"In God We Trust" Despite the "Wall-of-Separation Between Church and State" by Juan Bernal, Ph.D.
Quote of the Month
"Design in Nature: Again?" by Paul Ricci
"Car Makes the Man" Contributed by Pat Bryant
"Some Speculation on School Vouchers" by Dave Silva
"Why Dogs Can't Use Computers" Humor

Take out a coin or some paper currency and you can read a government sponsored motto declaring "In God We Trust." Our Declaration of Independence invokes a deity "..all men endowed by their creator..", as does our Pledge of Allegiance "....one nation under God..." One of our favorite patriotic songs is entitled "God Bless America." Obviously, our popular culture is a theistic one, insofar as belief in a deity and affirmation of the existence of God is the expected outlook, and more importantly an outlook apparently endorsed by our federal and state governments.

On the other hand, our tradition is also one that has looked with suspicion on governmental and religious entanglements. Thomas Jefferson observed in his "Notes on the State of Virginia" that, just as government cannot establish truth in physics, it cannot establish truth in religion, Truth can stand by itself." This expresses nicely an idea that may have guided Jefferson as he and James Madison worked to establish a Constitutional wall-of-separation between Church and State. But today the questions can still be raised: What exactly is this Constitutional separation between Church and State? Is the principle of separation consistent with official endorsement of belief in a deity?

Article I of the Amendments to the U.S. Constitution states that:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof

Obviously this calls for interpretation, but generally we take the "establishment" clause to mean that government cannot establish an official state religion and also cannot promote or favor any specific religion over other forms of worship. The strict "wall-of-separation" interpretation of the Establishment clause goes even further to declare that it is unconstitutional for government to support any form of religious activity or religious doctrine. Government should not be in the business of promoting religious doctrine in any form whatsoever. Some would apply this prohibition to religious belief in a deity.

But it is undeniable that our historical and current tradition is one that observes faith in a Supreme Being. Our governments, both federal and state, have never shied away from promoting and encouraging belief in a deity. Many court decisions regarding the "Establishment" clause of the first Amendment have presumed that governmental neutrality on religious doctrine does not entail neutrality on the question of a deity, as Supreme Court Justice Douglas noted in a 1950's court decision:

The First Amendment.., does not say that in every and all respects there shall be a separation of Church and State... We are a religious people whose institutions presuppose a Supreme Being.

There is a historical tension between our "religious" tradition and our enlightened, secular outlook, which continues today. Legislative policies and Supreme court decisions dealing with the relationship between Church and State reflect this tension. Sometimes those policies and decisions express the traditional theistic beliefs and sometimes they reflect the historical goal of keeping government neutral on questions of religious doctrine and faith.

At the next general meeting of the HAOC, on Sunday, July 16, I shall read a paper and moderate a discussion of this topic, which should be of interest to secular humanists, whether they are believers, or non-believers in a deity.

BRAITLEBORO, Vt : Mindful of a law banning booze on municipal property, Annette Cappy will stop short of serving champagne. But to the town clerk in this southern Vermont village, opening her office just after midnight this morning - the minute that civil unions between same-sex couples become legal here--seems like the right thing to do.

"This office has been known to stay open for 24 hours on the first day of hunting season," Cappy said. "I figure if we did it for people who want to shoot animals, I can do it for two people in love."

In the May, 2000, HAOC Newsletter, Benito Franqui requested we take seriously the 1996 book by A.A.Wyller, THE CREATING CONSCIOUSNESS: Science as the Language of God. The author challenges the reader to take more seriously the possibility of some type of consciousness guiding the evolutionary process. Now this temptation to do so is nothing new and first emphasized by a number of Greek philosophers, especially Aristotle, in the centuries before the Christian era. One of Aristotle's celebrated four causes included a final or teleological cause which later thinkers were never quite able to forego despite the amazing advancements in science which found such causes unnecessary and obstructive. As science progressed, final causes - various labeled as entelechies, vitalism, or design-- were replaced by naturalistic, mechanistic causes except in the social sciences where this category of thought is useful (but only because humans are purposeful creatures). Unfortunately, it is often found in biology where it inevitably confuses issues.

In 1992, Paul Davies in his excellent book: "THE MIND OF GOD," was one of those who succumbed to the temptation to view the world as in some sense created by design though he never specifies just what kind of designer he would favor except to suggest it wasn't God as traditionally understood nor was the designer necessarily supernatural. He even goes so far as to say we may yet find some evidence for a designer. "It is conceivable that clear evidence for design exists in nature, but that it is hidden in some way from us." He then closes his book with the thought "Through conscious beings, the universe has generated self awareness. This can be no trivial detail, no minor byproduct of mindless, purposeless forces. We are truly meant to be here." And in this last statement, he succumbs - in the words of Paul Kurtz-- to The transcendental temptation of a purposeful universe.

Michael Behe, in 1996, a notable molecular biologist, came out with his infamous, but influential book: DARWIN'S BLACK BOX: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution. He decided that science simply cannot explain, at the molecular level (calling this "irreducible complexity"), certain biochemical reactions (blood clotting), cellular organization (cilia and flagella), and a host of other biochemical phenomena. His criticisms amounted to nothing more than the claim that since he could not explain how the above phenomena came about at the molecular level, so that the phenomena were inexplicable except by a designer. A better example of the fallacy known as "Argument from Ignorance" (I cant explain X and find no evidence for it, therefore, X is impossible) would be hard to find.

Though Behe did admit that evolution did occur, he insisted - as do Davies and Wyller - that ultimately, there had to be a designer somewhere. Wyller's book--though written in the 80's before either Davies' or Behe's books - was not published until 1996, but he is just one of the many to have succumbed to the same transcendental temptation as those who came before him. He insists there is some type of designer to explain those organs or organisms that seem very complex and mystifying. As he nicely explains his position: "...the chance operator is a blindfolded manipulator of a vastly more complex cube than Rubik's and a few hundred million years simply will not suffice for those intracellular glues and reinforcing structures to be reproduced by chance." His calculations to show there was not nearly enough time for life to have evolved here on Earth are reminiscent of those given by Gish, Morris and others and have been repeatedly shown to be in error. Of course, the amino acids needed for life are not just formed by chance out of thin air. They are produced one atop the other; the simpler ones first, and then from these more complex enzymes are formed and useful to the preservation of life at each stage. When one builds a house, the whole structure is not put together at once. Rather, it starts from a foundation and then a framework. The rest is built up atop and around these structures. Furthermore, there are numerous books that have been written regarding self-organization pertinent to evolutionary biology as the author mentions. However, Wyller claims these efforts have a long way to go before they can explain the origin of even a single cell. Perhaps, but these small beginnings (some would think them large!) are far superior to the non-naturalistic explanations of those that have yielded to the temptation of employing a designer. And then there is the question of explanation. How much detail in explaining something is needed before we can say it is a good explanation? Wyller's expectations are too rigid and demanding at this stage of evolutionary explanation. Meteorologists cannot yet explain how many rain drops will fall in a given area on a given day nor can geologists explain how, let's say, Half-Dome in Yosemite was formed in terms of its size, shape and chemical composition though they can be explained in general terms. Nonetheless, we feel no need to employ a designer to explain meteorological or geological events and objects in detail. Why, then, do we need a designer to explain the detailed features of cell organization or change in species?

His second main argument accuses scientists of not having any mathematical foundation for how life came into being and evolved. Nor can evolutions make predictions about what kind of life should come into existence. The author claims, for example, that Darwinian biologists have no hard calculations to prove how many generations would be needed to "...produce the solutions for the conifers' reproductive cycle." But to do that, we would need to know the precise environmental conditions plus the chance way in which the gene structure was modified and then how these changes reacted to the changing environmental conditions, none of which can be reasonably known in detail. But why is this knowledge necessary? As mentioned above, we don't know these details in meteorology nor in geology: Why should we have to know them in biology? General explanations in all these areas are sufficient. Why should the situation for biological explanations be any different?

The author suggests there is a planetary intelligence that guides evolution over the complex aspects of organic history. This intelligence is growing, experimenting, learning and developing. This explains why there are so many different species, so many blunders, so few species still existing today (some 90-95% have become extinct), so many imperfect parts in the life of organisms. This planetary intelligence operates through a vague "consciousness field" somewhat analogous to the already vague notion of the quantum field. From this C.F. is associated an information field which inserts itself into DNA matter to guide evolution. But such an explanation raises more questions than it answers. For example, from where did these fields derive? Do other planetary systems have them also? Perhaps Mars, or one of Jupiter's moons? And what is the purpose or goal of this planetary intelligence? What is its ultimate aim? And how does it enter into DNA without disrupting the normal mechanisms for the operation of DNA? What operative mechanisms are involved in changing the DNA? Does it do all this intervening without violating either entropy or the conservation of mass/energy? And how can such a vague pair of fields be detected if at all?

His objection to evolution seems to be aesthetic: "There is no creativity involved (in evolution) . We just wait and complexity increases. It is far more inspiring and challenging to take a leap of intuition and assert that the ... variables of life forms that we observe in Nature are the result of the creativity of a higher planetary intelligence." Well, it may be more inspiring to him but it flies in the face of what really appears to occur and raises unobservable fields and many questions. Until I have better evidence, I will stick with a naturalistic evolutionary explanation despite its lack of details. Even here, there are some mathematical calculations that do apply to evolutionary change though I suspect Wyller will find some way to excuse these.

A man goes into his shrink's office and says, "Doc, you have got to help me! Every night I keep dreaming that I'm a sports car. The other night I dreamed I was a Trans Am. Another night, I dreamed I was an Alpha Romeo. Last night, I dreamed I was a Porsche. And there's never engines in any of 'em. What does this mean?"

"Relax," says the doctor, "You're just having an auto-body experience."

Our guest speaker, George Woods, admitted to a bias against school vouchers, but contended that even if he didn't work for the California Teachers Association that he would be against vouchers from a standpoint of common sense arguments and a lifetime of experience in education. While many of the arguments on both sides are speculative, the fact that a heavily funded voucher initiative is going to be on the California ballot this November brings real urgency in educating the public.

This initiative would give the parents of each child a $4,000 voucher and would amend the California constitution. It has to amend the constitution because it is clearly unconstitutional in its funding of religious schools with public money. A recent poll shows that in late June 57% of Californians approved of school vouchers. However, at this point the public has heard more pro-voucher rhetoric and isn't familiar with all the arguments. Voucher proponents argue that they give parents more choice, public schools are terrible and should have to compete in the market place with private schools and that poor minority children can escape from their crime ridden, low achieving schools through the magic of vouchers. While not often publicly stated many religious parents simply want to send their kids to religious schools at the tax payers expense. Another argument is why not try it to see if it's better?

Taking these arguments in order:

Yes, vouchers would give parents more choice, but the individual exercise of that choice would have the cumulative effect of decimating the public education system that has made this country a great and democratic society; with no assurance that it would improve the overall quality of education.

Those on the right have been waging a war of propaganda to demonize public education, in order to privatize it and destroy the wall of separation between church and state. By taking the worst examples they can find in public education they hold that up as the norm. Public education needs improvement in some areas; that does not justify destroying it. What happens when voucher schools go out of business as one school in Wisconsin did? Is there any reason to believe voucher schools won't try to give children as cheap an education as possible in order to maximize profits? What qualifications and standards will be required of teachers? Will they hire teachers at minimum wage or close to it? Will voucher schools flood their classrooms with corporate advertising to make a profit?

When have those on the right ever really cared about poor minority kids in the ghetto getting a better education? Is this that "compassionate conservatism" we have heard about? Or, maybe what we have here are a bunch of "bleeding heart conservatives". Remember that a lot of the same people who support vouchers are against any federal funding for education and want to abolish the department of education. Besides, what sort of education can you give a child for $4,000 a year and still make a profit?

If we pass vouchers you will have Southern Baptist schools, Catholic schools, maybe an isolated Jewish or Scientologist school, or schools with some gimmick that are out to make a buck. They won't have to accept any kid with behavioral problems or special educational problems like public schools do. Worst of all for our society we will have children growing up not knowing people who are different from them. That will breed prejudice and intolerance, which our society has just begun to rise above. There will be millions of children, especially in the south, who will be religiously indoctrinated to an extent unknown in the history of this country. Funding religious schools will make society less open and more fractionalized.

Why not just try it? Can the voucher advocates say, "Well, just look at Mexico, or Canada, or Italy and see what a wonderful change vouchers have made in improving their educational system!" They can't say that because all the best educational system around the world are a lot like ours. Once vouchers are voted in religious conservatives will go into denial about the bad consequences they will produce. Politically it will be hard to get rid of them Instead of launching a vast social experiment based on speculation we should take the good system we now have and make it better.