scordova

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If Miller ever makes an appearance in a public event to criticize ID, during the Q&A session, IDers should call him into account for why he misrepresented Michael Behe’s ideas under oath in Kitzmiller vs. Dover.

Casey Luskin, IDEA co-founder and attorney at the Discovery Institute, exposed the misrepresentations which Miller used in the trial. These misrepresentations were used by Judge Jones to unjustly criticize Michael Behe and Scott Minnich’s testimony.

Here is the link: Do Car Engines Run on Lugnuts?

At Telic Thoughts, Mike Gene points out that PZ Myers would vote against tenure to an IDer: PZ Myers on Tenure and ID.

The question about tenure denial has been a question I’ve been trying to get reporters to inquire about since last Fall. As far as I can tell, the question has been mostly evaded or been obscured until recently.

If tenure is to be denied, how about hiring? If ID is grounds for denying tenure, then logically why should it stop there? How about the granting of PhDs, or master’s degrees, or bachelor’s degrees, or even entry into college? Read More ›

Question: What sort of scientific discovery will win the war for ID?

Answer: Something that will bring healing to the sick and make money for the biotech industry.

Here are some thoughts from Bill Dembski.

Keynote Address at RAPID (transcript courtesy IDEA UCSD)

Steganography

Finally, we come to the research theme that I find most intriguing. Steganography, if you look in the dictionary, is an archaism that was subsequently replaced by the term “cryptography.” Steganography literally means “covered writing.” With the rise of digital computing, however, the term has taken on a new life. Steganography belongs to the field of digital data embedding technologies (DDET), which also include information hiding, steganalysis, watermarking, embedded data extraction, and digital data forensics. Steganography seeks efficient (that is, high data rate) and robust (that is, insensitive to common distortions) algorithms that can embed a high volume of hidden message bits within a cover message (typically imagery, video, or audio) without their presence being detected. Conversely, steganalysis seeks statistical tests that will detect the presence of steganography in a cover message.

Consider now the following possibility: What if organisms instantiate designs that have no functional significance but that nonetheless give biological investigators insight into functional aspects of organisms. Such second-order designs would serve essentially as an “operating manual,” of no use to the organism as such but of use to scientists investigating the organism. Read More ›

Cornell is considered by some to be among the top 12 universities in the world, and Cornell has an IDist in their biology department! John Sanford is a very successful professor of biology at Cornell and is inventor of the Gene Gun. In his testimony at the Kansas Hearings in May 2005, he revealed he was once a naturalistic evolutionist before becoming an IDist.

Sanford was so successful in developing genetic technologies and receiving patents he was able to retire early. To my knowledge, he still is a courtesy professor at Cornell. Crevo pointed out that Sanford even has a pro-ID book Genetic Entropy: The Mystery of the Genome.

A reviewer writes of Sanford’s book: Read More ›

The study by Bridgham et al (2006) published in the April 7 issue of Science is the lamest attempt yet — and perhaps the lamest attempt that’s even possible — to deflect the problem that irreducible complexity poses for Darwinism…

This continues the venerable Darwinian tradition of making grandiose claims based on piddling results.

— Michael Behe

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Here is another course which discusses ID: Genes and Genesis by Dr. Kevin Redding, Associate Professor of Chemistry and Biological Sciences. I think the course tries to be somewhat even handed. (Thank you to Paul Nelson for alerting me to this course!) Interestingly, almost without any fanfare, in 2001 a plasma physicist and professor at University of Alabama in Huntsville taught Honors 399 : Physics, Philosophy and Fundamentalism which made an excellent survey of ID, physics and religion. The lectures used to be online, and regrettably, they are no longer. I would hope the course is offered again.

A new course on ID has been offered at Cornell. This is the same school where the interim president of Cornell, Hunter Rawlings, declared war on ID and where a brave band of pro-ID students (like Hannah Maxson) and faculty (like Professor Mark Psiaki and Professor John Sanford) stood up in defiance. Cornell offers course on intelligent design

(University of Bath) Scientists discovered the minimal genome size needed for the first life increased by a factor of 2. That may seem like a modest rise in complexity, but consider that a target of just 10 bits growing in specificity to 20 bits (a factor of 2) implies that the target is now 1024 times more improbable (2 raised to the 10th). And if the previously presumed minimal gene size was several thousand bits of information, it boggles the mind just how much more improbable the origin of life becomes with this discovery! Minimal genome should be twice the size, study shows (Hat Tip: David Coppedge, Creation Safaris)

Is this a kind of Darwinalia, or should I say, Darwin Ale Ia? Evolution Amber Ale (Hat Tip: David Coppedge, Creation Safaris)

there still remain unanswered many fundamental questions about nature….nothing should be prohibited as a legitimate subject of science, and excluding the supernatural out of hand serves no useful purpose.

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California School District Adopts Policy Allowing Scientific Criticisms of Evolution

Last night, the Board of Trustees of the Lancaster School District in southern California voted unanimously to adopt a “Science Philosophy” policy permitting teachers to present scientific criticisms of Darwinian evolution. The policy had been supported by the groups Integrity in Academics and Quality Science Education for All.

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Paul Nelson writes: Could Sahotra [Sarkar] provide any experimental evidence, from any vertebrate group, that developmental pathways for whole organ systems (such as the gut) varied as significantly as his selection story requires? No — the usual term for such variation is “embryonic lethal.” Faced with data that refute the neo-Darwinian account of homology, Sahotra told a Tall One …. No problem for Sahotra, however. Natural selection, he said, simply preserved the adult anatomy — keep a tube — while allowing the developmental pathways to vary. Where’s the puzzle? Evolution triumphs again. The charitable description for that explanation is “ad hoc.” The accurate description is the steaming organic matter, suitable for fertilizer, produced by the nethermost regions of a male Read More ›

Here is a weblink to the video coverage of the 6 of 20 colleges represented in the final round of the James Madison Cup debate competition. The debate topic was ID in the public schools: Madison Cup Debate.

Interestingly, most of these youthful debaters wanted to argue for the affirmitive (ID should be taught in public schools), but there were not enough slots, so some pro-IDists were forced to argue the negative. It was my impression the audience was sympathetic to ID, but I’ll let you be the judge.

The winners with #1 listed first:
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Students pushing for intelligent design

I thought it appropriate to post on ID in Ireland given that it’s St. Patricks Day.

Secondary pupils in Northern Ireland are spearheading a campaign to introduce a scientific concept, banned in the United States, into the curriculum.

Students from both secondary schools and some of the province’s most prestigious grammar schools claim that so-called intelligent design will give a “more balanced view of how the world came into being”.
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