Nature Suggests Intelligent Design

A post written by Anika Smith, UK Columnist Spots Dawkins' Arrogance in Argument against Intelligent Design, at Evolution News and Views, comments on a piece authored by Melanie Phillips in the UK's Daily Mail. Quotes of Melanie Phillips are in green and my commentary is in blue. Melanie Philipps is quoted as stating:

There is no evidence for this whatever and no logic to it. After all, if people say God could not have created the universe because this gives rise to the question "Who created God?", it follows that if scientists say the universe started with a big bang, this prompts the further question "What created the bang?"

In other words the infinite regress causal chain dilemna is inherent to all explanations.

Moreover, since science essentially takes us wherever the evidence leads, the findings of more than 50 years of DNA research - which have revealed the almost unbelievable complexity of the arrangements which are needed to produce life - have thrown into doubt the theory that life emerged spontaneously in a random universe.

It is not merely a matter of complexity. The uniqueness of nucleic acids lies in the fact that their nucleotides are encoding symbols for amino acids. Symbolic encoding systems are familiar to us of course. You encounter them in the course of reading and their causal source is always intelligence.

These findings have given rise to a school of scientists promoting the theory of Intelligent Design, which suggests that some force embodying purpose and foresight lay behind the origin of the universe.

The suggestion is found in nature. A search for the cause of life consistent with non-telic, non-intelligent causal factors has been sterile since Darwin.