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To: gobucks

"science-rejecting creationists"

Here we go again, lumping ID in with creationists (i.e. those that take the bible literally).

You folks who dismiss ID as science rejecting are not very well informed. In fact, ID supporters assert that it is established science which is "science rejecting" when the issue of first causes (and evolution) is raised.

Please, lets keep this argument fair...

If you really want to know what ID is all about with respect to questioning the dogma of evolution read Phillip Johnson's "Darwin on Trial." He is not a biblical literalist, though he is a Christian. They are certainly not mutually exclusive except to the ignorant.

And for very intelligent, thoughtful, and powerful, though not scientific, arguments regarding the existence of God and the truth of Christ, read GK Chesterton's works on the matter and C.S. Lewis too.

Or you could still argue from ignorance, emotion and ingrained prejudice...your call.




14 posted on 09/19/2005 6:31:01 PM PDT by fizziwig
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To: fizziwig
Here we go again, lumping ID in with creationists (i.e. those that take the bible literally).

You folks who dismiss ID as science rejecting are not very well informed. In fact, ID supporters assert that it is established science which is "science rejecting" when the issue of first causes (and evolution) is raised.

Please, lets keep this argument fair...

Yeah sure, and they're not really Liberals, they are really Progressives

I hate to tell you, but you're not fooling anyone

18 posted on 09/19/2005 6:36:22 PM PDT by qam1 (There's been a huge party. All plates and the bottles are empty, all that's left is the bill to pay)
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To: fizziwig
You folks who dismiss ID as science rejecting are not very well informed. In fact, ID supporters assert that it is established science...
Please, lets keep this argument fair...

Okay...

Mere assertion does not "establish" science. Science is, mostly, a method of inquiry, and certainly not a collection of assertions. What science does require, on a prima facie basis, is that objectivity and empiricism prevail.

21 posted on 09/19/2005 6:46:47 PM PDT by Rudder
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To: fizziwig

"You folks who dismiss ID as science rejecting are not very well informed. In fact, ID supporters assert that it is established science which is "science rejecting" when the issue of first causes (and evolution) is raised."

ID supporters "assert that it is science."

Asserting that something is science does not make it so.


61 posted on 09/20/2005 5:20:25 AM PDT by BeHoldAPaleHorse
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To: fizziwig
If you really want to know what ID is all about with respect to questioning the dogma of evolution read Phillip Johnson's "Darwin on Trial." He is not a biblical literalist, though he is a Christian. They are certainly not mutually exclusive except to the ignorant.

For what it's worth (and I do not claim it is a great deal, btw) I did read Johnson's book, when it was first published (and at a time when I had a far more overtly religious outlook). I had hoped--then--that it would help remove growing doubts I had about my own religious dogmas.

In fact, it helped push me in quite other (and rather better) directions. Johnson is an intelligent and articulate lawyer, and it was some of the clear weaknesses in his misrepresentation of science that showed me how thin my own grasp of science was and motivated me to undertake a better study.

What Johnson does articulate well is his sense of spiritual 'emptiness' from evolutionary theory, which for him (and many, I suspect) is a driver for seeking 'truth' elsewhere. But it is easy to see the compound fallacies here. It is not--and cannot be--a 'role' of science to provide spiritual truths (although the truths it reveals happen to have great beauty--but that's another topic). One might as well say that, because astronomy does not give us spiritual satisfaction we must teach astrology alongside it in order to provide "meaning."

Science is an unrivalled tool for expanding and refining our knowledge of the natural world--and is entirely content to leave 'supernatural' matters firmly out of scope. But some religiously-minded folk just seem to be unable to accept this, demand that science somehow validate their own religious 'truths.' This demand is completely unreasonable and can only end in tears. Why do some religious folk keep picking this fight? Science and religion occupy separate spheres--something the framers of our Constitution understood very well indeed.

One could suggest that reconciling the natural truths of science with 'spiritual truths' of religion is a matter of personal conscience; it is certainly not an issue for the science classroom. Given the dreadfully poor understanding of even basic scientific methodology one encounters in these threads, it is clear science teachers have more than enough to do as it is.

64 posted on 09/20/2005 6:00:08 AM PDT by SeaLion ("Belief in a cruel God makes a cruel man" -- Thomas Paine)
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To: fizziwig
Here we go again, lumping ID in with creationists (i.e. those that take the bible literally).

The truth hurts. ID is creationism. The creators of the ID movement say so themselves. Consult the Wedge Document.

69 posted on 09/20/2005 6:29:03 AM PDT by doc30 (Democrats are to morals what and Etch-A-Sketch is to Art.)
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To: fizziwig
Here we go again, lumping ID in with creationists (i.e. those that take the bible literally).

But it seems to me that such "lumping" is one of the distinctive purposes of the whole Intelligent Design movement. Note that ID'ers resolutely refuse to posit any claims -- even hypotheses -- about when or how "design" is instantiated. They restrict themselves to "inferring" THAT acts of design have occurred, but restrict themselves from asking any further questions. (Indeed this may be saying too much because ID'ers don't really even commit themselves to the notion that design is the result of discrete "acts" by a designer. They merely suggest that there "is" design, that it at least some of it couldn't happen naturally, and that design somehow "implies" an "intelligent designer".)

Now this is pretty odd. A mechanism, model -- or some manner of understanding and explaining how and in what circumstances things actually come to happen -- is central to any scientific theory. Even if we grant (correctly in light of the history of science) that building the groundwork for a new scientific theory might commence before a mechanism has been clearly conceived, the notion that even speculation on the matter should be actively avoided as part and parcel of an entire investigative approach is completely bizarre. At least it's bizarre if we're talking about science.

My view is, whether the strategy is conscious or tacit, that this approach of focusing exclusively on the "design inference," while studiously avoiding any other focus, is itself "designed" so that ID can function as an umbrella or catchall ideology for the antievolution movement.

Look at the modern history of antievolutionism and you'll find constant bickering and schism. Not only did progressive, old-earth creationists argue with young-earth flood-geology creationists, but young-earth creationists were often at odds with each other. For instance Harold Coffin and Henry Morris argued bitterly about the importance of "ecological zonation" versus "hydrodynamic sorting" in explaining how a global flood produces the apparent order in the fossil record. Morris argued with Kofahl and other young earthers about whether the second law of thermodynamics applied before the fall and the flood. There were multiple disagreements about the "canopy theory," e.g. whether it was vaporous or solid, or whether there was a "canopy" at all.

Now such disagreement and argumentation is all to the good if one is pursuing science, but it's debilitating for a popular movement pursuing social or political aims. In the former case you want competing factions criticizing each other and pushing distinct ideas, in the later case you want the largest possible coalition supporting the broadest and most palatable possible agreement.

Which pattern does the ID movement fit? I think the answer is obvious.

If you really want to know what ID is all about with respect to questioning the dogma of evolution read Phillip Johnson's "Darwin on Trial." He is not a biblical literalist, though he is a Christian. They are certainly not mutually exclusive except to the ignorant.

This book, which you yourself designate as representative of ID, is a good example of what I've been saying. I've talked with Johnson, and he does (or did) indeed claim that he is not a "literalist" or a flood-geologist or young-earther. Yet the strange thing is that this book of his is peppered with young-earth and flood-geology arguments (particularly in the chapter on the fossil record). That is he uses many antievolution arguments that don't make any sense, or lose their point, outside of this context.

Why is this, if ID -- let alone Johnson's own views -- exclude a young earth and flood geology? The answer is that ID doesn't exclude anything that an ardent antievolutionist might believe. That's the point of it.

103 posted on 09/20/2005 10:25:27 AM PDT by Stultis
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