Sunday, January 15, 2006

 

Casey at the Bat

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Casey Luskin, an attorney for the Discovery Institute, appeared at the January 13, 2006 public meeting of the El Tejon School Board in Lebec, California to comment on the "Philosophy of Design" course that is now subject to another Federal lawsuit over the status of Intelligent Design as science or religion. The DI has now published Mr. Luskin’s account of what he said before the Board.

As was the case of a letter Mr. Luskin sent to the District’s Superintendent, John W. Wight, the Discovery Institute is intent on preventing this from turning into another Dover. Mr. Luskin told the Board:

Discovery believes that the Dover case was wrongly decided, and that it is constitutional to teach about intelligent design in a science or a philosophy course. However, given the history of this course, this course threatens to become a dangerous legal precedent which could threaten the teaching of intelligent design on the national level. The young earth creationist history of this course places it on extremely shaky legal ground. ... [T]he only remedy at this point to avoid creating a dangerous legal precedent is to simply cancel the course. ...

But if you do not cancel this course, and if you let this lawsuit go forward, you are going to lose and there will be a dangerous legal precedent set which could threaten the teaching of intelligent design on the national level. Such a decision would also threaten the scientific research of many scientists who support intelligent design.
One thing that Mr. Luskin does not make clear is how a high school course being declared unconstitutional would threaten the research of any scientist . . . unless he is saying that the only research going on in ID is being done in high schools (which would explain a lot, come to think of it).

But Mr. Luskin did actually make a reasonable proposal (setting off an intense search for the pod):

But I do not want you to think that you are without options. Cancel the course for this year, and then if you want to teach it again next year, take your time, and consult people from all sides to construct a course that everyone agrees on. You could consult people from Americans United, you could consult the Discovery Institute, you could consult other experts, and you could create a philosophy course which people on all sides agree would be acceptable. Then you could re-teach the philosophy course on origins next year.
We will have to wait to see if Mr. Luskin has struck out, however. The Board voted unanimously (apparently before Mr. Luskin’s address) to continue settlement negotiations with Americans United for Separation of Church and State, representing the plaintiffs in the case, which had proposed that the district end the class by Jan. 20, never offer it again in the future and, in exchange, Americans United would drop the lawsuit and not hold the district responsible for its legal fees. The Board made an undisclosed counterproposal that Americans United had until 2 p.m. Saturday, January 14th to accept or reject. No word yet on Americans United decision.

All of Mudville holds its breath . . .
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Comments:
Greetings, catshark. I was considering a 'hello' message anyway, and then I noticed that the only comments you've gotten so far are from a couple of trolls. What a shame

I'm a longtime t.o. reader and added you to my SciBlog folder in the Favorites list recently. Today's Luskin quotes were pretty entertaining, especially seeing just how far he's recommending that El Tejon retreat.

"[T]hreaten the scientific research," huh? I suppose, in DI FantasyLand, there are dozens, nay, scores of diligent ID scientists in academia whose grants would be revoked if ID can't be taught. (The logical connection remains unclear, but this is DI FantasyLand after all.)
Meanwhile, in the real world, I suppose a national slapdown on ID might somehow threaten the funding for the Discovery Institute, and that would certainly threaten the "scientific research" of "many scientists," i.e. it would cut into their budget for the next opus from Philip Johnson or Jonathon Wells.
 
Thank you for the kind words.

They weren't all trolls. Francis J. Beckworth . . . er . . . Beckwith, stopped by to complain that I had misspelled his name.

But now that I know somebody will be looking over my shoulder . . . Well, I don't know how I'll be able to stand the pressure!

;-)
 
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