Thoughts in a Haystack

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In my last post, I pointed out that Michael Behe, despite all his and the Discovery Institute's denials that ID is either religious or creationism (the latter based on a claim that "creationism" is only properly applied to YEC), is peddling ID as part of a series of lectures presented by The International Institute for Culture, a "non-profit educational and research center dedicated to Catholic cultural renewal." Not only that, but another presenter in the series is Hugh Miller, a notorious young-Earth creationist. An anonymous commenter asked:

And the fact that Dawkins and others are the darlings of atheists and speak at their events is, of course, of no relevance ... ?

It is a fair question but one that has an obvious answer, as I pointed out:

Not particularly ... unless you want to contend that Michael Collins, Ken Miller, Francis Ayala, Theodosius Dobzhansky, and many, many more supporters of the science of evolution are all atheists. The fact is that, with the exception of a few contrarians (who are always around), ID advocates overwhelmingly and obviously are pushing religious objections to evolution. It is doubtful that anywheres near a majority of scientists who support evolution are atheists and even fewer allege that evolution somehow disproves any god.

In other words, there is no evidence that evolution is a position taken to advance atheism while the reverse is true of ID.

Here is some more evidence on that point, in the form of an article from Inside Higher Ed discussing the travails of science educators at Christian colleges who want to teach evolutionary science fairly and accurately. One of those is Richard Colling, who "left Olivet Nazarene University, where he taught for 30 years, after a dispute in which he was barred from teaching general biology or having Random Designer, his book, taught at the university that is his alma mater."

Of course, Behe's participation in a program instigated by a religious organization that also sponsors YEC advocates does not, on its own, demonstrate that ID is religious and/or creationism. But it is yet another piece on the mountain of evidence that ID's real focus is, in fact, both religion and creationism. But, when even educators at institutions run by conservative Christian sects recognize the validity of evolutionary science, it is clear that the impetus for evolution is not atheism.
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