Stephen C. Meyer is a geophysicist and author of New York Times bestseller, “Darwin’s Doubt.” Despite not being a Christian himself, after years of scientific study, Meyer came to the conclusion that there simply must be an intelligent designer behind our creation.
In addition, contrary to many within his discipline, Meyer believes that expert scientific study of the origins of the universe can conclude a number of assertions that are in common with the central tenets of theistic beliefs. In a wide-ranging interview on the Ben Shapiro Show, Meyer also criticized Darwin’s evolutionary theory as being unable to answer the biggest question of all — how did life actually begin?
Intelligent Design vs. Creationism
“Creationism is an interpretation from religious authority, whereas intelligent design is an inference from biological and physical, cosmological evidence,” Meyer noted of the differences between the two belief systems. “One starts from data of the natural world, one starts from Scripture.”
In addition, Meyer said, most creationists “hold to the view that the earth is very young — created maybe 10,000 years ago,” before qualifying that he himself is an “old earth” guy.
Interestingly, despite evolutionary biologist Charles Darwin often being heralded as the enemy of those who believe in a creator God, for Meyer, Darwin modeled what it meant to investigate the big questions of life with rigor and scientific integrity. Despite following Darwin’s scientific method, however, Meyer came to very different conclusions.
Darwin had a “principle of reasoning” that he used to help him understand cause and effect on some of the biggest questions of life.
“It is possible to formulate a case for intelligent design in a strictly scientific manner,” Meyer said. “When we think about the origin of information, it always arises from an intelligent source.”
Whether it is a “hieroglyphic inscription, a paragraph in a book, or information embedded in a radio signal, whenever you find information, you trace it back to its source, you always come to a mind not a process,” Meyer explained.
In studying the issue, Meyer, who wrote a Ph.D. on the “origin of life problem” at Cambridge University, said that by using the Darwinian method of reasoning, he “came to a different, non-Darwinian conclusion — that there is evidence of intelligent design.”
Can intelligent design be proven wrong?
For many Christians, the creation question is a big one. Indeed, while there is a split over the mechanics of how our world came about, all believers would assert that God was, somehow, the creative force behind the world we now live in. With that in mind, is there any chance that a creator could actually be disproved?
“You would have to find an undirected process that was capable of producing information beyond a threshold that we have defined mathematically,” Meyer explained, adding that this would entail information arising “by chance, based on the probable resources of the universe.”
This, however, is unlikely to happen, because intelligent design posits that only “intelligence is capable of generating the amount of information needed for these big jumps in biological complexity in the history of life.” Indeed, for Christians, this intelligence or “mind,” would be equated to an infinite being — namely, God.
‘There are some questions that both science and religion speak to’
In terms of the congruity between religion and science, Meyer said that “there is far more agreement than people realize.”
“The universe had a beginning — this is one of the first words of the Biblical texts, that there was a beginning,” he noted. “That’s a point of agreement on the same issue.”
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In terms of the assertions made in the theory of intelligent design, there is also agreement with the Bible.
“Intelligent design is telling us that life and the universe were designed — that’s also something you would find affirmed in the theistic religious traditions,” Meyer added. “There are overlapping areas of interest, and increasingly, what we’ve found is that there is increasing agreement as we’ve understood the science better.”
The scientific problem with atheism
Atheism is often billed as the most logical form of non-belief system for any devoted and rigorous scientist. However, Meyer says that the atheist rejection of intelligent design presents many key scientific challenges.
“The Darwinian view is not just the idea of evolution over time, but an undirected, unguided process that produces the appearance, but not the reality, of design,” he explained. Atheists, however, see nature as a “self-creating entity that can produce all the wonders and intricacies of living organisms without any guiding hand whatsoever.”
Clearly, this is difficult to comprehend and is the key reason why so many Christians, and scientists, support the theory of intelligent design as a way to accommodate a belief in creator God.
Oxford mathematics professor and internationally renowned scientist, John C. Lennox, is just one of those who advocates intelligent design theory. Lennox, also a committed Christian and the uncle of famed worship songwriter, Kristyn Getty, argued the case for intelligent design in his book “Seven Days That Divide the World.”
“To the majority of those who have reflected deeply and written about the origin and nature of the universe, it has seemed that it points beyond itself to a source which is non-physical and of great intelligence and power,” Lennox brilliantly summarized in his earlier book, “God’s Undertaker: Has Science Buried God?”
Darwin’s major oversight
Despite Darwin’s extensive work on evolution theory, Meyer highlighted the fact that the famed scientist never spent much time investigating the very genetics and genesis of the first human life.
“He presupposed the existence of the first living cell,” Meyer explained. “There is a major discontinuity between chemical processes that we observe, and what we see in actual living organisms.”
“It’s a complexity gap that is absolutely extraordinary,” he concluded.
This is the very “gap” that many Christians claim is easily explained through the creative power of Almighty God.
Meyer’s book “Darwin’s Doubt,” can be found here. Prof. Lennox’s book, “Seven Days That Divide the World,” can be found here.