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narrator:dover, pennsylvania. like much of the united states,dover has become a town divided. man:i personally don't believe in darwin's theory of evolution. saying that you don't believein evolution is almost saying, for us,well, we don't believe that the civil war ever tookplace in the united states. narrator:dover is splitbetween those who accept charles darwin'stheory of evolution
and those who reject it; and that rift,between science and scripture, nearly destroyed the community. (church bells ring) signs of trouble first appeared after a dover high schoolstudent painted a mural, showing the evolution of humansfrom apelike ancestors. woman:it was a lovely pieceof artwork, very well done, artistically,
and it did not offend mein any way. narrator:but some in dover were offended by the idea that humans and apesare related, and that mural was removed fromthe classroom and destroyed. flames soon spreadto the local school board. angry that only darwin's theoryof evolution was being taught, the board required studentshear about a controversial idea at odds with darwincalled intelligent design. man:to just talk about darwin
to the exclusionof anything else perpetrates a fraud. narrator:but many say intelligentdesign is the fraud. intelligent designis a science stopper. it makes people stupid. narrator:eleven dover residents sued their school boardto keep intelligent design out of the classroom,and almost overnight, dover was catapultedto the front pages
of the nation's newspapers and the front linesin the war on evolution. woman:trials tear communities apart. they set neighboragainst neighbor. nobody wants to do this;you do it when you have to. narrator:with dover splitdown the middle, a federal court would decideif intelligent design is legitimate science or religion in disguise,
and the verdict would haveconsequences that reach far beyondthe classrooms of dover. it's about religion,politics and power. (church bells ringing) narrator:in october 2004,a war broke out in the small townof dover, pennsylvania. today, the teachersin a rural pennsylvania town became the first in the countryrequired to tell students that evolution isnot the only theory.
narrator:it started when the dover areaschool board passed a policy requiring that its high schoolscience classes include a controversial subjectcalled intelligent design. proponents of intelligent designclaim that many features of livingorganisms are too complex to have evolved entirely throughthe natural process of evolution as charles darwin proposed. instead, they claim some aspectsof those organisms must have been createdfully formed
by a so-calledintelligent designer; and, advocates contend,intelligent design is a bold, new, scientific theory, with the power to overthrowthe theory of evolution. man:it's scientists debating sciencebased on the evidence, not based on any religious textor authority, and it's clearly properlythe subject of a science class. it's, in fact,opening the path of inquiry to new ways of thinkingabout things.
if evolutionby natural selection is a scientific doctrine, then a critiqueof that doctrine is a legitimate partof science as well. narrator:the dover school board demandedthat science teachers read their studentsa one-minute statement, claiming that gaps in the theoryof evolution exist, and putting forward intelligentdesign as an alternative. the statement also directedstudents
to an intelligent designtextbook called of pandas and peoplethat would be made available. but many dover residents and an overwhelming numberof scientists throughout the countrywere outraged. they say intelligent design is nothing but religionin disguise, the latest frontin the war on evolution. the goal of intelligent design
is to try to re-christianizeamerican society. intelligent design is notanywhere a scientific concept. it's not a field of science. it's not being activelyresearched by anyone. it's a violationof everything we mean and everything we understandby science. narrator:the stage was set for a battlethat would pit friend against friendand neighbor against neighbor. it was like we shotsomebody's dog.
i mean, there was a blowuplike you couldn't believe. it was like a civil warwithin the community. there's no question. narrator:before it was over, this battle would land theschool board in federal court. no cameras were allowedin the courtroom, so to bringthis historic showdown between evolution andintelligent design to light, nova has dramatized key scenesfrom court transcripts.
it was a six-week trial in which modern biologywas exhibit a, and hanging in the balance was not just the doverbiology curriculum. the future of science educationin america, the separationof church and state, and the very natureof scientific inquiry were all on trial. in dover, pennsylvania,the debate
over religion and evolutionhas long been personal. we live in a community that has a great manyfundamentalist churches. i've never appreciatedthe fact that my children are being taught to believein evolution as opposed to creationism. in the beginning, god created. to me,that's all i need to know. narrator:located in the southeastern partof the state,
about 20 miles from the capital, it's a quiet, rural place, home to about 20,000 people,more than a dozen churches, and one high school. one of the first people in doverto sense that trouble was brewingwas bertha spahr. she had been teaching scienceat dover high school for almost 40 years. in the spring of 2003,she received
some disturbing news from the school district'sassistant superintendent. spahr:he actually came to my classroomone evening after school and said, bert, i think i needto give you a heads-up. there is a school board member who is talkingabout equal time-- whether it be 50%,but certainly equal time, for creationism, and i thinkyou need to be aware of this. that's when the red flagwent up.
narrator:another science teacher,bryan rehm, heard this, too. rehm:i had actually laughed at him because i thought that wasthe funniest thing i'd heard. i mean, creationismwas ruled out of public educationin science when i was injunior high school. narrator:when bertha spahr askedwhich school board member was interested in creationism being taughtalongside evolution,
she was told it was a localbusinessman named alan bonsell, who had recently joinedthe school board. bonsell:my family and i havebeen very blessed here, and i've had family that lived in the dover areafor a hundred years. so it was somethingto give back, and i thought i could helptry to make dover, you know, the school districta better place. narrator:when bonsell had questionsabout how evolution was taught
at dover high school, bertha spahrand her biology teachers agreed to meet with him. bonsell:i had a meeting with someof the science teachers in the high school,just to see what they taught or didn't teach in the high schoolscience class. and creationism really didn'tcome up at that meeting. it was more how dowe teach evolution,
and he seemedvery satisfied. he was okaywith how we taught, and we thoughteverything was good and we wenton our merry way. if you'll recall, he didenlighten us at that time that he did not--it wasn't his belief that evolution washow things came about. right. that's correct. he felt the earth was
not much more than4,000 years old.right. bonsell:i personally don't believe indarwin's theory of evolution. i'm a creationist;i make no bones about that. (church organ playing) narrator:creationists, like bonsell,reject much of modern science in favor of a literal readingof the bible. they believe the earth is lessthan 10,000 years old and that god createdeverything fully formed, including humans,in just six days.
?jesus... ?21400:09:54,844 --> 00:09:57,246narrator:although most mainstreamreligions made peace with evolution decades ago, many creationistsstill see evolution as incompatiblewith their faith. and both creationismand evolution are no strangers to the court. their legal battles stretch back to the famousscopes monkey trial of 1925. now, as i told you yesterday,darwin's theory tells us
that man evolvedfrom a lower order of animals. narrator:in that case, a high schoolscience teacher in tennessee named john scopes was accusedof violating state law by teaching evolution. i hereby place youunder arrest. narrator:loosely portrayed in theclassic film inherit the wind, the trial turnedinto a courtroom showdown between legendary lawyerclarence darrow... the defense wishes to placedr. keller on the stand,
so that he can explain to the gentlemenof the jury the exact meaningof the theory of evolution. narrator:...and three-timepresidential candidate william jennings bryan. if you had a son, mr.sillers, or a daughter, what would you think ifthat sweet child came home from school and told youthat a godless teacher... objection!
narrator:scopes was found guiltyof teaching evolution and slappedwith a mere $100 fine, but the verdict would havea chilling effect on science educationthroughout the country for the next three decades. scott:after the scopes trial, textbook publishers decidedthat evolution was just too controversial a subject, and so they just quietlyremoved it from the textbooks.
and for most of that time,the textbook was the curriculum, and so, if it wasn't in thetextbook, it didn't get taught. narrator:the chilling effectof the scopes trial did not thaw until the 1960s, but as publishers slippedevolution back into their textbooks, creationists foughtto teach their views in science class as well. over the next 30 years,
the two sides battled it outin court. the fight culminated in 1987when the supreme court decided that teaching creationismin public school science classes violated the separationof church and state mandated by the constitutionin the establishment clause, which prevents the government from promoting or prohibitingany form of religion. to this day, teaching creationismin public school science classes
anywhere in the united states remains a violation ofstudents' constitutional rights. another doverschool board member, bill buckingham,a retired policeman, was appointed by alan bonsell tohead the curriculum committee. it was his job to reviewall requests for new textbooks. the ninth grade biology teachershad asked for a widely-used book co-authored by biologistsken miller and joe levine, but buckingham did not likewhat he saw.
buckingham:in looking at the biology bookthe teachers wanted, i noticed that it was lacedwith darwinism. i think i listed somewherebetween 12 and 15 instances where it talked aboutdarwin's theory of evolution. it wasn't on every pageof the book, but, like,every couple of chapters, there was darwinin your face again, and it was to the exclusionof any other theory. narrator:and at a school board meetingin the summer of 2004,
buckingham made it clear he wasn't comfortableapproving that book. the school board putthe purchase on hold. so what was itabout charles darwin's theory that buckingham objected to? darwin publishedhis theory of evolution in 1859 in a book calledon the origin of species, and it has been sparkingcontroversy ever since. it was the culmination of workdarwin started
more than two decades earlier after sailing around the worldon a ship called the beagle. on that expedition, darwin collected thousandsof plants and animals that were unlike anyhe had ever seen, and when he returned hometo england, he becameparticularly fascinated by the many different birdshe had found on a remote chain of islands
off the coast of south americacalled the galapagos. miller:there was a bird that lookedto him like a warbler and another one that lookedto him like a woodpecker and another one that lookedlike a finch and so forth, and he wasn't surewhat these birds were, but they wereall clearly adapted for very different ways of life. some ate insects. some, for example,picked up small seeds.
some could crush the large seedsof certain plants which were foundon the galapagos. so they haddifferent appearances, different beaks,different styles of life. narrator:when darwin asked for helpidentifying these birds, he was in for a surprise. miller:he was floored,he was stunned to discover that the expert ornithologistsin great britain told him they're all finches.
that's not a woodpecker.it's a finch. that's not a warbler.it's a finch. narrator:but why, in this small chainof islands, had he found finches with suchdifferent characteristics? darwin reasoned that in nature individual organisms competefor limited resources like food. if, for example, a bird is bornwith a slightly larger beak than the other membersof the population, that might give it an advantage
on an island where large seedsare more common. over many generations, birds with large beakswould be more likely to survive and reproduce, handing downthis advantageous beak shape to greater numbers of offspringthan those with smaller beaks. darwin called this processnatural selection, because the forces of nature,such as the environment of an individual islandin the galapagos,
select those organismsbest suited to that environment, and he believed that, over time, this could give riseto new species. miller:what darwin pointed outwas a general principle, which is easily observedin nature: species are not fixed, that with natural selectionpushing or pulling or splitting, species can change over time. narrator:darwin thought all the differentkinds of plants and animals
we see around us today,including humans, could have arisenby this process. he called the gradual evolutionof new species from old descent with modification and he pictured the relatednessof all living things as a great tree of life with each twiga different species ultimately springingfrom a common ancestor. neil shubin:as you follow the family treefarther and farther back,
say from our twig-- which we're just one twigin this vast tree-- what you see aresimilarities with apes, and going further down aresimilarities with other mammals. further down are similaritieswith reptiles. further down are similaritieswith amphibians, fish, all the way down to wormsand jellyfish and so forth. what you see is a continuityof life on the planet. that is, we're not exceptionalin any great degree;
we're just a twigon a giant evolutionary tree that includes everything. narrator:the common ancestryof all forms of life was one of darwin'sgreat insights, but he recognizeddisturbing implications in the idea that humans hadevolved from apelike ancestors. in the eyes of a lot of people,once charles darwin had proposed that natural processescould have produced every species on this planet,including us,
they felt that took godout of the picture. narrator:and about a century and a halflater, many people in dover, like the united statesas a whole, agreed. one more, spider.come on, spider! narrator:to this day, somewhere between a thirdand half the us population does not accept evolution. buckingham:i find it personally offensivebecause i'm a christian. i believe the bibleis the inerrant word of god
and that the book of genesistells it like it is as to how we came into being. uh, god didn't create monkeyand then take man from a monkey. he created man. narrator:in dover, hostilityto the theory of evolution had already erupted in vandalism after a dover high schoolstudent painted a 16-foot mural depicting the evolution ofhumans from apelike ancestors. the mural was on displayin a science classroom
when someone removed itfrom the school and burned it. now, as bill buckinghamcontinued fighting the purchase of the biology bookat school board meetings, the science teachersbegan to suspect that he had been involved. spahr:this idea of man and monkey came into the conversationand i immediately remember saying to him, does this haveanything to do
with that muralthat disappeared? eschbach:and that's when he made the remark that he gleefullywatched it burn. right, sort ofunder his breath, but we heardwhat he said. (chuckles) narrator:though buckingham deniedany involvement in the incident, when he announced he wassearching for a biology book that included evolutionand creationism,
the school board meetingerupted in chaos. typically a school boardmeeting is a very dry thing-- a couple of people show up because they have a certainissue they want discussed-- but these meetings would behundreds of people and it would be hotand people would be upset. (rhythmic clapping) it was a zoo. it was justan absolute madhouse. tammy kitzmiller:ludicrous, bizarre--
there's many adjectivesi could use. they were disrespectfulto the public, disrespectful to the teachers. they didn't wantto listen to anybody. they were juston their own agenda. sometimes, in a democracy and when you have nine differentpersonalities together and you havea controversial issue, in the heat of the moment,somebody might say something
they wished ten minutes from nowthey wouldn't have said. let's bring this meetingback to order. now, like i said before... narrator:the controversy engulfingthe school board caught the attentionof local newspaper reporters, including lauri lebo,who grew up in the area. lebo:from the first time i heard school board memberswere talking about creationism, i thought this could becomea big issue.
i didn't realize how big, but i certainly knewi was intrigued by it. narrator:lebo began reportingon the controversy, but her interest in the issuewas not just professional. it was also personal. (music playing) laurie's fatherhad been the owner of a local radio station,but the oldies format wasn't paying the bills,and the electric company
was about to put him offthe air. (record slows, distorts) the next day,a gentleman came in who belonged to a local church, wanted to lease programmingon the radio station and offered to paya decent sum of money. (choir singing) and overnight,the radio station became a christian radio station.
my father became born again. narrator:in her articles,lebo would write about the 1987 supreme courtruling that would keep buckinghamfrom introducing any creationist textinto biology class. in the meantime,buckingham was in touch with two organizations knownfor questioning darwin. one, a public interestlaw firm in michigan called the thomas morelaw center.
headed by former publicprosecutor richard thompson, famous for his efforts to convict assisted suicideadvocate, jack kevorkian, the firm bills itselfas the sword and shield for people of faith. thompson:bill buckingham contacted meas a private citizen, and also as someonewho was concerned that the biology textbookpresented only one side, and he thought there should be
other alternativetheories involved. and that's when i introduced him to the theoryof intelligent design, and indicated that i thoughtthat that theory could be taught alongsidethe theory of evolution, and pass constitutional muster. i asked, you know,if there were any reference books out there,and they gave me the title of the book,of pandas and people.
narrator:he also found a conservativethink tank in seattle, named the discovery institute, which calls itselfthe nation's leading intelligent design proponent. they sent buckingham a dvd and other materialon intelligent design. in these materials,buckingham found a view that did not seemto conflict with his own. for example,according to the book
of pandas and people,intelligent design means that various forms of lifebegan abruptly through an intelligent agency,with their distinctive features already intact--fish with fins and scales, birds with feathers,beaks and wings, et cetera. and in the dvd he gotfrom the discovery institute, buckingham found more supportfor intelligent design. dvd narrator:150 years ago, charles darwin transformed science with histheory of natural selection.
today, that theory facesa formidable challenge. intelligent designhas sparked both discovery and intense debate overthe origin of life on earth. and for a growing numberof scientists, it represents a paradigm, an idea with the powerto once again redefine the foundationsof scientific thought. narrator:both the dvd and book use the same exampleto illustrate
intelligent design'scentral tenet, explained hereby proponent steve fuller. fuller:one way to get into the conceptof intelligent design is by imagining what itwould be like to run across something like this on a beach. john loves mary. i mean,this is the sort of design that's very unlikely justto have assembled itself just from sand blowing randomly
over even a very longperiod of time. rather, it shows a sign of some sort of intelligencethat's behind it. narrator:and just as those wordson the beach are clearly the productof an intelligent being, the claim is that some aspectsof life itself must be the productof a designer. buckingham:intelligent design,in my way of thinking, states that life is too complex
to happened at random, that there had to be a designer, uh... something to shape howthings went, so to speak. in the book of genesis,the designer would be god. narrator:but in the materialsbuckingham received, god is never mentioned. the designer is calledan intelligent cause or intelligent agent. championed by a law professornamed phillip johnson,
intelligent design beganto emerge in the 1980s. johnson:this whole darwinian story,it seems to me, has been very much oversold. everybody is told thatit's absolutely certain, and certainly true, and becauseit's called science, it has been provedagain and again by absolutely unquestionableprocedures, but this is not true. it's an imaginative storythat has been spun
on the basisof very little evidence. narrator:an emeritus professorat the uc berkeley law school, johnson wrote a book calleddarwin on trial, in which he laid the groundwork for the intelligent designmovement. for years, he's been makingthe claim that evolutionmay produce small-scale changes, like the different finch beaksdarwin observed. but for humans to come aboutrequires the intervention
of some kind of intelligence. johnson:that is the basic intelligentdesign proposition: that the unintelligent causesby themselves can't do the whole job. an intelligent causehad to be involved. narrator:armed with this new informationon intelligent design, bill buckingham returnedto the school board. lebo:he had been toldthat intelligent design was a good compromisebetween his religious beliefs,
is what he told me-- and alanbonsell told me that, too-- um, and what the courtswill allow. they were bothvery clear on that, that this is their compromise. even though they believein creationism, this would... this would sortof bridge the gap for them. narrator:but the science teacherswere not convinced. rehm:the first reading of it, an intelligent agentcreated life.
that's creationism. it's biblicalcreationism, you know? all you have to do istake out intelligent agent and put in god and voil? we have the storyof genesis. so there's no questionin my mind what intelligent design was. narrator:now, buckingham was readyto take a stand. eschbach:he came up with the ultimatumthat the only way
that they would votefor the textbooks was that we adopted the bookof pandas and people, as a sisteror companion textbook. narrator:but when he put itbefore the school board, he came up two votes short. the board chose to purchaseonly the standard biology book co-authored by ken miller. pandas was shelved. that might have beenthe end of the story,
but a few weeks later,60 copies of pandas turned upin bertha spahr's department, a gift to the schoolfrom an anonymous donor. then, without consultingthe teachers, members of buckingham'scurriculum committee drafted the outlinesof what became a bold new policy for the science department. it was brought before the fullschool board for a vote, and after a heated debate,it passed 6-3.
in its final form,the policy mandated that all studentsin ninth grade biology be read a one-minute statement telling them that darwin'stheory is not a fact, and that it contains gaps. suggesting intelligent designas an alternative, it directed studentsto the 60 copies of pandas that would beavailable as a reference. the school board memberswho voted
against buckingham's proposalresigned in protest. tammy kitzmiller is the motherof a ninth grade student who would be read the one-minutestatement at dover high school. she called the acluto see what could be done. i just didn't agreewith what they were doing. i did not likehow they were trying to mix religion and science. we had parents;we had students; we had teachers,all calling us and saying,
hey, there's a problem here.can you help us? we said, sure, we'll help you. narrator:on december 14, 2004, 11 parents of dover students,including tammy kitzmiller and bryan and christy rehm,filed a lawsuit in federal courtin pennsylvania, alleging the dover school boardwas violating their constitutional rights by introducing religioninto science class.
they would be representedby the aclu, which had joined forceswith the organization americans united for separationof church and state and philadelphia law firmpepper hamilton. attorney:eric said at the time, this is the casei've been waiting for my entire career. narrator:the school boardwould be represented by the thomas more law center,
the firm that had toldbill buckingham about the pandas book. a court date was set, and as depositionswere being taken, the science teacherstook a stand of their own against reading theintelligent design statement. we stepped up and said,we're not going to read it. we met togetherand agreed that as a unit, we would stand together.
i mean, i have principlesand standards of my own, and there was no waythat i was going to go into a science classroomof mine and make a statement about thisso-called intelligent design, knowing full wellthat it was not science. narrator:they notified the boardof their refusal in a memo that proclaimed intelligent designis not science. intelligent designis not biology.
intelligent design is notan accepted scientific theory. with the teachersrefusing to read the one-minute statement, dover's assistant superintendent walked into ninth gradebiology class on january 18, 2005, and read: the pennsylvaniaacademic standards requires students to learn about darwin's theoryof evolution,
and eventually to takea standardized test of which evolution is a part. because darwin's theoryis a 'theory,' it continues to be testedas new evidence is discovered. the theory is not a fact. gaps in the theory existfor which there is no evidence. narrator:on september 26, 2005,almost exactly a year after the school board passedthe intelligent design policy, six weeks of testimony
in the case of kitzmiller versusdover area school district got underway in federal courtin harrisburg, pennsylvania. good morning to all of you. are you prepared to open? yes, i am. you may do so. my co-counsel and i represent 11 parents who are challengingthe dover area district
school board's changeto its biology curriculum. dover school board membersannounced their interest in the topic of evolutionin starkly religious terms. they looked for a book that could provide a religiousalternative to evolution, and they found one herein of pandas and people. they did everythingyou would do if you wanted to incorporatea religious topic
in a science class,and cared nothing about its scientific validity. patrick gillen, your honor, on behalf of the defendantsin this action, the dover area school districtand its board of directors. the board believes that intelligent designwas not creationism. they knew what that was,the book of genesis. they believed it wasa legitimate educational goal
to make the students aware of the existenceof another scientific theory. defendants' expertswill show this court that intelligent designtheory is science. it is not religion. this expert testimonywill also demonstrate that making students awareof gaps and problems in evolutionary theoryis good science education. it's good liberal education.
narrator:by the time the trial started, challenges to the teachingof evolution had cropped up in dozens of other states, and intelligent design wasattracting some heavy hitters. rick santorum,then pennsylvania senator, had commendedthe school district for its intelligent designpolicy, and president bushhad thrown his support behind intelligent design,
saying both sides oughtto be properly taught so people can understandwhat the debate is about. now, the eyes of the nationwere on dover, the latest battlegroundin the war on evolution. walczak:i don't want to soundmelodramatic, but i actually think veryimportant things were at stake. one is the future of scienceeducation in this country. if a school boardcould do this, what wouldprevent them
from doing morethings like this in other classes? presenting pseudo scienceor pseudo math or pseudo historyin promotion of one particularreligious view. it's wrong. does science educationhave to be so narrow, so technical, so deferentialto the existing paradigm that we can't even introducestudents
to what may bethe next great theory. narrator:presiding over the case would bejudge john e. jones iii. jones:i could never have imaginedin august of 2002, when i took my seat,that i would be presiding over a case that would attractliterally worldwide attention. narrator:jones had been recommendedfor his position on the bench by senator santorum, and appointed by george w. bush.
before becoming a judge, jones was head of pennsylvania'sliquor control board, where he banned the saleof bad frog beer because it showed a cartoon frogmaking an offensive gesture. eric rothschild:initially, you find outyou've got a judge that's been appointed by president bush,who has come out himself in favor of intelligent design. that makes you a little nervous.
narrator:members of the defense, however, were optimistic about theirchances in jones' courtroom. fuller:what the dover school boardhad done, they weren't requiring thatintelligent design be taught, and they weren't removingevolution from the classroom. so it seemed to methis was pretty modest, and so i did thinkit had a pretty good chance if it was presented properly,of... of being accepted. we didn't have to showthat, you know,
one theory was betterthan the other, merely that it wasa credible theory, and that the studentswould gain something by understandingthe controversy surrounding the theory of evolutionand the origin of species. narrator:the parents who opposedintelligent design, or plaintiffs,had launched the lawsuit, so the burden of proofwas on them, and becausethe parents were asking
for the teaching ofintelligent design to be halted, an orderthat only a judge can render, there would be no jury. instead, the jury box was packed with reporters and writersfrom around the globe, including one with a surprisingconnection to the case. matthew chapman:i think of myself as being a sort of living disproofof evolution, because my great-great-grandfather was charles darwin.
it was obviously, you know,one of the great, one of the most important booksof the last 2,000 years. and i'm a screenwriter. this is not evolution, you know,in the right direction. narrator:to win, the plaintiff's lawyerswould have to show the judge that the dover school board'sone-minute statement promoted religion or that board membershad religious motivation.
in addition,both sides asked the judge to ruleon a fundamental question: is intelligent design scienceor not? walczak:in order to show that intelligent designis not science, we had to talk about, well,what is science? narrator:for help, the plaintiffs turnedto researcher nick matzke and his colleaguesat an organization
called the national centerfor science education, which tracks challengesto evolution in public schools. matzke:the last time any lawyer took biologywas probably in ninth grade, and i spent monthsand months on email, at meetings explaining science, explaining evolutionto the lawyers. narrator:to make their casebefore a judge who had no particularscientific training,
the lawyers for the parents assembled a teamof expert witnesses. and as their first witness, they called biologistken miller, co-author of the textbook that bill buckingham had calledlaced with darwinism. attorney:dr. miller, what is evolution? most biologistswould describe evolution as the processof change over time
that characterizesthe natural history of lifeon this planet. and what was darwin'scontribution to evolution? darwin pointed out that there'sa struggle for existence, whether we liketo admit it or not. he realized that those organisms that had the characteristicsthat suited them best in that struggle, those were the onesthat would hand
those characteristics downto the next generation, and that therefore the averagecharacteristics of a population could change in one directionor another, and they could changequite dramatically, and that's the essential ideaof natural selection. narrator:starting with ken miller, the plaintiffs walkedjudge jones through the conflictat the heart of this case. miller testified
how darwin's theory picturesthe history of life as a tree, species graduallyevolving into others over millions of years, producing new branchesand twigs, a process that gives riseto all the variety of life from bacteriato darwin's finches to ourselves. but intelligent designtakes a different view, as the movement'sown literature shows.
intelligent design teachesa history of life in which organisms appearabruptly, are unrelated, and linkedonly by their designer. matzke:what's really being advocated is the idea that organismspoofed into existence through the miraculous actof an intelligent designer, i.e., god. um, that's the view thatintelligent design promotes. narrator:so how can scientists be so sure
darwin's treeaccurately represents the history of life on earth? as it turned out, the latestin a large body of evidence to refute intelligent design and support evolutionwas coming to light just as this case was unfolding. shubin:i remember thinking to myselfwhen all this was going on, wait until they geta load of this because it's just so beautiful.
narrator:darwin believed that evidencefor his idea of common ancestry would be unearthed in the formof transitional fossils. for example, if over millions of years,fish gave rise to land animals, as evolutionary theory predicts, we should find fossilsof extinct creatures that are part fishand part land animal. in 1999, paleontologistneil shubin and his colleagues set out to findjust such a creature.
what evolution enables us to dois to make specific predictions about what we should findin the fossil record. the prediction in this caseis clear-cut. that is, if we go to rocksof the right age and the rocks of the right type, we should find transitionsbetween two great forms of life, between fish and amphibian. narrator:many scientists thinklife began in the water, at least three and a halfbillion years ago.
more recently,about 375 million years ago, the tree of life branched as primitive fish evolvedinto amphibians, such as today's frogsand salamanders, which live part of their liveson land. armed with this prediction, shubin and his colleaguesorganized an expedition to one of the most desolateplaces on earth, the canadian arctic,
about 500 milesfrom the north pole, where rocks of justthe right age are exposed. here they hope to fill a gap in the branchof the evolutionary tree that leads from primitive fish to animals with four limbs,or tetrapods, by finding a fossil of an animal that shared characteristicsof both. but after three summersof digging through hundreds
of tons of rockin this harsh environment, they had found littleof interest. they returned the next yearfor one last try. shubin:money was running out.this was it. we were toldthis was our last year up there. and then in 2004,in the third day of the season, a colleague of mine was removing rockand discovered a little snout sticking out the sideof the cliff,
just like, exactly like this. and he removed more rockand more rock and more rock, and it became clear this was the snoutof a flat-headed animal. and that's when we knew-- flat-headed animal,375 million years old. this is goingto be something interesting. narrator:they called it tiktaalik, which means largefreshwater fish
in the languageof the local inuit people. and it's one of the most vividtransitional fossils ever discovered, showing how land animals evolvedfrom primitive fish. over here you have a fishof about 380 million years old. and we see,just like any good fish, it has scaleson its back and fins. you compare thatto an amphibian, you find a creaturethat doesn't have scales,
and it's modified the finsto become limbs-- arms and legs--and the head's very different. it has a flat headwith eyes on top and a neck. what we see when we lookat the fossil record, at rocks of just the right age,is a creature like tiktaalik. just like a fish, it has scaleson its back and fins. you can seethe fin webbing here. yet when you look at the head, you see somethingvery different.
you see a veryamphibian-like thing with a flat headwith eyes on top. it gets even betterwhen we take the fin apart, and when we look inside the fin,as in this cast here, what you'll see is bonesthat compare to our shoulder, elbow, even parts of a wrist,bone for bone. so, you have a fishat just the right time in the history of life
that has characteristicsof amphibians and primitive fish. it's a mix. narrator:and just as evolutionary theorypredicts, tiktaalik suggestsa tree of life with one species giving riseto another over millions of years. the discovery of tiktaalikwas still being written up at the time of the trial,
so it couldn't be usedas evidence. but shubin's colleague, paleontologist kevin padian,showed the judge examples of other fossilswith transitional features that support darwin'stree of life. my testimony in the trialwas basically taking a day and showing the judgehow we do our work and what the evidence is. narrator:how dinosaurs evolvedinto birds,
as seen in creatureslike archaeopteryx, which has a long tail and teethlike a dinosaur, but feathersjust like a modern bird; how ancestors of modern reptilesevolved into creatures now extinct that share a common ancestorwith mammals; and how, surprisingly,whales evolved from large land animalsthat returned to the water. padian:and where the pandas book sayswe can't go from a to b--
there are no fossils and wedon't know how to study them-- actually, we've gone from a to band to c, d, e, f and g. we have the fossils. we have the transitionalfeatures. we have the waysof analyzing them with many different linesof evidence, and we're lookingfor the picture that accounts for the most linesof objective evidence. narrator:with each fossil,
padian refuted pandas' claim that different life formsappear suddenly by showing how fossilsof extinct organisms bridge the gaps between species, resulting in a pictureof gradual evolution just as darwin proposed. padian:the reportersin the courtroom were just amazed that we knewall this stuff, and how come they hadn't learnedabout this stuff before?
the reason is,it's not in textbooks because the creationists fightso hard to keep it out. that's been a big influence. the court took a break, and i remember the judge sayingsomething like, you know, biology class adjourned,you know, for... for lunch. and he was, you know, smiling,and it was clear that we had the judgeinterested in science. narrator:lawyers for the parents
may have impressedthe judge and reporters, but many in dover wondered,why is evolution taught as factif it's just a theory? bonsell:maybe darwinismis the prevalent theory out there today,but it is a theory. it isn't a law of science. it isn't, you know,a fact, it is a theory. we just wanted alternativeviews, uh, talked about, too. we weren't saying,don't talk about darwin.
talk about darwin. it's a... it's a theory. but that's what it is-- it's not darwin's law,it's not darwin's fact. it's darwin's theory. to say it's just a theoryis really a bit insulting to science because it holds...in science, the theory holds more weightthan just a fact does. and here i think the termtheory needs to be looked at
in a way that scientistsconsider it. a theory is not somethingwe think of in the middle of the nightafter too much coffee and not enough sleep. that's an idea. a theory in science means a large bodyof information that's withstooda lot of testing, probably consists of a numberof different hypotheses
and many differentlines of evidence. gravitation is a theorythat's unlikely to be falsified, even if we sawsomething fall up. it might make us wonder, but we'd try to figure outwhat was happening, rather than immediatelyjust dismiss gravitation. facts are just the minutiaeof science. by themselves, they can beright or wrong. but a theory is somethingthat's been tested and tested
over and over again,built on, revised. it continues to be reworkedand revised. dr. miller, would you agree thatdarwin's theory of evolution is not an absolute truth? oh, i certainly would. for the very simple reasonthat no theory in science, no theory is ever regarded as absolute truth.
we don't regardatomic theory as truth. we don't regard the germ theoryof disease as truth. we don't regard the theoryof friction as truth. we regard all of these theories as well-supported,testable explanations that providenatural explanations for natural phenomena. should we regard darwin's theoryof evolution as tentative? we should regard all scientificexplanations as being tentative,
and that includesthe theory of evolution. science is about discoveringthe unknown, what we don't know. i don't focus on whatwe know, as a scientist. i want to find new things thattell me about what i don't know. narrator:as the plaintiffs testified, that quest to investigate theunknown has led to the discovery of some of the strongestevidence for evolution. darwin was convincedthat species evolve over time through natural selectionacting on inherited traits,
but he had no ideahow those traits arose, or how they were passedfrom generation to generation. when 20th century scientistsdiscovered the role dna plays in heredity, they foundeda new science called genetics that put darwin's theoryto the test. virtually every cellin every living thing contains chromosomes, which are made of densely packedstrands of dna
that function as a blueprint of the individual organism'scharacteristics. during reproduction,chromosomes from each parent replicate and shuffletheir parts to produce new chromosomes. then, each parent passeschromosomes to offspring. but the process is imperfect. along the way, dna is subjectto random mutations, or mistakes,giving each offspring
its own unique blueprint. sometimes, this producescharacteristics in offspring that are benign. other times, it producesharmful characteristics, like a misshapen wing. but occasionally,the process gives rise to a beneficial trait. for example,a butterfly whose coloration mimics another speciesthat tastes bad to birds.
about 100 years after darwinproposed that natural selection acts on new traits appearingin a population, genetics revealedthe biological mechanism that gives rise to those traitsin the first place. and therefore,you could say that when modern geneticscame into being, everything in darwin's theorywas at risk. it could have been overturnedif it turned out that genetics contradictedthe essential elements
of evolutionary theory, but it didn'tcontradict them. it confirmed themin great detail. narrator:and as miller would testify, a genetics paper, published lessthan a year before the trial had confirmed what has long beenthe most inflammatory part of darwin's theory: the commonancestry of humans and apes. that paper explored a curiousdiscrepancy in our chromosomes. the cells of all great apes,
like chimpanzees, gorillasand orangutans, contain 24 pairs of chromosomes. if humans sharea common ancestor with apes, you'd expect usto have the same number, but surprisingly, human cellscontain only 23 pairs. miller:the question is,if evolution is right about this common ancestry idea,where'd the chromosome go? well, evolution makesa testable prediction, and that is that somewherein the human genome
we ought to be able to finda piece of scotch tape holding two chromosomestogether, so that our 24 pairs, two of them were pasted togetherto form just 23. and if we can't find that, then the hypothesisof common ancestry is wrong and evolution is mistaken. narrator:to solve this riddlefor the court, miller would show how scientistsdiscovered traces
of our evolutionary past buried in the very structure of a chromosomecarried by all humans. typically, on the endsof every chromosome you should find specialgenetic markers or sequences of dna called telomeres. and in their middles, you shouldfind different genetic markers called centromeres, but if a mutation occurredin the past,
causing two pairs of chromosomesto fuse, we should find evidencein those genetic markers-- telomeres not only at the endsof the new chromosome, but also at their middles, and not one,but two, centromeres. finding a structure like thisin our chromosomes would explain why humanshave one pair fewer than the great apes. and if we don't find that,then evolution is in trouble.
next slide. lo and behold, the answeris in chromosome #2. all of the marks of the fusionof those chromosomes predicted by common descentin evolution, all those marks are present on human chromosome #2. so the case is closedin a most beautiful way. and that is, the predictionof evolution of common ancestry is fulfilled by that lead pipeevidence that you see here,
in terms of tyingeverything together: that our chromosomeformed by the fusion from our common ancestoris chromosome #2. evolution has madea testable prediction, and it has passed. so, modern geneticsand molecular biology actually supportevolutionary theory? they support it in great detail. and the closer we can getto looking at the details
of the human genome, the more powerfulthat evidence has become. shubin:darwin didn't even knowabout molecular biology and dna. yet that's where someof the most profound evidence is being uncovered today. think about that. that somebody in the 1800smade predictions that are being confirmedin molecular biology labs today. that's a very profound statementof a very successful theory.
not a single observation, not a single experimental resulthas ever emerged in 150 years that contradictsthe general outlines of the theory of evolution. any theory that can stand up to150 years of contentious testing is a pretty darn good theory,and that's what evolution is. narrator:and the deep understandingof evolution, unlocked many of the secretsof life. robert pennock:it's an explanatory framework
within which all the restof biology fits. it's something that we use in practical biologicalapplications: medicine, agriculture, industry. when you're gettinga flu vaccine, that really dependedupon evolutionary knowledge. in many, many specific ways,
evolution makesa practical difference. it's not just something that happened in the past,evolution is happening now. narrator:so, if evolution has stood upto all this scrutiny, what about intelligent design? does it play by the same rules? if you invoke a nonnatural cause,a spirit force or something like thatin your research,
i have no way to test it. so, supernatural causation isnot considered part of science? yeah. i hesitate to beg the patienceof the court with this, but being a boston red sox fan,i can't resist it. one might say, for example, thatthe reason the boston red sox were able to come backfrom three games down agait the new york yankees, was because god was tiredof george steinbrenner,
and wantedthe red sox to win. (laughter) and in my partof the country, you'd be surprisedhow many people think that's a perfectly reasonableexplanation for what happenedlast year. and you know what,it could be true. but it certainlywouldn't be science. it's not scientific,
and it's certainly notsomething we can test. scott:the fundamental problemwith intelligent design is that you can't use itto explain the natural world. it's essentiallya negative argument. it says evolution doesn't work;therefore the designer did it. evolution doesn't work;therefore, we win by default. but when you ask them what does intelligent designtell you about nature? does it tell youwhat the designer did?
does it tell youwhat the designer used to design something with? does it tell youwhat purpose the designer had for designing something? does it tell youwhen the designer did it? why the designer did it? it doesn't tell youanything like that. basically,it's a negative argument, and you can't build a scienceon a negative argument.
narrator:after three weeks of testimonyon the nature of science, the evidence for evolution and the failingsof intelligent design, the plaintiffshad presented their case. to watch the whole thing, you got an educationin what evolution was, where evolution stands as atheory now in the 21st century. if you concentrated, you wouldget sucked into this thing, and the day would go byand you'd come out
and you'd think, that wasamazing what i heard here. and these eloquent people,you know, with these incredible educationsand it was fantastic. lebo:the plaintiffs' attorneyshad put on an amazing case, but there was this idea,especially among those who weren't sittingin the trial every day, that when the defense started,you know, then we'll see some pretty interesting stufftoo on the other side. narrator:the question now wascould the defense prove
that intelligent designis a scientific theory? what evidence could they musterto support this claim? while the battlein federal court heated up, the atmosphere in doverhad gone from divisive to dangerous. tammy kitzmiller,the lead plaintiff in the case, who had a daughter in ninth-grade biology classat dover high school, had been receiving hate mailsince the start of the trial.
kitzmiller:one letter waspretty disturbing. i think this was the onewith the passage that the last sentenceespecially... madeline murraywas found murdered for taking prayer and biblereading out of the schools, so watch out for a bullet. this was the letterthat i made sure my lawyers got a copy ofand it was forwarded to the fbi. anywhere you turned,we were getting attacked.
i mean, the people in thecommunity were attacking us in the newspapers; people in ourown profession were attacking us saying, you know, what are youguys doing in dover? why are you letting thishappen? people in the communitywere calling us atheists, which was a bit offensiveto two of us in the department, because two of us happen to besons and daughters of ministers. i fail to understandhow teachers can call themselves christians,go to church, talk about god,
talk about christ, and then goto school five days a week and talk about darwinand teach it as if it's fact, not a theorybut that's how it happened. i don't understand it. to me that's talking outof both sides of your mouth. narrator:having ignited muchof the controversy that resulted in the lawsuit, bill buckingham had madea surprise announcement. citing poor healthand struggles with oxycontin
as a result of surgery, he resigned from the schoolboard and moved out of state. a school board electionwas only months away, and now eight of the nine seatswould be up for grabs, putting intelligent designon trial in the voting booth as well as the courtroom. dover science teacherbryan rehm, who had already moved onto another school system, had thrown his hat in the ring.
rehm:i couldn't work for a boardthat was going to mandate we teach religious ideasin a science classroom. i've got kidsin the district, and that's notthe kind of district i want my kidsgoing to school in. so the choice was eithermove the whole family or try and fix the districtthat we live in. we chose to fix it. narrator:but when he hitthe campaign trail,
bryan found himself againin the line of fire in the war on evolution. rehm:the problems i ran intoin the campaign, being out door-to-door, where people justwouldn't listen to you and they just automaticallyjudged you in advance that you're this kindof person and we'regood christians. we'd never vote for you. and they slammedthe door in your face,
forgetting theirwindows are open, and call youan effing a-hole or tell you you're justa goddamn atheist. ?every step i take,i take in you ?131800:06:21,264 --> 00:06:22,931?you walk my way, jesus ?131900:06:22,999 --> 00:06:24,533?every breath i take... ?132000:06:24,601 --> 00:06:27,369narrator:for the rehms,this was particularly hurtful. both are active in their church and run a summerbible school program. christy rehm:we have a neighbor,actually, who was appointed to the school boardand was in support of intelligent design,
and he was out campaigningand saying very negative things about our family,how we're atheists, and if you votefor those atheists, well, then god's not goingto be happy with you. ?we are members of the samebody serving the lord. ?133100:06:55,965 --> 00:06:58,367narrator:to make the casefor intelligent design, the defense had lined upeight expert witnesses, including several membersof the discovery institute, the seattle organization thatpromotes intelligent design, but of those eight witnesses,five never testified.
witnesses started droppinglike flies. we still haven't hearda complete explanation of why this happened, but there was some disputegoing on between the discovery institute and the thomas more law centerover how the case would be run. narrator:nova made repeated requeststo interview members of the discovery instituteto talk about this and other issues,but the institute set conditions
that were inconsistent withnormal journalistic practice. for the defense to win,however, did not requirea large number of witnesses. thompson:our aim was not reallyto disprove darwin's theory of evolution. our aim was to merely show that there arecredible scientists who believe thatthe empirical data was supportiveof intelligent design.
that's all we had to show. it was our thinking,if they could prove that there was a scientificbasis for intelligent design, that it would be possible that the court could conclude that there wasa valid secular purpose for teaching intelligent design. walczak:i think everybody was waitingto see whether or not the intelligent design folkshad a case,
but by the time we finishedpresenting our case, i think the...it was pretty clear that everything restedon michael behe's testimony. narrator:a scientist and senior fellowat the discovery institute, michael behe is the author of the popular intelligentdesign book darwin's black box and dozens of papersunrelated to intelligent design published in peer-reviewedscience journals. behe refused multipleinvitations from nova
to be interviewedfor this program, though he went on recordin the trial. dr. behe, what isyour profession? i am a professorin the departmentof biological sciences at lehigh university inbethlehem, pennsylvania. and you're a biochemist? that's correct, yes. how long have you taught at the college level?
for 23 years. sir... what isintelligent design? intelligent designis a scientific theory that proposes that some aspectsof life are best explained as a result of design, and that the strong appearanceof design in life is real and not just apparent. is intelligent design based
on any religious beliefsor convictions? no, it isn't. what is it based on? it is based entirelyon observable, empirical, physical evidence from nature,plus logical inferences. now, when you use the termdesign, what do you mean? well, i discuss thisin my book, darwin's black box, and a short descriptionof design is shownin this quotation
from chapter nine. what is design? design is simply the purposefularrangement of parts. when we perceive thatparts have been arranged to fulfill a purpose, that's when we infer design. narrator:part of the defense strategy would be to show the judgeexamples of biological systems they claimed were too complexto have evolved
by natural selection and therefore must have beenthe product of a designer. can you give us a biochemicalexample of design, dr. behe? yes, that's onthe next slide. i think the best...well, the most visually striking example of design is somethingcalled the bacterial flagellum. now, this is a figureof a bacterial flagellum taken from a textbookwhich is widely used in colleges and universitiesaround the country.
the bacterial flagellumis quite literally an outboard motorthat bacteria use to swim, and in order to accomplishthat function, it has a number of parts whichare ordered to that effect. now, this part here, whichis labeled the filament, is actually the propellerof the bacterial flagellum. the motor is actuallya rotary motor. most people who see this and have the function explainedto them quickly realize
that these parts are orderedfor a purpose and, therefore, bespeak design. narrator:under the microscope, bacteria powered by flagellaseem almost acrobatic. they tumble, corkscrewand pirouette, thanks to thatwhiplike filament. driving this propelleris a tiny motor, part of a complex structure made of about 40 differentkinds of proteins.
muise:the bacterial flagellumlooks like a sort of jules verne notion of whatthe future looks like. it has a strange sortof mechanical quality to it, these sort of cogsand waving tails and stuff. narrator:and according to behe, if anyone of these parts is missing from the system,the motor can't function. behe calls systems like thisirreducibly complex, a term he coined. and he argues such systems couldnot have evolved naturally.
fuller:the idea is that there are certain aspects of life, perhaps organisms or organsor even cells, that in a sense could only havecome about as a whole. in other words,it was very unlikely they could have come aboutthrough just a kind of contingent combinationof parts over even millions or billionsof years, but rather, in a sense, had to be createdwhole cloth,
all together at once, becauseeverything fits together so well that to remove one part,the thing wouldn't function. have other scientistsacknowledged these design featuresof the flagellum? yes, they have. if you could advance to the next slide. in 1998, a man nameddavid derosier wrote an articlein the journal cell,
which is a very prestigiousscientific journal, entitled the turn of the screw,the bacterial flagellar motor. now, david derosieris a professor of biology at brandeisuniversity in massachusetts and has worked on the bacterialflagellar motor for most of his career. now, in that article,he makes a statement: more so than other motors, the flagellum resemblesa machine designed by a human.
so david derosier also recognizes thatthe structure of the flagellum appears designed. derosier:what i wrote was, this is a machine that lookslike it was designed by a human, but that doesn't meanit was designed, that is, the productof intelligent design. indeed, this more hasall the earmarks of somethingthat arose by evolution.
narrator:using an electron microscope,derosier produces ghostly pictures like this one,revealing the inner workings of what's been called theworld's most efficient motor. derosier:this is the driveshaft. this transmits this torquegenerated by the motor. that would then turnthe propeller, which would push the bacterialcell through the fluid. narrator:michael behe has arguedthat the flagellum could not have evolved,since its parts have
no functionfor natural selection to act on until they are full assembled. but evidence that refutes behe'sclaim of irreducible complexity comes from a tiny syringethat injects poison, found in some of the nastiestof all bacteria. derosier:this is a structure found,for example, in yersinia pestis, the bacterium that causesthe bubonic plague. and look at the similarities.
now, this structuredoesn't rotate, but it still has to extend this structure, whichis equivalent to the rod, the driveshaft here. it has to extend that becauseit needs this little channel. it's like, sort of likea syringe, so the... the virulence factorsthat are made inside the cell, which is down here,can be exported, pushed up into this holeand exported out
through this long kindof needle, perhaps into a cellin your body or mine, and thereby create misery. narrator:and it turns outthe two structures look similar for a reason. the syringe on the rightis made of a subset of the very same protein types found in the baseof the flagellum on the left. though the syringeis missing proteins
found in the motor and therefore cannot producerotary motion, it functions perfectly as an apparatusfor transmitting disease. so if we think about what itmeans to be irreducibly complex, the argument is that if you takeaway even one of these proteins, that the structurecannot function. yet here is a structurethat functions that is missing severalof the proteins,
and yet here it is: a working, viable organelleof the bacterium. so indeed, this structure is not in that senseirreducibly complex. narrator:to emphasize derosier's point, miller arrived at court makingan unusual fashion statement. miller:as an example of whatirreducible complexity means, advocates of intelligent design like to point to a very commonmachine, the mousetrap.
and the mousetrap is composedof five parts. it has a base plate,a catch, a spring, a little hammer that actuallydoes the dirty work and a bait holder. the mousetrap will not work if any one of these five partsare taken away. that's absolutely true. but remember the key notionof irreducible complexity. and that is thatthis whole machine
is completely useless untilall the parts are in place. well, that-- that turns outnot to be true. and i'll give you an example. what i have right here is a mousetrap from which i'veremoved two of the five parts. i still have the base plate,the spring and the hammer. now, you can't catch any micewith this, so it's not a very goodmousetrap, but it turns out that despitethe missing parts,
it makes a perfectly good,if somewhat inelegant, tie clip. and when we lookat the favorite examples for irreducible complexity-- and the bacterial flagellumis a perfect example-- we find the molecular equivalentof my tie clip, which is, we see partsof the machine missing two, three, four,maybe even 20 parts, but still fulfillinga perfectly good purpose that could be favoredby evolution.
and that's why the irreduciblecomplexity argument falls apart. narrator:but behe testified it's notjust microscopic organisms that are irreducibly complex. evolution, he says,fails to account for the network of organs and cells that defends us from disease. has the theoryof evolution, in particularnatural selection, explained the existenceof a defensive apparatus
such as the immune system?no. do you considerit a problem? i certainly consider itto be a problem, but other scientists who think that darwinian evolutionsimply is true don't consider much of anything to be a problemwith their theory. if you could highlightthe second full paragraph of darwin's black box,
page 138. what you say is: we can look highor we can look low, in books or in journals,but the result is the same. the scientific literaturehas no answers on the question of the originof the immune system. and in the context, that meansthat the scientific literature has no detailedtestable answers to the question of how theimmune system could have arisen
by random mutationand natural selection. may i approach, your honor? you may. rothschild:what i did was to pileon the witness stand articles all having verysophisticated explanations for how the immune systemevolved, and basically challenged him to respond,given the claims he'd made. now, dr. behe, thesearticles rebut your assertion
that the scientific literaturehas no answers on the origin of the vertebrate immune system. no, they certainly do not. my argument is that thesearticles have no detailed, rigorous explanations for howcomplex biochemical systems could arise by a random mutationin natural selection. and these articles do not address that. and then he starts to say,
well, have you readthis book, dr. behe? and he starts to pile these upon behe's witness stand. eventually behe was almostdwarfed by the stack of scientific literatureon the evolutionary origin of the immune system. all these hardworking scientistspublished article after article over years and years,chapters and books, full books, addressing the question of how the vertebrateimmune system evolved.
but none of them aresatisfactory to you. that's a lawyer's trick. purely a lawyer's trick. now, you know, is michael behegoing to read every one of those booksbefore he responded? you know, it wastotally theatrics. mr. rothschild,would you likeyour books back? they're heavy. narrator:the defense case includedthree expert witnesses.
and on the last dayof testimony, the final defense witness toldthe court about a creature that by now was familiarto everyone. i'm dr. scott a. minnich. i am an associate professor at the university of idahoin microbiology. dr. minnich, can you give usan example of design at the molecular level? this is a bacterialflagellum.
this is a system i work with. uh, we've seen that.i know. you're going to see a littlemore of it, your honor. i kind of feellike zsa zsa's fifth husband here. you know, as the old adage goes, i know what to do, i just can't make itexciting, but i'll try. now, you specialized your focusin research on the flagellum,
is that correct? that's correct. and you've done experimentson the flagellum? i have. and you've writtenpeer-reviewed articles on it. yes. now, dr. minnich, a complaintthat's often brought up, and plaintiff's experts havebrought it up in this case, is that intelligent designis not testable.
it's not falsifiable. would you agree with that claim? no, i don't. i have a quote herefrom mike behe. in fact, intelligent designis open to direct experimental rebuttal. to falsify such a claim,a scientist could go into the laboratory,
place a bacterial specieslacking a flagellum under some selective pressure,for motility, say, grow it for 10,000 generations and see if a flagellum or any equally complex systemwas produced. if that happened, my claimswould be neatly disproven. is that an experimentthat you would do? you know, i thinkabout it. i'd be intrigued to do it.
i wouldn't expect it to work,but that's my bias. now, you claim intelligentdesign can be tested, correct? correct. intelligent design,according to you, is not tested at all, because neither younor dr. behe have run the tests that you yourself advocate for testing intelligent design,right?
well, turn it around. in terms of these majorattributes of evolution. have they been tested? you see what i'm saying, steve? it's a problem for both sides. narrator:as the legal teams battled itout in court, the clash betweenintelligent design and evolution was taking a toll on dover.
local newspaper reporter laurilebo sat through every day of testimony, and the conflictbegan to drive a wedge between lauri and her father. lebo:he believed that god reallyshould be in science class. he did not believe in science. and he was all worried about me,because i believed in evolution, and he said, you know,well, do you really believe that we came from monkeys? i'm like...
at that point i was prettyburnt out from the trial, and didn't really havethe patience that i probably should have hadwith him, and i just said, yeah, i mean, yeah, i do believe in evolution,dad, you know. and so we'd fightevery morning. if you believe in heavenand hell and you believe you haveto be saved, nothing else couldpossibly matter--
not the first amendment, notscience, not rational debate. all that matters is that you'regoing to be rejoined with the people you lovemost on this earth. teaching the traditionalevolutionary darwinian concept that man evolvedfrom lower forms of life, that's almost a slap in my face. that takes the dignity awayfrom humanity, as far as i'm concerned. what gives dignity to man
is that every one of us are madein the image of god. he is the creator. and he created the worldwith intention and with design. it upsets me deeply that nowin our educational system we are indoctrinatingour young people to think differentlyabout humanity. miller:i've never made a secret of the fact that i'ma roman catholic, and a long traditionof scholarship
in the catholic church hasargued that truth is one; that science and religionshould ultimately be in harmony. but that doesn't make faitha scientific proposition. i think,as many religious people do, that faith and reasonare both gifts from god. and if god is real, then faith and reasonshould complement each other rather than being in conflict. narrator:throughout the trial, judgejones would never tip his hand
about which way he was leaning on whether intelligent designis science. but science was not the onlyissue before the court. the climax of the trial would bethe judge's ruling on a question stemming from a different lineof evidence. when they introduced intelligentdesign into the classroom, were members of the dover schoolboard motivated by religion? if so, that would amountto a violation of part of the first amendmentto the constitution--
the establishment clause, which mandates the separationof church and state. stephen harvey:in order to prevail, we neededto prove either that the school board acted for thepurpose of promoting religion, or that its policy has theeffect of promoting religion. it's either purpose or effect,either one. the establishment clause saysthat congress cannot pass a law which promotes one religionover another. and that trickles all the waydown to any state action,
and in this case,the actions of a school board. narrator:but what evidence was there that the school board wasmotivated by religion? months before the trial when bertha spahr had unpackedthe boxes containing the 60 copies of pandas givenby an anonymous donor, she found a clue. i was directedby the administration to unpack the boxes, count thebooks, stamp and number them.
in the bottom of the box,i found a catalog. i opened the catalog to see what they had to sayabout the book in question, and at the very topof the catalog page it was listedunder creation science. this would certainly bea smoking gun and would be a benefit to us somewheredown the road. narrator:this information was handed off to the national centerfor science education.
the ncse was helping the lawyerswho were arguing to keep intelligent designout of dover high school. knowing of pandas and peoplewould be central to the case, nick matzke investigatedthe book. matzke:when the court case was filed,and pandas was adopted in the policy, it became clearthat pandas was going to be the representativeof intelligent design for the purposes of this case. and so the history of that bookbecame important,
the arguments it made becameimportant, and we undertook to dissect these various aspectsin preparation for the case. narrator:matzke dug into pandas,examining it page by page and scouring the internet to see what he could unearthabout its history. rummaging through the ncsearchives one day, matzke came across a creationiststudent newspaper from 1981. at the bottom of the front pagehe noticed a tiny article with a headline announcing
unbiased biology textbookplanned. and that article mentioned thata man named charles thaxton, now a fellow at the discoveryinstitute, was working on a book that would present bothevolution and creation. matzke:the academic editorwas charles thaxton, who was the editorof the pandas book. so it was clearthat that ad was referring to the pandas project. what was interesting is thatit talked about the book being
about creation and evolution,instead of the later terms intelligent designand evolution. narrator:if they could show pandasstarted out as a creationist book, thatwould suggest intelligent design is simply creationism repackaged and thereforeinherently religious. matzke e-mailed this informationto eric rothschild, who immediately issueda subpoena to the publisher of pandas for any drafts
the book went throughbefore printing. in a few months, they receivedtwo boxes of material. the lawyers sent them to barbaraforrest, a philosophy professor and author who has been trackingintelligent design for years. she was scheduledto testify in the trial. forrest:oh, my goodness. those two boxes containedabout 7,000 pieces of paper, and i had to sit downwith those documents and just start flippingthrough them,
which is what i didday and night. narrator:after much digging,she hit pay dirt. buried in these documents weretwo drafts of pandas straddling the 1987 caseof edwards v. aguillard, in which the supreme courtruled it unconstitutional to teach creationismin public school science class. one draft was writtenbefore the case and the other revisedjust after. forrest:in the first 1987 draft, whichis the pre-edwards draft,
the definition of creationreads this way: creation means that variousforms of life began abruptly through the agencyof an intelligent creator with their distinctive featuresalready intact, fish with fins and scales, the same definitionin this draft, after the adverse decision,reads this way: intelligent design means through an intelligent agency
birds with feathers, beaks,et cetera. same definition. just one is worded in termsof creationism, the other one worded in termsof intelligent design. everyone said intelligent designis creationism relabeled. never in our wildest dreams,though, did we think that this wouldactually be recorded in paper in a way that could bedocumented in a court case. and that became probably
our best single pieceof evidence at trial. narrator:barbara forrest's testimonywould make a strong case that the dover school board was thrusting religioninto the classroom. and in comparing theof pandas and people drafts, forrest discoveredthat the authors had apparently madetheir revisions in haste. forrest:in cleansing this manuscript, they failed to replaceevery word properly.
i found the wordcreationists... um, and insteadof replacing the entire word, they just kind of did this... and got design proponents with the c in front and the ists in the backfrom the original word. so the correct termfor this transitional form is cdesign proponentsists. and, uh, everyone now refersto this as the missing link
between creationismand intelligent design. you've got the directphysical evidence there of a transitional fossil. narrator:barbara forrest's testimony not only traced the creationistlineage of pandas. citing a christian magazine'sinterview, forrest let one of theintelligent design movement's own leaders, paul nelson,speak for himself. forrest:the question he was asked was,
is intelligent design just acritique of evolutionary theory, or does it offersomething more? does it offer somethingthat humankind needs to know? and this is his answer: easily the biggestchallenge facing the id communityis to develop a full-fledged theoryof biological design. we don't have such a theoryright now, and that's a real problem.
without a theory,it's very hard to know where to directyour research focus. right now we've got a bagof powerful intuitions and a handful of notionssuch as irreducible complexity, but as yet, no general theoryof biological design. walczak:the evidence she broughtinto that courtroom really exposed the hypocrisy of the intelligent designmovement in a way that's irrefutable.
you know, she usedtheir own language, things that they had writtenand said, to show that they themselvesknew that this isn't science. narrator:and on the stand,michael behe was asked how he would define science. dr. behe, usingyour definition, intelligent design is ascientific theory, correct? under the samedefinition, astrologyis a scientific theory,
using your definition, using my definition, a scientific theory isa proposed explanation which focuses or pointsto observable physical data and logical inferences. there are many things throughoutthe history of science which we now thinkto be incorrect which would fit that definition. yes, astrology is in fact one,
so is the ether theory, the propagation of light,and many other... many other theories as well. the ether theory of lighthas been discarded. that is correct. but you are clear:under your definition, the definition that sweepsin intelligent design, astrology is alsoa scientific theory? yes, that's correct.
walczak:you know, when you loosen the rulesaround what is science and permit the supernatural,permit deities, you are really destroying what makes scienceso vitally important to the progress that ourcivilization has witnessed over the last 400 or 500 years. you're going back beforethe scientific revolution. and, uh, you know,that's a pretty scary thing.
narrator:with the scientific revolution, the work of galileo,newton and others banished supernaturalexplanations from science. but some think the supernaturalstill has its place. fuller:at the very beginningof genetics, the idea of there beinga hereditary factor that somehow was responsiblefor the traits that we have, but one couldn't quite identifywhat the factor was-- that was also initially regardedas supernatural as well.
so it's not that supernaturalismhasn't been part of science. in fact, it has been, and it's often ledto very fruitful results. and it seems that theevolutionists want to, in a way, ignore or marginalize that veryimportant part of the history. narrator:but barbara forrest testified that the intelligent designmovement's goals are not entirely scientific,and are spelled out in a secret discovery institutedocument
that had surfacedon the internet. forrest:their goals are listed quiteclearly in the wedge document. it's their strategy document that they drew up aboutnine years ago, in 1998. their goal isto completely overthrow all of the effects of evolutionon society, which they thinkare uniformly negative. um, this document statesthat they want to completely changeamerican culture
back to what they believe is itsproperly religious foundation. they want every area of life to be governed by their particularreligious preferences, and they're very clearabout that in this document. narrator:according to the wedgedocument, darwin portrayed humans notas moral and spiritual beings, but as animals, leading people to abandonobjective moral standards.
the document lays outan ambitious agenda to overthrow this legacy: to seeintelligent design theory as the dominant perspectivein science and to see design theorypermeate our religious, cultural, moraland political life. though not writtenby phillip johnson, the wedge documentis an outgrowth of a broader policy he conceivedcalled the wedge strategy.
johnson:i know it can be made to soundlike something sinister and conspiratorial, but the wedge strategyas i've explained it is quite simple and innocent. when you use a wedgeto split a log, you start with the sharp edgeof the wedge. my job is to be the sharp edgeof the wedge, to use my academic credentialsand legal abilities to get some hearingfor the proposition
that there really is somethingfundamentally wrong with the darwinian story. but i can't answer allthe questions that arise. so we need other people to formthe thick edge of the wedge to take on the questions thatdo require scientific expertise. narrator:with michael behe and others forming the wide endof the wedge, johnson hopes the wedge strategywill overturn what he sees asthe negative effects
of a century and a halfof darwin's theory. johnson:the darwinian story,when it became accepted, had a huge cultural impact. and if that storywere discredited, then the cultural impactwould be reversed, and there would becultural changes in the other direction as well. there is something outrageous about such a huge body ofevidence being put together,
then being confirmedin all kinds of other scientific disciplines,particularly genetics, and having other peoplejust sort of deny it for reasons that have nothingto do with truth. and this became apparentduring the trial. and then you began to looktowards the judge and think, how is this guygoing to get out of this? because here he is, he is a republican;
he's been appointedby george w. bush, who has said that he thinksthe jury is out on evolution and both theoriesshould be taught. and you began thinking, what isthis poor guy going to do? narrator:whatever the motivationsof the discovery institute, the intelligent design movement, or the authors of the bookof pandas and people, judge jones would need to focuson the motivation of the dover area school board.
mr. buckingham,i'd like to show you what has been identified as exhibit p-145. you'll need to lookat your monitor. buckingham:the book that was presented to me for biology was laced with darwinismfrom the beginning to the end. reporter:william buckingham is headof the curriculum committee
for the dover school district. he's also a board member. he strongly believes creationismneeds to be taught in the classroom. buckingham:it's my opinion thatit's okay to teach darwin, but you have to balance it with something else,such as creationism. buckingham:this was back inthe very early days of the intelligent design thing.
and don't you know, i could not think of the wordsintelligent design. i just couldn't. the camera is rolling,so i say creationism. in hindsight, i should have saidnothing at all, but i said creationism. i was like a deer caughtin the headlights of a car and i misspoke, pure and simple. i made a human mistake.
freudian slip, right,mr. buckingham? i wouldn't saya freudian slip. i would say a human mistake. narrator:and it was not buckingham'sonly mistake. both buckingham and bonsellhad sworn in their depositions that they did not knowwho donated the 60 copies of pandasto the high school, but by the time buckinghamtook the witness stand, a different story emerged.
buckingham:i stood up in front of ourchurch one sunday morning. we had to come up with, i think it was like $1,100to buy these books. i said, i'm not askinganybody for a dime. i'm not telling youi want anything. but we believe in the powerof prayer in our church. i said, just praythat the money comes in. narrator:buckingham's prayers wereanswered with donations from members of the church.
buckingham:so i deposited the money in our personal checking accountmy wife and i have, and i wrote a check to be passed on to whoeveris going to buy the books. it was my understandingat that time that a businessman inthe community had agreed to take the moneyand buy the books and donate them to the school. at that timei didn't know who it was.
narrator:but at the trial, buckingham admitted he had giventhat check to alan bonsell, and that the unknown businessmanwho bought the books had been alan bonsell's father. this contradicted statements bill buckingham and alan bonsellhad originally made in their sworn depositions. harvey:lying under oathis a serious crime. we impeached a presidentabout it.
and people go to jailfor it all the time. it seemed to usthat there was testimony that demonstratedclear inconsistency. i can't see into their heartsand know the extent of the falsehood, but i do knowthat when asked questions, it should have elicitedthat information. they didn't providethat information. lebo:it was almost likethis weird feeling
that, you know, when you've watcheda nature show and you know that the gazelle is about to getit from the lion, you know, i remember actually thinking, oh, god, judge jones is goingto kill alan bonsell. i can't look. and then judge jones, his face had gotten bright redat this point, and he goes, you tell mewhy you didn't say
where that money came fromto buy of pandas and people. and alan bonsell, finally,under judge jones's grilling, started to get a little nervous and he started flapping hishands and he started stammering and he completely had lostthis self-assured composure that he had earlier. and finally he just said,well, i misspoke. never in a million yearsdid i ever think that we'd, you know,i'd be in a federal lawsuit
when i was on the school board, or have the school districtin something like that over a one-minute statement. a one-minute statement. buckingham:we weren't asking the teachers to become priests or protes...pastors of some sort or lay ministersor anything like that. just let the kids knowthe theory's there. let the kidsdo their own research
and find answers for themselves. narrator:after six weeks, the trialconcluded with closing arguments that were as divided as the townof dover itself had become. what am i supposed to tolerate? a small encroachmenton my first amendment rights? well, i'm not going to. i think this is clearwhat these people have done, and it outrages me. that's a statementof one citizen of dover,
fred callahan, standing upto the wedge that has been driveninto his community and his daughter's high school by the dover school board'santi-evolution, pro-intelligent design policy. this trial has established that intelligent designis unconstitutional because it is an inherentlyreligious proposition, a modern form of creationism.
it is not just a productof religious people. it does not just havereligious implications. it is, in its essence,religious. the shell game has to stop. in sum, your honor,i respectfully submit that the evidence of recordshows that the plaintiffs have failed to provethat the primary purpose or primary effect of the readingof a four-paragraph statement on intelligent design,
explaining thatit's an explanation for the origins of lifedifferent from darwin's theory, letting the students knowthere are books in the library on the subject, does notby any reasonable measure threaten the harm whichthe establishment clause of the first amendment to the united statesconstitution prohibits. but instead, the evidence showsthat the defendants' policy
has the primary purposeand primary effect of advancing science education by making the students awareof a new scientific theory, one which may well opena fascinating prospect to a new scientific paradigm. narrator:judge jones said he would returna verdict promptly. four days after the trial ended, dover residents renderedtheir own verdict on intelligent design
with a huge turnoutfor the school board election. by a narrow margin, the people of dovercleaned house. all eight of the nine seatsup for election went to anti-intelligent designcandidates, including plaintiff and former dover science teacherbryan rehm. among the candidates who got thefewest votes was alan bonsell. with the judge stilldeliberating, dover's local school boardelection was national news
and even provoked the ire oftelevangelist pat robertson. i'd like to say to the goodcitizens of dover, if there is a disasterin your area, don't turn to god. you just rejected himfrom your city. though robertson had alreadypassed judgment, dover and the nationwould have to wait another month for judge jonesto render his verdict. on december 20, 2005, jonessent out his opinion by e-mail. i went to work that day.
we pretty much knewit was going to be out by noon. um, so i waited at workfor a phone call. the decision came across thecomputer, i think it was 10:37. there was a columnist behind me. i was reading itfrom the beginning, and he's standing overmy shoulder and he yells at me, go to the end!go to the end! i remember mrs. spahr, berthaspahr, knocking on my door, interrupting my class.
narrator:the 139-page opinion ruled that intelligent designis not science. finding it had been introducedfor religious reasons, judge jones decidedit was unconstitutional to teach intelligent designin dover's science classes. jones:both defendants and manyof the leading proponents of intelligent designmake a bedrock assumption which is utterly false. their presuppositionis that evolutionary theory
is antithetical to a belief inthe existence of a supreme being and to religion in general. to be sure, darwin's theoryof evolution is imperfect. however, the factthat a scientific theory cannot yet renderan explanation on every point should not be used as a pretext to thrust an untestablealternative hypothesis grounded in religioninto the science classroom, or to misrepresent
well-establishedscientific propositions. the citizens of the dover areawere poorly served by the members of the board who voted for the intelligentdesign policy. narrator:citing what he calledthe breathtaking inanity of the school board's decision, he found that several membershad lied to cover their tracks and disguise the real purpose behind the intelligentdesign policy.
jones:the crushing weightof the evidence indicates that the board set out to get creationisminto science classrooms, and intelligent designwas simply the vehicle that they utilized to do that. narrator:jones recommended to the u.s.attorney that he investigate bringing perjury chargesagainst buckingham and bonsell for lying under oath. and the overwhelming evidenceat trial, he said,
established that intelligentdesign is a religious view, a mere relabelingof creationism and not a scientific theory. in an era where we're tryingto cure cancer, where we're tryingto prevent pandemics, where we're trying to keepscience and math education on the cutting edgein the united states, to introduce and teach badscience to ninth-grade students makes very little sense to me.
you know, garbage in,garbage out. and it doesn't benefitany of us who benefit dailyfrom scientific discoveries. (bell rings) narrator:the school districtwas permanently forbidden to teach intelligent designin its science curriculum. the administration was ordered to pay the plaintiff'slegal fees totaling morethan a million dollars,
and the electionof a new school board opposed to intelligent designmeant no appeal of the ruling would be mounted. in the wake of the trial,time magazine named judge jones one of the 100 most influentialpeople of the year. but not everyone was so pleasedwith the judge's decision. buckingham:to put it bluntly, i think he's a jackass. i think he went to clown collegeinstead of law school,
or else he went to law school and slept duringthe constitution classes, because his decisiondoesn't jive with the law. uh, i thinkhe should be on a bench, but it ought to bein a center ring of ringling brothers circus. it's disgusting. bonsell:it makes me feel sad. we as a board were trying
to make dover the bestschool district it could be. that was our goal. at least mine was. i was trying to, we were trying to take it upto make it the best. thompson:i think, first of all, you haveto say we had a fair trial. i'm just disturbedabout the extent of his opinion, that it went way beyond what...what he should have gone into deciding mattersof science.
narrator:the discovery institutewas also displeased. soon after the decision, the institute published a123-page book distancing itself from the caseand criticizing the ruling as judicial activismwith a vengeance. the verdict turned outto be more controversial than judge jones had imagined. following the trial,he received death threats. jones and his familyhad to be placed
under round-the-clockprotection. jones:i could never have imaginedthat i would receive threats to my person inan establishment clause case, but that's what happenedin the dover case. narrator:for newspaper reporterlauri lebo, the verdict was bittersweet. her father passed away just ninedays after the judge's decision. they had never reconciledtheir differences, though lauri remainsa strong supporter of evolution.
recently her familytook over management of her father's radio station, and lauri began hostinga weekly show. good evening, folks. we're going to listento some johnny cash now: i talk to jesus every day. narrator:in the end, though,there is probably one thing everyone in the casecan agree on. walczak:the issue is certainly not over.
one of the things that we'velearned is that the opponents of evolution are persistentand resilient and they're still out there. i had thought at one point that we would make abreakthrough on this issue and change the scientificcommunity in my lifetime. now i'm somewhat sobered bythe force of the counterattack that we have received. i see that it's going to bea longer process than that.
i think history tells us that there is enduring...disagreement and dispute in the united statesas it relates to evolution. by no means did my decisionput a capstone on that, and that will proceedfor generations, i suspect. on the intelligent designweb site, hear nova's senior executiveproducer explain why nova took on thiscontroversial topic, watch any partof this program again
and much more.
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