Author: Jonathan Witt
Darwinism: Weeding out the Weak
World magazine has a brief essay and interview with historian Richard Weikart on how Germany moved from Darwin to Hitler. The essay begins, “Phillip Johnson, leader of the Intelligent Design movement, writes, “The philosophy that fueled German militarism and Hitlerism is taught as fact in every American public school, with no disagreement allowed.” The interview concludes with Weikart noting that “Darwinist terminology and concepts are prominent in many of Hitler’s writings and speeches.” In the example Weikart gives, Hitler is explaining the danger of saving and caring for the weak and imperfect: The natural struggle for existence, which only allows the strongest and healthiest to survive, will be replaced by the obvious desire to save at any cost even the Read More ›
Benedict XVI: Science May Have a New Friend and Neo-Darwinism a New Foe
Cardinal Ratzinger’s sermon at the Mass for the Election of a Supreme Pontiff has been trumpeted as a frontal assault against cultural relativism. This it was and, yet, digging deeper one finds reason to believe that Ratzinger, the newly elected Pope, may also have materialist interpretations of science (including Darwinism) in his sights. In an impassioned essay at NRO, Michael Novak writes:
Agronomists Poll Leads to Surprising Result
Update: Craig Roberts, Editor-in-Chief of Crop Science Society of America, pointed out that the poll noted below was posted for the normal, two-week period of time before giving way to the next two-week Quick Question. The ASA should be commended for leaving the poll up for the full period, and for all of its members who support free scientific inquiry into the question of origins. The post has been updated to incorporate Roberts’ information. As William Dembski notes here, there’s a new fad among professional societies — denouncing intelligent design. Perhaps somebody wanted the American Society of Agronomy to join the new fad; but agronomists, apparently, don’t herd very well. The society conducted an online poll regarding the teaching of Read More ›
Darwin Loyalists Unanimous in Their Loyalty to Darwinism!
The latest Wichita Eagle story on the upcoming Kansas science hearings does a solid job of explaining that the 23 scientists are coming to testify about the weaknesses in Neo-Darwinism, not to push for public school teaching of intelligent design. The story is mostly balanced, giving the Darwinists against balanced classroom coverage of their theory plenty of rope to hang their argument. As one reads the story, their reasoning becomes all to clear. Boiled down it works something like this:
AP Story Gets it Wrong: The Kansas Hearings are About the Weaknesses in Neo-Darwinism
An AP story on the upcoming hearings on Kansas science standards contains a crucial error. According to the lead, the hearings “will have as many as 23 witnesses speaking in support of teaching public school children intelligent design alongside the theory of evolution.” In fact, few if any of the featured scientists are pushing for design theory in the curriculum. That’s not even on the table in the science standards. Indeed, some of those speaking, like Italian geneticist Giuseppe Sermonti, aren’t even design theorists. They’re simply calling for students to learn the strengths and weaknesses in Darwin’s theory of evolution, rather than the air-brushed presentation of evolutionary theory they currently get. Why are some Darwinists so keen to obscure this Read More ›