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Intelligent Design Theory: Science or Religion?

 
 
farmerman
 
  1  
Mon 24 Mar, 2008 08:46 am
Im afraid that wed spend an inordinate amount of time hosing you down spendi. You know, we can only apply so much lipstick.
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wandeljw
 
  1  
Mon 24 Mar, 2008 09:01 am
Professor Michael Heller is also a Roman Catholic priest. Here is a review of a collection of Heller's essays:

Quote:
Michael HELLER, Creative Tension: Essays on Science and Religion
(Reviewed by Steven T. Ostovich, Catholic Books Review)

This engaging book is a collection of previously published essays on a variety of topics that Michael Heller has put together here as a way to make a statement about the relationship of science and religion. Heller is a professor of philosophy at the Pontifical Academy of Theology in Krakow, Poland and is a co-founder (in the 1970s with Joseph Zycinski and with the support of the then Cardinal Wojtyla) of the Center for Interdisciplinary Studies at the Academy.

The book is divided into four parts, the first (chapters 1-4) dealing with methodological issues, the second (chapters 5-8) looking to the history of science for exemplars. The third section (chapters 9-11) comes from Heller's own work in cosmology. Heller does an excellent job of describing this work for the non-cosmologist and explaining subjects like pointless space, non-commutative geometry, and their implications for our understandings of time and causality (thereby justifying Heller's suspicions regarding Process thought). The last section (chapters 12-14) situates this scientific work in the context of transcendence and advances what Heller describes throughout the book as a "theology of science." It is striking how well these essays cohere around the topic of the relationship of science and religion given their diverse origins.

Heller's concern at one level is to argue against an abuse of cosmology that amounts to a variation of the God of the gaps strategy for relating science and religion. Heller advocates "neutrality" as the best position for theologians to adopt regarding scientific theories, a position Heller illustrates in his own work by distinguishing clearly between the "exegesis" of the mathematical structure of a theory and the "interpretation" of this theory theologically. Chapter 8 offers a historical example of this respect for the proper domains of science and theology in the person of Georges Lemaitre who was embarrassed by papal and other theological attempts to engage science at what to Lemaitre and Heller is the wrong level, that is, the level of the scientific theory itself: "there is no Christian way of doing science" (71). Disciplinary integrity is sacrosanct here despite the tension entailed by the total commitments demanded by both science and religion as intellectual and personal pursuits, a tension incorporated in Lemaitre.

Science and religion touch at what Heller describes as a "horizon" of "mystery," that is, at the limits of scientific rationality. These limits are apparent in the "illicit jumps" science makes in connecting to the world, and they fall into three classes: ontological, or why there is something rather than nothing (the old Principle of Sufficient Reason); epistemological, or the Einsteinian wonder that the abstract mathematical structure of science should correspond to reality; and moral/axiological, or the concern with the meaning and value of what exists evident in the commitment to scientific reason (science deals with facts, religion with values, it seems). Heller believes it possible to respect the methodological integrity of science while situating scientific reason in the broader rational context of Christian Logos.

This is where troubles arise, despite Heller's persuasiveness. It feels like what Heller really desires is the kind of medieval synthesis of science and religion achieved by someone like Thomas Aquinas. Heller realizes this is impossible if one accepts the shift in scientific reasoning from logic to mathematics, the key change in the modern scientific revolution (41). He is stuck with the book's title, a "creative tension" between science and religion, or he writes of their "symbiosis" (xi), but he can't help repeatedly using the word "synthesis."

This approach to relating science and religion does not take seriously enough the need to re-think reason in light of, for example, the revolutionary history of science. Thomas Kuhn, revolutions, and crises are all mentioned here, but Heller is convinced, "Methodological anarchy solves nothing" (54). Science defines reason, and religion provides the context in which this reason works (ontologically, epistemologically, and morally). But isn't religion also concerned at the historical and political level with what it means to think?
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farmerman
 
  1  
Mon 24 Mar, 2008 09:05 am
interesting aint it?
Ive always been fascinated by the science writings of Heller and Ruse in particular, both being men of strong Faiths. I guess Id have to add Ken Miller to that list.

Spendi's head would explode with his AID's pronouncements with these three fellows.
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raprap
 
  1  
Mon 24 Mar, 2008 09:06 am
Quote:
Which relies for meaning on the old manicheistic error actually being an error.


Spendi- in your own words you've restated the second of Darwin's concepts. The one where errors don't survive.

To me, a truly enlightened supreme being would create a truly elegant successful (read stable) system that would requires a minimum of tinkering and repair. That, to me, is the inherent weakness of ID in general, it assumes that the creator is a bumbling inventor and that his inventions are so imperfect that they require an active intervention for continued improvement. For to assume that humans are in effect the perfect creation is both erroneous (as per example--to err is human) and arrogant (see erroneous).

Consequently, the assumption of an error prone inventor is an indication of a less than perfect creator. As a creator that is enlightened would let his rules of evolution alone perfect his creations. Now I don't know for sure that Darwin's theory of evolution is fact (that is also true of any scientific theory), but it is far more sophisticated than any of the other proposed hypotheses of evolution that has been proposed (ID, Young Earth, Lamarck, Ben Steinian, etc.), and that (so far) it has met the criteria of observation, confirmation, and Occam's Razor better than any other. Even old Charlie recognized this of his own theory as a great deal of "The Origin of Species" is, in effect, presentations of arguments against his theory.

Therefore; old Charley's rules of evolution are a far better indication of an intelligent creator than that proposed by ID.

Rap
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rosborne979
 
  1  
Mon 24 Mar, 2008 10:07 am
raprap wrote:
Therefore; old Charley's rules of evolution are a far better indication of an intelligent creator than that proposed by ID.

Uh oh, I see a slippery slope ahead...
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spendius
 
  1  
Mon 24 Mar, 2008 10:13 am
fm wrote-

Quote:
Im afraid that wed spend an inordinate amount of time hosing you down spendi. You know, we can only apply so much lipstick.


Dream on sunshine. When you continue supporting your own position by your own fantasies despite the stupidity of such a procedure being explained to you on numerous occasions it isn't going to take our intelligent viewers all that long to cease taking any notice of your pronouncements.

wande quoted-

Quote:
a fantastic load of high-sounding but incoherent tosh


Where is this Heller fellah. Is he yellah?

I bet he's read Spengler though.

rap wrote-

Quote:
To me, a truly enlightened supreme being would


It is difficult for me to take seriously any written composition into which those words have been fitted.

But I'm nothing if not game.

Quote:
Therefore; old Charley's rules of evolution are a far better indication of an intelligent creator than that proposed by ID.


That makes the assumption that old Charley's rules would produce the sort of effect we can see just by looking out of the window of our vehicles or into the windows of the lingerie shops.
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cicerone imposter
 
  1  
Mon 24 Mar, 2008 10:13 am
Yeah, that comes too close to what the IDers are using to support their case.
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spendius
 
  1  
Mon 24 Mar, 2008 03:53 pm
Would you explain that more fully c.i.?

And while you're on what do you think about the Placebo Effect, Reflexology and what is known as the drama of ritual healing?
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spendius
 
  1  
Mon 24 Mar, 2008 03:58 pm
The psychosomatic problem is not going to go away simply because you AIDs-ers put your heads in the washing machine every time you come across the word.

You should press the start button occasionally.
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spendius
 
  1  
Mon 24 Mar, 2008 05:37 pm
Jeeps-

I put a perfectly simple question on the thread, go to the pub to drink the harvest, and when I come back I am faced with a vacant void vacuum.
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spendius
 
  1  
Mon 24 Mar, 2008 05:43 pm
It's as if these AIDs-ers only know the way forward if a team of navvies laid down some tramlines along the promenade.
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Chumly
 
  1  
Mon 24 Mar, 2008 09:55 pm
spendius wrote:
Jeeps-

I put a perfectly simple question on the thread, go to the pub to drink the harvest, and when I come back I am faced with a vacant void vacuum.
In the Mirror Universe, Captain Kirk and his companions are swapped with their evil counterparts. Promotions are earned by assassination, and that pointy-eared hobgoblin Mr. Spendius now sports a menacing-looking goatee.
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spendius
 
  1  
Tue 25 Mar, 2008 05:13 am
I'm a hippie Chum. We don't allow our vanity to indulge in that sort of thing.

I stand at the bar as if I am hanging on a washing line and you should see me when I'm taking it easy. You need to get your feet up to provide your brain with an adequate blood supply. Apart from when your brain isn't needed I mean.
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wandeljw
 
  1  
Tue 25 Mar, 2008 08:55 am
FLORIDA UPDATE

Quote:
Storms' bills heads for showdown
(Ron Matus, St. Petersburg Times, March 24, 2008)

Will it be the The Clash in The Committee? The Donnybrook over Darwin? The Smackdown in Tally-town?

Okay, we're putting the thesaurus down, but you can't blame us: Sen. Ronda Storm's "academic freedom" bill (SB 2692) goes before the Senate education committee this week, and who knows what will happen.

Maybe we're too far removed from the action, but from way down here in Tampa Bay, it appears the education committee's decision could have as much drama, if not import, as the Board of Education vote on Feb. 19.

The committee has seven members - four Republicans and three Democrats - and one of the Republicans, Sen. Stephen Wise, R-Jacksonville, is co-sponsoring Storms' bill. Two members - Chairman Don Gaetz, R-Niceville, and Sen. Frederica Wilson, D-Miami - have commented about the issue, but not enough to comfortably predict how they will vote. As for the other four, who knows?

The meeting begins Wednesday at 1 p.m. in Room 110 of the Senate Office Building. There are six other bills on the agenda.
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rosborne979
 
  1  
Tue 25 Mar, 2008 09:55 am
It's so much fun when you get to vote on what type of science you like. Alchemy is more fun than regular old chemistry (which has to obey atomic laws). I'm sure the school kids will be much more enthusiastic to make Gold than to make bubbly green liquids.

The "academic freedom" bill (SB 2692) will finally make science classes fun for everyone and will really open up kids minds to all the amazing possibilities out there... like astrology, and charms for warding off evil spirits (known to cause back pain and warts).
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spendius
 
  1  
Tue 25 Mar, 2008 11:46 am
ros-

Before you have another ride around on your nursery hobby horse chattering out your irrelevant infantile mantras you might have the manners to respond to my question about the Placebo Effect, reflexology and the healing ritual drama an example of which was shown on our TV lately in a Boston University and which was discussed seriously by a scientist with a title of professor.

And also my point about the nexus of personal sensitivities and science which result from evolution theory and which don't apply to astrology, which I can defend as a science, or alchemy or gravitation or any other aspect of science.

Your continual use of these red herrings is insulting to our intelligence, unscientific and a demonstration of your unfitness to influence a debate about education.

It is ignorant, as I have pointed out to c.i. , to ignore points other debaters have made as if they are non-existent merely to enable you to go through the same stupid routine over and over again and again and which is neither interesting nor original to anybody over the age of 10.

Do you think sending someone good wishes has an effect upon their future fortunes?

It is you who are choosing what sort of science you like. And pumping out this snow to try to hide it from us.
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Foxfyre
 
  1  
Tue 25 Mar, 2008 11:51 am
rosborne979 wrote:
It's so much fun when you get to vote on what type of science you like. Alchemy is more fun than regular old chemistry (which has to obey atomic laws). I'm sure the school kids will be much more enthusiastic to make Gold than to make bubbly green liquids.

The "academic freedom" bill (SB 2692) will finally make science classes fun for everyone and will really open up kids minds to all the amazing possibilities out there... like astrology, and charms for warding off evil spirits (known to cause back pain and warts).


I don't think those supporting the Academic Freedom Act are suggesting any of that Ros. I do think they don't want the State to have the power to dictate to teachers that they must indoctrinate students with a single point of view and are not allowed to even acknowledge that a different point of view exists. An approved curriculum is fine. Forcing an educated and experience teacher to conform to a prescribed script dictated by the State is not.

If you're going to teach by script, why bother to certify teachers in any specific discipline? Just give anybody with ability to read the approved material to infuse into the kids and it won't matter whether anybody understands it as nothing will exist outside that box anyway.

Marx and Lenin would be proud.
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spendius
 
  1  
Tue 25 Mar, 2008 11:56 am
It is only to be expected that the authorised medical profession will seek a monopoly of all treatment and that a key component of its strategy will be to discredit all other possible procedures.

Another one will be to publicise the sort of rosdross we see above.
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spendius
 
  1  
Tue 25 Mar, 2008 12:03 pm
wande-- Do you know what line of work the seven committee members are or have been engaged in? Your post reveals nothing about the nuts and bolts of the meeting.
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TheCorrectResponse
 
  1  
Tue 25 Mar, 2008 12:10 pm
Quote:
I do think they don't want the State to have the power to dictate to teachersÂ…


Actually this IS the prerogative of the states by law.

Quote:
If you're going to teach by script, why bother to certify teachers in any specific discipline?


I had no idea that science certification included creationism, ID, voodoo, astrology. And if it doesn't how would the teacher be certified to teach in these areas?

By the way teaching 'F=ma' is NOT "teaching by script" it is teaching correct information.

Quote:
Just give anybody with ability to read the approved material to infuse into the kids and it won't matter whether anybody understands it as nothing will exist outside that box anyway.

Its called home schooling. It was the first genuflection to born-again illogic. And actually there you don't even need to follow an aproved anything.
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