Month: April 2006
Seattle Times Reporter Rides The Misinformation Train and Mischaracterizes Discovery Institute and Intelligent Design
Tonight, Seattle Times reporter David Postman will moderate a debate over intelligent design and evolution between CSC Director Stephen Meyer and UW Paleontologist Peter Ward. If Postman’s article in the Times today is any guide, Meyer has his work cut out for him trying to correct and educate the moderator, as well as having to refute the typical mischaracterizations and misplaced attacks he’ll likely hear from Ward. The fact is that Postman came in to our offices and spent a fair amount of time interviewing Bruce Chapman, and separately going over the science of intelligent design (which is virtually ignored in Postman’s piece — funny for a discussion about a science issue) with Meyer.Yet his piece is full of errors Read More ›
Fair Fight Over Darwinism and Design in North Carolina
When the controversy over Darwinism and intelligent design is debated on university campuses, the deck is usually stacked heavily against proponents of intelligent design. North Carolina State University has shown, however, that the topic can be debated with the fairness and civility that ought to characterize academic discussions. On Thursday, April 20, before a crowd of some 200 people, a biologist and philosopher defended intelligent design, and a biologist and philosopher defended Darwinism. That debate continued Thursday night at N.C. State University before a crowd of almost 200 people. Sponsored by the NCSU and Wake chapters of the American Civil Liberties Union, the debate featured four speakers — one scientist and one philosopher from both sides of the issue. The Read More ›
Evidence for Human Evolution Still Scant and Controversial After 25 Years
A post made 2 weeks ago highlighted how in 1981, Constance Holden wrote in Science that emotions, rather than abundant evidence, often rule the field of paleoanthropology and its claims about human evolution. Yesterday, an article by Charles Matthews in the San Jose Mercury News reiterates that same point. Reviewing a book by Ann Gibbons, Matthews notes: “Gibbons, who reports on human evolution for Science magazine, gives a lucid account of the science involved in finding fossils, establishing how old they are, and ascertaining whether they in fact belong to the ancestors of humankind. She also shows how difficult and sometimes dangerous the work of hunting for 7 million-year-old fossils can be. And that, like most humans, anthropologists are subject Read More ›
Bowman Law Review Makes Good Points but Article Misunderstands ID
Legal commentary mentioning the Kitzmiller decision is now starting to appear in legal journals. In the Spring, 2006 issue of the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy, one of the most widely circulated law journals, the lead article addresses intelligent design, Kitzmiller, and the establishment clause. Cristi L. Bowman’s article, “Seeing Government Purpose Through the Objective Observer’s Eyes: The Evolution-Intelligent Design Debates,” is available here. Most of the article is about establishment clause jurisprudence, and an argument against part of McCreary County v. ACLU. Bowman argues that the government purpose prong of the Lemon test should return to focusing on “actual intent,” rather than trying to evaluate government purpose with an “objective observer.” Kitzmiller and the evolution-intelligent design controversy Read More ›
The Role of Evolution in Biomedical Research is Highly Exaggerated
Darwinists claim that their theory is the foundation of all science. Indeed, we are often told that nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of it. In a news article last November, a Stanford biologist claimed he had been guided in his research by Darwinian evolution: “Researchers at the School of Medicine uncovered obestatin [an appetite-suppressing hormone] by using the principles of evolution to pick clues from data held in the Human Genome Project, as well as the genome sequencing projects for many other organisms, among them yeast, fruit flies and mice. ‘Darwin led us to this new hormone,’ said senior author Aaron Hsueh, an endocrinologist and professor of obstetrics and gynecology.” The Stanford press release continued: