The Intelligent Design (ID) movement is often portrayed as a religious Trojan Horse, a faux scientific steed hiding a band of religious fanatics trying to get a divine foot in the laboratory door.
Evolutionists … have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door. (Richard Lewontin)
The detractors of ID claim that it doesn’t offer specific scientific predictions and is guilty of filling the gaps in scientific knowledge with God. The problem is that they mistakenly believe that Christians worship a God who pulls rabbits out of hats rather than a designer who builds intricate ecosystems. It may be that the real motivation for their exaggerated criticism is jealousy. Confronted by design they have a very difficult time denying a guiding intellect and end up grasping at straws. Ironically, even a Scarecrow with a head full of straw knew that he had to consult a Wizard in order to find out that he actually possessed a mind.
The atheist tries to prevent God’s foot from getting in the scientific door by scaring us into believing that He is a snake oil salesman. However, much to their chagrin, many in their own scientific community are now entertaining the possibility that this foot may just be connected to a Universal Mind and instead of slamming it in His face they are now inviting Him in for a meet and greet.
Today, there is a wide measure of agreement, which on the side of physics approaches almost to unanimity, that the stream of knowledge is heading towards a non-mechanical reality; the universe begins to look more like a great thought than like a great machine. Mind no longer appears as an accidental intruder into the realm of matter; we are beginning to suspect that we ought rather to hail it as the creator and governor of the realm of matter. (Sir James Jeans)
Fearing that this universal immaterial mind will crowd out their highly developed physical brains, they cut Him down to size by declaring that He is just a chemical illusion. Confronted by design, they are forced to lobotomize the mind of God but in the process take a scalpel to the mind of man as well. Sadly, in the recovery room, the nurse informs them of some unanticipated surgical complications. The extremely finely tuned universe no longer has Someone to pull the levers and the highly evolved creature that they so cherish is reduced to an animal that drools every time Pavlov rings his bell. The intelligibility of the universe is replaced by a crap shoot and free will goes out the window and the only one who celebrates is the criminal who claims that his shooting spree was just due to a randomly bad neurochemical day.
If we are just nature red in tooth and claw then we can live on meat and potatoes but if we have immaterial souls then we must enrich our diet with the fruits of the Spirit. If we are meat computers then therapy is found in a butcher shop but if we are temples where our soul dwells then we need a great High Priest.
Whenever you meet a person you instinctively recognize that you are encountering another immaterial essence. You don’t dismiss the encounter as a mere chemical reaction but rather embrace it as a meeting of the minds. You cannot get to know another human by imaging their brain or measuring their neurotransmitter levels but you can by exploring their thoughts. It is the same with God, you cannot put His mind in a test tube but you can explore His thoughts by asking scientific questions about the words He spoke into creation long ago. Materialists reject God because they don’t want science to become a seance but then ironically keep chanting koans such as “design,” “masterplan,” “genetic code,” and “fine tuning,” all of which suggest that they really do believe that there is a ghost in the machine.
Intelligent Design resonates with me as a physician because I work with intricate physiological machines. Confronted by a particular physiological response or disease process that I don’t understand I never throw up my hands and just say “God did it.” I don’t attribute my scientific ignorance to a God of the gaps but rather view it as a divine stream of thought that I have yet to dip my toe in.
If you believe that the world was formed by random mistakes sifted by the cruel colander of natural selection then every scientific discovery is a one-night stand. A brief moment of exhilaration followed by the sad realization that it was a meaningless affair and all you have to show for it is an intellectually transmitted disease. If, however, you believe there is a mind behind the universe then each and every discovery is a conversation with a Friend and you find that your scientific social calendar is always full.
Intelligent Design predicts that you must to be very careful before you commit anything to the evolutionary scrap heap. For many years, scientists boldly proclaimed that our DNA was full of junk until some dumpster diving scientists defied the materialist chemical pool rules and jumped in to retrieve it. It appears that one scientists junk turns out to be another’s divine treasure. It also used to be in vogue to find fault with the biological world and point out that if God did in fact exist then He was a crappy creator, that cynical view has now been replaced by awe at the complexity of the natural world. In fact, this wonder has led to the development of the emerging field of Biomimetics where intricate biological machinery is used as templates for technological innovation. Instead of maligning nature, scientists are now mimicking it, and as we all know, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.
Interestingly, while Genesis is not a textbook it does give us some fascinating insights into how God and science are intimately connected. It describes a thinking God who speaks His mind. A spirit God who makes His immaterial thoughts a physical reality and then creates image-bearing scientists capable of understanding what He has just spoken. The progressive appearance of higher forms of life requires increasing amounts of genetic information and Genesis describes a God who delivers a series of daily lectures where He infuses more information into the universe with each ...And God said and the earth is more than happy to take down notes. Science as it turns out is really just a conversation between the Creator and the created.
If you want to dance on God’s grave then you had best make sure that He is brain dead. If, however, every time you do a mental status exam you detect evidence of design then the rumors of His death have been greatly exaggerated. Contrary to the critics, Intelligent Design isn’t the magic hand waving of mystics but is the most powerful science of all because it engages in Thought experiments.
Photo by Rohan Makhecha on Unsplash
