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1991 book by Phillip E. Johnson

Darwin on Trial is a 1991 book by law professor Phillip E. Johnson disputing tenets of science and evolution and promoting creationism. Johnson wrote the book with the thesis that evolution could be "tried" like a defendant in court. Darwin on Trial became a central text of the intelligent design movement, and Johnson has been described as the "father of ID". Eugenie Scott wrote that, in her opinion, the book "teaches little that is accurate about either the nature of science, or the topic of evolution. It is recommended neither by scientists nor educators." Scott pointed out in a second review that "the criticisms of evolution [Johnson] offers are immediately recognizable as originating with the 'scientific' creationists".

The book begins by recounting Edwards v. Aguillard, a US Supreme Court case regarding a Louisiana law requiring that if "evolution science" is taught in the public schools, the schools must also provide balanced treatment for something called "creation science"; the court deemed the law an "establishment of religion". Johnson states that an associated amicus curiae brief by the National Academy of Sciences improperly "defined 'science' in such a way that [it was impossible to] dispute the claims of the scientific establishment" and a rule it proposed against "negative argumentation [eliminated] the possibility that science has not discovered how complex organisms could have developed". The book then goes on to give various arguments against evolution.

Darwin on Trial alerted national media to the creationist movement and their fight against the theory of evolution. In the year after Darwin on Trial was released, many articles about the movement were published in popular newspapers and magazines across the country. Johnson said in an interview in California Monthly that he fully expected to be labeled a "kook" by the academy, but he was "pleasantly surprised" by its reception at Berkeley. The book initially received more attention from popular media than from the scientific community, although soon after the book was released Eugenie Scott of the National Center for Science Education responded to it, saying "scientific creationists" like Johnson "confuse the general public, by mixing up the controversy among scientists about how evolution took place, with a more general question of whether it took place at all". Stephen Jay Gould gave a harsh review in Scientific American, and that the claim of impartiality is contradicted by Johnson's stated aim "to legitimate the assertion of a theistic worldview in the secular universities". Stephen Jay Gould reviewed the book for Scientific American, concluding that the book contains " no weighing of evidence, no careful reading of literature on all sides, no full citation of sources (the book does not even contain a bibliography) and occasional use of scientific literature only to score rhetorical points." Robert T. Pennock rebutted Johnson's belief that science was improperly defined within Edwards v. Aguillard, stating that the dual model of science established by Johnson (either creationism or evolution is correct and true, and by disproving any part of evolution creationism 'wins' by default) is a false dilemma, a type of informal fallacy. Eugenie Scott has pointed out that the book repeats many arguments by creationists that were previously discredited.