Open letter to Bonnie Alba

Dear Ms Alba

I read with interest your editorial piece entitled Intelligent Design - What Do the Naturalists Have Against It?.

Your conclusion says: "When a science teacher announces that we are
all accidents, "nature is all there is," then this is philosophy and
not "empirical science." Instead of following the evidence where it
leads, the scientific community is enclosing itself in a box of its
own making. Science teachers will have a difficult time as more
Americans educate themselves and their children about Darwinism and
the naturalist worldview."

Surely you recognise that science does not say "nature is all that
there is". But if we can't measure, replicate or empirically examine
something beyond nature, then what use is science? The questions move
to philosophy or theology - hardly the realms of the science
classroom!

Your article (please forgive me) seems to show a rather shockingly
poor knowledge of evolutionary theory on your part. You also don't
seem to recognise that a great many Christians worldwide accept that
evolutionary science is quite compatible with their belief in God, as
the links on this webpage demonstrate.

More worrying, you don't seem to be aware that even the proponents of
Intelligent Design are quite upfront that they themselves do not yet
have a "scientific" alternative to standard evolutionary theory.

As Paul Nelson, a fellow of the ID-endorsing Discovery Institute,
wrote in Touchstone Magazine in 2004 (quoted here):

"Easily the biggest challenge facing the ID community is to develop a
full-fledged theory of biological design. We don't have such a theory
right now, and that's a problem. Without a theory, it's very hard to
know where to direct your research focus. Right now, we've got a bag
of powerful intuitions, and a handful of notions such as 'irreducible
complexity' and 'specified complexity' - but, as yet, no general
theory of biological design."

Do you really think it is right for you to promote Intelligent Design
as an alternative to standard evolutionary theory, when ID theorists
themselves admit that they do not yet have an alternative?

And do you not think that the Christian thing to do would be for you
to attempt to learn more about what *scientists* have to say about the
evidence for evolutionary theory, rather than relying on information
from clearly mis-informed third parties?

After all, "Intelligent Design" is not taught as science in any
non-Fundamentalist University. Is it not odd, therefore, that people
propose it should be taught in public schools?

Very kind regards