3) Scientists in the film thought they were being interviewed for a different movie.
As Richard Dawkins, PZ Myers, Eugenie Scott, Michael Shermer and other proponents of evolution appearing in Expelled have publicly remarked, the producers first arranged to interview them for a film that was to be called Crossroads, which was allegedly a documentary on "the intersection of science and religion." They were subsequently surprised to learn that they were appearing in Expelled, which "exposes the widespread persecution of scientists and educators who are pursuing legitimate, opposing scientific views to the reigning orthodoxy," to quote from the film's press kit.
When exactly did Crossroads become Expelled? The producers have said that the shift in the film's title and message occurred after the interviews with the scientists, as the accumulating evidence gradually persuaded them that ID believers were oppressed. Yet as blogger Wesley Elsberry discovered when he searched domain registrations, the producers registered the URL "expelledthemovie.com" on March 1, 2007—more than a month (and in some cases, several months) before the scientists were interviewed. The producers never registered the URL "crossroadsthemovie.com". Those facts raise doubt that Crossroads was still the working title for the movie when the scientists were interviewed.
4) The ID-sympathetic researcher whom the film paints as having lost his job at the Smithsonian Institution was never an employee there.
One section of Expelled relates the case of Richard Sternberg, who was a researcher at the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History and editor of the journal Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington. According to the film, after Sternberg approved the publication of a pro-ID paper by Stephen C. Meyer of the Discovery Institute, he lost his editorship, was demoted at the Smithsonian, was moved to a more remote office, and suffered other professional setbacks. The film mentions a 2006 House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform report prepared for Rep. Mark Souder (R–Ind.), "Intolerance and the Politicization of Science at the Smithsonian," that denounced Sternberg's mistreatment.
This selective retelling of the Sternberg affair omits details that are awkward for the movie's case, however. Sternberg was never an employee of the Smithsonian: his term as a research associate always had a limited duration, and when it ended he was offered a new position as a research collaborator. As editor, Sternberg's decision to "peer-review" and approve Meyer's paper by himself was highly questionable on several grounds, which was why the scientific society that published the journal later repudiated it. Sternberg had always been planning to step down as the journal's editor—the issue in which he published the paper was already scheduled to be his last.
The report prepared by Rep. Souder, who had previously expressed pro-ID views, was never officially accepted into the Congressional Record. Notwithstanding the report's conclusions, its appendix contains copies of e-mails and other documents in which Sternberg's superiors and others specifically argued against penalizing him for his ID views. (More detailed descriptions of the Sternberg case can be found on Ed Brayton's blog Dispatches from the Culture Wars and on Wikipedia.)
1002 Comments
Add CommentFace it guys. The whole debate...infact MOST debates brought about by human beings is about 'power'. For history eternal even before we came down from the trees all the way up to the middle ages we created groups - strong groups - of individuals that wanted power, to expouse and force their view on us. For example in the dark ages we would be thrown into a dungeon or killed for our views that did not fit in with those in power. For millennia the people who wanted power used religion, pegan beliefs or other ideologies to hold people prisoner lest they should disagree. I THANK GOD that through the hard work of OBJECTIVE PEOPLE and through scientists, mathematicians, physicians, physicists etc we now have a society that can no longer be ruled by a few people who use religion for their own needs. I am on the side of science and oppose the struggle of these oppresive people(who are trying to use religion) to get the power back. Its not about ID. Its about power. They must be stopped.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDarwin can say all he wants that neglecting the poor and weak is evil, but such neglect is still the logical conclusion of his theories, especially "survival of the fittest". If he wants to go about making such a religious statement, that neglecting the weak and poor is evil, he better be able to back it up.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIn addition, he should be able to provide reason for WHY men are to be differentiated from other species when it comes to protecting the weak and poor instead of allowing them to die off.
Another thing he doesn't want you to know--that he'd like to silence Darwin. From an interview:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"5. What would you like to say to Darwin?
[Ben Stein replies]"You are a wealthy man, you married a wealthy
woman, why don't you just live quietly out in the countryside and not
torture us with your half-baked suppositions, which have caused so
much misery?"
http://www.citizenlink.org/content/A000007058.cfm
There you are, Stein would essentially tell Darwin to shut up, not to
publish his science. It's the complete opposite of the freedom-fighting persona that he's trying to put over onto a gullible public.
This alone indicates that Stein is primarily interested in repressing
freedom of inquiry, and freedom of speech, at least where this goes
against his prejudices.
Glen Davidson
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7
What do you want from a Nixon speech writer?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWithout disputing any of the article content, the simple existence of this article shows that Scientific American has an agenda.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisskreezy: In fact animal altruism is well-known. Non-human mammals, for example, take care of the weak and poor all the time: not just their own young, but other members of their social groups. Vampire bats, for instance, willingly feed other bats who have not managed to get enough to eat that day. Walruses adopt orphans (even though they don't spread their genes that way), bonobo chimps care for the sick and injured, etc.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf you're curious how Darwin applies, Google altruism +animals
"Darwin can say all he wants that neglecting the poor and weak is evil, but such neglect is still the logical conclusion of his theories, especially "survival of the fittest". If he wants to go about making such a religious statement, that neglecting the weak and poor is evil, he better be able to back it up.
In addition, he should be able to provide reason for WHY men are to be differentiated from other species when it comes to protecting the weak and poor instead of allowing them to die off
Evolution, change and diversity go hand in hand. All of them are dangerous to the powers that be. Evolution is a dangerous idea and must be squashed by those in power. Obviously they will use all means necessary to bring back the dark ages so that fear can rule again.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this@ richardmumolo: are you serious?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRichardmumolo,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisVery intuitive conclusion. A scientific journal that publishes an article that refutes ignorant and intolerant right wing Christian propaganda that cannot even poorly masquerade itself as a psuedoscience. Indeed they have a clear agenda, science. Well done.
I havent seen this "movie" and not planning to. This "Expelled" movie really is a very lousy attempt to monetary gains but not to be shrugged off and dismissed as this will really affect those who are "mentally challenged" in the evolution part at least. May Ben Stein's "god(s)" bless him a thousand fold for his very very exemplary work. I salute Scientific American for pointing out these very important facts. Keep blogging on evolution. I always visit your site everyday,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFirst to skreezy: Not to offend you, but you clearly have a poor understanding of just how the theory of evolution works. This is a common problem in today's society as groups with religious agendas intentionally (or perhaps even stupidly) misconstrue what evolution is saying. Darwin never actually used the words "survival of the fittest" (although in the proper context, this is a perfectly adequate phrase), he actually believed in "survival of the best adapted". Being "fit" has nothing to do with physical strength. Rather, whether or not you are fit is a question of whether your physical (or in mankind's case, mental) attributes are beneficial to you in your environment. Whether these attributes make you better able to survive and reproduce. Mankind's "altruism" and "good-will" for each other is quite beneficial because it allows us to be collectively strong despite the fact that we're individually weak. A world of doctors would have nothing to eat just as a world of farmers would have no one to heal them. Furthermore (and this is something that Darwin was most likely unaware of since it regards genetic mutation which was hardly even suspected at the time) according the modern theory of evolution, mutations [or changes] in an animal's (or person's, if you don't consider humans to be animals) genetic structure [which determines our physical and mental attributes] are RANDOM. DNA is such a fragile (but still reliable) compound that even in humans--who have very strong and stable DNA--a mutation could take place in any child at any time. This means that a stupid/weak person is just as capable of giving birth to an intelligent/strong person as an intelligent/strong person is of giving birth to a stupid/weak person. Therefore, eliminating those that some might label as "weak" or "inferior" would actually be counter-productive according to the Theory of Evolution because it would reduce the available genetic pool and, in turn, the probability of a "superior" person being born. I think that this is all plenty of justification for how the success of mankind, in the context of its character, do in fact perfectly correlate with the Theory of Evolution.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd finally, to girl athee: that sounds like a rather religious commitment to science, no?
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Edited by crazimyke at 04/16/2008 7:01 PM
Maybe Stein and his supporters also want to go back to saying that evil spirits cause disease.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis makes, I think 5 or 6 articles SA has run on the front page of their web site in the past week concerning Ben Stein, and all of them have been hysterical rants.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI think SA is doing an excellent job of showing how anyone who even dares question Darwinism in any way whatsoever is witch hunted and burned at the stake.
Darwinism. The only supposed theory without direct experimental evidence in existence that cannot be questioned.
@frgrough:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI think all they are ranting about are the inaccuracies that Stein shoves forth as some sort of supposed truth, coupled with the dishonest means used portray them. And then calls it a documentary for religious types to have something to cling to and/or shout about as opposed to attempting to rationally understand or even learn about evolution.
I would imagine them having no problem with questioning darwinsim if the creaters of expelled were to do so in a responsible, rational manner. Bashing evolution for what they believe are the consequences of the theory is not a questioning of darwinism, its a half-assed attempt at riling up the bottom 5% and others who's heads begin to hurt upon undertaking any type of serious inquiry, throw up their hands and say...well I can't figure this out, god must have done it.
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Edited by Tommo0809 at 04/17/2008 4:27 AM
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Edited by Tommo0809 at 04/17/2008 4:50 AM
And if god is just a scientist in a white lab coat and we just "one" of his/he experiments,(think rats in a maze") what do you call it then?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat if we have been tinkered with (think genetic modafide food)_
If the lab rats thought they could explain where and why the cheese (mana) just appeared..... would we not have a great laugh....
So yes you can have it both ways, both are wrong to think they are the only ones who are right.
frgough, you have got to be kidding, man! Here is your statement:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDarwinism. The only supposed theory without direct experimental evidence in existence that cannot be questioned.
The best reply to such a statement is probably just to ignore it. For those of us who actually payed attention in high school and university biology, have critically thought about the research, and done our homework, it is just a concise statement of your scientific ignorance. But feel free to publish that thesis in a major journal, after all, if you were correct, well, you'd have a scientific revolution on your hands. If you don't have much success in that track, maybe you can publish that thesis where it belongs: on a bumper sticker, which if you are lucky might end up on a few minivans.
> This makes, I think 5 or 6 articles SA has run on the
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> front page of their web site in the past week
> concerning Ben Stein, and all of them have been
> hysterical rants.
>
> I think SA is doing an excellent job of showing how
> anyone who even dares question Darwinism in any way
> whatsoever is witch hunted and burned at the stake.
>
> Darwinism. The only supposed theory without direct
> experimental evidence in existence that cannot be
> questioned.
Hysterical rants???? Do you often try to make an argument by exaggerating to the point of being ridiculous? Your opening statement makes the rest of your scrawl less believable, but upon reading that as well, you're merely parroting the typical ID-proponent mantra, which are all false.
Evolution is one of the most researched and questioned theories in biological science. If you weren't a parrot you'd know that.
richardmumolo .... are you serious with this statement?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou said.....
"Without disputing any of the article content, the simple existence of this article shows that Scientific American has an agenda. "
You're right, there is a massive conspiracy at Sciam to advance the public knowledge & understanding of science.
This article is a perfect example of that.
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Edited by logica at 04/17/2008 8:10 AM
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Edited by logica at 04/17/2008 8:11 AM
It is interesting to think about logical necessity for creating scientific perspectives. If it trule is necessary to create these perspectives, one would have to admit that evolutionary scientists can prove through observation that certain types of human beings existed, but cannont analyze or study how they came to exist. This is a question rarely asked. The how is at best still conjecture.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOne of the more interesting observations I have of [u]Expelled[/u] is that the attempt to tie Darwin to eugenics and euthanasia is how neatly "survival of the fittest" fits in with modern American conservatism. It seems the American conservative movement's emphasis on individual responsibility and the perfect power of market forces to solve all problems is precisely a form of the doctrine of survival of the fittest.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThat pic is of Mr Stein staring at Darwin in the Natural History Museum, London. There's a caption contest running over at the Beagle Project blog.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHere's an idea, instead of attacking the small details of the movie, discuss the overarching purpose of the film, which is that evolutionary science is attempting to push away all the theories that irritate their theory. True science has always irritated the theories of it's day, and thats what this movie is talking about, that this new theory is being discriminated against because it's different, and that is just wrong. Maybe this theory of ID deserves a second look, they have some excellent points to a solid theory that are rarely mentioned in your articles, and I can't help but feel that you're being slightly hypocritical in these hate articles you're writing in the "scientific american". I only read about how this movie irritates you, rarely a word about the science involved. How's about you step off your pedestal, return to the humble realm of science, where people are proven wrong all the time, and attempt to prove the ID movement wrong instead of just writing hate propaganda.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTo Blake,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDid you read this article or are you simply responding out disgust for all who do not believe as you? It plainly states in the article that one of the major flaws with Intelligent Design as a scientific theory is that there is no way in which to attempt to disprove it. This does not mean that the theory is right, it simply means its a great idea but not something that can be proven or dis-proven and therefore resides outside of the realm of science. Yes, scientific theories are proven false all the time, but that is why they are theories... they can be supported or falsified by evidence gathered in experiments. When they are not supported by the evidence new theories are formed to explain the new data, this process cannot occur with ID.
I personally believe ID, but the idea that it should be thought of as Science is foolish at best.
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Edited by magichj at 04/17/2008 9:30 AM
I still think, even with the italics, the point of Darwin was that people would always try to wipe out the lessers if given the chance. The sooner we realize we are all monkeys the easier it is to pull the trigger.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWithout having seen the movie, I would guess Ben is using this quote to show how the 'higher ups' are trying to use survival of the fittest to abolish the 'lower ideas' of ID without really providing concrete fact - mostly just bullying.
Awesome comment Blake, Except the writer does hit on the main problem with ID its the whole UNSCIENTIFIC part. Frankly Evolution can be observed, reproduced, and validated. That is the point of Science the ability to validate someone's claim. ID theories rely on you to accept an unverifiable idea than accept a conclusion on that made up idea with no proof beyond I say its true. That type of illogical, irrational, mindset is better left for the Dark Ages than for a period that understands the concept of the Scientific Method. Frankly to expect educated individuals to accept ID without the ability to reproduce, validate, and observe is not only silly but against the entire purpose of Science. If we are to accept ID with no more substance than the air I breathe than you must accept that magical monkies are holding you down and not this made up idea called gravity. My proof because I said so, you can validate it by asking me and I will say it again.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSide note good article.
Brianwood,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisShow me the re-creation of an evolutionary pathway in the laboratory (say like re-evolving eukaryotic bacteria) and I'll shut up.
We can create the random mutation, we can reproduce the environmental pressures. Run the experiment and reproduce the evolution.
We don't do it because it can't be done. It can't be done because DNA mutation is totally unrelated to morphological evolution. SA themselves ran the article discussing that finding a few weeks ago.
I stand by my statement.
Although I feel this article might be taken with a bit more venom than intended, I personally appreciate the tone at which it is presented. Thank you for that.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTo magichi,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAn evolutionist criticizing ID because it is not falsifiable is laughable.
Name to me anything that evolution cannot be invoked to explain. It's invoked to explain everything from the presence of junk DNA, to the lack of junk DNA to human morality, to lack of human morality.
In fact, it's invoked to explain everything. Evolutionary theory is the most unfalsifiable theory ever proposed. There isn't a single piece of biological data that evolution cannot and will not be invoked as an explanation for.
I fail to see how point #1 actually changes the interpretation substantially. Of more use might be a quote from Darwin's "Descent of Man":
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAt some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilised races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace, the savage races throughout the world. At the same time the anthropomorphous apes, as Professor Schaaffhausen has remarked (18. 'Anthropological Review,' April 1867, p. 236.), will no doubt be exterminated. The break between man and his nearest allies will then be wider, for it will intervene between man in a more civilised state, as we may hope, even than the Caucasian, and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as now between the negro or Australian and the gorilla.
(edited to fix newline issues in the quote, and add the following)
It would appear to me that Darwin is espousing the idea of races that are "higher" and "lower" on the evolutionary scale within mankind. And truly, as evolution is a gradual process, it would seem necessary for such distinctions to exist, at least in the sense that they would be observed in retrospect as making one group of humans more likely to propagate their genetic material in a given environment, taking into account social and environmental factors.
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Edited by emiller829 at 04/17/2008 10:18 AM
Natural Selection is an undeniable process. It is happening today and will continue to happen throughout the natural world. Man is no longer part of this process because society has taken on the role of helping those in need, trying to give everyone opportunity, and health care....all great things. Natural Selection is not at odds with ID......reason is.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://www.atheistrevolution.com
@frgough
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Show me the re-creation of an evolutionary pathway in the laboratory (say like re-evolving eukaryotic bacteria) and I'll shut up."
Hmmm... Design an experiment that re-enacts a billion years of random mutation and selection and arrives at the same result. Might as well ask for a laboratory demonstration of the birth of a star. Difficult as those sound, however, I can imagine a clever person designing an experiment to do just that. However, I can't for the life of me, imagine how to demonstrate, in the laboratory, the creation of eukaryotic bacteria by a Designer.
"It can't be done because DNA mutation is totally unrelated to morphological evolution."
This is news to me. I don't really understand how you can come to this conclusion if you grant inheritance and phenotypic expression through DNA. Maybe you're suggesting that selection operates only at the molecular level and not at the level of the phenotype? I can think of several counter-examples. Could you elaborate?
emiller829 - Basing the validity of a scientific theory on the scientist proposing it will always be tenuous. Should we reject the Haber-Bosch process because Haber was the father of chemical warfare? Certainly not. Rejecting Evolution based on Darwin would also be silly. I was often disturbed by accounts in the Voyage of the Beagle, but I was just as disturbed by medicine of that era. Good science should be based on the validity of the hypothesis.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThat is not always immediately the case because respected scientists will always be given more credibility than young or unknown scientists. However, with time, the good science rises to the top. The resistance to new theories is one of necessity. If the rules under which science operated were constantly in flux, experimental design and procedure would become much more difficult than it already is.
MrTasses:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'm not really basing it on Darwin's comments so much as I see no other valid course of reason than the one he outlines. If one is to assert that certain genetic traits make one individual more likely to pass on his genetic material than another, then I'd welcome a more rosy view of future happenings to be submitted.
Let me describe the scenario I am picturing, to perhaps explain the stance I’m taking a bit more thoroughly. This is more of a philosophical question than a scientific one, I’m aware.
If we view the races of mankind as Darwin did in the previous quote, as existing on some sort of continuum from less advanced to more advanced, such that distinctions can be made about one group being more evolutionarily advanced than another (and it seems necessary to do so, even if those types of judgments can only be made in retrospect), then it seems that one or more of several outcomes become likely:
1. Genocide by those who are deemed (or deem themselves) more evolved than others will be rationalized as a continuation of survival of the fittest and a belief that the ends will justify the means.
2. The “less evolved†members may be subjugated by their “superiors†into slavery or a working caste.
3. If, as I would hope, part of what we consider more “advanced†about the human mind is its capacity for compassion and institution of certain laws and rights endowed mankind, we will actually retard the pace of our own evolution by artificially propagating the genes of those less suited to survive, eventually being “caught up to†by other species.
4. Non-violent eugenics may be employed to continue advancing the gene pool, possibly by leaps and bounds far beyond what natural selection would provide. The most advanced of these procedures would no doubt be available to only the countries/individuals with the means to finance them, turning the “class divide†into a “gene divide.â€
5. Eventually, in any case, if we assume that evolution is indeed a fact, mankind will produce offspring that are unable to mate with humans and give rise to a new species. It seems to my admittedly meager intellect at this point unavoidable that at some point in the future of that species, they will come to look at homo sapiens as we might a neanderthal. Further still, a chimpanzee, and at some point long after, a dog. Will the self-awareness of homo sapiens be enough to grant us equal rights by that time, assuming our branch of the evolutionary tree still survives? I don’t know, but at that point, more than ever, I can see the cycle begin anew at #1.
This is why it seems to me that it is fair to draw the relationship the film does. It seems inevitable that at some point, genocide is the end result. The only question is whether or not those doing the killing are far enough removed evolutionarily from those being killed for it to be classified as genocide, or something akin to the woolly mammoth’s extinction. The core flaw in Hitler’s “logic,†so far as the logic of a madman can be called so, is that he wrongly perceived this line to have already been crossed and therefore dismissed the ethical quandary.
When did the S A of my youth become a liberal political rag?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this@Matt W
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Design an experiment that re-enacts a billion years of random mutation and selection and arrives at the same result"
Please, lets not confuse these poor misguided souls any more than they already are. Evolution has nothing to do with randomness. That is a word IDers like to throw around to discredit evolution.
"Might as well ask for a laboratory demonstration of the birth of a star."
http://gizmodo.com/380291/inside-the-largest-laser-and-fusion-chamber-in-the-world ... Soon enough
Blake,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Here's an idea, instead of attacking the small details of the movie, discuss the overarching purpose of the film, which is that evolutionary science is attempting to push away all the theories that irritate their theory"
Ok. I highly doubt the ID proponents on the message board will take this seriously but let's give it a try. The problem is ID is not a scientific theory. Claiming that high complexity or the appearance of complexity could not have occurred through natural forces and therefore must be the act of a Designer or intelligent agent has nothing to do with science, it is not falsifiable. ID makes no predictions except the existence of a highly advanced "designer" because of the "appearance" of design in nature. ID is not unfalsifiable, nor does it make predictions therefore it does meet the minimum criteria to be a scientific theory. ID might be a philosophy but it fails the minimum criteria to be a science.
Many ID proponents will say well "evolution is a just a theory". Theory in science is a cohesive description of a phenomenon that attempts to make predictions. The lay usage of theory is more akin to "educated guess". Scientific theories lie on a continuum from barely-supportable to damn-near-certain. Evolution is at the tail-end along with the theory of gravity and the heliocentric theory of the solar system.
There are a number of problems with "design" theories in general. For example if you follow the ID argument, if a structure is too complex to have occurred naturally it must designed, the appearance of design means it was designed. Following the next step, a designer (who created the designed structure) must be extremely complex... who designed that designer? etc.... it is a never ending problem.
The interesting thing is an article like this exposes the practices of the ID movement for what it is, misdirection and misinformation. Lying to PZ Myers and Richard Dawkins about what they are being interviewed for.... paying extras to make it look like Ben Stein is doing a college speaking tour..... Misrepresenting the works of Charles Darwin and aligning him with eugenicists and the holocaust…. All the ID proponents are attempting to do is cry for fair play and obfuscate the issue with misdirection and misinformation.
KARANO SAID
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"When did the S A of my youth become a liberal political rag?"
Is science and the search for truth considered politically liberal?
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Edited by logica at 04/17/2008 10:49 AM
@oxilite
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Please, lets not confuse these poor misguided souls any more than they already are. Evolution has nothing to do with randomness. That is a word IDers like to throw around to discredit evolution."
I see your point, but there's no getting around the fact that mutation is necessarily random, even more so than Darwin thought (because he didn't understand the digital nature of genetic material.) I don't know that it's useful to dissemble about that. We just need to emphasize that [i]evolution[/i] is not random, guided as it is by unbiased selection, similar to the way that the random motion of free electrons can be guided by an electric field to produce current. (I think it's fascinating that though mutations themselves are random, that the [i]rate[/i] of mutation is not, and is subject to selection pressure.)
:-D
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI find the whole ID argument entertaining just trying to image some supreme being "Intelligently Designing" everything.
"hmm...I got bored of those big lizards, decided to run with those furry things I was playing with, now what? I know, let's see if I can get them to stand on two legs! It worked to make some of those dinosaurs fun, why didn't I think of that before?"
"Platypus?! Dodo?! Man, that must of been one heck of a party because I don't remember making those. Looks like I didn't give the Dodo enough brains to stay alive. Well, should be good for a bit of a chuckle."
"hmmm...this two legged thingy just looks kinda funny. A bit too hunched over. I'm just not sure where to go with this one. I guess I'll make a few models and see which one works for me."
Sounds more like a kid with a pack of Play-dough. If there really is an intelligence behind it all, our doctors would probably have some real good tips on some redesigns. The learning curve obviously stalled out.
As far as previous comments about having an inteliigent conversation without nit-picking the movie - sure, let's start by selectively cut out sentences from all texts to prove our points. Then, ever time you say "God did it" ,I get to say "Evolution did it" and not have to pull out all the empirical proofs that support evolution. Since you get to ignore all real world and laboratory tests that support evolution, I get to ignore...well, since "God did it" is all you have, then I guess I still come out ahead if I just get to ignore one thing on your side.
One can argue that the presentation of Darwin is wrong, but not with evolution itself. There is this phrase, [i]survival of the fittest[/i], which isn't quite correct, although it is close to correct.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEvolution occurs as an entirely negative process. It removes that which cannot survive to reproduce - period. Everything else is allowed. The greater the possible range of survival of forms, the greater the range of forms may appear. It is only when there are strong selective pressures that we see narrow "fitness".
Thus, a more accurate phrase is [i]non-reproduction removes associated genes[/i]. (But it has to be as a class, individuals can give their reproduction up for a gene group and improve overall reproduction.)
But it also isn't true that humanity is no longer under evolutionary selection. We are. But the selection is quite complicated. Look around. What do we see today that is causing low or no reproductive success?
Blake,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere is no real need to change the topic at this point. The question at hand is whether or not intelligent design is science. Arguing the "holes" in the theory of evolution does not elevate the concept of intelligent design. I assume therefore that by changing the subject you concede that ID is not in fact science as otherwise you would likely have some argument supporting its validity as such.
To your points on Darwin's Evolution, yes there are a number of studies being done and a number of theories out there that are based on Darwin's theories and expand upon them. There is no real need to discuss these as it just muddies up the waters for most. Suffice it to say that science is always evolving and trying to explain more and more about our universe. It does this by building on what is known and theorizing as to what is unknown.
Intelligent Design (if you do not mind me getting back to the point) just takes all that is unknown and figures we don't really need to know about it. That is all well and good and 99% of people who believe evolution to be true will not try to dissuade you in your beliefs. There are zealots on this side of the aisle as well as on yours, but the vast majority of us will leave you alone.
What is baffling to me, however; is how believers in intelligent design somehow believe that it should be taught as science as an alternative to evolution. You have already ceded the point that ID is not science and so I assume you do not hold this viewpoint.
It's pretty clear to anyone who has seriously studied history that there's no link between Darwin's work and the Holocaust - however, even if that link could be proven, it's important to note that this link would have no impact on the truth of evolution. A truth is independent of its societal impact.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisA major scientific problem with proposed atheistic explanations for life is that their proponents cannot suggest any good way to disprove them. Atheistic "theories" are so vague that even if specific explanations are disproved, proponents can simply search for new signs of purposelessness. Consequently, investigators should not generally consider atheism to be a productiveor useful approach to science.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this--
Edited by OneEye at 04/17/2008 11:39 AM
"It would appear to me that Darwin is espousing the idea of races that are "higher" and "lower" on the evolutionary scale within mankind. And truly, as evolution is a gradual process, it would seem necessary for such distinctions to exist, at least in the sense that they would be observed in retrospect as making one group of humans more likely to propagate their genetic material in a given environment, taking into account social and environmental factors."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis is nonsense and has been discredited for a century or more. 'Race', though a real phenomenon, is a social construction and not a biological one. Your use of the classification 'Caucasian' in your post (and your hint that Caucasian refers to the currently 'highest' racial classification) completely expose your anachronism (and, to put it bluntly, racsim.) The genetic disparity between groups of white people is often greater than that between groups of different skin color.
There are several problems with your supposed options for the future of humanity (eugenics, active selection, or genocide.) 1) Evolution supplies no moral imperative; it is a force of nature, not a program or agenda. 2) Selected traits are inherently unpredictable. Why, for instance, in a species so obviously reliant on sight, is myopia so prevalent? Perhaps there are other traits which render perfect vision less important. 3) 'Race', 'savage', 'civilized' are all cultural constructions that are completely unrelated to cladistics or selection fitness, and therefore are not useful in any way for evolutionary speculation.
Matt W:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'm assuming you are referring to me in your post.
That was not my use of the term Caucasian, it was Darwin's. Aren't you familiar with Descent of Man?
Here's the quote from my original post -- again, note the attribution:
I fail to see how point #1 actually changes the interpretation substantially. Of more use might be a quote from Darwin's "Descent of Man":
At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilised races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace, the savage races throughout the world. At the same time the anthropomorphous apes, as Professor Schaaffhausen has remarked (18. 'Anthropological Review,' April 1867, p. 236.), will no doubt be exterminated. The break between man and his nearest allies will then be wider, for it will intervene between man in a more civilised state, as we may hope, even than the Caucasian, and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as now between the negro or Australian and the gorilla.
> A major scientific problem with proposed
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> atheistic explanations for life is that
> their proponents cannot suggest any good way
> to disprove them. Atheistic "theories"
> are so vague that even if specific
> explanations are disproved, proponents can
> simply search for new signs of
> purposelessness. Consequently, investigators
> should not generally consider atheism
> to be a productiveor useful approach to
> science.
>
> --
> Edited by OneEye at 04/17/2008 11:39 AM
I don't know of any atheistic explanations for life. Which ones are you referring to?
"That was not my use of the term Caucasian, it was Darwin's. Aren't you familiar with Descent of Man?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHere's the quote from my original post -- again, note the attribution:"
Ah sorry, missed that it was a quote.. no quotation marks you know (and you can't get this board to indent properly.) My apologies.
I don't know of any atheistic explanations for life. Which ones are you referring to? - MattW
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDarwinism.
"Darwinism" doesn't attempt to explain the origin of life, it attempts to explain the EVOLUTION of already EXISTING life. And technically, it's not "Darwinism" it's "Biological Evolution." You silly, silly, uninformed people, wikipedia.org is right over there.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisCriminey, I get so emotional reading this drivel, first it's anger, then outrage, then pity, then I go and cry myself to sleep because of the pure ignorance still out there in the world.
I love the internet, but man, it really popped my cherry about how, let's say "intelligent" or "informed," most people are NOT the first time I hit a message board/forum.
--
Edited by sykotik at 04/17/2008 12:09 PM
--
Edited by sykotik at 04/17/2008 12:16 PM
> I don't know of any atheistic explanations for life.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> Which ones are you referring to? - MattW
>
> Darwinism.
Ah. It's best to be clear. Your vague statement about how 'atheistic theories' are vague left me confused. Problem is that Darwinism (by which I assume you mean the explanation of the origin of species through mutation, inheritance, and unbiased selection) is held to have considerable explanatory power by many people of faith (including me.) In fact, had you read the article more closely, you'd find that this is one of the author's major points.
Not that this probably matters to you, but if you did some exploration, you'd find that 'Darwinism' is a fairly detailed framework of thought. Darwin's [i]Origin of Species[/i] itself contains a fairly thorough and precise description of the process. Since then it's been expounded and expanded upon by many orders of magnitude. What examples of vagary in this framework can you provide?
> Here's an idea, instead of attacking the small
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> details of the movie, discuss the overarching purpose
> of the film, which is that evolutionary science is
> attempting to push away all the theories that
> irritate their theory. True science has always
> irritated the theories of it's day, and thats what
> this movie is talking about, that this new theory is
> being discriminated against because it's different,
> and that is just wrong. Maybe this theory of ID
> deserves a second look, they have some excellent
> points to a solid theory that are rarely mentioned in
> your articles, and I can't help but feel that you're
> being slightly hypocritical in these hate articles
> you're writing in the "scientific american". I only
> read about how this movie irritates you, rarely a
> word about the science involved. How's about you step
> off your pedestal, return to the humble realm of
> science, where people are proven wrong all the time,
> and attempt to prove the ID movement wrong instead of
> just writing hate propaganda.
This is the biggest problem with ID-ers. You do not understand the terminology of those in the world of science. The use of the word "theory" is the biggest faux pas committed.
Theory in a scientific sense means "A logical structure that enables one to deduce the possible results of every experiment that falls within its purview."
Theory as the ID'ers use it mean "An unproven conjecture."
Now you see with these two very different meaning of the word one sees no confusion between The "logical structure that enables one to deduce the possible results of every experiment" of Evolution and the "unproven conjecture" of Intelligent Design.
Now we can set ID off to the side as completely unscientific since it can not deduce any experiment under it's preview. One can not walk into a lab and say ID made it happen and have that as a plausible deduction.
So called "vague" versus "God did it"; I think I'll go with vague since it doesn't extend itself to the realm of fantasy. Science only does credit to itself by admitting that we do not know all, as opposed to making up "magical" reasons for what we don't yet understand.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> Problem is that Darwinism (by which I assume you mean
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> the explanation of the origin of species through mutation,
> inheritance, and unbiased selection) is held to have
> considerable explanatory power by many people of
> faith (including me.)
I'm not sure what your faith is, but the fact is that Darwinism (incl. neo-Darwinism, punctuated equilibrium, etc.) is committed to the idea that life is not the result of any supernatural influence (or now even of any natural intelligent influence) whatsoever. This is the methodological assumption of Darwinism (which the article makes clear): Life is the purposeless accident of blind forces interacting in aimless ways. Evolution assumes that no God is involved in the universe, and then seeks to prove that fact by creating godless accounts of the origin and elaboration of life. It is not a case of "God or science," but of "God or Darwin."
But perhaps you are a deist and this is all okay with you.
> So called "vague" versus "God did it"; I think I'll
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> go with vague since it doesn't extend itself to the
> realm of fantasy. Science only does credit to itself
> by admitting that we do not know all, as opposed to
> making up "magical" reasons for what we don't yet
> understand.
The universe looks more like a designed artifact than a random event. Life looks more like the product of design than it does of random chance. Everyone, even Richard Dawkins, agrees with that. The difference between the atheist and the theist is not one of faith versus fact. The difference is that atheists refuse to believe the obvious evidence. The tautology lies with atheism: Metholodogical naturalism assumes that there is no God, then goes on to interpret all of the evidence in light of that assumption. In the end, guess what? They come away believing that there is no God! Hmmm. Surprising.
> The universe looks more like a designed artifact than
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> a random event. Life looks more like the product of
> design than it does of random chance.
Really? you compared it to anything else?
You see i can go roll a six sided dice, once and state that this die only rolls 3's. You have a probability of 1 in 6 before you roll the dice. you have a probability of 1 in 1 after you roll the dice.
You ID-ers are looking at the dice after it has been rolled and saying "3 is the only number."
> The tautology lies with atheism: Metholodogical
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> naturalism assumes that there is no God, then goes on
> to interpret all of the evidence in light of that
> assumption. In the end, guess what? They come away
> believing that there is no God! Hmmm. Surprising.
Disproving the existence of God is not the agenda of the natural sciences. There's no a priori assumption to that effect; the underlying assumption is that the natural world is comprehensible, i.e. that there are principles, which can be logically deduced from what we can observe, that can provide a unifying framework for both existing and future data. So far, it seems that the comprehensibility assumption is correct. If you want to assert that this is evidence of design in the universe or that it proves that God is rational, that's fine, but that is metaphysics, not physics; it has no bearing on scientific inquiry. Neither does it justify positing an outside 'intelligence' that had a role in the origin or development of life on earth.
If an intelligence intervened in Earth's evolutionary history, when and how did it occur? It should be possible, at least theoretically, to find evidence of such intervention, and perhaps make predictions about whether and how it will occur again.
> The universe looks more like a designed artifact than
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> a random event. Life looks more like the product of
> design than it does of random chance. Everyone, even
> Richard Dawkins, agrees with that. The difference
> between the atheist and the theist is not one of
> faith versus fact. The difference is that atheists
> refuse to believe the obvious evidence. The
> tautology lies with atheism: Metholodogical
> naturalism assumes that there is no God, then goes on
> to interpret all of the evidence in light of that
> assumption. In the end, guess what? They come away
> believing that there is no God! Hmmm. Surprising.
And on what grounds do you base your statement that the universe more closely resembles an artifact than a random event? You seem to equate the concepts of Order and Chaos with that of inteligence. That because there is a semblance of order, that it must be bound to an intelligence. That is a pretty huge leap. Do you not allow that it is more likely that what we percieve as order is because we are created of this universe and therefore cannot perceive it in any other way? We are an expression of the base nature of the universe.
What obvious evidence do you refer to? If you are suggesting that I must first believe in something before I can see any evidence supporting it, then your logic is highly flawed. That does not stand up to a basic test of logical truth.
Of course it is not suprising that someone that does not believe in your God would come away still not believing in a god. Its because time and time again we realize that so called divine miracles of all of the diety based mythologies are in truth, facts that can be truely understood by us, given the time to actually discover them. Or perhaps you believe that thunder is still the work of Thor's hammer? (sorry, likely wrong god for you, but its a mythology just the same)
So what irrefutable evidence do you have to offer me that would satisfy a basic truth of logic? This is not a sarcastic question, if you truly have one solid piece of truth that can equal with the numerous laboratory tests, fossil records, and real world, real time observations that "seem" (to make you happy) to support evolution, please share it here and now. Please know that the flawed arguements of "you have to first believe" and "it is too complicated to have just happened on its own" do not and cannot hold water. Just because YOU do not understand something, doesn't mean it had to be done by a divine being.
My two year old can do some amazing things with his finger up his nose that I am sure that you and I do not immediately understand, would you like to come worship him sometime this week?;-)
Also a quick note to all who keep arguing Darwin as if he is the end of and be all of the current evolutionary picture. Darwin just put us on the track, and that was well over 100 years ago. Yes there are flaws in his theories, epsecially concerning the "races" of man, however current "Theory" has also EVOLVED (gasp!).
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPick up a recent book, hopefully something under 100 years old.
--
Edited by StepUp at 04/17/2008 1:04 PM
Yeah... their agenda is science. Ben Stein is attacking and skewing science, so this refutation of his claims belongs here.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAll right:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this#1) Evolution does not in any way preclude belief in Intelligent Design or promote atheism. If you want to believe in an Intelligent Creator, you could easily say that "something intelligent" was necessary to BEGIN the process of life in the first place. Although this still falls outside the realm of science, at least it fits in with it a bit more neatly. But not a single ID zealot has tried to offer up something logical like that. You are all making this an "either/or" debate on your own.
#2) Let's take the ridiculous idea that "Darwinism" caused the Holocaust at face value for one stupid minute and pretend it makes sense. "Darwinism" did not cause the Inquisition, the Crusades, or September 11. If you are going to discredit evolution based on the assumption that it inspired Hitler, then you must also discredit organized religion based on the countless slaughters, wars, and attempts at genocide that have been inspired in the name of God.
#3) As SciAm themselves pointed out back at the beginning of all this, there's a good possibility that "Expelled" only contacted them in the first place to inspire controversy. I'm inclined to go with that. This is not an attempt at an intelligent debate. It's a scam for money. It's a known controversial topic, and a bunch of clowns are exploiting the really intelligent people reading SciAm as vehicles to instant infamy. If you take this debate seriously, the most important thing you can do is NOT pay to see this movie.
#4) If anyone posting here has not heard the audio of SciAm's conversation with associate producer Mark Mathis, spend the hour and a half to do so. If you can come away from that experience still believing that this movie and its makers actually take themselves seriously, then you've missed something. Mathis faces a barrage of intelligent questions powered by actual facts, and shrugs them off with the most ridiculous NON-answers I've ever heard. My personal favorite: "I'm only the ASSOCIATE producer. I didn't make that decision."
This whole issue is a farce, and while it's nice to see intelligent people debating here in the forums, it's painful and embarrassing to see how wasted all of the good points are here. No one with a serious interest in Intelligent Design was involved in the making of this movie.
> #1) Evolution does not in any way preclude belief in
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> Intelligent Design or promote atheism. If you want
> to believe in an Intelligent Creator, you could
> easily say that "something intelligent" was necessary
> to BEGIN the process of life in the first place.
***ghahhh*** (sound of me choking on my coffee, lol) :-D
Re: frgough and others who espouse similar points of view.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI humbly beg of you enlightened beings to provide me with one shred of reputable peer reviewed published scientific evidence that would allow ID to be allowed into a scientific discussion of the evolution of man. Quite clearly, this website discusses science related issues. Granted, there are several interpretations of evolution, however, as far as I have witnessed, proponents of ID have not produced one piece of convincing, at least to an educated person, I'm not so sure about yokels, research that shows that ID should be included in a scientific discussion. Please refrain from quoting "reports" from snake oil salesmen who disguise themselves as "researchers" from such progressive institutions such as the inappropriately named Discovery Institute. I am amazed at the fact that educated people waste their time even acknowledging these zealots in a scientific arena. You see, the reason that modern science has ostracized ID and its supporters is because it has no place in science or the classroom. Its value, however, resides in the historical context in that it should be included in a discussion of the creation myths of different societies along with those of the Native Americans, Buddhists, Hindus, and Christians etc. I do pray that all of you will someday “discover†a grade school science textbook, and catch up with your brethren who have moved on from the Middle Ages.
Rooselvelt: I would say that I 100% agree with everything you just said, except that a more appropriate historical context in terms of mass-irrational behavior would be the small town farmers toting their shotguns onto the front porch whilst waiting for Well's aliens to come tearing through timbuktu.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> Quite clearly, this website discusses science
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> e related issues. I
> am amazed at the fact that educated people waste
> their time even acknowledging these zealots in a
> scientific arena.
Exactly!
[b]@frgough,[/b]
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThese arent hysterical rants. Just because one is free to express his opinion does mean he can just blame one person, one theory or one principle for causing something tragic or in Stein's case claiming Darwinism as imperialism of biology. Pathetic to ever write speeches and in the end just come up with something as irresponsible and as fallacious as Expelled. By all means question Darwinism, question science but do it in a responsible way.
In the end, we all have our blind spots and crotches, I am just appalled that there are a large number of people out there whose blind spots are the things that make the most sense. Very sad indeed. :-(
[b]@Tommo0809,[/b]
Very well said. I couldn't agree more with you.
Ben Stein did in fact do some events on college campuses. He hosted a terrible debate between Christopher Hitchens and Jay Richards at Stanford University. The event was put on by the Office for Religious Life and simulcasted to churches across the U.S. It was pretty clear to me that Hitchens was not chosen because he's a talented and level-headed debater (he's not), but because he's a polemicist with a talent for insulting the religious. Throughout the debate, Richards put up poor arguments that Hitchens could have rejected with reason and explanation. Instead he responed with petty slights. His rhetoric only served to bolster the opinion among conservatives that atheists are foolish and spiteful people. I will never get those four hours of my life back. I am definitely NOT going to see Expelled.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI agree that Ben Stien doesn't have a clue what he's talking about, but wasn't this the magazine that gave Al Gore an award for an exaggerated scare the masses global warming movie. Where was the scientific scrutiny then? Sciam has lost its own objectivity and is ruled by its politics.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWithout reaching the merits of whether the asserted facts in Al Gore's movie (Im not very familiar with it) were exaggerated, the underlying problem is Ben Steins movie is attempting little more than passing off superstition as science, and taking it one step further to bash an established, documented theory merely because it is antithetical to his arrangement of beliefs.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHypothetically speaking, if the facts represented in gore's movie did turn out to be exagerated, he was at least speaking about a set of hypothises that are falsifieble and to which a dissenter could present relevant evidence.
Scientific reasoning does reject religion. Look what happens when the bible is put up against scientific evidence. A scientist can chose to be Catholic but then they will believe in two philosophies that contradict each other.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe reasoning behind Evolution does promote Atheism.
Mr. Rennie and Steve Mirsky offer their evenhanded, integrity-loaded review of Ben Stein’s “Expelledâ€. Since I missed their evenhanded, integrity-loaded review of the Nova’s docudrama: “Judgment Day: Intelligent Design on Trial†(a contra media advocy job preceding “Expelledâ€) I thought we could apply their same evenhanded, integrity- loaded standards to it too?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLet’s see, Stein’s speech to an audience was really a movie setup, and Dawkins didn’t know what he was getting into when he expressed his views and took the money?
So was there equal outrage when NOVA’s show didn’t let ID proponents speak for themselves at all and when they did they were “selectively quoted†and displayed by actors! Now there is a great stage setup, and some very selective use of ID’s words!
Sternberg didn’t loose his job, you see he never had a job, (now he might have had a job if he hadn’t screwed up) but he never really had a job. So, we didn’t fire him, we just softened him up a bit?
“Science doesn’t reject religious ideas because we are atheists, we reject them because religion doesn’t play by our rules,†sounds a lot like real estate agents saying to black customers, “You can’t buy a house on this street, not because you are black, but because you have a different culture than we do….†It is still segregation to not allow alternative ideas of whatever motivation onto the table.
“Tons of evolutionists are religious, and we love them all!†Unless they allow their religious ideas to motivate alternative explanations to what we all know has to be the case in our dogmatically religion free universe.
This conversation seems to be full of a lot of people whose minds are made up before they see the film? Isn't anyone here self aware enough to see how close minded, dogmatic, and narrow that makes you appear, while decrying ID's proponents as narrow minded Yahoos?
--
Edited by jungledoctor at 04/17/2008 9:29 PM
Darwin's cousin Francis Galton did indeed contect eugenics with Darwinian evolution. Whether Ben Stein quoted the entire passage or not. Eugenics was popularly promoted up until it's unsavory aspects became obvious in the hands of Nazi's. Thus Ben Stein is correct in his point.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this>Please refrain from quoting "reports" from snake
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> oil salesmen who disguise themselves as
>"researchers" from such progressive
> institutions such as the inappropriately
>named Discovery Institute. I am amazed
>at the fact that educated people waste
> their time even acknowledging these
> zealots in a scientific arena.
So... I have to show you proof, but anyone who shows an opposing view is a "snake oil salesman"??? My guess is that it would be hard to find proof if I have to use only researchers that you approve of. I guess that's why movies like this are made.
Another reason that the establishment types in the US might want to squash evolution is because they don't want parents to think there is a struggle for life. They want people to pop out all the kids they can so that they can have more fodder. Be happy,don't worry about limited resources--- have those future toilers and tax payers for the good of the empire! Just like many these days, our leaders speak against social Darwinism and then engage in their own form of it.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSome of these comments are ad homenium arguments about Darwin or his cousin, not really arguments against evolution. Henry Ford had some strange social ideas --does that mean people shouldn't drive cars? The trouble with this movie and ID in general is that they promote very poor thinking skills for the public. It is irresponsible and in my opinion, intentional. The producers of this movie want the viewers to remain ignorant .
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisComplaining that science does not allow for Creationism or Intelligent Design is like complaining that the Royals are not allowed to kick field goals. Imagine making a movie attempting to show that major-league baseball refuses to allow its players to kick field goals. The gall of MLB, not even wanting to open discourse on the subject!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNone of these 6 reasons had anything to do with scientific reasons intelligent design isn't true!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBen Stein is a hypocrite. He is a Neocon whose belief in the "free market state" is nothing other than political and economic Darwinism. He needs to clean his own house before taking on the Darwinists.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> None of these 6 reasons had anything to do with
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> scientific reasons intelligent design isn't true!
They aren't trying to say if ID-ism is true or not. They are pointing out that it is not science. ID-ism can not be used to predict experiments from formed hypothesi and gives no more information into the natural world. ID-ism is the null answer, it has no substance whatsoever. It is a dead end for any research.
I'm wary of calling the movie "humanities scholarship"--I'm not sure it's worthy of the honor--but in the humanities, one perennial annoyance is wanting to quote at length and unabridged, but being under constraints that restrict long quotation. As someone who's wanted to give long quotes and needed to give shorter quotes, the quotation example could be explained by indefensible motivations, but I can see less strange reasons, and I was underwhelmed at the context that was supposed to clearly dissociate Darwin from eugenics and the like. There's a lot less grey that I can see in some other areas--i.e. a staged debate with a standing ovation from extras--but the "quoting out of context" is consistent with attempting something that people attempt for honest and legitimate reasons.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHow can intelligent design possibly have a place in scientific discussion when Aquinas' first mover argument is implemented. A theologian, trying to position religious dogma within the confines of empirical observation is commendable. Through logical reasoning, he was able to make his case for the existence of a omniscient and omnipotent being as a first mover. However, his reasoning is not testable. Therefore, we would call his line of thought as theology or philosophy, but not science. Thanks to Darwin, we now have a unanimously supported theory to explain the mechanism of life in the context of our planet. The disputes that are stemming from evolution's irrefutability, seem to have animosity toward the established scientific consensus of a theory. Theories can be refuted, however Darwin's theories have stood the test of 140 years of smart people.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI would love to see if this conversation even exists in Europe. America's fundamentalist tendencies are showing their ugly head in our scientific conversation. If ID does make it into the American education system, we might as well hand the torch of scientific progress to Europe. The religious right has no right to rewrite the unfinished story of human society and culture, and then call it science. They can rewrite human history any way they want and put the topic in the private funded theology classes.
My education is in Anthropolgy, and there is no bigger topic than the evolution and ID debate. If ID were to gain ANY ground within our country, my heart would deflate. The same feeling I get when I watch FOX "news".
To jspiers:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAh you poor misguided soul, let me put this in words that you may understand. I was simply challenging any supporter of ID to provide tangible evidence that would lend it credibility to be accepted as a scientific theory. However, I merely stated that said evidence must come from a reputable researcher or institution. Propaganda and misinformation from people such as Dr. Stephen Meyer, the head of the "Center for Science and Culture" would not be acceptable evidence. You see, he has no background in science, yet feels compelled to publish "scientific research" promoting ID. I only made the comparison that his tactics are eerily similar to those of the snake-oil salesman from the 19th century. I hope this clears up your confusion, please do not hesitate to ask, next time, if you have any other questions. Hopefully, one day you may understand the real reason why movies like expelled are made, I wish you the best of luck!
The more relevant question to ask is not "What, concerning the content of this film, is cinematic embellishment?", but rather, "What is the point of this film?" Most people, know very little about evolution or religion. Are the authors of this article proposing that, due to Ben Steins editorial adjustments, the questions proposed by the film have no merit? If so, the authors are as foolish as the arguments they are attempting to refute. As a stark agnostic, I have no vested interested in defending Darwinism or Intelligent Design, but as a student of Philosophy I find it pivotal that people question that which is proposed as truth . Maybe Darwins theories will collapse under their own weight or, maybe, they hold some merit. Either way, dont be as short sighted as the authors of this article and venture to ask the questions. In doing so, I guarantee that you, as I have, will see that neither religion nor science can provide the Absolute Truth that both seem quite willing to present.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBullshit sells; producers of expelled have figured out half the Americans are idiots already and since there's neither factual support nor scientific support for ID they can make a quick money by making a pop movie selling the ID conspiracy.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd conspiracy sells; the producers of Expelled are professional liars trying to make some easy buck by duping the gullible Americans.
"What is the purpose of the film?"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt is part of the Discovery Institute's / ID movement's "Wedge Strategy"... plain and simple.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wedge_strategy
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Edited by logica at 04/18/2008 2:20 PM
> This makes, I think 5 or 6 articles SA has run on the
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> front page of their web site in the past week
> concerning Ben Stein, and all of them have been
> hysterical rants.
>
> I think SA is doing an excellent job of showing how
> anyone who even dares question Darwinism in any way
> whatsoever is witch hunted and burned at the stake.
>
What a perfect Creationist tautology. Even when a proponent of Creationism/ID is shown to be a fraud, well, "that just shows how those dirty scientists have it in for us." Beautiful.
(BTW, evolutionary biology is not "Darwinism" any more than cosmological physics is "Einsteinism". The field has advanced far beyond Darwin, who knew nothing of genetics.)
> Darwinism. The only supposed theory without direct
> experimental evidence in existence that cannot be
> questioned.
Wrong. That statement is a stock Creationist lie. There are tons of experimental evidence for evolution. E.g.:
[url http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_evolution]Wikipedia entry on experimental evolution notes Lenski's 40,000+ generation e.coli evolution experiments and Garland's 50+ mouse evolution experiment[/url]
[url http://myxo.css.msu.edu/cgi-bin/lenski/prefman.pl?group=aad]List of dozens of published peer-reviewed papers from e.coli experiments[/url]
[url http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/04/080402071538.htm]Natural selection speeds up speciation in walking sticks[/url]
[url http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061106094904.htm]Novel experiment documents evolution of e. coli genome in realtime[/url]
[url http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/evolution-research.html#mullers-rna]Experimental support for Muller's Rachet (theory of evolution of sexual reproduction)[/url]
[url http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/evolution-research.html#reversal]Experimental reversal of parental investment in katydids[/url]
[url http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/full/99/22/14274]Experimental evolution of learning ability in fruit flies[/url]
Oh and by the way, there is also at least one instance of [url http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/evolution-research.html#observed-speciation]observed speciation in nature[/url]
Chuck Darwin said:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"(BTW, evolutionary biology is not "Darwinism" any more than cosmological physics is "Einsteinism". The field has advanced far beyond Darwin, who knew nothing of genetics.)
"
Right on... We do not refer to Calculus as Newtonism or Leibnizian Mathmatics.... The whole Darwinism term used by ID'ers is so annoying. I conveys a fundemental lack of understanding of evolutionary biology.
The past few weeks of endless attacks on Ben Stein's movie prove how SciAm editors always overreact to this topic. OK, all the readers expected M. Shermer to react this way; it's his job, and honestly, he did it well enough in his article. But the editor, John Rennie? It's a movie, for God's sake! If you restricted movie making (and writers) to telling the absolute truth, you'd all be out of work! You all bend the truth to push your own agenda.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHere's a great example: SciAm continues to promote the inacurate use of the words "Intelligent Design" and "Creationism". These phrases were hijacked by the biblical literalists. Intellectual honesty demands that you refer to "literal creationism" as a fringe belief, and allow mainstream scientists the dignity of believing that we just don't know the whole truth about how we got here.
Leave the attacks to Shermer, and get back to real science!
ID is not a viewpoint. ID is 'tool' used by a certain group of people who cant pick up a text book harder to read than 5th grade and actually do any 'work'. The hardest thing they do is probably something artsy. I dont know what the average salary of people who follow ID are....but the religious leaders in ID who do make money, make money because they TRICK their lazy followers to SUPPORT THEM(by going out and watching movies like this) and GIVE THEIR LEADERS FUNDS to gain more LAZY followers. For me the discussion is not about ID....but about really large groups of people ....LAZY people.... that want power to be able to CONTROL OTHER PEOPLE....and force these people into BELIEVING what they believe....without thinking, or actually doing any actual WORK. The good news is these kinds of people are losing their traction but they dont actually KNOW they are losing. Im talking about all religious groups here. They consist of an extremely large and scary group. Thank GOD religious groups no longer have power, say, rule....etc....and the reason that they no longer have power is because they are LAAAAAAAAZZZZZZY. ...Here's the reason why they will no longer have the power they had in the past. --Even-- if the hordes of the millions of backwards christians, catholics, muslims etc were to somehow decide to miraculously join together one day as one large army to fight the secular world...and each one of those LAZY people were to suddenly STOP BEING LAZY and decide to actually pick up a text book and read it...and learn genetics...or study mathematics and rocket science....and build computers and an advanced army of their own to fight the rest of secular society...(in order to force their ideas on secular society)....It wont matter. You know why? BECAUSE...they will still be BEHIND the REST OF SECULAR SOCIETY....and will LOSE the war in the end....because the REST OF SECULAR SOCIETY has been reading books, studying, building computers, rockets, mathematical algorithyms, discovering genetic secrets etc etc etc FOR A LONG LONG LONG TIME ALREADY........The REST OF SOCIETY has STOPPED BEING LAZY A LONG TIME AGO. So for all those religious people out there....please, if you cant read a book....stop wasting everybody's time with your LAZYNESS.... do something usefull like......blow yourself up. You are LOSING more and more ground every day and Im glad NO ONE is telling you this!.....well....except me...just now....i just told you with this rant......but you'll probably stop reading this half way and give up cause its too difficult to read and go watch tv.....so YAY!!! you will never find out the secret to success!!! Ok. Go watch tv now....or read a book with no math and no hard theories in it.... or threaten to kill someone because they drew a cartoon that your group doesnt like... or go out and enjoy your evening by watching this movie!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this--
Edited by jmarbas at 04/18/2008 4:31 PM
--
Edited by jmarbas at 04/18/2008 4:34 PM
--
Edited by jmarbas at 04/18/2008 4:34 PM
"The science vs. religion debate is over"- Craig Mello, 2006 Nobel Prize in Physiology/Medicine - commenting on the book "Thank God for Evolution" by Michael Dowd.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe desperation this author shows, in trying to discredit this documentary, reminds me of a child scraping the bottom of a pudding pot. The points made are about as devoid of meaningful substance as the fossil record is of transitional fossils. The science academy emperor has no clothes and is desperate.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> Darwin can say all he wants that neglecting the poor
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> and weak is evil, but such neglect is still the
> logical conclusion of his theories, especially
> "survival of the fittest".
So you believe it logical that observing nature and what happens to natural creatures over time is somehow prescriptive or provides guidance in the social behavior of intelligent creatures?
That one should have the slightest effect on the other is ludicrous in the extreme. Just because some misguided individuals in the (generally scientifically misguided) time shortly after these biological theories were proposed took that ball of crazy and ran with it is not supportive of your notion in any way. We have gotten over that particular bit of craziness.
In short, a biological explanation of life changes on this planet is not and cannot be interpreted as a social plan. To do so is IDiotic.
> If he wants to go about
> making such a religious statement, that neglecting
> the weak and poor is evil, he better be able to back
> it up.
Oh so typical. Making a moral observation is somehow religious? WRONG! Religion isn't the sole arbiter of evil. Morality can exist apart from religion quite well thank you.
And the arrogance! If he's gonna do this (made up association) then he better do this other thing (because I said so). And making demands of a dead guy? Preposterous! Pox and botheration to you sir.
> In addition, he should be able to provide reason for
> WHY men are to be differentiated from other species
> when it comes to protecting the weak and poor instead
> of allowing them to die off.
Oooo, I see what you did there.
You're trying to get someone to say that people are different from animals. But you know what - we are. We are the only self reflective social creature on this planet (that we are aware of). As such, we have discovered ethics and social responsibility, and these inform our behavior.
You cannot deny our choice in following an ethical path by your "logic" or by your incessant demands that religion be given more than it's due (which is nothing).
Not can you deny natural reality because it conflicts with your fantasies.
Sorry, but thank you for playing.
Pay attention much? He said he personally believed in ID.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGeez.
There have been gaping holes in the evolutionary theory - as in many "theories" - but the problem comes when science is not allowed to follow or is ridiculed for attempting to follow the evidence where it leads. If one were to remove all emotional attachment and personal opinion, one could see that there is no real evidence of evolution. It can neither be proven nor disproven. Believing in evolution takes just as much "faith" as believing in Intelligent Design. The issue is censorship and persecution of those who disagree or wish to pursue the evidence where it leads, without prejudice. Free Speech. Free Science.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLet's go for the whole quote, shall we, and judge is remarks IN CONTEXT, Hmmm?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"The great break in the organic chain between man and his nearest allies, which cannot be bridged over by any extinct or living species, has often been advanced as a grave objection to the belief that man is descended from some lower form; but this objection will not appear of much weight to those who, from general reasons, believe in the general principle of evolution. Breaks often occur in all parts of the series, some being wide, sharp and defined, others less so in various degrees; as between the orang and its nearest allies- between the Tarsius and the other Lemuridae- between the elephant, and in a more striking manner between the Ornithorhynchus or Echidna, and all other mammals. But these breaks depend merely on the number of related forms which have become extinct. At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilised races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace, the savage races throughout the world. At the same time the anthropomorphous apes, as Professor Schaaffhausen has remarked,* will no doubt be exterminated. The break between man and his nearest allies will then be wider, for it will intervene between man in a more civilised state, as we may hope, even than the Caucasian, and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as now between the negro or Australian and the gorilla."
If we look at that quote IN CONTEXT, what we have is a scientist musing about what has gone before and extrapolating what will be from it. Yes, he was a man of his times with all the inherent prejudices that implies, but he was not saying they should be exterminated, merely that it will probably happen.
And in a way he's right. Few of the savages of his day are still so. Most of them have (or at least are still trying to) rise above their traditional lot and join the civilized world.
People are savages because of lack of knowledge, or in some cases in spite of it. Not because they are inherently savages.
But that is a social problem, not an evolutionary one.
We (the "civilized world") have rejected that future, as has most of the rest of the world (except perhaps in places like Darfur). We are all trying to improve the lot of humanity in whatever way we can (as countries).
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSo, as this has nothing to do with Evolution, nor to (as you've claimed) Darwin's observations of man (at least up to that time) as being a blood thirty conquerer of those weaker (the so-called savages), I fail to see why you have even brought it up here.
> KARANO SAID
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this>
> "When did the S A of my youth become a liberal
> political rag?"
>
> Is science and the search for truth considered
> politically liberal?
Apparently by some.
Show the evidence that has been "suppressed" or STFU.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGaping holes indeed. Evolution is one of the most heavily cross pollinated of all the scientific disciplines. It touches virtually all of the sciences and is strengthened and enhanced by them. Large numbers of predictions have been made in various scientific fields based on evolution, and everyone of them has been proven in the end. To even attempt to throw out even a small portion of evolution is to bring large parts of our science establishment into question - both in their observations and in their scholarship. And this isn't about personal pride or corruption, this is about questioning our ability to observe nature and make conclusions based on those observations. You are saying "you're wrong" and offering little if anything to prove your view superior to what we have amassed over the years and then whine about being suppressed? You insult people with your accusations and you expect moderation? You ignore science and fall back on "the magic man did it" and expect to be taken seriously?
Give me a break!
Or just STFU. Bring some real scholarship, some actual research of the caliber required to challenge the factual bonds we have established. I don't think you can, but you are more than welcomed to try. Just don't be walking in and expecting to be taken seriously because of your unsubstantiated musings about bananas or flagellums.
Oh my science!
Looks like the author of the above article may have a few things they didn't want you to now also.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFor one, when did evolution become a fact? I thought it was theory.
When did religions become irrational?
I'm going to see the film this weekend. I'm sure it will remind me of an old joke: "A little girl asked her
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisfather: How did the human race appear? Father answered, God made Adam and Eve; they had children.
The girl then asked her mother the same question. Mother said, Many years ago there were monkeys from which the human race evolved.
The confused girl returned to her father and asked him to explain the 2 different answers. Well, Dear", he
said, "I told you about my side of the family, and your mother told you about hers."
And that's the whole point of Stein's movie: ~ discussion is key.
I.D. has serious scientific flaws, darwinism has serious scientific flaws. But darwin dogma is taken for
inerrant gospel which is then force fed to govt. school children everywhere with little or no facts presented about the flawed evidence, circular reasoning, and out right fraud which peppers the gaping holes in this theory.
~ Discussion is key. Why does that make so many nervous???
Even if you read the entire quote from Darwin, it is still clear that Darwin's reasoning was pointing to the fact that humans try to preserve the weak through extraordinary means, despite the fact that this will "propagate" the weak members of our species. Hitler and Stalin, and the Eugenicists of America were simply applying the argument of Darwin that to allow these lessor races or "weak" humans to "propagate", would be "ignorant". They chose not to "check their sympathy", but instead chose to use their "hard reason...for a contingent benefit" to begin a systematic elimination of those that would bring "degeneration" to humankind. My German mother has told me the story of how the mentally retarded boy in their flat in Stuttgart was taken away and never seen again during WWII. This is not something we can simply ignore. The reasoning behind Darwin's theories and arguments were used by these leaders who had no "God" or sense of "good & evil" to check their plans.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat is being ignored by the writer is that for decades the belief in a Creator was simply not tolerated in public schools on the most part. And in spite of 30 to 40 years of waiting for evolutionists to prove what they were teaching as fact to be in truth fact they are no closer today than they were then. I'm still going with God.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisJohn Rennie and Steve Mirsky's claim that the scientific method equates to methodological naturalism is false. In Warrant and Proper Function, Alvin Plantinga proves (in Chapter 12) that methological naturalism and evolutionism entails an undefeated defeater making the mutual embrace of methodological naturalism and evolutionism irrational. Somehow I don't think that John Rennie and Steve Mirsky will let such trifling concerns stand in their way of cheerleading for old Chuck.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisExcuse me, Mr Stein, but where did 'God' come from in the first place?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI do not find much of these six points to be compelling. In the first, for example, the writer indicates that a selective editing of Darwin's words as regards the existence of an entity know as social darwinism, unfairly indicates that Darwin himself was in favor of eliminating he weak. Actually the quote reveals a sufficient awareness on the part of Darwin that his theory could conceivably push the frontiers of such unethical ruminations. His own disclaimers, notwithstanding, the point that Darwinism could be, and indeed would be, in my opinion, invoked by those with genetic "cleansing" agenda stands. regardless of the allegations of biased editing.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe writer's fifth "thing" misses the point entirely. It is precisely the methodological naturalism that is missing from the "science" of evolution that keeps the premise of intelligent inference from dying a "natural" death alive. Whatever legitimate experimental data is used to support the argument for evolution supports Intelligent agency as well, or better. For example,Darwin's finches (which can be viewed as a prototype of more recent experiments illustrating so-called micro-evolution would more appropriately indicate a front loading of potential within the genome itself, especially since the reversion seems to occur when when the environment itself reverts.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI have read all of the preceding posts and offer some tools for a more educated discussion:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRESPECT FOR ONE ANOTHER
Cussing and belittling your opponent are very petty tactics in what is supposed to be a scientific discussion. For instance, many of the key proponents of ID have PhDs in fields such as Molecular BioChemistry -- to characterize them as uneducated and unable to read a 5th grade text is untenable.
DEFINING TERMS
Darwinism should be replaced with Evolution in most cases.
A distinction between macroevolution (species scale) and microevolution (adaptation within a species) should be made because microevolution is not being disputed by the ID proponents.
SEPARATION OF INTELLIGENT DESIGN ISSUES
* Weaknesses in Evolution (see next post).
* Inferring a Designer.
* Identifying the Designer (ID does not attempt to do this).
* Repression of dissent.
* Continued use of universally disproven data/examples/diagrams.
* Social implications of Evolution.
-- Sunny
TWO OF EVOLUTION'S WEAKNESSES
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe scientific basis of ID is in the weaknesses in Evolution as it is currently constructed.
Acknowledging these weaknesses does not imply that the theory should be scrapped -- modification may be possible.
INFORMATION
DNA comprises a set of very specific instructions for the construction of proteins and how these proteins should be assembled into parts of cells.
Evolution fails to explain how these instructions could be coded, both in current adaptations and in explaining the origin of life.
GRADUAL PROGRESSION
The mechanisms of random mutation and natural selection provide for a gradual progression of forms, but only if the change benefits the organism in its survival and/or procreation.
One problem arises when many changes have to occur simultaneously to be beneficial. Michael Behe describes these leaps as Irreducible Complexity.
Another problem arises from the lack of intermediate forms in the fossil record, especially the Cambrian Explosion.
-- Sunny
--
Edited by SoSaysSunny at 04/19/2008 10:51 PM
I quote my article from the ABC5, Asian Bioethics Conference 5 book
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this'Challenges for Bioethics from Asia'. It is about the father of the vulgarized evolutionary doctrine in the continental Europe, Ernst Haeckel. Race hygiene incarned. In
http://www.helsinki.fi/~pjojala/Haeckelianlegacy_ABC5.pdf
Subsequent editions of the Origin
stated:“[Haeckel]…brought his great knowledge and abilities to bear on what he calls phylogeny,
or the lines of descent of all organic beings. In drawing up the several series he trusts chiefly to
embryological characters.â€
And so Darwin elaborated in his Descent of Man (1871, p. 203):
"In attempting to trace the genealogy of the Mammalia, and therefore of man, lower down in the series, we become
involved in greater and greater obscurity. He who wishes to see what ingenuity and knowledge can effect, may
consult Prof. Haeckel's works."
In his autobiography, Darwin stated: "Hardly any point gave me so much satisfaction when
I was at work on the Origin, as the explanation of the wide difference in many classes between the
embryo and the adult animal, and of the close resemblance of the embryos within the same class.
No notice of this point was taken, as far as I remember, in the early reviews of the Origin".
Haeckel ascended from infanticide also to genocide: "…the morphological differences
between two generally recognized species - for example sheep and goats - are much less
important than those… between a Hottentot and a man of the Teutonic race" (The History of
Creation 1876, p. 434). He categorized human beings into "Woolly-haired" and "Straight-haired"
classes. The Woolly-haired people were "incapable of a true inner culture or of a higher mental
development" (The History of Creation, 1876, p. 310).
Only among the Aryans was there that
"symmetry of all parts, and that equal development, which we call the type of perfect human beauty" (The
History of Creation, 1876, p. 321). "The mental life of savages rises little above that of the higher mammals,
especially the apes, with which they are genealogically connected. Their whole interest is restricteed to the
physiological functions of nutrition and reproduction, or the satisfaction of hunger and thirst in the crudest animal
fashion… one can no more (or no less) speak of their reason than of that of the more intelligent animals." (The
wonders of life, 1905, p. 56-7).
Finally, since: "the lower races - such as the Veddahs or Australian Negroes - are psychologically nearer to the
mammals - apes and dogs - than to the civilized European, we must, therefore, assign a totally different value to their
lives… Their only interest are food and reproduction… many of the higher animals, especially monogamous mammals
and birds, have reached a higher stage than the lower savages" (The wonders of life, 1905, p. 390, 393).
I just returned from the movie theatre seeing EXPELLED.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt was interesting, thought provoking, and entertaining.
Mostly it allowed well known atheistic evolutionists to have their say and commented on what they said by music, lighting, and of course editing.
And mostly they allowed ID people to say what they wanted to say, with the bias in the music, angles and lighting, and film editing decisions.
It's motives are fairly clear:
1.) That ID proponents are not permitted to function in orthodox scientific institutions, and that any attempt to publish interpretations of data suggesting the ID hypothesis are supressed.
2.) That evolutionary explanation as sufficient for life as we know it support an atheistic world view, and that religionists who support evolution are welcomed as long as they don't stray into ID.
3.) That evolution provides no coherent explanation for the origin of life. Since there is no such thing as a simple cell, the problem of origins is largely ignored by militant evolutionists.
4.) The evolutionary spokespeople shown clearly will accept almost any explanation, as long as it is not identified with a God type originator. The closing interview with Richard Dawkins is particularly illuminating in this point.
5.) And the film suggests by the inteview of a very pessemistic evolutionist that the theory carried to its logical conclusions negates important human values of free will, hope, and the value of life in general. In this context it also suggests that Darwinian principles were applied by the eugenics movement, including those comandeered by Nazism.
Perhaps this discussion could focus on the points the film is actually making, instead of broadside denunciations of ID as religious fanaticism, backwoods stupidity, or venal moneygrubbing?
Jungledoctor writes:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Mr. Rennie and Steve Mirsky offer their evenhanded, integrity-loaded review of Ben Stein’s “Expelledâ€. Since I missed their evenhanded, integrity-loaded review of the Nova’s docudrama: “Judgment Day: Intelligent Design on Trial†(a contra media advocy job preceding “Expelledâ€) I thought we could apply their same evenhanded, integrity- loaded standards to it too?"
Our comments on the excellent NOVA episode can be found at
http://www.sciam.com/podcast/episode.cfm?id=3AFA05E8-E7F2-99DF-32715F03F75EAADE
And an interview with a producer of the NOVA episode is at
http://www.sciam.com/podcast/episode.cfm?id=173BE356-E7F2-99DF-3E8DA11E99F7F3BE
I strongly encourage everyone to read the entire Jones decision in the Kitzmiller case. It's both informative and entertaining. Available free online at
http://www.pamd.uscourts.gov/kitzmiller/kitzmiller_342.pdf
@ jungle doctor:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt's motives are fairly clear:
-propagation of the wedge theory
1.) That ID proponents are not permitted to function in orthodox scientific institutions, and that any attempt to publish interpretations of data suggesting the ID hypothesis are supressed.
-because ID does not belong in orthodox scientific institutions. ID is not science, as has been discussed previously in this thread.
2.) That evolutionary explanation as sufficient for life as we know it support an atheistic world view, and that religionists who support evolution are welcomed as long as they don't stray into ID.
-someone's personal beliefs, no matter how irrational or wrong headed need not color their professional work. It would be highly irresponsible for members of the scientific community to support and publicly trumpet a theory that could never be proven or at least evidenced through scientific methods.
3.) That evolution provides no coherent explanation for the origin of life. Since there is no such thing as a simple cell, the problem of origins is largely ignored by militant evolutionists.
-so what. Evolution was never meant to exlpain the origin of life on earth. Darwin's book was called the origin of species and was a baseline for a description of a functional tool to explain the mechanism behind living diversity.
4.) The evolutionary spokespeople shown clearly will accept almost any explanation, as long as it is not identified with a God type originator. The closing interview with Richard Dawkins is particularly illuminating in this point.
-because, to most rational thinkers the notion that life was sparked by a seeding asteroid or some superintelligent beings from another galaxy seems just as likely, if not more so, than an all-knowing, all-doing creature who has human features and communicates with every single person on this planet, and whatever others, on a one on one basis.
5.) And the film suggests by the inteview of a very pessemistic evolutionist that the theory carried to its logical conclusions negates important human values of free will, hope, and the value of life in general. In this context it also suggests that Darwinian principles were applied by the eugenics movement, including those comandeered by Nazism.
- again, so what, I mean that this could be an easily addressed argument but what is the point. It has no bearing on the validity of the hundreds of thousands of inquiries providing evidence of evolutionary theory.(not to mention the apparrent complete lack an evidentiary base that would point to an intelligent designers existence.)
--
Edited by Tommo0809 at 04/20/2008 7:18 AM
The article's complaint about the film's use of Darwin's quote is completely disingenuous. No one can deny that Darwin said that caring for the weak and infirm was injurious to the human race. Yes, he qualified that statement by saying that to do otherwise would result in the "deterioration of the noblest part of our nature." So what? Darwin's a better man than Hitler, hoorah!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBut the fact of the matter is that Darwin's unqualified statement has been used by all kinds of monsters since to justify some of the worst depravities ever perpetrated by man upon his fellow man. That's the point the film was trying to make. And it succeeded. Regardless of the article's banal complaint, it's an inescapable fact that part of Darwin's legacy is the eugenics movements of the Nazi's and others in the 20th century. Movements that cost millions of innocent people their lives.
John Locke once asked this question:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"What came first, mind or matter"?
For the materialists who do science, the answer is a forgone conclusion and no other answers can be considered. Mindless matter came first and everything from the universe, to evolution to your decisions and actions are mind-less matter in motion. And anybody who presents factual evidence that suggests otherwise is just a toothless, "backwater", snake-handling, idiot who also probably believes in fairies, gnomes and hobgoblins.
Today they don't burn you at the stake, but they do burn your reputation and career at the stake for even questioning materialism.
This documentary exposes most modern scientists for what they are: puppets to this belief system. And by asking simple, direct questions Ben Stein shows his deftness as a masterful puppeteer.
Go see this documentary. It's hilarious!
@Jungledoctor, IDiots et. al.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI believe most of you well-intentioned, humble Americans have been duped by the creators of the ID theory. You see, some time ago a "theory" called creationism attempted to supplant evolution in the public schools. However, knowledgeable judges, with level heads, prevailed and the crackpot theory was rightly banned from public schools. I know that when you received your degrees from whatever online university you purchased them from, they probably didn't require you to take any class that would provoke rational and meaningful thought, much less any type of concrete research. If it had, you would have realized that since the creationists failed in their attempt to force religion into public schools by creating a terribly flawed theory of origin, they decided they needed a new angle. All you need to do is open a few books, you could probably find them at the library, unless they still burn books from where you all are from, and see that many of the institutions that supported creationism simply changed their names and their charters to support ID. In fact, the textbooks authored to teach creationism just had their titles changed and are now essentially the same except that the word God has been replaced by the word Intelligent Designer. This creates quite the enigma however, because identifying oneself as a supporter of Intelligent Design actually belies quite a large lack of intelligence. I wish you Godspeed in quest to obtain a master's degree from the online university of your choice.
Scientific American is clearly doing its duty. As a politburo for truth it is imperative that counter revolutionaries like Stein be quickly repudiated, and definitively marginalized. SA, we hail you. We pledge our loyaty to your essential doctrines, and only hope we will forever be honored as colleagues and comrades.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisgood bud: is that sarcasm i'm picking up on?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWow, I had no idea that there was such a wild debate between two completely unrelated fields. I noticed a lot of fancy terms flying around, and quite bit of bashing too. It is tempting to condescend to those with opposing view points, especially when they don't back them up, but this will only result in further misinterpretation, so I will simply try to narrow down the terminology (using Merriam Webster online).
b: something (as a sport or technique) that may be studied or learned like systematized knowledge
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisScience:
1: the state of knowing : knowledge as distinguished from ignorance or misunderstanding
2 a: a department of systematized knowledge as an object of study
3 a: knowledge or a system of knowledge covering general truths or the operation of general laws especially as obtained and tested through scientific method b: such knowledge or such a system of knowledge concerned with the physical world and its phenomena : natural science
4: a system or method reconciling practical ends with scientific laws
5capitalized : christian science
Ok, already I see a problem. I didn't realize that the meaning of the word science would have so many interpretations. Oh well, moving right along.
Religion:
1 a: the state of a religious [a nun in her 20th year of religion] b (1): the service and worship of God or the supernatural (2): commitment or devotion to religious faith or observance
2: a personal set or institutionalized system of religious attitudes, beliefs, and practices
3archaic : scrupulous conformity : conscientiousness
4: a cause, principle, or system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith
Ah, now that was more what I expected. Now to my knowledge, religion and the different ideas associated with religion are a very personal thing, meaning that they differ from individual to individual and are generally very important to those that consider themselves religious. For instance, I would never tell someone that the belief in a god (s) (or God, or Allah, or Budah) was stupid, as this is simply insulting and not beneficial to me or them.
That being said I would never begin to use my religious beliefs to justify scientific theory (unless it was Christian Science as above that is one meaning of the word science). My issue with this debate is that ID is not really very scientific in the traditional since of the word. I'm not saying that I don't believe in ID; ever since reading C.S. Lewis's book on Christianity I believed whole heartily in a creator. And that's what this is, another form of creationism. But I am getting off the point. What makes a belief and what makes a theory. A belief is not scientific, it can't be proved or disproved, or weighed, measured, counted, or regulated, like ID or creationism or God. A scientific theory however can be proved or disproved and can be reviewed using agreed upon standards. The argument that the scientific standard need not apply to ID is invalid, they apply to all other ‘fields of study’ (definition of sciences as listed above).
Now, if you believe in ID then you have a choice:
a. you consider this to be a "belief" and therefore not a scientific discussion topic as much as a religious or social topic.
b. you consider this to be a "theory" and therefore do not actually believe it, in which case you are not a Christian or are at least a fallen Christian since you do not believe in God as the creator of all, including us.
Now if you do think you are a Christian but still consider ID a theory and not a belief ( I really don't think that something can be both a theory and a belief) then read the next question carefully.
Can God create a stone that is so heavy he himself can not lift it?
Hopefully that will keep you occupied long enough for the adults to finish this conversation :P
Thanks to SoSaysSunny (post 115) for your call to respectful discourse. Disagreement and debate of ideas here can (and should) be done cordially, without resort to name-calling and personal attacks.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisrooseveltdecosta - your remarks above (post 123) may be acceptable in other forums, but are out of place here. We all signed the usage agreement to be able to post comments -- #1 is "Play Nice". The forums at Scientific American, of all places, should be a place of rational discourse about ideas, not hateful personal attacks.
After reading through about half of these 124 posts (don't have time to read all of them) I'm surprised at the number of pro-ID posters... and their reasonable comments and questions. locomotivebreath (post 106) has it right... let's discuss issues! If the anti-Expelled crowd is so sure of their positions, they should welcome honest discussion and debate as a chance to logically outmaneuver the ID supporters.
It should be noted that the official formulation of ID is most definitely a science. The straw man versions of it put forward by its critics (often equating it with creationism, then critiquing creationism) are often not. (ID does not equate to creationism!!!)
Finally, I must disagree with SoSaysSunny on one point... Evolution is not a better term than Darwinism in this context. "Darwinism" refers to the current theory espoused be evolutionary biologists (technically "neo-Darwinism" is the most specific term for the current theory). Evolution is a word with many possible definitions -- most generally, as "change over time", which [i]no one[/i] disagrees with (eg, "the design of the Toyota Corolla has evolved significantly since its inception"). "Evolution", in the context of Expelled and the SciAm articles, is not a sufficiently specific term.
allright sumyunguy, aside from your faulty operating definition of darwinism and evolution....what exactly is scientific about ID-- it looks designed to me so...someone must have designed it?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd to the C.S. Lewis fan, I read the berenstein bears books when I was a little kid, but Mr. Berenstein never convinced me that there was a community of talking bears in rural michigan (no matter how badly I wanted it to be true)
toltec - As a Christian who takes ID to be an interesting "theory", not a belief, I must disagree with your previous post. Science and religion are most certainly unrelated fields; but ID falls into the former category, not the latter.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe common misconception that you are under is that ID cannot be "disproved, weighed, measured, etc" -- in fact, it can. For example, ID concerns itself in part with CSI - not the television show, but "complex specified information", a category of data that can be quantified and measured. (See Dembski's book Intelligent Design).
ID is often compared to (or equated with) creationism. Although superficially similar, creationism is clearly linked to Biblical Christianity, and thus is best categorized with religion; ID, on the other hand, not only takes no stance regarding religion (it is espoused by Christians, Muslims, agnostics, atheists, etc), but is a clearly scientific endeavor that examines/measures/categorizes "indications of intelligence" using a rigorous, scientific methodology. It makes falsifiable claims -- the hallmark of scientific theories.
Just a point on number 5.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTalking about the ID theory not being falsifiable. How do you falsify punctuated equilibrium? But it finds it's way through peer review and into High school and College Science textbooks.
> allright sumyunguy, aside from your faulty operating
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> definition of darwinism and evolution....what exactly
> is scientific about ID-- it looks designed to me
> so...someone must have designed it?
Tommo - see my previous post for the scientific aspects of ID (the measurement of indications of intelligence, via defined indicators such as CSI)
Which aspects of my definitions of Darwinism and evolution do you disagree with?
For starters, Darwinism is not the theory espoused by evolutionary biologists . Darwin's theory of natural selection was merely the beginning of the study of such a mechanism as natural selection. Evolution as you use it may work in a broad sense, but should not be appropriate in a discussion such as this where anyone involved should be presumed to have some sort of baseline knowledge.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFor ID, the supreme court has even said that the base notion of intelligent desing is both inextricably and inexcusably linked with the judeo christian creation myth.
As for CSI, it seems to be little more than a combination of question begging and goalpost moving, Aside from the fact that Dembski's only publised example has been refuted.
Ok now I'm confused. Darwinsim (or Neo-Darwinism) is a new term to me, so i looked it up. It apparently is the idea that evolution is solely brought on by natural selection and not through enherited traits. But that doesn't make any sense because all creatures inherit traits from their parents' genes. My mom has brown eyes and so there is a good chance that I will (besides recessive genes). So what does that have to do with ID? Is ID counter to natural selection, and why? It's hard for me to imagine natural selection not having anything to do with evolution, if everyone with blonde hair dies then it will become a very rare trait.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI would be very interesting to see some of their quantifiers for intelegence. I don't supposed you use an IQ or other bell curve scale? Please provide more examples, so far you seem to be the most clearly worded proponent of ID in these coments.
If ID is not related to religion at all then I apologize for associating it with something unrelated to science. I still think that arguing it as a point shows a certain lack of faith, but that's just my opinion.
As I said, please elaborate and I realize now I am quite ignorant on the subject.
Ben Stein equates Evolution with aBiogenesis and never says that one has nothing to do with the other, or that Evolution is about what happens AFTER life began and aBiogenesis is about HOW life began.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMr. Sumyungguy,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBefore you post anything else, please do your homework. I know this is asking a lot of you, it is painfully obvious that you failed to do so before stating that, "ID does not equate to creationism" Regarding that point, you may want to get a hold of Dr. Eugenie Scott of the National Center for Science Education. Specifically the lecture she presented at the University of Michigan in January of 2006. I am not sure on what cereal box you received your information, but quite simply, there are no issues between evolution and Creationism/ID. Evolution is a theory based on generations of repeatable experiments and observations that have resulted in a set of concrete conclusions as to how man arrived to the point at which he is today. Creationism, on the other hand, is a vaguely worded and untestable set of beliefs put forth by religious fanatics aimed towards turning America into a theocracy. It has survived so long due to the ignorance and laziness of many Americans, and their inability to pick up a book and do some actual learning. I have no qualms with religion, as I often fancy myself with a righteous day of worship now and again. I digress, however, the point is that the theory of evolution is cold hard science, Creationism/ID is not. When you find yourself caught with your head buried in the sand, you should emerge humbly and seek to enlighten yourself instead of just trying to get everybody else to bury their heads along with you. Do not hesitate, I see great potential within you, and I encourage you to fulfill it to the utmost of your abilities! We'll be waiting for you when the light bulb finally turns on.
One thing I noticed is that ID/Creationism has never actually done any "science" to produce evidence for ID or creationism one way or the other.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe only thing ID / Creationism has EVER done is to attack other (rather, existing Theories since they don't actually HAVE a Theory in the Scientific use of the word) theories. When are they going to actually do science to back up THEIR side of the issue?
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Edited by MorituriMax at 04/20/2008 8:05 PM
--
Edited by MorituriMax at 04/20/2008 8:05 PM
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Edited by MorituriMax at 04/20/2008 8:06 PM
> For starters, Darwinism is not the theory espoused by
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> evolutionary biologists . Darwin's theory of natural
> selection was merely the beginning of the study of
> such a mechanism as natural selection. Evolution as
> you use it may work in a broad sense, but should not
> be appropriate in a discussion such as this where
> anyone involved should be presumed to have some sort
> of baseline knowledge.
> For ID, the supreme court has even said that
> aid that the base notion of intelligent desing is
> both inextricably and inexcusably linked with the
> judeo christian creation myth.
> As for CSI, it seems to be little more than a
> e than a combination of question begging and goalpost
> moving, Aside from the fact that Dembski's only
> publised example has been refuted.
Tommo – Many (eg, Richard Dawkins, Encyclopedia Britannica) use “neo-Darwinism†as a synonym for the “modern synthesis†of evolution, a term favored by other evolutionary biologists. I was using them synonymously. Also, I didn’t mean to say I personally use “evolution†to mean “change over timeâ€â€¦ just that many could take it to mean that, and as such it is a vague term. Certainly, in a context such as this, readers *should* understand the intended meaning (as a synonym for “modern synthesis†and/or “neo-Darwinism)… but SoSaysSunny was originally referring to its use in the movie, which is certainly not targeting a highly educated audience. [smirk] It seems that avoiding ambiguity by using specific terms (both in the movie, and here where we discuss the movie) is wise… Dawkins himself favors the use of the term “Darwinism†over evolution for the very same reason.
The US Supreme Court has certainly not ruled on any cases involving ID. The main court case to date (the Dover school district case, in 2005) was primarily concerned with a particular textbook, which was clearly (and very poorly) directly adapted from a creationist textbook. Intelligent Design does have its *roots* in the creationism movement, but it is entirely independent at this point. For the reasons mentioned in my previous post, it is *not* connected with Biblical Christianity, but is totally a-religious.
Not sure what you mean by CSI being “goalpost movingâ€â€¦ more on CSI below. And what exactly is Dembski’s “only published exampleâ€?
> Is ID counter to natural selection, and
> why? It's hard for me to imagine natural selection
> not having anything to do with evolution, if everyone
> with blonde hair dies then it will become a very rare
> trait.
>
> I would be very interesting to see some of their
> quantifiers for intelegence. I don't supposed you use
> an IQ or other bell curve scale? Please provide more
> examples, so far you seem to be the most clearly
> worded proponent of ID in these coments.
Toltec – I’m definitely pretty novice to this too. :)
Sorry about the confusion with “neo-Darwinism†– as I mentioned above, perhaps “modern evolutionary synthesis†is the most accurate term, if a bit unwieldy, for what biologists believe today. But either way, modern evolutionary biologists certainly do teach that natural selection is the primary mechanism of change, and ID is *not* opposed to the idea that natural selection operates in the natural world.
As for “quantifying intelligenceâ€â€¦ it’s not that ID proposes to quantify the intelligence of the designer. It instead seeks to quantify *indications* that something was (or was not) designed. For example, archeologists must do this … if a human-shaped stone object is discovered, it must be determined whether someone carved it to resemble a man, or whether it is just a random man-shaped stone. Another common example is SETI’s search for extra-terrestrial radio signals…. Random “background†signals must be separated from signals that were designed by somebody out there. (Capt. Kirk?)
One way this is done is by analyzing complex specified information (“CSIâ€)… if something is *both* highly complex , and highly “specifiedâ€, it can be logically deduced that it was designed, not brought about by chance. For example, SETI astronomers might look for a very (very) long, repeating sequence of prime numbers encoded in a radio signal… this signal is both highly complex (incredibly unlikely to originate by chance) and *specified* (it actually contains information… in this case, a list of prime numbers). In this case, ID theorists would be interested in looking at a particular signal and scientifically quantifying how likely it was to have originated by chance, versus by design.
(This is obviously a simplification of the CSI statistical model -- It actually consists of a number of characteristics, including “a probabilistic version of complexity applications to eventsâ€, conditionally independent patterns, replicational and specificational probabilistic resources, pattern applicability, and a universal probability bound… see Dembski’s book [u]Design Revolution[/u] for detailed info on each of these).
This all leads into why ID is so different from creationism.... Creationism is a Bible-inspired belief of how the earth began. Intelligent Design is a scientific study of patterns of intelligence... and not just for "origin of life" issues!!! Concepts from ID research (as described above) could easily be applied to research in fields such as cognitive science, artificial intelligence, information technology, code encryption, archeology, linguistics, psychology, etc.
Again, I am definitely a novice in this area… there are lots of others out there that could describe all these things much better. Just tossing out my two cents. :)
"One way this is done is by analyzing complex specified information (“CSIâ€)… if something is *both* highly complex , and highly “specifiedâ€, it can be logically deduced that it was designed, not brought about by chance."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPlease "logically" deduce said tenent/foundation of Creationism for me and provide an example from the biological world that provides evidence for this.
On another note, this link will put to rest any notion that ID is independent from creationism. http://www.ncseweb.org/article.asp?category=21 -Simply perusing the articles will allow one to see how Creationism convienently morphed into ID after its rejection from public schools. If you need me to do your homework for you in Newtonianism or Einsteinism please do not hesitate to ask, seeing as how I have already completed much of it for you on this subject.
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Edited by rooseveltdecosta at 04/20/2008 8:55 PM
Dawkins use of the word darwinism carries quite a different meaning because in britain the word has not been so severely co-opted by crationist/ID proponents.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe question begging refers to the need to assume that ID is a sound theory in order to apply it. Similar, though not identical, to the Garbage in Garbage out principal in that if you have a unworkable system for analysing a set of data, it doesn't matter what your results are, because the system used to analyse can't be relied upon in the first place.
The goal post moving refers to ID's arguments to any findings regarding evolution is that they are not enough- Creationist claims have fallen back to cellular mitochondria and the bacterial flagellar motor after having given ground on every other front.
Dembski's example was the bacterial flagellar motor, which has been proven to NOT be irreducably complex
In his ruling, Jones said that while intelligent design, or ID, arguments “may be true, a proposition on which the court takes no position, ID is not science.†Among other things, he said intelligent design “violates the centuries-old ground rules of science by invoking and permitting supernatural causationâ€; it relies on “flawed and illogical†arguments; and its attacks on evolution “have been refuted by the scientific community.â€
-this is a federal judge applying the supreme court's designated establishment clause tests, quite a bit presumptuous for me to say a supreme court ruling, but it is more than evident as to how the supreme court would rule had they bothered to give any of the ID cases standing.
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Edited by Tommo0809 at 04/20/2008 9:15 PM
> Before you post anything else, please do your
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> homework.
Rooseveltdecosta – I hope the research I did for my last (rather lengthy) post is evident. :)
> I know this is asking a lot of you, it is
> painfully obvious that you failed to do so before
> stating that, "ID does not equate to creationism"
On the contrary, my personal opinion that “ID does not equate to creationism†is very well thought out. (For the record, I would describe myself as a anti-creationism, but potentially-pro-ID). See the rest of this post for details. (The opinions of others, including Eugenie Scott, were certainly considered in my decision-making process, but as a scientist I prefer to weigh the evidence myself and come to my own conclusions.)
> Creationism... is a vaguely worded
> and untestable set of beliefs put forth by
> religious fanatics aimed towards turning
> America into a theocracy.
I partially agree with you regarding Creationism… namely, that it is a set of beliefs put forth by honest religious individuals in an attempt to reconcile their faith with mainstream science. (I happen to disagree with their set of beliefs, as you apparently do.) It is certainly *not* vaguely worded (see Henry M. Morris’s book Scientific Creationism, and others). It is untestable in the same ways that evolution is untestable… no one has observed the deposition of the geologic layers, for example, and it is unfortunately not repeatable, by evolutionary scientists or anyone.
> On another note, this link will put to rest any
> notion that ID is independent from creationism.
> http://www.ncseweb.org/article.asp?category=21
> -Simply perusing the articles will allow one to see
> how Creationism convienently morphed into ID after
> its rejection from public schools.
Although ID certainly had its origins in creationism, its current formulation is far different. As described in my last post, it is a scientific discipline that seeks to quantify indications that a given object was (or was not) designed. It makes testable predictions. ID research could hold implications, not just for evolutionary biology, but for fields of science such as cognitive science and information technology, among others. It takes no position regarding religion, and is fully compatible with atheistic beliefs.
Creation science, according to the wikipedia article of the same name, is fully committed to:
1. Sudden creation of the universe, energy and life from nothing.
2. The insufficiency of mutation and natural selection in bringing about development of all living kinds from a single organism.
3. Changes only with fixed limits of originally created kinds of plants and animals.
4. Separate ancestry for man and apes.
5. Explanation of the earth's geology by catastrophism, including the occurrence of worldwide flood.
6. A relatively recent inception of the earth and living kinds."
On the other hand, Dembski notes that ID (with respect to biology) is committed to the following propositions:
1 - Specified complexity (SC) and irreducible complexity (IC) are reliable indicators of design.
2 - Biological systems exhibit SC and IC.
3 - Natural mechanisms are unable to explain the origin of SC and IC.
4 - ID constitutes the best explanation for the origin of SC and IC in biological systems.
While their historical connection is undeniable, creationism and ID are currently defined [i]very [/i]differently. I must disagree with Eugenie and Mr. Jones -- creationism is certainly inherently religious, but ID is a non-religious scientific theory.
PS - Thanks for toning down your personal attacks somewhat... "I see great potential within you." :)
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Edited by SumYungGuy at 04/20/2008 10:44 PM
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Edited by SumYungGuy at 04/20/2008 11:01 PM
Tommo -
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> The question begging refers to the need to assume
> that ID is a sound theory in order to apply it.
In this characteristic, ID is identical to every other scientific theory... you don't try to apply them to anything without assuming that they are sound.
> In his ruling, Jones said that while intelligent
> design, or ID, arguments “may be true, a proposition
> on which the court takes no position, ID is not
> science.â€
Again, this ruling is based off of a then-15-year-old textbook [i]originally written as a creationist text[/i]!!! The book was hastily adapted by the authors to the theory of ID (in 1989) following court rulings that creationism is inherently religious (which, of course, it is). While this demonstrates the close ties that ID had to creationism in 1989, the textbook in question is a far cry from ID in its current formulation. Allow me to recommend Dembski's [u]Design Revolution[/u] as a far more current representation of ID theory, or see my previous post for a summary.
Next, I do have to bring to your attention a very funny example from this page that shows the dishonesty / blind self-deception of the people in the mainstream media i.e. Scientific American who write so unscientifically. Nevertheless, the film is wrong to imply that understanding of evolution inevitably or necessarily leads to a rejection of religious belief. Francisco Ayala of the University of California, Irvine, a leading neuroscientist who used to be a Dominican priest, continues to be a devout Catholic, as does the evolutionary biologist Ken Miller of Brown University. Thousands of other biologists across the U.S. who all know evolution to be true are also still religious. Moreover, billions of other people around the world simultaneously accept evolution and keep faith with their religion. The late Pope John Paul II said that evolution was compatible with Roman Catholicism as an explanation for mankind's physical origins.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat a joke! While the rest of us are still entitled to our opinions, these guys who have donned white coats know evolution to be true. Evolution has truly morphed from a theory into a dogma, which we mere mortals who dont wear white coats as opposed to the mere mortals who do wear white coats dare not question their knowledge.
So What , Get a Life even if you have no intelligent design! It's a MOVIE, Watch the news, no more truth there, if you are not there to see it what ever you hear or read is written or said for the benefit of the one writing or saying it. What ever you believe because none of us know, give your stuff away before you die, because you will not take it with you and you will leave a mess for those you leave behind. Who really cares how we started, Lets look at how we are living and how we are ending. I saw the movie and I said to my husband who is a cancer doctor who works very hard to keep people alive and is the smartest person I know why would anyone besides the three people in the theater go to this movie? I realized when he didn't answer that he was not pondering the question he was merely getting some much needed sleep. With every news clip that starts in the middle of a sentence and ends before the person stops you have someone shaping the story to say what they want said. eve
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTheophilus: get over yourself, save the persecution complex for sunday mornings or your therapist's couch.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thissumyunguy: Again. No proof for either irreducable complexity or CSI. ID's so called tennents seem to be innocuous enough, however anyone with the vaguest amount of experience with the theory and its proponents can quickly discern the true purpose behind ID-- as evidenced by dembski's etc promotion of the wedge theory. So as opposed to going in another circle, with you providing no proof or evidence, I think its much more appropriate to dismiss ID as creationism attempting to masquerade as legit scientific theory and save it for an "issues in science" class or a comparative religion class.
I saw the movie.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhen I see hysteria, arm waving, and name-calling in any argument, I know which side does not believe that it has truth on its side.
I am a fairly rational person and admittedly somewhat of a science snob. I don't blame Hollywood or politicians or the average journalist for misinterpreting or overinterpreting the facts. I do blame the "scientists" (and "scientific journalists") who sell out and cherrypick facts to support one side and discard or denigrate the "inconvenient truths". But, if politics, law, and religion can be corrupt, why not science, too?
At least there is still mathematics.
I watched the movie yesterday and heard Dawkins say that Evolutions is fact. When did it become a law? If science is merely based on what can be measured, why do Biology textbooks present the possibility of aliens as the "beginners" of everything as viable?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRegarding item no. 1: Though I decry Stein's selective use of the Darwin quotation, you have done nothing above to demonstrate falsity in Stein's claim. Darwin does indeed put forth the proposition that man, were he not so ignorant, would prevent his weakest from breeding. Darwin's reference to "evil" in the next paragraph is seen as necessarily errant by the 20th century "enlightened" who make the logical and necessary connection that if we descended from animals there is no such thing as morality or "evil." Darwin's implied proposition to eliminate the weak of the species stands logically, therefore, in the mind of anyone who takes seriously the outworkings of this naturalist philosophy. While I don't condone Stein's trimming of the passage, he has accurately reported its implications. If you embrace Darwin's theory, at the same time calling on the avoidance of evil to stem its implications, you are living in a blissfully ignorant inconsistency.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisActually, Ben Stein DOES travel around to college campuses and other venues to give speeches. Though the crowd scenes bookending the movie may have been staged, they are typical for Stein, who is a widely coveted (for good reason) speaker!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTommo0809, you accuse ID'ers of moving the goal posts, but, what are you establishement evo's doing?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSumYungGuy's response bears respect, and honest evaluatiion and rational discourse.
I'm not arguing for ID here, I'm arguing for the objectivty the science community so iconoclastically promotes.
Yo'all would be wise to not be quite so dismissive.
Until you can answer the cellular complexity and lack of fossil links for transitional stages between species, beyond, X/Y strings and insects, I would say you are a bit premature in your victory dances.
Wait, why are we talking about fossils? I thought this was about the complexity of the various species and that such complexity implicates a designer. I think just because something is complex doesn't mean it was created by an inteligent being, plenty of complex things happen by chance in fact ID may best be argued against by choas therorists, since it actually has nothing to do with the proponents of Neo-Evolution.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI asked earlier if they were mutually exclusive and was told they were not...then why are we having this debate. Neo-Evolutionists don't believe in ID, that's fine because it's a seperate and unrelated field. Same for ID'ers, no need to cry fowl.
Please help me to see if I am missing something.
Point taken toltec, I'll leave fossils out.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBut, come on, chaos theorists.
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Edited by jcrudd at 04/21/2008 5:53 PM
As a reply to Armstead, it is not a logical and necessary connection that evolution implies the nonexistence of ethical principles. Behavior that emphasizes survival is ethical behavior chosen genetically. The greater variety of genetic material in the gene pool, the greater the adaptability the species will have. For humans living in a wild state, culling certain types of handicaps might be the more viable practice, but this culling would be done by nature. Clearly, this has nothing to do with the present human civilization. As I have pointed out elsewhere, what most aided the Nazis in coming to power was that they appealed to the hatred of the Jewish people shared by the majority of the Christian populace. This hatred did not originate with Darwinism or the survival of the fittest. The evil that has been generated by Christianity so far outstrips whatever evil may have inadvertently been caused by pseudo-scientific interpretations of Darwins survival of the fittest that far greater humility would be becoming on the part of Christians.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisJust for the record, I am a Christian (in a completely non-mythological way), which means that I do not accept the strictly materialistic interpretation of evolution.
Evolutionists are wrong! ID is testable in scientific way. It makes several predictions of events.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this1. Fully developed new species will appear at random points in time. There will be no warning and no past history but a breeding herd of "hiptoplats" may suddenly appear in central park.
2. The creator is super-powerful and must know that the debate is raging on earth. Look for him to come up with a really big miracle. Something so clear that people will know that he is "da bomb". Maybe instead of a world-wide flood (been there, done that) he could make all the worlds oceans disappear instantly.
Either one of the above will prove ID. Do you think it will happen? Lets all be on the look out.
> I'm going to see the film this weekend. I'm sure it
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> will remind me of an old joke: "A little girl asked
> her
> father: How did the human race appear? Father
> answered, God made Adam and Eve; they had
> children.
>
> The girl then asked her mother the same question.
> Mother said, Many years ago there were monkeys from
> which the human race evolved.
>
> The confused girl returned to her father and asked
> him to explain the 2 different answers. Well, Dear",
> he
> said, "I told you about my side of the family, and
> your mother told you about hers."
Cute story, but pointless.
> And that's the whole point of Stein's movie: ~
> discussion is key.
No, the point of that movie is propaganda, pure and simple.
They attacked science, impugned people's motives, and generally insulted anyone who has been involved in serious scientific research for the past 150 years because "they won't let us play with our rules".
> I.D. has serious scientific flaws,
ID has no science.
> darwinism has serious scientific flaws.
Evolutionary theory has some holes, but few flaws. What you are talking about has been superseded by improved science for the past 150 years. Let's stop banging that drum, shall we?
> But darwin dogma is taken for
Broken record. There is no dogma, except for your own. Do not paint science with the brush of religion, we will not be taken down to your level, thank you very much.
> inerrant gospel which is then force fed to govt.
> school children everywhere with little or no facts
> presented about the flawed evidence, circular
> reasoning, and out right fraud which peppers the
> gaping holes in this theory.
Gaping holes, gaping holes, come see the gaping holes.
I'd take swiss cheese over air anytime. And air is all you have to offer, my friend.
> ~ Discussion is key. Why does that make so many
> nervous???
No one is nervous, that's what we call a straw man.
Produce the science, come on, we are all waiting. Eagerly.
No science means no discussion, that is the rule you hate the most. You expect to have a place at the table when you come empty handed? When all you have to offer is insults to the real scientists? Grow up.
head->hole
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf that works for you guy.
Constructing straw men and then attacking them is ignoble.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWe have truth on our side, we don't have to make up parables about the delusional. Sticking to facts, my friend, is all we need do and this ghost of religions past will eventually wither up and blow away.
All the hand waving and finger pointing in the world will not advance their cause one iota. The scientific method will not be corrupted by their nonsense. It will rise like a scholarly Godzilla and squash their little religious rice shacks flat. Lol.
Rennie & Mirsky didnt read Darwin carefully. What Darwin called evil wasnt neglecting the weak & helpless. That was Darwins description of problems that could JUSTIFY neglecting the weak & helpless. Intentionally neglecting the weak & helpless, in Darwins view, should be contemplated only if it conferred a real benefit, and combated an overwhelming present evil.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEugenics programs didnt work by neglecting the weak, anyhow, and the movie doesnt say they did. Even the NAZI's didnt neglect inferior people - they sterilized & murdered them!
-Dave Burton
Cary, NC
> Tommo -
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this>
> > The question begging refers to the need to
> assume
> > that ID is a sound theory in order to apply it.
>
> In this characteristic, ID is identical to every
> other scientific theory... you don't try to apply
> them to anything without assuming that they are
> sound.
No sir, it most certainly is not. It is charlatanism, and no more than that. There is a deep dishonesty behind all of this ID stuff that I personally find repellent.
Your time is now, produce the facts upon which your "theory" is based. I know you have nothing just as you know you have nothing. This wedge tactic will surely fail and all of you who are behind it will find yourselves forever excluded from further serious scientific consideration. Just like Fleischmann and Pons.
It is insulting and denigrating to all real scientists that this "theory" is expected to be taken as a contender to evolution when it is no more than a bag of air pretending to be science.
(Trying again, to fix the typography)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRennie & Mirsky didn't read Darwin carefully. What Darwin called "evil" wasn't neglecting the weak & helpless. That was Darwin's description of problems that could [u]justify[/u] neglecting the weak & helpless. Intentionally neglecting the weak & helpless, in Darwin's view, should be contemplated only if it conferred a real "benefit," and combated an "overwhelming present evil."
Eugenics programs didn't work by neglecting the weak, anyhow, and the movie doesn't say they did. Even the NAZI's didn't neglect "inferior" people - they sterilized & murdered them!
-Dave Burton
Cary, NC
I LOLD.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe film's Darwin quote was accurate. It's Rennie & Mirsky who rewrote Darwin.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDarwin wrote: "The aid which we feel impelled to give to the helpless is mainly an incidental result of the instinct of sympathy... Nor could we check our sympathy, even at the urging of hard reason, without deterioration in the noblest part of our nature... [If] we were intentionally to neglect the weak and helpless, it could only be for a contingent benefit, with an overwhelming present evil."
Rennie & Mirsky claim that means "Darwin explicitly rejected the idea of eliminating the 'weak' as dehumanizing and evil." Not so!
1. Darwin wrote of "neglecting," not "eliminating," the weak.
2. Darwin's expressed ambivalence, not opposition, to neglecting the weak (for "contingent benefits").
Most eugenicists thought themselves humanitarians. Instead of neglecting the weak, they used "humane" methods, like sterilizing "defectives," and Margaret Sanger's practice of putting birth control clinics in black neighborhoods.
You're falling into the Expelled trap with sloppy writing yourself... "Thousands of other biologists across the U.S. who all know evolution to be true are also still religious." No one KNOWS evolution to be true. Things cannot be proven with the scientific method, only disproven. Many leading scientists have concluded based on the available evidence that evolution is the most likely mechanism for certain aspects of the questions relating to the origins of life (evolution doesn't actually answer directly how things got started in the first place, only how they changed thereafter!)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"This looks like it was designed, so there must be a designer; we know there is a designer because this looks designed." -- this is not a tautology
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Darwin explicitly rejected the idea of eliminating the "weak" as dehumanizing and evil. Those words falsify Expelled's argument."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis statement is illogical. The connections between Darwin, Gobineau, Nietzsche, and others to Hitler does not require an identical replication of ideas among them. That's ridiculous.
The only other point in this article that is worth commenting on is #5. The film does a poor job of addressing the nature of science, the nature of philosophy, and how the two are intersecting. This intersection does a disservice to both Science and to Philosophy. At issue is the ideological hostility that exists in the Academy. And, by avoiding the details here, the film pulls a Michael Moore. Despite this, the film has merit for those who are intellectually honest enough to explore the issues more deeply.
>"This looks like it was designed, so there must be a designer; we know there is a designer because this looks designed." -- this is not a tautology
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI looked it up, tautology has two meanings. In prepositional logic it means that the statement has to be true regardless of the validity of the it's parts (ex. (A or !A)= TRUE no matter whether A is true or false). In language, it just means you said the same thing twice, which you did.
"This looks like it was designed" we will call this A.
"there must be a designer" we willl call this B.
A therefore B is the same as B because of A. It basically said that IF it looks like it was designed THEN it was.
I might not know much about ID, but I am fairly good at logic and reasoning. I figured when I first read this statement that it was a mistake, but since it has been repeated so many times I am assuming you meant to say the same thing twice, again.
I am still unclear why were are debating this, evolution and ID are seperate and not connected. It does seem that ID'ers and Neo-Evolutionist have some sort of log term bone to pick with each other, and perhaps this goes back to the Creationist arguement.
Maybe we need to classify bad ID, like this movie which is obviously attacking and using underhanded techniques to do it, and good ID, which seems to be a science for understanding the complexity of an object and determining whether that complexity implies intelegence or design. I think if you leave people out of it, as in say neither side try and determine where we come from, then maybe people woudln't take it so personally.
> Without disputing any of the article content, the
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> simple existence of this article shows that
> Scientific American has an agenda.
Of course Scientific American has an agenda. It always has. And that agenda is to promote good science, and expose bad science.
If anyone in my family needed help and I was not there to give it, I would hope that our society would give that help. Anyone might need help at some point in time. Religion is not involved in what I am saying.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt is unfair to say that all individuals believing in ID want to force their view on everyone just as it would be unfair to claim that all of those in the scientific community are trying to do the same. I do not believe that everyone, regardless of which side their beliefs fall on, is interested in forcing their view on those that believe otherwise (as we are all human and therefore fallible I'm sure that is the goal in some cases). It makes sense that if you believe you have the correct answer you'd want to share. Evolution\Darwinism is a theory. It it is based on someone's beliefs not fact. Creationism\ID is based on faith which doesn't seem much different to me. Since science is supposed to be observable fact and no one was here to observe our beginnings [according to evolution, although according to creationist's beliefs there was - and it was documented], regardless of how you believe that occurred, neither can be scientific "fact". Just as future generations, having only the information they've found in an ancient TV broadcasting station might think all humans were vapid, shop-aholic, sex-addicted, spoiled brats if all they were able to find were broadcasts of the "reality shows" since they do seem to make us appear that way. That would be an inaccurate conclusion if they weren't here to see that is only part of the information. Or, if they decided other broadcasts that weren't "reality" shows must not have accurately represented humans in this day & age. Let's face it: neither ID nor evolution can ever be conclusively and unquestionably proven and as such, there will always be an element of "faith" involved in either belief. Why not teach evolution as the theory that it is and be tolerant of others beliefs as well? I do believe that without God in the mix we devalue life & that is a slippery slope. (Perhaps that was the only correlation trying to be drawn between Lysenkoism, evolution, and the Holocaust?)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI agree with your statements. Also I think it might be useful to make and study a hypothesis about intelligent design. If that could be profitable why not proceed with that study. That is what the scientist does.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI keep reading, post after post, those adamantly insisting that evolution can be reproduced, & has been proven to be fact. What do you say to those questioning the very INITIAL beginning which must be accepted in order to thoroughly believe any non-God-involved beginnings? (That bit - to my knowledge - has not ever been reproduced, tested, or "proven" by any other scientific method.) Which means regardless of what has since been observed there is just as much "proof" and faith involved in believing either way [all of this just happened | God is powerful enough to have made it all just as He said in Genesis]. I see harm in believing in evolution {as stated in my prior post} and yet I believe everyone has the right to believe in what they choose. I just want the same respect afforded those around me. I see no down-side to believing the Biblical account since it leads to good (if you follow Him and not individuals claiming to follow Him since we've seen what all of the imperfect humans can cause: The Crusades, The Inquisition, etc...). I've no issue with criticizing a film that claims to be scientific but presents no science. However, that should be the extent of the criticisms relevant to an article about that film and SA.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDarwin's complete quote is irrelevant to how it was interpreted and implemented by social Darwinists like Hitler.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat we must fight for is to safeguard the existence and reproduction of our race and people, the sustenance of our children and the purity of our blood&so that our people may mature for the fulfillment of the mission allotted to it by the creator of the universe Mein Kamph, Adolf Hitler, 1924
I might add Darwin considered compassion "an incidental result of sympathy" and contrary to "hard reason". He might have believed a lack of compassion to be evil but he doesn't make a very strong case for it.
A. Gene Young
I have no idea how these multiple quotes appeared. :)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this--
Edited by AGeneYoung at 04/22/2008 4:15 PM
good gravy!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this--
Edited by AGeneYoung at 04/22/2008 4:17 PM
:0 spam!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this--
Edited by AGeneYoung at 04/22/2008 4:17 PM
I have to admit my geology isn't great. Could you explain the testability of plate tectonics? The theory replaced continental drift yet neither predict a thing nor are they testable.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIn the same manner they attempt to explain the past and are theories in geology Intelligent Design attempts to explain the function of biological systems we observe today.
[b]
"Actually, science avoids design explanations for natural phenomena out of logical necessity. The scientific method involves rigorously observing and experimenting on the material world. It accepts as evidence only what can be measured or otherwise empirically validated (a requirement called methodological naturalism). That requirement prevents scientific theories from becoming untestable and overcomplicated."[/b]
--
Edited by AGeneYoung at 04/22/2008 4:24 PM
so i cant quite figure out what this movie is against, is it evolution? or is it darwins evolutionary process of natural selection? or is it that "big science" gives no credit to intelligent design?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisall that "big science" asks for is any sort of material proof, observable proof, or testable proof. thats it. either you have it or you dont.
and codequeen, yes there is evidence for proof of evolution.just because you dont care to look for it doesnt mean its not there. and yes evolution by natural selection is a theory. a theory that all observable data points to.
"I see no down-side to believing the Biblical account since it leads to good (if you follow Him and not individuals claiming to follow Him since we've seen what all of the imperfect humans can cause: The Crusades, The Inquisition, etc..."-codequeen
somebody has never read their bible.if you follow the example set by god in the bible, that means your willing to kill innocents because of what other people did?
do we really need to get into the atrocities performed by god in the bible? go read leviticus and deuteronomy and then say god is a good role model. id rather have my kid worshiping satan. he only killed about 10 people in the bible.all of jobs kids. on a bet with god. and he got some kids back anyway.
i used to believe in god.i have since grown up and started thinking for myself and demanding proof and reason for everything i see.
evolution is open for the challenge.if you want to argue against it, prove to us that it is wrong.even if intelligent design is proven right, that still doesnt make evolution wrong.
you should put more time and effort into creating a theory that can be proven to others,and not worry about taking down another theory just because it conflicts with you religious belief.
i guess all we ask is that you take the religious beliefs out of your mind for a moment and assess the situation with logic, reason, and a desire for the truth.
Still talking about god and evolution?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI just want to know some examples of ID, and not the human body (as I said, I think that is what is getting this out of hand).
Also, in response to the poster asking if they have reproduced the origin of life, I read an article once where they had created a primodial soup (similar to when the Earth was much younger and had more water) and shot some voltage through it (base on that there were large eletrical storms at the time) and they got a totally new micro organism where there wasn't one before.
But, in retrospect, using lightning to create life does sound pretty God like, even if they can reproduce it in a lab.
I have a question for either John Rennie or Steve Mirsky,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWould you consider archeology a science? What, if any, aspect of this forensic study is testable?
[i]
[b]Archeology is the study of the human past. Its initial objective is the construction of cultural chronology. Its intermediate objective is the reconstruction of past lifeways. Its ultimate objective is the discovery of the processes which underlie and condition human behavior.[/b][/i]
"Actually, science avoids design explanations for natural phenomena out of logical necessity. The scientific method involves rigorously observing and experimenting on the material world. It accepts as evidence only what can be measured or otherwise empirically validated (a requirement called methodological naturalism). That requirement prevents scientific theories from becoming untestable and overcomplicated." . . . from the 5th point of the authors.
If either could speak to the earlier point of plate tectonics I'd appreciate it.
A. Gene Young
Evolution has a theory of the evolution of the horse with no predictive use nor is it testable; additionally the explanation has evolved to the point it's unrecognizable from it's original form. Is this non-science within the field of this science?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisA. Gene Young
The Lucasian Professor in A Brief History of Time attempts to explain the singularity among other things. The big bang is hardly testable. Is he off his scientific rocker with these ideas?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this[b]
A Brief History of Time attempts to explain a range of subjects in cosmology, including the Big Bang, black holes, light cones and superstring theory, to the nonspecialist reader. Its main goal is to give an overview of the subject but, unusual for a popular science book, it also attempts to explain some complex mathematics.[/b][i][/i]
A. Gene Young
I have read those Old Testament accounts but Jesus' example supersedes any conflicting old laws and is what we are to follow. If one believes in a supreme being wouldn't it make sense that it might be possible that we wouldn't actually be able to wrap our minds around what His ultimate plan might be. I have read Old Testament accounts and that is one's own to deal with. I'm not insisting that everyone agree with me. I think it's unfair to tell someone to throw away a huge part of what they believe in order to agree with the "more enlightened and progressive thinking more rationals" (not your quote, have heard that elsewhere). I wouldn't ask someone to set aside their belief that killing is wrong and then ask them to decide the fate of an individual accused of atrocities. We all (scientists too) bring our beliefs and who we are at the core to everything we do. I've not chosen to disregard "proofs". Many of those proofs haven't been proven to my satisfaction or there are entirely logical alternate explanations that support ID. So long as any of that can be proof for either case, to me, it would take a much greater leap of faith to believe it all just happened than that there is Someone who is all-knowing, all-powerful and did just what He said. I am really a very proof-seeking person and I've seen many things that have no scientific explanation (I realize that in many cases that may be only because no one has found it yet) however, I still choose to believe - as you have chosen not to. One wouldn't avoid using electricity or a car simply because they don't fully understand how either works. It is a choice and a faith either way and while many seem to be overly irritated that I do believe I have ill-wishes for those that don't. I only wish that there could be more tolerance for others' beliefs, without acrimony, from both sides.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs with most political filmmakers, they tend to exaggerate and bend the truth. No surprise here.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"I am really a very proof-seeking person.."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI disagree CodeQueen1. You are NOT a proof-seeking person. This is generally what you probably do when trying to "proof-seek" ...
When you arrive at a subject of interest. You read about it for a short while: a day?, a month?, a year? and during or after that short period of time, you may turn to God for some sort of explanation.
This in and of itself is NOT the problem.
The problem is THE FOLLOWING:
After that short period of time: a day, a month , a year...... you STOP studying the subject and just put it on the shelf because it lost your interest....you stop studying it......... Meanwhile there are COUNTLESS other people studying the exact same subject you have been studying, except they study it for many years, dedicating their ENTIRE LIVES to the subject and discussing and writing papers and sharing this information with people who have also DEDICATED a great majority of their LIFE studying that same subject. And BEFORE them, there were countless other people THROUGHOUT HISTORY who have studied that same subject and are now dead but have passed on their knowledge of it to future generations........who will....also spend MOST of their lives studying the subject.
Thats the difference. THEY are the "proof-seekers" not YOU.
Matthew 5:5
Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.
The ID movement and the leaders of ALL the religious movements on earth are not the meek ones. They only do it because of their compelling need to "share" with the rest of the world their own very unique "opinion" (ie their interpretation of the bible, koran etc) onto other people. They think they know what God wants and they are compelled to share their wisdom with everyone else.
In my opinion the scientists, mathematicians, physicists etc who work in cramped, lonely labs getting paid little but only doing it because they enjoy doing it or are looking for the truth are actually the meek ones. And are the ones actually contributing to society.
"Trust those who say they are looking for the truth....be weary of those who say they have found it"
Baseless presumptive generalizations are what they are.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this::turns to God::
Please God, don't let me be misunderstood.
A. Gene Young
The last paragraph of #5 on this list caught my attention. I have had many discussions concerning the importance of 'falsifiability' of theory. It's frustrating when individuals defend theory by making circular arguments, which is what defenders of ID tend to do. Good job, SCIAM.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe hubris of ID and its believers, and I suspect the reason why people react so strongly to it, is the insistance on being evaluated side by side with evolution as a valid alternative theory. It is not, and has never been a viable "theory" - what it is is an invention by non-scientists that is adapted to sound "kinda" plausible to people who are either ignorant or not interested in science. They then insist on being taken seriously and evaluated as an alternative to evolution.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBy this logic, I can challenge any theory, and insist that my explanation be evluated as a viable option to say...the theory of gravity, or thermodynamics. The attachment to the word "theory" also shows a profound ignorance of scientific terminology, as gravity is also labeled a theory. As a satirical article I recently read pointed out, ID is about as logical as arguing that the theory of gravity is fatally flawed and should instead be replaced with theory of "Intelligent Falling." Gravity doesn't exist, it is just God pushing us down so we stay attached to the earth. Sound silly? So does ID...
Finally... claiming that you should be free to believe in anything you want is fine... but don't expect NOT to get judged for it. You are wrong when you say that people should respect your views, because if your views are ignorant and flawed nobody should be obligated to take you seriously. If you believe that the center of the earth is made of cream cheese - go ahead and believe it, but don't expect people to respect that opinion.
All kidding aside... although Evolution may have some unanswered components or flaws it has certinaly gone through far more actual scientific analysis and rigourous study than ID - which is just a story with absolutely nothing to back it up. Questioning or evolving certain components of the theory of evolution is not the same thing as simply replacing it with a totally different and completely unproven "theory."
Evangelical Scientists Refute Gravity With New 'Intelligent Falling' Theory
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisKANSAS CITY, KS—As the debate over the teaching of evolution in public schools continues, a new controversy over the science curriculum arose Monday in this embattled Midwestern state. Scientists from the Evangelical Center For Faith-Based Reasoning are now asserting that the long-held "theory of gravity" is flawed, and they have responded to it with a new theory of Intelligent Falling.
Rev. Gabriel Burdett explains Intelligent Falling.
"Things fall not because they are acted upon by some gravitational force, but because a higher intelligence, 'God' if you will, is pushing them down," said Gabriel Burdett, who holds degrees in education, applied Scripture, and physics from Oral Roberts University.
Burdett added: "Gravity—which is taught to our children as a law—is founded on great gaps in understanding. The laws predict the mutual force between all bodies of mass, but they cannot explain that force. Isaac Newton himself said, 'I suspect that my theories may all depend upon a force for which philosophers have searched all of nature in vain.' Of course, he is alluding to a higher power."
Founded in 1987, the ECFR is the world's leading institution of evangelical physics, a branch of physics based on literal interpretation of the Bible.
According to the ECFR paper published simultaneously this week in the International Journal Of Science and the adolescent magazine God's Word For Teens!, there are many phenomena that cannot be explained by secular gravity alone, including such mysteries as how angels fly, how Jesus ascended into Heaven, and how Satan fell when cast out of Paradise.
The ECFR, in conjunction with the Christian Coalition and other Christian conservative action groups, is calling for public-school curriculums to give equal time to the Intelligent Falling theory. They insist they are not asking that the theory of gravity be banned from schools, but only that students be offered both sides of the issue "so they can make an informed decision."
"We just want the best possible education for Kansas' kids," Burdett said.
Proponents of Intelligent Falling assert that the different theories used by secular physicists to explain gravity are not internally consistent. Even critics of Intelligent Falling admit that Einstein's ideas about gravity are mathematically irreconcilable with quantum mechanics. This fact, Intelligent Falling proponents say, proves that gravity is a theory in crisis.
"Let's take a look at the evidence," said ECFR senior fellow Gregory Lunsden."In Matthew 15:14, Jesus says, 'And if the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch.' He says nothing about some gravity making them fall—just that they will fall. Then, in Job 5:7, we read, 'But mankind is born to trouble, as surely as sparks fly upwards.' If gravity is pulling everything down, why do the sparks fly upwards with great surety? This clearly indicates that a conscious intelligence governs all falling."
Critics of Intelligent Falling point out that gravity is a provable law based on empirical observations of natural phenomena. Evangelical physicists, however, insist that there is no conflict between Newton's mathematics and Holy Scripture.
"Closed-minded gravitists cannot find a way to make Einstein's general relativity match up with the subatomic quantum world," said Dr. Ellen Carson, a leading Intelligent Falling expert known for her work with the Kansan Youth Ministry. "They've been trying to do it for the better part of a century now, and despite all their empirical observation and carefully compiled data, they still don't know how."
"Traditional scientists admit that they cannot explain how gravitation is supposed to work," Carson said. "What the gravity-agenda scientists need to realize is that 'gravity waves' and 'gravitons' are just secular words for 'God can do whatever He wants.'"
Some evangelical physicists propose that Intelligent Falling provides an elegant solution to the central problem of modern physics.
"Anti-falling physicists have been theorizing for decades about the 'electromagnetic force,' the 'weak nuclear force,' the 'strong nuclear force,' and so-called 'force of gravity,'" Burdett said. "And they tilt their findings toward trying to unite them into one force. But readers of the Bible have already known for millennia what this one, unified force is: His name is Jesus."
Very clear rebuttal - thanks. The worst part of film is the inter-splicing of so many clips that are intended to denigrate scientific progress or demonize its adherents. Even before the connection between Nazism and Darwinism is made explicitly, the directors cut in several violent, embarrassing or appalling images that have absolutely no connection to the discussion at hand. They are simply intended to manipulate the emotions of audience members. It is shameful, petty, and bigoted. In fact, it resembles the propagandistic films it decries, and seeks to rile up an audience in the very same way that other propagandistic films have done in the past. To see excerpts of such detestable films, go and see "Expelled". Otherwise, you'll learn more about Darwinism vs. ID if you stop a random 8th grader on the street and ask them what their opinions are.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOde to the Intelligent Flying, Falling, Spaghetti Monster
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Oh, not so good, not so clear
You mock those that search for truth
And invent Flying Spaghetti Monsters
To mock the power of imagination
And insult the getting of wisdom.
We are like an infant
Lying in a room
Our mother is born when she enters the room
And dies when she leaves
Again and again she is recreated
We can not guess of a father outside
This is your life
In the material world
Living in a room
Walls made of Space, Time, and Matter
To know this room
Not just what it Does
But what it Is
One must see beyond
That which is needed,
Is a metaphysical construct
That construct exists, yet is not real
Without it, you know nothing
Without it, science is nothing
Its name is Mathematics,
The construct that exists, yet is not real
Others there are, their names I know
And what of Space, Time, and Matter
No one knows what these are, only what they do
In the material world
Abstractions and entities in the eternal Now
Blinking in and out of the stretched out fabric
Who knows the nature of their existence?
They are real, yet do not exist
The tangible a dream
So mock the virtual if you will
But all is virtual, all the way down,
From senses to substance
From beginning to end
--pstanden
Take 2:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAcknowledge that the parody is funny. And no, I do not believe that Creation or Intelligent Design should be taught as science.
However, the quote by the putative “ECFR senior fellow Gregroy Lunsdenâ€
“This clearly indicates that a conscious intelligence governs all falling."
is a rather interesting “insightâ€, compared with the real life Seth Lloyd, MIT Professor in Quantum Mechanics, in this WIRED Magazine March 2006 interview:
"What is the universe computing when we are not hijacking it for our own purposes?
It computes itself. It computes the flow of orange juice as you drink it, or the position of each atom in your cells.
... Would it be fair to say the universe is a mind?
You could use that metaphor. And if you did, then you and I and my cat are its thoughts. But the vast majority of the universe's thinking is about humble vibrations and collisions of atoms.
You seem to be saying that the concept of the universe as one huge quantum computer is not just a metaphor - it's real.
Absolutely. Atoms and electrons are bits. Atomic collisions are "ops." Machine language is the laws of physics. The universe is a quantum computer."
I saw the movie and believe it confirmed what I've witnessed for years as a decided bias and, in my opinion, somewhat blind acceptance of the supposed "established fact" of evolution among those in Big Education, Big Science, and Big Media (yes, I use those terms intentionally, for emphasis). Your "rebuttal" is interesting and somewhat enlightening. I found your comments about scientific objections to ID particularly helpful. I would certainly hope scientists apply this same rigor in evaluating some of the preposterous claims of evolutionists who constantly present as indisputable fact extremely speculative and totally unverifiable assertions about origins of man and other complex organisms.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYour reply confirms the main theme of the movie. It's actually laughable that you see the Big Bad Creationists, perhaps with that little hole-in-the-wall office portrayed in the movie as their Center, as a threat to your religion. You can speak of God all you want, but it's obvious that your religiously held tenets are being challenged and you find that intolerable!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI think that the movie was trying to get to a deeper point than all of this fluff material mentioned. At the end, when Stein is talking with Dawkins, he asks him to put a number on his belief, where Dawkins replies '99%.' Although he was pressured into the question, it still shows he isn't "100%" positive that Darwin's theory is fact. What I took from this is that since the chances of the world coming to life the way it has (1 in a billion trillion or something like that) has the same probability of ID to be fact. So if this is the case, why shouldn't ID be validated in scientific discussions if these two scenarios are just as likely?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYour censoring my free thought... by being right. Damn science :(
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhen someone is being [i]intellectually dishonest[/i] with can be quite frustrating. The polarizing that was created was not by the editors of SciAM. If you had actually listened to the interview with Mark Mathus you would have realized this.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis position that the editors had taken on science and religion was that that [u]science and religion do co-exist[/u]. However, Mr. Mathus continued to present the argument that on the you are either support the atheist evolution or believe in an intelligent designer. This continued when the editors attempted to present arguments that both do actually co-exist. Mr. Mathus stated by interviewing an non-atheist who support evolution would confuse the issue. This is being [i]intellectually dishonest[/i].
I try to live according to the self-imposed principle that my opinion about a matter is worth very little unless I can articulate fairly accurately the opposing opionion. On the issue spoken of here, while my thinking, observations and inclination have become more strongly aligned with the "intelligent design" side, I am trying to educate myself further through reading and discussion of people with different viewpoints.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOne thing that should be abundantly clear to any honest student of history and science is that there have been brilliant scientists through the ages, up to the present, who were variously theists and atheists. For those of you (and it appears there are many) who sneer at the ideas of creation and/or intelligent design and insinuate that one could not be a scientist and hold such "stupid" views, I refer you to the following article written as a rebuttal to an earlier article in Scientific American:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this15 Answers to John Rennie and Scientific Americans Nonsense (By section)
by Bert Thompson, Ph.D. and Brad Harrub, Ph.D.
I would be hesitant in calling this article a rebuttal to what presented in the movie. This is more because a rebuttal requires something to be a difference of opinion. This article presents information that was omitted or manipulated by the makes of Expelled used to support their argument.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe makes of Expelled used to try to link the Holocaust to the theory of Evolution. In the interview with Mark Mathis, he denies this. Additionally, he takes offense to the fact that some of the editor present that someone could make the conclusion that the Holocaust was a direct result of Darwin's theory. Here is a link to Mr. Mathis true believe of on this issue.
http://live.hollywoodjesus.com/?p=1940&page=3
Here is a quote from "Mark Mathis interview" which can be found at Worldontheweb (ontheweb)
http://www.worldontheweb.com/2008/03/28/mark-mathis-interview/
[i]
[b]Mathis:[/b] Should we shy away from the truth? People are uncomfortable that a materialist philosophy can lead to a phenomenon like Nazism. Just because it makes people uncomfortable doesn’t mean we should leave it out. All the more reason we should leave it in. It’s not a guaranteed outcome, and we’re not saying that. But…we know that Adolph Hitler was a staunch Darwinist, and those ideals consciously drove him. It was a consequence. The unfortunate thing in this is that there are far too many people have misappropriated Nazism to their own agenda. It’s “The Boy Who Cried Wolf†syndrome.[/i]
To me it is more that Mr. Mathis is uncomfortable with the connect after listening to "Roundtable Discussion with Mark Mathis".
There are people who have very deep religious conviction, and this should be commended. It is very troubling when they need to change the world in so that it can be compatible with their religious views. Even when it becomes apparent that they do not have any understanding of the subject matter.
Take for example an article written by Rev. Edith Kaiser is associate professor of Bible at Global University in Springfield.
http://www.news-leader.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080426/OPINIONS02/804260305
She is quite harsh towards scientists, but shows no knowledge of various areas of study. This includes astronomy, geology, medical history and of course biology.
In an article by Bert Thompson, Ph.D. and Brad Harrub, Ph.D. (thanks Russerford-reply 196). The authors argue that "[i]If testimony from many of the evolutionists themselves is taken at face value, the study of dinosaurs was the deciding factor in their conclusion to abandon their belief in God and to accept in its place organic evolution.[/i]" You can read the full article yourself.
http://www.apologeticspress.com/articles/15
In this world we have two types of materialism. The materialist world that is the corner stone of scientific and academic inquiry. The other materialist desire to have material goods. These are not the same and it is hard to understand how someone can make such as linguistic error.
The concussion that can be obtained is that the supports of Intelligent Design deeply believe that they are doing the right thing. They believe that they are absolutely correct in their assertions, and that materialism is a great threat to them.
It is clear here that the writers are themselves ignorant of the fact that Evolution is a totally Faith Based Assumption. What Stein is doing is exposing the fear reactions of an opposing Faith and questioning the closed minds that will not allow an open platform on the beginnings and state of Life but rather chose to direct the student to believe rather than question any Theory presented as Valid.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisToo many Scientists fail to appreciate the Leap of Faith required to understand our beginnings and allow for possibilities that we could All be Wrong in our Theoretical understanding. Many early assumptions have been turned on their head, Open your Minds and think for yourselves. Just as Medicine creates as many problems as it solves, Science is there to Investigate not to Have A Side in any Argument and if you are a true Scientist You'd Know that a closed mind choses not to learn.
It looks like you have a few valid criticisms of the movie, but you don't seem to be able to dispute the overwhelming evidence of systematic censorship of ID proponents throughout the current 'scientific' community. Your first dispute with the Darwin quote is very weak, as the full quote doesn't reveal a different meaning. The video clips were there to keep the attention of the media-children and interject some humor/satire.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisCool-Braid - your random capitalization notwithstanding, your reply makes no sense, and is a random string of factually incorrect statements rather than any arguement for or against anything. Advocates like you make ID look worse than it already does.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd no, I do not respect your views or opinions - not because they are different but because they are objectively ignorant and stupid. If you want to argue something with someone, it is worthwhile to at least have a passable understanding of both sides, or least be able to articulate your position beyond listing a random selection of your own statements as "facts."
WilLCC - not sure I follow your logic. Most scientific theories are not 100% certain. That is why they are called theories in general - because science is not as conceited as religion, and does not pretend to know all the answers to all questions at all times. That said - 99% certain is pretty certain - not to mention that the 1% most likely pertains to the fact that there may be small nuances or differences from in some of the components, and not that the entire theory has a 1% chance of being entirely wrong.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOn the other hand - where exactly did you get the statistic that ID is also 99% certain? All that rigorous study it has undergone? all the of the subcomponents of this "theory" that have been proved? All the documentation and evidence? Of course not... since none of those things exist for ID.
So no, they are not equal, they do not have the same probability of being accurate, and your opinion that ID is correct is not even remotely as valid as that of someone who belives in evolution.
It is however a lot easier to believe in ID, or any other theory that ends at "God did it." then it is to actually learn things... like those difficult and pesky theories of gravity, thermodynamics, quantum mechanics, etc. ID is for the intellectually lazy and generally stupid who would rather substitute their own theories that don't make them feel inferior to people who actually do the work, learn the science, and take the time to study and understand things.
It is absolutely disgusting to me that there has been such a large scale resurgence of irrationality within American culture. Not only does it seem that long settle debates are being reignited but an entire generation has been raised in these muddy waters to ensure that this stupid argument will continue. Being scientists means we feel inclined to argue rationally with these people with the intention of persuading them, however they have arisen in a society permeated with persuasive arguments and somehow managed to remain irrational. The fact that a large studio would even bother releasing such drivel bodes poorly for the future of this country.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> At
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> the end, when Stein is talking with Dawkins, he asks
> him to put a number on his belief, where Dawkins
> replies '99%.' ... What I took from this
> is that since the chances of the world coming to life
> the way it has (1 in a billion trillion or something
> like that) has the same probability of ID to be fact.
> So if this is the case, why shouldn't ID be
> e validated in scientific discussions if these two
> scenarios are just as likely?
That is bad probability. You are trying to hook one into the other with out combining their probabilities.
Just because you rolled a 3 on one 6 sided dice (1:6) doesn't mean you will roll a 3 again (1:36) or on a different dice (1:36)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dice#Probability
so to say that the probability of the universe forming (1 in a billion trillion) and that it was formed by an intelligence (1 in a billion trillion) is actually (1 in a [billion trillion]^2 ).
> It is clear here that the writers are themselves
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> ignorant of the fact that Evolution is a totally
> Faith Based Assumption.
No it is not, it is peer reviewed and the best answer we have at the moment.
> What Stein is doing is
> exposing the fear reactions of an opposing Faith and
> questioning the closed minds that will not allow an
> open platform on the beginnings and state of Life but
> rather chose to direct the student to believe rather
> than question any Theory presented as Valid.
What Stein is doing is throwing Oranges on the Apple cart. It is not "open minded" math when 2+2 = 5, it is wrong. Going for the right answer in the face of wrong ones is not closed mindedness.
> Open your Minds and
> think for yourselves.
All I hear from you ID people is "open your mind and think like me." From the crusades to now, you are all the same autonomous robots, sending out missionaries to destroy the heathens and the heretics. Well you ain't taking over Science-land. Your god has no power here.
> Science is there to
> Investigate not to Have A Side in any Argument and if
> you are a true Scientist You'd Know that a closed
> mind choses not to learn.
So true. Since there is nothing to investigate with ID-ism, it never has an opposing side.
Your ID-ism is not an alternative to Evolution, you are trying to spread an alternative to Science itself and that is hogwash.
If those who oppose ID think this movie is preposterous, why do they bother? Please don't tell me that they're concerned for science education, public irrationality, etc. Science and research will continue. Plus, we've got the ACLU to ensure that no one openly questions humanism and/or materialism in the schools. If anything, it seems like liberal evolutionists are just scared. There aren't any other good reasons to elicit the level of concern they do :)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHave not and will not see the movie. Have never liked or respected Ben Stein's Utilitarian views of reality and consider him to be a prime example of the movies as a business. There's big business out there in those communities of faith. (think the tune and then sing.....) That's Entertainment. Digoweli
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisChaosqueued stated: "From the crusades to now, you are all the same autonomous robots, sending out missionaries to destroy the heathens and the heretics."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe irony of this statement is so rich! This "argument" is almost always marched out by secular humanists as the trump card which is apparently meant to silence any discussion that opposes their "scientifically established facts". Of course, harking back to the crusades, they never mention who the real enemies of freedom have been in modern times; for example, those in the officially atheistic Soviet state of the 1900's who eliminated an estimated 20 million or so opponents of their version of secular fundamentalism. For this reason alone, Ben Stein's movie, hyperbole and all, comes at an opportune time.
Russerford said:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Chaosqueued stated: "From the crusades to now, you are all the same autonomous robots, sending out missionaries to destroy the heathens and the heretics."
"The irony of this statement is so rich! This "argument" is almost always marched out by secular humanists as the trump card which is apparently meant to silence any discussion that opposes their "scientifically established facts". Of course, harking back to the crusades, they never mention who the real enemies of freedom have been in modern times; for example, those in the officially atheistic Soviet state of the 1900's who eliminated an estimated 20 million or so opponents of their version of secular fundamentalism. For this reason alone, Ben Stein's movie, hyperbole and all, comes at an opportune time."
The trouble is that ID advocates start out by saying they want to engage in a logical discussion of the merits of their point of view, and then proceed to ignore anything that logically challenges their point of view. They descend into circular reasoning, ad hominem attacks and other faulty forms of reasoning, to the point where those of us actually interested in the logic of the "debate" get so frustrated that we spin off into unconnected reasoning ourselves, as did Chaosqueued here. (temper, temper!) LOL.
Having said that, what does anything you have said to do with either evolution or intelligent design? We are talking about science, I thought, not secular humanism. As such, if this is truly--as ID advocates claim--a discussion about the relative merits of 2 SCIENTIFIC theories, shouldn't scientifically established facts have some standing?
Still and more: even the unrelated example you present of the Soviet suppression is riddled with logical fallacies. You are confusing correlation with causation by implying that because the Soviets were atheists they were killers. They were also totalitarians, they also live in a very cold place where maybe the weather had as much to do with them killing people as their alleged atheism.
Chaosqueued's comments were ad hominem (if understandable) but so was your response. So can we all go back to our corners and talk about the actual subject?
Russerford said:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"One thing that should be abundantly clear to any honest student of history and science is that there have been brilliant scientists through the ages, up to the present, who were variously theists and atheists. For those of you (and it appears there are many) who sneer at the ideas of creation and/or intelligent design and insinuate that one could not be a scientist and hold such "stupid" views,..."
There are zealots on both sides who denigrate the other side for alternately their beliefs or lack thereof. I am not one. Yes, there are many professed scientists of faith, and always have been. How they reconcile their faith with the scientific evidence that their research produces is between them and their God, and I assume that they tend not to be--with notable exceptions--literalistic in their interpretation of the Bible. It is interesting that the producers of this movie decided not to include any of them in this film.
The problem is not with the personal faith of a scientist, but when they insinuate that faith into what is ostensibly scientific work. Scientific theory BY DEFINITION must be duplicable, testable and refutable. (that is, there must be an experimental way to definitively refute the theory.) As such science must confine itself to the natural world. Intelligent design implies an unknowable untestable outside intelligence; strictly speaking, a supernatural explanation of species development, so by very definition is outside the realm of serious science. There may come a day when science can meet your "god", it's not now however. If that day comes I'm sure we'll get an answer to the validity of intelligent design, because we will be able to test it, and at that point the theory would be science.
The insistence of a hearing in the realm of science for an unscientific theory is at best misplaced, at worst a symptom of an ulterior motive, not to mention completely illogical.
bholvey29 wrote:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"If those who oppose ID think this movie is preposterous, why do they bother? Please don't tell me that they're concerned for science education, public irrationality, etc."
Yes, we most certainly are.
"Science and research will continue."
Yes, just not in Amerika-- not once all our children believe that "God did it" constitutes good scientific reasoning.
"Plus, we've got the ACLU to ensure that no one openly questions humanism and/or materialism in the schools."
The ACLU? You mean that little non-porfit orginization with a national annual budget of about $12 million? I wonder how much they spent making this movie?
" If anything, it seems like liberal evolutionists are just scared. There aren't any other good reasons to elicit the level of concern they do :)"
Yes we are. Dick Cheney is running Amerika. Be very afraid.
> It is unfair to say that all individuals believing in
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> ID want to force their view on everyone just as it
> would be unfair to claim that all of those in the
> scientific community are trying to do the same.
Certainly not the individuals listening to the argument, but those pushing for inclusion of ID in school science curriculums most certainly are. ID is NOT science.
> It makes sense that if you believe you have the correct
> answer you'd want to
> share. Evolution\Darwinism is a theory. It it is
> based on someone's beliefs not fact.
No, it's not. It is a theoretical argument following the rules of logic backed up with--at this point in time almost 100 years of--ongoing scientific, verifiable FACT.
> Since science is supposed to be observable
> fact and no one was here to observe our beginnings
> [according to evolution, although according to
> creationist's beliefs there was - and it was
> documented], regardless of how you believe that
> occurred, neither can be scientific "fact".
First, there are many facts that can be observed in the fossil record, in genetic testing and in other natural evidential records. The testing continues. As more data comes in the theory (ANY scientific theory) undergoes changes. That is not a refutation of the theory, but a tightening of it's strictures.
Scientific "observation" doesn't mean some one necessarily had to see it for it to be proved true in the scientific community any more than I have to go to "Turkey" (the only country with a worse education record than the US on this issue) to know that in fact there is such a country. This is not faith, this is logical reasoning applied to empirical data.
Finally, creationists always insist that evolution is a theory about the beginning of life. IT'S NOT. It's about the variation of species. While it may have implications pertaining to the origin of life, that is not strictly speaking what evolution is about.
> Let's face it: neither ID nor
> evolution can ever be conclusively and unquestionably
> proven and as such, there will always be an element
> of "faith" involved in either belief. Why not teach
> evolution as the theory that it is and be tolerant of
> others beliefs as well? I do believe that without
> God in the mix we devalue life & that is a slippery
> slope.
Evolution is NOT faith! It is well researched, well challenged, and a living EVOLVING scientific theory. Theory when spoken of in science is NOT just a "guess". To put ID which IS faith on the same playing field is inherently faulty logic. I promise not to show up at your church and insist you listen to my lecture on the comparative styles of Jane Austin and Emily Bronte as a sermon. All I ask is that you don't show up in my science class and insist on giving a sermon (read ID) on how God created the world. Evolution IS taught as the theory it is. The proponents of ID consistently refuse to understand the definition of" theory" as it applies to science. It's very frustrating!
You are more than welcome to your belief that without God the world would be evil. I have more faith in the innate (even naturally selected for) goodness of the human race than that.
> Evolutionists are wrong! ID is testable in scientific
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> way. It makes several predictions of events.
> 1. Fully developed new species will appear at random
> points in time. There will be no warning and no past
> history but a breeding herd of "hiptoplats" may
> suddenly appear in central park.
> 2. The creator is super-powerful and must know that
> the debate is raging on earth. Look for him to come
> up with a really big miracle. Something so clear
> that people will know that he is "da bomb". Maybe
> instead of a world-wide flood (been there, done that)
> he could make all the worlds oceans disappear
> instantly.
>
> Either one of the above will prove ID. Do you think
> it will happen? Lets all be on the look out.
LOL!
Oh no! I can see it now--global warming as proof of ID!
The consistent problem I see again and again with ID proponents is their immature quality. I've dealt with teenagers who got offended simply because I made them feel insecure while explaining something which was beyond them. Sure this is offensive to ID'ists, but it resonates so much with my personal experience that I can't help making that correlation. It is very akin to discussions I've had with religious zealots when they ask *me* why I believe what I believe. The typical outcome is that my explanations, even if intended as just personal beliefs or stances, will offend and be taken as personal attacks even if that wasn't the intention. I see the same behavior in ID people.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFurthermore, they counter reasonable arguments and questioning with ad hominem attacks, blaming others for the same actions they don't hold back from taking upon, endless amount of posturing, repeated statements yet no evidence to back them up, as well as "No I didn't, you did" childish replies.
It's frustrating because they are deeply impenetrable and vacuous. No matter how much proof has been asked from them (which has never been presented effectively), and how many explanations, demonstrations of data and experiments have been presented, Evolution still only "dogma" because they want it to be.
The psychological "artificial victim" aspect and the constant emotional projection is fascinating to me in a way, but also deeply disturbing because they are dragging others who don't know better with them, and because I fear for the future of an already ill education system.
I went and saw and expelled and I liked it. The question it makes me think of is why does no one listen to anyone. IDer's refuse to listen to Darwinists, and Darwinists refuse to listen to IDer's.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIDer's are automatically ignorant morons, and Darwinists are atheistic Nazi's. Neither of these are entirely true.
The problem of the issue lies with both sides. Darwinists will not listen to IDer's arguments or read their books. If they did then they would be able to point out the specifics of where their argument is flawed rather than just make a generalization of all IDer's as religious idiots.
IDer's immediately demonize every Darwinist saying they are trying to promote no purpose in life and they're evil and yada yada yada.
Here is the question I want to have answered, You who are IDer's have you read anything by Darwinists, atheists or anything else, or have you only read things supporting your view. You who are Darwinists, what books by IDer's, creationsists, religious philosophers have you read, plus have you even read the Origin of Species.
The reason I ask is because I believe both sides believe what they hear without ever thinking critically about it.
In high school I was told about evolution so I believed it and argued with my Mom that it was true. I became a Christian and then was told God (An intelligent being) designed everything and argued with others it was true. That got me and others nowhere. So what I did was read books by Christian Philosophers (C.S. Lewis Mere Christianity) and articles by IDer's (discovery institute) as well as books by Richard Dawkins (God Delusion) and am planning to read Origin of Species and other articles on evolution.
Although I am biased towards one I would at least like to be informed of the other argument. All I ask of you all is the same. If you want to better argue for Darwin/Evolution/Atheism you had better learn about what the other side has to say, so you know what to refute, same goes for those arguing for Creationism/ID/Christianity. Or are you to afraid to find out what the other has to say?
Seth
If you look for truth, you may find comfort in the end; if you look for comfort you will not get either comfort or truth only soft soap and wishful thinking to begin, and in the end, despair.
C. S. Lewis (former Atheist turned Christian)
P.s. Any suggestions for good reading for either side of the argument?
Said Earlier
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Scientific theory BY DEFINITION must be duplicable, testable and refutable. (that is, there must be an experimental way to definitively refute the theory.) "
As someone who is purely seeking to be better informed. Can you explain how Evolution does this. I am already aware of how ID doesn't do this but I am unaware of how Evolution does. Once again I'm not being sarcastic or using this as a rebuttal to Evolution but as someone who is ignorant as to why Evolutionists believe so strongly what they do. What are the duplicable testable and refutable experiments that can be done with Evolution?
Thanks,
Seth
> Said Earlier
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> "Scientific theory BY DEFINITION must be duplicable,
> testable and refutable. (that is, there must be an
> experimental way to definitively refute the theory.)
> "
>
> As someone who is purely seeking to be better
> informed. Can you explain how Evolution does this. I
> am already aware of how ID doesn't do this but I am
> unaware of how Evolution does. Once again I'm not
> being sarcastic or using this as a rebuttal to
> Evolution but as someone who is ignorant as to why
> Evolutionists believe so strongly what they do. What
> are the duplicable testable and refutable experiments
> that can be done with Evolution?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Seth
Seth,
I, like you, am merely an amateur--although I believe a fairly informed one. There are many better people who can reply to this (and have) in a rigorous scientific way. Having said that, since it was me you were quoting I'll give it a go.
Instance: (and I apologize to the scientists for my poor grasp here) Basically, by following the reasoning of evolutionary biology we can posit a "tree of life" on which all living beings can be placed in terms of their evolutionary relationships. This is a predictive model--in other words, it makes predictions about where a species SHOULD fall even before we have either an example of the existence of such a species or the ability to prove its location on this tree. If we then examine the creature's DNA (which of course wasn't even possible or known at the time of Darwin) we would expect it to be related to the flora/fauna most closely associated to it on the theoretical tree. If this is NOT true, then the theory has a problem--although not necessarily a fatal one--that would depend on the seriousness of the problem, that is, the ability of scientists to adapt the existing theory to fit the new data, or not. i.e.: finding that a bat species is more closely related to an ape than a bird (which it is) probably just indicates that the particular model we were using is wrong. On the other hand if we were to find evidence that an entire species suddenly appeared in the fossil record fully developed with no indications that it developed to or from another species, that would fly in the face of the theory as a whole. Thereby we have a way to prove it wrong, (refute-ability) although this is probably not the best or strongest example, just the easiest one for me to express. And again, in 140 years of research not one shred of evidence has been found to conclusively disprove the theory as a whole, while on the other hand evidence from multiple unrelated fields of science have all added to its confirmation.
As expressed by actual scientists, this IS rocket science, and we all need to educate ourselves about the details if we want to talk meaningfully about it.
I would suggest this website [url http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/][/url] for more in depth information. Hope I helped.
--
Edited by Art for Science at 05/05/2008 2:04 PM
> In high school I was told about evolution so I
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> believed it and argued with my Mom that it was true.
> I became a Christian and then was told God (An
> intelligent being) designed everything and argued
> with others it was true. That got me and others
> nowhere. So what I did was read books by Christian
> Philosophers (C.S. Lewis Mere Christianity) and
> articles by IDer's (discovery institute) as well as
> books by Richard Dawkins (God Delusion) and am
> planning to read Origin of Species and other articles
> on evolution.
Good on you, keep reading, keep an open mind.
Bear in mind though what is being asked and done here, what it really is that the science community objects to:
Strictly as scientists I don't think anyone objects to a person believing what he or she wants to about the "beginning of life" (which isn't what evolution is about anyway). The problem is with insisting that something which isn't science be taught as science. It's not that ID is wrong (it may or may not be) its that it is untestable, therefore unscientific. You rightly call CS Lewis a philosopher, not a scientist. Keep these distinctions clearly in mind.
> The consistent problem I see again and again with ID
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> proponents is their immature quality. I've dealt
> with teenagers who got offended simply because I made
> them feel insecure while explaining something which
> was beyond them. Sure this is offensive to ID'ists,
> but it resonates so much with my personal experience
> that I can't help making that correlation. It is
> very akin to discussions I've had with religious
> zealots when they ask *me* why I believe what I
> believe. The typical outcome is that my
> explanations, even if intended as just personal
> beliefs or stances, will offend and be taken as
> personal attacks even if that wasn't the intention.
> I see the same behavior in ID people.
>
> Furthermore, they counter reasonable arguments and
> questioning with ad hominem attacks, blaming others
> for the same actions they don't hold back from taking
> upon, endless amount of posturing, repeated
> statements yet no evidence to back them up, as well
> as "No I didn't, you did" childish replies.
>
> It's frustrating because they are deeply impenetrable
> and vacuous. No matter how much proof has been asked
> from them (which has never been presented
> effectively), and how many explanations,
> demonstrations of data and experiments have been
> presented, Evolution still only "dogma" because they
> want it to be.
>
> The psychological "artificial victim" aspect and the
> constant emotional projection is fascinating to me in
> a way, but also deeply disturbing because they are
> dragging others who don't know better with them, and
> because I fear for the future of an already ill
> education system.
Amen sister! testify!
I mean those are okay responses but it's not like a statement that simple would be enough to convince me. Because let's say I hear an argument for evolution that sounds good, but at the same time isn't stating some of the assumptions they make, if I then hear an argument for ID it sounds good as well. How do you determine which one is true.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOnce again I really wish both sides would listen to the other. Telling me ID is stupid and has no merit, doesn't invalidate the good arguments I heard for it, all it does is make me think you haven't heard the same arguments I've heard. For example a video at
[url http://www.whatyououghttoknow.com/show/2008/05/01/darwins-intelligent-design/]http://www.whatyououghttoknow.com/show/2008/05/01/darwins-intelligent-design/[/url]
while poking fun at ID pretending to have nothing to do with God it makes convincing arguments to me that Evolution isn't rooted in as much science as everyone says.
Can someone watch this video and point to me where they are making errors in their views specifically towards [i]Evolution[/i].
Also I am curious to all of those who favor Evolution or favor ID; Have you read Darwin's Origin of Species (maybe append a ""Have read OoS", or "haven't read Oos"). That way we know that those who argue for evolution are knowledgeable in the foundation of their arguments, or if they favor ID they are knowledgeable in the foundation of the argument they are against.
Seth - Currently Reading OoS
(free to read online
[url http://www.classicreader.com/booktoc.php/sid.2/bookid.107/]http://www.classicreader.com/booktoc.php/sid.2/bookid.107/[/url]
)
P.S. (By the way someone said Darwin didn't use the term "Survival of the Fittest" that shows they haven't read chapter IV on Natural Selection where he uses it pretty freely. Although Darwin should probably have said " survival of the [i][/i]fitter[i][/i] " since that is more accurate to his argument.
I find it sad that of the six things pointed to by Scientific American to criticize in Expelled, not one of them related to the science involved. There was not enough time in the movie spent on evidence for ID, in my opinion, but SA didn't address it all, which is typical for the "scientists" who attempt to refute ID by tying it to religion.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOnly Sunny and SumYungGuy really brought forth any evidence at all. This ID versus Accident Theory argument gets too religious in most venues, but it shouldn't happen here on an SA blog. Please keep this about science.
On the other hand, mathematics are a valid consideration. The poster who claimed ID uses the roll of a dice to show a 1 out of 6 chance, you fail your math class. The math of ID centers around the ratio between functional and non-functional physiological formations and microbiological systems. Excluding simplistic functionality, such as padding or ballast, there should be quintillions upon quintillions of non-functional mess for every functional formation.
Both fossil and contemporary evidence shows that we are farfrom this number. In fact, there are no tissues in any living thing that seemed to have formed without a purpose. Vestigial organs such as whale "legs" are remainders of a time when the legs did serve a purpose. Even if you want to argue such things as "junk" DNA, the numbers we see are the reversal of Darwin's predictions.
This makes sense because Darwinism is a reversal of mathematical principles. Darwin was wrong.
> This makes sense because Darwinism is a reversal of
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> mathematical principles. Darwin was wrong.
Frank,
Have you read Origin of Species to make the assertion that Darwin was indeed wrong. Or are you just like evolutionists believing everything you are told without thinking critically , except in your case believing all the ID arguments and saying things like Darwin was wrong.
I believe Darwin makes good points on the theory of Natural Selection, although some of the conclusions he reaches due to Natural selection i disagree with.
Seth - Currently reading OoS.
--
Edited by sephers165 at 05/06/2008 10:35 AM
Seth, I admire your open-minded approach. I have always believed that if anyone with a brain (an open one)investigates this issue enough, they will become an IDist. The scientific evidence is overwhelming and conclusive.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI started out (I'm embarrassed to admit) a Darwinist, but as a Biology Major in College I eventually realized it was a fraud.
I recommend Michael Behe's "Darwin's Black Box" to study irreducible complexity (IC). My only contention with Behe is that he defines IC too stringently. By overstating, he says that a system is IC if virtually none of its parts could have been used for something else. All a Darwinist has to do is find any single part and find a use for it to "refute" his IC.
A system should be considered Irreducibly Complex if there is no Darwinian explanation for it. This definition, however valid, makes virtually all parts of all living things IC.
Most attempts to refute IC either start with the irreducibly complex stuff already in place (see Wikipedia's "explanation" of the origins of the eye - though their drawings do not match fossil evidence) or else they take a physical formation and stretch it, move it, alter its tissues, chop it and change its function from something to nothing at all to something else. All of which would have been far easier to start from scratch.
My only issue with IC is that it gives too much credit to "selection", which does absolutely nothing anyway. It is a little like using an atomic bomb to squash the Darwinist gnat, when all you need is a rolled up newspaper.
Seth, I must say it has been decades since I read OoS. (I'm probably a bit older than you.) I was fascinated with the Materialist explanation for life's formation from 10th grade until my sophomore year in college, when I started to think it all through more.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI am a true IDist by now, and as such I believe in common descent with modification, but the modification is controlled intelligently in the same way other functional proteins are controlled intelligently. I have learned a lot about the properties of life that they will never teach you in school.
My best suggestion for you as you learn is to think and ask questions! If a Materialist claims that something happens because of chemicals, DNA or proteins, ask how it is that we just happen to see that particular chemical reacting at that particular time every time. Make a note of each time matter has to move in order to complete a biological function and ask what moved the matter.
Darwin did not add much of value to the study of evolution. Natural selection as a theory COULD happen, but it rarely, if ever, does. Species from the fittest to the least fit, usually become extinct in mass extinction events, such as famine, climate change or natural catastrophes, few if any of which had anything to do with mutating wrong.
Moreover, Natural Selection is just a subtractive filter with no creative force at all. In chicken and egg terms, it explains why there are no chickens who don't lay eggs (duh), but it doesn't explain the existence of eggs.
When it comes down to it, a Materialist believes that molecules cooperate, animate, reproduce, process energy, self-fuel, heal, feel and think by accident. I reject that ridiculous assumption and so does the evidence.
Thanks Frank, good responses. I am glad to hear that you think critically of the subject and don't just take one to be true and one to be false without having a reason to believe so.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI won't believe anything just because I'm told it's true and that's why I don't buy into everything Evolution says. For instance I think Natural Selection happens. Thinking Mendelian genetics, there could be a gene for an animal with long hair and a gene for short hair, let's say big 'L' and lil 'l'. Then if it gets really cold, those that get the big 'L' I think would survive more readily than those with 'l'. Over enough time maybe all 'l' genes are gone and the animals all over the planet are only left with big 'L' and are all hairy.
That seems like natural selection to me, but then there is this jump to believing that also means by the same process you get new species. I know how they arrive at the conclusion (mutations, millions of years and the like) but I've never seen how you can prove that actually happened. So although ash on a tree may turn a moth from white to grey, i don't believe it turns a moth to a bug, or a dinosaur or something. I find it easier to believe that God made all creatures how they were than to think that Natural Selection randomly made all creatures from a single living thing billions of years ago.
Maybe I am ignorant but rather than call me so, take the five best arguments the IDer's make and explain why they shouldn't be believed and what five arguments from Evolution best explain the things in their absence.
Seth
The claim that ID is not testable is completely false. Fossil evidence supports functional life formation, not random chance, so the Darwinists use "selection" and the "millions of years" excuse to create a fictional world of deceased asymettrical freaky mutants that are never seen in evidence.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBut evolution and reproduction are ongoing. Beyond fossil evidence, any modern day evidence of evolution can be studied to see if it follows parental lineage and to to see if it meets mathematical probabilities.
Someone mentioned the famous finches of the Galapagos. Family lineage was not documented, but by sheer numbers, the evolution was parallel because there wouldn't have been enough hatches to stay within lineage. The changes to the birds' beaks went back and forth, from one shape to another, generation by generation, in accordance with the drought conditions.
This follows ID's prediction that genetic editing is intelligent and follows a purpose. Darwinian projection that there would be quintillions of messy chaotic mutations for every lucky functional one is obliterated.
Bacteria can be presented with anti-biotics and genetic changes can be observed in a petri dish. Quite predictably, the bacteria will modify their genes in order to gain life-saving resistence to the anti-biotics. Bacteria stay in stasis for millions of years, then suddenly get just the life-saving genetic upgrades just at the moment they need it. This is evidence of intelligent genetics, not random luck.
There is much more. Virtually any evidence of evolution can be observed to see if there are quintillions of pointless blobs for every functional tube or chamber of enzymes. Random chance mutation fails every time.
> I mean those are okay responses but it's not like a
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> statement that simple would be enough to convince me.
> Because let's say I hear an argument for evolution
> that sounds good, but at the same time isn't stating
> some of the assumptions they make, if I then hear an
> argument for ID it sounds good as well. How do you
> determine which one is true.
If you're a scientist you apply the scientific method and logic. Unfortunately you can't do this with ID because it is untestable and unverifiable.
> Once again I really wish both sides would listen to
> the other. Telling me ID is stupid and has no merit,
> doesn't invalidate the good arguments I heard for it,
> all it does is make me think you haven't heard the
> same arguments I've heard. For example a video at
> http://www.whatyououghttoknow.com/show/2008/05/01/darw
> ins-intelligent-design/]http://www.whatyououghttoknow.
> com/show/2008/05/01/darwins-intelligent-design/[/url]
>
> while poking fun at ID pretending to have nothing to
> do with God it makes convincing arguments to me that
> Evolution isn't rooted in as much science as everyone
> says.
>
> Can someone watch this video and point to me where
> they are making errors in their views specifically
> towards [i]Evolution[/i].
I watched it. I'll try to go through this point by point:
First--Richard Dawkins' work, thoughts, semantics and actual quotes were generally taken out of their original context (quote mining) a very common tactic with the ID crowd supposedly to show how atheistic scientists are disingenuous about their beliefs. The first quote consisted of one sentence with no context, the speaker then built a completely fictional reality of Dawkins' thoughts based on ONE WORD of that quote. Although this quote was not attributed, both of these quotes came from the piece of cinematic trash which is "Expelled:..."
If no one has mentioned it, the scientists interviewed for this movie were interviewed under false pretenses. They were told they were being interviewed for an informational documentary called "Crossroads" intended to illuminate the basic conflict. This is true not only for Dawkins but ALL the other evolutionary scientists interviewed. After a long interview (about 90 minutes for Dawkins) where the interviewer lobbed softball questions looking for some kind of "gotcha!" the actual amount of time included in the film was about 3 minutes.
Which brings us to the second quote--the one where supposedly Dawkins says he believes in an alien "creator". What you are never told or shown in the film is the question which he was asked after a long logical refutation of ID in all its aspects: "Can you think of any circumstance in which Intelligent Design might be true?" after which he ironically presented the now much quoted sci-fi fantasy story indicated here.
When he gets into his critique of evolution itself some of this is just flat out wrong. There HAS been observation of speciation in nature. Evolution IS taking place now. This can be demonstrated through vestigial limbs, etc
He has absolutely no basis for the statement that the odds of evolution happening are "really really really long" he just presents it as fact and moves on. So it's true because he says so? When he comes back to it he says that if you believe it's true then you're screwed because then "we'd have seen evidence of it by now." But of course theres a MOUNTAIN of evidence for it, all of which is dismissed out of hand by IDers. If only the poor deluded scientists and teachers would admit they're deluded ID never would have come up in the first place, he says. So science brought this on itself? This is also untrue, not to mention faulty logic.
I want to know what would constitute concrete evidence to this bozo. There is again, a MOUNTAIN of commonly accepted scientific evidence. If scientific evidence is not concrete enough, then you want a scientific theory to provide what?
As far as his Lucy to Man equals bacteria to another species theory, I think that's his to prove as to its validity and logical reasoning. I'm no expert, but it seems to me presumptuous at best to draw a direct mathematical correlation based on average lifespan and approximate rate of genetic mutation between two different species which are as different on the cellular and sub-cellular level as humans and bacteria.
So after starting with a flawed and unsubstantiated theory as stated above he then insists that unless science can breed not only a new species from bacteria but one he considers "a higher form of life" that somehow the entire theory is invalid? You're kidding, right?
I'm not going to delve into the next Dawkins quote. Read the transcript, listen to the Moyers' interview in its entirety and decide for yourself. He ends with a bunch of unsubstantiated claims stated as fact. There's plenty of ways to verify or debunk them yourself if you want to. I'm too tired of listening to this guy.
> Also I am curious to all of those who favor Evolution
> or favor ID; Have you read Darwin's Origin of Species
> (maybe append a ""Have read OoS", or "haven't read
> Oos"). That way we know that those who argue for
> evolution are knowledgeable in the foundation of
> their arguments, or if they favor ID they are
> knowledgeable in the foundation of the argument they
> are against.
>
> Seth - Currently Reading OoS
I'm glad you're reading Darwin. Please don't think that if you can get through the works of Darwin you somehow understand the theory any more than me or any other amateur. The current state of evolutionary biology is a long way from those books written 140 years ago. There are many dedicated professionals who spend their entire careers immersed in this subject. Unless you think they are as a group disingenuous or deluded we all--whether we agree with them or not--owe them the respect due their dedication and knowledge in this extremely complex field of human en devour.
"If numerous species, belonging to the same genera or families, have really started into life at once, the fact would be fatal to the theory of evolution through natural selection"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOrigin of Species Chapter Ten
When the greatest amount of species found in the fossil record was in the Cambrian era, becoming less in the more recent eras, and practically none in the pre-cambrian era wouldn't that be the fact that is fatal to the theory of evolution. No, because it is explained by the Cambrian Explosion.
This is where I get confused, it seems like the theory is accepted as true regardless of any evidence, (not saying there isn't any) but if there is something missing rather than say the theory is false and there needs to be another explanation they expanded upon the theory further convoluting it till the simple person like me just needs to accept the fact that is true and am not allowed to question it.
Can someone explain to me how the Cambrian Explosion is a better explanation for the evidence given in the fossil record than the simple one of all of the species being created and placed on earth at the same time by God . (Maybe I'm ignorant but I usually choose what seems to be the simplest answer)
--
Edited by sephers165 at 05/06/2008 1:37 PM
Seth, I think you are headed in the right direction. Yes, you understand the concept of natural selection, but remember, natural selection did not create the longer hair. Genes had to tell a creature to have all of the appropriate hairs to stop growing at the right length. That takes more bits of information than can realistically happen by luck.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe big problem with Darwinism isn't survival of the fit, but ARRIVAL of the fit.
You say you believe in microevolution by luck, but not macroevolution by luck. You are not alone, by any means, but I will not agree. Microevolution can not happen the way it does without intelligent guidance of some sort.
Even just simple differences from parent to child that most don't think of as evolution, still follows functional, symettrical patterns that don't really fit a "random" arrangement. The only genetic changes that appear random seem to be those altered by radiation, light waves or chemical intrusion, such as alcohol or other toxins. These cause non-inheritable mutations that follow no design. NATURAL genetic changes are not random. Protein swapping along a DNA strand are not "copy errors" as was once thought.
If you believe God did things to cause formation of life, I am going to assume that you believe this for reasons other than scientific evidence. As an IDist, I personally would prefer to keep the conversation pertaining only to scientific evidence or mathematical calculations. The only things we know conclusively are that we are designed and created by a superior intelligence capable of instilling an intelligent consciousness and of moving and forming matter with the intention of sustaining life. If your God can do this, then you might be right, but for all I know, you might be wrong too.
You are on the right track, Seth. Stay tuned.
Art for Science, if I had a dollar for every time an Accident Theorist claimed that they had "mountains" of evidence in "over 100 years" of "scientific method" by "top experts", I would be a rich man.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBut I couldn't buy a cup of coffee with any actual evidence from a Darwinist, because there isn't enough to slide down my couch cushions. Evolution, sure, we all know that, but how can you conclude lucky genetic mutations as a cause?
I have been reading your posts. Could you plase put more substantive arguments forward, rather than just saying "ID isn't science, isn't testable", etc?
Darwinism isn't a theory with a few gaps to tidy up. It is nothing but a gigantic gap. Still, people complain that all ID proponents do is point out the failings of Darwinism.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWell, isn't that what science is all about? If your theory is fatally flawed (and it is), then why is all criticism silenced? Why do they have to make laws that outlaw dissent from a theory that has already been proven virtually impossible?
Showing the fatal flaws of Darwinism is not just fun...it is the very definition of true scientific inquiry.
> Art for Science, if I had a dollar for every time an
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> Accident Theorist claimed that they had "mountains"
> of evidence in "over 100 years" of "scientific
> method" by "top experts", I would be a rich man.
Even if you read it and understood it you wouldn't be rich--ask a scientist. I am not a scientist. I have presented what limited knowledge I have because Seth seemed like he was interested in learning more about the theory. My understanding of it is incomplete at best. I have posted a useful link previously. Do you want to see evidence or do you want to dismiss evidence? Here it is again-- care to learn? [url http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/][/url]
> But I couldn't buy a cup of coffee with any actual
> evidence from a Darwinist, because there isn't enough
> to slide down my couch cushions. Evolution, sure, we
> all know that, but how can you conclude lucky genetic
> mutations as a cause?
I'm not sure what this is refering to. Lucky genetics?
> I have been reading your posts. Could you plase put
> more substantive arguments forward, rather than just
> saying "ID isn't science, isn't testable", etc?
I am refering you to more substantive arguements in the links. I am not a scientist and even if I was how do you summarize a century of research in a web forum?
SO if I'm not a scientist why do I care? I care about truth and logical reasoning in the sciences and that's the perspective I try to approach this discussion from. I'm not going to convince any creationist/IDer to give up their god anymore than you will convince me to worship yours. That's not the point. This isn't a debate between 2 equally reasonable explanations, its apples and oranges, and you don't have to be a scientist to know this, just someone with a grasp of the basic laws of reasoning and logic. ID is not science anymore than evolution is religion. But its not scientists trying to get evolution accepted as a religion, this is about IDers trying to get their BELIEF taught as a science. Therefore it remains your burden of proof to produce, not science's.
Lest anyone claim that all IDists do is show why mathematics prove we couldn't have been formed by accident, I should probably point out that there is also positive evidence for intelligent design.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe code.
The very existence of any sort of intelligible code formed by nature is astounding enough, but this is a 3 billion base pair masterpiece, with enough bits of information to overflow an encyclopedia. The odds of it existing by accident are enough to make some scientists claim that there must be infinite universes. Simply put, it cannot happen.
Now this code isn't a love story (although there are some juicy parts) and it isn't a phone book or a war novel. It just happens to be the very specific and all-inclusive directions for building self-fueling, animating, reproducing machines so complex that no scientist can figure out how it is done.
This by itself ought to at least make you question those who say there is no evidence that we were designed. Yet we haven't even gotten to the best part yet. This code doesn't just passively exist, but it is read and obeyed by unthinking pieces of matter.
Is "obeyed" too strong a word? Not at all, considering that histones actually become the required cell type and even pieces of matter such as phosphates and calcium are brought to the prescribed location.
Did I say location? These pieces of organic materials don't have any navigational devices do they? Yet exactly the right cells, tissues and other matter go exactly where they are told to go, each and every time without fail. If there were going to be a copy error, this is where you would expect it. But whatever the code calls for, it gets. If it asks for a feather to be produced by various connective tissues assembled from nutrients in nearby capillaries, then that is what happens. Even fibrils wrap themselves around groups of cells in blood-tight formations in obedience to the complex spacial directions of the genes.
But it doesn't stop at being just the right thing in just the right place. Genes dictate timing as well. They control all growth from conception to adulthood and they control the timing of such things as when you get your baby teeth. So ribonucleic acids have clocks that enamel reads? Genes also dictate which cells will be replaced if lost and which cells will not.
RNA will be attracted to DNA, seemingly to do nothing other than to imprint itself with this supposedly meaningless accidental code. The RNA also never fails to align perfectly, although this is an even likelier place for errors. Then, once it has the code, it suddenly isn't attracted to the DNA anymore, but it goes off to transfer information. That's when those amazing moving proteins go to work.
So matter animates and forms itself according to the 3-D physical coordinates and timing given to it by a code. All types of matter complies unfailingly with no motive force, no navigational abilities and no intelligence.
There is no question that we were designed (the code) and created (obedience of the code with no motive force, clocks or navigational ability). Sorry, that is hard to accept for some people, but the scientific evidence is irrefutable and conclusive beyond debate.
Art for Science, I'm not trying to be critical, but I have hard time discussing an issue with someone who refuses to even present any counterpoint.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAFS: "I am refering you to more substantive arguements in the links."
I have read talkorigins many times. There are hundreds of websites all over all sides of this issues, although talkorigins is one of the least reputable. I can not argue against an entire link, so if all you are saying is that someone somewhere disagrees with me, I suppose we can leave it at that. If you care to present a point you feel relates to the subject matter we can discuss it. If not, that's your prerogative. Hey, I just asked, ok?
AFS: "I am not a scientist and even if I was how do you summarize a century of research in a web forum?"
I would prefer, rather than the usual "summary", that you present just a point or two that you feel supports your position. Again, if you feel unable or unwilling to do so, that is fine.
AFS: "I'm not going to convince any creationist/IDer to give up their god anymore than you will convince me to worship yours."
I thought we were talking about science. Why are you bringing anything up about God? I am not a Creationist and nobody said anything about worship (except you).
AFS: "its apples and oranges"
What do you mean by this?
AFS: "ID is not science anymore than evolution is religion."
That is a strange assessment, especially since ID is the theory of evolution by intelligent design. What is not science is to refuse to address the evidence.
AFS: "IDers trying to get their BELIEF taught as a science."
Actually I promote the idea that we should teach only evidence in school, without drawing conclusions for or against accidental materialism.
Now, if you are suggesting that science MUST find a materialist answer, then you ARE injecting your religious beliefs (atheism) into science. I hope you would never do that because we all know science requires an open mind in the search for the truth.
AFS: "Therefore it remains your burden of proof to produce, not science's."
Actually the burden of proof goes both ways (why wouldn't it?) and I have no intention of changing hardened minds. I offer evidence to those who are open minded and searching for who is really right in this controversy. (Hint: It's not you.)
What gives you the authority to speak on behalf of "science"? I am just as much speaking on behalf of science as you are, moreso really, since I actually FOLLOW the evidence. Reading an internet site is not scientific method.
Art for Science, if you don't want to discuss the various arguments for and against accidental life formation, I will respect that.
Seth, you bring up a great point about the Cambrian explosion. You also noted that Darwin himself understood that the kind of evidence shown in the Cambrian explosion falsifies his theory. One of the reasons I am very against Darwinism but not against Darwin is that he understood what kind of evidence would falsify him. I wish I could say the same for the neo-Darwinists. (Neo-Darwinism is Darwinism with a "neo" which stands for "No Evidence Observed".)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt isn't just the number of new species during the period of time around 530 to 540 million years ago, but also the parallel modifications. Eyes developed in many multiple separate species all at once, not in just one species along a family line. Likewise for internal organs as well. Practically nothing fits Darwin's theory at all.
Seth: "it seems like the theory is accepted as true regardless of any evidence"
I couldn't have said it better myself....
Frank M said,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this>Darwinism isn't a theory with a few gaps to tidy up. It is nothing but a gigantic gap. Still, people complain that all ID proponents do is point out the failings of Darwinism.
>Well, isn't that what science is all about? If your theory is fatally flawed (and it is), then why is all criticism silenced? Why do they have to make laws that outlaw dissent from a theory that has already been proven virtually impossible?
>Showing the fatal flaws of Darwinism is not just fun...it is the very definition of true scientific inquiryâ€
And later responding to Art for Science’s statement,
>"ID is not science anymore than evolution is religion."
Frank M said,
>That is a strange assessment, especially since ID is the theory of evolution by intelligent design. What is not science is to refuse to address the evidence.â€
So if the Theory of Evolution, or Darwinism as you call it, is nothing but a gigantic gap and is fatally flawed, doesn’t that put a big hole in ID since it is the Theory of Evolution by Intelligent Design? (Perhaps I misunderstand and it's a different theory of evolution that you speak of.) Or maybe it is just Creationism with a fancy new name. Or maybe we should just call it Beheism.
Frank M said in his May 6, 2008 8:09 PM post,
>The very existence of any sort of intelligible code formed by nature is astounding enough, but this is a 3 billion base pair masterpiece, with enough bits of information to overflow an encyclopedia. The odds of it existing by accident are enough to make some scientists claim that there must be infinite universes. Simply put, it cannot happen.â€
There may be infinite universes. Just because you believe it cannot happen doesn’t mean it cannot happen.
And then Frank M concludes the same post with,
>There is no question that we were designed (the code) and created (obedience of the code with no motive force, clocks or navigational ability). Sorry, that is hard to accept for some people, but the scientific evidence is irrefutable and conclusive beyond debate.â€
Sorry, the appearance of design doesn’t conclude a designer and just because something currently can’t be explained doesn’t mean it’s unexplainable. I think that’s how religion got started in the first place.
> The poster who claimed ID uses the
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> roll of a dice to show a 1 out of 6 chance, you fail
> your math class. The math of ID centers around the
> ratio between functional and non-functional
> physiological formations and microbiological systems.
> Excluding simplistic functionality, such as padding
> or ballast, there should be quintillions upon
> quintillions of non-functional mess for every
> functional formation.
That'd be me. In response, do you actually realize how much variance there is to "functioning"? Take a look at the aftermath of Chernobyl to see how imperfect a human body can be and still be functional.
For example let's look at something ID'ers love to use as an example of something that was intelligently designed... The eye.
Now if I were to create an eye from nothing, I'd certainly not place the opaque retinal veins in front of the light sensitive rods and cones. Since the veins would block the light from reaching the light respecters this would be counter productive. This is the Human eye. I'd place the retinal veins behind the photo receptors so that the light coming in could be absorbed to maximum efficiency with out being blocked by something. This is the Squid eye.
So from a design standpoint the human eye is inferior to the Squid eye.
And in response to all of Frank M's posts:
You say to question everything, yet your IDism leaves out one major thing that evolution doesn't. Why? You said, as an example, to ask why chemicals do what they do, but answer it with "cause god said so." Scientists take the same question and say, "gee i don't know, let us find out together". And that is what makes evolution science and IDism metaphysics and philosophy.
Glenn R, the Darwinists, lacking in any evidence of any sort and already proven to be catagorically falsified, love to use definitions to rhetorically argue. You seem to be using the same... er, "scientific method".
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGlenn: "So if the Theory of Evolution, or Darwinism as you call it..."
I'll stop you right there. Evolution means nothing more than "changes over time". By that definition, even slight changes from me to my kids counts. So everybody believes in evolution. Moreover, IDists are evidence-based, so of course we promote the fact that we are descendants from other primates and, going back, from single cell. So IDists are evolutionists. Sorry if it was easier to fight against the Creationists, but we follow the evidence and you don't.
Evolution was understood before Darwin. Darwin just added some serious flaws to concepts regarding the cause of evolution. Darwinism and evolution are not synonyms. Darwin thought evolution occurred because of random chance mutation and survival of the fittest. (Sorry, I don't use the term "natural selection", another misleading term.)
So Darwinism is flawed and a poor explanatory model, but evolution is certainly fact. If you still don't understand the distinction, let me know and I'll be happy to elaborate.
Glenn: "There may be infinite universes. Just because you believe it cannot happen doesn’t mean it cannot happen."
What I know is mathematically impossible is a code of such complexity and length happening by sheer accident in just a few billion years. Are there infinite universes? Perhaps, but then all things are not just possible, but certain. If there are infinite universes, then there is a God, but also a Zeus and virtually all possibilities. Infinity is a big number.
I would be happy if they teach students that Darwinist evolution is fact, but only if there are infinte universes. At least let students know the mathematical impossibility as nearly all mathematicians agree. An entire conference of mathematicians shot down a team of so-called "biologists" at the Wistar Academy of Anatomy and Physiology. There is no factual truth to Darwinism whatsoever. It is, after all, nothing more than a mathematical flaw.
Glenn: "Sorry, the appearance of design doesn’t conclude a designer"
Appearance just gets you to sit down and do the math. From there it is in the hands of the mathematicians, moreso than the scientists. Once a physiological change is proven to be mathematically impossible as accident, intelligent design can really only be rebutted with a general refusal to believe the evidence.
Glenn: "and just because something currently can’t be explained doesn’t mean it’s unexplainable."
No, but it means you shouldn't teach it as fact in a science class and it means you ought to open your mind to possibilities that are not proven to be virtually impossible.
The problem with almost everyone here is they are only concerned with winning arguments. Why doesn't everyone look openly at the strong points for Evolution and ID, and then look at the weak points for Evolution and ID and then discuss them.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf you think Evolution has no weak points you are wrong. If you think ID doesn't have any weak points you are also wrong.
And for those of you who assume the other side is just ignorant and just doesn't understand because they're too close minded to listen don't worry because they think the exact same thing about you.
Both sides are so sure they're right they don't even have to listen to what the other side has to say. That makes for really great discussion doesn't it.
I have an Idea rather than say how the other side is wrong lets do this:
IDers list the weakest parts of your theory and why people may have trouble considering it science (Example very closely tied to GOD), and then explain the weak parts and then discuss your reasons why it is okay.
Evolutionists list the weakest parts of your theory and why there are numerous people who don't accept it despite the "mountains of evidence" and then go on to explain why you think it's correct despite the weak parts (Example, all species seemed to pop up in one time era)
Thanks
Seth
"The task of the modern educator is not to cut down jungles, but to irrigate deserts."
C. S. Lewis
--
Edited by sephers165 at 05/07/2008 4:40 PM
"do you actually realize how much variance there is to 'functioning'?"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLots, but the important number to consider is the ratio of functional to non-functional. Put some foodstuffs in a crock pot and start stirring. Watch the mixture every second and see how many times it forms something functional in a more complex way that just taking up space and weight. No need to create a muscle attached to a tendon attached to a hand, just any tubular structure or bad of enzymes, interlocking vertabrae or even something that you feel COULD assist in a life form.
People say there are trillions of non-functional formations for any functional one, but this is far from the correct number. It is more like trillions of zeros in scientific notation and that is being very generous with the term "functional".
You also make the hiarious assessment that you would have done a far better job of designing the eye. The eye, however, is irreducibly complex and couldn't have been formed by accident, let alone in parallel evolution, in multiple species at the same time. The blind spot is easily overcome in the same way the inverted image is overcome, by the way the brain reads images. See how it works when YOU aren't designing?
Rods and cones and a complex microbiological system feed into optic nerves which just happen to go to the place on the brain that just happens to read and understand these chemoelectric impulses. My brother in law works on a team trying to reproduce vision for blind people, and despite decades of work, cannot reproduce what you say fell together by sheer accident. Why are optic nerves so strategically placed, but found nowhere else? I could have dozens of them in my forearms and it wouldn't affect my survival a bit. My in-law would have a much better time of it if he had ID training while doing graduate work.
"You said, as an example, to ask why chemicals do what they do, but answer it with 'cause god said so'."
You owe me an apology for so blatantly changing what I actually said into a quote that is entirely the opposite of what I said. No true IDist would say anything about God as a causal force or mechanism. Is that your best argument- to invent words and put them in my mouth?
Well I suppose it is easier to argue against words you made up yourself. Kinda pathetic, though...
A couple more thoughts on this desperate attempt to disprove design with features that are supposedly so horribly designed that they must have fallen together by random accident.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFirst, it is amazing how far you have to reach to claim "bad design". It seems like you could come up with something better than that.
More importantly, you show a complete inability to understand design inference. A minor flaw, or even a major one, in no way refutes design. If an O-Ring design flaw caused the destruction of the space shuttle, do you insist that the shuttle wasn't designed? Or perhaps just the O-Ring snuck in there by accident?
This reminds me of Ken Miller's hilarious extinct pachyderm fallacy. He claims that any species that is extinct proves they were never designed. When you go to a junkyard, do you presume none of the vehicles were designed? Virtually everything that has ever been designed had flaws and will eventually fail and break down.
I may find your logic abyssmal, but I am not so unflattering as to assume that you haphazardly tapped keys on your keyboard. If you have coherent language structure or a code such as in DNA, it was intelligently designed.
If a structure is functional and complex, it is virtually certain that it was designed. You could mix metal and ink, repeatedly heating and cooling it for billions of years but you would never get a ball point pen. Consistent tubular structures forming by luck could never happen even for a few inches and we have enough of them to circle the globe, without a leak, going exactly where they are needed.
Frank M: “I have read talkorigins many times. There are hundreds of websites all over all sides of this issues, although talkorigins is one of the least reputable.â€
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf you say so. Maybe I was misled by the 300+ references to scientific articles in the bibliography.
Frank M: “I can not argue against an entire link, so if all you are saying is that someone somewhere disagrees with me, I suppose we can leave it at that. If you care to present a point you feel relates to the subject matter we can discuss it. If not, that's your prerogative. Hey, I just asked, ok?...
“I would prefer, rather than the usual "summary", that you present just a point or two that you feel supports your position. Again, if you feel unable or unwilling to do so, that is fine.â€
Well, I do feel unable currently, although not unwilling, however that’s going to take more time and reading if I’m really going to present the science as I would like to, since, as stated before, I’m not a scientist. I really don’t mind if you feel the need to rip me or my arguments apart either, I have no scientific reputation to protect and am not afraid of playing the fool, but I’ll have to get back to you on that one. I’m working very long hours in a totally unrelated field, so this is all on my own time; I hope you understand. The one thing I do ask as ground rules is that we can agree that exposing the shortfalls of one theory (evolution in this case) does not [i]a priori [/i]constitute any kind of confirmation of another.
As far as the link goes, I was under the mistaken impression that we were talking about educating ourselves, not debating. So actually no, I wasn’t asking you to argue against it.
Frank M: “AFS: ‘I'm not going to convince any creationist/IDer to give up their god anymore than you will convince me to worship yours.’
“I thought we were talking about science. Why are you bringing anything up about God? I am not a Creationist and nobody said anything about worship (except you).â€
Fine—I withdraw the word worship. You’ll notice I did say god, not God. Designer if you prefer. I find the distinction between ID and creationism more semantic than actual, since presumably the Intelligent Designer also created, yes? Or did he/she/it have an Intelligent General Contractor?
Frank M: “AFS: ‘its apples and oranges’
“What do you mean by this?â€
Um… actually I meant what I said next. ID is not science anymore than evolution is religion; therefore, apples and oranges.
Frank M: “AFS: ‘ID is not science anymore than evolution is religion.’
“That is a strange assessment, especially since ID is the theory of evolution by intelligent design. What is not science is to refuse to address the evidence.â€
I am working on addressing the evidence, but it takes more research than I can reasonably devote to it at the moment. What I can say is that the stuff Seth was talking about regarding the Cambrian explosion does appear to be problematic to the theory, but I am far from feeling like I have a complete grasp on the arguments surrounding that particular issue at the moment. I am glad to see that you do have a distinct understanding of evolution as opposed to common descent.
Frank M: “AFS: ‘IDers trying to get their BELIEF taught as a science.’
“Actually I promote the idea that we should teach only evidence in school, without drawing conclusions for or against accidental materialism.â€
Or Intelligent Design either then? If that’s truly how you feel, can you explain how we teach science at all? Teachers can’t teach theory, only evidence? “Gravity holds us to the Earth’s surface because it does� And I should have taken exception to your use of “accidental materialism†long ago, but I let it slide. More on that later.
Frank M: “Now, if you are suggesting that science MUST find a materialist answer, then you ARE injecting your religious beliefs (atheism) into science. I hope you would never do that because we all know science requires an open mind in the search for the truth.â€
Actually, yes, strictly speaking science must find a materialistic answer—though not necessarily a materialist’s answer. Since science (according to the Wikipedia entry) “refers to a system of acquiring knowledge based on scientific method, as well as to the organized body of knowledge gained through such research.†And scientific method “seeks to explain the events of nature in a reproducible way, and to use these reproductions to make [b]useful[/b] predictions.†(same source, my emphasis.) So if science is about natural phenomenon it must confine itself to the material world. When it doesn’t, it fails to make useful predictions because so far material and the material world are all human beings can work with in any predictable, verifiable and repeatable way. So no, I’m not injecting atheism—which strictly speaking is not a religion, but lack of one.
Sure, science requires an open mind, but that’s not the same as an indiscriminate one.
Frank M: “AFS: ‘Therefore it remains your burden of proof to produce, not science's.’
“Actually the burden of proof goes both ways (why wouldn't it?) and I have no intention of changing hardened minds. I offer evidence to those who are open minded and searching for who is really right in this controversy. (Hint: It's not you.)â€
The burden of proof would go both ways if Intelligent Design has proved that it is in fact a scientific theory. It has yet to do so as far as I can tell. I have not seen anything showing that the theory of Intelligent Design can be scientifically verified or falsified or that we will gain any useful scientific insights into the workings of the universe by adopting it. As such the burden of proof IS on the proponents of ID. I don’t claim to know everything about it, so if you know how to prove or disprove it or how we will scientifically benefit from it, please do enlighten me.
You’re entitled to your opinion about the openness of my mind, we obviously are working from different definitions of that term.
Frank M: “What gives you the authority to speak on behalf of "science"? I am just as much speaking on behalf of science as you are, moreso really, since I actually FOLLOW the evidence. Reading an internet site is not scientific method.â€
I don’t think I’m speaking on behalf of science, just in defense of it. Reading an internet site is certainly not scientific method, but it is research which is supposed to be the first step of the scientific method. And, no, my research is not concluded.
Frank M: “Art for Science, if you don't want to discuss the various arguments for and against accidental life formation, I will respect that.â€
It’s not accidental life formation, unless you are specifically and only referring to the fact of genetic mutation. I assume we can at least agree that genetic mutation exists? Natural selection, sexual selection, genetic drift, etc.—the mechanics of Darwinism or evolution—are not random. They provide a predictive model of how speciation occurs, which has been shown to be correct enough for most scientists to accept the theory as practical fact. There is nothing intrinsically unusual in having inconsistencies and areas of controversy in any scientific theory and I am more than happy to discuss them as far as I can and I’m sure I will learn much from you as you seem well read on the subject. So as long as you agree to the ground rule above, I’ll get back to my research. Meanwhile can you tell me why ID should be considered a scientific theory?
Art for Science, I would caution against reliance on Wikipedia as well as talkorigins. Content for Wikipedia is from any individual who chooses to input data. There are citation requirements and other constraints, but the opportunity is there for extreme one-sidedness on an issue. In general, the scientific community has plenty of opportunities for circular citation, so I recommend to people that they listen to the arguments, not the number of citations and think for yourselves with an open mind.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAFS: "The one thing I do ask as ground rules is that we can agree that exposing the shortfalls of one theory (evolution in this case) does not a priori constitute any kind of confirmation of another."
Can't agree. First, there are no shortfalls to evolution, and I am an evolutionist. The mechanism for Evolution is intelligent design, not random accident as Darwin thought, but please don't try to put me against evolution.
That said, I disagree with the premise of your ground rules. We were either formed intentionally or unintentionally and I believe the former. There is no third option, so to prove intent, one must disprove accident. If it is a combination of intentional and unintentional, the existence of intelligent design is reality, so they are mutually exclusive theories.
This is not "a priori", which means a pre-drawn conclusion. I started out a Darwinist, so my original beliefs were wrong.
AFS: "Fine—I withdraw the word worship. You’ll notice I did say god, not God. Designer if you prefer."
You said god, not me. I rarely even refer to a designer, because we don't know if this is something personified at all, and we don't know if it may be a group of entities or just an immaterial force that has no being. It might be a "what", not a "who". So even the word "designer" is jumping ahead of the evidence a bit.
AFS: "I find the distinction between ID and creationism more semantic than actual"
Creationism starts with a belief in God. Materialism starts with a pre-drawn conclusion that there isn't one and ID takes the neutral agnostic approach that all scientists SHOULD take if they want credibility.
AFS: "since presumably the Intelligent Designer also created, yes? Or did he/she/it have an Intelligent General Contractor?"
The design is being implemented, of course, but whether or not a different force or entity is involved in the implementation is uncertain. Some intelligent motive force evidence is conscious, some sub-conscious and some extra-organismal.
AFS: "Um… actually I meant what I said next."
I probably should have picked up on that. Sorry.
Frank: “Actually I promote the idea that we should teach only evidence in school, without drawing conclusions for or against accidental materialism.â€
AFS: "Or Intelligent Design either then? If that’s truly how you feel, can you explain how we teach science at all? Teachers can’t teach theory, only evidence?"
Yes. There is too much disagreement between the two camps and forcing either as the ONLY government approved answer, eliminating all contradicting evidence is intellectual dishonesty and a detriment to science. Moreover, with the religious implications, the only constitutional answer is to present evidence and not draw final conclusions. Let the students think for themselves and inspire them to persue this further, perhaps as a profession.
AFS: "Actually, yes, strictly speaking science must find a materialistic answer"
What? Why? What if life is an immaterial thing? (as it certainly appears to be and most believe it is) Then we are doomed never to find any answers. There is no reason to exclude possibilities a priori and any pre-drawn conclusions corrupts the findings anyway. That is NOT how science works, unless it is determined to fail.
You seem to be trying to equate "natural" with "material", but they are two different constructs. Gravity and kinetic energy are natural, but not material. Whatever animates matter in living things is likewise natural, but not material, and it needs to be studied as such, not ignored.
AFS: "So no, I’m not injecting atheism—which strictly speaking is not a religion, but lack of one."
Wrong. Agnosticism is the lack of religion. It neither says there is or is not a God, but just doesn't know.
Atheism is the quite religious belief that there is no God. A true Atheist will refuse to believe in God despite heavy evidence showing the existence of a god. The infusion of Atheism into the life sciences has done more harm than the Christian simpletons, because it attempts to force Materialist answers where there are none. It is persued with a religious zeolotry and it is a form of religion.
AFS: "I have not seen anything showing that the theory of Intelligent Design can be scientifically verified or falsified or that we will gain any useful scientific insights into the workings of the universe by adopting it."
Are you kidding? Please see my post on page 15. Useful insights are huge! The advancements to medical technology in understanding the immaterial and intelligent nature of life are incalculable. Even if it weren't, finding the truth is reward enough for diligently seeking it.
AFS: "I don’t think I’m speaking on behalf of science, just in defense of it."
Trying to stifle evidence in favor of Materialism is not science or a defense of science.
AFS: "It’s not accidental life formation, unless you are specifically and only referring to the fact of genetic mutation. I assume we can at least agree that genetic mutation exists?"
Genetic editing exists. Protein swapping during reproduction is not the least bit random.
AFS: "Natural selection, sexual selection, genetic drift, etc.—the mechanics of Darwinism or evolution—are not random."
Yes, they are. You have it backwards. The only thing random in evolution is the chaotic, myriad and unpredictable causes of death and extinction, which are almost exclusively unrelated to genetic mutations.
AFS: "Meanwhile can you tell me why ID should be considered a scientific theory?"
Is anything I'm saying to you NOT science??? I haven't heard you utter a scientific word yet. How could it NOT be science to discuss irreducible complexity or the impossibility of a genetic code? You're not making any sense here.
We may disagree, but although I think your lack of evidence makes your theory a load of crap, the subject matter remains science nonetheless. I don't get you, sorry.
This is a question for the Evolutionists out there (not you Frank :-) )
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat do [i]you[/i] believe to be the weak points in the argument for Evolution?
and
Do you believe your theory to be infallible?
If you can't answer this question then I will go on continuing to believe what they said in the Expelled movie, that Evolutionists don't leave any room for argument.
Thanks,
Seth
( If you want to answer though Frank you can explain to me why I am wrong being a Creationist, since I guess that is what I am, rather than an IDer. I myself always thought, like the Evolutionists, that ID and God creating all the species were one and the same. )
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Edited by sephers165 at 05/08/2008 9:27 AM
One more question what is the usefulness of Evolution as a Science?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisReason being: Let's take two subject you might study in college, English, what my wife did, and Electrical Engineering, what I did. One allows you to actually produce a product, while the other just gives you more knowledge but you can't actually do much with it.
When Scientists learned that doping Silicon with Boron or Phosphorous allowed them to make the Silicon either conductive or resistive, that allowed us to make microchips which was useful.
That is what I see the role of scientists doing, and I don't see how Evolution does that. You might argue that Evolution tells us chimps and humans descended from a common ancestor which allows us to know that chimps and Humans have similar genetic structures therefore we can test drugs and stuff on chimps and get an idea whether they will work with humans.
This is incorrect though because it wasn't Evolution that tells us chimps and Humans are similar it was observations and genetic research, which in turn led people to support Evolution. But after we learn that chimps and Humans have similar genes we don't gain any extra (engineering or scientific) value from inferring that they descended from a common ancestor.
That doesn't mean it isn't a good question to ask why they have similar genetic structures (Evolved Common ancestor or, in my view, God used similar building blocks) it just means it doesn't benefit us scientifically; much like how English doesn't benefit us the same way Engineering does.
Any constructive thoughts?
-Seth
p.s. Notice I'm not calling one wrong or right, just asking about the usefulness, also the same thing goes with ID, i would like to see it taught but not in Sophomore Biology in HS.
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Edited by sephers165 at 05/08/2008 10:25 AM
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Edited by sephers165 at 05/08/2008 12:16 PM
>Reason being: Let's take two subject you might study in college, English, what my wife did, and Electrical Engineering, what I did. One allows you to actually produce a product, while the other just gives you more knowledge but you can't actually do much with it.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLOL are you serious?!? Take about being close minded. Like yourself I am an engineer (Mechancial) and I cannot even begin to imagine how you came to have such little regard for important scientific research let alone your wife's English degree.
To quote Professor Ricky Rylance of the Higher Education Academy with regarding to the study of English.
"In no hierarchical order, there is, first, the cultural aspect, in which students and teachers engage primarily with literary texts (though engagement with other sorts of text is possible and, I think, desirable) in order to enable discussion of issues and values."
"Second, there is the functional or instrumental aspect in which students and teachers acquire and understand modes of communication and how to operate them successfully."
"Finally, there is the creative aspect. This is of increasing importance and includes not only ‘creative writing’, but also the broad appreciation of intellectual and aesthetic creativity and originality."
The rest of the arguments in our post are simply a continuation of your close mindedness.
>Any constructive thoughts?
Yeah, get over yourself.
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Edited by Natedog at 05/08/2008 2:19 PM
Hey Natedog,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI by no means meant to imply that English was useless. Simply that you can't apply the way you would engineering. I see how the question of Evolution is useful to Philosophy but what does Philosophy have to do with science.
"The rest of the arguments in our post are simply a continuation of your close mindedness."
I wasn't being close minded, I was simply asking a question. I believe myself to be somewhat Ignorant of the subject and that is why I appreciate Art for Science, and Frank M, because they both try to answer my questions.
Anyways,
I see the usefulness (in an engineering way) in finding similarities between our genetic structures with those of chimps but I don't see the usefulness(in an engineering way) of saying humans and chimps had a common ancestor.
So what is the usefulness of Evolution as a science? (It's not useful is not the answer I'm looking for, so don't say it IDer's.)
Seth
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Edited by sephers165 at 05/08/2008 3:08 PM
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Edited by sephers165 at 05/08/2008 3:14 PM
>So anyways, you didn't answer my question, what is the usefulness of Evolution as a science (from an engineering perspective)?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf that is your cup of tea I highly recommend you look into genetic programming. Basically the researchers take a computer model of an object (a telescope lens for example) and apply minor random adjustments over thousands of generations. Those modifications which produce a better product are kept and those that produce negative results are discarded. At the end of the run the final product is generally far better than the original.
Now natural evolution is far more complex but even a simple evolutionary model has produced very real and patented consumer products.
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Edited by Natedog at 05/08/2008 3:27 PM
> >So anyways, you didn't answer my question, what is
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> the usefulness of Evolution as a science (from an
> engineering perspective)?
>
> If that is your cup of tea I highly recommend you
> look into genetic programming. Basically the
> researchers take a computer model of an object (a
> telescope lens for example) and apply minor random
> adjustments over thousands of generations. Those
> modifications which produce a better product are kept
> and those that produce negative results are
> discarded. At the end of the run the final product
> is generally far better than the original.
>
> Now natural evolution is far more complex but even a
> simple evolutionary model has produced very real and
> patented consumer products.
>
> --
> Edited by Natedog at 05/08/2008 3:27 PM
Hmm, that is interesting. I definitely see the use in that. But I am, and probably will be forever doubtful as to how that says it is a fact that we ourselves evolved.
Sometimes the same evidence gives two different interpretations.
[i]What do you see an old woman, or a young one?[/i]
That is OK though, I will continue to think critically of ID and Evolution till I throw them both out or decide one is more true than the other.
Thanks Nate,
Seth
I gotta agree with Natedog that knowledge is always a good thing and it is important to understand how evolution works. To use a loose analogy about history: Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Learning about how life formed teaches us more about how we form today and in the future (and vice versa). Learning and knowledge are great joys even if all we get is enlightenment, but I do feel there is much to be gained, particularly in the medical fields, by understanding the immaterial, intelligent nature of how life works and forms.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI must add that we don't always know in advance what we will gain by turning unknowns into known. My father was an engineer who was in a small but important way among a team of pioneers in the fields you mention, fiber optics and microchips. He said they had no idea what their knowledge was going to lead them to.
A question for you as an electrical engineer. First, do understand the electrical aspects of life's sustenence? Such as in thoughts, sight, muscle activation, heartbeat pace and sense of touch?
If so, how many bits of information in a code do you think it would take to spell out the precise regulation of capacitance, resistance, electrical generation from electrolytic reactions, current flow etc. that is needed to keep us alive at all times?
If you were writing this information in words, how many pages of information do you think would be required? Rough estimation or general thoughts would be appreciated.
Seth, you ask if you are a Creationist. Creationism is generally considered to be the belief in the Biblical explanation of the genesis of life. I would also include anyone who believes their deity created life if they are so entrenched in this belief that no evidence would deter them.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLikewise, a Materialist is one who will refuse to accept any and all evidence that could lead one to believe in immaterial aspects of life, such as a soul, God or miracles.
Both of these approaches are too close-minded to reliably find credible answers, and neither approach is how science is supposed to work. An open mind is absolutely essential to learning and to science.
In either case, you can determine if you have this pre-determination by honestly asking yourself if there is any possible evidence that would change your mind.
You sound like a theist IDist, which simply means that, although you are open-minded in your scientific research, you do believe in God. That is not Creationism as it is popularly described. One can be theist, atheist or agnostic and believe in either Evolution by Intelligent Design or the Accident Theory. However, to be a Creationist, you have to be a theist.
You say you don't understand the distinction between ID and Creationism. It's huge. Part of it is the starting point and part of it is the end point. ID starts with a neutral agnostic approach and follows wherever the evidence may lead, neither for or against any religion. Creationism starts with the Bible and attempts to make the facts fit it. The endpoint of Creationism is exactly where it started, as with Materialism, since refusal to accept contrary evidence will always lead you nowhere.
ID ends when we run out of evidence. We may still believe in God, but we draw a hard line distinction between where science runs out of factual evidence and such things as faith, morals or gut feelings take over. ID is compatible with your belief that God created all life. But it is also compatible with much less religious sounding concepts, such as a superior intelligence that is not all-powerful, loving or moral.
The evidence shows intelligent guidance in the formation of life. Those forces appear powerful and certainly capable of matter animation, but they also appear limited (or self-limiting) and we certainly have no evidence putting any religion over another, nor any religion at all.
Seth, you ask for a weakness in both ID and Materialism. I had a hard time with that as I feel that ID is virtually certain.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI would say that, since ID requires an intelligence capable of animating matter, we are setting up a very bold and bizarre hypothesis, which should be easily proven wrong. It is very testable. Simply show quadrillions of messy, incongruous and pointless mutations for every functional one and you have clinched the deal.
But I do not feel that we should consider it impossible for an intelligence to animate matter. We witness it happening every day. When we think we form neural pathways and cause dendrites to stretch, chemicals to react and electrical impulses to energize. When we want our legs to move, they do so by our will. Protein animation is an incredibly functional constant shuffling of molecular elves in a show shop, that only stop animating when we die. Virtually all protein movement works toward sustenence of life in a very intelligent way.
Matter animates in all living things, plant, animal, prokaryote and eukaryote, in all reproduction. Therefore abiogenesis of a reproducing being is a virtual impossible in a laboratory setting.
Intelligent motive force is scientifically certain and we must stop this "comedy of errors" charade and teach students the truth about the immaterial intelligent nature of life and life formation.
I don't see any of the arguments supporting intelligent design listed here at all, which seems to support the movies thesis that the theory is, in fact, being suppressed for some reason. It makes me wonder why. Is the theory so strong that it can't be addressed at all?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Actually, science avoids design explanations for natural phenomena out of logical necessity. The scientific method involves rigorously observing and experimenting on the material world. It accepts as evidence only what can be measured or otherwise empirically validated (a requirement called methodological naturalism). That requirement prevents scientific theories from becoming untestable and overcomplicated."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe above quote literally caused me to laugh out loud. The major tenets of evolution are totally unproved and unprovable. How life initially began, how complex organ systems "evolve" and huge, unexplained gaps in the fossil record are just a few examples. What science can't possibly verify, it simply fills in with the infamous "computer model." If evolution apologists truly accepted "only what can be measured or otherwise empirically validated," the theory of evolution would evaporate instantly.
>"I don't see any of the arguments supporting intelligent design listed here at all, which seems to support the movies thesis that the theory is, in fact, being suppressed for some reason. It makes me wonder why. Is the theory so strong that it can't be addressed at all?"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf a scientist could either proof the theory of intelligent design or at least disprove the theory of evolution they would be famous. They would be on the cover of every single scientific magazine and journal in the world. Science rewards those that increase our understanding it does not suppress them.
If the theory of intelligent design was even remotely valid groups all over the world would be racing to be the first uncover its secrets.
Why is none of this happening? Because there is no evidence to support such a claim, absolutely NONE! You would be just as well off spending your time researching leprechauns.
>It makes me wonder why.
Instead of simply pondering the matter why don't you try picking up a book?
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Edited by Natedog at 05/09/2008 7:52 AM
If we actually listen to either side we would understand they both have evidence for their theory, the question is are the conclusions they reach based on the evidence logical and/or factual.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe truth is ID and Evolution have research done on both of them. IDer's try to find incredibly complex things and say that is proof that it didn't evolve, and Evolutionists try to find similarities between genes to prove they had a common ancestor.
What both have failed in doing is proving via a controlled experiment, that their side is true. (And proving that animals adapt to their environment doesn't prove that they evolve into entirely different species).
Can anyone tell me of the active controlled experiments going on currently in the world of Biology?
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Edited by sephers165 at 05/09/2008 8:05 AM
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Edited by sephers165 at 05/09/2008 8:06 AM
Thanks Frank, I appreciate the answers.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd I guess I would be labeled as a Creationist but I hope I am not as close minded as you make some of us out to be, because I genuinely desire to know the other arguments out there, even if not because I am going to believe them, but I believe it is important to know what the other argument is. As Honest Abe said
"When I am getting ready to reason with a man, I spend one-third of my time thinking about myself and what I am going to say and two-thirds about him and what he is going to say"
It is true I accept the Bible and try to interpret the evidence through that.
It is also true though that everybody sees thing through their own presuppositions.
In order to prove things using science, you need to pre-suppose that the scientific method is a valid way of proving things. Most of us agree the scientific method does prove things but I think what a lot of the argument on is whether our pre-suppositions are true.
A good quote to explain my personal beliefs (and maybe if you replace Christianity with your own beliefs it would be for you too)
I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else.
C. S. Lewis
After reading just a bit of the discussion thread, I feel I should point out that this is not a new argument, but a very old one. Science and religion have been in conflict for centuries. This is no surprise - by their very definition faith and reason lead us to different conclusions. In the year 1633 Galileo Galilei was ordered to stand trial for heresy for his support of heliocentrism, because it was contrary to the holy scripture. Nearly 400 years later we all know that Galileo was right. Was this the end of faith and religion? Not a bit. We simply learned to accept that science and religion tell us different things.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEvolution is science and reason. Creationism is religion and faith. They are inherently contradictory concepts, and there is no logical reconciliation of one with the other.
Deal with it people.
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Edited by EastwoodDC at 05/09/2008 8:52 AM
>IDer's try to find incredibly complex things and say that is proof that it didn't evolve.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYes, that is exactly what they do. They say that incredibly complex things are proof that things didn't evolve but they do not prove that incredibly complex things did not evolve. You can SAY anything, proving something is a completely different matter. To date supporters of ID have not proved a single thing through research and have no evidence to support their claims.
>and Evolutionists try to find similarities between genes to prove they had a common ancestor.
They do that along with a number of other things such as proving (with evidence) that incredibly complex things evolved from less complex things...
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Edited by Natedog at 05/09/2008 9:54 AM
> To date supporters of ID have not proved a single
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> e thing through research and have no evidence to
> support their claims.
Now that is a little reaching. They have lots of evidence but they just make a different interpretation (which you may or may not agree with) of it. It is more appropriate to say that the take evidence of things and use illogical reasoning to arrive at their claims. (Like the eye is so incredibly complex and irreducibly complex that it had to be designed? But what about all the imperfections with the eye, aren't those evidence of more random events?)
> They do that along with a number of other things such
> as proving (with evidence) that incredibly complex
> things evolved from less complex things...
As I asked earlier however was I am aware of the evidence Evolution has, there is lots of it, but the conclusions reached by the evidence I don't necessarily agree with. Since you so strongly support this claim above, I would be interested if you could point me to some links (besides talkorigins they are not very objective, in my opinion) that I can read about the evidence that proves Evolution. That way I can see whether this evidence truly supports Evolution objectively, or if it pre-supposes Evolution to be true and then shows how the evidence supports Evolution.I am not one to believe something just because someone tells me, but if the argument is good I won't cling to something that is false.
What I wanted to know is what controlled experiments for Evolution are currently going on in Biology (that either support evolution or don't support it, i dont care, I just want to look up more info for myself)
Seth,
P.S. Nate, just because scientists say there is evidence of something doesn't mean it can't be questioned. For instance if there was statistics that said 80% of people think George Bush is a great president, but then you actually looked at the evidence and saw that the 1000 people polled were from a town that is entirely Conservative you wouldn't necessarily agree with the claim would you?
>"Nate, just because scientists say there is evidence of something doesn't mean it can't be questioned.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI fully support those who challenge scientific theories but you have to challenge science with science. Science vs. religion is a dead end road because they mostly deal in completely different subject matter.
>For instance if there was statistics that said 80% of people think George Bush is a great president, but then you actually looked at the evidence and saw that the 1000 people polled were from a town that is entirely Conservative you wouldn't necessarily agree with the claim would you?"
You are talking about two completely different things. Scientific discoveries are peer reviewed and are rigorously tested before they even begin to gain any level of acceptance. Even afterwards those discoveries may be continuously challenged and ultimately revised or discarded as new information becomes available.
Some theories are popular in the scientific community and as a result get more attention and some are unpopular and receive less attention but they each have scientific evidence supporting their claims.
Evolution isn't a popular theory because it is the offical status quo or because scientists are afraid to go against the establishment. It is popular because the evidence supporting it is so overwhelming. Either way the evidence exists regardless of peoples opinions which is completely different than your example which is a scenario that deals exclusively with people's opinions.
>It is more appropriate to say that the take evidence of things and use illogical reasoning to arrive at their claims.
Actually it would be far more appropriate to say that they use unscientific reasoning to arrive at their claims.
I am not claiming that the theory of intelligent design is false; I am simply claiming that it is unscientific. Maybe someday ID will produce scientific evidence to backup their claims but they haven't yet.
If anyone wants to argue for or against ID be my guest but the argument is purely philosophical.
>What I wanted to know is what controlled experiments for Evolution are currently going on in Biology (that either support evolution or don't support it, i dont care, I just want to look up more info for myself).
The best place to look for the most current information is scientific journals. In some cases they can be quite expensive to purchase so I would recommend visiting your main library branch and/or local universities to see about gaining access to their copies.
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Edited by Natedog at 05/09/2008 1:35 PM
Natedog wrote> I am not claiming that the theory of intelligent design is false; I am simply claiming that it is unscientific. Maybe someday ID will produce scientific evidence to backup their claims but they haven't yet.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis is giving ID more credit than it deserves. In order for ID to have evidence there must first be a hypothesis. ID has no hypothesis - There is no theory of ID under which the available data can be evaluated. Arguing against the "evidence" for ID is to tacitly assume there is a testable hypothesis to be evaluated, and there simply is not.
ID is a belief, a philosophy, a religion (choose all that apply). It is a comforting one too. However, it cannot ever be science, because it requires a hypothesis about that which simply cannot be defined.
On the other hand, the theory of evolution has been (and continues to be) refined from a series of hypotheses that are well supported by the data. Certainly there aspects of evolution that we do not yet understand, but that does not imply the entire theory is wrong, rather it means there are further refinements so be made.
> I fully support those who challenge scientific
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> theories but you have to challenge science with
> science. Science vs. religion is a dead end road
> because they mostly deal in completely different
> subject matter.
Well maybe I am confused on what the definition of science is. If it doesn't have to involve controlled experiments (still looking for one for evolution...??) then does it merely take a belief and then making observation about the world and then seeing if they're "consistent with that belief within a logical reasoning? I still don't see how ID doesn't do that. (Sorry if I go on and on, I just deal with things concretely, I need specific examples and arguments that are made that are not scientific)
> You are talking about two completely different
> things. Scientific discoveries are peer reviewed and
> are rigorously tested before they even begin to gain
> any level of acceptance.
I agree that they should be but it seems like the scientific discoveries are all peer reviewed by people who already accept Evolution. Therefore they presuppose Evolution to be true so when they find evidence (i.e. a fossil that looks like the combination of two species of today that share DNA), that supports their belief that the two must have evolved from the one. (And everyone makes some presuppositions about the world, some are just a little more far fetched. Like Aliens Intelligently Designed all the earth, lol.) But if you didn't pre-suppose Evolution to be true you might explain it differently.
> the evidence supporting it is so
> overwhelming.
But I've been looking for the evidence for it and I am still not overwhelmed. I'll keep digging though, but at some point if you search an area enough you either find something or decide nothing is there. Help me out people.
> Actually it would be far more appropriate to say that
> they use unscientific reasoning to arrive at their
> claims.
>
Still you have to at least admit Evolution does require assumptions, and I am not necessarily saying they are unreasonable either, just you have to assume some things. For instance in a controlled experiment you have to assume that what happens commonly continues to happen commonly under the same conditions.
> If anyone wants to argue for or against ID be my
> guest but the argument is purely philosophical.
So are you willing to argue with me about the Philosophical reasons for believing things were created as is, vs them being randomly appearing. I would definitely be more knowledgeable there than here. Alas this website isn't called Philosophic American. I'm still willing though if you know a good site to argue Philosophically.
Here is an assumption many people make, scientific proof, is more important than philosophical truth. But that is a matter of opinion.
"I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else" - C.S. Lewis
> On the other hand, the theory of evolution has been
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> (and continues to be) refined from a series of
> hypotheses that are well supported by the data.
> Certainly there aspects of evolution that we do not
> yet understand, but that does not imply the entire
> theory is wrong, rather it means there are further
> refinements so be made.
Ooh, ooh, you are the guy I'm looking for then. What are the hypotheses that are well supported by the data? Please give me examples, websites, journals, articles. Also are these hypotheses that are tested done in controlled experiments in a lab, or are they just observations of things in the world?
If the former, I definitely doubt ID does or can do that, (maybe though, I won't be so close minded to say it is impossible and can't)
but if the latter then ID kind of does that, it is just whether or not you agree with their conclusions. IDer's say things like this.
"We hypothesize that the world was designed intelligently because it is so complex, therefore if that is true we should be able to find things in nature that show things being so complex that they can only exist as part of a whole but not individually. Then they go use the eye as an example and say see if you take away one single part the eye wouldn't work so it had to be designed otherwise had would all the individual parts come together to form the eye."
Not that that is even a good argument, but nonetheless it supports an observational hypothesis that does no actual controlled experimentation. By the way I'm not saying this to prove ID, I don't think it can be proven in the way I want, but I'm just trying to reason that Evolution might not be an infallible theory.
EastwoodDC claims that "[ID] cannot ever be science, because it requires a hypothesis about that which simply cannot be defined."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thissephers165 claims "...everyone makes some presuppositions about the world, some are just a little more far fetched. Like Aliens Intelligently Designed all the earth, lol.)"
For my part I think aliens intelligently designing life on earth is the only way someone could possibly make a scientific case supporting intelligent design (for life on this planet specifically). That however doesn't answer the question of how those aliens were created and does nothing to bolster religious views.
I do not think it that life on our planet was intelligently designed by aliens or gods but again that is just my opinion.
>Here is an assumption many people make, scientific proof, is more important than philosophical truth.
I never really studied philosophy but philosophers have no single definition of truth on which the majority of professional philosophers and scholars can agree.
For a guy so interested in answers I would think you would find philosophy rather frustrating as philosophical questions only lead to more questions.
>Then they go use the eye as an example and say see if you take away one single part the eye wouldn't work so it had to be designed otherwise had would all the individual parts come together to form the eye."
That is a pretty common argument from supporters of ID but there really isn't any truth to that claim. Just ask someone who is partially blind if they think their eyes are useless. Seeing something even anything is better than seeing nothing.
In that line of reasoning imagine a creature that develops the ability to sense the difference between light and dark but nothing else. As far as eyes go it would be extremely basic but it would still give that creature an advantage over other creatures. For example it may be able to sense a predator (or prey) passing over by the reduction in light. Now imagine a creature that develops the basic ability to detect motion. Again it would have an advantage over other creatures.
Every new ability gained can give a creature certain advantages and it is hardly an all or nothing scenario. Eyes becoming more complex over time is exactly what you would expect from natural evolution.
>For instance in a controlled experiment you have to assume that what happens commonly continues to happen commonly under the same conditions.
There are certain assumptions that must be made but they are on a very fundamental level. For example I do not think it at all unreasonable to expect an experiment to obey the laws of motion, thermodynamics and gravity, etc.
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Edited by Natedog at 05/09/2008 3:33 PM
You are being very foolish if you don't think you are required to make a single presupposition in order to make any useful claim about Evolution.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat about the second law of thermodynamics?
Also do you know of any controlled experiments for Evolution?
Last, have you watched the expelled movie?
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Edited by sephers165 at 05/09/2008 4:31 PM
Alright I'm done here. I came in trying to be better informed but instead I have mostly been criticized for not believing something before I have the evidence personally for myself. I feel like I'm being called a fool for not believing something just because "There is a bunch of scientific evidence" and I don't just accept that but want to see and study the evidence for myself.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhen I was in high school they pretty much just simply told us we're here because of Evolution but never explained why. At the time I just accepted it but after I got to college and learned to think critically I decided not just believe things because it is the majority opinion. When I began actually looking at the evidencet, it brought many questions to my mind. I've been trying to find answers for these questions but I've just been told I'm dumb for not just accepting it. Well I guess I will leave here now continuing in my ignorance. I hope others out there will learn to not just believe everything they here (religious people, and Evolution people) but will learn to ask questions till they find answers.
Thank you to those who have been helpful and did their best to answer my questions. I appreciate it.
Frank,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI am confused by your use of the term Intelligent Design to represent your beliefs.
"I believe in common descent with modification, but the modification is controlled intelligently in the same way other functional proteins are controlled intelligently."
This suggests that you believe in intelligently guided evolution, which is not the consensus among ID proponents, though it seems you're trying to present it as such. In fact, you are the first person I've seen waving the ID flag who actually argues from that perspective. Most flat-out reject the possibility of macoevolution, guided or not. They insist that new species were "poofed" into existence at different times throughout history. These are the people at whom most of the comments in this forum have been directed thus far. Might I suggest using a different label so as to avoid lumping yourself in with people whose ideas you seem to be in fundamental disagreement with?
While I find your arguments concerning the efficiency of evolution to be very interesting, I honestly loathe the stance that such efficiency can only be due to the influence of some outside being. That has been the quintessential cop-out since humans have had the ability to communicate their thoughts. It's an insultingly simplistic and horrendously outdated approach to the rational explanation of phenomena.
You could simply say that our knowledge of evolution is incomplete and that you believe evidence points to some unknown contributing factor(s) which help(s) to more efficiently guide evolution down advantageous paths. I think most scientists can respect such a viewpoint, and, indeed, are perpetually searching for such factors.
Claiming that you KNOW this influence to be an intelligent designer, however, borders on lunacy. Why must intelligence be involved here? Water flowing down a hill will follow the path of least resistance, as will the flow of electric charge. Would you attribute these things to the guidance of some unknown intelligent being merely because they have the appearance of willfully seeking out the easiest path? Of course not, they're merely obeying the laws of nature. Why, then, would you do so to the evolution of life, which, essentially, seeks out the least resistant path to survival/propagation? Before humans became aware of the physics involved, rivers formed where they did because "God" put them there, people were struck by lightning because "God" was angry with them, life developed the way it did because "God" made it so.
As a note, arguing for ID from a probablistic standpoint is absolutely useless. If you posit that life on Earth could only become this complex through the intervention of some superior being, then you are implying that such a being, which by necessity must be more complex, must also require a creator. This would then have to be expanded into the existence of an infinite chain of exponentially greater intelligences, as no complex lifeform could originate naturally (i.e. unguided). The odds against such circumstances must surely approach infinite. While the odds against the evolution of life on Earth through unguided means to its current state might be very large, they are still finite, which makes them infinitely more likely than the existence of an indefinite chain of unfathomably intelligent beings.
Sephers,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHere is a good paper about experiments with microorganisms: http://ecology.tiem.utk.edu/~gavrila/AR/elena_lenski_03.pdf
Frank: “Art for Science, I would caution against reliance on Wikipedia as well as talkorigins. Content for Wikipedia is from any individual who chooses to input data. There are citation requirements and other constraints, but the opportunity is there for extreme one-sidedness on an issue. In general, the scientific community has plenty of opportunities for circular citation, so I recommend to people that they listen to the arguments, not the number of citations and think for yourselves with an open mind.â€
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAlright—give me your definition of science then. I chose Wikipedia because it was more or less in line with what I believe is an accurate definition of science and scientific method and—ironically—because I thought you would object to it less than something emanating from some more arbitrary authority like “Webster.†I am thinking for myself, but part of the scientific process involves peer review and consensus—like it or not. Arguments that site articles from peer-reviewed journals should hold more weight. Speciation by natural selection has already gone through a lot of this type of scrutiny over the years and has stood up remarkably well. I don’t think it unreasonable to require that a theory purporting to be better than it should be able to go through the same.
Frank:
“AFS: ‘The one thing I do ask as ground rules is that we can agree that exposing the shortfalls of one theory (evolution in this case) does not [i]a priori[/i] constitute any kind of confirmation of another.’
“Can't agree. First, there are no shortfalls to evolution, and I am an evolutionist. The mechanism for Evolution is intelligent design, not random accident as Darwin thought, but please don't try to put me against evolution.â€
EDIT: After reading this I went and looked at an earlier post of yours that I had missed. If I am reading it correctly—and correct me if I’m wrong—you believe in genetic mutation, you believe in a phylogenetic system (whether or not it’s the standard model), you believe in common ancestory, it’s merely the mechanics of natural selection you dispute? Forgive me, but I don’t see how the design force/being/whatever fits in in your view. Is it tweaking the genetics? Is it causing speciation? This is obviously not the generally presented view of IDers, so more details would be helpful. If this is an accurate reading, then it seems a little trivial really.
Frank: “That said, I disagree with the premise of your ground rules. We were either formed intentionally or unintentionally and I believe the former. There is no third option, so to prove intent, one must disprove accident. If it is a combination of intentional and unintentional, the existence of intelligent design is reality, so they are mutually exclusive theories.
“This is not "a priori", which means a pre-drawn conclusion. I started out a Darwinist, so my original beliefs were wrong.â€
I disagree that there is no third option, just because we can’t come up with it. You should be able to prove intent without disproving “accidentâ€. In fact it should be easier since it’s always more difficult to prove a negative. (By the way, I was using [i]a priori[/i] in reference to this debate, not your personal beliefs.)
This is a logical fallacy of false correlation. By your logic, all you have to do is show that natural selection didn’t cause some specific genetic speciation and can’t currently provide a viable explanation for it to [i]a priori[/i] state that it was therefore intelligent design.
It’s already understood that natural selection is only one mechanism of speciation, including sexual selection, genetic drift, bottlenecking, etc. It seems reasonable to speculate that there may be more mechanics undefined currently that have nothing to do with ID.
Frank:
“AFS: ‘Actually, yes, strictly speaking science must find a materialistic answer’
“What? Why? What if life is an immaterial thing? (as it certainly appears to be and most believe it is) Then we are doomed never to find any answers. There is no reason to exclude possibilities a priori and any pre-drawn conclusions corrupts the findings anyway. That is NOT how science works, unless it is determined to fail.
“You seem to be trying to equate "natural" with "material", but they are two different constructs. Gravity and kinetic energy are natural, but not material. Whatever animates matter in living things is likewise natural, but not material, and it needs to be studied as such, not ignored.â€
Here we are at the crux of the matter. We obviously are working from two different definitions of science. There are many good reasons to exclude possibilities that are impractical to test in the admittedly limited, imperfect, human endeavor of science. Just because we are unable to prove or disprove large primary questions doesn’t mean we can’t find any answers—just the answers to those large questions. ID may or may not be true, but it is un-testable given the current state of scientifically applicable technology.
Historically, pre-drawn corrupting conclusions of science are generally those things that are apparently and believably true. The earth is flat. The sun orbits the earth. These are apparently true through gross observation, and at some point were widely believed to be so, but of course aren’t.
I do not equate natural and material as you presume. Certainly gravity and energy are not material but we have reliable material ways to measure their effects and based on those measurements produce hypotheses to predict outcomes. The proof or disproof of an individual hypothesis about an aspect of gravity, for example, does not [i]a priori[/i] disprove the larger theory attempting to explain gravity as a force to which the particular hypothesis subscribes. Yet by rejecting my proposed ground rule you indicate that you think this type of reasoning is perfectly acceptable. We don’t know if life is animated by material or immaterial means. We simply don’t have any way to currently test it. It is illogical to presume that because we haven’t found evidence of one we have proven the other, or that we are doomed to never be able to prove one over the other. We may be able to prove or disprove ID at some point, currently we can’t, which makes its usefulness as a scientific theory moot.
I apologize that I simply don’t have the time currently to go through the rest of this point by point. Apparently I missed some of your posts—I will go look at those when I get a chance.
I may not be well versed in science or in the particular arguments; however I do understand logic and debate very well. If we can’t even come to a mutual agreement as to what the basic terms like “science†actually mean, then I am afraid we will be doomed to continually talk at cross purposes. My statement that I was speaking in defense of science, for instance, included the assumption that the term science encompasses the body of knowledge historically collected and collectively acknowledged to be science; an assumption which it seems you reject. Admittedly I haven’t provided a lot of “scientific†arguments. I am not a scientist while you at least have had much more study in science, so it takes me more time—which I currently lack—to cogently produce an argument in a realm where you will always have me personally at an educational disadvantage.
Having said that, a commonly agreed upon field of play is essential to good, fair, logical debate, something which apparently we currently lack. It seems like jumping the gun to start presenting arguments in favor of one or the other points of view before establishing some sort of common ground.
Science is a purpose based, evidence driven field of human endeavor. As an imperfect human activity, it depends upon collaboration and consensus (i.e., peer review) for quality control. It does not include all possible realities that can be imagined. That is philosophy or theology. I have presented a definition of science which I agree with and which I believe is a relatively accurate reflection of how the scientific community would define it. When held up against this definition, any theory that seeks to explain phenomenon by supernatural (that is outside of or above nature) forces or beings such as ID is [i]primae facea [/i] not science. If, as it seems is your interpretation, this is actually an immaterial but natural force, then eventually we will find natural, material, direct or indirect evidence for it. If and when we do, I am confident that scientific hypotheses and/or theories will be adapted, adopted and/or discarded as required by the evidence. If we don’t then it still may be true but it would be (as it currently is) scientifically trivial, as it doesn’t add any unique measurable, predictive information to our understanding of natural processes, and would remain basically un-provable and un-falsifiable.
If ID doesn’t fit the accepted definition of science then its proponents must come up with an acceptable alternate definition if it is to be taken seriously in the scientific community. Michael Behe, whom you cited earlier, has tried this, but upon scrutiny it was shown that the definition he proposed would also place such things as Astrology and Alchemy in the realm of science. You don’t have to be a scientist to see how patently absurd that is.
There are many other arguments and assumptions from your last post that I would contest (including your assumption that I am an atheist which I have never stated or denied as I think it absolutely immaterial to the questions at hand), but I’m out of time and it seems a little pointless anyway. I do not think my ground rule in any way unreasonable. If we can’t find common ground even with such basic things like the definitions of “scienceâ€, “scientific method†and “scientific theoryâ€, then this discussion will inevitably descend into rants and name calling. I have no desire to play out that particular endgame, my friend. So perhaps it’s best that we simply agree to disagree and leave it at that.
Seth, it seems you may have given up on this discussion, but if not check out this link: http://www.gate.net/~rwms/EvoEvidence.html especially the section on human and great ape common ancestery.
I agree ditches, you certainly picked up on the differences in his views from common ID quicker than I did. I feel a bit the dolt.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thissephers165, if you are still out there:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'm sorry if you feel that you were unjustly criticized, but critical thinking is needed if you really want to understand.
I have found that when I don't understand the answer to something, it is generally because I don't fully grasp the meaning of the question. This seems to be the cause of the entire evolution/ID debate. People (on BOTH sides) get so tied up in the details of the science they fail to understand that the science is barely relevant, and the heart of the matter is actually the conflict between science and religion.
The real issue is differentiating between what we can reason for ourselves and that which we must accept on faith. We teach math and science in schools not because we expect every pupil to go on to become a research scientist, but because we want our children to learn to reason for themselves. This causes a big uproar when ID/Creation, fundamentally a matter of faith, is presented as science in some schools.
I believe that faith needs to be taught as well, but this is the province of church and family and not public education. I have no expectation that other people will draw the line between faith and reason in the same way I do, but I think it is vital they understand the difference.
There is no such thing as scientific truth. No scientific theory is infallible, that is the nature of science. Nothing is ever proved in science; rather the successful theories are the ones that have withstood years of testing and have not failed, and have also predicted new phenomena that have since been observed. This goes back to what others have already said: a hypothesis must be falsifiable to be the basis of a scientific theory. A theory can never be proven, only validated beyond various degrees of doubt. They can, however, be disproved.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt is physically impossible to prove a theory to be the absolute truth - to do that a theory would have to be validated to infinite accuracy and precision in every possible scenario. No single one of the above is possible, let alone all three. There is no, nor will there ever be, a single experiment or observation that can be made to prove a theory to be the absolute truth.
Therefore, to answer the people who have asked if the scientific theory of evolution is infallible, the answer is of course not. No scientific theory can, by the very nature of what it is, be infallible.


As an example (I will draw from physics, as that is what I know best), take Newton's First Law, F = ma (Force = mass times acceleration). It is not only fallible, but wrong! Newton's laws are the approximate equations of motion at the scales and speeds that are relevant to our every day lives. F = ma does not give the absolute correct answer, even if exact values were input into it! Instead, it will yield an approximation to the real answer (albeit an extremely good approximation).
However, if you go down to very small scales, very large speeds or very massive objects, then quantum mechanical and relativistic processes become dominating effects and Newton's approximations no longer hold; they are replaced by more complete equations that are perfectly consistent with Newton's Laws in the relevant scales. It is important to note, however, that our understanding of the extremely small and extremely large is nowhere near complete nor perfect, and the equations we have for them are also approximations. Just because these theories are incomplete and imperfect does not mean they are worthless. They are very good models and are the reasons why we have things like computers and GPS navigation systems.
The point of science is not to come to some absolute truth of the way the world or anything else works - that is not realistic or possible outside of religion. Instead, the goal is to model the various processes that we see as best we can, and hopefully use them to predict new effects.

The prediction of other effects is actually a cornerstone of a good scientific theory. A theory that describes one phenomenon well but doesn’t manage to predict anything new is generally, but not always, proscribed to be fairly unsuccessful. The prediction of new phenomena that are then actually observed is the single most convincing way of validating a hypothesis, and this can be done in or outside of a laboratory. For example, many astrophysical and cosmological theories rely heavily on observations of uncontrolled systems in space - but we can observe so many different systems that, using sophisticated statistical analysis, implementing experimentally validated theories, etc, we can draw meaningful conclusions from them.
Now I’ll get back on point, using the above as a framework. The theory of evolution is based on several complicated hypotheses and I don’t claim to be expert in the field. My understanding, however, is that these hypothesis can be used to predict certain things, some of which have been experimentally or observationally validated. Similarly, there are many things that, if discovered, could disprove the theory of evolution, such as the sudden appearance of new species that did not ‘evolve’ from any other life-form. Such a discovery would essentially disprove the entire evolutionary theory of speciation. There are other discoveries, however, that would merely force the theory to change, and adapt to include the new discovery. That is how science evolves.
However, Intelligent Design’s hypothesis states that because life is too complex to have evolved by random or semi-random chance, then an Intelligent Designer must be responsible for it. Therefore, the evidence that must be provided is merely that life is too complex to have evolved by random or semi-random chance. I hope it is clear why this hypothesis does not fall under the same category as that of evolution. It is not possible to prove that something is impossible to occur by chance without proving that the event is impossible by any other means. And even if it could, that wouldn’t preclude other notions such as replacing the designer with aliens or something equally fantastic. And, as has been pointed out already, who created the necessarily more complex designer?
Then there is the problem with those who accuse the theory of Evolution of claiming that life developed [read: not originated] via a sequence of purely random events, which is not at all the case. It claims that random mutations play just one part in the process that leads to diversification of life. Any other description is a gross oversimplification, and thus an argument based off of it has no base to stand on.
Frank M: Your argument that many biological processes, such as protein swapping and indeed most of microevolution, happen too ‘intelligently’ to not be controlled by some intelligence is flawed. You are right that these processes are being controlled in some form, but your immediate jump to a Designer is vacuous. Instead it is a form of machine intelligence, specified by the cell’s and body’s DNA, RNA, and the chemical structure of their (and every other molecule’s) components. You would apparently be amazed at how powerful molecular structure can actually be. The structure of chemicals in the blood stream determine whether or not they can enter certain types of cells - some can pass right through the phospholipid bilayers that form the cell walls; some can pass through certain transport protein structures that are embedded in those cell walls whose functional forms, and thus functions themselves, depend on the concentrations of certain chemicals and pH.
The fact is, enormously complicated processes are understood extremely well in terms of chemical structure, and it is, for lack of better words, silly to assume that the aspects of these processes that are not yet understood must necessarily be due to supernatural intelligence. To give an example, a major research topic in biophysics is biological computing: using man-made molecular structures (usually mimicking DNA) to act as digital gates. This is not theoretical, it is practiced. If we, in our limited knowledge of biological physics, can create artificial molecules that behave in different ways depending on their environment (pH, concentration of other substances, etc), why can’t natural molecules do the same? We could get into an argument about how these complicated molecules arose in the first place, but that is a discussion of abiogenesis and is largely irrelevant to validity of the theory of evolution and ID.
This discussion appears to have died out, and Seth—who this is primarily in response to—seems to have gone, but I’ll post it here anyway in the hopes that it may be glanced at for what it’s worth.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI recently read an article in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences by J. William Schoptf of UCLA that I felt succinctly described the history of the scientific search for Pre-Cambrian fossils. It is called “Solution to Darwin’s Dilemma: Discovery of the missing Precambrian Record of Life†and is available as a free pdf on the PNAS website. (I’m sorry I don’t have the link handy at the moment.)
The upshot of the article is that although saying that there is a lack of fossil record for the Precambrian period may have been true until the 1960’s, that statement is no longer true at all. In fact, the article contends, the real question is why, given how many precambrian fossil examples are now on the scientific record, it took scientists so long to find them. The answer to that seems to be a combination of factors including misclassified and misidentified early findings, lack of (until relatively recently) a reliable methodology, the microscopic nature of most of the fossils, and the chilling effect on the search by statements (now shown to be wrong) of at least one very influential scientist of the early 20th century.
The oldest fossil currently (as of the presentation of the paper in 2000 anyway) on record is dated at almost 3500 million years ago—almost ¾ the estimated age of the planet. As far as I can tell other then the latest of these they are all of a microscopic nature, and the earliest “megascopic eukaryotes…are now known not to have appeared until shortly before the beginning of the Cambrian—except in immediately sub-Cambrian strata, the hunt for large body fossils in Precambrian rocks was doomed from the outset.â€
This article deals primarily with the history of and trends in the field work of Precambrian paleobiology and does not concern itself with making explicit explanations of how, for instance, natural selection would explain the jump from microscopic to macroscopic life seemingly more or less simultaneously across divergent branches of the phylogenetic tree.
Let’s be clear though: this level of evidence for life in the Precambrian puts the lie to the ID claim that the lack of life in the Precambrian combined with the Cambrian explosion proves that complex multi-cellular life sprang into existence in its completed form.
Pigeon,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThank you for this well reasoned and insightful response to the more scientific arguments that Frank was making and which I felt unqualified to address.
Pigeon states:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHowever, Intelligent Design’s hypothesis states that because life is too complex to have evolved by random or semi-random chance, then an Intelligent Designer must be responsible for it. Therefore, the evidence that must be provided is merely that life is too complex to have evolved by random or semi-random chance. I hope it is clear why this hypothesis does not fall under the same category as that of evolution. It is not possible to prove that something is impossible to occur by chance without proving that the event is impossible by any other means. And even if it could, that wouldn’t preclude other notions such as replacing the designer with aliens or something equally fantastic. And, as has been pointed out already, who created the necessarily more complex designer?
I can't comment on whether ID theory is accurately reflected in Pigeon's comment but I believe that some of the statemets made in the subsequent comments about scientific plausibility do not cary the absolute certainty stated and need further clarification. It is most certainly possible to prove that something cannot occur by purely Darwinian mechanisms mathematically. You do not have an infinite amount of time to accomplish the human organism, or any other "final product" for that matter..There must be a sufficient number of selective environments as compared to the number of generations possible to select a better fit and to de-select a precursor. The offending environment must accomplish both, or precursors would still be intermingling diluting the gene pool with their own. Furthermore, precursors that could not interbreed, but could survive, wouldstill be around unless a more restictive environment supervened, but there is no reason why the selected species would not also succumb to tat environment since the trait thqat had been selected was specific only to the earlier sective environment. One then would have to determine the number of changes that have occurred in the period since that Genus or Family (or kingdom) separated out. How many generations, for example, have there been, conservatively estimating, since Pan separated from Homo. Have there been sufficient generations along with environmental changes to account for the differences in the genetic makeup of chimps and man?
This, of course, is only one possible approach to the falsification of the Darwinian paradigm of chance and necessity.
Replacing a Designer by some other intelligence, simply pushes the question of the original source of the intelligence back further, rather that eliminate it.
Darwinism will ultimately fail, not by religious opposition, but by sound scientific process, but it is certainly interesting that the opposition has been spurred by religious considerations, while an entire scientific community tows the party line of evolution.
Pigeon states:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHowever, Intelligent Design’s hypothesis states that because life is too complex to have evolved by random or semi-random chance, then an Intelligent Designer must be responsible for it. Therefore, the evidence that must be provided is merely that life is too complex to have evolved by random or semi-random chance. I hope it is clear why this hypothesis does not fall under the same category as that of evolution. It is not possible to prove that something is impossible to occur by chance without proving that the event is impossible by any other means. And even if it could, that wouldn’t preclude other notions such as replacing the designer with aliens or something equally fantastic. And, as has been pointed out already, who created the necessarily more complex designer?
I can't comment on whether ID theory is accurately reflected in Pigeon's comment but I believe that some of the statemets made in the subsequent comments about scientific plausibility do not cary the absolute certainty stated and need further clarification. It is most certainly possible to prove that something cannot occur by purely Darwinian mechanisms mathematically. You do not have an infinite amount of time to accomplish the human organism, or any other "final product" for that matter..There must be a sufficient number of selective environments as compared to the number of generations possible to select a better fit and to de-select a precursor. The offending environment must accomplish both, or precursors would still be intermingling diluting the gene pool with their own. Furthermore, precursors that could not interbreed, but could survive, wouldstill be around unless a more restictive environment supervened, but there is no reason why the selected species would not also succumb to tat environment since the trait thqat had been selected was specific only to the earlier sective environment. One then would have to determine the number of changes that have occurred in the period since that Genus or Family (or kingdom) separated out. How many generations, for example, have there been, conservatively estimating, since Pan separated from Homo. Have there been sufficient generations along with environmental changes to account for the differences in the genetic makeup of chimps and man?
This, of course, is only one possible approach to the falsification of the Darwinian paradigm of chance and necessity.
Replacing a Designer by some other intelligence, simply pushes the question of the original source of the intelligence back further, rather that eliminate it.
Darwinism will ultimately fail, not by religious opposition, but by sound scientific process, but it is certainly interesting that the opposition has been spurred by religious considerations, while an entire scientific community tows the party line of evolution.The question is what will replace it. There is no doubt that some other naturalistic explanation will supervene. We live in a physical world, that God, in His infinite nature allows us to explore by natural methods whether we credit Him with it's existence or not. Never, will this naturalistic explanation, however, eliminate the Source, because methodological naturalism cannot cross from the finite natural world to the infinite supernatural Source that gives it existence.
(Intelligent Design proponents) "say that incredibly complex things are proof that things didn't evolve but they do not prove that incredibly complex things did not evolve."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEssentially we know that life evolved, but we assert that the evidence shows that it could not have happened by accident.
Based on some of the messages left in the past couple of days, I see that there is quite a bit of confusion on this issue. I assure you that all IDists believe in common descent. I have no ties with DI at all, but every time I have heard an IDist from DI being interviewed they are asked this question and they all ascribe to common descent. Berlinski, Behe, Dembski, Sternberg - they all adamantly support common descent, as does every IDist I have ever read.
We also are not claiming any deity did anything (can't say they didn't either), nor is this some Creationism in disguise mega-conspiracy.
So why do we keep being misrepresented? It seems that both Darwinists and Creationists feel they have something to gain by lumping us in with the religious set. Creationists call themselves IDists to gain credibility and Darwinists call IDists Creationists to lower our credibility. We follow the evidence more stringently than any Darwinist or Creationist ever did, yet we don't get nearly as much media play that the extremists get, nor the funding.
Seth is a Creationist. He believes the Biblical explanation of Creation in the Book of Genesis. I believe that the evidence disproves the Old Testament's version (both of them).
We came from apes, but is it mathematically possible to pick up a new genome with a coherent set of over 100,000 base pairs of genetic information, a 21st amino acid chain and entirely new genes by random chance mutation?
In a word, no. Mathematically, it couldn't have happened gradually or suddenly. BTW, Gradual step-by-step is an even bigger loser than sudden leaps, but Darwin didn't realize that. Gradualism limits the births and requires an astronomically impossible but curiously similar repeating of "copy errors" that keep progressing in the same direction.
Sologos, you are quite correct when you say that the claim of random chance mutations are very much testable and falsifiable by mathematical means. Look guys, evolution is an ongoing thing. It is profoundly simple to examine any evidence of evolution and see if there are quadrillions of messy, asymmettical, pointless, incongrous blobs for every one amazing functional lucky break. (as Darwin predicted) The evidence shows more the opposite. Accident versus Intelligence is very testable and very easy to discern who was right.
You just have to be open-minded enough to accept what the evidence is telling you.
With two threads dealing with religion and science, I'm curious if sciam has ever published any articles outing Carl Sagan's atheism, the lies of any Michael Moore's or Al Gore's films, or are these enlightened ones sciam heroes? Unfortunately, I suspect the latter. But to get to the point, science cannot disprove God, but God sure can explain science. When science becomes a religion, is when cracks start appearing in scientific validity, because after all, there is only one true God, the God and father of the Lord, Jesus Christ, Amen.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> We live in a
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> physical world, that God, in His infinite nature
> allows us to explore by natural methods whether we
> credit Him with it's existence or not. Never, will
> this naturalistic explanation, however, eliminate the
> Source, because methodological naturalism cannot
> cross from the finite natural world to the infinite
> supernatural Source that gives it existence.
We seem to agree, though perhaps we reach this conclusion in different ways. By definition, science cannot explain the supernatural. What then is ID, if it cannot be science?
Science cannot prove the validity of faith, but neither can it disprove it. Faith therefore must stand on its own merits, and from my perspective faith is doing just fine without efforts to repose it as science. That, however, that is another discussion.
Natedog: "If a scientist could either proof the theory of intelligent design or at least disprove the theory of evolution they would be famous."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs far as I'm concerned both of these challenges have been met and conclusively so.
You have a lot of faith in the ability for scientists challenging existing paradigms to be readily accepted. A little history lesson would correct you. Or try reading Thomas Kuhn, a critic of how the empowered who review papers for journals will reject anything that opposes the theories they have spent their lives advancing. It isn't just the church, but the majority of the scientific community who reject new and revolutionary theories.
This one is going to be even tougher than most, because mainstream academia sees this as a religious challenge, which it isn't. But make no mistake, the Darwinist regime WILL fall for all the right reasons - Because it hopelessly flawed and has been easily falsified.
Natedog: "Why is none of this happening? Because there is no evidence to support such a claim, absolutely NONE!"
Are you not paying attention or is this "selective" attention?
The evidence for Intelligent Design is pouring in from many directions and it is overwhelming, undeniable and conclusive.
I haven't seen "Expelled", but I probably will. However, I'm less than empressed with Scientific American's response, starting with the the title of the article. "Six things in Expelled that Ben Stein Doesn't Want You to Know . . ." isn't a rebuttal but an attack on Ben Stein's character. Is this an attempt to bias the readers before they read your article? Otherwise, why not: "Six Errors in Expelled". How about this for a title: "Six Things that Scientific American Wants You to Think"? See the difference?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe unedited Charles Darwin extract really isn't that sigificantly different from Stein's edited version. It simply makes it clear that Darwin believed that human beings tend to let their emotions get the best of them and act in ways that don't necessarily follow the natural order of things. To put it another way, human emotion causes humans to behave in ways that, in the long run, inhibit man's evolution. If that is what Stien essentially said in his movie, then you really don't have an issue here, and you're down to five things Ben Stein doesn't want you to know.
Why take issue with the obvious fact that some people interviewed didn't know the purpose of the movie? Would their answers have been different if they had known? Would they have refused to be interviewed? It appears to me that since they didn't know the purpose of the movie, they were more likely to answer honestly. Could it be that some of those interviewed regret saying what they actually thought? I think you're down to four things Stein doesn't want you to know, and if I were Stein I wouldn't mind at all if people know that certain individuals might have given quite a different answer if they had known the purpose of the interview. Ever heard of a hidden camera?
"Ben Stein's speech to a crowded auditorium in the film was a setup." A setup? You say that viewers "might think" that Ben Stein has been giving speeches on college campuses. . ." You're use of the words "might think" is an interesting choice of words. You're down to three things Ben Stein doesn't want you to know. There is no logical reason why Stein would care what you thought about his audience.
"Science does not reject religious or "design-based" explanations because of dogmatic atheism." I would suggest that those who are dogmatic about their atheism are predisposed to reject ID. It wouldn't be logical to suggest otherwise. People's actions are influenced by their beliefs. However, I'm not sure here what Stein would not want anyone to know here. If you believe, as I do, that the supernatural is outside the scope of science since it can't be tested, then scientists can neither confirm nor deny the supernatural. I think IDers would agree with that; their arguement is that the design of the universe requires a designer. So since design is testable, it really all boils down to which explanation is the most reasonable scientifically, natural forces or a designer. Unfortunately, that arguement has been badly distorted and has resulted in the allowance of only one possibility. Who really needs evidence if you're allowed to consider only one possibility. How about a criminal investigation where the police only allow for one suspect before they look at the evidence? That's not science; that's pure dogma.
You had a couple of other things Stein doesn't want you to know, but I'm tired of typing.
Ditches: "...I honestly loathe the stance that such efficiency can only be due to the influence of some outside being."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI don't think ID is settled on an "outside being" or even a "being" at all. It may be the primary consideration, but you used the word "only", so I would have to say that there are many IDists who see the intelligence as innate or instinctive or nothing more than intelligence itself. You will notice that I use the word "design" but not "designer". It may seem like a trivial distinction or no distinction because any verb needs a subject, but this may be an exception. I am open-minded on the nature of the causal force of intelligent design. In fact, I would sooner use the word "force" than "designer".
Ditches: "That has been the quintessential cop-out"
In what way is it a cop-out? If the question is accident or intent, why is one answer wrong by default because it is a "cop-out" while the other is "right" no matter what the evidence shows?
Are you one of those people who believes the scare tactic that admitting the intelligent nature of the properties of life somehow mandates that all science comes to a halt? Quick, hide the test tubes, right?
It's nothing like that. Accepting intelligent design opens up new avenues of study and closes the book on nothing except the "accident" excuse. If anything is a cop-out, it is deeming something an accident, even though it could not have been.
Even if what you say were true, and I highly disagree, isn't the more important consideration using the evidence to discern the truth? If the evidence shows ID (and it does) you won't get anywhere with a falsehood as a premise.
Ditches: "You could simply say that our knowledge of evolution is incomplete and that you believe evidence points to some unknown contributing factor(s) which help(s) to more efficiently guide evolution down advantageous paths."
I do say exactly that and I wish that was what we teach in school, because it is true.
Ditches: "Claiming that you KNOW this influence to be an intelligent designer, however, borders on lunacy."
Any attempt at explanation of our existence will at least border on lunacy because it defies explanation at this point. In scientific terms, nothing is "known" (proven), but yes, I do personally feel that some sort of intelligent involvement is beyond question at this point.
Can I ask if you are open to the possibility of intelligent design as a scientific study or are you excluding it as a "cop-out"? If you rule it out a priori, then it is you who needs to open your mind, not me.
Ditches: "Why must intelligence be involved here? Water flowing down a hill will follow the path of least resistance, as will the flow of electric charge."
Because in life water is flowing uphill. Matter animation in living things goes against the grain of any known motive force.
Could there be some other unintelligent force that we know nothing about? Perhaps, but we aren't going to find it by listening to Materialists pretending that matter isn't animating in living things in ways that are unlike non-living.
You alluded to electromagnetic force and gravity, but life's ability to animate MUST be studied as a fifth (or more) force(s) of nature. By Newtonian Laws, if something moves, there must be a REASON for the movement, a causal force.
Science ignores this basic fact at its own peril. Then the Materialists wonder why they keep banging into impossibilities. This leads me to another reason why I attribute evolution to intellgience and that is mathematics. Too much of the matter animation that keeps us alive does just the right thing at just the right time. I am too mathematically inclined to buy into the accident claim. The odds against life existing by luck is way beyond the realm of statistically impossible, even if we didn't already know that we have an intelligent consciousness.
I segue to the next reason I see this as an intelligent causation: We HAVE intelligence. We already know that intelligent thought leads to movement and formation of matter - in nerve formation, voluntary muscle flexing and chemical reactions to feelings show that our conscious and/or subconscious intelligence controls matter, not the other way around.
If intelligence itself isn't a sign of intelligence that what could possibly be?
Ditches: " Why, then, would you do so to the evolution of life, which, essentially, seeks out the least resistant path to survival/propagation?"
I do apply an unknown force to life, so please re-direct your very appropriate inquiry to people like Richard Dawkins and others who say Darwinistic accident explains everything?
I agree that life seeks the least resistent path to survival, but the question is HOW can it "seek" anything without intelligence or the will to live?
I may be two steps ahead of those who still claim that life is an ongoing series of indescribably incredible accidents, but if you are ready to discuss a life force, you are way ahead of the Materialists.
This life force is not 2-dimensional as the two natural forces you mentioned. It is 4 dimensional, using 3-D spacial placement and quite specific timing to accomplish its many tasks of survival. It seems to pick and choose according to a purpose. This is evidence, if not "proof", of intelligence.
Do you at least agree that the natural force causing animation in living things COULD have an intelligence?
Ditches: "As a note, arguing for ID from a probablistic standpoint is absolutely useless."
Are you serious? Why? If the most probable answer is that intelligence has a hand in life's functions and formation, why would this be "useless"? Even if it is "useless", and it is far from it, once again I must ask: Isn't the goal here to find the truth, not "usefulness"?
Ditches: "If you posit that life on Earth could only become this complex through the intervention of some superior being, then you are implying that such a being, which by necessity must be more complex, must also require a creator." (My term is "intelligence", not "being".)
What you call "by necessity" and "must also require" is not as certain as you claim it is. We don't know if the causal force is more complex or that it has a creator. We know that there is intelligence involved.
Again, the goal is to find the truth. If we find out that an intelligence IS at work in life formation and function, at least we have gotten that far. That it may bring up further questions does not refute the progress made by following the evidence. Some times you have to peel back layers of a mystery to get to answers you never dreamed of. Denying the evidence will get you precisely nowhere.
Any existentialist argument ends up at some point in a shrug, so I wonder if you apply this same standard to the Materialists.
Ditches: "While the odds against the evolution of life on Earth through unguided means to its current state might be very large, they are still finite, which makes them infinitely more likely than the existence of an indefinite chain of unfathomably intelligent beings." ("indefinite chain", "unfathomably" and "beings" are all your words, not mine.)
So, in your mind, the odds against there being an intelligence is "infinite"? There are essentially two schools of thought, neither one of which should be the default truth.
It isn't just "very large" odds against you. Unguided evolution is a series of steps that range from virtually impossible to statistically impossible and back, again and again, millions of times.
Statistically impossible is anything beyond 1 out of 10 to the 50th power. Virtually impossible means that we see no conceivable way that it could happen, which is not necessarily "finite" odds. Saying we don't know the answers "yet" doesn't mean you ever will and it doesn't make your assertions "infinitely more likely" than anything. It means that you are at a dead end of impossibility and in no position to claim superiority over anyone else's theory.
Ready to follow the evidence yet, or are you still using the "cop-out" cop-out?
Sologos:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI concede, you are right that it is possible to invalidate Darwinian mechanisms mathematically, provided all of the inputs and processes by which they occur are understood well enough. Your examples are interesting, and I am not familiar enough with the research done in the field to know whether these issues have been addressed (or if the science is at a point where they can be realistically addressed yet). Likewise I am sure that there are many ways to disprove the theory of evolution; if it couldn't be disproved then it would not be a scientific theory.
"Replacing a Designer by some other intelligence, simply pushes the question of the original source of the intelligence back further, rather that eliminate it."
That was my point. It is the same argument used against the "the universe must have been caused to exist by some pre-existing being [God]" argument. But that leads to the logical conclusion that "God must have been caused to exist by some pre-existing being," and so on. There is no logical escape from this: either something can exist without having been caused by something else (in which case there is no need to posit the existence of a creator of this world), or there must be an infinite number of creators, with no original.
"Darwinism will ultimately fail, not by religious opposition, but by sound scientific process, but it is certainly interesting that the opposition has been spurred by religious considerations, while an entire scientific community tows the party line of evolution."
This is why you are not a scientist (or at least not a very good one). No self-respecting scientist would ever claim that a theory [i]will[/i] fail (or succeed) without the necessary evidence already in front of him or her (and the skills and tools necessary to analyze it).
It is interesting, though, that the opposition to the Darwinian theory of evolution is spurred religious considerations, although this is not a new phenomenon. There are generally two sources of opposition to scientific theories: religion and science. Historically, religion does so because accepting certain theories would require a major reworking of prevailing religious thought (the Earth is the center of the universe, celestial bodies are perfectly spherical, and so on).
Scientific opposition tends to peter out as a theory amasses enormous amounts of supporting evidence. Einstein's theories of relativity and general relativity were highly controversial and divided the physics community, until they were used to explain behavior of cosmic rays, lensing due to the sun and the precession of Mercury's orbit, to name a few, with incredible accuracy.
It is not that the entire scientific community tows the party line of evolution; but rather it is that the entire scientific community has been convinced by the evidence that it is at the very least on the right track. If it were so easy to disprove evolution with the knowledge we have now, trust me it would have been done. There is no faster way to become a famous, eminent scientist than to prove a major accepted theory or notion wrong (in physics, some examples are Faraday, Planck, Rutherford, Einstein).
While many people have much invested in the theory of evolution, and scientists are as human as everybody else and thus subject to the same flaws, there are enough scientists who would set their egos and preconceptions aside if they encountered truly significant counter-evidence. Additionally, while a century or two ago it was easy to silence dissenting voices in any arena, with the advent of modern communication networks, doing so is now effectively impossible.
I will agree that dissenting in the scientific community can be dangerous. If a scientist tries to push dissenting theories that are pseudo-science at best and baseless at worst, then of course they will be ostracized by the community. From my understanding (based on my own limited research and discussions with friends and faculty in biological sciences), most dissenters from the theory of evolution are sensational - they make sweeping arguments based on little data and/or flawed analysis. This works to an extent, because it is extremely easy to convince people without the knowhow to determine the validity of something by citing lots of data and analysis, even if it is wrong.
"We live in a physical world, that God, in His infinite nature allows us to explore by natural methods whether we credit Him with it's existence or not. Never, will this naturalistic explanation, however, eliminate the Source, because methodological naturalism cannot cross from the finite natural world to the infinite supernatural Source that gives it existence."
You are right. If God, or an infinite supernatural Source truly exists, and is outside the scope of the natural universe, then our science will never account for it. This means that the existence of said being must be taken entirely on faith, unless it decided to make itself known to us in a manner that cannot possibly be accounted for by any other means. This has not happened or arguments over God's existence wouldn't occur. You (Sologos) and many others have concluded that God does exist, based on your personal experiences and reasons; many others have concluded that God does not exist, based on their person experiences and reasons. Yet others have concluded that God may or may not exist.
The point is, you cannot take God's existence for granted in science. If it cannot be disproved, and God's existence cannot be, then it cannot be a part of science. Any theory involving God is philosophy, not science, and while philosophy is a fascinating and diverse field of thought that has harbored some of the greatest minds of humanity, philosophical arguments have no place inside the laboratory. Even if Darwinian Evolution were disproved tomorrow, Intelligent Design would still have no place in the scientific arena. Science concerns itself with how things occur, not what supernatural force guides them, which is by definition outside the scope of the NATURAL sciences.
I want to stress that I am not saying that Intelligent Design is false. All I am saying is that it has no place in science because it is not a scientific theory. And while I believe the eminent scientists in the field that the theory of evolution has indeed survived the test of time and evidence, if they ever decide otherwise, then so will I. They are much more knowledgeable about the field than I and much more qualified to make conclusions based off of the data and are extremely intelligent individuals, so I don't believe they are just misguided. And I don't believe in conspiracy theories, so I don't accept that they are all dirty liars shoving a theory they know is wrong down our throats just to spite the religious.
Frank M:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"We follow the evidence more stringently than any Darwinist or Creationist ever did ..."
Forgive me if I don't take your word for it.
"We came from apes, but is it mathematically possible to pick up a new genome with a coherent set of over 100,000 base pairs of genetic information, a 21st amino acid chain and entirely new genes by random chance mutation?
In a word, no."
Again, forgive me if I don't take your word for it...
"Mathematically, it couldn't have happened gradually or suddenly. BTW, Gradual step-by-step is an even bigger loser than sudden leaps, but Darwin didn't realize that. Gradualism limits the births and requires an astronomically impossible but curiously similar repeating of "copy errors" that keep progressing in the same direction."
Again, forgive me if I don't take your word for it... I am in the field of physics, and based on that alone I now know that you are either parroting something you've been fed or making up your arguments as you go. I have had long and in-depth discussions with plenty of biophysicists to know that our knowledge of many microscopic biological processes is extremely lacking - to the point where no one in the field would ever say that a process as convoluted as evolution (gradual or not) is mathematically impossible. Using phrases like "loser" and "astronomically impossible" simply makes me even more wary. Excessive use of hyperbole tends to evoke doubt, not agreement.
I get the feeling that you know as little about biology as I and most other people in this board. Therefore, without any peer-reviewed sources to back up your claims I'm afraid your arguments mean little to nothing. I say peer reviewed because I do not have the ability to determine the veracity of an article on this topic myself, so it must be done for me by those who can.
"Look guys, evolution is an ongoing thing. It is profoundly simple to examine any evidence of evolution and see if there are quadrillions of messy, asymmettical, pointless, incongrous blobs for every one amazing functional lucky break. (as Darwin predicted) The evidence shows more the opposite. Accident versus Intelligence is very testable and very easy to discern who was right"
Biological evolution is significantly more than "is it a blob, or an new, functional limb?" On the timescales we can observe, most changes are things like slightly different protein structures, not something that really stands out at first glance. The only really effective way to observe evolution in realtime is by observing bacteria, with their short lifetimes. Again, I am no expert but my GUESS as to why we don't observe tons of disadvantageous or pointless mutations is because either they die with the bacterium (if it's disadvantageous enough it probably won't survive to reproduce), or if it's a harmless mutation it would probably just get washed out after generations. But a bacterium with a truly helpful mutation would reproduce more successfully, as would its offspring, and the mutation would spread fairly effectively. The experimenters don't look at the individual bacteria one at a time, that would be impossible. Instead they measure certain chemical, physical and behavioral properties of the sample as a whole and apply statistical analysis to reach their conclusions. Keep in mind this was just conjecture, but biological systems are the single most complex systems that humans have ever tried to study. Your oversimplifications would be out of place in most scientific problems, painfully so in this one.
"You just have to be open-minded enough to accept what the evidence is telling you."
I suggest you keep that in mind next time you read a journal article by an eminent scientist in the field.
nlaney:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"With two threads dealing with religion and science, I'm curious if sciam has ever published any articles outing Carl Sagan's atheism, the lies of any Michael Moore's or Al Gore's films, or are these enlightened ones sciam heroes? Unfortunately, I suspect the latter."
Why would Scientific American ever publish an article "outing" Carl Sagan's atheism? SciAm is not an inquisitorial tribunal, and being atheistic is not a crime nor a misconstruction of science. Additionally, while Carl Sagan is an atheist, he is not an atheist the way most people understand it. To quote him:
"The idea that God is an oversized white male with a flowing beard, who sits in the sky and tallies the fall of every sparrow is ludicrous. But if by 'God,' one means the set of physical laws that govern the universe, then clearly there is such a God. This God is emotionally unsatisfying... it does not make much sense to pray to the law of gravity."
In other words, Carl Sagan believes in Spinoza's God, Einstein's God, and the God of Stephen Hawking. Their God is the embodiment of the laws of the universe, the manifestation of the forces by which subatomic particles and galactic clusters interact. This is the set of beliefs that my own personal experiences and education have led me to.
Strictly speaking, and atheist is one who is not a theist, and a theist is someone who believes in the existence of one or more god that is the creator of the universe and intervenes in it and maintains personal relations with his creations.
I agree with you that there are enormous fallacies in Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth, and I don't know whether or not SciAm has published anything criticizing the film. If it hasn't, they should. However, none of Michael Moore's films really have anything to do with the subject matter at SciAm, as his films are social commentaries, not scientific ones.
"But to get to the point, science cannot disprove God, but God sure can explain science. When science becomes a religion, is when cracks start appearing in scientific validity, because after all, there is only one true God, the God and father of the Lord, Jesus Christ, Amen."
You are entirely right about everything, except possibly your final statement. Science cannot disprove God which is why no theory involving God can be construed as a scientific principle. God can explain science for those who believe in him because he is all-powerful and all-knowing. God explains nothing to those who don't believe in God. It frustrates me when religious people state that God is the answer, and that is the end. It is even worse when they they then encourage open-mindedness, because it's clear that they only want people to be open to their own opinions, and are not likely to reciprocate said openness.
EastwoodDC:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Science cannot prove the validity of faith, but neither can it disprove it. Faith therefore must stand on its own merits, and from my perspective faith is doing just fine without efforts to repose it as science. That, however, that is another discussion."
Couldn't have said it any better.
Frank M:
"Natedog: "If a scientist could either proof the theory of intelligent design or at least disprove the theory of evolution they would be famous."
As far as I'm concerned both of these challenges have been met and conclusively so."
Unfortunately, Frank M, you being convinced is not conclusive evidence that you are right.
"You have a lot of faith in the ability for scientists challenging existing paradigms to be readily accepted. A little history lesson would correct you. Or try reading Thomas Kuhn, a critic of how the empowered who review papers for journals will reject anything that opposes the theories they have spent their lives advancing. It isn't just the church, but the majority of the scientific community who reject new and revolutionary theories."
I have read and dissected Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions in a course on the history of science, physics in particular, and your argument is invalid. The biggest reason is that his book was written 46 years ago. You have no idea how different science journals are now than they were then. First, there was a small group of editors who would decide what got published and what didn't, and a paper that was not published was rarely ever seen by anyone again. Secondly, there was no internet, and collaboration and communication between scientists who were not geographically close was difficult (telephones are not adequate methods of communication for complex research topics).
Nowadays, the people who review submitted articles to journals is constantly in flux and there is an enormous number of them, not to mention that almost every journal in the world is now accessible to everyone (to read or submit to) via the internet. The chances that someone can find nowhere to publish their work are remote unless it is scientifically flawed. Additionally, there are plenty of resources to submit preprints online to be available to everyone (check ArXiv.org, for example) - these do not go through peer review at all and are still used fairly often. As I said in my previous post, with modern communication networks it is effectively impossible to silence anyone - they just won't get their sensationalism published in Nature.
Kuhn spoke not on the prejudices of scientists about a specific theory, but on how a phenomenon or entire field was thought about as a community. Additionally, you seem to be claiming that evolution is fraught with errors and is (or even has been) proven wrong without much effort at all. The reasons for opposition to paradigm-shifts are because they require a completely new method of thinking about a problem. For example, the paradigm shift brought about by Einstein, Lorentz and Poincaré in their formulations of relativity required the abolition of an absolute frame of reference and introduced the concept of mixing space and time. I am sorry, but going from evolution to Intelligent Design is not quite a paradigm shift.
"Natedog: "Why is none of this happening? Because there is no evidence to support such a claim, absolutely NONE!"
Are you not paying attention or is this "selective" attention?
The evidence for Intelligent Design is pouring in from many directions and it is overwhelming, undeniable and conclusive."
Apparently you haven't been paying attention, either. Just as much evidence has been coming in from both sides. The thing is, almost no one, including you, Frank M, has cited their sources or given much of any reason to believe the evidence being presented as fact.
You believe that some form of invisible intelligence is responsible for the evolution and diversification of life so strongly as to say that the evidence is "overwhelming, undeniable and conclusive." And yet the only evidence you've given us are a few rants about protein swapping and copy errors without a single citation. I think you're the one being unreasonable in expecting us to agree with you.
This is the difference between you and me: you believe that there is an invisible intelligence responsible for guiding the evolution and diversification of life. I believe that the forces of nature, in this case the electromagnetic force exclusively (because of the scale of biological systems), are responsible for it. My version is consistent with everything we know about chemistry, physics and the rest of the observable world. Your belief is consistent with faith in God as an intervening force in the world.
You (or somebody else, forgive me if I attribute this to you incorrectly) argued that ID does not require that God is the Designer. I disagree, at least based on your formulation of it. If the Designer were a part of our natural world (aliens, hyper-intelligent mice - extra points if you get the reference - you name it), then we would be able to find direct evidence of its tampering - i.e, we would be able to determine what exactly it did in order affect life. Instead ID proponents claim that the changes are simply too complex to have occurred without intelligent guidance, and if we can't actually determine what was done then the guidance must have come from outside our natural world, and thus must be some sort of supernatural being.
Pigeon states:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBut that leads to the logical conclusion that "God must have been caused to exist by some pre-existing being," and so on. There is no logical escape from this: either something can exist without having been caused by something else (in which case there is no need to posit the existence of a creator of this world), or there must be an infinite number of creators, with no original.
Please tell me why the following considerations should not be the endeavor of true science, except, of course by the limitation of it's current methodology.
The issue if causality is foundational to science. If we didn't believe that every effect must have a cause, the experimental method would be a futile endeavor. To say that the universe is infinite, then, would be tantamount to admitting the failure of the cause and effect paradigm upon which all scientific investigation rests. Out of nothing, nothing comes. Or as some have put it, why do we have something rather than nothing? Consider nothingness. No mass, no energy, no space, and no physical laws. Nothingness is physically "no thing".Hence the logical hypothesis(Science must always hypothesize, no?) of a Force that can create de novo. ie. out of nothing. (Are you beginnning to feel we have crossed out of science into something else? Then you may not be the true scientist!) What kind of Force must that be. First, of course, must be able to exist outside of the natural dimension, since we are beginning with "no thing" physical. (Now are we out of the field of science? If so, only because you have accepted that science is synonymous with naturalism, a definition it has fallen to only gradually in the last 400 years. It was not so, for example, for Copernicus, who never would have begun, if he was not convinced of an intelligent order to begin with) Secondly, It must be atemporal, outside of time, which of course must be the state of things in physical nothingness. Time has no existence, Albert showed us, outside of space. This state of atemporality, of course, eliminates His own causality, as causlity requires time. A causes B. B normally occurs after A(notwithstanding the artificial reversal of the arrow of time in certain quantum situations). Finally such a Being (can we agree to give Him a capital letter at this point yet?) , must have infinite knowledge and power, for if either was limited, how could He act out of atemporailty(eternity cannot be finite) and create de novo(nothingness is infinitely impossible to change iinto something). Any limit to His power and knowledge would eliminate His ability to effectuate time and something from(out of) His perspective of atemporality and nothingeness. He must, then, Himself be infinite.I call this Being God. Call it what you will, but acknowledge(from a logical perspective-science must proceed with logic) that He must have the above attributes.
Now comes the ultimate question science must grapple with, if it is ever to get past mere rules of thumb(which is all we got so far) and to what is really out there. If we really must acknowledge that we would have nothingness without such a One, but we cannot cross the great divide backwards to such a One, why are we so enthralled with our methodology as if it really does get us something more than a primitive amount of predictability? And why are we so arrogant (not you, Pigeon, all of us) as to think that naturalism can know it all.
Frank M:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"I don't think ID is settled on an "outside being" or even a "being" at all. It may be the primary consideration, but you used the word "only", so I would have to say that there are many IDists who see the intelligence as innate or instinctive or nothing more than intelligence itself. You will notice that I use the word "design" but not "designer". It may seem like a trivial distinction or no distinction because any verb needs a subject, but this may be an exception. I am open-minded on the nature of the causal force of intelligent design. In fact, I would sooner use the word "force" than "designer"."
I had not gotten this impression from your previous posts, and I think I mischaracterized your opinion in previous posts. I apologize for that, and indeed my impression of your opinion from the above quote is that it may even be in line with my own thoughts on the matter in many ways. Who woulda' thunk :-p
"Even if what you say were true, and I highly disagree, isn't the more important consideration using the evidence to discern the truth? If the evidence shows ID (and it does) you won't get anywhere with a falsehood as a premise."
You really need to stop this, though. The more you claim that evolution has been conclusively disproved and ID has pretty much been proven, the less likely anyone is to take you seriously - at least not until you provide adequate evidence for those statements. No offense but I'm going to take the words of hundreds or thousands of biologists who have spent their lives researching the subject and who actually have a sophisticated understanding of the science above yours. Yes, they might have something invested in it, but at the same time I have interacted closely with many scientists in many fields and, based on my impressions, most would accept the demise of evolution if they were presented convincing evidence.
"Ditches: "You could simply say that our knowledge of evolution is incomplete and that you believe evidence points to some unknown contributing factor(s) which help(s) to more efficiently guide evolution down advantageous paths."
I do say exactly that and I wish that was what we teach in school, because it is true."
I agree 100% there. Primary education is far too unequivocal in the majority of things it teaches. Few things are absolute and they should not be construed as such.
"Ditches: "Claiming that you KNOW this influence to be an intelligent designer, however, borders on lunacy."
Any attempt at explanation of our existence will at least border on lunacy because it defies explanation at this point. In scientific terms, nothing is "known" (proven), but yes, I do personally feel that some sort of intelligent involvement is beyond question at this point."
Here I agree with Ditches. You tell everyone else to keep an open mind, but you're the one throwing around all the absolutes. You 'know' evolution is wrong, you 'know' Intelligent Design is right. You'd find yourself in many fewer arguments if you accepted that you might be wrong, and that your words are just your fallible impression of the situation. Like I said before, it doesn't appear that any of us are experts in the field, so our impressions of evidence are probably not complete and might be downright wrong in some cases.
"Ditches: "Why must intelligence be involved here? Water flowing down a hill will follow the path of least resistance, as will the flow of electric charge."
Because in life water is flowing uphill. Matter animation in living things goes against the grain of any known motive force."
You're oversimplifying things again. Water flows downhill because it is energetically favorable to be closer to a gravitational source. Protons repel protons because protons create electromagnetic potential "hills", and the protons essentially roll down the hill (this is just a graphical way of explaining the electromagnetic interaction). Because electrons have negative charge, the hill created by a proton is inverted and becomes a hole, and the electron rolls towards the proton. Based on this principle, the only reason you don't fall through the ground is because something like a billion billion electrons on the surface of your foot are repelling with the electrons in the ground via the electromagnetic force. This is the same reason you can't walk through walls, and we feel the wind because of electromagnetic repulsion between the atomic electrons in the air and the skin on our face. Hemoglobin picks up oxygen from the lungs because Hemoglobin has an electromagnetic potential that is very attractive to oxygen but not much else (carbon monoxide is one of the few exceptions - hence why it suffocates people). Electric pulses in neurons are controlled by the concentrations of sodium and potassium ions inside and outside the atoms, which are regulated by extremely complicated transport proteins in the cell walls that have electromagnetic potentials that allow or prohibit the movement of the ions based on the concentrations inside and outside.
This is all fairly well understood, and is only a miniscule number of examples of complicated processes that we know to be controlled by electromagnetic interactions. On the surface it seems like the cells are behaving intelligently, like they are deciding when to do what - just like someone from a couple centuries ago would mistake modern computers for genuine intelligence. We all know that computers aren't really intelligent, they are just programmed to carry out certain functions under certain conditions, just like components of cells. We know an enormous number of cell functions to be controlled by electromagnetic potentials, which are not random but direct results of the structure of the molecules. Now, you might be right. Maybe there are some processes (there are still many we don't understand) that are guided by an actual intelligence, but so far we have no experimental or observational reason to come to that conclusion.
"Could there be some other unintelligent force that we know nothing about? Perhaps, but we aren't going to find it by listening to Materialists pretending that matter isn't animating in living things in ways that are unlike non-living.
You alluded to electromagnetic force and gravity, but life's ability to animate MUST be studied as a fifth (or more) force(s) of nature. By Newtonian Laws, if something moves, there must be a REASON for the movement, a causal force."
Now you're getting into tricky ground. This is a good example, we have been speaking about a topic that we really don't understand particularly well, and we have probably been making many gross simplifications. I'm sure the vast majority of people would take no issue with your statement here, but technically it's wrong. See? Things are usually more complicated than you might think.
First, if you enter the quantum mechanical realm then causality is not so set in stone, hence Einstein's famous dissenting quote that God doesn't play dice. At that level events are probabilistic, not completely causal. It is possible we're wrong and there is a fundamental theory below quantum mechanics that would expose this idea as wrong, but so far we have not found any evidence of it. Many bizarre things occur at such tiny scales - conservation of energy can even be violated for short (very very short) periods of time!
But, suggesting that intelligence itself is a force is a notion I've heard before but personally find unlikely. The interaction between particles due to the four forces of nature (electromagnetic, gravitational, nuclear weak and nuclear strong forces) are determined by the intrinsic properties of the particles as much as by the nature of the forces themselves. The forces are even transmitted by 'carrier' particles (the electromagnetic force is carried by photons, the weak force is carried by W and Z bosons, for example). For an 'intelligence force' to act intelligently, it would have to have some sort of consciousness to decide what to do with what particles in what situations. It would have to be infinitely dynamic and it would be essentially impossible to formulate any physical theory about it, from what I can see. If it were to coincide with how we think forces of nature wok, then the intelligence force would be moderated by some sort of intelligence particle. Even worse, why would this intelligence force act on life and not, say, a rock?
I think that, ultimately, an "intelligence force" would reduce to the direct intervention in the natural world of some supernatural consciousness, and would thus not be describable by science. I could be wrong - I would be fascinated and awed by such a force if it were discovered, and I would probably become a much more spiritual person than I am. If this were true, it would indeed be quite the paradigm shift!
"Science ignores this basic fact at its own peril. Then the Materialists wonder why they keep banging into impossibilities."
Science ignores many things, because at the moment it is not capable of dealing with them. No one has thought of a way to include intelligence or consciousness into our formulation of physics. If someone were to successfully achieve this it would be the ultimate paradigm shift. So far we have not proved ingenious enough. The sad fact is, we cannot account for things that we have almost no understanding of, and therefore we cannot begin to account for intelligence.
"This leads me to another reason why I attribute evolution to intellgience and that is mathematics. Too much of the matter animation that keeps us alive does just the right thing at just the right time. I am too mathematically inclined to buy into the accident claim. The odds against life existing by luck is way beyond the realm of statistically impossible, even if we didn't already know that we have an intelligent consciousness."
That's a flawed argument. We live in one universe (potentially of finitely or infinitely many!) of hundreds of billions of galaxies with trillions of stars each! Assume one planet per star and we get more than a trillion billion planets in this universe. That is an incomprehensibly large number, really. Can you say for sure that the conditions for life to arise by chance are much smaller than that? This is the anthropic principle: that we live in this universe because it supports life, on this planet because this is where (or among the places where) life arose. We aren't living on Mars because life didn't arise there. If the probability for something to occur is absolutely tiny, it can still be likely to occur eventually if given enough opportunities. This is philosophy again (and is also regarding abiogenesis, not evolution), but the point is that just because the chances for life to arise are small (we don't know exactly how small and in what conditions), it does not mean that, in aggregate, it isn't likely to occur. Someone gave the following example earlier: it is highly unlikely for any individual to win the lottery, but it is highly likely for [i]someone[/i] to win it (usually more than one person wins).
"I segue to the next reason I see this as an intelligent causation: We HAVE intelligence. We already know that intelligent thought leads to movement and formation of matter - in nerve formation, voluntary muscle flexing and chemical reactions to feelings show that our conscious and/or subconscious intelligence controls matter, not the other way around."
Many people believe that our intelligence and consciousness might just be comparable to a significantly more advanced version of the machine intelligence displayed by computers. We have shown, by the creation of computers, that inanimate matter is capable of responding in a pseudo-intelligent manner to inputs and environment. Human bodies are orders of magnitude more complicated than any computer we've designed, so who's to say our perceived intelligence is not merely a function of our design? I'm personally undecided on this matter, but for now I think this question must remain in the domain of philosophy. We need MUCH more advanced technology and a MUCH better understanding of biological systems before such a claim could realistically be investigated.
If that point of view turns out to be correct, though, then it might be that the chemical concentrations in and structure of our bodies (specifically in this case our nervous system), are precursors to thought. Ultimately, debates about the origins of intelligence is not a scientific one, at least at this time. It cannot be proven or disproved, and until the time when it can be it must be relegated to the domain of philosophy.
"I may be two steps ahead of those who still claim that life is an ongoing series of indescribably incredible accidents, but if you are ready to discuss a life force, you are way ahead of the Materialists."
I, and many others I would guess, are willing to discuss a life force, but not in the context of science. Again, in 200 years maybe, but for now it is beyond the scope of what our science can begin to explain and beyond the reach of our technology. We keep getting back to this point: what is and what isn't science. You have many fascinating ideas, but few of them belong in the scientific arena until we have the first clue how to deal with them. If you can come up with a framework to treat intelligence and a life force in a scientific context, you will probably become one of the most famous people in the world.
"Again, the goal is to find the truth. If we find out that an intelligence IS at work in life formation and function, at least we have gotten that far. That it may bring up further questions does not refute the progress made by following the evidence. Some times you have to peel back layers of a mystery to get to answers you never dreamed of. Denying the evidence will get you precisely nowhere."
Couldn't have said it any better, really.
"It isn't just "very large" odds against you. Unguided evolution is a series of steps that range from virtually impossible to statistically impossible and back, again and again, millions of times.
Statistically impossible is anything beyond 1 out of 10 to the 50th power. Virtually impossible means that we see no conceivable way that it could happen, which is not necessarily "finite" odds."
I have never seen these numbers before, and to be quite honest the entire process is not understood well enough and too complex for anyone to come up with meaningful odds. Unless you can point me to an extremely reputable source with those numbers I will, reasonably I think, write them off as sensationalism. I will agree that it is 'unlikely' step after step, but another thing you have to remember is that while the likelihood that life got to where it has now is extremely remote, I'm sure, there are countless (probably effectively infinite) ways how it could have turned out, each probably with an equally small probability of occurring. Thus, like in the anthropic principle, the reason why life is how it is out now is because this is where chance brought it.
If we could seed life in a laboratory, or on another planet with the same conditions as Earth, the chances that exactly the same life forms as have developed on Earth would develop there are probably nigh on 0. But the chance that some form of life, even intelligent life, developing might not be so small. The point is, we don't know. Proponents of evolution don't know, nor do its detractors; anyone in the field who says otherwise is either delusional or knows that the their arguments are vacuous.
Pigeon states:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt is not that the entire scientific community tows the party line of evolution; but rather it is that the entire scientific community has been convinced by the evidence that it is at the very least on the right track.
Experimental design is only the first part of disproving the theory. Funds are needed. How likely is one to get a research grant and a couple of grad students to assist or perform this experiment if one opposes evolution. I think that that might be the corollary of Expelled.
From my understanding (based on my own limited research and discussions with friends and faculty in biological sciences), most dissenters from the theory of evolution are sensational - they make sweeping arguments based on little data and/or flawed analysis. This works to an extent, because it is extremely easy to convince people without the knowhow to determine the validity of something by citing lots of data and analysis, even if it is wrong.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisActually, you can check it out for ourself. Experiments are being done every day. One can look at the data and determine whether the data bestfit evolution or creationism, regadless of the conclusions of the investigator. There is a website calle creation-evolution headlines that does just that sort of thing, reinterpret experimental data.from peer reviewed articles and scientific journals. Judge for yourself if all creationists are sensationa.
Sologos:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFirst, may I ask that you use shorter paragraphs and an extra line between them? I'm really enjoying this discussion, but it is hard to read giant "walls of text" it's often called :)
Now to get to the discussion:
"The issue if causality is foundational to science. If we didn't believe that every effect must have a cause, the experimental method would be a futile endeavor."
I will agree that, for the most part, causality is foundational to science. There are, however, some quantum mechanical phenomena that exist apart from it. For example, electron-positron pairs can spontaneously appear out of the vacuum by borrowing energy from the vacuum. They quickly annihilate and return the energy to the vacuum, unless something extreme happens like one gets sucked into a black hole and the other escapes. There is no causality here, merely probability.
"To say that the universe is infinite, then, would be tantamount to admitting the failure of the cause and effect paradigm upon which all scientific investigation rests."
That isn't necessarily true. If the Universe dates back to infinity in some form or another, one cannot necessarily say that causality is violated. Take any cycle; for example take a computer screen that turns from red to green and back again over and over. This could have theoretically been going on forever. Asking whether it started out being green or red simply becomes a meaningless question. In fact, almost all physical theories are time reversal invariant, and those that aren't are still semi-invariant (i won't expound on this because it would require pages of explanation). Thus, if the universe can exist for an eternity from a beginning, why can't it have existed for an eternity until now? One thing I've learned during my study of physics and mathematics is that common sense does not apply to infinity, and I am being wholeheartedly serious.
"Out of nothing, nothing comes. Or as some have put it, why do we have something rather than nothing? Consider nothingness. No mass, no energy, no space, and no physical laws. Nothingness is physically "no thing".Hence the logical hypothesis(Science must always hypothesize, no?) of a Force that can create de novo. ie. out of nothing."
Based on the assumption that there was quite literally 'nothing' (whatever that means - for example vacuum still has energy, is that nothing, or is vacuum something? :-p) then I agree - there would have to be some sort of prime mover. Although, if time itself hadn't yet begun, then time and everything else in the universe could have 'popped' into existence without even violating a single law of physics, not even energy conservation. Conservation of energy only has meaning when juxtaposed with time.
We are speculating here about that which we can by our fundamental nature have no experience with whatsoever, nor can we have make physical observations of it. Who is to say that other laws didn't exist to govern this "World of nothing"? What makes 'nothing' any less governable than 'something' if one can come from the other?
As you can see, when speculating about this we can come up with almost any bizarre situation that meets only a few constraints and no one will ever, at least in the foreseeable future, be able to prove us wrong, or even really say that one idea is better than another.
"(Are you beginnning to feel we have crossed out of science into something else? Then you may not be the true scientist!) ... (Now are we out of the field of science? If so, only because you have accepted that science is synonymous with naturalism, a definition it has fallen to only gradually in the last 400 years. It was not so, for example, for Copernicus, who never would have begun, if he was not convinced of an intelligent order to begin with) "
Well that's just a definition of science. The modern definition of science is the Natural Sciences. The reason the term has evolved was to differentiate the investigations of what can be verified via observation and experiment from those that are, essentially, purely intellectual exercises. Philosophy and the natural sciences have evolved immensely in the past 400 years, to the point where there was a natural distinction between the two. They attempt to solve different classes of problems. Even if Copernicus wouldn't have gotten started if science didn't mean what it did, that does not mean we should revert to its old meaning. Who knows, maybe an Isaac Newton would have come along a hundred years earlier instead? Such hypotheticals are not worth the time.
"What kind of Force must that be. First, of course, must be able to exist outside of the natural dimension, since we are beginning with "no thing" physical.... Secondly, It must be atemporal, outside of time, which of course must be the state of things in physical nothingness. Time has no existence, Albert showed us, outside of space."
I will give you this, although again this is pure speculation about a 'world' in which it isn't necessary for anything we believe we know to apply.
"This state of atemporality, of course, eliminates His own causality, as causlity requires time. A causes B. B normally occurs after A(notwithstanding the artificial reversal of the arrow of time in certain quantum situations). Finally such a Being (can we agree to give Him a capital letter at this point yet?) , must have infinite knowledge and power, for if either was limited, how could He act out of atemporailty(eternity cannot be finite) and create de novo(nothingness is infinitely impossible to change iinto something)."
I don't like this. First of all, if there is an infinite Being in a world of nothing then it would cease to be a world of nothing, unless this Being were also nothing. What does knowledge mean in a world of 'nothing?' If there is nothing to know then nothing can be known... Can concepts exist in a world that doesn't consist of anything, not even a vacuum, and thus no energy? Can a concept exist outside of a universe such as our own? And maybe nothingness isn't infinitely impossible to change into something. Your definition of nothingness is not anything we have any experience with. Maybe it has properties that allow it to become something. If we are going to suppose that there is an infinite Being that can cause nothing to be something, then we could just as easily suppose that the ability for nothing to become something is intrinsic to the nothing itself, and bypass the need for the Being.
"Call it what you will, but acknowledge(from a logical perspective-science must proceed with logic) that He must have the above attributes."
I can't do that with certainty. If we take all your assumptions about the properties of nothingness for granted and make a few leaps of faith then sure. But I, or you, or anybody, could create a different scenario following equally sound logic and arrive at different conclusions simply by making different assumptions. This is why it is philosophy and not natural sciences. We can argue until the end of the world, but we will never progress (if we assume our logic is perfect to begin with). Our different versions will be equally valid because they can never be verified nor disproved, no matter how fantastic.
"Now comes the ultimate question science must grapple with, if it is ever to get past mere rules of thumb(which is all we got so far) and to what is really out there. If we really must acknowledge that we would have nothingness without such a One, but we cannot cross the great divide backwards to such a One, why are we so enthralled with our methodology as if it really does get us something more than a primitive amount of predictability?"
Again the above is only really valid if you take certain assumptions for granted. Your description of a world of nothingness, for example. I am still caught up on the existence of a world of nothingness consisting of something infinite, and a Being with infinite knowledge in a world with nothing to know.
We are enthralled with our methodology because it is the best we have. Your argument is kind of like saying "Why were cavemen enthralled by fire if it didn't allow them to cook food evenly?" They hadn't invented the convection oven yet, fire was the best they had and they used it for what it was worth. Maybe our current methodology is the best we'll ever have, or maybe someone will come up with an ingenious way to improve it in the future. People will always focus on what we know now, because it is impossible to know what we will know tomorrow. It takes a very special person to get passed this and to concentrate on coming up with a brand new concept, one that is not merely expanding on something old.
"And why are we so arrogant (not you, Pigeon, all of us) as to think that naturalism can know it all."
I don't think many scientists believe that naturalism can know it all. I don't. As far as I know none of my professors or peers do, and most of the preeminent scientists of the past century certainly haven't. I wrote a fairly long post a couple pages back about it, actually.The point of the natural sciences is to model the world to whatever accuracy we want or need. Newton's laws are merely approximations at the scales relevant to everyday life. Relativity models the forces at large scales and high velocities, and quantum mechanics deals with the tiny. As far as we know none of these are perfect, but they are capable of predicting results to extremely good accuracy.
The only subfield in physics that I think anyone would dare to call exact is Quantum Electrodynamics, but I think most would balk at even that, even though every prediction of QED provides exact agreement (i.e, within experimental uncertainties) with corresponding observations and has predicted a vast number of bizarre phenomena that were then observed. Maybe it even is a perfect theory, but the fact is we will never know because we will never be able to measure to infinite precision or accuracy.
Sologos:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Experimental design is only the first part of disproving the theory. Funds are needed. How likely is one to get a research grant and a couple of grad students to assist or perform this experiment if one opposes evolution. I think that that might be the corollary of Expelled."
There is a fundamental flaw in this statement. Experiments involving evolution are carried out every day it seems. They do not need to be carried out by detractors of a theory to prove that the theory is wrong. Take the Michelson-Morley experiment as an example - it is often dubbed the most famous failed experiment of all time. It was designed to measure properties of the luminiferous aether, and instead provided powerful evidence that the aether in fact does not exist. Most theories are disproved not by experimenters trying to disprove it; they are disproved because experimenters design an experiment to observe a prediction of the theory and fail to see it (or see something else entirely).
That is one of the graces of science: intent does not affect the outcome of an experiment unless the experimenter intentionally changes the data or performs faulty data analysis to arrive at the desired conclusion. Very few scientists would dare do this, however, because their career would end if caught.
If the majority of the experiments designed to observe predictions of the theory of evolution are successful, it does not mean that people aren't trying hard enough to prove it wrong. It means that it is standing up to rigorous testing fairly well.
"Actually, you can check it out for ourself. Experiments are being done every day. One can look at the data and determine whether the data bestfit evolution or creationism, regadless of the conclusions of the investigator. There is a website calle creation-evolution headlines that does just that sort of thing, reinterpret experimental data.from peer reviewed articles and scientific journals. Judge for yourself if all creationists are sensationa."
I looked at that website but I didn't find any peer reviewed journal articles among its contents. I found plenty of media about research and some excerpts of what appeared to be actual scientific papers, though. Even if it did, however, it would not solve the problem I pointed out.
I mentioned that it is easy to convince people who are not familiar with data analysis, statistics and the scientific method that an erroneous conclusion is actually true by throwing data and poor analysis at them. Even if you give them the data and the methods used to analyze it, often other scientists from other fields, even, will not be able to or will have a very difficult time of catching those errors. We need people, other than the authors, who really know how to look at the data and draw meaningful conclusions to decide whether the analysis is valid and the conclusions logical. Some people will choose to believe that the peer reviewers will automatically reject the paper based on its conclusions rather than its analysis, but I don't believe in conspiracy theories and humbly disagree.
Nonetheless, by perusing the headlines about Intelligent Design on Creation-Evolution Headlines, I more or less confirmed my suspicions. The majority of the write-ups were full of logical fallacies and tongue-in-cheek insults. The most convincing argument against evolution that I found in the 15 minutes I spent looking was of the form, "This protein is really complex and they didn't say how it might have evolved!" Needless to say that isn't going to convince me of anything.
I am sure many proponents of Intelligent Design are reasonable people, but it appears to me that most represented by that website are not, and most of the evidence they expect to be taken seriously is just speculation.
I don't mean to pick on Sologos or anyone else, because I see a strong effort towards insightful discussion from all the recent participants (thank you!). However, to discuss the evidence for ID is simply to miss the point.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSologos wrote> "The evidence for Intelligent Design is pouring in from many directions and it is overwhelming, undeniable and conclusive."
No. There is [u]no evidence[/u] for intelligent design.
What we have is [u]data[/u]. An enormous amount of data. Wonderful data that appears to be incredibly unlikely. Some of it we understand, some of it we don't. Much if it describes a really amazing universe that we live in - a place so wonderful that it's simply intuitive that it was made to be this way.
[u]Data is not evidence[/u]. Evidence requires a framework for evaluation; a hypothesis - a statement which can be supported (or not) by data, and THEN the data becomes evidence for (or against) a theory.
Science is not capable of defining God (or any sort of supernatural designer). There is no evidence for ID because there is no hypothesis. While the supposed evidence for ID has great intuitive appeal and seems to confirm our faith, it is based on flawed reasoning.
Don't get me wrong - I am not saying that anyone's faith is flawed or that it is wrong to have beliefs - just that any attempt to validate faith through science is at best bad science, and at worst misguided faith.
I offer the following statement as both logically and intuitively correct: [i]We cannot show the existence of God (more generally the validity of the supernatural) through logic and reason.[/i]
We can argue the theory of evolution all day long (or longer) because there are hypotheses to consider and evidence to evaluate. We cannot have the same sort of discussion about ID because it has no basis in science. Many people on both sides of the issue fail to recognize this, and the result is the appearance of controversy where there is none. (This is perhaps a indication of the need for better science education, but that is also another discussion.)
There is a deeper controversy, that between faith and reason, and it has been going on a long time. In fact it has been going on far longer than the ID/evolution argument, which is just its latest appearance (remember Galileo).
True to the tone of Sciam's opening blog, it is extremely difficult to get most of these armchair "scientists" who believe in accidental formation of life to engage in discussion pertaining to evidence. Darwinists have been reduced to petty blustering and no substance whatsoever.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPigeon: "a hypothesis must be falsifiable to be the basis of a scientific theory.
Actually, no it doesn't, but it certainly is easy to test both guided and unguided evolution, so what is your excuse not to discuss the evidence again?
Pigeon: "A theory can never be proven, only validated beyond various degrees of doubt. They can, however, be disproved."
Darwinism has been soundly disproved. Can we move on now, or must we still keep teaching students that Darwinist evolution is supported by evidence as undisputed fact?
Pigeon: "The prediction of other effects is actually a cornerstone of a good scientific theory."
Cornerstone? Some scientific theories do not lend themselves to prediction and they are nonetheless a theory. Such is not the case at all, of course, with guided versus unguided evolution. Ready to drop the excuses and discuss the evidence yet?
Pigeon: "The theory of evolution is based on several complicated hypotheses and I don’t claim to be expert in the field."
Oh yeah, real complicated. Luck creates increased complexity. We are selected because we didn't die, therefore selection is the cause of life. Ignore all evidence.
That is the current Darwinian theory of evolution. Evolution by intelligent design actually FOLLOWS the evidence and makes sense.
Pigeon: "My understanding, however, is that these hypothesis can be used to predict certain things, some of which have been experimentally or observationally validated."
You couldn't be more wrong. Contemporary observations and experiments have left Darwin in the dustbin. Amazingly it seems as if nothing he predicted has happened. Bacterial evidence is anti-Darwin as is the fossil evidence, but cases of microevolution, such as with the Galapagos finches absolutely crush Darwinian theory.
Pigeon: "Similarly, there are many things that, if discovered, could disprove the theory of evolution, such as the sudden appearance of new species that did not ‘evolve’ from any other life-form."
Yes, but that would disprove common descent, which pre-dates Darwinism, and it would cause quite a re-shuffling of intelligent design theory, which includes common descent.
Pigeon, you have to understand the opposing theories before determining how to address them. Intelligent Design advocates common descent with intelligent modification.
The best way to prove whether evolution is guided or unguided is to examine modern day evidence to see if there are trillions of completely useless poorly formed physiological formations for any one just-right functional one. If it is the other way around, something is guiding evolution intelligently.
Pigeon: "Intelligent Design’s hypothesis states that because life is too complex to have evolved by random or semi-random chance, then an Intelligent Designer must be responsible for it.
(By "semi-random" are you using the "selection" card, or something else?)
Your definition is close, but a little off. First, it is incomplete because there are quite a few different ways to prove intelligent design, and they have all been effective. Second, we are proving design, not sure about "designer".
Thirdly, I would like to address the "too complex" point, because I keep hearing it here. Technically, you are correct, but you really don't need the modifier "too". Anything that could be considered both functional and complex indicates intelligence unless some unintelligent cause can be found. For example, despite all the molten metals heating and cooling under the earth's crust on a constant basis for billions of years, mathematically it could never have produced something as functional and "complex" as a hand-crank canopener in a few billion years. We do point out the most complex things to make a point, but even something as simple as your pinkie finger is irreducibly complex.
Pigeon: "Therefore, the evidence that must be provided is merely that life is too complex to have evolved by random or semi-random chance. I hope it is clear why this hypothesis does not fall under the same category as that of evolution."
It isn't clear at all. ID IS evolution, and either way it can be investigated and tested for validity or falsification.
Pigeon: "You are right that these processes are being controlled in some form, but your immediate jump to a Designer is vacuous."
Over three decades studying the life sciences is assumed as an "immediate" jump and "vacuous"? I can't help it if some of you are a step or three behind, still listening to the Darwinists. What is "vacuous" is to just make a claim with no attempt to support it with evidence.
Pigeon: "Instead it is a form of machine intelligence, specified by the cell’s and body’s DNA, RNA, and the chemical structure of their (and every other molecule’s) components."
DNA is indeed an intelligent agent of creation, but that hardly discounts intelligent design. Structures of molecules are also quite the amazing agent of life's functions, but in neither case have you reconciled the animation of RNA or other molecules and you have not really explained how these molecules happen to always be where needed when needed. "Powerful" may not be the best adjective. How about "well-engineered"?
Note: I did not say anything about "supernatural". I said "intelligence".
Pigeon: "We could get into an argument about how these complicated molecules arose in the first place, but that is a discussion of abiogenesis and is largely irrelevant to validity of the theory of evolution and ID."
Irrelevent? Just because you try to dodge the question? could not be more intrinsically connected as a central issue. For one thing, whatever the answer, it was going on when the first living thing came to life and it is going on now.
You couldn't argue it because you don't understand it. "Irrelevent" is just another excuse for you not providing factual evidence to back up your fairy tales.
Thank you for your advice. I will try to make my bites more readable.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI will agree that, for the most part, causality is foundational to science. There are, however, some quantum mechanical phenomena that exist apart from it. For example, electron-positron pairs can spontaneously appear out of the vacuum by borrowing energy from the vacuum. They quickly annihilate and return the energy to the vacuum, unless something extreme happens like one gets sucked into a black hole and the other escapes. There is no causality here, merely probability.
Science too often holds to a science of the gaps, but in this case there is no reason to speculate that the mysteries of the quantum world will ultimately yield to investigation, wierd as they may seem to our present world view. Quantum vacuums may not have mass but they do have space, energy and physical laws. Those are things that exist in the natural realm so apearances of mass temporary as they may be are not de novo creation.
Nothingness is the only likely state of nature, because it does not require a cause. In other words no state of nature is possible and nature is void of existence unless it is introduced. Cycles of contraction and expansion, quantum vacuums or changing states all are effects. Denying the need for cause has a chilling effect on all investigation.
>I would have to say that there are many IDists who see the intelligence as innate or instinctive or nothing more than intelligence itself. You will notice that I use the word "design" but not "designer". It may seem like a trivial distinction or no distinction because any verb needs a subject, but this may be an exception. I am open-minded on the nature of the causal force of intelligent design. In fact, I would sooner use the word "force" than "designer"."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSo do you believe that intelligence exists as a byproduct of life or as a catalyst required to create life in the first place?Or do you consider life and intelligence to be one and the same?
>In fact, I would sooner use the word "force" than "designer"."
Wouldn't a force suggest non-intelligent phenomena? I think the universe came into being (different discussion) before life occurred so certainly forces (energy) existed and could have acted as a catalyst for life.
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Edited by Natedog at 05/12/2008 3:27 PM
Frank M:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"True to the tone of Sciam's opening blog, it is extremely difficult to get most of these armchair "scientists" who believe in accidental formation of life to engage in discussion pertaining to evidence. Darwinists have been reduced to petty blustering and no substance whatsoever."
Ok, so now you're calling renowned scientists around the globe, of all (including no) religions, who have dedicated their entire lives to the study of natural phenomena armchair scientists? That is quite the claim! None of my discussions with actual biologists have reduced to petty blustering and no substance whatsoever. However, [i]your[/i] arguments have! You have made claim after claim and you have not backed a single one up! Not a one! To convince other people that you are right, you are going to have to do more than fling around hyperbole after hyperbole and repeat the same, vague criticisms about protein swapping and copy errors.
"Pigeon: "a hypothesis must be falsifiable to be the basis of a scientific theory.
Actually, no it doesn't, but it certainly is easy to test both guided and unguided evolution, so what is your excuse not to discuss the evidence again?"
Actually, yes it does. God is not a part of science because God is inherently outside of the scope of science. No scientific theory can ever require the existence of God (I am not talking about ID here, just in general). This is also why the Anthropic principle I mentioned above is considered philosophy and not science - it cannot be falsified. It is also why Superstring Theory is considered pseudo-science at best by a huge portion of the physics community - until our technology advances significantly, it is impossible to verify any aspect of string theory. We can conjecture all we want but if we can't prove it wrong by any possible means at this time, then it has no place in the scientific community unless it is abundantly clear that it is only meant as speculation for possible future topics of inquiry. (String theory actually does have some practical uses, though. For example it can provide a mathematical framework that makes solving real problems easier without affecting the results.)
It is easy to test guided and unguided theories of evolution? Fine - tell me how. Tell me a framework to test both of those theories, including the design of the experiment, how observations and measurements will be carried out, and what analysis you intend to perform. Also predict what different results that might be drawn from the analysis would conclude. I.E. what results would you need to find to conclude that unguided evolution is indeed wrong, and what results would conclude that guided evolution is wrong, and what results would be inconclusive. This is the bare minimum of what you would have to describe when applying for a research grant, so I don't think it's unreasonable.
If, as you say, this has already been done, then point me to it. Give me the names of the researchers, tell me where I can find all of this information as well as the actual results and analysis of their experiments. Also, if you're feeling ambitious, point me to the criticisms of their research (there is always criticism of research, even if it turns out to be correct). If you (or any research you point me to) can convince me that the analysis and conclusions of said research is valid and that the criticism of it is flawed, then I will be glad to change my mind.
I have not been discussing the evidence for a number of reasons. The first is that [i]neither[/i] of us has sufficient background in the matter to truly understand the nuances of the data nor the analysis used by either side of the isle. We can parrot what both sides say but we cannot individually vouch for the validity of our statements, other than by saying "this is what he said." My opinions are what they are because people I know and respect that do have the requisite knowledge and experience to verify the validity of other people's research have told me that based on all the evidence that they and their peers have seen, they think that the theory of evolution has merit. Not all opinions are equal. The thoughts of an evolutionary biologist on evolution are worth more than my own; just as my own thoughts on the theory of quantum mechanics are worth more than notions of a biologist.
If you wish to discuss the evidence, then I would demand that you provide the sources of your claims. If you do, I will do my best, given time constraints, to respond in kind. Anything short of that is just a waste of both our time.
"Pigeon: "The prediction of other effects is actually a cornerstone of a good scientific theory."
Cornerstone? Some scientific theories do not lend themselves to prediction and they are nonetheless a theory. Such is not the case at all, of course, with guided versus unguided evolution. Ready to drop the excuses and discuss the evidence yet?"
You are right, I didn't mean to be so unequivocal with that statement, but it is nevertheless usually true. In physics, if a theory cannot be used to predict other effects besides the ones it was originally meant to describe, then it is ultimately a failure. I would argue that this is true with most biological theories, as well. For example, if a theory is proposed to explain how the liver breaks down alcohol, it should also be able to predict a method to interrupt that process, maybe even speed it up.
I will point you specifically to this webpage: [url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution_as_theory_and_fact[/url]. It is wikipedia, though so take it with a grain of salt. The description of a scientific theory vs. fact is spot on, though, as is its discussion of the predictive power of a scientific theory.
"Pigeon: "The theory of evolution is based on several complicated hypotheses and I don’t claim to be expert in the field."
Oh yeah, real complicated. Luck creates increased complexity. We are selected because we didn't die, therefore selection is the cause of life. Ignore all evidence."
Sigh. Yes, mutation is a chance-driven phenomenon, but the theory of evolution does not just say "Hey look, all these completely random and unconnected events added up together to get us where we are!" Any single mutation is probabilistic, yes. However, according to, for example, source 24 in the wikipedia article I linked above (an article from a scientific journal) it is not merely a sequence of purely random events. Biologists predicted that the rate of accumulating changes in DNA sequences would be lower in critical sequences (their subsequently observed example being sequences that code for rRNA) than in less important sequences (example being sequences that code for fibrinopeptides).
As you can see, the formulation of evolution as a combination of Darwinian natural selection and Mendelian inheritance has made predictions of phenomena that should occur that were subsequently observed. I am sure I could find many more examples for you given time. Evolution is not some whackjob 'extremist' idea being propped up on fake arguments. It could still be wrong, but your characterization of it displays a lack of awareness or understanding of the nuances of the theory and its evidence.
Based on your explanation of evidence against Darwinian evolution/for Intelligent Design (you seem to equate the two even though one being wrong does not validate the other), it seems to me like your evidence is actually a [i]lack[/i] of evidence. A lack of evidence can indeed be devastating to a theory, but it must first be ascertained that the seeming lack of evidence is not due to some systematic neglect of observations and experimentation or other intervening factors. There could be reasons why some evidence that we predict should exist isn't being found. If there is indeed a dearth of evidence for key predictions of evolution, then it appears that the eminent scientists in the field have reason to believe that there is a possible reason for it other than the theory of evolution being outright wrong.
"That is the current Darwinian theory of evolution. Evolution by intelligent design actually FOLLOWS the evidence and makes sense."
A lack of evidence will only ever be evidence [i]against[/i] a theory, never [i]for[/i] it. If there is indeed a crucial lack of evidence for the theory of evolution and it is disproved, that lack of evidence cannot be used to validate Intelligent Design; it merely won't conflict with it. It would tell us that there is some force at work in biological systems that we apparently do not understand - maybe it's a fifth force of nature, maybe it's another aspect to a force we thought we understood but don't. To show that it is probably some form of intelligence, scientists would have to predict phenomena that should occur if the force is intelligence that should not occur for any other possible candidates. If those phenomena are then observed, then there will be strong evidence for Intelligent Design. Again, if this has been done then point me to the original research.
"Pigeon: "My understanding, however, is that these hypothesis can be used to predict certain things, some of which have been experimentally or observationally validated."
You couldn't be more wrong. Contemporary observations and experiments have left Darwin in the dustbin. Amazingly it seems as if nothing he predicted has happened. Bacterial evidence is anti-Darwin as is the fossil evidence, but cases of microevolution, such as with the Galapagos finches absolutely crush Darwinian theory."
I don't care where evidence leaves Darwin. Darwin formed his hypothesis 150 years ago, and the modern theory of evolution only includes certain elements of Darwin's original framework. Many of Darwin's ideas have indeed been proven wrong, but I really must emphasize that Darwin and the modern theory of evolution are not at all the same thing.
I have never seen bacterial evidence portrayed as "anti-Darwin" before - everything I have ever read or heard on the matter has lead me to conclude the opposite... I do not know much about fossils nor have I read much about it, though it appears to be the strongest case against evolution. However, your claim that microevolution crushes the theory of evolution is entirely flawed. Microevolution is considered to be the exact same process as macroevolution, just on smaller timescales. Again, if you can provide me with actual research on these matters I would be extremely interested in seeing it.
"The best way to prove whether evolution is guided or unguided is to examine modern day evidence to see if there are trillions of completely useless poorly formed physiological formations for any one just-right functional one."
No... The theory of evolution claims that such poorly formed physiological formations are not likely occur because they would either pose a disadvantage to the specimen or at best would have no effect. I went over this previously. Evolution argues that advantageous mutations are propagating throughout a species because the specimens that have it are more likely to be reproductively successful than others. If a mutation brings no advantage or a disadvantage, then the specimens with it would not reproduce any more successfully than the rest, and the mutation would be washed out. Additionally, a change in a species need not have been the only advantageous route that could have occurred; perhaps there were thousands of mutations that would have been just as or more advantageous, but they just didn't occur (this is a game of chance, after all).
However, depending on what you mean by physiological formations, we do see that. As cited above, species-wide changes in critical DNA sequences such as coding for rRNA are rare, but changes in relatively minor parts of DNA are extremely frequent. This is because if a critical sequence is altered, the critical process it is responsible for will likely fail and the specimen will probably not be successful and the mutation will not be passed on. But if a minor sequence is altered, the specimen can, in all likelihood, go on with its life with little to no affect and pass on its harmless, but not advantageous mutation.
'If it is the other way around, something is guiding evolution intelligently."
Unfortunately for your argument, the theory of evolution does not predict the trillions of malformed creatures. We do predict and observe trillions of minor mutations that do not greatly affect a specimen or species as a whole, but they tend not to manifest themselves as major physiological features (which would by their nature provide either an advantage or disadvantage). Therefore, by your logic, Darwinian evolution is correct.
Additionally, even if it were the other way around (and it is if you only consider macroscopic changes), that does not mean there is necessarily something guiding evolution intelligently. It would mean that our understanding of how evolution occurs if flawed, and it would provide some insight into how we might revise the theory.
That would be like saying there is a theory of gravity and a theory of 'new gravity'. Let's say that the theory of gravity argues that masses attract each other by bending spacetime such that the path that minimizes action (path of least resistance in layman's terms) is one in which the masses move towards each other (this is basic General Relativity). Now let's say that the theory of new gravity says that masses attract each other by interchanging particles called gravitons (this is, for example, how the electromagnetic interactions occur). If an experiment is conducted and concludes that masses do not bend spacetime, that does not mean that the gravitational attraction is due to interchanging gravitons. All that can be concluded is that masses do not attract each other by bending spacetime.
"First, it is incomplete because there are quite a few different ways to prove intelligent design, and they have all been effective."
Name the methods (you mentioned one of them above) and point me to the research that displays beyond a reasonable doubt their success.
"Second, we are proving design, not sure about "designer"."
If a thing is designed, then something designed it. That something is then the designer. Failure to admit that is a logical fallacy. The designer doesn't need to be God, but it sure has to be something.
"Anything that could be considered both functional and complex indicates intelligence unless some unintelligent cause can be found. For example, despite all the molten metals heating and cooling under the earth's crust on a constant basis for billions of years, mathematically it could never have produced something as functional and "complex" as a hand-crank canopener in a few billion years. We do point out the most complex things to make a point, but even something as simple as your pinkie finger is irreducibly complex."
What is your definition of complex? What is your definition of functional? A hand-crank can-opener can be used to open cans, or can be used to club people over the head. They were designed specifically to open cans, though. So your definition of functional appears to be something that was [u]intended[/u] for a specific purpose. However, I would argue that diamonds are complex. They not only require extreme conditions to form, but they have an amazing crystalline structure that we, as intelligent beings, have difficulty mimicking. Likewise, a diamond could be used to open a can. Diamonds are used as cutting tools by jewelers and manufacturers, but they were not designed.
The sun is incredibly complex. The nuclear processes that occur in the core are complex, the mechanisms by which the produced energy is transported to the surface of the sun are phenomenally complex. And we could argue that the sun has a function - it provides energy to the Earth's environment and sustains life.
The behavior of the oceans are immensely complex. If all the physicists in the world collaborated to solve the wave equation using the boundary conditions relevant to the ocean, we would probably get absolutely nowhere even using numerical approaches. But, somehow, the laws of nature don't run into that problem. The ocean goes on doing what it does in accordance with the laws of nature even if we don't have the ability to determine exactly what that behavior should be. And one could argue that the ocean's function is to support aquatic life, or to perpetuate the climate cycles.
The point is, we are surrounded by complexity and function, and life is the rule, not the exception. I will admit that this forum is the first time I've seen the term 'irreducibly complex' and the idea might have some merit. But I am loathe to accept that, even though the laws of nature manage to run the entire universe, from subatomic systems to oceans to galaxies and black holes, it cannot also account for a measly pinky finger. Again, I have not seen the evidence for this, but if you can provide it to me (in the manner I outlined earlier), I would grudgingly accept your position as the better one if it is actually convincing.
"Over three decades studying the life sciences is assumed as an "immediate" jump and "vacuous"? I can't help it if some of you are a step or three behind, still listening to the Darwinists. What is "vacuous" is to just make a claim with no attempt to support it with evidence."
You have not presented your argument as being based on 3 decades of evidence. You have presented your arguments as being true essentially be default and have failed to produce the slightest hint of verifiable evidence to back it up.
"DNA is indeed an intelligent agent of creation, but that hardly discounts intelligent design. Structures of molecules are also quite the amazing agent of life's functions, but in neither case have you reconciled the animation of RNA or other molecules and you have not really explained how these molecules happen to always be where needed when needed. "Powerful" may not be the best adjective. How about "well-engineered"?"
Molecules such as RNA do not just appear where they are needed. There are critical concentrations of molecules in each cell, and they carry out their functions statistically. For the sake of simplicity (and because I don't know actual numbers) I am going to make up a situation to express this:
Imagine four molecules, A, B, C and D. Let's say that if A and B molecules get within x distance of each other they will interact to form C (i.e, A + B -> C). Let's pretend that B is a harmful molecule, and that when A and B interact they form the harmless waste product C. Let's also say that normally A is only present in low concentrations, so that even if a lot of B molecules suddenly enter the cell, the A molecules can't destroy them efficiently. But, through another process analogous to this one, maybe the B molecules interact with a 4th molecule via B + D -> B + A. Now, it could be that D normally carries out some mundane task in the cell and is thus around in high quantities, but when it encounters a B molecule it becomes an A molecule. Therefore, if a cell becomes flooded with B molecules, reactions between D and B would lead to the construction of enough A molecules so that A and B interact frequently because of their high concentrations and thus high probability of encountering each other.
This is a made up example but is illustrative of what actually occurs within cells. Molecules such as RNA, proteins, enzymes, etc. get where they are "needed" by statistics. If the concentrations of two interacting molecules are low, the rate of interaction will be low. If their concentrations are high, then their rate of interaction will be high. The concentrations of most molecules in a cell are governed by complicated feedback loops. The interaction between the molecules are electromagnetic, and are fully understandable as such.
You are right that it is mind-boggling to think how such molecules and systems may have arisen, but it is also mind-boggling to think that both of us are bending the spacetime around us ever so slightly, that our bodies are being held together in the shapes we are via the electromagnetic force, and that all the particles in the ocean are acting together to form immensely complicated wave behavior, currents and tides as per electromagnetism and gravity. It used to be that all of those phenomena were though to be complex enough that the only explanation behind them must be some sort of intelligence. The forces of nature are capable of acting together and individually to form amazing, complicated and even bizarre phenomena.
When you see complexity and function, you see intelligence. When I see complexity and function, I see nature.
"Pigeon: "We could get into an argument about how these complicated molecules arose in the first place, but that is a discussion of abiogenesis and is largely irrelevant to validity of the theory of evolution and ID."
Irrelevent? Just because you try to dodge the question? could not be more intrinsically connected as a central issue. For one thing, whatever the answer, it was going on when the first living thing came to life and it is going on now."
You are right, it is not at all irrelevant to the discussion as those molecules were not always there and developed with life. Don't really know what I was thinking when I wrote that. :-p I don't know how they arose, nor does anybody, I think. But Einstein didn't know how space and time are related until he derived the relation. Our lack of knowledge is not grounds for the proof or disproval of a scientific theory. It is merely an incentive to continue looking into the phenomena of the world in which we live so that we might eventually figure them out.
"You couldn't argue it because you don't understand it. "Irrelevent" is just another excuse for you not providing factual evidence to back up your fairy tales."
You're right, I am not an expert in biology nor in biological evolution. I sincerely doubt you are, either. I'd like to comment that "my fairy tales" are actually the ideas formulated by thousands of brilliant individuals who have spent their lives studying the topic and defended by the evidence they have amassed that validate it. Scientists have little incentive to prop up a theory they know to be wrong. Historically, the funding for scientific endeavors dries up if little or no progress is made, and if an entire scientific community is going to knowingly promulgate a blatantly incorrect theory, progress is going to come to a halt and those same scientists are going to be out of a job.
--
Edited by Pigeon at 05/12/2008 4:36 PM
Sologos:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Science too often holds to a science of the gaps, but in this case there is no reason to speculate that the mysteries of the quantum world will ultimately yield to investigation, wierd as they may seem to our present world view. Quantum vacuums may not have mass but they do have space, energy and physical laws. Those are things that exist in the natural realm so apearances of mass temporary as they may be are not de novo creation."
I agree that it's possible, maybe even likely, that ultimately quantum mechanics will yield to a more fundamental theory, just like any other physical theory. Even if we never discover it, quantum mechanics is merely a model of the world, an approximation that is more than sufficient for most practical applications. However, it is still possible that quantum mechanics has got it right that the world is probabilistic. It is also important to note that causality still has a place in a probabilistic world; causality would determine the probabilities of the possible consequences of something that did happen.
Also, vacuums have mass if they have energy, there is no difference between the two (it may not appear that way from our points of view, but it is so at least at the quantum mechanical realm). Also, a clarification: vacuums occupy space, they do not have it. Space is not a property of matter or energy.
"Nothingness is the only likely state of nature, because it does not require a cause. In other words no state of nature is possible and nature is void of existence unless it is introduced. Cycles of contraction and expansion, quantum vacuums or changing states all are effects. Denying the need for cause has a chilling effect on all investigation."
In the absence of time, cause has no meaning. Therefore, using your definition of nothing one cannot say that nothingness requires no cause, because applying the notion of cause requires the existence of time. Cause and nothingness are intrinsically incompatible concepts. If the universe we know, including space and time and everything in it appeared within the nothingness, then how could the nothingness have 'existed'? It could not exist "before" the creation of the universe or "somewhere else", because the notions of "before" and "somewhere" cannot exist without space and time. Thus, if the world exists it would occupy the totality of the nothingness, in which case the nothingness would have to be equivalent to the universe.
Again, this is why it is philosophy and not science. We can make logical deductions about possible scenarios, but that is the end of the line.
Eastwood, you attributed the following quote to "sologos", but I was the one who wrote this: "The evidence for Intelligent Design is pouring in from many directions and it is overwhelming, undeniable and conclusive."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOddly, you took the exact opposite stance: "No. There is no evidence for intelligent design."
You do go on to explain that what we have is data, some of which may be hard to explain or understand. You say this is not evidence for ID. Let me ask a general question of you, Natedog and Pigeon, and anyone else who opposes ID:
In your opinion is there anything at all that could constitute evidence of intelligent design? For example, if we found a spacecraft on a distant planet, complete with fuel processing, aerodynamic design and climate control systems, would you find that evidence of intelligence or would you claim that it is a "cop-out" to explain it as such?
Eastwood: "Science is not capable of defining God (or any sort of supernatural designer)."
I can't speak for sologos if you were trying to respond to him, but I certainly never referenced God in the discussion. Whatever force is animating life in an intelligent manner is not supernatural. It is quite natural, and the effects of it are very much observable, testable and quantifiable. We may never put a "whodunnit" on the intelligent design, but we do know that it is intelligent.
Eastwood: "There is no evidence for ID because there is no hypothesis."
OK, you keep saying this. Haven't a couple of us addressed this rather completely after you said this last time? Did you just not like the answers? Please respond.
Eastwood: "Don't get me wrong - I am not saying that anyone's faith is flawed or that it is wrong to have beliefs - just that any attempt to validate faith through science is at best bad science, and at worst misguided faith."
Faith and science are polar opposites, but if the scientific realm confirms some of the beliefs of the faithful, so be it.
Let's say someone has a deeply held belief that there is no God of any kind, and they attempt to prove this through science. Is this "bad science" or "misguided faith"? Or, for that matter, let's say on some level they believe in God, but they feel that they MUST find an answer that only includes forces of nature that we already know about. Can you see how these biased pre-determinations also become flawed as bad science?
Or is it only those belief systems that are different than yours that you oppose regardless of evidence?
The Creationists start with the assumption that God did it all, and would not change their minds no matter what the evidence. Likewise, the Materialists will accept any "explanation", no matter how ridiculous, to "prove" that God DIDN'T have a hand in it.
Both approaches are biased and bound to failure. The only acceptable approach for science is to follow where the evidence is leading them, regardless if it fits their comfort zone. The only way to say there is "no evidence" of ID is if you refuse to accept any evidence that goes against accidentalism.
So I ask again: Is it possible for any evidence to lead to an acceptance of the theory of evolution by intelligent design?
I am just going to say two things in this post, because I keep getting two things thrown in my face that I never said:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI am NOT against evolution, as in common descent. I am opposed to Darwin's explanation of it and the entire concept that life is an extremely unlikely series of accidents.
I have not attributed life to God. I am neither for, nor against, the religious concepts of life's creation. I do not even use the word "designer" freely. Just because I say it couldn't have happened by accident doesn't automatically mean I am throwing God in the mix, or even any personified designer.
I hope that these two things are clear. I am an IDist, not a Creationist, and the two theories are completely different, regardless of how many Creationists call themselves IDists.
Pigeon, science has been struggling under the pre-supposition that we must explain life as an accidental mixing of random materials that just happen to animate, reproduce and think. Not all scientists buy into the Materialist bias, however, but those who do deserve ridicule because pre-determinations that ignore evidence are not scientific.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIntelligent Design is far more evidence based, but we will be fighting an uphill battle, at least for a while. As far as peer-reviewed journals, I will concede that ID will have fewer papers for citation, but that is true for any new viewpoint.
Pigeon: "Ok, so now you're calling renowned scientists around the globe, of all (including no) religions, who have dedicated their entire lives to the study of natural phenomena armchair scientists?"
I hardly went that far, but I will apologize for my tone in my response to you. The prevailing theories are horribly flawed, and some of the Darwinist thinking is so sophomoric that it is amazing that these people were able to get a college degree. I am not slamming Darwin, because there is a lot he could never have known, but modern day Darwinists ought to be ashamed.
Pigeon: "It is easy to test guided and unguided theories of evolution? Fine - tell me how."
As I have been saying, all we need do is look at ANY evidence of evolution, fossil or contemporary, and evaluate it to see if it fits mathematical probabilities for "random chance" or if it fits "guided" or "intelligent" genetic editing.
Mathematically, the two concepts are magnitudes of order apart from one another, and so should be profoundly simple to differentiate. Granted the mathematicians take center stage, moreso than the scientists, but so be it.
If random chance is in charge of the creating, then there should be quintillions upon quintillions of messy, asymmettrical, pointless, mixed, incontinuous and incoherent blobs for any one incredibly lucky functional formation that just happens to attach to just the right bone, chamber or tube.
If functional changes outnumber non-functional, it is time to accept that something other than random chance is our base point.
Yeah, I know the bogus excuse for never seeing these wierd mutations in fossil evidence is because of "selection", as if that really was adequate as an explanation. You still have to account for modern day evidence of evolution where "selection" can be monitored for effectiveness or even eliminated as a possibility.
We can also look at parental lineage better than we have, to look for evidence of parallel evolution. Any parallel evolution at all puts Darwinism strongly into question, but when we can witness it first hand under observation in the field, we really need to drop Darwinism like a bad date.
These tests have been going on regularly. That's not the problem. The trouble is that much of the public is as confused on the issues as you are. You seem to understand that I propose guided evolution, but then you quote scientists who speak on behalf of evolution, as if they are refuting me. You still think of me as religious. You just don't get it the question, let alone the answer.
Pigeon: "If, as you say, this has already been done, then point me to it."
I'm sure you are aware of much of it already. Virtually all evidence of evolution has shown intelligent guidance. The Galapagos finches are a classic case. The odds of them getting the correct size beak by random chance mutation would have to be a number written in a scientific notation that would fill this blog by itself. Yet they predictably get the genetic upgrades they need within ONE generation, as the need arises. The number of these modified beaks exceeds the possible hatches, so this genetic re-engineering has to have been parallel, not limited to parental lineage.
I won't even get into the predictability of intelligent genetic upgrades in bacterial experiments. Bacteria stay in stasis for millions of years, yet they get the genetic upgrades they need EXACTLY when they need it, under DIRECT observation in a petri dish, when anti-biotics are applied.
Pigeon: "I have not been discussing the evidence for a number of reasons. The first is that neither of us has sufficient background in the matter to truly understand the nuances of the data nor the analysis used by either side of the isle."
Speak for youself. My educational background is in Biology and I have been studying this subject since then for thirty years. I also have a background and education in Math, and the major flaws of Darwinism are mathematical. You need to talk to some mathematicians, Pigeon.
Pigeon: "The thoughts of an evolutionary biologist on evolution are worth more than my own"
Perhaps, but honestly, the education was flawed, because what they were taught is not correct. I can also tell you that the better Bio students became doctors and the rest teach Biology. Talk to a few medical doctors and try to get them to agree that life is "accidental". Still, you would gain more by talking to mathematicians, because that is where Darwin's worst flaws were.
Also, need I add that you keep referencing these experts views on "evolution", which I fuly support as well.
Pigeon: "Sigh. Yes, mutation is a chance-driven phenomenon"
No, that's just it. Evidence shows that genetic variations are NOT random chance.
Pigeon: "it seems to me like your evidence is actually a lack of evidence."
Much of ID theory is as an alternative to the failed Darwinian model, but evidence for ID is not exclusively negative, as I noted a few pages back.
Absence of evidence may not be evidence of absence, but it sure goes a long way toward disproving your theory and supporting mine.
Pigeon, there are very few scientists who would attribute the cooperation of molecules in living things as exclusively electromagnetism, or even any electromagnetism at all. It would be more true to say that the life force is stronger than electromagnetism, because it defies it.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhen you think thoughts, you create a chemoelectric data transmission. This electrical activity is held in check in electrolytic "capacitance" until the exact moment when you need it for thinking that thought (or moving a muscle, etc.). This can in no way be attributed to standard 2-dimensional electromagnetism pulling positive and negative poles together and repelling same poles.
You say: "Electric pulses in neurons are controlled by the concentrations of sodium and potassium ions inside and outside the atoms, which are regulated by extremely complicated transport proteins in the cell walls that have electromagnetic potentials that allow or prohibit the movement of the ions based on the concentrations inside and outside."
You are getting yourself confused here, although much of what you are saying here is true. The electric pulses are not "controlled" by the ions. The ions provide electrons, but potassium has no intelligence and can not discern when to release electrons and when to retain them. Nor can sodium be so finely tuned to the precise thoughts of an individual at any given time.
Reading your explanation, I had to wonder at what point the THOUGHT comes in. I recommend reading up on recent neuroscience findings that confirm that thoughts form neuron shape and chemical and electrical impulses. See work by Abel and Kandel or Squire, some of the best neuroscientists on the planet.
If thoughts formed by way of sodium presence alone, we would be raving madmen unable to form any coherent thoughts. Moreover, experiments on paramecium have shown that single celled creatures can learn and think, despite the absence of brains, neurons or any discernable electron flow. In addition, experiments with animal domestication by Discovery Channel has shown that learned thoughts can become non-genetic inherited behaviors. Intelligence precedes, and is independent of (but aided by), neural formation.
Your assertion that electromagnetism has anything to do with our inability to walk through walls is entirely false. I have only heard that theory presented once or twice, by some very poor reasoning. Living things are held together by collagens and fibrils and other connective tissues. This is well understood, although not well explained from a genetic information standpoint.
Pigeon: "On the surface it seems like the cells are behaving intelligently, like they are deciding when to do what"
Yes, it does, doesn't it? Very much so, in fact.
However when you go below the surface, it becomes even more convincing that thoughts are not just an extremely lucky assemblage of chemicals, electricity and curiously re-forming cell walls.
Yeesh.
Frank: "life's ability to animate MUST be studied as a fifth (or more) force(s) of nature. By Newtonian Laws, if something moves, there must be a REASON for the movement, a causal force."
Pigeon: "Now you're getting into tricky ground."
It is only "tricky" because of the ignorance and intransigence of Materialists, who are loathe to even admit that matter moves in living things according to free will. I think, then my arm moves. I say my thoughts led to the movement. A Materialist says it is because of chemical reactions in my arm muscle, claiming the thoughts had nothing to do with it. Or even that I had no free will choice to make the thoughts.
Pigeon: "First, if you enter the quantum mechanical realm then causality is not so set in stone, hence Einstein's famous dissenting quote that God doesn't play dice. At that level events are probabilistic, not completely causal."
Anything that moves must have a CAUSE for the movement, no matter how you try to talk your way around addressing the issue. Einstein believed that there had to have been an intelligent designer. This was a scientific revelation, not a religious one.
Pigeon: "For an 'intelligence force' to act intelligently, it would have to have some sort of consciousness to decide what to do with what particles in what situations."
OK, that may be so. It certainly seems as if our own intelligence and consciousness are either intertwined or one and the same. If you are trying to claim that intelligence and/or consciousness don't exist, I will have to hold you to task for that. If we can not rely on our own self-observation to conclude the existence of consciousness or intelligence then we can not rely on any observation at all.
Virtually nothing is more self-evident. It is nearly as self-evident that our intelligence can animate our muscles.
Pigeon: "It would have to be infinitely dynamic"
Not so much. It would have to be 4 dimensionally dynamic, but it does appear limited (or self-limiting).
Pigeon: "and it would be essentially impossible to formulate any physical theory about it, from what I can see."
What?? So your assertion is that we shouldn't attempt to theorize or study life's animation ability because, from what YOU can see, we can't. Did I get that excuse right?
The excuses never end...
Pigeon: "If it were to coincide with how we think forces of nature wok, then the intelligence force would be moderated by some sort of intelligence particle."
Why on earth would there need to be a particle? Are you being serious or just trying to throw the kitchen sink at any attempt to study matter animation in life or life's formation?
Pigeon: "Even worse, why would this intelligence force act on life and not, say, a rock?"
Good question. Why doesn't your sodium make rocks think? There is plenty of sodium among rocks of the earth. Why doesn't your potassium ever move a rock? Not even once?
For that matter why don't dead things continue to have electrical activity in the brain? Why can't we mix this stuff in the lab and find the kind of selective electrical activity that you say happens accidentally when we think?
Why the life force works only in ways that perpetuate life and ignores anything that doesn't help life continue can only be explained by understanding that the life force is intelligent or is connected in some way to an intelligence.
But why do you use the term "even worse"? Was that "rock" question supposed to refute an intelligent life force? If anything, it further supports intelligent agency.
Pigeon: "an 'intelligence force' would reduce to the direct intervention in the natural world of some supernatural consciousness, and would thus not be describable by science."
When you run out of excuses to ignore scientific evidence, the usual fall-back is to label this matter movement "supernatural" and then say we "can't" study it.
Pigeon: "Science ignores many things, because at the moment it is not capable of dealing with them."
Great, Pigeon. I hadn't heard that excuse to ignore the scientific evidence yet.
Pigeon: "We live in one universe (potentially of finitely or infinitely many!) of hundreds of billions of galaxies with trillions of stars each! Assume one planet per star and we get more than a trillion billion planets in this universe."
Setting aside the "infinite universes" desperation ploy as the most ridiculous excuse to ignore the scientific evidence, let me assure you that a trillion billion is negligible in terms of the odds against accidental life formation. Moreover, those planets mean nothing once you start talking about evolution of life beyond the first common anscestor. Most mathematicians who have refuted abiogenesis have included all planets in the cosmos from all years since the Big Bang, as if they all could have supported life.
Pigeon: "Someone gave the following example earlier: it is highly unlikely for any individual to win the lottery, but it is highly likely for someone to win it"
This isn't the lottery. The lottery has an extremely high probability that someone will win. Accidental life formation falls well into statistically impossible at not just the beginning, but millions more times after that.
Pigeon: "We have shown, by the creation of computers, that inanimate matter is capable of responding in a pseudo-intelligent manner to inputs and environment."
Except that our own intelligence isn't "pseudo-intelligence" and the computer is programmed by an intelligent designer.
Pigeon: "Human bodies are orders of magnitude more complicated than any computer we've designed, so who's to say our perceived intelligence is not merely a function of our design?"
Our what? Did you say "design"?
"Let me ask a general question of you, Natedog and Pigeon, and anyone else who opposes ID:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIn your opinion is there anything at all that could constitute evidence of intelligent design? For example, if we found a spacecraft on a distant planet, complete with fuel processing, aerodynamic design and climate control systems, would you find that evidence of intelligence or would you claim that it is a "cop-out" to explain it as such?"
First, let me preface my answer by saying that I do not, strictly speaking, oppose Intelligent Design. I simply have not been convinced of its merits either as a scientific hypothesis or a valid theory. Look to the end of this post for my answer to whether or not anything can constitute evidence of intelligent design.
If we found a spacecraft on a distance planet (or anywhere, really) with all the attributes you mention, I would be confident in saying that it is extremely strong evidence for the existence of intelligence.
There are major differences between life and the spaceship, though. The first is that a spaceship is very clearly intended for a certain purpose. To me, this obvious intent is greater evidence of intelligence than just its existence itself. It is difficult for me to see any intention behind the existence of life (that does not mean it's not there, but so far humanity has not been able to come to an agreement on what it might be, if it exists at all).
The second is that for a spaceship to have formed unguided by intelligence, a single object, for lack of a better word, would have to be continuously molded and changed over time. There would be no environmental stimuli that would specifically lead to the creation of a spaceship, nothing to encourage certain developments over others. The proposed method for the diversification and 'complexification' of life is significantly more elegant: evolution, the combination of Darwinian natural selection and Mendelian inheritance. Random changes occur and are passed on from generation to generation unless they pose some sort of disadvantage, and become widespread only (usually) if they pose an advantage. In this way certain developments are discarded and other developments are encouraged by environmental stimuli.
In the spaceship case, if a change occurs that is a step away from the final product, the change must be unmade to finally reach its 'destination.' In life, the statistical majority of changes that catch on are selected in large part by the environment. Disadvantageous changes die with the specimen or handful of specimen that carry it.
"Whatever force is animating life in an intelligent manner is not supernatural. It is quite natural, and the effects of it are very much observable, testable and quantifiable. We may never put a "whodunnit" on the intelligent design, but we do know that it is intelligent."
Stop saying that. You say "we" like the whole world agrees with you. I, for one, don't know if there is an intelligence behind the evolution of life. Thousands of researchers with an actual background in science who have dedicated their lives to this specific problem are similarly unconvinced of your claims. For you to write off [i]completely[/i] the opinions of so many qualified individuals of all backgrounds strikes me as incredibly arrogant. Why, exactly, is your opinion more valid than theirs? They have looked at the same evidence as you have, with much more knowledge and experience, and have come to a different conclusion. Why is your conclusion any more valid than theirs?
At least they (most, anyway) have the sense to not say unequivocally that Intelligent Design is wrong. Instead they say that they believe that evolution is a sufficient explanation, and that it is likely that the gaps in their understanding of evolution can be understood in terms of natural processes with further research. You, with far less qualification, say "They're wrong. I'm right. End of story." The more unequivocal a person is in proposing a theory, the less inclined I am to believe them.
You need to open your mind in this discussion as much as anybody else (note that I am not saying that you are wrong). Too often does the voice of dissent believe that it alone is entitled to intolerance, while everyone else needs to be flexible in their beliefs.
You are the one who came into this debate with your mind already made up; your statements are hyperbole as often as not, and your acceptance of Intelligent Design and denunciation of Darwinian evolution have been consistently unequivocal. Admit that you might be wrong and people will be more likely to consider your arguments based on their merits, rather than marginalize them because it appears like they are coming from someone [i]devout[/i] in his belief.
"Both approaches are biased and bound to failure. The only acceptable approach for science is to follow where the evidence is leading them, regardless if it fits their comfort zone. "
A scientist who believes that what he is searching to prove is true can still be a scientist. Einstein believed that quantum mechanics was inherently flawed because of its probabilistic nature and proceeded to spend the second half of his life trying to disprove it. He failed, but his methods were purely scientific, and his challenges to the theory forced quantum mechanics to be constantly refined and improved. So long as the process is scientific, the beliefs of the scientist are irrelevant. Unfortunately, not all scientists are capable of separating the two.
"The only way to say there is "no evidence" of ID is if you refuse to accept any evidence that goes against accidentalism."
It depends what you mean by 'accidentalism'. If you mean any theory of evolution that is explained without introducing some form of intelligence, then yes, that is true. If there is evidence against all possible theories of evolution sans intelligence, then obviously that is evidence for intelligent evolution (as it is the only option remaining). However, if by 'accidentalism' you mean Darwinian evolution, then your statement is wrong. Intelligent Design would not be the only nor necessary alternative if Darwinian evolution were proved wrong, and so evidence against Darwinian evolution is not evidence for Intelligent Design.
"So I ask again: Is it possible for any evidence to lead to an acceptance of the theory of evolution by intelligent design?"
Yes and no. It is well known that the majority of proponents of Intelligent Design believe that the designer is supernatural, and in most cases God. No evidence will ever lead to an acceptance of that version of intelligent design because it is intrinsically unreachable by science.
Your version of intelligent design is different. You believe that there is a [i]natural[/i] source of intelligence responsible for guiding evolution. It is possible for evidence to lead to this theory of intelligent design. However, the evidence would have to be more than our continued inability to figure out how various mechanisms of evolution could occur unguided.
First, a potential source of this natural intelligence would have to be hypothesized, and separate evidence for its existence would have to be found. Next, Intelligent Design would then have to predict how this intelligence guides evolution, what properties it has, what rules it obeys and how it interacts with the other forces. And finally, these predictions would have to be experimentally verified. At this point it would become [i]the[/i] accepted theory of evolution.
As you can see, this is a tall order. This is why I have been saying that even your version of Intelligent Design does not belong in the realm of science, at least at this time. A scientific formulation of your version of Intelligent design cannot occur until someone comes up with a workable hypothesis of the actual source of intelligence and gathers valid evidence supporting it. If/once the latter occurs, then a theory of natural intelligent design will suddenly fall within the realm of science.
It is also important to note that causality still has a place in a probabilistic world; causality would determine the probabilities of the possible consequences of something that did happen.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI agree. that causality and probability are not mutually exclusive in the sense that you describe.. It may even be possible that there is a degree of randomness consistent with determinism. We cannot nor should we abandon logic either science or faith (yes theologians seek logically to understand the nature of faith by careful and logical analysis of what we believe to be the revelation of God).
Sometimes as in an experiment, one must simply acknowledge what is seen regardless of whether one understands it, hoping some later investigator might bring light. One is, of course, free to speculate, for what it's worth. It appears that both are present. My speculation, for what it's worth, is that it is like a sphere of randomness within a sphere or order, a bit like the way order in fluid dynamics can countenance the chaos of turbulence.On the other hand trying to understand the infiinite mind of God, he source of order (and deteminism in my understanding) with our rather priimitive
organs is always fraught with self centered. What appears to be opposites may simply need a more comprehensive synthesis.
Also, vacuums have mass if they have energy, there is no difference between the two (it may not appear that way from our points of view, but it is so at least at the quantum mechanical realm).
Thank you for that clarification. I knew that the two are potentially inter convertible, and I knew that all mass is energy, but is that the same as saying that energy is mass? Does the arrow in fat go both ways? Does that come about by wave/ particle duality? Fascinating stuff that quantum !
Also, a clarification: vacuums occupy space, they do not have it.
What is the relevance of this distinction?
Space is not a property of matter or energy.
I believe what I mean by space is 3 dimensional volume, which mass does possess, no?
"Nothingness is the only likely state of nature, because it does not require a cause. In other words no state of nature is possible and nature is void of existence unless it is introduced. Cycles of contraction and expansion, quantum vacuums or changing states all are effects. Denying the need for cause has a chilling effect on all investigation."
In the absence of time, cause has no meaning.
Perhaps a alternative way of expressing this is that in the absence of time, there can be no cause and effect.
Therefore, using your definition of nothing one cannot say that nothingness requires no cause, because applying the notion of cause requires the existence of time.
I mean to say that nothingness need not be brought into existence.
Cause and nothingness are intrinsically incompatible concepts. If the universe we know, including space and time and everything in it appeared within
not "within", that would be impossible.
the nothingness, then how could the nothingness have 'existed'?
To say nothingness existed is to assign it substance. Nothingness refers only to physical dimension not state. Spirit is different ontologically. One must speculate it's existence from a scientific perspective. Faith, however assures us in an entirely different, yet no less valid, way. Some call faith a faculty.
It could not exist "before" the creation of the universe or "somewhere else", because the notions of "before" and "somewhere" cannot exist without space and time.
It doesn't exist, except conceptually as a contrast to being. This is what makes a Creator necessary. Is this physics or metaphysics? I think both are part of reality, and this what science purports to show us. Some scientists are positivists.I believe Hawking calls himself one. If I understand his position correctly, he has more or less given up on ever discovering reality. Just describing some approximate laws are sufficient. It is no wonder naturalism holds such an attraction, one doesn't have to deal with God. Given our nature,that is convenient, wouldn't you say?
Thus, if the world exists it would occupy the totality of the nothingness,
You lost me. Maybe I'm fragmenting you a bit too much. In what sense does the world(?universe) occupy nothingness? Do you mean swallow up nothingness? If so, I think the waqy I wouldout it is thait replaces notingness.
in which case the nothingness would have to be equivalent to the universe.
Now you really lost me.
Again, this is why it is philosophy and not science. We can make logical deductions about possible scenarios, but that is the end of the line.
I think that science and philosophy must inform each other. 2 books God has given us to read. Both, as I see it speak of His mind. One is creation, the other is revelation. Both reflect who He is with different emphases requiring different faculties and different methodologies. Both are given by way of revelation of Himself. Nothing we find in one could possibly contradict the other because they arise from the same Mind. (If w see contradiction, we need to look a little more carefully.) They are meant to be read together. Faith confirms what the experimental method infers. Scientific discovery, what revelation indicates. Have you ever considered the unlikely existence of the state of Israel. Who would have ever thunk that oil would be discovered in the area 2500 years ago when Isaiah told us that it would be at the center of the world? How could he have known?
"I hardly went that far, but I will apologize for my tone in my response to you. The prevailing theories are horribly flawed, and some of the Darwinist thinking is so sophomoric that it is amazing that these people were able to get a college degree. I am not slamming Darwin, because there is a lot he could never have known, but modern day Darwinists ought to be ashamed."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI am almost personally offended by that, and not at all because of your tone in response to me - I consider myself hard to offend. However, I know many people in biology who I know to be intelligent, objective, and capable of thinking for themselves and questioning what they are taught. Several of them began as or still are physicists first, who then went into biology. Maybe the prevailing theories are horribly flawed, but I sincerely doubt the flaws are as straightforward as you make them out to be. It appears we will just have to agree to disagree about the magnitude of the flaws of Darwinian evolution.
"Pigeon: "It is easy to test guided and unguided theories of evolution? Fine - tell me how."
As I have been saying, all we need do is look at ANY evidence of evolution, fossil or contemporary, and evaluate it to see if it fits mathematical probabilities for "random chance" or if it fits "guided" or "intelligent" genetic editing.
Mathematically, the two concepts are magnitudes of order apart from one another, and so should be profoundly simple to differentiate. Granted the mathematicians take center stage, moreso than the scientists, but so be it."
I'm sorry, but no. I know for a fact that our understanding of biological systems is not remotely sufficient to predict the relevant probabilities in this problem. First, the framework that Darwinian evolution proposes for how individual mutations occur is still incomplete, there's the first stumbling block [read: brick wall]. Second, if any mathematician in the world could figure out how to turn environmental stimulus into a probability for selection, I would personally nominate him for the position of God. Estimating these probabilities may be an interesting exercise, but until we actually understand the processes in question they are just that: exercise.
"If random chance is in charge of the creating, then there should be quintillions upon quintillions of messy, asymmettrical, pointless, mixed, incontinuous and incoherent blobs for any one incredibly lucky functional formation that just happens to attach to just the right bone, chamber or tube."
You fail to understand that Darwinian evolution posits that no mutation or change would ever reach such a macroscopic, large-scale pointless/disadvantageous formation. We do observe countless pointless mutations, it's just that they never develop into a major physiological feature. I have explained this twice now, so I won't go into it again, but I urge you to look back and reread what I already wrote on the matter.
"Yeah, I know the bogus excuse for never seeing these wierd mutations in fossil evidence is because of "selection", as if that really was adequate as an explanation. You still have to account for modern day evidence of evolution where "selection" can be monitored for effectiveness or even eliminated as a possibility."
How is it a bogus excuse? Why is that an inadequate explanation? Please explain. It is a reasonable prediction based on the tenets of Darwinian evolution that happens to be observed in nature. I have never seen modern day evidence of evolution where selection has been eliminated as a possibility, could you point any out to me? I am honestly intensely curious and would like to be as informed as possible on this issue.
"We can also look at parental lineage better than we have, to look for evidence of parallel evolution. Any parallel evolution at all puts Darwinism strongly into question, but when we can witness it first hand under observation in the field, we really need to drop Darwinism like a bad date."
Parallel evolution would indeed pose a problem unless a separate, workable hypothesis could be formulated to account for it. For example, maybe there exist some species that are capable of detecting a handful environmental stimuli and developing differently depending on different chemical concentrations, etc. In other words, maybe some organisms or capable of developmental responses to environmental stimuli. This is wild speculation, obviously, but I would really like you to understand that proving an aspect of a theory wrong does not mean the entire theory is incorrect; sometimes it just means a revision or addendum is in order.
"You seem to understand that I propose guided evolution, but then you quote scientists who speak on behalf of evolution, as if they are refuting me. You still think of me as religious. You just don't get it the question, let alone the answer."
I quoted people who speak on behalf of unguided evolution, not evolution as a whole (I think, I've written so much lately it's hard to remember). There is quite a distinction. I do understand that you are not arguing for anything supernatural, and I believe I have been fairly consistent and keeping my arguments relevant to that (at least when responding to you).
"Virtually all evidence of evolution has shown intelligent guidance. The Galapagos finches are a classic case. The odds of them getting the correct size beak by random chance mutation would have to be a number written in a scientific notation that would fill this blog by itself. Yet they predictably get the genetic upgrades they need within ONE generation, as the need arises. The number of these modified beaks exceeds the possible hatches, so this genetic re-engineering has to have been parallel, not limited to parental lineage."
I was not aware that we have observed the Galapagos finches evolving different beak sizes in one generation. That does appear to be pretty strong evolution against Darwinian evolution, unless an explanation like the example I gave above might apply. It seems to me that evolutionary biologists should focus on this example and try to determine if there is any way that this development could occur within an unguided framework. Do you know if any research beyond mere observation of this has been done?
"Bacteria stay in stasis for millions of years, yet they get the genetic upgrades they need EXACTLY when they need it, under DIRECT observation in a petri dish, when anti-biotics are applied."
I have also never heard of bacteria evolving to become resistant to drugs immediately. Although, my understanding of bacteria is that they are fundamentally different in many ways than, for example, humans. For one, they are much more efficient at sharing genetic material because they can do so without having to reproduce. Also, I have read that bacteria can detect different food sources and swap out pieces of genetic information to be able to digest the different foods; I was under the impression that this process was understood, but I could be wrong and have no sources.
"Speak for youself. My educational background is in Biology and I have been studying this subject since then for thirty years."
My apologies, I just assumed you would have made your background in biology clear from the outset (maybe you did and I missed it). Nonetheless, [i]I[/i] do not have a background in the field, hence my reluctance to get nitty and gritty with the evidence.
"I also have a background and education in Math, and the major flaws of Darwinism are mathematical. You need to talk to some mathematicians, Pigeon."
I am in the field of theoretical high energy physics - advanced mathematics is part and parcel of my daily life. I also collaborate with 'pure' mathematicians on a daily basis. Even more, I have had long and comprehensive discussions with biophysicists, who are probably the most qualified people to analyze the mathematics of evolution, and not one has ever expressed concern about the mathematics behind evolution. In fact, most of them would probably laugh at anybody who tries to quantify the probabilities of guided vs. unguided evolution.
Research and analysis of cellular processes have been very qualitative. Biophysics is one of if not the newest emerging field in the sciences, and it is really the first major attempt to understand these systems at a quantitative, fundamental level (Personally I think that the amalgamation of the two disciplines is going to lead to great things). However, I think any biophysicist would tell you that quantifying the probabilities associated with such a huge theory like evolution, which involves countless mechanisms as well as unquantifiable effects of environmental stimuli, is an exercise in futility.
"Perhaps, but honestly, the education was flawed, because what they were taught is not correct. I can also tell you that the better Bio students became doctors and the rest teach Biology."
The biologists and biophysicists I know who are of a mind to accept evolution don't do so just because it's what they've been taught, but because they have seen the evidence for themselves, and are fully capable of drawing their own conclusions from it. Just like I don't believe Maxwell's Equations of electromagnetism just because someone wrote them down on a chalkboard, but because I have personally derived them from first principles and have seen experimental evidence validating them.
"Talk to a few medical doctors and try to get them to agree that life is "accidental". Still, you would gain more by talking to mathematicians, because that is where Darwin's worst flaws were."
There are 4 medical doctors in my family (close family, I see them several times a year at least), and all of them are inclined to accept Darwinian evolution. Two of them are even devoutly religious.
"No, that's just it. Evidence shows that genetic variations are NOT random chance."
So then what about the massive number of pointless changes in unimportant DNA sequences, which either control minor processes are don't appear to control anything at all ("junk DNA")? If these are not random mutations, then there must be some reason behind them, no? If there is an intelligence behind evolution, then what is the point of making pointless changes?
All other physical interactions act to minimize energy or maximize the entropy or what have you (in physics we use the phrase "minimize the action" to encompass all of the above, and "action" is precisely defined). It would appear that if this intelligence guiding evolution makes all sorts of pointless, unnecessary changes, that it does not abide by this same principle. Most physicists would be skeptical of any proposed force that does not abide by this, as the principle of minimization of action is one of the most successful there has ever been. So you see, even if Darwinian evolution were discarded, there are plenty of questions that need answering before guided evolution will be considered a reasonable alternative.
"Absence of evidence may not be evidence of absence, but it sure goes a long way toward disproving your theory and supporting mine."
If there is no explanation for the absence of evidence other than the failure of Darwinian evolution, then yes it goes a long way to disproving it. However, in a court of law it would be considered circumstantial evidence for guided evolution, and in science it wouldn't be taken for actual evidence at all, only as a reason to explore the theory more fully.
If you guys are going to quote each other can you please put a ">" at the beginning of the quoted paragraph? It makes the posts, especially the long ones at lot easier to follow.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this>"Let me ask a general question of you, Natedog and Pigeon, and anyone else who opposes ID:
>In your opinion is there anything at all that could constitute evidence of intelligent design? For example, if we found a spacecraft on a distant planet, complete with fuel processing, aerodynamic design and climate control systems, would you find that evidence of intelligence or would you claim that it is a "cop-out" to explain it as such?"
As I stated in an earlier post, as far as I am concerned intelligent aliens planting designer life forms on earth is the only scenario that I can think of that could scientifically support a theory of intelligent design (on this planet specifically).
However, that does not answer the question of how those aliens themselves came into being and does nothing to bolster religious claims.
>Experimental design is only the first part of disproving the theory. Funds are needed. How likely is one to get a research grant and a couple of grad students to assist or perform this experiment if one opposes evolution. I think that that might be the corollary of Expelled.
And how difficult do you think it is to do legitimate research into climate change in a country where the federal government makes a point of censoring results? Or performing important stem cell research when it is basically outlawed for purely religious reasons?
If you are looking for sympathy you will receive none from me. If you want to raise money to put towards the study of intelligent design be my guest. Sadly, you would probably receive far less opposition than infinitely more worthy causes.
Maybe you should look into what the producers of Expelled are doing with their profits. Certainly they of all people would be willing to fund ID research.
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Edited by Natedog at 05/13/2008 11:32 AM
To Frank M:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFrank M> Eastwood, you attributed the following quote to "sologos", but I was the one who wrote this: "The evidence for Intelligent Design is pouring in from many directions and it is overwhelming, undeniable and conclusive."
Apologies if I misattributed the quote. I quoted from a post by Sologos and assumed it was his (hers?). Natedog has already pointed out that careless quoting makes posts difficult to follow.
Frank M>Let me ask a general question of you, Natedog and Pigeon, and anyone else who opposes ID:
Frank M> In your opinion is there anything at all that could constitute evidence of intelligent design? For example, if we found a spacecraft on a distant planet, complete with fuel processing, aerodynamic design and climate control systems, would you find that evidence of intelligence or would you claim that it is a "cop-out" to explain it as such?
Is there anything that would constitute evidence for ID? Anything and everything (literally) could be evidence IF there were a valid hypothesis. No hypothesis – no evidence. State a hypothesis that does not reference the undefined or indefinable, and then data could then be evaluated as evidence, for or against.
(***Did I misunderstand your question? Finding a spaceship, or Jar Jar Binks, would be clear evidence in support of the hypothesis that "Aliens Exist". This would be a prerequisite for a hypothesis of "Alien Design", but not evidence that Jar Jar is our Creator. See the difference? I'll come back to this point tomorrow, time permitting.***)
Further, I say that Natedog and Pigeon are barking up the wrong tree too (sorry guys), because by arguing the details of the science they have presumed that claims of ID have a scientific basis, and they do not. This discussion isn’t about science – it about faith* and reason – which is why there is no agreement.
* Faith, alien designers, FSM, or whatever. Insert the generic undefined actor of your choice.
I would reverse the question and ask if (in your opinion) there is anything that could constitute evidence in favor of evolution? (Any aspect of it you like, I’m not picky).
>Eastwood: "Science is not capable of defining God (or any sort of supernatural designer)."
Frank M> I can't speak for sologos if you were trying to respond to him, but I certainly never referenced God in the discussion. Whatever force is animating life in an intelligent manner is not supernatural. It is quite natural, and the effects of it are very much observable, testable and quantifiable. We may never put a "whodunnit" on the intelligent design, but we do know that it is intelligent.
It was not my intent to pin any particular beliefs on you, but my point stands. An undefined “intelligence†is also not in the realm of science.
Frank M >Faith and science are polar opposites, but if the scientific realm confirms some of the beliefs of the faithful, so be it.
We are actually pretty close to agreement here (sort of). If science corresponds to your beliefs (or vice-versa) and gives you comfort, then more power to you. I feel rather that way myself. However, science cannot prove my beliefs, nor do I require bad science to justify my faith.
Faith and reason are not really opposites, at least not in the sense that one denies the other, or that the two must conflict. I think it might be better to say that each stands alone.
That’s all the time I have for today, and this seems a good place to stop. You wrote a lot more (some of it quite interesting), but I’ll have to defer that to another time.
> Frank M: Let's say someone has a deeply held belief that there is no God of any kind, and they attempt to prove this through science. Is this "bad science" or "misguided faith"?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt is most certainly bad science. It is also misguided faith in that they have faith that a tool (science) can answer a question when it has no means to do so.
>Or, for that matter, let's say on some level they believe in God, but they feel that they MUST find an answer that only includes forces of nature that we already know about.
If by the above statement you mean that they are attempting to find proof of god's existence using forces of nature than I would have to say that they are doomed to fail as god has no basis in nature.
>Can you see how these biased pre-determinations also become flawed as bad science?
I can see how trying to use science to answer non-scientific questions simply does not work and serves no useful purpose.
>Or is it only those belief systems that are different than yours that you oppose regardless of evidence?
I think that belief is only a beginning and evidence may change or at the very least cast doubt on that belief. As Pigeon has pointed out "intent does not affect the outcome of an experiment unless the experimenter intentionally changes the data or performs faulty data analysis to arrive at the desired conclusion."
Along that line of reasoning one would expect a scientific study to provide evidence which supports the nature of the object being studied. Whether we manage to interpret that data properly is another story.
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Edited by Natedog at 05/13/2008 3:28 PM
I reported this blog as ABUSE. This is not a theological and philosophical site.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis is a semi-science or common person science site injected into a higher mind science space, wherein some experts take the time to get down to our level.
The ranting to raise Gods or lower Gods is ABUSE.
From the numbers the discussion is quite popular. So is domestic violence. So is junk television. The lowest common denominator.
Your ideas have zero to do with science and you are intentionally trying to cause trouble, not raise knowledge.
At this point in the list of your citations or replies and counter replies you are redundant.
The whole issue has been discussed to wipping a horse to death.
Renduncy ad nogsium is a hallmak of theological degenerates.
I made the point though ABUSE REPORT to pull the plug on your rantings.
Someone needs to keep science magazines and blog sites free from the worst of the stuff which is no more than BLOG SPAM.
If GOD exists -- maybe you should find a new site on internet to discusses it.
You are BLOG SPAN. The moderators should in my opinion, pull your plug now.
This is probably a liberal and conservative issue on part of scientists as differenced from a liberal and conservative issue on part of theologians.
God or Gods bless you.
Now let us use the site for semi-science and science and even science fiction and no more degenerate theology.
Peace.
Peace.
There are great intellects in theology. Let them start a new blog.
Peace.
I just wanted to post that I have not forgotten nor run away from this discussion, I have just had a ton of work to do in the past couple days. Unless SAVE THE SCIENCE gets his/her way and this forum is locked or deleted, I will do my best to reply to some of the new posts tomorrow.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEastwood, that you refuse to accept the existence of any sort of "intelligence" under any circumstance, I can not very well carry on any discussion of value with you. I will only add that any such pre-drawn conclusion reduces the credibility of your overall opinion on the matter.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisCreationists will only accept a Biblical God as Creator and, not surprisingly, that is precisely what they see in the evidence. Materialists, and specifically any die-hard atheists, will refuse to accept any evidence showing their bias to be unfounded, and suprise! Their conclusion is that there is no intelligence!
Pigeon, you seem much more open-minded, although I do believe you exaggerate the unanimity of belief in unguided evolution among scientists and especially among mathematicians.
Pigeon> "First, let me preface my answer by saying that I do not, strictly speaking, oppose Intelligent Design. I simply have not been convinced of its merits either as a scientific hypothesis or a valid theory."
Fair enough. I do believe that anyone who has both an open mind and access to the evidence will embrace intelligent design eventually.
Pigeon> "It is difficult for me to see any intention behind the existence of life"
I think you mean life in general as opposed to any particular physiological form, so I would moderately agree, although I would respond that we do have a will to live. Why we have it is a valid question, but there is no doubt that we have a desire to be alive. Whether this means anything to counter your point I don't know.
Certainly specific microbiological functions and physical formations do show clear intention. More importantly, all unconscious matter movement in living things leads toward the clear intention of keeping living things alive.
Pigeon> "There would be no environmental stimuli that would specifically lead to the creation of a spaceship"
If by "environmental stimuli", you mean Darwin's "natural selection", there is nothing there to create anything. What "environmental stimuli" create life? I see no "creation" force at all. Natural selection is a subtractive filter only. It creates nothing, nor does it "encourage" anything from non-existence into existence. It can do nothing until after existence occurs, so it is not creative.
Pigeon> "Random changes occur and are passed on from generation to generation unless they pose some sort of disadvantage, and become widespread only (usually) if they pose an advantage."
Please provide evidence of "random" changes. Nearly all evidence shows changes that maintain form and function and, when needed, beneficial changes.
What are the odds of a change that proposes an advantage? What kind of advantaged change would you give as an example and how many bits of information would have to be in the correct configuration to place matter in a specific 3-dimensional space?
Pigeon> "Thousands" of researchers have "looked at the same evidence as you have, with much more knowledge and experience, and have come to a different conclusion."
Not so much. Although accidental evolution has an entrenched hold on academia, I do not agree that this is such a unanimous conclusion. There are certainly PhD's on both sides. Most only discuss evolution itself and don't even discuss guided versus unguided. Despite the fact that we teach accident theory as undisputed fact and despite the intransigence against ID, the concept of guided evolution still maintains widespread support, albeit a minority opinion.
I have to disagree with your assessment about mathematicians and their conclusions on the odds against accidental evolution. I have read dozens of mathematicians who have studied this issue at length, including Von Neuman, Peter Woit and Fred Hoyle and they agree with Einstein's assessment of intelligent design. An entire conference of mathematicians at the Wistar Academy of Biology and Physiology, met with a team of Darwinists eager to prove their theory. The result was a sound and universal rejection of the math of Darwinism by the mathematicians, although the Darwinists remained unmoved.
I also have some family and friends in medical and math fields. I would have to say their feelings counter your experiences.
Pigeon> "The more unequivocal a person is in proposing a theory, the less inclined I am to believe them."
I am unequivocal on the presence of intelligence in evolution and life's functions. This is not a close call and I have been studying it for far too long. I am not going to say I am not sure about it for anyone else's likelihood of belief. There are a lot of the details that are unclear or even wide open in my opinion, but there is not any possibility that life formed by luck. I should also contest your assertion that those who believe in Darwinism are more open-minded. That statement gave me a sad laugh to myself. I know far too well how ID is received in scientific circles. The hard part is just getting someone to listen at all.
But you are listening so I am happy to get more into the substance of the issue. I'll remain certain, but try not to mention it so much, if that helps. I will admit that I used to be quite the Darwinist, but the evidence was just too powerful for me to continue down that road any longer.
Pigeon> "A scientist who believes that what he is searching to prove is true can still be a scientist."
I agree, as long as they are willing to admit to weaknesses as well as strengths in their beliefs. It seems that you are an example of the right approach, and I am glad to hear that you do consider the study of ID to be a scientific persuit.
Pigeon> "However, if by 'accidentalism' you mean Darwinian evolution, then your statement is wrong."
Disagree. The "creative" force of Darwinism is accident. Whether the created being lives or dies is irrelevent to how it was created in the first place.
Pigeon> "Intelligent Design would not be the only nor necessary alternative if Darwinian evolution were proved wrong, and so evidence against Darwinian evolution is not evidence for Intelligent Design."
It isn't proof, but it DOES support ID. Could there be other non-Darwinistic, but also non-intelligent means of life being created? I won't rule that out, but we certainly have no other hypothesis out there. Saying "non-intelligent" would exclude any form of Creationism as well as ID. I will say that if we are looking at the two options: intentional formation versus accidental, there is no third option as the the combination of these two options is all-inclusive.
Pigeon> "It is well known that the majority of proponents of Intelligent Design believe that the designer is supernatural, and in most cases God."
Well, the vast majority of people on the planet believe in some type of God, and once you conclude that the evidence shows that something designed and created us, it is not unusual to go there.
Still, they are not a true IDist if they inject God into their scientific arguments or conclusions. ID as a science does not include God, and there are certainly some IDists who believe in non-God explanations.
I think the term "supernatural" is most often used by ID's opponents, not us. We see design as a scientific persuit that has detectable physical effects that can be studied. If God did, in fact, create life, then God is natural, or at least His effects are.
Pigeon> "No evidence will ever lead to an acceptance of that version of intelligent design because it is intrinsically unreachable by science."
That version is Creationism, not ID. Creationists will label themselves as IDists and argue our points, but they are not IDists by definition.
Pigeon> "It is possible for evidence to lead to this theory of intelligent design."
I agree and it appears to be doing just that. (Was that better than saying "crushing Darwinism"?)
Pigeon> "However, the evidence would have to be more than our continued inability to figure out how various mechanisms of evolution could occur unguided."
Agree to an extent, but there is a point where intelligently guided evolution becomes the likelier answer. Bear in mind that no theory will be considered "proven", but if a theory could not be unguided, then it is guided. However, you used the term "unable to figure out", which connotes uncertainty. I would say that there is a difference between just not knowing and determining statistical impossibility. The answers will come in as a sliding scale, not a finish line.
Pigeon> "First, a potential source of this natural intelligence would have to be hypothesized"
I disagree here if I understand you correctly. I have no problem with hypothesis, but in this particular field of inquiry, the "source" could be a sensitive and unprovable subject. I might not disagree if you hadn't used the innocent sounding word "first". Step one is to gather and present evidence for the intelligence, which can happen whether or not we ever figure out a source. Finding a source is an important question, but I wouldn't want it to be a distraction or a pre-requisite for further inquiry.
Please explain what you mean by "source". Is this a red herring?
Pigeon> "and separate evidence for its existence would have to be found."
No doubt here. This is not the part I am worried about.
Pigeon> "Next, Intelligent Design would then have to predict how this intelligence guides evolution"
How? Well, we know it animates matter, as no reproduction can take place without matter animation. And obviously it uses encoded information. Now, as to how it animates matter, that could be a tough nut to crack, but we do know that SOMETHING animates matter intelligently in living things.
ID can make predictions on further guided evolution. We predict physical changes that are functional, symettrical and in cohesive units. We can predict that while these changes happen, there will be no non-functional physical changes or very few.
Pigeon> "...what properties it has, what rules it obeys and how it interacts with the other forces."
Now you are getting into some exciting stuff. This is exactly what scientists need to be studying openly and freely.
Pigeon> "And finally, these predictions would have to be experimentally verified. At this point it would become the accepted theory of evolution."
Ah, my dream....
Pigeon> "This is why I have been saying that even your version of Intelligent Design does not belong in the realm of science, at least at this time."
I disagree. It is still a scientific persuit throughout all phases of the scientific method. We don't have to wait until it becomes so accepted that all other theories are discarded before ID is "in the realm of science". I agree that the theory of evolution by intelligent design is in its infancy, but it is indeed a scientific persuit.
Now if you mean that it is in the realm of what we teach in a science class, I wouldn't go that far either, but I do believe we need to show evidence against Darwinism, admit what we don't know and present evidence, whether it supports ID or not, without mentioning ID itself yet.
Pigeon, I will have to wait to respond to your other message. It is after 3 AM here. Good points.
>I reported this blog as ABUSE. This is not a theological and philosophical site.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWe are discussing intelligent design and whether ot not it can be examined scientifically. If you do not like the subject matter than by all means do not read it but we both know admin isn't going to lock this thread.
>Pigeon "Intelligent Design would not be the only nor necessary alternative if Darwinian evolution were proved wrong, and so evidence against Darwinian evolution is not evidence for Intelligent Design."
>Frank M "It isn't proof, but it DOES support ID. Could there be other non-Darwinistic, but also non-intelligent means of life being created? I won't rule that out, but we certainly have no other hypothesis out there. Saying "non-intelligent" would exclude any form of Creationism as well as ID. I will say that if we are looking at the two options: intentional formation versus accidental, there is no third option as the the combination of these two options is all-inclusive."
It appears that you are both looking at the same evidence but arriving at different conclusions. If I could be so bold: Pigeon appears to concede that intelligent design could be at work but that the evidence does not currently and likely (read: almost certainly) will never be able to support such a claim.
Frank M on the other hand appears to insist that the evidence not only supports intelligent design but in doing so disproves or at least casts doubt on chance or "accidental" evolution.
From my point of view Frank M is claiming to at least partially understand that which cannot possibly be understood given the information available to us while Pigeon maintains a healthy respect for the limits of science and its inability to conclusively answer such a question. In other words Frank M is making a leap of faith while Pigeon is not.
>we do have a will to live. Why we have it is a valid question, but there is no doubt that we have a desire to be alive
>Certainly specific microbiological functions and physical formations do show clear intention. More importantly, all unconscious matter movement in living things leads toward the clear intention of keeping living things alive.
Yes, but the desire to live only acts to maintain life, not create it in the first place. I think it is quite plausable that some of the first life forms may have lacked any form of survival instinct or unconscious intent and subsequently died off.
>If by "environmental stimuli", you mean Darwin's "natural selection", there is nothing there to create anything. What "environmental stimuli" create life? I see no "creation" force at all.
Doesn't that statement support the idea of chance? Only the supporters of ID are insisting on a willful creation force. Certainly forces (energies) exist in the universe and as long as the possibility existed those forces could have caused life to occur without the need for either intent or purpose.
I do not think the forces in the universe intented to make stars, planets, galaxies, etc but it happened. Certainly you can accept that orderly systems can arise from chaos.
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Edited by Natedog at 05/14/2008 10:20 AM
Natedog> I reported this blog as ABUSE. This is not a theological and philosophical site.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNatedog may have a point, but at least the discussion is polite.
Frank M> Eastwood, that you refuse to accept the existence of any sort of "intelligence" under any circumstance, I can not very well carry on any discussion of value with you. I will only add that any such pre-drawn conclusion reduces the credibility of your overall opinion on the matter.
You misunderstand, or maybe didn’t read very carefully. Science cannot prove the existence of a supernatural force, much less that that force is intelligent. That doesn’t mean I don’t believe in it (I do), merely that I recognize it is a matter of faith. We agree that faith and reason are fundamentally different, is it any surprise that we reach different conclusions?
Still disagree? Then define the intelligence in rigorous terms, define the mechanism for it’s function, form a hypothesis that does not reference the undefined (because science doesn’t deal with that), show that ID hypotheses fit the data better than those of evolution. Hint: Science does this in many small steps – ID want to do it all in one whack.
As for my credibility, I almost surely test more hypotheses than you do. Should we question yours?
Now that you have had three people address you question (at great length), how about playing fair and answering the other side of the same question:
Repeating: [i]I would reverse the question and ask you, and anyone else who shares your opinion, if there is anything that could constitute evidence in favor of evolution? [/i](Any aspect of it you like, I’m not picky.) Please respond.
Frank M> Creationists will only accept a Biblical God as Creator and, not surprisingly, that is precisely what they see in the evidence. Materialists, and specifically any die-hard atheists, will refuse to accept any evidence showing their bias to be unfounded, and suprise! Their conclusion is that there is no intelligence!
So which one are you? (I’m somewhere in the middle.)
Natedog> From my point of view Frank M is claiming to at least partially understand that which cannot possibly be understood given the information available to us while Pigeon maintains a healthy respect for the limits of science and its inability to conclusively answer such a question. In other words Frank M is making a leap of faith while Pigeon is not.
Bingo! :-)
Actually I was quoting and replying to SCIENCE SAVES EARTH. I certainly do not have any issue with this topic. If Scientific American does not want us to discuss such topics they should not bring them up in the first place.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAny paragraph starting with ">" and as a result written in purple (at least on my browser) is a quote.
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Edited by Natedog at 05/14/2008 12:56 PM
Question for Natedog: Thank you for the tip, I will put >'s in front of all quoted paragraphs from now on.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFrank M:
>"Pigeon, there are very few scientists who would attribute the cooperation of molecules in living things as exclusively electromagnetism, or even any electromagnetism at all. It would be more true to say that the life force is stronger than electromagnetism, because it defies it."
Maybe, maybe not. I am confident in saying, though, that very very many scientists, and even more physicists, believe that it is at the very least possible that electromagnetism exclusively is responsible for the interactions between molecules in living beings. Based on our current understanding and experience, there is no reason to believe that this is not the case other than because it is mind-boggling to think that something as 'simple' as electromagnetism can be responsible for such a complex system.
True, we haven't looked into every single molecule in every possible situation (impossible) and so we cannot say that we know how every molecule interacts with every other. However, we have successfully modeled the actions of countless proteins, enzymes, even DNA based purely on electromagnetic interactions. This is done by compiling the structure of the molecules in an interaction, inputting relevant parameters for the electromagnetic potentials, then simulating how the molecules would interact. This has been an amazingly successful field and, as far as I am aware, has never indicated that something other than electromagnetism must be at work. There have been cases in which simplifications to the model or other errors have caused problems, but nothing more.
This isn't to say that there isn't something else at work. However, we have never observed evidence on this molecular scale to indicate that there is.
>"When you think thoughts, you create a chemoelectric data transmission. This electrical activity is held in check in electrolytic "capacitance" until the exact moment when you need it for thinking that thought (or moving a muscle, etc.). This can in no way be attributed to standard 2-dimensional electromagnetism pulling positive and negative poles together and repelling same poles."
You grossly underestimate the potential complexity of electromagnetic systems. We can do the same thing with computers - capacitors are easy. The one gap in this is that we don't understand our own intelligence. If intelligence is indeed some new force of nature, then there must be some sort of interaction between intelligence and electromagnetism and this problem would be solved. Likewise, if our own intelligence is merely a more complicated form of that exhibited by computers, then what we perceive as intelligence is really based on chemical [electromagnetic] impulses. The fact is, we don't know this, either way, and until we have a framework to investigate this, it is mere speculation. All we know at this time is that we have never analyzed a biological system on the molecular scale and determined that electromagnetism is insufficient to explain the observed events.
>"You are getting yourself confused here, although much of what you are saying here is true. The electric pulses are not "controlled" by the ions. The ions provide electrons, but potassium has no intelligence and can not discern when to release electrons and when to retain them. Nor can sodium be so finely tuned to the precise thoughts of an individual at any given time."
No, you are actually confused about my meaning, or about the underlying physics of the situation. The concentrations of the ions do indeed control the electric pulses. A pulse is either sent or not based on the relative concentrations of sodium and potassium ions on each side of the cell wall. This does not require intelligence on the part of any aspect of the system. However, the concentrations of the ions are controlled automatically by transport protein structures that either allow or forbid movement of the ions through the cell wall based on their concentrations. The functional forms of the proteins change based on the relative concentrations of the ions (sodium/potassium ions bind to the protein, causing its 'shape' to change and perform a different function). This isn't intelligence, either - it's a feedback loop (based on electromagnetic interactions) that is so characteristic of most biological processes. Feedback loops are why studying biological systems are so difficult, because many feedback loops intersect and affect each other, creating an unimaginably convoluted system.
The interaction between these chemical processes, which as far as we can tell are well within our investigative ability to understand via physics/chemistry, and thought is another matter. It is a matter which cannot be resolved until we have some sort of understanding of what, exactly, thought and intelligence are. Neuroscience is a large field trying to do just that. Unfortunately, not even the best neuroscientists are at the point where they can say they know what intelligence is or where it comes from. Among my greatest dreams is for that to change sometime in my lifetime.
>"If thoughts formed by way of sodium presence alone, we would be raving madmen unable to form any coherent thoughts."
Ah but here you have a problem. You are assuming a hypothesis to be false in order to prove it false. If thought is a consequence of chemical processes, then your statement is nonsensical. The fact is we don't know what the source of our thoughts are, nor do we know enough to rule out some sort of chemical origin.
>"Moreover, experiments on paramecium have shown that single celled creatures can learn and think, despite the absence of brains, neurons or any discernable electron flow."
I leave those fascinating conundrums for people in the appropriate field to figure out. On the paramecium I have no ideas. I'd be interested to hear if there are any proposed theories of how this can occur. The lack of neural systems is not enough to convince me absolutely that a specimen would be incapable of learning; just because we think we (or some of us, anyway) are capable of learning because of our neural networks does not mean it is the only way for it to be possible.
>"In addition, experiments with animal domestication by Discovery Channel has shown that learned thoughts can become non-genetic inherited behaviors. Intelligence precedes, and is independent of (but aided by), neural formation."
Are there any other cases of observed non-genetic inheritable attributes? For some reason I was under the impression that there are non-genetic characteristics in humans that can be passed on as well, but I can't think of any and maybe it's just poor memory.
>"Your assertion that electromagnetism has anything to do with our inability to walk through walls is entirely false. I have only heard that theory presented once or twice, by some very poor reasoning. Living things are held together by collagens and fibrils and other connective tissues. This is well understood, although not well explained from a genetic information standpoint."
100% wrong. Electromagnetism has every reason to do with our inability to walk through walls. If you have only heard poor reasoning for it then no one has explained it well or you just did not understand the principles. Your "collagens and fibrils and other connective tissues" are made out of molecules which are made out of atoms. Atoms consist of a nucleus surrounded by electrons. Atoms consist of more than 99.999999% empty space. I refer you to this website http://www.phrenopolis.com/perspective/atom/ to get an idea of the scale of an atom. And I refer you to this website http://education.jlab.org/qa/atomicstructure_10.html for an explanation of how electromagnetism prevents us from passing through other matter. Let me know if you want to me to go into further detail and I would be glad to.
>"However when you go below the surface, it becomes even more convincing that thoughts are not just an extremely lucky assemblage of chemicals, electricity and curiously re-forming cell walls."
FYI, it is pretty well understood how cell walls reform. They are made out of phospholipid bilayers composed out of molecules that are electrostatically attracted to water on one end and repelled from it on the other. They form a spheroidal shell (the cell wall) because that is the lowest energy state - all the ends that are attracted to water face out of the cell towards the water, and the ends that are repelled by water face inwards, away from the water. I have a professor whose research is in this very topic.
Arguing that evolution is guided by some form of intelligence is one matter. Arguing that the chemical processes in biological systems are often guided by some force other than the electromagnetic is completely unsupported by direct evidence; so far it is entirely contradicted as we have never observed this.
>"It is only "tricky" because of the ignorance and intransigence of Materialists, who are loathe to even admit that matter moves in living things according to free will. I think, then my arm moves. I say my thoughts led to the movement. A Materialist says it is because of chemical reactions in my arm muscle, claiming the thoughts had nothing to do with it. Or even that I had no free will choice to make the thoughts."
You have a knack for gross oversimplification. Free will is not a scientific concept or principle. There is no framework with which to include free will in scientific investigations. It isn't that scientists (who you broadly label materialists) are loathe to admit that matter moves according to free will - but rather that we have no way in which to predict or consider how matter could move according to it, because we have no idea what it is! Let's take two examples:
First, let's assume free will is a concept above the natural laws of this universe (I know you are not assuming this). If that is the case, then it is inherently not a part of science, cannot be described by science, and so science cannot under any circumstances conclude whether it is or isn't true, or predict what it might imply.
Second, if we consider free will to be as much a part of the natural world as my desk, then before we can take it into scientific consideration we require a scientific framework with which to treat it. It isn't that no one has ever thought about this or no one ever tried to do it - the problem is that no one has the first clue how to go about doing it! Until and unless there is a major breakthrough, then, then free will cannot be a part of science.
You might see this as a major flaw, but I see it as a necessary annoyance. 100 years ago it would have been worthless and completely unscientific to consider what atomic nuclei are made of. Their theory concerning atoms, let alone nuclei, was extremely incomplete (almost nonexistent) - and it turned it to be downright wrong. Additionally, they would lack the technology to experimentally or observationally verify any of their claims for the next 60 years or so (not for lack of trying). Thus, not only would their theories likely be based off of an incorrect theory, but would be unverifiable for another lifetime. There is nothing wrong with thinking about it, and proposing it as a topic for future research, but any 'theories' at the time were speculation, not science.
>"Anything that moves must have a CAUSE for the movement, no matter how you try to talk your way around addressing the issue. Einstein believed that there had to have been an intelligent designer. This was a scientific revelation, not a religious one."
I point you to the decay of unstable (radioactive) nuclei, for Uranium-238. It has a half-life of 4.4 billion years. This means that every individual Uranium-238 nucleus has a 50% chance of decaying in any period of 4.4 billion years. If you look at one U-238 atom in isolation, with nothing else around it, it might decay in two seconds, or you might have to stick around for 50 billion years to watch it decay. It is a completely statistical process - it's called a half-life because if you start out with millions and millions of unstable nuclei, after every half-life you will have only half the number of unstable nuclei as you did before. However, once you reach a small number of nuclei (say 100, but probably even 1000 would be few enough) then this fails - that means that this is indeed a probabilistic event. This is because statistical processes have very clear trends if you can observe enough of the events; but if you can only look at a few events then the probabilistic nature shows through.
A clarification of Einstein's beliefs (for anyone not familiar): Einstein believed in a pantheistic 'God,' that he said can only be conceived through the "rationality or intelligibility of the world which lies behind all scientific work of a higher order." Essentially, "Einstein's God" is the embodiment of the natural laws of the universe, and this is the "intelligence" in Einstein's "Intelligent Design" (I put it in quotes because Einstein never called it that). Based on this my understanding is that Einstein believed that life, and everything else, is guided by the natural laws (not our theories of them, but the actual forces themselves). This appears to me to be subtly different than the version of Intelligent Design that you are proposing - your version is inherently incompatible with Darwinian evolution, but Einstein's appears to be completely compatible; it is merely a question of what the natural laws are.
>"If you are trying to claim that intelligence and/or consciousness don't exist, I will have to hold you to task for that."
No. I am claiming that intelligence need not be a new, mysterious force of nature. It could just as easily be a consequence of order created by the natural laws that we already know.
>"Pigeon: "It would have to be infinitely dynamic"
>Not so much. It would have to be 4 dimensionally dynamic, but it does appear limited (or self-limiting)."
That is not at all what I meant, but I don't think I can explain it without giving way too much background, so forget this point. I will, however, say this. It is currently thought that all four forces unite, or become a single force at high enough temperatures (really, really high temperatures, like 10^16 Kelvin). It has been experimentally observed that the electromagnetic and weak forces unite to form what is called the electroweak force. If that works for all the other forces, then would intelligence become indistinguishable from any of the other forces at high enough temperatures? (Obviously I don't expect an answer, but it's bizarre to think about...)
>"What?? So your assertion is that we shouldn't attempt to theorize or study life's animation ability because, from what YOU can see, we can't. Did I get that excuse right?"
Yeah, point taken. I guess I got carried away. I guess I should put it this way: I can wrap my head around electromagnetism, gravity and the strong and weak forces. They are based on very straightforward and simple principles. I can also wrap my head around these forces acting together or individually in order to create unimaginably complicated systems, even possibly what we call intelligence. However, I can't really wrap my head around the concept of intelligence as something fundamental. Therefore, I would not theorize about it, but I would encourage anyone else who has less trouble with the concept and an idea of how to proceed to go for it.
>"Why on earth would there need to be a particle? Are you being serious or just trying to throw the kitchen sink at any attempt to study matter animation in life or life's formation?"
Because that is how we believe the world works. Forces are moderated by carrier particles. Electromagnetism is moderated by photons, gravity is theorized to be moderated by gravitons (we are only just now getting to the point where we can try to observe them, see the LIGO experiment), the weak force is moderated by the W and Z bosons, and the strong force is moderated by gluons. The way we understand it, particles don't magically know where each other are and interact with each other; each particle creates a 'potential' field, or a field of these carrier particles. It is difficult to explain without trying to explain all of quantum field theory, but so far this principle has been validated in every relevant experiment.
So if you want to put intelligence on the same level as the other forces, then either we are completely wrong (possible), or there is a particle carrier of intelligence (possible, but apparently we agree that this seems silly).
>"Pigeon: "Even worse, why would this intelligence force act on life and not, say, a rock?"
>Good question. Why doesn't your sodium make rocks think? There is plenty of sodium among rocks of the earth. Why doesn't your potassium ever move a rock? Not even once?"
That is a completely flawed analogy. Potassium is not a force. A more apt question would be "Why doesn't electromagnetism act on neutrinos?" The answer is because neutrinos have no charge. There are clear rules as to what and how all the other forces act on all other matter. If intelligence is a force, then it should have analogous rules and constraints - but what makes any aspect of my body on a molecular or atomic level than a rock? Or the ocean? Or tree sap? Or the hydrogen gas between stars?
>"For that matter why don't dead things continue to have electrical activity in the brain? Why can't we mix this stuff in the lab and find the kind of selective electrical activity that you say happens accidentally when we think?"
Good question. The answer is that we don't know - again, there is a lot we don't know about biological systems. They are extremely complicated systems and it takes time to unravel them. Maybe the reason why dead things don't continue to have electrical activity is due to some chemical process that occurs during/afterwards, or maybe it's because intelligence leaves the tissue. So many of your questions that you have posed can't be answered by modern science because the phenomenon has not been studied sufficiently. Quantum mechanics is still an ongoing topic of research even though it has been around for a century in some form or another, and quantum mechanical systems pale in complexity in comparison to biological system.
No answer to a question that has not been sufficiently studied, or because of a lack of tools, is not at all the same as no question despite comprehensive study. This kills some of your arguments and strengthens others; before posing questions, think about which case it falls into, and if it falls into the former, think of something else.
>"Why the life force works only in ways that perpetuate life and ignores anything that doesn't help life continue can only be explained by understanding that the life force is intelligent or is connected in some way to an intelligence."
No... Darwinian evolution provides a perfectly acceptable alternative for this. Development of life ignores anything that doesn't perpetuate it because only those that do perpetuate it perpetuate it. It's a pretty straightforward logical statement. Now, we can argue about the evidence, but your theory is not the only possible explanation based on pure logic.
>"Pigeon: "Science ignores many things, because at the moment it is not capable of dealing with them."
>Great, Pigeon. I hadn't heard that excuse to ignore the scientific evidence yet."
The example I gave above about theories of the composition of atomic nuclei is what I meant by that. If there is no framework and no technology with which to consider a problem, then it cannot be dealt with by science until both of those obstacles are removed. Also, there is no such thing as scientific evidence for an unscientific idea. We see evidence for the existence of free will, but it isn't scientific because we have neither a scientific framework with which to study it, nor technology with which to experiment. If there is evidence that our current framework is insufficient to explain something, then it is incentive to revise the framework so it can. However, that evidence has to provide some ideas on how to go about revising the framework, otherwise all it does is tell us we're wrong and nothing else.
>"Setting aside the "infinite universes" desperation ploy as the most ridiculous excuse to ignore the scientific evidence, let me assure you that a trillion billion is negligible in terms of the odds against accidental life formation. Moreover, those planets mean nothing once you start talking about evolution of life beyond the first common anscestor. Most mathematicians who have refuted abiogenesis have included all planets in the cosmos from all years since the Big Bang, as if they all could have supported life."
To be honest, I don't see why the concept of infinite universes besides our own is any more bizarre than an embodiment of intelligence in the form of a force of nature. Anyways, I have never seen these numbers and I am still waiting for you to show me how they are derived. The Drake Equation is supposed to tell us the probability of extraterrestrial life, but some of the input parameters are completely arbitrary. The same could be true of these calculations. I'll withhold my judgement on this until you can find me an actual derivation of these numbers.
>"Pigeon: "We have shown, by the creation of computers, that inanimate matter is capable of responding in a pseudo-intelligent manner to inputs and environment."
>Except that our own intelligence isn't "pseudo-intelligence" and the computer is programmed by an intelligent designer."
The pseudo-intelligence displayed by computers might just be due to their relative simplicity. If, in 100 years we design a computer capable of similar intelligence as our own, will you still hold that a distinct, fundamental force of intelligence is required for intelligence to exist? It seems to me that if we can eventually create a computer capable of a similar intelligence as our own (it doesn't have to be a philosopher, if it can display the intelligence of a 3-year old that would be enough), then we will have proved that intelligence can be 'constructed' via artificial means using electromagnetic impulses - no intelligence force. Yes, intelligence may have designed it, but wouldn't perpetuate it, which seems to be half of your argument.
>"Pigeon: "Human bodies are orders of magnitude more complicated than any computer we've designed, so who's to say our perceived intelligence is not merely a function of our design?"
>Our what? Did you say "design"?"
Replace the word 'design' with the word 'structure' and then answer my question :-p
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Edited by Pigeon at 05/14/2008 4:01 PM
Sologos:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this>"Sometimes as in an experiment, one must simply acknowledge what is seen regardless of whether one understands it, hoping some later investigator might bring light. One is, of course, free to speculate, for what it's worth."
This is precisely the point I'm trying to get across the Frank M. I couldn't have said it any better.
>"Thank you for that clarification. I knew that the two are potentially inter convertible, and I knew that all mass is energy, but is that the same as saying that energy is mass? Does the arrow in fat go both ways? Does that come about by wave/ particle duality? Fascinating stuff that quantum !"
The arrow does in fact go both ways. For example, high energy theorists essentially do away with the notion of mass completely, and call it all energy.
>"Also, a clarification: vacuums occupy space, they do not have it.
What is the relevance of this distinction?"
It's not exactly relevant to this conversation, other than that there is a difference. Not worth getting into, though.
>"I believe what I mean by space is 3 dimensional volume, which mass does possess, no?"
Actually, no. What we generally call the size of of a quantum mechanical particle is a combination of two things:
1) a region in space in which the particle is most likely to be found (particles are not in one defined location, but have a probability of being in a whole region) and
2) Size is relative. All it has to do with is how close individual particles have to be to each other to interact meaningfully; this depends on the particles and on what forces they experience, so different particles 'see' other particles as being different 'sizes.' This is called a "cross section."
The conventional definition of size only applies at macroscopic scales when quantum effects become negligible!
>"I mean to say that nothingness need not be brought into existence."
I would argue that neither does "something" need to be brought into existence - if it has always existed. Having an infinite past does not invalidate principles of causality. To invalidate causality there would be to be an event with no cause. In a causal universe with an infinite past, every event has a cause. The only difference is that there is no beginning. There is no first. You can trace back forever and ever but you will never find a violation of causality because you can always just go one step further. It's tough to think about, and it's why I said that common sense does not apply to infinity.
>"To say nothingness existed is to assign it substance. Nothingness refers only to physical dimension not state. Spirit is different ontologically. One must speculate it's existence from a scientific perspective. Faith, however assures us in an entirely different, yet no less valid, way. Some call faith a faculty. "
I don't accept that which requires a direct leap of faith; I accept only that it might be.
>"Some scientists are positivists.I believe Hawking calls himself one. If I understand his position correctly, he has more or less given up on ever discovering reality. Just describing some approximate laws are sufficient."
I guess I'm a positivist, then, too. That pretty much sums up stance as a scientist and individual.
>"In what sense does the world(?universe) occupy nothingness? Do you mean swallow up nothingness? If so, I think the waqy I wouldout it is thait replaces notingness."
I find the notion of a state defined by the lack of existence to be nonsensical. What is it a state of? For example, is nothingness a state of the universe, or of something else? And again, I hold that the if universe, including time and space were to 'appear' out of a state of nothingness, then causality would not be violated. Causality is only something we need to worry about during the existence of time. Causality would not be violated at t=0 because there is no time before it to worry about!
This conversation is difficult to have via keyboard...
>"Have you ever considered the unlikely existence of the state of Israel. Who would have ever thunk that oil would be discovered in the area 2500 years ago when Isaiah told us that it would be at the center of the world? How could he have known?"
Israel is not the center of the world. It is pretty much the one sliver of land in the entire region that is not swimming in oil... It's kind of ironic, really. Also, people tend to think highly of themselves. It doesn't seem out of place to me for a leader to claim that their culture/nation/what-have-you will be the center of the world for years to come. Nowadays most people would laugh if someone were to say that, but that's because the world has become much smaller, our record of history is much better, and the general population is much more aware of it.
Natedog and EastwoodDC:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFrank M does not believe in a supernatural creator or designer. He believes that there is a force of nature that can be understood by science much like electromagnetism and gravity. For lack of a better term I've been calling it the "intelligence force."
This is crucial, because both of you keep answering his questions as if he were arguing that God were reaching down from the heavens and telling all the molecules in our bodies what to do. He isn't. He is just saying that, just like we didn't know the nuclear strong force exists until some decades ago, we are still missing another fundamental force of nature.
Therefore, any argument you make in response to him regarding the supernatural is irrelevant, and it will only serve to convince him that you are opposing him out of dogmatic belief in evolution or against ID, instead of scientific reasoning.
>Frank M does not believe in a supernatural creator or designer.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYeah, I realize that but his arguments are still quite different that those I've come across regarding the gravitron or the god particle.
My objection to Frank M’s arguments is based on a lack of evidence and in my opinion a lack of necessity. The source and nature of his “intelligent force†isn’t really important.
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Edited by Natedog at 05/14/2008 6:32 PM
Frank M:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this>"Certainly specific microbiological functions and physical formations do show clear intention. More importantly, all unconscious matter movement in living things leads toward the clear intention of keeping living things alive."
Valid point, I will concede that there does appear to be intent in the microbiological realm. However, to say that the intent of life is to stay alive is like saying that the intent of a rock is to stay a rock. It is a flawed analogy, because to stay alive requires constant activity and all, while remaining a rock only requires perpetuation of the status quo; nonetheless the intent of life as a whole is much less clear, if it is there at all.
>"If by "environmental stimuli", you mean Darwin's "natural selection", there is nothing there to create anything. What "environmental stimuli" create life? I see no "creation" force at all. Natural selection is a subtractive filter only. It creates nothing, nor does it "encourage" anything from non-existence into existence. It can do nothing until after existence occurs, so it is not creative."
We are not talking about the creation of life, but the diversification of life. Your spaceship analogy is only valid (and it is flawed even then, as I pointed out) in comparison to [i]changes[/i] in life, not the creation of life itself.
>"Please provide evidence of "random" changes."
I already did. Several posts back I mentioned how there appear to have been an enormous number of random, essentially meaningless changes in the DNA sequence responsible for coding fibrinopeptides (and I even cited the source). This is only a single example of which there are many. Not only is this evidence of random changes, but it is also evidence against Intelligent Design: why would the intelligence behind diversification of life waste its time making all these meaningless changes? Seems like a waste of energy to me.
>"Nearly all evidence shows changes that maintain form and function and, when needed, beneficial changes."
Darwinian evolution predicts the same thing. Disadvantageous never occur throughout a species for obvious reasons - the specimens with this mutation would die. A harmless, but functionless third limb would never propagate throughout a species because it would provide no advantage and thus the specimens with this mutation would have a difficult time spreading it throughout the entire gene pool (more importantly, it would probably not have gotten to the point of a full limb). I've gone over this many times.
Also, how do you account for birth deformities, then? Why would an intelligent guide cause some children to be born with cleft lips or other congenital diseases? Why so many blood types? If this intelligence is capable of giving a whole species eyes, limbs and organs just because they would be advantageous, then why doesn't it evolve the human race to be immune to the measles, mumps, HIV and malaria? We know that there are individuals that immune or highly resistant to all of these, why not everyone? You seem to be arguing that massive physiological changes can occur throughout a species in a handful of generations, and most of the above mentioned diseases and viruses have been around for at least a few human generations - yet we seem to be no more resistant now than we were a 30, 50, 100 or 500 years ago. The same principle applies to animals.
Personally I think this is just as strong evidence against Intelligent Design as you believe the statistical calculations you mention are against unguided evolution.
>"What are the odds of a change that proposes an advantage? What kind of advantaged change would you give as an example and how many bits of information would have to be in the correct configuration to place matter in a specific 3-dimensional space?"
I don't know enough about biology or chemistry to answer this question.
>"Pigeon> "Thousands" of researchers have "looked at the same evidence as you have, with much more knowledge and experience, and have come to a different conclusion."
>Not so much."
Now you're being hypocritical. First you were arguing that people who disapprove of Darwinian evolution of are ostracized and ignored, and now you're claiming that it's really not that unevenly split. The [i]fact[/i] is that the majority of biologists are inclined to go with unguided over guided evolution, even if they don't think it's a flawless theory. If the large majority of biologists believed otherwise then it would not be as universally (for lack of a better word) accepted within the scientific community as it is. I am sure there is a large, if relatively small, number of equally qualified individuals who think that unguided evolution is fundamentally flawed and that guided evolution is the way to go, but that is not my point. Nor am I trying to say that the majority need be right. I am only saying that by calling thousands of individuals who are probably more qualified than you are and with more experience silly and blind you lose a lot of credibility. It is difficult to hoodwink the scientific community into believing that a blatantly false theory is true. I'll give you an example:
People used to believe that the Earth was the center of the Universe. People like Copernicus and Galileo were largely written off as crazy. But as telescopes became more available and more people looked into it, and when Isaac Newton proposed equations of motion that perfectly accounted for the motion of celestial bodies in the solar system, even the religious opposition conceded, and revised its notions of celestial bodies and motion. And quite frankly, the modern scientific community is [i]much[/i] more open to change than the 17th century Catholic Church was. If you believe otherwise, then you are essentially saying you have no faith in science, in which case this discussion is over...
>"I have to disagree with your assessment about mathematicians and their conclusions on the odds against accidental evolution. I have read dozens of mathematicians who have studied this issue at length, including Von Neuman, Peter Woit and Fred Hoyle and they agree with Einstein's assessment of intelligent design. An entire conference of mathematicians at the Wistar Academy of Biology and Physiology, met with a team of Darwinists eager to prove their theory. The result was a sound and universal rejection of the math of Darwinism by the mathematicians, although the Darwinists remained unmoved."
First, Einstein never assessed Intelligent Design - the idea of what is today called Intelligent Design is no more than a decade or two old. I addressed Einstein's beliefs in my previous post - I might be wrong about them, though, as I have never met the guy... I am somewhat familiar with Von Neumann's work on the subject, although I am not aware of what first principles he worked from. I know a little more about Fred Hoyle's work, though, and he even has something called [url http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoyle%27s_Fallacy]Hoyle's Fallacy[/url] named after him.
Again, the only way you will convince me of the astronomical odds against unguided evolution is if you can provide me with the assumptions made, the actual calculations, the results, and preferably any criticism that has been made of it. When it comes to most evidence for or against evolution I will defer to biologists; but I am perfectly capable of deciding for myself whether a probability calculation is reasonable or not if I am provided with evidence for and against the assumptions. Even the most intelligent people can be wrong. If we all believed Einstein over all his detractors, then we wouldn't have quantum mechanics and might not even have the computers we're using to have this debate.
>"I am unequivocal on the presence of intelligence in evolution and life's functions. This is not a close call and I have been studying it for far too long."
Ok then, we should just end this discussion, then... You know something is wrong when you are "unequivocal" about the validity of a science.
>"I should also contest your assertion that those who believe in Darwinism are more open-minded."
The other people involved in this debate have consistently misunderstood your position, I think, and take you to be a more traditional proponent of Intelligent Design. Whether most proponents of ID say it or not, they intend that the Designer is in fact God. Certainly not all, and clearly not you, but this is certainly the case for most of its vocal supporters, at least from my experience. I attribute their unyielding positions to their mischaracterization of your own.
>"It seems that you are an example of the right approach, and I am glad to hear that you do consider the study of ID to be a scientific persuit."
Thank you for the compliment - I really do try to remain as open-minded as I can. I really enjoy intelligent debate, but it isn't so fun going into it having decided ahead of time not to allow my position to change during or after its course. I'd also like to clarify my position on ID as a scientific pursuit. I think [i]your[/i] version could have a place in science, but I think more work needs to be done to clarify it's position and create a real workable hypothesis. It needs to be less vague, propose actual mechanisms through which it occurs, etc. It appears that some of this has already been done, but as I said I think it needs more.
>""Intelligent Design would not be the only nor necessary alternative if Darwinian evolution were proved wrong, and so evidence against Darwinian evolution is not evidence for Intelligent Design."
>It isn't proof, but it DOES support ID. Could there be other non-Darwinistic, but also non-intelligent means of life being created? I won't rule that out, but we certainly have no other hypothesis out there."
No, it doesn't support it. It merely doesn't contradict it. The only way in which it would support it is if Intelligent Design were the only possible alternative to Darwinian evolution. I am not aware of any other unguided hypotheses, but then there hasn't been much incentive to come up with one, either. If, however, there is evidence against any possible form of unguided evolution that would indeed be evidence of guided evolution.
>"I will say that if we are looking at the two options: intentional formation versus accidental, there is no third option as the the combination of these two options is all-inclusive"
Agreed.
>"Well, the vast majority of people on the planet believe in some type of God, and once you conclude that the evidence shows that something designed and created us, it is not unusual to go there."
Right, but unfortunately their beliefs tend to insert themselves into their arguments, which automatically invalidates it from a scientific perspective.
>"That version is Creationism, not ID. Creationists will label themselves as IDists and argue our points, but they are not IDists by definition."
Unfortunately the two terms have become muddled. Strictly, yes, people who believe evolution is merely a mechanism used by God to create life are technically theistic creationists, but they are usually called proponents of Intelligent Design. I don't think it's a deliberate attempt to discredit proponents of real Intelligent Design, but really due to confusion caused by many vocal people who claim to be proponents of Intelligent Design but are really theist creationists.
>"Pigeon> "However, the evidence would have to be more than our continued inability to figure out how various mechanisms of evolution could occur unguided."
>Agree to an extent, but there is a point where intelligently guided evolution becomes the likelier answer. "
I can't disagree with that. However, even if it turns out that we cannot understand evolution in the Darwinian framework, Intelligent Design will not be considered a scientific theory, let alone accepted as the most likely theory, until a working hypothesis that provides non-trivial predictions about what we should observe, and what mechanisms are responsible for evolution.
>"However, you used the term "unable to figure out", which connotes uncertainty. I would say that there is a difference between just not knowing and determining statistical impossibility. The answers will come in as a sliding scale, not a finish line."
Again neither I, nor apparently has the majority, been convinced of the statistical calculations you continue to mention. I still hold that it is unlikely they hold very much merit. After all, how can a calculation take into account biological processes that we don't fully understand? I said this before and I'll say it again: it sounds to me like an exercise in futility.
>"Pigeon> "First, a potential source of this natural intelligence would have to be hypothesized"
>I disagree here if I understand you correctly. I have no problem with hypothesis, but in this particular field of inquiry, the "source" could be a sensitive and unprovable subject. I might not disagree if you hadn't used the innocent sounding word "first". Step one is to gather and present evidence for the intelligence, which can happen whether or not we ever figure out a source. Finding a source is an important question, but I wouldn't want it to be a distraction or a pre-requisite for further inquiry."
I disagree. How can the mechanisms responsible for guided evolution be hypothesized if the nature of the intelligence is completely unknown? They can be guessed, but that isn't going to make for a very convincing theory. Evidence from biological systems, and possible other evidence, can be used to hypothesize the existence and nature of the intelligence, and the predictions that come from that hypothesis can then be tested. Obviously the predictions tested would have to be different than the evidence used to hypothesize the existence in the first place.
More importantly, if the "source" is a "sensitive and unprovable subject" then Intelligent Design cannot be a scientific theory. If we cannot understand the intelligence itself, then we cannot use Intelligent Design to further our understanding of the natural world, and thus it is not a valid scientific hypothesis. This has happened historically; theories have been developed that adequately explain the phenomenon they were meant to, but failed predict anything else or even made false predictions. They were therefore invalid. If a disprovable hypothesis about the nature of the intelligence and the mechanisms it uses cannot be made then it is not science.
>"Please explain what you mean by "source". Is this a red herring?"
Red herring? If the intelligence described by ID is a new force of nature, then that is what I mean by source. If it is a race of tiny microbial workers that designs life, then I mean that...
>"ID can make predictions on further guided evolution. We predict physical changes that are functional, symettrical and in cohesive units. We can predict that while these changes happen, there will be no non-functional physical changes or very few."
Keep in mind that you also have to make predictions to account for all seemingly contradictory evidence, such as the defects and truly random mutations that we do observe.
>"Pigeon> "...what properties it has, what rules it obeys and how it interacts with the other forces."
>Now you are getting into some exciting stuff. This is exactly what scientists need to be studying openly and freely.
I think there are a number of reasons why it isn't happening. The first is that it is extremely different from anything else science has tackled. The second is that understanding of intelligence as a whole continues to elude us. I think that putting Intelligent Design into a scientific framework will be realistic for the first time when/if we can come to some sort of understanding, however crude, of how our own intelligence arises. A third reason is that it would require very close collaboration between biologists, chemists, physicists and neuroscientists. It isn't easy to put together such diverse team and be cohesive, although it is getting easier and easier.
>"Pigeon> "This is why I have been saying that even your version of Intelligent Design does not belong in the realm of science, at least at this time."
>I disagree. It is still a scientific persuit throughout all phases of the scientific method. We don't have to wait until it becomes so accepted that all other theories are discarded before ID is "in the realm of science"."
I respectfully disagree. We do not yet have a deep enough understanding of various prerequisites to forming a complete hypothesis of Intelligent Design. Pieces of it, sure, but an incomplete hypothesis is unhelpful at best and dangerous at worst (can create lots of misconceptions).
I wouldn't go campaigning against funding for people who come up with interesting research proposals that could move the idea forward, but I think that, in general (for scientific and practical reasons), a much more appropriate research topic to fund is the study of human or animal intelligence on a microscopic scale. The reason I say this is that we have the tools with which to do this, and they are constantly improving, and that this form of intelligence is something we are familiar and comfortable with. It is always easier to begin with the familiar and work towards the abstract than the other way around.
Once enough progress is made there that some predictions can be made of the nature of the intelligence that might be behind evolution, then I think Intelligent Design will have a place in the sciences beyond that of speculation.
>"Now if you mean that it is in the realm of what we teach in a science class, I wouldn't go that far either, but I do believe we need to show evidence against Darwinism, admit what we don't know and present evidence, whether it supports ID or not, without mentioning ID itself yet."
I agree 100% with this statement. And not just about evolution. I think our education system would be vastly improved by applying this principle to everything that is taught in schools, from history to physics. It is a pet peeve of mine that so many people come out of high school physics classes believing that they are now an authority on the subject, and then proceed to make blatantly false claim after blatantly false claim. Our nation, and I think to a lesser extent foreign nations, is losing its ability to think critically because up until and sometimes through college education they are presented with simplified and unequivocal facts. If they aren't going to be given the opportunity to determine the validity of a claim for themselves, they need to at least be made aware that what they are being taught is what it is: simplifications and half-truths.
--
Edited by Pigeon at 05/14/2008 7:25 PM
> Six Things in Expelled that Ben Stein Doesn't
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> Want You to Know...
"intent does not affect the outcome of an experiment unless the experimenter intentionally changes the data or performs faulty data analysis to arrive at the desired conclusion."
Even the data we collect is biased . One does not go about willy-nllly collecting data. It is a selective process, and selection occurs in the context of a world view.
Science is mostly occupied in doing a mop up job. Every now and then a genuine paradigm shift does occur. Then we spend the next few decade(centuries?) trying to perfect it. Essentially that means we are preaching to the choir.. The design of the experiment , the technology we use, even the "data" is skewed. Then of course come the conclusion or interpretation, which again demonstrates the world view in which the scientist writes.
You must forgive me. I do not mean to be badmouthing science. I am really geateful for the discoveries that God has allowed to better our condition. It's just that we need to transcend the belief that science has some lock on reality, while faith has none. Both need each other, not simply to see reality for what it is, but to avoid the danger that either can pose when unbalanced. Science, a danger? Can we destroy ourselves with the technology in any of the basic sciences?
Frank m concludes: Whatever force is animating life in an intelligent manner is not supernatural. It is quite natural, and the effects of it are very much observable, testable and quantifiable. We may never put a "whodunnit" on the intelligent design, but we do know that it is intelligent.
Though we find intelligence sand order in the natural world, do you believe that intelligence is self-existent without a source? I think I grasp the strategy that underlies ID. To find a level of legitimacy in the scientific community, one must work within the naturalistic realm. It does, however, backfire. Intelligence thus elucidated can always be called a misnomer. It might be viewed as anthropomorphising. Order and intelligence thus could be deemed instead to be mere consistency with physical laws. I mean why call this intelligence in the normal sense that we use it. But if, on the other hand we link it to a purposeful action, then it's agent must be entertained. T
Frank M considers,
I disagree here if I understand you correctly. I have no problem with hypothesis, but in this particular field of inquiry, the "source" could be a sensitive and unprovable subject. I might not disagree if you hadn't used the innocent sounding word "first". Step one is to gather and present evidence for the intelligence, which can happen whether or not we ever figure out a source. Finding a source is an important question, but I wouldn't want it to be a distraction or a pre-requisite for further inquiry.
The real problem with issues of origins in unbridled naturalism is the denial of a source rather then the denial of order. Order is simply a natural order. The anthropic principle merely a tautology. No love in it. Evolution, shopping off the shelf. Start all over and maybe we get some other forms and functionalities. Any resemblance to design is just that. To define intelligence in the ordinary sense of the term, then requires a source of that intelligence. Anything less than that could easily be reduced to a mere consistency with the natural order.
On the other hand, I don't see the problem with demonstrating the inference in nature to a loving and omnipotent Creator. Predictability and falsification are part of experimental investigation, but science is bigger than it's methodology. When we try to reduce it to that, it will inevitably function as a religion, taking on it's own moral dictates and purposes. Even it's own deities, essentially those omnipotent co-deities of "chance" and "necessity".
Another approach to introducing the possibility of Agency into the scientific community is to see love in the benignity of our existence. As I see it, one of the important prerequisites to defining this particular Agency is love. If intelligence were inextricably linked to love, Agency would be less deniable. Demonstrate that morality is embedded in creation, and you have a threefold cord that cannot easily be broken. We ought to be able to detect every attribute of the Creator through science. Creation does, after all reflect it's agent. How to do all this is another matter(understatement, eh?). Intelligence is intrinsic in creation, it is true, but without the source, it is too easily misnamed. God wrote 2 books.
Natedog considers.
I do not think the forces in the universe intented to make stars, planets, galaxies, etc but it happened. Certainly you can accept that orderly systems can arise from chaos.
Chaos has not power in and of itself. If order can be detected, it is due to some attractor, or physical force. The beauty of nonlinear equations, (which are found in all sorts of natural situations) as seen in fractal art, demonstrates, moreover, that beauty is also to be found in our universe. Why should that be? Order and beauty intrinsically together, fancy that. I reckon these dumb laws aren't so dumb.
Eastwood DC believes,
Science cannot prove the existence of a supernatural force, much less that that force is intelligent. That doesn’t mean I don’t believe in it (I do), merely that I recognize it is a matter of faith. We agree that faith and reason are fundamentally different, is it any surprise that we reach different conclusions?
I'm not sure that it is that cut and dry. I agree that faith and reason are different, though both interdigitate. I don't however understand your posture that that they must intrinsically give different conclusions. Both skeptics and believers use rational processes. Certainly a strong inference of a "non-natural" realm can be made from legitimate data. Certainly a case can be made that such data best fits a non-natural source for the natural realm. Not just intelligence but intelligibility is part of the natural order. These alone ought to be "proof" enough to at least consider the existence of a supernatural force, One who thus reveals Himself through nature. Perhaps it is not so much that people cannot accept this, as that they may have a vested interest in rejecting it. So far, no faith need be invoked, just reason. Favorability or disinclination may be all that we are talking about yet, and these may have extraneous reasons.
Faith is more like finding these things to be excellent, so excellent as to give the Creator His due. It's those "eurekas!" that fascinate us so as we discover the hidden mysteries that underlie this natural order. To me, a "eureka" is a praise, but to who or what is it directed. .
Sologos:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this>"Even the data we collect is biased . One does not go about willy-nllly collecting data. ... The design of the experiment , the technology we use, even the "data" is skewed. Then of course come the conclusion or interpretation, which again demonstrates the world view in which the scientist writes."
I'm not sure what you mean by the data we collect is biased. If you mean that experiments searching for the existence of the Higgs Boson will only record data in the ~120 GeV range and not in the 10 GeV range sure, but so what? As you said we don't go around willy-nilly collecting data because we can take data much faster than we can analyze it, so what is the point of overwhelming ourselves with data that we don't have the first reason to believe will show anything interesting? Yes, it means that we might miss things, but that is why science is an iterative process. We build on what we know generation after generation, and the reasonable hope is that it will become more and more comprehensive with time.
The dangerous part is not the experiment design, recorded data or technology used, but the interpretation. Interpretation can definitely be subjective, and can definitely be affected by the investigator's preconceptions. This is somewhat mitigated by the fact that 1) an entire community attempts to interpret the same data in different ways, and 2) that we require hypotheses to predict other phenomena. If we believe we observe one thing predicted by a hypothesis but nothing else, the first thing that will be done is to redo the one successful experiment and analyze it much more carefully. Nonetheless, scientists are people, people are flawed, and thus science, especially new science, needs to be looked at with caution.
>" It's just that we need to transcend the belief that science has some lock on reality, while faith has none. Both need each other, not simply to see reality for what it is, but to avoid the danger that either can pose when unbalanced."
Personally I think faith has no lock on reality. Faith is a series of inherently indisputable inferences made by an individual based on life experiences and observations. The best reason I can give for why it has no lock on reality is the following: there are more than 6 billion people on this planet, and many of them have faith in different things. There are three major monotheistic religions in the world - Christianity, Judaism and Islam - with numerous denominations of each, not to mention other faiths such as Hinduism and Buddhism. Then there are deists, and pantheists and atheists. The members of each of those faiths believes just as strongly in their own as the others do in theirs, and few if any of them are actually compatible with one another. Jews believe the Torah was written by God, Christians believe the Old and New Testaments were, Muslims believe only the Qur'an was; as far as I know Hindus and Buddhists don't believe any texts were written by their gods, though I could be wrong. A theist believes in only their own god, and none of the others; and atheist adds that theist's god to that list - not a very big difference, is it? With so many conflicting faiths, it cannot logically have a lock on reality.
Science, however, is based on (relatively) objective observations of the natural world, deals only with that which can be repudiated, and functions based on a common framework among all scientists; it has no place for personal feelings, intuitions or experiences. Also, I don't see how faith mitigates dangers presented by science. To be honest I think it exacerbates them! The vast majority of conflict in the world occurs when conflicting faiths collide, and those are the greatest opportunities for the ugly aspect of science to come forward.
>"I think I grasp the strategy that underlies ID. To find a level of legitimacy in the scientific community, one must work within the naturalistic realm. It does, however, backfire. Intelligence thus elucidated can always be called a misnomer. It might be viewed as anthropomorphising. Order and intelligence thus could be deemed instead to be mere consistency with physical laws."
This is an amazing and subtle insight! Even if the rest of this entire discussion weren't interesting (but it is), this insight alone would have made it worth my time anyway. Thank you for that! :-)
>"Predictability and falsification are part of experimental investigation, but science is bigger than it's methodology. When we try to reduce it to that, it will inevitably function as a religion, taking on it's own moral dictates and purposes. Even it's own deities, essentially those omnipotent co-deities of "chance" and "necessity"."
Could you expand on that? I'm not really sure what you mean by that but it sounds interesting :-p.
>"Another approach to introducing the possibility of Agency into the scientific community is to see love in the benignity of our existence. As I see it, one of the important prerequisites to defining this particular Agency is love. If intelligence were inextricably linked to love, Agency would be less deniable. Demonstrate that morality is embedded in creation, and you have a threefold cord that cannot easily be broken."
I don't see what love has to do with anything. Why elevate love above any other emotion or abstract concept? I also don't see why love is a prerequisite to defining Agency, nor do I see how love being linked to intelligence would make it more or less deniable. It also appears to me like you are equating love and morality, but the two are not the same. Likewise, I don't see how this has anything to do with science - science cannot tell us anything about love or morality, it provides no framework with which to study them at all. I don't follow your argument.
>"God wrote 2 books."
So say you... As I mentioned above, even if billions of people are all unwaveringly confident in their own faiths, they cannot all be correct as few of them are compatible. Considering that faith is inherently irrefutable, we can never discover who is right and who is wrong. Therefore, unless I am specifically comparing different faiths then I make a point not to accept any argument that is based off of any faith.
>"Order and beauty intrinsically together, fancy that. I reckon these dumb laws aren't so dumb."
Order and beauty need not be products of intelligence. Personally I don't associate crystal structure with intelligence, and that is both ordered and beautiful. Likewise I consider sunsets, the ocean, fjords, the Grand Canyon and even other people to be beautiful, and yet I don't think some sort of intelligence conspired to make sunsets beautiful. Rather I would argue that where there are laws, there can be order, and that beauty can be a product of both order and chaos.
>"I agree that faith and reason are different, though both interdigitate. I don't however understand your posture that that they must intrinsically give different conclusions."
They need not inherently do so, but they often do.
>"Both skeptics and believers use rational processes. Certainly a strong inference of a "non-natural" realm can be made from legitimate data."
The flaw with this is that an infinite number of inferences can be made of a "non-natural" realm based on legitimate observations. The only thing that science gives us about the non-natural is a set of constraints. However, there is an infinite set of inferences than can be made of the non-natural world based on any set of constraints.
>"These alone ought to be "proof" enough to at least consider the existence of a supernatural force, One who thus reveals Himself through nature."
Yes, science provides an incentive to philosophize about the world, and what lies beyond it. But it never proves reason to consider [i]scientifically[/i] the existence of the supernatural, it would be like trying to pictorially describe a house without the means to create an image.
In Pigeon's entry we find,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this>"I mean to say that nothingness need not be brought into existence."
To which pigeon argues,
"I would argue that neither does "something" need to be brought into existence - if it has always existed. Having an infinite past does not invalidate principles of causality. To invalidate causality there would be to be an event with no cause. In a causal universe with an infinite past, every event has a cause. The only difference is that there is no beginning. There is no first. You can trace back forever and ever but you will never find a violation of causality because you can always just go one step further. It's tough to think about, and it's why I said that common sense does not apply to infinity."
Having an infinite past violates causality precisely because you are denying a beginning. The most significant cause is being denied. Where, even in the quantum world, do you witness the power of self-existence.You may postulate self-existence, but you have no scientific warrant to do so. Nothingness, on the other hand requires no cause. No warrant is required for it's existence, because it doesn't have an existence.
>"To say nothingness existed is to assign it substance.
Nothingness refers only to physical dimension not state. Spirit is different ontologically. One must speculate it's existence from a scientific perspective. Faith, however assures us in an entirely different, yet no less valid, way. Some call faith a faculty. "
To this Pigeon responded,
I don't accept that which requires a direct leap of faith; I accept only that it might be.
Speculation is not a leap of faith. Once one accepts the impossibility of an eternally past physical state of existence, one must speculate that a non-physical cause is required. Most cosmogonists today, including Hawking accept that there was a beginning of time, so it is not without scientific citation. The specific nature of this deity can also be at least hinted at by nature. All this as you say is a "might be"
If you would grant me leave(I hope "science saves earth" is not watching this entry), faith is a bit different than this. That it does not follow the so called "verifiability" of our present scientific methods does not lessen it's assurance. When one considers all the problematic issues of verifiability that accompany our scientific investigations, one might well wonder if there not be a another faculty we humans might possess for verifying reality. Faith is described by some more as a "gift" than a leap, and that is my experience. If there is a God and if if He has seen to it that this part of the universe is so fruitful and benign, one might also reason that He would not withhold this gift from one who asks.
I wrote
>"Some scientists are positivists.I believe Hawking calls himself one. If I understand his position correctly, he has more or less given up on ever discovering reality. Just describing some approximate laws are sufficient."
Then Pigeon wrote,
I guess I'm a positivist, then, too. That pretty much sums up stance as a scientist and individual.
OK. You decide.
Furthemore on the subject of nothingness I wrote
>"In what sense does the world(?universe) occupy nothingness? Do you mean swallow up nothingness? If so, I think the way I would put it is that it replaces notingness."
To which Pigeon remarked,
"I find the notion of a state defined by the lack of existence to be nonsensical. What is it a state of? For example, is nothingness a state of the universe, or of something else?"
Nothingness is a state that refers to the nonexistence of a universe. I do not find it nonsensical, though I've never experienced nothingness. You believe in something physical, because you have seen it and now can entertain the concept with your eyes closed. Why can't you conceive of nothing physical. I haven't experienced it, but niether did any body ever experience or even consider voices transmitted over wires untill Bell conceived and developed it. In fact, like nothingness, these things didn't exist before him. Maybe people thought he was a bit too metaphysical.
Pigeon continues,
And again, I hold that the if universe, including time and space were to 'appear' out of a state of nothingness, then causality would not be violated. Causality is only something we need to worry about during the existence of time. Causality would not be violated at t=0 because there is no time before it to worry about!
Causality would be violated if there were no inciting cause for the universe to appear out of nothingness. Time would also simultaneously begin, but not without an inciting cause. I don't know whether we can even speak of a T=0 in this atemporal state before time, but I know there must be some ability to cause in this atemporal state of nothingness, and it can't be a natural process, because there is nothing natural. It is all foreign to us because we have no precedence, but if the discipline of cosmogony won't regard it as a valid question, then we need to find what discipline does. To me, it is a valid scientific question because it is inquiring into beginnings.
Then Pigeon exclaimed,
This conversation is difficult to have via keyboard...
T'is
To this entry,
>"Have you ever considered the unlikely existence of the state of Israel. Who would have ever thunk that oil would be discovered in the area 2500 years ago when Isaiah told us that it would be at the center of the world? How could he have known?"
Pigeon replied,
Israel is not the center of the world. It is pretty much the one sliver of land in the entire region that is not swimming in oil... It's kind of ironic, really. Also, people tend to think highly of themselves. It doesn't seem out of place to me for a leader to claim that their culture/nation/what-have-you will be the center of the world for years to come. Nowadays most people would laugh if someone were to say that, but that's because the world has become much smaller, our record of history is much better, and the general population is much more aware of it.
Isaiah and other prophets stated that they would once again occupy the homeland after a long abeyance When I say that it is the center of the world, I mean to say that all eyes are on the middle East, and Israel stands out as the common enemy. This too was prophesied. The reason I bring this all out is not to make a political statement, but to point out that this is an example of how revelation also seems to speak with authority. Is this yet another consideration that is out of the purview of science, or are we content to leave it unsolved.
>"Having an infinite past violates causality precisely because you are denying a beginning. The most significant cause is being denied."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou still miss the point. Having no beginning does not violate causality unless the processes within the universe themselves do. Remember, in the absence of time, there is no such thing as cause and effect. It doesn't make any sense to say that "Time was caused to exist," because until the existence of Time, there was no such thing as causation. Therefore, time can exist without a beginning. Applying the notion of causality to time itself is nonsensical because [i]there is no such thing as causation, let alone causality, outside the existence of time[/i]. If nothing can be caused outside of time, then time itself cannot be caused.
>"Where, even in the quantum world, do you witness the power of self-existence."
>"Nothingness refers only to physical dimension not state. Spirit is different ontologically."
I don't know what this means. Nothingness is a physical dimension, just like the four (+?) dimensions of the natural world? You are arguing for the state of non-existence being 'replaced' (to quote you) by a state of existence, namely our universe. You still haven't explained what non-existence and existence are states [i]of[/i]. By this I mean, a particle can be in a state of motion or rest, a hydrogen ion can be in a free state or it can be in a bound state with another ion, etc. This means that the state of existence and the state of non-existence need be properties of.... something (for lack of a better word). Motion and rest are properties of matter, so what are existence and non-existence properties of?
Going back to non-existence being replaced by existence; I would argue that outside of time there can be no evolution of a state. Therefore, if time exists, then non-existence could never have been, because for non-existence to be replaced by an existence with time would have required the previous existence of time.
>"Speculation is not a leap of faith. Once one accepts the impossibility of an eternally past physical state of existence, one must speculate that a non-physical cause is required."
I am not convinced of the impossibility of an eternally past physical state of existence, so I feel no dire need to speculate that a non-physical cause is required for anything. Maybe there was a non-physical cause of the universe, and maybe there wasn't. The fact is we will never and can never know. Therefore it is philosophy, and while it is fascinating, I will never have faith in existence of the non-physical, only in the possibility that it might exist.
>"That it [faith] does not follow the so called "verifiability" of our present scientific methods does not lessen it's assurance. When one considers all the problematic issues of verifiability that accompany our scientific investigations, one might well wonder if there not be a another faculty we humans might possess for verifying reality. Faith is described by some more as a "gift" than a leap, and that is my experience. If there is a God and if if He has seen to it that this part of the universe is so fruitful and benign, one might also reason that He would not withhold this gift from one who asks."
But that is circular logic. "God gave us faith so that we can verify the veracity of that in which we have faith." It is tautological. I would argue that faith provides no assurance except for the individual. Again, there are 6 billion people on this planet, many of whose faiths are inherently conflictive. Faith cannot provide the ability to verify that which we cannot observe with science because billions of people's faiths are conflictive. It would be analogous to an experiment performed by scientists whose outcome is a function of the person running the experiment; if the results of one cannot be repeated and validated by the rest, then it tells us nothing.
>"Nothingness is a state that refers to the nonexistence of a universe. I do not find it nonsensical, though I've never experienced nothingness. You believe in something physical, because you have seen it and now can entertain the concept with your eyes closed."
Ah, I can imagine a state of nothingness (sort of, though I would guess that no human can know what nothingness would [i]really[/i] (not?) be), but it brings new questions; it makes me ask, of what is nothingness (and something-ness) a property? Likewise, based on my reasons above I cannot imagine how non-existence can be replaced by time in a manner that requires the formulation of non-existence to begin with.
>"Causality would be violated if there were no inciting cause for the universe to appear out of nothingness. Time would also simultaneously begin, but not without an inciting cause."
No! Cause without time is nonsensical. Causation requires the existence of time, so applying notions of causality is an exercise in futility - it is bound to fail because you are applying a principle to a situation in which it does not apply. It would be like an english-speaker reading a book in spanish and concluding "well that made no sense! The words were spelled funny and the grammar was wrong!" That conclusion would only be reached, however, because the reader applied the wrong set of rules and definitions to what she was reading. Therefore, as long as the energy and spatial dimensions of the universe were brought into existence at T=0, then we need not worry about causality.
>"I don't know whether we can even speak of a T=0 in this atemporal state before time"
T=0 is not applied to the atemporal state 'before' time (and note that there can be no such thing as 'before time'). T=0 means the very first instant of time; you cannot go back further than T=0, because then you would be outside of time.
>"It is all foreign to us because we have no precedence, but if the discipline of cosmogony won't regard it as a valid question, then we need to find what discipline does."
The discipline has been found (quite a while ago). Theology and philosophy.
>"To me, it is a valid scientific question because it is inquiring into beginnings."
But it is not a valid scientific question. Nothing we are speaking of here can be disproved. This question is essentially an exercise in logic, in which we are applying our presuppositions about reality and what [i]might[/i] exist, or not exist, outside of what we are familiar with. Science requires that a question must come with physical methods of validating it and methods of disproving it. Look at string theory: right now, it is essentially an exercise in math and logic. They are starting from their knowledge of the physical world, making a couple assumptions and following the logic from there. Nonetheless, string theory is barely considered actual science by many - and string theory is in principle verifiable and disprovable with better technology in the future.
sologos, intelligent design by its very definition is an observation of scientific evidence to deterimine if evolution (and on a wider scale other aspects of life and the physical laws and universe) are best described as accident or by intelligent agency.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWe would call ourselves "accidental design" if that is where the evidence went, but like it or hate it, it didn't.
So I do agree with you if you are saying that the evidence shows that something designed and created us.
But I do not believe the scientific evidence proves that whatever entity(ies) or force(s) did this designing was omnipotent or loving, as you said.
I will admit that it seems to have very high intelligence and I will admit that it has the ability to animate matter, which is odd, but undeniable. Extra-organismal evidence of intelligence even leads to a "big-picture" view that goes against my earlier beliefs that the life force is internal only.
All of this would lead one to be in awe of that which seems so much more powerful than we are, but it is quite the leap from there to "omnipotent". How could we scientifically prove "omnipotence"? Can you see where science leaves off and your faith is taking over?
In fact, the evidence shows a limited and at times fallable intelligence. Granted, we don't know enough to prove this either, but living things do die and hurt each other and sometimes they are born with horrible defects. I have had people argue with me that it could be that the intelligence is self-limiting for one reason or another. I will remain open to that possibility, although it seems counter-intuitive.
Likewise, how do we know scientifically that we are loved? I will admit that virtually all unexplained matter animation and most, if not all, intelligent genetics lead to sustenence of life and even comfort. So again, I will concede some evidence of this very un-scientific emotion that you feel should be included by ID.
On the contrary, though, this great circle of life does require all of us animals to destroy other life in order to live. Even herbivores kill living plants and the rest of us dog-eat-dog just to survive another day. If we were designed, and I do believe we were, this is a part of the design, no?
So I will stick to the following modifiers of the intelligence: It has the ability to animate matter. No question. It has an intelligence far greater than our own, at least in regards to biological functions. And thirdly, it has the clear intention of the sustenence of life.
Sologos: "The real problem with issues of origins in unbridled naturalism is the denial of a source rather then the denial of order."
The truly "unbridled" ones, and they are in charge, even deny the order. Intelligent Design is more of a middle ground between Creationism and Materialism. For what it's worth, I do believe you are far closer to the truth, if not all the way there, than the Materialists who seem to deny all evidence.
Still, we should only hypothesize the "source" if we have evidence for it or a way to test for it. Is God the source? I don't know. I feel as if I am taking the right approach by neither assuming God exists or assuming He doesn't.
Believe in your gut that God is our designer? More power to you, but it is not a scientific observation. Is it?
Sologos: "No love in it."
The truth may not have much love in it, so I prefer not to be deterred by following what gives me the warm fuzzies.
Now if you are noting that there is the existence of love and altruism, which could not happen by accidental particle collisions, I will agree that you make a better point than those on the accident side. A very strong point, in fact, if that was what you were alluding to.
Sologos: "To define intelligence in the ordinary sense of the term, then requires a source of that intelligence."
There may be source or there may not be. If you can say God always existed, maybe intelligence always existed or energy always existed. Who knows, maybe they are all the same thing. Maybe intelligence is just a potential kinetic energy with a penchant for self-preservation. Or maybe there are the tiny beings that Pigeon reflected upon. Or maybe there is a loving God.
Sologos: "If intelligence were inextricably linked to love, Agency would be less deniable."
I'll admit there is a link, if not "inextricable". Love keeps us alive as a species. Without parental care, or at least the care of some grown animal or human, every cub, calf and baby would die. In fact, not to be offensive, but without any love, parents would eat their children. Even bacteria come to each other's rescue.
Your opinion interests me, though I fear that you are slipping away from a scientific persuit. Do you have factual arguments here, or just feel-good presumptions? Please elaborate.
I do like your response to Natedog:
Natedog> "Certainly you can accept that orderly systems can arise from chaos."
Sologos> "Chaos has not power in and of itself. If order can be detected, it is due to some attractor, or physical force."
Agree. Randomness makes a complete mess of things, even if it starts with an orderly arrangement. Is it possible that there is some reversal of mathematical dynamics that could make chaos create order and function? Only on a "anything's possible" level, not on any realistic theory.
Darwinism is not a realistic theory. Materialism seems to be a desperate attempt to stifle the study of the properties of life and the "physical force" that you mentioned. It is the furthest thing from what science was ever meant to be.
Pigeon, I'm not picking on you - far from it - I just enjoy talking to someone who is both interested and open-minded about the subject matter.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPigeon> "It appears we will just have to agree to disagree about the magnitude of the flaws of Darwinian evolution."
I hope it doesn't stop there. There is much much more than we have touched on so far.
Frank> "all we need do is look at ANY evidence of evolution, fossil or contemporary, and evaluate it to see if it fits mathematical probabilities for 'random chance' or if it fits 'guided' or 'intelligent' genetic editing."
Pigeon> "I'm sorry, but no. I know for a fact that our understanding of biological systems is not remotely sufficient to predict the relevant probabilities in this problem."
I suppose the best way to keep claiming the guided versus unguided evolution "isn't testable" is to refuse to look at evidence by saying your own theory is so "incomplete" that it can't be tested. But what you say you know for a "fact" is quite unconvincing. I see your complaint here as nothing more than a sad attempt to avoid any recognition of evidence that refutes your favored theory. The only "brick wall" here is intellectual dishonesty.
Pigeon: "if any mathematician in the world could figure out how to turn environmental stimulus into a probability for selection, I would personally nominate him for the position of God."
No, you have to throw out all references to "selection" which has nothing to do with probabilities of the existence of anything. Calculations are to determine the chance of a new physiological formation, microbiological system, species or even the first life coming into existence. Whether it survives or is the fittest or (if you must use this misleading term) is "selected", has no bearing.
They can also calculate the odds against stasis and the continuance of existing functional systems. At the current rate of variation, truly random chance mutations would cause all living things to meet a hasty demise.
The factors that are as yet unknown all make Darwinist evolution even less viable. All reproduction requires unexplained matter movement and we have no idea how matter can obey a DNA code, especially in terms of 3 dimensional spacial navigation.
I'll get into why the probabilities against beneficial traits and formations are so prohibitive in another message, but I will say that your excuse that it "can't" be mathematically evaluated for sufficiency is a cheap attempt to dodge facts.
Pigeon> "It is a reasonable prediction based on the tenets of Darwinian evolution that happens to be observed in nature.
Darwinian evolution has never been observed in nature. Tests have shown artificial selection (not natural), but that is hardly earth-shattering. If you gather all the white dogs you can find and all the brown ones you can find and then kill all the brown ones, it is no surprise that only white ones are left. This is not particularly interesting.
Darwinian evolution holds that a species of creature has an individual hatch (birth, ect.) that has a genetic mutation that gives it an advantage over its parents and all others in its species. The advantaged creature populates, while the not-so-lucky ones become extinct because they didn't get the mutation. This has never been seen to happen in nature.
Any disadvantageous mutation could lead to immediate death (extinction of a one-creature "species"?) but failure to mutate right has never been seen to cause extinction to a species that was just fine before their offspring gained this unlikely advantage. Extinctions are usually caused by climate change, famine, disease or other catastrophes. They kill all levels of the food chain from fittest to least fit. Then the climate changes again and where does that leave our supposed progressive evolution of luck and foul weather turning dirt into peacocks?
Moreover, "natural selection" has nothing to do with the creation of a creature or physiology in the first place. Attempts to keep tossing survival into the equation are a distraction from whatever the true creative force is. "Selection" is a subtractive filter. If you pan for gold in a river and find some, the filter did not create gold. It was there already or you wouldn't have "selected" it.
Pigeon: "I have never seen modern day evidence of evolution where selection has been eliminated as a possibility, could you point any out to me?"
First, remember that "selection" isn't a positive force "encouraging" upgrades, as you say. It merely means that something lived long enough to reproduce. It is a circular tautology to say that "selection" means that you lived, therefore the reson we live is "selection".
What IS "selection" then? It is the comeback of all Darwinists when they are told of the odds against their theory. I mentioned the quintillions upon quintillions of messy, incongruous blobs and you, true to form, used "selection" as an offset. In contemporary evolution, however, we can see for ourselves if the messy blobs are really happening by the quintillions or rarely happening at all.
It doesn't happen. Again, modern day evidence can see first hand whether the disadvantageous traits are really only so rarely seen because they died out, or because they never existed in the first place.
Researchers need to do a MUCH better job of tracking the fates of those who did not get the genetic upgrades and what percentage of total births are getting so lucky. Tests need to be done that clearly eliminate selection so we can see what the genetics are really doing, without the "selection": complication. This is one reason why I feel we need ID scientists doing the research. Darwinists are bent on proving their own theory, and don't even seem to understand the arguments against them. We can do MUCH better in eliminating selection from the equation.
Human evolution eliminates selection, although Darwin predicted it wouldn't. As Richard Dawkins laments, humans protect the lives of the weak and disadvantaged. Yet we gain about an inch a century in height during the past half millenium. Toes have been getting far more genetically shriveled since the invention of covered tip shoes. Wisdom teeth came into existence and are now becoming considerably less common. None of this has anything to do with survival.
Also, if you are one of those who believes, like the Materialists, that instincts and inherited behaviors are random chance genetic errors, you will find multiple test studies on domesticated animals and other learned behavior that is handed down in two generations or so. See the Discovery Channel's work with wolves.
Pigeon> "Parallel evolution would indeed pose a problem unless a separate, workable hypothesis could be formulated to account for it."
Deal with it, because parallel evolution is not a rare exception. It is the norm and it is rampant. The Cambrian Explosion has aptly been described as an "arms race", where completely different species developed new but remarkably similar physiologies at essentially the same time. For example, the vertebrates all got eye sockets -two of them in practically the exact same location on the head - all at once. Carnivorous plants developed simultaneously as four separate species (more like 600 now), despite the need for thousands of bits of information to align just right - at astronomically impossible odds for each line.
The story of evolution in the evidence is entirely non-Darwinian. More like a repetitive designer.
Pigeon> "I was not aware that we have observed the Galapagos finches evolving different beak sizes in one generation."
Worse yet, it goes back and forth, as the climate changes. And we are talking about a very specific seed-shaped beak size that requires a huge amount of detailed genetic information bits. And again, it is parallel. Genetic protein movement is as intelligent as all other functional proteins.
Pigeon> "Do you know if any research beyond mere observation of this has been done?"
The Darwinists aren't looking for failure. They are looking for success and funding. They crow about the "mountains of evidence" for evolution, which few seriously contest since the days of the Scopes trial. But the real debate raging is about intelligent genetics - not the modifications themselves, but why they keep being so disproportionally beneficial and even predictable.
Pigeon> Bacteria "are much more efficient at sharing genetic material because they can do so without having to reproduce."
Quite correct. Very good, Pigeon. Notice I always refer to bacterial genetics as "genetic upgrades" but never "mutations" because most of their genetic changes are by such things as conjugation and transduction. The claim is that SOME of the genetic upgrades are mutations, though. Still, this does confuse the issue.
Bear in mind that my main point on evolution is that it is done by intelligent genetics and mostly I get ridiculed because such a thing as intelligent genetics is seen as impossible. Yet here we see it happening in a unicellular being. If this isn't intelligent genetics I don't know what is. Now you may say that this is different in its mechanism and you would be correct again, but the concept of intelligently editing genes is not something that should be dismissed out of hand.
Bacteria do send out a distress signal, sensing that they need an upgrade, and a buddy who somehow seems to know they have the needed DNA comes to the rescue. This still leaves one wondering how this chemical is supposedly accidentally happening and how the life-saving cell detects it, understands it, senses where it is coming from, knows it can help, comes to the rescue and transfers DNA in the right direction. It is very interesting, if nothing else, but it hardly refutes intelligent genetics as a theory. It establishes that it is possible in concept, because it already happens.
Pigeon> "So then what about the massive number of pointless changes in unimportant DNA sequences, which either control minor processes are don't appear to control anything at all ('junk DNA')?"
Some "junk" DNA has later been found to have a purpose, but there are some theories on this. One, of course, is that it is truly wasted material, but I'll respond to that in a moment.
DNA has some functions that are timed for various times of life, such as embryonic development and it has some functions that pertain only to a specific cell type, a specific location in the being or even a specific contingency, such as the genetic ability to restrict blood flow in extreme cold. To assume that we can see and detect all functions is more than a little optimistic.
Others feel that "junk" DNA is kind of a "Not Applicable" selection in a form that requires all fields to be answered. They say that it is needed to complete the full form of the double helix CAGT protein layout. Others say it is vestigial remainders of a past use or a precursor to a future use.
Even if they are junk, then it is odd that this particular encoded information is ignored, yet all non-junk DNA is obeyed at all costs. So proteins know which ones to ignore?
When it comes down to it, the most important thing, and the one thing that has clear answers, is not the code, but the result of the code. So the true defining attribute of a new trait is the physical change to the being, not the blueprints that we really can only read by observation of the result. I usually use terms like "new physiological formation" instead of "mutation" for this reason. Even if there is "waste" of microscopically tiny pieces of protein in a nucleic acid, we still must explain the absence of non-purposeful tissues in any living thing. If the vast majority has no waste at all, it isn't much of a case to point at such a tiny amount of "waste" that is probably not waste anyway.
If that is the best they can do to promote the "waste" or "bad design" argument, that is truly remarkable.
Frank M.,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this(I apologize for any spelling/grammar errors below, or if my thoughts seem fragmented, I am in a rush)
The more I read your responses, the better I understand your position, and the more I find that it, at least partially, lines up with my own opinion. However, I really wish that you'd stop using terms like intelligent and/or design (I will elaborate, so don't respond to this chunk of text independent of what is written below. I notice you frequently do this to help yourself gain the apparent "advantage" in these little back-and-forths).
When you suggest that there are some unknown evolutionary factors/forces that appear to react to changes in the environment (independent of selection), I tend to agree with you. My opinion is that these, as yet, unspecified "additive" (or at least apparently so) factors/forces work in conjunction with the "subtractive" notion of natural selection to (more) efficiently guide evolution down advantageous paths.
The schism between our opinions is centered around your insistence that these factors/forces must be intelligent and operate independently of the other forces which are already known. When you use the term "intelligence," I assume your meaning to be this (as taken from Dictionary.com): "capacity for learning, reasoning, understanding, and similar forms of mental activity; aptitude in grasping truths, relationships, facts, meanings, etc." Use of the term in this way implies sentience. Adding "design" to your theory's label only serves to reinforce that implication. If that is not your intended meaning, then please elaborate.
As was pointed out by Pigeon, for all we know the four forces of which we are currently aware could be responsible for this at a fundamental level. If that's true, then I don't see how there is room for "intelligence" unless you ascribe that characteristic to the four fundamental forces themselves (a scientifically worthless claim as there is no way to disprove it). It appears that you are claiming this unknown factor/force to be independent of these. If that is the case, then in order to legitimately propose a new force (in the scientific realm anyway), you would have to prove that those which are currently understood to exist (those which account for the formation of complex objects like planets and stars) can not possibly be responsible. As far as I'm aware, no such proof currently exists.
Another option is that the "intelligent" factor/force is operating within the confines of what we currently understand. This brings me to an ultimatum that you had presented earlier: if evolution is not accidental, then it must be intentional and therefore intelligently designed (or something to that effect; I can't remember exactly what is was). I find your use of the word accidental to be very misleading. Would you call it an accident that when I drop something, it is predictably pulled toward the Earth until it strikes the ground? Certainly scientists don't attribute gravity to some form of intelligence, so by your reasoning, it would fall under the category of "accident." Do you understand how ridiculous that sounds? I would not describe something obeying the laws of nature as accidental. I understand that this is merely semantics, but your word choice was obviously designed to load the question and might be indicative of why you think that intelligence must be involved (perhaps the belief that anything which isn't willfully guided by some intelligence is based on random chance).
I wish I had more time to continue this post, but I must wrap it up. I agree with you that evidence seems to point to some unknown guiding "factors" with respect to evolution. However, making the leap that such factors must be directly connected to some form of intelligence is something that I regard as both logically unnecessary and scientifically irresponsible.
--
Edited by Ditches at 05/16/2008 11:44 AM
Ditches, it does sound as if you and I are not far off in our opinions. You see some factors have to be guiding evolution, but you don't see it as intelligent.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAlso, you agree that there must be some sort of force animating matter in living things, but you think it might be one of the four known forces.
First let me say that it absolutely boggles my mind that the Materialists DON'T think there is a force animating matter in living things. Kinda makes you wonder of they had noticed that some of us MOVE once in a while.
Do you have any evidence or reasoning behind your belief that an already known force animates matter? I am open to the possibility to an extent, but I think intelligence is unavoidable on both evolution and animation. Many scientists, including Einstein, believed that the laws of nature are too fine tuned to have been in existence by luck, and therefore they had to have been intelligently designed. Others point to the constant speed of light as evidence of intelligence at work.
I will point out why I feel life's animation, including reproduction and the actions of nucleic acids, are a separate force altogether, which is clearly intelligent. The other forces of nature are 2-dimensional with an attraction pulling two things together in a very uniform way, whether it is functional or not (and it often is).
Life's force(s) is 4-dimensional and multi-faceted. It is able to regulate and pace itself, and it is able to deal with many different situations differently, according to the needs of the organism or of the species.
Moreover, it virtually opposes such forces as gravity and electromagnetism, so if it is these forces at work, they are intelligently altered.
So we will disagree on intelligence versus non-intelligence (you like that better than "accident"?), but I think you are being overly dramatic to call the design inference and the presence of intelligence "logically unnecessary and scientifically irresponsible". If the likeliest scenario, based on the evidence, is that there is intelligence involved in life and life's formation, then it is scientifically irresponsible to state otherwise.
Saying that there may be some other as yet unthought of force at work is a true, but very weak, statement. You could argue against virtually any theory by saying "Yes, but there may be some other wierd factor that nobody has ever thought of, so I will presume your theory is wrong."
I contend that if evidence supports intelligence and your only comeback is that you "might" find some conceivable other explanation some day, you ought to at least admit that, based on what we know now, intelligence is the likeliest scenario we know of. No theory is ever supposed to be written in stone, even one as thouroughly supported in evidence as intelligent design.
Also, even if you DO find a force at work that is non-intelligent, it is still luck that is your creative force. Yes, if gravity causes something to drop from one place to another, it is an accident. If stones randomly falling down a cliff by gravity fall into a pile, it is an accident. If the rocks somehow form a life sized statue of the Fantastic Four's Thing, we may infer design, although you may contend that it is luck. If electromagnetics are unintelligently lining things up just right in our bodies, as another blogger suggested, then it is luck that formed us. It is still an amazingly lucky confluence of just the right forces at work at just the right times. It is still a non-intelligent accident.
I will agree with you on this much. It is one step to recognize that there is a force at work when living things animate. It is yet a step further to identify that force. It is yet another step further to call that force intelligent. Some of you, yourself included apparently, think I am jumping steps, but I assure you I took them painstakingly one step at a time.
Great post, Ditches. You managed to sum up pretty much my entire point of view (which apparently coincides with yours) on the matter in one concise post. I'm looking forward to Frank's response to it.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFrank M:
>"Pigeon> "It appears we will just have to agree to disagree about the magnitude of the flaws of Darwinian evolution."
>I hope it doesn't stop there. There is much much more than we have touched on so far."
Unfortunately it is going to have to stop there... You keep pointing out flaws in Darwinian evolution, and you give examples, and yet you never provide a source. You keep arguing that I'm ignoring evidence, but I'm not; I'm maintaining a healthy sense of skepticism about evidence that I have never seen for myself and for which I have no reputable source (no offense). I can accept that you have seen evidence that has you convinced, but if you expect me to reach the same conclusions you have, then show me the evidence. Don't summarize it for me. Tell me where I can look at it for myself. I want to see the actual analysis. This is not an unreasonable demand; I understand that it may not be worth it to you to take the time to find all these sources for me, but if that is the case then please don't expect me to reach your conclusions based on word of mouth.
>"No, you have to throw out all references to "selection" which has nothing to do with probabilities of the existence of anything. Calculations are to determine the chance of a new physiological formation, microbiological system, species or even the first life coming into existence"
No, that's silly. Selection has everything to do with it because it [i]increases[/i] the likelihood of a functional, advantageous physiological change to occur. You are correct in that selection is not a 'creative' force. It adds nothing. But by removing the disadvantageous and by encouraging the advantageous, it allows the advantages to build upon one another with few setbacks. Here is an example:
Consider a race of living marbles, living inside a giant centrifuge. At the bottom of the centrifuge is a compactor that destroys any marbles that reach the bottom. Assume their food source falls in at a constant rate from the top of the centrifuge. Now let's say that the original population is just heavy enough that the marbles are kept at a constant height in the centrifuge. Then mutations start to occur; variations in density and size arise. The new marbles that have become bigger and heavier are slowly pushed downwards, while the smaller and lighter ones are pushed upwards. The result is that the smaller and lighter marbles get first dibs on the food - they are always fed. By the time the food gets to the heavier ones, there is less of it of poorer quality, so already the heavier ones are at a disadvantage. As time goes on, extremes in the properties of marbles are present; the extremely heavy and large ones are pushed down so quickly that they are destroyed at the bottom, while the lighter ones are pushed well above their original height, approaching the top of the centrifuge. The result is that the 'heavy' mutation doesn't catch on - the marbles that are heavy don't survive long enough to reproduce significantly for lack of food and for their limited life time due to their quick rate of descent toward the compactor. On the other hand, the light marbles are all the way at the top of the centrifuge and have become so numerous that no food reaches even the normal marbles!
The result is that from the start the disadvantaged (heavy marbles) are unlikely to survive long or reproduce. By the end of this scenario, even the marbles that had no disadvantage (the normal marbles) died off, because the advantaged (lighter) marbles consumed all the food. Selection makes a huge difference in the probability of advantageous physiological changes. The only mathematical studies on the matter with which I'm familiar with suffer from what has become known as [url http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoyle%27s_fallacy]Hoyle's Fallacy[/url]: the major problem is that they look at the probability of a modern specimen, protein, or other biological structure forming as the product of purely random chance. That is not at all accurate, as I hope my example above displays. Click the link for details.
Think of the development of a limb, for example. Even a stub could be advantageous; it could be used as a weapon or crude tool. Two stubs could be used as a rudimentary grasping tool. As the stubs become more dextrous, their ability to hold objects, move or climb become increased. As the population of a species with this advantageous formation grows, they compete with the rest of their species for food, shelter and mates - and they will likely get the most food, best shelter and reproduce more. The result is that these preliminary formations spread, and as they change slightly and over time develop into something more complex.
And the probability of the first life coming into existence is entirely irrelevant, as it is not within the scope of the theory of Darwinian evolution.
>"The factors that are as yet unknown all make Darwinist evolution even less viable. All reproduction requires unexplained matter movement and we have no idea how matter can obey a DNA code, especially in terms of 3 dimensional spacial navigation."
I don't even know what these is supposed to mean. "Unexplained matter movement?" "3 dimensional spacial navigation?" What?! We have never, [i]ever[/i] seen physical evidence of matter that does not follow the path of minimal action (for an explanation of what I mean be action, go [url http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Action_%28physics%29]here[/url]. Biological systems are extremely complicated, so verifying that biological systems likewise obey this principle would be an extraordinarily daunting task; but that is no evidence that they in fact disobey this principle.
Every time you mention anything about unexplained matter animation, you lose my attention. We have never observed dynamics that could not be accounted for by the four natural forces. The nature of thought remains a mystery, and maybe it is true that our thought and intelligence constitute a fifth force - but this has never been observed; even positing the existence of such a force is poor science at this point. Unless it is conclusively determined that the other four forces can in no way be responsible for observations, and that there is no revision that can be made to our current formulation of them to account for these observations, it will continue to be a vapid claim. If we tried to explain away every complicated phenomenon we have ever observed, or every phenomenon that appeared to contradict the current paradigm, by adding a new fundamental force, the field if physics would be worthlessly convoluted. The only time such an action is valid is if all other options have been exhausted. The application of physics to biological systems is such a new field that I can assure you that little if anything has been exhausted.
>"I'll get into why the probabilities against beneficial traits and formations are so prohibitive in another message, but I will say that your excuse that it "can't" be mathematically evaluated for sufficiency is a cheap attempt to dodge facts."
And your sourceless claims positing "impossible odds" are merely cheap attempts at avoiding discussion. If you cannot backup your claims, then I am going to ignore them.
>"Pigeon> "It is a reasonable prediction based on the tenets of Darwinian evolution that happens to be observed in nature.
>Darwinian evolution has never been observed in nature. Tests have shown artificial selection (not natural), but that is hardly earth-shattering."
This is just disingenuous. If you require, I am sure that I can produce innumerable research papers claiming otherwise. I hope by "artificial selection" you do not mean environmental stimuli introduced by experimenters, because there is really no meaningful difference between a stimulus introduced by nature vs. a stimulus introduced by man.
>"The advantaged creature populates, while the not-so-lucky ones become extinct because they didn't get the mutation. This has never been seen to happen in nature."
It happens in humanity all the time. People with weak hearts, sickle cell anemia or epilepsy? Black people and caucasians? Only recently with the advent of modern medicine have people with the three previous deficiencies reproduced often (with sickle cell anemia sometimes being an exception, as it provides some defense against malaria). Why do you think natives of Africa and other equatorial regions dark-skinned while natives of northern regions are lighter skinned? Because dark skin provides protection against extreme sun exposure, while lighter skin allows the body to function healthily in darker regions. According to your argument the offspring of caucasians in equatorial regions should be darker skinned than their parents, and the offspring of darker-skinned parents in darker areas should become lighter-skinned over time. African Americans have existed in the United States for over 500 years, and yet the only reason any of their descendants have lighter skin is due to genetic mixing with caucasians (there are obviously exceptions, which is to be expected in any statistical scenario).
>"Extinctions are usually caused by climate change, famine, disease or other catastrophes. They kill all levels of the food chain from fittest to least fit. Then the climate changes again and where does that leave our supposed progressive evolution of luck and foul weather turning dirt into peacocks?"
I'm having difficulty following this train of thought. Care to expound?
>"Moreover, "natural selection" has nothing to do with the creation of a creature or physiology in the first place. Attempts to keep tossing survival into the equation are a distraction from whatever the true creative force is."
Correct, and I agree that our understanding of the fundamental creative drive behind evolutionary development might be incomplete, and possibly even downright wrong. However, I have never seen evidence that has made me rule out every possible explanation for this that is expressible through the current forces we know. Therefore, I see no reason to posit the existence of an intelligence force.
>"First, remember that "selection" isn't a positive force "encouraging" upgrades, as you say. It merely means that something lived long enough to reproduce. It is a circular tautology to say that "selection" means that you lived, therefore the reson we live is "selection"."
Now you are the one displaying ignorance of the opposition's stance. You are the only one saying that. The rest of us are saying that environmental stimuli acts as a filter for which changes pass on through the generations and which don't. The final outcome is irrelevant.
>"I mentioned the quintillions upon quintillions of messy, incongruous blobs and you, true to form, used "selection" as an offset. In contemporary evolution, however, we can see for ourselves if the messy blobs are really happening by the quintillions or rarely happening at all."
How many children are born with immunodeficiencies vs. unusually strong immune systems? How many children are born with dysfunctional vestigial limbs vs. the number of children born with a second set of fully functional arms that comes with no adverse side effects? I think we see far more disadvantageous or unhelpful physiological changes in newborn children than children with inexplicable immunities to diseases and viruses, unusually high muscle density, or what have you. My impression is that there [i]are[/i] far more messy mutations than advantageous ones.
>"Researchers need to do a MUCH better job of tracking the fates of those who did not get the genetic upgrades and what percentage of total births are getting so lucky. Tests need to be done that clearly eliminate selection so we can see what the genetics are really doing, without the "selection": complication."
I wouldn't argue against this, but I'd also like to point out that any meaningful study on evolution requires a statistically significant population, which is usually an enormous number. Therefore, keeping track of this information is a logistical nightmare, if even possible.
>"Human evolution eliminates selection, although Darwin predicted it wouldn't. As Richard Dawkins laments, humans protect the lives of the weak and disadvantaged. Yet we gain about an inch a century in height during the past half millenium. "
Just because we protect the weak and disadvantaged (to some extent) does not mean they are as likely to reproduce. Maybe one or both of the sexes are, in general, more attracted to taller people, and thus the tall gene is passed on more frequently than the short gene. Likewise, it is well known that human development is [i]hugely[/i] affected by environmental considerations, such as diet. It is completely conceivable to me that more people are receiving enough of the requisite nutrients and vitamins for development every century. Food has, after all, become much more widely available throughout most of the world with the passage of time.
>"Toes have been getting far more genetically shriveled since the invention of covered tip shoes."
Is this genetic or developmental? If no study on the actual genetics behind it has been carried out, then no conclusion can be made from this. Animal development (including humans) is not exclusively determined by genes.
>"Also, if you are one of those who believes, like the Materialists, that instincts and inherited behaviors are random chance genetic errors, you will find multiple test studies on domesticated animals and other learned behavior that is handed down in two generations or so. See the Discovery Channel's work with wolves."
I am aware of such studies, though not of the details. I don't know exactly how instinct and behavior are handed down through the generations. In the specific study you mention involving wolves, is the behavior taught to the young generation, or do they genuinely inherit it? If the young wolves were separated from the older generations at birth, would they still exhibit this behavior? Even if the answer is yes, I think there is a lot we don't understand about animal and human intelligence and behavior, including instinct. It wouldn't surprise me if some behaviors can be passed genetically, others developmentally, and others taught.
>"For example, the vertebrates all got eye sockets -two of them in practically the exact same location on the head - all at once. Carnivorous plants developed simultaneously as four separate species (more like 600 now), despite the need for thousands of bits of information to align just right - at astronomically impossible odds for each line."
First, how do you define simultaneously? The Cambrian explosion was a period of tens of millions of years, and our ability to place rocks and fossils and all other evidence is not very precise going back that far. Four separate carnivorous plant species developing in 10 or 20 million years (or more) doesn't sound so far fetched, especially if they developed from a common ancestor, or each other. Your argument that thousands of bits of information needed to have aligned just right, therefore it didn't happen by chance, is fallacious. Their genes could have arranged in innumerable possible ways, yes - but they couldn't have occurred in every possible way; it is entirely possible that life [i]could[/i] have been extraordinarily different than it was/is. But there can only be one state of life on this planet at any given time - therefore one state will exist, and all the other possibilities will not. It is only chance that humans, and dogs and mice and elephants and pigeons and iguanas, exist today.
I am aware that the pace of diversification during the Cambrian explosion dwarfs that of any other period on Earth, but after doing a little research on the matter I've come across sine explanations that are believed to offer significant insight. It appears to be widely accepted that ecological reasons are capable of generating significant diversity in short periods of time, especially during the early stages of diversification of life. If this is true, then the remaining problem is to determine why the Cambrian explosion occurred when it did. Now, I can't judge the validity of these claims for myself, so I don't ask you to take my word for it, but I will point you [url http://arjournals.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev.earth.33.031504.103001?journalCode=earth]here[/url] and [url http://www.jstor.org/pss/3515182]here[/url]. I know you are going to spout your statistics again, but unless and until you provide a reputable source, that means nothing to me.
>"Worse yet, it goes back and forth, as the climate changes. And we are talking about a very specific seed-shaped beak size that requires a huge amount of detailed genetic information bits."
Really? This runs contrary to my experience. I was at the Galapagos Islands some 10 years ago, and everything I was told was that the finch species remained separated on the different islands, and essentially unchanged from their discovery during the Voyage of the Beagle. I was told this by our guide, who was a renowned local ecologist. Additionally, the climate is not particularly different on the separate islands... They are not very far from each other, only far enough so that the small birds cannot move from one to the other.
>"Pigeon> "Do you know if any research beyond mere observation of this has been done?"
>The Darwinists aren't looking for failure. They are looking for success and funding. They crow about the "mountains of evidence" for evolution, which few seriously contest since the days of the Scopes trial."
Seems to me like the Scopes trial is a straw man. The law that was challenged forbade the teaching of "any theory that denies the Divine Creation of man as taught in the Bible, and to teach instead that man has descended from a lower order of animals." Intelligent Design proposes the latter, just like Darwinian evolution.
And anyways, your response makes no sense. By observing parallel and almost immediate evolution in animals, it would appear that they have found evidence contradicting Darwinian evolution - therefore it would be an obvious watershed breakthrough in favor of Darwinian evolution if they could discover the mechanism behind it, consistent with accepted theory. Additionally, scientists need not look for failure to find it. If a scientist who looks for confirmation only ever finds confirmation, then chances are it's because the theory is damn good - otherwise it would probably not have predicted so many things so accurately.
>"Bear in mind that my main point on evolution is that it is done by intelligent genetics and mostly I get ridiculed because such a thing as intelligent genetics is seen as impossible. Yet here we see it happening in a unicellular being."
The above was regarding genetic sharing between bacteria besides reproduction. My understanding was that bacteria don't get together and decide which pieces of each other's DNA would be most advantageous for the other - if that were true then bacteria would rule the planet. What I learned was that bacteria have the ability to inject random (although for all I know there might be some restrictions) sequences of their own DNA into another nearby bacterium. No intelligence involved.
>"Bacteria do send out a distress signal, sensing that they need an upgrade, and a buddy who somehow seems to know they have the needed DNA comes to the rescue."
I have never heard this claim before, and I even just asked my biologist housemate and she said that such a phenomenon is news to her. Can you provide a source confirming that this does indeed occur?
>"To assume that we can see and detect all functions is more than a little optimistic."
That is essentially the point I've been trying to make to you. Simply because we have not yet been able to determine all of the rules that might apply to unguided evolution, or all the mechanisms through which it occurs, does not require the necessity of some form of intelligent guide. You use [i]every single fault[/i] associated with Darwinian evolution as incontrovertible, decisive evidence against it; when it could just as easily be that we do not yet know enough about the system or it's rules.
>"Even if they are junk, then it is odd that this particular encoded information is ignored, yet all non-junk DNA is obeyed at all costs. So proteins know which ones to ignore?"
Protein doesn't know anything, if you ask me. From what I remember of biology, the only association I recall DNA and proteins having, besides protein that actively affects DNA such as for replication purposes, is that DNA provides the template for the structure of proteins, and the proteins are synthesized via rRNA. Protein performs the function that is completely determined by its structure, which is defined in the DNA.
>"If the vast majority has no waste at all, it isn't much of a case to point at such a tiny amount of "waste" that is probably not waste anyway."
What evidence do you have that some of what we call junk DNA probably isn't waste, other than that we have discovered functions behind some DNA previously considered junk? The assumption that if some junk DNA isn't really junk, then no junk DNA is really junk, is as flawed a logical statement you could make. And yes, even a tiny amount of waste is still a fairly large case. Why would an intelligence so capable that it can guide single-celled organism to form large, complicated organisms such as humans which display intelligence of their own, make needless changes to purposeless DNA? Why would it even need DNA in the first place? Why can't it just push all the necessary atoms together to form the necessary molecules, and then push the molecules around to do whatever is needed? If no hypothesis can be made that predicts verifiable mechanisms through which evolution is guided, then it really isn't much of a hypothesis - just an insightful, yet unhelpful, guess.
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Edited by Pigeon at 05/16/2008 11:09 PM
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Edited by Pigeon at 05/16/2008 11:22 PM
Frank M:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this>"First let me say that it absolutely boggles my mind that the Materialists DON'T think there is a force animating matter in living things. Kinda makes you wonder of they had noticed that some of us MOVE once in a while."
This statement kinda makes me wonder if you have ever noticed that rocks MOVE once in a while. The only difference is that we possess self-awareness and, as far as we can tell, the rock doesn't. Nonetheless, the forces responsible for the motion of rocks is electromagnetism. My opinion is that the most likely force responsible for our own motions are, likewise, the four natural forces - in this case almost exclusive the electromagnetic (strong force only holds together atomic nuclei, the weak force likewise is likewise almost exclusively relevant to the nuclei, the strength of gravitational forces is negligible compared to electromagnetic). Again I concede that we don't understand our own intelligence - maybe it is a manifestation of a yet undiscovered fifth force of nature. However, I think it is just as likely, if not more so, that it is a result of the rules of electromagnetism on an extremely complicated physical system (the body).
Basically, motion does not require intelligence. The fact that we can move does not imply the presence of intelligence. Yes, it appears that we cause ourselves to move, but in order to move ATP must be burned, and energy expended, in order for our bodies to seemingly move unprompted. I think it would be the ultimate expression of beauty if the rules of the four natural forces are capable of conspiring to create intelligence. Conversely, I think it would be extremely ungainly for the intelligence to simply be the result of intelligence.
>"Do you have any evidence or reasoning behind your belief that an already known force animates matter?"
Personally I think the best evidence is that we have not ever conclusively observed any matter doing anything except as the result of the application of one of the four forces to it. We also know that our bodies utilize electric fields to a huge extent. We understand the interactions of chemicals and molecules within the framework of electrostatic interactions. The atoms in our bodies are held together by electrostatic bonds, and likewise the cells in our bodies. Intelligence isn't holding our atoms together, it isn't holding our cells together, it isn't whispering into the ears of proteins telling them what to do or where to go. I see no reason to assume that it is responsible for the large-scale dynamics of our bodies if it has never been observed in the small-scale dynamics which cooperate to result in the large-scale motions we observe.
>"Many scientists, including Einstein, believed that the laws of nature are too fine tuned to have been in existence by luck, and therefore they had to have been intelligently designed."
First, the fine-tuning problems in physics are some of the most active research topics at the moment, and are usually cited by physicists as evidence that our formulation is incomplete. NOTE: This does not mean they believe we are missing a force, but rather something more like the theory of relativity, which merely modified the forces already known (although a missing force is always possible). Secondly, Einstein did not believe that the laws of nature had to have been intelligently designed in the [i]least[/i]. He believed that the laws of nature are, for lack of a better word, God. He believed that the universe is merely the expression of the incredibly beautiful natural forces (natural force == natural law), not that these forces must have been designed by anything.
>"Others point to the constant speed of light as evidence of intelligence at work."
The constant speed of light is merely a consequence of the laws of electromagnetism. Maxwell's Equations (the mathematical formulation of the laws of electromagnetism) directly predict the speed at which electromagnetic waves (light) would travel. It is worth noting that Maxwell's Laws do not obey Newtonian relativity, but they do obey Special Relativity - and they predict the same velocity in all reference frames. Using this as evidence of intelligence would be equivalent to using the fact that the speed of sound depends on the density of the medium, or essentially any other physical phenomenon, as evidence for it.
>"The other forces of nature are 2-dimensional with an attraction pulling two things together in a very uniform way, whether it is functional or not (and it often is)."
That is actually blatantly false. The electromagnetic force is not merely attractive or repulsive. The magnetic force actually acts perpendicularly to the vector between any two moving charges and can result in extremely complicated 3 dimensional motion even just between two particles. For example, a moving charged particle entering a constant magnetic field at the right orientation will result in helical motion. Nonetheless, you are correct in saying that the four known forces act in a predictable way defined by a set of rules...
>"Life's force(s) is 4-dimensional and multi-faceted."
What does that mean? Life can cause things to move forwards and backwards in time? Right...
>" It is able to regulate and pace itself, and it is able to deal with many different situations differently, according to the needs of the organism or of the species."
First, all physical forces 'deal with' different situations differently. A charged particle in motion in a magnetic field will be forced into moving in circular patterns, while an electric charge at rest in a magnetic field will remain at rest. The forces merely deal with each situation based on rules governing them; the same would have to be true for any "life force," so I don't see your point.
Even apart from that, this statement is fraught with so many problems from a physics perspective. I don't know if I can adequately explain them because it requires a working knowledge of fairly advanced physics, including rudimentary field theory, but I'll try... The natural forces that we are aware of are the results of the interactions of fields (electromagnetic fields, gravitational fields, etc) with matter and even each other. Now, if a charged particle enters an electromagnetic field and accelerates, then it gains energy and momentum. This energy and momentum must come from somewhere (as both are conserved quantities). It turns out that the fields themselves possess these qualities; electromagnetic fields posses energy, momentum and angular momentum, and every time they act on a charged particle, they impart some of their energy and other properties to said particle.
Now, if this "life force" is capable of regulating itself, then it must be able to act on itself. But this would require a change in these properties, but if it is acting on itself then there is no source for it to come from or go to in order to conserve them. A self-regulating force would necessarily violate at least one conservation law.
And what defines the needs of the organism or species? If a physical force is going to act differently based on the [i]needs[/i] of something, then there must be a physical embodiment of these needs for the force to act on; a force cannot act on or based on an abstract concept.
>"Moreover, it virtually opposes such forces as gravity and electromagnetism, so if it is these forces at work, they are intelligently altered."
I will say it again. [i]There has never been a single observation in any system, including the biological, in which the four known forces of nature have not been adequate to explain the dynamics of a scenario[/i]. There have been observations that have led to revisions of these forces, but no evidence in physics that the natural forces themselves, regardless of our formulations of the, are inadequate.
Your statement is also nonsensical. First, you qualify "opposes" with the word "virtually," which means that it might appear to oppose them but doesn't really. Secondly, if the forces are intelligently altered, then they must have been altered by some form of intelligence that is independent of those forces, and thus some sort of physical or supernatural intelligence must have done the altering and you are back to where you started, which is based on false assumptions and ignorance of physics combined with a healthy sense of wonder, philosophizing and critical thinking.
>"but I think you are being overly dramatic to call the design inference and the presence of intelligence "logically unnecessary and scientifically irresponsible"."
It really isn't being dramatic, it is being scientific. The only time a paradigm shift has ever occurred, or should ever occur, is when there is no way to account for a phenomenon within the current scientific framework. This does [i]not[/i] mean that if at any given point we don't understand a phenomenon, or an aspect of it, we should just turn around and rework all of physics. Essentially all possibilities must be exhausted within the current framework before it should be abandoned for something else - and there must be enough evidence for whatever new framework is imposed that it can actually be expanded upon into something useful. So far, there is no reason within the context of physics to abandon all hope that the four known forces are sufficient to account for biological systems. Likewise, whatever evidence there may be for some sort of intelligent force is so vague, so poorly defined, that it provides absolutely no hints or ideas of where to start, or how to begin formulating a theory about it. That is why it would be both unnecessary and scientifically irresponsible - it would result in the needless convolution of our formulation of the natural laws.
>"If the likeliest scenario, based on the evidence, is that there is intelligence involved in life and life's formation, then it is scientifically irresponsible to state otherwise."
A physicist can believe that there is intelligence involved in life and its formation, but if he/she has no idea or where or how to begin to put it into a physical framework then he has absolutely no place trying to call it physics. Even if there exists biological evidence that such a life force exists, evidence for it in the context of physics must be found before it can be treated as physics (and I hope you will agree that the natural forces falls under the domain of physics, and not the other scientific fields).
>"You could argue against virtually any theory by saying "Yes, but there may be some other wierd factor that nobody has ever thought of, so I will presume your theory is wrong.""
Oh the irony. You do realize that this is exactly what you are doing with the notion of a separate life force, right? You are saying, "Oh, maybe these complex dynamics that we don't completely understand are due to this weird life force, even though it has never been shown that the other forces are inadequate."
>"I contend that if evidence supports intelligence and your only comeback is that you "might" find some conceivable other explanation some day, you ought to at least admit that, based on what we know now, intelligence is the likeliest scenario we know of."
I would agree if I agreed with your presuppositions. However I contend that the intelligence perceived to be responsible for guiding and and animating life is merely the result of the laws of the four natural forces conspiring together in a staggeringly complex system to form such complex and ordered dynamics that we have a hard time believing that there isn't something deeper behind it. Therefore, I don't admit that intelligence is the likeliest scenario.
>"If electromagnetics are unintelligently lining things up just right in our bodies, as another blogger suggested, then it is luck that formed us."
Well yes, ultimately everything is due to some degree of luck. There is no rule book that comes with the universe that states "Humans must exist!" We do exist though, and thus we are "lucky" to exist - there is no reason why humans or life at all to exist, just as there is no reason for stars or planets or black holes or hydrogen to exist, other than the rules of the universe resulted in their existence. It is [i]rules[/i] that formed us. The insertion of rules into chaos will inevitably result in order (as I think Sologos pointed out).
>"It is one step to recognize that there is a force at work when living things animate. It is yet a step further to identify that force. It is yet another step further to call that force intelligent. Some of you, yourself included apparently, think I am jumping steps, but I assure you I took them painstakingly one step at a time."
I have no doubt that you took the steps slowly and with great consideration. However, based on this discussion I also have no doubt that some of your steps were taken despite a lack of understanding of the scientific method and some of the relevant science (namely physics).
I think creationists fear evolution because that might invalidate belief in God the Creator. Evolution should not illustrate that there is no God, but perhaps, only a different more realistic concept. Natural law does not provide for unnatural stories, as in Genesis,to begin with.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisInterestingly also there is a story in Exodus that illustrates how blood spattered goats evolved into the symbol of evil- Satan the devil et al- another false concept that the fundamentalists hold dearly to.
Natedog, please don't assume that I have been making leaps away from the evidence. I would have to say that my intent from the start has been to look ONLY at evidence and also not to exclude any evidence. To me, Creationists start with "God did it.", Materialists start with "Luck did it." and IDists throw out all pre-conceptions. At least I can say that is my approach.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNatedog> "It appears that you are both looking at the same evidence but arriving at different conclusions."
Yes, that also would be a fair assessment of the entire conflict between ID and Accident. We don't have two separate sets of data. We have two widely different inferences drawn from the observations.
Natedog> "Pigeon appears to concede that intelligent design could be at work but that the evidence does not currently and likely (read: almost certainly) will never be able to support such a claim."
When you say "almost certainly...will never" you are almost as unequivocal as I am. (That was a slam on myself moreso than you, but making a point that there are some overly firm stances on both sides.)
Natedog> "Frank M is claiming to at least partially understand that which cannot possibly be understood given the information available to us while Pigeon maintains a healthy respect for the limits of science and its inability to conclusively answer such a question."
I hear the word "can't" a lot from both you and Pigeon. Yet the history of science is highlighted with hundreds of "can'ts" turned to "cans". Even if it turns out that we truly can't accomplish something, that is no reason to abandon the attempt before trying. Some of your "can'ts" seem very much possible to me.
I think you are the ones trying to leap ahead with your "can'ts". Maybe we can't ever discover the source of life's animating force, it's ability to reproduce, it's ability to think or it's ability to intelligently edit a code. In each of these cases, however, we CAN study the EFFECTS of these forces and learn much more about these forces at work.
Face it, we don't know the cause of nuclear forces, but we didn't let that stop us from acknowledging them and studying them. Why are you so against science that you would discourage inquiry on some very observable movement of matter? Why discourage learning about the effects and apparent properties of animation in life?
Frank> "all unconscious matter movement in living things leads toward the clear intention of keeping living things alive."
Natedog> "Yes, but the desire to live only acts to maintain life, not create it in the first place."
Who says? We don't know that at all. Matter animation is abundant in reproduction and either it always has been, or you have even more missing explanations. How could the first common ancestor have reproduced without animating matter?? Why do you think abiogenesis experiments have failed to create life from non-life? Matter animation ability MUST exist before any reproduction can take place.
(Can I also interject here that it appears that with the word "yes" here, that you agree that an immaterial intelligent force is animating matter in living things keeping us alive? If so, you and I are VERY much in agreement.)
Natedog> "I think it is quite plausable that some of the first life forms may have lacked any form of survival instinct or unconscious intent and subsequently died off."
I see this as highly unlikely and full of holes, but not excluded as a possibility. Mathematically the best odds I have seen of forming even one "replicator" by accident is 1 out 10 to the 650th power, which is statistically impossible. This is for a very simple "replicator" that has been shown in the lab not to replicate at all. This also assumes all planets in the cosmos had the ability to create life in all years since the Big Bang. Now you are suggesting that more than one of them self-created by sheer luck. Do you know how difficult it is to create a polymerase without it dissolving in water? How many of these functional, but lifeless things do you foresee occuring by luck?
The idea that a different mechanism created the first life as compared to what reproduces it now is not fully checked off my list, but you would have to explain this mechanism and then propose a hand-off of mechanisms. What combination of matter supposedly causes consciousness? If intelligence itself is not a sign of intelligence, what is? What caused one of these life forms to go from not caring if it lived or died, to having a survival instinct? What is intinct? Even unicells have it. How can materials create immaterial?
The materials-first approach just leaves too many questions for me, but I will concede you might be right, as there may be a method of reproduction completely different from that which we observe today. You already agreed that immaterial forces animate matter, though, so I have to say that, based on the evidence, immaterial probably came first.
(Switching from Natedog to Eastwood)
Frank> "I see no 'creation' force at all."
Eastwood> "Doesn't that statement support the idea of chance?"
Sorry, the sentence lost its context. I would add ..."in natural selection." to that sentence. I do see a creative force at work, but natural selection can't create anything. Even the famous Darwinist evolutionary scholar William Provine of Cornell admitted before his death that selection is "empty rhetoric" that has no effect whatsoever on evolution. He said it does not modify, adjust or cause anything, and he is absolutely right. It causes death, not life.
Eastwood> "Certainly you can accept that orderly systems can arise from chaos."
Not really. Even what we may think are examples of orderly systems arising from chaos (orbiting planets, orbiting electrons, the water cycle, etc.) are seen by many scientists and mathematicians as requiring fine-tuning that is too mathematically impossible to have occured by luck. I have read some of Einstein's theories on this concept, but I limit my ID opinions to my area of education.
Darwinism goes much further toward assuming that we got lucky breaks that turned randomness into complex and functional information. In Darwinist evolution, the "luck" just keeps on happening, millions upon millions of times. So even if you are right that we could get one lucky shot out of infinity, I reject the notion that we can continue to defy statistical impossibility on an ongoing predictable basis.
Chaos leads to chaos.
Eastwood> "Science cannot prove the existence of a supernatural force, much less that that force is intelligent."
Science and math CAN prove intelligence to the point of statistical impossibility. They can not prove "supernatural" and I do not recognize "supernatural" agency.
Eastwood> "if there is anything that could constitute evidence in favor of evolution?"
Yes, I think fossil evidence - and more conclusively - DNA evidence has proven evolution beyind any reasonable argument. Moreover, we can observe what is called "microevolution" in progress everywhere and there have even been a few polyploidal examples of speciation.
Eastwood (regarding Creationsim and Materialism)> "So which one are you? (I’m somewhere in the middle.)"
I started as a Darwinist, but found that my theory was lacking in explanatory power and opened my mind. For a long while I was in the middle, as you are. I couldn't put the pieces together until about 15 years after college, when I read Fred Hoyle and his 474 analogy. Shortly after that I heard about ID and everything I had been dead-ending on fit perfectly. I am no longer in the middle.
In Response to Frank M:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSince our last exchange I found one of your posts dated May 10, 1:32 AM (time zone uncertain) that ended up in my blog rather than in this discussion. Although I had not seen all of your arguments at the time of my subsequent post, it would not have changed my responses. I don’t feel that addressing that post now would be helpful. Repost it if you disagree.
In an earlier post Pigeon commented that your use of the word “intelligence†is confusing, and I agree. I have yet to see any distinction between what you propose (intelligence or natural force?) and mainstream ID.
I may also owe you an apology for attributing the flaws of ID directly to you, which isn’t fair. I do have considerable disdain for ID because it is a deliberately misleading campaign, but it would be wrong to transfer that to you by association. I will try harder to use “you†only when I mean you specifically, not when I am referring to ID in general.
Your most recent post confuses some of Pigeon's comments (or maybe Sologos?) for mine. I should not answer for him, but I would add this:
Pigeon wrote> "Certainly you can accept that orderly systems can arise from chaos."
Frank M replied> Not really.[snip]
Sure it can! There are plenty of examples Even Strange attractors in chaos theory exhibit a type of order (but non-repeating). There are [url=http://www.amazon.com/Sync-Order-Emerges-Universe-Nature/dp/0786887214]books[/url] that describe it.
Here is a [url=http://douweosinga.com/projects/archean?signature=3%28gzjk%23Ph%24uZs*JeQEnNiK5GLK%5EN99%26Ze%40wer]web site[/url] with a nice Java tool that demonstrates a simple type of self-organization. Watch the pretty non-random pictures develop from chaos and a few simple rules (some require a few minutes to develop).
Order arises from chaos! (Don't quote thermodynamics 2 at me. Systems can expend energy to gain order.)
The remainder of my response is going to be somewhat long, so I will post it separately later.
On the topic of science as a tool for discovering reality, I had intimated that the conclusions of any particular scientific investigation are skewed by the world view that the scientist believes in as the investigation is conducted. It is not simply theconclusions that are skewed. The data itself is skewed by the worldview.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPigeon took exception tothis and responded,
>"Even the data we collect is biased . One does not go about willy-nllly collecting data. ... The design of the experiment , the technology we use, even the "data" is skewed. Then of course come the conclusion or interpretation, which again demonstrates the world view in which the scientist writes."
'I'm not sure what you mean by the data we collect is biased. If you mean that experiments searching for the existence of the Higgs Boson will only record data in the ~120 GeV range and not in the 10 GeV range sure, but so what? As you said we don't go around willy-nilly collecting data because we can take data much faster than we can analyze it, so what is the point of overwhelming ourselves with data that we don't have the first reason to believe will show anything interesting?
I should preface my answer by saying I am not trying to demonstrate some of the many hidden limitations of science becaue I am aniti-science. I have a point. and I am hopefully going to work to a point that is germaine to the movie and the article in SCIAM. that has spawned this whole discussion that is going on here. I will really only touch on the limitations of science, but hopefully give enough to make the point.
I am not speaking of the limitations set by the tools in our possession, though for sure these tools will limit the outcome. What I am saying is that we look for what we hypothesize to be the case, and we hypothesize according to what our worldview is. This, of course, is done to determine whether the hypothesis is true or false. But there are larger underlying assumptions that we make, that makeup our world view. We expect for example, that the law of cause and effect will be in operation. It is also a basic assumption of the method that only the variables which one is trying to investigate will be varied, and the effects or data we collect will reflect that etc etc.
Now,it is apparent, given the ever changing face of scientific explanation, that our experimental design must be flawed not simply in that we are making asumptions that are either incomplete or entirely incorrect. That's OK, because, as you say, the process is iterative. This does not make the process useless, only temporary.
The point, however, is that we never really get closer to REALITY, just because we achieve a degree of predictabiltiy within our assumed world view. It is for some genius who will "see" it entirely differently, and usher us into to a new way of seeing. Now the mop up process begins again, and we use this new world view to design an experiment whose data will , in turn, be limited by our view. I am only stating what we all know, that the world view that one will see from our shoulders tomorrow will be different, and our discoveries will take their place with the rest of the history of science, (with, incidenta)lly, a shelf time whose half life seems to be becoming smaller with every turn of the wheel.
Great!, you say. We are getting to know the universe better. Well that is not really true. All we get are approximations that comport to the way we are looking. I'm not suggesting we do away with the process because of all this. It has served us well. Just understand it's limits. Unfortunately, as a society, we are not. Let me explain.
OK, so we may not be getting this illusive reality. What's the big deal. Mankind is benefiting, what need have we for truth? We may not have a lock on reality, but we certainly coming up with technologies that seem to prove to the lay man that science must really know what they are talking about. So, we should believe them when they define the realm of science. Furthermore,all sorts of institutions of society look to science, for guidance as to what is "TRUE". Science is assuming a role among the other institutions that guess who assumed in the middle ages.
We have been talking about assumptions, right or wrong, complete or incomplete, that paint our world view, which in turn formulates our scientific inquiry. But the most fundamental assumption in our methodology is that there is no non-natural or supernatural component operative. Is it any wonder, that the data is not found that might suggest supernatural influence, If there be any possibility that a supernatural activity may be suggested or indicated by the experiment, the rules of our methodology compel us to dismiss this as impossible. The constraint of the investigatory proceedure is that one must always look for a naturalistic explanation. and as often a not, one finds one! And so we say "There, you see, there is no need for God in science, and if He is somehow in here, it is not for us to inquire." There are many scientists, I reckon in the atheist camp, for this very reason. It is sort of an occupational hazard.
The Dover decision that was basically settled not so much on its scientific information, as Nova would have us believe by a clever dramatization of the court case, but by the issue of separation of church and and state. But the final(I promise) kicker is that this was not separation of church and state. This was separation of God and state using science as the final court of appeal
I fragmented Pigeon's answer. He went on,
Yes, it means that we might miss things, but that is why science is an iterative process. We build on what we know generation after generation, and the reasonable hope is that it will become more and more comprehensive with time.
This is my point, "comprehensive" is only an illusion.Every answer we come up with only opens ten more questions.
Pigeon goes on to defend the process on aq global level quite reasonably,
The dangerous part is not the experiment design, recorded data or technology used, but the interpretation. Interpretation can definitely be subjective, and can definitely be affected by the investigator's preconceptions. This is somewhat mitigated by the fact that 1) an entire community attempts to interpret the same data in different ways, and 2) that we require hypotheses to predict other phenomena. If we believe we observe one thing predicted by a hypothesis but nothing else, the first thing that will be done is to redo the one successful experiment and analyze it much more carefully. Nonetheless, scientists are people, people are flawed, and thus science, especially new science, needs to be looked at with caution.
You have spoken well, but caution cannot solve human flaws, nad the science it taints, only, as you say, mitigate it. Why should something so flawed dictate our educative and research institutions? This argument strikes deeper, and the resistance more fundamental that the rejection of all the other paradigm shifts in the history of science..
As a continuation of the previous entry, Pigeon writes,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPersonally I think faith has no lock on reality. Faith is a series of inherently indisputable inferences made by an individual based on life experiences and observations. The best reason I can give for why it has no lock on reality is the following: there are more than 6 billion people on this planet, and many of them have faith in different things. There are three major monotheistic religions in the world - Christianity, Judaism and Islam - with numerous denominations of each, not to mention other faiths such as Hinduism and Buddhism. Then there are deists, and pantheists and atheists. The members of each of those faiths believes just as strongly in their own as the others do in theirs, and few if any of them are actually compatible with one another. Jews believe the Torah was written by God, Christians believe the Old and New Testaments were, Muslims believe only the Qur'an was; as far as I know Hindus and Buddhists don't believe any texts were written by their gods, though I could be wrong. A theist believes in only their own god, and none of the others; and atheist adds that theist's god to that list - not a very big difference, is it? With so many conflicting faiths, it cannot logically have a lock on reality.
We are not talking about one particular faith or religion when we speak of a spiritual basis for the material world. The only faith (religion?) that does not believe this is atheistic reductionism.
Pigeon moreover believes,
Science, however, is based on (relatively) objective observations of the natural world, deals only with that which can be repudiated, and functions based on a common framework among all scientists
Right, all following the same paradigm, all agreeing on the validity of the parqdigm while disagreeing on the details of its unction.
; it has no place for personal feelings, intuitions or experiences. Also, I don't see how faith mitigates dangers presented by science.
Whence came the notion that we can depend on an intelligible order. Whence came the value of honesty and integrity in our investigative reporting?
But the biggest problem of separating physics from metaphysics, is by what measure do we decide the direction technology will be allowed to go. Who will regulate science, the scientists? They are neutral about technology. Make the best bomb, clone humans, manipulate whatecver we can. Do it for science.
Perhaps faith and science have a lot more in common than we might think. Thee is a mutual informing that can and should take place. Science informs faith when its interpretation of scripture doesn't allow for heliocentrism. Fauth informs science by reminding it that you can''t have something without it being created.(Yes, I know that I haven't persuaded you yet that something is infinitely less likely than nothing)
To be honest I think it exacerbates them! The vast majority of conflict in the world occurs when conflicting faiths collide, and those are the greatest opportunities for the ugly aspect of science to come forward.
It is not differences of faiths that causes the trouble. it is people. It happens with atheistic regimes, and with political social and economic partisanship.
In respose to Frank M, where the referenced quote was my own.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEastwood> "Science cannot prove the existence of a supernatural force, much less that that force is intelligent."
FrankM> Science and math CAN prove intelligence to the point of statistical impossibility. They can not prove "supernatural" and I do not recognize "supernatural" agency.
You lost me here, and I don't think you typed what you meant to type. Are you saying that an intelligence (designer) is a statistical impossibility? Your previous arguments mention that it must exist because the probability of natural selection occurring randomly seems small. Did you change your mind?
I will continue on the point of “statistical impossibilityâ€, because that point should be addressed.
There is a misconception that a small probability disproves a hypothesis. Statistical likelihoods are ALWAYS very small. They represent the probability of a single outcome out of all possible outcomes allowed under the hypothesis. If your data is more extreme (less likely) than almost all other possible outcomes under the hypothesis being considered, then you have some evidence that the hypothesis is false. A small number by itself means nothing.
Therefore whatever you meant to say about intelligence, design, and statistical probability, I strongly suspect it will not lead to a valid statistical inference. A common ID argument is to point out some vanishingly small number, claim it is proof of what cannot be, and proclaim ID as given truth. You appear to be making the same error (but perhaps to a lesser degree). Sorry, but that is not how it is done.
I wrote considerably more about the correct methods, but perhaps it is not really necessary or relevant. Unless you insist, I will spare you the lecture in statistics (or maybe hold it back as a threat. ;-) ).
One more:
Eastwood wrote (regarding Creationsim and Materialism)> "So which one are you? (I’m somewhere in the middle.)"
Frank M> I started as a Darwinist, … [snip] ... I am no longer in the middle.
Which implies you are on the Creation side? I recognize that you believe ID is not Creation, but there is a recent court decision ([url=http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10545387/]Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District[/url]) that concluded otherwise.
In any case, I wish you had said so a lot early. You could have said “God/Designer/Force did itâ€, I could have said “Fine, but I’ll keep looking anywayâ€, and we both could have saved a lot of time. I assume you are aware that many people believe Creation AND accept evolution?
Frank M:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this>"Face it, we don't know the cause of nuclear forces, but we didn't let that stop us from acknowledging them and studying them."
We do know the cause of the nuclear forces (when I use 'know' in the context of science, it is not to be taken to be absolute). Once Rutherford showed beyond a reasonable doubt that atoms consist of an incredibly dense, positively charged nucleus, that indeed was powerful evidence for the existence of the nuclear strong force. True, we didn't know what caused it, but here are two differences between this scenario and your proposed intelligence. The first is that this indirect evidence still inferred quite a lot about the nature of the force - we knew it had to be much stronger than electromagnetism, that it had to be a purely attractive force, and yet have an incredibly short range of operation (or the universe would be one big black hole). The second is that it also immediately predicted that there are other properties of matter, other than the standard mass and charge, because if this new force were due to either of the above then we would observe its effects in many other scenarios - which wasn't the case.
The evidence for the existence of some sort of intelligence force is that some aspects of matter appear to be guided by something that some people, for no robust reason (as far as physics is concerned), are convinced cannot be due to the other four forces. This vague, ill-defined notion provides nothing like the immediately necessary conclusions and predictions drawn from the nature of atomic structure. It gives us absolutely zero to work with - any attempt to formulate this force in the context of physics would be wild guesswork.
>"Why are you so against science that you would discourage inquiry on some very observable movement of matter? Why discourage learning about the effects and apparent properties of animation in life?"
I don't discourage any of that at all. I discourage jumping to conclusions, which you have done by unilaterally deciding, despite complete ignorance of physics beyond perhaps the high school level (this is not meant as an insult), that the four known forces are incapable of resulting in the either the macroscopic or microscopic behavior of matter in living systems. If you don't understand why this is jumping to conclusions, I suggest you reread the relevant sections of my last few posts. If you still don't understand and wish to understand, or wish to convince any physicist that you aren't jumping to conclusions, then I suggest you get a degree in the field.
>"Mathematically the best odds I have seen of forming even one "replicator" by accident is 1 out 10 to the 650th power, which is statistically impossible. This is for a very simple "replicator" that has been shown in the lab not to replicate at all. This also assumes all planets in the cosmos had the ability to create life in all years since the Big Bang."
Here you go with your silly numbers again. Seriously, how many times do I have to ask for citations before you will either give up posting worthless numbers or actually follow through? And I don't mean a book by some guy - I want to see an actual paper outlining the assumptions made and the calculations carried out. Anything else is sensationalism.
>"Do you know how difficult it is to create a polymerase without it dissolving in water? How many of these functional, but lifeless things do you foresee occuring by luck?"
This is called Hoyle's Fallacy. The probability of a modern polymerase forming from nothing in a petri dish all at once is not what is proposed by Darwinian evolution, which proposes that modern polymerases are the result of innumerable small changes made over millions of years.
>"The idea that a different mechanism created the first life as compared to what reproduces it now is not fully checked off my list, but you would have to explain this mechanism and then propose a hand-off of mechanisms."
The hand-off mechanisms are obvious. First there was no life for Darwinian evolution to apply, and then there was. Simple as that. We don't know the cause of life, and hopefully this will change. However, this being used as evidence against evolution would be like using the existence of gravity as evidence against the existence of electromagnetism.
>"What combination of matter supposedly causes consciousness?"
Good question, and plenty of people in the world are waiting on the answer. Just because we don't know something (in this case we don't know it because the relevant systems are extremely complicated - not because science or scientists are failing us), however, is not a reason to radically alter the fundamental formulation of physics.
>"How can materials create immaterial?"
I don't understand the relevance. It appears that you're assuming that this intelligence force is capable of creating the 'immaterial.' But if this intelligence is merely a fifth force of nature, why are you so opposed to the other forces being responsible for what we consider 'immaterial'?
>"Even the famous Darwinist evolutionary scholar William Provine of Cornell admitted before his death that selection is "empty rhetoric" that has no effect whatsoever on evolution."
I just spent 15 minutes searching for this online, but came up with nothing. From everything I found, William Provine seems to have been a staunch supporter of Darwinian evolution until the day he died. Could you provide a link?
>"He said it does not modify, adjust or cause anything, and he is absolutely right. It causes death, not life."
And you are consistently ignoring the importance of that function, despite it being explained to you god knows how many times. You accused me earlier of dodging your questions by refusing to discuss evidence. Now you are completely ignoring significant portions of posts so that you can continue to say the same thing over and over again and hope that it'll eventually sink into our minds after reading it enough.
>"Not really. Even what we may think are examples of orderly systems arising from chaos (orbiting planets, orbiting electrons, the water cycle, etc.) are seen by many scientists and mathematicians as requiring fine-tuning that is too mathematically impossible to have occured by luck."
Again, you are wading into deep waters without knowing how to swim. Orbiting electrons is not at all a fine-tuning problem, and neither are orbiting planets (I know nothing about the water cycle so I can't comment on that). Electron and planetary orbits (and stellar orbits, and galactic orbits, etc) are systems in relatively stable equilibrium. Your examples are not at all examples of fine-tuning problems. Real fine-tuning problems are, for example, the 'hierarchy problem' (why is gravity so much weaker than the other forces?), the strong CP problem, the cosmological constant, etc. Those have nothing to do with order arising from chaos, however.
And besides, I don't think that anyone here is claiming that order is going to arise from pure chaos (although in a large enough chaotic system it can be highly likely for order to arise in isolated regions). I, and I think others, are arguing that if you apply rules to a chaotic system, order can and often will arise. This has been shown in computer simulations, and the fact that there exists order in our otherwise chaotic universe provides further evidence.
>" In Darwinist evolution, the "luck" just keeps on happening, millions upon millions of times."
But you are assuming that each "lucky" event in a whole chain of events was [i]necessary[/i], but that is not at all the case! Take the example of a a simple system with one gene, and every generation that one gene can undergo one of two possible variations. After ten generations, there are 2^10 = 1024 equally probable possible final products - [i]but only one of them will actually occur[/i]. The final result (call it 'result x'), while very improbable, nonetheless had just as high a probability as any other individual final result. You are saying that because 'result x' was so improbable, it must be evidence that something guided the one-gene organism to that final state. Do you see the flaw (do you see it in this example specifically? If you do, but don't think it could apply to evolution, then please tell me why)?
>"...when I read Fred Hoyle and his 474 analogy."
Let me point out [url http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoyle%27s_fallacy]Hoyle's Fallacy[/url] yet another time (I think this makes 3). His analogy is fundamentally flawed.
In an entry addressed to Frank.M. Eastwood DC references the following dialogue:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPigeon wrote> "Certainly you can accept that orderly systems can arise from chaos."
Frank M replied> Not really.[snip]
Sure it can! There are plenty of examples Even Strange attractors in chaos theory exhibit a type of order (but non-repeating). There are books that describe it.
Here is a web site with a nice Java tool that demonstrates a simple type of self-organization. Watch the pretty non-random pictures develop from chaos and a few simple rules (some require a few minutes to develop).
Order arises from chaos! (Don't quote thermodynamics 2 at me. Systems can expend energy to gain order.)
I think many people would equate chaos with randomness, or luck. Chaos both arises from and returns to order, because orderly and well described laws are continuously at work right through the phases in and out of chaos. Some might think that randomness has, embedded within it, some ordering process, but order comes from an ordering potential that is embeded in the attractor. Here, then is a perfect example of how some people would ascribe all that occurs or has occurred or will occur in the universe and , in particular in the origin of the species as the interaction of chance and necessity. It is not randomness or luck. The order is built in to the force itself, and it is the intelligent source of information that runs that particular system. What is fascinating to me, is when we look at such an attractor, say gravity, we only describe it by its constraints. the size of the 2 masses and the distance between them which make it look like a simple dumb rule, but in effect it is an ongoing source of intelligent information. We don't say "Gravity pulls me down", we more correctly say, "Gravity is pulling me down". We use the proressive tense of the verb to indicate an ongoing action. Gravity, furthermore does not run down the way heat does(it is a force not an energy). My question is why not? What is continuosly replenishing this force(or, for that matter, any of the 4 forces) with a continuous supply of order producing (ie. intelligent) and beauty(pretty as you put it) producing ( ie.aesthetic) power. When I put beauty and intelligence together, I am usually referencing an individual rather than a force.
Sologos:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this>"On the topic of science as a tool for discovering reality, I had intimated that the conclusions of any particular scientific investigation are skewed by the world view that the scientist believes in as the investigation is conducted. It is not simply theconclusions that are skewed. The data itself is skewed by the worldview."
I don't know what you mean by this. How can data be skewed? The most common form of data is numbers. The numerical results of an experiment (or at least most experiments) are not subject to the whims of the researcher. What data is [i]recorded[/i] is skewed, but that is an obvious and necessary fact. Experiments are designed to observe something specific - it would be worthless to build a machine that spits out meaningless numbers based on undefined parameters; it would tell us nothing about anything. If that is what you mean, then I agree. If it isn't what you mean, then please explain what you do mean.
>"What I am saying is that we look for what we hypothesize to be the case, and we hypothesize according to what our worldview is. This, of course, is done to determine whether the hypothesis is true or false. But there are larger underlying assumptions that we make, that makeup our world view. We expect for example, that the law of cause and effect will be in operation. It is also a basic assumption of the method that only the variables which one is trying to investigate will be varied, and the effects or data we collect will reflect that etc etc."
Yes, I agree with that for the most part. Your example of cause and effect isn't really apt. We can observe cause and effect. If I let go of a ball, it will fall. No matter how many times I let go of a ball, it will fall. If we perform the same experiment repeatedly and the result is always the same, then it is statistically sound that the result is caused by something (sometimes a stimulus provided in the experiment, sometimes something external). But yes, we do make some base assumptions, and our hypotheses are based on our world views. But our world views are based on observation. Of course it is possible that we are in the Matrix, and the ball dropping when I let go is just an illusion, but that isn't even relevant - because then the rules of nature that we would be trying to discover would be the rules of the Matrix, and the observation that the ball falls is still valid.
>"The point, however, is that we never really get closer to REALITY, just because we achieve a degree of predictabiltiy within our assumed world view. It is for some genius who will "see" it entirely differently, and usher us into to a new way of seeing."
That is partially true, yes. The paradigm shift brought about by Einstein's relativity is a good example. Special Relativity is essentially a correction to Newton's laws. It turned out that we made observations that did not sit well in the assumption that Newton's laws were infallible; then Einstein came up with Special Relativity, which was compatible with all those worrisome observations. However, Newton's laws are still an incredibly good approximation at the relevant scales. The new paradigm [i]reduces[/i] the old paradigm to a special case. Thus I would argue that our understanding of the universe does indeed increase: First we had a theory which accurately described a phenomenon in a special case, then a new theory is proposed which provides a more accurate description of a phenomenon in a more general case, and so on. As the paradigms shift, our ability to predict events in the world becomes more accurate and more general. I consider this to getting closer and closer to reality, although I believe that we can never do more than make an arbitrarily accurate, but inherently imperfect, formulation of reality.
>"I am only stating what we all know, that the world view that one will see from our shoulders tomorrow will be different, and our discoveries will take their place with the rest of the history of science, (with, incidenta)lly, a shelf time whose half life seems to be becoming smaller with every turn of the wheel."
That's somewhat misleading. Upon the advent of a new paradigm, the old isn't merely discarded - it just becomes a special case (and is much simpler to work with when the special case is the relevant case). General Relativity may provide a better explanation of the dynamics of the world than Newton's laws, but I am not going to go through relativistic calculations to determine how long it takes for an apple to fall from a tree - I'll use Newton's laws, the relevant approximation.
>"Great!, you say. We are getting to know the universe better. Well that is not really true. All we get are approximations that comport to the way we are looking. I'm not suggesting we do away with the process because of all this. It has served us well. Just understand it's limits. Unfortunately, as a society, we are not. Let me explain."
I don't know if I agree with this. If we come up with a theory that can predict the dynamics of a system to arbitrary accuracy, then the theory is 'true' (by which I mean true beyond a reasonable doubt, or to a certain degree of accuracy). If a mathematical model describes a system, then it does so regardless of our world view. I agree that all we are doing is approximating reality, but I disagree with you on the impact of our world view on the validity of a mathematical model.
>"So, we should believe them when they define the realm of science."
Yes, you should believe scientists when they define the realm of science. If scientists truthfully tell you that they do not have the knowledge nor the tools to investigate something, you can falsely accuse them of lying, but what purpose does that serve?
>" Furthermore,all sorts of institutions of society look to science, for guidance as to what is "TRUE"."
Well then those institutions are at fault for misunderstanding the nature of science. I think most institutions that rely on science look to it for guidance as to what is [i]likely[/i].
>"Science is assuming a role among the other institutions that guess who assumed in the middle ages."
No it is not. The Church in the middle ages claimed authority based on nothing but their own individual beliefs. Their evidence was words written in books and claims that some supernatural being speaks to them. It's evidence for it being right was that it said i was right. Science as an institution provides answers to questions via a methodical, analytic process. The reasoning behind any and all scientific conclusion is available for anyone to look at and consider for themselves. It is obvious that scientists do not consider their work to be absolute truths or they wouldn't spend their lives trying to expound on current theories. Science makes no claims to have moral high ground, it makes no demands that people accept their theories. To compare it to the Church in the middle ages is simply ignorant and dishonest.
>"But the most fundamental assumption in our methodology is that there is no non-natural or supernatural component operative."
That is a common misconception. Science does not assume that there is no non-natural or supernatural component operative. The only assumption is that science cannot determine the validity of such a claim. HUGE difference.
>" Is it any wonder, that the data is not found that might suggest supernatural influence, If there be any possibility that a supernatural activity may be suggested or indicated by the experiment, the rules of our methodology compel us to dismiss this as impossible. The constraint of the investigatory proceedure is that one must always look for a naturalistic explanation. and as often a not, one finds one!"
The reason why science does not consider the supernatural is that the supernatural can be invoked to answer anything and everything. There are no constraints on what the supernatural can or cannot do, so science would be reduced to nothing.
>"And so we say "There, you see, there is no need for God in science, and if He is somehow in here, it is not for us to inquire.""
If we are capable of explaining a phenomenon without invoking God or the supernatural, then correct - there is no [i]need[/i] for the supernatural to be responsible. It does not mean that it isn't responsible - it could just be acting in ways such that we cannot detect its interference. Many scientists are religious, and many are not. Also, many scientists are extremely skeptical of the notion of the common conception of God (a giant man with a large white beard, which cares about the actions of people, good or bad), but are nonetheless spiritual (take Einstein, Stephen Hawking, etc).
>"This is my point, "comprehensive" is only an illusion.Every answer we come up with only opens ten more questions."
Um, so? Every answer may open up ten more question, but that still means we have one more answer than we used to. The comprehensiveness of our understanding is not measured by how few questions we have, but by how many answers we have. Some might even say that the more questions we have the more comprehensive our understanding is. After all, it is true that an educated physicist will likely have more questions at the end of an advanced physics lecture than, say, a farmer or a politician. Similarly, an english major will likely have more questions at the end of a lecture on the symbolism in a book than, say, a physicist. The more you know about a topic, the easier it is to think of questions that need answering.
>"You have spoken well, but caution cannot solve human flaws, nad the science it taints, only, as you say, mitigate it. Why should something so flawed dictate our educative and research institutions?"
Because however we may have reached the scientific theories that accurately describe our world, the fact is that they accurately describe our world. Faith can serve to explain our world, but the problem is, what faith would you teach? Christianity? Judaism? Islam? Buddhism? Deism? Atheism? Pantheism? Norse or Greek/Roman mythology? These are all faiths, and none is better than the others. Different people have different faiths, and you can never prove a faith wrong. Science, on the other hand, can be proven wrong. The conclusions reached can be analyzed, and the validity can be determined by anyone with the requisite training. There is a major, fundamental difference between the two.
Why should something 'so flawed' dictate our education and research institutions? Didn't we just establish that any endeavor undertaken by humanity will necessarily be flawed? Didn't we also just establish that the scientific method goes a long way in mitigating many of these flaws? By your argument, then, we shouldn't have education or research institutes. We shouldn't even think! We should kill ourselves, because only then will we be free of flaws. Personally, I'd prefer to deal with what we have.
Eastwood, I think somehow I am still confusing you as far as my stance on ID goes. Sorry about attributing your quote to someone else.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEastwood> "Are you saying that an intelligence (designer) is a statistical impossibility?"
No I am saying precisely the opposite. Life could not have been formed by chance. The ID argument IS largely a mathematical one. It is statistically impossible for life to have arisen by luck and it is statistically impossible for it to evolve by luck. Only intelligent agency of some sort explains the existence of life and evolution of life, because by accident it is statistically impossible.
Eastwood> "Your previous arguments mention that it must exist because the probability of natural selection occurring randomly seems small."
Natural selection is nothing more than noting that something lived long enough to reproduce, so by that definition the probability of natural selection is 100%, although it is hardly interesting. The term is extremely misleading, as its true value (however minimal that value is) lies in DE-selection as an explanation as to why some of the more disadvantaged traits do not exist.
Do we ever see a populated species die off because it doesn't have a genetic upgrade that an offshoot species or a microevolved breed of the same species has? Rarely, if ever. I do believe the full storyline of natural selection has happened, even though it is not observed, but it doesn't account for much in the story of evolution.
The statistical impossibility is on the random mutation side of the Darwinian model. There is nothing random about genetics, except when chemical intrusion or radiation affects it. If natural genetics were random, why would radiation victims or drug addicts have different results? Wouldn't it be random versus random? Is one scenario partially random and another a higher degree of randomness? Unless both scenarios (altered by radiation or not altered) are both completely random, then one must conclude that there is a non-random aspect of normal (non-altered) genetic modifications.
Perhaps I can explain this concept with an analogy that can address some of Pigeon's questions as well, because we must understand the difference between "random" and "variations".
Let's say you are driving through suburbia and note that many of the houses are quite similar with small differences, and that all of them have a few characteristics that are uniform, such as the presence of roofs and windows, etc.
The differences between the homes are variations, none of which are random at all. Some may have porches or basketball hoops in the driveway, etc. but none have hoops where a window should be. A truly random home improvement project would leave planks, nails, wires and paint laying all over the premises, not assembled into anything functional or formed at all. Random means NO intelligence in the formation or placement of anything.
Could one home develop a balcony or a porch that the other homes do not have, simply by throwing materials at the home with no design or intelligence? A trillion attempts would not so much as nail together two pieces of wood. Doors wouldn't hinge and bolt in a luckily-formed doorway even if you had decillions of random attempts.
Carrying this analogy to living things gets even worse for Darwinist formation, because ingested materials break down to the molecular level for diffusion and transport through the vascular system. Your home's plumbing would be pieces of PVC or copper, not perfectly molded pipes that fit elbows and couplers as a starting point.
Even though we are happy to accept ANY home improvement of any sort without hiring an architect, odds are that it will never happen, even with centillions of attempts and constant saturation with these molecule sized pieces of construction materials.
Moreover, any addition, such as a back porch or second floor, would need to maintain functionality in the meantime. No closing down the home to occupancy and shutting off the water and electricity during work periods.
Note that the odds of this accidental home improvement do not improve one iota by saying that you will only occupy a home if you "select" it.
A new physiological formation is not mathematically possible, even with centillions of attempts. Yet we are usually working with no more than a few billion births to get the job done. 9 or 10 lousy zeros won't get it done.
Eastwood> "There is a misconception that a small probability disproves a hypothesis."
Small, no. Infinitessimal, yes.
Eastwood> "Statistical likelihoods are ALWAYS very small."
Not really. They can be 100%. Depends.
Eastwood> "They represent the probability of a single outcome out of all possible outcomes allowed under the hypothesis."
No, they represent the probability of a degree of complexity as an outcome, not a SPECIFIC outcome.
To use another analogy, if you find the book War and Peace and want to know what the odds are that monkeys haphazardly typed it, you have to calculate the odds of accidental typing of a 600 page book of any language, code or consistent media, on any topic at all. It would be erroneous to calculate the odds of that specific book being typed, but it would also be erroneous to spell out the odds of typing a 6 word sentence and then merely multiply those odds times a thousand or so.
Darwinian evolution is more a matter of taking that book, deleting about 6 words and adding 6 different words. Sounds simple, right?
Wrong. It would have to maintain consistency, form and function. If you could type enough characters to form 6 words in 5 seconds, you would need more time than the Big Bang allows you to type a 6 word sentence - if the sentence is specific - and it would take trillions times trillions times trillions of attempts to get anything coherent at all, using the same code or language. And you have to do this millions upon millions of times, eventually re-writing the book almost completely, which is much harder than writing the final outcome completely in the first place. Gradualism doesn't help the odds at all, but makes them far worse.
Again, though, the odds are far worse in living things, because it isn't 600 pages, but 6 billion base pairs encoding information enough to overflow an encyclopedia. Occupying the space of six cells that worked out just right in just the right place doesn't even get you a physiology that is visual without a microscope. And you have to "black box" the cells to even get that far.
Eastwood> "A common ID argument is to point out some vanishingly small number, claim it is proof of what cannot be, and proclaim ID as given truth."
Yes, and if you think you have refuted this, I don't see it. If what you are saying is that small numbers are not tantamount to impossibility, then I would point out that there really are numbers that are close enough to zero possibility that it is not valid to make a case for it.
The "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" gives a nice parady of the Accidentalist. An invading spaceship spontaneously becomes a living whale while zooming through space. The whale soon dies of course, but they point out that this whale creation is not technically impossible. It is monumentally unlikely and has a huge probability number against it.
There have been times I have wanted to end a discussion with an accidentalist by saying "Fine, we both agree there is a 1 out of 10 to the 650th power that you are correct. Enjoy the rest of your day."
Given that the opposite of unintelligent is intelligent, then the two ARE mutually exclusive concepts. There is no error in pointing out the statistical impossibility of your theory as a refutation. I am open-minded on all of the possible non-accidental causes of life, so again, this is not any error. I know it bothers some of you that I am not specific enough as to the possible alternatives, but you have to start somewhere and that starting point should not be that which has been shown to be statistically impossible.
My opinions ARE mainstream ID, Eastwood. Don't let the Creationists who borrow our arguments fool you.
Eastwood> "Which implies you are on the Creation side?"
No. I recognize that something immaterial and intelligent can and observably does move and form matter in functional ways. I have no idea what non-accidental cause is going on here, but the mainstream Darwinist explanation is wrong.
Eastwood> "I recognize that you believe ID is not Creation, but there is a recent court decision (Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District) that concluded otherwise."
I am well aware of Judge Jones flawed conclusion. A slick ACLU lawyer tripping up a couple of IDists is not scientific method nor does it change my scientific persuits into some sort of pseudo-religion.
Eastwood> "You could have said 'God/Designer/Force did it', I could have said 'Fine, but I’ll keep looking anyway', and we both could have saved a lot of time."
You say "anyway" as if anyone was suggesting that any research should stop. If you meant the word "elsewhere" all I can say is that if you are looking for an accidental formative cause of a whale in water you may as well be looking for a whale in space. More power to you on your way, but you ignore the odds against the direction of your search at your own loss.
You see, a better way to state my position than "God/Designer/Force did it" is to state that life, reproduction and evolution have always happened the way they happen now. Whatever animates matter now; whatever causes reproduction now; whatever consitutes consciousness now, whatever gathers just the right amounts of just the right materials into just the right place at just the right time now - probably always did.
What I am proposing is not guesswork as the Darwinists have done and you seem bent on. I propose better study of modern day reproduction, evolution and life's functions, which can only help us understand our history better.
You have the right to keep looking for something completely different from what we see today, and although there is no evidence of it and the odds against you are astronomical, it still benefits science that people would be looking both toward and against ID.
Enjoy the rest of your day.
Pigeon, I spent hours yesterday responding to your recent messages, and the kids lost it before I posted. I hope some of what I discussed is covered in my response to Eastwood, but I can't even keep up with you on weekends.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI will acknowledge that I erred, as you noted, when I described electromagnetism as 2 dimensional. It is both polar and perpendicular. However, life doesn't animate by sticking to polar and perpendicular movements.
This brings me to one argument that I do want to address. You posit (sometimes even in italics) that all matter animation is explained by the four known forces of nature.
This is entirely false. Two main points of refutation: One, there ARE some matter movements that have no discernable motive force. Two, even in the cases where there is a known force at work, you still have to account for the precise, functional nature of the amounts, timing and location of these forces.
There are no theories as to the motive force behind many aspects of meiosis, including cell wall movement, sudden re-forming of duplicate organelles and movement of organelles as half of them go to one side of the cell and half to the other. This selective organelle movement is particularly perplexing, as it always pushes or pulls one organelle, but not the other, the right way.
There are no theories on how RNA attaches itself to DNA so perfectly, how it imprints the code and then suddenly loses its attraction to DNA, going elsewhere to carry out a function. No motive force is found or guessed at.
Most functional protein movement also needs a motive force, especially in determining locations to carry out their functions according to the code. As an embryo grows, a protein shouldn't know if it is in the leg or the chest, without navigational equipment, and it shouldn't be able to follow the timing that genes mandate without a clock device.
Even you admit that neural pathway formation occurs according to thoughts. Thoughts control chemicals, electricity and cell walls in neurons and synapses. So we already know intelligence moves and forms matter in non-accidental ways. This neural formation always goes TO the correct location on the brain, so it is no accident and not genetic or based on "millions of years".
Nor does accidental electromagnetics explain anything at all. Even in those things where we do see chemical or electric forces at work, such as voluntary muscle movement, we still need to acknowledge the root cause, which is free will.
We also need to acknowledge the ridiculousness of the random luck explanation. If something is so consistently functional under varying circumstances, we need to smarten up and stop calling it random accident. Even if you disregard the obvious reality that we know we have a consciousness and that we know we control (some of) our own muscles, you would still have to account for the mathematical odds against accidentally doing just what it takes to survive with this supposedly accidental non-free-will movement.
Intelligence has everything to do with muscle movement, even if it is an involuntary muscle, because you have to account for the consistently fortuitous muscle existence and activity just when and where needed.
If a painter spills a pallet of paint off of a scaffold and it accidentally paints the Mona Lisa on the floor, you know that your force was gravity. This still leaves one to question if some intelligence interfered with the normal pull of gravitational force. So even when you can identify a force at work, you have to explain its apparently intelligent activity where it picks and chooses what to do based on life's needs and functions.
The Materialists' fatal flaw in evolution, and indeed all of Biology, was to presume that all they need do is identify and name every material involved in life's functions and they have explained everything. They neglected to consider how just the right amounts of just the right things came to just the right place at just the right time to allow life to continue.
You are making the same error with forces of nature.
ON THE PREMISE OF THE SCIAM ARTICLE:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe error of materialistic reductionism is that it believes that explaining something on the physical level rules out the existence of a metaphysical level. It would be indeed an attractive philosophy if it could do that. It is this very misconception that prevents the investigator from appreciating the complexity of the problem. It can never ,with this simplistic approach, address the bigest day to day issues of the human condition. Naturalism, though piously claiming to not be able to address spiritual realities, actually behaves a if it does by assuming that it can ultimately explain all within the realm of human experience. Despite this disclaimer, it then goes about "reducing" human experience to particles and forces. It does, in fact, become itself an ideology not unlike the religions of the world. I find that a reductionist has a difficult time appreciating the subjectiveness and bias of his or her approach.
Disclaimers notwithstanding, science has, by its methodology, unwittingly propagated this very error among the institutions it influences. This "new science" and its adherents in fact cab't see through its own misconceptions. It assumes objectivity where there are proceedural limitations. It assumes neutrality because it divorces itself from religion, but begins to appear itself to have adopted all the characteristics of a religion. I do not incriminate the experimental method, nor science itself as itself as the problem. I consider this to be a fine tool and gift from God that he bot only placed an order in things ohysical, but has also given man the ability to comprehend that very order and use it. It is only when those using the method make assumptions beyond the realm of its limited purview that the error occurs. It isno longer science, but something more of a ideology. Some name this ideology Scientism.
When presented with the limitations of naturalism, reductionists cite the principles and refinements that have taken place in the methodology. Though they can recognise some of the limitations, they present the doctrine of "The Science of the Gaps", the very doctrine that they attack as the problem of "faith". To them, the gods of Chance and Necessity are omnipotent in forming eveything we see today. Some even wax so eloquent in their praise that it looks like worship. Free, they believe, of an absolute moral law with which they would be answerable to an absolute Deity, they come up with a new moral systems. These new system are relative in their scope, and though powerless to grant any enduring benefit, and based, as it were on strict allegiance to their gods, it decries any other religion, especially, it would appear monotheistic religions. It's becoming the ruin of many a good scientist who has succumbed to the lure of using the method where it doesn't apply. It is also cult-like in that it is seemingly quite easy to enter into the ideology, become brain washed by the mind set while actively denying it.
In the defense of scientism, its believers usually praise the objectivity and neutrality they believe that they have achieved by using the methodology. So persuaded are they by these 2 traits, that they find it difficult to transcend the notion that they have been blind sighted by the ongoing and continuous inability of their craft to decide what is really out there. Progress, they say, gets us closer to this reality, but every new paradigm shift, shows the inadequacy of the prior one, not to predict within its limit It does that fine. This is agood gift), but to demonstrate the illusive comprehensibility they seek. That any particular question "x" a been answered is not progress, since x divided by infinity is zero. They have taken the God-given gift of this methodology, and done away with its creator. They abject ot a wider scope of understanding (which the very word science implies), because they have become enchanted by their own discoveries, as if they were somehow responsible for them.
Science must become bigger than its methodology. It's OK to debate and refine the principles, but we must not allow it to becomes our god. This is not simply some societal error, but the ideology scientists have themselves adopted, pumped by their own heady successes. Their is room in science for both naturalistic verification, and revealed inspiration., as long as they each dialogue.
.
Pigeon, I suppose I should ask what you mean by the "source" of a force. We may infer the existence of nuclear forces by way of its effects, but we do not have any idea where this force came from, why it exists or who created it. Therefore, you have no more reason to throw out ID as a study, not knowing what or who causes it, than to disregard the nuclear forces or gravity.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSo what DO you mean by needing to identify a source, which you have claimed to be the first step?
Pigeon> "The evidence for the existence of some sort of intelligence force is that some aspects of matter appear to be guided by something that some people, for no robust reason (as far as physics is concerned), are convinced cannot be due to the other four forces."
OK, now YOU are getting unequivocal and full of yourself. Speaking on behalf of physics, you claim "no robust reason" and use words like "cannot". I do believe that life animates matter in ways that are not explained by the existing four forces. I should point out that, even if there ARE known forces at work, their consistently intelligent application is still very much on the table and not remotely explained. If this is only the four known forces at work, they are behaving in some VERY unique and intelligent ways. To say our reasoning isn't "robust" enough for you may require a bit more explanation as you discard it.
Pigeon> "This vague, ill-defined notion provides nothing like the immediately necessary conclusions and predictions drawn from the nature of atomic structure."
Actually I would contend that life's animation ability is abundantly more clear than nuclear forces. Humans saw signs of it from the very beginning of reasoning. The stumbling blocks working against intelligence are nothing more than petty irrelevencies such as obstinance, fear of religious implications and ignorance.
Pigeon> "It gives us absolutely zero to work with - any attempt to formulate this force in the context of physics would be wild guesswork."
This, even if true, is not a refutation of an intelligent force animating and forming matter in living things. But it is certainly not true. Lets say you identify the potential difference in electrical terms in a neuron. Then you identify the release of those electrons for no appreant reason, other than thought activity. It is quite possible to quantify the factor known as intelligence or the force that is intelligent.
Pigeon> "I don't discourage any of that at all. I discourage jumping to conclusions, which you have done by unilaterally deciding, despite complete ignorance of physics beyond perhaps the high school level (this is not meant as an insult)"
Actually I have taken college level physics, although my majors were Biology and Math. You may know physics, but sure as crap don't know Biology. (That is not intended as an insult, of course, just a desperate ploy for authority.)
You seem to be taking a major leap of conclusional faith in stating so unequivocally that all animation in living things is explained by the four known forces, even going so far as to use italics and underlines for emphasis.
Nevermind the fact that you are completely wrong.
Now, can we be a little more civil? As a physicist, what would be the correct way to approach the appearance of intelligence in any particular action, whether we identify a known force or not?
Lets say a force behaves differently in a particular situation? For example, lets say they find gravity behaving completely differently in a black hole as compared to normal? Would this be an indication of an opposing force or properties of gravity that we had never known, or could it be either one, needing more research?
Pigeon> "This is called Hoyle's Fallacy. The probability of a modern polymerase forming from nothing in a petri dish all at once is not what is proposed by Darwinian evolution, which proposes that modern polymerases are the result of innumerable small changes made over millions of years."
First off, I have read many refutations of Hoyle's analogy that are far better presented than Wikipedia's offering, made by someone with not nearly Hoyle's credentials. An analogy is not intended to be a carbon-copy duplication, and the analogy does what it is supposed to
do: It makes a powerful point.
Darwin knew little about cells, let alone any pre-cellular "replicator". Creation of some sort of amino acid chain is an acknowledged need in even the simplest of supposedly possible life forms, if that life is going to replicate. In fact, polymers have been created in the lab. They don't live. They don't reproduce or even wiggle.
Hoyle's analogy works fairly well to expose the gradualism fallacy a bit. Pick one of two pathways to get a 747 (or any flying craft capable of transporting human passengers)"
Option A: The 747 is built in one incredibly lucky shot.
Option B: You can start with a simpler creation and build from there, however, there are some ground rules if you pick Option B.
1. First the good news. You don't get more tries, but you do get to hold the previous functional unit as a base point (some limitations to this). Oh, did I mention you need to develop the ability to replicate first? Minor detail.
2. You need to be able to maintain functionality throughout, or go back to the last functional unit. If you want to go from an electric toothbrush to a lawn mower, both the brush and the mower had better keep running constantly.
3. Number 2 requires the ability to self-fuel, so this - oh, and the ability to animate to go get materials needed - will need to be acquired before you get your junkyard of materials.
4. On Option B, the vast majority of the fully functioning units die anyway, and are no longer usable for you. (Isn't selection a great creative force?)
5. At no point can you have any hole in a fuselage, short in wiring or leak in a fuel hose, or you go back to the last functional unit.
Option B is mathematically far harder to create. You see, Hoyle's true Fallacy is that he gave the Darwinists far too much slack. In life, an intelligence puts fuel in the plane. And in the end, the plane does nothing if a human doesn't get into it, start it and control it intelligently.
Some try to say that Hoyle was unfair to the Darwinists because he didn't add all the extra births (attempts) to create more and more complex units. (Not that fossil evidence shows gradualism) The simpler your starting point life form, the worse your mathematical odds are. You still have to get from nothing to everything. You just need to take a tougher pathway there and fewer attempts.
Pigeon> "The hand-off mechanisms are obvious. First there was no life for Darwinian evolution to apply, and then there was. Simple as that."
Magic!! Magic wands sure are simple, huh?
Yeah, really simple when we disregard things that go against our favored theory.
If production of the first reproducing thing is different than REproduction in the second, then an amazing change happened just in those moments. Bear in mind that all reproduction requires matter animation, whether you are aware of this or not. Perhaps this matter animation "developed" over time, but this leaves more questions than to say that it was there at the start.
Pigeon> "We don't know the cause of life, and hopefully this will change."
Not by ignoring evidence it won't. All Materialist attempts are doomed to failure, as has been their one consistency - failure. Life can not be created from non-life and to imagine that it could requires a profound lack of understanding about life, animation and reproduction.
Darwinian theory needing this minor detail is enough to trash can it, even without everything else. Life has to start before it can continue.
Frank> "What combination of matter supposedly causes consciousness?"
Pigeon> "Good question, and plenty of people in the world are waiting on the answer."
WAITING won't get it done, especially with a "naturalism" mandate that excludes the recognition of immaterial intelligence. Consciousness IS immaterial intelligence, so how can we study it with our heads in the sand? We must take consciousness into account as we study life. Consciousness is not a dirty word to be avoided by science. It is a fact. A reality.
Pigeon> "Just because we don't know something..."
PLEASE stop with the "there might be something we don't know that is not seen in the evidence, therefore we reject what IS seen in the evidence." anti-science excuse.
Frank> "How can materials create immaterial?"
Pigeon> "I don't understand the relevance."
The claim from Eastwood was that consciousness may have "developed" from unthinking living things that had no self-awareness. Do you see the relevence now?
Pigeon> "It appears that you're assuming that this intelligence force is capable of creating the 'immaterial.'"
More likely that it is immaterial itself, but consciousness may be an offshoot of some other consciousness. I am pretty open-minded on this subject as long as any theory recognizes the consciousness in living things and either offers some explanation or recognizes its lack of explanatory power.
Pigeon> "But if this intelligence is merely a fifth force of nature, why are you so opposed to the other forces being responsible for what we consider 'immaterial'?"
("merely"?) I'm not "SO" opposed. I just don't see evidence for it. I am open minded on your theory, but skeptical. Are the other forces intelligent? If not, they are not the final answer here, but at best a utility of an intelligence.
Frank> "Not really. Even what we may think are examples of orderly systems arising from chaos (orbiting planets, orbiting electrons, the water cycle, etc.) are seen by many scientists and mathematicians as requiring fine-tuning that is too mathematically impossible to have occured by luck."
Pigeon> "Again, you are wading into deep waters without knowing how to swim."
Not even toeing those waters, as it is not my swimming pool, but I will note that there are bright minds on both sides of the issue.
Pigeon> "This has been shown in computer simulations, and the fact that there exists order in our otherwise chaotic universe provides further evidence."
The computer simulations are clearly intelligently designed and programmed for a particular result. As to the universe, the jury is still out.
Frank> "you are assuming that each "lucky" event in a whole chain of events was necessary, but that is not at all the case!"
Read my last response to Eastwood, regarding calculation of odds. It is based on complexity, order and functionality, not any specific outcome. You are the one with flawed logic and assumptions.
Pigeon> "Take the example of a a simple system with one gene"
One gene? How does it process energy or proteins? How does it reproduce? How does it get a second gene? We don't yet know how new genes could be created.
Pigeon> "Do you see the flaw... but don't think it could apply to evolution, then please tell me why)?
I have heard this "flaw" described more times than I care to talk about. A non-mathematician wannabe IDist once calculated the odds of a horse being created by luck. Besides bad math, his logic was flawed because he needed to calculate the odds of a creature with the complexity of a horse existing by luck. Not specifically a horse. Real mathematicians do not foolishly ignore such things. Teams of mathematicians are not overlooking such an obvious flaw in condemning Darwinism.
Sologos, your criticisms of science are pretty much hitting the nail on the head, at least from my experience.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Methodological naturalism" uses no methodology. It starts with an assumption and tries to force it like a fat old man in a speedo. When it doesn't fit, we start hearing whining sounds like "we just haven't found the answer YET." or "we just have gaps" or "absence of evidence isn't evidence of absence."
Fine, if they want to promote an evidence-free religion, they have the right, but it isn't science and they have no right to forcefully shut down more evidence-based persuits that don't fit their pre-conceived bias.
The major flaw in science is bias. The scientific method starts with a hypothesis. Already at this point, many a scientist has their minds made up that they will prove their case regardless of the evidence, like a criminal lawyer. I'm not saying they routinely falsify evidence. More commonly they just ignore contradictory evidence and draw major assumptions and leaps of faith that they write off as fact.
This is particularly a problem in Biology and Archeology. And never have I seen it so blatant than on the battle against the role of intelligence in living things. Materialists know the evidence is against them, so they don't want anyone to discuss evidence.
One need only look at the name of this blog to see how much "objectivity" some pseudo-scientists have on the issue of ID. "Six Things Ben Stein Doesn't Want You To Know". How petty and childish. How UN American and UN scientific. None of the 6 things had anything to do with science. Science isn't really their strong point on this issue.
Sologos, you suggest that not only is their science based on greater leaps of faith than any religion (I agree!) but that they are a creed of their own, hiding under a guise of objectivity that really isn't there. You make a GREAT point.
As someone who loves science, I hate to hear this, though. I think this is more or less a recent problem, but I could be wrong. There have been (and still are) great scientists who do not deserve this kind of condemnation, but the irresponsible, single-mindedness of Sciam on this issue does nothing to reverse the recent slide in respect for science in general.
Belief that molecules cooperate, animate, reproduce, heal, feel and think by accident is a complete crock and everybody who isn't brainwashed by the self-love of pre-determinist "science" knows it.
Pigeon writes
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI don't know what you mean by this. How can data be skewed? The most common form of data is numbers. The numerical results of an experiment (or at least most experiments) are not subject to the whims of the researcher. What data is recorded is skewed, but that is an obvious and necessary fact. Experiments are designed to observe something specific - it would be worthless to build a machine that spits out meaningless numbers based on undefined parameters; it would tell us nothing about anything. If that is what you mean, then I agree. If it isn't what you mean, then please explain what you do mean.
Yes, collection of all sorts of data would tell us nothing. We must work within the framework of the experimental hypothesis. However, the same framework has the unintended effect of seeing only the data relevant to the hypothesis. Let me give a gross example. When Newton experimented with acceleration, he didn't consider that time was relative. Even if he had, he would not have the instruments (another problem that skews results) to make the observations. If he had he would have realized that though infinitesimally small, his theory would technically be erroneous. Thankfully for humanity and the technology that followed over the next 400 years, this factor was not detected. The example may be ridiculous, but the point s that for 400 years, we believed that what Newton had discovered was"reality". It was not. It was simply a section in the universe that would behave(and still does) itself enough that predictions could be made and a "law" could be relied on for engineering purposes. When instruments improved enough to make more accurate measurements, and mathematical sophistication had matured to the point that general and special relativity was spied, peole began to realize that no reality, not even an accurate description of behaviour of nature had been described by Newton. Now we ar looking fo a grand unified theory that would include Newtonian physics, relativity and quantum unpredictability. Does anyone seriously believe that the grand unifying theory will explain everything. There are dimensions of reality in 2008 that (like quantum mechanics in the 19th century) have not even been imagined, much less considered for this Grand theory. Naturalism works fine for technology, and I am glad for the refinements in its methodology, but does anyone seriously believe that we know enough to rule out this force, for example, that Frank M is postulating, or even to say, with any authority, that it is undetectable? We find only what our world view determines can be seen.
Pigeon also believes,
Yes, I agree with that for the most part. Your example of cause and effect isn't really apt. We can observe cause and effect. If I let go of a ball, it will fall. No matter how many times I let go of a ball, it will fall. If we perform the same experiment repeatedly and the result is always the same, then it is statistically sound that the result is caused by something (sometimes a stimulus provided in the experiment, sometimes something external)
That seems to be he case, but there is always the problem with inductive reasoning. We can't really say that the ball will drop timorrow and not ascend. If you think this is rediculous, consider that this is exactly the problem that exposed the inadequacy of Newtonian physics.
Pigeon then reasons that
our world views are based on observation. Of course it is possible that we are in the Matrix, and the ball dropping when I let go is just an illusion, but that isn't even relevant - because then the rules of nature that we would be trying to discover would be the rules of the Matrix, and the observation that the ball falls is still valid.
No, this is not a matrix scenario! But the observations are only as reliable as the world view that narrows our field of vision. Again, the enemy is not the mehodology. It is the people that use it, that feel they have keyed into the mechanism that actually demonstrates "truth". There are loads epistemic problems with reductionism.
Pigeon correctly concludes,
However, Newton's laws are still an incredibly good approximation at the relevant scales. The new paradigm reduces the old paradigm to a special case.
ight. s how should we react o new scientific endeavors like ID?
Pigeons agrees that,
Thus I would argue that our understanding of the universe does indeed increase: First we had a theory which accurately described a phenomenon in a special case, then a new theory is proposed which provides a more accurate description of a phenomenon in a more general case, and so on. As the paradigms shift, our ability to predict events in the world becomes more accurate and more general. I consider this to getting closer and closer to reality, although I believe that we can never do more than make an arbitrarily accurate, but inherently imperfect, formulation of reality.
Right so then why are we giving accolades to this methodology and telling the courts that ID doesn't qualify as science becauset doesn't fit the methodology as we now undersand it?Science is bigger than its methodology.
Pigeon considers ,
General Relativity may provide a better explanation of the dynamics of the world than Newton's laws, but I am not going to go through relativistic calculations to determine how long it takes for an apple to fall from a tree - I'll use Newton's laws, the relevant approximation.
Me too. But I won't send ID packing. There is something essential that is being lost, unfortunately, with all our spectacular achievements. Humility. It could be fatal.
Pigeon writes,
(by which I mean true beyond a reasonable doubt, or to a certain degree of accuracy
More from Pigeon as to reality
If a mathematical model describes a system, then it does so regardless of our world view. I agree that all we are doing is approximating reality, but I disagree with you on the impact of our world view on the validity of a mathematical model.
I am not arguing with the mathematics at this point. I am questioning whether it really is comprehensive enough.
Pigeon further believes,
Yes, you should believe scientists when they define the realm of science. If scientists truthfully tell you that they do not have the knowledge nor the tools to investigate something, you can falsely accuse them of lying, but what purpose does that serve?
I am not accusing people of lying. That problem can generalyy be adequately pliced by the scientific community. Bit I can't let someone define the realm who doesn't have the "knowledge or tools". By what authority do they declare?
Pigeon eanestly believes,
Well then those institutions are at fault for misunderstanding the nature of science. I think most institutions that rely on science look to it for guidance as to what is likely.
Unfortunately, that is not the way ot works. This is not so much a conscious conspiracy by the participants, as a natural outcome of deiningscience purely by its methodology. The problem with reductionism is that it leaves out 99? of reality.
Pigeon emphatically asserts,
No it is not. The Church in the middle ages claimed authority based on nothing but their own individual beliefs. Their evidence was words written in books and claims that some supernatural being speaks to them. It's evidence for it being right was that it said i was right.
I'm sorry, I think that those very thoughts do apply to the role we have tacitly given to science.Except for the part of "some supernatural being speaks". What you must write in its place to describe the ideology that science has become is "no supernatural being speaks". It has not achieved either the neutrality or objectivity it has persuaded itself of. One of its spokesmen once lamented, "People are incurably religious". He as right! Nevertheless. to give him credit. I would not be reading at tis hour, were it not for him!
So therefore Pigeon believes,
Science makes no claims to have moral high ground, it makes no demands that people accept their theories.
So why then does it say that creation should not be even mentioned in the classroom?
Pigeon asserts,
That is a common misconception. Science does not assume that there is no non-natural or supernatural component operative. The only assumption is that science cannot determine the validity of such a claim. HUGE difference.
For all practical purposes, there is no diference. Same effect at the end of the day.
Pigeon:
The reason why science does not consider the supernatural is that the supernatural can be invoked to answer anything and everything. There are no constraints on what the supernatural can or cannot do, so science would be reduced to nothing.
Not science, its methodology. Actually many of the tenets of revelation are falsifiable, but that is another matter.
Pigeon:
it could just be acting in ways such that we cannot detect its interference.
There you go.It is so obvious to so many people that there is a Creator and sustainer. If the scietific experimnt cannot detect it, perhaps their is a flaw in the design.
Pigeon:
The comprehensiveness of our understanding is not measured by how few questions we have, but by how many answers we have.
Unless he amount to know reflects the mind of its Creator, infinite in nature.
Pigeon:
Because however we may have reached the scientific theories that accurately describe our world, the fact is that they accurately describe our world. Faith can serve to explain our world, but the problem is, what faith would you teach? Christianity? Judaism? Islam? Buddhism? Deism? Atheism? Pantheism? Norse or Greek/Roman mythology? These are all faiths, and none is better than the others. Different people have different faiths, and you can never prove a faith wrong. Science, on the other hand, can be proven wrong. The conclusions reached can be analyzed, and the validity can be determined by anyone with the requisite training.
No need for that. All these religons assert a spiritual basis for reality.
Pigeon concludes with,
By your argument, then, we shouldn't have education or research institutes.
We should have education and research institutes. We should not let that be dictated by a ideology that outsteps its boundaries.
\\
I believe you are earnest in your disclaimer.
Frank M> The claim from Eastwood was that consciousness may have "developed" from unthinking living things that had no self-awareness.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWrong again Frank. That was not me.
Thank you for clarifying you stance, BTW. No confusion remains.
Now to the main point:
[b]Eastwood> "Statistical likelihoods are ALWAYS very small."
Frank M> Not really. They can be 100%. Depends[/b].
There is [u]one and only one[/u] way for a likelihood of a given hypothesis to equal 1.0. You do this by presuming a hypothesis is correct and not allowing even the possibility of any alternative. Is this science? Is this any sort of rational argument?
Statistical inference is my expertise, and (your) long rambling posts about the impossibility of evolution demonstrate a complete lack of understanding in this area. I do not blame you for not understanding - you are not alone – statistical theory requires some advanced mathematics, and many people find even basic statistics a difficult subject in the first place. Even some very smart people can have difficulty with the methods and application. I do blame those know better and abuse mathematics to spout nonsense anyway [url=http://science.blogdig.net/archives/articles/June2006/28/Dishonest_Dembski_the_Universal_Probability_Bound.html](***cough*dembski*cough***)[/url].
Were you really a math major? ([i]I read that just prior to posting[/i]) Gee whiz … perhaps I should blame you after all.
Because the mathematics of ID is utter [url=http://science.blogdig.net/archives/articles/June2006/28/Dishonest_Dembski_the_Universal_Probability_Bound.html]nonsense[/url]. Further, the same arguments can lead to any conclusion, even the non-existence of God, or the existence of a [url=http://www.venganza.org/about/open-letter/]Flying Spaghetti Monster[/url] that created all. There is a reason you don’t see this in the scientific literature though; the whole premise of demonstrating ID through the scientific method is nonsense in the first place.
Don’t like my sources? Find some to refute me if you can. Good luck with the math.
One last comment that doesn't go with the rest:
Your quote from Hitchhikers Guide nearly had me rolling on the floor with laughter, because [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Adams#Atheism_and_view_on_religion]Douglas Adams[/url] most certainly did not believe in God, Creation, or ID. Don’t forget about this [url http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babel_fish]zinger[/url], or [url http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dcncPpQ8loA]watch it here[/url]. I appreciate the chuckle though. :-p
--
Edited by EastwoodDC at 05/18/2008 10:53 PM
Funny but the added 'context' of the Darwin 'Descent' quotes only make the case more compelling. Denial of the historical connections between Darwinism (not Darwin) and the 'scientifically supported' decisions of the Nazis only makes SA look stupid.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNothing is better established in WWII history than the connections of Darwinian evolution to the Nazi's supreme race, artificial selection 'solution'.
Read R. Wiekarts book 'From Darwin to Hitler'.
The point is not that Darwinism leads to genocide, but rather the implications of Darwinism, on both the value of human life ('we're mere animals sharing a common heritage with earth worms') and racial distinctions, if taken to their logical conclusions CAN lead to the ideas that brought about Nazism.
Other SA points against Expelled faire no better.
It's all the same - ANY explanation but one that has metaphysical implications.
As 'patently absurd' as the explanations of Darwinian theory are, we're bullied into accepting them.
>The point is not that Darwinism leads to genocide, but rather the implications of Darwinism, on both the value of human life ('we're mere animals sharing a common heritage with earth worms') and racial distinctions, if taken to their logical conclusions CAN lead to the ideas that brought about Nazism.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI am not exactly sure what your point is. If Darwin had not published his theories someone would have. A few other scientists had already reached the same conclusions as Darwin before the Decent of Man was ever published. Are we to cover up the truth of your origins because some may use that information to justify committing atrocities against each other? I could fill volumes with the horrible deeds committed in the name of gods. At least now people cannot hide behind an excuse of righteousness.
All in all I think the sooner we rid ourselves of religion and accept our humble yet no less magnificent place in the universe the better off we will be.
As for the value of human life, the knowledge that this short time on earth is the only existence we will ever have should only serve to make us cherish our time here all the more.
--
Edited by Natedog at 05/19/2008 12:10 PM
> All in all I think the sooner we rid ourselves of
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> religion and accept our humble yet no less
> magnificent place in the universe the better off we
> will be.
Sometimes I agree with you Natedog, especially when a commercial offering like Expelled is spouting hate and ignorance. Holocust deniers use the same methods to bend the facts into awful lies, and it makes me sick. I try to remember that faith can bring about good things too, particularly when it is tempered with reason keep it from going to horrible extremes.
> As for the value of human life, the knowledge that
> this short time on earth is the only existence we
> will ever have should only serve to make us cherish
> our time here all the more.
That is still true even if you leave out "the only existence" part.
--
Edited by EastwoodDC at 05/19/2008 6:50 PM
Frank M
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe following variations of the same theme have been leveled against you.
>Seriously, how many times do I have to ask for citations before you will either give up posting worthless numbers or actually follow through?
>Could you provide sources
>provide me with the assumptions made, the actual calculations, the results, and preferably any criticism that has been made of it.
>and yet you never provide a source.
.>Tell me where I can look at it for myself. I want to see the actual analysis. This is not an unreasonable demand; I understand that it may not be worth it to you to take the time to find all these sources for me, but if that is the case then please don't expect me to reach your conclusions based on word of mouth.
>There is a reason you don’t see this in the scientific literature though; the whole premise of demonstrating ID through the scientific method is nonsense in the first place.
>Don’t like my sources? Find some to refute me if you can
There is quite a clamor here for sources. I know what your thinking Frank M. Correct me if I'm wrong. If I quote from some of the ID literature, it will be rejected as "not peer reviewed" or "not appearing in legitimate science journals". I think this would be a prety acurate guess s to their response. So why not be practical.
I think you see intelligence within the physical univers. If you truly believe this, then you ought not be afraid of any legitimate data investigators find. Why don't you give them what they want on their grounds?There should be evidence for your claims. In fact, someone in a prior post said, that data is neutral. Except within the limitations of any particular experiment,this appears to be a reasonable statement. It would, then, follow that you have volumes of data. The only obstacle is that evolutionists use the data to argue for their position. But if its legitimate data, and if your hypothesis is true, you should be able to see intelligence or design in these same experiments. At the very least, you should be able to show that the data fits an ID interpretation more than a Darwinian schema.
Take, for example, the experiments on so-called micro-evolution. Could an argument be made that he results indicate front loading more than randomness?
One needs to be practical with these debates. If one were to study some of these experiment well, one might be able to argue cogently that the data actually fit ID.
I recently read about some work being done from the research dept.at NYU that claimed "evolution is deterministic, not random" The findings were reported in the journal CURRENT BIOLOGY. The leading author was Karen Kiontke. That seems to speakf for ID more than Darwinian evolution.
First, forgive me if I've missed any posts or responses. I don't have as much time as before, so my responses might be less comprehensive, as well.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFrank M:
>"If natural genetics were random, why would radiation victims or drug addicts have different results?"
This is a dishonest argument. For one, drugs are chemicals, which affect biological systems in predictable way (again, based on their molecular structure). They do not just go through willy nilly and make all sorts of changes. In fact, most drugs don't affect DNA, but interfere with biological feedback loops, affecting the concentrations of various chemicals. Radiation is also extremely different. It usually doesn't just cause DNA to mutate, it destroys it.
>"A truly random home improvement project would leave planks, nails, wires and paint laying all over the premises, not assembled into anything functional or formed at all. Random means NO intelligence in the formation or placement of anything."
Yes but again, Darwinian evolution does not posit evolution by purely random means. You continually disregard selection as a straw man, and yet you've never found a single criticism of any example or analogy I've provided to justify that. The fact is, comparing Darwinian evolution to the possibility of a house or airplane assembling from raw materials all at once is disingenuous and wrong.
>"Note that the odds of this accidental home improvement do not improve one iota by saying that you will only occupy a home if you "select" it."
That is even more disingenuous than the rest of your argument. I'm not going to bother to explain why because it really should be obvious.
>"Eastwood> "There is a misconception that a small probability disproves a hypothesis."
>Small, no. Infinitessimal, yes."
Eastwood already covered this for the most part, but I'd just like to throw my support in with him. I suggest you follow the links he included in his post, one of them especially has a great example of how nonsensical your argument is. If there are 10^10^10^10^10 equally probable outcomes of a situation (each with 1 in 10^10^10^10^10 odds), you are going to end up with [i]one[/i] of them, even though which ever end result occurs had a vanishingly small probability.
>"No, they represent the probability of a degree of complexity as an outcome, not a SPECIFIC outcome."
Well, so far the only examples you've given have been of specific examples, and you haven't provided a source for any of those, anyway.
>"To use another analogy, if you find the book War and Peace and want to know what the odds are that monkeys haphazardly typed it, you have to calculate the odds of accidental typing of a 600 page book of any language, code or consistent media, on any topic at all."
Every example you've provided has been fundamentally flawed. There is no reproduction, no generations, and no consequences for any changes. The book is written linearly, from start to finish (although with the delete key, it can be somewhat anti-linear), all at once. If you can honestly say that you don't see a fundamental difference between your examples and Darwinian evolution, then the only conclusion left to draw is that you simply don't understand it.
>"The "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" gives a nice parady of the Accidentalist. An invading spaceship spontaneously becomes a living whale while zooming through space. The whale soon dies of course, but they point out that this whale creation is not technically impossible. It is monumentally unlikely and has a huge probability number against it."
Like Eastwood, I got a great laugh out of this. This is a classic example of finding meaning in literature where none was ever intended. Douglas Adams was not at all a supporter of ID or critic of Darwinian evolution.
>"There have been times I have wanted to end a discussion with an accidentalist by saying "Fine, we both agree there is a 1 out of 10 to the 650th power that you are correct. Enjoy the rest of your day.""
More with the made up numbers.
>"I propose better study of modern day reproduction, evolution and life's functions, which can only help us understand our history better."
These are all being done rather actively, so I don't really understand how your proposition is relevant.
>"You have the right to keep looking for something completely different from what we see today, and although there is no evidence of it and the odds against you are astronomical, it still benefits science that people would be looking both toward and against ID."
Well apparently most biologists seem to be of the opinion that there is plenty of evidence for it. I'm more inclined to believe them than you at this point. Your credibility with me has been going down steadily as your arguments point more and more to numbers you can't justify.
http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2008/05/behe-vs-lamprey.html
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnother one of Behe's claims debunked. surprise surprise.
Your point #6 is just plain retarded I'm sorry. There is just no possible way a person can be religions, that is, maintaining a personal relationship with God, and at the same time believe, teach, and live as though evolution could be true. That would be like smacking God right in the face. For goodness sake people, he fricken created you! And look what you're doing to Him! Whatever, you'll get yours. He's coming soon...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this>"Pigeon, I spent hours yesterday responding to your recent messages, and the kids lost it before I posted. I hope some of what I discussed is covered in my response to Eastwood, but I can't even keep up with you on weekends."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNo worries. To be honest I didn't really have the time to keep up with myself, but I couldn't pull myself away :-p
>"However, life doesn't animate by sticking to polar and perpendicular movements."
What justification do you have for this statement? Have any researchers ever concluded that their observations of molecular activity has defied the four forces we know of? Don't bother saying yes unless you can point me to a source. And to really convince me you'd have to find a source from someone knowledgeable in both chemistry and physics. I would be surprised if you can find a researcher who concluded definitively that their observation defied the four forces (predominantly e&m); I wouldn't be surprised if they concluded that they are unaware of the mechanism. There is a significant difference between those two conclusions.
I want to make it very clear that I am not saying we have successfully explained every observed biological process in terms of electromagnetism; I am only saying that I have never heard a qualified researcher conclude that there is something at work other than electromagnetism (usually in the form of chemical reactions).
>"There are no theories as to the motive force behind many aspects of meiosis, including cell wall movement, sudden re-forming of duplicate organelles and movement of organelles as half of them go to one side of the cell and half to the other. This selective organelle movement is particularly perplexing, as it always pushes or pulls one organelle, but not the other, the right way.
>There are no theories on how RNA attaches itself to DNA so perfectly, how it imprints the code and then suddenly loses its attraction to DNA, going elsewhere to carry out a function. No motive force is found or guessed at."
I think your use of the term "motive force" is misleading in this context, a more appropriate term would be "chemistry". I do remember learning in my college biology course that aspects of meiosis are poorly understood, as are many aspects of RNA. However, not understanding the chemical mechanism beyond certain complex processes could be just that: ignorance of the chemical mechanism. I will give you that every process that we don't understand leaves room for a very real possibility that there is indeed intelligence behind them - but it is not a necessary conclusion; and I suspect that most researchers would argue that further research is required before they can be conclusive.
>"Most functional protein movement also needs a motive force, especially in determining locations to carry out their functions according to the code. As an embryo grows, a protein shouldn't know if it is in the leg or the chest, without navigational equipment, and it shouldn't be able to follow the timing that genes mandate without a clock device."
The endocrine system is perhaps the single most complex biological human system. It is a huge system consisting of dozens or hundreds of proteins and hormones and almost as many different, interconnected feedback loops. We don't even know all the steps in the different loops, let alone all the mechanisms. However, much of the timing involved in biological systems are due to feedback loops, and in some cases external stimuli, such as sunlight.
However, going to the position thing. In most cases (every case I've ever learned about - which obviously is not nearly exhaustive), it isn't that proteins and hormones go somewhere specific, but rather they spread out throughout the body. However, proteins and other chemicals have specific functions determined by their chemical structure, and in many cases their primary function is only applicable in certain types of cells, etc. I've actually done rather extensive research on various endocrine systems for what was an amazing (and depressing) course.
>"Even you admit that neural pathway formation occurs according to thoughts. Thoughts control chemicals, electricity and cell walls in neurons and synapses. So we already know intelligence moves and forms matter in non-accidental ways."
Yes but the difference between you and me is that you assume that our own intelligence is fundamental, or based off of a new intelligent force of nature, while I maintain the position that, while that may be true, it is not inconceivable that our intelligence can be the result of the forces we already know.
>"Even in those things where we do see chemical or electric forces at work, such as voluntary muscle movement, we still need to acknowledge the root cause, which is free will."
But is free will a perception rather than reality? I know people who think that it's most likely that our thoughts, intelligence and consciousness as a whole are results of what is essentially labyrinthine chemical computing. Personally, I am inclined to believe that that isn't true, partially because it seems to trivialize our choices and actions. Nonetheless I don't claim to [i]know[/i]. Neither case has been ruled out scientifically. The notion that we are labyrinthine chemical computers hasn't been ruled out because, well, we are labyrinthine and not well understood in general. Free will has not been ruled out because it has never been considered in the scientific arena - not because the idea is rejected (in fact I'll bet that most scientists believe that free will probably exists), but because no one has been able to come up with a method to analyze the problem scientifically.
>"The Materialists' fatal flaw in evolution, and indeed all of Biology, was to presume that all they need do is identify and name every material involved in life's functions and they have explained everything. They neglected to consider how just the right amounts of just the right things came to just the right place at just the right time to allow life to continue.
>You are making the same error with forces of nature."
I don't think I am making that mistake. I am not arguing that the four forces of nature [i]are[/i] responsible for everything in this universe, but that it is [i]possible[/i]. Just like it is possible that there is another force of nature that is fundamentally intelligent. Personally, I am conflicted on the matter. On the one hand I am loathe to give up the notion of free will, but on the other hand I think that intelligence is excessively complex and ungainly to be a fundamental aspect of the universe. Obviously that doesn't mean it isn't possible or true, but it does defy the beauty inherent in the simplicity of the other forces.
> Another one of Behe's claims debunked. surprise surprise.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhereas it may be true that there are similarities and differences in the human and lamprey clotting system, there doesn't seem to be any clotting without complexity. In the yeas since I have been following the cascade factors in humans, several new factors have been identified. I do not know why there is a special need for factor 9 in humans, or whether there may not be some special as yet undiscovered factor peculiar to the lamprey cascade, but one thing for sure, it's only going to get more complex.
But demonstrating the presence of a cascade in a more primitive species doesn't really constrain us to conclude that there was an evolutionary line.What I believe is more germaine to Behe's point is that even the most primitive hemolymph clotting systems are themselve irreducibly complex. Even at the invertebrate level where circulatory systems ae first appearing, there appears cascades. See for example the clotting system of lobsters or priimitive insects.
http://www.springerlink.com/content/k56723220032jvp3/
and http://www.jbc.org/cgi/content/abstract/279/50/52033
> Six Things in Expelled that Ben Stein Doesn't
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> Want You to Know...
...
>I think that intelligence is excessively complex and ungainly to be a fundamental aspect of the universe. Obviously that doesn't mean it isn't possible or true, but it does defy the beauty inherent in the simplicity of the other forces.
I have never quite found the notion of simplicity to be elegant. The simplest answer, yes, but simplistic explanations always seem to give way to underlying complexities. Complexity seems more to be the nature of nature. Simply drawing up equations, simple or complex, to describe behaviour doesn't really tell us what force or matter is.
Intelligence is excessively complex, as you say. It seems to me that any Informational systems ( I see the intelligence found in nature to be more like an informational system than a force) that run a universe must be.
Sologos:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this>"The error of materialistic reductionism is that it believes that explaining something on the physical level rules out the existence of a metaphysical level."
I am sure many people do believe that, but I think most scientists would answer that successfully explaining a phenomenon does not rule out the supernatural. Like I said before, the supernatural could just be acting in such a way that we cannot detect it, or following its own set of rules, resulting in what we call the laws of nature. No self-respecting scientist would ever argue that anything could disprove the supernatural.
The one and only reason science does not concern itself with the supernatural is because it cannot be disproved, and it can be used to explain [i]everything[/i]. The major problem with that is that attributing anything to the supernatural eliminates the predictive power of science. The reason why science is progressive (it builds upon itself) is that each theory predicts new phenomenon and often even provides a solution to problems they weren't intended to solve. The moment the supernatural is invoked, this predictive power that is so essential to the progression of science is lost. It has nothing to do with whether the supernatural is real.
>"Naturalism, though piously claiming to not be able to address spiritual realities, actually behaves a if it does by assuming that it can ultimately explain all within the realm of human experience. Despite this disclaimer, it then goes about "reducing" human experience to particles and forces."
I don't see the problem with 'reducing human experience to particles and forces' as long as it works. To be honest I find it an astounding claim that even though our theories accurately predict so much, they are just illusions of reality. I am more inclined to believe that they do accurately reflect at least some aspect of reality and that their success is not merely coincidence. Likewise I'm sure that some of it is wrong, and probably all of it is incomplete. And none of it precludes the supernatural.
>"It does, in fact, become itself an ideology not unlike the religions of the world."
I really can't disagree more with this statement. Religions propose an absolute, unquestionable truth, a meaning to life, a set of morals, and they are inherently irrefutable. They propose the answer all at once, there is no searching, and you are required to believe it on 100% faith, although there is some consequential evidence. Science is fundamentally different. It is a continual quest for understanding based on reason and observations of the world around us. It provides no truth, but models of our world for both practical reasons and curiosity. All individuals can look at the same data, see each other's analysis, do their own, and draw their own conclusions. It provides no meaning, no morals, and it is inherently [i]refutable[/i]. A single observation can force the entire scientific community to rethink their ideas. Like in any other arena, major change of course takes time. It takes time to convince an entire community to accept a new idea, but if the evidence really is strong, and especially if previous ideas are failing, then it will change. Try changing the course of religion with an observation or two.
>" I consider this to be a fine tool and gift from God that he bot only placed an order in things ohysical, but has also given man the ability to comprehend that very order and use it."
See this is my problem with this discussion. You assume that God exists, you assume that he provided us with the ability to comprehend our world. I cannot have a meaningful discussion with somebody who inserts the irrefutable into his arguments.
>"It is only when those using the method make assumptions beyond the realm of its limited purview that the error occurs."
Couldn't agree more.
>"Though they can recognise some of the limitations, they present the doctrine of "The Science of the Gaps", the very doctrine that they attack as the problem of "faith"."
The term "science of the gaps" is overused and misused. It is invoked every time scientists argue against a fundamentally new idea because it is not (yet) necessary. But this is sort of like governmental checks and balances. There are often new theories that appear to solve a standing problem, but require a major fundamental addition or change. When the current paradigm is indeed insufficient, this can be much needed and result in a more concise, more general, and overall more complete understanding of the world. However, if the current paradigm is seen to be capable of explaining the troublesome problems in question with some more work, then working out the solution that way almost always results in a cleaner, more concise theory. If every time we encountered a new problem we invented a new force, or fundamentally altered our understanding of the world, then science would be worthlessly convoluted.
Additionally, I for one will never accept our lack of understanding of an aspect of the physical world as "scientific" evidence of God's existence. In fact, I think science as a whole is irrelevant to the existence of God. Whatever science tells us, I will always hold that God may or may not exist, unless he decides to make himself known to us (which, if he exists, I'm sure he can do pretty convincingly).
>"To them, the gods of Chance and Necessity are omnipotent in forming eveything we see today. Some even wax so eloquent in their praise that it looks like worship. Free, they believe, of an absolute moral law with which they would be answerable to an absolute Deity, they come up with a new moral systems. These new system are relative in their scope, and though powerless to grant any enduring benefit, and based, as it were on strict allegiance to their gods, it decries any other religion, especially, it would appear monotheistic religions"
Well that isn't science anymore. Anyone is free to have such beliefs, but if they profess such belief to be supported by science then they are either lying, ignorant or misguided. And I believe that morals do exist with or without God. I think morals are largely societal; humanity thrives in societies, and for a society to function there must be rules. If people were to go around killing each other over every argument, stealing from each other, taking whatever the wanted whenever they wanted, society would fall apart and humanity would suffer for it.
>"It's becoming the ruin of many a good scientist who has succumbed to the lure of using the method where it doesn't apply. It is also cult-like in that it is seemingly quite easy to enter into the ideology, become brain washed by the mind set while actively denying it."
You are criticizing the institution of science for those who debase it rather than for what it is. It would be like me criticizing all of religion for those who kill in the name of God.
>"That any particular question "x" a been answered is not progress, since x divided by infinity is zero."
That is the single worst argument I have ever heard. Please don't tell me you don't see why that is, to use Frank M's words, a huge "cop out".
>"They have taken the God-given gift of this methodology, and done away with its creator."
Here you are assuming the existence of God again. I understand that you believe in God, but if you intend to convince me of anything you will have to do so without invoking him.
No offense but that sounds like more goalpost moving. First it was the human clotting system- then dolphins-then bony fish- then jawless fish- and now insects?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this-you would have thought that years after making these claims Behe would have attempted to substantiate them. But he has done nothing of the sort, he said that the human clotting system was "irreduceably complex", and then had to move to a more primitive species and on down the line. His ID is nothing more than a "god of the gaps" theory, and the gaps keep getting smaller as real scientists do more work in related fields. I have to say it is more logical to think that the gaps will continue to become smaller as more is uncovered as opposed to "the designer" (read god) hiding in those ever shrinking areas.
Pigeon, I've been meaning to respond to this comment of yours, because it shows your bias.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPigeon: "I think it would be the ultimate expression of beauty if the rules of the four natural forces are capable of conspiring to create intelligence."
What you find beautiful is not scientific evidence. It is wishful thinking. In this case, it is rather bizarre, unsubstantiated wishfulness, since unintelligent forces do not "conspire" in an intelligent way. To be an objective scientist, one must accept evidence that is repugnant to their hopes and dreams just as tightly as any evidence that they feel supports them. I can see that you do not do this, although you give lip service to true objectivity.
Pigeon: "Conversely, I think it would be extremely ungainly for the intelligence to simply be the result of intelligence.
Ungainly? How does your perseption of beauty pertain in any way to the truth? Science is the search for the truth, not the search for Pigeon's aesthetics. This is where so-called scientists begin practicing religion, calling it science. When the ego wants the joy of proving something that nobody had ever imagined could be, and the truth is twisted to fit their belief system, which may very well be false.
Only intelligence has ever been known to create anything that shows intelligence. Random forces at work are not intelligent in the slightest, yet you try to push against fact in favor of your fiction, for - what? - your fragile ego?
Fine, just don't call it fact, don't teach it in school and don't think you hold the objective high ground nor that we all must follow you lest we be deemed "vapid".
Pigeon: "Basically, motion does not require intelligence."
Of course not. Motion DOES require a force. Now, motion that selectively aids life or follows our intelligent will DOES indicate intelligence.
Pigeon: "The fact that we can move does not imply the presence of intelligence."
Yes, it does, especially since we intelligently decide to do so. See, you are making statements that are so patently false they would lock you up if you said them in front of a judge. Now, if you are going to say that intelligently directed movement DOES imply intelligence, but you wish to seek other possibilities, then at least you would be truthful, if not particularly worthy of serious consideration.
It is your desperate attempts not to concede even the most obvious strikes against you that cause me concern for the "scientific" nature of your "study".
sologos, the case for intelligent design is not based on some new and undiscovered evidence. It is simply a matter of understanding what the evidence is telling us.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI can see that I am the only one here with a Biology background, and I am getting a lot more questions as to the details than I usually get. Bacterial experiments are done in high schools for Pete's sake and if they haven't heard of the Galapogos finches, they need to do some homework.
If Pigeon couldn't find William Provine's "empty rhetoric" interview in 15 minutes, then I would have wasted at least 20, and it really doesn't matter what that crackpot said.
I'm not going to get into a citation battle, with the others ready to play Wack-a-Mole with the Wikipedia counterpoints as soon as I post them. The citations are circular and I know all the arguments back and forth.
I haven't seen a whole lot of citations on the four forces creating intelligence concept of Pigeon either. I know that ID has had a tough time getting peer-reviewed acceptance. My aim is to get people to question the authorities who have misled them and to think for themselves.
If there is a specific point of contention that really matters, I will take the time to search for it. In the meantime, there is plenty that is on the table now that we see from two completely different directions. If what is already accepted by the group is not even seen as any evidence at all, then we already have work to do.
Somebody once told me - never let an opponent define your argument. I'll be fine.
http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Judge_continues_injunction_against_'Expelled'_film
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this...
Broken link, probably because it contains single quotes.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this[url=http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Judge_continues_injunction_against_'Expelled'_film]This link works.[/url]
I'd say that's great news, but the movie is pretty much dead anyway.
--
Edited by EastwoodDC at 05/21/2008 9:21 PM
Tommo0809,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI think we are 2 different wavelengths(greater or lesser, just different). First I should confess that I have not read Behe's book though I believe I have a fair idea from the sections I have read and the commotion it has generated in the evolution community. I have no vested interest in defending the man but I do believe that the concept of irreducible complexity has some merit as a challenge to the evolution community
Perhaps I can simply take some of your comments and respond to them.
>No offense but that sounds like more goalpost moving. First it was the human clotting system- then dolphins-then bony fish- then jawless fish- and now insects?
If I understand your concern, the notion that there are precedents in more prehominid forms to a workable cascade system of coagulation in the human, makes Behe's contention that all the factors in the human system(which I think we all agree are genetically determined) must be present and that all must have had to arise in one generation patently false.
If this were Behe's contention than he must have been sorely ill-informed about coagulation systems in Zoology. I doubt that that was the case. The differences in the cascades of different species has more to do with each's peculiar needs in the biosphere. Darwinian forces would certainly be sufficient, in this case to explain gradual evolution of any(not just the coagulation system) and every systems that appears as we move up the evolutionary ladder.
This, however, is not the issue with irreducible complexity as I understand it. More significantly, even in the most primitive forms (meaning the lowest on the lader, if you will) have cascades that are irreducibly complex.
Whereas it is true that each might have had ancestors that only had fibrinogen (the final product required for clot (fibrin) formation., it seems reasonable that one should be able to find instances of simpler systems that required no cascades now, but none have been found. Even the system of the horseshoe crab (now there's a creqture that loks like someting we would find in Jurassic ark!)) reveals a complex coagulation system. It is the irreducible complexity at the most basic level of the coagulation system that gives the argument against evolution legs.
The general trend in the last 50 years to the discovery of the almost unimaginable biological complexity has been accelerating. It is clear that we're only scratching the surface of coagulation complexity in organisms with circulations. Evolution as a potential explanation for this diversity and complexity requires time. Production of the enormous number of blood factors requires generations to reproduce with favorable mutations for each factor. Even if spare parts from unrelated systems were available for recruitment into coagulation system, there yet has to be some genetic regulation, ( yet another level of even higher complexity) to oversee this recruitment, and be sure there were an adequate supply of it for this additional function..
Furthermore, each system requires system specific parts, which usually means another mutation occurring simultaneously. A protease that catalyze protein breakdown iof, say, liver enzymes won't necessarily work well with clotting factors that ned to be broken down, unless, say a hydroxy group is added to an already cumbersome molecule. Even in the last few years since the original refutation of Behe's work which depended on lobster's having only one precursor to fibrinogen, seveal new factors in the cascade have been discovered.
If this retreat to earlier forms amounts to moving goal post back, then move we must.
>>you would have thought that years after making these claims Behe would have attempted to substantiate them. But he has done nothing of the sort, he said that the human clotting system was "irreduceably complex", and then had to move to a more primitive species and on down the line.
As I said before I am not here to defend the man as I have not widely read his stuff, bit if that is how he has defended his thesis, then I would have to agree with his defense.
>>His ID is nothing more than a "god of the gaps" theory, and the gaps keep getting smaller as real scientists do more work in related fields.
Actually the gaps keep getting bigger. If evolution appaars to be inadequate to the task, then we have no other science at the moment. Of course, we could always concoct the "science of the gaps". It won't be the first time.
>>I have to say it is more logical to think that the gaps will continue to become smaller as more is uncovered as opposed to "the designer" (read god) hiding in those ever shrinking areas.
I have to, of course, disagree with you since I believe in creation. The truth is that Gos (since you mention it) is in every gap, even the ones we already have elucidated. It is just a different dimension to the material one that we are so free to explore by naturalistic means. I suppose it could be said that if He is, then there appears to be some serious flaws in our experimental design.
And as long as I'm [i]fixing[/i] things ...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFrank M wrote:
> sologos, the case for intelligent design is based
> on some new and undiscovered evidence. It is simply a
> matter of misrepresenting what the evidence is telling
> us.
>
> I can see that I am the only one here with a Biology
> background, or at least no one else is claiming it so
> I will continue shooting my mouth off. Bacterial are
> evolving all the time for Pete's sake, just look at the
> antibiotic superbugs that are becoming such a
> problem in hospitals. I'm mention Galapogos finches,
> because they are birds.
>
> If Pigeon couldn't find William Provine's [url=http://science.blogdig.net/archives/articles/June2006/28/Dishonest_Dembski_the_Universal_Probability_Bound.html]"Dishonest Dembski"[/url]
> rhetoric" interview in 15 minutes, then I would have
> wasted at least 2, and it really doesn't matter what
> that crackpot said.
>
> I'm not going to get into a citation battle, I've been
> getting along just fine by ignoring the fact so far.
> Besides, I'm too lazy.
>
> I haven't looked for citations on the four forces creating
> intelligence concept of Pigeon, and I ain't gonna. Besides,
> everything I did find only proved myself wrong.
> ID has had a tough time getting peer-reviewed acceptance
> because it is crap. My aim is to get people to annoy
> people because I have no life.
>
> If there is a specific point of contention that
> really matters, I will pretend I didn't see it and because
> I know I would lose that point.
> In the meantime, I'm going to keep spinning out the
> same drivel and call it evidence. After all, I don't have
> any real work to do.
This version is SO much better now.Yes it is childish to edit someone's post, but it was fun.
Frank M [i]really did[/i] write:
> Somebody once told me - never let an opponent define
> your argument. I'll be fine.
Don't worry Frank, you are not in any danger of defining even your own argument.
--
Edited by EastwoodDC at 05/21/2008 9:18 PM
Pigeon, good to be back debating with you, although you aren't as smart as I thought you were.....
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFrank M>"If natural genetics were random, why would radiation victims or drug addicts have different results?"
Pigeon> "This is a dishonest argument."
Dishonest? I am pointing out the difference between mutations that DO appear to be random - such as those caused by radiation exposure - as compared to normal genetic variation generation to generation. This is an entirely valid discussion point. Not "dishonest" at all.
Pigeon> " For one, drugs are chemicals"
You don't say? That's why I mentioned them as an example of chemical intrusion as one possible cause of random mutation, Sherlock.
Pigeon> "which affect biological systems in predictable way (again, based on their molecular structure)".
Some chemicals interfere with the natural process and cause harmful genetic mutations. These mutations are predictable, yes - predictably random. By random here, I mean that the resultant modification does not follow form, function and symettry as normal genetic variation does.
Are you trying to claim that radiation and chemicals are not a known cause of harmful mutations? Or are you just trying to stir up enough dust in the air to avoid answering my "dishonest" question?
Pigeon> "In fact, most drugs don't affect DNA"
And your point? I didn't say ALL drugs cause harmful mutations. I said that some do. Again, are you disagreeing or dodging?
Pigeon> "Radiation is also extremely different. It usually doesn't just cause DNA to mutate, it destroys it."
Radiation can fry your skin off in the right concentration, but this also is an attempt to avoid the question with smoke and mirrors.
Fact: Radiation can cause harmful mutations. Do you contest this? If not, then I repeat my supposedly dishonest question to see if I can get an honest answer this time:
What is the difference between the random mutations of radiation and chemical intrusion, as compared to standard healthy genetic variation during reproduction? Are they different levels of randomness, then? Or are you really trying to say that there is no genetic mutation from radiation or chemicals?
An honest answer, please.
Frank>"A truly random home improvement project would leave planks, nails, wires and paint laying all over the premises, not assembled into anything functional or formed at all. Random means NO intelligence in the formation or placement of anything."
Pigeon> "Yes but again, Darwinian evolution does not posit evolution by purely random means."
It posits modifications by random means, so these quadrillions of random pieces and parts, practically never lining up properly ARE part and parcel to Darwin's mess.
Modern day observations show that the "selection" excuse is as phoney as a 3 dollar bill. The freak show Darwin predicted has always dominated modifications (but then unfailingly dies away efficiently enough that no fossils were ever found) is pure fiction.
Pigeon> "The fact is, comparing Darwinian evolution to the possibility of a house or airplane assembling from raw materials all at once is disingenuous and wrong."
Not when you are allowed trillions of tries at it, gradual or otherwise. A billion homes have been built in the past few centuries. Have any of them had a functional addition pop up accidentally as you say happened to such animals as a camel in just a few million births? The addition to the home should be MUCH easier, since the wiring need not reach every cell, and you get to start with full planks and nails, not molecule sized construction pieces. And you have FAR more tries at it than the pre-camel.
So how many self-created balconies or screen doors have stumbled into existence by happenstance so far?
Frank> "Note that the odds of this accidental home improvement do not improve one iota by saying that you will only occupy a home if you 'select' it."
Pigeon> "That is even more disingenuous than the rest of your argument. I'm not going to bother to explain why because it really should be obvious."
The only thing obvious is that you have no explanation to offer. But hey, I'll give you a big break and let you select them ALL. All billion of them! No de-selections to hurt your odds. Now surely you have at least one unintended furnace or garbage disposal. Our pre-camel got a bag on his back that just happens to have a connected tube going to just the right place... and it works! What "luck", eh? Hows that accidental solar heating system coming along?
Uh... maybe a dead bolt? A no-frill curtain?
Functional formations do NOT happen in just a few trillion attempts... EVER. Darwinism needs them to happen millions of times along each Early Cambrian vertabrate lineage.
Eastwood> "There is a misconception that a small probability disproves a hypothesis."
Frank> "Small, no. Infinitessimal, yes."
Pigeon> "If there are 10^10^10^10^10 equally probable outcomes of a situation (each with 1 in 10^10^10^10^10 odds), you are going to end up with one of them, even though which ever end result occurs had a vanishingly small probability."
This is a very elementary fallacy. He is essentially changing the question from "what are the odds against a complex functional creature arising by accident?" to "what are the odds of anything arising by accident?"
He needn't have used large numbers. No matter what the number is (positive integers), if you choose one, you have one of them. However, to get one that is both functional and complex becomes a very tiny percentage indeed. If your illogic held true, we would never be able to calculate the odds against anything. But you are not correct and neither was Eastwood. We can calculate the odds, for example, of a tornado hitting a major city this year, without saying it is 100% because a tornado will hit SOMETHING. Eastwood is simply asking a useless question: What are the odds of anything at all arising by luck?
Frank> "No, they represent the probability of a degree of complexity as an outcome, not a SPECIFIC outcome."
Pigeon> "Well, so far the only examples you've given have been of specific examples, and you haven't provided a source for any of those, anyway."
Not at all. I use terms like "beneficial trait", "genetic upgrade" or "functional physiological formations". I'm not new to this game. I may give a series of examples, but I continue to be very clear that any upgrade will do.
There is a wide range of outcomes (infinity, in fact) between the sum of all possibilities and one specific outcome. Eastwood is trying to pin us into one or the other, but we waste no time looking at either. We are looking at a very small sliver of the total possibilities - that sliver being either anything functionally complex or anything that is a genetic upgrade. We can also look at varying levels of complexity. He's trying to pretend that math CAN'T be done to prove him wrong, but of course, it can. And it does.
Now, I may use a specific example when discussing the odds of getting the encoded information. If it takes dozens, hundreds or thousands of bits of information for any specific modification, we calculate the odds of any assortment of that many bits that follows coherent form and function.
Its hilarious when Darwinists, of all people, think they can outwit mathematicians at mathematics.
Frank> "To use another analogy, if you find the book War and Peace and want to know what the odds are that monkeys haphazardly typed it, you have to calculate the odds of accidental typing of a 600 page book of any language, code or consistent media, on any topic at all."
Pigeon> "There is no reproduction, no generations, and no consequences for any changes. The book is written linearly, from start to finish (although with the delete key, it can be somewhat anti-linear), all at once."
Did you not read the very next sentences or did you dishonestly not include it?
Although this analogy was for the purpose of showing how odds are calculated (not that it stopped you from re-stating Eastwood's fallacy), I discussed how genetic modifications could fit this analogy, including repeated attempts (generations/births) deleting some letters and adding others, until a coherent insertion was created.
Consequences? Keep all the books if you like, good or bad, to increase your attempts. Or destroy any failed modification and drop back to the last coherent book, if you foolishly believe that helps your odds. Your choice.
Pigeon> "This is a classic example of finding meaning in literature where none was ever intended."
I'm not sure you have any idea what was intended, nor do I, so let's call it an "accidental" parody of accidentalists.
Here's another one: The Darwinist amazement at "millions of years" as you uttered earlier reminds me of that bald guy on Austin Powers, sticking his pinkie in his mouth and marvelling at the number one million. Millions, billions, trillions, quadrillions... These numbers are meaningless nothings compared to the odds against accidental formation of a complex biological system.
Pigeon> "Well apparently most biologists seem to be of the opinion that there is plenty of evidence for it."
For what? Accidentalism? Hardly. There is not a drop of evidence for it and I don't think you'll find many biologists who would attempt to say there is. Junk DNA was the best example you could come up with for "waste" or "bad design"? Even if it is "junk" - and we have no idea if that is true - how much "waste" are we looking at here? In a giraffe that weighs a third of a ton, the combined "waste" that you are fretting over wouldn't measure a milligram.
You wholly fail to grasp the rather common sense concept of design inference. Anything that has ever been designed has flaws, failure points and (usually) waste, but they aren't MOSTLY waste. It is not a matter of desperately looking for tiny amounts of so-called waste. It is a matter of percentages and probabilities. This is a mathematical argument. The Biology is not being argued, so the opinions of the Biologists, while not nearly as unanimous as you claim, are not as valuable as those of mathematicians.
In any case, the unanimity among Biologists pertains to evolution itself, not whether or not it was accidental.
Pigeon writes:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSologos:
>"The error of materialistic reductionism is that it believes that explaining something on the physical level rules out the existence of a metaphysical level."
>>I am sure many people do believe that, but I think most scientists would answer that successfully explaining a phenomenon does not rule out the supernatural. Like I said before, the supernatural could just be acting in such a way that we cannot detect it, or following its own set of rules, resulting in what we call the laws of nature. No self-respecting scientist would ever argue that anything could disprove the supernatural.
I wish that were the case: Richard Dawkins, Thomas Edison, Francis Crick.
>>
The one and only reason science does not concern itself with the supernatural is because it cannot be disproved, and it can be used to explain everything. The major problem with that is that attributing anything to the supernatural eliminates the predictive power of science. The reason why science is progressive (it builds upon itself) is that each theory predicts new phenomenon and often even provides a solution to problems they weren't intended to solve. The moment the supernatural is invoked, this predictive power that is so essential to the progression of science is lost. It has nothing to do with whether the supernatural is real.
Though I have to agree that naturalism cannot entertain God as a factor. On the other hand, an argument could be made that any method that automatically must eliminate a deity may have a built in flaw.
Having said that, though I would agreethat the supernatural may not lend itself to your criteria for "science". I would like to challenge the notion that revelation can not predict or be falsifiable. There are lot of tenets that revelation holds that can most certainly be, starting with the proposition of Creation. Creation predicts that nothing can exist de novo unless acted upon by an external non-natural force. Care to try to falsify that?
>>I don't see the problem with 'reducing human experience to particles and forces' as long as it works.
Oh, it works. Bur what do you think we've found by this process? Invariably we will have left out the lion's share, and i am not speaking of an exhaustive elucidation of the physical. That one is endless. How is this different from the non-self-respecting scientist that you were descrying at thestart of this post?
>> To be honest I find it an astounding claim that even though our theories accurately predict so much, they are just illusions of reality. I am more inclined to believe that they do accurately reflect at least some aspect of reality and that their success is not merely coincidence. Likewise I'm sure that some of it is wrong, and probably all of it is incomplete.
No, it is not coincidence, nor is it one of a Buddhistic illusion. . There is an order out there, and we have the organ that can perceive it. My comments about the infinitely small amount of surface that we have scratched was not meant to deny that. The aspect of reality that is reflected by our naturalistic investigations is, however, merely predictive, as you say. There is no sense of what it is by describing how it behaves. Light behaves like a particle and like a wave, reflects off some surfaces and is absorbed by other surfaces, but what is it?.
>>I really can't disagree more with this statement. Religions propose an absolute, unquestionable truth, a meaning to life, a set of morals, and they are inherently irrefutable. They propose the answer all at once, there is no searching, and you are required to believe it on 100% faith, although there is some consequential evidence. Science is fundamentally different.
I agree with none of this.
>> It is a continual quest for understanding based on reason and observations of the world around us.
" Understanding" is not the word I would choose,but I certainly agree with the description of the process. I have said befoe that the methodology is not. in itself a bad thing. Furthermore, it is all we have at the moment, and it has been fruitful.
>>Try changing the course of religion with an observation or two.
It actually happens all the time. The reformation was a case in point. Science and theology have more in common that you might think.
>>See this is my problem with this discussion. You assume that God exists, you assume that he provided us with the ability to comprehend our world. I cannot have a meaningful discussion with somebody who inserts the irrefutable into his arguments.
It is not purely an assumption. There is actually a rational process going on with all this. But it is true, it is difficult to have a rational discussion, if by rational you mean let's test this.
>>The term "science of the gaps" is overused and misused. It is invoked every time scientists argue against a fundamentally new idea because it is not (yet) necessary.
Ideas are just that in science until tested. By "science of the gaps", I mean proposing that there are naturalistic explanations every time there is a gap of knowledge. It is reasonable to assume that our knowledge base will continue to increase. But ir is gap thinking to believe that science can explain everything, That is a reductionist point of view.
I appreciate having this discussion with you Pigeon. Your apologetic for science captures some key aspects of the methodology. I'll have to give all this some more thought, Thank you for the challenge.
Eastwood: Thanks for fixing the link, and I agree about the movie pretty much being dead, however just the other day I was explaining the premise of the movie and some of the distorted realities that stein presents as truths to a buddy of mine whilst having a beer and the psycho sitting next to me informed me that if he heard another word come out of my mouth he would "vomit on my head".
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSo I would have to say its a small comfort to know that not only was the movie poorly made and dishonest about its underlying topic, but now courts wont even let it into theaters, not because it proposes some dangerous idea but because they tried cut even more corners (and I'm not sure which reason for its being held out of theaters would be more ironic).
> There is a wide range of outcomes (infinity, in fact)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this> between the sum of all possibilities and one specific
> outcome. Eastwood is trying to pin us into one or the
> other, but we waste no time looking at either. We are
> looking at a very small sliver of the total
> possibilities - that sliver being either anything
> functionally complex or anything that is a genetic
> upgrade. We can also look at varying levels of
> complexity. He's trying to pretend that math CAN'T be
> done to prove him wrong, but of course, it can. And
> it does.
I am not pretending Frank, I demonstrated that the evidence you claim is not valid inference. By ID methods the numbers you suggest show the impossibility of unguided evolution are also point probabilities. Among other errors, this fails to consider any other point probability that leads to the same observed outcome. This disproves nothing because it is simply bad reasoning. To quote [url http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_even_wrong]Pauli[/url], "It's not even wrong."
>
Sologos: I hear you on the wave length thing, and after reading a few of your posts I get the feeling that all we would do is keep going in circles. But at the very least I can take solace in the fact that you are not an ID hack that just spouts off what he reads at "answers in genesis" but someone who has taken the time to understand what the discussion is about. And now a few responses ( i left the quotes that you were responding to from my post in there for continuity's sake)
> >No offense but that sounds like more goalpost
> moving. First it was the human clotting system- then
> dolphins-then bony fish- then jawless fish- and now
> insects?;
>
> If I understand your concern, the notion
> n, the notion that there are precedents in more
> prehominid forms to a workable cascade system of
> coagulation in the human, makes Behe's contention
> that all the factors in the human system(which I
> think we all agree are genetically determined) must
> be present and that all must have had to arise in one
> generation patently false.
>
>
> This, however, is not the issue with
> the issue with irreducible complexity as I understand
> it. More significantly, even in the most primitive
> forms (meaning the lowest on the lader, if you will)
> have cascades that are irreducibly complex.
-this is one of the problems that I have with Behe's argument is that when one example is refuted I would be under the impression that the others, which were based on the same logic, would at the very least become shakey contentions, if not complete throw-aways. But instead most proponents of ID choose to say something along the lines of well we weren't really talking about X we were talking about X1....Xn. As evidenced by your later comment "move the goal posts we must"
Now I'm not saying disproving of one example means disproving of all, but to me it just seems like the same battle being fought on different ground with the same results. over and over and over.
>
> Whereas it is true that each might have
> might have had ancestors that only had fibrinogen
> (the final product required for clot (fibrin)
> formation., it seems reasonable that one should be
> able to find instances of simpler systems that
> required no cascades now, but none have been found.
> Even the system of the horseshoe crab (now there's a
> creqture that loks like someting we would find in
> Jurassic park!)) reveals a complex coagulation system.
> It is the irreducible complexity at the most basic
> level of the coagulation system that gives the
> argument against evolution legs.
-isn't the validity of this assumption based on the notion that scientists in the field will NEVER find a more primitive form of the clotting agent. That just seems like a fairly large, if not poorly made, assumption given the history of the discussion regarding this particular issue. Like I said before, first it was that humans had the irreducably complex clotting system, and then research showed it did not, then it was said that dolphins actually had the system, and then research showed they did not. So with your example about the horseshoe crab, it just seems premature to call it irraduceably complex when work in the field is pointed in the other direction.
>
> The general trend in the last 50 years to
> 50 years to the discovery of the almost unimaginable
> biological complexity has been accelerating. It is
> clear that we're only scratching the surface of
> coagulation complexity in organisms with
> circulations. Evolution as a potential explanation
> for this diversity and complexity requires time.
> Production of the enormous number of blood factors
> requires generations to reproduce with favorable
> mutations for each factor. Even if spare parts
> from unrelated systems were available for recruitment
> into coagulation system, there yet has to be some
> genetic regulation, ( yet another level of even
> higher complexity) to oversee this recruitment, and
> be sure there were an adequate supply of it for this
> additional function..
>
> Furthermore, each system requires
> system requires system specific parts, which usually
> means another mutation occurring simultaneously. A
> protease that catalyze protein breakdown iof, say,
> liver enzymes won't necessarily work well with
> clotting factors that ned to be broken down, unless,
> say a hydroxy group is added to an already cumbersome
> molecule. Even in the last few years since the
> original refutation of Behe's work which depended on
> lobster's having only one precursor to fibrinogen,
> seveal new factors in the cascade have been
> discovered.
-this sounds like the "argument from ignorance" to me. And I'm sorry but I refuse to buy into the "its so complex it must have been designed" especially when it is applied to recently discovered elements of a system. Even more so the argument isn't forwarded for its explanatory power, or because of problems with the philosophical or logical underpinnings of the evolutionary argument, but forwarded in defense of a notion that is arrived at far prior to perusing the evidence. And that isn't remotely a sound methodology, or good science.
;
> >>you would have thought that years after making
> these claims Behe would have attempted to
> substantiate them. But he has done nothing of the
> sort, he said that the human clotting system was
> "irreduceably complex", and then had to move to a
> more primitive species and on down the line.
>
> As I said before I am not here to defend the
> end the man as I have not widely read his stuff, bit
> if that is how he has defended his thesis, then I
> would have to agree with his defense.
- This irreduceable complexity is offered as a method whereby intelligent design can be shown as necessary. Showing that simpler clotting systems exist doesn't necessarily imply an evolutionary chain running from the simpler to the more complex system, but what it does show is that "irreducible complexity" is not necessary, if not scientifically meaningless.
>
>
> >>His ID is nothing more than a "god of the gaps"
> " theory, and the gaps k