Priests in lab coats

Are the creationists genuine in their belief?

I really, truly think so. I think sometimes they have worries about how it all fits together. I know the philosopher Paul Nelson, who has said that theologically he's drawn very strongly to a young-earth creationism. Scientifically, he realizes there's a lot to be said for a much older earth. Paul is genuinely puzzled. In the end he votes for theology over science because, you know, that's his paradigm. That's not to say they don't have motivations. Phillip Johnson, after a brilliant beginning to his legal career, had become best known as the author of textbooks. It's pretty clear that he has found it very satisfying to lead a movement like this, just at a personal level.

I see the sacrifices they make. William Dembski [the mathematician and philosopher who is among the I.D. movement's intellectual stars] is a very bright guy who should have been able to get a very good job, and he's reduced to going off to some theological tinpot college in Tennessee or something [actually, the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky.]. Paul Nelson hasn't got a regular job. They're making sacrifices for their faith. While I think their position is terrible, I don't see them as evil people. I don't see them as Hitlers. They're caught up in an appalling, idiosyncratic American religion. So they're not the first.

How closely allied is creationism to right-wing politics? When we read that 45 to 50 percent of the public claims to believe in a literal reading of Genesis, we assume we also know who those people voted for. Is that fair?

Well, look at the 2004 survey from the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, which I refer to in my conclusion. They have dug more deeply than I'm able to do. There's no question that red state equals George W. Bush equals not just anti-evolutionism, but opposition to homosexual marriage, opposition to abortion, strong support for capital punishment and strong sympathy for going into Iraq. I see the evolution-creation dispute as a litmus test for a much broader divide in American society.

Is that why you think creationism is dangerous? Or is that a kind of category confusion?

It's a two-level answer. I think creationism is dangerous because I don't think you should teach young people bad ideas. I'm a post-Enlightenment person. Inasmuch as I see creationism as a litmus test, I don't think creationism as such is dangerous. I think premillennialism is dangerous, because this inclines you to simplistic and dangerous positions. You hear echoes of this when George Bush talks about the "evildoers." I think the decision to go to war in Iraq was bound up with many different issues; Cheney just did it for the oil. But I do see it as allied to premillennial thinking, and that's even before you get to the Israel issue. Why are evangelical Christians so gung-ho in favor of Israel? Well, it's not because they like Jews. It's because of their eschatological reading of the Book of Revelation. I do think these things are very dangerous.

Well, there's also the capacity of Americans to hold essentially contradictory sets of beliefs. On one hand, we're good Christians who believe in Genesis. On the other hand, we want our kids to have a modern scientific education. I don't know how widespread that is, but I suspect it's out there.

That's quite right. There are always 5 percent who do believe in evolution but also think humans and dinosaurs coexisted. Science is part of our culture as much as Genesis. You can't turn everyone into an evolutionist, but I'm not certain that the level of opposition is as black as people think. Americans, given your exceptionalism and your feeling that you are God's chosen race, have more of a capacity for self-delusion than other people. With the possible exception of upper-class English people.

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