The defendants repeatedly denied the accusation, citing the aforementioned distinction between the “intelligent designer” and an explicit supernatural entity such as God. This line of thinking was called into question by the plaintiffs, who responded by advocating for the use of the Lemon Test. This procedure determines an idea’s relation to the Establishment Clause by examining whether its primary purpose or effect is the endorsement of religion. While the primary effect of an educational policy is difficult to determine, the purpose could be deduced by examining the wording of the ID policy in the context of its proponent’s discussions and communications. As physical evidence began to surface in the form of the Discovery Institute’s early drafts of ID materials (which explicitly mention “the creator”), the transcripts and communications from the school board meetings, and testimonies from numerous Dover science teachers, the court soon concluded that the “intelligent designed” was no other than the Christian God. Thus, the mere implication of a supernatural entity, coupled with the evidence linking ID to earlier attempts to institute creationism, would be enough to warrant unconstitutional status under the Establishment …show more content…
Advocates of design then postulate that evolution can account for small, gradual adaptations which increase the fitness of an organism, such as a gradual change in fur color, but not for the sudden appearance of such complex structures as the vertebrate eye, which would entail an instantaneous development of intricate biochemical pathways and structures which simply cannot occur under the mechanisms of natural selection and random mutations described in evolutionary theory. Therefore, they conclude, only the involvement of an intelligent designer can account for this