"Intelligent design" not science: Vatican paper

Reuters via Yahoo! ^ | 01/19/06 | Tom Heneghan

[peyton randolph]

PARIS (Reuters) - The Roman Catholic Church has restated its support for evolution with an article praising a U.S. court decision that rejects the "intelligent design" theory as non-scientific.

The Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano said that teaching intelligent design -- which argues that life is so complex that it needed a supernatural creator -- alongside Darwin's theory of evolution would only cause confusion...

A court in the state of Pennsylvania last month barred a school from teaching intelligent design (ID), a blow to Christian conservatives who want it to be taught in biology classes along with the Darwinism they oppose.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"Why should the Church have to prove that which had been accepted and "proven" for nearly 1500 years?"

You are requiring a much higher standard of evidence for Galileo than you required of the Church.

"The burden of proof was on Galileo, as he was challenging the scientific standard."

And he provided that evidence. He showed that the Earth could move. The reason the Church rejected the evidence was because it clashed with their theology. They used their ability to threaten force to *persuade* Galileo to recant.

[jcb8199]

That it clashed with their theology is secondary to the fact that the accepted, "proven" fact was that the Earth didn't move; the Church didn't say that, SCIENCE said that and the Church read the Bible in such a way that they agreed. Ptolemy worked in the 2nd century AD, when it was still illegal, in the Roman empire, to be Christian. So for the next 150 years or so, scientists agreed; then the Catholic Church was given official recognition and became the official religion of the Roman Empire. Then, more than 1200 years later, after nearly 1500 years of accepted SCIENTIFIC "fact," Galileo said the Earth moved, and provided compelling evidence (but not FINAL evidence).

What more needs be said? I keep exhorting you to look at this from the historical perspective--when will you?

[CarolinaGuitarman]

Why do you demand that Galileo do something (provide *final evidence*, whatever that means) when you demand NOTHING OF THE SORT from the Church? The Church demanded that people accept THIER position as fact, when THEY had no *final evidence* either. In fact, they were dead wrong. Why must you still defend what the Church has now said is indefensible?

[onedoug]

"...Until the scientific method provides us with the actual answers."

Or, at least a representation of an answer. We live in a universe were it not wonderful, we wouldn't be here remarking on it.

God in All, before all that ever was, is or will be.