Dr. Richards’ purpose was to respond to an argument popular amongst atheists in the blogosphere, and he also attributed it to skeptic Michael Shermer. The argument typically goes something like this: ID theorists believe order in nature is due to intelligent design because they see “reliable indicators.” Many of these theorists also favor free markets. However, market order cannot be designed, as exemplified by the failed attempts to plan economies that ended in disaster. Free market order is an example of the appearance of design without a designer, therefore ID theorists live in contradiction.

Hayek and other notable economists have argued that it is epistemologically impossible to plan markets. Free markets coordinate goods between producers and consumers who are often unaware of each other in a way that usually benefits all who are involved. To plan such a market would require an incredible amount of knowledge that simply isn’t feasible.

Adam Smith claimed that people develop goods because of self-interest, the primary motivation is not the interest of others. Smith believed an “invisible hand” guides the promotion of better goods in such a market. Interestingly, Smith was a deist and believed that this hand was God’s providence.

Hayek put forward a more sophisticated argument against the notion that markets can be designed:

1)      Subjective Theory of (Economic) Value- Value is determined by what the consumer is willing to pay for the product.

2)      Humans are not telepathic or omniscient.

3)      Therefore, no human can coordinate a market better than the spontaneous ordering of a market.

Perhaps one could plan an incredibly limited market, but markets of any complexity require spontaneous order. Hayek went a step further and claimed that order from chaos occurs in natural sciences (i.e. natural selection), so there’s no principled problem with finding order from chaos in economics. Hayek would have been wiser to stick to his area of study.

Does Hayek’s argument show that markets can’t be designed? He has shown that no human can plan a market, but could God? Of course- God is omniscient so He has the knowledge required for such a task. Hayek’s argument works well against socialist planning of markets, but does not prove that markets can’t be designed by a being with knowledge of everything.