Paul Nelson

Senior Fellow, Center for Science and Culture

Paul A. Nelson is currently a Senior Fellow of the Discovery Institute and Adjunct Professor in the Master of Arts Program in Science & Religion at Biola University. He is a philosopher of biology who has been involved in the intelligent design debate internationally for three decades. His grandfather, Byron C. Nelson (1893-1972), a theologian and author, was an influential mid-20th century dissenter from Darwinian evolution. After Paul received his B.A. in philosophy with a minor in evolutionary biology from the University of Pittsburgh, he entered the University of Chicago, where he received his Ph.D. (1998) in the philosophy of biology and evolutionary theory.

As an early associate of Professor Phillip Johnson of UC-Berkeley, author of the bestselling critique Darwin on Trial, Paul was an organizer of the Mere Creation conference (1996), where the modern intelligent design research community first formed. His research interests include the relationship between developmental biology and our knowledge of the history of life, the theory of intelligent design, and the interaction of science and theology. Paul lectures frequently at colleges and universities throughout the United States and Europe, has spoken on American and Italian national public radio, and written for popular publications as varied as the Oslo Dagbladet and the Christian Research Journal.

Nelson’s scholarly articles have appeared in journals such as Biology & Philosophy, BIO-Complexity, Zygon, Rhetoric and Public Affairs, and Touchstone, and book chapters in the anthologies Mere Creation (Intervarsity Press), Signs of Intelligence (Brazos), Intelligent Design Creationism and Its Critics (MIT Press), and Darwin, Design, Public Education (Michigan State University Press), and Next Generation Systematics (Cambridge University Press). Paul is one of the authors of the biology textbook Explore Evolution, and has appeared in several films on intelligent design for Illustra Media. He is a member of the Society for Developmental Biology (SDB) and the International Society for the History, Philosophy, and Social Studies of Biology (ISHPSSB).

Paul is married to Suzanne Nelson, M.D., M.P.H., a pediatric gastroenterologist, and they have two daughters currently attending graduate school. The family resides in Glenview, Illinois.

Archives

Is Epicurus Smiling?

Eugene Koonin pointed out that any abiogenesis scenario requires a cosmological background theory against which any local event probabilities must be evaluated.

Nature Paper: Groundbreaking Science on the Decline

On today’s ID the Future philosopher of science Paul Nelson discusses a new paper in Nature making waves in the scientific community, “Papers and Patents are Becoming Less Disruptive over Time.” According to Michael Park and his fellow researchers, the rate of groundbreaking scientific discoveries is declining while the percentage of consolidating (or incremental) science is coming to dominate. Is the spirit of groundbreaking scientific discovery withering, and if so, why? Nelson notes a 1997 book by John Horgan, The End of Science. Nelson credits Horgan for seeing the trend a generation ahead of the Park paper, but Nelson breaks with Horgan on the diagnosis. Horgan posits that groundbreaking science is declining because we have already made most of the big breakthroughs there are