Science and Culture Today | Page 1340 | Discovering Design in Nature

By Pete Chadwell

In further attempts to try and justify the e-mail lynching of Guillermo Gonzalez by his ISU colleagues during their secret tenure deliberations, there are a few folks trying to make a case that Gonzalez’s prestigious record of publication isn’t up to snuff, and that somehow he’s not been productive during his time at ISU. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Note: This is one of a series of posts adapted from my new book, Darwin Day in America. You can find other posts in the series here.

John B. Watson, founder of the behavioral school of psychology, believed that human beings were on par with animals, and so he insisted that they should be studied just like animals. Indeed, he defined behaviorism as “an attempt to do one thing—to apply to the experimental study of man the same kind of procedure and the same language of description that many research men had found useful for so many years in the study of animals lower than man.” He compared opposition to behaviorism to the “resistance that appeared when Darwin’s ‘Origin of species’ was first published.” In his view, the root of the resistance to Darwin and behaviorism was the same: “Human beings do not want to class themselves with other animals.” Watson attributed the rejection of behaviorism by some psychologists to their unwillingness to accept “the raw fact” that “to remain scientific” they “must describe the behavior of man in no other terms than those [they]… would use in describing the behavior of the ox [they]… slaughter.”

In the Iowa State Daily Hector Avalos asserts that “the Discovery Institute seems to want it both ways. They want scientists whose work leads them to believe ID is scientific to have academic freedom, but they don’t want scientists whose research leads them to believe ID is not scientific to express their opinions.” No, that’s not our position at all. Critics of ID have every right to oppose intelligent design and express their opinions. If they want to publish articles, books, blogs, etc., or speak expressing dissent from intelligent design, they should absolutely have the right to do that. But no one has the right to create a hostile work environment for other faculty and abridge their academic freedom, regardless Read More ›

The Design Matrix by Mike Gene is now available. It’s the first in a series of books and items that Discovery President Bruce Chapman is highlighting as great Christmas gifts at Discovery Blog.

Evolutionists sometimes try to re-frame the debate over evolution such that it appears that there is no debate. They fear that merely using the term “evolutionist” could lead people to the belief that not all scientists are Neo-Darwinian “evolutionists.” (A belief that would be correct.) Some Darwinists have even spun urban legends claiming that “evolutionist” is a term invented by Darwin’s critics in order to make it appear as if there is a debate over evolution. For example, a biology graduate student posting on Mike Dunford’s blog scolded another poster for using the word “evolutionist,” stating: “please refrain from using the term ‘evolutionist’. It’s a made-up term from the creationists, who refuse to acknowledge that this is BIOLOGY, and people Read More ›

The controversy over why Guillermo Gonzalez was denied tenure has resulted in much flip-flopping and denials from Darwinists at Iowa State University (ISU): Even Wired Magazine is joining in the flip-flopping. Last week, they wrote, “Though out-of-context email excerpts can be misleading, statements like ‘this is not a friendly place for him to develop further his IDeas’ make it sound like Gonzalez was not, as the university insisted, judged solely on the content of his astronomical scholarship.” But this week Wired‘s Brandon Keim says that after reading the e-mails we released to the Iowa State Daily, he’s “inclined to believe the University’s side,” which asserts that “intelligent design … was not a factor” in the denial of tenure. Yet even Read More ›

Mac Johnson is a columnist at Human Events who writes columns with which I often agree. Last month he posted a column with which I, and many commentators on his blog, disagree. His column, Intelligent Design and Other Dumb Ideas, attacks a theory not held by any advocate of Intelligent Design. Perhaps I can help clear up his misunderstanding.

Intelligent Design in biology is a straightforward idea — one that Mr. Johnson, who is a medical researcher and is well acquainted with the methods of science, should have no trouble getting right. Understanding what advocates of intelligent design are saying is a necessary prelude to a thoughtful critique, which Mr. Johnson has not yet offered.

German geneticist Wolf-Ekkehard Lönnig Tackles The Latest Claims on Giraffe Evolution Darwinists sometimes think that they can account for the evolutionary origin of a complex biological feature simply by citing some kind of experimental or theoretical evidence showing that the complex feature would have provided a selective advantage to its owner. However, such Darwinists forget that, as many have recounted, natural selection only accounts for the survival of the fittest, not the arrival of the fittest. Evidence that a given feature–when fully formed–provides some selective advantage does not demonstrate that the feature can be evolved in a step-wise, mutation-by-mutation fashion. If Michael Behe is correct, then irreducibly complex features require many parts to be present all-at-once in order to get Read More ›

In a post entitled “Denied Tenure, Astronomer Alleges Intelligent Design Witchhunt,” Wired Magazine‘s blog has acknowledged that Iowa State University (ISU) discriminated against Guillermo Gonzalez because he supports intelligent design: So far, science bloggers and defenders of evolution have dismissed Gonzalez’s complaints. However, I’m not sure they’re being fair. Though out-of-context email excerpts can be misleading, statements like “this is not a friendly place for him to develop further his IDeas” make it sound like Gonzalez was not, as the university insisted, judged solely on the content of his astronomical scholarship. Wired is exactly right. Regardless of Dr. Gonzalez’s level of grants or his publication record, the crucial question here is, Was Gonzalez discriminated against because he supports intelligent design? Read More ›