What has the ID movement been up to, following Kitzmiller and subsequent defeats? Apparently, they are going back to their base. In 2006 and 2007, the ID movement has hosted a number of “conferences” around the country. They call them “conferences” because it sounds scientific, but they are more like weekend revivals, actually, where the ID guys are flown in, give their standard talks to the public, and with a full-time professional apologist like Thomas Woodward (apologetics.org) or Lee Strobel (author of The Case for a Creator, The Case for Christ, etc.) emceeing the event. In fact, the “largest ID conference ever held” was held last September in the Florida Sun Dome, well-known to be a common venue for scientific conferences.
So anyway, this year a series of “Darwin vs. Design” conferences have been set up, apparently in a cookie-cutter format with identical guests and topics, and hosted by Lee Strobel.
The bios of the speakers are online (PDF). This bit is interesting, and shows us another thing that the ID movement has been up to:
Session #3 Dr. Stephen Meyer, director of the Center for Science & Culture, editor of Darwinism, Design and Public Education, and co-author of the forthcoming textbook Explore Evolution, will explain why the information encoded in DNA points powerfully to a designing intelligence.
Oh my, what a clever title for the new Discovery Institute textbook! It’s almost like they picked one of the most common phrases for mainstream evolution education projects and websites, so that they could appear to be teaching science rather than doing religious apologetics.
And as we all know, picking new labels easily solves all conceivable problems with creationist textbooks.
I think your missing link is here: http://www.pandasthumb.org/archives[…]link_cd.html
Yeah, the “Evolution of Creationism” contains that post and several others.
That’s it. Two can play at this game. We need to write textbooks called “Exploring Intelligent Design” and the like, and nary a positive argument (as if there was one) can be found within.
That these events are being MCed be Lee Strobel is expected, I believe he has written in his The case for… books that you cannot accept evolution and be a Christian.
Is anyone of a PT persuasion going to any of these? I’d like to know how information in DNA points to the creator, but won’t be on a convenient continent.
R
Explore Evolution?
That names already taken.
Holy crap Im dense this afternoon. Sorry– just really love the HIV exhibit :)
LOL!
I hope to attend the event at SMU. I hate like heck to enrich these bastards by $55 though. I might try and sneak in instead.
In all fairness, they were forced to change the orginal and more accurate working title, “Spewing Crap,” after several PTAs objected.
Looks like SMU does not want to appear to be endorsing the DI jesus fest. They’re in enough hot water over the propsed Chimp Library there. Anyhow, check this out over at Dimbski’s home for wayward children:
http://www.uncommondescent.com/educ[…]ign/#respond
This is along the lines of certain countries calling themselves “Democratic People’s Republics”, isn’t it?
And the purpose of all these “Trojan Horses”?
To get the Bible into every classroom as an inerrant reference work. Imagine “critical thinking” on all subjects by referencing biblical dogma instead of reality. And, why not at the university level also? Picture a prof walking into a UC Berkeley science lecture hall and lecturing from Genesis: “Ok everybody, be sure to read about Noah and the ark. There will be a question about it on the midterm. And, don’t forget the AiG assignment!”
These fanatics would destroy all rational thought in every domain of knowledge. I think this is one of the most dangerous movements ever.
WAD whined:
How about this, Willy: We love evidence. We love rationality. We love coherent thought.
Give us some and we’ll love you, too… and that’s really what you want, isn’t it, Willy?
Evolutionary theory is the most frequently changing “status quo” I’ve ever heard of. ID’s definition of “status quo” is like professional sports’ “lifetime bans” that only last a few years.
Unfortunately, you can’t copyright titles. Ever see a movie called “Running Scared”? The next question is, “Which one?”
(I liked the 1986 one best.)
I love how the SMU cosponsor of the DI lovefest is the Christian Legal Society. It is a most apt sponsor.
Well, I suppose that there wouldn’t be much inanity offered in the “lunch” session, though indigestion might prevent proper enjoyment of the session.
While Gascoyne is roughly correct that titles are not ordinarily afforded copyright protection, the University of Nebraska State Museum appears to be using “Explore Evolution” as a trademark for museum services (and possibly other goods and services as well). If UNSM has trademark rights in “Explore Evolution” then that includes the right to stop another party from using the same or a similar mark on the same or similar goods or services where such use is likely to cause confusion among consumers. UNSM could possibly stop an author from using “Explore Evolution” as a title of a book.
Patent Attorney - Thanks. So, looks like they go with Vyoma’s alternate title, “Spewing Crap”. At least they won’t get sued for false advertising!
Tired, pedestrian, sophomoric, beat to death, wore out and sad.
Sadder is some will eat this up and spread it, near viral like. Do your neighbor a favor, dissuade him from such silly shit.
There is a “Darwin vs. Design” conference coming up next month at Southern Methodist University. Professors from SMU’s biology, anthropology, and geology departments aren’t too thrilled that their school is hosting the event. Naturally the DI is playing the persecution card.
These conferences are the unwashed speaking to the unwashed, the consequences of which are zero. No converts will come from this. The only damage I foresee is that done to institutions like SMU that get hornswoggled into providing the facilities and suffer from the implication, no mater how strongly they disclaim it otherwise, that they endorses the antics. Maybe the SMU science faculties should recruit students to picket the circus in gorilla and chimpanzee suits.
Checking Amazon.com, I found no book titled “Explore Evolution” or “Exploring Evolution”. Not good!
A new Trojan Horse is needed. I wonder what the plan is. I noticed that in Ken Ham’s response to the Sisters, Oregon firing, he said that leaving his name and the name of AiG on the materials used was a mistake by Helphinstine. (Feed the kids this junk but completely hide it’s source. Wow!) Got me thinking. What if a book were to remove all references to ID, the Bible, creationism, God, Discovery Institute, Ken Ham, or AiG? Part of ID was allowing religious folks (knowing that there’s only one god) to take the last step of identifying the designer with God–not requiring a long chain of deductions really. Suppose a strategy were adopted that leaves the believers to fill the “gap” all by themselves. Maybe with just a little hint like: “Some will see God’s work here; as a scientist, I make no claim about that.” I think the old Trojan Horses of “ID”, “teach the controversy”, and “critical thinking” are dead or dying. A new horse is needed. Ultimately, it wouldn’t work though because those who know what to look for could spot the attack easily. But, would judges spot it?
I was thinking about writing my own version. It’s title. “Intelligent Design Revealed”. The cover would be beautifully done with DNA strands and then a little finger at the corner touching it. It would of course be nothing but blank pages. The idea being that if your going to make it up. Why not let each person make it up on their own. You may use this idea freely.
I just ran across something called The Discovery Institute for the Advancement of Science and Technology Education
I haven’t figured out which side they’re on yet, but I did search their Mission Statement for the word “Jesus” and came up empty. If these folks are legitimate, they picked a very unfortunate name for their organization. The web pages say © 2000.
Seems legit. The domain is registered to Derrick Lavoie, a biology professor (Ecology and marine bio) at Cuesta College (a community college) in San Luis Obispo. Here’s a link about what he’s up to. Seems on the up-and-up.
One way or the other, they’re getting into the schools.
Caution: starts with loud music. National Council on Bible Curriculum. Claims curriculum has been voted into 382 school districts in 37 states.
Then we have the book “The Bible and Its Influence” from Bible Literacy Project. Claim: “After first 18 months, The Bible and Its Influence, is used in 83 school districts in 30 states” Note that the Time Magazine article link is for April 2, 2007. (Yup, that’s what the cover looks like.)
I wonder if there will be any “teach the controversy” or “critical thinking skills” content to this curriculum?
Come to the Sun Dome on Sunday! Sunday! Sunday! for the Semi-annual Boat show and ID monster-truck Rally! See the amazing “Wild” Bill Dembski drive Bigfoot over a million flaming copies of “The God Delusion”! Watch in awe as “Mighty” Casey Luskin Jumps Gravedigger over 16 buses full of evilution indoctrinated schoolchildren! Cheer as Truckasaurus does battle with a 90-foot tall papier-mache effigy of Charles Darwin depicted as a monkey! It’s Science! Science! Science!
Tea, meet monitor. You owe me, Sophist.
It never ceases to amaze me how people will quote Strobel as a reference in a scientific discussion. Sometimes I lose all hope for even the people in my own family when they read that and think they are enriching their understanding of science. I still humor my family by reading his work, but they can’t grasp my return arguments or any evidence not handed out at the latest church rally.
Stroebel and Woodward aren’t the only well-trotted-out apologists they’ve acquired. I’m sure most of us here have at least a passing familiarity with Dr. William Lane Craig, i.e. “That Kalam Argument Guy.” I didn’t know he was a fellow at the DI until I re-read his Wikipedia entry. I wonder what sort of contributions he’s made to the more well-worn ID talking points. His area of concern is mainly cosmogony rather than biology and we haven’t heard nearly as much about Cosmological ID in the news.
Tangental: the wiki article also on the page is a link to a debate between he and Dr. Bart Ehrman of Misquoting Jesus infamy, the subject being the ressurection of Jesus and whether it’s historically likely. I recommend the Misquoting book, which is a nice introduction to the layperson about Textual Criticism of the Bible and (implicitly, sometimes explicitly) why Literalism is foolish. Ehrman even goes a little into his own personal religious history, from “born again” to “agnostic” and how learning more about the Bible rather than just reading it led him into the latter. The content of the book itself and the examples it uses are almost entirely uncontroversial to textual critics (despite not meshing well at all with a lot of fundamentalist ideas about scripture), even if Dr. Ehrman takes more controversial stances in other areas of Christian history. A little knowledge about the history of the Bible itself is a useful thing to have.
Hellobmh - this is just a testing, don’t worry about it
Students of who or what? Cheaper by the busload. Who will the lucky groups be?
Thomas Woodward and Lee Strobel are really honest peoples who had explored the substance of the Neo-Evolution idea. As you see the pictures on left side of this page, the earth and its plants and animals are so beautiful. If those were evolved by Darwinian Evolution process such as mutation and natural selection, those could not be so beautiful. If you gave a brush and some paints to apes, evolutionist grandfather, they can not make any of beautiful pictures. Apes will draw the picture as random process. Those will not be beautiful, and those shall be chaotic matters like evolution thoughts. How do you think about your wife or your daughter who are so beautiful to you. Can you imagine that they were evolved from some dust? If you think so, you are a liar. There is zero probability that evolution makes human beings from dust. Do you think the nature selects beautiful things only? If it is correct, the evolution process has a directional attribute in the prcess. It is not natural selection. I can not understand Darwinian peoples.
I have two comments.
First, I think this site would be oh-so-much more professional and convincing if you managed to comment on recent developments in the ID community without making snide comments about it. Really.
Maybe it will make evolutionists laugh. Maybe that’s all you’re looking for. But if you’re here to give people news or information, the sarcasm adds nothing, and it detracts from the respect that people have for you. Does it make you look good to say things like, “Oh my, what a clever title for the new Discovery Institute textbook!”? Think about it.
Secondly. I believe that students in any school, anywhere, should not be taught one point of view and one only. School is not meant to teach students FACTS. It is meant to teach them to THINK. You present both sides of the matter, you give them the FACTS, and you let them decide for themselves. What kind of math teacher tells his students to memorize 2+2, but does not teach them to add? Maybe you’re against evolution. Maybe you’re against ID. It doesn’t matter. Whether you’re right or wrong is not determined by how many people you ‘convert’ to your side.
I suppose you are right Mel. However, keep in mind that scientists are people too. After suffering through years of having their work misrepresented, having novices (or worse) dismiss years of their painstaking research based on the most superficial of analysis, having lies told about them and their views, and having their evidence-based responses completely ignored, it’s understandable that they’d get a little snide.
The bottom line that becomes clearer the more one follows this debate is that the ID community is not interested in an honest discussion of the science. They are political animals pursuing a political agenda. As such they aren’t worthy of the sort of respect you are requesting for them
School is meant to teach kids facts AND to teach them how to think, though granted we could do a lot better job on the latter. However, allowing kids to draw whatever conclusions they want is just silly, especially when we consider that on most subjects there are FAR more than “both” sides. There could be hundreds of competing hypothesis. And you think we should overwhelm the kids with all of this and hope they can figure it out? Rubbish.
Kids don’t know how to discern the truth of complicated matters like world history and biology, which is part of why we have schools (and research scientists) in the first place - to weed out the nonsense, and let kids benefit from the work of those who preceded them.
I agree, but your comment above suggests we shouldn’t tell the kids that 2+2=4, but should let them make up their own mind about it. We should (according to you) also present them with the theory that 2+2=5, and hope they figure out which is true.
Shouldn’t we instead teach them both the fact that 2+2=4 and the process of addition that leads to that fact? Likewise, why shouldn’t we teach them both the fact of common descent and the scientific theory of evolution that explains that fact?
There is no one here that would disagree with you. Reality, revealed through the results of falsifiable testing, is the ultimate arbiter. The purpose of schools is to give the kids the benefits of the knowledge gained from that process, as well as an appreciation for that process so they might one day be capable of implementing it themselves. That process has conclusively shown that evolution is solid science and ID isn’t, and kids should be made aware of that. There is no reason to expect or want kids to figure it all out themselves.
FUCK THE RELIGIOUS WAY
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