Intelligent Design: Bad Science, Bad Philosophy, or Both? Taner Edis Truman State University www2.truman.edu/~edis

2003Intelligent Design2 Our response to creationism u We say creationism is not science––not just that creationists do not practice science, but that the very idea of supernatural design is out of bounds for science. u We say creation is an essentially religious or at least metaphysical notion. Science is all about natural explanations for natural phenomena. Totally different.

2003Intelligent Design3 Interfering philosophers u Some philosophers give sophisticated version. u Robert Pennock: science must follow methodological naturalism (MN). Excludes ID, protects liberal religion. u No ID in science class!

2003Intelligent Design4 But is science naturalistic? u Philosophers dictating what science must be do not have a great track record. u Historically strange: Biologists adopted evolution as better explanation––they didn’t suddenly decide creation was not allowed. u Explanations involving design and intent not odd, e.g. in history. Nothing wrong with ID in biology as a hypothesis.

2003Intelligent Design5 Practical naturalism u Philosophical ID supporters attack MN, as illegitimately excluding ID. u They’re right. Politically bad move as well. u Better view: Naturalism is the most successful, best-supported broad description of the world. We expect this to continue. u ID could be scientifically correct. It just happens to be wrong.

2003Intelligent Design6 ID is a scientific mistake u Protecting the integrity of science education should be the job of scientists, more than philosophers! u The strongest reason to keep ID out of secular education is that ID proponents do make scientific claims, and they consistently get it wrong. u Ask scientists how they explain complexity.

2003Intelligent Design7 Bottom-up naturalism u Physical science takes a “bottom- up” view. No “life force”; no “molecular soul” to give properties of H 2 O. u Complexity is built up on the simple.

2003Intelligent Design8 Chance and Necessity u Physics relies on chance and necessity. u Radioactive decays happen at random. u H 2 O structure explained by physical laws; QM. u Combinations of chance and necessity!

2003Intelligent Design9 Rules and Dice u Chance and necessity are inseparable.

2003Intelligent Design10 Complexity? u How, then, do we explain complexity? u Theories of thermodynamics (self-organization), computation, evolution etc. u All are related, and all do their work through chance and necessity. u Life becomes mechanical?

2003Intelligent Design11 ID: A separate principle

2003Intelligent Design12 “Specified complexity” u William Dembski, mathematician and philosopher. Leading theorist of ID. u ID irreducible form of explanation, distinct from chance & necessity. u ID is a revolution.

2003Intelligent Design13 Dembski’s claims u Both designed artifacts and organisms exhibit special order: specified complexity. u Chance and necessity cannot generate SC, or information. è Intelligence is a separate principle. è Blind mechanisms (like those of Darwinian evolution) cannot explain life. è Artificial Intelligence is impossible.

2003Intelligent Design14 Testing for Design

2003Intelligent Design15 Why computers can’t create u Programming and input determine the output of a computer. No new information added.

2003Intelligent Design16 What about chance? u Chance outcomes are not determined by input and programming. And Darwinian variation-and-selection relies on random mutations which might work better… u Dembski says nothing changes. In that case, the SC (information) is extracted from the selection criteria.

2003Intelligent Design17 How are we creative? u Humans are truly creative––we are flexible, not bound by pre-programmed rules. We always might figure out a new way to do things. u Gödelian critique of AI: Any system of rules is rigid; it has blind spots. u Dembski’s SC + this  No mechanism can be creative, including Darwin’s.

2003Intelligent Design18 Where is ID mistaken? u All the previous claims are wrong. u Approach AI aspect first: how can we get flexibility and creativity without magic? u ID, and Gödelian arguments, demand that humans are nonalgorithmic, beyond computer programs. u This can be achieved by combining programs (rules) with randomness.

2003Intelligent Design19 Game theory u In games where the opponent can adapt to a set strategy and exploit it, occasional random behavior can be the best strategy. u Not bound by rules. Novelty, unpredictability come from randomness.

2003Intelligent Design20 Completeness Theorem u All functions are partly random (Edis 1998). u The only tasks beyond rules and randomness (chance and necessity) are those needing infinite information. We have no way to do these. u Any human output, including that with specified complexity, can be produced by mechanisms including chance.

2003Intelligent Design21 ID cannot work! u We know what is beyond mechanisms. Not flexibility, not creativity, not specified complexity. u Intelligence itself must be built out of chance and necessity. Not a separate principle!

2003Intelligent Design22 Darwinian Creativity u How, then, can randomness give real creativity? u Biologists have already solved this problem. The Darwinian mechanism does exactly this––creates information (Schneider 2000). u Darwinian thinking has become common in other fields concerning creativity––in AI, and cognitive and brain sciences.

2003Intelligent Design23 Darwin takes over the brain u Our own intelligent designs are enabled by Darwinian processes taking place within our brains!

2003Intelligent Design24 Dembski’s mistake u Dembski thinks of evolution as solution to a preset problem. u Evolution is no such thing. What is “fittest” continually changes, depending on the organisms themselves. There is no preset or final goal. u ID is completely out of touch with today’s science concerning complexity.

2003Intelligent Design25 Creationism is futile u In Darwin’s time, we could still say intelligence was a principle separate from chance and necessity; but the evidence was that life diversified by blind mechanisms. u Today, we can again notice that artifacts and organisms are alike. This is because intelligence itself is absorbed in chance and necessity. Intelligence is itself Darwinian!

2003Intelligent Design26 ID gets it wrong! u We can see ID has it wrong about complexity, and we see this by doing good, ordinary science––not just philosophy. u Politically difficult to say ID is like the flat earth, since ID expresses deep theistic intuitions about divine design. u Nevertheless, scientists should at least stand up and say we know better.

2003Intelligent Design27 Shameless plugs The Ghost in the Universe u Chapter in Taner Edis, The Ghost in the Universe, (Prometheus, 2002). u In preparation: essays by scientists, mathematicians, and philosophers, criticizing ID.

2003Intelligent Design28 My web site www2.truman.edu/~edis u Contains all sorts of articles on ID, creationism and other topics, including the slides of this talk.  My is