ProTheism

There has been a lot of confusion about Intelligent Design going around the blogsphere. Personally, I support ID; but I wouldn’t be dogmatic about the whole subject. Apologia Christi has already posted a question and answer blog for the top questions about ID, and they are short and to the point. Perhaps if proponents and opponents just quickly reviewed them, they can take a more effectual approach on the subject. For the most part, all I have heard against ID is name calling—this is just a trick and accomplishes nothing.

ID is not Christianities saving ark. In fact, ID doesn’t even have any implications of Christianity other than some “intelligent creator.” At best, ID can lead someone to Deism. Wikipedia defines Deism as the classical view is that the universe was created by a God who then makes no further intervention in its affairs (the clockmaker hypothesis).

When Sir Isaac Newton published his Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica, wherein he described universal gravitation and, via his laws of motion, laid the groundwork for classical mechanics, he wanted to show how unified and structured the world was. Newton believed that to explain what happens is the scientist's domain, but to explain the "ultimate causation" is God's domain. Newton wanted to bring Christianity into conformity with science. However, Newton only popularized Deism, because that’s as far as his works can take you. In essence, he wanted to bring people to Christ with his work, but it backfired and people became deists.

If the logical conclusion of ID is deism; it is not religious. Calling ID religious doesn’t make it religious. Melinda Penner from STR illuminates for us the religion vs. science debate in ID:

"Very simply, science employs induction to develop theories about how the natural world works. We make observations and draw conclusions. Darwin did this on his trip to the Galapagos Islands and his conclusion was the theory of evolution that has since become the reigning paradigm in science. In the very same way, intelligent design employs inductive reasoning. Observing cases in the natural world that appear irreducibly complex and designed, some scientists conclude that there is a designer. It’s the same method used in science every day. Based on that, I think ID should be taught as a rival explanatory theory in public schools."

"Now, religion only comes in when we try to determine the nature of the designer. That extends beyond the evidence science provides. We might get some clues, but who the designer is belongs in the realm of religion. But this isn’t what proponents of ID want to teach. We only want the science to be taught."

"As it stands now with no rival theories in public schools, a philosophical or pseudo-religious point of view is implicitly part of the curriculum because evolution as a random, purposeless process is explicitly naturalistic or, we might even say, atheistic."If the same process of induction can lead to a rival theory that isn’t allowed to be taught in public schools, the exclusion is a result of religion or philosophy, not science."

It would appear that atheism dogmatically opposes ID for philosophical reasons. I think atheists should not fear ID. If there is no God (personal or not), experiments for ID should come up with a big fat zero. If ID does come up with a zero, then I guess all its proponents look foolish. Either way, this has turned into a philosophical debate, rather than a scientifically debate.

Labels: Design, Science