Posted on 05/25/2005 3:41:22 AM PDT by billorites
Science feeds on mystery. As my colleague Matt Ridley has put it: “Most scientists are bored by what they have already discovered. It is ignorance that drives them on.” Science mines ignorance. Mystery — that which we don’t yet know; that which we don’t yet understand — is the mother lode that scientists seek out. Mystics exult in mystery and want it to stay mysterious. Scientists exult in mystery for a very different reason: it gives them something to do.
Admissions of ignorance and mystification are vital to good science. It is therefore galling, to say the least, when enemies of science turn those constructive admissions around and abuse them for political advantage. Worse, it threatens the enterprise of science itself. This is exactly the effect that creationism or “intelligent design theory” (ID) is having, especially because its propagandists are slick, superficially plausible and, above all, well financed. ID, by the way, is not a new form of creationism. It simply is creationism disguised, for political reasons, under a new name.
It isn’t even safe for a scientist to express temporary doubt as a rhetorical device before going on to dispel it.
“To suppose that the eye with all its inimitable contrivances for adjusting the focus to different distances, for admitting different amounts of light, and for the correction of spherical and chromatic aberration, could have been formed by natural selection, seems, I freely confess, absurd in the highest degree.” You will find this sentence of Charles Darwin quoted again and again by creationists. They never quote what follows. Darwin immediately went on to confound his initial incredulity. Others have built on his foundation, and the eye is today a showpiece of the gradual, cumulative evolution of an almost perfect illusion of design. The relevant chapter of my Climbing Mount Improbable is called “The fortyfold Path to Enlightenment” in honour of the fact that, far from being difficult to evolve, the eye has evolved at least 40 times independently around the animal kingdom.
The distinguished Harvard geneticist Richard Lewontin is widely quoted as saying that organisms “appear to have been carefully and artfully designed”. Again, this was a rhetorical preliminary to explaining how the powerful illusion of design actually comes about by natural selection. The isolated quotation strips out the implied emphasis on “appear to”, leaving exactly what a simple-mindedly pious audience — in Kansas, for instance — wants to hear.
The deceitful misquoting of scientists to suit an anti-scientific agenda ranks among the many unchristian habits of fundamentalist authors. But such Telling Lies for God (the book title of the splendidly pugnacious Australian geologist Ian Plimer) is not the most serious problem. There is a more important point to be made, and it goes right to the philosophical heart of creationism.
The standard methodology of creationists is to find some phenomenon in nature which Darwinism cannot readily explain. Darwin said: “If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down.” Creationists mine ignorance and uncertainty in order to abuse his challenge. “Bet you can’t tell me how the elbow joint of the lesser spotted weasel frog evolved by slow gradual degrees?” If the scientist fails to give an immediate and comprehensive answer, a default conclusion is drawn: “Right, then, the alternative theory; ‘intelligent design’ wins by default.”
Notice the biased logic: if theory A fails in some particular, theory B must be right! Notice, too, how the creationist ploy undermines the scientist’s rejoicing in uncertainty. Today’s scientist in America dare not say: “Hm, interesting point. I wonder how the weasel frog’s ancestors did evolve their elbow joint. I’ll have to go to the university library and take a look.” No, the moment a scientist said something like that the default conclusion would become a headline in a creationist pamphlet: “Weasel frog could only have been designed by God.”
I once introduced a chapter on the so-called Cambrian Explosion with the words: “It is as though the fossils were planted there without any evolutionary history.” Again, this was a rhetorical overture, intended to whet the reader’s appetite for the explanation. Inevitably, my remark was gleefully quoted out of context. Creationists adore “gaps” in the fossil record.
Many evolutionary transitions are elegantly documented by more or less continuous series of changing intermediate fossils. Some are not, and these are the famous “gaps”. Michael Shermer has wittily pointed out that if a new fossil discovery neatly bisects a “gap”, the creationist will declare that there are now two gaps! Note yet again the use of a default. If there are no fossils to document a postulated evolutionary transition, the assumption is that there was no evolutionary transition: God must have intervened.
The creationists’ fondness for “gaps” in the fossil record is a metaphor for their love of gaps in knowledge generally. Gaps, by default, are filled by God. You don’t know how the nerve impulse works? Good! You don’t understand how memories are laid down in the brain? Excellent! Is photosynthesis a bafflingly complex process? Wonderful! Please don’t go to work on the problem, just give up, and appeal to God. Dear scientist, don’t work on your mysteries. Bring us your mysteries for we can use them. Don’t squander precious ignorance by researching it away. Ignorance is God’s gift to Kansas.
Richard Dawkins, FRS, is the Charles Simonyi Professor of the Public Understanding of Science, at Oxford University. His latest book is The Ancestor’s Tale
You guys have been decidedly nasty recently. Actually, Solich was fired over a year ago, and coincidentally, I saw him driving down Capitol Parkway yesterday. Because he was fired during a five year roll-over contract, we pay him a lot of money for the next four years for doing nothing. Nice work, if you can get it.
Good.
We've agreed that a resurrected guy would be unususal. The fact that you think it's a hoax explains why he isn't a deity to you.
But, the fact that many think it's a true story explains why many consider him a deity.
No wonder you have a hang up with ID as science! Be that as it may, is science by definition incapable of studying matters pertaining to "personhood?" What evidence is there that such a thing as "personhood" exists? Must something have a physical form to be worthy of scientific study?
Fester seems to have appointed huimself arbiter of who should be a professional scientist or teacher, although, earlier in the thread, he made a big show of not knowing even the most basic science. Sort of like having a blind man select your wardrobe.
Well, if your objective was to persuade me why many consider Jesus Christ to be a deity, you've succeeded. Congratulations!
Whatever it is that you're thinking, the reason I have a 'hang up' with ID as science is because there's no evidence for its validity.
Be that as it may, is science by definition incapable of studying matters pertaining to "personhood?"
No. Don't be silly.
What evidence is there that such a thing as "personhood" exists?
Find a mirror.
Must something have a physical form to be worthy of scientific study?
No. Don't be silly.
That's a start.
I'm not trying to persuade you. My understanding of God is that He makes people receptive at certain points in their lives. You don't seem to be there right now.
Do you have a definition of deity that I can work with, so that I can sort correctly when I think on the subject?
Elaborate on what?
Feel free to post a quotation or summary of what you want me to elaborate on, particularly after hundreds of posts have gone by.
I did look back, and I honestly don't know what part of my post you are questioning.
Most of the commentaries give the dimensions as being "about 4.5.meters (diameter) and about 13.5 meters circuference".
The passage in IKings never uses the word "circle" but describes a massive bronze casting "round all about" (KJ) "circular in shape" (NIV, and "circular in form" (NSRV). I have yet to see the passage translated as "Huram cast a large bronze sea that was a perfect Euclidean Circle". So, if IKings 7:23 read "and the sea measured 9.7 cubits from rim to rim...and needed a line 30.45 cubits to measure around it", you would be a sold out, on fire, spirit filled Jesus Freak, right?
That may sound sarcastic, but I am trying to illustrate a point.
There is a big difference between "literal" and "innerrant". Whether Huram cast Soloman's Sea with perfect geometric proporations, or the chronicler in IKings rounded his numbers does not reveal anything about God's nature, and how to receive his grace.
The thing that cracks me up on these threads, is that many of the hard "naturalism only" that regularly post on Crevo threads would make the Pharisees of old proud. As would many of those that are diametrically opposed.
Interesting to see a moral quality attached to simple lack of knowledge. How can an entity that DRIVES SCIENCE be a bad thing?
An entity of supernatural or supranatural powers. The very easiest definition possible. You evidently made it more difficult on yourself by instead attempting to persuade me specifically of the existence of a god such as described by Christians (an omnipotent, ubiquitous, absolute trinity). I didn't ask you to do anything quite that difficult. Any deity would've sufficed.
Three high school pals who went to different colleges are making a reunion cross-country trek during summer vacation, and come upon a flock of sheep in a pasture adjacent to the highway one day. The following dialogue takes place among them:
1st student (From Boston University): "Boy, I wish those sheep were coeds from BU; we'd be having a great time!"
2nd student (from Harvard): "Well, I wish those sheep were coeds from Wellsley; we'd be on our backs inside of 10 minutes.
3rd student (from Utah): "I wish it were dark out......"
Ignorance doesn't drive science. People having the desire to remove ignorance drive science.
I don't know why you find it interesting. For example, the Buddha preached that ignorance is the ultimate evil. Though I admit Christianity has sometimes been equivocal about whether ignorance is a bad thing.
How can an entity that DRIVES SCIENCE be a bad thing?
Disease drives medical research. Hunger drives food production.
Fair enough.
Maybe I'll have something to offer as we cross paths in the future.
Been nice talking to you. I've gotta go get some work done and then to a regional track meet this afternoon.
Auf wiedersehen.
Ouch.
"Roar of the Greasepaint; Smell of the Crowd"?
;-)
Do you believe science by definition is incapable of comprehending evidence for intelligent design? If so, why? If not, what kind of evidence would be acceptable?
2. Never eat at a place called Mom's.
3. Never sleep with a woman whose troubles are worse than your own.
4. (from a Kliban cartoon) "Never try to eat anything larger than your head."
sayonara!
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