The "Intelligent Design" Debate: I Think I've Had Enough

Let me confess something: I am a practicing Catholic who is very much a fan of science. I know there are some of you out there who will find this difficult to believe; but for my part, it's entirely clear that an omnipotent Creator will make something really mind-bogglingly complex which will enlighten those who unravel it.

At the same time, I don't have any interest in public schools teaching my children about where and how the hand of the Divine makes itself manifest in the world. That's my job, and my Church's. Heck, I was at a parents' open house the other night and got a little worked up about the school's "credo" encouraging kids to be respectful and good citizens. But, with the encouragement of my wife, I shut up about these things.

Then something comes along such as Dr. Robert Schwartz's "Perspectives" editorial in the October 6, 2005 issue of The New England Journal of Medicine. Entitled "Faith Healers and Physicians — Teaching Pseudoscience by Mandate," it is a fairly vicious attack on the proponents of intelligent design, which the author considers "an insidious menace" that puts its advocates on par with the godless Joseph Stalin. The author's point, apart from the assertion that intelligent-design theory is crap, is that it will keep doctors from looking for the root causes of things, instead stopping at some arbitrary point and saying "Put down your tools and stop looking--I guess God just makes it happen." This is damaging, apparently, because a knowledge of the origins of a process are necessary to medical care and research. Hogwash. While physicians hate to be compared to mechanics, I think it's appropriate here: it's very much like a mechanic saying, "I don't know where this car came from, so I can't understand how it works."

In short, we have a prominent scientist managing to be offensive and condescending without actually saying anything. Indeed, he says himself of one opponent

Philip Johnson...can accurately pinpoint many problems that the theory of evolution has not come close to solving. His criticisms have merit, and his focus on precisely those things that we do not yet know blocks any rational dialogue.

A very scientific assessment. The author cannot answer the charges of his critics; therefore, the discussion cannot be rational. Dr. Schwartz would do well to look back on the history of science. We get taught in grade school, for instance, how Copernicus and Galileo showed a heliocentric system, whereas their predecessors were totally wrong. Well, this is true; but it also needs to be stated that the Ptolemaic system was very elegant and comprehensive, save for a few kinks that could not be adequately worked out. Or a better example: Newtonian mechanics cannot adequately account for Mercury's orbit, while Einstein's theories on general relativity can. What if scientists had argued that the fact Newton's theories had holes prevented any further discussion of the problem?

All that said, I do not believe the primary argument in intelligent design theory holds any water at all. Namely, the idea that we are the product of an extremely improbable process; so improbable that it could not have come about without divine intervention. I will say here as well, hogwash. A natural assumption given human nature, but not convincing. Improbable things happen all the time, such as people winning the lottery; improbable, but not impossible. From the standpoint of the lottery winner there is a disbelief that anything so rare could possibly happen to him, but does he say "this could not have happened without divine help"? Well, maybe. But the point is that it does not require divine intervention--just a lucky roll of the dice. Getting struck by lightning may be a one-in-a-million shot, but there are people who have gotten hit multiple times. Really weird, improbable things happen...are we to say that "it could not have happened" just because we're standing on the other end of the improbability?

Tags: Intelligent design, Evolution