Main differences between Intelligent Design and Theistic Evolution ?

Answer 1

Theistic Evolution is the idea that God used molecules-to-man evolution to create.

"Intelligent Design is the study of patterns in nature that are best explained as the result of intelligence" (Dr. William Dembski). That's it; it says nothing of who the creator is and how he/she/it/they did it. Intelligent Design encompasses every "creation" story or idea out there, including Theistic Evolution.

Answer 2

I'll start off with Theistic evolution. As you know evolution is excepted in the science community. Also Theistic evolution is accepted by some religions. The most prominat is the Catholic Church. (they also are supporters of the Big Bang) So Theistic evolution has both scientific and religous support. Now theistic evolution states that God created the universe. (big bang string theory however you want.) Then he knew that we he created the universe, Humans could come about via evolution. So TE says God created the universe, but all of life cam about through evolution which he knew would happen. Basically it takes the belief that God is all knowing (so he could see that evolution could make Humans), the idea that God created the Universe and the scientific fact (evolution is regarded as fact). This view is very popular amoung Christian scientists and many open minded Christains.

ID is not supported by scientists. Also the only religous support it has, is from evangelicals attempting to fit God into Science rooms. ID basically says that certain body parts (or any organelle anything like that) is too complex to be formed by chance. This is called, Irreducible complexity. However some of the first examples that "showed" this have been proven wrong. (the Human eye and Bacterial flagellum). So intelligent design says that God comes in and makes the eye. Then evolution continues as planned. However in a recent trial im Delawere ID has been kept out of schools, for ID has no peer reviews, and is essentially a psuedoscience. They main point though is that some parts are too complex to evolve by chance so God Intelligently designed that part.

Answer 3

There is a very large overlap ... almost to the point where they seem like the same thing ... but there are areas of non-overlap on both sides.

Theistic evolution (a.k.a. evolutionary creationism) is the idea that evolution did occur (and by this I mean evolution of all species from common ancestry over billions of years), but that God played a hand in this evolution.

God's participation in evolution could be in one of two forms:

1. The "watchmaker" hypothesis. God created the universe and all its laws, in such a way that evolution could (or must) occur, but then did not interfere with its unfolding. In other words, God is like a watchmaker who created a watch (the universe, or the earth), wound it up and let it run without further interference. So this is evolution with no Intelligent Design.

2. God-directed evolution. God not only started the universe and evolution, but occasionally guided it. This is basically the stance of many, if not most, Intelligent Design advocates ... such as Michael Behe who fully accepts the evidence of an old earth (billions of years old), and evolution via common ancestry ... but insists that certain structures are not explainable by Darwinian mechanisms alone ... they require assistance from an intelligent agent ... a "designer".


Intelligent design is the premise that some structures show signs of being deliberately designed. For the most part this is the same as #2 above ... God-directed evolution.

However, hard-core young-earth creationists who deny evolution (common ancestry) altogether, require Intelligent Design to justify this position. In other words, all species were created pretty much in their current form ... so *all* their structures must be the result of Intelligent Design. So there is an area of non-overlap.

The Intelligent Design hypothesis also allows that the intelligence may not be a supernatural agent (God), but could be something else (specifically, some alien intelligence), starting or interfering with, the path of evolution. Technically, this would be ID, but not theistic evolution. However, for the most part, this seems to be merely a stopgap position by Intelligent Design advocates to deny that they are just creationists in disguise.

I should add that neither theistic evolution nor intelligent design is a scientific theory ... which is why discussing them in a science forum is questionable. Both of them include both scientific and clearly *non*-scientific elements. Both suffer from having very little explanatory power (as both the concept of God or an intelligent designer just shifts the questions about complex things to an even *more* complex, and far more mysterious thing ... a supernatural agent with no proposed mechanism or motive). And both suffer from having no generally accepted evidence (all "evidence", including *all* cases of "irreducible complexity", proposed by Intelligent Design advocates have been explained quite well by evolutionary science).

Answer 4

The difference between them is that Intelligent Design specifies that an intelligent being or beings designed our biochemical "structures of irreducible complexity"; and Theistic Evolution specifies that a god or gods was/were the intelligent being/beings. Theistic Evolution would be a subset of Intelligent Design.

Answer 5

Evolution-Change in Species over time Creationism- A Deity made everything. Theistic Evolution-is the general opinion that some or all classical religious teachings about God and creation are compatible with some or all of the modern scientific understanding about biological evolution. Intelligent Design-A mixture of Creationism and Evolution.

Answer 6

I would assume intelligent design says God made everything how it is and theistic evolution says God made everything and left it to evolve into what it is.

Answer 7

Just a small change to be accurate:

TE - God created the pattern

ID: evolution cannot work because of complexity of some systems. there must have been a designer. (God not specified... could be space aliens or the FSM)

Answer 8

ID: Evolution cannot have happened as the theory describes (without a directing intelligence) because of "irreducible complexity"
TE: Evolution is the way God creates.

Answer 9

MyName has a pretty good overview, but ID boils down to this: "I don't know how this could have come about, so it must have been made by someone, and that someone is God." That's all very well, but history is chock-full of things that people didn't understand at one time, and figured out later. It takes a pretty cocky person to say "What I know now is all there is to know."

Answer 10

Nothing new to add, just starring because of the good answers so far.