Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

What is wrong with intelligent design?
EurekAlert! ^ | 22-Feb-2007 | Suzanne Wu

Posted on 02/22/2007 6:22:34 PM PST by Boxen

In a thought-provoking paper from the March issue of The Quarterly Review of Biology , Elliott Sober (University of Wisconsin) clearly discusses the problems with two standard criticisms of intelligent design: that it is unfalsifiable and that the many imperfect adaptations found in nature refute the hypothesis of intelligent design.

Biologists from Charles Darwin to Stephen Jay Gould have advanced this second type of argument. Stephen Jay Gould's well-known example of a trait of this type is the panda's thumb. If a truly intelligent designer were responsible for the panda, Gould argues, it would have provided a more useful tool than the stubby proto-thumb that pandas use to laboriously strip bamboo in order to eat it.

ID proponents have a ready reply to this objection. We do not know whether an intelligent designer intended for pandas to be able to efficiently strip bamboo. The "no designer worth his salt" argument assumes the designer would want pandas to have better eating implements, but the objection has no justification for this assumption. In addition, Sober points out, this criticism of ID also concedes that creationism is testable.

A second common criticism of ID is that it is untestable. To develop this point, scientists often turn to the philosopher Karl Popper's idea of falsifiability. According to Popper, a scientific statement must allow the possibility of an observation that would disprove it. For example, the statement "all swans are white" is falsifiable, since observing even one swan that isn't white would disprove it. Sober points out that this criterion entails that many ID statements are falsifiable; for example, the statement that an intelligent designer created the vertebrate eye entails that vertebrates have eyes, which is an observation.

This leads Sober to jettison the concept of falsifiability and to provide a different account of testability. "If ID is to be tested," he says, "it must be tested against one or more competing hypotheses." If the ID claim about the vertebrate eye is to be tested against the hypothesis that the vertebrate eye evolved by Darwinian processes, the question is whether there is an observation that can discriminate between the two. The observation that vertebrates have eyes cannot do this.

Sober also points out that criticism of a competing theory, such as evolution, is not in-and-of-itself a test of ID. Proponents of ID must construct a theory that makes its own predictions in order for the theory to be testable. To contend that evolutionary processes cannot produce "irreducibly complex" adaptations merely changes the subject, Sober argues.

"When scientific theories compete with each other, the usual pattern is that independently attested auxiliary propositions allow the theories to make predictions that disagree with each other," Sober writes. "No such auxiliary propositions allow … ID to do this." In developing this idea, Sober makes use of ideas that the French philosopher Pierre Duhem developed in connection with physical theories – theories usually do not, all by themselves, make testable predictions. Rather, they do so only when supplemented with auxiliary information. For example, the laws of optics do not, by themselves, predict when eclipses will occur; they do so when independently justified claims about the positions of the earth, moon, and sun are taken into account.

Similarly, ID claims make predictions when they are supplemented by auxiliary claims. The problem is that these auxiliary assumptions about the putative designer's goals and abilities are not independently justified. Surprisingly, this is a point that several ID proponents concede.

###

Sober, Elliott. "What is Wrong with Intelligent Design," The Quarterly Review of Biology: March 2007.

Since 1926, The Quarterly Review of Biology has been dedicated to providing insightful historical, philosophical, and technical treatments of important biological topics.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Philosophy
KEYWORDS: creationisminadress; crevo; crevolist; evolution; fsmdidit; goddidit; id; idjunkscience; intelligentdesign; itsapologetics
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-4041-6061-80 ... 641-649 next last
To: Williams
I thought intelligent design was a theory that certain designs were put in place at the beginning so that the universe tends toward certain results - life, intelligence, etc. Not that God specifically designed a panda's thumb, or the bamboo the panda eats.

If you accept that God, or another designer, put a mechanism in place that took millions of years to reach existing forms of life, then you're subscribing to evolution. As Oscar Wilde said, you're just haggling over the price.

This universe seems to tend toward life and awareness, two very great mysteries. The scientists say this is all just the result of random physical interactions, and I say hooey. A universe that can be aware of itself is more than random.

That argument reminds me of Douglas Adams' comparison of man to a puddle in a pothole. The puddle is in awe of the miracle that someone or something created a pothole in exactly his size and shape, never pausing to consider that he might have been formed in such a way as to conform to the pothole.

The available evidence does not -- at least yet -- support the hypothesis that the universe tends toward life and awareness. Out of an unfathomable number of worlds in our universe, without even getting into the potential number of past, present and future universes, we know of precisely one that supports life and intelligence. A lone data point cannot define a pattern.

41 posted on 02/22/2007 7:35:51 PM PST by ReignOfError (`)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 23 | View Replies]

To: Panzerfaust

Some of the proponents of ID think Space Aliens made us. Then there is the "13th Floor" crowd which thinks we are someone's computer simulation. The unifying point of view seems to be that things can't evolve without some outside designer making decisions along the way. So they don't have to figure out how things really work, because the Designer can make whatever he wants. Consequently, the IDers bury their talents in the ground, and we all know how that turns out.


42 posted on 02/22/2007 7:36:21 PM PST by SubMareener (Become a monthly donor! Free FreeRepublic.com from Quarterly FReepathons!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 34 | View Replies]

To: Rudder
A third and valid criticism is that Intelligent Design has no empirical data to support it.

A physician discussing medical acupuncture addressed the weak record that acupuncture held when it comes to placebo controlled double blind studies. He said that using the measurement techniques of Western science evaluate acupuncture was like measuring the performance of a work horse by putting him in the Kentucky Derby. The "scientific method" is man man made. It is not infallible.

43 posted on 02/22/2007 7:42:07 PM PST by outofstyle
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 16 | View Replies]

To: Central Scrutiniser
A creationist would open the hood of the car and say "I can't explain it, its a MIRACLE"

An evo wouldn't open the hood because it would have to be analyzed to see how old of a fossil it is.

44 posted on 02/22/2007 7:42:35 PM PST by taxesareforever (Never forget Matt Maupin)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 37 | View Replies]

To: Rudder

>A third and valid criticism is that Intelligent Design
>has no empirical data to support it

Evolutionists and Creationists have the same Evidence. What the evidence indicates depends largely upon the worldview of the beholder.

> has generated no hypotheses

Patently false. I could give you a long list of web sites where such hypotheses are forwarded, but your mind is probably made up.

> scientifically-generated results in scientific journals

They are generally not allowed to publish any of their findings in any of the Mainstream "scientific" journals.

The same kind of ideologues dominate "scientific" journalism as those that dominate what we call the Main Stream Media around here. In some cases, they probably even share the same board of directors, or at least some of the directors.

The religion of Evolutionism has many of the same hallmarks as the religion of Environmentalism; the same kinds of assertive pronouncements and predictions from "on high" that, when proven false, are quickly shoved under the rug; the same blackballing for heresy; the same schoolyard name calling; the same categorical dismissal of the other side's arguments with derision and sarcasm.

I fully expect the Evolutionists in this forum to disparage my remarks with the most biting derision they can muster. They will characteize me as a mouth-breathing, knuckle-dragging, pie-eyed moron, when clearly my writing belies their assessment.

They haven't disappointed me yet.

I don't believe I've ever had an intelligent conversation with an Evolutionist, because they dismiss me as an ignoramus and a drooling idiot at the outset and their minds are clamped shut.

I was an Evolutionist once, so I understand this mindset.

I was also a Liberal once.

I don't think it was a coincidence that I was a Liberal when I was an Evolutionist. They have so much in common.

Well, enjoy.

... Time ... Will ... Tell ... All ...

.


45 posted on 02/22/2007 7:47:02 PM PST by Westbrook (Having more children does not divide your love, it multiplies it!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 29 | View Replies]

To: outofstyle
The "scientific method" is man man made. It is not infallible.

Good point, and a point which all scientists assume. That's why replication of results is so important in the scientific method. In all probability everything man conceives is not infallible, including the concept of God, a notion of a creator and intelligent design.

Where is all of the universe? In your head.

46 posted on 02/22/2007 7:50:32 PM PST by Rudder
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 43 | View Replies]

To: rickdylan
An evolutionist is somebody who could open the hoods to TWO cars, a Ford and a Chevy, and figure the engines in BOTH of them just kind of drifted together.

A scientist would find the VIN plate on the engine block, compare it to others observed on other cars, and compare to other references to figure out who made it and where. Science is based on amassing a body of evidence, not just taking a first guess, writing it down, and putting it in a drawer.

47 posted on 02/22/2007 7:58:10 PM PST by ReignOfError (`)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 32 | View Replies]

To: Boxen

Well, if ID is untestable according to Karl Popper's idea of falsifiability, doesn't evolution's millions of years of transitional forms fit this because nobody had the chance to witness these changes? It is all totally interpreted by the observer. You have to take both theories on faith.

Doesn't the cosmoligcal 'big bang' 'life from nothing' theory fit this as well, since nobody was around to witness it? You also have to take this on faith: "In the beginning, there was nothing - then it exploded into everything."


48 posted on 02/22/2007 8:01:24 PM PST by Secret Agent Man
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: rickdylan
The problem is that both the secular evolutionists, and the intelligent designer stop when they get to their dogma. They do not look for the underlying causes or rules of organization and awareness. Stan's work approaches this from his discovery that God embedded the question and the answer to the question of the universe in the LETTERS of the Hebrew Bible, The Torah. Burkhard Heim, http://www.heim-theory.com, approached it from a multidimensional quantum geometry point of view. As the abstract to a paper based on his work states: "A unified 6-dimensional polymetric structure quantum theory by Burkhard Heim (1925-2001) will be described, which yields remarkably exact theoretical values for the masses, the resonances, and the mean lifetimes of elementary particles, as well as the Sommerfeld finestructure constant."

Interestingly, the first letter of Genesis is "bet" which is Hebrew for "house" or "home". It represents the distinction of inside from outside. "Heim" is German for "home" or "House". Cosmologically, Heim's theory says that the universe started as a "trinity of spheres", which Stan told me is one of the Hebrew traditions.
49 posted on 02/22/2007 8:05:47 PM PST by SubMareener (Become a monthly donor! Free FreeRepublic.com from Quarterly FReepathons!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 32 | View Replies]

To: taxesareforever

No, an evolutionist would take the system apart, determine how the engine worked and chart it out and build a knowledge base on how the engine worked and figure out how to make it better.

A creationist would look and say "I know nothing about this! It must be a creation of the Devil!"

And proceed to stone it and destroy the perceived "evil"


50 posted on 02/22/2007 8:06:44 PM PST by Central Scrutiniser (Never Let a Theocon Near a Textbook. Teach Evolution!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 44 | View Replies]

To: Rudder
Good point, and a point which all scientists assume. That's why replication of results is so important...

I hear you on this. The point is that "experiments" as we design them are limited. As a physician, I know that many "clinically proven" therapies are worthless. Everyone who actually cares for people knows that this is true. The scientific method is the best we have, and it is a tool that we are obliged to use. No reproducible experiments can prove that life evolved in the absence of a Creator. That it may have, is highly counter intuitive and mathematically unlikely. Nevertheless, it is certainly possible.

51 posted on 02/22/2007 8:08:03 PM PST by outofstyle
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 46 | View Replies]

To: Central Scrutiniser
A creationist would open the hood of the car and say "I can't explain it, its a MIRACLE"

With some American cars, it is.

I recall the billboards in the mid-80's for the Chevy Citation.

"Citation -- It Works"

(Off-topic: ...and that's more than Microsoft claims for its software, if the EULA is anything to go by)

Cheers!

52 posted on 02/22/2007 8:08:43 PM PST by grey_whiskers (The opinions are solely those of the author and are subject to change without notice.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 37 | View Replies]

To: Westbrook
The religion of Evolutionism

You lost me right at this point.

Scientists all over the globe, day in and day out, since the late 1800's have been searching for empirical data to test the hypotheses generated by the Theory of Evolution. Religions don't do this. Religion is the presumption of faith. Science is the presumption of the unknown until empirical data suggest otherwise.

53 posted on 02/22/2007 8:09:51 PM PST by Rudder
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 45 | View Replies]

To: rickdylan
An evolutionist is somebody who could open the hoods to TWO cars, a Ford and a Chevy, and figure the engines in BOTH of them just kind of drifted together. The question of who or how many people or what kinds of people it takes to make Ford or Chevy engines is pretty irrelevant, neither one of them just happens.

And a creationist would imagine a great car in the sky who made the Ford and then lifted a piston out of it's engine to create the Chevy.

54 posted on 02/22/2007 8:11:03 PM PST by elmer fudd
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 32 | View Replies]

To: ReignOfError
Come on man, this explains it all:


55 posted on 02/22/2007 8:11:30 PM PST by Central Scrutiniser (Never Let a Theocon Near a Textbook. Teach Evolution!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 47 | View Replies]

To: SubMareener
In Jewish tradition, Hashem/Elokim ("Lord God") is undifferentiated and utterly Singular... This ideal "Echad" ("One"; singular, unique Unity) tolerates no differentiation ("a jealous God"), and no qualities knowable to us (beyond Singular All-Inclusiveness).

The theology is flawed even upon a cursory examination. God is one AND also has distinct parts. For example, the scriptures refer to His hand. It does not matter that this is metaphorical. If the Unity claim in your friend's argument where true, even metaphorical references to God's parts would be building idols in the mind.

Ezekiel 14:13 Son of man, these men have set up their idols in their heart, and put the stumblingblock of their iniquity before their face: should I be inquired of at all by them?

Joshua 4:24 That all the people of the earth might know the hand of the LORD, that it is mighty: that you might fear the LORD your God forever.


Intelligent Design requires god to apply a structured logic to the world, in order to force evolution.

It does not require that God's "logic" be limited to our comprehension of it. His "logic" can and must be superior to our logic.

Proverbs 3:19 The LORD by wisdom hath founded the earth; by understanding hath he established the heavens.

Isaiah 55:8-9 For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD.
[9] For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.


no qualities knowable to us [other than sinularity] ???

What about the many titles of God? His qualities are knowable by the very text which your friend claims to validate his wrong ideas. God is Holy, Pure, Faithful, Gentle, Kind, Strong, Patient, and on and on. It seems your friend is hiding from God behind a veneer of religious speculation.
56 posted on 02/22/2007 8:19:57 PM PST by unlearner (You will never come to know that which you do not know until you first know that you do not know it.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 27 | View Replies]

To: Central Scrutiniser
Bonus Question: Is Hell exothermic (gives off heat) or endothermic (absorbs heat)?

Most of the students wrote proofs of their beliefs using Boyle's Law (gas cools when it expands and heats when it is compressed) or some variant.

One student, however, wrote the following:

First, we need to know how the mass of Hell is changing in time. So we need to know the rate at which souls are moving into Hell and t he rate at which they are leaving. I think that we can safely assume that once a soul gets to Hell, it will not leave. Therefore, no souls are leaving.

As for how many souls are entering Hell, let's look at the different religions that exist in the world today. Most of these religions state that if you are not a member of their religion, you will go to Hell. Since there is more than one of these religions and since people do not belong to more than one religion, we can project that all souls go to Hell.

With birth and death rates as they are, we can expect the number of souls in Hell to increase exponentially. Now, we look at the rate of change of the volume in Hell because Boyle's Law states that in order for the temperature and pressure in Hell to stay the same, the volume of Hell has to expand proportionately as souls are added.

This gives two possibilities:

1. If Hell is expanding at a slower rate than the rate at which souls enter Hell, then the temperature and pressure in Hell will increase until all Hell breaks loose.

2. If Hell is expanding at a rate faster than the increase of souls in Hell, then the temperature and pressure will drop until Hell freezes over.

So which is it?

If we accept the postulate given to me by Teresa during my Freshman year that, "it will be a cold day in Hell before I sleep with you, and take into account the fact that I slept with her last night, then number two must be true, and thus I am sure that Hell is exothermic and has already frozen over.

The corollary of this theory is that since Hell has frozen over, it follows that it is not accepting any more souls and is therefore, extinct...leaving only Heaven thereby proving the existence of a divine being which explains why, last night, Teresa kept shouting "Oh my God."

THIS STUDENT RECEIVED THE ONLY "A"

Cheers!

57 posted on 02/22/2007 8:20:59 PM PST by grey_whiskers (The opinions are solely those of the author and are subject to change without notice.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 55 | View Replies]

To: Central Scrutiniser
No, an evolutionist would take the system apart, determine how the engine worked and chart it out and build a knowledge base on how the engine worked and figure out how to make it better.

I agree an evolutionist may take it apart but then would ask the advice of of 40 people with PhDs what makes it tick and everyone would have a different opinion and therefore it would never get put back together. However, there will be at least one who would look into the exhaust pipe believing he could observe the past and see how the engine was initially put together.

58 posted on 02/22/2007 8:25:28 PM PST by taxesareforever (Never forget Matt Maupin)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 50 | View Replies]

To: outofstyle
The scientific method is the best we have, and it is a tool that we are obliged to use.

As a physician and former research scientist, I recall the wisdom of Dean Turner (JHH) when he wrote that a good physician sits on a three-legged stool: Education, Experience and Intellect.

When I stared clinical practice rather late in life after I had retread from scientist to clinician at JHH, I was full of education. After 20 years of clinical practice, I value experience more.

59 posted on 02/22/2007 8:25:43 PM PST by Rudder
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 51 | View Replies]

To: grey_whiskers

That's the best post on this miserable thread!


60 posted on 02/22/2007 8:25:52 PM PST by Coyoteman (Religious belief does not constitute scientific evidence, nor does it convey scientific knowledge.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 57 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-4041-6061-80 ... 641-649 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson