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Intelligent Design Theory: Science or Religion?

 
 
farmerman
 
  1  
Thu 12 Apr, 2007 05:29 am
To call a conference" DARWIN v DESIGN", presumes a modicum of scientific credibility. Therefore its a bit disingenuous to include Darwin in their title . Wasnt it these same guys who attempted to rent out the Explorers HAll of the Smithsonian last year?

To give your phony cause some phony status by choosing the site for your preaching is sorta like Duane Gish preaching Creationism from the North Rim of the Grand Canyon .Since they dont have anything worth saying, the IDists choose instead , a grand location, for their telethons.

Now all the world can see what frauds they are when they tried to turn the spin back on the scientists by accusing them of "Not wanting to Debate". All this when the scientists werent even invited to the event in the first place.

Why dont they just buy a cable tv station and they can go on and on for 24 hours a day on their own channel ID-TV
0 Replies
 
wandeljw
 
  1  
Thu 12 Apr, 2007 05:46 am
INTELLIGENT DESIGN CONFERENCE UPDATE

Quote:
A response to Levy and Smith
(By John Wise, SMU Daily, 04/12/07)

Please don't worry. Academic freedom and freedom of speech are very much alive and well here at SMU. It turns out that even scientists have a First Amendment guarantee to the right to express themselves, and not surprisingly, some of us even exercise this right. It seems you are worried that some members of the science faculty here at SMU raised an objection to the administration that the Darwin vs. Design event will be held in McFarlin Auditorium.
I think it is important to point out that one does not have to make a choice between religion and science. For many people of many beliefs, science and religion are very compatible with one another. There are in fact many expert, practicing scientists that are devoutly religious. Dr. Francis Collins, the director of the Human Genome Research Institute, is an evangelical Christian biologist. A look at his recent book "The Language of God" may serve to convince those with strong religious beliefs that modern science and modern biology are very compatible with religion. Last year Dr. Collins was quoted in Religion and Ethics Newsweekly as saying, "the evidence that we are all descended from a common ancestor is overwhelming. Some might wish that not to be so. It is so. Does this conflict with Genesis 1 and 2? I don't believe it does."
Why did some of the faculty object to the upcoming intelligent design event being held at SMU? One of the objections was made because the event is attempting to promote religious belief as objective science. This is deceptive. The statement that intelligent design is not science but rather a faith-based, religious belief system reflects the opinions and decisions of the overwhelming majority of America's best scientists and highest courts.
The organization behind the upcoming event, the Discovery Institute, has a political agenda that is attempting to replace objective science with their version of faith and this is disturbing to many of us in our society, not just scientists.
It is important to separate what is knowable through science from that which is not knowable by science. We can use science for useful and important things, from cancer therapy to influenza vaccines to space exploration. Explanations and discoveries drawn from the material world actually work in the material world. That is the utility of science. That is why our society spends billions of dollars every year on science. It works. It improves our condition. If you doubt this, you doubt the validity of modern medical science, airline travel and everything useful science has produced. Science and its derivatives are arguably America's most important domestic product. But if you blur the lines between what is science and what is religious belief, you will undermine its usefulness.
Sean Carroll, one of the leading geneticists in the world, and a number of other evolutionary biologists have recently discovered, using the scientific method, one of the great evolutionary explanations in biology. After many years of tedious hard work and study, these scientists have accumulated massive evidence through analyses of DNA found in living species that explains in rational material terms the wonders of the Cambrian Explosion. The Cambrian Explosion, as Dr. Carroll so elegantly phrased it, was the " 'Big Bang' of animal evolution."
The Discovery Institute still believes that the Cambrian Explosion occurred because an intelligent designer directly interceded in the biology of the planet and made it happen by divine intervention. Dr. Carroll has explained it in the useful, scientific terms of natural selection without any magic tricks or supernatural intervention. Which description is more useful? Dr. Carroll's description even helps us understand more deeply certain developmental defects (birth defects) that happen in our own human species. I ask again, which description is more useful?
Beyond the question of utility, there is an even more pressing issue: If Dr. Carroll and all the other people involved in scientific research would indeed take the intelligent designer's way out, then the logical consequence would be to simply stop looking for these amazing, beautiful, useful and factual answers. It is easy to say the supernatural did it. But it is not useful to our understanding of the natural world and is counterproductive to the practice of science.
Scientists like professor Carroll do not take the easy way out. They keep looking, keep working and never ever give up in their search for natural explanations for natural phenomena. Should we also stop looking for answers to AIDS, cancer and every other approachable question in our natural world, simply because a few people believe these things have been intelligently designed? We should not stop the practice of science. It is useful and reveals an elegance and beauty in nature that is observable and testable.
As I pointed out in my 2005 DC article, intelligent design has many flaws. As the U.S. Federal Courts and our best scientists have repeatedly pointed out, intelligent design is not science, it is religion. There is a place for both science and religion in our world, and like Dr. Collins, I believe one person can be involved with science and be religious without conflict. They are aimed at different realms, both the spiritual and material, and that deliberately diluting them is counter-productive at best.
So yes, some of the faculty here at SMU objected quite passionately to the event sponsor's attempt to promote faith-based, religious beliefs as objective science. I would never deny anyone his or her right to believe, speak out or worship as one sees fit. That is a basic American right. But if I believe a deception is involved, I think I have not only the right to speak out against it, but also the duty to do so. If you want to deny me my right to stand up and speak out when such things occur on our campus, I suggest that it is you who is putting open debate and free speech in jeopardy.
0 Replies
 
spendius
 
  1  
Thu 12 Apr, 2007 06:14 am
fm wrote-

Quote:
To give your phony cause some phony status by choosing the site for your preaching is sorta like Duane Gish preaching Creationism from the North Rim of the Grand Canyon


One could hardly think of a symbolism more appropriate.
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spendius
 
  1  
Thu 12 Apr, 2007 06:26 am
It seems to me wande that the Discovery Institute is something of a millstone around the necks of proper IDers. Their activities offer opportunities for anti-IDers to smear the whole movement. From the little I know about the DI I would say that they are nothing to do with intelligent design and are more into self publicity, book sales drives and "conferences".They do gigs.
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farmerman
 
  1  
Thu 12 Apr, 2007 06:41 am
spendi
Quote:
proper IDers.
.GAWD, now they have denominations.
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Foxfyre
 
  1  
Thu 12 Apr, 2007 07:54 am
rosborne979 wrote:
Foxfyre wrote:
The one thing that you Chumly, Farmerman, Wandel et al can't seem to get through your head is that NOBODY is arguing that ID is relevant science.


The reason we are responding the way we are is because your comments are making it sound as though you ARE arguing that ID is relevant science... and I now see why.

Your comment said this:

Foxfyre wrote:
It depends. We have what the Bible describes as a "cloud of witnesses" who have experienced God who will testify to certainties based on that experience.

When we have a similar cloud of witnesses who can testify to experience with gnomes and fairies, then we would have to think about that wouldn't we?


To you, your first comment is a statement of reason and truth, and your second statement is a counter point of unreason, so as an analogy, your whole point was that Gnomes and Fairies are unreasonable just like ID.

HOWEVER, to us, your first statement is as unreasonable as your second, so from our point of view, your entire point would be that ID is reasonable.

This is a clear case of two points of view (yours and ours) being so different that the context of the intended analogy are not only lost, but inverted.
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wandeljw
 
  1  
Thu 12 Apr, 2007 08:03 am
Foxfyre wrote:
I think any science teacher intelligent and educated enough to be teaching science to kids will both acknowledge and teach that all that exists in the universe cannot be tested or proved or understood through the science we have available to us now, and will further express that we yet know only a tiny fraction of all that there is to know. And when there is no scientific principle by which a claimed experience can be tested, no scientist worth his salt would deny something that millions claim to have experienced based purely on the fact that he has not.

ID is one of those things we cannot prove or disprove through any known scientific principle and that is why it should not be taught as science. It is also why it should not be denied, at least to his/her students, by a science teacher.


Science teachers do tell students that not everything can be determined by science. If science teachers talk about ID they should tell students that ID is pseudoscience, the same way that astrology is pseudoscience.
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spendius
 
  1  
Thu 12 Apr, 2007 08:14 am
fm wrote-

Quote:
Quote:
proper IDers.
.GAWD, now they have denominations.


They sure do as with proper nouns and improper nouns or proper behaviour and improper behaviour.

ID is the true religion. It is at odds with all these "here today gone tomorrow" shoe-horned sects and whatnots. It is not corruptible.

What you anti-IDers are criticising is the various corruptions which you pick and choose among for your purpose. You are actually criticising human nature.

Do the members of any other species, our so-called common ancestors, trick each other as humans do with ever increasing skills accelerating now that the TV screen provides a vast range of demonstrations.

As Joubert said-

Quote:
No one can give faith unless he has faith; the persuaded persuade, as the indulgent disarm.


What could be more indulgent than going around sinning with the ladies, confessing, mumbling a penance at rap speed and it being all the more exciting for being contrary to the Papal Bulls of the Holy Father, winding up the confessor with the details and emerging smelling of roses or, as they say, in a state of grace. Over and over again.

I don't think the roundhead anti-IDers are indulgent quite like that. They get indignant. Presbyterians really. They're past it and angry.

ID lives in all those famous names you have all heard of but never read starting with Homer. It isn't flavour of the month to help ease the conscience of hung-up suits. Or even of the era.

It lives in those few men who heard what the mob did to Jesus and wondered how to eradicate such an evil force from humanity and who were fully aware of how long it would take and how difficult it would be.

Joubert again-

Quote:
Religion is neither a theology nor a theosophy; it is more than all this; it is a discpline, a law, a yoke, an indissoluble engagement.


And it's an indissoluble engagement to turn the other cheek and 9/11 showed just how difficult, and useful, such a doctrine is. Andy Warhol embraced it when he said that Ms Solanis shooting him in the chest a few times at close range was an "accident". Your most famous pictorial artist, by miles, went to church every week.

"It was just an accident Bob," he said.

And Ronnie Barker wanted the burglar who stole his video whilst he was away making rubbish TV programmes racking. Obviously an anti-IDer.
0 Replies
 
Foxfyre
 
  1  
Thu 12 Apr, 2007 10:17 am
wandeljw wrote:
Foxfyre wrote:
I think any science teacher intelligent and educated enough to be teaching science to kids will both acknowledge and teach that all that exists in the universe cannot be tested or proved or understood through the science we have available to us now, and will further express that we yet know only a tiny fraction of all that there is to know. And when there is no scientific principle by which a claimed experience can be tested, no scientist worth his salt would deny something that millions claim to have experienced based purely on the fact that he has not.

ID is one of those things we cannot prove or disprove through any known scientific principle and that is why it should not be taught as science. It is also why it should not be denied, at least to his/her students, by a science teacher.


Science teachers do tell students that not everything can be determined by science. If science teachers talk about ID they should tell students that ID is pseudoscience, the same way that astrology is pseudoscience.
0 Replies
 
spendius
 
  1  
Thu 12 Apr, 2007 10:44 am
Foxy wrote-

Quote:
Scientific principles can be and are used to show that astrology is pseudoscience.


I fear that you are falling into the error, which I drew attention to in my last post, of criticising the corruptions of astrology. and thus human frailty.

I made out a scientific case for astrology once on the Questions Game. Its pure form, unhindered by economic surfeit and deviousness, seems to me to be quite reasonable from a scientific point of view when all distortions are removed which is not an easy task.

But few take any notice of what I say because they don't like their settled opinions to be pulled around too much. Saying I'm barmy is enough for them to be satisfied.
0 Replies
 
wandeljw
 
  1  
Thu 12 Apr, 2007 10:46 am
No offense, foxfyre, but pseudoscience is defined as "a system of theories erroneously regarded as science". "Creation Science" and ID have been deceptively promoted as science.

Scientific methods were not used to classify ID as essentially a religious view. Instead this was done through epistemology (a branch of philosophy).

Last year there was an attempt in England to have ID taught in science classes. The Archbishop of Canterbury issued a statement opposing this. He characterized ID as a "category error" (religion masquerading as science).
0 Replies
 
spendius
 
  1  
Thu 12 Apr, 2007 11:03 am
Yes wande- and the Archbishop stands behind birth control, abortion, women priests, divorce, homosexualty and who knows what else flows from those. It bends to the breezes.

Most people here think of the Church of England as a property company and marriage arrangment system.

You should see what the satirists in ZIT magazine do to him.

I can't see what you get out of this thread when in two years you seem to have learned absolutely nothing. What's the point of Able To Know when what you know now is the same as what you knew two years ago.
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Foxfyre
 
  1  
Thu 12 Apr, 2007 11:35 am
wandeljw wrote:
No offense, foxfyre, but pseudoscience is defined as "a system of theories erroneously regarded as science". "Creation Science" and ID have been deceptively promoted as science.

Scientific methods were not used to classify ID as essentially a religious view. Instead this was done through epistemology (a branch of philosophy).

Last year there was an attempt in England to have ID taught in science classes. The Archbishop of Canterbury issued a statement opposing this. He characterized ID as a "category error" (religion masquerading as science).
0 Replies
 
wandeljw
 
  1  
Thu 12 Apr, 2007 12:19 pm
You are correct, foxfyre. ID comes in different versions (the oldest version can be traced to Thomas Aquinas in the twelfth century).

Nowadays, ID has been tainted by attempts to insinuate it into science education.
0 Replies
 
Foxfyre
 
  1  
Thu 12 Apr, 2007 12:50 pm
wandeljw wrote:
You are correct, foxfyre. ID comes in different versions (the oldest version can be traced to Thomas Aquinas in the twelfth century).

Nowadays, ID has been tainted by attempts to insinuate it into science education.


I think we can safely say the notion didn't orginate with Thomas Aquinas either but goes back well before the birth of Christ. Certainly the Apostle Paul recognized the phenomenon.

For me it is quite simple. A Creator who could devise a universe and living thngs and creatures in it as glorious as what we have using some kind of master blueprint available only to Him would certainly also be the author of all science and all valid scientific principles. Therefore, as I see it, natural selection (and all science) is a component of ID but ID is not limited to scientific principles nor can it be defined using any known scientific principles.

For that reason it is entirely inappropriate and dishonest to attempt to teach ID as science. It is also entirely appropriate for a science teacher to acknowledge ID as one of many theories of the origin of the universe but one that cannot be evaluated scientifically and therefore we won't be doing that in this class.
0 Replies
 
wandeljw
 
  1  
Thu 12 Apr, 2007 01:10 pm
Foxfyre wrote:
For me it is quite simple. A Creator who could devise a universe and living thngs and creatures in it as glorious as what we have using some kind of master blueprint available only to Him would certainly also be the author of all science and all valid scientific principles. Therefore, as I see it, natural selection (and all science) is a component of ID but ID is not limited to scientific principles nor can it be defined using any known scientific principles.


That sounds like an all-encompassing spiritual belief. There is nothing wrong with that.
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spendius
 
  1  
Thu 12 Apr, 2007 01:39 pm
And you can't teach it. Not only not in science classes. You can't even teach it in an Intelligent Design class. It is a form of lese- majeste to think you even might be able to do.

You soak it up from art. From Christian art. A bit like your skin grows. Like you learn your language. Some ladies play Mozart to the foetus and change their diet and other stuff.

A school is either imbued with it like sap in a tree or it isn't. It's a recruitment problem. Which is quite a complicated issue on its own account which we had better not lift the lid on.
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Chumly
 
  1  
Thu 12 Apr, 2007 02:57 pm
Spendi;
are you a practicing fundamentalist Christian?
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rosborne979
 
  1  
Thu 12 Apr, 2007 03:12 pm
Foxfyre wrote:
My post was directed to an issue of experience, not theory; of empirical evidence, not scientific law.


Your experience is not empirical evidence.

I wouldn't challenge the fact that you "experienced" something, but I would challenge any claim that your "experience" was proof of anything.

You seem to think that the conviction you feel about your experience somehow validates it within science, but it doesn't.
0 Replies
 
Chumly
 
  1  
Thu 12 Apr, 2007 03:19 pm
She has it on good authority though!
0 Replies
 
 

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