SCOTT: The evidence for the inference of evolution, which is that
living things had common ancestors, comes from a wide range of
scientific fields. Virtually any information from the biological realm
supports the idea of common ancestry. When you look at biochemistry,
you can look at the similarities and differences of proteins of animals
and you find that some animals are much more similar in their proteins
than others.
The inference of evolution is that, the more recently you've shared a
common ancestor, the more similar your proteins are going to be. That is
carried over in areas like comparative anatomy, embryology and it is
even carried over in behavior. It comes from all of these various
sources of evidence that show that living things are arranged in this
set of nested hierarchies of greater and greater similarity.
It's not that intelligent design supporters and evolutionists look at
the data differently and come to different conclusions. That's not the
problem. The problem is the intelligent design supporters ignore a
great deal of the data that supports our position. And, frankly, they
really don't have data supporting their position. Their position
largely is evolution can't do the job. Here's a little anomaly that
proves that evolution didn't work.
THOMPSON: There are basically two theories. Either we were just an
unplanned accident of the cosmos, or we were in some way intelligently
designed. When you talk to some person who says, "I believe in
evolution," what are they saying? Do they believe that there is change
over time? There is change in a species? I think most people will agree
with that.
But when they talk about evolution as the scientists look at it, that is,
living matter having come from non-living matter without any causation
other than natural selection, then you have a problem because you don't
have any scientific experiment that can show that. It cannot explain the
complexity of the living cell. It is such a complex mechanism it could
not have happened by random chance. A Christian cannot believe in
evolution, if evolution means the unplanned purposeless evolving person
from pre-biotic soup without the hand of God in it.
SCOTT: It's clear that the American public likes the idea of fairness
and equal play and giving students all the information. But the issue
here is what do you teach in high school, and what you teach in high
school is the consensus view of the scientific discipline. The biggest
danger, I think, is that students who are taught intelligent design will
confuse religion with science and they will believe that you can claim as
science a view that is profoundly anti-scientific. The whole purpose of
intelligent design is to try to claim that evolution is inadequate
to explain the diversity of living things and that you have to have an
intelligent agent to explain all the different kinds of plants and
animals. It is, unfortunately, a profoundly unscientific idea.
THOMPSON: Good science education requires that we not only teach
Darwin's theory of evolution. Students are going to have to be involved
in critical thinking. That is all we are asking science students to do: evaluate the evidence, look at Darwin's theory of evolution, look at
the facts that show Darwin's theory is not working. Look at the theory
of intelligent design, look at why it may or may not be supported by the
evidence. Ultimately you will make those students more interested in
science if they have this controversy.
