Sunday, January 16, 2005

Why don't the creationists chase after the Fermi Paradox?

Google Search: "fermi paradox" "intelligent design"

I mentioned in a previous post that I think the creationists/intelligent design folks are barking up the wrong tree. They attack natural selection, a very robust model with wide applicability. Natural selection offends them because it makes man a happenstance -- rather than a deliberate creation of a God who has made Man "in his own image". (Of course any decent theologian could find a vast number of workarounds to this problem, but the anti-Darwinists are weak theologians.)

They ought instead to be chasing physics. In particular, the Fermi Paradox is a uniquely interesting argument for intelligent design. Since I'm not a creationist by inclination it took me a few months of puzzling about the Fermi Paradox to come to the (duh) obvious realization that one of the explanations is that we exist in a created environment -- an environment designed for rare or singular sentience.

My favored explanation for our solitude is still the 'Singularity' thesis -- that all sentiences experience Singularities and none go traveling afterwards. To be fair, however, I have to admit that "intelligent design" feels like it's in the same range of implausibility. So why don't the creationists go after the Fermi Paradox?

I did a google search to see if this theme was emerging in creationist discussions. My search returned only a handful of pages, of which my old SETI Fail/Fermi Paradox page was at the top (a peculiar and fleeting glory -- for a year or two my old skijoring page led that search).

I do hope they'll chase this one down. It's much more interesting than a bizarre ideological attack on Darwin.

No comments: