As I mentioned in a comment to one of Gareth’s posts; ‘The Root of All Evil’, personally, do I not only believe Intelligent Design to be a valid scientific theory but also that it holds a lot of water.
The thrust of this programme was looking at whether or not Intelligent Design is indeed a valid scientific idea. Evolutionists say that it isn’t because, without getting to technical, it relies on something external (the designer) to the system in question (the origin of life) for it to work. Also, as Allan Evans comments in the same above post, that it is really very hard, if not impossible to disprove. Unless somebody comes up with a definitive alternative answer that is.
However, I would say that Evolution as a theory is very similar in that it also can’t be disproved as those who follow it will always claim the conclusive evidence for it is still out there waiting to be found. It’s a difficult puzzle and one that I am not going to get into now. A very useful, if a little one side book by Lee Strobel; ‘The Case for a Creator’, looks at the argument for Intelligent Design over Evolution in some detail and is well worth a read if you are interested in the subject.
All of that is kind of an aside as the real reason for my post is an observation that one of the experts interviewed made on how the “creation myth” as he put it, has an effect on its society. He offered the idea that all civilizations and societies have a creation myth. The western civilizations creation myth is evolution. Previously it had been the Geneses story. Other cultures around the world have their own. The interesting observation he made was that if you look at these ‘myths’ then you see that the society that believes it, in fact bases their existence on it. Their philosophy, their laws, their general behaviour, the way they think and how they go about their daily lives.
The programme didn’t really dwell on this idea but it got me thinking and I think that he may have a point. Please forgive me, for I know I am about to make some quite sweeping over generalizations but bare with me. If you look at the culture of Britain 100 - 200 years ago, you can see how much a general acceptance that God created the world, and therefore has purpose for it, affected their lives. The idea that there was a higher purpose, a point to all, meant a much more community based approach to life. It wasn’t just all about me and there were obviously consequences of their decisions for other people, not just the person who made them.
Now jump forward to today. The creation myth that is accepted as fact today is Evolution. Which, at a very basic level says that we are here by random chance and whoever is the ‘fittest’ will get the most out of life. Consequently people have less of an idea of purpose and direction and are of the opinion that what they do is really only about them.
Now I know that is a real caricature of the situation but hopefully you get the idea of what is going round in my head.
Personally, looking at history, I think we are due another scientific revolution like the one which saw Evolution replace Creationism as ’scientific fact’ and therefore the creation myth. As time goes on more and more people are losing faith in Darwinism as the wholes get bigger and bigger. Whether or not it will be replaced with Intelligent Design remains to be seen, but the effect that the slippage of Evolution from western cultures creation myth may be bigger on society, and us as individuals than previously I had thought.
6:07 am
thank you