{"id":50,"date":"2006-09-29T07:36:57","date_gmt":"2006-09-29T11:36:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.flascience.org\/wp\/?p=50"},"modified":"2008-08-05T10:25:56","modified_gmt":"2008-08-05T14:25:56","slug":"letter-about-id","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=50","title":{"rendered":"Letter about ID"},"content":{"rendered":"

A letter to the editor in today’s St. Petersburg Times<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Kudos to the School Board candidates at the recent political forum in Beverly Hills who support the teaching of “intelligent design” in our schools as an acceptable alternative to the teaching of Darwin’s theory of evolution.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

In 1996, Lehigh University biologist Michael Behe shook the foundations of Darwinism, the theory that all living things descended from a single ancestor, and that all existing life is the result of random mutation and natural selection, when he proposed the theory of “irreducible complexity.”<\/p>\n

Simply put, organisms including the microscopic universe of the cell (totally unknown to Darwin) consist of several interrelated parts, all of which must be present for the system to function. The organisms’ existence is all or nothing with no stages of development in between, thereby ruling out the numerous, successive, slight modifications of evolutionary theory.<\/p>\n

Intelligent design also brings into question the lack of fossil evidence that reveals one species slowly evolving into the next. Five hundred and thirty million years ago almost every animal phyla arose out of nowhere. After this occurrence, known as the Cambrian explosion, almost no new phyla appear in the fossil records and many became extinct, leaving a 500-million-year gap in the evolutionary process. At best, we see microevolution, the tweaking of an existing species to adapt to different environments, and nothing more.<\/p>\n

Another supporting point is the age of the Earth itself, approximately five billion years. A single cell evolving into a human in five billion years defies all probability. It is mathematically impossible for this to occur in such a short time span.<\/p>\n

To further put into question the soundness of Darwinism is the growing understanding of the DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) molecule. DNA is a communication system within the cell. Just as humans have written languages, so do cells through the DNA code. This code (language) determines our physical characteristics and guides our development into adulthood. This genetic language suggests creativity that science has been unable to confirm in natural selection.<\/p>\n

And, of course, evolutionists have yet to explain the biggest leap of all – how life came to be in the first place.<\/p>\n

Certainly, these few points help build a compelling argument for the inclusion of intelligent design in our schools’ curriculums. The last thing we want our educators to do is summarily dismiss certain important possibilities as inherently unworthy of consideration. That would be the antithesis of education.<\/p>\n

Sam Lyons, Hernando Beach<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So, does anyone know about these school board candidates? Please speak up if you do.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A letter to the editor in today’s St. Petersburg Times: Kudos to the School Board candidates at the recent political forum in Beverly Hills who support the teaching of “intelligent design” in our schools as an acceptable alternative to the … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[6,3],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pcZNLl-O","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1114,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1114","url_meta":{"origin":50,"position":0},"title":"Molecular Decay Of Enamel In Toothless Mammals Supports Theory Of Evolution","author":"Jonathan Smith","date":"September 8, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"\u00c2\u00a0Biologists at the University of California, Riverside report new evidence for evolutionary change recorded in both the fossil record and the genomes (or genetic blueprints) of living organisms, providing fresh support for Charles Darwin's theory of evolution.The researchers were able to correlate the progressive loss of enamel in the fossil\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":785,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=785","url_meta":{"origin":50,"position":1},"title":"Evolution’s New Wrinkle","author":"Jonathan Smith","date":"November 12, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"A team of Princeton University scientists has discovered that chains of proteins found in most living organisms act like adaptive machines, possessing the ability to control their own evolution. The research, which appears to offer evidence of a hidden mechanism guiding the way biological organisms respond to the forces of\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 7 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 7 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=785#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":386,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=386","url_meta":{"origin":50,"position":2},"title":"Dixie County?","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"January 13, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"The Dixie County Advocate's website is painful to navigate. But if you have the patience, you can venture to the Dec. 20 issue and see a column on page 12 written by Dixie County School Superintendent, Dennis Bennett. The State is in the process of developing and approving changes to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Our Science Standards"","block_context":{"text":"Our Science Standards","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=7"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":339,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=339","url_meta":{"origin":50,"position":3},"title":"Florida education official uses position to oppose evolution","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"December 8, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"An employee at the Florida Department of Education sent out an e-mail from her personal account to several people in an attempt to rally them to oppose the new draft of the state science standards because of the way evolution is now included. (Browse through previous posts on this blog\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "In the News"","block_context":{"text":"In the News","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=3"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3153,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=3153","url_meta":{"origin":50,"position":4},"title":"Meanwhile in Clay County: the teaching of evolution is “intellectually deceptive”","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"January 10, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Evolution fires suddenly seem to be popping up everywhere. The latest controversy over the teaching of evolution in public schools just happened in Clay County, which is nestled between Jacksonville to the northeast and Gainesville to the southwest. The Clay County school board at their Jan. 4 regular meeting took\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Controversial Theories bill 2017\/18"","block_context":{"text":"Controversial Theories bill 2017\/18","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=34"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":728,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=728","url_meta":{"origin":50,"position":5},"title":"Textbooks changed under pressure","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"March 14, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Florida Citizens for Science was under a time crunch to get a letter out to the Brevard County school board about science textbook selections. 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