Professor Rigid on Evolution (must "believe" to get med school rec)

The Lubbock Avalanche Journal ^ | 10/6/02 | Sebastian Kitchen

[hispanarepublicana]

Professor rigid on evolution </MCC HEAD>

By SEBASTIAN KITCHEN </MCC BYLINE1>

AVALANCHE-JOURNAL </MCC BYLINE2>

On the Net

• Criteria for letters of recommendation: http://www2.tltc.ttu.edu/dini/Personal/ letters.htm

• Michael Dini's Web page:

http://www2.tltc.ttu. edu/dini/

Micah Spradling was OK with learning about evolution in college, but his family drew the line when his belief in the theory became a prerequisite for continuing his education.

Tim Spradling said his son left Texas Tech this semester and enrolled in Lubbock Christian University after en countering the policy of one associate professor in biological sciences.

Professor Michael Dini's Web site states that a student must "truthfully and forthrightly" believe in human evolution to receive a letter of recommendation from him.

"How can someone who does not accept the most important theory in biology expect to properly practice in a field that is so heavily based on biology?" Dini's site reads.

Dini says on the site that it is easy to imagine how physicians who ignore or neglect the "evolutionary origin of humans can make bad clinical decisions."

He declined to speak with The Avalanche-Journal. His response to an e-mail from The A-J said: "This semester, I have 500 students to contend with, and my schedule in no way permits me to participate in such a debate."

A Tech spokeswoman said Chancellor David Smith and other Tech officials also did not want to comment on the story.

At least two Lubbock doctors and a medical ethicist said they have a problem with the criterion, and the ethicist said Dini "could be a real ingrate."

Tim Spradling, who owns The Brace Place, said his son wanted to follow in his footsteps and needed a letter from a biology professor to apply for a program at Southwestern University's medical school.

Spradling is not the only medical professional in Lub bock shocked by Dini's policy. Doctors Patrick Edwards and Gaylon Seay said they learned evolution in college but were never forced to believe it.

"I learned what they taught," Edwards said. "I had to. I wanted to make good grades, but it didn't change my basic beliefs."

Seay said his primary problem is Dini "trying to force someone to pledge allegiance to his way of thinking."

Seay, a Tech graduate who has practiced medicine since 1977, said a large amount of literature exists against the theory.

"He is asking people to compromise their religious be liefs," Seay said. "It is a shame for a professor to use that as a criteria."

Dini's site also states: "So much physical evidence supports" evolution that it can be referred to as fact even if all the details are not known.

"One can deny this evidence only at the risk of calling into question one's understanding of science and of the method of science," Dini states on the Web site.

Edwards said Dini admits in the statement that the details are not all known.

Dini is in a position of authority and "can injure someone's career," and the criteria is the "most prejudice thing I have ever read," Seay said.

"It is appalling," he said.

Both doctors said their beliefs in creationism have never negatively affected their practices, and Seay said he is a more compassionate doctor because of his beliefs.

"I do not believe evolution has anything to do with the ability to make clinical decisions — pro or con," Seay said.

Academic freedom should be extended to students, Edwards said.

"A student may learn about a subject, but that does not mean that everything must be accepted as fact, just because the professor or an incomplete body of evidence says so," Edwards said.

"Skepticism is also a very basic part of scientific study," he said.

The letter of recommendation should not be contingent on Dini's beliefs, Edwards said.

"That would be like Texas Tech telling him he had to be a Christian to teach biology," Edwards said.

Harold Vanderpool, professor in history and philosophy of medicine at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, said he has a problem with Dini's policy.

"I think this professor could be a real ingrate," Vanderpool said. "I have a problem with a colleague who has enjoyed all the academic freedoms we have, which are extensive, and yet denies that to our students."

Vanderpool, who has served on, advised or chaired committees for the National Institute of Health, the Food and Drug Administration and the Department of Health and Human Services, said the situation would be like a government professor requiring a student to be "sufficiently patriotic" to receive a letter.

"It seems to me that this professor is walking a pretty thin line between the protection of his right to do what he wants to do, his own academic freedom, and a level of discrimination toward a student," he said.

"It is reaching into an area of discrimination. That could be a legal problem. If not, it is a moral problem," Vanderpool said.

Instead of a recommendation resting on character and academic performance, "you've got this ideological litmus test you are using," he said. "To me, that is problematic, if not outright wrong."

William F. May, a medical ethicist who was appointed to President Bush's Council on Bioethics, said he cannot remember establishing a criterion on the question of belief with a student on exams or with letters of recommendation.

"I taught at five institutions and have always felt you should grade papers and offer judgments on the quality of arguments rather than a position on which they arrived."

Professors "enjoy the protection of academic freedom" and Dini "seems to be profoundly ungrateful" for the freedom, Vanderpool said.

He said a teacher cannot be forced to write a letter of recommendation for a student, which he believes is good because the letters are personal and have "to do with the professor's assessment of students' work habits, character, grades, persistence and so on."

A policy such as Dini's needs to be in the written materials and should be stated in front of the class so the student is not surprised by the policy and can drop the class, Vanderpool said.

Dini's site states that an individual who denies the evidence commits malpractice in the method of science because "good scientists would never throw out data that do not conform to their expectations or beliefs."

People throw out information be cause "it seems to contradict his/her cherished beliefs," Dini's site reads. A physician who ignores data cannot remain a physician for long, it states.

Dini's site lists him as an exceptional faculty member at Texas Tech in 1995 and says he was named "Teacher of the Year" in 1998-99 by the Honors College at Texas Tech.

Edwards said he does not see any evidence on Dini's vita that he attended medical school or treated patients.

"Dr. Dini is a nonmedical person trying to impose his ideas on medicine," Edwards said. "There is little in common between teaching biology classes and treating sick people. ... How dare someone who has never treated a sick person purport to impose his feelings about evolution on someone who aspires to treat such people?"

On his Web site, Dini questions how someone who does not believe in the theory of evolution can ask to be recommended into a scientific profession by a professional scientist.

May, who taught at multiple prestigious universities, including Yale, during his 50 years in academia, said he did not want to judge Dini and qualified his statements because he did not know all of the specifics.

He said the doctors may be viewing Dini's policy as a roadblock, but the professor may be warning them in advance of his policy so students are not dismayed later.

"I have never seen it done and am surprised to hear it, but he may find creationist aggressive in the class and does not want to have to cope with that," May said. "He is at least giving people the courtesy of warning them in advance."

The policy seems unusual, May said, but Dini should not be "gang-tackled and punished for his policy."

The criterion may have been viewed as a roadblock for Micah Spradling at Tech, but it opened a door for him at LCU.

Classes at LCU were full, Tim Spradling said, but school officials made room for his son after he showed them Dini's policy.

skitchen@lubbockonline.com 766-8753

[scripter]

Don't forget Patterson's comments in his 1979 letter to Sunderland that I posted: "Gradualism is a concept I believe in..." In the beginning, had you mentioned my own post stated Patterson believed in gradualism (phyletic evolution), I would have moved onto what he thought of the evidence. He staked his life on evolution and as we have seen, he knew of no transitional fossils, saw no evidence of PE, agreed evolution was based on faith alone, didn't consider it truly a scientific theory, but he didn't utterly reject it.

Can you provide quotes from Patterson's 1999 book demonstating he changed his mind on the above? I've decided to boycott amazon.com and will try to get my own copy of his 1999 book from another source. Thanks for telling me about it.

You would never know what Patterson believed of the evidence if you only listen to one side. Some here would have us believe Patterson accepted evolution hook line and sinker. From what I've posted it's obvious he didn't. The book Darwin's Enigma contains quotes from scientists, some from Patterson, that say some of the very same things anti-evolutionists on this forum have been saying all along. Some of the reasons I included the quotes here is my way of saying the anti-evolutionists are raising some of the very same concerns evolutionists have previously raised. It's my opinion you could not find an in context quote from Patterson stating he utterly accepted evolution. Some here would never admit it.

Thanks for the discussion, sir, it's truly been enjoyable.

[beckett]

The hardcore evos on this thread apparently believe that Patterson's tepid, heavily qualified defense of evolutionary theory (or I should say, the "evolutionist truism") is cause for breaking out the champagne! That's a great indication of the level of their evidentiary standards.

And to top it all off, some of them even assert that failure to subscribe fully to their version of the neverending evolutionary guessing game makes one unfit to practice medicine!

[scripter]

The hardcore evos on this thread apparently believe that Patterson's tepid, heavily qualified defense of evolutionary theory (or I should say, the "evolutionist truism") is cause for breaking out the champagne!

Well, we can hope others see Patterson's candid comments, which I'll summarize in an easy to read format. Patterson:

• staked his life on evolution
• knew of no transitional fossils
• saw no evidence of PE
• agreed evolution was based on faith alone
• didn't consider evolution truly a scientific theory

Still, Patterson didn't "utterly reject" evolution. It was just something he believed and thought "we should accept it until someone thinks of a better [theory]." I guess Dr. Raup is right, it really takes overkill for conventional wisdom to die out.

[Ready2go]

As secular science writer Richard Milton recently observed:

"An important factor in bringing about the universal dominance and acceptance of Darwinian evolution has been that virtually every eminent professional scientist appointed to posts in the life sciences in the last 40 or 50 years, in the English-speaking world, has been a convinced Darwinist. ...These men, as well as occupying powerful and important academic teaching positions, were also prolific and important writers whose influence has been widespread in forming the consensus."

These names include such men as Gavin de Beer, Julian Huxley, J.B.S. Haldane, C.H. Waddington, Ernst Mayr, Theodosius Dobzhansky and George Simpson.

Despite strong pressure to accept evolutionism, many intelligent and experienced scientists either openly or secretly dismiss Evolution as highly unlikely or impossible. In the 1980s, researcher and lecturer David Watson noted an increasing trend that continues today, disturbing those who want evolutionism to be perceived as the accepted scientific consensus:

"...A tidal wave of new books... threaten to shatter that confidence - titles like Darwin Retried (1971), Macbeth; The Neck of the Giraffe: Where Darwin Went Wrong (1982), Hitching; The Great Evolution Mystery (1983), Taylor; The Bone Peddlers: Selling Evolution (1984), Fix; Darwin Was Wrong - A Study in Probabilities (1984), Cohen; Darwinism: The Refutation of a Myth (1987), Lovtrup; and Adam and Evolution (1984), Pitman. Not one of these books was written from a Christian-apologetic point of view: they are concerned only with scientific truth - as was Sir Ernst Chain when he called evolution 'a fairy tale'."

As Science Digest reported:

"Scientists who utterly reject Evolution may be one of our fastest-growing controversial minorities... Many of the scientists supporting this position hold impressive credentials in science."

One example is the late Dr. Arthur E. Wilder-Smith, an honored scientist with an amazing three earned doctorates. He held many distinguished positions.

A former Evolutionist, Dr. Wilder-Smith debated various leading scientists on the subject throughout the world. In his opinion, the Evolution model did not fit as well with the established facts of science as did the Creation model of intelligent design.

"The Evolutionary model says that it is not necessary to assume the existence of anything, besides matter and energy, to produce life. That proposition is unscientific. We know perfectly well that if you leave matter to itself, it does not organize itself - in spite of all the efforts in recent years to prove that it does."

Secular researcher Richard Milton summarized the current world situation: "Darwinism has never had much appeal for science outside of the English-speaking world, and has never appealed much to the American public (although popular with the U.S. scientific establishment in the past). However, its ascendancy in science, in both Britain and America, has been waning for several decades as its grip has weakened in successive areas: geology; paleontology; embryology; comparative anatomy.

Now even geneticists are beginning to have doubts. It is only in mainstream molecular biology and zoology that Darwinism retains serious enthusiastic supporters. As growing numbers of scientists begin to drift away from neo-Darwinist ideas, the revision of Darwinism at the public level is long overdue, and is a process that I believe has already started."

Partial list of Creationist scientists
(past and present)

600+ voting scientists of the Creation Research Society (voting membership requires at least an earned master's degree in a recognized area of science).

150 Ph.D. scientists and 300 other scientists with masters degrees in science or engineering are members of the Korea Association of Creation Research. The President of KACR is the distinguished scientist and Professor Young-Gil Kim of the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology. Ph.D. in Materials Science, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute / highly distinguished / inventor of various important high-tech alloys.

(Note: The following list is very incomplete. Inclusion of any person on this list is in no way an endorsement, nor does it necessarily indicate anything about their religious beliefs.)

Gerald E. Aardsma (physicist and radiocarbon dating)

Louis Agassiz (helped develop the study of glacial geology and of ichthyology)

Alexander Arndt (analytical chemist, etc.)

Steven A. Austin (geologist and coal formation expert)

Charles Babbage (helped develop science of computers / developed actuarial tables and the calculating machine)

Francis Bacon (developed the Scientific Method)

Thomas G. Barnes (physicist)

Robert Boyle (helped develop sciences of chemistry and gas dynamics)

Wernher von Braun (pioneer of rocketry and space exploration)

David Brewster (helped develop science of optical mineralogy)

Arthur V. Chadwick (geologist)

Melvin Alonzo Cook (physical chemist, Nobel Prize nominee)

Georges Cuvier (helped develop sciences of comparative anatomy and vertebrate paleontology)

Humphry Davy (helped develop science of thermokinetics)

Donald B. DeYoung (physicist, specializing in solid-state, nuclear science and astronomy)

Henri Fabre (helped develop science of insect entomology)

Michael Faraday (helped develop science of electromagnetics / developed the Field Theory / invented the electric generator)

Danny R. Faulkner (astronomer)

Ambrose Fleming (helped develop science of electronics / invented thermionic valve)

Robert V. Gentry (physicist and chemist)

Duane T. Gish (biochemist)

John Grebe (chemist)

Joseph Henry (invented the electric motor and the galvanometer / discovered self-induction)

William Herschel (helped develop science of galactic astronomy / discovered double stars / developed the Global Star Catalog)

George F. Howe (botanist)

D. Russell Humphreys (award-winning physicist)

James P. Joule (developed reversible thermodynamics)

Johann Kepler (helped develop science of physical astronomy / developed the Ephemeris Tables)

John W. Klotz (geneticist and biologist)

Leonid Korochkin (geneticist)

Lane P. Lester (geneticist and biologist)

Carolus Linnaeus (helped develop sciences of taxonomy and systematic biology / developed the Classification System)

Joseph Lister (helped develop science of antiseptic surgery)

Frank L. Marsh (biologist)

Matthew Maury (helped develop science of oceanography/hydrography)

James Clerk Maxwell (helped develop the science of electrodynamics)

Gregor Mendel (founded the modern science of genetics)

Samuel F. B. Morse (invented the telegraph)

Isaac Newton (helped develop science of dynamics and the discipline of calculus / father of the Law of Gravity / invented the reflecting telescope)

Gary E. Parker (biologist and paleontologist)

Blaise Pascal (helped develop science of hydrostatics / invented the barometer)

Louis Pasteur (helped develop science of bacteriology / discovered the Law of Biogenesis / invented fermentation control / developed vaccinations and immunizations)

William Ramsay (helped develop the science of isotopic chemistry / discovered inert gases)

John Ray (helped develop science of biology and natural science)

Lord Rayleigh (helped develop science of dimensional analysis)

Bernhard Riemann (helped develop non-Euclidean geometry)

James Simpson (helped develop the field of gynecology / developed the use of chloroform)

Nicholas Steno (helped develop the science of stratigraphy)

George Stokes (helped develop science of fluid mechanics)

Charles B. Thaxton (chemist)

William Thompson (Lord Kelvin) (helped develop sciences of thermodynamics and energetics / invented the Absolute Temperature Scale / developed the Trans-Atlantic Cable)

Larry Vardiman (astrophysicist and geophysicist)

Leonardo da Vinci (helped develop science of hydraulics)

Rudolf Virchow (helped develop science of pathology)

A.J. (Monty) White (chemist)

A.E. Wilder-Smith (chemist and pharmacology expert)

John Woodward (helped develop the science of paleontology)

A more thorough list of current (and past) Creationist scientists is not provided for two reasons: (1) A complete list would be extremely lengthy, and (2) Some scientists would rather not have their name made public due to justified fear of job discrimination and persecution in today's atmosphere of limited academic freedom in Evolutionist-controlled institutions.

Creationists holding DOCTORATES IN SCIENCE
(partial list, in alphabetical order)

Agard, E. Theo

Allan, James

Armstrong, Harold

Arndt, Alexander

Austin, Steven

Barnes, Thomas

Batten, Don

Baumgardner, John

Bergman, Jerry

Boudreaux, Edward

Catchpoole, David

Chadwick, Arthur

Chaffin, Eugene

Chittick, Donald

Cimbala, John

Clausen, Ben

Cole, Sid

Cook, Melvin

Cumming, Ken

Cuozzo, Jack

Darrall, Nancy

Dewitt, David

DeYoung, Donald

Downes, Geoff

Eckel, Robert

Faulkner, Danny

Ford, Dwain

Frair, Wayne

Gentry, Robert

Giem, Paul

Gillen, Alan

Gish, Duane

Gitt, Werner

Gower, D.B.

Grebe, John

Grocott, Stephen

Hawke, George

Hollowell, Kelly

Holroyd, Edmond

Hosken, Bob

Howe, George

Humphreys, D. Russell

Javor, George

Jones, Arthur

Kaufmann, David

Kennedy, Elaine

Klotz, John

Koop, C. Everett

Korochkin, Leonid

Kramer, John

Lammerts, Walter

Lester, Lane

Livingston, David

Lopez, Raul

Marcus, John

Marsh, Frank

Mastropaolo, Joseph

McCombs, Charles

McIntosh, Andrew

McMullen, Tom

Meyer, Angela

Meyer, John

Mitchell, Colin

Morris, Henry

Morris, John

Mumma, Stanley

Parker, Gary

Peet, J. H. John

Rankin, John

Roth, Ariel

Rusch, Wilbert

Sarfati, Jonathan

Snelling, Andrew

Standish, Timothy

Taylor, Stephen

Thaxton, Charles

Thompson, Bert

Thomson, Ker

Vardiman, Larry

Veith, Walter

Walter, Jeremy

Wanser, Keith

Whitcomb, John

White, A.J.(Monty)

Wilder-Smith, Arthur Ernest

Wile, Jay

Williams, Emmett

Wise, Kurt

Wolfrom, Glen

Zuill, Henry

http://www.christiananswers.net/creation/people/home.html

[balrog666]

BWAAAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHA! You truly are a useless boob! Why not post the voter list from your precinct? It would mean about as much! BWAAAAAAAHAHAHAHA!