The Origins Of The Universe
The Magnificence of How
In the 1970s, when the big-bang model for the origins of the universe at last seemed firmly established, Christian, Jewish, and even some Muslim preachers and exegetes took heart. Hadn't modern cosmology at long last proved what scripture always claimed? The universe emerged in a single indefinable instant. Creation out of nothing stood confirmed. Genesis had been vindicated.
The troublesome fact that big bang cosmology offers a model of how the cosmos came into being from a dimensionless point of infinite density but says nothing about what—or who—precipitated that primordial explosion (whose effects still determine our world, some 15 billion years later), hardly fazed these eager explicators. But the question nags. How far are we entitled to draw metaphysical inferences from scientific models?
Why the Intelligent Design Lobby Thanks God for Richard Dawkins
Anti-religious Darwinists are promulgating a false dichotomy between faith and science that gives succour to creationists
On Wednesday evening, at a debate in Oxford, Richard Dawkins will be gathering the plaudits for his long and productive intellectual career. It is the 30th anniversary of his hugely influential book The Selfish Gene. A festschrift, How a Scientist Changed the Way We Think, has been published this month, with contributions from stars such as Philip Pullman.
A week ago it was the turn of the US philosopher Daniel Dennett, second only to Dawkins in the global ranking of contemporary Darwinians, to be similarly feted at a series of lectures and debates across the UK launching his book on religion, Breaking the Spell. The two make quite a team, each lavishing the other with generous praise as the philosopher Dennett brings to bear his discipline on the scientific findings of Dawkins.
The curious thing is that among those celebrating the prominence of these two Darwinians on both sides of the Atlantic is an unexpected constituency—the American creationist/intelligent-design lobby. Huh? Dawkins, in particular, has become their top pin-up.
The Anthropic Universe
It‘s called the anthropic universe: a world set up so that human beings could eventually emerge. So many physical constants, so many aspects of our solar system, so much seems to be finely tuned for our benefit. But was it? We hear from Professors Martin Rees, Paul Davies, and Frank Tipler, as well as many others, about one of the ultimate questions.
Intelligent Design Proponents Set Back by Dover Case
A federal judge Tuesday prohibited mentions of intelligent design in Dover, Pa., public school biology classes. The case was closely watched by school districts around the country, and the decision is likely to put a damper on other such efforts.
Intelligent Design Has Not Surfaced in the British Press
At a journalism seminar, a BBC producer was ‘struck by the concern about intelligent design amongst our transatlantic colleagues.’
I’ve been asking a few friends who are neither journalists nor scientists— nor, for that matter, Americans— what they understand by the term “intelligent design.” “Isn’t that the slogan of that German car company?,” one said, in a remark typical of what I often hear. In Europe, intelligent design is nowhere near the big issue that it is in North America. Serious newspapers have been giving brief coverage to the Dover, Pennsylvania court case on their inner pages, but in the popular press and on television there is not a mention made.
It’s interesting to reflect on why that might be. After all, according to the U.S. Constitution, church and state are separate whereas over here, the queen is both head of state and head of the Church of England. And many schools are church schools with religious education a small but significant part of their curriculum, and a brief act of worship is an almost daily event. But it is hard to find anyone here who thinks that intelligent design is serious science or that it should be taught as such in schools, or at least who is prepared to say so in public. The Church of England, for the most part, seems to be on the side of the biologists, and even the Catholic Church has gone on record as saying that evolution is more than just a theory.
Intelligent Design
Teach it as a belief, but not as science
On Monday, in a round-table discussion with journalists from five Texas newspapers, President Bush said he thought intelligent design should be taught to students alongside evolution.
"Intelligent design" is the belief that the universe and the Earth show evidence of a thinking, purposeful plan. That belief is thousands and thousands of years old; the phrase is of fairly recent coinage.
President Bush made his remarks in the broadest, blandest terms: "I think that part of education is to expose people to different schools of thought."
That's the line you're hearing from many politicians: "I think students should learn all sides of an issue," etc. Sounds reasonable, right? No nice person could possibly take exception, right? Ah, but many do. They're afraid intelligent design - especially when it gets capitalized, as in Intelligent Design - is just "warmed-over creationism," anti-scientific Christian fundamentalism looking for a back-door into classrooms. In school districts throughout the land - in Dover, Pa., in Kansas, in Michigan, and elsewhere - debate rages over whether these ideas have any place in the way we teach our children science.