It's Over in Dover, But Not For Intelligent Design

More fallout and criticism of Judge Jones' flawed ruling in the Dover (Kitzmiller, et al v. Dover School District, et al) trial. I have used the title of the copy of the article on the Discovery Institute website. My comments are bold and in square brackets.

Idea not based on religion, USA Today, 12/21/2005, John G. West ... Pyrrhic victory. It's a phrase proponents of Darwin's theory might do well to ponder as they crow over the decision by a federal judge in Pennsylvania "permanently enjoining" the Dover school district from mentioning the theory of intelligent design in science classes. ["A Pyrrhic victory ... is a victory which is won at too great a cost for the victor." The cost of this victory to Darwinism is that it will be even more associated in the public mind with the use of the power of the State to ruthlessly crush scientific dissent. Not to mention the ultimate Pyrrhic victory being to those who suppress truth in order to maintain error. Since truth is its own reward, then untruth is its own punishment.]

Contrary to Judge John Jones' assertions, intelligent design is not a religious-based idea, but instead an evidence-based scientific theory that holds there are certain features of living systems and the universe that are best explained by an intelligent cause. [Irrespective of what Judge Jones, or ID's critics say, the fact is that intelligent design is a scientific theory that there is empirically detectable evidence of design in nature and is based solely on the evidence of nature, not the Bible or any other sacred text. As the agnostic Michael Denton put it, "the inference to design ... may have religious implications, but it does not depend on religious presuppositions" (my emphasis):

"Paley was not only right in asserting the existence of an analogy between life and machines, but was also remarkably prophetic in guessing that the technological ingenuity realized in living systems is vastly in excess of anything yet accomplished by man. ... The almost irresistible force of the analogy has completely undermined the complacent assumption, prevalent in biological circles over most of the past century, that the design hypothesis can be excluded on the grounds that the notion is fundamentally a metaphysical a priori concept and therefore scientifically unsound. On the contrary, the inference to design is a purely a posteriori induction based on a ruthlessly consistent application of the logic of analogy. The conclusion may have religious implications, but it does not depend on religious presuppositions." (Denton M.J., "Evolution: A Theory in Crisis," Burnett Books: London, 1985, p.341).]

No legal decree can remove the digitally coded information from DNA, nor molecular machines from cells. The facts of biology cannot be overruled by a federal judge.[Agreed. I am sure that there are many scientists and philosophers of science who, while they think ID is wrong, nevertheless would be deeply troubled by a science that depends on a lawyer to decree what is, and what is not, scientific.]

Research on intelligent design will continue to go forward, and the scientific evidence will win out in the end. [As previously stated, I am not so sure that "the scientific evidence will win out in the end", in the case of ID, because while ID cannot from the evidence of nature alone prove the designer is God, it is clear that those opposed to ID unwittingly demonstrate Romans 1:18-20 to be true in that they intuitively know that the designer is God, and therefore will seek to suppress that knowledge.]

Still, Darwinists clearly won this latest skirmish in the evolution wars. But at what cost? Evolutionists used to style themselves the champions of free speech and academic freedom against unthinking dogmatism. But increasingly, they have become the new dogmatists, demanding judicially-imposed censorship of dissent. [It is a supreme irony that science, whose mythology is that of the individual scientist (e.g. Galileo), armed only with the evidence of nature, triumphing over the overwhelming power of the entrenched establishment (e.g. the College of Cardinals). But as Johnson points out, these days the equivalent of the College of Cardinals is the National Academy of Sciences (which makes the equivalent of Galileo, Mike Behe!) :

"From the Galileo case, what we really learn is that a man who thinks for himself is apt to get in trouble with his other professors and the people who control the funding. The problem was not only with the Catholic Church. Galileo's scientific colleagues were also to blame. Of course, at the time, the Catholic Church was the ruling intellectual power; the problem was that all the professors of natural science happened to be affiliated with the church. But today, the equivalent of the College of Cardinals is not a group of guys in red hats who sit in Rome, but the National Academy of Sciences in Washington DC and their equivalent bodies in other countries. In other words, these people are the academic elite. And the academic elite is never really in favour of freedom of thought. Why? Because the academic elite is the people who get a name for themselves by establishing their theories. And so naturally, I guess, they don't want to see them overturned. That's the lesson from Galileo." (Hastie P., "Designer genes: Phillip E. Johnson talks to Peter Hastie," Australian Presbyterian, October 2001, p.5. Emphasis in original)]

Now, Darwinists are trying to silence debate through persecution. At Ohio State University, a graduate student's dissertation is in limbo because he was openly critical of Darwin's theory. At George Mason University, a biology professor lost her job after she mentioned intelligent design in class. At the Smithsonian, an evolutionary biologist was harassed and vilified for permitting an article favoring intelligent design to be published in a peer-reviewed biology journal. Those who think they can stop the growing interest in intelligent design through court orders or intimidation are deluding themselves. Americans don't like being told there are some ideas they aren't permitted to investigate. Try to ban an idea, and you will generate even more interest in it. [It will be interesting to see if this is the case. Sooner or later the Darwinists are going to overreach themselves, and this might be it!]

Efforts to mandate intelligent design are misguided, but efforts to shut down discussion of a scientific idea through harassment and judicial decrees hurt democratic pluralism. The more Darwinists resort to censorship and persecution, the clearer it will become that they are championing dogmatism, not science. ... [Agreed, but the Darwinists' dilemma is that deep down they must know that if they don't "resort to censorship and persecution" then they are going to lose to ID on the evidence. Otherwise, why would they "resort to censorship and persecution" if they thought they had truth on their side and so would win on a level playing field?]

Dembski: Life after Dover: William Dembski says the Dover verdict is not ID's Waterloo, but merely one battle in a long culture war, Science & Theology News, William A. Dembski, December 21, 2005 ... Judge John E. Jones III has ruled in the Dover ID case, not only striking down the Dover school board policy advocating intelligent design but also identifying intelligent design as nonscientific and fundamentally religious. [Judge Jones was simply wrong in the latter-see above. The world authority on creationism, historian Ronald L. Numbers, had previously agreed that "the creationist label is inaccurate when it comes to the ID movement. But ... its `the easiest way to discredit intelligent design'":

"The Massachusetts Institute of Technology Press signaled ID's growing importance in January, issuing an 805-page anthology titled `Intelligent Design Creationism and Its Critics.' That book title depicts ID as a variant of creationism, which reads Genesis literally and says the Earth was formed thousands of years ago - rather than billions - all species appeared immediately and a flood engulfed the globe. Yet ID actually insists on none of that. And while creationists are mostly conservative Protestants, ID theorists come from a wider range of faiths and some are nonreligious. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled creationism is too biblical for public schools, and ID proponents sought to distinguish themselves from that label in a long Utah Law Journal article arguing that ID is fit for public schools. University of Wisconsin historian Ronald L. Numbers, an ID opponent and author of `The Creationists,' agrees the creationist label is inaccurate when it comes to the ID movement. But, he adds, its `the easiest way to discredit intelligent design.'" (Ostling R.N., "Ohio School Board Debates Teaching 'Intelligent Design'," The Washington Post, March 14, 2002)

It will be interesting to see if any philosopher of science has the guts to say what Larry Laudan said in the aftermath of the Arkansas trial, when Judge Overton ruled "creation-science" as not science but religion, that "The victory in the [Dover] case was hollow, for it was achieved only at the expense of perpetuating and canonizing a false stereotype of what science is and how it works. If it goes unchallenged by the scientific community, it will raise grave doubts about that community's intellectual integrity":

"The victory in the Arkansas case was hollow, for it was achieved only at the expense of perpetuating and canonizing a false stereotype of what science is and how it works. If it goes unchallenged by the scientific community, it will raise grave doubts about that community's intellectual integrity. No one familiar with the issues can really believe that anything important was settled through anachronistic efforts to revive a variety of discredited criteria for distinguishing between the scientific and the non-scientific. Fifty years ago, Clarence Darrow asked, a propos the Scopes trial, `Isn't it difficult to realize that a trial of this kind is possible in the twentieth century in the United States of America?' We can raise that question anew, with the added irony that, this time, the pro-science forces are defending a philosophy of science which is, in its way, every bit as outmoded as the `science' of the creationists." (Laudan L., "Science at the Bar-Causes for Concern," in Ruse M., ed., "But is it Science?: The Philosophical Question in the Creation/Evolution Controversy," Prometheus Books: Amherst NY, 1996, p.355).

Probably not, so fierce would be the Darwinist's retribution. But there must be many (if not most) philosophers of science who know that Judge Jones (like Judge Overton) was wrong in that he could not so simply define what is, and what is not, "science." But if no philosopher of science speaks up for what they know to be true, then there would no longer be "grave doubts about that [scientific] community's intellectual integrity"!]

To what degree does this ruling constitute a setback for ID? Let's turn the question around. If the judge had ruled in favor of the Dover policy, it would have emboldened school boards, legislators and grass roots organizations to push for intelligent design in the public school science curricula across the nation. As a consequence, this case really would have been a Waterloo for the supporters of neo-Darwinian evolution (the form of evolution taught in all the textbooks). Conversely, the actual ruling is not a Waterloo for the intelligent design side. Certainly it will put a damper on school boards interested in promoting intelligent design. But this is not a Supreme Court decision. Nor is it likely this decision will be appealed since the Dover school board that caused all the trouble was voted out and replaced this November. [Agreed that this would have been a disaster for Darwinism if Judge Jones had ruled that ID was not "religion" (he did not need to rule that it was "science") and so was not unconstitutional to be taught in science classes. But conversely it is not a disaster for ID, just a setback. How major a setback, remains to be seen.]

Thus we can expect agitation for ID and against evolution to continue. School boards and state legislators may tread more cautiously, but tread on evolution they will - the culture war demands it! [Indeed! The ID movement will continue its war of attrition against Darwinism, in what Phil Johnson called the science educators' `Vietnam'":

"The first New York Times story on the Kansas decision quoted me as saying that this is the science educators' `Vietnam.' What I meant by this is that in the first place they have a determined adversary who is not going to surrender. They're not gaining ground. That's what the polls show, and that is why there is so much worry. If the enemy keeps on fighting, he wears you down. The second thing is that it is an adversary--that is, the anti-Darwinists--that can appeal to the liberal values of a lot of their opponents, just as the Viet Cong appealed to the anti-imperialist sentiments of the American public. The adversary can say, Let's hear both sides, let's have an open discussion, you don't know the majority position unless you have heard it effectively challenged, and so on. Already the polls show that two-thirds of the public favors something of the `teach both sides, teach the controversy' direction. The Kansas decision is certainly going to encourage other states and localities to do something like this." (Johnson P.E., "Evolution and the Curriculum: A Conversation with Phillip Johnson and Gregg Easterbrook," Center Conversations No. 4, Ethics and Public Policy Center: Washington DC, September 1999)

The ID movement "enemy" will keep on fighting because (like the Viet Cong) we know we have right, if not might, on our side. And the polls will continue to show that the majority want both sides to be taught. Whether the Darwinists can in the long-term sustain their unpopular position also remains to be seen.]

It is therefore naive to think that this case spells the end of ID, which is rapidly going international and crossing metaphysical and theological boundaries. I now correspond with ID proponents on every continent (save Antarctica). Moreover, I've seen ID embraced by Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, agnostics and even atheists. The idea that ID is purely an "American thing" or an "evangelical Christian thing" can therefore no longer be maintained. Even if ID is stifled among high school students (and with the Internet this is impossible), ID is of growing interest to college and graduate students. Three years ago, there was one Intelligent Design and Evolution Awareness (IDEA) Center at the University of California-San Diego. Now there are thirty such centers at American colleges and universities, including UC Berkeley and Cornell. These centers are fiercely pro-ID. [This is an important point. It may be that ID not being able to be taught in USA schools may not be such a setback when potential scientists will get their information about ID from the Internet. And it is going to be hard for teachers to teach evolution, when students will know from the Internet that "it ain't necessarily so".]

Ultimately, the significance of a court case like this depends not on a judge's decision but on the cultural forces that serve as the backdrop against which the decision is made. Take the Scopes Trial. In the minds of most, it was a decisive victory for evolution. Yet, in the actual trial, the decision went against Scopes (he was convicted of violating a Tennessee statute against teaching evolution). Judge Jones's decision may make life in the short-term more difficult for ID proponents, and it certainly will not be pleasant to endure the inevitable gloating by the victors. [Agreed, but then we are used to it!]

But the work of ID will continue. In fact, it may continue more effectively than if the judge had ruled in favor of ID, which might have convinced people that ID had already won the day when in fact ID still has much to accomplish in developing its scientific and intellectual program. Judge Jones's decision may well prove best for fostering ID's intellectual vitality and ultimate success. [One good side-effect will be that those (like the Thomas More Law Center-see below) who have no real commitment to ID itself but have jumped on the ID bandwagon to use it to advance their own creationist, or Christian, or political agenda (however worthy in their own right those may be) will jump off, leaving ID to develop its program less distracted by peripheral, non-ID issues.]

Santorum Breaks Ties With Law Center: Santorum Breaks Ties to Law Firm That Represented School District on Intelligent Design, ABC News/AP ... PHILADELPHIA Dec 22, 2005 - Sen. Rick Santorum on Thursday withdrew his affiliation from the Christian-rights law center that defended a school district's policy mandating the teaching of "intelligent design." Santorum, the Senate's No. 3 Republican who is facing a tough re-election challenge next year, earlier praised the Dover Area School District for "attempting to teach the controversy of evolution." But the day after a federal judge ruled the district's policy on intelligent design unconstitutional, Santorum told The Philadelphia Inquirer he was troubled by testimony indicating religion motivated some board members to adopt the policy. Santorum was on the advisory board of the Michigan-based Thomas More Law Center, which defended the district's policy. The law center describes its mission as defending the religious freedom of Christians. "I thought the Thomas More Law Center made a huge mistake in taking this case and in pushing this case to the extent they did," Santorum said Wednesday. [Agreed. Personally I think the TMLC used the Dover Board, and the ID movement, as throw-away items in pursuit of its President Richard Thompson's agenda:

To find its first intelligent design case, the lawyers went around the country looking for a school board willing to withstand a lawsuit. In May 2000, Robert Muise, one of the lawyers, traveled to Charleston, W.Va., to persuade the school board there to buy the intelligent design textbook "Of Pandas and People" and teach it in science class. Mr. Muise told the board in Charleston that it would undoubtedly be sued if the district taught intelligent design, but that the center would mount a defense at no cost. "We'll be your shields against such attacks," he told them at a school board meeting, a riff on the center's slogan, "The Sword and Shield for People of Faith." He said they could defend teaching intelligent design as a matter of academic freedom. ... The board in West Virginia declined the center's offer. So did school districts in Michigan and Minnesota and a handful of other states ... But in Dover, the firm found willing partners when it contacted the school board in the summer of 2004 and promised it a first-class defense, The Dover school board proceeded despite a memo from its lawyer, Stephen S. Russell, warning that if the board lost the case, they would have to pay its opponents legal fees - which according to the plaintiffs' lawyers exceeds $1 million. ... Some of the proponents of intelligent design are also unhappy that the case went to court, and fear it could stop the movement in its infancy because some board members had a public record of advocating creationism, which the Supreme Court has twice ruled cannot be taught in public schools. "The school district never consulted us and did the exact opposite of what we suggested," said John G. West, a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute .... "Frankly I don't even know if school board members know what intelligent design is. They and their supporters are trying to hijack intelligent design for their own purposes. ... Mr. Thompson, the Thomas More Center's chief counsel, said the case appealed to him because of its "national impact." ("In Intelligent Design Case, a Cause in Search of a Lawsuit," The New York Times, November 4, 2005).

If the TMLC did indeed promise to "shield" the Dover board from having to pay the plaintiffs' $1M plus legal costs, then I would have thought the new board would have a case against the TMLC.]

He said he would end his affiliation with the center. The leading Democratic challenger in Santorum's 2006 re-election battle, state Treasurer Robert P. Casey Jr., accused him of backtracking on intelligent design. Casey spokesman Larry Smar said Wednesday that Santorum's statements were "yet another example of 'Election Year Rick' changing his positions for political expediency." Casey has led Santorum in recent polls. Richard Thompson, president and chief counsel of the center, said Santorum's withdrawal came as no surprise because several weeks earlier the senator had indicated that he was unhappy with the center's involvement in the case. "It is a very controversial issue, as you know, and he is involved in a very hotly contested Senate race, and it's probably in his best interest," Thompson said Thursday..... Santorum said in a 2002 Washington Times op-ed article that intelligent design "is a legitimate scientific theory that should be taught in science classes." But he said he meant that teachers should have freedom to mention intelligent design as part of the evolution debate not be required to do so and said his position hasn't changed. Santorum said he disagreed with the Dover board's policy of mandating the teaching of intelligent design, rather than teaching the controversy surrounding evolution. Because of that, he said the case provided "a bad set of facts" to test whether theories other than evolution should be taught in science class. ... [All along Santorum's position has been the ID movement's "teach the controversy", i.e. against mandating ID as the Dover board's policy did.]

Stephen E. Jones, BSc (Biol).
"Problems of Evolution"

The Problem with God: Interview with Richard Dawkins #1

Here is an interview with Richard Dawkins. The interviewer's questions are bold and in italics to distinguish them from my comments which are bold and in square brackets. Because of its length, I have had to split this post into multiple parts.

The Problem with God: Interview with Richard Dawkins, Beliefnet, 15 December 2005. The renowned biologist talks about intelligent design, dishonest Christians, and why God is no better than an imaginary friend. [Molecular biologist turned Christian theologian Alister McGrath observes, "Yet while Dawkins' atheism became more strident in its tone and more aggressive in its assertions, it did not become noticeably more sophisticated .... Religious folk are demonized as dishonest ... when he comes to deal with anything to do with God, we seem to enter ... the world of a schoolboy debating society":

"As philosopher Michael Ruse pointed out in a review of The Devil's Chaplain, Dawkins' `attention has swung from writing about science for a popular audience to waging an all-out attack on Christianity.' The brilliant scientific popularizer became a savage anti-religious polemicist, preaching rather than arguing (or so it seemed to me) his case. .... Dawkins' account of religion tends to amount to little more than freak-pointing, with the extreme portrayed as the typical. Religious people were dismissed as anti-scientific, intellectually irresponsible, or existentially immature - on a good day. Yet while Dawkins' atheism became more strident in its tone and more aggressive in its assertions, it did not become noticeably more sophisticated in terms of the arguments offered. Religious folk are demonized as dishonest, liars, fools, and knaves, incapable of responding honestly to the real world, and preferring to invent a false, pernicious, and delusionary world into which to entice the unwary, the young, and the naïve. ... Dawkins writes with erudition and sophistication on issues of evolutionary biology ... Yet when he comes to deal with anything to do with God, we seem to enter into a different world. It is the world of a schoolboy debating society, relying on rather heated, enthusiastic overstatements, spiced up with some striking oversimplifications and more than an occasional misrepresentation (accidental, I can only assume) to make some superficially plausible points - the sort of arguments that once persuaded me that atheism was the only option for a thinking person when I was a schoolboy. ... I had hoped that his writings would produce a new, intellectually reinvigorated atheism - something that would be really exciting and engaging. Instead, I found the same plodding rhetoric and tired old cliches that I knew well from my schoolboy days. Dawkins was preaching to the choir, recycling rather than renewing the case for atheism. ... The year 2003 dawned, and with it came the publication of A Devil's Chaplain. It is not one of Dawkins' best works ... the book exudes intellectual weariness, as if its author had run out of intellectual steam.." (McGrath A.E., "Dawkins' God: Genes, Memes, and the Meaning of Life," Blackwell: Malden MA, 2005, pp.8-10)]

Interview by Laura Sheahen British biologist Richard Dawkins has made a name for himself defending evolution and fighting what he sees as religiously motivated attacks on science. Dr. Dawkins sat down with Beliefnet at the World Congress of Secular Humanism, where his keynote address focused on intelligent design. [The issue is not "religiously motivated attacks on science" but "religiously motivated attacks on" (and defences against), scientific materialism which denies that the primary subject-matter of religion, God, even exists. However, as a Christian, I have no brief for "religion" in general, so hereafter by "religion" I mean the Christian religion, i.e. what C.S. Lewis called "mere Christianity," i.e. "the belief that has been common to nearly all Christians at all times.":

"Ever since I became a Christian I have thought that the best, perhaps the only, service I could do for my unbelieving neighbours was to explain and defend the belief that has been common to nearly all Christians at all times. ... what Baxter calls 'mere' Christianity." (Lewis C.S., "Mere Christianity," [1952], Fount: London, 1997, reprint, p.vi.)

You're concerned about the state of education, especially science education. If you were able to teach every person, what would you want people to believe?

I would want them to believe whatever evidence leads them to; I would want them to look at the evidence, judge it on its merits, not accept things because of internal revelation or faith, but purely on the basis of evidence. [Dawkins falsely assumes that Christians don't "believe whatever evidence leads them to", that "revelation" is not itself "evidence", and that "faith" cannot be based on "evidence". But as the Apostle Paul pointed out in 1 Cor. 15:14, "if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith." And when I was an atheist, it was the evidence of design in nature that (like Antony Flew), led me to renounce atheism for deism in the 1960s, and then later, on the basis of the evidence of the Bible, accept Christianity. The boot is in fact on the other foot: it is the atheist Dawkins who is not willing to follow the evidence wherever it leads, e.g. the prophet Daniel predicting in ~538 BC the exact year of Messiah's coming in 26 AD, because if he did, he would become a Christian. ]

Not everybody can evaluate all evidence; we can't evaluate the evidence for quantum physics. So it does have to be a certain amount of taking things on trust. I have to take what physicists say on trust, for example, because I'm a biologist. [Physics is not the only subject that Dawkins takes on trust, i.e. has faith in. He also takes his "biology", specifically his Darwinian evolution, on trust. That is, Dawkins assumes that every mutation in the entire history of life has been random (in the sense of undirected) because he has faith that there is "no mechanism" (like the supernatural intervention of God) "that could guide mutation in directions that are non-random":

"There is a fifth respect in which mutation might have been nonrandom. We can imagine (just) a form of mutation that was systematically biased in the direction of improving the animal's adaptedness to its life. But although we can imagine it, nobody has ever come close to suggesting any means by which this bias could come about. It is only in this fifth respect, the 'mutationist' respect, that the true, real-life Darwinian insists that mutation is random. Mutation is not systematically biased in the direction of adaptive improvement, and no mechanism is known (to put the point mildly) that could guide mutation in directions that are non-random in this fifth sense. Mutation is random with respect to adaptive advantage, although it is non-random in all sorts of other respects. It is selection, and only selection, that directs evolution in directions that are nonrandom with respect to advantage." (Dawkins R., "The Blind Watchmaker," [1986], Penguin: London, 1991, reprint, p.312. Emphasis in original)]

But science [has] a system of appraisal, of peer review, so that I trust the physics community to get their act together in a way that I know from the inside. [It is significant that Darwinists routinely compare their largely historical science with an experimental science like physics, to make it seem that they have the same degree of reliability. But as Bill Dembski notes, "how many physicists ... will claim that general relativity is as well established as Darwin's theory? Zero":

"Regardless of one's point of view, it's actually quite easy to see that Darwinism is not in the same league as the hard sciences. For instance, Darwinists will often compare their theory favorably to Einsteinian physics, claiming that Darwinism is just as well established as general relativity. Yet how many physicists, while arguing for the truth of Einsteinian physics, will claim that general relativity is as well established as Darwin's theory? Zero." (Dembski W.A., "Introduction: The Myths of Darwinism," in Dembski W.A., ed., "Uncommon Dissent: Intellectuals Who Find Darwinism Unconvincing," ISI Books: Wilmington DE, 2004, p.xxi)]

And there is no "peer review" permitted as to whether naturalistic evolution itself is true. Witness what happened when evolutionary biologist Richard Sternberg , the editor of a peer-reviewed journal, allowed to be published in it a paper in by ID theorist Stephen Meyer proposing that the information increase in the Cambrian explosion was the result of intelligence. Sternberg was hounded from his job and the paper was deleted from the journal's online archives.]

I wish people would put their trust in evidence, not in faith, revelation, tradition, or authority. [Again, Dawkins falsely assumes that "evidence" and "faith, revelation, tradition, or authority" are necessarily mutually exclusive.]

What do you wish people knew about evolution?

They need to understand what evolution is about. Many of them don't. I was truly shocked to be told by two separate religious leaders in this country [the U.S.] a few weeks ago--they both said something to the effect that, "I'll believe in evolution when I see a tailed monkey give birth to a human." [This is just a rhetorical trick by Dawkins, picking on the worst argument by an opposing position and making out that that is its best argument. Dawkins also makes out that the reason most people reject evolution is because they "need to understand what evolution is about." But in fact it is because people "understand what evolution is about", i.e. "the standard scientific theory that `human beings have developed over millions of years from less advanced forms of life, but God had no part in this process" (my emphasis) and that, as Dawkins himself has said, "there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference", that they reject evolution:

"In one of the most existentially penetrating statements ever made by a scientist, Richard Dawkins concluded that `the universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.' Facing such a reality, perhaps we should not be surprised at the results of a 2001 Gallup poll confirming that 45 percent of Americans believe `God created human beings pretty much in their present form at one time within the last 10,000 years or so'; 37 percent prefer a blended belief that `human beings have developed over millions of years from less advanced forms of life, but God guided this process'; and a paltry 12 percent accept the standard scientific theory that `human beings have developed over millions of years from less advanced forms of life, but God had no part in this process.'" (Shermer M.B., "The Gradual Illumination of the Mind," Scientific American, February 2002. My emphasis)]

That is staggering ignorance of what evolutionary science is about; if they think that's what evolutionists believe, no wonder they're skeptical of it. How can a civilized country have adult people in positions of leadership who know so stunningly little about the leading biological concept? [Dawkins is just deluding himself if he thinks that after four decades of compulsory public education in "evolutionary science", the reason why most people reject it, is because of "staggering ignorance of what evolutionary science is about". Dawkins seems unable to bring himself to consider that the real reason why most people reject fully naturalistic evolution is that they know too much about it, e.g. its philosophical assumptions, its lack of evidence, its problems, its implications, and the way the Darwinists argue their case:

"In the final analysis, it is not any specific scientific evidence that convinces me that Darwinism is a pseudoscience that will collapse once it becomes possible for critics to get a fair hearing. It is the way the Darwinists argue their case that makes it apparent that they are afraid to encounter the best arguments against their theory. A real science does not employ propaganda and legal barriers to prevent relevant questions from being asked, nor does it rely on enforcing rules of reasoning that allow no alternative to the official story. If the Darwinists had a good case to make, they would welcome the critics to an academic forum for open debate, and they would want to confront the best critical arguments rather than to caricature them as straw men. Instead they have chosen to rely on the dishonorable methods of power politics." (Johnson P.E., "The Wedge of Truth: Splitting the Foundations of Naturalism," Intervarsity Press: Downers Grove IL, 2000, p.141).

In my case, it was when I was most ignorant of evolution, that I assumed it was true, but the more I learned about it (including completing a biology degree in 2004, in which I gained distinctions in all my evolutionary units), the less I know evolution to be true! See for example my, "The Minimal Cell: A Problem of Evolution 1/2" and 2/2]

[Continued in part #2]

Stephen E. Jones, BSc (Biol).
"Problems of Evolution"

Intelligent-design backers blast judge #2

Intelligent-design backers blast judge: Jurist in Dover case 'activist' with 'delusions of grandeur', WorldNetDaily, December 21 2005 ....

[Continued from part #1]

Ellen Johnson, president of American Atheists, the group founded by Madalyn Murray O'Hair, praised the ruling, saying the court has made it clear that intelligent design is "simply rhetorical camouflage for promoting religious beliefs and accounts." "The fact is that proponents of intelligent design simply have not made their case, and their claims have not met the burden of evidence," she said. [You would think that someone who claims (or at least implies) that he is a Christian, would be worried that atheists would find his ruling so congenial! But in my experience in debating such theistic naturalistic evolutionists is that they don't seem to care a fig that their criticism of ID is interpreted by atheists as confirming their atheism.]

Discovery Institute attorney Casey Luskin said, however, he believes the decision will be of "minor significance" in the larger debate over intelligent design. "As we've repeatedly stressed, the ultimate validity of intelligent will be determined not by the courts but by the scientific evidence pointing to design," Luskin said. [Agreed about the validity of ID "will be determined ... by the scientific evidence pointing to design" but as pro-ID witness Stephen Fuller pointed out in the trial, unless ID can be taught in schools, it cannot "get a toe hold in science" by generating "new recruits":

"Because the scientific community is a monolith, impenetrable and often hostile to new theories, intelligent design proponents have to turn to the public schools to recruit support, a witness said Monday. Testifying on behalf of the Dover Area School District in U.S. Middle District Court, philosophy of science expert Steve Fuller said intelligent design "can't spontaneously generate a following" because the scientific community shuts the door on radical views. A sociology professor from the University of Warwick in England, Fuller said, "How do you expect any minority view to get a toe hold in science? You basically get new recruits." (York Daily Record, October 25, 2005)

I don't subscribe to the romantic ideal that the truth will inevitably win-at least not in an area where the Bible itself in Romans 1:18-20 says that guilty sinners try to suppress the evidence of design in nature, because they intuitively realize that it points to there being a God, and they don't want it to be so. So while I think ID is true, I don't expect it to ever become a majority position, although it could become a significant minority position. Personally I think that the Discovery Institute should appeal the case (assuming it can), because the judge said extremely damaging and false things about it, which should not be allowed to stand.]

West is confident the ruling will only provide fuel for the debate. "Americans don't like to be told there is some idea that they aren't permitted to learn about," he said. "It used to be said that banning a book in Boston guaranteed it would be a bestseller. Banning intelligent design in Dover will likely only fan interest in the theory." [I agree with that. But without access to science classes, will that be enough to generate a following? Admittedly the Internet is an unknown wild card in this.]

Luskin pointed out that the ruling applies only to the federal district in which it was handed down. The decision likely will not be appealed, he said, because the recently elected Dover school board members campaigned on their opposition to the policy. "The plans of the lawyers on both sides of this case to turn this into a landmark ruling have been preempted by the voters," Luskin said. [Agreed also about "lawyers on both sides of this case". As I had already opined, the Thomas More Law Center and its Chief Counsel Richard Thompson are not really interested in ID for itself but are just using ID as a mere throw-away tool in its (otherwise praiseworthy) mission of "Defending the Religious Freedom of Christians."]

West said the Discovery Institute continues to oppose efforts to mandate teaching about the theory of intelligent design in public schools. "But the Institute strongly supports the freedom of teachers to discuss intelligent design in an objective manner on a voluntary basis," he said. "We also think students should learn about both the scientific strengths and weaknesses of Darwin's theory of evolution."[This has been the DI's consistently maintained position all along:

Recent news stories have led to confusion about Discovery Institute's role in the case of Kitzmiller v. Dover School District, which challenges a Pennsylvania school district policy requiring students to be notified about the theory of intelligent design. The lead attorney defending the Dover district, Richard Thompson of the Thomas More Law Center, has made several statements inaccurately characterizing both the position and the actions of Discovery Institute regarding the Dover case. We are issuing the following statement in order to correct the record: 1. Discovery Institute's science education policy has been consistent and clear. We strongly believe that teaching about intelligent design is constitutionally permissible, but we think mandatory inclusion of intelligent design in public school curricula is ill-advised. Instead, we recommend that schools require only that the scientific evidence for and against neo-Darwinism be taught, while not infringing on the academic freedom of teachers to present appropriate information about intelligent design if they choose. Although we believe teaching about intelligent design is constitutionally permissible, we think mandating intelligent design politicizes what should be a scientific debate and harms the efforts of scientists who support design to gain a fair hearing in the scientific community." ("Setting the Record Straight about Discovery Institute's Role in the Dover School District Case," Discovery Institute News, November 10, 2005)]

West said a legal ruling "can't change the fact that there is digital code in DNA, it can't remove the molecular machines from the cell, nor change the fine tuning of the laws of physics." "The empirical evidence for design, the facts of biology and nature, can't be changed by legal decree," he insisted. [The arrogance of Judge Jones is breathtaking! With qualifications of "B.A., 1977, Dickinson College" and "J.D., 1980, Dickinson School of Law," he actually thinks that he can rule universally that ID is not science! At least King Canute realized that he could not change the facts of nature by a mere decree! But West's point, what Woodward calls "the recalcitrance of nature," is the reason why ID will outlast Judge (Canute) Jones' ruling:

"Nature's recalcitrance is the ultimately determinative factor (or limiting factor) in the shredding, shaping, or vindicating of any cosmological narrative. The reader will have noted that certain stubborn realities of nature keep coming up time after time, and they serve as the main fuel in the evidentiary debate: (1) the Cambrian explosion, now underscored and heightened in the recent discoveries in China, (2) the general absence of transitional fossils between the higher taxonomic categories outside of the Cambrian, (3) the cell's molecular systems of breathtaking complexity, recently elucidated, and (4) the quiet experiment-driven collapse of confidence in `chemical soup' scenarios for the origin of life. These four sets of brute facts, of course, mean nothing by themselves, as Gross has reminded us; they must be interpreted and woven by rhetorical skill into some explanatory scheme. Yet, such facts are ultimately stubborn; they surprise and confound; they often trigger a heightened sense of mystery. They are the stuff of anomalies, which of course in the Kuhnian vision of science may lead eventually to a genuine paradigm crisis. The four scientific realities cited above (a list that could easily be expanded) cannot be ignored in their foundational role as rhetorical weapons in the hands of Design. They and their range of possible interpretations have become the turf on which some of the fiercest battles are now fought. So the recalcitrance of nature, I propose, is the foundation of. the Design assault on the Darwinian paradigm. In dramatic terms, it is cast as the ultimate protagonist in all of the major scenes. Phillip Johnson refers to the power of recalcitrant nature (without using that name) in his `sinking ship' projection theme, found in the `How to Sink a Battleship' essay in Mere Creation. The key reference to recalcitrance is in the final line-'reality.' To appreciate the context, I will quote the entire projection theme:

When I finished the epilogue to Darwin on Trial in 1993, I compared evolutionary naturalism to a great battleship afloat on the ocean of reality. The ship's sides are heavily armored with philosophical and legal barriers to criticism, and its decks are stacked with 16-inch rhetorical guns to intimidate would-be attackers. In appearance it is as impregnable as the Soviet Union seemed a few years ago. But the ship has sprung a metaphysical leak, and that leak widens as more and more people understand it and draw attention to the conflict between empirical science and materialist philosophy. The more perceptive of the ship's officers know that the ship is doomed if the leak cannot be plugged. The struggle to save the ship will go on for a while, and meanwhile there will even be academic wine-and-cheese parties on the deck. In the end the ship's great firepower and ponderous armor will only drag it to the bottom. Reality will win.

The deciding factor in the defeat of the battleship-in Johnson's view-is the power of `reality,' which is, at root, recalcitrant nature itself." (Woodward T.E., "Doubts about Darwin: A History of Intelligent Design," Baker: Grand Rapids MI, 2003, p.200) ]

Richard Thompson, president and chief counsel for the Thomas More Law Center, which represented the school board members, said the decision shows "our present Establishment Clause jurisprudence, as several Supreme Court justices have noted, is in hopeless disarray and in need of substantial revision." "The founders of this country would be astonished at the thought that this simple curriculum change 'established religion' in violation of the Constitution that they drafted," Thompson said. [At least I agree with Thompson on that!] ...

Stephen E. Jones, BSc (Biol).
"Problems of Evolution"

Intelligent-design backers blast judge #1

Here is more on Judge Jones' flawed decision in the Dover (Kitzmiller, et al. v. Dover School District, et al.) trial. My comments are bold and in square brackets. Because of its length, I have split this post into two parts.

Intelligent-design backers blast judge: Jurist in Dover case 'activist' with 'delusions of grandeur', WorldNetDaily, December 21 2005 .... The think tank regarded as the leading proponent of "intelligent design" theory reacted strongly to U.S. District Judge John E. Jones' ruling yesterday against the Dover, Pa., school board, calling him "an activist judge who has delusions of grandeur." [I must say I agree. The signs were there that Jones saw this case in egocentric terms, seeing it as his "opportunity to rule in matters of great importance":

"During an interview in his court chambers, Jones, a Lutheran, described the experience as "intriguing and a little surreal." He said the full impact of the case's popularity hit him when he was in an Orlando airport while visiting his daughter and he noticed a woman reading a story on the trial in USA Today. Seeing the headline "brought it home," he said, "that the trial was the one I am sitting in as finder of fact and judge. . To that extent this is something I looked forward to." (Philadelphia Inquirer, Oct. 16, 2005)

and describing the trial as, "certainly ... one of the most significant cases in United States history", being star-struck that "Even Charles Darwin's great grandson is attending the trial":

"It certainly is one of the most significant cases in United States history," Judge Jones said. "Even Charles Darwin's great grandson is attending the trial." "It's hard to say [how this case will be remembered," Judge Jones said. "History generally gets written a long time after the fact. We'll know better in ten or 20 years. All we can do now is decided as according to the law and legal precedent and hope for the best." (Tide Lines, 4 November 2005).]

"The Dover decision is an attempt by an activist federal judge to stop the spread of a scientific idea and even to prevent criticism of Darwinian evolution through government-imposed censorship rather than open debate, and it won't work," said John West, associate director of the Center for Science and Culture at Discovery Institute in Seattle. [Agreed. When Judge Overton in the 1982 Arkansas trial ruled that creation-science was not science, philosopher of science Larry Laudan criticized the expert witness, fellow philosopher and devout Darwinist Michael Ruse, for "perpetuating and canonizing a false stereotype of what science is and how it works" and that "If it goes unchallenged by the scientific community, it will raise grave doubts about that community's intellectual integrity":

"The victory in the Arkansas case was hollow, for it was achieved only at the expense of perpetuating and canonizing a false stereotype of what science is and how it works. If it goes unchallenged by the scientific community, it will raise grave doubts about that community's intellectual integrity. No one familiar with the issues can really believe that anything important was settled through anachronistic efforts to revive a variety of discredited criteria for distinguishing between the scientific and the non-scientific. Fifty years ago, Clarence Darrow asked, a propos the Scopes trial, `Isn't it difficult to realize that a trial of this kind is possible in the twentieth century in the United States of America?' We can raise that question anew, with the added irony that, this time, the pro-science forces are defending a philosophy of science which is, in its way, every bit as outmoded as the `science' of the creationists." (Laudan L., "Science at the Bar-Causes for Concern," in Ruse M., ed., "But is it Science?: The Philosophical Question in the Creation/Evolution Controversy," Prometheus Books: Amherst NY, 1996, p.355)

The fact is, as I was taught in the philosophy of science unit of my biology degree, there simply is no way to determine what is, and what is not, "science", and so the real question is not, "is it science?" but "is it true"? That is, "is it supported by the evidence?" And whether ID (i.e. the theory there is empirically detectable evidence of design in nature) is true is not something that a judge (who is after all just a lawyer) can simply decree to be not science. See Stephen Meyer's "Expert Report Part 3: The Failure of Demarcation Arguments" which was prepared for the Dover trial (but because Meyer never appeared could not be officially accepted as evidence-not that Judge Jones would have taken any notice of it anyway!]

Jones ruled against an October 2004 school board policy that required students of a ninth-grade biology class in the Dover Area School District to hear a one-minute statement that says evolution is a theory, and intelligent design "is an explanation of the origin of life that differs from Darwin's view." Proponents of intelligent design say it draws on recent discoveries in physics, biochemistry and related disciplines that indicate some features of the natural world are best explained as the product of an intelligent cause rather than an undirected process such as natural selection. Proponents include scientists at numerous universities and science organizations worldwide. [ID, unlike creation-science, is based solely on the evidence of nature and if it is scientific for Darwinian evolution to advance the proposition that there is no design in nature, then it is equally scientific for ID to advance the counter-proposition that there is design in nature.]

Jones determined Dover board members violated the U.S. Constitution's ban on congressional establishment of religion and charged that several members lied to cover their motives even while professing religious beliefs. [This is self-evidently absurd! How can reading to students a brief statement before an evolution class that there are problems with the theory of evolution and there is ID material in the library for students interested in an alternative, be a "congressional establishment of religion"? A prime example of Mr Bumble's observation in Oliver Twist : "If the law supposes that ... [then] the law is a ass-a idiot"!

But amazingly, on the very same day that Judge Jones delivered his ruling, the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that "The First Amendment does not demand a wall of separation between church and state" and "the ACLU's `repeated reference 'to the separation of church and state' ... has grown tiresome" and it "does not embody the reasonable person" (my emphasis)

1st Amendment 'doesn't create church-state wall of separation': Court whacks civil-liberties group, OKs Ten Commandments display, WorldNetDaily, December 20 2005 ... A U.S. appeals court today upheld the decision of a lower court in allowing the inclusion of the Ten Commandments in a courthouse display, hammering the American Civil Liberties Union and declaring, "The First Amendment does not demand a wall of separation between church and state." Attorneys from the American Center for Law and Justice successfully argued the case on behalf of Mercer County, Ky., and a display of historical documents placed in the county courthouse. The panel voted 3-0 to reject the ACLU's contention the display violated the Establishment Clause of the Constitution. The county display the ACLU sued over included the Ten Commandments, the Mayflower Compact, the Declaration of Independence, the Magna Carta, the Star Spangled Banner, the national motto, the preamble to the Kentucky Constitution, the Bill of Rights to the U. S. Constitution and a picture of Lady Justice. Writing for the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals, Judge Richard Suhrheinrich said the ACLU's "repeated reference 'to the separation of church and state' ... has grown tiresome. The First Amendment does not demand a wall of separation between church and state." Suhrheinrich wrote: "The ACLU, an organization whose mission is 'to ensure that ... the government [is kept] out of the religion business,' does not embody the reasonable person." The court said a reasonable observer of Mercer County's display appreciates "the role religion has played in our governmental institutions, and finds it historically appropriate and traditionally acceptable for a state to include religious influences, even in the form of sacred texts, in honoring American traditions."

This ruling will be very important, especially if it is appealed by the ACLU to the Supreme Court and upheld. In that case Judge Jones might indeed go down in history - as the last judge to slavishly follow the ACLU's "not ... reasonable person" line on the First Amendment!]

"The citizens of the Dover area were poorly served by the members of the Board who voted for the ID Policy," Jones wrote. "It is ironic that several of these individuals, who so staunchly and proudly touted their religious convictions in public, would time and again lie to cover their tracks and disguise the real purpose behind the ID Policy." West asserted Jones "conflated Discovery Institute's position with that of the Dover School Board, and he totally misrepresents intelligent design and the motivations of the scientists who research it." [This was perhaps one of the most inept aspect of Jones' ruling-his failure to distinguish between the Dover board (who in the trial were forced to admit that they knew very little about ID), and the ID movement itself, as represented by the Discovery Institute and it's position, which was opposed to the Dover board's policy, calling it "misguided" and calling for its "withdrawal":

"SEATTLE, DEC. 14 - The policy on teaching evolution recently adopted by the Dover, PA School Board was called `misguided' today by Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture, which advised that the policy should be withdrawn and rewritten. `While the Dover board is to be commended for trying to teach Darwinian theory in a more open-minded manner, this is the wrong way to go about it,' said Dr. John G. West, associate director of Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture (CSC). `Dover's current policy has a number of problems, not the least of which is its lack of clarity. At one point, it appears to prohibit Dover schools from teaching anything about 'the origins of life.' At another point, it appears to both mandate as well as prohibit the teaching of the scientific theory of intelligent design. The policy's incoherence raises serious problems from the standpoint of constitutional law. Thus, the policy should be withdrawn and rewritten.' Apart from questions about its constitutionality, West expressed reservations about the Dover School Board's directive on public policy grounds. `When we first read about the Dover policy, we publicly criticized it because according to published reports the intent was to mandate the teaching of intelligent design,' explained West. `Although we think discussion of intelligent design should not be prohibited, we don't think intelligent design should be required in public schools. `What should be required is full disclosure of the scientific evidence for and against Darwin's theory,' added West, `which is the approach supported by the overwhelming majority of the public." ("Discovery Calls Dover Evolution Policy Misguided, Calls For its Withdrawal," Discovery Institute, December 14, 2004).]

The judge reached "well beyond the immediate legal questions before him," West contended, offering "wide-ranging and sometimes angry comments denouncing intelligent design and praising Darwinian evolution." [Agreed that Jones exceeded his brief. He sounds like the sort of theistic naturalistic/gnostic evolutionist that one encounters on Internet lists, who make "angry comments denouncing intelligent design and praising Darwinian evolution", even more than some atheists! In fact I heard a radio clip of Michael Ruse marveling that Jones, a Christian sounded, "outraged" at ID! Hardly the even-handed impartiality that one expects of a judge.]

"Judge Jones found that the Dover board violated the Establishment Clause because it acted from religious motives. That should have been the end to the case," said West. [Actually, I heard another radio clip by Christian leader saying that to rule out those with "religious motives" is to disenfranchise the majority of the population! Obviously there is a huge distance between individuals on a school board acting from "religious motives" and congress establishing a religion!]

"Instead, Judge Jones got on his soapbox to offer his own views of science, religion, and evolution. He makes it clear that he wants his place in history as the judge who issued a definitive decision about intelligent design. This is an activist judge who has delusions of grandeur." [Agreed. Quite clearly Jones had his own hidden agenda and the trial was a waste of time-he obviously took no notice of the pro-ID expert witnesses and could have written his ruling without hearing them.]

Jones anticipated the charge of judicial activism, writing in his opinion: Those who disagree with our holding will likely mark it as the product of an activist judge. If so, they will have erred as this is manifestly not an activist Court. Rather, this case came to us as the result of the activism of an ill-informed faction on a school board, aided by a national public interest law firm eager to find a constitutional test case on ID, who in combination drove the Board to adopt an imprudent and ultimately unconstitutional policy. [It is significant that Jones "anticipated the charge of judicial activism" because it shows that he was conscious of him being so. But it is no defence for him to claim "this is manifestly not an activist Court", because judges can be conservative on most topics and activist on only a few.]

The breathtaking inanity of the Board's decision is evident when considered against the factual backdrop which has not been fully revealed through this trial. The students, parents, and teachers of the Dover Area School District deserved better than to be dragged into this legal maelstrom, with its resulting utter waste of monetary and personal resources. [This is `over the top'. The Dover school board members were just ordinary people who, with the best of intentions, got into something way beyond their depth. If Jones was really concerned with the "waste of monetary and personal resources" then he could have issued a summary judgment as requested by the Dover board:

"The attorney for the Dover Area School Board calls his client's decision to include intelligent design into the biology curriculum a "modest proposal." "That this very modest proposal is in fact a violation of the (First Amendment's) establishment clause is ridiculous," said Richard Thompson of the Thomas More Law Center. But apparently a federal judge thinks that it's at least a possibility. In a ruling Tuesday, U.S. District Judge John E. Jones III denied Dover's request for summary judgment to throw out a case filed against the district by 11 parents over the intelligent design inclusion. He wrote that "genuine issues of material fact exist regarding as to whether the challenged policy has a secular purpose and whether the policy's principal or primary effect advances or inhibits religion." The trial is scheduled to begin Sept. 26 in Harrisburg federal court. "We're disappointed, but not surprised," Thompson said." ("Lawsuit over intelligent design moves forward," York Daily Record, September 14, 2005)

But then Judge Jones would not have had his "opportunity to rule in matters of great importance" in "one of the most significant cases in United States history"!]

[Continued in part #2]

Stephen E. Jones, BSc (Biol).
"Problems of Evolution"

Judge bans teaching intelligent design #3

[Continued from part #2]

Judge rules against 'intelligent design' in science class, CNN, Delia Gallagher and Phil Hirschkorn, December 20, 2005 ... Jones -- an appointee of President Bush, who backs the teaching of intelligent design -- defended his decision in personal terms. "Those who disagree with our holding will likely mark it as the product of an activist judge. If so, they will have erred as this is manifestly not an activist court," Jones writes. "Rather, this case came to us as the result of the activism of an ill-informed faction on a school board, aided by a national public interest law firm eager to find a constitutional test case on intelligent design, who in combination drove the board to adopt an imprudent and ultimately unconstitutional policy," he said. [Sounds like a guilty conscience on the part of Judge Jones! But he has hit the nail on the head. He has been accused of being "an activist judge" on this issue at least. But I will leave that for my next post.]

... Richard Thompson, a spokesman for the Michigan-based Thomas More Law Center, which aided the school district, called Jones' verdict a "troubling decision." "The founders of this country would be astonished at the thought that this simple curriculum change established religion in violation of the Constitution that they drafted," Thompson said. [Agreed. This really is the reductio ad absurdum of the USA courts' rulings on the "religion". What was originally intended by the founders to be the prevention of a European-style State church, has been mutated into the banishment of religion (especially Christianity) from the public square, leaving effectively atheism as the established religion of America!] Jones said of the defendants, "It is ironic that several of these individuals, who so staunchly and proudly touted their religious convictions in public, would time and again lie to cover their tracks and disguise the real purpose" ... [See previous on their catch-22. The real question is why should Christians feel they have to "disguise the real purpose"? And what about Judge Jones' "real purpose"?]

U.S. judge rules 'intelligent design' can't be mentioned in biology classes, CNews, December 20, 2005 , Martha Raffaele ... HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) - Intelligent design cannot be mentioned in biology classes in a Pennsylvania public school district, a U.S. federal judge said Tuesday, ruling in one of the biggest courtroom clashes on evolution since the 1925 Scopes monkey trial. Dover Area School Board members violated the U.S. Constitution when they ordered that its biology curriculum must include the notion that life on Earth was produced by an unidentified intelligent cause, U.S. District Judge John Jones ruled. .... Jones said advocates of intelligent design "have bona fide and deeply held beliefs which drive their scholarly endeavours" and that he didn't believe the concept shouldn't be studied and discussed. But, he wrote, "our conclusion today is that it is unconstitutional to teach ID as an alternative to evolution in a public school science classroom." ... [This is even more bizarre! So ID's advocates can "have bona fide and deeply held beliefs which drive their scholarly endeavours" yet students in USA public schools are not allowed to even be told what they are! Sounds more like the former Soviet Union that the USA!]

Judge rules against `intelligent design': `Religious alternative' to evolution barred from public-school science classes, MSNBC/AP, Dec. 20, 2005 ... HARRISBURG, Pa. - In one of the biggest courtroom clashes between faith and evolution since the 1925 Scopes Monkey Trial, a federal judge barred a Pennsylvania public school district Tuesday from teaching "intelligent design" in biology class, saying the concept is creationism in disguise. .... The ruling was a major setback to the intelligent design movement, which is also waging battles in Georgia and Kansas. [Agreed that this is a major setback to the ID movement, and personally am not sure that it will recover from it. But since I regard ID as true, I regard the real losers to be those who think ID to be false, and those who will never find out that ID is true, thanks to Judge Jones (and his ilk).]

... The old board's actions may still have an impact, however. Jones also ruled that the school board would have to pay the plaintiffs' legal fees, which are not insignificant. Plaintiffs' attorney Rothschild said compensation would be sought despite the turnover on the board, but that the cost was still being tallied. "We'll sort out who we might pursue for this remedy in the days ahead," he said. ... [These fees, quoted as being over $1 million, will certainly prevent any other board considering mentioning ID in its curriculum.]

'Intelligent design' teaching ban, BBC, 20 December 2005 ... A court in the US has ruled against the teaching of "intelligent design" alongside Darwin's theory of evolution. ... Judge Jones said he had determined that ID was not science and "cannot uncouple itself from its creationist, and thus religious, antecedents". ... [This is an example of the genetic fallacy, confusing the truth of an idea, with its origins:

"TO argue that a claim is true or false on the basis of its origin is to commit the genetic fallacy. For example: 'Jones's idea is the result of a mystical experience, so it must be false (or true).' Or: 'Jane got that message from a Ouija board, so it must be false (or true).' These arguments are fallacious because the origin of a claim is irrelevant to its truth or falsity. Some of our greatest advances have originated in unusual ways. For example, the chemist August Kekule discovered the benzene ring while staring at a fire and seeing the image of a serpent biting its tail. The theory of evolution came to British naturalist Alfred Russell Wallace while in a delirium. Archimedes supposedly arrived at the principle of displacement while taking a bath, from which he leapt shouting, `Eureka!' The truth or falsity of an idea is determined not by where it came from, but by the evidence supporting it." (Schick T. & Vaughn L., "How to Think About Weird Things: Critical Thinking for a New Age," Mayfield: Mountain View CA, California, Second edition, 1995, p.287)

On that basis, astronomy could not be true because its antecedent was astrology and chemistry could not be true because its antecedent was alchemy. Even if ID had "creationist, and thus religious, antecedents", so what? ID (as well as its creationist, and ... religious ... antecedents) could still be true. If only a theory with non-"religious antecedents" is allowed to be taught in USA school, then by definition only atheistic evolution can be taught, even if it is false!]

Stephen E. Jones, BSc (Biol).
"Problems of Evolution"

Judge bans teaching intelligent design #2

[Continued from part #1]

Judge Expels Intelligent Design, CBS, HARRISBURG, Pa., Dec. 20, 2005(CBS/AP) In one of the biggest courtroom clashes between faith and evolution since the 1925 Scopes Monkey Trial, a federal judge barred a Pennsylvania public school district Tuesday from teaching "intelligent design" in biology class, saying the concept is creationism in disguise. ... [If Judge Jones really said that (I haven't yet read his ruling) then he is simply wrong. Creationism is based on the Bible but ID is based on the evidence of nature.]

... Jones ... accused several board members of lying to conceal their true motive, which he said was to promote religion. [While I don't condone those Dover board members who tried to evade admitting that they were motivated by Christianity and creationism, the real fault is in a legal system that puts pressure on them to hide their motives. Especially when Christianity (and therefore some form of "creationism") is true.]

A six-week trial over the issue yielded "overwhelming evidence" establishing that intelligent design "is a religious view, a mere re-labeling of creationism, and not a scientific theory," said Jones, a Republican and a churchgoer appointed to the federal bench three years ago. [Jones is simply wrong and going beyond the evidence presented in his court that ID is "a mere re-labeling of creationism, and not a scientific theory." I won't comment on his being a "churchgoer" except to say that there are plenty of "churchgoers" in the USA who are rightly opposed to the excesses of "creationism" which they then wrongly transfer to ID.]

The school system said it will probably not appeal the ruling, because the members who backed intelligent design were ousted in November's elections and replaced with a new slate opposed to the policy. [That then seems to be the end of legal action to oppose the teaching of State-sanctioned atheism under the guise of evolution. If so, it would confirm that the USA is no longer a Christian nation, and it would also confirm my amillennial interpretation that we are well into "Satan's little season":

"The Final Conflict ... ([Rev 20:7-10]: The meaning, then, is this: the era during which the Church as a mighty missionary organization shall be able to spread the gospel everywhere is not going to last for ever; not even until the moment of Christ's second coming. Observe what is happening in certain countries even today. Are certain regions of this earth already entering Satan's little season?' In other words, we have here in Revelation 20:7-10 a description of the same battle- not 'war'-which was described in Revelation 16:12ff. and in Revelation 19:19. In all three cases we read in the original, the battle. Thus 16:14: 'to gather them together for the battle of the great day of God, the Almighty'. Again, Revelation 19:19: 'gathered together to make the battle against him....' Similarly, here in 20:8: 'to gather them together to the battle'. In other words, these are not three different battles. We have here one and the same battle. It is the battle of Har-Magedon in all three cases. It is the final attack of antichristian forces upon the Church. The 'new' thing which Revelation 20 reveals is what happens to Satan as a result of this battle. This final onslaught is directed against 'the beloved city', also called 'the camp of the saints'. Thus the Church of God is described here under the double symbolism of a city and a camp. 'And fire came down out of heaven and devoured them.' Notice the sudden character of this judgment upon Gog and Magog. It is as sudden and unexpected as the lightning which strikes from heaven (cf. 2 Thes. 2:8). Thus, suddenly, will Christ appear and discomfit His enemies! This is His one and only coming in judgment. Satan had deceived the wicked world. He had deceived the wicked into thinking that a real and absolute victory over the Church was possible and that God could be defeated!" (Hendriksen W., "More than Conquerors: An Interpretation of the Book of Revelation," [1940], Tyndale Press: London, 1966, reprint, pp.194-195).

The anti-Christians may (and indeed will) win the battle ("of Har-Magedon") but they will lose the war!]

... But the judge said: "We find that the secular purposes claimed by the board amount to a pretext for the board's real purpose, which was to promote religion in the public school classroom." [This wrongly assumes that one cannot have legitimate "secular purpose" in criticizing evolution (which may be false) and advocating alternatives to it (which may be true), even if one is motivated by Christianity (which also may be - and in fact is - true).]

... "Clearly what the judge has said here is going to have ramifications all over the country, where intelligent design is a controversy," Bagnato reports. "This doesn't end the case," says ... Legal Analyst Andrew Cohen. "We almost certainly will see an appeal here and the ruling doesn't prevent any other school board in any other jurisdiction from trying to get Intelligent Design into public classrooms. But clearly this ruling is a sign that those efforts will not get any easier." [Actually, I disagree. I think this kills off forever any attempt to get ID "into public classrooms", in the USA. Personally I think that those who agree with ID and oppose evolution should abandon the public school system for private schools where both evolution and its problems and alternatives (including ID) can be taught without fear of State-sanctioned, legally enforced, thought-control.]

... In his ruling, Jones said that while intelligent design, or ID, arguments "may be true, a proposition on which the court takes no position, ID is not science." [This is ridiculous. So students could be taught untruth (and not even be allowed to know what "may be true" (e.g. ID) in the name of "science"!]

Among other things, he said intelligent design "violates the centuries-old ground rules of science by invoking and permitting supernatural causation"; it relies on "flawed and illogical" arguments; and its attacks on evolution "have been refuted by the scientific community." [Jones' here himself "relies on `flawed and illogical' arguments", because ID does not claim that the design in nature must be the result of "supernatural causation", but that it is the result of intelligent causation:

"There is an important contrast to keep in mind here. Science, we are told, studies natural causes whereas to introduce God is to invoke supernatural causes. This is the wrong contrast. The proper contrast is between undirected natural causes on the one hand and intelligent causes on the other. Intelligent causes can do things that undirected natural causes cannot. Undirected natural causes can throw scrabble pieces on a board but cannot arrange the pieces to form meaningful words or sentences. To obtain a meaningful arrangement requires an intelligent cause. Whether an intelligent cause operates within or outside nature (i.e., is respectively natural or supernatural) is a separate question from whether an intelligent cause has operated." (Dembski W.A., "Introduction," in Dembski W.A., ed., "Mere Creation: Science, Faith & Intelligent Design," InterVarsity Press: Downers Grove IL, 1998, p.15)

He is also wrong in his claim that ID's "attacks on evolution "have been refuted by the scientific community." In fact one of the world's leading atheists, Antony Flew, recently abandoned atheism for deism, based solely on the evidence of nature, and admitted that "his current ideas have some similarity with American "intelligent design" theorists":

"A British philosophy professor who has been a leading champion of atheism for more than a half-century has changed his mind. He now believes in God -- more or less -- based on scientific evidence, and says so on a video released Thursday. At age 81, after decades of insisting belief is a mistake, Antony Flew has concluded that some sort of intelligence or first cause must have created the universe. A super-intelligence is the only good explanation for the origin of life and the complexity of nature, Flew said in a telephone interview from England. Flew said he's best labeled a deist like Thomas Jefferson, whose God was not actively involved in people's lives. ... Over the years, Flew proclaimed the lack of evidence for God while teaching at Oxford, Aberdeen, Keele, and Reading universities in Britain, in visits to numerous U.S. and Canadian campuses and in books, articles, lectures and debates. ... Yet biologists' investigation of DNA "has shown, by the almost unbelievable complexity of the arrangements which are needed to produce (life), that intelligence must have been involved," Flew says in the new video, "Has Science Discovered God?" ... The first hint of Flew's turn was a letter to the August-September issue of Britain's Philosophy Now magazine. "It has become inordinately difficult even to begin to think about constructing a naturalistic theory of the evolution of that first reproducing organism," he wrote. ... if his belief upsets people, well "that's too bad," Flew said. "My whole life has been guided by the principle of Plato's Socrates: Follow the evidence, wherever it leads." ... Flew told The Associated Press his current ideas have some similarity with American "intelligent design" theorists, who see evidence for a guiding force in the construction of the universe. He accepts Darwinian evolution but doubts it can explain the ultimate origins of life. (Ostling R.N., "One of the world's leading atheists now believes in God, more or less," Associated Press/San Francisco Chronicle, December 9, 2004).

As an editor of the Dallas Morning News asked, "If the scientific data are compelling enough to cause an atheist academic of Antony Flew's reputation to recant much of his life's work, why shouldn't Texas schoolchildren be taught the controversy?":

"An intellectual bombshell dropped last week when British professor Antony Flew, for decades one of the world's leading philosophers of atheism, publicly announced that he now affirms the existence of a deity. To be sure, Mr. Flew has not become an adherent of any creed. He simply believes that science points to the existence of some sort of intelligent designer of the universe. He says evidence from DNA research convinces him that the genetic structure of biological life is too complex to have evolved entirely on its own. Though the 81-year-old philosopher believes Darwinian theory explains a lot, he contends that it cannot account for how life initially began. We found this conversion interesting in light of last year's controversy regarding proposed revisions to the state's high school biology textbooks. Our view then was that while religion must be kept out of science classes, intellectual honesty demands that when science produces reliable data challenging the prevailing orthodoxies, students should be taught them. We were bothered by Harvard geneticist Richard Lewontin's statement that for scientists, materialism must be `absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door.' That's called stacking the deck. Mr. Flew may be dead wrong, but it's refreshing to see that an academic of his stature is unafraid to let new facts change his mind. The philosopher told The Associated Press that if admirers are upset with his about-face, then `that's too bad. My whole life has been guided by the principle of Plato's Socrates: Follow the evidence, wherever it leads.' If the scientific data are compelling enough to cause an atheist academic of Antony Flew's reputation to recant much of his life's work, why shouldn't Texas schoolchildren be taught the controversy?" (Editorial, "An Atheist's Apostasy," The Dallas Morning News, December 15, 2004).

Now thanks to Judge Jones, across the entire USA, schoolchildren be taught about that scientific data for design in nature that was compelling enough to cause even Antony Flew to abandon atheism and embrace a minimal form of theism. They (and their parents) will have to rely on other sources of information (e.g. blogs like this) to get the other side of the story.]"The students, parents, and teachers of the Dover Area School District deserved better than to be dragged into this legal maelstrom, with its resulting utter waste of monetary and personal resources," he wrote. "What's striking about the language of this ruling is the harsh tone the judge had for proponents and defenders of Intelligent Design," says Cohen. [I agree that Judge Jones' is a "harsh tone". It sounds like he is a closet theistic evolutionist whose own anti-ID buttons are pushed by ID.] "In the end, clearly, he did not believe this was a close case, did not believe this was about anything other than trying to get religion into public school, and the ruling shows it." [Which is absurd. Clearly design could be true in its own right, irrespective of the issue of "trying to get religion into public school". That ID is not simply "religion" is evident in Judge Jones himself, who claims to be a "churchgoer", yet is opposed to ID.]

The judge also said: "It is ironic that several of these individuals, who so staunchly and proudly touted their religious convictions in public, would time and again lie to cover their tracks and disguise the real purpose behind the ID Policy." [And what if they had openly admitted that they were motivated by their "their religious convictions"? They would have still been denied the right by Judge Jones and his ilk, to oppose evolution and propose ID. It was a catch-22, a no-win situation. And what about the "religious convictions" of those opposed to ID (and to Christianity and creationism)? Why are their anti- "religious convictions" regarded as constitutional? See previously on the USA's education system being now irrevocably effectively atheistic, i.e. a State-sanctioned practical atheism.] Former school board member William Buckingham, who advanced the policy, said ... that he still feels the board did the right thing. "I'm still waiting for a judge or anyone to show me anywhere in the Constitution where there's a separation of church and state," he said. "We didn't lose; we were robbed." [I agree with Buckingham. There is nothing in the USA Constitution itself about "a separation of church and state". Proof of that is that Australia's Constitution in Section 116 has an almost identical "establishment clause" to the USA's:

116. The Commonwealth shall not make any law for establishing any religion, or for imposing any religious observance, or for prohibiting the free exercise of any religion, and no religious test shall be required as a qualification for any office or public trust under the Commonwealth.

yet Australian courts have tended to interpret that literally and there is no such strict "separation of church and state" in Australia as in the USA.] ... The new school board president, Bernadette Reinking, said the board intends to remove intelligent design from the science curriculum and place it in an elective social studies class. "As far as I can tell you, there is no intent to appeal," she said... [The USA Constitution says nothing about "the science curriculum". If it is unconstitutional to teach ID is science classes, then it should be also unconstitutional to teach it "in an elective social studies class"!]

[Continued in part #3]

Stephen E. Jones, BSc (Biol).
"Problems of Evolution"

Judge bans teaching intelligent design #1

At the end of my last post, I wrote:

So to sum up: (1) I consider it likely that Judge Jones will rule as constitutional the Dover board's policy itself, although he may rule that that particular board's motivation was religious and therefore its implementation was unconstitutional, but even that I consider unlikely; and (2) I consider it likely that Judge Jones will rule that ID is not "religion" in terms of the First Amendment and therefore it is not unconstitutional for ID to be taught in public schools. The latter (2) would be a devastating blow to the anti-ID side and of course it would be appealed by them all the way to the Supreme Court. Now I will wait and see how right (or wrong) I was!

So I was completely wrong - on how I thought Judge Jones would rule. Since as an atheist back in the 1960s, I was convinced by the evidence that there is design in nature, I consider ID to be is true - that there is empirically detectable evidence of design in nature, so I regard Judge Jones' ruling (not ID) to be wrong. However, I do consider this a major setback to the ID movement, and unless Judge Jones' ruling is overturned on appeal - which I consider to be unlikely - it will remain illegal in the USA to teach students in the USA that there is evidence of design in nature. This would mean that the USA's education system is now irrevocably effectively atheistic:

"Reduced to simplest terms, courts rightly assume that theism is a religious position, while wrongly assuming that atheism is not. It will be countered that atheism is not taught in public schools, which is true if teaching is taken to proceed explicitly only and not implicitly as well, but no educational theorist thinks that the two forms of instruction can be separated completely. If God is omitted from accounts of human origins, students will take that absence as implying that God has no place in the picture. .... This is a clear case of marginalizing. Religious claims are not squarely faced for their truth or falsity. Rather, they are eased out of the picture by classifications; in this case, theism is religious, while its alternative is not. This is supposed to reflect a national policy of neutrality, but the move is anything but neutral when the effect is to exclude important ideas and public policies from national scrutiny and debate." (Smith H., "Why Religion Matters: The Fate of the Human Spirit in an Age of Disbelief," [2000], HarperCollins Publishers: New York NY, 2001, reprint, pp.132-133. Emphasis in original).

My comments are bold and in square brackets. Because of its length, I have split this post into three parts.

Judge bans teaching intelligent design, ABC News/Reuters, Dec 20, 2005, Jon Hurdle ... PHILADELPHIA - A federal judge on Tuesday banned the teaching of intelligent design as an alternative to evolution by Pennsylvania's Dover Area School District, saying the practice violated the constitutional ban on teaching religion in public schools. [Apart from the fact that ID is not "religion", it is not the USA's constitution which "ban on teaching religion in public schools" but the Supreme Court's interpretation of a clause that was merely to prevent the Federal Government from establishing a State religion. It is simply bizarre to convert this into a ban on students hearing about the evidence of design in nature, while they can hear about the evidence of no design in nature, i.e. Darwinism!]

The ruling by U.S. District Judge John Jones dealt a blow to U.S. Christian conservatives who have been pressing for the teaching of creationism in schools [If this is indeed "a blow to U.S. Christian conservatives" then by the same token it is a boost for non-Christians. And since Christianity is true and naturalism is false, it is in the end even more a blow to non-Christians.]

"Our conclusion today is that it is unconstitutional to teach intelligent design as an alternative to evolution in a public school classroom," Jones wrote in a 139-page opinion. ... the judge condemned the "breathtaking inanity" of its policy." Jones defended the students and teachers of Dover High School whom he said "deserved better than to be dragged into this legal maelstrom with its resulting utter waste of monetary and personal resources." ... [Judge Jones shows his prejudice here, by describing the Dover board's (admittedly bungled) attempt to counter the State-sanction monopoly in teaching evolution as "breathtaking inanity." They deserved better than that. If Christianity is true (which it is) then their heart was in the right place, but they were out of their depth, trying to work within the straightjacket of an anti-Christian constitutional interpretative tradition.]

[Continued in part #2]

Stephen E. Jones, BSc (Biol).
"Problems of Evolution"