I’m afraid I have to disagree with Nathan Schneider again. This time it’s about his AlterNet assessment of the Dover trial and the Intelligent Design controversy. I have several things to say about it. For starters, he makes this most curious allusion:
The Dover trial followed in the footsteps of its notorious predecessor, the famed Scopes “Monkey Trial” of 1925 in Dayton, Tennessee. Like Dover, Dayton was a set-up, orchestrated by money and interests from far away. The ACLU backed Clarence Darrow, the great freethinking lawyer, against the towering populist politician William Jennings Bryan, who fought, literally, to his death — he died, exhausted and disgraced, a week after the trial ended. All of it was immortalized by H.L. Mencken of the Baltimore Sun, one of the foremost journalists of his generation.
Mencken may have immortalized it, but as MSNBC notes, he did it by distorting it:
The picture that emerged, especially in the hyperventilating prose of the iconoclastic Baltimore journalist H.L. Mencken and later in the play and movie “Inherit the Wind,” was of a town full of “Christian pro-creation” believers who were “uneducated, dimwitted people who came to town barefoot and married their cousin,” said historian John Perry, co-author of a new book, “Monkey Business: The True Story of the Scopes Trial“…. That caricature, like so much we think we remember about the famous Monkey Trial, was largely wrong.
And it would be all too easy to conclude from Schneider’s account here that Dayton was a creationist set-up. The “money and interests from far away” were the ACLU’s.
Schneider’s information on Dover apparently comes from Laurie Lebo’s bookThe Devil in Dover: An Insider’s Story of Dogma v. Darwin in Small-Town America. It is not without some distortion of its own, not so much in what is said but (as above) in what is left unsaid. The Discovery Institute is made to appear pragmatically calculating:
Early on, seeing how the case would go, the Discovery Institute withdrew its support.
In fact the DI did not just withdraw support, turning tail and running from the case as soon as it looked lost. They consistently advised the school board not to proceed with its new policy, just because it was ill-advised (here and here).
Under current case law, Judge Jones was right to rule against the Dover School Board because of their openly religious intent. He went far beyond his proper role, though, in ruling Intelligent Design unscientific. Though Schneider called this “damning” for ID, it’s really quite irrelevant, unless the science community thinks they should submit all of their conclusions to federal judges for final approval.
Schneider proceeds to engage in some serious stereotyping:
The pro-evolution science establishment wants to protect the methodology and public support that have allowed it to learn so much already and poise it for endless more. Secularists want to protect the American legal tradition that keeps church and state comfortably separate. Religious fundamentalists want to bear witness to the created truth of God before the invented truths of people, winning even as they lose.
That is breathtakingly … something. (You fill in the blank.) Where do I begin to respond to this?
First I’ll ask whether Schneider considers David Berlinski to be a religious fundamentalist. What, in fact, does “religious fundamentalist” mean, other than being a convenient name to pin on persons so you can dismiss them out of hand?
Next, what is it that the science establishment needs so carefully to protect? What in ID is an attack on scientific methodology? Only this: that it will not insist on philosophical materialism, the doctrine that nothing exists except for matter, energy, and their interactions; or, that every natural event without exception has a natural cause that in principle could be investigated by scientific means. ID brings no “attack” on science per se. It does suggest that science may not be able to answer every question that can possibly be asked, a fact that is as well established as gravity and relativity theory. Some scientists may feel personally attacked by that. But science itself needs no protection from truth.
As for public support, I don’t think evolutionists’ dogmatic closed-mindedness contributes much toward public goodwill. Scientists who think otherwise are making a serious strategic error.
ID is also not about attacking the “separation of church and state.” Remember, the DI advised Dover against taking up their policy. Recall too that there are two streams to this debate. ID opponents seem to jump from one of these streams to the other, based on rhetorical convenience. There is the pursuit of scientific knowledge, and there is science education in public schools. The matter of ID in science education is not in dispute. Despite some serious distortions of fact regarding Texas, Missouri, and Florida, nobody is calling for ID to be taught in American public schools. That’s settled, and it’s hard to see why it keeps coming up from anti-ID writers.
The other stream is the pursuit of scientific knowledge, which is not a matter of constitutional law (despite Judge Jones’s sticking his nose into it). This stream is not about what’s being taught in the schools, it’s about what’s being studied in the labs. This is where the future of this debate needs to go. It may be the only thing that has any chance of ending the stalemate Schneider describes. We ought not to expect it to change the debate much for a few years, though; not until a critical mass of young pro-ID scientists attain tenure and feel safe to publish on the topic.
Schneider says in the end we just ought to change the subject:
Despite its theatrical appeal, battling creationists will not fix science education. Teaching science will — with high standards, qualified teachers, and access to lab equipment.
I wonder if he thinks that contributes anything to the debate. I would ask him to pick up the phone, call the Discovery Institute, and ask them to respond to that. Here’s how they’ll answer: “Thank you for that. We’ve been saying that all along!”
Good post, Tom.
I will take issue (a minor one) with one point of yours:
Fair enough, but what about methodological naturalism:
This is definitely something that ID has to work on. How does one objectively find markers of design in nature?
That said, I am in agreement with the rest of your post. For all the flack that DI has taken (rightfully so) over its Wedge Document, “Darwinisits” conveniently forget that DI has a policy not to teach ID in public schools.
Thanks for that word of encouragement. I mostly agree with your additional point. Methodological naturalism (MN) is fine, except it has a way of spilling over its banks. Here’s how it does that:
1) When we do science, we operate as if the cosmos is all there is.
2) Science is the only reliable route to knowledge. If we don’t know X scientifically, then X is false, unreal, or irrelevant.
3) Therefore the cosmos is all there is that is not false, unreal, or irrelevant.
Of course (2) is utterly false, so the conclusion (3) is false. Nevertheless (2) is an unconscious belief shared by many, many people, so they will not see either (2) or (3) as false. MN spills over and becomes philosophical materialism (or naturalism) by default.
So I will quite happily agree with you, as long as MN really remains MN, and does not unconsciously get turned into de facto philosophical materialism/naturalism.
Tom,
I read the whole article and it seems to me like you’re maybe being overly sensitive; I don’t think the writer was making all of the sweeping and critical assertions that you drew from it.
You wrote “And it would be all too easy to conclude from Schneider’s account here that Dayton was a creationist set-up. The “money and interests from far away” were the ACLU’s.” Well, it wasn’t just the ACLU that came to town. Bryan was from Nebraska. Schneider isn’t rewriting history here; he’s saying that the trial drew from all quarters. It did.
When Schneider sums up the debate’s standard roles, like the stock characters in a dramatic format, you wrote “First I’ll ask whether Schneider considers David Berlinski to be a religious fundamentalist.” David Berlinski isn’t mentioned in Schneider’s article. And why should Schneider list an atypical proponent when all he was doing was describe the general breakdown of the sides? Why would you even bring him up? Aren’t you doing the same thing here — making it all too easy for a reader of your post to conclude that Schneider brought up Berlinski — that you accuse Schneider of doing?
You wrote: ” …nobody is calling for ID to be taught in American public schools. That’s settled, and it’s hard to see why it keeps coming up from anti-ID writers.” I don’t think it’s that hard to see why it keeps coming up; I’m pretty sure our current President has publicly endorsed the idea that ID should be taught in public schools. I know people personally who still believe ID should be taught because of what they’ve been told in church and in bible study groups. The release of Expelled recently has brought ID back to the forefront, banging the drum that only the close-minded and immoral would oppose the acceptance of ID as science. The political environment is what will bring ID into schools, and until the issue becomes dead politically it will remain a live debate.
I read the links you posted on the DI website. They do, to my reading, appear to take a pragmatic approach, one that would presumably change with the political climate. (E.g., “While Discovery Institute does not support efforts to REQUIRE [emphasis mine] the teaching of intelligent design in public schools…”) In other words, the Discovery Institute is not opposed to teaching ID in the science curriculum because it’s not science (it is not), but because the current political climate would be a waste of resources and could build up a greater body of case law. This is not a principled stand against teaching ID in public schools; it is a pragmatic approach that seeks to gain an objective (the destruction of materialistic naturalism) through the most efficient means.
I think your last point is also a stretch – that the only thing the Discovery Institute has been saying is that “science education needs only high standards, qualified teachers, and access to lab equipment.” How do you reconcile that assertion with DI’s “Teach the Controversy” campaign and the Wedge Document and its stated goals like, “If we [the Discovery Institute] view the predominant materialistic science as a giant tree, our strategy is intended to function as a ‘wedge’ that, while relatively small, can split the trunk when applied at its weakest points.” That does not sound like a disinterested call for more resources in the classroom to me. For that matter, are there any examples of the Discovery Institute making donations that, for instance, provide a school with something like lab equipment?
You wrote, “ID brings no “attack” on science per se. It does suggest that science may not be able to answer every question that can possibly be asked, a fact that is as well established as gravity and relativity theory.” I am confused here. If the fact that science admits that it cannot answer every question is as well established as gravity and relativity theory, which I think is true, then what exactly is ID’s contribution to science supposed to be? Because if you are saying that ID would transform science so that it must allow for the presumption or conclusion of the supernatural, that would be an attack on science “per se” no matter how you look at it.
I know that most of my points of contention with your post can be written off as our approaching the article from our different viewpoints. But aside from our usual disagreements I thought I detected contradictions and inconsistencies that you usually avoid. (Or maybe it’s just me.)
Thanks for your comments, Tony (it’s been quiet around here lately!).
It’s entirely possible I misread Schneider’s intent. He and I have had one excellent previous exchange, and I gained a real appreciation for him through that. So rather than trying to defend my view of Schneider, which is subject to considerable error and not so crucial anyay, I’m going to respond in terms of the broader ID issue.
Regarding Berlinski, I consider him representative of a broader question, which I asked in the blog post: what do you mean by “fundamentalist”? It’s an all-too-available pejorative, which nobody can define in a coherent sense. Or if they try, they either stretch it far beyond its proper meaning, or else they end up with a pretty small grouping in the end. (I’m an Evangelical, not a Fundamentalist, by the way,—though I would guess many would call me a Fundy. That’s just to illustrate the difficulty of definining the term.)
On the public schools: When I say “nobody” is calling for ID to be taught in public schools, I mean nobody among those who are well informed on the issues, taking leadership in ID. It would be parallel to saying “nobody believes that evolution has a sense of direction in which it is ultimately headed.” Actually some people believe that, but the well-informed do not.
The DI’s “pragmatic approach” that “would presumably change with the political climate” is a perfectly sensible one. I mean, this is comical, Tony:
Tell me why the DI would oppose teaching ID on grounds that it’s not scientific, please? They are taking a strongly principled stand that it is scientific. But schools are government institutions, politically governed, and current case law has to be taken into account. What fool would deny that?
Is there any necessary contradiction between taking a principled stand and a strategic approach at the same time?
Hold it just a minute right there. Did I say the only thing the DI has been saying? Hardly. I said they have been consistent in saying we need better science education, not that they only have one note that they sing. They are encouraging schools to teach evolution more thoroughly, included its evidential challenges.
What, then, is this about a “disinterested call for more classroom resources”? Is Eugenie Price disinterested?
Then you do not (I’m sorry, but it’s true) understand what science really is. Science is the pursuit of knowledge of nature, and of natural explanations for natural phenomena. ID says that it’s possible that origins involve other means than what is typically considered natural. It suggests that nature displays hints of something beyond nature. What about that is an attack on science?
Anyway, thank you for your irenic note at the end. I don’t see the contradictions that you think are in there, but it’s certainly fruitful to work through the questions.
Tom,
Thanks for your reply. Yeah, things have been quiet around here recently. I actually chuckled when I first read this post, though, thinking that it was perfectly constructed to goad me into commenting. So, hey, if you’re ever feeling things are slow on this site just whip up a few paragraphs anytime on “ID” and “scientific establishment” and “church and state” and at least you know you’ll be getting one commenter.
Regarding Berlinski, I still don’t why you throw him in as being smeared in any way by Schneider as a fundamentalist. But the term fundamentalist is still a convenient shorthand. (I have been following the term myself for at least 5 years now, and I wasn’t aware that it had become such a pejorative – it might be because it’s so often preceded by “Islamic.”) For the record, I understand fundamentalists to be closer to a literal interpretation of religious texts than a metaphorical one, and my own personal shorthand has been that fundamentalists will learn toward adhering to Scripture over the senses when the two come in conflict. I think, from our own conversations, you sit on the cusp of fundamentalism.
Regarding the DI, you were the one who seemed to think that “pragmatically calculating” was a critical characterization of that organization – you took Schneider to task for it. I was simply saying the characterization is fair, and you seem to be saying the same when you say their tack to account for political institutions and case law is “a perfectly sensible one.” I thought you were casting the DI as a kind of Don Quixote, but I think (and it appears that you agree) that they are not an institution of idealists. Principles plus a strategic approach basically equals pragmatism. I have no problem with characterizing the DI in that way, but I was surprised that you seemed to find Schneider’s depiction of the DI as precisely that as dismissive.
You wrote that “They [those at the DI] are encouraging schools to teach evolution more thoroughly, included its evidential challenges.” I could apply that description to virtually any educational group in the world and nobody would have a problem with it. So I have to ask how accurate that description is in terms of differentiating the DI from other groups who say they have an interest in education. In other words, is that what you think is the best and most accurate description of the DI’s goals and activities? Because it sounds to me like you just described the NCSE.
Your last point is that I don’t understand what science really is. This could very well be true. Actually, this is almost certainly true. But I still see a contradiction in your definition of science and its compatibility with ID. You wrote, “Science is the pursuit of… natural explanations for natural phenomena.” and “It [ID] suggests that nature displays hints of something beyond nature.” Well, philosophy and theology already do suggest that nature displays hints of something beyond nature, so ID isn’t alone or first in that category. Where ID attacks science is by attempting to join two distinct methodologies. As Holopupenko said in an earlier post about the failings of ID as science, ID’s “error rests upon the lack of a crucial distinction, namely Intelligent Design’s failure to recognize—or at the very least blur—the distinction between science and philosophy, both in ontology and methodology.” It would be like my proposing that mathematical descriptions of the physical world should not only be accurate but that they should also rhyme. It might be nice, but it’s an unnecessary and unproductive hindrance, and my requiring that mathematical descriptions rhyme should be considered an attack on physics.
Lastly, thanks for your last comment, and using the word “irenic.” That one was knew to me, and I’m glad to add it, at least temporarily, to the list of words I know.
Tony,
I threw Berlinski in as an example of the fact that not all ID proponents are fundamentalists, not by any definition of the word.
I appreciate your definition of “fundamentalist.” If everybody used it in some consistent way–that one, for example–it might be a useful term.
On “pragmatically calculating,” here’s the distinction: First, Schneider misrepresented what the DI did. They did not withdraw their support just because they saw death in the looming. They advised against Dover’s policy from very early on. Schneider’s version made it appear that the only principle they were operating under was the political one. If it were so, that would be “pragmatically calculating,” but it is not.
To have political considerations in mind when addressing political policy is not wrong or stupid. To have only political considerations in mind is unprincipled and manipulative. This is what it seemed to me Schneider may have been hinting at, and that is the impression I have been trying to correct.
I wasn’t using that description to differentiate the DI from other educational groups, or as a full and complete description of DI’s activities. It is an accurate description as far as it goes, but it does not attempt to be comprehensive.
This is where I disagree with Holopupenko, because I think ID advocates have been, for the most part, keeping their categories straight. Here is my own best shot at explaining how this can and should be accomplished.
Tom,
I looked at your linked chart and explanation and I still don’t see how that answers the fundamental problem that ID faces. You wrote:
It’s an attack on science because you are suggesting that science can admit supernatural phenomena to explain nature; you can only make ID compatible with your definition of science by changing it to something like: “Science is the pursuit of knowledge of nature, and of natural AND SUPERNATURAL explanations for natural phenomena.” Maybe attack is too harsh a word; if you prefer, I can say that ID would alter science.
The point that I am trying to make is that ID is a dead end because it holds that scientific means can be used to reveal the supernatural. If that were true, ID would destroy the classification of whatever supernatural phenomena it revealed; anything that can be revealed by science is, by the definition of science that you gave above, natural and not supernatural. ID is a self-defeating system because it can only either turn the supernatural (what you call “beyond nature”) into the natural or fail to prove something scientifically. I may be philosophically challenged but this seems like a contradiction even I can drive a truck through.
You wrote: “Philosophical Naturalism says that [a supernatural explanation for neo-Darwinism] doesn’t matter: it doesn’t need evidence, because neo-Darwinism is the only game in town, so it must be true.” Saying that philosophical naturalism “doesn’t need evidence” is something I have a hard time believing you think is true. (What are all those neo-Darwinists doing with fossils, molecular biology, study of embryology, etc. if they don’t need evidence?)
For me, the problem with ID isn’t that just that it can’t (yet) provide a better theoretical explanation to the theory of Evolution – that could have been said at some point of every dominant scientific theory today. The problem with ID is that instead of providing a better answer to an existing theory it seeks to change the question. In other words, what other scientific theory seeks to explain natural phenomena by asking the question, “At what point can there no longer be a natural explanation?” And that perception (of changing the question) is why I think writers like Schneider and people like me view ID to be an attack on science unlike, say, the Big Bang would have been viewed when it was first proposed.
Tony, you wrote,
Feeling under attack by this? Touchy, touchy
I’ll try again. I am not suggesting that “science” as commonly understood can admit supernatural phenomena. I am instead suggesting that knowledge more broadly taken can admit supernatural phenomena. To exclude supernatural phenomena from all knowledge is to take up the unsupportable position of philosophical materialism.
Defining science is known to be a hopeless venture: there is no universally applicable, necessary, sufficient, and demarcating set of conditions that make something science and everything else non-science. So you’re facing a terrific uphill battle in complaining about my definition of science–which I didn’t provide, by the way; the words are yours and not mine.
But the point is well taken: should science’s definition allow for the supernatural as part of its purview? No, I don’t think so, and I haven’t said so. Read the chart again. I have said that science should study what it can study in the natural realm, and draw what conclusions it can draw from there. In the process it may (and I believe does) turn up discoveries that are very difficult to explain on a strictly natural basis. I do not suggest that scientists give up and say, “Well, that’s just God for you.” I am in favor of continuing to search for natural explanations for anything anybody wants to investigate. If, however, there are natural phenomena that appear to be intractable for natural explanation, that information can be handed over to other disciplines as food for further thought. Science would not be making a conclusion that the supernatural was involved; it would just be making an information handoff for further processing by other disciplines.
Further: nature features tons of information at its core. Science has offered no feasible hypothesis for how that got started—none whatsoever. We know, however, that information commonly comes from minds. Can science alone tell us, then, that there is a transcendent Mind behind nature? The question is a red herring. Science can tell us what exists in nature, and then we can (gaspose!) think about what that means. We can also consult knowledge from philosophy and theology. With that combination of approaches, we can draw our conclusions, be they strong or tentative.
Now, if in your mind science=knowledge and knowledge=science, then ID most definitely would want to alter your version of “science.” And you ought to welcome the correction to your error.
But I do believe it’s true. I didn’t say PN doesn’t want evidence; I didn’t say it’s not searching for evidence; I didn’t say (here) that it has no evidence.
Here’s what I said, stated more formally. Consider the following premises:
1) Philosophical naturalism is true.
2) Other than some form or version of Darwinian evolution, no explanation for the development of life is conceivable under PN.
3) There is considerable evidence in the natural world for Darwinian evolution.
4) Therefore Darwinian evolution is true.
Here’s my point: Given (1) and (2), (4) follows. You can bypass (3) entirely and still arrive at the same conclusion. Evidence is irrelevant. You don’t need it, if you start with (1) and (2).
And what’s wrong with that question? Seems like a perfectly good one to me. Are you going to suggest we shouldn’t explore it?
Tom,
You last wrote:
But on August 1 in our discussion you wrote:
How is the above not provided by you, and how is the sentence that begins “Science is…” not a definition of science?
So, in your original post and our comments together on this topic, you:
1) wonder why anyone would consider ID an attack on science;
2) dismiss my response to your question, explaining that I do not understand what science really is;
3) provide your own definition of science;
4) deny that you provided a definition of science; and
5) pronounce that “Defining science is known to be a hopeless venture.”
Regarding the rest of your post I have these questions for you. How is this different from what you wrote about Philosophical Materialism:
1) Theism is true;
2) Other than some branch of Christianity, no explanation for the universe is conceivable under Theism;
3) There is considerable evidence for Christianity;
4) Therefore Christianity is true.
In other words, what does the above prove, where does premise 2 come from (it doesn’t follow from anything as far as I can tell), and what reasonable person arrives at their convictions through such an argument? It looks to me like you’re portraying a world where people arrive at their worldviews without experiential contact and move forward from there. My experience, and the attested experience of so many others, disagrees.
Lastly, in response to your question, what’s wrong with asking “At what point can there no longer be a natural explanation.” I agree that it’s a great question. As I understand it, biological scientists everywhere are working on answering it. My question back to you is, do you suggest we propose to them where they should stop exploring it?
Tom,
Just a couple of other things I didn’t have time to address in previous comment:
You defend your insertion of Berlinski with this statement, “I threw Berlinski in as an example of the fact that not all ID proponents are fundamentalists, not by any definition of the word.” Where in the article does Schneider say that all ID proponents are fundamentalists? Your raising the issue smears Schneider with making a claim he did not. It would be like my saying, “Contrary to Tom Gilson, not all atheists are genocidal dictators.”
With regard to the DI, you wrote: “First, Schneider misrepresented what the DI did. They did not withdraw their support just because they saw death in the looming.” Actually, that is precisely what the DI did. The DI had encouraged a tactic of inserting ID into the school curriculum until there was a controversy, then withdrawing. The policy seemed to be one of a) insert ID into curriculum, and b) retreat before there’s a legal dispute. Here, for instance, is what the book entitled “Intelligent Design in Public School Science Curricula,” written by a fellow of the Discovery Institute, said: “…school boards have the authority to permit, and even encourage, teaching about design theory as an alternative to Darwinian evolution — and this includes the use of textbooks such as Of Pandas and People that present evidence for the theory of intelligent design.”
And here’s what Mark Ryland from the DI had to say about why the DI did not want there to be a legal dispute: “But from the start we just disagreed that this was a good place, a good time and place to have this battle — which is risky, in the sense that there’s a potential for rulings that this is somehow unconstitutional.”
So it looks to me like the DI ceased being involved in encouraging the Dover school board to teach ID not because the DI had a policy against teaching ID in public schools, but because there was going to be a legal dispute. Legal dispute = death looms. (And it looked like there wasn’t even consensus among DI members about the inevitability of the outcome, as three of them were set to testify as expert witnesses, then withdrew after the deadline for declaring expert witnesses.)
My point is that Schneider’s account, “Early on, seeing how the case would go, the Discovery Institute withdrew its support.” If, as you attest, the DI did not have only political considerations in mind, what other justification is there?
You wrote: “Now, if in your mind science=knowledge and knowledge=science, then ID most definitely would want to alter your version of “science.” And you ought to welcome the correction to your error.” But I don’t think this. Where did you get that impression?
You wrote: “Science can tell us what exists in nature, and then we can (gaspose!) think about what that means. We can also consult knowledge from philosophy and theology. With that combination of approaches, we can draw our conclusions, be they strong or tentative.” (I can’t help but point out that it sounds to me like you’re defining science again here.) And I wonder if you might be failing to distinguish between philosophical convictions and scientific explanations. At some point, the two diverge — as you say above, knowledge = science is an error. I guess I’m just saying that it seems to me that your justification for ID seems to me to be the same thing as a justification for science in general, and I think this either mis-states what ID proposes (that the supernatural can be revealed by science, when I think that it can only be revealed by philosophical or theological speculation), or that ID doesn’t exist except as a way of identifying the philosophical convictions of those who practice science. In other words, the way you define ID in relation to science it seems no different than being a Red Sox fan would be to science; it just doesn’t seem to matter.
THE JERUSALEM POST, August 6, 2008
Q: Speaking of your desire for this kind of particularity, you are a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute that studies and believes in Intelligent Design. How do you, as an Orthodox Jew, reconcile with this kind of generality - with the view of their being a hierarchy with a chief “designer” - while believing in and praying to a very specific God?
MICHAEL MEDVED: The important thing about Intelligent Design is that it is not a theory - which is something I think they need to make more clear. Nor is Intelligent Design an explanation. Intelligent Design is a challenge. It’s a challenge to evolution. It does not replace evolution with something else.
Q: The question is not whether it replaces evolution, but whether it replaces God.
MM: No, you see, Intelligent Design doesn’t tell you what is true; it tells you what is not true. It tells you that it cannot be that this whole process was random.