Posted on 04/21/2008 7:23:01 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
In Ben Stein's new film "Expelled," there is a great scene where Richard Dawkins is going on about how evolution explains everything. This is part of Dawkins' grand claim, which echoes through several of his books, that evolution by itself has refuted the argument from design. The argument from design hold that the design of the universe and of life are most likely the product of an intelligent designer. Dawkins thinks that Darwin has disproven this argument.
So Stein puts to Dawkins a simple question, "How did life begin?" One would think that this is a question that could be easily answered. Dawkins, however, frankly admits that he has no idea. One might expect Dawkins to invoke evolution as the all-purpose explanation. Evolution, however, only explains transitions from one life form to another. Evolution has no explanation for how life got started in the first place. Darwin was very clear about this.
In order for evolution to take place, there had to be a living cell. The difficulty for atheists is that even this original cell is a work of labyrinthine complexity. Franklin Harold writes in The Way of the Cell that even the simplest cells are more ingeniously complicated than man's most elaborate inventions: the factory system or the computer. Moreover, Harold writes that the various components of the cell do not function like random widgets; rather, they work purposefully together, as if cooperating in a planned organized venture. Dawkins himself has described the cell as the kind of supercomputer, noting that it functions through an information system that resembles the software code.
Is it possible that living cells somehow assembled themselves from nonliving things by chance? The probabilities here are so infinitesimal that they approach zero. Moreover, the earth has been around for some 4.5 billion years and the first traces of life have already been found at some 3.5 billion years ago. This is just what we have discovered: it's quite possible that life existed on earth even earlier. What this means is that, within the scope of evolutionary time, life appeared on earth very quickly after the earth itself was formed. Is it reasonable to posit that a chance combination of atoms and molecules, under those conditions, somehow generated a living thing? Could the random collision of molecules somehow produce a computer?
It is ridiculously implausible to think so. And the absurdity was recognized more than a decade ago by Francis Crick, co-discoverer of the DNA double helix. Yet Crick is a committed atheist. Unwilling to consider the possibility of divine or supernatural creation, Crick suggested that maybe aliens brought life to earth from another planet. And this is precisely the suggestion that Richard Dawkins makes in his response to Ben Stein. Perhaps, he notes, life was delivered to our planet by highly-evolved aliens. Let's call this the "ET" explanation.
Stein brilliantly responds that he had no idea Richard Dawkins believes in intelligent design! And indeed Dawkins does seem to be saying that alien intelligence is responsible for life arriving on earth. What are we to make of this? Basically Dawkins is surrendering on the claim that evolution can account for the origins of life. It can't. The issue now is simply whether a natural intelligence (ET) or a supernatural intelligence (God) created life. Dawkins can't bear the supernatural explanation and so he opts for ET. But doesn't it take as much, or more, faith to believe in extraterrestrial biology majors depositing life on earth than it does to believe in a transcendent creator?
Like I said, stopped clock. Or I'd love to by a fly on the wall when they're deciding what cases to take.
The university won't give any information directly since that's confidential. Sweet deal for Gonzalez, he gets to say whatever he wants and the university can't just bring out the truth. Gonzalez probably could request a release of those records showing the reason for the denial, but I notice he hasn't done that.
Your contention is all well and good, but I think that evidence should show a significant rise in the parameters you mentioned at ISU due to the results of the anti-academic freedom campaign involving Avalos against Gonzalez.
I don't see how. It sounded pretty standard fare. There's a glut of Ph.D.s and only so many tenure positions, so competition is fierce and the standards correspondingly high, especially in hard science areas. His department had a pretty low tenure acceptance rate overall.
I also think that they, the Darwinists, are protected.
Darwinists (if there are any anymore) will be a protected class when someone can claim they were fired for working on natural selection and people will rally around them for that. That's not going to happen any time soon.
And I don't hate IDers, I just hate the very concept of a protected class. Pulling out the race card or an equivalent also makes me mad.
Your third step equates ID with Christians by implication yet the record clearly shows that Muslims believe in ID and further, it is often pointed out by Darwinists that Christians believe in Darwinism. Therefore it is erroneous to exclusively equate ID and Christians.
Step 4 therefore does not follow.
Fallacies do not have length as a requirement. They are simply fallacies.
Being godless myself, I can only point to liberals ruining everything, especially education. I have kids in school and I'm watching their instruction very closely. I've actually been surprised, as they did Christmas around the world, Halloween and Thanksgiving, none with an overly PC treatment. Waiting to see how their later instruction goes.
I won’t challenge your opinions since they are yours and not mine. The only evidence on the Gonzalez case are the statements made by Avalos and Gonzalez and the results of the tenure decision. That is not to deny the statistics of Gonzalez publishing, teaching, etc., but it seems to me that Avalos and others expected some outcome from their petition.
Show me a piece of rock known to be an arrowhead for comparison.
I believe that was published before his scholarship went down the tubes. As I said, he was apparently a very promising astronomer before he got seriously involved with ID.
Is 70% low?
First Edition published in 2001, second edition in 2006. Still used widely.
If ID is religion, then personal belief in ID outside the classroom is protected by the First Amendment.
The emails sent by some of Gonzalez' colleagues make it clear that they denied him tenure because of beliefs he held, but never brought to the classroom.
ISU is a state actor and the 1A is incorporated to the states. Hope they have deep pockets.
Okay I give you what I consider an arrowhead since you did not specify where this arrowhead should come from. Now how do you test it?
I said "known to be an arrowhead". There are rocks we have already established to be arrowheads. Get me one of those.
Try a .30-06, it’s higher tech than rock throwing or bow and arrow.
Thanks. For high tech, I'm starting to like the looks of those railgun thingies.
Big jump from rock throwing to Lorentz. :-}
Rock throwing might be effective under the right circumstances, too. (RAH, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress reference.)
Yeah, Jimmy Webb used to throw rocks at Ms Ronstadt when she screwed up the lyrics. No sense overdoing it.
I’m working on a theory that sometime in the future, the physicists will begin to experiment with time travel, and will inadvertently introduce microbial life into Earth’s ancient past.
Wonderful, we can call it Tacticological Time Warp Panspermia, TTWP for short.
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.