The ID Update

Phyllis Schlafly gives a fine summary of the cultural battle for the minds of our children between theists and atheists on the townhall web site.

Schlafly states that "the worst censors are those who prohibit classroom criticism of the theory of evolution".

A Chinese scholar observed, "In China we can criticize Darwin but not the government. In America you can criticize the government but not Darwin."

The intolerant minority is forcing the majority of students (who do not believe in Darwinism) to be indoctrinated in public school classrooms. Their justification for doing so is simply asserting that all the evidence is in, and Darwinism is a FACT.

For the full opinion, click HERE.

Sarah Hied expresses her well thought view concerning ID in the York Daily Review, the local paper covering the ID controversy in the Dover PA School District.

For the entire letter to the editor, click HERE.

A breakthrough will come when we can scale the wall of the false dichotomy of science vs religion, fact vs philosophy.

In Men's News Daily, Joe Mariani provides an excellent example of potentially confusing rhetoric.

It's a good read to test your skills in recognizing the tactics that materialists use to attempt to twist the debate in their favor.

For the full opinion, click HERE.

A biology major cannot see the big fuss about Dover school board's decision to require ID to be taught in biology class.

It's a big deal because it goes to the core of what human beings believe their origin is, and that informs them on how they structure their lives and behave.

Darwinists do believe that macroevolution is a FACT, not wishful thinking (faith). That's exactly at the core of the controversy.

For the full opinion, click HERE.

ID will not be required to be taught in Biology class in the Dover School District in January.

For the story, click HERE.

Michael C. Dorf, Michael I. Sovern Professor of Law at Columbia University in New York City, comments on ID in the Find Law's Legal Commentary.

Like so many others, Dr. Dorf claims that our search for the truth about the world is described either "scientifically" or "religiously". Entertaining the possibility of a transcendent reality beyond matter, energy, space, and time, is deemed "religious". Materialists, in their narrowed world view will never allow for the possibility that non-material, transcendent beings (agents) exist, or that acknowledgement of them is "scientific".

Dr. Dorf does offer an interesting take on school curriculum. He states that "there is no general constitutional requirement that public school students be taught the truth." If the curriculum serves the "good" of the state, teach it.

Dr. Dorf claims that ID is not a scientific theory because it conflates uncertainty with error, and it is not an explanation for the reality we discover.

He states, "by contrast, what does it mean to say that species arise or change through 'intelligent design?' Certainly the term connotes intervention by some intelligent agent. But are the intelligent agent's interventions themselves subject to the laws of the natural world, or are they supernatural? Even if one is prepared to accept the possibility that science could, without sacrificing its essential premises, include accounts of supernatural phenomena, the concept of 'intelligent design,' standing alone, is simply a label, not an account."

But, would ID be any less true because the agent chose not to fully reveal the details or overarching plan and purpose of the creation? Remember, though, the constitution does not require that truth be taught in public schools.

Perhaps origins should not be taught in any science class. Maybe Darwinism should be put in its proper place in a Comparative Religion curriculum.

For the full commentary, click HERE.

The Discovery Institute announced on their web site that "Students in Kansas will be allowed to learn about the scientific evidence both for and against Darwinian evolution if the State’s Board of Education adopts a proposed revisions from a group of scientists on the science standards writing committee."

One of the statements in the proposal is that the teaching of ID is NOT required as an objective.

DI believes that this is the proper approach to take. The problems with Darwinism should be taught, without mandating the teaching of ID.

For the full news release, click HERE.

Robert Meyer, on the renewamerica web site gives a lucid commentary on what the debate between evolution and ID is all about.

To tie in with the last post, Meyer correctly labels evolution (secularism, materialism, etc.) as a religion.

Meyer comments on the characterization (actually false dichotomy) of "science vs faith". He also weighs in on the absurdity of matter, energy, space, and time appearing out of absolute nothing.

Furthermore, he discusses the atheist dissenters of classical Darwinism, Gould and Crick. He shows that Darwinism is far from a monolithic belief system.

For the full commentary, click HERE.

David Klinghoffer writes for Christianity Today on the religion of secularism.

While the vast majority of secularists would vehemently object to their worldview being called a religion, a valid definition of religion in Webster's dictionary is "a cause, principle, or system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith." Secularists try to get around this by dogmatically asserting that Darwinism is a proven fact, which it is not.

The problem we have with many secularists is "their aggressive means in advancing their political agenda and spreading their faith."

Public education is the place where secularists have "ensured that its creation account alone should be taught."

Klinghoffer goes on to say that "the prejudice on behalf of the secular faith emanating from the media is likewise hard to ignore. HBO's Bill Maher, speaks of himself as "spreading the anti-gospel."

For the full article, click HERE.

R. Albert Mohler Jr., president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, was on MSNBC's "Scarborough Country."

Mohler appeared on the show along with David Silverman, communications director for American Atheists. Commentator Pat Buchanan served as guest host.

Mohler said parents of children who attend America's public schools "have become wise to the secular left's agenda in teaching Darwin's theory of evolution as fact." He also pointed out that "ID is not the same thing as creationism and that a majority of Americans want it taught in public schools."

Silverman dismissed in condescending terms the concept of a supreme intellect that created all things. "The idea that Darwinistic evolution has happened is fact," Silverman said. "The idea that the universe was created by an invisible magic man in the sky is fiction."

For the full story, click HERE.

Terence Kealey, a biochemist and Vice-Chancellor of Buckingham University, voices his opinion on ID in the London Times Online.

As an ID critic, he engages in some ad hominem descriptions stating that "99 per cent of ID supporters are fundamentalist Christians who believe in the literal truth of Genesis, Deep South-style. This is why ID’s hub is the Discovery Institute — which, despite its authoritative name, is a typical American palaeoconservative think-tank."

He concludes by saying that he has "no objection to ID being taught in schools as long as Darwinism gets equal time. Indeed, such a debate is more, not less, likely to inculcate a true understanding of natural selection, because theories of intelligent design and creationism are transparently absurd and driven not by a search for truth but by faith."

Kealey shows his true secularist bias.

For the full editorial, click HERE.

Linda Whitlock, a literacy instructor for TAP and an adjunct English instructor at Virginia Western Community College, chimes in on the merits of ID in the Roanoke (VA) Times.

For the commentary, click HERE.

Jonathan Witt, senior fellow and writer in residence at Discovery Institute's Center for Science & Culture in Seattle, was a guest columnist in the Seattle Times. He commented on the remarkable turnabout by former atheist Antony Flew, and the growing influence of the intelligent design movement.

For the full article, click HERE.

Three proponents of Intelligent Design (ID) present their views of design in the natural world. Each view is immediately followed by a response from a proponent of evolution. The report, printed in its entirety, opens with an introduction by Natural History magazine and concludes with an overview of the ID movement.

For the full report, click HERE.

The ACLU is using their vast resources to make their definitions and descriptions of intelligent design the defacto standard. Much of the media, but not all, are parroting the language with little questioning.

The Discovery Institute has circulated widely, through the media, FAQ about ID.

ARN has had FAQ about ID on this web site for some time, compiled by Mark Hartwig.

For ARN's FAQ, click HERE.

For DI's FAQ, click HERE.

Barbara Bradley Hagerty of NPR recently reported on the Dover School District controversy. The report was fair and balanced. Michael Behe was allowed to give a brief exposure to the logic of the ID argument.

To listen to the program, click HERE.

Represented by the ACLU and Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, parents of students in the Dover School District are suing the school district. The parents say "creationism" is being mandated in classrooms.

The confusion between intelligent design and "creationism" continuously occurs. Until enough of the secularists can be pursuaded that the debate is science vs science, confusion will continue.

For the full story, click HERE.

The Discovery Institute has stated that the Dover policy is "misguided", and is calling for its withdrawl.

For this commentary, click HERE.

A Letter to the Editor by Michael S. Shelton in the Fredericksburg, VA Free Lance-Star brings out some key points about the debate between Darwinism and ID. Among those is that bacteria mutation is not an example of macroevolution. He also stresses that the debate is NOT between science and religion, but science worldview vs science worldview.

A short, cogent, letter to the editor of your local rag (or beyond) is a good way to get the word out, and to get people thinking about ID.

For the full commentary, click HERE.

AP writer Martha Raffaele reports that the ACLU and Americans United for Separation of Church and State have scheduled a Tuesday afternoon news conference to discuss the lawsuit against the Dover Area School District, which will be filed in U.S. District Court in Harrisburg, PA, ACLU spokesman Paul Silva said.

This is a predictable move. The requirement to teach ID in public schools has not been endorsed by organizations such as the Discovery Institute.

For the full story, click HERE.

San Franciso Chronicle staff writer Charles Burress went to visit with Dr. Phillip Johnson at his North Berkeley house.

They talked about ID, naturally.

Dr. Johnson does not favor the requirement of teaching ID to public school students, but continues to advocate the approach of "teaching the controversy". Students should be free to hear the problems with Darwinian theory in a classroom setting.

For the full article, click HERE.

The San Francisco Chroncile's OPEN FORUM published a commentary/opinion from Dr. Stephen C. Meyer and John Angus Campell, both of the Discovery Institute.

Essentially, they stated that it is both legal and right for students to be exposed to weaknesses of prevailing theories, and be free to learn about other competing theories. In our context, this would include Darwinism and ID.

It has not been the position of the Discovery Institute to require the teaching of ID in public schools, which is pointed out here.

For the full commentary, click HERE.

A wonderful book on the marvelous design of the human body, by Alexander Tsiaras, details the human body using the latest imaging techniques.

An academic IDer mentions, tongue in cheek, that "lots of unsophisticated people out there in the red states, who aren't privy to highly nuanced discussions, apparently think that when a book refers to the "design" of the human body, that the author means that the human body is designed.

Here is one brief review on the book from the jacket:

“Alexander Tsiaras and Anatomical Travelogue have left no technological stone unturned to build this work about the subtle architecture of the human form. He and his staff of talented imaging artists and scientists have earned their way into the finest repositories of clinical images and contemporary anatomical and physiological laboratories. The result is this astounding and beautiful book—superb in its abilities to address basic questions about the design of the human form and to anticipate the inquiries made practical only by employing the most modern medical technologies. This is a work for our time.”

—Adrianne Noe, Director of the National Museum of Health and Medicine and Associate Director of the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology

Looks like a good Christmas gift idea! The book can book found on the internet or at your local bookstore.

In an OPEN FORUM in the San Francisco Chronicle, Stanford neurology professor Robert M. Sapolsky discusses the current origin of life issue.

This commentary is a magnificent example of tortured thinking and ad hominem attacks, and, therefore is a must read to understand how the far left "progressive" mind interprets the world we live in.

Dr. Sapolsky, much more intelligent than I am, as a matter of fact, makes some foolish factual errors and mistakes in reasoning.

He states that "scientists don't argue about whether evolution is for real; that's proven. They argue about how exactly it works."

First, there is a vigorous debate amongst scientists on whether Darwinian theory is the most plausible explanation for life's origin and development. Of course, Sapolsky could be referring to "real" scientists without agendas, not scientists like Michael Behe, Dean Kenyon, William Dembski, or, now, former atheist Antony Flew (my tongue in cheek).

Second, Darwinian evolution is all about the "how it works" (random mutation and natural selection), and there is plenty of vigorous debate on this subject. How about the disagreement between strict Darwinists like Richard Dawkins, and punctuated equilibra proponents like the late Stephen J. Gould and Nils Eldredge? The obvious seems to escape Dr. Sapolsky!

The rhetoric really ramps up when Dr. Sapolsky describes from whence the intelligent design proponents come. He comments, " Undeniably, some are scientists (although it is rare that their expertise is in the realm of evolutionary biology). Others are educated nonscientists. But the rank and file of intelligent design supporters is most likely to come from the parts of the country with the lowest literacy rates, the lowest percentages of high-school graduates and the lowest rates of government investments in education. Much has been made of the, er, Jed-Clampett profile of the typical intelligent-design supporter..."

Suddenly I'm simultaneously noting some arrogance and sensing that my IQ is slipping.

In the doctor's eyes, most IDers are mentally challenged, perhaps worthy, by some, of being a protected class. His commentary should qualify, according to the progressive's definition, as "hate speech." What's good for the goose is good for the gander!

For this "rich" commentary, please click HERE.

In a Townhall commentary, Jay Bryant discusses Tom Vail's book Grand Canyon: a Different View. The overarching principles Bryant is espousing pertains to ID.

He recognizes the rampant anti-supernaturalistic bias of naturalists. Their wornout reply of "separation of church and church" is getting tiresome to most Americans.

He says, "So you go home and pull out your well-worn copy of the Constitution and reread the First Amendment, noting it says quite clearly, 'Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.'
And if you're at all like me, you scratch your head and wonder how that very plain English could possibly be construed to mean the Park Service can't sell a book in a bookstore."

Bryant rightly points out that scientific discoveries in the last century, i.e., Big Bang, irreducible complexity in biological systems, etc., have provided compelling scientific evidence for the existence of an intelligent agent.

For the full commentary, click HERE.

The science world was all abuzz when it became known that world-renowned atheist Antony Flew had shifted his world view position from atheist to theist. He believes in an intelligent designer, but believes that "God" has walked away from mankind (a deist approach).

The significance of this change of mind by one of the most prominent atheists in the world cannot be overstated. He is now in the intelligent design camp. Flew is an example of an intellectually honest human being who takes an unbiased look at the prevailing evidence and "follows the evidence where it leads." Bravo for his courageous, yet necessary, switch!

For the full story, click HERE.

And HERE.

And HERE.

And HERE.

It's hard to imagine a more innocuous statement than the one the Cobb County, Ga., school board recently ordered pasted into their biology textbooks: "Evolution is a theory, not a fact, regarding the origin of living things. This material should be approached with an open mind, studied carefully, and critically considered."

Yet this disclaimer is the subject of a nationally publicized lawsuit, in which the plaintiff alleges that the wording violates the separation of church and state.

So what's the problem? After all, evolution is indeed a theory. And it seems ironic at best that calling for open-minded, critical thinking would somehow be construed as religious advocacy.

Nonetheless, there are many - folks who insist that evolution is a fact, or well-nigh to it - who read dark intentions between the lines. To them, any talk about critical thinking is simply religiously motivated rubbish.

We are told that the popular distinction between "fact" and "theory" - that one is certain and the other a matter of guesswork - is naive and conflicts with how scientists view the terms. In place, critics offer "more scientific" definitions of "theory" - which exorcise the notion of uncertainty. A theory is not a hunch, an educated guess or even a hypothesis, they tell us, but a well-substantiated naturalistic explanation for related facts.

Hence, evolution's status as a theory indicates strength and durability, not uncertainty. And if you want critical thinking about evolution, why not include other theories, such as germ theory or the theory of relativity? Indeed, we are told, singling out evolution smacks of a religious agenda masquerading as science.

To many, this is entirely plausible. But it is seriously flawed.

If you look in the science journals, you'll see that the use of the word theory often diverges from this definition. There, you can read of such things as tentative theories, failed theories, controversial theories, promising theories, and unconfirmed new theories.

Thus, contrary to the definition championed by Darwin's defenders, scientific theories vary greatly in their trustworthiness. And a school district is fully warranted in singling out such theories, especially when they have been a source of widespread, ongoing controversy - like Darwinism.

Not only is the theory controversial at the cultural level, but some pro-evolution scientists have nonetheless expressed skepticism about Darwin's theory: The processes that produce bacterial resistance to drugs or changes in birds' beaks, they say, simply can't generate the massive diversity that characterizes the living world - much less produce the bursts of wildly disparate animal forms found in the fossil record.

Such skepticism, long evident in scientific literature, has made its way into textbooks. Indeed, one major college text, Biology, reports that "many evolutionary biologists now question whether natural selection alone accounts for the evolutionary history observed in the fossil record."

There is thus every good reason to state that "evolution is a theory, not a fact," even in some popular senses of those terms. Of course, that doesn't mean the label's backers are free of religious motivation. But motivations notwithstanding, there's a legitimate secular purpose in urging kids to approach the theory with an open but critical mind.

That's far healthier than defining critical thinking out of the classroom. I only hope the judge agrees.

This article first appeared in the Philadelphia Inquirer. The author can be reached here.

Charles C. Haynes, a senior scholar at an organization called The First Amendment, asks the question, "Is Darwin winning the battle, but losing the war?"

Haynes seems to think Darwin is losing the war against the advancing wave of the ID movement.

Haynes points out that "if the aim of science education is scientific literacy, then students must learn the prevailing theories in science. But if we expect them to believe what they hear, they must also learn something about the conflicts and controversies surrounding those theories. Winning the hearts and minds of students is what really counts."

For the full commentary, click HERE.

In the Christian Science Monitor, correspondent Randy Dotinga summarizes the battle of ideas between the National Center for Science Education (NCSE), the Institute for Creation Research (ICR), and the Discovery Institute (DI).

Leaders at NCSE complain that they are being outfunded by the other side, but The Discovery Institute's Bruce Chapman scoffs at Eugenie Scott's "preposterous" claims of underfunding. "There's huge bucks in evolution studies at every major university in the country," says Chapman. "We're up against a whole Darwinist establishment."

Barbara Forrest, a philosophy professor at Southeastern Louisiana University, who battled efforts to change the teaching of evolution in her local school district says the debate revolves around "the religious right's dislike of secular education and secular society."

Once again, does it ever occur to the secularists that the religious right recognizes the controversy about Darwinism in scientific circles, and would like students to know about this controversy?

The author of this piece describes the debate as science vs religion, when it is actually science vs science. Once this false dichotomy is overcome, the tide of ID may advance even faster.

For the full article, click HERE.

The Discovery Institute reported that by a vote of 6-1 the school board of Grantsburg, Wisconsin adopted a revised policy on the teaching of evolution at a special meeting on December 6. The policy states that "Students shall be able to explain the scientific strengths and weaknesses of evolutionary theory.”

"Students are the real winners here, because now they will be able to study all the relevant scientific evidence relating to evolutionary theory, not just a skewed selection of the evidence," said Dr. John West, Associate Director of Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture.

For the full news story, please click HERE.

The San Francisco Chronicle's Anna Badkhen reports on the growing tide of the ID movement and creationism in public schools.

"There's a constant impetus by conservative evangelical Christians to bring religion back into the public schools," said Witold Walczak, legal director of the Pennsylvania branch of the American Civil Liberties Union."

Patricia Nason at the Institute for Creation Research, the world leader in creation science, said her organization and other activist groups are encouraging people who share conservative religious beliefs to seek positions on local school boards.

"The movement is to get the truth out," Nason said. "We Christians have as much right to be involved in politics as evolutionists. We've been asleep for two generations, and it's time for us to come back."

While ICR is quite clear on the identity of the intelligent designer, the ID movement does not specifically identify the designer.

Eugenie Scott of NCSE says "The religious right has a list of topics that it wants action on. Things like abortion, abstinence, gays are higher up in the food chain of their concern, but evolution is part of the package."

For the full article, click HERE.

An extensive response to the National Geographic article "Was Darwin Wrong" has been offered by the organization Apologetics Press.

Dr. Bert Thompson and Dr. Brad Harrub provide detailed rebuttals to the many tired claims of organic evolution put forth by David Quammen.

National Geographic seems to have misstepped again by being woefully behind on the current topics.

For the full discussion, click HERE.

The evidence continues to mount that the non-coding sequences of DNA serve vital functions, instead of the Darwinist claims that they are "junk" DNA. It may be time for molecular biologists who advocate an ID interpretation of the facts to appeal to major journals to withhold judgment on DNA sequences whose function has yet to be determined.

For the full article in PLoS Biology, click HERE.

Laura Parker, writing for USA Today, chronicles recent developments in the debate over origins.

Because of a requirement in the federal No Child Left Behind law that states must review science standards over the next two years, the debate is likely to further heat up.

Eugenie Scott, director of NCSE, thinks that the new approach is politically smart.

"They have no science," Scott says. "But they can argue to the American public that it's only fair to teach alternative science theories or evidence against evolution."

To say that ID has no science to back up its claims is over the top.

For the full article, click HERE.

Steve Jones writes a byline about the mounting evidence for the evolution of the eye. The human eye, which gave Darwin himself a "shudder" (because of it's perfection in design), is nowadays thought to be easily explained by tiny incremental changes over eons of time and "convergent" evolution.

A letter to the editor of the London Daily Telegraph by David Tyler says that "Steve Jones uses his column to accuse "believers" of arrogance. 'When the facts don't fit, tell lies' is the caricature he uses. Whatever the issues are, they are not to do with lying about facts. They are about interpretations. Jones describes the evolutionary ancestor as a 'complex creature', even though it lived in the Precambrian. The new research pushes back the origin of eye complexity to a time where Darwinists think that there were no predators and no land life-forms and where there are no convincing drivers for natural selection to act on natural variations. This new research makes Richard Dawkins' assertion (that the eye has evolved over 40 times independently) to look a bit thin. More importantly, since there are so many design features relating to eyes, it is not unreasonable to consider the possibility that similar architectures are related to design rather than evolution. Indeed, one might deem it arrogant to suggest that all talk of design belongs to the 'anti-science brigade'."

Random mutations are all the Darwinists have, so teleologic arguments get them nowhere. Supposed convergent evolution, in any form, strongly argues
against random mutations and for something else. Perhaps similar eyes point to a common designer with general templates for the eye?

For the full article (you must register and search for Steve Jones) in the London Daily Telegraph, click HERE.

Thomas Woodward, author of Doubts about Darwin: A History of Intelligent Design reviews the recent story in National Geographic that causes quite a buzz.

Woodward pointed out that "several scholars have noted in recent weeks that throughout the article, small-scale or modest "variations" in animals are treated blithely as evidence for the origin of new organs or body structures—what biologists call "macroevolution." Huge unsolved problems that plague the current gene-centered macroevolutionary theory—revealed in such cutting-edge texts as MIT Press's Origination of Organismal Form—are not mentioned. Most significantly, there is no hint that intelligent, well-informed dissent exists anywhere in the university world. As I read Quammen's article, I kept looking in vain for his response to the telling critiques of the Intelligent Design Movement. This is puzzling, in light of the conundrum that is confronted in the article: Why so many Americans still doubt Darwinism?"

For the full article in Christianity Today, click HERE.

A recent paper in Trends in Biotechnology November 2004 issue pleas for a more realistic assessment of the biotechnology industry and what it can deliver. An abstract of the paper is below:

The myth of the biotech revolution
Paul Nightingale and Paul Martin
Trends in Biotechnology, Volume 22, Issue 11 , November 2004, Pages 564-569

The existence of a medicinal 'biotech revolution' has been widely accepted and promoted by academics, consultants, industry and government. This has generated expectations about significant improvements in the drug discovery process, healthcare and economic development that influence a considerable amount of policy-making. Here we present empirical evidence, from a variety of indicators, that shows that a range of outputs have failed to keep pace with increased research and development spending. Rather than producing revolutionary changes, medicinal biotechnology is following a well-established pattern of slow and incremental technology diffusion. Consequently, many expectations are wildly optimistic and over-estimate the speed and extent of the impact of biotechnology, suggesting that the assumptions underpinning much contemporary policymaking need to be rethought.

Conclusion
The data we have presented suggests that it is time to rethink the biotech revolution. Policy makers need to follow the FDA and move away from an increasingly discredited linear model of innovation that sees new drug and diagnostic products as little more than the application of basic research. Instead, policy needs to address the uncertain, systemic nature of technical change and the very long time scales between advances in basic knowledge and productivity improvements 23, 32 and 33.
The FDA's emphasis on the importance of getting our facts right is a welcome development because unrealistic expectations have had a major impact on government policy.
Undoubtedly, some of the
policy suggestions are intrinsically good ideas, such as promoting better knowledge transfer between industry, universities and the healthcare system, but successful policy needs to be based on sound evidence and a sense of proportion. This has not always been the case with biotechnology and there is now a substantial mismatch between the real world and the unrealistic expectations of policy-makers, consultants and social scientists.
Although we have hinted at an alternative model we can say very little at present about the long-term prospects for biotechnology and our data are compatible with a range of eventualities. A pessimistic perspective might highlight that the biotechnology revolution has been closely associated with a reductionist, genetic model of disease 37 and 38 that is increasingly being challenged by explanations that emphasize the interaction between environmental, lifestyle and biological factors across the life course [27]. Epidemiologists have already noted how the social distribution of a range of common disorders, such as obesity, stomach ulcers and heart disease, has radically changed in the last century, suggesting that the major determinants of these diseases are social rather than purely genetic in origin [39]. These environmental factors, such as poverty and smoking require comprehensive public health programmes rather than unproven high-tech solutions that are unlikely to be delivered in the short term [29]. This uncertainty about the timing and benefits of biotechnology suggests the need for regular checks against the evidence to avoid constructing shared expectations that have little empirical foundation.
Our concern is not the future but the present, and more particularly how current expectations and talk of revolutions help generate the social co-operation needed to deal with the very long-term lead times required to create new medicines. Unrealistic expectations are dangerous as they lead to poor investment decisions, misplaced hope, and distorted priorities, and can distract us from acting on the knowledge we already have about the prevention of illness and disease.

For the full article (for a fee), click HERE.

The recent vote in California that takes $3 billion to conduct embryonic stem cell research is an example of the false hope involved in some biotechnological research. Embryonic stem cell research has yet to help those who suffer from debilitating diseases, however, great work has been done in the arena of adult stem cell research, umbilical cord blood stem cell research, etc., without killing a human embryo.

In connection with this thought-provoking article from Trends in Biotechnology, click HERE to see an article from the Los Angeles Times.

In addition, an article from CBC shows the exciting treatment of patients using umbilical cord blood with stem cells. For the full article, click HERE.

On Friday, November 19th, a Pennsylvania school district defended its decision to discount Charles Darwin's theory of evolution and take a lead in teaching what critics say is a version of creationism.

A statement by the school district "Because Darwin's theory is a theory, it is still being tested as new evidence is discovered. Gaps in the theory exist for which there is no evidence."

"Intelligent design is creationism in a cheap tuxedo," said Nick Matzke, a spokesman for the National Center for Science Education. As if that statement is all that is needed to brush aside the growing ID movement.

Americans' belief in creationism remains strong. A recent Gallup poll found that nearly half of Americans believe that God created humans in their present form, with a mere 13 percent saying God played no part in the process of human development.

For the full article, click HERE.

National Public Radio (NPR) aired a program on the controversy of a number of school districts mandating or suggesting that ID be taught along with evolution in public schools.

Dr. David K. DeWolf is an attorney and professor of law at Gonzaga University School of Law. He is also a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture. In the NPR discussion DeWolf comments, "the point of the Darwinian project is to provide an explanation without the use of any sort of intelligent process, that natural processes by themselves, through random mutation and natural selection, can generate complex organisms of marvelous complexity. The question is whether--as you investigate that scientifically, does the evidence bear that out, or does the evidence point, as you would in a murder investigation, to, say, `Gee, I don't think this is likely explained by a natural cause'? Who the intelligent agent is that is responsible for the phenomenon is a separate question after you've determined whether it's more likely explained by a natural cause."

Nick Matkze is a public information project specialist at the National Center for Science Education in Oakland, California. He comments, "And so you can see, you know, when you look at creationism and how it's evolved over the last 15 years--it's gone from creationism to intelligent design to evidence against evolution, and it's always the same people with the same kinds of motivations. They all think evolution is, you know, bad for society, evolution is the root of societal evils. And that's pretty much why they're going for this."

Dr. Ken Miller voiced his concern that " the most destructive part of the disclaimer that's on the textbooks in Georgia, is the last sentence. And it says something to the effect that students are urged to study this material carefully, critically examine it and consider it with an open mind. Now, think about what that means to a student. It means to a student that you're supposed to do this to evolution, but that every other topic in that book need not be critically considered or examined with an open mind. It's like telling you we're certain of everything in science except for evolution. And I can't think of a worse policy in terms of scientific education. And, unfortunately, that's what this, the intelligent design movement, has led to: a lot of bad teaching, a lot of bad ideas about science, and, as you heard from the school board members in Dover, a lot of personal conflict at a local level, which I think is needless and unnecessary if science is taught well and taught properly.

For an article and audio file of the discussion, click HERE.

A student group, inspired by Matzke and Miller, generated a few new textbook disclaimers. For the mock Darwinist disclaimers at the IDEA Center, click HERE.

Janice Spiewak of Waukesha, Wisconsin is a student at Mount Mary College, and has something to say about "teaching the controversy" in the Milwaukee Sentinel Journal.

Ms. Spekwak asks, "What would you think of a police department that disregarded evidence to follow only one of several possible theories to solve a mass murder?"

She concluded that you "would call them foolish, and you would be right, because it’s foolish to insist on looking at only one theory when there is evidence for other possibilities."

But that is what public schools all across the nation have done for decades. They teach the theory of evolution as though it’s the only one on the playing field. This article was prompted by the recent decision in Grantsburg, Wisconsin to allow the students to look at theories of biology other than Darwinism.

For the full article, click HERE.

A commentary, written by Dr. Kelly Hollowell, appears on the WorldNetDaily web site. Dr. Hollowell, J.D., Ph.D., is a scientist, patent attorney and adjunct law professor of bioethics. She is also a nationally recognized conference speaker.

The thoughtful commentary begins by noting that "A favorite liberal maxim is: 'The mind is like a parachute. It only functions when open.' So why are libs so zealously opposed to any idea that runs counter to evolution?"

Hollowell rightly points out that "the entanglement of philosophy and science over the last 100 years has led to a one-sided education system where the free exchange of ideas and critical thinking is suppressed."

She notes that the juvenile attacks of Darwinists to silence anti-evolutionists consist of "marginalize them through name-calling and character assassination. They characterized those who support the intelligent design movement as Bible-thumping fundamentalists, dangerous pseudo-scientists, flat earthers, etc."

For the full commentary, click HERE.

Jack Cashill, executive editor of Ingram's Business Journal in the Kansas City area for the past 25 years, describes, in an opinion column, his meeting with ID proponents, and the book that turned him around in the origins debate.

This eye-opening column shows the work that can be done on a mind open to the facts regarding the debate.

For the full opinion column, click HERE.

An editorial in the newspaper Charlotte Observer gets it right, then gets it wrong.

The editorial states that "The fundamental issue is intellectual honesty in public education. That's a fight worth fighting." And, so it is.

But, then the editorial goes on to talk about the separation of church and state, and religion vs science.

One of our first goals is to tear down the false dichotomy of science vs faith. We should be discussing and debating how the world really was and is. We should be answering fundamental questions to ascertain which world view is reasonable. If the most reasonable world view, determined from the evidence, includes the supernatural, so be it. Let's fight this false dichotomy.

The last sentence of the editorial compares the Georgia debate to Islamic and Taliban extremists in Iran and Afghanistan.

For the full editorial, click HERE.

It is often helpful and instructive to see how the other side constructs the "debate" between Darwinism and Intelligent Design. This article, written by Paul R. Gross on the web site butterflies and wheels, shows one such "fashioning", reviewing the book Why Intelligent Design Fails.

I will forego mentioning specific examples of emotionally charged language, which portrays ID proponents as backwoods rubes, or, more kindly, as scientists who haven't thought of the obvious.

A newcomer to the debate, after reading this article, would come away with the picture of the wise Darwinist who now has to casually wave his/her hand in the air to scare a bothersome gnat circling his/her head.

To read the full article, click HERE.

An article on the Discovery Institute web site reports that "The courts should not prevent educators from encouraging students to approach the study of evolution with an open mind according to over 30 scientists, including 25 from Georgia, who have submitted a legal brief to the US District Court in the Northern District of Georgia."

Attorney Seth Cooper, an expert on the legal aspects of teaching evolution points out that “the ACLU is supposed to be against censorship and favor the free marketplace of ideas, but here it is dogmatically trying to censor a school district from encouraging an open-minded approach to teaching evolution.”

To view the full article, click HERE.

Susanne Quick, reporter for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, states that the Grantsburg, Wisconsin School District has passed a motion permitting "various theories/models of origins" to be incorporated into its science curriculum.

"Wisconsin law mandates that evolution be taught. The Grantsburg School Board felt the law was too restrictive, said Joni Burgin, the school superintendent. So when the board examined a new science curriculum - which happens every six years - a line was added that called for "various models/theories" of origin to be incorporated. According to Joseph Donovan, a spokesman for the state Department of Public Instruction, the Grantsburg motion is perfectly legal."

You may need to register with the Journal Sentinel to view the full article. For more information on this story, please click HERE.

An itsy, bitsy water strider has a remarkably designed leg structure that helps it stay afloat, even in a driving rainstorm.

CBC News reports that in an article in Nature Magazine researchers in China have discovered the secret behind the water strider's ability to resist a violent rainstorm.

The structure of the water strider's microscopic hairs, called microsetae
are scored with tiny grooves that trap air, boosting the water resistance of the leg. A single leg can support 15 times the insect's body weight.

The researchers stated that "Our discovery may be helpful in the design of miniature aquatic devices and non-wetting materials."

It is amazing how human engineers often copy the designs in nature.

For the full article, click HERE.

A press release by the European Molecular Biology Laboratory claims that researchers have now provided concrete evidence about how the human eye evolved. Jochen Wittbrodt says that "Quite possibly, the human eye has originated from light-sensitive cells in the brain. Only later in evolution would such brain cells have relocated into an eye and gained the potential to confer vision." Another scientist, Detlev Arendt, stated that he "noticed that the shape of the cells in a worm’s brain resembled the rods and cones in the human eye. I was immediately intrigued by the idea that both of these light-sensitive cells may have the same evolutionary origin."

What is interesting here is the leap of faith required. Because the SHAPE of cells in a worm's brain resembles the SHAPE of rods and cones in the human eye, one likely evolved for the other. What could be said from the ID perspective is that the intelligent designer has certain design templates that work well in all creatures that possess the sense of sight, and therefore, there are similarities in the structure and chemical makeup. What's at issue in the debate is NOT the similarity of structures between species, but rather HOW all this irreducible complexity got here in the first place. You must answer the HOW of Darwinism, not just assert that it happens. No one has provided a complex chemical evolutionary path from one irreducibly complex feature to another in a living being. Making assertions out of thin air is not science.

For a review of the full press release, Click HERE.

The Design Revolution was reviewed by Travis K. McSherley on townhall.com.

McSherley remarks that, "Intelligent design is a commendable and reasonable response to the unanswered - and in many cases unasked - questions about the feasibility of Darwinian biology. Most bothersome is the unexplained origin of the information required to generate life."

He further comments that Dr. Dembski "has produced a fascinating - albeit technical - overview of the major components of intelligent design theory and an impressive critique of Darwinian ideology."

For a look at the article, please click HERE.

A trial date has been set for a lawsuit seeking to have Cobb County remove disclaimers about evolution from its science textbooks.

The U.S. District Court in Atlanta will hear the case on Nov. 8.

The wording on the sticker said that evolution is a theory, and "this material should by approached with an open mind..."

For the entire article by AP in the Macon Telegraph, click HERE.

Evan Ratliff's article in Wired Magazine has drawn criticism from the Discovery Institute. With "tongue in cheek" they commented, "Wired has now gone where no pure science magazine has gone before. In an apparent effort to boost the magazine’s sex appeal, the latest issue wades into the imaginative world of science fiction."

In his criticism of ID, Ratliff needs to be much more objective. Dr. Stephen Meyer, of the Discovery Institute stated that "the piece portrays the theory of intelligent design as a religiously motivated political crusade rather than what it actually is, an evidence-based scientific research program. It portrays our scientific research and publications as a nefarious plot to infiltrate the public schools with a virulent new form of creationism. We’re hoping they’ll follow up this yarn with a non-fiction piece about the real attempts to shut down discussion of the weaknesses of neo-Darwinism."

For the full article, please click HERE.

Dr. Jay Richards and Dr.Guillermo Gonzalez, will visit New Zealand, a very secularized country, from October 27th to November 9th. They will be speaking at a number of locations, focusing on their book The Privileged Planet.

For more details on the Privileged Planet seminars, please visit the Focus on the Family, New Zealand web site by clicking HERE.

An article written by Mustafa Akyol on the website IslamOnline encourages Muslims to join in an alliance with those who champion the Intelligent Design movement. Together we can engage the culture and civilly debate the merits of ID.

For the article, please click HERE.

Sorry to visit the Meyer affair yet again, but a recent letter to Nature makes a point that bears highlighting. The letter, by Vladimir Svetlov, a microbiologist at Ohio State University, chides Nature for making such a big deal out of the fact that a pro-ID article was published in a peer-reviewed journal science journal.

“I cannot in all honesty share in the anxiety surrounding publication of a dubious paper on ‘intelligent design’—regarded by most scientists as a version of creationism—in a journal with an impact factor of less than one,” says Svetlov. “Your News story "Peer-reviewed paper defends theory of intelligent design" (Nature 431, 114; 2004) suggests that getting an intelligent-design paper into a peer-reviewed journal is a huge achievement for creationism.”

To the contrary, he argues, the real surprise is that ID proponents didn’t get such a publication earlier.

Why? Because “one can publish just about anything if one goes far enough down the list of impact factors. There are papers all around us containing problems glaring enough to fail their authors in undergraduate midterm exams.”

Svetlov may not understand why the publication of Meyer’s paper was such a big deal. As I pointed out in my first piece on this topic, it’s a big deal because the anti-ID crowd has invested so much in the claim that ID has never published in peer-reviewed publications (which is a canard to begin with; see “Media Backgrounder: Intelligent Design Article Sparks Controversy” on the Discovery Institute’s Web site). It’s also a big deal because ID proponents are consistently denied a level playing field. And getting published despite the unfairness is a significant accomplishment.

But Svetlov’s point about the ease of publishing bad science is an interesting one. For one thing, it exposes the double standard of those who have dedicated their lives (and livelihoods) to defending the public from the allegedly “bad science” of intelligent design while doing nothing about the genuinely bad science that’s published in many journals. (This is eerily reminiscent, by the way, of what happened with biology textbooks. While the anti-ID folks were out guarding the schools from the “bad science” of intelligent design, they serenely accepted even the most egregious errors, as documented in Jonathan Well’s book, Icons of Evolution, in textbooks used by millions of kids.)

More interesting, however, is the conundrum Svetlov’s letter poses for the anti-ID community. There have been signs that the anti-ID folks want to back away from making publication in peer reviewed journals a touchstone of good science. Not a bad idea. But doing so affirms the likelihood that peer-reviewed journals have published some rubbish—maybe a good deal of it, as Svetlov asserts. And if that’s true, it diminishes the cultural authority that the science establishment has relied on to keep ID and criticisms of Darwinism out of public school science classrooms.

Anti-IDists seem to know this and are working both sides of the street. On the one hand, as I’ve noted elsewhere, they seem to be downplaying the importance and validity of peer review—but only to a limited extent. On the other hand, they’re still trying make it look as if Meyer’s paper was published only through chicanery—and therefore doesn’t count as a peer-reviewed article.

Strategically, this is probably the best thing they can do. But if some enterprising team of young scholars decided to document Svetlov’s claims—the way Jonathan Wells did on a smaller scale with biology textbook errors—the whole issue of ID and peer review could be rendered moot in the ensuing controversy.

Of course, this is just my speculation. But what if it really happened?

What if?

Submitted 10/26/2004

The cover story in Wired Magazine is the latest evidence of ID's success. Written by Evan Ratliff, the article shows that the panic attack experienced by evolutionists is only deepening in intensity.

For a commentary on the Ratliff story in the Christian Post, please click HERE.

A recent letter to the editor, entitled, No Equal Billing for Science, Faith, in the York Daily Record shows that the writer, Randy Littlefield, is uninformed about ID. He, like so many others, conflates Biblical Creationism and ID.

When you hear those around you doing the same, call them on it.

For the full letter, click HERE.

A byline, in the Washington Monthly, can only be properly described as anti-ID propaganda. With a wealth of pejorative language, and ad hominem attacks, Chris Mooney chooses not to look at the evidence, but rather, play the emotional strings of the reader.

For another example of the all too common approach that Mooney and those of his kind take, click HERE.

A story in the York Daily Record by Lauri Lebo and Joe Maldonado shows that the Dover Area School Board voted to require the teaching of intelligent design Monday night. This is likely the first district in the United States to do so.

Dover's 6-to-3 vote was in favor of teaching alternative theories to evolution, "including, but not limited to, intelligent design".

Eugenie Scott of NCSE said she believes intelligent design proponents are now looking for a test case to defend the issue in court.

Those at the Discovery Institute, who have also advised a school board member on the issue, said the board member might have overstepped his bounds. "We don't endorse or support what the Dover School District has done," West said. "This is not what we recommend."

Eugenie Scott said, "Intelligent design is just a sham to get creationism into the curriculum. The intelligent design movement is politically motivated and has little standing with the mainstream scientific community."

For the full story, click HERE.

The York Daily Record report by Joe Maldonado states that the Dover Area School Board voted to add “Intelligent Design Theory” to the district’s biology curriculum Monday evening

New wording in the curriculum states: “Students will be made aware of gaps/problems in Darwin’s Theory and of other theories of evolution including, but not limited to, intelligent design."

The discussion by the board was heated. Lawsuits were a fear of just about everyone speaking against the curriculum change.

For the full article, click HERE.

A slanted article in the Cleveland Plain Dealer by Anglea D. Chatman, stated that, "Ohio teachers will teach good science despite scientists' fears that a state school board vote earlier this year has opened the door to the study of creationism."

Member of the state board of education, Martha Wise, said she does not expect teachers to use a controversial model lesson plan, entitled "Critical Analysis of Evolution," that some scientists say opens the door to teaching creationism in the state's public schools. Of course, the switching of the word "creationism" for intelligent design is an oft used obfuscation of the issue.

Case Western Reserve University has hosted a weekend-long conference called "Evolution & God: 150 Years of Love and War Between Science and Religion."

One school board member said he was afraid that the teaching of this curriculum would "become mandatory..."

For the full article, click HERE.

The Charles County Board of Education proposed and suggested censoring of reading materials which contain "immorality" or "foul language," and inviting an outside organization to hand out Bibles in schools and to teach the theory of creationism in science classes. The school board did not specifically mention ID.

The sentiment from school parents and others was that "the board should not focus on instilling religious and moral lessons in the public schools."

An interesting comment was that, "As good as my son's teachers are at J.C. Parks [Elementary School] . . . I don't ever want them responsible for the education of my son religiously or spiritually. That's my job."
Taking the view of people who have a supernaturalistic worldview, the same could be said. The naturalistic worldview has been "shoved down the throats" of religious students, with no apparent angst concerning that practice from naturalistic thinking school officials and parents. What's good for the goose, is good for the gander! Let's dump the false dichotomy of science vs religion.

What needs to be done is to take an open minded view of origins science. This involves taking a fair-minded look at the evidence, and if it favors an extranatural designer, so be it. We are looking for the truth about the nature of reality, not for a tale that some group feels comfortable with, right? Let's play fair on both sides.

To view the full article by Joshua Partlow in the Washington Post, you may need to register. Click HERE.

An article by Lucas Grundmeier in The Iowa State Daily stated that two atheist professors at Iowa State University attempted to show that ID is illegitimate as a scientific endeavor.

They claimed that "Design can't be separated from the designer." In a sense, this is true. If you found an SUV in the desert, you intuitively know that it didn't appear from random natural processes, but rather, was designed and manufactured by intelligent agents. You are able to infer certain characteristics of the designers and those for whom the SUV was made. For instance, the designers paid careful attention to details, and in some fashion, valued those for whom the SUV was made. This we can intuitively recognize. ID doesn't even take this legitimately reasoned step in identifying the designer(s).

The professors also claimed that ID fails "to identify anything substantive about that designer...and this failure destroys the scientific validity of those arguments." Well, you don't need to know exactly who the designer is to know that that thing was designed. Once you have established that something is designed, you can go on and ask who designed it. This step may not be a scientific endeavor, but rather knowledge revealed to us by the designing agent.

Dr. Patterson made several bold assertions, none backed up with evidence. My favorite was "Science thrives on unanswered questions, religion, by contrast, thrives on unquestioned answers." Patterson's closeminded view of reality dooms him to be a perpetual seeker and not an eventual finder. He also thinks that "intelligent design theorists have an ulterior motive in their work." And atheists don't????

The two professors haul out the false dichotomy that science and faith are not overlapping magisteria.

The bottom line is that the same old arguments are being paraded out, and people who are not careful thinkers buy into the rhetoric.

We are all seeking out the truth concerning the nature of reality. The atheistic worldview boxes itself in, and is more closeminded, by only accepting naturalistic answers to the origins question. The ID worldview is willing to be more openminded, and entertains the possibility that reality can be explained in both a naturalistic and supernaturalistic sense. Let's just look carefully at the evidence from an openminded worldview, and let the best worldview prevail. What could be more fair-minded than that approach in the academic and public arenas?

For the full article click HERE.

Genetic Analysis of Coordinate Flagellar and Type III Regulatory Circuits in Pathogenic Bacteria

By: Scott A. Minnich & Stephen C. Meyer
Second International Conference on Design & Nature, Rhodes Greece. Comparing Design in Nature with Science and Engineering

September 1, 2004

Abstract

The bacterial flagellum represents one of the best understood molecular machines. Comprised of 40 parts that self-assemble into a true rotary engine, the biochemistry and genetics of these systems has revealed an unanticipated complexity. An essential component to assembly is the subset of parts that function as a protein secretory pump to ensure and discriminate that the correct number of protein subunits and their order of secretion is precisely regulated during assembly. Of further interest is the recognition of late that a number of important plant and animal pathogens use a related protein secretory pump fused to a membrane-spanning needle-like syringe by which a subset of toxins can be injected into target host cells. Together, the flagellar and virulence protein pumps are referred to as Type III Secretion Systems (TTSS). The archetype for TTSS systems has been the pathogenic members of the genus Yersinia which includes the organism responsible for bubonic plague, Y. pestis. Our interest in the Yersinia centers on the coordinate genetic regulation between flagellum biosynthesis and virulence TTSS expression. Y. enterocolitica, for example operates three TTSSs (motility, Ysa, and Yop), but each is expressed under defined mutually exclusive conditions. Y. pestis has lost the ability to assemble flagella (the genes are present on the chromosome) and expresses only the Yop system at 37oC, mammalian temperature. Using a combination of microarray analysis, genetic fusions, and behaviors of specific engineered mutants, we demonstrate how environmental factors influence gene expression of these multigene families, where the influence is exerted within each system, and propose why segregating these systems is critical for the organism. Our model further offers an explanation as to why an important subset of human pathogens has lost motility during their histories.

The Biological Society of Washington (BSW) has come up with a "new and improved" statement about the Stephen Meyer article that it published in its August 4, 2004 issue. The statement is reproduced below:

The paper by Stephen C. Meyer, "The origin of biological information and the higher taxonomic categories," in vol. 117, no. 2, pp. 213-239 of the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington, was published at the discretion of the former editor, Richard v. Sternberg. Contrary to typical editorial practices, the paper was published without review by any associate editor; Sternberg handled the entire review process. The Council, which includes officers, elected councilors, and past presidents, and the associate editors would have deemed the paper inappropriate for the pages of the Proceedings because the subject matter represents such a significant departure from the nearly purely systematic content for which this journal has been known throughout its 122-year history. For the same reason, the journal will not publish a rebuttal to the thesis of the paper, the superiority of intelligent design (ID) over evolution as an explanation of the emergence of Cambrian body-plan diversity. The Council endorses a resolution on ID published by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (www.aaas.org/news/releases/2002/1106id2.shtml), which observes that there is no credible scientific evidence supporting ID as a testable hypothesis to explain the origin of organic diversity. Accordingly, the Meyer paper does not meet the scientific standards of the Proceedings .

We have reviewed and revised editorial policies to ensure that the goals of the Society, as reflected in its journal, are clearly understood by all. Through a web presence (http://www.biolsocwash.org) and improvements in the journal, the Society hopes not only to continue but to increase its service to the world community of systematic biologists.

This statement mainly makes explicit what was implicit in the previous statement (though the president and current managing editor had been pretty explicit in their comments to the press). Since I covered the accusations against Sternberg in my previous Wedge Update, I won't rehash that material here.

Most interesting about the statement is the logic it employs. Near the end of the first paragraph it reads: "The Council endorses a resolution on ID published by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, ... which observes that there is no credible scientific evidence supporting ID as a testable hypothesis to explain the origin of organic diversity. Accordingly, the Meyer paper does not meet the scientific standards of the Proceedings."

In other words, because a resolution by the AAAS board "observes" that there is "no credible scientific evidence" supporting intelligent design, the BSW has determined that Meyer's article "does not meet the scientific standards of the Proceedings." And that's despite the (apparently irrelevant) fact that three independent reviewers said it did. 1

It's also despite the fact that the AAAS resolution is a politically motivated document, put together by people who know relatively little about ID. Indeed, after the AAAS board initially released its resolution, the Discovery Institute's John West contacted board members by e-mail and found that the resolution was essentially based on a couple of books read by staffers and a few Web documents. The board members who responded indicated that they themselves had read nothing—except for one who said she’d read some stuff on the Web but couldn’t remember what it was. 2

These facts notwithstanding, the Council has announced that it has "reviewed and revised editorial policies," presumably to make sure that no paper like Meyer's is published in the journal again, no matter what its actual relevance or scientific merits.

Ironically, though, by publishing and then repudiating the Meyer paper, the BSW has done the seemingly impossible. Not only has it given ID proponents a publication in a peer-reviewed biology journal, it has also handed a smoking gun to those ID proponents who argue that the peer-review process is unfairly stacked against them.

Quite a feat for a single journal.

There's no telling how the controversy over Meyer's paper will shake out. But whether the anti-design camp wins or loses, the BSW has tarnished its image—not by publishing Meyer's paper, but by the bumbling, disingenuous way it has handled the fallout.

If I were them, I'd have to wonder: Was it really worth it?

###

1. Note: Some may claim that I am taking these last two sentences out of context. However, the previous sentences of the paragraph concern only the alleged "inappropriateness" of Meyer's article. That standard is also cited as the reason the journal will not run any rebuttals to the piece. Yet it's doubtful that the BSW would claim that such a rebuttal would fail to meet the scientific (as opposed to the relevancy) standards of the journal.

2. John West, personal communication.

An article by Lucas Grundmeier in The Iowa State Daily states that the first lecture in the discussion of origins took place on the campus of Iowa State University.

Del Ratzsch claimed that "there are many people who argue that...talk about a supernatural designer is forbidden in science. The risk is putting artificial...arbitrary restrictions on science."

Ratzsch's concluded that "intelligent design deserves attention in the scientific community as it competes with naturalistic evolution as a possible explanation for why things are the way they are."

For the full article, click HERE.

A couple of lectures at Iowa State University discuss origins, including Intelligent Design.

The news story begins with a rather provocative statement that "many
scientists and academics have long since discredited biblical creationism, the belief that God created the world as described in Genesis, replacing it with evolution and the Big Bang." Says who?? Says the journalism major author at ISU.

Tuesday's lecture, by Del Ratzsch, professor of philosophy at the
Calvin College in Michigan, approached the issue from a pro-ID perspective.

In the following lecture, two ISU faculty members who have been long noted for their arguments against the teaching of creationism and against the existence of God will critique a 2004 intelligent design book, The Privileged Planet) by an ISU professor, Guillermo Gonzalez, assistant professor of physics and astronomy.

For the full article by Lucas Grundmeier in The Iowa State Daily click HERE

A rather sympathetic review of "Information: The New Language of
Science" by Hans Christian von Baeyer was presented recently in the Natural History Magazine.

Among other things, the reviewer states that, "The genetic code, with its alphabet of four letters grouped into words of three letters each, looks uncannily like some kind of computer file format." In addition, "In the case of information, it's no great surprise that meaning is imposed on a message by the sender and receiver. We are all accustomed to thinking of communication as something that happens between people, and so minds are naturally a part of the process. But it's unsettling when a similar kind of subjectivity is invoked to explain the behavior of atoms or electrons."

For a look at the full article click HERE.

The anti-intelligent design community has been bitten by its own rhetoric, and is doing all it can to stanch the wound—by less than ethical means.

For years, now, the anti-ID party line has been that intelligent design should not be considered legitimate science because it has never been published in peer-reviewed scientific publications. This claim surfaces over and over again—whenever the origins controversy makes the news.

Right now, however, many of them may be regretting that line. In the August 4 issue of the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington (PBSW), an obscure but respected peer-reviewed journal, appears an article by design theorist Stephen C. Meyer, titled "The origin of biological information and the higher taxonomic categories."

In that article Meyer argues that no current naturalistic theory of evolution can account for the massive amounts of complex, multi-level information needed to produce novel animal forms. He further argues that intelligent agents routinely exhibit all the capacities needed to produce such information. He thus proposes intelligent design as an explanation for the origin of biological information and the higher taxa.

Taxa are the particular groups into which organisms have been classified, whether species, genera, families, orders, classes and phyla. The latter of these are called the higher taxa because they are the most general and take in the most organisms. Thus, humans are classed in the genus Homo and the species sapiens, which are both lower taxa. But we also belong to the phylum Chordata, a higher taxon, which includes mammals, reptiles, fish, amphibians and any other organism that has a hollow nerve chord running down its back.

As you might guess, opponents of design are in an uproar. Stories have appeared in The Scientist, The Chronicle of Higher Education, Science and even Nature.

Stung by Meyer's publication, the anti-ID community is responding with smear tactics. In particular, the National Center for Science Education (NCSE), a staunch advocate of naturalistic evolution, and the Biological Society of Washington (BSW) are trying to play off the article's publication as a thoroughly underhanded affair by which a “substandard article” evaded rigorous scrutiny. In a nutshell, the charge is that the PBSW was hijacked to promote a creationist agenda.

Although the article itself has received a share of the abuse—mostly in the form of a "critique" published on the Panda's Thumb blog—the main target has been the editor who published the piece, Richard Sternberg.

Sternberg is an evolutionary biologist with a Ph.D. in molecular evolution and another in systems theory and theoretical biology. He works for the National Institute of Health as a curator for the National Center for Biotechnology Information's (NCBI's) DNA database and as a Research Associate at the Smithsonian Institute's Natural Museum of Natural History. His research and writing areas are evolutionary theory and systematics. He worked as managing editor for PBSW for three years.

Sternberg has been cast as the main villain behind the publication of Meyer's paper. He's essentially been accused of deviating from the journal's established review process to help Meyer score a coup for ID advocates.

So what were the alleged deviations?

1. Sternberg didn't clear the article with the BSW's Council.

On Sept. 7, the BSW issued a statement repudiating the article. In its statement, the Council alleges that the article, "was published without the prior knowledge of the Council, which includes officers, elected Councilors, and past presidents, or the associate editors."

Sounds serious. Problem is, there has never been a policy requiring the editor to show submitted articles to the Council.

On his Web site, Sternberg notes, "At no time during my nearly three years as managing editor did I ever ask the Council for its input on any editorial decision regarding any particular paper. Nor did the Council itself or anyone on the Council intimate to me that the Council ought to be in any way involved in editorial decision-making with regard to particular papers."

He backs it up with the text of the form letter that is sent to article contributors. The relevant portion of the letter reads:

The editorial system of the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington is as follows: the Journal (Managing) Editor receives all manuscripts, provides editorial information regarding style, format, and organization, and selects the appropriate Associate Editor to handle the review process. Associate Editors select ad hoc reviewers, render decisions regarding acceptability of manuscripts, define the nature of the revision necessary, and if needed, edit the manuscript to improve precision and clarity. Manuscripts not accepted by the Associate Editors will be returned to authors. The Journal Editor receives accepted manuscripts, marks manuscripts for the printer, provides final editing, and organizes issues of the Proceedings. The Journal Editor is responsible for all matters about the publication of the Proceedings.
Not a word about the Council.

That’s not to mention the fact that Sternberg, as managing editor, was himself a member of the Council. As will be noted later on, another Council member did know about the article.

2. Meyer’s article was outside the scope of what the journal normally publishes.

The BSW’s statement also alleges that Meyer’s article “represents a significant departure from the nearly purely taxonomic content for which this journal has been known throughout its 124-year history.”

The president of the BSW, Roy W. McDiarmid, repeated the allegation to the Chronicle of Higher Education, which depicted the journal as one that “normally publishes papers describing species of plants and animals.”

The intimation, of course, is that the paper should have been sent to a journal with editors and reviewers who were better qualified to judge its merits. The Chronicle comments:

[O]pponents of intelligent design and creationism say that Mr. Meyer should have submitted his paper to one of the several journals that normally deal with the origin of animal forms.

"People who would be appropriate to review the paper would be evolutionary biologists, and I doubt that any evolutionary biologists reviewed the paper," said Eugenie C. Scott, executive director of the National Center for Science Education.

However, the official description of the journal, found in each issue, is considerably broader than what the BSW has been telling the press. It declares that the journal "contains papers bearing on systematics in the biological sciences ( botany, zoology, and paleontology)."

And, indeed, Sternberg notes that the journal has regularly published articles that go beyond pure taxonomy. The kinds of studies published include:

• Comparative cytogenetics, which compares the characteristics of chromosomes of different organisms. Such characteristics include the size, shape, banding pattern and number of chromosomes.
• Developmental studies, which are studies that examine the development or growth of one of more organisms.
• Phylogenetic hypotheses and classifications, which are proposed evolutionary histories for one or more groups of organisms as well as the classifications that are based on those histories.
• Reviews of faunal groups, which are essentially reviews of how certain animals have been classified, as well as their relationship to one another.

“In addition,” says Sternberg, “evolutionary scenarios are frequently presented at the end of basic systematic studies.” (A sample list of titles from the journal can be found here.)

According to Sternberg, “Meyer set forth a reasoned view about an issue of fundamental importance to systematics: the basis of taxa.”

Sternberg explains: “Darwin set forth … common descent with random modification … as being the basis for the discipline of systematics (understanding the interrelationships of taxa). In other words, according to Darwin and most subsequent biologists, taxa at all taxonomic ranks (phyla, classes, orders, families, genera, species) can only be understood as historical accidents, the unplanned product of random variation and selection. Evolutionary theory, then, is the basis of modern systematics. Meyer argues that some kind of deep purpose (which he characterizes as ‘intelligent design’) underlies living systems; if he is right, the whole basis of systematics would be radically altered. Instead of being a historical record of ‘successful’ (surviving) accidents, systematics becomes the study of the putative designer's plans and their interrelationships.”

Thus, Meyer’s paper was well within the scope of the journal.

And contrary to what Eugenie Scott claimed, it was also well-refereed. In addition to being an evolutionary biologist himself, Sternberg chose three referees, “all of whom are evolutionary and molecular biologists teaching at well-known institutions.” Although they all demanded significant revisions, which were made, they thought the article was worth publishing.

3. Sternberg didn't show the paper to the journal's board of associate editors.

In one of its Web reports, the NCSE charges, "According to the PBSW's instructions for contributors, 'Manuscripts are reviewed by a board of Associate Editors and appropriate referees.' It seems, therefore, that Meyer's paper was not published in accordance with the journal's established review procedure."

Again, sounds serious. But it misrepresents the way the process works.

"What the sentence means is that manuscripts are reviewed by some member of the group of associate editors," says Sternberg on his home page. "At no time in the past has the board as a whole (or even more than one associate editor) ever reviewed any paper, nor has that practice and policy changed as a result of the recent controversy."

The above letter to contributors backs him. What's more, associate editors have different areas of expertise and are not qualified to make decisions on every paper that comes down the line. So it wouldn't make sense to require all the associate editors to review a given piece.

4. Sternberg didn't show the paper to any of the associate editors.

Science magazine reported that the PBSW’s current editor, ornithologist Richard Banks, “says Sternberg deviated from the journal's practice of assigning every submission to an associate editor.”

Sternberg counters that sometimes none of the associate editors has the expertise to handle a paper. At such times, he had the option of assigning an ad hoc associate editor or taking the article himself. Since he has two Ph.D.s in evolutionary biology, he took the article himself. This was entirely within the range of acceptable practice.

An e-mail message from McDiarmid backs him up. The e-mail describes a Council meeting in which the Council members discussed Sternberg’s handling of Meyer’s paper. McDiarmid wrote: “The question came up as to why you didn't pass the ms on to an associate editor and several examples were mentioned of past editorial activities where a manuscript was dealt with directly by the editor and did not go to an associate editor and no one seemed to be bothered …”

Moreover, Sternberg didn’t go solo: “In order to avoid making a unilateral decision on a potentially controversial paper … I discussed the paper on at least three occasions with another member of the Council of the Biological Society of Washington (BSW), a scientist at the National Museum of Natural History. Each time, this colleague encouraged me to publish the paper despite possible controversy.”

Even if he had failed to consult with the Council member, the fact remains that the article went through peer review. And the peer reviewers approved it. The president of the BSW acknowledged this, also.

As Sternberg recounts, “after the controversy arose, Dr. Roy McDiarmid … reviewed the peer-review file and concluded that all was in order. As Dr. McDiarmid informed me in an email message on August 25th, 2004, ‘Finally, I got the [peer] reviews and agree that they are in support of your decision [to publish the article].’”

At every point in the process, then, Sternberg acted ethically and adhered to customary practice at the journal. Because of this, Meyer’s piece is a bona fide peer-reviewed article.

And that’s the real problem.

ID opponents have invested heavily in portraying ID proponents as being unable to publish in peer-reviewed literature, which allegedly proves that ID is inherently bad science. They’ve invested so heavily, and for so long, the actual publication of such an article 1) would inevitably be a big deal and 2) would naturally lead many people to conclude that ID is legitimate science.

The first has already happened—as witnessed by the fact that even Nature and Science have reported on it. The second is what ID opponents are doing their best—or worst—to prevent. Hence, the smear tactics, which are aimed at stigmatizing Meyer’s paper so that they can claim that it “doesn’t count.” They are also aimed at making an example of Sternberg, lest anyone consider publishing another pro-ID paper.

Whether they succeed in stigmatizing Meyer’s paper and making an example of Sternberg, ID opponents know they’re in trouble. As the ID movement continues to grow, adding new talent to its ranks, there will certainly be more peer-reviewed ID publications.[1] ID opponents understand this and are perhaps backing away from the peer-review gambit.

Biologist Kenneth Miller, listed on the NCSE Web site as one of their “supporters,” told Nature that more such articles would undoubtedly appear. Nature reports:

Meyer’s article has attracted a lengthy rebuttal on The Panda’s Thumb, a website devoted to evolutionary theory. But Miller says that, despite criticism of the journal, versions of the theory will find their way into the scientific literature at some point. Arguments for it can be written, he says, as reappraisals of certain aspects of evolution rather than outright rejection. “Peer review isn’t a guarantee of accuracy,” he adds. “That is especially true of review articles.”

So despite the travail, real progress has been made here, and will continue to be made in the future. There’s still a lot of work ahead—not to mention suffering. But the ID movement is gaining ground.

Count on it.

###
[1] In fact, such publications already exist, including the book, Debating Design: From Darwin to DNA, published by Cambridge University Press. But I won’t list off any more because the authors and journals don’t need the kind of treatment Sternberg has been receiving.

What is "The Wedge"?

Recently, a few Intelligent Design (ID) critics have created some confusion over the meaning of "The Wedge." Several statements made by ID detractors in books and blogs (web logs) have suggested "The Wedge" to be a partially concealed strategy by well-funded religious fanatics to attack science and force it to come under the thumb of a specific religious mindset. (But how concealed can it be when the acknowledged sharp edge of the wedge, Philip Johnson, writes a book entitled, The Wedge of Truth in which he delineates the strategy for all to read?) Some statements have gone so far as to suggest that the advocates of "The Wedge" are dead-set on turning the United States into a theocracy! (For examples of writings suggesting the Wedge has hidden insidious motives and conspiratorial intentions, see the articles by Massimo Pigliucci and Robert Witzel and Steve Olson's book review "Shapes of a Wedge" on page 825 of the May 7, 2004 issue of the AAAS magazine Science).

But is this an accurate characterization of "The Wedge," or is this just a baseless appeal by Darwinists to impugn the motives of their adversaries? Well, as they say, when the facts aren't on your side, argue motives. The truth is, with regard to "The Wedge," the facts can speak for themselves. First of all, let's distinguish the Wedge document from the Wedge strategy. "The Wedge" document is nothing more or less than a fundraising proposal generated in 1999 by the Discovery Institute - a think-tank in Seattle, Washington. It is posted in its entirety (as well as a response to all the misinformation that has been spread by Wedge critics) at the Discovery Institute's website here. Interested readers may want to sift through the document and see for themselves that the Wedge conspiracy charges are simply not true.

Secondly, there is the Wedge strategy. Wedge advocates are becoming increasingly more convinced that the emerging biochemical and cosmological facts implicate the involvement of intelligence in the natural world. Helping scientists as well as the general public become aware of these facts is the central plank in "The Wedge" strategy. The intent of Wedge supporters is to split apart two arguments often used in tandem to dissuade people from the consideration of design hypotheses.

One of the two arguments is philosophical in nature and plays a critical defensive role in preserving Darwinism from potentially damaging competition. The thrust of this argument goes like this: science is ill-equipped to handle inferences to design, so therefore, these inferences have to be ruled out on principle alone (i.e., science simply cannot assess the presence of design). The second argument is evidentiary in nature and serves its purpose in offensive situations. The basic thesis here is that all or virtually all of the biological and physical evidence available to us points in the direction of purposeless, blind forces. Together these arguments form a rhetorically powerful one-two punch. When Darwinists are on the offensive, out comes the "evidence" about sloppy design and vestigial organs. These arguments attempt to illustrate the absurdity of a designer who would have possibly "done it that way?" But when ID advocates advance arguments based on observations that all but demand an inference to design, the Darwinist camp quickly switches to defense and reminds everyone that, tempting as it may seem, it is impossible to generate scientific evidence in favor of design - science simply doesn't allow it. Heads, I win; tails, you lose.

Now of course a major logical flaw occurs when these two arguments are combined. Although design advocates feel both arguments are faulty, any impartial observer can see that the two arguments cannot both be correct. If, on the one hand, science cannot speak to the issue of design, then it makes no sense to a moment later speak of "evidence" that opposes design. And if it is possible to marshal scientific evidence opposing design, then it must be at least theoretically possible to marshal scientific evidence supporting design - so why is it rejected a priori?

I presume that Darwinists who are bent on protecting their theory from fair critique are aware of this logical flaw, but evidently the utility of employing both arguments makes it irresistible. It is this having-their-cake-and-eating-it-too that necessitates any wedge strategy at all. So, for instance, Wedge advocates point out, among other things, that legitimate sciences infer the presence of design all the time. In fact, entire scientific enterprises exist because design is empirically detectable (regardless of whether the nature or intentions of the designer are discernable or not). What if biological evidence continues to surface, the most honest assessment of which repeatedly merits this inference to design? What if it becomes more and more apparent that there are verifiable signs of designing intelligence in the natural world? This is indeed the juncture at which we sit. Refusing to acknowledge this does not make the evidence go away. In light of this situation, Wedge advocates are simply attempting to reopen the public forum on the presence of design in nature - a forum which has been prematurely shut down by faulty Darwinist rhetoric.

Exposing the incongruity between the naturalistic doctrine of blind, purposeless causes and the emerging scientific evidence from information theory, molecular biology, and other fields associated with origins issues, is the crux of "The Wedge" strategy. There is nothing clandestine or sinister about it. It is simple, direct, and open for all to observe. Either it will succeed because hypotheses inferring design will lead us into further scientific truth, or it will wither away due to its fruitlessness. Is it evil and pernicious to allow this idea to breathe and see what happens? Is it appropriate to repeatedly make baseless claims designed to dissuade curious observers from taking a closer look? As a Wedge advocate, I would ask you to see past the histrionic hand-wringing of the Darwinists and take a close look at the possibility of design. Examine the evidence and judge for yourself, isn't that the way science is supposed to work?

Dr. Nesselroade is Associate Professor of Psychology at Asbury College in Kentucky. Readers are welcome to respond to this column at the ARN Discussion Forum.

Copyright 2004 Paul Nesselroade. All rights reserved. International copyright secured.