Politics of evolution

[Haezed]

Haezed,

 

You're right, sorry. I read carefully the post I quoted but I haven't read all your previous posts. Now I agree when you say it can't currently be tested.

 

No worries.

 

However... "Intelligent Design" was coined by Thaxton (of the Discovery Institute) and means that the complexity of life can't be explained without referring to a designer, and I prefer to keep that definition, it avoids confusion.

 

Half of the battle in advocacy is over what you call a thing. I would not lightly concede the more defensible terrain of "intelligent design" to those who believe in divine daily intervention in life.

[ParanoiA]

You just need to understand the distinction between a direct intervention (interfering in the process) and an indirect intervention (having created the universe so evolution would be possible).

 

Woah, that's what I've been going on and on about Phil. Exactly that. I've got the distinction down just fine, what I don't have is what to CALL that distinction. All of my posts are replied to with various forms of label contentions, which validates the point that wormwood has been making about the ambiguity of the term.

 

 

Intelligent Design (or ID) is a highly controversial claim holding that certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent designer, rather than an undirected process such as natural selection.

 

Is this the definition you're talking about? I did google "define: Intelligent Design", but all I got was one McGraw source and two Wiki sources.

 

Per this definition, ID attempts to bunk natural selection with supernatural explanations that aren't the least bit testable, let alone provable. By definition, ID guts the dynamics and implications of natural selection. That's a huge chunk of evolution, proven with the scientific method, cast aside for faith alone.

 

Seriously? It is faulted because anyone can just write whatever they want in wiki regardless of if it's true or not. I could go enter myself as the supreme ruler of the universe right now, but would that make it true?

 

Actually that's its strength. That's why it has potential to be the most unbiased resource, because anybody can edit. It's not there yet, I know. The idea is that most people want accuracy and truth and will ultimately prevail over those who wish to enter they are the supreme ruler of the universe.

 

Well it's also Wiki vs the New Yorker. I am going to go with the one that at least has professional writers and editors.

 

Oh I see your logic now. Better to go with those who profit at it, rather than those driven solely by non-profit interest. Because we all know how the media is so accurate, fair and balanced right?

 

Sorry, but the only thing worse than corporate media is politicians. I'll trust the freedom driven wikipedia over private business of information any day. People who stand to profit, stand to lose. Although, I doubt the definition of ID is on their list of propaganda, I'll give you that.

 

How can you reconcile this glaring inconsistency from the same source?

 

Well, splitting hairs maybe, but after reading it...

 

Most ID advocates state that their focus is on detecting evidence of design in nature, without regard to who or what the designer might be. ...

 

Its primary proponents, all of whom are associated with the Discovery Institute,[6][7][8][9][10][11][12] believe the designer to be the Abrahamic God.[

 

"Its primary proponents" is different from "Most ID advocates". Primary proponents are leaders. "Most ID advocates" is a percentage of the total pool of ID advocates. See, Wiki actually notes the difference. The New Yorker leaves this out. So much for professionals...

 

There are so many factual errors in the first paragraph that there isn't much point in reading on.

 

So, you apparently didn't check the sources for those comments on ID on Wiki. I did. They reference articles from the New York Times, the ACLU's website, the Discovery Institute itself, AAAS, and etc.

 

I'm not saying this is gospel and Wiki is completely accurate without bias at all, in fact all of those sources except for the discovery institute are biased sources. I include news media as biased sources since their living depends on news and how we react to it. However, each of those sources did repeatedly point out that Discovery is leading the charge, including Discovery. And of all the figures most focused on, they all seem to be affiliated with Discovery.

 

ID proponents don't say or imply that it is the God of Abraham that they are talking about; in fact they refuse to speculate about the nature of God within this theory.

 

The Tammy Kitzmiller, et al. v. Dover Area School District, et al., ruling is where this comes from. Quite disputable, but not trumped up rhetoric.

 

Everybody has different ideas on what ID means and everyone claims to have found their source. I'm not sure how this thread can progress at this point and still maintain any sense of integrity. We're all just going to argue semantics and never really get anywhere.

 

There's nothing to gain until definitions are cleared up. If ID is truly as simplified and all encompassing as "god created the universe" - then we need a new term to partition and reference "god created the universe, and continues to meddle with it and natural selection is bunk".

 

And can I ask a stupid question? If ID makes no specifics and doesn't attempt to alter the scientific understanding of evolution and natural selection...then what is there to teach? How do you teach ID, when it's nothing more than a sentence to throw in the intro chapter to evolution?

 

If the interpretation of ID is merely the believe that these system were created by a designer, then the mere mention of the possibility in the news has taught us all - class dismissed! Next thread...

[waitforufo]

Woah, that's what I've been going on and on about Phil. Exactly that. I've got the distinction down just fine, what I don't have is what to CALL that distinction. All of my posts are replied to with various forms of label contentions, which validates the point that wormwood has been making about the ambiguity of the term.

 

Its called Deism.

[ParanoiA]

Its called Deism.

 

Perfect. How about the belief that god still interferes?

[Dak]

deistic/theistic evolution.

 

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/wic.html

 

ID is officially saying that the complexity of life can only be explained by direct creation by god (which is obviously BS from a scientific pov, as evolution has been firmly proven to be capable of creating complex life), but it basically boils down to 'no, god did it, so there '

 

theistic evolution is kinda like 'yeah, ok, evolution etc. but god was tinkering with the process'.

[Haezed]

M. Rees, no scientific slouch, seems to say we have three choices to explain the incredible fine tuning of the universe which allows life, even matter, to form: (i) incredible coincidence, (ii) intelligent design/divine intervention or (iii) varied infinite universes in which a few like our own get very lucky and life can form.

 

 

Actually, I think there are two initial choices.

 

1. All universes in existence, which might be just ours, have these same rules which seemed fine tuned for life.

 

2. There are multiple, perhaps infinite universes, each with differing rules and ours simply had the right combination of rules to produce life.

 

Rees opts for #2. If #1 is true, the options are a. raw chance, b. intelligent design. A, by definition, is highly improbable.

 

Although Martin Rees' book is on my short list of books I have to read this year, I've not gotten to it yet. However, the article suggests that he at least feels comfortable with an opinion leaning towards #2. I'm wondering if this is more intuition in play than anything else but can't say, obviously, unless I read the book.

 

My uneducated intuition would be the reverse - it seems more likely that there was fine tuning by intelligence of the initial design than that there are an infinite number of universes with different physical rules in play. For one thing, I can't understand, and from some reviews, Rees does not explain, why rules would differ from one universe to another. This seems squarely outside of the realm of current science, but at least science appears to have narrowed the decision to these two alternatives and given us decisions points at which to aim our intuition (which will mostly likely be completely wrong).

 

All of this is to repeat the point that I hate how the phrase "intelligent design" has become so tarnished by creationists because I think our species may finally be nearing a point where the issues can be intelligently discussed with something other than blind faith.

[ParanoiA]

deistic/theistic evolution.

 

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/wic.html

 

ID is officially saying that the complexity of life can only be explained by direct creation by god (which is obviously BS from a scientific pov, as evolution has been firmly proven to be capable of creating complex life), but it basically boils down to 'no, god did it, so there '

 

theistic evolution is kinda like 'yeah, ok, evolution etc. but god was tinkering with the process'.

 

That is an interesting link. That clears a few things up for me too. Although ID creationism remains as muddied as before. Especially if all the various creationists are united under that title...which is weird since they already have a title according to this Mark Isaac - "creationist".

[Haezed]

deistic/theistic evolution.

 

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/wic.html

 

ID is officially saying that the complexity of life can only be explained by direct creation by god (which is obviously BS from a scientific pov, as evolution has been firmly proven to be capable of creating complex life), but it basically boils down to 'no, god did it, so there '

 

theistic evolution is kinda like 'yeah, ok, evolution etc. but god was tinkering with the process'.

 

See, I don't think ID says anything officially or otherwise. I think some leading creationists have deceptively packaged their beliefs into a phrase which connotates nothing about creationism. It is a mistake for us all to buy into that phrase because ultimately, to most people, words mean nothing more and nothing less than what they actually say.

 

This is amply evidenced by the poll cited in this thread. When people are asked whether they believe in Intelligent Design, they don't know the history of how the phrase developed.

[Haezed]

That is an interesting link. That clears a few things up for me too. Although ID creationism remains as muddied as before. Especially if all the various creationists are united under that title...which is weird since they already have a title according to this Mark Isaac - "creationist".

 

It's bait and switch. Don't buy into it!!

[Dak]

That is an interesting link. That clears a few things up for me too. Although ID creationism remains as muddied as before. Especially if all the various creationists are united under that title...which is weird since they already have a title according to this Mark Isaac - "creationist".

 

which has become synonomous with 'someone who disreguards science and evidence due to their faith'.

 

nothing wrong with that per se, but the ID movement -- of the 'discovery institute' fame -- want to put forth a facade of intelectual viability. e.g., they want to pretend that there's some scientific basis for believing in deistic creation, and disbelieving evolution.

 

Ultimately, they're starting to experience the same embarrasment as the flat-earthers are, as it becomes clearer that we evolved, and they wish to avoid this by pretending that their beliefs are scientific.

 

this, btw, is why quite a few scientists' hackles are raised by ID, but not by creationism. creationism is just dibelief in evolutionary science; ID is misrepresentation of evolutionary science.

 

See, I don't think ID says anything officially or otherwise.

 

'oficialy' was probably a bad choice of wording.

 

all i meant is that the leading IDers (eg, the discovery institue) are packaging creationism in a lab coat and pretending it's scientifically valid, as opposed to just admitting that it's a matter of faith.

 

This is amply evidenced by the poll cited in this thread. When people are asked whether they believe in Intelligent Design, they don't know the history of how the phrase developed.

 

yes, to a lot of people ID == creationism == 'god did it'. it's only when you look at the movements, and what the main players officially claim, that the distinction becomes clear. but at the poll level, i've no doubt that if you asked people 'do you think science is crap, and we were made in 6 days according to genesis, and to hell with all the evidence' less people would say 'yes' than if you asked them 'do you believe in ID'.

[ParanoiA]

See, I don't think ID says anything officially or otherwise. I think some leading creationists have deceptively packaged their beliefs into a phrase which connotates nothing about creationism. It is a mistake for us all to buy into that phrase because ultimately, to most people, words mean nothing more and nothing less than what they actually say.

 

This is amply evidenced by the poll cited in this thread. When people are asked whether they believe in Intelligent Design, they don't know the history of how the phrase developed.

 

I think you are exactly right, on both counts. You have been consistent on this, and I have to agree with you here.

 

nothing wrong with that per se, but the ID movement -- of the 'discovery institute' fame -- want to put forth a facade of intelectual viability. e.g., they want to pretend that there's some scientific basis for believing in deistic creation, and disbelieving evolution.

 

But I thought deistic creation wouldn't really be at odds with evolution, since it doesn't change the science. I mean, no one knows what started everything, so deistic creation is as good as any other guess right? I guess I'm not sure why it would conclude a disbelief in evolution.

[Dak]

bloody terminology

 

by 'deistic creation', i meant the belief that god made everything (e.g., 6-day creation as described in genesis). which is definately mutually exclusive with evolution.

[ParanoiA]

Deism

1. belief in the existence of a God on the evidence of reason and nature only, with rejection of supernatural revelation (distinguished from theism).

2. belief in a God who created the world but has since remained indifferent to it.

 

How does that exclude evolution?

 

Evolution could have been invented by a designer. Science doesn't have anything to say about the origins of the natural selection processes we observe does it?

[Dak]

i'm not sure. probably phisics has something to say on the matter. but you're right in as much as theres no scientific reason to assume that a god didn't create the universe so that evolution would happen (okkram's razor notwithstanding).

 

but like i said, i meant 'deistic creation' as in a god created everything, including life, in 6 days as described in genesis ('divine creation' would have been better; i thought 'deistic' just meant 'involving a deity')

 

ID (e.g., the discovery institute) is trying to make out that there's scientific merit to the idea that the earth was created in 6 days by a god, which is in direct opposition to the actual science that states that we evolved slowly over time.

[Wormwood]

Intelligent Design (or ID) is a highly controversial claim holding that certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent designer' date=' rather than an undirected process such as natural selection.

 

Is this the definition you're talking about? I did google "define: Intelligent Design", but all I got was one McGraw source and two Wiki sources.

 

Per this definition, ID attempts to bunk natural selection with supernatural explanations that aren't the least bit testable, let alone provable. By definition, ID guts the dynamics and implications of natural selection. That's a huge chunk of evolution, proven with the scientific method, cast aside for faith alone.[/quote']

 

Not just faith alone, but circumstantial evidence as well. How could natural selection turn non-living matter into living matter? There is no explaination, so a special scenario has to be created to fit what we think. How could natural selection cause a loss of differentiation between endosymbiotic cells and a complete sharing of DNA and structural components? How could a colony of single celled organisms utilize natural selection to become a single eukaryote? How does natural selection fit into the anthropic principle? There are answers to these questions but they are weak and most are just assumptions that must be true to fit the random model. To me this suggests that the random model may need a closer examination.

Along the same line of reasoning that you use above, you will never be able to test or prove the big bang either. We believe because of circumstantial evidence collected after the fact.

 

 

Originally Posted by Wormwood

Seriously? It is faulted because anyone can just write whatever they want in wiki regardless of if it's true or not. I could go enter myself as the supreme ruler of the universe right now, but would that make it true?

 

Actually that's its strength. That's why it has potential to be the most unbiased resource, because anybody can edit. It's not there yet, I know. The idea is that most people want accuracy and truth and will ultimately prevail over those who wish to enter they are the supreme ruler of the universe.

 

Obviously you haven't been using the internet very long jk

 

Originally Posted by Wormwood

Well it's also Wiki vs the New Yorker. I am going to go with the one that at least has professional writers and editors.

 

Oh I see your logic now. Better to go with those who profit at it, rather than those driven solely by non-profit interest. Because we all know how the media is so accurate, fair and balanced right?

 

Moreso than the average guy on the street? You bet. One group has professionals that edit, fact check etc, and the other group is anyone with an internet connection. Your willingness to believe the latter seems to reflect your desire to use that definition. If you want to use the wiki definition, go for it. I just never accept wiki as a primary source for myself. If I can't verify the info somewhere else that at least tries to appear unbiased, I have to assume that it is false.

 

Sorry, but the only thing worse than corporate media is politicians. I'll trust the freedom driven wikipedia over private business of information any day. People who stand to profit, stand to lose. Although, I doubt the definition of ID is on their list of propaganda, I'll give you that.

 

Conspiracy fan eh? If anything, the "liberal media" would take the most critical view of ID since it is akin to social lepracy from our "enlightened" social view.

 

 

Originally Posted by Wormwood

How can you reconcile this glaring inconsistency from the same source?

 

Well, splitting hairs maybe, but after reading it...

 

 

Most ID advocates state that their focus is on detecting evidence of design in nature, without regard to who or what the designer might be. ...

 

Its primary proponents, all of whom are associated with the Discovery Institute,[6][7][8][9][10][11][12] believe the designer to be the Abrahamic God.[

 

"Its primary proponents" is different from "Most ID advocates". Primary proponents are leaders. "Most ID advocates" is a percentage of the total pool of ID advocates.

HAHA nice. I like the technical wins.

 

 

Originally Posted by Wormwood

There are so many factual errors in the first paragraph that there isn't much point in reading on.

 

So, you apparently didn't check the sources for those comments on ID on Wiki. I did. They reference articles from the New York Times, the ACLU's website, the Discovery Institute itself, AAAS, and etc.

 

I'm not saying this is gospel and Wiki is completely accurate without bias at all, in fact all of those sources except for the discovery institute are biased sources. I include news media as biased sources since their living depends on news and how we react to it. However, each of those sources did repeatedly point out that Discovery is leading the charge, including Discovery. And of all the figures most focused on, they all seem to be affiliated with Discovery.

 

We both know that the wiki article was written with an obvious bias. If you still want to use it, that's fine but I think it is going to slow the conversation even more. Since everyone agrees that the discovery institue is the main proponent of ID, why not just use what the discovery institute says ID is?

 

 

Originally Posted by Wormwood

ID proponents don't say or imply that it is the God of Abraham that they are talking about; in fact they refuse to speculate about the nature of God within this theory.

 

The Tammy Kitzmiller, et al. v. Dover Area School District, et al., ruling is where this comes from. Quite disputable, but not trumped up rhetoric.

What is this case supposed to mean? All I saw was this:

A month later, the School District issued

a press release announcing that teachers at Dover High School would be

required to read an intelligent design statement in ninth grade biology class

 

http://www.law.georgetown.edu/news/releases/documents/trowel_note_FINAL-1.pdf

 

Wow a whole statement in 9th grade? That might take up 5-10 minutes...I can see why people are so upset.

 

 

Everybody has different ideas on what ID means and everyone claims to have found their source. I'm not sure how this thread can progress at this point and still maintain any sense of integrity. We're all just going to argue semantics and never really get anywhere.

 

There's nothing to gain until definitions are cleared up. If ID is truly as simplified and all encompassing as "god created the universe" - then we need a new term to partition and reference "god created the universe, and continues to meddle with it and natural selection is bunk".

 

I think there is a middle ground here that you missed, which is that God designed the universe, and did so in a way that was pre-destined to produce human beings. So there is no active participation, but there is no randomness involved in the natural selection either.

 

 

And can I ask a stupid question? If ID makes no specifics and doesn't attempt to alter the scientific understanding of evolution and natural selection...then what is there to teach? How do you teach ID, when it's nothing more than a sentence to throw in the intro chapter to evolution?

That's just it, at this point it is little more than a few sentences. All that is being taught is that the universe might not be random. That human life may indeed have a puropose other than just being the product of dumb luck. This is why people hear so many different versions of this idea; because it basically just opens the door for any other religious beliefs to be attached, but they are not implied. If scientists concede that maybe everything isn't random, then there is a place for these people's religion to co-exist with science (in a very general sense).

 

If the interpretation of ID is merely the believe that these system were created by a designer, then the mere mention of the possibility in the news has taught us all - class dismissed! Next thread...

 

Well, I think the issue is that you may want to teach your kid about your religion, then he goes to school and his teacher tells him that your religion is impossible, and ignorant, and disputed by an incomplete scientific theory. Some people get upset about this undermining by what they consider to be an overly liberal, and atheistic institution.

[PhDP]

Wow a whole statement in 9th grade? That might take up 5-10 minutes...I can see why people are so upset.

 

Does it matter if the statement is based on pseudoscience and faulty logic ?

[waitforufo]

Some might find the following read interesting.

 

http://www.update.uu.se/~fbendz/library/cd_relig.htm

 

It is titled “Religious Belief, By Charles Darwin”

 

In it you will find:

 

“Although I did not think much about the existence of a personal God until a considerably later period of my life, I will here give the vague conclusions to which I have been driven. The old argument of design in nature, as given by Paley, which formerly seemed to me so conclusive, fails, now that the law of natural selection has been discovered. We can no longer argue that, for instance, the beautiful hinge of a bivalve shell must have been made by an intelligent being, like the hinge of a door by man. There seems to be no more design in the variability of organic beings and in the action of natural selection, than in the course the wind blows. Everything in nature is the result of fixed laws. But I have discussed this subject at the end of my book on the Variation of Domestic Animals and Plants, and the argument there given has never, as far as I can see, been answered. “

 

William Paley was the big ID man of Darwin’s time. As a student Darwin admired Paley and agreed with his philosophy. Later of course Darwin changed his mind.

 

One can also find:

 

“Another source of conviction in the existence of God connected with the reason and not the feelings, impresses me as having much more weight. This follows from the extreme difficulty or rather impossibility of conceiving this immense and wonderful universe, including man with his capability of looking far backwards and far into futurity, as the result of blind chance or necessity. When thus reflecting I feel compelled to look at a first cause having an intelligent mind in some degree analogous to that of man; and I deserve to be called a theist.

 

This conclusion was strong in my mind about the time, as far I can remember, when I wrote the Origin of species; and it is since that time that it has very gradually with many fluctuations become weaker. But then arises the doubt -- can the mind of man, which has, as I fully believe, been developed from a mind as low as the possessed by the lowest animal, be trusted when it draws such a grand conclusions? May not these be the result of the connection between cause and effect which strikes us as a necessary one, but probably depends merely on inherited experience? Nor must we overlook the probability of the constant inculcation in a belief in God on the minds of children producing so strong and perhaps an inherited effect on their brains not yet fully developed, that it would be as difficult for them to throw off their belief in God, as for a monkey to throw off its instinctive fear and hatred of a snake.

 

I cannot pretend to throw the least light on such abstruse problems. The mystery of the beginning of all things is insoluble to us; and I for one must be content to remain an Agnostic.”

 

My guess is that Darwin would tell scientists to spend their time discovering how species came to be and leave the why to theology.

[Wormwood]

Does it matter if the statement is based on pseudoscience and faulty logic ?

Obviously not since I learned about the primordial ooze in high school. Where do you draw the line? Who decides?

[PhDP]

Science is made by publishing articles in recognized peer-reviewed journals (id est: Nature, Evolution, Journal of Theoretical Biology...)

 

Creationism/ID is not science. They don't publish articles in peer-reviewed journals, they don't predict anything. Therefore, Creationism/ID should not be taught in science classes.

 

It's why Creationism/ID is a political movement, not a competing scientific hypothesis.

[ParanoiA]

We believe because of circumstantial evidence collected after the fact.

 

Good point. Noted.

 

 

Moreso than the average guy on the street? You bet. One group has professionals that edit, fact check etc, and the other group is anyone with an internet connection. Your willingness to believe the latter seems to reflect your desire to use that definition. If you want to use the wiki definition, go for it. I just never accept wiki as a primary source for myself. If I can't verify the info somewhere else that at least tries to appear unbiased, I have to assume that it is false.

 

Since when has the "professionals" that "fact check" included the links to their citations? The sentences you took issue with had direct links to their source - multiple sources for one fact, no less. I've never seen that in any media source until Wiki. Though I admit, I have never consciously looked for media source that does.

 

Never forget, the professionals make money at getting you to read their stuff. How do you do that delivering the humble truth? You don't. You have to sensationalize, exaggerate and many times flat out misrepresent the facts to accomplish that. How many times have you seen a headline that immediately grabbed your attention, only to then read the story and find out it wasn't what it was made out to be? That's your professionals at work. Truth doesn't pay the bills, your business does.

 

Obviously you haven't been using the internet very long jk

 

I know you said you were just kidding, but I do have a lot of faith in humanity's intentions. And note I used the word "intentions".

 

Conspiracy fan eh?

 

Not at all. Limited personal experience and analysis of motive. I recognize news media as the business it is - just like Wal-mart, AT&T and Best Buy. Do you trust Best Buy to give you the honest answer about which hard drive is the best, even if it isn't a brand they carry?

 

There's a reason we all grow up with a healthy distrust of business. I'm just not sure why we seem to give the news media business immunity.

 

HAHA nice. I like the technical wins.

 

I'm not looking for a "technical win". 'Primary proponents' and 'Most advocates' are two different things. Words mean things, and those were carefully placed, with citations following each. That wasn't an accident or careless editing. However, I agree in that I don't think the Wiki article is unbiased.

 

We both know that the wiki article was written with an obvious bias. If you still want to use it, that's fine but I think it is going to slow the conversation even more.

 

I'm using it with a grain of salt, like all biased sources. I like Dak's link better, personally. But that could also be because it was easy for me to absorb. For a deeper understanding, none of these sources are really adequate anyway.

 

Since everyone agrees that the discovery institue is the main proponent of ID, why not just use what the discovery institute says ID is?

 

Because the idea is older than the institute hijacking it. Many have made the case that they are misrepresenting ID and flooding the label with creationism in disquise. If that's true, then Discovery should be our last resource for this definition.

 

Wow a whole statement in 9th grade? That might take up 5-10 minutes...I can see why people are so upset.

 

Irrelevant. I only referenced that because that's the source for the Wiki article you had such an issue with. I didn't say I agreed with it or otherwise. In a 139 page decision, Judge John E Jones III concluded that ID did actually promote that the designer was the christian god.

 

Again..I'm not saying I agree with any of this. Only that the Wiki article did have sources that check out. When's the last time the New Yorker provided their sources?

 

I think there is a middle ground here that you missed, which is that God designed the universe, and did so in a way that was pre-destined to produce human beings. So there is no active participation, but there is no randomness involved in the natural selection either.

 

Well, that was my intent with the former. That god created evolution, but has no need to interfere. I just presumed this would assume all life, not just humans, in all of its complexity is not random, but merely appears that way. I have no problem with that at all, because it doesn't really change the nuts and bolts of natural selection, rather just provides a gee whiz kind of prequel. Am I wrong here?

 

That's just it, at this point it is little more than a few sentences. All that is being taught is that the universe might not be random. That human life may indeed have a puropose other than just being the product of dumb luck. This is why people hear so many different versions of this idea; because it basically just opens the door for any other religious beliefs to be attached, but they are not implied. If scientists concede that maybe everything isn't random, then there is a place for these people's religion to co-exist with science (in a very general sense).

 

I completely agree, but that wasn't what I was getting at. I meant, if there's little more than a few sentences and an essential disclaimer, then I have a hard time believing this is what everyone is fighting over. There must have been more to the ID agenda than that to receive this kind of backlash from the scientific community. I need to read more about the details of the Kansas issue I guess.

 

Well, I think the issue is that you may want to teach your kid about your religion, then he goes to school and his teacher tells him that your religion is impossible, and ignorant, and disputed by an incomplete scientific theory. Some people get upset about this undermining by what they consider to be an overly liberal, and atheistic institution.

 

I guess that makes sense, except I thought science didn't really have anything to say about god. I thought the idea was that god couldn't be proven or disproven any more than unicorns, so what's to talk about? But I've also noticed a pattern of atheism in scientists, and I'm sure that bleeds over in the classroom.

 

I know I've tried to keep from doing that with my kids, to let them form their own opinion, yet I repeatedly catch myself making atheist comments in front of them.

[Wormwood]

Since when has the "professionals" that "fact check" included the links to their citations? The sentences you took issue with had direct links to their source - multiple sources for one fact, no less. I've never seen that in any media source until Wiki. Though I admit, I have never consciously looked for media source that does.

 

If I quote Mein Kampf as a source, can I use it to prove how evil the Jews are? All I mean is that the quality of what is being cited also has to be called into question.

 

Never forget, the professionals make money at getting you to read their stuff. How do you do that delivering the humble truth? You don't. You have to sensationalize, exaggerate and many times flat out misrepresent the facts to accomplish that. How many times have you seen a headline that immediately grabbed your attention, only to then read the story and find out it wasn't what it was made out to be? That's your professionals at work. Truth doesn't pay the bills, your business does.

 

Fair enough, but it seems that it would be a lot more sensationalistic to paint the ID proponents as the complete idiots people think they are.

 

 

 

I'm not looking for a "technical win". 'Primary proponents' and 'Most advocates' are two different things. Words mean things, and those were carefully placed, with citations following each. That wasn't an accident or careless editing. However, I agree in that I don't think the Wiki article is unbiased.

 

I'm not sure how "carefully placed" they were considering that they were probably written by two different people, but even so, we have agreed that this source is biased, so there is no need to argue the specifics. You are probably right on this specific instance and let's just leave it at that.

 

 

I'm using it with a grain of salt, like all biased sources. I like Dak's link better, personally. But that could also be because it was easy for me to absorb. For a deeper understanding, none of these sources are really adequate anyway.

 

This is true.

 

 

Because the idea is older than the institute hijacking it. Many have made the case that they are misrepresenting ID and flooding the label with creationism in disquise. If that's true, then Discovery should be our last resource for this definition.

 

Well I tried to use the general definition and people started commenting on how it was an idea of the discovery institute (even though the idea appeared in ancient Rome), so I suggested using the discovery institute's (worst case scenario) to appease everyone else. In any incarnation I can find, I don't see anything about the specific issues that the anti-intelligent design people are so mad about. It has basically boiled down to a lack of published papers, which is a type of fallacy. That's like saying gravity didn't exist before there were equations made about it.

 

Also those people might find this interesting:

http://www.discovery.org/scripts/viewDB/index.php?command=view&id=2177

 

http://my.opera.com/Bantay/blog/two-recent-peer-reviewed-papers-that-sup

 

http://www.evolutionnews.org/2006/07/john_derbyshires_new_bumper_st_1.html

 

Apperantly, some people get all of their information from the highly biased "Talk Origins" atheist website.

 

 

Irrelevant. I only referenced that because that's the source for the Wiki article you had such an issue with. I didn't say I agreed with it or otherwise. In a 139 page decision, Judge John E Jones III concluded that ID did actually promote that the designer was the christian god.

 

Again..I'm not saying I agree with any of this. Only that the Wiki article did have sources that check out. When's the last time the New Yorker provided their sources?

Ok, thanks. My sarcasm was because I couldn't find the specific point of your reference.

 

 

 

Well, that was my intent with the former. That god created evolution, but has no need to interfere. I just presumed this would assume all life, not just humans, in all of its complexity is not random, but merely appears that way. I have no problem with that at all, because it doesn't really change the nuts and bolts of natural selection, rather just provides a gee whiz kind of prequel. Am I wrong here?

 

Not at all. This is pretty much what I have been saying. That natural selection was guided or random could just be the way things appear, but certainly worth investigation and thought.

 

I completely agree, but that wasn't what I was getting at. I meant, if there's little more than a few sentences and an essential disclaimer, then I have a hard time believing this is what everyone is fighting over. There must have been more to the ID agenda than that to receive this kind of backlash from the scientific community. I need to read more about the details of the Kansas issue I guess.

 

Yes, because you said the key word "agenda". The theory itself is definitely worth mention and investigation in my opinion, but the ideas that are attached to it, or the ideas it was meant to mask are what cause the problems. Certainly it was indignant theist that wanted this theory endorsed for obvious self serving reasons, but I also think that many atheistic scientists oppose it for the same type of self serving reasons rather than what merit it may or may not contain. The fact that ID makes it possible for a church to teach creationism and still be consistent with current scientific theory (to some degree) is what pisses people off IMO. In other words, I don't think it is the theory itself as much as it's what the theory opens the door for in a pseudoscientific way. Science says, the universe was designed...see Johnny, Jesus wants you to hide Easter eggs.

 

 

 

I guess that makes sense, except I thought science didn't really have anything to say about god. I thought the idea was that god couldn't be proven or disproven any more than unicorns, so what's to talk about? But I've also noticed a pattern of atheism in scientists, and I'm sure that bleeds over in the classroom.

 

I know I've tried to keep from doing that with my kids, to let them form their own opinion, yet I repeatedly catch myself making atheist comments in front of them.

It's not just you. A lot of people do that, and today's schools, especially at the college level, are full of atheist instructors who put their own opinions into their work. This is fine, except we are teaching an assumption and a personal life choice as a fact. Don't get me wrong, I don't think "God did it" is a very good excuse for anything, and I certainly don't see that as a reason to stop searching for the mechanisms involved. And you are correct that the whole topic really has no place in science class, so perhaps a better method would be to refine what we teach about the randomness in nature? This would prevent the issue of atheist or the theist getting to express their religious view through teaching.

[PhDP]

While you were arguing over definition of ID (which somehow proves my point that a broad definition leads to confusion), nobody answered my initial question; when will the political movement to introduce ID and creation "science" in science classes will stop?

 

And you are correct that the whole topic really has no place in science class, so perhaps a better method would be to refine what we teach about the randomness in nature?

 

oh great, so now we'll have to stop using a certain number of models (or stop teaching them), because they are based on the idea of random mutations and mutational pressure? We should do the exact opposite. There's too much emphasis on natural selection, about the same amount of time should be devoted to the effect of mutations and random drift, then people could understand what we mean by "random". But there's really no way the scientific community will change the way it teaches something just because it offends some religious people, science is not a democracy.

[Haezed]

While you were arguing over definition of ID (which somehow proves my point that a broad definition leads to confusion), nobody answered my initial question; when will the political movement to introduce ID and creation "science" in science classes will stop?

 

Which just goes to show that it is always a good idea to define the terms you use so others don't do it for you.

[john5746]

When (and “how”) will this nonsense end ?

 

Since it is politically motivated from the religious right, it will ebb and flow with their political fortunes. If the science education level of the public improves then it may influence the religious beliefs and stop the nonsense.