Product Description

A leading scientist examines the battle between evolution and Intelligent Design in America

At the dawn of the twenty- first century, the debate over Darwin’s theory of evolution is nearly as contentious as it was in the notorious Scopes trial a century ago. Today, however, people who believe that evolution is “only a theory” have put their hopes in a concept known as Intelligent Design.

In Only a Theory, Kenneth Miller dissects the claims of the ID movement in the same incisive style that marked his testimony as an expert witness in Pennsylvania’s landmark 2005 Dover evolution trial.

Unlike other books on the subject, Only a Theory’s critique of ID goes far beyond the scientific claims of the movement. To Miller, America’s “soul”—its place as the world’s leading scientific nation—is at risk because of this struggle. As he explains, the tactics of this new assault on science mimic earlier efforts of the academic left to remake science as a relativistic, culturally determined enterprise, rather than a rational search for truth about the natural world. Such marginalization, he argues, would effectively destroy American science.

Despite this analysis, Miller refuses to play the role of pessimist. He sees this as a teachable opportunity, a moment at which public understanding and support for science can be redeemed, and offers nothing less than a prescription for how America can save its scientific soul.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #24958 in Books
• Published on: 2008-06-12
• Format: Bargain Price
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 256 pages

From Publishers Weekly
Thoroughly enjoyable and informative, this new book by Miller (Finding Darwin's God), a Brown University biologist and leading proponent of evolution, dismantles the scientific basis of intelligent design piece by piece. He does this by taking seriously the claims of intelligent design (though with tongue often in cheek), such as irreducible complexity, and looking at the biological facts and the dubious conclusions ID concepts would lead to. He turns to the peer-reviewed scientific literature to demonstrate that the two biological phenomena ID proponents say could not have evolved—blood-clotting proteins and bacterial flagella—are now well-enough understood to fully rebut intelligent design. Looking at the underlying philosophical issues, Miller explains that ID's proponents want to replace modern science with  'theistic science'... that would use the Divine not as ultimate cause, but as scientific explanation. Miller effectively explores the devastating consequences such a change would have on both science and society. In a measured, well-reasoned book, Miller explains why evolution does not deny us our humanity or our unique place in the universe. Illus. Colbert Report appearance on June 16. (June 16)
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Review
"In this powerfully argued and timely book, Ken Miller takes on the fundamental core of the Intelligent Design movement, and shows with compelling examples and devastating logic that ID is not only bad science but is potentially threatening in other deeper ways to America's future. But make no mistake, this is not some atheistic screed -- Prof. Miller's perspective as a devout believer will allow his case to resonate with believers and non-believers alike."
--Francis Collins, Director, the Human Genome Project and author of The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief

"Only A Theory is an original and perceptive examination of the causes and effects of the ongoing civil war over evolution in America. A wise and tested veteran of its front lines, Ken Miller makes the compelling case that there is much more at stake in this conflict than one scientific theory - the fate of America's hard-earned scientific prowess is in the balance. Readers are sure to be inspired by this passionate appeal to defend and nourish one of our most important institutions."
--Sean B. Carroll, author of The Making of the Fittest and Endless Forms Most Beautiful

“Ever since the publication of Darwin’s Origin of Species 150 years ago, the public controversy over creation and evolution has been fought largely in books. For the past two decades, Ken Miller has been a prominent participant in that debate with his books and lectures. In Only a Theory, Miller takes up the cudgels again in a lively new book that persuasively argues for the theory of evolution, penetratingly critiques the claims for intelligent design, and explains why this dispute should matter to everyone. It may be only a book, but it’s a good one. I highly recommend it.”
--Edward J. Larson, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Evolution: The Remarkable History of a Scientific Theory

“Ken Miller’s new book, Only a Theory, is everything we have come to expect from him— informed, witty, and above all deeply serious about matters of concern to us all. He takes so-called intelligent design theory apart, piece by piece, showing it for the sham that it is. In its stead, Miller makes a very strong argument for the truth and beauty of evolutionary thinking and begs that we not keep this wonderful science from our children. Highly recommended!”
--Michael Ruse, author of Darwinism and Its Discontents

About the Author
Kenneth R. Miller is a professor of biology at Brown University. He has published scientific papers in CELL, Nature, and Scientific American. In 2007 he was named a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and received the Exploratorium’s Outstanding Educator Award. He lectures widely and has appeared on NPR’s Science Friday and The Colbert Report.

Customer Reviews

A Magisterial Refutation of Intelligent Design and the Danger It Poses to America's Future
"Only A Theory: Evolution and the Battle for America's Soul" is all we have come to expect from noted Brown University cell biologist Kenneth R. Miller in the course of his many public debates against creationists; a sterling blend of ample wit and elegant prose coupled with his passionate sincerity in defending genuine science's methodology and data from those intellectual Vandals seeking to replace it with their delusional notion of pseudoscientific mendacious intellectual pornography known as Intelligent Design. Here, in this succinctly-worded, quite magnificent, book, Miller has rendered an elegantly stated, magisterial refutation not only of Intelligent Design's pathetic pretense of being genuine science, but of its ongoing - and regrettably still successful - effort to claim America's "scientific soul" as he has defined it, and thus, to pose a dire threat to American scientific and technological supremacy. Fanatical skeptics like Discovery Institute mendacious intellectual pornographers ("Fellows" and "Senior Fellows") Michael Behe, William Dembski, David Klinghoffer, Paul Nelson, and Jonathan Wells, among others, will scoff at Ken Miller's assertions, and accuse him of being "possessed" or "enslaved" by his "atheistic, liberal Darwinist" agenda. However, unlike them, Miller has consistently staked out views recognizing that science and religion must remain separated - despite his own devoutly held Roman Catholic religious convictions - and indeed, his cogent remarks are rather quite persuasive, and, happily, harbor the glimmerings of some hope despite their dire alarmist nature. Without question "Only A Theory" ought to serve as a clarion call to those willing to be persuaded by Miller's arguments, because the emotional, intellectual and political stakes for America's future are quite high, and among these include the survival of a vibrant, American science as a rational enterprise totally devoid of supernatural considerations (For these reasons alone, "Only A Theory" demands a wide readership, extending well beyond the battle lines of contested school districts like Dover, Pennsylvania's to the very halls of Congress, even if there are many, in Washington, D. C., unlikely to listen to Miller's warning.). Not only evolutionary biology, but geology, chemistry, and physics too would be twisted beyond recognition by the Discovery Institute's zealous band of mendacious intellectual pornographers seeking a more expansive "definition" of science that allows "research" into supernatural phenomena; a nonsensical definition endorsed by Behe, having admitted under oath at the 2005 Kitzmiller vs. Dover trial, that astrology could be accepted as science.

What is America's "scientific soul" and why its survival remains in jeopardy from Intelligent Design's ongoing, vigorous - or perhaps more accurately, fanatical - assault, are among the most important, most compelling, themes examined by Miller in his elegant, terse tome. As Miller eloquently notes in the opening chapter, his recognition of a "battle for America's scientific soul" is one he has discerned only recently, in the aftermath of recent legal battles against Intelligent Design and other creationist foes. And, regrettably, it is a battle that goes well beyond shaping the future course of American secondary school science education. Miller passionately believes that our "scientific soul" is exactly the very essence that makes us Americans; a healthy disdain for authority, but one which does respect pragmatism, and demands results, in short, the very cultural environment that has been embraced, and sustained by mainstream science for centuries. A cultural environment whose revolutionary nature arose in little more than a decade during the American Revolution, according to Miller's distinguished Brown University colleague, eminent American historian Gordon Wood, when Americans transformed their society from "one little different from the hierarchal societies of European monarchies to one that took up the truly radical notion that individuals were both the source of a government's legitimacy and its greatest hope for progress."

In many respects, not only is Intelligent Design an idea that is "un-American", since its very principles are antithetical to America's defining cultural values of practicality, pragmatism and disrespect of authority, but, in its key objective of "overthrowing methodological naturalism", Intelligent Design, argues Miller, is a far more serious and dangerous threat to mainstream science than traditional creationism, since it is a revolutionary assault against the very fabric of scientific methodology ("methodological naturalism", or rather, what is commonly recognized as the scientific method comprised of hypothesis generation and testing) employed by science for centuries, transforming science into an unrecognizable entity that is as rife with relativism as the leftist-leaning social sciences criticized by philosopher Allan Bloom in his landmark tome, "The Closing of the American Mind: How Higher Education Has Impoverished America's Young and Failed Its Students". Indeed Miller observes astutely that Bloom's analysis was not a conservative-leaning attack on leftist Academia, but instead, one warning how a relativistic "openness" - an uncritical embrace of all ideas - was detrimental to the survival of rational thought on college and university campuses, and, not surprisingly, Bloom contended that the sciences were the only realm of Academia unaffected by the politics of openness. However, if Intelligent Design successfully gains further acceptance amongst a sympathetic American populace, then, Miller warns, American science would be susceptible too to the same political plagues affecting the arts, humanities and social sciences (Ironically the same plagues that have been the subjects of ample discourse, mostly hysterical ridicule, from leading Intelligent Design advocates like Philip Johnson, David Klinghoffer, and Ann Coulter.). This is a warning which should be heeded by anyone who reads or hears of Miller's message, since the very essence, the very future, of American science is at stake.

If Intelligent Design is "un-American" in both its tone and temperment, then why is it gaining wider acceptance among Americans? Miller concludes one of his early chapters noting how biologists have failed to persuade the public of "the imperfections of biological design", implying that such imperfections are not, in of themselves, "proof" of evolution; an observation which Intelligent Design advocates have been quite persuasive. Moreover, by emphasizing the existence of biological design to the general public so they can ask "How come?" and noting the other "weaknesses" of evolutionary theory, Intelligent Design advocates are winning the public relations battle and, so far, the battle for America's scientific soul.

"Only A Theory" should not be viewed only as a concise, well-reasoned polemic on behalf of rational thought, and America's scientific future. It is as I have noted earlier, an elegant refutation of the mendacious intellectual pornography that is Intelligent Design. However, instead of simply refuting it, Miller examines it, asking us to look into the possibility that Intelligent Design is credible science, and therefore, a viable, truly better, alternative to contemporary evolutionary theory in explaining the structure and history of Planet Earth's biodiversity (In fairness to Miller, however, the very brevity of this book means that "Only A Theory" does not include ample discussion of issues ranging from understanding the tempo and mode of evolution, the relationship of sociobiology to contemporary theory, and the importance, if any, of neutral models of evolution; all of which have been cited by Intelligent Design advocates and creationists as solid "evidence" that evolutionary theory is an outmoded theory in "crisis", on an intellectual "death watch", awaiting its replacement by Intelligent Design. Of course, despite such delusional assertions, evolutionary theory remains a vigorous, unifying scientific theory of biology; a point Miller emphasizes in the book's conclusion.). Miller devotes much of Chapters Two and Three in reviewing the history of Intelligent Design, beginning with William Paley's work, and in explaining Behe's concept of Irreducible Complexity and Dembski's "mathematical" notion of Complex Specified Information. In evoking once more Behe's favorite mechanical mousetrap analogue as an "example" of Irreducibly Complex, Miller offers his most concise, but extensive, explanation why the mousetrap isn't, offering instead, some sly, and humorous, analogues of exaptation at work (While Miller doesn't refer specifically to the term exaptation as such - one that has gained widespread currency since the publication of a classic early 1980s paper co-authored by paleontologists Stephen Jay Gould and Elisabeth Vrba - anyone familiar with it should recognize the mousetrap as a mechanical analogue comparable to the evolution of feathers in theropod dinosaurs originally for thermoregulation, before assuming prominent roles in powered flight in avian dinosaurs and their closely related kin.). He follows up his elegant discussion of the mousetrap with one of a real biological exaptation, the evolution of a "poison pump" in some bacteria from the bacterial flagellum (Behe's real-life favorite example -which he asserts still - of Irreducible Complexity.).

If we were "Embracing Design" (Chapter Three), then how would Intelligent Design explain the history of Earth's biodiversity? Using as an elegant example, the evolutionary history of horses, Miller shows why Intelligent Design does a poor job of it, observing that an Intelligent Designer's only consistent pattern would be the constant replacement of "designed" species due to their extinctions (Unless, of course as Miller notes, that was indeed the "design" of the Intelligent Designer after all.). On the other hand, Miller notes how evolutionary theory explains the history of Earth's biodiversity in the succeeding two chapters, noting the so-called Cambrian "Explosion" (which, he reminds us, was instead a gradual diversification of marine metazoan taxa over the span of tens of millions of years) and human evolution. Moreover, he explains how evolutionary developmental biology (`evo devo") is yielding fascinating new insights from genomic data that confirm the robustness of Darwin's ideas on "descent with modification" at the molecular level; overwhelming data denying the implications of an "Intelligent Designer" "predicted" by William Dembski in his mathematically flawed conceptions of Complex Specified Information and his so-called "Law of Conservation of Information". And last, but not least, Miller explains why evolution is not a "random" process in "The World That Knew We Were Coming" (Chapter Seven), reminding us of the importance of convergence and contingency in influencing the history of life on Planet Earth.

Other books have emphasized the danger posed by Intelligent Design to America's scientific and technological future, most notably, Niles Eldredge's "The Triumph of Evolution and the Failure of Creationism", and Donald Prothero's "Evolution: What the Fossils Say and Why It Matters". However, none have been as eloquent or as extensive in pointing out this danger as Miller has through his compelling and persuasive reasoning. Few have devoted as much space as Miller's admirable effort in "Only A Theory" in taking seriously the "scientific" claims posed by Intelligent Design advocates, if only to demonstrate why these are not merely "bad" science - or rather mendacious intellectual pornography as I would prefer to describe them - but how they would "impoverish" the very nature of science if they were ever recognized as science. While Miller closes "Only A Theory" on a potentially optimistic note, relying on his personal anecdotal evidence drawn from giving lectures around the United States to demonstrate Americans' keen current interest in science - even if they object strongly to contemporary evolutionary theory - he recognizes that the ongoing battle for America's scientific soul will be long and arduous. Recent interest in so-called "Academic Freedom" bills promoted by the Discovery Institute in several state legislatures and the Texas State Board of Education's sympathy towards emphasizing the "strengths and weaknesses" of scientific theories like contemporary evolutionary theory merely demonstrate just how difficult a struggle this battle shall be.

A tale of warning from a great fighter in the "evolution wars"
The market is crowded with books on the evolution/intelligent design "controversy," so much so that works in this area have become highly repetitious--read one, it seems, and one has read them all. This is a refreshing book in a couple of respects.

First, Miller's rhetorical approach is to err on the side of taking the claims of intelligent design more seriously than they really deserve. As a result, the book does not come across as polemical, and this gives rise to the hope that an ID creation-sympathetic reader might actually read it and learn something truly useful about the flaws of ID creationism rather than getting insulted and putting it aside in disgust. Miller initially presents the claims of design without rebuttal and acknowledges how powerful these claims--if true--are. Only after having given these claims an initially friendly treatment does he then return to them and explain just why they are unsupported by evidence.

Second, Miller argues fairly forcefully that acknowledging the facts of evolution does not compel one to reject religion, and he does so from the position of a person of faith--Miller being, himself, a Roman Catholic. He does not purport to be able to "prove" his religious faith in purely rational terms, but only to show that science does not exclude it. His arguments, being somewhat subjective in nature (e.g., the "fine-tuned universe" argument) are going to seem persuasive to some and not at all persuasive to others, but he does a splendid job of setting them out and putting the case well.

The main thesis comes toward the end, and is reflected in the subtitle, "Evolution and the Battle for America's Soul." Miller is concerned that the fight over creationism has morphed, through the political program of intelligent design, into an all-out attack upon science at its roots--and upon America's "scientific soul." Where the hard sciences have been largely untouched by the advent of extreme relativism, ID threatens to introduce that relativism to biology--a relativism which asserts that there is no real "right" or "wrong," that objective knowledge is beyond our reach, and that all points of view and ways of looking at evidence are equally valid. Such a view would of course undermine the whole foundation of science. Materialism is under attack; methodological naturalism is under attack; and if these attacks succeed, what can remain of science? Nothing good, to be sure; baraminology would have equal status with cladistics, "flood geology" equal status with real geology, and so on.

Miller's involvement in school-book publishing as the author of popular biology textbooks, his involvement in disputes over school-book choice, and his testimony as a fact and expert witness in federal trials over anti-evolution laws and ID creationism policies have given him a seat front-and-center to this battle for our scientific soul, and his hopes and fears clearly have been shaped by the fights he has seen. He ably points out the strangeness of the dispute, including the odd manner in which the relativism of the far academic left has been enlisted in the service of an agenda of the religious right--a very peculiar marriage of absolutism and relativism indeed.

If I were going to try to persuade a creationist friend to give due consideration to the theory of evolution by natural selection, this is the book I would give him. The treatment of the science is necessarily a quick one, but it is a good one if the reader has not done a lot of reading in biology lately. Miller's sincerity in his religious belief comes through strongly, and constitutes an excellent "testimony" for someone who thinks that there is a stark and unavoidable choice between Darwin and God.

What impact will this book have? It is hard to say. As positive and persuasive as it is, I think Miller's theology -- which he treats here in less detail than in Finding Darwin's God -- will seem unsatisfying to the hard-core literalists who are the strongest adherents to ID creationism. Miller sounds too much like a Deist, or a Gouldian NOMA-ist, to give much comfort to people who believe in a God who answers prayers and does miracles. Miller has elsewhere disclaimed both Deism and Gould's NOMA concept, but there is a resemblance which those who have "rapture-ready" bumper stickers will easily notice. The best hope, and one to which this work is well suited, is that people whose theology is less literal but who are nonetheless troubled by what they see as a general "godlessness" and "purposelessness" in evolution will find this book persuasive. Miller feels that Americans are characteristically practical, and it is to that pragmatic nature that he appeals; with any luck, he will win some hearts and minds.

Another Solid Work by Miller
It's a question that I have pondered before, "How can America be one of the most scientifically advanced nations when such a scientific idea as evolution is so widely doubted compared to other countries?"

But for the more economically thoughtful among us the answer is probably more obvious than not. The incredible -- and ironically rather Darwinistic -- powers and capabilities of competitive capitalism lie at the heart of America's soul. Consequentially, business is not the only place where such factors are present in the United States, for science is home to them as well. The result, then, is that just as good and bad products come and go before really great ones succeed in the niche of popular demand, scientific ideas (even so called ones) are in a manner of speaking subject to the same experience.

But there's a little bit of problem here, as Kenneth Miller elaborates on in his new book "Only a Theory". While the more competitive nature of science in the States has given fertile ground to great ideas, the arbiters of what constitutes good scientific ideas worth being taught in the curriculum have too often not been scientists! Rather political ideologues have attempted to interject what is somewhere between poor science and not-science to be either taught along with genuine science (at best...) if not to its detriment (at worst). With these concerns as the foundation of his book, Miller describes the problems that could confront America's scientific eminence if such aforementioned political forces were to gain further power.

To fulfill his duty to ensure that more people become educated, and therefore hopefully able to make better decisions when it comes to the scientific education of our children, Miller, for three chapters, engages in a powerful but honest assault on the (so-called) alternative scientific ideas that were argued over in the 2005 Dover trial. This is probably the best part of the book and undoubtedly the reason why many, if not most, will read it. Much of this portion of the book reads like a version 2.0 of his previous book "Finding Darwin's God". Miller takes on once again the claims surrounding the sacred icon of the recent "Intelligent Design" movement: the bacterial flagellum. He also again addresses the argument of irreducible complexity as it relates to the blood-clotting cascade. Beyond this, Miller references a couple of examples of observed evolution-in-action with regards to synthetic compounds, and looks at our genetic relationship with the chimps. Suffice it to say Miller does, as we've come to expect, an excellent job dealing with the science and making his case. Michael Behe's newer work "The Edge of Evolution" even gets a little addressing.

It is perhaps a bit misguided to think that this book is all but a screed of scientific arguments. In fact, although it contains the scientific arguments, it's also more than that. Miller explores how the educational system is, in fact, facilitating the "closing of the American mind", referencing Allan Bloom's criticisms of America's academic approach, and citing relativism as a culprit in the successes the ID movement has had on the PR front. Miller also spares some words regarding God and faith, which I found enjoyable.
Ultimately, while this book is not quite the powerhouse of scientific arguments that "Finding Darwin's God" was (after all, we've been there done that), it is another admirable and timely book (I've been anticipating Miller's next book) that excellently addresses the current issues of the debate.

ADDED IN EDIT: After further consideration of Miller's argument regarding the nature of science education, it has occurred to me that the following consideration may in fact require Miller to amend his argument about how evolution, and science as a whole, should be taught: the Soviet Union was very much a nation captivated by science, and even placed far more of the nation's expenditures into science programs and research than the United States, yet it was the latter that clearly took the lead while the former remained stagnant. If this is proof that capitalism via competition is better for science than uniformity, then such implications must be considered in terms of their application to education of science in America. In any case, I'll leave the reader to decide for him or herself how this point does or does not affect, to some degree, Miller's argument. I personally think it might.