Both sides are firmly entrenched on 'intelligent design'

During the debate, which was part of COSA’s School Law Seminar, the Rev. Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, took a firm stand that teaching intelligent design will not pass constitutional muster.

“There is no compromise on science and intelligent design as science,” he says. “We understand and the courts have all concluded that everything like intelligent design and/or creationist science is ultimately religious.”

As a theory, intelligent design suggests that the complexity of life cannot be explained by natural causes but only by the intervention of an “intelligent designer,” whether God or some other unknown entity.

Supporters of the theory have offered it as an alternative to the scientifically accepted theory of evolution.

Earlier this year, the Dover Area (Pa.) School District lost a federal lawsuit challenging a policy requiring that students taking biology listen to a disclaimer questioning the validity of evolutionary theory.

Arguing on behalf of intelligent design was Patrick T. Gillen of the Thomas More Law Center, which helped defend the Dover school board. Just because many supporters of intelligent design believe God is the ultimate designer of the universe, he says, such personal beliefs do not negate the science behind the theory.

Gillen also argues that there is scientific evidence and research to support intelligent design, but that a conservative scientific community is not prepared to accept a challenge to evolution.

He suggests school boards have a right to inform students that there is controversy and opposing scientific challenges surrounding evolution.

“Simply because this theory jives with religious beliefs should not disqualify it,” he says.

Intelligent design is not a valid scientific theory and is widely discredited by the scientific community, Lynn responded. What’s more, as was shown in the Dover case, the religious belief of the theory’s supporters -- including school board members -- clearly influences the adoption of such controversial policies.

Lynn dismissed any argument that teachers have a free speech or academic freedom right to question evolution in the classroom.

The U.S. Supreme Court has made it clear that “there is no academic freedom for teachers to say anything they want,” he says. “That’s not a guarantee of the Constitution.”

One possible opening for intelligent design would be in an advanced philosophy class that examined a variety of controversial issues, he acknowledged, but he suggests that other issues, such as immigration or even abortion, would be on safer grounds.

Lynn argues that any concession on intelligent design could open the floodgates to challenges of any scientific theory that conflicted with people’s religious beliefs.

“Some people believe that God is able to stop the motion of the sun,” Lynn says. If that becomes the basis for disclaimers to scientific principles, “there’s no place to stop.”

Yet, while Lynn makes it clear that school boards are on good constitutional grounds by keeping intelligent design out of the classroom, Gillen predicted that the legal debate is far from over. “There is a real issue which will continue to come up,” he says.