Richard Thompson, chief counsel for the Thomas More Law Center, has replied to the open letter written by a group of scientists and philosophers from the University of Pennsylvania to the Dover school board. See Thompson's letter here. It is amazingly vitriolic for something written by a lawyer and the head of a major public advocacy group. It begins with this astonishing statement:
If the level of inquiry supporting your letter is an example of the type of inquiry you make before arriving at scientific conclusions, I suggest that at the very least, your students should get their tuition money back, and more appropriately, the University should fire you as a scientist. It is clear that you do not have the slightest idea of the actual Dover school policy that you so vehemently condemn, and so let me educate you.
Wow. Remember, this is the same man who, upon being chosen by the Dover school district to defend them in this case, declared that "The ACLU is now showing its true colors. They are in the business of banning books from school libraries and suppressing academic freedom." And now he is calling for a university professor to be fired for taking a position contrary to him on the issue? And yet another irony meter bites the dust. Perhaps Mr. Thompson has been taking hypocrisy lessons from Robert Novak? So much for all that nonsense we hear from the likes of Dean Esmay about who the censors are.
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Thompson has been busy slinging rhetoric since TMLC got involved in the case. This from the York Daily Record of January 7:
"After several day [sic] of depositions it became clear that they simply did not have a strong enough case to ask that the policy be blocked," said Richard Thompson, president and chief counsel for the Thomas More Law Center, which is representing the school district.
"Clearly, if they thought they could have succeeded, they would have asked the court to stop the policy before it was implemented."
Mr. Thompson seems more interested in trying his case in the court of public opinion than in a court of law. This is, of course, entirely in keeping with the ID/creationist strategy of force feeding ID to schoolchildren rather than establishing its bona fides within the scientific community.
Actually, the greater "academic freedom" hypocricy is that the district and the TMLC have taken the position that teachers do not have the right to refuse to follow directives by the school board.
Still, I'd prefer it if some group on the side of sanity would put out a release noting that the school board officials are "backtracking" from their earlier positions that they were making the schools open to Jesus, and that their sudden, convenient forgetting is what makes it unwise to seek an immediate injunction.
Were I doing the court of public opinion defense, I think I'd figure out how watering down the science standards violates the purpose of the No Child Left Behind Act, and make that clear, too.
Wow. Remember, this is the same man who, upon being chosen by the Dover school district to defend them in this case, declared that "The ACLU is now showing its true colors. They are in the business of banning books from school libraries and suppressing academic freedom." And now he is calling for a university professor to be fired for taking a position contrary to him on the issue? And yet another irony meter bites the dust. Perhaps Mr. Thompson has been taking hypocrisy lessons from Robert Novak?
I think you missed the point of his rhetoric. He isn't saying anything about their position on the issue, but rather their lack of research in to school policy. A bunch of scientists neglected to do their homework. That's the force of the rhetoric and nothing more.
I think you missed the point of his rhetoric. He isn't saying anything about their position on the issue, but rather their lack of research in to school policy. A bunch of scientists neglected to do their homework. That's the force of the rhetoric and nothing more.
One could certainly make a far more compelling argument for shoddy research or faulty understanding of ID advocates, but no one has ever suggested that they should be fired for it. One could make a very strong case that Michael Behe's work is of a very poor quality, but no one argues that Lehigh should fire them. Certainly arguing that UPenn should fire Weisberg because they don't think he was accurate in his writing on an entirely different subject is far more ridiculous, isn't it? I would also note that Thompson isn't telling the truth about the Dover policy, which does indeed mandate the teaching of intelligent design as an alternative.
I think you missed the point of his rhetoric. He isn't saying anything about their position on the issue, but rather their lack of research in to school policy. A bunch of scientists neglected to do their homework. That's the force of the rhetoric and nothing more.
Maybe if we only take into account Mr. Thompson's opening paragraph. There was more to his letter than just that first paragraph though.
As I've said before, the reality based people need to start their own reality-based schools. The culure wars in the US will ensure that the public schools will be going by the wayside. Actually, I'm going to propose that at my Wellesley MA town meeting in the spring. I have no interest in paying for irreality-based education.
Raj, I think you'll be pleased to hear that in Florida, they've done just that.
Matt,
The original statement read, ""Students will be made aware of gaps/problems in Darwin's Theory and of other theories of evolution including, but not limited to, intelligent design. Note: Origins of life will not be taught."
This clearly says students will be made aware of (taugh) ID. So the UPenn letter was on the mark until recent changes in the statement were made.
Mr. Anderson, Richard Thompson writes in his open letter:
You write that the Dover school Board made a decision to "mandate the teaching of 'intelligent design' along with evolution."
And then later on in the same letter he writes:
Finally, you are under the impression that Dover students will not be taught evolution, Let me disabuse you of that concern.
Maybe before Mr. Thompson published his letter he should have made some inquiry into some of the earlier paragraphs before arriving at conclusions
in the later paragraphs within the same letter? You think that might be a good idea?
Nick Matzke writes: funny that Thompson cites the teachers for support, considering that they just declared an open revolt against the policy)
Thompson's letter is full of all kinds of cheap rhetoric tricks, and this from a guy who's supposed to have the "values."
Bill Ware said: The original statement read, "Students will be made aware of gaps/problems in Darwin's Theory and of other theories of evolution including, but not limited to, intelligent design. Note: Origins of life will not be taught."
I think it's still in there.
http://www.dover.k12.pa.us/doversd/cwp/view.asp?A=3&Q=261852
Here is my question. If the ID people are just pushing for the school board to show that there are alternative positions to evolution, then why push for a "christian" position. Why not teach the Hopi Indian view of the creation of the world and the development of people, or the Hindu version, or the native Hawaiian version. In truth they are pushing for Christianity to supplant science in the science class. I don't know of people who object to a ID concept taught in Comparative Religion class or philosophy class.
And this dilution of science--along with President Bush saying the science of global warming is in question and Bush's other acts of politicizing science--is happening as our younger people are falling further behind in the sciences to India and China and other countries.