Looking for information on when a decision may be rendered in the Dover ID trial, I was not amazed that about the only concise report (that Google found) is from the Register in the UK.

Pennsylvania intelligent design trial winds up

The Register says:

"Judge John Jones says he wants to have made his ruling by the end of the year, early January 2006 at the latest."

And additionally:

"Meanwhile on Thursday, the Vatican issued a statement warning against ignoring scientific reason, saying that by doing so, religion risks turning into fundamentalism. Cardinal Paul Poupard, who heads the Pontifical Council for Culture said:

"The permanent lesson that the Galileo case represents pushes us to keep alive the dialogue between the various disciplines, and in particular between theology and the natural sciences, if we want to prevent similar episodes from repeating themselves in the future."

"He also argued that religion could act as the conscience of science, citing the atomic bomb and the possibility of human clones as scientific ideas devoid of ethics."

(italics added)

The Register, in a separate story does give some concern that all the nut cases aren't exclusive US property though.

"It seems to me in many respects the cards are stacked against radical, innovative views getting a fair hearing in science these days," he said.

The guy obviously hasn't looked at much modern physics if he can't see radical all over the place ...

John