They like us, they really like us!

Jeremy at Personal Knowledge gave us a link with this comment:

Unfortunately, most of the activity at the blog seems to be focused on critiquing Intelligent Design, which is neither “anti-evolution,” nor a serious threat to the integrity of science. Of course the nice gents over at the Thumb would probably disagree with me about that.

As Jeremy predicted, I disagree with him on his assessment of “intelligent design” as not being antievolution and not a serious threat to the integrity of science.

I’ll direct Jeremy’s attention to Creationism’s Trojan Horse: The Wedge of Intelligent Design by Barbara C. Forrest and Paul R. Gross, which scrupulously documents the historical and conceptual links between “intelligent design” and earlier antievolution efforts in the USA. ID advocates utilize the very same hoary chestnuts of the young-earth creationists; it is hard for me to imagine anyone seriously trying to argue that these folks are not antievolutionists. Further, they are anti-science, as they are after nothing less than a redefinition of how science gets done, so as to bring about a “theistic science”. I was there at the 1997 “Naturalism, Theism, and the Scientific Enterprise” conference where most of the big names from the ID movement presented their thoughts on how to bring about the desired redefinition of science.

As for the threat posed, let’s take a look around the country. ID advocates have been extremely active in attempting to have legislation passed, textbooks altered, school boards pass their policies, and science standards rewritten. They haven’t been entirely unsuccessful in all these endeavors, either. I tend to think that these things do make them a threat.