How Intelligent Design Has Flourished In Spite of the Scopes Effect

Intelligent Design the Future

Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture

Science, Philosophy, Astronomy, Society & Culture, Life Sciences

4 • 993 Ratings

🗓️ 2 July 2025

⏱️ 28 minutes

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Summary

The Scopes "Monkey" trial of 1925 has cast a long shadow over the evolution debate in the last century, thanks in large part to the Hollywood film Inherit the Wind, which caricatured the trial and promoted stereotypes that still persist today. On this ID The Future, host Andrew McDiarmid continues a conversation with Dr. Casey Luskin about the long history of the Scopes effect in science and how intelligent design has managed to flourish in spite of it. This is Part 2 of a two-part conversation. Source

Transcript

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0:00.0	ID, The Future, a podcast about evolution and intelligent design.
0:10.0	So, the Scopes' monkey trial turns 100 this year.
0:16.0	According to the myth propagated by champions of Darwinian evolutionary theory,
0:20.0	the Scopes' trial was a great
0:21.8	showdown between ignorant, fundamentalist religion and enlightened scientific progress.
0:27.8	This theme was crystallized by a play, and later a movie, loosely based on the Scopes trial,
0:33.2	called Inherit the Wind. Is the spirit of Scopes alive and well today? Does it continue to
0:39.0	hamper the advance of science by marginalizing skeptics of Darwinian evolution? You bet it does.
0:45.8	Today I welcome back Dr. Casey Luskin to continue our conversation about the 100th anniversary
0:51.9	of the Scopes trial. Dr. Luskin is Associate Director of Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture.
0:58.7	He's a scientist and attorney with graduate degrees in science and law.
1:02.9	He also holds a PhD in geology from the University of Johannesburg.
1:07.8	Luskin is a California licensed attorney since 2005, practicing primarily in the area of evolution
1:13.8	education in public schools, and defending academic freedom for scientists who face discrimination
1:20.0	because of their support for intelligent design. His background gives him expertise in both the
1:25.8	scientific and legal dimensions of the debate over evolution.
1:30.6	In Part 1, Casey gave us some helpful historical background on the Scopes trial,
1:35.9	the play and the movie that resulted from it,
1:38.3	and some of the flashpoints since the Scopes trial that have heightened the debate over Darwinian evolution.
1:43.9	But even as the Scopes stereotypes were crystallizing in the public consciousness,
1:48.8	skepticism about the power of Darwin's selection mutation mechanism continued to mount.
1:54.7	And it wasn't just intelligent design scientists sharing their concerns about Darwinism.
	...

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