It simply infuriates me that certain insideous people try to impose their own beliefs on others by advocating the teaching of so-called intelligent design in science classes, or, even more subtley, simply call for the teaching of the controversy (without mention of intelligent design) that the theory of evolution is only a theory.

Thus, it's a relief to learn today that "'Intelligent design' cannot be mentioned in biology classes in a Pennsylvania public school district, a federal judge said Tuesday, ruling in one of the biggest courtroom clashes on evolution since the 1925 Scopes trial." Of course I have no problem with relevant classes on religion or philosophy mentioning this view, but it's not science and has no place in any science class.

But I also think the "intelligent design" view is simply myopic. I understand that its advocates believe that science cannot explain all the mysteries of life, because of their complexity, which in and of itself argues that there must be an intelligence behind it. While I agree that science cannot currently explain many things, it's simply a logical fallacy to conclude that a designer lies behind it, much less an intelligent one, for that reason alone.

True intelligence, in my opinion, doesn't design complexity. Rather, it designs simplicity. Complexity arises from hacks, kludges, randomness. The more complex something is, the more likely it is to fail. Ergo, if there is a designer behind the complexity of life, it's not as intelligent as some would have us believe. Further, if some designer has guided life to its current condition, I'd have to rate him/her/it/them an F in terms of QA and debugging.

For people who think life is too complex to have evolved on its own, I feel sad that they apparently cannot comprehend the vastness of time and space that has allowed it to happen. Why can't people accept that the way things are is the way things are, without invoking a designer? If some intelligence was needed to design life, well, then that implies that an intelligence had to design the designer, right? That's a never-ending cause-and-effect cycle.

We've only been playing the science game, for what, 200 years or so? We're playing catch-up on a universe estimated to be some twenty million times older. Not years. Times.

Science cannot explain all of life. Not yet, no. Religion has had, what, 4000 years to try? 8000? They haven't succeeded. I'd say let science have a crack at it for something like half as long, and I'll bet things get explained a little better than they are at present. Intelligently.