Posted on 05/25/2006 2:59:09 PM PDT by dukeman
ADF filed friend-of-the-court brief in defense of textbook stickers which accurately stated that evolution is a theory
ATLANTA — The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit today vacated a lower court decision that declared Cobb County science textbook stickers which stated “evolution is a theory, not a fact” unconstitutional. The court was critical of the district court for issuing its ruling against the stickers despite holes in the evidentiary record in the case and remanded the case back to the district court for new proceedings.
“No school should be in trouble for simply stating the facts. That’s what schools are supposed to do. Though we wish the appeals court would have ruled on the constitutional merits of the case without sending it back to the district court, we are pleased that the district court’s ruling against the school district has been vacated,” said Alliance Defense Fund Senior Legal Counsel Joel Oster.
In its ruling today, the 11th Circuit wrote, “The problems presented by a record containing significant evidentiary gaps are compounded because at least some key findings of the district court are not supported by the evidence that is contained in the record.” The full text of the court’s ruling in the case Selman v. Cobb County School District can be read at www.telladf.org/UserDocs/CobbCountyDecision.pdf.
The lower court judge agreed that the stickers were not applied to the textbooks for a religious purpose and were devoid of religious content. Nonetheless, he deemed the stickers a violation of the so-called “separation of church and state” for the sole reason that many people were aware that Christians supported the stickers.
According to the friend-of-the-court brief ADF attorneys filed in the case, “The District Court’s analysis will lead to absurd results…. The Establishment Clause was never meant to prohibit the passage of a secular law, for a secular purpose, simply because Christians actively lobbied for the law” (www.telladf.org/news/story.aspx?cid=3404).
The sticker which had been applied to each textbook read, “This textbook contains material on evolution. Evolution is a theory, not a fact, regarding the origin of living things. This material should be approached with an open mind, studied carefully, and critically considered.”
ADF is a legal alliance defending the right to hear and speak the Truth through strategy, training, funding, and litigation.
That the Dover defendants and lawyers weren't up to the task, and that some creationists don't understand the differences between ID & creationism, DOES NOT make ID and creationism the same.
Now, if A has similarities with B, and I confuse them, does that make A=B?
Very well stated. Everything we know about our world from the perspective of chemistry, physics, geology, astronomy, biology shows how intertwined all these concepts are. Biology depends on concepts from physics (energy) and chemistry (chemical bonds); physics utilizes discoveries in astronomy; geology uses ideas from physics (radioisotope-dating).
The materialistic methodology, secular approach to understanding the world has proved extremely successful in understanding. The alternative of shamans, holy texts, priests promoting demon explanations, psychics, and superstitutions and myths have proven very UNsuccessful.
Ask me if I'm surprised that this has been misrepresented by the creationists.
These are evidences of an evolutionary process at work? Really!!
What we see here is evidence of the capacity of the human mind to shoe-horn any and every observed fact regarding living or extinct biological entities into the pre-conceived evolutionary construct.
Somebodys been reading my stuff again.
Thanks for the Brinkley thing. I'd been giving some serious thought on how to return the kindness. I'm almost there. :-}
On what judicial or constitutional principle is a court to reach its conclusions on the basis of presumtions regarding the motivation of a party to the issue in dispute?
Now that I look at it, I see my dyslexia at work. I think EVR should be ERV.
Evolutionists take it as a metaphysical given that their approach to explaining the presence of living matter and its incomprehensible diversity of form and function is the only correct one, and that it is impervious to the possibility of falsification.
It is clear that this not a victory for the ID sticker crowd. As you said, the court said that 'legally this is a mess, let's go back and get a clear case we can deal with.'
This shows a court not disposed toward "judicial activism" but "just the facts, ma'm". When we get to "just the facts", ID always loses.
"Intelligent Design" was launched by the Discovery Institute (DI) with the hope that it would become a broad-based movement in conservative circles, especially in "family-values" organizations. But despite hundreds of millions of dollars spent promoting ID--about $25 million from DI--over the last 10 years, ID has never developed a solid constituency. Today it is a notion increasingly seen as vacuous.
One problem that ID proponents have not been able to overcome is that it has not been picked up by churches and televangelists, such as Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, Gary Bauer, James Dodson, and the like. ID is almost never mentioned on Christian radio.
Many preachers consider that ID has muddied the waters from the simple notions of creationism, Noah's Flood, and Biblical inerrancy. The main creationist groups, Institute for Creation Research and Answers in Genesis, have never embraced 'intelligent design'. They appreciated that ID diverted questions about Noah's Flood, which was impossible to justify on scientific grounds, to the "God issue", but they are unhappy that ID has never addressed moral values and skirts the issue of of who the "Grand Designer" is.
After Kitzmiller, the Discovery Institute could only whimper, claiming they never believed ID should be in schools. This directly contradicted their "Wedge Document." And the expert testimony sponsored by DI was caught in several contradictions at the trial, which Judge Jones pointed out. Even the Thomas Moore Center--the legal counsel engaged "to defeat the ACLU" ---was appalled by DI undermining their legal filings. So 'intelligent design' lost face big time with potential backers. DI has tried to reply with ad hominem attacks on Judge Jones, with a campaign to "teach the controversy", with attempts to brand critics as "liberal elites", but these attempts have backfired.
To make matters worse for ID and the DI, a distinct schism between Catholics and some evangelical Christians has arisen. Several important Catholic leaders have spoken out to say that the scientific theory of evolution is not inconsistent with Catholic doctrine. Neither the Roman Church nor the Orthodox Church have become champions of "intelligent design". Without this support in the largest Christian congregations, ID has no real base.
"See this site: Gravity is just a theory. A neat spoof on ID.
http://www.re-discovery.org/gravity_1.html"
Teach the controversy! We need a sticker!
ID is not a movement or a theology.
It is an idea.
What is that idea?
<< Evolutionists take it as a metaphysical given that their approach to explaining the presence of living matter and its incomprehensible diversity of form and function is the only correct one, and that it is impervious to the possibility of falsification. >>
False. Evolution is falsifiable, as are all scientific theories. That is one of the characteristics of a good theory.
Let me ask you: What would falsify creationism? What would falsify ID? I would really like to know.
What you point out in the last paragraph of your post is most interesting...however, I would say, that the schism between the Catholics and the evangelicals/fundamentalists has always been there, and this issue of evolution/ID/creationism has only widened the schism...
How often has someone noted that the Popes allowed for support of evolution and then a creationist will chime in, with their usual mantra 'Well, Catholics are not Christians anyhow", or some such nonsense...
So the disagreement between different Christian religions, concerning evolution/ID/creationism, is used to once again, to declare that one Christian religion or another is not really 'Christian' at all, or just not 'Christian' enough...
"ID is not a movement or a theology. It is an idea. What is that idea?"
I take it, then, that you disagree with the Discovery Institute, the main ID organization in the world.
When we all get to the great beyond we will all be IDers. God will show us exactly how he made the heavens and the earth and all that in them is in 6 days, just like he wrote down on the tablets of stone. And we will understand. And we will marvel.
Now, can we get back to the legal issues?
All that nonsense at the Dover school; all that inquiry into the intents of those who drafted the disclaimer would be irrlevant if the Lemon Test did not demand a "religious test" for legislation that creates the kind of entanglement between the courts and religion that logically would be prohibited by the excessive entanglement prong of the same stupid test.
<< How often has someone noted that the Popes allowed for support of evolution and then a creationist will chime in, with their usual mantra 'Well, Catholics are not Christians anyhow", or some such nonsense... >>
No TRUE Scotsman eats sugar with his oats!
Ah, but can he have oats in his shaving cream?
What we see here is evidence of the capacity of the human mind to imagine all sorts of things, to want to believe in a 'higher power', and to distort every observation of the natural world into something about invisible entities, deities, mischeivous or nasty devils, to fit into the pre-adopted belief construct.
"I believe, therefore I know" is the refrain of the faith-fundamentalists. The sciencific way of thought says, "I want to know, then--and only then-- I will believe a theory that collects the facts and observations."
Wanna Bet? There are many aspects of Gravity under different circumstances that CANNOT be measured. Theories deal with the mechanisms behind the measurement, not the measurement.
water will wet you, fire will burn.
So the observations of fire and water are the endpoint? Maybe for OOk Grunk, but science wants to know what are the properties of fire? What makes it burn under what circumstances? Why does it burn?
Your definition of science means that ancient cave drawings are the pinnacle of scientific pursuit.
"Me feel water from sky. Make me wet. Me scientist now."
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