ID: What’s it all about, Darwin?

The American Thinker ^ | August 26th, 2005 | Dennis Sevakis

[Heartlander]

Is bearing false witness in keeping with the commandments of your God?

You have invoked scripture in a science thread… Why?

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"A.I. – where does this come from?

Genetic Engineering – where does this come from?"

People. The existence of intelligent design among people is not under dispute. This says nothing about the processes that led to life and that shaped the evolution of that life through time.

There is no evidence that intelligent design existed before people.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

" You have invoked scripture in a science thread… Why?"

Because you are lying about what someone said here. And you know it.

[Heartlander]

So you believe that your material mind is the result of mindlessness because science allows no other answer? You also know science has a record of being wrong…

Beyond this, how could science answer the question differently if it found evidence to the contrary?

[philetus]

ALL scientific theories only work with natural, material causes."

Scientific proof is based on showing that something is a fact by repeating the event in the presence of the person questioning the fact. There is a controlled environment where
observations can be made, data drawn, and hypotheses empirically verified.
Now if the scientific method was the only method of proving something,you couldn't prove that you went to first hour class this morning or that you had lunch today.There's no way you can repeat those events in a controlled situation.
(from More Than A Carpenter, by Josh McDowell)

Using this criteria, is a "scientific theory" scientific or is it just an idea a scientist has?

[Mylo]

Boy, that McDowell guy needs to watch CSI.

I could take out your stomach and prove if you had lunch today or not; a blood glucose measure would be a good alternative also- although less definitive.

[Heartlander]

Did you invoke scripture?

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"So you believe that your material mind is the result of mindlessness because science allows no other answer? "

I believe that the mind is a result of material, natural causes. There are no other causes that can be tested or observed.

"You also know science has a record of being wrong…"

It's history of being right is far greater.

" Beyond this, how could science answer the question differently if it found evidence to the contrary?"

There is no evidence to the contrary, unless you are finally willing to tell us what the evidence for non-material causes is.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"Now if the scientific method was the only method of proving something,..."

Science doesn't prove anything, it just weighs the evidence for theories.

"you couldn't prove that you went to first hour class this morning or that you had lunch today."

I can't. I can provide evidence to where I was though. Can you provide evidence fora non-material cause?

"There's no way you can repeat those events in a controlled situation. "

This is not required for a scientific theory.

"Using this criteria, is a "scientific theory" scientific or is it just an idea a scientist has? "

What it is NOT is something that uses non-material, non-natural causes as evidence.

[Heartlander]

There is no evidence to the contrary, unless you are finally willing to tell us what the evidence for non-material causes is.

But you and I know that there is scientific research in A.I. and genetic engineering. What is the evidence and research for material consciousness coming ultimately from mindlessness?

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"Did you invoke scripture?"


I invoked a commandment, though I did not quote any scripture.


Where did js1138? He brought up his theological ideas; saying he *invoked* scripture is very presumptuous of you unless you can show what chapter and verse he invoked. Otherwise you are just blowing smoke out your butt.

I am still waiting for you evidence of a non-material cause.

[Heartlander]

A commandment? From where?

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"But you and I know that there is scientific research in A.I. and genetic engineering. What is the evidence and research for material consciousness coming ultimately from mindlessness?"

And that research has nothing to do with a non-material cause or a non-natural process. The fact that people can intelligently design is in no way evidence for the Intelligent Design hypothesis. It is amusing that you keep bringing it up anyway.

I assume that you know of no evidence for a non-material cause are just bluffing.

[Heartlander]

Psssst… Hey, guess what…

The ID theory does not need to invoke the supernatural and I’ve been saying this all along.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"A commandment? From where?"

Good God, say what scripture he quoted or I will be forced to assume you a blithering idiot. And a liar. He brought up God; that is not the same as bringing up scripture. There have been concepts of God outside of the Bible.

[philetus]

I could take out your stomach and prove if you had lunch today or not; a blood glucose measure would be a good alternative also- although less definitive."

Sure you could, but that would be legal proof and not scientific proof.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"Psssst… Hey, guess what…

The ID theory does not need to invoke the supernatural and I’ve been saying this all along."

Psssst... Hey, guess what... it has to. It is just too dishonest to come out and say it.

[Heartlander]

There have been concepts of God outside of the Bible.

Look, I asked you a question point blank if ‘you’ quoted scripture. Do 'you' want to answer?

You are obviously diverting our discussion and I have said many times now that ‘he’ can answer 'his' question.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"Look, I asked you a question point blank if ‘you’ quoted scripture."

No. didn't. And you have not shown any evidence for a non-material cause (a question I asked you first). Or what scripture js1138 is alleged to have invoked. Again I assume from your total silence there was no scripture he invoked, and you introduced that line of argument to insinuate that because he didn't believe in God like you then he had no business to speak of God.

"I have said many times now that ‘he’ can answer 'his' question."

And you can't answer any of mine.

" You are obviously diverting our discussion"

And you are obviously incapable of supporting your assertions.

[Heartlander]

Psssst... Hey, guess what... it has to. It is just too dishonest to come out and say it.

Fine… If you insist on playing this game than current biological science is atheistic and it is just to dishonest to say it…

There are ‘scientists’ such as Richard Dawkins, William Provine, David Barash, Stephen Pinker, Jacob Weisberg, Sam Harris, and many other people who use evolution to tear apart Judeo-Christian beliefs and replace them with atheistic beliefs from science. Where is the cry from the scientific community about this mixing of religion and politics? Who sets the criteria that allows this to happen without recourse? Beyond this, any Freeper who participates in scientific discussions and religious discussions has seen first hand that the atheistic Freepers in the science forums attack Christianity in the religious forums. But I digress, let’s get back to our ‘non-religious’ and ‘non-political’ scientists’.

National Center for Science Education gives teachers lessons on how to ‘reconcile’ science and religion. Think about that… The NCSE is against religious views in science if they include any intelligent design but yet they advocate the mixing of the two according to the rules they have established.

But what does Dick Dawkins say?:

The same is true of many of the major doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church. The Virgin Birth, the bodily Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Resurrection of Jesus, the survival of our own souls after death: these are all claims of a clearly scientific nature. Either Jesus had a corporeal father or he didn't. This is not a question of "values" or "morals"; it is a question of sober fact. We may not have the evidence to answer it, but it is a scientific question, nevertheless. You may be sure that, if any evidence supporting the claim were discovered, the Vatican would not be reticent in promoting it.

Either Mary's body decayed when she died, or it was physically removed from this planet to Heaven. The official Roman Catholic doctrine of Assumption, promulgated as recently as 1950, implies that Heaven has a physical location and exists in the domain of physical reality - how else could the physical body of a woman go there? I am not, here, saying that the doctrine of the Assumption of the Virgin is necessarily false (although of course I think it is). I am simply rebutting the claim that it is outside the domain of science. On the contrary, the Assumption of the Virgin is transparently a scientific theory. So is the theory that our souls survive bodily death, and so are all stories of angelic visitations, Marian manifestations, and miracles of all types.
by Richard Dawkins

I wonder if ‘Richard’ would “enlighten” us with a political view?

Our leaders have described the recent atrocity with the customary cliche: mindless cowardice. "Mindless" may be a suitable word for the vandalising of a telephone box. It is not helpful for understanding what hit New York on September 11. Those people were not mindless and they were certainly not cowards. On the contrary, they had sufficiently effective minds braced with an insane courage, and it would pay us mightily to understand where that courage came from.

It came from religion. Religion is also, of course, the underlying source of the divisiveness in the Middle East which motivated the use of this deadly weapon in the first place. But that is another story and not my concern here. My concern here is with the weapon itself. To fill a world with religion, or religions of the Abrahamic kind, is like littering the streets with loaded guns. Do not be surprised if they are used.
by Richard Dawkins

Ladies and gentlemen, this man is required reading in many college level biology classes. (I could post more of this rubbish but this man longs for a spotlight that I will not give him) I find it ironic that a man like Dawkins has a problem with this ‘mindlessness’ when a book he wrote is titled The Blind Watchmaker: Why the Evidence of Evolution Reveals a Universe Without Design . Mindlessness is by definition void of intelligence and design.