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Author | Topic: Questions for William Dembski | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Modulous Member Posts: 7801 From: Manchester, UK Joined: |
If I was to meet someone like Dembski and was afforded the opportunity to ask him anything it would be to ask about implementation of the design and if any work was being done to detect implementation of design.
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Cold Foreign Object  Suspended Member (Idle past 3073 days) Posts: 3417 Joined: |
The lecture includes a Q&A session towards the end How do you know this? Theist scholars do not usually allow questions from inferior persons. Questioning presupposes superiority, that is, the superior questions the inferior. I doubt that a person like you will get a chance to question the superior. If you want to ask Dembski a question then go over to his site and ask him (Uncommon Descent). Ray
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Chiroptera Inactive Member |
Theist scholars do not usually allow questions from inferior persons. I can understand why. It must be embarrassing when an "inferior" knows more about the subject than the so-called "scholar". I could tell you what I've read about evolution, the big-bang, super-universes, quantum foam, and all that stuff. Eventually you'd ask a question I can't answer, then I'd have to go look it up. Even If I had the time for that shit, in the end you'd ask a question science hasn't answered yet. So let's save time and skip ahead to "I don't know." -- jhuger
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Dr Adequate Member (Idle past 310 days) Posts: 16113 Joined: |
Theist scholars do not usually allow questions from inferior persons. If by "theist scholars" you mean "theist scholars", then this is an oddly-phrased libel on theist scholars; but if, as I suspect, you mean "creationists" then I don't suppose that your assertion has ever been put to the test --- where would a creationist find an inferior?
Questioning presupposes superiority. What a lot of lies you tell, to be sure.
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Admin Director Posts: 13032 From: EvC Forum Joined: Member Rating: 2.1 |
If one can't think of a constructive response, it is better to say nothing at all.
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sidelined Member (Idle past 5934 days) Posts: 3435 From: Edmonton Alberta Canada Joined: |
Cold Foreign Object
Theist scholars do not usually allow questions from inferior persons. That makes sense if they wish to keep hidden the man behind the curtain.
Questioning presupposes superiority, that is, the superior questions the inferior. I doubt that a person like you will get a chance to question the superior. What a croc! Questioning has nothing to do with superiority or inferiority , it has to do with understanding by inquiry.It does not matter who the person is on a given topic questioning is to be encouraged as it is the means by which the validity of an arguement is tested.A person who merely relies on their level of education or their reputation as support for a position is not a sensible fellow and should know better in the first place. It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.
Charles Darwin
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taylor_31 Member (Idle past 5949 days) Posts: 86 From: Oklahoma! Joined: |
The lecture was last night and lasted about one hour. The Q&A session lasted two full hours; there was quite a long line to ask questions. Due to the large number of people, I decided to sit back and enjoy the show.
Overall, I was very unimpressed with Dr. Dembski's representation of intelligent design. He pointed out two examples of "irreducible complexity": the bacteria flagellum and the pathway from DNA to protein production ("every step is necessary, and could NOT have evolved"). Also, he also had a long, convoluted process for detecting design through pattern recognition and other criteria. But I don't see why a few examples of unexplained phenomena is devastating to evolution, especially when it appears that science is making headway on those examples without invoking a designer. And his process may indeed detect "design" in biological systems; but I never understood how this process dismantles evolutionary theory, because evolution explains the illusion of design with naturalistic processes. It seemed to me to be a sexed-up version of Paley's watchmaker argument, designed to persuade the layman with dense and impressive-sounding terminology. My favorite moment was when a professor from our school - a man who has spent thirty years researching the bacteria flagellum, according to one of his students - offered to explain the evolution of the flagellum, offsetting stuttering protests from Dembski and wild cheers from the crowd. Dembski was forced to put the slide of the flagellum back up on the wall, and the professor explained to him the four steps of the flagellum evolution, and answered every one of Dembski's objections with a factual statement. Eventually, a red-faced Dembski said in a panicky voice that he wouldn't believe it until he saw "every step", and that the scientist had only added "two more islands between Los Angeles and Tokyo". This was an extremely revealing exchange for me. It showed that Dembski is employing a simple "God of the gaps" theory; it also showed that Dembski is not a scientist and that he borrows outdated work from other, more scientifically trained individuals; and it showed that normal, evolutionary-based biology is making progress on these difficult questions, without the "revelation" of intelligent design. I was quite proud of our professor. I was glad that Dr. Dembski came to our university, but he showed absolutely nothing that convinced me of intelligent design; in fact, I walked away more confident than ever of evolutionary theory and its explanatory power.
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arachnophilia Member (Idle past 1370 days) Posts: 9069 From: god's waiting room Joined: |
It seemed to me to be a sexed-up version of Paley's watchmaker argument, designed to persuade the layman with dense and impressive-sounding terminology. "seems?" nay, it is. i know not seems.
My favorite moment was when a professor from our school - a man who has spent thirty years researching the bacteria flagellum, according to one of his students - offered to explain the evolution of the flagellum, offsetting stuttering protests from Dembski and wild cheers from the crowd. Dembski was forced to put the slide of the flagellum back up on the wall, and the professor explained to him the four steps of the flagellum evolution, and answered every one of Dembski's objections with a factual statement. Eventually, a red-faced Dembski said in a panicky voice that he wouldn't believe it until he saw "every step", and that the scientist had only added "two more islands between Los Angeles and Tokyo". This was an extremely revealing exchange for me. It showed that Dembski is employing a simple "God of the gaps" theory; it also showed that Dembski is not a scientist and that he borrows outdated work from other, more scientifically trained individuals; and it showed that normal, evolutionary-based biology is making progress on these difficult questions, without the "revelation" of intelligent design. I was quite proud of our professor. oh, man, i seriously hope someone had a camera and puts that on youtube. i wish i'd been there for that one!
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Taz Member (Idle past 3317 days) Posts: 5069 From: Zerus Joined: |
arachnophilia writes:
Well, I would have traded my arm to be there. i wish i'd been there for that one! Disclaimer: Occasionally, owing to the deficiency of the English language, I have used he/him/his meaning he or she/him or her/his or her in order to avoid awkwardness of style. He, him, and his are not intended as exclusively masculine pronouns. They may refer to either sex or to both sexes!
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Modulous Member Posts: 7801 From: Manchester, UK Joined: |
oh, man, i seriously hope someone had a camera and puts that on youtube. i wish i'd been there for that one! IT was recorded. PZ Myers wrote this about the event:
quote: There is a rough link to a transcript (as it happened) to the ripping here quote: The recording isn't up yet, but this person has apparently done an audio recording and will hopefully post it. Meantime there is this to read: And finally, a link to the professor who made the night so successful.
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bluegenes Member (Idle past 2503 days) Posts: 3119 From: U.K. Joined: |
Thanks for the account, taylor. As a matter of interest, did you manage to get a question in, and if so, what was it, and what was the answer?
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nator Member (Idle past 2196 days) Posts: 12961 From: Ann Arbor Joined: |
quote: Wha? What kind of school did you go to where the students were not permitted to ask the teacher questions? Anyway, questioning each other's results and hypotheses is what scientists do, Ray. A scientist should start worrying for her job if her collegues stop having enough interest in her work that they stop challenging it with rigorous questioning.
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Zhimbo Member (Idle past 6037 days) Posts: 571 From: New Hampshire, USA Joined: |
quote: Ding ding ding! You win the prize! Actually, it's considerably less sexy; the eye (Paley's fave example) is much cooler and easier to talk about than blood clotting cascades.
quote: And here Dembski tips his hand completely as a "God of the Gaps" proponent. Of course, he starts by maintaining there were NOT any islands between L.A. and Tokyo...but when shown to be wrong, he now says that every intervening step just creates more gaps, the classic "God of the Gaps" response. As a side note, the "L.A. to Tokyo" schtick is an interesting rhetorical choice on his part, because we know there are wide expanses of ocean between the real L.A. and Tokyo. He could just as easily have chosen Key West and Florida, but that wouldn't bias people's intuitions nearly as much, would it?
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taylor_31 Member (Idle past 5949 days) Posts: 86 From: Oklahoma! Joined: |
Thanks for the account, taylor. As a matter of interest, did you manage to get a question in, and if so, what was it, and what was the answer? The line for questioning was so long that I decided to simply watch. The Q&A session was supposed to have lasted forty minutes, and it was twice as long as the actual lecture! (And it was far more interesting.) I have to give Dr. Dembski some credit: He has some thick skin. If I had been up there taking a hammering like he was, I would have ran off the stage in tears. (Then again, if I was deliberately misleading the public on scientific affairs, I would definitely deserve it.) He also, to my surprise, waited until the entire questioning line was empty. Even if the answers were pretty crappy, at least he didn't run and hide from the questions. But overall, I was not very impressed with him. He came across as intelligent but rather arrogant, like someone who always believes that they are right and everyone else is wrong. Indeed, I think in fifty years he'll still be out there somewhere, preaching his message of intelligent design to some zealous church or youth group.
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Minnemooseus Member Posts: 3945 From: Duluth, Minnesota, U.S. (West end of Lake Superior) Joined: Member Rating: 10.0 |
But I don't see why a few examples of unexplained phenomena is devastating to evolution, especially when it appears that science is making headway on those examples without invoking a designer. Those of the Discovery Institute (DI) are generally vague about how their design details fit into the big picture. They won't take any stand on the age of the Earth. And seemingly, they refuse to admit that their design considerations are (at best) details in what is mainstream evolutionary theory. Personally, I prefer "God in the details" over "God of the gaps". Dembski is citing Michael Behe material. Behe is, IMO, a theistic evolutionist, accepting the bulk of the mainstream theory of (biological) evolution. Dembski would seem to be the same. Their "design" is trying to document God having, at least to some small degree, guided evolution. The DI seems to want to have it both ways - They are essentially old Earth evolutionists, but they don't want to disassociate and/or alienate themselves from the young Earth creationist (YEC) ID crowd. Moose Professor, geology, Whatsamatta U Evolution - Changes in the environment, caused by the interactions of the components of the environment. "Do not meddle in the affairs of cats, for they are subtle and will piss on your computer." - Bruce Graham "The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness." - John Kenneth Galbraith "Nixon was a professional politician, and I despised everything he stood for ” but if he were running for president this year against the evil Bush-Cheney gang, I would happily vote for him." - Hunter S. Thompson "I know a little about a lot of things, and a lot about a few things, but I'm highly ignorant about everything." - Moose
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