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| June 09, 2006 |
Subject: Intelligent Evolution - My answer to Evolution vs. Intelligent Design
Time: 03:30 PM
© 2006 Tristan A. Arts/Alexander Antonin Arts
These days, there is renewed debate about Evolution versus Intelligent Design. There are ignorant ideologies, dogmatic approaches, and other mistakes being made on both sides. So much focus is being put on one side or the other that more reasonable "middle ways" are being ignored. One side tends to see Intelligent Design proponents as all being ignorant hicks with a literalistic interpretation of the Bible and that same Bible as their only evidence, while many in favor of Intelligent Design view Evolutionists as Godless, immoral people bent on taking all spirituality away and mystery out of life. While there are people fitting these descriptions in existence, there are not as many as you might think. People tend to make their assumptions about those on the other side of the fence by the way the most visible among them behave. This, however, is doomed to create discord and unrest, misunderstanding and a failure to communicate. For it is usually the troublemakers who get the most attention, and when troublemakers profess being in favor of one side or another, that side gets labeled with the bad reputations of those troublemakers.
This all may seem like it doesn't concern the common person, but it very much does. So long as only the opinions of the fanatics of either side are being heard, the middle ways are ignored and the more open minded among us do not get their fair say. Humans, at least in Western Civilization, tend to think in dualities; this results in an inadvertent overlooking of points of view that are outside the norm. People tend to see this debate, for example, as being either "Bible-thumping 10,000 year old Earth" Intelligent Design or "Godless sodomite no-meaning-to-life" Evolutionists. Today, however, I would like to break through those stereotypes and address both sides by giving another opinion some say. So please, meet the theory that I call Intelligent Evolution. Or it could be called "Non-literalistic Intelligent Design Via the Medium of Evolution."
According to this "middle way" type of theory, existence as we know it was brought into form via some form of intelligence. Here, however, those of both opposing sides of this argument need to clear their heads of certain mistaken notions before continuing. The literalists must set aside their literalistic interpretation of their sacred scripture and see it instead as a series of allegorical tales, much like those that Jesus told. It would also be helpful if the scientists would also set aside these beliefs, or more accurately, set aside the belief that literalistic beliefs must be connected to this theory. Intelligent Evolution rejects dogma or literalism from either side.
Let also the scientists set aside for now all their preconveived notions about the rigidity of mechanical nature of the universe. It would also help if the literalists would also set aside this notion, or the thought that this point of view is necessarily a part of any evolutionary theory.
Good. With that out of the way, we continue. Now we must reject the notion of science that there was nothing in existence before the Big Bang, for even by its own accepted laws of physics, this is an impossibility. The same goes for literalistic Creation theories, too, because Einstein clearly states (and has collected much evidence to prove) that matter and energy are not only different forms of the same thing, but can be neither created nor destroyed. Thus, we can not only see that the currently accepted view of the Big Bang is impossible (or at least incomplete), but that there is also no way a God (in the sense of being a very large and invisible human being) could have created all the matter and energy in existence. Therefore, like God Itself, matter and energy must have necessarily always existed, but merely in another form.
What form did this energy take before the Big Bang/Act of Creation? We can only speculate. However, quantum physicists have observed quantum particles appearing and disappearing as though being blinked in and out of existence, as well as light behaving - oddly enough - as both a particle and a wave. Of course, we must consider the role of Einstein's theory of relativity in all this: matter cannot be created nor destroyed, thus we must assume that there is more to existence than what we can currently observe. So where are those particles coming from, and where do they go when they vanish? And where are these light particles that our light particles are interacting with, to act like waves, when only one is being sent through the hole at a time? Quantum physicists have come up with some very interesting theories to explain these, and every theory I come across points out one thing to the open-minded individual: no matter how existence came to be, it is intelligent at the simplest levels.
Consider one theory of why light behaves like both a particle and as a wave: the alternate universe theory. This theory posits that for some unfathomable reason, light particles in this universe are interacting with light particles from other universes. Which leads one to wonder: if these light particles are not in the same universe, how and why are they interacting? If this theory is incorrect, it still raises some wonderfully bizarre questions, and if it is true, then it would seem that - for reasons we are unaware of - light particles in neighboring universes are communicating or otherwise interacting with one another. Whether this is a purely mechanical action or a sign of intelligence at the smallest level, it still leads one to wonder why and how they do this. Then again, it also makes one wonder how the universe came up with its laws anyway.
Let us assume for a minute that those in favor of a mechanical universe based purely on chance are right. If this is the proper model, then how does random chance create such order? That is one key flaw with a mechanical theory of the universe: it cannot account for all the complexity. Proponents of this theory try to shake off this flaw in their theory with the story of a mud puddle that assumed the world was made just for it because everything was perfect for the existence of a creature shaped as it is. That, however, is a cop-out. For a system to gain any order from random chance, there must be some sort of rules. Take the computer game called Life, for example. In it, short-lived dots interact with one another the way microbes might. It seems, on first glance, to be bringing order from chaos, but the program is based on rules arrived at through mathematical formulae.
The universe is much the same way. No one knows how or why the laws of physics came to be, but everyone with the ability to observe their world can observe the balance of chaos and order in the universe; everyone can observe the complexity. To people who have noticed things like this, it says to them that the universe is intelligent down to the smallest level, and that there isn't really such a thing as inanimate matter; all matter and energy are part of Life. Regardless of how matter and energy particles came to interact with one another as they do, regardless of their origin, and regardless of whether or not they started out intelligent, one thing is now plain: our universe (and one would assume the neighboring universes ours interacts with) is now intelligent, and had to be in order to give rise to such complexity.
Is this theory correct? We don't know; but it makes a lot more sense to us than the others do. It makes more sense than a giant invisible human-shaped God, and it makes more sense than "random chance alone did it." It the theory complete? Far from it! Is it a better theory? No. It is just a different theory. You may personally find it better or not better, but theories are just theories. Can we ever know the Truth? Maybe, or maybe not. We don't know. But at least this theory has a voice now.
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