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The triumphal Darwinian Centennial in 1959 seemed once and for all to end the argument between science and religion that had been raging since Thomas Huxley took up the cause of evolution in the Victorian era. As far as science was concerned, God was dead--case closed. But in the past two decades, as prize winning science writer Larry Witham shows in By Design, the case has been reopened. Advances in science suggest that the materialist "laws" may be incapable of comprehending the subtleties of evolution. Independent scientists and those involved with organizations such as the New Discovery Institute are now using the cutting edge tools of physics, biochemistry, genetics, information theory, and neuroscience to reconsider whether "intentional" fine-tuning was required for life to be possible. At the heart of "By Design" are two inter-related movements. One is the "science and religion dialogue," which stretches from the laboratories of Nobelists to inner sancta of the Vatican. This dialogue attempts to build bridges between two worlds formerly thought to be implacably hostile and incompatible. The other is the intelligent design movement, which by reviving a natural theology of design in nature has challenged the Darwinian strongholds in science and public education. Larry Witham introduces some of the most colorful characters in these movements, and summarizes the scientific developments that have made this dramatic new dialogue possible. After reading "By Design" we understand how what was once a battleground between God and science is now becoming a meeting ground.
E-Book Content
BY
DESIGN SCIENCE AND THE SEARCH FOR GOD
LARRY
WITHAM
Encounter Books SAN FRANCISCO
Copyright © 2003 by Larry Witham All rights reserved, Encounter Books, 665 Third St, Suite 330, San Francisco, California 94107-1951. Published by Encounter Books, an activity of Encounter for Culture and Education, Inc., a nonprofit tax exempt corporation. Encounter Books website address: www.encounterbooks.com Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Witham, Larry, 1952By design : science and the search for God / Larry Witham. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 1-59403-030-8 1. Religion and science. I. Title. BL240.3.W58 2003 215–dc21 2003040778 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
CONTENTS
Preface Rethinking Science 1 Darwin Triumphant 2 Science in the Dock Intimations of Design 3 The Cosmic Center 4 Looking for Light 5 The Dialogue 6 Life’s Origin 7 The Movement 8 By Design The Human Dimension 9 The War of Words 10 The Tree of Life 11 Mind and Brain 12 Leaps of Faith
Acknowledgments Bibliographical Essay
BY DESIGN
Science and the Search for God
Larry Witham
5
P R E FA C E
F
or the past twenty years, new curiosity has arisen about an age-old question: Does nature point to something beyond itself—toward a God, perhaps, or a transcendent order? Since the demise of natural theology in the 1800s, there have been strong taboos against using science—the measuring of physical matter—as a gauge of God or a higher reality. But in our time we have seen that stigma slowly fall away, allowing a renewed interest in what used to be called “reading the Book of Nature,” a metaphor suggesting that there is either an Author or, at the least, a text imbued with meaning. One survey of well-educated Americans, conducted by Skeptic editor Michael Shermer and MIT professor Frank Sulloway, found that the strongest reason for believing in God was seeing “good design, natural beauty, perfection, [or] complexity” in the world. The journal Science wondered recently about a “thaw in the ice between science and faith,” and Scientific American reported that four in ten ranking scientists can investigate nature and believe in a personal God. Though