Congressional Investigation Confirms Discrimination against Smithsonian Scientist Critical of Darwinian Evolution
Conservative_X
persecuting creationists! I hope this helps open your guys eyes.
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Congressional Investigation Confirms Discrimination against Smithsonian
Scientist Critical of Darwinian Evolution
By: Staff
Discovery Institute
December 18, 2006
SEATTLE-The demotion of a well-published evolutionary biologist
critical of Darwinian evolution has been found to be religiously and
politically motivated, according to a new government report.
The U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Government Reform
released a staff report titled, "Intolerance and the Politicization
of Science at the Smithsonian: Smithsonian's Top Officials Permit the
Demotion and Harassment of Scientist Skeptical of Darwinian
Evolution." The report details the persecution of Dr. Richard
Sternberg, whose civil and constitutional rights were violated by
Smithsonian officials when he published a peer-reviewed article by Dr.
Stephen Meyer criticizing Darwinian evolution and supporting
intelligent design.
"After two years of denials and stonewalling by Smithsonian
bureaucrats, a congressional investigation now confirms a campaign of
harassment and smears against evolutionary biologist Richard Sternberg,
whose only 'crime' was his honest skepticism of Darwinian dogma,"
said John West, vice president of public policy and legal affairs at
the Center for Science & Culture. "It's outrageous that the federal
government would sanction such blatant discrimination. This is clearly
an infringement of Dr. Sternberg's free speech rights."
According to the report, Sternberg said, "[I]t is clear that I was
targeted for retaliation and harassment explicitly because ... I
allowed a scientific article to be published critical of neo-Darwinism,
and that was considered an unpardonable heresy." The staff
investigation validates this claim and documents the evidence in
detail.
Findings of the investigation include:
* Officials at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural
History "explicitly acknowledged in emails their intent to pressure
Sternberg to resign because of his role in the publication of the Meyer
paper and his views on evolution." They wanted "to make Dr.
Sternberg's life at the Museum as difficult as possible and encourage
him to leave."
* "NMNH officials conspired with a special interest group to
publicly smear Dr. Sternberg; the group was also enlisted to monitor
Sternberg's outside activities in order to find a way to dismiss
him."
* "The hostility toward Dr. Sternberg at the NMNH was reinforced
by anti-religious and political motivations." NMNH scientists
demanded to know whether Sternberg "was religious," "was a
Republican," "was a fundamentalist," and whether "he was a
conservative."
The investigation concludes, "This is discrimination, plain and
simple. The abject failure of the Secretary and Deputy Secretary to
protect the basic rights of Dr. Sternberg to a civil work environment
is indefensible."
"Given the attitudes expressed in these emails, scientists who are
known to be skeptical of Darwinian theory, whatever their
qualifications or research record, cannot expect to receive equal
treatment or consideration by NMNH officials."
Fight the evilutionists!
Psycho Dave
information.
The U.S. Office of Special Counsel had dropped Richard von
Sternberg's religious discrimination complaint against the
Smithsonian Institution. The short version is that Sternberg, as an
unpaid research associate at the Smithsonian, is not actually an
employee, and thus the OSC has no jurisdiction.
However, as documented in an article from The Panda's Thumb, the case
made by the discovery Institute was riddled with false assertions and
misinformation, and was nothing more than a political football.
Key facts are:
(1) Sternberg was not an employee of the Smithsonian. he was an unpaid
research associate, and never had a paying position with the
Smithsonian.
(2) He was never threatened with being fired, and in fact, the
Smithsonian staff recommended that he not be fired at all.
(3) According to John Coddington, the person who sponsored Sternberg at
the Smithsonian, "At no time did anyone deny him space, keys or
access."
(4) Coddington also wrote "As for prejudice on the basis of beliefs or
opinions, I repeatedly and consistently emphasized to staff (and to Dr.
von Sternberg personally), verbally or in writing, that private beliefs
and/or controversial editorial decisions were irrelevant in the
workplace, that we would continue to provide full Research Associate
benefits to Dr. von Sternberg, that he was an established and respected
scientist, and that he would at all times be treated as such.
On behalf of all National Museum of Natural History staff, I would like
to assert that we hold the freedoms of religion and belief as dearly as
any one. The right to heterodox opinion is particularly important to
scientists. Why Dr. von Sternberg chose to represent his interactions
with me as he did is mystifying. I can't speak to his interactions
with anyone else."
(5) Stephen C. Meyer, the author of the paper that Sternberg caused
controversy with, even said that Sternberg went outside the usual
review procedures, and even he objected to how Sternberg got the
article published. This is the very guy who wrote the paper that got
Sternberg in trouble!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Sternberg
The Discovery Institute (DI) is a conservative think tank based in
Seattle, Washington. It is the organization behind many of the recent
attempts to include "intelligent design" or the "evidence" against
evolution in science instruction. The Center for Science and Culture is
the part of the DI that attacks evolutionary biology and the use of
naturalism in science. The exact positions of its fellows vary from
young-earthers to those who accept common descent with God taking a
very active role in guiding evolution. Most fellows appear to deny
common descent.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discovery_Institute#Controversy
The Discovery Institute is essentially a lie factory, pumping out
misinformation in an attempt to get people to latch onto creationism.
Many of the "300 scientists" they count as members are people who got
their degrees from Christian diploma mills, and who have never actually
worked in the field as actual scientists in any capacity.
Steve Benen, of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, in
May 2002, wrote "Though the Discovery Institute describes itself as a
think tank 'specializing in national and international affairs,' the
group's real purpose is to undercut church-state separation and turn
public schools into religious indoctrination centers."
The institute is promoting a Christian agenda, observers of the
institute also point to the fact that the Discovery Institute is
largely comprised of outspoken Christian members, who are promoting an
explicitly Christian agenda, funded largely by conservative Christians,
catering to an almost exclusively Christian constituency.
The Templeton Foundation, who provided grants for conferences and
courses to debate intelligent design, later asked intelligent design
proponents to submit proposals for actual research, "They never came
in," said Charles L. Harper Jr., senior vice president at the Templeton
Foundation, who said that while he was skeptical from the beginning,
other foundation officials were initially intrigued and later grew
disillusioned. "From the point of view of rigor and intellectual
seriousness, the intelligent design people don't come out very well in
our world of scientific review," he said.
The Templeton Foundation has since rejected the Discovery Institute's
entreaties for more funding, Harper states. "They're political - that
for us is problematic," and that while Discovery has "always claimed to
be focused on the science," "what I see is much more focused on public
policy, on public persuasion, on educational advocacy and so forth."
atma...@yahoo.com
quite discredited now.
Freedom of religion gives one nothing when it comes to peer review
science.
The Discovery Institute is nothing more than the front for creationist
prpaganda.