Center for Science and Culture

We are the institutional hub for scientists, educators, and inquiring minds who think that nature supplies compelling evidence of intelligent design. We support research, sponsor educational programs, defend free speech, and produce articles, books, and multimedia content. Read More …

News

Bringing Past Articles Current to 2020: Butterflies, Hummingbirds, More

_{Evolution News
January 23, 2020}

Here are items reported in 2019 that have made news in 2020: more on butterflies, hummingbirds, and the Cambrian explosion. Structural Color in Butterflies Past articles at Evolution News have discussed the phenomenon of structural color, in which colors are intensified not by pigments but by optics. In a variety of animals, light interference from microscopic ridges and other structures can intensify and diminish particular wavelengths. Butterflies are particularly good at this. A new study published in PNAS extends the trick with light into the infrared, giving butterflies an additional advantage: warmth! The optical properties of microstructures on butterfly wings are well studied in the visible spectrum, providing an understanding …

ID the Future

Dr. Brian Miller Explores Coevolution

_{Sarah Chaffee
January 25, 2020}

On this episode of ID The Future from the vault, Sarah Chaffee interviews Center for Science and Culture Research Coordinator Dr. Brian Miller about co-evolution. Together they explore a recent paper on the subject by Winston Ewert and Robert Marks in BIO-Complexity. Your browser does not support playing Audio, please upgrade your browser or find our podcast on podOmaticDownload …

Honoring Phillip Johnson, Pt. 2: Jonathan Wells and Paul Nelson

_{Jonathan Wells
January 22, 2020}

Today’s episode of ID the Future comes from a Berkeley, California symposium honoring the recently deceased Phillip Johnson. Biologist Jonathan Wells recalls how he met Johnson and the huge influence he had on Wells’ own research and writing. Then philosopher of biology Paul Nelson reminisces on Johnson’s keen intellect, his eye for hidden assumptions, his awareness that “we are not of our own devising,” and on the mountain range of new knowledge opening up to us in biology, one that scientists knew little about even 30 years ago and that Nelson says points strongly away from Darwin’s idea of common descent. Your browser does not support playing Audio, please upgrade your browser or find our podcast on podOmaticDownload Episode Please consider …

Honoring Phillip Johnson, Pt. 1

_{Stephen C. Meyer
January 20, 2020}

Today on ID the Future we hear the first of a series of podcasts in honor of the late Phillip E. Johnson, the pioneering thinker, networker, and organizer, who played such a crucial role in the development and growth of the Intelligent Design movement. These messages come mostly from a November 2019 symposium held in his honor in Berkeley, California. Today we hear Stephen C. Meyer, director of the Discovery Institute’s Center for Science and Culture, as he opens the symposium and introduces speakers to come, and then the first of these speakers, Phillip Johnson himself, in thoughts previously recorded by Illustra Media on intelligent design, philosophical materialism, and strategies for accomplishing change. Your browser does not support playing Audio, please upgrade your …

Events

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2020}

Conference on Engineering in Living Systems

_{Daniel Reeves
Date
April
04
Apr
23
23
2020
Biola University — Feinberg Hall
La Mirada, CA}

We are pleased to announce the Conference on Engineering in Living Systems (CELS 2020) to be held in spring 2020 at Biola University. CELS 2020 brings together leading engineers and biologists in order to: (1) apply engineering principles to better understand biological systems, (2) craft a design-based theoretical framework that explains and predicts the behaviors of living systems, and (3) develop research programs that demonstrate the engineering principles at work in living systems. The conference will follow a workshop-like format of discussion-oriented sessions in a collegial setting, with a goal of fostering active participation and establishing concrete results and action items. Topics include the following: Intersection of Biology and Engineering — the impacts of …

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July
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2020}

The CSC Seminar on Intelligent Design in the Natural Sciences

_{Telos
Date
July
07
Jul
10
10
2020
Seattle, WA}

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 …

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10
2020}

C.S. Lewis Fellows Program on Science and Society

_{The Center for Science and Culture
Date
July
07
Jul
10
10
2020
Seattle, WA}

The C.S. Lewis Fellows Program on Science and Society will explore the growing impact of science on politics, economics, social policy, bioethics, theology, and the arts during the past century. The program is named after celebrated British writer C.S. Lewis, a perceptive critic of both scientism and technocracy in books such as The Abolition of Man and That Hideous Strength. Topics to be addressed include the history of science, the relationship between faith and science, the rise of scientific materialism, the debate over Darwinian theory and intelligent design, evolutionary conceptions of ethics, science and economics, science and criminal justice, stem cell research and abortion, eugenics, family life and sexuality, ecology and animal rights, climate …

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7
07
2020}

16th Annual Discovery Society Insiders Briefing

_{Discovery Institute
Date
August
08
Aug
7
07
2020}

The Insiders Briefing on Intelligent Design is returning to the greater Seattle area on August 7–8, 2020. You won’t want to miss this invitation-only event for members of the Discovery Society and their guests. Confirmed speakers include: Stephen C. Meyer, Siegfried Scherer, Sigrid Hartwig-Scherer, and Günter Bechly. The two-day conference for Discovery Society members and their guests will be held at the Hyatt Regency Lake Washington on the shores of Lake Washington. As always this is the highlight of our year, so make plans now to attend. Keep an eye out for more details in the mail in late February! Transportation & Lodging Registrants are responsible for securing their own transportation and lodging. The closest airport is Seattle Tacoma International and because …

More Events …

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Dallas Conference on Science and Faith 2020

_{The Center for Science and Culture
Date
January
01
Jan
25
25
2020
Dallas, TX}

According to a nationwide survey, more than two-thirds of atheists and one-third of agnostics believe that “the findings of science make the existence of God less probable,” while nearly half of self-identified theists believe “the findings of science are neutral with regard to the existence of God.” But what if the discoveries of science actually lend support to belief in God? Tackle this question head-on at the Dallas Conference on Science and Faith.