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.
It was the road to Emmaus near Jerusalem where Jesus first appeared to two of his followers the day after His resurrection and explained the Old Testament scriptures to them regarding the Messiah's death.
He speaks at ID events… He is a Christian… He is an evolution skeptic… He did the intro to Dembski’s Book… He has a DVD on ARN.org…
He might not be a ‘design theorist’ though… Infidels.org dislikes this “best living quantum chemist” so he might be a ‘design theorist’.
Scientists and Their Gods
- Dr. Henry F. Schaefer, III
I’m sure you will recognize a few other names from his article.
Modern bacteria are the survivors after 4.3 billion years of dog-eat-dog evolution. The early models cannot be described.
You want an exercise? Compare the 500 variants of the simple HIV viurs with the known extant version of 25 years ago. Compute the probabilty of that proliferation and then back it up 4,300,000,000 years. Be sure to check your work.
Attempts to calculate, post hoc, the odds of some unique event are generally worthless. Given the number of potential base pair combinations in the human genome, what are the odds that the exact combination you carry in your cells would come to be? And yet, here you are...
Must have been pretty darned good, considering we're here....
Of course I'm sure you realize that the strength of you argument rests' on your belief - your faith if you will - that all the above will happen in it's due course.
The obvious problem or question is; what do we do with the one life that we have? I for one am not a gambler - not that I always have to have the "sure thing" - but I want the odds in my favor. You and the rest of the "pro-evo's" want "proof-positive" - "kilroy was here" - before you accept the existence or even the possibility of a creator.
However, with your background, you know that the Bible decrees that "the righteous will live by faith - not by works". Thus, you should know you're not going to find "kilroy was here".
Blind Faith! you say. Perhaps. Your gospel states "in the beginning, there was nothing, then it exploded". You've got to admit it takes a lot of faith to believe that (somehow we got something from NOTHING. We don't understand it now, but ONE DAY the sky will open and the answer will come). And if your faith - belief - whatever you want to call it, brings you peace in this life - I personally don't have issues with it. I will just continue to hold onto "..in the beginning, God...".
And you know - maybe man will figure it all out and science will have an answer for the rational as well as the irrational. But keep in mind too that the Bible states "there is a way that seems right to a man - but the end is death".
I don't know - the Bible could be a bunch of B.S. But again, I'm not a gambler.
Regards,
What the heck are you talking about?
90% of christians, if not more understand that evolution is the best scientific theory, they also understand that creationism is a religious theory.
They also have NO problem with believing both.
This is the way science sees it, this is the way religion sees it.
They are able to separate the 2 and look at it from different perspectives.
Why are you creationists here unable or unwilling to do that? This is Science, Evolution, biology, etc and this is religion, Creationism, flood, etc.
They are different, one is based on conclusions based on facts, the other is faith based, with conclusions based on written words in a book.
Why is it so hard for you to separate the 2.
EVERY post that an "evolutionist" makes is based on science, not faith, every post by a creationist is based on faith. The 2 are NOT compatible.
Why the creationist must have us say that creationism or ID is scientific, when it most definitely is not, and why your faith for some reason must be backed up via science is beyond me as well.
Care to explain?
There are 2 ways to anser that question.
The first one, is scientific: We don't know yet, but we are studying it, and will give you updates from time to time, and if and when we figure it out, we will let you know.
The second one, religion: God did it
There ya go, take it as you will.
Evolution. Anything else?
I personally? No, I can't.
Scientifically, Yes, I can, scientifically I can say without refute from scientists, that there is a natural cause for everything, incuding the formation of life from the primordial soup, to the evolution of Homo Sapien Sapiens from a small Shrew like mammal that lived 50-60 million years ago. And if I do not know what that Causation is or was, I say, I don't know yet.
Personally, I can say god did it, but scientifically, I cannot.
So, if I am working on a scientific thesis, I can give causation, and results of experiments, natural processes etc.
If I am in church, then I can say god did it, and not feel at all confused about what is what.
But if I say 'God did it" in a scientific venue, then I can expect to be laughed out of the venue. Because "god did it" is not science.
Am I getting any clearer yet?
Religion is for god, science is for facts, and conclusions based on those facts.
They are separate things, and must remain separate.
The only calculations you ever see are something else entirely. Creationists figure the odds of something complicated like a modern cell jumping together all at once from some sub-unit like atoms, molecules, or single amino acids. Bad model. Garbage in, garbage out. All nonsense and nothing but. Even God wouldn't make a cell that way.
Then pray tell, what is the problem?
Science cannot use "god did it" as a causation, that's it, and no scientist would do so, at least a real one.
Science is for facts, religion is for faith.
No problem resolving the 2 for me, why is it so hard for you?
Religion is faith based, the bible that you read, you have faith, that it is correct, you have no proof.
Well, you're the one fightin the fact that science is science and religion is religion, and fighting the fact that "God did it", is not scientific.
You and I can believe whatever we want, but our beliefs do not belong in science, our conclusions based on facts and experimentation belong in science, our beliefs and faith belong in religion.
The 2 are incompatible, keep them separate, and hey, we are all happy campers.
Exact odds can't be figured without the exact conditions. Odds nevertheless can be calculated. Insurance companies are in business.
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