Never underestimate the intelligence of the American people:
All eight members up for re-election to the Pennsylvania school board that had been sued for introducing the teaching of intelligent design as an alternative to evolution in biology class were swept out of office yesterday by a slate of challengers who campaigned against the intelligent design policy.Among the losing incumbents on the Dover, Pa., board were two members who testified in favor of the intelligent design policy at a recently concluded federal trial on the Dover policy: the chairwoman, Sheila Harkins, and Alan Bonsell.
The election results were a repudiation of the first school district in the nation to order the introduction of intelligent design in a science class curriculum. The policy was the subject of a trial in Federal District Court that ended last Friday. A verdict by Judge John E. Jones III is expected by early January.
The debate between ID and evolution involves emotion, religion, politics, and a touch of madness. The one thing missing has been science. Every time the proponents of Intelligent Design enter into a debate on the science of their theories, they lose. The reason has nothing to do with faith in evolution but rather the empirical evidence that has been presented for more than 100 years which show that animals do indeed evolve from lower forms of life, that they do not spring up out of nothingness.
The vagaries and capriciousness of mutations that contribute to evolutionary development of the various life forms on this planet has existed for more than 3.5 billion years. While we don’t have all the answers, that doesn’t invalidate the theory of evolution. Science is a process for finding facts, not truth. If it is truth you seek, read the bible not Darwin.
As for ID, I have no doubt that it would make an excellent field of study in religion class. But to try and substitute it for teaching evolution in biology class would be disastrous.
8:54 am
[...] Wing Nuthouse, referring to Pennsylvania’s decision to reject a similar proposition, has this: “I have no doubt that it would make an excellent fiel [...]
9:59 am
JR, I was looking to make a comment but you beat me to it and did a much better job than I would have.May I also add that we must all come to understand the difference between fact and assumption. Assumptions do not turn into facts based on how long it is generally considered to be true nor by how many people believe it. We are all better served admitting to which is which.
10:11 am
Sorry for the second post, but don’t you think that ultimately the truth and the facts are necessarily in harmony?
10:28 am
Well put, Rick. I’m glad to see that some conservatives haven’t swallowed the latest “flavor-of-the-month,” ID. Anyone who values intellectual honesty should run far, far away from the ID crowd. And #2, it appears that you need to expand your reading list a bit if you think that all the evidence for evolution by natural selection would “fit in a small box.” Sheesh.
10:54 am
Are you a son of Orpha “Pat” and “Bud” -My Husband, Bill and I lived in Palma Sola Shores and were Friends – Sorry that your Father is deceased. He was such a wonderful Person. We like your Mom too, She’s “the best”. jane & bill Brien
11:35 am
[...] g of the Dover Board, anyone who thinks all Republicans favor this ID/Creationist nonsense is sadly mistaken). We’ll call it natural selection, and the cu [...]
11:44 am
I think the argument here is not whether or not ID is wrong, but whether it should be taught in school. Somewhat spiritual myself, I tend to side with ID. However, I do not believe it should be taught in school. Science is about what we know for sure. ID is about faith. It is dangerous to teach religion in school, whether that religion is the quasi religion of environmentalism or the concept of ID.
Because we don’t know precisely how life began does not mean God created it, or for that matter that it came about randomly. From a scientific view point, it simply means we don’t know for sure—nothing more, nothing less. It’s that “I don’t know” area in which religion and philosophy fill the holes. Though I personally believe a higher power had a hand in things, I understand this is the realm of religion and philosophy. Teaching this “hole filling” to students as fact is a mistake (teaching it as opinion is another matter).
JR, you said “You’ll find, however, that the physical evidence for these intermediary states can fit in a box that FedEx would ship for about 5 bucks.” I’m curious as to what makes you think that. We have been finding fossil evidence for many decades now. We’d need a pretty big box for all of that evidence. Even if what you say is the case, the bible could be mailed for cheaper than five bucks, and ID wouldn’t exist without it. Is your contention that the size and amount of the evidence is at all relevant to what that evidence proves? A bloody knife with finger prints can send someone to jail for the rest of their days. Does the fact that it is small mean it is not a worthy piece of evidence? Even if the bloody knife is the only piece of evidence, it can still send someone to jail just because of the evidence on it. The same goes for a handful of fossil evidence (and there is more than a handful out there).
3:21 pm
Arguably “intelligent design” exists and is operating here and now. How so you might ask?
Consider a dog with AKC papers. Consider VNF variety tomatoes. These represent outcomes that were effected by man’s intelligence perturbing evolution.
An appealing idea (to me anyway) is next to use some proof-by-mathematical-induction like logic to extrapolate and demonstrate the necessity for the existence of intelligence other than man’s.
That result would be tough for some to accept!
4:18 pm
“I think the argument here is not whether or not ID is wrong, but whether it should be taught in school. Somewhat spiritual myself, I tend to side with ID. However, I do not believe it should be taught in school. Science is about what we know for sure. ID is about faith. It is dangerous to teach religion in school, whether that religion is the quasi religion of environmentalism or the concept of ID.”
To me, statements like this show basic ignorance of the nature of the controversy, and suggest that someone has bought into the popular mischaracterization of what ID is and is about. Anyone who thinks “science is what we know for sure” has a notion of science that is foreign to scientists. That’s absurd. And ID is NOT necessarily or primarily about faith. It is primarily a discussion of the scientific evidence for and against the premise of random or undirected changes in life forms. It’s been a subject of genuine scientific discussion, inquiry and debate for decades in the biology departments of major universities, and the subject of books and journal articles by some very distinguished scientists. There are agnostic and atheist biologists who have no difficulty whatsoever in recognizing that the currently dominant theories have more holes than substance, and could be completely wrong. It’s a source of constant amazement and amusement to me that people believe otherwise.
5:24 pm
But in evolution, where is the original life? evolutionary science, as I was taught in school, believes that life just sprang up out of nothing, too. The random collection of the exact sequence of amino acids and other gunk required to make a functioning single-cell organism that could survive a geographically chaotic environment. That’s at least as hard to swallow as an ‘intelligent designer,’ no? Personally, it seems to me to be a combination of the two, that life was created and then allowed to follow natural laws. Both theories work fine but break down at opposite points – evolution has lots of evidence (internally, you understand) but no feasible origin, ID has (if you stay within the rules, once again) an origin but not a lot in the way of evidence. ??
5:57 pm
You can call it ID or anything else you like. When you get to the end of the argument, you are still stuck with “I don’t understand it so it must be the Thunder God”. Admitting that you don’t understand it is fine. Admitting that it’s too complex for us to understand NOW, given the state of our collective knowledge, is fine. Attributing anything to a ficticious being, of whatever name, is religion, not science.
6:11 pm
Kyle:
Your right about the science statement. I misspoke. Science regularly corrects itself, to be sure. My point is that it is based on tangible evidence. That evidence upholds theories which we accept ast true until new evidence proves otherwise.
The concept of a directed universe is not based on tangible evidence. Yes, there are patterns in nature, but a pattern does not dictate that it was directed by an intelligent force. I think this is where the argument is based. One side believes that the universe cannot possibly be random, therefore there is a supreme being(s) that directed it. The other side believes that it can happen randomly, that it does not need a supreme being(s) to operate, and thus God is tossed out the window ala Occam’s Razor. Both arguments are based on one thing: faith. One has faith it was directed, the other has faith it was not. Neither can prove it scientifically.
“And ID is NOT necessarily or primarily about faith. It is primarily a discussion of the scientific evidence for and against the premise of random or undirected changes in life forms.”
I’ve never heard ID used as an argument for undirected changes in life forms. The name “intelligent design” indicates that it was designed intelligently, not randomly (the argument for life without design is called “evolution”). Given that, an argument against the “undirected changes in life forms” implies that it was directed (by God or aliens or whatever). Since there is no evidence of this outside of coinicidence (which would never hold up in court, much less in science), it requires a measure of faith. A belief in a supreme being is the domain of religion. Like it or not, faith plays a very significant role in ID, as it requires one to accept the reality of something that cannot be proven (like God). Nothing wrong with that at all (I believe myself), but it is important to keep science and religion separate
On the other hand, the belief that there is no God and everything is random (the old Occam’s Razor argument) requires one to believe that because things can be simple they must be simple. It assumes that Occam’s Razor (the idea that the best conclusion is the simplest) is a fact, when it is just a philosophy—a sort of guiding rule. It is not absolute. So, one side says, “My religion trumps your philosophy” while the other says “my philosophy trumps your religion.” Maybe ID people and athiests should go bowling together. They have a lot in common.
“There are agnostic and atheist biologists who have no difficulty whatsoever in recognizing that the currently dominant theories have more holes than substance, and could be completely wrong.”
This is a very general statement. If it were truly had “more holes than substance” then scientists would reject it outright. The arguments against evolution that I have seen involve nitpicking. “This detail is wrong,” or, “that detail is wrong,” thus the whole theory is wrong. Of course the current theories have holes. So does theoretical physics (quantum mechanics and relativity have different views of gravity, for example). Just about every theory has holes in it. Even the law of gravity is not perfect (when you get close to the speed of light, it falls apart). We are imperfect creatures, and thus our creations (and theories) are not perfect. We try to come up with theories that work under most circumstances (any scientist will tell you that). Evolution, thus far, fits the evidence. It doesn’t provide all the answers, but what theory does?
The truth is that we don’t know everything about how we got here. Until someone can come up with concrete evidence that a being (or beings) directed evolution on our planet, the theory of evolution is the best scientific explanation we have. To say that ID is a scientific alternative requires proof. Without proof it is little more than a debate exercise.
Having said all of this, my tendancy is to believe there is something greater. As Joe said, “I prefer the God who set up rules, and then stepped back and let them run, maybe occasionally performing a miracle or two.” I couldn’t agree more. But, again, that’s my faith and it should not be taught as fact to anyone (especially in school).
6:14 pm
[...] licy. Blogging: Right Wing Nut House: A SMALL VICTORY FOR SANITY John Cole / [...]
7:24 am
I dunno, Vaclav Havel said, given in a speech in PA 1992, something to effect that whenever scientific man measures all things according to scientific man the results are schizophrenia.
He also said “As soon as man began considering himself the source of the highest meaning in the world and the measure of everything, the world began to lose its human dimension, and man began to lose control of it.”
Ya know, we mere human beings are not the big Gods we believe ourselves to be and we would be wise to recognize this scientific, intellectually-designed fact.
Funny, there was a time when man believed the world is flat. Today, it seems that man still believes the world is flat. After 400 years of scientific research, one would think that science could offer more than just theories.
8:12 am
“I’d prefer a God…?” Well then build one in your basement to your specs. Yours probably won’t be able to do those occassional miracles, though.
4:33 pm
ID isn’t science. The reason it isn’t science is because its hypothesis isn’t provable. You can’t prove or disprove the existance of an intelligent designer.
Second, it is an obvious attempt to bring religion into the classroom. I’m starting to think is born of insecurity, and certainly ignorance. Science and religion aren’t competitors (the Catholic Church agrees with that statement). There doesn’t have to be this conflict, that’s one of the infuriating aspects of all this.
Anyhow, things might be ok in PA, but in Kansas they’ve just redefined science.
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/9967813/
9:48 pm
“Never underestimate the intelligence of the American people” Really? My favorite saying is ‘Never underestimate the stupidity of the people’ which some of you, in due respect, are showing in your comments. First, Darwins Evolution Theory is just that, a theory. In science any theory is subject to constant analysis and evaluation. Those scientists that are proposing intelligent design are not biblical creativists but are proposing an alternate and/or complement to evolution because evolution simple does not answer all the questions about the creation and changes of life forms. In fact, David Bohm, a physicist on the par with Einstein and his other peers, not only posited but proved that there is something going on in the universe at the micro and macro levels that cannot be explained by evolution, quantum mechanics or any other theory. In this article on David Bohms intelligence theory by David Pratt, http://www.theosophy-nw.org/theosnw/science/prat-boh.htm
Pratt writes “Bohm believes that life and consciousness are enfolded deep in the generative order and are therefore present in varying degrees of unfoldment in all matter, including supposedly “inanimate” matter such as electrons or plasmas. He suggests that there is a “protointelligence” in matter, so that new evolutionary developments do not emerge in a random fashion but creatively as relatively integrated wholes from implicate levels of reality.”
Read the article, you might change your minds about intelligent design. If you don’t have the technical expertise to understand the article, find a technically literate friend to explain it to you. As for me, the very big hole in Darwin, is the belief that complex life can come from pure chance. No way!!
1:04 am
This is an interesting article, but I fail to see how it proves ID is valid. It seems that Bohm believed it, but so what? Because Bohm is a famous physicist, a brilliant physicist at that, and because he believed in some sort of design in physics that it must absolutely be true? Of course not. An opinion, even a scientists opinion, is just that until proof can be found.
The article says “The mystical connotations of Bohm’s ideas are underlined by his remark that the implicate domain ‘could equally well be called Idealism, Spirit, Consciousness. The separation of the two—matter and spirit—is an abstraction.’” The operative word being “could.” He is not saying “yes it is consciousness.” This is his opinion, nothing more, nothing less.
All Bohm managed to do was show that there are things science cannot explain. This is not new. Scientists do not claim to know everything, even in regards to evolution. Scientists regularly update their theories based on new information. Just because there are things science has yet to explain does not automatically mean that ID is involved. All it means is that we don’t know. God or aliens or whatever may be involved, but we can’t assume that until we have proof (of which there is none outside of conjecture). Show me an alien fossil that is dated back to the time of single celled life forms and then we can talk ID.
I’ve discussed this in other forums as well and each argument comes down to this: science cannot explain absolutely all aspects of evolution, thus it is not valid. I said this already, but this to follow this logic is to say all scientific theories are invalid.
It is human nature to want to understand things. If there is no proof, it is our tendency to insert our own explanations. But lack of proof does not mean proof is lacking. The answer is there even though we can’t see it, but we don’t assume one thing is true—be it evolution or ID—unless we have the evidence, and we have museums full of proof of evolution (to fed ex it would cost a whole hell of a lot of cash).
When we see a situation we cannot explain, we simply say “I don’t know.” There is nothing wrong with not understanding something. There is something wrong with insisting that a particular answer is correct when there is no concrete evidence to support it.
One other thing. The site on which this is article is posted says the following (you have to go to the main page of the site): “Theosophical Society is dedicated to universal brotherhood, independent spiritual search, and study of the religious, scientific and philosophical thought of humanity, ancient and modern.” They admit they have a bias toward religion. It was originally printed in theosophy magazine (Sunrise).
For reference: http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=theosophy for a definition of theosophy (you guys probably already know this, but just in case…).
All of this brings the whole article into question in the first place. Without having read Bohm’s work, how do I know it is in the correct context? I could quote you stuff from the Democratic Underground and from the Daily Kos that Bush lied about the war on terror. Given the source, you would question that so-called evidence. The same thing applies here.
9:56 am
“Museums full of proof…?”
“...the extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists as the trade secret of paleontology. We fancy ourselves as the only true students of life’s history, yet to preserve our favorite account of evolution by natural selection we view our data as so bad that we never see the very process we profess to study.” Steven J. Gould, Natural History, May 1977 p.14.
12:41 pm
1977? Think you could come up with something a little more recent? Do you think we have found nothing new since then? And describe “rare.” Rare, as in, only fifty thousand or so? Ten thousand? Compared to how many creatures have lived and died, that is rare indeed, but even ten thousand is a hell of a number. Just saying “it’s rare” doesn’t help. And it doesn’t address the quality of the fossils, which is perhaps more important. Caveman bones are very telling of what we used to be, even though we may not have a lot of them (at least as compared to how many people there have been).
Further, you are quoting a man who firmly believed in the theory of evolution. So, are you saying that he was admitting that he believed evolution was false? He screwed up, let the cat out of the bag, and now the truth is out?
Again, we have nitpicking. “I found a hole in evolution, therefore it is ALL false.” Nonsense, and I’ve already explained why.
I’ve come to the conclusion that talking with ID’ers and creationists about evolution is like talking to liberals about the war in Iraq. Instead of supporting their own view with facts, they attempt to destroy other points of view in the hopes that people will accept theirs when it is the only one left. It is irrational and does absolutely nothing to prove they are correct. ID will never be a valid scientific fact until it provides EVIDENCE of a designer(s). And when that happens, I’ll change my mind about a lot of things (as will a lot of scientists).
3:28 pm
I am not saying I found a hole in evolution therefore it is all false. Here is my point. Even in the evolution camp—would you prefer I quote Behe or Dembski from 2005?—there are doubts about the fossil record and it’s neither a sign of intellectual immaturity nor religious zealotry to admit it.
I’m not trying to convince anybody of anything. This is my personal question about the “proof” that’s in museums (BTW: Favorite indoor place? Smithsonian Museum of Natural History. Card-carying member, too!): Here is early bone set A. There is later bone set B. That proves nothing to me except that A and B existed. Where are all the necessary iterations between those points? Maybe I can’t expect complete lines for every living thing but I would expect the gaps to be quite rare not the lines. Saltation everywhere I look. A and B are facts. That A became B is not observable therefore, an assumption. Not a lie or an error necessarily, but an assumption. At such a point I get to decide for myself what I choose to believe. If every other person on earth agrees with me it is then a popular assumption yet not a fact.