Randomness, Creationism and Intelligent Design
With the coincidence of presidential politics and the start of the school year, the debate over what to teach as part of the standard science curriculum is making folks hot under the collar once more. Today, I’m posting an essay by David White, a retired educator and an acquaintance of mine, which offers a unique insight into the conundrum that seems to perplex and vex almost everybody on both sides of the issue.
The Creationist Chimera of Accidental Evolution Lives On as the Centerpiece of Intelligent Design
“God’s dice ever have a lucky roll.” –Sophocles
Practitioners of “intelligent design,” much like Molière’s Physician in Spite of Himself, not only belie the true nature of their avocation and motives but also play fast and loose with a commonly held precept. They tacitly negate the clear and completely traditional parameters that illuminate the position of chance occurrence in our universe.
How often do we see people settle an otherwise contentious decision by tossing a coin or by drawing straws near the climax of one of those tense action movies? It seems fair to all because it’s random and impartial; and most people seem to acknowledge this without any hesitation. Here’s the larger issue. What proponents of so-called intelligent design have cynically omitted in their polemic is that according to Biblical tradition, chance has always been considered God’s choice as well.
When Joshua divided the newly won Promised Land of Canaan among the tribes of Israel, it was done, as had been specifically commanded by God, through the casting of lots…in other words, by a roll of the dice. In Acts of the Apostles, the remaining apostles chose between two proposed replacements for Judas again by casting lots, clearly understood as a solemn appeal for God’s own choice. The Bible abounds with similar examples.
So, from this viewpoint, just how random is randomness in God’s most solemn and magnificent work of creation? Today’s scientists will readily tell you that in this “queerer than we can suppose” universe, as J.B.S. Haldane put it, order appears to be continually leaping forth from chaos. An uneasy boundary seems to interface certain unequivocally random initiations and their ultimately deterministic course of outcomes. Some decades ago, I heard the truly fascinating topic of randomness in our natural world beautifully unraveled in a spellbinding lecture series by Paul Weiss. I have considered it a remarkable and mysterious subject ever since.
I am, however, easily able to draw one inescapable conclusion: the chance vs. intelligence debate we are seeing today is about faith and not about science. For the skeptic, all chance can remain truly blind, and so it should. For the scripturally guided believer, however, an omnipotent God would have to be in charge of absolutely everything by definition. God as “designer” is already built into this metaphysical view of chaos, which triumphantly includes no true randomness component whatever.
Such overwhelming control would have to preside over any number of even the tiniest chance biochemical mutations and over any possible span of time. This would certainly stack the deck for natural selection. For truly rigorous people of the Book, there is no accidental evolution because there is no accidental anything. As is so often proclaimed in worship, God is in control. This credo should be all any believer of the precept would need to add from their own spiritual understanding in order to explain and integrate any construct based on scientific research into their worldview. Everyone could be happy.
But this is not the case. Astounding as it may seem, the stigmatization of chance as the lynch pin both of creationism and intelligent design is not only a totally unscriptural position, but it is borrowed from the atheist viewpoint. You may not ever hear this preached, but for the Bible believer, God can roll the dice infinitely and win at every turn. Much as I cringe feeling compelled to disagree with Albert Einstein, I have to consider, along with Ralph Waldo Emerson, that perhaps God does play at dice with the universe, but only with those ontologically loaded dice.
I can already begin to hear some rumblings coming from the amen corner…”Proof text! So where’s your proof text?”…O.K. it’s here, plain and simple, what some might call prophetic correction: “The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the Lord.” Proverbs 16:33 (NASB)
Yes, people of the era in which this line was written made their own instant gaming tables by sitting or squatting on the ground and casting lots, a game of chance equivalent to dice, perhaps on a portable game board held in their laps. Now, for those who would counter that even the devil can quote scripture, I might be willing to agree but have to point out that he doesn’t get to write it too, and this is just too clear a proclamation to misconstrue in any way. Every toss of the dice — that is, every decision based on chance – can only mean one thing when it comes to a fiercely unequivocal deity.
Accordingly, the rejection of biological evolution based essentially on the part played by chance, which appears to have become the sum and substance of intelligent design, is in fact a rhetorical chimera, an unworthy trick from those who should know better and probably hope that no one, not even their “designer,” is able catch them at it. The intelligent design movement has become an unabashedly transparent fig leaf for the urge to insert sectarian creationism into every science curriculum and text. Can any believer truly honor God with such dissimulation?
Instead of arguing disingenuously on behalf of faith that blind chance alone cannot produce such levels of order as science reveals, why don’t creationists and their heirs simply state that on scriptural grounds they believe God’s hand orders all chance, and be done with it? That would certainly put God squarely into the picture for any who choose to agree and would obviate the need to torture science in order to prove anything at all. Simply stated, as with any casino, the house always wins.
Most critically, this would also suggest a distinct mechanism through which the “designer” might participate in guiding the physical universe. At present, intelligent design is simply a wish, not even a well-framed hypothesis. It must offer a testable interfacing mechanism between the ”intelligence” and matter in order to meet the minimum threshold of being science at all. Since this has not even been hinted at, why substitute a charade of nit-picking at science for a simple and honest declaration of faith? Such a declaration would posit that what science demonstrates in the physical world also constitutes, within the limitations of our understanding, precisely what God intended.
This notion that God’s hand orders chance hardly represents a new viewpoint among religious scholars. Theologians have long held that what God desires to happen through chance will happen through chance. Nor is this position confined to the basic understandings of any one faith. Yet, intelligent design proponents insist on defining chance for everyone as designer-less, even while science itself does not, simply because this issue crosses over into the metaphysical, beyond where physical science permits itself to go.
We’re surely overdue for a Sic et Non examination of this dicey and irreducible contradiction in the creationist viewpoint which tirelessly propels the flagellum of intelligent design as well. I will leave it to the reader to decide to what extent the aggressive promulgation of sectarian religion in science education has helped stoke the greatest backlash against faith in anyone’s recollection.
Is there a clever reason why intelligent design proponents, even those of a professed religious bent, persist in avoiding this seemingly inescapable axiom from their own songbook? Must they avoid putting God in charge of chance because it would also demonstrate once and for all, that this inescapably religious precept, while perfectly legitimate for believers, does not support any insights from alternative science that need to be taught in schools?
I’m sure intelligent design proponents also realize that without their fatuous red herring, in terms of scripture, about what constitutes randomness, all that’s left of this “new” anti-evolutionary argument is the same old rejection of the increasingly well founded concept that all living things may belong to one truly amazing and ancient family. It’s just the same old monkey business once again.
But that appears, when viewed honestly, to have been the real sticking point all along, right from those heady days of Darwin, Huxley, and Bishop “Soapy Sam” Wilberforce. Might it be the horrific prospect of dethroning man from his cherished position as preeminent mini-god of this earth? Half a millennium ago the outraged predecessors of those who would currently deny the progress of scientific evidence railed against the prospect of earth itself being dethroned as the dimple of the entire universe around which the Sun and all the planets and stars revolved.
On the other hand, I am also amazed that scientists defending evolution fail to convincingly point out that a dead mechanical invention like a watch or a mousetrap cannot in any way explain the design process of living systems that reproduce, recycle, and recombine changeable components infinitely regardless of function. You’ll never find a watch with anomalous spare gear wheels, but many animals are continually born with useless extra limbs. Life is just full of untidy surprises.
For some of us who identify ourselves as people of faith, the creationist notion that God’s existence must be proved, particularly with sleight-of-hand maneuvers, is philosophically toxic as well. If such proof were ever possible to achieve, it would obviate the all-important value of faith as central to the life of the believer. It would also mean that pleasing God would forever after become stiflingly legalistic, and merely as rational as searching for the best interest rates. In evangelical terms, the crassest of pragmatists might soon be storming the Pearly Gates in droves, quite possibly leaving behind them in the dust those self-doubting, compulsively conscientious, and genuinely perplexed souls who have always lived and ultimately triumphed in their search for life’s meaning primarily by faith rather than by sight.
Curious isn’t it, that no matter how much scientific data we add to the mix, it is still not possible either to prove or to disprove God’s existence? Our great human dilemma seems as persistent as any other universal constant; it remains forever a matter of choice…a matter of faith, and that is indeed a remarkably intelligent design.
***
David M. White is a retired career educator and commercial developer of educational media materials. His academic specializations include educational technology, the administration of instructional resource and interactive learning facilities, and the design and development of self-paced courseware. A graduate of New York University, he has an M.A. in Science Education, and has served as a faculty administrator at Allan Hancock College and at Oregon Institute of Technology. His most widely read web feature, written as “Professor Nemo” is A Different da Vinci Code: The Missing Pieces of Leonardo’s Puzzle Point to Plane and Simple Hermeticism.
***
NOTICE: Reprinting/translation of this entire text is permitted, but only with attribution to the author, David M. White, and the original publisher, www.phoebekate.com and prior notification of the author at david-m-white@hotmail.com. Picture credit: Chris Lawson at Frankenblog.
You’re right. Christianity says God made everything. No debate.
But we are not talking religion, we are talking science. The point of science is to observe what there is and derive principles and determine relationships and processes. If one tries to determine ultimate sources, problems arise. If nobody saw the beginning, how can one say conclusively God did not make the universe?
You are also correct that the question is of faith, that is, what one holds to be true, and not science. By the same token science is also not able to say conclusively that it happened by chance.
“Science” so-called has stacked the deck in favor of chance. Men have decided that from the outset supernatural causes are not allowable explanation. This doesn’t result from observation, but from sheer bias. The only acceptable mechanism is chance. So far, the naturalistic explanation is: It just happened.
Does “It just happened” explain anything?
ID observes the complexity in the universe, from macro down to micro and asks, “Is it possible that something comes from nothing plus chance?” Chance is not power, nor is it information. It is just a mathematical expression of probability. Probability never made anything.
ID emphasizes that the sheer complexity of what is observable argues that impersonal and impotent “chance” is not adequate to explain anything. That leads to the only other possible explanation: personality, life, and complexity are the product of someone possessing intelligence, power, and life. Nobody has ever suggested a third explanation.
IDers are careful to say that ID can’t scientifically say that God made the universe because that is not an observable phenomenon. But on the basis of what is observable, ID says a Designer is a better explanation than “It just happened.”
Now, sir, what is dishonest in all this?
The very idea that a higher power made the universe is a philosophical idea. THAT is what is dishonest about most ID.
Some IDers take Einstein’s approach, which is not dishonest: God may have created the universe, but He used the laws of physics to do it. If we uncover these laws, eventually we will understand God’s Will and purpose.
The purpose of science is to uncover the mysteries of the world and to release the burden of the philosophical world from trying to explain “why is the sky blue,” “where do we come from,” and “why are we here?”
If science can sufficiently explain the (rather small, actually) universe that we live in without the need for “because I said so,” “just because,” or “God did it,” then I will look into it to determine whether or not it is justified well enough to omit the need for divine “light switches” (Robin Williams, Broadway 2002).
Believe in miracles, if you wish, but if they break the known laws of physics, they will be scrutinized until someone feels comfortable enough that it could be explained by mundane means.
As for a REASON the universe is created, the exact methods over which it is governed, the methods through which the ever-expanding multi-verse of 12-dimensional membranes (prevailing theory, anyway) came to be, explaining the inexplicable, etc. I will happily cede to the idea that there is/can be some type of deity out there.
And any scientist worth his/her/its Sodium Chloride would tell you that any scientific theory that is shown to be false in one case will either become revamped to better fit the data (like fine-chiseling or polishing a statue), or completely tossed out.
This is another dishonest part of ID. There is no need for any “revamping” because they are basing their entire theory on an unprovable hypothesis (God, or something very suspiciously like the Judeo-Christian God exists). It is a philosophy, not a science.
Click my website link to read my review of the book Only a Theory, which addresses the fallacy of irreducible complexity, once a centerpiece of ID but now increasingly discredited.
As the GWBush-conservative judge in the Kitzmiller v. Dover case ruled, ID is creationism in a fancy suit, a religious doctrine rather than a science, despite its claims to the contrary.
Dingman begins with the well known creationist red herring that Darwinian evolution is the same as the origins of life. It is not. Abiogenesis and evolution are two completely different studies and the principles that can be applied to one may or may not be applicable to the other.
Continuing, Science by definition is concerned with material phenomena and does not concern itself with spiritual phenomena–that is, science does not deal with myths of talking animals, the walking dead, and unprovable folktales. It is not difficult to determine which set of beliefs corresponds to the real world–which set of beliefs fit into a structure that can be tested and used to predict events in the physical world. The validity of science as a model of the world is the result of observation, not of bias.
Contrary to Dingman’s assertion, ID does not question whether supernatural powers affect the universe; ID states outright that such powers do exist and cause physical events in the physical universe, though, lest it be revealed as a religion, ID does not define the nature of these powers. In fact ID cannot find evidence of such powers or events. ID claims it is a science but ID cannot produce any examples or physical evidence of the processes supposed to occur through ID. ID is therefore not a science and IDs claims of being a science are fraudulent and dishonest.
Finally probability is not a physical thing, therefore it is true probability never made anything. However, the abstract concept of probability can be used to predict events in the real world and is useful in modeling the real world; ID can make no such models.
Unfortunately, if randomness were the only issue in dispute regarding the ID conflict, it would likely have been put to bed a long time ago.
No, the real sticking point with most of the ID’ers I’ve talked to is Young Earth Creationism. There’s no reasoning with unreason, unfortunately
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young_Earth_creationism
Interesting how the bedrock of this argument is now randomness, and whether one believes it actually exists in the real world or not.
A step of faith, indeed.
In short, if God is inscrutable, even random evolution is totally plausible.
I think the logical steps buried here are:
1. Premise: irreducible complexity.
2. Intuition: chance could not produce it.
3. Deduction: a Designer controls all events.
4. Premise: Designer anticipates outcomes beyond our knowledge and presumably has specific intentions that we don’t know.
5. Consequence: we cannot predict Designer choices.
6. Consequence: experiment does not (dis)prove.
7. Consequence: Science is not justifiable.
8. Consequence: Intuition (2) is invalid.
9. Consequence: Deduction (3) is unnecessary.
http://www.eequalsmcsquared.auckland.ac.nz/sites/emc2/tl/philosophy/dice.cfm explaining Einstein’s comment on God’s dice, has it that “causal determinism does not imply predictive determinism since the concept of causal determinism does not include anything about knowledge or predictability.”
Margarete Michel’s book, ‘Gone With the Wind’ was not written by chance. Neither was ‘The Book of Life’.
Zero
If ‘Gone With the Wind’ was not written by chance then the will of its writer is what made the difference.
If “The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the Lord.” Proverbs 16:33 (NASB) is true then the will of God is what makes that true.
It is perfectly possible for life to have arisen from physical processes apparently by chance and to develop and evolve without any apparent involvement by God, and still be entirely the product of God’s decisions.