Sunday, March 20, 2011

Texas Bill to Protect Non-Darwinists from Discrimination

A new Texas bill would make it illegal for colleges to fire or refuse jobs to professors based on their research on intelligent design or other theories on the origin of life that question evolution.

Such discrimination has been admitted in several cases, including where the University of Kentucky Wouldn't Hire Christians as Scientists

-- From "Arlington lawmaker's bill would protect questioners of evolution" by Aman Batheja, Fort Worth Star-Telegram 3/17/11

The measure from Republican state Rep. Bill Zedler would block higher education institutions from discriminating against or penalizing teachers or students based on their research into intelligent design or other theories that disagree with evolution.

Zedler said he filed the bill because of cases in which colleges had been hostile to those who believe that certain features of life-forms are so complex that they must have originated from a higher power.

Zedler said fear of workplace discrimination is preventing evolution critics in colleges from speaking their minds.

To read the entire article above, CLICK HERE.

From "Texas Bill Would Protect College Professors Who Question Evolution" by Katherine T. Phan, Christian Post Reporter 3/19/11

The bill, HB 2454, was received by the Higher Education Committee earlier this week.

Researchers who study intelligent design [ID] deserve the same academic freedom as those who support evolution, said a spokesman for Discovery Institute, an intelligent design think tank based in Seattle, Wash.

"Without academic freedom to follow the evidence where it leads, science cannot progress," Casey Luskin, program officer in Public Policy and Legal Affairs at Discovery Institute, told The Christian Post.

In 2007, Baylor University shut down an evolutionary informatics lab by professor Robert Marks after administrators learned he was doing pro-ID research. The lab was forced to move from the university server to a third-party server. The incident was documented in Ben Stein's "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed."

Another incident at Baylor a few years ago involved the Michael Polanyi Center, considered to be the first intelligent design think tank at a major research university. Headed by leading ID-theorist William Dembski, a senior fellow of Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture, the center was also shut down due to intolerance of the pro-ID viewpoint.

To read the entire article above, CLICK HERE.

From "Texas considers protecting those who question Darwin" by Bob Unruh © 2011 WorldNetDaily 3/19/11

"Isn't it amazing in the halls of academia you can almost believe anything and espouse everything and they go right along with you. But lo and behold if someone talks about intelligent design, all of a sudden, we need to get rid of you," Zedler told WND.

Walt Ruloff, the executive producer of Premise Media, who worked with actor Ben Stein on the project called "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed," about the monopoly Darwinian beliefs hold in academia, wrote in the Baylor student newspaper about his concerns at the time.
"As many of you have heard, Marks, a distinguished professor of electrical and computer engineering, has been conducting research that ultimately may challenge the foundation of Darwinian theory. In layman's terms, Marks is using highly sophisticated mathematical and computational techniques to determine if there are limits to what natural selection can do," he wrote. "At Baylor, a Christian institution, this should be pretty unremarkable stuff. I'm assuming most of the faculty, students and alumni believe in God, so wouldn't it also be safe to assume you have no problem with a professor trying to scientifically quantify the limits of a blind, undirected cause of the origin and subsequent history of life?

"But the dirty little secret is university administrators are much more fearful of the Darwinian Machine than they are of you," he said.
To read the entire article above, which includes several cases of discrimination against Christian scientists, CLICK HERE.

Also read Scientific Teaching vs. Darwinism: States' Legislation