11.05.08
Warning, “Intelligent Design” is a brand name
Alfred Russel Wallace on why Mars is not habitable
Remember that Wallace has been derided for his beliefs in ID and spiritualism. Yet he was obviously not afraid to go against the scientific speculative spirit of the age.
When I read that people in the ID movement say that Wallace ‘had beliefs in ID’, I wince, because he is being mislabeled by current Intelligent Design Advocates who have twisted the meaning of the term into something that noone else can use, and that cannot be applied to anyone not associated with the Discovery Institute. Period. Over and Out.
The point of Wallace’s thinking here was he finally came to see the inadequacy of natural selection in the explanation for the descent. From there he began weaving in and out of a series of views, none of which could be associated with the style, tone, dogmatism, and theological fundamentalism of those now associated with the Intelligent Design Movement, whose views are ambiguously stated in order to promote a religious agenda, and whose politics is rabidly conservative, and anti-modern.
It is unfair to use this language for Wallace, whose thinking in any case began to flounder once he tried to explain human evolution. Flounder, but for good reason, because he knew that he couldn’t explain it, although he understood the problem with Darwinism.
So leave Wallace alone.
We have to face the fact that the Intelligent Design movement has corrupted the usage of the term ‘Intelligent Design’ by making it a brand name. It is thus no longer suitable for general discussions of design.
We need to invent a new terminology here, since it is dangerously misleading to use the term ‘intelligent design’.
(We already have on this blog, up to a point, with our distinctions of g-design, and n-design, but we need more distinctions here.)