Posted on 04/30/2005 10:08:16 AM PDT by PatrickHenry
When Bill Harris examines a bacterium's whip-like tail, he sees a food-finding, poison-avoiding machine the likes of which man can't build. That and other observations lead him to question evolution.
"It's got function; it's got purpose," said Harris, a professor of medicine at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. "In science, you follow where the evidence goes."
Harris is at the center of a contentious debate over science testing standards for Kansas schools. He and other advocates of intelligent design want to expose Kansas students to more criticism of evolution, particularly conclusions that change over time in a species can lead to a new one and that man, apes and other animals had common ancestors. Many scientists view intelligent design - which says some features of the natural world, because of their well-ordered complexity, are best explained by an intelligent cause - as creationism.
"They're trying to prove God, scientifically," said Denis Lamoureux, an assistant professor of science and religion at the University of Alberta in Canada, who also describes himself as a born-again Christian.
In June, the State Board of Education expects to consider changes to science standards, which currently describe evolution as a key concept for students to learn.
A three-member board subcommittee plans hearings May 5-7 and 12-14, and intelligent design, or "ID," advocates expect nearly two dozen witnesses to critique evolution. National and state science groups are boycotting, viewing the hearings as rigged against evolution.
Intelligent design advocates haven't proposed citing ID in the standards or including it in lessons. Yet ID is under scrutiny because scientists fear there will be an attempt to sneak it - or even creationism - into the classroom. Critics contend intelligent design is a response to court rulings against teaching creationism in public schools.
Backers of intelligent design said opponents are trying unfairly to identify ID advocates with Christians who take literally the Bible's account of a divine, six-day creation. Advocates stress that ID doesn't identify the intelligent cause of creation - or claim that science can.
"You cannot, by seeing something that's designed, know anything about the designer," Harris said. "The data doesn't take you to the God of the Bible, the Koran, or some little green man on Mars. We're not being coy."
Critics of intelligent design scoff at such arguments.
"We're not talking about little green aliens," said Jack Krebs, an Oskaloosa math teacher and former science curriculum designer affiliated with Kansas Citizens for Science. "What kind of designer has been around 4 billion years and has the power to do - literally - God knows what?"
John West, senior fellow at the Seattle-based Discovery Institute, which supports [but doesn't really do] intelligent design research, said ID advocates aren't challenging explanations for changes within species over time. Instead, he said, the controversy is about how new species arise and whether there's a common ancestor for all life.
"From goo to you, via the zoo," Harris said. "That's the big Darwinian picture."
West pointed to the Cambrian Explosion - a sudden appearance of diverse, multicelled life during the Cambrian Period, some 500 million years ago. Where fossils for ancestors of Cambrian life should exist, he said, they are lacking.
"This is turning Darwin's theory on its head," he said.
Richard Schrock, an Emporia State University biology teacher, said the record is spotty possibly because Precambrian seas were more acidic, destroying potential fossils. With advances in genetic research, he said, "It's not causing a problem."
"They're fighting a losing battle," he said of intelligent design advocates. "The universities here, we're not going to be presenting intelligent design in our curriculums, because it has no scientific credence."
Among the 23 witnesses expected to question evolution during the hearings in May are teachers, chemists and biology, religion and philosophy professors.
Lamoureux said while such a lineup can look impressive, most intelligent design advocates aren't well-trained or work day-to-day in historical sciences such as paleontology or evolutionary biology.
"Are they bright guys? No question. Do they have good Ph.D.s from great institutions? No doubt about it," said Lamaoureux, who once planned to participate in the hearings but pulled out. "But if you're a dentist, you can't deliver babies."
West said ID critics "sling mud" instead of defending Charles Darwin's theory and their conclusions about evolution.
Schrock said scientists are frustrated because while ID advocates did not gain credibility among scientists, they were still able to create a political and social debate. He said that's because, "The level of scientific stupidity in America is terrifically high."
Lamoureux said intelligent design taps into the wonder the natural world can inspire - and into people's religious experiences.
"Rhetorically, it's unbelievably powerful," he said. "It's something most people can wrap their brains around."
Really? Any theory? What about the theory that babies come from storks? Would you lose respect for my ideas if I labeled that theory "claptrap"?
In the immortal words of Steven Tyler, let's not be so "open-minded" that our brains fall out.
A garage is not a biological system.
Try to stay on the topic.
I thought you brought up Nanotechnology; my bad.
Don't laugh: Scientific Storkism. Soon to appear at your local school board.
Apology accepted.
The perverted, materialist "sexual reproduction" theory is responsible for the downfall of civil society. We demand equal time!
Now that we are friends again, can you reestablish the linkage of something that is clearly engineered (bacterial flagellum), to evidence for evolution.
The engineering feats that nature can perform seem to outpace mans ability to apply his intellect just by adding the magic element of time.
How long has this been happening to you? Are there any other symptoms? :-)
Science is limited in it's truth seeking apparatus, for it chooses to disregard the Supernatural. Because it cannot test supernatural events, it is forced to disregard it's influence on the totality of our reality. Science is entertaining, and sometimes helpful. I truly enjoy Science (Definitely not something you want to base your worldview on though, for pure science is constrained to amorality). Knowledge is not worthy of worship!
Well said.
The foundation of "science", or its hallmark, is the Scientific Method. That is the ability to physically test hypotheses and then to be able to repeat the results. (What is they say about doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results?) Those hypotheses are based on present knowledge and the repeated results "prove" the point, as far as they go. Often we later find there are some tricky and sometimes contradictory underlying principles.
However, look at the differences in Newtonian Physics and Quantum Physics, each sworn to by scientists. Each is sometimes either validated or doubt cast upon them, but all were valid when proposed within the then available scientific knowledge.
Regardless, back to what you said. The physical, no matter how discovered or described, is only half of it.
You are technically correct and I suppose I am technically wrong, but do you think anyone truly subscribes, or ever subscribed, to that theory?
To many, evolution is "claptrap" but to not consider its possible applicability would be foolish.
The Crevos have been whining here incessantly about the insults, perceived or imaginary, from those that choose to not take a literal interpretation of the Bible. You would do well to not throw stones at glass houses.
That said, in some respects I am a Creationist in that I believe that God DID create all of this. However, not in the timeperiod of 6 days.
I am not Anti-Creationism.
I am, however, Anti-Ignorance.
Regards
I typically avoid these debates like the plague but for me ID is a happy medium between creationism (too literal) and the strict naturalism that cannot take into consideration divine origins. It should at least have a tent set up in the market place of ideas--alongside whatever other evolving theory is out there.
Anyway, while that's a farcical example, the point is that there must be some point for any theory where we can say that the evidence clearly renders that theory false, and thus the theory should be rejected. Where that point is exactly will probably vary from one person to another, but that point must be somewhere, or else we're doomed to forever be lost in a sea of possibilities, without really ever "knowing" much at all. Keeping an open mind about where babies, christmas presents, and Easter eggs come from is probably relatively harmless. Keeping an open mind about whether diseases are caused by germs, an excess of blood and bile, or demons living in one's brain might very well prove fatal, on the other hand.
I've said it before and I'll say it again. ID is nothing more than the Golden Calf of this age. Something to "see", a crutch for "faith".
If someone can explain how the universe evolved, that would settle it.
Macroevolution cannot be tested and is therefore not science. In addition, we will never know with any kind of certainty what happened before recorded history, and that is where the only indirect evidence of macroevolution is. Science that can be tested is the only type of science that leads to knowledge. That is why I am OK with microevolution, but speculation about the past is just that, speculation.
You really can't avoid the "who created the creator" dillema or other dillemas for that matter. However, logicians agree that an infinite regress (i.e. gods begetting gods ad infinitum) is a falacy. So for me, there are only two options: 1. Something came from nothing (Naturalism) or 2. An uncreated creator created creation (say that 5x). Option two was acceptable to Plato, Aristotle and the medieval scholastics.
"...because the question by definition cannot have a testable answer."
Yes, and that is why this is a question for philosophers, not scientists. The same is true to ID - since it is untestable, it is outside the scope of science. ID should only be included in science ciriculum insofar as it is an example of an untestable (i.e. nonfalsiable) theory about which science can say nothing one way or the other.
I would posit the unprecedented results that came about after a man died and resurrected himself should be sufficient evidence that there are powers beyond our senses ability to measure.
P.S. This is what the galaxy hurler had to say on the topic:
Isa 43:10 Ye [are] my witnesses, saith the LORD, and my servant whom I have chosen: that ye may know and believe me, and understand that I [am] he: before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me.
Isa 44:8 Fear ye not, neither be afraid: have not I told thee from that time, and have declared [it]? ye [are] even my witnesses. Is there a God beside me? yea, [there is] no God; I know not [any].
(An entity who can hurl a galaxy and raise himself from the dead (as witnessed by hundreds of real people) has more insight into reality than we have). Jesus Christ entered our time domain and changed the world on a cross!
Ouch! Talk about checking your brains the door. So is faith defined as "believing something you know isn't true?"
YEC INTREP - every living system in the universe is an information-based system. No fanciful thinking about the Big Bang can explain the origin of the information - apart from a Mind. Information is categorically different from matter, time, space, and energy. Evolution has NO explanation - think about it.
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