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Interesting turn of events, suggesting that its promoters thrive on
historical roles as biblical underdogs always aligned against hedonists/an
oppressor. Note the comments about Baylor University, which like other
denominational colleges, rejected intelligent design as Science. Intelligent Design Might Be
Meeting Its Maker Intelligent design posits that the complexity of biological
life is itself evidence of a higher being at work. As a political cause, the
idea has gained currency, and for good reason. The movement was intended to be
a "big tent" that would attract everyone from biblical creationists
who regard the Book of Genesis as literal truth to academics who believe that
secular universities are hostile to faith. The slogan, "Teach the
controversy," has simple appeal in a democracy. Behind the headlines, however, intelligent design as a field of inquiry is failing to gain the traction its
supporters had hoped for. It has gained little support among the academics who
should have been its natural allies. And if the intelligent design proponents
lose the case in Dover, there could be serious consequences for the movement's
credibility. On college campuses, the movement's theorists are academic
pariahs, publicly denounced by their own colleagues. Design proponents have published few papers in peer-reviewed
scientific journals.
The Templeton
Foundation,
a major supporter of projects seeking to reconcile science and religion, says
that after providing a few grants for conferences and courses to debate
intelligent design, they asked proponents to submit proposals for actual
research. "They never came
in,"
said Charles L. Harper Jr., senior vice president at the Templeton Foundation,
who said that while he was skeptical from the beginning, other foundation
officials were initially intrigued and later grew disillusioned. "From the point of view of rigor and intellectual
seriousness, the intelligent design people don't come out very well in our
world of scientific review," he said. While intelligent design has hit obstacles among scientists,
it has also failed to find a warm embrace at many evangelical Christian colleges. Even at conservative schools, scholars
and theologians who were initially excited about intelligent design say they
have come to find its arguments unconvincing. They, too, have been greatly
swayed by the scientists at their own institutions and elsewhere who have
examined intelligent design and found it insufficiently substantiated in
comparison to evolution. "It can function as
one of those ambiguous signs in the world that point to an intelligent creator
and help support the faith of the faithful, but it just doesn't have the
compelling or explanatory power to have much of an impact on the academy,"
said Frank D. Macchia, a professor of Christian theology at Vanguard University, in Costa Mesa, Calif., which is
affiliated with the Assemblies of God, the nation's largest Pentecostal
denomination. At Wheaton
College,
a prominent evangelical university in Illinois, intelligent design surfaces in
the curriculum only as part of an interdisciplinary elective on the origins of life, in which students study
evolution and competing theories from theological, scientific and historical
perspectives, according to a college spokesperson. The only university where intelligent design has gained a
major institutional foothold is a seminary. Southern Baptist Theological
Seminary in Louisville, Ky., created a Center for Science and Theology for William A. Dembski, a leading proponent of
intelligent design, after he left Baylor, a Baptist university in Texas, amid
protests by faculty members opposed to teaching it. Intelligent design and Mr. Dembski, a philosopher and
mathematician, should have been a good fit for Baylor, which says its mission
is "advancing the frontiers of knowledge while cultivating a Christian
world view." But Baylor, like many evangelical universities, has many
scholars who see no contradiction in believing in God and evolution. Derek Davis, director of the J. M. Dawson Institute of Church-State Studies at Baylor, said: "I teach at the largest Baptist university in the world. I'm a religious
person. And my basic perspective is intelligent design doesn't belong in
science class."
Mr. Davis noted that the advocates of intelligent design claim they are
not talking about God or religion. "But
they are, and everybody knows they are," Mr. Davis said. "I just
think we ought to quit playing games. It's a religious worldview that's being
advanced." John G. West, a political scientist and senior fellow at the
Discovery Institute, the main organization supporting
intelligent design, said the skepticism and outright antagonism are evidence
that the scientific "fundamentalists" are threatened by its
arguments. "This is natural anytime you have a new controversial
idea," Mr. West said. "The first stage is people ignore you. Then,
when they can't ignore you, comes the hysteria. Then the idea that was so
radical becomes accepted. I'd say we're in the hysteria phase." In the Dover trial, where intelligent design finally got its
day in court, the movement faces perhaps the greatest potential for a serious
setback. The case is the first to
test whether intelligent design can be taught in a public school, or whether
teaching it is unconstitutional because it advances a particular religious
belief. The Dover board voted last year to read students a short statement at
the start of ninth-grade biology class saying that evolution is a flawed theory
and intelligent design is an alternative they should study further. If the judge in the Dover case rules against intelligent
design, the decision would be likely to dissuade other school boards from
incorporating it into their curriculums. School boards might already be wary
because of a simple political fact: eight of the school-board members in Dover
who supported intelligent design were voted out of office in elections last
month and replaced by a slate of opponents. Advocates of intelligent design perceived the risk as so
great that the Discovery Institute said it had tried to dissuade the school
board in Dover from going ahead and taking a stand in favor of intelligent
design. The institute opposed the Dover board's action, it said, because it
"politicized" what should be a scientific issue. Now, with a decision due in four or five weeks, design
proponents like Mr. West of Discovery said the Dover trial was a
"sideshow" - one that will have little bearing on the
controversy. "The future of
intelligent design, as far as I'm concerned, has very little to do with the
outcome of the Dover case," Mr. West said. "The future of intelligent design is tied
up with academic endeavors. It rises or falls on the science." http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/04/weekinreview/04good.html |
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