ME: The Intelligent Design movement may not have much science behind it but they DO have lots of lawyers.JM: I thought you said they paid "Creationists." C'mon Hugh, when will you stop using false rhetoric. "Creationist" =/= ("does not equal") Intelligent Design. People who conflate those terms purposefully (like yourself) keep any meaningful discussion from happening. You're better than this.ME: Apparently I'm not. I also don't think I need to be either. Legally, ID is creationism. Has been since Kitzmiller v. Dover in 2005. The large majority of scientists share that opinion too. Labeling it anything else is trying to give it a legitimacy it doesn't deserve.JM: No, it's seeking clarity and accuracy. Honest skeptics like Ruse and others recognize that and don't continue obfuscating things by applying false labels. Judge Jones declared ID "religious" (which was wrong, but he's a single judge and judges get things wrong as well), but "Creationism" it is not.Calling ID "Creationism" is a disingenuous way of avoiding having to discuss the actual issue...something true "free thinkers" should abhor.
ME: Actually, he called it "creationism" as well as religion: A six-week trial over the issue yielded “overwhelming evidence” establishing that intelligent design “is a religious view, a mere re-labeling of creationism, and not a scientific theory,” said Jones, a Republican and a churchgoer appointed to the federal bench three years ago. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10545387/ns/technology_and_science-science/t/judge-rules-against-intelligent-design/JM: I've read the transcript of the decision in its entirety, and address it whenever I teach on the subject. Jones is flat out wrong. As wrong as the judges who once declared black people are "3/5ths of a person." And note, I don't think ID should be taught in Science class, unless it's a Philosophy of Science course of some type. But ID is most definitely NOT a "re-labeling of creationism" and the fact that Jones ruled it such is an incredible display of ignorance.Creationists themselves recognize that ID is not Creationism. The two most prominent creationist groups, Answers in Genesis Ministries (AIG) and Institute for Creation Research (ICR) have criticized the intelligent design movement (IDM) because design theory, unlike creationism, does not seek to defend the Biblical account of creation.
Historian of science Ronald Numbers has acknowledged the distinction between ID and creationism. So has science writer Robert Wright, writing in Time magazine: "Critics of ID, which has been billed in the press as new and sophisticated, say it's just creationism in disguise. If so it's a good disguise. Creationists believe that God made current life-forms from scratch. The ID movement takes no position on how life got here, and many adherents believe in evolution. Some even grant a role to the evolutionary engine posited by Darwin: natural selection. They just deny that natural selection alone could have driven life all the way from pond scum to us."
Maybe a syllogism will help, Hugh:
Creationism : ID :: Stalinism : Atheism
Why continue advancing ignorance instead of pursuing truth and clarity (unless it's because you know "Creationist" is just a sensationalized term that's sure to garner clicks on your articles by the angry hoards, despite being completely unrelated to actual Intelligent Design theory...but you would never take the intellectual low road just for some clicks, now would you?)
;)
ME: Thank you for your expert legal opinion on Kitzmiller v. Dover Board of Education but, to paraphrase your own observation about Judge Jones, you're a single minister and ministers get things wrong as well. The thing is though, ID had it's very well-funded day in court and if they thought the decision against them was based on "an incredible display of ignorance" by Judge Jones rather than a sound legal interpretation of the evidence, then why didn't they appeal it? The fact that they didn't argues for the conclusion that they thought that argument wouldn't fly. Furthermore, the fact that in the 6 years since the Dover decision, the Intelligent Design movement has made no other legal challenges to the banishment of Intelligent Design from science classes, bolsters that conclusion.JM: No it doesn't, Hugh. It shows what most ID theorists, including Dembski, recognize, which is that ID is not a full-fledged field of science yet. It is a philosophy of science. It doesn't need to be pushed into science classrooms.But that does NOT make it in any way the same as "Creationism." THAT is what Jones (and you) got completely wrong. And ID proponents have consistently since then clarified, published and educated people on the difference between the two...but close-minded critics who are looking for an easy way to get around any discussion based on facts and logic continue to use the "Creationist" label as a handy way of misinforming the public. As someone who values truth, accuracy and clarity in debate it's as maddening to me as it is to you when people call atheism a "religion."
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