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Intelligent Design Philosophy of Science Issues

• Wesley R. Elsberry
• Wildlife Fisheries Sciences
• Texas AM University

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Did you hear about the Aggie professor?
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Problems With Intelligent Design Arguments

• Use of marker of intelligent agency approach is
  invalid in principle (Irreducible Complexity
  Specified Complexity)
• Mistaking criticism of Darwinian theories for a
  positive case for Intelligent Design
• Making unsubstantiated or overblown claims
• False claims of scientific status
• Poor track record of following scientific
  practice in pursuing Intelligent Design arguments

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Dembskis Explanatory Filter Design Inference
(EF/DI)

• Explanatory Filter Supposed to capture the
  essential features of how humans already make
  design inferences
• Design Inference Supposed to make the argument
  of the Explanatory Filter rigorous
• Argument by elimination of alternatives
• Design is a residue
• Going from design to agency is based upon
  induction

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Criticism of Dembskis EF/DI Invalidity

• In spite of limited publication venue of EF/DI,
  it has attracted significant criticism
• Several critics contend that Dembskis basic
  arguments are invalid
• Fitelson Sober, 1999
• Ellery Eells, 1999
• Massimo Pigliucci, 1999
• Eli Chiprout, 1999
• Richard Wein

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Criticism of EF/DI Improper Procedures

• The methods deployed in Dembskis EF/DI have come
  under criticism
• Elsberry, 1999
• Wilkins Elsberry, (in press)
• Ivar Ylvisakar

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Criticism of EF/DI Interpretation

• Some critics contend that even if basic EF/DI is
  a valid argument, that certain interpretations
  made do not follow
• Elsberry, 1999
• Wilkins Elsberry, (in press)

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Criticism of EF/DI Theology

• Criticism of Dembskis EF/DI on theological
  grounds
• Howard Van Till
• Edward Oakes
• Nancey Murphy

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Criticism of EF/DI Methodology

• Bill Jefferys point that DI is not predictive
• Proper practice of natural science
• Show the work before making public claims
• No significant empirical testing of EF or DI
• Is DI even subject to empirical test? (Dembski
  1997)
• Dembski has thus far only proposed a
  verificationist program
• Historical review (regression testing)
• Does DI put fairies in the fairy rings?
• Look where the evidence is, not where it isnt
• Examine Krebs citric acid cycle, mammalian
  middle ear, etc.

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The Ordinary the Extraordinary

• Humans certain animals executing plans to a
  purpose are within our empirical experience, and
  hence are ordinary
• Action of God is not within the same scope of
  empirical experience, hence extraordinary
• This cell made by YHWHä example
• Naturalizes God, result is a God who is not very
  Godly Pennock

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Design Inferences The Ordinary the Rarefied

• Inference to Ordinary Design a class of causal
  regularity warranted in cases of known agency
• Inference to Rarefied Design a class of
  causation based solely upon characters of
  artifacts examined
• The color Red as an invalid marker of Rarefied
  Design
• CSI as a(n invalid) marker of Rarefied Design
• Mnemonics
• Ordinary Design, DAWKINS Design As We Know It,
  Not Supernatural
• Rarefied Design, DEMBSKI Design (Exclusively
  Maintained By Scanty Knowledge) Inference

Acronyms due to John Wilkins
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The Pitfalls of Inferring Intelligent Agency

• The question is not really over design
• The point of the ID movement is to infer
  intelligent agency (IA) as a cause for
  biological examples
• Design has simply been a means to this end
• Replacement of artifact with event
• What does an inference to intelligent agency
  require of us?

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Finding the Action of an Intelligent Agent

• Desired class of events
• Intelligent Agency (IA)
• Sufficient grounds We observe the agent produce
  the artifact
• Epistemological warrant often occurs via multiple
  independent lines of evidence which imply
  existence and/or establish the identity of the
  agent causing the artifact
• Artifacts classed in IA because of evaluation of
  all the relevant evidence consideration of the
  plausibility of agent causation
• Are we limited to ordinary design in assigning
  an artifact to IA? I argue Yes.

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Are we limited to ordinary design in assigning
an artifact to IA?

• Consider an IA inference by looking at sets via
  Venn diagrams
• Set view shows problems in the generalized
  logical argument
• Instances of artifacts with attribute X are in IA
• No instances of artifacts with attribute X are
  not in IA
• Thus, attribute X is a reliable marker that an
  artifact is in IA
• Call such classes Marker of Intelligent AgencyX

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The ID Treasure Map The Search for a Reliable
Marker of Intelligent Agency

• Argument from design advocates have searched
  exhaustively for their own treasure map
• No map so far has gotten them to a reliable means
  of inferring rarefied design
• Specified Complexity marks the spot
• Latest treasure map features statistics
• Same old conceptual problems remain

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Reliability

• Claim by Dembski that his EF/DI makes no false
  positive attributions
• Ignores a priori biases in application
• Ignores reliance upon current ignorance
• No test procedure yet given by an ID advocate
• Claim by Dembski that his EF/DI finds design in
  biological systems
• Where are the calculations?
• No fulfillment of requests for the work

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Marker of Intelligent Agency An Invalid Approach
to Infer IA

• Marker of Intelligent AgencyX (MIAX) is then
  taken to imply IA without reference to
  plausibility of the designing agent or other
  evidence of an event
• Inductive basis of argument provides no warrant
  for claims of reliability of any MIAX approach,
  whatever X instantiates
• MIAX is an attempt to conclude IA on the cheap

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MIAX is an Appeal to Current Ignorance

• Consider red color as a possible marker of
  intelligent agency

• Small enough experience favors view that MIARED
  is a proper subset of IA, and thus warrants
  inferring that event E in MIARED -gt IA
• Examples Red flashlight, fire truck, toolbox,
  fire hydrant

Intelligent Agency
MIARED
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Induction Means That MIAX Is Inherently
Unreliable

• View that MIARED is a proper subset is based
  inductively
• Testing status are done by reference to empirical
  data

• Logic is insufficient to establish warrant for
  use of MIARED
• Asymmetry can establish that MIARED is not a
  proper subset, but cannot establish that it is a
  proper subset

IA
This -gt
MIARED
IA

MIARED
Or this -gt
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Dembski Markers

• In The Design Inference (Cambridge, 1998) I
  argue that specified complexity is a reliable
  empirical marker of intelligent design.
• Thus a likelihood analysis that pits competing
  design and chance hypotheses against each other
  must itself presuppose the legitimacy of
  specified complexity as a reliable empirical
  marker of intelligence. WA Dembski, Another
  Way to Detect Design?

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MIASC Is an Unreliable Basis Upon Which to Infer
IA

• MIASC fares no better than any other MIAX
• Quantitative difference, not qualitative
  difference

gt50 bits
gt100 bits
Intelligent Agency
gt250 bits
1
2
MIASC gt500 bits
3
4
5
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MIAIC Is an Unreliable Basis Upon Which to Infer
IA

• Michael Behes irreducible complexity (IC) is
  yet another case of MIAX, has the same
  problems
• Examining MIAIC
• Given a mousetrap knowledge of mousetrap
  makers, make ordinary design inference to IA (IC
  attribute is superfluous)
• Given a defective mousetrap knowledge of
  fallible mousetrap makers, make ordinary design
  inference to IA (non-IC does not interfere with
  ordinary DI)
• Given sealed box labeled, Contains IC widget,
  have no warrant to make either an ordinary or a
  rarefied design inference to IA (IC attribute is
  uninformative regarding IA) Behes black box

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Falsifiability

• Popperian concept of falsifiability
• What is falsifiability?
• Theory X implies class of observation Y
• If there exists y in Y such that y, then X
• Need to state theory as a specific proposition
• For example, Flight is not specific enough, but
  All birds fly is a falsifiable proposition
• Finding a flightless bird falsifies the
  proposition
• A basic statement which contradicts the theory
  is a falsifier
• Nothing in there about somebody elses idea

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Dembski Falsifiability

• Dembskis claim that Darwinian explanation of
  bacterial flagellum would falsify specified
  complexity as a marker of intelligent agency
  (2001/04/25) reveals confusion
• No entailment, and thus no consequences for SC
• Can simply say, OK, what about this other
  example?
• Not really falsification

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Behe Falsifiability

• Claim that IC as a marker of intelligent agency
  would be falsified by a Darwinian explanation of
  a bacterial flagellum
• Same problem no statement of a specific
  proposition implied class of required
  consequences
• Same confusion the validity of another
  proposition in no way constitutes a falsification
  of the proposition being tested

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The Excluded Muddle

• EF/DI as an argument by elimination has practical
  as well as philosophical problems
• Relies upon current ignorance (like all marker
  of intelligent agency approaches)
• Relies upon completeness of generation of
  alternative hypotheses (regularity or chance)
• Relies upon accurate assessment of plausibility
  of causation by regularity or chance hypotheses
• Begging the question by broaching hypothesis, but
  not correctly assessing its ability to cause the
  event
• EF/DI is a conduit for a priori biases

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Real Design Inferences Are Ordinary Design
Inferences

• Properties of warranted design inferences
• Use design as an independent category, not a
  residue of elimination
• Evaluate plausibility of agent causation
• Compare evidence plausibility with respect to
  various causal hypotheses
• Allow uncertainty to lead to categorization in
  dont know yet/get more data bin
• World is open, not closed

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Real Design Inferences are Ordinary Design
Inferences

• Where the Rubber Meets the Road
• Dembskis examples of existing DIs are examples
  of Inference to Ordinary Design
• Includes SETI, Made By YHWHä examples
• Dembskis real-world examples include the
  properties of warranted design inferences use
  of ordinary design inferences (last slide)
• Dembski extrapolates ordinary design inferences
  to rarefied design inferences
• Not warranted

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Summary (1)

• Inductive arguments from a marker of intelligent
  agency give no warrant for either ordinary or
  rarefied design inferences
• Ordinary design inferences remain our only
  reliable approach to inferring intelligent agency
• Critics have argued variously against Dembski's
  underlying logic, his procedures, and his
  interpretations of results

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Summary (2)

• Dembski has consistently failed to properly
  subject his ideas to effective empirical test
• Dembski has put little effort into explicating DI
  methodology in the peer-reviewed scientific
  literature
• Dembski has failed to fulfill requests from his
  colleagues for data and work underlying
  publicly-made assertions
• Dembskis implication that his EF/DI is something
  that re-invents the basis of doing science is hype

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The End
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Dembski the Genome

• Features of genome due to de-evolution (U.
  Georgia lecture, 2001)
• TDI says that the specificity of information can
  imply plagiary
• Why is the specific information of dead viruses,
  parts of bacterial genes, and transposable
  elements not evidence of copying?

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Dembski ID Activism

• Though design theorists believe Darwinism is
  dead wrong, unlike the creationist movement of
  the 1980's, they do not try to win a place for
  their views by taking to the courts. Instead of
  pressing their case by lobbying for fair
  treatment acts in state legislatures (i.e., acts
  that oblige public schools in a given state to
  teach both creation and evolution in their
  science curricula), design theorists are much
  more concerned with bringing about an
  intellectual revolution starting from the top
  down. Their method is debate and persuasion. They
  aim to convince the intellectual elite and let
  the school curricula take care of themselves. By
  adopting this approach design theorists have
  enjoyed far more success in getting across their
  views than their creationist counterparts. WA
  Dembski, What every theologian should know about
  creation, evolution and design

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Dembski on Criticism

• "I would go further than that and say that I
  value objective peer review. I always learn more
  from my critics than from the people who think
  I'm wonderful."
• - William A. Dembski as quoted by Fred Heeren

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Dembski on Visceral Responses

• "If we're generating such strong, visceral
  responses, we must be doing something right."
• William Dembski as quoted by Lynn Vincent
• Does this imply that when critics evoke a strong,
  visceral response from Dembski, that they too are
  doing something right?

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Who is Wesley R. Elsberry? (1)

• Wesleys allocation of scholarly effort
• Lets look at the publications participation
  from the time of the NTSE conference
• () Enterprising science needs naturalism, 1997
• () Optimality book, co-editor, INNS series, 1997
• () First audiogram of a marine mammal at depth,
  JASA, 1997
• () TTS in delphinoids, JASA, 1997
• () U.S. Navy technical report 1751 on TTS, 1997
• () Letter responding to TTS comments, JASA, 1998
• () Dolphin dorsal fin morphology poster, 1998

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Who is Wesley R. Elsberry? (2)

• Wesleys allocation of scholarly effort
• More publications and participation
• () Simultaneous digital data of physiological
  acoustic signals during dolphin biosonar, poster,
  1999
• (-) Review of TDI by William A. Dembski, 1999
• () Review of Tower of Babel by Robert Pennock,
  1999
• () Dissertation research (intranarial pressure
  and biosonar click production in bottlenose
  dolphins), 1999-present
• () Multiple sound sources in the bottlenose
  dolphin, JASA, 2000
• () Deep Hear paper, J. Exp. Biol., in press
• (-) Wilkins Elsberry, Biol. Phil., in press

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Who is Wesley R. Elsberry? (3)

• Wesleys allocation of scholarly effort
• Other activities
• (-) Dembski commentary on the Internet
  (talk.origins, web page, other fora)
• () Non-Dembski EvC discussion on the Internet

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Dembski Markers (1)

• When SETI (Search for Extra-Terrestrial
  Intelligence) researchers attempt to discover
  intelligence in the extra-terrestrial radio
  transmissions they are monitoring, they assume an
  extra-terrestrial intelligence could have chosen
  any number of possible radio transmissions, and
  then attempt to match the transmissions they
  observe with certain patterns as opposed to
  others (patterns that presumably are markers of
  intelligence). WA Dembski, Intelligent Design
  as a Theory of Information

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MIACSI Is an Unreliable Basis Upon Which to
Infer IA

• MIACSI fares no better than any other MIAX
• Proper subset?
• Examples known
• from IA are expected
• this does not
• validate inference to
• IA

IA
MIACSI gt500 bits
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MIACSI Is an Unreliable Basis Upon Which to
Infer IA

• MIACSI fares no better than any other MIAX
• Assertion that no example is outside IA
• Current ignorance

IA

MIACSI gt500 bits
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MIACSI Is an Unreliable Basis Upon Which to
Infer IA

• MIACSI fares no better than any other MIAX
• What about local small probability bounds?

gt50 bits
IA
gt100 bits
gt250 bits
1
2
MIACSI gt500 bits
3
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History Arguments To From Design

• Paleys watch and watchmaker
• The artifact implies an artificer
• Paley and criticism
• The Pre-criticism of Hume
• The insufficiency of analogy as a warrant
• Darwin alternative explanation
• The sufficiency of natural causation to explain
  adaptation
• Dawkins and the Blind Watchmaker

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More on Paley

• A Sober Re-evaluation of Paley
• Elliott Sobers classification of Paleys
  argument as abduction
• Paley Redux The Intelligent Design Movement
• The rehabilitation of natural theology?

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Dusting for Fingerprints

• Forensics fingerprints
• Trace evidence implies existence of an agent
• Trace evidence can identify the agent
• This trace evidence is in the form of physical
  artifacts
• The search for Gods fingerprints
• A popular theological pastime
• 100 failure rate so far
• Track record commends modesty in claimants

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Why Do We Find Mans Fingerprints Not Gods?

• We know the features actions of our fellow
  humans by our sense experience intersubjective
  critique
• God has not yet deigned to be examined under the
  microscope