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To: Modernman
The existence or non-existence of a supernatural creator is beyond the scope of science.

What if we found some evidence on earth or a device that seems to have with it an explanation the origins of life, but it looks like evidence of another intelligent life form's ship or capsule, then we could not study it scientifically. We would just haul it off to the nearest church.

68 posted on 03/01/2004 2:46:36 PM PST by microgood
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To: microgood
What if we found some evidence on earth or a device that seems to have with it an explanation the origins of life, but it looks like evidence of another intelligent life form's ship or capsule, then we could not study it scientifically. We would just haul it off to the nearest church.

I think it's implied in these threads that when we talk about intelligent design, we're talking about some sort of supernatural force, whether God, Zeus or the Great Pumpkin.

72 posted on 03/01/2004 2:56:31 PM PST by Modernman ("The strong do what they can, the weak suffer what they must." - Thucydides)
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To: microgood
What if we found some evidence on earth or a device that seems to have with it an explanation the origins of life, but it looks like evidence of another intelligent life form's ship or capsule, then we could not study it scientifically. We would just haul it off to the nearest church.

No, that would be positive evidence for intelligent design. Nobody on the ID side has ever put forth positive evidence for ID. In fact, Wm. Dembski, in putting forth his purely negative theory of the Explanatory Filter, has refused time & again to speculate on either the identity or the design goals of the designers - so-called "designer-centric" questions. He prefers to limit discussion to "design-centric" questions.

Unfortunately, limiting ID-based biological research to the supposed markers of design contained in biological systems is doomed from the start: Absent clear positive evidence for design, you can't infer design unless you implicitly make assumptions about what the object was designed for - i.e. what its design goals were. And this automatically implies statements about who the designers were. On a philosophical level ID cannot even get started unless & until they're willing to engage the evidence on those terms.

74 posted on 03/01/2004 3:04:56 PM PST by jennyp (http://crevo.bestmessageboard.com)
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To: microgood
[The existence or non-existence of a supernatural creator is beyond the scope of science.]

What if we found some evidence on earth or a device that seems to have with it an explanation the origins of life, but it looks like evidence of another intelligent life form's ship or capsule, then we could not study it scientifically. We would just haul it off to the nearest church.

What part of the word "supernatural" was unclear?

119 posted on 03/01/2004 4:11:54 PM PST by Ichneumon
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