Science

“Should public schools teach Intelligent Design along with Evolution?” http://www.bu.edu/com/greatdebate Wednesday, November 2, 2005, 6:30-8:30 p.m. Tsai Performance Center, Boston University 685 Commonwealth Avenue Visit this page to view a live webcast of the debate: http://realserver.bu.edu:8080/ramgen/encoder/greatdebate.rm The Debate Participants: Affirmative Edward H. Sisson, Esq. Partner, Arnold and Porter, Washington, D.C. Mr. Sisson advised witnesses at the Kansas evolution hearings. Professor Bill Dembski, Ph.D. Senior Fellow, Discovery Institute’s Center for Science and Culture Nick Barber Broadcast Journalism major, Boston University College of Communication +++++++++++++++++ Negative Eugenie C. Scott, Ph.D. Executive Director, National Center for Science Education. Professor James Trefil, Ph.D. Robinson Professor, George Mason University; co-author, Dictionary of Cultural Literacy. Neil St. Clair Broadcast Journalism and Political Science major, Boston University Read More ›

Check out http://origins.mcmaster.ca/about.html. Will ID get a fair hearing at this institute?

Here is Barbara Forrest’s take on the religious implications of neo-Darwinism and astronomy in her article “The Possibility of Meaning in Human Evolution,” Zygon: Journal of Religion & Science 35.4 (Dec 2000), 861-889. She writes (p. 862, notes omitted): Read More ›

www.themonkeytrial.com distinguishes myth and reality.

This just in from my good friend and colleague on the other side, Michael Ruse: At long last, I have been asked to write for a medium appropriate to my talents – I am doing a piece for Playboy on science and religion – “Heff” feels that the time is right – those of us who take the Enlightenment seriously must stand shoulder to shoulder in these dark days – I am privileged to do my bit for the cause (actually, it was not until I was asked that I realized that Playboy actually carries written material other than dirty jokes). Apparently I get paid somewhat less than a third what the Playmate of the Month gets paid. Michael Ruse Read More ›

Denis Alexander is one of the more prominent theistic evolutionists in the UK. As with many theistic evolutionists there, he is not at all pleased with ID, regarding it as both bad science and bad theology. Some time back he wrote a brief critical review of my book The Design Revolution . He has since expanded his criticisms in a full-length article here. Some ID-friendly colleagues in the UK tell me that they will respond to this piece, and so, since time is limited, I’ll leave it to them to answer Alexander at length. Yet Alexander’s fundamental misconception in that longer paper is readily seen as well in his earlier, shorter critical review of The Design Revolution. For that review Read More ›

For IMMEDIATE RELEASE on October 12, 2005

Contact: Larry Caldwell
Phone: 916-774-4667
lcaldwell@qsea.org

Lawsuit Alleges that Federally-Funded Evolution Website Violates Separation of Church and State by Using Religion to Promote Evolution

San Francisco, CA— A California parent, Jeanne Caldwell, is filing a federal lawsuit today against officials of the National Science Foundation and the University of California at Berkeley for spending more than $500,000 of federal money on a website that encourages teachers to use religion to promote evolution in violation of the First Amendment. Read More ›

The Nobel Prize in medicine this year is for the discovery of H. pylori‘s role in ulcers. The scientific community’s reception of this discovery should give us pause about the continuing controversy over ID. When Robin Warren and Barry Marshall first claimed that the bacterium Helicobacter pylori plays a key role in the development of both stomach and intestinal ulcers, they were roundly ridiculed. So much so that Marshall actually infected himself to prove the point: Dr Marshall proved that H. pylori caused gastic inflammation by deliberately infecting himself with the bacterium. The Nobel citation praises the doctors for their tenacity, and willingness to challenge prevailing dogmas. . . . [At the time] stress and lifestyle were considered the major Read More ›

Exhibit 1: Letter by 6 Nobel laureates et al. to all 50 governors of the United States — go here.

Exhibit 2: DEFCON’S top 10 Places Where Science Education is Under Threat — go here.

As these exhibits indicate, the other side is pulling out all the stops. It makes you wonder whether they’ve got something to lose. Read More ›

Rob Pennock, as the witness of the hour in the Dover case, is citing me shamelessly. According to the local paper (go here), the quote of the day is: “So long as methodological naturalism sets the ground rules for how the game of science is to be played, (intelligent design) has no chance (in) Hades.” — William Dembski, senior fellow at the pro-intelligent design Discovery Institute. So who does set the ground rules for science? And why should be trust Darwinists like Pennock? Pennock lost my trust a long time ago (go here).

CHURCH/STATE AT DARTMOUTH By William F. Buckley Jr.
Tue Sep 27, 8:06 PM ET

The whole business of whether public schools can permit “intelligent design” to be acknowledged as an alternative to Darwinian evolution in explanation of human life will begin democratic exercises in a courtroom in Pennsylvania this week. There are regular flashpoints on this matter of the separation of church and state. Some of them test out constitutional questions, others merely modi vivendi. A week ago Noah Riner, the president of the Dartmouth Student Assembly, ran into the wrath of orthodox hard-liners.

Read More ›

Oh, the temptations that scientists face: http://www.fortune.com/fortune/print/0,15935,1101810,00.html.

Here’s an old paper, but one well worth looking at if you haven’t seen it already: “The Spurious Foundations of Genetic Engineering” by Barry Commoner. It goes without saying that the “spurious foundations” here are the same as those for neo-Darwinism.

ID-critic Chris Mooney’s latest book, The Republican War on Science, is now available: http://www.waronscience.com/home.php. [UPDATE:] For more on Mooney, go here.

Stem cell hopes distorted by ‘arrogance and spin’
Tim Radford, science editor
Monday September 5, 2005

Read More ›