Introduction

The late Princeton professor of theology, Charles Hodge, in reference to the design of organisms, once stated in his book What Is Darwinism? “If God made them, it makes no difference how He made them, as far as the question of design is concerned, whether at once or by a process of evolution.”[1] For the most part, I share this sentiment with Hodge, insofar as the question of “how” God creates is an in-house debate amongst Christians. My intention is not to sow more divisions among our Christian brethren but to probe into a question that is worth investigating more deeply. ID literature has largely centered on identifying indicators of design in nature rather than examining how God may have actualized that design. Though often treated as a secondary issue, the question of how design unfolds, whether conceptually or empirically, is essential for advancing the discussion of divine action, evolution, and front-loading. It invites deeper engagement with the mechanisms and modalities of creation. Regardless of whether one adheres to Young Earth Creationism (YEC), Old Earth Creationism (OEC), or some mode of theistic evolution, all positions face the same difficulties, whether it pertains to divine action or the problem of natural evil, for example. What is important is whether a particular position best explains how God created it from a theological, philosophical, and scientific standpoint. The interwovenness of these three broad disciplines is fundamental to understanding reality as best we can.

In order to facilitate a potentially fruitful discussion over the relationship between ID and evolution, broadly situated in the conversation between science and theology, I intend this paper to serve as a primer on the question of divine action and front-loading. First, I will provide an overview of key ideas and terms, including evolution, theistic evolution, ID, and front loading. In so doing, I will demonstrate the compatibility of ID (to variant degrees) with practically all meanings of evolution. Second, I will provide a brief background on discussions relating to front-loading. Third, I will discuss the wide application of front-loading with respect to various understandings of evolution and ID. Fourth, I will propose a series of front-loading research programs for the science-theology interaction.

Evolution

Many proponents of naturalistic evolution (NE) (for example, Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, George Gaylord Simpson, and Ernst Mayr) and non-teleological theistic evolution (NTE) (for example, Nancey Murphy, Francisco Ayala, and Jeff Schloss) have neglected to clarify the various meanings of “evolution.” In contrast, ID theorists have carefully parsed these distinctions,[2] recognizing that the term carries different scientific and metaphysical implications. Clarifying these meanings is vital not only for theological dialogue but for accurately situating ID within scientific discourse. They have muddied the waters and used different interpretations of evolution interchangeably, depending on their purposes. Conflating the different meanings of evolution can create confusion while also pushing forward one’s views on the compatibility of God and evolution without much rigour, which has been the case for some proponents of theistic evolution.

In 2001, historian Michael Keas and philosopher of science Stephen C. Meyer wrote and published a pedagogically useful article, “The Meanings of Evolution,” that delineates six meanings of the word “evolution.” These are scattered throughout textbooks within the broad fields of physics, chemistry, and biology.[3] “The Meanings of Evolution” provides the most helpful delineations and distinctions regarding the term. The purpose of including these definitions is to show the high compatibility of ID with most meanings of evolution and, consequently, the concept of front-loading, which we will examine below.

Some examples of the different meanings of evolution include change over time. This could be applied to anything ranging from the sequence of events in nature, whether cosmological, physical, chemical, or biological. Thus, evolution can be used to describe physical evolution (big bang cosmology), the origin of the first organism (chemical evolution), the origin of species (biological evolution), or the evolution of consciousness (human anthropology/neuroscience), all of which must be carefully distinguished. As for biological evolution, there is great variance such as (1) changes in the frequencies of alleles in the gene pool of a population; (2) limited common descent (micro-evolution); (3) the mechanisms involved in limited common descent; (4) universal common descent (UCD), the idea that all organisms have descended from a single common ancestor (often referred to as the “fact of evolution” and “macro-evolution”); (5) the “blind watchmaker” thesis, namely, the conjunction of universal common descent with an unguided, unintelligent, purposeless material process, including processes such as natural selection acting on random variations or mutations and other naturalistic mechanisms (which are sometimes considered to be part of the extended synthesis of evolution);[4] and (6) the idea of purposeful evolution or teleological evolution, which was a common usage prior and throughout Darwin’s time (a definition that is closely connected to the concept of front loading).

The most controversial (or conflicting with Christian theism and theism in general) of all the aforementioned definitions of evolution is the fifth one, the blind watchmaker thesis. This combines UCD with naturalistic mechanisms (namely natural selection and random mutation with the possibility of other naturalistic mechanisms such as endosymbiosis, self-organization, and so on.), while precluding the possibility of any direction or purposiveness from an intelligent agent by fiat. The “blind watchmaker” thesis, coined by Richard Dawkins,[5] portrays evolution as an entirely unguided and purposeless process, one in which natural selection and random mutation function as substitutes for a designer. This model, often treated as scientifically normative, actually reflects a philosophical stance rather than empirical necessity. As George Gaylord Simpson famously stated, “Man is the result of a purposeless and natural process that did not have him in mind. He was not planned.”[6] Such claims extend beyond biology into metaphysics, asserting a worldview that arbitrarily excludes divine purpose.

The “blind watchmaker” thesis, in my view, is not a necessary interpretation of evolutionary theory, but rather a philosophical or a-theological “add-on” rather than a scientific one. In other words, I see compatibility between Darwinism and theism if we do not accept the interpretation of the “blind watchmaker” thesis, which is clearly not necessary. In the past decade, a debate between philosophers Alvin Plantinga and Jay Richards has ensued over this topic. Plantinga has argued that there is no apparent incompatibility with theism and Darwinism,[7] whereas Richards has argued the opposite.

Part of this debate resides on their understanding of the term “randomness.” It is worth making the distinction between metaphysical randomness and scientific randomness.[8] Throughout the literature on biological evolution, randomness is argued to be non-necessary, unlike natural selection.[9] The late eminent evolutionary biologist Ernst Mayr has defined randomness with respect to mutations in the following way, “When it is said that mutation or variation is random, the statement simply means that there is no correlation between the production of new genotypes and the adaptational needs of an organism in a given environment.”[10] In other words, random mutations are independent of the environment and selection. These definitions are scientific uses of the term as they apply to Darwinism (Neo-Darwinism), which are compatible with Neo-Darwinism.[11] On the other hand, metaphysical randomness relates to the claim of the “blind watchmaker” thesis of the cause of mutations being unguided, purposeless, and unguided. As the definitions clearly illustrate above, these are not necessary to understand the role of randomness within evolution. There is no reason to think that randomness itself cannot be a product of design. William Dembski, in a seminal paper in 1991, published in the journal Nous,argues

Randomness, properly to be randomness, must leave nothing to chance. It must look like chance, like a child of the primeval chaos. But underneath a keen intelligence must be manipulating and calculating, taking advantage of this and that expedient so as systematically to concoct confusion. I am reminded of the photo-journalists in Vietnam who rearranged scenes of carnage simply to enhance the sense of indiscriminate violence. Here, of course, there was a moral fault, but not with randomness per se. Suffice it to say, randomness, to be randomness, must be designed.[12]

Philosophers R. van Woudenberg and J. Rothuizen-van der Steen argue that evolution is both random and guided, supporting Plantinga’s defence of their compatibility.[13] Likewise, I tend to side with Plantinga over Jay Richards on this issue, since Darwinists are overstepping scientific boundaries when arbitrarily attempting to remove God’s action from the evolutionary process, whether as the initiator and/or sustainer.[14]

Theistic Evolution

There are three broad categories that come under theistic evolution. In my estimation, one of the three following theistic evolutionary (TE) models is most conducive to a broad picture of God’s creative action concerning the universe with life itself, the variety of organisms, and human consciousness. UCD is the best explanation for the diversity of life on Earth. It is empirically more robust and theologically more coherent than both Young Earth Creationism (YEC) and Old Earth Creationism (OEC).[15] Theologically, theistic evolutionary models generally avoid turning God into a tinkerer, as OEC does. Empirically, it offers greater explanatory scope and power than both YEC and OEC, particularly more so than YEC. Moreover, UCD offers great explanatory scope since it is based on the corroborative nature of modern scientific fields, such as geology, paleontology, and genetics. It also adheres to cosmic evolution (OEC does as well) following the corroborative sciences of cosmology and astrobiology. It is indeed the best explanation of several lines of evidence, including the fossil record (for example, transition from fish to amphibians), geographical distribution, comparative physiology, and biochemistry (for example, DNA sequencing, endogenous retroviruses), and comparative anatomy (for example, homologous structures).[16]

Nonteleological Evolution (NTE)

Nonteleological evolution is very similar to a completely naturalistic vision of the universe (it adds on a theistic bent to the “blind watchmaker” thesis), with the exception that NTE holds that God exists and is the ultimate cause and reason for the universe’s existence. NTE proponents also claim that God is intimately involved in the sustaining of the universe and the process of evolutionary development, although how one explains God’s action in a concrete way is rather difficult to envision under such a view. The precise distinctions between naturalistic mechanisms acting on their own and God’s involvement are extremely vague at best. This view is said to not follow a plan or direction, so that the origins and emergence of organisms and their components may remain as elusive as under a fully naturalistic vision of reality. Thus, they do the opposite of the naturalistic Darwinists—they declare by fiat that God is involved in the process without giving a convincing or plausible account while still adhering to some of the designer substitute language that atheists like Dawkins favor.

Planned Evolution (PE)

According to Planned Evolution (PE), the universe had a specific intention and plan at the time of creation. It is a form of teleological evolution and is a monotheistic position. PE suggests that God can certainly intervene in creation, but he does not do so because the original creation was perfect. Some major advocates of PE include Canada’s dentist, theologian, evolutionary biologist, and first tenure track professor of science and religion, Denis Lamoureux, cell biologist Kenneth R. Miller, medical doctor and biophysicist Francis Collins (leader of the Human Genome Project and founder of BioLogos), and geneticist, medical doctor, and first prominent dissenter of Neo-Darwinism, Michael Denton.[17]

Directed Evolution (DE)

In some ways, the final model of theistic evolution, which is also another form of teleological evolution, is similar to PE. After creating the universe, DE says God still acts within it. Unlike PE, DE asserts God’s intervention throughout the universe’s history, with proponents divided over its scientific detectability. Supporters of this view include the prolific quantum chemist Henry Fritz Schaefer III,[18] physicist Loren Haarsma,[19] and the famous biochemist Michael Behe, who coined the term “irreducible complexity” as a criterion for ID.[20] While some ID advocates align with DE, this does not imply that ID and DE are mutually exclusive. ID is a broad umbrella, but most ID proponents do not adhere to DE.

A Recent Approach

In his book, The Compatibility of Evolution and Design, theologian E. V. R. Kojonen attempts to harmonize his understanding of evolutionary theory with the concept of design.[21] While his work introduces some novel explanatory perspectives, it largely aligns with existing forms of theistic evolution. Kojonen appears to accept direct evidence of design in cosmology and physics as a precursor to biological evolution (though not required by his model), while maintaining standard evolutionary mechanisms to account for biological complexity. His book was the subject of a 2022 symposium in Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science,[22] which featured critical appraisals from multiple scholars including prominent figures in the ID movement,[23] to which Kojonen issued a response.[24] The debate has since expanded through additional scholarly exchanges.

A central concern among ID proponents is that Kojonen’s model weakens the explanatory power of design by bypassing empirical rigor. Their critique centers on two main issues:

1. the empirical difficulty of explaining biological complexity via a front-loading model
2. the absence of discrete design events such as the origin of the bacterial flagellum that serve as hallmarks of ID reasoning.[25]

Critics have characterized Kojonen’s view as a “full-throated” version of front-loaded design yet lacking in empirical accountability. [26]

While I share Kojonen’s aim of reconciling evolutionary theory with design, my approach diverges in several crucial respects. Kojonen largely avoids invoking discrete design events and embraces mainstream evolutionary explanations as sufficient. By contrast, my front-loading proposal is explicitly compatible with the Intelligent Design research program, particularly in regard to explanatory criteria like irreducible complexity and specified complexity. Unlike Kojonen’s broader notion of design, I treat ID not merely as a metaphysical position but as a scientific framework that must address how something may have been designed, not only that it was designed.

My approach also allows for the possibility of divine interventions without requiring them. It affirms that design can be embedded through front-loading and expressed through secondary causes an idea resonant with classical theological models, such as those of Thomas Aquinas. The empirical challenge of how design occurred remains a live issue for all explanatory models, whether naturalistic or theistic. In this regard, front-loading provides a productive avenue to move beyond detection into detailed inquiry about design processes.

There is, as I argue below, a significant gap in the literature when it comes to this crucial “how” question. Both Kojonen and many ID proponents seem content to focus on the presence or inference of design, without pressing into the mechanisms by which it could occur. Kojonen, responding to critics, writes,

This depends on whether design beliefs are falsified when one discovers that [the] design plan was actualized through a different method than one initially supposed. I would claim that knowledge of the Creator’s methods has not been historically crucial to design arguments.[27]

While there is some truth to this, it also highlights a limitation—if ID is to mature into a robust research program, it must go beyond inference and begin formulating concrete models of design processes. Evolutionary biology, for example, routinely offers detailed, even if incomplete explanations of mechanisms by which life forms and organelles arise. ID must meet or exceed that level of explanatory detail if it hopes to function as a viable scientific paradigm.

To that end, I contend that there is no incompatibility between front-loading and discrete design events like the origin of the bacterial flagellum. Nor is there a contradiction between ID and evolutionary design understood as secondary causation. Kojonen is right to point out that criticisms of his view often overlook a long-standing ID tradition, one exemplified by William Dembski, who writes,

Intelligent design is not a theory about the frequency or locality or modality by which a designing intelligence intervenes in the material world. It is not an interventionist theory at all. Indeed, intelligent design is perfectly compatible with all the design in the world coming to expression by the ordinary means of secondary causes over the course of natural history.[28]

Kojonen also cites literature affirming that design detection does not depend on discrete interventionist acts. This is a helpful corrective to the common misconception that ID entails a constant disruption of natural processes.[29]

Nonetheless, for the purposes of my own research program, building a conceptual and scientific bridge between evolution and Intelligent Design, I believe we must press further. If ID is to account for complex biological structures like the flagellum or the first self-replicating system, we must ask: by what method or process were they designed? We understand how humans design computers and machines through clearly definable architectural steps. But in the case of biological systems, we currently lack this level of design specificity.

Front-loading offers a way forward. It shifts the discussion from detection to discernment from recognizing design to investigating how it may have been implemented. This includes exploring how information systems, akin to those devised by human programmers, might inform the design of organisms, organelles, and events within the physical universe. Much like a software developer encodes the unfolding capabilities of an operating system, a front-loading model posits that biological systems may have been programmed from the outset to yield specific outcomes over time; a theme I develop in greater detail below.

Intelligent Design and its Compatibility to Evolution

ID, traditionally presented by its proponents, is the minimalistic claim that an intelligent cause, rather than a purely undirected process, best explains the universe itself, certain features of the universe, and living systems. It is distinct from creationism and natural theology although some of its proponents may adhere to such notions. Moreover, although ID exponents may criticize many tenets of evolutionary theory, they also claim to have a positive basis for their reasoning, which is dependent upon standard modes of scientific reasoning. ID extends into various domains including cosmology, physics, chemistry, biology, and neuroscience, and also into the humanities, so it is not restricted to biology (a popular misconception), however, our discussion will be predominantly focused to biological evolution. Although interesting to consider the possibility of the whole universe being front-loaded, this would be the project for a much larger research project, and one that would have to deal with Stephen Meyer’s pointed critique of front-loading as expressed by Denis Lamoureux,[30] which is beyond the scope of this paper. Having said that, there are available counter-arguments Meyer’s position. [31]

It is important to note that ID is compatible with all of the abovementioned definitions of evolution, whether in standard scientific terms or within a theistic evolutionary framework. Moreover, for NTE and even some understandings of PE and DE,[32] ID may function solely at the cosmological level (origin and expansion of the universe) and as an explanation for the fine-tuning of the laws of physics, initial conditions, and constants. Depending on the understanding of PE and DE presented, there could be varying degrees of compatibility between ID and a form of teleological evolution, with DE being the most closely aligned.

If incorporated into a wider Christian theistic understanding, ID functions as an explanation for the universe itself and the features within, such as the laws of physics, origin of life, biological organisms, consciousness, and organelles. Theological critics of ID argue that it advocates for an unknowable deity and fails to distinguish it from deism. Proponents of ID argue that the designer’s nature remains elusive, while the deduction of design is arguable. ID is compatible with a variety of interventionist creation positions and theistic evolutionary models. The “blind watchmaker” thesis is the only definition of evolution that runs contrary to ID, but only arbitrarily. ID has different degrees of overlapping with the aforementioned creationist and theistic evolutionary models. So, for the theist in general, and the Christian in particular, ID is almost inescapable, even though it has many negative connotations and has been deemed a dirty term by many. This not only includes non-theists such as Deists, Buddhists, and Hindus, for example, who, although they reject theism, are open to design even if it is at a very miniscule level. ID is clearly compatible with theism, which includes those in the PE and NTE camps, as well as YEC and OEC, who criticize the ID program for not naming the designer. Nevertheless, ID remains contentious in philosophical, theological, and scientific discussions since it seeks to challenge the efficacy of methodological naturalism as a reliable methodology for the natural sciences.

God’s Action and Intelligent Design:
Beyond Detection

Typically, discussions of how God acts in creation are sidelined in ID literature, which tends to focus on the detection of design rather than the mode of divine causation. The argumentation is focused on exploring particular indicators for design, such as irreducible complexity, specified complexity,[33] the presence of functional information, and making inferences to the best explanation over naturalistic explanations,[34] whether it pertains to the origin of the universe, the fine-tuning of the universe, the origin of information in DNA and the origin of life, the origin of irreducibly complex molecular machines, the origin of animals and their organelles, and the origin of humans, instead of discussing how the Designer may have designed a certain phenomenon or feature. This model of divine action aligns with the classical Thomistic view of God working through secondary causes, where natural processes serve as instruments of providence rather than as competitors to it.

In this section, I propose that God, at the biological level, uses teleological evolution (either planned evolution or directed evolution (with a preference towards the latter) to bring about the diversity and specified complexity of life throughout the universe. In other words, I will argue for the frontloading to a first prototypic organism, one that is the universal ancestor to all other organisms found on Earth. Life on Earth exhibits a profound unity, reflected in shared biological structures and genetic codes, alongside a remarkable diversity, manifested in increasing complexity and levels of consciousness.

What Is Front-Loading?
A Functional Analogy

One way to conceive of front-loading in relation to divine action is to see God designing the future through present conditions, embedding within creation the parameters for future developments. God’s present action within space and time sets up future outcomes from this initial act. In some ways, God constrains evolution by directing it toward possible outcomes. For instance, God may have endowed evolution with potential variances in structural design to increase the likelihood of the emergence of discrete events and organisms.

Front-loading can be understood as God’s act of embedding causal and informational constraints into the initial conditions of creation such as constraints that guide evolution toward intended outcomes. A helpful analogy is the installation of an operating system. Like Windows or macOS, which contains foundational code to support future applications, God’s front-loaded creation contains parameters that enable the emergence of specific outcomes over time, without requiring constant intervention.

This program contains all of the necessary data to build any program or application that must operate in a Windows or Mac environment. In other words, an aboriginal design exists within the Windows/Mac environment, outlining the causal and logical possibilities. Similarly, nature constrains itself to produce specific types of organisms, rather than a wide range of imaginable species. This could serve as an explanation for the striking similarities among organisms across the animal kingdom as well as the gradations in complexity and consciousness. It would also provide a plausible explanation for why there is a remarkable fit between organisms and their environment. The environmental constraints would involve the environmental setup among different mechanisms of evolution that would arise, including natural selection, random mutation, self-organizational processes, punctuational change, stasis, hierarchical selection, exaptation, punctuated equilibrium, neutral theory, developmental mutations: evo-devo, morphogenic fields, self-organization/complexity theory, and endosymbiosis. 

Historical Roots:
Augustine, Wallace, and Purposeful Evolution

It is important to note that the term “evolution” was quite common among scientists, philosophers, and theologians prior to the publication of Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species (1859). In the first six editions of On the Origin of Species, Darwin deliberately avoided the term because of its religious connotation and emphasis on intentionality and agent causation. Nevertheless, from Aristotle forward, the term evolution suggested purposefulness and a teleological process of sorts.[35]

The connection between ID and front-loading can be argued to be traced back more explicitly to St. Augustine, fourteen hundred years prior to Charles Darwin and Alfred Wallace publications on evolution by natural selection, Augustine, argued in Book VI of his work De Genesi ad litteram (The Literal Meaning of Genesis) that God could have created the universe and organisms with certain potencies to allow for evolutionary change. According to Augustine, species did not develop all at once, but rather gradually over the course of history.[36] As Alister McGrath explains,

Augustine’s basic argument is that God created the world complete with a series of dormant multiple potencies, which were actualized in the future through divine providence… God must be thought of as creating in that first moment the potencies for all the kinds of living things that would come later, including humanity.[37]

This demonstrates how different interpretations of the creation stories in Genesis can lead to varying ideas about how God created the world and how it has changed over time.

Interestingly, the co-discoverer of natural selection, Alfred Wallace, defended a version of ID that he dubbed “intelligent evolution.” In his book The World of Life, in the second chapter titled “Some Extensions of Darwin’s Theory,” he draws a sharp line between himself and Darwin on their understanding of evolution and purpose.

Beyond all the phenomena of nature and their immediate causes and laws there is Mind and Purpose; and the ultimate purpose is so far as we can discern) the development of mankind for an enduring spiritual experience… If this view is the true one, we may look upon our Universe, in all its parts and during its whole existence, as slowly but surely marching onwards to a predestined end.[38]

In a subsequent chapter, he also indicates the inadequacy of undirected natural forces to account for life and that there must be a directed, planned, or as he puts it, “pre-ordained system of evolution.”

I admit that such forces and such rudimentary mind-power may and probably do exist, but I maintain that they are wholly inadequate, and that some vast intelligence, some pervading spirit is required to guide these lower forces in accordance with a pre-ordained system of evolution of the organic world.[39]

Behe and Cellular Front-Loading

In response to critiques that ID relies on recent or miraculous interventions, Michael Behe has proposed a form of front-loading that shifts design to the earliest stages of life, namely, the first cell. A strong defender of DE is Behe. Behe, who argues that “junk” DNA is not in fact junk, has responded to a prominent critic of ID (cell biologist Kenneth Miller) who has argued that the presence of non-functional pseudogenes cannot be explained by ID but is better explained by a higgledy-piggledy process of gene duplication gone wrong.[40] Moreover, Miller, associates the activity of a “designer” with respect to “irreducible complexity” as a recent geological event (as YEC proponents might suggest) but points out that inferring design is not dependent on a recent creative or designing act. Miller makes the common mistake of pinning ID against evolutionary development and in favour of an interventionist mode of Creation. Behe’s response involves his own idea of front loading, not through the laws of physics, but rather one that would come into play within the first cell:

The irreducibly complex biochemical systems that I have discussed in this book did not have to be produced recently. It is entirely possible, based simply on an examination of the systems themselves, that they were designed billions of years ago and that they have been passed down to the present by the normal processes of cellular reproduction. Perhaps a speculative scenario will illustrate the point. Suppose that nearly four billion years ago the designer made the first cell, already containing all of the irreducibly complex biochemical systems discussed here and many others. (One can postulate that the designs for systems that were to be used later, such as blood clotting, were present but not “turned on.” In present-day organisms plenty of genes are turned off for a while, sometimes for generations, to be turned on at a later time). Additionally, suppose the designer placed into the cell some other systems for which we cannot adduce enough evidence to conclude design. The cell containing the designed systems then was left on autopilot to reproduce, mutate, eat and be eaten, bump against rocks, and suffer all the vagaries of life on earth. During this process pace Ken Miller, pseudogenes might occasionally arise and a complex organ might become non-functional. These chance events do not mean that the initial biochemical systems were not designed. The cellular warts and wrinkles that Miller takes as evidence of evolution may simply be evidence of age.[41]

Teleological Direction:
Teilhard, Denton, and Kauffman

The drive towards diversity and complexity is inevitable in a front-loading scenario through God’s action. This would be loosely akin to what biologist Daniel W. McShea and philosopher of biology Robert N. Brandon call the first law of biology, known as Zero-Force Evolutionary Law, or ZFEL. ZFEL makes the case that diversity and complexity tend to rise in evolutionary systems where there are no external forces or restraints.[42]

The Catholic priest and paleontologist Pierre Teilhard de Chardin understood well the necessity for a direction to evolution; he understood God as providing such a directionality towards his Law of Complexity to Consciousness. Thus, it is the arrow of time that allows for these transformations through space and time. Teilhard provides us with a first glimpse in his law of complexity-consciousness when he states: “The stuff of the universe, woven in a single piece according to one and the same system, but never repeating itself from one point to another, represents a single figure. Structurally it forms a Whole.”[43] Teilhard observes a tendency inherent within matter such as one of increasing complexity. This increasing complexity develops from the geosphere (barysphere, lithosphere, hydrosphere, atmosphere, and stratosphere) to the biosphere, and the noosphere (the sphere of mind [consciousness] represented by persons, in the case of the Earth, human persons). Indeed, Teilhard advocated for his own understanding of front loading.

Michael Denton has come up with a fascinating model himself, which coincides with both PE and DE and is worth mentioning, even though it extends beyond biological evolution but presents a position worth considering regarding the emergence of biological diversity and directionality of evolution.

Denton subscribes to structuralism, which holds that the “laws of biological form” ultimately cause the order and designs found in living systems. Structuralism is in line with both front-loading and ID since fundamental to its understanding of biology is that there are certain constraints and features that emerge from the properties of matter and that evolutionary development will inevitably lead to the advent of humanlike creatures. Lawrence Henderson’s book The Fitness of the Environment (1913) had a profound influence on Denton.[44] This text “examines all the properties of the key building blocks of life—water, carbon dioxide, carbon compounds, and the basic biochemical processes like hydrolysis and oxidation.”[45]

In Denton’s second book, Nature’s Destiny: How the Laws of Biology Reveal Purpose in the Universe, he expanded on Henderson’s work with the aid of modern scientific evidence. Henderson’s book demonstrated how the fine calibration of universal laws produced an environment that was exceptionally fit for life. Denton extended this concept to suggest that “life’s constituent forms [that] are “lawful” rather than contingent assemblages of matter.”[46] He suggests that the “possibility of evolution by natural law—the idea that physical law may be a major determinant of organic order . . . [and that] many simple organic forms were indeed determined by natural law—the round shape of he cell and the flat shape of the cell membrane are well known examples.”[47] Moreover, he envisioned medical doctor, theoretical biologist, and complex systems researcher Stuart Kauffman’s ideas of self-organizational processes as directing evolution “[through] prearranged paths, by mechanisms which would not have necessitated any sort of specific directed mutations in the DNA sequence space.”[48] Denton believes his claims are quite consistent with some of Kauffman’s, “We will have to see that we are all natural expressions of a deep order. Ultimately, we will discover in our creation myth that we are expected after all.”[49] The notion of natural law influencing the direction of the evolutionary process, coupled with Kauffman’s speculations about self-organizational processes, provides an interesting alternative to the Neo-Darwinian model of evolution and a potential paradigm shift in how we view evolution. The merit of Denton’s work is that he conceives of ways in which the universe’s laws have capacities to bring forth emergent systems and how human consciousness was part of the plan. Denton presupposes an intelligible structure that unravels these laws of physics and biology to bring forth greater complexity and radical new phenomena such as life and consciousness.

Front loading has this tendency built into its algorithmic structure. I argue that this tendency towards diversity and complexity would be impossible without God, since there would be no movement or impetus towards one direction or another, much less orderliness and purpose. This is something that both McShea and Brandon take for granted within their naturalistic outlook; it is taken as a given, but in fact, under a naturalistic universe, it is not the natural state of affairs, since one would expect nothingness, and if there were something, its natural state would be motionless. In part, the late palaeontologist Stephen J. Gould appreciated this truth, at least when it pertains to the directionality of life through space and time. He maintained that a series of contingencies, rather than a linear trend towards complexity, mark the history of life on earth. Gould argued that you would generate radically different results, over and over again, in terms of diversity and complexity if you rewound evolutionary development.[50]

Convergence and Constraint:
Conway Morris and Gene

Interestingly, professor of evolutionary paleobiology at Cambridge University, Simon Conway Morris, whose work Gould celebrated in his classic book, The Wonderful Life, comes to a radically different conclusion.

Conway Morris emphasizes the significance of convergence, which he argues is reflected in a planned and directed evolution. When two species that are only distantly related exhibit strikingly similar features, whether phenotypic, genotypic, or even behavioural, this is known as convergent evolution. This indicates that rather than deriving those similarities from a shared ancestor, they independently evolved them. Some examples of convergent evolution include camera-type eyes found in many mammals, octopuses, and squids; the opposable thumbs of primates, opossums, koalas, giant pandas, and chameleons; the possession of wings and the ability of flight, as found in birds, bats, moths, dragonflies, and others; the capacity of echolocation found in whales and bats; complex and intricate brains with a high level of consciousness like that of dolphins and humans; there are many more examples, of course. Together, Conway Morris’s emphasis on evolutionary constraint and Mike Gene’s insights into deep homology offer a vision of evolution that is neither random nor solely environment-driven. Instead, they point toward an informational architecture embedded early in life’s history, which is a hallmark of front-loading.

Conway Morris argues for many lines of convergence since evolution is more constrained than many naturalists believe and that human-like beings are practically inevitable to arise throughout the course of evolution, as he states:

The principle aim of this book has been to show that the constraints of evolution and the ubiquity of convergence make the emergence of something like ourselves a near-inevitability. Contrary to received wisdom and the prevailing ethos of despair, the contingencies of biological history will make no long-term difference to the outcome. Yet the existence of life on the Earth appears to be surrounded with improbabilities.[51]

The idea of convergent evolution makes perfect sense when front-loading directs evolution. It would also make sense of homology, which is the resemblance between all levels of organisms, populations, and species that result from either a common ancestor and/or environmental constraint.

Mike Gene, who in 2007 wrote an excellent book on evolution, ID, and front-loading titled The Design Matrix: A Consilience of Clues, argues that a great example of deep homology and convergence is manifested in the “invented” or “appearance” of the hemoglobins of jawed and jawless vertebrates:

The crucial point is that if a designer introduced cytochromes/globins into the original cells, they would not be surprised at all to find that a mammal-like creature, evolving billions of years later, also “just happened” to have built their circulatory systems around it. In fact, this may very well be what their models would have predicted.[52]

Several years later, he discusses the conceptual power of front-loading using examples like the following,

The lamprey hemoglobin is part of the globin superfamily. Thus, one could argue that once the globin-fold emerged and associated with heme, it was only a matter of time before it would be put to use for O2 binding and delivery purposes. That is, the globin-fold itself is a preadaptation and it is this preadaptative state that restricts possibilities as evolution is much more likely to tap into and exploit this poised, pre-existing state than stumble upon some other possible solution that would be harder to reach. In other words, a significant factor to convergence can be attributed to deep homology, where ancient ancestral states effectively “constrain” where evolution goes.

The case for front-loading not only gets stronger, but for those able to focus, it is starting to separate itself from conventional, nonteleological views. Nonteleological thinking led evolutionary biologists to resist and deny deep homology; front-loading predicts it. Non-teleological thinking attributes convergence to the environment (since the environment is the designer); front-loading expects an intrinsic dimension, where deep homology constrains evolution by functioning as a preadaptation.[53]

Toward a Theology of Front-Loaded Complexity

A God-directed model of front-loading offers both freedom and form: freedom in allowing for contingent processes and environmental variation, and form in maintaining a teleological direction toward complexity, consciousness, and relationality. This aligns with a theology of creation in which divine intention unfolds through secondary causes and embedded potentials. Far from undermining the evolutionary narrative, front-loading enriches it, inviting us to see creation not as a product of blind chance, but as the outworking of divine wisdom encoded from the beginning. The eventual emergence of human-like consciousness capable of reflecting on the cosmos is not incidental but part of God’s telos.

Potential Research Programs

Advancing the discussion of front-loading requires an interdisciplinary effort that brings together scientists, philosophers, and theologians who are open to the interconnection between evolution, ID, and divine action. The goal is not merely to argue that something was designed, but to explore how it may have been designed thereby transforming ID into a more robust scientific research program.

In the spirit of philosopher Imre Lakatos’s model of progressive research, front-loading can function as a heuristic device that turns current anomalies in evolutionary theory into fertile ground for new explanations. As Lakatos writes:

[A] research programme also has a “heuristic,” that is, a powerful problem-solving machinery, which, with the help of sophisticated mathematical techniques, digests anomalies and even turns them into positive evidence. For instance, if a planet does not move exactly as it should, the Newtonian scientists check his conjectures concerning atmospheric refraction, concerning propagation of light in magnetic storms, and hundreds of other conjectures which are all part of the programme. He may even invent a hitherto unknown planet and calculate its position, mass and velocity in order to explain the anomaly.[54]

Following this model, a front-loading research program could inspire testable models, novel biological predictions, and a re-examination of long-standing puzzles in evolutionary biology, theology, and philosophy.

Conceptual and Foundational Work

This section outlines the essential groundwork needed to develop front-loading into a coherent explanatory framework. Here, I clarify how front-loading can be precisely defined, what types of information might be embedded from the outset, and how this idea connects ontologically and epistemologically to both Intelligent Design and evolutionary mechanisms. By establishing clear conceptual boundaries and foundational assumptions, this part aims to equip future research with a structured basis for testing, refining, and integrating front-loading within the wider science–theology dialogue.

• Develop an integrated framework that unifies front-loading with ID and evolutionary theory, clarifying ontological commitments and epistemic limits.
• Define the type(s) of information that could be front-loaded: genetic, structural, developmental, epigenetic, or even quantum-level informational architecture.
• Examine how present conditions might encode future outcomes, that is, front-loading as design through temporal causality.
• Explore whether front-loading can coexist with models of special creation or divine intervention.

Biological and Informational Front-loading

• Investigate whether primitive genomes (for example, Amoeba dubia, (also known as Polychaos dubium) with 670 billion base pairs, over 200 times larger than the human genome)[55] could serve as informational reservoirs, despite their organismal simplicity suggesting early front-loading of future complexity.[56]
• Study how such genomes could store or compress instructions for:
  • Multicellularity
  • The emergence of major life forms (plants, fungi, animals)
  • Vertebrates vs. invertebrates
  • Mammalian radiation and the rise of human-like consciousness
• Explore whether epigenetics, non-coding DNA, and mechanisms akin to Lamarckism could be part of a front-loaded informational system.

Mind, Consciousness, and Emergence

• Develop models of how front-loading might account for the emergence of consciousness and mind.
• Explore connections between front-loading and panpsychism or emergentist models of mind.
• Examine the fine-tuned conditions necessary for complex neural architectures to emerge.
• Investigate whether front-loading could help explain teleological features of the noosphere, in line with Teilhard de Chardin’s law of complexity-consciousness.

Evolutionary Patterns and Constraints

• Explore deep homology and convergence as outcomes of a preloaded evolutionary matrix.
• Analyze gaps in the fossil record in terms of front-loaded informational “bursts” producing organisms de novo.
• Examine whether front-loading better predicts convergent traits than strictly naturalistic models (for example, eyes, echolocation, opposable thumbs).
• Study how constraints in development (for example, evo-devo, morphogenic fields, self-organization) may act as expressions of a front-loaded system.

Experimental and Computational Models

• Create computer simulations of evolution that test whether front-loaded parameters produce directionality or complexity more effectively than random mutation and selection alone.
• Compare simulation outcomes with real-world evolutionary patterns, including stasis, punctuated equilibrium, and hierarchical selection.
• Integrate insights from chaos theory, quantum physics, and complexity theory to model emergent front-loaded outcomes.

Theological and Philosophical Implications

• Explore how front-loading affects interpretations of Genesis, special creation, and divine providence.
• Examine its compatibility with Thomistic secondary causation and broader Christian theological traditions.
• Investigate whether front-loading alleviates or exacerbates the problem of natural evil.
• Study how front-loading relates to the intelligibility of nature and the correspondence between human cognition and the rational order of the cosmos.

This research agenda is not prescriptive but exploratory. It invites interdisciplinary engagement with the goal of elevating ID beyond design detection, toward a research program capable of explaining how design may have unfolded. In doing so, front-loading has the potential to reshape the science-theology dialogue and revitalize ID as a serious explanatory framework.

Conclusion

This paper has argued that the opposition between evolution and ID is both unnecessary and counterproductive. Through the concept of front-loading, we move beyond the question of whether life was designed to explore how such design may have unfolded through evolutionary processes. Emphasizing the teleological structure of evolution offers a pathway for reconciling scientific inquiry with theological insight, reclaiming a richer vision of nature’s intelligibility. Evolution and ID are fully compatible and complimentary. Undoubtedly, the concept of front loading can serve as a powerful explanation for the origin and existence of specified complexity and life diversity. This need not bring us further from God, but it can help us appreciate humanity’s deep connection with the rest of nature.[57] From the Greek philosophers such as Aristotle to early Christian thinkers like Augustine, to Darwin’s contemporary and co-discoverer of natural selection (Alfred Wallace), to a variety of modern thinkers including Teilhard de Chardin, Lawrence Henderson, Michael Behe, Michael Denton, Stuart Kauffman, Simon Conway Morris, Mike Gene, and many others, the connection between evolution and ID is vast, with many layers of depth waiting to be unravelled. As we peer into the recently discovered extravagances and complexities of the cell, we see a profound similarity between our present technology and low-life nanotechnology. In this era of unprecedented scientific discovery and technological advancement, we are gaining access to a previously hidden world of biological nanotechnology, systems of breathtaking intricacy, far more sophisticated than any device yet engineered by humans. The fact that we can uncover, interpret, and even mimic such systems points to the deep intelligibility of the cosmos. This intelligibility invites theological reflection: it suggests that our minds are fitted to a rational structure within creation. Front-loading provides a powerful way to bridge evolutionary science and Intelligent Design, not merely by proposing that design is detectable, but by calling us to investigate how design might have been encoded from the beginning. This represents the next vital step for advancing ID as a serious scientific research program and for integrating it more deeply with philosophical and theological understandings of God’s creative action.

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[1] Charles Hodge, What is Darwinism? (New York: Charles Scribner, 1871), 58.

[2] See Stephen C. Meyer and Michael N. Keas, “The Meanings of Evolution” in Darwinism, Design and Public Education, edited by John Angus Campbell and Stephen C. Meyer (Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 2003), 135-56; Jay Richards, ed. God and Evolution: Protestants, Catholics and Jews Explore Darwin’s Challenge to Faith (Seattle: Discovery Institute Press, 2010).

[3] Meyer and Keas, “The Meanings of Evolution.”

[4] Concerning variations, same applies to traditional Darwinism and concerning mutations, this would be the case with the modern synthesis of evolution, Neo-Darwinism. Also, see Suzan Mazur, The Altenberg 16: An Expose of the Evolution Industry (Berkeley: North Atlantic Books, 2009). The extended synthesis has also been termed Meta-Darwinism, Thomas B. Fowler and Daniel Kuebler, The Evolution Controversy: A Survey of Competing Theories (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007), 277-328.

[5] See Richard Dawkins, The Blind Watchmaker: Why the Evidence of Evolution Reveals a Universe Without Design (New York: Norton, 1986).

[6] George Gaylord Simpson, The Meaning of Evolution (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1967), 345. Biology textbooks frequently contain these kinds of statements. For example, in Douglas Futuyma’s widely used college textbook, Evolutionary Biology, it says, “By coupling undirected, purposeless variation to the blind, uncaring process of natural selection, Darwin made theological or spiritual explanations of the life processes superfluous.” See Douglas J. Futuyma, Evolutionary Biology (Sunderland: Sinauer Associates, 1998), 5.

[7] Alvin Plantinga, Where the Conflict Lies: Science, Religion, and Naturalism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), 3-30.

[8] Although used interchangeably in common parlance, they possess different meanings throughout the scientific and mathematical literature. Antony Eagle, “Chance versus Randomness,” in Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. Edward N. Zalta, last updated Spring 2021, https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/chance-randomness/#Rand.

[9] Michael Ruse, Philosophy of Biology Today (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1988), 75.

[10] Ernst Mayr, Towards a New Philosophy of Biology: Observations of an Evolutionist (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1988), 98.

[11] For an extensive examination of the role of randomness in evolutionary biology, see John Bonner Tyler, Randomness in Evolution (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2013).

[12] William A. Dembski, “Randomness by Design,” Noûs 25, no. 1 (1991):75-106.

[13] See R. van Woudenberg and J. Rothuizen-van der Steen, “Both Random and Guided,” Ratio 28, no. 3 (2015): 332-48.

[14] See Alvin Plantinga, “Where My Conflict with Jay Richards Really Lies, Evolution News, April 16, 2012, https://evolutionnews.org/2012/04/where_my_confli/.

[15] Adherents to Scientific Creationism seek to impose a particular interpretation upon Genesis 1 and 2 by collecting empirical evidence in the natural world to corroborate this particular interpretation. Scientific Creationism is typically associated with young earth creationism (YEC), which entails the belief that God created the world in six, twenty-four-hour days, usually within the past 10,000 years. Adherents to old earth creationism (OEC) hold to mainstream scientific consensus with respect to the age of the universe and the earth. However, they believe that God created particular things, which include galaxies, planets, ecosystems, the first replicating cell, a variety of life, humans, human souls, and so on, but in a direct way, such as a “primary” or “efficient” cause. There is disagreement amongst OECs as to when and where God creates particular things, but there is agreement that nature on its own could not produce these particular things without God’s direct intervention.

[16] See Scott D. G. Ventureyra, On the Origin of Consciousness: An Exploration through the Lens of the Christian Conception of God and Creation (Eugene: Wipf and Stock, 2018), 104-9.

[17] See Kenneth R. Miller, Finding Darwin’s God: A Scientist’s Search for Common Ground between God and Evolution (New York: Cliff Street, 1999); Kenneth R. Miller, Only a Theory: Evolution and the Battle for America’s Soul (New York: Viking, 2008). Miller considers himself both an orthodox Darwinist and an Orthodox Catholic. Concerning Francis Collins, see Collins, The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief (New York: Free Press, 2006).

BioLogos is a non-profit organization that seeks to reconcile evolutionary biology with the Christian faith. They also seek to demonstrate, in more general terms, that there is no inherent contradiction between science and biblical Christianity.

Denton has claimed to be religiously agnostic, but it seems clear that he believes in some sort of God. He has also been associated with the ID movement, but at times he has seemed to distance himself from it. Despite this, The Discovery Institute, a prominent ID think tank, has actively promoted and published some of his recent work. See Denton, Evolution: Still a Theory in Crisis (Seattle, WA: Discovery Institute Press, 2016); Denton, Fire-Maker: How Humans were Designed to Harness Fire and Transform our Planet (Seattle, WA: Discovery Institute Press, 2016); Also see his documentary, Privileged Species, produced by Discovery Institute, March 24, 2015, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VoI2ms5UHWg. One could say that Denton’s work is broadly sympathetic toward ID, at least when it comes to demonstrating teleology in nature and that the laws of physics, chemistry, and biology are fine-tuned.

[18] See Henry F. Schaefer III, Science and Christianity: Conflict or Coherence? (Athens: University of Georgia Printing, 2003). Schaefer has published over 1,500 scientific papers and was a nominee for the Nobel Prize in Chemistry several times.

[19] See Deborah B Haarsma and Loren D. Haarsma, Origins: Christian Perspectives on Creation, Evolution, and Intelligent Design (Grand Rapids: Faith Alive Christian, 2001).

[20] See Michael J. Behe, Darwin’s Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution (New York: Free Press, 1996); Michael J. Behe, The Edge of Evolution: The Search for the Limits of Darwinism (New York: Free Press, 2007). For “irreducible complexity,” see Darwin’s Black Box, 39. Behe defines it as “A single system which is composed of several interacting parts that contribute to the basic function, and where the removal of any one of the parts causes the system to effectively cease functioning.”

[21] See Erkki V. R. Kojonen, The Compatibility of Evolution and Design (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2021).

[22] See Erkki V. R. Kojonen, “Response: The Compatibility of Evolution and Design,” Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science, 57 (December 2022): 1019-1108.

[23] See Stephen Dilley, Case Luskin, Brian Miller, and Emily Reeves, “On the Relationship between Design and Evolution” Religions 14, no. 7 (2023): 850. https://doi.org/10.3390/rel14070850; For a long series of posts by Dilley, Luskin, Miller and Reeves, see Evolution News and Views, available at https://evolutionnews.org/tag/the-compatibility-of-evolution-and-design-series/.

[24] See Stephen Dilley, Case Luskin, Brian Miller, and Emily Reeves, “On the Relationship between Design and Evolution” Religions 14, no. 7 (2023): 850. https://doi.org/10.3390/rel14070850; For a long series of posts by Dilley, Luskin, Miller and Reeves, see Evolution News and Views, available at https://evolutionnews.org/tag/the-compatibility-of-evolution-and-design-series/. See the response at, Erkki V. R. Kojonen, “On Questioning the Design of Evolution.” Theology and Science 23, no. 2 (March 2025): 276-297. https://doi.org/10.1080/14746700.2025.2472121.

[25] Both ID proponents and Kojonen use the term “direct” as opposed to “discrete.” I take them as synonymous.

[26] Dilley, et al., “Design and Evolution,” 850.

[27] Kojonen, “On Questioning,” 286.

[28] Kojonen, “On Questioning,” 286. For the original source, see William A. Dembski, “Making the Task of Theodicy Impossible? Intelligent Design and the Problem of Evil.” In The Evolution of Evil, ed. Gaymon Bennett, Martinez J. Hewlett, Ted Peters, and Robert J. Russell, (Göttingen: Vanderhoeck & Ruprecht, 2008), 218-233, 221.

[29] Kojonen, “On Questioning,” 287; For the original, see William A Dembski, and Robert J. Marks II, “Life’s Conservation Law: Why Darwinian Evolution Cannot Create Biological Information.” In The Nature of Nature: Examining the Role of Naturalism in Science, ed. Bruce L. Gordon and William A. Dembski (Wilmington, Delaware: ISI Books), 360-399. Available at https://evoinfo.org/papers/ConsInfo_NoN.pdf.

[30] See Ventureyra, On the Origin of Consciousness, 104-9; Stephen C. Meyer, “Teleological Evolution: The Difference It Doesn’t Make” in Darwinism Defeated? The Johnson-Lamoureux Debate on Biological Origins, ed. Phillip E. Johnson and Denis O. Lamoureux, (Vancouver, BC: Regent, 1999), 89-100; Stephen C. Meyer, “The Difference it Doesn’t Make” in God and Evolution: Protestants, Catholics and Jews Explore Darwin’s Challenge to the Faith, ed. Jay W. Richards (Seattle: Discovery Institute Press, 2010), 147–64.

[31] I will, however, make brief mentioned of Michael Denton’s position, which is distinct from Lamoureux in the sense that it argues for the laws of biology to be in line with evolutionary development. See Brian Whitworth, “The Emergence of the Physical World from Information Processing,” Quantum Biosystems 2, no. 1 (2010): 221–249. https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.1011.3436. Whitworth considers the fundamental role that information plays in processing and reality (whether physical or virtual). He states that: “Modern information science can suggest how core physical properties like space, time, light, matter and movement could derive from information processing. Such an approach could reconcile relativity and quantum theories, with the former being, how information processing creates space-time, and the latter how it creates energy and matter.” This indicates that information is fundamental to the shaping of reality. Could front loading be operative in such an understanding of reality?

[32] For an in-depth discussion of these different models, see Ventureyra, On the Origin of Consciousness, 87-120.

[33] For irreducible complexity, see Michael J. Behe, Darwin’s Black Box. Concerning specified complexity, the term refers to the arrangement of an object’s, organism’s, or organelle’s structure. It is a designation for the organization of a particular thing, commonly used to describe functionally integrated systems such as organisms and their components, but can also refer to a computer program, literature, recipes, a telephone book, and so on. For instance, a strew of letters arranged in a random manner may be complex, but it does not necessarily specify anything; however, a series of letters organized in a particular fashion, as we observe with the English alphabet to formulate certain words, phrases, or sentences, can be considered to have specified complexity since it conveys a certain pattern or message based on both its complexity and specificity in the arrangement of the letters and words. The same is true in life, whether within a cell or in the arrangement of trillions of cells, such as those that make up the human brain. See William A. Dembski, The Design Inference: Eliminating Chance through Small Probabilities (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998).

[34] See Stephen C. Meyer, Signature in the Cell: DNA and Evidence for Intelligent Design (New York: HarperOne, 2009).

[35] See Aristotle, The Complete Works of Aristotle: The Revised Oxford Translation, ed. Jonathan Barnes, Bollingen Series 71 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984.), 1:661 (traditionally cited as De Anima [On the Soul]: 2.415b, 10– 30).

[36] Augustine, The Literal Meaning of Genesis, trans. John. H. Taylor, Ancient Christian Writers: The Works of the Fathers in Translation, ed. Johannes Quasten, Walter J. Burghardt, Thomas C. Lawler, vol. 41 (New York: Newman Press, 1982); 175-76 (traditionally cited as VI.13.23–25).

[37] Alister E. McGrath, A Fine-Tuned Universe: The Quest for God in Science and Theology (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009), 102.

[38] Michael A. Flannery, ed., Alfred Wallace’s Theory of Intelligent Evolution: How Wallace’s World of Life Challenged Darwinism (Riesel, TX: Erasmus Press, 2008), 75.

[39] Flannery, Alfred Wallace’s Theory, 134.

[40] Kenneth R. Miller, “Life’s Grand Design.” Technology Review (February/March 1994) 29–30. Even though he does not directly weigh in on the Behe and Miller debate, Francis Collins has also addressed the issue of pseudogenes and junk DNA; Collins uses junk DNA as a strong argument against ID. While everyone in the scientific community agrees that most of the DNA is non-protein coding, there is a debate going on about whether the non-protein coding regions of DNA (estimated to be at 95 percent of total DNA) have any function. For many years, junk DNA was used as evidence against ID by prominent evolutionists such as Richard Dawkins and Jerry Coyne. Ironically, around the same time, Collins’s own research team was publishing a number of these papers that argue for a high degree of functionality in these non-protein coding areas. See Jonathan Wells, The Myth of Junk DNA (Seattle: Discovery Institute Press, 2011).

[41] Behe, Darwin’s Black Box, 227–28.

[42] Daniel W. McShea and Robert N. Brandon, The Tendency for Diversity and Complexity to Increase in Evolutionary Systems (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2010), 1-5.

[43] Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, The Phenomenon of Man,trans., Bernard Wall (New York: Harper & Row, 1975), 45.

[44] Denton, Nature’s Destiny: How the Laws of Biology Reveal Purpose in the Universe (New York: Free Press, 1999), xvi–xvii. See also Scott Ventureyra, “Science and Christian Spirituality: The Relationship between Christian Spirituality and Biological Evolution,” American Journal of Biblical Theology 16, no. 43 (October 2015).

[45] Denton, “An Anti-Darwinian Intellectual Journey,” 167.

[46] Denton, “An Anti-Darwinian Intellectual Journey,” 169.

[47] Denton, “An Anti-Darwinian Intellectual Journey,” 170.

[48] Denton, “An Anti-Darwinian Intellectual Journey,” 171.

[49] Stuart Kaufmann, At Home in The Universe: The Search for the Laws of Self-Organization and Complexity (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995), 112.  Denton’s statements are consistent with Kauffman’s, see Denton, Nature’s Destiny, xvii. See also Ventureyra, “Science and Christian Spirituality.”

[50] Stephen J. Gould, Wonderful Life: The Burgess Shale and the Nature of History (New York: Norton, 1989), 48.

[51] Simony Conway Morris, Life’s Solution: Inevitable Humans in a Lonely Universe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 328.

[52] Mike Gene, The Design Matrix: A Consilience of Clues (New York: Arbor Vitae Press, 2007), 172-73.

[53] Mike Gene, “Bunnah Gets it Right Again,” The Design Matrix, September 14, 2010, https://designmatrix.wordpress.com/2010/09/13/bunnah-gets-it-right-again/.

[54] Imre Lakatos, The Methodology of Scientific Research Programmes, Philosophical Papers, edited by John Worrall and Gregory Currie, vol. 1 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1978), 4.

[55] Ali Karami, “Largest and Smallest Genome in the World,” unpublished (2013), https://www.researchgate.net/publication/235907922_Largest_and_Smallest_Genome_in_the_World.

[56] Joseph Leidy, “Amoeba proteus,” The American Naturalist 12, no. 4 (1878): 235-38.

[57] Robin Collins, “Divine Action and Evolution,” The Oxford Handbook of Philosophical Theology, edited by Thomas P. Flint, Michael C. Rea, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), 241-61.