THINK ABOUT THIS: Prominent Atheists Concede Creation Looks Intelligently Designed

By Kyle Butt, M.Div.

The concept of creation by a supernatural Creator has been a powerful and persuasive aspect of truth since the beginning of time.

The idea that there is no supernatural Creator, and that everything we see in the Universe—from hummingbirds to humans—has evolved through mindless, chance processes has been advanced in an attempt to dispel the truth of creation.

Photo by Aldebaran S on Unsplash

One reason that naturalistic evolution has not made more head-way against creation than it has is because, intuitively, humans can see the obvious fact that the world exhibits every indication of intelligent design. Even the most outspoken atheistic evolutionists tacitly admit this to be the case.

For instance, Richard Dawkins stated: “Living things are not designed, but Darwinian natural selection licenses a version of the design stance for them. We get a short cut to understanding the heart if we assume that it is designed to pump blood” (2006, p. 182, emp. added). Did you catch that? He said that things weren’t designed by any intelligence, but we can understand them more readily if we assume they were.

University of Chicago professor Jerry Coyne, in his book Why Evolution is True, wrote:  “If anything is true about nature, it is that plants and animals seem intricately and almost perfectly designed for living their lives” (2009, p. 1, emp. added).

He further stated, “Nature resembles a well-oiled machine, with every species an intricate cog or gear” (p. 1). On page three of the same book, he wrote: “The more one learns about plants and animals, the more one marvels at how well their designs fit their ways of life.”

Atheist Michael Shermer, in his book Why Darwin Matters, stated: “The design inference comes naturally. The reason people think that a Designer created the world is because it looks designed” (2006, p. 65, ital. in orig.).

Consider another example. Kenneth Miller is an evolutionary biologist at Brown University and co-author of a biology textbook published by Prentice Hall that is used widely in high school classes across the country.

In his book, Only a Theory: Evolution and the Battle for America’s Soul, Miller admits that structural and molecular biologists, as they study the natural order, routinely mention the presence of design in their explorations.

He, himself, admits that the human body shows evidence of design, pointing out examples like the design of the ball and socket joints of the human hips and shoulders, as well as the “S” curve of the human spine that allows us to walk upright (2008).

So powerful is the design inference, Dawkins was forced to grudgingly admit: “So compelling is that illusion [of design—KB] that it has fooled our greatest minds for centuries, until Charles Darwin burst onto the scene” (2009, p. 416).

The irony of the situation is that each of these writers contends that such design is a product of naturalistic, mindless factors. But their telling statements underscore the obvious conclusion. If an Intelligent Designer really did create the world, what would it look like? Answer: Exactly like the one we have!

REFERENCES

Brown University (2008), “There is ‘Design’ in Nature, Biologist Argues,” ScienceDailyhttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/02/080217143838.htm.

Coyne, Jerry (2009), Why Evolution Is True (New York: Viking).

Dawkins, Richard (2006), The God Delusion (Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin).

Dawkins, Richard (2009), The Greatest Show on Earth (New York: Free Press).

Shermer, Michael (2006), Why Darwin Matters (New York: Henry Holt and Company).

This article was originally published by the Apologetics Press. It is reproduced here with permission. For a comprehensive reading list of additional analyses, articles and resources for the existence of God, go here.


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14 Comments

  1. Rick Caird on August 30, 2021 at 8:38 am

    I am quite willing to believe in evolution within a species, but I am not ready to believe everything is the result of random attempts.

  2. Pettifogger on August 30, 2021 at 8:42 am

    Would not whatever world existed appear to be perfectly designed to be that world?

  3. Charles Meyrick on August 30, 2021 at 9:38 am

    I would like to submit an amendment to the above. Evolutionists argue that a Creator would not make “mistakes” (The Panda’s Thumb by Stephen Jay Gould comes to mind.) Because Man sinned, we live in a fallen and broken universe. We ought not attribute the brokenness to the Creator. Rather, we should marvel at how well the broken universe performs.

    • Mark Tapscott on August 30, 2021 at 9:42 am

      Mr. Meyrick, how are you these days? I hope you are well. We will be starting a new Zoominar in September. Hope you can join us.

  4. David Justus on August 30, 2021 at 10:24 am

    I find in curious that believers seem to want to insist the God’s universe is imperfect and requires him to constantly tinker with the natural laws that they believe he set up. The idea that God can’t create a universe where all the diversity we see arises from the natural laws he created seems limiting to me.

    The God I believe in isn’t so limited.

    • Mark Tapscott on August 30, 2021 at 10:26 am

      David, I don’t understand what Butt says that makes you think he thinks the universe is imperfect and requires constant correction.

      • David Justus on August 30, 2021 at 5:37 pm

        If, in order to create diversity of life, God has to change something, create the new species from scratch in violation of the ‘normal’ way the universe works, that is constant correction and tinkering. It is a much less impressive universe then the one where the processes of life spawn amazing complexity and inter connected systems.

        Being the creator of a universe where you have to design every individual thing is a lot less awesome then being the creator of a universe that creates infinite diversity due to the way it works.

        • Jim Brock on August 10, 2022 at 2:31 pm

          Seems to me that the concept of a personal Creator was a lot easier when it was limited to the Earth, the Biblical concept. Now that we can see the immensity of the universe it becomes much harder. Not an Atheist, just Agnostic.
          Jim B

  5. Lary Stieglitz on August 30, 2021 at 11:46 am

    Why are citations for articles like this always so old? The latest reference is 2009. Positively ancient in scientific terms…

    • Mark Tapscott on August 30, 2021 at 1:14 pm

      I am similarly struck but the issue is whether any of the information from the citations subsequently been proven to be in error?

  6. A Friend on August 30, 2021 at 1:09 pm

    Miller is a Christian, not an atheist. Believing in “intelligent design” has nothing to do with believing in God.

  7. Clizby Wampuscat on October 25, 2021 at 5:00 pm

    Just because something looks designed does not mean that it is. The claim that biological systems are designed is a claim that needs to be substantiated with good evidence. The earth looks flat, the earth looks stationary and everything revolves around it, the universe looks’ static etc. Biology is remarkable and does look designed at times but that is not good evidence that it is. There is good supporting evidence that evolution is happening. As a matter of fact there is more good evidence for evolution than any other theory in science.

    • Mark Tapscott on October 25, 2021 at 5:25 pm

      Interesting observation, Clizby. Tell me what you mean when you say “just because something looks designed does not mean it is” when the proposed explanation for that design is an intelligent designer, but when evolution is proposed, there is “good supporting evidence that it is.” This formulation sounds like you have an unstated presupposition that evolution is evidence-based but intelligent design is not. And here’s a query around which you could helpfully organize your response: Evolution claims common ancestry, but why could not the same evidence indicate a common designer? Thanks again for an interesting comment.

    • Jim Brock on August 10, 2022 at 2:35 pm

      Umm. The universe does not look static. For a long time we recognized that the universe was expanding. Now we suspect that the rate of expansion is increasing.
      JimB

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