In this post Francis and I are addressing the question whether intelligent design theory is really science or just a form of biblical creationism. I will be posting all our responses to one an other over time and each will be dated so it is easier to follow the order. Our comments will be published in couplets so the the opening remarks are alongside the responses and all further responses will follow this pattern. You may also wish to read my opening statements and Francis’s opening statements on this discussion.

Is Intelligent Design science or ‘creationism in a cheap tuxedo?’

20th September, 2011

Joshua Gidney-Opening

As I have already outlined in my opening statements, intelligent design theory states ‘that there are tell-tale features of living systems and the universe that are best explained by an intelligent cause…’1 ID theorists also claim that the theory is a scientific one, ‘…an inference from scientific evidence, not a deduction from religious authority.’2 The question whether ID theory is scientific or just creationism is one that provokes much, if not most, of the discussion on this issue and it is a lot rarer to hear measured, rigorous debate about whether the theory has the empirical evidence on its side. Because of this it only seems necessary to sweep away some of these caricatures and straw men in order for us to discuss the validity of the methods by which we can detect design and what the empirical evidence itself suggests. In this part of the discussion, I will argue that ID is indeed a legitimate scientific theory and will attempt to defend it against claims to the contrary. I will also attempt to defend it against the common accusation that it is a synonymous with biblical creationism.

One of my prevailing irritations when it comes to discussions about ID is the fact that it is so frequently misunderstood and misrepresented by many critics and the media, sometimes shamelessly so. I held this position even when I rejected ID. As a result, many people tend to look upon it with much suspicion and unwarranted scepticism. Whilst ID advocates have been largely consistent and clear in their claims, they are often met with accusations of being fringe lunatics, fraudsters, and stealth creationists. The infamous 2005 Dover trial in Pennsylvania had a huge impact on the public perception of ID, where Judge Jones ruled it out as being a religious doctrine and not scientific. Since ID had falsely been given the religious label, and was being used by a group of creationists to get it into school science classes, it was ruled out as being unconstitutional, violating Church-state separation. It was a public relations disaster. Unfortunately one of the most common rhetorical moves used by critics is when they illegitimately equate ID with biblical creationism in order to discredit it. It was famously labelled ‘creationism in a cheap tuxedo.’3 by Leonard Krishtalka.

In Charles Foster’s book The Selfless Gene: Living with God and Darwin, he asserts that intelligent design is ‘The currently fashionable fig-leaf to cover the nakedness of creationism…’4 This asseveration echoes the sentiments of most ID critics but it is plainly a gross mischaracterization. ID theory is solely based on what theorists believe to be empirical evidence and mentions nothing of God, theology, or any religious belief in its premises. It should be pointed out that ID is quite a broad tent because amongst its supporters are Young Earth and Old Earth creationists, Jews, Muslims, agnostics, and it is even technically possible for ID to be embraced by those who hold to an atheistic worldview because design theory is ‘a philosophically minimalistic position’5 and thus carries ‘minimal metaphysical baggage…’6 Even though there are people within the design community who advocate biblical literalism and Young Earth creationism, this does not mean that ID is based upon any religious doctrine.

My own acceptance of ID was not the result of a theological reading. It was the result of a long, arduous, and detailed look at the arguments and evidence. The leading theorists in the ID movement also testify to coming to their position by looking at the empirical evidence and finding out that Neo-Darwinism has many deficiencies. One of the movement’s most prominent figures is Michael Behe. He recalls that one of the reasons he came to his position was through reading Michael Denton’s book Evolution: A Theory In Crisis. Denton is a Biochemist and an agnostic.7 Through Behe’s scientific research he noticed evidence of ID in Biochemistry. From this observation it should be plainly clear that Behe did not come to his position by scrutinising the Gospels through his microscope! ID is not creationism and critics would do well to acknowledge this. It is no fig-leaf and it is hiding nothing.

As ID theorist Steven Meyer writes ‘there are no good-non—question begging-reasons to define intelligent design as unscientific.’8 When considering the scientific status of ID, it is necessary to look in detail at what science is and isn’t. This necessarily involves much philosophy of science because science cannot answer the question itself. One way to help us the answer the question is to look at the history of philosophy and science. It is important to note first of all that throughout history the word science has meant different things and has changed considerably. Science in the early modern period simply referred to the study of nature and was called natural philosophy. Natural philosophers were permitted to appeal to all four of Aristotle’s four causes, which Aristotle thought were necessary in order to truly explain things in nature. It wasn’t until figures like Rene Descartes, Francis Bacon, and Thomas Hobbes that the rejection of final and formal causes was proposed, eliminating reference to function and teleology. When one speaks of science these days, it almost always refers exclusively to the natural sciences and it now seems to be largely equated with the principle of methodological naturalism, a principle I will examine in detail in subsequent responses.

One of the biggest myths about the sciences is that they speak with a single unified voice and that it has a set of principles that are uniform throughout the sciences. The truth is that natural science is very diverse and certain concepts need to be distinguished from one another. It seems that there are several categories in which different scientific fields fall into although many of them overlap: Experimental, observational, historical, and origins. Some unifying features of the sciences are that they are based on public evidence, they can be confirmed and tested empirically, are systematic, and use standard methods of reasoning. ID does conform to these principles and is based on publicly available evidence, is testable, makes predictions, and although falsifiable, this is not a necessary or a sufficient condition for a theory to count as science.

I realise that here I have only touched the surface of this topic and in my following response I will delve deeper into the principle of methodological naturalism and ID’s status as a scientific theory.

 References

  1. Stephen C. Meyer. Signature In The Cell: DNA and the Evidence for Intelligent Design. (New York: HarperCollins. 2009). p. 4.
  2. Ibid.
  3. Leonard Krishtalka. Quoted by Gleen Branch in ‘Human Nature After Darwin by Janet Radcliffe Richards’. Philosophy Now. 40. March/April 2003, p.44.
  4. Charles Foster. The Selfless Gene: Living With God and Darwin. (Great Britain: Hodder & Stoughton. 2009). p.XIV
  5. Marcus R. Ross. Intelligent Design and Young Earth Creationism: Investigating Nested Hierarchies of Philosophy and Belief. http://gsa.confex.com/gsa/2003AM/finalprogram/abstract_58668.htm
  6. Peter S. Williams. I Wish I Could Believe In Meaning: A Response to Nihilism. (Southampton: Damaris Publishing. 2004). p. 349
  7. 7.       Unlocking the Mystery of Life: The Scientific Case for Intelligent Design. (Illustra Media. 2002)
  8. 8.       Stephen C. Meyer. Signature In The Cell: DNA and the Evidence for Intelligent Design. (New York: HarperCollins. 2009). p. 421

Francis Smallwood- First Response

‘One of the most common rhetorical moves used by critics is when they illegitimately equate ID with biblical creationism in order to discredit it… ID is not creationism and critics would do well to acknowledge this.’

In my opening statement, I asked if the Intelligent Design movement is, perhaps, just a ‘new strain of creationism’?1 As Joshua says, many of ID’s critics cursorily dismiss ID as ‘creationism’, as if no more need be said. I don’t believe that this is a productive tactic, but despite the rhetoric is there something in the allegation?

Michael Behe writes in his book Darwin’s Black Box,

‘Many people think that questioning Darwinian evolution must be equivalent to espousing creationism. As commonly understood, creationism involves belief in an earth formed only about ten thousand years ago, an interpretation of the Bible that is still very popular [although scientifically indefensible]. For the record, I have no reason to doubt that the universe is the billions of years old that physicists say it is. Further, I find the idea of common descent (that all organisms share a common ancestor) fairly convincing, and have no particular reason to doubt it.’2

Of the three fathers—I was tempted to say ‘stooges’—of the ID movement—Behe, Dembski and Johnson—Behe is the only qualified biological scientist. Dembski is a mathematician, as evinced by his enamour with gargantuan improbabilities; Johnson, not a scientist of any description, is a shrewd lawyer. As Joshua said, ‘It should be pointed out that ID is a broad tent,’ covering a wide spectrum of views. Whilst there are those within the ID community who subscribe to biblical creationism, notably Paul Nelson, it is apparent, from this quotation alone, that Behe’s intelligent design is far removed from Nelson’s base ‘history denial.’3

So, whilst the equation of ID with biblical creationism—as in six days, light before sun, etc.—is illegitimate, how is it that ID just simply can’t seem to rid itself of creationist associations?

In October, 2004 the school board of Dover, Pennsylvania altered the biology curriculum, so as to allow the teaching of intelligent design as an alternative to evolution. The board’s decision violated the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause, separating Church from state, bringing them to trial, a band of indignant parents in frank opposition to the board’s actions.

Amongst the expert witnesses for the defense was Michael Behe. The following citation is excerpted from the trial transcript,4 where Behe was questioned by Eric Rothschild:

Q. …Please describe the mechanism that intelligent design proposes for how complex biological structures arose.

A. Well, the word “mechanism” can be used in many ways. In this I was—and when I was referring to intelligent design, I meant that we can perceive that in the process by which a complex biological structure arose, we can infer that intelligence was involved in its origin. …

Q. So intelligent design is about cause? …

A. Well, cause is a broad word, and when you’re trying to explain how something came about, you can say it came about for a variety of reasons. But intelligent design is one reason or one aspect or one cause to explain how the purposeful arrangement of parts that we see did come about.

Q. Back to my original question. What is the mechanism that intelligent design proposes?

A. And I wonder, could—am I permitted to know what I replied to your question the first time?

Q. I don’t think I got a reply, so I’m asking you… what is the mechanism that intelligent design proposes for how complex biological structures arose?

A. Again, it does not propose a mechanism in the sense of a step-by-step description of how those structures arose. But it can infer that in the mechanism, in the process by which these structures arose, an intelligent cause was involved.

Q. But it does not propose an actual mechanism?

A. Again, the word “mechanism”—the word “mechanism” can be used broadly, but no, I would not say that there was a mechanism. I would say that we have an aspect of the history of the structure.

Q. So when you wrote in your report that “Intelligent design theory focuses exclusively on the proposed mechanism,” you actually meant to say intelligent design says nothing about the mechanism of how complex biological structures arose.

A. No, I certainly didn’t mean to say that. I mean to say what I said in response to the last question, that while we don’t know a step-by-step description of how something arose, nonetheless we can infer some very important facts about what was involved in the process, namely, that intelligence was involved in the process.5

Is it just me, or does it appear that ‘creation’ would have suited Behe’s explanation admirably? I cited this exchange at such length because I wanted to show that although Rothschild asked Behe again and again to explain the ‘actual mechanism’ giving rise to ‘complex biological structures’ the most he got in answer was ‘that intelligence was involved in the process’. ID denies that natural, scientifically explicable processes are capable of generating these complex structures and so attribute their existence to a non-natural intelligent ‘designer’, or is it an intelligent creator?

As Kenneth Miller so excellently put it, the intelligent designer is ‘not really a designer but a creator. We may say that a particular organ or species or biochemical system was “designed,” but “design” isn’t what we really mean. We may know that a building was designed, but we know that only because we can see the building itself. A design is nothing more than a concept, a plan, and we would have no evidence that a design ever existed unless someone had taken it and used it to produce a concrete object that we observe and study—unless, in other words, he had actually built the building. Similarly, in the biological realm, a bacterial flagellum wasn’t just designed—it was created. By any reasonable use of language, our designer of molecular machines is actually the creator of those machines and the genes that specify them.’6

Proponents of ID are desperate to distance themselves from creationism—if they don’t they can’t get into the school science class—and whilst, as Joshua said, it is illegitimate to equate ID with biblical creationism, ‘Intelligence… is manifested in creativity. ID proponents believe that the intricate, complex structures that excite our sense of wonder must be the signatures of creative intelligence.’7 The conclusion that ID is some form of creationism, some ‘new strain’, does seem inevitable.

What was the reckoning, then, of the Kitzmiller v. Dover trial? The ruling signified another roaring triumph for evolution in its grand battle with creationism. Judge John E. Jones III concluded:

‘The citizens of the Dover area were poorly served by the members of the Board who voted for the ID Policy. It is ironic that several of these individuals, who so staunchly and proudly touted their religious convictions in public, would time and again lie to cover their tracks and disguise the real purpose behind the ID Policy… The breathtaking inanity of the Board’s decision is evident when considered against the factual backdrop which has now been fully revealed through this trial. The students, parents, and teachers of the Dover Area School District deserved better than to be dragged into this legal maelstrom, with its resulting utter waste of monetary and personal resources… In making this determination, we have addressed the seminal question of whether ID is science. We have concluded that it is not, and moreover that ID cannot uncouple itself from its creationist, and thus religious, antecedents.’8

 References & Notes

  1. Zimmer, C. Evolution: the triumph of an idea. (London: William Heinemann, 2002). p.325.
  2. Behe, M. Darwin’s black box: the biochemical challenge to evolution. (New York: Touchstone, 1998). p.5.
  3. Dawkins, R. The greatest show on earth: the evidence for evolution. (London: Black Swan, 2010). p.436.
  4. The transcript is available in full at: http://www.aclupa.org/legal/legaldocket/intellige ntdesigncase/dovertrialtranscripts.htm
  5. Michael Behe questioned by Eric Rothschild. Kitzmiller v Dover [2005] ACLUPA 4:04-CV-2688, p.82-85.
  6. Miller, K. R. Only a theory: evolution and the battle for America’s soul. (New York: Viking Penguin, 2008). p.52.
  7. Young, M. and Taner, E. Why intelligent design fails: a scientific critique of the new creationism. (New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 2005). p.12.
  8. Judge John E. Jones III’s memorandum opinion, Kitzmiller v. Dover [2005] ACLUPA 4:04-CV-2688, p.136-38.
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