Starting Tuesday this week (15/10/2002), the schools in the state of Ohio can adopt a science curriculum that allows the schools in the various districts to decide whether they want to teach the "intelligent planner" concept, according to which the universe is guided by highly intelligent beings
Starting Tuesday this week (15/10/2002), the schools in the state of Ohio can adopt a science curriculum that allows the schools in the various districts to decide whether they want to teach the "intelligent planner" concept, according to which the universe is guided by highly intelligent beings.
The committee voted in favor of the concept that both evolution and the reasoned criticism of the theory should be taught.
The committee put on record what many schools have been doing for a long time - they teach evolution but also explain that there is a debate about the origin of life.
"The decision is not in favor of intelligent planning" says Mikal Kochran, a member of the committee who pushed for the decision that this same idea be included in the standard. "I see this as a compromise."
The decision came after weeks of behind-the-scenes talks to reach an agreement with members who wanted equal time for competing theories of evolution to get equal time for Darwin's theory.
In January, Ohio became the latest battleground in the debate over how biology should be taught to high school students and what they should know about evolution.
Proponents of intelligent design include several conservative groups that have tried and failed to introduce biblical creationism into school teaching. Critics of the theory of intelligent design say that this is creationism in disguise.
You don't have to believe the Bible, but neither do Darwin
"Intelligent creation", a theory that explains with scientific tools the formation of life and denies evolution, is gaining momentum in the USA
By James Glantz, New York Times
Two of the books that explain the theory of intelligent creation. Its supporters agree that the Earth is billions of years old, and not thousands of years as creationists believe, but they disagree on the idea that natural selection - the force that according to Darwin drives evolution - is sufficient to explain the complexity of the animals and plants on Earth.
When officials at the Kansas State Board of Education restored the theory of evolution to the state curriculum a few weeks ago, biologists saw it as a victory over creationism, which accepts the biblical creation story at face value. But according to some researchers who support the theory of evolution, the battle over alternative theories about the origin of life is not over.
On the contrary: the polemic on the charged issue is only intensifying. And this time Darwin's evolution was confronted with an idea more complex than creationism: the theory of intelligent design. Supporters of this theory, led by several intellectuals, accept the statement that the earth is billions of years old, and not thousands of years as creationism holds. But they dispute the idea that natural selection, the force that Darwin believed drives evolution, is sufficient to explain the complexity of animals and plants on Earth. According to them, this complexity is the work of an intelligent creator.
According to the supporters of the theory, it is possible that the creator is very similar to the biblical God, but they are open to other explanations such as the claim that the origin of life is in a meteorite that arrived on Earth from another place in the universe, a process that may involve some intelligent entity from outer space. Another explanation, held by advocates of New Age philosophy, is that there is a mysterious and still life force in the universe.
In recent months, the supporters of the intelligent creation theory have made great strides on several fronts. In Kansas, after the backlash against traditional biblical creationism, supporters of the theory of intelligent creation became the central force working against the theory of evolution, although so far they have not been able to compare the status of theories such as the theory of intelligent creation to the status of evolution in the curriculum.
In Michigan, nine legislators in the House of Representatives submitted a bill to compare the position of the theory of intelligent creation with that of the theory of evolution in the state's education programs. In Pennsylvania, where creationists and scientists advocating the idea of intelligent creation have collaborated, government officials are about to adopt a curriculum in the field of the development of life, which will include other theories besides evolution.
Supporters of intelligent creation organized conferences at Yale and Baylor universities last year, and the movement spawned at least one student organization, Intelligent Design and Evolution Awareness (or the IDEA Club), at the University of California, San Diego.
Darwin's supporters see intelligent creation as a more insidious theory than creationism, especially given that many of its proponents are scientists. "The most impressive thing about the supporters of intelligent creation is their ability to give a scientific facet to the opposition to the theory of evolution," says Dr. Eugene Scott, director of the National Center for Science Education in Oakland, California, which promotes the teaching of the theory of evolution.
One of the publications that first formulated the arguments of the theory of intelligent creation is the book "Darwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution", by Dr. Michael Behe, professor of biology at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania. Dr. Behi asserts that certain biochemical structures in the cell could not have been formed in stages, as emerges from the theory of evolution. Since then, the movement has gained the support of several scientists, in various fields of specialization, most of them conservative Christians.
Dr. Behi claims that some complex structures within the cell, which depend on the joint action of many molecules and proteins, are "complex in a way that cannot be simplified", because the removal of just one protein may cause them to malfunction. If the structure has no function when only one component is missing, asks Dr. Behi, how could evolution create it gradually, step by step?
"I don't think something like this could have happened through simple laws of nature," says Behi.
Most biologists disagree. "This is simply not true," says Dr. Alan Orr, a geneticist at the University of Rochester. According to him, structures in the cell could have formed in a variety of unexpected ways during evolution, and it is possible that a protein that was added to the structure was not essential at first, but became essential at a later stage, when many other proteins were organized around it.
The leaders of the intelligent creation movement are looking for flaws in evolutionist thinking, and they have succeeded in advancing their cause by publishing embarrassing errors in well-known biology textbooks. "This is a legitimate intellectual project," says Dr. William Dembsky, PhD in Mathematics from the University of Chicago and one of the main proponents of the intelligent creation theory, who receives a small portion of the funding for his research from the Texas Baptist Convention. "This is not about creativity. We are not committed to the biblical story of creation."
Dembski admits that his interest in alternatives to Darwin stems in part from the fact that he is an evangelical Christian, but he argues that the theory of intelligent creation can stand up to rigorous scientific criticism. "Religious faith plays a role, but the last thing I want is to compromise my scientific work," he said.
Biologists who support the theory of evolution believe that the arguments of intelligent creation do not stand up to scientific criticism, but they admit that it often takes a lot of biological and mathematical knowledge to disprove them. "I would use the words 'diabolically clever,'" says Dr. Jerry Coyne, a professor of ecology and evolution at the University of Chicago, referring to the structure of the theory. "It attracts intellectuals who know nothing about evolutionary biology, because the proponents of the theory are doctors and professors and also because researchers use academic jargon." Tomorrow is held by Dr. Leonard Kristalka, biologist and director of the Natural History Museum at the University of Kansas. In his opinion, "intelligent creation is nothing more than creativity wearing a cheap tuxedo."
Yaden Darwin and the struggle of the theory of evolution
https://www.hayadan.org.il/BuildaGate4/general2/data_card.php?Cat=~~~349422149~~~89&SiteName=hayadan
