Today has an automobile theme, it appears. Earlier, Granville Sewell wrote, “More on Self-Replicating Machines.” Now our colleague Daniel Reeves points out that intelligent design has its own car, or cars: Volkswagen’s ID series, which are electric vehicles that have gone through several iterations. They’re now on the 2022 ID.4. Yes, it stands for “intelligent design.”

A press release from VW explains, “The name is revealing: the ID. abbreviation stands for intelligent design, identity and visionary technologies and the number 4 identifies the new model as a representative of the compact SUV segment.”

The websites of some of our Seattle-area VW dealerships are reticent about acknowledging this. I suppose that customers locally will simply have to wonder. A dealer in Ohio, though, sees it as a selling point: “[T]he ID in Volkswagen’s new lineup stands for ‘intelligent design’ — among other things. The ID.4 is a great example of this.”

Daniel is a longtime VW driver, and comments: “From my first car (a 1998 Passat) to my present and fourth VW (a 2012 Jetta TDI), I’ve always said that these are well-designed cars — simple, elegant, and made of high-quality materials.” (No, “TDI” doesn’t stand for The Discovery Institute.)

Speaking of cars, evolution, and ID, the other day I saw on the back of a Subaru in Bellevue a bumper sticker reading, “Let’s Go, Darwin.“ Intrigued, I couldn’t tell whether to infer that the driver is an ID proponent, or an evolution fan who doesn’t get the “Let’s go, Brandon” reference. Actually, it’s neither. The slogan, as I learned in looking it up, expresses a nasty sentiment, wishing death on people whose politics and vaccine status you don’t like; see here. Charming.