Intelligent Design in Historical Perspective

Abstract

The advocates of intelligent design hold that important properties or aspects of nature are intended i.e., that they are the results of intelligent planning and design. In other words, they maintain that some features of cosmos and nature (i.e., the physical universe and the living things) are caused by nonhuman intelligence. Nothing in particular is said about the nature of the designer. However, it is clear that most advocates of intelligent design imagine a transcendent designer and not some other sort of extra-terrestrial intelligence. In this way, the position is mainly related to the various religious beliefs according to which the universe is conceived as the outcome of divine intention.