Friday, July 21, 2006
Keith Miller Responds to Calvert Smear Campaign
Keith Miller, an evangelical Christian, a research assistant professor in the Geology Dept. at Kansas State University, and a board member of Kansas Citizens for Science, has written a response to John Calvert's misrepresentation of KCFS. Here's an excerpt:
John Calvert of the Intelligent Design Network charges that during the science hearings in May 2005, “KCFS was the primary tool of the opposition and has been used and supported by national organizations to promote a materialist world view that seeks to demean the idea of creation. This effectively promotes non-theistic religions and worldviews over traditional theistic views and causes governmental institutions that employ the strategy to engage in religious discrimination.”
Such a portrayal of KCFS is both false and a personal insult. I am a current and founding Board member of KCFS. I am also an evangelical Christian, a fellow of the American Scientific Affiliation (an association of Christians in the sciences) and an officer in the Affiliation of Christian Geologists. I believe that God is always creatively active in the natural world and that the very existence of physical reality is dependent on God's continual creative action.
There are also several other Christians on the Board, as well as members with other religious views. Calvert knows this and yet persists in portraying KCFS as advocating a materialist worldview and denigrating faith.
The efforts of KCFS have been to oppose the false portrayal of science and evolutionary theory as atheistic, and to combat the utterly false popular “warfare” view of science and faith.
It is Calvert and the Intelligent Design (ID) proponents, not KCFS or the Kansas scientific or educational communities, that are responsible for promoting and legitimizing an atheistic view of science.
John Calvert of the Intelligent Design Network charges that during the science hearings in May 2005, “KCFS was the primary tool of the opposition and has been used and supported by national organizations to promote a materialist world view that seeks to demean the idea of creation. This effectively promotes non-theistic religions and worldviews over traditional theistic views and causes governmental institutions that employ the strategy to engage in religious discrimination.”
Such a portrayal of KCFS is both false and a personal insult. I am a current and founding Board member of KCFS. I am also an evangelical Christian, a fellow of the American Scientific Affiliation (an association of Christians in the sciences) and an officer in the Affiliation of Christian Geologists. I believe that God is always creatively active in the natural world and that the very existence of physical reality is dependent on God's continual creative action.
There are also several other Christians on the Board, as well as members with other religious views. Calvert knows this and yet persists in portraying KCFS as advocating a materialist worldview and denigrating faith.
The efforts of KCFS have been to oppose the false portrayal of science and evolutionary theory as atheistic, and to combat the utterly false popular “warfare” view of science and faith.
It is Calvert and the Intelligent Design (ID) proponents, not KCFS or the Kansas scientific or educational communities, that are responsible for promoting and legitimizing an atheistic view of science.
