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If anything, Darwinian evolution has metamorphosed into a dishonest attempt to preach materialist religion under the guise of science, while at the same time using the power of government to stifle scientific inquiry into evidence for Intelligent Design.

False, on several points.

First, the theory of evolution has progressed a great deal since Darwin's pioneering efforts.
Second, the theory of evolution is not a religion. (I did six years of grad school, with half my time spent in evolution and closely related subjects, and not once did anyone pass a collection plate! That proves it!) Naturalism may be a worldview, but it is not a religion.
Third, there is no scientific inquiry into ID. There is only religiously-motivated apologetics. If ID offered any explanatory power in science, and if it were amenable to the scientific method, it would have no problem being accepted.
Finally, the court cases have all come as challenges to attempts by ID and its kin to sneak back into science classes. You think excluding ID from high schools is "stifling scientific inquiry?" High school students are there to start catching up with science, not to do research. Until they actually learn some science they are not going to make any contributions at all.

If you truly believe in a separation of religion and state, then the state (to include state and federally funded science) has no business promoting Darwinism. If, on the other hand, you believe Darwinism should be taught in our public schools, then ID should be taught right along side it.

The fact that a small minority of religious believers disagree with the results of the theory of evolution does not discredit it as a science. It follows the scientific method.

On the other hand, ID is not science--it does not follow the scientific method--and it has no business in science classes.

But I am sure you disagree. So, a couple of questions:

What is the single most powerful argument you have for ID?

How many intelligent designers were there? Please explain the basis for your answer.

The most powerfull argument that I have seen for Intelligent Design is the complexity of the information that is coded in the DNA. To create a single protein long strings of amino acids must be placed in the correct order. The information about the order in which to arrange Amino acids is coded in the DNA which can have one of four bases at any location - this is similar to binary computer code which an can have either a 1 or a 0 at any location.

Natural selection would not favor the gradual evolution of a new and beneficial protein, because, the intermediate stages would not provide a benefit to the organism. So, the new proteins (or at least any chunk of protein large enough to provide a benefit) would have to develop by chance before it could be protected by natural selection. The odds against randomly generating such a beneficial protein are astronomical due to the large number of DNA bases that would have to be arranged in the proper order. This is why I believe that intelligent design was required.

So are you claiming that, because Gonzalez (outside of his classes, no less) researches anthropic coincidences that he is substituting religious faith for scientific inquiry? Are you actually claiming that research into these coincidences does not constitute scientific inquiry? Stephen Hawking certainly thinks it does. Have you or Shuckmaster actually looked at what Gonzalez does or any of his publications? Do you have any criticisms at all that pertain to him and not to some sort of amalgamation of every conclusion or statement made by the Discovery Institute or Young Earth Creationists that you’ve disagreed with?

The issue here is one man and what he specifically brings to the table.

Fine-tuning arguments do seem to be the design arguments most accepted by the scientific mainstream, even to the point that string theorists like Lawrence Krauss claim that if M-theory or some adaptation of it is wrong, design is the strongest alternative left. What is pretty clear is that physics departments are much more accepting of design arguments than biology departments. Maybe that’s because of a Platonist bias against materialism in the more mathematically elegant sciences and positivist bias for it in the more empirically based, messier ones, or maybe that’s because arguments based on the anthropic coincidences are are simply better than the ones based on irreducible complexity, specified complexity and the like.

Really, though that’s neither here nor there. The question is, should Gonzalez, who has proven himself to be more than able in his field, be denied tenure when his peers had already decided to award him it?

==What is the single most powerful argument you have for ID?

My single most powerful argument for ID is that there is intelligence and design in the universe.

BTW, ID does not attempt to explain who the designer is, they only seek to use the scientific method to detect design in nature. In that sense, their program is rather modest, in that they leave the identification of the designer for other disciplines (which, given our current understanding, is where you leave the realm of science and enter the field of metaphysical cosmology, religion, etc).

==The fact that a small minority of religious believers disagree with the results of the theory of evolution does not discredit it as a science. It follows the scientific method.

Sorry, Darwinian evolution is nothing more than a materialist myth. The evolutionists tell us “that major evolutionary changes happen far too slowly, or too rarely, to be observable in the lifetime of human observers. Most living organisms and their offspring are said to remain largely unchanged for tens of thousands, or even millions, of years. According to the evolutionist Theodosius Dobzhansky, even when evolutionary changes do occur, they are by nature ‘unique, unrepeatable, and irreversible.’ Dobzhansky tells us that the ‘applicability of the experimental method to the study of such unique historical processes is severely restricted.’ The well-known evolutionist Paul Ehrlich says the theory of evolution ‘cannot be refuted by any possible observations’ and thus is ‘outside of empirical science.’” Sounds like faith to me. In short, these so-called scientists have managed to put a stranglehold on the ideology of science and are nothing short of a new priesthood—evangelists, if you will, sent forth by the First Church of Darwin.