Posted on 01/03/2006 12:12:37 PM PST by PatrickHenry
Also today, Dover's board might revoke the controversial intelligent design decision.
Now that the issue of teaching "intelligent design" in Dover schools appears to be played out, the doings of the Dover Area School Board might hold little interest for the rest of the world.
But the people who happen to live in that district find them to be of great consequence. Or so board member James Cashman is finding in his final days of campaigning before Tuesday's special election, during which he will try to retain his seat on the board.
Even though the issue that put the Dover Area School District in the international spotlight is off the table, Cashman found that most of the people who are eligible to vote in the election still intend to vote. And it pleases him to see that they're interested enough in their community to do so, he said.
"People want some finality to this," Cashman said.
Cashman will be running against challenger Bryan Rehm, who originally appeared to have won on Nov. 8. But a judge subsequently ruled that a malfunctioning election machine in one location obliges the school district to do the election over in that particular voting precinct.
Only people who voted at the Friendship Community Church in Dover Township in November are eligible to vote there today.
Rehm didn't return phone calls for comment.
But Bernadette Reinking, the new school board president, said she did some campaigning with Rehm recently. The people who voted originally told her that they intend to do so again, she said. And they don't seem to be interested in talking about issues, she said. Reinking said it's because they already voted once, already know where the candidates stand and already have their minds made up.
Like Cashman, she said she was pleased to see how serious they are about civic participation.
Another event significant to the district is likely to take place today, Reinking said. Although she hadn't yet seen a copy of the school board meeting's agenda, she said that she and her fellow members might officially vote to remove the mention of intelligent design from the school district's science curriculum.
Intelligent design is the idea that life is too complex for random evolution and must have a creator. Supporters of the idea, such as the Discovery Institute in Seattle, insist that it's a legitimate scientific theory.
Opponents argue that it's a pseudo-science designed solely to get around a 1987 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that biblical creationism can't be taught in public schools.
In October 2004, the Dover Area School District became the first in the country to include intelligent design in science class. Board members voted to require ninth-grade biology students to hear a four-paragraph statement about intelligent design.
That decision led 11 district parents to file a lawsuit trying to get the mention of intelligent design removed from the science classroom. U.S. Middle District Court Judge John E. Jones III issued a ruling earlier this month siding with the plaintiffs. [Kitzmiller et al. v Dover Area School District et al..]
While the district was awaiting Jones' decision, the school board election took place at the beginning of November, pitting eight incumbents against a group of eight candidates opposed to the mention of intelligent design in science class.
At first, every challenger appeared to have won. But Cashman filed a complaint about a voting machine that tallied between 96 to 121 votes for all of the other candidates but registered only one vote for him.
If he does end up winning, Cashman said, he's looking forward to doing what he had in mind when he originally ran for school board - looking out for students. And though they might be of no interest to news consumers in other states and countries, Cashman said, the district has plenty of other issues to face besides intelligent design. Among them are scholastic scores and improving the curriculum for younger grades.
And though he would share the duties with former opponents, he said, he is certain they would be able to work together.
"I believe deep down inside, we all have the interest and goal to benefit the kids," he said.
Regardless of the turnout of today's election, Reinking said, new board members have their work cut out for them. It's unusual for a board to have so many new members starting at the same time, she said.
"We can get to all those things that school boards usually do," she said.
You wrote: "I see. So the Intelligent part of Inteligent Design is merely a figment of my imagination."
Reply: I think you finally got it. You postulate that there is a god, he/she is intelligent and omnipotent. This god designs all things, intelligently, as we humans understand the word. Everything that happens, God did it. That explains everything. Supernatural intervention to make Noah's Flood? Supernatural guidance to make the Internet work? God directing every sperm and ovum on the planet? Gosh, there is no end to "intelligent design" being invoked to "explain" everything!
You posted: "In my opinion, even if you do not believe that Torasco [sic] v. Watkins provides the necessary legal weight, given your posted definitions and the Secular Humanism website that I cited, you would have to agree that Secular Humanism meets the definition of religion.
"You would have to also agree that the beliefs of the Secular Humanists sound an awful lot like many evo posters from Darwin Central...And their beliefs go way beyond science (into faith and religion)."
Reply: Roy Torcasso is alive and well and living in Maryland. If you are familiar with the case regarding Art VI in the Constitution, you might try to get the name right.
What is your definition of religion? Evolution has no alter boys, no prayers, no church establishments, no tax-exemption, no record of sex scandals, no pastors, preachers, or priests, no coming-of-age rituals like Bar Mitzvah or confirmation, no holidays, no banned books or statements about heresy and blasphemy, no record of burning witches or heretics, no public displays of prayer or piety, no holy book supposed to contain "All Truth', no recited creed, no mythological 'transubstantions', no edifices with crosses.
These are evidences of religion. The idea of evolution, based on observation of the natural world as we see it, does not have any of these attributes of religion.
Ipso facto, the Theory of Evolution, the Theory of Gravity, the Germ Theory of Disease are not religions.
Very nice post. We didn't descend from apes. God created humans as humans.
Evidently they suck.
Wrong, boyo. At the moment there are no other theories. IDers seem to think their position must be considered science even though it lacks any positive evidence or testable hypotheses. If or when ID proponents get off their duffs and actually do some science then and only then will they have a dog in this hunt. Poking at evolution does not constitute POSITIVE evidence for ID.
I know it comforts you to think there is some sort of Grand Conspiracy to keep the masses ignorant of all those "alternate theories" but in this day and age, with the advent of the internet, it should be pretty easy to get the word out on a new theory -- IF THERE ACTUALLY WAS ONE.
The government takes our money to pay for public schools. I would rather they not take it at all if I send my children to a private school.
I reckon you would accuse those who believe in theistic evolution as being "John Kerry" types. I have been clear in stating that science, when it excludes God entirely from its purview, is atheistic. I have been clear in stating this is a legitimate way to do science, whether it's embryology or geology. I have been clear in stating this type of science should be allowed a hearing in public schools. Lastly, I have been clear in stating that our Constitution does not guarantee the establishment of atheistic principles, whether it be in science classes or English classes, which essentially means that one may also undertake science with the assumption of an intelligent designer.
The controversy is really about the assumptions under which one receives and interprets the evidence. They range from atheistic to theistic and any combination of the two. They are all protected by our Constitution. They are none to be favored by the federal government.
So? It's no different than when a human designs an implement and then steps in later to tweak it. Big deal.
I thought by "X-rays" you meant the medical application. Either type of X-ray is designed, intelligible, useful, and behaves according to predictable laws. Either can comfortably be considered a product of intelligent design and thus further studied by science.
Granted, faith in God is indeed faith and therefore the reasoning may be considered circular, but no more nor less so than for naturalism. As in, "God doesn't exist, yet here we are, so we must have evolved through some process which God had nothing to do with."
I noticed you did not answer me about the law of gravity. Does that mean you understood what I was driving at?
I never understand what you are driving at - LOL. But I assume you mean there are different types of gravity but you don't deny gravity exists.
What difference does it make which God we're talking about? If I were suggesting that we teach kids specifically in the public schools that Allah from the Koran or Yahweh from the Old Testament, or Zeus or Kali created the universe you'd have a point. All I'm suggesting is that science remain open to the possibility that the billions of people who believe there's more to life than natural processes which work simply of their own accord not be dismissed on a tautological technicality (i.e., "We've defined science in such a way as to exclude the possibility of the supernatural, therefore only purely naturalistic explanations for our origins and development are potentially true").
You're correct, science can't test the supernatural, so therefore it can neither determine nor disprove its existence. So it should not operate on the sole assumption that it doesn't exist.
I could understand you fellows getting upset if Christians were demanding that a big chunk of science education be composed of religious teaching. But all that's usually asked for is a simple suggestion that maybe there is a God and maybe He had something to do with all this, or as in Georgia a sticker asking kids to keep an open mind. The hysteria that erupts over such usually modest requests is what leads many of us to think there's an agenda behind what you're doing.
Huh? An X-ray is an electromagnetic wave along with; Visible light, IR, radio, microwave, gamma, etc (the electromagnetic spectrum). The only difference is the wavelength, which directly corresponds to the energy being transported. BTW, the higher the wavelength, the higher the energy. See:
http://praxis.pha.jhu.edu/pictures/emspec.gif
and:
http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/waves/emwv.html#c2
"Rehm, who was one of 11 plaintiffs in the intelligent design trial ..."
Thanks for the brief expose. The electromagnetic spectrum may easily be considered a product of intelligent design.
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