Book Review – Intelligent Design: The Bridge Between Science & Theology (Why is it undesirable to view all coincidences as design by an intelligent being?)

I have read William A. Dembski’s book Intelligent Design. I think it is undesirable to view all coincidences as design by an intelligent being. Let’s discuss why.

 

In his book Intelligent Design, William A. Dembski argues for the theory of intelligent design, which states that an intelligent being designed life with intention. This contradicts the traditional theory of evolution, which holds that life arose by chance and natural selection. William A. Dembski utilizes the concepts of irreducible complexity and specified complexity to argue that at least some parts of life are intelligently designed. We will look at what irreducible complexity and specified complexity are, show that if these concepts are found in life, it is natural to think that life is intelligently designed, and argue that recognizing intelligent design as a science can help advance science.
First, let’s talk about irreducible complexity. There are some organs in living things that are impossible for them to have arisen through gradual evolution because without just one element, the organ itself would have no function. A simple example from William A. Dembski’s book is the mousetrap. A mousetrap consists of a support, a hammer, a spring, a clasp, and a holding rod, any one of which cannot function without the other. It’s impossible for a mousetrap to arise through gradual evolution. Without all the elements of a mousetrap, the mousetrap would not function. Individuals with incomplete mousetraps would be culled out by natural selection as a waste of resources. Complexity that is so intricate and organized that it cannot be explained by gradual evolution is called irreducible complexity. Since irreducible complexity cannot emerge through gradual evolution, the whole thing must have arisen by chance, which is far too improbable. Therefore, intelligent designers argue, it is reasonable to believe that an intelligent designer exists.
To understand specified complexity, we first need to understand specificity and complexity. Specificity means that something has a pattern and can be explained in a short time. Complexity is a form that is unlikely to arise by chance. Specified complexity is a combination of both specificity and complexity. William A. Dembski defined information with specific complexity as complex-specific information, and then used information theory to show that mutations and natural selection alone cannot explain complex-specific information.
To understand specified complexity, we first need to understand complexity and specificity. Specificity is a form that has an appropriate pattern and can be explained in a short time. Complexity is a form that is unlikely to occur by chance. Specified complexity is a combination of both specificity and complexity. For example, imagine someone claiming that a monkey typed a sentence on a keyboard by accident. If the sentence was “We” or “u fhvsoadlhds fio zihsdflaf ahdfkasddfkjd;sljasdfdvkl”, his claim would seem credible. The former is specific, but not complex. The latter has complexity, but not specificity. On the other hand, if the sentence is ‘We mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor’, people will not believe his claim. The sentence is too complex and specific to be the result of a monkey accidentally typing on a keyboard.
According to William A. Dembski, natural selection can be viewed as a function that selects elements that are successful at reproducing in a defined domain and corresponds to the public domain. According to information theory, when a function replaces a piece of information in its definition with a piece of information in the void, the amount of information is maintained or reduced. Therefore, assuming that there is complex and specific information in the void, it cannot be explained by the function of natural selection alone. Attempts to explain the origin of complexity-specific information in the airspace by reversing the process of natural selection are either meaningless or make it harder to explain by increasing the amount of information.
Mutation can be viewed as the act of adding an element to the definition. However, complex-specific information cannot be generated by mutation (chance). Complex-specific information cannot be generated by a single mutation because it has complexity, and it cannot be explained by the superposition of multiple mutations because it has specificity. Therefore, if complex-specific information exists in the airspace, it either existed in the airspace from the beginning of time, or it was added by design by an intelligent being somewhere along the way. Therefore, if we find forms in nature that have complex-specific information, i.e., forms that exhibit specific complexity, we can only attribute them to intelligent design.
My argument for intelligent design is that it provides a better explanation for life as it exists on Earth than evolutionary theory, and that intelligent design is beneficial to the advancement of science. Life on Earth has organs and forms that have concepts that cannot be explained by evolutionary theory, such as irreducible complexity or specified complexity. Evolutionary theory cannot account for irreducible complexity or specified complexity, and there are organs that do, such as the bacterial flagellum and the blood clotting chain reaction. Despite these arguments, there are still opponents of intelligent design. They argue that intelligent design is simply a set of arguments against evolutionary theory, and that it prevents further progress by attributing the causes of phenomena to intelligent beings that we cannot explain.
Of course, it’s not that evolution hasn’t helped science advance, but sometimes it simply provides a convenient explanation for things we can’t fully explain. The theory of intelligent design can help us reject evolutionary explanations for these areas and find better ones. A classic example is junk DNA. According to evolutionary theory, life evolved without a specific purpose or direction based on random mutations and natural selection. Under this paradigm, scientists look at DNA that doesn’t seem to have any function and explain that it has grown unnecessarily over the course of evolution, giving it the name junk DNA. They were ignored for a while, and only recently have additional studies revealed their functions. If they had seen DNA that seemed to have no function under the paradigm of intelligent design, instead of labeling it junk DNA and not explaining its function, they would have assumed the intent or purpose of an intelligent designer and used their imagination and enthusiasm to find a function for it. And as a result, they would have been able to figure out the function of that DNA much earlier.
Accepting the paradigm that life was designed is not synonymous with stopping the study of life. Rather, the new paradigm allows us to ask questions we couldn’t ask before, such as who or what designed life, how did they do it, and what was the purpose of designing life? It makes sense when you think about it. Even in fields like archaeology, we study things that must have been designed by someone, and it doesn’t hinder us at all to think that the artifacts were designed by someone.
In this way, intelligent design theory does not impede the progress of science, nor is it simply a collection of arguments against evolution. Normal science under the current paradigm of evolutionary theory is facing anomalies such as irreducible complexity and specified complexity, which are typical of a paradigm reaching the end of its life. Intelligent design is a new paradigm for explaining these anomalies, and it perfectly explains the anomalies that appear under the paradigm of evolutionary theory, and it can help us to have new perspectives and questions about life. It’s time to move away from the stereotype of evolutionary theory and look at life from a new perspective with an open mind.