[Vision2020] Strong Reaction to UI Stance

[Tom Hansen]

>From today's (December 9, 2005) Spokesman Review -

"'It's pretty clear there's a lot of misunderstanding out there about what
constitutes science in America,' he [UI President White] said. 'I don't want
anyone to think we have, in our science curriculum, anything other than
science.'"

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Strong reaction to UI stance 

White says feedback positive for most part, welcomes debate from proponents
of intelligent design

Shawn Vestal
Staff writer
December 9, 2005

The University of Idaho has received several hundred responses to President
Tim White's statement this fall that the school would teach only evolution
in its science classes, and the reaction hasn't died down.

"I get a letter or two a day about this," White said Thursday. "It was a
strong response."

He said the reaction has been generally supportive, though some critics
accuse him of stifling academic freedom and fostering anti-religious bias by
limiting subjects like intelligent design to philosophy or religion classes.


 
The move drew media coverage from around the country, and has prompted an
ongoing back-and-forth among letters to the editor at newspapers in the
region. White's statement is mentioned in an article in this week's
Newsweek, and the current New Yorker has an article on intelligent design
that quotes trial testimony from Scott Minnich, a UI biologist, in support
of the theory.

White said he views the debate as a positive development - especially
considering the violent turn the controversy took in Kansas this week, where
a professor who proposed a class debunking intelligent design was beaten by
two men apparently angered by comments he'd made about Christians.

"Anytime there's this kind of public debate, it helps advance society,"
White said Thursday morning during a news conference at the UI's offices in
Coeur d'Alene.

White's Oct. 4 statement banned "alternatives" to evolution from biology
curriculums, making the UI one of the few universities in the country to
craft such an explicit policy. White's statement came as proponents of
intelligent design - including Minnich - were making news around the
country.

Intelligent design proposes that certain biological systems are too complex
to have evolved via random mutation, and so it can be inferred that they
were designed. Most scientists reject it as creationism in disguise, and say
evolution has a scientific track record that dwarfs the objections presented
by intelligent design supporters.

National scientific associations, as well as presidents at Cornell and the
University of Kansas, have taken stands similar to White's, and faculty
members on the Moscow campus seem generally to support it. The Discovery
Institute, a Seattle organization that promotes intelligent design, harshly
criticized White's move as a restriction of academic freedom.

Minnich is one of a few scientists who have become public figures in favor
of intelligent design, though he has emphasized that he does not teach the
theory in his classes at the UI.

In early November, he testified on behalf of the Dover, Pa., Area School
Board, which voted in 2004 to require students to hear a statement about
intelligent design and "gaps" in the theory of evolution in biology classes.
Eight families sued, saying the policy violates the constitutional ban on
state promotion of religion because it essentially promotes a biblical view
of creationism.

A judge is expected to rule before the end of the year.

Minnich studies the bacterial flagellum, a tiny whiplike motor that
intelligent design supporters cite as an example of "irreducible
complexity." He could not be reached Thursday.

Intelligent design supporters say they're not attempting to force biblical
creationism into the science classroom, though the idea has been embraced by
creationists. They argue that certain systems - such as the bacterial
flagellum or the eye - could not have evolved piece-by-piece, because if you
remove any single part they stop functioning. 

Most scientists dispute this view, and some have presented arguments that
such systems evolve and change functions as they do so. They also argue that
intelligent design fails basic tenets of what constitutes science - it
cannot produce hypotheses that can be tested, and it can't be proven untrue.

White said his statement wasn't an attempt to distance the university from
Minnich, whom he called "a valued member of the faculty," though he did want
to clarify what the UI considers science.

"It's pretty clear there's a lot of misunderstanding out there about what
constitutes science in America," he said. "I don't want anyone to think we
have, in our science curriculum, anything other than science."

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Take care, Moscow.

Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho


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"If you are going to take Federal Money, then you need to accept the Federal
requirements."

- Dale Courtney (December 5, 2005)

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