Des Moines Register
06-10-07
Tenure denial springs from ignorance of design theory and scientific hubris
The June 2 Iowa View about the denial of tenure to astronomer Guillermo
Gonzalez by Iowa State University physicist John Hauptman displays almost
total ignorance of the argument that Gonzalez and I make in our book "The
Privileged Planet" ("Rights Are Intact: Decision Rests on, 'What Is Science?'").
For instance, after listing the conditions needed to build a habitable planet like
Earth, Hauptman says, "Why are these conditions so 'perfect' for us, allowing
humans to exist and, above all, to ask these questions? Intelligent design is the
notion that a supreme being arranged it for us."
No it's not. We never argue for design based on the rarity of habitable planets. In
fact, we spend a great deal of time arguing that that's a bad argument. Rather,
we argue that the overlap of conditions for life and for scientific discovery
suggests design, because you would expect such an overlap if the universe were
designed for discovery, but not otherwise. Hauptman doesn't even know our
basic premise - which a number of prominent scientists have found persuasive even though it's in the subtitle of the book ("How Our Place In the Cosmos Is
Designed for Discovery").
Hauptman then tells readers, "Intelligent design is not even a theory. It has not
made its first prediction, nor suffered its first test by measurement. Its proponents
can call it anything they like, but it is not science." But in the book, we make
predictions and list ways our argument can be tested: Find native animal life in a
radically different astronomical setting than ours, or based on chemistry other
than carbon or in an environment hostile to scientific discovery, and you've
falsified our argument. Find a place that is hostile to life but more congenial to
science than the Earth, and our argument collapses. So, by Hauptman's own
definition of science, "The Privileged Planet" qualifies.
Hauptman was involved in denying tenure to Gonzalez. So we now know that
decision was based not only on ill-informed prejudice against intelligent design,
but on ignorance of Gonzalez's views. What does that say about the integrity of
the tenure process at ISU?
- Jay W. Richards,
co-author, "The Privileged Planet: How Our Place in the Cosmos is Designed for
Discovery,"
East Grand Rapids, Mich.
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Although John Hauptman, a professor of physics at Iowa State University,
voted to deny tenure to Guillermo Gonzalez, he respectfully stated that Gonzalez
"is very creative, intelligent and knowledgeable, highly productive scientifically
and an excellent teacher."
However, because Gonzalez believes in "intelligent design," which is not science,
Hauptman claims that Iowa State's "physics department is not obligated to
support notions that do not even begin to meet scientific standards" (even though
- it is worth pointing out - Gonzalez does not talk about "intelligent design" in the
course of his Iowa State teaching responsibilities).
Assuming that Hauptman believes that the delicate balance of diverse,
multifaceted variables that allow for life's existence on this planet happened by
chance alone, I wonder if he thinks that such a "belief" is any more scientific than
that of Gonzalez.
Immanuel Kant, over 200 years ago in his "Critique of Pure Reason," showed
that neither of these beliefs is capable of rational (i.e., scientific) proof or disproof.
Of course, it's also possible that Hauptman chooses to be agnostic about the
matter. Assuming this to be the case, I wonder if he believes that every tenured
physics professor, in order not to be excommunicated from the academic
community, needs to be similarly agnostic? If so, Hauptman is giving an ironic
21st-century twist to the shame of Galileo's 17th-century persecution.
Coincidentally, on the same day that Hauptman's lengthy defense of his "no" vote
appeared in the Register, another article in the paper noted that ISU president
Gregory Geoffroy "said that, Gonzalez's advocacy of the 'intelligent design'
concept was not a factor in the decision to turn down his request for tenure."
- Steve Perlowski,
Des Moines.
I appreciated John Hauptman's June 2 defense of the decision to deny tenure to
Guillermo Gonzalez. He was respectful of Gonzalez's intelligence and provided a
most excellent description of science.
Hauptman's description of science is so good I think all scientists should think
about how his definition of science applies to their own disciplines. For instance,
the presupposition that is the building block of modern evolutionary biology is that
time plus chance plus nothing is responsible for the existence of organized life.
Is this supposition provable? Hauptman states that "... just thinking about what
you see and imagining reasons are not enough." I agree; I have scoured the
literature in search of published experiments where elements under the right
environmental conditions spontaneously assembled themselves into amino
acids, proteins, nucleic acids and organelles required for life.
There is simply no experimental evidence of this supposition. In defense of the
chance-plus-nothing supposition, scientists go to the fossil records for their proof.
Unfortunately, the fossil records have a long history of fraud, circular reasoning
and scientific turf wars. If you read the research, there are serious doubts about
the fossil records even among committed evolutionary biologists.
So, unfortunately for Gonzales, he was denied tenure because he followed
Hauptman's advice to "junk" a theory that makes wrong predictions.
- Scott Nelson,
Urbandale.