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Five Years Later, Evolutionary Immunology and other Icons of Kitzmiller v. Dover Not Holding Up Well
Judge Jones might not realize it, but in a recent article in the York Dispatch he admitted that his ruling in the Kitzmiller v. Dover case amounted to judicial activism. He stated: “The decision seems to be holding up well … No other school district has engaged in this kind of a battle. I hope that’s a product of the decision and perhaps the way that I wrote the decision.” As Lawrence Baum writes in his book American Courts: Process and Policy, “[w]hen judges choose to increase their impact as policymakers, they can be said to engage in activism; choices to limit that impact can be labeled judicial restraint.” By admitting that he sought to impact the policy decisions of Read More ›
Media Bias Trickle Down at the Seattle Times
In the New York Times, Mark Oppenheimer reports on the case of astronomer Martin Gaskell, who is suing the University of Kentucky for (alleged) religious discrimination. The article is fair, objective, and descriptively accurate. Perhaps the most interesting detail Oppenheimer reports concerns the “smoking gun” in Gaskell’s case: the text of a 2007 email from UK staffer Sally Shafer to two colleagues: “Clearly this man is complex and likely fascinating to talk with,” Ms. Shafer wrote, “but potentially evangelical. If we hire him, we should expect similar content to be posted on or directly linked from the department Web site.” To this gem, Gaskell’s attorney, Francis J. Manion, said: “I couldn’t have made up a better quote. ‘We like this Read More ›
Biologic Highlights New Peer-Reviewed Paper In BIO-Complexity On Evolutionary Algorithms
At Biologic Institute’s website Ann Gauger has posted a piece about the new peer-reviewed article in BIO-Complexity : In the recent past, several papers have been published that claim to demonstrate that biological evolution can readily produce new genetic information, using as their evidence the ability of various evolutionary algorithms to find a specific target. This is a rather large claim. It has thus fallen to others in the scientific or engineering community to evaluate these published claims. How well do these algorithms model biology? How exactly was the work done? Do the results make sense? Are there unexamined variables that might affect the interpretation of results? Are there hidden sources of bias? Are the conclusions justified or do they Read More ›
National Center for Selling Evolution Science Education’s Policy Director Josh Rosenau: It’s Hard to Distinguish Unborn Children From Cancer
National Center for Science Education official Josh Rosenau has chosen to pick up the pro-abortion mantle from P.Z. Myers, who despite expressing the wish that more women would abort their children, seems to have developed writer’s block since I asked him to define the characteristics that a human being must acquire before Myers would grant him/her the right to life. Rosenau, the Programs and Policy Director at the NCSE, is less reticent to publicly defend the pro-abortion cause. He begins his post by botching even the rudiments of the pro-life argument: Rosenau: “[Egnor] declares by fiat that every fertilized egg is a human and entitled to all the rights associated with personhood.” No. Biological science affirms that every fertilized human Read More ›
The Church of Science: Losing Our Religion?
Slate startled us the other day by publishing an insightful essay asking whether political and worldview presuppositions drive the debate over climate change on both sides — not only for those on the Right, but for combatants on the Left too, including scientists (who are mostly on the Left). It’s an elementary observation that should be evident to anyone who follows the evolution debate, but of course a welcome surprise coming from a venue like Slate. Author Dr. Daniel Sarewitz worries that because the ranks of scientists are so politically skewed, that threatens the trust that scientists currently enjoy among the public: This exceptional status could well be forfeit in the escalating fervor of national politics, given that most scientists Read More ›