Introduction

Theological arguments play an important role in motivating people on all sides of the debate over Intelligent Design (ID), and this creates a need to study what might be the relationship between design arguments and religious beliefs. This article focuses on the central issue of moving between the “intelligent designer” and God, a problem that also divides opinions among critics of ID. For example, some argue that ID proponents’ separation between the unidentified intelligent designer and God is merely a ploy meant to mask the religious character of ID because it is so easy to connect a designer responsible for life and the order of the universe to God. However, other critics argue that the designer as represented by ID proponents could not be further from the classical understanding of God, because any designer-like entity would be a “being among beings” rather than being itself.[1]

On the ID side of things, proponents also balance between seemingly opposite approaches. Sometimes the definition of ID seems minimalistic and inviting to all, as when Logan Paul Gage writes that ID simply means “the minimal claim that it’s not natural processes and forces all the way down—a claim to which we Catholics are dogmatically committed, believing as we do that all things originate in God.”[2] But most theological critics of ID could also affirm this idea, meaning that they would then also qualify as ID proponents. On the other hand, sometimes ID proponents argue that those who oppose ID undermine the rationality of belief in creation. For example, according to John G. West, theistic evolutionists such as Francis Collins represent “Stockholm syndrome Christianity” that seeks to make Christianity palatable to its opponents at the cost of losing any force to oppose secular culture.[3]

There may be ways to harmonize such statements, both on the part of the critics and on the part of the ID proponents. For example, many ID critics would argue that ID can be a religious idea while also being bad theology. And ID proponents might argue that opponents indeed fail to provide a credible defense of even broad-ranged understanding of God’s self-revelation through the creation. But in either case, developing such a critique requires a more detailed examination.

The purpose of this article is twofold: (1) to analyze the ID proponents’ move between the designer and God, for the purposes of bringing to light the premises dividing proponents and opponents, and (2) to argue for a more robustly theistic understanding of design arguments. The relationship between design arguments and theism has large consequences for the idea of “design-engaged theology” under investigation in this special issue.[4] For example, suppose we agree with most ID proponents that design arguments are about scientifically establishing the existence of some kind of intelligent designer, but design arguments do not tell us anything about the characteristics of the designer. In that case, “design-engaged theology” would come close to the recent development of “science-engaged theology” with “design” decidedly on the side of science in this interaction.[5]

However, for much of their history, design arguments have been seen as arguments for a Creator, not merely any kind of designer. Today as well, many defenders of fine-tuning design arguments and even biological design arguments prefer to formulate them as part of a theistic natural theology or theology of nature.[6] On this understanding, design arguments may draw on science and have similarities to our ordinary and scientific design detection. Nevertheless, on such an understanding, design arguments would be on the theology or philosophy side of the engagement with science. In that case, “design-engaged theology” would be better seen as theology that recognizes the theological value of the idea of God as a “designer” and uses this idea to engage with the sciences.[7]

Both approaches assume that the idea of design has some kind of theological value. This article also takes this assumption as a starting point, creating common ground with ID proponents. Some types of design arguments have been part of Jewish, Christian, Muslim, and other religious traditions since ancient times, and the idea of purposeful ordering seems to capture an aspect of the doctrine of creation, as presented already in the Genesis creation narrative.[8] This is not to say that particular formulations of design arguments could not have theological problems. For example, perhaps an overt focus on machine metaphors might give a lacking portrait of how God acts in the world, and perhaps some approaches to design might neglect other aspects of the doctrine of creation too much. [9]

Thus, the general value of the design argument does not imply that all versions of the design argument are equally good. In this article, I will argue that there are ultimately many reasons to prefer a more robust, theistic and philosophical formulation of the design argument, over a minimalistic approach that needs to move between the designer and God. The minimalistic version is defensible, given certain assumptions about the logic of the design argument, but minimalism also leaves many unanswered questions that are better handled by the more robust theistic version.

In this article, I will first introduce the ID movement’s separation between the designer and God. I will then examine three reasons why someone might prefer the more minimalistic formulation, drawing particularly on thinkers within the ID movement. Finally, I develop responses to these reasons, together with three reasons to prefer the more robust, theistic formulation.

ID’s Separation Between the Designer and God

One of the signature features of the modern intelligent design movement has been its insistence on a separation between design detection and the identification of the designer. The distinction is quite intuitive: there are many cases in which we can detect that something was purposefully designed without being able to tell who the designer was. For example, when early explorers found Mayan ruins, they were able to tell these buildings were designed first, and knowledge of Mayan civilization came only afterwards. ID proponent Michael J. Behe is right, I think, in noting that at least sometimes “we can determine that a system was designed by examining the system itself, and we can hold the conviction of design much more strongly than a conviction about the identity of the designer.”[10]

ID proponents sometimes use this distinction to argue that theological criticisms of ID are beside the point. For example, Dembski states that

Critics who invoke the problem of evil against design have left science behind and entered the waters of philosophy and theology. A torture chamber replete with implements of torture is designed, and the evil of its designer does nothing to undercut the torture chamber’s design.[11]

Dembski’s point is not that discussion of the problem of evil is unimportant. He goes on to argue that the criteria of optimality used by ID critics are based on bad theology and that there are theological responses to the problem of evil.[12] His claim is instead that such theological and philosophical discussions do not affect the design argument itself, because even poorly designed or malevolently designed creations can still showcase evidence of purpose. Thus, for Dembski, discussion of the problem of evil is a separate step that should occur only after some system has first been established as designed.

However, at other times, ID proponents emphasize the theological usefulness of design arguments—so a connection between the designer can be made. On the one hand, certain religious ideas might increase the credibility of ID arguments. For example, Phillip Johnson argued that a “theistic realist” should believe that God could have created life without relying on a natural process, so this should lead to an openness to arguments for the Creator’s more direct involvement in the history of life.[13] And on the other hand, ID might, according to many proponents, support a religious worldview and even the meaningfulness of life, or act to reduce the credibility of alternative worldviews that require the idea of unguided evolution. This is the basis of Dembski’s famous statement that ID is the “ground zero of the culture war”[14] and the Discovery Institute’s (in)famous “Wedge document.”[15]

The separation of God and the designer is not always as clear in ID arguments, however. For example, consider ID-centric moral arguments. Benjamin Wiker, in a book endorsed by major ID proponents such as Dembski and Behe, argues for an opposition between a design-centric worldview and a relativistic Darwinian worldview.[16] For Wiker, design provides grounds for objective morality and the value of human life. This is because there is an “intelligent designer who has created a moral order intrinsic to human nature (and therefore, human beings must act in accordance to the designer’s natural moral order).”[17]However, this goes far beyond the kind of minimalistic designer described by Dembski. The designer, according to ID proponents, need not be good, and could even be an alien civilization, for example. But if Wiker had written “aliens have created us, and therefore we must act according to the moral order they implanted in us,” the unconvincing nature of the inference would be clear. For example, suppose it turned out that an alien civilization had designed humans to be their slaves. Surely, this would be insufficient for concluding that we are therefore morally obligated to obey the aliens’ directives.[18] Wiker’s argument only makes sense if the designer is the supreme moral authority of the universe, the source of all good, namely God.[19] So why not refer openly to a good Creator God at points like this, rather than merely to an unidentified intelligent designer?

Along the same lines, considerations of beauty and goodness often creep into discussions of design detection itself, both within and outside ID literature, both by supporters and opponents. Within ID literature, this most commonly occurs in discussions of cosmic and large-scale patterns of design in the universe. For example, Wiker and Witt argue that the universe does not display merely some sort of design but has the marks of genius, creating a universe in which “the cup of its meaning continually overflows into mystery and wonder.”[20] Gonzales and Richards argue that considerations of value enhance the fine-tuning argument because a “fine-tuned habitable universe has an intrinsic value that an uninhabitable one would lack.”[21] Or as Johnson summarizes, “Reality is simply too rational and beautiful ever to be forced into the narrow categories that materialism can comprehend.”[22] All this goes beyond mere design: the designer values life, meaning, and beauty, and such features are thus well explained by design. This seems like an argument for a good, divine Creator, rather than just any designer.[23]

In sum, we can see that ID thought balances between, on the one hand, the separation between the designer and God, and on the other hand the connection. There are exceptions—early on, ID proponents mostly wrote of the “Creator” rather than merely an “intelligent designer,” and the popularity of Stephen Meyer’s recent book Return of the God Hypothesis may signal the resurgence of more explicitly theistic design arguments within the ID movement.[24] However, minimalism concerning the designer’s identity has traditionally been a core part of ID’s identity.[25]

If we take a broad historical view, the ID proponent’s emphasis on this distinction is surprising. For example, in the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century debates, it was more commonly those skeptical of design arguments, such as David Hume, who claimed that design cannot prove God, whereas defenders of design arguments like William Paley believed that features of design can also tell us a great deal about the Creator’s character.[26] For example, Paley concluded that because there is a greater amount of good than evil in the world, the Creator must be good.

In contrast, in the modern debate, proponents of ID argue for the distinction, whereas many critics have seen design as a fundamentally religious hypothesis. For example, Robert J. Russell (representing theistic evolution) and Elliott Sober (representing naturalism) have argued separately that to explain where the designer came from, consistent ID proponents would need to posit the chain of designers begins with an uncreated designer, namely God.[27] For these authors, the religious implications of ID’s design argument are an argument for keeping ID out of public schools. For others, a connection between design and God might in contrast be necessary for answering such problems and showing the theological relevance of design arguments.[28] But how might one defend the minimalistic formulation of the design argument?

Examining Minimalism in Design Arguments

I see three main ways to defend the idea of design as a minimalistic argument. The first appeals to intuition, the second to the logical nature of the argument, and the third to strategic reasons.

First, as already noted, there is a kind of intuitive credibility to the distinction between detecting design and identifying the designer. In many cases, as in the example of archeology mentioned earlier, we are indeed more certain about the conclusion of design than about the identity and motives of the designer. We can also imagine many hypothetical scenarios (or thought experiments) that support the same distinction in the case of non-human designers. For example, supposing that we found a Moon-sized Volkswagen-like structure orbiting a distant planet that humans have never visited, we would be certain that it was designed but would have little idea of the motives and identity of its maker.[29]

Furthermore, many have argued that the detection of agency is not necessarily based on arguments but on an intuitively functioning, in-built human capacity.[30] Thomas Reid (1710-1796) famously claimed that we use the same capacity both to recognize the presence of mind in other humans and behind nature’s order. Reid’s basic defense of the rationality of this faculty was that we simply must begin from a standpoint of trust. Otherwise, our quest for knowledge will end up in a skeptical mire, because we cannot have a noncircular justification for the reliability of any of our senses. For Reid, the most consistent position would be to trust our faculties of design detection when they tell us that nature is designed. After all, we also trust these faculties in the case of our family members.[31] If our belief in design is grounded chiefly in accepting the reliability of this kind of ability of design detection, and the ability itself is unable to distinguish between divine and human design, then it seems to follow that identification of the designer must be an additional step.[32]

Second, the way ID proponents formulate the design argument does not generally depend on a very specific understanding of the designer’s identity, despite some of the wavering between minimalistic and more robust formulations noted above.

ID proponents have presented a variety of formulations of the design argument, from Dembski’s eliminative “Fisherian” design inference to Stephen Meyer’s use of the inference to the best explanation.[33] Ultimately, all these arguments have both positive and negative components. Positively, proponents must establish some sort of connection between the features to be explained and the evidence, so that design can be seen as a plausible explanation for the data. Negatively, proponents must criticize the sufficiency of alternative explanations such as unguided evolution.

ID proponents generally believe that the suitability of a mental explanation for explaining apparently purposeful and ordered structures can be grasped intuitively, without the need for detailed argument. It is believed that detecting design is something we all must do constantly in our ordinary lives and a kind of ability that is built into human cognition.[34] However, proponents have also provided explanations for why this sort of design detection might be rational based on modes of reasoning we normally use in historical and scientific investigation. Most prominently, it is argued that we know based on inductive experience that certain sorts of features are normally explained by design.[35] It might also be argued that our general mental experience of, and philosophical analysis of the abilities of arranging things purposefully supports the explanatory power of design arguments.

For example, it might be argued that an agent with foresight would have more capacity to order parts in a complex purposeful order than chance, and thus a complex arrangement would favor intelligent design over the chance hypothesis. This might also help explain why particularly superlative examples of design in nature can provide even better evidence for design. These simply contain even more of the style of complexity that design is well-equipped to explain, but which is difficult to explain naturalistically. For example, for Michael Behe, as the purposeful “irreducible” complexity of the system increases, the probability of design goes up and the probability of naturalistic explanations goes down.[36]

Third, formulating the design argument in a minimalistic way has also been advocated for strategic reasons. The idea is that this is required to make design into a neutral, scientific idea, rather than a sectarian religious belief. And its power to challenge culture is the greatest as a scientific argument. This then challenges the self-sufficiency of nature within the arena that proponents of naturalism respect the most: science.

For instance, Dembski explains that there are strategic reasons for defending the scientific status of design arguments, instead of arguing for design as a form of natural theology or philosophical metaphysics.  These are not, for Dembski, the primary reason that the ID movement’s design arguments should be recognized as scientific. Rather, the scientific status of ID is primarily based on the greater argumentative rigor of ID in comparison to natural theology: “What has been a long-standing but fuzzy philosophical intuition can now be cashed out as a robust program of scientific research.”[37] However, Dembski also argues that the scientific status of ID is important for the purpose of attaining cultural influence:

It bears repeating: the only universally valid form of knowledge within our culture is science. Within late-twentieth-century Western society neither religion, nor philosophy, nor literature, nor music nor art makes any such cognitive claim. Religion in particular is seen as making no universal claims that are obligatory across the board. The contrast with science is stark. […] It is therefore clear why relegating intelligent design to any realm other than science (e.g., religion) ensures that naturalistic evolution will remain the only intellectually respectable option for the explanation of life.[38]

For those who accept that design arguments fit comfortably within science, and who accept the greater epistemic status of science in our culture, it can thus be argued that this provides good reason to formulate design arguments as part of science. If this requires steering clear of theological questions, it becomes understandable why a minimalistic formulation would be chosen.

The Connections of God and Designer

Exploring just what the relationship between the designer and God might be is one of the central theological issues of the ID debate. In this section, I will explore some reasons why a more robust, theistic design argument might be preferable. These correspond to (1) intuitiveness, (2) the nature of the argument, and (3) strategic reasons, and thus also serve as responses to the three points above.

First, it seems plausible that the strength of design beliefs indeed draws some of its strength from a kind of intuitive recognition of purposeful order in nature. However, our intuitions are also greatly influenced by reflective beliefs and the surrounding social environment. Cognitive scientists of religion do not believe that our beliefs about complex matters like the creation of the world are solely the product of innate tendencies and abilities. Rather, what those tendencies do is make it easier for us to acquire certain sorts of beliefs, such as that there is a Creator. However, the support of cultural scaffolding for these beliefs is still significant.[39]

Moreover, perception itself is plausibly “theory-laden.” Psychologists argue that perception makes use of conceptual representations, “schemas,” which the mind uses to organize sensory data. On the common understanding, this is what makes it possible to recognize, for example, that a particular arrangement of green is a tree or a crocodile. Or compare the perceptual abilities of a chess master and a chess novice, both looking at a pattern of pieces on a board. The master will be able to “see” certain patterns on the chess board as purposeful traps or enticing opportunities even though a novice might miss them. Similarly, Alister McGrath argues that the perception of nature as designed is itself also “enabled and elicited by the Christian theological vision.”[40] It has indeed been possible for people in different cultures to recognize some sort of purpose in nature, so the perception of design is not fully dependent on a particular set of religious background assumptions.[41] On this understanding of perception, however, a religious culture and pre-existent belief in a Creator may legitimately aid in recognizing nature as creation, because it provides a proper environment for training our inherent capabilities. Thus, the intuitiveness of design detection does not require minimalism.

Second, theistic design argument can make use of all the analogies and inductive reasoning utilized by the minimalistic version but also has other features that provide comparatively more explanatory power. It also allows for better handling of relevant objections and supporting arguments.

Whereas the minimalistic version has little to say about the designer’s nature or motives, the theistic version can draw explanatory power from a more robust understanding of the designer’s nature. This is common in fine-tuning design arguments. For example, Swinburne argues that God’s creation of an orderly world is understandable, because a good God would want his creatures to be able to interact with each other, and this requires reliable causal processes.[42] Collins argues that intelligent life is valuable, and thus it is not outlandish to expect that a good Creator might want to create a life-permitting universe. Collins also points out that this understanding of the Creator was posited long before the discovery of fine-tuning evidence—meaning that it is not ad hoc as an explanation.[43]

A theistic version also allows design arguments to more directly address relevant objections and draw on other supporting considerations. Consider two logically distinct propositions, A and B. If A nevertheless entails or strongly implies B, then it seems that arguments against B will also be relevant for assessing the probability of A. This is why reductio ad absurdum arguments, in which the falsity of an argument is demonstrated by showing that it leads to obviously absurd consequences, can be powerful.

Thus, it is understandable that people’s objections based on the problem of evil, “who designed the designer” questions, or their broader worldview will affect the credibility of design arguments. The theistic formulation allows for addressing these issues directly and thus increases the credibility of the argument.[44] Likewise, on a theistic understanding, belief in the existence of the Creator does not need to rest solely on design arguments but can also be supported by many other considerations and arguments.[45]

Third, on strategic reasons. As noted, the great cultural influence of science is one motivation behind the ID proponent’s desire to formulate a scientific, rather than a philosophical or theological design argument. It is believed that if design can be defended within the arena of science, this may then act as a “wedge of truth” against naturalism, showing that the ultimate reality is personal, rather than unintelligent.[46]

Of course, the credibility of such strategic and pragmatic considerations partly depends on what we think about the state of the evidence and the nature of science. For example, for those who accept methodological naturalism as a good or even credible general strategy for the natural sciences, adopting the strategy of the ID movement will not seem credible. Instead, it may seem to make the credibility of design depend on a controversial solution to the demarcation problem. Much energy has been used in the ID debate over this issue, but I will leave it aside here and instead focus on pragmatic concerns more closely related to theology.[47]

One problem with strategic and pragmatic reasons for minimalism is that there are also strategic and pragmatic reasons for defending design arguments as philosophical and theological, rather than scientific inferences. For instance, requiring scientific status from a credible design argument might seem to tacitly condone our culture’s scientism, which undervalues philosophical and theological arguments. However, this scientistic attitude is highly problematic since science itself depends on rationality broader than itself.[48] Scientism as a philosophical belief needs to be challenged directly.

Christians, at least, should not grant that philosophical and theological reasoning are necessarily unreliable, or that such reasoning cannot be persuasive in the public sphere. After all, Christian religious beliefs (and many of our everyday beliefs) are not typically grounded in science. But if the scientistic assumption of the supremacy of science is something we want to challenge anyway, then it seems there is no clear need to insist on the scientific status of design arguments. Focus on the issue of how to distinguish science and non-science may instead seem like a diversion from the real issue—are design arguments good arguments or not? Moreover, stating design as a philosophical or theological argument would call attention to the many ways in which design and scientific explanations can coexist, rather than competing. Philosophical and theological arguments can also include detailed discussion of scientific discoveries, even scientific premises. Philosophical formulations also help highlight the broad basis of creation beliefs—meaning that their credibility does not depend on being able to defend one particular version of the design argument within science. The idea that doctrine of creation has a broad basis relates to the classic critique of “God of the gaps” arguments, which has many aspects but also includes tracking potential dangers in making faith depend on gaps in scientific explanations. For example, Dietrich Bonhoeffer famously claimed,

It is wrong to use God as a stopgap for the incompleteness of our knowledge. If in fact the frontiers of knowledge are being pushed further and further back (and that is bound to be the case), then God is being pushed back with them, and is therefore continually in retreat. We are to find God in what we know, not in what we do not know; God wants us to realize his presence, not in unsolved problems but in those that are solved.[49]

Bonhoeffer’s quote expresses both a pastoral concern and a more fundamental theological point. Pastorally, Bonhoeffer is worried that if faith in God is based on “gaps” in our knowledge, then faith rests on very shaky ground, and is liable to become undermined as science progresses. Theologically, he is worried that focusing on gaps causes us to miss glorifying God in all that we know of the world, such as its order and rationality, rather than merely in lack of scientific explanation. Because whatever processes there are in the world are created by God, studying such processes should strengthen our faith, rather than undermine it. Any approach allowing that would have major pragmatic benefits, as it would not make belief in the Creator depend on a particular controversial scientific viewpoint.

I am not saying that an ID-style design argument is necessarily a God of the gaps. But I am saying the theistic formulation of design arguments provides a better answer to the pragmatic concerns related to God of the gaps arguments.[50] The theistic formulation of the design argument presents it as one among many arguments and does not necessarily see any conflict between evolution and design either. In contrast, ID proponents’ theological defenses of the design argument sometimes give the impression that only scientific design arguments are able to ensure the rationality of believing in the Creator. For example, Dembski argues that

Within theistic evolution, God is a master of stealth who constantly eludes our best efforts to detect him empirically.… Accordingly, the physical world in itself provides no evidence that life is designed. For all we can tell, our appearance on planet Earth is an accident.[51]

According to Dembski, Occam’s razor is an understandable naturalistic response to theistic evolution, because design recognized strictly through the eyes of faith provides no explanatory benefit. Being able to recognize design empirically, within the sciences, in a way that shows the inadequacy of Darwinian explanations, in Dembski’s antidote to this problem. Similarly, John G. West argues,

Modern theistic evolution erodes the biblical teaching that God’s activity can be clearly discerned through our observation of nature. […] the history belief of both Jews and Christians is that nature supplies observable evidence of God’s purposeful activity (Romans 1:20, Psalm 19).[52]

Both Dembski and West allow for a kind of theistic evolution as a relevant possibility. As West argues, a truly guided form of evolution would be one in which “evolution unfolded according to a clear and specific plan that was conceived of and supervised by God.”[53] Both thinkers believe, however, that this is incompatible with a Neo-Darwinian understanding of evolution which emphasizes the unguidedness of evolution and leaves any involvement by the Creator explanatorily unnecessary. West’s presentation is also nuanced in allowing that proponents of this style of theistic evolution might still defend other arguments for God’s existence. For example, he notes that BioLogos founder Francis Collins does believe that physics and astronomy give evidence of design. However, for West giving up the evidence from biology erodes a crucial part of natural theology.

I would agree with West that biology’s apparently purposeful order has traditionally been seen as good evidence for the Creator, and giving up this evidence altogether has costs. Compared to the evidence from astronomy and physics, biological order is more readily available for everyday perception. For this reason and others, I believe theistic evolutionists should formulate design arguments that are compatible with mainstream evolutionary explanations.[54] This sort of positive attitude towards design is also expressed by some BioLogos theistic evolutionists. For example, former BioLogos president Darrel Falk states that “the processes of life I was observing as a science student were so intricate and so beautiful that even if they were created through evolution (and I came to be quite certain they were), the process had to God’s and under God’s control.”[55]

However, suppose that theistic evolutionists do give up on biological design arguments. Coming back to Bonhoeffer’s point, it would nevertheless be highly problematic to argue that Romans 1:20, Psalm 19, and similar passages in our Sacred Scriptures require Christians to defend the particular versions of the design argument formulated by ID proponents.

For much of Christian history, arguments from natural theology have not required deep scientific knowledge. The kind of design arguments presented by early Christian thinkers, for example, mostly operated on a very general level and are quite compatible with evolution, as I have argued elsewhere.[56] It would be strange for the rationality of belief in creation to depend on, for example, the correctness of ID arguments for the irreducible complexity of certain biological systems, the details of which require highly specific scientific understanding. Otherwise, the so-called “general knowledge” of the Creator would not really be very general at all, as it would be accessible only to a minute fraction of humans throughout history.

Moreover, the rationality of faith rests on much broader than merely argumentative grounds, and there will be many cases in which experiences can be rationally interpreted from the standpoint of religious faith, even if that phenomenon itself does not function as the grounds of faith.[57] But this would mean that thinkers like Francis Collins may well have good grounds for their faith, even if they give up biological design arguments as such.[58]

So, in contrast to the strategy emphasizing scientific arguments, presenting design as a philosophical argument connects it to the other arguments of natural theology or a broader theology of nature. This means that the design argument does not have to stand alone and allows avoiding any impression of implicitly endorsing scientism.

Conclusions

The relationship between the intelligent designer and God is crucial for understanding the relationship between science and theology in Intelligent Design. ID proponents have argued for a minimalistic understanding of the design argument. This is meant to identify ID as scientific, alongside other reliable design-detecting practices such as those used in forensics and archeology. Understanding design in this way would make design part of the sciences, which theology would then have to engage with. Hence the need for a “design-engaged theology.”

However, the arguments of ID proponents and the motivations of the movement have always drawn from theology, not merely the sciences. As a discourse that concerns the ultimate basis of reality, the debate over design is greatly influenced by philosophical and theological factors, despite also drawing on the natural sciences. As an alternative way to defend design arguments, the theistic formulation of design arguments makes such connections explicit in a way that has the potential to strengthen the argument and avoid pitfalls such as tacitly endorsing scientism or making design and natural explanations compete unnecessarily. Design should not be defended as a scientific idea merely because this brings some cultural benefit. After all, the idea that science is the sole reliable determinant of reality is, from a theological standpoint, itself an assumption that needs to be challenged. On the theistic understanding of “design-engaged theology,” the idea of design is a theological and philosophical idea, but it is still an idea calling for close engagement with the natural sciences.

Acknowledgements
The author wishes to thank anonymous referees for helpful feedback.

---

[1] For example, Michael Hanby argues that “if your conception of the God-world relation is such that God can be replaced by a space alien without loss, there is probably something wrong with both.” It seems to me, however, that probably no proponent of design arguments would think that design arguments tell us everything about God. Rather, design arguments might be thought of as confirming or corroborating one aspect of the doctrine of creation. Hanby, No God, No Science: Theology, Cosmology, Biology (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2016), 166n51. On the debate over God as “being among beings,” see Bethany Sollereder, “A Modest Objection: Neo-Thomism and God as Cause Among Causes.” Theology and Science 13 (2015): 345–53; and Marilyn McCord Adams, “What’s Wrong with the Ontotheological Error?” The Journal of Analytic Theology 2 (May 2014): 10.12978/jat.2014-1.120013000318a.  

[2] Logan Paul Gage, “Understanding Design Arguments,” in God’s Grandeur: The Catholic Case for Intelligent Design, ed. Ann Gauger (Manchester, NH: Sophia Institute Press, 2023), 20 –31, 21.

[3] John G. West, Stockholm Syndrome Christianity: Why America’s Christian Leaders Are Failing and What We Can Do About It (Seattle: Discovery Institute Press, 2025).

[4] The idea of “design-engaged theology” as summarized on the website of Joshua R. Farris’s 2023 conference, seems meant to create a version of “science-engaged theology” that utilizes the positive case for design presented by ID proponents. However, the expectation at the conference was that “plenary speakers will argue for the existence of a personal, intelligent, and transcendent God” and for God’s “care for life and human beings,” even to the extent that “God individually creates each human soul” (Design Theology). This goes beyond minimalist ID and thus creates need for analysis of the move between the designer and God. Design Theology, “About Us,” Designed-Engaged Theology, accessed March 26, 2025, https://designtheology.org/about-us.

[5] On science-engaged theology, see particularly John Perry and Joanna Leidenhag, Science-Engaged Theology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2023). Science-engaged theology typically recognizes that the boundaries of science and religion are not set in stone but vary contextually. Historically, science and religion have also been intertwined, rather than fully separate entities. See Nicholas Spencer, Magisteria: The Entangled Histories of Science and Religion (London: Oneworld, 2023).

[6] For example, see Robin Collins, “The Teleological Argument,” in The Blackwell Companion to Natural Theology, ed. William Lane Craig and J.P. Moreland (Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell, 2009), 201–281. Christian philosopher William Lane Craig also believes that design arguments are better seen as philosophical, rather than scientific arguments, even though he believes there is good reason to be skeptical of the power of neo-Darwinian evolutionary explanations. See Craig, “Naturalism and Intelligent Design,” in Intelligent Design: William A. Dembski and Michael Ruse in Dialogue, ed. Robert B. Stewart (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2007), 58–71. 

[7] On the distinction between natural theologies and theologies of nature, see E. V. R. Kojonen, “Natural Theology in Evolution: A Review of Critiques and Changes,” The European Journal of Philosophy of Religion 9, no. 2 (2017): 83–117.

[8] This is not to say that historical versions of the design argument are equivalent to modern versions in all aspects, however. See E. V. R. Kojonen and Shoaib A. Malik, eds., Design Discourse in Abrahamic Traditions: History, Metaphysics, and Science (London: Routledge, 2024).

[9] See E. V. R. Kojonen, “Divine Design and the Creation-Evolution Debate as Questions for Christian-Muslim Dialogue,” Theology and Science 21, no. 4 (2023): 660–67; and Kojonen, The Compatibility of Evolution and Design (London: Palgrave, 2021), 22-26; 71–74. On different metaphors that have influenced design arguments, see Kojonen and Malik, ed. Design Discourse in Abrahamic Traditions.

[10] Michael J. Behe, Darwin’s Black Box, 10th Anniversary ed. (New York, NY: The Free Press, 2006), 196.

[11] William A. Dembski, “Intelligent Design is Not Optimal Design.” (Talk at Baylor University, February 2, 2000), Available at https://billdembski.com/documents/2000.02.ayala_response.htm. Dembski has since also written a book addressing the problem of evil, Dembski, The End of Christianity: Finding a Good God in an Evil World (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2009). Overall reviews of the relevance of the problem of evil for ID are in Joseph Corabi, “Intelligent Design and Theodicy,” Religious Studies 45, no. 1 (2009): 21–35; and E. V. Rope Kojonen, The Intelligent Design Debate and the Temptation of Scientism (London: Routledge, 2016), chapter 8.

[12] A similar point is also made by ID proponents such as Cornelius G. Hunter, Darwin’s God: Evolution and the Problem of Evil (Grand Rapids, MI: Brazos Press, 2001), and Stephen Dilley, “Charles Darwin’s Use of Theology in the Origin of Species.” British Journal of the History of Science, 45, no. 1 (March 2012): 29–56. Both argue that evolutionary theory draws much of its explanatory power from a contrast with theistic explanations. Many opponents of ID would agree that theological and religious views have certainly influenced the popularity and interpretation of evolutionary theory. For example, see Michael Ruse, Darwinism as Religion: What Literature Tells Us about Evolution (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016). However, Ruse argues that the explanatory power of evolution is not tied to such religious interpretations, but also stands on its own, although comparisons to alternative explanations can also be legitimate. For example, common descent is thought to explain certain patterns of biological similarity plausibly. 

[13] Phillip Johnson, Reason in the Balance (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1995). In this book, Johnson proposed ID as a kind of theistic science, but the proposal ultimately was not adopted as an official teaching of the Discovery Institute, although many other ID writers also expressed similar ideas. For instance, Dembski argued that “Intelligent Design is just the Logos theology of John’s Gospel restated in the idiom of information theory” (Signs of Intelligence) These writers emphasized theological presuppositions are unnecessary for the conclusion of design. However, such arguments nevertheless show how ID proponents might also see theology as a relevant inspiration for what they see as scientific arguments. Dembski, “Signs of Intelligence: A Primer on the Discernment of Intelligent Design.” Touchstone Magazine, July/August, 1999, https://www.touchstonemag.com/archives/article.php?id=12-04-076-f. For further analysis of the relation between ID and “theistic science,” see Kojonen, Intelligent Design Debate, 76–78.

[14] William A. Dembski, “Foreword,” in Benjamin A. Wiker, Moral Darwinism: How We Became Hedonists (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2002), 9–13, 12.

[15] The Wedge document was focused on by several ID critics as evidence of the movement’s religious nature. For example, Barbara Forrest and Paul Gross, Creationism’s Trojan Horse: The Wedge of Intelligent Design (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004). For an ID friendly perspective that notes both religious and non-religious motivations, see Angus Menuge, “Who’s Afraid of ID? A Survey of the Intelligent Design Movement.” In Debating Design: From Darwin to DNA, William A. Dembski and Michael Ruse, eds. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 32–51.

[16] The idea that ID has good cultural consequences, whereas Darwinism has bad consequences, has been a mainstay of ID argumentation beginning already with Phillip Johnson’s books, such as The Wedge of Truth: Splitting the Foundations of Naturalism (Downer’s Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2000). Wiker’s argument represents one way of cashing this out.

[17] Wiker, Moral Darwinism, 22.

[18] Thought experiments in which a civilization creates intelligent beings to serve them are common in science fiction. For one example discussing such moral dilemmas, see the video game Geneforge (2021) by Seattle-based company Spiderweb Software.

[19] For the history of arguments on the relationship of theism and morality, see David Baggett and Jerry L. Walls, The Moral Argument: A History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019).

[20] Benjamin Wiker and Jonathan Witt, A Meaningful World: How the Arts and Sciences Reveal the Genius of Nature (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2006), 245.

[21] Guillermo Gonzales and Jay W. Richards, The Privileged Planet: How our Place in the Cosmos is Designed for Discovery (Washington, DC: Regnery Publishing, 2004), 300.

[22] Johnson, Wedge of Truth, 152.

[23] This also plays out to some extent in biological design arguments, as references to the perfection of organisms is often used, and the tendency of human designers to reuse components is used to argue that life’s similarities might also point to a common designer. For example, see Casey Luskin, “An Unpeaceful Peace.” Salvo Magazine, Summer 2021, https://salvomag.com/article/salvo57/an-unpeaceful-peace. This seems to assume a more robust conception of the designer, because it is at least in principle possible to imagine a designer that might act through evolution, wants to make all their works unique, and so on.

[24] See Stephen C. Meyer, The Return of the God Hypothesis: Three Scientific Discoveries That Reveal the Mind Behind the Universe (San Francisco, CA: HarperOne, 2021). Meyer’s approach here is not exactly new. He also proposed much the same idea early on in Meyer, “The Return of the God Hypothesis,” Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies 11, no. 1-2 (1999): 1–38. For some examples of early ID references to the Creator, see William A. Dembski, ed. Mere Creation: Science, Faith, Intelligent Design (Grand Rapids, MI: Intervarsity Press, 1998).

[25] There have been some defenses of ID-style design arguments by atheists and agnostics as well. See for example, Bradley Monton, Seeking God in Science: An Atheist Defends Intelligent Design (Peterborough, ON: Broadview Press, 2009). Along the same lines, ID proponents sometimes refer to Michael J. Denton as an agnostic defender of design arguments. However, this is not relevant here, because in his published works, Denton typically presents explicitly theistic or deistic versions of the design argument. See for example, Denton, Nature’s Destiny: How the Laws of Biology Reveal Purpose in the Universe (New York, NY: The Free Press, 1998).

[26] David Hume, Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, 1779; William Paley, Natural Theology, 1802. For an examination of Humean objections to design arguments, see James F. Sennett and Douglas Groothuis, eds. In Defence of Natural Theology: A Post-Humean Assessment (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2005). For the development of natural theology in response to objections, see E. V. R. Kojonen, “Natural Theology in Evolution: A Review of Critiques and Changes,” European Journal of Philosophy of Religion 9, no. 2 (2017): 83–117.

[27] Robert J. Russell, “Intelligent Design is Not Science and Does Not Qualify to be Taught in Public School Science Classes,” Theology and Science 3, no. 2 (2005): 131–32; Elliott Sober, “Intelligent Design and the Supernatural: The ‘God of the Extraterrestrials’ Reply,” Faith and Philosophy 24, no. 1 (2007): 72–82. Notably, ID proponent Michael J. Behe himself has also reasoned along similar lines for identifying the designer as God, but argues that this is logically distinct from the design argument. See Behe, “Reply to My Critics: A Response to Reviews of Darwin’s Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution,” Biology and Philosophy 16, no. 5 (2001): 685–709.

[28] For a robust defense of God as an explanation for in the case of the fine-tuning argument, see Robin Collins, “From Design to God: What Fine-Tuning Design Arguments Tell Us About the Designer,” in Design Discourse in Abrahamic Traditions: History, Metaphysics, and Science, ed. E. V. R. Kojonen and Shoaib A. Malik (London: Routledge, 2024), 218–35.

[29] I have taken this example from Lydia McGrew, “Testability, Likelihoods, and Design,” Philo 7, no. 1 (2004): 5–21, https://doi.org/10.5840/philo2004711.

[30] See Kojonen, Compatibility of Evolution and Design, 32–44; Kojonen, Intelligent Design Debate, 119-25; and Del Ratzsch, “Perceiving Design.” In God and Design: The Teleological Argument and Modern Science, ed. Neil A. Manson (London: Routledge, 2003), 125–45.

[31] See Thomas Reid, Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man (1785), Critical ed., Ed. Derek R. Brookes (University Park, PA: Penn State Press, 2002).

[32] Discussion of the reliability of our intuitive design detection nowadays focuses on whether the findings of the cognitive sciences of religion might undermine the reliability of such intuitive beliefs. See Kojonen, Compatibility of Evolution and Design, 39–44; and Lari Launonen, “The Naturalness of Religion: What It Means and Why It Matters?” Neue Zeitschrift für Systematische Theologie und Religionsphilosophie 60, no. 1 (March 2018): 84–102. https://doi.org/10.1515/nzsth-2018-0005.

[33] Kojonen, Intelligent Design Debate, chapter 8.

[34] See Kojonen, Intelligent Design Debate, 119–20. Since the publication of the book, the intuitiveness of design detection has also been emphasized particularly by Douglas Axe, Undeniable: How Biology Confirms Our Intuition That Life Was Designed (San Francisco, CA: HarperOne, 2016).

[35] See Kojonen, Intelligent Design Debate, 127–42. McGrew, “Testability, Likelihoods, and Design” provides one of the most in-depth defenses of this way of arguing.

[36] Behe, Darwin’s Black Box, 40.

[37] Dembski, Mere Creation, 18.

[38] Dembski, Mere Creation, 27.

[39] See Launonen, “The Naturalness of Religion.”

[40] Alister McGrath, The Open Secret: A New Vision for Natural Theology (Oxford: Wiley, 2008), 312. McGrath has sometimes been criticized for arguing that natural revelation may be difficult to recognize for those who do not begin from the standpoint of faith. However, McGrath argues that the ability of (Christian) faith to make sense of the world also draws outsiders to faith and provides evidence of the correctness of the standpoint. See further Kojonen, “Natural Theology in Evolution.” For an alternative robust theory of perceiving design in nature, see Mats Wahlberg, Reshaping Natural Theology: Seeing Nature as Creation (London: Palgrave, 2012).

[41] Thus, ancient Jewish and Christian thinkers believed that Greek and Roman philosophers correctly recognized the existence of some kind of Creator, even while Greek and Roman conceptions of the Creator remained somewhat wrong or incomplete. See Kojonen, “Early Christian Design Discourse: Perceiving the Creator through the Creation,” in Design Discourse in Abrahamic Traditions: History, Metaphysics, and Science, ed. E. V. R. Kojonen and Shoaib A. Malik (London: Routledge, 2024), 32–54. See also C. Mackenzie Brown, “The Design Argument in Classical Hindu Thought,” International Journal of Hindu Studies 12 (2008): 103–151.

[42] Richard Swinburne, The Existence of God (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), chapter 8.

[43] See Robin Collins, “The Teleological Argument,” in The Blackwell Companion to Natural Theology, ed. William Lane Craig and J.P. Moreland (Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell, 2009), 201–281. As can be seen from these formulations, defenders of theistic design arguments commonly want to make some allowance for the Creator’s freedom. God did not have to create the universe, so we cannot “predict” God’s actions as though God were an impersonal force. In personal explanations, certain predictions are difficult to come by even in the human case. But if the creation of fine-tuning is at least not wildly improbable on theism, then it is argued that this is sufficient to make theism a far better explanation than naturalism, for example, on the underlying logic, see Luke Barnes, “Fine-tuning in the Context of Bayesian Theory Testing,” European Journal for Philosophy of Science 8, no. 2 (May 2018): 253–69, https://doi.org/10.1007/s13194-017-0184-2.

[44] On the significance of the “who designed the designer” question, and why this might require a theistic answer, see Robin Collins, “From Design to God.” On ID and the problem of evil, see Joseph Corabi, “Intelligent Design and Theodicy,” Religious Studies 45, no. 1 (March 2009): 21–35; and Kojonen, Intelligent Design Debate, 149-68.

[45] See for example, Andrew Loke, The Teleological and Kalam Cosmological Arguments Revisited (London: Palgrave, 2022); and Matthew Levering, Proofs of God: Classical Arguments from Tertullian to Barth (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2016).

[46] Johnson, The Wedge of Truth.

[47] For further discussion of methodological and metaphysical naturalism, see Kojonen, “Methodological Naturalism and the Truth Seeking Objection.” The International Journal for Philosophy of Religion, 81 (2017): 335–55; and Miles K. Donahue, “Methodological Naturalism, Analyzed.” Erkenntnis 90 (June 2025): https://doi.org/10.1007/s10670-024-00790-y. For further discussion of the issue of whether ID is scientific or not, see particularly Kojonen, Intelligent Design Debate, 73-87; Del Ratzsch, Nature, Design, and Science: The Status of Design in Natural Science (New York, NY: SUNY Press, 2001); and Jeffrey Koperski, “Two Bad Ways to Attack Intelligent Design and Two Good Ones.” Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science 43 (2008): 433–49.

[48] On scientism, see particularly Jeroen De Ridder, Rik Peels, and René van Woudenberg, eds. Scientism: Prospects and Problems (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018); and Rik Peels, Jeroen de Ridder, and René van Woudenberg, eds. Scientific Challenges to Common Sense Philosophy (London: Routledge, 2020).

[49] Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Letters and Papers from Prison, New Greatly Enlarged ed. (Touchstone, 1997), 311.

[50] The critique of the God of the gaps has often been directed against ID, and proponents have also developed responses to it. See Kojonen, “The God of the Gaps, Natural Theology and Intelligent Design,” The Journal of Analytic Theology 4 (May 2016), https://doi.org/10.12978/jat.2016-4.041708101413a; and Kojonen, “Divine Design,” 664–66. For example, one way to respond to the pastoral concern would be to question the risk-reward assessment. For those who believe that evolutionary explanations are quite good, ID-style design arguments seem quite risky. Insofar as scientific inquiry has already previously shown that natural explanations exist for many complex biological systems, this makes it likely that similar explanations also exist for those cases that presently remain less understood. However, according to ID supporters, evolutionary explanations are not likely to ever emerge, and their likelihood has been decreasing rather than increasing over time. They also see significant theological benefits to ID-style design arguments, such as showing the inadequacy of naturalistic worldviews. Thus, the credibility of the pastoral critique depends partly on empirical premises. But this does not respond to Bonhoeffer’s main point about the need to recognize the broad basis of faith in God.

[51] William A. Dembski, Intelligent Design: The Bridge Between Science and Theology (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1999), 110.

[52] West, Stockholm Syndrome Christianity, 73.

[53] West, Stockholm Syndrome Christianity, 69.

[54] Kojonen, The Compatibility of Evolution and Design. For critical dialogue, see Stephen Dilley, Casey Luskin, Brian Miller, and Emily, Reeves, “On the Relationship between Design and Evolution.” Religions, 14, no. 7 (June 2023): 850; Kojonen, “On Questioning the Design of Evolution.” Theology and Science 23, no. 2 (March 2025): 276-97, https://doi.org/10.1080/14746700.2025.2472121; and Kojonen, “Response: The Compatibility of Evolution and Design,” Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science 57, no. 4 (December 2022): 1108–123. Others have also discussed difficulties involved in constructing a precise account of how theistic explanations and natural explanations fit together. See for example, Mikael Leidenhag, “The Blurred Line Between Theistic Evolution and Intelligent Design.” Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science 54, no. 4 (December 2019): 909–931, https://doi.org/10.1111/zygo.12556; and Christoffer Skogholt, “I Walk the Line: Comments on Mikael Leidenhag on Theistic Evolution and Intelligent Design.” Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science 55, no. 3 (September 2020): 685–95.

[55] Todd Wood and Darrel Falk, The Fool and the Heretic: How Two Scientists Moved Beyond Labels to a Christian Dialogue About Creation and Evolution (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Academic, 2019), 69.

[56] See Kojonen, “Early Christian Design Discourse.”

[57] See for example, Vainio, Beyond Fideism: Negotiable Religious Identities (Burlington: Ashgate, 2010); and McGrath, The Open Secret.

[58] Theistic evolutionism is of course a highly broad category that includes a great spectrum of views. In engaging with theistic evolutionists, ID proponents most commonly critique fideistic versions of theistic evolution or thinkers who agree that evolution must have been unguided even by God. However, many theistic evolutionists argue that unguidedness should not be understood as part of the scientific content of mainstream evolutionary theory. See for example, Denis Alexander, Is There Purpose in Biology? (Oxford: Lion Hudson, 2018); Matthew Levering, Engaging the Doctrine of Creation: Cosmos, Creatures, and the Wise and Good Creator (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2017); as well as Ted Peters and Martinez Hewlett, Evolution from Creation to New Creation: Conflict, Conversation and Convergence (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 2003). Scott Ventureyra likewise points out that several versions of theistic evolution also make use of the idea of a divine plan or design that is to some degree recognizable in the universe, and thus there is overlap between the ID and TE positions.Ventureyra, On the Origin of Consciousness: An Exploration through the Lens of the Christian Conception of God and Creation (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2018), 94–120.