Michael Behe’s recent column in the New York Times on intelligent-design creationism seems to have generated some controversy over the last few days, so I thought I’d take a moment to address just one of the several problems with Behe’s essay. In a public policy context, it’s probably the most important error to focus on.
[T]he theory of intelligent design is not a religiously based idea, even though devout people opposed to the teaching of evolution cite it in their arguments…. Intelligent design proponents do question whether random mutation and natural selection completely explain the deep structure of life. But they do not doubt that evolution occurred. And intelligent design itself says nothing about the religious concept of a creator.
This was the opening point in a series of arguments Behe laid out, and it came first for a reason: it’s the foundation upon which advocates of intelligent-design creationism build. Behe, like other IDC supporters, have come to realize that there’s little hope in undermining modern biology by sticking to the notion that the earth is 6,000 years old and a literal reading of Biblical scripture is all anyone needs to know about the development of life. As a result, some IDC advocates embrace evolutionary biology in general — “they do not doubt that evolution occurred,” as Behe put it — and deny any interest in a theological agenda. “Religion?” Behe seems to argue, “Who said anything about religion?”
This is a sham and Behe must know it. As University of Texas Professor Robert T. Pennock explained in his award-winning book, Tower of Babel, “One of the main things [intelligent design creationists] have learned is what not to say. A major element of their strategy is to advance a form of creationism that not only omits any explicit mention of Genesis but is also usually vague, if not mute, about any of the specific claims about the nature of Creation…that readily identify young-earth creationism as a thinly veiled disguised biblical literalism.”
Some are better at hiding this than others. Philip E. Johnson, a law professor at the University of California at Berkeley and, according to Behe’s think tank, the de facto godfather of the IDC cause, has admitted that intelligent-design creationism is a religious “wedge” designed to raise public doubts about the validity of evolutionary biology.
…[A]t a February 1999 gathering organized by TV preacher D. James Kennedy, Johnson admitted intelligent design’s religious agenda and said that through use of his “wedge,” people will be introduced to the truth of the Bible, then “the question of sin” and ultimately “introduced to Jesus.”
Not a “religiously based idea”? Please.
Johnson’s comments weren’t a fluke, and what’s more, he’s not the only one admitting a religious agenda when they think no one’s looking.
In 2000, at a meeting of the National Religious Broadcasters, the Discovery Institute’s William Dembski, a colleague of Behe for years, framed the IDC movement in the context of Christian apologetics, a theological defense of the authority of Christianity.
“The job of apologetics is to clear the ground, to clear obstacles that prevent people from coming to the knowledge of Christ,” Dembski said. “And if there’s anything that I think has blocked the growth of Christ [and] the free reign of the Spirit and people accepting the Scripture and Jesus Christ, it is the Darwinian naturalistic view…. It’s important that we understand the world. God has created it; Jesus is incarnate in the world.”
Somehow, Behe managed to overlook this when telling the New York Times’ audience that intelligent-design creationism “is not a religiously based idea.”
My point isn’t that Behe’s wrong because he’s advancing a religious cause, or that IDC must be rejected because it’s a principle based on faith-based principles. If these activists want to promote their religious ideas, that’s entirely up to them.
Instead, my point is that Behe, like the IDC movement in general, is being disingenuous. They’re driven by a religious motivation, which is fine, except they hide it from as many people as possible. They want to undermine modern science to advance a theological message, but for legal and political purposes, they conceal their beliefs and put on a secular façade. Give us access to public school science classes, they argue, so we can push religion under false pretenses.
I realize why Behe and his colleagues feel this charade is necessary, but it only goes to reinforce the fact that their ideas have no merit.