Intelligent Design: Should it be discussed in schools?

[Rightarrow]

If Universities are meant to be a place for the free exchange of ideas, why isn't the idea of Intelligent Design not exchanged freely? What unequivocally proven theories take its place to explain how life started, or how the information stored in the DNA in cells evolved to what we find in them today?

 

[rathi]

If Universities are meant to be a place for the free exchange of ideas, why isn't the idea of Intelligent Design not exchanged freely? What unequivocally proven theories take its place to explain how life started, or how the information stored in the DNA in cells evolved to what we find in them today?

Intelligent design can certainly be discussed freely, in a philosophy or religion class where it belongs.

 

[Alex Libman]

Tragedy of the commons.

Abolish public schools.

Let parents decide.

(I'm an atheist.)

 

[Rightarrow]

Intelligent design can certainly be discussed freely, in a philosophy or religion class where it belongs.

The question is still unanswered; what is taught in it's place to explain the origin of life?

 

[Redress]

The question is still unanswered; what is taught in it's place to explain the origin of life?

Depends on the class. In a class on religion, then religious origins would be explained, in a science class, scientific explanations would be explained.

 

[Kernel Sanders]

The question is still unanswered; what is taught in it's place to explain the origin of life?

I went to public high school and we did not cover abiogenesis. I would assume most are the same.

 

[rathi]

The question is still unanswered; what is taught in it's place to explain the origin of life?

Abiogenesis is not a required part of highschool biology, but when mentioned, it teaches the various scientific theories that postulate how life formed on earth. Intelligent design isn't a scientific theory, so it never had a place in the science classroom to start with.

 

[Rightarrow]

I went to public high school and we did not cover abiogenesis. I would assume most are the same.

I don't necessarily think this should be discussed in high schools, but university professors (even biology ones), should be allowed to open discussion about origin of life, shouldn't they?

 

[rathi]

I don't necessarily think this should be discussed in high schools, but university professors (even biology ones), should be allowed to open discussion about origin of life, shouldn't they?

Indeed. Discussion of scientific theories about the origin of life is a good one, as it is still very much up in the air. However, Intelligent design isn't one of those theories, so it shouldn't belong in a biology classroom.

 

[Rightarrow]

Abiogenesis is not a required part of highschool biology, but when mentioned, it teaches the various scientific theories that postulate how life formed on earth. Intelligent design isn't a scientific theory, so it never had a place in the science classroom to start with.

Stephen Meyer just wrote a book explaining ID using the scientific method.

Signature in the Cell - About the Book

Drawing on data from many scientific fields, Stephen Meyer formulates a rigorous argument employing the same method of inferential reasoning that Darwin used. In a thrilling narrative with elements of a detective story as well as a personal quest for truth, Meyer illuminates the mystery that surrounds the origins of DNA. He demonstrates that previous scientific efforts to explain the origins of biological information have all failed, and argues convincingly for intelligent design as the best explanation of life’s beginning. In final chapters, he defends ID theory against a range of objections and shows how intelligent design offers fruitful approaches for future scientific research.

 

[Goshin]

I wish you well, Don Quixote Rightarrow. I, your faithful retainer Sancho Panza, will stay here with the mule. The windmill is that way, O Noble One.

In all seriousness, this is the wrong crowd for that argument. :2brickwal
There are more athiests per square mile at DP than there are in London.

Onward, Rocinante.

 

[rathi]

Stephen Meyer just wrote a book explaining ID using the scientific method.

No he didn't. ID does not meet the basic criteria for the Scientific Method. Namely, it has zero evidence, isn't falsifiable and has no testable predictions.

 

[Thorgasm]

Only if the lesson is about hypothetical constructs.

 

[rathi]

In all seriousness, this is the wrong crowd for that argument.
There are more athiests per square mile at DP than there are in London.

But intelligent design has nothing to do with atheism right? After all, ID is not the same thing as biblical creationism and that is why it is okay be taught in schools. I am shocked you would assume that ID is merely a cover for a religious agenda.

 

[jackalope]

Stephen Meyer just wrote a book explaining ID using the scientific method.

Signature in the Cell - About the Book

No he didn't, that is impossible. ID is not compatible with the scientific method.

I'll just copy/paste, cuz this guy has just writting a series of articles about ID and it's incompatibility with the scientific method:


In popular culture, the word “theory” is used almost synonymously with the word “idea,” but the definition of a scientific theory is much narrower. According to most scientists, including the National Academy of Sciences, a scientific theory must:

1. offer a natural explanation for observed facts;
2. make specific predictions about facts that have not yet been observed;
3. be testable; and
4. be subject to change in light of new data, new interpretations, or demonstration of error.


Intelligent Design meets none of these criteria.

By requiring supernatural intervention to explain certain observed facts, ID immediately disqualifies itself as a scientific theory. That does not mean there was not a designer, but science concerns itself with what can be explained naturally. This focus on natural explanations is not a bias against faith; it’s just that once someone starts accepting supernatural explanations for what they don’t understand, there is no point in researching other possible explanations. Science keeps asking questions no matter what.

Why Intelligent Design is not a scientific theory



What is with proponents of ID in schools insistance on its inclusion in science class? Do they not care what science actually is?

 

[jackalope]

But intelligent design has nothing to do with atheism right? After all, ID is not the same thing as biblical creationism and that is why it is okay be taught in schools. I am shocked you would assume that ID is merely a cover for a religious agenda.

*laughs softly* ...

 

[Kernel Sanders]

I don't necessarily think this should be discussed in high schools, but university professors (even biology ones), should be allowed to open discussion about origin of life, shouldn't they?

Science classes should teach scientific theories, and as others have stated ID is not a scientific theory. If a private university wants to allow their professors to teach non-science in science classes, though, there's nothing stopping them.

 

[ALiberalModerate]

Stephen Meyer just wrote a book explaining ID using the scientific method.

Signature in the Cell - About the Book

Simply writing a book does not establish a scientific theory. If it did, anyone could come up with anything and all they would have to do is write a book on in and it would be in a science text book the next year.

If Stephen Meyer wants Intelligent Design to be recognized as a legitimate scientific theory, then all he needs to do is publish some positive empirical evidence supporting it in a peer reviewed journal.

 

[Agent_Grey]

When it has an actual scienfitic theory to discuss, perhaps. Currently, most of the ID stuff I find might have a paragraph or two about what observations one might make to formulate it as science, but invariably such writing devolves into an ATTACK on existing theory. That's where it always falls down.

Dissenting Physicists who question how Gravity works do not feel the need to attack the moral foundation of existing theory.

 

[obvious Child]

Would we teach our children that if we cannot explain something now for whatever reason, therefore God?

Because that's what you'd do in teaching Intelligent Design. Intelligent Design is essentially animism and Animism has no place in the science classroom.

Hell, I'd be for teaching intelligent design to seniors in highschool. It would take all of 20 seconds.

"The theory of intelligent design states that if something cannot be explained now for whatever reasons, including too complex, therefore Goddidit"

 

[moe]

I went to public high school and we did not cover abiogenesis. I would assume most are the same.

You never learned about Louis Pasteur in high school???

Moe

 

[moe]

Stephen Meyer just wrote a book explaining ID using the scientific method.

Signature in the Cell - About the Book

Excellent book. I am reading it right now.

Moe

 

[moe]

No he didn't. ID does not meet the basic criteria for the Scientific Method. Namely, it has zero evidence, isn't falsifiable and has no testable predictions.

You have read the book?

Moe

 

[moe]

Meyers has been published in a peer reviewed journal. And the evolutionary biologist that permitted the article to be printed was fired for it.

Stephen C. Meyer - Biography

Because the article was the first peer-review publication in a technical journal arguing for ID, the journal’s editor, evolutionary biologist Richard Sternberg, was punished by his Smithsonian supervisors for allowing Meyer’s pro-ID case into print. This led to an investigation of top Smithsonian personnel by the U.S. Office of Special Counsel, widely covered in the media, including the Wall Street Journal and Washington Post. The federal investigation concluded that Sternberg had been wrongly disciplined and intimidated. The case led to widespread public indignation at the pressures placed on Darwin-doubting scientists not only at the Smithsonian but at universities around the U.S. and elsewhere

Moe

 

[jackalope]

Meyers has been published in a peer reviewed journal. And the evolutionary biologist that permitted the article to be printed was fired for it.

Stephen C. Meyer - Biography

Because the article was the first peer-review publication in a technical journal arguing for ID, the journal’s editor, evolutionary biologist Richard Sternberg, was punished by his Smithsonian supervisors for allowing Meyer’s pro-ID case into print. This led to an investigation of top Smithsonian personnel by the U.S. Office of Special Counsel, widely covered in the media, including the Wall Street Journal and Washington Post. The federal investigation concluded that Sternberg had been wrongly disciplined and intimidated. The case led to widespread public indignation at the pressures placed on Darwin-doubting scientists not only at the Smithsonian but at universities around the U.S. and elsewhere​

Moe

Moe,

That little blurb is from Meyer's own site. Seriously .... not an objective source.

Also, that would be George W Bush's Office of Legal Counsel ..... which is a joke in and of itself. The office opened an investigation even though it had no authority or jurisdiction. It was forced to close it with no action b/c it had to acknowledge that it had no authority over the matter.