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Now here's a weird source for commentary on evolution!

 

The online column is Tuesday Morning Quarterback by Gregg Easterbrook.
(Tuesdays on NFL.com during the season). Easterbrook is a socio-political
pundit, but also a complete football geek. His column dissects the week's
gridiron action (don't get him started on the blitz!), but he also talks
about lots of other things. Like nitpicking episodes of Star Trek or
Stargate. Here's what he had to say this week about a certain concept that
pisses off many people reading this:

 

 

"No Higher Power Is Guiding "Intelligent Design" Politics : Yours truly
thinks the "intelligent design" idea is being given the short shrift by the
mainstream media. Yes, some intelligent design advocates want to use I.D. as
a Trojan horse to put religious doctrine into public schools -- forbidden by
the First Amendment, and wisely so in the opinion of this churchgoer. And
some intelligent design advocates believe young Earth creationism, a nutty
idea for which there isn't one iota of scientific evidence. But as they mock
the notion of intelligent design, the mainstream media is systematically
avoiding a substantial question mark in evolutionary theory: it does not
explain the origin of life. That organisms evolve in response to changes in
their environment is well-established -- anyone who doubts this doesn't know
what he or she is talking about. But why are there living things in the
first place? Darwin said he had no idea, and to this day science has little
beyond wild guesses about the origin of life. Maybe life had a natural
origin that one day will be discovered. Until such time, higher powers or
the divine cannot be ruled out. Exactly because I think intelligent design
is a more important concept than the mainstream media will admit, I really
wish right-wing screwballs would stop advocating I.D. -- they're giving the
idea a bad name! First, it's common to hear them say evolution can be
disregarded because it's "just a theory."

"This is ill-informed. In everyday usage, "theory" can mean a conjectural or
unlikely claim. ("See, I have this theory why Maria Sharapova would go out
with me.") In science, a theory is an idea that has well-accepted supporting
principles, has been tested successfully and that no one has falsified; in
science the word theory conveys high standing. For instance, first
relativity was an analytical idea, then a hypothesis, then after many years
of testing was acknowledged as a theory. When in 1996 Pope John Paul II
called Darwinianism "more than a hypothesis," he was choosing words
precisely. Many on today's anti-science right appear ignorant of such basic
precepts as the definition of the word theory. 

"The screwball fringe keeps proposing I.D.-related legislation that shows it
doesn't even understand the limits of evolutionary theory. Two years ago
some science illiterates in Cobb County, Ga., got the local Board of
Education to mandate stickers on biology textbooks reading, "Evolution is a
theory, not a fact, regarding the origin of living things." Evolution has
nothing to do with the origin of living things. The core quandary of
Darwinian logic is that we can imagine how living things evolve but cannot
imagine how they came into existence in the first place. Now a know-nothing
Utah state representative has
<http://www.le.state.ut.us/~2006/bills/sbillint/sb0096.htm>  proposed this
bill that "requires the State Board of Education to establish curriculum
requirements and policies that stress that not all scientists agree on which
theory regarding the origins of life ... is correct." Hey, Utah state
legislature, there are no theories on the origin of life. A few biologists
have made wild guesses involving RNA, clay or hot ocean vents, but no
scientist has offered anything nothing remotely near the level of a testable
theory. (The details on that point
<http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml%3Fi=express&s=easterbrook121304> ) Given the
presence of life is so mysterious, a creator God may be why we are here. But
please, science illiterates, stop attempting to enact rules about
intelligent design; you are ruining the idea. "

You'll have to check out the online column to use the links. One point he
does neglect is that ID doesn't just posit a creator for the origin of life,
but that said creator must have intervened directly/supernaturally for life
today to exist as it does. Still, cool to see some common sense in such a
forum as TMQ.

Plus it gives me an excuse to say: Steelers rule!!! 

Waving my Terrible Towel,

Jonah Cohen

Outreach & Public Programs Manager

Science Center of Connecticut

 

"On blind faith they place reliance,

what we need more of is science"

           -MC Hawking

 


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