Category: Culture
How NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory Punished David Coppedge for His Views on Intelligent Design
David Coppedge has worked on the Cassini mission since 1997. In 2000 he earned recognition for excellence, receiving the important role of “Team Lead SA” (system administrator), a role he held until his demotion in 2009. SAs oversee 200 Unix workstations, several high-capacity data storage units, networking equipment, and other specialized computing equipment across America and Europe. He has a wide breadth of knowledge about technical aspects of Cassini’s computers and networks and was heavily involved in all the mission operations. Coppedge has been a faithful and highly regarded JPL employee for many years, has led tours of the lab and has served as an outreach speaker presenting the Cassini findings to civic and astronomy clubs and school groups. Now, Read More ›
What You Can Do to Help David Coppedge’s Fight for Academic Freedom
UPDATED 01-27-2011 It’s an outrage that JPL employee David Coppedge was harassed and discriminated against for his pro-intelligent design views, but you can help him. If you want to stand up for academic freedom, this man needs to hear from you:Get ready now to call (preferably) or at least email Charles Bolden, NASA’s administrator, to express your outrage at the fact that Coppedge was fired this week. Here’s that contact information: phone: 202-358-1010; email: charles.bolden@nasa.gov. Your voice has an impact in this debate — make sure it gets heard!
Discrimination Lawsuit Filed against NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab for Harassing and Demoting Supporter of Intelligent Design
Supervisors at NASA’s prestigious Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) illegally harassed and demoted a high-level computer system administrator for expressing support of intelligent design to co-workers, according to a discrimination lawsuit filed in California Superior Court. The lawsuit was filed by attorneys on behalf of David Coppedge, an information technology specialist and system administrator on JPL’s Cassini mission to Saturn, the most ambitious interplanetary exploration ever launched. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory is a NASA laboratory managed by the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) where robotic planetary spacecraft, such as the Mars Rovers, are built and operated. Coppedge was a “Team Lead” Systems Administrator on the Cassini mission until JPL demoted him for allegedly “pushing religion” by loaning interested co-workers DVDs supportive Read More ›
Last Chance to Apply to Discovery Institute’s Summer Seminars on Intelligent Design
Finals might be over, but there’s still one deadline looming for college and graduate students. Applications for Discovery Insitute’s 2010 Summer Seminars on Intelligent Design are due this Friday, April 16. These two intensive summer seminars on intelligent design, science, and culture run from July 9-17, 2010 in Seattle. The first seminar is for students in the natural sciences and philosophy of science; the second seminar is for students in the social sciences and humanities (including politics, law, journalism, and theology). These seminars allow students not only to learn about ID, but to become equipped to make a difference as a part of the ID movement. Leading lights from the intelligent design community such as Michael Behe, Douglas Axe, Stephen Read More ›
“Crucial Gaps” Filled by Fossil Discovery? We’ve Heard That Before…
Another year, another fossil with some serious media backing. This week it’s a Homo habilis said to be “almost-complete” — of course, the report from the Telegraph also claims that Homo habilis was “previously unknown,” so you might want to take that with a grain of salt. In fact, you might want to read a bit more before you throw that OMG Missing Link Found! party I know you were planning. (Squatch is going to take it hard when you cancel his first music gig since the Sonics left town.) This is the same species that was reported in an AP article from 2007 which disowned Homo habilis as a human ancestor. As far back as 1999, a paper in Read More ›