Don’t teach ‘design theory’ in schools

In his March 25 letter Stewart Brekke identifies himself as a secular humanist and a former high school physics teacher, and he declares that creationism should not be taught in science classes because creationism is a matter of faith rather than science. But he then goes on to say that some kind of design must have been involved in the origin of life due to its complexity, but the origin of that design is not known.

He emphasizes that the complexity of life-forms relies on specific organic compounds which could not have been produced by chance interaction of basic molecules, and therefore some form of design must have been there, and he advocates the teaching of such design theory in science classes “since there is some evidence for that.”

I must disagree with Mr. Brekke. First, this discussion is not a matter of physics, but rather a matter of biochemistry. In “Life Ascending” by Nick Lane, a biochemist, we see that specific organic compounds can in fact be produced by chance interactions of basic molecules, despite the so-called complexity involved, and accordingly any notion of original design is not necessary to explain such complexity.

Mr. Brekke uses the phrase “original design,” but isn’t that the same thing as “intelligent design”? And our federal courts have already declared that intelligent design is the equivalent of creationism, and constitutionally it may not be taught in our public schools.

I think we can only conclude that many things do happen at random, and over time they may end up being complex. However, such complexity is not necessarily a scientific basis for proclaiming the existence of an intelligent designer, and such design theory definitely should not be taught in our science classes.

Theodore M. Utchen

Wheaton