Posted on 02/22/2007 6:22:34 PM PST by Boxen
In a thought-provoking paper from the March issue of The Quarterly Review of Biology , Elliott Sober (University of Wisconsin) clearly discusses the problems with two standard criticisms of intelligent design: that it is unfalsifiable and that the many imperfect adaptations found in nature refute the hypothesis of intelligent design.
Biologists from Charles Darwin to Stephen Jay Gould have advanced this second type of argument. Stephen Jay Gould's well-known example of a trait of this type is the panda's thumb. If a truly intelligent designer were responsible for the panda, Gould argues, it would have provided a more useful tool than the stubby proto-thumb that pandas use to laboriously strip bamboo in order to eat it.
ID proponents have a ready reply to this objection. We do not know whether an intelligent designer intended for pandas to be able to efficiently strip bamboo. The "no designer worth his salt" argument assumes the designer would want pandas to have better eating implements, but the objection has no justification for this assumption. In addition, Sober points out, this criticism of ID also concedes that creationism is testable.
A second common criticism of ID is that it is untestable. To develop this point, scientists often turn to the philosopher Karl Popper's idea of falsifiability. According to Popper, a scientific statement must allow the possibility of an observation that would disprove it. For example, the statement "all swans are white" is falsifiable, since observing even one swan that isn't white would disprove it. Sober points out that this criterion entails that many ID statements are falsifiable; for example, the statement that an intelligent designer created the vertebrate eye entails that vertebrates have eyes, which is an observation.
This leads Sober to jettison the concept of falsifiability and to provide a different account of testability. "If ID is to be tested," he says, "it must be tested against one or more competing hypotheses." If the ID claim about the vertebrate eye is to be tested against the hypothesis that the vertebrate eye evolved by Darwinian processes, the question is whether there is an observation that can discriminate between the two. The observation that vertebrates have eyes cannot do this.
Sober also points out that criticism of a competing theory, such as evolution, is not in-and-of-itself a test of ID. Proponents of ID must construct a theory that makes its own predictions in order for the theory to be testable. To contend that evolutionary processes cannot produce "irreducibly complex" adaptations merely changes the subject, Sober argues.
"When scientific theories compete with each other, the usual pattern is that independently attested auxiliary propositions allow the theories to make predictions that disagree with each other," Sober writes. "No such auxiliary propositions allow … ID to do this." In developing this idea, Sober makes use of ideas that the French philosopher Pierre Duhem developed in connection with physical theories – theories usually do not, all by themselves, make testable predictions. Rather, they do so only when supplemented with auxiliary information. For example, the laws of optics do not, by themselves, predict when eclipses will occur; they do so when independently justified claims about the positions of the earth, moon, and sun are taken into account.
Similarly, ID claims make predictions when they are supplemented by auxiliary claims. The problem is that these auxiliary assumptions about the putative designer's goals and abilities are not independently justified. Surprisingly, this is a point that several ID proponents concede.
###
Sober, Elliott. "What is Wrong with Intelligent Design," The Quarterly Review of Biology: March 2007.
Since 1926, The Quarterly Review of Biology has been dedicated to providing insightful historical, philosophical, and technical treatments of important biological topics.
I tried it too, but my reception was terrible.
Only the ones written by Jack Chick.
He did spell "Ku Klux Klan" right, which could explain a lot. Interestingly, the Klan cited the Bible to justify their depredations. The few remaining Klansmen continue to do so (get them all together in a room and collectively you might find enough teeth for a full set).
OTOH, it's doubtful that they were "Darwinists".
Sorry. That would be the logical conclusion. Wakeup Sleeper won't accept that.
Euphanists? Are they some kind of musician? Because I know for a fact that most saxophonists are evolutionists, and most trombonists are too. Darwin himself played the trombone. He'd get drunk and chase children in the streets with the evil instrument, blasting jazz in their little ears and poking them over and over with the slide. Its true.
Did you know that Darwin was a racist? a womaniser? and believed in not helping the sick? Did you know darwins family was riddled with drug abuse and alcohlism and infidelity . . .
He wore corduroy too. Evolutionists all wear corduroy. If you see a saxophonist wearing corduroy, run for your life!
http://www.bible.ca/tracks/dating-radiometric.htm#c14
"Here is the correct link to that site. And the article is a laugh."
I suppose he meant euphemists. Most of us evil evolutionists are. That's why we say that wake-up sleeper is not so bad a poster...
Not so bad a poster, but a perfectly lousy billboard.
No Im meant euthanist! as in euhanasia!
still didnt spell it rite oh dear me! euthanasia!
dont get it? Science is science! show it where its wrong!
its a laugh huh! show me where its wrong in its train of thought! give me one specific not websites you yourself tell me where at one point tell me where its wrong! Make one specific point from that site bible.ca where its wrong in its science!
Not talking about that site, oh my word! the carbon dating site I just showed you! anyways peace dude!
Come on coyoteman dont sink to such childish levels, what I have in all its badtyping/spelling has far beyond the credibility of the proposed propaganda no evidence science that all evolutionists proporte. You havent brought up one point just one point at a time. you dont want to seem to debate it that way1 how come. pick one thing you think is a error in the site I gave just one for now and then will go from there and will see that way plain and clear whos holds water!
thats a lame reply and I dont get your points, put downs arent science!
Like I said give me one point at a time and will see, dont give a website make one specific point, and then we will debate it and will see if evolution is so overwhelming obviously true, which is ridiculous because it is so overwhelmingly false.
#49: still didnt spell it rite oh dear me! euthanasia!
Ah, that was a tricky one:
| word | google-hits |
|---|---|
| euthanist | 571 |
Compare this with a real word:
| word | google-hits |
|---|---|
| euthanisia | 5.390.000 |
The good thing about creating your own words: no-one will mind your spelling!
BTW, your remember the list, promised in #338?
Crackpots are evolutionists/atheists like
Stalin
Hitler
murderers in general/Charles manson
Lennin
Mary madalin O hare what ever how you spelled it.
and the other guy who said never trust anyone over thirty,and he killed himself.
These are the crackpots and oh yeah there evolutionists/atheists!
to come off saying HA! coyoteman shows arrogance and a lack of credibility and maturity! If you can prove a specific point invalis then by all means lets hear it, but to just try and say everytime oh thats not fact and then not back it up, is real quite unscientific.
Probabaly! But his mom probably had it ruff, since she married a nutcase Charles father who was the son of ersamus Darwin who killed his wife by giving her a to strong a dose of opium when she was intoxicated, no to mention Charles dad who was a ruthless business man who kept cheap labor practices etc... reda about Darwins crackpot upbringing.
talk about spelling, "your remember the list" post such and such do you realy want me to just go on and on with names that you have so poorly been able to deny so far,
regardless its been more than 50 which you said It would stop at 50, but Ill give you some more if you need to keep seeing.
Go to- Answers in genesis - and look up "Are there any scientists whoare alive TODAY believe in the biblical account of genesis?".
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