Learn From It

I tried. Really I did. I spent a good portion of yesterday digging through the non-science of so-called Intelligent Design, which, for all intents and purposes is simply a politically-correct rebranding of Creationism. Darwin is the Devil, and Evolutionists are just souls in need of saving. Blah blah blah.

Scratch an “Intelligent Design” cultist and you'll find a fundamentalist Christian (or Catholic) just under the surface. Press one of them on it, and this idea of a External Designer is always about their god. But is that any surprise? How could it not be about their god and not also be blasphemous (according to their own idea of what a sin is, of course)? I found any number of references about ID (no, there's no subliminal messaging there), but you know what? I was disappointed: for something that has so much momentum out there, I went in expecting to learn a thing or two—or at least learn of new examples of wonderment out there in the world that these crazies might have accidentally tripped into.

Alas, it's the tired old saw: failure of the imagination.

You know the baser christian types out there don't have any imagination. I know it. Even they know it—though they'll only admit it indirectly, under the aegis of not needing to imagine anything when god is there to instruct them.

I'll borrow one of their political commandments—and I'll take a shower later—to illustrate the point: keep it simple; nuance just muddies and complexity is from the devil.

So here goes: Intelligent Design is about Negative Evidence. In other words, “if I can't fathom how a thing came to be, it must have been Jesus God a Supreme Designer who made it happen.

That's it, folks! They try to mask their utterly misunderstood notions of the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics in information theory, or they trot out the old Watchmaker argument (someone get these people a Yahtzee game), or the more candidly honest ones admit that God Must Have a Place in Any Valid Argument. In any case, it's sad that human beings are so gullible as to consider that ID belongs anywhere near Science Education.

It's up to the churches these people tithe to teach them about that Big Intelligent Designer in the sky, not science teachers.

I know it must be upsetting to the god-ridden to see the rest of us possessing of senses of wonderment, of embracing the unembraceable unknown with smiles and warmth, of having a sense of self, of worth, of value even as we admit that we are but bits of flotsam in the larger flood of reality.

How do we do all of that without the need for an Intelligent Provider? Well, we do it the way that material reality has always done it: we evolve, using thirst for knowledge as our first, best Fitness Function.