In the News

A story by Lisa Anderson in the Chicago Tribune shows the materialists bemoaning the plight of biology teachers in Kansas, who are "under the thumb" of those who want to change the definition of science and allow the "designer's foot in the door."

The emotional sympathy card is being played. According to the materialists, those poor adults are being harassed by students who are so uneducated and indoctrinated, that don’t believe in Darwinism.

Their "Constitutional right to be comfortable" is being violated. But, the students "right" to be comfortable is being violated as well. It cuts both ways. Maybe the teachers are being ridiculed by people who don’t get the debate. More education of the adults and students is needed.

CafePress is having a Post-Holiday sale and you can save some bucks for the next week on select items from the ARN Merchandise. Between 12/28/05 and 01/04/06 (next Friday) you can get $5 off any Hoodie and $4 off all Greeting Cards and Wall Calendars. Just enter the Discount Code: BIG5 or BIG4 in the Discount Coupon field at checkout and the credit will be applied. This includes our new 2006 "Mind Preceded Matter" Wall Calendar with thirteen fantastic Hubble Space Telescope photos and quotes about the design of the universe. All of our designs are available on Greeting Cards which are pretty unique and also qualify for the sale.

A story on the ACLU trial lawyers of Kitzmiller v. Dover written by Gina Passarella appears in the Law Intelligencer.

The lawyers are now world famous and showing how they approach the debate. For instance, Stephen Harvey comments, "The right to believe includes the right not to believe."

Does this mean that if two or three worldview positions are put before public school students, they can choose which one seems most plausible. That option is no longer allowed in Pennsylvania. The Darwinistic worldview will now be taught unchallenged. While in school in Pennsylvania, you WILL be taught the state-sponsored worldview, but elsewhere, you can learn about other worldviews. Darwinism/Materialism has been elevated to the level of indisputable fact.

The lawyers also say that since there will be no appeal on the ruling, this case will most likely stand as a trial court opinion that is not binding on any other state.

Pat Buchanan weighs in on the Kitzmiller v. Dover judicial ruling on the RealClearPolitics Web site.

Mr. Buchanan gives a wide-angle view of the decision which stretches from Aristotle to the present.

A story by Erin Hemme Froslie on the InForum Web site, tells of a decision made in North Dakota regarding ID and high school debating.

The North Dakota High School Activities Association won’t allow students to debate the role of intelligent design in public school classrooms.
Some parents and administrators feel the topic is too controversial.

A former debate coach, Kent Hjelmstad, said the process of debate is more important than the topic. He thinks "the message is that you want the experience of an academic challenge, but you don’t need to have objectionable discussions to get that challenge".

Now, we wouldn't want to infringe on anyone's "Constitutional right to be comfortable".

You will need to register with InForum to read this amazing article.

This article in First Things is a MUST read to understand the current culture war between scientism (neo-Darwinism) and design theory.

Many misunderstood Cardinal Schonborn's article in the New York Times, and this is his eloquent and clear-thinking response.

He rightly points out that there are not just two ways to discover the Truth of Reality, but three. He states that "Modern science alone may well be incapable of grasping the key truths about nature that are woven into the fabric of Catholic theology and morality. And theology proper does not supply these key truths either. Prior to both science and theology is philosophy, the “science of common experience.” Its role in these crucial matters is indispensable.

The following is a crucial point that all must grasp. Schonborn says "Let us return to the heart of the problem: positivism. Modern science first excludes a priori final and formal causes, then investigates nature under the reductive mode of mechanism (efficient and material causes), and then turns around to claim both final and formal causes are obviously unreal, and also that its mode of knowing the corporeal world takes priority over all other forms of human knowledge. Being mechanistic, modern science is also historicist: It argues that a complete description of the efficient and material causal history of an entity is a complete explanation of the entity itself—in other words, that an understanding of how something came to be is the same as understanding what it is. But Catholic thinking rejects the genetic fallacy applied to the natural world and contains instead a holistic understanding of reality based on all the faculties of reason and all the causes evident in nature—including the “vertical” causation of formality and finality.

This article should be read over and over, and slowly digested. In doing so, the reader will see it's overall importance, and Schonborn's critics will seem like the sound of "tinkling cymbals".

On the Science & Theology News Web site, Dr. William A. Dembski comments on the recent ruling of Kitzmiller v. Dover, and it's implications for ID and the culture war.

It is not the "Waterloo" of ID, just as the Scopes Trial was not the "Waterloo" for Darwinism.

An opinion by Paul Campos appears in the Rocky Mountain News. Campos practiced law in Chicago before returning to his home state in 1990 to join the law faculty at the University of Colorado at Boulder. He has written extensively on the role of law in American society.

His opinion of Kitzmiller v. Dover is illuminating.

KMBC-TV News reports that next semester, a class will examine intelligent design. The class will be taught by Richard Menninger, a religion professor, and Henry Tillinghast, a biology professor.

Ottawa University, located in Ottawa, KS has about 500 students and is affiliated with the American Baptist Churches USA.

Albert Alschuler, Julius Kreeger Professor of Law and Criminology at the University of Chicago, continues his three-part series on Kitzmiller v. Dover. Included are comments from others in the faculty blog.

Tom Bethell, author of The Politically Incorrect Guide to Science, give his perspective on the recent Kitzmiller v. Dover ruling in the Washington Times.

Hiroaki Sato, and essayist and translator, writes on Id and Darwinism in the Japan Times.

The article is anything but objective and fair, assuming that Biblical Creationism and ID are one-and-the-same.

He batters Hisayoshi Watanabe, professor emeritus of English and American literature at the University of Kyoto. He calls Watanabe an "intellectual" who defined ID as "a theory that proposes to give up explaining the making of this universe and the natural world in terms of aimless, plan-less mechanical forces alone," and to "recognize as science, other than natural factors like 'inevitability' (natural law) and 'coincidence', a 'design' factor."

James Skillen, president of the Center for Public Justice, weighs in on the issue of who decides what our children can be taught in the public schools.

Skillen points out that "...the history-of-science lesson that Judge Jones in PA included in his ruling was largely philosophical and theological in character. He stated, for example, that science is limited to 'the search for natural causes to explain natural phenomena' and must therefore reject revelation in favor of empirical evidence. None of this amounts to a biological argument".

Dr. G sends his Christmas greetings to our ARN web visitors with this special year-end column in response to the recent Kitzmiller v. Dover court decision about Intelligent Design:

A proposed letter to my Hospice patients in light of the ruling in Dover.

Dear Hospice Patient:

Recently a ruling was made in a federal court, with respect to the separation of faith and state, concluding that intelligent design in biology is not Science.

Since I am a medical scientist (physician) who is reimbursed by the state for my services and you are a biological entity (human being) that is enrolled in a state funded program, it is my unhappy duty to inform you that henceforth I will no longer be able to adequately tend to your spiritual needs.

I realize that as a human being who is approaching imminent death, the questions surrounding the mystery of life take on great import, so much so that significant existential angst may be the result. However, with this ruling, Judge Jones has made the legal decision that your concerns have been determined to be unfounded and irrelevant to all practical biological science and therefore I must comply with his judgment.

Please be advised however that for your physical and emotional comfort I will continue to prescribe for you intelligently designed pharmaceutical agents which work by acting upon, the now legally determined, unintelligently designed enzymes and receptors that are necessary for life.

Sincerely yours,
Howard Glicksman M.D.

While the Darwinists are celebrating in the streets over Judge Jones' Dover decision outlawing ID and criticism of Darwin's theory, Paul Nelson explains in this blog entry why nothing has really changed. Be sure to read his previous comments link about anti-glacier books. Between the two (one written before the decision and one after) Paul gives us a pretty good bird's eye perspective on why nothing has really changed.

"Issuing theological statements isn't normally thought of as the job of a federal judge. Yet, this week when U.S. District Court Judge John E. Jones III released the first federal ruling on intelligent design, there was at the core of his written decision an unambiguously theological ruling: that evolution as formulated by Charles Darwin presents no conflict with the God of the Bible. Quite apart from what one thinks of his legal decision, what should we make of his theology?"

David Klinghoffer writes in the Seattle Times that Judge Jones decision to declare it is constitutional to expose young people to one such worldview, but not lawful to introduce them to another, is not really education. It is indoctrination.

In the Colorado Springs Gazette, Brian Newsome reports on a state legislator's thoughts on introducing ID into public school, but without the "mandatory" wording.

Sen. Greg Brophy, R-Wray, believes the Pennsylvania ruling and a general culture of “political correctness” will leave school boards afraid to take up the topic. He wants to draft legislation that would allow school districts to teach intelligent design.

Intelligent design is not covered in Colorado statutes. If a school board attempted to add intelligent design to a curriculum, its legality probably would be determined by a lawsuit, as it was in Pennsylvania.

Brophy’s idea will receive a chilly greeting at the Statehouse.

Reasons to Believe, a Christian science/faith organization, issued a press release on the Dover ruling.

"As currently formulated, 'intelligent design' is not science," says biochemist, Dr. Fazale 'Fuz' Rana. "It is not testable and does not make predictions about future scientific discoveries."

Rana continued by saying that "at Reasons To Believe, our team of scientists has developed a theory for creation that embraces the latest scientific advances. It is fully testable, falsifiable, and successfully predicts the current discoveries in origin of life research."

Terry Devitt, reporting for the University of Wisconsin, writes on the frustration of scientists trying to fit the facts of natural history into a Darwinistic framework.

Considering that the general theory of evolution (macro-evolution) is a "fact", this is puzzling.

Stephen Dyer, reporter for The Akron Beacon Journal, writes on the Dover ruling's affect in Ohio.

It is truly amazing how each side sees such different potentials from the same ruling. Read on for the details.

Fox News reports that U.S. Senator Rick Santorum says he intends to withdraw his affiliation with the Christian-rights law center that defended a school district's policy mandating the teaching of "intelligent design."

"I thought the Thomas More Law Center made a huge mistake in taking this case and in pushing this case to the extent they did," Santorum said Wednesday. He said he would end his affiliation with the center.

The Discovery Institute vigorously encouraged the Dover School Board to not mandate the reading of a four paragraph statement which led to the case.

David DeWitt, Discovery Institute Senior Fellow has provided a short analysis of the decision in the Dover School Board case. DeWolf is a professor of law at Gonzaga University and the author of a briefing book for public school administrators, Teaching the Controversy: Darwinism, Design and the Public School Curriculum.

From Creation-Evolution Headlines comes commentary on a guide on how to win over the reluctant to evolution.

Dr. Albert Alschuler, of the School of Law at the University of Chicago, has posted his opinion on Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District.

He opines, "If fundamentalism still means what it meant in the early twentieth century, however, accepting the Bible as literal truth, the champions of intelligent design are not fundamentalists. They uniformly disclaim reliance on the Book and focus only on where the biological evidence leads. The court’s response – 'well, that’s what they say, but we know what they mean', is uncivil...an illustration of the dismissive and contemptuous treatment that characterizes much contemporary discourse. Once we know who you are, we need not listen. We’ve heard it all already".

This trial was truly not about ID, it was about what one confused judge thinks about ID. The success of ID will not depend on its success in the courtroom, but rather on its success in the scientific realm.

Read on.

A press release concerning the Dover decision from IDnet (Kansas) is available for viewing. The title says it all.

Commentator Joe Loconto, the William E. Simon Fellow in religion at the Heritage Foundation, gives his opinion on the Dover decision on NPR's All Things Considered. It's definitely worth a listen.

An opinion piece by David Klinghoffer of the Discovery Institute appears in the National Review Online.

Klinghoffer opines by saying that "Tuesday's ruling by a federal judge in Pennsylvania, disparaging intelligent design as a religion-based and therefore false science, raises an important question: If ID is bogus because many of its theorists have religious beliefs to which the controversial critique of Darwinism lends support, then what should we say about Darwinism itself? After all, many proponents of Darwinian evolution have philosophical beliefs to which Darwin lends support.

'We conclude that the religious nature of Intelligent Design would be readily apparent to an objective observer, adult or child,' wrote Judge John E. Jones III in his decision, Kitzmiller v. Dover, which rules that disparaging Darwin's theory in biology class is unconstitutional. Is it really true that only Darwinism, in contrast to ID, represents a disinterested search for the truth, unmotivated by ideology?"

So, according to the judge, Darwinists do NOT have a worldview agenda? Klinghoffer gives many examples of the Darwinist's agenda and disingenuous nature of executing the forced acceptance of their worldview and scientism.

Many have said this ruling was so poor that it may help ID in the long run. It reminds one of the current movie Chronicles of Narnia, where the White Witch and her minions are gleefully dancing after the execution of Aslan. Just wait till tomorrow.

The above story by Fox News is typical of many stories across the world. Getting some of the details correct, but not all.

For instance, while the reading of "the statement" would have been mandatory, ID would not have been taught in the Dover School District.

Some comments from those in the higher ranks of the ID movement:

- Is ID science or not? If it's science, some judge's opinion somewhere doesn't really matter. He can't make things true that are actually false or false that are actually true. He delays the day of reckoning.

- Has a court ever considered whether a civil rights ordinance would be unconstitutional because a legislator thought he was conforming the country to the will of God that all people be treated equally?

- Welcome to the USSA where you can't question the anti-religious motives of those who want the exclusive teaching of the Theory of Unintelligent Design in our public schools.

- The judge said IDers "have bona fide and deeply held beliefs which drive their scholarly endeavors". The ACLU could not have written it any better. By implication, evolution is just science.

- U.S. District Judge John E. Jones III said several members repeatedly lied to cover their motives even while professing religious beliefs.
Sounds like we should be hearing some perjury trials coming up, if this is true.

- The judge's ruling said "It is ironic that several of these individuals, who so staunchly and proudly touted their religious convictions in public, would time and again lie to cover their tracks and disguise the real purpose behind the ID Policy".

In my mind, this is one of the most misleading statements in the opinion. It ignores the fact that everyone has a metaphysical commitment of some kind. It buys into the positivist notion that philosphical materialism or naturalism is somehow neutral, unbiased, and can be simply ignored.

- The judges opinion says that "to preserve the separation of church and state mandated by the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, and Art. I, § 3 of the Pennsylvania Constitution, we will enter an order permanently enjoining Defendants from maintaining the ID Policy in any schoolwithin the Dover Area School District, from requiring teachers to denigrate or disparage the scientific theory of evolution, and from requiring teachers to refer to a religious, alternative theory known as ID."

Does this mean that Punctuated Equilibrium (a criticism/alternative of traditional evolutionary theory) cannot be required to be taught? What about endosymbiotic theory a la Margulis? Surely that denigrates Darwin's gradualistic vision. Does this forever enshrine a 19th century theory as everlasting dogma, regardless of where future science leads? This is a sad day for Dover.

No doubt, opponents of ID will spin this story to dizzying proportions: some with a humble tone, and some not, such as this example in Time online.

You asked for it and here it is: Mind Preceded Matter 12 Month Wall Calendar

It includes thirteen stunning space photos from the Hubble Telescope and twelve fabulous quotes about the design of the universe. Order today and request overnight shipping to get it before Christmas.

Merry Christmas from the ARN Staff!

Judge Jones ruled in favor of the plaintiffs, and accepted the theory that the board's policy was adopted as part of the "Wedge" strategy. Here is an excerpt that summarizes his opinion:

“The citizens of the Dover area were poorly served by the members of the Board who voted for the ID Policy. It is ironic that several of these individuals, who so staunchly and proudly touted their religious convictions in public, would time and again lie to cover their tracks and disguise the real purpose behind the ID Policy.

With that said, we do not question that many of the leading advocates of ID have bona fide and deeply held beliefs which drive their scholarly endeavors. Nor do we controvert that ID should continue to be studied, debated, and discussed. As stated, our conclusion today is that it is unconstitutional to teach ID as an alternative to evolution in a public school science classroom.

Those who disagree with our holding will likely mark it as the product of an activist judge. If so, they will have erred as this is manifestly not an activist Court. Rather, this case came to us as the result of the activism of an ill-informed faction on a school board, aided by a national public interest law firm eager to find a constitutional test case on ID, who in combination drove the Board to adopt an imprudent and ultimately unconstitutional policy. The breathtaking inanity of the Board’s decision is evident when considered against the factual backdrop which has now been fully revealed through this trial. The students, parents, and teachers of the Dover Area School District deserved better than to be dragged into this legal maelstrom, with its resulting utter waste of monetary and personal resources.”

There were some surprise statements in the decision such as the implication that teachers in Dover cannot criticize the theory of evolution in any way:

"To preserve the separation of church and state mandated by the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, and Art. I, § 3 of the Pennsylvania Constitution, we will enter an order permanently enjoining Defendants from maintaining the ID Policy in any school within the Dover Area School District, from requiring teachers to denigrate or disparage the scientific theory of evolution, and from requiring teachers to refer to a religious, alternative theory known as ID."

What are they afraid of? Apparently Judge Jones has forgotten what Justice Jackson said in the flag salute case:

"If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion." West Virginia Bd. of Ed. v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624, 642, 63 S.Ct. 1178, 87 L.Ed. 1628 (1943)

Although there was some fascinating testimony by ID scientists such as Michael Behe and Scott Minnich, and many interesting aspects to the case, Discovery Institute and many other supporters of Intelligent Design saw this as a poor test case for ID and predict that this will be just the first court case on the Intelligent Design, not the last.

A column by Dennis Byrne in the Chicago Tribune speaks to the overarching quest to answer the "Big Question" about origins. This is a fair and balanced piece, which deserves a look.

The Dover trial decision by Judge John E. Jones III is expected on Tuesday. Read this article by Ap in the Philadelphia Daily News.

In the continuing saga of Dr. Paul Mirecki, backers of the Religious Studies Department at the University of Kansas have sent a postcard to potential donors, seeking to distance themselves from the department’s former chairman. Read the article by AP picked up by the Kansas City Star.

This column by Douglas Baynton in the Washington Post is the kind of muddled thinking that will bring further shame to, and possibly eventually bring down the Darwinists.

Baynton presents a false dichotomy: either understand the world as a meaningful place of beauty and purpose or a mechanical, meaningless accident to be understood via material causes only.

Given this false dichotomy, it's amazing how much scientific progress was made when many scientists were theists in the 17th and 18th centuries.

According to Baynton, since theistic scientists said silly or stupid things in the 19th century, then ID is worthy of ridicule today. Following that line of argument, since Darwin was a racist, then Neo-Darwinism isn't worth holding to today!

One who follows ID closely commented that "Braynton is committing the fallacy of composition, arguing that whatever is true of the parts of something must true of the whole. Some 19th century design thinkers said stupid things, but it does not follow from that that those stupid statements get transferred to all design advocates. It would be like saying, 'Stephen Douglas and other 19th century Democrats believed that states should have the right to permit slavery, so therefore, if 21st century Democrats were to achieve political power again, then we would see a resurgence of proslavery-state rhetoric.'"

Baynton's thinking needs to be exposed for what it is...nonsense.

Amanda Gefter, on NewScientist.com, gets into the mind of Leonard Susskind. He is the Felix Bloch Professor of Theoretical Physics at Stanford University in California. His new book is titled Cosmic Landscape: String theory and the illusion of intelligent design.

It is an interesting Q & A session on string theory and the naturalistic scientist's grappling with origins. He admits that multiverse theory is unfalsifiably, but will not give an inch to ID.

The last question and paragraph are telling:

"If we do not accept the landscape idea are we stuck with intelligent design"?

"I doubt that physicists will see it that way. If, for some unforeseen reason, the landscape turns out to be inconsistent - maybe for mathematical reasons, or because it disagrees with observation - I am pretty sure that physicists will go on searching for natural explanations of the world. But I have to say that if that happens, as things stand now we will be in a very awkward position. Without any explanation of nature's fine-tunings we will be hard pressed to answer the ID critics. One might argue that the hope that a mathematically unique solution will emerge is as faith-based as ID."

Sorry Dr., but it would be much more faith-based than what ID is really about.

Ellen Berry, writer for the LA Times, reports on the Cobb County Georgia book sticker ruling.

A federal appeals court panel appeared sharply critical Thursday of a ruling this year that ordered the removal of stickers in science textbooks stating, "Evolution is a theory, not a fact."

Science Education book by Michael Poole added to ARN catalog.

Someone recently brought this gem to our attention which was originally published in Britain in 1995. Much of the raging Darwin vs Design debate boils down to the worldview of scientists, educators, school boards, or editors that are in command, and how that worldview is imposed on those with different worldviews. The debate is seldom over the scientific data, but the framework within which that data is interpreted.

This book hits that issue head on. If if more educators teaching science would embrace Poole's wise guidance on addressing Beliefs and Values in Science Education in an honest an open fashion we believe much of the public agnst over teaching Darwin or Design would dissipate.

Consider this quote from the preface of the book:

An Educational Model

"the sensible educator...will not expect or intend to produce an educated adult who has no beliefs, values, or attitudes, which he cannot rationally defend against all commers and who is incapable of settled convictions, deep-seated virtues, or profound loyalties. But neither will he treat his pupils in such a way as to leave them with closed minds and restricted sympathies. The process of being educated is like learning to build a house by actually building one and then having to live in the house one has built

It is a process in which the individual inevitably requires help. The extreme authoritarian helps by building the house himself according to what he believes to be the best plan and making the novice live in it. He designs it in such a way as to make it as difficult as possible for the novice to alter it. The extreme liberal leaves the novice to find his own materials and devise his own plan, for fear of exercising improper influence. The most he will do is to provide strictly technical information if asked. The sensible educator helps the novice to build the best house he can (in the light of accumulated experience). He strikes a balance between the need to produce a good house and the the desirability of letting the novice make his own choices; but he is careful that the house is designed in such a way that it can subsequently be altered and improved as the owner, no longer a novice, sees fit."

-- Professor Basil Mitchell, The Durham Report

With this model in mind, Michael Poole engages the topics of science standards; beliefs and values about science; language, concepts and models; environmental beliefs and values; cosmology and creation; the Galileo affair; and the Darwinian controversies. His approach to science education is an excellent example on how to move forward with the Darwin vs. Design controversy in a pluralistic society.

A free, 31 page study guide in pdf format for Nancy Pearcey's book Total Truth is available on the Web site above. Merry Christmas from the Pearceys!

On the CBC Web site an article describes that scientists have figured out the functions of the narwhal whale tusk.

How did that evolve by random chance and natural selection? How many lucky steps occurred, and was there enough time for this to happen? Oh, the faith of the Darwinists!

On Friday, December 16th, the University of Leiden in the Netherlands will hold a half-day symposium on ID. The Web site is in Dutch. The question addressed in the symposium is, "Is ID about theology or science?"

ID is becoming a global topic.

On Human Events Online, Casey Luskin, of the Discovery Institute, is published. The opinion is a clear thinking, right-on-the-mark, critique of recent ID articles by Charles Krauthammer and George Will.

When I read those articles, my first thought was, "Didn't they do their homework (rhetorical question)?"

Luskin answers that question.

A story by Ryan Alessi, reporter for the Lexington Herald-Leader, investigates what may be going on politically with ID in Kentucky. Too bad he didn't interview anyone with a good working knowledge of ID to get a good sound bite from our side.

A story on the ID controversy at ISU by Marcos Rivera, Virginia Arrigucci and Emily Schaefer appears in the Iowa State Daily.

A seminar, led by Hector Avalos, Jim Colbert and Michael Clough titled "The Nature of Science: 'Why the Overwhelming Consensus of Science is that Intelligent Design is not Good Science,'" will be held to explore why the majority of scientists are coming out in such strong opposition to introducing Intelligent Design as a science.

Avalos said he is not in favor of completely dismissing the theory, but thinks it should be introduced in the philosophy or religious studies departments rather than as a science.

One person who will not be attending the discussion forums is Guillermo Gonzalez, author of "The Privileged Planet: How Our Place in the Cosmos is Designed for Discovery," assistant professor of physics and astronomy. He says that the arguments for ID are not based on religion.

"I don't intend to participate in any kind of forum presented by the opposing side," Gonzalez said.

Larry Caldwell's voice is being heard in California, with regard to a proposed Quality Science Education Policy, dedicated to improving how Charles Darwin's theory of evolution is taught in public schools.

This is his response to the editorial on the subject in the Sacramento Bee. You may need to register to read the opinion.

Sophia Maines, of the Lawrence-World Journal, writes on the continuing saga of Dr. Mirecki. Seems he's unhappy with the sheriff's department and KU. You be the judge.

This is an excellent opinion letter in the Rocky Mountain News by professor Doug Groothuis, of Denver Seminary.

Straw men are easy for the other side to knock down. Of course, it's a deceptive practice, and a waste of people's time.

Dave Carhart writes a lucid opinion letter in the Chicago Tribune.

It's definitely worth a read, and you need to do a free register with the Trib.

Chris Kahn, of the Sun-Sentinel, writes on a flap over a new biology textbook that makes a mention of ID.

Teachers should decide whether to buy a textbook that tells students about intelligent design, not Superintendent Frank Till, the Broward County Teacher's Union said Friday.

Till made the decision on his own Thursday when he said references to the creationist idea would be cut out of Biology: The Dynamics of Life, one of two books under consideration for use in local classrooms.

Seems the thought police are everywhere. WIll he use scissors?

Pillars of Naturalism

Sigmund Freud, Karl Marx and Charles Darwin are considered the pillars of modern western thought. They differed in many ways but had one thing in common—they were reductionists who claimed that all higher realms of existence could be explained by lower natural causes. They were the pillars of naturalism.

But their ideas were tested during the twentieth century and found wanting. Freud was the first fall. Incidents in his career were cited to call into question both his integrity and his scientific competence, and psychiatry seemed to make more progress through medication than through Freudian analysis. The collapse of the Soviet Union in the late 1980s inflicted a death blow on Marxism, which is now seen as not only failing to deliver its promised utopia but as creating an inhumane tyranny. Darwin is the last man standing, but his theory is rapidly eroding as modern biological science reveals amazing complexity and design that cannot possibly be explained by Darwin’s proposed mechanism of random mutations and natural selection. This led Phillip Johnson to summarize the situation one day with the phrase that appears on this shirt: “Freud is dead, Marx is dead, and Darwin is not feeling very well.”

Elizabeth Pennisi, writing for ScienceNOW Daily News, reports that a new survey of marine life indicates that "simple" organisms such as corals and sea anemones have many of the same genes and complex gene families, consisting of many closely related genes derived from the same ancestral gene as we do.

The complexity of genes is causing all to pause...and wonder.

Listen to a debate between William Dembski and Michael Shermer on audiomartini.

The Wichita Eagle picked up the story from the Kansas City Star by David Klepper, regarding the embattled Dr. Paul Mirecki of the University of Kansas.

Dr. Mirecki claimed he was beaten up by people sympathetic with creationism or ID on a lonely rural road south of Lawrence, Kansas this past Monday. While many believe he should be given the benefit of the doubt, some aren't so charitable, such as the piece you can access by clicking HERE.

You may recall, Dr. Mirecki said some rather unkind things about people of faith and ID proponents in a letter to his friends. He was going to teach a course at KU the next semester which called ID a myth (among other things), but the course was canceled shortly after his e-mail became public.

MyrtleBeach online picks up the story by Lisa Anderson of the Chicago Tribune.

It examines the three possibilities of the judicial decision in the Dover trail. The ruling could range from landmark to local. No matter what the outcome, you can bet the political spin will be dizzying.

"There is a disturbing trend of scientists, teachers, and students coming under attack for expressing support in the theory of intelligent design, or even just questioning evolution," said Robert Crowther director of communications for Discovery Institute’s Center for Science & Culture.

For the disturbing details, read the entire blog on the Discovery Institute Web site in Evolution News & Views.

MSNBC carries a stroy by Victoria Bosch in Newsweek.

For students who doubt the validity of evolution, college science class can be daunting. What happens when beliefs and schoolwork collide?

IDEA Clubs are mentioned in the piece.

We are pleased to announce that a 25% discount will be made available on any of the Intelligent Design T-shirts and merchandise in our Café Press store on December 7th and 8th.

On those two days (this Wed & Thur) any Café Press orders will receive the following discounts:

HOL5 $5 off $20
HOL10 $10 off $40
HOL25 $25 off $100

When you checkout just enter the HOL5, HOL10, or HOL25 in the Coupon/Promotional Code box on the checkout page and if your order total (before tax and shipping) exceeds the $20, $40 or $100 threshold, the discount will be applied to your order. The coupon codes are only valid Dec 7-8, 2005.

Cheers,
The ARN Staff

On space.com, Seth Shostak thinks that IDers are being less than honest when using the SETI program to bolster support for ID.

You can read a rebuttal from David Coppedge on the Creationsafari Web site by clicking HERE.

Bruce Chapman of the Discovery Institute reports on another proposed course mentioning ID to be taught at Knox College in Illinois. Knox will also host Phil Johnson in February.

A link to a story about sloppy reporting in the New York Times is also found on the link above.

William Dembski comments on an article in the New York Times on the Templeton Foundation and its willingness to support proposals for actual research.

Dr. Stephen C. Meyer states our case for ID in the National Post (Canada)

An article by Kenneth Silber on Tech Central Station briefly looks into String Theory and ID.

The multi-verse hypothesis is brought up, which is a way for atheists and Darwinists to brush aside the idea of an uncaused intelligence. The only problem is we will never know if multiverses exist, because they can never break into this space-time continuum. It takes as much, if not more, faith to believe in them as an eternal, intelligent being.

In the National Review online, Mustafa Akyol, a Muslim writer based in Istanbul, Turkey, and one of the expert witnesses who testified to the Kansas State Education Board during the hearings on evolution, writes on the cultural bridge that ID could offer.

Akyol points out that in a New Republic cover story, "The Case Against Intelligent Design," Jerry Coyne implied that all non-Christians, including Muslims, should be alarmed by this supposedly Christian theory of beginnings that "might offend those of other faiths." Little does he realize that if there is any view on the origin of life that might seriously offend other faiths, including Islam, it is the materialist dogma: the assumptions that God, by definition, is a superstition, and that rationality is inherently atheistic.

The New York Times picked up on this Reuters story.

Ronald Numbers said that the proponents of intelligent design "want to change the definition of science" to include God, an issue he predicted would end up in the Supreme Court. He added, "one of the most successful PR campaigns we've seen in recent years is intelligent design."

John Milburn, writing in Guardian Unlimited, reports that the course at KU, which was to be taught by professor Mirecki, has been canceled.

Not surprising, because of the furor that arose from his arrogant and condescending attitude revealed in an email to his pals that became public.

Dr. Gerald Schroeder of MIT discusses the amazing odds against random mutation to create anything remotely complex on aish.com.

Boggles the mind...atheists dare not read this.

The new book by Tom Bethell, The Politically Incorrect Guide to Science, is now available through ARN. There are many interesting topics covered, including the crumbling of Darwinism.

This is a must read for scientists like me, who get asked about Global warming and Darwinism frequently.

A joint op-ed column by Bob Beckel and Cal Thomas appears in USA Today.

Beckel begins by saying, "Cal, I'm going to stray from the consensus liberal line on the issue of intelligent design. The Dover, Pa., school board had a good reason to allow the teaching of intelligent design as a scientific alternative to Darwinism in the school system's science classes. Despite the overwhelming consensus of the scientific community that evolution is the sole explanation for all living things, these scientists have yet to prove the theory conclusively. Not only are there still gaping holes in the evolutionary chain from single cells to man, the science crowd hasn't come close to explaining why only man among all living things has a conscience, a moral framework and a free will".

Thomas then adds, "What I find curious about this debate, not only in Pennsylvania, but in Kansas and throughout the country, is that so many scientists and educators are behaving like fundamentalist secularists. Only they will define science".

Much more good dialogue in this piece...

We have added new links at the ARN home page. The combination of watching Meyer talk about design and then Dawkins talk about "apparent design" and his faith in natural selection makes for an excellent one-two punch.

The links are near the top, in the center of the home page.

Denis Boyle writes in National Review, about the recent debate and antics of the opposition.

The chairman of KU’s religious-studies department, Paul Mirecki, and the campus group he mentors, the 120-member "Society of Open-minded Atheists and Agnostics" is exposed for what he and they are.

Beware, there is some profane and possibly offensive language in the piece.

On the Human Events Online Web site Nancy Pearcey weighs in on the debate and shows why a paradigm shift to ID will occur.

A story on NPR by Barbara Bradley Hagerty treats the subject fairly.

Express you appreciation to NPR for this story. Ms. Hagerty has received condescending emails in the past from the opposition.

To get to the NPR reply form, click on "contact us" at the top of the webpage, then click the circle "NPR Program" and select "All things considered" from the drop-down menu.

The controversy is discussed in an article in the Harvard Crimson by Sarah E. F. Milov.

Leading scholars on the issue at Harvard Divinity School (HDS) and other divinity schools say their faculties have almost no proponents of intelligent design.

Michael Behe says that the intelligent design argument is purely scientific and is in no way related to the creationism debates of the early twentieth century.

Mark U. Edwards Jr., professor of the history of Christianity and associate HDS dean for academic affairs, says intelligent design is bad science and bad theology.

Edwards has an explanation for the persistence of a contentious dialogue between science and religion. "One quarter of the population is evangelical," Edwards says. "They aren’t very sophisticated."

Excuse me while I knuckle-drag my way to the kitchen for a snack...

Recently a discussion on ID and Darwinism took place at Warwick University in the UK.

To have a listen, go to the site above and scroll down a bit.

An AP story reports that, in a written apology, Paul Mirecki, chairman of the university's Religious Studies Department, said he would teach the planned class "as a serious academic subject and in an manner that respects all points of view."

In an email to associates and friends, his real thoughts and emotions on the subject came out.

Rep. Brenda Landwehr, vice chairwoman of the Kansas House Appropriations Committee, called the e-mail "venomous," adding, "He's not sorry he wrote it. He's sorry it became public."

So true.

The controversy between Darwinism and Intelligent Design has, in addition to sparking lively, and sometimes vitriolic exchanges, caused a rise in sales of merchandise on both sides.

This AP story in the Kansas City Star describes that phenomenon.

Russell Jacoby, a professor of history at UCLA, opines in the LA Times on why controversy should not always be taught in the university, and chimes in with an ID example. One interesting comment by Dr. Jacoby is that ID "is now mandated to be taught in five states and proposed in 20 others." Truth is, ID is not mandated to be taught in any one of the United States.

According to Jacoby, the jargon of choice and diversity actually corrodes academic freedom, which once referred to the freedom of college instructors to teach what they considered salient, subject to the review of their peers, not outside authorities. Today, it increasingly means the freedom of students to hear what they, or their parents want.

Using material from the Boston College Honors web site:

What is a Liberal Education?

The British playwright George Bernard Shaw once said, with more wit perhaps than truth, that a school is much like a prison, indeed worse since in a prison at least the inmates aren't forced to read books written by the warden and the guards. Well, you may have felt this way once or twice during the years you've spent in school, but a good education should have precisely the opposite effect. It should "free" a person, Aristotle thought, from the bondage of unexamined opinions, prejudices, and ignorance.

The American university in the late 20th century has become a supermarket of bewildering choices, reflecting the breakdown of agreement in our culture about what is worth knowing. In contrast, we in the Honors Program believe that there is no better foundation for an education than a solid grasp of the history of the debate--from Homer and the Hebrew Bible to our own century--about the perennial topics that have preoccupied men and women: the origin and destiny of our lives, human nature, the just society, the constitution of the physical world, how we understand our history.

But learning the wisdom of the past is not enough. An education for a constantly changing world has to be a training in a special way of thinking: one that leads you to see connections across disciplines, to notice what the tradition has valued and what it has neglected, to challenge your own conclusions and commitments, and to prize what can be learned from people different from you. But even this style of thinking will remain incomplete, unless you use it to develop a vision of a worthwhile life for you and your neighbors and to imagine plausible ways of achieving it.

This is the real goal of a liberal education.

"Teach the Controversy" makes a lot of sense after this kind of introduction to what college is suppose to be about.

Becky Bartindale and Lisa Krieger of the San Jose Mercury News report on the lawsuit filed by Larry Caldwell against operators of a University of California-Berkeley web site that is designed to help teachers teach evolution. Caldwell claims the site improperly strays into religion.

Defendants include two top biologists from the UC Museum of Paleontology, which runs the Understanding Evolution web site (http://evolution. berkeley.edu) and an official from the National Science Foundation, who is named because the foundation provided more than $400,000 in public funding for the site.

Caldwell says that amounts to a government endorsement of certain religious groups over others, and is an effort "to modify the beliefs of public school science students so they will be more willing to accept evolutionary theory as true."

Strange but Glenn Branch of NCSE says this action encourages a "climate of hostility", and yet the University of Kansas professor's new courses are just fine, with no victims apparent there. One word to describe that: hypocrite.

ID will make its way into a second KU classroom in the fall, this time labeled as a 'pseudoscience.' Sophia Maines reports in the Lawrence World Journal of the new class at KU.

John Hoopes, associate professor of anthropology, said the course focused on critical thinking and will teach how to differentiate science and 'pseudoscience.' Intelligent design belongs in the second category, he said, because it cannot be tested and proven false.

Oddly enough, Darwinian theory is also not falsifiable. Darwin's test of irreducible complexity can always be "explained away" by creative Darwinists. The highly elastic theory will always be stretched to cover whatever is found to be the case factually. Note, in some circles the move from gradualism, once thought to be crucial to the theory by Darwin himself, to Gould's punctuated equilibria.

It is amazing when you examine the bias and hypocrisy of the professor at KU who will teach the course 'Special Topics in Religion, Intelligent Design, Creationism and othef Religious Mythologies.'

An email of his has been circulated and written about in the Lawrence World Journal. For the story by Sophia Maines, click HERE.

In addition, the upcoming class has obviously upset ID proponents. For the story by Sophia Maines, click HERE.

One could easily counter by simply observing that Professor Mirecki is uneasy with the notion that one can offer rational arguments for beliefs that fit well within a religious worldview. This attitude would stifle the intellectual development of both him and his students. At an institution funded by citizens from a wide range of worldviews, the University of Kansas faculty and administrators have an obligation to offer respectful critiques of positions with which they disagree. American pluralism requires nothing less. Professors like Mirecki appear to be narrow minded religious bigots whose passion for protecting their orthodoxy clouds their otherwise good judgment.

It's this kind of activity that should cause some Kansas legislators to
question the extent to which Kansas taxpayers should be funding state sponsored faith bashing. Imagine if a religious studies professor announced an upcoming course bashing Native American 'mythologies.'

Of course, bashing ID seems to be just fine.

Fox News picks up this AP sotry that creationism and intelligent design are going to be studied at the University of Kansas.

A course being offered next semester by the university religious studies department is titled "Special Topics in Religion: Intelligent Design, Creationism and other Religious Mythologies."

Paul Mirecki, department chairman, says "Creationism is mythology. Intelligent design is mythology. It's not science. They try to make it sound like science. It clearly is not."

John Calvert is quoted in the short story.

Of course, scientific creationism and intelligent design are treated as being identical.

On the website LiveScience the marvels of Monarch butterfly navigation are revealed. Was this system designed or "designed" by chance?

Michael Behe was interviewed on C-SPAN on Monday. Scroll down to find the 30 minute segment.

The upcoming issue of Newsweek has a story on the controversy, with a photo of Charles Darwin on the cover.

Jonathan Witt, of the Discovery Institute, is a published guest columnist in the Seattle Times.

This op-ed piece nicely balances (in the Seattle Times) the Charles Krauthammer rant of a few days ago.

Tom Heneghan, Religion Editor for Reuters, reports on Austrian Cardinal Christoph Schoenborn's remarks on scientific creationism, Darwinism, and Intelligent Design.

The Kansas City Star picks up on a story by Garance Burke of AP, who writes on parents and students fretting over the new Kansas State Board science standards.

It is truly amazing how muddled people's thinking is on this issue. The science standards set forth in Kansas actually now fit in better with the standards in over 40 other states.

Also, wouldn't it be nice if people could just sit down and dialogue in a cordial, gentle, respectful manner instead of setting up strawman arguments and doling out ad hominems attacks? The above usually comes from the Darwinist's side, but not exclusively.

Instead of Kansas "being the laughingstock" of the US, which the other side claims is occurring, the truth is Kansas is falling into line with a majority of the rest of the states, and is taking out a narrow definition of science. That being, that science only looks for the right kind of explanations (materialistic), not the right explanations. Why in other science endeavors, criminology, SETI, archeology is intelligent agent causation allowed, yet in biology it is arbitrarily disallowed? That's the question you should continuously be asking the other side, and demanding an answer.

The New York Daily News reports on a no holds barred attack on the President and ID at an exhibit unveiling on the life of Charles Darwin at a museum event in New York.

Tom Brokaw, one of the museum patrons, was quoted as saying that the exhibit "doesn't attempt to argue the theory of evolution because there is no argument."

And other guests became even more condescending...

Charles Krauthammer opines in the Washington Post on ID....AGAIN!

He didn't get the facts right the first time, and apparently still hasn't boned-up on what ID theory is and is not.

He states, "Let's be clear. Intelligent design may be interesting as theology, but as science it is a fraud."

Maybe, with some feedback from ID proponents, his third time (opinion) will be the charm.

The American Enterprise Institute (AEI) for Public Policy Research published it's newsletter Friday. In it, a short piece with the above title discusses the subject.

AEI should be taken to task for a statement in the first paragraph, which says, "The Kansas Board of Education recently voted to require that students learn about intelligent design". This, of course, is completely false. The Kansas Board encouraged more teaching of Darwinism, including it's weaknesses as a scientific theory. The words "intelligent design" do NOT appear in the standards.

From BBC News, a remarkable example of design in living creatures.

Yet the final line of the story quoting Dr. Vukusic (who discovered this feature), "When you study these things and get a feel for the photonic architecture available, you really start to appreciate the elegance with which nature put some of these things together."

Yes, it all boils down to a happy series of accidents...

On the Malaysiakini website Dr. Stefen Tan opines on ID and Darwinism.

William Dillon of the Tribune (mid Iowa) reports that 150 faculty of the University of Iowa have signed a statement denouncing the use of intelligent design in science.

The nearly 400 signatures from ISU, University of Northern Iowa and UI accounts for only about 10 percent of the faculty at the three universities.

The materialists are teaching their sectarian theological that God, if He exists, never engaged in special divine action (miracles) in the history of life. If the Iowa universities intend to exclude ID, then they must suppress their sectarian theology, which is teaching macroevolutionary biology.

This column on the EducationNews.org website by Steve Abrams, chairman of the Kansas State Board of Education, is an ABSOLUTE MUST READ for those who engage in dialogue on the subject of teaching all of Darwinism in the public schools.

It shows how the other side is disingenuously engaging in the debate with their cohorts, the media, and the public.

Well...this is not really NEWS...but it's good to be reminded of how truly powerless random mutation and natural selection (that would be Darwinism) are when examined by a brilliant scientist.

In this 1997 book review by Ashby Camp of Dr. Lee Spetner's book Not By Chance!, the odds are shown regarding the evolution of one species into another species.

After reading this, I don't have enough faith to be a true believer in Darwinian theory. How about you?

From the Univeristy of Guelph in Canada, comes a short and simplified description of the "gun cell" of a fungus known as Haptoglossa mirabilis.

Also, see another description and photos by clicking HERE to access information in a supplement to the Fifth Kingdom.

Does this looks irreducibly complex? Surely the Darwinists have come up with a detailed pathway of development! Perhaps, given enough time, anything can happen.

MSNBC reports on James Mellett, a retired professor of biology, geology and paleontology at New York University, and his defense of Darwinism.

Tristan Abbey, executive director of the Intelligent Design Undergraduate Research Center (IDURC) in Stanford, CA was quoted in the story. Abbey said that "when you go to an intelligent design conference, the discussion is always completely about science. It's important to acknowledge that."

Mellett said, "George Bush, our president, says he doesn't believe in evolution. The next minute, he tells the country, 'We have to watch out for the flu virus.'"

That he can try to get away with conflating micro- and macro-evolution is startling. Or is it?

Learning more about the Kansas School Board's definition of science as it relates to other states according to the Discovery Institute.

The naturalistic defintion replaced by the Kansas School Boeard was taken from Ohio's Science Standards, which got the definition from the Ohio Academy of Science. The definition is areligious.

The Louisville Courier-Journal picks up on a story by Mary Beth Schneider of the Indianapolis Star on a intelligent design debate which may heat up in the Hoosier state's House of Representatives.

This op-ed by the editorial page editor of the Jackson (TN) Sun is a fine example of someone with a strong naturalistic bias, using the talking points of Darwinists, pejorative language, and ad hominem attacks. See how many you can find, and think how you would counter each one by asking the right questions. It would be tough to have a conversation concerning ID with this gentleman...

Bill Sulon of the Patriot-News reports that the The Discovery Institute, a Seattle-based proponent of intelligent design, wants judge John E. Jones to limit his ruling to the school board's actions. Opponents of the policy want a broad ruling, one that addresses not only the board's decision but the issue of whether intelligent design is science or a new term for creationism.

Jones commented that he had been given "the opportunity to preside over one of the most important trials [on the] First Amendment and the Establishment Clause."

NPR's religion correspondent, Barbara Bradley Hagerty, reports on the Richard Sternberg controversy in All Things Considered.

Eugenie Scott's comments are ridiculous, saying the the incident didn't hurt Sternberg, that he wasn't a real scientist, that he allowed a "creationist" paper to be published, and basically he should get over it.

The propaganda machine is surely working overtime at NCSE.

Douglas Kern, a lawyer, gives five reasons why ID will replace Darwinism as the reigning biological paradigm on the website Tech Central Station.

The article is informative and sometimes very funny (reason 2, ID will win because the pro-Darwin crowd is acting like a bunch of losers).

Learn and enjoy!

Geoff Brumfiel gets it wrong in this article on the Nature website.

In the first paragraph he states that ID is "the idea that an intelligent creator shaped the course of evolution". He should simply be saying that ID is about making design inferences. The two tenets of ID are that intelligent causes exist, and intelligent causes can be detected empirically. Period. Leave the discovery of the indentity of the designer for another discipline.

On a positive note, Casey Luskin, of the Discovery Institute is give some ink.

A piece by William Ress-Mogg in the London Times reports on the recent news of the Catholic's Church view on Darwinism.

Cardinal Paul Poupard has said that the description in Genesis of the Creation was perfectly compatible with Darwinism, if the Bible were read properly.

The Pope made his views known. For a look, click HERE.

Does the Church support a concept of God-guided Darwinism? And, how would that work, since Darwinism is an unguided, purposelss process that did not have man in mind?

Focus on the Family's Citizen Link reports on the vote in Kansas and the inability of some of the mainstream press to get it right. The standards are all about teaching more about Darwinism, not about teaching ID.

Martha Raffaele of the AP reports that voters ousted eight incumbent Dover Area school board members who favor mentioning ID as an alternative to evolution, replacing them with a slate of eight opponents who want to remove the subject from the science curriculum.

The Seattle Times picked up the story by John Hanna of the AP that the Kansas state Board of Education approved science standards for public schools today that cast doubt on the theory of evolution.

The board's 6-4 vote, expected for months, was considered a victory for intelligent design advocates who helped draft the standards.

The website ScienceDaily reports on research conducted at the Wistar Institute. Wow...looks irreducibly complex!!! Read the details and be amazed!!!

A series of articles on ID by Owen Gingerich, professor emeritus of astronomy and history of science at Harvard University and a senior astronomer emeritus at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, Cambridge, Mass., appear on the website Science & Theology News.

Science & Theology News "takes a look at concepts of ID and presents counterpoints from scientists and theologians alike, without mudslinging or repetitive rhetoric".

ID simply argues that Darwinism, which asserts that random mutation and natural selection are all that is needed for the biological world we see today, is mistaken.

Casey Luskin, lawyer at the Discovery Institute has posted two detailed reports of the end of the Dover trial.

First, he gives a blow by blow description of Scott Minnich's cross-examination. Dr. Minnich runs a lab at the University of Idaho which studies the bacterial flagellum, and has been teaching biology at the college level for 18 years. Read the story by clicking HERE.

Also, Luskin describes the final arguments presented by the ACLU.
Read this story by clicking HERE.

Nancy Haught of the Oregonian reports that two separate panel discussions will take place on November 12th and 13th at the University of Portland.

John F. Haught, whose books include "God After Darwin: A Theology of Evolution", and Michael J. Behe, who wrote "Darwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution", will discuss the theories in two separate lectures.

Haught says, "It is not the job of science to talk about ultimate explanations. That is why I object to intelligent design being taught as a science."

I wonder why it's okay to teach Darwinism in science class, since it is an ultimate explanation (from an atheistic standpoint). Darwinism is science as a philosophy, not science as a methodology.

Errol Castens of the University of Mississippi Daily Journal, writes a favorable piece on the ID-Darwinism controversy. Part of the problem ID is having in the current debate is the science vs religion mantra of Darwinists. Castens is the religion editor of the paper, by the way.

Josh Getlin, staff writer for the LA Times, reports on Michael Behe and the Dover trial.

Time and time again we encounter the "genetic fallacy" used by the other side. Just because people who believe in the God of the Bible think ID points to the God of the Bible, doesn't mean ID isn't scientific in every respect. All you Darwinists, please respond to the scientific idea, not the people of faith who back it. It's science vs science not science vs religion.

From Laurie Goldstein of the New York Times, a piece which leans a bit to the Darwinism side.

Russ Pulliam, associate editor for the Indianapolis Star, writes a very balanced opinion piece on ID and Darwinism.

Read the Expert Report filed by Dr. Stephen Meyer of the Discovery Institute, which was attached to an Amicus Brief filed in Dover trial by clicking HERE.

Read about DI's true role in the trial and Dr. Scott Minnich's testimony by clicking HERE.

The Daily Nebraskan, newspaper of the University Nebraska, reports on a panel discussion titled 'Our Origins, Evolution, Intelligent Design or Creationism?' held November 3rd at the Lied Center for Performing Arts. Kelley Hascall reported that five men from scientific and religious backgrounds, including Dr. Paul Nelson, discussed various topics.

The mischaracterization as this being a battle between science and religion was brought to the fore again. In reality this is a worldview vs worldview battle with plenty of science to go around on both sides.

Laurie Goldstein of the New York Times reports on the Dover trial from the perspective of the defendant's law firm.

Mary Beth Schneider and Robert King of the Indianapolis Star report that Indiana public schools would teach "intelligent design" along with evolution under legislation that some Republican lawmakers are developing for the 2006 legislative session.

A related link in the Indianapolis Star by Michele McNeil on the Governer's take on ID in the public schools can be seen by clicking HERE.

As reported by Steven Ray Haberlin in the Ocala-Star Banner, the Marion County School District has decided to carry two ID friendly resources in its library.

There were no plans to use the materials during classroom instruction. But teachers were provided written and verbal advice on how to deal with the topic of intelligent design.

Just a reminder that the transcripts of the Dover trial are available on the Pennsylvania ACLU web site. The trial is in day 18.

The bacterial flagellum, long the "poster child" of the ID movement, is described in stunning detail in a 34 minute movie made by the Nanotechnology Researchers Center of Japan. The link above contains the movie. To read a report, click HERE.

I don't have enough faith to be an atheist...

Casey Luskin, Program Officer of Public Policy & Legal Affairs
Center for Science and Culture at the Discovery Institute, wrote an op-ed piece for Beliefnet. It explains DI's position on what the school board in Dover, PA is attempting to do.

There are also some links to other ID pieces bordering Luskin's piece.

The York Dispatch, in a Q & A with Dover PA school board candidates, not surprisingly, first asked them about ID.

TheAge.Com.au reports that Victoria's government schools will treat intelligent design as a religious faith, not science, Education Minister Lynne Kosky has ruled.

In her first statement on the subject, Ms. Kosky reaffirmed the principle that government schools were secular and did not promote any religion.

This ruling again shows where the strategy must focus: it's science vs science, and this message must be spread. Intelligent Design Theory scientifically seeks to find out whether something in the cosmos came to be from natural causation or intelligent agency. The causes of something could be natural or intelligence, or a combination.

Jodi Wilgoren of the New York Times reports that the National Academy of Sciences and the National Science Teachers Association have denied the Kansas Board of Education permission to use their copyrighted materials as part of the state's proposed new science standards because of the standards' critical approach to evolution.

This move comes less than two weeks before the board's expected adoption of the controversial new standards, which will serve as a template for statewide tests and thus have great influence on what is taught.

Expert testimonies from the Dover trial are available for you viewing.

The testimony of Steven William Fuller, Professor of Sociology at the University of Warwick, England can be viewed HERE.

The testimony of Roger T. Pennock, Professor of Science and Technological Studies at Michigan State University's Lyman Briggs School of Science and Associate Professor of Philosophy in the Philosophy Department can be viewed HERE.

As reported on EurekAlert!, a new book, The Plausibility of Life: Resolving Darwin's Dilemma, Harvard Medical School's Marc W. Kirschner and John C. Gerhart, of the University of California - Berkeley address a key problem in evolutionary theory that has puzzled scientists from Darwin on and which is now under intense scrutiny by proponents of intelligent design: where do the big jumps come from in evolution?

The example given reminds one of the beginning of a fairytale, "Once upon a time..." How did the living tissue develop these remarkable abilities to achieve these complex interactions through random mutation and natural selection? Let's see what discussion comes forth.

In a predictable move, USA Today reports that the AAAS head Alan Leshner announced that without better science standards, students would be unable to tell "intelligent design," which he called a religious viewpoint, from real science.

Looks like Leshner's scientific materialistic philosophy is driving this latest tactic.

John Hanna of AP reports that a retired law professor who's sometimes called the father of the intelligent design movement plans to speak Saturday, October 29th at Washburn University, amid an ongoing debate over how evolution is taught in Kansas' public schools.

Phillip Johnson's visit is sponsored by Christian Challenge, a student group on the Topeka campus. The event is scheduled for 7 p.m. at the university's union.

School Officials Must Answer in Court for Alleged Religious Discrimination

Sacramento, CA In an important legal victory for citizens seeking to improve how evolution is taught in public schools, a federal judge has ruled that California citizens have a Constitutional right under the First Amendment to put proposed evolution policies on the agenda of local school board meetings for public debate and potential adoption, and that school officials who refuse such a request are subject to potential civil rights remedies in federal court.

Said plaintiff Larry Caldwell, "The court's ruling is a vindication of the constitutional right of California citizens to initiate public debate in school board meetings on the question of how we should teach evolution to our children."

Added Caldwell, "This is a crucial educational policy issue that must be addressed if our children are to acquire the critical thinking skills they will need to compete in the Twenty-First Century."

School officials of the Roseville Joint Union High School District have maintained that they have the right to deny citizens the opportunity to have a proposed education policy placed on a school board agenda. The court ruled that such a policy, if proven, would constitute illegal "viewpoint discrimination" under the Free Speech Clause of the U.S. Constitution.

The legal ruling came in a federal civil rights lawsuit brought by parent activist and attorney Larry Caldwell, arising out of his year-long effort to persuade the Roseville Joint Union High School District to adopt his Quality Science Education Policy.
The QSE Policy seeks to stimulate the critical thinking skills of students by including both scientific strengths and weaknesses of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution in biology classes.

U.S. District Court Judge Frank C. Damrell, Jr. also ruled that school officials who base their refusal on the actual or perceived religious beliefs or affiliations of the citizen proposing the policy also run afoul of the protections against religious discrimination in the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, and in the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. In papers filed in the lawsuit, attorneys for school officials have admitted that their refusal for eight months to permit Caldwell's proposed QSE Policy to be debated and voted on at school board meetings was based in part on Caldwell's Christian religious beliefs.

Said Karen England, Executive Director of Capitol Resource Institute, a California pro-family, public policy group, "We are pleased that the court has recognized the constitutional right of California parents to participate in local school board meetings in a pro-active way. It is unfortunate that it has taken a lawsuit to get the leadership of the Roseville high school district to honor the constitutional rights of Mr.
Caldwell and other citizens."

Pacific Justice Institute, the Sacramento-based public interest organization, is acting as co-counsel with Caldwell in the lawsuit.

Check out the link above for talks at the recent conference.

Despite the predictably disparaging reaction of the news media and some established scientists, Wells thought that the conference was a huge success.

The conference was organized by Charles Thaxton, co-author of the now classic *The Mystery of Life's Origin* (1984), and his hard-working wife, Carole. (The Thaxtons had originally planned to hold the conference several years ago, but their plan was put on hold when Charles lost his leg to
cancer.)

Held in the large hall where the Czech Communist Party used to meet, the conference featured seven speakers from five countries: Stephen C. Meyer (USA), Jonathan Wells (USA), Charles Thaxton (USA), David Berlinski (France), John C. Lennox (UK), Cees Dekker (The Netherlands), and Dalibor Krupka (Slovakia). The proceedings were chaired by Peter Verner, a Czech chemist. The talks (in English) were simultaneously translated into Czech for the audience, and the five main speakers (Meyer, Wells, Thaxton, Berlinski, and Lennox) had provided written summaries in advance that were available in English and Czech.

Stuart Pivar has asked Glenn Branch at NCSE to remove "or that natural selection is a major mechanism in its occurence" from the wording of the "Steve" declaration. Click the link above for more.

William Dembski, in Uncommon Descent comments on the equivocation of the late Dr. Stephen Jay Gould on the role of natural selection in the macroevolutionary process.

Would Gould have signed "Steve's List"? Maybe. Maybe not.

William Provine, Professor in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, gave a lecture "Evolution and Intelligent Design" at Alpha Delta Phi fraternity at Cornell University.

The lecture came on the heels of Interim President Hunter R. Rawlings IIIs condemnation of the push to teach intelligent design in public schools during the his State of the University Address.

Provine is an avid defender of Darwinism, but believe the public debate should take place between Darwinism and ID, having debated Phil Johnson several times.

On Townhall.com, Monisha Bonsal gives a brief summary on the Washington, D.C. conference this past weekend. It seems it is only a matter of time before the phrase "intelligent design is not science" will wear thin as the public becomes more informed.

Mike Argento in the York Dispatch is good at "attacking the man" and being mildly humorous. We wonder what he really thinks of ID?

Denyse O'Leary blogs on Gould, and his supposed namesake, Steve's list. WWSHD...What would Steve have done?

One of the sessions in the upcoming AAAS Annual Meeting is Anti-Evolutionism in America, What's Ahead?

It is stated that the Dover, PA school board is declaring that teachers study ID in class. This is a total misrepresentation of reality. The biology teachers would be required to read a short statement, and tell students that there is a book in the library they can look at if they wish. That's it! In addition, did the school board state that their objective was to eliminate or restrict the teaching of evolution? We think not!

The Summary of the AAAS session...A Science Teacher's View of the Anti Evolutionary Movement
Recently, the school board in Dover, Pa., declared that teachers were to study intelligent design, a form of creationism characterized by frequent intervention by an unnamed Designer, rather than the all at once creationism of biblical literalism. With this statement, Dover joined a steadily growing U.S. movement at the state and local levels whose objective is to eliminate or restrict the teaching of evolution. The proponents of intelligent design are not attempting to carry out a legitimate scientific debate, rather they are using the teaching of biological and cosmological evolution as a mechanism to attain political objectives. While eliminating or severely restricting the teaching of biological evolution is a primary goal, all of the scientific disciplines, natural and physical, are being affected. Speakers will present an overview on the teaching of biological evolution and where it is headed, clarify the scientific issues; identify other fields, auxiliary to biology, that are directly affected, illustrate the effect of the antievolutionism movement on scientific textbooks and standards, and present the perspective of high school science teachers. The aim of this symposium is to initiate a discussion among science teachers, professional scientists, and people interested in all aspects of science designed to develop an understanding of our mutual interests in supporting the teaching of Darwinian evolution.

Christina Kaufman, of the York Dispatch, reports on the lengthiness of the trial.

Former board member William Buckingham, who resigned to move to North Carolina about two months before the trial started, has been one of the key figures in the trial because of religious comments he reportedly made at school board meetings. He is scheduled to testify Thursday.

Ondrej Hejma, AP writer, appears in the Seattle Post-Intelligence, reporting on the recent ID Conference in the Czech Republic.

About 700 attended the conference, and guess what. There were protestors on hand too.

Carlin Romano of Knight Ridder gives his opinion on the recent book and thoughts of Michael Ruse.

The following is a press release from the Intelligent Design Evolution Awareness (IDEA) Club at Cornell concerning Cornell president Rawlings' state of the University address blasting Intelligent Design.

Contact: Hannah Maxson
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Tel. 607-253-2803
Email: idea@cornell.edu

Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, October 22, The Intelligent Design Evolution Awareness (IDEA) Club at Cornell is deeply concerned with President Hunter Rawlings' blatant disregard for the facts concerning Intelligent Design in Friday's State of the University Address. In a speech usually reserved for current university business, he spent over two thirds of his time blasting the emerging Intelligent Design theory as anti scientific and religious in an unscrupulous, unknowledgeable manner.

Intelligent Design (ID) is a scientific theory which holds that certain features of the universe and living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, and are not the result of an undirected, chance based process such as Darwinian evolution. It follows the principles of the scientific method, scorns the biases of either religion or naturalism, and attempts to follow all the available evidence to a valid conclusion. ID is testable and falsifiable, and so far its predictions have repeatedly been shown accurate.

The IDEA Club at Cornell holds that the problems with Neo Darwinian evolution can no longer be ignored, and it is time for true research and debate about the issues surrounding the beginnings of life to take place at universities across the country.

Attacking ID as a non scientist and without addressing its scientific claims, Rawlings states that it is religion masquerading as science and is a religious belief at its core. This gross misstatement is a disservice to unbiased discourse, besides being an insult to people of faith throughout America. Ad hominem attacks and confusing people's religious beliefs with their scientific research is not befitting a university president. We would hope Rawlings will instead follow Cornell's often lauded commitment to a free and open exchange of ideas.

Below is a collection of articles on the Dover trial.

For an editorial from the York Dispatch, click HERE.

For an article from MSNBC by AP, click HERE.

For an editorial in the Morning Call by a proponent of ID, Donald Hoffman, click HERE.

For an article from the Patriot-News by Bill Sulon, click HERE.

This article on the website Top Tech News delves into Michael Behe's academic sojourn at Lehigh University.

John Bright, a postgraduate humanities fellow at Lehigh, said, "frankly, just from a humanities point of view, it's considered good to challenge the conventional wisdom. It's inherently respectable." Bravo to Mr. Bright!

Alan Leshner, head of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, characterizes ID proponents as "mostly fringe players." We wonder if Leshner lived in the time of Galileo, would he have called Galileo a "fringe player". Too bad ad hominem remarks like Dr. Leshner's still seem to work.

An article by Ker Than goes a bit deeper than most on the website LiveScience.

It looks into the twin pillars of ID, irreducible complexity and specified complexity, and says both are wanting. Than buys into the co-option argument to "refute" irreducible complexity, and "refutes" specified complexity with the "nylon problem".

Both have been ably defended as not being examples of Darwinism.

For more on the "nylon solution", click HERE,

and HERE.

It is worth your while to read ID proponent Stephen Jones's replies to Austrailian science organizations against ID.

They pull out every old sound bite in the atheist/agnostic/freethinker playbook, including "dressed up in a cheap tuxedo"!

William Kates of the AP reports that Hunter Rawlings III, felt it imperative to use his state of the university address, usually a recitation of the school's progress over the last year, to speak out against intelligent design, which he said has put rational thought under attack.

Straight from the talking points of scientific materialists, Rawlings causes those who have delved deep into the subject to yawn, and to hope that the students at Cornell are intelligent enough to see past the rhetoric.

Michael Powell of the Washington Post reports that there is little, if any, resemblance between the Scopes Trial and the Dover Trial.

Behe impressed! But, we knew he would.

The graphical header shows a man. he symbolizes the Essence of manifestation. He is admiring the starred sky upon him. The drawing on the right shows a woman. She symbolizes the Substance pole of manifestation. (Both drawings made by Leonardo da Vinci). In the middle, there is a glimpse on the universe, which stays between (and is composed of) Essence and Substance (photo of the Dark nebula Horsehead in Orion). The vibration on the photo symbolizes an echo of the Big Bang (Substance, matter and energy) and Big Installation (Essence, information) due to the initial Fiat Lux.
The Intelligent Design label stays on a clear background (it is near the truth). The Evolution text stays on a dark background (it is far from the truth). ID is correct, evolutionism is wrong.

The articles are a mix of English and Italian.

A most important and decisive book that defends a "non-evolutionist" position is back in print. Douglas Dewar's "The Transformist Illusion" exposes, scientifically, all the maneuvers undertaken by those that prop up Darwinism. Nobody ever demonstrated scientific evidences that a species "developed" from another, and Dewar shows this. The book is available from Barnes and Noble.

PRNewswire reports on the upcoming ID Conference in Europe this weekend which is expected to draw around 1000 people from around the world.

Continue to follow the Dover trial from the perspective of the Discovery Institute, which has three staff members attending the trial.

Transcripts of the Dover trial are available on the Pennsylvania ACLU website, including Dr. Michael Behe's expert testimony.

As we have said for quite some time..."junk" DNA is not junk.

Peter Andolfatto, an assistant professor of biology at UC-San Diego, says such DNA plays an important role in maintaining an organism's genetic integrity. Read about it on ScienceDaily.

The Philadelphia Enquirer op-ed page featured opinions on both sides of the trial issue. Read about it on the DI website.

We are wrong...Darwinism has been caught on tape. Not!

Dr. Michael Behe has been on the witness stand as the defense's star witness.

For a report from the York Dispatch by Christina Kauffman, click HERE.

For a report from AP on MSNBC, click HERE.

It is amazing that the American Physical Society (APS) can get it so wrong when it comes to ID and Biblical Creationism.

ID only states that something is designed because it exhibits certain characteristics. The identity of the designer doesn't even come up.

For their statement on the Kansas State Board decision written in 1999, click HERE.

Christiana Kauffman of the York Dispatch reports that the defense has begun to present its case supporting the Dover Area school board's decision to include intelligent design in biology classes. Attorneys will set out to undo the past three weeks of testimony from expert scientists, former board members and parents.

John Staver, a fellow of the AAAS, delivered a statement at the monthly meeting of the Kansas State Board of Education in Topeka. The board is expected to give final approval to the new standards, which greatly trouble AAAS, in a vote in October. Read the statement in the AAAS news archives in the link above.

NEWS RELEASE:
Contact: Intelligent Design network, inc.
John Calvert, Managing Director
913-268-0852

IDnet Announces Establishment of IDnet of Ohio

Shawnee Mission, KS. - IDnet announced that it had re-established its Ohio division through an office in Cincinnati. The new division will be managed under the direction of attorney Roddy M. Bullock. Mr. Bullock was also elected to the IDnet Board of Directors and IDnet Executive Committee at a special meeting of the Board on October 15.

IDnet currently has offices in Kansas City, Albuquerque, and Minneapolis. The reopening of its Ohio office reflects a renewed interest in furthering institutional objectivity in teaching origins science in Ohio schools.

In addition to practicing patent law with a Fortune 100 corporation in Cincinnati, Mr. Bullock is a degreed mechanical engineer (BSME and JD from The University of Texas, Austin) and an author. Married with four children raised in public schools, Mr. Bullock has a passion for excellence in science education in Ohio and around the nation.

"I am excited about helping the citizens of Ohio capitalize on the outstanding work accomplished by others over the few years to permit teachers to open up the classroom discussion about origins," said Mr. Bullock. "Although great progress has been made by people dedicated to excellence in science education, a kind of scientific fundamentalism continues to hinder Ohio teachers from teaching Darwinism fully and honestly. That is not healthy for good science or good science education," continued Bullock. "We need to take fear out of the biology classroom and empower teachers to candidly discuss both sides of the current scientific controversy over evolution."

"The new science is generating an exciting new 21st century perspective on origins. 20st Century concepts of random mutation and natural selection are being replaced by new ways of looking at a genome that exhibits indescribably complex information processing systems," said John Calvert. "The old way of thinking about origins is going to need major revision as the new data is changing the way we think about both the operation and evolution of the genome."

*******

Intelligent Design network, inc. is a nonprofit national organization that seeks institutional objectivity in origins science. Intelligent design is a scientific disagreement with claims that the apparent design of certain natural phenomena is an illusion that can be adequately explained by random mutation and natural selection. Objectivity is necessary because many institutions systematically suppress any objective consideration of that disagreement.

It continues to amaze us how writers can keep on misrepresenting what ID actually is, conflating it with Biblical creationism. In a Yahoo News article by Lisa Anderson Tribune, it is reported that efforts continue by museums around the country to legitimize Darwinism at all costs.

Mentioning the Dover PA trial, the tired phrase that the school board wants to teach ID is restated. In that school district the proposal is for a short statement to be read in 9th grade biology classes saying that ID is another theory of origins, and the student can look at a book in the library if they wish to do so. That hardly constitutes "teaching" ID.

The spotlight in the Dover trial turned to Jonathan Well's book Icons of Evolution and the companion DVD. Learn more in this article in the York Dispatch by Lauri Lebo.

The American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research is hosting a conference in Washington, D.C. on Friday, October 21st. Heavyweights on both sides of the debate will be present.

Don Cicchetti, a musical artist and free-lance writer, has dialed into the ID movement, like many others around the world, by setting up a blog. Way to go, Don!

Scientists at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine have identified an elusive protein that performs a necessary step in the production of human chromosomes.

The new study appears in the most recent issue (Oct. 7) of the journal Cell.

The study found that a protein called CPSF73 acts like scissors to cut strands of histone messenger RNA (mRNA) in the cell nucleus. This cutting action produces the mRNA needed to create histone proteins that combine with DNA to form chromosomes.

Just another example of irreducible complexity rampant in biology.

Jonathan Well's response to The New Republic article by Jerry R. Coyne, evolutionary biology at the University of Chicago, is up on the Discovery Institute website.

Subject: Lawsuit: Federally-Funded Website Uses Religion to Sell Evolution to Students

News Release

For IMMEDIATE RELEASE on October 12, 2005

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

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

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

"In this stunning example of hypocrisy, the same people who so loudly proclaim that they oppose discussion of religion in science classes are clamoring for public school teachers to expressly use theology in order to convince students to support evolution," said Larry Caldwell, President of Quality Science Education for All, who is co-counsel in the suit with the Pacific Justice Institute.

Called "Understanding Evolution," the website identified in the lawsuit directs teachers to doctrinal statements by seventeen religious denominations and groups endorsing evolutionary theory. A statement by the United Church of Christ, for example, declares that evolution is consistent with "the revelation and presence of... God in Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit."

The website further suggests classroom activities that explicitly use religion to promote evolution. In one suggested activity, teachers are supposed to share with students statements by religious leaders on evolution, but only those "stress[ing] the compatibility of theology with the science of evolution." In another activity, students are assigned to interview ministers about their views on evolution, with the purpose of showing students that "Evolution is OK!" Teachers are cautioned, however, that this particular activity may not work if they live in a community that is "conservative Christian."

"While the government has a legitimate purpose in educating students about the science of evolution, it's outrageous that tax dollars would be spent to indoctrinate students into a particular religious view of evolution. There are many different religious views about evolution. How dare the government tell students which religious view is correct!" said plaintiff Jeanne Caldwell. "This is propaganda, not education."

The lawsuit alleges that the state and federal government are promoting religious beliefs to minor school children through the website in violation of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. The suit seeks injunctive relief to remove these government endorsed religious beliefs from
the website.

The lawsuit also alleges that the website is being used to further the religious agenda of a private organization, the National Center for Science Education (NSCE), which has a "long history of religious advocacy" on the evolution issue. According to the suit, the NCSE, which helped design the website, provides religious "outreach" programs and "preaching" on evolution to churches, all aimed at convincing people of faith that there is no
conflict between their religious beliefs and evolution.

"It turns out that the NCSE and its allies in the scientific and educational establishments don't mind having religious beliefs discussed in science class, as long as those discussions are aimed at convincing students to convert to the religious beliefs favored by the NCSE", added attorney Caldwell. "Their willingness to flagrantly violate students'
constitutionally protected religious freedoms in order to sell evolution to our children is the height of hypocrisy."

Dave Dentel, copy editor for the York (PA) Dispatch, is a clear thinker who gets it absolutely right when describing the tactics of the Darwinists on trial. He shows their disingenuousness and wrongheaded thinking.

Cristina Bautista of UC Berkeley's Daily Californian reports on the UC Berekely's involvement in the ID controversy.

UC Berkeley integrative biology professor Kevin Padian is currently working as an expert witness in Kitzmiller et al. v. Dover Area School District, where he is assisting 11 parents from Dover, Penn. who argue that the school district is violating their First Amendment rights by imposing religious beliefs through the inclusion of intelligent design in their children's science curriculum.

The pro-ID side is fairly well represented in the article, mentioning Phil Johnson, and senior Tom Kim, who started up the UC Berkeley chapter of Intelligent Design and Evolution Awareness this fall to provide a forum for like-minded students on campus to openly discuss their views without fear of insult.

Jeff Jacoby, op-ed writer for the Boston Globe, recently gave his pro-ID take on the controversy. He basically says what we have been saying all along. You will need to register with the Boston Globe to read the piece.

Discovery Institute has set up a resource page for the Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District federal court trial that began Sept 26, 2005. The page includes transcripts from the case, press release summaries and amicus briefs.

According to lawyer Douglas Kern the future belongs to ID. The only remaining question is whether Darwinism will exit gracefully, or whether it will go down biting, screaming, censoring, and denouncing to the bitter end.

He expounds on the following five reasons in his article at Tech Central Station:

1) ID will win because it's a religion-friendly, conservative-friendly, red-state kind of theory, and no one will lose money betting on the success of red-state theories in the next fifty to one hundred years.

2) ID will win because the pro-Darwin crowd is acting like a bunch of losers.

3) ID will win because it can be reconciled with any advance that takes place in biology, whereas Darwinism cannot yield even an inch of ground to ID.

4) ID will win because it can piggyback on the growth of information theory, which will attract the best minds in the world over the next fifty years.

5) ID will win because ID assumes that man will find design in life -- and, as the mind of man is hard-wired to detect design, man will likely find what he seeks.

Could it be that the theory of evoltuion's judicially sanctioned monopoly in the classroom has backfired? That is the question asked by science writer Michael Balter in his commentary in the October 2, 2005 issue of the Los Angeles Times. He concludes that the most effective way to convince students that the theory is correct is to confront the challengers, not avoid them. We agree. So let the rumble begin. Let's teach the controversy and may the best theory win.

Academic freedom is a cherished value in our institutions of higher learning--that is until the cherished ideas of the university gatekeepers come under attack. Here are a few examples of the persecution suffered by those who have dared to challenge the Darwinian worldview in our universities:

University of Idaho

San Francisco State University

Mississippi University for Women

Geogre Mason University

Baylor University

Ohio State University

Iowa State University (faculty)

Texas Tech and Iowa State (students)

Research by ophthalmologists has clearly shown why the human retina must employ what is called the "inverted" design. An inverted retina is where the photoreceptors face away from the light, forcing the incoming light to travel through the front of the retina to reach the photoreceptors. Read this report by Jerry Bergman and Joseph Calkins. Jerry Bergman is on the Biology faculty at Northwest State College in Ohio. Joseph Calkins is an Ophthalmologist in private practice, formerly Professor of Ophthalmology at Johns Hopkins University.

"This week, the case of Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District opened in federal court. The ACLU is suing the school board of Dover, Pennsylvania for adopting a policy which requires that teachers read to students a three-paragraph statement about the theory of intelligent design. In his opening statement, Eric Rothschild, the attorney for Kitzmiller, argued against the legitimacy of intelligent design (ID). Unfortunately for Rothschild, the testimony of Kenneth Miller-a Roman Catholic biology professor from Brown University who staunchly defends evolution-has already refuted his argument. And even more unfortunately, Miller was his expert witness."

Read the rest of Joe Manzari's report on highlights from the first few days of the trial.

Paul Nussbaum writing in the Philadelpia Inquirer sees the Dover trial as a test of values between the likes of William Dembski:

"Naturalism is the disease. Intelligent design is the cure," William Dembski, director of the Center for Science and Theology at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky., wrote in his book Intelligent Design. "... Darwin gave us a creation story in which God was absent, and undirected natural processes did all the work. That creation story... is now on the way out. When it goes, so will all the edifices that have been built on its foundation."

and Dover plaintiff Frederick Callahan:

"One of the Dover plaintiffs, Frederick Callahan, made the link between belief in evolution and support for separation of church and state on the witness stand.

'I've come to accept that we [believers in evolution] are in the minority. I've seen the polls,' he said. 'And we've been called intolerant.'

'What am I supposed to tolerate? A small encroachment of my First Amendment rights? I will not.'"

Transcripts for the federal court case filed against the Dover Area School District and its school board over mention of intelligent design in biology classes are now available.

The parents, along with the American Civil Liberties Union and Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, were expected to argue that the school board had religious motives in requiring a statement about intelligent design to be read in biology classes. They also contend intelligent design is based on religion.

Since the time of Darwin, scholars have resisted design in nature, but throughout the twentieth century new discoveries have forced a reappraisal and revived an interest in design. The aim of this international science conference is to review evidence for intelligent design, drawing upon results in astronomy, physics, mathematics, biochemistry, biology, genetics, and paleontology.

Prague Congress Centre, Prague, Czech Republic
October 22, 2005

8:30 Registration and Welcome
9:00 Jonathan Wells, Ph.D.Icons of Evolution (genetics)
10:00 John C. Lennox, Ph.D., D.Sc.Design Features of the Universe (mathematics)
11:00 Coffee Break
11:45 Charles B. Thaxton, Ph.D., FAIC Origin of Life (biochemistry)
12:45 Lunch
2:15 Stephen C. Meyer, Ph.D. Information and the Cambrian Explosion (paleontology)
3:15 Responses
Panel Discussion
5:30 Snack
6:30 Michael J. Behe, Ph.D. Molecular Machines (molecular biology)
7:30 Closing

Popular Mechanics BREAKTHROUGH AWARDS 2005 salute the innovators who are shaping the world's future through science and technology-and new products that represent benchmarks of engineering. The Young Achiever Award went to Sarah Mims, an amateur scientist who is a sophomore in college, and an advocate of intelligent design, for her discovery that living fungal spores and bacteria are found in abundance in the smoke from distant biomass fires.

Conventional wisdom had always indicated that burning crops was a good way to kill disease. Not so fast, said this student who demonstrated that smoke can carry living organisms. The formal paper about Sarah's discovery is: Sarah A. Mims and Forrest M. Mims III, Fungal spores are transported long distances in smoke from biomass fires, Atmospheric Environment 38, 651-655, 2004.

In a October 4, 2005 Letter to the University of Idaho Faculty, Staff and Students, University President, Timothy P. White legislates that only evolution will be taught:

"Because of recent national media attention to the issue, I write to articulate the University of Idaho's position with respect to evolution: This is the only curriculum that is appropriate to be taught in our bio-physical sciences."

To check out Time magazine's take on the trial in Harrisburg, PA, click HERE.

On October 14, Denyse O'Leary, well known Canadian author, will be at Biola University in Los Angeles, leading a breakout session on blogging on the intelligent design controversy.

The organizers want her to tell how blogs and the blogosphere have helped a small group of ID advocates circumvent and frustrate a formidable intellectual orthodoxy.

For more details on Christianity.ca, click HERE.

The week long on-line debate between Francis J. Beckwith, Associate Director of the J. M. Dawson Institute of Church-State Studies, and Associate Professor of Church-State Studies at Baylor University and Douglas Laycock, holding the Alice McKean Young Regents Chair in Law at The University of Texas at Austin has come to a close.

To look at the debate, click HERE.

The New York Times published a piece on the continued wrangling in Kansas over science standards in public schools.

Seems the Nobel prize winners don't quite have it right when it comes to ID.

For the brief article (you will need to register with the NYT), click HERE., or in the Kansas City Star (you will need to register), click HERE.

Brian Fahling, senior trial attorney for the American Family Association Center for Law & Policy, rightly points out that Darwinism (or what he calls the theory of evolution) is tightly bound to a philosophical creed. The entire paradigm, thus, resembles the methodology of Biblical creationism. However, ID is an a posteriori argument; it is the inference drawn from examination of complex structures in living organisms and the universe.

For the article in AgapePress, click HERE.

There was a debate in Washington, DC on the legal/constitutional issues surrounding the teaching of ID in schools.

It was sponsored by several major organizations (Pew Forum, Federalist Society, The Constitution Project). Around 100 people attended with press in attendance as well.

To read a transcript of the event, click HERE.

Johnathan Witt, of the Discovery Institute, is attending the trial in PA, regarding the "teaching" of ID in York, PA.

For his summary of the proceedings, click HERE.

Christina Kauffman of the York (PA) Dispatch is well aware of the importance of THE trial that began in Harrisburg.

For the story in the local paper, click HERE.

Joe Manzari, in the online version of American Enterprise, gives a plug for the persecution taking place against ID proponents in education throughout the last several years.

To read the article, and especially the last sentence, click HERE.

An on-line debate will take place this week. The participants are
Francis J. Beckwith, Associate Director of the J. M. Dawson Institute of Church-State Studies, and Associate Professor of Church-State Studies at Baylor University, and Douglas Laycock, the Alice McKean Young Regents Chair in Law at The University of Texas at Austin.

To follow the debate in the Legal Affairs magazine, click HERE.

Livescience.com and writer Ker Than take a swipe at ID in his two part series.

Judge for yourself regarding the barbs thrown, and old rebuttals, such as cooption which claims to refute irreducible complexity.

For the series, click HERE.

The court case in Pennsylvania will surely draw increasing national media attention next week.

Aided by the ACLU, 11 parents of Dover, Pa., schoolchildren have filed a federal lawsuit against that town's school board, accusing it of violating the principle of separation of church and state. The school board requires that at the beginning of the 9th grade unit on evolution, teachers are supposed to read a statement to a biology class: "Because Darwin's theory is a theory, it continues to be tested as new evidence is discovered. The theory is not a fact...Intelligent Design is an explanation of the origin of life that differs from Darwin's view."

For the full story in the Wall Street Journal by Suzanne Sataline, click HERE.

For an interesting twist on ID from a sports perspective, reading Sally Jenkins column in the Washington Post by clicking HERE.

For a list of recent stories on the Darwinism v ID (creationism) debate compiled by Christianity Today click HERE.

Charles Colson, long time Christian apologist and commentator on culture weighs in on the Darwinism v ID debate again.

To view his most recent commentary and other Breakpoint commentaries, click HERE.

Museum lecturers and docents are frequently being confronted by small groups of creationists challenging Darwinism.

The National Science Foundation, sponsoring evolution-themed exhibits at six museums of natural history across the nation, includes training for docents and staff members in how to respond to creationists.

To see an example of the docent training, click HERE.

WorldNetDaily reports that a federal court of appeals ruled that Wisconsin prison officials violated an inmate's rights because they did not treat atheism as a religion. There is a precedent for the ruling.

The Supreme Court has said a religion need not be based on a belief in the existence of a supreme being. In the 1961 case of Torcaso v. Watkins, the court described "secular humanism" as a religion.

So, if we are going to keep religion out of the public school science classroom, let’s keep all the religions out, including Darwinism, which has atheistic metaphysical implications.

For the full article, click HERE.

For American Atheist's and Freethinker's comments, click HERE.

An article by Christina Kauffman of the York Dispatch points out again what has been known for quite some time.

The Discovery Institute issued a policy position against Dover in its upcoming court case. John West calls the Dover policy "misguided" and "likely to be politically divisive and hinder a fair and open discussion of the merits of intelligent design."

For the full article, click HERE.

The NCHRA (National Coalition of Human Rights Activists) has officially denounced "Intelligent Design" as a violation of students' human right of religious freedom. However, several members of the NCHRA also consider ID blasphemous.

Nevermind, that Darwinism is also a worldview with metaphysical implications.

The article generates more "heat" than "light", and portrays IDers as sneaky and mostly ignorant.

For the article from Pressbox.co.uk, click HERE.

An insightful journal article (Journal of Geoscience Education) by Mr. Marcus Ross of Liberty University clears up confusion on different scientific worldviews.

Mr. Ross claims, and rightly so, the demarcation of scientific vs non-scientific worldviews by Scott and Wise is illegitimate.

He proposes a Nested Hierarchy of Design, which "is meant to classify teleological positions based on the relative strength of design claims.

This article is a must read for all concerned with origins issues, and shows you formal definitions of the ten teleological positions, including ID.

For a free download of this article (this link begins downloading immediately and is 5.3MB !!!), please click HERE.

A 25-year old man from Oregon has taken the web world be storm with his clever and satirical website which takes on ID. Bobby Henderson believes in the Flying Spaghetti Monster and His creative powers, and wants you to believe as well.

For a look at the FSM site, click HERE.

For a rebuttal letter from a university student, read on...

Philosophical Foundation for a FSM Worldview

Dear Mr. Henderson,

First, let me compliment you on your creative website. After viewing a theory which you disagree with, you have responded with parody, sarcasm, and satire, much as the ancient Greeks did. However, in combating one theory, you invented a second which can now be subjected to its own criticisms and complaints.

My first criticism: your theory is self-defeating. You say that there exists a power that both can and does replace true information in one's mind with false information. In saying that, you immediately open the door to the possibility that the information about your Flying Spaghetti Monster is simply false information in your mind replacing the truth about reality. And if that were the case, then the existence of the FSM would be false. In other words: If you argue that information enters the mind against its own will that alters the truth about reality, then of course, one can use your own argument against you proving that the theory you just presented was merely implanted in your head. Therefore, a Being that freely implants false information in the minds of humans cannot rationally exist. This appears to be a discrepancy in your COVERT attempt to compare the FSM to the Mono-theistic God of Judeo-Christianity as the primary basis of the existence of our knowledge of that all-good God is the creation of free-will.

Second: Darwinian evolution (the belief that all of life can be explained by the mechanisms of random mutation and natural selection) is the primary origin belief of atheists (would you agree?) as there is no other currently widely accepted belief that does not involve a deity of some sort. As of three weeks ago, atheism was declared a religion by the U.S. 7th court of appeals. Darwinism would now appear to violate the wonderful, though falsely based, separation of church and state which you seem to be a heavy advocate of, and should hence be removed from all classrooms across the country. Am I mistaken in thinking that you really only want "just science" taught in the science classroom?

Third: If you don't think that "faith-based theories should be taught in the classroom" then you really shouldn't be advocating Darwinian evolution and all it entails. Darwinian evolution requires MUCH more faith than any other theory. Given the scientific evidence seen both cosmologically and molecularly, at this point in time, even your FSM theory would be more reasonable than believing the universe existed infinitely. Of course, in there we discover another fatal flaw in your theory in that the FSM, although invisible, is materialistic. It exists in this universe as evidenced by its "noodley appendage." For it to create the universe (and the time/space/material) limits that the universe represents, it would have to be immaterial and transcend time and space. This would of course rule out your flying-spaghetti monster as #1 it's made of spaghetti (material) and #2 it is always flying from place to place inside the universe (space).

Fourth: Your tomes of historical knowledge. How do we know they are the words of a supernatural being? Do we have some sort of accurate and specific prophesies in there that can be verified as written prior to the happenings? Also, referring to my earlier point, any writings in your tome would of course be subject to being just false information implanted by your FSM. In which case, they would not prove the existence of a FSM.

Finally: If you would like a philosophical, scientific, and rational argument arguing as to why Darwinian evolution requires faith then I would recommend reading Norman Geisler’s "I Don't Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist." I understand that you are currently unemployed and therefore may not wish to spend the money to purchase a copy of this book. If that is the case, please respond to this e-mail, and I will be happy to send you my copy free of charge. Also, please feel free to post this on your website (although please credit many of my arguments to Mr. Geisler and his book). I don't see why you would consider this hate mail since I'm merely disagreeing with your theory, but seeing as similar e-mails have made it onto that page, I'll look forward to finding mine there as well.

Tom Long, of Citizen's Voice, reports on a school district in northeast Pennsylvania that is considering teaching ID.

For the full story, click HERE.

Paul Nelson and Michael Ruse will discuss "Design by Evolution or Evolution by Design?" tonight (9/15) at the University of Miami, in a program sponsored by the Department of Philosophy.

For more on the program for those who wish to attend from the south Florida area, click HERE.

Maybe you need to relieve a little stress...

Have fun by clicking HERE.

A recent newsletter of ISCID reminded us of an upcoming conference, Applications of Methods of Stochastic Systems and Statistical Physics in Biology October 28-30, 2005 Presented by the Interdisciplinary Center for the Study of Biocomplexity at Notre Dame.

Its purpose is to stimulate new interdisciplinary collaborations between physicists, mathematicians, biologists, chemists and engineers with interests in modeling stochastic behavior in biology. More information by clicking HERE.

ISCID's featured book

"Endless Forms Most Beautiful: The New Science of Evo Devo and the Making of the Animal Kingdom"
click here
by Sean B. Carroll

is a look at the development of organisms, discussing the "toolkit genes" and "genetic switches" which shape and control the forms of biological life.

Two papers on the origin of man by Casey Luskin and Willaim Dembski are also offered:

Casey Luskin

William Dembski

The Guardian Unlimited (UK) chatted with Michael Behe on the ID movement. It must have drove the Darwinists crazy. There was no rebuttal in the piece.

To read the interview, click HERE.

“The Daily Show with Jon Stewart” will air a four-day report on the controversy over evolution.

“Evolution Schmevolution” will air nightly at 10 p.m. Monday through Thursday on Comedy Central.

To view the details, courtesy of the Lawrence (KS) Journal World please click HERE.

A recent opinion in the Fredericksburg (VA) Free Lance-Star by an average person who is a theist evolutionist (TE) can be instructive.

Sarah Marcus says that Dr. Ken Miller, a theist evolutionist, absolutely debunks the research done by Dr. Michael Behe. Hardly the truth, but you are free to believe anything you want Sarah.

Sarah is a Christian, and a theistic evolutionist. She believes in an intelligent designer (God) who uses "evolution" to accomplish what we see in biological history and the current biologicial system.

One flavor of theistic evolution has nothing to do with Darwinism, because Darwinism, by definition, is a random, undirected process (random mutation and natural selection (no God need apply)). Proponents of this type of TE say God "tinkers" with the evolutionary process, and hides His "tinkering."

Another flavor of theistic evolution, which some Christians hold to, claims that God designed the cosmos in such a way that life would inevitably originate and evolve from the properties of chemistry and physics initially "programmed" into the Creation Event, with no further "tinkering" necessary. The Christian Bible does not suggest this frontloading, but rather a progressive creation over time, be it days or eons. The difference between this view and atheistic Darwinism is that the TE frontloads the cosmos with properties ordained by God, while the Darwinist says this cosmos and life are effects of a lucky throw of the dice. Of course, initially, the Darwinist has to make the incredible blind leap of faith that this universe, or whatever it came from, arose from absolute nothing. And NOTHING is literally NOTHING...no space...time... energy...matter.

Sarah goes on to say that "acceptance of evolution does not require a person to believe that life is without meaning, or that the development of life totally lacked direction". Here is where she gets herself in trouble with an equivocal term. Her word "evolution" can have so many different definitions that you don't know what she means. Substitute the word "Darwinism" for "evolution", and the statement is nonsense, because life ultimately has no meaning, value, and purpose if atheistic Darwinism is true. You can make-believe there is meaning, or say there is temporary meaning, but, ultimately, there is none. She does mean God-directed "evolution", which is not Darwinism, but simply either a mix of God-ordained physics and chemistry and millions or billions of miraculous, yet hidden interventions, or a frontloaded cosmos where life and evolution are inevitable. What would be the motive of God to have random mutation and natural selection take place, and concurrently make millions or billions of miraculous non-random selections, and then totally hide those interventions for human view? And, if an intelligent designer frontloaded the cosmos with all the properties for life to orginate and evolve, and then let it go, He would have no control over the evolution of life forms (random chance and natural selection). He would be limited, and certainly not the Christian God. The ultimate kickoff question should be, from what did the cosmos spring?...a transcendent intelligent designer, or nothing? And let's follow the evidence where it leads.

Be careful when you use the word "evolution". When discussing the debate of Darwinism vs ID, use the terms "Darwinism" or Darwinist theory", and know what it means.

For the full opinion, click HERE.

The Intelligent Design Undergraduate Research Center (IDURC) is proud to
announce the first-ever Graduate Awards to two of its most respected members. Their names are being deliberately withheld. The recent cases
of Rick Sternberg, Guillermo Gonzalez, and others testify to the
importance of these bright minds remaining out of the crosshairs of
those opposed to open-minded investigation.

Tristan Abbey, the director of IDURC, congratulated the winners with
this message: "Only honest, rigorous, scientific investigation of
intelligent design will determine its status in ten years: whether it
will be taken seriously as a scientific theory or merely regarded as a
quaint set of assertions. These two will be shining examples for years
to come of what it means to have an open mind. Live bravely, friends,
but also wisely."

Each summer, IDURC will present Graduate Awards to outstanding
students who have just completed their undergraduate degrees and have
demonstrated exemplary dedication to both the study of science and the
rigorous investigation of intelligent design.

This year, award-winners will each receive a one-time grant funded by
Access Research Network (ARN) to be used however they wish, and an
autographed copy of Debating Design: From Darwin to DNA, inscribed
by William Dembski.

The Intelligent Design Undergraduate Research Center (IDURC) is proud to
announce the first-ever Graduate Awards to two of its most respected members. Their names are being deliberately withheld. The recent cases
of Rick Sternberg, Guillermo Gonzalez, and others testify to the
importance of these bright minds remaining out of the crosshairs of
those opposed to open-minded investigation.

Tristan Abbey, the director of IDURC, congratulated the winners with
this message: "Only honest, rigorous, scientific investigation of
intelligent design will determine its status in ten years: whether it
will be taken seriously as a scientific theory or merely regarded as a
quaint set of assertions. These two will be shining examples for years
to come of what it means to have an open mind. Live bravely, friends,
but also wisely."

Each summer, IDURC will present Graduate Awards to outstanding
students who have just completed their undergraduate degrees and have
demonstrated exemplary dedication to both the study of science and the
rigorous investigation of intelligent design.

This year, award-winners will each receive a one-time grant funded by
Access Research Network (ARN) to be used however they wish, and an
autographed copy of Debating Design: From Darwin to DNA, inscribed
by William Dembski.

Jay Richards of the Discovery Institute is on the radio show "The Bible Answer Man" with host Hank Hanegraaf Tuesday, Sept. 6th and Wednesday, Sept. 7th. Check your local listings, OR check out or purchase the programs at:

OnePlace.

or at:

Christian Research Institute.

Rebecca Keller, who has a Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of New Mexico, is president of Gravitas Publications of Albuquerque and writes elementary and middle-school science textbooks.

Dr. Keller writes a commentary on the proper role of science, and the science vs science controversy regarding Darwinism and ID.

To read her excellent commentary, click HERE.

John West of the Discovery Institute gets some ink in the Dallas Morning News.

The article is a brief description of what ID is, and is not, and what the movement is trying to accomplish. It also shows some of the disingenuousness of Darwinists regarding the debate.

To read the article (you must register with the paper), click HERE.

Reid Forgrave, of the Des Moines Register, gives a detailed look at the life and worldview of Dr. Gonzalez, and some of the thoughts of rivals Hector Avalos, an associate professor of religious studies at Iowa State who is also the faculty adviser for the ISU Atheist and Agnostic Society, and Jim Colbert, an associate professor of ecology, evolution and organismal biology at ISU.

"Anytime you incorporate the possibility of a supernatural explanation, you can't accumulate any evidence," said Colbert. We're not saying no one should believe in intelligent design. It's just that you can't accumulate evidence, so it's not science," he further added.

These are odd assertions from a learned professor, since ID professes that there is an intelligent designer, without pursuing the identity of the designer. The precise identity is, indeed, beyond science. What Colbert is saying is that we could never determine whether a person with five bullets holes in his chest died of natural causes or was the victim of a malevolent intelligent agent, because we could never gather any evidence from the crime scene to determine whether there was a crime committed. We could never determine if Mt. Rushmore came to be from the natural forces of rain, snow, and wind, or if a talented sculptor and his assistants took years to carve out the rock, because we could gather no evidence to determine the cause (natural or agent causation) of the effect (Mt. Rushmore).

The ISU petition against ID said "it's becoming increasingly clear to some of us that Iowa State University is being marketed as an intelligent design research center."

This is interesting, because on one hand people from NCSE (Glenn Branch and Eugenie Scott) tell ID theorists and researchers to get busy, do the work and get it through the peer-review process, but the idea of a ID research center is out-of-bounds. Who is being disingenuous?

For the full article, click HERE.

In the 7:30 Report on ABC in Australia, Geoff Hutchinson has a discussion about the current mindset of ID opponents and proponents.

To read the transcript of the show, click HERE.

The "openminded" and "charitable" Iowa State University Atheist and Agnostic Society will continue to oppose Dr. Gonzalez at ISU.

For examples of their mindset and tactics, visit their website by clicking HERE.

More commentary on the ISU-Gonzalez controversy can be read from the Discovery Institute by clicking HERE.

David Schweingruber, Assistant professor of Sociology at ISU weighs in on the ID debate at ISU. He takes jabs at both sides.

Be sure and read the responses to the letter below it. One reads:
"For the record, Professor, I took Astronomy 120 under Gonzalez last spring and he did in fact make the attempt to teach Intelligent Design in one of the last classes of the semester. Granted it was in passing and only covered for a minute at the outside but the fact remains that he has been allowing it into his classroom and passing it off as a scientific alternative to the idea that the universe was a product of nature".

I didn't know that the universe (nature) could be a product of nature. It seems something transcendent to the cosmos would have to cause the cosmos, and that "something" could not have a cause.

For the entire letter, click HERE.

A brief opinion in The American Thinker, points out that Charles Darwin did not address the origin of life (OOL), but rather the origin of species.

The opinion says that "Darwin knew little if anything about primitive life forms such as bacteria, viruses and the chemistry of the 'primieval soup'. He also knew little about astronomy and biological history before the fossil record, which has been developed rigorously and pointed out in the past 30 years, by scientists such as Dr. Paul Davies and Dr. Hugh Ross.

It is becoming increasingly clear that Darwin knew woefully little about the history of biological life as well, as has been demonstrated in the explosive knowledge garnered in the field of microbiology. The devil's in the details.

For the full opinion, click HERE.

Canadian author and writer Denyse O'Leary, who has also collaborated with Access Research Network, was honored at the 35th Anniversary National Convention of the Christian Booksellers Association Canada by receiving the "Recommended Canadian Author of the Year" award for 2005.

"The award was a complete surprise, as I did not even know I had been nominated," O'Leary said, when informed, on arriving at the Ottawa Congress Centre the following afternoon. "I had only come up to give a workshop."

She also noted that the award is undoubtedly linked both to her 2004 book, By Design or by Chance? (Augsburg 2004), an overview of the intelligent design controversy AND to her current project with Harper San Francisco: a book co-authored with Montreal neuroscientist Mario Beauregard on the neuroscience evidence for the spiritual nature of the human being.

Both projects attracted attention because of their possible international significance. By Design or by Chance?, intended for the Canadian market, was republished by the US head office for the American market, within 30 days of its Canadian publication. The "spiritual brain" project netted the two Canadian authors an advance of US$100 000, believed to be the largest advance ever offered to Canadians for a work of this type.

The CBA Canada booksellers determine the award by a private in-group poll.

Read brief excerpts from By Design or by Chance?: The Growing Controversy On the Origins of Life in the Universe (Augsburg Fortress, 2004) at:

this site.

For the Study Guide, click HERE.

For more insight into ID in Australia on the Lifesite website, click HERE.

Edward J. Larson is a historian of law, science and medicine at the University of Georgia. His book, "Summer for the Gods: The Scopes Trial and America's Continuing Debate Over Science and Religion," won the Pulitzer Prize in history in 1998.

I could never hope to win a Pulitzer Prize. Dr. Johnson is a much brighter man than I, but can be added to the list of people who make foolish mistakes when it come to the debate.

He insists that intelligent design is not science, because it does not seek testable, repeatable — and therefore exploitable — explanations. Can the biological history on planet earth be repeatable, in experiment after experiment? My point is, Darwinism is a result of the scientific philosophy of methodological naturalism (MN). It's a narrow approach, intending to find the right kind of "truth", which may miss the true truth about origins of the cosmos and life.

Dr. Edwards is a brilliant man, with blinders on.

For his essay, in the LA Times, click HERE.

Philip S. Skell is Emeritus Evan Pugh Professor at Pennsylvania State University, and a member of the National Academy of Sciences. An essay of Dr. Skell was published in The Scientist.

To those in the know, it made the rather obvious point that embracing Darwinism has, in almost all cases, nothing to do with ongoing scientific research. Those on the other side blindly assert that holding to Darwinism has everything to do with carrying on valid, scientific endeavors.

For this excellent essay provided by the Discovery Institute, click HERE.

William Safire's opinion column in The New York Times was picked up by the International Herald Tribune.

The origin of the use of the words "intelligent design" is briefly traced from the 19th through the 20th century. The use in the 21st century is driving the opposition nuts.

For the opinion, click HERE.

AgapePress reports on the South Carolina lawmaker, Mike Fair, who has made good on his promise of introducing a bill that would free up public schools to teach the controversy surrounding evolutionary theory by requiring them to expose students to the "full range of scientific views that exist" on biological evolution.

For the full article, click HERE.

Jonah Avriel Cohen recently finished his PhD in philosophy and religion at the University of London. He is not persuaded by intelligent design arguments, yet has written an honest piece in The American Thinker on the disingenuousness of most ID critics.

Please read the facts in this article by clicking HERE.

An article by Lucas Grundmeier in the student newspaper Iowa State Daily reports on the thoughts of atheist professors pertaining to ID. The comments are straight out of the "talking points" of methodological naturalists. A lecture, sponsored by the Atheist and Agnostic Society, tried to point out why ID is not scientific.

Dr. Tom Ingebritsen, associate professor of genetics, development and cell biology, said he thought the atheist's worldview is biasing their understand of whether intelligent design could be legitimate science.

For the full article, click HERE.

In The Chronicle of Higher Education, Jamie Schuman reports on the declaration of many Iowa State University professors to distance themselves and ISU from the theory of ID.

The statement, published this week in the student-run newspaper, the Iowa State Daily, was prompted in part by recent news-media attention surrounding Guillermo Gonzalez, an associate professor at ISU, who supports ID.

While the professors insist they are not making their dogma known to silence Gonzalez, "Mr. Gonzalez is having none of that. In a written statement, he called the petition 'an attempt to silence talk of ID by definitional fiat.'"

Especially vocal is associate professor of religious studies, Hector Avalos.

The statement calls the theory "an abandonment by science of methodological naturalism," which it describes as "the view that natural phenomena can be explained without reference to supernatural beings or events."

What has come out of the discussion is that their defintion of science has been exposed. "Methodological naturalism, the view that natural phenomena can be explained without reference to supernatural beings or events" restricts the search for ultimate truth. Suppose that there is a designer. Then their science will never find the designer, because the designer's existence is made impossible, a priori.

For the full article, click HERE.

In this reminder, one of Darwin's "icons" is nothing more than oscillating adaptation of Darwin's finches. They are still finches, when all is said and done, as they adapt to changing environmental conditions.

Peter and Mary Grant (Princeton) – wrote a Quick Guide in Current Biology in question-and-answer format. If the finches diverge then converge back to what they were before, is that really evolution? The Quick Guide moves on, leaving that question unasked and unanswered.

Of course, we know that the answer is yes, but only microevolution.

For the full story, click HERE.

Mike Littwin of the Rocky Mountain News takes digs at the designer and State Representative Debbie Stafford in this commentary. Littwin resorts to ad hominem attacks and subterfuge with the good Representative, and seems to know more about the balance of nature than the designer.

To read the whole commentary, click HERE.

The New York Times features a major profile of Discovery Institute’s Center for Science and Culture (CSC) that credits the Institute with transforming the public debate over evolution in America. By advocating "a 'teach-the-controversy' approach to evolution."

For the full article, click HERE.

Bill Frist, Senate Majority Leader, weighs in on ID and public schools in this MSNBC story. While Senator Frist's ideas may not fall in line exactly with many ID proponent's wishes for science education in the schools, the exposure of ID from politicians and others recently is stunning.

For the full article, click HERE.

Dr. Richard Sternberg is suffering the equivalent of a 21st century inquisition for having had the courage to buck the Darwinian establishment and publish a pro-intelligent design paper by CSC Director Dr. Stephen Meyer, himself a Cambridge educated philosopher of science.

For a breaking story on the controversary, click HERE.

David, brother of Rush Limbaugh, gets it right, again!

For the full commentary, click HERE.

A commentary by Hendrik Hertzberg was recented published in the New Yorker. It had to do with ID.

In the commentary Hertzberg says that ID is easily refuted and untestable. Think about that; ID is both false and can’t be proven false or true.

If that is not bad enough, ID “enjoys virtually no scientific support,” implying that there is some scientific support for it. But it is also “unsupportable by empirical evidence.” We can conclude then, that ID is both unsupportable and has some support.

To read more mental gymnastics, click HERE.

Glenn Branch and Eugenie Scott of NCSE also have an opinion piece in USA Today.

Mixing pejorative language and some false claims, the "creationists" are portrayed as "sneaky" ,"underhanded", and "dogmatic."

They say that "America needs to produce the scientists who will pioneer in these fields, which means maintaining and improving the quality of science education— including a healthy dose of evolution, uncompromised by sectarian dogma, bad science and fake "critical analysis."

Their phrase "sectarian dogma" is simply another negative rhetorical way in which they refer to ID creationist rascals. They assume that sectarian dogma in principle can not have evidence in its favor, thus betraying their claim that they are not promoting atheism. Only if you know that atheism is the unrevisable truth can one claim that theistic claims can never be the result of a sound argument.

For their full editorial, click HERE.

John Angus Campbell and Stephen C. Meyer have an opinion piece in USA Today.

The article carefully walks through the current position of why the controversy about Neo-Darwinism should be taught.

They correctly point out that the Kansas School Board policy would "require students to learn not only the full scientific case for contemporary evolutionary theory, called 'neo-Darwinism,' but also the current criticisms of the theory as they appear in scientific literature. The Kansas policy would not require, or prohibit, discussing the theory of 'intelligent design,' which has been so much in the news since President Bush spoke about it earlier this month."

For the full editorial, click, HERE.

Harvard will give a $1 million grant per year to researchers to tackle the problem of the origin of life.

This ID unfriendly research begins with an admission that some mysteries about life's origins cannot be explained.

For the AP article picked up by the Washington Post, click HERE.

Ryan Huxley of the IDEA Center in San Diego was interviewed by Dana Parsons of the LA Times on the subject of ID being taught in public schools. One point, which Ryan believes was glossed over in the article was that more evolution should be taught in schools to shows its weaknesses.

For the article (you may need to register), click HERE.

The debate over whether ID should be taught in schools has taken hold in Australia, where the country's education minister said students should be exposed to the theory.

For the full story on Cybercast News Service by Patrick Goodenough, click HERE.

A commentary by John West of the Discovery Institute appeared recently in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

To read the commentary, click HERE.

An Australian newspaper, The Melbourne Age, contains an article by Shane Green, the education editor.

It mentions the DVD "Unlocking the Mystery of Life". This article may be the biggest news story on ID to date in Australia.

To read the full article, click HERE.

The cover story on TIME magazine for 15 August is "The Evolution Wars."

The final sentence reads:

"By raising the profile of intelligent design, the President has doubtless emboldened those who differ with Darwin and furthered one goal of that movement: he has taught all of us the controversy."

For an on-line look at TIME, click HERE.

David Limbaugh gets it right in his commentary on the ID-Darwinism debate.

For the commentary, click HERE.

George Neumayr, executive editor of The American Spectator, discussed the Washington Post's recent stories on ID.

He keys in on some of the recent mischaracterizations of the Post.

For the article/commentary in the American Thinker, click HERE.

Dan Peterson, of the American Spectator, writes on intelligent design.

For the article, click HERE.

Dennis Brown, writing for News and Information at Notre Dame, tells that Alvin Plantinga, world renowned philosopher from the University of Notre Dame, supports recent comments by Cardinal Christoph Schönborn that belief in evolution as accepted by some in science today may be incompatible with Christian beliefs.

Plantinga rightly asks, "How could science show that God has not intentionally designed and created human beings and other creatures? How could it show that they have arisen merely by chance. That’s not empirical science. That’s metaphysics...It’s a theological add-on, not part of science itself. And, since it is a theological add-on, it shouldn’t, of course, be taught in public schools.”

For the full news release, click HERE.

Read Discovery Institute's take on President Bush's statements on evolution and ID in the public classroom by clicking HERE.

Recently, it's amazing how commentators such as Mort Kondracke, and now Charles Krauthammer in Time, can get it so wrong when it comes to ID.

Krauthammer is a well-known and respected (by many) commentator. He is supposed to give intelligent, well though out insights with regard to culture debates. Yet, his characterization of ID as a "God of the Gaps" religious enterprise shows his ignorance, perhaps self-imposed, of the true debate. His idea that ID is nothing more than plugging the "holes" in scientific theories with the divine is just silly. His inability to recognize Darwinism/atheism as a philosophical worldview, based on a good deal of blind faith, is inexcusible. And, his lack of knowledge regarding Kansas standards, which do not even mention ID, is baffling.

Rather, ID can simply be characterized as a "whodunnit" investigation, based on legitimate forensic (scientific) investigation.

When someone tries to use the "Krauthammer club", tell them you know better, and explain to her what ID is really about.

For the commentary in Time, click HERE.

George Neumayr, executive editor of The American Spectator, weighs in on the ID - Darwinism debate.

The closing paragraph of the story is telling:
"While the evolutionists continue their tired celebrations of the Scopes trial, they glance anxiously over their shoulders. They are running scared, and as the list of scientists and thinkers who dissent from Darwinism grows -- the Discovery Institute lists hundreds of scientists who now regard it as an intellectually bankrupt theory -- the evolutionists will increasingly mirror the intolerance they used to bemoan".

For the full article, click HERE.

Dr. Stephen Meyer and Dr. John West of the Discovery Institute are featured on the Focus on the Family broadcast Monday and Tuesday with Dr. James Dobson.

To listen, click HERE.

Bruce Chapman, president of the Discovery Institute in Seattle, got some ink in the Washington Post.

For the full opinion, click HERE.

An excellent article in the East Bay Express by Justin Berton is an indepth overview of the Intelligent Design Movement and its founder Dr. Phillip Johnson. Id has made much impact on the culture, especially during the past couple of years.

To read the article, click HERE.

WorldNetDaily reports on the case of Eugenie C. Scott retracting her false claims against a parent-activist who wants to change how a state school district teaches evolution.

Scott was forced to retract false statements about lawyer Caldwell when threatened with a lawsuit.

Caldwell said, however, he's disappointed it took a lawsuit to get action.

"Unfortunately, Scott and the NCSE have a long history of libeling people in the debate over how evolution should be taught in our public schools; my case is only the most recent example," he said. "Hopefully, it won't take any more libel lawsuits to teach them how to stick to the truth."

For the entire story, click HERE.

In an article by John L. Allen Jr. in the National Catholic Reporter a good amount of posturing seems to be going on in the Church. Catholic leaders and adherents are trying to figure out how to take the recent comments of the archbishop of Vienna on evolution. The term is equivocated, but Michael Behe does bring some clarity to evolution in a Darwinian sense.

For the full article, click HERE.

A new movie about the lives of emperor penguins in Antarctica is more than a documentary. While not an ID film explicitly, you might think it shouts out that the penguins were "designed".

For a review on the film by the USCCB, click HERE.

Dr. Niall Shanks, the man who wrote the 2004 book "God, the Devil, and Darwin: A Critique of Intelligent Design Theory" has moved from Tennessee to Kansas, which currently is in the midst of a debate about how evolution should be taught in public schools.

Shanks recently took a job at Wichita State University, filling an endowed professorship that focuses on the history and philosophy of evolution.

For the brief story by AP in the Kansas City Star, click HERE.

The second edition of "Convergence: The Magazine of Engineering and the Sciences at UC Santa Barbara" reads like an ID magazine. The lead article "Real Life" on Systems Biology seems to indicate that it is legitimate to talk about design concepts when they are funding endowed chairs to research the topic.

You can read the entire article by clicking HERE. It begins on page 2.

Peter Slevin of the Washington Post described a group of people who are frightened by the ID movement across the nation. An e-mail seeking support from more than 300 local Democratic campaign volunteers and other potential supporters described efforts across the country to challenge evolutionary theory. It warned against "politically infused theological pseudo-science". Now that is a mouthful.

The group's bigger dream is a statewide repudiation of intelligent design.

For more, click HERE.

Arguments for and against the teaching of intelligent design in Pennsylvania public schools were heard in a pretrial hearing on Thursday, July 14th, once again opening up a debate that has reignited controversy across the nation.

Eight families filed a federal lawsuit charging the school with violation of the separation of church and state. They claim that intelligent design is just another version of creationism.

In the pretrial hearings on Thursday, lawyers from the American Civil Liberties Union representing the eight families began their attacks on intelligent design.

According to the courts, creationism cannot be taught in public schools because it is a religion. The current lawsuit must determine whether the school district’s policy was motivated by the intent to teach about creationism and religion.

Defense attorneys from the Thomas More Law Center argue that the school district’s motivation was purely educational.

What's interesting is the religion vs science false dichotomy is claimed time and again, when the debate should be framed as science vs science. Also, if it can be proved that just the "intent" of the York school district was to teach "creationism", then it would be unconstitutional. Reminds one of the "intent reasoning" of the recent Supreme Court ruling on the display of the Ten Commandments in Kentucky. They were okay in Texas, but not in Kentucky. Apparently, judges can read minds.

For the article, click HERE.

A reminder about the Uncommon Dissent Forum in Greenville, SC the first week of August.

For the details, click HERE.

The L.A. Times picked up on a story by Ben Feller of the AP on the "attack" of Darwinism in the public schools.

What is interesting is what science teachers are saying about ID. For instance, teachers are saying that the Darwinism - ID "fight" is just political. Faye Haas, a Chemistry teacher states that "to spend half the time talking about things that speak against it (Darwinism) doesn't make any sense." So, we just ignore the gaping holes in the theory, and assert that it is fact??

For other thoughts from educators, read the article HERE.

Eugenie Scott recently stated on NPR that real scientists should not debate ID in public because most people are "naive". Name calling and implying that the vast majority of people are stupid is a good sign that the end is in sight. This seems to be an opening for ID proponents because it makes clear that we are committed to a culture of rational discourse and the other side is not.

William Dembski blogged on this "foot-in-mouth" disease of Scott. Click HERE for the blog.

Earlier this week, two members of the Kansas Science Committee and one other member of the Board offered further revisions to the June 9 draft of the Science standards which essentially made that draft consistent with the Minority Report and the provisions that 23 experts validated during the hearings in May.

An article by Diane Carroll in the Kansas City Star provides an inaccurate description of the actions taken.

The article illustrates the strategy of the opposition evolving from "you are putting ID into the standards," to "you are putting in the standards a concept "friendly to ID." Since they are friendly to ID, they should not be allowed. This essentially means that criticisms of evolution are not allowed because all criticisms are going to be friendly to ID. This elevates evolution to the status of an ideology. Of course, the State can not promote an ideology.

One of the major misstatements in the Star article is relevant to this issue. The article incorrectly states that

"There was, however, at least some new language added to the standards. The following paragraph, offered by Bacon, was adopted: "We also emphasize that the science curriculum standards do not include intelligent design, the scientific disagreement with the claim of many evolutionary biologists that the apparent design of living systems is an illusion. While the testimony presented at the science hearings included many advocates of intelligent design, these standards neither mandate nor prohibit teaching about this scientific disagreement."

Substantively this is not a new addition.. The language has been in the minority report from inception:

"According to many scientists a core claim of evolutionary theory is that the apparent design of living systems is an illusion. Other scientists disagree. These standards neither mandate nor prohibit teaching about this scientific disagreement."

The language is significant because it provides a defintion of ID that shows on its face to be "scientific." Hence, even though ID is not being added, it is being appropriately defined.

Thanks to John Calvert for the clarifications above.

For the full article (you may need to register), click HERE.

The Weekly Standard weighs in on ID vs naturalism via Isaac Constantine.

For the entire article, click HERE.

The latest on the Kansas State Board of Education science standards...changes are coming.

For the full story by Josh Funk in the Wichita Eagle, click HERE.

The Discovery Institute has filed a public records request with the Ohio State University (OSU) seeking all documents related to Darwinist attacks on OSU doctoral candidate Bryan Leonard. The request was submitted under the Ohio Public Records Act.

In June, Leonard's dissertation defense in the area of science education was suddenly postponed after three Darwinist professors at OSU attacked Leonard's dissertation research because it analyzed how teaching students evidence for and against macroevolution impacted student beliefs. According to a news report in The Columbus Dispatch, the professors admitted at the time that they had not read Leonard's dissertation.

Discovery Institute feels that Leonard may be the target of a payback, since he helped draft Ohio's innovative "Critical Analysis of Evolution" lesson plan adopted last year for use in schools statewide by the Ohio State Board of Education.

For the full story, click HERE.

Bill Dembski gives some insight into the recent article on ID in the New Scientist.

For information, click HERE.

The New York Times reporter Cornelia Dean not only writes "news" stories but dabbles in op-ed pieces as well. It just goes to show why her "news" stories are so bias in the New York Times.

In her op-ed piece in the York Dispatch, she weighs in on the inadequacy of "creationism" and "intelligent design". She says that evolutionists "cite radiocarbon dating to show that Earth is billions of years old, not a few thousand years old, as some creationists would have it". Interesting, because radiocarbon dating can reliably date things that have been alive from around 900 years to 35,000 years ago, perhaps 115,000 years ago as an outer limit. She confuses radiocarbon dating with radiometric dating. We might ask, "What else is Dean confused about?"

One other point. Just because a bunch of scientists named "Steve" think ID is untenable, doesn't mean ID is truly untenable. It means there are alot of scientists named "Steve" who hold to a materialistic world view. The same goes for other scientific and social issues. For instance, something may be legal in a society, but it may be objectively immoral.

At least, from now on, when you read a "news" story from Dean, you know her underlying biases.

For the full op-ed, click HERE.

A followup article by Cornelia Dean and Laurie Goodstein in the New York Times regarding the op-ed piece by the Archbishop of Vienna tries to confuse the Catholic church's official postion on Darwinism. The headline reveals the bias of the article.

The writers assert, right from the talking points of Darwinists, that "Darwinian evolution is the foundation of modern biology. While researchers may debate details of how the mechanism of evolution plays out, there is no credible scientific challenge to the underlying theory."

A question; why must a researcher believe in Darwinism to do practical scientific reasearch? Unless, of course, he is a professor who is specifically trying to advance the Darwinian paradigm.

The article goes on to give examples of Christians who hold to theistic evolution, such as, Dr. Kenneth Miller. Miller said he was already hearing from people worried about the cardinal's essay. "People are saying, does the church really believe this?"

Well, a recent Harris poll shows that around 10 percent of people believe in Darwinism in the U.S., so the vast majority of Americans are really not shaking their heads, wondering why the church doesn't hold to Darwinism.

For the full article, click HERE.

An article about a sponge on the MSNBC website offered by Daniel B. Kane had me eagerly soaking up the information.

Turns out, this lowly deep-sea sponge, the Venus' Flower Basket, is quite an engineer, moreso than me or other folks interested in ID. Joanna Aizenberg from Bell Labs/Lucent Technologies explains that "the number and placement of the diagonal (glass) beams fits an equation engineers use to calculate the minimum number of reinforcements needed to achieve the maximum stability. The sponge uses exactly what’s needed but nothing more.”

The sponge glass cage is then wrapped in spiraling surface ridges that protect it from being squeezed like an empty can of soda. And lastly, the sponges are anchored to the soft sediments of the sea floor in such a way that they do not break off due to the stress and strains of ocean currents.

“It puzzles me. In my wildest dreams I can’t imagine how these fibers are assembled to make the nearly perfect, highly regular square cells, diagonal supports and surface ridges of the cage,” said Aizenberg.

Yes, how all these intricate structures came together through random mutation and natural selection would, indeed, be puzzling to a materialist. A question for the materialists; How could random mutation and natural selection provide such specified complexity? Please give a detailed account of the evolutionary pathway(s). Their answer; it just did, and it had to, because it's the only player on the field.

Oh really...

For the article, click HERE.

Craig Holdrege of the Nature Institute discusses the varying Lamarckian and Darwinian explanations for the length of the giraffe's neck. After surveying and critiquing a number of ideas, he concludes that there may be a more mysterious explanation, which takes into account the entire body plan of the giraffe. Holdrege is looking for an explanation that comports with naturalism. An intelligent designer need not apply, thank you.

The Nature Institute's Mission Statement contains that odd language that grants Nature with a capital N powers that should be given only to intelligent agents. For instance, "we do not yet fathom her depths, and our actions to do not embody her wisdom...we work to create a new paradigm that embraces nature's wisdom..."

For the entire article, click HERE.

Christoph Schonborn, the Roman Catholic cardinal archbishop of Vienna, has an op-ed piece published in the New York Times.

In the piece, he points out that Pope John Paul II never endorsed Darwinism, as Darwin proponents constantly assert. He did, however, leave the door open for theisitic evolution (common ancestry).

The archbishop of Vienna says that "neo-Darwinists recently have sought to portray our new pope, Benedict XVI, as a satisfied evolutionist. They have quoted a sentence about common ancestry from a 2004 document of the International Theological Commission, pointed out that Benedict was at the time head of the commission, and concluded that the Catholic Church has no problem with the notion of "evolution" as used by mainstream biologists - that is, synonymous with neo-Darwinism."

Nothing could be further from the truth, for the Pope said in his homily at his installation that "we are not some casual and meaningless product of evolution. Each of us is the result of a thought of God. Each of us is willed, each of us is loved, each of us is necessary."

The disingenuousness of Darwinists who make the claim that the Catholic Church's position is that Darwinism is true is apparent, and must be challenged.

For the full commentary, click HERE.

Put on your waders...the proponents of naturalism have always tried to point out that the world is full of examples of lousy design, therefore, the intelligent designer is bumbling and inept. The latest commentary comes via the L. A. Times by Dr. David P. Barash, a psychologist.

Odd that a naturalist would try to make a theological argument about the nature of God (intelligent designer), by asserting that the designer wouldn't do it this way. There may be an optimum design in Dr. Barash's imagination, but given the nature of the cosmos and the "laws" that govern it, and the specified complexity of biological systems, trade-offs in design are likely necessary. Therefore, in actuality, the design is the best available for the various functions of the creature in question.

A doctor would weigh in by stating that the naturalist's conclusion just begs the question, because you could raise the bar by asserting that our bodies couldn't have been intelligently designed because we're not immortal.

Dr. Barash whines about the ineptitude of the designer with regard to the male genitourinary system, which is set up to allow for the two separate male functions, while protecting each system from each other. In addition, the testicles actually do descend in order to allow for adequate fertility.

For the commentary, click HERE.

Emile Schepers, contributor to the People's Weekly World Newspaper online, takes a swipe at ID...and misses.

The lead paragraph is misleading at best. Emile conflates creationism with ID and states the goal of ID is to get it taught in public schools. This is straight from the nonsensical "talking points" of anti-ID proponents.

Emile then asserts that the intelligent designer must be stupid for creating such a "bizarre array of species in nature". Why 85 different species of salamanders of the genus Bolitoglossa, which range from Mexico to the jungles of South America? Or, better yet, from my recollection, why a quarter million species of beetles worldwide? First, the idea of species must be defined. Can these salamaders or beetles interbreed, or do they just choose not to? In addition, how does Emile exhaustively know how each species fits into its ecosystem? Maybe, just maybe, each performs a needed function in a local area?

From the Christian perspective, God describes himself as not only the Creator of life, but as a playful artist, enjoying the creatures he has designed ex nihilo. Maybe if the salamanders (choose any other group of being) from one area to another don't perform needed functions in each local ecosystem. Perhaps God takes infinite pleasure in variations on a theme?

To Emile, "it would have been more intelligent to design just a single species and make them infinitely tougher and more adaptable, say the size of crocodiles, with claws, poison fangs, fur (for cold snaps) and pterodactyl wings, instead of fragile little things that fit in the palm of your hand and that curl up and die if you leave them in the sun for two minutes. What’s intelligent about designing them like that?" This unreasoned approach reminds one of Dr. Stephen Hawking's complaint that God (intelligent designer) should have just created one sun, one earth, and been done with it, not realizing that the cosmos, in all its size and gradeur is necessary, given the fine-tuned nature of the "laws" of physics. There is much that underlies the surface observations of Emile and Stephen. Yes, why not just have a dozen or so super-tough creatures and man, and be done with it! Maybe there is something to the "playful artist" concept of an intelligent designer, and perhaps an intricately complex ecosystem is necessary for the collective good of all species alive at this time in earth history?

Finally, Emile complains that ID does not even bother to answer the question, "who designed the designer?" First, the ID discipline is under no obligation to answer the question, because it is a philosophical/ theological question, not a science question. ID deals with proximal causes not ultimate causes. He states, "to posit the existence of a vast intelligence and will behind nature, and then expect people to take this on faith, is a religious-mystical stance, not a scientific one." This is a curious, self-indicting statement because materialists are doing exactly the same thing. Some ID proponents ultimately appeal to an uncaused intelligent designer, but materialists also appeal to an uncaused "creator", whether it be the materialistic "intelligence" that birthed the cosmos, or the unintelligent multiverses in the present or past (but this just pushes back the infinite regress). Reasonably and logically, material things cannot come from absolutely nothing, and it takes just as much, if not more, faith to believe that stuff comes from absolutely nothing as it does for an intelligent designer to have created the material universe. Both worldviews make a claim to some uncaused cause. In the case of materialism, the uncaused cause is ultimately absolutely nothing. The theist appeals to a non-contingent intelligent being. Emile, or any other atheist or agnostic, has not thrown down the trump card when they ask, "who designed the designer?" This needs to be pointed out to them, in a respectful and gentle manner.

For more on the question of "who designed the designer, go to the IDEA Center by clicking HERE.

For Emile's full commentary, click HERE.

A forum titled "Uncommon Dissent Forum: Scientists Who Find Darwinism Unconvincing" will take place in Greenville, SC, August 4, 5, and 6. Featured speakers will be Michael Behe, Jonathan Wells, Paul Nelson, David Keller, Ed Peltzer, Ralf Seelke, John Angus Campbell and Jed Macosko.

The order of topics is important, as a typical anti-ID person needs to see the problems with the icons that they have bought into before they can appreciate the irreducible complexity arguments of Michael Behe, which lie at the heart of ID. This conference nicely follows that same approach.

Specifically, the eight topics broken into two sections. First, the "Icons" chunk, in which Jonathan's talk is bookended by Ed and Paul presenting the first two chapters of Icons of Evolution, respectively, (Miller-Urey and Tree of Life), and by Ralph presenting what I see as the eleventh icon (bacteria evolving in test tubes). Second, there is the "Black Box" chunk, in which Behe's talk is bookended by David and Jed presenting an overview of all the machines that a typical cell needs, highlighting the three groups that are studied in the lab, and by John Angus presenting what every anti-ID person should hear right after they finish reading Darwin's Black Box in order to answer the question, "I see the merits of ID, but now what should we teach in the public schools?"

To look at the announcement of the forum, click HERE.

Tom Cruise has been getting much press lately, and now he weighs in on ET.

In an interview with the German tabloid daily Bild and reported on CNN.com, Cruise says, "Are you really so arrogant as to believe we are alone in this universe? Millions of stars, and we're supposed to be the only living creatures? No, there are many things out there, we just don't know."

His comments speak to the common notion that life springing from non-life is easy and inevitable. To date, the scientific evidence shows nothing to support that notion, but rather, a number of speculations that have led to dead ends. Also, from a design perspective, the universe HAS to be as big as it is, with the given physics, to be able to produce the "just right" conditions for life to exist, and for advanced life to thrive. He is claiming the same misguided idea that Dr. Stephen Hawking has voiced. Odd that Hawking, one of the most brilliant men on the planet, would not realize this, though.

But what caught my attention was the comment that people are "arrogant" for believing that we might just be alone in this vast cosmos. This is just the passive aggressive name-calling trick. Call anyone "arrogant" and presto, they are marginalized. The fact is, the idea that we might be alone is in no way arrogant in itself. Now, someone could present this idea in an arrogant manner, but the idea itself is not "arrogant". Tom Cruise should look into a mirror before he is tempted to use this passive aggressive trick on others. Trouble is, people who are consistently and truly arrogant seldom reflect deeply on how to craft a good argument, and on how they present their arguments. Often, the arrogant cannot see that they themselves are arrogant.

Finally, his last quote seems puzzling. He asserts there are many things out there, but has no scientific evidence (because there isn't any). Then he says "we don't know". Let's see, I am arrogant for believing that we may be alone in the cosmos, but he doesn't know either. So he simply asserts there are millions of other life forms out there. Seems like Tom Cruise's worldview is clashing with the known scientific facts.

For the full article, click HERE.

On July 22-23 a conference will take place in the San Francisco Bay Area, condcuted by Dr. Hugh Ross, Ph.D. and other Reasons To Believe team members.

The conference (Cosmic Fingerprints: Evidence of Design) will focus on issues related to fine tuning, irreducible complexity and evidence for design in our universe that can only be due to an intelligent agent.

This conference will be a good forum for folks to ask tough questions and perhaps come to understand that science and the belief in intelligent agency are quite compatible. This would be a great opportunity to invite friends and acquaintances who believe in materialism (atheists) or are agnostic on this important issue.

For more information, click HERE.

A brief interview took place between Dr. Jonathan Wells and IDURC (Intelligent Design Undergraduate Research Center) member Daniel Cervera.

To view, please click HERE.

Here's another example of Caltech scientists that experience the "wow factor" when investigating the utter complexity of creatures.

Author Douglas L. Smith discusses the complexity of a "lowly" worm. Not so fast, this worm is reverse-engineered for starters! Surely, it takes alot of faith to be a Darwinist.

For more information, click HERE.

George Will, a commentator I agree with more often than not, says something quite remarkable in the latest issue of Newsweek. Writing on the debate on origins and life's history, he says that ID is not a falsifiable theory, and therefore is not legitimately a part of the scientific endeavor, and therefore, does not belong in science class.

For a piece by William Dembski on the testability and falsifiability of ID click HERE.

For the full George Will commentary, click HERE.

This editorial by the Boston Globe shows a profound ignorance and bias.

"More holes than swiss cheese" would be a good analogy regarding the description of the Smithsonian Institution and Stephen (not Scott) C. Meyer's article accepted by peer review in their publication.

In addition, the author(s) actually believe that most ID proponents and the Discovery Institute have a goal of wanting ID taught alongside Darwinism in public schools science classes.

Errors and obfuscation abound in this editorial. Click HERE to view.

Science Magazine, a mouthpiece for AAAS, stated in it's Netwatch that

"school boards in Kansas and other states consider whether to mandate teaching of "intelligent design," a glorified version of creationism (Science, 29 April, p. 627)."

The above statement is odd because the school board in Kansas was considering teaching more about Darwinism and nothing about ID. So their claim shows a disregard for the truth about what is happening and a bias. This is a public statement being made in an effort to prejudice readers about what is going on, and therefore, they should be publicly challenged to produce the evidence to back up their claim.

Later in the day, John West, of the Discovery Institute, issued a $100 challenge to Science magazine about its bogus claim regarding Kansas. If Science can produce proof of the claim, he will donate $100 to the AAAS to promote evolution. For his challenge, click HERE.

The Darwinism - ID debate may reach into the Montana State Legislature later this year if some representatives have their way.

One debate will be over whether the curriculum decisions will be made at the local or state level.

Of course, science educators don't see intelligent design as an alternative. Here come the talking points:

"Creationism is based on supernatural, religious, mystic beliefs. There is no scientific basis; it can't be proven or disproved with empirical data."

"There are reasons why it (ID) is not science. I'm not knocking anyone's beliefs, but it's not testable by the rigors of science."

"The public needs to be wary of those promoting intelligent design."

"There are people saying they are in favor of this intelligent design theory and they say they have a Ph.D. or a doctorate, but what are they doctors in? I doubt very much it's in evolutionary science or biology or in any field related to evolution."

Gee...ever heard of Dr. Michael Behe, Dr. Jonathan Wells, Dr. Forrest Mims III, etc...?

When are they going to debate the actual merits of the views instead of making ad homenim attacks and bald assertions?

For the full article by John Fitzgerald of the Billings Gazette, click HERE.

In an article by Cornelia Dean in the New York Times a fairly balanced piece on the Kansas "debate" was presented.

Watch for these problems though:

- the use of the equivocal term "evolution," which is never defined. ("Evolution" can mean many things (change over time, etc.), but it's the Darwinian mechanism we have a problem with.)

- that there is no real evidence, independent from faith, against Darwinism. (Darwinists have to exercise a certain amount of faith to believe their position, because the evidence is either not there, or is equivocal. But they vehemently deny their faith.)

- faith is not a factor influencing opinions on all sides of the debate. (Darwinists assert that their position has airtight evidence, but it really is not.)

For the full article (you may have to register with the New York Times), click HERE.

This somewhat slanted article by AP on FoxNews online reports that a Pennsylvania Legislature House Subcommittee on Basic Education heard testimony on a bill that would allow local school boards to mandate that science lessons include intelligent design.

The American Civil Liberties Union claims that allowing intelligent design to be taught would undermine the state's science standards, which specify the teaching of evolution. (If a dogma is suspect, then just maybe it would be okay for the state to change how it's taught. Rather than teaching ID, maybe teaching more about Darwinism would be a good first step.)

"How many new biotechnology companies will want to locate here in Pennsylvania if our students are being taught a watered-down version of the complexities of evolution?" asked Larry Frankel, legislative director for the state's ACLU chapter. (Mr. Frankel, how would students learning more about Darwinism or ID hinder biotech research?)

For the full story, click HERE.

ROSEVILLE, CA -- The California Academy of Sciences has settled with a California parent, Larry Caldwell, who raised a potential libel claim against the organization over its publication of a false and defamatory article authored by Eugenie C. Scott, Executive Director of the National Center for Science Education, Inc. (NCSE) Scott's article, entitled "In My Backyard: Creationists in California," appeared in the Spring print and online editions of the Academy's California Wild magazine. The article had also been accessible through a link on the NCSE's website.

In a lawsuit filed against Scott and the NCSE in April, Caldwell claimed that the Scott article contained numerous factual misstatements and libeled him in an effort by Scott and the NCSE to discredit his efforts to promote his "Quality Science Education" policy, which is designed to include some of the scientific weaknesses of the Darwin's theory of evolution in biology classes. Caldwell's lawsuit did not formally name the California Academy of Sciences as a defendant, although, as the publisher of the Scott article, it was a potential defendant in the suit.

In a settlement agreement finalized recently, the California Academy of Sciences has agreed to permanently remove all on-line access to the Scott article. The Academy has also agreed to publish a lengthy letter by Caldwell and a retraction letter by Scott in the upcoming Summer 2005 Edition of Calfornia Wild, which will be available in print and on the internet in early July.

Caldwell's letter will correct a number of factual misstatements in the Scott article.

Scott's letter will retract several false allegations about Caldwell and his-year long effort to improve science education in the Roseville high school district. For example, Scott had falsely accused Caldwell of purportedly proposing two young earth creation science books to the Roseville Joint Union High School District for potential adoption and use in biology classes--one of which is authored and published by the Jehovah's Witnesses. In her letter to be published in California Wild, Scott now concedes that Caldwell did not submit these books to the school district.

Contrary to her article, Scott also now admits that school officials in the Roseville high school district never actually considered those books for adoption anyway.

Scott also concedes that her allegation that a science expert had purportedly expressed his opinion that Caldwell had a "gross misunderstanding of science" was false; and Scott will also retract her claim that the Roseville high school board had purportedly passed a resolution "recommending" that "creationist" materials be used in science classes.

Said Caldwell, "I am pleased that the California Academy of Sciences and California Wild have shown the professional integrity to remove this libelous article from internet access, and to give me an opportunity to set the record straight on my Quality Science Education Policy"

Caldwell added, "It's a shame it took a lawsuit to get Scott, the author of the article, to retract some of the more outrageous factual misstatements in her article.

"Unfortunately, Scott and the NCSE have a long history of libeling people in the debate over how evolution should be taught in our public schools; my case is only the most recent example. Hopefully, it won't take any more libel lawsuits to teach them how to stick to the truth."

"Other critics of Darwin's theory have been personally attacked on the basis of misrepresentations in similar cases where the Darwinists claim that the critics' professional statements or qualifications are false," said Caldwell. "The difference between them and me is that I decided to take legal action. Darwinists need to get the message: engage in civil discourse without defamation or prepare to answer in court."

According to Caldwell, there is also an important lesson for journalists and publishers: Claims by Darwinists should by carefully investigated before being reported as facts.

Meanwhile, Caldwell's libel lawsuit against Scott and the National Center for Science Education, Inc. continues.

Caldwell is the founder of Quality Science Education for All, a non-profit organization dedicated to securing and defending the right of all students to receive a quality science education that exposes them to the scientific strengths and weaknesses of evolution. Quality Science Education for All is on the web at http://www.qsea.org.

State Sen. Mike Fair, R-Greenville is advocating that S.C. schools teach more than Charles Darwin’s theories of evolution. Fair plans to push for his latest idea to modify standards for teaching science, particularly in high schools.

Public school students, he said, should be told a “full range of scientific views ... exist. We must have our eyes wide open on these issues. What I’m saying is let’s give the whole story. Let the kids make up their own minds. Don’t be afraid of the truth.”

Fair is lead sponsor of a bill filled June 1, a day before the Legislature adjourned, that puts the issue in play when lawmakers return to work in January.

For more by Bill Robinson in The State, click HERE.

Religion and science, according to Charles Townes, winner of a Nobel Prize in Physics and a UC Berkeley professor in the Graduate School, they are united by similar goals: science seeks to discern the laws and order of our universe; religion, to understand the universe's purpose and meaning, and how humankind fits into both.

Townes has been exploring for many of his 89 years, and in March his insights were honored with the 2005 Templeton Prize for Progress Toward Research or Discoveries about Spiritual Realities. Worth about $1.5 million, the Templeton Prize recognizes those who, throughout their lives, have sought to advance ideas and/or institutions that will deepen the world's understanding of God and of spiritual realities.

Embedded within this interesting article and interview of Townes by Bonnie Azab Powell in the UC Berkeley News Online is an unsurprising statistic that 56 percent of those surveyed at UC Berkeley believe in Darwinism, as compared with 13 percent of those surveyed across the U.S.

For the full article, click HERE.

Under the title of "Guarding the Integrity of Science in Classrooms"
AAAS is countering efforts to "teach the controversy" in U.S. public school science classrooms.

Of course, the organization says, what controversy? All genuine scientists are in lockstep agreement.

On their website, resources include an informational Q&A on evolution and intelligent design and commentary including an op-ed piece on the State of Kansas Board of Education evolution hearings.

For some "enlightenment", compliments AAAS, click HERE.

Inside Higher Education News reports that Ohio State University called off a dissertation defense scheduled for this week. Seems some faculty were concerned that it was set up to favor a Ph.D. candidate’s views that question Darwinism.

Bryan Leonard, a graduate student in science education and a national leader on behalf of “intelligent design” theory, was scheduled to defend a thesis dealing with how students’ attitudes change how they “are taught the scientific data both supporting and challenging macroevolution.”

Some were concerned that OSU is about to award and Ph.D. that legitimizes ID.

For the full story click HERE.

The "teach the controversy" idea has come to the forefront in Utah, when State Senator Chris Buttars introduced a bill to teach "divine design" in the schools.

The controversy gets much ink in the Salt Lake Tribune.

For the full story by Peggy Fletcher Stack, click HERE.

Check out the PBS offering of Religion and Ethics with Bob Abernethy which delves into the concept of "teaching the controversy" in public schools. Dr. Stephen Meyers and a few others get a few sound bites in edgewise. Eugenie Scott sticks to the talking points, one of which is that the introducing the "G" word is a science stopper. If a materialistic explanation is so ridiculously remotely possible, why not go with a much more plausible explanation, even if it might involve an intelligent agent?

For the transcript, click HERE.

This story in Wired News by Amit Asaravala reports on the National Academies desire to stifle a growing movement to teach anternatives to Darwinism in U.S. public schools. The National Academies has unveiled a new section of its website dedicated to teachers' resources on evolution.

The site features academic papers supporting evolutionary theory and supplements for educators detailing how to teach evolution in the classroom.

Intelligent design is an updated form of creationism that claims life was created by an "intelligent designer", according to the NA party line.

(Here we go again with the science vs faith dichotomy)

The National Academies and other scientific organizations have long said that intelligent design should not be taught in schools because it counters many scientific observations about biology and the origins of life.

(Imagine that...trying to overturn a stale...reigning paradigm!)

The National Academies is a collection of private, nonprofit organizations that provide science, technology and health policy advice under a congressional charter.

The assertion by the National Academie that the status of Darwinian theory is "robust" is misleading, at best.

Darwinism assumes that variation is not limited. However, every experiment which has tried to push past the normal limits of variation, has always been stopped at a point where either further changes are lethal to the species, or further variation is simply not possible. It would be honest to say that Darwinism can't even get to home plate.

Darwinism predicts that billions of bits of functional information can be generated through natural processes. Yet, we have no demonstrable natural process that can do such a thing. Computer simulations are also showing that millions of generations will not be able to even cross a relatively minor jump in information of even 50 bits. An average protein requires on the order of 500 bits of functional information to properly encode.

An assertion by the National Academies that Darwinism is robust shows either an ignorance of the scientific results, or a profound self-imposed blindness to the facts.

For the full report, click HERE.

EurekAlert posts a public release from the University of Chicago which announces that an important component of Darwinism is not exactly spot on. New data suggest that the accumulation of genetic changes is not solely determined by natural selection. It turns out that the rate of mutations determines how many are incorporated into the genome. While this certainly does not scream that ID is true, it does show that "things ain't often as they are advertised."

For the full release, click HERE.

The Christian Post reports that a proposal to REQUIRE the teaching of divine design in public schools has been introduced in Utah.

State Senator Chris Buttars (R-West Jordan) has agreed to take the lead in pushing new legislation on the teaching of intelligent design in conjunction with evolution in schools.

Buttars is supported by a strong conservative lobby, headed by the Eagle Forum.

For more details, click HERE.

After co-sponsoring the movie about the book The Privileged Planet, the Smithsonian is apparently distancing itself from the content of the movie.

At first, Smithsonian folk said that enjoyed the movie, but now, they will not require the screening fee of $16,000 from the Discovery Institute, and have apparently withdrawn their co-sponsorship.

The Darwinistas are a curious lot.

For the story in the Washington Post by Tommy Nguyen, click HERE.

Doug Cowan of Port Orchard, WA is a public school biology teacher who teaches more evolution than he has to. In fact, he teaches the controversy, and the students are glad he does.

For the full story in the Christian Science Monitor, click HERE.

Next month the Smithsonian Institution will co-sponsor a viewing of a film intended to undercut scientific materialism.

The Discovery Institute, a group in Seattle that supports an alternative theory, "intelligent design," is announcing "the national premiere and private evening reception" on June 23 for the movie, "The Privileged Planet: The Search for Purpose in the Universe."

The film is a documentary based on a 2004 book by Guillermo Gonzalez, an assistant professor of astronomy at Iowa State University, and Jay W. Richards, a vice president of the Discovery Institute, that makes the case for the hand of a creator in the design of Earth and the universe.

For the full article by John Schwartz of the New York Times, click HERE.

Michael Behe is interviewed by the Christian Post.

For the article, click HERE.

Phil Johnson was interviewed by Michael Powell of the Washington Post. The article, regarding ID, also appeared in the Chicago Tribune.

For the full article, click HERE.

An excellent opinion appeared in the MetroWest Daily News (MA) regarding the implausibility of macroevolution (Darwinism) written by Marty Pomeroy.

While natural selection is obvious in nature, beneficial chance mutations that produce humans from amoebas is utterly inadequate.

For the full opinion, click HERE.

This is a good example of the leaps of faith taken by Darwinists, who expound on the wonders of nature, then just say they evolved.

How did the exact recipe of proteins, sugars, phosphates, calcium, sulfur, neurotransmitter peptides and other organic and inorganic ingredients that yielded a substance called spider silk? It evolved.

It evolved because it evolved: that is enough intellectual content to satisfy a Darwinista.

For the full description, click HERE., then scroll down.

The London Times has published two letters to the editor essentially against Richard Dawkins rant article about those crazy, political, religious nuts and ID.

For the letters from scientists in the UK, click HERE.

The word is getting out, far and wide. Dawkins can use all the rhetoric he wants, but people are seeing the science in ID, and are not buying the science vs religion (politics) blather as much as before.

For the full article on the Canadian website Lifesiteclick HERE.

A story in the Washington Post reports that the more than 34,000 stickers that were placed in biology textbooks in Cobb County, Georgia were removed.

While it is questionable what impact the simple statement on the sticker announced, it was a "slippery-slope" issue to the Darwinists. And how a judge could interpret the sticker, with no mention of religion, as a church-state issue is baffling.

For the article, click HERE.

The complex development of the eye is discovered by scientists of the Sauk Institute. Again, no mention of Darwinism in this article in ScienceDaily. How could this mechanism develop by chance mutation and natural selection?

For the full explanation, click HERE.

In this magnificent discovery by Saulk Institue scientists, no mention is ever made of Darwinian evolution.

The more complete and detailed our mechanistic knowledge becomes, the more clear it will become that, in an organism, the whole causes the parts, and parts cause the whole. The limits and ultimate inadequacy of conceiving of a living thing mechanistically will be more clear.

For the article on this intricate design in ScienceDaily, click HERE.

An excellent summariy of the goings on in Kansas written by Timothy Lamer in available in World Magazine.

For the full article, click HERE.

Sunday's edition of the Washington Post included this profile on Phillip Johnson by Michael Powell. Although the Post editorial page has bashed Johnson and the ID movement in the past, this news reporter takes a fair look at the man and the movement.

Phil Skell, a National Academy of Sciences member and Evan Pugh Professor of Chemistry, Emeritus Penn State University, has written a letter to the Kansas State Board of Education, voicing "strong support for the idea that students should be able to study scientific criticisms of the evidence for modern evolutionary theory along with the evidence favoring the theory."

This is a brave move when many of his colleagues at the Academy are trying to frame this as a science vs. religion debate and attempting to convice the media and general public that there is no scientific controversy.

More evidence exists for intelligent design than for neo-Darwinism, and “grand Darwinian claims rest on undisciplined imagination,” according to Lehigh University biochemistry professor Michael J. Behe.

Speaking in the evening at Stanford Univeristy on May 2, 2005, Behe presented a primer for a growing theory of origins called intelligent design, which posits that certain features in nature are best explained by some sort of intelligent designer, rather than the purely neo-Darwinian mechanisms of natural selection and random mutations.

Tristan Abbey, director of ARN's student division, reports on the lecture and debates a fellow student about some of the issues.

This from the New York State Assembly: Click here

Click on the link below to witness the discussion between Dembski and Ruse on ABC Nightline: Show

Bill Dembski and Michael Ruse will be on ABC News Nightline program, on Monday, May 9th.

Check your late night listings!

NPR reports on the hearings at the Kansas School Board.

For the audio report, click HERE.

Jonathan Witt has a doctorate in English from the University of Kansas and is a senior fellow and writer in residence with the Discovery Institute's Center for Science & Culture. He was published in the Kansas City Star, weighing in on the weaknesses of Darwinism.

The word is getting out, during this week of testimony before the Kansas State Board of Education.

For the full article, click HERE.

While the L.A. Times put the Kansas controversy on page 1, the New York Times buried it on page 18.