Intelligent Design
Intelligent design (or ID as it is commonly abbreviated) is a belief that certain aspects of the universe and nature are so complex that they are best explained as being designed by an intelligent designer. Its proponents make the claim that their ideas are scientific and not religious. They are essentially saying, “Our evidence shows us things were designed, but naming a creator isn’t the role of science, so we have no idea who did it.” In doing this, ID rejects the idea that it is re-branded creationism. ID supporters also claim that their ideas fall squarely under the definition of science and should be taught as such.
Many Christians seem to have made ID their final last stand. It seems to me as if they’ve stacked their faith on the hope that intelligent design, being an alternative to evolutionary theory, can save their faith and restore God as the creator of the universe. In their view, science needs to prove the existence of God. (Quick clarification: ID only claims proof of a designer; Christians can then comfortably name that designer as God).
However, intelligent design is a hopeless mess. It’s really bad science. Actually, it’s not science at all. It’s even worse theology. It’s also in the news a lot lately, as our culture has hit new levels of animosity with intelligent design supporters trying to force its teaching in high school science classes around the country. I want to have a post where I talk about intelligent design, as calmly as I can, so that when it comes up in the future, people will understand my opposition to it.
This post will also explore the clash of two worldviews between many Christians and scientists and why there has become such a wedge driven between the two in our culture. Having written on evolutionary theory in my recent lengthy post, I will compare the claims of ID to see if it offers any better explanations of the world around us. Finally, this comparison will really illuminate why I believe some of the ground rules of science (namely seeking natural, falsifiable explanations) are so useful.
Intelligent design is not falsifiable. Intelligent design is not science.
Here’s one overwhelming reason that ID is wretched science. It is not falsifiable. (See my recent post on science for a discussion of falsifiability.) How can you devise a test that would falsify the existence of a designer? This is actually why science does not present a threat to religion (in my view) because science can never claim that a designer does not exist. Science simply has no way of evaluating that statement. Science can also never claim that a designer exists. The statement — by definition — is not scientific.
Here are some other claims that could be just as true as intelligent design. They cannot be proved or disproved scientifically.
- Multiple designers created the world. Every organism was created by different designers. (Or why not a team of designers?) Perhaps these designers even had competitions with each other to design the biggest, smallest, fastest, slowest, most colorful, etc, etc organisms. To give credit, this idea of multiple designers comes from this post at Panda’s Thumb (a blog that discusses evolution, the science behind it, and ill-founded “theories” like intelligent design).
- The universe is 6,000 years old, but was created to look much older. All fossils were actually placed in the ground by a designer. Light coming from distant stars was placed right at the edge of the earth, so that it arrives 6,000 years later, even though our understanding leads us to believe it’s billions of years old.
- The universe is 5 minutes old. When it began, I was here at my computer, typing a message about intelligent design. I’ve never met my parents. My wife sitting next to me, studying for a final exam, has never even attended the class. Our memories, like the fossils in the example above, were given to us by a designer. Everything, everyone, and everywhere that I think defines who I am is simply an implanted memory.
- My favorite — The universe has been created by a flying spaghetti monster, through the use of his noodly appendage. (Plea to the reader — That link is a wonderful satire of the philosophy behind intelligent design. Friends and family I’ve shared it with have gotten a good laugh. It’s much funnier than my post, so take the time to read it.)
Every single one of the ideas presented above is just as scientifically valid as intelligent design. Due to the nature of science, they simply cannot be proved or disproved. In other words, they’re not falsifiable and thus not scientific.
Others have pointed this out better than I
Don’t simply take my word for it though. The criticism of ID comes from all over the spectrum. Many conservative Christians will dismiss criticism of ID as only coming from liberal circles. Far from it though, conservatives too have been highly critical of intelligent design. Two of the best articles I’ve seen from conservative commentators are Charles Krauthammer’s in the Washington Post and John Derbyshire’s in the National Review. Since I know these articles will soon disappear off the net, I’ll quote a few excerpts.
Derbyshire is extremely critical of President Bush’s ill-formed opinion that “Both sides [evolution and intelligent design] ought to be properly taught so people can understand what the debate is all about.” (This said to a reporter on August 2, 2005).
This is Bush at his muddle-headed worst, conferring all the authority of the presidency on the teaching of pseudoscience in science classes. Why stop with Intelligent Design … Why not teach the little ones astrology? Lysenkoism? Orgonomy? Dianetics? Reflexology? Dowsing and radiesthesia? Forteanism? Velikovskianism? Lawsonomy? Secrets of the Great Pyramid? ESP and psychokinesis? Atlantis and Lemuria? The hollow-earth theory? Does the president have any idea, does he have any idea, how many varieties of pseudoscientific flapdoodle there are in the world? If you are going to teach one, why not teach the rest? Shouldn’t all sides be “properly taught”? To give our kids, you know, a rounded picture? Has the president scrutinized Velikovsky’s theories? Can he refute them? Can you? (emphasis in original)
Derbyshire points out that at one time, these theories had just as many supporters as ID. He goes on to explore just what some of those alternative theories state and arrives at this conclusion.
What, then, should we teach our kids in high-school science classes? The answer seems to me very obvious. We should teach them consensus science, and we should teach it conservatively. Consensus science is the science that most scientists believe ought to be taught. “Conservatively” means eschewing theories that are speculative, unproven, require higher math, or even just are new, in favor of what is well settled in the consensus. It means teaching science unskeptically, as settled fact. (emphasis in original)
Krauthammer too is well informed about what makes for good science and what doesn’t.
Let’s be clear. Intelligent design may be interesting as theology, but as science it is a fraud. It is a self-enclosed, tautological “theory” whose only holding is that when there are gaps in some area of scientific knowledge — in this case, evolution — they are to be filled by God. It is a “theory” that admits that evolution and natural selection explain such things as the development of drug resistance in bacteria and other such evolutionary changes within species but also says that every once in a while God steps into this world of constant and accumulating change and says, “I think I’ll make me a lemur today.” A “theory” that violates the most basic requirement of anything pretending to be science — that it be empirically disprovable. How does one empirically disprove the proposition that God was behind the lemur, or evolution — or behind the motion of the tides or the “strong force” that holds the atom together?
Some of intelligent design’s claims are falsifiable however, and they have been falsified.
Don’t let this confuse you. The idea that a designer was involved in the fruition of the natural world is not a falsifiable idea. The statement that some biological systems are so complex that they could not have evolved because any modification to the system breaks the entire thing is a falsifiable claim.
Enter Michael Behe. Behe is one of the champions of intelligent design. He holds a PhD in biochemistry, teaches at Lehigh University (his biology department colleagues have this interesting response), and has written a book called Darwin’s Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution. In it, he champions a very famous, oft-spoken argument from the ID folks. He gives the example of a bacteria’s flagellum and claims that it could not have evolved because if you change any part of the molecular makeup of the flagellum, the whole thing breaks. Thus if something doesn’t work until all of its pieces are in place, surely natural selection couldn’t produce the structure and we must be looking at evidence of design. ID has given this term a name. They refer to it as irreducible complexity. For a Christian wanting to discredit evolution, it’s a compelling argument. The only problem with this argument is that it’s simply not true.
Ken Miller, a biochemist at Brown University who also happens to be a devout and practicing Christian, has provided particularly lucid examples of how the bacteria’s flagellum is not irreducibly complex. His discussion, which you can find here, is long on biology, though written for a layperson. I’ll quickly summarize his point though.
Some bacteria that make us sick use a system that secretes proteins into our cell membranes. One such type of system is called a type III secretory system (TTSS). This system is found in bacteria lacking flagella. It turns out however that the entire TTSS proteins are part of the makeup of the flagellum. Here’s why it matters. The idea of irreducible complexity put forth by ID says that a structure (in this case the flagellum) cannot work until all of the pieces are in place and that the parts (or subsets) of a structure aren’t functional by themselves. Clearly this is not the case with the bacterial flagellum and ID’s argument of irreducible complexity falls flat. (Remember, read Miller’s work for an in-depth explanation. I’ve greatly condensed the discussion here.)
Intelligent design is vacuous
Another problem with ID that I must point out is that it essentially makes no claims, no predictions, no testable hypotheses of any kind. And perhaps this, more than any other reason, is why scientists have completely dismissed it and refused to even recognize it as science. Essentially, ID simply complains (and quite loudly at times) that evolution can’t explain this or evolution can’t explain that. However, beyond the argument that things were designed, ID offers absolutely nothing to explain the data in evolution’s place. In this way, ID is a negative theory. (And I don’t mean negative as an attitude, I mean negative in terms of what it offers.)
Consider the following. The intelligent design movement has not published a single paper — not one — in established scientific journals. For example, Behe, in sworn testimony in 2005, was asked this question.
There are no peer reviewed articles by anyone advocating for intelligent design supported by pertinent experiments or calculations which provide detailed rigorous accounts of how intelligent design of any biological system occurred, is that correct?
Behe’s answer:
That is correct, yes.
Despite this, the Discovery Institute (which is the institute supporting ID) claims that articles in favor of ID have been published in peer reviewed journals. Scientists completely reject this claim however, and point out that these “journals” have essentially been created, are reviewed, and are published in only by ID supporters.
I think this speaks volumes. After more than a decade of the “theory” of intelligent design, not a single paper has been presented worthy of publication in any scientific journal. Were the theory as worthy as its proponents say, we should clearly expect to see its ideas and predictions, being championed by its supporters in the major scientific journals of our time.
Why intelligent design is bad theology
I’m sorry. I’m slightly ranting, aren’t I? It’s easy to get frustrated any time you have to deal with ID. I’ve pointed out its scientific failings. Perhaps more important are its theological failings, since I (and many other Christians) view ID as essentially theological in nature (something that its supporters will argue bitterly about, I know).
ID is the worst type of Christian theology for dealing with science. It is a God-of-the-Gaps argument. It claims that design happens in places where science either lacks knowledge, or has relatively poor knowledge, on how something works. It is essentially inviting a scientist who does not believe in God to explain how something works and thus discredit God, a game they are all too happy to play.
Take the argument of irreducible complexity in a bacterial flagellum for example. The moment science explains how something works, it essentially weakens the case for believing in God. God-of-the-Gaps arguments effectively turn God into the slave of science. The more we know about the laws of nature, the less God is needed. Until finally, He’s really not needed at all.
One of the things that bugs me to no end about ID is that by claiming this nebulous designer, they’re not even proclaiming that God is the creator. From the horse’s mouth itself, William Dembski (who along with Behe is ID’s top proponent) states in a recent post on his blog:
God’s skill-set includes not just ordering matter to display certain patterns but also creating matter in the first place. God, as understood by the world’s great monotheistic faiths, is an infinite personal transcendent creator. The designer responsible for biological complexity, by contrast, need only be a being capable of arranging finite material objects to display certain patterns. Accordingly, this designer need not even be infinite. Likewise, that designer need not be personal or transcendent.
Oh, and this is supposed to free me from the chains of science and enlighten my understanding of God? Putting aside the very scientific claim that God created a designer, who then created biological complexity, and then perhaps passed away, I’m left with the overwhelming theological question: Is this consistent with a biblical message? No. The very fact that I do believe in an intelligent designer — the God of the bible — is one of the very reasons I completely reject the ideology of intelligent design! In affect the message for people who would grow up under the ideas of intelligent design would be, “Parts of us were designed by something. Not really sure what.”
Another intrinsic problem with intelligent design and other types of creationist theories that fly in the face of reason is that they offer a false dichotomy. The message is simple. Do you believe in intelligent design (and thus God) or do you believe in evolution (and thus reject anything that would lie outside the realm of science)? This is offered as an either or choice. If anything, this is about power — worldly power. Christian leaders that perpetuate this dichotomy are trying to influence people into thinking, “I believe in God, so of course I reject evolution!”
Even the wording of the very question is flawed. Do you believe in evolution? Scientists don’t believe in evolution. I certainly don’t. Nor do we worship Darwin. We find that evolution is an incredibly helpful theory as we try to understand the natural world around us. Scientists at their best seek theories that are useful. Evolution is an extremely useful theory.
The whole conflict is nonsense. As a Christian, a healthy response is to revel — literally to find inexplicable joy — in experiencing God’s creation around me. By recognizing the universe and all that is in it to be a result of God’s providence (thoroughly unscientific, I know!), I am free to view the world around me through the lens of a scientist, humbly learning how the world works, even if limited by our own human perspective. In this way however science shapes my understanding does not threaten, cheapen, or weaken my faith in and worship of God.
Why do biologists hate Christians?
Having examined evolution and now intelligent design, I think it’s time to answer this question. Many Christians feel that biologists hate them. I would guess that biologists more than physicists or chemists, are likely to have a poor view of Christianity and religion in general. I think what you’re really seeing is that biologists are sick and tired of the whole argument. For non Christian biologists, they are responding to repeated and blatantly ignorant attacks on their research. And their responses can be pretty mean. If for theological reasons Christians attacked the theory of gravity as viciously as they have evolution, the response you’d see from physicists would be just as strong. (Again, just my opinion.) For those of us that are Christian biologists, we have grown deeply frustrated with our brothers and sisters who constantly put us in the unenviable position of trying to live out our faith while enjoying the scientific enterprise. I’m a Christian, and because of that, I will be stereotyped by many in the scientific community who’ve had very negative experiences with Christians. It didn’t have to be this way.
So where does that leave us?
I’ve written four posts that were grueling for me to create. Science, Faith, Evolution, and this post on Intelligent Design. I did this for one reason. These are the things I want to focus on here at Ocellated. I want to revel in the wonder I see in the natural world around me. I also want to live out a life of faith. In particular, I hope that I might bring a small amount of healing to the wedge between science (and scientists) and faith (particularly my tradition of Christianity).
These four posts essentially describe my worldview. I felt it was import to state because without it, it leaves people to interpret my future statements in harsh ways. People of science can write me off as a fundamentalist, blinded by my faith. People of faith can dismiss me as being a God-hating Darwinist who clearly has rejected the true message as they read it. I’m under no illusions. Writing four posts on my worldview won’t keep me from getting personally attacked by both sides anymore than knowing about cancer means I’ll never have to deal with it. But at least I’ll have something to point people to; a starting place as I embark on this journey in life.
I’m a Christian. I want to be a scientist.
Jay, I just have to say that I greatly respect you for these past posts. I only wish every Christian and non-Christian (which I am) were able to understand these subjects as you do. For a long time, I’ve been of the same mind about how evolution and Christianity/creationism don’t even need to be in conflict. There’s no evidence suggesting they can’t coexist. Like you’ve pointed out, people just need to realize the difference between faith and science and what each covers. There’s so much needless hate out there because of it. Anyway, thanks for the posts.
-Nick
Hey Jay,
Quite impressive that you have taken on such a daunting task, especially in the span of 3-4 entries. It has definitely been a trial in patience to be a Christian in a graduate program chock-full of very, for the lack of a better word, “passionate” evolutionary biologists. The very mention of the word “God” unleashes a fury of negative and often close-minded responses. I think what bothers me the most is two things, (a) the majority of Christian non-scientists continue to be ignorant and don’t take matters into their own hands by researching/reading, but rather blindly follow what the media portrays as evolution (i.e., man evolving from ape) and (b)scientists, who are taught from day one to be openminded/nonbiased and to continually rigorously test theories, for some reason get upset/offended when people challenge the theory of evolution. So what some people want to teach another theory…the whole point of getting an education is learning how to think and reason for yourself and not be spoon-fed all of your thoughts. And just because another proposed theory cannot be falsified does not mean it does not have a valuable place in science. The history of the debate alone would be enough for me to want to address it and talk about it in a science classroom. And maybe we need non-scientists to put forth challenging ideas to evolution…I don’t know if you have noticed but it does not go over very well for actual scientists to challenge Darwin, and this is something that I am learning happens even more generally in the scientific world, if you go against the mainstream thought of the moment and challenge existing ideas you tend to lose your funding, you can’t get published in any journals, and all of the sudden everything is political.
Furthermore, I wonder if the reason the debate continues on so strongly and heated is because it is deeper than just the mechanism. At the heart of the debate is more of a case for the existence of God. If earth really all started because of a vacuum that sparked some primordial soup to cause life as we know it, and that goes against the written word of God, then what use is there for the rest of the Bible, especially if the first chapter is apparently wrong? And if the Bible is wrong, than maybe there isn’t a God at all. I think that is really hard when we are taught as Christians to cling to the Word as our daily bread.
Why is it as scientists that we can challenge Darwin and evolution? It really annoys me that you never read in science text books the caveats or things that didn’t go right with some of the key evidence points (like Miller-Urey experiments, the peppered moth case, Darwin’s tree, the fossil record, the cambrian explosion, etc.) we use to support evolution. Even cladistics and phylogenetics makes a lot of assumptions. But we seem to leave it to the ‘crazy creationists’ to point out the shortcomings and then we just claim they have no idea what they are talking about because they don’t do real science. And your whole point about ID never being published in a scientific journal doesn’t carry much weight with me. I finally got my first paper accepted in a journal, but the whole process is a pain in the ass. Your whole publication fate is basically up to 3 anonymous people who review your paper and decide whether or not in their oppinion it warrents publication. I would guess that there have probably been several papers submitted, but that they probably don’t make it past politically minded, often biased reviewers.
For me personally, I don’t think I could do science without faith. How could you stand witness to the incredible detail and perfect structure and function of the tiny insects, how could you stand beside the immense ocean and cathedral forests without attributing it to something more than survival of the fittest? I think evolution is a plausible theory, but I also think it doesn’t hold all of the answers, just as much as the Bible doesn’t hold all of the answers.
Wow, Im gonna dismount the soapbox now
What can I say? I am just a scientist who loves God and the insects. The more and more I learn about the insects the more and more I wonder how.
Kelley, we’ve known each other for a little while now, and I’ve greatly appreciated your views on faith and particularly conservation. I must respectfully disagree with you here though, as much of what you say troubles me.
If you believe this, than anything can be taught as science. Flying Spaghetti Monsterism, the earth is 5 minutes old, anything now passes as science. Notice that I’ve never said all thoughts or beliefs should be falsifiable. (In that case, no one should believe in anything other than science). Rather I strongly believe science should be limited to things falsifiable, as have the overwhelming number of people who practice science.
There’s a good reason for this. It’s because people who are going against evolutionary theory aren’t coming back with anything positive in it’s place. They aren’t proposing any alternative theories. See this article at Science and Theology News for a great discussion on the comparision between the Big Bang as a scientific theory, and Intelligent Design. The bottom line, many resisted the theory of Big Bang, particularly since it sounded a little too religious for some. However, Big Bang made testable predictions and as the theory was developed, became today’s mainstream. (Big Bang proponents also never sued people demanding their theory, in it’s early stages, be taught in astronomy classes either).
No. Christians are making this debate about the existence of God. Say I believe that conception is a miracle — God creating another human. Now through science I discover the process of fertilization. Sperm meets egg. When a child is born, is he or she any less special to his or her parents? A Christian worldview would certainly say not. Also, I would encourage everyone to understand that the Bible was written in a time and a place. Our tradition holds that it was inspired, something I agree with. But being inspired doesn’t necessarily mean that we can now use the book as a science textbook. (Think about how boring Psalms 23 would be if it described, in detail, the Kreb’s cycle or glycolysis instead of our refuge in God.)
Most of these claims are too vague for me to really know what you’re refering to. I’ll respond to a few. I guess what particularly troubles me is that some of the people using these arguments have been shown time and again to not understand what they’re talking about, or worse, to be deliberately misrepresenting the truth… (Jonathan Wells of The Discovery Institute quickly comes to mind.) I would caution any Christian to not jump too quickly to accept something you want to believe. Making hasty faith-based claims about science puts one in a very weak position. For example, the flat earth…
Miller-Urey experiments and others like them tested the Oparin-Haldane hypothesis. Basically the area of research is the origins of life. This is a field with plenty of research and dissention amoung scientists. There is no consensus on exactly how life originated. Furthermore, the specific origin of life has nothing to do with the theory of evolution by natural selection, so I’m not sure what the point is. If a scientist was to think they knew exactly how life originated, I would disagree with them strongly (as would a plethora of other scientists). At the same time, I find it perfectly reasonable that God may have kicked off life through a natural mechanism, and if tomorrow scientists could “create” life from nothing in a test tube, it wouldn’t trouble me one bit. My believe in God is not tied to science.
As far as the peppered moth goes, science has come to realize this interesting phenomenon may have had several subtle factors at play, besides a selective pressure soley from birds. In this specific case, realizing that sometimes more is going on than meets the eye hardly weakens our understanding of evolution. It strengthens it. Have a look at these three resources here, here, and here (pdf format). The first is by Ken Miller, the biologist responsbile for writing the textbook that approximately half of US high school and college biology students use. He wears both the title of Christian and evolutionary biologist. The other two links are by Bruce Grant, who’s extensively studied pepper-moths.
Finally, I’ll point to this reference as a response to the cambrian explosion. Though I would agree that we have a ton to learn about this time in the earth’s history (a very difficult task due to the amount of time since then), it hardly causes inconsistencies with evolutionary theory.
Kelley, this is precisely how it’s supposed to be — a pain in the (you know where). I too have two minor papers awaiting publication, and the fact that others are helping ensure my paper is worth publishing is one of the very things that safeguards the validity of scientists’ research. Anyone is free to take the Intelligent Design route of deciding that publishing in journals isn’t as productive as writing books for the popular masses. Of course then we call them authors, not scientists. (Again, refer to that article on the Big Bang).
I can understand that sentiment. I think people can do science without faith. I personally just don’t think it’s as uplifting.
The same can be said for a sunset. Can you watch a sunset (which can be particularly beautiful here in west Texas) without attributing it to something more than gravity? I believe both are a result of God’s providence. But I think we’ve shown both are a result of natural mechanisms.
Hello Again Jay,
Nice to see that much of what I say “troubles” you. Thats not being sensitive to your readers and promoting open discussion of these ideas, Mr. Packer…and because we have known each other for some time I will let you get away with it
I will just briefly respond to a few things, I think some of the things could be debated for ever
(1) “If you believe this, anything can be taught as science”. I wasn’t trying to imply that creation/ID be taught as science. But I don’t understand why some school districts and such are threatened by the thought of talking about it in the classroom and presenting it as other ideas that are floating out there in the world, hell as far as I am concerned they can discuss the flying spaghetti theory too. Teachers can premise the discussion/theories as “non-scientific” or what have you, but the creation/evolution debate has been going on for so long and has had such an impact on both science and religion, and for that reason alone I would argue that we should address the discussion in academic settings so that youth, parents, up-and-coming scientists/preachers and the like don’t have to rely on the media or politcally driven voices to learn about it.
(2) “There’s a good reason for this. It’s because people who are going against evolutionary theory aren’t coming back with anything positive in it’s place. They aren’t proposing any alternative theories”. Is it always necessary to provide an alternatibe answer? Yes, that is the common practice in the scientific community, but the scientific community also has this habit of only publishing statisitically significant results and often won’t publish non-significant data. I think there is scientific value in showing that some things don’t work. There is also value in offering an alternative testable explaination…but maybe that is not always necessary in order to make the point.
(3) “I would caution any Christian to not jump too quickly to accept something you want to believe.” Haha, I think you could offer the same advice to any adamant evolutionist who ignores/disreguards gaps and such in the theory. In fact, that is advice for anyone who does science. As my genetics prof once said, “Let the data speak for itself, don’t make it something it is not.” In my experience with adamant evolutionists, I always come away with the feeling that they are too quick to close the book on evolution and hold not even the slightest bit of reservation that maybe they don’t know/understand the whole picture yet. I have the same feeling for adamant creationists.
All of those are just minor points really and my real reason for responding to you is because I either didn’t make it clear what my point with the original post was or you misunderstood me. I wasn’t trying to argue against evolution. I am merely suggesting that the theory of evolution, in its current state, does not have all the answers, which is contrary to what some people would have you believe. If the evidence was perfect and fitted the theory perfectly, then I don’t think we would have whole departments, institutes, etc. designed in order to study it and race to fill in the gaps. In fact, most, if not all, people doing science are in pursuit of filling in missing information (gaps, if you will) in order to further our understanding of the natural world. I think that it is rare to find scientists who are still studying and re-testing things that have already been proven (at least with physiology in mind). Whole departments and institutes have been formed to study evolution, so obviously we haven’t answered all the questions and we don’t know all there is to know about it yet. We’re still looking at an incomplete picture when it comes to the current state of the theory…just as much as Genesis probably offers an incomplete picture of the beginnings.
By the by, what are your papers and where are you publishing? Send me reprints or the PDF’s because I would like to read them.
Always,
Kelley
Kelley, one last response and we can leave it at that (unless of course you have something to add, and then of course you’re welcome to).
I have no problem talking about intelligent design. I particularly think it would serve as a great example on how to teach kids pseudoscience, and tackle the issue that science need not conflict with faith. I personally believe strongly that a science class, particularly in public education, isn’t the place to do this. I know many other scientists, even many who aren’t Christians, have publicly expressed these sentiments as well. Teaching ID is fine, just put it in a humanities or religion class. Furthermore, the type of discussion that many ID advocates are demanding is nothing short of supplanting their ideas in a science class through the political process of local school boards rather than establishing their ideas as science. Therefore I fully support those who oppose discussing it this way in a science class.
As far as this issue of “gaps” goes, I agree with your evaluation that science is a constant search for new knowledge, and as such, our focus is on explaining things we don’t know. This certainly holds true for evolution. I’m guessing it will be an exciting time to be a scientist as we learn more.
However, I personally dislike the use of the word gaps for one reason. I think it gives a very false impression to those not well versed in science. I have the same problem with calling our lack of understanding about evolution gaps as I do with saying evolution is just a theory. Gravity is just a theory. Atomic theory is just a theory. Every single theory in science is just a theory. But when people start saying evolution is just a theory, they’re using the word theory as a tenative, unsure hunch, a definition that differs from that of science.
I would agree that our knowledge is never complete. I’m not sure it ever will be. But using this as a basis to have problems with evolution is unsound, in my humble opinion. My view is that just because you can’t know everything doesn’t mean you can’t know something. (This is hardly a unique idea…)
For an excellent discussion of this principle, see Derbyshire’s article that I linked to in this post. He examines Newtonian physics and how Einstein proposed new ideas, and has this to say if the same were to happen with our understanding of evolution — that is, it were shown to be an incomplete theory.
As for your question about my papers in publication, here you’ve asked me to publicly state just how insignificant my work is… I’ve got a mammalian species account of Neusticomys monticolus, a very cool acquatic rodent of South America, that should be approved soon (I hope) and a paper on our mammal survey in Ecuador in the summer of 2003. The latter is a simple ecology paper which is basically a report on what we found. We had a few things in places not known before from Ecuador (most notably N. monticolus).
Huh? I wasn’t saying your work was insignificant, Jay….haha, Im asking because I would like to read them
Apparently discussion science and faith makes every statement seem hostile
No, you certainly weren’t saying my works were insignificant. I was!
Ok, so next question…why on earth would you trivialize your work like that? Some of our greatest and most foundational science came (and still comes) from naturalists who described the incredible world around them. Give yourself some credit.
It was a joke. Kind of poking fun at myself for bragging (not my real intention) that I had two papers awaiting publication, but that when asked, they’re not as big a deal as I could make them sound.
This is my take on ID. First off, I think that any sound biological Christian would not even consider this theory as sound science, as Jay has aptly stated. I believe that ID is for scientists who do not want to believe in God, but cannot deny the fact matter can have such complex systems and be so intricate that the atoms simply changed and rearraged themselves to do it. They can see that things were designed but they do not want to admit that Christians’ God may be the one responsible so that is why it is just an ‘Intelligent Designer’. The reason I believe that any sound Christian scientist should disregard this theory is because it is our faith that makes us believe that God is the creator. But I also know that evolution has most certainly occured and you would be silly not to see it, but alas, this is not about ID. But then again, if this post makes no sense, I blame it on the fact that I was just created 5 minutes ago in front of this keyboard and given a poor mind. And yes, it is VERY hard being a christian scientist and have uber conservative christians as family. About a year ago I went with Dr. Sheldon to Washington D.C. to speak to congress about the regutting of the Endangered Species Act and when my uncle found out he called me a sandle wearing, bong smoking hippie. It’s hard work trying to save the earth for the ignorant so they can continue to enjoy it, but someones got to do it.
Well Tim, I suppose we are sandal wearing, at least on occasion.
Yeah, I completely feel your pain, growing up in west Texas. I often don’t see eye to eye with many Christians and their understanding of stewardship. My favorite is how churches use imagery of nature, either from scripture, in songs, or in pictures (during slideshows, etc) to invoke a sense of wonder and awe in God, and then turn around and act like how we treat the world around us doesn’t matter. It’s a duality that boggles the mind.
iF YOU DON’T MIND ME JUMPING IN HERE:
(1) “If you believe this, anything can be taught as science”. I wasn’t trying to imply that creation/ID be taught as science. But I don’t understand why some school districts and such are threatened by the thought of talking about it in the classroom and presenting it as other ideas that are floating out there in the world, hell as far as I am concerned they can discuss the flying spaghetti theory too.
So then don’t treat Creationis/ID as science at all. Full stop. I don’t want my kid to be exposed to rubbish ideas - I want my kid to be able to be exposed to the full force of scientific method in formulating his ideas about the world. Anything else is lesser and I am not spending money having my kids head fulled with creationist crap - unless it is in a class of comparitive religion.
Teachers can premise the discussion/theories as “non-scientific” or what have you,
and they are welcome to pardon my son from the rest of the class once they premise a lesson that way - and I will have my money for that particular lesson back. I presume you are talking about a science class.
but the creation/evolution debate has been going on for so long and has had such an impact on both science and religion,
Excuse me … but what contribution has creationism had on impacting science other than to validate science and reason over blind faith whenever the two are (artificially) put into the same boxing ring. The creation/evolution debate died and was buried after the Scopes trial.
And - I hate to be smug about it … but the theory of evolution has broght quantifyable benefits to mankind - like understandings in stem cell development - that creationism never could. In fact I can tell you creationism’s contribution nary amounts to a hill of beans in terms of mankinds progress. Nothing. Nada. Nought. Cretinism is a passenger.
and for that reason alone I would argue that we should address the discussion in academic settings so that youth, parents, up-and-coming scientists/preachers and the like don’t have to rely on the media or politcally driven voices to learn about it.
So it turns out that the reason to teach creationism/ID in an ‘academic setting’ is so people don’t get evolution from the media? I cannot see why your media prejudice should disadvantage so many fresh young minds. Just turn off your television if you don’t like news.
As far as I can tell the only good things about ID’s attempts to inject itself into the academic agenda is that it will ultimately further weaken religiosity as ID’s theories and posits get destroyed under the blow torch of reason and replicable falsifications - such as the TTSS evidence refuting the ‘irreducible complexity’ of the bacterium flagellum. And that it will demonstrate to my son the intellectual dishonesty of so called religious people so he can understand how the church in the past could burn ‘witches’ at the stake, or call for a crusade and ensuing slaughter of many, many innocents. Or more recently call for Africans in HIV/AIDS areas to not use condoms to protect themselves when the actually do what can only be reasoned and explained by science as a 100% natural drive - i.e. have sex. It is no coincidence that the recently retiring chief scientist of the oldest scientific institution pinned the Pope for genocide in his stance against the use of contraceptives.
ID may not be science but neither is Darwinian evolution religion. However, many in the biology community take evolution as their religion. I believe the development of ID was to level the playing field in the marketplace of ideas of metaphysics. Matrialists trumpeting evolution as the idea of beginnings…which cannot be falsified since there is only one beginning…the religion of the ungodly. I think we can agree…science needs to stick to science [which you do]; metaphysics to metaphysics [which the deposed Dover SB did not do]. Will that happen? Not a “chance”!
Wadard, while I understand your sentiments, and even agree with you on the idea that as a pluralistic society, Christians ought to behave politely to others that do not share our worldview, I think your tone’s a little harsh. Kelley is also a very good friend of mine, somebody I respect.
WCKriner, thanks for the comment. There are certainly poor representatives in the biology community. For some who see no reason to believe in God, evolution presents them with a great scientific theory on which to extend to their metaphysics. I certainly am of the opinion that this is one of the reasons that many of my brothers and sisters resist the idea of evolution so strongly… All I can do is hang my head and let out a big sigh… (That and blog.)
As far as there not being a chance at scientists and religious folks “playing by the rules” so to speak, all I can do is have faith and play my ever so small part. It’s been incredibly encouraging to have both Christians and friends who are comfortably and strongly agnostic, thank me for talking about these issues. (The first comment in this thread was just such an example.)
WC, I must confess, I’ve never heard of anyone claiming that evolution explained creation. Evolution can explain how we got from this point to that point, but the actual beginning of course has nothing to do with evolution: you can’t evolve something from nothing. WC, I must confess, I’ve never heard of anyone who actually understood evolution claiming that evolution explained creation. I’ve only heard people who attack evolution make the claim that anyone says this.