While certain churches believe evolution is compatible with Christianity, they nonetheless believe that evolutionary changes occured through the will of God. This idea, that evolution is ultimately directed by a higher power, not just some meaningless progression of chemical states, is supressed in academic discourse.
...but what you cite
isn't Intelligent Design. Intelligent Design isn't "evolution guided," where some nonspecific, metaphysical entity might have guided the progression of evolution. Even if this were the case, discussion of this "possibility" in academic discourse would essentially be a fruitless exercise in warring idealisms, as the actual scientific process wouldn't change.
No, Intelligent Design is distinctly different. ID says that certain aspects of life as we see it
cannot have come about from natural processes. Again:
cannot. It then proceeds to interject itself into the many, many gaps still extant in biological understanding, seizing upon ephemera and declaring "Aha! This is irreducibly complex! You cannot find a natural explanation for this!" Attempts to find an explanation--a manifestation of scientific curiosity, a continuation of the investigatory process of science--are, according to intelligent design, absolutely fruitless, and you shouldn't even bother, because the intelligent agent designed the bacterial flagellum and you're never going to find a solution. Stop looking. And if you
do find a solution...well, onto the next gap.
ID isn't the detached, "purposeful-evolution" entity that you describe. Few scientists and academics would have any real problem with your version, I'd think, because it has absolutely no actually effect on the progress of science (perhaps outside of instilling in it a distinctly anthro-perfective focus). ID is
different.
