Posted on 02/20/2006 5:33:50 AM PST by ToryHeartland
Churches urged to back evolution By Paul Rincon BBC News science reporter, St Louis
US scientists have called on mainstream religious communities to help them fight policies that undermine the teaching of evolution.
The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) hit out at the "intelligent design" movement at its annual meeting in Missouri.
Teaching the idea threatens scientific literacy among schoolchildren, it said.
Its proponents argue life on Earth is too complex to have evolved on its own.
As the name suggests, intelligent design is a concept invoking the hand of a designer in nature.
It's time to recognise that science and religion should never be pitted against each other Gilbert Omenn AAAS president
There have been several attempts across the US by anti-evolutionists to get intelligent design taught in school science lessons.
At the meeting in St Louis, the AAAS issued a statement strongly condemning the moves.
"Such veiled attempts to wedge religion - actually just one kind of religion - into science classrooms is a disservice to students, parents, teachers and tax payers," said AAAS president Gilbert Omenn.
"It's time to recognise that science and religion should never be pitted against each other.
"They can and do co-exist in the context of most people's lives. Just not in science classrooms, lest we confuse our children."
'Who's kidding whom?'
Eugenie Scott, director of the National Center for Science Education, which campaigns to keep evolution in public schools, said those in mainstream religious communities needed to "step up to the plate" in order to prevent the issue being viewed as a battle between science and religion.
Some have already heeded the warning.
"The intelligent design movement belittles evolution. It makes God a designer - an engineer," said George Coyne, director of the Vatican Observatory.
"Intelligent design concentrates on a designer who they do not really identify - but who's kidding whom?"
Last year, a federal judge ruled in favour of 11 parents in Dover, Pennsylvania, who argued that Darwinian evolution must be taught as fact.
Dover school administrators had pushed for intelligent design to be inserted into science teaching. But the judge ruled this violated the constitution, which sets out a clear separation between religion and state.
Despite the ruling, more challenges are on the way.
Fourteen US states are considering bills that scientists say would restrict the teaching of evolution.
These include a legislative bill in Missouri which seeks to ensure that only science which can be proven by experiment is taught in schools.
I think if we look at where the empirical scientific evidence leads us, it leads us towards intelligent design Teacher Mark Gihring "The new strategy is to teach intelligent design without calling it intelligent design," biologist Kenneth Miller, of Brown University in Rhode Island, told the BBC News website.
Dr Miller, an expert witness in the Dover School case, added: "The advocates of intelligent design and creationism have tried to repackage their criticisms, saying they want to teach the evidence for evolution and the evidence against evolution."
However, Mark Gihring, a teacher from Missouri sympathetic to intelligent design, told the BBC: "I think if we look at where the empirical scientific evidence leads us, it leads us towards intelligent design.
"[Intelligent design] ultimately takes us back to why we're here and the value of life... if an individual doesn't have a reason for being, they might carry themselves in a way that is ultimately destructive for society."
Economic risk
The decentralised US education system ensures that intelligent design will remain an issue in the classroom regardless of the decision in the Dover case.
"I think as a legal strategy, intelligent design is dead. That does not mean intelligent design as a social movement is dead," said Ms Scott.
"This is an idea that has real legs and it's going to be around for a long time. It will, however, evolve."
Among the most high-profile champions of intelligent design is US President George W Bush, who has said schools should make students aware of the concept.
But Mr Omenn warned that teaching intelligent design will deprive students of a proper education, ultimately harming the US economy.
"At a time when fewer US students are heading into science, baby boomer scientists are retiring in growing numbers and international students are returning home to work, America can ill afford the time and tax-payer dollars debating the facts of evolution," he said. Story from BBC NEWS: http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/sci/tech/4731360.stm
Published: 2006/02/20 10:54:16 GMT
© BBC MMVI
I thought he was Chairman of IBM
I have stated here before, and see no reason to change my mind, that the main problem that Creationists have with Evolution is they see it interfering with the "special" relationship Man has with God (Man is just another animal). This makes them feel insecure and so they attack Evolution and with it most of the "hard" sciences since they are all interconnected and support each other.
They feel threatened - it doesn't have to be that way.
You again ...
I suppose according to you, GOd is a liar too!
The truth is your the rabid liar that twists things. Hey, there's hope for you too! Even rapid liars can be acceptable to Him, if you repent.
Such open defiance of God!
I believe in God. His book reveals Him to me. As He eloquently puts it:
Rom.1:20
[20] For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:
All you have to do is OPEN YOUR EYES!
The evidence speaks for itself.
MY post?
It's mostly GOD's Word!!
(Go ahead!!)
I hope I didn't imply that was my impression, very far from it. The conservative movement in the UK (which is not confined to the Conservative and Unionist Party) may not seem of particular importance to some Americans, but I'd argue we do matter--at least when in power (we've been lousy in oppostion in recent years, but that's another story). I would happily argue that the premiership of Margaret Thatcher helped President Reagan win the Cold War, for example, and that we have done much to reverse the damage to the UK wrought by socialists (if only we could stop the rot in continental Europe as well--but that's yet another story). In short, I would hope that conservatives on both sides of the Atlantic recognised our common values and objectives.
Not quite what I said (do we ping here?), but the essence of the charge is true, and that whether you are a fiery fundmentalist or a god-hating atheist, or somewhere in between. Claiming "objectivity" in an issue like this is a fool's claim. If you sincerely believe that if I "accept" the concept of an eternal judge then I am not motivated to find a way to build a world where "science" gets me out from the idea of that type of world then all I can say is that you are incredibly naive and have not much experience with people. People are irrational, unobjective, emotional, and prone to the grossest distortions and misrepresentations of data that can be imagined. That doesn't change just because you have a bunch of analytical instruments in your place of work, compared to those who labor on spreadsheets, or with a pick and shovel. "Peer review" is no more of a safeguard against this than some group of clerics are immune from silly declarations about Ptolmy or the date of the original creation.
The point is that no one is objective, not that one group or the other is deliberately dishonest. The dishonesty comes in the proclamation that one is "objective." That is a load of crap. Objectivity is by definition impossible, but doubly so on an issue like this.
And is being discuused by...
...a bunch of silicon age, Berkinstock wearing SUV drivers.
So what??
Thanks for the ping!
Knock it off!
Many thanks for the reference, sounds of interest. Google came up with the full name, Dr. Armand Nicholi. Now, if my local library can come up with the text itself...I'll let you know
I do NOT disbelieve in God. I just dont see him in the ramblings of the primitive people who penned the words.
That you assert it is so isn't necessarily compelling.
Hmmmmmmmmmmm
I think I'll go get lunch. Anyone want to join me?
Low expectations (both of the school system and it's students) are poison to our civilization.
Yeah, too bad they didn't listen to the priests and shamans or even to the common people who all knew that the earth wasn't flat but an oblate spheroid that orbited the sun and not the other way around. Oh, those silly scientists...
Science has shown itself to be fallible in the past. It would be the height of arrogance to think it will never be found so again. Refusing to challenge the concepts of science rather defeats the purpose of science itself.
And no one here claims that science is infallible but just because we don't know everything doesn't mean we don't know anything.
If we were to follow your advice we should not only teach astronomy but also astrology, Velikovsky's catastrophism or von Daeniken's nonsense.
And rest assured that the concepts of science get challenged all the time however, this doesn't mean that all positions deserve equal standing because if we gave every crackpot the same attention there'd be no time to do any serious research anymore.
As far as creationism is concerned (especially the YE variety), it has been shown to be untenable as science long before Darwin.
Like everyone else, your opinions are based on your perceptions. If you wish to be a product of primordial ooze, be my guest.
OK, I see this quite often but I still don't understand where you get the idea that we wish to be a product of primordial ooze?
Just because we defend a scientific theory doesn't mean we wish to be a product of primordial ooze as you put it. This is not a matter of what we want or don't want to be true but following the evidence no matter where it leads and how unpleasant it may be to some people.
To simply accept what one wants to be true is rather a trait I've observed in creationists (I'm no kin to monkeys, I chose to believe I'm specially created, etc.).
Now as far as I'm concerned, I couldn't care less whether I'm the descendant of some billion year old primordial ooze or two supernaturally animated lumps of clay from only a couple of millennia ago.
Whatever happens to be the case doesn't affect my self-image in the least and I don't see why it should.
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