Intelligent Design Theory: Science or Religion?

Also, someone sent me this today:

A new hit from the Science Times, not available in stores yet:

Sing to the tune of "Battle Hymn of the Republic"

My bones proclaim a story of incompetent design
My back still hurts, my sinus clogs, my teeth just won't align
If I had drawn the blueprint I would certainly resign
Incompetent Design!
Evo-Evo-Evolution
Design is but a mere illusion
Darwin sparked our revolution
Science shall prevail!

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Pretty good Mac-

A skeleton dancing with glee.Love it.To a Michael Tippett waltz under the blinking neon signs.Flucking great man.

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Mctag-Incompetent March ws written by Don U. Wise, a structural geologist who was, as far as I know, the first scientist to have an article published in a prestigious jounal that was a total goof. The article was seriously written and published in a ournal that had an April 1 edition. Don taught at U Mass , Franklin and Marshall (here in Lancaster) then he was drafted by NASA on the moon program. From this he separated himself in disgust one year , because of the bloated beuracracy.

Don had been warning about the outcome of playing pattty-cake with Fundamentalists, and we just laughed at him.
Don introduced that song at the Geol Society of America annual meeting last year. He gave an invited scholars talk about the battle for our nations minds , using ID as an example of religion gone amok.

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Quote:

Kansas Governor may jump into Board of Education races
(Associated Press, December 30, 2005)
TOPEKA, Kan. - Democratic Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, who has been critical of the State Board of Education's conservative Republican majority, may jump into board races next year.
"That could happen," Sebelius told The Topeka Capital-Journal during an interview Thursday. "I think it's a critical position."
Five of the board's 10 members must stand for re-election next year, and four are part of the conservative majority that approved new science standards treating evolution as a flawed theory and hired Bob Corkins as education commissioner, though Corkins had never before run a school or school district.
At least two groups already have formed to unseat conservative board members.
Three conservatives facing re-election: Connie Morris, of St. Francis; Iris Van Meter, of Thayer; and John Bacon, of Olathe, already face opposition. The fourth, Ken Willard, of Hutchinson, has said he expects to have an opponent.
Sebelius didn't say how she would be involved in board races.
"I think the good news is Kansans finally understand we have an elected board," she said. "I'm not sure people knew or knew what kind of decisions they could make. So having some very visible activity at this point, I think, is going to be good for the elections."

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wandel, Please keep us updated on these elections. Would be interesting to see how the old board members fare.

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wandeljw wrote:

spendius wrote:
What's up with "the major arguments from ID have been contradicted repeatedly"?

A section in the 139 page decision in the Dover case does specify how the major arguments from ID have been contradicted.

(You can also read this entire thread from the beginning and see the major arguments from ID contradicted repeatedly.)

I submit, to put a finer point on it, that the Jones Decision did not merely "contradict" the ID-iot arguments, but rather that in that document the entire ID-iot proposition was conclusively demonstrated to have been unambiguously refuted and debunked.

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timber,
I agree. "Refuted" is more accurate than "contradicted".

c.i.,
A lot of people are putting hope in the 2006 Kansas elections. If the conservative board members are replaced with moderates, it is possible that the newly configured board may actually repeal the anti-evolution policy before it goes into effect. The revised standards will not go into effect until 2007. A court challenge to the revised standards would probably be successful. However, Kansas citizens are waiting to see what happens in 2006.

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The Kansas board revised only those parts of the science education standards that involve evolutionary theory. Below are proposed changes:

Quote:

"The view that living things in all the major kingdoms are modified descendants of a common ancestor (described in the pattern of a branching tree) has been challenged in recent years by (i) discrepancies in the molecular evidence, (ii) a fossil record that is not consistent with gradual increases in complexity, and (iii) studies that show that animals follow different rather than identical early stages of embryological development."

"New heritable traits may result from new combinations of genes and from random mutations or changes in the reproductive cells. Except in very rare cases, mutations that may be inherited are neutral, deleterious or fatal."

"Whether microevolution (change within a species) can be extrapolated to explain macroevolutionary changes (such as new complex organs or body plans and new biochemical systems which appear irreducibly complex) is controversial."

"The lack of adequate natural explanations for the genetic code, the sequences of genetic information necessary to specify life, the biochemical machinery needed to translate genetic information into functional biosystems, and the formation of proto-cells"

"The sudden rather than gradual emergence of organisms near the time that the Earth first became habitable"

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quoting from wandels quote

Quote:

?Whether microevolution (change within a species) can be extrapolated to explain macroevolutionary changes (such as new complex organs or body plans and new biochemical systems which appear irreducibly complex) is controversial.?

If this goes to some kind of legal test, then it will be interesting to see how the IDers duck around all the evidence we now have available. Ive already seen a chart on the evidence supporting "Macroevolution" of a land dwelling creature with ear and nares modififcations all the way to the whale over a 20 million year period. When you look at the geologic data from where the fossils clusters , to the changes in the ear and nares (and flippers from feet) the distinction (yet their connections) are pretty strong evidence for descent with modification.
The IDers are actually arguing from a point of "back to tyhe drawing board" for each new higher taxa. And they say that theres not enough time for evolution to occur. Buuulllll.

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One area that Judge jones may reap a little flack was explained to me yesterday by a lwayer from the case. He (jones) stated outloud that , in effect, the courts time is being wasted on cases like these and , he mildly hints, that his opinion may be interpreted as being overreaching in its scope.
Now, if the School board were reelected as the IDers wanted, then , perhaps anappeal would have been mounted with the idea that , in appeal, the school would get its money back fr the entire case.As it stands, the new schoolboard will have a very clean slate with no IDers to mess with and a clear win on the side of reason.
The only thing thats left is how the concept of starre decisis will play out in other states that have to have jones decision sitting there like a huuge pink whale.
So, they (the other states involved with ID training) may want to challenge the jones decision as totally non applicable in the rest of the country (even tough that is already the case, )

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Timber-

I'm afraid that this continual use of

Quote:

the ID-iot arguments,

shows a lack of respect for one's opponents.This is particularly so when an issue as important and as long standing as this one is is the one being debated.Such a debate took place in ancient Greece and the death penalty was a part of it.And it has been proceeding ever since.

Now I am aware that you don't know what the issue is.That is obvious from your posts,which are well written but limited in scope,and those from others in the opposition to ID, and it is the explanation of why IDers do not contribute much.
Thus I think you are trying to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

And it is your chosen bathwater in which the other side are easily refuted or contradicted.It is the bathwater of your own time and space where nothing went before except a picture in your mind gleaned from specific texts or consistent groups of texts and nothing comes after.In this juicy,mucoid plasma,which is pretty good I'll admit,the refutation of ID is as easy as flicking fag-ash of your sleeve.
Which is why the debate is conducted where it is.It is quite natural to go for the easy route.Monkeys do it and they also don't reckon with the before and after.
Wouldn't we criticise politicians who gave no thought for the after:who allowed its electorate to have a jamboree blow-out and lay the cost on the future generations?Wouldn't we?Heaven help a nation with politicians like that.Given human nature without divine guidance.

It is a serious debate and categorising the opposition in a serious debate as ID-iots,which has as a phrase now become trite with overuse,is not only disrespectful in civilised company and boring but it also demonstrates your lack of appreciation of the seriousness of the issue.It also heaps odium on your own side.

The SDers have not even bothered to try to answer any of the questions I have posed on behalf of the "baby".If the SDers are so right what do you do if they convert everybody overnight,which one simply must allow for if one is presenting an argument.What do you then do with the churches and the congregations.What do you do with books and movies and other arts.Children are influenced much more by those things than they ever will be by what goes on in biology lessons.What about the Book of Etiquette?What about "How many seas must a white dove sail before she sleeps in the sand?"
What will your ideal society look like when religion has been eradicated?And the Dover decision is a further step along that road and has been greeted with a degree of jubilation similar to that when a goal is scored in a football match half way into the first half.A totally "NOW!" response.I'll refrain from quoting a line from Ballad of a Thin Man that springs to mind.

A little more respect is due I feel.It isn't a football match although I think you think it is.

Is there any hope of the children being considered in all this rather than who has won and who has lost in this squabble over Dover.I imagine their little heads are spinning and they think school is now an arena for parental slanging matches.

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And parental slanging matches are an inevitable consequence of allowing parents anywhere near the educational system.

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wow, and timber only asked spendi for the time.

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spendi, were there anything whatsoever deserving of respect within or related to the ID-iot proposition, it would not be the ID-iot proposition it is. I accord the ignorant, luddite, patent absurdity and its proponents all the regard it and they merit.

I likewise accord to your referenced questions (cf " ... The SDers have not even bothered to try to answer any of the questions I have posed ...") such response as they by their own substance merit. Irrelevance and nonsequitur properly are to be disregarded.

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Spendius,

How the *** do you get from "ID isn't science" to the decision is an attempt to eradicate religion?

"ID isn't science" doesn't equate to teaching science will eliminate religion unless it means that religion can't withstand a test of logical and rational thinking. Perhaps that is your fear.

Man has always dealt with the question of "why are we here?" Science hasn't been able to answer that question. It can answer the how we got here but will never be able to answer the why because why is a philosophical question. As long as religion sticks to the why it will never have a problem.

Religion that refuses to put spirituality in the context of real world knowledge will be thrown away. Religion that accepts that knowledge and adapts to it will thrive.

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Quote: "Religion that refuses to put spirituality in the context of real world knowledge will be thrown away. Religion that accepts that knowledge and adapts to it will thrive."

parados, I'm not so sure about your statements. Religion is based on faith, and it has very little to do with "knowledge" - especially "real." That's the reason so many religious people continue to justify ID in science.

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parados wrote-

Quote:

How the *** do you get from "ID isn't science" to the decision is an attempt to eradicate religion?

I'm sorry if I gave an impression that Judge Jones was attempting to eradicate religion.I doubt if he was but the decision moves us,very slightly,as with fronts in trench warfare,in that direction.Look at the confidence it has put into some of those who do wish to eradicate religion.

Quote:

"ID isn't science" doesn't equate to teaching science will eliminate religion unless it means that religion can't withstand a test of logical and rational thinking. Perhaps that is your fear.

No that is not my fear.I'm not in the least concerned with my own position here except insofar as I very much doubt that society can function without religion and I think our society is as good as ever society got and I'm not sure we ought to disturb the status quo too much.Lose a skirmish and you get used to losing and then you lose a battle and then the war.I think a fairly strong religious confidence is,all things considered,which is rare enough,a good thing and I think our institutions are strong enough to cope with any excesses such as have been practiced in the past:a place where we do not live.Even those excesses,shameful though they are,may have been judged necessary by those to whom such sad tasks fall and who may well have reaped discredit from activities of those exploiting their edicts for other reasons.But all that is past.Given economic stabilty such as we are used to I can't see any way those types of thing could recur.

I agree with your last remark but we will have to be very patient and accept that we won't see that come to pass.It is far distant but your thought does beg the question of what "real world knowledge" actually means.

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c.i. wrote-

Quote:

parados, I'm not so sure about your statements. Religion is based on faith, and it has very little to do with "knowledge" - especially "real." That's the reason so many religious people continue to justify ID in science.

.

You are on the same treadmill c.i.

Suppose ID is motivated,in it's higher echelons,by a fear of "real knowledge" in your sense of the expression.My beef with ID is that it is schismatic.And schisms weaken the religious agenda.But that's another matter.

"Real knowledge" can be seen as a threat to settled and successful ways of life.It has already happened, especially in the sixties.But real knowledge has exploded since then and it moves at a rate that Mr and Mrs Average have great difficulty keeping up with.

So basically,as I must depart to a knees up soon,there is a dialectic and if our past history is anything to go by we will come up smelling of roses.But at a nice leisurly pace so Granny doesn't get the collywobbles.

Happy New Year-Whoooosh!

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cicerone imposter wrote:

Quote: "Religion that refuses to put spirituality in the context of real world knowledge will be thrown away. Religion that accepts that knowledge and adapts to it will thrive."

parados, I'm not so sure about your statements. Religion is based on faith, and it has very little to do with "knowledge" - especially "real." That's the reason so many religious people continue to justify ID in science.

But there is a difference between using religion to justify existence while not ignoring the reality of science, medicine etc vs religion that is used to deny reality.

I see no problem with religion from the standpoint of morality and to answer the question of why are we here.

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But with limits; I don't like any religion shoved into my face or their active participation to deny American citizens equal rights. I also do not approve of the way Bush has limited stem cell research in the US based on his religious' beliefs.

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Intelligent Design Theory: Science or Religion?

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