Professor's Snub of Creationists Prompts U.S. Inquiry

New York Times ^ | 2/02/03 | NICK MADIGAN

[kattracks]

UBBOCK, Tex., Feb. 2 — A biology professor who insists that his students accept the tenets of human evolution has found himself the subject of Justice Department scrutiny.

Prompted by a complaint from the Liberty Legal Institute, a group of Christian lawyers, the department is investigating whether Michael L. Dini, an associate professor of biology at Texas Tech University here, discriminated against students on the basis of religion when he posted a demand on his Web site that students wanting a letter of recommendation for postgraduate studies "truthfully and forthrightly affirm a scientific answer" to the question of how the human species originated.

"The central, unifying principle of biology is the theory of evolution," Dr. Dini wrote. "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?"

That was enough for the lawyers' group, based in Plano, a Dallas suburb, to file a complaint on behalf of a 22-year-old Texas Tech student, Micah Spradling.

Mr. Spradling said he sat in on two sessions of Dr. Dini's introductory biology class and shortly afterward noticed the guidelines on the professor's Web site (www2.tltc.ttu.edu/dini/Personal/letters.htm).

Mr. Spradling said that given the professor's position, there was "no way" he would have enrolled in Dr. Dini's class or asked him for a recommendation to medical school.

"That would be denying my faith as a Christian," said Mr. Spradling, a junior raised in Lubbock who plans to study prosthetics and orthotics at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas. "They've taken prayer out of schools and the Ten Commandments out of courtrooms, so I thought I had an opportunity to make a difference."

In an interview in his office, Dr. Dini pointed to a computer screen full of e-mail messages and said he felt besieged.

"The policy is not meant in any way to be discriminatory toward anyone's beliefs, but instead to ensure that people who I recommend to a medical school or a professional school or a graduate school in the biomedical sciences are scientists," he said. "I think science and religion address very different types of questions, and they shouldn't overlap."

Dr. Dini, who said he had no intention of changing his policy, declined to address the question of his own faith. But university officials and several students who support him say he is a religious man.

"He's a devout Catholic," said Greg Rogers, 36, a pre-med student from Lubbock. "He's mentioned it in discussion groups."

Mr. Rogers, who returned to college for a second degree and who said his beliefs aligned with Dr. Dini's, added: "I believe in God and evolution. I believe that evolution was the tool that brought us about. To deny the theory of evolution is, to me, like denying the law of gravity. In science, a theory is about as close to a fact as you can get."

Another student, Brent Lawlis, 21, from Midland, Tex., said he hoped to become an orthopedic surgeon and had had no trouble obtaining a letter of recommendation from Dr. Dini. "I'm a Christian, but there's too much biological evidence to throw out evolution," he said.

But other students waiting to enter classes Friday morning said they felt that Dr. Dini had stepped over the line. "Just because someone believes in creationism doesn't mean he shouldn't give them a recommendation," said Lindsay Otoski, 20, a sophomore from Albuquerque who is studying nursing. "It's not fair."

On Jan. 21, Jeremiah Glassman, chief of the Department of Justice's civil rights division, told the university's general counsel, Dale Pat Campbell, that his office was looking into the complaint, and asked for copies of the university's policies on letters of recommendation.

David R. Smith, the Texas Tech chancellor, said on Friday afternoon that the university, a state institution with almost 30,000 students and an operating budget of $845 million, had no such policy and preferred to leave such matters to professors.

In a letter released by his office, Dr. Smith noted that there were 38 other faculty members who could have issued Mr. Spradling a letter of recommendation, had he taken their classes. "I suspect there are a number of them who can and do provide letters of recommendation to students regardless of their ability to articulate a scientific answer to the origin of the human species," Dr. Smith wrote.

Members of the Liberty Legal Institute, who specialize in litigating what they call religious freedom cases, said their complaint was a matter of principle.

"There's no problem with Dr. Dini saying you have to understand evolution and you have to be able to describe it in detail," said Kelly Shackelford, the group's chief counsel, "but you can't tell students that they have to hold the same personal belief that you do."

Mr. Shackelford said that he would await the outcome of the Justice Department investigation but that the next step would probably be to file a suit against the university.

[PatrickHenry]

Truth is not threatened by inquiry; but resistance to such inquiry is prima facie cause for such inquiry.

Yes. Alas, we differ as to which one (the student or the professor) has the closed mind.

[longshadow]

Inquisitorial Placemarker!

[Alamo-Girl]

I want to absorb everything, PatrickHenry! I don't restrict my surfing to websites that agree with my worldview. How could I learn otherwise?

[PatrickHenry]

I want to absorb everything, PatrickHenry! I don't restrict my surfing to websites that agree with my worldview. How could I learn otherwise?

Most commendable. But one does need to employ rational epistemological filters. For example: THE TIME CUBE .

[Nebullis]

The DOJ is compelled to investigate any complaint.

Do you have a source for that statement?

I suppose frivolously ludicrous complaints can be closed without investigation. This case has caused such a local and national uproar, however, that it isn't frivolous, even if it is found to be meritless after investigation.

[Alamo-Girl]

LOL! Thanks for the chuckle!

You’ve known me for a long time, PatrickHenry, so I hope by now you realize that I am epistemologically zealous when it comes to math and science. I am infinitely more zealous when it comes to the Word. But I have never had a problem reconciling the two.

With regard to science, my worldview can be summarized by these quotes from Einstein:

Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.

I have deep faith that the principle of the universe will be beautiful and simple.

These thoughts did not come in any verbal formulation. I rarely think in words at all. A thought comes, and I may try to express it in words afterward.

And my favorite…

"The most beautiful and deepest experience a man can have is the sense of the mysterious. It is the underlying principle of religion as well as all serious endeavour in art and science. He who never had this experience seems to me, if not dead, then at least blind. To sense that behind anything that can be experienced there is a something that our mind cannot grasp and whose beauty and sublimity reaches us only indirectly and as a feeble reflection, this is religiousness. In this sense I am religious. To me it suffices to wonder at these secrets and to attempt humbly to grasp with my mind a mere image of the lofty structure of all that there is."

We have a common goal in finding answers to great questions. IMHO, our difference is perspective.

[Alamo-Girl]

Thank you so much for the clarification! My ears really perked up with the original observation because it dawned on me that we might have had more success in the Clinton years by "freeping" the DOJ with legitimate complaints. That would have kept Reno and crew too busy for Elian, et al (LOL!)

[f.Christian]

Logic requires you to be right more than one time . . .

and even one time w/o twisting the facts to prove a fallacy from the start to the ending . . .

evolution will never be a science - - - only a cult // ideology ==== an aberrant theory of science !

[Nebullis]

My ears really perked up with the original observation because it dawned on me that we might have had more success in the Clinton years by "freeping" the DOJ with legitimate complaints.

What makes you think legitimate complaints aren't investigated?

[Nebullis]

If it can be determined from the complaint that it is frivolous, then the case can be closed. But, in the current complaint, such couldn't be determined, because there wasn't enough information. That's why the DOJ asked Texas Tech for its policy on recommendations (there is none). The investigation will determine if the complaint has merit.

[SkyRat]

Einstein believed in a creator ....

"It was, of course, a lie what you read about my religious convictions, a lie which is being systematically repeated. I do not believe in a personal God and I have never denied this but have expressed it clearly. If something is in me which can be called religious then it is the unbounded admiration for the structure of the world so far as our science can reveal it." - Albert Einstein in Albert Einstein: The Human Side, edited by Helen Dukas (Einstein's secretary) and Banesh Hoffman, and published by Princeton University Press..

"Our situation on this earth seems strange. Every one of us appears here involuntary and uninvited for a short stay, without knowing the whys and the wherefore. In our daily lives we only feel that man is here for the sake of others, for those whom we love and for many other beings whose fate is connected with our own." ... "The most beautiful and deepest experience a man can have is the sense of the mysterious. It is the underlying principle of religion as well as all serious endeavour in art and science. He who never had this experience seems to me, if not dead, then at least blind. To sense that behind anything that can be experienced there is a something that our mind cannot grasp and whose beauty and sublimity reaches us only indirectly and as a feeble reflection, this is religiousness. In this sense I am religious. To me it suffices to wonder at these secrets and to attempt humbly to grasp with my mind a mere image of the lofty structure of all that there is." Einstein's speech 'My Credo' to the German League of Human Rights, Berlin, autumn 1932, Einstein: A Life in Science, Michael White and John Gribbin, Page 262.

"I believe in Spinoza's God who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what exists, not in a God who concerns himself with fates and actions of human beings." Upon being asked if he believed in God by Rabbi Herbert Goldstein of the Institutional Synagogue, New York, April 24, 1921, Einstein: The Life and Times, Ronald W. Clark, Page 502.

[Lurking Libertarian]

Its too bad that Albert Einstein, who believed in a creator, would not have met the professor's standards. As limitating as you may think it is to believe in a creator

Where does this professor say that you cannot believe in a Creator? Did you read the article?

[Alamo-Girl]

Oh, I suspect the person filing the complaint always believes it is legitimate. But I would imagine the DOJ gets a ton of such complaints and sorts them down into areas and priorities for assignment. From there, I would expect the low priority complaints to go on the back burner until they become a non-issue.

That's just a guess based on the relative size of the DOJ and that even the U.S. attorneys are political appointees. (One of the first things Clinton and Reno did was to fire all US attorneys and replace them with their own.)

In sum, I see the DOJ as primarily motivated by the law - but subject to politics. That's why, in this case, because an "unintended consequence" could be religious institutions having to hire pagans - I wouldn't be surprised to see it on Ashcroft's desk. He might prefer to "punt" the underlying issue to the White House or Congress to clarify the law before doing anything else. That would be a good result, IMHO.

[balrog666]

Yes. Alas, we differ as to which one (the student or the professor) has the closed mind.

That statement seems to summarize the entire thread thus far.

[Nebullis]

In sum, I see the DOJ as primarily motivated by the law - but subject to politics.

I agree. I would add but, subject to religious beliefs as well. That trumps law, doesn't it? And this is a case certain creationist want to see processed.

[Nebullis]

Just a reminder of Micah Spradling's own view on the subject of evolution: (emphasis mine)

"I really don't see how believing in the evolution of humanity has anything to do with patient care or studying science."

[Physicist]

Just go to the professors web site, he specifically states that you must accept the scientic explaination for the origion of humans.

If that's the best you can do, I consider you refuted.

[Always Right]

From the Professor's web site:

If you set up an appointment to discuss the writing of a letter of recommendation, I will ask you: "How do you think the human species originated?" If you cannot truthfully and forthrightly affirm a scientific answer to this question, then you should not seek my recommendation for admittance to further education in the biomedical sciences.

The professor specifically states origination of the 'human species' several times. This indicates that he will not accept any non-scientific belief in the creation of man, and thus rules out any belief in a creator, even a non-Christian belief such as Einstien held.

[Alamo-Girl]

Thank you so much for your post!

I would add but, subject to religious beliefs as well. That trumps law, doesn't it? And this is a case certain creationist want to see processed.

Interesting that you should bring that up. Oath of office is a promise to God which must be kept, if a person is a Christian.

A classic case is Justice Scalia, who is Catholic and has to rule on abortion and the death penalty. He ruled with the majority in Planned Parenthood v. Casey despite his Catholic beliefs.

And here is Scalia again Justice Scalia vs. the Pope - Should every Catholic judge in America quit? By Dahlia Lithwick

For the second time in two months, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia has pitted his formidable brain against the Catholic Church and its increasingly strong stand against the death penalty. Addressing students at Georgetown University last week, Scalia argued that Catholic judges who believe the church's teaching that capital punishment is wrong should not be on the bench, stating that "any Catholic jurists (with such concerns) ... would have to resign." The comment didn't win him many fans. Catholics objected to Scalia's public renunciation of the pope's teachings. Religious judges balked at the implication that they cannot separate their religious convictions from their judicial duties. And many of us came away with the uneasy sense that such personal revelations by Supreme Court justices about ideology and religion compromise judicial neutrality.

[f.Christian]

Just calling evolution a theory is an overstatement . . .

only an idea // mood // feeling - - -

an ideology === perverse oddity ! ! !


To: f.Christian

Conjecture masquarading as science might be more appropos - I agree.


71 posted on 01/21/2003 12:04 PM PST by Havoc ((Evolution is a theory, Creationism is God's word, ID is science, Sanka is coffee))

DOGMA masquarading as science might be more appropos - I agree.

Main Entry: dog·ma
Pronunciation: 'dog-m&, 'däg-
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): plural dogmas also dog·ma·ta /-m&-t&/
Etymology: Latin dogmat-, dogma, from Greek, from dokein to seem -- more at DECENT
Date: 1638
1 a : something held as an established opinion; especially : a definite authoritative tenet b : a code of such tenets < pedagogical dogma > c : a point of view or tenet put forth as authoritative without adequate grounds
2 : a doctrine or body of doctrines concerning faith or morals formally stated and authoritatively proclaimed by a church

Main Entry: 1con·jec·ture
Pronunciation: k&n-'jek-ch&r
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English, from Middle French or Latin; Middle French, from Latin conjectura, from conjectus, past participle of conicere, literally, to throw together, from com- + jacere to throw -- more at JET
Date: 14th century
1 obsolete a : interpretation of omens b : SUPPOSITION
2 a : inference from defective or presumptive evidence b : a conclusion deduced by surmise or guesswork c : a proposition (as in mathematics) before it has been proved or disproved