From ResearchID.org

Breaking the Mold II: Empirical Research of Intelligent Design

by ResearchID.org. Initiated 10 March 2006.

For more introductory remarks, please visit Breaking the Mold I: Theoretical Research of Intelligent Design

Introduction

In order to undertake empirical research from an intelligent design framework, we should realize that the history of science is filled with promises, as well as challenges. From the perspective of ID, some current researchers, "standing on the shoulders of giants" from the scientific past, are standing on giants that have been dwarfed by materialistic ideology, while they themselves are also amputated by extreme reductionism and anti-teleology.

Therefore, a "revolution of the mind" must take place in those who will undertake design-theoretic research. A principle theatre of this revolution is recognizing the limited value of reductive approaches, and to transcend them through macro-research. This revolution is a progression into a composite scientific view that reductive and non-teleological approaches alone are usually impotent to even encounter.

The most important thing to remember when applying intelligent design as a heuristic is that intelligent design ADDS explanatory options to the possible scientific repertoire. ID takes no explanatory options away from current science.

Drawing on the strengths of conventional, reductive, and design-theoretic research, ID has the potential to propose explanatory and predicative research surpassing the veracity of current methods. This is only possible if this research retains high proximity to the evidence, being careful not to stray into wild imaginative hypotheses, like the current reductive and neo-Darwinian paradigms currently do.

Synthetic Outline

Viewing the whole process of applying the new concepts of ID from the ground up, a general outline could be:

1.) Natural Science Foundations - Study the domain of the natural sciences.

a. Criteria - Learn the currently accepted criteria for the natural sciences.

2.) Scientific Method - Understand how to use the scientific method in research applications.

3.) Disciplinary Foundations - Understand the inherent reasoning and logic of the discipline, especially by knowing the:

a. Object of Study - Learn what is currently defined as the proper object of study for the discipline.

b. Methodology - Become familiar with the trends and approaches of the discipline, including laboratory or field methods of data collection.

4.) Design Foundations - Become thoroughly familiar with the general concept of intelligent design and its subsidiary views.

a. Design Formulations - Master the pertinent ID concepts that are applicable to the discipline, as formulated by other design theorists.

5.) Reinterpretation - Learn how to look at old data in new ways, enhanced by ID perspectives. Develop new methodologies for interpreting data through the design paradigm.

a. Telic thought - Keep in mind there are heuristic highways, unbeaten paths, as well as dead-ends.

b. Integration - Brainstorm other potential ID approaches to the discipline.

6.) Testing Design - Proceeding with new interpretations, predictions, and testing of design-theoretic research.

We must begin to think about what science can tell us if there are teleological aspects involved in the origin and unfolding of phenomena.

a. Observation - Collect initial data utilizing conventional, reductive, and design approaches.

b. Hypothesis - Formulate an hypothesis that is amenable to empirical validation, based on the observations, previous research, and design foundations.

c. Experimentation - Develop and perform tests for the proposed hypothesis.

d. Conclusion - Evaluate hypothesis in light of the experimental results.