Posted on 07/13/2007 8:27:37 AM PDT by Turret Gunner A20
Intelligent Design scientist faults university evolution ideology
A scientist who believes the theory of intelligent design helps explain life's origins is appealing to state officials to save his job at Iowa State University, where his tenure was rejected because of his "personal religious and ideological beliefs."
snip
John West, associate director of the Discovery Institute's Center for Science & Culture, where Gonzalez is a senior fellow, said the tenure denial is "clearly a result of the vicious attacks he's had to endure from Darwinists and various atheists for presenting a scientific argument for the intelligent design of the universe based on the empirical evidence from physics and astronomy."
Gonzalez, who will be out of his job at ISU after the 2007-2008 year if the decision is not changed, was rejected by officials despite his publication of 68 peer-reviewed scientific articles, nearly four times what his own department suggests as a standard for "excellence."
His articles also have the highest normalized citation count among all of the astronomers in his department, a standard used to evaluate the work of professors.
"Incredibly, ISU's President Geoffroy denied tenure to Gonzalez while approving 91 percent of those applying for tenure this year," said West. "Geoffroy even promoted to full professor one of Gonzalez's chief persecutors at ISU, atheist religion professor Hector Avaloz, who believes that the Bible is worse than Hitler's Mein Kampf."
The day after ISU's president announced his rejection of Gonzalez's first appeal, a member of ISU's department of physics and astronomy published an article in the Des Moines Register openly admitting that Gonzalez's support for intelligent design was the only reason he voted against tenure for Gonzalez.
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Gonzalez has said he does not teach intelligent design at the school
(Excerpt) Read more at worldnetdaily.com ...
Sue the bastards.
Suing won’t accomplish much, especially since a liberal judge will not be sympathetic.
As a rule, the most you can get out of a tenure dispute lawsuit is a year’s salary, but not reinstatement, because university’s are presumed to know what is best for them in the academic line.
That said, this case is really atrocious. Not only has he published a lot of ground-breaking, widely recognized work, he doesn’t push Intelligent Design in his classes—unlike his critics, who I am sure push Darwinism down their students’ throats and fail any student who objects.
Darwinists simply cannot permit any slightest questioning of their beliefs.
But he can get publicity. That’s worth much more than a year’s salary.
“Darwinists simply cannot permit any slightest questioning of their beliefs.”
I’ve noticed that of many people on both the creationist and evolutionist sides of this issue.
Before you ask, I’m on the “waiting for enough information to make an informed decision” side.
Maybe he could do what Michael Moore would do and make a movie to showcase these cretins to the world for what they are.
All well and good, but how are you going to have enough information if one side of the debate is silenced?
Yes, very true. But at least if you apply for a job at a Baptist university with requirements such as promising never to drink, smoke, dance with anyone not your wife, and swear that Jesus is your personal savior, and that you believe in the literal truth of the Bible, then you know what you are getting into, and you would be foolish to pursue a job there unless you agreed with these views.
Iowa State doesn't make prospective science professors sign a Darwinist loyalty oath before hiring; that embarrass them and probably violate the state constitution. But in practice, that is their real position. It's our way or the highway, Darwin or the dustbin.
I’ve read other article about this, and I’ve had a look at his publication list. His publications are all in reputable peer-reviewed journals, he has been praised in journals such as “Nature,” and he has published about ten times as much as most people in his position.
He takes in interest in ID, but he does not push it in his scientific articles or in the classroom. In other words, there is nothing there to justify denying him tenure.
Sorry - I have no problem with the department denying tenure. Although he is an expert in the field of astronomy, his views on biology are no more scientifically valid than any other layperson. I would no more give him tenure than I would a biologist who insisted on being a vocal member of the Flat Earth Society. Both would use their positions of tenure to legitimize scientifically unsupportable stands, reflecting very poorly on other faculty members, the science departments, and the university. Why doesn’t the Discovery Institute (chuckle) just hire him full time where he can follow what is obviously his passion?
Am I reading this correctly, this guy teaches astronomy? What the hell does that have to do with evolution?
“but how are you going to have enough information if one side of the debate is silenced?”
I have plenty of information from both sides. The question is how are students at this and other state-run universities and grade schools going to have that information. The answer is: They’re not, as long as the tax supported schools exist.
When the creationists ran the schools evolution theory was silenced. Now that the evolutionistas are running the show creationists are silenced. The answer is PRIVATIZATION. My wife and I homeschool all three of our children for reasons like these.
Reason is the first casualty of government school.
Read my post in 14.
There is a solution.
He's gone to other IU campuses to lecture on ID.
This guy needs help from FIRE
FIRE - Foundation for Individual Rights in Education
Well, so what? He is a astrophysicist, and he has a side interest in ID. Astrophysics really has nothing to do with Darwin one way or the other. What he does has to do with spectrum analysis, searching for stars with planets, and mathematical analysis. No one has questioned the quality of this work, which is ground-breaking.
If he wants to give lectures on some other interest, such as Intelligent Design, or on the use of proportion in Renaissance Archictecture as a manifestation of the ancient belief that the fundamental basis of the universe is mathematical, or why we have not been visited openly by aliens if the universe is full of habitable planets—an issue on which various scientists have speculated—why not?
“this guy teaches astronomy?”
astrology=astronomy
alchemy=chemistry
religion=philosophy
As hard as it may be to believe, him being an academic egg-
head brainiac and everything, maybe he’s just a screwball.
IMHO, that makes the claim that his interest in ID purely a personal belief that he doesn’t attempt to bring into the classroom suspect.
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