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When you finish reading about the link between ID and anti-materialism, read on here:

Materialism Is Our Adversary

Materialism is the philosophy that argues that matter is all there is. It denies the existence of all spiritual entities, and, of course, God. According to a materialist, the universe is not created by God; it is self-existent. He, therefore, assumes that everything in the universe, including the life within it, is the product of blind, purposeless forces of physics and chemistry. Materialism denies the existence of the human soul, too. According to this view, we are nothing but highly organized molecules, and our ideas, feelings, and emotions are simply chemical reactions inside our brain cells. In short, materialism is the philosophical underpinning of atheism.

Since its beginning, Islam has carried on an intellectual war against materialism. The Qur’an emphasizes the irrationality of men’s denial of God: [How do you deny God when you were dead and He gave you life? Again He will cause you to die and again bring you to life, then you shall be brought back to Him] (2:28).

More reading on ID and the "wedge" issue.

Well, there is good news. We are not alone in this battle. There is another powerful component in the West that is determined to root out materialism. That force is Christianity.

Christianity as Our Ally

Intelligent Design as Our Common Cause

This “wedge” is the code name for the Intelligent Design Movement, formed in the early 1990s by Christian scientists and intellectuals. The leader of the movement is Phillip E. Johnson, a prominent professor of law from the University of California, Berkeley. During a sabbatical year in London in 1987, Dr. Johnson read about Darwinism and noticed that Darwinian ideologues like Richard Dawkins use deceptive arguments to sell their unsubstantiated story. He decided to dedicate the rest of life to unravel this sophisticated fallacy. His first book, Darwin on Trial (1991), annoyed the Darwinist establishment terribly, but it was just a beginning. In the following years, serious scientists like Michael Behe from Lehigh University, William Dembski from Baylor University, and Paul Nelson from the University of Chicago joined the ranks of the movement.

Today the movement, headed by the Discovery Institute in Seattle and the Intelligent Design Network in Kansas, is leading a great battle first to free school textbooks and then the whole of society from the Darwinist dogma and the materialist philosophy it supports.

Hundreds of verses in the Qur’an call people to examine the natural world and see in it the evidence of God.

Intelligent Design (ID) is a term that implies creation. The universe and life are not products of blind forces of nature, ID holds, but show evidence that they were designed by an intelligence. The ID Movement has deliberately chosen not to specify the identity of the Designer. Through science you can demonstrate convincingly that there is a designer, but you can’t go further without invoking theology. Everybody has the right to believe in a Designer according his own theology. What makes the movement effective is its emphasis on solid scientific evidence.

This non-theological nature of the ID Movement also makes it inter-religious. Whether you are a Christian, a Jew, a Muslim, or any other kind of theist, you can identify with the movement. This movement defines the particular paradigm of science we would like to have, and it is science that defines society in the long run.

Muslims should also note the great similarity between the arguments of the Intelligent Design Movement and Islamic sources. Hundreds of verses in the Qur’an call people to examine the natural world and see in it the evidence of God. Great Islamic scholars like Ghazali wrote large volumes about design in animals, plants, and the human body. What Intelligent Design theorists like Behe or Dembski do today is to refine the same argument with the findings of modern science.

In short, Intelligent Design is not alien to Islam. It is very much our cause, and we should do everything we can to support it.

It is very hard to see the difference between the Christian writings and the Islamic writings....

A Call for Action

Here are a few suggestions:

If there should be a clash in the 21st century, it should not be between Islam and the West, but between theism and materialism.

Muslim Students: Go and learn about Intelligent Design. Learn why Darwinism is wrong. Then raise this issue in your classrooms. Question your biology teachers and your textbooks. Form Muslim Student Associations and get in touch with the Intelligent Design groups in your area. Organize lectures by ID scientists and write under the title “The Fall of Darwinism, The Greatest Myth Ever.”

Muslim Families: If you have children in schools, pay attention to their biology classes. Are they being indoctrinated by the myths of Darwinism? If so, appeal to your school board and question this theory by appealing to the work of the ID scientists. Get help from Christian families who support the Intelligent Design cause in your school board.

Muslim Intellectuals: Write and speak about this in your newspapers, magazines, Web sites, lectures, speeches, khutbahs (sermons), and the like. We cannot raise a Muslim generation by merely speaking about the Islamic victories in the past; we have to do something for today. And don’t think that Darwinism is compatible with Islam by referring to some vague theories of limited evolution developed by some medieval Muslims. The real issue at stake here is not whether some organisms have a common ancestor or not. The real issue is whether life is created by God or evolved by itself. We cannot be neutral on this. We have to defend faith against unbelief. This is our raison d’être, the reason why we exist.

If Muslims get involved in this debate, they will help both themselves and Western society. They will also see their common values with Christians more clearly. This alliance will help counter the doomsday calls for a “clash of civilizations.” In fact, if there should be a clash in the 21st century, it should not be between Islam and the West, but between theism and materialism. And since the battlefields in this clash are labs, lecture halls, and Web sites, it will be a much safer place for controversy.