For the record, the copy of the Wedge Strategy I linked is the full original as it first appeared at the DI’s web site, before it was taken down and replaced with the “explanation” you tried to reference. That document, by the way, is here.

Even in the revision, the DI charges that evolutionary biology has to be judged by its cultural and social consequences, and makes the outrageous slander that Darwin is to blame for the Nazi holocaust: Consider, for example, the eugenics crusade pushed by Darwinist biologists early in the twentieth century…. “Crusade” indeed. The creationist James Kennedy makes the same claim in the current edition of his televangelism program, and he’s been condemned by the Anti-Defamation League for it.

The three paragraphs I cited are present in both copies of the Wedge Strategy document and they say all that needs to be said. Theologically and socially appropriate science isn’t science at all, it’s propaganda.

You should be especially careful in making your arguments, given that you essentially convicted Hance Haney of intellectual dishonesty for his mere association with DI.

The cultural consequences of this triumph of materialism were devastating. Materialists denied the existence of objective moral standards, claiming that environment dictates our behavior and beliefs. Such moral relativism was uncritically adopted by much of the social sciences, and it still undergirds much of modern economics, political science, psychology and sociology.

Materialists also undermined personal responsibility by asserting that human thoughts and behaviors are dictated by our biology and environment. The results can be seen in modern approaches to criminal justice, product liability, and welfare. In the materialist scheme of things, everyone is a victim and no one can be held accountable for his or her actions.

Finally, materialism spawned a virulent strain of utopianism. Thinking they could engineer the perfect society through the application of scientific knowledge, materialist reformers advocated coercive government programs that falsely promised to create heaven on earth.

Discovery Institute’s Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture seeks nothing less than the overthrow of materialism and its cultural legacies.

Read the whole thing.

That’s an absurd assertion. Agree with it or not, ID’s main point is that certain features of nature exhibit the same sort of informational complexity that we automatically take as signs of design wherever else they appear. We may think that biological complexity can be sufficiently explained by other means (evolution). Nonetheless, your description of ID is a silly caricature.

I’m sorry, but it strikes me that far too many people on this board are condemning Hance Haney for a stand he’s never taken, on an issue no one here really knows very much about, and that is sad. By the same rules, many of you deserve to have your views ignored simply because you work for Cato and everyone knows that people who work for Cato hate the poor, minorities, and just about everyone else.

ID is a question-begging doctrine that was created out of the belief that scientific theories that cause immoral behavior must be banned from the public square, whether they’re right or wrong.

That’s not the rational approach to science or to public policy, of course.

Frankly, I would have hoped for a little more rationality, and a little less knee-jerking, from a group that so clearly thinks itself brilliant.

I’m affiliated with a controversial organization – the Cato Institute – which is truly detested by many people out there. I go out and talk to groups all the time starting at a credibility deficit because of my affiliation. If those groups were to refuse hearing what I had to say entirely, we’d all be worse off, don’t you think?

I appreciate the passion that most of you hold about the Intelligent Design debate – I haven’t followed it very closely – but I have known Hance and colleagues of his who work on telecom policy, financial privacy, and the like at the Discovery Institute since long before the ID debate heated up.

If you’re here on TLF to debate Intelligent Design, you’ll probably disagree with the choice of including Hance – and you’ll be bored pretty quickly, too, because it’s not germane to this blog – but if you’re here to discuss technology policy, you’ll let your opinion of Hance and TLF rise or fall on the merits.