There are two problems with your argument:
1- Intelligent design is not science. It is not a hypothesis that can be tested through scientific study. Without this requisite, it cannot be taught in a science classroom.
2- How many high school students have a good enough background in science and religion to actually have a productive discussion about intelligent design. It would be like talking to little kids about what presidential candidate is the best, they would just say whatever their parents have taught them (or the opposite to rebel against their parents). Save the discussion of intelligent design for college. Instead teach evolution, which is vital for success in biology at the college level.

I'm certain that "evolutionnews.org" [sloppy reporting] is a reliable source, and that the 500 people referenced are considered be leading lights (or even nightlights) in their field). To imply that there is even a small plurality of the scientific field that denies the primacy of evolution is, simply, a lie.

There is no question that the theory of evolution has some holes to be filled. That's true of many scientific theories. However, a competing "theory" must be amenable to the scientific method. Creationism/ID simply are not. If I argue that gravity is caused by the love God has for each of his creatures and the force of His mind, I may or may not be right, but my theory is not "scientific," and need not be treated as such.

The ID strategy goes like this: announce an untestable theory that posits God's role as creator. Wait for indignant reactions from scientists. Announce that their reaction demonstrates that there is a legitimate "controversy." When the scientists maintain that your theory is not scientific, you accuse them ... of being not scientific for not agreeing that your untestable theory is part of legitimate debate!

It's good politics, and stupid science, and makes us all dumber for having to hear it.

Joelle, you are free to "choose" that the "theory" of gravity does not apply to those whom God truly loves. However, I suggest that you test your theory from a relatively low roof.

You are missing the point. Intelligent Design is simply NOT SCIENCE. 500 doctoral scientists is actually a very small number, and who knows what their exact position is. They may have a problem with only SOME of the facets of Darwin's Theory of Evolution. There is plenty to debate about when it comes to the mechanics of Evolution, but NOT when it comes to wether Evolution took place and TAKES place.

Evolution is a SCIENTIFIC theory, whereas Intelligent Design is not. Until Intelligent Design can ascend to the status of being a scientific theory, it has absolutely NO business in being part of the science curriculum any more than long division has any place in a World History class. Let's not weaken science by confusing our students over what is OBVIOUSLY a religious manipulation of science.

Alex

For essays that show "Why Intelligent Design is Scientific", please visit:

http://intelligentreasoning.blogspot.com

All comments are welcome.

The essays will show that both "intelligence" and "design" are natural processes. That acceptance of ID does not require one to believe in "God" anymore than acceptance of the theory of evolution mandates atheism.

And the essays will show that if held to the SAME standards (as ID critics demand of ID) the theory of evolution wouldn't be considered science.

Intelligent design should be included where it belongs - as part of curriculum covering religions and other myths.

I don't buy this "let the students decide for themselves" philosophy. If something is incorrect, then students need to be told so and it needs to be explained to them why it is incorrect. Why don't we let representatives from every major religion into the science class, and they can teach the kids 100 different "theories"? Why stop there? Why not let kids decide if they want to believe that the earth is flat or round. Or how about basic physics? If a child wants to believe that he can fly, then let him jump off a roof.

The point is, Intelligent Design is not science. Even if it's presented in a way as to not reference religion, it is still not science. Science class is about teaching kids how the world really works. And even if there is some theory that is "incomplete," it doesn't validate any arbirary, superstitious belief.

Banning ID in science class is not limiting students' freedom of choice. It is making sure they get a proper education in science.

If they aren't taking a theology class deciding between "what is right" shouldn't even be an option. Religion, as it is taught in ID, has absolutely nothing to do with science. If they had a similar theory applied to math a child could just punch a complicated problem into a calculator and not have to show his work because "a higher power created these math rules." What ID teaches about the pursuit of knowledge is dangerous to have in a public school because it undermines all of the other info the kids are being taught. Scientist aren't trying to stifle our children's education, they are trying to make sure it is actually something that can educate before it is spoon fed to them. You can't call ID science because it doesn't stand up to any definition of the word.

"because of one dominating staple of American life: freedom of choice"

I guess that includes the freedom to be ignorant as well?

Joelle, either you are adept at spouting GOP talking points, or you need to get a serious clue.

This bill does not ban intellgent design in public schools, just as there is no ban on prayer in public schools. You can pray every second of the day in school, and no one will stop you. Teachers LEADING the prayer is another matter.

This bill merely is a response (not a preemptive strike) to the zealots who want to create some atricifical scientific conflict between darwinism and creationism. There is no scientific conflict between them because creationism IS NOT SCIENCE.

If a classroom teacher in civics, U.S. politics, history, social studies, wants to discuss, debate and throughly present creationism or intelligent design to students, that is perfectly acceptable. In fact, it is currently being done across the country. That presentation, however, does not belong in a science class any more than astrology belongs in a history class.

This issue is all about the far, far, far right wing of the christian conservatives trying to establish their view of the world as the only view acceptable. Would you allow Muslim teachings in Science class? They too have a belief about how the world began.

I would think we want to teach in a science class that which is currently supported by the scientific community. In the area of biology, the modern theory of evolution is overwhelmingly supported by the scientific community.

Scientists are taught to be skeptics. And the purpose of peer review is to critically examine each scientific work before publication. Understandably then, when asked if modern evolutionary theory presents problems to a scientist, we will get a significant number skeptical of certain elements of the theory. This does not necessarily mean that these scientists support the Intelligent Design hypothesis.

Modern evolutionary theory is well-accepted because it explains how life works better than any other alternate theory. If compelling evidence was found to support the Intelligent Design hypothesis, scientists would no doubt be in a rush to peer-review and publish the work. Scientists are driven by recognition as much as any other social endeavor. There are always contrarian researchers in the scientific community who would jump at new areas of opportunity should they show promise.

The reality is that no such compelling evidence has yet been found. Arguments for the Intelligent Design hypothesis entail disproving the adequacy of evolution to explain, but such arguments, while they may be convincing to a non-scientist, ultimately do not support the assertion that the Intelligent Design hypothesis is true. Within the peer-reviewed scientific literature, the Intelligent Design hypothesis remains just a hypothesis. There is no theory.

Arguing for teaching Intelligent Design in a science classroom as a matter of freedom of choice, is a strategy that many ID supporters voice. While each public school board must be sensitive to the worldviews of the community it serves, it must always rule in favor of what it determines as good education. When it comes to teaching biology, modern evolutionary theory has no competing alternative.

I would like to discuss a few points from Ms. Parks's column.

Alan Attie earned his Ph.D. from the University of California-San Diego, so he should be referred to as Dr. Attie, not Mr. Attie as Ms. Parks referred to him as.

Ms. Parks suggests that a flaw with this proposed legislation is that it only applies to science curricula. She states that although a high school science teacher could not mention a supreme being while teaching under this legislation, a math teacher could lecture about geology, biology, and even religion. I suppose that is true. However, no religious groups are attempting inject pseudomathematics into the curriculum. No one is saying that 1 + 1 = 3. Intelligent design advocates are, however, misrepresenting what science is in order to further a religious agenda, hidden as it may be.

The scientific community is responding to the threat that is intelligent design. If groups were trying to redefine mathematics or rewrite history, it would be up to those respective communities to respond as well. So until school boards begin to adopt 1 + 1 = 3, I think the mathematics curriculum is safe.

I would also like to add a point that I have seldom heard in this debate. The scientific community is not attempting injecet its standards and practices into religious doctrine. We are not saying that there is no room for debate on the creation vs. evolution issue from religious or philosophical standpoints. We are saying, however, that intelligent design is not science and does not belong in science classrooms.

The idea that science goes down to "freedom of choice" is just plain silly.

You may "choose" to disbelieve Newton's second law, but if you run face first into a wall it will, nevertheless, hurt like hell.

Dispite popular thinking, not all things are a matter of personal choice, regardless of how much we'd like them to be. If they were, I have disbelieve Newtons third law quite some time ago, built a perpetual motion machine, and retired to seaside villa in Costa Rica years ago.

Ms. Parks, you need to check your facts. The proposed bill of which you speak does NOT seek to ban ID from public schools. It seeks to ban it from SCIENCE classrooms, because it is NOT science. It can be taught in other courses, just not as science.

No new law is needed. A teacher in public school is ALREADY allowed to preach that life forms were created not by God but by the majestic and creative power of blind accident operating over billions of years. This is called "science". In biology and geology, kids are taught to worship the marvelous power of blind accident operating over billions of years; kids are taught that Mother Nature is the "blind watchmaker", the Creator of the Universe.

But another teacher in the next class over ALREADY is not allowed to share her view that the complexity and efficiency of a bird's wing is evidence of supremely intelligent aeronautical design, that if a painting of an eagle in flight can be identified as intelligently designed, then so can the actual eagle in flight. No, should she utter a mere observation she will be fired, perhaps sued.

The anti-theist is free to exercise his faith, but the theist is not free to express her intelligent observation.

It is obvious to every fair minded person that if one view is religious, then both are religious; if one view is scientific, then both are scientific.

There was a time in history when governments mandated the teaching of Ptolemaic Astronomy. Ptolemaic astronomy was founded on the idea that the sun and the planets rotate around the earth. Now Mrs. Berceau wants to mandate the teaching of Darwinian evolution to the exclusion of all other ideas. This is progress?

"There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance-that principle is contempt prior to investigation."
--Herbert Spencer

Glenn Jennings

"What is the point of preaching freedom of choice when the government is constantly trying to limit these freedoms?"

No one is denying you freedom of choice.

You can believe in intelligent if you choose.
You can believe that Shakespeare is a hack.
You can believe that 2+2=5

"But if the math teacher wants to educate students about the development of earth and humans right along with multiplication, it is legal for her to do so."

Legal, but stupid. The legislators are hoping, perhaps incorrectly, that they do not need to write a law that prohibits teaching history and calling it math or teaching music and calling it psychology. They shouldn't have to write a law for science classes, but too many people don't know enough about science to recognize that intelligent design isn't science.

Scientists are free to investigate intelligent design.

"It is difficult, if not impossible, to convince people of a single way of creation, especially when the scientific community has enough trouble agreeing itself. According to "evolutionnews.com," there are over 500 doctoral scientists who have signed a statement publicly expressing their skepticism about the contemporary version of Darwin's theory of evolution."

There is no debate in the scientific community. I wish I had better statistics for you, but the Discovery Institute, the organization that collected the 514 signatures admits that only about 1/4 of them are biologists.

According to the Occupational Outlook Handbook, there were 77,000 employed biological scientists in the U.S. in 2004.

514/4/77,000*100=.17% if I haven't screwed up the math. Not much of a debate.

Let's talk, hypothetically, about surgery. 99 doctors recommend one technique, but one doctor recommends another. Do you want medical students to learn both techniques and decide for themselves or would you like the medical schools to teach only proven techniques?

I think Glenn needs a refresher course on the philosophy of science. How is "that if one view is religious, then both are religious; if one view is scientific, then both are scientific" true? By that logic, if your car doesn't start, and you think it is because you are out of gas, then that is a religious belief.

There is a place for religion in school, and that place is in a philosophy of religion, or history of religion class.

To simply assert that things in nature needed a designer is wildly unscientific and illogical. At what point do you stop investigating, throw up your hands and say "well, this can only have happened by a designer." If people did that, we would not have the understanding we have today. The periodic table would have the four elements, wind, water, fire, earth. Nobody would question why the sun rises and sets because it would already be known: the earth is at the center.

IDists use the phrase "irreducible complexity," IC. What is the criteria for something to be IC? Maybe I think snow flakes are irreducibly complex. But someone with knowledge of thermodynamics would tell you about lowest energy states of crystal lattices.

There is no logical way to make a jump from empirical observation to magic. Ok, so DNA appears to be designed? What does this tell us? Nothing. We haven't gained knowledge, nor have we really explained anything. Science is about constructing logically consistent models about how the world works. The ID mentality is to view the world as a black box, stamp the label "god" on it, and walk away.

A good scientific model must satisfy the following criteria: 1, it must explain. 2, it must predict. 3, it must be simple.

ID seems to pass on 1. But, literally any theory will pass 1. Just use the phrase "_____ did it," and insert whatever word you want in the blank. So ID doesn't offer much of an explanation

It totally fails on point 2. Ok, so we have this being called "creator" that did something. Using this new idea, what else does it tell us? Nothing. I guess you could run around the park, pointing at every tree, squirrel and bird yelling "god made that. God made that. God made that." Is this an explanation? It really doesn't tell us much. It is merely relabeling something. "god" becomes equivalent to "unkown."

And ID really fails on point 3. The goal of science is to take a complex world and make it simple (dispite what freshmen may think about intro to physics.) Maxwell discovered that electricity and magnetism were related. Newton showed that the forces in the heavens are the same as those on the earth. Every element in a scientific model is there for a reason. Nothing is frivolous. If you want to describe the trajectory of cannon balls, you write F=ma. You don't write F=ma, and unicorns are pink. It has nothing to do with anything. Likewise, to create some magical, super powerful being as a mechanism for explanation is taking a huge step backward in science. Ok, if god created life, then what created god? What are the properties of god? What is the nature of this designer? And wouldn't this designer be irreducibly complex?

There is only the natural world. There is, by defintion, nothing outside this universe. And nothing is beyond the reach of scientific investigation.

Paul, Glen, and Scott, ID is science, it has hypothesis', testable predictions, and seeks to discover design empirically, see the IDEAcenter Website. Ideacenter.org... so if you are going to whine go whine to your liberal friends, but unless you have something other than denial to add, you might as well not even comment.

I find it interesting to hear people argue against teaching intelligent design using arguments that they designed.

To compare the ideas and arguments put forth by the intelligent design theory with the idea that the world is flat is a terribly unfair and misleading comparison. Intelligent design does not posit that the world is flat. You should think about that for a moment. Don't forget that qualified and reputable scientists are backing and putting forth the ideas of intelligent design because they have reached an intellectual breaking point with evolutionary theory. The point was also made that all religions would have to be allowed in the classroom if they allowed intelligent design. But I would argue that evolutionary theory requires as much faith as any of these other religions so it too should be left out of the classroom. One must believe that the theory explains what we observe in nature and the world and thus the continuing debate amoung evolutionists and IDers and creationists. I don't think that evolution, ID, or creation should be taught in public schools; they should stick to teaching science.

I am not against science; science is wonderful and useful and imperative to our way of life. Let's stick to teaching the kids science and leave origins up to the individual.

Travis makes an excellent rebuttal to the "let the students decide". Students are not scientists. If they knew everything they needed to know to make a truly informed decision about ID, they wouldn't be in a ninth grade science class. This is why ID advocates direct their advocacy primarily at public school science students (usually by going through conservative and scientifically illiterate politicians such as school boards) and not toward professional scientists and science organizations where, as even Michael Behe admitted in the Dover trial, ID has no mainstream support.

What shall we have next? Social studies classes that present the views of the KKK or the Nazi party to 9th grade social studies class as valid competing social viewpoints, and let the kids decide if they want to be racist or not? English classes that present ebonics, 'l33t speak, or text message shorthand as valid alternatives to traditional english? How about math classes where the kids get to decide when they've gotten all the math they need? Hell, why not let the kids decide if they need to go to school at all?

That would be ridiculous. Children don't get to decide whether to attend school, or what classes to take, or what those classes should teach for the obvious reason that they don't yet have enough information to make those kinds of decisions. They're in school to be taught what they need to know, not to choose what knowledge they want to accept from some ala carte menu of viewpoints held by whichever groups made the best sales pitch - or exerted the most effective political pressure, as seems to have been the case in Dover - to the local school board. Public schools should arm children with the best, most verifiable information available from recognized experts and organizations in various fields of human knowledge. If some group thinks some of that information is wrong, the people to make that case to are the professionals in those fields. If you can't convince enough of them to make a dent in the accepted thinking - and ID definitly has not - then consider that maybe, just maybe, you might not know as much about the field as people who spend their entire lives working in it, and that perhaps you aren't the best choice to determine what that subjects curriculum should be.

Legal decisions are usually horrifically dry reading, but Judge Jones writes better than most, and his decision contains what amounts to an excellent primer on why ID fails every test that separates science from non-science; why it's few starring examples of alleged design (bacterial flagellum, blood clotting, and the immune system) are not in fact the clear cut evolutionary impossibilities ID advocates say they are; why even if they were, they wouldn't be evidence of intelligent design; why the book "Of Pandas and People", the ID "textbook" the Dover board pointed students to is a warmed over creationism tract; that no scientific organization recognizes ID as science (including Micheal Behe's alma mater, which put out a statement specifically to disassociate themselves from Behe's views); why contrary to the assertions of ID advocates, ID doesn't work unless the designer is assumed to be God (at least that's what they claim in front of secular audiences - for religious groups most freely admit the designer is God); why Behe's notion of "design detection" can't be applied to biological process and is not the same as what SETI researchers, archeologists, or other real scientists do; and on and on.

Dover trial documents can be found here:
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/dover/kitzmiller_v_dover.html

Talkorigins.org is a good source of information on evolution in general.

For those who think William Dembski has enough scientific or mathematical credibility to hold his views up as "scientific" support of ID:

http://www2.ncseweb.org/kvd/experts/shallit.pdf

"Intelligent design is not science. It is not a hypothesis that can be tested through scientific study. Without this requisite, it cannot be taught in a science classroom."

By this standard...evolution cannot be taught either. Evolutionists have created this myth that they've "proven" materialistic origins of life. In fact, they haven't -- Darwinian theory of the origin of life is neither testable nor repeatable through "scientific study," so your statement goes *poof* into the ether. From false representations of "transitory species" to fossil records that do not bear the fruit Darwin predicted to Haeckel's embryos...much of the history of the uncritical acceptance (and rabid defense) of Darwin has been veiled in dishonesty. Absent proof of materialist life origin, "scientists" have decided to just begin with the presupposition that life arose from nothing and base the rest of their work on that unworthy and largely baseless presupposition. Materialism is philosophy, not science, and crumbles closer to dust as we advance in our quest for knowledge. The more we study life, the more complex we realize it is, down to its simplest elements...and the less plausible it becomes that we are just a miserable and pointless accident.

I wonder how life feels when you think it is meaningless...

I would quite simply like to point out that the "evolutionnews.com" website sited in the article contains nothing more than a front page and a series of sponsored, meaningless links. Sorry to be critical, but I feel the need to point out this inaccuracy as it blows out the final pilar supporting this article's relevancy. I hope your state succeeds in holding up the truthseeking that science and Darwin's theory are based upon.

- Nicholas Kent
Paris, France

Paul

You make that point "that intelligent design is not science and does not belong in science classrooms." I hear what your saying, but of course the same counter comes against evolution. Both require faith. Stellar evolution, cosmic evolution, organic evolution, chemical evolution and macro evolution are require belief and are thus deemed unscientific by the same objection. I would agree that micro-evolution occurs although I would object to the term because all we really witness is a variation of existing information; we never witness macro-evolution. I am well-versed in evolutionary theory because I want to understand the theory. Are you well-versed in ID or Creationism? Take a look at it with an open mind.

Thanks for listening

Excuse me, but Newton was a Creationist who understood he was uncovering the handi-work of the Creator. Therefore he would have to be banned from discussion in science classrooms.

Pasteur- Creationist- banned from science classroom discussions
Kepler- Creationist- banned from science classroom discussions
Max Planck? He gave us:

"All matter originates and exists only by virtue of a force which brings the particles of an atom to vibration and holds this minute solar system of the atom together . . . . We must assume behind this force the existence of a conscious and intelligent mind."

BANNED from science classroom discussions!

There are only three options to our existence:

1) Unintelligent, blind/ undirected processes (non-goal oriented)
2) Intelligent, directed processes (goal oriented)
3) A combination of 1 & 2 (as exemplified by Dr. Behe):

"Intelligent design is a good explanation for a number of biochemical systems, but I should insert a word of caution. Intelligent design theory has to be seen in context: it does not try to explain everything. We live in a complex world where lots of different things can happen. When deciding how various rocks came to be shaped the way they are a geologist might consider a whole range of factors: rain, wind, the movement of glaciers, the activity of moss and lichens, volcanic action, nuclear explosions, asteroid impact, or the hand of a sculptor. The shape of one rock might have been determined primarily by one mechanism, the shape of another rock by another mechanism.

Similarly, evolutionary biologists have recognized that a number of factors might have affected the development of life: common descent, natural selection, migration, population size, founder effects (effects that may be due to the limited number of organisms that begin a new species), genetic drift (spread of "neutral," nonselective mutations), gene flow (the incorporation of genes into a population from a separate population), linkage (occurrence of two genes on the same chromosome), and much more. The fact that some biochemical systems were designed by an intelligent agent does not mean that any of the other factors are not operative, common, or important."

We do have processes and criteria in place that allow us to determine the design is real.

What processes and criteria are used to determine the design is illusory?

If, as I like to say, science is our search for the truth, i.e. the reality, to our existence via our never-ending quest for knowledge, then forcing the data to lead only to option #1 by relying on multiple atomic accidents, multiple chance collisions, multiple metaphysical universes and multiple lucky events, is not only an injustice to science, but to all residing on this planet.

Yes ID is scientific:

http://intelligentreasoning.blogspot.com

"I wonder how life feels when you think it is meaningless..."

Personally, I think it feels pretty good. Whether I'm here by accident or design, I still enjoy the things that I do. There is nothing more than the physical world. I am just a walking, talking bag of proteins. I am motivated by my base desires. There is no heaven, no hell, no inherent morality, no soul. I have the freedom to do whatever I want, and to make of the world what I want. I am no slave to superstitious dogma or mythical karma.

I have seen many creationists/IDists talk. And I have never, not once, met an IDist who was not Christian, (let alone non religious).

Let's say that we can apply ID principles to understanding the world. As I have said before, the best it gets you is, "ok, it was ultimately designed." This isn't much of an answer at all. To conclude that there was a god would beg the question of the nature of this god. And, no surprise, the Christians have the answer. Hm, how convenient.

ID is just a foot-in-the-door tactic used by the religious reich to spread their ignorance.

"Evolutionists have created this myth that"

False. Anti-evolutionists have created the myth

"they've "proven" materialistic origins of life. In fact, they haven't"

True. And virtually all scientists agree. Theories can only be disproven, not proven, by science.

"-- Darwinian theory of the origin of life"

origin of SPECIES, not life

"is neither testable nor repeatable"

But it is.

You should really ask a biologist for good examples. However, if a theory, any scientific theory, is true, then you can make predictions. Then you can test those predictions. If they are true, then they support the theory. If they are consistently true, then they are repeatable.

Here's an example. Dinosaur fossils and human fossils should be from different eras if evolution is true and from the same era if the literal interpretation of Genesis is true. Therefore, I can test the theory of evolution by dating a human and dinosaur fossil. I can repeat this test by finding more fossils. Dating techniques (accepted by almost all scientists, but rarely accepted by fundamentalist Christians) routinely test and produce reproducable results that support evolution.

"And nothing is beyond the reach of scientific investigation."

This statement sums up the juvenile arrogance and narrow-mindedness of radical materialists. You CAN'T know this to be true...you simply CAN'T. Nuff said.

There's far too much wrong with Parks' column to go into it here, so have a look at

http://jswynne.typepad.com/gropes/2006/02/a_sophomoric_vi.html

But it is true that no question is beyond the realm of scientific and logical investigation. If there were something that wasn't, then what does it even mean to ask the question? What is the nature of, or what is an example of, a question that is beyond the realm of logical scrutiny?

If something cannot be answered with science, then what would you use? Faith? In that case, every answer is equally valid. And therefore, by considering two mutually exclusive answers, we conclude that such a method is meaningless.

lookin' good, joelle. ha ha!

I am an IDist.

I am NOT a Christian.

"Science without religion is lame; religion without science is blind." Albert Einstein

As far as I can tell the theory of evolution was founded on ignorance- Darwin thought the cell was a blob of proto-plasm. And it continues because of ignorance:

What makes a fly a fly? In his book (English title) "Why is a Fly not a Horse?", the prominent Italian geneticist Giuseppe Sermonti, tells us the following :

Chapter VI "Why is a Fly not a horse?" (same as the book's title)

"The scientist enjoys a privilege denied the theologian. To any question, even one central to his theories, he may reply "I'm sorry but I do not know." This is the only honest answer to the question posed by the title of this chapter. We are fully aware of what makes a flower red rather than white, what it is that prevents a dwarf from growing taller, or what goes wrong in a paraplegic or a thalassemic. But the mystery of species eludes us, and we have made no progress beyond what we already have long known, namely, that a kitty is born because its mother was a she-cat that mated with a tom, and that a fly emerges as a fly larva from a fly egg."

A scientist was talking with a farmer. They agreed that if the scientist could tell the farmer the number of sheep in his flock the scientist could take a sheep. The scientist glanced over the flock and shouted 53! "That's right," said the farmer. "That science of yours is pretty amazing. Take yer pick."
The scientist bends over and scoops up an animal.
"You must be a molecular biologist." Said the farmer.
"Why yes, I am. How did you know?" inquired the scientist.
"That's not important" replied the farmer.." Just put down the dog."

I don't care about some philisophical quote by Einstein. He was a brilliant physicist, but that doesn't mean we have to take every quip and poetic remark of his as the gospel.

I ask again, what good does it do us to conclude that there is a designer? Biology class would consist of one lecture. The professor would come in, announce that everything is the way it is because god made it thus, and that would be it.

The issue is not about understanding the origins of life. The problem is that ID is not science, no matter where it is used. Why does it make sense to use ID to describe life, but not to describe physics? What happen if every physicist, chemist, or medical researcher used ID to explain everything? We would still be living in caves, drilling holes in our heads to let out evil spirits.

What would my advisor say if I showed him some graphs and said "look, god has blessed our plasma discharge with these high frequency oscillations." He would say "nice work. That has brought us more understanding about the world. So how will you damp these oscillations in the future?" I would say "perhaps I shall pray to god and see what happens." Yes, I'd say that's worth a Ph.D.

Interesting, the anti IDs say no one (or entity) could have "designed" life as we know it, yet the very same people tell us humans are smart enough to figure it out (using science of course) and perhaps someday create life... let me get this straight, people are intelligent (could be) enough to create life, but it is not possible that an intelligent entity existed a billion years ago and did the same thing we a trying to do? I guess the science used a billion years ago (by those not of Earth) was not quite up to the standard of human science... how arrogant can you get!

First alternate science, next up, alternate history.

Private middle school teaches alternative view of U.S. history. Topics include "Our Godly Heritage" and "Understanding the Homosexual Lifestyle and Agenda, Parts I & II"

http://sptimes.com/2006/02/24/Brandontimes/In_God_they_trust.shtml

At least they don't think apotates should be beheaded or gays stoned to death like another religion (which shall remain name-less so they don't hunt me down and kill me for blasphemy).

Joelle, you make some good points. Censorship is a desperate move. It never works. Whether it's forbidden fruit or an idea, banning it makes the mouth water. It is only a matter of time until the truth sets us free.

Travis Yates,

All of your "complaints" are answered in my blogs.

What good is it to say that our existence is due to multiple atomic accidents, coupled with multiple chance collisions, coupled with multiple lucky events, all wrapped in some metaphysical multi-verse scenario? How can such a scenario even be tested?

How can we falsify the claim that some particular biochemical structure or organism arose via some blind watchmaker-type process?

How can we objectively test the claim that a population of non-humans "evolved" into a population of humans?

And why is that people who obviously don't know anything about ID feel they need to speak up the loudest against it?

If you dare Travis, visit:

http://intelligentreasoning.blogspot.com

I will gladly deal with your complaints and expose the double-standards that anti-IDists must use in order to keep ID out of the science classroom.

It's amazing how the people who know the least about ID have the loudest and strongest opinion about it. Why is this? Because they are uncomfortable (terrified) of it's implications regarding a designing intelligence. So, they conflate the science with it's implications - sometimes out of intellectual dishonesty, sometimes out of ignorance. And usually they are just echoing the tired ignorant rhetoric of their political gurus. Travis is an excellent example of this. Tell me, Travis, how do you explain the following:

- The 4 letter digital encoding along the spine of the DNA molecule. Digital information more complex than any software program devised by humans, complete with backup protection mechanisms. Remember, software programs require programmers.

- The Irreducible Complexity of molecular machines. Like the cell, or the bacteria flagellum. Meaning that these machines require all of their specified parts to be in place simultaneously or they fail completely. How can Darwin's gradualistic and blind mechanism build such machines? Let me answer for you: it can't.

- The complete inability of Darwin's mechanism of Natural Selection + Random Mutation to produce anything novel or creative, i.e.: cell types, tissue types, or body plans. We have only observed this mechanism maintain the status quo in existing, fully formed species. And even that is questionable, as there is strong evidence that all the information is present within the genome and just reacting to environmental pressures. NS + RM has no creative power. Macroevolution is an unwarranted extrapolation and a myth.

- A fossil record which demonstrates the abrupt appearance of fully-formed and distinct body plans without any precursors. Like the Cambrian Era (Biology's Big Bang), where all significant phyla appear suddenly and without antecedents.

- The precision fine-tuning of the cosmologic constants. i.e. gravity dialed to the perfect tolerance to support organic life, the exact position necessary relative to the sun and moon to support organic life. The list goes on and on.

Oh, there are plenty of other SCIENTIFIC evidences which support a designing intelligence, but these are just a few that should get the point across.

The real question to ask yourself is: why are we still teaching our children the steamboat-era Darwinian narritive? Especially when the evidence over the last 150 years has progressively been pointing away from it and towards a designing intelligence? Why are we still teaching this civil war era tale when the evidence just isn't there to support it?

Thanks to a very good "Dr." I just had a revelation-

Intelligent Design is today's "Green Eggs and Ham".

People don't like it because they won't even try it.

Here is the ID three-hour challenge:

Watch two videos- "The Privileged Planet" and "Unlocking the Mystery of Life", and then, if you can without lying, tell us why ID is not based on observation and scientific research, but is based on religious doctrines and faith.

Travis, You are missing the point entirely. If there is a creator, your biology class would still have plenty to talk about. As you know many scientists have had a belief in God and still made scientific discoveries. Evolution, on the other hand, offers much less than you think it does. To say that all life stems from a common ancestor might be a really neat discussion, but it doesn't add so much to present knowledge of the cell, for example. That knowledge comes from microscopes, not a theory.

Travis

I appreciated your remarks concerning the use of ID to explain everything. What place does ID have in the biology classroom? Well, I suppose that biology class should go on as usual, but if the class did turn to a discussion of origins or how such mindboggling complexity is brought about by undirected random mutations, then ID would be a valid point of discussion. Evolution attempts to answer questions relating to origins in the classroom--those attempts should be critically evaluated, not protected against criticism through legislation.

You make the comment that if ID was used to explain everything the "...the professor would come in, announce that everything is the way it is because god made it thus, and that would be it." If I was a student in that class I may respond that we should continue discovering what God has made and that we should keep doing science...keep discovering. A professor may very well enter a classroom and announce that everything is the way it is because random mutations made it thus, and that would be it.

I understand that you only believe in the material world, but scientists and individuals who believe in more are not the silly, illogical individuals you proport them to be. Noone has ever received a Ph.D. by praying to God. I don't believe there is a need for you to make such unfair judgements about those who believe in a Designer. I don't believe you're silly or ridiculous for only believing in the natural world. In fact I would be quite interested in knowing why you only believe in the natural world; I am sure you have many good reasons for believing so.

Thanks for listening

Scott,

you can go here:
http://jswynne.typepad.com/gropes/2006/02/after_this_post.html
for answers to your questions.

This idea that an ID debate should take place in public schools, with 9th graders as the jury, is ludicrous. Evolution is a scientific theory overwhelmingly accepted by scientists. ID is pseudoscience, but even if we pretend that it's rooted in sound scientific principles, it's still at best a fringe theory, and one not accepted by any science organizations. Michael Behe, one of IDs poster boys conceded as much the Dover trial.

If ID is good science, IDists should be making the case to is scientists. They should be publishing peer reviewed articles (to date there are none) proposing falsifiable hypotheses (again, they have none) and devising experiments to test their ideas (which requires a falsifiable hypotheses, so they can't do that either). The place for debate on unproven and nearly unanimously rejected scientific theories is NOT 9th grade science classes.

Real scientific evidence of non-human intelligence, especially one that's not only been on this planet but has taken an active role in shaping life on it would be the most staggering discovery in history. It would send shock waves through every field of study, not just science. A convincing case for a radical new scientific idea is the fastest way for a scientist to achieve recognition and immortality. That's how Einstein, Newton, and of course Darwin did it, and their ideas would pale in comparison to a scientifically cogent ID theory. So if there was anything about ID worth pursuing, there'd be a land rush in the scientific community. Those that didn't dive into ID with both feet would at least be dabbling. The argument put forth by ID proponents that the overwhelming majority of scientists, university science departments, scientific organizations and science publications are declining to take a stab at having their name attached to the greatest discovery in history because of peer pressure, personal beliefs, or some unexplained conspiracy to oppress religion is beyond bizarre. It's unimaginable.

Besides simply not passing a common sense test, IDists claim that their ideas are being suppressed or ignored because the "establishment" is threatened, closed minded, oppressive, politically motivated, or whatever else is also the standard defense used by UFOlogists, psychics, astrologers, faith healers, mediums, crystal worshippers and of course the "creation scientists" ID claims to be unrelated to. If ID is not pseudoscience, why the pseudoscientists defense? Why spend so much effort targeting conservative political bodies with influence over school agendas in attempts get their arguments in front of impressionable high school science students, yet make no serious efforts to persuade the scientific community at large through peer-reviewed papers (and the popular "we're being oppressed" defense doesn't even work - virtually no papers on ID have even been submitted to credible science journals). Why is getting their ideas taught to 9th graders so much more important than getting it accepted by scientists? Doesn't that set of priorities seem a little odd for people who claim to be scientists?

If ID is really valid science now, it'll be valid science 5 or 10 years from now. The right way to do this is to build your case, gather evidence, come up with TESTABLE hypotheses that can be sujected to experiment. If it turns out to be real science with real explanatory power it will make it's way into high school text books. Being unwilling to go that route and instead resorting to political maneuvering to get their ideas taught to children as quickly as possible doesn't sound like an approach scientists would take. It is however very much the behavior one might expect from people trying to push a religious idea, one that they know can't hold up to scientific scrutiny.

Ms. Parks, your reasoning is so full of holes that I'm embarassed to be a product of the UW education system.

First, there's the tired "Teach the controversy" mantra: What's next, Holocaust denial in History classes? That's controversial--someone just went to prison for it in Austria this week. How about the square root of two not being a rational number? That was a raging argument at one time. How about the great debate over whether light is a particle or a wave?

Ah, but these "controversies" don't challenge somebody's comforting little bedtime story that their species is somehow God's special science fair project. (Just like The Church fought the notion that the Sun just might not circle the Earth just a few hundred years back--there's no real difference.) And that's just the problem.

Then there's the equally lame "It's only a theory" business. If you don't know the difference between the scientific definition of a theory and somebody's wild-haired idea, you have no business opining on the subject. Yes, evolution is a "theory". It's withstood scrutiny and been refined for over a century now, and no one has been able to come up with anything that stands up to a continuingly building body of data better. Certainly not Dawkins. The Theory of Relativity is a "theory" too, and no one really challenges that, even though it's been on the scene for less time. Should we not teach Newton's laws? Those are so outdated, y'know, coming from the 1600s and all. And they don't always hold up when it comes to things like black holes. So by your reasoning we'd better play it safe and assume that God--oops, I mean "The Designer"--is personally involved in everything that ever fell from any height.

Your "500 doctoral scientists" questioning evolution seem to be a bit outnumbered by the 10000+ clergy who have signed their names to a letter affirming that anti-evolutionary doctrines are not only shabby science but also shoddy theology: http://headlines.agapepress.org/archive/2/172006b.asp

Finally, your argument about banning ID somehow taking away choice holds the least amount of credibility. This is about banning psuedoscience from the classroom, much in the way that no one would want their children learning astrology in an Astronomy class, even though the things were very much entwined just a few hundred years ago. Stop copping the "persecuted Christian" attitude. No one is telling you that you can't believe in God. Shoving *any* supernatural explanation of the Universe (be it ID or the Flying Spaghetti Monster) down anyone's throat at taxpaper expense is taking away THEIR choice. And all so that you don't have to have to be challenged by hard evidence that doesn't fit a literal interpretation of Genesis. If your faith can't reconcile that, then maybe you need to have a good look at the strength of that faith.

I cannot believe that at a time when America is rapidly losing its edge on the worldwide science and technology front, we are wasting taxpayer money on this kind of twaddle.

William Dembskis name is tossed around by ID advocates as an example of a scientist who supports intelligent design, and terms like "specified complexity" that he's coined are bandied about as established mathematical principles.

http://www2.ncseweb.org/kvd/experts/shallit.pdf is a report filed on behalf of the plaintiffs in the Dover case by Jeffrey Shallit, a mathematician, analysing William Dembskis credentials and the validity of his arguments. The report says it's in rebuttal to William Dembskis proposed testimony. In fact Dembski did not testify at the trial but in the court transcripts there is a sidebar that while not about Dembski per se, mentions an unspecified "problem" and "dispute" involving Dembski. I have to wonder if the problem was how easily and thoroughly Shallits report shredded Dembskis credentials as an "expert" scientific witness.

Some highlights from the report:

IDists label him as a scientist - and sometimes so does Dembski himself - but the only scientific degree he holds is a B.A. in Psychology. His advanced degrees are in mathematics, statistics, philosophy and theology. He has held no scientific grants for 14 years, has trained no junior scientists, and published no papers in scientific journals. In short he holds no scientific credentials and does none of the things scientists do. He is not a scientist.

Despite IDists assertions that he's a respected information theory researcher and he refers to himself as an expert on randomness, he has published no peer reviewed papers on either information theory or randomness, nor has he presented his claims in recognized mathematical forums. Dembski scholarly output (peer reviewed papers, etc) is a fraction of what people in his field normally produce.

He shows disdain for his fields accepted peer review process, instead choosing to publish in the popular press where the money is better, the audience more gullible, the professional scrutiny less intense, and criticisms of his work (which abound) are easier to ignore (which he consistently does, even when the errors involved are substantial).

A search of mathematical and scientific journals revealed no researcher in any scientific or mathematical field who used Dembski's idea of "complex specific information", or any of the other self-invented concepts he and the ID movement throws around as though they're recognized mathematical protocols. His definitions and methods are not supported by the mathematical community, and in fact are often scorned as sloppy and error-ridden.

A major part of Dembski's defintion of CSI is that it matches an "externally given pattern", but he gives no mathematical description of what qualifies as a "pattern". Any contrived sequence that has any meaning to anyone can qualify, which means you can invent a pattern for _any_ collection of information that proves it's CSI.

Demski and others like to claim his methods for detecting design in biological system is similar to SETI's search for signs of intelligence in radio signals. But SETI researchers are not looking for signals that demonstrate complexity, they're looking for signals that demonstrate artificiality. Uncontrolled natural astromical phenomena blast their emissions over a wide range of frequencies. SETI is looking for a simple, narrow band broadcast. The idea that SETI is looking for the same kind of complexity Dembski is comes from the fictional methods used in Carl Sagans novel "Contact" in which the telltale signal contains a sequence of prime numbers. (Amusingly, in the Dover trial Michael Behe also defended IDs methods by saying they work "in science fiction movies". Apparently watching the Sci-Fi channel is what passes for research among ID scientists.)

There is quite a bit more, including some mathematical arguments which are way over my head but the plain english arguments are more than enough to show that Dembski's ideas have no support or credibility in scientific or mathematical circles. It's an informative read.

Intelligent Design is easily the greatest hoax perpetrated on the American public in the last century. It was falsified over two centuries ago and revived as a tool used by right wing extremists who would rather play wedge politics than pursue the facts and the truth.

Mr.Don Walters

I read your post and I wondered "Why the character assassination on Dembski?" Would it be fair to say that if he supported what you believed you would find something positive to say about him. Do you have anything positive to say about anyone in any scientific or academic field who is not an evolutionist? Is your post suggesting that one must believe in evolution to be a scientist?

How do you feel about allowing critical analysis of evolutionary theory within the science classroom?

Thanks

Really? You didn't read it and ask, "gee, why would the Discovery Institute, who claims to have so many scientists behind it, rely so heavily on the claims of a mathematician with little influence in the mathematical field and no scientific credentials?" You didn't ask, "If Dembskis methods for detecting design are so well accepted in the scientific community, why does he favor an analogy to a fictional SETI technique that he misrepresents as what SETI actually does?" You didn't ask, "How exactly is one to determine whether information is 'specified' if the inventor of the term doesn't offer an objective method for measuring specificity, how can 'complex specified information' be a meaningful term without such a method, and how can Dembskis 'design detection', which relies on the concept of CSI, detect anything without a working definition of CSI?"

It is telling that instead of addressing a single point in my post (which were culled from a mathematicians report, not my own opinions) you ignored them all and just lumped it all together as "character assasination" then tried to make my personal feeling about ID "scientists" the issue. It's also very familiar to anyone who follows Dembski's blog, uncommondescent.com. It's the same technique he and his lackeys use. I did some searching since my post here mentioning the "problem" with Dembski in the Dover trial and found the details. After Shallits report was submitted to the judge in the Dover case, the defendants legal team pulled Dembski from their witness list (presumably because they saw that Shallit would have ripped Dembski to shreds). Since Shallit's role was as a rebuttal witness to Dembskis testimony, he was dropped by the plaintiffs when Dembski was dropped by the defense. But Dembski had a different, slightly, um, crazier spin: He claimed Shallit was dropped by the plaintiffs because he was "stalking" Dembski on the internet, his motives were all personal, and he had a crazy obsession with Dembski would have harmed the plaintiffs case.
[http://www.stcynic.com/blog/archives/2005/11/update_on_dembski_and_shallit_1.php]

If you can actually refute the points made in my previous post, feel free. That you didn't try to address even one of them suggests you can't. If the only defense you can muster is a Dembski-eseque assertion that I dislike Dembski and his fellow ID "scientists" (which is true, but unless you can refute Shallits points above, irrelevant) there's no point in my trying answer any of your questions seriously.

Here's a nice example of the kind of debate that Dembskis blog engages in, suggesting a connection between Alabama church fires and a popular pro-evolution blog, www.pandasthumb.org. The comment isn't from Dembski, but from one of the people he hand-picked to provide content for the blog.

http://www.uncommondescent.com/index.php/archives/901

Even as a joke, this is the most irresponsible and reprehensible form of debate I can imagine, and anyone who lines up behind people who condone this sort of vile hate speech should be ashamed of themselves.

Don Walters

You're right, I didn't address your criticisms. You're right, I can't, I don't know much about Mathematics; I haven't trained any junior scientists either. Your point about me lumping your arguments together and summing them up to character assassination is well-taken. I didn't mean to offend you. Your sarcastic response led me to believe I had.

The reason that I wrote what I did is because your post left me feeling that you really didn't like him personally and he's not here to defend himself or his position.

Would you please answer the following question for me even though I cannot address your mathematical challenges?

"Do you believe in anything?"

Thanks Don

p.s. sorry for the unfair rebuttal

"Do you believe in anything?"
Ah, that's the rub, isn't it? If ID was really science, there'd be evidence for it, or at least testable ideas that wouldn't require empty belief. ID has nothing.

What I or anyone else does or doesn't believe in or who I or anyone else does or doesn't like has nothing to do with whether a theory that claims to be scientific actually _is_ science. Attempting to counter my replies to this article tells me that you at least support ID, and probably want it taught in science classes as science. That your rebuttals have been solely based on what _I_ "feel" or who _I_ "like" or what _I_ "believe" and have completely avoided discussing IDs merits _at all_, much less on any level that would be required to make a case for teaching it as science, tells me that your understanding of ID, the alleged "science" behind it, the motives of the people pushing it and their stated agenda, and what actually constitutes proper science is so thin that you can't come up with ONE SINGLE real argument in defense of your position. But you want there to be a "designer" (aka God) so you don't care whether or not ID has a scientific basis. You just want a God-friendly theory to be taught as though it's science. Whether or not it really is doesn't matter.

Before defending ID you should learn what it is, what it isn't, and how science really works (NOT the IDists strawman of how it works, which very often describes ID more than it does true science). But at the very least, if you're going to post in places like this defending the teaching of a religion-based psuedoscience in science class, take the time to learn the psuedoscientists propaganda so you can offer up some response besides personal nitpicks that have no relevance to the central issue.

Quotes from Phillip Johnson, founder of the ID movement:

"Our strategy has been to change the subject a bit so that we can get the issue of Intelligent Design, which really means the reality of God, before the academic world and into the schools."

"This isn't really, and never has been a debate about science. It's about religion and philosophy."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligent_design

Don

I do not wish ID to be taught in science classrooms. You make a lot of assumptions.

You said "What I or anyone else does or doesn't believe in or who I or anyone else does or doesn't like has nothing to do with whether a theory that claims to be scientific actually _is_ science." Well, I
couldn't agree more. I hold the theory of evolution to this same standard.

You also said "You just want a God-friendly theory to be taught as though it's science." No I don't. Let's look at the observable evidence and see where it leads us.

You said "Attempting to counter my replies to this article tells me that you at least support ID" I support teaching the kids science. My offical position is that science belongs in the science classroom. Proper science is what can be observed, tested and repeated? Can we agree on that? I take issue with teaching our kids Cosmic, Stellar, Organic, Chemical, and Macro evolution as if were observed and factual science. Noone has ever observed these things and they cannot be repeated, so when scientists think to themselves..."hmmm, these explanations don't explain what we observe, maybe there's another explanation?" what's the problem?

Stick to science in the classroom and get the teachings of Origins and proven mistakes that support evolution in the textbooks out. Mistakes such as "Vestigial body parts" the idea that "non-living chemicals can come together to produce life", "explosions can create an increase in order" Random mutations can not only be beneficial, but given enough time are responsible for the vast array of complexity reponsible for life. To name a few.

p.s. I am NOT your enemy, you don't need to be so mocking in your tone.

ID is a God-friendly theory. That's what it was designed to be. Note the quotes from the guy who started it. Read the Dover transcripts or the Judges decision, where you will find that the original draft of "Of Pandas and People" was written in support of creationism. After the Edwards decision declared creationism to be inherently religious and not valid science, "Pandas" was revised just enough to skirt the issue. It's pre-Edwards defintion of "creationism" was _exactly the same_ as the post-Edwards definition of intelligent design. They just did a search and replace. Follow IDs roots. It was not born from scientific study, it was conceived by religious creationists as an end-run around the Edwards decision that banned "scientific" creationism. They use the same core reasoning: "I can't find (or don't believe) the scientific explanation for X, so 'somebody' designed X". The only difference between SC and ID is that SC said the somebody was God. When the courts said SC was religion, they changed "God" to "somebody who we refuse to define" but who clearly cannot be anybody but God, given the characteristics he'd have to have. ID is just a word game, no more scientifically valid than creationism.

"I take issue with teaching our kids Cosmic, Stellar, Organic, Chemical, and Macro evolution as if were observed and factual science."

What does cosmic and stellar 'evolution' have to do with the theory of biological evolution? Evolution, the theory that says random mutation and natural selection drive speciation _only applies to bioligical life_ and has no relation to any colloquial usage of the word "evolution" in other contexts. Attempts to drag unrelated fields under it's umbrella just so you can create an artificial list of things evolution doesn't explain is a creationist/IDist tactic, and by using it you show your true colors, and your ignorance of what the theory of evolution actually is. As for "organic" and "chemical" evolution, I'm not even sure what that means. Evolutionary theory says nothing about chemistry either.

As for "macro" evolution - this is a ridiculous dodge. Life on earth is some 4 billion years old. Complex multicellular life is something like 600 million years old, but still a long time. Claiming that repeated "micro" evolutionary steps, which I'm sure even you have to agree have been demonstrated, can never add up to anything "macro" is a remarkable combination of both ignorance and hubris. Yours and my lifetimes on this planet will only span maybe 100 years if we're lucky, but neither of us are even close to that yet. The notion that what you've experienced in your tiny little corners of the globe in your piddly few decades, or even what modern science has been able to duplicate in the century or so that evolution has been accepted can in any way be expected to duplicate any of what evolution could do in hundreds of millions of years on a planetary scale is just ludicrous. It's as if someone offered to give you a penny a year and you flatly and confidently declared that since that would never get you enough to buy anything worthwhile in your lifetime, then it couldn't possibly amount to anything worthwhile even in half a billion years.

Evolution has been a very slow process that's been going on for a long time. Expecting "macro" evolution to be duplicated in a lab in a convenient timespan isn't a reasonable demand to make. And even if one did manage to expedite the process I'd wager the ID crowd would say it didn't prove evolution because the scientist was playing the role of a "designer" so it wasn't really natural selection. For scientists it's a lose-lose proposition.

Yet despite the fact that we haven't had a planet-size laboratory working on this for 500 million years, there is evidence that supports evolution. It makes specific predictions about the degrees and types of differences between the DNA of related species that have been shown to be correct. It explains why humans and chimps share a lot of the same genes, including "broken" genes that we both got from our common ancestor. For instance, many mammals can produce vitamin C themselves so don't require it in their diet. Humans and chimps OTOH have the gene in the same place other mammals do, but ours is broken. Evolution can't currently say why it broke - that's a historical matter that nobody was there to witness - but it explains why it's broken in both us and our primate relatives. On the other hand observed facts like that make NO sense as a designed feature. Why would the designer give other mammals a working vitamin-C producing gene, but give us and our near relatives a broken one? Why do we have an appendix? Why are our pelvises and spines so badly designed for upright walking? Evolutionarily speaking it's because we evolved from quadrupeds for which that design works well. A true bipedal design should be much different but we weren't designed from scratch. We were quadrupeds that tried to stand up, and after thousands or millions of years the bones changed shape enough to allow it, but it's a kludge. It's _not_ design. IDists like to point at the few things evolution got amazingly right as evidence for design, but they have to completely ignore all the kludgy, patchwork solutions it came up with. This is one of the reasons ID can't say anything about the designer - their argument is based on what a genius he was to come up with bacterial flagellum, but then you have to explain what fit of mental retardation led him to things like the appendix, or all the parts of the human skeleton that fail relatively early (knees, back, hips) that any mechanical engineer could have redesigned for longer life. (The other reason they can't get into who the designer is is because they need the designer to be God, but if they say that they'll get slapped down by the courts again.)

Evolution also says nothing about how life started. It describes the mechanism by which living species, once here, change and give rise to new species. So whether "non-living chemicals can come together to produce life" is not under it's purview either. By way of analogy, a complete and accurate explanation of how a car engine, once started, continues to run (fuel/air mixture injected into a cyliner, compressed by a piston, is ignited and the resulting explosion releases the energy required to power the next cycle) does not require knowing how the engine got started in the first place. In fact if the car has a manual transmission, there are at least two ways it could have been started and if you weren't there you've no way to know which was used. But since the starting method has no effect on how the engine runs, you don't need to know the former to be able to explain the latter. Because the process that started the car (the engaging and driving of the starter motor) play no role in keeping it running, "how does it run?" and "how did it start?" are two completely different questions. Both are worth answering, but neither requires having an answer to the other.

In the same way evolution addresses "how does it run". Once life got started evolution needed no intervention from whatever process started it so "how did it start" is another, separate question that is being researched in fields like abiogenesis (which "non-living chemicals can come together to produce life" doesn't accurately describe either). Again, attempting to cast doubt on evolution by insisting it be able to explain the origin of life is another creationist/IDist diversion.

Other rebuttals in your post are equally nonsensical, but they'd take longer to properly refute, this reply is already too long, and the degree of ignorance you've shown about what evolutionary theory really covers and what it says suggests I'd be wasting keystrokes anyway. There is information out there besides the ID propaganda that you're clearly eating up. On the web, try talkorigins.org and the many resources it points to, or the National Center for Science Educations web site. On paper I'd suggest "Finding Darwins God", by Ken Miller which not only explains why ID doesn't make scientific sense, but why it doesn't make religious sense either. And again, I urge you to read the Dover judges decision. In the Dover case ID and some of it's proponents had their chance to make their "ID is science" case, and failed. Not just a little bit, but totally and utterly.

Another quote to chew on:

"I'll wager a bottle of single-malt scotch, should it ever go to trial whether ID may legitimately be taught in public school science curricula, that ID will pass all constitutional hurdles." -- William Dembski, 2002
[http://acs.ucsd.edu/~idea/dembskincse.htm]

(Of course in the Dover trial last year ID failed to clear any constitutional or scientific hurdles at all. As far as I know Dembski hasn't made good on his wager.)

Don

Thanks for taking the time to write your thoughtful post.

I have read loads about evolution, I am sure you know more about it than me though. I don't understand the technical stuff, but I do understand what it implies happened in the past.

As I see it, we all have the same evidence to look at and study--Creationists, Evolutionists, and IDers. It is our interpretation of this evidence that leads us into different directions. We each hold presuppositions about the past. An evolutionist sees evidence and fits it into a view of millions or billions of years; a Creationist sees evidence and fits it into a different view. You pointed to similarities of apes and humans as evidence of common ancestry; I understand your logic here, but I look at that evidence and see evidence for a common designer as I cannot ignore the question of how the biological engine got running. (I am not implying that you personally are ignoring this question, but I do not believe what evolutionary theory posits concerning origins. I believe that a designer is a better explanation for the complexity that we observe.)

You mentioned that cosmic and stellar evolution have nothing to do with biological evolution. Then why do we teach stellar and cosmic evolution in school? The text books start with some factual and observable evidence such as observed variations within the different kinds of species, then lump in chemical, stellar, cosmic, and organic evolution as if it we observable too. You're right that Darwin began by observing living creatures and your point about the car engine running and not needing to ask how it started running is well taken. But that's the unfortunate thing about evolutionary theory; it has such a powerful hold on the imaginations of some scientists that it's actually said that non-living things such as chemicals and planets also have evolved in the same way. I am not attempting to employ a tactic here, I really don't understand how a biological mechanism for change can be applied to non-living things so that over time changes occur in the same way.

You also mentioned that macro evolution cannot be observed because you and I will only live for about 100 years and this process has taken millions of years. Again, I am not employing a tactic here, but I don't believe that Macro evolution is believable; please do not attribute this to simple ignorance of evolutionary theory. Scientists agree that the universe has a beginning right? They call it a singularity. Well that means that evolutionary processes have had a finite amount of time to achieve what they have right? I think that I might be able to give some credibility to the evolutionary theory of origins if an infinite amount of time was available for these changes to take place, but an infinite amount of time is not available. What are your thoughts?

Don, my understanding of how the ID movement was started was that a meeting at Pijaro beach California transpired where a group of scientists came together to discuss evolutionary theory and the difficulties with it. Many had reached an intellectual breaking point with attempting to explain how evolutionary processes could be responsible for what we observe. Professor of biology at San Francisco State University, Dr. Dean Kenyon wrote a book titled "Biochemical Predestination" However, after being challenged by a student to re-think his position, by the 1980's Kenyon had come to the conclusion that since so much human guidance was needed for such small results reached in laboratory experiments on abiogenesis, an intelligent designer must have been necessary for life's beginning.

Reading Kenyon's story suggests that Kenyon's objective was not motivated because he was a creationist sympathizer or anything like that, but based on the findings of his own work.

If creationism is a true account, then it would follow that scientists regardless of their religious persuasions would find evidence of design. I don't think it's fair or observed that these scientists are simply and overtly pursuing a political objective to teach creationism in schools. It was a bunch of parents in Dover who wanted ID taught, not the Discovery Institute.

Personally, I am not interested in employing tactics and such within discussions. You're quite right that tactics are employed by the right, but they are also employed by the left. I am interested in truth, fact, and observable evidence, not the imaginations of so many men. You can bet I do not agree with much of what the Discovery institutes scientists believe.

Do you believe in spiritual things Don? Please don't think that I am employing a tactic here, I am really interested in what you think. Personally, I have witnessed some absolutely amazing things that have no material explanation in my life and in the lives of others. I believe that there is so much evidence for a spiritual component to our existence. Are you personally really comfortable in an explanation of our origins that leaves no room for the spiritual? Maybe you're not; I am making an assumption here. I understand that science is not able to test spiritual things, so then we begin to accept ideas that are unfalsifiable. But you and I have to choose what we are going to believe. As you said earlier, we only live for 100 years at best, we will never see macro evolution actually occur...we have to believe it. In that way, it is really a religious belief. I have observed that you hold to it as dogmatically as others do to their religious beliefs. I don't mean to offend you by saying that; I know that you believe evolutionary theory is scientific. I also trust science. I am constantly berated, criticized, and mocked for what I believe, but that doesn't matter, I am interested in truth; I don't believe that evolutionary thinking is leading us to a truthful explanation of why we are here on this earth. Especially when you consider what it means in terms of morality, emotions, passion and all those things that we observe and that make life worth living. I don't believe that these intangible things such as emotions, passion, love and kindness or the opposite selfishness, greed, hate and lust simply evolved and have a purely materialistic explanation; there is no evidence for that. There is so much that evolution cannot explain and leaves un-answered and will leave unanswered when each of us dies; we have to choose what we are going to believe. This is why I am asking you your feelings on spiritual things. Have a great day.

Thanks for listening

So I'm typing up a response and notice two things. First, it's getting even ridiculously longer than previous replies, and I'm finding myself googling various things to double check both our facts, and realize that I'm tired of being the only one researching what I post.

Second, the evolutionary theory you're arguing against is one that no evolutionary biologist would call evolution. What you're repeating is a parody of evolution, a strawman constructed by IDists and creationists so they can have something that's easier to tear down than real evolution is. Demanding that biological evolution be able to explain fields completely unrelated to biology - which is rather like insisting that unless an internist can also fix your teeth, your car, your water heater, and your home network, he's an incompetent doctor - is an old one, and you've done it twice, once after I pointed out how irrelevant it is. Dismissing evolution because you don't like it's moral implications or lack thereof, something that clearly has no bearing on it's scientific validity, is a favorite of the creationists. Any argument that begins "I don't believe", which you used a couple of, is by definition a matter of belief, which is not how science is defined.

You acknowledge the difference between answering "how it runs" and answering "how it starts" then turn right around and dismiss it because you "cannot ignore the question of how the biological engine got running". It's been explained to you that that's not relevant to evolution, and that it falls under abiogenesis but your rebuttal is again "evolution doesn't explain it". Again, this makes as much sense as demanding a podiatrist that gives eye exams, but that will be lost on you. You don't want to separate biological evolution from everything else you're trying to dump on it because the more ridiculous the demands you make of it, the easier it is to find things wrong with it. You _like_ the creationist version of evolution because it's comfortably ridiculous. The real version, the one that's been hammered out over 140 years by people who spend their entire careers studying biology, geology, genetics, paleontology, etc, people who know a hell of a lot more about evolution than you or I, that's too hard to even get familiar with, let alone argue against. So you stick with the creationist version with all it's pre-perforated holes you can point out that those silly PhDs couldn't find because they're not as clever as you.

I've shown you quotes from Phillip Johnson who founded the ID movement. He's also the guy who organized that meeting that you seem to think had a scientific purpose, even though it's guest list included creationists and philosophers and Johnson himself is a lawyer and a religious fundamentalist. All this information is easily found on the web.

I don't say this for your benefit. All this tells me that you know full well your idea of evolution isn't accurate, and you don't care. You're getting all your information from the Discovery Institute, or Answers in Genesis, or some other ill-informed fundamentalist source, and you're happy doing this. But it should be on the record that what you're doing is not debating evolution, but propagating creationist dogma.

Now understand, I don't care what you believe, or what you teach your own children. You can raise them to be a scientifically ignorant as you like. But this is about what should be represented as science to everybody's children, using everybody's taxes. Your beliefs, creationist beliefs, IDist beliefs (which are just creationist beliefs, modified to look secular) ARE NOT SCIENCE, and you/they have no business shoving using public schools to shove their religious beliefs down other childrens throats.

(Yes, this is still much shorter than my original reply was going to be.)

Since I'm posting, I'm going to add one more note. The original story mentions the Discovery Institutes "Dissent from Darwinism" list and it's 500 signatures, as if that's significant. Anyone who thinks that number at all implies wide scientific support or a legitimate scientific controversy over evolution should take a gander at the list of signatures the NCSE is compiling:

http://www.natcenscied.org/article.asp?category=18

This list of scientists who support evolution numbers 700, 200 more than the creationists have mustered in their favor - even though the NCSEs list is restricted to scientists whose first name is some variation of "Steve". Steves are about 1% of the scientist population (including Stephen Hawking and two current holders of Nobel Prizes in science, all three of whom have signed the NCSEs petition), so those names (727 as of 3/15 according to Wikipedia) represent over 72,000 scientists that disagree with the 500 the Discovery Institute has cobbled together.

I also notice that nobody on the DIs list has credentials in evolutionary biology, whereas many of the NCSEs Steves do. IDists predictable defense would be that people who don't believe in evolution wouldn't get PhDs in it but if in fact evolutionary theory were as flawed as IDists would have you believe, surely a few EB PhDs would have joined IDs ranks. What this actually shows is that they haven't managed to find anyone who _fully_ understands evolution and still supports ID.

The NSCEs list is just a poke (albeit a devastating one) at the lists that creationists and IDists like to collect. Science isn't done through petitions and lists like these are PR stunts, not science, which is further evidence that ID is a PR campaign, not a scientific one. But the IDist list needs to be refuted since it's what they hold it up as evidence of the "scientific controversy" that they they claim makes ID legitimate science.

The relevance of the DIs petition is weakened further by it's wording. They'd have you believe that petition represents support for ID, but read the actual statement:

"We are skeptical of claims for the ability of random mutation and natural selection to account for the complexity of life. Careful examination of the evidence for Darwinian theory should be encouraged."

Do you see anything there about support for ID, either scientific or personal? Any mention of a designer? Complex specific information? Irreduceable complexity? There's no mention of ID or any of it's core principles _at_all_. All the statement is is a stab at evolution, and not even a very effective one at that. The most it commits it's signatories to is "skepticism" about whether the two main mechanisms of evolution are sufficient to explain all of lifes complexity, which isn't the same as skepticism about evolutionary theory in general, and is certainly worlds away from supporting the idea of a designer. "Careful examination of the evidence for Darwinian theory should be encouraged" is hardly a damning condemnation of evolution. In fact to scientists "careful examination" of evidence is standard scientific practice in any field, for any evidence for any theory. It's what scientists do. One hundred and forty years of exactly such careful examination is what convinced them that evolution is correct.

Compare the DIs petition with the NCSEs petition statement:

"Evolution is a vital, well-supported, unifying principle of the biological sciences, and the scientific evidence is overwhelmingly in favor of the idea that all living things share a common ancestry. Although there are legitimate debates about the patterns and processes of evolution, there is no serious scientific doubt that evolution occurred or that natural selection is a major mechanism in its occurrence. It is scientifically inappropriate and pedagogically irresponsible for creationist pseudoscience, including but not limited to "intelligent design," to be introduced into the science curricula of our nation's public schools."

Note that their statement emphatically supports evolution, and equally emphatically rejects intelligent design. If the DIs goal is to highlight the "scientific" support for ID theory, why isn't their statement as clear? Why is it so watered down and wishy-washy that it doesn't mention ID at all, or even reject evolution? Is it perhaps that that wording that clearly stated the DIs goals and beliefs would have been an even harder sell than it already is? Maybe the wimpy wording was designed to facilitate misrepresenting the purpose of the petition? I stumbled across this:

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2002450329_danny24.html

One has to wonder how many others on the DI petition didn't realize what the goals of the Discovery Institute or it's petition were. (Bob Davidson does seem to have been removed from the current list.)

And now, unless somebody posts a rebuttal that isn't based entirely on a creationist strawman of evolution, or an attempt to put forth their own beliefs as justification for injecting ID into science classes, I think that's it for me.