[00:00:04] Speaker A: Id the Future, a podcast about evolution and intelligent design.
Hello and welcome to id the future. Can design and evolution be wedded in a happy marriage? I'm Casey Luskin, and today we have on the show with us Dr. Steve Dilley. Steve Dilley is academic mentoring coordinator and senior fellow at Discovery Institute center for Science and Culture. He holds a PhD in philosophy from Arizona State University and was a professor for 14 years at St. Edwards University in Austin, Texas. We recently had Dr. Dilly on the show with us to discuss a book titled the Compatibility of Evolution and Design by a university Helsinki theologian named Robe Kajonin, where he argues that evolution and design not only are compatible, but they can be wedded in a very happy marriage that basically makes a very robust case for design. And Kajonin seeks to wed mainstream evolutionary theory with design and say that together they're compatible, and you can use mainstream evolutionary theory to make a case for design. In the previous podcast, we discussed with Dr. Dilley what Professor Kajonin's thesis is and what some of the basic problems are. We were discussing why the scientific evidence matters to Kajon's thesis and where all this is going. So, Steve, thank you so much for coming back on the show with us.
[00:01:24] Speaker B: Yeah, Casey, great to be here.
[00:01:26] Speaker A: Well, I'm glad we can continue this conversation, because as we said in the first podcast, we think this is an important book. It's a good work of scholarship, even though we ultimately disagree with it. It raises very important questions about how do we detect design, whether design and evolution are compatible, and what are the implications of evolution for, say, theistic evolution? Is it possible to make a very robust case for theistic evolution using mainstream evolutionary theory? And these are all questions that we certainly think about. So in the previous podcast, we were talking about the scientific evidence and why it matters to Kajonin's model. We were talking about the ability of proteins to evolve. But you were going to talk about another line of scientific evidence and why that matters to whether design and evolution are compatible. So could you explain, what does Conjonin say about convergent evolution, and why is that relevant to trying to marry design and evolution together?
[00:02:20] Speaker B: Yes, good question, Casey. And I do want to say, by way of framing, what we've done in the article is, in effect, we've raised three types of criticisms. We've raised criticisms of Kajonin's conception of design, and that's partly some of the worries about his view of proteins. We've also raised worries about how he puts design as he conceives it together. With evolution. When I talk about convergent evolution here, in a moment, that point will be relevant to our second worry. And then the third general worry we have is that Kajonin's model, I think, harms our ability to detect design in the first place, which, of course, is highly relevant to his model generally, which prizes design detection in the biological realm. So those are the three general categories that we're concerned about.
[00:03:20] Speaker A: And, Steve, before you go any further, I was remiss in that I didn't mention that we published an article in the journal Religions. You were the lead author on that paper, did a great job with it. It was titled on the relationship between design and evolution, where we discussed rope Kajonin's book and his model in great detail. So that's the paper that Steve Dilly is referring to. And I should have mentioned that at the beginning, but keep.
[00:03:40] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. And as you said, the Kajonin's book is quite. Well, very. It's fun to engage. That's that second element, that second broad concern we have about his conception of design and how it goes together with mainstream evolution. An example we see of a worry is his treatment of convergent evolution. So Cajonin regards convergent evolution as highly supportive of his particular conception of design, of his view of God having created the laws of nature, and these laws of nature being conducive to life, helping to form fine tuned preconditions that allow evolution to succeed. And he thinks convergence supports that because on a convergent view, what you have are very different organisms that are not said to have a common ancestor with similar characteristics as each of these organisms, but nonetheless, from these seemingly different lineages, the organisms converge on similar characteristics. So, for example, Kajonin says the eye, or various versions of the eye, evolved independently 49 times.
And I think the general idea here is, well, there must be something about natural selection in the environment that moves organisms, that pressures organisms to evolve in a certain fashion, and perhaps that is best explained by fine tuned conditions, by the way God set up the environment, the laws of nature, and so on. So that's partly how convergent evolution supports his version of design. Here's the worry on convergent evolution.
What you have is the idea that, say, complex organs or organelles. Take, for example, the eye, that complexities like the eye can evolve independently multiple times. All right, now let's hold that thought in mind, cajonin. That supports his conception of design. Cajonin also accepts mainstream evolutionary theory, and along with it, he accepts common ancestry. And along with that thesis, he accepts the idea that when you see similarities in nature, those similarities seem best explained by a common ancestor. So, for example, when he talks about protein evolution, or when he critiques Behee, he assumes that if you have proteins that have similar sequences, that the best explanation for those is that they had some earlier protein in common from which they evolved that also had those sequence similarities. Or when he's looking at, say, the bacterioflagellum and the type three secretory system, if he sees various components that look similar, the supposition is that they evolve from some other system or from some other part of a cell that had those features or had similar features. So on the common ancestry side, the assumption is that when you find complexity, it's better to explain multiple complexities by reference to them evolving from a single lineage, because it's unparsimonious, it's overly complex. It's more improbable to say that complex systems or features evolve independently. As soon as you make that move, you lose the case for common ancestry, which says that complex similarities are more likely to have just evolved once. Hence, we have grounds for a single common ancestor in the past. So he has attention, on the one hand, in convergence, when he's making this part of his case for design, he freely accepts that complex features that bear similarity do not indicate did not arise from a single common ancestor. He's willing to go with the improbabilities, as it were. But then, on the other hand, he also seems to accept, on the evolutionary side, this standard issue argument for common ancestry that thinks exactly the opposite way. When you have these similarity, complex features with similarities that does indicate they did not arise independently, they have a common ancestor, and putting those together, it's unclear that they go very well together. This is a tension, I think, between his justification of design on the one hand, and his justification of evolution, on the other hand, and I think it remains to be seen if those can be put together in a coherent way. It's not enough simply to invoke convergent evolution when it suits you, and then convoke common ancestry when it suits you, without a principal distinction as to why one's invoking one and not the other, when the epistemology behind them is so vastly different. So I think that's one example of that type of tension in his model.
[00:08:58] Speaker A: And to be fair to Kajonin, this sort of tension between common ancestry and convergent evolution is found all throughout evolutionary biology. It's a problem that is not peculiar to his own model. It's a problem that evolutionary biologists face all the time. They find two structures are similar, and the initial impulse from evolutionary biologists is to want to explain them by common ancestry, because, as the thinking goes, the likelihood of the same feature arising twice is very low. So therefore, you should assume that if you find the same feature in two different organisms, that it is the result of inheritance for common ancestor. The problem, of course, is that when you start to draw your phylogenetic trees, or when you start to dig into the biochemical molecular details of many complex features that are similar, you find that they really can't be the result of common ancestry. You get echolocation in both bats and whales, which are on very different branches of the mammalian tree, according to standard evolutionary thinking. So the fact that they sort of uniquely have echolocation really cannot be explained by common ancestry. You have to appeal to convergence, and then when you dig into the molecular details, you even find that there are some protein sequence similarities between genes involved in echolocation and bats and whales, and that further complexifies. You want to appeal to common ancestry, but you can't. So you've got to invoke convergent evolution. And this is found all over biology. I love Simon Conway Morris'books, because he repeatedly says that convergence is ubiquitous, ubiquitous in biology. What is he really saying? When we say convergence, what do we really mean? What we really mean is similarities that are found in organisms that cannot be explained by common ancestry. Convergence is really just a catch all term to describe instances of similarity which cannot be explained by common ancestry, because if they could be explained by common ancestry, that is exactly what evolutionary biologists would do. They only appeal to convergence when there's some reason. Usually it has to do with the structure of the tree that prevents them from being able to explain similar traits in two different species or two different organisms. They can't explain it by common ancestry, so they have to appeal to convergence. And so you get this sort of, this tension of the thinking, exactly as you just said, steve, that similarity implies common ancestry, except for when it doesn't, and then they'll say, oh, this know shows the power of natural selection to converge upon the same solution in two different species, and it's independent evolution. So really? Yeah. What you just said is right on target, and it's a tension in evolutionary theory. So there you go. Any other thoughts on that before we move on?
[00:11:41] Speaker B: Yeah. Just to note that this tension is very much a problem in evolutionary theory generally. But as we deploy it in our argument, we're not simply attacking Kajonin's commitment to evolutionary theory.
We're willing to concede in his model, for the sake of argument, that evolution is true, and then evaluate the model on its own terms.
When we deploy this worry, we're deploying it because his understanding of convergent evolution is a really important, arguably the most important part, or at least one of the most important parts of his support for his view of design, that there have to be these fine tuned preconditions, that the laws of nature and the environment have to be set up in such and such a way, and that convergent evolution provides evidence for that understanding of design. So it's important to know we're not simply criticizing Cajonin's assumption of evolution, but the marriage, the attempted marriage of design as he conceives it, and as he argues for it with evolutionary theory, the tension there is in the harmony.
[00:12:53] Speaker A: That's a really important point, Steven. This has come up in sort of the dialogue we've had with Kajonin, and the claim has been made. Oh, well, you're just critiquing evolution, and you're not allowed to do that, know? As you said, his model assumes evolution for the sake of the argument. He assumes that mainstream evolutionary biology is correct, and we say, that's fine. You're allowed to assume that we don't have a problem with that. And we would argue that our critique of his model is not about attacking evolution. It's about looking at his thesis, his sort of syncretization of evolution and design, and asking if it works. So here's the question. Are we simply attacking evolution? And does that miss the point of Kajonin's model?
[00:13:32] Speaker B: That's a key question, I think. Yeah, I'd say we're really careful about that. Even when we get into the particulars of the science with, say, our critique of his understanding of how proteins came about, what we're really doing is asking the question, are there fine tuned preconditions? Is there evidence of the type of design that you claim? And is there evidence at the locus of design in particular? So one could almost think of it like a modus tollens if you want. If evolutionary theory is true and requires fine tuned preconditions in the context of a model that says that biological design is detectable, then these fine tuned preconditions ought to be detectable. That's what the model is aimed at. But it turns out, when you analyze carefully where these fine tuned preconditions are said to be, that they're not detectable. And in fact, the evidence seems to indicate that the data strongly point in the other direction in terms of, say, the kind of fine tuning needed for proteins to evolve into other proteins and so on. They look rare and isolated. So we're making a straightforward empirical analysis of where he thinks design is located and the type of design is located. That, of course, is relevant to the project of saying, can design and evolution meaningfully get along?
If you posit two kinds of claims, design and evolution, and you say we should join these together. But one part of your conjunction, the design part seems to lack explanatory power, seems to lack evidential justification, then in some, I suppose, academic sense, you can wed it to evolution, but you're adding a conjunct that has very little explanatory value to it. And I think, we think that's relevant, of course, for evaluating the model as a whole, the conjunction of design and evolution.
[00:15:41] Speaker A: And of course, Steve, we would argue that it's not just that his fine tuning isn't detectable. It might be detectable. We're arguing that it isn't know, when we look for the kind of fine tuning that he's searching for, we're not finding it. It could in principle be found, but it's just not there. And that poses a big challenge to, overall his synthesis of design and evolution.
[00:16:02] Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely.
[00:16:04] Speaker A: So the article that you helped us lead author Steve, argues that Kajonin's model harms our ability to detect design. And this is really important because obviously he wants to make a very robust case for design detection. He wants to appeal to what he calls the theist on the street. And you talk about sort of, you divided his thesis into three parts, the harmony thesis, the evidence thesis, and the audience thesis. A very important part of his thesis is to appeal to his audience. He wants the theist on the street to feel like he's made a robust case for detecting design. But you argue, and you help us argue, that his model actually harms our ability to detect design. Can you take us through this concern?
[00:16:47] Speaker B: Yeah, thanks, Casey. That's a good question. The first thing I would say is, I think, from Cajonin's point of view, if some of our earlier criticisms suppose they are successful, I think he might be inclined to say that nonetheless, in general, his model still succeeds, because aside from the details of his technical argument, he's in a sense, giving a model that's robust enough to say that even the theist on the street is justified in holding their design view, even if evolutionary theory is true. And that's really the heart of what he's going after. So, in one sense, I think this last part of our paper, where we focus on the harm to design detection, particularly for the theist on the street, is crucial to evaluating Rope's argument as a whole. Now, having said that, in an intellectually sympathetic spirit to his view, I will say I do think our critique of some of the particulars of his model, some of the science, particularly proteins, bacterioflagellum, convergent evolution, I do think those are relevant, highly relevant to assessing his model as a whole, since I think we get into how the model works, and if it doesn't work in the biological details, then there's a significant problem. But having said that, I do want to say this last element is notably important for Kajonin's enterprise. Okay, so, as you said, he wants to defend the theist on the street. The first question is, well, who or what is THEist on the street, and what is their experience of design? It seems to me the relevant factors are, first, we're talking about theist in the street, presumably in the context of evolutionary theory being in the water, Dawkins, Darwin, and so on. And part of evolutionary theory, or at least an interpretation of it, is that the whole point of the theory is to defeat biological design, or to explain it away, to replace it, or to render it superfluous. OCCAM's razor. Once you have natural selection, nature, doing the selecting, you don't need a designer. That may be right or wrong, but that's, as it were, in the background. Now, suppose that's in the background. What is the theists on the street immediate experience of nature? Well, when they come to biology and biological phenomena, it seems to me there are sort of two key elements to their experience. The first is essentialism, and the second is a direct design of Those essences. So take, for example, a person who sees a hummingbird for the first time, a theist on the street, everyday theist, they see that for the very first time. Wow. SOMEBoDY made that. God MAde that.
They don't necessarily mean God directly made that particular organism that they see. They MEAN God made the first instance of it. First, hummingbirds. And then THEY reproduced. Or when they see an elephant for the first time, like a little kid, wow.
And it does look desiGned. And of course, there are good studies about kids naturally perceiving or inferring design from a very young age.
So that's their sort of epistemological framework, essentialist framework, and that the first types were directly designed. Now, suppose that person encounters evolutionary theory or encounters Kajonin's model. Well, in Kajonin's model, there is no direct design of elephants. God didn't design the First Elephants. God didn't design the first hummingbirds. Instead, all God did in terms of direct creative activity was design the origin of the universe and the laws of nature. And then there are just secondary processes that took over from there. So this theist on the street is suddenly in a weird position. Every time they see a new type of organism, they have this direct design and essentialist intuition. But it's wrong, and it's wrong scores of time with each new types of OrganIsm. It's wrong over and over and over. What KajOnin's model gives them is actually a defeater for their direct design intuition. Cajonin's model stresses continuity of these secondary causes, really, from the big bang all the way through the advent of human beings. But again, that's directly contrary to what the Theists on street Intuitive. No, human beings are a special creation. Elephants were specially designed. They sure looked HummingBirds were specially designed. So this is not to say that Cajonin's model and evolutionary theory contained within it defeats the justification the theist on the street might have, but it does run directly contrary, and I think that needs to be acknowledged. And I think in Kajonin's attempted Defense of TheIst on the street, he doesn't really grapple with how much, epistemologically, his model runs against the grain of their intuitive experience. All right, we can take it a step further. I think a TheIst on the street who takes Kajonin's Model seriously might, you know, wait a minute. I'm wrong over and over evolutionary Theory. I was wrong over and over about my direct Design Intuitions. Was all of this indirectly designed? Did God do something at the very beginning? I think that becomes more of an open question, a less settled question, particularly because mainstream evolutionary theory purports to explain the advent of human beings, including our minds, including our experience of creating things in ways that we think nature can't. And mainstream evolutionary theory purports to get rid of or never need to invoke a divine designer. So I think a theist on the street who takes mainstream evolutionary theory seriously would suddenly be faced with a dilemma that, wait a minute. Are my direct perceptions of design of humans the first types of humans, hummingbirds, elephant, are those defeated? Are those rendered superfluous by Occam's razor? After all, the whole cant of evolutionary theory is natural processes can do it, and no need to invoke a designer. So, as I see the movement, epistemologically, of Kajonin's theory, the theist on the street who takes it seriously begins to have deeper and deeper erosion of his or her basic perception of design in nature precisely because of evolutionary theory. Now, I do want to add, Casey, let me pause here. I'm talking quite a bit, and I do want to reflect a little bit about how Kajonin has responded to this worry I've raised. But let me pause there. Hopefully that's clear, at least to this point.
[00:23:31] Speaker A: Look, this is one of the reasons why I try to make it a personal policy that I don't argue with, is basically, I got involved with a philosopher who was critiquing another philosopher, and you guys are going to have it out. And I'm just trying to make sure that I don't get harmed in the crossfire here. No, but this is really interesting, Steve, and I think it's very helpful for you to explain to us the implications of Kajonin's model for detecting design. So, look, we're running out of time here, so could you summarize very briefly what has been Kajonin's response to our paper critiquing his model? And also, how would you summarize our main concerns with his model?
[00:24:15] Speaker B: Yeah, Kajona has been super gracious and thoughtful, and all my interactions with him have been lovely. It's been quite wonderful in terms of our scientific critique. My sense is he thinks we just don't get it. He thinks we're criticizing evolution, and I think that's not what we're doing. We're testing his conception of design. His conception of design is empirically testable, particularly in the details of, say, how proteins come about. So we very much disagree with his response there. I think CaJONIN also thinks that we've kicked front loading design as a category to the curb and only accept an interventionist view of design. But we haven't really done that. Front loading conceptions of design are certainly possible, and on the table. It's just we find the particulars of his version of front loading design problematic. With respect to design detection and my criticisms of design detection, I think his basic reply is to say, look, when the theists on the street sees the hummingbird, even if there's all these evolutionary explanations in the play, maybe you'd say, look, Dilly. Even if direct design is damaged or it runs contrary to that, he can still look at the beauty of a hummingbird and say, surely that's better explained by theism than naturalism, or that's better explained by theism than, say, ultimately, at the end of the day, metaphysically, chance processes. And in one sense, I agree with that. Whether evolution is or is not in play, I think theism is a better explanation than naturalism of, say, hummingbirds or elephants or whatever. But I think that reply misses the point, because the context here is mainstream evolution. And the context of that particular version of evolution is the idea that evolution renders design superfluous. For the theists on the street, who really accepts mainstream evolution, and the idea going back to Darwin, that evolution may regard that evolution may render design and biology superfluous, that's, I think, a much more formidable version of evolution that has to be contended with.
I'll put it this Way. There's an easy way to solve the problem, and then there's a difficult way to solve the problem. The easy way to solve the problem is just to say complex biological complexity is better explained by God. And theist on the street is justified in holding that. So no matter how much the model that Cajonin posits runs against much of the theists on the street, basic epistemology, then he can still say, yes, but this complexity is better explained by God. I would say that's the easy way to solve it. Here's the hard way to solve it. To say mainstream evolutionary theory as it is, the whole point of which is to explain away design. If you accept that full blooded theory, then to say, in light of that theory, what do you do with the theists on the streets intuitions of design? That is a much more difficult problem to solve. And I think Cajonin, in effect, does a little bit. I love his scholarship, but I think he does a little bit of bait and switch. I think he takes a watered down version of mainstream evolutionary theory and is dismissive towards the kind of defeater it poses to our experience of design, or our intuitive experience of design, and simply says, the complexity is enough that we should continue to infer design? In one sense, I agree. In another sense, I think what he's really done is wetted a version of design to a soft pedaled version of evolutionary theory, but not the mainstream view. And I take it that was actually originally the point of the project.
[00:28:19] Speaker A: Okay, well, that's very interesting, Steve, and I think that it's helpful for our listeners to understand where rope Kajonin went right and where he went wrong in his critique of, I guess, those who would say that design and evolution are not compatible in his attempt to marry design and evolution into a single.
[00:28:36] Speaker B: So, hey, Casey, can I throw in one last thought?
Right at the heart of Kajonin's view is that selection and mutation are limited, that they can't produce biological complexity and diversity without these fine tuned preconditions. So what's fascinating is, in this model that purports to wed mainstream evolutionary theory and design is what I regard. I don't know if Kajonin would regard it as such, but what I regard as a massive concession that evolutionary theory is highly limited and that it needs design in a certain way. And if we're right in our article that when we go look for that type of design, that it's not there, then one actually has, in Kajonin's model or his defense of it, a strong argument against mainstream evolution that it is, in fact, limited. Suppose he's right that selection and mutation cannot work without a very specific type of design. And suppose we're right that that very specific type of design is not there, then what are you left with? You're left with evolutionary theory, impotent. And that, I think, is a fascinating result, potentially, of this model and of our critique of it. It really could be a very strong argument against mainstream evolutionary theory.
[00:29:59] Speaker A: Well, Steve Dilly, that's a really helpful way to close out this conversation. Thank you for your very erudite investigation into the book by Professor Rope Kajonin, the compatibility of evolution and design, published by Paul Grape McMillan and Springer Nature, which, of course, you helped to lead author the paper that we co published in the Journal of Religions last year titled on the relationship between design and evolution. And you also took a lead in that. Again, you're reminding me why I try not to get in arguments with philosophers. You guys are far more careful and far more precise in your use of terminology and your logic than most people are. And it's really helpful to have you help us to parse through this very complex issue. So thank you, Steve, for taking the time to talk to us today.
[00:30:40] Speaker B: Yeah, great to be with you, Casey.
[00:30:42] Speaker A: I'm Casey Luskin with id the future. We're going to have more podcasts with Brian Miller, Emily Reeves, and myself discussing this question of whether design and evolution are compatible. But make sure you listen to these two interviews with Steve Dilley to get the foundation and the framing of why this topic matters and what the debate is about. I'm Casey Luskin with id the future.
[00:31:01] Speaker B: Thanks for listening.
[00:31:04] Speaker A: Visit
[email protected] and intelligentdesign.org. This program is copyright Discovery institute and recorded by its center for Science and Culture, our channel.
