Posted on 08/16/2004 9:40:47 AM PDT by PatrickHenry
Samuel Chen was a high school sophomore who believed in freedom of speech and the unfettered pursuit of knowledge. He thought his public high school did, too, but when it came to the subject of evolution -- well, now he's not so sure.
In October 2002, Chen began working to get Dr. Michael Behe, professor of biological sciences at Lehigh University, to give a lecture at Emmaus High School in Emmaus, Pennsylvania.
Chen, who was co-chair of a student group that tries to stress the importance of objectivity on controversial issues, knew that Behe would be perfect, since the group was examining evolution as a topic. The author of Darwin's Black Box, a critique of the foundational underpinnings of evolution, Behe had presented his work and debated the subject in universities in the U.S. and England.
Behe agreed to come in February 2004 and give an after-school lecture entitled, "Evolution: Truth or Myth?" As the school year drew to a close in 2003, Chen had all the preliminaries nailed down: he had secured Behe's commitment, received approval from school officials, and reserved the school auditorium.
Then he found out just how entrenched Darwinist orthodoxy was in the science department at Emmaus. By the following August, Chen had entered into a six-month battle to preserve the Behe lecture.
As the struggle unfolded, it became obvious that those who opposed Behe coming to Emmaus didn't seem to care about his credentials. In addition to publishing over 35 articles in refereed biochemical journals, Darwin's Black Box was internationally reviewed in over 100 publications and named by National Review and World magazine as one of the 100 most important books of the 20th century.
Instead, it was Behe's rejection of Darwinism -- in favor of what is called "intelligent design" -- that drove opposition. According to the Discovery Institute, of which Behe is a fellow, this theory holds "that certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection."
The head of the science department, John Hnatow, sent a statement to every faculty member in the school stressing that Emmaus held to the official policy of the National Science Teachers Association. That policy states: "There is no longer a debate among scientists about whether evolution has taken place."
It appeared there would be no debate at Emmaus, either. Some of the science teachers would not even allow Chen to address their classes and explain to students what Behe's lecture would be about.
Chen said various tactics were apparently used to undercut the event, including an attempt to cancel the lecture and fold the student organization without the knowledge of Chen and other members; requiring that the necessary funds for the lecture be raised much faster than for other student events; and moving the lecture from the auditorium to the school cafeteria.
One science teacher in particular, Carl Smartschan, seemed particularly riled about the upcoming lecture. Smartschan took it upon himself to talk to every teacher in the science department, insisting that intelligent design was "unscientific" and "scary stuff." He asked the principal to cancel the lecture, and then, when the principal refused, asked the faculty advisor for the student group to halt the lecture. Smartschan even approached Chen and demanded that the student organization pay to have an evolutionist come to lecture later in the year.
Smartschan's campaign to get the Behe lecture canceled was surprising to Chen because the event was scheduled after school, and not during class time, and was sponsored by a student group, not the school itself. Nevertheless, Chen persevered. The lecture was a success, attracting more than 500 people.
In the process, however, Chen's struggle took its toll. His health deteriorated over the course of the controversy, to the point where he collapsed three times in one month, including once at school. "My health has been totally junked," he told AFA Journal.
Brian Fahling, senior trial attorney and senior policy advisor for the American Family Association Center for Law & Policy, is advising Chen on his options for the coming year. Fahling said, "Schools are not allowed to interfere with viewpoints with which they disagree, and schools cannot disrupt the right of the students to participate in the academic and intellectual life."
Despite the hardship, Chen said he would do it all over again because the issue is so important. "I feel that there's a dictatorship on academic freedom in our public schools now," he said, adding, "I refer to evolution education as a tyranny .... You can't challenge it in our schools. Kids have been thrown out of class for challenging it."
That tyranny can be intimidating to students. "Some of the students who support me are afraid to speak out, especially because they saw how the science department reacted," Chen said. "They have a fear of speaking out against it in their classes."
On the other hand, he added that some students "are now questioning evolution, some for the first time."
That may be the first step in the overthrow of Darwin's dictatorship.
The Cosmic Clerk is, as you correctly guessed, related to the Fine Tuner. They are both subservient to, and handle details for, the Intelligent Designer.
I would have said "boob" instead of "dork," but then I have a twisted sense of propriety.
It's news to me he's a 'design theorist'. though I know he's a Christian and an evolution skeptic. Can you find any papers he's written on ID? If not, isn't this a little misleading? If I work on biophysics, but have doubts about General Relativity, does that make me a cosmologist?
I have yet to meet an anti-evolutionist who does not understand the basic tenets of evolution. It's inescapable.
No other aspect of science is attacked so relentlessly because no other element of science has become a religious belief for its adherents.
The difference? Science is open to debate. Religion isn't. Creationists are more open to debate about their theories than evolution is. That tells me who the real fanatics are.
You, yourself, have proven you do not understand what the actual theory of evolution says -- on this very thread.
No other aspect of science is attacked so relentlessly because no other element of science has become a religious belief for its adherents.
To a child with a hammer, everything looks like a nail. To a person whose entire life is ruled by religion, everything looks like religion. The difference here is that creationism is based on faith, and evolution is based on physical evidence.
The difference? Science is open to debate. Religion isn't. Creationists are more open to debate about their theories than evolution is. That tells me who the real fanatics are.
Not quite. Any debate must be consistent with the evidence. Creationists do not have theories, at least in the scientific sense of the word, so they can debate till the cows come home. Science is more constrained because of its reliance on evidence.
Never saw it. I'm told it didn't look like a bag of gravel, maybe more like a sock full of sandy sludge or something. There weren't any notable stones per se but it was diseased and wasn't emptying right.
It is apparently an argument ad hominem if you notice someone trying to pull your hat brim down over your eyes and dance around you mocking and japing.
You haven't been reading these threads. I invite you to provide links to any posts by creationists or ID proponents that demonstrate a basic understanding of evolution.
I don't mean they have to agree with it, but they must state the theory in a way that would be acceptable to a biologist.
Yes, as long as it's real science that they get excited about.
Intelligent Design is not real science, it is religion, trying to claim it's science.
When you wish to use real scientific hypothesis, to excite childrens minds about science, we can talk, but ID is not a scientific hypothesis, it is religion, masquerading as science.
I read some of that site that that cartoon pointed to.
No scientific thought there, the logic went beyond me and I thought my head was going to explode looking at all the nonsensical conclusions that they were making.
Yikes, please don't make me suffer like that again. ;)
Modification of your tagline.
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And a good thing too. Because based on the organization human genome, the "designer" must have been an incompetent putz.
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ID also doesn't make moral judgements on the quality of the design. An inefficient design is still as much of a design as an efficient design. In other words, level of efficiency is irrelevant to the question of design.
What a great escape clause.
Doesn't make a moral judgement on the quality of the design.
Evolution shows that the Genome should look pretty confusing, there should be some that is used and some that aren't, some are tossed in randomly because they somehow fused into the DNA structure at some point.
ID would show that there is a minimum of unused DNA structure, that there would be a minimum of wasted space, the designer would have used as little as possible to make his designee to work.
DNA structure shows and evolution made the prediction, that the DNA structure would be loaded with DNA fragments that were either A: not used, or B: were used for a different purpose then they had orignally beeen.
ID makes no predictions, it is not helpful to science in any way shape or form, except to get creationists all excited about the possibility. Sorry to burst your bubbles, but it not scientific, and it sure as heck makes no predicitions, and it has not been helpful to science in the least.
The talk origins site is a bunch of propaganda -- twist the science to make evolution appear as fact. These guys are a bunch of religious humanist zealots -- look at the links to the guys who passed away. This is all they did with their time.
I would recommend the article "Five Major Evolutionist Misconceptions about Evolution." I think this link will get you there
http://www.trueorigin.org/isakrbtl.asp
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