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To: PatrickHenry
You're wrong again Patrick. I do wish you'd study a little bit before you say some of these things. It is in fact, Darwinian evolution which is unfalsifiable. To quote Dr. Dembski:

FALSIFIABILITY: Is intelligent design falsifiable? Is Darwinism falsifiable? Yes to the first question, no to the second. Intelligent design is eminently falsifiable. Specified complexity in general and irreducible complexity in biology are within the theory of intelligent design the key markers of intelligent agency. If it could be shown that biological systems like the bacterial flagellum that are wonderfully complex, elegant, and integrated could have been formed by a gradual Darwinian process (which by definition is non-telic), then intelligent design would be falsified on the general grounds that one doesn't invoke intelligent causes when purely natural causes will do. In that case Occam's razor finishes off intelligent design quite nicely.

On the other hand, falsifying Darwinism seems effectively impossible. To do so one must show that no conceivable Darwinian pathway could have led to a given biological structure. What's more, Darwinists are apt to retreat into the murk of historical contingency to shore up their theory. For instance, Allen Orr in his critique of Behe's work shortly after _Darwin's Black Box_ appeared remarked, "We have no guarantee that we can reconstruct the history of a biochemical pathway." What he conceded with one hand, however, he was quick to retract with the other. He added, "But even if we can't, its irreducible complexity cannot count against its gradual evolution."

30 posted on 01/07/2002 4:06:45 PM PST by Exnihilo
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To: Exnihilo
On the other hand, falsifying Darwinism seems effectively impossible.

Nope. Simplest thing in the world. Just find me a mammal fossil from a rock stratum formed long before the mammals existed.

39 posted on 01/07/2002 4:12:51 PM PST by PatrickHenry
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To: Exnihilo
If it could be shown that biological systems like the bacterial flagellum that are wonderfully complex, elegant, and integrated could have been formed by a gradual Darwinian process (which by definition is non-telic), then intelligent design would be falsified on the general grounds that one doesn't invoke intelligent causes when purely natural causes will do. In that case Occam's razor finishes off intelligent design quite nicely.

OK, here:

So, there is evidence suggesting evolutionary scenarios leading to a flagella. Behe tries to ridicule these on page 66, but the best he can do is demand detail.

. . .

It is also difficult to accept that a flagella represents Intelligent Design, when it is so different from a cilia or an undulopodia. And why do archae and bacteria use a very different flagellin? What kind of intelligent designer doesn't re-use designs, or even components?

From here. Now, YOU go away!
47 posted on 01/07/2002 4:18:07 PM PST by VadeRetro
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