Is Intelligent Design a Bad Scientific Theory or a Non-Scientific Theory?

Tech Central Station ^ | 11/10/2005 | Uriah Kriegel

[highball]

At the same time, science should be recognized as a philosophy.

In practical terms, what does that mean?

It is a philosophy that has played an important role, to be sure, but at root it is a philosophy. Other philosophies have played important roles too.

I'm not sure who's diminishing the role of other philosophies, either in our history or today. All we're saying is that we shouldn't let the dogma of one philosophy intrude upon the workings of another discipline.

[MHalblaub]

"So why don't you just answer the question? Do you accept as truth the first 10 words of the Bible? Or does the Bible start out by spouting lies?"

I can only believe them to be true.
To accept it I would need some proof or facts.

[From many - one.]

I'm sorry that you don't see it and I don't think I'll be able to persuade you.


Perhaps you might take into consideration the Jewish concept that the only pure "mitzvah" (pretty much, but not exactly a "good deed") is that of throwing soil onto the grave. There is no possibility of the deed being repaid. Every other mitzvah carries with it the possibility of reciprocation or recognition.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"When someone else INTENT becomes crystal clear, and that intent is to injure others, then there is good reason to act."

All competition is an intent to injure another company. When a business is too successful at what it does, when some magic threshold is passed, then they have become *anticompetitive* and must be stopped.


Collectivist nonsense. You have a right to drive others out of business as long as you don't initiate force against anybody.

"This is similar to freedom of speech and the "man shouting fire in a crowded theater."

This has nothing to do with freedom of speech; this is basic property rights. An oil company owns their oil and has a right to sell it at WHATEVER price they wish. If nobody wants it at their prices, then they won't be able to sell it. If they give it all away, that is their right too. If that puts other companies out of business, too bad. Their is no *right* to business success; if you can't keep up with the free market then you don't deserve to be in business.

Anti-trust is anti-capitalist.

[RogueIsland]

Probably the major issue at the time was trust control of the railroads and concommitant use of shipping "rebates" on the railroads to basically rig the game by making sure transportation costs always favored the trusts. Since the railroad really was the only game in town in 1905, that tactic was a real choke-point for interstate trade.

Purists will no doubt say that it still wasn't any affair of the Federal Government, but one also has to put it in the context of a social tinderbox where there were very real anarchist and communist movements afoot in the country and there was no guarantee that republican (in the non-party sense of the term) sensibilities would win out in the end. Many of TR's actions were largely pragmatic efforts to relieve some of those pressures before the whole social structure fractured beyond repair, and he had as much if not more distaste for the attitudes of labor union extremists as he did for the Trusts.

[drlevy88]

I think it would be a refreshing move to get the nation out of the science/creation debate into a higher level of thought.

The philosophy called science is notable for its fruits in the physical world: medicine, energy, food. It is guided by physical observations.

The philosophies called religions are notable for their fruits in the spiritual realm: ethics, comfort, purpose. It is guided by spiritual revelation.

There are areas of truth claims where the two conflict in their conclusions and people need to choose a philosophy in order to resolve the issue, or may choose to leave the question open.

Perhaps this is belaboring the obvious.

[js1138]

I'm going to jump in here with a question. What principle do you follow if the property was originally a gift from the government?

[drlevy88]

There's no escaping the system. I could say that if you fill up and tend my grandpa's grave, I'll fill up and tend yours.

[xzins]

I do not have the freedom to use my property in a way that injures my neighbor. For example, I do not have the right to store radioactive nuclear waste on it.

Also, in a free market, competition is not designed to drive your competitors out of business.

It is designed as a place where customers can bid on available commodities.

If the farmer's market in our area had someone come in week after week giving away what everyone else was selling, then it would surely drive the others out of business.

Just because I have water in the desert, it doesn't make it ethical for me refuse water to a man dying of thirst until he signs over all his property and accounts.

The market might be able to bear it at that moment in that situation, but it is clear extortion.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"What principle do you follow if the property was originally a gift from the government?"

I vote the government out.

[xzins]

Good information. Thanks.

[atlaw]

You have a right to drive others out of business as long as you don't initiate force against anybody. . . . Anti-trust is anti-capitalist.

I respectfully disagree. The Sherman, Clayton, and Robinson-Patman Acts have been rather successful in maintaining a competitive marketplace for the last century. The notion that price fixing and monopolistic predation is an inherent, and indeed virtuous, element of a free market strikes me as somewhat akin to the notion that fraud is a competitive virtue. There are thresholds of human connivance that we have, as a society, declared inviolable.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"Also, in a free market, competition is not designed to drive your competitors out of business."

Yes it is. They don't have a right to be in business if they can't provide services and goods a competitive rate.

"It is designed as a place where customers can bid on available commodities."

Freely and at whatever rates both parties agree on. The government has no legitimate power to interfere.

"If the farmer's market in our area had someone come in week after week giving away what everyone else was selling, then it would surely drive the others out of business."

And they would perfectly within their rights to do so.

"Just because I have water in the desert, it doesn't make it ethical for me refuse water to a man dying of thirst until he signs over all his property and accounts."

Forcing someone to give another their property because of alleged *need* is immoral.

"The market might be able to bear it at that moment in that situation, but it is clear extortion."

No, it's a free market.

[P-Marlowe]

I do not see "Love thy neighbor as thyself" or Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" as being even the slightest bit self-sacrifcing

Try practicing it sometime.

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"The notion that price fixing and monopolistic predation is an inherent, and indeed virtuous, element of a free market strikes me as somewhat akin to the notion that fraud is a competitive virtue."

I never said fraud was a virtue. That would be stealing. I am talking about being able to sell your property at whatever levels someone else agrees to purchase them. Or to give them away if you wish. Why is this so controversial?

"The Sherman, Clayton, and Robinson-Patman Acts have been rather successful in maintaining a competitive marketplace for the last century."

They have been a bludgeon used by the less successful businesses to get a piece of what they feel they are entitled to.

"There are thresholds of human connivance that we have, as a society, declared inviolable."

That doesn't make it moral.

[xzins]

We have vastly different ideas on what constitutes a free market.

Our here in farm land, when they take the cattle to market and folks stand around and bid on them, we understand what market price means.

As soon as all those bidders have a gun to their head, then it is no longer a free market.

[MHalblaub]

"I was taught that in nature all things "wind down", and that things move from 'order to chaos'."

You got bad teachers.
In Kansas they are looking forward for this kind of teachers.

Nebulas of hydrogen form stars.
All higher elements were breed in stars from hydrogen.
20 gallons of water, a bin of proteins, another one of lipids, a cup of carbohydrates, some minerals and finally a touch of nucleic acid are much more ordered separated than working together in an human body.

And please don't mix up the term "entropy" used in physics with the term used in information theory. Just because thermodynamic entropy is always rising in an isolated system you can't derive from that anything about partial systems.

[From many - one.]

You don't kow my private life as I don't know yours.
But...
I practice it on these threads for all here to see.

When I respond to a courteously worded post, I try to be at least equally courteous in response.

When the other poster is rude, I call them on it and become increasingly more terse in my responses. I try not to be rude because that is not who I am.

If I erroneously or inadvertently produce a less than courteous reply, as soon as I become aware of it, I apologize.

[P-Marlowe]

I'm not dodging the question. Personally, I believe that the Bible contains more parables than just the ones attributed to Jesus. But again, that's not the point. If you have to believe that the first 10 words of the Bible (in whichever translation you prefer) are literally true for ID to make any sense whatsoever, then that tells us a lot about how "intelligent" it really is.

In other words, "No", you do not believe the first 10 words of the bible and "Yes", the bible starts out by spewing lies.

I can accept that answer. Why don't you just answer the questions like that? Are you afraid to express your beliefs?

Frankly I have no problem with evolutionists and intelligent design critics who do not believe in the God revealed in the Bible. I would expect them to deny the existence of such a God for the God revealed in the Bible takes credit for CREATING "the heavens, the earth and all that in them is". Maybe such a God does not exist. I accept skeptisim of that fact. What I have trouble with is those who claim to be followers of Christ and who claim to be believers in the God revealed in the Bible, yet they deny the truth of the book in which that God reveals himself to mankind.

If the first 10 words of the Bible do not express TRUTH, then the rest of the book cannot be trusted.

For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty. For he received from God the Father honor and glory, when there came such a voice to him from the excellent glory, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. (2 Peter 1:16-17 KJV)

[CarolinaGuitarman]

"As soon as all those bidders have a gun to their head, then it is no longer a free market."

That's exactly what antitrust is, the government putting a gun to the heads of business telling them what prices to offer and how to distribute their products. It's the definition of fascism; government leaves *ownership* to private industry but runs it.