Five critiques of Intelligent Design

Edge.org ^ | September 3, 2005 | Marcelo Gleiser, Jerry Coyne, Richard Dawkins, Scott Atran, Daniel C. Dennett

[snarks_when_bored]

Five critiques of Intelligent Design

John Brockman's Edge.org site has published the following five critiques of Intelligent Design (the bracketed comments following each link are mine):

Marcelo Gleiser, "Who Designed the Designer?"  [a brief op-ed piece]

Jerry Coyne, "The Case Against Intelligent Design: The Faith That Dare Not Speak Its Name"  [a detailed critique of ID and its history, together with a summary defense of Darwinism]

Richard Dawkins & Jerry Coyne, "One Side Can Be Wrong"  [why 'teaching both sides' is not reasonable when there's really only one side]

Scott Atran, "Unintelligent Design"  [intentional causes were banished from science with good reason]

Daniel C. Dennett, "Show Me the Science"  [ID is a hoax]

As Marcelo Gleiser suggests in his op-ed piece, the minds of ID extremists will be changed neither by evidence nor by argument, but IDists (as he calls them) aren't the target audience for critiques such as his. Rather, the target audience is the millions of ordinary citizens who may not know enough about empirical science (and evolution science in particular) to understand that IDists are peddling, not science, but rather something tarted up to look like it.

Let us not be deceived.

[King Prout]

ah - a simple translocation, not like the veritable saltation involved in the puzzling-but-common QG interchange error.

[Gumlegs]

I take back all the snide thoughts I had during your "Festival of 25,000 posts."

[dynoman]

Where were you programmed?

[drlevy88]

Yawn, all this is saying is that science-as-we-know-it can't grok the concept. They can not show that in absolute truth it isn't so.

[Cruising Speed]

To ask the question "Who designed the Designer?" is to fundamentally (willfully?) mis-understand what you're up against.

The "Who designed the Designer?" argument is not meant to enlighten about god, rather, it proves quite convincingly that ID does not qualify as a scientific theory.

[snarks_when_bored]

We're out here holding up the tails of the bell curve. Without us, it would be exp(-x**3).

(laughing)

[PatrickHenry]

Hold them ... we haven't won yet.

[drlevy88]

No, that's a catamount.

[Vive ut Vivas]

Ah, a modest recognition of Darwin Central's contribution to the preservation of Western Civilization.

LOL. What initiation rituals are involved in joining Darwin Central?

[Doctor Stochastic]

[VadeRetro]

Nothing convincing--just a fluke.

[snarks_when_bored]

Did Nobel invent that?

No, I think it was dynoman.

 

 

(Kidding, dynoman, kidding!)

[PatrickHenry]

What initiation rituals are involved in joining Darwin Central?

If we tell you, we'd have to kill you. You're supposed to figure it out on your own. When you do, you'll know.

[dynoman]

Hey, we really shouldn't start again since we are both already winners.

Besides you already know how I would answer.

[Doctor Stochastic]

Isn't that the past participle?

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

You asked. ;)

[Coyoteman]

I'll match your tail...

[King Prout]

could be worser - could have catalysed catalepsis

if this keeps up, this thread shall morph into a catafalque as the conversation catapults catastrophically over the cataract of catatonia

[shuckmaster]

Excellent articles. It's a shame the pinheads don't/won't read them.

[VadeRetro]

Categorically wrong.