Intelligent Design

George Ellis, physicist and Templeton Prize winner, in today’s Nature has an interesting short article titled “Physics, Complexity, and Causality.” In it he remarks that the physical sciences offer no insight into “intentional design.” The article itself includes the following image and caption: The question you need to be asking yourself is why is Nature giving such respectful treatment to ID, in effect conceding that ID has focused on a major conceptual problem for science. For more on the significance of Ellis’s article as well as for links to it and related articles, see Paul Nelson’s remarks at IDthefuture (go here).

Evolutionist row makes museum ditch donation
Geoff Brumfiel, Washington DC

Nature 435, 725 (9 June 2005)

But intelligent-design group will show movie on Smithsonian premises… Read More ›

I’ve been out of pocket a few days to attend the deposition of Barbara Forrest in the Dover County ID Case (I’m an expert witness for the ID side and was advising the ID side’s deposing attorney; by the way, Forrest struck me as very nice in person). I expect I’ll be reporting more on this case at some point. Though seemingly insignificant (a tiny community’s school board enacts a seemingly trivial concession to ID), this case could well blow up with huge implications for ID in high school biology curricula.

Just so there’s no doubt regarding the following story, to say that the provost was replaced is to say that he was fired. What does this portend for Baylor? The signs are not good if the aim is to see Baylor become a university that is Christian in more than just name. Sloan and Jeffrey — both gone within the space of less than 12 hours (Sloan’s resignation went into effect midnight, June 1; Jeffrey was fired later that morning). They should have done a “Bill Clinton” and installed me as a tenured professor before they left — I would have been their best gift to the people that have vexed them all these years. Read More ›

Smithsonian Distances Itself From Controversial Film
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/01/AR2005060101986.html

By Tommy Nguyen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, June 2, 2005; Page C01

The controversy over the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History’s decision to allow a documentary based on “intelligent design” — the theory that life is so meticulously complex that a divine intelligence must have designed it — to be played at one of its theaters ended in compromise yesterday: The film will be shown, but the screening fee required by the museum (in this case, $16,000) won’t be accepted and the museum will withdraw its customary co-sponsorship. Read More ›

Here is an email from one of my ID colleagues in the defense industry. Imagine this scenario, but with me instead of Bolton going not to the UN but to the NSF to head a new initiative on ID with lots and lots of tax dollars to back it up. Could this happen? Who would be choking back tears? Read More ›

Smithsonian to Screen a Movie That Makes a Case Against Evolution By JOHN SCHWARTZ, as reported in the NYTimes Published: May 28, 2005 The Discovery Institute, a group in Seattle that supports an alternative theory, “intelligent design,” is announcing on its Web site that it and the director of the [Smithsonian] museum “are happy to announce the national premiere and private evening reception” on June 23 for the movie, “The Privileged Planet: The Search for Purpose in the Universe.” For full story go here.