Intelligent Design

I have a much bigger ax to grind than whether "intelligent design" should be taught in biology courses. What the controversy about teaching intelligent design really teaches us is that our educational system has become a pawn in the culture wars and suffers greatly for it. The American educational system is geared not toward critical thinking and intellectual autonomy but toward socialization and an absurd politically correct juggling of the various world...

T he problem of global warming is having its moment in the sun - thanks to factors including a new administration more open to climate-control initiatives; the ongoing Copenhagen conference on climate; new data on the accelerating rate of global warming; and new studies about the economic impact of doing what is necessary to reduce greenhouse gases. Not unexpectedly, such forces have produced reactionary push-back from those who criticize the science on global warming. And this push-back is producing alarming results.

PRESIDENT BUSH was asked at a recent news conference if he would reveal his "personal views" on "the theory of intelligent design." Proponents of intelligent design argue that their view is an alternative to evolutionary theory. Mr. Bush reminded the reporters from Texas newspapers that when he was governor of Texas, he suggested that local school districts should decide if they teach evolution or creationism. Then he added, "I felt like both sides ought to be properly taught." Ron Hutcheson of Knight-Ridder newspapers responded, "Both sides ought to be taught?"

The winners in the race for county school board will not be official for days, but one candidate already says that dirty campaigning could cost her a seat. Diane Butler, who finished fourth in the contest for three seats, said campaign literature distributed by third-place finisher Allen Dyer was taken out of context and distributed without her permission. "This is dirty politics," said Butler, who finished about 1,000 votes behind Dyer. "I was very nice with Allen, and this is how he repaid me."

Federal Judge John E. Jones III, a George W. Bush appointee, has ruled unconstitutional the referencing of intelligent design in public school science classes in Dover, Pa. He called it a "mere re-labeling of creationism" and said it amounted to an unconstitutional establishment of religion. Which raises a question: How intelligently designed are public schools in which intelligent design cannot even be referenced? Unlike the Scopes case of 1925, the Dover case did not involve politicians yanking evolution from the classroom and replacing it with creationism.

WASHINGTON - President Bush waded into the debate over evolution and "intelligent design" yesterday, saying schools should teach both theories on the creation and complexity of life. In a wide-ranging question-and-answer session with a small group of reporters, Bush essentially endorsed efforts by Christian conservatives to give intelligent design equal standing with the theory of evolution in the nation's schools. Bush declined to state his personal views on "intelligent design," the belief that life forms are so complex that their creation can't be explained by Darwinian evolutionary theory but rather points to intentional creation, presumably divine.

WASHINGTON - A sharp debate between scientists and religious conservatives escalated yesterday over comments by President Bush that the theory of intelligent design should be taught with evolution in the nation's public schools. In an interview at the White House on Monday with a group of Texas newspaper reporters, Bush appeared to endorse the push by many conservative Christians to give intelligent design equal treatment with evolution in public schools. Bush was pressed on whether he accepted the view that intelligent design was an alternative to evolution.

The Reluctant Mr. Darwin: An Intimate Portrait of Charles Darwin and the Making of His Theory of Evolution David Quammen Why Darwin Matters: The Case Against Intelligent Design Michael Shermer Times Books - Henry Holt / 202 pages / $22 In the border war between science and faith, the doctrine of "intelligent design" is a sly subterfuge - a marzipan confection of an idea presented in the shape of something more substantial. As many now understand - and as a federal court ruled in December - intelligent design is the bait on the barbed hook of creationist belief, intended to sidestep legal restrictions on the teaching of religion in public-school science classes.

TOPEKA, KAN. -- The state board of education yesterday approved science standards that question evolution and allow for the teaching of intelligent design in public schools. "This is a great day for Kansas," board president Steve Abrams said. "This absolutely raises science standards." The board, in a 6-4 vote, directed schools to teach the "considerable scientific and public controversy" surrounding the origin of life - a controversy that most scientists contend exists only among creationists.

HARRISBURG, PA. -- A Pennsylvania biochemist testified in federal court yesterday that "intelligent design," a view critical of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution, is a scientific theory that doesn't require involvement of a supernatural agent, although he said he believes the intelligent designer was God. With Matthew Chapman, a great-great-grandson of Darwin looking on, Lehigh University professor Michael Behe testified as the first witness for...

Creationists: Selected Essays 1993-2006 E.L. Doctorow Random House / 192 pages / $24.95 In the U.K. the word "brilliant" has long been slang for pretty much anything fun, exciting, delicious, good, enjoyable - you name it, it's covered by the term. In America, the word brilliant is repetitively overused as well, although with a more hifalutin' clarity of objective: This writer is "brilliant," this artist is "brilliant." At least the British have it right - the appellation of brilliance has long since become pointless.

Rosapepe worked hard for Clinton The Sept. 3 article about the 21st District state Senate race quoted Jim Rosapepe's opponent criticizing his service in the Clinton administration with no response from those of us who served with him. The truth is that, as U.S. ambassador to Romania, Jim was a hard-charging advocate for President Clinton's foreign policy agenda. No one should be surprised that he ruffled some bureaucratic feathers. The bottom line is that he successfully served Clinton and did a great job. John Podesta Washington, D.C. The writer is a former chief of staff to President Bill Clinton.

The Reluctant Mr. Darwin: An Intimate Portrait of Charles Darwin and the Making of His Theory of Evolution David Quammen Why Darwin Matters: The Case Against Intelligent Design Michael Shermer Times Books - Henry Holt / 202 pages / $22 In the border war between science and faith, the doctrine of "intelligent design" is a sly subterfuge - a marzipan confection of an idea presented in the shape of something more substantial. As many now understand - and as a federal court ruled in December - intelligent design is the bait on the barbed hook of creationist belief, intended to sidestep legal restrictions on the teaching of religion in public-school science classes.

KANSAS CITY, Kan. --God and Charles Darwin are not on the primary ballot in Kansas today, but once again a contentious schools election has religion and science at odds in a state that has restaged a three-quarter-century-old battle over the teaching of evolution. Less than a year after a conservative Republican majority on the State Board of Education adopted the most far-reaching standards in the nation defining science education in ways that challenge Darwin's theory of evolution, moderate Republicans and Democrats are mounting a fierce counterattack to retake power and switch the standards back to what they call conventional science.

Each one of you has had two important principles deeply embedded in you through your association with this amazing institution: an unwavering allegiance to the power of science and a profound commitment to use that power to help people. And this is a good thing, because now more than ever, these two fundamental concepts are being ignored, or are under attack. Today, we are seeing hundreds of years of scientific discovery being challenged by people who simply disregard facts that don't happen to agree with their agendas.

While he was still in graduate school, psychologist Frank Muscarella started thinking about male pattern baldness. Muscarella wasn't worried about his own hair, which was thick and dark. He wondered why a small percentage of men start to lose their hair in puberty and are pretty much completely bald by the time they're adults. The answer, he suspected, had something to do with evolution. Until perhaps the 1950s, most scientists who thought about the problem would probably have said that baldness was a medical problem, like bad breath or cancer.

DOVER, PA. -- Jim Cashman wants a recount, but even if he still winds up losing his seat on the area school board, he wants to make something clear: God has not been voted out of office. In fact, God is very much in good favor in the shops and creaky porch-fronts of this small Pennsylvania town, despite the community's apparent objection to discussing "intelligent design" in the local public high school, Cashman said. The Supreme Being certainly hasn't been "rejected" from the place, as religious broadcaster Pat Robertson suggested the other day. "That was an unfortunate thing to say," said Cashman, a 51-year-old auto repair shop owner who was among eight school board members voted out of office this week, ostensibly for approving a four-paragraph passage, read during ninth-grade biology class at Dover Area High School, suggesting an alternative to Darwin's theory of evolution.

Why is Henry Louis Mencken, the most prolific, acerbic and influential journalist of the 20th century, who died 50 years ago last week, still quoted so often in the press and now on the World Wide Web? Like a mere handful of other deceased American critics, Mencken continues to enjoy the status of a celebrity, that exalted individual whom Mencken once defined as "one who is known to many persons he is glad he doesn't know." Like another Baltimorean, Babe Ruth, Mencken did not need a press agent.

Gaps in Darwinism can't justify `design' Andrew Cline's column "Stretching the Constitution to keep out intelligent esign" (Opinion * Commentary, Jan. 2) is full of the same specious arguments that were presented to and rejected by federal Judge John E. Jones III - a Republican and President Bush appointee, by the way - when he rejected the reference to intelligent design in the Dover, Pa., school curriculum. Mr. Cline needs to understand that the concept of "theory" in science is quite a bit different than its normal usage (Colonel Mustard, with a candlestick, in the parlor, for instance)