Posted on 12/03/2005 5:28:45 PM PST by Right Wing Professor
TO read the headlines, intelligent design as a challenge to evolution seems to be building momentum.
...
Behind the headlines, however, intelligent design as a field of inquiry is failing to gain the traction its supporters had hoped for. It has gained little support among the academics who should have been its natural allies. And if the intelligent design proponents lose the case in Dover, there could be serious consequences for the movement's credibility.
On college campuses, the movement's theorists are academic pariahs, publicly denounced by their own colleagues. Design proponents have published few papers in peer-reviewed scientific journals.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
RIF: Fascinating. My statement, “The approach of intelligent design is to analyze phenomena, through the use of logic and math, in order to reach a conclusion,” itself arises from my own a priori (and simple) reasoning. A priori reasoning is present in any instance of human discourse.
So your answer to his question is, "no."
RWP: “By the way, the process of speciation can be and is being examined by scientific methods.”
RIF: Examination by scientific methods is vastly inferior to demonstration by scientific methods, thus speciation goes in the category of untested ideas next to intelligent design.
You may have put your finger on something here. You appear to be admitting that ID fans want to "demonstrate" without "examining." I can accept that.
Speciation has already been observed, by the way. This makes it quite a distance from ID (at least in the sense you're using ID).
This is similar to the Drake equation which attempts to determine the probability of intelligent life in the universe.
The difference between Drake and ID is that the parameters of the Drake equation are being filled in by research.
No it doesn't. Once again you're imparting more substance to ID than it actually ventures to claim.
ID'ers have often noted that the "intelligent" agent could itself be a creaturely being. ID only "infers" the presence of "intelligent design" here and there, in this or that case. Such "design" might easily, in various scenarios, be present in a world that was not, overall, a product of creation.
Face it: philosophically ID is contemptably timid. A real creationist should be ashamed to defend it.
So If you have no actual ideas you compensate by writing longer sentences?
But does the research rely on "man-made facts," or the other kind?
One of the Drake variables is the percentage of stars having planets. These kinds of things are being filled in. It would also be helpful to find life on another planet or moon.
It would also be significant to find an earthlike planet without life.
My only point is that SETI can be and is being researched on many fronts.
Another difference is that the Drake equation is grounded in empirical observation - ie the parameters are based on the observed human position. So the equation is constrained to finding the probability of intelligent life like us.
However the ID version of the drake equation, which would be something like "the probability of an intelligent designer of life" has completely unknown parameters, as we know of no intelligent designers of sufficient ability to base the search on. We neither know the design method, or the motive.
Yet despite this it is ID which is claiming a definite conclusion. They don't simply say "our research is not conclusive yet". They are right out there saying "yep this flagellum *must* be intelligently designed". Wheras astronomers/cosmologists on the drake equation do not claim a definite conclusion even though they have a lot more background info about what intelligent life would be like.
I hope they find some intelligent life. We could use it here on Earth.
wow that would be amazing. Although I wonder if a planet can become earthlike without life - where would the oxygen come from?
“Einstein never felt the need to have a school board change the rules of science so his theory could be taught to high school students. He proposed a scientific theory, offered potential disproof (kindly enlighten us as to the potential disproof for ID), and then, when partial vindication for his theory was presented, held out for additional support. That's how science is done. Thanks for reminding us about Einstein.”
You’re welcome. So we shall limit all formal presentation of scholarly thinking by requiring that it be accompanied by an example of disproof. Einstein is not great because of the disproof he offered, but because of his courageous use of imagination to forge new paths in human thought.
“No faith at all. It is the theory that best explains all the known evidence. If you think it's based on faith, you're not paying attention.”
We can observe the replication of DNA in a test tube. We cannot duplicate the hypothesized process of the formation of species, so our acceptance of speciation as fact is a leap of faith.
“ID uses mathematics in the absence of all the known factors, so the math is junk, too. As I've posted before, ID pretends to be able to tell us the odds of rolling a six in an unknown number of passes, with an unknown number of dice, each having an unknown number of sides. Go ahead and show us how you'd calculate the odds under those conditions.”
You have shown no example of any violation of mathematical principles by proponents of ID.
You know what, I NEVER THOUGHT OF THAT BEFORE! Here in these threads we have half the anti-evos insisting that ID is just pure science, and has nothing to do with that religious creationism stuff; and the other half throwing tantrums about us evos being "anti-God," often when and because we criticize or dismiss ID.
Now it will be interesting to notice if there aren't some individuals that take BOTH positions!
“So If you have no actual ideas you compensate by writing longer sentences?”
To criticize form while ignoring substance is a sign of losing.
Okay, I’ll restate it more simply for you. ID is kind of like creationism and kind of like evolutionism, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t study it.
Whatever. He still didn't go around to school boards demanding (or even requesting) that his ideas be taught. No scientist whose ideas were eventually vindicated ever behaved in this way to my knowledge. Do you have a counter example?
You misunderstand the meaning of the word "theory" when used in the context of science.
Science doesn't deal in proofs, it deals with evidence. The theory of evolution will never be proven because scientific theories are never proven. Atomic theory isn't proven, germ theory isn't proven, gravitation theory isn't proven either. Scientific theories don't graduate to facts or laws - they are different things.
BTW, evolution (biological changes over time) is a fact - it has been observed. The Theory of Evolution is the scientific theory used to explain the fact of evolution.
Yep heliocentric theory. It isn't proven either. No theory in science is proven.
There are loads of contradictions on the ID/creationism side. I don't know if the same person presents both sides of the contradiction, but I don't know why they wouldn't. Some examples:
The regularity of the world proves a designer.
Irregularities and improbabilities prove a designer.
The Designer designed everything.
We can spot design when we see it.
Life is impossible, therefore ID.
The universe is made for life, therefore ID.
Evolution causes communism.
Evolution causes fascism.
Evolution causes the evils of capitalism.
Anything found in the wild is evidence of Intelligent Design; and your theories mean nothing unless you can actually produce something in the lab.
Anything people deliberately do in a lab is obviously evidence of Intelligent Design; and such tinkering tells us nothing about what happens in the wild.
" So Evolutionist believe in an unproven theory made up by a finite Human brain?"
NO theory in science has ever been proved. None.
"Evolutionist's offer no proof, only opinion, and yet want people to accept Evolution and then have the gall to to make fun of people who have faith in a higher power when you have nothing but faith in a chance and a theory!"
We do not make fun of people who faith in a higher power. We DO ridicule those who make blindingly ignorant statements about what evolution is, or what science is.
"Many of the goals of science is to prove there is no God and it can't."
Like the above statement.
" And as far as support for evolution, support is not proof, show me the proof."
Support is all ANY theory has; proof is for mathematics and whiskey.
Wow. That's a hilarious website. Thanks for posting.
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