William Jennings BUSH: Taking the Mystery Out of Science

What a continual embarrassment to have a President who thinks the Earth was created in 4004 BC during a coffee break joke that got out of hand among God and his angels.

Intelligent design is not so intelligent
By Donald Kaul
MinutemanMedia.org
People keep telling me that George Bush isn't dumb. Intelligent people. Honest. They say that, close up, he's quick and sharp. Which, if true, means that he is the most willfully ignorant man who has ever occupied the White House.
His statement the other day -- that the theory of "intelligent design" should be taught in high school science classes, right beside evolution -- was nothing short of appalling.
" ... people ought to be exposed to different ideas," he said.
Really? Crackpot ideas as well as sound ones Mr. President? Taken to its logical conclusion it would mean that kids should be exposed to the flat earth theory and astrology as well as astronomy, numerology along with statistics. On the other hand, taking something to its logical conclusion is the last thing I'd accuse the president of. I suspect he's simply pandering to the Know-Nothing wing of his party, that is to say, its majority.
There are many explanations of how life came to be. Most of them rely heavily on magic, a god-figure creating the heavens, earth and man out of nothingness simply through an act of will. Shazam!
Evolution, the theory that man has evolved through the millennia from less complex forms of life, does not rely on magic; rather it is an informed speculation that has been shaped over the past 150 years by relentless scientific investigation. It has proven itself to virtually the entire scientific community (a few cranks excepted) and is integral to a whole range of scientific disciplines, biology especially.
Intelligent design -- the notion that human life is too complex to be explained by evolution and so must be the work of an intelligent -- something -- is just another magic act and not a persuasive one at that. (They never tell you whom they suspect of being that intelligent, for one thing.) Its proponents have seldom published in reputable scientific journals nor put their research, such as it is, to the test of peer review. It is junk science.
In short, intelligent design isn't very.
Mr. Bush's science adviser (and doesn't that sound like a zany job. I wonder if they make him sleep in the basement and eat scraps from the table) tried his best to make his boss sound less of a dolt.
"Intelligent design is not a scientific concept," the adviser, John Marburger III, said. The president's remarks should be interpreted to mean that intelligent design could profitably be discussed as part of the "social context" in science classes.
And if you think that's what the president really meant, I have some Enron stock I'd be willing to let you have at cost.
If it were just a case of the president being a science ignoramus one could shrug it off as part of his good ol' boy act (like his dropping of g's) but this ignorance, in case after case, has been reflected in disastrous public policy, particularly in the areas of the environment (global warming) and scientific inquiry (stem cell research).
We have become the most science-illiterate people in the industrial world and our president is giving aid and comfort to the enemy, at times because it is politically advantageous to do so, at times because he is a man of belief rather than reason.
The "Scopes-Monkey trial," which dealt with the right of Tennessee teachers to teach evolution in the schools there, is now 80 years old. Since then we have entered the ages of jet propulsion, atomic energy, television, space exploration and the Internet. Yet we find ourselves still fighting that same battle -- with the president on the side of the tin-foil collectors.
Creationists and others have been putting stickers on high school textbooks pointing out that evolution is "only" a theory and has not been proved. Fair enough, but to be accurate and thorough we should add another sticker saying "And the Bible is a series of well-crafted myths of a kind common to all cultures and should not be confused with journalism."
It's an idea people should be exposed to.


Donald Kaul recently retired as Washington columnist for the "Des Moines Register." He has covered the foolishness in our nation's capital for 29 years, winning a number of modestly coveted awards along the way.