Debating Darwin: Should evolution be taught as the only truth? at the 2007 Battle of Ideas conference hosted by the Institute of Ideas.
The debate over creationism has sprung up as the latest flashpoint in the battle between secularism and religion. While the US has seen extended conflict over the theory of evolution - from the 1925 'Scopes Monkey Trial' to the recent Dover, PA court case "new challenges to Darwinism under the guise of intelligent design (ID) have arisen in the UK. Concerns centre on school science education, from Sir Peter Vardy's Emmanuel Schools Foundation to the controversial teaching packs distributed by the anti-evolution group Truth in Science. The rise of 'Islamic creationism', modeling itself on ID, adds to concerns that Islam poses a special threat to secularism in Britain. Although the Royal Society and much of the scientific establishment have denounced the teaching of creationism, a recent MORI poll revealed that over 40% of the public believe that creationism or ID should be taught alongside evolution in school science classes.
While few seriously endorse the literal biblical story of creation, ID on the other hand claims to highlight Darwinism's shortcomings on scientific grounds. Evolution is 'just a theory' after all. Surely in the spirit of encouraging critical thinking we should 'teach the controversy'? Science is about questioning received truths rather than establishing certainties for all time. Does this not permit a more flexible approach to science education, where debate is encouraged? Further, the sheer complexity of evolutionary theory leads ID advocates to claim it is best to cultivate a critical eye in pupils, rather than have them take as truth a misunderstood Darwinian theory.
Is science, or 'scientism', just as fundamentalist as religion, arrogantly claiming to know everything, or are doubts such as these a reflection of scientists' failure to make the case properly for what science does have to offer? Is this merely another case of the 'balance fallacy' the mistaken belief that even falsehoods should be given air time?- IoI
Bio
Simon Conway Morris
Simon Conway Morris is Professor of Evolutionary Palaeobiology in the Department of Earth Sciences at the University of Cambridge. He has worked as a Research Fellow at St John's College, and has lectured at the Open University. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1990, and has received medals from the National Academy of Sciences and the Geological Society of London. He worked for the Natural Environment Research Council between 1998 and 2002. Simon is renowned for his insights into early evolution and his studies of palaeobiology.
Steve Fuller
Steve Fuller is Professor of Sociology at the University of Warwick, UK. He received his B.A. summa cum laude (History and Sociology) from Columbia University (1979), MPhil. (History and Philosophy of Science) from Cambridge University (1981), and PhD (History and Philosophy of Science) from University of Pittsburgh (1985). He is the founder of the research program of social epistemology - which is the name of a quarterly journal he founded with Taylor & Francis in 1987, as well as his first book Social Epistemology
Steve's work has appeared in 15 languages, and he has been a visiting professor in the US, Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark, Japan and Israel. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society for the Arts, Fellow at the Economic and Social Research Council, and is listed in Who’s Who in the World. In 2007 Warwick University awarded him a 'higher doctorate' (DLitt) for distinguished contributions to scholarship.
Alex Hochuli
Alex Hochuli is a masters student in European studies at King's College London and editor of the Battle of Ideas and Institute of Ideas websites.
He assists in the development of the IoI's communications and new media, and with the Debating Matters Competition. Alex is a Battle of Ideas committee member and is on the editorial team of the 2007 Battles in Print.
He occasionally writes articles for spiked and reviews for Culture Wars. Alex co-edits the Manifesto Club freedom blog, Speaking Our Mind, and is a regular guest on news discussion programme Up Front on internet talk TV channel 18 Doughty Street.
Alex is a recent graduate in International Relations and History from the London School of Economics (LSE) with a special interest in religion and secularism, co-producing the IoI and Bishopsgate Institute series of debates on secularism in early 2008. He also has a keen interest in issues relating to the media and the internet, particularly with regard to censorship and free speech.
David Perks
David Perks has taught in state schools for over 20 years and is a passionate defender of academic science education. His critique of the new school science curriculum published in What is science education for? provoked the front page headline in The Times - Science elite rejects new GCSE as 'fit for the pub'. David writes more broadly on education and the relationship between science and society. His interests range from environmentalism to intelligent design. David originated the Institute of Ideas and Pfizer Debating Matters sixth form debating competition
(born Feb. 12, 1809, Shrewsbury, Shropshire, Eng.—died April 19, 1882, Downe, Kent) British naturalist. The grandson of Erasmus Darwin and Josiah Wedgwood, he studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh and biology at Cambridge. He was recommended as a naturalist on HMS Beagle, which was bound on a long scientific survey expedition to South America and the South Seas (1831–36). His zoological and geological discoveries on the voyage resulted in numerous important publications and formed the basis of his theories of evolution. Seeing competition between individuals of a single species, he recognized that within a local population the individual bird, for example, with the sharper beak might have a better chance to survive and reproduce and that if such traits were passed on to new generations, they would be predominant in future populations. He saw this natural selection as the mechanism by which advantageous variations were passed on to later generations and less advantageous traits gradually disappeared. He worked on his theory for more than 20 years before publishing it in his famous On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection (1859). The book was immediately in great demand, and Darwin's intensely controversial theory was accepted quickly in most scientific circles; most opposition came from religious leaders. Though Darwin's ideas were modified by later developments in genetics and molecular biology, his work remains central to modern evolutionary theory. His many other important works included Variation in Animals and Plants Under Domestication (1868) and The Descent of Man… (1871). He was buried in Westminster Abbey. See alsoDarwinism.
Why not teach intelligent design as an equally plausible explanation for other scientific theories such as plate tectonics, disease or the most ridicules theory out there... relativity! I mean, come on now stop time?!?!? Have YOU ever seen anyone frozen in time? I thought not! (For the mythologically impaired this is written as a sarcastic post.)
For anyone in the scientific, political and academic communities to be taking creationism and "Intelligent Design" seriously at the dawn of the 21st Century is appalling; to be attempting to teach it as being equal to and along with science is disgusting, and unacceptable.
member. 
