Posted on 05/23/2005 5:32:19 PM PDT by CHARLITE
“The social implications of Darwinism have been disastrous,” said Richard Thompson, the president and chief counsel of the Thomas More Law Center in Ann Arbor, Mich. “Nazi Germany used Darwin to justify a master race based on the idea that it’s survival of the strongest.” Thompson’s perception that teaching evolution is socially destructive is just one of the reasons why he volunteered to defend the Dover Area School District’s school board and administration against a lawsuit brought against them last December, he said.
Eleven parents sued the district, saying a statement issued by the district to ninth-grade biology students that intended to teach students that there were gaps and problems with Darwinian evolution, was unconstitutional.
The problem, they said, was that the statement also included the mention of “intelligent design theory.”
Intelligent design suggests that life is too complex to have evolved on its own through the process of natural selection, which Darwin conceived. Intelligent design suggests that all living organisms were designed by a supernatural being or entity.
Critics say the “designer” in intelligent design is God in disguise. And while many of the plaintiffs have said they have nothing against God, they do have a problem with religion being taught in a secular classroom funded with taxpayer money that comes from people of all faiths or no faith at all.
A decision made by Dover’s board Oct. 18 authorized a curriculum change that makes specific mention of intelligent design.
Repeatedly since October, board members such as Alan Bonsell, William Buckingham and Sheila Harkins have said intelligent design is legitimate science and has nothing at all to do with God. But if that is true, opponents of the curriculum change ask, then why has Thompson volunteered to defend the board?
Thomas More’s Web site states the group is “dedicated to the defense and promotion of the religious freedom of Christians, time-honored family values and the sanctity of human life.”
The reason Thompson said he took on the case is because Christians, including himself, support intelligent design.
“And because Christians support it, the ACLU wants it out of the classroom,” Thompson said. “(Thomas More) is like the anti-ACLU.”
Evolution, which is the current state standard for biological science in Pennsylvania, has positive implications for atheists in America, Thompson said. “But anything that has a positive implication for Christians is not OK,” he added. “That’s discrimination.”
When the case comes to trial in mid- to late September, Thompson said, intelligent design’s links to creationism won’t matter because his experts will prove that intelligent design is good science.
“We have credible scientists on both sides of the issue who will say that the one-minute statement does a good service for students,” Thompson said. “The statement has already been read once and the roof didn’t cave in.”
But Vic Walczak, ACLU attorney for the plaintiffs, said Thompson’s got nothing.
“Nothing gets my fires burning faster than the way the ACLU is associated with liberal causes,” he said. “We are defenders of constitutional freedoms for people of all religions, including Christians.”
He cited cases last year in which the ACLU supported an Amish fight for horse and buggy rights in Cambria County, a black church near Pittsburgh that had zoning problems with a local government, and a woman in Beaver County who needed counseling but insisted that it be Christian counseling.
“Thompson said we interfere with the rights of people to worship,” Walczak said. “But the truth is Thomas More, and others like them, are trying to impose their religious views, symbols and prayers on everyone.”
Thompson said that while schools are not allowed to teach origins of life, biblical or otherwise, intelligent design will lead students to wonder where life comes from.
Members of Dover’s school board have said the “designer” could be anything, including an alien.
“But for many, the answer will be God,” Thompson said. “And it’s that connection that certain people have problems with.”
People such as Walczak.
“Once you strip away all the rhetoric you are not left with science,” he said. “You are left with something that closely resembles creationism. And that does not belong in any science classroom.”
bump
What a bunch of codswallop. ID and/or creationism certainly do not belong in a science classroom.
Being ignorant is not a conservative position.
"Darwinism." Bogus word. Just like "Newtonism," "Galileoism," "Einsteinism" etc. Invented for the sole purpose of obfuscation by the mystics who carry God's water. If God is who believers say he is, he doesn't need his hysterical "defenders."
Lets at least not teach a belief system as science.
This is also why I did take the time to spend three years teaching a 5th and 6th grade science class (sans pay) about 10 years ago even though I have never had children.
Pathetic!
When the world was finished, there were as yet no people, but the Bald Eagle was chief of the animals. He saw that the world was incomplete and decided to make some human beings. So he took some clay and modeled the figure of a man and laid him on the ground. At first he was very small but he grew rapidly until he reached normal size. But as yet he had no life; he was still asleep. Then the Bald Eagle stood and admired his work. "It is impossible," he said, "that he should be left alone; he must have a mate." So he pulled out a feather and laid it beside the sleeping man. Then he left them and went off a short distance, for he knew that a woman was being formed from the feather. But the man was still asleep and did not know what was happening. When the Bald Eagle decided that the woman was about completed, he returned, awoke the man by flapping his wings over him and flew away.The man opened his eyes and stared at the woman. "What does this mean?" he asked/ "I thought I was alone!" Then the Bald Eagle returned and said with a smile, "I see you have a mate! Have you had intercourse with her?" "No," replied he man, for he and the woman knew nothing about each other. Then the Bald Eagle called to Coyote who happened to be going by and said to him, "Do you see that woman? Try her first!" Coyote was quite willing and complied, but immediately afterwards lay down and died. The Bald Eagle went away and left Coyote dead, but presently returned and revived him. "How did it work?" said the Bald Eagle. "Pretty well, but it nearly kills a man!" replied Coyote. "Will you try it again?" said the Bald Eagle. Coyote agreed, and tried again, and this time survived. Then the Bald Eagle turned to the man and said, "She is all right now; you and she are to live together.
Salinan Indian creation story, south-central California
Oh, you mean they didn't want this creation?
If that's the non-science you want to teach at home that's your prerogative.
That gets right to heart of the matter. The hysterics do not truly believe God is who they wish Him to be. At best, they hope they can convince others and thereby shore up their own faltering beliefs. At worse, they know that if God is truly what they claim, they are in deep trouble in their own afterlife.
Great response, shuckmaster! Honestly, I don't see why there is such a conflict. I recall being assigned a topic for a paper in Biology 101 as a Freshman at Wellesley College. The topic was: "Can you reconcile divine creation with evolution?"
I reconciled them. I remember that much.......and even today, I certainly can argue that land reptiles evolved from marine life. Fins gradually morphed into legs. New species developed from natural environmental adaptation.
Thousands of species transformed in the same gradual manner over countless millenia. To conclude this is not the same as to also conclude that human beings are descended from monkeys.
There is still a "missing link." Isn't there?
Besides, who is to say that the Intelligent Designer didn't design an evolving universe? This would make evolution part of and compatible with Intelligent Design. In that way, the two concepts are harmonious, because they are ongoing and purposefully functional, because intertwined "by design."
Char :)
If the Nazis had really believed in Darwinism, they wouldn;t have bothered with that Affirmaive Action for the Master Race.
The reason Thompson said he took on the case is because Christians, including himself, support intelligent design.
As Ken Ham has pointed out, Christians also support murder, rape, adultery, prostitutuiion, illegal drug use, and Sabbath-breaking.
monkey trial ping!
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Beat ya here.
See posts 4 and 8. :-)
Dude! You're supposed to ping PH at the first opportunity. It's in the Darwin Central By-Laws.
Ohhh, goodie! Sadism placemarker!
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