Terminology Tuesday: God-of-the-Gaps Argument
God-of-the-Gaps Argument: A type of argument that invokes God as an explanation for what cannot be explained naturally or scientifically. Critics of this style of argument claim that such a strategy will inevitably make God’s role in the universe appear to diminish as scientific explanation advances. Critics of the intelligent design movement allege that the attempt to argue for an intelligent cause of biological order is a God-of-the-gaps argument, but proponents of intelligent design argue that there is positive empirical evidence for intelligence as the cause of complex systems in nature.1
1. C.Stephen Evans, Pocket Dictionary of Apologetics & Philosophy of Religion (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2002), p. 50.
See also this video by John Lennox on God-of-the-gaps arguments.