ID: What is Intelligent Design (Part 2)

The fundamental claim of intelligent design is straight forward and easily intelligible: namely, there are natural systems that cannot be adequately explained in terms of undirected natural forces and that exhibit features which in any other circumstances we would attribute to intelligence.


William Dembski. The Design Revolution (IVP 2004), pg 27



According to Darwinism, undirected natural causes are solely responsible for the origin and development of life. In particular, Darwinism rules out the possibility of God or any guiding intelligence playing a role in life's origin and development. Within western culture Darwinism's ascent has been truly meteoric. And yet throughout its ascent there have always been dissenters who regarded as inadequate the Darwinian vision that undirected natural causes could produce the full diversity and complexity of life.

Until the mid 1980s this dissent was sporadic, focused largely at the grass roots, and seeking mainly to influence public opinion through the courts (and not very effectively at that). With the Intelligent Design movement this dissent has now become focused, promising to overturn the cultural dominance of Darwinism much as the freedom movements in eastern Europe overturned the political dominance of Marxism at the end of the 1980s.

The Intelligent Design movement begins with the work of Charles Thaxton, Walter Bradley, Michael Denton, Dean Kenyon, and Phillip Johnson. Without employing the Bible as a scientific text, these scholars critiqued Darwinism on scientific and philosophical grounds. On scientific grounds they found Darwinism an inadequate framework for biology. On philosophical grounds they found Darwinism hopelessly entangled with naturalism, the view that nature is self-sufficient and thus without need of God or any guiding intelligence. More recently, scholars like Michael Behe, Stephen Meyer, Paul Nelson, Jonathan Wells, and myself have taken the next step, proposing a positive research program wherein intelligent causes become the key for understanding the diversity and complexity of life.

* Note, IMHO this statement overlooks the strong and consistent criticisms of Macro Evolution leveled by both scientists and theologians over the last 150 years, as well as direct counter-response by members of the Creationist community.


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Critique by the Mark Farmer, Panda's Thumb. 7/10/10
http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2010/07/more-di-word-ga.html

Intelligent Design Creationism has evolved yet again. In preparing for a discussion last month (May) with Charles Thaxton I went to the DI’s site to see what their definition of ID was. What I found was this:


Intelligent design is a scientific theory which holds that certain features of the universe and living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, and are not the result of an undirected, chance-based process such as Darwinian evolution.

OK so what does the same site say today, a month later?

Intelligent design refers to a scientific research program as well as a community of scientists, philosophers and other scholars who seek evidence of design in nature. The theory of intelligent design holds that certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection.

Notice the two important differences? 1) Apparently ID is no longer a “scientific theory” instead it now refers to “a scientific research program” and 2) ID is no longer contrasted with “chance-based process such as Darwinian evolution.” but rather is now compared to “an undirected process such as natural selection.”

It makes one wonder whether this is simply the natural evolution of ID as it continually adapts to an ever changing environment or whether recent court defeats, rejections by state school boards, and continued lack of intellectual advancement have brought about their own form of punctuated equilibria for intelligent design.

http://www.wordiq.com/definition/Intelligent_design