Category: Evolution
Academic Freedom Bill Introduced into New Mexico Legislature
New Mexico State Senator Steve Komadina has introduced a bill into the New Mexico Senate which would protect the academic freedom of teachers to discuss scientific strengths and weaknesses of evolution. The bill requires that the New Mexico Department of Education adopt rules to “give teachers the right and freedom, when a theory of biological origins is taught, to objectively inform students of scientific information relevant to the strengths and weaknesses of that theory and protect teachers from reassignment, termination, discipline or other discrimination for doing so.” The bill would not only protect teachers, but also students: it requires the adoption of rules to “encourage students to critically analyze scientific information, give them the right and freedom to reach their Read More ›
How Darwinist Myths Are Spread (Part II)
In Part I of this short response, I explained some false information about intelligent design promoted by George Kampis at East Tennessee State University. This second and final post will discuss the false information about both intelligent design arguments and Phillip Johnson that Kampis spread. Dr. Kampis’s view was summarized as: “Dr. Phillip Johnson, ID founder and longtime critic of Charles Darwin, rejects the concept of natural selection” There are many problems here. “Intelligent design” was founded by scientists, and the term was coined in its modern form by chemist Charles Thaxton in the mid-1980s, before Johnson got involved with the subject. Jonathan Witt’s The Origin of Intelligent Design: A brief history of the scientific theory of intelligent design gives Read More ›
Dogmatic Darwinism Is the Science Stopper
Robert Naeye at Sky & Telescope recently posted a simplistic rant against intelligent design. His logic is astoundingly bad, and his “attacks” on ID are the most elementary sort that have been rebutted too many times to mention. (But I will anyhow — go here, here, and here just to start.) Here’s his big complaint:
Are Darwinists Smarter than You?
We reported a survey last year (“Poll: 60 Percent of Doctors Reject Darwinism“) that showed a surprising percentage of doctors simply don’t agree with Darwinian evolution. While doctors seem to be more apt to doubt Darwin’s theory than biologists, apparently biologists and scientists are more apt to be arrogant than the general public.In a blog at The Panda’s Thumb, Steve Reuland writes: It is true of course that doctors are more prone to being creationists than scientists in general and biologists in particular. This is to be fully expected, as it’s unlikely that you’re going to find any one group of people who are more convinced about evolution than biologists and other scientists. But the fact is, we see a Read More ›
When the Non-religious Tell the Religious to Accept Evolution
I don’t necessarily believe that religion has to always be incompatible with evolution, but it’s always amusing when unreligious people try to convince the religious that Darwinism is highly compatible with religion. The famous example is of course Eugenie Scott, a signatory of the Third Humanist Manifesto, who recommends that biology teachers discuss pro-evolution theological viewpoints in public schools. This past week has revealed two more examples of attempts by unreligious scholars telling the public that religion and evolution are compatible: H. Allen Orr In an article in the latest issue of New York Review of Books, evolutionary biologist H. Allen Orr attacks Dawkins for fighting against religion and says, “it’s far from certain that there is an ineluctable conflict Read More ›