I don’t want to get too much farther into the ID debate on this blog, which is supposed to maintain a higher-ed focus. It may be worth mentioning my view that the arguments for and against evolution aren’t as high-stakes as many people seem to think, since the key claims of Christianity (and most other major religions) can be interpreted to be quite consistent with evolution. The Catholic Church and many other believing Christians have acknowledged this. In any case, here are a few quick answers to Carol’s points, after which I will let the topic rest and leave the last word to anyone else who might want to comment.

[Carol] If there are mechanisms that we don’t have all the answers for yet, why accept the Darwinian hypothesis that life forms evolved from random mutation and natural selection? Why is that more acceptable than saying it might have been intelligence?

[Me] Science, by definition, seeks to provide natural–not supernatural–explanations for the things that we see in the world around us. Why? Because natural theories can be tested and falsified based on empirical observations. Questions and doubts about these natural theories can be settled according to a standard methodology. If you give up on this methodology and start positing unobservable supernatural entities to explain the phenomena you see around you, then you’re no longer doing science. You’ve gone beyond the limits of empirical observation. You’ve moved into the realm of philosophy or theology—which is fine, just as long as it’s not masquerading as science.

[Carol] Darwin has no answers to many things at present, so skepticism about his theories is entirely justified, or at least justified. [Me] The modern theory of evolution (which has been significantly refined from Darwin’s original version) is the best existing scientific model for explaining the origin of complex biological organisms. Like any scientific theory, it is always open to further revision based on new empirical observations. Good scientists always cultivate an attitude of skepticism in all of their work—but skepticism is the exact opposite of Intelligent Design theory, which is perpetually itching to jump to a single foregone conclusion: God did it! [Carol] Darwinians accept falsifiability only on their own terms. [Me] The basic idea of falsifiability in science is quite simple: A scientific theory makes a positive claim about the world. If an empirical observation contradicts the theory, then the theory must be abandoned. Modern evolutionary biology is bound to a fairly fixed timeline, with a fossil record that is constrained by the principle of gradual descent with modification via natural selection over billions of years. In the eyes of 99 percent of working scientists, no fossilized organisms have yet been found that contradict (or even seriously call into question) this evolutionary timeline. [Carol] And what about the probability models that show a trillion to one that something evolved by chance? . . . For example, ribosome, the molecule that constructs DNA and is needed for biological systems to multiply. The time needed for that molecule to develop by random processes can be calculated, since it can be made in the laboratory, and would be a trillion times the age of the known universe. [Me] When confronted with these nonsensical “probability models,” most working scientists I know tell me they can only shake their heads. These models reflect such a deep lack of understanding on the part of IDers that it is almost impossible to know where to begin rebutting them. Suffice it to say: No serious evolutionist thinks that a molecule such as a ribosome came into existence all at once through a flurry of spontaneous, random mutations (as the phony probability models assume). Yes, individual mutations are random—but they are preserved and passed on by a process of natural selection that is decidedly *not* random. In a way, natural selection is the exact opposite of randomness: It is ruthlessly focused on propagating genetic mutations that are expressed (phenotypically) as favorable adaptations in organisms. So mutations gradually accumulate, being guided all the while by the criteria of natural selection. By way of analogy, it’s like walking one step at a time up many flights of stairs—not jumping to the top of a building in a single leap.