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.

[betty boop]

I'm always sorry for the loss of a great mind. May John Bahcall rest in peace. My prayers for his family, loved ones, friends, and colleagues.

[PatrickHenry]

Are you lost or just spiritually blind placemarker.

[js1138]

I personally went blind reading the amended
Second Law.

[js1138]

Then why did you claim DNA was the evidence linking species over time?

Because it does, just as DNA reveals identity and parentage in courts of law.

[Southack]

Codons are the three letter programming words (built from the GATC bases) that specify one of 20 amino acids that in turn form the (now decoded) proteins required to physically build an organism. - southack

"Yes this is true,
but they are not three letter "programming words"." The term "word" exists in computing, and it is not relevant to DNA." - bobdsmith

The term "word" exists in computing to denote a grouping of Binary bits that comprise an instruction. The analogy in DNA are the three bases (mathematical Base-4 instead of Binary Base-2) that are grouped together on each successive rung of the DNA double-helix ladder.

The computing "word" expresses a command instruction to the CPU. The DNA double-helix rung likewise expresses an amino acid, start command, or stop command (read: "Instruction") in the genome processing.

[Southack]

"I know computers, and I know DNA. They are not the same at all."

Then you know nothing about either.

Computers and DNA both process commands and data. Both computers and DNA have start and stop instructions for processing, for instance.

[Southack]

Each codon word of 3 bases is therefor an instruction for the translation to any one of 20 amino acids, 3 stop signals, or 5 start signals.

"No, it is a template, not an instruction." - bobdsmith

Incorrect. In fact, not only incorrect, but completely wrong and utterly uninformed. Go back to school. Demand a refund. Do not pass go. Do not collect $200.

DNA start commands and stop commands are incontrovertibly instructions.

Do not say otherwise.

[Junior]

Then why did you claim DNA was the evidence linking species over time?

Proof positive you are incapable of actually comprehending the written word. "Linking species over time" != "life." Your lack of critical thinking skills is getting wearisome.

[Fester Chugabrew]

Both computers and DNA have start and stop instructions . . .

Biology operates as a machine. Machines do not make themselves. What does that imply?

[Southack]

"I never claimed DNA transcription had no direction, I said the overall process is not sequential. Transcription is just one part of the processes. The proteins finally expressed by DNA go on to simultaneously interact with one another to produce the biological effect. This is the real "execution" of DNA, and notice that it is not sequential and nothing like computer execution."

...Only if you've never heard of parallel processing...or if you've never heard of multi-threading...or if you've never heard of external interrupt driven design...or if you've never heard of fuzzy logic...or if you've never heard of nueral nets...yeah, if you've been isolated from the past 40 years of computer science advances then you *might* be forgiven for thinking that DNA has little in common with computer execution.

You'd still be wrong, but at least you might have a good enough excuse to warrant forgiveness.

[Southack]

"Biology operates as a machine. Machines do not make themselves. What does that imply?"

Self-replicating machines already exist.

[Southack]

"Because it does, just as DNA reveals identity and parentage in courts of law."

...and as does software code likewise reveals its authors (see: Novell/IBM versus SCO) in court.

[Just mythoughts]

"Because it does, just as DNA reveals identity and parentage in courts of law."

First I wholeheartedly agree that DNA reveals identity.

That fits exactly within what the Bible says as well, each individual is identified and identifiable, their soul returns to the Maker that sent it.

Come now what was removed from The Adam that was used to create the woman, surely you are going to say it was actually a rib. Check the word out what it actually means.

So what somebody got a wild hair and decided that the Creator did not, could not, form each different species at a given specific time, because they all have DNA?

[js1138]

I think, as usual, you are missing the point.

DNA contains data used by the cellular machinery for creating proteins, but DNA is not a program in sense of containing conditionals and branching instructions.

The distinction is not really important in the arena of computer science -- program and data are not really distinctive -- but it is important in the arena of biological research that much of the mystery is in the cellular machinery rather than in the DNA.

[Fester Chugabrew]

Self-replicating . . .

Without or without self-replication, what does the presence of a machine imply?

[Physicist]

"It is with great sadness that I write to inform you of the death on August 17 of APS President-Elect John Bahcall, at the age of 70. John was one of the great masters of theoretical astrophysics."

Tragic, tragic, tragic. I had not heard.

He died of a rare blood disorder, the news outlets say. Why would the Intelligent Designer leave such jack-stupid flaws unfixed? And if some cosmic intelligence is hand-picking who lives and dies (the better to micromanage apparent historical contingency), why would he do something so manifestly counterproductive?

[Southack]

"DNA contains data used by the cellular machinery for creating proteins, but DNA is not a program in sense of containing conditionals and branching instructions."

DNA has start commands, instructions for creating amino acids which in turn are processed into proteins, data, wholly contained subroutines that we call "genes" that can be moved from one genome to another, and stop commands.

That's a program.

[Southack]

"Without or without self-replication, what does the presence of a machine imply?"

Intelligent Design.

[Southack]

"Why would the Intelligent Designer leave such jack-stupid flaws unfixed?"

Perhaps because a program with such flaws is vastly larger than many operating systems combined. Have you ever noticed how many fatal flaws MS Windows displays?!

One common error in ID debates is that the mere existence of an intelligent design is extrapolated into a "perfect" Designer...even though the evidence appears to show quite the contrary.

[Just mythoughts]

Hey I am trying to follow this fairy tale called evolution that has no beginning and becomes extinct. Doesn't your theory take into account that not all intellect fits into your patterns?