TEN QUESTIONS TO ASK YOUR BIOLOGY TEACHER ABOUT INTELLIGENT DESIGN

Ten Questions to Ask Your Biology Teacher

About Intelligent Design

William A. Dembski & Sean McDowell

1. Design Detection

If nature, or some aspect of it, is intelligently designed, how could we tell?

Design inferences in the past were largely informal and intuitive. Usually people knew it when they saw it. Intelligent design, by introducing specified complexity, makes the detection of design rigorous. Something is complex if it is hard to reproduce by chance and specified if it matches an independently given pattern (an example is the faces on Mt. Rushmore). Specified complexity gives a precise criterion for reliably inferring intelligence.

2. Looking for Design in Biology

Should biologists be encouraged to look for signs of intelligence in biological systems? Why or why not?

Scientists today look for signs of intelligence coming in many places, including from distant space (consider SETI, the search for extraterrestrial intelligence). Yet, many biologists regard it as illegitimate to look for signs of intelligence in biological systems. Why arbitrarily exclude design inferences from biology if we accept them for other scientific disciplines? It is an open question whether the apparent design in nature is real.

3. The Rules of Science

Who determines the rules of science? Are these rules written in stone? Is it mandatory that scientific explanations only appeal to matter and energy operating by unbroken natural laws (a principle known as methodological naturalism)?

The rules of science are not written in stone. They have been negotiated over many centuries as science (formerly called "natural philosophy") has tried to understand the natural world. These rules have changed in the past and they will change in the future. Right now much of the scientific community is bewitched by a view of science called methodological naturalism, which says that science may only offer naturalistic explanations. Science seeks to understand nature. If intelligent causes operate in nature, then methodological naturalism must not be used to rule them out. 

4. Biology's Information Problem

How do we account for the complex information-rich patterns in biological systems? What is the source of that information?

The central problem for biology is information. Living things are not mere lumps of matter. Life is special, and what makes life special is the arrangement of its matter into very specific forms. In other words, what makes life special is information. Where did the information necessary for life come from? Where did the information necessary for the Cambrian explosion come from? How can a blind material process generate the novel information of biological systems? ID argues that such information has an intelligent source.

5. Molecular Machines

Do any structures in the cell resemble machines designed by humans? How do we account for such structures?

The biological world is full of molecular machines that are strikingly similar to humanly made machines. In fact, they are more than similar. Just about every engineering principle that we employ in our own machines gets used at the molecular level, with this exception: the technology inside the cell vastly exceeds human technology. How, then, do biologists explain the origin of such structures? How can a blind material process generate the multiple coordinated changes needed to build a molecular machine? If we see a level of engineering inside the cell that far surpasses our own abilities, it is reasonable to conclude that these molecular machines are actually, and not merely apparently, designed.

6. Irreducible Complexity

What are irreducibly complex systems? Do such systems exist in biology? If so, are those systems evidence for design? If not, why not?

The biological world is full of functioning molecular systems that cannot be simplified without losing the system's function. Take away parts and the system's function cannot be recovered. Such systems are called irreducibly complex. How do evolutionary theorists propose to account for such systems? What detailed, testable, step-by-step proposals explain the emergence of irreducibly complex machines such as the flagellum? Given that intelligence is known to design such systems, it is a reasonable inference to conclude that they were designed.

7. Similar Structures

Human designers reuse designs that work well. Life forms also reuse certain structures (the camera eye, for example, appears in humans and octopuses). How well does this evidence support Darwinian evolution? Does it support intelligent design more strongly?

Evolutionary biologists attribute similar biological structures to either common descent or convergence. Structures are said to result from convergence if they evolved independently from distinct lines of organisms. Darwinian explanations of convergence strain credulity because they must account for how trial-and-error tinkering (natural selection acting on random variations) could produce strikingly similar structures in widely different organisms and environments. It's one thing for evolution to explain similarity by common descent-the same structure is then just carried along in different lineages. It's another to explain it as the result of blind tinkering that happened to hit on the same structure multiple times. Design proponents attribute such similar structures to common design (just as an engineer may use the same parts in different machines). If human designers frequently reuse successful designs, the designer of nature can surely do the same.

8. Fine-Tuning

The laws of physics are fine-tuned to allow life to exist. Since designers are capable of fine-tuning a system, can design be considered the best explanation for the universe?

Physicists agree that the constants of nature have a strange thing in common: they seem precisely calibrated for the existence of life. As Frederick Hoyle famously remarked, it appears that someone has "monkeyed" with physics. Naturalistic explanations that attempt to account for this eerie fine-tuning invariably introduce entities for which there is no independent evidence (for example, they invoke multiple worlds with which we have no physical way of interacting). The fine-tuning of the universe strongly suggests that it was intelligently designed.

9. The Privileged Planet

The Earth seems ideally positioned in our galaxy for complex life to exist and for scientific discovery to advance. Does this privileged status of Earth indicate intelligent design? Why or why not?

Many factors had to come together on earth for human life to exist (chapter 9). We exist in just the right place in just the right type of galaxy at just the right cosmic moment. We orbit the right type of star at the right distance for life. The earth has large surrounding planets to protect us from comets, a moon to direct important life-permitting cycles, and an iron core that protects us from harmful radiation. Moreover, the earth has many features that facilitate scientific discovery, such as a moon that makes possible perfect eclipses. Humans seem ideally situated on the earth to make scientific discoveries. This suggests that a designer designed our place in the world so that we can understand the world's design. Naturalism, by contrast, leaves it a complete mystery why we should be able to do science and gain insight into the underlying structure of the world.

10. The Origin of the Universe

The universe gives every indication of having a beginning. Since something cannot come from nothing, is it legitimate to conclude that a designer made the universe? If not, why not?

For most of world history, scientists believed the universe was eternal. With advances in our understanding of cosmology over the last forty years, however, scientists now recognize that the universe had a beginning and is finite in duration and size. In other words, the universe has not always been there. Since the universe had a beginning, why not conclude that it had a designer that brought it into existence? Since matter, space, and time themselves had a beginning, this would suggest that the universe had a non-physical, non-spatial, and non-temporal cause. A designer in the mold of the Christian God certainly fits the bill.

Taken from: Understanding Intelligent Design

                Copyright © 2008 by William A. Dembski and Sean McDowell

                Published by Harvest House Publishers

                Eugene, Oregon 97402

                www.harvesthousepublishers.com

                Used by Permission

By Sean McDowell Click here for bio and archived articles

To the 'Scientists laugh at Dembski' Guy... Posted On: 10/12/09 01:40:38 PM Age 36, OK So...tell us how you REALLY feel about God, why don't you? Enough with your subtle innuendos! You need to be more direct in your God-hating views. But seriously though...you really had NOTHING to say or any valid point to make to refute the article. You need something a little more thought out and convincing rather than resorting to accusing people of being "liars-for-Jeebus" without any proof. Also, being that you're already 59, you might want to re-consider the direction of your life and your own soon-coming mortality. Your raving and ranting against Christians and Christianity (and more importantly Christ) will only come back to haunt you then. What you choose to believe is important. Wow, Posted On: 10/10/09 02:05:50 PM Age 49, MO And you call this an intelligent argument? Scientists laugh at Dembski Posted On: 10/09/09 07:58:06 AM Age 59, FL Ten Questions to Ask Your Biology Teacher About Intelligent Design - William A. Dembski & Sean McDowell I never heard of McDowell, but I assume he's as stupid and dishonest as Dembski, who is an international joke. They should be honest and rename this to "Ten Questions to Ask Your Biology Teacher About MAGIC" or "How to disrupt a science classroom with childish religious ideas". The previous comment (Great points - Age 44, MN) was written by an uneducated moron. His "GOd created each species in its kind" is exactly what I would expect from a god-soaked idiot who doesn't even know what science is, so of course this worthless know-nothing Liar-For-Jeebus likes Dembski. Great points Posted On: 10/01/09 09:03:00 AM Age 44, MN Great points. These would be most helpful after and in conjunction with destroying macroevolution theory. It would be helpful to have points on how to do that. Such as macroevolution theory is not really science as it breaks scientific law. First of all, it has never been observed or repeated. It breaks the second law of thermodynamics. OVer time, things run down or wear out. They don't get better and better as macroevolution states. There is no fossil evidence of any life forms evolving into any others. None. There is microevolution within species hence variations of dogs, variations of horses, variations of human beings... But no evidence that a horse ever evolved from some more primitive life form... In fact, with the study of DNA and genetics, it is now been proven impossible for one species to evolve into any other. No. GOd created each species in its kind. He designed microevolution within each kind, but not macroevolution. He created each species seperately according to its kind. It then reproduced and evolved within its kind.