Intelligent Design and Evolution at the White House

SETI Institute ^ | August 2005 | Edna DeVore

[PatrickHenry]

On August 1, 2005, a group of reporters from Texas met with President Bush in the Roosevelt room for a roundtable interview. The President’s remarks suggest that he believes that both intelligent design and evolution should be taught so that “people are exposed to different schools of thought.” There have been so many articles since his remarks that it’s useful to read the relevant portion of published interview:

“Q: I wanted to ask you about the -- what seems to be a growing debate over evolution versus intelligent design. What are your personal views on that, and do you think both should be taught in public schools?

THE PRESIDENT: I think -- as I said, harking back to my days as my governor -- both you and Herman are doing a fine job of dragging me back to the past. (Laughter.) Then, I said that, first of all, that decision should be made to local school districts, but I felt like both sides ought to be properly taught.

Q: Both sides should be properly taught?

THE PRESIDENT: Yes, people -- so people can understand what the debate is about.

Q: So the answer accepts the validity of intelligent design as an alternative to evolution?

THE PRESIDENT: I think that part of education is to expose people to different schools of thought, and I'm not suggesting -- you're asking me whether or not people ought to be exposed to different ideas, and the answer is yes.”

(Transcript released by the White House and published on August 2, 2005 at WashingtonPost.com)

The reporter got it right: there is an ongoing debate over intelligent design vs. evolution, at least in the media and in politics. There is not a debate in the greater scientific community about the validity of evolution. Further, the vast majority of scientists do not consider intelligent design as a viable alternative to evolution.

Dr. John Marburger III, Presidential Science Advisor, tried to dispel the impact of the President’s comments. On Aug. 2, The New York Times quoted a telephone interview with Marburger in which he said, “evolution is the cornerstone of modern biology” and “intelligent design is not a scientific concept.” Certainly, no one doubts where Marburger stands. One might question whether the President takes Marbuger’s scientific advice seriously, or is simply more concerned about pleasing a portion of the electorate.

Marburger also spoke with Dr. Marvin Cohen, President of the American Physical Society, and recipient of the National Medal of Science from President Bush in 2002. In an Aug. 4 release, Cohen explains that the APS is “…happy that the President’s recent comments on the theory of intelligent design have been clarified. As Presidential Science Advisor John Marburger has explained, President Bush does not regard intelligent design as science. If such things are to be taught in the public schools, they belong in a course on comparative religion, which is a particularly appropriate subject for our children given the present state of the world.” It would be better to hear this directly from the President. Likely, the intelligent design advocates will ignore Marburger’s explanation. Like the fabled little Dutch boy, Marburger, stuck his finger in the dike in hopes of saving the day.

Unlike the brave boy, Marburger did not prevent the flood of print and electronic coverage that ensued. From August 2 to the present, Google-News tracked more than 1,800 articles, commentaries, and letters to the editor on intelligent design. That’s about 120 per day since the President’s remarks.

In the days following the interview, major educational and scientific organizations issued statements that criticized the President for considering intelligent design as a viable alternative to evolution, for confusing religion with science, and for advocating that intelligent design be taught in schools.

“President Bush, in advocating that the concept of ‘intelligent design’ be taught alongside the theory of evolution, puts America’s schoolchildren at risk,” says Fred Spilhaus, Executive Director of the American Geophysical Union. “Americans will need basic understanding of science in order to participate effectively in the 21 st century world. It is essential that students on every level learn what science is and how scientific knowledge progresses.” (AGU, Aug. 2, 2005) AGU is a scientific society comprising 43,000 Earth and space scientists.

Likewise, the American Institute of Biological Sciences criticized the President: “Intelligent design is not a scientific theory and must not be taught in science classes,” said AIBS president Dr. Marvalee Wake. “If we want our students to be able to compete in the global economy, if we want to attract the next generation into the sciences, we must make sure that we are teaching them science. We simply cannot begin to introduce non-scientific concepts into the science curriculum.” (AIBS, Aug. 5, 2005) The American Institute of Biological Sciences was established as a national umbrella organization for the biological sciences in 1947 by 11 scientific societies as part of the National Academy of Sciences. An independent non-profit organization since 1954, it has grown to represent more than 80 professional societies and organizations with a combined membership exceeding 240,000 scientists and educators. (AIBS website)

Science educators are equally dismayed. “The National Science Teachers Association (NSTA), the world’s largest organization of science educators, is stunned and disappointed that President Bush is endorsing the teaching of intelligent design – effectively opening the door for nonscientific ideas to be taught in the nation’s K-12 science classrooms. We stand with the nation’s leading scientific organizations and scientists, including Dr. John Marburger, the president’s top science advisor, in stating that intelligent design is not science. Intelligent design has no place in the science classroom, said Gerry Wheeler, NSTA Executive Director.” (NSTA, Aug. 3, 2005) NSTA has 55,000 members who teach science in elementary, middle and high schools as well as college and universities.

The American Federation of Teachers, which represents 1.3 million pre-K through 12 th grade teachers, was even harsher. “President Bush’s misinformed comments on ‘intelligent design’ signal a huge step backward for science education in the United States. The president’s endorsement of such a discredited, nonscientific view is akin to suggesting that students be taught the ‘alternative theory’ that the earth is flat or that the sun revolves around the earth. Intelligent design does not belong in the science classroom because it is not science.” (AFT, Aug. 4, 2005)

There is a problem here. Obviously, scientists and educators understand that intelligent design has no place in the classroom. Intelligent design is, simply, one of several varieties of creationism that offer religious explanations for the origin and current condition of the natural world. As such, it does not merit being taught alongside evolution as a “school of thought.” There’s significant legal precedent from US Supreme Court that creationism - in any clothing - does not belong in the American classrooms. Teaching creationism is in violation of the separation of church and state, and has been ruled illegal by the US Supreme Court in several cases. It’s unfortunate that the President apparently does not understand that science is not equivalent to a belief system but is description of how the natural world works. Creationism, including intelligent design, is a religious point of view, not science.

At a time when industrial, academic, and business leaders are calling for more American students to train in engineering, mathematics, science and technology, we need to teach science in science classrooms. Let’s teach the scientific ideas that are supported by overwhelming evidence such as gravitation, relativity, quantum mechanics, and evolution. Creationist ideas/beliefs, such as intelligent design, don’t belong in science classrooms. In our haste to leave no child behind, let’s not leave science behind either.

[Physicist]

An honest person who cannot explain this must acknowledge they do not personally understand how some of the basic premises of evolution are possible.

Ridiculous. You're insisting that nobody can claim to know the basics of a science until every problem has been solved. I have no idea how the three-chamber heart developed. I also have no idea of why particles have mass, or why CP is not a universal symmetry of nature, or how gravity can behave in a manner consistent with quantum mechanics. Do I therefore not have a basic understanding of particle physics?

[tortoise]

But for this discussion, Kolmogorov's theory of IC would merely be the minimum DNA code necessary for any given stage of biological life...which isn't necessarily the same thing as what biologists want from Irreducible Complexity, which is the minimum simultaneous events or changes required for that stage to survive and be replicated.

What biologists want and what biologists get are two different things. The only rigorous approximation of what you are asserting biologists want is Kolmogorov IC in a closed system, and that does not really give you what you want.

There are an astronomical number of pathways between any two system states that will preserve any arbitrary number of parameters (e.g. survival and replication). The only real value for your argument in showing genuine irreducible complexity is that it is the only state in which something external would have to be added to the system in order for a state transition to occur. However, since biological change effectively occurs in an open system, even this serves as weak proof.

Again, you can prove Kolmogorov irreducible complexity for processes and dynamic systems as well as static information like DNA. (And honestly, thinking otherwise is a 1950s view of information theory and computer science -- how old are you!?) If you want to mechanically generate the entire transition and process description between two states within a set of required constraints, that can be done too. Including for heart configurations, flagella, eyes, or anything else that strikes your fancy.

In this sense, your argument really is one of incredulity. For any effectively open system like an organism in our universe, there is always an unimaginably large number of viable transition pathways. Mathematics requires this. That neither you nor I can imagine such a transition pathway is really quite irrelevant, as we can prove vast numbers of such pathways exist. Some such pathways are improbable, but there will be many that are quite plausible that may never occur to humans, ourselves being entities of very finite mind.

[PatrickHenry]

Is it not possible to lobby for extended mutations?

Blasphemy! When the permitted number of mutations for a particular kind has been achieved, according to the records kept by the Cosmic Clerk, then the Intelligent Designer resets the DNA to the initial state, as required by the 2nd law of thermodynamics. Why can't you Darwin cultists grasp this simple fact?
</creationism mode>

[KMJames]

Show me the self-limiting mechanism. Every population on earth is undergoing constant change. Where is the limitation?

OK, look at these ring species examples. The populations change (even diverging along two lines that also change...it may also happen that the divergent lines can further diverge and so on and so on - with degrees of change occurring all along). This goes on and we observe great variation among the populations - with much interbreeding going on - or else there would not be this great variation. The interbreeding is essential to the change of populations.

But, then, there appear (apparently disparate) populations which do not interbreed - this is THE POINT OF LIMITATION. For whatever reason, these populations will not naturally interbreed, or to use the peculiar term "give rise to" another "variety". Perhaps this shows that a dumb animal is not inclined to breed with another animal that is too different from itself - this is THE LIMITATION.

Change (facilitated by interbreeding) WITHIN a strong variety/species/kind but no change BEYOND.

[narby]

This from post 314 " The entire scientific field of genetic engineering is about the intelligent design of life and life forms. " is one of many places where you are using the term "intelligent design" as a label for what some biologists are doing.

Yours is a fairly transparent attempt to lend weight to the creationists "Intelligent Design" by labeling what science does as "Intelligent Design".

Semantics is one of the more powerful tools of propaganda, and you're using it well by conflating the term with two entirely separate issues. Continue the practice if you must, while I must call the practice propaganda, because that's what it is.

[js1138]

If I name an exception, you will say it falls outside the premise.

I said science in general rested on a premise. You responded that only evolution rested on this premise. I asked for an exception from anywhere in science. If I didn't make that clear previously, I am now.

Give me an example from anywhere in science where the finding of a naturalistic cause is not the goal.

[PatrickHenry]

The scientific case against powered flight

1. For thousands of years, powered flight has been known to be impossible.
2. If God meant man to fly, He'd have given us wings.
3. There is no evidence of powered flight. None at all.
4. Those who claim to have flown are liars, in it for the money.
5. Things seen in the sky other than birds are, in truth, evidence of supernatural beings.
6. The Second Law of Thermodynamics rules out heavier-than-air flight.
7. Powered flight upsets the natural order, and leads to sexual promiscuity.
8. Powered flight is not mentioned in the Bible.
9. Lord Kelvin (1824-1907), a highly regarded scientist and president of the Royal Society of London, stated flatly in 1885, "Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible."
10. It takes more faith to believe in powered flight than to believe in the tooth fairy.

[Chameleon]

Ridiculous. You're insisting that nobody can claim to know the basics of a science until every problem has been solved.

No, I'm saying that when a theory has difficulty explaining observable phenomenah, we must acknowledge this as a weakness of the theory as we understand it.

You can have a basic understanding of evolution while recognizing that the theory has difficulty explaining some types of observable evolotionary phenomenah.

It is the people who deny that some types of evolution are difficult to explain with existing theory who lack the "basic understanding."

[KMJames]

The changes that result in speciation result in two genetically independent populations of organisms which can diverge even further now that there's no intermingling of genes between the two...Evolution predicts only small changes from one generation to the next, but that these small changes can accumulate to produce large ones.

I believe my post to js1138 at #584 relates to your comments.

Unfortunately, the link you provided in #561 isn't working for me - so I don't have a comment on that. Perhaps you can repost the link or the url?

[Chameleon]

Yes, you do have a distinction there. I don't think it's a rock-solid distinction because I think it's possible that a source of organic intelligence could be located. But I'm having trouble imagining a scenario.

[js1138]

I really don't know where to start. Ring species ar an elample of populations loosely separated by geography, diverging seamlessly from those populations most geographiclly remote. There is absolutely nothing prevententing the ends of the ring from diverging to the point where they are physically and biologically incapable of producing viable offspring when interbred.

All that is necessary to produce a new species is a barrier of any kind that separates two populations. And time.

Now the point of all this is to illustrate how evolution occurs in populations rather than individuals. The genetic barriers to interbreeding do not happen overnight, or in just a few individuals. The transition is not embodied in hopeful monsters having no possible mates.

[b_sharp]

"And Dembski's explanatory filter does not count because... ?

Would you mind giving an example of its use? I've never had the opportunity of seeing it applied to a real life object.

[Fester Chugabrew]

I said science in general rested on a premise.

No. You stated the premise upon which you believe science to be based.

You responded that only evolution rested on this premise.

No. I responded by pointing out the small nature of your premise; how it is not falsifiable, etc.

I asked for an exception from anywhere in science.

Given your premise it is not possible to provide an exception.

[js1138]

I suppose even within a small box like that there is plenty for science to do, but I am happy to know science is inclined to think bigger.

Let's take this in baby steps. Show me a case where bigger thinking science does not presume natural causes.

[b_sharp]

"From what I've read about this, the "nail and washer" wording was ascribed to the spark plug itself, not something outside of it. Talk Origins says otherwise. Anyway, I find it interesting how much confusion resulted from this find. I happen to believe it is a Model-T spark plug. What I find remarkable is that, if it had never been opened up, evolutionists would have declared the entity as 500,000 years old. But then, direct observation has never been our best friend in terms of science, right? [underlining mine]

Geologist. Not part of evolutionary biology, just a contributing discipline.

My opinion is that it was a spark plug embedded in a concretion, and that it was not a geode. Views of the inside as shown by the photo do not show any of the type of crystallization found in geodes. According to legend, the age of the nodule was never determined, the age of the fossils on it may have been, but even that could not be verified because the discoverers did not allow any independent verification. Even if the fossils were verified as 500,000 years old, that does not give the date of the concretion.

It is very likely the discoverers did not want its monetary value damaged by any further examination; they may have been that unsure of it's true age.

Today's trip was canceled. I am supposed to be working on a customer's server though.

[Southack]

"DNA is nothing like computer programming code."

Incorrect.

DNA code is comprised of mathematical Base-4 "codons" that are organized in three letter programming words and grouped into reuseable subroutines that we call genes.

Base DNA codon words are translated into one of 20 amino acids and processed by a biological code-reading engine precisely as human computer Base-2 (aka Binary) bits are processed by a computer CPU.

Likewise, the overall genome contains both programming commands as well as data.

[narby]

Fester, why are you even discussing science? You believe that God zapped the world into existence and He continues to do anything He wants at any time without any physical rules to limit Him.

Why should science attempt to discover how biology works? God made it work, end of story.

Why should doctors attempt to cure diseases, because God will take you to heaven in His time?

My point is that believing in miracles of God, like a 6000 year old world would necessarily be, is an excuse to abandon science entirely.

Back in Marx's day, I'm sure there were those who said his theories would be a disaster. But true believers convinced a majority of the world in Marx's BS. Likewise, you are a true believer too, and your kind might just be successful in turning the world back to a pre-rennesance culture, because that's the direction you're aiming. That would be a shame.

Believers in ideologies are the most dangerous. I'm sure you will claim that science or evolution is an ideology too, in order to excuse your own beliefs. But you'd be wrong.

[Southack]

"Unfortunately for the ID community, when you actually analyze DNA for oddball stuff, you find evidence for common descent." - js1138

Science views the analyzation of data as fortunate, not unfortunate. If the examination of DNA code reveals natural descent, then so be it, but to date such an analysis has not been seen. Quite the contrary, actually (e.g. DNA code-skipping entire species).

---

"But keep on a happy face. Entire DNA sequences will eventually be available, and you can use them to find Bible Codes, or whatever you want." - js1138

Tossing around ad hominems such as "Bible Codes" isn't going to support your failed argument. In fact, if you search this thread you'll readily find that Darwinists are prolific with ad hominems, but lacking in facts, logic, and reasoned debate. That alone speaks volumes for your lack of confidence in your own beliefs.

Oh, and "entire DNA sequences" are already available for study. Do try to keep up with the current state of science (even if you choose to never agree with me).

[KMJames]

Thanks for slogging through this with me - but - perhaps I haven't communicated accurately.

Here's the crux of my point (mentioned in #584): The interbreeding is essential to the change of populations.

When populations stop interbreeding the changes stop.

If the friggin' 50cent warblers don't interbreed with the BarryManilow warblers there will be no genetic mixing of the two - no further change in that direction. The result: when the populations get to some point of disparity they STOP - they stop interbreeding and thus stop changing.

All that is necessary to produce a new species is a barrier of any kind that separates two populations. And time.

Perhaps a barrier is necessary to "define" a species, but, a barrier sure isn't going to produce one. I think that interbreeding is necessary to produce a new species. As for time,...if 50cent warbler doesn't hook up with BarryManilow warbler while they're alive - I don't see it happening when they're dead.

[Southack]

"There is no way to find irreducible complexity."

That's incorrect. Irreducible complexity is already known to exist for abiogenesis. It is likely to exist for the 3 chambered reverse flow heart.

Irreducible complexity is a biological stage...a stage that requires several simultaneous changes from the previous state in order to exist, survive, and be replicated.

Such a stage can be found with physiology, physics, controlled lab experiments, and/or math.