Intelligent Design Theory: Science or Religion?

@rosborne979,

Quote:

Leadfoot said something in the Evolution/Religious nonsense thread which may have gone unnoticed, but clearly differentiates his position from the usual one we run into:
Leadfoot wrote:

“Like I've said, the history of the planet whether via ID or nature is indistinguishable.”

That statement leads down into into a rabbit warren of subtle philosophical arguments, so much so that it's not even clear where to start.

Your interpretation of that is understandable, I’ll try to clarify what I meant by it.

I was trying to get farmerman to see that from an unbiased position, evolution is as unfalsifiable as ID is claimed to be, and could be just as easily called pseudo science as well. I say this because you cannot make any argument that evolution cannot come up with an answer for, even if unproven. ID is often refuted by simply stating that evolution explains everything about the existence of life. I.e. , it is unfalsifiable.

For example, the Cambrian explosion is explained as a changing environment causing relatively rapid appearance of hundreds of new species and completely new body plans. But when cockroaches or horseshoe crabs stayed relatively unchanged for far longer periods (450 million years) through many changes in environment, the reply is ‘they were simply well adapted'.

Or, the unlikely separate evolution of eyes or other feature in completely separate species is explained by 'convergent evolution'. Maybe, but ID would explain it equally well.

I don’t think I explained that well but I’m outta time.

On the 'religious bias' charge from farmer, I have never denied that I have a belief in God, but the arguments I make for ID are completely divorced from that belief.

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@Leadfoot,

How can you unfalsify ID when you can't even produce evidence of an IDer?

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@Leadfoot,

Quote:

cockroaches or horseshoe crabs stayed relatively unchanged for far longer periods (450 million years) through many changes in environment, the reply is ‘they were simply well adapted'.

When you have no training at understanding how these classes of organisms evolved and developed through the Paleozoic through today, you would try to state that they evolved little. In fact, cockroaches developed from a class of arthropoda that were sea"dwelling from the Ordovician through the late Devonian. They had major changes during the Carboniferous when they were actually quite huge due to a 80 million year excess oxygen event. Horshoe crabs actually arose from sea Spiders. Each of these animal groups have undergone evolution of their internals and externals .I would imagine that dinours, hqd they not gone extinct, could have shown similr retention of their shapes .
Insects , due to their adaptation to environments have not necessarily changed intraspecies, but as the rule states
"When you have many species of your genera, you can undergo evolution of one and loss of another through extinction and not show any bulk loss of the genus under study.

Last time you brought up this point as a burning question, I asked you to visit a university library and go online to the Treatise of Invertebrate paleontology, and look up "Limulus evolution". Every typ of invertebrate fossil gets added until the very treatise would be like 28 volumes long today.

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@cicerone imposter,

Quote:

How can you unfalsify ID when you can't even produce evidence of an IDer?

Assuming that sentence makes sense (I’m being generous) I answered that earlier and I hate repeating myself.

Conversely, Can you produce evidence of natural abiogenesis?

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Abiogenesis has absolutely nothing to do with evolution. This is a cri de coeur of the creationist, and it is deceitful to bring it up in a discussion of evolution, just as all of so-called intelligent design is deceitful. Evolution can only take place once life is present--how it got there is completely irrelevant. LF bringing it up constantly reminds me of Lash bringing up Clinton in every discussion of President Plump.

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@Setanta,

Its really hard getting that through folk's heads

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As if I hadn’t made that same point many times.

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The discussion is about evolution. You continually bring up abiogenesis. That's the only thing you've done many times before. It is completely irrelevant. It appears, more and more, that you are fundamentally dishonest.

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@farmerman,

LF seems like a broken record--he mentions abiogenesis in almost every post.

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@Setanta,

whats a record uncle Set?

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Umm.. that might be because the issue of abiogenesis is a fundamental issue directly related to ID theory. Some parts of evolution are as well.

But that does nicely illustrate the point that some here have no idea what ID theory really is.

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@farmerman,

Now that's an interesting point of conjecture. What would be the modern equivalent? I'm nominating 'animated gif'.

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@Leadfoot,

Quote Leadfoot:

Quote:

Umm.. that might be because the issue of abiogenesis is a fundamental issue directly related to ID theory. Some parts of evolution are as well.

No, it really isn't. It is not necessary to know how the first life came about to be able to ascertain how life, once established, behaves and reproduces.

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@hingehead,

animated gif sounds good, except being "one" as an insultdoesnt work too well. Neither does "broken CD" because it usually just aborts

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@Blickers,

Quote:

Quote Leadfoot:
Quote:
"Umm.. that might be because the issue of abiogenesis is a fundamental issue directly related to ID theory. Some parts of evolution are as well. "

No, it really isn't. It is not necessary to know how the first life came about to be able to ascertain how life, once established, behaves and reproduces.

Really? Are you new to this thread? You want to be the expert here on ID?

Go for it man!

I'm wondering if I made it more obvious by wording it:
"Some parts of evolution are related to ID as well."

Was that the confusion?
Hope that helped.

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@farmerman,

Quote:

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof..." The Etablishment clause and the Free expression clause of the 1st amendment both set the basis for "freedom of worship". If Congress were to find for those evidence-free (but myth based) Creation stories, it would be in violation of the Amendment itself.

To exercise my religion (which is a system to help people have a relationship with the creator) you must ask questions like, "how did He create the universe and is the scientific evidence supporting the assumption that He did it. That inquiry is a part of my families life.

Right now I pay for two schools in my community dedicated to teaching children how to inquire the origins of the universe. One a catholic school a small portion of the population voluntarily support, the second a public school I am forced to support. The second one is a belief system I am forced to support, the first I freely support. The forcing to support the second does not sound like freedom. Not allowing discussion in apublic school does not sound like freedom either. (I want discussion not forced baptism)

Quote:

There;s a lot of history involved in which the author of the first drafts of that Amendment (John Dickinson of the "Lower Counties of Pa), based his drafts on the separation of the states of Pa and Marylqnd which were founded on foundations of two unfriendly religions and were separated based on a single North south and East West line layed out by two surveyors in 1761-66. There;s a lot of history involved in which the author of the first drafts of that Amendment (John Dickinson of the "Lower Counties of Pa), based his drafts on the separation of the states of Pa and Marylqnd which were founded on foundations of two unfriendly religions and were separated based on a single North south and East West line layed out by two surveyors in 1761-66. It protected citizens of each of these individual colonies from practicing favored religions. When Dickinon layed out the First amendment in draft form, he expanded the "right" to be included in the ARticles of Confederation and it was brought into the Constitution of the states. When Dickinon layed out the First amendment in draft form, he expanded the "right" to be included in the ARticles of Confederation and it was brought into the Constitution of the states.

And neither belief system was atheistic in your example. I am not asking you to practice my religion, just don't force me to pay for your kids to practice yours if you won';t contribute to mine. Even the kids at the Catholic don't have to be catholic. We have atheists graduating from the school.

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Science doesnt give a rats ass about religion. BUT, religion has NO PLACE in science at all .

Then science should quit forcing an atheistic point of view on everything that has to do with education.

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If you can find actual scientific evidence (not mouth play) that ID dos govern the direction this planet has taken, then Ill be happy to back off. Ive got 40 years under my belt in several areas of relevant interdisciplanary research and have yet to hear , read, or be part of a major symposium or conference on the subject of ID (other than gatherings where funny stories of "what the hell are those ID guys doing lately" , are exchanged

And if you can find actual scientific evidence to prove to me where matter originally came from and how abiogenisis occurred beyond speculation I will do the same.

I will admit the discovery institute and the catholic church are doing more harm than good right now when it come to evolutionary science from an ID point of view. The reason is they both assume the big bang was the event that created matter.

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@brianjakub,

Quote:

I will admit the discovery institute and the catholic church are doing more harm than good right now when it come to evolutionary science from an ID point of view.

Think I know what you mean. I regret their relatively recent decision to 'contaminate' the good science on the ID website with commentary on abortion, euthenatia and the death penalty. That gives the impression to some that the science is biased.
WTF were they thinking?

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@Leadfoot,

They can't help it, they are human. They are biased toward nature revealing the morality of God and his purpose. Which was actually the purpose of science at one time because in reality that's what humans were made to do; develope a relationship with God through His creation.

They forgot Paul's advice "and when with the Romans, act like a Roman."

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@brianjakub,

Quote:

To exercise my religion (which is a system to help people have a relationship with the creator) you must ask questions like, "how did He create the universe and is the scientific evidence supporting the assumption that He did it. That inquiry is a part of my families life.

Theres nothing that stops you in the US. The "Free Exercis" clause makes certain that, hould you want your own school that have such a worldview, you can do this with no tax support. Public schools, funded by tax dollars, should be religion free no matter whose.

Quote:

just don't force me to pay for your kids to practice yours if you won';t contribute to mine. Even the kids at the Catholic don't have to be catholic. We have atheists graduating from the school.

Parochial schools are separated from the 1st Amendment by the Free Exercise clause. The members, like any church, carry their own expenses. TAX DOLLARS support schools that are kept secular because of the "Establishment Clause". If you drive it further, there will be a lawsuit. Teaching science must remain a secular exercise, not based on anyones religious belief

Quote:

Then science should quit forcing an atheistic point of view on everything that has to do with education

(sigh), You dnt get it at all do you? If you wanna believe and teach your kids that a big spaghetti monster created the planet a apasta sauce, go for it. Just dont push that stuff on the rest of us, We are protected by the same Constitution.

Code:

  And if you can find actual scientific evidence to prove to me where matter originally came from and how abiogenesis occurred beyond speculation I will do the same

deal, but everything was really abiogenesis no? What did your creation even do, create little model critters and then POOF??
Im not in the area of the origins of life, I follow some of the research and evidence of the chemical fossil record, but I dont do anything in it. Im hevily involved in evolutionary geology and have lots of evidence on common ancestry and "missing evidence" also.
I have no idea what you are doing but Ive not ever heard anything from your worldview that was not already pre macerated by its tenets and not anything constituting any evidence.

Quote:

I will admit the discovery institute and the catholic church are doing more harm than good right now when it come to evolutionary science from an ID point of view

I really dont have any arguments with the Catholic schools systems in the US. They had long abandoned any beliefs in the Creation and even ID. They pretty much teach a transcendent God and natural evolution directed by geological changes that are also natural.
Discovery Institute is another story entirely. They profess beliefs like Leadfoot says he is about and then fool one with these "sudden appearance" and "Irreducible Complexity" and "Specified Complexity" stuff and plate it with all sorts of social issues they call "Renewal" (sounds to my cynical self as nothing more than "GIMME THAT OLD TIME RELIGION"). One of the reasons I have little faith that Leadfoot is actually what he claims to be since his most recent quote about how Evolution has the same issues as Creationism, was coincidentally produced by the Faculty at Discovery. I am questioning EVERYTHING those guys print, including how they jump onto discussion hypotheses like Neutral "theory" (which aint even a theory). Anyone else, when we talk neutral theory, we talk about gene flow and strength of something like drift, when the DI discusses it, it becomes a branch of "Sudden appearance" preaching.

1 Reply

@Leadfoot,

Quote:

I regret their relatively recent decision to 'contaminate' the good science on the ID website with commentary on abortion, euthenatia and the death penalty.

Theyve been involved in most of their "Cultural renewal" projects for 20 yers. Actually They are on stronger ground there than they are with ID. They dont deny their religious worldview that underlies most everyones moral leanings

1 Reply

Intelligent Design Theory: Science or Religion?

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