Intelligent design to take over all studies
By now, the consensus among reasonable people is that modern science indicates the theory of evolution was, at best, a misguided effort. Most contemporary theorists agree that evolution does not explain the fact that the universe is so perfectly adapted to our needs. And if even a single step in the alleged "evolutionary" process had gone wrong, we would be completely different creatures. We probably would not even be able to think.That is why there is increasing acceptance among the scientific community of intelligent design theory, or the theory that life is best explained as the product of some kind of prior plan, sketched out by an all-encompassing being far cleverer than we are. Intelligent design explains why the universe was designed for us and why our incredibly complex physical systems became what they are now. It also accounts for the usefulness of our brains, which would be mush had they just been left to random natural processes.
Several hundred scientists around the United States recently signed an open letter expressing their doubt about evolution. The list included Rice professors Patricia Reiff, James Tour and Pablo Yepes, plus professor emeritus Dale Spence. (Seriously - they all signed it.) But why did they stop with biology? The latest wave in scientific discovery suggests that evolution is not the only theory we all got wrong.
One old theory which, like evolution, appears doomed is that of gravity. Skeptics have always had their doubts about gravity. After all, if gravity were true, wouldn't our excess fat be on our feet rather than our bellies? And we have all seen birds and airplanes fly, even though gravity says that they shouldn't.
The explanation which best fits the evidence is a new theory called "intelligent dispersal." According to intelligent dispersal theory, a higher power dispersed all matter during creation and placed each molecule on an eternal path. The reason "gravity" sometimes seems to be happening, and sometimes does not, is because the molecules falling or flying are actually just enacting the courses the intelligent disperser created. This divine theory makes gravity and its obvious flaws unnecessary.
Something similar can be said for plate tectonics, a theory long singled out as failing to explain the perfect alignment of the continents. Scientists now understand that the continents have been fixed in place since our planet was created and only the rock beneath the ocean is still moving. Our new discoveries pave the way for intelligent subversion, the theory that oceans can slide under the immobile continents. Intelligent subversion explains where excess water would be stored in the event of, for example, a great flood.
Likewise, a core group of brilliant astronomers is changing the way we look at the stars. For centuries we have thought that the Earth is not, after all, the center of the universe. But now we know that it is.
Before humans acquired scientific knowledge, we had the satisfaction of knowing that the universe was exclusively designed for us. But as we got more and more arrogant about this fact, treating the galaxy as our oyster, a higher power chose to restore in us our modesty. It did so by making us think that we were in fact stuck in an inconsequential corner of an unimportant galaxy in a massive void.
This is called intelligent deception theory: the idea that, to keep us humble and worshipful, the intelligent deceiver made us think that the universe is not really centered on us.
The most controversial of these revolutionary new scientific theories is the one called intelligent sensitivity. This is a response to the philosophy of the so-called "Enlightenment."
Allegedly enlightened philosophers like David Hume worried that we could not always trust our senses, because what our senses report to our brain might actually be different from what actually exists. Now we can dismiss this complaint by postulating an intelligent sensitizer who gives us all of our sensory inputs after making sure they are accurate. The sensitizer is a sort of divine fact-checker.
As you can see, the revolution in science which overthrew evolution is now prepared to take on other mere theories like gravity, plate tectonics, astronomy and phenomenology. The explanatory power of the intelligent new hypotheses is far greater than the old ones. I have full confidence that intelligent design, intelligent dispersal, intelligent subversion, intelligent deception and intelligent sensitivity will pave the way to new scientific frontiers.
They even point the way to a grand unified theory of science, based on a central intelligent figure. Who could that figure be? We have a theory about that, too.
Its name is intelligent blind faith.
Brian Reinhart is a Wiess College senior and Thresher calendar editor.
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