Posted on 08/19/2005 1:02:07 PM PDT by SmithL
NASHVILLE, Tenn. - Echoing similar comments from President Bush, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist said "intelligent design" should be taught in public schools alongside evolution.
Frist, R-Tenn., spoke to a Rotary Club meeting Friday and told reporters afterward that students need to be exposed to different ideas, including intelligent design.
"I think today a pluralistic society should have access to a broad range of fact, of science, including faith," Frist said.
Frist, a doctor who graduated from Harvard Medical School, said exposing children to both evolution and intelligent design "doesn't force any particular theory on anyone. I think in a pluralistic society that is the fairest way to go about education and training people for the future."
The theory of intelligent design says life on earth is too complex to have developed through evolution, implying that a higher power must have had a hand in creation. Nearly all scientists dismiss it as a scientific theory, and critics say it's nothing more than religion masquerading as science.
Bush recently told a group of Texas reporters that intelligent design and evolution should both be taught in schools "so people can understand what the debate is about."
That comment sparked criticism from opponents, including Democratic Party Chairman Howard Dean, who called Bush "anti-science."
Frist, who is considering a presidential campaign in 2008, recently angered some conservatives by bucking Bush policy on embryonic stem cell research, voicing his support for expanded research on the subject.
Frist said his decision to endorse stem cell research was "a matter of science," but he said there was no conflict between his position on stem cell research and his position on intelligent design.
"To me, I see no disconnect between that and stem cell research," Frist said. "I base my beliefs on stem cell research both on science and my faith.
I'm sure there are studies that could be sited but I am relying on personal observations.
Wrong
Christians make up 76.5% of the general population but make up 83.8% of the prision population
Meanwhile people with no religion make up 14.1% of the population but make up only 0.21% of the prision population
President Bush
Senatate Majority Leader Bill Frist (as you just read)
David Limbaugh
Anyone still want to say creationism isn't conservative?
As well as the hard core Conservative Ted Kennedy
Oh wait...
Evolution is basically a religion. Nobody defends any sort of a science theory the way evolution is defended, i.e. at all costs, to the last man, and the truth be damned.
Good luck with Evolution on those.
What cannot be proven should not be taught as fact.
If you zealots could even begin to understand that your faith is not provable because it cannot be observed, then we could start an intelligent dialogue with you on this matter.
Get rid of your faith in evolution, and teach science in science class.......both the evolutionary theory and the ID theory...........that's all that's being asked.
You've hit on something important here.
The zealotry, anger and condescension with which evolution is defended is telling.
There is fear in an opposing theory, because there is fear in the admission of the truth that this complex world could not be a product of chance.
If they were truly scientists, they would not have fear of truth. The fear is that the their religion taught as science, and their denial of academic freedom in science class will end.
Is "peer review" valid when your "peers" reject opposing thought out of hand?
No, I'm not wrong. Read the article. Nutty Howie sounds just like FR's evo nuts. The are definitely on the same side.
The FR evo nuts are on the side of the left with great frequency......even to the point of wanting to silence the freedom of speech of Creationists and thwart the will of the people of a community to control the leftist influence in their schools.........yet they routinely deny the clear association.
It's remarkable.
Ah, but this is not the opposing thought.
It is that the complexity of nature cannot be explained by the guesswork of evolution, and the conclusions drawn from those guesses (and, not incidentally, presented as facts). And it is that there is scientific evidence that there is intelligence behind nature.
And the scientific powers that be are thwarting opposing thought. Just like the liberal academic elites are doing in all other fields.
Hi, Patrick. Have you evolved into a decent human being yet? ;)
Taking an interdisciplinary approach in education and curriculum is the way things are thankfully going these days.
In fact there may never be one regardless of how much true scientific evidence is presented for intelligent design.
That's why I asked you about the 'peers.' If there were a comparable political 'peer review' and the 'peers' consisted of all liberals would a competing conservative idea be considered fairly?
That is the question I'm asking. All of you evo zealots preach about peer review as though it is your gospel, and an inerrant one at that. I'm asking how valid it really is, depending on who the 'peers' are, and how capable of independent thought.
That's why there is resistence to it from the left.
Unlike evolution which you must believe is fact but is without factual basis. Your argument is no argument at all considering there is no factual basis for evolution. So until you present FACTS and not THEORIES enough with your rhetoric. By the way, peer review does not establish facts.
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