Judge Jones is careful to say, “We express no opinion on the ultimate veracity of ID as a supernatural explanation.” This is not the position of most evolutionary scientists, however. They believe that there are no supernatural explanations, and that trying to show that they are incompatible with the evidence is a waste of time. It is part of their basic epistemological and metaphysical framework, which either excludes the existence of God or, at best, places him entirely outside the boundaries of the natural universe. They do not think, Maybe there are supernatural explanations, but if there are, science cannot discover them. Rather, they think, Anybody who is willing even to consider supernatural explanations is living in the past.
We cannot, however, make this a fundamental principle of public education. I understand the attitude that ID is just the latest manifestation of the fundamentalist threat, and that you have to stand and fight them here or you will end up having to fight for the right to teach evolution at all. However, I believe that both intellectually and constitutionally the line does not have to be drawn at this point, and that a noncommittal discussion of some of the issues would be preferable.
(Thomas Nagel, "Public Education and Intelligent Design," Philosophy & Public Affairs 36 [spring 2008]: 187-205, at 205 [footnote omitted])
Note from KBJ: Only someone who distrusts the ability of high-school students to understand the issues would deny them the opportunity to reflect on Design Theory. If the theory is inferior to evolution by natural selection, as evolutionists say it is, then students will see it; if it is not, then they should not be denied the opportunity to consider it. Isn't it ironic that the dogmatists in this case are the scientists? Isn't science supposed to be nondogmatic? Aren't scientists supposed to be committed to reason? Why do they have so little faith in their method?
Keith Burgess-Jackson, J.D., Ph.D. 