I just read the article Chairboy. Seems the ID proponents were ousted on a separation of church and state argument. There is nothing in our American constitution concerning separation of church and state, so I have to ask, where does this argument come from and more importantly, why does it have any traction in court ? I view this outcome as a great injustice not only to the ones who lost their jobs, but to the nation as a whole.
More to the point, why were they ousted on a separation of church and state argument and not on an argument that it is not science? And who's to say it's not science? ID sounds like deductive methodology. In deductive reasoning there is a hunch or insight to begin with (in this case a "creator"). This has nothing to do with religion or advancing a religious agenda. Their insight is that complex intricacies found in nature must have been designed by a creator, and they procede from that generalization to more specific details.
In my opinion, what we are seeing here is a rivalry between the inductive and deductive methods. Proponents of the two have always been at loggerheads, with inductive science mainly prefered by the empirical sciences as a matter of practicality, i.e. building and maintaining material things useful to man.
However in a science such as Biology, I would think the deductive method would be right at home, particularly when science concerns itself with seeking or explaining the origins of life. At that point there must be some philosophy involved. To discount the possibility of a creator is very unsound science if indeed philosophy has any place in science. To my thinking, if origins of life are to be discussed in a science (Biology) class, both camps must be allowed mention, or it is not scientific. To be even more scientific, Darwinian Evolution should be mentioned as outdated and for the most part no longer accepted as factual by modern scientists.
Les
