Intelligent Design

The Center for Science and Culture

Profile: Intelligent Design and Academic Freedom (Transcript)

This transcript, published by All Things Considered (NPR), is about Discovery Institute Center for Science & Culture Senior Fellow Richard Sternberg:

MICHELE NORRIS, host: From NPR News, this is ALL THINGS CONSIDERED: I’m Michele Norris.

Should intelligent design be mentioned in biology class? In a federal courtroom in Dover, Pennsylvania, this fall, lawyers, scientists and parents debated that question. On Tuesday, voters ejected the school board members who introduced the proposal, but a judge has yet to rule in the case.

Intelligent design is the idea that life is too complex to have evolved through Darwinian evolution. It’s stirring up controversy not only in high school classrooms but at universities and scientific research centers as well. As NPR’s Barbara Bradley Hagerty reports, it’s part of a broader clash between religion and science in popular culture, academia and politics.

BARBARA BRADLEY HAGERTY reporting:

Everything about Richard Sternberg is careful: his wrinkle-free, button-down shirt; his spotless apartment; his deliberate, sometimes halting sentences. And so Sternberg, a staff scientist at the National Institutes of Health, is puzzled to find himself smack in the middle of the culture wars. First, he wants to set the record straight.

Dr. RICHARD STERNBERG (Scientist, National Institutes of Health): I’m not an evangelical. I’m not a fundamentalist. I’m not a young Earth creationist. I’m not a theistic evolutionist.

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Faculty Protest Creation Speech

Original Article A planned lecture by intelligent design proponent John Lennox has upset Samford University faculty who don’t want the Baptist-affiliated school to be seen as endorsing teaching alternatives to evolution. A resolution introduced in the College of Arts and Sciences’ faculty senate describes intelligent design as a political movement, not science. The resolution, by Samford geography professor Max Baber, Read More ›

Setting the Record Straight about Discovery Institute’s Role in the Dover School District Case

Recent news stories have led to confusion about Discovery Institute’s role in the case of Kitzmiller v. Dover School District, which challenges a Pennsylvania school district policy requiring students to be notified about the theory of intelligent design. The lead attorney defending the Dover district, Richard Thompson of the Thomas More Law Center, has made several statements inaccurately characterizing both Read More ›

ID Opens Astronomer’s Mind to Universe’s Surprises

This article, published by Science & Theology News, is about Discovery Institute Center for Science & Culture Senior Fellow Guillermo Gonzalez: In 1995, a solar eclipse he saw in India made him think about Earth’s unique place in the universe — a place designed to be able to study such phenomenon. Though there was no “Eureka!” moment, Gonzalez felt strongly Read More ›

Discovery Institute Welcomes Pope’s Embrace of “Intelligent Project”

Seattle – — Discovery Institute president Bruce Chapman hailed an impromptu statement Wednesday by Pope Benedict XVI embracing the “intelligent project” that lies behind nature. “Fooled by atheism,” the Pope said, many people today “think, and try to demonstrate, that everything is without direction and order…” Instead, said the pope, “Through sacred Scripture, the Lord awakens the reason that sleeps, Read More ›

Groups Weigh in Before Evolution Vote in Kansas

The Associated Press cited Discovery Institute in an article on Kansas science standards published on Nov. 8, 2005: “Under these standards students will learn more about evolution, not less,” said Casey Luskin, a spokesman for the Seattle-based Discovery Institute, which supports intelligent design research. Luskin added: “Anyone who reads the proposed science standards will see that they deal solely with Read More ›

Kansas Becomes Fifth State to Allow Teaching of Scientific Criticism of Evolution in Public Schools

Seattle –— Kansas will become the fifth state in the nation to allow students to learn about the scientific evidence both for and against Darwinian evolution if the Kansas State Board of Education adopts proposed science standards tomorrow as expected. Discovery Institute praised the proposed science standards because they expand the information presented to students about biological and chemical evolution Read More ›

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Microscope in library of books

The Case of Behe vs. Darwin

“Intelligent design is not the dominant view of the scientific community,” he said. “But I’m pleased with the progress we are making.” After two grueling days on the stand, Behe looked drained. He was also unbowed. In a nationally watched trial that could determine whether intelligent design can be taught in a public school, the soft-spoken professor had bucked decades of established scientific thought. Read More ›

Starry Fight

This article, published by the Miami New Times, is about Discovery Institute Center for Science & Culture Senior Fellow Guillermo Gonzalez: Guillermo Gonzalez was a science whiz, the kind of kid classmates eye with awe — —or scorn —— as they fumble with their beakers in chemistry class. While a senior at Hialeah-Miami Lakes High, he interned at Cordis Laboratories, Read More ›

Intelligent Design: Relevant to Science

This article, published by The Minnesota Daily, mentions Discovery Institute Center for Science & Culture Senior Fellow Michael Behe: Professor James Curtsinger, in his Oct. 11 column, “”Intelligent Design 101: Short on science, long on snake oil,”” takes Lehigh University biochemist Michael Behe to task for his concept of irreducible complexity. The rest of the article can be found here.