Jeff's Opening Statement:
4 (or 5) evidences of Intelligent Design

Intelligent Design, I would define this way: all the organisms that we observe today were designed by someone (or something, or some group of things) that was (and maybe still is) intelligent. All organisms were created in essentially their current form, but not necessarily all at the same time. Their genes were designed with a certain amount of extra information that creates variations between individuals, so that populations can adapt, to a limited extent, to changes in their environment.

Now, with those definitions, let's make some predictions. I'm going to list predictions of both theories in several areas, to emphasize the point that Intelligent Design is at least as valid a scientific theory as Evolution. If you would like to add more predictions that Evolution makes, I'll add corresponding predictions for Intelligent Design.

1. Fossils

A. Evolution predicts that the fossil record will be full of innumerable transitional forms of organisms that show the slow progression from simple forms to increasingly complex forms. From fish to amphibian, from amphibian to reptile, from land mammal to aquatic mammal, etc.

B. Intelligent Design predicts that organisms will appear in the fossil record fully formed, and will remain relatively unchanged until they go extinct or until the present time.
(Note that neither theory really predicts how many or how few fossils will be found. That's a question for geology more than for life-origin theories.)

The most notable aspect of the fossil record, for ID'ers, is the Cambrian explosion. Before that, there was only single-celled life. Then, all of a sudden (in geologic terms), hundreds of diverse and complex life forms appeared. These included trilobites, with fully-formed eyes very similar to modern ones. There is no fossil evidence of any intermediate steps leading up to trilobite eyes or any of the other biodiversity. So, this seems much more consistent with the theory that all these forms of life were designed and created at about the same time, than with the theory that they slowly evolved over millions of years. This pattern is repeated with the sudden appearance and disappearance of the dinosaurs.

Evolution theorizes that amphibians evolved from fish. This means that at some point there must have been some creature that would be classified as a fish which gave birth to a creature that would be classified as an amphibian. Obviously, the parent and offspring would have been very, very similar, somewhere in between a fish and an amphibian, and the offspring of the offspring would have continued to change over many more generations until they looked like modern amphibians. The ID'ers point is that there should be lots of fossils that are hard to classify because they are somewhere in between fish and amphibians. But we have found many fossilized fish and amphibians, but no such intermediate forms between the two. So the fossil evidence suggests that there was no evolution, and that both fish and amphibians were designed and created.


2. Genetics

A. Evolution predicts that DNA similarity between organisms should reflect their common ancestry. Reptiles should be more genetically similar to all other reptiles than to any birds or mammals, because all reptiles evolved from one reptile ancestor. Apes and humans should be more genetically similar to each other than to anything else, because they share a more recent common ancestor with each other than with any other species. DNA analyses of various areas of the genetic code should generally point to one common evolutionary tree. So Evolution predicts that the more DNA analyses we do, the more they will reinforce the same evolutionary tree.

B. Intelligent Design predicts that DNA similarity between organisms should reflect their common design. Many organisms should share many genes, especially if they are designed to live in similar environments, or if they function in similar ways. But the relationships will probably not fit into one common tree. DNA analyses of various areas of the genetic code will show that organism A is most similar to organism B in some areas but most similar to organism C in other areas. Some genes, such as the genes for eyes, which almost all organisms need, will be shared among vastly different organisms, like humans and squid. So Intelligent Design predicts that the more DNA analyses we do, the more different relationships we should find, including some that link organisms which appear to be vastly different.

We mentioned briefly before that human insulin is most similar to that of pigs, while our immune system is most similar to a rat's, while structurally, we are obviously most similar to apes. If humans and apes shared a common ancestor more recent than their common ancestor with any other animal, then all of our genes should be more similar to those of apes than those of pigs or rats or anything else. Whales are another example cited by ID'ers. Evolutionists once believed that whales evolved from Ambulocetus and several other extinct fox-like creatures. But then DNA analysis showed that whales were much more genetically similar to hippos than to the family that Ambulocetus belongs to (whose name I forget). Since various DNA analyses have produced very different evolutionary trees than morphological analyses and other DNA analyses, genetics supports common design much better than it supports common ancestry.


3. Environmental effects

A. Evolution predicts that changes in the environment will create selective pressures, which will in turn cause organisms to evolve so that they are suited to the new environment.

B. Intelligent design predicts that when the environment changes, organisms will adapt as far as their genes allow, but the adaptation will be limited. If that limit is exceeded, they will simply become extinct.

To quote one of your earlier emails: "Why is there so much diversity of life when we know extinction is real?" We certainly have observed many species become extinct, usually due to changes in the environment. We have not observed any new species evolve. Thus, the pattern that we see is one of always-decreasing biodiversity. Extrapolating this pattern forward and back in time suggests that a very wide variety of life was created at some time in the past, and that without intervention, all of it will eventually become extinct. This supports intelligent design, and not Evolution.


4. Irreducible complexity

A. Evolution predicts that organisms evolve through long sequences of small mutations. Thus all the complexity and diversity of life that we observe must have arisen through many, many steps, every one of which produced a survival advantage. If any structure or system that we observe is irreducibly complex, meaning that it could not have arisen through this process, then Evolution is falsified. So, obviously, Evolution predicts that no such structure or system will be discovered.

B. Irreducible complexity is very typical of things designed by human intelligence. A computer, for example, must have at least an input device, a processing unit, and an output device in order to serve any purpose. A radio is an even more significant example. Not only does a radio receiver have a certain minimum number of parts, but even a complete receiver is useless by itself. There must be a radio transmitter, which is a completely separate and completely different machine, transmitting a signal for the receiver to pick up. Television is the same way. So, Intelligent Design predicts that we will observe many biological structures and systems, and even inter-special dependencies, that are irreducibly complex.

This seems to me to be one of the ID'ers strongest points. The bacterial flagellum certainly does seem to be an irreducibly complex electric motor. Of course, if it were the only example, we could dismiss it. But we observe apparently irreducible systems everywhere: eyes (of which there are several varieties), ears, the digestive system, the cardiovascular system (including the blood clotting mechanism, without which any organism would almost certainly bleed to death before reaching maturity), the musculoskeletal and nervous systems (which I put together because either of them would be useless without the other), wing-powered flight, sexual reproduction, etc. There are also inter-special dependencies, like bees and flowers, humans and intestinal bacteria, and wasps and figs.

Now, in many of these cases, there are examples of similar but less complex things, like bacterial cilia for the flagellum, and the worm digestive system for the human digestive system. But all of these things would require not one or two, but thousands of intermediate steps to be developed through small, random mutations. It is difficult, if not impossible, to even imagine how every one of the thousands of intermediate steps could have provided a selective advantage. And even if we could imagine it, we have not found any fossil evidence of the intermediate steps between wingless mice and winged bats. On top of that, according to the evolutionary tree, many of these systems must have evolved many times. For example, wing-powered flight must have evolved four times, in birds, bats, pterosaurs, and insects. There are at least five types of sexual reproduction. Eyes, according to one evolutionist, must have evolved between forty and sixty times. There are 300 known species of fig wasps, almost all of which pollinate one and only one species of fig tree! (The whole fig wasp thing is a truly astonishing story that deserves more discussion later.) So, because irreducible complexity appears to be astonishingly common, it supports intelligent design much better than Evolution.


Alright, I'll leave it there for now. If these points are scientific, then ID'ers do know at least something about science. In fact, like I said, it seems to me that science is generally (maybe even completely) on their side. I know you disagree, so how would you respond to each of these points? And what other points do you think support Evolution better than intelligent design? (If any of this sounds accusatory, I really don't mean it to be. I mean it to be calm and scientific. And I know this is another long one, so respond at your convenience.)


I'd like to make a quick addendum to my last email. Most of the things I discussed are more like explanations of things that have been observed rather than predictions about things that we will observe. (Of course, Evolution similar explains rather than predicts most of the time, as do many scientific theories.) But in reading through the ID literature, I've found that many ID proponents make a very scientifically testable prediction. We have found that only about 2-5% of DNA encodes for proteins. Evolution theorists have predicted that the other 95-98% of DNA is leftover junk from the haphazard evolutionary process.

ID proponents predict that the intelligent agent(s) would not have thrown so much garbage into the design. A few portions of DNA may have degraded since they were designed, in accordance with the Second Law of Thermodynamics, such as our broken vitamin C-production system. But since DNA is obviously very good at preserving itself, most of it should still be functional. Therefore, ID predicts that we will discover that most of that junk DNA is actually useful. I would also like to point out that ID is often accused of trying to stifle scientific research by simply declaring that 'God did it,' but this is an example of ID suggesting avenues for further scientific research. All sorts of DNA experiments are going on right now, and I can't wait to find out what they discover. If it turns out that most of our DNA really is useless junk, I'd be ready to abandon ID as a scientific theory. But if it turns out that most of it is useful, I think it would be strong evidence for the truth of ID.