“Survival of the Slickest”

_{William Dembski

September 24, 2005

Intelligent Design}

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Check out this article on ID from Sydney, Australia: http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/the-trouble-with-darwin/2005/09/23/1126982233685.html. Here’s an excerpt:

Last month, the federal Minister for Education, Science and Training, Dr Brendan Nelson, gave intelligent design ministerial imprimatur, telling the National Press Club he thought parents and schools ought to have the opportunity – if they wished – for students to be exposed to intelligent design and taught about it.

Comments

yes. i do take offense to lies. and arrogance. who cares about the men on the list? you think darwinism was first to come up with common ancestry? try the greeks! the idea has been around, literally since ancient times, and most men of science have rejected it. darwins success, as even many darwinsts admit was that he had a great way with telling the story and was big on PR. fact remains- on your own blog you accuse nearly all of the sr fellows of DI of being liars and not practicing real science...that their mission isnt really science but to use religion to undermine and overthrow science, etc. pretty big claims, especially when they dont agree with the facts. not all the fellows at the discovery inst. are christians, not all of them believe the intelligent designer is god at all. you divide the camps into two groups- scientists= those who accept darwinism and the psuedo scientists (who one can easily see from your blog is anyone attached to ID.) ID isnt real science you tell us and the IDers arent real scientists. theres absolutely no debate over evolution- its a fact, we all came from a single cell, no doubt, no debate at all. if thats not arrogance, arrogance doesnt truly exist. anyone would take offense to that sort of close minded, nearly bigoted worldview. this is basically your view-- if you dont agree with me (and the majority of scientists), youre not a real scientist, youre a liar who is using religion to overthrow science, and you shouldnt be trusted. in the end, its not about it being offensive- its mainly about your clear agenda to attack anything connected to ID, falsely claim IDers are liars, call names, attack them as not being real scientists, etc. its the most common thing i see from your side of this debate (tho youll deny there is a debate, since you make it clear you dont see dembski and others as reputable scientists, but rather religious propagandists), and its getting old. one side REFUSES to discuss the issue, they say theres NO debate...yet by saying that youre discounting the views of thousands of men and women who dont buy into the view. and considering the evidence doesnt support the theory (even most honest darwinists admit as much- for example: gould was honest enough to admit that the fossil record shows no true change in form or intermediates, and that NS doesnt do much of anything in the wild), that itself seems to be a pretty big debate as to the question involved. any honest scientist in any field will freely admit- we know very little about life, the universe, and everything in between. they often say we know a lot more than we did in the past, but we still only know maybe 5-10% of what there is to know and ideas change DAILY. scientists used to think that galaxies took billions of yrs to form, now they say that they form very quickly...science cant even make its mind up on issues we deal with in our daily lives, so its fair to say that only a fool wishing to undermine science could question if evolution from a single cell to man occurred?! thats beyond preposterous! in the 70s they warned of the coming danger of global cooling, in 30 yrs thats suddenly changed to the FACT of global warming. lets not be so arrogant that we think science can tell us SO much about anything. just this past month with the hurricanes, you have a number of scientists saying that the hurricanes are the result of global warming, while others have pointed out that overall temperatures are COOLING worldwide. we cant even come to much of an agreement on global temperatures but the book is closed on the "FACT" that all life has an ancestor of a single celled organism that came from non-life in some unknown, magical manner that well never be able to verify? come on! i mean, how silly do ideas have to get before we admit that -golly, we might not know it all afterall! ??? in the end, the average person is tired of the attitude you have and those who agree with you and use the same tactics. you distort, lie, mislead, and use every other trick in the book to proclaim that science is on your side and the others are just religious nuts with no credibility. i say- keep at it! all the polls show that the great majority of people (around the world) dont agree with you and the majority of scientists. and guess what? a lab coat isnt a coat of ultimate knowledge as too many scientists seem to think is the case. so, of course im offended...i get offended everytime people lie to push their agenda. i get offended when people close their minds to any other view but the dogma theyve clung to, i get offended by a number of things, and i think its safe to say (judging from public polls and reaction from the common man on the street) that were all sick and tired of the disgusting tactics used by only one group on the one side of this issue.jboze3131_{September 25, 2005
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Josh, biology has changed a lot science 1915, the year Jean Henri Fabre passed away (he is the youngest of those you list), so recycling the arguments of these men, though they are all of enormous reputation, won't get you too far. Often it is said that Intelligent Design is merely recycling William Paley's argument in Natural Theory, which have been addressed adnauseam. Dr. Dembski and others, if I am reading them correctly, are trying to reformulate the design hypothesis without any attachments to scripture and base it far more refined mathematics then what was available in the 1790s. [Please correct me if I'm wrong] Now you seem to take offense to my comments and personal views I express on my own blog. Such is your rite. But please, my first comment was merely showing how ID proponents should not look to Australian Minister of Education as another vociferous proponent of teaching intelligent design in SCIENCE classes. For growing influence of ID, I believe Dembski cited Belgium or the Netherlands recently, whose Education Minister was considering adding "questions concerning design" to the curriculum.doran_{September 25, 2005
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oh, and dont forget this gem: "Is there a budding research program like Steve Myers tried to con Nightline into thinking? No. Is there a controversy in the scientific community about the validity of Biological Evolution? No. Will the media stop printing pseudo-scientific garbage? Probably not. Is it worth the effort to keep fighting for science? YES!" so, i see he also accuses steve myers of lying. he says theres no controversy about the validity of bio evo. wonder if hes head of stephen gould? maybe that whole split between darwinism, neo darwinism, pe, and the other forms slipped his mind. no controversy. nope, no way. i guess that means the 400 PhD's who signed DI's list arent truly part of the "scientific community"...same goes for you bill, youre not part of the "scientific community" either it seems. can i just repeat how sick and tired i am of the arrogance that exists with one side of this debate? the arrogant attitudes- its just mind boggling. dembski isnt truly part of the scientic community, but doran here is. genius! lets also add newton, kepler, pascal, boyle, faraday, joule, pasteur, fabre, lord kelvin, and a long list of other theists/creationists to the list with dembski and various other DI fellows who arent part of this so-called "scientific community" (lets not pretend darwin was the first to think up common ancestry- the theory itself is ancient). doran knows better than these men, surely. and of course, they werent part of the scientific community, so who are they to say anything?jboze3131_{September 24, 2005
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in case no one thought to check to see if the various posters have websites of their own...and just for background info. check out doran's site http://history-science.blogspot.com/ (also linked in his name) he links to pandasthumb in every other post, he attacks dembski, he attacks witt, he attacks the discovery institute itself. he claims ID'ers purposely distort the mechanisms of evolution, etc. i only mention this to show yet another evolutionist who claims there is no debate at all, that anyone who dissents isnt a real scientist, and the whole list of other stereotypical traits you find with these guys. ID doesnt do real science, its a front for a religious organization (that sort of nonsense). not interested in debating the issue- only interested in claiming that DI is spreading lies, that certain fellows are spreading lies...he claims ID is a "cloaked religious attempt to undermine science", and he complains that "the ID movement is not about reliable scientific research, but rather gaming the education system in any way possible to accomplish its social-religious agenda." a blog full of propaganda, in other words...rather hypocritial to write everyday about DI and ID conspiracy theory nonsense, then for him to attack DI and claim the group is merely a religious group trying to undermine science! again, we see that one side can look at the evidence and discuss the issue, yet the other side seems unwilling to do anything but call names, belittle, attack, spread falsehoods, and claim that anyone who disagrees is a fool who only has religious motivations and wants to undermine or even overthrow the scientific method. theyre getting so desperate with their talking points-filled webpages that you can guess what the posts contain before you even read them!jboze3131_{September 24, 2005
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pathetic. seems the dogma lives on. if someone told you that you should only teach engineering in a religion class, youd laugh at them and call them deranged...if the same level of design is obvious in living things, you demand that it be called religion and not science and the world agrees and says- that makes total sense. like i said- pathetic. close minded dogma will continue to rule the day, i see.jboze3131_{September 24, 2005
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I would recommend before anyone flies off the handle about the Honorable Australian Education Minister is all for teaching Intelligent Design in science classrooms, I would recommend popping over to Dr. John Wilkins' (of Sydney) site: http://evolvethought.blogspot.com/ where he discusses a reply from the Education Minister concerning ID. It seems to be along the lines that Nelson would find it OK to teach ID in a comparative religion class, though as Wilkins' susinctly notes, he "might have said all this when he raised it in public [the first time]." Hope everyone is looking forward to the BU debate, I know I am.doran_{September 24, 2005
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Ã¢â‚¬Å“However this lack is the ultimate expression of the scientific process: that which cannot be spoken of must be passed over in silence.Ã¢â‚¬Â that's one thing that bugs me about naturalism. it's so completely foolish to think that science will ever answer all the questions one could think of about the world, life, people, etc. it's as if too many in that camp have the odd impression that science can do all things. it can't, it never will be able to do so, and it never has been able to do so. furthemore, if we get an answer on some topic, but it's not strictly a "scientific" answer, does that somehow make it less of an answer? does it mean that the answer isn't a "real" answer (or that science can/must somehow come up with a better answer eventually), because it wasn't garnered via a strictly "scientific" method? i get the feeling TK is in that camp (??) finally, i'd say that any theory of a mechanism that has no information on what causes the mechanism to begin with isn't much of a theory at all. a hypothesis, maybe...but not a theory.jboze3131_{September 24, 2005
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"My point is that the only thing that this pseudo scientific theory shows is that evolution lacks any info on what causes itself." No, it shows that evolutionary processes can't produce complex life from "simple" one-celled critters. A designer can be deduced from that which is designed. It is not necessary to who or what did the designing, nor why. "However this lack is the ultimate expression of the scientific process: that which cannot be spoken of must be passed over in silence." And this is why ID makes no scientific claims about who or what did the designing. It is the ultimate expression of the scientific process: that which cannot be spoken of must be passed over in silence.russ_{September 24, 2005
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The "camp" of ID seems to be divided into two camps those who are biblical creationists in the purest sense and those who are less inclined to say that GOD created the world. Almost like the moderate camp are those who do the arguing, the others just add to your numbers. This is what worries us on the left. Then please Fred explain to me what the difference is between ID and evolution if not for the cayusa prima? My point is that the only thing that this pseudo scientific theory shows is that evolution lacks any info on what causes itself. This lack, is being abused by proponents of ID. However this lack is the ultimate expression of the scientific process: that which cannot be spoken of must be passed over in silence.Thistleking_{September 24, 2005
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thats a little silly tho. you cant talk about evolution without talking about origins. that argument doesnt hold up- if youre going to postulate one single living cell that is the ancestor of all life, with changes from that cell to man, you HAVE to talk about origins. theyve stopped talking about origins, because the model of mud to man doesnt hold up when talking about some primordial soup that magically brought forth life. you cant say that all life has a single cell as its ancestor, then say- were not going to deal with how in the earth that cell got here from nothing, how life arose from nonlife, how something as complex as a cell could arise without intelligent causes outside of the cell, how that cell could transform and code for rna and dna somehow, etc. its like talking about the history of the automobile while never mentioning who invented it, who made the first car, where it was made, how it was made, etc. (i can hear the historian now- "who cares where the first car came from, its umm not part of the theory, the underlining start of the field of study itself is unknown, thus we wont speak of it!" only in evolution is one allowed to state all those miraculous happenings (that, by definition, cannot be tested or repeated), while refusing to mention how the whole thing started, who or what started it, where and under what circumstances it started, and so forth. in any other field of study, if someone refused to mention the start of it all, theyd be laughed out of the room- with biological evolution, we can pretend that origins arent part of the theory, but just doesnt hold. theres no logical way to describe the mechanisms without bringing up the start of those mechanism, how NS came into being (by chance? odds are astronomically opposed to this idea). theres too much that cant be explained when it comes to origins, and it causes major problems with evolution, which is why evolutionists have pretended that its not really part of the theory and its part of some other, unknown (as of yet) theory.jboze3131_{September 24, 2005
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Thistleking: That's not a flaw in the theory. Evolution has never attempted to explain how life started. It only explains how life has changed since it began. If you want to talk about origins, then we get into hypotheses and theories that we're not totally sure about yet (abiogenesis and such).FishyFred_{September 24, 2005
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Why not teach that God is behind evolution? It is, after all irrefutable. I mean it should be up to parents to decide whether or not to expose their children to whatever wisdom they wish. All this jurisprudence and media rhetoric are clouding the subject: are the theories of intelligent design and evolution mutually exclusive? Because if they are not the there is no reason not to ammend the curricula to add that fundamental question of what brought this life on earth about. There is nothing in evolution that helps us with causation and this flaw in the theory should be exposed and discussed...Thistleking_{September 24, 2005
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