Is Intelligent Design Incompatible with Cosmological Fine Tuning?

A visitor to this blog emailed me a question about a paper written by Ted Poston and Trent Dougherty, "A User's Guide to Teleological Arguments" (PDF). Poston and Dougherty propose that the Intelligent Design position, taken as evidence for God, is incompatible with the Fine Tuning Argument. That is, they suggest, a theist might argue one position or the other, but probably should not try to do both at the same time. It's a provocative suggestion, at least.

By way of quick review, the Fine Tuning Argument (FTA) looks to the well-established scientific finding that our universe's physical parameters are astonishingly fine-tuned to allow complex life to develop. It says that the odds of this happening, apart from purposeful direction from God, are essentially nil.

Poston and Dougherty seek to make a case that this fine tuning argument works effectively only if we presume God fine-tuned the universe not just so that life could develop (which they call the Weak Fine Tuning Argument, WFTA), but that it inevitably and through God-instigated natural processes would develop. God did not just create a universe that allows life; he created a universe that would inexorably bring about life, with no further direct intervention on his part (the Strong Fine Tuning Argument, SFTA). Thus, they are arguing in favor of theistic evolution from philosophical grounds.

Throughout the first part of the paper I was scribbling notes in the margin, asking why their FTA required the strong version. Their probability comparison on pages 7-10 seems inadequate of itself. It says, in short, that an SFTA argument presents a stronger case for theism than a WFTA. But if Intelligent Design can be empirically supported, then its evidence adds to the strength of a WFTA. (Poston and Dougherty do not say whether they think such empirical support might exist or be forthcoming.)

I was gratified to find on page 10 and following that they addressed the difference between a world that could permit life and one that would produce life. Their answer centers around an efficiency principle (EP):

"... a principle of rational action. Rational action is efficient. Rational action is action based on reason.... We think the nature of rational action yields a prima facie reason to expect efficient action, including God's creation of the world.... God ... will act in a way that is likely to achieve all his goals.... Given the truth of (EP) once you fix God's goals, you thereby gain a reason to think that God will accomplish those goals in the fewest possible acts."

For my part, yes, this is a reason to think this of God, but not a reason necessarily to think this of God. At any rate, we have too little information regarding other goals God may have been pursuing along the path of creation to draw much by way of conclusions from this principle. I appreciate their note at this point:

"From this point forward we will operate on the assumption that (EP) is true. If the reader disagrees, she may read on anyway, since our overall project is one of logical cartography."

In other words, they are not insistent on their answer being the only correct one; they are instead trying to show a map of logically coherent possible positions. In this--which they re-emphasize in their concluding notes--they are admirably effective. Still, taking (EP) as correct, I'm not sure their next line logically follows:

"So given that FTA advocates hold that God intends to bring about intelligent life, he will create a universe that is life-producing, not merely life-permitting."

Again, it seems to me we know too little of God's other possible goals under (EP). They address that thus:

"some other goals must be given. It's not enough just to advert to 'other' reasons as merely conjecture. This would be an argument from ignorance.... the foe of a stacked [i.e., life-producing rather than just life-permitting] universe would need to argue that creation in many acts realizes a greater good than creation by a single act."

Pace common theodicies, this is actually not the case; it only needs to be argued that a creation in many acts produces no less good than creation by a single act, or even that it is possible that it produces no less good. To entertain this as a possibility may weaken the Bayesian probabilities they presented earlier in the paper; yet their numbers for that probability analysis are rather arbitrarily chosen, and it seems that the cosmological FTA is robust enough to survive such weakening. So it seems to me that WFTA survives.

The above is offered as a direct response to the arguments of the paper. Now I need to put it in context.

The Fine Tuning Argument for God is very strong; so strong, that the typical escape from it is quite fantastic and nonscientific: the Many Worlds Hypothesis. This view suggests that the reason we live in such a fine universe is because there are just zillions of them, and at least one out of so many was bound to have conditions fruitful for life. Logically it is possible; but it very seriously violates Occam's Razor, and it seems to be inherently untestable by any scientific means. The Fine Tuning problem arose from within science, and scientists and philosophers look to Many Worlds as a potential scientific out from its implications, but Many Worlds is not, by any measure, scientific.

The Intelligent Design argument for God is very weak at this stage, to say the least. The science is nowhere near robust enough to be persuasive to most skeptics. Poston and Dougherty have this important comment on that, on page 16:

"In the end, whether the data supports the WFTA... or the SFTA must determine how teleological arguments are run."

It depends on what we empirically find, in other words. The jury is still out on Intelligent Design. I'm sure the data will never be strong enough to force a theistic conclusion from ID. If Many Worlds can be raised as an answer to the FTA, then something can surely be brought forth as a non-theistic answer for origins, no matter how strongly ID may someday make its points. From a Biblical perspective, there are spiritual dynamics affecting these decisions. Arguments for God can make theism an intellectually plausible or even attractive option; they cannot prove God or force new spiritual life into any person.

This is one reason I keep saying here that my support of ID is not grounded on any hope that it will turn the tide in favor of belief in God. It has potential to provide data to challenge Philosophical Naturalism, and it could potentially correct neo-Darwinian misunderstandings of origins; and that's about the most I expect from it.

In the end, whether we accept an Intelligent Design explanation of life depends on how the science comes out. Some people--some on either side of the controversy, in fact--think that answer has already been given. The controversy rages on, though. I take a strong stand here: ID research should be encouraged rather than discouraged. I take a weaker stand here: I think ID will (probably) be shown, in the end, to be largely on the right track. It seems to me that's the most we ought to commit to, especially we non-scientists, while the scientists battle it out.

Near the end the authors remind us:

"In the end we are merely concerned with having performed a bit of logical cartography. We have described several positions in logical space and argued that they are not all compatible. So at the very least, this essay is a clarion call for design arguers to be circumspect in their theorizing."

With that, I agree most heartily.

Posted: Thu - April 19, 2007 at 01:59 PM |

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Is Intelligent Design Incompatible with Cosmological Fine Tuning?

Thinking Christian by Tom Gilson