Our take on the ID controversy
“Intelligent design” refers to the claim that many aspects of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause.
The significance of this claim, if true, is not controversial. In the words of eminent Harvard biologist E. O. Wilson, “Any researcher who can prove the existence of intelligent design within the accepted framework of science will make history and achieve eternal fame.”[1] According to him, even the Nobel Prize “would fall short as proper recognition.”
Notice that Wilson here concedes that proving the design hypothesis is not categorically unscientific—if it were his statement would be nonsense. Furthermore, most careful thinkers concede the reasonableness of inferring that life was designed.
Geneticist Graham Bell, for example, writes the following in the introduction to his excellent technical monograph on natural selection:
A light bulb or a lathe are preconfigured in the mind, and constructed according to a plan. It is entirely reasonable to assume that beetles and daisies must be constructed after the same fashion, especially because they are much more complicated than anything that human ingenuity has so far managed to devise.[2]
Notice the absence of any mention of religion here. Bell seems to be saying that inferring intelligent design is just plain reasonable. Like Wilson, he prefers Darwin’s explanation, but he’s not the only modern Darwinist to concede that intelligent design is compelling in a common-sense way that requires no religious motives.
In fact, Richard Dawkins even recognizes the strength of the reverse logic, whereby people become religious because they see intelligent design in life:
Our world is dominated by feats of engineering and works of art. We are entirely accustomed to the idea that complex elegance is an indicator of premeditated, crafted design. This is probably the most powerful reason for the belief, held by the vast majority of people that have ever lived, in some kind of supernatural deity.[3]
So, in view of the unmistakable importance, the scientific legitimacy, and rationality of this design idea, you’d think every scientist would be asking the obvious scientific question—Is it true?
Many are, of course, and in this they share our judgment that the best way to settle scientific disputes is by doing good science. Regrettably, though, others seem bothered by the suggestion that this dispute hasn’t already been settled in Darwin’s favor. These people are happy to let science settle the matter—provided we all submit to their pronouncement that the case has been closed.
But science doesn’t work that way. It never has.
Science is the open-ended, open-minded pursuit of the best data and the best interpretations of those data. That’s the public enterprise that the public funds for the common good. So, instead of lamenting the fact that Darwin’s idea has never achieved a convincing win on the public stage, perhaps his sympathizers would do well to ask whether they really have a case. If convincing science is very convincing (and it is), then an unconvinced public should perhaps tell us something.
The scientists at Biologic Institute are convinced that careful science on the nature of life is poised not only to answer the design question, but also to usher in an exciting new era of scientific discovery.
[1] http://www.newscientist.com/channel/opinion/.
[2] Bell G (1997) Selection: The Mechanism of Evolution. New York: Chapman & Hall.
[3] Dawkins R (1986) The Blind Watchmaker. Longman.