Science vs. religion : what scientists really think - File PDF

NOTES TO PAGES 19–20189such as natural selection,” according to Casey Luskin of the Intelligent Design andEvolution Awareness (IDEA) Center (see Luskin, “ID Uses Scientific Method,” 2ndparagraph ). Though many in the general public might find this explanation benign oreven plausible, scientists across the board—including religious ones—consider ID, as itis applied today, to be detrimental to science. They’ve experienced it as a distraction atbest and, at worst, a danger to the scientific enterprise. Their arguments against ID arenot generally arguments against God or the idea that God created the universe. (Indeedmost nonreligious scientists, as we’ve learned, don’t take much time to consider theexistence of God at all.) Rather they argue against the mixing of science and religion insuch a way that God is considered a “proof” for something being considered scientifically.Even religious scientists (and learned nonscientists) have raised arguments againstthe ID movement, arguing that God (as a superior Creator) is completely outside ofscience and shouldn’t be considered on the same level as a scientific experiment. Instead,religious scientists will often attest that the theory of evolution, the best theory they havefor the origins of life on earth, in no way disparages a belief in an intelligent Creator. Forworks by Christian evolutionists, see Giberson, Saving Darwin ; Collins, The Language ofGod ; Miller, Finding Darwin’s God ; and Alexander, Creation or Evolution? Do We Haveto Choose?While none of the scientists I interviewed, religious or nonreligious, thought that IDtheories had scientific merit, there was some disagreement over whether they should beaddressed in science curricula. Most of the scientists in the study considered ID a partof religion, particularly evangelical Christianity, while ID theorists, such as MichaelBehe, say that there is nothing religious about it, although they do employ supernaturalexplanations. For extensive discussion of arguments in favor of ID, see Michael Behe,Darwin’s Black Box . Sociologists have examined ID as a case of how knowledge movementsare structured and disseminated through a society, even when there are fewmembers in the movement. See Binder, “Gathering Intelligence on Intelligent Design,”and Fuller, “Intelligent Design Theory.” Probably the most extensive volume everwritten on the history of creationist movements is Numbers, The Creationists .ID casts its shadow over my study in many ways, because a portion of the data wascollected during 2005, when school boards in both Kansas and Pennsylvania were havingheated discussions about teaching the theory of evolution and/or ID in public schoolclassrooms.13. Religious critics of embryonic stem cell research argue that it is unethical todestroy living human embryos for the sake of science, even if it advances research thatmight save other lives. For a more extensive discussion about how debates about humangenetic engineering are constructed, see Evans, Playing God? See also Evans and Hudson,“Religion and Reproductive Genetics.”14. Soc 19, conducted August 30, 2005.15. A roughly similar proportion of Jewish scientists were raised in a religious home(about 19 percent) as remained Jewish (about 16 percent), and this comparison is statisticallysignificant at the .05 level. The comparisons for Protestants and Catholics arealso significant at the .05 level. See also Leuba, The Belief in God and Immortality and