Is intelligent design an argument from ignorance? Is it a modern version of creationism? Can its claims be backed up by experimental results? On this ID The Future from the vault, Dr. Stephen Meyer debates Keith Pannell, a chemist at the University of Texas at El Paso and host of the NPR affiliate KTEP program Science Studio. Pannell also brings on biologist Ricardo Bernal as a co-host. We often say that Darwinists are reluctant to debate advocates of intelligent design, but here are two who deserve a tip of the hat.

Pannell and Bernal tow the standard materialist line, but they're civil and give Meyer room to make his case. And as always, Meyer delivers. The discussion was likely an education for these two Texas scientists. Meyer patiently explains how intelligent design is different from creationism in epistemology as well as methodology. He notes that intelligent design uses the same historical methods of reasoning that Charles Darwin pioneered in the Origin of Species. Pannell is convinced that intelligent design is an argument from ignorance. Not at all, says Meyer. It's a positive case based on our uniform and repeated experience as well as on everything we know about the nature of information.

The interview was occasioned by the anniversary of the Dover trial, a topic which comes up in the conversation. Wasn't the debate over intelligent design over after Dover? Not even close, says Meyer. We don't look to federal judges to settle deep, imponderable scientific questions. There are different disciplines for that. Meyer rounds out the discussion by elucidating on molecular machines and the type of information that contemporary Darwinian theory is given credit for without justification.