IT IS not often that New Scientist receives letters from readers threatening to sue God, but one recently wrote in asking for compensation for his badly designed back. Disregarding the chutzpah of such a lawsuit, and the difficulties of arranging debt collection in case God lost and failed to pay up, the letter was emblematic of the passions roused by the debate over intelligent design (ID), the creationist challenge to Darwinism.
2005 was the year that ID, which argues that living creatures are too complex to have evolved without the influence of an 鈥渋ntelligent designer鈥�, became a significant political force in the US. By July, 13 states had 18 legislative proposals to introduce ID into the school curriculum.
President Bush got involved in August, arguing that science teachers should be allowed to teach both sides of the 鈥渄ebate鈥�. And in September the documentary film March of the Penguins, about how these birds overcome the rigours of Antarctica, became an unlikely rallying point for the ID movement. The unsuspecting birds were held up as paragons of Christian morality 鈥� without any mention of their infidelity and prostitution.
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The action heated up in September when parents in Dover, Pennsylvania, sued their school board for promoting intelligent design in science classes. The case, which ran until November and is awaiting judgement, was the first to scrutinise ID in court, and will decide whether teaching it violates the constitutional separation of church and state. The verdict will set the tone for a legal battle that seems destined for the US Supreme Court.
Meanwhile, Dover鈥檚 electorate ousted the school board and replaced them with people who want to keep ID out of science classes.
And here are all of New Scientist鈥檚 roundup stories for 2005.