Posted on 10/18/2005 9:31:08 AM PDT by PatrickHenry
Invisible Pink Unicorn, you heretic!
"Every time that I attempt to build a shrine to the Flying Spaghetti Monster, I wind up covering it with shaved parmesan and consuming it. Sigh."
"Invisible Pink Unicorn, you heretic!"
...which explains Behe's appearance on the stand.
Given that the plaintiffs' witnesses have conceded the point that evolution is not a fact,
...given that you keep misrepresenting what they actually did and did not say...
an alternative viewpoint may very well have merit.
Except that it doesn't.
As an aside, if evolutionists have no explanation for the origins of life; they are really in no position to to simply claim that an intelligent designer was not involved.
Right, which is why they don't "simply make" such claims. The objection to "ID" is not that it has somehow been ruled out, it's that there is no evidence in support of that hypothesis, yet its proponents want it presented as if it was on par with actual science.
That the evolutionist side is the plaintiff in this case does not mean that evolution isn't on trial.
So you are claiming intelligent design has to prove origins, but evolution does not.
No, he isn't. He is examining the claims that ID *does* make about origins.
Funny how evols like to hold everyone else to a higher standard than they, themselves, are willing to adhere to.
Funny how the anti-evolution folks seem to have problems with basic reading comprehension.
"That the evolutionist side is the plaintiff in this case does not mean that evolution isn't on trial."
::::sigh::::: Even when the difference is pointed out to you between Intellligent Design and Creationism, you refuse to see it.
I must have missed it -- what *is* that alleged difference?
Also, please note that creationism is the position that life was created by some creator. ID is the position that life was created by some designer. Er, designed by some creator. Whatever.
Please explain the "difference" here, and why ID is not creationism.
I am fairly certain that I've explained this to you before, but as tabula rasa appears to have struck again...
ID must stand or fall as a scientific theory on its own merits. Science knows of no such thing as a default explanation to be fallen back on once other explanations have been disproved. Therefore ID must explain the existing data concerning the history of life on earth (all of it that we have, such as the retroviral evidence, not just cherry-picked fragments), make testable predictions about what we are likely to find in the future, and be subject to being falsified by hypothetical observations. No-one has ever explained how ID can do this (to me anyway).
Paganism, pure and simple. Next you'll be telling me these shrines are the sites of miracles.
There's no mystery as to what the case is about. Here's a copy of the plaintiff's complaint (pdf file). It ends up (page 22) saying that the plaintiffs want teaching ID enjoined because it violates the First Amendment.
No, it isn't. The plaintiff in this case are several concerned parents. A mandatory creationist "statement" is what's on trial.
does not mean that evolution isn't on trial.
Dream on.
The 1st amendment freedom of religion side is the plaintiff in this case. Quit making stuff up.
How many times do I have to say that ID seriously questions the merits of evolution because life at exists today simply cannot be the result of random chance. If not random chance, some other force must be behind the design of life as it exists.
You are going to have a LAWYER doing the cross. My experience of lawyers is that they think they are omnicompetent, but their knowledge of anything besides the law is large rote. He will take Miller's testimony as his brief and try to defend that position. My guess is that he will advance an argument like" Most people say you are wrong; why should we believe you?"
The pope--who is a supporters of evolution, by the way--has a book on Christianity that makes an interesting point. Not all religions are "faiths." Some, like Roman relgion, was largely the punctilious observance of tradition rituals. One did not have to "believe" in the existence of the gods to participate in these rituals. Participation in them did not require "faith" in the Chruistian sense of the word, More or less the same is true of the teaching of "evolution." However, in a room in which half of the students may believe literallity in the truth of Genesis, an element of compulsion is present. A concession to this raw fact is what the school board is making. I prefer a poliucy of accomodation. You may think that ID is not more than creatioism in disguise. Maybe the board has this in mind. But even though I agree withe the Court in the Arkansas case, I disagree with the thinking that has compelled the court to strain at gnats and make decisions that are, frankly, just stupid.
To set the record straight:
The second and more important point is that, while the paper is very interesting, it doesn't address irreducible complexity. Either Miller hasn't read what I said in my book about metabolic pathways, or he is deliberately ignoring it. I clearly stated in Darwin's Black Box metabolic pathways are not irreducibly complex (Behe 1996) (pp. 141-142; 150-151), because components can be gradually added to a previous pathway. Thus metabolic pathways simply aren't in the same category as the blood clotting cascade or the bacterial flagellum. Although Miller somehow misses the distinction, other scientists do not. In a recent paper Thornhill and Ussery write that something they call serial-direct-Darwinian-evolution "cannot generate irreducibly complex structures." But they think it may be able to generate a reducible structure, "such as the TCA cycle (Behe, 1996 a, b)." (Thornhill and Ussery 2000) In other words Thornhill and Ussery acknowledge the TCA cycle is not irreducibly complex, as I wrote in my book. Miller seems unable or unwilling to grasp....
Michael Behe
Cordially,
"Paganism, pure and simple. Next you'll be telling me these shrines are the sites of miracles."
Ha! You are SSSOOOOO wrong.
I can go to literally dozens of outlets in which I can receive the sacrements of the FSM. I can go to any grocery store and purchase the fixings to make my own offering to the FSM.
Way more available than IPFs.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.