Editing Intelligent design movement (section)

== Structure ==

=== The 'big tent' strategy ===
The movement's strategy as set forth by Phillip E. Johnson states the replacement of "materialist science" with "theistic science" as its primary goal; and, more generally, for intelligent design to become "the dominant perspective in science" and to "permeate our religious, cultural, moral and political life." This agenda is now being actively pursued by the Center for Science and Culture, which plays the leading role in the promotion of intelligent design. Its fellows include most of the leading intelligent design advocates: William A. Dembski, Michael Behe, Jonathan Wells and Stephen C. Meyer.

Intelligent design has been described by its proponents as a 'big tent' belief, one in which all theists united by having some kind of creationist belief (but of differing opinions as regards details) can support. If successfully promoted, it would reinstate creationism in the teaching of science, after which debates regarding details could resume. In his 2002 article in ''Christian Research Journal'', Discovery Institute fellow Paul A. Nelson credits Johnson for the 'big tent' approach and for reviving creationist debate since the ''Edwards v. Aguillard'' decision.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Nelson |first=Paul A. |author-link=Paul Nelson (creationist) |year=2002 |title=Life In The Big Tent: Traditional Creationism And The Intelligent Design Community |url=http://www.equip.org/PDF/DL303.pdf |journal=Christian Research Journal |location=Charlotte, NC |publisher=[[Christian Research Institute]] |volume=24 |issue=4 |issn=1082-572X |access-date=2014-06-01}}</ref> According to Nelson, "The promise of the big tent of ID is to provide a setting where Christians (and others) may disagree amicably, and fruitfully, about how best to understand the natural world, as well as Scripture."

In his presentation to the 1999 "Reclaiming America for Christ Conference," "How The Evolution Debate Can Be Won," Johnson affirmed this 'big tent' role for "The Wedge" (without using the term intelligent design):

{{quotation|To talk of a purposeful or guided evolution is not to talk about evolution at all. That is "slow creation." When you understand it that way, you realize that the Darwinian theory of evolution contradicts not just the book of Genesis, but every word in the Bible from beginning to end. It contradicts the idea that we are here because a Creator brought about our existence for a purpose. That is the first thing I realized, and it carries tremendous meaning.

...

So did God create us? Or did we create God? That's an issue that unites people across the theistic world. Even religious, God-believing Jewish people will say, "That's an issue we really have a stake in, so let's debate that question first. Let us settle that question first. There are plenty of other important questions on which we may not agree, and we'll have a wonderful time discussing those questions after we've settled the first one. We will approach those questions in a better spirit because we have worked together for this important common end."

...

[The Wedge is] inherently an ecumenical movement. Michael Behe is a Roman Catholic. The next book that is coming out from Cambridge University Press by one of my close associates is by an evangelical convert to Greek Orthodoxy. We have a lot of Protestants, too. The point is that we have this broad-based intellectual movement that is enabling us to get a foothold in the scientific and academic journals and in the journals of the various religious faiths.|Johnson|How The Evolution Debate Can Be Won<ref name="debate_won"/>}}

The Discovery Institute consistently denies allegations that its intelligent design agenda has religious foundations, and downplays the religious source of much of its funding. In an interview of Stephen C. Meyer when ''[[ABC World News|World News Tonight]]'' asked about the Discovery Institute's many evangelical Christian donors the Institute's public relations representative stopped the interview saying "I don't think we want to go down that path."<ref>{{cite news |date=November 9, 2005 |title=Small Group Wields Major Influence in Intelligent Design Debate |url=https://abcnews.go.com/WNT/story?id=1297170&WNT=true |work=[[ABC World News|World News Tonight]] |location=New York |publisher=[[American Broadcasting Company]] |access-date=2014-06-01}}</ref>

=== Obfuscation of religious motivation ===
Phillip E. Johnson, largely regarded as the leader of the movement, positions himself as a "theistic realist" against "methodological naturalism" and intelligent design as the method through which God created [[life]].<ref name="johnson_theistic_realist">[[#Johnson 1995|Johnson 1995]], pp. 208-209. "A theistic realist assumes that the universe and all its creatures were brought into existence for a purpose by God. Theistic realists expect this 'fact' of creation to have empirical, observable consequences that are different from the consequences one would observe if the universe were the product of nonrational causes... God always has the option of working through regular secondary mechanisms, and we observe such mechanisms frequently. On the other hand, many important questions—including the origin of genetic information and human consciousness—may not be explicable in terms of unintelligent causes, just as a computer or a book cannot be explained that way."</ref> Johnson explicitly calls for intelligent design proponents to obfuscate their religious motivations so as to avoid having intelligent design recognized "as just another way of packaging the [[Evangelicalism|Christian evangelical message]]."<ref name="johnson_evangelical_message">{{cite journal |last=Johnson |first=Phillip E. |date=April 1999 |title=Keeping the Darwinists Honest |url=http://www.arn.org/docs/johnson/citmag99.htm |journal=Citizen |location=Colorado Springs, CO |publisher=[[Focus on the Family]] |issn=1084-6832 |access-date=2014-06-01 |quote=ID is an intellectual movement, and the Wedge strategy stops working when we are seen as just another way of packaging the Christian evangelical message. ... The evangelists do what they do very well, and I hope our work opens up for them some doors that have been closed.}}</ref> Hence intelligent design arguments are carefully formulated in [[secular]] terms and intentionally avoid positing the identity of the designer. Johnson has stated that cultivating ambiguity by employing secular language in arguments which are carefully crafted to avoid overtones of [[theism|theistic]] [[creationism]] is a necessary first step for ultimately introducing the Christian concept of God as the designer. Johnson emphasizes "the first thing that has to be done is to get the [[Bible]] out of the discussion" and that "after we have separated materialist prejudice from scientific fact" only then can "biblical issues" be discussed.<ref name="johnson_bible_out">{{cite journal |last=Johnson |first=Phillip E. |date=July–August 1999 |title=The Wedge: Breaking the Modernist Monopoly on Science |url=http://www.touchstonemag.com/archives/article.php?id=12-04-018-f |journal=[[Touchstone Magazine|Touchstone: A Journal of Mere Christianity]] |location=Chicago, IL |publisher=Fellowship of St. James |volume=12 |issue=4 |issn=0897-327X |access-date=2014-06-01 |quote=...the first thing that has to be done is to get the Bible out of the discussion. ...This is not to say that the biblical issues are unimportant; the point is rather that the time to address them will be after we have separated materialist prejudice from scientific fact.}}</ref> In the foreword to ''Creation, Evolution, & Modern Science'' (2000) Johnson writes "The intelligent design movement starts with the recognition that 'In the beginning was the Word,' and 'In the beginning God created.' Establishing that point isn't enough, but it is absolutely essential to the rest of the gospel message."<ref>[[#Bohlin 2000|Bohlin 2000]], p. 5</ref>

=== Organizations ===

==== The Center for Science and Culture ====
{{Main|Center for Science and Culture}}
The Center for Science and Culture, formerly known as the Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture, is a division of the Discovery Institute. The Center consists of a tightly knit core of people who have worked together for almost a decade to advance intelligent design as both a concept and a movement as necessary adjuncts of its wedge strategy policy. This cadre includes Phillip E. Johnson, Michael Behe, William A. Dembski and Stephen C. Meyer. They are united by a religious vision which, although it varies among the members in its particulars and is seldom acknowledged outside of the Christian press, is predicated on the shared conviction that America is in need of "renewal" which can be accomplished only by unseating "Godless" materialism and instituting religion as its cultural foundation.

In his keynote address at the "Research and Progress in intelligent design" (RAPID) conference held in 2002 at [[Biola University]], William A. Dembski described intelligent design's "dual role as a constructive scientific project and as a means for cultural renaissance." In a similar vein, the movement's hub, the Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture had until 2002 been the "''Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture''." Explaining the name change, a spokesperson for the CSC insisted that the old name was simply too long. However, the change followed accusations that the center's real interest was not science but reforming culture along lines favored by conservative Christians.

Critics of the movement cite the Wedge Document as confirmation of this criticism and assert that the movement's leaders, particularly Phillip E. Johnson, view the subject as a [[culture war]]: "Darwinian evolution is not primarily important as a scientific theory but as a culturally dominant creation story. ... When there is radical disagreement in a commonwealth about the creation story, the stage is set for intense conflict, the kind of conflict that is known as a 'culture war.'"<ref>[[#Johnson 1995|Johnson 1995]], [https://books.google.com/books?id=Cpq97VuAAJEC&pg=PA12 pp. 12–13]</ref>

Recently the Center for Science and Culture has moderated its previous overtly theistic mission statements<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.discovery.org/crsc/aboutcrsc.html |title=What is The Center for the Renewal of Science & Culture All About? |author=<!--Staff writer(s); no by-line.--> |website=[[Center for Science and Culture|Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture]] |publisher=Discovery Institute |location=Seattle, WA |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/19970608130849/http://www.discovery.org/crsc/aboutcrsc.html |archive-date=1997-06-08 |access-date=2014-06-01}}</ref> to appeal to a broader, more secular audience. It hopes to accomplish this by using less overtly theistic messages and language.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.discovery.org/csc/aboutCSC.php |title=CSC - About CSC |author=<!--Staff writer(s); no by-line.--> |website=Center for Science and Culture |publisher=Discovery Institute |location=Seattle, WA |access-date=2014-06-01 |archive-date=2014-02-09 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140209190742/http://www.discovery.org/csc/aboutCSC.php |url-status=dead }}</ref> Despite this, the Center for Science and Culture still states as a goal a redefinition of science, and the philosophy on which it is based, particularly the exclusion of what it calls the "unscientific principle of materialism," and in particular the acceptance of what it calls "the scientific theory of intelligent design."

Promotional materials from the Discovery Institute acknowledge that the [[Howard Ahmanson, Jr.|Ahmanson]] family donated $1.5 million to the Center for Science and Culture, then known as the Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture, for a research and publicity program to "unseat not just Darwinism but also Darwinism's cultural legacy."<ref name="Reason_Olson">{{cite journal |last=Olson |first=Walter |author-link=Walter Olson |date=January 1999 |title=Dark Bedfellows: Postmoderns and Traditionalists Unite Against the Enlightenment |url=http://dheise.andrews.edu/Content/leadership/comps/6a/1educ_fndns/freed_readings/educ632_2.6.htm |journal=Reason |location=Los Angeles, CA |publisher=Reason Foundation |issn=0048-6906 |access-date=2014-06-07 |archive-date=2014-06-07 |archive-url=https://archive.today/20140607140411/http://dheise.andrews.edu/Content/leadership/comps/6a/1educ_fndns/freed_readings/educ632_2.6.htm |url-status=dead }}</ref> Mr. Ahmanson funds many causes important to the [[Christian right|Christian religious right]], including [[Christian Reconstructionism]], whose goal is to place the [[United States|US]] "under the control of biblical law."<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.salon.com/2004/01/06/ahmanson/ |title=Avenging angel of the religious right |last=Blumenthal |first=Max |author-link=Max Blumenthal |date=January 6, 2004 |website=Salon |location=San Francisco, CA |publisher=Salon Media Group |access-date=2014-06-01}}</ref> Until 1995, Ahmanson sat on the board of the Christian Reconstructionist [[Chalcedon Foundation]].<ref>{{cite journal |last=Clarkson |first=Frederick |author-link=Frederick Clarkson |date=March–June 1994 |title=Christian Reconstructionism: Part 3: No Longer Without Sheep |url=http://www.publiceye.org/magazine/v08n1/chrisre3.html |journal=[[Public Eye Magazine|The Public Eye]] |location=Somerville, MA |publisher=[[Political Research Associates]] |volume=8 |issue=1 |issn=0275-9322 |access-date=2014-06-01}}</ref>

==== Other organizations ====
*The [[Access Research Network]] (ARN) has become a comprehensive clearinghouse for ID resources, including news releases, publications, multimedia products and an elementary school science curriculum. Its stated mission is "providing accessible information on science, technology and society issues from an intelligent design perspective."<ref name="trojan">[[#Forrest & Gross 2004|Forrest & Gross 2004]], pp. 165-167</ref> Its directors are Dennis Wagner and CSC Fellows Mark Hartwig, Stephen C. Meyer and Paul A. Nelson.<ref name="about_ARN">{{cite web |url=http://www.arn.org/infopage/info.htm |title=About Access Research Network |author=<!--Staff writer(s); no by-line.--> |website=Access Research Network |location=Goleta, CA |access-date=2008-05-17}}</ref> Its 'Friends of ARN' is also dominated by CSC Fellows.<ref name="trojan" />
*The [[Foundation for Thought and Ethics]] (FTE) is a Christian non-profit organization based in [[Richardson, Texas]], that publishes [[textbook]]s and articles promoting intelligent design, [[abstinence]], and  [[religious nationalism|Christian nationism]].<ref name="buell2">{{cite web |url=http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/dover/buell2.html |title=Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District Pre-Trial transcript: July 14, Part 2 |website=TalkOrigins Archive |publisher=The TalkOrigins Foundation, Inc. |location=Houston, TX |access-date=2014-06-02}}</ref> CSC Fellows Charles Thaxton and William A. Dembski have served as academic editors for the Foundation.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.fteonline.com/history.php |title=Our History |author=<!--Staff writer(s); no by-line.--> |website=Foundation for Thought and Ethics |location=Richardson, TX |access-date=2014-06-06 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140714164146/http://www.fteonline.com/history.php |archive-date=2014-07-14 |url-status=dead }}
* {{cite web |url=http://www.fteonline.com/leadership.php |title=Leadership |author=<!--Staff writer(s); no by-line.--> |website=Foundation for Thought and Ethics |location=Richardson, TX |access-date=2014-06-06 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140714132225/http://www.fteonline.com/leadership.php |archive-date=2014-07-14 |url-status=dead }}</ref> The FTE has close associations with the Discovery Institute, hub of the intelligent design movement and other religious Christian groups.
*The [[Intelligent Design and Evolution Awareness Center]] (IDEA Center) is a Christian nonprofit organization formed originally as a student club promoting intelligent design at the [[University of California, San Diego]] (UCSD).<ref>{{cite news |last=Brown |first=Sarah Price |date=January 5, 2006 |title=Intelligent Design Gains Momentum, Raises Eyebrows on Campuses |url=http://www.vwc.edu/academics/csrf/issues/inteldesigncampus.php |location=Washington, D.C. |publisher=Religion News LLC |agency=[[Religion News Service]] |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060902061120/http://www.vwc.edu/academics/csrf/issues/inteldesigncampus.php |archive-date=2006-09-02 |access-date=2014-06-01 |quote=Luskin explained that as a Christian group, 'we wanted to be totally open about who we thought the designer was.'}}</ref> There are about 25 active chapters of the organization in the United States, [[Kenya]], [[Canada]], [[Ukraine]], and the [[Philippines]]. There have been 35 active chapters formed and several others are currently pending. Six out of the listed 32 chapters in the United States are located at high schools.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.ideacenter.org/clubs/locations.php |title=Chapter Locations |author=<!--Staff writer(s); no by-line.--> |website=[[Intelligent Design and Evolution Awareness Center]] |publisher=Casey Luskin; IDEA Center |location=Seattle, WA |access-date=2014-06-01}}</ref> In December 2008, biologist Allen MacNeill stated, on the basis of analysis of the [[Web page|webpage]]s of the national organization and local chapters, that it appeared that the organization is moribund.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://evolutionlist.blogspot.com/2008/12/intelligent-design-movement-on-college.html |title=The 'Intelligent Design' Movement on College and University Campuses is Dead |last=MacNeill |first=Allen |date=December 22, 2008 |website=The Evolution List |publisher=Allen MacNeill |location=Ithaca, NY |type=Blog |access-date=2014-06-01}}</ref>
*The [[Intelligent design network|Intelligent Design Network]] (IDnet) is a nonprofit organization formed in Kansas to promote intelligent design. It is based in [[Shawnee Mission, Kansas]]. The Intelligent Design Network was founded by John Calvert, a corporate finance lawyer with a bachelor's degree in [[geology]] and nutritionist William S. Harris. Together, Calvert and Harris have published the article in ''The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly''.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Harris |first1=William S. |last2=Calvert |first2=John H. |date=Autumn 2003 |title=Intelligent Design: The Scientific Alternative to Evolution |url=http://www.intelligentdesignnetwork.org/NCBQ3_3HarrisCalvert.pdf |journal=The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly |location=Philadelphia, PA |publisher=[[National Catholic Bioethics Center]] |pages=531–561 |doi=10.5840/ncbq20033333 |issn=1532-5490 |access-date=2014-06-02 |archive-date=2007-06-22 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070622222230/http://www.intelligentdesignnetwork.org/NCBQ3_3HarrisCalvert.pdf |url-status=dead }}</ref> Calvert also has written a play about intelligent design in a high school biology class with Daniel Schwabauer.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.intelligentdesignnetwork.org/TheRule.PDF |title=The Rule: A One-Act Play |last1=Schwabauer |first1=Daniel |last2=Calvert |first2=John |year=2002 |website=Intelligent Design network |publisher=[[Intelligent design network|Intelligent Design network, inc.]] |location=Shawnee Mission, KS |type=Play |access-date=2014-06-02 |archive-date=2015-09-24 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150924035418/http://www.intelligentdesignnetwork.org/TheRule.PDF |url-status=dead }}</ref>