Intelligent Design Theory: Science or Religion?

Miss Wabbit, Elsie is not going to put forth a theory, because she only came to scorn others. She has steadfastly avoided the question of the nature of the designer in the a theory of intelligent design, although that would be a core principle of such a theory, if it had the genuine scientific credentials to be a theory. But it's not, it's only an hypothesis. As such, it is pretty weak. Hypotheses need to collect data and refer them to the statements of the hypotheses in order to attain to the dignity of a theory. The IDers have never done so, because their stock in trade is to question a theory of evolution, and use fallacious debate techniques to attempt to discredit such a theory.

But in the end, the IDers are simply creationists in sheep's clothing, and dogma is at the heart of their contentions. Which is why Elsie will neither propound a theory, nor explain the designer--because she won't admit to the dogmatic basis for her belief.

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They're not even in sheeps clothing; it's more like the bible devil that it describes so well. They attack the scientists and their findings in the attempt to discredit them, but it's obvious their creation god doesn't exist. They're drowning in evolutionary evidence, and it scares them shytless. All they have going is their "faith." What a sorry bunch; they can't even defend their bible without making excuses for it.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/21/national/21evolve.html?pagewanted=1&ei=5094&en=88f0b94e7eb26357&hp&ex=1124596800&partner=homepage

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Like a well-tooled electoral campaign, the Discovery Institute has a carefully crafted, poll-tested message, lively Web logs - and millions of dollars from foundations run by prominent conservatives like Howard and Roberta Ahmanson, Philip F. Anschutz and Richard Mellon Scaife. The institute opened an office in Washington last fall and in January hired the same Beltway public relations firm that promoted the Contract With America in 1994.

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Elsie_T's entire time at this site has been spent in this thread. Her technique is to scorn others--she sneers at me for referring to a Wikipedia article, while quoting a faith-healing charlatan; she sneers at me for acknowledging that i am a layman in these matters, while failing to acknowledge that she possesses no more credentials, or if she contends as much, failing to give her credentials; she scorns me for making statements from authority, while making them herself.

She laughs her hollow and phoney laugh and refuses to name the designer implicit in intelligent design, while making the patently false claim that science does not concern itself with such matters. Science does indeed concern itself with prime causes--if that were not so, then the bible-thumpers have no basis upon which to make their claim that a theory of evolution is an attempt deny the existence of a deity. If it is to be contended that a theory of evolution is an attempt to foist atheism onto the public, then "intelligent design" advocates who attempt to discredit a theory of evolution (and fail to do so) are obviously involved in the converse, foisting theism off on the public.

It's long past time for Elsie to put up or shut up. If she hasn't the honesty to state the nature of the designer implicit in "intelligent design," then there's little point in continuing to entertain her nonsense and give it a credit which it is not due by treating it as fit material for debate.

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Hey, Miss Cunning Coney, Miss Elsie is a countrywoman of yours. Is this sort of thing common in Oz? Are the fundies a big thing there?

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Elsie_T wrote:

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It does amuse me how people love to dig deeply into any IDer's past and discredit them, rather than actually focus on what they put forth as theory.

Your 'past', or the 'past' of any IDer is itself, irrelevant. Your belief structure and religious faith may be entirely relevant however, depending upon the nature of that faith.

If you hold, as does Adele, that certain elements of your faith are true a priori and true absolutely (God created the universe, Jesus is divine and the Bible is the Revealed Word) then you immediately forfeit any claim to epistemological objectivity. Only one conclusion is available to you - there was a Designer and He is God. All other conclusions and all hypotheses/evidences pointing elsewhere MUST BE false, ipso facto. The universe WILL and MUST, inevitably, demonstrate the truth of your assumption regarding this Creator.

As to "rather than focus on theory"...the pages preceding here show your claim to be at minimum disingenuous, more appropriately, a simple lie.

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Also funny how a religious connection is immediately 'evidence' of a person's inability to be objective... yet an atheist/agnostic is never questioned how his philosophies affect his biases. Hypocritical? Definitely.

Again, it isn't a matter of 'religious connection', but rather a matter of the specifics of your faith stance. Many Christians (not to mention many people of other religious faiths) do not share your a priori assumptions regarding either the origins of the universe or the suitability of placing ID theology into the science classroom.

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Elsie_T wrote:

Don't be disingenuous, Thomas- I did not write that. If you need to put words in my mouth so that you can discredit me, things are looking more desperate for you than I thought.

I keep mixing you up with Adele. I apologize again.

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I discovered last night that the Gates Foundation was among the funding sources for the Discovery Institute. I concluded that they were funding only the transportation project Cascadia. But why is the Discovery Institute doing a transportation project? What does transportation in the North West have to do with evolution? I wonder if it's a way they have of looking as if they are truly interested in science by attracting donors with a reputation for supporting science. I wouldn't put it past them.

Then I saw this article this morning in Salon. It doesn't address my question. But it does explain why the Gates Foundation and others who support science are making donations.

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2005/08/26/gatesfoundation/index.html

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Lola- If what the people at Gates are saying is on the up and up, I have no problem with it. Again, the idea of funding a center for one project that is involved with another project to which you object, is another instance of not "throwing the baby out with the bathwater".

I will be keeping a close watch to see what develops, though!

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Elsie_T wrote:

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Well this forum has turned into a remarkably stimulating debate. It does amuse me how people love to dig deeply into any IDer's past and discredit them, rather than actually focus on what they put forth as theory. Also funny how a religious connection is immediately 'evidence' of a person's inability to be objective... yet an atheist/agnostic is never questioned how his philosophies affect his biases. Hypocritical? Definitely.

There are many pages past in which the focus has been on the validity of the so called science behind the ID agenda. It's also relevant to observe and determine how and why the Discovery Institute was founded. If it was founded for the very purpose of making creationism appear to be science, then it's more evidence that the "science" is actually not science at all. As Set and many others of us keep saying, true science is marked by a genuine interest in the true answers to questions. Any study or opinion that starts with an absolute conviction that the desired outcome is correct is by definition not science.

There are many Christians who value the long history of science that supports evolutionary theory. It's not a question of atheist vs. christian. It's a matter of valid scientific methods and those that don't qualify as valid. The techniques supporting ID theory do not qualify.

The fact that the Discovery Institute was founded for the purpose of proving a desired conclusion and funded by fanatical Christian Reconstrutionists makes it all the more clear that the Discovery Institute's work is not science, but about politics and religion.

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Phoenix32890 wrote:

Lola- If what the people at Gates are saying is on the up and up, I have no problem with it. Again, the idea of funding a center for one project that is involved with another project to which you object, is another instance of not "throwing the baby out with the bathwater".

I will be keeping a close watch to see what develops, though!

I would agree with you Phoenix if it weren't for my question above and the one below.

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Even if the Gates money doesn't directly fund Discovery's I.D. work, the grant has created an image problem for the foundation. "Its support of the Discovery Institute is not commendable because of the murky situation created," wrote Francisco Ayala, a biologist at the University of California at Irvine, in an e-mail. "Many people will not notice that Gates' support is restricted to one particular project ... I am reminded of the saying, 'The wife of Caesar not only should be chaste, but also appear to be so.'" Ayala raises an intriguing question: As the Discovery Institute becomes increasingly associated with intelligent design, does the Gates foundation worry that its own good name might get tied up in the political storm? "It's a good question," Shaw says. "When a grantee's work is so much associated with something not related to the work you are funding, how does that affect your grant? I don't know the answer to that. It's something we are going to have to look at."

There are plenty of projects Gates and others can fund other than this one. It makes the DI look legit and it's not.

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Lola has a good point about the nonsense which IDers propose as "science." We have been all through the silly claims that IDers make in this thread and the "Evolution? How?" thread in the Religion and Spirituality forum. Given that the record of Elsie's participation here is that she has visited no other thread, and that the same applies to Adele--it is hard to escape the conclusion that neither have read the thread, and only came here to jump in and puke up the talking points in which they have been schooled. I seriously doubt that either of them came here with any other purpose.

It gets tedious, and it is understandable why people here tire of dealing with the same horsie poop time after time. The effort is worth it, but the flesh is often weak.

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snood wrote:

Yeah, that - or "we" could have individual experience that we individually consider significant, with powers higher than ourselves, and not give a piffle about what anyone thinks about our personal convictions. There are a lot of options "we" have, re what to 'do' about the God thing.

Hi Snood.........good to see you. Convictions and experience are personal and desirable, but they're not science. That's the very point.

How've you been? Haven't seen much of you lately.

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Thomas wrote:

Elsie_T wrote:
Don't be disingenuous, Thomas- I did not write that. If you need to put words in my mouth so that you can discredit me, things are looking more desperate for you than I thought.

I keep mixing you up with Adele. I apologize again.

I mix them up too, Thomas. Maybe it's because they advance the same arguments and their names appear remarkably similar. Adele_g and Elsie_T. I agree with Set........they're probably here for the sole purpose of spouting the ID party line.

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Lola wrote:

snood wrote:
Yeah, that - or "we" could have individual experience that we individually consider significant, with powers higher than ourselves, and not give a piffle about what anyone thinks about our personal convictions. There are a lot of options "we" have, re what to 'do' about the God thing.

Hi Snood.........good to see you. Convictions and experience are personal and desirable, but they're not science. That's the very point.

How've you been? Haven't seen much of you lately.

I've been here - just not at the same discussions as you, I guess.
And as far as mine not being 'the' point - there have been many made on many levels here. This started as a question (leading and disingenuous maybe, but a question) about whther or not ID is science, or religion. Along the way, the same digs have been taken to ridicule and scoff as is the norm whenver the believers talk to the atheists and agnostics here. I have no conflict with either side - I believe ID has a place in schools and I couldn't care less what class it's taught in. Wrestling ad nauseum over whether it should be in science class or not seems silly to me. "It ain't science, you stupid creationists!" Fine. I don't happen to think a whole lot of things with the suffix '-ology' deserve scholarly treatment, but if we are all content and secure in whatever our philosophies or belief systems, why is there such friggin' angst over what category to put ID in? Are you all so afraid that the teenagers will become indoctrinated to some 'evil' cult, or something? I don't believe that, any more than I think sex education produces nymphomaniacs.
It's going to be taught in schools - it probably shouldn't be in a science class, but it's going to be taught - no one can stop it, anymore than we can go back to teaching there is only one 'normal' kind of nuclear family, or teaching history classes that exclude the contributions of all ethnicities.
I just don't get what the hullabaloo is all over.

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farmerman wrote:

I just pointed out that you made the ORNL story "UP"

How stupid do you think I am? Do you think I would randomly make something up to support myself? I quoted my source, who was apparently incorrect, and I admitted that I was wrong. Can you please have the decency not to make unfounded accusations.

farmerman wrote:

I guess I have no idea where you got this from, could you supply me with the source.

I did not mention the source because everything I quoted came directly from my last post where I did source them. I was requoting them in point form to make it more accessible to you to respond to, seeing as you didn't respond to them when I last posted them.

I know that you don't like it when I use quotes, but it is really much quicker. I only select quotes which either say what I want to say, or that contain interesting things that I come across and am curious about. I am sorry but I will continue to use quotes because it saves time and is practical. The source that I am using for quotes from this time is: http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs2002/carbon_dating.asp . It's quite an interesting article, I encourage you to read it.

farmerman wrote:

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2. How can you determine how much carbon-14 is left in matter when you do not know how much was present in the atmosphere to start with, or how long it has been increasing and decreasing.

Dont need to know anything of the sort. The math of radionuclide decay is simple and robust its an exponential decay series. All we need to know is an accurate amount of isotope is present now.

That's all very well, but the amount of isotope present is not the same as a date. See the following:

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The isotope concentrations can be measured very accurately, but isotope concentrations are not dates. To derive ages from such measurements, unprovable assumptions have to be made such as:
1. The starting conditions are known (for example, that there was no daughter isotope present at the start, or that we know how much was there).
2. Decay rates have always been constant.
3. Systems were closed or isolated so that no parent or daughter isotopes were lost or added.

farmerman wrote:

We know that the ratio of C14 to C12 C13 is fairly constant

Do you take the following into account in your calculations?

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farmerman wrote:

In MAZOR 91 "Applied Isotopic ground water Hydrology" theres a good discussion of isotopic calibration of C14 in recent times when atmospheric testing had artificially increased the C14 incorporated in plant tissue

I tried but could not find it online, so I am not sure what it covers. I did come across this in relation to C14 in plant tissue. I would be interested to hear your comments.

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plants discriminate against carbon dioxide containing 14C. That is, they take up less than would be expected and so they test older than they really are. Furthermore, different types of plants discriminate differently. This also has to be corrected for.

Here are some more interesting things that I came across. I am sorry once again that they are in quote form, which you do not seem to like, but I really couldn't be bothered regurtitating it in my own words. Sorry, but please I would interested to hear what you have to say.

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The strength of the earth's magnetic field affects the amount of cosmic rays entering the atmosphere. A stronger magnetic field deflects more cosmic rays away from the earth. Overall, the energy of the earth's magnetic field has been decreasing,5 so more 14C is being produced now than in the past. This will make old things look older than they really are

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Laboratories that measure 14C would like a source of organic material with zero 14C to use as a blank to check that their lab procedures do not add 14C. Coal is an obvious candidate because the youngest coal is supposed to be millions of years old, and most of it is supposed to be tens or hundreds of millions of years old. Such old coal should be devoid of 14C. It isn't. No source of coal has been found that completely lacks 14C

farmerman wrote:

We inject "known' values into the machine at low levels to establish calibration curves and from these we run our unknowns

What are these known values? And how do they become known? Are they just dated by other radiometric processes?

Lastly, this quote sums up my position nicely,

Quote:

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Thomas wrote:

Just to prevent the impression that I butted out because I could not answer Elsie_T's assertion, I did a google search on "predictions of evolutionary biology". One of the first hits is a page on talk.orgigins.org which makes 29 predictions for the narrow field of common descent and macroevolution alone.

you needn't have bothered with the link, because you didn't answer my question. You demanded that I find a timeline, and I told you that I could not, however I provided you with predictions by ID. You also could not find a timeline but provided me with predictions by evolution. I fail to see the difference.

I too am tiring of arguing, don't feel the need to reply unless you cannot help yourself.

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dlowan wrote:

Intelligent Design.

An existential oxymoron.....

What? Do you even know what you are on about? Or are you just failing to be clever?

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I submit that Snood willfully refuses to "get what the hullabaloo is all over." IDers willfully lie, misrepresent and obfuscate--and that has no place in schools, whether in a science course, or any other course. This is a pluralistic society--so it's not just about his personal contempt for atheists and agnostics--Native Americans, Hindus, Muslims and other believers have a right not to have a narrow Christian mythology shoved down their collective throats.

This one of many areas in our national life in which fundamental Christians are attempting to take over. That's what the hullabaloo is over. He can think his way and i'll think mine. And i will not be silent when i see narrow-minded and hateful Christians trying to puke their dogma all over the nation i love.

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No matter what, I am damned pleased at the level of discourse thats gone on here It gives me great pleasure to see that , when doggy doo doo is presented as factual material, there are some people who will take the time and provide factual evidence (THAT IS EVIDENCE) in order to help clean up the mess.

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Intelligent Design Theory: Science or Religion?

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