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creation vs. evolution (pg. 5)
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| occrider |
Well since I'm at work without a soundcard ... courtesy of Kaos ....
Chirp Chirp! |
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| Orbax |
What came first the belief or the proof?
There is ample information for everyone to justify their beliefs. I mean, its all well and good to show that you arent just blindly choosing a path, that youve done some research, etc... but for a creationist (Man was created, dunno bout that other junk :D) to base his supernatural belief on natural law and science is kind of odd.
Why do I believe the way I do? Because when I am standing on top of a mountain at 4 am watching the run rise over a verdant valley with lakes and rivers and mountains in the distance...I just have to thank God for getting this whole "earth" thing down for us. Basically, the world is too cool.
There is obvious a more personal feeling of connectedness with that which I feel is God, and lots of other stuff.
Im just glad I have been fortunate enough to experience some of it. I hope other people get out of their daily grind to appreciate this place once in a while too, regardless of their belief.
hehe. on a side note:
TA has been an onling journal of sorts for me. I can look back on how I used to speak towards Christianity and such, but through actually talking to people in the world about it and watching other people do what I used to do...man. So many angry Christians!
Their belief makes your God no less real. Dont get so worked up. I wish that people could respect the religious mentality a little more, but even more importantly, I wish the religious could respect others mentalities as well.
Someone once said that when placed into a tough situation that 99% of Christians would act like pagans. Something we all need to work towards yes?
ElectronicM:
Tone it down and show respect. You call them stupid and idiots then expect them to not curse when you ask? Honey or Vinegar my friend.
Maybe someone has read all of this, and I have sucked time out of your life muahahha. Youll never get it back...Nevverrrrrrrrr. You are closer to dying for having read this.
haha I dunno. Im sick and skipping my classes today so I got some free time.
Peace! |
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| arctic |
| quote: | Originally posted by tathi
hmmm was melech actually DJBARON? I never remembered melech getting involved in anything to do with religion, other than call islam evil, but DJBARON was a bastard creationist |
I think that meelech did start a few threads proclaiming that Judaism was the only true faith. As for Baron, I'm not sure. They could have been the same person - they were just as crazy. I think that Barron might still be suspended though.
MisterOpus1 - I think it's a hit and run - there are four 'ban electro' threads in chillout at the moment, so no need to apologise for the 'talking out of your buttocks remark, it was entirely justified. :haha: He's completely ignored my, yours and DrUg_Tit0's responses, so there probably isn't much chance of getting a serious response.
Lastly - Orbax, you're a YEC right? Out of curiosity, do you think that someone can be an evolutionist and a Christian/Muslim/Jew? If not, then how do you feel about the Catholic Church throwing it's support behind evolution?
It's just something I'm interested in, as the majority of evolutionists are actually Christians, but then you have the creationists who seem to think that evolution and Christianity are somehow incompatible. |
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| Orbax |
Im not a young earth person. If someone presses me Ill say "Jesus turned water into wine, and the Garden was full and bearing fruit when God created Man who was full grown, he can make things appear to have age" but I dont really care and I think that the age of the earth has no bearing whatsoever on any kind of deism, much less Christianity.
For the most part I abide by science's rulings on stuff. I dont really doubt the veracity of an old earth and universe. Saying God can create things with the appearance of age dodges the fact that to our knowledge everything is old.
My thoughts on evolution...hmmm.
Its hard. I dont think Homo Sapiens are the end product of a series of actions beginning with ooze. The human body is too perfect. It is unwittingly called a machine by so many people and books because when you get down to it, it is the most complex machine ever created. I loved Behe's Darwins Black Box: The biochemical challenge to evolution. Its just wild how we work.
Point being I think that DNA is the most amazing stuff ever. Micro evolution happens rapidly and correctly. The fact that we can change and adapt so easily is the greatest gift of all. I think humans ARE changing, and that pretty much all species in open systems are. Some relics of older ages exist like sea turtles and crocodiles and such, but even they have had to change to cope with food supplies and human infringement.
SO:
Do I think All creatures have a built in mechanism to change and adapt, sometimes with great physical changes? Yes. Absolutely.
Do I think that this can eventually make them change species or create new ones? No. I have yet to see answers to the challenges of irreducible complexity set out by behe and others.
The "missing link" is still huge, and the fact that earlier "man" types seem to be totally unrelated is disturbing to me in some way. I havent quite reached a conclusion on how exactly Man got to earth, or was created on it, or what.
I do believe that there are many devoted Creationists spanning all religions that have bowed down unquestioningly to the demands of science, yet still love and revere their God and try as best they can to live their life.
I dont think anyone is going to go to Hell over it if thats your question, although I do think it sets up a fundamental conflict in you to establish what has classically been seen as a diametric for your belief system.
Im all for someone who has done a balanced examination of both sides and reached a conclusion that they think suits their relationship to God/s the best.
Personally? Im still towards the middle, I think that there are still a great many unanswered questions, but I am still on the side of Mankind being created. It is in the same arena as why I believe in God. There is a fundamental part of me that sees life, and the body, and the amazing interaction of all living things, and knows homeostatic eco systems yet still says "this is just too amazing".
I understand the evolutionists side, and, like I said, I like educated people. But so far every person Ive dealt with in the world hasnt known enough to have a rational conversation with me and ends up saying "You have too many facts, I need to do research".
Research to justify the pre-existing belief. Thats my problem with it. People believe and then prove it. They never asked the all important QUESTION. They flipped a mental coin and went meandering down a path, and stopped at the first clearing with a stream and sat down and have been growing moss since.
So, all in all, I think people can justify just about anything to themselves, God sees our hearts and wont send you to Hell for being brainwashed in elementary school, ask forgiveness for your sins, try to do your best, and try to have a healthy relationship to your God.
A lot of stuff becomes rather inconsequential after that ;) but stay with it, and realize there is always something new to learn and one of these days something might come along that will totally change everything youve ever known, and youll have to adapt :D
peace |
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| 3xx3r7 |
I actually had a debate with my gf on that before I broke up with her. She kept on repeating the stuff from bible and rarely tried to counter my points. Especially the one with C14 dating.
Fundies are so amusing at debating. :haha: :haha: |
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| Orbax |
| Most people are totally uneducated in a wide variety of subjects, including what they believe to be their everlasting soul. I wouldnt necessarily chalk the cause of stupidity up to the subject someone has chosen to be blatantly ignorant in. |
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| xKaoSx |
| quote: | Originally posted by Orbax
So, all in all, I think people can justify just about anything to themselves, God sees our hearts and wont send you to Hell for being brainwashed in elementary school, ask forgiveness for your sins, try to do your best, and try to have a healthy relationship to your God.
A lot of stuff becomes rather inconsequential after that ;) but stay with it, and realize there is always something new to learn and one of these days something might come along that will totally change everything youve ever known, and youll have to adapt :D
peace |
You must play a lot of Dungeon's and Dragon's dont ya?
:(
Seriously though-
My beliefs mostly come from proof and one side is "slightly" winning. |
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| Orbax |
| lol what about DnD? |
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| MisterOpus1 |
Warning: this is a long one.
| quote: | Originally posted by Orbax
My thoughts on evolution...hmmm.
Its hard. I dont think Homo Sapiens are the end product of a series of actions beginning with ooze. The human body is too perfect. It is unwittingly called a machine by so many people and books because when you get down to it, it is the most complex machine ever created. I loved Behe's Darwins Black Box: The biochemical challenge to evolution. Its just wild how we work.
Point being I think that DNA is the most amazing stuff ever. Micro evolution happens rapidly and correctly. The fact that we can change and adapt so easily is the greatest gift of all. I think humans ARE changing, and that pretty much all species in open systems are. Some relics of older ages exist like sea turtles and crocodiles and such, but even they have had to change to cope with food supplies and human infringement.
I understand the evolutionists side, and, like I said, I like educated people. But so far every person Ive dealt with in the world hasnt known enough to have a rational conversation with me and ends up saying "You have too many facts, I need to do research".
Research to justify the pre-existing belief. Thats my problem with it. People believe and then prove it. They never asked the all important QUESTION. They flipped a mental coin and went meandering down a path, and stopped at the first clearing with a stream and sat down and have been growing moss since. |
Hmmm, I believe I understand what you are saying - that evolution is a standard that is taught in schools, and that individuals are just programmed to believe it without ever being skeptical of it. To that I think I might agree, but there's one caveat - the concept of evolution is quite simple, but the details are amazingly complex. It would literally take an entire semester, if not longer to scratch the surface of these details in a high school biology class. Consequently, high school biology books and classes just brush upon the concepts of those details.
But this certainly does not mean that those details are any less true, simply because the time constraints and cognitive requirements to understand the intricacies of evolution make it difficult for a full understanding of the matter. There is a monumental amount of evidence to support evolutionary pathways in a wide range of fields with include cell and molecular biology, genetics, geography and geology, comparitive biology, biochemistry, anthropology, horticulture, and of course, paleontology. Would it be realistic to touch upon each of these subjects to explain evolutionary theory in detail for a typical high school student? No way. That's what the specific courses taught at universities are for. But it is necessary to mention that the evidence at present from each of these fields give strong support towards an evolutionary pathway explaining life's many different organisms.
Is it necessary to involve other ideas of an explanation of life's organisms? Certainly, provided that there's positive evidence to support such ideas or assertions. This is where the problem of creationists in schools comes from. From the scientific method, high schoolers learn that a hypothesis is created based on previous observations, which may take a new direction on a given unexplained phenomena or event. But for any creationist assertion, there is nothing to support even this first step of creating a working hypothesis, because there are no previous supporting observations on which to go on. They are merely conclusions, 99% coming from the Christian interpretation of life's organisms, from which no real hypothesis can be created from.
But that certainly doesn't stop the creationists from creating a hypothesis regardless. The next problem, however, they simply cannot work around - testing that hypothesis. I have yet to see any creationist idea (ID included) go through the rigors of actual tests. It is this very reason why there have been no published creationist papers in any peer-reviewed science journal - they (creationists) simply have no means of testing their hypothesis'.
And if you think about it, how could they? The underlying difficulty with creationism is that conclusions have already been created for them, i.e. the outcome is a known (God has a hand in it all). This is in stark contrast to any true scientific inquiry, where no conclusions are known, but rather, conclusions are drawn upon evidence through observation and/or testing of hypothesis'. And those hypothesis' do not necessarily have to be shown to be true in order for a descent "conclusion" to be made (actually there are no conclusions, just theories based on observation/testing results); hypothesis shown to be false can give credence to sound theories as well. But in essence, without direct evidence from testing, retesting, and/or observation, you are left with an unanswered and shaky at best hypothesis, which is purely philosophical by nature (and personally I think that’s being rather rude to the philosophy field).
So when you say:
| quote: | | Research to justify the pre-existing belief. Thats my problem with it. People believe and then prove it. |
And strangely, you are referring to evolutionists, this is exactly the problem with creationists. They do what they can to justify their pre-existing beliefs or conclusions, without ever allowing the process of observation/testing create those conclusions all on their own, which is the nature of science. What’s more, those pre-existing “beliefs” are merely just that – beliefs. It is quite difficult to prove such beliefs in the first place.
This poses yet another problem with creationism attempting to merge itself in science – their belief system in the supernatural or unexplained. In order for something to be tested or observed, a rigorous procedure must be adhered in order to rule out any bias or other influencing factors that may skew results. Unfortunately, since it has been shown to be quite impossible to directly observe or test supernatural events, supernatural phenomena, if it truly exists, can therefore not be directly tested. And if any event, supernatural or otherwise, cannot be directly tested or observed, it logically follows that that given event cannot be inserted in any logical way into the equation. Ironically, this is exactly what creationists propose – despite the fact that certain supernatural events cannot be observed, they should be inserted into the scientific process regardless.
How can this be explained in a logical manner? In short, it can’t. So why should we allow such unexplained, unobserved events be incorporated into scientific inquiry? IOW, why should it be necessary to incorporate unexplained phenomena in any science class, when the purpose of science that is being taught to the students is to explain only the observed or tested phenomena in the natural world? If one allows one part of unexplained/unobserved phenomena into the explained and observed, would the results be logical? Would they be explainable, given the fact that one inserted unexplained events within? Furthermore, where would it end with insertion of supernatural events? If you insert one supernatural event, why not another?
Clearly, the methodology would be quite tainted. And it simply is not science. So why would I want my kids to learn something that clearly is not science, in a science classroom?
Finally, I think it’s fair game to address the hidden notion behind the creationist movement and it’s politics. Although the vast majority of biological scientists support evolution (well over 99%), the creationist movement has taken a foothold onto the American public. This is quite unfortunate, though truly it shouldn’t be all that unexpected, considering how strong the fundamentalist Christian movement is within our country. It is the fundamentalists who’ve contributed heavily to the creationist movement, both financially and verbally. There is no doubt that it is a Christian notion which created and fully supports the creationist movement, which again taints the viewpoint of the movement. And anyone who believes that there is room for other religions to be involved in the creationism are going to eventually run into the wall of Christian fundamentalism and dogmatic beliefs sooner or later. So to have a religious movement willfully and spitefully clashing with natural observed and tested phenomenon is quite ridiculous, but to see almost ½ the American public support such ideas is nothing shy of embarrassing. However, given the financial and political strength of the fundamentalist right, it truly isn’t too terribly appalling. For creationists to continually distort, misunderstand, misrepresent, and flat out lie to support their dogmatic, unchanging viewpoints which flies in the face of logic, rationality, and true inquiry, is really nothing new when one considers the source.
Well, that’s my personal beef with creationists. I’m going to cut this short and give a follow-up on my opinion on Intelligent Design in another post. Sorry this was so damn long. |
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| Orbax |
i guess you indirectly struck the heart of the matter for me. i agree God shouldnt be taught in a biology class. i DO think that, starting in highschool, a religoius studies section should be taught on all major religions. It would be a 4 year mandatory course explaining the tenents of each. With so much Love and Hate balanced around this issue, people need to understand what the REAL differences are between people. And to get speakers to come in and show that totally normal people can be Hindu or something...
A revamping of the education system needs to happen, but to completely leave out one of the largest facets of world affairs is ludicrous. People arent going to church any more because there is no fellowship, no community. Hell there isnt community anywhere in America these days. Point is, people arent learning anything about their own religions, you think theyll understand the half-baked counterpart from another?
If nothing else itll teach them some basic life principles to work off of, and if they feel a connection with something, good for them. Replace stupid crap like "Home Economics" where you learn how to write checks for 3 weeks with an intensive program.
So Recap:
Religion isnt a science and shouldnt be taught as such
Religion should be taught as a religion though, might help establish some tolerance.
Maybe just put the whole thing under Religious History and learn the roots and whats happened recently.
Also, evolution should be taught more in depth. Im getting really annoyed with the "fins eventually turned into wings" ideas.
Highschoolers arent stupid, the just have no responsibility to learn in the current system. Make graduating Highschool hard. Like a first year community college course. Prepare the little bastards for life.
| quote: | | And strangely, you are referring to evolutionists, this is exactly the problem with creationists. |
I was actually referring to everyone hehe.
I am just so sick of people not knowing ANYTHING except who did the cover art for the latest 50cent album.
Smart educated people dont exist any more! its crazy! |
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| MisterOpus1 |
| I don't personally have a problem if there was a religious studies course in high school. I'm not sure if I'd agree for it to be mandatory, but it would certainly be an interesting course for kids, and would be the most appropriate place for teaching creationism. |
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| MisterOpus1 |
| quote: | A lot of stuff becomes rather inconsequential after that ;) but stay with it, and realize there is always something new to learn and one of these days something might come along that will totally change everything youve ever known, and youll have to adapt :D
peace |
I honestly think you have a pretty descent healthy view on things, so I'll spare you the direct questions and make some generalities (besides, we've been down that road anyways). In particular, I want to talk about Behe and the ID movement.
When I first read "Darwin's Black Box", I too felt Behe had brought up some compelling questions about Intelligent Design. Furthermore, after reading Dembski's "No Free Lunch", and seeing Dembski's mathmatical probability skills in full view, I felt the ID movement posed some interesting questions. And just out of curiousity, I also followed up with Dembski's "The Design Inference : Eliminating Chance through Small Probabilities", and Dembski and Behe's "Intelligent Design". You throw in Jonathon Wells' "Icons of Evolution" (not an ID book, but an anti-evolutionist nonetheless), and Michael Denton's "Nature's Destiny : How the Laws of Biology Reveal Purpose in the Universe", you might think that I would have been so incredibly skeptical of any evolutionary idea, and that I was very near to being an ID believer from that point forward.
It should also be noted that this idea of Intelligent Design is nothing new, though it is the current foothold that modern day creationists are using to gain access into the science classroom. William Paley had a somewhat similar idea in the early 19th century:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Paley
Strange how the same old creationist arguments continue to resurface. Anyway, back to my review….
But there was something very troubling to me when reading these books that were skeptical of evolutionary theory. Actually, there was a handful of things that were nagging at me. The first thing that troubled me was that despite their arguments, which were all pretty compelling even to me (a B.S. in Biology back in '97), I did not find one bit of positive verifiable piece of evidence to support their ID assertions. It seemed that every anti-evolutionist book I kept reading had pretty much the same assertions - there are problems with evolution, there are gaps in the theory, etc. etc. And instead of demonstrating positive evidence to support their case of ID, all the authors deemed it appropriate to fill in those "gaps" with an ID whom was responsible for it all. This troubled me, because one of the first and foremost tenets of any scientific inquiry is to have supporting evidence to explain a given event or phenomenon. The absence of any such evidence to explain certain phenomena can not logically give credence to another explanation without showing supporting evidence for that alternative explanation (in this case, an Intelligent Designer started the whole process of life creation - which isin't evolution in the first place, and/or an IDer conveniently intervenes intermittently to help create new species or alter evolutionary pathways). It was frustrating to continually read each ID author, despite some of their impressive backgrounds (Behe a PhD in biochemistry, Dembski a PhD in mathmatics), fail to fully explain or demonstrate any positive evidence to support their assertions that an IDer is involved somehow. At the time I didn't quite know logical fallacies very well, but this type of reasoning fits perfectly into the logical fallacy of bifurcation, or false dichotomy:
http://www.infidels.org/news/atheis...tml#bifurcation
Furthermore, it left open the door for any being, either supernatural, cosmological, or otherwise, to be the inherent culprit of design. IOW, the nature of the designer was left unexplained, which further complicated my understanding. As a result, it became apparent that readers could easily fill in their given choice of a designer on their own. Dembski, a devout Christian, of course, filled in the unknown designer with his own Christian God, without ever showing any evidence to do so. I found this to be highly inappropriate, and it certainly was not science.
The second problem I had, specifically with Behe's “Darwin’s Black Box”, is that each and every proposed evolutionary pathway he has problems with and proposes ID involvement instead, has been shown to have some possible evolutionary pathways for their formation. But to understand fully what Behe is referring to when speaking of Irreducible Complexity, let’s look at his definition, according to his book:
| quote: | | By irreducible complexity I mean a single system which is composed of several interacting parts that contribute to the basic function, and where the removal of any one of the parts causes the system to effectively cease functioning. An irreducibly complex system cannot be produced gradually by slight, successive modifications of a precursor system, since any precursor to an irreducibly complex system is by definition nonfunctional. |
So the trick is to see whether or not successive modifications of a precursor system has produced positive results for an evolutionary pathway. And if you look at his argument carefully, you see that Behe is not offering a way to detect design, he is offering a way to falsify gradual Darwinian evolution, and by elimination, conclude design (which is a false dichotomy fallacy to begin with). But there is one big problem- his falsifier has been falsified. The conclusion that an "irreducibly complex system cannot be produced gradually by slight, successive modifications of a precursor system" is simply wrong. There are at least three different ways that an IC system can be produced by a series of small modifications: 1) Improvements become necessities, 2) Loss of scaffolding 3) Duplication and divergence.
http://www.cs.colorado.edu/~lindsay...rreducible.html
And as H. Allen Orr states about this fatal logical flaw in Behe’s argument:
| quote: | "Behe's colossal mistake is that, in rejecting these possibilities, he concludes that no Darwinian solution remains. But one does. It is this: An irreducibly complex system can be built gradually by adding parts that, while initially just advantageous, become-because of later changes-essential. The logic is very simple. Some part (A) initially does some job (and not very well, perhaps). Another part (B) later gets added because it helps A. This new part isn't essential, it merely improves things. But later on, A (or something else) may change in such a way that B now becomes indispensable. This process continues as further parts get folded into the system. And at the end of the day, many parts may all be required."
"The point is there's no guarantee that improvements will remain mere improvements. Indeed because later changes build on previous ones, there's every reason to think that earlier refinements might become necessary. The transformation of air bladders into lungs that allowed animals to breathe atmospheric oxygen was initially just advantageous: such beasts could explore open niches-like dry land-that were unavailable to their lung-less peers. But as evolution built on this adaptation (modifying limbs for walking, for instance), we grew thoroughly terrestrial and lungs, consequently, are no longer luxuries-they are essential. The punch-line is, I think, obvious: although this process is thoroughly Darwinian, we are often left with a system that is irreducibly complex. I'm afraid there's no room for compromise here: Behe's key claim that all the components of an irreducibly complex system 'have to be there from the beginning' is dead wrong. |
Unfortunately for Behe, precursor evolutionary pathways are well documented. Furthermore, possible evolutionary pathways can be demonstrated in his examples given that he claims have only arisen from Intelligent Design. Rather than explain each example in painstaking detail, I’ll direct you to some websites that show refutations of his examples:
1. His mousetrap analogy:
http://udel.edu/~mcdonald/mousetrap.html
2. Vertebrate Blood Clotting:
http://biocrs.biomed.brown.edu/Darw...t/Clotting.html
http://www.bostonreview.net/br22.1/doolittle.html
http://www.ncseweb.org/resources/ar..._10_31_2002.asp (fantastic debate between Miller and Behe)
3. Antibodies and the Immune System:
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/behe/icsic.html
http://www.talkdesign.org/faqs/Evolving_Immunity.html
4. Bombadier Beetles:
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/bombardier.html
5. Bacterial Flagella:
http://www.health.adelaide.edu.au/P...ys/flagella.htm
http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CB/CB200_1.html
http://www.talkreason.org/articles/flagellum.cfm
6. Cilia:
http://www.btinternet.com/~clare.stevens/behenot.htm
7. Metabolic Pathways:
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/behe/review.html
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/...6&dopt=Abstract
http://www.millerandlevine.com/km/e...n1/article.html
And an excellent review from a couple of biochemists:
http://www.cbs.dtu.dk/staff/dave/Behe.html
http://www.millerandlevine.com/km/e...n1/article.html
And if you’re absolutely dying to know where to locate primary literature on these rebuttals, here’s an exhaustive list of literature on each topic:
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/behe/publish.html
After reading the criticisms, I started realizing that this idea of ID was, in essence, not unfamiliar at all with any other creationist idea – it has already drawn it’s own conclusions without any evidence to support those conclusions, and furthermore those conclusions and assertions are untested assertions to begin with. Behe also draws upon a number of other logical fallacies, including creating strawmen, ad hoc, shifting the goalposts, and of course, argument from incredulity – which is the ultimate take home message here. Behe simply fills in the gaps with an IDer (umm, God, in case you were wondering), when he simply fails to understand or refuse to accept possible evolutionary pathways developing complex designs.
But lastly, I think the ultimate underlying problem with Behe’s argument is that he simply wouldn’t have an argument to begin with if he simply understood evolutionary principles better. This is a pretty shocking statement to make, given the fact that Behe himself is a biochemist scientist. But his misunderstandings of evolution are evident throughout his book with all the logical fallacies thrown at evolutionary concepts, one after another. For Behe to be able to continue working as a scientist and to follow scientific principles via the scientific method, which ultimately contributed to his collegiate research position, but yet throw that basic scientific tenet for an untestable, and unproven idea like ID, which is in direct contrast to scientific methodology, is truly mind boggling. In closing, I’d like to post this thought from a buddy in another forum on the matter of Behe and ID:
| quote: | But now I'll go ahead and state my own position: If all life descended from a common ancestor (or a few) by natural undirected processes, then the same sorts of natural undirected processes may have been how that common ancestor community got there. Behe is making the fact that our knowledge of abiogenesis may always be extremely tentative his a priori evidence that intelligent intervention was involved. He offers no example of a biological structure or organism arising solely through intelligent intervention, but he asserts that this is a scientific explanation. In fact it is neither.
Intelligent design creationists cannot tell us why the universal application of natural law is an invalid assumption, but they accuse us of being overly credulous for accepting that assumption in the absence of evidence to the contrary. Why 'IC' or 'specified complexity' or any other attribute should automatically signify the inadequacy of natural laws and processes has never been explained. Why the inadequacy of methodological naturalism doesn't invalidate empirical evidential inquiry as a whole has never been explained. ID creationism is based on stretching metaphors, arguments from analogy, and explanatory filters rigged to arrive at the IDC-ordained conclusion.
The attacks on Behe shine a harsh light on the scientific, philosophical, and logical shortcomings of intelligent design creationism. They have been successful in relegating IDC and God-of-the-gaps methodology to the status of smart-sounding but ultimately irrelevant creationist nonsense. |
And finally, if there were an Intelligent Designer who’s created everything, this ID being has some explaining to do for some of the following “anomalies”:
http://www.freewebs.com/oolon/SMOGGM.htm
And if this hasn’t gotten you excited enough, I’ll have another post on Dembski tomorrow! |
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