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Is Intelligent Design different than Creationism?

To answer this question, we must first define what is meant by "Creationism" so that we may compare it with the Intelligent Design movement. While it can be argued that "Creationism" just means a belief in some sort of creator was in some way involved, this is not the form that has been gaining public attention in recent decades due to attempts to introduce the latter brand into public schools.

That form (sometimes referred to as "creation science" wink is much narrower in scope. One of the first sets of requirements for this form, came from Arkansas Act 590 which states that creationism requires



In this form, we can clearly see that all aspects of this form aside from (1) are directly opposed to evolution. Today, this is often referred to as "Young Earth Creationism" (YEC). However, there exists other forms of creationism that omit (5) and (6) and allow for the scientifically accepted chronology. Indeed, there are yet other forms which even omit the Christian God (such as Adnan Oktar's Atlas of Evolution which espouses an Islamic version of Creationism). Many forms also omit (3), allowing for the speciation of plants and animals, but only under the influence of the supernatural creator.

Thus, for the context of this thread in which we will analyze the form of creationism that is in the public spotlight and being thrust into political controversy, the definition by which I shall operate has three requirements, which is the common denominator between all forms of Creationism to which I have been exposed in over 7 years of studying the topic:
1) A belief that a supernatural creator (ie, God) created life.
2) A claim of some sort of "evidence" or "explanation" for this belief.
3) A rejection of evolution.

The only true difference between Intelligent Design and this form of Creationism is that the former pretends not to claim who the designer is. However, as this post intends to explore, this is a facade aimed at disguising Creationism in an attempt to make it constitutionally acceptable to teach in public school classrooms (since Creationism was ruled unconstitutional in the 1987 Supreme Court case Edwards v. Aguillard). Aside from the explicit naming of God as the creator (or "designer" wink , Intelligent Design is identical to Old-Earth Creationism. However, while Intelligent Design pretends not to name the designer, their hand is revealed in a variety of ways.

Knowing that Intelligent Design must be free of references to a specific god, Intelligent Design proponents are forced to sanitize their language. Unfortunately for them, they are frequently very poor at doing so. This is highlighted in a document from the chief organization in support of Intelligent Design, the Discovery Institute. In 1998, the Center for Renewal of Science and Culture (since changed to the Center for Science and Culture), a subset of the Discovery Institute, penned a document that has become infamously known as the "Wedge Document."

In it, the authors explicitly state that their goal is not scientific in nature, but intend to "replace materialistic explanations with the theistic understanding that nature and hurnan[sic] beings are created by God (emphasis added)." Here, it is explicitly stated that the goal of the Intelligent Design movement is not the promotion of an anonymous designer, but explicitly the Abrahamic God.

In defense, the Discovery Institute frequently claims that this document was part of a fund raising campaign. However, if this was the case, and the Wedge Document was not to be taken seriously, then this would imply that the Discovery Institute is, at best, dishonest in their goals which should still give one reason to be concerned.

But given the writings of many of its most prominent members, we can see that this is not just a fund raising strategy meant to draw money from religious organizations. Rather, this view that the Abrahamic God is responsible for the perceived design, is the driving force behind Intelligent Design.

One of the chief proponents of Intelligent Design is Phillip Johnson. Johnson is the principal architect of the Wedge Document as well as the co-founder of the Center for Science and Culture at the Discovery Institute. As such, he is well qualified to speak as representative of the Discovery Institute. In an article he wrote entitled Starting a Conversation about Evolution, he refers to the Intelligent Design movement by saying,



Again, we see that Intelligent Design affirms a supernatural (and explicitly Christian) force which makes it synonymous with Creationism. However, Johnson has revealed that the supposedly anonymous designer is God in other sources. In his 1997 book, Defeating Darwinism by Opening Minds he writes,



During a Christian radio talk show from 2004, Johnson states,



In an article from 1996 we find Johnson saying,



In the forward to his book, Unapologetic Apologetics Johnson explicitly ties Intelligent Design to Christian religion during the forward in which he states:



In Church & State magazine, the April 1999 issue reports on a speech of Johnson's at a Coral Ridge Ministries' conference (Feb. 26-27) in which he makes the goal of Intelligent Design even more explicit:



So what we now see is that Phillip Johnson, hailed as the founder and head of the Intelligent Design movement, repeatedly states that Intelligent Design has nothing to do with science, but rather, is about promoting the Abrahamic God. By promoting God as the designer, Intelligent Design fails to distinguish itself from Creationism.

These are but a small collection of Johnson's statements inexorably linking Intelligent Design and Creationism (many more from him and other Intelligent Design advocates can be found by reading the transcripts of Day 6 of the Dover trial of Barbra Forrest's testimony).

But Johnson is far from the only head of the Intelligent Design movement that holds this position. Another voice of the Discovery Institute is Dr. William Dembski. In his book 2002 book, Intelligent Design, Dembski states:



Here we see the true motive of Dembski; He views the methodological naturalism of science as idolatry and seeks to overthrow it. Furthermore, Dembski also tips his hand in a paper presented at the Millstatt Forum August 10, 1998 in which he states:



In this paper (which also appears as Chapter 8 of Intelligent Design) Dembski clearly suggests that Intelligent Design is a result of divine creation as stated in Scripture as a miracle.

More recently, Dembski has been even more candid and explicitly stated,



In 2010, Dembski admitted, in his own words, to being a "Creationist" when accused of being a Theistic Evolutionist, saying,

Dembski also refutes the argument that Intelligent Design could be the result of some sort of naturalistic entity (such as space aliens) in his 1992 work Incredible Talking Pulsar in which he states,



Thus, regardless of whether or not Dembski is promoting the Abrahamic God of his faith, he claims that Intelligent Design demands a supernatural intelligence. A supernatural being can only be defined in religious or mythological terms, thus, again showing that Intelligent Design is religious in nature.

Much like Johnson, Dembski has far more quotes showing the indistinguishable nature of Intelligent Design and Creationism but for sake of space, they shall not be listed here. Instead, this is merely a representative sampling.

At this point, we have seen that two of the figureheads for the Intelligent Design movement both argue that Intelligent Design supports a supernatural creator and readily identify it as the Abrahamic God. Both are exceptionally well qualified to speak to the goals and properties of Intelligent Design. In this analysis we shall forgo quotes from numerous other Intelligent Design proponents along the same lines for the sake of redundancy. However, one more conspicuous piece of evidence remains to be addressed.

One of the most prominent and condemning pieces of evidence of the similarity between Intelligent Design and Creationism arose in the 2005 court case Kitzmiller v. Dover. In this case, it was revealed that one of the prime textbooks hailed as representative of Intelligent Design, known as Of Pandas and People, which featured contributing work from Intelligent Design advocate Michael Behe, was a creationist textbook, prior to the 1987 Supreme Court ruling. Following the ruling, the publishers merely replaced all instances of "God" or "creator" with "designer". This is exceptionally well highlighted by a single passage. Prior to the Edwards v. Aguillard ruling, this passage read,



Immediately following the ruling, the Foundation for Thought and Ethics (Panda's publisher), released a new edition of the book which read as follows,



From this, we can see that Intelligent Design is a word for word repackaging of Creationism. It should be noted that, aside from the Discovery Institute, the Foundation for Thoughts and Ethics is one of the other major proponents of Intelligent Design. One of its main members is William Dembski who is also associated with the Discovery Institute. The articles of incorporation of the Foundation for Thought and Ethics (which is conspicuously absent on their website) states its explicitly Christian goals:



Aside from the motivation driving Intelligent Design mirroring that of Creationism, Intelligent Design also mimics the methodologies. First and foremost among these is the attempt from both to create a false duality through which, if Creationists or Design proponents can cast doubt on evolution, they, by default, support their own position. As such, both spend exorbitant amounts of resources trying to discredit evolution. Although Intelligent Design uses more technical terms than most Creationists, their arguments are ultimately synonymous.

For example, creationists often cite William Paley who often argues that there are objects too complex to have arisen through natural means. Thus, they must have arisen by means of a creator. His canonical example is that of a watch which necessitates a watchmaker. The analogous Intelligent Design version is of course, Dr. Behe's notion of Irreducible Complexity. During the Dover trial, Dr. Behe admits that the basis for this concept is not original and predates even Paley's claim (pp. 71, lines 9-13). Behe has done little but dress up a standard creationist argument up in more scientific language.

Aside from philosophical arguments couched in scientific terms like these, both Creationism and Intelligent Design proponents have an obsession with trying to present evolution as the root of all evil. This is especially highlighted in the upcoming (as of the writing of this section) film Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, which conflates Evolution with the abortion, atheism, and the Holocaust. (This film also highlights the [******** dishonesty of Creationists.) Although ID claims not to be a science, it again makes the same non-scientific, philosophical arguments Creationism does.

Even when ID proponents are not explicitly trying to demonize evolution, they still frequently list it as explicitly opposed to the possibility of a Designer. In a July 2008 article by Discovery Institute chair John West, he states,



Again, we see that West, like other ID proponents attempts to create the bifurcation fallacy by appealing to a strawman of evolution (evolution does not reject the possibility of a god). Additionally, West is rather candid in linking "alternatives" to evolution to the Christian God. As has been pointed out before, this undermines their claim that ID is in any way independent from outright Creationism. (The article also goes on to paint the resistance to ID as "anti-religious bigotry", again showing that ID is inherently religious.)

All of evidence, as well as the explicit mission statement set forth in the Wedge Document, along with direct testimony of many of the founders of the Intelligent Design movement (although we only cite two here for brevity) provide ample evidence that Intelligent Design merely pretends not to name the designer in order to bypass constitutional protections. In reality their hidden goal is to destroy the methodological naturalism that has made science so powerful, and in doing so, pave the way for a theistic (read: Creationist) worldview.

So now that we've established that Creationism and Intelligent Design are the same in all respects, we should then ask if either one is actually science. To address this question, we must first define the criteria which something must fulfill to become science. One of the foremost requirements is that science follow the scientific method. This method requires that explanations be testable. To be testable, the explanation must not invoke any supernatural explanations. As I will show, by the admission of Intelligent Design's own leaders, Intelligent Design requires a supernatural designer.

One of William Dembski's collaborators for his blog, Dave Scot, wrote:



While many ID proponents try to make this claim that the "designer" is not the Abrahamic God, we have already seen that this is not the case. But even if it was, the main proponents still have something to say about the characteristics of that designer, even if they won't name it explicitly. What they have to say is that the designer is at the very least supernatural in nature.

In his article "Response to my Critics", Behe states,



He later goes on to ask whether or not it is "possible that the designer is a natural entity." His response is definitive:



He concludes his address of this question by stating:



This position that it is implausible for the designer to be a natural entity is confirmed by Behe's fellow Intelligent Design proponent, William Dembski, in his work Incredible Talking Pulsar, again, placing the designer outside nature.

In the Dover trial, defense witness Steve Fuller was asked during his deposition whether or not Intelligent Design aspired to change these rules to allow supernatural causation. His response (p 26), was that indeed Intelligent Design sought to remove this restriction.

But this was not the only restriction that would have to be removed. Later in the trial, Behe admitted that, in order to broaden the definition of science enough to include Intelligent Design, this new broadened definition would have to include astrology.

In a recent interview, Behe again admitted that there is a supernatural component involved, saying that it would require an answer "for those events lies outside, or partially outside, of science."

Thus, by the admission of a number of Intelligent Design's most vocal proponents, it posits a supernatural creator. Thus, Intelligent Design is disqualified as being science on these grounds alone but seeks to change the rules of science to allow supernatural causation.

Another requirement of the scientific field today, is that ideas must be peer reviewed. This is generally done in the form of journal articles. To date, Intelligent Design has no peer reviewed journal articles explicitly supporting its position. Intelligent Design advocates claiming that there are peer reviewed articles in favor of Intelligent Design can only refer to articles that offer criticisms of aspects of evolutionary theory, which have been published in journals. However, arguing against one position does not make another stronger by default. Thus, despite the fact that articles are routinely published criticizing various aspects of the mechanisms of evolution, there have yet to be any peer reviewed articles directly supporting Intelligent Design.

To avoid this peer review process, Intelligent Design advocates routinely publish their materials to non-technical venues, explicitly books and websites. However, these are published without the benefit of peer review. Occasionally, Intelligent Design proponents claim that their books have been peer reviewed, but as was revealed in the Dover trial, peer review the most celebrated of those books, Darwin's Black Box, had almost no scholarly review. Instead, Dr. Michael Atchison, one of those that "reviewed" the book, had this to say:



In case there is any confusion on the matter, a 10 minute synopsis does not constitute peer review in an academic sense.

Defenders of Intelligent Design generally claim that they are unable to get their research published because of some grand conspiracy by "Darwinian" scientists eager to suppress their data. However, as shown by shown by the New York Times, this is not the case:



So we see that, when explicitly asked for research by an organization that is friendly to their cause the Intelligent Design crowd is unable to produce. Thus, the reason that they have no peer reviewed articles is not due to censorship, but rather due to the fact that Intelligent Design has produced no research.

ID proponent Paul Nelson, when interviewed for the Christian Magazine Touchstone said,

Clearly, he states that ID has no research, no theory, and no real direction since their "notion" like "Irreducible Complexity" fail utterly. But Nelson is not the only ID proponent to have admitted this. Founder, Phillip Johnson has also clearly stated in 2006:



While Johnson hints that he believes that ID may be able to become a theory, he admits that as of yet, there has been no established framework by which to call ID a "theory".

This is again confirmed by Discovery Institute Senior Fellow, Michael Medved who says:



During the Dover trial (pp 22-23), Intelligent Design supporter Michael Behe was asked:



Behe indicated that this was indeed correct. So why is this?

As I've already noted, the Templeton Foundation incident shows that the Intelligent Design crowd is not really interested in doing research. To date, they've done absolutely nothing to make a positive argument. Rather, what Intelligent Design seeks to do is support their position through a negative critique of evolutionary theory. However, the negation of one theory does not inherently support the other. Johnson has even affirmed this, while being interviewed for the PBS Documentary "Intelligent Design On Trial", Johnson said:



This, "business" is also echoed by Medved who admits,



Thus, what we have seen is that Intelligent Design fails as a science by failing to conduct research, have any peer-reviewed supporting its position, and due to violation of the restriction to natural causation. Thus, despite the claims of Intelligent Design supporters, it fails wholly as a science.

We can clearly see that Intelligent Design fulfills the requirements of Creationism I established earlier.
1) A belief that God created life: As evidenced by the quotes from proponents, the pretense that they are not claiming to know who the designer is is a sham.
2) A claim of some sort of "evidence" or "explanation" for this belief: ID claims many evidences such as ireducible complexity.
3) A rejection of evolution: The definition of Intelligent Design from Pandas & People explicitly states that ID claims that life was created "fully formed" which rejects evolution.

Additionally, it precisely mirrors the methodology and arguments creationists use as well. As such, there is no functional difference between the two. Thus, is it any surprise that the followers of "ID" are often confused as well? In one instance, one grassroots supporter even went so far as to claim ID presented evidence for a young Earth and Noah's flood as told in the Bible. Similar parallels are drawn in Expelled, which explicitly states that being against ID is being against religion. Such confusions are commonplace, but are easily best by the fact that Intelligent Design is a wholesale replacement for Biblical Creationism since the latter was ruled unconstitutional.

Cliff notes:
ID = Creationism
Neither are real science

Further reading:
Evidence & Testing in the Scientific Field
The Failure of Irreducible Complexity
Evolution, Entropy, the Big Bang, and the Second Law
Why are ID Proponents/Creationists intellectually dishonest?
Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed (An ID Propaganda Film)
Evolution - What it is and isn’t
Evolution and its Compatibility with Creationism

Updates:
- 10/23/07: Added quote from Dave Scott pertaining to the identity of the designer and fixed minor grammatical errors.
- 10/31/07: Added additional quote from Johnson reflecting that ID does not make a positive argument.
- 11/14/07: Added new quote from Paul Nelson as to the lack of an actual ID theory and fixed misattributed quote tag.
- 12/14/07: Added additional quote from Dembski admitting "The Designer of intelligent design is, ultimately, the Christian God."
- 12/16/07: Added additional quote from Johnson admitting that ID is not coherent enough to be considered a theory.
- 12/16/07: Added new link to Further Reading section: Why are ID Proponents/Creationists intellectually dishonest?
- 1/29/08: Revised section on definition of creationism, changed various text throughout to correspond with this and tidied up conclusion.
- 2/13/08: Added additional quote from Behe admitting that ID proposes answers "for those events lies outside, or partially outside, of science."
- 4/2/08: Added reference to Expelled and additional link on followers of ID conflating with young Earth Creationism.
- 4/15/08: Added new link to Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed (An ID Propaganda Film).
- 7/16/08: New quotes from John West demonstrating ID proponents use of Creationist tactic of bifurcation (evolution = anti-God) and conflation of ID with Creationism
- 8/12/08: Quotes from Michael Medved admitting that ID is not a theory and makes no positive argument.

Exactly. stare

Well spoken.

Honestly I have less of a problem with ID, even though it is obviously Christian, because for the most part it is taught along-side evolution and not counter to it. So, basically, its "evolution guided by divine hands". If a religious person wants to believe there is divine work being done, thats fine by me, as long as they understand that evolution is for all intents and purposes a fact.

What bothers me is when people use ID as a direct replacement for creationism, ie anzimals just appeared as is fully formed. Thats just flawed imo.

ID is an attempt to get creationism into the classroom by trying to make it look like science. But it is not science, and I object to it for that reason. If you want to teach it to your kids, feel free to do it at home or church.

But don't be forcing it on my kids on what is supposed to be a secular public school.

No, you've got to have a strawman version of evolution to demonise. If you don't, well, there are only so many different ways to say "God did it!"

Agreed.
The difference between creationism and ID are entirely a matter of cosmetic surgery. An attempt to secularise creationism in order to hopefully get it past a single court case, somewhere. No one's really fooled, of course.

I dunno if they even read this thread, to be honest. I suppose they don't like arguments that have any thought behind them.