Intelligent Design Timeline

1. The term "intelligent design" has been used in conjunction with the "teleological argument" and "argument from design" in somewhat "religious" contexts since ancient Greece.  (What we call "science" had crude beginnings in ancient Greece as "Natural Philosophy."  The term "science" is derived from ancient Roman Latin.)  In modern times it has escaped those religious overtones as it is science not religion that promotes it as explained forthwith.

    

2. Antonie van Leeuwenhoek (b. 1632 d. 1623) The "inventor" (leading developer, scientific investigator) of the microscope Anton van Leeuwenhoek coined the term "animalcules" for the smallest living things.  Microscopes in those days had very low magnification perhaps 100 to 300 times.  At that level of magnification a euglena for example appears to be just a drop of jelly and no more complicated than one.  Watching it with a microscope for some people confirmed the notion of "animalcules."

    

3. William Paley (b. 1743 d. 1805) Most people of normal intelligence believed in "a god" because of the "Paley's Watch" argument long before Paley was born.  As you should know Paley, argued that a watch is proof of a watchmaker.

   The question likely arose whether an animalcule was as complicated as a watch, since it did not appear so yet.

    

4. Charles Robert Darwin (b. 1809 d. 1882) In 1859 when Darwin wrote "On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life" the highest powered microscope had about the same magnification power as in van Leeuwenhoek's days.

   Although Darwin himself never tried to argue for the origin of life, only the origin of species, his theory kindled the imagination of atheists, who of course believed in "animalcules."  Although the world had certainly seen atheists before, especially on the fringes of expanding civilization, there were never atheists with any "scientific" clout.  Even ancient shepherds without indoor plumbing who had never seen a watch were not ready to believe much assembled itself without intelligent help.

   That is the problem.  Because of Darwin a new sort of "atheism" was born, and at last with some sort of "intellectual" standing.  Before that the widespread assumption was that atheists were intellectually inferior.  That would eventually change to the widespread assumption that anyone who believed in a god must have failed "science."

    

5. 1925

   The "Scopes" trial, so called after Thomas John Scopes and making no mention of microscopes, found the substitute teacher to be in violation of a state law making it illegal to teach "human evolution" in any state-funded school.  Scopes only got a $100 fine.

    

6. Thomas Hunt Morgan (b. 1866 d. 1945) Thomas Hunt Morgan received a Nobel Prize in 1933 for his more developed understanding of "genes" and the use of the term "chromosome."  For those of you who never understand what anything means, that means science was alerting the new intellectual atheism they have serious trouble ahead.  There will be no more "animalcules" or anything like them.  The assumption that atheists were intellectually superior would never again be that high, although at various times it would somewhat dominate.

    

7. "Miller-Urey" Stanley Lloyd Miller (b. 1930 d. 2007), Harold Clayton Urey (b. 1893 d. 1981) In 1952 using a mixture of gases intended to represent the atmosphere of a primordial Earth and an electric spark intended to represent lightning, the two showed that the set of "amino acids" would be produced.

   That brought the reputation of atheism up momentarily.

   However the set of amino acids didn't do anything.  Over the long years sensible people began to talk.  "Look atheists, that is not doing anything and it has been a long time.  Where is the next step?"

    

8. 1972

   Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes record the song "If You Don't Know Me by Now" written Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff, the song, intentionally or not, taunting atheists to show the next step or shut up.

   Although "intellectual" atheism was indeed challenged, it did not give up.  They said that extremely small "probabilities," for example one in a million, might take thousands of years to happen.

    

9. 1980

   Larry Graham recorded the song "One in a Million You" written by Sam Dees.  It does not necessarily have anything at all to do with the atheist arguments of the time, and might even be against atheism.  It was however coincidentally the atheist argument of the time.

    

10. 2007

    The decision in Kitzmiller v. Dover bans "Creationism" in public schools and equates "Intelligent Design" to "Creationism in disguise."  ID is therefore also banned.  Notice that in 1925 the state took the side of "religion" and in 2007 took the side of something pretending to be "science."

     

11. 2013

    Arlon Staywell (yours truly) revises the definition of "random" because there are no "random" agencies in the inanimate universe.  Contrary to current definitions that require the absence of attention, any "random" event requires the "free will" only living things have.  It is not the first contronym.  It no longer has meaning that events in the inanimate universe have a "probability."  Or another way to put that is the "probability" of every event in the inanimate universe is exactly "1," it must happen according to conditions present.  There are no other choices.

What Do Christian Leaders in the Trump Base Say About ID?

Would they like to overturn Kitzmiller v. Dover?  Do they care at all what public schools do?  Do they care at all what happens to science?

They need to care about public schools and science because good science won't trouble religion at all.  The people whose assumption is that anyone who believes in a god must have failed science are turning out bad scientists who simply repeat propaganda they do not understand, and beleaguer the faithful.

Is Intelligent Design Just Creationism in Disguise?

The judge in Kitzmiller v. Dover seemed to believe it is.  Perhaps the "intelligent design" of the defendants was indeed just creationism in disguise.  (Perhaps they were not genuinely proponents of actual ID.)  A drastic mistake often made is to assume that the definition of Intelligent Design forever after and everywhere must also be just creationism in disguise.  That is in violation of the rules of debate. In debate there are often controversial terms with very different definitions depending who is asked.  For example, what do people mean when they say "God"? An examination of the most often found definitions is available here.  Likewise there can be different definitions of intelligent design.  The rules of debate specify that both teams must mutually agree to definitions of terms, if some terms are controversial it is especially necessary to settle on one definition before the actual debate begins.

A more accurate definition of Intelligent Design would be as in the following chart.

A longstanding problem has been that many proponents of "creationism" take the Bible too literally when the Bible itself does not require it be taken literally, and many proponents of "evolution" believe it can explain the origin of life when Darwin himself did not say anything so ridiculous.  That is to say both sides of the "Creationism v. Evolution" conflict read at a very rudimentary level.  At higher levels of reading there is no conflict between science and religion.

The story of gene pool modification is found in Genesis 30:28 to 31:13 and has most of what Darwin said about evolution.  People attending Bible college should be familiar with that.