Editing Intelligent design (section)

===Possible theological implications===
Intelligent design proponents often insist that their claims do not require a religious component.<ref>[[#Merriman 2007|Merriman 2007]], [https://books.google.com/books?id=l_8VFygyaDYC&dq=intelligent+design+science+can+test+religion&pg=PA26 p. 26]</ref> However, various philosophical and theological issues are naturally raised by the claims of intelligent design.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Murphy |first=George L. |year=2002 |title=Intelligent Design as a Theological Problem |url=http://puffin.creighton.edu/nrcse/IDTHG.html |journal=Covalence: The Bulletin of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America Alliance for Faith, Science and Technology |volume=IV |issue=2 |oclc=52753579 |access-date=2014-02-28 |archive-date=2016-04-11 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160411004103/http://puffin.creighton.edu/NRCSE/IDTHG.html |url-status=dead }} Reprinted with permission.</ref>

Intelligent design proponents attempt to demonstrate scientifically that features such as irreducible complexity and specified complexity could not arise through natural processes, and therefore required repeated direct miraculous interventions by a Designer (often a Christian concept of God). They reject the possibility of a Designer who works merely through setting natural laws in motion at the outset,<ref name="PM 09">{{cite journal |last1=Padian |first1=Kevin |author-link1=Kevin Padian |last2=Matzke |first2=Nicholas J. |date=January 1, 2009 |title=Darwin, Dover, 'Intelligent Design' and textbooks |url=http://www.ntskeptics.org/news/4170029.pdf |journal=[[Biochemical Journal]] |volume=417 |issue=1 |pages=29–42 |doi=10.1042/bj20081534 |issn=0264-6021 |pmid=19061485 |access-date=2015-11-10}}</ref> in contrast to [[theistic evolution]] (to which even [[Charles Darwin]] was open<ref>[[#Darwin 1860|Darwin 1860]], p. 484, "... probably all the organic beings which have ever lived on this earth have descended from some one primordial form, into which life was first breathed by the Creator."</ref>). Intelligent design is distinct because it asserts repeated miraculous interventions in addition to designed laws. This contrasts with other major religious traditions of a created world in which God's interactions and influences do not work in the same way as physical causes. The Roman Catholic tradition makes a careful distinction between ultimate [[Metaphysics|metaphysical]] explanations and secondary, natural causes.<ref name="Haught Witness Report" />

The concept of direct miraculous intervention raises other potential theological implications. If such a Designer does not intervene to alleviate suffering even though capable of intervening for other reasons, some imply the designer is not [[Omnibenevolence|omnibenevolent]] (see [[problem of evil]] and related [[theodicy]]).<ref>{{cite web |url=http://designinference.com/documents/2003.04.CTNS_theodicy.pdf |archive-url=https://wayback.archive-it.org/all/20070614103827/http://www.designinference.com/documents/2003.04.CTNS_theodicy.pdf |url-status=dead |archive-date=2007-06-14 |title=Making the Task of Theodicy Impossible? Intelligent Design and the Problem of Evil |last=Dembski |first=William A. |date=Spring 2003 |website=DesignInference.com |publisher=William Dembski |location=Pella, Iowa |access-date=2014-02-28 }}</ref>

Further, repeated interventions imply that the original design was not perfect and final, and thus pose a problem for any who believe that the Creator's work had been both perfect and final.<ref name="PM 09" /> Intelligent design proponents seek to explain the [[Argument from poor design|problem of poor design in nature]] by insisting that we have simply failed to understand the perfection of the design (for example, proposing that [[Vestigiality|vestigial organs]] have unknown purposes), or by proposing that designers do not necessarily produce the best design they can, and may have unknowable motives for their actions.<ref name="Pennock 245" />

In 2005, the director of the [[Vatican Observatory]], the [[Society of Jesus|Jesuit]] astronomer [[George Coyne]], set out theological reasons for accepting evolution in an August 2005 article in ''[[The Tablet]]'', and said that "Intelligent design isn't science even though it pretends to be. If you want to teach it in schools, intelligent design should be taught when religion or cultural history is taught, not science."<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.thetablet.co.uk/cgi-bin/archive_db.cgi/tablet-01063 |title=God's chance creation |last=Coyne |first=George |date=2005-08-06 |publisher=The Tablet |access-date=2008-10-16 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060220104834/http://www.thetablet.co.uk/cgi-bin/archive_db.cgi/tablet-01063 |archive-date=February 20, 2006 }}</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.usatoday.com/news/religion/2005-11-18-vaticanastronomer_x.htm |title=Vatican official: 'Intelligent design' isn't science |work= [[USA Today]]|access-date=2008-10-16 | date=2005-11-18}}</ref> In 2006, he "condemned ID as a kind of 'crude creationism' which reduced God to a mere engineer."<ref name=Dixon82>{{cite book|first=Thomas|last=Dixon|title=Science and Religion: A Very Short Introduction|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=efgTDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA82|date=24 July 2008|publisher=OUP Oxford|isbn=978-0199295517|page=82}}</ref>

Critics state that the [[wedge strategy]]'s "ultimate goal is to create a theocratic state".<ref name="ForrestGross2007">{{cite book|first1=Barbara|last1=Forrest|first2=Paul R.|last2=Gross|title=Creationism's Trojan Horse: The Wedge of Intelligent Design|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7mMSDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA11|year=2007|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0195319736|page=11}}</ref>