Discovery Institute's Blog, page 56

Extreme Flight Tracked by Electronics on Frigate Birds

Named for fast-moving French warships of the 18th century, the frigate bird is built for gliding. With one of the largest wing surface ratios of any bird, they soar from the ocean surface up to the high clouds, staying aloft for weeks at a time. Recently, scientists traveled to Europa Island, a speck of land in the Mozambique Channel between Madagascar and the African mainland, to study their navigation patterns. What they found pushes the limits of flight physics. Here is a bird that flies...

Is Intelligent Design a Peasants' Revolt?

When I was a high school debater back in the Reagan era, scaremongering about nuclear war was omnipresent. Facing off, debate teams had a habit, which became a joke, of arguing that any policy favored by their opponents would result in an exchange of warheads with the USSR. Even something as innocuous as to support, or oppose, a law requiring automobile airbags could be wrestled into a threat of annihilation.

It goes beyond high school. In countering an idea you really don't like, the tempta...

We Hold These Truths to Be Self-Evident

On Independence Day, it's appropriate to review the sources of our rights as citizens. There is one source that is more basic than any other, yet that receives less than the attention it deserves. I refer to the idea that there is an intelligent creator who can be known by reason from nature, a key tenet underlying the Declaration of Independence -- as well as, curiously, the modern theory of intelligent design.

The birth of our republic was announced in the Declaration through the pen of Th...

Founding Father Thomas Jefferson on Intelligent Design

In a special edition of ID the Future for Independence Day weekend, Discovery Institute Senior Fellow John West explores the real views of American Founding Father Thomas Jefferson on intelligent design.

Download the episode by clicking here:

Critics of intelligent design sometimes claim they are defending the principles of Jefferson in trying to ban discussions of intelligent design. In the words of one writer, "Thomas Jefferson makes it quite clear that there was not a consensus of supp...

Expanding Canada's Radical Euthanasia License

That didn't take long. When Parliament legalized euthanasia for people with medical conditions leading to "foreseeable" death, many in the media and among the "experts" yelled that it was too restrictive.

And unconstitutional. Based on the Supreme Court's forcing of Belgium-style euthanasia onto the country, they are probably right.

Let the lawsuits begin. From the Globe and Mail story:

In a test case on the highly charged issue of whether the right to a medically assisted death should belon...

For July 4 Weekend, Poll Shows Huge Support for Academic Freedom in Teaching, Research on Evolution

Though endangered on campuses, academic freedom couldn't be more all-American. That includes the freedom of teachers, students, and scientists to speak out, debate, and weigh diverse, even critical scientific ideas about evolution. While demonized by the media, independence of thought on the ultimate question of biological origins finds support across the broadest spectrum of age, sex, political and religious perspectives.

Indeed, Americans celebrate Independence Day this weekend, and right...

Puberty, Maturation, and Fertility: The Role of Information in Human Sexuality

Editor's note: Physicians have a special place among the thinkers who have elaborated the argument for intelligent design. Perhaps that's because, more than evolutionary biologists, they are familiar with the challenges of maintaining a functioning complex system, the human body. With that in mind, Evolution News is delighted to offer this series, "The Designed Body." For the complete series, see here. Dr. Glicksman practices palliative medicine for a hospice organization.

The word sex comes...

Alleged Instances of Observed Speciation -- Evolution's Smoking Gun Is Still Missing

Editor's note: William Dembski and Jonathan Wells, leading figures in the intelligent design movement, are co-authors of The Design of Life: Discovering Signs of Intelligence in Biological Systems. Originally published by the Foundation for Thought and Ethics, this path-breaking work explores some of the most important arguments for intelligent design in biology. To celebrate the launch of Foundation for Thought & Ethics Books as an imprint of Discovery Institute Press, we will be publishing...

Yes, We'll Live-Stream the July 13 Book Party for Douglas Axe and Undeniable!

The stars are coming into alignment for Doug Axe's forthcoming book, Undeniable: How Biology Confirms Our Intuition That Life Is Designed. The dust-jacket blurbs are superb, including from biologists at the University of Georgia, State University of New York, California State University, and more. We'll share those in due time.

Bestselling novelist Dean Koontz praises the book, too, rightly observing that, "Great scientists are as much artists as scientists. Enchanted by the beauty of the...

Science, Knowledge, and the "Epistemic Horizon"

National Review Online's Kevin Williamson has sometimes rubbed me the wrong way, but in the 24 hours or so since Neil deGrasse Tyson shot off his "#Rationalia" tweet, Williamson composed an essay in response that can only be called profound. Tyson, the "dumbest smart person on Twitter," proposed a "virtual country," with a "one-line Constitution: All policy shall be based on the weight of evidence." In reply, Williamson offers the image of a limit to knowledge, an "epistemtic horizon" like t...