Witness: 'Intelligent Design' doesn't qualify as science [Day 4 of trial in Dover, PA]

Sioux City Journal ^ | 29 September 2005 | Staff

[PatrickHenry]

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) -- The concept of "intelligent design" is a form of creationism and is not based on scientific method, a professor testified Wednesday in a trial over whether the idea should be taught in public schools.

Robert T. Pennock, a professor of science and philosophy at Michigan State University, testified on behalf of families who sued the Dover Area School District. He said supporters of intelligent design don't offer evidence to support their idea.

"As scientists go about their business, they follow a method," Pennock said. "Intelligent design wants to reject that and so it doesn't really fall within the purview of science."

Pennock said intelligent design does not belong in a science class, but added that it could possibly be addressed in other types of courses.

In October 2004, the Dover school board voted 6-3 to require teachers to read a brief statement about intelligent design to students before classes on evolution. The statement says Charles Darwin's theory of natural selection is "not a fact" and has inexplicable "gaps," and refers students to an intelligent-design textbook for more information.

Proponents of intelligent design argue that life on Earth was the product of an unidentified intelligent force, and that natural selection cannot fully explain the origin of life or the emergence of highly complex life forms.

Eight families are trying to have intelligent design removed from the curriculum, arguing that it violates the constitutional separation of church and state. They say it promotes the Bible's view of creation.

Meanwhile, a lawyer for two newspaper reporters said Wednesday the presiding judge has agreed to limit questioning of the reporters, averting a legal showdown over having them testify in the case.

Both reporters wrote stories that said board members mentioned creationism as they discussed the intelligent design issue. Board members have denied that.

U.S. District Judge John E. Jones III agreed that the reporters would only have to verify the content of their stories -- and not answer questions about unpublished material, possible bias or the use of any confidential sources.

"They're testifying only as to what they wrote," said Niles Benn, attorney for The York Dispatch and the York Daily Record/Sunday News, the papers that employed the two freelancers.

The reporters were subpoenaed but declined to give depositions Tuesday, citing their First Amendment rights. A lawyer for the school board had said he planned to seek contempt citations against the two.

The judge's order clears the way for the reporters to provide depositions and testify Oct. 6.

[KMJames]

(and might, perhaps, in the fullness of time, be directly observable as fact in other non-terran environments)

Though, I don't share your optimism - I sure appreciate your mind expanding terminology. What might these other "non-terran" environments be?...space?...gaseous planets or some such?

[King Prout]

"non-terran" simply means "not (of) Earth"

"non-terrestrial" means "not LIKE Earth"

I seriously doubt that we'd be able to recognize life which developed on a non-terrestrial world, even assuming we ever manage the trick of expanding out of this puny little system.

[KMJames]

Let's have that St Augustine quote again.

Was this taken from Augustine's review of Origin of Species?

Also, how can you accuse "Christianity" of resisting lightning rods - that's like saying that "Evolution" promoted Piltdown man.

[King Prout]

1. he got the definition of "irreducible complexity(sic)" correct. the proper term is "irreducible simplicity" but I suppose that didn't sound grandiose and arcane enough for IDiots, so they goosed it for mass appeal.

2. so it takes 11 steps for one form of blood clotting. there are other forms of blood clotting, are there not? there are less efficient but similar forms of blood clotting, are there not? do any of the chemicals in the clotting cascade have any other biological function (implying they might have been adapted from one function to another)? etc...

3. evolution does not require completely unguided processes.
inherent properties of matter and energy provide some factors which favor some outcomes over others - that is a form of organizing principle or "guidance".
there are other basic, unavoidable, highly organized factors - orbital mechanics for example - which render the Earth-life system other than "completely random".
Climate factors generally change gradually, rather than suddenly. Such cliomate factors as temperature and average rainfall, atmospheric composition, etc... provide relatively stable selective pressures on populations of organisms, and thus effectively "guide" selection towards advantageous mutations surviving and reproducing more successfully than climatologically disadvantageous mutations. etc...
More developed life forms also "guide" selection through various forms of breeding preference paradigms. These seem to tend to accentuate speciation.

None of these factors requires the organism to "know" diddly-squat about "good" and "bad" or "useful" and "unuseful" adaptations.
None of these factors requires an intelligent designer, either.

[KMJames]

I've got no problem with private schools teaching ID.

It's good to know that you're not a raving tyrannical evolutionist.

Well, if we can get rid of the public schools we can clear up this mess, yes? Seriously, anatomy and physiology are worthwhile, practical areas of scientific study that could be pursued without regard to evolution - do you agree?

[KMJames]

You got it KMJames,

Thanks, RunningWolf, I was beginning to question my ability to synthesize everything I'm learning on these threads.

[Antonello]

My parents live on the edge of the Petrified Forest in AZ. When I was a kid, I used to curse them damned chunks of petrified wood every time I had to plow the garden.

I sure wish Nathan had been around then, it would have made my chores much easier if I had only known there was no fossil record.

[RunningWolf]

Oh I understand completely your message, your doubt, and why.

I picked up on this aspect right away.

A good analogy is the Star Trek NG show wherein Picard is captured by the Romulans, and his interrogator abandons the interrogation and becomes his tormentor, insisting that Picard sees 3 lights when there are only 2 lights.

Well.., you have maybe 20 or so posters here insisting that there are 3 lights. Picard won.. There are 2 lights.

Wolf

[Antonello]

I give you the USDA

Heh, and the ATF is a convenience store in Texas ;)
(Sorry, I just couldn't resist.)

[Antonello]

It's good to know that you're not a raving tyrannical evolutionist.

Thank you; I tend to try not to rave too much. I'm getting older, and it's hard on my back.

Well, if we can get rid of the public schools we can clear up this mess, yes?

I am a strong supporter of a private school system.

Seriously, anatomy and physiology are worthwhile, practical areas of scientific study that could be pursued without regard to evolution - do you agree?

For most practical purposes I agree. There are a few areas of study that do directly need knowledge and data acquired through the ToE, and several that benefit from at least a grasp of the evolutionary process (what you would probably consider 'micro-evolution'), but someone ignorant of evolutionary instruction would probably still do okay in most fields that require no more than a layman's understanding of genetic biology. Whatever tools and knowledge their jobs used that would be developed through continued work involving evolution could be provided and used without them actually having to formulate them personally, or even understand how they work.

Not everyone has to be a genetic biologist. The world needs ditch diggers, too.

[PatrickHenry]

Well, it's particularly easy to correct for The Flood.

Foolish man of flesh! How can you correct your diabolical equipment for the flaws built in because of the Fall? There are things you were not meant to know.

[fortheDeclaration]

where neither repeatability, nor observation, nor measurement—the three immutable elements of the scientific method—may be employed false statement.

How so?

Those three aren't the basis of the scientific method?

Or should we add a fourth, the evolutionist's method of making up imaginary scenerio's, the Sci-Fi, method.

[exDemMom]

For lawn sprinkler systems, black=hot, white=ground=common; usually.

Hmm. I thought green was ground? At least, when I'm changing out a light switch, the bare copper wire (isn't that the ground?) gets attached to the green screw. Oh, well. As long as everything is color coded, I'm fine.

[exDemMom]

If a Creator created alll things then that includes science, no matter what wee little people claim.

If God created the world and all life upon it exactly the way it is today, then He put a lot of effort into making all the evidence point to evolution. If God went to such trouble to make it look like we evolved, but we didn't, then God is a liar. I, for one, do not believe that God put together such an elaborate lie. The reason for all the evidence of evolution is because we evolved.

It IS a sign of weak faith when you have to disbelieve the mountain of multidisciplinary evidence supporting evolution (may I suggest you try searching "evolution" on the PubMed database and see how many hits you return) in order to maintain your belief in God. Personally, being a scientist who sees the evidence of evolution every day, I do not find my faith in God in the least bit challenged. That's because my faith is strong.

[exDemMom]

Just remember that if you get it wrong, it'll kill you and your entire family. Cheers!

As long as they're color-coded, I think me and my family are safe! ;)

[Just mythoughts]

"If God created the world and all life upon it exactly the way it is today, then He put a lot of effort into making all the evidence point to evolution. If God went to such trouble to make it look like we evolved, but we didn't, then God is a liar. I, for one, do not believe that God put together such an elaborate lie. The reason for all the evidence of evolution is because we evolved."

Consider, you know very well that this earth is NOT a young earth, and the Bible declares that the earth is ancient, called in one place the "age that was", a time long before man in the flesh walked upon it.

Now nowhere in the whole of the Written Word when His children were following His instruction did He allow another way, contrary to what He instructed become the thought or theory of the day. So what most creationists claim took place in Genesis is against what is actually Written.

Make sense that the Heavenly Father would allow another way become the prevailing "educational" method, and even have His deceived children pay with their very own tax dollars and have their own children required to be taught another way??? The Heavenly Father divorced Israel for her whoring after other gods, and as it is written there is NOTHING NEW UNDER THE SUN.

"It IS a sign of weak faith when you have to disbelieve the mountain of multidisciplinary evidence supporting evolution (may I suggest you try searching "evolution" on the PubMed database and see how many hits you return) in order to maintain your belief in God. Personally, being a scientist who sees the evidence of evolution every day, I do not find my faith in God in the least bit challenged. That's because my faith is strong."


I do NOT disbelieve the evidence, what I do not believe is the TOE as the man created explanation, calling it science, and claim it is separate from the Creator. There is NO, not one fragment of evidence that shows common descent, the evidence shows commonality of the materials and methods used of flesh bodies NO more NO less.

The flesh age is for a specific purpose and a specific time regardless of what man attempts to claim otherwise. The flesh dies, and we are told at the death of flesh that "soul" placed at conception returns to the Maker that sent it. Obsessing over the flesh, the natural is the parameters of man's creation that makes them blind to the purpose of the flesh body.

[donh]

Evolution cannot explain irreducible complexity, defined as systems which cannot suffer the removal or disablement of a single component without loss of function.

You have this backward in that ID posits that that irreducibly complex organisms cannot be the product of gradual development over a long period of time.

In regard what particular element of concern is VadeRetro's statement "backward" to yours?

All of the parts must be present from the beginning, not that it will stop working if parts are taken away. It is the origin of the parts and the controlling instructions that are in question.

VadeRetro's statement of the thesis of "irreducible complexity" comes a good deal closer the Behe's formulations, and the explanations in his book than yours does.

We're fairly used to creationists preening and crowing and unilaterally declaring victory with a bust hand, so this is nothing new.

[VadeRetro]

You have this backward in that ID posits that that irreducibly complex organisms cannot be the product of gradual development over a long period of time.

Hence "evolution cannot explain" its existence? Did I fail to anticipate your exact favored wording? Who cares what your exact favored wording is?

ID is not about change, it is about origin.

Actually, no. It refuses to address that directly. "It might have been the Raelians, but that would be stupid. It might have been Brahma, but that's bull. We know what it was, but WE'RE NOT SAYING because that would be ... something ... mumble mumble ... It's not that kind of theory."

It's not about origin. It's about what evolution cannot explain because evolution posits no Designer.

That said ...

Evolution says that all of that came about over a long period of time, by random chance, unguided and without purpose. It would also lead us to believe that somehow all of this randomness can account for a highly sophisticated, complex system coming into existence - natural selection assessing each mutation, keeping "useful" changes, rejecting each "un-useful" change.

I hope the above isn't your answer to the counter-challenge, to state the theory of evolution and give a quick summary of the lines of evidence for same. Because if it is, you have failed to distinguish yourself from your YEC/ID brethren in any way.

[VadeRetro]

Hmm - anyone seen VR?

Do the proofs of YECism include when someone signs off and someone else refuses to see?

[donh]

It is obvious to me that the majority of the people on this thread who oppose ID have not bothered to read any of the literature that is currently available. They buy into what the MSM says, and let that suffice. They would not do that on any other topic than this...amazing.

"The Literature" wow, makes it sound like an impressively vast field of scientific study, doesn't it? Like something that couldn't be digested in about a week of bedtime reading. Of what does the literature consist, that actually even gives the appearance of being scientific? Basically, Behe and Dembski (who is a mathematician, by the way), who have been taken apart inch by inch and thrashed by far more serious and competent scientists and mathematicians more times than you can shake a stick at.

Filling your books with nice looking engineering drawings, or vast piles of indigestible formulas, does not necessaily mean you have automatically earned your spurs in science.

If you want to see what serious mainstream science has to say about the literature you are touting, a good start would be "Finding Darwin's God", by Miller, an actual mainstream scientist with a serious reputation, and a strong commitment to christian teachings, or you could find several summaries of the counter-arguments in PH's list of links. Broken down, Behe and Dempski's arguments amount to saying "Because my giant brain can't imagine how something could have happened, it must be a miracle". Now, this is an opinion, and anyone is entitled to have an opinion, and even to dress up their opinions in fancy sunday-go-to-meeting clothes, but they aren't entitled to claim that throwing up their hands in dispair and giving up, even if you do it with fancy diagrams and formulas, is a scientific achievement.