“Box 2. Natural divisions
From the following article:
Intelligent design: Who has designs on your students’ minds?
Geoff Brumfiel
Nature 434, 1062-1065(28 April 2005)
doi:10.1038/4341062a
Evolution advocates say that researchers should be careful about how they respond to such overtures. If the request is for a public debate with an intelligent-design advocate, the best answer is ‘no’, argues Robert Pennock, a philosopher of science at Michigan State University in East Lansing. “A public debate is an artificial setting for getting into scientific issues,” he says. “There's no way in that format to thoroughly give a scientific response, especially to a lay audience.”
“A formal debate is not how we do science,” agrees Eugenie Scott, director of the National Center for Science Education in Oakland, California. “But I think it's appropriate for scientists to meet with students and educate them about what the real science is saying.”
That's what Victor Hutchison and his colleagues in the zoology department at the University of Oklahoma in Norman have been doing for the past few years. “We will not agree to debate the creationists publicly,” he says. “But we encourage faculty members and graduate students to attend their meetings and challenge them in the discussion.”
Jonathon Wells may feel like the fellow Friday of Robinson Crusoe fame. He lands on the beach but Robinson hides lest he be roasted, not toasted, and eaten.
Indeed, Eugenie Scott has written an article urging evo scientists not to debate Creation or ID scientists because...drum roll please...the evos always get beat!