The problem is that the definition we use for science doesn't allow for the supernatural. I fully understand why that is so. We can't measure the supernatural, put it to tests, etc.
However, that also puts us into a quagmire. What if a supernatural explanation is true? If it is, then that means our current definition of science puts it at odds with the truth. This is why so many of us see the theory of evolution as an attack on God. If God did create life on earth, and if each creature was created whole, meaning no evolution from one species to another occurred, then our current definition of science would require us to pretend that didn't happen and still teach evolution, because evolution is the best thing anyone can come up with in the absence of God.
This strikes me as similar to the church-state controversies we often see. Christian moral values can't be legislated, we're told, because they're religious. But non-religious moral values can be legislated. Thus, we can't restrict abortion, but we can force Christians to subsidize them. We can't ban sodomy, but we can force the Boy Scouts to accept sodomites. We can fund a crucifix dropped in urine, but we can't have a Nativity scene in the town square.
Christians are told to stay in the closet. Our children can't be taught intelligent design by their teacher, because that's "religion", but they can be taught evolution, because it explains how life of earth blossomed without God.
But do we know for sure God doesn't exist? No, we don't. Yet, we've defined science in such a way that it must always pretend He doesn't.
I'll repeat that. If God exists, we have created a definition of science that must always pretend He doesn't. You asked me to come up with a theory to explain the development of life that is scientific as so defined, that is better than evolution. But how is that possible?
It's why this is an endless debate. Science has been defined so as to exclude the possibility of God. Now, I know there are those who will say it doesn't. That we can still have our religion classes at Catholic schools, or whatever. Or that we can fantasize in our minds that God was controlling evolution when it occurred. But none of that really clicks, for lack of a better word. Ultimately, what we're being told is that the real world must exclude God. And that's true EVEN if He exists. After all, if Jesus Christ rose from the dead right in front of you, by the current definitions of science we'd have to pretend it didn't happen, or fashion some evolution-type explanation for it (e.g., there exists some previously unobserved physical condition which allows people to survive deadly wounds, lie in suspended animation for three days, then get up and walk off).
Intelligent design fits the available evidence as well as evolution. In fact, it fits it better since the fossil record doesn't show things evolving from one species to another. It just shows things appearing. Yet, intelligent design can't be considered because it requires a designer and our current definition of science requires everything to have "just sort of happened".
So we have an unhittable ball and an unmissable baseball bat when discussing religion and science. I don't pretend to know all the answers. I just think that to exclude the possibility of God so cavalierly from the discussion of something as fundamental as where we came from is a disservice to tens of millions of Americans, particularly when the alternative, evolution, is such a weak, unobservable, and unfalsifiable theory.
You are only partially correct about science. In actual fact, science does not assume that God exists. Science says nothing about God either way. I will admit that if the truth is that God created everything via miraculous acts, then science cannot arrive at the truth. The difference between your analogy and this issue is that we allow elected leaders to make value decisions for society and that's all there is. There is no other way for anyone to impose their values on society as a whole. In the case of the search for truth, science is not all there is. There is philosophy, theology, revalation, etc. in addition to science. If science were to fail to find the truth, then hopefully one of these other ways will do so. It still won't stop evolution from being the theory that is accepted by science, though. I think our mistake as a society is that somehow we have equated science with truth. There is a mindset among many people that if it's science it must be true and if it's true it must be science. I think that's the main motivating factor behind the drive to try to make creationism scientific. ID and creationism are not science, but that's okay. I don't have a problem with teaching them. Just don't do so in science class.
Nicely put.
And I've never been a baseball fan -- the game is too boring to watch, but it was lots of fun to play (when I was much younger).
The Crevo Game on FR is lots of fun to watch for some reason, but rather tiresome to play...
Thats a great way of putting it.
Both deal with entirely different things.