For the first time, you can have living room access to over seven hours of teaching by intelligent design pioneer Stephen Meyer in a brand-new online course. A favorite of students young and old(er), Meyer will delight both as he explores the scientific evidence for intelligent design (ID) found in physics, cosmology, biology and the chemical origin of life. Join Read More ›
Throughout his distinguished and unconventional career, engineer-turned-molecular-biologist Douglas Axe has been asking the questions that much of the scientific community would rather silence. Now, he presents his conclusions in this brave and pioneering book. Axe argues that the key to understanding our origin is the “design intuition” — the innate belief held by all humans that tasks we would need Read More ›
According to one cynical view, academic disputes are so vicious only because the stakes are so low. Yet as the editors of Synthese, a leading philosophy journal, can tell you, what they publish matters: in debates over Christianity, the teaching of evolution, and American politics.
This story began in March 2009, when a special issue of Synthese was published online, titled “Evolution and Its Rivals.”
It was guest-edited by Glenn Branch, deputy director of the National Center for Science Education, and James H. Fetzer, a former editor of the journal. They included an essay by Barbara Forrest, of Southeastern Louisiana University, condemning the work of the philosopher Francis J. Beckwith, who believes it is constitutionally permissible, although not advisable, to teach intelligent design in public schools.
But Dr. Beckwith says he is no ally of the intelligent design movement, whose mainly Christian proponents argue that certain features of the universe are best explained by a “designer,” perhaps a god or deity, rather than by natural selection or other scientific theories.
In her essay, Dr. Forrest, known for her opposition to intelligent design, argued that Dr. Beckwith made many of intelligent design’s conceptual mistakes, and “presents I.D. exactly as I.D. leaders do.”
In language some would later criticize as unfit for a scholarly journal, Dr. Forrest also questioned Dr. Beckwith’s qualifications, writing that he takes positions on church/state issues but has “no formal credentials as a constitutional scholar.” She suggested connections between Dr. Beckwith and intelligent design theorists and the marginal, far-right Christian Reconstructionists, who believe that a theocracy under Old Testament law is the best form of government.
Read More ›You know the story, the play, the movie–all based on a piece of American history. It starts when a high school biology teacher in a small, rural American community begins teaching his classes about a theory of mans origins that defies conventional beliefs. The teacher asks his students to examine the fossil record and draw their own conclusions. He traces Read More ›
1. Cards on the Table In the movie Dream Team starring Michael Keaton, Keaton plays a psychiatric patient who must feign sanity to save his psychiatrist from being murdered. In protesting his sanity, Keaton informs two New York City policemen that he doesn’t wear women’s clothing, that he’s never danced around Times Square naked, and that he doesn’t talk to Read More ›