If that were not true, then we return to getting something from nothing.

Our system is closed, but rational inference tells us another must be open.

The design principle cannot reside inside nature. If we think about it for a moment, we will understand why. In fact, all of empirical reality and all the objects of scientific enquiry are undergoing constant change. And yet, the laws that govern them are unchanging. That means that the origin of those laws must transcend nature because, if they did not, they too would be changing with everything else. Since they don’t we can safely assume a transcendent reality that governs them.

“That really is the faith of my fathers.”

Forgive me if I’ve slighted your faith—it was not intentional. Even though we end up agreeing to disagree, you made for some lively commentary here (some 70 posts in quick order). I agree with you that God’s word is the final word—logic alone, natural law alone—none of it alone will save us from the the baby killing, marriage destroying, terrorist appeasing onslaught of modern paganism.

“Do you accept that there are other ways to posit design?”

Yes. One can establish the credibility of the Bible by its internal coherence, its lack of false assertions (it doesn’t say, for example, that the planet sits on the back of a turtle), its corroboration by archaeology, and its prophetic accuracy. We can begin, as did Isaac Newton, with the scriptural assertion that there is a Designer. But isn’t it a good thing that modern microbiology supports our faith?

If we only accept scripture for cultural or emotional reasons then we might as well be multiculturalists, for so also the pagan adheres to his scripture—including the materialist and his Communist Manifesto and Origin of Species.

Dave Scott:

“Maybe ‘God’ is made of dark energy and influences the material world through quantum gravity. Who knows.”

Fascinating! I’ve wondered about that myself. Pure coincidence, I’m sure, but the biblical kabod ‘glory’ really means ‘heavy’.

AB’s line of reasoning is perfectly reasonable if we keep in mind the distinction between natural curiosity and the cosmological ambition of Big Science. There’s nothing corrupt about looking at a cell and seeing what’s in it and speculating about how it works—as long as this enterprise doesn’t cause our “scientist” to become infatuated with himself and his theories.

That’s not what happens in Big Science, however—and this includes Newton and Galileo. Those who engage in Big Science want their theories to have transcendent significance. They want to be known as “scientists” who have obtained knowledge of the nature of being. This enterprise repeats the first sin and is therefore inherently corrupt, from the perspective articulated by AB.

Big Science is like the Tower of Babel. Men build themselves up in a futile attempt to diminish the difference between themselves and God. Its own ambition causes it to succumb to a confusion of languages—it is divided just like Plato and Aristotle between theory and observation, and this divide cannot be overcome.

The Tower principle is operative in this very thread. Some want ID to reflect Yahweh. Some want it to reflect an unspecified designer along the lines of the Greeks. Some don’t want it to reflect a “designer” at all—they have a Gnostic view of design. The more we talk, the less force we have. The Tower melts away at its foundations.

AB’s provocative stance has made UD readable again. Hopefully he won’t get himself booted off by the Prickly One.

To Avraham Barda,

Even the anti-ID position relies on something beyond nature as natural processes only exist in nature and therefor cannot account for it.

There’s a lot of confusion about what is meant by “materialism”. Classical materialism is deader than a doornail. It was killed by quantum mechanics, particle physics, and theoretical physics. We now know there are particles which don’t take up space, have zero rest mass, and don’t obey the Pauli Exclusion Principle. We have experimental proof of spooky action at a distance, particles which have identical quantum states, particles which sometimes behave as waves and are in more than one place at the same time, and all sorts of other weird stuff like everything being made of vibrating strings that exist in 10 or more dimensions. Adding insult to injury physics is incomplete as we don’t have a theory of quantum gravity. Making matters even worse we now believe that about 70% of the “stuff” that makes up the universe is some form of exotic energy which physics can’t yet describe and is called, for want of any meaningful term, dark energy. This dark energy is only known through its gravitational interaction with normal matter. It’s thought to homogenously permeate everything everywhere. Maybe “God” is made of dark energy and influences the material world through quantum gravity. Who knows. All I know is classical materialism is dead yet there are hoardes of scientists who think it’s still alive and well.

1) The religiously sanctimonious: those who insist that because ID has potentially divine implications, that it should be subject to the direction and control of a fundamental elite, a self-appointed religious/intellectual caste/priesthood. Gerry Rzeppa was a perfect example of this — unless ID adherents were practicing Christianity (and Intelligent Design) according to his convoluted notions of religious devotion, they were either compromisers, complacent, heretical, or Laodicean. Theistic Evolutionists are often the other part of this first category. Many of these insist that ID is bad theology and bad science at the same time, because it dares to suggest that God’s actions are detectable in tests and inferences of natural effects. This view imposes a preference for the behavior of God that is based on convenience rather than special revelation.

2) Chance worshipers: those who insist that only the study of effects with natural causes is “scientific,” and that there can exist only such causes. This group is consciously or unconsciously embarrassed that the chain of natural causes ends at a quantum singularity, for which there can only be a supernatural explanation. They attempt to conflate ID with religious creationism, in order to bully adherents into legal compliance. These must attempt to force ID theories into fully embracing their potential implications — or risk exposing the lie of materialism: that all ‘natural’ effects can be traced to natural causes.

I’m not entirely sure if Avraham is in one of these two groups, or if he is an exception to the rule; however when you factor the meat out of his arguments, they sure seem (to me) to resemble the tired old stereotype of convenience: ID = religion.

It’s been interesting sitting on the sidelines and reading Barda’s comments. He is another who has come and voiced his thoughts, which we all welcome, but again it shows how many trailerloads of worldview we carry and, at times, dump onto the blogosphere.

The first issue I’d like to raise is the continung misunderstanding of what ID is and what it isn’t. (Although our beliefs do not always line up on aspects of the mechanisms, etc. we have core understandings of ID as a theory and ID as a movement) Can we have a link at the top that outlines these in a little more detail for the first-timers who don’t seem to ‘get it’.

Secondly … yes, some will not get it, but it may help those who are interested-enough to research before they start the same conversation.

Even a broader definition at this site of the parameters in which ID operates would certainly be an interesting work-in-progress.

The term ‘evolution’ works as does the concepts of the illusionist’s smoke and mirrors. Let’s define ID – as best we can – so that the evobots can continue to try and portray us as they do, but we can rest assured that the definition we apply is more or less consistent and on show … Hopefully this, with time, will provide a more solid foundation for us, here, to work from.

Hmm?

Actually, you have things turned around again. It was the enlightenment thinking that culminated with Darwinism and the elimination of teleology from science that was new. Eliminating final and formal causes was part of the change that occurred with modern science. Intelligent design constitutes a return to tradition, a renewal of formal and final causes, considerations, by the way, that Newton had made a part of his repertoire. Indeed, Aristotle included efficient, material, formal, and final causes in his study of natural phenomena. Modern science chose to ignore formal and final causes, a point that clearly refutes your assertion about the sameness of science throughout the ages.

——An unwritten rule can be just as onerous a dead hand as a written, formalized one. The believing creationist scientist shares one common belief with his Darwinist enemy: both, upon losing their keys, would discount outright the idea that some demon took it and hid it. This is the heritage of Greek methodological determinism, and it has been an unwritten but firm rule for science since its inception.

We are speaking now of a rule that can formally single out and disfranchise one group of researchers from the scientific community. An unwritten rule can hardly be as onerous as that one, because unwritten rules aren’t used to persecute scientists, slander them, and ruin their careers. There has never been any such rule until now. There is no historical tradition of disfranchising scientists for not following rules or using the proper methods for reasons that should be obvious: Only the scientist can know which methods he needs to serve his research question.

—–“You say earlier scientists avoided non-natural causes in science in order to maximize, optimize their answering capabilities. Excellent! Exactly this the materialists do, only with more restrictions than the early scientists.”

They avoided non-natural causes as a means of solving a problem in context, they did not mean for it to define science once and for all. Again, you ignore the purpose of science which is to answer questions about nature and solve problems. No methodology can answer all questions and solve all problems. The continuity that you hope for is there is not there.

—-“I have no problem with the notion that a design inference is an a posteriori conclusion borne out by the forensics. This is not the issue at all.”

You made quite a thing of it for a long as you could.

—-“The issue is, that ID speaks of nothing beyond the inference of a designer (not even number, so it could be multiple designers for all we know). Being a big tent means that ID can’t go beyond science.The reason I bring the Raelians is, that there is nothing to prevent someone who infers design from becoming one of them. Or a Deist 18th-century style, or a polytheist ID advocate like Cicero, or… anything. ID might as well be called ABD, for Anything But Darwinism.

Sounds good to me.

—–“I said, that I have no problem with a post factum design inference.”

Actually, you did have a problem with it for quite a while.

—–Do you accept that there are other ways to posit design?

Of course. One can perceive it through intuition in a non-scientific way. One can also “believe” it as a matter of faith.

——“OK, believing in design because the Bible says so is not an inference, and could be a tautology as you say; but why does that make it illegitimate?”

It doesn’t make it illegitimate; it just makes it something other than ID. One can posit design two ways from the Bible. According to Romans 1: and Psalm 19, God’s handiwork has been made manifest, which means that it can be perceived through the use of unaided reason. One can also simply believe in the teachings of Christianity and take design on faith. The whole point Romans 1: and Psalm 19, however, is that faith is not needed to draw a design inference. This, however, is not the same as a formal ID inference, which is consistent with, but not required by Scripture. So there are three levels of accepting design in nature: [A] (Formal) scientific inference based on empirical science (ID), [B] (Informal) perceived design inference based on reason and observation as taught in the Bible [C] Design based on religious faith, as also taught in Bible.

—–“In wishing to adhere to Greek-derived science and logic, ID works hand in glove with Darwinism in discounting (or denying altogether) the power of revelation. As I said before: ID is ecumenical to a fault.”

According to the Bible, God reveals himself in Scripture and in nature; the two revelations are consistent and mutually confirming. That ID “wishes to adhere to Greek-derived science and logic” is a characterization of yours that doesn’t capture the essence of a formal design inference. ID wishes to be reasonable, no more, no less. The Greeks did not invent logic; they simply discovered it. It has always been there for anyone who wants to use it.

What you say here is exactly correct. To which I respond, “so what”?

I think I understand you now. It seems that your problem is that ID does not make claims that it cannot make, which, it seems to me, is a very odd problem to have.

Yes, ID does not specify who/what the designer is. Why? Simple. Plain old ordinary humility. ID is not a theological or philosophical project. It’s sole purpose is to investigate the empirical data and make reasonable inferences from that data. Where people go after the data has spoken is not for ID to say.

As DaveScot has already demonstrated, the data do not allow us to say much, as an empirical matter, about the nature of the designer other than he/it

1) has a deep understanding of chemistry and physics

2) is capable of abstract thought

3) is ability to manipulate matter to bring abstract thought into physical reality.

Because ID is at its core an empirical investigation, it must per force stop where the data stops. I don’t know why you find that so difficult to understand.

This is no to say that the metaphysical/religious implications of ID are unimportant. ID lends strong support to those who believe in a creator God.

But to criticize ID because it is not something it cannot — by its very nature — be is more than passing strange.