^{Date
Jun01Jul172021
June
06
Jun
1
01
2021

Time
00:00:00

Locale
Dallas, TX

Venue
Dallas, TX}

The CSC Seminar on Intelligent Design in the Natural Sciences

The CSC Seminar on Intelligent Design in the Natural Sciences will prepare students to make research contributions advancing the growing science of intelligent design (ID). The seminar will explore cutting-edge ID work in fields such as molecular biology, biochemistry, embryology, developmental biology, paleontology, computational biology, ID-theoretic mathematics, cosmology, physics, and the history and philosophy of science. The seminar will include presentations on the application of intelligent design to laboratory research as well as frank treatment of the academic realities that ID researchers confront in graduate school and beyond, and strategies for dealing with them.

Although the primary focus of the seminar is science, there also will be discussion of the worldview implications of the debate over intelligent design. Participants will benefit from instruction and interaction with prominent ID researchers and scholars. Past seminars have included such speakers as Michael Behe, Stephen Meyer, William Dembski, Jonathan Wells, Paul Nelson, Jay Richards, Douglas Axe, Ann Gauger, Richard Sternberg, Robert Marks, Scott Minnich, and Bruce Gordon. The seminar is open to students who intend to pursue graduate studies in the natural sciences or the philosophy of science. Student applicants must be college juniors or seniors or already in graduate school. We also reserve spaces for a cohort of professional applicants, including postdocs, professors, scientists, teachers, pastors, or other working professionals.

Do you have a commitment to truth and to following the evidence where it leads? Do you have the desire, the vision and the determination necessary to breathe new purpose into the scientific enterprise and influence its self-understanding in ways that will benefit both science and humanity? Apply to become one of a select group of students participating in this exciting program.

Format & Dates

The 2021 Seminar on Intelligent Design in the Natural Sciences will be comprised of three parts:

(1) Self-paced online curriculum including special video lectures, readings, and more
(June–July)

(2) Online discussions with seminar faculty and fellow participants over Zoom
(June 25–26, July 2–3, and July 9–10)

(3) A capstone weekend of lectures and discussions held in Dallas, TX for U.S. participants and online for international participants (July 15–17)

Questions?

Contact Daniel Reeves at dreeves@discovery.org
or (206) 826-5557

Update: Application deadline has ended as of April 30, 2021.

Were you looking for the CS Lewis Program on Science and Society?

Admission Requirements

Students applicants must be currently enrolled in a college or university as a junior, senior, or graduate student. Required application materials include:
(1) Resume/CV
(2) Copy of academic transcript
(3) Short statement describing your interest in intelligent design and its perceived relationship to your field of study and/or career plans
(4) Letter of recommendation from a professor who is familiar with your work and friendly toward ID
(or) Phone interview between the applicant and a seminar director

Cost

There is no application fee or tuition, and those admitted to the program will receive digital course materials free-of-charge, including books, articles, and other resources. U.S. participants who will also be attending the capstone weekend in the Dallas area will be provided with lodging, meals, and the ability to request a need-based travel scholarship towards airfare.

Faculty

Michael J. Behe

_{Senior Fellow, Center for Science and Culture}

Michael J. Behe is Professor of Biological Sciences at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania and a Senior Fellow at Discovery Institute’s Center for Science and Culture. He received his Ph.D. in Biochemistry from the University of Pennsylvania in 1978. Behe's current research involves delineation of design and natural selection in protein structures. In his career he has authored over 40 technical papers and three books, Darwin Devolves: The New Science About DNA that Challenges Evolution, Darwin’s Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution, and The Edge of Evolution: The Search for the Limits of Darwinism, which argue that living system at the molecular level are best explained as being the result of deliberate intelligent design.

David Klinghoffer

_{Senior Fellow and Editor, Evolution News}

David Klinghoffer is a Senior Fellow of Discovery Institute’s Center for Science and Culture. He is the author of six books including The Lord Will Gather Me In: My Journey to Jewish Orthodoxy and, with Senator Joseph Lieberman, The Gift of Rest. A former senior editor at National Review, he has contributed to the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and other publications. He received an A.B. magna cum laude from Brown University in 1987. Born in Santa Monica, CA, he lives on Mercer Island, WA.

Stephen C. Meyer

_{Director, Center for Science and Culture}

Dr. Stephen C. Meyer received his PhD from the University of Cambridge in the philosophy of science. A former geophysicist and college professor, he now directs the Center for Science and Culture at the Discovery Institute in Seattle. He is author of the New York Times-bestseller Darwin’s Doubt (2013) as well as the book Signature in the Cell (2009) and Return of the God Hypothesis (2021). In 2004, Meyer ignited a firestorm of media and scientific controversy when a biology journal at the Smithsonian Institution published his peer-reviewed scientific article advancing intelligent design. Meyer has been featured on national television and radio programs, including The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, CBS's Sunday Morning, NBC's Nightly News, ABC's World News, Good Morning America, Nightline, FOX News Live, and the Tavis Smiley show on PBS. He has also been featured in two New York Times front-page stories and has garnered attention in other top-national media.

Jay W. Richards

_{Senior Fellow at Discovery, Senior Research Fellow at Heritage Foundation}

Jay W. Richards, Ph.D., is the Director of the DeVos Center and William E. Simon Senior Research Fellow at the Heritage Foundation, and a Senior Fellow at Discovery Institute. Richards is author or editor of more than a dozen books, including the New York Times bestsellers Infiltrated (2013) and Indivisible (2012); The Human Advantage; Money, Greed, and God, winner of a 2010 Templeton Enterprise Award; The Hobbit Party with Jonathan Witt; The Privileged Planet with Guillermo Gonzalez, coming out in a second edition in 2024; The Price of Panic: How the Tyranny of Experts Turned a Pandemic Into a Catastrophe with Douglas Axe and William Briggs; and Eat, Fast, Feast. His most recent book, with James Robison, is Fight the Good Fight: How an Alliance of Faith and Reason Can Win the Culture War.

Jonathan Wells

_{Senior Fellow, Center for Science and Culture}

A molecular and cell biologist, Jonathan Wells (1942-2024) was author of the path-breaking book Icons of Evolution: Why much of what we teach about evolution is wrong (2000), which exposed serious inaccuracies in how evolution has been taught in contemporary science textbooks. A Senior Fellow with the Center for Science and Culture at Discovery Institute, Wells was also a proponent of the scientific theory of intelligent design.

John G. West

_{Senior Fellow, Managing Director, and Vice President of Discovery Institute}

Dr. John G. West is Vice President of the Seattle-based Discovery Institute and Managing Director of the Institute’s Center for Science and Culture. Formerly the Chair of the Department of Political Science and Geography at Seattle Pacific University, West is an award-winning author and documentary filmmaker who has written or edited 12 books, including Darwin Day in America: How Our Politics and Culture Have Been Dehumanized in the Name of Science, The Magician’s Twin: C. S. Lewis on Science, Scientism, and Society, and Walt Disney and Live Action: The Disney Studio’s Live-Action Features of the 1950s and 60s. His documentary films include Fire-Maker, Revolutionary, The War on Humans, and (most recently) Human Zoos. West holds a PhD in Government from Claremont Graduate University, and he has been interviewed by media outlets such as CNN, Fox News, Reuters, Time magazine, The New York Times, USA Today, and The Washington Post.

Jonathan Witt

_{Executive Editor, Discovery Institute Press and Senior Fellow, Center for Science and Culture}

Jonathan Witt, PhD, is Executive Editor of Discovery Institute Press and a Senior Fellow with the Center for Science and Culture. His co-authored books include Intelligent Design Uncensored (IVP), A Meaningful World: How the Arts and Sciences Reveal the Genius of Nature (IVP), and The Hobbit Party: The Vision of Freedom That Tolkien Got, and the West Forgot (Ignatius Press). Witt is also the lead writer and associate producer for Poverty, Inc., winner of the $100,000 Templeton Freedom Award and recipient of over 50 international film festival honors. His latest book is a YA novel co-authored with astronomer Guillermo Gonzalez, The Farm at the Center of the Universe.