John G. West

John G. West is a Senior Fellow at the Seattle-based Discovery Institute (DI), and Associate Director and Vice President for Public Policy and Legal Affairs of its Center for Science and Culture (CSC), which serves as the main hub of the Intelligent design movement.

Biography

West received an undergraduate degree in Communications (Editorial Journalism) from the University of Washington in 1986. From 1986-1989, he served as Managing Editor of Public Research, Syndicated, which distributed essays on public affairs to more than 700 daily and weekly newspapers. He received his Ph.D. in Government from The Claremont Graduate School (now Claremont Graduate University) in 1992, has taught political science and history courses at California State University, San Bernardino and Azusa Pacific University, and was an Associate Professor of Political Science at Seattle Pacific University (a private Christian university) where he chaired the Political Science and Geography department.[1][2]

West has been co-director of the CSC since its formation in 1996, out of discussions between himself and Stephen C. Meyer, which lead to an invitation from DI president Bruce Chapman to create it as a unit within the DI.[3][4] At the 1995 DI-sponsored 'Death of Materialism' conference out of which it was born, he delivered an address entitled 'The Death of Materialism and the Renewal of Culture', which was an early articulation of the Wedge Strategy (later leaked in 1998 as what became known as the Wedge Document, with an introduction identical to West's opening paragraphs).[5]

Darwin Day in America

In both his 2007 book Darwin Day in America and in lectures,[6] West presents his case for linking Darwin to the eugenics movement. Historian of Science Mark Borrello criticized West's argument in writing, "West means blaming biologists in general and Darwinian theory in particular for the coerced sterilization laws that passed many state legislatures in the first half of the 20th century. This will not do. Historians of science know that the passage of the first sterilization laws at the beginning of the 20th century occurred during the 'eclipse of Darwinism'." Borrello further states that this popular support for eugenics was matched with popular opposition to teaching evolution.[7] Moreover, modern scientists, such as Stephen Jay Gould spoke out against eugenics.[8][9]

Bibliography

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ Discovery Institute biography
  2. ↑ Seattle Pacific University biography
  3. ↑ Forrest and Gross(2004) p20
  4. ↑ Numbers(2006) pp381-383
  5. ↑ Forrest and Gross(2004) pp30-32
  6. ↑ West Wins In Minn., Bruce Chapman, Evolution News & Views, Discovery Institute
  7. ↑ Dancing with the Disco Institute, Mark Borrello, assistant professor of the history of science, University of Minnesota. Minnesota Citizens for Science
  8. ↑ How the West was ‘Won’: with spin and rewriting history, PZ Myers, Pharyngula
  9. ↑ Carrie Buck's Daughter, Stephen Jay Gould

References

External links

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