The Politically Incorrect Guide to Darwinism and Intelligent Design [Paperback]

Jonathan Wells (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 21, 2006

You think you know about Darwinism and intelligent design, but did you know: there is no overwhelming evidence for Darwinism; intelligent design is based on scientific evidence, not religious belief; what many public schools teach about Darwinism is based on known falsehoods; scientists at major universities believe in intelligent design; scientists who question Darwinism are punished - by public institutions using your tax dollars. Battle-hardened veteran with doctorates in biology and theology sets the record straight in "The Politically Incorrect Guide to Darwin and Intelligent Design".

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

Why Darwinism—like Marxism and Freudianism before it—is headed for extinction

In the 1925 Scopes trial, the American Civil Liberties Union sued to allow the teaching of Darwin’s theory of evolution in public schools. Seventy-five years later, in Kitzmiller v. Dover, the ACLU sued to prevent the teaching of an alternative to Darwin’s theory known as "Intelligent Design"—and won. Why did the ACLU turn from defending the free-speech rights of Darwinists to silencing their opponents? Jonathan Wells reveals that, for today’s Darwinists, there may be no other choice: unable to fend off growing challenges from scientists, or to compete with rival theories better adapted to the latest evidence, Darwinism—like Marxism and Freudianism before it—is simply unfit to survive.

Wells begins by explaining the basic tenets of Darwinism, and the evidence both for and against it. He reveals, for instance, that the fossil record, which according to Darwin should be teeming with "transitional" fossils showing the development of one species to the next, so far hasn’t produced a single incontestable example. On the other hand, certain well-documented aspects of the fossil record—such as the Cambrian explosion, in which innumerable new species suddenly appeared fully formed—directly contradict Darwin’s theory. Wells also shows how most of the other "evidence" for evolution— including textbook "icons" such as peppered moths, Darwin’s finches, Haeckel’s embryos, and the Tree of Life—has been exaggerated, distorted . . . and even faked.

Wells then turns to the theory of intelligent design (ID), the idea that some features of the natural world, such as the internal machinery of cells, are too "irreducibly complex" to have resulted from unguided natural processes alone. In clear-cut layman’s language, he reveals the growing evidence for ID coming out of scientific specialties from microbiology to astrophysics. As Wells explains, religion does play a role in the debate over Darwin—though not in the way evolutionists claim. Wells shows how Darwin reasoned that evolution is true because divine creation "must" be false—a theological assumption oddly out of place in a scientific debate. In other words, Darwinists’ materialistic, atheistic assumptions rule out any theories but their own, and account for their willingness to explain away the evidence—or lack of it.

Darwin is an emperor who has no clothes— but it takes a brave man to say so. Jonathan Wells, a microbiologist with two Ph.D.s (from Berkeley and Yale), is that brave man. Most textbooks on evolution are written by Darwinists with an ideological ax to grind. Brave dissidents—qualified scientists—who try to teach or write about intelligent design are silenced and sent to the academic gulag. But fear not: Jonathan Wells is a liberator. He unmasks the truth about Darwinism— why it is wrong and what the real evidence is. He also supplies a revealing list of "Books You’re Not Supposed to Read" (as far as the Darwinists are concerned) and puts at your fingertips all the evidence you need to challenge the most closed-minded Darwinist.

About the Author

Jonathan Wells is a Senior Fellow at the Discovery Institute in Seattle, Washington. He holds a Ph.D. in biology from the University of California at Berkeley and a Ph.D. in theology from Yale University. He is the author of Icons of Evolution: Why Much of What We Teach about Evolution Is Wrong (Regnery) and is currently doing intelligent design–related scientific research.

Product Details

• Paperback: 273 pages
• Publisher: Regnery Publishing; 1ST edition (August 21, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1596980133
• ISBN-13: 978-1596980136
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 7.4 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (111 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #218,941 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I have two Ph.D.s, one in Molecular and Cell Biology from the University of California at Berkeley (1994), and one in Religious Studies from Yale University (1986). After finishing my Berkeley Ph.D. I taught embryology at California State University in Hayward, did post-doctoral research at Berkeley, and worked as the supervisor of a medical laboratory in Fairfield, California. In 1998 I moved with my family to Seattle, where I am now a Senior Fellow at the Discovery Institute's Center for Science & Culture.

I have published scientific articles in Development, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, BioSystems, The Scientist and The American Biology Teacher. I am also author of Charles Hodge's Critique of Darwinism (Edwin Mellen Press, 1988) and Icons of Evolution: Why much of what we teach about evolution is wrong (Regnery Publishing, 2000). I am now working on a book criticizing the over-emphasis on DNA in biology and medicine.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Science is Objective, if nothing else. This book is Not!, October 29, 2011

By 

Bannon (Santa Monica, CA, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Darwinism and Intelligent Design (Paperback)

I was looking for an objective education from this book but what I found was an ill fated attempt to indoctrinate me into the Intelligent Design camp. I am not religious nor do I have an emotional investment in Darwin's Theory. I do however have a strong bent for objectivity in Science. To describe a theory as "Intelligent Design" and simultaneously deny it's fundamental need for an intelligent designer (God) seems absurd to me. How is a reader not supposed to think of I.D. as a fundamentally religious theory?

I am thus far convinced that without an Intelligent Designer (God) there is no Intelligent design theory. It seems to me to be an attempt to convince people of the existence of a God through the use of scientific language, or to be generous, the search for God through the use of science. Either way I remain unconvinced that I.D. belongs in the realm of a proper science.

I am admittedly quite ignorant of Darwin and his theory's as well, an ignorance I was attempting to alleviate with this book. But because of the authors vitriolic nature toward Darwin and his theory I cannot help but consider anything he says on the subject as irrationally biased.

So to err on the side of caution I will say that my biggest lesson here is that I have no more time to waste on the intellectually dishonest opinions of Jonathan Wells PH.D.

45 of 62 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Pretty good polemics for a Moonie!, March 28, 2010

By 

David Marshall (Seattle area) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Darwinism and Intelligent Design (Paperback)

First, my overall evaluation. The book is well-written, punchy, and has an edge. Wells make a plethora of strong arguments, overturns many of the most popular anti-ID talking points, but decidedly does not overturn what he calls "Darwinism."

Let me start the criticism with that term. It appears to have been chosen more to irritate the other side than because it most accurately describes his opponents. Darwin did not, after all, know about genetics -- as Wells makes clear -- or the supposed engine of innovation, random mutations. It would be like calling the General Theory of Relativity "Newtonism" -- both overly pejorative and underly accurate.

But my main criticism is that Well's argument against neo-Darwinian evolution (NDE, a better term) is not that strong. He allocated one chapter each to overturning the evidence from fossils and from genetics -- both mostly seemed like hand-waving, generalizations, and rank assertions, to me. He should at least have admitted that the general pattern of fossil evidence does show progression and development over four billion years. I don't think he even mentions the hominid record, or if he did, his mention was hard to notice as a speed sign in a poor town. All in all, on this subject Wells seemed to protest too much, and say too little.

The rest of the book was generally quite good, I thought. Wells deals with philosophical objections well. He shows that ID proponents are engaging in serious science. He demonstrates that there are a lot of very small-minded and virulent critics of ID on college campuses (if you've been around here, you might add Amazon), some of whom seem to have little room in their hearts for the concept of freedom of speech or a marketplace of ideas. (One star reviewers: get a clue, naming a man's religion does not refute his scientific arguments.) The book is extremely well-written and fun to listen to.

As a political or philosophical overview of ID, this book is worth reading. Wells is guilty of some hubris, though, and needs to double down on the scientific evidence and make concessions where needed, I think.

27 of 39 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Intentionally dishonest, October 3, 2009

By 

Timothy M. Griffin - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Darwinism and Intelligent Design (Paperback)

If you're curious about intelligent design (I am, as a science teacher and as a Christian), I suppose this is a good book to read. However, you should also follow up by checking the author's citations. Alas, I found that most of his claims about "Darwinism" (a term he never clearly defines and uses to mean pretty much anything bad) are demonstrably and provably false. He carefully selects and then very creatively edits quotes from various scientists to make them appear to say whatever he wants instead of what they actually said; many of his sources have debunked his "quotes" online. His evidence in support of I.D. consists mainly of the irreducible complexity hypothesis, which has the advantage that anytime one of their "irreducibly complex" features turns out to have a solid evolutionary track record (think eyeball), the I.D. advocates can just pick another structure that hasn't been properly studied yet without ever admitting they were wrong.

Ultimately, this book demonstrates the failure of I.D. as science. The author keeps trying to redefine what science should mean in an effort to force inclusion of his ideas; finally he has to divert attention from his lack of evidence with an alleged conspiracy by the powerful "Darwinists" to suppress the bold thinkers (like the author, I guess) who advocate I.D. Worse, though, than its failure as science is I.D.'s failure as theology; by relying solely on things we haven't fully explained yet to support the thesis, the Intelligent Design movement in effect tries to make my God into a god of ignorance. My faith is bigger than natural causes, bigger than rational explanation, and is not subject to peer review; that's why we call it faith, you dunderheads. New discoveries about the universe do not make God smaller, they only make his creation all the more wonderful. Rather than legitimizing religion, forcing religion into a pseudo-scientific mold only makes God (and the advocates of intelligent design) look silly.