Design in the early twenty-first century

In the early twenty-first century, the discussion of design is being engaged with renewed vigor. Discussion centers on the somewhat negative evaluations emerging from chaos theory and evolutionary biology, and around more positive evaluations based upon the intelligibility of the universe and the suitability of the universe for the emergence of life. In these discussions, there are differences of viewpoint within the fields of theology and science that are every bit as great as some of the differences between these fields. It is not uniformly the case that theology affirms design while science denies it; the discussions are much more nuanced than that.

The reintroduction of the role of chance and contingency in the way the world works has, for many, challenged notions of design. Ian Stewart in Does God Play Dice? The Mathematics of Chaos (1989) has noted that with the advent of quantum mechanics the clockwork universe of Newton’s day has become a cosmic lottery. “The very distinction . . . between the randomness of chance and the determinism of law, is called into question. Perhaps God can play dice, and create a universe of complete law and order, in the same breath.” As one learns more about chaos theory, the question becomes “not so much whether God plays dice but how God plays dice” (p. 1–2).

Biologist Jacques Monod in Chance and Necessity (1972) expressed the conclusion of some: “The ancient convenant is in pieces: Man at last knows that he is alone in the unfeeling immensity of the universe, out of which he has emerged only by chance. Neither his destiny nor his duty have been written down” (p. 167).

Theologians who wish to uphold design are responding variously to chaos theory and the observations of science that much of what occurs in the universe is random activity, pure chance. A great deal depends upon their differing understandings of what one must mean by God’s “design” as presented above. Those who mean “a detailed preexisting blueprint in the mind of God” hold a view that is antithetical to chance. These theologians tend to argue that what appears to be random is only apparently so. They point out that even Albert Einstein held the position that what appears to be a random occurrence would prove not to be random if only the causal activity behind it could be seen.

Other theologians do not understand design in such a constraining mode. They would allow that it might be part of the “design” that some things happen by necessity, others by chance, and others in open interplay of relative freedom. The design might include contingency as well as regularity, chaos as well as order, novelty as well as continuity.

Design might simply mean setting the systemic conditions that make life and consciousness possible, and then allowing it all to unfold. This view has the capacity to incorporate elements of chance as well as necessity into “design.” This shift has profound implications for the way in which God and God’s relation to the world are viewed. As John Polkinghorne expressed it, this view is “consistent with the will of a patient and subtle Creator, content to achieve his purposes through the unfolding of process and accepting thereby a measure of the vulnerability and precariousness which always characterize the gift of freedom by love” (1987, p. 69).

Process theology takes this general approach but allows for a more interactive role for God. God’s purposes are expressed not only in setting the unchanging structural conditions and then letting things be, but also in the novel possibilities introduced. Divine creativity works within order and chaos, persuading toward good ends. It works with and does not coerce the self-creating activity of creatures.

Evolutionary biology, generally speaking, excludes appeal to the notion of intelligent design in organisms. The explanation of life in all its diversity, according to neo-Darwinist Francisco Ayala, lies in the blind, unguided, and mechanical process of natural selection. There are teleological processes internal to organisms; the heart, for example, has the purpose of pumping blood. However, these are not to be accounted for by divine design but through the process of natural selection and the development over time of features that prove reproductively successful. This process needs no external teleology directing it from outside. If there is anything like a “goal” or “end” to which things tend, it is reproductive efficiency.

To these assumptions, most contemporary theologians (except for creationists who reject evolutionary theory altogether) would accede. The question may still be posed as to why all things are oriented toward reproductive success. Can one infer, for example, that ultimate reality is in some sense fecund and biophilic? Why does natural selection work in the way that it does? How did material existence come to be self-organizing in the way that it is? Moreover, the mode of operation of evolution is a source of wonder that seems to point beyond itself. Differentiation, self-organization, and interrelation seem to characterize the evolutionary process. As Paul Davies points out, life forms have emerged from primeval chaos in a sequence of self-organizing processes that have progressively enriched and complexified the evolving universe in a more or less unidirectional manner. All this diversity, as John Haught has noted, comes from the informational sequencing of only four DNA acid bases. It is a remarkable state of affairs.

Nature seems to operate with a kind of “optimization principle” whereby the universe evolves to create maximum richness and diversity. Davies observes “that this rich and complex variety emerges from the featureless inferno of the Big Bang, and does so as a consequence of laws of stunning simplicity and generality, indicates some sort of matching of means to ends that has a distinct teleological flavor to it” (1994, p. 46).

As Paul Davies observed, “Human beings have always been struck by the complex harmony and intricate organization of the physical world. The movement of the heavenly bodies across the sky, the rhythms of the seasons, the pattern of a snowflake, at the myriads of living creatures so well adapted to their environment—all these things seem too well arranged to be a mindless accident. It was only natural that our ancestors attributed the elaborate order of the universe to the purposeful workings of a deity” (1994, p. 44). However, with the increased understanding that science has brought, one no longer needs explicit theological explanations for these phenomena. The questions that remain concern why the universe is lawful, coherent, and unified in this way. Why is it intelligible? Scientists themselves normally take for granted that people live in a rational, ordered cosmos subject to precise laws that can be uncovered by human reasoning. Yet why this is so remains a “tantalizing mystery” (Davies 1992, p. 20). Ian Barbour quotes Einstein as saying, “the only thing that is incomprehensible about the world is that it is comprehensible” (1990, p. 141).

Not all scientists agree here, however. Theoretical physicist Steven Weinberg at the end of his book, The First Three Minutes (1977), makes the statement, “the more the universe seems comprehensible, the more it also seems pointless” (p. 149). Analysis of cosmos does not, for him, yield clear and evident purpose. Advocates of the anthropic principle, John Barrow and Frank Tipler (also theoretical physicists), make a different interpretation. The very laws that Weinberg takes to be indifferent to human beings seem to them to suggest the presence of an intelligence that “wanted” human beings to evolve.

Biological systems do have some very particular requirements and these requirements are in fact met by nature. There are cosmic coincidences of striking proportions. For example, if the expansion rate of the universe after the Big Bang were greater by an infinitesimally small proportion, stars and planets would not have formed. If it were any smaller, the universe would have collapsed upon itself. Similarly, the inverse square laws that apply to gravitational, electric, and magnetic forces are essential to the stability of the atoms and solar systems.

Even a small change in the force-distance relation would jeopardize life as we know it. There are countless other instances of what Barbour has called “remarkable coincidences” (p. 136) The odds against this special set of physical conditions and natural laws that make our lives possible are astronomical. The theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking has said, “The odds against a universe like ours emerging out of something like the Big Bang are enormous. I think there are clearly religious implications” (p. 121).

Detractors will say that one could only observe a universe that is consistent with one’s existence (the weak form of the anthropic principle). Moreover, there is a possibility that there are an infinite number of universes. It is also possible that other, vastly different, forms of life have emerged elsewhere under different initial conditions and physical laws, although, as of 2002, none are known and this remains an open question.

If it is the case that the existence of life requires finely tuned conditions and these do in fact exist, then the suggestion of intelligent design does not seem an extravagant metaphysical claim. It is not more extravagant than the claim for infinite random universes. Some would apply the criterion of Ockham’s Razor and argue that the hypothesis that there exists an intelligent designer serves as a simpler and therefore better explanation (applying Ockham’s Razor criterion).

Theological responses to the argument from design emerging from some scientific accounts of the intelligibility of the universe and its suitability for life are mixed. From this scientific picture of the universe, many theologians are willing to make the interpretive leap to the existence of an intelligent designer—a creator with an investment in life, and even, apparently, intelligent life. If one does see design, it is hard not to make the leap to thoughts of an intelligent designer. While one may imagine a designer without a design, a design without a designer would be a surprising thing indeed.

Nevertheless, many theologians do not want to invest too much import in the argument from design. This is, in part, because the evidence is ambiguous. Scientists do not all agree, for example, that evolution manifests the directionality that is often appealed to as evidence of design. Paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould holds that while early evolution might be said to complexify (there was no other direction to go), as things steadied out life randomly got simpler as often as it got more complex. Complex life forms are actually disadvantageous; they are easy prey to mass extinctions that periodically plague the planet.

Even if the weight of scientific opinion were clearly in the side of design in the universe, the leap to an intelligent designer is still a large interpretive leap, and not one that all impartial observers would make. And even if this be granted as a reasonable inference from the evidence, a “designer” is not yet “God” in the sense of the creator of all things visible and invisible, infinite in goodness, wisdom, and power.

Theologically speaking, the argument from design is somewhat limited in its efficacy. At best, it is a pointer toward God; it cannot offer a convincing proof for God’s existence. For the believer, evidence of design in the universe seems a kind of confirmation that there is reason to believe that it is not unreasonable to believe. Whether one believes or does not believe is a question of interpretation, as some would have it, “a leap of faith.” One that is inevitably “underdetermined by the data.” The current state of the discussion between theologians and scientists is one of active engagement and mutual illumination. There are exciting new directions and many diverse perspectives represented.

Old assumptions that theologians will uniformly support arguments from design while scientists will uniformly oppose them, simply do not hold. Scientists, for example, disagree with one another as to whether there is in fact evidence of intelligent design in the universe. Theologians, conversely, differ as to whether and to what extent such evidence would have bearing upon the question of the existence of God. The questions remain open and interesting.

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