Religion Tooday (AP's title)

(AP) ^ | March 14, 2002, 12:01 PM EST | By RICHARD N. OSTLING

[dheretic]

And what no creationist has been willing to accept is that if a religious origin-of-life belief is taught as a theory in classrooms then every religious group could sue to have its belief system taught as a theory on the origin-of-life. Thus it is a bad idea for creationists to pursue this. Every belief ranging from "God made the Earth in 7 days to the Pink spotted purple dog sitting in his dog house in dimension x barked and thus it was so" would have to be taught in classrooms. Think about it....

[Junior]

Bump.

[Youngblood]

Every belief ranging from "God made the Earth in 7 days to the Pink spotted purple dog sitting in his dog house in dimension x barked and thus it was so" would have to be taught in classrooms.

It seems that that battle is going to be left until another day.

Still, where are they going to draw the line? Are they going to take the "Darwin's Black Box" line i.e. cells and complex biochemical structures and processes look designed, but allow that some evolution did occur? Will such proposals satisfy the fundamentalists? Or will astrophysics (12-13 billion year old universe)and geology (4.6 billion year old earth and plate tectonics) be next on the hitlist? Will they address the unimagineably long period of time it took this omnipotent, omniscient designer to finetune the universe and the earth for man's entry? Is this designer still actively manipulating the biosphere? Where is the line between designer intervention and natural processes going to be placed?

[Exnihilo]

Miller also raises a theological objection. If God purposely designed 30 horse species that later disappeared, he asserts, then God's primary attribute is incompetence. "He can't make it right the first time. I don't think the Almighty works that way."

Ken Miller is a very intelligent moron. His ignorant comment here is almost embarrassing. I mean, what is "right"? Obviously what is "right" depends on context, Ie. environment, climate, etc., etc. Something "right" a million years ago might not be "right" today and natural selection is a very real phenomenon.

[another cricket]

How about we have school choice and parents can decide what they want taught?

Who knows that might even include spelling!

A. Cricket

[Exnihilo]

Did you even read this article? It stated at least twice, possibly three times, that ID proponents are not Creationists. So your statement is null, void, and meaningless.

[Exnihilo]

Let's be honest now. I assume you're fine with an archaeology course teaching students to infer design based on artifacts they unearth, correct? Why then do you object to the idea that biologists can infer design as well? Why is it okay for SETI to search for design in radio waves from space, but not for biologists to search for it in living things? I will tell you why I think you and others are so against it. Because while ID does not name the designer, the designer could be God, and that makes you uncomfortable. Your assertion that religion would be introduced is of course, totally erroneous. Nothing of the kind would be introduced because ID does not name the designer. Now, you need to explain a few things. The discrepancies I listed above, and to provide objective evidence that ID would introduce religion.

[f.Christian]

"Alvin Plantinga, a noted Protestant philosopher at the University of Notre Dame, turns the tables. Plantinga says evolution is presented with built-in godless assumptions so it's unfair for public schools "to teach one set of religious beliefs as opposed to another."

"By way of conclusion: a natural way to understand such notions as rationality and irrationality is in terms of the proper functioning of the relevant cognitive equipment. Seen from this perspective, the question whether it is rational to believe in God without the evidential support of other propositions is really a metaphysical or theological dispute. The theist has an easy time explaining the notion of our cognitive equipment's functioning properly: our cognitive equipment functions properly when it functions in the way God designed it to function. The atheist evidential objector, however, owes us an account of this notion. What does he mean when he complains that the theist without evidence displays a cognitive defect of some sort? How does he... understand---the notion of cognitive malfunction?"

[Redshift]

Here's why scientists cannot infer intelligent design:

1. Intelligent design is actually not a scientific theory. It's merely a complex of re-hashed (and refuted) arguments against naturalistic evolution. It doesn't itself provide any positive theory about the origins or complexity of life. How is this so?

2. It cannot answer, even in principle, any of the 'design questions'. Namely:
a. How was the design accomplished? No mechanism, no causal explanation whatsoever is provided for how this intelligent designer (or designers--why assume there was just one?) did his/her/its/their work. Naturalistic science provides an answer to this question. I.D. "theory" does not.

b. When did it happen? NO evidence is forthcoming and no theoretical reason is provided for making any claims about this. Did it happen just once? A billion times? Was it one act and then several minor modifications? What evidence (remember, we're dealing with science here, not faith) could one point to in order to conceivably answer any of these questions?

c. Who did it? We know that the I.D.'ers likely assume that capital G "God" is the intelligent designer. But again, where is the evidence for this? Assuming I.D. is true for the sake of argument, since we don't have any direct evidence for the nature of this designer, then it seems reasonable to suppose that any of the following are equally logical candidates: super-advanced aliens, machine intelligence, a million different permutations of "God", a group of gods, etc.

d. What actually happened? Did this designer merely structure matter in such a way at the Big Bang such that we'd see "apparent design" later? Did this designer begin a single molecular process, or were there multiple interventions? Any event in any chemical process could be the site of a designer's intervention. What method do the I.D'ers have to sort this out? Even conceded naturalistic processes could be the result of this designer's actions but were meant to appear to be natural. How can you tell if this were the case?

3. It's a logical fallacy to assume I.D.
a. God of the gaps: Just becuase natural science can't explain 'X' now does not mean it won't be able to in the future. Positing I.D. in its place risks making I.D. a laughing stock if it, as have supernatural explanations so many times in the past, turns out to be not needed when natural science once again explains something that seemed like it couldn't yesterday.

b. Non sequitur: Even if we assume evolution as we currently know it is false, it does not logically follow that I.D. must then be true. There could be other explanations other than I.D. And even if all other alternatives were ruled out I.D. would still need positive confirming evidence to demonstrate its truth--which it currently doesn't have and even conceivably can't get. Merely finding fault with a theory does not automatically make another alternative the default winner.

4. I.D. is incoherent in some of its forms. If we assume theism is true, which is what Philip Johnson, Behe, and others do, then it's difficult to see why we should take I.D. seriously at all for the following reasons. On one definition of theism, God is described as being an immaterial being. How does an immaterial being interact with matter and energy? Any theories for this, I.D.'ers? What sense can be made of the notion of a disembodied mind anyway? The fact that these elementary points of definitional clarity are ignored in I.D. literature speaks volumes about the lack of seriousness of the "theory".

Thoughtful replies welcome.

[Brookhaven]

And what no creationist has been willing to accept

What no creationist can accept is that evolution is taught as a scientific FACT instead of a scientific THEORY. Evolution is a long way from being proven, but it's taught in school as if it were a settled fact.

It would be fair if students were told that scientist don't really know for sure where life came from, but one scientific theory that has a lot of support amoung scientists is the theory of evolution.

That would be a fair (and accurate) statement, but you never hear it. Instead the theory of evolution is taught as though it was as proven as the law of gravity.

[PatrickHenry]

Instead the theory of evolution is taught as though it was as proven as the law of gravity.

Yes. Evolution certainly does happen, and that's an observed fact. The theory, first proposed by Darwin, described a natural mechanism which is a cause of the observed fact of evolution. Ditto for gravity. Things fall; that's a fact. Newton's theory (since superseded by Einstein's) is a more elaborate description of the observed facts.

[cracker]

Evolution is a long way from being proven, but it's taught in school as if it were a settled fact.

Science is not mathematics - it does not PROVE theories. Theories can always be disproven. A long history of successful prediction and explanatory power, coupled with continual validation secures a theory's place in science, but even the most well-established theory could be disproved tomorrow if observations are not reconcilable with it.

Instead the theory of evolution is taught as though it was as proven as the law of gravity.

That's because it is. It is as well supported as the "Theory of Gravity." And gravity is as precarious as evolution.

[f.Christian]

Main Entry: evo·lu·tion
Pronunciation: "e-v&-'lü-sh&n, "E-v&-
Function: noun
Etymology: Latin evolution-, evolutio unrolling, from evolvere
Date: 1622
1 : one of a set of prescribed movements
2 a : a process of change in a certain direction : UNFOLDING b : the action or an instance of forming and giving something off : EMISSION c
(1) : a process of continuous change from a lower, simpler, or worse to a higher, more complex, or better state : GROWTH
(2) : a process of gradual and relatively peaceful social, political, and economic advance d : something evolved
3 : the process of working out or developing
4 a : the historical development of a biological group (as a race or species) : PHYLOGENY b : a theory that the various types of animals and plants have their origin in other preexisting types and that the distinguishable differences are due to modifications in successive generations
5 : the extraction of a mathematical root
6 : a process in which the whole universe is a progression of interrelated phenomena

Main Entry: sci·ence
Pronunciation: 'sI-&n(t)s
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English, from Middle French, from Latin scientia, from scient-, sciens having knowledge, from present participle of scire to know; probably akin to Sanskrit chyati he cuts off, Latin scindere to split -- more at SHED
Date: 14th century
1 : the state of knowing : knowledge as distinguished from ignorance or misunderstanding
2 a : a department of systematized knowledge as an object of study b : something (as a sport or technique) that may be studied or learned like systematized knowledge
3 a : knowledge or a system of knowledge covering general truths or the operation of general laws especially as obtained and tested through scientific method b : such knowledge or such a system of knowledge concerned with the physical world and its phenomena : NATURAL SCIENCE
4 : a system or method reconciling practical ends with scientific laws

Science---"to cut--peal"...means to expose fraud(evolution) and reveal Truth--objectivity!

Evolution is a superstition---19th century hoax religion---debunked!

[AndrewC]

That's because it is. It is as well supported as the "Theory of Gravity." And gravity is as precarious as evolution.

Drop a rock. Create a new species.

[medved]

Though opponents like Scott contend that ID is too inherently religious for science classes, Alvin Plantinga, a noted Protestant philosopher at the University of Notre Dame, turns the tables. Plantinga says evolution is presented with built-in godless assumptions so it's unfair for public schools "to teach one set of religious beliefs as opposed to another."

The problem is, that if you wish to teach a religion alongside evolution on an equal footing with evolution, you need to ensure that the religion you choose is the RIGHT one, i.e. you need a religion which operates on an intellectual basis comparable to that of evolution, and the only two candidates are voodoo, and Rastifari.

Rastifari in fact would actually lend itself to certain kinds of team-teaching situations; a bio teacher looking for a way to put a group of 30 teenagers into the proper frame of mine to be indoctrinated into something as stupid as evolution, could walk across the hall tothe Rasta class for a box of spliffs.

[gore3000]

Atheism is a religious belief, it is being taught, it is unconstitutional too. Evolution is atheism. There is absolutely no reason to teach it. It has no place in any of the sciences and it is totally unnecessary for the understanding of any scientific principles.

[gore3000]

Just becuase natural science can't explain 'X' now does not mean it won't be able to in the future.

For heaven's sake, how long do you evolutionists need to prove your theory? You have had 150 years since you first said evolution was proven and you still can not prove it. You are still saying that sometime, somewhere, you will find the proof.

[medved]

The book is too new for scholarly critiques, but Wesley Elsberry of Texas A&M University says Dembski's previous work has failed to rule out Darwin's natural selection as the cause behind what might appear to be design.

Hate to say it, but Weley's an idiot. Natural selection is a destructive and not a contstructive process which weeds out anything an iota to the left or right of center for a species. Claiming that natural selection somehow 'designs' new species is like claiming to be in the business of constructing new buildings with a wrecking ball. Natural selection is the basic driving force of the stasis we observe in the fossil record.

[Youngblood]

Evolution is atheism.

Really? I live in a mainly Catholic country. Recent poles revealed that 95% of the people believe there’s a God. At the same time evolution is widely taught and accepted, some Protestant biblical literalists aside. Pope John Paul II, very influential in this country, accepted evolution was more than just a theory. If evolution is atheism, why isn’t the Pope instructing his priests to denounce it from the altar every Sunday?