The AAAS web site has a wonderful profile of Hana and Francisco Ayala, along with an interview with both on video. Dr. Francisco Ayala states that ID is not science, but it is also very bad theology. He calls evolution the unifying principle of biology, and calls intelligent design “blasphemy.”
This is worthwhile listening for anyone who is really interested in this issue. I strongly recommend listening to it. There is a written summary here.
There’s a new post on The Daily Kos, Know Your Creationists: Bill Dembski, that readers may find interesting. It provides some background, and there are some links to some work on the math in the comments.
I appreciate those mathematicians who have deconstructed Dembski’s math. When I first read something by him, it occurred to me that there was a major problem, in that the whole thing really depended on the probability of a process occurring when he really did not know what that process was. What is the probability of the bacterial flagellum being produced by natural processes? Unless we know the processes or we can truly eliminate all possible processes, there’s really no way to know. It could be absolutely impossible, or it could be quite a simple variation. I didn’t bother to plow through the math as I’m certainly not qualified to comment on it. There’s a simple principle however, applicable to any algorithm, that garbage in will produce garbage out. I simply (and perhaps lazily) assumed that if garbage was going out, it didn’t matter how many pages it took to describe the math, garbage was coming out.
An excellent place to start on critiques of Dembski is the work of Howard van Till. His article E. Coli at the No Free Lunchroom: Bacterial Flagella and Dembskis Case for Intelligent Design is excellent. You can read it as a PDF as well, which would be my own preference, and you can follow more of the exchange starting with the following links on the AAAS web site: Dialogue on Science, Ethics, and Religion: Perspectives.
I have frequently commented that intelligent design (ID) is bad theology. Equally often, I am challenged by someone who will point out that ID may be bad theology from my point of view, while it might be good theology from someone else’s point of view. This is a very valid objection to what I have said, though I will defend the basic point. ID could be more correctly termed “theology done badly” than “bad theology.”
Nonetheless, since ID is being supported primarily by Christians, and evangelical Christians at that, it can be quite properly called “bad theology” as well, because it is bad theology within what is supposed to be the theological framework of most of its supporters. If you are wondering why there is a split amongst conservative Christians over ID, it is simply that many conservative Christians are saying either that this does not prove or that it is not even trying to prove anything that actually works within their theology.
In talking to Christian groups, I frequently find people who are shocked that I don’t support ID. “How can you not believe the universe is designed?” they ask. My answer is that I don’t accept ID precisely because I believe that the universe is designed. However it is disguised, however many chapters of mathematical formulas are provided, however many pious statements are made (whenever someone is not trying to pretend this is not theology), ID does not prove, and is not attempting to prove that the universe is designed. It is, in fact, attempting to prove that some elements are more designed than others, i.e. when we deal with specified complexity as a test of design, it means that we distinguish things that could happen randomly, and things that happen by design. Right or wrong, evangelical Christians are generally very uncomfortable with things that happen randomly. They are not looking for Paley’s watch on the seashore to prove that the watch is designed, but rather to prove that everything is designed.
Incidentally, that remains a failing of Paley’s proof for the existence of God. In traditional Christian theology the sea, the seashore, and each grain of sand is a design, and not just the watch, so again we’re distinguishing design from design. Theologians grab hold of such arguments largely because in a scientific age in which objective knowledge is king, they want to have just such scientific facts in hand. They want to replace faith with fact, but do so without giving up theology. The ID theorists envy the scientists their objective data, and their theories that explain major categories of evidence in an elegant way. They want that for themselves, but they don’t want to give up theology and go pursue science in order to do it.
Scientists wonder why ID proponents are so slow to get down to actual research and publication related to their material if they really want ID to be accepted as scientific. Michael Behe has even suggested research, questionable as it may be, that could be done, but nobody is doing it. Why? Because these people are essentially following the processes of theology. They are rearranging the existing ideas and historical data, and constantly wondering why it is that it doesn’t become acceptable science. They can maintain this search despite scientific training because they have become theologically convinced that theological proposals must be able to be as true as, and as demonstrably true as the results of the hard sciences.
This comes simply from a different approach. Most commonly theology, especially Christian theology, focuses on coherence rather than correspondence. (I’m bracing myself for the accusations that I am oversimplifying here. I am. I confess it. But I think that the generalization is adequately valid for my purposes and I don’t want to dig that far into epistemology.) The scientific method, on the other hand, focuses on correspondence. If a theologian finds a misbehaving fact, one that won’t fit into the system, he is first going to look for a way to tuck it into the system. A scientist in the same circumstances will try to adjust the theory, and if that fails, will hope to propose a new one and become famous. This is what the general public seems to miss about science and scientists. Discovering revolutionary new things is something scientists dream of. You don’t get famous by producing more data to support an existing theory; you have to produce something new. Theologians do try to produce something new as well, but most commonly that is a new way of arranging or looking at old data. An entirely new theology can be built without a single piece of hard data being introduced. And need I mention inventing data, something that gets scientists get caught at and get drummed out of the profession, but makes theologians founders of new religions. 🙂
A theologian doesn’t worry about new discoveries destroying his systematic theology. He is concerned instead with people who take apart the logic, or reinterpret some foundational text, and then follow some new path through the data. Rarely, however, does such a reinterpretation result in the original author recanting his view. It will probably just start a new school of theology, or a new sub-school, or perhaps a new sub-sub school. That’s because one theologian can’t tell another one that he is unable to replicate his data, and thus the theologian’s theology must be false.
Let me detour for a moment to comment that when a theologian deals with a field that does have objective data there will be a difference, and that theologians can make statements that can be objectively disproven. For example, a preacher approached my son when he was ill with cancer, and said that God had told him that anyone he laid hands on and prayed for would be healed of cancer. He laid hands on my son and prayed. My son later died of that cancer. Claim falsified. Fortunately, my son was smarter than the preacher, and didn’t let those words ruin such time as he had left at that point. But even in these cases, the theologian’s approach is not generally to alter the theory, but to explain the data within the prior theory. The recipient didn’t have enough faith (whether that was specificed in advance or not), the historical data that seems to contradict the inerrancy of the Bible can be explained in some other way, or will soon enough be contradicted by other data and God (or rather the theologian) will be vindicated.
If I can illustrate from something closer to my own field of Biblical studies, let’s say new evidence is discovered about the destruction of Jericho, as has happened several times. The objective archeologist takes the new data and adjusts his historical charts for the city of Jericho, looking at all available evidence. The theologian, in this case a defender of the Bible, looks at that data to see how it can be handled to support the Biblical story of the destruction of Jericho by Joshua and the Israelites. Some skeptics, taking an equally theological approach look at the same data to see how well it can be used to oppose the Biblical story. Only the view that attempts to formulate the best understanding taking into account all of the data (and that admits where data is absent) is an attitude compatible with a scientific approach. (I’m avoiding here differences between historical study and hard science. My observation is that the data comes down on the side of the defenders sometimes and of the skeptics sometimes, which suggests to me that the Bible is neither 100% historical when talking about history, nor is it totally in error. Of course, any amount of error means not inerrant.)
This takes me to the current mini-flap about an article Rumors of Angels: Using ID to Detect Malevolent Spiritual Agents. Scientists quite properly laugh this out of scientific court. But why would ID advocates avoid it? The intelligent designer is not specified. ID is not supposed to be a religious concept. So what difference does it make if the designer is an alien, and unknown intelligence from the stars, an angel, a demon, or God Almighty?
But that article has underlined the problem, because we clearly see that ID cannot distinguish between these various possibilities of a designer, because it is trying to demonstrate design in those little places where some external intelligence (rodents of unusual size, perhaps?) might tinker with life in an experimental lab. It’s precisely because they are not looking for design in the traditional sense that most Christians accept theologically, that this kind of thing cannot be excluded. Evangelical theologians would not be proposing angels and demons as agents of creation. But ID doesn’t really have a defense against it.
And please, my fellow Christians, don’t laugh just because we’re talking angels and demons. If you believe in one invisible friend, who are you to laugh at more invisible friends and and some invisible enemies. I see nothing in Christian theology that suggests that we can’t have such agents involved. But again, the fact that ID can admit this shows that it is working much more like theology than science. It reminds me of a three year old foster child my parents took in when I was a teenager. Whenever something bad happened, she’d announce, “Somebody done it, but I didn’t done it!” ID has attained just that level of explanatory power. When all current explanations have failed, ID proposes that we announce: “Somebody done it!”
Personally I don’t see much theological light in seeing demons interfering with nature. I’d have a serious practical problem if someone started suggesting exorcism as the proper response to Ebola, but then DD (demonic design) doesn’t suggest that the demons are actually in the virus, but rather that they adjusted it. I don’t tend to see “spiritual beings” as existing, but rather as more of a metaphor allowing us to use concrete language about spiritual issues. But then that’s my theology. Others will be more receptive to spiritual entities, many will be less so. That’s theology for you!
And thus I see ID as badly done theology, because it does not fit itself into any theological system, including the one purportedly held by most of its advocates, and because it presents itself as though it was theologically demonstrating something it cannot. In my own Christian view of a creator God who is sovereign over all and designed everything, however small, including many processes that produce other things in predictable ways, it is also just plain bad theology. Your mileage may differ on how good the theology is, but it remains theology, nonetheless.
But something else that shows up here is that it is also politics, because it shows a different face to different people. Many Christians right now are deceived into thinking that somehow these scientists who advocate ID have “proven” the existence of God and the presence of the creator. Because they believe this has been scientifically proven, they cannot see why it should not be taught as science in the classroom. Finally, they think, the existence of God has been made as certain as the principles that allow an airplane to fly! But ID has acomplished no such thing, and I would suggest that Christians should not rejoice if it had. The ID movement is perpetrating this deception as a political strategy. This makes it badly done theology used as a political strategy. The jury is still out on whether it’s an effective political strategy.
“Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1, NRSV). Let’s not confuse that with science. If that type of faith embarrasses you, perhaps you should reconsider your faith choice.
Three posts today called my attention to the problem of uncritical thinking amongst Christians. This is a topic I bring up frequently. It’s not that I believe those who think critically will automatically agree with me. I’ve had to revise some of my own opinions after thinking critically about them at a later date. But some people seem to be sailing through the intellectual seas without any rudder at all.
How long, gullible people, will you love being gullible?
You scorners delight in scorn?
And fools hate knowledge? — Proverbs 1:22Test everything!
Hold onto what is good.
Keep away from every form of evil. — 1 Thessalonians 5:21-22
(Translation by the author)
It seems that many Christians change this latter verse into “Accept everything, as long as the authors make sufficiently pious pronouncements.” This morning the gullible seem to be out in force. Actually, they probably always are, but this morning they caught my attention, which gave me a chance to blog about two of my favorite Bible verses (the two I quoted above, in case you missed it).
The first item I found via Dispatches from the Culture Wars via the post Catholic Art is Satanic. Ed Brayton’s post refers to an article over at WorldNetDaily titled ‘Satanic’ art in Catholic Church exposed: Documentary links clergy sex abuse with occult imagery. Sometimes “testing” doesn’t take very long. This one doesn’t pass the “snork test,” i.e. can you read it while drinking coffee and not have to clean your keyboard and monitor afterward. On the other hand, it illustrates a willingness amongst Christians to believe anything nasty about “those Catholics.” And just be aware that I did read the part about the authors being Catholic themselves, which is a good indication that often Catholics can be their own worst enemies. I bet this will be spread far and wide by non-Catholics looking for reasons why Catholics must not be real Christians.
Then I browsed over to The Panda’s Thumb where Nick Matzke pointed to another really interesting case. Here Robert C. Newman, in an article titled Rumors of Angels: Using ID to Detect Malevolent Spiritual Agents has now proposed a way to discover the activities not just of angels, but also of demonic agents in the world. What he seems to have failed to accomplish is to find any way to define just what it is that these agents do, or how one would scientifically determine the difference between a world in which angels and demons repeatedly made adjustments to creatures, and a world in which random mutations were selected for naturally. I do think that the folks in the intelligent design movement shouldn’t laugh at Newman’s work, however, since he has as much of a solid basis for it as they do for an “intelligent” design agent of undefined capabilities.
Finally, thanks to Nick Matzke’s entry, I followed a trackback to Uncommon Descent (Dr. Bill Dembski’s blog), where DaveScot demonstrates elitism for us. His original comment suggested that Nick Matzke had finally found an opponent that would make him look well-versed in science. That was a cheap, and inaccruate shot in itself. But then he tries the “we’re more elite than you” form of argument by posting an update to add that Newman has a PhD from “(Ivy League) Cornell” and thus he offers his ” . . . abject apologies to Dr. Newman for the comparison.” Yes, he really did add “(Ivy League)” in parentheses before the word “Cornell” for those of us to ignorant to understand the true importance of someone with a PhD from an Ivy League school. Hmmm . . . let’s see. While he was at it, he referred to Nick Matzke’s school as “unremarkable” and to his field of geography as much more lightweight than that of chemistry or biology.
I would suggest that it’s pretty silly for the person in the minority to try to make an argument based on the weight of degrees and on elitism. I find that generally a sign of intellectual vacuity in any case, and when one knows that one’s opponents are more numerous, with more prestigious degrees, and a much more substantial research and publication record, then it’s vacuity compounded by stupidity. Of course, he would like to think he’s merely attacking Nick Matzke, and perhaps is enjoying his cheap shot when he thinks he can get by with it. I would suggest instead working on some of that scientific research. Perhaps he can show us sometime how any amount of mathematical formulas will make garbage-in not result in garbage out.
I would not claim the prestigious degrees of the majority as proof that they are right. I know that minorities can become majorities if they have a good case.
(Oh, by the way, let me save you some time. I’m not a mathematician. My degrees are not in the natural sciences, not even in “lightweight” geography. I have not attained a PhD. My schools were not Ivy League, nor are they spoken of together with the University of Chicago. But my nonsense detector is in good shape.)
As reported in various newspapers and summarized on the Florida Citizens for Science web site, (Textbook Debate Still Evolving, Letter to Brevard County School Board, and Textbooks Changed under Pressure) a school board member in Brevard County wants to adopt a science textbook including two paragraphs about intelligent design. I find the introduction of these two little paragraphs into the curriculum of a public school disturbing. (Please read the articles linked, or some of my discussion will not make sense.)
Now some will (and some have) asked, why I should feel this way. After all, I’m a Bible teacher and an advocate for increased Bible study, though not at government expense. I’m an advocate of prayer, though not state sponsored prayer. I believe that the universe is designed. So what’s my problem?
Well, I have several problems. Primarily, though, we are talking about a science textbook, and what is introduced here is not science. The contents of science textbooks should be material that has gone through the processes of science–proposal, study through the scientific method, publication after peer review, criticism by others qualified to do the criticism, and then normally after some time of discussion, acceptance as part of the body of science.
These paragraphs do not represent any of that. They are there because people who could not get them accepted by active scientists, experts in the relevant fields, and so chose instead the process of public relations and political pressure. They abandoned the idea of seeking facts–accurate data–and instead sought popularity. They abandoned the idea of truth, and instead sought political force. What really gets on my nerves is that these are, in general, my fellow Christians. We supposedly share a commitment to openness and honesty. Most importantly, we should share a commitment to truth and to an individual’s freedom to test it, choose it, and express it.
Now they sell this all as an issue of free speech. Shouldn’t we allow all sides of the topic to be discussed in public schools? But that is not quite the point. The marketplace of ideas is definitely open to them. They can, and do, express this in many venues. But free speech does not imply that all speech is equal in all settings. If I write a devotional article and submit it to Scientific American, just as an example, I could hardly expect them to welcome it and publish it. That wouldn’t be because they hate religion, but because that isn’t the sort of thing they publish. My freedom to write didn’t impose upon them a duty to publish, and more importantly, it didn’t impose on them a duty to accept what I say.
The problem clearly isn’t free speech. There are ample opportunities for our children to hear these ideas. They can find them in books and they could hear them in Sunday Schools. It’s not the fault of our public education system that people don’t make adequate use of the available facilities. Since I do not accept the validity of intelligent design theory, I would oppose it–not the expression, but the viewpoint–in church settings or religious studies classrooms. But that, at least, would be the correct venue in which it should be discussed. Nobody is cutting off anyone’s free speech here. If they were, we would hear much less about all this.
The problem is that government authorities are refusing a state platform for them. That is their real complaint. They don’t want free speech; they want a forced audience, and the forced audience that they want is our children. Don’t let anyone convince you that adding ID theory to the classroom is a matter of free speech. It is not.
So what about evolutionary theory taught in the classroom? I could argue the evidence for evolution, but that is not the key issue here. The key issue is that evolutionary theory has gone through the process. It has made itself open to testing and refutation. The scientists who support it have proposed and done the experiments. They have had their ideas tested now for a century and a half. Evolutionary theory is science. So is the theory of gravity, of relativity, and many of the ideas of quantum theory. Each of these is equally subject to question, and each may, in the future, be revised or replaced by something that more precisely represents the data available.
That is what we need to teach our children in science class. Science. There is little enough time to teach real science. That is one good reason to limit what we teach to consensus science–what is agreed upon by the experts as working science. But there is a better reason. In basic education about science, we need to provide science with integrity. Not all ideas are equal, and we will, no matter what, choose some to present to our students as part of the science curriculum in middle and high school, while some will be left out. We need to make sure that what we present represents the scientific method at its best.
The theory of evolution does that. The very element that anti-evolutionists (not creationists–I believe in God the creator and I also accept evolution), use the most in attacking evolution is one of the strongest reasons why it should be part of the curriculum: Elements of the theory are being challenged and tested on a daily basis. There is effectively no scientific disagreement on the outlines, but in the details there is an abundance of excellent science being done. The debates that anti-evolutionists cite as a weakness in fact demonstrate the great strength of evolutionary theory as science.
If we allow a couple of paragraphs like this to enter into our science textbooks we have also opened the door to another disaster for knowledge and free exchange of ideas. We will have allowed popularity to determine the truth value of an idea or theory. I would think that my Christian brethren who have taken this position would consider the nature of their argument. Looking at polls and depending on popularity to win a debate about ideas is monstrously wrong, and should frighten any Christian. We know from our history what it is like to be in the minority, arguing for a viewpoint that we believe to be true, but is not accepted by those around us. We should treasure the free exchange of ideas. We should treasure the filter that we have in deciding the curriculum of our public (state supported) schools. When we instead try to have truth determined by popularity, we are stepping into very dangerous territory. It seems that being in the popular majority, in a country primarily of Christians, has made some of us intellectually and spiritually lazy.
Finally, I do want to add a brief note on my theological problems with ID. These issues are not the ones that should be involved in the textbook controversy. The issues there are and should be scientific. But ID proponents are claiming the support of a broad range of people who believe in God, even theistic evolutionists. We get included when it’s convenient and excluded when our ideas are distasteful.
I reject Intelligent Design because I believe the universe was designed by God. ID is mislabeled. It should be theistic. Further, it doesn’t prove what Christians want it to prove and what many think it proves. It proves only a level of divine intervention, not the absolute primacy of God the creator. I believe that God operates through natural processes, but I also believe God always operates everywhere. Because of that, intelligent design theory is anathema to me theologically. It’s not just God in the gaps; it is God reduced to a convenient size to be studied in a lab. I’m not surprised at the limited success ID advocates have had in producing new science. God woudn’t fit in their labs, so whatever they are studying is likely something else.
I have been writing for a number of entries about Christian views on origins. Since in some of these entries I was describing someone else’s view, I thought it would be a good idea to call attention to some good reading from advocates of each of the views. For more detail see Energion.com Classified Directory Page – Creation vs Evolution.
What I’m interested in in selecting this material is those resources that are accessible to a non-expert who is a serious student, that they are clear and generally complete, and that they represent their own position and that of others honestly. In this debate there’s a great deal of misrepresentation that takes place. This falls into two categories, with those in the young and even old earth creationist camps tending to question the sincerity of their opponent’s beliefs, and making what I would regard as spiritual judgments of them. This can even occur between young earth and old earth advocates. Belief in evolution is equated with atheism, and it doesn’t matter how much one confesses to belief in God, in Jesus, and other key doctrines, disagreement on this one topic is considered sufficient to effectively exclude one from Christianity entirely. On the other hand, there is a tendency by advocates of evolution to regard all opponents, young earth, old earth, and intelligent design, as either stupid or deranged.
I prefer those materials from creationists that do not pass spiritual judgment on evolutionists. Those materials are few and far between. I think it is appropriate for creationists to question my doctrinal views, for example. I don’t believe in inerrancy, and it is quite valid to point this out and relate it to my approach to understanding scripture. But don’t call me an atheist, not because it’s an insult (in my view it isn’t), but because it’s simply not true. So I have no problem with literature that is doctrinally hard-hitting.
From the other side I believe that false claims of credentials, misuse of credentials, and misrepresentation of opponents’ arguments are definitely fair game. But even if one regards certain arguments as stupid or ignorant, the people themselves may be quite intelligent and quite skilled in their own field.
Obviously, I have no power or authority to enforce such standards, but I do my best to point out where material I reference follows them and where it does not.
One general resource to look into is the book Three Views on Creation and Evolution. Note that I have not read this book, but I have read items by all of the authors, and I believe they represent their own position well.
Probably the major web resource on this topic is the Institute for Creation Research. In addition, if you read just one book on this topic, I recommend Faith, Form and Time by Dr. Kurt Wise (link is to my review). The reason I recommend this book is that its author has impeccable credentials, and spends most of his time on the data and very little time making negative remarks about his opponents’ character. The ICR material is more typical of the way this issue is often debated.
On the web, the key site here is Reasons to Believe, Dr. Hugh Ross’s ministry. Many people involved in the creation-evolution debate are actually old earth creationists, though young earth creationists tend sometimes to dismiss them. For information on old earth creationism, works by Dr. Hugh Ross (from the scientific perspective) or Gleason Archer (Biblical scholar) are generally good. Ross’s book A Matter of Days is a good place to start.
This is one of the hardest views to get substantial information about. A good overview is The Invisible War by Donald Grey Barnhouse.
Here your best online resource is the material from the American Scientific Affiliation. I recommend two books as must read information, Finding Darwin’s God by Dr. Kenneth Miller, and The Fourth Day by Howard van Till.
If you are unacquainted with this area, probably start with Darwin’s Black Box, by Michael Behe. It’s still kind of the starting point, especially for those of us who are not professional scientists.
There are those who might believe I don’t recognize this category, and in one way I don’t. I think that science done by a Christian believer and science done by an atheist should produce the same results, because both study the natural world. Disagreement centers on what else there may be. An excellent summary of the atheistic position is Richard Dawkins’ book The Blind Watchmaker. I found the book tremendously helpful in spite of the kind of gratuitous insults to my own position. Dawkins would probably prefer the debate to be entirely between atheistic evolution and young earth creationism. He might as well get used to disappointment. I’m even going to go right on buying and enjoying his books. So there! 🙂
For general information on evolution, I recommend Ernst Mayr’s book What Evolution Is. I’m definitely not an expert, and not even a well-informed amateur when it comes to biology, so this book was very hard reading for me. I read it with a dictionary within arm’s reach, and I had to go to the encyclopedia several times and also do a couple of web searches to learn about species that Mayr references as examples without any comment. But the experience was entirely worth the effort. This isn’t a book of polemics. It simply explains how evolution works and the basic evidence for it.
When I continue this series I’m going to go into the key elements of a Christian doctrine of creation and relate them to these various views. I outline what I believe these elements are in the Participatory Study Series pamphlet God the Creator.
