And the set of rationals is closed when using all of the operations in the equation.
Wrong again. Your fallacy was known as such before Aristotle.
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
I'd hope the only Religious Leader that I cared to put that kind of faith in, is Jesus Christ. The Pope is claiming to be #2. I don't agree. But I don't see some New Catholic Holocaust stemming from this. Benedict/Ratzinger is not that kind of man. Now if Kenneth Ham got elected pope I'd worry a bit more.
What is wrong with this picture?
A is used before consonants, an before a vowel sound. A comes before words that begin with a u, but are pronounced as though they began with a y: a union; a useful gadget. An comes before a silent h: an heir; an honour. Some people still use an before h in words from French, where the h was silent: an hotel. This is rather old-fashioned. There is no reason to use an before an h which is sounded.So I guess it's "a hypothesis." But to my ear, it sounds a bit like "a apple." I'm just old-fashioned.
Source: a or an.
I'm trying to be as candid about Roman Catholicism's claims as I can. I'm not claiming faith in it. I'm an evangelical.
The Pope can be a nag towards evangelicals on what orthodoxy is, but he can't change their beliefs about it without their consent. Any more than, say, "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" could change the Pope's beliefs without his consent.
Setting up the perpetual motion machine, my friend?
Yes, I appreciate that. Thanks.
"One Lord, one Faith, one Baptism" is not mere wishful thinking. When history runs its course the past, present, and future disparation between occupants of heavenly glory will be staggering, each one having a history of exchanging the truth for a lie and thus losing pure science, each one being reclaimed by the Creator who assumed human flesh for the purpose of bringing the crowning glory of His creation back to Himself.
Unity in the church is not a creation of the Pope, nor is it effected by the political machinations of this or that body of doctrine. From a human standpoint you may be right, however. There are many respects in which Southern Baptists and Roman Catholics agree. A good many from both denominations attend public schools, which schools are obligated to remain neutral where matters of faith and science intermingle.
Some telemarketers leave 000-000-0000 on my caller ID. I think they are trying to avoid the do-not-call lists.
Perhaps the frequency of use of the word lends itself to the de-hypostasis (grin) of the h in hypothesis. A physical or biological scientist speaking of his theory is going to be using that word a lot. So H's tend to get dropped as a waste of breath. An-'ypothesis, an-'ypothesis.
Intelligent Design: A hypothesis wherein given features of life v non-life that are otherwise inexplicable are explained by an intelligent cause, rather than by an undirected process such as natural selection.*
What say you Alamo-Girl? Shall we accept this as our definition?
* Please note that I've changed "not by an undirected process" to "rather than by an undirected process" because it's more precise. If there's any objection to this, then now's the time!
When Christ comes back, whoever's a Christian or ever lived as a Christian will come with him. Guaran-d***-tee ya that nobody in that number will say "I'm a Roman Catholic" "I'm a Baptist" "I'm a Methodist" anymore.
The unity comes from being in Christ, who is the head of the body. Being in Christ is the thing, and is no temple made with human hands, therefore it can never be a man-made structure, not even Solomon's temple.
Unity was never meant to be one massive organization. That is the lesson of the tower of Babel.
Party's over.
It never went away, it just suffered a name change. Our current Pope was the head of the Inquisition, before he got his present job.
There's a tension between the fallen aspirations of fallen man, which can't see beyond the borders of this world, and the born again aspirations of the regenerated man, which see into heaven.
Yes. If a church that I attended had such an office, I would be wondering why.
Or rather, the party should begin... shall I order Powerball Winner balloons because if I buy tickets forever I will win it?
And the set of rationals is closed when using all of the operations in the equation.
Wrong again. Your fallacy was known as such before Aristotle.
You're a Catholic?
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.