I can’t understand those persons who see their divine beliefs threatened by some humans, using the scientific method, sustaining that the way life exists today, is the result of billions of years of evolution and that it will continue to evolve in the next billions of years. In other words, we are here present as conscious beings only during an extremely short fraction of the time that THIS universe has been going on and will continue to go on.

When you die and you face God (if that’s what you believe) you, creationists, will have the chance of arguing to the Divinity: “Why did you make me believe that you had created us spontaneously and not as a result of things evolving?” The Divine Being might respond: “After all, that was my call, wasn’t it? As the CREATOR of the Universe, am I not free to choose the method?”

My father, who died in 1964 when I was 14 years old, once, after having asked him about the mystery of the Trinity (the Holy Trinity, 3 persons in one God) and the idea of “God” as such, he came to me with this very simple answer:

“We say that God is almighty, don’t we? He can do anything, right? Well, just for an exercise of your mind, place the word Time instead of the word God; then you get: Time can do anything. Everything is possible through Time. That is, everything you SEE today.”

“About the Holy Trinity, think of it as Time, Space and Energy (matter). If any one of those 3 concepts, elements or ideas is missing, the other two can NOT BE! Try to imagine Space and Time without Energy, no way, since time and space as such are in relation to eneryg. Try to think about space and energy without time: it’s impossible, is n’t it? Energy only exists if there is TIME for it to exist. And so forth”

I hope this will help some people see things a little clearer. It’s helped me.

And never mind all the detailed discussions over at talkorigins.org, and never mind the fact that biologists are actually seeing evolution in action in lower life forms, it’s clear that evolution is unfalsifiable and unobservable, because I say it isn’t!

Now it’s clear whether these folks are really interested in intelligent debate and discussion… *sigh*

But again, I’m still curious to know the exact line of reasoning leading to the judgement of unconstitutionality.

Ty: you’re saying that evolution theory is unscientific… unlike the Omphalos hypothesis, which is perfectly verifiable and falsifiable?

That’s only the end of the ruling’s explicit legal authority, however; it’s not the end of its persuasive reach.

Doubtless, the judge’s ruling will serve to give very strong guidance to any similar situation that might develop anywhere in the Middle District of Pennsylavania, even though there are other judges and other school districts in that district.

(Federal district courts–the kind on which Judge Jones serves–are trial level courts. There is a “layer” of intermediate appellate courts–called circuit courts–above the district or trial court layer and, of course, the SCOTUS–the Supreme Court of the United States–is the ultimate appellate court which reigns above even the circuit courts. The U.S. is divided, for federal judicial purposes, into 13 regional circuit courts of appeal, and each of those is divided into state or substate districts, which are the territories within which the district or trial courts operate.)

Were the case to be appealed–which, at this point, it appears it will NOT be–then the opinion of the circuit court would set the law for all the districts (covering several mid-Atlantic states) governed by that circuit. And if the case reached the SCOTUS, any resulting opinion would set nationwide constitutional law.

Again, however, just because the strict legal reach of the case will probably be confined to the immediate parties and the Middle District of Pennsylvania, a thorough, well-written, well-researched, and well-reasoned opinion such as this one–which was based in turn on a set of facts, expert witness testimony, and series of documents that deliberately and thoroughly explored the entire history and theory of ID as an “intellectual” program, and which both sets of parties intentionally approached as a “test case”–will tend to have a persuasive influence far beyond its strictly “legal” confines.

Any common law court in the world (courts whose underpinninngs run back to the English common law and jurisprudence–the U.K., U.S., Canada, Australia, etc., etc.), whether trial or appellate, may–in the absence of contrary controlling authority–look to any other well-reasoned decision of any other common law court in the world that has previously dealt with the same or substantially similar facts and law. Any such other court may discuss and cite (rely upon the reasoning of; find support in) an opinion such as Judge Jones’s. Any other court in such a situation might, therefore, very well choose to reach the same results as Judge Jones did, unless the other court could find some significant difference between the facts and law before it, or unless the later judge could find some strong logical basis for disagreeing with Judge Jones.

Judge Jones’s opinion could thus be cited, or relied upon for its logic and reasoning, by any other federal or state court in the country facing a similar set of issues, conceivably even by the SCOTUS itself.

Thus, though the opinion mandates or controls the actions and behavior of only a few, it may potentially prove persusive in a variety of settings far beyond Dover and the Middle Distric of Pennsylvania.

Hope that helps!

How wide-reaching will the impact of this decision be? Will it apply to the Kansas IDiocy? Will the case be applicable only to a certain area?

Thanks to anyone with the legal acumen to satiate my curiousity!

Wonderful stuff.

Science really can be mutually compatible with religion. I talk about that a lot at my blog. It’s fundamentalism, the determination to hold a view and never given in, never think about it, that is not compatible with science.

Even if we’re a minority, there are lots of people that have no problem with science, evolution, and their religious beliefs.

When I learned about the Dover decision all I felt was relief. I do believe religion serves a purpose to many people in this country, especially christianity, but by no means should it be part of our education system and what’s more, treated as if it is science when it’s simply not. I know Darwinian evolutionary theory can’t answer many questions, but I know first hand, as we all do in our lab, that it works in more than one level and we have TONS of proof for it.

I know we scientists don’t have the answers to everything, but ask yourself if answering our kids that “A higher being made it that way” is even an answer.

I disagree with some commentors in the previous post. I do not believe science is mutually compatible with religious belief. Many Christians in this country, evangelicals in particular, belive in every words in the Bible. They believe God created the world in seven days, not in a metaphorical or poetic way, but literally created the word in seven days. That, and many other accounts in the Bible, or any other religious scriptures, can be readily debunked by science.

I can understand many scientists’ motivation to reconcile science with religion. Yes science can not yet explain the beginning of the cosmo and the beginning of life; Yes people look for the meaning of life to sustain individuals and societies. Yes, the majority of population in this country is religious one way or the other. But I believe scientists’ role in society, everybody has his own role in society, religious fundamentalists included, is to creat a selective pressure which favors reason, enlightment and intelligence. It is the fight for memes, if we do not promote what we belive, we will lose. Evolution, including evolution of idieas, do not always favor what seem to be reasonable. You have to earn your right to propagate.

BTW, thank you Carl, for creating this website. I really enjoy every post here.

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