Eugenie Scott Lecture (and the DI Panic)
The controversy between evolution and intelligent design does not come down to whether a person is religious, but is a matter of sound scientific evidence, said a speaker who was on campus last night as part of Ohio University’s scientific lecture series.
“Evolution is the only scientific game in town,” said Dr. Eugenie C. Scott, executive director of the National Center for Science Education, a nonprofit organization based in Oakland, Calif., that promotes teaching evolution in public schools.
Seems that the successes of NCSE and its supporters has become a thorn in the eye of the Discovery Institute.
Compare Scott’s statement
Although she is a strong opponent of intelligent design, Scott said she does not see a “dichotomy between science and religion or evolution and religion.”
Many Roman Catholics and evangelistic Christians accept the idea of human evolution, yet still maintain their faith, she said.
“Every human society known has some concept of something beyond physical matter. There is a reason why people seek out these beliefs,” she said. She added that science can meet most human needs, but that “science is not going to meet all the needs that humans have.”
With West’s spin
Since most Americans believe in God, these efforts undoubtedly represent clever public relations on Scott’s part. Whether they represent more than that is questionable. Like most leading evolutionists, Scott herself is certainly not personally sympathetic to religion. A few days ago, for example, she was a featured speaker at the “Crystal Clear Atheism” conference sponsored by the Atheist Alliance International. There she shared the podium with such atheist attack-dogs as Dawkins, Sam Harris, and Christopher Hitchens.
Or worse…
But one doesn’t need to rely on private correspondence to ascertain Scott’s real views on religion and evolution. In 2003 she signed a public document called the Humanist Manifesto III, which celebrates “the inevitability and finality of death” and proclaims that “humans are… the result of unguided evolutionary change.” By specifically citing “unguided evolutionary change” as part of its case for “a progressive philosophy of life… without supernaturalism,” this manifesto clearly suggests that evolution properly understood contradicts belief in a personal God. Did Scott fail to understand this document when she signed it along with such anti-religious zealots as Richard Dawkins and Michael Shermer? Do I really need to answer that question?
I love to see the “Christian mind” at work. As a Christian and scientist, I am quite disappointed in West.
Doesn’t West comprehend that in case of evolution, religious beliefs do not matter unlike with ID where the lack of scientific relevance and the entanglement with religion makes ID unconstitutional to be taught as science in public schools.