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Calif. School Scraps 'Intelligent Design' [El Tejon litigation]
The Dispatch (Lexington, N.C.) ^ | 17 January 2006 | JULIANA BARBASSA

Posted on 01/17/2006 11:24:31 AM PST by PatrickHenry

A rural school district agreed to stop teaching a religion-based alternative to evolution as part of a court settlement filed Tuesday, a legal group said.

Frazier Mountain High School will stop teaching a philosophy class discussing the theory of "intelligent design" this week and won't teach it in the future, said Ayesha N. Khan, legal director for Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

Officials at the El Tejon Unified School District were not immediately available for comment.

A federal judge in Fresno had been scheduled to hold a hearing Tuesday afternoon on whether to halt the class midway through the monthlong winter term.

A group of parents sued the district last week, saying it violated the constitutional separation of church and state by offering "Philosophy of Design," a course taught by a minister's wife that advanced the theory that life is so complex it must have been created by God.

"The course was designed to advance religious theories on the origins of life, including creationism and its offshoot, 'intelligent design,'" said the lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court.

In a landmark lawsuit, Americans United for Separation of Church and State had successfully blocked Dover, Pa., schools last month from teaching intelligent design in science courses. [Kitzmiller et al. v Dover Area School District et al..]

El Tejon school officials had claimed the subject was proper for a philosophy class.

The high school in the Tehachapi Mountains about 75 miles north of Los Angeles draws 500 students from a dozen small communities.

Sharon Lemburg, a social studies teacher and soccer coach who was teaching "Philosophy of Design," defended the course in a letter to the weekly Mountain Enterprise.

"I believe this is the class that the Lord wanted me to teach," she wrote.

Similar battles are being fought in Georgia and Kansas. Critics of "intelligent design" say it is biblical creationism in disguise, but defenders argue it is based on science and doesn't require adherence to any religious belief.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Philosophy
KEYWORDS: bibleidolatryloses; biblethumpers; creationisminadress; crevolist; evolution; goddooditamen; ludditefundies; scienceeducation; setbackforkooks; superstitions; yeccultists
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To: CarolinaGuitarman
...Funny how few people were persuaded by relativity before 1900. Funny how few people were persuaded by Copernicus before the 1500's...

But, so far on this thread, God has not accused of lying about relativity.

Revelation is still more sure than imagination!

121 posted on 01/17/2006 2:02:22 PM PST by DaveyB (Peace follows victory - never before)
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To: b_sharp

yes, I read it.....I even copied and pasted the link for the court case for future reference. It's going to get more and more interesting. This is only the start of the "humor".....:)


122 posted on 01/17/2006 2:02:56 PM PST by tgambill (I would like to comment.....)
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To: DaveyB
" Yes, it is creation not a random happening - what evidence by the way is being ignored?"

By creationists? Just about everything.

"A pig tooth or moths glued on a tree trunk or fully formed fossils?"

Nebraska man was a mistake, that didn't convince the scientific community, and was discarded after about 3 years. The peppered moth studies are valid science. 2 moths were glued to a tree for a comparison photo to show the different coloration. The rest of the photos were of individual moths resting on the trunks of trees, in the wild. It is a very common practice in insect photography to fasten the subject down. There was no faking involved in that study.

As for your *fully formed fossils* remark, it shows an incredible ignorance of what would be expected from the fossil record.

I repeat, in order for creationists to believe what they do they must ignore the evidence of the physical creation.
123 posted on 01/17/2006 2:03:32 PM PST by CarolinaGuitarman ("There is grandeur in this view of life...")
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To: DaveyB

" But, so far on this thread, God has not accused of lying about relativity."

That's because creationists haven't studied relativity very hard.

"Revelation is still more sure than imagination!"

But still less than objective evidence.


124 posted on 01/17/2006 2:05:16 PM PST by CarolinaGuitarman ("There is grandeur in this view of life...")
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To: mlc9852
What exactly do you mean by "political agenda"? Do you think the evolutionists have a political agenda?

I mean the intent isn't first and foremost to provide the best education for students, it's to get somebody's religion into the public schools.

I have never seen any credible evidence that "evolutionists" (is there such a group) have a political agenda. As to the political agenda of creationists, I direct your attention to the testimony of the Dover school board members, who lied under oath about their intentions to try and sneak past the Establishment clause.

125 posted on 01/17/2006 2:05:29 PM PST by highball ("I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have." -- Thomas Jefferson)
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To: CarolinaGuitarman
..it shows an incredible ignorance of what would be expected from the fossil record.

Oh! What was Darwin expecting?

The peppered moth studies are valid science.

Let's see we started with moths - we ended up with moths - yep that does it evolution all right!

Or of course it might just be that genes that were present to begin with, expressed themselves.

Nebraska man is a dramatic example how if you presume evolution you find evidence to support your framework - but then you might just be being played for the fool.

126 posted on 01/17/2006 2:10:27 PM PST by DaveyB (Peace follows victory - never before)
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To: DaveyB
" Oh! What was Darwin expecting?"

What has been found.

" Let's see we started with moths - we ended up with moths - yep that does it evolution all right!"

It was a demonstration of natural selection, not speciation. Nobody every claimed it was anything more than that.

" Or of course it might just be that genes that were present to begin with, expressed themselves."

Obviously you don't know anything about the study. It was a demonstration that two different color variations had differential success depending on the bark coloration. With a dark bark, the light colored moth decreased in number. With a light bark, the dark moth decreased. Nobody ever said it was a demonstration of mutation. You are attacking a strawman.

"Nebraska man is a dramatic example how if you presume evolution you find evidence to support your framework - but then you might just be being played for the fool."

It was never accepted by science and was discarded with a few years. It's a great example of how peer review works. It's a blip on the scientific landscape, yet creationists have latched on to it as some sort of sacred component of evolutionary theory.
127 posted on 01/17/2006 2:17:43 PM PST by CarolinaGuitarman ("There is grandeur in this view of life...")
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To: microgood
El Tejon school officials had claimed the subject was proper for a philosophy class.

Which is correct.

Oh, please!

The substance of this "philosophy" class consisted of videos presenting young-earth, flood-geology creationism. I've followed the antievolution movement for many years, and have studied its history extensively. Young-earth, flood-geology creationism has ALWAYS been identified -- by its own advocates and practitioners -- as either "Biblical Creationism" or "Scientific Creationism" or "Creation Science" or some formulation of the sort. It's never, ever been put forward as a subject of "philosophy".

You can't possibly believe this utterly transparent dodge. Have you no shame? Or is any level of obvious deceit and baloney acceptable if it advances the cause?

128 posted on 01/17/2006 2:19:52 PM PST by Stultis (I don't worry about the war turning into "Vietnam" in Iraq; I worry about it doing so in Congress.)
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To: CarolinaGuitarman
creationists have latched on to it as some sort of sacred component of evolutionary theory.

Only because they think they can twist it into some critique of the scientific method or scientists themselves.

It's extremely ironic - Nebraska Man is a great example of how the system works. Nebraska Man shows that poor work gets exposed.

I suspect they don't actually know what Nebraska Man really was, any more than they understand the peppered moth experiment was all about.

129 posted on 01/17/2006 2:21:59 PM PST by highball ("I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have." -- Thomas Jefferson)
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To: Stultis
Or is any level of obvious deceit and baloney acceptable if it advances the cause?

Silly Stultis.

You know it doesn't count as "lying" if they only lie to infidels....

130 posted on 01/17/2006 2:22:50 PM PST by highball ("I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have." -- Thomas Jefferson)
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To: PatrickHenry

Bummer...........now that the Court of Appeals has shot down the ACLU's mantra "separation of church and state" and have upheld the right to Freedom OF Religion instead of Freedom FROM Religion.


131 posted on 01/17/2006 2:23:55 PM PST by libertylass
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Comment #132 Removed by Moderator

To: CarolinaGuitarman
Q: Oh! What was Darwin expecting?
A: What has been found.

Why is not every geological formation and every stratum full of such intermediate links? Geology assuredly does not reveal any such finely-graduated organic chain; and this is the most obvious and serious objection which can be urged against the theory. -- Charles Darwin

The extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists as the trade secret of paleontology. -- Gould

If the fossil record is as expected - why abandon Darwinism for punctuated equilibrium?

In the end the emperor has no clothes and God gets the last laugh!

133 posted on 01/17/2006 2:25:57 PM PST by DaveyB (Peace follows victory - never before)
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To: highball

http://www.reviewevolution.com/press/pressRelease_LeakedPBSMemo.php

Well, perhaps some evolutionists have a political agenda.


134 posted on 01/17/2006 2:31:37 PM PST by mlc9852
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To: narby
It wasn't a "philosophy class". It was a science class, ...

Sunday school bible "study" ...

135 posted on 01/17/2006 2:32:19 PM PST by dread78645 (Sorry Mr. Franklin, We couldn't keep it.)
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To: DaveyB
Oh, gee! Darwin and Gould admitted Darwin was just faking it! I guess creationism is real science after all. Incredibly convincing and somehow I'd never seen anything like that before.
136 posted on 01/17/2006 2:35:46 PM PST by VadeRetro (Liberalism is a cancer on society. Creationism is a cancer on conservatism.)
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To: DaveyB

I imagine God is getting a pretty good chuckle even now. The Bible says "the fool has said in his heart there is no God". What's great is that we will all know for sure one way or another, won't we?


137 posted on 01/17/2006 2:37:38 PM PST by mlc9852
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To: mlc9852
I think she would have to be better. She learned from his mistakes.

She certainly has been more discrete in her affairs with other women.

138 posted on 01/17/2006 2:43:47 PM PST by wyattearp (The best weapon to have in a gunfight is a shotgun - preferably from ambush.)
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To: DaveyB; jennyp
Nebraska man is a dramatic example how if you presume evolution you find evidence to support your framework - but then you might just be being played for the fool.

The "man" part of "Nebraska Man" stems entirely from a popular article, and an accompanying drawing, written by an overly enthusiastic British scientist who never examined the actual fossil. The original researchers in America dismissed the British drawing and reconstruction as "a figment of the imagination of no scientific value, and undoubtedly inaccurate".

The only proposal the American scientists ever put forward was that the tooth appeared to be that of an APE (not a "man") which maybe possessed a few incipient human affinities, although the fossil was far too worn to be definitive about such details.

You may be looking at this all wrong. The alleged "discovery" that Hesperopithecus dawsonii was "really" only a pig's tooth might be the nefarious evolution conspiracy cover up; and you've fallen for it! You see an ape in North America would really be evidence AGAINST evolution and for creationism, since apes supposedly evolved in Africa long after the continents separated. Apes should have never been here on the evolutionary scheme!

139 posted on 01/17/2006 2:46:29 PM PST by Stultis (I don't worry about the war turning into "Vietnam" in Iraq; I worry about it doing so in Congress.)
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To: longshadow

How about if they want to teach the Bible as it relates to history, art, geography? Would that be constitutional?


140 posted on 01/17/2006 2:47:32 PM PST by mlc9852
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