Sir, thanks for your thoughts. I’d like to respond and interact with your thoughts here more at length as opportunity permits.
But one observation quickly… (and I hate to sound like a fanboy), but I fear you have grossly mischaracterized “ID Philosophy.” Stephen Meyer in “Signature in the cell” goes into great length to distinguish the difference between purposeful, intelligent complexity and complexity which appears to have a certain elegance due simply or primarily to repetition. He makes a comparison of something like the following arrangement of letters, the first being simply not complex, the second having an appearance of complexity but which is merely the repitition of a very little complexity, and the third which clearly has intelligent intent and has what he calls “specified, functional complexity.”.
HVHF DHFHGNF FHF DJFJGJ. JEWLVNGMRHCY. DBUU
ABACABACABACABACABACABACABACABACABACABAC
IT WAS THE BEST IF TIMES IT WAS THE WORST OF TIMES
So I fear Dr. Meyer, at least, has explicitly discounted your idea that anything with this kind of “design” as you illustrated must automatically imply a supernatural designer. I recall he spent many pages to make this point abundantly clear. You may still disagree with him, but I beg you to ensure you know the positions of those with whom you disagree so you do not inadvertently so misrepresent their position.
I will try to address some of your other questions as I have opportunity.
Ok good, at least I now know what you were implying the entire time since you started this post.
Too many pages.
I don’t have any questions really. I still stand by that all of ID is a god of the gaps argument. The only reason that this bogus nonsense about ‘specified, functional complexity’ is persuasive (though only to Christians mostly who are already anti-evolution) is that it is hard for people to believe that natural mechanisms and laws of physics could be behind the structure and organization of DNA. The entire argument falls apart more every year as we learn more about genetics and how you can go from non-life to life, from simple to complex, etc.
I’ll leave you for now with this quote taken from an actual Biologist who reviewed the book in depth (Quintessence of Dust: Book Reviews):
And of course, Stephen Meyer is a layperson. He’s clearly not a biologist, or even a person who’s particularly knowledgeable about biology. (That paper in the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington became infamous due to political disputes; I thought it was most notable for being lame.) This is obvious from my reading of this book and his other work, and the mistake on page 66 just serves to remind me that despite the thunderous praise from fans on the dustjacket and in the ID-osphere, Meyer just isn’t all that impressive as a scientific thinker. Call me a jerk, but I expect a heck of a lot more from someone who wants to rewrite science (and its history).
[quote=“Daniel_Fisher, post:36, topic:36197, full:true”]
Ma’am, perhaps you misunderstand the point of my analogy.[/quote]
I don’t think so. I’m pretty sure that Christy is pointing out that your analogy is not analogous.
But the archaeologist would be studying execution, not design. Therefore it’s not analogous.
She would be concentrating on the execution: the who, when, and where. The only mention she would make of design would be in the process of hypothesizing those parameters, no?
[quote]My point is simply that he could still recognize the Hebrew writing on said tablet as the result of an intelligent agent, no? Can we agree that far at least?
[/quote]But you haven’t explained the desperate need to limit our focus to “detecting design” instead of execution, timing, and location.
I just ran across this thread, about which I have exchanged thoughts before on other threads. I think peoples’ hostility toward ID comes from the fact that there is just too much of it that is painfully sloppy or just plain false.
I just sent an email to a friend who was so excited about Louie Giglio’s talk on laminin. Arghhh!!! I was appalled that someone of his stature could be so painfully off base! Brings ridicule to Christians.
However regardless of the failings of some, it’s the underlying concept that Daniel is arguing here, and the underlying concept has legs. Seems to me that people are throwing the baby out with the bathwater and yes, there is WAY too much bathwater! But there is a baby here.
Can you imagine a public defender in a courtroom trying to free the accused by arguing that “all the evidence provided by the CSI team is not science?” It’s like, “so what?” If it’s based on demonstrably sound science, it’s perfectly valid argument!
As many people here know, I love science, and support MN. But you cannot demonstrate scientifically that only scientific uses of the data are valid, so by it’s own standard, that argument fails. You’re arguing philosophically that philosophical argument using science is invalid, but you have no proof.
Unfortunately, a lot of it is. The two big failings of ID are god-of-the-gaps, or that there is way too mishandling of the science.
But suggesting it is all god-of-the-gaps makes the assumption that there IS a natural explanation for all the gaps. Isn’t that a naturalism-of-the-gaps argument? Is that better? I stand against god-of-the-gaps where it occurs, but recognize some gaps that ain’t gonna be filled by naturalism. The science shows that nature don’t work that way.
The real ID question (whether handled correctly or not by various people) is whether the science is indicating that there is stuff we find has happened that does not happen on its own. That’s Daniel’s point. And if so, some ONE may have done it. That’s all.
Note also that Dr Francis Collins has argued for the Anthropic Principle, and that is, like it or not, arguing for an Intelligent Designer using science. So the Biologos founder is an ID advocate.
So I’m all for handling the science well. But just like we separate good science and bad science, we have to separate good ID from bad ID. Even if there is a massive amount of bad ID, there can still be good ID.
Dude, that’s just an ad hominem attack. Whether from an “actual Biologist” or from a person on the street, let’s stay away from those.
You’re mischaracterizing ID here. In good ID practice, you don’t first assume a god. But you can recognize that something is probably not only a result of time plus matter plus chance.
In summary, it seems Daniel and I have read and listened to ID people who are doing a decent job and we can’t understand the apparent hostility to all of ID. I would encourage folks here to consider that there is valid ID argument. My preference is to call out the bad arguments, recognize that we are already using some of the good ones, and acknowledge that there are indeed good ID arguments regardless of how many bad ones are out there.
Hi George! I think we are in agreement. Anyone using science to argue that Earth is 6000 - 10000 years old is doing so from an a priori commitment to a particular scriptural interpretation. With people in that camp, you have to start the discussion with the Bible anyway, and show that their interpretation of Day is not required. I personally find it compelling that there was time and creation activity before the “first” Day. That makes it clear to me that the Framework of Days is a form, not a literal.
As you mentioned, ID does rely heavily on the God of the Gaps fallacy. This becomes apparent when you try to reverse the argument. For example, imagine a scientific conference where there are multiple presentations on evolution, but in every presentation all the presenter does is point out how there is no evidence for intelligent design. The presenter then concludes with, “then it must have evolved”. I think most people would clearly see this as bad science, and rightly so. The problem is that this is almost the entirety of the ID argument: there is no evidence that evolution did it, therefore it was designed.[quote=“Marty, post:44, topic:36197”]
Note also that Dr Francis Collins has argued for the Anthropic Principle, and that is, like it or not, arguing for an Intelligent Designer using science.
[/quote]
The Anthropic Principle argument does not use methodological naturalism, however. The problem is with the null hypothesis. If the universe were not able to support intelligent life then no one would be here to observe it. This means that the Anthropic Principle is not falsifiable.[quote=“Marty, post:44, topic:36197”]
You’re mischaracterizing ID here. In good ID practice, you don’t first assume a god. But you can recognize that something is probably not only a result of time plus matter plus chance.
[/quote]
I have often found that the sleight of hand in this argument is misrepresenting “chance”. For example, I could say that by chance a river has an equal probability of going uphill or downhill. However, rivers always go downhill so it has to be guided by an intelligent designer since chance can’t do it. With biology, we have the same thing. The river in biology flows towards higher fitness, not in a random direction.
I’ve got to ask you… what are you referring to specifically. What gaps are not going to be filled by naturalism? And what science shows nature works what way? Perhaps @T_aquaticus can better address your naturalism of the gaps (ah you already responded!). In general I would add that every natural phenomena we’ve went to understand we’ve been able to figure out some natural mechanisms behind it. Current unknown in our day could be what started the ‘big bang,’ how did life arise, where do the laws of Physics and constants of physics come from and smaller things like what is dark matter, dark energy, what triggered the Cambrian explosion, etc. We’ve used plenty of apologetics for God like John Edward’s in that we had no idea what powered the sun for 200 some years and thus ‘God did it.’
Science has never indicated this. I will wait until ID folks actually publish in out of house journals.
Interesting, yes. Consistent with an all powerful God, yes. Scientific argument or proof for God, no. All the probabilistic arguments are no good (unless the probability is actually zero), as they require huge amounts of knowledge that we do not actually have to make accurate probabilistic calculations. Sadly Behe’s Edge of Evolution did nothing to further the cause.
I was quoting the review of Signature in the Cell, so not technically my words. However, Meyer definitely is not a biologist yet he is the chosen representative of ID to write such a huge book on the Cell. He gets a number of things just plain wrong and resorts to bad arguments in many cases (like the no ‘junk DNA’ myth).
Can you name one thing?
What have you read and who? I’d like to now what of substance has ever been produced.
What is the good argument? That it doesn’t seem like something arose by chance alone and therefore… a god did it?
There is a good ID argument - - it’s what BioLogos teaches. But it is so different from all the rest of the I.D., we have to call it Theistic Evolution (and the companion schools to this general thesis).
As for conventional I.D. - - I am still waiting for YECs to adopt Intelligent Design as part of the overall scientific interpretation of:
A) The understanding that anything that God accomplishes - - because lawful natural processes cannot do it alone - - is by definition a miracle.
B) I do not see how any scientist can hope to prove a miracle has occurred.
When I.D. focuses on scientific matters (instead of a mix of faith and science),
they should be able to agree on the following:
A 5 billion year Earth:
Inevitable Speciation when you have a 5 billion year timeline;
As soon as Speciation is accepted, the corollary of “Common Descent” is unavoidable.
Rejection of Devolution as a valid category.
@Marty, which part of these two sections are you most interested in discussing?
The category of I.D., like the BioLogos position (in my personal view), is a mixture of science and faith.
Any I.D. proponent who thinks he can describe the activities of God and is still talking pure science is someone who shouldn’t be allowed to do science.
This is the fundamental problem of I.D.
Christian scientists under the BioLogos umbrella are capable of doing Science and reporting on Science - - without thinking they are proving something about God (other than how God organizes natural law).
I.D. scientists seem to think they are doing science (even when they aren’t performing any laboratory work) … even though God is a part of their equation.
Proposing the existence of Alien Beings would be much more convincing if they incorporated these Alien Beings into an Old Earth scenario. But if they refuse to do that … they are obviously not talking about Aliens - - they are talking about an entity that can magically make a whole planet in six days.
I have always liked this quote from Darwin because it succinctly and eloquently describes what I view as the Biologos position:
It can hardly be supposed that a false theory would explain, in so satisfactory a manner as does the theory of natural selection, the several large classes of facts above specified. It has recently been objected that this is an unsafe method of arguing; but it is a method used in judging of the common events of life, and has often been used by the greatest natural philosophers … I see no good reason why the views given in this volume should shock the religious feelings of any one. It is satisfactory, as showing how transient such impressions are, to remember that the greatest discovery ever made by man, namely, the law of the attraction of gravity, was also attacked by Leibnitz, “as subversive of natural, and inferentially of revealed, religion.” A celebrated author and divine has written to me that “he has gradually learnt to see that it is just as noble a conception of the Deity to believe that He created a few original forms capable of self-development into other and needful forms, as to believe that He required a fresh act of creation to supply the voids caused by the action of His laws.”— Charles Darwin, The Origin of Species (1859)
As musical as Darwin’s comments appear to be, as each phrasing strikes the drum of our ears, it leaves a trailing trace of a missing melody: the harmonies of God’s sublime orchestration.
If Darwin were alive today, and having the confidence of this age that Gravity is not simply an accident of nature, but a creation and operation of the Father, I believe Darwin would have almost certainly have mentioned something along these lines:
“The elements of Evolution, like Gravity, inform the Cosmic Order, and feel God’s divine impulses as he directs the shape and form of his creations in real time, according to a plan to which only He is privy.”
U[quote=“Marty, post:44, topic:36197”]
Can you imagine a public defender in a courtroom trying to free the accused by arguing that “all the evidence provided by the CSI team is not science?”[/quote]
The point I’m making is that the ID team isn’t providing any evidence, period.
It’s not valid science unless the ID team is testing ID hypotheses.
[quote]
The real ID question (whether handled correctly or not by various people) is whether the science is indicating that there is stuff we find has happened that does not happen on its own. That’s Daniel’s point. And if so, some ONE may have done it. That’s all.
[/quote]But the ID team isn’t doing it,
Hi George! All of them! At least, when I can squeeze out a few minutes. Wish you lived closer and we could meet for coffee! Typing takes way too long.
As you know, I agree about YECs.
Hey, let me get an opinion from you. When I hear someone stating that 100% of “the other side” (whoever it may be) is 100% wrong and are only out to deceive and have completely and utterly nothing to offer, I’m more likely to dismiss the person saying this, rather than those they criticize. What do you think?
[quote=“Marty, post:57, topic:36197”]
What have you read by Axe, Meyer, Behe, or even maybe Strobel’s Case for a Creator for something more broad but not as deep?[/quote]
I’ve read the first three. The only one who has provided any evidence is Axe, but he’s testing a straw-man evolutionary hypothesis, not an ID hypothesis.
Seriously.
Not at all. First, you cite science. Quotes are generally what pseudoscientists employ.
I’m talking about whether they are contributing evidence. None of them are willing to test an ID hypothesis. Behe claimed at Dover that it’s up to others to test his hypotheses. That’s absurd.
[quote]Who are you referring to? We might agree on some people that way.
[/quote]For starters, Meyer and the work that won a 2009 Nobel Prize, published in 2000.
If the ID team had any faith in their positions, they’d be testing ID hypotheses.
If you actually want to know what I think, I don’t mind telling you. But I do find too many people here ask questions not to understand, but to correct and lecture.
I think life arising is now not just unknown, but clearly miraculous. I’ve got a presentation to a bunch of scientists this coming Wednesday eve making that case. Shapiro here argues that all nucleotide and amino acid based origins scenarios are bankrupt, but his own suggestions are no better, and especially since the problems he points out would persist and affect any attempt to transition from a small molecule scenario to RNA/DNA/proteins.
I’m also convinced Evolution needed and got help. The systemic gaps in the fossil record get more severe as you go up the taxonomic tree. And Darwin’s finches are still finches after 2.3MM years - shows the limits of mutation and NS.
Human consciousness is clearly not of this universe.
So these are areas where naturalism of the gaps is currently held.
