 322-330). The abstract reads:
She did a great job. I was also really happy to see your Isis article. I'm a grad student in HoS and I agree that historians should play a greater role in supporting science education.
Looking forward to your piece in the HSS Newsletter when it appears...
One thing that struck me at the end was the question from the audience about what the objection was to the word "weakness". I'm willing to bet that there are large segments of the anti-evolution community who don't understand why the scientific community finds the word objectionable. I'm not sure that Lustig addressed that.