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It seems limiting that we must receive feedback from an item in order to observe it. Couldn't we calculate the existence of indirectly-observable objects?

In some sense, this is what high-energy physics is all about. They come up with mathematical models to describe all the particles and such that they know about, and those models predict other particles that haven't yet been observed. The classic example of this is the neutrino. You need neutrinos to make subatomic physics work properly, yet neutrinos are (approximately) massless and don't really interact with anything. Even if you were deep underground, they'd be happily flying through you and the earth without bothering to stop and have some tea.

The trick, then, is constructing experiments to validate the existence and alleged properties of neutrinos. That's what science is all about.

As to Intelligent Design, the pseudo-religious movement, I went slogging through the Discovery Institute's web site to see if I could find a concise expression of the theory. Here's the best I could find:

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The fact that intelligent design doesn’t identify the source of design is not political calculation but precise thinking, refusing to go beyond what the scientific evidence tells us. Consider intelligent design’s most famous design inference, the bacterial flagellum. Michael Behe shows that this microscopic rotary engine, like an automobile engine, needs all of its machinery in place to function at all. The best explanation for this irreducibly complex machine is intelligent design, but there's no inscription on the bushing of this little motor that identifies its maker. To discover the identity of its designer(s), one has to look beyond science.


That's one of their shining star theories. Of course, evolution certainly can explain the evolution of the flagellum and is the best theory for why. Before ID can be a part of a science curriculum, it needs to (a) propose theories that are testable and (b) perform those tests. Until they've done so, ID is, at best, an alternative creation myth.