The Personal Website of Mark W. Dawson

Containing His Articles, Observations, Thoughts, Meanderings,
and some would say Wisdom (and some would say not).

Naturalistic/Materialistic or Intelligent Design Evolution

Introduction

Does nature as a whole point to a reality beyond itself, or can nature be better understood as an autonomous, self-existent, and self-organizing system? Does the worldview of naturalism or materialism prevail (hereinafter referred to as Naturalistic/Materialistic evolution), or does something like theism or deism (hereinafter referred to as Intelligent Design evolution) better explain key scientific discoveries?

I am a firm believer that science is the best way of explaining the physical properties and physical laws of the universe. I also am a firm believer that God created our universe and established its physical properties and physical laws. And I see no conflict between the views of Science and Religion, as I have written in my article “Science versus Religion”. Science is the explanation of how God created the universe, and God is the explanation of why we have the physical properties and physical laws of the universe.

For over a century, Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution has been as unquestioned as Newton’s theory of gravity had been unquestioned. But Newton’s theory of gravity was eventually overturned by Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity. As science never stops asking questions, or at least it is not supposed to, many scientists are taking up the challenge of the origins and evolution of the Universe and Life that Naturalistic/Materialistic evolution cannot answer.

To this challenge arose the Intelligent Designer theory of evolution. Initially, I was highly dubious of Intelligent Design theory (then known as “Creation Science”), as it seemed to presume a God and then improperly used science to justify this belief in a God. However, in the last several decades, many scientists took the path of first analyzing the science to determine the shortcomings of the Naturalistic/Materialistic evolution and the veracity of an Intelligent Designer. This path has led them to believe that the Naturalistic/Materialistic explanation of evolution could not answer some basic questions and/or was highly improbable. Thus, the Theory of Intelligent Design arose that placed science first and foremost, which led them to believe that Intelligent Design evolution was the best explanation for the evolution of the Universe and Life. Contrary to media reports, Intelligent Design is not a religious idea but an evidence-based scientific theory about the Universe and life’s origins. Thus, Intelligent Design is not based on religion but on scientific discoveries and our experience of cause and effect, the basis of all scientific reasoning about the past. Unlike creationism, Intelligent Design is an inference from scientific data. While believing in an Intelligent Designer may lead you to a belief in God, this is not necessarily so, as it is a belief that Naturalistic/Materialistic evolution cannot provide the answers to the origins of the Universe and Life and, therefore, it is more likely the result of an Intelligent Designer.

In 2004, the distinguished philosopher Antony Flew of the University of Reading made worldwide news when he repudiated a lifelong commitment to atheism and affirmed the reality of some kind of creator. Flew cited evidence of intelligent design in DNA and the arguments of “American [intelligent] design theorists” as important reasons for this shift. As Professor Flew advises: “We must follow the evidence, wherever it leads.” so must we evaluate Intelligent Design based on the evidence, not philosophical preferences.

But first, we must consider a few scientific premises to understand the issue of Naturalistic/Materialistic or Intelligent Design Evolution.

Scientific Premises

As I have written in my Article “On the Nature of Scientific Inquiry”, science is in a constant state of flux. New facts or corrected facts are always being discovered. This leads to revision in current theories or the creation of new hypotheses that could displace a currently accepted theory. It should be remembered that scientific theories are not guesses (as English parlance defines theory) but are the best explanations for the facts, as the American paleontologist, evolutionary biologist, and historian of science Steven Jay Gould has stated:

“Well, evolution is a theory. It is also a fact. And facts and theories are different things, not rungs in a hierarchy of increasing certainty. Facts are the world’s data. Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts. Facts do not go away when scientists debate rival theories to explain them. Einstein’s theory of gravitation replaced Newton’s, but apples did not suspend themselves in mid-air, pending the outcome. And humans evolved from apelike ancestors whether they did so by Darwin’s proposed mechanism or by some other yet to be discovered.”
- Steven Jay Gould

All scientific theories are incomplete, as not all the facts are known, or some of the known facts could be incomplete or incorrect. Therefore, scientific theories are subject to modification or replacement. But just because a scientific theory may be incomplete or contain incorrectness, it does not make them necessarily wrong. They could be wrong, but it is more likely that they need to be modified. Only when a scientific theory has been shown by new or corrected facts to be incapable of modification should we consider it to be wrong. At that point, it may be advisable to consider rejecting the scientific theory or displacing it with a new scientific theory.

Deductive, Inductive, and Abductive reasoning, and Bayesian Inference

When evaluating a scientific hypothesis or theory in which there is no direct evidence that can be confirmed by observation and/or experimentation, scientists must utilize Deductive, Inductive, and Abductive reasoning, then apply Bayesian Inference to reach a conclusion. Thus, to understand the arguments for or against Naturalistic or Theistic Evolution, a brief description of these techniques is in order:

Deductive, Inductive, and Abductive Reasoning Explained from the website factmyth.com:

Deductive reasoning deals with certainty, involving reasoning from general principles to specific conclusions. If the premises are true, the conclusion must be true. Example: All humans are mortal (premise), and Socrates is a human (premise); therefore, Socrates is mortal (conclusion).

Inductive reasoning deals with probability, involving reasoning from specific observations to broader generalizations. The conclusion is likely, but not guaranteed, to be true. Example: You observe that the Sun has risen every day of your life, so you conclude that the Sun will rise tomorrow.

Abductive reasoning deals with guesswork, involving reasoning from incomplete information to form a hypothesis or a best guess. Example: Your car won’t start in the morning. Based on your knowledge of cars and the circumstances, you hypothesize that the battery is dead.

Bayes’ Theorem Can Calculate Probable Truth from the website factmyth.com:

Bayes’ theorem is a probability theory used to calculate the likelihood of an event being true or not true based on conditions related to the event. (i.e., an equation used for calculating conditional probabilities).

In other words, Bayes’ theory is a logical statistics-based theory that expresses the concept that we can compare conditional probabilities to find the likely truth with a mathematic equation.

In non-math terms, Bayes’ theory says, “the more variables considered, and the more certain we are of those variables, then the more certain we can be about our conclusion.”

Or, “the more data pointing to a true outcome, the higher the odds that the outcome is true.” Likewise, “the more data pointing at a false outcome, it’s less likely it is the outcome is false.”

In conclusion, it can be said that:

Deductive Arguments: The Conclusion is Certainly True
Inductive Arguments: The Conclusion is Probably True
Abductive Arguments: The Conclusion is the Best Explanation
Bayes’ theorem: An equation for calculating the likelihood of inductive arguments that utilize statistical reasoning.

It can also be said that applying Bayes’ theorem to Abductive Arguments provides inference to the best explanation for a natural event.

Occam’s Razor

Occam’s razor is a Philosophical premise that is often utilized in science. In philosophy, a razor is a principle or rule of thumb that allows one to eliminate (“shave off”) unlikely explanations for a phenomenon or avoid unnecessary actions. Thus, Occam’s razor can be stated in several different ways:

“Simpler explanations are more likely to be correct; avoid unnecessary or improbable assumptions.”
“Entities should not be multiplied beyond necessity.”
“The simplest explanation, that fits all the known facts, is most often the correct explanation.”

This philosophical razor advocates that when presented with competing hypotheses about the same phenomena, one should prefer the one that requires the fewest assumptions. Occam’s razor is not meant to be a way of choosing between hypotheses that make different predictions but only to help determine the most likely explanation. Similarly, in science, Occam’s razor is used as an abductive heuristic in the development of theoretical models rather than as a rigorous arbiter between candidate models.

Occam’s razor is used to evaluate two or more competing scientific hypotheses to determine the most likely explanation for a scientific phenomenon. It is the problem-solving principle that recommends searching for explanations constructed with the smallest possible set of elements. It is also known as the principle of parsimony or the law of parsimony. However, it should be noted that Occam’s razor does not state that the simplest explanation is the more likely explanation, as an explanation must account for all of the known facts to be considered as a likely explanation. Thus, a simple explanation that does not explain all the known facts may be rejected as not scientific.

The Limitations of Scientific Laws

It should be noted that Scientific Laws are descriptive and not explanatory. Many scientific laws describe regularities but do not explain why the events they describe occur. Scientific Laws cannot be equated with causes or as explanations for a second reason. Many scientific explanations do not depend, either principally or at all, upon scientific laws. Many scientific explanations depend primarily upon antecedent causal conditions and events, not laws. That is to say, citing past causal events often does more to explain a particular phenomenon than citing the existence of a regularity in nature. A scientific example of this is that scientific laws can explain the result of a cue ball striking a billiard ball but do not explain why the cue ball was set in motion. Was the cue ball's initial movement that of a person involved in a competitive poll competition that used a billiard cue stick to strike the cue ball, or was it just a friendly game of pool in which a person used a billiard cue stick to strike the cue ball, or perhaps, even a drunk person grasping the cue ball and flinging it at the billiard balls. Scientific laws cannot explain where the person placed the cue tip in relation to the cue ball (up, down, or center), the angles and direction of the cue stick, and the amount of force to be applied against the cue ball by the cue stick. Once a person has made these decisions and applied them, then scientific laws can determine the outcome of these decisions. Thus, the initial conditions (or scientific boundaries) must be set before the scientific law can be applied.

Consequently, science often cannot be used to explain the “primary explanatory work” of why an event initially occurred (for a more thorough explanation of this, I would direct you to the article by Stephen C. Meyer, “Laws, Causes and Facts”), but once a decision is made scientific laws can explain the outcome of the decisions. A good example of this from the history of science was Newton’s Universal Law of Gravitation, which Newton himself freely admitted did not explain, but instead, he merely described gravitational motion that states that any two bodies in the universe attract each other with a force that is directly proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them. This is a general physical law derived from empirical observations by what Isaac Newton called induction. It is a part of classical mechanics and was formulated in Newton’s work Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica (“the Principia”), first published on 5 July 1687. As he put it in the “General Scholium” of the second edition of the Principia: “Hypothesis non fingo” (i.e., “I do not feign hypotheses”).

Newton’s universal theory of gravitation held sway for over two hundred years, but as Newton freely admitted he did not know what gravity actually was, he simply described how it worked. Over these centuries, Astronomers observed an inconsistency in the orbit of the planet Mercury that Newton’s gravitational theory could not account for. They tried to reconcile the inconsistency with Newton’s theory but failed. It took another great scientist, Albert Einstein, to propose a new theory of gravity in 1912, General Relativity, which resolved this inconsistency of the motion of Mercury and predicted other gravity phenomena that Newton’s theory could not account for. Therefore, General Relativity theory displaced Newton’s Universal Gravity theory.

The Vastness of Space and the Enormity of Time

One of the peculiarities of the human mind is its inability to grasp the very small and the very large. We place numbers on the very small and very large to assist us in comprehending them. However, we can never fully grasp them in their entirety. The Enormousness of Time and the Vastness of Space in the Universe is something that the human mind is incapable of grasping. A universe that is 13.8 billion years old and perhaps hundreds of billions of light years in size is not something a human being can fully grasp. The vastness of space is not germane to this article, but the enormousness of time is germane. We must always keep in mind the enormousness of time whenever we discuss evolution.

The Universe is about 13.8 billion years old, while the Earth is about 4.5 billion years old, and the evolution of microbial life on Earth started about 3.7 billion years ago. The earliest evidence of complex cells with tiny cellular structures that perform specific functions within a cell date back 1.85 billion years, while more complex life forms began about 850 million years ago. The Cambrian Explosion event occurred approximately 541 million years ago when most major animal phyla appeared in the fossil record. It lasted for about 13 to 25 million years and resulted in the divergence of most modern life forms. Human evolution is the evolutionary process that led to the emergence of anatomically modern humans, beginning with the evolutionary history of primates—in particular, genus Homo—and leading to the emergence of Homo sapiens as a distinct species of the hominid family, the great apes. Within the ape's superfamily, the Hominidae family diverged from the gibbon family some 15–20 million years ago; African great apes diverged from orangutans about 14 million years ago; and the humans, Australopithecines and other extinct biped genera, and chimpanzees tribe parted from the gorilla tribe between 8–9 million years ago. The humans and their biped ancestors and chimpanzees separated from the others about 6 to 7 million years ago. Thus, we can determine a lineage for the evolution of intelligent beings (humans) from a common ancestor (hominids).

As can be seen, the evolution of life on Earth took an enormous amount of time, and even the 6 to 7 million years it took for humans to evolve is an extremely large amount of time. Always keep in mind the enormousness of time whenever you think about evolution.

Keeping these thoughts in mind, we can begin to discuss the issue of Intelligent Design evolution versus a Naturalistic/Materialistic evolution of the Universe and Life.

Scientific Advances

Three advances in science in the last several decades have called into question the Naturalistic/Materialistic evolution of the Universe and Life and have given rise to an Intelligent Designer evolution hypothesis to resolve the problems that these discoveries invoke. The main discoveries are:

The discovery that the Universe must have been created in The Big Bang Theory.
The determination that the physical constants and properties of the Universe are extremely fine-tuned for the emergence of life.
The enigma of the complex information coding of the DNA in the cell that is required for even the simplest forms of life to exist.

Using Deductive, Inductive, and Abductive reasoning, then applying Bayesian Inference to reach a conclusion, throws into doubt that Naturalistic/Materialistic evolution can explain these discoveries. Using these same techniques on Intelligent Design evolution and then evaluating the Naturalistic/Materialistic and Intelligent Design evolution conclusions with Occam’s razor to determine the best explanation for these discoveries increases the likelihood that Intelligent Design may be the correct explanation.

The Creation of the Universe

For time immemorial, humankind has gazed at the stars and thought that the universe had existed throughout time. They also believed that the universe consisted of only the Milky Way galaxy and was thus finite with fixed stars and moving planets. Indeed, when Albert Einstein developed his Theory of Universal Gravitation, he realized that it implied that the universe could be expanding or contracting, so he added a Cosmological Constant to his equations to maintain a fixed state for the Universe. When the astronomer Edwin Hubble discovered in 1924 that many of the hazy patches in the photographs that he was studying were actually other galaxies far outside the Milky Way galaxy, it was realized the Universe was infinite. About a decade later, he discovered that these external galaxies were moving away from each other (through the spectral Gravitational Redshift increases with distance), and thus our Universe was expanding. Einstein, at first, disbelieved these findings but soon began to accept them as fact. Einstein withdrew his Cosmological Constant, but much later, it was revived and reinterpreted as the energy density of space, or vacuum energy, which arises in quantum mechanics. The Cosmological Constant is also closely associated with the concept of dark energy.

The expansion of the Universe called into question if, at some point in the distant past, all the matter and energy of the Universe was compacted into a single point (a Gravitational Singularity), and therefore the universe had a beginning and did not exist throughout time. There was also much debate if the Universe would expand forever (an Expanding Universe) or if gravity would be stronger than the expansion and the universe would eventually stop expanding and collapse into itself and trigger another expansion (an Oscillating Universe). Some even proposed that new galaxies formed within the expansion, and thus, the Universe could exist throughout time (a Steady State Universe).

It was discovered that the universe had insufficient mass for gravity to overcome the expansion, and therefore, an Oscillating Universe was not possible. Thus, the scientific dispute was between a Steady State Universe or a Universe with a beginning point that erupted to create the Universe. The Steady State Universe advocates derisively labeled the Expansion as a Big Bang Theory. It was agreed that an erupting universe would leave a lingering signature as Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) radiation that should be detectable. When such a signature was detected in 1965, it was considered landmark evidence of The Big Bang Theory for the origin of the universe, and the Steady State Universe theory was abandoned.

An Expanding Universe implied that the Universe had a beginning and that it was finite in size as it could not be larger than the expansion rate would allow from the beginning of the Universe. It was determined that the Universe was about 13.8 billion years old and that the size of the Universe, based upon our best guesstimate using the most accepted method, is approximately 91 billion light years in diameter.

The beginning of the Universe begs the question of what was the trigger mechanism that initiated the eruption of the Universe. There is no known, and perhaps unknowable, Naturalistic/Materialistic explanation for this eruption. Many scientists have postulated some exotic speculations as to how this happened, with the most common speculations being:

The Multiverse is the hypothetical set of all possible universes. Together, these universes are presumed to comprise everything that exists: the entirety of space, time, matter, energy, information, and the physical laws and constants that describe them. The different universes within the Multiverse are called “parallel universes”, “other universes”, “alternate universes”, or “many worlds”. One common assumption is that the Multiverse is a “patchwork quilt of separate universes all bound by the same laws of physics.”

Brane cosmology refers to several theories in particle physics and cosmology related to string theory, superstring theory, and M-theory. This cosmology postulates that for an eternity, our universe lay dormant—a frozen, featureless netherworld. Then, about 14 billion years ago, the cosmos got an abrupt wake-up call. A parallel universe moving along a hidden dimension smacked into ours. The collision heated our universe, creating a sea of quarks, electrons, protons, photons, and other subatomic particles. It also imparted microscopic ripples, like ocean waves crashing on a shore. These ripples generated tiny fluctuations in temperature and density, the seeds from which all cosmic architecture—from stars to gargantuan clusters of galaxies to galactic superclusters—ultimately arose.

The Many-Worlds interpretation (MWI) is a philosophical position about how the mathematics used in quantum mechanics relates to physical reality. It asserts that the universal wavefunction is objectively real and that there is no wavefunction collapse. This implies that all possible outcomes of quantum measurements are physically realized in some “world” or universe. In contrast to some other interpretations, the evolution of reality as a whole in MWI is rigidly deterministic and local.

Thus, these speculations postulate that the Universe is unbounded in time and space, with our Universe being only one of many universes that exist throughout time and space. There are many scientific and philosophical objections to these postulations, and using Abductive reasoning along with Bayes’ Theorem, it seems highly unlikely that these postulates have any merit or basis in reality.

As the late great Astrophysicist Robert Jastrow commented when confronted by the evidence of the reality of the Big Bang Theory in the creation of the Universe:

“it is an exceedingly strange development, unexpected by all but the theologians. They have always accepted the word of the bible. In the beginning God created the heaven and Earth. . . . The development is unexpected because science has had such extraordinary success in tracing the chain of cause and effect backward in time. For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountains of ignorance, he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the highest rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries.”

The Fine-Tuning for Life in the Universe

It was also discovered that the fundamental properties and constants of the Universe, as I have written in my article “The Fundamental Properties and Constants of the Universe”, are fine-tuned for the existence of life in our Universe. The Fundamental Properties of the Universe are Relativity (both General and Special Relativity), Quantum Mechanics (including the Laws of Thermodynamics and Entropy), DNA and Molecular Biology, and Evolution (the evolution of the universe as well as the evolution of biology). If any of these constants and properties are changed, then life could not have arisen in our Universe. The question is, then, why this fine-tuning occurred in our Universe?

Scientists have responded to this question by postulating the Multiverse, Brane cosmology, and the Many-Worlds interpretation, amongst others, postulate many universes and that we inhabit just one of the many universes that fit the Anthropic principle. The Anthropic principle, also known as the “observation selection effect”, is the hypothesis, first proposed in 1957 by Robert Dicke, that the range of possible observations that could be made about the universe is limited by the fact that observations could happen only in a universe capable of developing intelligent life. Proponents of the anthropic principle argue that it explains why the universe has the age and the fundamental physical constants necessary to accommodate conscious life since if either had been different, no one would have been around to make observations. Anthropic reasoning is often used to deal with the idea that the universe is finely tuned for the existence of life.

There are many different formulations of the Anthropic principle. Philosopher Nick Bostrom counts them at thirty, but the underlying principles can be divided into “weak” and “strong” forms, depending on the types of cosmological claims they entail. The Weak Anthropic Principle (WAP), as defined by Brandon Carter, states that the universe’s ostensible fine-tuning is the result of selection bias (specifically survivorship bias) and that our location in the universe is necessarily privileged to the extent of being compatible with our existence as observers.”. Note that for Carter, “location” refers to our location in time as well as space. Most such arguments draw upon some notion of the Multiverse for there to be a statistical population of universes from which to select. However, a single vast universe is sufficient for most forms of the WAP that do not specifically deal with fine-tuning. Carter distinguished the WAP from the Strong Anthropic Principle (SAP), which considers the universe in some sense compelled to eventually have conscious and sapient life emerge within it, and hence the fundamental parameters on which it depends must be such as to admit the creation of observers within it at some stage.

Once again, there are many scientific and philosophical objections to the Anthropic principle. The philosophers of cosmology John Earman, Ernan McMullin, and Jesús Mosterín contend that “in its weak version, the anthropic principle is a mere tautology, which does not allow us to explain anything or to predict anything that we did not already know. In its strong version, it is a gratuitous speculation”. A further criticism by Mosterín concerns the flawed “anthropic” inference from the assumption of an infinity of worlds to the existence of one like ours:

“The suggestion that an infinity of objects characterized by certain numbers or properties implies the existence among them of objects with any combination of those numbers or characteristics [...] is mistaken. An infinity does not imply at all that any arrangement is present or repeated. [...] The assumption that all possible worlds are realized in an infinite universe is equivalent to the assertion that any infinite set of numbers contains all numbers (or at least all Gödel numbers of the [defining] sequences), which is obviously false.”

When using Abductive reasoning along with Bayes’ Theorem and then applying Occam’s razor, it seems highly unlikely that the Anthropic principle has any merit or basis in reality.

The Creation of Life

The complexity of life, even in its simplest form, poses many questions as to how it could arise and mutate into complex life forms through Naturalistic/Materialistic evolution. The two largest problems arise in the DNA Enigma of the creation of life and the rapid rise and multitude of complex life forms from simplistic life forms in The Cambrian Explosion.

The DNA Enigma

The DNA Enigma refers to the statistical improbability of DNA to sequence and resequence itself to produce viable and even improved DNA that can be utilized for the propagation and improvement of a species. Each species has a different complexity of its DNA, with different orders and different sequences that define its DNA. This DNA information is in the form of four strings of precisely sequenced chemicals called nucleotide bases that store and transmit the assembly instructions—the information—for building the crucial protein molecules that the cell needs to survive. The number of possible permutations of the DNA that can support life is exceedingly small compared to all the possible permutations. For the possibility of a life-supporting DNA combination to arise through natural selection would mathematically take more time than the age of the Universe. The complexity of this arrangement would belie that they would happen naturally, as complex structures in nature do not arise spontaneously. Complex structures in nature form from combinations of simple structures, and even the simplest form of life has a complex DNA structure. When someone encounters a complex structure not built upon simple structures, they can safely assume that an intelligence was responsible for the design and development of the complex structure.

The adage that a million monkeys typing for a million years could produce the writings of William Shakespeare is false. The odds of the monkeys randomly typing to produce the phrase “To be or not to be.” is 1 in septillion (or 58 x 10²⁴). A 2003 experiment aimed at testing the theory suggests it might help to start by teaching the monkeys not to pee on their keyboards. Thus, the random creation of the DNA combinations needed to produce the simplest life form is much more than astronomical, and with the addition of more monkeys and/or more time, it is still astronomical.

There is also the example of the difference between the following two lines:

noiuqehtseetahtsiTbebeotrotono
To be or not to be, that is the question.

Both of these lines use the same number and frequency of characters, but one implies randomness while the other implies intelligence. So, it is, with the creation of the complex DNA structures of the simplest forms of life.

Therefore, it is highly statistically unlikely that a random reordering or resequencing that Naturalistic/Materialistic entails would produce viable life DNA, let alone an improved viable life DNA. Consequently, it is reasonable to deduce that an Intelligent Designer wrote the DNA structure for life.

The Cambrian Explosion

The other issue is the explosion of life forms that happened in the Cambrian Explosion event that occurred approximately 541 million years ago when most major animal phyla appeared in the fossil record. It lasted for the relativity short evolutionary period of 13 to 25 million years, rather than the previous hundred million years of evolution of simplistic life forms evolution. It is correct to point out that this seems to be a relatively short period of time for this to happen; however notwithstanding, 13 to 25 million years is still an enormous amount of time. Also, it should be pointed out that there is a dearth of facts about what the environmental state of the Earth was during this time. Given the hundreds of millions of years of erosion (water, atmospheric, glaciation, volcanism, earthquakes, tectonic activity, solar activity, life form activities, etc.), it is amazing that we have as much information as we currently have. We may expect that we will gain more information in the future, but we can also expect that we cannot gain all the information that we need. Much of the information may have simply disappeared due to erosion. The Cambrian Explosion event needs more information and better science for us to understand its workings. This will most likely lead to a modification to the scientific theories on what occurred, but probably not to a replacement of the scientific theory.

As I agree that random reordering or resequencing is very highly statistically unlikely, it is not impossible given the enormous amount of time it took life to evolve. Perhaps it only takes a few lucky hits for life to evolve rather than trying for all possibilities. Maybe we just got lucky, but I would not bet any significant money on this luck. But the inherent assumption of all of this is the word “random”. Perhaps there were environmental factors that reduced this randomness to the point of possibility. Perhaps there is something in the DNA (i.e., the “Dark Matter of the Genome”) that restricts the randomness. In other words, it’s not the chemistry or physics that produces the sequences that convey the instructions; it is something extraneous to the physics and chemistry of the system, and that extraneous something remains a scientific mystery. However, in evaluating any new findings, you must use abductive reasoning and then apply Bayesian Inference to reach a conclusion, then apply Occam’s razor to the possible Naturalistic/Materialistic conclusions while including Intelligent Design explanations in the evaluation.

There is also the question of increased radiation striking Earth that may have caused genetic mutations in preexisting life. The Sun revolves around the Milky Way galaxy about once every 250 million years. When the Sun does this, it moves closer or farther away from the center of our galaxy, and it can be expected that the radiation levels will increase when it is closer, as there is a greater concentration of energetic stars near the center of our galaxy, as well as increased radiation from the Black Hole at the center of our galaxy. In addition, during this revolution, the Sun can approach groups or clusters of stars and/or energetic stars, which can increase the radiation levels striking the Earth. There is also the question of Cosmic Ray radiation striking the Earth. Cosmic Rays from Deep Space are always striking the Earth. The quantity and distribution, along with the intensity, of Cosmic Rays is purely random as a function of Cosmic Ray bursts that occur throughout our Galaxy and other Galaxies (Cosmic Rays do reach us from other Galaxies). If there was an increase in Cosmic Ray activity during the Cambrian Explosion, it may have impacted life on Earth. It should also be pointed out that increased radiation can also destroy life (more likely) as well as mutate DNA (less likely). I have not seen nor heard of any scientific research that addresses this question, but I believe that this question is worthy of scientific consideration.

The Cambrian Explosion of diverse and complex life forms is a large and important issue for Naturalistic/Materialistic evolution to explain how it happened. But I would point out that there is a dearth of facts about what was occurring on Earth during these times and how it impacted the evolution of life. When, or if, we discover more and better facts about what was occurring on Earth at this time, we may be able to modify the Naturalistic/Materialistic evolution theories to explain how this explosion occurred; however, with the information that we currently possess it reasonable to deduce that an Intelligent Designer may be responsible for this explosion.

In both the DNA Enigma and The Cambrian Explosion, if you use abductive reasoning, then apply Bayesian Inference to reach a conclusion, and then evaluate the conclusions of Naturalistic/Materialistic evolution and Intelligent Design evolution utilizing Occam’s razor, it would seem that an Intelligent Designer evolution is more of a likely explanation than a Naturalistic/Materialistic evolution.

Conclusions

It is not possible for science to completely explain everything due to not all the facts being known or that some of the known facts could be incomplete or incorrect. Science is constantly reexamining its facts through observations and experimentation to determine their validity and to gain additional facts. When more facts become known, scientific theories are modified to accommodate the new facts. When the new facts contradict a scientific theory, or when the new facts cannot be incorporated into the scientific theory, then it is time to doubt a scientific theory. Until this occurs, it is incorrect to say that a scientific theory is wrong because it cannot explain everything. Those things that it cannot explain may simply require more scientific investigation for an explanation to be obtained. Remember, nothing can explain everything, and if we wait for something to explain everything, then nothing is what you will have. It is better to have a scientific theory that explains the known facts, which can be modified or replaced as additional facts are ascertained than to have no scientific theory that scientists can build upon through further scientific reasoning and/or observation and experimentation.

Any scientist who wishes to propose a new scientific hypothesis must explain all the currently known facts in their hypothesis, as well as any facts that contradict the current scientific theory. The new scientific hypothesis must also be a better explanation than the old theory. The new scientific hypothesis must also be confirmed by scientific reasoning and/or observation and experimentation by other scientists (known as scientific reproducibility). Consensus by other reputable scientists that the new scientific hypothesis better leads to the old scientific theory being displaced by the new scientific hypothesis, and the new scientific hypothesis is then elevated to a new scientific theory. Even if consensus is obtained, the scientific theory may still be wrong, as I have explained in my Article “On the Nature of Scientific Inquiry”.

Critics of Intelligent Design have claimed that it is a God-of-the-Gaps (GOTG) explanation and that it would stifle scientific progress if it were adopted. It is neither of these things. The GOTG objection is that whenever GOTG is used to explain natural phenomena, they are not allowing for the possibility of future scientific discoveries to determine the science within the gaps. After all, many times in the past, the advancement of science has answered the objections of the critics of the gaps. The objectors to Intelligent Design make the claim that the supporters of Intelligent Design are arguing that if natural causes cannot explain something, then Intelligent Design must explain the thing, which is a known false supposition. However, Intelligent Design supporters retort this is not what they are arguing but that they are claiming that after a thorough scientific investigation in which no natural causes are possible to explain the origin or complexity of something, and the something is of such origin and complexity that it will not occur naturally, then only an intelligent Designer can explain the origin or complexity of the thing. Thus, an Intelligent Designer becomes the most likely explanation by Occam’s razor. As origin and complexity are known to be the result of intelligent thought and actions, it is thus safe to assume that an Intelligent Designer created the Universe and Life. This logic is a subtle but important distinction.

As to believing in an Intelligent Designer will result in the stifling of scientific progress, this assumes that scientists will stop their desire and search for knowledge once a claim of an Intelligent Designer is made. It also forgets that at the beginning of the Scientific Revolution, most scientists believed in God, and this belief drove them to further scientific discoveries to understand the mind of God. It was only after the explosion of scientific knowledge that explained many of the workings of the Universe that scientists drifted away from God as an explanation for natural phenomena. This drift from God spurred on the scientific revolution to new discoveries and explanations, but when science encounters something that may be inexplicable, despite their best efforts, an Intelligent Designer offers a rational explanation as to the something.

While I still believe that most Intelligent Design proponents approach this topic from a theistic argument, which I find unconvincing, there are Intelligent Design proponents that approach this topic from a scientific argument, which I find is much more intriguing and convincing. It is within these scientific arguments that the topic of an Intelligent Designer should be considered.

We should also remember the words of wisdom of the late great American paleontologist, evolutionary biologist, and historian of science:

Although The DNA Enigma and the Cambrian Explosion Event may lead one to raise a wary eye to the current scientific theories, I do not believe it is sufficient to discard the current scientific theories. I expect, however, that the current scientific theories will need to be modified by new facts or corrected facts. Or, to paraphrase Steven Jay Gould:

“I believe the Evolution is a fundamental property of nature. It has existed since it was created during the birth of the universe, and it will exist until the death of the universe. It worked before scientists first gave a scientific explanation for its behavior, and it worked before and after others came up with a better scientific explanation for evolution. Other scientists may provide a better explanation of evolution in the future, but evolution will continue to work until the end of the universe.”
- Mark W. Dawson

This is not to say, however, that we should not consider an Intelligent Designer as part of the primary explanatory work to explain the origins of the Universe and Life. As more scientific facts are discovered on the origin of the Universe and Life, it seems, however, it appears that Intelligent Design evolution may be more likely. Thus, we should not ad-hoc reject Intelligent Design as an explanation, but we should consider it along with Naturalistic/Materialistic explanations as to the answer for the origins of the Universe and Life.

References

One of the major proponents of Intelligent Design is Dr. Stephen C. Meyer. Dr. Stephen C. Meyer received his Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge in the philosophy of science. A former geophysicist and college professor, he now directs the Center for Science and Culture at the Discovery Institute in Seattle. In 2004, Meyer ignited a firestorm of media and scientific controversy when a biology journal at the Smithsonian Institution published his peer-reviewed scientific article advancing intelligent design. You can read his thoughts on Intelligent Design at his website, Stephen C. Meyer - Philosopher of Science, and he has written three books that examine in depth his ideas:

Signature in the Cell: DNA and the Evidence for Intelligent Design by Stephen C. Meyer
Darwin’s Doubt: The Explosive Origin of Animal Life and the Case for Intelligent Design by Stephen C. Meyer
Return of the God Hypothesis: Three Scientific Discoveries That Reveal the Mind Behind the Universe by Stephen C. Meyer

These books may be difficult for the layperson to read, as they require much thoughtful thinking to understand the complexities and reasoning of his arguments. However, they are well worth the read to understand why the idea of an Intelligent Designer with a Theistic evolution of the Universe and Life is a valid scientific idea that should be considered.

Also, PragerU has released videos by Dr. Meyer that provide an introduction to the topics of Intelligent Design:

I Believe

As I mentioned at the beginning of this article, I am a firm believer in God. A God that created our universe and established its physical properties and physical laws. And a God who gave us science as the best means of explaining the physical properties and physical laws of the universe. A succinct summary of my beliefs is as follows:

In the Beginning:

Before the beginning, there was God.
And God was all there was, is, and could be.
And God was conscious, intelligent, and all-knowing.
And God was bored as it knew all there is, and was, and what will be.
And God decided to create a universe, a universe of matter and energy, and dark matter and dark energy. A universe of gravity, electromagnetism, the strong and weak nuclear forces, and thermodynamics.
And this universe would evolve so that galaxies, stars, and planets would form, and life could be created and evolve on the planets.
And this life would also evolve so that conscience intelligent life would come forth.
And God gave this intelligent life the knowledge of good from evil, right from wrong, truth from falsehood, creative from destructive, reasonable from emotional, love from hate, wisdom from folly, and beauty from ugliness.
And God gave this intelligent life free choice so that it could decide how to behave based on this knowledge.
And God would observe their behavior and be entertained by it.
When the intelligent life died, God would absorb its consciousness’ into his own, and God would know all the intelligent life knew.
After the intelligent life died, God would judge them based on their words, deeds, and thoughts and punish or reward their consciousness as appropriate.

I believe that God knows all there was and all that is, but I do not believe that God knows all that will be. God knows the physical properties and physical laws of the universe, so God knows what will happen as a result of these physical properties and physical laws of the universe. But God does not know what humans will do. This belief is a result of my belief that God gave humans “Free Will” for individuals to take any action they so desire. As individuals have the free will to take any action, God cannot know what action they will take. God only observes their words, deeds, and thoughts and renders a judgment of them after their body passes away and their spirit joins with God (see numbers 9 through 12 above).

Disclaimer

Please Note - many academics, scientists, and engineers would critique what I have written here as not accurate or thorough. I freely acknowledge that these critiques are correct. It was not my intention to be accurate or thorough, as I am not qualified to give an accurate or thorough description. My intention was to be understandable to a layperson so that they could grasp the concepts. Academics, scientists, and engineers' entire education and training are based on accuracy and thoroughness, and as such, they strive for this accuracy and thoroughness. I believe it is essential for all laypersons to grasp the concepts of this article so they make more informed decisions on those areas of human endeavors that deal with this subject. As such, I did not strive for accuracy and thoroughness, only understandability.

Most academics, scientists, and engineers, when speaking or writing for the general public (and many science writers as well), strive to be understandable to the general public. However, they often fall short of understandability because of their commitment to accuracy and thoroughness, as well as some audience awareness factors. Their two biggest problems are accuracy and the audience's knowledge of the topic.

Accuracy is a problem because academics, scientists, engineers, and science writers are loath to be inaccurate. This is because they want the audience to obtain the correct information and the possible negative repercussions amongst their colleagues and the scientific community at large if they are inaccurate. However, because modern science is complex, this accuracy can, and often, lead to confusion amongst the audience.

The audience's knowledge of the topic is important as most modern science is complex, with its own words, terminology, and basic concepts the audience is unfamiliar with or misinterpret. The audience becomes confused (even while smiling and lauding the academics, scientists, engineers, or science writers), and the audience does not achieve understandability. Many times, academics, scientists, engineers, or science writer utilizes the scientific disciplines' own words, terminology, and basic concepts without realizing the audience's misinterpretations or having no comprehension of these words, terminology, and basic concepts.

It is for this reason that I place understandability as the highest priority in my writing, and I am willing to sacrifice accuracy and thoroughness to achieve understandability. There are many books, websites, and videos available that are more accurate and thorough. My webpage on “Further Readings and Literature” also contains books on various subjects that can provide more accurate and thorough information. I leave it to the reader to decide if they want more accurate or thorough information and to seek out these books, websites, and videos for this information.

Table of Contents