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The commonly cited case for intelligent design appeals to: (a) the irreducible complexity of (b) some aspects of life. But complex arguments invite complex refutations (valid or otherwise), and the claim that only some aspects of life are irreducibly complex implies that others are not, and so the average person remains unconvinced. Here I use another principle autopoiesis (self-making)-—to show that all aspects of life lie beyond the reach of naturalistic explanations...

A bill to overhaul the way evolution is taught in Louisiana public schools easily cleared its final legislative hurdle Monday despite threats of a lawsuit. Opponents, mostly outside the State Capitol, contend the legislation would inject creationism and other religious themes into public schools. However, the Senate voted 36-0 without debate to go along with the same version of the proposal that the House passed last week 94-3. The measure, Senate Bill 733, now goes to Gov. Bobby Jindal, who is expected to sign it. Backers said the bill is needed to give science teachers more freedom to hold discussions...

Philosophers, scientists and other intellectuals close to Pope Benedict will gather at his summer palace outside Rome this week for intensive discussions that could herald a fundamental shift in the Vatican's view of evolution. There have been growing signs the Pope is considering aligning his church more closely with the theory of "intelligent design" taught in some US states. Advocates of the theory argue that some features of the universe and nature are so complex that they must have been designed by a higher intelligence. Critics say it is a disguise for creationism. A prominent anti-evolutionist and Roman Catholic scientist,...

Austrian Cardinal Christoph Schonborn of Vienna said he thought Darwin's theories on evolution deserve to be studied in schools, along with the scientific question marks that remain. It is right to teach "the science of Darwin, not ideological Darwinism," Cardinal Schonborn said Aug. 23. He spoke at a meeting in Rimini sponsored by the Catholic lay movement Communion and Liberation, and his remarks were reported by Italian newspapers. In 2005, Cardinal Schonborn helped fuel the debate over evolution and intelligent design when he wrote in The New York Times that science offers "overwhelming evidence for design in biology." He later...

Show links Darwin, Hitler ideologies Holocaust was fallout of evolution theory, says new production -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted: August 19, 2006 1:00 a.m. Eastern © 2006 WorldNetDaily.com Charles Darwin should share with Hitler the blame for the 11 million or more lives lost in the Holocaust, a new television special explains. And, the program says, the more than 45 million American lives lost to abortion also can be blamed on that famous founder of evolutionary theory. The results of Darwin’s theories "This show basically is about the social effects of Darwinism, and shows this idea, which is scientifically bankrupt, has probably been...

Godless: The Church of Liberalism by Ann Coulter Coultergeist A Review by Jerry Coyne H. L. Mencken once responded to a question asked by many of his readers: "If you find so much that is unworthy of reverence in the United States, then why do you live here?" His answer was, "Why do men go to zoos?" Sadly, Mencken is not here to ogle the newest creature in the American Zoo: the Bleached Flamingo, otherwise known as Ann Coulter. This beast draws crowds by its frequent, raucous calls, eerily resembling a human voice, and its unearthly appearance, scrawny and pallid....

Criticism Of Evolution Can't Be Silenced by Phyllis Schlafly, August 16, 2006 The liberal press is gloating that the seesaw battle for control of the Kansas Board of Education just teetered back to pro-evolutionists for the second time in five years. But to paraphrase Mark Twain, reports of the death of the movement to allow criticism of evolution are grossly exaggerated. In its zeal to portray evolution critics in Kansas as dumb rural fundamentalists, a New York Times page-one story misquoted Dr. Steve Abrams (the school board president who had steered Kansas toward allowing criticism of evolution) on a...

Evolution is on the way out - more than 30% of students in the UK say they believe in creationism and intelligent design. Harriet Swain reports on a surprising new survey. *snip* This means more than 30% believe our origins have more to do with God than with Darwin - evolution theory rang true for only 56%. Opinionpanel Research's survey of more than 1,000 students found a third of those who said they were Muslims and more than a quarter of those who said they were Christians supported creationism. Nearly a third of Christians and 10% of those with no...

A comparison of peoples' views in 34 countries finds that the United States ranks near the bottom when it comes to public acceptance of evolution. Only Turkey ranked lower. Among the factors contributing to America's low score are poor understanding of biology, especially genetics, the politicization of science and the literal interpretation of the Bible by a small but vocal group of American Christians, the researchers say. “American Protestantism is more fundamentalist than anybody except perhaps the Islamic fundamentalist, which is why Turkey and we are so close,” said study co-author Jon Miller of Michigan State University. The researchers combined...

Behe Jumps the Shark By P Z Myers Nick Matzke has also commented on this, but the op-ed is so bad I can't resist piling on. From the very first sentence, Michael Behe's op-ed in today's NY Times is an exercise in unwarranted hubris. In the wake of the recent lawsuits over the teaching of Darwinian evolution, there has been a rush to debate the merits of the rival theory of intelligent design. And it's all downhill from there. Intelligent Design creationism is not a "rival theory." It is an ad hoc pile of mush, and once again we catch...

An evaluation of DNA/RNA mutations indicates that they cannot provide significant new levels of information. Instead, mutations will produce degradation of the information in the genome. This is the opposite of the predictions of the neoDarwinian origins model. Such genome degradation is counteracted by natural selection that helps maintain the status quo. Degradation results for many reasons, two of which are reviewed here. 1) there is a tendency for mutations to produce a highly disproportionate number of certain nucleotide bases such as thymine and 2) many mutations occur in only a relatively few places within the gene called “hot spots,”...

10 Ways Darwinists Help Intelligent Design (Part I) ---------------------------------------------- Eighty years after the Scopes “Monkey” Trial, the public still refuses to accept the idea that Darwin’s theory of natural selection is a sufficient explanation for complex biological phenomena. In fact, opinion polls show that fewer people are willing to accept the idea that human beings developed from earlier species than they were just ten years ago. In Britain—a country that is not exactly known for fundamentalist Christianity—fewer than half accept the theory of evolution as the best description for the development of life. (And more than 40% of those polled...

What’s the Matter with Kansas? Dishonest Darwinists -- coming to a state near you. By David Klinghoffer ----------------------------------- State school-board elections don’t normally receive much national media attention. Yet the school-board primary race in Kansas on Tuesday, representing a key front in the Darwin wars, was an exception. Will Darwinism be taught as unquestionable dogma? That’s the question that voters decided. In Kansas, it seems it will. Kansas has been one of five states with biology curricula that include instruction about the evidence both for and against neo-Darwinism, requiring that students learn about the “critical analysis” of evolutionary theory. Darwin...

As the August 1, 2006, Kansas primary elections approach, evolution is a burning issue. The state board of education is at the center of the furor, of course; in November 2005, the board voted 6-4 to adopt a set of state science standards that were rewritten, under the tutelage of local "intelligent design" activists, to impugn the scientific status of evolution. The standards were denounced by a host of critics, including a group of 38 Nobel laureates (PDF), the National Science Teachers Association, the National Academy of Sciences, the , the American Institute for Biological Sciences, the committee that wrote...

I seem to have got myself elected to the post of NR’s designated point man against Creationists.* Indignant anti-Creationist readers have urged me to make a response to George Gilder’s long essay “Evolution and Me” in the current (7/17/06) National Review Well, I'll give it a shot. I had better say up front that I am only familiar with George’s work — he has written several books, none of which I have read, I am ashamed to say, since I know he has read one of mine — in a sketchy and secondhand way, so what follows is only a...

Education Creationism taught by design CREATIONISM is finding its way into university lecture halls, raising concerns with some academics that the biblical story of creation will be given equal weight to Darwin’s theory of evolution. Compulsory lectures in intelligent design and creationism are going to be included in second-year courses for zoology and genetics undergraduates at Leeds University, The Times Higher Education Supplement (June 23) reveals. But there’s a twist: lecturers will present the controversial theories as being incompatible with scientific evidence. “It is essential they (students) understand the historical context and the flaws in the arguments these groups put...

Biologists generally accept that evolutionary change can take from decades to millennia, while ecological change can occur over mere days or seasons. However, a new Cornell study shows that evolution and ecology can operate on the same time scale. When evolution occurs so quickly, the researchers conclude, it can change how populations of various species interact. Ecologists need to consider such evolutionary dynamics in their studies because evolution could affect populations being studied. This insight is critical to predicting the recovery time needed for threatened populations or for predicting disease dynamics, says Justin Meyer '04, who conducted the study as...

A Seattle-based research group that advocates intelligent design said today it will campaign to educate Kansans that the science standards approved by the State Board of Education are sound. “Kansas citizens need to have accurate information about what the science standards do,” said John West, associate director of the Center for Science & Culture for Discovery Institute. West said the group will start an information campaign over the Internet immediately and possibly start a radio campaign. He declined to say how much the center would spend. The decision puts the Discovery Institute in the center of hotly-contested State Board of...

The Fish That Shoots Down Evolution This unusual fish uses a specialized system to blast insects out of the air. How could this evolve slowly over time when there is no survival advantage without the whole system working perfectly? by Mario Seiglie In Asia, Africa and Australia lives a remarkable creature, the archerfish, that shoots down its prey from the air above it with a burst of water. It uses its tongue and the top of its mouth to form a groove similar to a gun barrel. Then, by compressing its gills, it squirts water up to six feet with...

I have been speaking to diverse small groups about science and religion in the context of the ongoing national debate about the teaching of evolution in our public schools. The response to my talks has been almost uniformly positive. It would be useful for other physicists to do as I have been doing. My audiences have been service clubs such as Rotary, high-school and college students of science and science journalism, a school-based community event, a League of Women Voters chapter, a Unitarian church, and a microscopy club. They have ranged from a dozen to some 60 or 70 people....