FORTUITOUS CHANCE AND DESIGN - Fact Sheet 03  - [UPDATED DECEMBER 2002]
( Snowflakes, Crystals, Beach Pebbles and The Weasel Program )

THE ULTIMATE REASON HAS TO BE
THE SUPREME DESIGNER

"FORTUITOUS CHANCE"

Richard Dawkins, a Fellow of New College Oxford, is an evolutionary biologist and the "Charles Simonyi Professor For The Understanding Of Science" at Oxford University. Put simply, his mandate is to explain science to the layman.

He claims that everything developed "by fortuitous chance" from nothing over millions of years of "evolution". He says that what we see to be evidence of design in creation is only "the appearance of design."

The writer of this article is a Christian and has about 40 years experience in Architecture both in office and on site. His experience has taught him that, in the majority of cases, if work is not carefully designed and supervised, if anything can go wrong it usually will.

If a construction detail is overlooked by the designer, in most cases there will be problems when trying to build it on site. Very rarely, "by fortuitous chance", we will be "lucky". But everyone who has been involved in design knows that it could not have happened if, to begin with, some design had not been in place.

For example - a plumbing engineer might design a layout for service pipes, a ventilation engineer design a layout for air condition trunking and an electrical engineer design a layout for electrical trunking, all to go in the same ceiling void. The architect might have designed the void large enough for that to happen but the designed routes have not been co-ordinated to ensure that pipe and trunking runs do not collide. The chances are that, when the work is being carried out on site by three different teams of fixers, routes will clash. Sometimes but very rarely "by fortuitous chance" the  service routes do not clash but that could not happen if there were not designed items in place already - in this case; a building, its ceiling voids, pipes, ducting and layouts for the pipes and ducting.. So one cannot avoid the fact that even "fortuitous chance" does not occur unless initially there are designed items on which that "chance" can operate. "Fortuitous chance" cannot come first. There must be design before there can be fortuitous chance.

Even if, for the sake of argument, it be allowed that in a primeval initial chaos fortuitous chance initiated a spark of order in the midst of that chaos, then the chaos around it would swamp it, immediately negate it and destroy it. For spontaneous evolution to commence there would have to be an abundance of fortuitous chances happening in the same location in the same instant, all miraculously coordinated into some sort of rational order which would:  i) render it immune to the negating effect of the overwhelming chaotic chance occurrences going on all around, and  ii) enable it to function.

THE CRYSTALS ARGUMENT

Sometimes, theoreticians offer the formation of snowflakes, ice crystals and other mineral crystals as examples of order and design spontaneously arising from chaos. What those "theoretical scientists" overlook is that a true scientist confronted with phenomena such as these would not assume that they occur by chance.

A research scientist would assume that if they had all the factors at their finger tips they would understand the reason why these crystals form as they do. They certainly would not write it of as order arising spontaneously by "fortuitous chance" from chaos.* Scientists involved in research, work on the basis that there is reason for everything they observe and they look for explanations based on reason not on chance. They do not write-off what they do not understand as being fortuitous chance operating on chaos. They look for answers, not cop-outs. They expect to find design - not just "the appearance of design" - to find reason, not just the appearance of reason.

[* Some scientists reason that the regular arrangement of snowflakes and crystals is determined by the directional forces in the atoms as arranged in the molecules, being influenced by the environment in which the crystal grows.]

THE POLISHED BEACH PEBBLES ARGUMENT

The theoretical scientist, Richard Dawkins, has publicly claimed that just as a polished beach pebble is formed by accident and yet has the appearance of design - so - given enough time - everything that has appearance of design could have come about by chance. He overlooked the fact that much design is already in place for polished beach pebbles to be formed - gravity, air, water and minerals formed from atoms and molecules. Without these there would be no pebble.

Supposing we selected at random any polished beach pebble and could ascertain all the factors involved in its formation from a rough stone. Would any research scientists reject as self evident that with the necessary skills, time and facilities at their disposal it would be possible to deduce how that beach pebble came to be the shape it is? This is feasible because design is already in place for such "fortuitous accident" to happen.

THE WEASEL COMPUTER PROGRAM ARGUMENT

Richard Dawkins has demonstrated a computer program that kept re-writing letters entered at random on the keyboard, with small changes each time, until it spelt the words " METHINKS IT IS LIKE A WEASEL" (taken from Shakespeare's Hamlet) claiming it proved that complex order can happen by random chance alone.

Richard Dawkins, or a programmer on his behalf, must have used  a program language ( probably a problem-orientated language such as Prolog) with which to design his "weasel" program. The designers of that program language most likely based their program on a more low-level language such as an assembly language. Assembly languages and their compilers are in turn developed by designers  for each type of computer's machine code language. Even these most elementary languages (binary encoders) are designed. They do not come about by fortuitous chance. It is an insult to the scientists and programmers involved to suggest that the fruit of their labours, involving millions of man hours, evolved by fortuitous chance.

All this design was in place for the "weasel" programmer to be able to produce a program that produced the result that had the appearance of fortuitous chance. Anyone with programming experience knows that the algorithms must have been built into the "weasel" program which made it inevitable that the final result for any mix of letters entered would read " METHINKS IT IS LIKE A WEASEL"

THE SPONTANEOUS GENERATION OF LIFE THEORY

Some theoreticians propose that by some process, such as lightning zapping inanimate mud on a primeval shore a life form, the first "primitive" cell, the ancestor of all life forms, spontaneously came into being from a random collection of chemicals by fortuitous chance.

All life forms have DNA. Every life form's DNA is a complex program similar to a computer program. Computer program languages are designed. Computer programmers then use the program languages to design programs. Without these computers are useless. A lot of ingenuity is involved in designing these languages and programs. they do not evolve by "fortuitous chance". Are we to believe that the DNA program language and life form DNA programs evolved by "fortuitous chance"? Is not that an audacious supreme insult to the Supreme Designer?

What is the simplest life? How complex is it? The simplest known life form is the parasite Mycoplasma genitalium, It has long DNA strands of 482 coded genes consisting of 580,070 base pairs! [Science, 270 (5235): 397-403 & 445-446]

So evolutionists require us to believe that on the primeval shore there was dust consisting of all the right chemicals in the necessary amounts and in the right proportion (by fortuitous chance) all together in the right place at the right time, being lapped by water when suddenly they are zapped into the simplest life form complete with all the necessary DNA fully functioning RNA in place etc.etc etc.. "Marvellous what evolution can do" Is it? Anyone who believes something like that will believe anything.

The theory of the spontaneous generation of life does not even have a kick start. Evolution of life by fortuitous chance is a non-starter. So all the theorising about subsequent transmutation of species* being proof of transmutation across the barriers of distinctly different genera, is irrelevant. No foundational premise - no theory.

[* "species" is used to denote any variant within genera. In Genesis 1:12, 21 & 25 "kinds" is used for distinctly different life forms.]

THE ULTIMATE REASON

Speculating theoreticians, who places their faith in "fortuitous chance", should not be let loose in a research laboratory. In their search for fortuitous chance they would only bungle their research. Only scientists who believe that there is reason behind all physical phenomena can be relied on to have the right approach to research.

The ultimate reason has to be the supreme designer. That is why major advances in empirical science have been made by scientists who believe in the Creator. Even those scientists who do not believe in the ultimate designer have to admit that they do their research expecting to find reasons even when investigating phenomena that "have the appearance of" chaos.

It cannot be overemphasised that true scientists expect to find reason, expect to find design. Only bogus scientists look for chaos as the reason for physical phenomena and that is where the case for fortuitous chance producing order collapses.

CONCLUSION

Design must be in place for "fortuitous" accidents to happen.
THE ULTIMATE REASON HAS TO BE THE SUPREME DESIGNER

The heavens are declaring God's glory and the expanse is displaying His handiwork.
Day after day is uttering speech and night after night is showing knowledge.
There is no language and there are no words where their voice is not being heard.

(Psalm 19:1-3)

APPENDIX

A new term for the English language:-

"A weasel" - noun, figure of speech, irony: a computer program devised to always produce the answer intended by the programmer.