Intelligent Design 

help from Rory Roybal

Evidence for Intelligent Design?

This common saying reflects the first and most important basis of the scientific method, which is the ability to observe any supposed scientific hypothesis, theory or law in action. Science observes physical evidence, and attempts to reason from that observed evidence to form ideas, tests and conclusions about how things work. If processes operate consistently, scientists attempt to represent their behavior in mathematical formulas for more precise understanding.

In the Bible,                                                                                                                                                  “For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, [even] his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:” (Rom. 1:20).

Interestingly, many leading evolutionists, naturalists and atheists agree with intelligent design and creation advocates that our universe appears to be carefully designed.

Why is there an intelligent design vs. evolution debate at all?  Evolutionary atheists and naturalists find it extremely difficult to admit there is a conscious, intelligent designer. Obviously this is disbelieving  what they clearly observe, choosing instead to believe what they see is a grand illusion, and that incredibly complex design, including life, came about by natural means and not an intelligent, conscious Creator.

Amazingly Evolutionist Scientists See Evidence of the Supernatural

However, an increasing number of evolutionist scientists have come to believe there must exist some sort of supernatural plan or agency behind the laws and constants of physics, because of how minutely precise they must be for the universe or life to exist at all.

A Wall Street Journal article reported: “Scientists … often change their minds when they see new evidence. I was reminded of this a few months ago when I saw a survey in the journal ‘Nature’. It revealed that 40% of American physicists, biologists and mathematicians believe in God — and not just some metaphysical abstraction, but a deity who takes an active interest in our affairs and hears our prayers: the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.”  Jim Holt, Science Resurrects God, The Wall Street Journal, December 24, 1997, Dow Jones & Co.

‘Science’ is the most prestigious peer-reviewed scientific journal in the United States. Its August 1997 issue featured an article entitled Science and God: A Warming Trend? in which it said:  “The fact that the universe exhibits many features that foster organic life — such as precisely those physical constants that result in planets and long-lived stars — also has led some scientists to speculate that some divine influence may be present.”

What Leading Evolutionists Say About Intelligent Design

Physicist Dr. Stephen Hawking is regarded as one of the most brilliant scientific minds of this age. Although he declares himself an agnostic, he is clearly also an evolutionist, since he said:

“We are just an advanced breed of monkeys on a minor planet of a very average star.”

Stephen Hawking (quoted), Der Spiegel, October 17, 1988.

In an apparent turnaround, however, Hawking said:  “It would be very difficult to explain why the universe should have begun, except as the act of a God who intended to create beings like us. The whole history of the universe can be said to be the work of God.”

Stephen Hawking, The Theory of Everything: The Origin and Fate of the Universe, Agawam, Massachusetts: New Millennium Press 2002, p. 117.

In a similar vein, Hawking conceded:

“The odds against a universe like ours emerging out of something like the Big Bang are enormous … I think clearly there are religious implications whenever you start to discuss the origins of the universe.”

Stephen Hawking, A Brief History of Time: From the Big Bang to Black Holes, New York New York: Bantam Books 1998, p. 128.

Richard Dawkins is the leading evolutionist and spokesperson for evolution today. In his famous book The Blind Watchmaker, he says:

“Biology is the study of complicated things that give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose.”

“Natural selection is the blind watchmaker, blind because it does not see ahead, does not plan consequences, has no purpose in view. Yet the living results of natural selection overwhelmingly impress us with the appearance of design as if by a master watchmaker, impress us with the illusion of design and planning.”

Richard Dawkins, The Blind Watchmaker, New York, New York: Penguin 2006, pp. 1, 21.

The following quotes are from Dawkin’s book, The God Delusion:

“One of the greatest challenges to the human intellect, over the centuries, has been to explain how the complex, improbable appearance of design in the universe arises.”

“The natural temptation is to attribute the appearance of design to actual design itself. In the case of a man-made artifact such as a watch, the designer really was an intelligent engineer. It is tempting to apply the same logic to an eye or a wing, a spider or a person.”

Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion, Boston, Massachusetts: Mariner Books 2008, p. 157-158.

Phillip E. Johnson cites the renowned geneticist Francis Crick in order to illustrate the fact that the biological world has the strong appearance of being designed:

“One of the world’s most famous scientists, probably the most famous living biologist, is Sir Francis Crick, the British co-discoverer of the structure of DNA, a Nobel Prize winner… Crick is also a fervent atheistic materialist, who propounds the particle story. In his autobiography, Crick says very candidly biologists must remind themselves daily that what they study was not created, it evolved; it was not designed, it evolved. Why do they have to remind themselves of that? Because otherwise, the facts which are staring them in the face and trying to get their attention might break through. What we discovered when I developed a working group of scientists, philosophers, et al., in the United States was that living organisms look as if they were designed and they look that way because that is exactly what they are.”

Phillip E. Johnson, Essay: Evolution And Christian Faith.

Francis Crick, What Mad Pursuit: A Personal View of Scientific Discovery, New York, New York: Basic Books 1990, p. 138.

Moreover, Crick has written several times that problems with an undirected origin of life on earth are so great that we should consider the idea that space aliens sent a rocket ship to the earth to seed it with spores to begin life. Crick also stongly recommends Dawkin’s book The Blind Watchmaker, which says plainly that living things have the appearance of design.

Crick also wrote:

“An honest man, armed with all the knowledge available to us now, could only state that in some sense the origin of life appears at the moment to be almost a miracle, so many are the conditions which would have had to be satisfied to get it going.”

Francis Crick, Life Itself, Its Origin and Nature, New York, NY: Simon & Schuster 1982, p. 88.