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.All the major scientificsocieties in the United States have issued statements supportingevolution and rejecting intelligent design.Behe's own depart-ment at Lehigh University has put it as well as any:The faculty in the Department of Biological Sciences is com-mitted to the highest standards of scientific integrity and aca-demic function.This commitment carries with it unwaveringsupport for academic freedom and the free exchange of ideas.Italso demands the utmost respect for the scientific method,integrity in the conduct of research, and recognition that thevalidity of any scientific model comes only as a result ofrational hypothesis testing, sound experimentation, and find-ings that can be replicated by others.The department faculty, then, are unequivocal in their supportof evolutionary theory, which has its roots in the seminal workof Charles Darwin and has been supported by findings accumu-lated over 140 years.The sole dissenter from this position, Prof.Michael Behe, is a well-known proponent of "intelligentdesign." While we respect Prof.Behe's right to express his views,they are his alone and are in no way endorsed by the depart-ment.It is our collective position that intelligent design has nobasis in science, has not been tested experimentally, and shouldnot be regarded as scientific.26Amid faculty protests, Dembski has left Baylor University, thelargest Baptist university in the world, for the Southern BaptistTheological Seminary.27 Many scholars at Baylor and other Chris-THE ILLUSION OF DESIGN 59tian universities have come to realize that intelligent design doesnot provide respectable support for their religious beliefs.28The battle over intelligent design, which is fought in the polit-ical arena rather than in scientific venues, is producing its share oflitigation.29 In a court case that attracted world attention inDecember 2005, a federal court in Dover, Pennsylvania, deter-mined that intelligent design was motivated by religion and thuspresenting it in science classes in public schools is unconstitu-tional.30 This would seem to signal the death knell for intelligentdesign except for a subtle point that has escaped the notice of mostof the scientific community and others that support evolution.In the Dover trial Judge John E.Jones III ruled that teachingintelligent design (ID) in public-school science classes is anunconstitutional violation of church and state.This case mirroredMcLean v.Arkansas, described above.In both trials, the presiding federal judges went further thanwas necessary in making their rulings.Not only did the juristsrule creation science and ID as unconstitutional entanglementsof government with religion, which would have been sufficient todecide each case (as Judge Jones admitted in his decision), butthey also labeled them as not science.In doing so, they wereforced to define science something on which neither scientistsnor philosophers have been able to reach a consensus.In Arkansas, Judge William R.Overton relied mainly on thetestimony of philosopher Michael Ruse and defined science asfollows:31(1) It is guided by natural law;(2) It has to be explained by reference to natural law;(3) It is testable against the empirical world;(4) Its conclusions are tentative, that is, are not necessarilythe final word;(5) It is falsifiable.60 GOD: THE FAILED HYPOTHESISThe eminent philosopher Larry Laudan, my colleague at the Uni-versity of Hawaii at the time, had worked for years on the so-called demarcation problem, how to draw a line between scienceand nonscience.When the Arkansas decision was announced,Laudan objected strenuously.He pointed out that creation sci-ence is in fact testable, tentative, and falsifiable.For example, itpredicts a young Earth and other geological facts that have, infact, been falsified.Falsified science can still be science, justwrong science.Laudan warned that the Arkansas decision wouldcome back to haunt science by "perpetuating and canonizing afalse stereotype on what science is and how it works."32Coming up to date, we similarly find that intelligent design istestable, tentative, and falsifiable.As described above, the claimsof primary design theorists William Dembski and Michael Behehave been thoroughly refuted and in some cases falsified.I am not quibbling with the ruling that ID, as practiced by theDover Board of Education, represented an unconstitutionalattempt to promote a sectarian view of creation under the guiseof science.And I also agree that ID has all the markings of pseu-doscience rather than genuine science.Judge Jones relied on the Arkansas precedent and witnessesfrom both sides who testified that for ID to be considered science,the ground rules of science would have to be broadened to allowthe consideration of supernatural forces.This position was bothunwise and incorrect, for reasons I discussed in chapter 1.It isunwise because it plays into the hands of those who accuse sci-ence of dogmatism in refusing to consider the possibility on non-natural elements at work in the universe.It is incorrect becausescience is not forbidden from considering supernatural causes.Furthermore, some reputable scientists are doing just that.THE ILLUSION OF DESIGN 61SELF-ORGANIZATIONProponents of intelligent design often point to a statement by "400scientists" that is purported to demonstrate their support for intel-ligent design.Let me quote the exact statement: "We are skepticalof claims for the ability of random mutation and natural selectionto account for the complexity of life.Careful examination of theevidence for Darwinian theory should be encouraged [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]