Posted on 11/13/2005 6:07:54 AM PST by NYer
CBN.com – SEATTLE, Washington - The Dover, Pennsylvania school board is on trial in the state capitol. Their crime? They wanted to tell high school students once a year that evolution is only a theory. They also wanted to mention an alternate theory: Intelligent Design, or ID.
That was too much for some parents. They sued, claiming ID is religious and therefore illegal in school. The judge will decide the case in the next few weeks.
So is ID really just religion in disguise? Do both biology and astronomy support ID? And who are these people promoting ID?
To answer those questions, we went to the Discovery Institute in Seattle, the major proponents of ID.
Dr. Stephen Meyer is the head of Discovery's Center for Science and Culture. He says to ban design theory as mere religion is wrong.
"And in fact,” Meyer said, “it's a science-based argument that may have implications that are favorable to a theistic worldview, but the argument is based on scientific evidence."
But perhaps these ID experts are not really reputable?
Mayer stated, "These are people with serious academic training. They are Ph.D.s from very, not just reputable -- but elite -- institutions. And they are people doing research on the key pressure points in biology and physics, and so their arguments are based on cutting-edge knowledge of developments in science."
So what is the evidence from researchers like biochemist Dr. Michael Behe, a Ph.D. graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and a senior fellow of the Discovery Institute?
He is an expert on a special kind of bacteria called flagella. Inside the bacteria are exquisitely engineered ‘inboard motors’ that spin at an amazing 100,000 revolutions per minute.
Darwin said that such complexity must have developed piece by piece. Behe said that is bunk. All the pieces must be in place at the same time or the motorized tails would never work.
Darwin's gradual theory has no good explanation for that -- ID does.
Behe makes the case for ID in a video called "Unlocking the Mystery of Life." The video’s narrator declares, “A thimbleful of liquid can contain four million single-celled bacteria, each packed with circuits, assembly instructions, and molecular machines..."
"There are little molecular trucks that carry supplies from one end of the cell to the other,” Behe explained. “There are machines that capture the energy from sunlight, and turn it into usable energy."
ID experts say the more you know about biology -- and some of the weird creatures like this island lizard -- the worse it gets for Darwinism.
Consider the workings of the genetic code. That code produces all kinds of molecular machines, plus all the other components of life. ID advocates say that to believe those components are just Darwinian accidents takes a blind faith in the creativity of dumb molecules.
So with growing evidence of ID, isn't Lehigh University proud of this cutting-edge scientist who teaches there—and wrote the 1996 bestseller "Darwin's Black Box?" Hardly.
In August, all the other (22) biology faculty members came out with a political statement on the department's Web site. They stated that "Intelligent design has no basis in science."
But they cited no evidence, and made no references to any scientific research.
Dr. John West, a political scientist at Seattle Pacific University, is senior fellow at Discovery Institute. He says these political responses to scientific issues are getting nasty.
West remarked that "hate speech, speech codes, outright persecution, and discrimination is taking place on our college campuses, in our school districts, against both students and teachers and faculty members."
In fact, universities are evolving into centers for censorship. Five years ago, Baylor University dismissed mathematician Dr. William Dembski from his position, primarily because he headed a center for ID there.
This September, the University of Idaho banned any dissent against evolution from science classes -- a slam on university biologist Dr. Scott Minnich, a noted supporter of ID.
"The school seems to be confusing where it's at,” West said. “Is it in Moscow, Idaho, or the old Moscow, Russia? ...in issuing this edict that…no view differing form evolution can be taught in any science class."
And at Iowa State University, more than 100 faculty members have signed a petition against ID -- an apparent political attempt to intimidate ISU astronomer Dr. Guillermo Gonzalez because he writes about ID.
Gonalez is, in fact, co-author with philosopher Dr. Jay Richards of "The Privileged Planet." Both scholars are also connected with the Discovery Institute.
The book and related video argue that astronomy also shows evidence of design. For instance, the earth has numerous aspects just right for our existence.
Gonzalez explained, "...We find that we need to be at the right location in the galaxy...that we're in the circumstellar habitable zone of our star (correct distance from the sun)...that we're in a planetary system with giant planets that can shield the inner planets from too many comet impacts...that we're orbiting the right kind of star -- it's not too cool and not too hot.”
These are just four of 20 some characteristics of earth that make our planet unique -- right for life, right for discovery by human science.
Richards said, "So you have life and the conditions for discovery happening at the same places. That, to us, suggests that there is something more than a cosmic lottery going on. That sounds like a conspiracy rather than a mere coincidence. So that to me is a tie-breaker in the question."
And there is more -- the finely-tuned underlying rules of the universe-- or physical constants. One of them is gravity. But what if gravity were not constant?
A film clip from Privileged Planet says: "Imagine a machine able to control the strength of each of the physical constants. If you changed even slightly from its current setting, the strength of any of these fundamental forces -- such as gravity -- the impact on life would be catastrophic."
In plain terms, a bit more gravity would mean any creature larger than the size of a pea would be crushed into nothing. And a little less gravity would mean that the Earth would come unglued and fly off into space.
But Darwinism has been maintaining that advanced life is easy to produce all over the universe.
"Almost everything we've learned in the area of astrobiology suggests that, 'Look, this is just not going to happen very often' -- now that might be sort of depressing for script writers for sci-fi movies, but that's where the evidence is taking us," Richards said.
Despite the attacks on ID, Meyer said the design interpretation of the evidence is exposing Darwinism as a theory in crisis:
"I think we're reaching the critical point where Darwinism is going be seen as simply inadequate,” Meyer asserted, “ -- and therefore the question of (intelligent) design is back on the table."
Just as this city of Seattle has all the earmarks of ID, so does nature, except that nature is infinitely more intricate.
Your ignorance is showing. Here are some definitions (from a google search):
Theory: a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world; an organized system of accepted knowledge that applies in a variety of circumstances to explain a specific set of phenomena; "theories can incorporate facts and laws and tested hypotheses"; "true in fact and theory"
Hypothesis: a tentative theory about the natural world; a concept that is not yet verified but that if true would explain certain facts or phenomena; "a scientific hypothesis that survives experimental testing becomes a scientific theory"; "he proposed a fresh theory of alkalis that later was accepted in chemical practices"
Law: a generalization that describes recurring facts or events in nature; "the laws of thermodynamics"
Assumption: premise: a statement that is assumed to be true and from which a conclusion can be drawn; "on the assumption that he has been injured we can infer that he will not to play"
Observation: any information collected with the senses
Data: factual information, especially information organized for analysis or used to reason or make decisions
Fact: when an observation is confirmed repeatedly and by many independent and competent observers, it can become a fact
Belief: any cognitive content (perception) held as true; religious faith
Dogma: a religious doctrine that is proclaimed as true without proof
Impression: a vague idea in which some confidence is placed; "his impression of her was favorable"; "what are your feelings about the crisis?"; "it strengthened my belief in his sincerity"; "I had a feeling that she was lying"
Based on this, evolution is a theory. CS and ID are beliefs.
People on both sides get into tizzies. Probably a poor choice of words. I am not that "gifted" with words as some are around here:).
You think a single sentence informing students that there is another competing theory out there is the same thing as a complete curriculum?
Yes. Quite expected.
Junior, archival ping.
Another IDer who got his degree from a mail order house.
The best measure of the scientific "contribution" of ID would be the number of published papers since its inception, some 10 years ago. In that time span, there have been over a hundred thousand published papers on aspects of evolution. Not quite the "theory in crisis" that this imbecile believes. How many published, peer-reviewed papers on ID??? Answer: ZERO I love that: ZERO.
By further contrast, the subject of "horse feces" has 97 citations. Maybe when ID has the number of scientific citations as "horse feces", it might attain some of the scientific credibility that its proponents are so pathetically desperate to attain. LOL.
Horse feces vs ID and horse feces wins!!!!!
Those are fightin' words on this forum . . .
You must not be Catholic. They have no problem with evolution, and thus the true claim by our side that "most Christians believe evolution", since the Catholics have so many members. I'm sure some other Christian denominations accept evolution as well.
It's too bad your denomination does not. Certainly some of your young members will reject your denomination, and perhaps their faith, when they learn that they've been taught bunk, as proven by the evidence they have in their hands.
If it were a bona fide, well-developed theory and had the proof of refereed publications to back it up, well, then yes, that would be OK.
Unfortunately, ID doesn't meet that standard (or any scientific standard that I am aware). At best it could be considered a working hypothesis. Perhaps even a good one. But the ID proponents, and the discovery institute in particular, failed to make good on the hypothesis. There is no data presented. There is nothing.
Correct.
OTOH Evolutonary Theory is based on interpetion of the fossil record and cannot be used to predict future evolution.
Also no mechanism is described to explain how the DNA changes other than 'random' mutation.
Again, completely false. Try to learn something about a field before you attempt to critique it.
This is inadequate to describe, the rapid, massive changes seen over relatily short periods of time in the fossil record.
You sort of "forgot" to include your evidence for this assertion, or at least a citation.
And in actual fact, when researchers *have* compared rates of genetic change with the fossil record, they find that the two are in quite good accord.
Please stop posting your wild presumptions as if they were facts.
Most dramatically there is no experement to show how life evolves from inorganic or organic chemicals. At best there are experments that show how some amino acids can be cooked in a lab from inorganic chemicals.
Again, please stop posting your presumptions as if they were fact. There is a vast body of published research on that very topic -- research didn't stop after the 1953 Miller/Urey experiment, as you so ignorantly presume. PubMed has close to 300 published papers on just the RNA World scenario, for example.
But in any case, evolutionary biology is *not* abiogenesis -- they are two different and distinct fields. Try to learn the difference. Evolutionary biology remains valid no matter *what* may or may not be discovered about how/where life originally arose. Similarly, the science of meteorology doesn't depend in the least on how the atmosphere originated.
This part of biology is VERY soft science, it's not like physics or chemistry where there theories grounded in math and experement that can be described and produce predictable results.
Frankly, you really haven't a clue. Your statement is utterly false.
There is work that has described order 'spontaneously' springing from disorder when energy is added to the system. This suggests a very different universe than the dumb random universe.
Not at all, but it may look that way to someone who doesn't know much about science.
Ilya prigogine provided some Hints that lay a foundation the could be used to develop an ID theory.
Fine, get back to us when he has more than "hints".
Stuart Kauffman's stuff about self organization in complex systems is also interesting. He applies his insights to evolution, but this approach could also be used in ID models.
I highly doubt that.
People of Faith can 'believe' in God and his primacy as the creator and Atheist can say God doesn't exist and wasn't neccesary for the universe to exist, neither side can 'prove' scientifically their position.
That's nice, but it's totally irrelevant to the truth of evolution. Evolution is not atheism, and there is a vast amount of evidence supporting evolution.
The current confilict over evolution is politics and not science.
Thank you for admitting that the "ID conflict" is politics by the ID people, and not science.
I am dismayed by the censorship being applied towards ID.
There is no censorship of ID. Try to crank the hysteria level down a few notches.
That is not science. Both sides should be allowed to present their moldels, and supporting arguments.
And they are. Happy now?
Unfortunately, though, "ID" has no models and lousy supporting arguments, so it's getting laughed off the stage as it fully deserves. And that's why it doesn't belong in science class, and isn't gaining acceptance in the scientific community.
Every time!
Sorry, if you are looking for an argument as many seem to be, I'm not one of them. Don't make suppositions that I'm "insisting" anything. I don't think that ID is an "alternative" equal to evolution in a scientific sense because it is more faith based than anything. I have no problems with briefly mentioning that some people believe in ID. However, I don't think it should be more than briefly. I don't think there should be a whole class built around it.
As for being open-minded. I seem to be one of the few here that doesn't have any problem with either ID or evolution. Even though I'm strongly in the creationist camp, I can respect and learn from the opinions of evolutionists. I don't disregard science at all either and have stated that many times here.
my boot to their teeth - I have grown so weary of their endless recapitualtion of the same tired old fallacies that I have lost much of my will to be polite on this topic.
What about horse feces vs. the spaghetti guy?
Then what are you going to permit to be taught in biology class, that the stork brings babies?
Those are fightin' words on this forum . .
I would say so:)
"impossible" is a term I do not like to see used inadvisably, but I'll concede that that is a tenable position.
Then what are you going to permit to be taught in biology class, that the stork brings babies?
THEY DON'T???? AND SANTA IS NOT REAL TOO???? OH DRAT!!!!!
Wait until I tell the Easter Bunny about this.
No, and that's the point. "ID" *has* no curriculum of any sort, and yet wants to dishonestly pretend that it does. Why should we mislead students like that? Answer: We shouldn't.
Furthermore, there *is* no "competing theory out there". ID isn't even a theory, and pretending that it is is yet another lie that the IDers are trying to pollute students' minds with.
As I said in an earlier post, "ID" as a concept isn't being censored, but we *do* object to them telling lies, and will call them on it every time they try it. Lies don't deserve to be taught as part of a school curriculum.
The hypotheses of Erasmus Darwin was replaced by lamarckism, which was replaced by Darwinism, which was replaced by neo-darwinism, which undoubtedly will be replaced by something else, and maybe not in our lifetime.
I am not emotionally involved in the outcome because it doesn't affect my Christian faith. However, I think that resorting to censorship to control the advent of new ideas is a little extreme.
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