Casey Luskin

Associate Director, Research Director, and Senior Fellow, Center for Science and Culture

Casey Luskin is a scientist and an attorney with graduate degrees in science and law, giving him expertise in both the scientific and legal dimensions of the debate over evolution. He holds a PhD in Geology from the University of Johannesburg where he specialized in paleomagnetism and the early plate tectonic history of South Africa. He earned a law degree from the University of San Diego, where he focused on First Amendment law, education law, and environmental law. His B.S. and M.S. degrees in Earth Sciences are from the University of California, San Diego, where he studied evolution extensively at the graduate and undergraduate levels, and conducted geological research at Scripps Institution for Oceanography. Dr. Luskin has been a California-licensed attorney since 2005, practicing primarily in the area of evolution-education in public schools and defending academic freedom for scientists who face discrimination because of their support for intelligent design (ID).

In his role at Discovery Institute, Dr. Luskin works as Associate Director of the Center for Science and Culture, where he helps direct the ID 3.0 Research Program, and assists and defends scientists, educators, and students who seek to freely study, research, and teach about the scientific debate over Darwinian evolution and ID. He is also a Senior Fellow of the Center for Science and Culture.

In 2001, Luskin co-founded the Intelligent Design and Evolution Awareness (IDEA) Center, a non-profit helping students to investigate evolution by starting "IDEA Clubs" on college and high school campuses. Casey and the IDEA Club movement he co-founded were featured in the April 27, 2005 cover story of the journal Nature. 

Dr. Luskin has lectured widely on ID at university campuses and conferences on four continents, and has coauthored or contributed to multiple books. In 2006, he coauthored Traipsing Into Evolution: Intelligent Design and the Kitzmiller v. Dover Decision, a detailed critique of the first court ruling to assess the constitutionality of teaching ID in public schools. In 2012, he coauthored Science and Human Origins, reviewing fossil and genetic evidence which challenges human/ape common ancestry. He is coauthor of Discovering Intelligent Design, the first comprehensive introductory intelligent design curriculum, published in 2013. He co-edited with William Dembski and Joseph Holden The Comprehensive Guide to Science and Faith: Exploring the Ultimate Questions About Life and the Cosmos, which won an honorable mention in World magazine's 2021 "accessible science" book of the year awards. Luskin has also contributed to the volumes Intelligent Design 101: Leading Experts Explain the Key Issues; Theistic Evolution: A Scientific, Theological, and Philosophical Critique (Crossway, 2017); The Praeger Handbook of Religion and Education in the United States; Dictionary of Christianity and Science (Zondervan, 2017); Science and Faith in Dialogue (Aosis, 2022); Signature of Controversy; The Unofficial Guide to Cosmos; Debating Darwin's Doubt; More than Myth; and the award-winning God and Evolution. 

Dr. Luskin has published in technical science, legal, and religion journals, including Journal of Church and State; Montana Law Review; Geochemistry, Geophysics, and Geosystems; South African Journal of Geology; Hamline Law Review; Religions; Liberty University Law Review; Trinity Law Review; University of St. Thomas Journal of Law & Public Policy; and Progress in Complexity, Information, and Design. He also contributed to The Archaean Geology of the Kaapvaal Craton, Southern Africa (Springer Nature, 2019) and Ancient Supercontinents and the Paleogeography of Earth (Elsevier, 2021).

Luskin has published in, and/or been quoted in, hundreds of radio, TV, Internet, print, and other media sources, including the NY Times, LA Times, Nature, Science, U.S. News & World Report, NY Post, Washington D.C. Examiner, Human Events, The Blaze, The Stream, The Federalist, The Daily Wire, Christianity Today, CNS News, The Christian Post, BeliefNet, Touchstone, World, Epoch Times, Christian Science Monitor, Coast to Coast AM, Daily Dose of Wisdom, NPR, CNN.com, Sean McDowell Show, Premier Christian Radio (with Justin Brierley), Socrates in the City (with Eric Metaxas), Cross Examined with Frank Turek, The Andrew Klavan Show, C-SPAN, and Fox News. For years he was a senior editor at Salvo Magazine, and Luskin is a regular contributor to Science and Culture Today (formerly Evolution News) and the ID the Future Podcast.

Casey is a Christian with a Jewish background. His special interests include geology, science education, biological origins, and environmental protection. He and his wife reside in the Seattle region, where they enjoy hiking, camping, kayaking, sailing, and other outdoor activities.

Archives

Fossil Feuds and Scientific Secrecy

Casey Luskin
March 25, 2026
How do you separate the facts from the narrative? That can be challenging these days, and the realm of science is no exception. On this ID The Future, enjoy the second half of a conversation with Dr. Casey Luskin that originally aired on the Come Let Us Reason Together Podcast hosted by Lenny Esposito. Casey discusses the growing controversy surrounding Sahelanthropus tchadensis, a fossil often described as one of the earliest human ancestors. But what began as a celebrated evolutionary discovery has now sparked open disagreement among evolutionary scientists themselves. In this concluding segment, Casey will discuss the telling researcher-to-specimen imbalance in the field of paleoanthropology, the nuance between error and deception in human origins narratives, and the broader implications of the controversy around the Sahelanthropus fossil. This is Part 2 of a two-part conversation.

Missing Links or Media Hype? Navigating the Politics of Human Origins

Casey Luskin
March 23, 2026
Science is a very human enterprise, and very human problems can color scientific research as well as the narratives cast around findings and results. On this ID The Future, we’re bringing you the first half of a conversation with Dr. Casey Luskin that originally aired on the Come Let Us Reason Together Podcast hosted by Lenny Esposito. Casey discusses the growing controversy surrounding Sahelanthropus tchadensis, a fossil often described as one of the earliest human ancestors. But what began as a celebrated evolutionary discovery has now sparked open disagreement among evolutionary scientists themselves. In this segment, Casey reviews the history of paleoanthropology, what the field is trying to prove about human origins, and how language, bias, politics, prestige, and funding pressure all play a part in how discoveries are framed and evidence is weighed. This is Part 1 of a two-part conversation.

Casey Luskin on the Rising Tide of Intelligent Design Research

Casey Luskin
December 24, 2025
Any scientific theory for the origin of life and the universe is only as strong as its research program. For intelligent design, this is good news. On today's ID The Future, Dr. Casey Luskin describes the current growth and scientific maturity of the Intelligent Design (ID) movement. Luskin describes the progress of ID across three main areas: successful scientific predictions, the unresolved failures of Neo-Darwinism to account for life, and the growth of the ID community as well as scientists outside ID who are looking for alternatives to modern evolutionary proposals. Dr. Luskin compares the growth of the ID research program to a snowball; it started small and faced early setbacks, but it is now rapidly picking up size, speed, and scientific weight as it rolls forward.