Biology expert testifies. Professor: Intelligent design is creationism.

York Dispatch ^ | 9/27/05 | Christina Kauffman

[whattajoke]

Human beings have souls; animals do not.
A very large portion of the world disagrees with you.

Humans are made in the image of our Creator
But were they made from clay or dust or ribs or thin air? I forget. Thank you in advance.

[whattajoke]

I really hadn't even paid much attention to the name-calling. That kinda goes with the territory I guess, and it says alot more about our opponents than about me or you.
Claptrap probably said it best, when he likened engaging in these crevo threads to "casting pearls before swine" :^]

I can't be the only one who was bludgeoned by this absurdly ironic post.

[Junior]

To support your position you need to supply evidence for the soul and the Creator. Otherwise, it's just conjecture.

[whattajoke]

Must be a pretty depressing life to be an atheist/agnostic.

I find your baseless accusation unjust and ignorant. I could say the same about someone who lives in constant fear of a supernatural judge who may (or may not) enforce 2000 year old dietary laws to such an extent that I and everyone I know may burn in eternal hellfire for eating some shrimp cocktail. That, my friend, sounds pretty damn depressing to me. (But I would never say such a silly thing.)

[whattajoke]

hook, line and sinker. You guys are too easy.

ME: A very large portion of the world disagrees with you [re: animals having souls].
YOU: So?! A very large portion of the world believes X42 is the greatest living American. Doesn't make any of 'em right.

Aaaaaaand therefore your particular belief that animals don't have souls whereas humans do is better/more correct... um, how again?

We are dust, no matter how important chest-thumping secular humanists think we are.

Is that what the bible teaches? Hm. Super special dust though, right? Cause now you're sounding like them sek'lar humanists you despise so much.

[whattajoke]

My life has plenty of purpose. I'm not depressed. What more do you want to hear?

I like to think I'm doing more than "just kinda hanging out." I'm experiencing the world, getting into debates with idiot liberals, reading, learning, traveling, loving, fathering, observing, teaching, feeling, etc.

I'm not sitting here judging your devotion to a nomadic desert myth as being deressing, am I? So stop doing the same to my rational beliefs.

[whattajoke]

And besides, why are we even discussing religion on this thread about evolution and "intelligent design?" There is no religious agenda WRT ID at all. Nope. uh-uh.

Off to bed. Toodles.

[Doctor Stochastic]

Ah, make the most of what we yet may spend,
Before we too into the Dust descend;
Dust into Dust, and under Dust, to lie,
Sans Wine, sans Song, sans Singer, and---sans End!
--Omar

[Dimensio]

What is "truth"?

Truth is a statement which corresponds completely with reality.

[Dimensio]

You can read God's own Word and discover the truth for yourself.

This is circular reasoning. You're assuming your conclusion again.

[Vive ut Vivas]

You can check fossil records and find some evidence of evolution. However, it's a huge jump of faith to extrapolate that and say that the world evolved from some form of primordial sludge at the beginning of time.

Maybe, although you probably would be less inclined to say that if you understood the evidence that exists. As of right now, evolution is the best theory we have for explaining origins. Of course it's not perfect, but it's idiotic to propose not teaching it now because it can be proved incorrect in the future. If you, and whoever is on the receiving end of this science education, understand how science works, then the future possibility of a complete reversal of a scientific theory is not a problem at all. It's completely normal.

Even then evolution cannot explain where that primordial sludge came from.

Nobody, except those that mischaracterize the theory and those that do not understand it, is proposing that evolution explains where the "primordial sludge" came from. Different branch of science.

If not being able to be proven makes it not be science, evolution is not science.

This statement is correct. However, since "not being able to be proven" does not make something "not be science", your statement is irrelevant. In fact, and you're not going to hear this only from me, nothing in science is ever proven. Surprise!

There are still simply questions that are better answered by divine intervention than by evolution.

Perhaps, but science is purely naturalistic, purely agnostic. It relies solely on empirical evidence. Evolution is the best explanation we have been able to come up with based on the empirical evidence. For the sake of science, it is imperative to assume that only naturalistic explanations exist within the context. You're free to come up with your own philosophical or theological explanations.

Actually we don't have the means to prove or disprove scientific theories, or they're no longer theories. If we can prove it it is considered a law, not a theory. The scientific process is the search for a way to prove or disprove a theory.

You're getting stuck on terminology and not thinking about concepts. Ignore the common usage meanings of "law" and "theory". They are meaningless in a scientific context. Science uses theories to propose explanations of natural occurances described by laws. Theories are always going to change and be proven "wrong", this is not news to anybody. This is why I propose that you not get stuck up on what's "actually correct" as opposed to what's "wrong" - our knowledge base is constantly changing, and it's best just to accept the theories for what they are: the best explanation right now for the evidence available.

Exactly, you just contradicted your assertion that intelligent design isn't a scientific theory because it we haven't found a way to prove it.

ID isn't not a scientific theory because we haven't found a way to prove it; it's not a scientific theory because we haven't found a way to disprove it.

There isn't an invisible wall between science and religion. A honest scientist will tell you that there's much more about this world that we don't understand than we do understand.

Yes there is. You're looking to science to answer some questions for you that it never will. Yes, scientists know we don't understand the world, but science, by very definition, cannot address that which is not naturalistic. Perhaps your worldview includes the supernatural. That's fine, but it's not something that's even relevant to science.

If you forget that and close yourself off from possible theories because of dogma, you're limited your ability to learn through the scientific method.

Please go back and review what the scientific method specifically involves.

People who say that one or the other is not are not doing so on the basis of science, but on the basis of blind faith. That may be faith in God, or faith in something else.

No, people that say ID is not science are doing so because ID is not falsifiable.

[Vive ut Vivas]

Darwin didn't invent evolution or atheism. I'm sure there were atheists before Darwin

But you claimed that all atheists are evolutionists. Evolution didn't come up as a theory until Darwin, so atheists pre-Darwin couldn't have been evolutionists.

It doesn't matter to me what Dawkins or Gould say. You're still wrong. Atheism is not dependent on any knowledge of science whatsoever, just a lack of belief in gods.

Does anyone here disagree with the proposition that the idea that the universe is not designed is tantamount to atheism?

Yes.

[Vive ut Vivas]

No, you're missing my point. Bottom line is, man is not born "basically good" at heart. Man is born selfish and rebellious, with the innate tendency to seek only pleasure and serve only himself.

Kind of supports the proposition that humans are animals, doesn't it?

Only by a saving knowledge of the God Who made us (and made us to be better than we are by nature) do human beings have the moral character to choose good, defer our own wants, and serve others.

This is not correct. Do you think all atheists hvae no moral character and never choose to do good? If so, you need to get out more.

[bondserv]

You have not shown what increased complexity is let alone shown why it is necessary for speciation.

Speciation has no bearing on the mechanism that has produced the complexity evident in living organisms. Beneficial mutation does not lead to an increase in complexity; it only indicates the organism remains functional. The function of the genome is in it's marvelous intelligent programing. That it has maintained viability for this many years without the programmer making purposeful corrections is a testament to His genius.

Consider for example the callous. It does not code-in unless the person puts a stress on the epidermis for an extended period. This adaptation is similar to what Darwin discovered in the Finch beaks. Within the programming of the Finch was an ability to adapt beak strength and size to accommodate the conditions. When conditions reverted back, the Finch beaks followed suit, just as a good program would allow for. However if Shumaker-Levy struck the earth, beak strength wouldn't mean too much (it happened to a planet in our solar system within our geologically insignificant lifetimes).

BTW, what does gene duplication followed by modification provide?

1. This is an example of argument from incredulity, because irreducible complexity can evolve naturally. Many of the proteins in the bacterial flagellum or eukaryotic cilium are similar to each other or to proteins for other functions. Their origins can easily be explained by a series of gene duplication events followed by modification and/or co-option, proceeding gradually through intermediate systems different from and simpler than the final flagellum.

Beware: Talk Origins Link

These guys are trying to convince the great unwashed that because the parts could be interchangeable, they can logically assemble themselves into a mechanism of miraculously complexity. The design of the flagellum cannot come about with the concerted efforts of the entire scientific community (creating the chemistry that would assemble and maintain these strings of proteins into a functioning nano machine like the flagellum is way beyond our capabilities), and yet T.O. claims that because certain proteins are floating around performing other functions, the over 20 piece puzzle will self assemble (unlike the Infinite Monkey Theorem, chemistry removes the font from the page as the hammer retracts). Think it through man.

The human diseases that cripple and kill an increasing percentage of our population demonstrates that the evolutionary model being pawned is not making advances in beneficial characteristics. Considering the number of people that I know who would die if not for modern medicine, nature is failing miserably. And modern medicine is wearing boxing gloves in a china store, even with all of our directed intelligence.