Zimmer's Evolution Article: Science Writing vs. Editorial Bias
This paper critically analyzes Carl Zimmer's National Geographic feature article "A Fin is a Limb is a Wing," which explores how complex biological structures evolved step by step from simpler origins. The review evaluates Zimmer's effectiveness as a science writer, distinguishing between feature journalism and editorial opinion. While praising the article's depth, clarity, and accessible presentation of complex biology, the paper argues that several paragraphs targeting Intelligent Design and Creationism undermine the article's journalistic credibility. The paper suggests that separating the science content from the evolution-versus-creationism debate would have produced a stronger, more credible piece, and draws on Michael Shermer's Why Darwin Matters to support the view that science and religion need not be in conflict.
- Introduction: Evolution, Creationism, and the Zimmer–Luskin Exchange: Context for Zimmer's article and Luskin's rebuttal
- Types of Journalism and the Feature Article Standard: Defining feature articles versus editorials
- How Editorial Opinion Undermines Zimmer's Piece: Anti-creationism paragraphs weaken journalistic credibility
- The Article's Genuine Strengths: Zimmer praised for clarity and scientific depth
- A Better Structure: Separating Science from Controversy: Proposed two-article format for stronger journalism
- Conclusion: Science and Religion Need Not Conflict: Shermer argues science and religion can coexist
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What makes this paper effective
- The paper applies a clear journalistic framework — distinguishing news items, feature articles, and editorials — to evaluate Zimmer's writing, giving the critique a principled, non-partisan foundation.
- The analysis is balanced: it genuinely praises Zimmer's science communication skills and accessibility while pinpointing specific structural weaknesses, avoiding a one-sided takedown.
- The closing reference to Michael Shermer's Why Darwin Matters adds intellectual authority and redirects the argument toward a constructive resolution rather than simply criticizing Zimmer.
Key academic technique demonstrated
The paper demonstrates textual analysis applied to journalism criticism. The writer identifies specific paragraphs in Zimmer's article, explains what journalistic function they do or do not serve, and proposes a concrete editorial remedy (a sidebar). This move — diagnose, explain, prescribe — is a hallmark of effective applied criticism.
Structure breakdown
The paper opens by contextualizing the evolution-versus-creationism debate and the Zimmer–Luskin exchange, then defines feature journalism to establish an evaluative standard. It applies that standard to expose the editorial intrusion in Zimmer's article, pivots to acknowledge what Zimmer does well, proposes a structural alternative (two separate articles), and closes with a broader point about science and religion from Shermer. The argument flows logically from context → standard → critique → praise → remedy → conclusion.
Introduction: Evolution, Creationism, and the Zimmer–Luskin Exchange
Few intellectual disputes run as hot as the debate over evolution versus creation. One can imagine how Charles Darwin stirred things up when he first developed his theory, considering that the controversy remains so heated today. Recently, Carl Zimmer wrote "A Fin is a Limb is a Wing" for National Geographic, which included an up-to-date look at life's complexity. Biologists are starting to understand how complex structures developed step by step from the simplest beginnings — that is, how a gene for a limb in a bat's mole-like predecessor turned a hand into a wing and finally launched a mammal into the air.
Zimmer's article had barely reached readers when Casey Luskin, a supporter of Intelligent Design, published his rebuttal. Intelligent Design holds that nature is too creative and intricate to be a purely natural occurrence, and that it must have been shaped by a more intelligent being. It is no wonder that Luskin responded so quickly.
Types of Journalism and the Feature Article Standard
There are several types of articles written for magazines and newspapers — the news item, the feature article, and the editorial, to name the major ones. The best journalism is when one form does not bleed into another. News mixed with innuendo cannot be seen as credible, for who knows what is actually factual and what is assumption?
A feature story, by contrast, is a detailed presentation of facts offered in an engaging form for the purpose of entertaining or informing the average reader. Rather than expressing the writer's own opinion, it weaves together the comments of those who are interviewed. It aims to supplement the bare facts of a news report by providing more detailed information about the persons, places, and circumstances involved. Once the author's own opinion is expressed, the piece begins to become an editorial or personal essay. Obviously, readers can often detect the bias of a publication — and its writers — by noting who is interviewed and what those individuals say. However, it is the interviewees' comments, not the writer's, that are meant to drive a feature article.
How Editorial Opinion Undermines Zimmer's Piece
Most of Zimmer's article is a thorough, well-researched, and well-written piece aimed at National Geographic readers — individuals who are interested in science and the environment but do not want a heavily academic piece dense with jargon and scientific formulas. The question, then, is why Zimmer chose to open his article with a jab at Creationists. The piece could clearly have stood as a well-rounded feature without waving a red flag in front of the bull.
It is not that Zimmer actually writes something like, "These inane Creationists — what are they thinking?" Rather, he starts the article with the evolution-versus-creationism debate and then spends the next twenty-four pages demonstrating all the reasons that evolution is a working process. Analyzing the article's structure, the introductory two paragraphs aptly establish the interest and purpose of the piece: readers understand immediately that they will be learning how scientists are discovering more about the complexity of animals. These two paragraphs then lead into three pointed paragraphs against Creationism before the article returns to its central theme.
Near the end of the piece, Zimmer states: "Doubters of evolution are fond of pointing out that the flagellum, as this tail is called, needs every one of its parts to function. They argue that it could not have evolved bit by bit; it must have been created in its present form." The factual narrative then continues until the conclusion, which offers a few final echoes of the controversy.
Everyone knows which side of the evolution-versus-creationism debate Zimmer occupies. So it is no surprise that he would view the latest scientific findings on complexity as supporting evolution rather than Intelligent Design. Even a strictly scientific article by Zimmer on the newest thinking regarding complex design would naturally be read as support for his beliefs. Why, then, the added zing against Intelligent Design? Was it because the ongoing dispute between scientists and Creationists had troubled Zimmer enough that he felt compelled to include those comments? Or did a National Geographic editor read the draft and decide to make the article more provocative by setting the Intelligent Design community against the scientists?
No one will ever know for certain which of these scenarios — or some other — reflects the truth. However, it does seem telling that the three paragraphs noted above, immediately following the introduction, can be removed without any disruption to the article's flow. The first two-paragraph introduction moves very smoothly into "Some have emerged…" Nothing is lost by removing those middle three paragraphs except a measure of heat.
How much more credible the article becomes without those added paragraphs. The piece is then no longer about who is right or wrong, but rather about how much is being learned through the study of these complex marvels. The story is not whether one animal evolved into another, or whether God or some other intelligent being created these creatures. The story is instead about how marvelous and wonderful such creatures are. Who would think that a fly larva could be so complex? Or that a wormlike body could carry such an intricate gene structure? Consider the complexity of a single feather — however it was evolved or created, it is something to behold.
Conclusion: Science and Religion Need Not Conflict
In his book Why Darwin Matters, Michael Shermer — founding editor of The Skeptic and a columnist for Scientific American — argues why religion and science need not be in conflict. Science and religion operate in two different realms, he stresses: the natural and the supernatural, respectively. He cites Pope John Paul II in support of their possible coexistence. As Shermer's argument suggests, the relationship between science and religion is far more nuanced than a simple opposition. Zimmer and other scientists do not need to discount their opponents in order to demonstrate the fascination of evolutionary science. All the examples found in nature do that all by themselves.
Reference: Zimmer, Carl (2006). "A Fin is a Limb is a Wing." National Geographic Magazine.
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