(RANDOM JACK: DISSEMINATE FREELY.)
Beyond dishonesty, there is a logical fallacy underlying the position of those who advocate “Intelligent Design” in the science curriculum of public schools. The dishonesty is their failure to advocate creationism in a straightforward manner. The fallacy is the assumption that Darwinian theory posits a point of origin on earth or in the universe. The very concept of evolution assumes that something existed in order to evolve.
There is no inherent conflict between theories of evolution and the postulates of creation; they are mutually exclusive. The real question is whether one believes in a god of chaos, senselessness, dispersion and chance or a god of order, discipline and law.
I will leave it to others to determine where the various gods – Buddhist, Christian-Judaic, Islamic, Hindu, Zarathustran, Copernican, et al – reside on the continuum between random chance and order. I would only note that the theory of relativity does not allow absolutes in time and space. Therefore, to postulate a point of origin is in conflict with Einstein’s most substantial contribution to scientific theory.
If we allow the creationists to proceed on a path traditionally reserved to scientists, we may find that relativity is called to question and, therefore, nuclear weapons do not exist and Einstein, himself, was nothing more than a mythological being from an alternate universe of pure fantasy.
I am not opposed to discussing “intelligent design” or creationism in the public schools but it should fall under the heading of comparative religions or universal mythology (depending on your persuasion), not under the discipline of science.
Every individual has a right to believe in anything but no one has a right impose a belief that two plus two is less than four.
[See The Albion Monitor or Buzzle.com for the latest Jazzman Chronicle: The Woodward Gambit.]
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