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Defense Attorney's Closing Argument in Dover Evolution Trial
National Center for Science Education ^ | 16 November 2005 | Patrick Gillen, Esq.

Posted on 11/16/2005 2:38:35 PM PST by PatrickHenry

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To: curiosity
I'm with the creationists in hoping the Lemon test gets scrapped.

If you undo the Lemon test, you're still stuck with the cases that Lemon attempted to summarize in that three-pronged test. It's difficult to see how a state action that has no secular purpose could survive a First Amendment attack. That's prong one. Prong two says that the principal or primary effect of the state action must be one that neither advances nor inhibits religion. Will the Supreme Court strike that down?

I suppose that in some ways the Lemon test is too strict. If a state gives its employees a day off for Christmas, that would technically be a problem under Lemon, and it shouldn't be. I definitely see some wiggle room in the future. But not in this Dover case. ID has no secular purpose (except fund-raising, book sales, legal fees, etc.).

61 posted on 11/16/2005 7:19:46 PM PST by PatrickHenry (Expect no response if you're a troll, lunatic, retard, or incurable ignoramus.)
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To: spinestein
The theory of evolution does fit that definition just as much as the theory of gravitation does,

I can drop a rock and see the effects of gravity. Show me the beginning of life thru evolution using facts and we'll see how well your science theory holds up.

62 posted on 11/16/2005 7:26:51 PM PST by taxesareforever (Government is running amuck)
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To: PatrickHenry

The testimony and evidence offered by Behe and Dr. Scott Minnich proved that IDT is science.

Bwhahaha. Even Behe admitted on the stand under oath that science had to be redefined for ID to be considered science. The defense attorney must think the judge is dense.

63 posted on 11/16/2005 7:39:18 PM PST by ml1954 (NOT the disruptive troll seen frequently on CREVO threads)
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To: taxesareforever
The theory of evolution does fit that definition just as much as the theory of gravitation does,

I can drop a rock and see the effects of gravity. Show me the beginning of life thru evolution using facts and we'll see how well your science theory holds up.

Do you not pay attention to what you are presented with on these threads? Or do you just not believe in evidence, and hence ignore what we say. You have been told many times that the beginning of life is not a part of evolution, yet you continue to insist that it is.

Evolution is about change, not origins. There are a lot of examples in PatrickHenry's List-O-Links, but you probably won't believe them either.

Do you really expect to impress anybody with your arguments if you cannot even get the basics correct? From your arguments, and the rigor of your method, it seems like you are promoting religious belief, not doing science.

64 posted on 11/16/2005 7:48:07 PM PST by Coyoteman (I love the sound of beta decay in the morning!)
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To: PatrickHenry
It's difficult to see how a state action that has no secular purpose could survive a First Amendment attack.

Easy. The purpose of the 1st Amendment is NOT to stop government from doing anything with a religious purpose, but rather to stop actions that have sectarian religious purposes, that is, actions that favor one sect over others.

Taken literally, the Lemon test would ban the pledge of allegance, the motto printed on our currency, and would even demand acts like closing the national Cathdral, stopping the daily congressional invocation, and firing of the congressional chaplain. Given that the founders had all these things, it's pretty hard to argue that the founders had the Lemon Test in mind when drafting the 1st Amendment.

Prong two says that the principal or primary effect of the state action must be one that neither advances nor inhibits religion.

It's hard to argue any of the above things don't have the primary effect of advancing religion.

Will the Supreme Court strike that down?

Yes, because to uphold it would have absurd legal implications for which the public would not stand.

I definitely see some wiggle room in the future. But not in this Dover case. ID has no secular purpose (except fund-raising, book sales, legal fees, etc

I think a better argument against ID is that it's sectarian.

65 posted on 11/16/2005 7:55:00 PM PST by curiosity
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To: PatrickHenry
Clarification. The founders did not put into place all the religious government actions I mentioned. However, they clearly had no problem with non-sectarian religious actions by the government, like the motto "In God we Trust," like the congressional invocation, like having a congressional chaplain on the payroll, etc. The cathedral and the "under God" phrase in the pledge of allegiance came later, I realize.
66 posted on 11/16/2005 8:03:12 PM PST by curiosity
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To: steve-b; Doctor Stochastic
Admitting supernatural causation into science is like admitting forged documents into the historical record.

... or allowing dice with the dots removed into a crap game!

[read Damon Runyon for details]

67 posted on 11/16/2005 8:10:13 PM PST by longshadow
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To: PatrickHenry

Thanks for the ping!


68 posted on 11/16/2005 8:13:25 PM PST by Alamo-Girl
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To: longshadow

That would be OK if Big Jule didn't remember where they were.


69 posted on 11/16/2005 9:04:01 PM PST by Doctor Stochastic (Vegetabilisch = chaotisch ist der Charakter der Modernen. - Friedrich Schlegel)
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To: curiosity

The plaintiffs' main argument is that the statement of the school board does not pass the Lemon test. Personally, I think it does.

The big question is whether or not the Lemon test survives. If it doesn't, the defendants will win. If it does survive, it's a closer call.


70 posted on 11/16/2005 10:04:18 PM PST by connectthedots
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To: Coyoteman; taxesareforever
Evolution is about change, not origins.

Seem to my that ID is more aboput origins than change. If that is the case, why do evolutionists attack ID? Based on your statement the two have nothing to do with the other.

Darwinian evolutiuon certainly did address the origin of life when I was in school; the whole primordial soup thing. Problem is advancement in the sciences clearly established the impossibility of such a claim, so much so that evolutionists had to simply drop all references or inferences about the origin of life.

To claim that evolution never address the origin of life is a lie.

71 posted on 11/16/2005 10:14:16 PM PST by connectthedots
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To: steve-b
WTF? Admitting supernatural causation into science is like admitting forged documents into the historical record.

That's another one for my archives. Goes along well with this gem from 1999:

It's the same trick Clinton's supporters used -- they divided the accusations against their Glorious Leader onto those which "do not rise to the level of impeachment" (micro-corruption) and those which "if proven, would justify impeachment" (macro-corruption), and placed every charge that did stick, regardless of objective severity, into the former category.

72 posted on 11/16/2005 10:57:49 PM PST by jennyp (WHAT I'M READING NOW: Art of Unix Programming by Raymond)
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To: steve-b
Can any of you creationists show me ONE breakthrough theory in science that has EVER been successful, that relied on the existence of the supernatural???

Integrated circuits run on magic smoke. This is proven by the fact that if you see the smoke escaping, the chip stops working.

Now that I think about it, I spent a lot of frustrating time trying to figure out how a car's differential transmits the energy with all those weird gears flying around in that strange configuration. But now I just accept that it's done by elves.
73 posted on 11/16/2005 11:01:42 PM PST by jennyp (WHAT I'M READING NOW: Art of Unix Programming by Raymond)
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To: jennyp

Every breakthrough in science is the result of a mind, of intelligence operating on a problem. The operation of the mind lies beyond the reach of any materialist explanation for it.


74 posted on 11/16/2005 11:06:32 PM PST by JCEccles
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To: connectthedots
To claim that evolution never address the origin of life is a lie.

Really? Then tell us, what did the first self-replicating organism evolve from? You can't answer that because that's like asking what's south of the South Pole.

75 posted on 11/16/2005 11:06:56 PM PST by jennyp (WHAT I'M READING NOW: Art of Unix Programming by Raymond)
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To: jennyp
Then tell us, what did the first self-replicating organism evolve from?

In the late 60s, Darwinian evolution based textbook for 9th Grade biology, said life arose from a 'primordial soup' and that the environmental conditions, like lightening etc, combined with whatever in the oceans formed the ingrediantd for the origin of life. Even remember seeing a film strip on the subject.

76 posted on 11/16/2005 11:15:37 PM PST by connectthedots
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To: jennyp
Can any of you creationists show me ONE breakthrough theory in science that has EVER been successful, that relied on the existence of the supernatural???

Quantum theory.

Hidden Variables

A term used with respect to the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen Paradox, first described by Einstein and his co-authors Boris Podolsky and Nathan Rosen in 1935.

Quantum mechanics makes an unusual prediction that although two entangled particles may be light-years apart, they seem to have the uncanny ability to affect one another instantaneously. If the two particles have a total spin of zero, for instance, an observer measuring the first particle's spin will instantly cause a so-called "collapse of the wave function," yielding a precise measurement of the second particle's spin. This information about the second particle becomes available to the observer far faster than the speed of light should allow.

Einstein challenged this prediction, which seemed to violate his own strict limits on the speed of information travel. Undefined "hidden variables" must be at work, Einstein claimed, in order for information about the second particle to become available instantaneously to an observer light-years away. Einstein called the effect 'spooky action at a distance' and attributed it to hidden variables.

In 1964, British physicist John Bell later disproved the notion that hidden variables affect interactions between particles with his well-known Bell's inequalities.

77 posted on 11/16/2005 11:38:29 PM PST by AndrewC (Darwinian logic -- It is just-so if it is just-so)
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To: jennyp
Really? Then tell us, what did the first self-replicating organism evolve from? You can't answer that because that's like asking what's south of the South Pole.

Easy. The chemicals that made it up. Important note: south is a concept.

78 posted on 11/16/2005 11:54:26 PM PST by AndrewC (Darwinian logic -- It is just-so if it is just-so)
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To: Coyoteman
You have been told many times that the beginning of life is not a part of evolution, yet you continue to insist that it is. Evolution is about change, not origins.

If there is no beginning how can there be change? I guess what you are saying is that since you don't have an answer there is no need to pursue it. Sounds like a copout to me.

79 posted on 11/16/2005 11:57:39 PM PST by taxesareforever (Government is running amuck)
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To: taxesareforever
"If there is no beginning how can there be change?"

We know there is an origin of life, Evolution just doesn't explain it, and NEVER has attempted to. The same way that Newton didn't attempt to explain the origin of matter when he worked out his gravitational theory. 'How could Newton describe motion of matter without knowing it's origin??!!' Simple: he took it as a given and didn't care where matter came from.

The same is true of evolution: it doesn't matter where life came from. The ToE only concerns what happened AFTER life was already here.

"I guess what you are saying is that since you don't have an answer there is no need to pursue it. Sounds like a copout to me."

Sounds like you are a slave to your preconceptions.
80 posted on 11/17/2005 12:20:26 AM PST by CarolinaGuitarman ("There is a grandeur in this view of life...")
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