Because most philosophies that frown on reproduction don't survive.

Tuesday, October 11, 2005

The Creature on the Heath

"In crossing a heath, suppose I pitched my foot against a stone and were asked how the stone came to be there, I might possibly answer that for anything I knew to the contrary it had lain there forever; nor would it, perhaps, be very easy to show the absurdity of this answer. But suppose I had found a watch upon the ground, and it should be inquired how the watch happened to be in that place, I should hardly think of the answer which I had before given, that for anything I knew the watch might have always been there. Yet why should not this answer serve for the watch as well as for the stone? Why is it not as admissible in the second case as in the first? For this reason, and for no other, namely, that when we come to inspect the watch, we perceive -- what we could not discover in the stone -- that its several parts are framed and put together for a purpose." [William Paley, Natural Theology, Chapter Four]

Paley is, in many ways, the 18th century forerunner of today's Intelligent Design movement. His example of finding something a clearly designed as a watch lying on the heath is restated, in more complex form, by Michael Behe. In inspecting the watch, Behe would point out that the watch was irreducibly complex (that it could not function with even one of its parts missing) and William Dembski would add that it also displays specified complexity (that it must be as configured to function and is sufficiently complex that it could not be the result of chance).

However, the fact remains, the debate between evolution and intelligent design isn't about watches (or even mousetraps) but rather about animals. A lot of people, impressed by Behe and Dembski's lectures, and liking the idea of empirically proving the existence of God, enjoy saying that intuiting design from irreducible complexity or specified complexity is so incredibly obvious that one has to make an active effort to suppress this assumption.

Maybe so, maybe not. Let us embark upon the heath, and rather than sinking into despair and madness like Lear, Fool and Kent, let us instead imagine that we come across a strange creature, the like of which we have never seen before. (The joys of Google image search.)

Now, this definitely fits the bill of "strange creature", but imagining that we happened across it upon the heath, would we immediately assume that some deity, alien or mad scientist had created it? Or would we assume that there must be a small population of such creatures thereabouts (perhaps shy and retiring creatures seldom seen) and that this strange creature was in fact descended from a strange creature mother and a strange creature father? Myself, I would generally assume the latter -- unless some peculiar thing about it began to lead me to believe that it was unlike other animals and was not in fact descended from others of its own kind.

What am I getting at, you may wonder, and will I ever get to the point? The point is this: animals fall into a different category from any other physical thing in that they are the only things capable of creating new beings like themselves. When you see an animal, you assume that it is the offspring of another animal. When you see a car, you do not assume that it is the offspring of another car. This is because you understand that animals reproduce and manufactured objects do not. Further, reproduction produces slight variances in result. Sexually reproducing animals do not produce exact copies of themselves, but rather variations based upon the inherited characteristics from both parents.

Now, the fact that animals can reproduce and that their offspring have variations certainly does not prove that an ancestral animal was not created or modified by some intelligent being. But it does mean that one needs to give the question more thought before announcing a sweeping conclusion such as: "Anything with specified complexity or irreducible complexity must be designed, and therefore animals were obviously designed."

Clearly, if animals were not capable of reproducing, then finding one would suggest manufacture or indeed (given the complexity of most animals as compared to any machine) an outright miracle. However, as things stand what we can say with surety is: "Any non reproducing thing which is found to possess specified complexity or irreducible complexity must be the product of intelligent design. Any reproducing thing which possesses specified complexity or irreducible complexity may be the product of either design or the offspring of other organisms -- most likely the latter since we have no idea how to manufacture a living organism."

This takes us back to the question of: From what, then, do these animals descend? And that, of course, is the question. (What, you expected answers?) More later...

UPDATE: Welcome Mark Shea readers. If you're interested in more, do check out today's follow-up post on evolution.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

This is because you understand that animals reproduce and manufactured objects do not.

That is not strictly true even now (the company McAfee exists to destroy manufactured self-reproducing pests, after all); and to the extent it is true that is a very temporary state of affairs.

Darwin said...

Fair point -- I hadn't thought about software as a 'thing' which could be considered to reproduce. (Though depending on how you look at it I suppose you could argue that a spreading virus is essentially one long execution loop, rather than a set of 'things'.)

Certainly, from a science fictional point of view, there's the idea of self-reproducing machines and even of machines programmed to make survival improving adaptations to themselves or their 'offspring', but although certainly a SF and technology fan, I have the feeling (may well be wrong) that we're actually rather far off from pulling off anything very close to that level.

Julie D. said...

a spreading virus is essentially one long execution loop

Which almost sounds how IDers view creation, hmmmm? :-0

I honestly don't see why people get their knickers in a twist over ID as long as one accepts the fact that it is a philosophical view of evolution, just as "mutation" is another philosophical view of the same thing. Both are attributing causes that cannot be proven to scientific facts. (And I got NO problems with evolution, just for the record.)

Anonymous said...

I think the main controversy is over whether we let local school boards and parents decide which philosophies of science to apply in teaching biology to children or whether we impose the darwinian philosophy of science universally in biology classes using the court system and police power. If the political conflict were not there - that is, if darwinists did not insist on using the police and courts to root out heresy - then the philosophical conflict would remain, but would I think be far less controversial.

Darwin said...

The education element is certainly part of it, but I think the other reason the debate has legs is that there is a segment of Protestant theology which demands a school of biblical interpretation that rules out an old earth and common descent. Now, the majority of people who are interested in or support ID are in no sense 'creationists' in the standard sense of the term, but I'm not sure that the fight would have carried on this long if there were not a certain group of people whose faith in God absolutely depends on evolution being false.

Maybe part of the reason I have so much trouble seeing why people get so excited about ID is that I missed the primary and high school public education entirely, and although I took Physical Anthropology at a state college from a self professed agnostic (I wanted to leave my Steubenville credits open for other classes, so I took my science core of the summer) there was certainly no pushing of a materialist agenda in class. It was very much a 'this is the best explanation we have for this at this time' and 'we're not sure how this works, but it appears to be something like X' kind of atmosphere. Which isn't to say one never meets bio or anthro teachers who announce "And therefore there is no God" it's jus that I've never met one.

Anonymous said...

"the darwinian philosophy of science universally in biology classes using the court system and police power. If the political conflict were not there - that is, if darwinists did not insist on using the police and courts to root out heresy - then the philosophical conflict would remain, but would I think be far less controversial."

I welcome this day. I'm sure high school history classes would be so much less contentious if they would allow my theory of how the holocaust never happened. It's really only the dominance of Jewish historical philosophy that stands in my way.

Julie D. said...

Although bio or anthro teachers may not say it, my atheist mother makes this the backbone of her reason for belief in no God. She learned the mutation theory good and well in college and has never looked back.

Anonymous said...

I'm sure high school history classes would be so much less contentious if they would allow my theory of how the holocaust never happened.

Part of why discussion of darwinism is so fascinating is because of the level of self-parody on the part of so many of the participants. (I don't include our blog host here).

...but I'm not sure that the fight would have carried on this long if there were not a certain group of people whose faith in God absolutely depends on evolution being false.

Someone whose faith depends on a young earth and rejection of descent with modification doesn't have a friend in ID, though; although I don't doubt that there is a degree of "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" going on.

Darwin said...

I'm sure high school history classes would be so much less contentious if they would allow my theory of how the holocaust never happened.

Ummm... Yeah. I'll admit to the necessity of bringing Nazi's into any contentious discussion, but could we just...not?

Someone whose faith depends on a young earth and rejection of descent with modification doesn't have a friend in ID, though; although I don't doubt that there is a degree of "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" going on.

Agreed. I think some of it is indeed "enemy of my enemy" and also a dash of "Evolution as a theory is falling apart. Science has no explanation for the history of life. It could just as well be that the earth is only 8000 years old."

There also seems to be general, dispersed feeling that in some sense, if the theory of evolution could be disproved, that this would somehow strengthen Christianity.

Anonymous said...

There also seems to be general, dispersed feeling that in some sense, if the theory of evolution could be disproved, that this would somehow strengthen Christianity.

I'll buy that. That dispersed feeling may even be correct, in the same pastoral sense in which if the practice of cremation were to disappear that would strengthen Christianity (since cremation, though not morally or theologically wrong strictly speaking, undermines the doctrine of the resurrection of the body).

But of course what really matters is in what senses evolution is true, (granted that it is clearly true in the broad sense of old earth and common descent with modification).