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.
Or, alternatively, science should be replaced with creation myths.
You know I have wondered that myself. What does it hurt that people believe in ID? I am not offended by people who believe in evolution. That is their right to believe what they want. But evolutions get so upset when ID is even mentioned. They can't have a logical discussion because they think that a belief in ID takes their intellect into question. For ID believers to put ID against their intellect, well, whoa, can't be going there. They always have to have a human answer to situations, as if they are the ones with the only plausible answers. Something gets labeled as "scientific" and to them that is the end of the story. Questioning it otherwise would lead to knowledge from a higher source (scary to them) and to them they are the only source.
In Job 5:7, we read, 'But mankind is born to trouble, as surely as sparks fly upwards.' If gravity is pulling everything down, why do the sparks fly upwards with great surety? This clearly indicates that a conscious intelligence governs all falling.
Sweet.
You can out-argue Marketing majors such as myself all day long, but you will ultimately have to out-argue other PHD Physicists.
Name one.
ping
Here are a few, and there are many more available with a Google search: http://www.icr.org/index.php?module=discover&action=index&page=discover_faculty
"Good point. When has evolution ever conformed to the scientific method?"
Pretty much every single day for the last 150 years or so.
Actually, ID isn't limited to biology; it can apply to any physical science. For example, ID in 1890 would have concluded that since flying is too complex, birds must have been created.
Alternatively, since we haven't yet been able to re-create certain elements such as diamonds, petroleum, gold, etc (without consuming more energy/material than the end result), ID also lends itself to concuding that, well, it's too darn complex, therefore it must have been created.
ID is better than a good household cleanser - it can be used in any number of ways to explain how things exist without gaining any real knowledge.
BWAHAAHHHAHAA! Talk about a fairy tale for adults.
Jeez!
Know where I can get a chicken-lizard egg breakfast taco?
Yes, yes, drugs and abortion, excellent Smithers.....
Dear Professor. God created science.
I asked, figuring you couldn't answer. I was right. And you want to tell me what to teach in science class!
“The intelligensia,” writes Lee Harris in Policy Review, “Has no idea of the consequences that would ensue if Middle America lost its simple faith in God and its equally simple trust in its fellow men. Their plain virtues and homespun beliefs are the bedrock of decency and integrity in our nation and in the world.”
Really? When was that?
Works for me and miles better than what is taught in schools today. The complete absenence of faith in school is baffling when one considers the influence of faith on science, history, literature, law, and even the #1 school subject self-estem / self-centerness.
There are pro-life Libertarians.
"Science must be observable and repeatable. Have fun kiddies."
Evolution can and has made valid predictions about a variety of animals. Repeatability does not mean that the process of evolution has to be reproduced; it means that the theory needs to be able to make repeated independent and correct predictions. Randomly choosing an animal, using your theory to make a prediction about that animal, and then testing that prediction is a scientifically valid experiment. Now you may argue that scientist do not do this in the case of evolution. I don't know. However, even if that were the case, that only reflects badly upon the scientist but does nothing to refute the fact that evolution is a scientific theory it that it can potentially be tested and potentially falsified via scientific experiments as I described above. ID has no such potential because it makes no predictions that can be tested. Moreoever, even basic notions such as "intelligence" are completely undefined and thus make the issue of studying ID on a scientific basis a non-starter. The fact that no ID proponents are asking serious questions about the scientific definition of "intelligence" is a clear indication that their intesest has nothing whatsoever to do with furthering science.
But damn few of them, compared to those I'd have to out-argue if I changed my mind. And probably no more of them, than if I had instead picked up cudgels against astrology.
If you're going to argue from authority, first make sure that the weight of authority is on your side.
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