University of Cambridge

Intelligent Design, as opposed to religiously motivated creationism, seeks to discredit the scientific basis for evolution. Although the intelligent design movement lacks a scientific basis and legal standing it has substantial public support in the US and growing support in the UK and other parts of Europe.

"Professor Miller will argue that the popularity of this movement, which is pitted against Darwinian evolution, points to a profound failure on the part of the scientific community to articulate its own message effectively," said Katie Turnbull, Communications Officer at the Faraday Institute. "He believes that analysing the appeal of this concept is central to developing an understanding of why evolution is still resisted a century and a half after the publication of On the Origin of Species."

Professor Ken Miller is a cell biologist based at Brown University. He chairs the Education Committee of the American Society for Cell Biology and in 2008 won the AAAS Public Understanding of Science and Technology award in recognition of his work to communicate evolutionary science.

Professor Miller is very active in promoting the public understanding of evolution. He defended the scientific integrity of evolution as lead witness in the 2005 Dover Trial, Pennsylvania, where it was ruled that teaching intelligent design in public school biology classes violated the Constitution of the United States. He also serves as an adviser on life sciences to News Hour, a daily PBS television programme that focuses on news and public affairs.

The Faraday Institute of Science and Religion is an academic research enterprise based at St Edmund's College. It covers topics from stem-cells and cloning to the Big Bang and the origins of the universe. The Institute provides accurate and up-to-date information to help inform and improve public understanding of the interaction between science and religion. It aims to make academic research accessible to the public through close links with a network of experts from diverse disciplines including astrophysics, geology, neuroscience, genetics, evolutionary biology, theology and history and philosophy of science.

The lecture is free and open to everyone. It takes place at on Tuesday 28 April, 5.30pm in the Queen's Lecture Theatre, Emmanuel College. The lecture will be followed by free refreshments and a chance to meet the speaker and browse the bookstall.

Reproduced courtesy University of Cambridge Office of Communications