OK, let me see if I’ve got this right.
It’s okay for you to pass off as “SCIENCE” in Tax-Funded, Government-Mandated, Union-Run schools such silliness as “hopeful monsters” and “punctuated equilibrium” and even a long history of FRAUDs like the “Nebraska Man”, “Piltdown Man”, “Java Man, and the “Dino Bird”, but for us to suggest an Intelligent Designer in the same forum is problematic because it is not Materialistic.
Amazing.
Your definition of Science is vastly different from the one I learned; the QUEST FOR KNOWLEDGE (the root for the word “science” is the latin word for “knowledge”) using our FIVE SENSES to investigate what we can Observe and Measure.
It seems the new definition of “science” is whatever fits into a Materialist paradigm, regardless how silly, foolish, nonsensical, counter-intuitive, or fraudulent.
Makes me gladder and gladder every day that we homeschool our children and teach them to THINK CRITICALLY.
What about ID? The main thesis of ID is a designer, that nobody can verify or falsify. It is neither observable nor measurable. There is no experiment that could be devised to test whether the main tenet is correct or not. More importantly, it does not make predictions that could either verify or falsify itself. That by its very definition is NOT science. (Do take a look at your 6th grade science book at the definition of science. Anything that cannot be tested, although it may be a pursuit of knowledge, belongs not in science but philosophy). I'm not debating its merit. I'm simply saying that by its very definition, it is a different animal than science. And to try to pass it for science is sheer folly - if not madness.
Again I would have to repeat myself. I'm not debating whether or not ID is correct. It could very well be the truth. But by its very definition, it does not belong in the realm of science. Science is materialistic, not because it is anti-God, but it is the very definition of it. Anything that is not testable, i.e. materialistic, is outside of science, no matter how correct or beautiful.
As for the silly ideas, let's touch one of them, shall we? I'm no biologist, so forgive me as I blunder along. Punctuated equilibrium is the idea that sometimes evolution exists in a rapid pace as opposed to gradualism of mutation. Let's see how it fits the scientific method. Data - two independent paleontological studies (on pulmonate gastropods and on Phacopsid trilobites) that suggest rapid evolution. Hypothesis - punctuated equilibrium. Species do evolve rapidly in bursts. Predictions - if the hypothesis is correct, we'd have in our fossil records short bursts of mutation in an otherwise stable species. Test - well..collect those records.
So...what's so silly about that? If the fossil records don't show it, it'd be thrown away. If it does, then we are more confident that we are on the right track. You keep claiming it is nonsensical and fraudulent. Do tell me - what is so nonsensical and fraudulent about this particular idea? Even if it really is nonsensical, since it is testable, it fits very well with scientific principles and thus in science classes.
So yeah...until ID can pass muster with the scientific method, keep it away from science classes. And before you go off on a rant again on how it's all a vast materialistic, godless conspiracy, answer this question first. Can we really test ID so at the end of the day we can say, yes ID is correct or not it's not?
What is amazing to me is that you claim you think critically while you hang on to an idea that is not testable and yet keep claiming evolutionary theory, which is tested day by day by the stream of independent studies for 150 years, to be nonsensical. You see a problem here?