International interest in intelligent design is growing. On a new episode of ID the Future, I welcome back Dr. Brian Miller, this time to discuss his recent participation at a conference on science and faith in Guadalajara and to explain how intelligent design is making inroads internationally.

In his presentation to Mexican students and faculty, Dr. Miller summarizes several lines of evidence for intelligent design. As he explains the sudden appearance of new animal forms in the fossil record, he uses the popular Disney-Pixar movie WALL-E to make a helpful new analogy. In WALL-E, humans now live in space, having left behind on planet Earth huge mountains of garbage. Imagine aliens were to come to Earth and probe humanity’s artifacts: vehicles, appliances, gadgets, and the like. Not finding any designers present, and recognizing a number of similarities among the detritus, they might surmise that all the artifacts evolved from a common ancestor. Perhaps an automated factory produced them, with the occasional glitch in the software producing new variations and forms. Miller notes that this same problematic assumption is being made in biology today.

Miller was also able to convey to his audience in Mexico how a systems engineering perspective can be helpful to the study of biology. “Life does not look like the product of some undirected, incremental process,” he says. “What life looks like is the product of a mind which planned everything out very carefully in advance.”

Miller concludes by describing the enthusiasm and excitement for intelligent design he has experienced recently overseas. He notes the positive response from audiences in Gaudalajara, as well as Kenya and South Africa on a recent speaking tour. Miller says students and scientists in other parts of the world often exhibit a freedom of inquiry that is lacking in the United States. 

Dig Deeper

• Listen to Dr. Miller and Dr. Casey Luskin discuss their recent African speaking tour.