Letters to the Editor
Let's Be Intelligent About Design
I frequently read the Register online, so I haven't read the article I'm going to comment on. The problem is in the title, “Design or Dumb Luck?” I strongly hope that the article makes the point I am about to make.
Intelligent design is not a theory. While I believe the Lord created the universe and it certainly has an intelligent design, the use of the word theory here is incorrect. A theory must do two things: It must explain what has been observed and it must be useful in predicting the results of experiments. This second one is sometimes simplified by saying it must be testable.
While intelligent design certainly fills the first criteria, it absolutely fails the second. This means intelligent design has no place in a science classroom. It is not a theory in the way science uses the term.
This does not disturb or disappoint me, as life is supposed to test our faith. If intelligent design could meet the criteria of a theory, that would be prima facie evidence of the existence of the Almighty, which would remove the need for faith.
PAUL A. NEVINS
Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin
Regarding “Design or Dumb Luck?” (Oct. 30 -Nov. 5):
I wish this were only an issue for ninth-grade students! Just take a look at the “science” books available for children of all ages, even the very young. Most are tainted with evolution theory. If I want a book on insects, all I want are the observable facts. I don't need or want evolution referenced in so many places. I don't need “pro-wings” or “billions of years” or “developed over time” or “became able” or “grew.” I am just sick of seeing evolution nonsense explaining things that do not even need to be said at all.
If evolution is taught and required, I think intelligent design should also be, as well as any other explanation of creation. All these things cannot be proved. (Although evolution is said to be proved, it is not even a good explanation of the actual facts.) They should be taught as “beliefs,” just like world religions are. What is fair for one should be fair for all.
When our school systems, museums, libraries, books, televisions, computers, movies and all of culture brainwash our children with approval and funding by our government, some serious freedoms are being denied.
HELEN DICKEY
Reston, Virginia
Regarding the controversy on intelligent design and the court case in Pennsylvania (“Design or Dumb Luck?” Oct 30 - Nov 5):
Some in our Christian family are apparently advocates of intelligent design, the attractive but flawed concept proposing that the sheer complexity of creation “scientifically hypothesizes” a higher power. But creation's complexity and diversity may be accounted for by evolution alone, which postulates a primitive Earth teeming with single-cell life forms. From this elemental base of ever-multiplying cells, where else could the life processes go except toward increasing complexity? This, however, misses the key point to be made.
Only a weak, insecure, and potentially abusive spirituality demands belief in physical phenomena that are demonstrably false (such as a seven-day creation). On the contrary, legitimate Christian faith — the belief that a loving, eternal being lived historically with us in an otherwise indifferent universe — tells us both that we are loved and that our lives and relationships have meaning.
True spirituality neither overpowers nor lies subjugated before rational science, but compliments and tempers it in our lives with the qualities of compassion, love, drama and virtue: subjective qualities beyond the tests and conjectures of the scientific method.
Science may explain life, but only the Spirit makes life worth living.
DANIEL J. BIEZAD
San Luis Obispo, California
“How can we decide whether Darwinian natural selection can account for the amazing complexity that exists at the molecular level? Darwin himself set the standard when he acknowledged, ‘If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down.'
“Some systems seem very difficult to form by such successive modifications — I call them irreducibly complex. An everyday example of an irreducibly complex system is the humble mousetrap. It consists of (1) a flat wooden platform or base; (2) a metal hammer, which crushes the mouse; (3) a spring with extended ends to power the hammer; (4) a catch that releases the spring; and (5) a metal bar that connects to the catch and holds the hammer back. You can't catch a mouse with just a platform, then add a spring and catch a few more mice, then add a holding bar and catch a few more. All the pieces have to be in place before you catch any mice.”
The Faith vs. The Force
I greatly appreciate the fact that Star Wars: Episode III — Revenge of the Sith made your list. However, I take issue with your review of it (Video Picks & Passes, Oct. 30-Nov. 5).
Steven G. Greydanus insists on comparing Palpatine to a “modernist theologian” because of his references to the “narrow dogmatic views of the Jedi.” The Jedi, Greydanus observes, make a rather weak parallel to Christianity. This should not be a surprise or a disappointment. George Lucas is not a Christian, much less a Catholic, and his Star Wars films are not meant to be religious allegories.
The Jedi are emphatically not Christians; the Force is emphatically not God. Yoda makes reference in Episode III to the dead as those “who have transformed into the Force.” This, obviously, is not Christian theology. If you try to apply Christian theology to the entire Star Wars saga, you will find yourself running in circles.
The virgin gives birth to a chosen one and the chosen one turns to the dark side. The Force is explained by the scientific reasoning of midi-Chlorians, or Force-cells.
What I am trying to establish is that, by insisting that a story take on a religious analogy, you weaken its initial worth. As a religious analogy, The Revenge of the Sith is weak and flawed, but as the fantastic epic it was meant to be, it shines as a masterpiece. Don't debase it by trying to make it something it isn't.
BECKY PANAYIOTOU
Fort Pierce, Florida
Alito and Abortion
The record of Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito does not justify the hysterical charge by Planned Parenthood, echoed by others, that he “would undermine basic reproductive rights” (“Alito's Way,” Editorial, Nov. 6-12).
In 1991's Planned Parenthood v. Casey, Judge Alito expressed the opinion that Pennsylvania's law requiring spousal notification of abortion was constitutional because it posed no more of an “undue burden” than some of the restrictions Sandra Day O'Connor had upheld, such as parental-notification requirements and regulations that raised the price of abortions.
Alito said No, it didn't impose an undue burden, because the vast majority of abortion-seekers informed their husbands anyway; the requirement didn't apply to unmarried women; the husband's consent was not necessary; and women fearing physical abuse were exempted by the law.
Isn't it carrying the right to privacy a tad too far to say it includes not telling your husband you are aborting his child?
Alito, the judge who allegedly threatens women's “reproductive rights,” concurred in the Third Circuit's Planned Parenthood v. Farmer decision to overturn New Jersey's partial-birth abortion ban as unconstitutional, noting: “Our responsibility as a lower court is to follow and apply controlling Supreme Court precedent.”
Clearly, Judge Alito, the most experienced Supreme Court nominee in 70 years, is no ideologue. And what those who fear the overturning of Roe v. Wade seem to forget is that such an event would not ban abortion but return the matter to the states and the elected representatives of the people, where it resided prior to 1973. Doesn't the Constitution begin with the words “We the People”?
DANIEL JOHN SOBIESKI
Chicago
Schumer's Sadness
Sen. Charles Schumer's reaction to President Bush's nomination of Judge Samuel Alito for the Supreme Court — “It is sad that the president felt he had to pick a nominee likely to divide America instead of choosing a nominee in the mold of Sandra Day O'Connor, who would unify us” — would be laughable were it not so serious.
The only nominee Schumer would accept would be one who believes, as he does, that the Constitution provides for the murder of innocent, unborn babies and the old and infirm, which it does not. Democrats lost the last presidential election because of people who believe in what the Constitution and the Bill of Rights actually provide: that everyone has the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
GERARD P. MCEVOY
Coram, New York
Really Present, But How So?
In “Do Catholics Understand the Real Presence?” (Oct. 30-Nov. 5), there is a statement that needs some clarifying.
I have felt that the Register not only brings Catholic news but also educates, except for rare occasions. In this case there is a statement that I cannot accept because it is not true. I quote: “Nigerian Bishop Joseph Bagobiri of Kafanchan called on the synod to develop a ‘theology of presence’ so that the faithful are not confused and know that Christ is present sacramentally but not physically in the Eucharist.”
Don't ask me to explain it, but a theology expert, Jesus himself, said, “This is my body, which will be given up for you.” It was not a “representation” that hung on the cross and died for us and it was not a “representation” that we had adoration for today.
Please do not allow errors like this to go unchallenged or unexplained because any confusion that is present over this issue will only become worse.
DOROTHY HALEY
Tracy, California
