Experts bring arguements to forum at OSU

By CAROL REEVES
Gazette-Times reporter

Intelligent design — science or not?

What about evolution?

The debate over these questions has grown more contentious in recent years. Across the country, it has spurred community protests, lawsuits and a lot of ugly banter among bloggers tuned into the latest scientific squabbles.

Monday night the debate comes to Corvallis.

Two leading experts — Michael Ruse, a professor of science history and philosophy at Florida State University, and Cornelius Hunter, a biophysicist and adjunct professor at Biola University in La Mirada, Calif. — will offer their answers at Oregon State University’s CH2M Hill Alumni Center.

On opposite sides of what seems to be an impenetrable divide, each will argue their position in what promises to be a lively discussion.

Intelligent design is a theory that suggests because of the complexity of the universe and the natural world, life must have come about through an agent of design, not as a result of a lengthy, random process of natural adaptations as suggested by the theory of evolution.

Although evolution has long had a stronghold on America’s colleges and high school campuses, alternative theories of the origins of life are gaining a foothold.

According to a September 2005 Gallup poll, 61 percent of people thought evolution should be taught in public school science classes, 54 percent thought creationism also should be taught and 43 percent said intelligent design should be included as well.

Gallup studies also indicate only half of those polled said they were “very or somewhat familiar” with intelligent design theory.

Hunter noted there are a lot of misconceptions — one of them being that intelligent design is just another version of creationism.

“It is not a religious theory,” he said from California earlier this week. “ID is the hypothesis that without using religious premises, the evidence found in the natural world indicates design. We’re saying let’s look at the evidence and see what it says about the possibility of design compared to the likelihood of things developing by chance. It’s an empirical science.”

By contrast, Hunter said, evolution is not empirical. It’s rationalism that’s based explicitly on religious premises, he said.

Darwin’s promotion of natural selection is based on his and other scientists’ assumptions about the nature of God. They presume God would not create anything with an “imperfect” form or function and so the awkward and sometimes unpleasant anomalies found in nature can only be explained by chance mutations over time, he explained.

“Evolution and creationism both are approaches that hinge on a particular history of origins. In both, all the evidence is fitted into the pre-existing framework,” Hunter said. “ID, on the other hand, does not assume a particular history of origins.

“ID scientists are comfortable pursuing experimental science without knowing all the details of the origins problem. Different people can conclude different things about where the design comes from, but ID scientists are more interested in solving current-day problems without worrying about historical questions,” he concluded.

“Intelligent design is not a scientific argument, it’s a philosophical argument,” countered Ruse from his office in Tallahassee. It’s an “appeal to miracles” and attributes the development of the natural world to the supernatural.

Ruse is reluctant to make judgments about people’s beliefs in miracles and the supernatural, but he said intelligent design proponents have “taken themselves out of the realm of science” with their claims. They claim to be neutral when it comes to religion, “but of course that’s what they’re going to say. They cannot allow it to be a religious theory because then their effort to get it into the schools becomes unconstitutional.”

He will argue during Monday’s debate that it is intelligent design that fails to meet the criteria for genuine science and that naturalistic evolution provides a completely satisfying explanation for the development of life.

Between the two of them, Ruse and Hunter have written or edited about two dozen books on the evolution-intelligent design controversy and related subjects. When asked what difference it makes which theory people accept, both expressed concern for the future of their discipline.

“It matters very much for a scientist like me for whom science is a rational thing to protect it against those who promote irrational science,” said Ruse.

Hunter responded, “I think the reputation of science is at risk. Science is damaged when they (evolutionists) say their theory is fact.

“We need to be more careful about our claims as scientists. We can’t take a theory and hold it uncritically,” he said.

There’s one thing on which both men agree — the value of public debates such as the one at OSU.

Ruse acknowledged scholars can “argue until they’re blue in the face,” but as an educator, his goal in participating in such debates is to inspire students to investigate the issues for themselves.

“I would like to think that there will be students who go home (Monday night) and decide they need to think about this and study this more on their own,” Ruse said.

At a glance

WHAT: “Evolution vs. Intelligent Design: Scientific Assumptions in a Free Society”

WHEN: 7 p.m. Monday

WHERE: CH2M Hill Alumni Center, OSU

SPEAKERS: Michael Ruse, professor of science history and philosophy at Florida State University, and Cornelius Hunter, biophysicist and adjunct professor at Biola University

ADMISSION: Free

SPONSORS: OSU Socratic Club and the Intercollegiate Studies Institute (Wilmington, Del.)

INFORMATION: 752-7224

Carol Reeves covers religion for the Gazette-Times. She can be reached by e-mail at carol.reeves@lee.net or by phone at 758-9516.