Why "Intelligent Design" Is Not a Scientific Hypothesis
"Whatever cannot be conceived quantitatively cannot belong to scientific knowledge." -- Michael Oakeshott, Experience and Its Modes , p. 221 Thus, the critics of ID are quite correct: there is no way to quantify the idea "X designed Y to be so," and thus "design" is an idea excluded from scientific discourse. That truth in no way implies that "design" is a nonsense idea: it just means that, in the world of science, which seeks to establish mathematical relationships between measured quantities, "design" has no place. As objections to this fact, I often have seen two cases offered: 1) Archaeologist detect design in their research. Yes, they do, but archaeology is an historical, and not a scientific, discipline. 2) SETI researchers look for evidence of intelligent design. OK, while this search has been conducted by scientists, is there any evidence it is scientific? I think not.