An Evolving Career for a Darwin Devotee

Sophomores, pay attention: Philip Kitcher is the current chair of Contemporary Civilization, as well as the John Dewey Professor of Philosophy here at Columbia. And today, on international Darwin Day, Professor Kitcher will discuss his latest book, Living With Darwin: Evolution, Design, and the Future of Faith.

Darwin was released this past January. "This book deals with two big issues," Kitcher said. "The first is that it's concerned with the credentials of Darwin's theory. The second is to explore the possibly disturbing implications of Darwinism."

Kitcher has been fascinated with and written a number of books on the conflicts over Darwinism for almost thirty years. "It was 1979 and my eldest son was just born, so my wife and I were both very tired all the time. One night I was up late and flipping through the TV guide, and of all things I saw an ad for a book by one of these right-wing religious types, so I sent away for it," Kitcher said. "And I was surprised to find some of these arguments [for creationism] sounded quite plausible and challenging."

In 1982, Kitcher wrote his first book on the subject, Abusing Science-the Case Against Creationism. "Most people believe there's no real problem with Darwinism," Kitcher said. "In fact, I used to believe that too. So I wrote this book at a time when there was a lot of noise about the debate on Darwinism and Creationism. ... I gave a lot of public lectures, participated in debates, and then it all died down. That was, until the rise of intelligent design in the mid-'90s."

One of the issues Kitcher's new book deals with is how intelligent design is a dead science, and so "it's not a rival to Darwinism at all."

"But there is something disturbing about Darwinism to religious beliefs, and I think we fail to understand the magnitude of the losses people would experience if religions were removed," Kitcher said. "And this is symptomatic of a much deeper problem."

The self-professed "dotty and eccentric" professor didn't always used to be such a philosophy fanatic. "I grew up in England," Kitcher said, "where we were required to specialize by the age of 15." Kitcher went to Christ College of Cambridge University where he initially concentrated in mathematics. "I think it's important for undergraduates to read this because they'll understand the enormous changes one can go through. I switched in college from mathematics to history and philosophy of science," Kitcher said.

Kitcher came to the United States in 1969 and has lived here ever since. Before coming to Columbia in the late '90s, Kitcher taught at Vassar College, the University of Vermont, the University of Michigan, the University of Minnesota, and University of California, San Diego.

This semester will be Kitcher's final one as the head of CC. "My wife and I are going to Germany next year," he said. He's coming back the following year, but not to teach CC. "I may teach Literature Humanities," Kitcher said, "or I may even teach Professor [Michael] Seidel's course on Joyce, and I would enjoy that very much."

Kitcher is a veritable renaissance man. While maintaining his earlier enthusiasm for mathematics, physics, and chemistry, he's been picking up more passions since coming to the United States. "I'm interested in a lot of things- that's the problem," Kitcher said.

"When I was at the University of Vermont, I was teaching a class and the students, who were mostly pre-medical students, were complaining about how all of my examples were from physics and chemistry. So I started reading up on biology and I got hooked," Kitcher said.

Additionally, Kitcher has co-authored a book on Richard Wagner, the opera composer, and has a book on the way about James Joyce titled Joyce's Kaleidoscope: An Invitation to Finnegans Wake.

And what does this modern Renaissance man plan to do in Germany? "We're really looking forward to avant-garde German theatre."