Intelligent Design Theory: Science or Religion?

Make that 20 degrees F. I wasn't intending to impugn the virility of the boys.

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spendius wrote:

For goodness sakes wande. How many more times?

The concept of intelligent design is not an "ideological cousin of creationism". It is not a "creationist front". It is not a "creationist idea."

Intelligent design is a much deadlier enemy of creationism than evolution theory ever will be or could be.

Intelligent design is a form of syncretism.

Of course-

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There is no credible scientific challenge to the theory of evolution as an explanation for the complexity and diversity of life on earth.

We are not talking about " life on earth". We are talking about organised and successful human society.

Evolution science is a one-shot thing. No syncretism involved. Nothing but animal and vegetal impulses are of the slightest importance to evolution theory. That is its attraction. It's simplicity. Its absolution from thinking and feeling and willing. Its certainties.

Intelligent design is a counter to evolution theory which, if not countered, goes from Darwin to Hitler and from Hitler to Mark 2 Hitler.

The NYT is obviously a newspaper only fit for lighting the fire with or some other domestic operation.

Has its editor and staff only got animal and vegetal impulses?

Your talk of, and dismissal of, simplicity reminds me of a National Geographic article I read about animal groups that follow relatively simple individual commands such as "don't crash into the animal next to you" or "go where other ants in your colony have been going." These commands result in behaviors that seem incredibly complex, like the flight of flocks of birds or the motion of schools of fish, even though they're based on extremely simple commands.

If evolution and ID only conflict in the realm of society, then the character of our disagreement is very different. I think you'll find, though, that the people who commit atrocities are very similar, in the sense that whether they use evolution or religion to justify their actions, their use of the idea is a perversion of the idea's truth.

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Vengo-

I wouldn't be prepared to hazard a guess about what these other creatures are up to or why they are up to it. I saw a magpie last night perch on the top twig of a tree. I thought- "what's that bugger up to". It seemed silly to think it was doing the "Look at me girls" as it's not magpie shagging season. (We don't have such inconveniences do we?). It was a precarious perch from an anthromorphic point of view. I wondered if it was looking down disdainfully upon us poor sods scrabbling on the ground or in frustration that we are too big to catch. Anyway- I rolled a fag and when I next looked it had gone. Must have got fed up I suppose. It was a bit windy and the twig was swaying a lot. Maybe it got dizzy.

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If evolution and ID only conflict in the realm of society, then the character of our disagreement is very different.

Well- that's the only place there could be a conflict. It's about what to teach in biology lessons isn't it. And lessons and society are interwoven together like the threads in a shag-pile carpet. If there was no intelligence there could be no evolution. "Evolution" is a word. A sound if you like. Say it out loud. Slowly.

"Space" is a similar one. "Time". "Light". There are a lot. We give these things names because it helps us to think we understand them .

But they are words with many nuances. Different people use them in different ways to try to describe what is actually indescribable.

"Evolution" is a word that only really has validity at all in our culture. Our Christian culture. Other cultures never thought about such things. And that is the important fact.

It is impossible for us to imagine what an Aztec or Roman or an Egyptian meant when he used a word like "Space". Our space is not mere extension. It is efficient extension into distance. Like a Gothic cathedral, which you must admit has the look of a launch vehicle at the Cape at lift-off. Both grand symbols of our will to reach. No other culture had that.

The Romans reached a bit but it was for spoil and rape and general pillage. We do it for its own sake. A Roman intellectual would have thought walking to the North Pole the action of a complete barm-pot. And climbing Mt Everest. And as for sitting atop a Titan B/43a and pressing the button- one shudders to think what he might have thought about that.

Look at the eyes in any Greek art work. They don't bore into you like those of that floozie in the Olympia painting by Manet. Even Cabanel's Venus is peeping at you under her arm. No other culture depicts eyes as our's does. A force field is depicted in them. And "potential". Which now depends on the observer. It's dynamic.

The Romans built aqueducts. Fabulous things. But they were only artificial rivers. We build hydro-electric generators and have the energy available at our fingertips. The Egyptians piled up stones to bury their dead kings. Our forbears sent them to sea in burning boats.

I have only ever been discussing these matters from the point of view of the social consequences in society. It's the only science left now we have reached the limits of observation. The anti-IDers would never address the matter despite constant requests to do so. Evolution is an entirely Christian (Faustian) concept.

Our whole Culture is driven of necessity to establish a "functional dependence of things upon spirit". (Spengler's words). How can we deny the spirit? To the extent we do so our Culture declines and another one begins to grow up on its foundations. Maybe that is as it should be but the new one needs to be discernable for us to buy into it too rapidly.

There's an annotation in Spengler's On The Form Of The Soul-

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When a Materialist or Darwinian speaks of a "Nature" that orders everything, that affects selections, that produces and destroys anything, he differs only to the extent of one word from the 18th-Century Deist. The world-feeling has undergone no change.

That is what I meant when I said that atheism was a cult of Christianity. They all laughed at me.

I think that "atrocities" are caused by human nature. At least Religion is trying to reduce their incidence. A Darwinian might welcome them as a weeding out process if he had the intellectual nerve and wasn't burdened with a Christian socialisation. Darwinian and Mr Nice Guy are not terms which sit easily together.

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UK UPDATE

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Creationism out of the classroom
(James Randerson, Guardian Unlimited, September 28, 2007)

The UK government has issued new guidelines to teachers on what to teach about creationism and intelligent design in science classes. They are pretty explicit that creationism and ID do not belong.

The move seems to be a response to efforts by the ironically named campaign group "Truth in Science". Last year it sent DVDs promoting ID to every school in the land in the hope that they would be used to teach the creationist idea alongside evolution in science lessons.

The new guidelines could not be clearer:
"Creationism and intelligent design are not part of the science National Curriculum programmes of study and should not be taught as science."

That doesn't mean it cannot be mentioned of course, but the guidelines state that it should only feature as part of discussions about what does and does not make a scientific theory:
"The use of the word 'theory' can mislead those not familiar with science as a subject discipline because it is different from the everyday meaning of being little more than a 'hunch'. In science the meaning is much less tentative and indicates that there is a substantial amount of supporting evidence, underpinned by principles and explanations accepted by the international scientific community...Creationism and intelligent design are sometimes claimed to be scientific theories. This is not the case as they have no underpinning scientific principles, or explanations, and are not accepted by the science community as a whole."

There are even specific guidelines about using materials from groups like TIS:
"While these resources may be used, it must be remembered that they do not support the science National Curriculum and they present a particular minority viewpoint that is not underpinned by scientific principles and evidence."

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Quote:

science classes.

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They are pretty explicit that creationism and ID do not belong.

seems pretty straightforward to me.

when i was in school, we never learned anything about ufos, cold fusion, faster-than-light travel, near-death-experiences, reincarnation, the brown note, elvis sightings, fad diets, the jewish conspiracy, eugenics, orgone energy, dianetics, phrenology, or how to use a dowsing rod.

of course, we'll never know for certain if that was due to it being unimportant, or because of budget cuts, but it could always be both.

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It's probably because the same people fighting to keep creationism out of the science class have been successful.

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The UK Government has a long history of issuing guidelines on a wide variety of matters. It has departments which do nothing else.

They issued guidelines recently on how to turn the TV off before retiring for the night.

We follow them when it suits us and we don't when it doesn't.

In the actual classroom things are somewhat different from that envisaged by a bunch of lower-middle-class dimwits who learned their control freakery playing with toy soldiers and doll's houses.

c.i.- There are loads of things not taught in science classes. Orgone theory for example.

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tinygiraffe wrote:

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science classes.

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They are pretty explicit that creationism and ID do not belong.

seems pretty straightforward to me.

Me too.

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Might I humbly suggest that instead of reading the journalistic drivel of the type wande regales us with that viewers of this thread have a Google around on the subject of Father Roger Boscovich S.J. and maybe discover the basis on which the following is based-

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THE MAIN THREAD OF UFT IS:
Boscovich ->Faraday ->Maxwell->Einstein->LL Whyte -> Baranski-> Watson.

and on why it is accepted by the scientific community.

UFT being Unified Field Theory.

Anyone who does so will, at the least, gain a glancing knowledge of the role of the RC Church in Science and anyone who can't be arsed is hardly in a position to be treated seriously on the subject of Science and Religion or on the education of the next generation which is a matter not to be treated in soundbites and vainglorious posturing.

Viewers of a nervous disposition should avoid reading Thomas E Woods Jr's book How The Catholic Church Built Western Civilization.

Those who think that scrutinising knowingly a fossilised bone or reading a short review of Darwin's tome constitutes "science" will speedily be relieved of the burden of such infantile tomfoolery.

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spendi, Do you mean "Argonne Theory?"

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c.i. - No.

It was a glancing allusion to Wilhelm Reich which tg introduced.

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Wow! Page 1200!

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The magical and religious significance of certain numbers.

777 went by un-noticed.

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Spendi, is your problem with evolution or natural selection?

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spendi is an IDer with his own unique definition which he's not been able to clarify.

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It just seems to me that the proverbial evolution "meatgrinder" is not a consequence of the belief that species develop over time and occasionally branch off, but is the consequence of the idea that groups struggle against each other, usually until one is defeated/drops dead.

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Vengoropatubus,

I argued that "the meatgrinder" can be equally useful in describing either a species or a society.

No intelligence needed except as a survival strategy.

No intelligence needed = No Intelligent Designer needed either Exclamation

Since Gods cannot be shown to be necessary but are a tool used to form societies which are called religious then IMO it follows that Intelligent Designers, if allowed to, would form societies that would be indistinguishable from religion.

Since religion has not been shown to be generally beneficial to humans then I suspect that a philosophy that postulates an Intelligent Design (er) would also probably not be beneficial to humans. Sad

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akaMechsmith wrote:

Vengoropatubus,

I argued that "the meatgrinder" can be equally useful in describing either a species or a society.
No intelligence needed except as a survival strategy.

I'm not really seeing how your argument relates to my argument, that Spendius' problem is not with evolution as a whole, but with natural selection.

akaMechsmith wrote:

No intelligence needed = No Intelligent Designer needed either

I don't quite know where you're getting this one, but then, I haven't read your argument, so there we go.

akaMechsmith wrote:

Since Gods cannot be shown to be necessary but are a tool used to form societies which are called religious then IMO it follows that Intelligent Designers, if allowed to, would form societies that would be indistinguishable from religion.

Since religion has not been shown to be generally beneficial to humans then I suspect that a philosophy that postulates an Intelligent Design (er) would also probably not be beneficial to humans.

I think you're using a lot of negatives here to prove a positive. It seems to me that your proof isn't really so much a proof of the idea, but a proof that your idea is plausible.

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Vengoropatubus,

Right you are. I prefer to explain how things work;mechanically. Simplistically even.

Hopefully by showing the similarities that must exist in living things, from the simplest prion to the most complicated human social enterprises, the idea that any sort of supreme intelligence is necessary to achieve an observed result will be rendered superfluous.

Spendi didn't think that I had shown this satisfactorily Sad

and your "meatgrinder" seemed to be an appropriate metaphor for Natural Selection. I used it shamelessly Embarrassed

The discussion on this particular point started on page 1195 with the assertion that an atheist cannot be a romantic.

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Vengo wrote-

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Spendi, is your problem with evolution or natural selection?

I have no problem with either when applied to non-human organisms. Nature, the atheist's word for God, is red in tooth and claw.

I am against teaching kids that intellectually they are animals and thus are following the true path by engaging in tooth and claw activities simply to satisfy a few psuedo-scientific poseurs.

Evolution theory is shallow. It may have its uses for a few specialists who encounter it as qualified adults. In my opinion it isn't even proper science. Anyone, with a little thought, can see it at work outside the window or in, say, the fashion business. It is popular because it is simple.
Anything that can be understood by the masses can hardly be classed as science in this day and age.

There is a political agenda behind anti-ID. A revolutionary one too.

Helmholtz said-

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...the final aim of Natural Science is to discover the motions underlying all alteration, and the motive forces thereof; to resolve itself into Mechanics.

"All alterations". The emotions eh?

All qualities resolved into quantities. Nature, obviously including human nature, in an imagined picture of a measureable order. And imagined by anti-IDers and thus under their domination.

They are having a self-indulgent splurge on the back of tapping the fossilised store of unimaginable time a bit like a lottery winner or a rich family's passed on wealth. Or like immigrants in an untapped store of wealth who think using it all up is a function of their genius. And up and up goes the population on a bet they can keep it ever expanding and all working harder and harder. And Nature her very self is shaken and stirred. Their own God.

And as Spengler wrote-

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Hence the fantastic traffic that crosses the continents in a few days (hours now), that puts itself across oceans in floating cities, that bores through mountains, rushes about in subterranean labyrinths, uses the steam engine till its last possibilities have been exhausted, and then passes on the the gas engine, and finally raises itself above the roads and railways and flies in the air; hence it is that the spoken word is sent in one moment over all the oceans; hence comes the ambition to break all records and beat all dimensions, to build giant halls for giant machines, vast ships and bridge spans, buildings that deliriously scrape the clouds, fabulous forces pressed together to a focus to obey the hand of a child, stamping and quivering and droning works of steel and glass in which tiny man moves as unlimited monarch and, at the last, feels nature as beneath him.
And these machines become in their forms less and ever less human, more ascetic, mystic, esoteric. They weave the earth over with an infinite web of subtle forces, currents, and tensions. Their bodies become ever more and more immaterial, ever less noisy. The wheels, rollers, and levers are vocal no more. All that matters withdraws itself into the interior. Man has felt the machine to be devilish, and rightly. It signifies in the eyes of the believer the deposition of God. It delivers sacred Causality over to man and by him, with a sort of foreseeing omnisience is set in motion, silent and irresistable.

And Marx wrote-

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...yet there will come a time when he will blot out the whole thing from his memory and his environment, and create about himself a wholly new world, in which nothing of this Devil's technique is left.

And then all this about objective evidence and peer reviewed hypothesis will not be worth a sparrow fart in a tempest.

When persons and things in themselves replace forces and efficiencies.

But before that the scientific expert must become tyrant so that he can end up throwing himself down in exhaustion or one last fling of destructiveness.

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Intelligent Design Theory: Science or Religion?

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