Creationism and ID

From the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Biological Design in Classrooms.

Although evolutionary biology is replete with explanations for complex biological structures, scientists concerned about evolution education have been forced to confront "intelligent design" (ID), which rejects a natural origin for biological complexity. The content of ID is a subset of the claims made by the older "creation science" movement. Both creationist views contend that highly complex biological adaptations and even organisms categorically cannot result from natural causes but require a supernatural creative agent. Historically, ID arose from efforts to produce a form of creationism that would be less vulnerable to legal challenges and that would not overtly rely upon biblical literalism. Scientists do not use ID to explain nature, but because it has support from outside the scientific community, ID is nonetheless contributing substantially to a long-standing assault on the integrity of science education.

Nature is full of complex biological adaptations such as the camera eye, the bird wing, the bacterial flagellum, the mammalian immune system, or the complex traps of orchid flowers. Evolutionary biology continues to make progress in explaining such fascinating structures through the scientific process of positing natural explanations and testing them against the natural world. Nevertheless, in recent years scientists have been forced to confront a resurgence of opposition to evolution in the political realm of public education. This new antievolutionism is called "intelligent design" (ID). Its proponents allege that it is a revolutionary new scientific explanation for complex adaptations, that it is purely secular and definitely not creationism, and that it is therefore pedagogically and legally appropriate for public school biology classrooms. However, an analysis of ID shows that in both content and history, it is a subset of an earlier antievolution movement known as creation science.