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Author | Topic: abiogenesis | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
marc9000 Member Posts: 1522 From: Ky U.S. Joined: Member Rating: 1.4 |
Actually, Talkorigins is an archive, not a website "made up of many scientists". Also, could you provide me a reference that shows thtat a large part of the scientific community regard it as a scientific website? Why sure! Talk Origins Archive Awards Page
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marc9000 Member Posts: 1522 From: Ky U.S. Joined: Member Rating: 1.4 |
Hello
I'm in agreement with the above posters that the link provided is simply wrong at best, and intentionally misleading on some points. There is also virtually nothing on the link provided which would give me any insight into the qualifications of the author(s) and/or any research papers or other sources to support their suppositions. I would make one other point: The main page's subtitle is "A Resource for a Reasoned, Respectful, and Ready Defence of the Christian Faith". What does the "Christian Faith" have to do with biology, and why do they feel the need to "defend" that faith from objective scientific research? I'll answer that for you: because their faith is contradicted by the evidence of objective scientific research. A better answer would be, because their faith is under political attack, and scientific research is the weapon being used.
I expanded on the PAH World Hypothesis to give you an example of the explanatory power of a real hypothesis. My brief (1 paragraph) paraphrasing of source material provided (hopefully) most of the main points. I then asked you if you could expand on ID to give us an example of its explanatory power in helping to understand the world around us, to which you replied: quote: As do the rest of us marc. But if you can find the time to say things like this (from your original post) ... quote: ... then you should be prepared to support those comments with some form of evidence. We are all also busy people. Just from my observations, from people I personally know, and my experiences in observing posting times, dates, and habits of posters, shows me that many people who frequent message boards such as this one often come from certain groups of people that have more time on their hands than most. Young people — mid teens or even early teens, as well as physically disabled people or retired people. There’s not a thing wrong with that, but they naturally may tend to get a little impatient with someone in the prime of their working career who disappears for several days at a time — it can be perceived as a weakness. I usually have time to post only in the evenings, and not all of them. I’ve been opposed by several in the past as a group[not here] and been taunted for missing just one or two evenings, as the new posts from different angles continued to pile up. I made the mistake of allowing myself to be rushed, and it resulted in less than my best, and I want to try to improve on that here. RAZD and you have both indicated that it’s not a problem. I’m just saying this as a response to what you said above, and also to make it clear to anyone who may be used to a more day-by-day exchanges, that discussions with me may not be what they’re looking for.
Not good enough. You may say "you're asking a lot" - but you are the one that implied in your original post that ID's propositions are as scientific as abiogenesis hypotheses, so I'm simply asking you to support this proposition with an example. The fact that you don't have an example off the top of your head is cause for concern, considering that despite this you seem convinced that ID is something that should be taught in schools. With that sort of conviction, I would expect you to be able to provide even a small example of ID helping to explain or understand abiogenesis (or anything for that matter). But you cannot. I challenge you - with no time limit - to give us ANY example of an ID hypothesis (or anything!) that is of any value in explaining or understanding anything. If the claim is that ID is of no value in explaining or understanding anything, do you claim that everything studied/taught as science must be able to show that value? Would you consider the hypothesis that extraterrestrial intelligence exists to be of value in explaining/understanding anything? Considering the history and activity of The SETI Institute, it seems that a search for intelligence outside of human intelligence isn’t always off limits to science. 404
quote: This obviously isn’t first level, primary science, but in the ‘frequently asked questions’ section, we find the following;
quote: Why can’t intelligent design be an interdisciplinary science for both evolution and abiogenesis, that adds to exploration and searches for function and complexity that are currently only searched for by naturalistic forces that consist of only randomness/clumsiness/incompetence? There’s more to ID than goddidit — in Dembski’s words; ID supplements material mechanisms with intelligent agency — intelligent design can subsume present biological research. Even efforts to overturn the various criteria for detecting design are welcome within the intelligent design research program. (That’s part of keeping the program honest.) Intelligent design can also look for function as a heuristic for guiding research, inspiring biologists to look for engineering solutions to biological problems that might otherwise escape them. Also, Design is always a matter of tradeoffs. ID can help us understand these tradeoffs and clarify the design problems that organisms actually face. This in turn keeps us from sweeping problems under the rug simply because evolution is purported to be a blind and wasteful process. A non teleological approach to evolution has consistently led biologists to underestimate organisms. Is, for instance, junk DNA really junk? Work by John Bodnar and his associates suggests that some of it is not.
At the risk of sounding rude, you're right - off topic and not relevant. The next 3 paragraphs consist of nothing more than you chatting to us about what kind of guy you are and what you think. The one thing I gleaned from this is that you, like others, have this odd notion that people "worship" science. What's that about? It’s about accepting what the scientific community tells them without question. It’s about scientific education being bent in such a way as to not inspire questions, or open inquiry. In 2007, Michael Behe stated that On the origin of the cilium/IFT by random mutation, Darwinian theory has little that is serious to say. It is reasonable to conclude then, that Darwinian theory is a poor framework for understanding the origin of the cilium. The cilium is no fluke. The cell is full of structures whose complexity is substantially greater than we knew just ten years ago. Can mutation of DNA explain this? Or rather, can random mutation explain it? Life descended from a common ancestor, so DNA did mutate — change from species to species. But what drove the crucial changes? The SETI Institute searches for signs of intelligence. If it receives a clear signal from space indicating intelligence, does it have to be disregarded until the source can be identified? The ID organization searches for signs of intelligence in biology. If they find an example of it, do objective scientists really have anything to be afraid of?
I can assure you that I do not awake in the morning and annoint myself with Dawkins' oil, or pray to my copy of "Life: An Unauthorised Biography" by Richard Fortey. As I can assure you that I don’t seek to have my personal religion taught as science, and I don’t think the earth is flat. You don’t accuse me of that, but others do, and I hope for the sake of how it makes THEM look that they’ll knock it off.
quote: What? I'm trying desperately to understand the point you are trying to make here. If there is one, but I cannot find it. The fact that evidence is piling up of water on the moon IS an amazing discovery - one that has been predicted and expected by many - the fact that the evidence is becoming concrete is exciting. What's this got to do with abiogenesis or ID? Sorry for not being clear. I’m saying that if water on the moon is surprising to the scientific community, I don’t automatically accept as fact their proclamations about what’s going on in deep space, at unimaginable distances. It seems that a lot of what the scientific community proclaims is not falsifiable, something that is often required of subjects the scientific community doesn’t like.
quote: Eh? Would you expect to see revisions? Would you expect there to suddenly be a galaxy where there wasn't one before? Why? And if not, then what is the point of this comment? The Hubble is utilised to great benefit, and to imply that scientists utilising it are sitting around twiddling their thumbs saying "Nope, nothing new today" (if that was your intended implication, hard to tell) - is just ridiculous. I shouldn’t have brought it up, but now that I have, I’ll clarify it as briefly as possible, then be done with it. I’m saying they might be seeing a galaxy hundreds of billions of light years away, or they may be seeing a star similar to our sun one or two light years away, with dust around it. If all these foreheads are being smacked about water on the moon, I tend to not readily accept what they tell me about billions of light years. I was 15 in 1969, and dutifully believed we put men on the moon, at least until 30 more years went by, when I began to wonder if there was ever going to be any follow up on it. It was then that I saw a newspaper article where NASA said that if we were going back to the moon, the whole thing would have to be done over from scratch. All drawings and information about Apollo were lost, and two guys were laid off from NASA years ago — the only two who knew anything about the rocket boosters used. Then came the Percy/Collier vids, which implied that the whole thing was faked anyway. I don’t know or care if it was or wasn’t, but either way it was little more than a political stunt, for feel-goods about JFK (the one who predicted it would happen) and of course to beat Russia to the moon. If we’re only just now finding water there, obviously we got little return on our investment of the millions we spent on the Apollo program. We live in a world of sales and marketing. I believe what the scientific community claims about as quickly as I believe a politician or used car salesman.
(PS - don't be offended by the snippy nature of my comments. As you've seen, others are far worse. I have only become "snippy" now because I feel that you haven't even tried to support the comments made in your original post. Despite this, I am grateful for your participation in the discussion and hope you will continue.) Not a problem - directness is a good thing!
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marc9000 Member Posts: 1522 From: Ky U.S. Joined: Member Rating: 1.4 |
But I would guess that you are not concerned so much about global warming or many of the other things science is working on as about your religious beliefs not being either accepted or confirmed--or, horrors, being contradicted--by science. I'm honestly not worried about my personal religious beliefs. I don't necessarily believe in a young earth, but am not convinced the earth is billions of years old either. I don't really care about things like that. Behe believes in common descent - I don't. A study of ID being permitted to be on the same level as SETI won't forward my personal beliefs at all. It will do one thing - challenge the current godless evolution establishment, and they NEED a challenge!
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marc9000 Member Posts: 1522 From: Ky U.S. Joined: Member Rating: 1.4 |
RAZD writes: Bluejay writes: Message 104: To fit the definition of "science," an idea must contain (1) valid logical reasoning, (2) evidence that supports the possibility that it is accurate, and (3) a lack of evidence contradicting the possibility that it is accurate. This is a good relatively low bar level to start with, would you not agree? I don’t know, there have been so many in this thread so far, yet none of them have clearly specified what I’ve seen required of ID more than any other before I came here, the testable, repeatable, observable, falsifiable, useful requirements. Let’s review all of the variety that this thread has had so far;From your message 11; quote: You added to that in your message 59;
quote: And then from Coyote, message 61;
quote: From Iblis, message 67;
quote: c/p’d in message 67, from John E Jones;
quote: From the SETI website;
quote: And finally, the word rigourous was introduced in post #109;
quote: Can’t all of this be condensed into something concise, something brief and easily referable as we apply them to abiogenesis and ID? Could you do that for me, to the satisfaction of everyone posting in this thread? Do you agree that the words falsifiable, and useful are important words? How falsifiable was all that detail in message 107?
RAZD writes: For intelligent design to be interdisciplinary, it first needs to show what the science of ID is -- and we are still waiting for your input on that question. I touched on it briefly in my post #100 — it was ignored.To repeat;
marc9000 writes: There’s more to ID than goddidit — in Dembski’s words; ID supplements material mechanisms with intelligent agency — intelligent design can subsume present biological research. Even efforts to overturn the various criteria for detecting design are welcome within the intelligent design research program. (That’s part of keeping the program honest.) Intelligent design can also look for function as a heuristic for guiding research, inspiring biologists to look for engineering solutions to biological problems that might otherwise escape them. Also, Design is always a matter of tradeoffs. ID can help us understand these tradeoffs and clarify the design problems that organisms actually face. This in turn keeps us from sweeping problems under the rug simply because evolution is purported to be a blind and wasteful process. A non teleological approach to evolution has consistently led biologists to underestimate organisms. Is, for instance, junk DNA really junk? Work by John Bodnar and his associates suggests that some of it is not. To go further with the junk DNA thing, we find this link, including this paragraph;
quote: Intelligent design really can sometimes correct mistakes of the Neo-Darwinian mindset. To continue to answer your question of what the science of ID is, here is a list of criteria that Dembski puts forward. As he admits, the nuts and bolts science of Intelligent Design is not as advanced as its cultural and political activity. His ideas to correct that; 1)To catalog fundamental facts2)To catalog correcting misinformation 3)To network researchers and resources 4) To build a design curriculum 5)To objectively measure progress I'll admit this is mainly a promissory note. It’s not easy to attract talent to the movement if it's blocked from the public realm by the courts, and when the political evolution steamroller seeks to destroy it at every step. I suspect that progress is being made, except that it’s not carelessly being released until a proper, political time. Again, I hope you'll now average all of the above requirements of something to be "scientific" into something concise, and I'll then move forward in applying ID and abiogenesis to it. If I don't agree with what you come up with, I'll make a reasonable argument against it, based on the content of all of the above.
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marc9000 Member Posts: 1522 From: Ky U.S. Joined: Member Rating: 1.4 |
Coyote writes: You are thinking of dogma. That is the antithesis of science. It is the antithesis of science, but not to imperfect humans who study science. Those humans have loaded evolution up with dogma.
I think what you are reacting to is the body of established science, hundreds of years of trial and error, experiment, theory, data, and all the rest. Some of that doesn't need to be questioned at every step. Some of that is now well-established. Some of it, but how much of it? Here’s a list (only partial) of books written only in the last few years, several of them best sellers;
quote: In reading the reviews, it’s easy to see that ‘science’ is the most common basis and foundation for the claims. I’ m always told that that means nothing, that those people are allowed to have their personal opinions. So are the people who wrote the wedge document! It’s obvious that the people who read those books accept the science that they’re told about without question, to a comparable way that religious people accept their beliefs without question.
Scientists except that body of established science because it has been established and because no evidence has been produced to contradict it. Produce evidence and things can change, although not always turn on a dime. Two examples: continental drift and the channeled scablands of Washington. Both theories were resisted until the evidence was conclusive, then they were accepted. That is the problem with religious dogma when it tries to masquerade as science: it has not, so far, brought the body of scientific evidence that would cause it to be accepted. Religious believers accept it without question but scientists want evidence. So what we have, largely politically unopposed, is some scientific fact, and some atheist dogma masquerading as science. How are we supposed to tell them apart?
Perhaps it is because there is evidence there (once you can ignore the politics). And unfortunately, politics can overwhelm science in the short term, but in the long term the facts will win out. But I would guess that you are not concerned so much about global warming or many of the other things science is working on as about your religious beliefs not being either accepted or confirmed--or, horrors, being contradicted--by science. Would that be correct? My concern is about an un-level playing field concerning worldview opposition. The naturalist/Darwinist worldview is that evolution indicates a practically unlimited vision of improvement in humans/human nature, while the Judeo Christian worldview recognizes humans as sinners, not able to achieve perfection - having limits on what they can achieve. It’s largely what causes the political divide in the U.S. There are exceptions to every rule of course, but most Darwinists are liberal, and most traditional Christians are conservative.
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marc9000 Member Posts: 1522 From: Ky U.S. Joined: Member Rating: 1.4 |
Coyote writes: From the Wedge document, the famous internal memo of the Discovery Institute. They are, if you recall, the leading proponent of ID. A few passages: quote:Bringing together leading scholars from the natural sciences and those from the humanities and social sciences, the Center explores how new developments in biology, physics and cognitive science raise serious doubts about scientific materialism and have re-opened the case for a broadly theistic understanding of nature. ... We are building on this momentum, broadening the wedge with a positive scientific alternative to materialistic scientific theories, which has come to be called the theory of intelligent design (ID). Design theory promises to reverse the stifling dominance of the materialist worldview, and to replace it with a science consonant with Christian and theistic convictions. ... Governing Goals --To defeat scientific materialism and its destructive moral, cultural and political legacies.--To replace materialistic explanations with the theistic understanding that nature and human beings are created by God. This document was produced by the Discovery Institute's Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture. It apparently was an internal fundraising memo that was somehow leaked to the internet. All one would have to do is change a few words around, to show how a wedge is currently being driven, by evolutionists, between different denominations of religious people.
From Wiki: quote:In 2003, a review of tax documents on GuideStar showed grants and gifts totalling $1.4 million in 1997. Included in the supporters were 22 foundations. At least two-thirds of these foundations stated explicitly religious missions.[92] In 2001, the Baptist Press reported, "Discovery Institute ... with its $4 million annual budget ($1.2 million of which is for the Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture) is heavily funded by evangelical Christians. Maclellan Foundation of Chattanooga, Tenn., for example, awarded $350,000 to the institute with the hope researchers would be able to prove evolution to be a false theory. Fieldstead & Co., owned by Howard and Robert Ahmanson of Irvine, Calif., pledged $2.8 million through 2003 to support the Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture."[93] ... In 2005, the Washington Post reported, 'Meyer said the institute accepts money from such wealthy conservatives as Howard Ahmanson Jr., who once said his goal is "the total integration of biblical law into our lives," and the Maclellan Foundation, which commits itself to "the infallibility of the Scripture." '[94] Given all of this by the leading proponents of ID, I would doubt that you could make a legitimate case that ID is not religious. The religious nature of ID, incidentally, was also confirmed by a federal district court in the Dover decision. ID seems to be explicitly religious, and explicitly anti-science and anti-materialistic in nature. It certainly is not science! Where else could they get their funding? Evolutionary study gets its funding from the public realm, as well as from atheistic sources.
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marc9000 Member Posts: 1522 From: Ky U.S. Joined: Member Rating: 1.4 |
I know a fair number of theistic evolutionists who would strongly disagree with you on this. Perhaps you've heard of this thing called "the Catholic Church"? I’ve seen the Catholic church brought up quite often concerning the creation/evolution debates — its position seems to be shapeable on demand. That, and details about the equally flexible positions of all theistic evolutionists should probably be kept brief in this thread, to keep it from straying off topic too much.
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marc9000 Member Posts: 1522 From: Ky U.S. Joined: Member Rating: 1.4 |
If ID were done AS SCIENCE IS, then I would have no problems with it. When it threatens REAL work, it's a problem. What current work does ID threaten? What is the basis for your fears?
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marc9000 Member Posts: 1522 From: Ky U.S. Joined: Member Rating: 1.4 |
I'm a doctoral student in a biology lab. Let me give you a quick synopsis of the people in my lab: 1 is Anglican2 are Catholics 1 is Mormon 1 is Protestant 1 is agnostic, but believes in an afterlife and I've never talked about it with the last guy. You keep referring to godlessness and atheism as characteristics of the scientific community. At least take into consideration the fact that many, if not most, members of that community are not atheists. I mean it this time: stop doing that! Militant atheists in the scientific community need theistic evolutionists. Much of evolutionary study concerns ancient history, and it can’t be studied in a way that brings a direct profitable product, so it can’t support itself in free markets. The 90+ percent of atheists in evolution must get support/funding from a general population that has far less than 50% of its population with the atheist worldview. It has to convince them that evolution is compatable with religion. Atheists in evolutionary academia need any and all religions they can find to be compatable with evolution, so they can shout from the rooftops that evolution isn’t just about atheism, hoping that mainstream Christians will be fooled enough to help provide them with funding. Amazingly enough, it works for them somewhat - it is not politically correct to speculate on the atheistic aspect of evolution too much. Since atheists need theistic evolutionists, it only makes sense that some theistic evolutionists, however few, are not sincere in the personal beliefs they put forward. Anyone can claim to be a Christian, but when his actions show him to be an atheist in every way, it does raise suspicions. There is really no question that some non-sincere ones exist. It seems to me that the sincere ones would make an effort to separate themselves from the phony ones, and they don’t seem worried about it. Kenneth Miller doesn’t seem worried about it — I read his book Finding Darwin’s God a couple of years ago — he showed absolutely no basic knowledge of Christianity in the entire book. Of course he’s adamant about his opposition to ID — seems strange that someone can claim to be Christian and not believe God is intelligent, or that indicators of God’s intelligence should not be publicly noticed, to protect the sacred separation of church and state. He’s sure not worried about the combination of atheism and state. I borrowed a public school biology textbook from my friend’s 15 year old son last weekend. Kenneth Miller was one of the two authors. I saw dogma there.
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marc9000 Member Posts: 1522 From: Ky U.S. Joined: Member Rating: 1.4 |
It is probably off topic, but... I regard the concept of original sin as about the most evil thing every dreamed up by humankind. If you want to debate this, start another thread and let me know. It hasn't been debated here before yet? If not, we may do that sometime. But any detail about it is off topic for this thread, except to say that it's a fact that Christians believe that. And it's also indirectly part of the foundations of the U.S. - James Madison doesn't have good things to say about human nature in Federalist paper #10, and there's little question he was educated about original sin in his Presbyterian upbringing.
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marc9000 Member Posts: 1522 From: Ky U.S. Joined: Member Rating: 1.4 |
Hello RAZD,
From these messages and your OP I glean the basic topic to be: 1. whether abiogenesis can properly be considered science,2. whether ID can properly be considered science, and 3. whether abiogenesis is more scientific than ID or vice versa We can leave the other issues aside for now (or move them to new\alternate threads). Yes, you’ve clarified it well, I believe your A,B, and C should be the focus of this thread, and I agree about leaving the other issues.
The basic starting point for this discussion must be an agreed on definition of science. Yes, but it’s also about the usage of science as it has been practiced, it’s history and philosophy. More below.
RAZD writes: quote:Science (general): any systematic knowledge-base or prescriptive practice that is capable of resulting in a prediction or predictable type of outcome. The question now is whether ID can fit this definition. I think we’re already beyond that, not necessarily in this thread, but throughout discussions on these forums, throughout the scientific community, and in the courts (Dover) that ID doesn’t fit. Let’s look again at the last paragraph of my opening post;
quote: We now need to apply the CURRENT, most common, most aggressive challenges that are directed at ID and apply them to abiogenesis. A good start would be to simply look at some of the basics of the Dover trial, and apply them to abiogeneis. We need to redirect the focus off of ID for now, and take a detailed look at abiogenesis.
Can you cite the original prediction and show how it follows directly from an hypothesis on the function of DNA derived strictly from ID paradigms -- ie IF hypothesis {AID} is true, THEN some "junk DNA" will have some use. If I, or anyone, attempted to do that, it won’t do this thread any good — it would make it like so many other ID threads, and it would keep it from going to new places that I think it could go. I can’t singlehandedly overturn the conclusion that the Dover court came to, and all of the subsequent reinforcement of it by thousands and thousands of people over a period of years, any better than anyone else. Also, I don’t have access to inside research and activity that’s going on within the Intelligent Design community. Clearly, they have good reason to carefully measure the political consequences of any careless release of work and progress they may be making. I’d like to put forward my opening post claim by looking at the history and philosophy of abiogenesis in a way that the layman can understand. Not by plunging into a lot of deep scientific jargon like message #107 contains, or by citing a huge number of scientific papers/ approvals that it has, but by applying how useful it is to society, how falsifiable it is, etc. The philosophical things that are/have been recently applied to ID.
RAZD writes: marc9000 writes: To continue to answer your question of what the science of ID is, here is a list of criteria that Dembski puts forward. As he admits, the nuts and bolts science of Intelligent Design is not as advanced as its cultural and political activity. His ideas to correct that; 1)To catalog fundamental facts2)To catalog correcting misinformation 3)To network researchers and resources 4) To build a design curriculum 5)To objectively measure progress I'll admit this is mainly a promissory note. So this is not done yet. I'm looking for what is DONE not what is PROMISED. * Is there a systematic knowledge-base involved?* Is there a prescriptive practice involved? * Are they capable of resulting in a prediction or predictable type of outcome? Once this is answered, then we can move up a notch by using Bluejay's definition: Looking at what is done, not what is promised isn't fair concerning the historical, actual applications of science, because it requires far more of ID than was ever required for abiogenesis. Should abiogenesis be ‘grandfathered’ in, because of different, less political requirements of the science of yesteryear? Since day one, it has always been considered science, whether that was 1870, when Huxley coined the term, or 1953, when the Miller/Urey experiment was done, or any other time. In either case, or any case, abiogenesis started with NOTHING done, whatever has been done was done after abiogenesis was assumed/declared to be science, not before, like you’re requiring of ID. Suppose, in 1870, there was a court case questioning the scientific status of abiogenesis, similar to the recent Dover one for ID, judge Jones presiding. When the judge asked if abiogenesis has been published in peer-reviewed journals, engaged in research and testing, and gained acceptance in the scientific community, or if there is a systematic knowledge-base involved, or a prescriptive practice involved, or if there were predictions or predictable types of outcomes, he would have gotten a no on all counts. He then could have asked didn’t one Louis Pastuer show, only 11 years ago, that life doesn’t spontaneously arise from non-life? What do you think his ruling would have been on the scientific status of abiogenesis? When we require ID to be published in scientific journals, fully engaged in research and testing, and fully accepted by the scientific community before it is accepted as science, aren’t we doing the same thing as requiring an entry level worker to have experience before we allow him to have a job? How can he get experience if he can’t get a start? How can the scientific community accept ID if they refuse to evaluate it because it’s not science? I don’t see evidence that they even get started looking at it before they declare it religion and throw it out. When we evaluate the definitions of science, we need to include questions about why the details in qualifications for what is science have been changed over the past 50 or 100 years, and why they’ve changed, and why older subjects don’t have to adapt to new requirements. So....... your three things you listed just above, and my [Dembski's] five "promisory notes" that I listed, are what I’d like to find out about studies of abiogenesis. Just brief starting points; do they exist COMPLETELY separately from evolution studies? As we network researchers and resources, can we scrutinize their personal beliefs and goals to the same extent that the beliefs and goals of ID proponents are scrutinized? Since evolution and abiogenesis are claimed to be completely separate issues, is it a philosophical problem if we find that the same people are uniting them as they study them?
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marc9000 Member Posts: 1522 From: Ky U.S. Joined: Member Rating: 1.4 |
Hello Percy, apologies for my long absence, all the snow in my area has been quite exciting.
Percy writes: Science doesn't reject ID because of a lack of evidence, though the lack of evidence is certainly a severe handicap. Science rejects ID because it stipulates entities and processes for which there is no evidence. It isn't the lack of evidence for these things that is the problem. It's that despite the lack of evidence, ID stipulates them anyway. That’s only your opinion, there can be scientific evidence for design. There can be evidence, study, and usefulness, of studying for design without addressing further workings (entities and processes) that are beyond human understanding. If imperfect human processes cause speculation of it happening anyway (as the scientific community fears) it’s no different than current atheistic speculation that science indicates that there is no God.
What ID has is an interesting hypothesis, that because life is so intricate it might have been designed and constructed by an intelligence. If they started with that hypothesis, stopped disparaging methodological naturalism, and began conducting serious research then they would at least fare no worse than ESP researchers. But ID doesn't do that. Instead of saying that life is so intricate that it might have been designed, they're insisting that life is so intricate that it *must* have been designed. Some like Dembski and Behe even claim they've demonstrated this to be fact, and say it with a straight face even though they only present their ID arguments in popular press books and never in scientific journals. That’s the same thing that those who study abiogenesis often do with it. (See post #107) It can, and is easily then taken to exactly the same place you claim ID is taken — the claim that the abiogenesis hypothesis is so elegant and sound that life *can’t* have been designed. Some like Dawkins and Stenger even claim they’ve demonstrated this to be a fact, and say it with a straight face even though they only present their atheistic arguments in popular press books and never with evidence in scientific journals. But throughout those scientific journals the opportunity to praise Dawkins and Stenger as fine scientists is seldom allowed to slip by.
Abiogenesis stipulates that life originated through the same physical laws with which we're already familiar. A theory of abiogenesis that imitated ID by stipulating something equally without evidence, like a life force or some such, would be rejected just like ID. Because abiogenesis is a process requiring nothing more than the universe being just what it already is, we're confident that if we could somehow replicate in the laboratory the conditions on the early Earth that gave birth to life that we could produce new life. But ID requires something beyond the known universe, an intelligence for which there is no scientific evidence and who prominent IDists like Behe and Dembski openly admit they think is God. ID doesn’t actually require anything more. The intelligence behind the design it studies has no more, or no less social implications than does the godlessness of the universe being just what it already is — something that we can’t possibly have all the answers for. Why does science have to be atheistic, why does it have to RULE OUT what it doesn’t/can’t understand? This ruling out violates U.S. founding principles to a comparable extent that ID establishes religion. It is constantly declared that ID cannot be taught in public schools in the U.S. because the First Amendment to the Constitution prohibits public schools from teaching or promoting religion in any way. What goes unsaid is that the first amendment equally prohibits public schools teaching or promotion of atheism. The proof of this is the fact that courts have routinely held that the free exercise clause protects not only religious beliefs but also the absence of religious beliefs. If someone gets fired from a government job because they’re an atheist, their first amendment rights have been violated, exactly the same as if they get fired for being a Christian. If the free exercise clause defines religion in a way that includes atheism, then the no-establishment clause must define religion in the same way. So the agencies of government are prohibited from "establishing" not only religion but also atheism. This means that just as a public school teacher cannot advocate Christianity or hand out Bibles to his students, so too public school textbooks and science teachers should not be able to speculate on the atheism that’s involved in abiogenesis, no matter how legitimate or masked those speculations are made to look. No matter how much they resemble all the technical jargon of post 107, the fact remains that abiogenesis has still not reached theory status yet.
At one point you mention falsifiability. I don't think I'd be very far off the mark saying that very little has been established with certainty about abiogenesis. Well Hallelujah! Here's an important question for you - do you think a middle school student would come to that conclusion after reading post #107?
To the extent that there's a theory of abiogenesis, all it says is that life originated through natural means. How are you going to falsify that, since the same assumption underlies all scientific study? If falsification does not apply to all scientific study, the scientific community has no business requiring falsifiability of ID. Why is ID subjected to this kind of dishonesty?
You think that ID is burdened with requirements with which abiogenesis is unencumbered, but on the contrary they are being held to identical standards. If you think that's not the case then be specific instead of hiding behind generalities. I’ve been specific enough. My arguments come from a general, common sense look at the controversy, not from current political power that dictates measurable amounts of practiced nuts-and-bolts science.
Not sure how you went so wrong here. Pasteur (not 'Pastuer') died over a hundred years ago, and his work was completely unrelated to abiogenesis. What he showed was that the life observed arising on decaying organic matter (e.g., maggots on rotting meat) was not new life, but merely life that was deposited there later (e.g., flies lay eggs in the rotting meat) or was already there (e.g., bacteria). He did no work at all on de novo life on the early Earth. If you’d have read what I wrote more carefully, you’d have noticed that I hypothetically placed Judge Jones in an 1870 case, hence the 11 years reference. Pasteur’s work was not completely unrelated to abiogenesis, because they both involve NEW life — life from non-life. That’s what a comparison between abiogenesis vs ID is mainly about.
What other scientific theory has ever received special treatment like this? You mentioned Pasteur. Was his rejection of spontaneous generation accepted before he did his experiments? Was relativity accepted before Sir Author Eddington measured the predicted effects of the general theory? Was continental drift accepted before the evidence of sea floor spreading and directionally magnetized rocks were discovered? Is abiogenesis accepted before it has evidence that life spontaneously arose from non-life? YES. It has received, and continues to receive, that special treatment.
But ID isn't being rejected just because it has no evidence. It's being rejected as inherently unscientific because of its unevidenced assumptions that are so obviously religious in nature. Drop the unscientific religious assumptions and it might have at least a prayer of the scientific community taking it seriously. I doubt it — the scientific community is far too fascinated with unscientific ATHEISTIC assumptions to notice much of anything else.
Percy writes: marc9000 writes:
Prove you're not making this up and detail the changes. When we evaluate the definitions of science, we need to include questions about why the details in qualifications for what is science have been changed over the past 50 or 100 years, and why they’ve changed, and why older subjects don’t have to adapt to new requirements. Requirements for falsifiability of ID and nothing else would be one. The rarity of several current scientific disciplines facing court challenges would be another.
If you scrutinize the beliefs of evolutionists and abiogenesists you'll find that they come from a variety of cultures, countries, backgrounds and religions. But they always have one thing in common — God does not exist/God is irrelevant.
If you scrutinize the beliefs of IDIsts you'll find that they're predominantly evangelical Christians. Comparing the religious beliefs of the two sides in the creation/evolution debate is not a good idea for the creationist IDist side. Of course, you can always fall back on the old lie of, "Evolutionists are all atheists who are trying to destroy religion." It’s almost as bad as the old lie of ID proponents are all fundamentalists who are out to destroy science. Harvard biologist E.O. Wilson writes in his widely-assigned book On Human Nature: "If humankind evolved by Darwinian natural selection, genetic chance and environmental necessity, not God, made the species." Biologist Stephen Jay Gould writes in his essay in the book Darwin's Legacy: "No intervening spirit watches lovingly over the affairs of nature...whatever we think of God, his existence is not manifest in the products of nature." Douglas Futuyma asserts in his textbook Evolutionary Biology: "By coupling undirected, purposeless variation to the blind, uncaring process of natural selection, Darwin made theological or spiritual explanations of the life processes superfluous." Biologist William Provine writes, "Modern science directly implies that there are no inherent moral or ethical laws...We must conclude that when we die, we die, and that is the end of us." Evolution, Provine has also said, is the "greatest engine of atheism." In his essay on "Darwin's Revolution" in the book Creative Evolution, Francisco Ayala credits Darwin with proving that life is "the result of a natural process...without any need to resort to a Creator." This is only a very brief example of how I can back up "my old lie" with a WIDE variety of sources. Can you back up your old lie with ANYTHING but one Wedge Document? Anything at all?
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marc9000 Member Posts: 1522 From: Ky U.S. Joined: Member Rating: 1.4 |
Hello RAZD, sorry for my long absence.
RAZD writes: marc9000 writes: The question now is whether ID can fit this definition. So do we have any evidence that ID can fit this definition? It depends on the worldview of who is asked.
At this point I'll take that as a "no" - so ID does not meet that very general definition of science. I would expect one with your worldview to do that, while (without saying at this point) holding abiogenesis to a lesser standard.
Let me recap: For (natural) abiogenesis: the hypothesis is that life can begin from chemicals by natural processes. From this hypothesis several predictions can be, and were, made: 1. amino acids should be able to form naturally from a prebiotic "soup" 2. self-replicating molecules should be able to form naturally from a prebiotic "soup" that includes amino acids, 3. proto-cells should be able to form naturally from a prebiotic "soup" ... ... if the conditions of the original earth could be replicated. We see that these predictions have been validated by many scientific experiments and studies, starting with the Miller-Urey experiment and continuing to today, including refinements of what we believe the original conditions of the early earth were. See Self-Replicating Molecules - Life's Building Blocks, Part II for some modern research results. But since we can’t go back in time billions of years to check on the conditions of the early earth, that validation is very weak — JUST AS WEAK as ID proponents being unable to make specific discoveries about a supernatural intelligent being.
For ID: the hypothesis is that a designer could be the cause behind life on earth. From this hypothesis the following predictions can be made: 1. oops sorry, not done yet, may next week, stay tuned ... don't pay any attention to the man behind the curtain ... And don’t pay any attention to my previous post #111, where I showed that ID predicted that junk DNA may not be as junky as the godless scientific community wants it to be. We see that that prediction was validated. Not thorough enough for you? Do the goal posts keep getting moved further and further, demanding more and more predictions, more and more research required of a subject that receives no admittance to the scientific realm, that gets politically and emotionally opposed everytime it writes or speaks one word?
So far it is no contest, with abiogenesis exceeding the requirements of the given definition and ID not meeting it. No contest according to the godless worldview — a minority in the U.S. when it comes to sources for funding of science.
Go ahead. The above link would be a good starting point to show that actual science has been done based on predictions from the hypothesis of (natural) abiogenesis. But these things were accomplished AFTER abiogenesis was considered to be science, not before, as is required of ID.
The average high school science fairs are filled with experiments that students have done by the scientific method without needing any approval of the scientific journals. How can high school students be prompted to do anything concerning Intelligent Design, when any reference to it is blocked from their science classes? How can they be comfortable in thinking about an experiment that may violate 'separation of church and state"?
You don't need approval of scientific journals to actually do scientific experiments and studies, make predictions and test them. But you may need their approval if you want them to see the light of day, not easy to obtain when those experiments are rejected as religion before even receiving a glance from the scientific community.
We put (2) and (3) together and we get: science: Accumulated and established knowledge, which has been systematized and formulated with reference to the discovery of general truths or the operation of general laws; such knowledge when it relates to the physical world and its phenomena, the nature, constitution, and forces of matter, the qualities and function of living tissues, etc.; -- called also natural science, and physical science. Curiously, I do not find that significantly different from Message 73: It isn't, therefore my point remains as strong as ever. The atheism that’s in science today, from abiogenesis to the SETI institute, attained compliance to scientific standards long AFTER it was declared science, not before, as is required of ID. They would have never been able to accomplish those things if they would have been politically blocked and opposed from the public scientific realm to the extent that ID is.
So far we haven't found an old definition that would fit the current status of ID, so the claim that the definition has been changed to keep ID out is spurious assertion without merit. ID doesn’t fit abstract or speculative principles? My point is being proven very nicely - that all these definitions of science that abiogenesis and ID are held to, is done in the subjective, that is, according to the worldview of the one doing the applying. Over 90% of the scientific community is godless, so it's no surprise where we are. But as I pointed out to Percy above, (and he didn't address) it's too close for comfort to a Constitutional violation.
You will note that the 1828 definition pre-dates Darwin, so we could legitimately claim that the definition of science has been changed to make it more difficult for evolution to meet the requirements. What we do see is that the definition of science has changed, but there is no evidence that this change is not applied across the board to all existing sciences: there is no evidence that a single science has been "grandfathered" in any way. Here’s the evidence — that ID is the only thing ever proposed as science to be hauled into court by a heavily funded special interest and politically defeated. The grandfathering in this regard (the lack of legal prosecution), has been so common with so many other sciences that it goes unnoticed.
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marc9000 Member Posts: 1522 From: Ky U.S. Joined: Member Rating: 1.4 |
Hi Marc, The requirements of science are the same for all fields. ID is being held to the same requirements asany other field within science. If you think this isn't true then tell us what additional requirements you think ID is being asked for. I've already done that - requirements for falsifiability not required of other sciences, political action in courts, and the biased subjectivity applied when ID vs other sciences are held to standards of science definitions.
Science is not atheistic. It just doesn't comment on phenomena for which there is no evidence. Science seeks natural explanations for natural phenomena. Anything we can detect through our senses is natural and can be part of science. If ID is about things that we can actually observe, such as the modification of genes and the creation of new species, then it is definitely part of science and all IDists need do is find the evidence. Science assumes a level above human power when it rules out (attempts to trump) possible processes that it can't deal with/understand.
Does it bother you that science doesn't include supernatural explanations for gravity or radio? Of course not (I assume). It doesn't bother me, because the natural explanations for those things doesn't weaken the existance/power of God.
Then why does it bother you that science doesn't include supernatural explanations for abiogenesis. Could it be because abiogenesis somehow bears upon your religious beliefs, while gravity and radio do not? Yes, not only my religious beliefs, but the beliefs of future generations, and their parents who are currently paying the bills in todays scientific study.
The detail of Message 107 enumerating what we do know about abiogenesis shouldn't be something that bothers you. When I said that there's no real theory of abiogenesis other than that it came about through natural causes (an assumption that underlies all of science) I only meant that we don't know the specifics of how it happened. We don't even know if it happened in the air, on the ground, beneath the ground or underwater. But I certainly didn't mean to imply we don't know anything. We obviously know a great deal, and Message 107 provided a very high level outline of what we know. But there's no real theory of abiogenesis beyond that it came about through natural causes, again, an assumption that underlies all of science. --Percy If it stopped short of guesses and philosophy that ID is constantly accused of, and was publicly challenged by other ways of thinking, then I would have no problem with it.
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marc9000 Member Posts: 1522 From: Ky U.S. Joined: Member Rating: 1.4 |
RAZD writes: Hi marc9000, hope the snow wasn't too much trouble. We only had a couple of inches and it was gone the next day, no time to enjoy it. Not too much trouble, just time consuming. I have a snowplow — made a couple of bucks with it, then the truck breaks and I end up spending it all fixing it back haha
RAZD writes: So do we have any evidence that ID can fit this definition?
It depends on the worldview of who is asked. No, it depends on whether it fits the definition or not. That is the purpose behind starting with an established definition and applying it equally to each area of investigation. Established definitions aren’t that simple, you should have noticed that in your thread about definitions of evolution. It’s at 174 posts and continuing to grow.
Abiogenesis passed this first test because it meets the parameters of the first level definition. That’s your opinion, and you can show a lot of scientific detail of abiogenesis to make that point, that I haven’t the time nor the scientific knowledge/interest to counter it. But my point is this — when abiogenesis was accepted as science, it had NONE of that detail. It gained those details within the public realm of science. It didn’t have to aquire them as a condition to be accepted as science, as ID is required to do.
If you can show that ID meets the parameters of the first level definition, then we can move on to the next level. If ID could get its foot in the door like abiogenesis got with its original free pass, it could accomplish those things. I can base that statement on the success of other accepted sciences that deal with intelligence, like anthropology, archeology, forensic science, and the SETI Institute’s search for extraterrestrial intelligence. The SETI institute’s success seems to have come easy — correct me if I’m wrong, but so far it has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING in its quest for a contact with intelligence. If that BIG ZERO is good enough for the scientific community, why is it that the same scientific community is so demanding from ID proponents?
But I'm not holding abiogenesis to a lesser standard, I'm using the standard that you agreed to: You (and the scientific community) really are holding it to a lesser standard, by not demanding that it pass an entrance exam prior to become science. It will be interesting to see if you and others here will concede that point. If you don't, then this thread (mercifully for you ) will probably end, with my announcement that I'm finished with it. You largely disregarded an entire link I provided earlier about the gaps and faith in abiogenesis simply because the author didn’t define evolution in an exact way that you agreed with. Why would you blame me, or any creationist/ID proponent for disregarding most of what you (or any evolutionist/naturalist) say concerning science if you refuse to concede proven points about double standards in entrance requirements in the scientific community?
I noted several predictions that not only had been made, but had been validated in regards to abiogenesis: I have to keep hammering this point home because it’s an important fact - those all happened after abiogenesis became science, with all the funding, all the attention, all the exposure to education curriculums, all the support from militant atheism, etc. ID doesn't have that luxury.
Thus it doesn't matter that we cannot know precisely what it was like, so long as we can apply a systematic knowledge based approach to what we do know, and eliminate what we know to be wrong, it fits the definition of science being used. And it also doesn’t matter that ID can’t yet jump through all the hoops required of it today, as long as it can apply a systematic knowledge based approach to areas of detail in biology that continue to stump those who study abiogenesis, and evolution for that matter. I’ve provided a general outline of that systematic knowledge earlier in this thread. Not enough detail to satisfy the scientific community of course (there couldn’t possibly be) but more than abiogenesis and the SETI Institute started with.
.......Bogus prediction. Failed prediction. Typical IDologist website misrepresentation (falsehood/s). Have you studied any of the detail in post 107 to this degree? Could it be that since abiogenesis is public science, and ID is not, that not only does the lopsided public establishment get one studied more than the other, it gets one attacked much more than the other?
Sorry, but that's as much as I can deal with tonight. I'll get back with more tomorrow on the definitions of science through the ages, and the fact that there has been no change in requirements for ID that do not apply equally to Abiogenesis. The change that is required of ID is an entrance requirement, that other branches of science have never had required of them.
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