Creationists, with and without Intelligent Design camouflage, are keeping up an endless barrage of propaganda to convince the public and politicians that creationism should be allowed to borrow the credibility that comes from science yet denying its methods. One of the conservative voices propagating this view is Sharon Hughes. Her latest commentary is desperately begging for a fisking, and here it is.
Darwin said that everyone believed in evolution except "the ignorant, stupid or wicked."
Charles Darwin, who authored The Origin of Species in 1859, certainly said no such thing. If Hughes had the slightest knowledge of the man who originated the theory of evolution, which she hates so much, she would know that such a statement was entirely against his cautious character. The phrase originates with modern evolutionist Richard Dawkins, who wrote this in a book review in The New York Times in 1989:
So to the book's provocation, the statement that nearly half the people in the United States don't believe in evolution. Not just any people but powerful people, people who should know better, people with too much influence over educational policy. We are not talking about Darwin's particular theory of natural selection. It is still (just) possible for a biologist to doubt its importance, and a few claim to. No, we are here talking about the fact of evolution itself, a fact that is proved utterly beyond reasonable doubt. To claim equal time for creation science in biology classes is about as sensible as to claim equal time for the flat-earth theory in astronomy classes. Or, as someone has pointed out, you might as well claim equal time in sex education classes for the stork theory. It is absolutely safe to say that if you meet somebody who claims not to believe in evolution, that person is ignorant, stupid or insane (or wicked, but I'd rather not consider that).
If that gives you offense, I'm sorry. You are probably not stupid, insane or wicked; and ignorance is no crime in a country with strong local traditions of interference in the freedom of biology educators to teach the central theorem of their subject.
I am not sure if Dawkins would be amused or annoyed at being confused with the great 19th century naturalist. The names are probably so similar that Hughes confused them, which I'm afraid is rather symptomatic for the quality of her research, and goes quite some way towards proving Dawkins right.
If you check out MSNBC's online emphasis on the future of evolution you may be surprised to see what's going on today regarding Darwin's 'worldview.' For one thing, teachers at the recent NEA (National Education Association) convention debated on how to teach creationism 'without stifling creative thinking.'
As reported by Ben Feller for MSNBC, teachers want their students to be creative thinkers, like Lisa Marroquin, a biology teacher at Downey High School in a Southern California, who says she tells her students that 'they must learn it (evolution) even if they don’t like it, because 'they’ve got to live in the real world.' In California the real world includes evolution as a key part of California science standards.
And on planet Earth, the real world to most of us, evolution is a powerful natural force, it is something happening every day, so it is prudent that our future scientists know about it, and that our political leaders accept that fact. We may face a potentially disastrous pandemic from avian flu, and that is precisely because the virus is not adhering loyally to creationist dogma, but mutates and evolves in a way that can endanger all of us. I suspect even Sharon Hughes is betting on the evolutionists in this battle, even if she prays for creationists to succeed in the classroom. Any cognitive dissonance? I fear not.
There is a growing challenge today regarding teaching evolution-only in schools, due in great part to the Intelligent Design (ID) movement. But, this challenge is not without reaction from those who fear that teaching creationism will erode 'real' science. Intelligent Design is called religious vs. scientific, 'supernatural' vs. natural, while Darwinism is called theory. This is the very reason evolution is being challenged by a growing number of ID advocates in the scientific community.
There is a number of nonsensical sentences in Hughes' article, above is certainly some of them. What is the "this" which is the reason ID advocates challenge evolution? That Darwinism is a scientific theory, while ID is religious? Well, duh!
If there is a growing number of ID advocates in science, I have failed to see it. On the contrary, it appears Michael Behe and a handful of others are dragged out every time IDers want to boost their credentials. The debate about ID doesn't occur in scientific fora, but in political kangaroo courts like the one in Kansas. The "scientific" arguments favouring ID is typically convoluted versions of the "by design" argument for theism, which can be summarised as "we don't understand how this happened, so God Did It." We should be thankful that the scientists who developed modern medicine, including vaccinations and antibiotics, didn't take that for an answer.
Biologist, Professor Dean Kenyon of S.F. State, challenged this issue 10 years ago, teaching Intelligent Design while rejecting the term creationism, "because immediately people stereotype me as a biblical fundamentalist." (San Jose Mercury News, 2/6/94) Rather, he would teach that an 'Intelligent Designer' created the first life on earth. This brought some complaints by students and great enmity by his colleagues in the science community.
Imagine that. He wanted to teach religion in science classes. What is there to object to? Kenyon's ID was a rather crude version, hard to distinguish from old-fashioned creationism. His theories, like those of other IDers, simply fail to deal with the evidence. It isn't science.
However, at SF State, on what is certainly one of the most liberal campuses in the country, he found support among his fellow professors. U.C. Berkeley Law Professor, Phillip E. Johnson, the unofficial spokesman for the ID movement, is one of those who are carrying the baton in this decade.
Like most of us would prefer to hire a lawyer instead of a biologist to handle our court cases, most people would be more inclined to listen to a biologist instead of a lawyer when the topic is biology. We are tempted to conclude that when a renegade biologist fails to find support among his peers, but gets on board a lawyer with an at best crude understanding of biology, it is the arguments that are sadly lacking.
Then there are those who believe in 'intelligent design' but not by a Creator. They believe an alien life force is a possible option for explaining creation, and they're serious. Many may be surprised to know that Francis Crick, Nobel Prize winner and one of the discoverers of the DNA, believes that life forms were sent to earth in a space ship by a dying civilization. As a matter of fact, both discoverers of the DNA, Watson and Crick, are outspoken atheists.
That is supposed to be the saving grace that makes ID a form of science distinguishing it from creationism: we don't know who the Designer is (wink, wink). Yes, there exists people, like the Raelians, who believe that life on earth was created by aliens, and the other IDers hold their noses and invite them into their big tent so the movement can pretend to be something more than Christian fundamentalism. But Rael's creation myth is not merited any more equal time in biology classes than creationism, because the evidence supporting the theory is sorely lacking.
The example that Francis Crick favoured an odd theory of 'directed panspermia' doesn't support Sharon Hughes' argument as much as she thinks; quite the contrary. Crick was right about the DNA, something even creationists don't deny today. This is taught in the classrooms. He was unable to support his panspermia theory, so that is not taught in classrooms, and until we find some UFO in a glacier that proves him right, we rightfully reject it. Scientific facts and theories are not what is written by some scientist with a big name, but what is supported by factual evidence. The history of science provides endless examples of eminent scientists who were wrong, and sometimes even ridiculously so. Science is a methodology to distinguish between good and bad ideas, however imperfect, and is precisely what distinguishes it from religion. And the methods has excluded 'Intelligent Design.' There is not verifiable evidence for design in nature, quite the contrary, so that hypothesis is rejected.
Could this 'atheistic worldview' be the cause of the battle over allowing creationism to be taught in schools?
If it were, why are scientists also opposed to "atheistic theories" like directed panspermia?
While some evolutionists are atheists or agnostics, many are religious. Asa Gray, an eminent 19th century botanist, had an extensive correspondence with Darwin and made many contributions to the theory. Gray, who more than anyone introduced Darwinism to America, was also a devout Christian.
IDers are otherwise careful to distinguish between creationism and ID. It is worth noting that Sharon Hughes obviously doesn't buy into that distinction, and neither should we.
Objective scientists in the Intelligent Design movement are investigating whether or not there is empirical evidence that life on earth was designed by an Intelligent Designer.
Not really. They, like other creationists, have a priori decided there is such a being, and are looking for evidence supporting it.
However, despite ID sometimes being called a theory, the scientific community does not recognize it as such.
The ayurveda community also insists that transcendental meditation (TM) is science and that Maharishi Mahesh Yogi's fanciful ideas are scientific theories, and that they should be taught in school. It doesn't make it true. ID, like TM, fails every test for being scientific, and the more it is treated as science and subject to testing (something IDers desperately want to avoid), the more obvious it is that it is false.
I have a question for them: Why would you, the scientific community, not welcome the search for evidence in regards to the possibility of Intelligent Design when it is the very purported nature of science to explore all possibilities? Or is this no longer true?
This naively presumes that ID creationism is anything like an honest exploration of nature. Until the time when IDers can actually put up some solid, verifiable evidence in support of their hypotheses, science rightfully considers it at best pseudoscience, at worst a political project to subject science to religious dictate.
The Intelligent Design community is throwing out the question: Is science broad enough to allow for theories of human origins which incorporate the acts of an intelligent Designer?
If such theories are falsifiable, as proper scientific theories are, and supported by at least a little bit of evidence, it could be interesting to debate that question. Until that point, it is prudent to insist that science as much as possible stays neutral to religious and ideological issues.
And is the teaching of the theory of ID appropriate in public education, using scientific evidence, the same that is claimed to be used in teaching Darwinism?
Darwinism, and evolution, has massive, solid evidence in its favour. ID doesn't. Since that is the case, science classes should ignore such ideas, like it ignores geocentricism and phrenology, to mention two other ideas that have been demonstrated to be false.
In my previous article on evolution I covered the racist roots of Darwin's theory of evolution.
It takes massive chutzpah for a Christian to accuse Darwin's theory of evolution to be 'racist.' Through the ages when racism was pretty universal, when Christian Europe (as well as the Muslim Middle East) was engaged in massive atrocities against Africans in the slave trade, evolution was yet not thought up. The slave trade, and other aspects of colonialism, was founded on a belief that other races were inferior. Anti-Semitism was pandemic in Europe when Christianity held power. If Hitler was influenced in any way by Darwin, he was much more so by Martin Luther.
Yes, like practically all men of the 19th century, Darwin had racist ideas. He believed white people were intellectually superior to blacks. So had he learned in Christian Europe. These ideas have since been found not only morally repugnant, but factually wrong. The theory of evolution, we have also found, have no ethical implications whatsoever.
I'd be surprised if a Christian is foreign to the idea that even a good idea can be misused, or what do you say, Ms Hughes?
What is worthy of note here is that he also believed that there is no ultimate foundation for ethics; that there is no ultimate meaning in life;
I guess it would be counter-productive to ask Hughes for a reference here, but I am not aware of any great investigation of ethics by Charles Darwin. Are we confusing Dawkins and Darwin again?
and that free-will is a human myth.
So would Christians like Augustin, Luther and most famously Calvin also argue. It astonishes me that she uses this against Darwin, considering how crucial the rejection of a free will has been in Christian theology.
Scientific materialism which is quietly ruling in schools is not based so much on sound science as on a worldview that leaves God out.
Science is methodological materialism. Anyone who works in science essentially keeps God out of the formulas and test tubes, regardless of whether he or she believes in God. That, I will argue, is precisely why science has been such a massive, overwhelming success (so successful, in fact, that religionists now want to borrow its clothes). Ms Hughes and her creationist allies at the Discovery Institute will want to wreck this science, and replace it with pseudoscience that is required to adhere to religious dogma to satisfy her personal need for "ultimate meaning in life." If she finds meaning in church, as many people do, good for her. But let's keep the church out of the laboratories and science classrooms.
Let's not forget that Darwin was an atheist.
In fact, Charles Darwin, who studied theology as a young man, was a Christian who drifted towards agnosticism later in life, but he emphatically denied being an atheist.
Francis Crick was, as Ms Hughes told us earlier, an atheist. But does that make his DNA theory wrong? No. Does it make his directed panspermia theory right? No, it doesn't. Science is about logical analysis of the evidence. It is about going to where the evidence directs us. And evidence has certainly confirmed the fact of evolution, and the futility of looking for a God in its gaps.
If there is a God, shouldn't he be greater than what ID-creationists can squeeze in between the molecules of the flagellum?
9:20:39 PM 
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