University President Bans Consideration of Alternatives to Evolution
In a strangely worded letter, Timothy P. White, the President of the University of Idaho has forbidden consideration of any theory but evolution in the school's "life, earth, and physical science courses." He said, in part:
I write to articulate the University of Idaho’s position with respect to evolution: This is the only curriculum that is appropriate to be taught in our bio-physical sciences. . . . At the University of Idaho, teaching of views that differ from evolution . . . is inappropriate in our life, earth, and physical science courses or curricula.
Taken at face value, this would seem to forbid teaching the theory of relativity, string theory or number theory (since "evolution" is the "only curriculum that is appropriate to be taught"), but I do not think that is what he meant. What he means is therefore unclear, but very scary. What is clear is that he has thrown academic freedom out the window. What in the world are "views that differ from evolution"? Can you teach, for example, about the Cambrian Explosion since that poses serious problems for evolutionary theory and tends to support "views that differ from evolution"? Can you mention that biological systems appear designed, as long as you clarify each time that you believe they are not designed in the same breath?
He does assure us that in religion classes, professors can still teach "views that differ from evolution," but only if they are "in faculty-approved curricula." He does not explain what is faculty-approved curricula. Perhaps he will set up a committee to police the appropriate limits of academic thought in those areas as well.
He did not articulate the penalty for violating this policy, but I am sure he knows what to do with people that cross the line. But who knows where the line is?
I wonder if he will come out with a statement soon forbidding teaching anything but Stalinism in poly sci classes. Students at the university may want to read the resources at this link, before President White blocks access. I guess when your ideas cannot prevail in a free marketplace of ideas, drastic measures are needed.
President White, you are hereby inducted into the Darwinian Fundamentalism Hall of Fame.
This info comes thanks to the Discovery Institute, whose statement is here.
posted by Lawrence Selden @ 2:06 PM
3 comments
3 Comments:
Non-evolutionists (I use the term to keep from offending the rabid atheists out there) understand science. They are able to see how things work just as "accepted science" does. Where the two views part ways is when an evolutionist makes the assumptive jump to believe that biology dis-proves the existence of an intelligent designer, and non-evolutionists choose to believe that there IS an intelligent designer.
The latter is motivated by a reverence for a higher power, the former by a deep fear of the same!
ID is a bunch of thinly disguised religiot crap. Man invented gourd, not the other way around.
ID isn't peer-reviewd, isn't a fasifiable theory, isn't science.
Oddly, the proponents of ID usually dismiss global warming as 'junk science'.
If ID is as much a scientific theory as evolution then what does ID predict? All scientific theories make predictions and are falsifiable.
The fact is ID makes NO predictions and isn't open to testing. ID has no supporting evidence. Evidence against evolution (which there isn't any) isn't supporting evidence for ID. ID is simply an argument from ignorance. It is for those who are disinterested in research and intellectually lazy - simply saying things are too complex to understand so they must be the result of a creator is laziness at its best.
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