Posted on 10/06/2005 5:04:43 AM PDT by gobucks
University of Idaho President Tim White has entered the debate pitting Charles Darwin's theories of life against religious-based alternatives by forbidding anything other than evolution from being taught in the Moscow school's life, earth and physical science classes.
White's edict came as a U of I biologist, Scott Minnich, a supporter of the "intelligent design" theory, was set to testify in a Pennsylvania lawsuit brought by eight families trying to have this theory, branded as a new form of creationism, dropped from a school district's biology curriculum. Minnich was asked to testify on behalf of the district.
Hours after White's letter reached students, staff and faculty on Tuesday, the Discovery Institute, a Seattle public policy group that funds research into intelligent design, blasted the order as an unconstitutional assault on academic freedom and free speech.
White said in his letter that teachings of views that differ from evolution may occur in religion, philosophy or similar courses.
Intelligent design is the belief that Darwin's mechanism of natural selection inadequately explains the origins of different life forms. It argues that natural selection fails to fully explain how extremely varied and complex life forms emerged during the past 600 million years. It concludes that guidance from some external intelligence that many interpret as God must be involved.
With Idaho now in the debate, disputes over evolution are unfolding in at least 19 states. In August, President Bush weighed in, saying he thought people should be taught about different ideas — including intelligent design.
Officials at the National Center for Science Education say White is likely the first U.S. university president to come out with an official position. The center advocates against incorporating theories such as intelligent design into science curricula on grounds they introduce religion into the subject matter.
"Departments have issued statements, and scientific groups have issued statements," said Glenn Branch, the Oakland, Calif.-based center's deputy director. "But I can't think of a university president who's issued a statement like this."
White wrote that national media attention on the issue prompted the letter.
"This (evolution) is the only curriculum that is appropriate to be taught in our biophysical sciences," he wrote. "Teaching of views that differ from evolution may occur in faculty-approved curricula in religion, sociology, philosophy, political science or similar courses. However, teaching of such views is inappropriate in our life, earth, and physical science courses."
Harold Gibson, a school spokesman, said the views of Minnich, a tenured professor in the school's College of Agriculture, didn't prompt the letter.
Rather, White was staking out a position on an issue that's emerged as a successor to "creationism" after that Biblical explanation was barred from the nation's schoolhouses in 1987 by the U.S. Supreme Court.
Minnich didn't return Associated Press calls for comment.
But members of the Discovery Institute — founded in 1990 by Bruce Chapman, a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Organizations in Vienna under President Reagan — lambasted White's edict as an intrusion into the academic freedom of Idaho professors.
John West, the associate director of the institute's Center for Science and Culture, said White's move restricting science curricula to discussions of evolution broadly restricts teaching anything that contradicts Darwin's ideas on the role of mutation and natural selection in the development of life — even by scientists not advocating intelligent design.
In addition, limiting classes where evolution alternatives can be discussed violates free speech protections, he said.
"He (White) is saying, 'If you're a teacher in philosophy, we may allow you to do this. But in science, it just doesn't cut it,' West said. "In any other area, this would be preposterous."
White's letter came just a week before Eugenie C. Scott, an activist who's fought to segregate creationism and intelligent design from science classes, is due to speak at the University of Idaho on Oct. 12.
Scott said the school's science faculty, who invited her, haven't explicitly mentioned Minnich as motivation for bringing her for a lecture titled "Why Scientists Reject Intelligent Design."
Still, "the elephant in the living room is: there is a proponent of intelligent design on the faculty of the University of Idaho," said Scott, executive director of the National Center for Science Education. "Biologists across the country have examined intelligent design as a scientific model, and found it seriously lacking."
And you base that on what? Are you saying that believers have never tried to commit genocide?
You are wrong on that point. Science relies exclusively on naturalistic phenomenon. To go outside those bounds, means you are leaving science behind. It is definitely not circular. ID is the circular arguement where the question of design gets pushed back because ID fails to account for the origin of the necessary complexity of the designer. Who designed the designer of the designer?All historical theories depend on making inferences based on indirect observations in an attempt to reconstruct past conditions or causes from present facts.
If you take a look at modern science, there is very little that is directly observed. Even in the hard sciences, data are indirectly inferred from instrument measurements. Theories based on historical sciences are tested by further observation which is equally valid, scientifically, to replicate instrument measurements on a single sample.
The fundamental probel with ID is that it does not offer a test that can falsify it. There is a flaw in your example of a homicide investigation. Tests are done to determine cause of death and the mechanism of death. A murderer leaves physical evidence. In ID, there is no evidence of intelligent intervention. It is possible to philosophically say that ID 'shadows' evolution, but there is no evidence of direct physical interaction of a designer. The other problem is that you say either hypothesis my be true. Evolution is not an hypothesis. Evolution is built upon millions of observed facts and is the model that explains these facts. ID is not even an hypothesis because it contains no testable postulations.
"This (evolution) is the only curriculum that is appropriate to be taught in our biophysical sciences," he wrote. "Teaching of views that differ from evolution may occur in faculty-approved curricula in religion, sociology, philosophy, political science or similar courses. However, teaching of such views is inappropriate in our life, earth, and physical science courses."
If he somehow thought this would stem the increasing openess of many towards a view not in keeping with the current scientific paradigm of totally materialistic evolutionary thought, he has made a strategic mistake. It would have been wiser to remain silent. He just threw down a big gauntlet. I will be curious to see how this plays out politically.
"He just threw down a big gauntlet."
I have to agree. Why increase the intensity of the light on the subject, if the subject is so utterly dismissable?
I don't know who you're trying to fool with you Orwellian doublespeak but everyone knows it's the creationists who are the radical left-wingers railing on Darwin's Influence on Ruthless Laissez Faire Capitalism.
I regard theoretical physics as theoretical and not empirical and, as such, not solidly within the realm of science. That theoretical physics has had difficulty in establishing a solid foundation for itself as a scientific endeavor is not surprising. Although based upon previous empirical observations, theoretical physics is what it says it is...theoretical and established by little more than fiat.
Troll alert....
No it's not. The notion that science can accurately describe what and why the most complex of events happened millions of years ago is a joke. Of course, everyone in the field treats it so deadly seriously - it's how they make their living. Others have different ideological axes to grind. This parade of egos is a prime example of why the public distrusts academics.
"The notion that science can accurately describe what and why the most complex of events happened millions of years ago is a joke."
I see you have run out of arguments. Your non-answer has been noted.
A funny response from someone who has admitted that science is always wrong.
Better to be always a little bit wrong than right twice a day.
"A funny response from someone who has admitted that science is always wrong."
That's a lie. I never said that. Why do you feel it necessary to lie? Does that make God happy with you?
As I said, I see you have run out of arguments.
You are asserting that to be scientific a theory must be naturalistic. Why must a theory be naturalistic to be scientific? To answer that such theories are not scientific because they are not naturalistic simply assumes the very point at issue. What independent metaphysical criteria of methodology disqualifies theories that invoke nonnaturalistic events—such as instances of agency or intelligent design? What non-circular reason can you offer?
The fundamental probel with ID is that it does not offer a test that can falsify it.
If the same standard is applied impartialy to evolutionary theory then it doesn't meet the strict criterion of testability by direct direct verification or repeated observation of cause-effect relationships either. There are a host of Darwinian theoretical postulations of past, unobserved and unobservable events that purport to account for present classes of facts and present biological data. that cannot be directly tested. In either case the "testabilty" lies in the putative explanatory power rather than verification by direct and repeated observation. In the case of a theoretical postulate of ID, the past action of an unobservable agent could have empirical consequences in the present just as an unobservable genealogical connection between organisms does. It is only a hegemony of metaphysical bias cloaked in a lab coat that denies the possibilty that the actions of an unobserved and observable agent (as opposed to an impersonal mechanism) in the past could have left empirical evidence in the present.
A murderer leaves physical evidence.
Exactly my point.
In ID, there is no evidence of intelligent intervention... there is no evidence of direct physical interaction of a designer.
"There is no evidence" is a pretty strong statement. Are you sure about that? I also notice your use of the terms, "intervention", and "interaction". Both of these terms imply assumptions, dare I say, "theological" assumptions, about the nature of or the way a putative designer should have or would have designed that may or may not necessarily be the case. Darwin did the very same thing, but it was very odd for him to support his scientific theory in such a way. I do know this, if you assume there is no designer a priori, you would never find one even if there really was one, and had left a trail of blood and fingerprints all over the place.
Cordially,
"Contrary to their public image, scientists are normal, flawed human beings. They are as capable of prejudice, covetousness, pride, deceitfulness, etc., as anyone." --David Weatherall, "Conduct Unbecoming," American Scientist (vol. 93, January-February 2005), p. 73.
"Evolutionists have 'Physics Envy.' They tell the public that the science behind evolution is the same science that sent people to the moon and cures diseases. It's not.
The science behind evolution is not empirical, but forensic. Because evolution took place in history, its scientific investigations are after the fact—no testing, no observations, no repeatability, no falsification, nothing at all like physics. . . . I think this is what the public discerns—that evolution is just a bunch of just-so stories disguised as legitimate science." --John Chaikowsky, "Geology v. Physics," Geotimes (vol. 50, April 2005), p. 6
Yes, if you ignore everything we know about the biology of the eye, biochemistry, DNA, and evolution, someone can come up with an imaginary story about how an eye might have developed from an eyespot.
But if you look at the mathematics behind causing even one gene to change, you see that the idea that a whole eye could evolve into an eyespot undirectedly is absurd.
Berlinski commented on the original paper that this page is based on here and here. Unfortunately, I could not find the original paper itself on the web.
Darwinism: substituting imagination for experiment.
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