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Darwin vs. Design conference
A perspective from one group of students
By:
Posted: 4/17/07
Considering the way in which the Discovery Institute describes its
mission in all of its articles and speeches, one would think that it
really does support some sort of science, some sort of new-age way to
learn about the world and that all it really wants to do is simply make
our education more complete.
However, when one actually attends the "conferences," or as I like
to call them, "indoctrination seminars," its true face is shown.
Five of my brave friends and I decided to take an informed and
conscious stand against the Discovery Institute on Friday. We decided
to silently protest the "debate," which was called "Darwin vs. Design,"
though they failed to have anyone representing the Darwinian viewpoint,
by disseminating facts and information regarding the institute.
I did some research and typed up a flier that consisted of nothing
more than quotes from the institute's own policy paper, known as the
Wedge Document. The following are the most profound quotes, which we
distributed, found in this document:
- "Design theory promises to reverse the stifling dominance of the
materialistic worldview, and to replace it with a science consonant
with Christian and theistic convictions."
- Under "Governing Goals:" "To replace materialistic explanations
with theistic understanding that nature and human beings are created by
God."
- Under "Twenty Year Goals:" "To see design theory permeate our religious, cultural, moral, and political life."
One look at these quotes indicates the true goals behind the Institute's little conference.
They are not teaching science, but instead are preaching religion
as science. Now, none of us has any problems with Creationism or
Intelligent Design, so long as it is understood that it is personal
belief and not science. Teach it in history class. Teach it in religion
class. But do not teach it in science class, because science is the
study of the natural world and thus cannot prove or disprove the
existence of God, who operates and exists in the supernatural world.
So, armed with these quotes and with some posters which displayed
questions regarding the fact that if ID is true, why are there so many
unintelligent "designs" present, we entered McFarlin Auditorium.
We began handing out fliers and were receiving mixed reviews -
until a tall, lanky, and toothy man jittered his way over to us and
demanded to know who was handing out these fliers. We all took
responsibility, and he began ripping the flyers out of our hands,
saying that we could not distribute anything of the sort. I told him we
paid to go to school here and that we were students who could walk
anywhere on our campus, and that it just so happened that we walked
into McFarlin, and it also just so happened that we had fliers to
distribute.
He didn't take too kindly to that, and in two minutes' time, we had
two police officers who all of a sudden had a real job to do watching
us instead of sleeping the night away in the back. I'm sure if we had
been distributing thank-you notes expressing our gratitude for the
institute coming to our campus, he would've given us a warmer
reception.
Then a hall manager spoke to us about being respectful to those who
paid to use the auditorium. I replied that the next time I want to buy
some personal freedoms, such as freedom of speech and freedom to
protest, I would just rent out McFarlin and start making up rules.
Anyway, the event got underway and the six of us felt as though we
were in church. The first speaker was a journalist (who happened to be
oh-so-qualified on the topic at hand) who told us that he used to be an
atheist (I think he meant "a theist," judging from his fervor) because
of biology class. But then when he started trying to understand science
(which happens so often in the halls of journalism school), he realized
that science had come to its limit in being able to explain the world
around us and that it was a lesser leap of faith to believe in God than
to believe in Darwin.
He also decided to preach about how he believed the world's creator
and designer was the "God of the Bible," as he said. That's
interesting, seeing as how he said nothing of the God of the Jews,
Muslims and other religions; apparently Christianity's God is the only
one we have to believe in. And his entire speech dealt with
differentiating atheists from Christians, where he seemed to use the
word atheist as a synonym for "Darwinist" or "evolutionist."
At this point, we were fed up with the sheer lack of science being
discussed. (Remember, ID theorists claim to support a science, not a
religion.) So we held up our signs. They bore questions such as, "Why
do we have wisdom teeth if they do not fit our jaws?" and "Why did it
take 20 species of elephant to go extinct to get two species that
survived?" and "Why do the ribosomes (protein synthesizing machinery)
in our mitochondria match those of bacteria?" to name a few.
Well, after holding up these signs for a while, the men on stage
noticed and decided to answer one of them. They chose the last one,
regarding ribosomes. Immediately, the only person on stage with any
knowledge of biology, Michael Behe, took up the question.
His answer was that ID theory does not allow for explanations
regarding interspecies commonalities such as those implied in the
question.
In short, his answer was that he couldn't explain it with ID theory.
But then he went on, describing how a Creator may have given humans
similar ribosomes for no good reason. His logic was that when one sees
a car with a radio, one can ask how that radio got there and there are
many explanations.
One such explanation was provided by Behe, and it was so very
realistic: He said the radio could've fallen from an apartment and
landed in the car, suggesting that a Creator could have simply thrown
ribosomes all over the place, and they just landed in humans by chance.
Very likely, indeed.
Over the course of the event, two of my friends decided to stand up
slightly and move a row ahead. When they did, they were manhandled by
SMU's finest officers and escorted out.
Good job, boys in blue. Way to stifle freedom of expression while
disallowing people to stand up for two seconds. I'm glad you're keeping
our campus safe.
The four of us decided to stay behind after receiving a text from
our two friends letting us know they were safe. However, that was not
the last text we received that night, because after that, my friend
Mahmud and I began receiving hate text messages, telling us to "shove
your sign up your ass" and to "shut the f*** up." All very Christian
indeed.
The night was wrapped up when, somehow, one of our flyers made it
to the front of the stage, where the journalist asked the other men on
stage about the quote regarding the institute's true purpose (see first
quote mentioned above) being that it wants to replace modern science
with "a science consonant with Christian and theistic convictions."
To my shock, one of the men on stage said, "Yes that's true, and I don't see anything scandalous about that."
Nothing scandalous about trying to replace science with
Christianity? Nothing scandalous about the fact that religion keeps
being brought up during what is supposed to be a scientific conference?
Clearly, the institute's dictionary must define the word "scandalous"
differently from the dictionaries we own, because it sure appears to be
pretty scandalous. And that sums up the night in question, after it
ended with us being escorted out by the police.
My friends, if you care anything at all about this matter, then I
would urge you to research it yourselves, as we did, and see who is
giving you the information. The Discovery Institute has an agenda, and
it is a very serious one. If it has its way, then in 20 years, it will
"permeate our religious, cultural, moral, and political life."
Be warned, George Orwell, be warned.
Francis Goldshmid: Junior, Biology B.S., Chemistry B.A.
Nicolas Sanchez: Junior, Biology B.S., Italian minor
Jani Brackett: Junior, Biology B.S., German B.A.
Desiree Brooks: Sophomore, Biology B.S., Chemistry B.A.
Ati Nayeb: Junior, Phsycology major, Biology and Chemistry minors
Mahmud Shurafa: Biology and Spanish double major
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