Ben Stein: Science Leads to Killing People

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Barbarian observes:
In fact, if Darwin’s theory is correct, it should sometimes become simpler. He presented a great deal of evidence for this in his book.
It’s good to see that you offer the possiblity that it is not correct.
It’s one of the important differences between science and ID. In science, all truth is provisional on new evidence. What happened here, was you were convinced that Darwinian theory said things have to become more complex. They lied about that. It doesn’t.

Barbarian observes:
There are entire journals dedicated to work on unresolved questions in evolutionary theory, as there are for all sciences.

But that isn’t one of them. Wouldn’t you be more effective against science, if you knew what it was?
Yes, I’d really like to know about the unresolved questions in evolutionary theory that give good reason to question and doubt the theory itself.
Don’t know any that basic. After you have directly observed macroevolution, it’s pretty hard to deny it. Chemistry is unlikely to show that atoms don’t exist, either. But there are important questions. One interesting one is the question as to how much, if any inheritance is due to extragenetic factors. There are some interesting hints that in a few cases, it is not entirely from DNA.

In evolutionary development, the issue of insect wings as an elaboration of biramous appendages is still controversial.

And there are frustratingly few hominin fossils precisely where humans went separate ways from the rest. Finding more of those would be a great help.
Please feel free to post as much of that as you can.
Those are some of the more interesting ones.
Wouldn’t you like to help me learn about all the weaknesses of evolutionary theory so I could be even more convinced that it is false?
I’m thinking that a reasonably intelligent person, if they knew the strengths and weaknesses of the theory, would be more receptive to it. That’s what we see in the real world; the better you understand biology, the more receptive you are to evolution.
 
Ann Coulter writes:
Only liberals could interpret a statement that people have varying IQs as a call to start killing people

Hitler did. But perhaps, Ann Coulter, thinks Hitler was a liberal.

Compared to Ann Coulter, he might have been.
The Nazi’s were liberal. Why do you think differently?
 
Mary - the Church has not condemned ID. The Church has condemned certain forms of evolution (not all), as described below.

The US Catholic Catechism for Adults is a document created by the Church specifically for the purpose of instruction of Catholics.

Quote directly from the US Catholic Catechism for Adults - page 60 (2007):

“Christian faith does not require the acceptance of any particular theory of evolution, nor does it forbid it, provided that the particular theory is not strictly materialistic and does not deny what is essential to the spiritual essence of the human person, namely that God creates each human soul directly to share immortal life with him.”

This quite clearly states that:
  1. Catholics are free to reject any and all forms of evolution.
  2. Catholics are forbidden to accept theories of evolution which are strictly materialistic, etc. (as described above).
  3. Catholics may accept forms of evolution which are not forbidden, as above.
Thanks! I appreciate your clarification a great deal.🙂 👍
MaryJohnZ
 
The Nazi’s were liberal.
You must be really, really conservative.
Why do you think differently?
Fascists were widely admired by conservatives in America before the war.

They were racists and hated Jews.

They were militaristic.

They sided with businesses against labor.

They were vigorously opposed by leftists of all kinds.

The destruction of Ernst Rohem and the SA occurred because Rohem had espoused socialist ideas, and scared the military and industrialists Hitler was relying on to gain power.

**In a interview in January 1923, Commander-in-Chief Alvin Owsley of the American Legion not only endorsed Mussolini and Fascism, but announced his readiness to do what the Duce did…
“If ever needed,” he said, “the American Legion stands ready to protect our country’s institutions and ideals as the Fascisti dealt with the destructionists who menaced Italy.”

Asked whether that meant taking over the government, he replied:
“Exactly that. The American Legion is fighting every element that threatens our democratic government-soviets, anarchists, I.W.W., revolutionary socialists and every other 'Red … Do not forget that the Fascisti are to Italy what the American Legion is to the United States.”**
thirdworldtraveler.com/George_Seldes/Man_Horseback_TGSR.html
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alvin_M._Owsley

American industrialists actually approached a prominent American military officer, General Smedley Butler, with a plan to implement a fascist regime. Unfortunately for them, Butler would have none of it, and promptly reported it, when he realized what they were up to.

In 1934, Butler came forward and reported to the U.S. Congress that a group of wealthy pro-Fascist industrialists had been plotting to overthrow the government of President Franklin D. Roosevelt in a military coup. Even though the House Un-American Activities Committee corroborated most of the specifics of his testimony, no further action was taken.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smedley_Butler
Stuff like that.
 
I found this article which traces the ties ofthe Nazi program to California, the Rockefeller Institute and American scientists and medical professionals: The Supreme Court in our country also handed down a court decision supporting Eugenics.
sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2003/11/09/ING9C2QSKB1.DTL
:Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote, “It is better for all the world, if instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime, or to let them starve for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind . . . Three generations of imbeciles are enough.” This decision opened the floodgates for thousands to be coercively sterilized or otherwise persecuted as subhuman. Years later, the Nazis at the Nuremberg trials quoted Holmes’ words in their own defense.

Only after eugenics became entrenched in the United States was the campaign transplanted into Germany, in no small measure through the efforts of California eugenicists, who published booklets idealizing sterilization and circulated them to German officials and scientists.

Hitler studied American eugenics laws. He tried to legitimize his anti- Semitism by medicalizing it, and wrapping it in the more palatable pseudoscientific facade of eugenics. Hitler was able to recruit more followers among reasonable Germans by claiming that science was on his side. Hitler’s race hatred sprung from his own mind, but the intellectual outlines of the eugenics Hitler adopted in 1924 were made in America.

During the '20s, Carnegie Institution eugenic scientists cultivated deep personal and professional relationships with Germany’s fascist eugenicists. In “Mein Kampf,” published in 1924, Hitler quoted American eugenic ideology and openly displayed a thorough knowledge of American eugenics. “There is today one state,” wrote Hitler, “in which at least weak beginnings toward a better conception (of immigration) are noticeable. Of course, it is not our model German Republic, but the United States.”

Hitler proudly told his comrades just how closely he followed the progress of the American eugenics movement. “I have studied with great interest,” he told a fellow Nazi, “the laws of several American states concerning prevention of reproduction by people whose progeny would, in all probability, be of no value or be injurious to the racial stock.”

Hitler even wrote a fan letter to American eugenics leader Madison Grant, calling his race-based eugenics book, “The Passing of the Great Race,” his “bible.”

Now, the American term “Nordic” was freely exchanged with “Germanic” or “Aryan.” Race science, racial purity and racial dominance became the driving force behind Hitler’s Nazism. Nazi eugenics would ultimately dictate who would be persecuted in a Reich-dominated Europe, how people would live, and how they would die. Nazi doctors would become the unseen generals in Hitler’s war against the Jews and other Europeans deemed inferior. Doctors would create the science, devise the eugenic formulas, and hand-select the victims for sterilization, euthanasia and mass extermination.

During the Reich’s early years, eugenicists across America welcomed Hitler’s plans as the logical fulfillment of their own decades of research and effort. California eugenicists republished Nazi propaganda for American consumption. They also arranged for Nazi scientific exhibits, such as an August 1934 display at the L.A. County Museum, for the annual meeting of the American Public Health Association.

In 1934, as Germany’s sterilizations were accelerating beyond 5,000 per month, the California eugenics leader C. M. Goethe, upon returning from Germany, ebulliently bragged to a colleague, “You will be interested to know that your work has played a powerful part in shaping the opinions of the group of intellectuals who are behind Hitler in this epoch-making program. Everywhere I sensed that their opinions have been tremendously stimulated by American thought . . . I want you, my dear friend, to carry this thought with you for the rest of your life, that you have really jolted into action a great government of 60 million people.”

That same year, 10 years after Virginia passed its sterilization act, Joseph DeJarnette, superintendent of Virginia’s Western State Hospital, observed in the Richmond Times-Dispatch, “The Germans are beating us at our own game.”

More than just providing the scientific roadmap, America funded Germany’s eugenic institutions.

By 1926, Rockefeller had donated some $410,000 – almost $4 million in today’s money – to hundreds of German researchers. In May 1926, Rockefeller awarded $250,000 toward creation of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Psychiatry. Among the leading psychiatrists at the German Psychiatric Institute was Ernst Rüdin, who became director and eventually an architect of Hitler’s systematic medical repression. "]

That last underlined emphasis is related to our discussion in which ID is being systematically repressed.

God Bless,
maryJohnZ
 
You must be really, really conservative.

Fascists were widely admired by conservatives in America before the war.

They were racists and hated Jews.

They were militaristic.

They sided with businesses against labor.

They were vigorously opposed by leftists of all kinds.

The German people did not vote for the Nazi party for the above reasons. They voted for the promise of jobs,retirement benefits, health care. The Nazi’s did not introduce euthanasia, it was well established before they took power. It was not the conspiracy of industry but rather the German industry looking out for their interests IE. govt. contracts & business. Which is much the same as we have in Washington now. Your claim that the Fascist regimes were conservative are erroneous. The Fascist moto is everyone & everything for the state, conservative values place their values on everything for the individual & want limited government. By saying the Nazi’s were opposed by the leftist assume you meant the communists which are really just a different flavor of fascism. It was the Progressives of the Woodrow Wilson era & the FDR regime that brought us to Fascism in America & Fascism is making a resurgence once again.
 
That last underlined emphasis is related to our discussion in which ID is being systematically repressed.God Bless,maryJohnZ
Meanwhile – while you’ve been spending a month hunting for Nazis and complaining bitterly about the “suppression” of ID – my Catholic priest-scientist friends have been quietly at work in their labs and classrooms, testing their research programs in evolutionary biology and teaching their students, and praying for humanity in their celebrations of the Eucharist.

Petrus
 
Meanwhile – while you’ve been spending a month hunting for Nazis and complaining bitterly about the “suppression” of ID – my Catholic priest-scientist friends have been quietly at work in their labs and classrooms, testing their research programs in evolutionary biology and teaching their students, and praying for humanity in their celebrations of the Eucharist.

Petrus
Simply because a person enters the priesthood does not automatically make him a saint. I have known some who I would even dare question as to whether they were true Catholics. How do I know what your Priests friends are like? What they teach? or what their research involves? I cannot judge for or against what they do in any of those things.

You completely ignored the article I posted with all the ties and connection to American scientists and funding. You completely ignore the fact that one of the main scientists escaped the trials after the war and went underground and is part of the genetics movement still. I offered some fact, and you offer an emotional statement.
.
If you tell me these Priests are courageously fighting against the culture of death, then I owe them my deepest gratitude. I am grateful for their prayers and masses, but believe they could better serve the mankind by administering the sacraments then by forwarding evolution.

I will pray for them.

God Bless, MaryJohnZ
 
Simply because a person enters the priesthood does not automatically make him a saint. I have known some who I would even dare question as to whether they were true Catholics. How do I know what your Priests friends are like? What they teach? or what their research involves? I cannot judge for or against what they do in any of those things.Z
MaryJohnZ, why do you hate Catholic priests so much that you need to insult even them? Is not chasing Nazis enough for you? Please, I beg you, let priest friends go!
 
MaryJohnZ, why do you hate Catholic priests so much that you need to insult even them? Is not chasing Nazis enough for you? Please, I beg you, let priest friends go!
As a scientist you surprise me with how much you use hyperbole and exageration in your comments. I do not hate authentic, faithful catholic priests at all. I have been alive long enough to know that in any vocation or calling you have people who practice it faithfully and ones who don’t. I do not automatically cannonize priests because of their vocation. I have a vocation as well and according to Church teaching I have a 'prieshood; as well! We all share the call to holiness.

Please be more mature in your statements.

God Bless, maryJohnz
 
Please be more mature in your statements.God Bless, maryJohnz
Humor is mature, a time-honored and constructive way of defusing annoyances with pesky things such as nagging Nazi hunting and the insulting of my friends who are excellent scientists and holy priests! The trouble with conservative Catholics is that they usually have no sense of humor!
 
That last underlined emphasis is related to our discussion in which ID is being systematically repressed.
Why do you insist on repeating this completely unsupported assertion. Either support your assertion that ID is being systematically repressed, or stop saying it. Please, in the interest of fostering honest discussion, when people tell you that what you’re saying isn’t true, don’t simply dismiss them and keep repeating it; look into the matter and find out if they might be correct. If they are wrong, show them the evidence! If they are correct, stop repeating your error.
 
Why do you insist on repeating this completely unsupported assertion. Either support your assertion that ID is being systematically repressed, or stop saying it. Please, in the interest of fostering honest discussion, when people tell you that what you’re saying isn’t true, don’t simply dismiss them and keep repeating it; look into the matter and find out if they might be correct. If they are wrong, show them the evidence! If they are correct, stop repeating your error.
Tonyl, there is in intriguing fantasy-like quality to the people who continue to lament that ID is excluded from biology labs and that Darwin leads inevitably to Hitler. They remind me of afficionados of “World of Warcraft” or “Second Life,” communities of conversation that continue in a virtual world that bears no relation to the reality the rest of us experience. “Second Life” flourishes online, but unless you participate in the game, it is irrelevant to the world.

Similarly, MaryJohnZ and her ilk run around in a virtual world or on-line community having fun hunting for Darwinist Nazis, while real functioning scientists (including Catholic priests) are quite unaware of this fantasy world, quietly producing results for the benefit of human understanding.

So in one sense these people might simply be ignored, or studied by sociologists of knowledge as interestingly revelatory of the preoccupations of early-third-millennium American conservatism. On the other hand, we need to be vigilant in keeping their fantasies from unnecessarily distracting students and teachers in actual science classrooms.

Incidentally, I’m reading and critiquing a fascinating book by John Haught, entitled Is Nature Enough? Meaning and Truth in the Age of Science. He does a superb job of taking apart evolutionary metaphysical naturalism, arguing that meaning and purpose are inherent in nature. Mind and all that implies–including anticipation of the openness of being–are natural to the cosmos. God lures the world from the future, rather than pushing it from the past. Provocative thesis!

Petrus
 
(Barbarian shows evidence that Nazis are not liberals)

Fascists were widely admired by conservatives in America before the war.

They were racists and hated Jews.

They were militaristic.

They sided with businesses against labor.

They were vigorously opposed by leftists of all kinds.

The destruction of Ernst Rohem and the SA occurred because Rohem had espoused socialist ideas, and scared the military and industrialists Hitler was relying on to gain power.

Stuff like that.

The German people did not vote for the Nazi party…

Doesn’t matter. What they did was more important than what they claimed to be for.
Nazi’s did not introduce euthanasia, it was well established before they took power. It
That’s also not relevant. Both left and right wing dictators have sometimes committed mass killings. Of course, no liberal regime has done that, so it clearly refutes your argument that they are liberal.

(Barbarian observes that Hitler attacked leftists to appease the German Military and industrial leaders, on whose support he depended)
was not the conspiracy of industry but rather the German industry looking out for their interests IE. govt. contracts & business.
Meanwhile the conservative industrialists who had supported Hitler’s rise to the chancellorship in 1933 were uneasy with the very public socialist leanings of both Röhm and the Strasser brothers. The conservatives and the officer corps repeatedly expressed their anti-SA opinions directly to president von Hindenburg, with whom they were closely allied both politically and socially. In early June 1934, von Hindenburg, through Blomberg, issued an ultimatum to Hitler–unless political tension in Germany ended, the ailing Hindenburg would likely declare martial law. Hitler was shocked to hear this from Blomberg, who up to that point had displayed a near lackey-like attitude around him. However, when Hitler went to see the president himself, von Hindenburg confirmed the ultimatum. Knowing such a step could forever deprive him of power, Hitler decided to carry through on his pact with the Reichswehr to suppress the SA and end its plans for a “second revolution”, leading to a showdown with Röhm.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_R%C3%B6hm
Which is much the same as we have in Washington now.
Hardly the same. Hitler conspired with industrialists and the generals to suppress leftists by a violent purge that included summary executions. In America, our vice-president conspired with oil companies to produce a policy they wanted. If you think these things are equivalent, I’d have to disagree with you. It is doubtful Cheney’s actions were even illegal, much less an atrocity.
Your claim that the Fascist regimes were conservative
I was pointing out that they weren’t liberal. Not the same thing. Nazis, as the evidence I showed you, were conservative in many ways, but it would be wrong to call them conservatives too.
The Fascist moto is everyone & everything for the state,
Actually, it was “the corporate state.” Labor was to “cooperate” with business. And the Nazis effectively destroyed unions, making them subservient to the industrialists.
Conservative values place their values on everything for the individual & want limited government.
You’ve confused conservatives with libertarians. Once, many conservatives were libertarians. But not lately.
By saying the Nazi’s were opposed by the leftist assume you meant the communists
Including Christian democrats, socialists, etc.
It was the Progressives of the Woodrow Wilson era & the FDR regime that brought us to Fascism in America
Seems unlikely. Admirers of fascism, like the diredtor of the American Legion, and many others, detested Roosevelt. They even,as you see, plotted to implement a coup to replace him and install a fascist regime. The reason is clear; fascism gains adherents in bad times, and improvements in the economy quickly drained support from fascist (and communists, BTW)
Fascism is making a resurgence once again.
I’d have to agree, that the last seven years has seen a large increase in the power of the government over individuals. But it came about in one of the most conservative administrations we’ve had in a long time.

But a reckoning is coming, I think, no matter who gets elected this time. I note that the Congress is in no mood to pass legislation the president proposed, retroactively protecting people who broke the law in that regard. Senators Obama, Clinton, and McCain all seem to be unwilling to protect the guilty.
 
Hitler even wrote a fan letter to American eugenics leader Madison Grant, calling his race-based eugenics book, “The Passing of the Great Race,” his “bible.”
Typically, Grant was a lawyer, not a scientist. Arrayed against him were Darwinists like George Punnett:

Davenport and his contemporaries failed to recognize that not all familial traits are biologically inherited, and that even traits that are inherited can have complex causes. This, coupled with an evangelical commitment to create a society molded in their own image, led the eugenicists to make simplistic and unsupportable claims about human heredity. Punnett made an early indictment of the methods during a presentation at the First International Congress on Eugenics in 1911 – the year The Trait Book was published: "Except in very few cases, our knowledge of heredity in man is at present far too slight and too uncertain to base legislation upon…It must be clearly recognized that the collection of such [accurate] pedigrees is an arduous undertaking demanding high critical ability…"
eugenicsarchive.org/html/eugenics/essay4text.html

**By the mid-1930s, according to Daniel Kevles, ‘mainline eugenics had generally been recognized as a farrago of flawed science.’ By then, most geneticists accepted that eugenic sterilization could not rid society of its undesirables. **
P.M.H. Mazumdar, ‘*Reform’ eugenics and the decline of Mendelism *

“Reform eugenics” continues today, in such things as genetic counseling to help couples assess the risks of genetic disorders in children they might have, and to help people avoid hereditary disorders by managing diet and exposures.

But classic eugenics were finished before Hitler gained power. At least as far as scientists were concerned.

In Western countries like the United States and Britain, criticisms began to arise over the sloppiness of many eugenicists’ research methods. Among the first and most important critics in the United States was Thomas Hunt Morgan (1866–1945), a geneticist at Columbia University and prior to 1915 a moderate supporter of eugenics. Morgan felt that the movement had become more propagandistic than scientific and criticized eugenical claims in print, starting with his book Evolution and Genetics (1925). He chastised eugenicists for lumping many mental and behavioral conditions together under a rubric like “feeblemindedness” and treating it as if it had a single underlying cause in a single gene…Furthermore, as Reginal C. Punnett (1875–1967) (of Punnett Square fame) noted, even if a trait were found to be controlled by a single Mendelian gene, unless it was a dominant, it would take hundreds of generations of rigorous selection to eliminate it from the population…H. J. Muller (1890–1967), a student of Morgan, delivered a searing attack on “old style” eugenics at the Third International Eugenics Congress in New York City in 1932. Muller, who harbored strong eugenical beliefs as well as socialist leanings, argued that until the economic and social environment could be equalized, it would be impossible to know how much of any individual’s “social inadequacy” was due to heredity and how much to environment.
science.jrank.org/pages/9250/Eugenics-Criticisms-Eugenics.html

Daniel Hunt Morgan, as you might know, was the man most responsible for the Neo-Darwinian revision of evolutionary theory. Muller is known for his evolutionary studies of “Mullerian” mimickry.

But lawyers, politicians and religious leaders continued to believe.

It is one of the more despicable lies Stein is peddling. He’s blaming the very people who debunked the kind of ideas the Nazis promoted.
 
Why do you insist on repeating this completely unsupported assertion. Either support your assertion that ID is being systematically repressed, or stop saying it. Please, in the interest of fostering honest discussion, when people tell you that what you’re saying isn’t true, don’t simply dismiss them and keep repeating it; look into the matter and find out if they might be correct. If they are wrong, show them the evidence! If they are correct, stop repeating your error.
… the reality in most situations in human history is that when one viewpoint has become the widely circulated and generally accepted it will be an uphill battle for those who question it or would wish to offer a new view point. This isn’t new to this situation, but it is something that should be recognized and corrected.Teaching and believing in evolution has become almost like the 'gospel" of secular progressives. They would like to believe that everyone agrees with this and no one can question or offer other possibilities, but some have tried. The response has been to stiffle them. Here are some examples I found:

On a website for scientists who do support a more “Creationist” approach to researching the development of life on earth I found this quote about evolution (given by scientists supporting evolution

"Evolution is taken as a fact—and while there might be disagreements about some of the details of how evolution proceeds, there are no disagreements about the idea that it does occur and that it is the explanation for the diversity of life on our planet. Ashtaroth’s claim is exactly the opposite of the truth, which is that “almost no scientist puts any stock in any other attempted explanation for the diversity of life—especially creationism” (atheism.about.com/b/a/063194.htm. Accessed May 28, 2004, p. 1).
Code:
            This view is not an isolated example. The late Ernst Mayr, Alexander Agassiz Professor of Zoology at Harvard University, is “one of the most influential evolutionary theorists of our time” (Ferris, 2001, p. 326).  Mayr declared that “no educated person any longer questions the validity of the so-called theory of evolution, which we now know to be a simple fact” (Mayr, 2001, p. 141).  He has been claiming this for over 40 years—in 1967 he wrote that “evolution is accepted by every scientist” and for this reason it is no longer necessary to “enumerate painstakingly the proofs for evolution” Mayr, 1967. p. v). In 1971 Mayr claimed that he did “not know of a single well-informed person who questions the factuality of evolution” (p. 49).  Not one person!  Mayr defines evolution, which he calls “Darwinism,” as the rejection of “all supernatural phenomena and causations.  The theory of evolution by natural selection explains the adaptedness and diversity of the world solely materialistically.  It no longer requires God as creator or designer” (2001, p. 138).  

           "Mayr adds that “eliminating God from science made room for strictly scientific explanations of all natural phenomena” (2001, p. 138).  Furthermore, Mayr concludes, the “truly outstanding achievement” of Darwinism is that his theory “makes unnecessary the invocation of ‘final causes’—that is, any teleological forces"
The above quote is given on a page that lists a large number of scientist who oppose the Darwin/evolution approach but at the same time the scientists that were willing to put their names on the page had tenure. Other scientists were unwilling to list their positions or where thjey were employed for fear of reprisals.

Here is the statement:
  • On my list I have well over 3,000 names including Nobel Prize winners but, unfortunately, a large number of persons that could be added to the public list, including many college professors, did not want their name listed because of real concerns over possible retaliation or harm to their careers. Many of those who did not want their names on the public list are young academics without tenure, or academics who are concerned about if outing them could damage their career. Many on this list are secure tenured professors, teach at Christian Universities that protect their academic freedom to criticize Darwinism, or are in industry, or in a medical field where less antagonism exists to questioning Darwin. Some on this list are now involved full time in speaking and writing on origins, and no longer depend on secular employment to put bread on the family table. Many are also retired, thus no longer face retaliation for their doubts about Darwin. Some consented to include their names only if their current employment was not listed."*
rae.org/darwinskeptics.html

Here is an example of someone fired from a research position

Creationist files lawsuit against Woods Hole
From Boston Globe
The Boston Globe (December 7, 2007) reports that a former researcher at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution is suing the research center, claiming that he was fired, in violation of his civil rights, for not accepting evolution. Nathaniel Abraham, who earned a Ph.D. in biology from St. John’s University in 2005, was employed as a post-doctoral researcher in the laboratory of Mark Hahn; according to the Globe, “He was hired by Hahn’s marine biology lab in March 2004 because of his expertise working with zebra fish and in toxicology and developmental biology, according to court documents. He did not tell anyone his creationist views before being hired.”

Abraham’s views become apparent to Hahn in a casual conversation in October 2004, however, and the next month, Hahn asked him in a letter to resign, citing Abraham’s “wish not to work on evolutionary aspects of my grant” and writing, “You have indicated that you do not recognize the concept of biological evolution and you would not agree to include a full discussion of the evolutionary implications and interpretations of our research in any co-authored publications resulting from this work. … This position is incompatible with the work as proposed to NIH and with my own vision of how it should be carried out and interpreted.”

In June 2006, Abraham filed a complaint with the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination, which ruled against him in April 2007, stating that there was insufficient probable cause to find that Hahn and Woods Hole engaged in unlawful discriminatory practices. Represented by two lawyers, including David C. Gibbs III of the Christian Law Association (which seeks “to provide free legal assistance to Bible-believing churches and Christians who are experiencing legal difficulty in practicing their religious faith”), Abraham then filed suit in federal district court on November 30, 2007, alleging that his rights were violated under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and seeking compensatory and punitive damages.

In his complaint, Abraham claims that acceptance of evolution “was in no way a bona fide occupational qualification of employment, was not previously mentioned or implied as a requisite of hiring, and was never listed among necessary criteria for the advertised position.” In his November 2004 letter to Abraham, however, Hahn wrote, “The research proposed … has as its foundation the orthologous and paralogous (i.e. evolutionary) relationships among aryl hydrocarbon receptor signaling proteins in the various species proposed as models. The importance of these relationships is clearly evident in our previous papers, which were cited in the advertisement for the position, and in the grant proposal itself.”

NCSE’s executive director Eugenie C. Scott told the Globe, “It is inconceivable that someone working in developmental biology at a major research institution would not be expected to deal intimately with evolution. … A flight school hiring instructors wouldn’t ask whether they accepted that the earth was spherical; they would assume it. Similarly, Woods Hole would have assumed that someone hired to work in developmental biology would accept that evolution occurred. It’s part and parcel of the science these days.” And the philosopher Michael Ruse was quoted as asking, “what is a person doing in an evolutionary lab when they don’t believe in evolution … and didn’t tell anybody they didn’t believe in evolution?”
ncseweb.org/resources/news/2007/MA/850_creationist_files_lawsuit_agai_12_7_2007.asp

Obviously the Education Community in Public Schools opposes any other view point than evolution:here is one quote to support that:ncseweb.org/

"The National Center for Science Education (NCSE) defends the teaching of evolution in public schools. We are a nationally-recognized clearinghouse for information and advice to keep evolution in the science classroom and “scientific creationism” out. NCSE is the only national organization to specialize in this issue. We provide:

Reviews of current anti-evolution activity in the United States and around the world Background to the fundamentally creationist and anti-evolution movement known as “Intelligent Design”
Detailed information on the Creation/Evolution controversy from 1859 to the present Resources for parents, teachers, school boards, and the general public Contact NCSE if you need advice, information, or help in defending the teaching of evolution. We also work to increase public understanding of evolution and of the nature of scientific knowledge. "

In other word, the Theory of Evolution is pretty much mandated and to hold any other view or to try to look at things from a different perspective or avenue of research is considered “heresy”
in the secular progressive world of scientific inquistion.

God Bless, maryJohnZ
 
Here is an example of someone fired from a research position
Nathaniel Abraham, who was hired to study certain problems in evolution, only told his boss after he accepted the job that he didn’t believe in evolution and would not do the job he was hired to do. He offered to do equivalent work in something else, but Woods Hole told him that they needed someone to do the job for which he was hired.

Can you imagine taking a job, and on your first day saying “I don’t believe in this kind of work, but I’ll be glad to do something other than what you hired me to do.”

What do you think any rational boss would do?

Right.

BTW, if you compare your list of scientists (actually, there are engineers, lawyers, philosophers, etc included as “scientists”) with the list from Project Steve, you come up with about 0.3% of those with doctorates in biology or a related field doubting evolutionary theory.

Not even 1%. And all of those for a relgious reason.
 
Nathaniel Abraham, who was hired to study certain problems in evolution, only told his boss after he accepted the job that he didn’t believe in evolution and would not do the job he was hired to do. He offered to do equivalent work in something else, but Woods Hole told him that they needed someone to do the job for which he was hired.

Can you imagine taking a job, and on your first day saying “I don’t believe in this kind of work, but I’ll be glad to do something other than what you hired me to do.”

What do you think any rational boss would do?

Right.

BTW, if you compare your list of scientists (actually, there are engineers, lawyers, philosophers, etc included as “scientists”) with the list from Project Steve, you come up with about 0.3% of those with doctorates in biology or a related field doubting evolutionary theory.

Not even 1%. And all of those for a relgious reason.
Why should I believe your word on this? (even 1% of those listed were scientists)?
Show me these men are not scietists. And besides, you probably define anyone who has an ID viewpoint as being a phoilosopher, not a scientist.

As far as the scientist at Woods Hole, it sounded like they hired him to do research. They did not specify he had to take an approach linked to Evolution and he was prepared to do the research from another view point. They fired himbecause he did not accept Evolution as the only approach.

.Isn’t that what we have been talking about? Scientists who want to approach things from another perspective other than Evolution who are stiffled and not allowed to work.

You know in the begiining of this discussion I actually was more prone to see that both ID and Evolutionists should work side by side and that there was merit in both approaches, but that they should be integrated. As the discussion has progressed I am beginning to see what CS Lewis meant when he said:

‘What inclines me now to think that you may be right in regarding it [evolution] as the central and radical lie in the whole web of falsehood that now governs our lives is not so much your arguments against it as the fanatical and twisted attitudes of its defenders.’

In Christ,
maryJohnZ
 
On a website for scientists who do support a more “Creationist” approach to researching the development of life on earth I found this quote about evolution (given by scientists supporting evolution

"Evolution is taken as a fact—and while there might be disagreements about some of the details of how evolution proceeds, there are no disagreements about the idea that it does occur and that it is the explanation for the diversity of life on our planet. Ashtaroth’s claim is exactly the opposite of the truth, which is that “almost no scientist puts any stock in any other attempted explanation for the diversity of life—especially creationism” (atheism.about.com/b/a/063194.htm. Accessed May 28, 2004, p. 1).
The fact that that a scientist said this, and that it is a rather accurate statement, does not support your contention that ID is being suppressed.
“Mayr adds that “eliminating God from science made room for strictly scientific explanations of all natural phenomena” (2001, p. 138). Furthermore, Mayr concludes, the “truly outstanding achievement” of Darwinism is that his theory “makes unnecessary the invocation of ‘final causes’—that is, any teleological forces”
This quote, however, is the perfect example of the dishonesty displayed by creationists. Just two sentances before that quote he says:
"The theory of evolution by natural selection explains the adaptedness and diversity of the world solely materialistically. It no longer requires God as creator or designer (although one is certainly still free to believe in God even if one accepts evolution).
An honest reading of the paragraph shows that he is simply saying that by allowing scientists to ask “how”, instead of assuming the conclusion “miracle” opened the door for us to learn more about our world.
The above quote is given on a page that lists a large number of scientist who oppose the Darwin/evolution approach but at the same time the scientists that were willing to put their names on the page had tenure. Other scientists were unwilling to list their positions or where thjey were employed for fear of reprisals.
Here is the statement:
  • On my list I have well over 3,000 names including Nobel Prize winners but, unfortunately, a large number of persons that could be added to the public list, including many college professors, did not want their name listed because of real concerns over possible retaliation or harm to their careers. Many of those who did not want their names on the public list are young academics without tenure, or academics who are concerned about if outing them could damage their career. Many on this list are secure tenured professors, teach at Christian Universities that protect their academic freedom to criticize Darwinism, or are in industry, or in a medical field where less antagonism exists to questioning Darwin. Some on this list are now involved full time in speaking and writing on origins, and no longer depend on secular employment to put bread on the family table. Many are also retired, thus no longer face retaliation for their doubts about Darwin. Some consented to include their names only if their current employment was not listed."*
That there exist scientist who dislike Darwinism for religious reasons is not in doubt. However, this in no way proves that ID is being suppressed. It also doesn’t provide any evidence for an alternative to evolution.
Here is an example of someone fired from a research position
As has been pointed out, he was fired for refusing to do what he was hired to do.
Now, Imagine that I hired a post-doc to work in my lab (I work in the field of optical physics.). If he told me that he was unwilling to apply quantum mechanical theory to the analysis of our experiments, He’d be utterly useless to me. Lasers are inherently quantum mechanical, and most of the effects I study require quantum mechanics to fully explain. While it’s true that you can explain a large amount of it and conduct the experiments without using quantum theory, the use of quantum theory is a necessity to do the job properly.
Likewise, this guy was hired to do a job that he knew would involve the application of evolution in the analysis of the experiments. Let me say that again He applied for and accepted a job that he knew required the application of evolutionary theory When he refused to to a large part of his job, he became utterly worthless as an employee.
Obviously the Education Community in Public Schools opposes any other view point than evolution:here is one quote to support that:ncseweb.org/
"The National Center for Science Education (NCSE) defends the teaching of evolution in public schools. We are a nationally-recognized clearinghouse for information and advice to keep evolution in the science classroom and “scientific creationism” out. NCSE is the only national organization to specialize in this issue. We provide:
Reviews of current anti-evolution activity in the United States and around the world Background to the fundamentally creationist and anti-evolution movement known as “Intelligent Design”
Detailed information on the Creation/Evolution controversy from 1859 to the present Resources for parents, teachers, school boards, and the general public Contact NCSE if you need advice, information, or help in defending the teaching of evolution. We also work to increase public understanding of evolution and of the nature of scientific knowledge. "
In other word, the Theory of Evolution is pretty much mandated and to hold any other view or to try to look at things from a different perspective or avenue of research is considered “heresy”
in the secular progressive world of scientific inquistion.
That’s a big stretch you’re making there. The theory of evolution is taught because that is the current scientific explaination. There is no other theory that has any scientific evidence Once again, this does not support your contention. There is a huge difference between ID not being taught because it has not yet even been formulated into a testable theory and your claim that it is being suppressed.
 
You know in the begiining of this discussion I actually was more prone to see that both ID and Evolutionists should work side by side and that there was merit in both approaches, but that they should be integrated. As the discussion has progressed I am beginning to see what CS Lewis meant when he said:

‘What inclines me now to think that you may be right in regarding it [evolution] as the central and radical lie in the whole web of falsehood that now governs our lives is not so much your arguments against it as the fanatical and twisted attitudes of its defenders.’
So basically, you don’t care the the massive amount scientific data collected in the past 140+ years supports evolution. You don’t care that ID has yet to formulate a theory or even a single testable hypothesis. You don’t care that the ID proponents won’t even try to formulate any theory or hypothesis. You decided from the start that ID was valid and since we won’t accept it, evolution must be a lie. Wow.
 
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