A moderate naturalism:beyond Intelligent Design creationism

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I believe that the “Intelligent Design” creationism (“IDc” hereafter) controversy in the U.S. is very important—easily important relative to Habermas’ interest in clarifying the place of religion in constitutional patriotism—as a majority of USAmericans are religious, and that fact is vital for Republican control of U.S. geopolitics (though only a tiny minority of USAmericans support IDc in science education). This might also be important to persons outside the U.S., since the U.S. issue may register a very important version of the growing pains of late modernity globally: gaining fundamentalist/evangelical reconciliation—without religious resentment—toward secularist politics (let alone the issue of jihadist violence). IDc may be the ultimate religious recourse against scientific modernity (echoing the legacy of religious philosophy—the so-called Argument from Design of late-medieval natural theology, which became the “blind watchmaker” of 18th century “science”—while it was an aim of both Newton and Kant to keep the world safe for religious hope).