STu you can piss your pants all you want you just do not get it. This is what Susskind means as this is his quote. answer from Susskind I doubt that physicists will see it that way. If, for some unforeseen reason, the landscape turns out to be inconsistent - maybe for mathematical reasons, or because it disagrees with observation - I am pretty sure that physicists will go on searching for natural explanations of the world. But I have to say that if that happens, as things stand now we will be in a very awkward position. Without any explanation of nature's fine-tunings we will be hard pressed to answer the ID critics. One might argue that the hope that a mathematically unique solution will emerge is as faith-based as ID. -- If his theory is wrong - he is telling you that --- without any explanation for natures fine tunings - we will be hard pressed to answer the ID critics. Get it Stu. Now the next part of the statement takes some education in this subject to understand so i doubt you will pick it up. But when you understand what he means by a mathematically unique solution then you will understand how powerful the ID argument really is. Many many physicists are attempting to explain the fine tunings. The existence of the cosmological constant being just right in our universe is just killing the atheists. Susskind says that if his theory of 10 to the 500 universe is not correct then science being able to refute ID is just as faith based as ID. Which has been my point all all along. People who say the universe is not designed are just as faith based a people who say it is. Nothing you can do about it till science changes.
by the way STU this site credits him with the discovery of string theory. Could you be more wrong? so consistently. LEONARD SUSSKIND has been the Felix Bloch Professor in theoretical physics at Stanford University since 1978. He is a member of the National Academy of Science and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, recipient of numerous prizes including the science writing prize of the American Institute of Physics for my Scientific American article on black holes. His contributions to physics include the discovery of string theory... the theory of quark confinement, the development of Hamiltonian lattice gauge theory, the theory of scaling violations in deep inelastic electroproduction, the theory of symmetry breaking sometimes known as "Technicolor theory", the first theories of cosmological baryogenisis apart from Sakharov's work which was unknown in the west, the string theory of black hole entropy, the principle of "black hole complementarity", the holographic principle, the matrix description of M-theory, the introduction of holographic entropy bounds http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/bios/susskind.html
Worldâs Premiere Scientific Journal Reports on Iowa Stateâs Denial of Tenure to Guillermo Gonzalez by Robert Crowther He's a young astronomer with dozens of articles in top journals; he has made an important discovery in the field of extrasolar planets; and he is a proponent of intelligent design, the idea that an intelligent force has shaped the Universe. It's that last fact that Guillermo Gonzalez thinks has cost him his tenure at Iowa State University. So begins Nature magazine's story. Reporter Geoff Brumfiel goes on to lay out Gonzalezâs stellar professional credentials. Gonzalez's early career was far from controversial. He graduated with a PhD from the University of Washington, Seattle, in 1993 and did a postdoc at the University of Texas in Austin. "He proved himself very quickly," says David Lambert, director of the university's MacDonald Observatory. He and Gonzalez co-authored several papers on variable stars, and Lambert says that while there, the young Cuban immigrant was an impressive scientist. "He is one of the best postdocs I have had," he says. Unfortunately, some scientists are quite proud to support the dogmatic trampling of Gonzalez's academic freedom at Iowa State University (ISU). "I would have voted to deny him tenure," says Robert Park, a physicist at the University of Maryland in College Park. "He has established that he does not understand the scientific process." Gonzalezâs 68 published peer-reviewed articles argue otherwise. One of Gonzalez's persecutors at ISU, atheist religion professor Hector Avalos, admitted to Nature that Gonzalezâs research on intelligent design was a factor behind his petition drive to denounce the theory, even though the petition didnât name Gonzalez directly. "We were starting to see Iowa State mentioned as a place where intelligent-design research was happening," says Hector Avalos, a religious-studies professor who helped lead the signature drive. "We wanted to make sure that people knew the university does not support intelligent design." Avalos adds that they did not name Gonzalez directly, and he takes no position on the astronomer's tenure. Contrary to Darwinists claims that persecution is not happening, or that it is deserved by intelligent design proponents, it is clear to otherwise qualified scientists that their support of ID is an issue, and one that will affect their careers forever more. "There is a pattern happening to everybody who's pro intelligent design," says one pro-design biologist, who declined to be named because his own tenure process has just begun. "The same thing could happen to me," he says. "I don't want to get into trouble." In Gonzalezâs case the damage has already been done. In spite of his impressive publication record, in spite of meeting all the requirements for tenure at ISU, the university has denied him tenureâand clearly his research into intelligent design was a negative factor: Eli Rosenberg, who chairs Iowa State's physics department, concedes that Gonzalez's belief in intelligent design did come up during the tenure process. "I'd be a fool if I said it was not [discussed]," he says. Rosenberg insists, however, that intelligent design was not a "major" factor in the decision. But his comments to other reporters undermine that claim. Last week, he made clear to the Des Moines Register that "impact in the community, how you are being received in the community" was one of the criteria used to deny Gonzalez tenure. Given that Gonzalez has an outstanding publication record, the only thing that "being received in the community" can refer to is the negative reaction to his support of intelligent design. That places intelligent design squarely in the center of the justification for denying Gonzalez tenure. Fortunately, according to Nature there are scientists outside of ISU who do not think Gonzalez's support of intelligent design is an adequate reason for blackballing him from the scientific community: "Nothing I have seen in his refereed papers leads me to believe his beliefs are impinging on his science," says David Lambert. "I would have said he was a serious tenure candidate." Let's hope ISU President Geoffroy thinks on this as he makes his decision on Gonzalez's appeal.
what does he think about the wedgie pact thing, guillermo? that's a popular paper! here's a copy, feel free to circulate widely "GOALS Governing Goals . To defeat scientific materialism and its destructive moral, cultural and political legacies. . To replace materialistic explanations with the theistic understanding that nature and hurnan beings are created by God. " http://www.antievolution.org/features/wedge.html THE WEDGE STRATEGY CENTER FOR THE RENEWAL OF SCIENCE & CULTURE INTRODUCTION The proposition that human beings are created in the image of God is one of the bedrock principles on which Western civilization was built. Its influence can be detected in most, if not all, of the West's greatest achievements, including representative democracy, human rights, free enterprise, and progress in the arts and sciences. Yet a little over a century ago, this cardinal idea came under wholesale attack by intellectuals drawing on the discoveries of modern science. Debunking the traditional conceptions of both God and man, thinkers such as Charles Darwin, Karl Marx, and Sigmund Freud portrayed humans not as moral and spiritual beings, but as animals or machines who inhabited a universe ruled by purely impersonal forces and whose behavior and very thoughts were dictated by the unbending forces of biology, chemistry, and environment. This materialistic conception of reality eventually infected virtually every area of our culture, from politics and economics to literature and art The cultural consequences of this triumph of materialism were devastating. Materialists denied the existence of objective moral standards, claiming that environment dictates our behavior and beliefs. Such moral relativism was uncritically adopted by much of the social sciences, and it still undergirds much of modern economics, political science, psychology and sociology. Materialists also undermined personal responsibility by asserting that human thoughts and behaviors are dictated by our biology and environment. The results can be seen in modern approaches to criminal justice, product liability, and welfare. In the materialist scheme of things, everyone is a victim and no one can be held accountable for his or her actions. Finally, materialism spawned a virulent strain of utopianism. Thinking they could engineer the perfect society through the application of scientific knowledge, materialist reformers advocated coercive government programs that falsely promised to create heaven on earth. Discovery Institute's Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture seeks nothing less than the overthrow of materialism and its cultural legacies. Bringing together leading scholars from the natural sciences and those from the humanities and social sciences, the Center explores how new developments in biology, physics and cognitive science raise serious doubts about scientific materialism and have re-opened the case for a broadly theistic understanding of nature. The Center awards fellowships for original research, holds conferences, and briefs policymakers about the opportunities for life after materialism. The Center is directed by Discovery Senior Fellow Dr. Stephen Meyer. An Associate Professor of Philosophy at Whitworth College, Dr. Meyer holds a Ph.D. in the History and Philosophy of Science from Cambridge University. He formerly worked as a geophysicist for the Atlantic Richfield Company. THE WEDGE STRATEGY Phase I. Scientific Research, Writing & Publicity Phase II. Publicity & Opinion-making Phase III. Cultural Confrontation & Renewal THE WEDGE PROJECTS Phase I. Scientific Research, Writing & Publication Individual Research Fellowship Program Paleontology Research program (Dr. Paul Chien et al.) Molecular Biology Research Program (Dr. Douglas Axe et al.) Phase II. Publicity & Opinion-making Book Publicity Opinion-Maker Conferences Apologetics Seminars Teacher Training Program Op-ed Fellow PBS (or other TV) Co-production Publicity Materials / Publications Phase III. Cultural Confrontation & Renewal Academic and Scientific Challenge Conferences Potential Legal Action for Teacher Training Research Fellowship Program: shift to social sciences and humanities FIVE YEAR STRATEGIC PLAN SUMMARY The social consequences of materialism have been devastating. As symptoms, those consequences are certainly worth treating. However, we are convinced that in order to defeat materialism, we must cut it off at its source. That source is scientific materialism. This is precisely our strategy. If we view the predominant materialistic science as a giant tree, our strategy is intended to function as a "wedge" that, while relatively small, can split the trunk when applied at its weakest points. The very beginning of this strategy, the "thin edge of the wedge," was Phillip ]ohnson's critique of Darwinism begun in 1991 in Darwinism on Trial, and continued in Reason in the Balance and Defeatng Darwinism by Opening Minds. Michael Behe's highly successful Darwin's Black Box followed Johnson's work. We are building on this momentum, broadening the wedge with a positive scientific alternative to materialistic scientific theories, which has come to be called the theory of intelligent design (ID). Design theory promises to reverse the stifling dominance of the materialist worldview, and to replace it with a science consonant with Christian and theistic convictions. The Wedge strategy can be divided into three distinct but interdependent phases, which are roughly but not strictly chronological. We believe that, with adequate support, we can accomplish many of the objectives of Phases I and II in the next five years (1999-2003), and begin Phase III (See "Goals/ Five Year Objectives/Activities"). Phase I: Research, Writing and Publication Phase II: Publicity and Opinion-making Phase III: Cultural Confrontation and Renewal Phase I is the essential component of everything that comes afterward. Without solid scholarship, research and argument, the project would be just another attempt to indoctrinate instead of persuade. A lesson we have learned from the history of science is that it is unnecessary to outnumber the opposing establishment. Scientific revolutions are usually staged by an initially small and relatively young group of scientists who are not blinded by the prevailing prejudices and who are able to do creative work at the pressure points, that is, on those critical issues upon which whole systems of thought hinge. So, in Phase I we are supporting vital witting and research at the sites most likely to crack the materialist edifice. Phase II. The pnmary purpose of Phase II is to prepare the popular reception of our ideas. The best and truest research can languish unread and unused unless it is properly publicized. For this reason we seek to cultivate and convince influential individuals in pnnt and broadcast media, as well as think tank leaders, scientists and academics, congressional staff, talk show hosts, college and seminary presidents and faculty, future talent and potential academic allies. Because of his long tenure in politics, journalism and public policy, Discovery President Bruce Chapman brings to the project rare knowledge and acquaintance of key op-ed writers, journalists, and political leaders. This combination of scientific and scholarly expertise and media and political connections makes the Wedge unique, and also prevents it from being "merely academic." Other activities include production of a PBS documentary on intelligent design and its implications, and popular op-ed publishing. Alongside a focus on influential opinion-makers, we also seek to build up a popular base of support among our natural constituency, namely, Chnstians. We will do this primarily through apologetics seminars. We intend these to encourage and equip believers with new scientific evidence's that support the faith, as well as to "popularize" our ideas in the broader culture. Phase III. Once our research and writing have had time to mature, and the public prepared for the reception of design theory, we will move toward direct confrontation with the advocates of materialist science through challenge conferences in significant academic settings. We will also pursue possible legal assistance in response to resistance to the integration of design theory into public school science curricula. The attention, publicity, and influence of design theory should draw scientific materialists into open debate with design theorists, and we will be ready. With an added emphasis to the social sciences and humanities, we will begin to address the specific social consequences of materialism and the Darwinist theory that supports it in the sciences. GOALS Governing Goals To defeat scientific materialism and its destructive moral, cultural and political legacies. To replace materialistic explanations with the theistic understanding that nature and hurnan beings are created by God. Five Year Goals To see intelligent design theory as an accepted alternative in the sciences and scientific research being done from the perspective of design theory. To see the beginning of the influence of design theory in spheres other than natural science. To see major new debates in education, life issues, legal and personal responsibility pushed to the front of the national agenda. Twenty Year Goals To see intelligent design theory as the dominant perspective in science. To see design theory application in specific fields, including molecular biology, biochemistry, paleontology, physics and cosmology in the natural sciences, psychology, ethics, politics, theology and philosophy in the humanities; to see its innuence in the fine arts. To see design theory permeate our religious, cultural, moral and political life. "
The critics of ID have their own "wedge" and political/atheistic agenda. The secular movement hands out decrees, networks extensively, spreads propaganda, injects innuendo into the public domain, denies tenure to ID advocates, and sees itself as part of a Revolution. For an example of this "wedge" in action see next post.
Iowa State Promotes Atheist Professor Who Equates Bible with Mein Kampf While Denying Tenure to ID Astronomer by John West While Iowa State University denied tenure this spring to gifted pro-ID astronomer Guillermo Gonzalez, it turns out that it decided at the same time to promote to full professor outspoken atheist Hector Avalos, religious studies professor and faculty adviser to the ISU Atheist and Agnostic Society. Avalos has led the charge against Gonzalez and intelligent design on ISU's campus, helping to draft a 2005 petition denouncing intelligent design that ultimately was signed by more than 120 ISU faculty. Apparently ISU professors who are horrified by the supposed mixing of metaphysics and scholarship on the part of ID proponents have no qualms about supporting Avalos's explicit anti-religious propaganda, including his effort to equate the Bible with Hitler's Mein Kampf (for more on Avalos's view of the Bible, see below). It is worth pointing out that ISU issued a press release a few years ago boasting about Avalos's appointment as the executive director of a group affiliated with the Council for Secular Humanism that seeks to debunk religion. Avalos's promotion to full professor comes just in time for the publication of his new book on the Bible later this month. According to the publisher's description, Avalos argues in the book that our world is best served by leaving the Bible as a relic of an ancient civilization instead of the "living" document most religionist scholars believe it should be. He urges his colleagues to concentrate on educating the broader society to recognize the irrelevance and even violent effects of the Bible in modern life. Just how extreme Avalos's view of the Bible is can be seen in his previous book, Fighting Words: The Origins of Religious Violence (2005), in which he repeatedly equates the Bible with Hitler's Mein Kampf. Indeed, in a section of the book titled "Scripture: A Zero-Tolerance Argument," Avalos actually suggests that the Bible is worse than Mein Kampf: In fact, Mein Kampf does not contain a single explicit command for genocide equivalent to those found in the Hebrew Bible... Thus, if all of Mein Kampf is to be rejected simply for its implied genocidal policies, we should certainly reject all of the Bible for some of its explicit and blatant genocidal policies. [p. 363] At other points, Avalos appears to blame Jewish people for Hitler's attempt to exterminate them, locating the origins of the Holocaust in what he calls "Hebrew racism." Consider the following passages: "The purpose here is to show that the Nazi policy of genocide was based on premises quite similar to those in the Hebrew Bible." [p. 316] "the Nazi Holocaust represents the synthesis of attitudes found in both the New Testament and the Hebrew scriptures." [p. 318] "[Scholars Katz and Wolpoff] fail to see the parallels between certain practices promulgated in the Hebrew Bible itself. Indeed, the supreme irony of the Holocaust is that the genocidal policies first systematically enunciated in the Hebrew scriptures were reversed by the Nazis. Nazi ideology simply had better technology to do what biblical authors had said they would do to their enemies." [pp. 318-319] "Hitler saw himself as trying to counteract Hebrew racism, which he saw as the main counterpart and enemy of the German race." [p. 319] As if these statements were not enough, Prof. Avalos has equated creationism with Nazism, denounced religion-inspired acts of love, and even suggested that we "eliminate religion from human life altogether": "Nazi ideology is similar to creationist ideology, which believes that scientific findings support the biblical stories of Creation and the Flood." [p. 318] "any act of love based on religion is immoral." [p. 369] "Mother Teresa... advocated policies that helped to generate the very pool of poor people she was attempting to help. Religious beliefs are largely responsible for arguments against contraception, which helps to perpetuate poverty and conflicts over scarce resources. So in the end, did Mother Teresa help more people than were harmed by her religious belief?" [p. 370] "until the Abrahamic religions overthrow the master-slave model in which they were born, we see little progress to be made. Since all religious beliefs are ultimately unverifiable, the greatest scarce resource of all is verifiability. And one way to remedy or minimize unverifiability in any decision-making process, especially that leading to violence, is to eliminate religion from human life altogether." [p. 371, emphasis added] Iowa taxpayers can be relieved to know that ISU is making sure their tax dollars will be spent on worthy scholars like Prof. Avalos rather than disreputable astronomers like Dr. Gonzalez.
Greater atrocities in the last 100 years were at the hands of the religious, or those atheists such as Hitler, Stalin, Mao? It would seem that western religions have evolved, but the human nature of all of mankind has not... The writings of Marx and Engles did not suggest genocide, but twisted human beings take the words of others, either scriptural or philosophical, and slaughter at will... The authors are not to blame for the acts of inhumanity toward humanity... Totalitarian thought and extremism are the enemy, not any particular religious text...or atheistic text...or philosphical text. It is quite bizzare that a country founded on the concept of freedom of the practice of different religions, would seek to punish those of faith in the name of "science."
Rwandan Genocide On April 6, 1994, President Habyarimana and Cyprien Ntaryamira, the president of Burundi, were killed when their airplane crashed, apparently shot down, near Kigali. Rwanda's presidential guard, which opposed the sharing of power, was generally held responsible. A number of moderate Hutu politicians, including the acting prime minister, were killed on April 7, and in the months that followed the army, the presidential guard, and extremist Hutu militias killed an estimated 200,000â500,000 civilians, most of them Tutsi. In response, the RPF resumed its military campaign. Hundreds of thousands of people, both Hutu and Tutsi, fled to neighboring countries. By late July, when the RPF announced a cease-fire and declared victory, it was estimated that there were more than 2 million refugees, more than half of whom were in Zaire (now Congo). The repatriation of these refugees was marred by periodic outbursts of violence. (In Context: In 1994 genocide in Rwanda wasn't the biggest in history, but it may have been the fastest. It happened in less than 100 days. At least 500,000 people, mostly Tutsis, were killed from a population of nearly eight million. By comparison, it took the Nazis six years to kill six million Jews in the Holocaust, a rate of about 2,700 people a day.) (In ten weeks, hundreds of thousands of innocent and unarmed people were slaughtered. Nearly one third of all Tutsis on earth were wiped out.) Christianity Religions: Roman Catholic - 56% / Protestant - 18% / Islam - 1% / Animist - 25% Nowhere in Africa has Christianity had a more decisive impact than in Rwanda. The Hutu revolution derived much of its egalitarian inspiration from the teachings of the European clergy, and Catholic seminaries served as recruiting grounds for Hutu leaders. Roman Catholicism claims the allegiance of about two-thirds of the population. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The majority of Rwandans, about 56%, are Roman Catholic, with another 18% Protestant. Only about 1% of the population is Muslim and about a fourth of Rwandans are adherents of indigenous beliefs. However, these numbers and divisions are not clear cut. Many Rwandans practice both their traditional religion and Christianity at the same time. At the core of traditional religion is a supreme being or spirit called Imana. This supreme being can only be addressed through intermediaries, and they can be Christian, the spirits of deceased family members known as abazima, or other illustrious ancestors. In this final category, Ryangombe and Nyabingi are two venerated ancestral deities that can intercede and ask for power and benevolence from Imana but do not posses them themselves. Ryangombe is venerated mostly in southern and western Rwanda. Nyabingi is a goddess venerated mostly in northern Rwanda. Rwandan's believe that one's familial ancestors, the abazima, can protect and benefit living family members if they are honored and remembered through sacrifices. When they are not, and sacrifices are not performed, they can cause illness or other misfortunes. Diviners are called upon by family members to interpret the wishes of abazima and to recommend ways to appease angered ancestors. Rwanda's genocide of 1994 has radically changed the way in which Christianity is practiced in the region, according to a church leader and theologian from the central African country. They no longer can use worship as just a place for pastors to speak. Worship to them has now become a place for those who survived to speak, and for others [implicated in the violence] to confess," Andre Karamaga, a Rwandan theologian and church leader, told Ecumenical News International in Geneva recently. "Worship is now a place of healing, a place for people to speak."