Robert Crowther

Congress’s recent report documenting the harassment of evolutionary biologist Richard Sternberg at the Smithsonian reveals a shameful lack of respect for the free speech rights of scientists skeptical of Darwinian evolution on the part of federal officials. It is important to emphasize that pro-Darwin officials at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History (NMNH) tried to punish Dr. Sternberg for his activities outside of the museum.

One of the most disturbing revelations of the recent congressional investigation into the Smithsonian’s persecution of Richard Sternberg is the behind-the-scenes role of the pro-Darwin lobbying group the National Center for Science Education (NCSE). According to the congressional staff report, the NCSE was in essence asked to spy on Dr. Sternberg by Smithsonian official Dr. Hans Sues:

The House Government Reform Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy, and Human Resources has issued its official report on the investigation into the harassment and discrimination against biologist Dr. Richard Sternberg. (for more background see here). The congressional report bluntly states: The staff investigation has uncovered compelling evidence that Dr. Sternberg’s civil and constitutional rights were violated by Smithsonian officials. Posted here is the Executive Summary of the report. The full report can be downloaded here, and the appendix can be downloaded here.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
In January 2005, an opinion piece published in the Wall Street Journal first raised public awareness about disturbing allegations that officials at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History (NMNH) had retaliated against museum Research Associate (RA) Richard Sternberg because he allowed publication of an article favoring the theory of intelligent design in a biology journal.¹ A well-published evolutionary biologist with two doctorates in biology, Dr. Sternberg claimed that after publication of the article, his colleagues and supervisors at the NMNH subjected him to harassment and discrimination in an effort to force him out as a Research Associate.

We have made clear that Judge Jones’ wholesale and uncritical copying from ACLU attorneys in the Kitzmiller v. Dover decision is not considered “plagiarism” in legal circles–even though such verbatim copying has been frowned upon by appellate courts. But what about the unattributed use of language from someone else’s book in a public speech? According to the posted text of his Commencement Address at Dickinson College, Judge Jones appears to have engaged in unattributed copying outside the courtroom as well. Compare the following passages and decide for yourself whether this new finding constitutes plagiarism.

The egregious case of copying text from plaintiffs’ attorneys by federal judge John E. Jones has drawn additional criticism from legal scholars who explain that such copying should be scrutinized and carefully examined.

Yesterday Discovery Institute released a report revealing that the key section of the widely-noted court decision in the Kitzmiller vs. Dover intelligent design case was copied nearly verbatim from a document written by ACLU lawyers.

“Discovery Institute is on solid ground in pointing out Judge Jones’ highly questionable practice in this case,” said Bruce Green, an attorney with the Center for Law and Policy. “While having no legal bearing at this stage, it is highly frowned upon by the federal judiciary for a judge to adopt wholesale the findings and conclusions of a party without making a case for independent investigation demonstrated in the record.”

The key section of the widely-noted court decision on intelligent design issued a year ago on December 20 was copied nearly verbatim from a document written by ACLU lawyers, according to a study released today by scholars affiliated with Discovery Institute.

“Judge John Jones copied verbatim or virtually verbatim 90.9% of his 6,004-word section on whether intelligent design is science from the ACLU’s proposed ‘Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law’ submitted to him nearly a month before his ruling,” said Dr. John West, Vice President for Public Policy and Legal Affairs at Discovery Institute’s Center for Science and Culture.

Update: The link to the American Prospect article has been fixed. Sahotra Sarkar has become a revisionist of the first order. Not even 12 months have gone by since the Dover ID trial and he’s already rewriting history in this web post for the American Prospect. Apparently, the whole argument for the fine tuning of the universe from The Privileged Planet, published in 2004, almost 2 full years before the Dover ruling, was just a reaction to Dover, and an attempt to subvert Judge Jones’s (may he live forever) ruling banning ID from Dover area classrooms. Won’t those stealth creationists Jay Richards and Guillermo Gonzalez be surprised. Not to mention those poor creationists Peter Ward and Donald Brownlee. All this Read More ›

No one seriously thinks Brian Greene — he of multiverse fame — is an intelligent design proponent. I’m fairly certain he doesn’t see himself as one. Yet he is speculating on the possibility of scientists being able to create their own universes . . . so maybe he should be called something like a proponent of intentional formation of natural universes theory. Regardless, NPR’s All Things Considered recently had a story on all the speculation about this: One day (far off, no doubt), it may be possible to go into a laboratory on Earth, create a “seed” — a device that could grow into a universe — and then there would have to be a way to get that seed, Read More ›

Some of the recent reporting on the evolution debate in the UK has been less than accurate. Looks like we’re not the only ones to notice. Peter Hitchens had an insightful op-ed in The Mail last Sunday looking at why it is that some many in Britain are up in arms about the possibility of schools teaching criticisms of Darwin as well as the argument for intelligent design. He rightly points out that proponents of ID are, for the most part, misrepresented in recent reporting.

Our popular podcast (20,000 subscribers in just the past six months) today features Casey Luskin interviewing Dr. Thomas Woodward. They discuss his new book, Darwin Strikes Back: Defending the Science of Intelligent Design, which analyzes the rhetoric used by Darwinists in their critiques of intelligent design. Woodward documents how Darwinists often use ad hominem attacks and promote “fantasy themes” about the supposed “theocracy” of intelligent design to avoid discussing the scientific issues. Click here to listen to the interview.Woodward of course is the author of Doubts About Darwin, the 2004 book that documented the emergence of intelligent design among scientists. Darwin Strikes Back is the sequel to that book and in it Woodward asks and answers some key questions, such Read More ›