[Protagoras]

Better reread #481. And read it in context of the exchange it occurred in.

I maintain that evolution is a theory. I recognize that the same can be said of so called intelligent design.

I have never advocated teaching ID in government schools. In fact, I have advocated abolishing government schools. Further, I oppose any attempt to have government employees teach religion in government schools. It would be folly for both the teacher, who would most certainly be incompetent, and the pupils who would be hopelessly mislead by such "teachers".

Further, I have not said evolution is incorrect. I think the theory has some merit.

I have further said that I see no reason that both cannot be correct. I have never said ID should be taught in any particular class, much less "science" class. (where, unfortunately, much nonsense is taught as fact)

I merely maintain that in any school worthy of being called a school, serious questions are suitable material for further inquiry. The advocation of one theory on a given subject, while not even acknowledging a different theory is clearly not designed to further intelligent inquiry. It is, rather, the precise thing that ID advocates are being accused of in this case. Namely, pushing an agenda.

So you see, no matter how much you folks jump to incorrect conclusions about me or the subject matter, I have not even attempted to have it both ways. It is merely a construct of your imagination.

Carry on.

[NJ_gent]

"The advocation of one theory on a given subject, while not even acknowledging a different theory is clearly not designed to further intelligent inquiry."

When no other significant, scientific theory exists, I find it inappropriate to teach alternate theories. While I'll agree that the ToE is indeed a theory (in the scientific sense, not in the common usage of the word), it remains the best scientific theory we have to explain the vast array of living things currently observed. Those who do advocate the teaching of ID under the premise that it's wrong to just teach one "theory" (and they generally advocate such without an understanding of the difference between a scientific theory and their version of the word) are implicitly advocating the teaching of any and all crackpot ideas about how the ecosystem arrived at its current state. That includes Scientology and Raelianism (both forms of ID, and both major advocates of it) as much as it does Christian creationism and Norse mythology.

I find it as inappropriate to teach ID as factual or scientific in public schools (except within the confines of a philsophy or religious studies class) as I do to teach that Yggdrasil is the foundation of life as if it were scientific in some way.

Find me a truly scientific theory that performs as well as the ToE in explainations of the source of the modern Earth biological ecosystem and I'll gladly stand behind it as being entirely appropriate and necessary for presentation in the science class of every kid in the nation. I'm no ToE fanatic who can't be convinced otherwise, but I'm not about to give up a working, functional, testable, scientific theory for thinly-veiled religious beliefs cloaked in shaky mathematical modeling.