![_The Dandy Warhols at Emo's East [Show Photos]](http://austinist.com/assets_c/2012/05/IMG_8133-thumb-250x250-716346.jpg)
![_The Preservation, The Dalles and SuperLiteBike at Beauty Ballroom [Show Preview]](http://austinist.com/assets_c/2012/05/the preservation-thumb-250x250-716401.jpg)
Truesday: Let's Leave The Caves For Good This Time
*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole.* -The Editors
So let me get this straight: Perry wants to teach Intelligent Design in Texas Public Schools? Wow. Fascinating. How… old school of him. REALLY old school.
Two points that make this a moot debate in Texas, today:
Back when I was in high school, there was a big fracas surrounding the “under god” portion of the “Pledge of Allegiance”(before recent efforts to deep-six the entire chant). At the time, I thought the whole thing silly, considering I rarely bothered to say the pledge anyway. Let alone the “god” part. No teachers ever took issue with my laziness. They must have known how pointless it would have been. It was a simple mechanical process for us. It marked the beginning of the day, nothing more.
But there were some rather astute students in our school who actually thought about what they were saying, and chose to openly defy it. Apparently they weren’t cool with pledging to what they assumed was a country that was bound to a Christian god. They took it up with principals and superintendents. They might have gone to PTA meetings with their case. No one paid any attention to the complaints. Eventually, the issue dissolved into obscurity and the rest of us continued to lazily mumble, if any effort at annunciation was made, the morning pledge. None of us believed any more or less in whatever allegiance was being stated. We were all too busy trying to sell drugs, get laid, get high, get laid whilst high, or avoid getting shot at, to bother with the lot of it.
My first point being: no high school kid (or younger, for that matter) would believe any more or less in Intelligent Design if it were added to a curriculum. Don’t fool yourselves, they don’t really care. Thirty year-olds care about shit like that. Fifteen year-olds put more care and faith in selecting acne medication than they do any “theories of the progression of human existence”. It’s a rough world out there. No time for bullshit.
My second point is that the Texas Legislature already decided this issue, and it won’t be back on the legislative table in Texas until 2008. So it’s not like anyone’s child is in any immediate danger of any extra education.
Alright then. So it isn’t a pressing issue to students or textbook printers, and the discussion is probably deterring us from dealing with real problems with the Texas Public Educational system. Like, say, the funding debacle or whatever. Got it. But let’s pretend it is a pressing issue, up for current decision on the house floor, just for a few paragraphs.
Question one: Should the theory of Intelligent Design be taught in (any) Science course?
Simply put, the theory of “Intelligent Design” states that everything in our existence (earth, universe, pickled herring, clouds, magnetics, particle waves of all varieties, punches to the face, etc) displays patterns or discernable systems, which were specifically designed by something intelligent. Presumably, something more intelligent than ourselves. Aliens, Christian god(s), mythological gods, or prior human inhabitants of earth could possibly be the Designer.
Interesting, and full of that Greco-Romanesque worldview which is seeing such a resurgence in furniture design in today’s Cincinnati flea-markets: potentially genuine, might look good in front of your fireplace, yet not necessarily attractive to everyone. But the question remains still: is it a scientific theory?
No. That should be obvious.
This theory is older than written record, and is in form, a faith-based theory. To say probability dictates, in a closed system, that any construct which appears abnormally complex and organized (containing comparative “high information”) in structure must be specifically designed by something, and that something is probably intelligent…well, that’s a tired-ass concept. This theory brought us monuments to Zeus for protection against plagues, paintings of Osiris to protect us in death, and probably caused countless tears to fall from the muddied cheeks of our lightning-horrified cave-dwelling ancestors (who probably had not yet learned to demand anything from their perceived Designers). It does not matter what deity you finger as the “Designer”, there is an assumption of faith in order to believe in that deity, since its existence is (currently – I concede) completely without proof.
Except for the hordes of anal-curious aliens in trailer parks across the south-central US. Yes, except for them.
Is this theory even related to Science? Well, in my opinion, outside of being the nexus of all true scientific theories ever developed, no, it isn’t even related. It is the same default explanation for all things confusing and unknown, used by we humans since before the written word.
Should the theory of Intelligent Design be taught in (any) Science course?
Of course not. Only Science should be taught in a Science course.
Question two: What class should Intelligent Design be taught in, if not in Science?
It should be taught in pieces, probably, since the theory encompasses everything in our detectable environment (and beyond, if you “believe”). The non-Dianetic aliens and “lost humans from elsewhere” should all probably go in a fiction lit class (not necessarily sci-fi, but I don’t think it would matter much). All the Greco-Roman mythology should remain in theatre arts, since they seem to dig that shit. Any and all religious versions (eastern philosophy, American Indian, Judaism, Christian, Dianetic, whatever) MUST be left out entirely, without any question.
While I agree with the assertion that the American public school system is already quietly lousy with religious and/or mythological/fantastical reference throughout the curriculum(s), I will never support being blatant about it. It’s one thing to give a nod to the cultural past that my forefathers worked with/beyond. It’s a whole ‘nother to usher that shit right back into the mainstream.
By god (or whatever), I can’t abide by that.
