Rachel Ankeny asks: Why is such junk science so popular?

Intelligent design is junk science. But its success in being heard illuminates our understandings and expectations of science.

Today's proponents of intelligent design are not biblical literalists. They often remain agnostic as to what or who the designer might be, and clearly do not hold that the universe was created in six days, that the Earth is only 10,000 years old or that the fossil record was deposited during the flood in Noah's time. Neither do intelligent design theorists reject the notion that some evolutionary change has occurred during the history of life on Earth.

The intelligent design movement's primary claim is that living organisms are
too complex to be explained by any natural causes or "mindless" processes. Instead, the design we find in organisms can be accounted for only by invoking a very clever designer of indeterminate nature. They rely on a series of examples, such as the human eye, to illustrate the idea that it is extremely difficult to imagine how complex organs and organisms could have arisen simply through evolution.

Traps

For instance, one of intelligent design's main scientific advocates, the biochemist Michael Behe, focuses on the idea that cells arc complex not just in degree but in kind, as they contain structures that he claims are irreducibly complex. Behe typically provides the simple example of a mouse trap.

A mouse trap has a number of different components: a base, a spring, a catch, a hammer and bar to hold down the mouse. All of them have to be present in the right place for the mouse-trap to function: if you remove one piece, it isn't the case that the mouse-trap works less well; it simply doesn't work. So if you consider even relatively simple biological structures such as the bacterial flagellum, you find that 30 to 40 different proteins are required in a particular arrangement for the flagellum to motor around. Since the flagellum needs all its parts to function, it is impossible to imagine it having been built up via gradual mutations combined with selection. Behe thus argues that irreducibly complex cells arise in the same way as irreducibly complex devices such as mouse-traps: they must have been designed by someone.

As logical as this argument seems, it fails to consider that perhaps indirect paths to outcomes could explain them. Extremely elaborate natural structures may be produced and selected over time for various reasons that change with environmental and other alterations and later prove to be well adapted for yet other reasons. A mouse trap missing some of its parts might be useful as a tie clip, and the base of a mouse trap on its own could be useful as a doorstop.

Critics ignore complexities of science

If intelligent design relies on weak arguments and analogies, why has it been relatively successful in the past few years at getting a serious airing?  Its success points to a critically important issue facing us today: our understandings and expectations of science.

Even relatively robust critiques of intelligent design often fail to convince us because they do not capture the actual complexities inherent in scientific theory and practice.

For instance, consider the frequent claim that the theory of evolution by natural selection has been conclusively proved. This sort of argument reflects sloppy language and reasoning that even an undergraduate student of the philosophy of science would immediately recognise. Most accounts of scientific success hold that no theory can ever be conclusively proved or verified. Our best theories are those that provide explanations of key phenomena that were not provided by earlier, competitor theories. Scientific theories must be capable of being checked against positive evidence through having testable consequences, and hence can be proved wrong (or falsified). The core concepts in the theory of evolution by natural selection have not been cast into doubt as new evidence has been gathered.

In contrast, critical problems arise when one attempts to assess the theory of intelligent design using these principles. It presupposes an invisible causal element that is, by definition, not detectable - the intelligent designer - to explain the observed natural world, an element that cannot be rigorously assessed using the usual scientific methods.

Even if the theory of evolution by natural selection were shown to be false, the next best contender would not be intelligent design. But those who argue against intelligent design often assume that those they are trying to persuade are not clever enough to make these sorts of distinctions, and instead rely on an impoverished, polarised view of what science is, leaving evolution by natural selection woefully vulnerable to criticism.
 
Science is failing cultural needs

At a deeper level, the recent popularity of intelligent design underscores disquiet in society about our relationship with science. For many, science has become our modern, secular saviour, giving us direct access to the cosmos and the mysteries of life. But more recently science has become inaccessible and distant. Increasingly we must rely on experts to tell us what to believe, and have stopped thinking and making judgements about what counts as good science.

In addition, our often blind faith in science has been shaken. The pay-off from promissory notes about the miracles of science, particularly medicine, seems distant indeed: the war on cancer seems less likely to reach a satisfactory end any time sooner than the Iraq conflict. For some, the increasing commercialisation of science has changed it from a unique, knowledge-seeking activity to merely another big business. It is not surprising that we search for options and choices, particularly in our market-driven culture.

We are often encouraged to think of religious faith in polar opposition to science: to be truly rigorous and scientific, some claim (often implicitly) you must be an atheist. This type of fundamentalism is unappealing to many, who turn away from science in search of some meaning. Once again there is a deep cultural need that has been recognised and exploited by those who wish to promote intelligent design, and which often is not fully appreciated by its critics.

Something to trust

It is important that we begin to develop more critical attitudes towards science that are grounded in good philosophical principles as well as realistic ideas about what science can give us and how it evolves over time, even sometimes being shown later to be wrong. Intelligent design is not just bad science; it is pseudoscience or junk science. But it is powerful precisely because it seems to give us answers that are simple. Its advocates have been politically and culturally savvy enough to make certain it is compelling to the average listener, not just to those who can follow research articles in Nature or Science.

Intelligent design does not have an empirical research programme. Its scientific supporters have not published data in peer-reviewed journals. It fails to exhibit the hallmarks of what makes a field or theory scientific. But its advocates in Australia provide a free video featuring trustworthy people in white coats, an authoritative narrator and clear, accessible examples to support its claims, something that often is lacking even in the best science documentaries on television.

Science cannot merely be what scientists say it is: science requires public support not only for its financing but for its very survival. But in an era when we all need something to trust, much science is failing to live up to its promises. Intelligent design provides an important lesson: successful science must engage the public, starting in the school classroom, so we can all make intelligent choices about what to believe and whom to trust.

Dr Rachel A. Ankeny is at the School of History and Politics at the University of Adelaide

This is an edited version of an article which first appeared in the Sydney Alumni Magazine