Intelligent Design Theory: Science or Religion?

Thanks for the fun posts Wandel

Is that the wan wave of the departing trying to save face as best he can?

Well- when you start stacking the jury you really have discredited your position.

Unless you live in N. Korea of course.

Which we don't.

And for which we thank The Lord.

Those of us who know which way up is I mean.

Hey, has anyone heard from FM? It's been a while?

rosborne,

Farmerman mentioned recently that he may not be able to post until around Christmas time.

Thanks. I couldn't remember how long he said he would be gone.

You should pay more attention ros.

I came here looking for a discussion thread about science and religion, after listening to a radio show today, "Debating Darwin" on national public radio's "To the Best of Our Knowledge," part of a series "Electronics to Enlightenment" on science and religion. The show/s can be heard from the website http://wpr.org/book/

They interviewed scientists, atheists, and also the fellow from the Discovery Institute mentioned a few posts back on this thread. And a woman whose name escapes me, an evolutionary biologist from MIT who feels strongly that there is no need to polarize over science versus religion, since Darwin had specific roots in the Industrial Revolution that are no longer relevant. She said intelligence and consciousness may lie at the root of all life on any scale, rather than be the ultimate refinement, referring to mutations among pathogens as intelligent behavior. Her point was that science and religion were not incompatible.

There was mention of a movie, "Flock of Dodos." http://www.flockofdodos.com/ The interviewee from the production said the arrogance of scholars created barriers in dialogs over science and religion--that religious groups had better PR and use of media. An interesting subject.

If this thread could be revived and if anyone were interested in listening to the stream of the radio program I mentioned, I would enjoy comments. I could go to the NPR discussion site, but I have enjoyed comments/commentors on this site.

Thanks.

Sal

I was unable to get the link to function but I would guess that the thread has covered most of the discussion.

One point may be not-



Darwin's ideas were embraced eagerly by the industrial magnates, one of which families he married into, the Wedgewoods, because it justified their lifestyles and the conditions under which their workers toiled.

It also justified imperialism and the slave trade.

The Theory of Evolution is a very elegant scientific edifice. The only trouble is is that if everyone digs it, as they will if anti-IDers have their way, life becomes not worth living for the broad mass of the population.

It contradicts the tenets of Christianity.

It hold up a "chilling image of a seething slum, with everyone scrambling to get out."

The weak are trampled underfoot.

Nature was abortive, squandering, profilgate.

Her failures, most, are discarded to rot. Even the poor-house exists to contradict the theory.

As Darwin himself said- "What a book a Devil's Chaplain might write on the clumsy, wasteful, blundering low & horribly cruel works of nature."

Progress through pain.

Erasmus Darwin wrote- "One great slaughterhouse the warring world."

Tennyson wrote- "Nature red in tooth and claw."

Your "views" across the fields, the pretty gardens and the green valleys are actually of a killing field despite the sweet musical backing tracks. No question about it.

Your blood runs with brute DNA.

Your laws to protect against monopoly, price gouging, rape, murder and death by starvation are ridiculous.

The meek don't inherit the earth-they go to the wall.

Yes- it is an elegant scientific theory. Darwin was a heavy investor in industry if you know what I mean. And an absentee landlord.

Let it rip boys. What are you holding back for. You only need get it voted for and that should be easy seeing as how you are so,so right and can prove it.

There is no sweetness
In an evolutionist
All he knows is the
Jackboot and the crashing fist.

Don't let him kid you
He's putting on an act
There's iron in his velvet glove
It's a scientific fact.

I might add that that most brilliant and erudite anti-IDer Mr James Joyce said-

"When I hear the word love I feel like puking."

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/10/science/10cnd-evolve.html?hp&ex=1165813200&en=459da82e1510cecf&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Do you suppose whomever is doing all this designing desided to make a change to his/her/its grand plan and allow the some East Africans people to digest the milk of their cows?

Thank you for the link, SallyMander, the NPR program seems to be showing the many sides of the debate. (There probably are at least four different positions.)

In my opinion, issues of science should be kept separate from issues of faith. The "why questions" asked by scientists are different than the "why questions" asked by theologians.

In Geoffrey Gorer's book on the Marquis de Sade there is this in relation to de Sade's vast knowledge and his anti-religious position-

"All this learning is employed in an attack on God and the Church which for length and intensity can seldom have been equalled; he attacks them with reason, with ridicule, with imprecations, with blasphemy; he attacks from the philosophical, the economic, the political, the ideal and the pragmatic angle; he ranges from the discussion of inconsistencies in the Bible to the Black Mass, from the history of the Papacy to the pre-Christian origin of the Eucharist, from the dogma of Hell to the economic foundations of the Church's property."

"The basis of all this is obvious. De Sade was a passionate idealist and could neither forgive a God who permitted all the evil and misery of which he was so terribly aware, nor a Church whose explanations could not satisfy his reason, and whose practice and representitives so completely belied the principles they professed to observe."

I think de Sade adequately sums up the anti-ID position. All the points Gorer lists there are elaborated at great length in de Sade's works along with much else that derives from them.

But like all anti-IDers, including James Joyce, he takes no notice of social consequences which is only to be expected of such gigantic egos. A Church unable to provide explanations to satisfy the reason of such egos is too much for them.

MICHAEL BEHE UPDATE

Behe doggedly adheres to this position even though the basic premis of his argument has been demonstrated to be incorrect.

Yeap.
http://www.millerandlevine.com/km/evol/design1/article.html

Well, he's still sellin' books, right?

And people are still buying magnetic insoles for shoes, anti-aging cream, herbal male enhancement, hair growth tonic, eye exercies, memory enhancement pills, and burnt toast that looks like jesus.

Let the buyer beware.

Sounds like Behe is doing what primitive humans have been doing for eons; attributing what they don't understand to the supernatural. Behe seems to think we know all there is to know today so if we don't understand the creation of complex structures than we must attribute it to the supernatural world. In effect Behe is saying our knowledge will never allow us to understand it so God must be the answer.

Since we already know Behe's claims are false, that just leaves his motives in question... he's either a moron, a shyster, a crackpot or an evangelist, we just don't know which yet.