The critique of intelligent design: Epicurus,Marx, Darwin,and Freud and the materialist defense of science

A new version of the age-old controversy between religion and science has been launched by today’s intelligent design movement. Although ostensibly concerned simply with combating Darwinism, this new creationism seeks to drive a “wedge” into the materialist view of the world, originating with the ancient Greek philosopher Epicurus and manifested in modern times by Darwin, Marx, and Freud. Intelligent design proponents thus can be seen as challenging not only natural and physical science but social science as well. In this article, we attempt to explain the long history of this controversy, stretching over millennia, and to defend science (especially social science) against the criticisms of intelligent design proponents – by defending science’s materialist roots.

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Brett Clark (Corresponding author)Email:

John Bellamy FosterEmail:

Richard YorkEmail:

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Brett Clark   received his Ph.D. from the University of Oregon and is the Editorial Director of Monthly Review Press. His research interests are ecology, political economy, and science. He has published articles and review essays in Theory and Society, The Sociological Quarterly, Organization & Environment, and Critical Sociology. He received the 2007 Outstanding Publication Award from the Environment and Technology Section of the American Sociological Association for a series of articles (one of which was the article “Carbon Metabolism: Global Capitalism, Climate Change, and the Biospheric Rift,” published in Theory and Society in 2005) with Richard York. John Bellamy Foster   is Professor of Sociology at the University of Oregon and editor of Monthly Review (New York). He is the author of The Theory of Monopoly Capitalism (1986); The Vulnerable Planet (1994); “Marx’s Theory of Metabolic Rift,” American Journal of Sociology (1999); Marx’s Ecology (2000); Ecology Against Capitalism (2002); Naked Imperialism (2006); and (with Paul Burkett) “Metabolism, Energy, and Entropy in Marx’s Critique of Political Economy,” Theory and Society (2006). Richard York   is Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Oregon and co-editor of the Sage journal Organization & Environment. His research focuses on human interaction with the natural environment and the philosophy, history, and sociology of science. He has published articles in American Sociological Review, Gender & Society, Rural Sociology, Social Problems, Social Science Research, Sociological Forum, The Sociological Quarterly, Theory and Society, and other scholarly journals. He has twice (2004 and 2007) received the Outstanding Publication Award from the Environment and Technology Section of the American Sociological Association.