Intelligent Design

Intelligent design, the view that the universe was created by some sort of intelligent designer, has inserted itself into the curriculum debates of state boards of education and local school boards. The argument revolves around whether public schools should teach intelligent design and Darwin's theories of evolution. The historical root of the intelligent design theory goes back to the Scopes Trial, also called the Scopes Monkey Trial, in Dayton, Tennessee, in 1925. This religious attack by Christian fundamentalists and attorney William Jennings Bryan against the teaching of evolution still echoed in the 2005 court case, Kitmiller vs. Dover Area School District. From Dayton to Dover, from 1925 to the present, the attempt of [Page 475]some Christian groups to insert sectarian religious interpretations into the public school curriculum has been a matter of considerable attention and debate.

In the Dover case, the court ruled that the defendants presented no convincing evidence of a valid secular purpose. The school board was found to be using the secular arguments for intelligent design as a pretext for its real purpose, which was to promote religion in the public school classroom. Furthermore, the court ruled that this was a violation of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

Intelligent design represents a rhetorical struggle between the two extremes of science and religion. One side insists that the universe is perfectly balanced and contains all the properties that humans should expect. Essentially, there is no design, no purpose, no evil, and no good. All that is manifest from nature is indifference. The other side also insists that the universe has all the properties that humans should expect, but in opposition to the no-design view, these proponents insist on divine creation, with abundant evidence of cosmic design. Originally known as the argument “from design,” the idea of intelligent design was first taught by William Paley, a 19th-century British theologian. Paley's archetypal metaphor was that of a watchmaker. He argued that if one found a watch in the woods, it would indicate that a watchmaker existed who had created the timepiece. By an extension of this logic, since we know a universe exists, there must be a universe maker.

Today's intelligent design advocates, such as Michael Behe and William Dembski, insist that their theory is based on scientific discovery and not faith. Overall, the scientific community disputes the claims of intelligent design and insists that it is merely religious truth claims masquerading as science. To be fair, Michael Behe, a leading intelligent-design scientist, is professor of biological sciences at Lehigh University. He argues for a minimal intelligent design theory by saying that his idea of intelligent design requires only physical evidence of an intelligence behind creation and its complex natural systems.

The basic theory of intelligent design is that biological organisms owe their origin to a preexistent intelligence. It locates the origins of new organisms in an immaterial cause in a blueprint, a plan, and a pattern devised by an intelligent agent. This is not the same as arguing that the universe was created by a good and loving God. Opponents of intelligent design assume that the theory is sectarian and religious because the proponents and supporters of intelligent design are primarily conservative, evangelical Christians.

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