Intelligent Design, edited by Denise Little (pub. 2009)
(As far as I can tell, all the stories were written specifically for this anthology.)
Amazon; B&N; Goodreads; isfdb; Penguin Random House; StoryGraph

The intersection of science and religion is something that people have been questioning and philosophizing about for centuries (or longer), but I guess the term "intelligent design" has been around since 1989. The term refers to a concept that is rather complicated, and I'm pretty sure there is disagreement even among its proponents as to what exactly it means. I haven't really studied the concept, so I can only explain it in a very simplistic way: There are, of course, many people who believe firmly in science, and believe that what humanity has learned from science disproves the possibility of the existence of God. Contrariwise, there are many people who believe so firmly in God that they summarily reject any science that would seem to disprove His existence. Then there are people stuck in the middle, people who believe firmly in both God and science, and are pretty much incapable of disavowing either one. So, naturally, they had to come up with a way to blend those seemingly incompatible beliefs into a new belief that wouldn't necessitate choosing one over the other. That's basically what "intelligent design" is. It's a concept that is rejected by many scientific-minded people for being just another name for creationism, and by many religious people for not taking Scripture literally. But... the people in the middle have to believe something. (Personally, I believe more in science, but I don't disbelieve in God, necessarily. So I like the idea of something in between the two, although I wouldn't necessarily call myself a believer in "intelligent design." Especially since, as I said, I haven't studied it.)

But that's not really what this book is about, anyway. It's actually an anthology of eleven short stories (most of them more comedic than philosophic) by different authors, which I don't think are about "intelligent design" specifically, but each story explores both science and religion, in some way. (Well, most of them explore both; possibly all of them do, though some stories you might have stretch your definition of either "religion" or "science.") So I guess the book's title, even if it's mainly a way of cashing in on a trendy buzzword, isn't entirely inappropriate. And... I dunno. I liked all the stories, some more than others, but I was a bit disappointed that they were at best tangentially related to the concept of intelligent design. Anyway, I'll tell you a bit about each story's plot, hopefully without any major spoilers....

The Year of the Rat, by Kristine Kathryn Rusch

The story is told from the perspective of a woman who is a professor of philosophy, with a specialty in ethics. (I don't think she was ever named.) She's the oldest of five children; their mother was very religious, and their father was a mathematician. So the kids ended up being a bit of both, though some go more in one direction or the other, with the narrator pretty much in the middle. She gives lectures at conferences, and there's one guy who is a sort of heckler. At one conference, he asks the narrator... something about rats being so perfectly designed for scientific research, that they must have been created as such by God. She later tells some of her siblings about this question, then thinks nothing more of it. But a year later, it turns out that her brother Luke is in trouble, because he'd apparently proven the heckler was right, and his employers fired him because of it. So he's having a bit of a break-down. And... I don't know what else to say. We, the readers, never get to know anything about Luke's research, or what will come of it. Will his findings be published? Will they change the world? What will become of Luke? I have no idea. Anyway, the story was okay... as far as reading goes, for its own sake. I mean, it was... not unpleasant to read, while I was reading it. But I was left feeling like the story had no point, no resolution, and ultimately I just feel sort of neutral about it. I didn't gain anything by reading it, but I don't feel my time was wasted, or anything. *shrug*

God, No Matter How You Spell It, by Brendan DuBois

The story alternates between two different scenes. In one, a man named Tasker, who works for DARPA, visits an agricultural research station in Maine. His assignment is to shut the place down and relocate the staff to new jobs at the CDC. There's a major epidemic called the Hanoi flu, which hasn't yet reached America, but it has a 95% mortality rate, and it's been causing a panic around the world. So the government wants every scientist it has to stop whatever else they're doing, and try to find a cure. However, Tasker meets a scientist named Dr. Monroe, who shows him what they've been working on, in secret, at the facility. He hopes to convince Tasker not to shut them down. Meanwhile, there are also scenes of someone named Tucker traveling with his wife, Gwen, and their son, Ronnie, to visit a cathedral. When they get there, the place is packed, because in troubled times like these, people rely on their faith in a higher power. Gwen believes in God, and Tucker... well, he's more skeptical. But they both respect each other's beliefs. Anyway... I don't want to spoil the nature of Monroe's project, nor how it finally ties to what's going on with Tucker's family. But I definitely thought there were some enjoyable twists. I think I preferred the writing in Rusch's story, but I found DuBois's story more entertaining (and I thought it had a better ending.)

Int Des 101, by Jean Rabe

This story actually is about intelligent design. Sort of. There's this college student named Vivian who signed up for a course she thought was about interior design, but turned out to be about intelligent design. At first, she only stays in the class because she's attracted to the teacher's assistant, Baruti (who does pretty much all the teaching of the class). But before long, she becomes intrigued by the subject, and decides to incorporate it into her career plans: "intelligent interior design." The story is fairly short, and a pleasant enough read, even if it doesn't do much beyond throw around a few references to books or ideas related to intelligent design theory. The one thing that really makes the story memorable is... well, actually, I don't want to spoil it. It's not much of a twist, IMO, and it is revealed fairly early in the story. Let's just say the world in which the story is set is exactly like the world as we know it, except for one minor detail. It's a detail which, in a longer, more serious work, might be more interesting and thought-provoking than I find it to be in this story. Here it just comes off like a cutesy gimmick, instead of really representing the whole sort of ironic perspective flip that seems to be intended. (And the story would be no different, to my way of thinking, if the gimmick didn't exist.) Although I also wouldn't say the author is really trying to make any big points regarding intelligent design. She's just telling a goofy little love story. Sort of. (And there's nothing wrong with that.)

Made Manifest, by Jody Lynn Nye

In this story, the internet is ready to collapse, unless a new way of transmitting data can be found. By coincidence, a man had taken a trip to Brazil and when he returned home, he gave some crystals he'd bought there as a gift to his girlfriend, who worked at a computer chip manufacturing company called Aptel. She then discovered that the crystals were exactly what the company needed. So they sent someone to Brazil to try to buy more, but the vendor disappeared. The story focuses on two engineers named Will and Don, whom Aptel sends to Brazil to try to discover the source of the crystals. They have local guides named Paulo and Rodriguo. Will believes the fact that the crystals were discovered right when humanity needed them is part of God's plan, whereas Don believes it's just a coincidence, albeit one he can't explain. And... I don't want to reveal any more about the story. But I liked it well enough, and I thought it had a decent ending (with speculation as to why God's plan might have called for the crystals to be found at this time, though nothing conclusive).

The Signature of God, by Michael Hiebert

A nanotech engineer named Maya Rose oversees one of the teams in the company she works for, which is currently developing nanobeetles as weapons for the Department of Defense. Meanwhile, her father is in the hospital, near death. Her project at work keeps her very busy, so she doesn't get to spend as much time with her father as she'd like. Anyway... an entomologist named Dorian Moore had introduced Maya to bombardier beetles, as a good design to follow in creating the nanobeetles. And he was of the opinion that they are one of nature's many "signatures of God," things that are so perfectly designed that they could not have evolved by chance. I'm not sure what else to say. The story is kind of tragic and bleak, and I was left wondering about what reasons God could have for designing something that would inspire humans to imitate it for the purposes of war. It seems... rather pessimistic. Still, not a bad story.

Created He Them, by Sarah A. Hoyt

Cities and all the people in them have begun disappearing, so people in the remaining cities have begun evacuating. The story focuses on a mother and father and their two daughters, 5-year-old Rosalyn and 12-year-old Caroline. The girls insist on taking their cat and her six kittens with them. During the car ride, the family talk about what's going on, and Rosalyn has a theory that I don't want to spoil. But I will say this is probably my favorite of the stories I've read so far in this book, mainly because I liked her idea.

The Final Report on the Eden Project, by Bill McCay

A guy named Ben Radmore has spent the past few years living among a native tribe in the Amazon rain forest, searching for anything that might be useful to the outside world. He kind of hopes not to find anything, because he doesn't want the native people to be displaced or their way of life changed. But that doesn't mean he doesn't do the job to the best of his ability. For most of his time there, he finds absolutely nothing. However, there are eventually stories of some mysterious new tribe rescuing people who were lost or injured, though no one's sure what they look like (possibly they're translucent). After Ben sends this report back to UNAID (The United Nations Administration for International Development), the organization sends three delegates to meet the locals, led by a shaman called Monkey's Uncle, who has become a friend of Ben's. The thing that confuses me is that it doesn't seem like their interests in the land have anything to do with the mysterious tribe of which Ben and the locals have heard stories, so I'm not sure how the stories managed to trigger the visit of the delegates. (I feel like that would have happened, in any event.) Mainly, they want to use the land for farming. Anyway... Monkey's Uncle manages to offend the delegates, which he does intentionally, for a reason that, at first, doesn't seem to make much sense, because it doesn't really change anything. However, the truth is ultimately revealed (to the reader, not to Ben or any other characters). It's reasonably interesting, and sheds a whole new light on not just the entire story, but pretty much all of human history, I guess. I don't want to spoil that revelation, which is amusing, in a sort of alarming way. But it's a decent story, anyway.

The Vaunting, by Janny Wurts

A guitarist named Jordy O'Jaimison quits his band over a disagreement. He wants to only do new material they create themselves, but the others are more practical, wanting to do reliable covers until they're successful enough to do their own stuff. Anyway, Jordy is making his way angrily home through a rainstorm, when suddenly he finds himself in an alternate, magical world. A gnome chooses Jordy as his champion in a contest called a "vaunting." Other magical creatures have their own human champions, as well. Basically, the contest involves reinventing different animals. Jordy wasn't too keen on taking part in this, partly because he had no idea how it actually worked. In fact, I don't think any of the champions had a clear idea of how their choices would actually manifest. But anyway... the whole thing has the feel of standard creation myths, but with a bit of a twist. I don't really think it made much sense, for a number of reasons, but I suppose I won't go into all that. Still, I guess it was a reasonably entertaining story.

Luck Be a Lady, by Dean Wesley Smith

Now this, I think, is my favorite story in the book, so far. There's a "superhero" called Poker Boy, who works for Stan, the God of Poker. Stan himself reports to Burt, the God of Casino Operations, who is second in command to Laverne (aka Lady Luck), who is in charge of all the Gods of Gambling. In fact, she is one of the most powerful gods in the world. Anyway, Stan calls Poker Boy and his sidekick/girlfriend, Front Desk Girl (aka Patty Ledgerwood), in on a mission. Lady Luck has disappeared, which could prove disastrous to the world, in which everything will presumably now be governed purely by statistical probabilities (and it could be even worse than that). Poker Boy and Front Desk Girl contact the third member of their team, the Screamer (no relation to Munch's The Scream, as far as I know). Their investigation leads them to a a mathematical superhero called the Bookkeeper. I don't want to reveal any more specific details, but Poker Boy and the others do eventually find Lady Luck and save the world. Anyway, I've always enjoyed stories of this type, with a satirical, tongue-in-cheek sort of take on mythology (or on the fantasy genre in general). And this one did the concept pretty well.

Guilt by Association, by Peter Orullian

There's a Scottish scientist named Edmond (at least the first several occurrences of his name in the story are spelled that way; thereafter, it's mostly spelled Edmund). He's spent like the last six years occasionally engaging in confessional conversations with a friend of his, a pastor named Michael. At the start of the story, he believes he's finally proven that either God is dead, or He never existed at all. The reason is that he doesn't feel any guilt for a particular wrongdoing. He believes, I guess, that guilt is an evolutionary trait that has run its course, and is no longer needed. After their conversation, Michael goes to Rome, to talk with another friend of his, a former Archbishop. And later, he returns to Scotland and has another conversation with Edmund. I don't want to give away how it ends, but I did feel like it came closer than any previous stories in the anthology to truly dealing with the concept of intelligent design. (But even that's really just because there's some debate about creation vs. evolution, which still isn't quite what intelligent design is.) And it wasn't a bad story, but I couldn't help feeling that the entire premise was flawed. When Edmund first explained his theory, I was a bit interested in where the story might go, because it reminded me of the fact that... some religious people seem to believe there can't be any real morality without God, an idea I've always completely rejected. But I thought it might be fun if it turned out (at least within the context of this story) that I was wrong, and if God really did die, humanity would lose all guilt and morality. Maybe even atheists only possess such traits because God wills it, whether they believe in Him or not. Anyway... that's how I wanted the story to go, but it went in a different direction, so I was a bit disappointed. I was also disappointed that none of the characters mentioned another thought I had, which was that perhaps Edmund was simply a sociopath. (In the end, I don't think he was, for a reason I won't spoil. Still... for awhile, it did seem to me like a distinct possibility, and a far more rational explanation for his apparent lack of guilt than his own explanation was.) And... I guess that's all I want to say.

Project: Creation, by Laura Resnick

So, we've come to the final story in the anthology. And probably it is the closest one to actually dealing with the idea of intelligent design, though it's a purely comical take on Creation. (It kind of reminds me of things I've written in the past. And after reading it, I checked to see if any such story was on my website. I found one called Origins, which I have no idea when I wrote it, but it was surely quite a few years ago. Apparently it was something I did for a school assignment, but I have no idea whether it would have been grade school, high school, or even college. I really hope it wasn't college, because... while I like some of the ideas in it, some of the actual writing is kind of cringe-worthy. Anyway, I've done other things with a similar theme, but I'm not sure if any copies of them still exist.) I should say, probably lots of writers have done stories like this one; it reminds me a bit of things by Mark Twain, and Parke Godwin, and... I can't think who all.

But I should stop comparing the story to things I or anyone else has written, and just say a bit about Resnick's story. Um... it is set In the Beginning, and is told from the perspective of someone called Schmidt. He was created by Professor Yahweh, to help implement the professor's plans for Creation. Yahweh had apparently created lots of beings to help with this, who were split up into different teams to work on different stages of the project. Schmidt was assigned to a team led by Lucifer, who ends up having frequent disagreements with the Professor, which Schmidt does his best to mediate. Anyway, I found it entertaining, and a pretty good fit for the ostensible theme of the anthology. Not quite my favorite, but I'd put it near the top of the list. And... I don't know what else to tell you.