Don't get me wrong, I'm not religious... but I think these intelligent design folks make just as much sense as the evolutionists. Do you belive in intelligent design, and either way isn't it fair to at least let both theories be taught so kids can make up their own mind?
because they imply the christian god, since ID is a christian concept only, and since the concept of god is totally unscientific, thus unsuitable for mention in a science class.
In interest of the separation between church and state it should not be taught in schools. If parents or a church choose to teach their children that it is fine, so long as it is not a public institution such as public schools.
Because it isn't science. Science is approached scientifically, i.e., by heuristically poking into the dark from the known to the unknown to reveal new light, by reason and empirical method. "Intelligent Design" is simply a tautology: "anything that is both 'complex' and 'specified' cannot have come about by anything other than intelligence, therefore all theories outside [the circular reasoning] are necessarily false." It is a tautology simply because the ID proponents have defined nature thus; it's as much as me saying that the reason the Aegean Islands exist is because something so phenomenally large in the middle of the ocean couldn't have happened except by a precipitous snort of the sea-god, Poseidon; and therefore, theories of volcanic action, etc., must be bunk. Tautologies are, logically, completely unsound. And certainly unscientific. Which is why "ID," which is really a kind of repackaged version of creationism (which is itself tied to a specific theology, as stated above), has no place in a science curriculum in school. A class in cultural anthropology, exploring comparative creation myths, fine. But they need to be understood as faith and/or myth, and not science - no matter what scientific patina is attempted to be applied. No matter how much scientific sheen is pasted on, it always boils down, eventually, to: The above quote is from Michael Behe, a leading proponent of ID. More: I bold Behe's quote because this is at the heart of it. ID proponents would like us to believe that there is something scientific to its claims; there is not. It doesn't belong in a science curriculum.
Education isn't about letting children make up their own mind, it's about teaching them what is true and about the method used to find the truth. If intelligent design wants to participate in the scientific process - formulating an assertion, devising experiments to test that assertion, presenting scientific papers describing their assertion and the experiments used to test it, predictions that should be true if their assertion is factual and decades of peer review - i would be all for teaching it to children. But while its a bunch of religious fundamentalists or con-men looking for a quick buck i say we keep it in the realms of fantasy where it belongs. THERE IS NO EVIDENCE - let me know how many times i have to repeat this. And could you explain how it's "fair" if intelligent design is permitted to by-pass the scrutiny of the scientific process?
Simply put, you'd have to first decide who's story of intelligent design was correct and how to teach it definitively. The Christian story? Which denomination? Islam? Beyond that, in a classroom setting it just wouldn't make sense. The only place it makes sense to teach intelligent design as a curriculum is in church. Where it belongs..... Trying to teach intelligent design in public schools is like having a Christian bible study leader teaching in an Islamic Mosque. It makes about the same amount of sense.
No, it isn't. One is a set of beliefs (anyone with any scientific education couldn't even really call it a "theory") which flies in the face of and distorts all historical and scientific evidence, and the other is factual. They shouldn't be taught together for the same reason that a serious, democratically elected politician shouldn't share a public platform with a terrorist: the appearance given by such arrangements can be one of "equality", which is both misleading and dishonest. You don't really want kids ending up believing that dinosaurs and man were around at the same time, do you? But that's the kind of thing you have, somehow, to end up choosing to believe, if you take the so-called "intelligent design" views seriously. It's intellectually dishonest as well as both offensive and degrading to hundreds of years of human research, study, education, discovery and understanding. There's no way that can be called "fair"!
Evolution is a credible theory to some extent while intelligent design is a mere assumption. That, my friend, is a major difference.
Both sides have equal the amount of evidence as the other - that would be absolutely NONE. I believe in intelligent design for the record. And we shouldn't teach what we don't know, unless we are teaching the fact that we don't know about it and there are multiple options on what could have happend.
the universe could not have happened by random chance (way too many variables) and ill keep saying this. I am still experimenting on throwing up leaves into the air and if they come down as a fully formed dolly parton than the universe could have come about by random chance. All of these universal laws that we have just started to discover couldnt have come about by random chance. Some kind of intelligent force had to have been acting upon the universe. This is why no atheist will dare to accept this because it would shatter their world and make them think twice that just maybe there is a chance of there being a god or some super intelligent creator , but I will keep pointing this out when they start spreading their stampede progaganda
Sorry but you don't know what you are talking about. There are absolute mountains of evidence for evolution. Just because you are too gutless to acknowledge it or too poorly educated to understand it doesn't mean it doesn't exist. pingpong, Even if i accept that the constants are to complex to come about without a creator (which i absolutely don't think is true) what has that got to do with evolution? Don't mix your apples and oranges, You will only expose your utter ignorance and scientific illiteracy, Not to mention your inherent, religiously motivated dishonesty.
Why not just call him a stupid coward? Afraid of getting banned. There are a lot of condescending posters in this forum, but I think you might just take the prize.
My vocabulary means i don't have to use such crass language (vocabulary means the words i have at my disposal) Yeah probably... have a cry, see if it makes you feel better.