There She Goes Again

Speaking of My Favorite Posts, Cornelia Dean has shown that she has not lost her religion and that she still loves to recite what I call "Cornelia's Creed," which I originally discussed here. In a recent article, she keeps beating her drum like the Eveready Bunny:

There is no credible scientific challenge to the idea that evolution explains the diversity of life on earth, but advocates for intelligent design posit that biological life is so complex that it must have been designed by an intelligent source.

You will note that she brilliantly combines her creed with a convenient mischaracterization of the claims of the leading proponents of intelligent design.

I love Cornelia. Sometimes it is hard to show media bias because of its subtlety. She makes it easy.

You can find related follow up posts by putting "Cornelia" in the "search this blog" field above.

Can Fossils Be Unconstitutional?

If Greek philosophy can be banned in a California high school, we should ask again if 500 million year old fossils can be unconstitutional. I recently updated my My Favorite Posts post to include Unconstitutional Fossils, in which I discuss a Washington Post editorial. This post also happened to get a lot of comments.

Hurst v. Newman Is Over

This just in:

Frazier Mountain High School will stop teaching a philosophy class discussing the theory of "intelligent design" this week and won't teach it in the future, said Ayesha N. Khan, legal director for Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

My earlier posts on this case can be found here and here. The settlement states:

No school over which the School District has authority, including the High School, shall offer, presently or in the future, the course entitled ‘Philosophy of Design’ or ‘Philosophy of Intelligent Design’ or any other course that promotes or endorses creationism, creation science, or intelligent design.

As far as I can tell, no other ideas in the intellectual history of the world were permanently banned. I wonder if any pages from the school's history books (e.g. discussing Greek philosophers) will need to be removed and destroyed. Warnings should now go to history teachers at the school not to assign the original writings of certain historians and philosophers without prior censorship or legal clearance. Teachers will now need to be very careful in discussing current events and answering students' questions.

Hurst v. Newman Update

A judge has been assigned, and it is Oliver Wanger, a Bush #1 appointee. A hearing is scheduled for tomorrow, January 17 at 1:30 pm.

Background articles can be found at The Mountain Enterprise newspaper.

Casey Luskin of the Discovery Institute spoke to the school board on Friday, and told them they should reformulate the course. A written summary of his statements is here.