Intelligent “Design”
During an idle work conversation with a colleague the other day, we got onto the subject of “Intelligent Design”, and it provoked a thought which made me realize just how loaded the “Design” word actually is. To speak of creation being “designed” is to invoke, almost subconsciously, a huge deterministic mechanistic metaphor for interpreting our reality – the cosmos as machine and God as designer/engineer.
Metaphors really interest me because, although we use them as part of everyday speech, and think we understand what we mean by them, analysis often reveals we do not. In a sense they obfuscate, smudge and blur assumptions, giving an air of precision and understanding but in reality serve to mask the opposite. Moreover, our consumption of metaphoric language is such that we forget we are talking in simile and figurative language, and substitute the representative for the actual. In this case God becomes the designer / engineer.
Such a mechanistic view of our reality is neither necessary nor, I believe, real. From a quantum perspective, our world is far from deterministic. And ever since Hume, we have been aware that “cause and effect” are anything but provable. Philosophically, we simply are not able to demonstrate rationally that effect follows cause – something I intend to explore in further blogs under the “Faith & Science” category. Cause and effect, action and reaction, are nothing more than assumptions - presuppositions which we are just not able to justify.
This is not to say that these assumptions are not useful; far from it. In fact, the whole of our scientific world view is based on such assumptions. They enable us to engage with and manipulate our reality in an unprecedented manor. But to reduce our reality to such a deterministic understanding is to make it something less. Further, such a world view removes the possibility of free will and with it, the notion of an agent capable of both moral and immoral decision. In a sense, from this perspective, the only person who could possibly function as a moral agent is God, the designer / engineer who set everything in motion.
Significantly, it is important to realize that this metaphor does not originate from scripture. It is an understanding which we have superimposed on the creation narrative. The Hebrew word used simply means “to bring into being” or to “produce” and is not tied in any way to a mechanistic operation. To reduce the creation event to that of a master engineer constructing a machine is, in my opinion, to have a very low view of creation. God created us, and our reality, to be free. It is as if, in creation, God made space for an-other. We are not automatons executing a predetermined program, but individuals capable of making moral choices. But, perhaps even more importantly, we are free to love!
The God of love, in love, made space for an-other to love and be loved. The root and the very fabric of our reality is based on this principle and this principle alone. To reduce God, humanity or creation to that of a machine is to miss everything.
God is a lover not a “designer”!
6 Responses to “Intelligent “Design””
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Ray
Said this on June 4th, 2007 at 2:32pm:In a purely random non-deterministic fashion, I happened to chance upon this site….
Well actually I wanted to find AJ’s new mobile number, looked up recent emails, found one I hadn’t opened before, saw a link that “sounded interesting” knowing past conversations with AJ, opened the link, read some posts, having read God Delusion (because someone recommended it), wrote this blog comment.
Did I know I was going to be led down such a path before needing a mate’s phone number, no I did not. Did I make choices - possibly. But what I cannot know is that I did so out of free will. Completely random thoughts do not enter my mind…. but “random” (albeit predetermined?) events sometimes seem to make them so.
One cannot yet say whether our reality is determistic, but does that matter? Our current scientific view happens to map quite nicely to our observed reality, does that mean our model is correct.. maybe. If not, that model will adapt, it does not mean cause-and-effect doesn’t exist, indeed empirical evidence suggests that it does.
Certainly, at least at the human level of interaction, reality *needs* to be deterministic. A universe that isn’t I suggest couldn’t support life, or at least intelligent life.
Also you seem to want free will, but at the same time religion begs for god intervention (such as praying), I don’t personally see how the two can co-exist.
isc
Said this on June 13th, 2007 at 8:59pm:Quite.
Anyone…?!
hamawa
Said this on June 14th, 2007 at 6:40pm:I suppose it depends what you mean by prayer. If you believe that praying for your leccy bill to be paid will send God down to the post office with his amex then that’s one thing. But if that is the case, then what sort of a God do we have if (for example) he will abandon that Madeleine girl in Portugal but if enough people over the world pray for her retrieval He will say, oh alrighty then and send her safely home? Is God a democracy? If enough people pray for the sky to be pink instead of blue will He be swayed? Or is there some sort of health & wealth system going on whereby the faithful will be rewarded on earth and anyone having a rubbish time needs to accept it is their own fault for not praying hard enough?
I think prayer is a twofold thing. Firstly we are God’s instruments and when we pray for our leccy bill to be paid we should be asking for God’s help to do it - for him to show us a way we can, or to comfort us so that when the lights go out we are strong and secure in his love and can endure no heating. When praying for an end to war or hunger we should be asking what can we do to make heaven on earth? Secondly prayer is not just something we do but it is perhaps a state of mind or being. Acknowledging a mutual relationship, used and valued, and leading the soul into the Presence of God. Religion is a boring collection of outward signs and actions that “ought” to be done for whatever cultural or habitual reasons we may have picked up during our lives. Prayer is vital and real and in it lies the love of God. Prayer, an attitude, is different to prayers which are particular actions and expressions of the underlying attitude. A person does not only pray when they utter prayers - that would be like saying that you can only love while writing love letters or speaking loving words.
God (I think) doesn’t intervene, but supports His lovers to act of their own free will. They in turn may wish to make the God they love happy. Prayer is bound with love because people like to be close to those they love and to make them happy - prayer accomplishes these both.
And as for the other point, someone can invent a new sport, lay out the pitch and write some rules, but once the players have started the game it is in their hands alone to determine the course of play and whether or not they break the rules. But if in doubt over whether something was intended, a player could always try to track down the inventor for guidance.
AJ
Said this on June 16th, 2007 at 7:46am:Guys, thanks for your comments here and apologies for being a bit lax on the responses. Things are busy for me and the blog has taken a bit of a back seat. Also I am about to go on hols for a week or so, so just before I catch my plane, please allow a couple of brief replies here.
Ray: really appreciated your post. I wondered how long it would take for you to discover the site and pitch in. I miss our daily conversations we used to have. Anyway, I am sure you knew you were pushing a few buttons with your comment and indeed, I am going to reply in future posts in some detail. In short though, I want to have my cake and eat it; I want both a determinate and indeterminate reality. WRT cause and effect though, I believe you are wrong about the empirical method – see my next post. And you definitely raise an important issue about how God’s providence impacts our freedom. I am going to respond in detail to this stuff in future posts.
Hamawa: thank you for your comment. I really like what you have to say about prayer. Unfortunately I do not have time to say more now; I will respond with more when I get back of hols.
AJ
Said this on June 24th, 2007 at 12:15pm:Hello Hamawa
Now I am back of hols, I just wanted to respond a little more to your comments on prayer. I have to agree with you that as I have gone on as a Christian, I have realized that prayer is often more about changing me than about changing circumstances around me. And I think you are right, often it is about God motivating us to be the solution to problems in this world; about us becoming truly salt and light.
I liked your analogy of the sports game designer although it could be considered a little Deist. Ray does raise an important question of how God’s providence affects our free will but I think the answer is again to be found in prayer. My understanding of God is that (s)he is the absolute respecter of our humanity and that this extends to our freedom as individuals, but more than that, I think (s)he has not only made space for us as individuals but for the whole of our reality. It seems to me that prayer, in a sense, is us inviting him (her) to intervene in our reality; us asking God to act. If you like it is a case of “Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven”. We are inviting God to act in our world. From this perspective God is not then inflicting his will on our world or our lives but accepting an open invitation.
Believe Differently » Blog Archive » The Metaphor of “Kingdom”
Said this on January 26th, 2008 at 10:04am:[...] closely, but from a slightly different perspective, with the post I wrote a while back entitled “Intelligent Design”. In that post I questioned the mechanistic metaphor behind and inferred by the concept of [...]