Intelligent design and popular culture: Evil geniuses of the Discovery Institute find acceptance among orthodox Jews

Yes, of course I was just kidding about the evil geniuses. Regular readers will know that I am no fan of conspiracy theories - in fact, I use them as a sort of instant IQ test.

That is, a person who wants to convince me that he is both stupid and unteachable, and possibly insane, can best accomplish that goal by letting me know that evil conspirators run the world and their plotters are all around us.

In reality, almost all agendas are right out there in the open, but few notice. As Sherlock Holmes warned, we see but we do not observe.

Anyway, elsewhere I have commented on the way in which Disco's evil geniuses "time and again - apparently effortlessly - made both negative legacy media coverage and the normal behaviour of frantic Darwinists work in their interests."

So when Discovery's uber-wizard Bruce Chapman sent round a note the other day to say that he and ID-friendly tech pioneer George Gilder had been well received in Israel, I was hardly surprised to hear it. Indeed, I had heard things like that before.

The part I found interesting is,

Three of George's speeches dealt directly with the negative influence of Darwinism on contemporary society and then posed the positive scientific evidence for intelligent design. It was exciting to realize how well that message resonated with orthodox Jews in Israel, including scientists.

The fact that Chapman would even write this shows that materialism has dominated cultures worldwide to such an extent in recent years that people hardly know their own names any more.

I mean, like, you're an orthodox Jew and you don't think the universe shows evidence of intelligent design? Say what? Isn't the whole of orthodox Judaism a design for life that responds (and, ideally, corresponds) to the design of the universe? Otherwise, why bother? It strikes me as a lot of trouble for nothing if there is No One at the other end who cares if you are doing it.

Citing this Jerusalem Post piece that actually tries to interpret what guru Gilder is saying (instead of just telling us what is supposed to be wrong with it), Chapman notes that further pilgrimages to Israel are planned.

I can't wait till orthodox Jewish interest in ID is exposed as an evil Zionist conspiracy. Readers, do write and let me know - but please note that I won't intentionally post links to anti-Semitic sites.