Defending science education against intelligent design: a call to action

American Society for Clinical Investigation ^ | 01 May 2006 | Alan D. Attie, Elliot Sober, Ronald L. Numbers, etc.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"See how it feels!"

Except you did say what I said you did. :)

[metmom]

I've heard that before but I think that the fact the the reference specifically mentions the material used and then makes the refence to life being given to it, lends it more to a seperate creation act and giving life to something non living. It's the most obvious reading IMO, so I don't tend to look too much deeper when the plain meaning makes sense.

[puroresu]

####Have a good one, puroresu!####

You too, Tory! You're a scholar and a gentleman. And I'm pining for the fjords! :-)

[longshadow]

who sometimes comes with pretty waitresses to boot.

Damn! At long last, a restaurant where they allow the patrons to kick the waitresses, and no one invited me!

[Right Wing Professor]

At long last, a restaurant where they allow the patrons to kick the waitresses, and no one invited me!

Mysogynist!, er, no, Misoginist!, that doesn't look right, either, let's try this ....Mysoginist! yeah that's the ticket!

(/Mamzelle)

[Condorman]

5: skull fossils have either shown to be human, ape or fakes (combinations of both spliced together to support evolution)

Are you sure of this?

Jenny, you wouldn't happen to have that skull categorization thingy handy, would you?

[VadeRetro]

It's OK. In fact, I expect kickbacks.

[LibertarianSchmoe]

21st century science which seeks to define faith as dangerously irrational

This assertion is simply untrue, but it explains why you believe the way you do.

seeking censorship through threats of legal coercion..has replaced tolerance and debate

It's not censorship when a religious idea is prevented from being presented to "mush-minds" as science. IDers keep trying to manufacture arguments (strawmen) rather than debate the actual issue at hand: is ID science? If you want to assert that, you have to be willing to provide evidence. Why is the ID crowd spending so much energy creating strawmen and so little trying to scientifically prove their belief?

and has consigned open inquiry into finding scientific proof of the existence and nature of the Judeao-Christian personal God....or of an impersonal but highly advanced super intelligent consciousness which underlies the creation of a mathematically precise universe...to open ridicule

There is no scientific uber-organization that could make such a consignation. You are free to search for, and find, as much proof as you want! If you could prove God's existence, you'd be the most famous person in history, and deservingly so. But if your search is fruitless, don't try to change the rules of science (through coercion) as compensation. And don't call everyone who says "That's not proof" an atheist.

And by the way, Galileo had both science AND faith.

Like many evolutionary scientists

His beef was not that the Church was wrong to believe in God's role as Creator, but that they were misinterpreting the way God did it, based on the physical evidence.

Thank you. This is exactly what most of us "evolutionists" have been trying to argue on these threads!

[Coyoteman]

Macroevolution has no evidence. We do not have a demonstrably new species that shows evidence of more complexity (such as an improved system that functions better than it's ancestors or non-degraded element of an organisms DNA that demonstrates a branch of programing, via RMNS, not found in it's ancestor).

No evidence?

You want a new species that has more complexity? How about humans; we have a larger brain that functions better than the brains of our ancestors.

Now, see? That was easy.

[MissAmericanPie]

I hate to point out the number of students who flunk science. So the hysteria over teaching a failed agenda seems to escape me. Maybe ID is the shot in the arm that science needs to keep students interested in all levels of science.

I do know one thing for sure, way back when children were taught that there was a higher authority the worse infractions of the rules was chewing gum and spit wads. And the majority of students actually hung around to graduate.

[LibertarianSchmoe]

It is this arrogance, as displayed in your response

Arrogance? I'm just being humorous, something you'd see more often on these threads if you bothered reading other people's posts. But clearly you don't BOTHER with such trivialities, as evidenced by your continual misrepresentation of the words "theory" and "fact", both of which have been explained numerous times, even on this thread alone. I can only guess that you don't deign to read what others have to say since you already know everything. Now, WHO'S arrogant?

and those who express ANY reservation, even SCIENTIST who vary from the narrow lock step orthodoxy are attacked and branded as "unscientific", rubes, relgious zealots..etc

More lies. You know, all of the lying perpetrated by the ID side was one (but only one) of the nails on the ID coffin lid at the Dover burial services. Science has strict standards, which contributes to its overwhelming effectiveness. ID has not been barred from science; it's just being required to prove its qulaifications. Since it has none, CRIDers want to use affirmative action to FORCE ID into a position it hasn't yet earned. I don't have a law degree. But that shouldn't keep me from being hired as a lawyer, should it? Oh, wait...

I do not hold to the view that ID should be taught in schools...I hold to the view that THEORY should be labeled as such and not presented as unquestionable fact.

You really should learn more about how science works before making (and repeating) statements about how science works.

Now, juding by the ever declining vote totals for LIBERTAINS, I would think, (thank Intelligent Design), that this little arrogant species will soon be extinct.

Ahhh, the old libertarian (note the correct spelling, BTW) ad hominem. That's the clicking of an empty chamber. First, I don't base my principles (and, thankfully, neither does science) upon popularity. Appealing to the desire to fit in is a CRIDer tactic. Second, does your saviour know that you wish someone (actually, a whole group of people) dead (you DO know what "extinct" means, right?) just because they disagree with you? It's okay. Religious zealots have been doing that for thousands of years.

[usastandsunited]

One is religion (faith, revelation, belief). The other is science (naturalism, data, theory).

I don't much much about theology, but apparently you know even less than I do.

[Sloth]

Only 38% agree with the statement, "human beings evolved from an earlier species"

*snip*

A majority of people do not hold a literal young-earth interpretation of the Bible.

So, what do the other 12%+ believe?

[LibertarianSchmoe]

immediatley following.....

Later that same post...

BTW you misspelled immediately

So did you.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"So did you."

That post was to me. The funniest thing is, I never even used the word *immediately*. He accused me of misspelling a word I never even used, while misspelling it himself. :)

[blowfish]

Hey everybody look all the big bad brave evos ganging up on metmom.

Oh, don't be an ass. You post something inflammatory on one of these threads, you're going to get some responses. Now we're 'ganging up'. If no one responded, you'd say 'they're too chicken to respond'.
Oh, now I get it. The Secret Eeevolootionist Cabal should have selected a single spokesman to send a single response to avoid ganging up on metmom. Personally, I think metmom can stand up to the devistating torrent of responses she has received. :^)

[Zionist Conspirator]

"What if instead of asking "is this faith or science" we simply asked "what actually happened?"

That's what science is already doing, to the chagrin of Biblical literalists.

There's a clock on my mantle that ticked itself into existence. I didn't see it created. You didn't see it created. The "design" it exhibits is illusory. Why assume someboy put it together and wound it up?

Be sure and makes lots of money, since that's the only thing in which a soulless collection of atoms brought into existence by accident can find fulfillment. And don't ever become brain-dead or anything. We might want to euthenase you to make room for other soulless collections of atoms who can actually contribute something (or at least use you for a clone farm).

There's no atheist nastier than a self-hating redneck.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"There's a clock on my mantle that ticked itself into existence."

Sure there is.

"The "design" it exhibits is illusory. Why assume someboy put it together and wound it up?"

Because we know that people build clocks, how they build clocks, and where they build clocks? In other words, there are ways of testing the claim that it was designed.

"And don't ever become brain-dead or anything."

How do you propose one avoids that, in the long run I mean?

"There's no atheist nastier than a self-hating redneck."

?? Are you attacking the South along with your general attack on science?

There's certainly nobody nastier than a presumptuous, self-righteous anti-evo, that's for sure. :)

[Coyoteman]

You wrote: I think people need to understand the difference between Theology and Biology. I'm no expert in either one, but they both are science and both are very different. A theologist has no more authority on matters of biology than a biologist has on theology.

I responded: Theology and biology are not both science. One is religion (faith, revelation, belief). The other is science (naturalism, data, theory).

To this, you have responded: I don't much much about theology, but apparently you know even less than I do.

Please educate me then. Please explain how and why theology is a science.

[Zionist Conspirator]

Because we know that people build clocks, how they build clocks, and where they build clocks? In other words, there are ways of testing the claim that it was designed.

Oh, so we know the universe could not have been created by G-d because there are no universe factories with "gxds" creating universes on an assembly line.

I note that evolutionism and theistic religion have one very strange thing in common: the conviction that mankind bears a unique moral obligation to acknowledge his creator. Why else would so many atheists act as if there was something "wicked" or "immoral" about denying evolution?

And as you are well aware, I am a southern redneck. I am well aware that self-hating Southerners have to go out of their way to attack Fundamentalist Protestantism to make up for it. But oddly, I am unaware of any burning compulsion to attack anyone else's religion.