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This article represents the work of many contributors and much negotiation to find consensus for an accurate and complete representation of the topic. Newcomers to Misplaced Pages and this article may find that it's easy to commit a faux pas. That's OK — everybody does it! You'll find a list of a few common ones you might try to avoid here. Misplaced Pages policy notes for new editors: A common objection made often by new arrivals is that the article presents ID in an unsympathetic light and that criticism of ID is too extensive or violates Misplaced Pages's Neutral Point of View policy (WP:NPOV). The sections of the WP:NPOV that apply directly to this article are: NPOV: Fringe theories and pseudoscience (WP:PSCI) NPOV: Undue weight (WP:UNDUE) NPOV: Making necessary assumptions (WP:MNA) NPOV: Giving "equal validity" (WP:GEVAL). The contributors to the article continually strive to adhere to these to the letter. Also, splitting the article into sub-articles is governed by the content forking guidelines. These policies have guided the shape and content of the article, and new arrivals are strongly encouraged to become familiar with them prior to raising objections on this page or adding content to the article. Other important policies guiding the article's content are No Original Research (WP:NOR) and Cite Your Sources (WP:CITE). Tempers can and have flared here. All contributors are asked to please respect Misplaced Pages's policy No Personal Attacks (WP:NPA) and to abide by consensus (WP:CON). This talk page is to discuss the text, photographs, format, grammar, etc of the article itself and not the inherent worth of Intelligent Design. See WP:NOT. If you wish to discuss or debate the validity of intelligent design or promote intelligent design please do so at talk.origins or other fora. This "Discussion" page is only for discussion on how to improve the Misplaced Pages article. Any attempts at trolling, using this page as a soapbox, or making personal attacks may be deleted at any time.
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view · edit Frequently asked questions Many of these questions arise frequently on the talk page concerning Intelligent design (ID). To view an explanation to the answer, click the link to the right of the question. Q1: Should ID be equated with creationism? A1: ID is a form of creationism, and many sources argue that it is identical. U.S. District Judge John E. Jones III ruled that it "cannot uncouple itself from its creationist, and thus religious, antecedents", and Phillip E. Johnson, one of the founders of the ID movement, stated that the goal of intelligent design is to cast creationism as a scientific concept. Not everyone agrees with this. For example, philosopher Thomas Nagel argues that intelligent design is very different from creation science (see "Public Education and Intelligent Design", Philosophy and Public Affairs, Vol. 36, no. 2, 2008). However, this perspective is not representative of most reliable sources on the subject. Although intelligent design proponents do not name the designer, they make it clear that the designer is the Abrahamic god. In drafts of the 1989 high-school level textbook Of Pandas and People, almost all derivations of the word "creation", such as "creationism", were replaced with the words "intelligent design". Taken together, the Kitzmiller ruling, statements of ID's main proponents, the nature of ID itself, and the history of the movement, make it clear—Discovery Institute's protestations to the contrary notwithstanding—that ID is a form of creationism, modified to appear more secular than it really is. This is in line with the Discovery Institute's stated strategy in the Wedge Document. Q2: Should ID be characterized as science? A2: The majority of scientists state that ID should not be characterized as science. This was the finding of Judge Jones during the Kitzmiller hearing, and is a position supported by the overwhelming majority of the scientific community. Scientists say that ID cannot be regarded as scientific theory because it is untestable even in principle. A scientific theory predicts the outcome of experiments. If the predicted outcome is not observed, the theory is false. There is no experiment which can be constructed which can disprove intelligent design. Unlike a true scientific theory, it has absolutely no predictive capability. It doesn't run the risk of being disproved by objective experiment. Q3: Should the article cite any papers about ID? A3: According to Misplaced Pages's sourcing policy, Misplaced Pages:Verifiability, papers that support ID should be used as primary sources to explain the nature of the concept. The article as it stands does not cite papers that support ID because no such papers have been published in peer-reviewed scientific journals. Behe himself admitted this under cross examination, during the Kitzmiller hearings, and this has been the finding of scientists and critics who have investigated this claim. In fact, the only article published in a peer-reviewed scientific journal that made a case for intelligent design was quickly withdrawn by the publisher for having circumvented the journal's peer-review standards. Broadly speaking, the articles on the Discovery Institute list all fail for any of four reasons: The journal has no credible editorial and peer-review process, or the process was not followed The journal is not competent for the subject matter of the article The article is not genuinely supportive of ID The article is published in a partisan ID journal such as PCID If you wish to dispute the claim that ID has no support in peer-reviewed publications, then you will need to produce a reliable source that attests to the publication of at least one paper clearly supportive of ID that underwent rigorous peer-review in a journal on a relevant field. Q4: Is this article unfairly biased against ID? A4: There have been arguments over the years about the article's neutrality and concerns that it violates Misplaced Pages's neutral point of view policy. The NPOV policy does not require all points of view to be represented as equally valid, but it does require us to represent them. The policy requires that we present ID from the point of view of disinterested philosophers, biologists and other scientists, and that we also include the views of ID proponents and opponents. We should not present minority views as though they are majority ones, but we should also make sure the minority views are correctly described and not only criticized, particularly in an article devoted to those views, such as this one. Q5: Is the Discovery Institute a reliable source? A5: The Discovery Institute is a reliable primary source about its views on ID, though it should not be used as an independent secondary source. The core mission of the Discovery Institute is to promote intelligent design. The end purpose is to duck court rulings that eliminated religion from the science classroom, by confusing people into conflating science and religion. In light of this, the Discovery Institute cannot be used as a reference for anything but their beliefs, membership and statements. Questionable sources, according to the sourcing policy, WP:V, are those with a poor reputation for fact-checking or with no editorial oversight, and should only be used in articles about themselves. Articles about such sources should not repeat any contentious claims the source has made about third parties, unless those claims have also been published by reliable sources. See also: WP:RS and WP:V Q6: Are all formulations of intelligent design pseudoscience? Was William Paley doing pseudoscience when he argued that natural features should be attributed to "an intelligent and designing Creator"? A6: While the use of the phrase intelligent design in teleological arguments dates back to at least the 1700s, Intelligent Design (ID) as a term of art begins with the 1989 publication of Of Pandas and People. Intelligent design is classified as pseudoscience because its hypotheses are effectively unfalsifiable. Unlike Thomas Aquinas and Paley, modern ID denies its religious roots and the supernatural nature of its explanations. For an extended discussion about definitions of pseudoscience, including Intelligent Design, see Pigliucci, Massimo; Boudry, Maarten, eds. (2013), Philosophy of Pseudoscience: Reconsidering the Demarcation Problem, University of Chicago, ISBN 978-0-226-05179-6. Notes and references ^ Phillip Johnson: "Our strategy has been to change the subject a bit so that we can get the issue of Intelligent Design, which really means the reality of God, before the academic world and into the schools." Johnson 2004. Christianity.ca. Let's Be Intelligent About Darwin. "This isn't really, and never has been a debate about science. It's about religion and philosophy." Johnson 1996. World Magazine. Witnesses For The Prosecution. "So the question is: "How to win?" That's when I began to develop what you now see full-fledged in the "wedge" strategy: "Stick with the most important thing"—the mechanism and the building up of information. Get the Bible and the Book of Genesis out of the debate because you do not want to raise the so-called Bible-science dichotomy. Phrase the argument in such a way that you can get it heard in the secular academy and in a way that tends to unify the religious dissenters. That means concentrating on, "Do you need a Creator to do the creating, or can nature do it on its own?" and refusing to get sidetracked onto other issues, which people are always trying to do." Johnson 2000. Touchstone magazine. Berkeley's Radical An Interview with Phillip E. Johnson "I have built an intellectual movement in the universities and churches that we call The Wedge, which is devoted to scholarship and writing that furthers this program of questioning the materialistic basis of science."…"Now the way that I see the logic of our movement going is like this. The first thing you understand is that the Darwinian theory isn't true. It's falsified by all of the evidence and the logic is terrible. When you realize that, the next question that occurs to you is, well, where might you get the truth?"…"I start with John 1:1. In the beginning was the word. In the beginning was intelligence, purpose, and wisdom. The Bible had that right. And the materialist scientists are deluding themselves." Johnson 1999. Reclaiming America for Christ Conference. How the Evolution Debate Can Be Won Dembski: "Intelligent design is just the Logos theology of John's Gospel restated in the idiom of information theory," Touchstone Magazine. Volume 12, Issue4: July/August, 1999 Wedge Document Discovery Institute, 1999. "embers of the national ID movement insist that their attacks on evolution aren't religiously motivated, but, rather, scientific in nature." … "Yet the express strategic objectives of the Discovery Institute; the writings, careers, and affiliations of ID's leading proponents; and the movement’s funding sources all betray a clear moral and religious agenda." Inferior Design Chris Mooney. The American Prospect, August 10, 2005. "ID's rejection of naturalism in any form logically entails its appeal to the only alternative, supernaturalism, as a putatively scientific explanation for natural phenomena. This makes ID a religious belief." Expert Witness Report Barbara Forrest Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District, April 2005. Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District, 04 cv 2688 (December 20, 2005)., pp. 31 – 33. ^ Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District, 04 cv 2688 (December 20, 2005)., 4. Whether ID is Science, p. 87 "Science and Policy: Intelligent Design and Peer Review". American Association for the Advancement of Science. 2007. Retrieved 2007-07-19. Brauer, Matthew J.; Forrest, Barbara; Gey, Steven G. (2005). "Is It Science Yet?: Intelligent Design Creationism and the Constitution" (PDF). Washington University Law Quarterly. 83 (1). Retrieved 2007-07-18. ID leaders know the benefits of submitting their work to independent review and have established at least two purportedly "peer-reviewed" journals for ID articles. However, one has languished for want of material and quietly ceased publication, while the other has a more overtly philosophical orientation. Both journals employ a weak standard of "peer review" that amounts to no more than vetting by the editorial board or society fellows. Isaak, Mark (2006). "Index to Creationist Claims". The TalkOrigins Archive. With some of the claims for peer review, notably Campbell and Meyer (2003) and the e-journal PCID, the reviewers are themselves ardent supporters of intelligent design. The purpose of peer review is to expose errors, weaknesses, and significant omissions in fact and argument. That purpose is not served if the reviewers are uncritical "Statement from the Council of the Biological Society of Washington". Biological Society of Washington. Retrieved 2007-07-19. See also Sternberg peer review controversy. Wilkins, John (9 November 2013), "The origin of "intelligent design" in the 18th and 19th centuries", Evolving Thoughts (blog) Matzke, Nick (2006), "Design on Trial: How NCSE Helped Win the Kitzmiller Case", Reports of the National Center for Science Education, 26 (1–2): 37–44 "Report of John F. Haught, Ph. D" (PDF). Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District (NCSE). 2005-04-01. Retrieved 29 August 2013.

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this article really encapsulates all the strength and weakness of wikipedia, and, why, I think ultimately wiki is an experiment doomed to failure. I last saw this article about a year ago, and it was MUCH better - shorter and better written. How can anyone rely on a source which is constatnly changing ? on the other hand, the editors have done an unbelievably heroic job of maintaining this article in the face of an onslaught by people who don't seem to understand that neutral canbe critical (to take an example purely for argument sake, an article on Stalin or Hitler or Pol Pot is going to be mostly negative). I look at all the work the editors have done, for free - unpaid and unsung, and that they can't keep an article with revisions once every few years is astonishing. my heart goes out to them — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.195.10.169 (talk) 21:39, 18 June 2013‎

The Scope of Intelligent Design and the Discovery institute in this Article

It looks like the article makes a necessary connection between the Discovery Institute and Intelligent Design. However, based on my reading, it seems as though the Discovery Institute doesn't have a copyright or any other kind of monopoly on ID. While many ID proponents may have a relationship with Discovery Institute, it seems the relation is one of voluntary ideological or sociopolitical affiliation rather than a necessary one, or one by definition. Given that the relationship is voluntary, it seems more than likely that among the hordes of ID supporters, there are many who have no connection to the Discovery Institute. If this is the case (it seems to be the case according to an exchange between philosopher of biology Michael Ruse and Christian philosophy Alvin Plantinga (http://chronicle.com/blogs/brainstorm/alvin-plantinga-and-intelligent-design/42185). Do we have any reason to say all ID advocates are DI affiliates? If Jerry Coyne wakes up tomorrow and decides ID must be more plausible, is he required to register with DI? What if someone believes, for instance that their tribal deity intervened in some kind of creation process, are they now de facto Discovery Institute members? I wouldn't think so. The association between the ideological position and the activist group needs to be more closely delineated. BabyJonas (talk) 04:58, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

What does any of this have to do with this article? You seem to be confusing "leading proponents" with "supporters" and "advocates". Also, you seem to be thinking of ID as some sort of "phlosophy". It is not. It is a legal, political and PR ploy to circumvent US court rulings forbidding the teaching of religion in public schools. The dilineation you seek already exists in the hatnote at the very top of the article. Other versions of the argument from design that are treated in the article on the Teleological argument. The scope of the article has been discussed ad nauseum here already, as has the fact that all of the leading proponents are associated with the DI. See the archives. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 05:29, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

It could be worded better. For one, the relationship is not a necessary one. In other words, members of Association of African Historians would necessarily have to be qualified or work in history or related fields. But leading proponents of ID do not necessarily have to be from the Discovery Institute, so this absolute statement will need to be very carefully verified. Instead, if the goal is not to make an arbitrary absolute statement but to expound on the campaign by the Discovery Institute to promote ID, then there are better ways to convey this information. In addition, could you point me to any source that is relatively recent, say within the last 12-18 months that says that all proponents of ID are members of Discovery? The reason I'm particular about this is because of the recent story of Ball State University Professor Eric Hedin. I'm looking for any clue that he's a member of Discovery and I can't find any. That, and Plantinga, certainly a leading proponent of ID in analytical philosophy has no apparent link to the Discovery Institute. BabyJonas (talk) 06:08, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

Neither comes close to being a leading proponent by a long shot. And no, we don't need a source from the last 12-18 months absent any evidence that the situation has changed. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 06:27, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

Hi Dominus, it appears that you deleted someone else's comment on this page. Did you do that intentionally? Also, can you explain how you come to the conclusion that they are not leading proponents? BabyJonas (talk) 06:42, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

Yes, I did remove it intentially, as it violated WP:TPG and WP:NPA, and amounted to nothing more that trolling and vandalism. I came to that conclusion by reading the reliable sources quoted in the article, which identify the leading proponents. You seem to be confusing "proponent" with merely "supporter" or "advocate" again. This has been discussed many times on this talk page before. Search for "leading proponents". Also, see Intelligent design movement. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 06:52, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

Again, your edits do not conform with what the reliable sources say. ID is very much the DI's baby. If you have any evidence that there are leading proponents not associted with the DI, please produce them. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 07:15, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

The problem with the wording you revert to is that it is in principle unverifiable. It's impossible to verify that all leading proponents are affiliated with the Discovery Institute, and thus cannot be an encyclopedic claim. Citing court testimony from 2005 is certainly not representative of current state of affairs, and while citing court testimony certainly appears to lend prima facie credibility, this credibility is not due to the source, but due to the fact that the individual testified in court. Testifying in court on it's own doesn't make for a credible source, especially for a claim like this. It's certainly not a legal finding and a record of court proceedings. We need to work with current sources, verifiable claims, and credible sources. The problem with the claim is that of it's two citations, the second doesn't actually support the claim ("Intelligent Design and Peer Review"), and the first is, as you know, personal testimony in court. Altogether, this is insufficient evidence to support the starkly absolute claim in question. For a start, can you look at source #4, "Intelligent Design and Peer Review" and find where it supports the claim that "Leading proponents of intelligent design are associated with the Discovery Institute"? I'm trying to find the quote in the source and could use your help. Thanks. BabyJonas (talk) 07:29, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

The testimony is expert opinion, not "personal testimony", and stands. There's been a lot of checking over time, and all of the proponents shown to be leading have been directly associated with the DI. You seem to be making a supposition based on your own opinion, a published reliable source is needed. dave souza, talk 07:48, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

Being called to give expert opinion in one court case does not make her an expert by Misplaced Pages standards. Neither does having an expert opinion make consensus on Misplaced Pages. Given that the second source actually fails to support the claim, and the claim is strong, this one citation is simply not enough to justify the strength of the claim. But that's not even the fatal problem with the source. The fatal problem is, if you actually read the testimony of this expert, her claim is not about the leading proponents of intelligent design as a position or theory, but on the leading proponents of intelligent design movement. The source doesn't even say what you claim it says. Look for the question Q. Has the Discovery Institute been a leader in the intelligent design movement? on Day 6 of the transcript. In the end, the single source you are citing doesn't even say what you think she says. BabyJonas (talk) 08:32, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

Intelligent design is not a theory, nor does it exist independent of the DI. It is an collection of ad hoc ploys to evade court decisions by removing overt references to God from its predecessor, Creation Science. All of these ploys were formulated and promulgated by persons associated with the DI, without exception. There is no evidence whatsoever that there have been any significant contributions to ID from outside the DI. All unaffiliated supporters and advocates of ID merely regurgitate the concepts developed by the DI. Unless you have sources that directly state that there exist leading proponents that are not affiliated with the DI, there is no reason to change the text. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 08:51, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

Baby Jonas, I'll answer your main query: The reason I'm particular about this is because of the recent story of Ball State University Professor Eric Hedin. I'm looking for any clue that he's a member of Discovery and I can't find any. No, he is not a member, AFAIK, but the DI fought (and lost) this battle for him.

• "Hedin was not without his supporters, as the Seattle-based intelligent design group, The Discovery Institute, argued in favor of Hedin's course in the name of academic freedom." Christian Post.
• The DI created, promoted, and delivered a petition in his favor. Yahoo News.

Here's the petition, and here's proof it's a DI project.

Have you found any other group unaffiliated with or not under the sway of the DI that supported Hedin? Yopienso (talk) 10:58, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification, Yopienso, that's useful background for a topic that should be discussed somewhere: possibly in Discovery Institute intelligent design campaigns. . dave souza, talk 15:04, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

Welcome to the eternal problem here. A group here has gone through an immense range of things to have the article ignore/exclude the reality that ID is broader than the DI version. There was longstanding sourced coverage in the article of historical ID that immensely predates the the DI; they removed it. Their premise/argument is that all ID that is not the DI version is not ID, it is "teleological argument". It's going to take a broader effort with more external eyes to get this fixed. North8000 (talk) 11:54, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

The historical design argument is covered in an appropriate article, this article is about ID which is shown by reliable sources to be a specific adaptation of that argument. It's going to take very good sources to change it in the way you suggest, and your suggestion that you want to "get it fixed" indicates an uncollegiate way of thinking. Please make properly sourced proposals for improvement of the article, and desist from vague allegations about other editors. . dave souza, talk 14:54, 6 August 2013 (UTC)

Yopienso, DI creating petitions in support of Hedin is not indicative of affiliation. One can start a petition to support anything, regardless of affiliation. To summarize the overall situation here:

• Hedin and DI are not known to be affiliated. DI's circulating of a petition in support of Hedin does not entail affiliation.
• DI has no known copyright, ownership or any formal control of any Intelligent Design theory or pseudo-theory.
• We have only one source cited in support of the claim.
• The cited source's statements do not amount to support of the claim that DI has any kind of exclusive relationship with ID. The citation has the witness Barbara Forrest affirm that the Discovery Institute is "...a leader in the intelligent design movement." and that "All of the leaders are..." associated with the Discovery Institute.

1. The intelligent design movement is not the same thing as Intelligent Design.
2. If the witness' statement is true, that all of the leaders were associated with the DI in 2005 (when the statement was made), this still does not confer any exclusive relationship between the Discovery Institute and ID.
3. The cited statement was made in 2005.
4. The source is an expert witness called up by the prosecution in a case about Intelligent Design, thus representing a biased or opinionated source, and makes it necessary, at minimum, to use in-text attribution as per WP:RS.
5. According to the same source, going over the court testimony about the nature of Forrest's qualifications relevant to her role as an expert witness in the case demonstrates that she falls into the class of Self-Published Source, which according to WP:SOURCES may only be used as sources of information on themselves.

Given these issues, do we actually have any reasons to keep the text as is?

EDIT- Also, Yopienso, your question, referring to groups "under the sway of" DI doesn't sound like objective wording to me. I don't know how one can objectively measure which group is "under the sway of" which other group. What we can do, instead is go by available sources. Available sources don't show any connection between Ball State professor Eric Hedin, a proponent of ID in the department of physics at a state university, and the Discovery Institute. This, combined with all the above make for compelling reason to revisit the depiction of the relationship between the Discovery Institute and Intelligent Design in this article. BabyJonas (talk) 21:43, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

Baby Jonas, how does this affect the statement that leading proponents are all associated with the DI? Is Hedin a leading proponent of ID? In other words, has he contributed anything significant to the theory/movement? Also, I don't think there is anything in the article that attempts to create an exclusive relationship between ID and the DI. The verb promulgate means to make popular, and the DI certainly popularized this form of creationism. -- MisterDub (talk | contribs) 22:14, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

Rather than that particular statement, what it affects more is the endemic-in-the article assertion that intelligent design is exclusively the Discovery Institute version. North8000 (talk) 22:18, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

@BabyJonas: You have produced exactly zero evidence to the contrary. Hedin is certainly not a leading proponent of ID by any stretch of the imagination. Nor can I find any evidence that he is a proponent at all. Nor that he has published anything on the topic at all, or contributed to ID in any way. As far as I can tell, he merely recommended materials written by the DI and the leading proponents associated with it. At this point, we actually don't know anything concrete, as he isn't talking and neither is the university. We can't tell from reliable sources that he even believes in ID.

Now Gonzales, on the other hand, is a leading proponent, and is associated with the DI. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 22:17, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

So the unsourced assertion endemic in the current article is that intelligent design is exclusively the Discovery Institute version. Historical sourced ID info that was in the article (which by example,. shows that the assertion is not only unsourced but false) was removed. A good starting point (and specific proposal) would be to restore that sourced historical ID material North8000 (talk) 22:15, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

North8000, there was never any "historical sourced ID info" that wasn't affiliated with the DI; ID is not the same thing as the teleological argument. -- MisterDub (talk | contribs) 22:39, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

Yest there was, see below for an example. North8000 (talk) 01:15, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

MisterDub and Dominus- two individuals were presented as leading proponents of ID, Alvin Plantinga, based on his prominence as a philosopher and open advocacy of ID, and Eric Hedin, who taught Intelligent Design at a class in Ball State University. In addition, another group called Foundation for Thought and Ethics, a group that filed an Amicus Curiae in the Dover vs Kitzmiller trial is an advocate of ID, according to their website, and are not a part of the Discovery Institute. If you do not consider these groups "leading proponents", then it is contingent upon you to provide an explanation why and a coherent, testable definition of what "leading proponent" entails, rather than merely declaring who is or isn't a leading proponent. In fact, barring any clear definition of this term, I'd like to use a clearer phrase for important advocates of ID. BabyJonas (talk) 23:09, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

A proponent is a person who has made an original contribution to the concept, someone who has actually proposed something. In this case, people like Thaxton, Johnson, Behe, Dembski and Meyer are leading proponents. They came up with the idea. Other supporters and advocates are merely regurgitating what they proposed. Precious little of the content of ID comes from individuals not associated with the DI. Plantinga has not contributed much content to the concept (it's not even clear if he even agrees with ID; he claims not to), and Hedin has contributed nothing (and again, we don't know for sure whether he even agrees with ID). Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 23:21, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

• Comment Misplaced Pages articles are about concepts and topics, not about words, which is something that seems to escape people on a regular basis. For instance, while cocaine is sometimes called coke, we don't have a cocaine section in the Coca cola article nor a cola section in the Cocaine article. To use an example I've explained to North before, the homophobia article is about the concept of homophobia, not the word homophobia. This article is about the concept of intelligent design, not the phrase "intelligent design." The concept of intelligent design contemporaneously is limited to the context surrounding the DI. The *wording" "intelligent design" as used historically referred to the teleological argument and this is why at the top of the page it very clearly states "This article is about the form of creationism promulgated by the Discovery Institute. For the philosophical "argument from design", see Teleological argument. For other uses of the phrase, see Intelligent design (disambiguation)." To cover other contexts of ID in this article would be redundant to the TA article and would not fit within the topic at hand. Nformation 22:54, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

This has been explained to him countless times before. WP:IDHT applies in spades, so don't waste your breath (or electrons). Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 23:03, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

I think BabyJonas has made a valid point about a significant problem with this article and its sourcing. Is it true that a history of ID that predates DI involvement was removed from this article? Cla68 (talk) 23:26, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

I'm very short on time but will explain that what I meant by "under the sway" of was "influenced by" or "supported by". For example, the Foundation for Thought and Ethics offers "our books," most of which are written by DI fellows. (Oddly , it doesn't tout Of Pandas . . . ) Bill Dembski is part of their leadership.

It's silly or dishonest to disregard the DI's support of Hedin. Yopienso (talk) 00:41, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

A group's book recommendations don't necessarily suggest they are "under the sway" of another group, nor do shared memberships. Let's keep in mind the issue here- the page's conflation of Intelligent Design and the Discovery Institute. There is no problem with saying the Discovery Institute plays a vital role in research, promotion and discussion of Intelligent Design. Maybe ID even originated with them (as some might believe). But we simply don't have sufficient evidence for the claim that Intelligent Design is being promoted (singlehandedly, the text implies) by one group. Having a Google exec on an Apple board doesn't mean Google and Apple are the same company, or that one is "under the sway" of the other. Do you have any stronger evidence that Discovery Institute is the only group advocating Intelligent Design? BabyJonas (talk) 02:32, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

I don't know how to say this differently than others have... We are discussing two concepts. One is an "argument from design", which is an argument for the existence of a god. The other is a political movement created by a select group of people to further a specific educational agenda. These two topics are distinct. They belong in distinct articles. A consensus of editors has decided that the argument from design is most commonly referred to as the "teleological argument". A different consensus of editors has determined the political movement is most commonly referred to as "intelligent design". That's why they are so named. Merging the articles because they sometimes share a common phrase would be appropriate for a dictionary, but not an encyclopedia. A political movement is not even in the same conceptual ballpark as an argument for the existence of god, and as long as they are separate ideas, they should be handled separately.

Here's what we would need to make a change.

1. A consensus that the common name for the "argument from design" was "intelligent design"; we could then rename that article "Intelligent design (argument)"
2. A consensus that the phrase "intelligent design" referred to the "argument from design" approximately as frequently as the political movement; we could then make Intelligent design a disambiguation page, and name the two articles "Intelligent design (argument)" and "Intelligent design (movement)".
3. New sources which showed that a significant portion of promotion and popularity for the political movement has come from outside the discovery institute. Such sources would need to be very strong, because we currently have very strong sources which say it is exclusively from the DI. We could then change the article to reflect influences from organizations other than the DI.

Arguing any of these points isn't going to get us anywhere. We've done that for years already. What we need are sources fitting in one of the above 3 categories.   — Jess· Δ♥ 03:02, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

@North8000-I'm not part of any "group" here. I knew nothing about this subject at all before conducting my totally independently initiated and conducted library research to lend help in ongoing disputes at Creation Science. I've since collected scores, literally, of impeccable references focusing on this very subject. Not a single one of them - literally - not a one of them is as fixated on diminishing DI's dominance than the most diehard "devil's advocate" editors who won't let go of it on this space. Think about this, and what it must mean in terms of why there's so much push back against these "devil's advocates" with their fringy complaints over the DI association. The commensurate attention devoted to the antecedents or cousins of ID, such as teleological argument or theistic evolution--these sources deal with them and as we should. Theistic evolution might need a bit more development or explication here, but ..... it's still demonstrably separable from ID and isn't in the same universe of complaints you're still stuck in. I do not understand why you keep returning to this as if it were some scratched thread in the vinyl on the WP turntable or something with the "group" business. This is what you don't seem to get: you think you're fighting "the WP in-group" but you're really swimming upstream against "the finest RL sources". Professor marginalia (talk) 04:47, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

Historic intelligent design material

Responding to comments that it never existed, and to make the proposal more specific, the proposal is to restore longstanding historical source intelligent design material, material and sources that have subsequently removed from the article:

The phrase "intelligent design" can be found in an 1847 issue of Scientific American, in an 1850 book by Patrick Edward Dove, and in an 1861 letter from Charles Darwin. The Paleyite botanist George James Allman used the phrase in an address to the 1873 annual meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science:

"No physical hypothesis founded on any indisputable fact has yet explained the origin of the primordial protoplasm, and, above all, of its marvellous properties, which render evolution possible—in heredity and in adaptability, for these properties are the cause and not the effect of evolution. For the cause of this cause we have sought in vain among the physical forces which surround us, until we are at last compelled to rest upon an independent volition, a far-seeing intelligent design."

The biologist Alfred Russel Wallace also used the phrase in his book titled Darwinism (1889); according to Wallace: "There are some curious organs which are used only once in a creature's life, but which are yet essential to its existence, and thus have very much the appearance of design by an intelligent designer". The phrase can be found again in Humanism, a 1903 book by one of the founders of classical pragmatism, F.C.S. Schiller: "It will not be possible to rule out the supposition that the process of evolution may be guided by an intelligent design". A derivative of the phrase appears in the Macmillan Encyclopedia of Philosophy (1967) in the article titled, "Teleological argument for the existence of God": "Stated most succinctly, the argument runs: The world exhibits teleological order (design, adaptation). Therefore, it was produced by an intelligent designer". Robert Nozick (1974) wrote: "Consider now complicated patterns which one would have thought would arise only through intelligent design". The phrases "intelligent design" and "intelligently designed" were used in a 1979 philosophy book Chance or Design? by James Horigan and the phrase "intelligent design" was used in a 1982 speech by Sir Fred Hoyle in his promotion of panspermia.

1. Nick Matzke. The Panda's Thumb. The true origin of "intelligent design"; August 14, 2007 .
   Journals: Scientific American (1846–1869) .
2. Dove, Patrick Edward, The theory of human progression, and natural probability of a reign of justice. London, Johnstone & Hunter, 1850. LC 08031381 "Intelligence-Intelligent Design".
3. Charles Darwin. Letter 3154—Darwin, C. R. to Herschel, J. F. W., 23 May 1861; May 23, 1861.
4. The British Association. The Times. September 20, 1873:10; col A..
5. Wallace, A. Darwinism: An Exposition of the Theory of Natural Selection with Some of Its Applications (2007) p. 113
6. William P. Alston. In: Paul Edwards. Encyclopedia of Philosophy. New York City, London: Macmillan Publishing Company, The Free Press, Collier Macmillan Publishers; 1967. ISBN 0-02-894990-0.
7. Robert Nozick. Anarchy, State, and Utopia. USA: Basic Books; 1974. ISBN 0-465-09720-0. p. 19.
8. James E. Horigan. Chance or Design?. Philosophical Library; 1979.
9. Nicholas Timmins. Evolution according to Hoyle: Survivors of disaster in an earlier world. January 13, 1982:22. "F. Hoyle stated in a 1982 speech: '...one arrives at the conclusion that biomaterials with their amazing measure or order must be the outcome of intelligent design.'"

This needs an RFC to get some additional eyes on the question. North8000 (talk) 01:16, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

The issue is the teleological argument is a distinct topic from the creationism promulgated by the Discovery Institute. Since they are distinct topics, they should be handled in distinct articles. The quotes you list above are, at best, related to the teleological argument, not to the DI's political tool. Combining the two topics into one article, just because they happen to share a similar word or phrase, would be appropriate for a dictionary, but not for an encyclopedia.   — Jess· Δ♥ 01:27, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

I'll leave this for later and an RFC. But, briefly, that is just the point. These ARE related to intelligent design, but are not a part of the DI version. North8000 (talk) 01:30, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

From the first source provided above...

"As everyone now knows, even though the ID guys will never admit it, "intelligent design" as such originated in the 1989 ID textbook Of Pandas and People, with "intelligent design" being the new label chosen after the 1987 Edwards decision made creationist terminology difficult to use in textbooks."

"Pandas was the first place the term "intelligent design" was used systematically, defined in a glossary, claimed to be something other than creationism, etc."

"In a desperate attempt to obfuscate this basic historical point, ID guys have dug up various random instances of the words "intelligent" and "design" placed together (although they missed the 1861 Darwin letter, and the 1847 Scientific American article), most of them with absolutely no evidence of having influenced the actual actors in the 1980s who created the ID movement (there are some legitimate precursors, but they are in explicitly creationist works, e.g. Lester and Bohlin's (1984) The Natural Limits to Biological Change, so the ID guys won't cite them post-Kitzmiller)."

...it is clear that "intelligent design" is a modern creation. Attempting to link ID with "random instances of the words 'intelligent' and 'design' placed together" is not supported. — ArtifexMayhem (talk) 03:06, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

North, as you well know, we can't discard sourced information in favour of original interpretation by editors...especially not an interpretation as bad as the one you presented. Guettarda (talk) 05:56, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

Removal of the citation needed tag

I added a "citation needed" tag on a far reaching unsourced claim, essentially that the historic usages of the term "intelligent design" are unrelated to the modern usages of the term. Someone deleted the tag twice, their first edit summary was a incorrect claim that it was already sourced. When I pointed out that that was incorrect, with their second removal they basically said "it's sourced elsewhere in the article, go find and source it yourself". This is a direct violation of wp:verifiability and wp:nor. North8000 (talk) 01:36, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

He actually said, in quotes, no less, "it's sourced elsewhere in the article, go find and source it yourself"? Or is that something you just made up. (Hint: redact or ANI). Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 01:54, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

Here's the exact quote from the edit summary: "Already abundantly sourced in the rest of the article. If you want, copy those cites here." North8000 (talk) 02:06, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

Just to be abundantly clear, if I ever see you misquote any editor again, I will personally drag your sorry little ass to ANI. Capisce? (Hint: that was a formal warning). Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 02:13, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

Nice try. It was an accurate paraphrasing, and the "basically said" means that it is such and not an exact quote. Now, back onto the topic. Are you going to revert your removal of the tag? North8000 (talk) 02:17, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

I agree with North8000 and Dominus Vobisdu, you owe North8000 five cents for threatening him. Cla68 (talk) 05:17, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

If that 'threat' is worth 5 cents, what's your threats to out me worth? Surely you should attempt to pay your own debts before trying to bully other editors. Guettarda (talk) 05:40, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

North, read Nick's article, don't just search it for the word "unrelated". It clearly supports this assertion. Specifically: In a desperate attempt to obfuscate this basic historical point, ID guys have dug up various random instances of the words “intelligent” and “design” placed together (although they missed the 1861 Darwin letter, and the 1847 Scientific American article), most of them with absolutely no evidence of having influenced the actual actors in the 1980s who created the ID movement (there are some legitimate precursors, but they are in explicitly creationist works, e.g. Lester and Bohlin’s (1984) The Natural Limits to Biological Change, so the ID guys won’t cite them post-Kitzmiller). If you can find a better way to phrase that information, feel free to suggest it. But claiming that the statement is unsupported by the text is simply untrue. Guettarda (talk) 05:44, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

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