STAFF EDITORIAL: Discussion impedes science, learning

A UNL student organization, Ideas Have Consequences, held a student forum this week about evolution and intelligent design. We sincerely hope the forum, which was called "Darwin Meets Design," is the last of its kind to be held at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. No matter what the impetus for the forum, public discussions of its kind legitimizes intelligent design, which is a heinous transgression. The theory of evolution represents the most developed and tested science there is. That we should be debating its accuracy at a public university is sad. Intelligent design, which contends that the natural world is too complex to have been arrived at through evolutionary processes, is hogwash, and it has been rejected by all corners of the scientific community. Its founder, Michael Behe, is a discredited buffoon. The problem with creationism vs. evolution forums is that their discourse treads on the surface of the issue. Rhetoric trumps substance, and the best debaters end up scoring the most points. That is an extraordinarily dumb way to discuss a scientific issue that should be left in the hands of serious, genuine people. Since the anti-evolutionists began their latest conservative crusade against science and reason in the form of the intelligent design movement, they have perfected their craft. Rapid fire, they throw out serious-sounding arguments - the structure of the human eye, the Second Law of Thermodynamics, flaws of radiometric dating, punctuated equilibrium, a dearth of transitional fossils, and, most recently, intelligent design. All of these points are complete nonsense. They are baseless and are used disingenuously. But the ridiculousness is effective because it is presented in palatable sound bites, perfectly packaged for the uninformed, Fox-News-watching crowd. It is very easy to explain why "scientific" arguments for creationism are nonsense. But those points are not so easily explained in sound bites. They require some time and thought to understand, and a back-and-forth forum venue does not provide the right atmosphere for that to happen. To put two groups of people behind some microphones, one camp backing evolution and the other backing intelligent design, implies that the two ideas are equal. That is absurd. They are polar opposites when it comes to the amount of supporting empirical evidence. Evidence for evolution is substantial. Based on the fossil record and radiometric dating, among other scientific evidence, it is embraced by the vast majority of the scientific community. At the forum, Tobias Davis, a sophomore biological engineering major, said: "It's reasonable to infer design on biological systems." No it isn't. But doesn't he sound convincing? Ideas Have Consequences, please don't allow such comments to be uttered at a public forum again. It's embarrassing.