>>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.
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.”