Posted on 08/16/2003 12:12:19 PM PDT by Vindiciae Contra TyrannoSCOTUS
Move over, Darwin. Intelligent Design has arrived, and it's time to welcome the new kid to town.
"In the future, everyone will be entitled to 15 minutes of fame." artist Andy Warhol.
Darwinism - the notion that all species of plants and animals evolved from earlier forms, and that a blind process, natural selection, determines which forms survive - has had a grip on intellectual culture for 150 years.
Now advocates of a relatively new way of thinking about the origins of life say it's long past the time for the dead Charles Darwin (and adherents of his dying theory) to realize their 15 minutes are up and welcome a new kid to town. It's called Intelligent Design (ID) - the idea that the intricacies of life are too complex to have merely happened randomly. To coin a bromide - "ID is a theory whose time has finally come."
Indeed, you can tell ID has "arrived" because, in the last couple of years, the theory has made a major splash as state and local school boards have debated whether to allow students to learn about ID and other alternatives to Darwin's theory of evolution.
You can also tell because some top academics are publishing articles in top scientific journals about it.
But perhaps the best sign that ID has "made the big time" - pro-ID videos are being shown on television. Even public television.
Since May, "Unlocking the Mystery of Life" has aired on more than a dozen major PBS affiliates. Publicly funded TV stations in Miami, Baltimore, Cleveland, New York, Los Angeles, Seattle, Washington, D.C., and elsewhere, have shown thousands of viewers the Focus on the Family/Illustra Media video, which makes a positive case for Intelligent Design theory.
It's a milestone, according to Dr. Mark Hartwig, worldview analyst at Focus on the Family. It's almost a miracle that the film, which explores the discovery of some of the amazingly intricate complexities that are present in the cell, even made it to public TV.
"Evolution has basically been the official religion of PBS," Hartwig said. "To see them allowing 'heretics' in the 'pulpit' is a remarkable thing."
For Dr. Stephen Meyer, director and senior fellow of the Center for Science and Culture at Seattle's Discovery Institute, the TV airings are signs of a larger trend - the growing acceptance of Intelligent Design as a scientific theory at the same time serious cracks in the edifice of Darwinism are beginning to show up.
"We've been really delighted by this development, because PBS reflects the consensus in the scientific world," Meyer said. "For many, many years, it has aired mainly programs that promote a Darwinian evolutionary point of view."
Added Hartwig: "What I'm hoping is that this is a sign that the people are beginning to take what I call a 'truly liberal attitude' towards ID, and that is: 'If there's a substantive case to be made here (against evolutionism), let's air it.' " Blowing Darwin 'Out of the Water'
The case against Darwinism - and for ID - is substantive and substantial. Hartwig and Meyer say academic philosophers and scientists are beginning to publish books with major academic publishers and articles in major scientific journals questioning some of the presuppositions of Darwinism.
"The debate about Darwinism - and the debate about Intelligent Design - is being validated at a very high level of academic discourse, and it's getting very difficult to ignore," Meyer said. "Most biologists have defended Darwinism as a 'well-supported theory,' and many of the scientists who are a part of the Intelligent Design movement are challenging that idea, and in fact many who aren't a part of the movement are critiquing various elements of Darwinian theory."
Hartwig and Meyer are reluctant to publicize the names of pro-ID scientists and the academic journals publishing their research, for fear that Darwinists may exert pressure to try to squelch the studies.
There is absolutely no doubt, however, that ID is making inroads in local and state school districts where, Hartwig maintains, it is blowing Darwinism "out of the water."
Credit belongs not only to the openness of school board members, but to the compelling messages contained in "Unlocking the Mystery of Life," and a companion video called "Icons of Evolution."
Jim Fitzgerald, president of Coldwater Media, which produced "Icons" in association with Focus on the Family, said thanks to the passage of the No Child Left Behind education reform law, every state will have an opportunity to reevaluate its science standards over the next four or five years.
"These battles are going to be ongoing for a number of years," Fitzgerald said.
Already, ID is gaining hold.
• In Ohio, a decision was made last December by a nearly unanimous vote of the Ohio Board of Education to require students to critically analyze key aspects of criticism of Darwinian theory.
"Additionally, though the state board did not mandate the teaching of Intelligent Design, many of the board members made it clear they understood that there was a local option for individual teachers to discuss with their students alternative theories to Darwinism," Meyer said.
• In the Cobb County (Ga.) school district, which encompasses greater Atlanta, the school board passed a "Teach the Controversy" proposal recognizing that there are scientists on both sides of the evolution issue, and students need to know the arguments from both the perspective that favors Darwinism and the critique of it, as well.
"Icons of Evolution," by the way, was broadcast on local commercial TV stations in Ohio before the state school board voted.
"We have also had a number of people approach their local cable companies asking them to show the video," Fitzgerald said. "One (unidentified) gentleman in Georgia got the video into 350,000 homes. And he bought radio advertising time to let people know when it was going to be shown." The Real ID
What's the science behind ID's momentum? According to Meyer, "New discoveries in fields like palentology and molecular and cell biology are putting Darwinism under such intense pressure, it will not survive."
"In fact, we've learned a lot about biology since the Civil War - that's really how long it's been since the theory came into being," Meyer said. "I don't think much of biology fits with Darwinian theory. We're learning that life is much more complex than people imagined when Darwinian theory was first being formulated. That has created challenges to the Darwinian explanation of where we came from."
Perhaps the best way to understand the complexity argument is to consider DNA, the building block of human life, which ID adherents say could not have simply "developed" randomly.
"Bill Gates, the computer guru behind Microsoft, has compared DNA to a computer program," Meyer said, "only much more complex than anything we've ever created. We ask people to reflect about that. Bill Gates hires computer programmers to design his software. If there is, effectively, software in the cell, that is powerfully suggestive evidence that there must have been a 'programmer' - an intelligent designer of life itself."
In the end, the job is simply to boldly go where no non-Darwinist theory has ever gone before. The idea that their case is finding listeners and people willing to consider the truth about origins - whether from television, academic discussions or in public school classrooms - simply delights ID adherents.
"Darwinism still has sway in some quarters, but that won't always be the case," Hartwig said, "It's basically a new day. It may still be morning, but it's definitely a new day."
FOR MORE INFORMATION
1. The two videos "Unlocking the Mystery of Life" and "Icons of Evolution" are available from Focus on the Family as part of a video set, "The Evolution Set."
2. For information on Intelligent Design, please see the Discovery Institute Web site.
3. The video "Icons of Evolution" is available for placement on local cable TV systems, or local broadcast stations," free of charges - if you meet certain modest restrictions. Jim Fitzgerald, president of Coldwater Media, producer of "Icons of Evolution," said he anyone interested only needs to call (719) 488-8670 to obtain advance permission and let him know of their plans.
Well, my sock puppets of Niels Bohr, Dick Feynman and Jesus all disagree with your Einstein sock puppet.
I wonder how the Gates analogy is holding up after the last few days of viruses. This must've cost the economy a couple of billion dollars.
Vindiciae Contra TyrannoSCOTUS: It does no good to argue ideas with those who will respond as brutes. Those who have been fooled into thinking they evolved from brutes will probably act like it.
You post this article and then predict the evolutionists will come streaming in throwing insults around. Before you even allow an evolutionist to post and engage in intelligent discussion, you call us "Mind-numbed robots" and "Brutes.” You are so drunk on your religion you can't see your own hypocrisy.
I am an evolutionist and can respect some creationists' beliefs as long as they can control their emotions. In the evolution-creation issue, I prefer civil debate with those I disagree with. However, you have justly earned the title of "Morons"
We haven't been able to predict earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. Should we then abandon our theories on why these two natural events occur? Perhaps it just the demons fighting in hell that cause them.
You believe the average scientist working in a lab is worse than Hitler or Stalin?
One of the worst analogies I've seen. Suppose I said: "Warren Buffet, the stock market guru behind Berkshire Hathaway, has compared stock picking to Darwin's natural selection. Buffet hires financial analysists, which is powerfully suggestive evidence that nature does too."
In other words, the bogus analogy goes like this:
Mr. X, a successful big name we've chosen to impress you (but who is definitely not a biologist), suggests (with no hint of scientific evidence) that his business activities are similar to something in biology. That is "powerfully suggestive evidence" that everything Mr. X does is also being done by nature.
Typical strawman against Darwin's ideas again. Never mind that its SCIENTIFIC research that is building upon his hypothesis. I wonder how many past scientists from the 1800's or any other time are bashed for making conclusions about some of their observations.
A well thought out, cogent, articulate, thoroughly appropriate response.
Bear in mind a brute is anyone who bests a creationist in a discussion, and a 'mind-numberd robot' is anyone who thinks for himself.
Einstein believed in the existence of God and also in evolution. Belief that God created the universe with laws that allow the evolution of life is not what's currently being touted as "Intellegent Design", although it would be reasonable to describe it that way.
(not directed at you, Vindiciae - This is a big pet peeve of mine-- the misuse of 'theory' over the correct 'hypothesis'.)
Well, frankly, you aren't using the terms correctly, either. As scientists use the terms, a "hypothesis" is a statement about reality, a "theory" is a conceptual model, and a "law" is an empirical relationship. None of the terms make any reference to whether the proposition is proven or not (or even true or false).
What distinguishes a hypothesis from a theory is not proof, but testability. I can make a statement such as, "All souls cover a finite spatial extent, ellipsoidal in shape, with sharply defined edges," but with no prospect of testing it, it is doomed to remain a hypothesis. Sometime later, I may develop a method of testing it, and it may survive a number of tests: the first billion souls I measure may agree with the statement. But while my measurements may support the statement (which I would then be entitled to call a theory), it would never prove it, because there is always the possibility that there exist non-ellipsoidal souls, however rare.
Indeed, theories can be disproven and still remain theories. Newton's Theory of Universal Gravitation fails a number of empirical tests, but it is still (and ever will be) a theory, because it makes testable qualitative predictions, it unites several disparate phenomena, and it allows the accurate calculation of physically meaningful quantities.
Yes, and those who have been fooled into thinking that they descended from English ancestors will probably drive on the left side of the road, play soccer, and agitate for the institution of monarchy in America.
ROFL! I laughed out loud when I saw this!
Newtwon's Law of Universal Gravitation also. Laws too can be shown to have flaws and still remain laws.
Please find a designated writer so you can express your thoughts in proper syntax.
Thank You
Is that what happened? You were attacked by a mind warper? I'm so sorry.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.