Darwin under fire (again): Intelligent design vs. evolution

First Amendment Center ^ | 12/5/04 | Charles C. Haynes

[Michael_Michaelangelo]

Is Darwin winning the battle, but losing the war?

As soon as one challenge to the teaching of evolution is beaten in the courts, another emerges to take its place.

The current contender is “intelligent design,” a theory that according to advocates at the Discovery Institute “makes no religious claims, but says that the best natural evidence for life’s origins points to design rather than a process of random mutation and natural selection.”

[crail]

How much change are we allowed before it becomes fundamental? How is change stopped before this point?

Here's what I would argue if I believed in ID. God created the species close to how they are now x many years ago, as described in Genesis. Since that point they have evolved and changed and new species may have arose. As an evolutionist, I think it would be hard to argue against that because it's irrefutable. (Irrefutable doesn't mean there is evidence to support it over evolution however.)

Otherwise, you have to address how divided subpopulations of a species evolve more or less in parallel, at least parallel enough then when the division between them is removed, they can still interbreed.

[ironmike4242]

Ok, but how many new characteristics before we call it a new animal?

Excellent question. Taxonomists fight over this question every day? What makes it a new species? What would put it in a new genus?

The fact is it's easy to classify things that already exist. Horses are different than fish are different than mold. And convienently there are very few organisms that push the boundries between designations. And the ones that do are fairly rare and hence given little concern. Is the duckbilled platypus just a freak, or did it go off on an evolutionary tangent, or is it surviving because it was fitter than an ancestor? We don't know yet.

Which incidentally is something that not many people involved in this debate are willing to say.... we just don't know yet.

[Michael_Michaelangelo]

Why couldn't a creator intelligently design an evolutionary process?

Many people believe the creator 'created' evolution. You may be interested in Nosivad's comments here:

A Prescribed Evolutionary Hypothesis

[RadioAstronomer]

The second question - can people with an ideological agenda take control of the scientific curriculum out of the hands of scientists? - is harder. The answer is that probably in the short term they can. The results will be a weakening of already tottering science education in the US, and a brewing fight when scientists like myself decline to accept the credentials of students educated according to unscientific curricula. However, in my opinion, ID is destined to lose, because while it can be forced into schools; while it might even be forced into a couple of the more religiously oriented universities (like Baylor) it can't be forced into the hearts and minds of the scientific community. And those institutions which embrace creationism will simply be excluded from the body of the scientific community.

Bravo! Extremely well said.

[Protagoras]

How much change are we allowed before it becomes fundamental?

Humans have changed incrementally and greatly, even if you start the measurement from a relatively recent time, but not fundamentally. The DNA is the same.

Thanks for all your input on the rest of your ruminations on the question, but I have made a narrow comment and have no interest in debating the issue. It has been beat to death and no minds have yet been changed on here as far as I know.

I think it is possible for God to have used evolution for his own purposes because I think he can do anything he pleases. That is my personal opinion.

Having said that, no true proof exists on either side of the question, so it's to be answered in heaven. I can wait.

[RadioAstronomer]

Lying for the Lord is Doing God's Work!

I was actually told this directly during a crevo debate that this is a valid method to futher "his" aims during a crevo argument.

[crail]

...and have no interest in debating the issue. It has been beat to death and no minds have yet been changed...

But changing minds isn't the fun part! Debating it is. :)

Having said that, no true proof exists on either side of the question

Agreed. Later.

[Protagoras]

Ok, but how many new characteristics before we call it a new animal?

How can you tell one animal from another? DNA? Could that be the answer?

[Fester Chugabrew]

Scientists control the scientific literature, and we decide whether to accept the credentials of those who wish to be included in our community.

Hail to the self-annointed!

[RightWingNilla]

Teaching "Intelligent Design" side by side with real science to young kids will promote atheism *far* more than anything else you can imagine.

Evolutionary theory has 150+ years of real, tangible, scientific evidence from many different fields to back it up. It makes intuitive sense and makes biological science fully comprehensible to an elementary biology student.

ID on the other hand teaches what exactly? What point do you wish to get across to the students? Life was designed? By whom? How? For what purpose? Can a biology teacher really answer these questions in the context of a high school science class? These questions will be asked. And if you really want to do some damage to your cause, bring up Noah's Ark, the Flood and a 6000 year old earth in science class as well.

If you ask impressionable children to choose based on scientific criteria, I absolutely promise you and other religiously motivated people are *not* going to like the result.

[RadioAstronomer]

Hail to the self-annointed!

How about Hail to the folks that took the extreme effort to become scientists.

[Right Wing Professor]

Hail to the self-annointed!

We have our club, you have yours. Churches are the ultimate self-anointed entities. We may not let you in but at least we don't predict your eternal damnation if you're out. :-)

[RightWingNilla]

I was actually told this directly during a crevo debate that this is a valid method to futher "his" aims during a crevo argument.

Who's aims? Hank's? ;-)

[Sofa King]

Let me sum it up for you: that's not enough evolution.

What you need to do is show an example where 10,000,000 years of evolution are replicated in a lab over the course of a few months.

That's not enough either, though. Really, what you need to do is re-create the entire evolutionary history of the planet, all 4-5 billion years of it over the course of a week or so. Creationists then might consider that some slight evidence of evolution.

[PatrickHenry]

How about Hail to the folks that took the extreme effort to become scientists.

Hey! Just because you've actually studied something doesn't mean you're qualified to judge claims about your field made by people who haven't studied it.
</creationism mode>

[Mulch]

The theory that some scientists are making that the fundamental elements of life came from mars is valid, I don't have a problem with that - in terms of scientific rational, but to claim it is absolutely true, as I saw a few NASA scientists doing at their press conferences, in this early stage of analysis is certainly not scientific. It's just wishful thinking.

[PatrickHenry]

Really, what you need to do is re-create the entire evolutionary history of the planet, all 4-5 billion years of it over the course of a week or so. Creationists then might consider that some slight evidence of evolution.

No. We've had threads about speciation which is observed in the lab. The immediate response of creationists is that because the labwork was done by humans, it "proves" Intelligent Design.

[pnome]

How can you tell the difference between me, and a silver-back gorilla?

Our DNA is very very close, but we look very very different. Or do we? I wonder how different we look to say, a dog? We smell different for sure. But then, I'm sure you smell different than me.

The gorilla and I both have hair, him more than me. (though I've seen some hairy guys in my time. We both have one head, two arms, two legs, and some dangelies between our legs.

However, what is really a slight difference in brain to body mass ratio seems, in this case, to make ALL the difference.

A slight difference in characteristics, and I'm a silver-back (a small one anyway).

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the ping!

[Sofa King]

Yes, that's the other one they use.