Less Than impressive Christian Apologetic Law Review Paper

Yesterday I posted a bit about the return of little casey luskin to the cultural debate over teaching religion as if it was actual science.  I hadn't read his actual paper or the Discovery Institute (DI) Evolution 'News' and Views (EnV) post about it just yet, I was focused on where little casey published his paper and why the DI didn't seem to want anyone to know it wasn't a real law review, but a Christian apologetic law review.  I also said that I would be posting today after reading the EnV post and his paper.

Unlike Paul Nelson, when I tell you I am going to do something the next day, I actually make an honest effort in accomplishing it the next day.  So let's start with the DI's post.  Actually it doesn't start well.  The EnV post is "In Court Rulings on Teaching Origins Science, Law Review Article Finds a Double Standard".  Early in the post Sarah Chaffee, the author, said that casey:

" . . . examines the way courts have struck down the teaching of alternatives to evolution because of their historical associations with religion."

I have to question the use of the word 'historical'.  I think casey is going to try and imply that the connection between alternatives to evolution, like Creationism and its little brother Intelligent Design, no longer have a religious association.  That it was in the past and no longer applicable.  If anyone believed that, why is little casey's paper in a Christian apologetic law review publication and not one from a school that is actually approved by the American Bar Association?

We can list many of the current connections between the DI and religion, especially their own wedge strategy document.  But we have done that so many times times in the past (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10) and those are just the ones called "So There is Nothing Religious about Intelligent Design parts 1 thru 10.  There are plenty of other posts about the current association of the DI, and their Intelligent Design Movement and religion!

This line really summed up the whole post for me:

"The result is a double standard, as courts hold alternatives to evolution unconstitutional to teach, but evolution constitutional."

That's not exactly true.  What the Courts have said is that Creationism and Intelligent Design are not science but religion and therefore cannot be taught as if they are science because that violates the Constitution.  Seriously, it's not alternatives to evolution that are unconstitutional, but religious alternatives to evolution, specifically Creationism -- which includes Intelligent Design -- that are unconstitutional.  If you disagree, instead of taking casey's word, look at some of the court cases themselves:

• Kitzmiller v. Dover -- ruled against teaching Intelligent Design in science class in 2005
• Epperson v. Arkansas -- invalidated a statute that prohibited evolution whose purpose was to protect a specific religious viewpoints (1968)
• Daniel v. Waters -- invalided a law requiring an equal amount of emphasis on evolution and the Genesis account in the Bible (1975)
• McLean v. Arkansas -- ruled against a statute mandating the teaching of "Creation Science" because it is religious, not science.  (1982)
• Edwards v. Aguillard -- In 1987. The Supreme Court of the US ruled that a Louisiana law requiring that creation science be taught in public schools, along with evolution, was unconstitutional because the law was specifically intended to advance a particular religion
• Selman v. Cobb County -- invalidated the use of stickers designed to weaken science education (2006)

There are others, all basically reached that same conclusion, Creation-based alternatives to evolution are not science and therefore to teach them as if they are actually science is unconstitutional.  These cases span 1968 through 2006, granted you can claim yesterday was historical, but really -- 2006 is historical?  Every single time Creationism and all of its relatives, like Intelligent Design and Creation Science, have been tested, the link between then and their underlying religious basis has never been placed in solely a 'historical' perspective.  No, the links are there even today!  Who are the only receptive audiences for ID?  Where does their funding come from? What have they been desperately trying to hide from for decades now?  Think about it!  The connection from their religious beliefs and their claims cannot be uncoupled, as much as they keep trying to do so.  This paper is nothing but another example.

The other half of his statement is equally misleading, the 'constitutionality of evolution'.  At no time when looking at those court cases did I find them ruling that evolution is constitutional.  I don't think the rulings specified evolution at all.  True, I haven't read them all, but I have read several and while evolution was mentioned in some of the supporting documents, the rulings did not address evolution specifically.  Even in the supporting documents, it's usually just contrasting the Creationism concept with its intended target.  But, in reality, has anyone sued a school for teaching evolution?  No, the court cases were brought about because of religious groups trying to impose their view on science class.

So far Sarah's not off to a rousing start, but when your source material is so weak, what can you do? It doesn't matter how much mayo you use, you cannot make chicken salad out of chicken sh**. Sarah and little casey mention Selman v. Cobb County specifically.  You can read all about it in your link, but I would like to mention that casey did state that the original ruling was 'remanded', which is legalese for sending it back on appeal for consideration.  Of course casey doesn't say why it was remanded . . . which was an evidence issue, not a problem with the ruling.  Final result is basically this was tried twice and both times the Creationists lost and their little efforts to undermine science education failed.

Sarah closed with what has to be a quote from casey:

"But what about evolution? Are courts evaluating neo-Darwinism objectively? In a future post, I will discuss the history of anti-religious activism associated with evolution advocacy."

So he starts off claiming that evolution has been declared to be Constitutional . . . and then bails before addressing this issue , , , promising to address it in the future.  Hmmm, Paul Nelson again?

I read through casey's paper as well as Sarah's EnV post.  In all honesty, it was pretty boring and didn't say anything new.  I will say this for Sarah, she summed things up pretty well . . . but then casey's work has always been pretty basic.  Probably one reason he was never a 'fellow', just the title of 'research coordinator', which was funny for an organization that doesn't do anything resembling research.

The Return of casey luskin

When he departed the Discovery Institute, lawyer and pamphlet distributor (at the Dover Trial) I figured wherever casey luskin landed we had not heard the last of him.  The Discovery Institute's Evolution 'News' and Views website had this little article about something little casey had written. However, something seemed off to me.  Here is the link: "In Court Rulings on Teaching Origins Science, Law Review Article Finds a Double Standard".  Of course, since this post is on the DI's site, it needs to be taken with a large bag of salt.

Before reading their post or even the link to the article itself, I had to wonder about the source. According to the DI, this is article was published in 'a' Law Review.  OK, which one?  They don't say. Isn't that just the tiniest bit suspicious to you?  The link to the article itself is another DI link, not to the source.  Normally when quoting an article, you go to the authoritative source, not a copy.  Why would the DI not want to identify the source?  If it was something like the 'Harvard Law Review', I'm pretty sure it would be a large part of the article, if not the overwhelming content.  So, where in the world did casey's little missive get published.  It's going to take a little more research on that.  In the mean time, here are a few examples of other times the DI tried to hide things.  You can check it out while I do a little Googling.

1.  First up, back a while ago, in a post "So there is nothing religious about Intelligent Design? Part II" I discussed Heather Zeigler. One of my points was that the DI described her as:

"[NOTE: Today we welcome a new contributing writer to Evolution News & Views, Heather Zeiger. Ms. Zeiger graduated magna cum laude from the University of Texas at Dallas with a B.S. in chemistry and a minor in government and politics. She received her M.S. in chemistry, also from UTD; her research was in organic synthesis and materials.]"

and yet forgot to mention all her credentials, like [the bold were the words they used, the rest they forgot to mention.  I added the underlines for emphasis]:

"Heather Zeiger graduated magna cum laude from the University of Texas at Dallas with a B.S. in chemistry and a minor in government and politics. She received her M.S. in chemistry, also from UTD; her research was in organic synthesis and materials. She interned at Probe Ministries prior to graduate school and now serves with Probe as a Research Associate. Her interests involve science and culture issues, including bioethics, origins, and the environment. She is currently working on a M.A. in bioethics from Trinity International University. She is married to David, another former Probe intern and teacher at Trinity Christian Academy. "

In other words, they decided to not mention that Heather is one who already drank their kool-aid and tried to pass her off as somewhat objective.  Of course, when you look at her a little bit closer, you realize that she probably won't be particularly objective at all.  I don't think they hired her for her objectivity.

2.  A while back the DI discovered the power of polling, we discussed in "A New 'Poll' conducted by the DI says what the DI says, what a surprise!" The DI announced the results of a poll, yet they forget to tell you it was their poll and they worded the questions and twisted the results for their own purposes.  In another poll they even forget to tell you what questions were asked ("Another poll from the Discovery Institute, oh boy, oh boy!"), they only presented their spin on the results.  Their version of a poll is something like one kid asking another, "Have you stopped beating up your sister?  Yes or No."

3. In "Klinghoffer lies by Omission" we discussed a new 'Biography' of Alfred Russel Wallace written by the Michael Flannery.  In the piece, little davery klinghoffer described Flannery as:

"Michael A. Flannery is Professor and Associate Director for Historical Collections at the Lister Hill Library of the Health Sciences, University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) and editor of Alfred Russel Wallace's Theory of Intelligent Evolution (2008)."

For some reason little davey forgot to mention that Michael Flannery is also Fellow at the Discovery Institute. Now why in the world for davey not bother mentioning that little item? He says so many nice things about Flannery, but not once does he mention that he and Flannery are buddies who share the same political masters, the DI. Why would that be?

Are you sensing the same trend here?  When there is information about any subject that might cast the slightest doubt on whatever point the DI is trying to make with anything resembling honesty and maybe a little objectivity, the DI always seems to fail to mention it.

4.  Sometimes the lie is pretty blatant, like in 2010 when I posted "Intelligent Design, Sh** or get off the Pot!"  When Stephen C. Meyer was quoted as saying:

"First, the scientific community is not uniformly opposed to ID. My recent book on the subject received enthusiastic endorsements from many scientists not previously known as advocates of ID, such as chemist Philip Skell, a National Academy of Sciences member, and Norman Nevin, one of Britain's top geneticists."

My response back then:

"In my humble opinion Stephen C. Meyer is a liar. According to this quote Meyer states that Philip Skell and Norman Nevin were not previously advocates of Intelligent Design. Let's set the record straight, Skell is a Signatory of the very discredited "A Dissent From Darwinism", the list used in Discovery Institute intelligent design campaigns in an attempt to discredit evolution and bolster claims that intelligent design is scientifically valid by claiming that evolution lacks broad scientific support. Meyer is a liar, Skell may not have published a pro-ID fluff piece, but he is an advocate. Nevin is a supporter of "Truth in Science" a United Kingdom-based organization which promotes the "Teach the Controversy" campaign. It uses this strategy to try to get intelligent design taught alongside evolution in school science lessons."

Continuing that trend, it took a little digging to uncover where little casey had his article published, "Trinity Law Review", which is published by the Trinity Law School. Now that might sound prestigious, but it's not. If just the name 'Trinity' doesn't give it away, their own website states:

"At its core, our community is shaped by our commitment to the Gospel – the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. We exist to serve Christ by championing a biblical view of human law and government through our students, graduates, faculty, and staff." (Trinity Law School: About Page)

You can check them out in Wikipedia (Trinity Law School), which has a bit more to say like:

"Trinity Law School ranked second on The National Jurist's list of "Most Devout Christian Law Schools,"

"At present, Trinity Law School is not approved by the American Bar Association (ABA)"

"[They are the] publisher of Journal of Christian Legal Thought, a publication of Christian Legal Society"

OK, so without even reading little casey's missive, we know that it was published not in a prestigious law review, but a Christian Apologetic version of a law review.  No wonder the DI didn't publicize the venue.

So what else does that tell us?  I am pretty sure this is going to be nothing more than what casey used to write for the DI.  A fluff piece that takes an unsupported, and possibly even unsupportable position and make it sound like ID is not the religious proposition that we all, including the DI, know it is.  Anyone want to take a bet on it?  OK, this is long enough and it's getting late.  I will post again tomorrow after I read the DI post and casey's 'Christian Law Review' article.