Intelligent design movement

The Intelligent Design movement is a campaign in the U.S., which advocates far-reaching social, academic and political changes. She is by name and content derived from intelligent design, a form of neo - creationism. It aims to put this concept into the public consciousness to have included political pressure they represent of their teaching in the curriculum of schools, and to have means of legal action to defend such teaching and to remove barriers against it. The overall goal of the movement is to " reverse the stifling materialist world view superiority " that is. Their attacks are directed primarily against Darwin's theory of evolution. In their place, a science is to come that is consistent with Christian theistic ideas in line.

The movement was formed in 1990 after the establishment of its center, the conservative Christian think tank Discovery Institute. Most of the leading intelligent design representatives, in particular its programmatic adviser, Phillip E. Johnson, belong to the Center for Science and Culture (CSC ) of the organization. Johnson is one of the most productive and prolific authors of the movement as well as the architect of the "wedge strategy" and the Teach the Controversy campaign.

History

As the founder of the Intelligent Design movement is often the lawyer and Born -Again Christian Phillip Johnson, called the one in his 1991 published book, Darwin trial the theory of evolution as well as the methodological naturalism attack and in its place Intelligent design as the origin of the universe and life propagated. However, the subsequent typical terminology and arguments of the movement was already used in the 1989 issued by the neokreationistischen Foundation for Thought and Ethics book Of Pandas and People, so that it is considered as actual fundamental publication. The publication of this book by the publisher advertised as a scientifically followed two years after the decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in the case Edwards v. Aguillard that banned the teaching of creationism in public schools.

According to P. Johnson a conference at Southern Methodist University designated movement was in 1992 the first public appearance of the internal as Wedge Movement ( for wedge Wedge engl. ) In contact with later key players, such as M. Behe and W. Dembski, were made.

One in 1993, published in the journal Scientific American scathing critique of Johnson's book Darwin on Trial by the evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould and the unsuccessful attempt Johnson, his essay The Religion of the Blind Watchmaker to have them published in response to Gould's critique in Scientific American led, the attempt by supporters of Johnson to win by a petition a base in academia. 39 From several thousand scientists from different research fields is described in U.S. universities were willing to make a signature. Nine of the undersigned scientists, none of them with a significant scientific contribution to the field of evolutionary theory were later Fellows of the Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture ( CRSC ) (now the Center for Science and Culture (CSC ) ), which organizational the germ cell ( also called the Wedge ) is the Intelligent Design movement.

The Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture ( CRSC ) was established in 1996 within the Discovery Institute, a conservative think tank in Seattle, which was itself founded in 1990. The CRSC is financed mainly by HF Ahmanson ( Fieldstaed & Company ), known for his support of right-wing political organizations, as well as the two aligned on evangelical Christian missionary work Stewardship Foundation and Maclellan Foundation. Directors of the CRSC were S. Meyer and J. G. West; P. Johnson was an advisor to the CRSC.

After the founding of the CRSC, the activity of the movement increased significantly. A large number of publications appeared (among M. Behe's Darwin's Black Box in 1996 and W. Dembski's The Design Inference in 1998) and a variety of conferences were organized. Trying to solid foothold in the academic world, failed in October 2001, when the rector of university R. Sloan arbitrarily installed and run by W. Dembski Michael Polanyi Center at Baylor University after only one year after protests by the Faculty for the neokreationistischen alignment was dissolved. In 2001, the founding of the International Society for Complexity, Information, and Design ( ISCID ) was announced, which was however only in 2003 officially registered as a non-profit organization. Although not enshrined in the academic field, the ISCID is considered the successor organization of the Michael Polanyi Center and is largely fulfill its functions. Director of ISCID is W. Dembski. Since 2002, The ISCID publishes the quarterly journal Progress in Complexity, Information, and Design.

In addition, the neokreationistische movement, intelligent design tries to anchor it as on a par with the theory of evolution in the classroom. Thus, in 1998 announced that the CRSC was involved in the case of Roger DeHart, a teacher in the U.S. state of Washington, which his students taught for years with kreationistischem teaching material from the book Of Pandas and People and material from the official biology books, which is essential for a proper understanding of the theory of evolution, was omitted. Since then, there have been many other U.S. states, attempts by the Neokreationisten to anchor the Intelligent Design as a school subject. With the exception of the U.S. state of Kansas, these attempts have failed so far to the selected school board seats or were legally struck down by courts.

Wedge Strategy

The overarching goal of the official Intelligent Design movement was defined by Phillip Johnson and referred to as " Wedge Strategy": A wedge (English Wedge ) to be driven between the empirical sciences and naturalism to the methodological naturalism as by a Johnson Theis Phonetic realism designated alternative to replace; This postulates that the universe and its creatures were created intentionally by God. A special point of attack in the Wedge Strategy is the Darwinian theory of evolution, since it forms the weakest link between naturalism and empirical science in the eyes of Johnson. The Wedge Strategy is available to the public in detail in the so-called Wedge Document.

Wedge Document

In addition to the official publications of the CRSC and the representative of the intelligent design movement is primarily the Wedge Document became known as strategy - paper of the CRSC important for assessing the objectives and strategies of neokreationisischen movement. This document appeared on 5 February 1999 on the Internet and describes the concrete planning of the Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture ( CRSC ) for the years 1999-2003, as well as long -term goals. As is known today, were M. Duss, a part-time employee was presented in a copy center in downtown Seattle, which the Wedge Document declared as "TOP SECRET " and " NOT FOR DISTRIBUTION " for duplicating, and his friend T. Rhodes responsible for the publication.

The authenticity of the wedge Documents was adopted outside the movement because of the many similarities between passages of the Wedge - Documents with passages from other official documents of the CRSC assured. The CRSC itself has acknowledged the authenticity only in 2005 in a statement.

In addition to the insight into the goals and strategies of the importance of the Wedge - Documents is that it for the first time confirmed the existence of a concrete and detailed defined strategy of the intelligent design movement. In addition, it can serve as a benchmark for the recent success of the ID movement and also provides the basis for criticism. So especially the multiple reference is to a Creator God as the basis of Western civilization (such as in one of the two listed overarching goals: "To replace materialistic Explanations with the theistic understanding did nature and human beings are created by God. " ) Taken as clear evidence that the ID movement, contrary to their official statements, primarily pursuing christian religious goals.

Criticism

In the context of political discussion is accused of the Intelligent Design representatives to spread creationist ideas under the guise of science. Since constitutionally applies a strict separation of religion and state in the U.S., state-funded schools may no religion (that is, no Christian beliefs ) teach. This was the conclusion in 1987, a court in the U.S. state of Louisiana, creationism serve religious, not scientific objectives. Therefore, the representative of Intelligent Design to avoid any creationist covers and replace religious terms such as "creation" through scientific -sounding terms such as " design ", " signal detection", etc. According to the Discovery Institute Kansas tried as the fifth U.S. state of doubt as to the theory of evolution in the classroom to integrate. In 2005 it was decided in a far-reaching ruling that intelligent design creationist own, so religious roots, which is why the announcement of his theses in the classroom against the American constitution contrary. The organization Americans United for Separation of Church and State said after this decision is that it is difficult for Kansas, continue to maintain this dissenting opinion.

Due to the targets set out in the Wedge Document (such as the 20 - year goal "To see design theory permeate our religious, cultural, moral and political life. " ) And other evidence (such as the compounds of HF Ahmanson as a major financier of the Center for Science and Culture to the Christian Reconstructionist ) the allegation was made that the true objective of the Intelligent Design movement is to abolish the separation of religion and state, and to replace democracy with a theocratic state.

Parody

The most famous parody of the Intelligent Design movement is fun religion Flying Spaghetti Monster. It was founded by Bobby Henderson in 2005. His idea was to ask for a school board in Kansas Equality idea of ​​" Unintelligent Design" his spaghetti monster that is said to have created the earth drunk with Intelligent Design. It points to the fact that the claims of the intelligent design movement are unrealistic and unscientific. The fun of religion found by the distribution on the Internet quickly a very large number of individuals who symbolically profess to her. They also provided the impetus for a whole series of similar imitations.

Documents

• Intelligent Design
• Religion ( United States)