So Just How is ID's Supernatural-based Science Supposed to Work? (SUM. MESSAGES ONLY)

Honestly, randman, you shame and embarrass yourself with this sort of feigned ignorance. You have read the Holy Bible, right? Lots of clear and definitive examples of "supernatural" there, so if you don't know what "supernatural" means, then I assume you have no understanding of the Bible whatsoever. I can understand why 3 months have gone by with no reply to this comment of yours, and perhaps I'll come to regret responding to it, but for the moment, I can't help it:Define "Designer". Can you do that without knowing and using the concept of "supernatural"?

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autotelic adj. (of an entity or event) having within itself the purpose of its existence or happening.

On the contrary, the assumption is that a relatively small but highly consistent set of principles has been governing the development of life on Earth since the beginning. Perhaps the claim you make is just a matter of how you define "order".When an unguided and seemingly "accidental" sequence of events over billions of years happens to result in a living species capable of deep thoughts (particularly self-awareness and sensations of intention/purpose), many of the deep thinkers in the species can only assume that there must have been some all-encompassing awareness, intention and purpose that must underlie, motivate and even guide the sequence of events -- for them, that is how the whole thing can be seen as "orderly" (and the intention/purpose, of course, was precisely to create the deep thinkers). This sense of "order" is quite abstract, being based on imagining some sort of creator/controller entity that defies description in any sort of concrete terms; disagreements about the "true" identity, nature and goals of this entity are innumerable, irreconcilable, and quite interminable.Others (the "scientific thinkers") spend their time looking at how things happen, broadening their experience regarding both ongoing and bygone events, figuring out how things work, and putting together pieces of various puzzles. Eventually, gradually, after many attempts, many mistakes, many partial solutions and many changes of mind imposed by new evidence, they arrive at increasingly concise and accurate descriptive methods that encompass the whole sequence of events, showing it to be a natural outcome arising from combinations of known (observed) materials with known (observed) physical processes. This does not limit, devalue or otherwise damage their capacity for deep thought, and certainly does no harm to their sense of intention and purpose. But it does create a very solid and robust sense of an "orderly" world (and universe), one that is reinforced by everything we experience. Again, it hinges on what you consider to be "order", and what you think it means for there to be "alot of order in the world". Bear in mind that the assumed "designer" is not entirely "in the world", and is supposed to be the source of all "order". I wonder: would the ID approach, taken to its "logical" conclusion, entail that the physical world (universe) as we know it is fundamentally nothing but chaos? Without the "designer's" constant meddling, nothing could be counted on to be consistent from one moment to the next... What sort of "order" is that?You are right to point out the tendency for confirmation bias in both camps. The notable difference is: among evos, the bias gets caught and corrected when new evidence becomes available; among IDists, it remains stuck as dogma, with no chartable course for correction -- disagreements about the dogma are resolved by splitting the IDist camp into subgroups having different beliefs, as has always been the case among Jews, Christians, Muslims, etc.

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autotelic adj. (of an entity or event) having within itself the purpose of its existence or happening.

Rather, I gave you a convenient reference where you could look it up. But you are still pretending to be stupid, so I'll play along and try to spell it out clearly. Let's try an explanation based on a relevant example:A doctor and a preacher witness a couple being married in a religious ceremony; later they observe this same couple attending church. Within a few months, they see that the woman is pregnant. The preacher asserts, based on being a spiritual guide for the couple, that the pregnancy is a gift given to the couple by the deity they have been worshipping. The doctor asserts, based on deduction from knowledge about similar events -- and on the basis of seeing the woman as his patient -- that the couple has had sexual intercourse and the man's sperm happened to encounter a viable egg, which subsequently began to develop as a fetus in the woman's womb. In due time, the baby is born with a serious disability that proves fatal within days. The preacher asserts that this was either a punishment or a test of faith and resolve, visited on the couple by the deity. The doctor asserts that the husband and wife both carry genetic traits that, when combined in conception, produce the fatal ailment.The preacher's explanations are "supernatural", because the influence of the deity is not directly observable or confirmable by any clear-cut means of factual discovery. His explanations are also prone to be categorically wrong, except in the eyes of those he can convince to believe him. Basing future actions and expectations on the preacher's explanations is likely to be problematic, whereas basing them on the doctor's explanations is much more likely to avert future problems.Anyway, now let's look at how you tried to answer my question [define "designer"]: The only things that are meaningful by definition "from a scientific perspective" are the numeric digits, arithmetic operators, values like pi, e, i, the basic units of measure, and the basic properties that are measured (distance, volume, mass, time, speed, force, etc). Everything else must be observable in order to be meaningful. It is possible (and always a good idea) to define terms that apply to observable things, and such definitions, in order to be meaningful, must ultimately include the stuff that is "meaningful by definition" -- that is, refer to the rigid numeric and logical conventions for measuring observable things.So if God is real, and granting that God is not comprised solely of digits, arithmetic operators, special numeric values, and/or basic units/properties of measure, then in what way should God (or maybe just the "effects of the designer") be observable and measurable? There is still no answer to my request for a definition of "designer" in terms that are not supernatural. This is the crux of the OP: how is this "concept of God" supposed to work "in a scientific perspective"?If you're saying it's just a matter of time before we figure out what technology is needed and how to use it in order to make the necessary measurements, well, I'm not holding my breath for that, but any further reply along that line should include some details, don't you think?Of course, if someone ever does propose a detailed method for measuring or otherwise observing the effects of a designer -- that is, a prediction can be made of an outcome that would support this hypothesis -- there's a chance that the actual observation would come out negative, yielding no support.You have introduced the phrase "supernatural is not a scientific term" as a subtitle, which I quite agree with, and you have posed the conditional premise, "If God is real..." Will you be ready to accept the consequences of a negative result and move on from there? Every scientist must be prepared for that sort of outcome: a given hypothesis finds no supporting evidence, so move on to other hypotheses.

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autotelic adj. (of an entity or event) having within itself the purpose of its existence or happening.

You misunderstand me (still): I "appealed" to the bible because I assume you accept it as a usable reference and because it provides lots of clear examples that help to define "supernatural". I do not consider the "definition of supernatural" to be a scientific question at all -- science deals only with what is "natural", i.e. consistently explainable on the basis of observable and confirmable evidence. Of course not. There's virtually nothing in the bible that is applicable to a "scientific perspective". I'm saying (again) that the bible provides many clear examples of events with supernatural properties (things that would be properly deemed physically impossible, based on thousands of years of objective observations of the world), and supernatural causes (things that happened specifically because the unseen God made them happen).These are things (such as the global flood or the Tower of Babel) that science would never even attempt to explain, because all the objective evidence that science has gathered over the centuries makes it clear that these things really did NOT happen. We've only read about these things in the bible (and we've read similar stories from other mythological traditions from roughly the same epoch and region), and that's because someone wrote them down based on oral folklore (or divine inspiration, if you prefer), rather than on direct observation. And I would say that you are dishing out double-speak. You are arranging your nouns and conjunctions to put things together (like "God" and "real", "supernatural" and "science") that simply do not belong together in any objective discourse. Your sense of semantics has been distorted by equivocation to the point of being meaningless. And that is why it is a mistake to firmly believe, in contradiction to ample evidence, that all assertions in the bible must be taken as literal, historical fact, because this cannot be true for all assertions in the bible. If instead you take these counter-factual assertions as being symbolic or allegorical or metaphorical or "archaic and outdated hence not currently applicable or useful" or whatever, you have a much better opportunity for deriving more meaning and value from the text, while still having the benefit of knowing and accepting reality for what it really is.The bible serves well as a record of religious belief and doctrine, and there is value in that. It does not serve very well as a scientific or historical reference -- this is especially true for its opening chapters. Yeah, IF... (... a big if ...)But you have to face this: the "supernatural" does not exist "from a science perspective". It is only "part of the real and natural world" from your own subjective, personal point of view, which others do not share, and which science cannot explain (except perhaps by reference to psychological peculiarities).As for the intertwining of spiritual and physical worlds and principles, that certainly is the bible's domain, and I have no problem with that -- if it works for you, I'm glad -- but don't expect that it can be connected in any way with science. That is decidedly outside of science's domain, and science will neither help nor hinder anyone's beliefs in that matter.Edited by Otto Tellick, : minor grammar repair

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autotelic adj. (of an entity or event) having within itself the purpose of its existence or happening.