This will be a brief post, mostly to present a framework for a series of small posts I intend to do defending and applying the argument from design. Despite the broad dismissal of this argument in pop-culture, it is alive and well. When people say that "science has disproven God" (it hasn't - how could it?) what they most often mean is "science can explain the order of the universe, so we don't need God." Indeed, gods have long been used as cop-out explanations for hard-to-explain phenomena (like lightning, earthquakes, or the rise and fall of empires).
Yet there are two critical things to observe at the outset when analyzing arguments from design. The first: what sort of question are we asking here? The second: Is it proper to think that science could answer it?
On the type of question: when we ask "Why is there apparent order in the universe?" what sort of question are we asking? Is it an aesthetic one? No - though the order of the universe can be quite beautiful. It is a literary question? No (despite the common use of creation myths to explain the order). At its fundamental level, it isn't asking for a story explaining the order - just an answer. It certainly isn't an ethical question...Or a political one (to use an absurd example)
Is it scientific? Well, here we'll have some say "yes," but they'd be hard pressed to argue that. The scientific process demands experiment, hypothesis, and repetition (to gather sufficient data to infer inductive principles or laws). Obviously, we cannot yet observe the origin of our universe to determine if the order we observe in the universe is producable (reliably) by random chance. Such an experiment is simply impossible (as it depends on us existing, which requires the universe to exist).
Yet the difficulty for this question as a scientific one goes much, much deeper. Actually, this difficulty extends to the cosmological arguments (the arguments from change, time, and cause) as well. You see, the scientific method is NOT an independently existing idea (it isn't a self-evident, axiomatic truth). Rather, the scientific method is based on a CLEAR philosophical view of the world.
Science assumes, as part of its method, that things exist (to observe) and that they follow observable patterns. If we don't assume those things, we can't do science. If we don't assume existence (i.e. if we doubt our senses' abilities to interact with a real outside world), then observation of the wold around us would be unable to produce real knowledge. Further, if we don't assume that things behave in patterns (observable patterns) then it becomes impossible to infer "laws" inductively. Inductive reasoning entirely depends on the assumption that things behave consistently.
So how could it be possible, then, for the scientific method to demonstrate that things exist and that they follow observable patterns? In other words, if science has to assume that things exist (as its first premise) and that they are ordered (as its second premise) it can NEVER be used to justify or explain WHY they exist and are ordered. That would just be a giant example of circular reasoning (assuming your premise as part of your conclusion).
So the question has to preceed science. If science is based on assumptions about the ultimate nature of things, do we have a word for questions about the ultimate nature of things? Indeed we do: metaphysics.
The questions of teleology and cosmology are NOT scientific questions. They are metaphysical questions. We should never expect science to be capable of proving or disproving any of the possible answers to these questions. It simply isn't equipped to do so.
So the issue between Intelligent Design and Evolution is a complete red-herring. It isn't religion vs science or even science vs science. It is philosophy reminding science that science cannot answer all questions. The avoidance of addressing intelligent design is our culture's avoidance of addressing the inherent circularity of its own materialist world view.
The question is still live: Why is there order in the universe?
Part four will attempt to answer it.
In Christ,
Macarius
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