Search This Blog

Monday 14 March 2022

On the reset.

<iframe width="853" height="480" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/g7x7kHC91dk" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

The realignment.

<iframe width="853" height="480" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/dBa3-IJGr-M" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

"Man to man is a wolf"

<iframe width="853" height="480" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ptbuPdkI434" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Headed for a fall?


The civil war rages on.

<iframe width="853" height="480" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/omKZGAk8iJQ" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

War continues to be good business.

<iframe width="853" height="480" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/TmKvdQ6uGaY" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Censorship on the march?

<iframe width="853" height="480" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/lnsByps85gE" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

On the foundation of reason.

 

Faith in God Is the Only Coherent Basis for Reason

Michael Egnor
 
 

Atheists commonly assert that there is a profound dichotomy between faith and reason. This is exemplified by atheist evolutionary biologist Jerry Coyne’s book Faith vs. Fact. He implies that we can have faith in the truth of something or we can have factual knowledge of the truth but we cannot have both. Faith and fact are, in his view, mutually exclusive. But that is not true.

Faith in God provides an indispensable foundation for the power of human reason. In the perspective proposed by medieval philosopher and theologian Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274), we must accept radical skepticism about the veracity of our perceptions and our concepts.

One may ask: How do we know that what we perceive or what we believe corresponds to reality? The answer is that we can’t know, in the sense that we can’t use our perceptive or intellectual abilities to prove the validity of our perceptions or concepts. To do so would be to reason in a circle. If our perceptions and our concepts are not reliable, then how could we use them to validate their reliability?

That’s Radical Enough

The skepticism Thomas requires is radical indeed. For example, even Descartes’s assertion, “I think therefore I am,” is not something we can prove without faith. The problem lies in the “therefore.” We must tacitly assume the validity of logic — specifically the logic of non-contradiction — to link “I think” to “I am.”

If we do not have faith in logic, then it would be possible to think but not to exist. Of course we find this possibility absurd, but it is only absurd because of our profound faith in the validity of logic — in this case, the validity of the logical principle of non-contradiction. That is the principle inherent in the belief that thinking presupposes the existence of the thinker. If logic were not reliable, there would be no logical connection between thinking and existence. Thinkers could think without existing.

So we are left with radical skepticism — theists and atheists alike. We can conclusively prove nothing about our knowledge of the world. It might all be a delusion and we have no certain way to be sure that it is not.

But of course sane people believe that — at least to some extent — we have access to truth. But this access is always a matter of faith — the validity of reason cannot be validated by reason itself. The process of this faith differs between those who believe in an omniscient and omnibenevolent God and those who do not.

I will speak here from the Christian perspective as it is the one with which I am the most familiar. 

Read the rest at Mind Matters News, published by Discovery Institute’s Bradley Center for Natural and Artificial Intelligence.

How Darwinism's ministry of truth warps the origins debate II.

Do Non-Scientists Have Freedom to Question Darwinism?

John G. West
 
 

Editor’s note: This article is an excerpt from a chapter in the newly released book The Comprehensive Guide to Science and Faith: Exploring the Ultimate Questions About Life and the Cosmos. See also Dr. West’s article from last week, “Do Scientists Have Freedom to Question Darwinism?

Even nonscientists can face problems for suggesting that there might be a serious intellectual debate over Darwinism. At Baylor University, philosopher and legal scholar Francis Beckwith was initially denied tenure despite an outstanding record of academic research and publications.1 Although Professor Beckwith was well known for his prolife views, he was most controversial for his law review articles and an academic book defending the constitutionality of teaching about intelligent design as an alternative to Darwinism.2 It is important to note that Beckwith did not advocate that intelligent design should be taught in public schools — only that it was constitutional to teach it in an appropriate manner. But that nuanced position was too much for some of his colleagues, who were defenders of Darwin’s theory. Fortunately for Beckwith, after a public outcry, the president of Baylor later granted him tenure.3

A Dissertation in Limbo

College professors are not the only targets in academia who face discrimination because of their skepticism of Darwinism. Students can be even more vulnerable. Ohio State University doctoral candidate Bryan Leonard had his dissertation defense put in limbo after three pro-Darwin professors filed a spurious complaint attacking Leonard’s dissertation research as “unethical human subject experimentation.” Leonard’s dissertation project looked at how student beliefs changed after students were taught scientific evidence for and against modern evolutionary theory. The complaining professors admitted that they had not actually read Leonard’s dissertation. But they were sure it must be unethical. Why? According to them, there is no valid evidence against evolutionary theory. Thus — by definition — Leonard’s research must be tantamount to child abuse.4

Outside of academia, there have been similar cases of discrimination in government-funded science organizations. David Coppedge was a senior computer systems administrator for the Cassini Mission to Saturn at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab in California. He faced demotion and discharge after he offended his supervisor by occasionally offering to loan colleagues DVDs about intelligent design.5 No one had ever complained to Coppedge about his offers of DVDs, but when the supervisor found out, Coppedge faced a punitive investigation. His employment evaluations, which had been outstanding, suddenly became negative, and ultimately he lost his job. Coppedge’s dismissal was justified as a budgetary reduction unrelated to his views on intelligent design, but that explanation was questionable given the facts of the case.

The Sternberg Case

Evolutionary biologist Richard Sternberg faced similar retaliation by officials at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History (NMNH) after accepting for publication a peer-reviewed article supportive of intelligent design in a biology journal he edited. A research associate at the museum, Sternberg said that after the article was published, he was told to vacate his office space and was shunned and vilified by colleagues. Efforts were also made by administrators to discover Sternberg’s personal religious and political beliefs.6 Investigators for the U.S. Office of Special Counsel concluded that “it is…clear that a hostile work environment was created with the ultimate goal of forcing [Dr. Sternberg]…out of the [Smithsonian].”7

Smithsonian officials denied any wrongdoing, but Sternberg was demoted from a research associate to a research collaborator without explanation.8 A 17-month investigation by subcommittee staff of the House Committee on Government Reform subsequently confirmed and elaborated on the previous findings of the US Office of Special Counsel. In a detailed report released to the public, subcommittee investigators concluded that they had uncovered “substantial, credible evidence of efforts to abuse and harass Dr. Sternberg, including punitively targeting him for investigation in order to supply a pretext for dismissing him, and applying to him regulations and restrictions not imposed on other researchers.”9

Congressional investigators further accused NMNH officials of conspiring “on government time and using government emails…with the pro-evolution National Center for Science Education (NCSE)…to publicly smear and discredit Dr. Sternberg with false and defamatory information.”10 The NCSE even provided a set of “‘talking points’ to…NMNH officials on how to discredit both Sternberg and the Meyer article.” In addition, the NCSE was asked by senior museum administrator Dr. Hans Sues “to monitor Sternberg’s outside activities…The clear purpose of having the NCSE monitor Dr. Sternberg’s outside activities was to find a way to dismiss him.”11 Congressional investigators concluded that “the extent to which NMNH officials colluded on government time and with government resources with the NCSE to publicly discredit Dr. Sternberg’s scientific and professional integrity and investigate opportunities to dismiss him is alarming.”12

When asked about Sternberg’s plight by the Washington Post, Eugenie Scott of the NCSE seemed to suggest that Sternberg was lucky more was not done to get rid of him: “If this was a corporation, and an employee did something that really embarrassed the administration, really blew it, how long do you think that person would be employed?”13

Teachers at Risk

Science teachers in K-12 schools also face challenges if they criticize Darwinian theory. In Minnesota, high school teacher Rodney LeVake was removed from teaching biology after expressing doubts about Darwin’s theory. LeVake, who holds a master’s degree in biology, agreed to teach evolution as required in the district’s curriculum, but said he wanted to “accompany that treatment of evolution with an honest look at the difficulties and inconsistencies of the theory.”14

In Washington State, longtime high school biology teacher Roger DeHart faced continuing harassment from pro-Darwin activists, who succeeded in getting his school district to prohibit him from discussing scientific criticisms of modern Darwinian theory with his students. DeHart was even banned from sharing mainstream science publications with students that corrected textbook errors about evolution. Although DeHart complied with his district’s gag order, ultimately, he was removed from teaching biology. When he took a job in an adjoining school district so that he could continue to teach biology, the harassment continued. He was eventually reassigned from teaching biology in that district as well, even though there were no allegations by his new district that he was not following the prescribed curriculum. DeHart finally was driven from public education altogether.15

Notes

  1. John West, “Scandal Brewing At Baylor University? Denial of Tenure to Francis Beckwith Raises Serious Questions About Fairness and Academic Freedom,” Evolution News and Views (March 28, 2006), https://evolutionnews.org/2006/03/scandal_at_baylor_university_d/ (accessed November 24, 2020).
  2. See, for example, Francis J. Beckwith, Law, Darwinism, and Public Education: The Establishment Clause and the Challenge of Intelligent Design(Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2003); Francis J. Beckwith, “Science and Religion Twenty Years After McLean v. Arkansas: Evolution, Public Education, and the New Challenge of Intelligent Design,” Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy 26 (Spring 2003), 455-499; Francis J. Beckwith, “Public Education, Religious Establishment, and the Challenge of Intelligent Design,” Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics, & Public Policy 17 (2003), 461-519; Francis J. Beckwith, “A Liberty Not Fully Evolved?: The Case of Rodney LeVake and the Right of Public School Teachers to Criticize Darwinism,” San Diego Law Review 39 (November/December 2002), 1311-1325.
  3. Robert Crowther, “Welcome News as Scholar Francis Beckwith Is Granted Tenure At Baylor,” Evolution News & Views (September 27, 2006), https://evolutionnews.org/2006/09/welcome_news_as_scholar_franci/ (accessed November 24, 2020).
  4. For information about the Bryan Leonard case, see Catherine Candinsky, “Evolution debate re-emerges: Doctoral student’s work was possibly unethical, OSU professors argue,” The Columbus Dispatch (June 9, 2005); “Attack on OSU Graduate Student Endangers Academic Freedom,” Discovery Institute (April 18, 2005), https://www.discovery.org/a/2661/ (accessed November 24, 2020); “Professors Defend Ohio Grad Student Under Attack by Darwinists,” Discovery Institute (July 11, 2005), https://www.discovery.org/a/2715/ (accessed November 24, 2020).
  5. For information and documentation about the Coppedge case, see Robert Crowther, “Trial to Begin in Intelligent Design Discrimination Lawsuit against NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab,” Evolution News and Views (March 5, 2012), https://evolutionnews.org/2012/03/trial_to_begin_/ (accessed November 24, 2020); “Facts of the Coppedge Lawsuit Contradict the Spin from Jet Propulsion Lab and National Center for Science Education,” Evolution News and Views, March 12, 2012, https://evolutionnews.org/2012/03/facts_of_the_co/ (accessed November 24, 2020); Joshua Youngkin, “Why Did NASA’s JPL Discriminate Against David Coppedge and Why Does It Matter?” Evolution News and Views (November 22, 2011), https://evolutionnews.org/2011/11/what_happened_t/ (accessed November 24, 2020).
  6. See David Klinghoffer, “The Branding of a Heretic,” The Wall Street Journal, January 28, 2005, https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB110687499948738917 (accessed November 24, 2020). For more information about the controversy surrounding the publication of the journal article supportive of intelligent design, see “Sternberg, Smithsonian, Meyer, and the Paper That Started It All,” https://www.discovery.org/a/2399/ (accessed November 24, 2020); Richard Sternberg, “Smithsonian Controversy,” http://www.richardsternberg.com/smithsonian.php (accessed November 24, 2020).
  7. Letter to Richard Sternberg from the US Office of Special Counsel, August 5, 2005, available at http://www.richardsternberg.com/smithsonian.php?page=letter (accessed November 24, 2020). Also see Klinghoffer, “The Branding of a Heretic.”
  8. Intolerance and the Politicization of Science at the Smithsonian: Smithsonian’s Top Officials Permit the Demotion and Harassment of Scientist Skeptical of Darwinian Evolution, Staff Report Prepared for the Hon. Mark Souder, Chairman, Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy and Human Resources (Washington, DC: US House of Representatives, Committee on Government Reform, December 11, 2006), 3, 20-21, https://www.discovery.org/m/securepdfs/2020/11/IntoleranceandthePoliticizationofScienceattheSmithsonian.pdf (accessed November 26, 2020).
  9. Intolerance and the Politicization of Science At the Smithsonian, 4.
  10. Intolerance and the Politicization of Science At the Smithsonian, 5-6.
  11. Intolerance and the Politicization of Science At the Smithsonian, 22, emphasis in original. The congressional report further explained, “Dr. Sues hoped that the NCSE could unearth evidence that Dr. Sternberg had misrepresented himself as a Smithsonian employee, which would have been grounds for his dismissal as a Research Associate: ‘As a Research Associate, Sternberg is not allowed to represent himself as an employee of the Smithsonian Institution, and, if he were to do so, he would forfeit his appointment.’”
  12. Intolerance and the Politicization of Science at the Smithsonian, 23, emphasis in original.
  13. Quoted in Michael Powell, “Editor Explains Reasons for ‘Intelligent Design’ Article,” The Washington Post (August 19, 2005), A19.
  14. Quoted in Rodney LeVake vs. Independent School District #656, State of Minnesota Court of Appeals, C8-00-1613 (May 8, 2001); https://web.archive.org/web/20130314100547/http://www.lawlibrary.state.mn.us/archive/ctappub/0105/c8001613.htm (accessed November 24, 2020). Additional information on the LeVake case can be found in James Kilpatrick, “Case of Scientific Heresy is Doomed,” Augusta Chronicle (December 23, 2001), A4. The Minnesota Court of Appeals found that the school district’s interest in maintaining its curriculum overrode LeVake’s First Amendment interest in teaching material critical of Darwinian evolution.
  15. John G. West, Darwin Day in America: How Our Politics and Culture Have Been Dehumanized in the Name of Science (Wilmington, DE: ISI Books, 2007), 231-232, 234-238.

 

The bravest newest world yet?

Our Looming Procreative Anarchy

Wesley J. Smith
 

It is no secret that the traditional family is under unprecedented assault. But we haven’t seen anything yet. A time is coming — I would say, within the next twenty years — when there will be no limits to the creation of novel family structures enabled by biotechnology.

We get a hint of that coming dystopia (from my perspective) in an article published in the Reproduction and Fertility medical journal. A bioethicist claims there are no moral reasons for disallowing skin cells to be turned into ova and sperm (in vitro gametogenesis, IVG) — already done in mice — so as to allow open-ended means of having children. When coupled with other emerging biotechnologies, there would be few impossibilities! From, “Is There a Valid Ethical Objection to the Clinical Use of In Vitro-Derived Gametes?”:

IVG affords biological parenthood to more family constructions than does natural conception. Concerns regarding this fact constitute a large proportion of those found in the literature. Biological parenthood could conceivably be made accessible to the deceased; postmenopausal women; single individuals; same-sex couples; groups of more than two individuals; children, fetuses and embryos.

Well Beyond Merely Radical

Embryos as fathers, mothers, or whatever, would go well beyond merely radical, to the socially destabilizing. But other than safety concerns, the author sees no reason not to charge full speed ahead into this biotechnologically enabled social anarchy:

Ethicists discourage objections based on natural law as they have been illustrated to be flawed and morally prejudiced. Even if this were not the case, an attack on the unnatural is a prima facie move which targets the entire medical profession, including medicines, vaccines and other ARTs. This is something that, one must assume, is not the intention of proponents of such a view.

Therefore, one may say instead that reproductive IVG somehow crosses a line and is more unnatural than other medical interventions but even this is difficult to justify. When one is less accustomed to a certain practice, it may attract more distrust or criticism than is warranted; this is a manifestation of the mere-exposure effect, a cognitive bias that renders individuals more averse to the unfamiliar. Such a belief does not reflect the moral value of the practice in question. As an example, IVF was initially regarded as morally suspect for many years – it is only as its practice has become commonplace that public opinion has shifted in its favour. Therefore, while ethical policy should recognise pluralism, it should be developed from rational arguments that are accepted as valid from the perspective of all stakeholders

Which means that moral objections will never be deemed valid. Think about it. People will always be found who want what they want with regard to having children — no matter the moral threats that their desires pose to cultural stability or to the social well-being of future children.

The Bottom Line

That’s clearly the author’s bottom line:

In light of the arguments presented in this review, I conclude that there is no coherent and justifiable in-principle ethical objection to the use of IVG as an ART [assisted reproductive technology] for those who cannot, by any other means, parent offspring with whom they share genetic material. Although both practical and safety concerns currently prevent its application in humans, the approval of reproductive IVG ought to be enacted upon their resolution.

The West is engaged in the most radical remaking of the basic structure of the family in human history — enabled by the most powerful technologies ever devised — methods that can literally change our genomes down the generations and erase fundamental family definitions.

And we are inert in the face of the chaos that could (would, in my view) result therefrom. Not only are we not creating reasonable boundaries; we aren’t even talking about it.