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Isaac Newton — Proto-Intelligent Design Advocate

Image: Isaac Newton, by William Blake [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Great scientists of the past anticipated aspects of the modern case for intelligent design. As philosopher of science Stephen Meyer notes, the greatest of all these proto-ID advocates was Sir Isaac Newton. Some atheists, like Neil deGrasse Tyson, have miscast Newton as a mechanist and a materialist, in their own image. But as Dr. Meyer learned in studying Newton at the University of Cambridge, Newton’s theism is crucial to understanding his science. 

Meyer’s new book, Return of the God Hypothesis: Three Scientific Discoveries That Reveal the Mind Behind the Universe, continues the Newtonian tradition of recognizing the action of a divine creator, a personal God, in the workings of nature and in the origin of the universe. See here for a list of scientists who have endorsed the book, including Nobel Prize-winning physicist Brian Josephson, also at Cambridge. Meyer explains Newton’s thoughts on intelligent design here: