Posted on 01/10/2006 4:51:17 AM PST by tpeters
Welcome to Science Court
The ruling in the Dover evolution trial shows what the legal and scientific processes have in common--intellectual rigor
Chris Mooney; January 9, 2006
Legally speaking, Judge John E. Jones III's ruling in Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District--Pennsylvania's much-discussed lawsuit over the teaching of "intelligent design"--can only be called conservative. The decision draws upon and reinforces a series of prior court precedents, all of which barred creationist encroachment upon the teaching of science in public schools.
In another sense, though, Jones' ruling is revolutionary. We live in a time when the findings of science themselves increasingly seem to be politically determined--when Democrat "science" is pitted against Republican "science" on issues ranging from evolution to global warming. By contrast, Jones' opinion strikes a blow for the proposition that when it comes to matters of science, there aren't necessarily two sides to every story.
Over the course of a lengthy trial, Jones looked closely at the scientific merits of "intelligent design"--the contention that Darwinian evolution cannot explain the biological complexity of living organisms, and that instead some form of intelligence must have created them. And in the end, the judge found ID utterly vacuous. "[ID] cannot be adjudged a valid, accepted scientific theory," Jones wrote, "as it has failed to publish in peer-reviewed journals, engage in research and testing, and gain acceptance in the scientific community."
ID critics have been making these same observations for years; so have leading American scientific societies. Meanwhile, investigative reporters and scholars studying the ID movement have demonstrated that it is, indeed, simply creationism reincarnated--all religion and no science. On the intellectual merits, ID was dead a long time ago. But before Judge Jones came along, it's astonishing how hard it was to get that acknowledged, unequivocally, in public discussion of the issue.
Up until the Dover trial, well-funded ID proponents based at Seattle's Discovery Institute had waged a successful media campaign to sow public doubts about evolution, and to convince Americans that a true scientific "controversy" existed over Darwin's theory. And thanks in part to the conventions of television news, editorial pages, and political reporting--all of which require that "equal time" be allotted to different views in an ongoing political controversy--they were succeeding.
For example, a national survey conducted this spring by Ohio State University professor Matthew Nisbet in collaboration with the Survey Research Institute at Cornell University found serious public confusion about the scientific basis for “intelligent design.” A slight majority of adult Americans (56.3 percent) agreed that evolution is supported by an overwhelming body of scientific evidence, but a very sizeable proportion (44.2 percent) incorrectly thought the same of ID.
Ritualistically "balanced" news media coverage may not be the sole cause of such confusion, but it’s can hardly have helped. Consider just one of many examples of how journalists, in their quest for "objectivity," have lent undue credibility to ID. The York Dispatch, one of two papers covering the evolution battle in Dover, Pennyslvania, repeatedly summarized the two sides of the "debate" thusly: “Intelligent design theory attributes the origin of life to an intelligent being. It counters the theory of evolution, which says that people evolved from less complex beings.” Here we witness the reductio ad absurdum of journalistic "balance." Despite staggering scientific consensus in favor of evolution--and ample documentation of the religious inspiration behind the "intelligent design" movement--evolution and ID were paired together by the Dispatch as two competing "theories."
Judge Jones took a thoroughly different approach, actually bothering to weigh the merits of competing arguments. He inquired whether an explanation that inherently appeals to the supernatural--as "intelligent design" does--can be scientific, and found that it cannot. He searched for published evidence in scientific journals supporting the contentions of the ID movement--and couldn't find it. And in his final opinion, he was anything but "balanced."
We have seen this pattern before. During the early 1980s, the evolution trial McLean v. Arkansas pitted defenders of evolutionary science against so-called “scientific creationists”--the precursors of today's ID proponents. Today, few take the claims of "scientific creationism,” such as the notion that the earth is only a few thousand years old, very seriously. At the time, however, proponents of “creation science” were treated very seriously by members of the national media covering the trial. According to a later analysis of the coverage by media scholars, reporters generally tried to create a “balance” between the scientific-sounding claims of the “scientific” creationists and the arguments of evolutionary scientists.
But in the McLean decision, judge William Overton did no such thing. Rather, the judge carefully investigated whether "creation science" fit the norms of science at all--and found that it did not. Overton therefore concluded that the attempt by the state of Arkansas to include "creation science" in science classes was a transparent attempt to advance a sectarian religious perspective, as barred by the First Amendment. Now, Judge Jones is following in Overton's footsteps very closely. In his decision, Jones cites the McLean case repeatedly.
If there's an underlying moral to be derived from Judge Jones' decision, then, it may be this. It's very easy to attack well-established science through a propaganda campaign aimed at the media and the public. That's precisely what "intelligent design" proponents have done--and they're hardly alone in this. However, it's much more difficult for a PR attack on established science to survive the scrutiny of a serious, independent judge.
That hardly means that courts are more qualified than scientists to determine the validity of evolutionary theory, or other scientific findings. But in their investigative rigor, their commitment to evidence, and their unhesitating willingness to decide arguments on their merits, courts certainly have much more in common with the scientific process than many of today's major media journalists do. The fact that today Judge Jones has become America's leading arbiter of what counts as science certainly underscores his own intellectual seriousness. But it also exposes the failure of other gatekeepers.
You're right. Atheism is that in which atheists fail to believe.
Are you claiming freedom of thought is the morally-superior position?
Shhhhh!
If you're truly from the South, that should be "Miss Mamzelle"--unless it was just sexism and condescension?
Tangent? This thread is about Mooney--and he was praised by the first poster. He is indeed in the employ of leftists. He is indeed greenlisted to begin a movie with Spurlock (Supersize Me) called "The Republican War on Science"--
"Supersize Me" was an attack on a fast-food business and got funding from Soros and is promoted by trial lawyers. It was presented in schools in front of the children you hold so precious. It is agit-prop. "Republican War on Science" will certainly also be agit prop.
SHOULD "REPUBLICAN WAR ON SCIENCE" then be SHOWN IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS?
What say you, Junior? Will it reach your holy standard on what should be allowed to be seen by our little ones? Do you have an opinion on that? I sure don't want this agitprop in my schools. I'm not given a choice.
I'm just wondering, which side of that war are you on, and the other evos here? And just how republican and conservative are evos here on FR, if they are praising and promoting someone who's about to do a Michael Moore on us, pry away some vital votes, and put us (I'm calling "us" GOP and conservative) out of power in the Senate.
It was an Anglicization of your handle.
As for the "Republican War on Science," the anti-evo types, who want to basically exclude half of science (biology, cosmology, physics, astronomy, paleontology, etc.) because it contradicts their pet beliefs have brought this on us. Are we loathe to poke fun at our opponents' foibles? Why should our opponents not feel the same?
Creationism and its attendent Trojan Horse, ID, has done more to set back the conservative movement than Hillary Clinton could ever do.
They are most unreliable conservative allies. They have a habit of shrugging and staying at home on election day, or throwing their vote away on some L-party dweeb.
There were several reasons I left 'tarianism behind--and quickly--their obsession over drug legalization, their refusal to do the hard work of grass-roots politicking, and their maddening, destructive prejudice against the religious. They really wanted Those Baptists to go away, and take their votes with them.
ID is just a stick to beat the Baptists with. If not that, it'd be something else.
Of course, if you don't want to answer, we'll all understand.
We used to watch movies all the time in high school (20+ years ago). Of course, the movies in question had something to do with what we were learning, such as Romeo and Juliet or Moby Dick.
Now, just where have you heard that this so far unfilmed movie is going to be shown in schools?
I'd like to see a source for this if you have one. Einstein spent a large part of his life working on QM and is still credited by many with originating the quantum interpretation of reality.
Einstein's issue was with the Copenhagen Interpretation of QM and that the theory seemed incomplete because of it's probabilistic nature
But I appreciate that you want to look out for the interests of the Michael Moores and the Spurlocks in --"our"-- opposing camp.
Pick me!! PICK ME!!!! ;)
?
I think it takes some time before posters here get a good enough grasp of the scientific background of some of the regulars around here to start being careful about posting on such matters. Some never learn. Some of us learn to step carefully and try not to exceed our educational limits too often.
You don't have a high enough percentage of evo-posts to indicate crank status, and you also have an unfortunate indication of generalized loyalty to the RNC. Sorry.
Ahh, the old "political loyalty above all else" argument.
If the republicans want to back a loser like ID for political expediency, they deserve to have their noses rubbed in it.
Yes. But we shouldn't ignore what we already know. Science gave us computers so we can easily have these discussions. The new technology available on the market over the next 20 years will make the 20th century look like the Flintstones.
We shouldn't throw this away without good cause.
wfallen:
Abiogenesis (where the first cell comes from) has nothing to do with the Theory of Evolution.
Now you know.
Almost ...
Could you please give the date that evolution became "conservative"?
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