Publication: Georgia Journal of Science
Publication Date: 22-SEP-05
Delivery: Immediate Online Access
Author: Forrest, Barbara Carroll
Article Excerpt
Abstract
Intelligent design (ID) creationists at the Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture claim to be advocating good science and education. Although they promote ID as a "full-scale scientific revolution," it is really the newest variant of American creationism. Proponents have no scientific data to support their contention that a supernatural designer explains biological phenomena better than natural processes. They have waged a thirteen-year PR and political campaign to translate their religious views, which include religious exclusionism and anti-secularism, into public policy. Only six states remain exempt from their attempts to influence science standards, curricula, or textbooks. When approaching educational policymakers, they disguise their agenda with seemingly innocuous terminology co-opted from legitimate scientific and educational discourse. ID creationists work through local, state, and national religious organizations and religious/political operatives, including members of Congress. If they succeed, they will damage both science education and the separation of church and state.
Editor's Note: Barbara Forrest appeared on CNN's Larry King Live, August 23, 2005, defending the methodology of science against advocates of Intelligent Design "theory."
Keywords: Intelligent design, politics, Wedge strategy, legal decisions, Michael Behe, William Dembski, Phillip Johnson. Jonathan Wells, Center for Science and Culture, Discovery Institute, Intelligent Design and Evolution Awareness Center, Intelligent Design Network.
INTRODUCTION
In Creationism's Trojan Horse (1), Paul R. Gross and I explained the nature and strategy of the intelligent design (ID) creationist movement, which is headquartered at the Discovery Institute (DI), a conservative think tank in Seattle, WA. In 1996, DI established the Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture (CRSC), now called the Center for Science and Culture (CSC), to promote "intelligent design theory." Functioning as DI's creationist arm, the CSC is advancing a religious agenda by cultivating political influence with state boards of education, local school boards, and members of Congress. Executing a twenty-year plan outlined in a document called "The Wedge Strategy" (a.k.a. the "Wedge Document"), ID creationists hope to drive a "wedge" between the concept of science and the naturalistic methodology by which science operates (2). This would foster in the public mind a premodern understanding of science in which God is invoked as a scientific explanation of natural phenomena. An early CRSC website announced that "new developments in biology, physics, and artificial intelligence are raising serious doubts about scientific materialism and re-opening the case for the supernatural" (3). ID proponents call this "theistic science."
Law professor Phillip E. Johnson began his anti-evolution crusade in the late 1980s following his religious conversion (1). He and his tightly knit cadre of religiously motivated associates call themselves "the Wedge." While they were formalizing the Wedge Strategy in 1996, DI added the CRSC to its roster of programs, guaranteeing that the Wedge would have a formal home and lucrative "research fellowships." Johnson became a CRSC advisor. A student creationist group founded in the 1970s (37), Students for Origins Research, transformed itself into Access Research Network (ARN), a separate, auxiliary ID organization in Colorado Springs. ARN functions as a clearinghouse for ID "educational" and promotional materials.
The Wedge Strategy called for publication of thirty ID books by 2003, and the CSC has moved past that goal with books aimed at a popular audience. In 1991, Johnson had already published Darwin on Trial, in which he rejects science's naturalistic methodology (4). In 1996, biochemist Michael Behe published Darwin's Black Box, in which he stated that excluding the supernatural from scientific explanations is "an artificial restriction on science" (5). William Dembski, a philosopher, mathematician, and Christian apologist, followed in 1999 with Intelligent Design: The Bridge Between Science and Theology, explaining ID in overtly religious terms (6). In 2000, Jonathan Wells, the only founding Wedge member with a Ph.D. in biology, published Icons of Evolution (7), charging that science textbooks present fraudulent material about evolution to unsuspecting students. In 2003, philosopher Stephen C. Meyer co-edited Darwinism, Design, and Public Education (8), falsely advertised as a "peer-reviewed science book" (9). In addition to publication, the Wedge is executing virtually every aspect of the Wedge Strategy except the one they list as foundational to their program: "scientific research being done from the perspective of design theory" (2). Despite their protestations to the contrary, ID is a supernatural religious belief that its proponents attempt (unsuccessfully) to conceal behind their scientific pretensions.
Wedge leaders deny that ID is religion and, consequently, that it is creationism. Most worrisome is Meyer's contention that the 1987 U. S. Supreme Court ruling, Edwards v. Aguillard, which outlawed creationism in public school science classes, "does not apply to design theory" since ID is science (13). Claiming that "intelligent design fits the bill as a full-scale scientific revolution" (36), Dembski challenges critics: "Ask any leader in the intelligent design movement whether intelligent design is stealth creationism, and they'll deny it" (1). Yet their own words show that ID is characterized by that hallmark of creationism, the rejection of evolution in favor of creation by a supernatural deity. Johnson has stated flatly, "Evolution is a hoax" (1). "Darwinism is not science," insists Behe (10). DI president Bruce Chapman promotes the falsehood that "Darwinism is a theory in crisis" (12). And Dembski identifies ID as not only a religious but a sectarian Christian belief: "Intelligent design is just the Logos theology of John's Gospel restated in the idiom of information theory" (11). Wells' involvement, stemming from a different but equally anti-evolutionist religious affiliation, fulfills his obligation as a "Moonie," a member of...
NOTE: All illustrations and photos have been removed from this article.
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