Intelligent Design—Not Just for Book Jackets
by Lynn Andriani -- Publishers Weekly, 2/5/2007
One can't help wonder what Charles Darwin—whose birthday is February 12—would've made of the 2005 intelligent design case Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District. And more importantly, what would he think of the outbreak of books it spawned? In addition to the following forthcoming trade titles, there are In the Beginning: Fundamentalism, the Scopes Trial, and the Making of the Antievolution Movement by Michael Lienesch (Univ. of North Carolina, Apr.) and The Panda's Black Box: Opening Up the Intelligent Design Controversy, edited by Nathaniel C. Comfort (Johns Hopkins Univ., May).
| 40 Days and 40 Nights: Darwin, Intelligent Design, God, OxyContin and Other Oddities on Trial in Pennsylvania by Matthew Chapman (Collins, Apr.) | Monkey Girl: Evolution, Education, Religion, and the Battle for America's Soul by Edward Humes (Ecco, Jan.) | Scientists Confront Intelligent Design and Creationism, edited by Andrew J. Petto and Laurie R. Godfrey (Norton, Mar.) | |
| The author/editors: | Charles Darwin's great-great-grandson | Pulitzer-winning journalist | Academics at the Univ. of Wisconsin–Milwaukee and UMass-Amherst |
| The gist: | An in-depth report on Kitzmiller v. DASD, which Chapman covered for Harper's. | An absorbing, character-driven story of the Dover case. | A serious, comprehensive collection of new and revised essays from some of the biggest names in the anti-creationism field. |
| The stance: | Anti-creationism, but "creationism in all its forms should be a mandatory part of every child's science education." | Unbiased: "I ask readers of all perspectives to turn these pages with open minds.... Let the combatants be armed with facts, not fiction." | "A ringing and lasting refutation of creationism's fraudulent claims." |
