Intelligent Design Theory: Science or Religion?

On a chilly, late March day I was happily sipping a Starbucks half-caf when I caught a glimpse of a friend's cup and narrowly avoided performing a Danny Thomas-style spit take. On the side of the paper cup was printed

Men alternate between langour and passion: the mass are clerks and drones existing as slaves in the soul's hot prison, and the so-called independent few, or intellectuals, are madmen on a sea of moral experiment flying before despotic winds. These slaves who "their lives to some unmeaning taskwork give" will soon, he realizes, include himself: ( a job as School's Inspector ) and his lines especially in their tone depict the souls of a thousand million city people from his time to ours, from Leningrad to Sydney, London to New York to Tokyo.........

The "few" who escape from economic necessity and social conformity, the proud intellectuals, are like the mad helmsman,

"Still bent to make some port he knows not where,
Still standing for some false, impossible shore....

Is there no life, but these alone?
Madman or slave, must man be one?

It's okay Mathos. I didn't notice it.

It's okay Mathos. I didn't notice it.

Facts about the museum and beliefs
(BY RYAN CLARK, Cincinnati Enquirer, May 20, 2007

WHAT IS CREATIONISM?
A belief in the literal interpretation of the Bible: that God created the world in six 24-hour days on a planet just 6,000 years old (according to Biblical genealogies). The interpretation runs counter to accepted scientific theory, which says Earth and its life forms evolved over billions of years.

Followers base their views of history and science on a literal reading of Genesis, the first book of the Old Testament. They say science "facts" must be interpreted, that many forms of scientific dating are inconclusive and that many scientists provide only one possibility of how the world began. They refer to the Bible as "the history book of the universe," which they say helps make sense of the world.

A FEW SPECIFICS
Mark Looy, vice president for Answers in Genesis, explains what creationists believe on these topics:

Dinosaurs: Dinosaurs, a major Creation Museum theme, were originally vegetarians that co-existed with man and the rest of God's creatures in the perfect world before Adam's sin.

Continental drift: The Bible is virtually silent about plate tectonics, except for a reference to the "breaking up" of the fountains of the Great Deep during Noah's Flood. Many creationists believe that, under the right conditions, plates could have moved rapidly (not a "drift") during Noah's Flood.

Stars: Answers in Genesis astrophysicist Dr. Jason Lisle and his new planetarium programs proclaim that God "made the stars also" (Genesis 1:16). And the writer of the 19th chapter of the Book of Psalms says that the heavens declare the glory of God.

Carbon dating: Carbon dating can date only tens of thousands of years. Assumptions about other radiometric decay-rates give dates of millions or billions of years, but there is much evidence that the rates were accelerated in the past.

Different "races": The Bible (Acts 17:26) and science (the field of genetics) teach that there is only one group of people - the human race - and that skin colors are shades of one color (brown).

Fossils: Most fossils found in the ground were formed as a result of a catastrophic flood a few thousands years ago - the flood that is recorded in the Bible (Genesis Chapters 6-9).

WHAT IS THE STATEMENT OF FAITH?
Before a person is hired in the Answers in Genesis ministry, or the Creation Museum, he must sign a Statement of Faith.

According to the Answers in Genesis Web site, the worker agrees that he believes, among other things: that "Scripture teaches a recent origin for man and the whole creation," and "no apparent, perceived or claimed evidence in any field, including history and chronology, can be valid if it contradicts the Scriptural record."

WHAT IS ANSWERS IN GENESIS?
It is an independent, nonprofit, international ministry organization based in Petersburg, Ky. Its headquarters is on site of the Creation Museum.

WHO IS ANSWERS IN GENESIS?
In all, about 300 people work there as part of the ministry and the museum.

They include Ken Ham, president of the ministry, who decided to start his ministry based on the Bible in a central U.S. location, hence the move to Kentucky's Boone County.

Jason Lisle is the museum's astrophysicist. His job is to make certain the museum's theories are scientifically accurate.

"God constructed the universe so you and I can understand it," he says. "It is logical, and it speaks of his design."

Patrick Marsh, the museum's design director, is a Los Angeles native and a former designer for theme parks like Universal Studios. He is charged with making the museum fun. His work is based on his deep-rooted faith in creationism.

If any of that sounds stupid to you, consider that the alternative is evolutionism, which really IS stupid.

The sum total of miracles descri bed in the bible, both testaments in the case of Christians, is probably less than a hundred. Evolution on the other hand requires an endless sequence of probabilistic miracles and outright violations of real physical and mathematical laws. You could devise a new religion by taking the single stupidest idea or doctrine from each of the existing religions, and even that would make more sense than evolution.

Linus Van Pelt's "Great Pumpkin" theology makes more sense than evolution.

I can be a strong IDer and still believe that this allows for Darwin's theory and natural selection.

While scientists can be as guilty as religionists of drawing wrong conclusions about what they research and study, I don't think they have to be enemies or necessarily be at odds with each other.

foxfyre,

Your description of ID is something that can be "known" through spiritual faith only.

Evolutionary theory offers an explanation of natural processes through an examination of material evidence only. Science ignores spiritual issues. If new material evidence refutes a scientific theory, scientists correct their theory. Spiritual beliefs are not correctible in this way.