INTELLIGENT DESIGN: Teaching children the truth [Cal Thomas gets it]

Miami Herald ^ | 28 December 2005 | CAL THOMAS

[Texas Eagle]

The secular left, which resists censorship in all its forms when it comes to sex, library books and assigned materials that teach the ''evils'' of capitalism and ''evil America,'' is happy to censor any belief that can be tagged ``religious.''

Amen. He gets it all right.

[furball4paws]

Not only that. The case for the School Board is so weak that an appeal could well kill any future for ID. I think the appeal will come on some other, stronger case, but it will ultimately fail, too.

[Condorman]

A theory is a theory until proven. I didn't say when it would be proven, if it would be proven or if it could be proven. It would then become a Law, right ?

Can you name a scientific law that was once an unproven scientific theory?

[bvw]

Please go back and start at 194 if not earlier. You've made an erroneous assumption as to who is asking what. To correct that -- it is CarolinaGuitarman who asserts that it is the environment in entirety which performs the "natural selection" process. He does so in responce to my question as to what exactly are the selectors of "natural selection".

For the record my beliefs are immaterial to this line of intellectual inquiry, yet further I try to avoid having "beliefs", period.

I'll try the question again, slightly variant:

Assuming that the slectors of "natural selection" are the enviroment, what then, specifically, are those selectors, and if the selectors are "the enviroment in its entirety", how is that in any way meaningful, or testable, or different than pure arbitrariness/randomness?

[Quark2005]

There's an alarming increase from the drug and low class culture who are using homeschooling as an excuse to avoid the hassle of sending their children to school.

Very true. I've seen this happen a few times. In many cases I've even seen such parents wrest money & resources & paid instructors from the local school system under the premise that their child is 'learning disabled' and thus can't behave in a public school setting. Another case of government policy rewarding bad behavior (the well-meaning but disastrously implicated Americans with Disabilities Act, in this case).

I suspect that this trend will gradually drag the average performance of homeschooled kids down to par with the norm (if it hasn't already).

[jwalsh07]

Cal is both right and wrong. Unquestionably the best thing for education in America would be vouchers. Competition works.

But he is wrong for ceding all that ground to the secualrists, he is wrong about Dover going to Scotus and he is wrong about his predicted outcome.

When Judge Jones held that a disclaimer advising students of their right to free exercise was unconstitutional because it "stifled creative thinking", he went over the top. A pity Cal didn't read that part of the opinion.

[cinives]

next: Archaeoraptor liaoningensis

or: Beringer's Autographed Stones

your turn

[Quark2005]

... (the well-meaning but disastrously implicated Americans with Disabilities Act, in this case).

implicated ---> implemented (oops)

[js1138]

I have an actual Masters degree in Special Education, so you could argue that I have a bias in favor of existing institutions.

But I don't. Most kids get a few minutes a day of individual attention in school. Anything that isn't individual attention could be replaced by books, filmed lectures, interactive computer programs and the like.

A kid who gets an hour a day of instruction from a parent is getting more than a kid at school. I also suspect that home schooling parents are brighter than most parents, probably brighter than the average teacher. To the extent that genetics figures in, the kids are probably brighter also.

On the downside, I have seen kids raised to reject mainstream science and culture. I wouldn't want my kids to be this isolated.

[Quark2005]

Clearly home schooling is a mixed bag, since there are many different reasons for doing it and many different people with disparate backgrounds doing it.

In the end, in any environment I guess it always comes down to the quality of the teacher(s) and the latitude they are allowed by the "management".

[js1138]

What did they say were their true intentions?

The discrepancy is between what they said in court and what they said at board meetings. There were also blatant contradictions between what they said in pretrial depositions and what they said in court.

[cvq3842]

Right!

[js1138]

Okay then, what is the environment selecting for?

Evolution is about differential reproductive success. One of the failures of the ID movement is to account for the fact that you can't know very far in advance what traits will be successful. Design, as usually interpreted, is static. You design something for a static environment. But living things exist in a constantly changing environment.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"Assuming that the slectors of "natural selection" are the enviroment, what then, specifically, are those selectors, and if the selectors are "the enviroment in its entirety", how is that in any way meaningful, or testable, or different than pure arbitrariness/randomness?"

Things like the temperature, climate, amount of food, geography, other members of the same species, other members of other species, and so on. These are constraints on what organisms will survive to reproduce. There are far far more individuals born to most species than could possibly survive. Those that do have some kind of advantage over those that don't. Much of the variation we see is heritable.

It's a stochastic process (natural selection), but it is far from random. Random would mean that every individual has the same chance of survival as any other. This is preposterous.

[Matchett-PI]

Linked from: http://www.mrdawntreader.com/the_dawn_treader/2005/12/so_they_went_an.html

Dover Ruling December 2005

"....Judge Jones sided with the Discovery Institute and ruled against the Dover school board policy. No promotion of biological design in public school science classrooms.

A better approach, in my opinion, is to allow biological design to flourish as a metascience as Dr. Robin Collins suggests here. As a metascience, biological design will receive the time and support it needs to mature and flourish.

Scientists make wonderful pragmatists and lousy philosophers. Philosophical arguments about science will not convince them to switch away from their current research paradigms. In order to gain traction and acceptance, design based research programs need to produce more discoveries, more break throughs and more cures. Research grants will follow, and so will more scientists.

One interesting area to keep a close eye on is the oxymoronic research area known as directed evolution. It may prove to be an interesting testing ground of paradigms (design -vs- chance). I hope to post more on this interesting subject as I learn more about it.

A second area where I think design based programs may yield superior results is in forensic biology. Just a hunch.

Once biological design gains traction in the scientific community, and I have every reason to expect it will, then you will see a more interesting trial than the one we witnessed in Dover.

Update: Some legal and philosophical analysis of the case from an expert over at Through A Glass Darkly.


12/20/2005 http://www.mrdawntreader.com/the_dawn_treader/2005/12/dover_ruling_is.html

[applpie]

THEN WHY SHOULD CHRISTIAN PARENTS HAVE TO PAY FOR AN EDUCATION THEY CANT TAKE ADVANTAGE OF BECAUSE OF ITS HOSTILE, POOR PERFORMING, AMORAL CHARACTER?

of course that will never be an option.

CAL THOMAS....go ahead, strip out all aspects of christian influence on this nation (which is exactly what prompted the founders to create such a good model of government) because it no longer seem relevant to you (because of your own personal religious beliefs) and see what is left at the end. I would imagine a leftist, amoral, godless state.....ruled by amoral elites who steal all the cream and leave only the shell for the citizen -- hey, sounds like alot of countries we already know....and everyone is flocking to get away from them to America.

Jesus said, If you are ashamed of me before men, I will be ashamed of you before the Father in heaven.

[caffe]

Cal has been running away from "christians" for a long time. He is simply another elitist and obviously does'nt understand the lack of scientific foundation for evolution. He is not qualified to comment on the subject other than to start "I am not a scientist, but, in my opinion, even though I really don't know what i'm talking about, and even if I did want various understandings of evolutionary thought atleast open for discussion, I would not be invited to all the Washington parties. So even if I did believe that all these cosmologists are full of it,I still must go on the record and state that although I still believe in freedom of speech and thus evolutionists may teach anything they want but I.D. Any alternate theory will lead to the destruction of children's minds and ultimately the end of all science. We will not be equipped to deal with global warming or any other pop science theory that becomes universally acceptable with all of us smart people. Now i've spoken and you know I am the smartest man in town. Please don't confuse us anymore with facts. I must go and spray my hair now."

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"CAL THOMAS....go ahead, strip out all aspects of christian influence on this nation...."

You're not very familiar with Thomas are you?

[Quark2005]

I have an actual Masters degree in Special Education, so you could argue that I have a bias in favor of existing institutions.

I spent a few years as a science teacher working closely with special education teachers. Existing conditions in schools are terrible, I agree - most of the problems stem from lack of individual accountability and an absence of an atmosphere of discipline.

It's all a mixed bag - I think; on one hand, kids need to get individual attention; on the other, they need to get used to the fact that eventually they're going to have to function without it. I think a good classroom with 20-25 kids in a school with with quality teachers who both know their subject(s) and can maintain interest & and an administration that backs them up is the best option; (unfortunately, this isn't always available, in which case homeschooling can be the only sane alternative).

[cinives]

I completely agree with you, and in fact it's what I meant by an "open mind". Except then maybe you could explain how a liberal can be a true scientist ? ;)

However, I disagree with you on one point. While I am not a professional paleontologist or biologist, and therefore may use terms in such a way as to confuse the professionals, I question the definition of "transitional" used in this context - perhaps you can help me out here. I've seen some definitions of "transitional" to mean "a fossil sequence through history that shows one older form tranforming or morphing into a newer and different form".

A variation is not what I consider a "transition". One species does not become another species because it changes color, develops one more toe, or the like. The fossil record, as far as I am aware, does not prove descent. It cannot prove, to the best of my knowledge, whether one fossil is a direct descendent of another. It can suggest that one fossil is older than another, but not whether they are in a direct line. Why did Gould have to resort to "punctuated equilibrium" to explain the lack of fossil evidence for transition at the species level ? Even the horse fossils can at best only describe variations, not macro evolution. And yes, I am aware that some regard transitional fossils to be fossils that show new structures such as lungs appearing at different times. The problem with that as I see it is that there's nothing conclusive to say that this was not a mutation or sudden development, having nothing to do with a continuity in development.

I'm really not trying to rehash an ongoing million-plus-page controversy in this thread. I've read articles describing a lot of points of view coming from both sides and it's very hard to sort out the useful from the wishful thinking.