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Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
There you go again.
Foot in Mouth Disease, chapter 11
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...080201686.html
Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory Fuel Debate
By Peter Baker and Peter Slevin
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, August 3, 2005; A01
President Bush invigorated proponents of teaching alternatives to evolution in public schools with remarks saying that schoolchildren should be taught about "intelligent design," a view of creation that challenges established scientific thinking and promotes the idea that an unseen force is behind the development of humanity.
Although he said that curriculum decisions should be made by school districts rather than the federal government, Bush told Texas newspaper reporters in a group interview at the White House on Monday that he believes that intelligent design should be taught alongside evolution as competing theories.
"Both sides ought to be properly taught . . . so people can understand what the debate is about," he said, according to an official transcript of the session. Bush added: "Part of education is to expose people to different schools of thought. . . . You're asking me whether or not people ought to be exposed to different ideas, and the answer is yes."
These comments drew sharp criticism yesterday from opponents of the theory, who said there is no scientific evidence to support it and no educational basis for teaching it.
Much of the scientific establishment says that intelligent design is not a tested scientific theory but a cleverly marketed effort to introduce religious -- especially Christian -- thinking to students. Opponents say that church groups and other interest groups are pursuing political channels instead of first building support through traditional scientific review.
The White House said yesterday that Bush's comments were in keeping with positions dating to his Texas governorship, but aides say they could not recall him addressing the issue before as president. His remarks heartened conservatives who have been asking school boards and legislatures to teach students that there are gaps in evolutionary theory and explain that life's complexity is evidence of a guiding hand.
"With the president endorsing it, at the very least it makes Americans who have that position more respectable, for lack of a better phrase," said Gary L. Bauer, a Christian conservative leader who ran for president against Bush in the 2000 Republican primaries. "It's not some backwater view. It's a view held by the majority of Americans."
John G. West, an executive with the Discovery Institute, a Seattle-based think tank supporting intelligent design, issued a written statement welcoming Bush's remarks. "President Bush is to be commended for defending free speech on evolution, and supporting the right of students to hear about different scientific views about evolution," he said.
Opponents of intelligent design, which a Kansas professor once called "creationism in a cheap tuxedo," say there is no legitimate debate. They see the case increasingly as a political battle that threatens to weaken science teaching in a nation whose students already are lagging.
"It is, of course, further indication that a fundamentalist right has really taken over much of the Republican Party," said Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), a leading liberal lawmaker. Noting Bush's Ivy League education, Frank said, "People might cite George Bush as proof that you can be totally impervious to the effects of Harvard and Yale education."
Bush's comments were "irresponsible," said Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State. He said the president, by suggesting that students hear two viewpoints, "doesn't understand that one is a religious viewpoint and one is a scientific viewpoint." Lynn said Bush showed a "low level of understanding of science," adding that he worries that Bush's comments could be followed by a directive to the Justice Department to support legal efforts to change curricula.
Bush gave no sign that he intended to wade that far into the debate. The issue came up only when a reporter from the Knight Ridder news service asked him about it; participants said the president did not seem especially eager to be asked. "Very interesting question," he told the reporter playfully.
At a morning briefing yesterday, White House press secretary Scott McClellan said Bush was simply restating long-standing views. "He has said that going back to his days as governor," McClellan said. "I think he also said in those remarks that local school districts should make the decisions about their curriculum. But it's long been his belief that students ought to be exposed to different ideas, and so that's what he was reiterating yesterday."
In comments published last year in Science magazine, Bush said that the federal government should not tell states or school boards what to teach but that "scientific critiques of any theory should be a normal part of the science curriculum."
The president's latest remarks came less than two months after Cardinal Christoph Schonborn, archbishop of Vienna and an influential Roman Catholic theologian, said evolution as "an unguided, unplanned process of random variation and natural selection" is not true.
"Any system of thought that denies or seeks to explain away the overwhelming evidence for design in biology is ideology, not science," Schonborn wrote in the New York Times. He said he wanted to correct the idea that neo-Darwinism is compatible with Christian faith.
Bruce Alberts, president of the National Academy of Sciences, warned this year in a "Dear Colleagues" letter of "increasingly strident attempts to limit the teaching of evolution."
The most prominent debate is underway in Kansas, where the conservative state board of education is expected to require the teaching of doubts about evolution to public high school students. A challenge to the teaching of intelligent design is scheduled for trial in Dover, Pa., while a federal court in Georgia said textbook stickers questioning evolution were unconstitutional.
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
http://www.discovery.org/csc/aboutCSC.php
The Center for Science and Culture
Started in 1996, the Center for Science and Culture is a Discovery Institute program which:
• supports research by scientists and other scholars challenging various aspects of neo-Darwinian theory;
• supports research by scientists and other scholars developing the scientific theory known as intelligent design;
• supports research by scientists and scholars in the social sciences and humanities exploring the impact of scientific materialism on culture.
• encourages schools to improve science education by teaching students more fully about the theory of evolution, including the theory's scientific weaknesses as well strengths.
Discovery's Center for Science and Culture has more than 40 Fellows, including biologists, biochemists, chemists, physicists, philosophers and historians of science, and public policy and legal experts, many of whom also have affiliations with colleges and universities.
The Center's Director is Dr. Stephen Meyer, who holds a Ph.D. in the history and philosophy of science from Cambridge University.
The Center's Associate Director is Dr. John G. West, who holds a PhD in Government from Claremont Graduate University and a B.A. in Communications from the University of Washington.
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creationism
excerpts of hypertext version
Intelligent Design movement — The main proponents of intelligent design have intentionally distanced themselves from other forms of creationism, preferring to be known as wholly separate from creationism as a philosophy. One of the chief websites of the movement defines it thus: "The theory of intelligent design holds that certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as [Darwinian] natural selection." Intelligent design styles itself as a philosophical approach to the origin of information and complexity within nature, and, its adherents claim publicly, is not concerned with religion, or the identity or nature, whether natural or supernatural, of any possible designer(s). Ostensibly, intelligent design does not oppose the theory of evolution. However, the leading proponents of intelligent design are Christian theists who vociferously oppose evolution and acknowledge to their constituency "our strategy has been to change the subject a bit so that we can get the issue of intelligent design, which really means the reality of God, before the academic world and into the schools" and that "this (the ID movement) isn't really, and never has been a debate about science. Its about religion and philosophy." Critics cite such statements as proof that intelligent design is creationism in new clothing.
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In 2000, a People for the American Way poll estimated that:
- 20% of Americans believe public schools should teach evolution only;
- 17% of Americans believe that only evolution should be taught in science classes — religious explanations should be taught in another class;
- 29% of Americans believe that Creationism should be discussed in science class as a 'belief,' not a scientific theory;
- 13% of Americans believe that Creationism and evolution should be taught as 'scientific theories' in science class;
- 16% of Americans believe that only Creationism should be taught;
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The western world outside the United States
Most vocal creationists are from the United States, and creationist views are much less common elsewhere in the Western World.
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
Lots or articles on this topic, and more will be coming.
I've posted my views on this in ttp://www.stripperweb.com/forum/showthread.php?t=53096&page=2&pp=15 ...
"For example in the news was GWB's intention to require "intelligent creationism" to be taught in schools with an equal status as scientific-based creation. Now that is just his personal belief that he is foisting on an already-technical averting citizenship (probably itself due to the public's inability to concentrate on more than a few bars of rock at a time or the next bottle of beer). All we need in this country is more belief in magic than reality as our world competitors go whizzing by."
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
Yeah so GWB is a dumbass... We all are when it comes to certain things.
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
Yeah, but GWB has a huge entourage to ask if it makes sense to express to the world. Consequenty this lack of reflection is yet another area where his dumbass is showing.
It is embarassing to have a president who is such a loose cannon.
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
I always thought that fiction was better left to be read, as opposed to being taught. Know what I mean?
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
People can learn about creationism in sunday school, leave science class for science, not fables.
Might as well teach jack and the beanstalk.
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
When you can theorize cause, hypothesize results, test the hypothesizes, and observe the results about "intelligent design," then it's appropriate for the science classroom. Until then, it belongs in philosophy or sociology.
On the other hand, screw it. Start bringing religion into the science classroom as "competing theories." Then you can talk about how the Hindu age of the universe comports much more closely to the physical evidence than the Judaic/Islamic/Christian story. That will make everybody happy.
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
There they go again... what Bush really said was that it should be taught ABOUT so kids would know what the discussion was about... NOT told to believe it. Just as students are taught about racism and slavery so they will understand what the subjects are about. Not so they would become racists or slave holders. What's wrong with knowing ABOUT something so you're capable of understanding and even debating it? I guess free thought is a bad thing in liberal circles. In liberal land, ignorance is bliss and it is folly to be educated.
So once again, the left pounces on nothingness to pursue their agenda to knock the administration. But why do we need to waste time on such silly topics like the President's vacation or "intelligent design"? Where are the threads on IRA disarmament, Sudanese rioting, CAFTA, the coup in potentially oil-rich Mauritania, or the melt-down of the American liberal print and radio media? I'd like to see more intelligence designed into this forum than the transmogrified fables liberals want us to swallow.
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
Well, no matter which political slant I've got, and I've been accused of having both, it is newsworthy to me that a President, assumed to be the most powerful man in the world, is so ignorant about simple science at best, or shamelessly pandering to religious zealots at worst.
I don't care about his vacations. I don't even care greatly about Rove. I don't care about the Supreme Court appointment - in fact, I think he should get his choice.
However, when he advocates keeping kids ignorant in school, that's bothersome. The principles of evolution are as important to biological sciences as the energy form of light is to physics, as the table of elements is to chemistry. For President Bush to want to interject religion into it is ... well, disappointing.
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
Jay,
Do not be surprised at a non scientist making mistakes regarding evolution. Scientists make them all the time.
This link is to a paper by a BU prof.
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-...o-biology.html
This is not hidden attempt to criticize evolution ( a theory I believe in) but chronicals and explains evolution, including all the explanations of evolution which were erroneous. there are tons of them, and several schools of evolutionary hypotheses.
The problem of evolution is that both those in favor and against it are so damn sure they know 100% of everything without every admitting that a piece or two may be flat wrong. I was listening to a radio debate between a creationist and an evolutionist the other day. The evolutionist (volunteered) that the high school biology teachers association's official statements on evolution (passed overwhelmingly) contained language about "unguided variation" which is innacurate. That is, until the ones who really new came along and made them correct it because it was flat out overreaching.
There is a lot of crap on both sides floating around. Intelligent design is just another round of crap in need of a good flushing away. From my perspective, the sole benefit to mankind of stupid ideas is that they make the good ideas stay on their toes and not become complacent and dogmatic when parts of the consensus are wrong.
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jay Zeno
When you can theorize cause, hypothesize results, test the hypothesizes, and observe the results about "intelligent design," then it's appropriate for the science classroom. Until then, it belongs in philosophy or sociology.
Just for kicks...
You can do the first two with Intelligent Design. You can do the first two for Evolution.
You can't do the second two for either. Just saying.
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
Quote:
Originally Posted by montythegeek
The problem of evolution is that both those in favor and against it are so damn sure they know 100% of everything without every admitting that a piece or two may be flat wrong.
And that's against science. No, Darwin didn't get everything right, and our understanding of evolutionary processes is, ahem, evolving. That's what science does - it forms the most likely postulates given the best available data. If the data changes, be ready to adjust the postulate.
I don't "believe" in evolution because it's not a matter of faith for me. I accept the simple, proven, observable fact that evolutionary processes occur. The biological types that I know aren't "evolutionists" any more than biochemists are "oxygen-exchangists."
Quote:
Originally Posted by Eques
You can't do the second two for either. Just saying.
No, you can test adaptation and survivability and genetic change in plant life, in the microbiological realm, and in sophisticated computer modeling (which is not an actual test, but a simulation, and can be pretty interesting). Evolutionary processes can be observed in fossil records, historical documentation, and real time.
I don't actually have a problem with "intelligent design," which goes back solidly to some neat writing during Renaissance times. But it's not subject to observation, it's not subject to changing data, and it's not a scientific approach. If we keep this year's viral mutation out of the philosophy class, then we let's keep spiritual guidance out of the science class.
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
Quote:
Originally Posted by threlayer
...Although he said that curriculum decisions should be made by school districts rather than the federal government, Bush told Texas newspaper ...
Interesting comment from a President who has done more than any toher to try and federalize our local schools.
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
INTELLIGENT DESIGN
Is it necessary to have a personable and intrusive Creator to have "intelligent design"?
NO
HERE'S WHY
The laws of nature are not random and arbitrary; they are precise and beautifully logical, even mathematical. Now, quantum physics tells us that we cannot predict anything with zero uncertainty, even if we have all the conditions, the precise knowledge of all the relevant laws, and a super-massive computer system calculating everything and even all the time we need to do the calculations (for example weather). The laws of nature are INTELLIGENT, meaning that they can be expressed and follow consistent and predictable logic patterns. Nature doesn't change its laws based on some anthropomorphic being deciding to do a group of things different now because of feedback from what "HE" sees as needing change. Natural laws are immutable and perfect. Now our understanding of them is imperfect and will always be, even though humans have made incredible strides in understanding things that we could not even imagine even just a few years ago.
Maybe this is mystical (I am). However, if you have to have a god concept, maybe GOD made perfect natural laws and just allowed the universe to happen because of them. Maybe this GOD initiated the Big Bang as an actualization of these laws of nature.
Now, I do not say that there has to be a creator of the laws of the universe. Maybe that is just the way things are in spite of whether or not there are intelligent beings trying to uncover them.
However, if one is purposely ignorant of natural laws and logic, or for some stubbornly-held opinion what I have just said is complete gibberish or probably sacreligious as well, then "What the Hell" do I care how ignorant these people are? Nature is independent of their superstitious and mislead opinions.
Don't expect me at the Pearly Gates. Oh, and you won't be there either.
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
Well, to play devil's advocate (an amusing term, given the circumstances):
It is our present grasp of reality that leads us to say that we cannot predict with zero uncertainty (usually discussed as the Heinsenberg Uncertainty Principle). But our present understanding of reality is highly imperfect, and for all we know, there is a method to predict with zero certainty. I'm not saying that there is; I'm just saying that we cannot with absolutely certainty say that there is not.
Some might intuit that the presence of order in the universe implies an orderly initiation.
There is nothing, except for human ambition, to say that an prime mover has to be anthropomorphic or have a gender. In fact, if there is a prime mover, quite logically, it is neither anthropomorhic nor has genitals.
If there is a prime mover, and if there is some equivalent of "pearly gates," neither you nor I can say who would or wouldn't be there.
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
Jay,
From dictionary.com
I think both our versions of recognition are covered by the word. hehehe
I think we both recognize that there are bad scientists/educators as well as bad pseudo-scientists. The bad also are more vocal than the competent, although competent pseudo-scientist is an oxymoron.
To quible with you -- Heisenberg's uncertainty prinicple is a narrow application to mechanics, not a universal statement of observation. Non-scientists attempted to expand the meaning. Certain things can be predicted with certainty. Atomic particle states cannot because observation, by necessity, changes the environment of the viewie.
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
Monty, I'm always glad to engage in fun angels-on-the-head-of-a-pin discussions, especially when they can be at least vaguely justified as on-topic.
Sure, the word covers what we both are saying. That's why I used the literary device of quotation marks around the word, to dilute its meaning. I was making the reference to the "-ist" side of things - to me, "evolutionist" describes a focus and belief structure that most biologists don't have. That was my device for getting the point across.
I agree there's bad scientists, pseudo-scientists, and they probably do as much harm to science as anti-science posturers.
I was using the Heisenberg reference specifically to quantum processes, and thanks for the clarification. It's been about 73 decades since my physics classes, but I remember the the principle as being that any observation is tainted by the act of observation itself; that the direction of a quantum particle cannot be predicted; that the more you determine momentum, the less you can determine position. Or something like that.
But my point, whether I'm accurate on it or not, was that unpredictability is true for us, for our knowledge, now. Perhaps Heisenberg will be proven wrong someday. He wouldn't be the first scientist to have that happen.
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
Quote:
Originally Posted by montythegeek
To quibble with you -- Heisenberg's uncertainty prinicple is a narrow application to mechanics, not a universal statement of observation. Non-scientists attempted to expand the meaning. Certain things can be predicted with certainty. Atomic particle states cannot because observation, by necessity, changes the environment of the viewie.
The interference by the observer is only the half of it. The fact is that this principle refers to the fact that the position or velocity of atomic particles cannot be determined other than by probability. The phenomenon of "tunneling" demonstrates this completely (tunnel diodes for example). Here it is not the observer effect; it is the assumed impossibility of a particle passing over/thru a potential energy barrier with reduced probability.
But you are right in that when it comes to larger sized objects (observable in our normal world, or the cosmos) this is not the case. We know macroscopic things can be predicted. As a concrete example you won't see a high jumper jumping 20 feet because of the tunneling effect.
Take the case of "protein folding" on a macro-atomic scale. Similar proteins fold differently, making different tissues out of the same macro-molecules. Depending on how the folding goes, different functions are enabled. This is not understood (it needs to be, to understand diseases for example) and is related to the quantum physics of the molecular segments/appendages that come into close contact.
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
This was to discuss Intelligent Creation. I think Nature is the intelligence and the universe is the creation. We just happened along, and we are not alone here.
When that (not being alone) someday is demonstrated to humans, MANY RELIGIOUS CONCEPTS will alter/vanish, hopefully along with human ego inflation (but I doubt it). I think that will change the nature of religion in the long run at least.
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
The real uncertainty in the creation of the universe is three-fold, as I see it:
(1) How all of this get started (what caused the Big Bang and how did all of that energy/matter get started or get assembled)?
(2) The physics of the Big Bang is infinitely complex (involves elementary particles, relavitivistic gravitation, mass-energy conversion, radiation, dark matter, dark energy, et all). This is where the "prime mover" comes into play. If some entity did this, along with all physics, man, that is some creativity!
(3) How did life itself start? I don't believe real life has yet been created by humans from chemicals found in natural processes. This is another place where the "prime mover" comes into play. Or maybe we humans just need another 100 years to figure out how reproductive life could spontaneously start.
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Evolution
How do the creationists explain the finding of paleontology and the many evolving species found, including plants as well? Don't tell me it is a trick God has played on us to test our faith. I am just not that gullible.
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
Quote:
Originally Posted by Eques
Just for kicks...
You can do the first two with Intelligent Design. You can do the first two for Evolution.
You can't do the second two for either. Just saying.
Yes you can. Dandelions growing in your front yard grow shorter stalks than dandelions growing out in a field somewhere...
Done, thanks for coming out...
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
threlayer,
The creationists are not all stupid (just blinded by their beliefs). They use the fossil record, or more accurately the inevitable holes as evidence that some force guide the process and "made" the jumps. While childish, it is not as naive as you believe.
Part of the reason the creasionist make headway is that they are perrenially being underestimated. If you try to treat them as misguided schoolchildren they will sneak up behind you. For them it is guerilla war again the forces of evil.
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Re: Bush Remarks On 'Intelligent Design' Theory
Monty, the fucked up thing about creation 'science' is that it relies on evolution 100%... It';s all about attacking science, and not about explaining things...