Breathtaking Inanity

Not good news for proponents of Intelligent Design (via ALDaily):

In a broad and withering opinion, a federal judge ruled today that intelligent design was nothing more than creationism in disguise and therefore that it was unconstitutional to teach it in a public-school science classroom.

The judge, John E. Jones III of the U.S. District Court in Harrisburg, Pa., took proponents of intelligent design to task in his 139-page opinion, saying that they wished to “change the ground rules of science to make room for religion, specifically, beliefs consonant with a particular version of Christianity.”

He also chastised the former members of the Dover Area School Board who insisted that teachers in the Pennsylvania district present intelligent design as a legitimate alternative to the widely accepted principles of biological evolution laid down by Charles Darwin nearly 150 years ago. The judge cited the “breathtaking inanity” of the board’s decision and the board members’ “striking ignorance” about the concept of intelligent design, often called “ID.” (Eight board members who supported inserting intelligent design into the science curriculum have since been voted out of office.)

“The citizens of the Dover area were poorly served by the members of the board who voted for the ID policy,” the judge wrote. “It is ironic that several of these individuals, who so staunchly and proudly touted their religious convictions in public, would time and again lie to cover their tracks and disguise the real purpose behind the ID policy.”

Judge Jones also had harsh words for intelligent-design proponents in general, writing that the concept is “at bottom premised upon a false dichotomy, namely, that to the extent evolutionary theory is discredited, ID is confirmed.” At one point in the ruling, he stated plainly that intelligent design is “not science” — a view that reflects the arguments of ID’s strongest critics.

More links at B&W.