Posted on 12/31/2005 12:41:23 PM PST by streetpreacher
| Darwin's Pyrrhic victory Posted: December 28, 2005
By Patrick J. Buchanan © 2005 Creators Syndicate Inc.
"Intelligent Design Derailed," exulted the headline. "By now, the Christian conservatives who once dominated the school board in Dover, Pa., ought to rue their recklessness in forcing biology classes to hear about 'intelligent design' as an alternative to the theory of evolution," declared the New York Times, which added its own caning to the Christians who dared challenge the revealed truths of Darwinian scripture. Noting that U.S. District Judge John E. Jones III is a Bush appointee, the Washington Post called his decision "a scathing opinion that criticized local school board members for lying under oath and for their 'breathtaking inanity' in trying to inject religion into science classes." But is it really game, set, match, Darwin? Have these fellows forgotten that John Scopes, the teacher in that 1925 "Monkey Trial," lost in court, and was convicted of violating Tennessee law against the teaching of evolution and fined $100? Yet Darwin went on to conquer public education, and American Civil Liberties Union atheists went on to purge Christianity and the Bible from our public schools.
The Dover defeat notwithstanding, the pendulum is clearly swinging back. Darwinism is on the defensive. For, as Tom Bethell, author of "The Politically Incorrect Guide to Science," reminds us, there is no better way to make kids curious about "intelligent design" than to have some Neanderthal forbid its being mentioned in biology class. In ideological politics, winning by losing is textbook stuff. The Goldwater defeat of 1964, which a triumphant left said would bury the right forever, turned out to be liberalism's last hurrah. Like Marxism and Freudianism, Darwinism appears destined for the graveyard of discredited ideas, no matter the breathtaking inanity of the trial judge. In his opinion, Judge Jones the Third declared:
But if intelligent design is creationism or fundamentalism in drag, how does Judge Jones explain how that greatest of ancient thinkers, Aristotle, who died 300 years before Christ, concluded that the physical universe points directly to an unmoved First Mover? As Aristotle wrote in his "Physics": "Since everything that is in motion must be moved by something, let us suppose there is a thing in motion which was moved by something else in motion, and that by something else, and so on. But this series cannot go on to infinity, so there must be some First Mover." A man of science and reason, Aristotle used his observations of the physical universe to reach conclusions about how it came about. Where is the evidence he channeled the Torah and creation story of Genesis before positing his theory about a prime mover? Darwinism is in trouble today for the reason creationism was in trouble 80 years ago. It makes claims that are beyond the capacity of science to prove. Darwinism claims, for example, that matter evolved from non-matter – i.e., something from nothing – that life evolved from non-life; that, through natural selection, rudimentary forms evolved into more complex forms; and that men are descended from animals or apes. Now, all of this is unproven theory. And as the Darwinists have never been able to create matter out of non-matter or life out of non-life, or extract from the fossil record the "missing links" between species, what they are asking is that we accept it all on faith. And the response they are getting in the classroom and public forum is: "Prove it," and, "Where is your evidence?" And while Darwinism suggests our physical universe and its operations happened by chance and accident, intelligent design seems to comport more with what men can observe and reason to.
If, for example, we are all atop the Grand Canyon being told by a tour guide that nature, in the form of a surging river over eons of time, carved out the canyon, we might all nod in agreement. But if we ask how "Kilroy was here!" got painted on the opposite wall of the canyon, and the tour guide says the river did it, we would all howl. A retreating glacier may have created the mountain, but the glacier didn't build the cabin on top of it. Reason tells us the cabin came about through intelligent design. Darwinism is headed for the compost pile of discarded ideas because it cannot back up its claims. It must be taken on faith. It contains dogmas men may believe, but cannot stand the burden of proof, the acid of attack or the demands of science. Where science says, "No miracles allowed," Darwinism asks us to believe in miracles.
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Ping!
Darwinism has nothing to say about the Prime Mover. Aristotle was wrong about a lot of things, like every great scientist is/has been - that's what so cool about science in comparison to theology.
Randomness is not random, it's just inexplicable. The Bible says very little about probability theory.
To ponder: What is the difference between order, design, intelligent design, and creation?
Neils Bohr, "Every sentence I utter is but a question.".
You don't bathe because you might be killing the next evolution of bacteria ... but you don't kick little kittens because they need to grow up and evolve, too.
"The Old Testament was around before Aristotle."
Could he have read it?
Why is he such an authority?
I must be an idiot to keep posting that to you when I know you've been posting the same idiocies for years and years on these threads and not paying the slightest attention.
"Now, all of this is unproven theory"
Ahhh, it always raises a chuckle. Now then children, lets make a list of 'proven theories' shall we?
Really it's not worth the effort of ridiculing these people when they make themselves look so foolish all by themselves.
I suppose if you keep restating that mutations are mostly lethal it will, by magic, become true, at least in your mind.
While still enjoying the privilege of paying for those public schools, of course. After all, we can't be offending that 5%.
Lots of people understood evolution before Darwin published his doorstop of a book. The debate was well underway even by 1800 when Rev Paley fully anthropomorphized the universe.
later read.
Of course, in an ideal world, education would be totally privatized, with some "welfare schools" set up for the poor.
Public schools are welfare for the middle classes. It is time to abolish them for good.
Judge Jones seems to think intelligent design is a distinctly "Christian" notion. Aristotle predates Christ, yet reasonably assumed a First Mover to be causal of all observable phenomena.
"If you take the Biblical version of creation literally, the universe was created a long time before Christ got on the scene as well. What point is the author trying to make by pointing out that Aristotle was around before Christ?"
I realize that every person takes what they choose and calls it a literal Biblical account. Literally speaking from what is scriptural Christ was "God" in flesh appointed for a specific purpose and time.
A literal account of Genesis does not date this earth or the heavens, at best and most it is possible to date fairly close to when this flesh age began. Peter tells us there are three different heaven and earth ages and which age we in the flesh are now in.
Further Christ was in Genesis, referenced as the "tree of life".
Archival ping
Yes they do. So now since someone has to lose out as long as government-funded schools are maintained, let's compare the amount they pay to the amount the other 95% pay...
What does that have to do with anything?
His point is that Intelligent Design is something that can be seen by man without the revelation of the Bible--preventing it from being something taught by Christianity alone. Incidentally, this itself is a Christian teaching:
"For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse." Romans 1:20
"Darwinists", whatever that is, may be secularists. But scientists who study evolution are not. In this country, most are Christians.
Why should a public school, open to ALL, be implicitly atheistic in its approach to science? Because it's "convenient?"
Here is the text of Judge Jones decision.
It is a worthwhile read, (all 139 pages) and it does make some sense to read it before commenting on the subject.
http://www.sciohost.org/ncse/kvd/kitzmiller_decision_20051220.pdf
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