Judge Jones loses in Florida and Louisiana

_{Salvador Cordova

April 29, 2008

Constitution, Courts, Darwinism, Education, Intelligent Design}

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Judge Jones (the former liquor control board director famous for his involvement with Frog Beer) ruled in 2005 that it was unconstitutional for teachers in the Dover school district to question Darwinism. Jones viewed himself as the person who would settle the question of Darwinism for all time an eternity. He even went on the talk show circuit boasting of his brilliant cut-and-paste of ACLU opinions.

Thankfully Jones does not speak for all of the United States, and his cut-and-paste ruling apparently has not been able to stifle the first amendment rights of students in other states.

Casey Luskin reports in Florida House and Louisiana Senate Pass Evolution Academic Freedom Bills.

Academic Freedom bills have now passed both the Florida House of Representatives and the Louisiana State Senate. The bills protect the rights of teachers to teach controversial scientific theories objectively, where scientific criticisms of scientific theories (including evolution) can be raised as well as the scientific strengths. The Darwinists in those states do not like this. First Florida Darwinists called academic freedom “smelly crap.” Then Louisiana Darwinists called academic freedom protections a “creationist attack” that is “Just Dumb.” Most recently Florida Darwinists used the “enlightened British will laugh at us argument” to oppose academic freedom. All I can say is, you heard it here first: “For the Darwinists who oppose the bill, this battle is about falsely appealing to people’s emotions and fears in order to suppress the teaching of scientific information that challenges evolution.”

The creationists at Dover did a great disservice to the cause of ID by refusing to heed the wise counsel given to them by the Discovery Institute. The creationists on the Dover school board represented themselves as proponents of ID when they themselves couldn’t even explain the basics of ID. Their indiscretions destroyed the fine work of many in the ID movement.

But finally legislatures are heeding wise counsel. While ID is not explicitly advocated in the latest bills, criticisms of scientific theories (including evolution) can be raised. And that is good enough as far as I’m concenred.

I am ambivalent to the idea of teaching of ID in public schools, and I’m definitely negative on pro-Darwin NEA teachers teaching creationism in public schools.

However, I am a gung ho about exploring evolution in public schools. [A very good outline of how to explore evolution is provided in the book: Explore Evolution. ]. I am also in favor of ID being explored and taught in the court of public opinion and in university contexts like Allen MacNeill’s Evolution and Design course at Cornell…

Freedom has visited the children of Florida to explore evolution! May this freedom visit all the children of the USA one day!

Comments

Venus Mousetrap, I understand your confusion: We are examining an effect for which the cause is unknown and unverifiable. But while we may never know beyond the shadow of a doubt the true answer to the mystery of life, we can nevertheless come to rational conclusions by asking the following question: What IS known to produce this effect? Explaining these effects is also confusing because when we observe an effect, with an unknown and unverifiable cause, occurring in nature, it is very easy to assume that its cause must also be "natural" (as opposed to intelligent). However, there is no logical justification for this assumption. As we can see from the earth's environment, intelligent activity can leave its mark on nature as well (not that I subscribe to any particular view on whether these effects are positive, negative, or neutral). But removing these extraneous assumptions, we are left with a bare effect. And it is an effect for which there is a known cause: intelligence. That is why we should accept ID as the best answer rather than assuming the truth of Darwinian Evolution as a premise.QuadFather_{April 30, 2008
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JPC: that's a negative prediction (a little like 'I've never seen God so he doesn't exist'), but those can be useful (evolution, after all, has the prediction that no animal will exist that isn't related to all the others by dna). However I'm not sure relying on irreducible complexity is a good move for the ID movement, since it relies on a flawed definition of evolution (it leaves out duplication, deletion, and functional change).Venus Mousetrap_{April 30, 2008
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StephenB: "Moreover, some our best definitions come to us by much the same process. An “Aristotelian” definition, for example, is one which begins by providing the many descriptions of “what a thing is not” so that a final explanation of “what it is” will become much more clear. I think this whole thing about being positive and negative is overblown" Not only that, but as exemplified by some of the answers given by atheists in the Expelled movie, darwinian evolution, as a process devoid of intelligence, is THE de facto antithesis of the process infused with purpose, so that the denial of one necessarily affirms the other. In an sense, it is not the IDist that has set up this form of logical thnking.JPCollado_{April 30, 2008
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Also: The ambivalence on teaching the theory of intelligent design comes from the following: It is a young theory. I can understand if those developing this theory are wary about having it taught to students while it is still in development. That is not to say that there aren't certain things about the theory that are not pretty well-defined. But Stephen C Meyer only just published the first ever peer-reviewed scientific paper arguing for intelligent design in 2004 (right?). Since then, intelligent design has published a steady flow of peer-reviewed papers, but their numbers remain in the dozens. We have developed the theory in principle, but is "dozens" enough to say that the cold hard science of the theory has developed well enough to teach it in a science class? That's the part that I too am ambivalent about. What *is* well-developed in the intelligent design theory is the philosophical and logical underpinnings of the inference to design. It is, in principle, quite rational to interpret synchronisms between the effects of intelligence and the effects we observe in nature as evidence for intelligent causation. This is the part that I might feel fairly comfortable with being taught in, say, a *philosophy of science* class. As for the cold hard science: There may be a few things, like Dembski's Design Inference, that could be taught in specialized science classes. But when it comes to the very broad scope of high school science classes, or even core science classes in college, I think it is best to wait until the ongoing scientific research is able to converge into a broad scientific perspective strongly supported by a wide range of hard data. Until then - and the time is coming - I think it is best for now only to mandate that students and teachers are PERMITTED to discuss evidence against Darwinian Evolution as well as inform students about alternative theories (including but not limited to intelligent design).QuadFather_{April 30, 2008
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Quadfather: the problem is that all those things ARE within the abilities of one unintelligent process, evolution, which also happens to operate on the very organisms which ID is investigating. Your question can be turned around; why should people accept that ID is an answer, when it is clear that only those items which are capable of evolving, have the properties associated with evolution?Venus Mousetrap_{April 30, 2008
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A prediction of IDT is that natural processes do not have the capacity to assemble irreducibly-complex biological nano-machines via a slow, step-by-step process without the aid of a coordinating intelligence.JPCollado_{April 30, 2008
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-----"I am not sure what positive information would look like. All I am doing is saying that the information we have now involves the elimination of other possibilities. That is all either side has too." To me, the presence of functionally specified complex information constitutes a positive alternative to random variation and natural selection. To say that something is designed is to make a positive affirmation. The accuracy of our conclusion depends on the consistency and integrity of the process; it has nothing to do with negatives and positives. Such terms are useful only as a means of clarifying the texture of the process itself. Indeed, every positive affirmation implies a negation of some kind and vice versa. There is nothing wrong with associating a positive affirmation with its negative counterpart, nor is there anything wrong with using a "negative process" to arrive at a “positive” affirmation (conclusion). We have the same kind of thing in logic. A Reductio ad absurdum (Latin for “reduction to the absurd”, also known as an apagogical argument, is a way of proving a positive affirmation through contradiction. We begin with what seems to be a false assumption, reason perfectly, and then prove the error of the assumption by the absurdity of the conclusion. Moreover, some our best definitions come to us by much the same process. An “Aristotelian” definition, for example, is one which begins by providing the many descriptions of “what a thing is not” so that a final explanation of “what it is” will become much more clear. I think this whole thing about being positive and negative is overblown and is a residual of political correctness, which always militates against logic in the name of sensitivity.StephenB_{April 30, 2008
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ic: Thanks - it's just a combination of the Venus Flytrap plant, and Dr Behe's analogy of a mousetrap. I quite like it for places that bridge the terrifying and relentless divide between biology and ID :) However, all you have done is predicted that design exists, which we know, when I meant the more specific idea that life was designed. Also, you speak of proving true, which is not what science is about.Venus Mousetrap_{April 30, 2008
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Venus Mousetrap, You can hold intelligent design to whatever criteria you wish to throw at it, but the fact remains: ID theory infers an intelligence when intelligent activity is the only known cause for the effect in question. Intelligent activity is known to produce symbolic information; Unintelligent activity is not. Intelligent activity is known to produce information processing systems; Unintelligent activity is not. Intelligent activity is known to produce functional and specified irreducibly-complex structures; Unintelligent activity is not. Am I to believe that UNintelligent activity is the best explanation for these effects when it is not known to produce ANY of them?QuadFather_{April 30, 2008
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Mousetrap: "It won’t be possible to have positive evidence of design" The evidence for design is abundant and incontrovertible. The debate and controversy concerns the source of that design.JPCollado_{April 30, 2008
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"If ID is true then it must be true that we find evidence of design in the universe." That's circular. Contrast it with Einstein's prediction, which is about what must actually be observed (that the measured position of stars will be altered, and in a specific direction). It's not a prediction if it involves future interpretation by you or anyone else--the idea is to do all the interpretation before the prediction.Russell_{April 30, 2008
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Venus Mousetrap (what an interesting name? what is the story?) If ID is true then it must be true that we find evidence of design in the universe. Clearly we do find this evidence (blood clots, cells have tails, information is not free), therefore ID is true. If ID were false then we would not necessarily see design in the world.irreducible_complacency_{April 30, 2008
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It won't be possible to have positive evidence of design until ID can make a prediction and confirm it. The 'junk DNA' one simply doesn't cut it, because that only predicts a very specific designer - one who will make a fully functional genome. If junk DNA really turns out to be junk, that simply rules out that specific designer, but not design itself. That's actually bad. You need to be able to rule OUT design, to have positive evidence OF it. For an example: Einstein's prediction that starlight will be bent by the sun. If you don't see it, Einstein is wrong. If you do, that's evidence. And they did, during an eclipse. It works because the bending of starlight was a logical necessity for what Einstein was suggesting; if his theory was correct, then that had to be true. What ID needs are things that MUST be true if ID is true, and it must be possible to show that one logically follows from the other.Venus Mousetrap_{April 30, 2008
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jerry, I thought you were saying in 69 that you were not sure what positive evidence for ID would look like. I am offering some suggestions of positive evidence that an ID researcher could look for. When the EF suggests that an arrowhead is intelligently designed, how do we confirm it? By looking for corroborating evidence of the designer's existence, location, capabilities, etc.congregate_{April 30, 2008
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congregate, You of course have introduced the negative information for the "no designer" hypothesis. I said all sides in this debate use negative information. What you have failed to do is introduce positive information for another theory when positive information should be readily available.jerry_{April 30, 2008
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Possible positive evidence for intelligent design: tools, factories, blueprints, footprints of designer, ruins of designer's house, landing strip for alien designer's spacecraft, crashed spacecraft from designer being chased by design gone out of control. Newspaper dated June 30, 20,008, left behind by time traveling designer.congregate_{April 30, 2008
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Patrick, I am not sure what positive information would look like. All I am doing is saying that the information we have now involves the elimination of other possibilities. That is all either side has too. There is lots of information for micro evolution by naturalistic means so ID does not contest it. Though some here do on occasion. Few micro evolution events would pass through the EF to intelligence. There is no information for most macro evolution events so the events do pass through the filter to intelligence. This is negative information. But suppose we found 20-30 different fossils of giraffes passing through different neck and feet lengths we would completely change our assessment for this species and it is unlikely that there would be much of a discussion on giraffes and it would be thought to be a product of micro evolution. There would be positive information for micro evolution as the cause of giraffes and no one would discuss it here. But right now all we have is the lack of information in the fossil record to support ID for the giraffe. If some mechanism was found in the code that was foresighted and it could be established that this code led to something in the future and had not current use and was preserved then there might be something here. But then one would have the burden of eliminating any current or past use for the mechanism to establish its only use as foresighted. In 10 years we may be having completely different discussions as we learn a whole lot more about the code especially its limitations to produce meaningful change. But that is Behe's proposition and a form of negative information.jerry_{April 30, 2008
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jerry, When you say "no positive evidence" are you referring to evidence such as foresighted mechanisms self-contained within biology? Or long-term preservation mechanisms for conserving information that is not currently implemented? Or retroviruses being capable of being used to implement designed changes? If that's the case, I would say that is outside the scope of core ID and is instead the domain of ID-compatible hypotheses. It's a different category you're looking for (and others have already addressed the positive evidence for ID proper). Now I would agree that the research we have so far does not provide conclusive positive evidence (at least for this category). We do have tantalizing glimpses that such things may exist. There's also some types of observed changes that happen so rapidly and repeatedly that they would seem to defy being within the domain of strictly Darwinian processes. But such research is just beginning. Also, assuming intelligent evolution, for some types of Designed modifications the mechanism may not be self-contained within biology. If external mechanisms or direct modification is the case we may only find evidence for foresighted mechanisms that are limited in capability. But let's say we did find such foresighted mechanisms. Darwinists might argue that such mechanisms would be selected for without intelligence being involved. After all, being foresighted would allow proactive responses to a changing environment and thus increase survivability. It's kind of like how they create a story for modularity.Patrick_{April 30, 2008
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gpuccio, you said "It is so positive, that ID has effectively shown that no kind of CSI can derive form other known causal factors (necessity, randomness) in absence of an intelligent designer. " This is negative information because in the process of establishing ID one eliminates other options. It is very persuasive but it is negative in the sense that to get to ID one does not establish that intelligence did it, just that law and chance did not do it and intelligence is left by default. Dave, you said "he positive evidence for ID: 1) intelligent agents produce complex code driven machinery 2) intelligent agents exist in the universe today" But we do not have any finger prints on the data, only that law and chance have been eliminated. Leo Hales, you said "When this analogy exists, and the pattern in question is too improbable to have been brought about by chance or natural laws, then you have the beginnings of a design inference." Again this is negative information because in order to get to ID you eliminate the other possibilities just as we eliminate gradualism in Darwinian macro evolution. All these arguments are subject to God of the Gaps defenses. If we discover tomorrow, just as black swans were discovered, some organizing force in nature that produced the complex molecules found in cells all the probabilities that are used to justify ID would have to be re-evaluated. And the negative arguments would have to be re-evaluated. I don't expect to see such a discovery but this is the argument of the Darwinists who say the scientific community is only in its infancy in terms of biology and look how far we have come. I am not a skeptic but just point out the difficulties of teaching ID in the science curriculum. But neither should Darwinian macro evolution or OOL ideas be taught and macro evolution and OOL questions should be answered with "we do not know." I believe this would be a devastating to the Darwinists to have to do so in textbooks.jerry_{April 30, 2008
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Note application of Intelligent Design in Biotic systems. Will this ID be detectable? Lab-made nanostructures work like DNA, only with bells and whistles
. . .“Everyone in DNA nanotechnology is essentially limited by what they can buy off the shelf,” says Chaput, who is also an ASU assistant professor in the Dept. of Chemistry and Biochemistry. “We wanted to build synthetic molecules that assembled like DNA, but had additional properties not found in natural DNA.” . . ."Researchers come up with all of these clever designs now.”
DLH_{April 30, 2008
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Scordova, the thrust of your point is well received but I would rather have the kids at least exposed to it even if the teachers roll their eyes or mock it. Those kids from "low income households" don’t usually have parents who will teach them this stuff because it is the common nature of the situation that the find themselves in. I Agree that privatization is an excellent answer but I don’t see this country moving to the right any time soon. So I think that that public schools, teachers and student, overall would not be ill served by teaching ID as part of a public curriculum. I think everyone can gain from light of truth- as my father says “sunshine kills a lot of viruses.” I don’t know if it does or it doesn’t but ID might be a good stepping stone out of where those teacher’s minds are now- and away from the disinformation campaign of “ID= creationism.” I certainly respect you view and agree to disagree.Frost122585_{April 30, 2008
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One avenue that I've thought about for kids in public schools is to use various Equal Access Initiatives and freedom of speach rights for students to learn ID. Students can write book reports and essays. They cannot be punished for writing a book report or essay on ID books or DVD's. In Chesterfield Virginia, the state school administrators hinted something to that effect, but it was not really a mature initiative. There was only vague reference to this by a pro-Darwinist Chesterfield Science Education Blog. In Fairfax Viriginia, we're getting pro-ID DvD's and creationist materials to kids via private channels. They are learning and the Darwinists can't stop the progress of truth.scordova_{April 30, 2008
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Slightly OT example, PZ gives some insight into chromosome numbers: http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/04/basics_how_can_chromosome_numb.php He starts out with some just-so stories regarding early life to push his own atheistic worldview but moves on to describe the process as understood now. The irony here is that for a non-biologist like myself who has read up on ID, I became more convinced of ID as his description proceeded. There is a kind of machine beauty that happens when many types of well-designed parts reinforce one another and this is what one beholds as the cell and its underlying coded logic are revealed. (note he trys to counteract any sense of wonder with "Never mind what the Intelligent Design creationists tell you — the cell is really, really stupid" but this is unconvincing and reeks of an agenda) Once one is exposed to the notion of ID you can never listen to these atheist-agenda-tinged descriptions in the same way. That's probably what has them so much on the defensive.steveO_{April 30, 2008
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Wiiliam J. Murray (56) “Exactly how do forensic investigators learn to tell the difference between an accidental fire and arson, or between an accidental death and murder, unless they employ some sort of I.D. analysis?” They do it precisely by separating designed causes from those that aren’t. In other words, yes of course intelligent design exists (in the fom of an arsonist, in your example), but designed events are discrete from non-designed – that’s the whole point! If you’re not prepared to make the necessary distinction you would have to conclude that, even if a fire-investigator found what s/he would consider conclusive proof that the fire was an accident (a lightning strike?), the fire could still nevertheless have been designed. Or alternatively, if a fire-investigator found what s/he would consider conclusive proof that the fire was arson, well hey, how do we know for sure that the perpetrator was human? It would make any sort of post-event analysis entirely redundant and completely overthrow the criminal justice system. DaveScot posted a very similar question a few weeks back (he used the example of a body with a knife in its back). The Explanatory Filter doesn’t give a satisfactory explanation because it operates on the presumption of materialism.duncan_{April 30, 2008
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Forst wrote: I don’t know scordova, I think that ID should be taught in the class room because it leads to differing meta-conclusions and meta-reasoning than DE.
To alleviate confusion and to set the record straight: I would like children to learn ID. The question is how they should learn it. There are various ideas as far as how they could learn it at High School age: 1. Public Schools 2. Home Schools 3. Sunday Schools 4. Private Schools 5. Other Private Channels I have no problem with home Schools and most sunday schools teaching ID. I have good feelings about private schools. But Public Schools? Public Schools where teachers have suspect qualifications and motivations to teach ID? I just don't know. There are lots of teachers with PZ Myers mentality teaching in US public schools. I'm also disturbed that these schools are being run by polititicians and not parents.... I supppose I have rather negative attitudes about the government being competent to do things. For ID to be taught to kids, perhaps keeping the government out the enterprise might be a tough choice we have to make. I can't say that I have the right answer for how little or how much the government should be involved... All I can say is at this time, I am personally working the private channels. That is where my energies are devoted.scordova_{April 30, 2008
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William J. Murray at 56
I.D. theory (of one sort or another) is already employed in several sciences, even though they may be loathe to use that term for fear of political ramifications. Exactly how to forensic investigators learn to tell the difference between an accidental fire and arson, or between an accidental death and murder, unless they employ some sort of I.D. analysis?
This principle is very important: 1) Present ID practice: Intelligent design is currently practiced by intelligent designers. 2) Terrestrial Recognition of ID: *2A) Intelligent Design is currently used by intelligent agents to recognize recent ID by other intelligent designers. e.g., reverse engineering, arson, crime scene investigation. *2B) Intelligent Design principles are being applied to detect intelligent vs natural or stochastic causes in biotic systems. e.g., the copyright in DNA by the J. Craig Venter Institute. *2C) Intelligent design in the historic past is being recognized by intelligent agents. e.g., Reverse engineering the Parthenon and the Pyramids. *2D) Intelligent design in the prehistoric past is currently being recognized by intelligent agents. e.g. archeological excavations. 3) Detecting Extra-terrestrial ID: Intelligent design principles used in recognizing present, historic or prehistoric events are being used to recognize extra terrestrial evidence of intelligent agents. e.g. SETI. In Expelled, Richard Dawkins posits such detection is possible. 4) Biotic ID Detection: Intelligent Design principles can consequently be used to identify other intelligent causation in biotic systems distinct from natural law or stochastic processes, including origins of biotic systems. 5) ID Theory Development: It is important to document and formalize these methods of detecting ID. Descriptive ID: ID Principles of reverse engineering can then be applied to formulate a design methodology that appears to have been used by intelligent designers of biotic systems. Predictive ID: This reverse engineered design methodology can them be applied to predict existence of design in biotic systems that can be discovered. e.g., Biotic ID Prediction based on the recent detection of the J. Craig Venter Institute's DNA signature/copyright, I predict that such DNA signatures can and will be used in the future and will be discoverable by similar ID reverse engineering principles. ID Application: These ID principles can be applied to intelligent design of new systems, whether biotic or abiotic. DLH_{April 30, 2008
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Uthan, Salvador, it appear you are really making a difference! Congratualtions. Will you be speaking at any congressional investigation that does happen, if it comes to that?
Thank you for the kind words. I will not be speaking, but my boss at IDEA, Dr. Caroline Crocker has already been speaking to congressmen!!! She has also been invited to speak at the various state legislatures that have academic freedom initiatives. Dr. Crocker herself has been possibly been the victim of being black listed at the NIH. If so, that is subject to congressional investigation. The problem however is that if the majority of congress is pro-Darwin, it won't get anywhere. The grass roots pressure has to be substantial for something to happen and for the wrongdoers at the NIH to be removed from power....The NIH should be helping heal the nation, not wasting taxpayer money perpetuating Darwinism. Walt Ruloff was very upset with this.... If you see the movie, "Expelled", the people that had their faces concealed were the kind of people that were talking about the suppression of RNA synthesis research....scordova_{April 30, 2008
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My demarcation criteria (see above) work for creationism against all oxymoronic "historical sciences" such as ID and paleontology. As creationism is historic, it alone survives the demarcation test. ID, like all of the "historical sciences", smacks of scientism, since it hopes to persuade based on its being accepted as science. Darwinism relies upon the same thing--it is falsely believed to be science in those things where it attempts to speak about the past. Only disciplines where both conditions and results are observed qualify as science, since that is the only way that mechanisms can be precisely identified. Also, since experimental control figures heavily into our epistemic context, it grants us epistemological assurance and warrant, to some degree. Things beyond our control in distance and time we must necessarily be far less sure of and knowledgable about than things within our control. This is why science is mostly limited to the context of earth in the present. We can know *some* things about the heavens, but we will necessarily be very limited in studying them. We can know *nothing* for certain about any alleged prehistoric past beyond what God has told us. Ethically, man has a duty to exert control over the earth, since we are commanded to do this by God. For Christians, this should be the primary reason for doing science.thogan_{April 30, 2008
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jerry The positive evidence for ID: 1) intelligent agents produce complex code driven machinery 2) intelligent agents exist in the universe todayDaveScot_{April 30, 2008
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#41: Quote [I think that the point of RRE and William J. Murray is that since people design things today, we can infer a designer in the past. I believe that they see this as positive evidence. However, inference of past conditions from present results is irrational. ] End Quote No. I am implying no designer in the past whatsoever. I am deliberately implying nothing of the sort; I'm sticking to known facts. We KNOW that humans employ Intelligent Design. Intelligent Design itself is not theoretical or hypothetical; we employ it every day. Stop inferring anything from that for the time being. We may or may not have a good theory that describes the difference between the potential naturally-occurring existence of a computer compared to a certain formation of a rock slide, but we know I.D. is the best explanation for one. The theory of I.D. as it is stated doesn't postulate any specific designer anywhere or any time, it only postulates that some phenomena are better explained via I.D. That is a fact - computers & battleships. I.D. theory (of one sort or another) is already employed in several sciences, even though they may be loathe to use that term for fear of political ramifications. Exactly how to forensic investigators learn to tell the difference between an accidental fire and arson, or between an accidental death and murder, unless they employ some sort of I.D. analysis? It seems to me that virtually nobody on either side of the I.D. debate can fully and successfully separate the actual theory as stated from the entrenched, associated idea that "some supernatural designer in the past manipulated life". Excise that idea and focus: Just as Newton knew something he called gravity existed because everyone could see and experience its effects, we all know I.D. exists because we employ it every day. Are humans, and their characteristics and processes, immune from scientific theory and investigation? Are we supernatural entities? I.D. exists - that is a scientific fact. I.D. created science and guides every activitiy science performs - that is a scientific fact. For science to doubt that I.D. exists, or claim it isn't scientific, IMO demonstrates such a psychotic, irrational fear of the associated ideological implications that they are willing to call the very tool by which science was creaated and is currently conducted "non-scientific". The irony is palpable. It's a pity that so few can disassociate I.D. theory as stated from their pet implication and association.William J. Murray_{April 30, 2008
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