Philosophy of Religion Research

Intelligent Design: Describing and Criticizing Elliott Sober’s View Point

Document Type : Original Research

Authors

1 PhD Graduate in Comparative Philosophy, University of Qom, Qom, Iran; and Researcher at Imam Hossein University, Tehran, Iran

2 Associate Professor at Philosophy Department, University of Qom, Qom, Iran

Abstract

Intelligent Design (ID) is an attempt to defend the idea that the order of nature bears marks of its Creator. This image of the concept has a historical root in ancient Greek philosophy. ID argues that science and theology support each other, when they are rightly understood. Under the influence of investigations of modern sciences –especially biology and cosmology- ID became the most serious battle in contemporary debates between theists and atheists. In this article, after an introduction for describing ID in general, Sober’s view point on the subject is described and criticized. Sober’s main claim is that ID is not testable and so should be rejected from scientific enterprise. In this article, we show that (1) his notion of testability is not complete and (2) ID can satisfy the testability criterion with some considerations. Sober's critics mainly underlie his notion of designer (divine) intervention in nature. The first response of this article is not only a deductive proof for ID, but also a critique of methodological naturalism.

Keywords

صفایی‌پور، حامد. ۱۳۹۲. «اصل آنتروپیک و نقش آن در برهان تنظیم ظریف کیهانی». پژوهش‌های علم و دین ۸ ، 77-109.
مصباح یزدی، محمد تقی. 1382. آموزش فلسفه، ج 2. تهران: شرکت چاپ و نشر بین الملل.
مطهری، مرتضی. ۱۳۸۷. مجموعه آثار، ج 8. تهران: صدرا.
معصومی، سعید و مهدی گلشنی. 1392. «معیار نظریه‌های علمی». در مطالعات معرفتی در دانشگاه اسلامی، 407-432.
Behe, Michael. 1996. Darwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution. New York: Free Press.
Bostrom, Nick. 2002. Anthropic Bias, Observation Selection Effect in the Science and Philosophy. New York and London: Routledge.
Carter, B. 1974. "Large Number Coincidences and the Anthropic Principle." Cosmology Confrontation of Cosmological Theories with Data.
Carter, B. 2004. "Anthropic Principle in Cosmology." Contribution to Colloquium Cosmology: Facts and problems, College de France.
Collins, R. 2009. “The Teleological Argument: An Exploration of the Fine-Tuning of the Universe.” In W. Craig & J. Moreland, The Blackwell Companion to Natural Theology, 202-281. Blackwell Publishing.
Craig, William Lane. 1988. "Barrow and Tipler on the Anthropic Principle vs. Divine Design." British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 39(3): 389-395.
Craig, William Lane. 2005. "Design and the Anthropic Fine-Tuning of the Universe." In God and Design: The Teleological Argument and Modern Science, by Neil. A. Manson, 155-177. London and New York: Rutledge.
Craig, William Lane. 2007. “Naturalism and Intelligent Design.” In E. R. Stewart (ed.), Intelligent Design: William A. Dembski & Michael Ruse in Dialogue. MN: Fortress Press.
Dembski, William. 1999. "Signs of Intelligence: a Primer on the Discernment of Intelligent Design." Touchstone, 76-84.
Dembski, William. 2002. No Free Lunch: Why Specified Complexity Cannot Be Purchased without Intelligence. MD: Rowman and Littlefield.
Duhem, P. M. M. 1954. The Aim and Structure of Physical Theory. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Gould, Stephen Jay. 1980. The Panda’s Thumb: More Reflections in Natural History. New York: Norton.
Kojonen, Erkki Vesa Rope. 2014. "Intelligent Design: A Theological and Philosophical Analysis." (Academic dissertation). Finland, Espoo: Faculty of Theology at the University of Helsinki.
Moreland, J. 1994. The Creation Hypothesis: Scientific Evidence for an Intelligent Designer. IL: IVP Books.
Murphy, N. 1993. Theology in an Age of Scientific Reasoning. NY: Cornell University Press.
Numbers, Ronald. 2006. The Creationists: From Scientific Creationism to Intelligent Design. MA: Harvard University Press.
Plantinga, Alvin. 1991. "When Faith and Reason Clash: Evolution and the Bible." Christian Scholar’s Review 1. 8-32.
Plantinga, Alvin. 2011. Where the Conflict Really Lies? Science, Religion, and Naturalism. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Poper, Karl. 1959. The Logic of Scientific Discovery. New York: Basic Books.
Sedley, David. 2007. Creationism and Its Critics in Antiquity. California: University of California Press.
Sober, Elliott. 2005. "The Design Argument." In The Blackwell Guide to Philosophy of Religion, edited by William Mann, 117-146. Blackwell.
Sober, Elliott. 2007. "What is Wrong with Intelligent Design?" Quarterly Review of Biology, 3-8.
Swinburne, Richard. 1996. Is there a God. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Philosophy of Religion Research
Volume 14, Issue 2 - Serial Number 2
November 2017
Pages 123-148