Home > What’s Wrong With Intelligent Design as Science?

What’s Wrong With Intelligent Design as Science?

by Open-Publishing - Friday 2 December 2005
35 comments

Edito Religions-Beliefs Sciences USA

An intensifying battle over intelligent design (ID) to be taught in science classes has been emerging across the United States, alarming scientists and educators who consider ID as a political ploy to repackage religion under the guise of “alternative science” to undermine the scientific theory of evolution. Policymakers in 24 states are weighing proposals to introduce ID in their public school curricula. Whether ID is a religious belief or a scientific theory is at the heart of the controversy waged in courtrooms and public forums.

Intelligent design holds that some complex developments observed in nature that cannot be explained by natural selection suggest design by an unspecified intelligent agent. Despite the absence of identifying the designer or creator, the theory of ID mimics the biblical account of creation - God created all matter, various forms of life, and the world out of nothing.

Intelligent Design (ID) fails as science

To be considered as a scientific theory, intelligent design must satisfy three criteria: 1) explanatory power; 2) plausibility; and 3) falsifiability. The National Academy of Sciences has declared that ID is not science because its intelligent designer cannot be observed (plausibility) or verified by experiment (falsifiability), and proposes no new hypothesis (explanatory power) on how the world is designed. While the scientific theory of evolution is supported by plenty of observable facts and repeated physical evidence found in the process of mutations, gene flow, genetic drift, adaptation and speciation through natural selection. The failure to meet all three requirements is a compelling argument against ID being considered as science.

Arguments for ID

The ID theory is largely purported by two arguments known as irreducible complexity and specified complexity. Michael Behe, a biochemical researcher and a professor at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania, forwarded the concept of irreducible complexity in his book, Darwin’s Black Box (Simon and Schuster, 1996). He claims that the removal of any one of the interactive parts of a cellular system would destroy the function of the entire cell. Therefore, intelligent design is the blueprint for everything to be in its right place to work. In The Design Inference (Cambridge University Press, 1998), William Dembski, a mathematician and a professor of science and theology at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, argued for the inference of intelligent design based on William Paley’s famous “watchmaker” analogy in 1802 Natural Theology. Dembski asserts that patterns exhibited in nature being not only complex but also specified infer some form of intelligent guidance in their formation.

Complex Adaptive System (CAS) vs. ID Arguments

The observations made by Behe and Dembski were inadequate and their conclusions faulty. The explanation for nature to be the way it is lies in the comprehensive theory of complex adaptive system (CAS). As a novel scientific theory, much of what is known about CAS involves a combination of mainly three accepted theories: evolution, chaos, and complexity. To put it simply, CAS is an open network system in which many independent, self-organized, yet interconnected agents (cells, species, individuals, societies, etc.) compete, evolve and adapt to a changing environment, resulting in an order of emergent system properties and a general pattern for the whole system.

As a response to Behe’s assertion that a removal of a part would cause the whole system to fail; perhaps so in his example of a mousetrap (man-made contraption) but not so in a living cell that has the tendency to compensate the function of a missing part with another cellular part due to the cell’s dynamic evolving system. According to CAS, a cell functions as a cellular system when all its interconnected parts spontaneously interact with one another. In addition, Behe dismisses an important aspect of a cell - organelles (protein, enzyme, gene, etc.) in fact, do evolve through natural selection to be of different types with specific functions.

Although Dembski uses the term “complexity” in his argument on specified complexity, he seems to overlook a crucial point about complexity theory - that order arises from chaos due to complexity. The “order of emergent system properties” appears to be Dembski’s description of “design.” And he assumes that a design implicates intelligence behind a complex pattern, which is not necessarily so, according to CAS. In the macroscopic world, one can see the natural hierarchy of emergent properties (e.g., from a grain of sand to a beach to a seacoast).

Furthermore, complexity theory could also explain the gaps in the fossil record that proponents of ID hold as evidence against evolution. Fossil record gaps are identified as punctuated equilibrium in evolution - long stable periods interrupted by a series of sporadic durations of rapid radical changes. The fact that the presence of old and new species coexist on our planet speaks as stark proof for evolution.

Moreover, the Miller-Urey experiment, which succeeded in producing basic molecules at the first stage for generating life from non-living matter, establishes the fact that natural processes could produce the building blocks of life from non-living matter. In reality, natural processes of nature can be explained without a divinity or an intelligence equation.

ID Supported by Discovery Institute

Behind the big push for a national dialogue on ID is the Discovery Institute, a Seattle think tank financed largely by conservative Christian donors. With a $4 million budget, Discovery Institute spends more than $1 million a year for research, polls and media exposure supporting ID. It also uses about 85 percent of its budget to funding researchers at major universities, and the rest of the budget to publishing religious writings and launching political ID campaigns. Since 2003, it has promoted the DVD, "Unlocking the Mystery of Life," which advocates ID shown on PBS stations in major markets and schools.

State vs. Religion

On the legal front, a courtroom drama over teaching ID in a public school had made headlines for weeks - a reversal of the famous 1925 Scopes “monkey” trial in which a Tennessee man was prosecuted for violating state law by teaching Darwin’s evolution. As the first ID court case followed closely by the media, the Dover Area School District was put on trial for violating the constitutional separation of church and state by teaching ID in science class. The judge is still out on the verdict. Emboldened by the "free speech" approach bolstered by President Bush who had endorsed teaching ID in schools, ID advocates argued that banning ID from science class is a violation of the First Amendment - unconstitutional limit on free speech. However, national science organizations and university faculty groups disputed that claim to mute free speech by pointing out subjects like religion, alchemy and astrology have always been included in the school curricula as non-science courses.

In a recent poll by Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, 64 percent of Americans believed that teaching ID along side evolution is a simple matter of fairness. The bottom line of the legal issue is not about the First Amendment whether one has the freedom to express one’s religious beliefs but rather one’s religious beliefs should be imposed as science. Religion has no place in science class. And the voters in Pennsylvania in the November election understood that well to have ousted all the education board members who supported ID in the science curriculum.

Although proponents of ID have claimed that their theory is not tied to religion, Discovery Institute contradicted that declaration with its own 1999 fundraising document for strategy proposal - “Design theory promises to reverse the stifling dominance of the materialistic worldview, and to replace it with a science consonant with Christian and theistic convictions.” Even the Vatican’s chief astronomer, Rev. George Coyne admitted, "Intelligent design isn’t science even though it pretends to be." The conclusion is obviously clear - intelligent design is indeed related to religion and has been highly politicized as pseudo-science.

http://uniorb.com/RCHECK/idesign.htm
By Diana Lee
UniOrb http://uniorb.com/realitycheck.html

Forum posts

  • "Intelligent Design" is unintelligent nonsense. It is simply Creationism, repackaged by the same people that lost the battle to put Creationism in the Public Schools. They have never given up the idea of imposing their ideas on the entire nation, with the willing help of our Chief Executive Nut. Any claim that this is NOT Creationism is a lie, but the Creationists do not mind lying. The ends justify the means. If stealth and deception will do it, then the Creationists too will do it.

  • Lets look at it in realistic terms. A lawnmower is specifically (designed) to mow grass. However, if you leave it parked in your yard for 1 million years, do you actually think it will evolve and learn to start and move itself around? Yet it was specifically designed to mow lawns. Lawnmowers are very simple devices too. Imagine complex beings and galaxies. If the lawnmower can’t even work on its own, how would it ever create itself? Evolution is a bogus hypothesis developed by a man who drank to much liquor. But everyone is allowed to make up their own minds. That is the result of God giving us free will to choose. So Evolution is the ultimate psudo-science.

    • I think you should mate with your lawn mower and evolve, you already had to much liquor.

    • The lawnmower can’t evolve because we didn’t design it that way. One day we will be capable of doing that. Only a creator being can withhold free will. We may have free will because God didn’t withhold it from us. Or we may have free will because there is no God to withhold it.

    • The "power of god" contained within the atoms and molecules of the lawn mower are of course different by far from the ’pog’ contained within the fantastically cosmic world of cells which are obviously blessed with a ’higher power’— the power to replicate unlike the mower. The whole "creationism vs. evoltion" debate is IMO a non issue other than there are still some that cannot equate the hair on their bodies and canine teeth, and fingernails, with a cohesive idea of a powere of ’god’— and they miss the many different uses of the word for ’diety’ in scriptures and therefore miss the deeper meaning IMO.

      SmT

    • Intelligent design is NOT SCIENCE. It’s the foundation of myth and wishful thinking packaged cleverly into a ’something did it’ box. It is not based on scientific theory or available data, whereas SCIENCE lives upon AVAILABLE DATA.

      It is the radical fundamental religious loonies attempting to subvert the constitutional separation of church and state by offering warm fuzzy religion in the public schools as opposed to hard core science. Just a further attempt to DUMB DOWN the populace through religion.

      I believe the Flying Spaghetti Monster theory

      http://www.venganza.org/

      should be taught right alongside Intelligent Design - but in the literature classes. Science should be reserved for the science classes.

    • Webster-a definition-Deux Ex Machina-God from a machine-collegiate text-1958-9(year)Time,change,process-evolve-I am at risk to say this,but,if any human knew what God knows,life would be virtual absolute boredom since all would be known,thus leaving nothing to experience-(a tid bit of logic)(my own ? imagination plays with me)I was once in a small lawnmower repair business-I would like to do a thesis on lawnmower types and history,never produced possibilities,up to the nylon string revelation-(trimmer)Living on a farm,the seven foot hay mower caused a disparity in my thinking as I mowed the lawn,each task being based on a different purpose-The rotary lawn mowers would leave virtually nothing to be gathered-Weekly or so mowing of two or three inch lawn-mulched to disappearance-The other side,hay up to three feet high,after cutting,raking to windrows for the baler,then baled-then hauled to the barn and stored-a vast difference-The hay mower functioned as hair clippers,concomittant with the harvesting purpose-a reciprocating cutter-similar to scissors-Much technology developed in the 1950’s including the pelletizing of hay in the field-The march of science?Where goeth the scythe?I had a couple of those-three garden tractors,mower equipped-every which way-I finally figured out that the best reason for mowing a lawn was to prevent an over-ripe crop of tall grass from reaching wooden strucures in case of a grass fire-(other than walking barefoot and not stepping on unwary snakes)The O’leary theory-Chicago-1871- I have attempted to extract some reason from a seeming infinite flux-If I think of anything better,I’ll let you know-(lawn mower based in necessity-is not a luxury)Good Luck?Cometh the Machine-

    • It is a little known fact that Charles Darwin was a card carrying communist. Equally little known are the all night drinking bouts he used to have with Marx and Engels in London. "Evilution" was all part of the world-wide communist conspiracy that those three drinking buddies hatched in a Soho pub. Check it out if you don’t believe me: "charliedarwinthecommie.org"

    • the rock em sock em robots of competing religions, wotta spectacle! i need a drink.

    • or we may have free will simply because it’s free. everybody likes free stuff.

    • my lawnmower frequently doesn’t work. is it satan’s fault?

    • one more time 68.***.49, separate yer church and yer state! are you a political activist of a minister of the reformed fundamentalist atheist church?

    • rarely in the history of man, have so many words been used to say so little.

  • If things worked on their own there wouldn’t be a need for the equation for Force. Force encounters stationary objects and moves them. Force is God. Yes Intelligent Design and Evolution are both Religions. One believes and the other determines to fight others beliefs. Everyone, should be allowed to make their own decision regarding what side they are on. What anyone thinks really doesn’t change reality.

  • Clarification: Un-Authorized thoughts don’t change reality.

  • The problem with these ID people is that they ignore aspects of reality that don’t appear to have issued from a designer that was not as intelligent as they would wish s/he, it to be. Starting from the macro world, for example, what’s so intelligent about two galaxies colliding with each other, or a star going supernova? In the micro world, what is so intelligent about a cell mutating into a cancer, or a virus that causes pain and suffering?

    It seems to me that an all-powerful being could have done better on those scores. Perhaps s/he, it should have been more patient, worked on the design a little more, gotten it straight and then rolled it out of the shop, instead of rushing it into production with so many flaws.

    But, the ID folks will say all of these flaws in the design are apparent, and their true purpose is part of a grand scheme that is perfect, although that grand scheme will forever remain a MYSTERY.

    • I find the whole creationism vs. evolution "debate" strange as it seems to me when one finally comes to the realization of god as "the spirit that moves in all things" and IS very much a creator— with god intelligence in every particle— that clearly BOTH exist. There is absolutely IMO a god force but also IMO animals/humans change and DEFINATELY evolve as changes take place over millions of years and certain traits are shown to be advantageous (or not) to survival. That humans have canine teeth, hair on their bodies, and fingernails is NO "accident". IT is the "spirit of god" working through evolution to bring about constant change.

      I think it would be perfectly fine to "discuss" different beliefs and let the "kids" in school doing the learning fully defend and debate their "beliefs". NOBODY IMO should fear the Sunlight as a disinfectant against BS. The classes should be taught simply as sources of "possibilities" and which possibilities seem most reasonable, logical, provable, and knowable. Schools could do such a FAVOR to our young if they could get our kids to THINK rather than RECITE.

    • translation: this pogue [24.**.145] thinks he [she] is smarted than God.

  • Thousands of "Intelligent Design" DVD’s have been sent to Australian Schools. This is such a joke. The Christian schools will apparently take these theories seriously as part of their curriculum, but fortunately the public schools will show them to students only as a comparison to Darwin’s Theory of Evolution and let these astute and aware children make up their own minds as to what actually makes sense.

    I believe that mainstream Australia is cynical in regard to "Intelligent Design" which hopefully will only indoctrinate the religious right so we can live in hope that they are still a minority here in Australia.

    • in order to understand intelligent design, one must first have at least a vague understanding of what intelligence is. This requirement, rergrettably, disqualifies most Australians.

  • At the apex of intelligent design the designer with a stroke of genius created the only proof any one needs for his intellect - Placodelloides jaegerkskioeldi inside the warm, airless reaches of the hippo’s rectum the leeches are looking for love. The hippopotamus spins its tail during defecation to show the creator the most magnificant creation.

    • Is not the universe no more than a thought, fraught with nought more than that with which man sought to prove to others the size of his libido, .....
      NURSE, where`s my medication?

    • when you shoved yer head in there to inspect these critters, did you hold yer breath?

    • your medication is up the hippo’s butt.

  • Based on the definition found in most dictionaries you would have to face the fact that evolution is NOT science either. The public school system was setup so they would have a way to force feed children(hence the population) ideas most rational thoughtful people would reject after just a few moments thought. Thats why they force us to attend school before we have a chance to put our minds together. Both intelligent design and evolution are bunk. Governments have no business setting up public schools as mind control camps. Public schools are preemptive warfare against individual thought

    • ....."Public schools are preemptive warfare against individual thought>"

      Perhaps this is true, do you have any constructive suggestions as to a replacement system?

    • Is "evolution" a law (fact) or a theory (belief) ?
      Why does one belief hold dominance over another?

    • what an absolutely absurd question! The doctor says: "We must cut out this cancer." and you reply: "But doctor, what will we replace it with?!"

    • Aristotelian logic: the law of the excluded middle.

  • Honestly, I don’t know why we’re having this discussion. Let’s keep religion in the church where it belongs. When will these ID types stop trying to mix religion with science/politics in order to brainwash people? I guess they must be missing the good ol’ Dark Ages...

  • How many on the left are ready to live with the full moral implications of evolutionary theory, premised on chance, driven by natural selection and directed by dominance? What appears to be a defeat for the creationists, or if you like, the moralists, may prove to be a call to take the battle to a higher level rather than to a higher court- the phenomenological.

    • Then there is darwinian economics, as practiced by the current members of the human race.

      Where ther are oilfields we will bomb the natives into submission.
      Where there are forests, we will bomb the natives into submission.
      Where the are mineral deposits, we will bomb the natives into submission.

      Religion belongs to the bombers, no matter what side they profess to represent.

      Intelligent design? This is surely the last gasp procrastination of a failed premise, as first proposed by the sumerian/jewish priests, desperate to control the tribes of the M.E., andequally desperate never to do an honest days` work.

      So nothing new there, lazy arsed feckers, scientists, priests and politicians, all profess eagerness to serve, yet like all wildlife, a calculated yearning to rule.

    • oh, fer cryin’ out loud. Put down the bong, take a deep breath, and at least try to be coherent.