Wednesday, November 28, 2012

Is ID Science?

If you've ever heard the criticism of Intelligent Design that it's not a scientific theory and should therefore not be taught in public schools you might be interested in perusing the information at Evolution News and Views.

Casey Luskin amasses a formidable array of resources which collectively make the case that ID is every bit as much a scientific theory as is anything else.

Along the way Luskin mentions the demarcation problem which, to my mind, makes the whole question of the status of ID moot. The demarcation problem is the challenge of trying to determine what it is about science that separates it from non-science. Most philosophers of science agree that there really is no clear boundary or demarcation and that the best way to define science is to say that it's simply whatever it is that scientists do.

If that's the case then it seems a bit futile to insist that ID is not science.

Not Over Yet

It looks like there'll be yet another challenge to the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) before the law is fully implemented:
President Obama’s national health care law will be back at the U.S. Supreme Court by next fall, according to a lawyer for Liberty University, which is challenging the constitutionality of the law on different grounds from the recent major health care suit.

Earlier on Monday, the Supreme Court ordered the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Virginia to rehear a suit brought by Liberty University challenging the constitutionality of Obamacare.

“We’ll probably be back before the Supreme Court in fall of 2013, about a year from now,” Mathew Staver, the lawyer representing Liberty University, predicted in a phone interview with the Washington Examiner.

When the Supreme Court upheld the law’s individual mandate this past June, it did not address other issues raised by the suit brought by the Christian college.

In addition to challenging the individual mandate, Liberty has argued that the additional mandate forcing employers to offer their workers federally-approved health insurance or pay a penalty violated the Constitution. Should judges reject the argument that the employer mandate is broadly unconstitutional, Staver emphasized that the university is also making the narrower argument that the individual and employer mandates are unconstitutional “as applied” to religious institutions, because the law forces them to pay for abortions. This, Staver said, “collide(s) with the free exercise of religion.”
There's more at the link. "Fundamentally transforming" the country is a messy and difficult business, of course, and lots of obstacles stand in the way of seizing power and control over people's lives.

It's an interesting historical footnote that it seems that it's always religious institutions and individuals motivated by religious principles that get in the way of those who wish to aggrandize more power to themselves and to the state. It's doubtless one reason why there are, and will probably continue to be, so many martyrs.