Intelligent Design and Evolution: Preliminary Thoughts

I've been writing at several blogs (Thoughts in a Haystack, Eye of the Storm) on the debate between advocates of intelligent design and evolution, and I've been taking up far too much space on those blogs with my own ruminations. (I've also been following Uncommon Descent very closely, though I was banned from there due to inappropriate language.)

Thinking over the problem from a variety of perspectives, I've arrived at the following point of view:

1) Intelligent design is necessarily committed to the existence of at least one supernatural being.
2) Intelligent design is not necessarily committed the view that this being must be God.
3) Intelligent design does not succeed as an argument for the existence of God.
4) Intelligent design fails to pass muster as a scientific theory.
5) Intelligent design should be mentioned in science classrooms in high schools and colleges.

My argument for (1) is that intelligent design theorists themselves go so far as to define "intelligence" as "that which is irreducible to the combination of chance and necessity." In this approach, basically reading Plato against Monod, they define intelligence as non-natural. Although biological intelligent design (BID) leaves open the purely formal possibility of design by aliens, this only raises the further question as to where those aliens came from. Either they did evolve, in which one can well ask why that hypothesis is not available for terran life as well, or else they were also intelligently designed. By contrast, cosmological intelligent design (CID) explicitly requires that the fine-tuning argument licenses the inference that there must be at least one being which cannot be described by the laws of the physics of this universe, and that sounds close enough to "supernatural" for it to count. (But see my note (1) below.)

My views for (2) and (3) are basically indebted to the insights of Hume and Kant, though I think that Kant sees the problem in a more general and deeper way that Hume does. (Briefly: Hume only provides a criticism of the argument from design when cast in the form of an argument of analogy; Kant provides a criticism of the argument from design in any form.)

My argument for (4) hinges on the importance of testability. Consider these two hypotheses (thanks to John Pierot of Thoughts in a Haystack for the discussion, based on work I've read by Eliot Sober):

H1: There exists a supernatural being which is solely responsible for the natural order and which wants (or would have wanted) everything to be purple.

H2: There exists a supernatural being which is solely responsible for the natural order and which wants (or would have wanted) there to be exactly as many different, and different types, of purple things as there are.

Firstly, notice that both hypotheses are claims about supernatural beings, and both make claims about the relation between supernatural beings and observable phenomena. But there's a crucial difference. If H1 is true, then there is a set of observable phenomena -- "everything being purple" -- which can be shown to be false. So H1 is testable -- that is, it can be tested, and it can be shown to be false according to the test.

But compare that with H2. The observables entailed by H2 are indistinguishable from observations that can be made independent of H2. There are exactly as many different purple things, and as many different types of purple things, as there are -- regardless of the truth of H2. Since the truth or falsity of H2 makes no difference in what can be expected, it is not testable.

My contention, then, is that intelligent design is like H2 -- it claims that there exists some intelligent being which wanted to produce either the universe (CID) or life (BID) exactly as it is. This yields zero explanatory insight, or what is the same thing, it is not testable.

Having said all that, one might reasonably expect me to argue that intelligent design has no place in the science education of our public schools, colleges, and universities. Here I depart from what is basically an entrenched consensus, on the following grounds.

Firstly, "teaching the controversy" -- that is, bringing the full weight of evidence and reasoning to bear -- is an excellent opportunity to teach students how to think scientifically and not merely master a body of scientific knowledge. Unfortunately, science educators are not themselves taught in how to teach epistemology. The easy solution is to ignore the problem. The hard solution, and the better one, is to regard the "teach the controversy" movement as an excellent opportunity for the NCSE (National Center for Science Education) to create a program on how to teach science educators how to teach epistemology and philosophy of science for high school and college students. It's a public secret that we are not teaching students how to think scientifically, we're not teaching students how to appreciate and enjoy what science can and cannot do, and the "teach the controversy" strategy is an opportunity to change that.

Secondly, consider the argument raised by Crispin Sartwell in favor of teaching intelligent design in schools (here or here). In brief, he argues that while intelligent design (or, for that matter, creationism -- though he doesn't mention creationism by name) is anti-naturalistic, and for that matter, anti-scientific, that doesn't mean that it should be excluded from science education. And I agree.

Consider, Sartwell asks us, someone who is deeply religious, and who believes, as part of her faith, that neo-Darwinian explanations are incompatible with that faith. That person is going to be very upset if her child is subjected to nothing but the neo-Darwinian point of view in a school that is supported by her school taxes. But more interestingly, Sartwell points out that it's completely reasonable for her to be upset. It would be puzzling if she weren't upset, given what she believes! Now, does her voice deserve to be heard in the classroom?

I think that the answer is "yes" -- "yes," even though intelligent design is not a scientific theory. That's because science education has be about more than instilling in young minds all the latest scientific theories. It has to be about training people about how to be scientifically informed citizens in a pluralistic and (supposedly) democratic society. And for that reason, anti-naturalistic -- even anti-scientific -- voices should not be excluded. To exclude those voices from the classroom -- or, to put it more pointedly, to silence those voices within the classroom -- is tantamount to isolating science from its social and cultural and historical and political context. And doing that is a failure of science education.

Having said that, I would take issue with Sartwell in one serious respect. On his view, the naturalistic world-view, which is (for him and for me) the scientific world-view (but see note (2) below), is the stance of "reason" -- in contrast with that of "faith." For one thing, I'm not happy with any simplistic, Enlightenment-era contrast of "reason" and "faith." For another, I'm not happy with the identification of science and reason.

If we take "reason" here in a broadly Sellarsian sense -- in the famous phrase, taking part in "the game of giving and asking for reasons" -- then it seems clear to me that anyone who deliberately excludes him or herself from that game has positioned him or herself outside the range of views that are available for dialogue in the public sphere. So if one takes up an anti-scientific position, and in doing so puts oneself outside of the space of reasons altogether, then no, I don't think that position is entitled to a public voice. (I say that even though the division between public and private is itself highly contested.) And I take it as fairly obvious that someone such as P.Z. Myers (Pharyngula) holds precisely that view: that scientific methods and rational inquiries are simply co-extensive. (But see note (3) below)

Therefore, in order to maintain that anti-naturalistic/anti-scientific voices deserve to be heard, I conclude that one can position oneself outside of science without thereby positioning oneself outside of "reason" altogether, and that means that the identity between "science" and "reason" should be rejected.

I don't doubt that this view as outlined here would be of little comfort to either party of the intelligent design/evolution debate, but for the time being, I think it's the most plausible view to hold.



Notes:

(1) However, one might consider the multiverse hypothesis. Suppose there are infinitely many possible universes. Each universe is defined by a set of values of different physical constants. Possibly, a fully developed physics could explain the nature of universes as such. Call this a general physics and the physical laws for each universe are defined by a particular physics. Then a supernatural agent, in keeping with the tradition of theological speculation, would be an agent that cannot be defined in terms of a general physics.

(2) Of course, the sharp contrast should be noticed between my view and that of the advocates of intelligent design. On their view, the identification between the domain of scientifically explicable phenomena and the domain of natural phenomena is precisely what ought to be rejected!

(3) I'm not entirely sure if Myers can afford to be as committed to materialism as a metaphysical position as he advertises himself as being, for the simple reason that it has proven to be exceedingly difficult, if not impossible, to adequately account for mathematics and for ethics in materialist, or physicalist, terms. Myers is best understood, I contend, as an Enlightenment rationalist whose basic commitments are to science, to liberalism, and to secularism. Whether this is ultimately a compelling view, or whether the work of Nietzsche, Adorno and Horkheimer, Foucault, Wittgenstein, and Rorty shows how deeply problematic this view is, is a matter I shall address in a subsequent posting.

Fundamentalism vs Pragmatism?

In a comment below, Kirby wrote:

You still need some axioms that you take on faith in order to think at all, so I think I prefer fundamentalists to Nietzscheans.

(Not clear who the Nietzscheans are here -- surely not me!)

I'd like to make one minor point and one major one. The minor point is that I object to the use of "axioms" here -- it seems to me that inquiry begins from lived situations which are found to be problematic. To call these problematic situations "axioms" is to put far too 'logicized' a gloss on our cognitive process.

The major point is what really matters isn't whether one has presuppositions and prejudices from which one sets sail -- since it is incontestable that such are always and already at work -- rather, what really counts is whether the presuppositions and prejudices are themselves subjected to criticism based on subsequent inquiry.

The error of fundamentalism, like that of rationalism in general, is that certain premises are held a priori and so immune to criticism, whatever the results of inquiry turn out to be.

Now, I realize that I've just made a sudden shift in my position from my previous post, and that shift deserves emphasis. Below, I fell for the standard line that there is something "irrational" or even "stupid" about fundamentalism. Now I want to shift positions here -- and perhaps pick a fight with WW in the process.

In rough, what strikes me about fundamentalism (whether "religious" or not -- there is also Marxist fundamentalism, Freudian fundamentalism, feminist fundamentalism, etc.) is how basically rationalistic it is. By which I mean, that there are certain assumptions from which one begins, and the consequences of these assumptions are drawn with admirable rigor and acumen, whether those consequences concern the decadence of the West or the foolishness of teaching evolution in public schools.

I want to contrast this rationalism with a different attitude which I identify as pragmatism. The pragmatist attitude is one in which presuppositions and prejudices are revised in light of the results of inquiry. Thus, nothing is a priori in any firm or absolute sense. What is held as stable at a time is just whatever makes possible fruitful inquiry, and any inquiry might allow for rejection or revision in what has previously been held as stable. (And of course the criteria according to which inquiry is evaluated as "fruitful" are themselves revisable!)

In that light, the problem I find with fundamentalism is not a deficiency of rationality but -- if anything -- an excess, a hypertrophy, of rationalism at the expense of correction by experience (scientific, historical, artistic, religious, or otherwise).

What is fundamentalism?

What if fundamentalism is a tool of the Devil designed to ensnare the souls of those who refuse to use the reason and intelligence that God gave them?

The Difference

The difference between science and religion is that science does not explain everything, whereas religion explains nothing. This is because it is not the vocation of religion to explain -- nor to mystify! -- but to illuminate.

What is a Rational Animal?

The reactions against Cartesianism in analytic philosophy of mind have made possible a revival of the Aristotelian term for a human being -- the idea of a rational animal. Descartes famously (or infamously) dismisses this description in Meditation II, where he denies that the cogito can be identified with the Scholastic animale rationale, on the grounds that it is requires categories that cannot be derived from the solipsistic stance of self-consciousness.

By contrast, in the work of Donald Davidson, Alastair MacIntyre, and especially John McDowell, the idea of a rational animal has resurfaced. In doing so, we must confront two questions: (a) what makes an animal rational? and (b) why must the rational entity, so conceived, be an animal?

To be rational, on a model broadly shared between Davidson and McDowell, is to capable of making moves within what Sellars called "the space of reasons": it is to be capable of asserting, of giving reasons for ones assertions, and to be capable of asking others for the reasons for their assertions. McDowell emphasizes that this point holds not only for episodes of knowing, as in Sellars, but for all thought as such. To put the point in terms developed by Bob Brandom, to think is to make a material inference.

An animal is rational if it is not merely sentient but also sapient. "Sentience" entails consciousness, affectivity, and responsiveness to changes in its environment. An animal may be sentient and yet be extremely clever in manipulating objects in its environment, even its fellow creatures. "Sapience" differs in that sapience entails a capacity for reasoning and for recognizing that it is taking up a view on the world and not merely occupying a place in an environment. (Heidegger's distinction between Welt and Umwelt, mediated through Gadamer, is an important influence on McDowell's version of this distinction.)

But McDowell, more than his fellow Sellarsians Brandom and Rorty, insists that the bearer of rationality must be an animal. It must be something intrinsic to the way of life of a particular kind of animal, a human being -- an animal that can acquire culture, Bildung, Geist. Thinking and knowing are part of how we are as animals, as web-weaving is part of how a spider is as an animal. And it is part of McDowell's critique of "para-mechanism" in philosophy of mind -- Millikan and Dennett in particular, also fellow Sellarsians -- that they lose their grip on the fact that what is rational must be animal, and what is animal must be rational.

Haiku for Levinas

Wild yet unhidden
Open to the elements
Time grows in the mind.

A Challenge to Modern Atheism

Over the past year I've become a frequent lurker at Uncommon Descent, a website devoted to discussion of "intelligent design theory." There are sufficient criticisms of the epistemology of intelligent design theory that it would be overkill to add yet another, and in any event, there are many far more competent than I to do so. Rather, I want to direct attention to a specific feature of the sort of arguments favored by intelligent design supporters: the critique of materialism.

The argument, as I understand it, goes like this: the problem with Darwinian explanations is that they entail a materialistic metaphysics, and that is bad because materialism is incompatible with deeply-held assumptions that are necessary for social functioning and for personal fulfillment. So Darwinism, apart from being false (as it is held to be) is also extremely dangerous.

This argument finds an eloquent expression in the work of C. S. Lewis (esp. Mere Christianity) and a more sophisticated elaboration in Alvin Plantinga's "self-defeater" argument against naturalism. Here I want to present one version of the argument; in subsequent posts I'll begin to examine what I think is wrong with it.

The conundrum of modern atheism is that it is committed to two seemingly incompatible theses: materialism and rationalism. The commitment to the first consists of the premise that only entities that can figure in a physical theory (however broadly construed -- dark energy is in, pixies are out) can count as real. The commitment to the second consists of the premise that the world as encountered in everyday experience is intelligible to human reason. Historically speaking, the commitment to the second premise has required a denial of the first, for we can be assured of the intelligibility of the universe only if there is an Intelligence who was responsible for its creation.

At work here is the following line of argument, very powerful but surely in need of critical examination:

P1: Only a rational agent could produce a structure that could be comprehended by a rational agent.

P2: This structure can be comprehended by a rational agent (namely, us).

C: It was produced by a rational agent (if not us, then God).

The foremost arguments against modern atheism, as seen for example in C.S. Lewis and Alvin Plantinga, are supposed to show that materialism and rationalism are incompatible, so that if one accepts materialism, then one must reject rationalism. Conversely, if one accepts rationalism, then one must reject materialism.

Another way of putting this point is in terms of versions of naturalism. Materialism can be interpreted as metaphysical naturalism: nature, however broadly construed, is all there is. Rationalism can be interpreted as methodological naturalism: the methods of the natural science have priority in adjudicating between competing assertions. The Lewis-Plantinga strategy is to drive a wedge between metaphysical naturalism and methodological naturalism. Thus metaphysical naturalists such as Marx, Nietzsche, and Freud are put to one side, and methodological naturalists such as Quine are put on another. Dembski says of Quine:

Quine, though a naturalist, was not wedded to the methodological and metaphysical naturalism of Van Till. Quine was a pragmatic naturalist. This pragmatism allowed him to entertain the following possibility: "If I saw indirect explanatory benefit in positing sensibilia, possibilia, spirits, a Creator, I would joyfully accord them scientific status too, on a par with such avowedly scientific posits as quarks and black holes. (from "Naturalism; or, Living within One's Means," Dialectica 1995, vol. 49); see Naturalism's Invincible Ignorance

The alleged incompatibility of materialism with rationalism, and so the alleged incoherence of modern atheism, is closely connected with the alleged incompatibility of materialism with morality. As rationalism is an epistemological thesis, and so is concerned with what one ought to believe, so morality concerns what one ought to do. In both cases, then, what is concern is “oughtness” or normativity.

In both science and in morality, in our theoretical and practical lives, we are rational beings; we occupy what Wilfrid Sellars called, “the space of giving and asking for reasons.” So one way of seeing the Lewis-Plantinga objection to modern atheism is to see it as raising a skeptical challenge as to how anything merely material, and so fully describable in terms of deterministic laws, could nevertheless also be capable of normative guidance, whether epistemic or moral.

The prevalence of normativity in human life is so obvious as to seem undeniable. (And even philosophers who seem to deny it, such as Spinoza and Nietzsche, may seem to sneak it in the back door having kicked it out the front.) In any event, I shall simply take for granted the basic distinction between "the realm of law" (what is material/physical) and "the space of reasons" (what is normatively oriented, i.e. science and morality). What I shall deny is that accepting this distinction requires that one reject materialism/metaphysical naturalism. Instead I shall show, in the course of working through some thoughts of John McDowell and Hilary Putnam, just how one can have one's cake and eat it, too.