Findings on Hostility at Smithsonian Noted in NRO Article

Fri Aug 19 09:44:54 PDT 2005

The distinction between malevolent and non-malevolent design depends on a prior notion of what is good and bad. However, if the latter are merely relative to culture and/or the individual, such judgments cannot in principle be universally applied with integrity unless they are not relative. On the other hand, if they can be universally applied, and there are in fact universal, unchanging bits of knowledge we call the moral law, then we have the problem of accounting for that knowledge as well.  So, your suggestion, ironically, depends on the very design that I believe you are denying.  

The smart-alec quip about the anti-Semitic book is particularly distateful and uncalled for. 

Frank

On Friday, August 19, 2005, at 10:44AM, Mark Graber <mgraber at gvpt.umd.edu> wrote:

>I presume malevolent design should also get equal time, based on the
>claim that whatever "intelligence" is responsible for this really has it
>in for humans.  And, of course, there is the Protocols of the Elders of
>Zion, a world-wide best seller, etc.
>
>Mark A. Graber
>
>>>> nebraskalawprof at yahoo.com 08/19/05 11:34 AM >>>
>I am not (nor do I have any desire to be) a scientist. But I do teach
>and write about free speech, and when I hear that the powers that be are
>trying to suppress a new idea, my 1A instincts are triggered and go into
>high gear.
> 
>Such is the case with ID--when I read about people trying to discredit
>ID scholars and trying to prevent ID scholarship from being published or
>taught, I ask myself "what are they so afraid of?" Why not have
>symposium issues of science journals devoted to debates between the best
>ID scholars and their critics? Why not welcome ID scholars on university
>faculties in the name of intellectual diversity and open-mindedness? Why
>the mockery and suppression rather than a fair and free debate? 
> 
>Methinks I need to spend more time in the classroom discussing the EC
>and the teaching oif ID. In Edwards, the Court struck down the Balanced
>Treatment Act only by first misinterpreting the law's stated secular
>purpose (academic freedom for students) and then declaring the law
>unconstitutional for want of a secular purpose.The Balanced Treatment
>Act was clumsy and poorly drafted. I think a properly drafted law (one
>that sets out a clear secular purpose of teaching the controversy for
>the benefit of students) concerning the teaching of ID is clearly
>permissible under the EC. Federal courts should not be acting as science
>curriculum committees for public schools. That is the job of state and
>local government. 
> 
>I think we will read and discuss Prof. Beckwith's article on Public
>Education, Religious Establishment, and the Challenge of Intelligent
>Design in my Con Law Seminar this Spring. Or does it violate the EC to
>teach about ID and the EC?
> 
>Rick Duncan
> 
>Frank: Do you have 15 reprints to spare?
> 
>
>
>Francis Beckwith <francis.beckwith at mac.com> wrote:
>Ed:
>
>I appreciate your comments. I admit I am a tad bit sensitive about this.
> I do think thought that the way Forrest and Branch frame my appointment
>that it appears that we were part of some internal Baylor scheme to win
>the place over for ID.  As I noted in my letter, I applied to Baylor
>without knowing anyone there (except Dembski, and that was of no help,
>as you would probably guess given the Polanyi controversy).  For the
>record, the Dawsons did not technically object to my views on church and
>state, but rather, my work on ID and the law as well as my fellow status
>with Discovery.  My views on church and state were never inquired about.
>In fact, my views are fairly mainstream, and will be published in a
>couple of weeks in the next issue of Chapman Law Review, in an essay,
>"Gimme That Ole Time Separation: A Review Essay of Phillip
>Hamburger's Separation of Church and State."   My views on ID are
>spelled out in my letter.  (BTW, I was recently interviewed by the Ft.
>Worth
> Star-Telegram about "Justice Sunday II." It will surprise many of you
>to know that even though I am a supporter of Judge Roberts, I came out
>against the event on theological grounds, that such events held in the
>pulpits of churches many corrupt the integrity of churches, which is not
>to say that individual church-goers or groups of them may not publicly
>support the President. My problem is with the use of the church and its
>pastoral authority to do this.  My comments were published last week in
>the Star-Telegram.)
>
>I never even knew about the "Wedge strategy" until I received a personal
>letter by a member of the Dawson family in which she mentioned it
>(August 2003).  Having said that, in principle I see nothing wrong with
>helping to fund scholars who offer critiques of philosophical
>materialism (which is part of the Wedge document), since I believe that
>there are some very good arguments against it and these scholars need
>the help. I do not read it as some sort of blueprint for the institution
>of "theocracy," as Forrest and Gross seem to suggest in their book. I
>read it as a noble attempt to provide support for scholarship that
>offers arguments for an understanding of human beings, culture, and law
>that better grounds our fundamental rights than materialism.  To put it
>another way, it is an attempt to defend in a sophisticated fashion the
>view of liberal democracy, religious liberty, subsidiary institutions,
>and natural rights offered by thinkers such as John Paul II.  
>
>That's all I'm going to say on this. It's too painful to write about a
>time in my life that I would like to leave in the past.
>
>Take care,
>Frank
>
>
>
>
>
>On 8/18/05 11:28 PM, "Ed Brayton" <stcynic at crystalauto.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>Francis Beckwith wrote: 
>Mark:
>
>Having been the victim of such retaliation here at Baylor, I am
>skeptical of Ed's response (though I like Ed personally, and carr no ill
>will toward him).  Some of these people will stop at nothing to destroy
>anyone who even entertains the possibility that ID advocates are raising
>important questions that may have a place in public discourse including
>classrooms (such as in my case).   
>
>Below is my letter that was published in the most recent issue of
>Academe, in reply to a misleading hit-piece penned by Barbara Forrest
>and Glenn Branch, two people who never even bothered to contact me
>before they wrote their piece. Yet, they claim to know intimate details
>of what occurred here at Baylor as well as the content of my writings.  
>
>First, I want to thank Frank for sending me a link to the actual article
>written by Branch and Forrest, which can be found here
><http://www.aaup.org/publications/Academe/2005/05jf/05jfforr.htm> . But
>I also have to say that, given his description of the article as a
>"misleading hit piece", I expected much more. In fact, Frank is barely
>mentioned at all. The article is really about the Polanyi Center, an
>issue which has long been out in the open. I don't know if Frank objects
>to their descriptions of what went on in forming, and then disbanding,
>the Polanyi Center, but if he does he has not said so. After describing
>the events that led up to the founding of that center and the outraged
>reaction from the faculty and many Baylor alumni, Gross and Forrest say
>this about Frank:
>
>"Baylor also hired two additional members of the Wedge, mechanical
>engineering professor Walter Bradley and philosopher Francis J.
>Beckwith. 
>
>Shortly after his appointment as associate director of the J. M. Dawson
>Institute of Church-State Studies at Baylor, Beckwith was involved in a
>controversy of his own, when twenty-nine members of the Dawson family
>complained that Beckwith's views on church-state separation rendered him
>inappropriate for the post. Particularly troublesome to them was his
>affiliation with the Discovery Institute, the institutional home of
>intelligent design, which they described as promoting "the latest
>version of creationist theory."
>That's the full text with regard to Frank, and near as I can tell there
>is nothing false in it at all. I suppose he might object to being
>characterized as a member of The Wedge, but given that he is listed as a
>Fellow of the Center for Science and Culture at the Discovery Institute,
>the braintrust behind the Wedge strategy, this is not an unreasonable
>assumption. It's possible, of course, that Frank is not an ID advocate
>but merely advocates that ID may constitutionally be taught in schools,
>but given his fellowship with the most prominent ID think tank, I don't
>think it's unreasonable for people to group him in with them (at least
>in some ways; I would not aim the same charges of dishonesty at Frank
>that I do at some of the other DI fellows, particularly John West and
>Jonathan Wells). I suppose also that Frank might be irritated at the
>mention of the controversy at Baylor when the Dawson family complained,
>but nothing said in regard to that was false and given that the arti!
> cle is
> about the controversy at Baylor becoming home to so many ID advocates,
>it's certainly germane to the story. I don't think there is anything in
>that passage about him that justifies saying that Branch and Forrest
>"claim to know intimate details of" the events surrounding his hiring.
>They simply say list him as someone with ties to ID that was also hired.
>There is no detail claimed or given, as opposed to the much greater
>detail they put into the hiring of William Dembski and the resulting
>controversy. The comments about autocratic hiring were in relation to
>Dembski, not Frank. So while I can understand why Frank would be mildly
>annoyed by the article, I don't think it's reasonable to call it a "hit
>piece" written by people who will "stop at nothing to destroy anyone"
>who advocates ID. Nowhere do they advocate that Frank's job be in any
>jeopardy at all, they only mention that the Dawson family wanted that at
>one point (and I personally think they were wrong to do so). And wit!
> h all due
> respect to Frank, who I really do like and respect very much, I think
>this is part of the reason why I tend not to take such claims of
>persecution all that seriously. When you examine what really happened,
>you often find that the claims don't really stand up to scrutiny and
>what was said was far more mild. To turn the above into an attempt to
>"destroy anyone" who advocates ID is to engage in extreme hyperbole, I
>think.
>
>Ed Brayton
>
>
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>Rick Duncan 
>Welpton Professor of Law 
>University of Nebraska College of Law 
>Lincoln, NE 68583-0902
>
>"When the Round Table is broken every man must follow either Galahad or
>Mordred: middle things are gone." C.S.Lewis, Grand Miracle
>
>"I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed, or
>numbered."  --The Prisoner
>		
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--
Francis J. Beckwith, MJS, PhD
Associate Professor of Church-State Studies
Associate Director, J. M. Dawson Institute for 
     Church-State Studies, Baylor University
<Francis_Beckwith at baylor.edu>
<http://francisbeckwith.com>