Willravel

Then what we are talking is 'within a reasonable proximity to fact', or something that is so probable, it is generally accepted as a rule of science for the purposes of understanding the world around us and it's various systems (semantics aren't as important as the meanings behind them). I think that it is only because of the complicated nature of the theory of evolution that it is not quite thought of in the same respect as the digestive system or something of the sort. Once we have even more evidence that is irreputable in supporting the theory of evolution - such as developing life from non life, or actually creating a new species that cannot reproduce with what it has come from (in a lab under controlled circumstances) - people may calm down about it a bit. I imagine evolution will always get some people to huff an gruff, simply because they assume that it disproved the existence of God. That's just silly. Evolution and ID are not in a competition. They aren't even in opposition. It is possible that God created evolution. I'm rambling....

Science, or theories with some proof, belongs in a class called 'science'. Religion, or a belief system possibly involving the supernatural or teachings of a spiritual and non scientific teacher, belong elsewhere.

Darwin was eaten by a larger, smarter evolutionist.

pig

willravel,

agreed and agreed. i think the problem with religion/theology vs. evolution/science arises from the fact that the religious texts / teachings seem to be not only repositories for spiritual information, but basic science of the civilizations they originated from. Now that we have better measurements/estimates/explanations, religous people may feel that to concede that a scientific portion of their relgious text is inaccurate necessarily invalidates the entire teaching, and thus one must protect the entire fort at all costs, or else lose everything. Thus the need to inject a shadow version of the religion into science, in order to bolster the claims of the religion.

Regardless, ID is not science and its sad to see deterioration of our scientific standards; particularly in light of the significant challenges we already face in our nation in skills involved analytical skills, mathematics, technology. The root problem I fear with the line of ID is the insinuation that some knowledge is beyond man, and is firmly in the realm of the God (the Designer/creator) so maybe we should just give up some avenues of research because they are too hard or too sacred (hi stem cell research, it sure is nice to see you over there in Korea. Take care!) Reminds me of the Pope asking Hawking not to look into the origins of the Big Bang, because that was the province of God.

I would also like to make it clear, that as far as I can see, ID does no better job of explaining the origins of life than evolution does. Neither do. Saying that some Designer created and designed the universe is just begging the question and forcing a quasi solution, which itself can't be explained.

I'm going to run off some of this annoyance.

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rsl12

This is true. One way to disprove ID is to prove that all life as we know it was created via a process that had no involvement of a higher power in the last few billion years. No one has done so conclusively.

However, the interesting question is not whether the theory can be disproved (cf. flying spaghetti monsterism, which also can't be disproved at the moment), but whether the theory can be proved. The evidence supporting ID, according to supporters, is the amazing complexity and functionality of biological organisms. The argument goes, "How is it possible that such incredible creatures could have been created by the simple laws of physics/chemistry and random chance?" And actually, it's a pretty good starting point. Let's see how we might procede from this. If we see a rock in the ground with a pretty design on it, we can ask, "did this occur from natural phenomena, or did a person create this?" The short simple answer, depending on our degree of laziness, might be simply to say, "well, it's so intricate, a person must have created it" and then walk away. The more rigorous approach would be to go deeper into the problem--find an answer via a number of paths: 1. determine a particular natural phenomenon or combination of phenomena that might cause the design to be engraved in the rock; 2. find the people responsible for the creation of the design and ask them to show how they did it; 3. find specialized tools used to create the design. There are converse proof methods associated with these three methods. These three are much harder: 1a. show that no combination of natural phenomena could produce the design; 2a. find all people that might be responsible for the creation of the design and prove that none of them did it; 3a. show that no tool could ever be used to create the design.

All the converse proofs are difficult, if not impossible in practice; however, they may be used in a pinch by your typical rational fellow. For example, if we are wondering about the question: are Indian arrowheads created by people or natural phenomena? People accept they were created by people, I think, only because no-one has found any explanation in natural phenomena for their existence (method 1a), and because none of the other methods of proof (methods 1, 2, and 3 in particular) have yielded any results. Motive is a supporting argument: there is plenty of reason to believe that people would have a reason in exerting so much effort in creating arrowheads. However, motive is *only* a supporting argument--if a natural phenomenon could explain why arrowheads exist, the motive argument would fall by the wayside (why would people go through the trouble of creating arrowheads that are already being produced by nature?)

Let's look at ID and evolution. The ID argument is strictly 1a, and not exhaustive--no natural phenomena can explain the complexity of life; however, ID does not claim to have examined every possible natural phenomenon. This is in direct opposition to evolution, which uses argument method 1: the progress of functionality in life can be explained from natural phenomena. Now, given the choice between a very tentative argument using method 1a and a more solid argument using method 1, I will choose the method 1 argument every time! There are certainly ways of proving ID more solidly (methods 2 and 3)--and I would welcome seeing evidence along those veins.

PS. Some people see long-winded arguments (like the one I present above) as being proof that ID vs. evolution is a controversial topic in science; in fact, it is not. I would also require a long-winded argument to explain why E=mc^2, but that doesn't make it controversial. A more accurate estimate of the degree of contention regarding a topic might be the number of dissenting opinions published in scientific journals. I'm sure someone can come up with stats for this regarding ID vs. evolution.

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ubertuber

Alansmithee and stevo, I'm curious to read your response to this post by Redlemon. Everything I've read from the ID crowd emphasizes the intelligent DESIGN aspect, not the intelligent SPARK or CREATOR aspect. If you are saying that evolution leaves room for a creator to kick start, I'd have to agree with you. However, I don't think what you are defending is the same thing that the ID crowd is promoting. Have I missed something?

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Slavakion

Well, there was the Miller-Urey experiment. They simulated the atmosphere of the young earth and were able to synthesize some amino acids out of organic molecules. It was a pretty big deal. Not exactly creating life, but it lent credence to organic molecules gradually transforming into cells.
There are laws in science. The laws of thermodynamics for instance. It's pretty safe to assume that nobody can disprove those. And if they do, physics will be broken. To prove something in science just takes a ridiculous amount of support and nothing to the contrary.
Well, there are rabid supporters of any side of a debate. I'm a supporter of evolution, but I'll concede that there may have been a deity involved in the origin of the universe. Until there's evidence to the contrary, I'll keep an open mind to that possibility.

Just out of personal experience... I went to a catholic high school for two years and now attend a catholic college. I took plenty of science courses, and they all taught evolution. I don't know when ID first made an appearance, but I never heard a word of it in school. Schools run by conservative christians taught evolution instead of ID or creationism. In fact, the entire biology department at my college publicly opposes ID. What's my point? Just an interesting aside.

jonjon42

ok this is for everyone, the origin of life has nothing to do with evolution it has everything to do with Abiogenesis. Secondly, just because the theory of evolution has flaws does not mean ID is valid. God of the gaps is a silly arguement. Just because we are not sure I do not have a complete puzzle does not mean that don't have an idea of what it is. Also, I would like to add that we have no evidence of ID anywhere but we have a very large fossil record that backs evolution quite well.

Also I would like to add if we were designed, the designer was an idiot. Look at our sinuses and look at our appendix and you'll have some idea of why.

therefore of course I can not support the teaching of ID or stand the "debate"

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maximusveritas

Intelligent design was just a ploy by conservative Christians to get religion into the science classrooms. Most people who support it have very little idea about what it is, much less about what evolution is. It's not real science so it shouldn't be mentioned in the science classroom.

alansmithee

Well, I'll then admit I haven't kept up to date on exactly what ID is currently being promoted as. I've read much more about evolution and abiogenesis than I have about ID. I just assumed ID was forcused more on origins than design. If what you quoted from Redlemon is really true, and not a misrepresentation, I agree that should not be taught in a scientific setting.

But on the other hand, it seems many of the anti-ID crowd sees ID's supporters as nothing but bible-thumping religious freaks, which I also disagree with. They use ID as nothing more than an issue to broad-brush any Christian as an unscientific clod. And that I do disagree wiht.

raveneye

Both these have already been accomplished. We've been able to create perfectly functional, living, evolving viruses in the lab for over a decade now, plus new plant species have been created numerous times that were not capable of reproducing with their progenitors.

The problem here is that no amount of "evidence" can, even in theory, refute the ID hypothesis. That's because ID is supernatural. It is outside and above all natural laws, theories, observation. This allows an ID supporter to say "Whatever you observed was orchestrated by the ID. It's not nature that you're observing or gathering evidence about, its the ID." That's why it's never possible, even in theory, to "disprove" ID. To do so, ID has to contradict natural law. But ID by definition is above and outside natural law, so it has the ability to do anything without contradicting it.

Science is incapable of saying anything whatsoever, pro or con, about a supernatural agency, because that agency operates outside science.

raveneye

By any informal use of the word "fact" evolution as a process is a fact. Both microevolution and macroevolution have been directly observed and verified and replicated so many times that nobody disputes the fact that they exist and occur and always have throughout the history of life.

So you could say that evolution is both theory and fact. It is a set of observations and associated theoretical propositions so overwhelmingly supported that it is treated as fact. It is just as factual as gravitation, which is also a set of overwhelmingly supported theoretical propositions, treated as fact.

Anybody interested in the details can consult any recent college biology textbook.

raveneye

But such a proof of course is impossible. In order to prove anything, you have to assume that logical relationships are being followed. A supernatural agency, by definition, is free to do anything it wants, to follow logical relationships or not follow logical relationships. So anything you observe is consistent with it existing, and is also consistent with it not existing. So there is no way to "prove" anything about any supernatural agency.

Another way of looking at this is that "evolution" and "ID" are logically independent of each other. Nothing about evolution contradicts ID, and nothing about ID contradicts evolution. They are separate but parallel ideas, have their own separate world of relationships, and have absolutely no effect on each other. Everybody is free to "believe" both without any inconsistency whatsoever.

Treating ID as an "alternative" to evolution is a complete misunderstanding of science, of evolution. It is not an alternative, it is an entirely independent idea that has no logical relationship to any scientific theory whatsoever, including to evolution.

That's why ID is not science, and not appropriate to teach in a science class. It is though entirely acceptable to teach it in a humanities class.

rsl12

You quoted the wrong part of my message Raveneye. ID and evolution are in direct opposition to each other.

ID states that biological organsims are too complicated and functional to have arisen solely due to the simple laws of physics/chemistry and random chance.

Evolution states that, over time, biological organisms become increasingly complex and functional due to the simple laws of physics/chemistry and random chance.

You can't have it both ways.

Also: there are certainly ways to prove ID, as described in my previous post.

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Charlatan

ID has *nothing* to do with religion...

OK. Then what are we really talking about then? Would it be safe to say that aliens set the Universe in motion? If ID isn't talking about God then who?

ID belongs in theology class, not in science class.

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raveneye

-- what is not in direct oppositon are the propositions that (1) ID exists and (2) evolution exists, even for any particular biological structure. That's what I was referring to.

-- your propositions above are specific arguments. These specific arguments are in opposition.

-- I don't see anywhere in your post above (which is somewhat confusing to me) where you show how ID is "proven". Are you saying that you can prove ID by showing that no natural agency or combination of agencies whatsoever is capable of producing a particular biological structure in question? How is is possible to do that without complete understanding of every natural agency and every combination of natural agencies and of starting conditions that ever existed anywhere on earth at any time?

-- it is easy to show that natural processes can produce complex biological structures and this has been done admirably for many structures, starting with Darwin. E.g. genomes, proteins, nucleic acids, viruses, organelles, the vertebrate eye. This however has done nothing to silence ID proponents, because of what I was referring to before: ID is not science and there are always ways to continue believing in ID regardless of the outcome of scientific research.

JustJess

It has nothing to do with which theory is more valid. Nothing. The facts are that evolution is a theory based on observable facts, and scientific investigation.

OTOH, ID is about religion, because it adds some sort of supernatural power into the equation. Is it possible? Of course, I'm not omniscient or anything, and neither are any of you. Once we start discussing a supernatural direction of things, it is no longer pure science, it's religion. Whether you refer to it for the initial "spark" of life, or as the direction of the whole schmeer. And religion should stay the hell out of the classroom unless it's a theology or bible class.

It's that simple.

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Redlemon

I wrote that description to be as value-neutral as possible. The eyeball always seems to be the primary ID example. Thanks for agreeing that ID is not suitable for science class.

Here's an excerpt from Wikipedia (which may contain bias, but seems fair to me):
I still fail to see how any form of an intelligent designer can be separated from the concept of a god.

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kutulu

No, no no. Theories and laws are totally separate. The existance of more proof will not elevate evolution from a theory to a law. Nothing will make the theory of evolution into the law of evolution. However, that does not in any way discount the importance or truth of evolution. It's just creationist crap that they spew to people who don't understand science.

The postulation of theories is the end goal of scientific research. To say that evolution is 'just a theory' is actually a compliment to evolution.

kutulu

ID is like science without effort. They encounter a difficulty and suddenly claim that it's too complex to understand. Where would we be now if scientists just gave up and said it's too complex?

raveneye

That's basically it. The ID "hypothesis" in reality doesn't explain anything. I suppose the intelligent designer was designed by another intelligent designer, and so on.

sailor

Precisely. This is probably my biggest problem with ID--it promotes the line of thinking that "well, we can't explain it, it must be attributable to some all-powerful supernatural being." By taking that approach essentially encourages one to never question--if it isnt easily explained, don't bother. Besides, definitions of what's too complex change with time. 1000 years ago, gravity was too complex to explain. 100 years ago, DNA was too complex to explain. Today, to take the classic argument of ID, the eye is too complex to explain. What tomorrow? Saying that just because we can't explain something means that some supernatural being created it is at best ignorant and at worst dangerous. If no one had ever bothered to try to explore and research things that seemed unexplainable, we'd still be living in the stone age.

And then, like everyone else said, it isn't science. And shouldn't be taught as such. If you want to learn about ID, fine, that's your prerogative, but keep it out of the classroom.

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sapiens

Yes! Being a theory is a good thing, not a bad thing.
Great statement!

Superbelt

I just wanted to stop in and say bye to everyone before I die.
Pattie Robertson just told us that God is gunnin' for us.
Maybe a meteor, Terrorist strike. Hurricane or the earth even opening up and sending us straight to hell.
But, York (dover) Pa.. We're going down.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20051110/...n_robertson_dc

raveneye

I guess that settles it, the intelligent designer is God.

Straight from the horse's mouth.

rsl12

You mentioned you were a bit confused by my post, so I hope you won't be offended when I return the emotion: this confuses me. An intellegent designer and a process of improved functionality due to natural selection both exist for any particular biological structure? I still don't see how one can hold the concepts of intelligent design (the designer is responsible for the intricate parts of the machinery) and evolution (natural selection is responsible for the intricate parts of the machinery) to be both valid.

I never said ID was proven--only that, contrary to what you were saying, there could theoretically exist enough evidence to prove to rational folks that there is an intelligent designer responsible for the complexity/functionality of life. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought you were saying that, because ID is a supernatural claim (which, btw, I don't think it is, since aliens could potentially be the 'intelligent designers'), that it is unprovable/unrejectable under any circumstances. I disagree. It is perfectly possible to create a test for a supernatural claim (let's say, a person claiming mind-reading or telekinesis abilities) to determine if the claim is false. Even if no test can be 100% foolproof, enough evidence could be generated to satisfy most rational-thinking individuals. The 'supernaturalness' of ID (which, again, I don't think is really a proper description of ID) has nothing to do with its provability.

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raveneye

If an intelligent designer created the world, including all the natural laws and conditions, then that intelligent designer is as responsible for anything in that world as those natural laws and conditions are. So e.g. the vertebrate eye evolved by natural selection because the intelligent designer created the necessary preconditions for the vertebrate eye to evolve by NS. It would never have evolved without those preconditions, so the ID was responsible for it. The intelligent design idea extends far beyond biology; proponents are using ID to explain all sorts of physical phenomena, such as the geometry of the earth/moon/sun system, the magnitudes of universal physical constants, the beautiful symmetry of mathematical physics. Simply showing that complex biological structures could in theory have evolved by NS (as has been done countless times already) is not sufficient to refute ID.

I understand that; my response is that the evidence outlined in your previous post would seem to be impossible in theory to collect: you would need to have complete, 100% understanding of every natural agency, and every combination of natural agencies, and every combination of initial conditions that ever existed anywhere on earth at any time, in order to "prove" that no natural agency could have been responsible for a structure.

Do you agree that such a proof is impossible? If so, then what other kind of proof would be possible to convince rational folks that an intelligent being designed all forms of life on this planet?

On the supernatural question: clearly any "being" that has control over universal physical constants is outside their realm.

raveneye

Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying.

And a point about the "aliens" idea: that doesn't eliminate the necessity for supernatural agency, because it begs the question: how did the aliens come into existence? Again, the choices are NS/natural agency or supernatural agency.

And if Uri can't bend the spoon in that test, he'll just say that the conditions weren't quite right, or that this time the spoon didn't bend but it became hotter, and too bad the test wasn't designed to measure temperature because it sure did work, etc. That's the thing about supernatural agencies: they don't behave. They're not like gravity which always does exactly what it's supposed to do.

It's the same with ID and creationism: there is no empirical test that is going to corner them; ergo they are not science.

rsl12

I wasn't aware of this, but after a bit of research I see that this is, in fact true. Some proponents of ID see it as encompassing more than just biological aspects. I can see where you're coming from now. Certain aspects of ID could be compatible with evolution.

That being said, I think you'll agree that the biological aspect of ID is the really the meat of the matter--it's what Kansas Board of Education and Flying Spaghetti Monsterists have gotten all excited about! ID proponents are claiming that ID is an alternative theory to evolution--I think it's the ID ideas that are directly in conflict with evolution that are of interest to most people.

not at all. see methods 2 and 3: i would accept, as proof, finding the designers and asking them questions about how they did it, finding specialized tools that were used in the creation of various organs/animals, finding detailed notes regarding the design progress, perhaps with copies of prototypes.

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raveneye

But again, we have the infinite recursion problem: who designed the designers? We're back to where we started from. I can design and create a virus myself in the lab; that doesn't mean that viruses or all life was designed by intelligent beings.

In order for this proof to work, you would have to find a designer for every designer, on out to infinity, correct?

rsl12

Ech, that wouldn't really bother me. If the designers showed me all that proof, I could decide that they were responsible for designing life on earth, even while not understanding how the designers themselves came to be. That would be a question for another day.

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raveneye

Well then I'd say that you haven't at all refuted evolution. If some forms of life can evolve to the point of creating other forms, that certainly doesn't do anything to negate natural selection. In fact exactly that has happened, as people are creating life (viruses) in labs all over the world now as we speak.

rsl12

good point raveneye--it might be possible to prove that life on earth was created via an intelligent designer, but that natural selection is still at work in the universe. However, I think what's in question (at least as far as Kansas Board of Education is concerned) is whether life on earth, and earth alone, was created by evolution or if a designer consciously built some or all of the more complicated parts (or, more accurately, if teaching evidence for only one of these beliefs is being biased). Those two stances cannot exist together.

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rsl12

And I still maintain that supernatural claims can be subject to testing. If Uri Gellar does not manage to bend a spoon in controlled conditions, he may convince himself that it was because there was something wrong with the energy in the room, but the rational-minded folks observing the test may conclude very differently.

What makes a claim untestable stems from other issues: lack of reproducibility, lack of observable and unique repercussions, etc.

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hannukah harry

ID was created solely to conflict with evolution and wedge creationism back into the classroom. that's why people have gotten so excited about it.

ID is about god. the whole 'it could be aliens' thing is just a nice way for the propents of ID to say 'well, uh, it doesn't have to be god... it could be aliens... we don't really talk about the designer anyways.'

so how would you identify the tools used by a god to design life, to design and create a universe? not only that, why would god need tools. according to genisis, he just needed to say 'let there be...'

as to finding the designer, short of god beaming himself down to earth and holding a press conference and magic show, it's not giong to happen.

with uri, we can tell he's full of shit when he fails the test of bending the spoon. but how do we test a supernatural claim when the only people making that claim aren't the source of the supernatural event?

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Willravel

ID was created by God, it was misinterpreted and/or misused to try and take on science by some dudes. It's a misguided attempt to attack something that they fear is attacking them. For those of you clinging onto ID, don't worry about it. God exists and you don't need to get angry that some people are okay with being logical about the world around them. God doesn't want us to force Him onto people. He wants people to accept him openly. God is great in church. Science is great in the lab and at school.
I couldn't agree more. Unless you consider God to be an alien.
Exactly. There are no tools acording to religion. God didn't use a really big phillips screwdriver in Genesis.
I'd totally watch that.
Not bending a spoon, that's for sure.

raveneye

I think the question for the court is simply whether ID is science or religion. It can't be both. For the reasons I've summarized, it is not science.

raveneye

Your position seems to imply then that anyone who believes in God is irrational. That's because there have been countless opportunities for God to reveal his supernatural power in experiments, but it has not happened.

The alternative point of view (mine) is that all these people are indeed rational, and that god/religion is a completely separate realm from science/empiricism, and the two do not affect each other.

On testability, I agree: in order for reproducibility to be possible there has to be theoretical predictions that are borne out by observation. There is no "theory of the supernatural" by definition, therefore there are no predictions, therefore no reproducibility. As soon as there is a "theory of the supernatural" with testable predictions, it is ipso facto no longer supernatural, but part of the natural world.

meembo

Eric Cornell has an essay in the back of the latest TIME magazine (link) that has a nice summation at the end that I've quoted a few times this week:

Stick with the plainest truth: science says nothing about intelligent design, and intelligent design brings nothing to science, and should be taught in theology, not science classes.

That sums it well for me. It defines and resolves the issue in a couple of sentences (as much as an issue like this can be, I suppose).

I think the essay draws an acceptable distinction between the pursuits of science and the pursuit of theology, both very worthy pursuits, in my opinion. I recommend you follow the link above and read the entire essay (not long at all).

BTW, Eric Cornell won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 2001. The essay I refer to is an adaption from a speech he gave for his induction into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

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