Intelligent Design Revisited (D Limbaugh)

Human Events Online ^ | 8-22-05 | David Limbaugh

[joyspring777]

On those rare occasions that I write a column touching remotely on science, especially if I depart from the conventional wisdom of the greater scientific community, the contemptuous e-mails fill my inbox.

Such was the case a few columns ago when I broached the subject of Intelligent Design (ID) after President Bush indicated his receptiveness to ID theory being taught alongside evolution in the public schools. The hostile e-mailers pointed out what a consummate idiot and criminal trespasser I was for treading on their real estate.

They demanded I stick to law and politics, not because I know much more about them either, but by concentrating on those subjects at least I wouldn't be encroaching on their turf, which is reserved for the gifted. OK, they didn't really say that explicitly, but I divined, via supernatural intuition, that that's precisely what they meant.

The thrust of the e-mails was that ID is not science-based but is purely a matter of faith -- Biblical creationism in disguise. It cannot be tested in a lab (can macroevolution or any historical science be reproduced in a lab?). As such, ID should only be taught in public schools, if at all, under the rubric of philosophy or religion, not science. Besides, it is just one alternative theory. If you teach it, in fairness you must teach all other competing theories.

But not all scientists agree that ID lacks a scientific foundation. In the first place, ID uses science to confute certain tenets of Darwinism. In addition, ID proponents, such as Michael Behe and William Dembski, have developed criteria for testing design inferences.

[VadeRetro]

Sorry, but I am far from convinced that you understand Denton's argument. In fact, I am close to convinced that you don't.

Well, your paraphrase of Denton isn't evidence against evolution. Nobody else's seems to be, either. All pig-ignorant strawmen.

[js1138]

Can't you see that without that information your theory is worthless?

I dunno. Life has struggled on for quite a while without us knowing the harmful to beneficial mutation ratio. If it were unfavorable, we'd all be dead.

[furball4paws]

But think how much fun I'll have before I start oinking :-)

[atlaw]

"...it is the SHer evo who rejects the Bible, and seeks out and imagines way and reasons to support his rejection of a Supreme Being. Then he says, 'Now I can sit back and do whatever I please without responsibility to anyone'"

You have a very peculiar view of biologists. What do you imagine they do? Have orgies? Do lots of drugs and listen to loud rock and roll?

Remember, these are the science geeks in flannel shirts. The ones with tape on their glasses. The medical research lab rats. These are the folks who spend countless hours pouring over cultures in petri dishes, wading marshlands and forests for specimens, analyzing reams of genetic data, carefully composing hundreds of articles that you can reference, for example, here:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?CMD=search&DB=pubmed

(articles that, oddly enough, make no reference at all to rejection of the Bible or God).

Please tell me, what do you imagine these folks are looking to "sit back and do . . . without responsibility to anyone"?

[joyspring777]

I did not say ALL museum displays.

I believe most are plastic constructs, and people Oh and Ah as if they are the real thing right in front of them...most are not.

The warning was a suggestion toward truthfulness about the displays themselves.

[RobRoy]

>> Which, if any, of the three do you possess?

(If you are going to denigrate someone, the least you can do is let them know you're doing it).<<

To one degree or another, all three. But education is the least important. You can teach a human to do almost anything. They can observe experiments and write down results. It takes intelligence to interpret the results accurately. And it takes wisdom to understand the ramifications of those results.

Many evos here have demonstrated a strong propensity for deifying education while leaving the other two more highly prized attributes blowing in the wind.

[joyspring777]

Why do you assume it is my view of biologists?

There are creation biologists, ID proponent biologists, as well as SHer biologists, SHer Evo biologists and many others.

My statement was about Secular Humanists (SHers) that are evolution believers (evos).

So...I said SHer evos...who reject the Bible, and seek out and imagine ways and reasons to support their rejection of a Supreme Being. Then they say, 'Now I can sit back and do whatever I please without responsibility to anyone'

How is this boiled down in your mind to biologists? This assertion is of SHer Evos!

It also has nothing to do with their social activities. It simply refers to their desire to throw off via their minds any conviction of the existence of a Supreme Being, which includes any responsibility toward one as well. I did not discuss what they ingest in their mouths or ears.

"sit back and do"

This is a metaphor of their activity in the realm of activity toward a Supreme Being, not their physical activity or inactivity. They wholly reject any thought of one.

The Declaration of Independence of the United States of America presupposed a Supreme Being. One of the Founders indicated that "this Constitution was intended for a religious people, and is wholly unsuitable for any other".

Perhaps those who think we needn't recognize a Creator, should stop destroying our Constitution via the courts, and just go found another nation on their own...with their own SH constitution.

I do think they tried that in the USSR starting in 1917, and have abandoned it for the most part since 1989. It did not work out too well.

[atlaw]

Ok, since you've eliminated biologists from the mix (who happen to be the ones actually studying and expanding upon the theory of evolution), and have narrowed your field down to this group of "SHer evos" (with whom I am not familiar), can you tell me who these folks are? Can you name a few? And can you direct me to what they have published concerning the theory of evolution?

And while you're at it, can provide a few names of "creation biologists" and "ID proponent biologists," and perhaps provide some citations to their original creation and ID based research?

[RussP]

"I dunno. Life has struggled on for quite a while without us knowing the harmful to beneficial mutation ratio. If it were unfavorable, we'd all be dead."

This is a classic example of begging the question, and it's typical of the tactics evolutionists engage in routinely. If the harmful/beneficial mutation ratio were unfavorable, we'd all be dead? Oh, I see. But you haven't a clue what that ratio is, do you. Nor do you even understand the fundamental importance of the question to the mathematical viability of the Neo-Darwinian Theory of Evolution.

A few years ago, some mathematicians (can't remember the source off hand) presented a paper at a conference claiming that their mathematical analysis showed that life could not have possibly have originated by random chance. (Yes, that's a different issue than the harmful/beneficial mutation ratio, but the point I am about to make is the same.) How did the evolutionists respond? Basically, they said, "Well, we know that life originated by random chance, so go back and find the flaw in your analysis." Yes, the rules of the game are fairly clear, aren't they, when your premise drives your conclusions.

Common sense strongly suggests that the ratio of harmful to beneficial mutations is likely to be extremely large. Imagine randomly flipping bits in the executable kernel of an operating system. What are the chances that one of those bit flips will improve the functioning of the OS? And what are the changes that they will harm it? Use your brain, folks.

One thing I have learned in debating evolutionists is that few if any of them understand mathematics and its implications for a theory based on randomness. Apparently advanced mathematics just isn't a requirement for becoming a biologist or biochemist.

By the way, I spent waaaaay too much time yesterday on this thread, and I need to get back to work today. So I bid you all farewell.

[GoLightly]

By the virus whose DNA got stuck in cellular DNA?

Yes.

The cell that made the repeat error?

Statistical odds would argue against it. You buy this argument, correct?

Or is the cosmic ray zipping in from space really a thunderbolt from Zeus?

A cosmic ray? I don't know a cosmic ray played any part in it, nor do you. A virus is the best explanation. Extrapolating further requires faith.

[js1138]

You pose a question as if I had to demonstrate that enough energy from the sun reaches the earth to keep plants alive.

I don't have to know the exact ratio of favorable to unfavorable mutations -- although it is an interesting question.

I know that mutations occur, and I know that some have been demonstrated to be useful, and I know that the unfavorable ones have not killed us off.

It's like discussing the disease that will kill everyone off. It never happens, because when the population thins due to a plague, there are fewer vectors to transmit the disease.

This is not a circular definition. It is a well understood dynamic process.

[<1/1,000,000th%]

The thrust of the e-mails was that ID is not science-based but is purely a matter of faith -- Biblical creationism in disguise.

Everyone knows that ID is about space aliens.

[RussP]

OK, I lied. I will post one more reply.

RussP wrote (paraphrasing evolutionists):

Premise: If any God or any "intelligent designer" exists, He/It is beyond the realm and scope of science.

Junior replied:

True. He is supernatural and thus cannot be tested for using the tools of science.

RussP replies:

This is where evolutionists are fundamentally wrong. The correct scientific starting point is the *HYPOTHESIS* that life came to be without any intelligent design. That hypothesis should then be *tested* objectively and fairly.

Starting with a *hypothesis* is fundamentally different than starting with a *premise*. If your *premise* is that life came to be without any intelligent design, then any conclusion you reach on the matter is worthless.

Imagine you are on a jury. The starting *hypotheses* is that the defendant is guilty as charged. If the starting *premise* is that he is guilty as charged, than of what value is the trial? None.

Many evolutionist, including mental midgets like Richard Dawkins, apparently do not understand this fundamental distinction, hence their conclusions are worthless. They are like the jurist whose premise was that the defendant is guilty.

OK, now I'm really back to work and off this thread for the rest of the workday at least.

[Quark2005]

What do you do with the natural clocks issue? River delta sedimentation? The expectation by NASA as to the amount of lunar dust? The long intimated time of millions of years it took for the Grand Canyon to be carved, only for Mt St Helens to do similar stuff in less than an hour?

Here we go. Why do creationists keep using the same irrelevant arguments over and over and over again?

The fact that you think the "moon dust argument" or "river delta sedimentation" are legitimate arguments shows that you really need some more science literacy before you can even argue competently about this stuff. I guarantee any geologist worth their degree would either be shaking their head or laughing out loud at these assertions. (And I'm not going to waste my time debunking them one by one; that work has already been done; do some homework and find out why for yourself. It's easier to tell a lie than to research it and prove it wrong; I'm not going to do that for you.)

My question still stands, that no creationist I've known ever would give a straight answer to - if we abandon peer review by the mainstream scientific community as a litmus test for what is considered good science, what general standard should we use for determining what science should be taught?

ID is very comparable to psychic power theory, UFOlogy and astrology in that none of them have been accepted by any significant part of the scientific community. There is no reason to teach a theory of biology that has been accepted by less than 1% of the biological community and has no publications in mainstream peer-reviewed journals. And young-earth theory, which you seem to be confusing with ID, has even less scientific credibility and is outright laughable.

If you're unwilling to educate yourself properly about science, you should leave it to the professionals.

[Quark2005]

Good link - thanks

[Quark2005]

Please tell me, what do you imagine these folks are looking to "sit back and do . . . without responsibility to anyone"?

I found this post to be a fun read, and you made an amusing and true point.

I personally work with the scientific community; most of the hardest working people I've ever known have been the ones I've met in science research & engineering. Most laypersons have no clue how much work and difficulty go into becoming a professional in this field (I'm trying to do it now, and it hasn't been an easy trek) - or how much more experts know about their work than they do. A lot of people can read a popular book by Stephen J. Gould, for example, and think that actually understand his work at a fundamental level, when really what they are reading is just a gleaning of the surface of the the theory; the true scrutiny of the evidence lies at a much, much deeper level that took years of work by extremely dedicated and intelligent people to uncover. Science research departments are hardly what you would call bastions of decadence (which is funny to hear coming from creationists, most of whom I'm familiar with have no formal science training or association with any real science research.)

Funny that typical "creation scientists" usually have little more than a degree cranked out of a diploma mill yet claim to know more about every specific subject in biology, geology, astronomy, chemistry and physics than every scientist in the world combined.

[GoLightly]

ID can also be seen as comparable to forensic science, where there is probability there is a perp whodunit.

Early science assumed a "life force", but they misunderstood it & the study of it got pushed out to the fringes. They didn't have the tools to see the critters bringing life into to the dead things exhibiting "spontaneous generation".

The observation remains, life hands life off to other life & it does it in many different environments, though it has not been observed in any of the extremes where building blocks to life are being searched to discover the origin of life. How can all simple life on earth accomplish something that seems to require extremes elsewhere?

You want proof against ID, prove there is no "life force". Physics accepts forces by what they do & they put enegy into discovering their properties. Biology does the opposite & assumes against any such force, despite the evidence, cuz it's a lot more fun coming up with different recipes for the soup.

[VadeRetro]

Statistical odds would argue against it. [Cellular copy error]

You have a scoop. Same with ionizing radiation not causing mutations.

Your Nobel awaits when you're ready to publish.

[Quark2005]

You want proof against ID, prove there is no "life force". Physics accepts forces by what they do & they put enegy into discovering their properties. Biology does the opposite & assumes against any such force, despite the evidence, cuz it's a lot more fun coming up with different recipes for the soup.

This "life force" as you call it seems to be a pretty intangible concept. Before you can make the claim that something that can be falsified you need to define a set of predictions that can be falsified. Saying "prove there is no life force" is like saying "I have a magic aura surrounding me, but I can't tell you exactly what it does. Prove it isn't there". Science can't operate like that.

Physics (and all other science) only assumes measurable forces are there. If there is some sort of "life force" out there, it hasn't produced any measurable consequences, that's the problem. I've said before, I have no problem with ID (and other such things) as philosophy, but this isn't empirical science you speak of; it's more like metaphysics (which is interesting enough in its own rite, but is not science in the rigorous sense).

The only forces we can scientifically assume are ones that produce measurable consequences; that holds true in physics and biology. Also; one must be careful how the word force is used; in physics, this specifically means something than can cause the acceleration of mass, or in the quantum sense, is part of a field with measurable conquences with respect to particle interactions; "force" is often misapplied as a word in its more colloquial context.

There is no empirical evidence of any such "life force", as you put it. There is a lot we don't know about life, that's for sure, but these gaps in our knowledge are just that; gaps. Biological evolution through natural selection (with a contribution by the statistical factor of genetic drift), on the other hand, has been shown in a huge number of cases to work in describing the evolution of life & has yet to be falsified. Many examples of once-thought irreducible complexity have been solved in the context of evolution, and no doubt many more of these "gaps" will be filled in the future. So far, no better model with any measurable consequences has been developed to fill these gaps in.

All the so-called probability calculations you repeatedly make have two fundamental errors:

1) The false assumption is made that all the boundary conditions used to calculate the probability are known (virtually impossible to do with a complex system)

and

2) The false assumption is made that outcome that we observe is somehow a "favored outcome", as if life could not have turned out in another completely different yet equally astonishing way (or not all, in which case we wouldn't be here to make the observation anyway). VadeRetro has aptly labelled this the "fallacy of retroactive astonishment" in some of his other posts (please forgive me if I have misquoted); the cosmology community refers to a similar phenomenon as the anthropic principle.

[Quark2005]

One thing I have learned in debating evolutionists is that few if any of them understand mathematics and its implications for a theory based on randomness. Apparently advanced mathematics just isn't a requirement for becoming a biologist or biochemist.

Any IDer who would actually try to deliberate on their theory at a conference in front of biological and biochemical professors would find out how wrong you are about this in a big hurry. Knowledge of mathematics and the limitations of its ability to operate within given boundary conditions is exactly why ID is rejected.

Advanced statistics is a cornerstone of education in the biological sciences. The fact that biologists understand statistics is the very reason they can't take ID (and what they pass off as mathematical rigor) seriously as science.

Scientists who specialize in collecting in analyzing and collecting data aren't trained in advanced mathematics and statistics? This is the strangest thing I've heard all week.