When Real Judicial Conservatives Attack [Dover ID opinion]

The UCSD Guardian ^ | 09 January 2005 | Hanna Camp

[PatrickHenry]

If there’s anything to be learned from the intelligent design debate, it’s that branding “activist judges” is the hobby of bitter losers.

For those who care about the fight over evolution in biology classrooms, Christmas came five days early when the Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District ruling was handed down. In his decision, Judge John E. Jones III ruled that not only is the theory of intelligent design religion poorly dressed in science language, teaching it in class is an outright violation of the First Amendment.

The ruling was a concise and devastating demonstration of how law, precedent and evidence can come together to drive complete nonsense out of the courtroom. But if the aftermath of the event proves anything, it proves that nine times out of 10, if someone accuses a judge of being an “activist,” it is because he disagrees with the ruling and wants to make it clear to like-minded followers that they only lost because the liberals are keeping them down. Gratuitous overuse has, in just a few short years, turned the phrase “judicial activism” from a description of an actual problem in the legal system into a catch-all keyword for any ruling that social conservatives dislike.

During the months between the initial suit and the final decision, a high-powered law firm from Chicago volunteered some of its best to represent the plaintiffs pro bono, defenders of evolution and intelligent design mobilized, and few people really cared other than court watchers, biology nerds and a suspicious number of creationist groups. The trial went well for the plaintiffs: Their witnesses and evidence were presented expertly and professionally, and it never hurts when at least two of the witnesses for the defense are caught perjuring themselves in their depositions. Advocates for teaching actual science in school science classes were fairly confident that Jones was going to rule in their favor.

When it came, the ruling was significant enough to earn a slightly wider audience than the aforementioned court watchers, biology nerds and creationists. What drew interest from newcomers was not the minutiae of the trial, but the scope of Jones’ ruling and the scorn for the Dover School Board’s actions that practically radiated off the pages. He ruled both that intelligent design was a religious idea, and that teaching it in a science class was an unconstitutional establishment of religion by the state. He didn’t stop there, however.

“It is ironic,” he wrote, “that several of these individuals, who so staunchly and proudly touted their religious convictions in public, would time and again lie to cover their tracks and disguise the real purpose behind the intelligent design policy.”

Such harsh language might provoke some sympathy for intelligent design advocates, if they hadn’t immediately demonstrated how much they deserved it by responding — not with scientific arguments for intelligent design or legal precedent to contradict Jones’ ruling — but with ridiculous name-calling. The Discovery Institute, the leading center of ID advocacy, referred to Jones as “an activist judge with delusions of grandeur.” Bill O’Reilly also brought out the “A” word on his show. Richard Land, spokesman for the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission and noted drama queen, declared him the poster child for “a half-century secularist reign of terror.” The American Family Association, having apparently read a different ruling than the rest of America, insisted that judges were so eager to keep God out of schools that they would throw out even scientific evidence for Him. Funny how so many creationist groups seemed to have missed the memo that intelligent design isn’t supposed to be about God at all.

It was depressingly predictable that the intelligent design crowd would saturate the Internet with cries of judicial activism regardless of the actual legal soundness of the ruling. In only a few years, intellectually lazy political leaders have morphed an honest problem in the judiciary that deserves serious debate into shorthand for social conservatism’s flavor of the week. The phrase has been spread around so much and applied to so many people that it only has meaning within the context of someone’s rant. It is the politico-speak equivalent of “dude.”

Only when one learns that Jones was appointed by George W. Bush and had conservative backers that included the likes of Tom Ridge and Rick Santorum can one appreciate how indiscriminately the term is thrown around. Jones is demonstrably a judicial conservative. In fact, he’s the kind of strict constructionist that social conservatives claim to want on the bench. Their mistake is in assuming that the law and their ideology must necessarily be the same thing.

In the end, no one could defend Jones better than he did himself. He saw the breathless accusations of judicial activism coming a mile away, and refuted them within the text of the ruling. In his conclusion he wrote:

“Those who disagree with our holding will likely mark it as the product of an activist judge. If so, they will have erred as this is manifestly not an activist Court. Rather, this case came to us as the result of the activism of an ill-informed faction on a school board, aided by a national public interest law firm eager to find a constitutional test case on intelligent design, who in combination drove the Board to adopt an imprudent and ultimately unconstitutional policy. The breathtaking inanity of the Board’s decision is evident when considered against the factual backdrop, which has now been fully revealed through this trial. The students, parents, and teachers of the Dover Area School District deserved better than to be dragged into this legal maelstrom, with its resulting utter waste of monetary and personal resources.”

Jones knew his name would be dragged through the mud and issued the correct ruling anyway. One can only hope that the utter childishness of the intelligent design response will alienate even more sensible people, and that the phrase “judicial activism” will from now on be used only by those who know what they’re talking about. No bets on the latter.

[RussP]

The fact that some people consider creationism and ID to be equivalent does not mean that they *are* equivalent, regardless of whether those people are evolutionists or creationists.

I assume that a creationist believes in the Biblical account of creation. But I also assume that Hindus, Buddhists, and Muslims believe in intelligent design without believing in the Bible. And some scientists came to believe in ID through science rather than the Bible. Yes, it's true. As a matter of fact, I myself believed years ago that evolution was essentially proven, but Michael Denton's book woke me up. And as far as I know Denton is an agnostic.

[Right Wing Professor]

After debating with evolutionists, you quickly realize that they have no interest whatsoever in the ratio of harmful to beneficial mutations or the "sharpness" of the natural selection "filter." In fact, they consistently demonstrate that they don't even understand the problem. They are clueless about the mathematics involved.

This from someone who thinks that you can infer something about point mutations in a living system from single bit errors in Linux!

Humans are an unusually genetically homogeneous species. Nonetheless, there are single nucleotide polymorphisms every 100 - 300 bases along a 3 billion base genome. So what would happen if you applied this mutation rate to the Linux kernel?

[Coyoteman]

Evolutionists have much more in common with dogmatic creationists than they do with intelligent design advocates.

Except those studying the theory of evolution generally have facts and well-reasoned theory to back up their position.

Intelligent design is creation lite.

Creationism is an honest religious belief (which I believe is wrong).

ID, as promulgated in the wedge document was an outright deception from start to finish.

[Right Wing Professor]

The fact that some people consider creationism and ID to be equivalent does not mean that they *are* equivalent, regardless of whether those people are evolutionists or creationists.

No doubt. Now why not address the point that a textbook on one can become a textbook on the other by simply replacing one word by the other word?

But I also assume that Hindus, Buddhists, and Muslims believe in intelligent design without believing in the Bible.

Certainly not Buddhism, which doesn't even subscribe to a personal deity.

[Buggman]

When you find life without DNA, we'll discuss the feasibility of such life coming into existence by accident; until then, you're grasping at straws with the desperation of a religionist whose pet creation myth is under scientific attack.

The most telling argument against evolutionary abiogenesis is how many of your fellows are trying to distance evolution from abiogenesis.

[Ichneumon]

Dogs have 78 chromosomes, far more than humans and more than any other diploid organism. The massive increase in information in the dog genome is due to the mechanism of selection, artificially accelerated by man**. Without the selection by man, the differences between the genomes of cats and dogs would be far less.

Well... Not really.

Domestic dogs do have 78 chromosomes, but then so do other canids, including the coyote and the timer wolf. And since neither one of those are domesticated, their 78 chromosomes are not the result of artificial selection by man. Clearly, domestic dogs just inherited the pre-existing wild canid chromosome number.

And while 78 chromosomes is pretty high, it's not the largest. Tarsius syrichta (a tarsier, a kind of small primate) has 80 chromosomes, Ichthyomys pittieri (a Venezuelan semiaquatic rodent) has 92, and Tympanoctomys barrerae (the red viscacha rat) has 102.

And that's just the mammals. Lampreys (a primitive fish) have up to 178 chromosomes, depending on species. Sharks have anywhere from 70-ish to 104 (again depending on species), etc.

But don't mistake number of chromosomes for total genome size. Dogs have 78 chromosomes, compared to 46 in humans, but their total genome size is actually a bit *smaller* than the human genome. Remember that chromosomes can come in various sizes. Mammalian genomes are roughly the same size, compared to the range found in other classes:

Mammal species which have more chromosomes usually do it by having each chromosome smaller, on average. The DNA sequences are just "repackaged" in differently sized "chunks" in different species.

[dread78645]

Well if that isn't proof we didn't come from apes I don't know what is.

I'm convinced.

[RussP]

"Humans are an unusually genetically homogeneous species. Nonetheless, there are single nucleotide polymorphisms every 100 - 300 bases along a 3 billion base genome. So what would happen if you applied this mutation rate to the Linux kernel?"

I'm sorry, but getting a point across to you is extremely difficult. The point was not that Linux can withstand a higher or lower mutation rate than human genes. The point was that, if a defect or mutation occurs at random, the chances of a harmful effect are much greater than the chances of a beneficial effect (and neutral effects are essentially irrelevant by definition).

Let me ask you the question that I have never had answered by an evolutionist. What is the approximate ratio of harmful to beneficial mutations in nature? I will be impressed by either a general estimate or a specific estimate for any species at any time, anywhere. Just give me a frickin' ballpark number, and tell me where it is documented. Is it closer to 10:1, 1000:1, or 1,000,000:1? Thanks.

[Ichneumon]

Another thing you could have mentioned is that the Federal government routinely subsidized the construction of churches for something like the first 150 years of the republic.

Citation?

The notion that even mentioning the possibility of ID in science class somehow constitutes the establishment of religion is preposterous.

That's why no one has actually made such a claim. Please do not misrepresent the Dover decision.

That such a notion is even taken seriously is cause for alarm.

What's actually cause for alarm is your misrepresentation of the actual situation.

Also, I really love the implication that this judge must be right because he anticipated the charge of judicial activism!

No one has said *that* either. You're pretty fond of Straw Man arguments, aren't you?

Gosh, I can anticipate all the bogus arguments of the evolutionists, so I must be right too.

Unlikely.

[Ichneumon]

The Darwinists never stop pasting in their boilerplate until they've beaten all signs of anyone wanting to argue with them into the ground.

Gee, we're sorry that we counter the lies and errors of anti-evolution creationists so thoroughly, by posting volumes of facts and research, that no one can think of any further rebuttals. We're *so* cruel...

[RussP]

"No doubt. Now why not address the point that a textbook on one can become a textbook on the other by simply replacing one word by the other word?"

I did already, but you missed it (as usual). The authors apparently consider ID to be equivalent to creationism. If they do, they are simply wrong. Is that clear enough now?

"Certainly not Buddhism, which doesn't even subscribe to a personal deity."

ID does not require a personal diety. That's creationism you're thinking about. You're still confused.

[connectthedots]

Another perfect analogy is that the English language descended from the ancestral language of Latin.

Comparing the development of languages to macro-evolution is so illogical and irrational on its face, that one need not comment on it.

If there was evidence of macro evolution, you would not need an analogy. Your use of this 'analogy' is a pretty bad attempt to distract the casual reader from the real problems of evolution. It's a very weak effort.

[Ichneumon]

Good post!

[RussP]

Your dogma/sentence ratio is utterly astounding.

[dread78645]

Well, see, the OT is the rule of law. After Jesus came, he did away with the OT law.

"Fundamentalism is the triumph of Paul over Christ."

[Ichneumon]

["It's also one of the dumbest. The entire purpose behind the construct of ID was to somehow slip creationism past the First Amendment radar detectors of the federal courts, while at the same time it would be enthusiastically supported by creationists' buying the books and tapes."]

The evolutionists who sell this crap

It's not crap, son. Read the transcripts of the testimony in the Dover trial. Get back to us when you're up to speed on this subject. At the very least, read the decision itself, which you very clearly have not, because you made a comment in a subsequent post which reveals complete ignorance of an event spelled out and documented in that decision.

are the very same ones who cry foul if you point out that evolution has been identified by Marx as the scientific foundation of communism.

Sure, because that's a completely bogus comparison, AND completely false.

Clue #1 for the clueless: Marx published his Communist Manifesto years before Darwin published anything on evolution. Clearly, the "foundations" of communism, "scientific" or otherwise, had nothing to do with evolution - unless you want to be a lunatic and claim that Marx had a time machine.

Clue #2 for the clueless: Even if Marx *had* been inspired by evolution, that *still* would not be a valid analogy for the roots and motivations of the "ID movement". Evolution was not *originated* as a Trojan horse for communism. ID *was* originated as a Trojan horse for creationism. Nor is evolution at fault if some idiot misapplies it, as would be the case for anyone trying to use it as the basis of communism (for that matter, Darwinism is far better modeled by laissez faire capitalism). ID, on the other hand, was originated for the *purpose* of smuggling creationism into classrooms and other venues.

Again, read the trial testimony before you waste more of our time -- and yours -- with your uninformed opinions on this topic.

[Ichneumon]

I agree completely. And like you, I sometimes dream about reaching these folks through reason, but its a tough nut to crack.

It's not tough if you actually *use* reason, and not multiple fallacies and misrepresentations and errors. Feel free to improve your presentation.

By the way, did you read my article called The Myth of the Blind Watchmaker at http://RussP.us/Dawkins.htm ?

Yes, but I stopped after the tenth error. It's not as pathetic as the average anti-evolution screed, but it doesn't even rise to the level of a competent effort.

If it were presented in a college-level biology class, it would earn no higher than a C-, at best.

[Binghamton_native]

So are we beginning on these threads to concede that the 1st amendment by itself is not enough for all the cases where the issue is separation of church and state?

[Binghamton_native]

It seems unlikely that the content of the post Civil War amendments (such as the 14th) approach the elegance of the base Constitution (and the Bill of Rights). This might be part of the reason why we continue to have such contention in cases where these amendments are brought to bear.

[Binghamton_native]

"Fundamentalism is the triumph of Paul over Christ."


Where did that come from?