Intelligent Design case decided - Dover, Pennsylvania, School Board loses [Fox News Alert]

Fox News | 12/20/05

[snarks_when_bored]

Fox News alert a few minutes ago says the Dover School Board lost their bid to have Intelligent Design introduced into high school biology classes. The federal judge ruled that their case was based on the premise that Darwin's Theory of Evolution was incompatible with religion, and that this premise is false.

[unlearner]

Condorman has apparently set his auto reply for an infinite feedback loop. His inability to distinguish what falsifiability, supportability and testability mean leave me no recourse since I have answered the issue repeatedly.

"HOW IS IT SUPPORTABLE?" He asks again.

By assembling life in the lab. This supports the idea of intelligence being an organizing principle.

"Show me that not one single natural process can produce life, or propose a means by which to test the premise."

Any test which could show this would serve to FALSIFY ABIOGENESIS, rather than support my ID assertion. Again, abiogenesis makes no falsifiable statements. Test your own beliefs; don't insist I test them for you. My assertion is testable exactly as described. If you cannot comprehend what is supportable and falsifiable, it would be better to read up before trying to debate these matters.

[unlearner]

"building life in a lab is replicating the theory of instantaneous abiogensis"

For the sake of argument, I distinguish between abiogenesis and intelligent assembly. Abiogenesis is to be defined as life self assembling without reliance on intelligent intervention. (It is reasonable to allow such a test to be intelligently controlled in its parameters, just not guided by such.)

Building life in a lab certainly does not support abiogenesis. It supports the idea that intelligence is the organizing principle for the assembly of life, and that the intelligence is external to the life being assembled.

Supporting abiogenesis would require either an instance of self assembly in a controlled environment, or a testable model for the mechanisms which might cause it to work. And I have yet to hear how such a proposition will be falsifiable. Sure, you may be able to falsify one particular mechanism, but not the ball of wax. That is an Achilles heel to abiogenesis in the first place.

[unlearner]

"[Testability] hardly constitutes all the criteria of a modern, viable scientific hypothesis."

Then what is your standard of demarcation? Falsifiability and supportability are the two most commonly proposed on this forum.

[unlearner]

"You haven't the foggiest notion what you are talking about. Find a book or web site on elementary quantum physics... Indeed there is [a law of conservation of energy], however, there is nothing 'contrary' about it."

I do not find support for your claim of something from nothing. Exactly how you could support such an assertion is troubling. Where exactly would you find nothingness to test? Even empty space is not "nothing". If you could find some nothing to test, you would change it by observing it. If something can come from nothing, why isn't something coming from it continuously, everywhere? If it only happens under certain conditions, how can nothingness have conditions?

I think you are misconstruing the sciences you are using to support your claim.

[unlearner]

"I can't do it. I won't live long enough."

Well, without a model or a test, you have nothing. It really doesn't matter if you can or can't do it.

"You just finished saying it was meaningless, now you say it's a tautology."

By defining Santa to fit the outcome of any experiment, your claim is a tautology, and is meaningless in the sense it shows nothing. Sure the words have some meaning, but the overall illustration makes no point at all. Not all tautologies are as useless; I will give you that much.

"Which is why it will never be affordable"

I think you underestimate the speed with which technology is currently advancing. Nanotechnology will dwarf ALL of the other technological advances of all human history within the next few decades.

Nanotech will allow for the assembly of custom material from the ground up on the atomic scale. We will have nanodots, programmable matter, mass produced carbon nanotube materials that will replace steel for planes, trains, cars, ships, buildings and bridges. It will offer tensile strength that allows building towers many miles high, and even elevators that will reach outer space. It is more likely than not that it will permit the assembly of existing life forms and new, custom designed ones within our lifetimes.

[unlearner]

"If the proposed test is supposed to raise or lower my confidence regarding abiogensis, then it has to at least bear some sort of resemblance to abiogensis."

The proposed test has to do with supporting the idea that intelligence is the organizing principle of life assembly. Abiogenesis is an unscientific myth. My test has no bearing on it at all. When you can propose a supportable and falsifiable test for abiogenesis, then my test might have a bearing.

"If I create life more or less instantaneously in a lab, how is it that I am supporting the non-natural theory of abiogensis any more than the natural theory of abiogensis? While it's true that I'm demonstrating that intelligence can create life, I'm also demonstrating that natural processes can create life. Maybe we should call this the shoot-yourself-in-your-own-foot experiment."

You are free to argue that intelligence is a natural process or group of them. (However, it might prove difficult to support this.) Either way, my test supports the proposition that intelligence is THE organizing mechanism for life assembling. If you can show how some other natural processes can accomplish the same without the need for external intelligence, you will have falsified my proposition.

[unlearner]

"So, where, exactly, have I said that I don't like the consequences?"

By claiming that a preexisting intelligence is a problem. It is only a problem to you.

No matter what philosophy or science you hold, there is the issue of preexistence. Evolution does not explain it. The big bang does not explain it.

Is matter (or even life) eternal, or did it come from nothing? Can science ever answer this?

Just because my assertion cannot answer this issue, does not make my assertion any less valid. No scientific theories, as far as I know, successfully answer it either.

You'll have to find some other point of attack. This one doesn't work.

[Condorman]

So, where, exactly, have I said that I don't like the consequences?

By claiming that a preexisting intelligence is a problem. It is only a problem to you.

You can, of course, show me where I claimed to have a problem with that notion. I simply contend that your hypothesis depends on the existence of intelligence without life. We have no evidence of such. I question your reasoning in assuming such an entity and then basing your hypothesis on your assumption.

This is even more startling in light of post 3135, in which you said "When you hypothesize you must make assumptions. You then test these assumptions. After that you form conclusions." How do you plan to test your assumption that intelligence can exist without life?

While you're at it, have you figured out a way to demonstrate that the exclusivity of your hypothesis is supportable yet?

[Condorman]

Is matter (or even life) eternal, or did it come from nothing? Can science ever answer this? Just because my assertion cannot answer this issue, does not make my assertion any less valid. No scientific theories, as far as I know, successfully answer it either.

Your knowledge is incomplete. Try quantum foam, for a start.

[Condorman]

HOW IS IT SUPPORTABLE?

By assembling life in the lab. This supports the idea of intelligence being an organizing principle.

But it does NOT, as you again fail to notice, support your contention that it's the ONLY way life can be assembled.

This really is a difficult exercise for you, isn't it?

[donh]

"building life in a lab is replicating the theory of instantaneous abiogensis"

For the sake of argument, I distinguish between abiogenesis and intelligent assembly. Abiogenesis is to be defined as life self assembling without reliance on intelligent intervention. (It is reasonable to allow such a test to be intelligently controlled in its parameters, just not guided by such.)

I have no idea what you are on about here. "intelligently controlled...[but] not guided" sounds creative.

Building life in a lab certainly does not support abiogenesis. It supports the idea that intelligence is the organizing principle for the assembly of life, and that the intelligence is external to the life being assembled.

Yea, well, it also supports the theory that life can originate naturally, in that humans are natural, and scientists in laboratories only have access to non-supernatural techniques for building life, or anything else. At the risk of stating the obvious--asembling life in a lab by non-supernatural, non-miraculous, means proves that life can occur by non-supernatural, non-miraculous means.

Supporting abiogenesis would require either an instance of self assembly in a controlled environment, or a testable model for the mechanisms which might cause it to work. And I have yet to hear how such a proposition will be falsifiable. Sure, you may be able to falsify one particular mechanism, but not the ball of wax. That is an Achilles heel to abiogenesis in the first place.

Now what are you on about here? That bit about "self-assembly" would seem to suggest that you can't get over your fixation on instantaneous abiogenesis, and as I've pointed out to you many times, instantaneous abiogenesis is not significantly a modern scientific theory. No self-assembly required.

[donh]

"[Testability] hardly constitutes all the criteria of a modern, viable scientific hypothesis."

Then what is your standard of demarcation? Falsifiability and supportability are the two most commonly proposed on this forum.

I have answered this perhaps three times now, and three is enough. Science, to the extent that it should be reported on in high school science textbooks, isn't a fever dream you once had, it's something tangible and affordable, with results that are objectively verifiable by technically available means.

[donh]

"I can't do it. I won't live long enough."

Well, without a model or a test, you have nothing. It really doesn't matter if you can or can't do it.

I have a model and a test. I just don't have a lab test. Don't make me go back and find the part of this discussion where you finally conceded that you can have a science that operates entirely on historical data.

"You just finished saying it was meaningless, now you say it's a tautology."

By defining Santa to fit the outcome of any experiment

Are you telling me I can't fail to create a Santa in the Montgomery-Ward lobby? What if santa doesn't show? What if a kid penetrates my santa's disguise?

, your claim is a tautology, and is meaningless in the sense it shows nothing. Sure the words have some meaning, but the overall illustration makes no point at all. Not all tautologies are as useless; I will give you that much.

I have no idea what you are giving me, but tautologies are not nonsense. They could be considered the opposite of nonsense.

"Which is why it will never be affordable"

I think you underestimate the speed with which technology is currently advancing. Nanotechnology will dwarf ALL of the other technological advances of all human history within the next few decades.

Nanotech will allow for the assembly of custom material from the ground up on the atomic scale. We will have nanodots, programmable matter, mass produced carbon nanotube materials that will replace steel for planes, trains, cars, ships, buildings and bridges. It will offer tensile strength that allows building towers many miles high, and even elevators that will reach outer space. It is more likely than not that it will permit the assembly of existing life forms and new, custom designed ones within our lifetimes.

I think I might be able to get you a job with the Polly-Anna universal chamber of commerce. But still, nobody will perform your experiment because neither side of the argument gets much out of it.

[donh]

"You haven't the foggiest notion what you are talking about. Find a book or web site on elementary quantum physics... Indeed there is [a law of conservation of energy], however, there is nothing 'contrary' about it."

I do not find support for your claim of something from nothing. Exactly how you could support such an assertion is troubling. Where exactly would you find nothingness to test? Even empty space is not "nothing".

It seems pretty nothing-like to me.

If you could find some nothing to test, you would change it by observing it. If something can come from nothing, why isn't something coming from it continuously, everywhere?

It pretty much does.

If it only happens under certain conditions, how can nothingness have conditions?

Really? You have a quantum event shield? How much do they cost?

I think you are misconstruing the sciences you are using to support your claim.

Well, I guess we're even, because I think you haven't bothered to find a basic tutorial on quantum physics, as I suggested, and are simply continuing a bluff.

[donh]

"If the proposed test is supposed to raise or lower my confidence regarding abiogensis, then it has to at least bear some sort of resemblance to abiogensis."

The proposed test has to do with supporting the idea that intelligence is the organizing principle of life assembly. Abiogenesis is an unscientific myth. My test has no bearing on it at all. When you can propose a supportable and falsifiable test for abiogenesis, then my test might have a bearing.

Don't make me spank you. You conceded long ago in this discussion that I don't need a contemporaneous lab experiment to have a science. Instantaneous abiogensis is, indeed, an unscientific myth, and a handy strawman for creationists to fixate on. Gradual abiogenesis, however, is a promising young science that springs from the observation of DNA clocks just like evolutionary theory operated on the observation of fossils.

"If I create life more or less instantaneously in a lab, how is it that I am supporting the non-natural theory of abiogensis any more than the natural theory of abiogensis? While it's true that I'm demonstrating that intelligence can create life, I'm also demonstrating that natural processes can create life. Maybe we should call this the shoot-yourself-in-your-own-foot experiment."

You are free to argue that intelligence is a natural process or group of them. (However, it might prove difficult to support this.) Either way, my test supports the proposition that intelligence is THE organizing mechanism for life assembling. If you can show how some other natural processes can accomplish the same without the need for external intelligence, you will have falsified my proposition.

No, not correct. The test is not definitive, and the two notions are not mutually exclusive. Life could be a natural process which could have been created by a supernatural intelligence.

[unlearner]

"I simply contend that your hypothesis depends on the existence of intelligence without life. We have no evidence of such. I question your reasoning in assuming such an entity and then basing your hypothesis on your assumption."

My assertion does not depend on what you contend. It simply makes no judgment about it. Causality cannot be proved because it is axiomatic. And it does not logically fit with the beginnings of existence. You claim I am assuming prelife intelligence, then arguing against that assumption - classic straw man.

"How do you plan to test your assumption that intelligence can exist without life?"

It is not my assumption. It is yours.

"While you're at it, have you figured out a way to demonstrate that the exclusivity of your hypothesis is supportable yet?"

I have answered this many times. Please stop repeating the same foolish question. Laws suggest universal conditions, and no one is advocating that laws be required to support their exclusive claims. It is adequate to have the possibility of falsification. You just do not get it. I'm not sure you're capable of getting it since you haven't by now. Go back to square one. Do not pass go. Do not collect $200.

[unlearner]

"Your knowledge is incomplete. Try quantum foam, for a start."

Everyone's knowledge is incomplete, including yours. Quantum foam does not represent your claim of "something from nothing". The temporary formation of particles and antiparticles requires both space and photons. Both of which are "something".

Your example only serves to underscore my point about the assumption of causality, i.e. it is unlikely to apply to the earliest of events in time.

[unlearner]

"But it does NOT, as you again fail to notice, support your contention that it's the ONLY way life can be assembled. This really is a difficult exercise for you, isn't it?"

See previous post. Exclusivity cannot be supported only falsified. That does not invalidate exclusive claims or make them unscientific. You are the one with a major difficulty.

Try providing support for "every point mass attracts every other point mass by a force directed along the line connecting the two". Get back to me when you can support the every part of Newton's law using your criteria.

[unlearner]

"I have no idea what you are on of here."

I was assuming you had heard about controlled experiments. That does not mean that the outcome is guided.

"At the risk of stating the obvious--asembling life in a lab by non-supernatural, non-miraculous, means proves that life can occur by non-supernatural, non-miraculous means."

So what? I never said my assertion had any bearing on supporting supernatural or miraculous events. You are also assuming that miracles do not conform to natural laws. This may or may not be true, but that is not a scientific query anyway.

"That bit about 'self-assembly' would seem to suggest that you can't get over your fixation on instantaneous abiogenesis"

For clarification, self assembly refers to any unguided assembly. It includes, for the sake of definition, self assembly which discards some of the material needed for the assembly process. I do not require the process to be instantaneous. But there must be a distinction of life and non life. So even if you cannot pinpoint a precise moment at which life begins, it still must be distinguished from the lifeless matter from which it originates.

[unlearner]

"Gradual abiogenesis, however, is a promising young science that springs from the observation of DNA clocks just like evolutionary theory operated on the observation of fossils."

Can your gradual abiogenesis be falsified? Can you make any predictions which, upon failing, would prove gradual abiogenesis never occurred?

"Life could be a natural process which could have been created by a supernatural intelligence."

True (and I am assuming you mean the formation of life could be by a supernaturally designed natural process), but that would still fit my definition of self assembly and contradict my assertion. If intelligence is THE process (whether intelligence is NATURAL or not is irrelevant) by which life can assemble from lifeless matter, then the natural process you propose does not exist (other than the natural process of intelligence). Otherwise it would falsify my claim. (Unless you want to argue that these hypothetical processes are intelligent in and of themselves.)