How can Intelligent Design be called a scientific theory?

Question

When it dose not fit into the elements of scientific method?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_method#Elements_of_scientific_method

I mean if creation was a one time event then its not mesurable or testable.

And if it is not a scientific theory then why should it be taught in a science class?

Answer 1

True, by definition Intelligent Design isn't a scientific theory- its based on finding tests that prove its true rather than prove its untrue- so at most its a bad theory.

But consider this, for most people in America, the question of evolution/creation is much more than a question of scientific method, and is much more a personal question of what you really believe... its a sociological question. I need to understand gravity, I need to understand aerodynamics, but I don't really have any use for understanding evolution (i'm not going to mate based on it)- so maybe the question shouldn't be whether we teach Intelligent Design in science class but whether we should put too much emphasis on a theory that for most the public has become stigmatized as a question of identity.

Every scientific theory can teach scientific method- which should be taught- so why waste that lesson on a topic that so many people take as a social debate rather than a scientific one?

Answer 2

"Intelligent Design" is a fancy way of saying "a big invisible man did it." It's not science. It does not follow the scientific method. It doesn't offer a way to be falsified, because it leaves things open to speculation constantly ("Well the big invisible man might have changed it to look like that just 5 minutes ago"), and most of all it doesn't let us learn anything about the world. Evolution, however, does all of these things.

People who argue "evolution has never been observed" invariably don't know what evolution really is, and have probably never researched the subject (and that doesn't mean just reading a couple of creationist sites). Besides, if we went along with the idea that we could only know things if they were directly observed, and not rely on any inference, then the police for example would never have solved a crime.

Answer 3

It's not science. And no, it should not be taught in science classes in school. A reference to the fact that some people do not believe evolution is true might be made, just for good manners. But a science class should teach science.

But most scientists agree that they do not have all the answers. They even tend to agree that not all the questions are their department's responsibility. Notably, they can tell you how something works, but it's not their job to tell you why it is the way it is. That's the philosophy or the theology department's job.

Lots of scientists are religious, and have no problem separating out these two different viewpoints on the nature of the universe. And lots of science (most notably quantum physics) actually corresponds very well to much of what mystics have been saying for centuries.

Answer 4

The key to being science is whether a claim makes testable predictions or retrodictions. The fact an event happened in the past is not relevant. The problem with supernatural creation is a total lack of accountability as to a predictive model.

Answer 5

Depends on what constitutes a "scientific theory". Besides, what is taught as "science" in class rooms incorporates not only theories of science, but facts derived by inference. Intelligent design would seem to fit in that category.

See also http://www.bcbsr.com/topics/sciences.html

Answer 6

I don't call it a scientific theory. It's just creationism in a new suit. We teach about evolution and the Big Bang and all that at the school where I teach. I don't see either real theory as incompatible with Christianity, unless you're a Biblical literalist, which I most definitely am not.

Answer 7

Has anyone answering these questions actually read anything on the topic??? Been to discussions and debates??? Taken a Biology course on a college level beyond an undergrad??? Those of you who attack the ability of "Intelligent Design" to called a "scientific theory" aren't looking at the presentations made by scientists that believe in ID. You need to read some of the SCIENTIFIC evidences put forth by Michael Behe, William Dembski, Stephen Meyer, Jonathan Wells, Robin Collins, Guillermo Gonzalez, and Jay W. Richards. Their theories have the ablity to be proven false, it is not religious psychobabel that is void of logical and reasonable science. These are men with Ph.D.s in different scientific fields that doubt evolution; not because of religion, or because the Bible (taken literally) disagrees with evolution, but because scientific evidence led them to their conclusion. Why are these men attacked and their theories called religion disguised when those who believe in evolution make such statements as: “No educated person any longer questions the validity of the so-called theory of evolution, which we now know to be a simple fact,” announced Ernst Mayr in the July 2000 issue of Scientific American.” Or this quote: “Is evolution a theory, a system, or a hypothesis? It
is much more–it is a general postulate to which all theories, all hypotheses, all systems must henceforth bow and which they must satisfy in order to be thinkable and true. Evolution is a light which illuminates all facts, a trajectory which all lines of thought must follow–this is what evolution is.” – Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. Why isn't evolution referred to more often as "Materialistic philosophy merely masquerdaing as a science."? What really makes evolution more "scientific" than ID? Is it because evolution completely denies the existance of a "god" of anykind other than nature having anything to do with the "creation" of the earth? Or is it because the ID theory claims that all of the SCIENTIFIC EVIDENCE available points towards a "creator" of some kind that is above our intelligence? Michael Behe proposes the question of "irreducible complexity"? Why do we have organisms and biochemical systems that cannot be broken down into an evolutionary chain. Behe states: “The impotence of Darwinian theory in accounting for the molecular basis of life is evident not only from the analysis in this book, but also from the complete absence in the professional scientific literature of any detailed models by which complex biochemical systems could have been produced, as shown in chapter 8. In the face of the enormous complexity that modern biochemistry has uncovered in the cell, the scientific community is paralyzed. No one at Harvard University, no one at the National Institutes of Health, no member of the National Academy of Sciences, no Nobel Prize winner – no one at all can give a detailed account of how cilium, or vision, or blood clotting, or any complex biochemical process might have developed in a Darwinian fashion. But we are here. Plants and animals are here. The complex systems are here. All these things got here somehow: if not in a Darwinian fashion, then how?” I like how he referred to ID as in-duck-tive reasoning; it something looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, swims like a duck, smells like a duck, and waddles like a duck, then we usually believe it to be a duck. Do we not? If something looks to be designed, has the appearance of having been designed to complete or perform a certain fuction, and remarkably resembles something that looks like it took extreme intelligence to produce, then what would lead us to not believe that it was designed or possibly "created" by an "intelligent designer"? There is so much more info that could be presented here, but for the sake of time, I will end with one final quote. I hope that this is somewhat helpful and you take the time not just to read what I wrote, but research the entire topic. "Intelligent design is the science that studies the signs of intelligence. Note that a sign is not the thing signified. Intelligent design does not try to get into the mind of a designer and figure out what a designer is thinking." Demski, The Design Revolution, pg. 33

Answer 8

It is a theory. It can't truly becalled a scientific one until some reputable scientists present some proofs or even falisfiactions.

It is, none the less, self-evident and cannot be invalidated that CREATION has contributed more to modern man than has evolution or randomism.

In case you haven't notice, TV sets don't grow on trees.

Answer 9

It used to be called Natural religion, then Creationism and now ID. Its all nonsense, its not scientific and does not rise to the level of theory in the scientific sense of the word.

Answer 10

Occurring once does not invalidate something from being scientific.

This demonstrates that your understanding of science is also flawed.

But I do agree that there is nothing scientific about creationism, ahem, I mean "intelligent design".