Intelligent design

[goku]

they had to make those comments about the sea turtles because they believe the evolutionary theory is correct. everything has to fit the theory. if it can't fit the theory it is brushed under the rug.

[TRoutMac]

they had to make those comments about the sea turtles because they believe the evolutionary theory is correct. everything has to fit the theory. if it can't fit the theory it is brushed under the rug.

 

Right. And they call this "science". That's a heckuva a way to spell "fraud".

[Edge]

Excuse me, but it seems to me that you people are grasping at straws or nitpicking in order to disprove evolution. Not all species have to evolve... just like not everything is a result of specified design. (Unless, the creator wanted those undirected processes to ocurr, meh)

 

Anyway, on morals. We already have a thread discussing it. In my opinion, we created morality, we just don't handle them in a proper way, though.

 

Click to see thread.

 

they had to make those comments about the sea turtles because they believe the evolutionary theory is correct. everything has to fit the theory. if it can't fit the theory it is brushed under the rug.

Most creationists do the same thing. They even challengue evolution with the 2nd law of Thermodynamics. Those creationists try to fit everything with their interpretation of the Bible. If the Universe is scientifically seen as billion years old is because god is testing our faith, if there are dinosaurs' fossils is because god is testing our faith, is the Earth is estimated to be millions years old is because everything scientists are doing is wrong... (notice how if scientists make improvements in medicine, engineering, astronomy, etc. they are all for science. Yet, if scientists find evidence that Evolution is happening or that the Earth is million years old is because they are biased)... creationists are doing the same thing you say evolution scientists do.

 

The only difference? Evolution has evidence to back it up...

 

The Intelligent Design crowd seems much more prepared, tough, they are quite careful in what they are willing to state.

 

By the way, TRoutMac, I have searched around it, and found a website that states that the speed of light is constant, or that the claims made by creationists are wrong.

 

http://www.godandscience.org/youngearth/speedlight.html

 

The evidence presented to state this is unconvincing. And notice that I used a religious-biased website.

[Boerseun]

Evolutionists, Intelligent Designers, Countrymen - Lend me your ears:

 

This is one heck of a thread. Sizewise.

 

I went through it now - took me couple 'o hours, lemme tell you.

 

And what I found is that quite a few arguments (from both sides) gets reheated, recooked, and presented again in an endless cycle of leftover-servings. This might be that both ID'ers and evolutionists seems to suffer from a terminal case of lastwordalytis.

 

Any newcomer to this thread is gonna have a hard time catching up. But because of the size of this elephantine thread, it's quite unreasonable to expect anybody to go through this mission to make a worthy contribution at the end of it.

 

There's one of a few things we can do:

 

1) Keep it running as is, and not expect the thread to go anywhere.

2) Scan the thread for topics going in several different directions, and make new threads for those topics, and THOSE TOPICS ALONE. Contributors to those topics should understand not to digress - if they want to go beyond those points, there will be other, more compact threads dealing with those issues.

3) Understand the fact that this thread has devolved into a question of ID'ers trying to convert evolutionists, and vice versa - and understand the fact that this isn't gonna happen. Period. Id'ers and evolutionists on this specific thread should 'agree to disagree'; otherwise we'll be here for the next ten million posts.

4) Reach a conclusion and close the thread. (The conclusion part seems a bit unlikely, though - unless we use 3 as a conclusion to this particular matter).

5) Open two threads: One for ID evidence, one for evolution evidence. This evidence should fit all the requirements for proper scientific evidence. Any postings on evidence that doesn't fit the science bill will be removed. And then have a third thread where we discuss the validity of it, referring to evidence as posted in the two evidence-threads. Comment-posts are not to be made in the evidence threads. This third thread will be rigorously patrolled for personal attacks, flaming, general behaviour, and argumentative logic. This is just a thought, though.

6) Any suggestions?

 

Keep in mind - this specific post is neutral regarding the issue; I just think that we are busy giving birth to an elephant here.

[Edge]

I agree, there should be two threads, one for positive evidence that helps Evolution and one for positive evidence that helps Intelligent Design. Only positive evidence...

[goku]

the mullet has spoken, may it be so :confused:

[ldsoftwaresteve]

TroutMac:

No, this is a silly statement. Silly because you're claiming it as fact and yet you have nothing to base that fact on but faith. Faith that we have created our notion of morality; faith that it was not handed to us. It's just your opinion, stated as though it were a fact, as though you have some authority on the matter.

Well, aside from the fact that I like you (which is my choice and my responsibility and a fact), I have to say the only hole in your logic is on this point. Every other weakness is a construct sitting atop this particular brick.

Morality is chosen. That makes it my responsibility and I accept the outcome of my choices. That also implies options and by definition they'd have to come from somewhere. If I don't like any of the options, I'll make up my own - why? because that's one of my responsibilities as a man. Arrogance has nothing to do with it. I need to survive.

The bottom line is that we must, because of our nature (whether designed or accidental), identify the proper rules of conduct for dealing with others and with ourselves.

Religion pre-empts self-esteem and bases it upon an act of humility. I accept no higher authority than my own conscience because I have to live with me every single day. We need a religion that allows us to stand upright, one that is not based upon a contradiction in terms.

[TRoutMac]

4) Reach a conclusion and close the thread. (The conclusion part seems a bit unlikely, though - unless we use 3 as a conclusion to this particular matter).

 

Well, the originator of this thread asked 2 questions:

 

1) Does ID make any predictions and if so, what are they?

2) Is ID testable, and if so, how?

 

With regard to question 1, I listed a handful of predictions, one of which was:

 

The genetic code will NOT contain discarded genetic baggage code or functionless "junk DNA".

 

And Erasmus conceded:

Now we have a geniune difference, and a geniune experiment. If every single bit of junk DNA (or even 95% or so of it) turns out to have a use, then yes, intelligent design is quite a reasonable theory.

 

By virtue of the fact that an apparent "hardened" Darwinist such as Erasmus accepts that ID makes at least ONE prediction, I contend that the first question was answered in the affirmative, and adequately explained.

 

With regard to question 2, I listed several tests for ID and pgrmdave conceded that:

 

Intelligent design would be disproved if we could show that complex information can arise from less complex information. If we could show that simple information can, using only itself, rearrange itself into more complex information then Intelligent Design would be disproved, or at least greatly weakened.

 

By virtue of the fact that a faithful evolutionist like pgrmdave acknowledges the existence of at least ONE test for ID, I contend that the second question was answered in the affirmative, as well.

 

Although it's true that there were other tests and predictions that all of you rejected, two of you independently conceded one test and one prediction, which forces the following conclusions:

 

1) ID makes at least ONE prediction

2) There is at least ONE test for ID

 

Therefore…

 

3) ID is a legitimate scientific theory.

 

Not exactly the conclusion you wanted, is it?

[pgrmdave]

I agree TRoutMac, Intelligent Design may be considered a scientific theory as such. That doesn't mean that it is right, or correct, or that it should be taught, but that it is a scientific theory, similar to Geocentrism being a scientific theory.

 

As I started this thread, I think that I should end it with the conclusion that I have come to through this thread and through the (mostly) civil discussions that have gone on in here.

 

Intelligent Design asks a simple question, why is organic material given special consideration over inorganic material? When we discover inorganic material that seems to fit certain patterns, we assume that it was created by something, and go about trying to show that something. Assume that we found the Easter Island statues on Mars - we would try to discover how they occured, first by looking for intelligence. Yes, it would be possible for them to occur naturally, but it would not be our first thought.

 

With life, we assume that it must be due to natural forces, without considering an intelligence. But what if we did consider that since it looks like it was intelligently designed, that it was intelligently designed? I struggled with this question for a week until I came to what I hope is a good conclusion.

 

I first had to define intelligence - it cannot really be defined by a brain, but by the system of the brain. Not only is the brain a simple pattern, but it is a system with feedback that both affects its environment and is affected by its environment. As such, a single species can be seen as this system, as it affects its environment, and then is affected by its environment. But no species exists in isolation, it is even more complex than a brain. Not only do we have all these species interacting, but the organisms that are weaker die off. That adds even more complexity to the equation. The brain seems simple in comparison to the complexity of the interactions of species.

 

Thinking about the above, I must think that the system of life itself is the intelligence that supporters of Intelligent Design rightly see. And I think that evolution is true, both 'micro' and 'macro'.

 

Thank you, to both sides, for helping me understand both sides better, and come to a conclusion that, at least for now, is satisfactory.

[Pyrotex]

Who cares? You may as well ask us what kind of ice cream we like, for all the relevance it has to the subject. What, now "legitimate science" to you must include fortune-telling?...

The ability to demonstrate that a theory has "prediction value" is at the very heart of science. "Predictive value" is totally relevant to the subject.

...I.D. could be disproven, or at least "non-supported", if no similarities could be found between the things that humans with intelligence produce and the systems which are found in living organisms.

Science is not based on "similarities". Similarity is a subjective quality. I can show you similarities between the New Testament and Aesop's Fables. So what?

...I can fully understand why Darwinists wish to pretend we've never answered this question....We know quite a bit about this [DNA]…Man is intelligent, these are things intelligence produces, and within the living cell we find precisely the same thing (albeit in a different form)....

No, actually you can't understand the "darwinist" point of view or you wouldn't be so dogmatic. So, your "logic" goes like this: Man is intelligent and he uses languages to describe things; DNA is a language and describes things; therefore DNA is evidence for an intelligent language-user. Is that fair?

 

The weak link in this "logic" is that you call DNA a "language"; that word necessarily implies intelligence, so you have circular logic. You are assuming the very thing you wish to demonstrate when you call DNA a "language".

 

DNA is a molecule. Let's get very careful about our wording here, so we can avoid fallacies. DNA is Deoxy Ribonucleic Acid. Molecules form all the time, everywhere in the universe. DNA forms all the time, at least on Earth. DNA is NOT a "transmitted language", ie, a means of sentient-to-sentient communication. It is NOT a "transcribed language", ie, a means of recording arbitrary information. It IS a language only in the sense that it provides a sequence of datapoints that control a natural process. We call this process, "reproduction".

 

In other words, DNA is <<data>>. It is information that has been biologically encoded at a molecular level. This is not a unique phenomenon. Trees record data in their tree rings. Humans are able to decode huge amounts of climatological and ecosystem data from measuring tree rings. Does this mean that trees are intelligent?

 

Living (and non-living) systems often leave encoded information behind. Sometimes it is chemical, sometimes fossilized, sometimes encoded in physical patterns. Atoms contain information in the configuration of their electrons. Galaxies contain information in their shapes and spectra.

 

If DNA were like "letters" written in an "ink" on sheepskins or paper, it would be obvious that we have an "artificed" language. But we can watch under the microscope and see RNA strands from two parents combine into a DNA molecule, which IF inserted into the right bio-chemical environment, will control the process of reproduction. This is all chemistry. Atoms hanging onto each other, atoms colliding, energy levels, electron exchanges--all natural chemistry which goes on all the time. Neither the sources nor the recipients of this chemical "code" are sentient--they are as mindless as a virus, a fleck of algae, a drop of rain.

 

The problem of the origin of DNA is very complicated and we have not answered it yet. I grant you that. But all that means is: we have not answered it yet. It is a mystery. I grant you that. But that cannot be MADE to mean that Divine Intervention is involved.

 

Do you know how much change I have in my pocket? No? It's a mystery, yes? Does that mean that Divine Intervention put it in my pocket?