Education

Do you believe in ‘individual liberty, limited government, free markets, and peace’? These are some of the CATO Institute’s principles, and if you agree, then you may well agree with Andrew J. Coulson’s latest pronouncement regarding mandated school policies, not the least of which is prohibiting the mere mention of alternate scientific theories of origins, and not allowing the theory of Darwinian evolution to be questioned in the least.

CATO is a libertarian think tank that promotes individual freedoms, and favors limited government. At least to the degree that federal judges have been allowed to dictate curriculum, I agree with his critique. In a philosophical policy statement, CATO cites the Tenth Amendment, which says that the ‘people’ (or individual states) have that authority, and not the government. Coupled with a proper interpretation of the First Amendment, there just may be a basis for a legal challenge (Dover, et al) Read More ›

Intelligent design to feature in school RE lessons

Alexandra Smith
Tuesday January 23, 2007
EducationGuardian.co.uk

Teenagers will be asked to debate intelligent design (ID) in their religious education classes and read texts by evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins under new government guidelines.

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Civic Scientific Literacy: A Necessity in the 21st Century

I read this Huffington post which notes that the U.S. leads Europe by quite a margin in those who reject orthodox evolution as scientific fact. They go on to an unsupported conclusion that this means the U.S. must be trailing in scientific and engineering accomplishments. Au contraire, mon ami, au contraire! Read More ›

Over at Telic Thoughts there is a quote from Ian Lowe of the British Centre For Science Education. The quote originated at David Anderson’s BCSE Revealed blog.

At the BCSE website, under the subheading “What BCSE is not” we read:

We do not object to or support religion or atheism.

But David Anderson provides some interesting insights into two of BCSE’s major players.

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Barbara Forrest, the official historian for the anti-ID side, has a piece of revisionist history in the latest Skeptical Inquirer (see here). It is titled “The Vise Strategy Undone.” Since I’m the inventor of the Vise Strategy and one of the principal targets of her piece, let me offer a few corrections: (1) I wrote up the Vise Strategy for the Thomas More Law Center to assist them in interrogating the expert witnesses on the other side (for the full Vise Strategy go here; by the way, I gave this to the Thomas More people as a freebee). Forrest’s piece suggests that the Vise Strategy was tried and found wanting. In fact, the Thomas More attorneys never implemented it — Read More ›

Settlement puts lid on thought

By LARRY TAYLOR
Published on: 12/21/06

Once again, the potent combination of a liberal judge and the deep pockets of the American Civil Liberties Union have proved too much to overcome. Read More ›

The Rembrandt of flash animation and I are working to enhance “The Judge Jones School of Law.” As a first step we have made the animation less offensive to more refined sensibilities. All the overt flatulence has therefore been removed. Go to www.overwhelmingevidence.com for the less objectional version of this animation (we are keeping the original, however, so that when the history of evolution’s demise is written, all versions of this animation will be available to historians).

The Center for Inquiry’s new branch office in DC has issued a “Declaration on Science and Secularism” in which they lament the increasing appeal of ID among the unwashed masses. There’s a simple way for this problem to go away: stop stealing the money of the unwashed masses (in the form of taxes) to underwrite an ideologically driven materialistic conception of science; instead, get your money from secular elites like Paul Allen, George Soros, Charles Simonyi, etc. For the text of the Declaration, go here: http://www.cfidc.org/declaration.html.

“You measure a democracy by the freedom it gives its dissidents, not the freedom it gives its assimilated conformists.” — Who said it and how does it apply to the ID-evolution controversy?

Steven Pinker has published an interesting op-ed in today’s Harvard Crimson, criticizing the current report of Harvard’s committee on general education. If one could reformulate Pinker’s dogmatic pronouncements as questions to be examined, this would be a good essay. For example, What is faith? Is Earth truly an undistinguished speck in the cosmos, or is there something special about it? How is the paramount value of “reason” affected if the mind and its thoughts are merely products of chemical activity in the brain? Opinion –Less Faith, More Reason Published by The Harvard Crimson On 10/27/2006 4:36:48 AM By STEVEN PINKER … [T]he picture of humanity’s place in nature that has emerged from scientific inquiry has profound consequences for people’s understanding Read More ›

Baylor University, which in the past has figured large in the debate over ID (see here), continues to struggle with its Christian identity. Check out the following blog entry by Hunter Baker, and especially comment #5: http://www.southernappeal.org/index.php/archives/2124.

1. Paul Nelson is such a cool and brilliant guy
2. I’ve never met him before
3. There are lots of extras at the event he is speaking at, such as:
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In preparing a letter to the editor of UVa magazine, I was researching the case of 1996 Nobel Laureate in Chemistry, Richard Smalley. I was astonished to discover that he delivered an anti-Darwinian speech during a graduation ceremony and apparently received a standing ovation. I also thought it an appropriate time to remember this extraordinary scientist.

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Blogger David Anderson, who has a first-class degree in Mathematics from Oxford University, is putting a bit of pressure on the British Centre for Science Education, quite successfully, it seems. He has uncovered good evidence that they have been less than forthright in the course of some recent parliamentary lobbying: http://bcse-revealed.blogspot.com