Proponent of Intelligent Design Denied Tenure by ISU

The Ames Tribune ^ | May 5, 2007 | William Dillon

[GodGunsGuts]

Proponent of intelligent design denied tenure by ISU

By: William Dillon

05/12/2007

Guillermo Gonzalez, an assistant professor of astronomy and physics who argues for the theory of intelligent design, was denied tenure this semester by Iowa State University.

"I was surprised to hear that my tenure was denied at any level, but I was disappointed that the president at the end denied me," Gonzalez said during a telephone interview with The Tribune Friday.

Gonzalez filed an appeal with ISU President Greg Geoffroy on Tuesday, May 8. Geoffroy has 20 days to respond.

While his work is heralded as "path-breaking" by supporters of intelligent design as a way of offering a new theory supporting design in the universe, Gonzalez has come under criticism by the mainstream science community for incorporating the theory of intelligent design into his work.

Opponents maintain that proving intelligent causes or agents is not science but rather the study of theology and philosophy. Some also have accused Gonzalez, an openly non-denominational Protestant, of thrusting religion into science.

In the summer of 2005, three faculty members at ISU drafted a statement against the use of intelligent design in science. One of those authors, Hector Avalos, told The Tribune at the time he was concerned the growing prominence of Gonzalez's work was beginning to market ISU as an "intelligent design school."

The statement collected signatures of support from more than 120 ISU faculty members before similar statements surfaced at the University of Iowa and the University of Northern Iowa.

According to ISU's policy on promotion and tenure, evaluation is based "primarily on evidence of scholarship in the faculty member's teaching, research/creative activities, and/or extension/professional practice."

In addition to that criteria, Gonzalez's department of astronomy and physics sets a benchmark for tenure candidates to author at least 15 peer-reviewed journal articles of quality. Gonzalez said he submitted 68, of which 25 have been written since he arrived at ISU in 2001.

"I believe that I fully met the requirements for tenure at ISU," he said.

Gonzalez said he would rather not comment on why he believes he was denied tenure.

On Friday, Geoffroy declined comment on why Gonzalez was denied tenure.

"Since an appeal is on my desk that I will have to pass judgment on, it is not appropriate for me to offer any comment," he wrote in an e-mail to The Tribune.

In addition to his research and teaching at ISU, Gonzalez is a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute, a conservative Seattle think tank leading the intelligent design movement.

John G. West, associate director of the Center for Science and Culture at the institute, said he sees this as a clear case of "ideological discrimination" by ISU against Gonzalez. He said he thinks the statement against intelligent design drafted at ISU played a large part in the eventual denial of Gonzalez's tenure.

"What happens to the lone faculty member who doesn't agree and happens to be untenured," he asked. "That is practically, with a wink and a nod, a call to deny him tenure."

Faculty members typically leave a university if they are denied tenure.

ISU considered 66 faculty cases for promotion and tenure during the past academic year. Only three, including Gonzalez, were denied tenure.

William Dillon can be reached at 232-2161, Ext. 361, or William.Dillon@amestrib.com.

[gondramB]

>>Science is disyinguished from magic in this regard: magic invokes invisible powers while science tries to ignore them.<<

Bad science might do that. And there is plenty of bad science around.

Good science keeps working, for generations or even centuries, if that’s what it takes, until we find the mechanism. Sometimes, enormous advances in math or technology are needed first.

Aristotle did science by “how things should be” - modern science, when its well, done requires tests and/or correct predictions.

[redgolum]

For later info

[Cicero]

I don’t think either of them proves the ID case, which would be very difficult. What they suggest is that the case for the purely materialist explanation is astronomically improbable, even with many billions of years to work with. So, what could be a more probable alternative?

I had already thought myself many years ago when I first ran into evolutionary theory that it seemed highly improbable, but with the development of cell biology the case is now much clearer.

I could never imagine how fitness could explain, for example, the development of an eye or wings. There would be no advantage in having half-developed wings or a partly developed eye that didn’t work yet, so why would these things continue to develop over long periods of time when they were actually a drag in the intermediate stages of development?

It’s far more difficult how you could develop dozens of highly complex biological molecules or amino acids, none of which have any purpose unless they co-exist with all the other molecules or amino acids. Even the simplest life forms are incredibly complex on the molecular level. Stirring the primal soup just doesn’t cut it.

[gondramB]

>>I don’t think either of them proves the ID case, which would be very difficult. What they suggest is that the case for the purely materialist explanation is astronomically improbable, even with many billions of years to work with. So, what could be a more probable alternative?<<

I’m obviously not in charge but I would not have a problem answering that question for kids with “I don’t know but here are some ideas that have been put forward but for which there is no evidence yet.”

For example there is a theory in physics that there is no magnetic monopole - i.e magnetism never appears by itself but is always created by electricity. I remember asking a professor how it would change science if a magnetic monopole was discovered - we had a fun day (by nerd standards) showing the changes that would have to be made to various formulas.

That’s different though, than teaching that magnetic monopoles are real because we have good theory that shows magnetism only comes from moving electricity and never can appear by itself. Since the current theory is useful (i.e. it makes many predictions not made by any other theory) and a magnetic monopole theory has no supporting evidence, it would be wrong to put magnetic monopoles into science curriculum.

Its pretty much the same with ID. The current theory is useful and supported by evidence while ID is not so ID should not go in the science curriculum.

But I hope teachers don’t get too scared to answer questions.

[AmishDude]

It’s worse. Rockets are just calculus. To use the inaccurate language of physics, you just have an element of mass and integrate. I.e., dF=a*dm.

Newton was wrong.

He didn’t account for relativistic effects. Now, a physicist would say that it’s such a minor effect that it doesn’t matter, but if you want to use the language of mathematics, you have to have the standards of mathematics.

The physicists know the difference, but I shudder at the softer scientists who say “this evidence proves...”.

[Cicero]

Well, I’ve been in college academia for a long time, and at least since the cultural revolution began in 1968 it has rarely been the case that conservative professors persecuted liberals, except possibly in a few small religious colleges. In fact, many “religious” colleges are now dominated by the leftists, too.

At least 99 times out of a hundred, it’s been the leftists who can’t stand to have any conservative or religious ideas expressed, or even insufficient enthusiasm for their pet ideologies.

It’s much the same in the public school systems in most places.

At the moment, Darwinism has a monopoly. I don’t see any danger in the foreseeable future that intelligent design will ever hold a similar monopoly. And, perhaps, in a few Bible Belt school systems, creationism still holds sway, but I doubt that that is very common.

I agree with you, it’s fun to discuss these things, and I think most people just want that to be possible in our schools, without having the courts come down on them. If there isn’t Darwinian general evolution, there are certainly hierarchies, ladders of species, genera, families, and so on, and these things can be discussed without being dogmatic about them.

I have a friend with a PhD in artificial intelligence, who teaches in a philosophy department. I find it interesting to discuss whether rationality in a general and meaningful sense is even possible unless you posit something like the Logos to make the human mind more than an accidental phenomenon hitching a ride on the interactions of material particles. How does it happen that physics, which deals in material particulars, accords so harmoniously with mathematics, which is a theoretical construct of the mind? How does the mind, which can only think in Aristotelian universals and categories, deal so successfully with matter objects, which you might call nominalist?

If Darwinism disappears from the schools, it will be because people grow tired of it and no longer find it useful, like Freudianism, not because IDers manage to outlaw it. I still find some aspects of Freudianism useful, now that it is no longer a kind of authoritative religion that permits no disagreement with it, under penalty of being called “hostile.”

[GodGunsGuts]

I wrote to the Discovery Institute (Discovery.org) and informed them that a rumor was going around that Guillermo Gonzalez had not been published in mainstream science journals. They emailed me back with a link to a list of his published, peer reviewed papers:

http://www.discovery.org/scripts/viewDB/filesDB-download.php?command=download&id=1362

[jwalsh07]

You state that ID is religion. Well, religion is protected and Iowa State is a state actor meaning that denial of tenure based on religious choice is a no go. Perhaps you’d like to rethink the ID is religion thing?

[jwalsh07]

You state that ID is religion. Well, religion is protected and Iowa State is a state actor meaning that denial of tenure based on religious choice is a no go. Perhaps you’d like to rethink the ID is religion thing?

[Coyoteman]

You state that ID is religion. Well, religion is protected and Iowa State is a state actor meaning that denial of tenure based on religious choice is a no go. Perhaps you’d like to rethink the ID is religion thing?

No. I still think ID is religion.

However, ID proponents consistently claim to be doing science. That is what makes the following line in the Wedge Document so ironic:

We are building on this momentum, broadening the wedge with a positive scientific alternative to materialistic scientific theories, which has come to be called the theory of intelligent design (ID). Design theory promises to reverse the stifling dominance of the materialist worldview, and to replace it with a science consonant with Christian and theistic convictions.

[Radix]

That entire 6000 year thing is a red herring.

Nowhere in the Bible does it give any indication that the Earth is 6000 years old.

Nowhere.

On the other hand, the 6000 year date does come into play when it comes to the generations of Man.

This is more evidence to me that the produce of Public Education is not quite able to pass a quality control inspection.

[jwalsh07]

No. I still think ID is religion.

Then you'd agree that any denial of tenure due to religious expression outside the classroom by a state actor violates the First Amendment, correct?

[jwalsh07]

You've heard of Google Scholar no doubt. Would you care to familiarize yourself with some of the work of Guillermo Gonzales?

[Coyoteman]

Then you'd agree that any denial of tenure due to religious expression outside the classroom by a state actor violates the First Amendment, correct?

Nice try. Let's just ask IDers whether they are pushing science or religion and see what they say.

The whole scam depends on them claiming that ID is science. They can't claim religious discrimination without blowing their cover!

[jwalsh07]

LOL, courage and conviction seem to be somewhat foreign to Coyotemen.

[GodGunsGuts]

==The fact that a small minority of religious believers disagree with the results of the theory of evolution does not discredit it as a science. It follows the scientific method.

Sorry, Darwinian evolution is nothing more than a materialist myth. The evolutionists tell us “that major evolutionary changes happen far too slowly, or too rarely, to be observable in the lifetime of human observers. Most living organisms and their offspring are said to remain largely unchanged for tens of thousands, or even millions, of years. According to the evolutionist Theodosius Dobzhansky, even when evolutionary changes do occur, they are by nature ‘unique, unrepeatable, and irreversible.’ Dobzhansky tells us that the ‘applicability of the experimental method to the study of such unique historical processes is severely restricted.’ The well-known evolutionist Paul Ehrlich says the theory of evolution ‘cannot be refuted by any possible observations’ and thus is ‘outside of empirical science.’” Sounds like faith to me. In short, these so-called scientists have managed to put a stranglehold on the ideology of science and are nothing short of a new priesthood—evangelists, if you will, sent forth by the First Church of Darwin.

[Coyoteman]

The well-known evolutionist Paul Ehrlich says the theory of evolution ‘cannot be refuted by any possible observations’ and thus is ‘outside of empirical science.’

This is an inaccurate quote--but it is used often enough to claim something it does not actually say that it made The Quote Mine Project: Or, Lies, Damned Lies and Quote Mines.

Here is the documentation (about 2/3 of the way down the page).

[Coyoteman]

According to the evolutionist Theodosius Dobzhansky, even when evolutionary changes do occur, they are by nature ‘unique, unrepeatable, and irreversible.’ Dobzhansky tells us that the ‘applicability of the experimental method to the study of such unique historical processes is severely restricted.’

You quote Theodosius Dobzhansky in such a way as to make it appear that he does not support the theory of evolution.

Wikipedia's article on quote mining notes that:

Although the phrase itself is new, complaints about the practice are not. Theodosius Dobzhansky's famous 1973 essay Nothing in Biology Makes Sense Except in the Light of Evolution:

Their [Creationists'] favorite sport is stringing together quotations, carefully and sometimes expertly taken out of context, to show that nothing is really established or agreed upon among evolutionists. Some of my colleagues and myself have been amused and amazed to read ourselves quoted in a way showing that we are really antievolutionists under the skin.

That is now two quotes I have refuted from your paragraph a few posts above. Perhaps you should do research somewhere other than creationist websites. Your uncritical use of their doctored quotes is making you look foolish and your arguments look weak.

[ChessExpert]

ID is based on scripture and revelation.

So you claim. But what I have read on Intelligent Design is not based on scripture and/or revelation. Perhaps you are fighting a phantasm of your own imagining. I suggest you read Gonzalez’s Privileged Planet. I think you would learn more about Gonzalez, and about Intelligent Design.

[GodGunsGuts]

I checked your reference. It appears that the Church of Darwin have gotten their panties in a twist over a single sentence. Ok, I’ll add it here. Here’s the quote with the additional sentence:

“Our theory of evolution has become . . . one which cannot be refuted by any possible observations. It is thus “outside of empirical science,” but not necessarily false. No one can think of ways in which to test it. . . . (Evolutionary ideas) have become part of an evolutionary dogma accepted by most of us as part of our training. The cure seems to us not to be a discarding of the modern synthesis of evolutionary theory, but more skepticism about many of its tenets” (Ehrlich and Birch, p. 352).

Sounds to me like they are lamenting the fact that Darwinism has become dogma and made them a laughingstock among scientists (and now laymen) who know better. LOL!