The Judge Speaks

A few days ago Crooks and Liars ran a link to this PBS story.

Its about the case in 2004 when Dover, Pennsylvania became the center of the storm between the theory of evolution and Christian creationism now know as intelligent design.

In 2004 the quiet town of Dover, Pennsylvania, was catapulted into the spotlight of national attention and scrutiny. That year, Dover Area School District board member Bill Buckingham requested that a textbook teaching intelligent design—the idea that life is too complex to have evolved naturally and therefore must have been designed by an intelligent agent—be added to the science program.

..On December 14, 11 parents of Dover high school students filed a lawsuit in Federal District Court alleging the school board was violating their constitutional rights by introducing religion into a public school....

The site is very good. It breaks down the arguments and in particular it has a transcription of the judge's ruling. This argument caught my attention. It is a clear articulation of the points that I regard as essential in this issue:

Intelligent design, as noted, is grounded in theology, not science. Accepting for the sake of argument its proponents' as well as Defendants' argument that to introduce intelligent design to students will encourage critical thinking, it still has utterly no place in a science curriculum. Moreover, intelligent design's backers have sought to avoid the scientific scrutiny which we have now determined that it cannot withstand by advocating that the controversy, but not intelligent design itself, should be taught in science class. This tactic is at best disingenuous, and at worst a canard. The goal of the intelligent-design movement is not to encourage critical thought but to foment a revolution which would supplant evolutionary theory with intelligent design.

There are many religious expressions on how the world and the universe came into being. Anyone who has read the work of Mircea Eliade or Joseph Campbell knows this. None other than the fundamentalist Christians seem as opposed to evolution theory.

I personally like the Buddhist idea of 'co-arising interdependence.' As much as I like the idea I have no interest in seeing it presented as scientific fact.

I regret to see that many Republican Party presidential candidates do not believe in evolution and would prefer to see intelligent design taught in its place. This is a disturbing trend.