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The Smithsonian withdraws sponsorship of intelligent design film
NY Times ^ | 6/3/05

Posted on 06/03/2005 6:25:25 PM PDT by Crackingham

The Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History has withdrawn its co-sponsorship of a showing later this month of a film that supports the theory of "intelligent design."

The museum said it would not cancel the screening of the film, "The Privileged Planet," but would return the $16,000 that the Discovery Institute, an organization that promotes a skeptical view of the Darwinian theory of evolution, had paid it.

Proposals for events at the National Museum of Natural History are reviewed by members of the staff, and it shares sponsorship of all events. After the news of the showing caused controversy, however, officials of the museum screened "Privileged Planet" for themselves.

"The major problem with the film is the wrap-up," said Randall Kremer, a museum spokesman.

"It takes a philosophical bent rather than a clear statement of the science, and that's where we part ways with them."

(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; Government; News/Current Events; Philosophy
KEYWORDS: copout; creation; crevolist; darwinianpriesthood; documentary; elite; elitist; freethinkingnot; inquisitionlives; intelligentdesign; jerkalert; justthefactsnot; museum; nooneexpects; openmindednot; privilegedplanet; smithsonian; wimp; wimpout
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To: American Vet Repairman
Look in the mirror. Look at your eyes. I mean take a good long look. Now think about this. How did evolution know things needed to be in focus, how did evolution know there were colors to be seen?

Evolution doesn't "know" anything. Creatures with better eyesight were better able to survive and reproduce and pass their genes allowing for superior eyesight to subsequent geneerations.

Do you have an argument that isn't a strawman?
101 posted on 06/05/2005 4:51:44 PM PDT by Dimensio (http://angryflower.com/bobsqu.gif <-- required reading before you use your next apostrophe!)
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To: American Vet Repairman
Look in the mirror. Look at your eyes. I mean take a good long look.

Okay, looking at eyes, check.

Now think about this. How did evolution know things needed to be in focus, how did evolution know there were colors to be seen?

Evolution didn't "know." Those ancestors of mine who had a better ability to focus light and discern different wavelengths had a reproductive advantage over their cohorts who did not. They passed that advantage to their descendants. Those of the descendants whose vision conferred a reproductive, compared to their cohorts, had, on average, more descendants, and so on. Millions of years later, there is me. (And the human eye is only one of about 40 different eyes that independently evolved, by the way.)

How could we, who are so wonderfully made-be the product of a string of coincidences?

Wonderfully made? Ha! We're a collection of ad-hoc adaptations, maladaptations, and evolutionary holdovers. We walk upright, but have the lower backs of quadrupeds. We have an appendix, which is susceptible to infection, bursting and death, but which has no necessary function. The evolution of the eye has the light sensitive cells wired backwards which has lead to a blind spot in our field of vision. And, after using one of our key adaptations (our brain) to form modern society, our natural desire for sugar and fat in our diet has become a severe maladaptation.

Wild Horse...you are the proof.

Given the fact that I have a blind spot in my eyes, a slipped disk in my back, an appendectomy scar, and an expanding waistline from a sweet tooth and a taste for burgers, if I'm proof of anything, it is evolution. But I don't see any evidence of a creator.

102 posted on 06/05/2005 4:55:52 PM PDT by WildHorseCrash
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To: CarolinaGuitarman
"outside the realm of scientific testability"

Curious phrase. Many scientific hypothesis are outside the realm of scientific testability, yet they make their theories never the less. Unless a black hole happens to come for tea, scientifically testing that theory simply isn't possible, nor is it possible to absolutely prove it wrong. What you are concerned with is primacy of thought, which is good, otherwise I wouldn't have you as such a textbook example for my footnotes.

Perhaps you could contemplate and answer the big "so what" to all knowledge of the universe beyond our solar system, and to all life not today in existence. Beyond satisfying our own curiosity, of what use is this knowledge? Chemistry, physics, etc. provide real fruits, but at the end of the day how does ID vs. Darwin matter? I'm sure it is significant and you have a wonderful answer, or you wouldn't let yourself be so consumed by it. Please share.

103 posted on 06/05/2005 5:36:49 PM PDT by SampleMan
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To: WildHorseCrash
Wonderfully made? Ha! We're a collection of ad-hoc adaptations, maladaptations, and evolutionary holdovers.

Well, create some dirt and get busy building a better model then. Since you have a brain and evolution doesn't (curious, isn't, how you got intelligence from the hot primordial soup of the Big Bang?) with just a slide rule and few sheets of foolscap you can easily design and build a superior model.

Get cracking. Time's a wasting.

104 posted on 06/05/2005 5:42:04 PM PDT by JCEccles
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To: Dimensio

I pity you.


105 posted on 06/05/2005 5:52:54 PM PDT by American Vet Repairman
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To: JCEccles
Well, create some dirt and get busy building a better model then.

The issue isn't whether I could do better. The previous poster pointed to the fact that humans are allegedly "wonderfully made" as evidence of a creator-god. I pointed out that, as proof of a divine creation, our bodies are poor proof, if they are proof at all.

But more to the point, the fact is that no one needs to "design" a better human from scratch because humans were never designed from scratch to begin with. The human body fails as evidence for design by any type of direct creator, but as the end process of billions of years of evolutionary adaptation, it's pretty darned good.

106 posted on 06/05/2005 6:00:10 PM PDT by WildHorseCrash
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To: skr
"Don't zygotes require external energy in order to grow? If a pregnant woman stops eating, a linebacker is unlikely to show up in 22 years. We start dying the moment we begin to live, since all cells eventually break down. The 2LoTD is a universal law, isn't it? Doesn't that mean it works under any circumstance, as far as we have been able to observe? Or does evolution trump the laws of the universe? How does it not pertain to cells, if it pertains to everything else that cells make up? "

Of course the zygote receives energy from its mother, that is exactly my point. I never said that evolution is not subject to the 2LoT, I stated that it does not break the 2Lot because the earth is continually receiving energy from the sun.

I'm not sure where you got that idea, but we do not start dying as soon as we are born. Even though we have individual cells dying we receive energy indirectly from the sun which enable us to increase our cell number over all until we reach adulthood. We hit a stasis point where the number of cells dying equals the number created until mid adulthood. The replacement of cells is not equivalent to dying.

"Not that your or anyone else's quotes aren't on the up-and-up, but Wikipedia isn't original source material, since anyone can edit at will."

I used Wiki because I wanted to give the poster a source other than creationist sites that is easily understood. Had I given him links to other more technical sites he would not have even attempted to read them. I also wanted him to see how to reference his quotes.

107 posted on 06/05/2005 6:14:03 PM PDT by b_sharp (Science adjusts theories to fit evidence, creationism distorts evidence to fit the Bible.)
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To: Elsie

If you knew anything about ID, and the fact it does not support your idea of a young earth nor your angst about evolution you would not be so quick to jump on the ID bandwagon.


108 posted on 06/05/2005 6:18:12 PM PDT by b_sharp (Science adjusts theories to fit evidence, creationism distorts evidence to fit the Bible.)
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To: SampleMan
"My point was that the church then, and science now, have taken on the same role of stifling new thought."

Stifling new thought. Hmmm. You mean new thought like string theory, game theory, branes, the multi-universe,...? Go through the list of all developments in science over the last 20 years and tell me which ones have only been accepted because they are main stream science. Then go through the list of hypotheses that haven't been accepted by science and show they were rejected, not on the basis of bad or incomplete research, but because of a bias in science.

109 posted on 06/05/2005 6:27:51 PM PDT by b_sharp (Science adjusts theories to fit evidence, creationism distorts evidence to fit the Bible.)
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To: SampleMan

"Many scientific hypothesis are outside the realm of scientific testability, yet they make their theories never the less. Unless a black hole happens to come for tea, scientifically testing that theory simply isn't possible, nor is it possible to absolutely prove it wrong."

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2001/ast12jan_1.htm

http://csep10.phys.utk.edu/astr162/lect/active/smblack.html

http://cosmology.berkeley.edu/Education/BHfaq.html

There is a lot of evidence for the existence of black holes.
As to absolute proof, it doesn't exist in regard to scientific theories.

There is nothing that could theoretically be discovered that could disprove the axioms of the ID explanation. It is therefore not a scientific theory.

"Beyond satisfying our own curiosity, of what use is this knowledge? Chemistry, physics, etc. provide real fruits, but at the end of the day how does ID vs. Darwin matter?"

It answers how we came to be. I value reason, so I want to know what really happened, as apposed to a fairy tale. There is no need for a scientist to waste time on a fairy tale.

"I'm sure it is significant and you have a wonderful answer"

There's hope for you yet... not much, but some. :)


110 posted on 06/05/2005 6:31:59 PM PDT by CarolinaGuitarman (There is a grandeur in this view of life....)
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To: Hacksaw
Randi views ID as pseudoscience, quite correctly I might add, and as is his wont, he tries to expose pseudoscience for what it is. That is his right is it not?
111 posted on 06/05/2005 6:32:25 PM PDT by b_sharp (Science adjusts theories to fit evidence, creationism distorts evidence to fit the Bible.)
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To: Hacksaw; Dimensio
"It sure as hell (oops!) is - that theory that Randi "ponied up" 20,000 to have banned at the Smithsonian. Sounds like you haven't RTFT. Maybe I should hook you up with Randi."

Calling it a theory and making an obvious attempt to elevate ID's status is your doing, not Randi's. He considers it pseudoscience.

Now answer Dimensio's question and show why you insist on referring to ID as a theory.

112 posted on 06/05/2005 6:39:06 PM PDT by b_sharp (Science adjusts theories to fit evidence, creationism distorts evidence to fit the Bible.)
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To: AndrewC
"$20,000 payoff by Randi says there are."

Hardly! Randi does not consider ID a theory, just junk-science.

113 posted on 06/05/2005 6:41:31 PM PDT by b_sharp (Science adjusts theories to fit evidence, creationism distorts evidence to fit the Bible.)
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To: American Vet Repairman
"I have read all the threads in regards to this post and the conclusion I come up with is that many evolutionists are no different than any other liberal ideologue they get personal and vicious when they are shown to be wrong. Yes evolutionists are hostile because their precious religion is being dismantled."

Rather than making wild assertions why can't you acquire a working knowledge of the subject being debated?

Our hostility comes from the frustration of hearing the same old baloney from creationists that have been refuted time and again, not from some unfounded and unsubstantiated claim of fear you hope will help your cause.

114 posted on 06/05/2005 6:57:17 PM PDT by b_sharp (Science adjusts theories to fit evidence, creationism distorts evidence to fit the Bible.)
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To: Hacksaw
"You still haven't read the subject?"

I assume your reticence in answering is either because your knowledge is incomplete or you are aware there is no theory. I'm relaively certain that if you were sure of your own knowledge and were confident of the existence of an ID theory you would be all too happy to share it with us.

115 posted on 06/05/2005 7:04:48 PM PDT by b_sharp (Science adjusts theories to fit evidence, creationism distorts evidence to fit the Bible.)
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To: b_sharp
"Our hostility comes from the frustration of hearing the same old baloney from creationists "


Your hostility comes from your hatred of being a created being. For you slime birthed animals (Which is what evolution believes)would have to acknowledge that you must answer to a higher being. When I was a child the communists spat out the same filth to us in the schools and I swallowed it hook line and sinker. But unlike you, you batch of primordial ooze, I got a real education and questioned the lies. Evolution is a lie-you live a lie and you will die a liar.
116 posted on 06/05/2005 7:28:57 PM PDT by American Vet Repairman
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To: b_sharp
Hardly! Randi does not consider ID a theory, just junk-science.

So why is he willing to pay to suppress it?

117 posted on 06/05/2005 7:45:00 PM PDT by AndrewC (Darwinians love censorship)
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To: American Vet Repairman
"Look in the mirror. Look at your eyes. I mean take a good long look. Now think about this. How did evolution know things needed to be in focus, how did evolution know there were colors to be seen? How could we, who are so wonderfully made-be the product of a string of coincidences? Wild Horse...you are the proof."

Evolution reacts to changes in environment, it does not anticipate. The ability to focus came as the eye, which has evolved as many as 20 times, experienced mutation (probably a copy error) and natural selection weeded out those that could not focus.

For your edification, there exist within extant organisms a relatively smooth transition between a simply light sensing cell and the Octo-eye which is superior to ours in design. You are aware that much of our eye is backwards or otherwise poorly designed?

BTW, trying to prove evolution incorrect is not equivalent to proving your God exists. That is a much used false dichotomy intended to give anti-evolutionists some hope that they will be proved right about the existence of their God.

118 posted on 06/05/2005 7:48:48 PM PDT by b_sharp (Science adjusts theories to fit evidence, creationism distorts evidence to fit the Bible.)
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To: American Vet Repairman

"For you slime birthed animals (Which is what evolution believes)"

No, that is just your ignorant distortion of evolution. Every evolutionist believes that every human being was born from another human being.

"When I was a child the communists spat out the same filth to us in the schools and I swallowed it hook line and sinker"

I am not surpised your were easily led.

"But unlike you, you batch of primordial ooze, I got a real education and questioned the lies. Evolution is a lie-you live a lie and you will die a liar."

Liar Liar! Pants on Fire!! lol


119 posted on 06/05/2005 7:48:58 PM PDT by CarolinaGuitarman (There is a grandeur in this view of life....)
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To: Dimensio
"Do you have an argument that isn't a strawman?"

Not so far. Take a look at my discussion with him. Very frustrating.

120 posted on 06/05/2005 7:50:22 PM PDT by b_sharp (Science adjusts theories to fit evidence, creationism distorts evidence to fit the Bible.)
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