Posted on 07/23/2002 6:41:57 PM PDT by Karl_Lembke
What exactly do you mean by that? Intelligent Design simply means that one can determine with a reasonable degree of confidence whether a system was designed.
What exactly do you mean by that? Intelligent Design simply means that one can determine with a reasonable degree of confidence whether a system was designed.
What I mean is, by what method is design detected?
How does this method rule out, say, a snowflake, as a designed object, while retaining those things the Intelligent Design/Intelligent Origin Theorists want to declare "designed"?
What possible observations would prove Intelligent Design/Intelligent Origin Theory to be false? (I can offer any number of such observations for evolution.)
What does Intelligent Design/Intelligent Origin Theory explain that is not explained by naturalistic science?
To a Creationist, there is not a distinction, both life and the snowflake have the same designer... If you want to point specifically to the snowflakes distinction from ID origin theory, the distinction is that a snowflake, relative to the SIMPLEST life form, is incredibly simple, and easily explained by scientifically proven processes which produce the relativly complex structure (snowflake) from a less complex structure (water vapor) in a process we call crystalization. The Intelligent Design thought is that there are no such processes which are capable of producing the complex organisms we can observe from simple "premordial soup", and therefore that there is prima facia evidence of intelligent influence/design.
The clincher for me a chemist and chemical engineer by schooling was the complexity of chemical systems. Systems such as the blood coagulation cascade are incredibly complex and it seems very implausible that such things could just happen to fall into place.
As a matter of full disclosure, I'm a conservative Christian but have absolutely no religious problems with evolution. If someone comes up with the proof to end all proofs for Darwinian-style evolution tomorrow I won't lose a bit of sleep. I also have plenty of scientific problems with young-earth creationisism and consider the notion only slightly more credible than the Tooth Fairy.
Every Intelligence should have a name....how about Farley?
In which case the concept loses all meaning. Everything is designed.
If you want to point specifically to the snowflakes distinction from ID origin theory, the distinction is that a snowflake, relative to the SIMPLEST life form, is incredibly simple,
Both of them are trivially simple compared to a plasma, or the Mandelbrot set, but nobody would claim that these are designed. Mere complexity can't be the litmus test.
The Intelligent Design thought is that there are no such processes which are capable of producing the complex organisms we can observe from simple "premordial soup", and therefore that there is prima facia evidence of intelligent influence/design.
All that means is that we haven't found such a mechanism. It is evidence only of our ignorance. (While Man's ignorance is not evidence for God, it is commonly Man's primary reason for belief in God, as even the most devout person must admit.)
Every Intelligence should have a name....how about Farley?
I prefer Multivac.
:-)
To a Creationist, there is not a distinction, both life and the snowflake have the same designer...
In that event, design ceases to be a scientific theory, since no possible observation could ever falsify it. Evolution, on the other hand, could be proven false by any number of conceivable observations.
If you want to point specifically to the snowflakes distinction from ID origin theory, the distinction is that a snowflake, relative to the SIMPLEST life form, is incredibly simple, and easily explained by scientifically proven processes which produce the relativly complex structure (snowflake) from a less complex structure (water vapor) in a process we call crystalization. The Intelligent Design thought is that there are no such processes which are capable of producing the complex organisms we can observe from simple "premordial soup", and therefore that there is prima facia evidence of intelligent influence/design.
Having waded through some Intelligent Design/Intelligent Origin Theory writings, I've come to the conclusion that the only definition these theorists have for "complexity" is "statistical improbability". I have never seen any other definition proposed.
In order for the Intelligent Design/Intelligent Origin Theory to be a valid scientific theory, it really ought to define its terms. We can start with "design". How do you define "design", so that a Martian, examining some object, can tell whether or not it is, in fact, "designed"?
My apologies to the original poster, but the Creationist is not synonymous with the ID theorist. Snowflakes are complex, but not specified; a product of the physical properties of water under certain conditions. There is no discernable property of matter that leads to "specified complexity" such as Dembski is attempting to isolate.
Mere complexity can't be the litmus test.
It's not. I commend you to Dembski's own work for a fuller explaination.
All that means is that we haven't found such a mechanism. It is evidence only of our ignorance.
And if, in fact, such a mechanism did not exist, and the actual cause were an intelligent agent, what line of scientific inquiry would uncover it as such. Darwinists are content to say "we don't know how, but it couldn't have been ...." That's an ideological qualification by definition: not science. As Dembski himself has pointed out " ,... falsifying Darwinism seems effectively impossible. To do so one must show that no conceivable Darwinian pathway could have led to a given biological structure."
(While Man's ignorance is not evidence for God, it is commonly Man's primary reason for belief in God, as even the most devout person must admit.)I admit no such thing. This is gratuitous assertion. If Darwinists could demonstrate a property of matter that shows a tendency to organization into discrete, opportunistic, self-replicating mechanisms the debate would be over, and "creation" would be relegated to the same realm as astrology. Instead, the critics of Darwinism are treated to reductionist or conjectural attacks that could just as easily be applied to Darwinism itself.
The presupposition that Darwinism can explain everything observed, when it manifestly has not, is perfectly acceptable: provided it does not stifle other avenues of inquiry. But stifle it does. So much so that Niebuhr's observation that "Frantic orthodoxy is never rooted in faith but in doubt" acts as blood in the water to those that are suspicious of Darwinism...both justifiably and unjustifiably.
Then I assure you, you haven't "waded" far enough. Might I recommend Dembski's "Why Natural Selection Can’t Design Anything" for your review. It can be found easily as a .pdf on the web.
I'm rather at a loss about what you've read as the whole of Dembski's work hinges on the understanding of contingent complexity (such as in the geometry of a common rock) and "specified complexity" (as in the complexity of a wristwatch). It seems to me that he prefaces just about everything but his grocery list with a primer on the distinction between the two, and more importantly, the methodology for distinquishing between one and the other.
Forgive me for saying so, but you seem to be continually asking how to tell the difference between design and complexity as a rhetorical device, and not actually entertaining the notion that Dembski could have an answer.
Until Dembski (or anybody else) can come up with an algorithm by which any given example of complexity can be judged "specific" or "nonspecific", the term "specific complexity" is a null concept.
I admit no such thing. This is gratuitous assertion.
It is not gratuitous and you must admit it, because only a minority of the religious people in the world are [insert your religion here]. Assuming, for example, that Christianity is the "correct religion", then most religious people in the world (indeed, in human history) have chosen their God or gods incorrectly because they didn't know any better, and they wanted something to fill their conceptual void. It has nothing to do with Darwinism.
The presupposition that Darwinism can explain everything observed, when it manifestly has not, is perfectly acceptable: provided it does not stifle other avenues of inquiry. But stifle it does.
The same charge can be levelled at the theory of electromagnetism. Not every E&M problem has been solved, of course, but we trust in advance that it will ultimately work where we expect it to apply, so we don't seriously pursue alternatives. The only reason there isn't any public outcry about it is because it doesn't happen to contradict anybody's spiritual dogma. If it did, you'd see exactly the same foodfight that you see over Darwinism.
My problem with evolutionary theory has always been reducible to the difficulty presented in moving from elemental amino acids or rudimentary elements and the energy required to move to higher and more complex organizational processes and organisms. This is not merely adaptations but large-scale complex organisms with extremely higher-order processes and functions. This for me is not explainable in purely evolutionary terms. It is true that the intellectual transition to "intelligent design" is one which requires other than a purely materialistic world-view. One of the premises for ID must be metaphysical. But I say, so what?
It's interesting you used the Mandelbrot set as an analogy. But maybe I misunderstood your point. Even the Mandelbrot set has a "design." and an "organization". The organization is the mathematics which undergirds it. That is, the basis is an algorithm with defined boundaries (certain variables not escaping to infinity). Is not this the point of IDers?
No it doesn't lose all meaning. If physicists were to arrive at a unified field theory would this tend to disprove ID or tend to confirm it? Admittedly, the move to ID is premised on some non-materialist premises. But evolutionary theory itself is based on materialist assumptions about nature which have been far from borne out by the datum of experience. Maybe the best which can be asserted from the standpoint of reason is that showing intrinsic order and complexity tends to point towards non-materialist explanations regarding origins.
But what isn't undergirded by mathematics?
That is, the basis is an algorithm with defined boundaries (certain variables not escaping to infinity). Is not this the point of IDers?
No, IDers think that some things in the universe are designed and some are not. By "design" they mean conscious, intentional conception and construction by an intelligent entity. I don't think they'd call the Mandelbrot set "designed".
In fact, you're getting pretty close to my Deistic conception of God the Geometer, but such a God could not be said to have designed anything in the universe except in the broadest sense, as opposed to the narrow ID/creationist notion of specific, intentional construction.
That's the fundamental assertion of ID. Personally, I don't see the slightest basis for it.
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.