Intelligent Design Movement Research Articles

Design, designers and the Designing God: A critical look at some models

This paper examines some of the main positions in the debate on intelligence, design and purpose in nature. It seems that the machine metaphor with its ostensible Deistic implications, introduced by Boyle and Paley, still haunts discussion today as is clear from the anthropic principle. To deal with the issue, some ideas from the side of naturalism are discussed (Dawkins and Davies). The strict naturalistic approach of Dawkins is valued but also criticised for its lack of appreciation for the way humans perceive the world and thus view it through the lens of religion and spirituality – a quality Paul Davies tries to accommodate to some extent. Some comments are made on the ideologically based intelligent-design movement which utilises the concept of intelligence to prove a creator (Shannon, Dembski). From a theological perspective, the concerns expressed by Haught are discussed, namely, a discussion of purposeful design in a way that is less ideological than that of Dembski and Shannon (of the intelligent design movement). The efforts of some theologians (Gregerson, Drees, Rottschaefer and Pannenberg) are discussed in order to reach a conclusion which endeavours to do justice to naturalism as well as theological and spiritual concerns.

Creationism and intelligent design.

Creationism, the rejection of evolution in favor of supernatural design, comes in many varieties besides the common young-earth Genesis version. Creationist attacks on science education have been evolving in the last few years through the alliance of different varieties. Instead of calls to teach "creation science," one now finds lobbying for "intelligent design" (ID). Guided by the Discovery Institute's "Wedge strategy," the ID movement aims to overturn evolution and what it sees as a pernicious materialist worldview and to renew a theistic foundation to Western culture, in which human beings are recognized as being created in the image of God. Common ID arguments involving scientific naturalism, "irreducible complexity," "complex specified information," and "icons of evolution," have been thoroughly examined and refuted. Nevertheless, from Kansas to Ohio to the U.S. Congress, ID continues lobbying to teach the controversy, and scientists need to be ready to defend good evolution education.

Leaders and Followers in the Intelligent-Design Movement

Leaders and Followers in the Intelligent-Design Movement

Intelligent Design Psychology and Evolutionary Psychology on Consciousness: Turning Water into Wine

From the titles of some recent evolutionary psychology publications on the mind, one could get the impression that the mystery of consciousness has been solved, but serious questions and doubts persist. Many scientists have deep reservations about Darwinian theory. Some of these scientists promote the Intelligent Design movement, which has received recent attention from scholars in biology, biochemistry, mathematics, philosophy, and theology. Intelligent Design theory both challenges the naturalistic evolutionary account of life and proposes an alternative scientific research program. Its aim is to investigate the natural world for evidence of divine causes and to detect the patterns or fingerprints of an intelligent designer. The implications of this theory for the field of psychology are examined, and a new field, a Christian version of Intelligent Design Psychology (IDPC) is proposed. The article then briefly compares the psychological implications of IDPC with its chief rival, a naturalistic version of evolutionary psychology (EPN), in relation to consciousness and self-consciousness, including why these phenomena provide serious difficulties for EPN, while at the same time providing positive support for IDPC. Both approaches are examined for their comparative abilities to describe, explain, and predict various facets of human persons that center on consciousness and self-conscious emotions.

Intelligent Design Psychology and Evolutionary Psychology: A Comparison of Rival Paradigms

The purpose of this article is to flesh out some details of the ideas at the core of the Intelligent Design movement as they apply to the field of psychology and to compare intelligent design psychology (IDP), specifically, a Christian version of IDP (IDPC), with its chief rival, evolutionary psychology (EP), specifically, a naturalistic version of EP (EPN). After providing some preliminary remarks about scientific research programs and scientific theory assessment, I shall will sketch out some of the details of IDPC and contrast it with EPN. Along the way, I will draw out various explanatory or predictive issues relevant to comparing the two, and provide an occasional critique of EPN.

Intelligent Design: A Look at Some of the Relevant Literature

In these pages I will summarize some literature that may be useful to readers interested in gaining a rhetorical perspective on the intelligent design movement (hereafter ID). I will begin by discussing some of the relevant ways that scholarship in the rhetoric of science can inform an understanding of this movement. Then, I will turn to the ID debate itself by examining discourses of prominent evolutionary scientists and their counterparts who advocate design.

Intelligent Design, Darwinism, and the Philosophy of Public Education

Intelligent Design, Darwinism, and the Philosophy of Public Education John Angus Campbell The present issue of Rhetoric & Public Affairs is dedicated to exploring the question of Intelligent Design (ID). ID is at once an argument against the orthodox Darwinian claim that mindless forces—principally variation, inheritance, natural selection, and sufficient time—can account for the principal features of the biological world; a critique of the prevailing philosophy of science that limits explanation to purely physical or material causes; and a public movement to make Darwinism, its evidence, philosophic presuppositions, and rhetorical tactics a matter of informed, broad, and spirited public discussion. Central to all three aspects of ID— as argument, critique, and movement for public debate over Darwinism—is its claim that if science education is to be other than state-sponsored propaganda a clear and principled distinction must be drawn between empirical science and the patently materialist philosophy that drives contemporary Darwinian theories of origin and development.1 Because the ID movement is just now coming into public awareness—chiefly through the tireless publication, speaking, and debating of its leader, Berkeley law professor Phillip Johnson, and the publication of Lehigh University biochemist Mike Behe's Darwin's Black Box—its more detailed technical arguments are not yet well known.2 Since a central aim of Rhetoric & Public Affairs is to engage public issues and not just wait for them to happen (and to awaken the postmodern university from its theory-induced spectatorish political torpor) our current issue provides Intelligent Design a forum. Our aim is not to advocate ID but to advance public understanding of the nature of science, science policy, and the rhetoric of science. The best plan for the present issue would have been to offer equal time to representatives of Darwinism. Because of limitations of space, and because the Darwinian position is well known, we have given the floor to the "newcomers"—though intelligent design is hardly new—and have invited six respondents representing a variety of John Angus Camphell is Professor of Communication at the University of Memphis in Memphis, Tennessee, and a Fellow in the Discovery Institute Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture in Seattle, Washington. He is immediate past president of the American Association for the Rhetoric of Science and Technology. © Rhetoric & Public Affairs Vol. 1, No. 4, 1998, pp. 469-502 ISSN 1094-8392 470 Rhetoric & Public Affairs disciplinary perspectives to offer opinions, critiques, cautions, or rejoinders. In place of our regular book review section we have asked our rhetoric of science colleague Tom Lessl to write a review essay of recent works relevant to questions raised by ID, by Darwinism, and by the rhetorical dimensions of science. To set forth the case for ID we have asked the five, predominantly young philosophers and philosopher-scientists who are its chief architects, to make their case. The philosopher, scientist, and theologian Bill Dembski (Ph.D. Mathematics, University of Chicago, Ph.D. Philosophy, University of Illinois at Chicago, M.Div. Princeton Theological Seminary) will set forth the basic logic of ID. The philosopher and historian of science Steve Meyer (Ph.D. History and Philosophy of Science, St. Catherine's College, Cambridge), building on Dembski's argument, will review origin -of-life research and argue how the nature and specificity of information preclude Darwinian arguments based on chance, necessity, and deep time. The scientist and theologian Jonathan Wells (Ph.D. Religious Studies, Yale, Ph.D. Developmental Biology, University of California, Berkeley) and the philosopher-scientist Paul Nelson (Ph.D. Philosophy of Biology, University of Chicago), who is founding editor of the ID movement's journal Origins & Design, will take issue with Theodosius Dobzhanski's famous observation that "nothing in biology makes sense without evolution." The biochemist Mike Behe (Ph.D. Biochemistry, University of Pennsylvania) will conclude our ID forum by summarizing his case for the "irreducible complexity" of microbiological structures. Responding to these papers are the philosopher and rhetorician of science David Depew; the biochemist and chair of the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at California State University, Fullerton, Bruce Weber; law professor and ID founder Phillip Johnson; rhetorical critic and rhetorician of science Celeste M. Condit; philosopher of argument and rhetorician of...