Those familiar with the debate about biological origins know that proponents of Darwinian evolution and proponents of intelligent design are typically at opposing ends of the spectrum. Less familiar but also noteworthy are those folks interested in making a robust case for design, including in biology, while also calling for peace, as it were — fully accepting what they regard as mainstream evolutionary science. This position offers the tantalizing possibility of having one’s cake and eating it too. If such an intellectual endeavor could be successfully defended, that would be quite worthy of attention.

Rope Kojonen’s recent and thoughtful book, The Compatibility of Evolution and Design (CED), provides an extended argument that mainstream evolutionary theory dovetails seamlessly with the biological argument for design. With my colleagues Brian Miller, Emily Reeves, and Casey Luskin, I have weighed the merits of Kojonen’s book — in a peer-reviewed paper, “On the Relationship Between Design and Evolution,” in a series of occasional articles at Evolution News, and in ID the Future podcasts. 

In what follows, I provide a summary of the main points of our critique. We argue that Kojonen’s model runs contrary to empirical evidence, lacks coherence, and even harms itself.

Problem 1: No Evidence

One of Kojonen’s key challenges is to provide evidence that design has something useful to add to evolution. As we write in our article:

The salient question in this article is one that Kojonen himself addresses: Are two explanatory appeals better than one? Why bother with ‘design’ if one already accepts ‘evolution’? Kojonen’s task is to show that the conjunction of ‘evolution and design’ is explanatorily superior to ‘evolution’ alone. To succeed, he needs to show that adding ‘design’ increases evolution’s explanatory value in a way that offsets the liability of violating Ockham’s razor. Kojonen holds that the kind of ‘design’ that fits the bill is the type in which God created the laws of nature, which ultimately lead to fine-tuned ‘preconditions’ (and smooth fitness landscapes) that enable evolution to occur. Kojonen gives several lines of evidence for this view, including research on fitness landscapes, the bacterial flagellum, evolutionary algorithms, convergence, and so on. His task is to show that this evidence makes his view of ‘design’ sufficiently robust and plausible to add explanatory merit to ‘evolution’. 

So, design adds something to evolution by supplying “preconditions” that allow evolution to succeed.¹ But does this account work? 

Unfortunately, Kojonen’s model runs contrary to the empirical evidence. We write:

In this article, we have argued that Kojonen’s account of design is flawed. It requires fine-tuned preconditions (and smooth fitness landscapes) so that evolution can successfully search and build viable biological forms. Yet empirical evidence shows that no such preconditions or fitness landscapes exist. At precisely the place we would expect to find evidence of Kojonen’s type of ‘design’, we find no such thing. Accordingly, his view of design is at odds with the evidence itself. As such, it is poorly situated to add explanatory value to evolution. 

Kojonen posits a specific type of design. But the actual empirical evidence shows that no such design exists. As a result, his conception of “design” adds nothing to evolution’s explanation of biological complexity.²

Problem 2: Internal Incoherence

A second problem with Kojonen’s view is that it fails to harmonize “design” and “evolution” in a coherent, unified way. We argue:

Kojonen’s conjunction of ‘design’ and ‘evolution’ is internally fragmented. Recall that Kojonen believes that the complexity of the bacterial flagellum adds to his case for joining ‘design’ to ‘evolution’. Yet Behe’s irreducible complexity argument shows that the type of design manifest in the bacterial flagellum runs contrary to mainstream evolution. Thus, the very system that provides strong evidence of design also undercuts evolution. In effect, this drives a wedge between the two. Kojonen’s conjunction of ‘design and evolution’ is at war with itself. [Emphasis in the original.]

Kojonen’s attempt to reconcile design and evolution is marred by the fact that one of his cited instances of design, the bacterial flagellum, fits extremely poorly with evolution.³

He also fails to harmonize “design” and “evolution” in his treatment of convergent evolution. He believes that convergence supports his conception of design yet he does not realize that convergence undermines his conception of evolution, including some of his own reasoning about it. We explain:

We also highlighted the internal tension in Kojonen’s attempt to join ‘design’ and ‘evolution’ with respect to convergent evolution. Kojonen draws on convergence as a key argument for the ‘laws of form’, which are an important element of fine-tuned preconditions and, thus, his case for design. Yet convergent evolution conflicts with Kojonen’s use of co-option and approach to protein evolution. It also conflicts with the general justification of common ancestry. Thus, this element of Kojonen’s case for design chafes against his own reasoning as well as mainstream evolutionary thought. Internal discord surfaces once again. 

Problem 3: A Self-Inflicted Wound

A final problem is Kojonen’s treatment of design detection. His model actually undercuts itself. In particular, his reliance on evolutionary (and non-agent) causes ends up harming his ability to recognize evidence of design in biology. As such, his adherence to “evolution” undermines his case for “design.” In effect, he pulls the rug out from under himself. We explain:

Finally, we raised epistemological concerns aimed at the fundamental basis of Kojonen’s understanding of design detection. If our concerns are correct, then they cut deeply against Kojonen’s design argument as well as his defense of the theist on the street. In a nutshell, our worry is that a person who takes Kojonen’s model seriously — or who lived in such a universe — would either have defeaters for her biology-based design beliefs or might not have the cognitive dispositions and beliefs that (in our experience) are foundational to the formation of such beliefs in the first place. Kojonen’s reliance on evolution (and non-agent causes) undermines his basis for design detection, in short. 

A Long Siege

According to a proverb, you can’t dance at two weddings at the same time. Rope Kojonen believes that you can. He contends that one can coherently accept both full-blooded evolution and full-blooded intelligent design. 

Having raised a number of criticisms of this argument, my co-authors and I also want to be clear that Kojonen’s book is a fine piece of scholarship. As we write in our conclusion, “[I]t is important to reiterate … the many strengths of Kojonen’s treatment. The extensive review we have given here is a credit to a book of remarkable sophistication, precision, and erudition. Only a mighty fortress is worthy of a long siege. The Compatibility of Evolution and Design is the best of its class.” 

The final paragraph of our article turns a corner to consider the implications of our criticisms of Kojonen’s model:

[W]e bring this article to a close on a poignant note: Kojonen’s model may have devastating implications for mainstream evolutionary theory. Recall that the heart of his proposal is that evolution needs design (in the form of fine-tuned preconditions). Evolution on its own is insufficient to produce flora and fauna. But if we are correct that Kojonen’s conception and justification of design are flawed, then it follows — by his own lights — that evolution is impotent to explain biological complexity. Kojonen’s own account of the efficacy of evolution depends upon the success of his case for design. But if the latter stumbles, then so does the former. In a startling way, Kojonen has set the table for the rejection of evolution. If he has failed to make his case for design, then he has left readers with strong reasons to abandon mainstream evolutionary theory. The full implications of this striking result warrant further exploration.

In a final post in this series, Casey Luskin and I will explore some of these deeper implications.

Notes

1. Strictly speaking, Kojonen’s attempt to harmonize “design” and “evolution” does not per se require fine-tuned preconditions. He argues, for example, that his model is compatible with divinely guided mutations. (See, for example, Kojonen’s response to David Glass in Kojonen, “Response: The Compatibility of Evolution and Design,” Zygon 57 (2022): 1024–36.) Be that as it may, in CED, Kojonen strongly emphasizes fine-tuned preconditions (CED, p. 63-68, 119-33, 156-74). This is the centerpiece of his model. Yet insofar as this conception fails, it’s not clear that Kojonen succeeds at showing how “design” and “evolution” are compatible. And surely this is a desideratum: whether “design” and “evolution” are reconcilable is closely tied to how they are to be reconciled. Second, if his model allows direct divine tinkering with mutations, it’s also unclear that his view of evolution is consistent with “mainstream” evolutionary theory. As such, it’s unclear that his model reconciles mainstream evolution with design. Third, even setting aside these two criticisms, Kojonen’s model, in its various conceptualizations, does not seem to escape our deeper epistemological concerns, which we describe below.
2. Given the lack of empirical evidence favorable to Kojonen’s account of design (in the form of fine-tuned preconditions), his account does little to fend off the claim that evolution provides a defeater for design arguments (or beliefs) in biology. 
3. To be sure, Kojonen takes evolutionary theory as a given and, thus, presupposes that an evolutionary account of the origin of the bacterial flagellum is correct. He is entitled to this assumption, of course. But it seems odd to claim, as he does, that the bacterial flagellum counts as evidence of design while, at the same time, ignoring the very type of design that it displays. Doing so seems to require either selectively ignoring empirical evidence or attempting to join “design” and “evolution” in a case where the two are actually in tension.