Churches urged to back evolution

British Broadcasting Corporation ^ | 20 February 2006 | Paul Rincon

[ToryHeartland]

Churches urged to back evolution By Paul Rincon BBC News science reporter, St Louis

US scientists have called on mainstream religious communities to help them fight policies that undermine the teaching of evolution.

The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) hit out at the "intelligent design" movement at its annual meeting in Missouri.

Teaching the idea threatens scientific literacy among schoolchildren, it said.

Its proponents argue life on Earth is too complex to have evolved on its own.

As the name suggests, intelligent design is a concept invoking the hand of a designer in nature.

It's time to recognise that science and religion should never be pitted against each other Gilbert Omenn AAAS president

There have been several attempts across the US by anti-evolutionists to get intelligent design taught in school science lessons.

At the meeting in St Louis, the AAAS issued a statement strongly condemning the moves.

"Such veiled attempts to wedge religion - actually just one kind of religion - into science classrooms is a disservice to students, parents, teachers and tax payers," said AAAS president Gilbert Omenn.

"It's time to recognise that science and religion should never be pitted against each other.

"They can and do co-exist in the context of most people's lives. Just not in science classrooms, lest we confuse our children."

'Who's kidding whom?'

Eugenie Scott, director of the National Center for Science Education, which campaigns to keep evolution in public schools, said those in mainstream religious communities needed to "step up to the plate" in order to prevent the issue being viewed as a battle between science and religion.

Some have already heeded the warning.

"The intelligent design movement belittles evolution. It makes God a designer - an engineer," said George Coyne, director of the Vatican Observatory.

"Intelligent design concentrates on a designer who they do not really identify - but who's kidding whom?"

Last year, a federal judge ruled in favour of 11 parents in Dover, Pennsylvania, who argued that Darwinian evolution must be taught as fact.

Dover school administrators had pushed for intelligent design to be inserted into science teaching. But the judge ruled this violated the constitution, which sets out a clear separation between religion and state.

Despite the ruling, more challenges are on the way.

Fourteen US states are considering bills that scientists say would restrict the teaching of evolution.

These include a legislative bill in Missouri which seeks to ensure that only science which can be proven by experiment is taught in schools.

I think if we look at where the empirical scientific evidence leads us, it leads us towards intelligent design Teacher Mark Gihring "The new strategy is to teach intelligent design without calling it intelligent design," biologist Kenneth Miller, of Brown University in Rhode Island, told the BBC News website.

Dr Miller, an expert witness in the Dover School case, added: "The advocates of intelligent design and creationism have tried to repackage their criticisms, saying they want to teach the evidence for evolution and the evidence against evolution."

However, Mark Gihring, a teacher from Missouri sympathetic to intelligent design, told the BBC: "I think if we look at where the empirical scientific evidence leads us, it leads us towards intelligent design.

"[Intelligent design] ultimately takes us back to why we're here and the value of life... if an individual doesn't have a reason for being, they might carry themselves in a way that is ultimately destructive for society."

Economic risk

The decentralised US education system ensures that intelligent design will remain an issue in the classroom regardless of the decision in the Dover case.

"I think as a legal strategy, intelligent design is dead. That does not mean intelligent design as a social movement is dead," said Ms Scott.

"This is an idea that has real legs and it's going to be around for a long time. It will, however, evolve."

Among the most high-profile champions of intelligent design is US President George W Bush, who has said schools should make students aware of the concept.

But Mr Omenn warned that teaching intelligent design will deprive students of a proper education, ultimately harming the US economy.

"At a time when fewer US students are heading into science, baby boomer scientists are retiring in growing numbers and international students are returning home to work, America can ill afford the time and tax-payer dollars debating the facts of evolution," he said. Story from BBC NEWS: http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/sci/tech/4731360.stm

Published: 2006/02/20 10:54:16 GMT

© BBC MMVI

[stands2reason]

Religion need not be specifically theistic to be religion.

[WildHorseCrash]

The Bhagavad Gita is Hindu sacred texts. I was making the point that one should not be surprised that atheists promote ideas that aren't in keeping with Christianity any more than one should be surprised that a Protestant promotes ideas that aren't in keeping with Hinduism.

[WildHorseCrash]

The Hindu Vedas predate the first written accounts of the Bible by centuries; that should mean they're more bona fide than Scripture.

I wonder why all copies weren't lost in Noah's flood?

[MamaB]

So, you are saying that we believe that God created us, that we are liars? Baloney. And I am not an useful idiot. My IQ is very high, thank you. I know what it is because as a high school student, I worked in the office and I looked to see what it was. I guess you could say I was sneaky.

I will go to whatever thread interest's me.

[stands2reason]

What I want to know is, when exactly did a letter of recommendation become an entitlement?

I bet it was right after I graduated... (grumble grumble)

[stands2reason]

Science is limited. Accept it.

[Jo Nuvark]

I believe the first written texts and alphabet were found at Ur of the Chaldeas. So it is possible that Moses wrote the Pentateuch.

FROM KARL RANDOLPH: Let’s go back to archeology: unless the reports I heard were wrong, the tablets at Ebla mentioned that there were two cities named Ur, one was Ur of the Sumerians and the other Ur of the Chaldeas. Two, the Bible (the only ancient document that records Abraham’s existance) states that he came from Ur of the Chaldeas. The conclusion I draw is that the Bible’s claim rules out that Abraham was from Sumeria.

So there were a lot of Semites who intermingled with the Sumerians? That doesn’t change the above equation, unless you can show that Ur of the Sumerians and Ur of the Chaldeas were one and the same city. Then how do you explain the Ebla reference? Karl W. Randolph. http://lists.ibiblio.org/pipermail/b-hebrew/2005-May/023497.html

First Alphabet Found in Egypt Volume 53 Number 1, January/February 2000 by Elizabeth J. Himelfarb

Along an ancient road in Egypt's western desert at the Wadi el Hol (Gulch of Terror), Yale archaeologists John and Deborah Darnell have discovered two inscriptions representing the earliest-known phonetic alphabet. The script, which incorporates elements of earlier hieroglyphs and later Semitic characters, was carved into a natural limestone wall alongside hundreds of Egyptian inscriptions about 4,000 years ago.

Although a few glyphs look familiar to readers of semitic languages and ancient Egyptian, the alphabet has not yet been deciphered. "Within a couple seconds you realize it's pretty odd-looking," says John Darnell. http://www.archaeology.org/0001/newsbriefs/egypt.html

THE FOUR VEDAS... together represent ancient Hindu thought at its most beautiful and esoteric and belong to the period 1500 - 1000 BC. wwww.indiaheritage.com/religion/hindu/vedas.htm

VEDAS not old enough.

[nmh]

"The Bhagavad Gita is Hindu sacred texts. I was making the point that one should not be surprised that atheists promote ideas that aren't in keeping with Christianity any more than one should be surprised that a Protestant promotes ideas that aren't in keeping with Hinduism."

Circular nonsensical logic is no excuse for ignoring the Bible was quite clear that the earth is round, oblong or whatever you want to label it.

[HiTech RedNeck]

Separate sheep from goats

[WildHorseCrash]

Surely you must admit that even the Bible NEVER claimed it was FLAT.

Actually, the bible, taken as a whole, is consistent with a flat-earth cosmology. This should be of no surprise, as this was the cosmology common in the Middle East at the time its authors wrote it. It is unsurprising that they had beliefs similar to their contemporaries and expressed that in their writings.

The Bible's references to the earth's four corners, its "foundations", about a tree so high that it could be seen from the furthest reaches of the Earth, a mountain so high that the ends of the earth could be seen by someone on the mountain, that the earth is fixed and immovable, that the heavens are a "vault" etc. are totally consistent with a flat earth cosmology. On the whole, they are inconsistent, without a great deal of interpretation and apologetics, with anything approaching the modern understanding.

Makes you wonder what they were reading when Galileo shocked them with the fact the earth was NOT flat.

Galileo's issue was professing belief in a heliocentric solar system, not a Earth roughly spherical in shape.

[freedumb2003]

So the scientists' guessing about what actually happened is more viable than the creationist guessing that God did it?

There is plenty of proof that meets scientific rigor of TTOE. Physical, empirical, observable proof. Or are the Red Shift, string theory, alterations to the Theory of Gravity which, surprise, is NOT what you see as a layperson, all scientists "guessing?"

Sorry, I still think both sides need to be presented, just not necessarily in the same class.

I have already said that religion can and should be taught in public school as theology or philosophy.

Knowledge can only grow when concepts are freely exchanged and discussed.

Allowing only ONE point of view is abhorrent to a People whose entire country is built around the ideals of Freedom

Agreed, so long as the topic at hand is subject to "viewpoints." Viewpoints about string theory may be subject to debate, but that debate is amongst scientists with the proper background and knowledge. Pastry Chefs (for example) with no scientific knowledge are not qualified to present a "viewpoint" on string theory even if they hold an opinion on it.

Evolution belongs with science, Creation with theology.

I think you are more in agreement than not with me.

[pollywog]

I serve a living, compassionate God whose desire is that NONE should perish but all have ETERNAL life.....your comment is sick! Are you sure you trust in Jesus Christ as Savior? don't think He would have responded in that way!!

Your best bet is to ignore these fallible mortals as I do and believe what God states.

[WildHorseCrash]

But you still have doubts...

Doubts? No. As an agnostic, I know for a fact that the question is unanswerable. So I don't worry about it.

[mlc9852]

No argument here.

[WildHorseCrash]

Your nonsensical statment is irrelevant to the fact that you were called on your rather childish statement expressing amazement that atheists would promote ideas that do not mimic your religious texts.

(Also, you really should correct that gaping ignorance of yours. It does the conservative movement no good when conservatives display ignorance of an elementary fact of the world, such as the identity of the Bhagavad Gita.)

[PatrickHenry]

A truly splendid post! Thank you.

[Jo Nuvark]

The Bible's references to the earth's four corners, its "foundations", about a tree so high that it could be seen from the furthest reaches of the Earth, a mountain so high that the ends of the earth could be seen by someone on the mountain, that the earth is fixed and immovable, that the heavens are a "vault" etc. are totally consistent with a flat earth cosmology.

BOOK AND VERSE PLEASE.
The Bible has proven conjecture to be fact more often than the reverse.

[presently no screen name]

Humans ARE animals



Only to those who have been brainwashed by their professors. They make you 'beg' for a good grade or recommendation letters!

BTW, are you house trained or do you just run wild, as in your thinking.

[stands2reason]

So God has two eyes, two ears and a bad back? And exactly how much chest hair?

I always took it to mean that our soul, you know, the eternal part of us, the real part of us, was the part of us made in God's image, not our gangly bodies.

[Junior]

The Vedas are the oldest extent religious texts, accurately dated to between the 12th and 15th centuries BCE. Older writings, including some Egyptian religious texts, have been reconstructed from later works. The earliest Biblical texts date from about the 6th century BCE (when the Israelites decided to finally write down all their stories) -- derived from clues within the texts themselves (the same types of clues that date the Vedas). The earliest extent copies of Biblical texts date from the 2nd century BCE.

So, no, the Bible does not predate the Vedas, no matter how much you'd like them to.