Intelligent Design Theory: Science or Religion?

Evolution debate heats up for election season
(By JOHN HANNA, Associated Press, July 8, 2006)

TOPEKA -- An anti-evolution group launched an Internet campaign Friday to build support for Kansas science standards in schools, less than a month before elections that could decide whether those standards remain.

Officials from the Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture, based in Seattle, said they're trying to counter criticism of the standards from many scientists and national science groups.

John West, a center vice president, said in a national conference call with reporters that such criticism has resulted in a ''wildly distorting'' picture of the standards.

The standards, adopted last year by the State Board of Education's conservative majority, don't mention intelligent design or other alternatives to evolution. But they treat evolution as a flawed theory, defying mainstream scientific views. Critics contend parts of the standards are based on long-discredited arguments about evolution.

West said the center won't endorse candidates or otherwise become involved in races for five state board seats on the ballot. Instead, he said, its ''Stand Up for Science'' efforts, which involve a new Web site with a petition that can be signed and possibly radio ads, are designed to educate Kansans.

But Jack Krebs, president of Kansas Citizens for Science, which opposes the anti-evolution standards, said the timing of the campaign is no coincidence.

Of the five seats on the Aug. 1 primary ballot this year, four are held by conservative Republicans who supported the new standards. If two conservatives are defeated, it would shift the board's majority to the moderates.

''The intelligent design movement as a whole knows that if they can retain the majority, they'll have a victory,'' Krebs said. ''If they lose it, it will be another crushing defeat for intelligent design.''

The standards took effect in November and will be used to develop tests students take to measure how well schools are teaching, but decisions about what actually will be taught remain with 299 local school boards. Some educators fear pressure will increase to teach less about evolution or more about creationism or intelligent design, which says some features of the universe are so well-ordered and complex that they are best explained by an intelligent cause.

West and other backers contend the new standards will encourage a freer discussion in the classroom.

''Obviously, we favor intelligent design, but our science policy is that we favor good science education,'' West told reporters.

Critics see intelligent design as repackaged creationism. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that creationism can't be taught in public schools because it endorses a particular religious view.

West said the Kansas standards encourage schools to expose students to both the strengths and weaknesses of evolutionary theory. He refused to say how much the center plans to spend on its campaign but that it's necessary because of a ''year of misinformation.''

Krebs said trying to expose students to supposed problems with evolution is part of a strategy designed to lead them to embrace intelligent design.

The new standards say evolutionary theory that all life had a common origin has been challenged in recent years by fossil evidence and molecular biology. They also describe as controversial the theory that changes over time in one species can lead to a new species.

None of those statements were in Kansas' previous standards, which treated evolution as well-established and universally accepted by scientists.

I've had occasions of reading my 'horoscope' in the local newspaper, but it's only for 'entertainment' purposes. I don't believe in such things, but once in a great while, something will match what it says - sometimes a few days off. I call that 'coincidence.' They're general enough where many interpretations can be made from what it says, such as "you'll travel to a far off land." It's true, on Monday, I'm off to South America for fifteen days. c.i..

The new standards say evolutionary theory that all life had a common origin has been challenged in recent years by fossil evidence and molecular biology. They also describe as controversial the theory that changes over time in one species can lead to a new species.

"The view that living things in all the major kingdoms are modified descendants of a common ancestor (described in the pattern of a branching tree) has been challenged in recent years by (i) discrepancies in the molecular evidence, (ii) a fossil record that is not consistent with gradual increases in complexity, and (iii) studies that show that animals follow different rather than identical early stages of embryological development."

"New heritable traits may result from new combinations of genes and from random mutations or changes in the reproductive cells. Except in very rare cases, mutations that may be inherited are neutral, deleterious or fatal."

"Whether microevolution (change within a species) can be extrapolated to explain macroevolutionary changes (such as new complex organs or body plans and new biochemical systems which appear irreducibly complex) is controversial."

"The lack of adequate natural explanations for the genetic code, the sequences of genetic information necessary to specify life, the biochemical machinery needed to translate genetic information into functional biosystems, and the formation of proto-cells"

"The sudden rather than gradual emergence of organisms near the time that the Earth first became habitable"

except when he was fecundating when his theory was telling him that he really didn't ought to being and he knew it.

Come, messmates, pass the bottle 'round
Our time is short, remember,
For our grog must stop,
And our spirits drop,
On the first day of September.
For tonight we'll merry, merry be,
For tonight we'll merry, merry be,
For tonight we'll merry, merry be,
Tomorrow we'll be sober.

Farewell old rye, 'tis a sad, sad word
But alas! it must be spoken,
The ruby cup must be given up,
And the demijohn be broken.
For tonight we'll merry, merry be,
For tonight we'll merry, merry be,
For tonight we'll merry, merry be,
Tomorrow we'll be sober.

Jack's happy days will soon be gone,
To return again, oh never!
For they've raised his pay five cents a day,
But stopped his grog forever.
For tonight we'll merry, merry be,
For tonight we'll merry, merry be,
For tonight we'll merry, merry be,
Tomorrow we'll be sober.

Yet memory oft' will backward turn,
And dwell with fondness partial,
On the days when gin was not a sin,
Nor cocktails brought courts-martial.
For tonight we'll merry, merry be,
For tonight we'll merry, merry be,
For tonight we'll merry, merry be,
Tomorrow we'll be sober.

All hands to splice the main brace, call,
But splice it now in sorrow
For the spirit-room key will be laid away
Forever, on tomorrow.
For tonight we'll merry, merry be,
For tonight we'll merry, merry be,
For tonight we'll merry, merry be,
Tomorrow we'll be sober.

Quote:
except when he was fecundating when his theory was telling him that he really didn't ought to (be)being and he knew it.


Would I be correct were I to attribute this to an attenuation of synaptic effects resulting from an over- assimilation of Mr Smiths Extra Smooth? or would there be some actual meaning here?

"The war of all against all"

"Laissez-faire run amok, throat slitting competition."

"Might is right."

"Napoleon was right and every cheating tradesman is also right."

"Origin would gratify the free-market fanatics who reduce all the laws of action and human thought habitually to the lowest and most sordid motives."

"The Malthusian circle was ecstatic."

Thus,social amelioration is drivel.

Ken Lay was a saint.

Price gouging is perfectly natural and worthy.

Let the kids hear nothing else. Oh yeah!