As posted yesterday, a federal judge here in PA shot down Intelligent Design in the Dover, PA School District. This is a good thing, because now kids won't be forced to hear the crap that's jammed into their heads enough on Sundays in regular, public-funded school as well. Well, a quick stroll around the Net is in order, and it's time to see what other bloggers are saying:

From A Nom De Guerre:

I'm all for religious belief. I have Christian family and atheist family so I grew up with quite a balanced view, getting both books about dinosaurs and bible stories to read. Unsurprisingly I ended up agnostic (which is a posh way of saying I haven't a clue whether there's a divine influence). I think it would be nice to really believe in something but I never will and I'm content with that.

However, I think there is a time and a place for religious study and that's the Religious Education class rather than the Science class. My only gripe with RE classes at school was that they focused heavily on Christianity at the expense of other religions (which I was interested in hearing about).

Here's someone over in Europe, looking at the ID debate with clear, unclouded thoughts, and laughing their arse off at us "silly Americans." And, while still a Christian in a sense and Agnostic in practice, the conclusion is still reached: That teaching Intelligent Design is nothing more than a sham front for teaching God to kids in schools.

And from This Nut-Job comes the other side of the argument, no matter how fasical and asinine it really is

At that moment, I realized that our resident skunk family had eaten like kings the night before. They had a smorgasbord, compliments of those wasps. I reflected on that miracle in utter amazement. The Lord God had created both creatures: predator and prey. Both animals are considered nuisances by us humans. I was reminded that there is a fierce debate sweeping the country regarding evolution and Intelligent Design. I wondered to myself, "At what point in the evolutionary process would worldly science tell us that a single-celled organism decide that it would eat things that produce painful consequences?" A skunk doesn't have an armor plating, so evolution must have missed a step. While their hair is thick and wiry, a wasp/bee is small enough to penetrate it. A skunk's spray doesn't work on insects because they don't have sophisticated olefactory organs like mammals do. There was no sign or smell of spray anywhere. Evolution can't explain why a skunk would eat the habitat of a stinging insect, while being swarmed by hundreds of them. The skunk had used stealth, calculation, and strategy, attacking at night, under the cover of darkness, and knowing exactly where and when to dig.

Yeah, man. Scientific indeed. You looked, and instinctively knew it was God's will? That's not Science, pal, that's brainwashing.

And finally, Doug Berger over at Secular Left puts this all into simple, plain English for the rest of us:

Judge Jones found:

1. The Board's actions violated the establishment clause and failed the "purpose" and "effect" prongs of the Lemon Test.

2. That ID is NOT science and that is in fact "creation science" with a different label.

3. The Board members at the heart of the case, the ones' who led the effort to put ID in the curriculum, lied under oath and that the Board attempted to hide their real intentions about the change after they found out it might cause a legal case.

4. While ID is not appropriate for the science classroom, the court wasn't saying it couldn't be studied in a more appropriate context.

The debate will rage on, I'm sure. ID is still the norm in Kansas, where Jesus reigns supreme over common sense. But at least here in Pennsylvania, our schools are safe. For now... (Link to Technorati Search)