Whilst I have every sympathy with Christopher Booker's concern over the lack of balance in BBC jornalism I must take issue with his apparent defence of Intelligent Design (Notebook 7th August 2005).
The Intelligent Design (ID) movement is anything but a scientific one. Essentially, it is a pseudo-scientific veneer on top of the usual creationist objections to evolution. The use of a great deal of (apparently) non-religious and scientific-sounding terminology is ID's deliberate ploy to confuse its audience and suggest a rational equivalence between ID and mainstream science.
Mr Booker goes on to claim that '... Darwinians have put themselves in the same position as the Christian creationists they so despise They rest their case on nothing more than blind faith...'. This is clearly untrue, for a start consider the many experiments, observations and scientific investigations that have been undertaken by the scientific community with regards to understanding the origin of life over the past 150 years. It is astonishing that Mr Booker can dismiss the achievements of biology, physics, genetics, palaeontology and other sciences so readily. Modern Darwinism is not a fixed, blind belief, it is an evolving (excuse the pun) scientific theory subject to the usual rigours of scientifc review and research.
In an age when irrational thought and superstition abounds in the western media it is refreshing when a program strives to redress the balance. For this reason my criticism stands, not only as a criticism of Mr Booker's views on ID but also of his use of that particular program to illustrate the BBC's 'agenda'. I have always found Mr Booker's column interesting and usually find myself in support of his arguments. In future I will check his assumptions and sources more closely before I accept his conclusions.
