May 25, 1984

Dear John Clayton,

     You speak to me of "simply trying to justify" a life-style. This is absurd. I could not even begin to agree with this assessment. I was quite happy and contented before I took my present position. Doing what I have done has caused me all sorts of problems, and I was severely depressed for a time after I initially accepted my present position. I am still, somewhat, recovering from that blow. I am learning that happiness is indeed simply a state of mind and I am taking advantage of that fact. My choice of agnosticism was strictly an intellectual decision, taking place only after much deliberation. I should have made this clearer from the outset. I repeat: I am not trying to justify a life-style; I am simply presenting the faults in the arguments for the existence of God that I discovered as a result of my intellectual investigation (which I clearly outlined in "In Terms Of Finding Out").

     You speak to me of being "extremely disappointed" in my letter. I must return your disappointment to you. I as disappointed in the way you have dealt (or not dealt, I should say) with my last three letters (T3, T4, and T5).

     You speak to me of "rhetoric without substance." I thought I made it quite clear that T5 was simply a reference to and a summary of T3 and T4. Indeed, I referred to T3 and T4 throughout the letter. So, yes, T5 is a rhetoric, a summary, while T3 and T4 make up the substance.

     You speak to me of "philosophical evasions." If an argument is based on a false premise, if it is illogical to begin with, then no matter how many so-called statistical and practical applications you bring up to flesh out your argument, you will not be able to defend the argument because it is flawed in its very formulation, Even so, I went ahead and specifically showed why some of the so-called statistical and practical applications are not the "facts" they pretend to be.

     You speak to me of "sweeping condemnations." It must be kept in mind that I am criticizing a specific argument that these scientists espouse, and, yes, "an argument of substance" has been raised against the so-called argument of the statistical improbability of the natural origin of life. Furthermore, I must return your statement to you. Who is making sweeping condemnations of not only all of the top scientists in the world today in fields relevant to evolution but also of the vast array (and virtual unanimity barring fundamentalist creationists) of biologists, paleontologists, geneticists, biochemists, etc. in general?

     You speak to me of "simply regurgitating the canned atheist's arguments which have been held over the years and have been shown by virtually every major debate that has ever been held to be totally and completely erroneous." (I could say something about "canned theistic arguments," but I won't.) And you say that I am "accepting sources and standards of logic that would not work in any practical application, and that in fact, in and of themselves would preclude any possibility of science." Now who's using "rhetoric without substance" and making empty accusations? My purpose is not to debate. My purpose is to learn, my attitude is that of open-mindedness and intellectual honesty, and ay method is science (which you can just as easily, I suppose, call empiricism). And if my criticisms of your arguments (I have not really made any arguments at all against the existence of God; all I have done is to show the weaknesses in your arguments for the existence of God) are so totally and completely erroneous and if the error of these criticisms has been shown time after time over the years, then I would think it would be a simple matter for you to show me where these criticisms fail or to at least refer me to something already written by you or someone else that shows the failures of these criticisms. As I said in T5, it is imperative that repairs be made to correct the flaws in the design argument. And, further, my sources and standards of logic not only work in practical applications (I learned my logic in my use of mathematical definitions and proofs and in the application of these to physical problems in my physics classes and labs), but some of the ideas I have used form the very basis of scientific inquiry and method (which I'm sure you will agree does work and is the most useful method humans have devised), I refer you to T3, paragraph 4 and T4:2. You also say to me: "By the applications you are making, engineering would be a total and complete impossibility." This is, again, more rhetoric, and as such needs some justification, And, on the contrary, I have shown you where your formulation of the design argument ignores standard methods of logic and of formulating theories, the first and foremost being that of having and using well-defined concepts. You keep repeating your statements that the criticisms I have pointed out concerning the design argument are illogical and erroneous, but you never give any reasons for your statements. You keep saying my criticisms are wrong, but you never tell me why.

     You speak to me of not responding to your logical flow sheet. But I have, implicitly and explicitly, done so repeatedly (T3:9-10; T4:719-11,24; T5:419). Did you spend so little time with my last letter (and with the other two for that matter)? I very clearly said: "I have stated in both letters that I agreed that the universe had a beginning and a cause..." (T5:4). Is it possible for me to be more clear and explicit than this? But I will now respond (for the fourth time) very clearly and explicitly to your logical flow chart. Beginning or no beginning, cause or no cause, design or no design (your April 18 letter — J5:2 and various charts and statements in The Source and in your newsletter). You believe in the positive of each of these choices. I say: beginning, caused, nonpurposive (undesigned), and I have shown explicitly why I say this in T3 and T4. Now please, say no more about me not responding to your choices. I have done so repeatedly.

     You speak to me of not separating the cosmological argument from the design argument, I said in T4:24 that I thought that you wereprobably not using these two arguments separately, but I was not really sure. Thank you for setting me straight. I think we can now confidently say we are in accord (and have been all along without knowing it for sure) on the cosmological argument. What I have been criticizing in past letters is the attempt by many theists to use the cosmological argument as a sufficient argument in and of itself for the existence of God (and your second letter, dated February 10 — J2:3, gave me this same impression and is what has led me astray on this point). But I'm glad this confusion between us has been cleared up, because now I can concentrate on the fallacies of the design argument.

     I will try to make this as clear and specific and explicit as possible. When I begin discussing the design argument I will number each point I as trying to make (regardless of whether each point takes more than one paragraph or not). I will also be quoting a lot of material from my previous three letters. And I will try to follow a logical order in the presentation of ay criticisms.

     Before I begin discussing the design argument (yet again) I do want to repeat once again my questions of methods that you so far seem to have completely ignored. You say on page 15 of The Source (1983 edition) that the scientist functions in a realm of what is workable and functional in helping his solve his problems. It may well be that he never absolutely proves from a philosophical standpoint that the principle he is working an is absolutely true, but he does prove in any kind of rational terms that the laser beam is coherent or polarized or whatever his intent is. In the same way, when one discusses the existence of God, one does not profit by wandering into philosophical abstractions and hiding behind demands for absoluteness. The problem of God's existence can be attacked in the same way as the research scientist might approach the attempt to discover a new particle in the atom. We are dealing with something we cannot see or really manipulate in a rational controlled way, and yet by looking at the evidence and the effects of the various forces and other parameters that can be measured, we can find convincing proof that such does exist. If we can prove the existence of the neutrino, which we accept in nuclear science in a more-or-less absolute way, then we can also prove the existence of God by similar techniques and logic.

     (At this point I will ignore your statement about not dealing with something in a rational way. And here you say abstractions are not profitable, but in 35:6 you chastised se for refusing to consider an abstraction, even though I wasn't actually doing so.) I also think your points in the first paragraph on p.15 are relevant. With this in mind, I repeat my questions (T3:4 and T4:2):

     There is this idea (or hypothesis, if you will) that God has created the universe. What are the observable consequences of this idea? What explanations and solutions to problems does this idea give us concerning this origin process? What insights does this idea give us concerning possible routes of further explanation?

     I think that, indirectly, the design argument may be used to answer the first question (though you have not explicitly said so). Okay (if your design argument can hold up), but please address all of these questions.

(Point 1)

     Now, you must define the concept of design. We must have some useful method or idea that will allow us to distinguish between ordered systems that have been designed and ordered systems that have not been designed, You say on p.15 of The Source: "...definitions of what is meant by reality and assumptions of what physical reality really is can always be challenged..." and "...one does not profit by wandering into philosophical abstractions and hiding behind demands for absoluteness." And I think you are trying to use this type of idea to accuse me of playing philosophical games and making philosophical evasions regarding my asking you to provide a valid definition of design. I am not making any kind of philosophical evasion whatsoever when I ask you to define your concept (if anything, you are evading the problem). This is standard logical practice and must be done in order to have a workable, applicable concept. I have also given specific examples that showed the need for providing a way to distinguish between designed ordered systems and undesigned ordered systems (T3:15-17 and T4:17,18).

     "There is no qualification for design. Design is given no definition and no qualifications. No criteria for design are given. Then various arguments are made using this vague concept of design.... The design argument is bad because of the fact that, since no criteria have been given, there is no way in which design can be predicted or falsified" (T4:17). "Another result of this problem of an undefined concept of design...is that of misplaced attribution.... I don't believe you want a concept of design that is vague enough to be able to include ordered systems that have been ordered by unconscious, nonpurposive forces" (T4:18) — which I'm sure you would call "chance." "The construction of the argument must establish valid ways to distinguish between designed order and undesigned (natural) order" (T4:18). "Whether order exists or not is not in dispute. The question is: Has the order been brought about by design or by unthinking physical processes? ...order does not imply design. There exist designed ordered systems and there exist undesigned (natural) ordered systems. A distinction needs to be made" (T3:13).

(Point 2)

     Of course, it is possible that the criteria you are using to establish design in an ordered system is the idea that the order could not have come about randomly (i.e., by unconscious, nonpurposive forces). To do this, though, you are using a strange combination of argumentation using ignorance and misapplied statistics.

     "The Source goes on and on for dozens of pages mentioning complexity upon complexity that exists in the universe, then asserts that, since present physical theories do not explain the observable complexities satisfactorily, we must postulate the existence of God to account for their existence (even though The Source does not even propose a cause-effect relationship). This is nothing more than a leap in the dark. This is an argument that relies on ignorance for its basis. 'We cannot explain this naturally, so God must have done it'" (T3:5). "The Source asks us to accept God because the complexities of many problems have up to the present time prohibited scientists from working out natural (physical and testable as opposed to mystical and supernatural) explanations and solutions. In other words, in lieu of an explanation we shall resort to a non-explanation. In lieu of a coherent explanation for the motion of the planets, it was said that God (or some other supernatural force or forces) did it, but this did not provide an explanation. It provided (and still provides) a psychological satisfaction that is not provided by saying, very truthfully, we don't yet know" (T3:7). "'[The argument from design] amounts to nothing more than a simple assertion that naturalistic processes automatically cannot be considered as candidates for an explanation of the order and complexity we...see in nature'" (T4:23).

     Of course, this is the weakness of the design argument I was talking about when I said that this argument degenerated to the "scapegoat" argument, a term which you brought up. Throughout human history events, processes, and systems have been attributed to the supernatural, but as we continue to become more and more sophisticated in our explorations we find that what used to be attributed to God (for lack of knowledge about whatever was in question) is simply the result of blind forces. As science progresses, we continue to find these natural processes that are responsible for bringing about various complexities that we see in nature. Physical forces may be blind, but we already have a vast amount of knowledge concerning physical systems that demonstrate that these blind forces "are capable of producing vastly complex, intricately ordered systems" (T4:20).

(Point 3)

     "You must make sure that all your statistical arguments against a natural, nonpurposive ordering are taking all the relevant information into account. After all, statistics is simply mathematical probabilities computed after taking certain information into account, and if relevant information has been neglected or is not even known about then the statistical arguments based on the computed probabilities could be inaccurate or completely wrong. (And I must honestly admit, I fail to see how statistical arguments dealing with the likelihood of the occurence of a planet with particular characteristics in the formation of planetary systems can really be all that informative. After all, as you must admit, at the present time in human history, no other planetary systems have been explored, and we thus know very little about planetary systems in general. This criticism is also true, at least in part, of other negative arguments used by creationists)" (T4:21). (Also, I believe I made a mistake in terminology here. I think "planetary systems" should instead be "stellar systems." I hope there was no confusion.)

     "You base your argument against natural ordering on a concept of statistical improbability, but you keep using the idea of randomness to show the improbability. Creationists constantly misuse this same idea of randomness in their railings against evolution. But, even though we are dealing with randomness, we are dealing with a randomness that takes place only when certain conditions have been met or certain physical principles are followed. Are you aware of the fact that it can be shown that, statistically speaking, it is virtually impossible for rain to occur because droplets of any significant size cannot form initially? (Arguments against the initial formation of living organisms base part of their refutation on similar thinking.) But there are many things other than random formation that must be taken into account. We could say, well, the raindrops are here, and since they can't have come about randomly, God must have done it (a belief, incidentally, that many primitive cultures have). Is this really evidence for God? Or we could say, well, even though we are not yet fully aware of the physical processes that could have caused this ordering to take place, we are still trying to determine what those processes are (I am speaking generally here, because droplet formation is fairly well understood)" (T4:19).

(Point 4)

     "For example, creationists used to (and some still do) make the argument that even simple proteins could not be produced from simple chemicals in the laboratory, let alone a replicating, energy-utilizing system of proteins (life). Their argument was made from the laws of probability. But when proteins were finally produced in the laboratory, many creationists backed off this and retreated to what they believe is a safer position. Now they say that life cannot be produced in the laboratory because probability argues against it. Their argument is just as wrong now as it was demonstrated to be before (and I will say why in a bit). Besides, many of the major steps on the road from simple chemical elements to replicating, energy-utilizing organic systems have been demonstrated in the laboratory, and scientists are fast approaching final solutions to this problem. Many believe it may be solved within the next ten years. But regardless of this, the fact remains that for decades creationists used an argument (which was wrong to begin with as will be shown) from probability that was demonstrated to be wrong. They then continued to use the same argument (changed just a hair) without batting an eyelash" (T3:16).

     I think I should have been more explicit here in T3. Creationists used their statistical arguments to say not only could living systems not be produced in the laboratory, but even simple proteins could not be produced either. But then, when simple proteins were indeed produced (thus falsifying the statistical argument), creationists retreated from this and now just apply their argument to living systems. I go on in T3 to show why the statistical argument was wrong to begin with (and why it is still wrong), i.e., wrong in its logical formulation without even being physically tested and falsified.

     "The Source uses the same argument, and it is still just as wrong for all the same reasons. First of all, chemicals do not form molecules in a random fashion. This is why a chemist knows exactly what reactions will occur when two chemicals are mixed if she or he has observed the event before. Molecules are not formed randomly and chaotically. Certain chemical principles are observed to apply to reactions that take place. Furthermore, a mistake in the application of probability has taken place. We don't need the formation of one specific molecular structure that can utilize energy from its environment and can replicate itself. Any molecular struture that can perform these functions will suffice" (T3:17).

     So, your mathematical applications are bad for two reasons: probability and statistics cannot be applied when there is a substantial lack of relevant information, and the application itself has been done in a faulty ikanner in many cases.

     Here is a summary of the problems in the design argument: (1) Valid criteria for determining design have not been established. (2) The design argument (your version of it, anyway) asserts that physical processes cannot bring about a complexity simply on the basis that at the present time we do not know how this complexity could have arisen naturally. (3) Statistical arguments are used to claim conscious, purposive ordering when there is not enough information to determine the probabilities of the occurrences. (4) Many statistical applications that are used have been based on false assumptions.

     So, as I said in my last letter: "The design argument is flawed to begin with because of the vagueness of the initial concept and the misapplications used in the argument. I have not seen anywhere any solutions to the problems in the design argument that I have pointed out. Progress in our discussion cannot be made without these solutions. What is imperative is that these solutions be found; if they cannot be, then the whole design argument collapses because of its weak foundation and its bad structure" (T5:9). This is not just rhetoric. The four points above may very well be canned atheistic criticisms, but they are legitimate criticisms nonetheless (some good things do come out of a can). (I have sent along a copy of Dr. Wallace Matson's criticisms of these same ideas for your perusal.) And this ends my discussion of the design argument for this letter.

     I get this feeling from your last letter that, because you are finding great difficulty in getting me to accept the design argument (or rather, as I perceive it, the design argument is flawed and you are unable to repair it), you are considering discontinuing our discussion altogether. If this is what you wish, then so be it. I realize this takes time to think about, discuss, and type, and I also realize you are a very busy person. And I at not going to mislead you: if the problems I have pointed out in the design argument are not corrected, then I will not accept it, and this argument for the existence of God will have failed. But, as I said in my very first letter (dated February 2), "I am willing to continue the discussion (as I always am)." And I feel that, if you are unable to defend the design argument, you should be willing to consider abandoning it. Also, you might consider discussing something else in this area (God, which God, God's communication to humans, evolution). Whatever you wish.

In the spirit of Job 33.32,
Todd Greene

May 16, 1984

Dear Todd:

     I have to admit to you that I was extremely disappointed in your letter. It seems to me that you are simply regurgitating the canned atheist's arguments which have been held over the years and have been shown by virtually every major debate that has ever been held to be totally and completely erroneous. You are accepting sources and standards of logic that would not work in any practical application, and that in fact, in and of themselves would preclude any possibility of science. You make wide and sweeping categorical condemnations of arguments that as yet you have offered no substantial arguments against.

     When you make a statement like "the design argument is flawed to begin with because of the vagueness of the initial concept" you are simply giving rhetoric without substance. The kind of arguments you have made against it have been simply philosophical evasions of the position, rather than actually dealing with the statistical or practical applications involved. By the applications you are making, engineering would be a total and complete impossibility. I think this is clearly demonstrated with your sweeping condemnation of three of the top scientists in the world today. When you dismiss Frederick Hoyle, Britain's most eminent scientist, Murray Eden of M.I.T., and Francis Crick, who is one of the best known biologists in the world, and who has received Nobel Prizes and many other awards, on the basis that "several scientists and philosophers have criticized them" you are still missing the basic fact that no one has offered an argument of substance against their positions.

     Quite frankly, Todd, I think you have taken a position and are desperately trying to defend it, rather than looking in an open-minded way, or in any kind of practical way at the arguments that I have attempted to give to you. You are trying to separate arguments also which are contemporary and coherent positions. The flow chart that I gave you did not separate the cosmological argument from the design argument. The logical flow sheet that was given you, you have not responded to except to attempt to provide a philosophical evasion on an abstract position of philosophy which would not work if it was applied to any practical science.

     I hope you can understand the position I am trying to make to you and will give some further consideration to the approach. If you have chosen a life-style and are simply trying to justify it, I see no point in continuing this discussion.

     The young man at Michigan Christian College that sent me the request to contact you indicated that you had an open-minded attitude toward these things, but I was very disappointed in the approach of your last letter in that regard. Please give some consideration to this discussion from the vantage point I am attempting to present.

Sincerely in Christ,
John N. Clayton