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GOP State School Board Member Acknowledges That Intelligent Design Can Include Aliens

GOP STATE SCHOOL BOARD MEMBER
ACKNOWLEDGES THAT INTELLIGENT DESIGN STANDARD CAN INCLUDE ALIENS FROM SPACE?

COLUMBUS – GOP Ohio State School Board Member Deborah Owens Fink told the Columbus Dispatch this week that a teacher could teach information from a group believing that under Ohio’s intelligent design standards, a 4-foot tall space alien with long dark hair and olive skin and almond shaped eyes brought DNA from another planet to start life as we know it.

In an article comparing the recent Kansas intelligent design standards to Ohio’s standards which are similar, Owens Fink was asked about the group known as the Raelians who believe extraterrestrial beings created life and therefore are supporters of intelligent design standards in the classroom.

According to the Dispatch, Owens Fink acknowledged that the Ohio standards could be opened up to more than the intelligent design standards under the state education policy. When asked about the Raelians the Dispatch quoted her as saying: “A lot of students would be really engaged. [See full article in context below.]

“Ohioans have to ask themselves, whether she was serious or tongue-in-cheek and whether GOP leadership has lost its grip. We are putting teachers and scientists in the position of having to acknowledge unproven things like aliens in space in our children's classrooms,” said Brian Rothenberg, Communication Director of the Ohio Democratic Party. “We need the GOP to come back to earth when it comes to education policy. The only thing alien is that extreme GOP policies are starting to border on the absurd.”

According to State Auditor Betty Montgomery’s web site Ms. Fink is the Summit County Campaign Chair for Ms. Montgomery’s campaign for Governor.

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[NOTE TO ODP E-LIST: THIS IS A REAL ARTICLE BELOW FROM TODAY’S COLUMBUS DISPATCH!]

The Columbus Dispatch

INTELLIGENT DESIGN

Like Ohio, Kansas redefined ‘science’

Thursday, November 17, 2005

Mike Lafferty

The Kansas school board, in approving standards last week that cast doubt on evolution, might have helped boost an entirely new area of science, a move Ohio started last year.

Under the new Kansas standards, high-school students must understand major evolutionary concepts. But, in what is viewed as a victory for proponents of the theory of intelligent design, the Kansas board also challenged widely accepted science that all life has a common origin and that natural chemical processes created the building blocks of life.

The board also went one step further — broadening the definition of science.

Last year, while it was Ohio’s turn in the national spotlight, the State Board of Education did the same thing. "We changed the definition as well — very similarly, quite honestly," said Deborah Owens Fink, a state board member from Richfield.

In Kansas schools, science might no longer be limited to the search for natural explanations of phenomena. New definitions could open new research realms.

"Like witchcraft," said Kent State University anthropologist Owen Lovejoy, who studies the evolution of early humans.

Or voodoo, ESP or the study of ghosts.

But Owens Fink disagrees.

"I think he’s worrying unnecessarily," she said. "We wanted to investigate intelligent design."

In Ohio, the state board adopted for its 10th-grade science-education standards most of a definition recommended by the Ohio Academy of Science. However, the board dropped academy language that scientific explanations must be accepted or rejected on the basis of evidence and not just accepted on faith.

"The people of Kansas pretty much invoked and copied the Ohio definition of science," said Jack Krebs, a Kansas high-school math teacher from Oskaloosa who helped write the standards.

Krebs, who opposed the board’s standards on evolution, said proponents of the new wording specifically wanted to include the possibility of "supernatural causation" in science.

Intelligent design holds that life is too complex to have developed on its own and that life was fashioned by a force or omnipotent designer. Scientists say there is no way to test that idea.

Owens Fink acknowledged that the Ohio standards could open up discussions in science classes beyond those for intelligent design, which, like the idea of biblical creationism, is promoted by fundamentalist Christians.

It fits the belief held by some that extraterrestrial scientists brought DNA from another planet to get the ball of life rolling. That’s the belief of a quasireligious group known as the Raelians, who have become boosters of intelligent design.

The organization dates from 1973 when its founder, a French journalist named Rael, said he was visited by a 4-foot-tall man from space with long dark hair, olive skin and almond-shaped eyes. The Raelian Web site says the visitor told Rael to establish an embassy to receive the creators who are going to come to Earth.

Discussing that idea in class should be interesting, Owens Fink said. "A lot of students would be very engaged."

It might be a fun debate, scientists say, but believing in 4-foot-tall creators is not science.

"If the language doesn’t stay universal, science can mean anything you want it to mean," said Ohio Dominican University political scientist Ron Carstens.

Modern biology is built on a foundation derived from Charles Darwin’s 19th-century theory that generations of organisms adapt slowly to be better suited to their surroundings. Without evolution, Lovejoy said, scientists could not understand how influenza and other disease organisms change.

Owens Fink, a strong supporter of intelligent design, refused to say whether she accepts evolution. Her personal belief is not relevant, she said.