Intelligent Design Theory: The Latest Version of Creationism
"ID" theory is the latest version of creationism to emerge at the end of the 20th century. This theory holds that biological structures—characterized by complexity and rich information—cannot emerge by virtue of natural forces alone, but only through the intervention of some supernatural intelligent power. The use of the specific term "intelligent" design is intended to avoid the conspicuous terminology employed by traditional creationism, such as "God," "Deity," and "Creation," thereby circumventing legal obstacles to entering the field of public education. The ID movement was initiated in the 1990s by Philip Johnson, a professor of law at the University of California, Berkeley. Its research center is the unofficial "Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture" (CRSC) of the Discovery Institute, located in Seattle, Washington. ID theory attempts to unify various forms of creationism by demanding that they set aside internal differences to confront their common enemy—evolutionary theory—under the shared slogan of "creation" or "design." As human history entered the 1990s, the ID movement became the representative of creationism and began to lead the struggle against evolution.
I. The ID Movement and Its "Wedge" Strategy
(1) The Origins of the ID Movement
According to Barbara Forrest [1], an American philosopher and one of the primary leaders opposing the ID movement, this movement did not arise from a scientific crisis, but rather from Johnson's personal confusion following his divorce. This failed marriage caused Johnson to become a devout believer in the religious conviction of being a "born-again" Christian. Thus, in a sense, the Wedge movement is an adjunct to a religious conversion in Johnson's life. In his own explanation, Johnson stated:
My marriage and family life had shattered; although I had achieved some academic success, I had gained a meaningless life, which led me... at the energetic age of 38, to commit myself to Christ. This awakened a specific level of intellectual interest in researching why the world of knowledge is always dominated by the ideologies of naturalism and agnosticism. [2]
Nancy Pearcey, a colleague of Johnson’s, also noted:
Phillip Johnson has politically led and molded this movement, proposing what he calls the "ID" movement. Johnson is a law professor at UC Berkeley who did this because, stimulated by his failed marriage, he converted to Christianity in mid-life. [3]
Johnson published his work Darwin on Trial in 1991, opening the curtains on the ID movement. In 1999, the CRSC published its manifesto:
The consequences of this materialism’s cultural success have been quite destructive. Materialism denies the existence of objective moral standards, claiming that the environment dictates our behaviors and beliefs. This moral relativism has been adopted uncritically by many social sciences and remains the foundation of much of modern economics, political science, psychology, and sociology. By asserting that human thought and behavior are controlled by our biology and environment, materialism similarly undermines individual responsibility. This result is manifest in modern criminal trials, product liability regulation, and welfare. Within the materialistic framework of these social affairs, all people have been victims; no one can be held properly responsible for his or her actions. The goal of the CRSC is nothing less than the effort to overthrow this materialism and its legacy. The center of its inquiry is to show how new developments in biology, physics, and cognitive science challenge scientific materialism, having reopened the doors to a broad theistic understanding of nature. The center grants fellowships to its members for original research, holds conferences, and acts as a formulator of conviction for the prospect of life after materialism. [4]
(2) The "Wedge" Strategy of the ID Movement
For a long time, creationism was disseminated primarily through oral tradition or pamphlets within limited localities (such as churches). However, since the 1990s, the ID movement has utilized modern means of communication such as television, radio, video tapes, and the Internet to conduct grand-scale hype. One could confidently say that creationism’s influence in institutions of higher education was previously negligible; it was primarily taught by pastors in churches. Today, however, certain members of the ID movement have secured important positions in universities or colleges and are leading the assault on evolutionary theory. Their academic credentials and social resources grant them easy access to broad public forums. Entering higher education institutions is seen as a hallmark of their new starting point; this is the "Wedge" strategy for creationism to intervene in mainstream academia.
Johnson declared:
Throughout the 20th century, Christianity has played a defensive role... to protect what they have, to protect as much as they can. They have now launched an offensive campaign... We are not asking to turn the tide; what we can do is something entirely different. We are attempting to enter the enemy's territory, their core, and detonate their arsenal. In this metaphor, what is their arsenal? It is their prejudice regarding creation. [5]
If we understand our era, we will know that we should acknowledge God’s world by challenging the dominance of naturalism and materialism in the world of the mind. Relying on many of our friends, I have proposed a strategy for carrying out this work... we call it the "Wedge." [6]
In these passages, Johnson describes the "Wedge" strategy for advancing the ID movement. In his book Defeating Darwinism by Opening Minds, Johnson speaks openly about this strategy: using a wedge to first open a small hole and then split a giant log. "We call our strategy the 'Wedge.' A giant log looks like a solid mass, but a wedge can eventually be inserted into a crack, gradually tearing it open and finally splitting it apart. In this situation, the ideology of scientific materialism (often called naturalism by ID movement members) is clearly that stubborn log." [7]
The plan for ID’s "Wedge" activities includes three steps. The first step is to establish research projects, which include: (1) specialized paleo-biological research projects; (2) specialized molecular biology research projects; and (3) individual research grant projects. The second step is to manufacture public opinion, which includes: (1) promotion of books; (2) holding academic exchange conferences; (3) organizing apologetics lectures; (4) teacher training programs; (5) publishing editorials; (6) utilizing PBS or television; and (7) distributing promotional materials and publications. The third step is to engage in cultural confrontation and renewal, which includes: (1) holding academic and scientific challenge conferences; (2) establishing social science research grant projects to shift into the fields of social sciences and humanities; and (3) removing possible legal obstacles to entering middle school classrooms.
Three important sponsoring institutions have provided large amounts of research funding for the CRSC. It is estimated that by the year 2000, this center had received over $1 million in related sponsorships. Fieldstead & Co. began increasing its funding to the Discovery Institute in the summer of 1988, deciding to provide $300,000 annually. In 1999, the Maclellan Foundation provided $400,000 in funding, and the Stewardship Foundation agreed to provide the institute with $200,000 annually for the five-year period from 1999 to 2003. [8] According to Larry Witham in the Washington Times, all three of the aforementioned funds have "Christian backgrounds." Bruce Chapman, president of the ID movement, acknowledged this support: "We no longer worry about research funding. We believe certain ideas are destined to change the intellectual world (and future politics); otherwise, Fieldstead & Co., the Maclellan Foundation, and the Stewardship Foundation would not have given us such substantial funding." [9]
By 2000, as their program was elucidated in the "Wedge" documents and supported by sufficient funding, these strategies began to be implemented and gained significant momentum. From an initial base of only four researchers, the CRSC currently has 41 members, 13 of whom hold senior professional titles. With the October 1999 founding of the Michael Polanyi Center at Baylor University—led by CRSC members William Dembski and Bruce Gordon—the "Wedge" movement’s insertion into science has grown deeper and deeper.
However, Barbara Forrest used statistical methods to study literature in academic journals since 1997 and found that papers on ID as a biological theory do not exist. In the BIOSIS and Medline databases, she entered the keyword "intelligent design" and searched 4 articles; only one was regarding ID, and it was an article by Sahotra Sarkar [10] in Philosophy of Science criticizing ID theory. Entering the keyword "design theory" into BIOSIS yielded 16 articles, but none were related to ID creationism. In the online medical literature analysis and retrieval system, the keywords "intelligent design" and "design theory" yielded 14 articles, none of which were related to ID creationism. Among the 61 articles found in SciSearch for "intelligent design," all except four were related to industrial technology, engineering, computers, and shipbuilding. Among these four, two were related to intelligent design as biological theory—namely, the aforementioned critique by Sahotra Sarkar in Philosophy of Science and the rebuttal by Behe. The other two were titled "Intelligent Design" in Geotimes and "Re-examining Intelligent Design Theory" in Technology Review; neither explicitly viewed ID as a biological theory.
Therefore, Forrest concludes:
This analysis shows that the ID "Wedge" movement into mainstream science has failed in its most important goal: scientific knowledge of intelligent design creationism and related papers published in scientific journals are considerably lacking. Therefore... no member of the CRSC has researched scientific evidence that can support intelligent design theory... In all its activities attempting to strategically "wedge" into mainstream science, the work of the CRSC has completely failed. [10]
Despite the lack of success in the first stage of the "Wedge" strategy—the research stage—ID theorists began their second stage of "manufacturing public opinion" and third stage of "cultural confrontation and renewal" ahead of schedule. They sponsored "opinion-making conferences" and apologetics forums, published books and editorials, and wrote textbooks for teachers to disseminate their ideas. They established connections with the media; for instance, the Washington Times, Books & Culture, and other conservative newspapers and magazines regularly support them. They lobby various levels of legislative bodies and boards of education across the United States.
In November 1996, Johnson and his assistants held a "Mere Creation" conference at Biola University, a Christian university in California. The proceedings of this conference, titled Mere Creation: Science, Faith and Intelligent Design, featured a preface by Henry Schaefer, a chemist at the University of Georgia, who clearly pointed out the goals of the meeting: the conference provided an opportunity for scientists and scholars who reject materialism as the basis for scientific research to gather together, allowing them to seek a unified creationism within the framework of ID and laying the foundation for the organizational development of ID in the United States. [11] As Scott Swanson wrote in his report on the conference for Christianity Today:
The nascent "ID" movement contends that Darwin’s explanation of human origins is insufficient, and the movement’s goal is to transition from the periphery to the mainstream... The first major gathering of ID supporters occurred at a November conference at Biola University, a Christian university in California... As expected for this meeting, ID is gaining a substantial following; over 160 academic groups were represented, with attendees from 98 universities, colleges, and organizations. {12}
(3) Legal Contests To introduce ID into public school classrooms, the "CRSC" has taken actions attempting to eliminate relevant legal obstacles. David K. DeWolf, a law professor at Gonzaga University in Washington State and a senior fellow at the CRSC; Stephen C. Meyer, a philosophy professor at Whitworth College; and Mark E. DeForrest (not a CRSC member) co-authored the book Intelligent Design in Public School Science Curricula: A Legal Guidebook (1999). On its science education website, the CRSC claims, "Our curriculum will be legally permitted to be taught in public schools... No more intimidation and suppression of classroom reform." {13} This approach of using the law to change how the public and influential policymakers evaluate science is vital to its "wedge strategy" [12] for entering the field of education.
Prior to 1968, American creationism sought to prohibit the teaching of evolution in public secondary schools through statutes such as Tennessee's 1925 Butler Act. Arkansas, for instance, had an anti-evolution law passed by a popular vote in 1928. This statute prohibited any public school (or university) from teaching "the theory or doctrine that mankind ascended or descended from a lower order of animals." In 1968, the U.S. Supreme Court declared this statute null and void because the "sole reason" why the law made the teaching of evolution illegal was that it was "deemed to conflict" with "a particular interpretation of the Book of Genesis." The statute was "establishing a religion," which is precisely what the First Amendment to the Constitution prohibits. After the failure of attempts to prohibit the teaching of evolution through law, American creationists attempted to use "equal time" laws to give creation science and evolutionary theory equal instructional status in public secondary schools. In 1981, Arkansas passed "Act 590." Reverend McLean of Little Rock, Arkansas, served as the plaintiff, and in 1982, Judge Overton declared Act 590 invalid. This ruling was of great significance for subsequent court trials regarding creationism because it relied on a definitive definition of science to rule that "creation science" was not a science but a religion. The 1987 U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Edwards v. Aguillard stated: "[The Louisiana 'Creationism Act,' which required creation science to be taught alongside evolution in public schools,] has as its primary purpose the goal of changing the public school science curriculum to provide persuasive advantage to a particular religious doctrine that rejects the factual basis of evolution in its entirety. Thus, the Act was designed either to promote the theory of creation science which embodies a particular religious tenet of a religious denomination or to prohibit the teaching of a scientific theory because of its opposition to such a tenet. In either case, the Act violates the First Amendment." After 1987, this ruling became the precedent for judges presiding over creationism cases in American courts.
In October 2004, the Dover Area School Board in the United States proposed a resolution requiring that "students will be made aware of gaps/problems in Darwin's theory and of other theories of evolution including, but not limited to, intelligent design." In November 2004, the board mandated that when evolution was taught in the ninth-grade science curriculum, teachers must read a statement of approximately one minute to the students: explaining to them that evolution was not a "scientific fact" and that "intelligent design" is an explanation of the origin of life that differs from Darwin’s own explanation. Eleven parents of students from Dover, Pennsylvania, filed a lawsuit against this requirement. This led to the case of Tammy Kitzmiller, et al. v. Dover Area School District, et al. {14} This was a U.S. federal court case concerning a statement in public school curricula that intelligent design could serve as an alternative to evolutionary explanations for the origin of species. The plaintiffs successfully demonstrated that ID is a form of creationism and that the Dover Area School Board's policy violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The judge's ruling provoked a considerable reaction from both supporters and opponents. Because of the involvement of the book Of Pandas and People, this case is also known as the "Panda Trial," echoing a similar case from 1925, the Scopes "Monkey Trial." The plaintiffs were represented by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Americans United for Separation of Church and State, the National Center for Science Education, and the law firm Pepper Hamilton. The defendants were represented by the Thomas More Law Center. The Foundation for Thought and Ethics, the original publisher of Of Pandas and People, also sought to join the defense but was subsequently denied.
Judge Jones’s final ruling was as follows: "The citizens of the Dover area were poorly served by the members of the Board who voted for the ID Policy. It is ironic that several of these individuals, who so staunchly and proudly touted their religious convictions in public, would time and again lie to cover their tracks and disguise the real purpose behind the ID Policy. With that said, we do not question that many of the leading advocates of ID have bona fide and deeply held beliefs which drive their scholarly endeavors. Nor do we think that ID should any longer be inhibited from being studied, debated, and discussed. As we stated, our conclusion today is that it is unconstitutional to teach ID as an alternative to evolution in a public school science curriculum..." (p. 138)
II. Reflections on the ID Movement
With Judge Jones’s ruling, the ID movement’s attempt to "wedge" its way into public secondary education was declared institutionally bankrupt. However, this does not mean that the conflict between ID theory and evolutionary theory has ended. The emergence of the ID movement undoubtedly possesses a complex social and cultural background, but it is closely linked to the proliferation of relativism in later philosophy of science.
Methodological naturalists usually assume that the world moves according to natural laws and that people can understand this world based on natural laws; this understanding does not need to involve supernatural powers, such as God. Whether nature exists in a sense that is intervened upon by supernatural powers is not a question considered by methodological naturalism. Methodological naturalism seeks to build a solid wall between science and religion. In the philosophy of science, methodological naturalism manifests in the problem of demarcation. For centuries, philosophers of science have expended a great deal of energy on the problem of demarcating science and non-science, attempting to draw a sufficient and necessary line between them, but all such efforts have failed. Influenced by Anglo-American analytic philosophy, logical empiricism focused only on the general problem of scientific method, using verification or falsification to distinguish science from non-science. The general method of the philosophy of science is itself a type of conceptual analysis, often accompanied by the reconstruction of methods and theories in formal language and symbolic logic. The history of science is largely a history of cognition, focusing on the logical development of scientific theories themselves. The sociology of science focuses on the social functions and structures of science; despite some disagreements, the general attitude toward science is natural realism. Of course, there were simultaneously many unsettling factors threatening this effort to seek a scientific methodology: such as N. R. Hanson's thesis on the theory-ladenness of observation, and Quine’s thesis on the underdetermination of theory by evidence. However, although they admitted that all these unsettling factors were very severe, philosophers of science generally believed they could be transcended or avoided.
Yet, the publication of Kuhn’s The Structure of Scientific Revolutions shattered the illusions of logical empiricism. Although Kuhn tells us that he himself did not intend to fundamentally destroy the assertion that science is a rational enterprise, many readers of The Structure of Scientific Revolutions often overlooked the many subtle and ambiguous ideas within it, hearing only one voice: science does not "progress" through the accumulation of well-confirmed truths, or even by discarding falsified errors, but through revolutionary leaps [13] during catastrophic processes. Thereafter, the history of science is written by the victors; there are no objective standards for evidence, only incommensurable standards belonging to different paradigms; the success of a scientific revolution, like that of a political revolution, relies on propaganda, rhetoric, and the control of resources; the scientist’s shift in loyalty to a new paradigm is not a rational change of mind, but a religious conversion. After conversion, things appear so different to him that we might almost say he lives in "a different world." Subsequently, the "sociological turn" in the philosophy of science appeared—namely, the emergence of social constructivism. Social constructivism holds that science is to a large extent, or in its entirety, a matter of social interests, negotiation, and consultation, or the creation of myths and the production of narrative inscriptions [14]; appeals to "facts," "evidence," or "rationality" are merely ideological lies to cover up the oppression of this or that group. According to this new orthodoxy, science not only lacks any special epistemological authority or unique rational method, but like all purpose-driven "inquiry," it is indeed merely a form of politics. Consequently, from the 1970s onward, while scientists and many philosophers of science maintained an objectivist stance toward science, many historians of science and almost all sociologists of science adopted a position colored by constructivism. Simultaneously, the most perplexing thing for philosophers of science was that for the past 20 years, the development of Science Studies has been almost entirely dominated by social constructivism.
Social constructivism carries a strong color of relativism, directly providing an opportunity for creationism to appear in the name of science and constituting the theoretical foundation of creation science. Creationists believe that science belongs to a "paradigm"; if natural science is the paradigm of the scientific community, then creation science is the paradigm of the biblical fundamentalist sect. Not only are the two incommensurable, but they also possess equal status and equal rights. Evolutionary theory and creationism begin with premises that are entirely different in meaning, articulate their own unique scientific paradigms, accept different basic values and beliefs, and construct conflicting worldviews. The conflict between science and religion thus becomes a battle for cultural authority in a free society; whoever wins will dominate society and culture. In short, from the perspective of social constructivism, this is not a contest between fact and error, but a socio-cultural struggle based on different worldviews.
In his pioneering work of social constructivism, Knowledge and Social Imagery, David Bloor calls for a symmetrical treatment of science and religion. Bloor points out: "Is it not strange to specify science using a religious metaphor? Are they not both neutral principles? This metaphor is both inappropriate and offensive. Those who discover the typical form of knowledge in science cannot possibly commit to religion having the same validity. Thus, we can expect them to view this comparison with disgust. This reaction may ignore a viewpoint whose purpose is to compare the two spheres of social life and point out that the same principles are at work in both. This purpose is neither to disparage one side or the other, nor to plunge the practitioners of these two fields into a quandary. Religious behavior is established around a distinction between the sacred and the profane, and the various manifestations of this distinction are similar to the positions people often take toward science. This point of contact means that perhaps other insights concerning religion can also be applied." {16}
Therefore, Bloor insists that the symmetry principle should be employed to study the relationship between religion and science. That is to say, there is no need to involve nature; one only needs to study the social causes of the polemics between science and religion to reveal the essence of such disputes. Within this framework, discourses of negotiation and rhetoric built upon faith, the operation of power as a social symbol, and the orientation of social interests all play key roles in defining the question of "truth" in both scientific and religious statements.
Consequently, in his book Darwin on Trial, Johnson also positions this debate at the level of worldviews. He views the struggle for authority between evolution and creationism as a conflict of "stories," positing that the battle between the two is a contest between two narratives. Both sides seek to capture the hearts and minds of the people, implying what constitutes the human "good," how they should organize their social lives, and what their responsibilities are. Both stories have persuaded thousands of listeners, many of whom work tirelessly to gain a wider audience for their narrative and to exert a greater influence on the lives of others. Each story reflects the fundamental values and beliefs of certain storytellers; in fact, they reflect a larger-scale struggle hidden within contemporary American culture: "Leaders of science see themselves as locked in a desperate battle against 'religious fundamentalism,' a label that tends to make people believe a Creator plays an active role in secular life. These fundamentalisms are seen as threats to liberalism... As the creation myth of scientific naturalism, [evolution] plays an indispensable ideological role in the battle against fundamentalism."{17}
In summarizing the significance of the debate between evolution and creationism, Kary Smout states: "The creation/evolution controversy is a struggle for cultural power—an example of a polemic of our generation. The recurring debate over creation and evolution—concerning whose view is the self-evident truth and whose is deceptive sophistry—raises several very important questions. When America commits itself to humanity or to God, should our public schools teach a spirit of skeptical criticism or a trusting loyalty to certain other ideals? When the answers given by science and religion to specific questions conflict, should we submit to science or religion? Or should we attempt to show that the answers of both have different meanings in different spheres? When we celebrate the great achievements of the past, should we tell the stories of heroic scientists or extraordinary events from the Bible?"{18}
Concluding Remarks
In the Western cultural context, science and religion are two completely different domains of human activity. Science investigates nature, while religion governs the spiritual and moral life of humanity; the two are unrelated. If one party attempts to intervene in the other’s domain, conflict inevitably erupts. The three major conflicts between science and religion that broke out in the 20th century were rooted in creationism’s attempts to intervene in or replace the theory of evolution. There are many causes for this conflict, among which the current trend of postmodern relativism [15] pervading academia is particularly worthy of our reflection. We believe that methodological naturalism cannot erect a solid wall between science and religion, yet postmodern relativism has moved toward another's absurd extreme. The key issue is that both discuss the relationship between science and religion in the abstract, detached from the concrete practice of science. Therefore, to identify the non-scientific characteristics of creationism, one must contrast the practice of evolutionary theory with the practice of "creation science." Only then can its true non-scientific face be recognized, and a genuine demarcation between science and religion be achieved.
References (Omitted in translation as they consist of standard academic citations provided in the source text.)
Author Biography: Cai Zhong, High-Institute of Humanities and Social Sciences of Nanjing University, Professor and Doctoral Supervisor at the Department of Philosophy, Nanjing University.