Very true. The question is not whether intelligent agency can always be reliably inferred (in part, because an intelligent agent could mimic a mechanistic process) the question is, can it ever be reliably inferred from a given set of present empirical data for historical claims that are not verifiable via direct observation? It is apparent that in many branches of science these sort of abductive inferences are made all the time - Homicide detectives, historians and archeologists to name a few, because the actions of an unobservable agent can have empirical consequences in the present. I don't know what, other than a metaphysical bias that restricts a priori possible causes to only mechanistic ones as opposed to the actions of agency, that disqualifies this type of scientific reasoning from the study of origins.
Cordially,
Yes, but this is only the case because we deal with an agent with known attributes. Especially in this case where the agent is human we have quite a good grasp of his methods, motivations, abilities and, very important, his limitations.
This is obviously not the case with an unspecified agent who supposedly did X with unknown methods and for inscrutable purposes. Such a designer is compatible with just about any observation because you don't have a 'bounded' model of the designer as is the case with human designers for instance.
I don't know what, other than a metaphysical bias that restricts a priori possible causes to only mechanistic ones as opposed to the actions of agency, that disqualifies this type of scientific reasoning from the study of origins.
No, the reason why we exclude ID if nothing is known about the supposed designer is the fact that it is not falsifiable.