Product Description

In the last fifteen years a controversial new theory of the origins of biological complexity and the nature of the universe has been fomenting bitter debates in education and science policy across North America, Europe, and Australia. Backed by intellectuals at respectable universities, Intelligent Design Theory (ID) proposes an alternative to accepted accounts of evolutionary theory: that life is so complex, and that the universe is so fine-tuned for the appearance of life, that the only plausible explanation is the existence of an intelligent designer. For many ID theorists, the designer is taken to be the god of Christianity.

Niall Shanks has written the first accessible introduction to, and critique of, this controversial new intellectual movement. Shanks locates the growth of ID in the last two decades of the twentieth century in the growing influence of the American religious right. But as he shows, its roots go back beyond Aquinas to Ancient Greece. After looking at the historical roots of ID, Shanks takes a hard look at its intellectual underpinnings, discussing modern understandings of thermodynamics, and how self-organizing processes lead to complex physical, chemical, and biological systems. He considers cosmological arguments for ID rooted in so-called "anthropic coincidences" and also tackles new biochemical arguments for ID based on "irreducible biological complexity." Throughout he shows how arguments for ID lack cohesion, rest on errors and unfounded suppositions, and generally are grossly inferior to evolutionary explanations.
While ID has been proposed as a scientific alternative to evolutionary biology, Shanks argues that ID is in fact "old creationist wine in new designer label bottles" and moreover is a serious threat to the scientific and democratic values that are our cultural and intellectual inheritance from the Enlightenment.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #267057 in Books
• Published on: 2007-03-15
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 296 pages

From Booklist
University professor Shanks is an impassioned defender of evolution. He is animated by the progress he believes evolution's critics are making in injecting creationism into American society, particularly into schools. His opponents' recent books, rarely reviewed in the press, provide Shanks' sounding board here, especially titles by Phillip E. Johnson, Michael Behe, and William Dembski. Collectively, they are the leading lights of the so-called intelligent-design theory, which front-rank Darwinist Richard Dawkins, in the foreword, indicts as "pernicious nonsense which needs to be neutralized before irreparable damage is done to American education." Although Dawkins may be crediting intelligent-design advocates with undue influence, Shanks zealously prosecutes the case against them. He focuses on their main precepts, such as claims that biochemistry possesses an "irreducible complexity" and, therefore, a nonmaterial component, or that thermodynamics refutes evolution. For communities with curriculum concerns about creationism versus evolution. Gilbert Taylor
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review

"[A] cogent and well-argued alarum...Shanks deftly skewers the scientific pretensions of intelligent design creationists."--Science

About the Author

Niall Shanks, a native of England, earned his Ph.D. at the University of Alberta, Canada. He is currently Curtis D. Gridley Professor in the History and Philosophy of Science at Wichita State University.

Customer Reviews

Succinct tour de force
After introducing his book by situating intelligent design theory in the context of resurgent religious fundamentalism, Shanks discusses traditional design arguments for the existence of God and early critical reactions (e.g., those of Hume and Kant) to them. This discussion provides background for the rest of the book.

In chapter 2 Shanks examines Darwin's response to the traditional biological version of the argument from design, as well as his views of religion. Shanks also presents key developments in evolutionary biology since Darwin, including the impact of genetics and recent research bringing together issues in evolution with issues in developmental biology.

In chapter 3 Shanks attends to the Second Law of Thermodynamics. He contends that errors about the meaning of the Second Law pervade creationist writings. He also argues that non-equilibrium thermodynamics has revealed how natural mechanisms can result in self-organization, by which physical systems organize themselves into complex, highly ordered states. Thus, Shanks contends, in addition to evolutionary mechanisms studied by biologists, there are other natural sources of ordered complexity working in the universe.

Supernatural science is the subject of chapter 4. Shanks emphasizes that, typically, scientists do not reject the possibility of supernatural causation; they do not presently take it seriously because of a lack of convincing evidence. To sharpen the issues here, Shanks examines some recent attempts to introduce supernatural causes into medicine, namely, with respect to the efficacy of prayer as effective therapy. He points out that such studies are relevant because they are serious attempts to gather evidence in favor of supernatural causation.

In chapter 5 Shanks presents some recent and influential biochemical arguments put forward by Michael Behe and others to justify the conclusion of intelligent design. Shanks argues that irreducible complexity, the centerpiece of these arguments, could have evolved.

Shifting his focus from biology to cosmology, in chapter 6 Shanks focuses on arguments for the conclusion of intelligent design that proceed from the nature of the universe and from anthropic principle cosmology in particular. He argues that the cosmological design arguments are inconclusive.

In the concluding chapter, Shanks briefly discusses science, morality, and God. He points out that intelligent design theorists are part of a movement which has a social agenda which goes well beyond science education. By contrast, Shanks argues that Darwin himself provides a way of thinking about morality which fits well with the democratic values which are our common inheritance from the Enlightenment. Shanks states that finally his book is about the Enlightenment and its enemies and about the choices we will all have to make, not just about science, but about life itself: how we want to live, how we want society to be structured, how we want to see the future unfold.

The book concludes with a rich glossary and bibliography.

Shanks has written a fine book. It is quite timely, immensely informative, logically rigorous, well-documented, and a pleasure to read. As nearly as I (a retired philosophy professor) can tell, this is cutting edge stuff, clearly presented. Anyone interested in creationism, intelligent design, or (at least if one is a layperson) just plain contemporary evolutionary biology or cosmology, or concerned to preserve us from the rabid forces of religious obscurantism, would benefit from reading this excellent book. With a mere 246 pages of text, it is a succinct tour de force.

Demolishes the modern argument from design
Professor Shanks has done somebody a real service here in painstakingly demonstrating the utter intellectual poverty of so-called "intelligent design theory." Just who that person is I don't know. Perhaps it's a US congressman. Most people I know either haven't a clue about the subject, or are rationalists and are well aware that the intelligent design argument is scientifically vacuous and actually a religious power play, or they are religious true believers themselves and uncritically accept the notion that the universe was designed by a supernatural being whom they call God.

In other words, all the close and detailed analysis done by Shanks in this book--and trust me, he really addresses the question in the most thorough way--isn't about to persuade anybody one way or the other. Most people won't--and could not even if they tried--read it. It is entirely too finely meshed in technical detail about matters of no particular interest to them: cosmology, quantum mechanics, probability theory, biochemistry, thermodynamics, etc. Yet the book had to be written just for the record, one might say. All the pseudoscience served up by the creationists and the intelligent designers needed to be answered thoroughly, and Shanks has done that in a most impressive manner.

Shanks takes the intelligent designers seriously and presents their arguments, and then, piece by piece, refutes them. Frankly, I believe he gives them more attention than they deserve. After all, how seriously can one take a man (leading intelligent design theorist, William Dembski, for example) who writes: "My thesis is that all disciplines find their completion in Christ and cannot be properly understood apart from Christ" (quoted on page 157)? I mean, isn't it enough to just quote such a person? He's a true believer and all his "arguments" are merely attempts to justify his belief in a supernatural being and supernatural causation. No amount of counter argument from logic or scientific experiment or from the multitudinous conclusions of the various sciences is going to sway him one iota.

But of course Shanks is not aiming his arguments at Dembski or his colleagues. Rather, like the good teacher he is, Shanks wants it spelled out for his students and for students everywhere just how absurd and wanting is the case for intelligent design. He is writing for those not yet entirely corrupted by religious propaganda and as yet innocent of the weight of the scientific evidence.

Why, one might ask, are the religious fundamentalists so intent on attacking Darwinism? Is it because they are uncomfortable with being closely related to apes, as were the Victorians? They probably are, but the real reason is that "Darwin's theory of evolution can be viewed as a sustained refutation of the argument from design..." (p. 24) Before evolution it was a mighty mystery as to how species arose, and any argument was as good as another, with the hoary argument from design being especially agreeable; and therefore pronouncements from the clergy held not only psychological, social and political sway over the masses, but intellectual sway as well. Darwinism changed all that, with the result that the Church lost an enormous amount of power and prestige--power and prestige that it has been desperately trying to regain ever since.

Noteworthy is the fine introduction by Richard Dawkins who has fought long and hard himself against the stupidities of the creationists and intelligent designers. Note well his sharp and decisive tone: "Intelligent Design 'theory' is pernicious nonsense which needs to be neutralized before irreparable damage is done to American education." (p. x)

That really is the bottom line. All that we have learned from science and rationalism is under attack from the forces of ignorance, mostly right-wing religious fundamentalists who would substitute their authoritarian mumble-jumble for reality in an attempt to seize the reigns of political power and usher in a return to the Dark Ages with themselves at the throne. Professor Shanks is to be commended for his efforts to prevent such a catastrophe, as unlikely as such a catastrophe might be.

A mixed bag
First, the good. Shanks does an effective job of accurately summarizing the scientific the arguments supporting evolution by natural selection. He does this in ways that are mostly accessible to readers whether they have a background in sciences (biology, chemistry, or physics) or not. Likewise, the reader can see the weaknesses of ID as so much arm-waving. He does this by grounding his arguments in the scientific method of hypothesis testing, so that there can be no (real, substantial) argument that scientists are rejecting ID out-of-hand because they don't like it. The new ingredient to Shanks' book is the philosophical grounding of his arguments. He argues that arguments for ID are based on the metaphors we use to understand abstract ideas like the development of organisms and other complex systems, and makes an effective case that the "life as a machine" metaphor obstructs our understanding of, and critical thinking about, how life could evolve.

Now for the not-so-good. It seems that any good argument should define what it is arguing for and against. Shanks never tells us as much, unless one consults the glossary (to which the text does not refer). This could potentially weaken further arguments through the very mis-interpretation he spends much of the book lamenting. (So for example, biological evolution is change in allele frequencies of a population over time.) It's also clear that Shanks is well-versed in the philosophical foundations of the anti-science of IDers, but his descriptions and explanations are muddled in a way that suggests he has not spent enough time (or had a good enough editor) reviewing how the common person knows what she knows. The chapters themselves progress logically, but the organization within the chapters is sometimes hard to follow and circuitous, a curious breakdown in a book by a philosopher.

Finally, I was disappointed that such a strong work, overall, suffers from what seemed to me as self-sabotage. Early in the book, Shanks identifies himself as someone who does not believe in a deity. This reader took it as a courageous declaration of the author's point of view, which purpose was the make sure readers suffer no ambiguity about his point of view. (Other readers, no doubt, will interpret it as the devil himself setting pen to paper, but this book is not written for minds permanently closed.) I'm afraid, though, that between that declaration and other, rather pointed jabs at IDers, that Shanks weakens the "punch" of what is otherwise a succinct and powerful volume. I'd also suggest that what was missing for me from this, and other, volumes about creationism and ID is more of an exploration about what such people and groups think and how they got that way -- beyond the obvious explanation that many/most IDers believe that a deity created the world we experience. I'm afraid that for all its strengths, this book lapses into what IDers and many other will take as yet another arrogant proclamation for evolution and against deities, and that's just not where the cheese is. We scientists owe it to people to inform, which Shanks does quite well, but we'd do better to keep our literate put-downs to ourselves if we hope to engage people in this rally to save critical thinking.