I did a media interview this morning regarding the intelligent design controversy. Interestingly the conversation meandered somewhat away from the subject of evolution and the origin of life (and the universe) and more towards the question of academic freedom: who can say what within the academy and how the notion of free speech is actually somewhat different than being free to teach students to your religious point of view.
That is: my being free to stand in the Johnson Center with a protest sign is qualitatively different from my being free (as a professor) to teach intelligent design as part of the curriculum for say…a biochemistry course….as opposed to perhaps a senior elective in theology.
Furthermore, how is this fine line manifest in such gray areas as promotion and tenure decisions?
Interesting food for thought…
Jim
Discoverers and Discoveries 
The primary reason why intelligent design is not something that should be taught or debated in science curricula is that it concerns a metaphysical question. All metaphysical questions lie outside the domain of science because they cannot be answered by the scientific method. Therefore, if you seek to debate intelligent design or God as suggested by some in the classroom you can only do so in fields or settings (such as theology or philosophy) that do not apply the scientific method to phenomena. Let’s simply regard intelligent design as a proxy for a belief in some kind of theology and some kind of deity. The clear reason for the separation between science and religion goes back to the case of Galileo who was forced to renounce his sun centric solar system by the Catholic Church. If you seek answers to metaphysical questions, seek them outside of science. Leave science to scientists and theology to theologians. You can have metaphysical beliefs and be a scientist; you just can’t examine metaphysical beliefs using the scientific method of inquiry.
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But should I be able, for example to spend class time ranting about Bush and Iraq in a Calculus course. What about the aspects of mathematics that would, as a result, be cut out of the curriculum?
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i guess it’d be pretty ridiculous, within a purely academic setting, not to talk about the controversy. I don’t know that anyone’s trying to teach biblical creationism, but from a secular point of view, anyone who has doubts on the ability of nothing to produce everything is dubbed a religious fanatic. Saddening. If we can’t talk about this stuff in class, where can we talk about it??
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