Intelligent Design: Evolution’s Foil

By Derek Stolp

"I’ll be your foil, Laertes: in mine ignorance
Your skill shall, like a star i' th' darkest night,
Stick fiery off indeed."
-Hamlet, Act V, Scene 2


When federal Judge John E. Jones III handed down his decision in Kitzmiller v. Dover in December, 2005, I experienced a considerable sense of relief, if not jubilation, that a challenge to the scientific method, perhaps even to reason itself, had been turned back. Having taught mathematics for nearly forty years, I was not affected directly by the outcome of the case but, as a citizen, I was and continue to be concerned about American views on evolution.

After all, in their 2006 article "Public Acceptance of Evolution," in Science , Jon D. Miller, Eugenie C. Scott and Shinji Okamoto pointed out that, in 2005, an international study of attitudes and beliefs about evolution revealed that over the previous 20 years, the percentage of U.S. adults who accepted evolution had declined from 45 to 40 percent. I thought that, perhaps now, Judge Jones’ decision would allow biologists to attend to the issue of teaching the fundamentals of this field without having to fight a rear-guard action by creationists who have repackaged themselves as proponents of intelligent design. But upon further reflection, and drawing upon some lessons from my own teaching in mathematics, I have had a change of heart. Including intelligent design in the biology curriculum, I realize, would not only help in the teaching of evolution but is, perhaps, necessary if we are to put religious belief into its...

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