The Power of the New Intelligent Design...

Hi sensei, Sure. That's nice. But it gets me no closer to understanding your position.You're a recent member and we've never interacted before and whilst I've read some of your posts, I don't think I've ever really seen you set out your stall regarding precisely what your position is. I'm just trying to get a feel for what it is you actually believe.In your previous post you very strongly implied that special creation makes no testable predictions. Is that really what you wanted to say?It's not a trick question. It's pretty foundational stuff. This thread is supposed to be about Intelligent Design and ID has always been very keen to be seen as science. In order to be taken seriously as science ID must make testable, falsifiable predictions. If your personal theory makes no predictions, it can hardly be called science and it certainly wouldn't be in step with the stated aims of the ID crowd. Is that really what you wanted to say?Mutate and Survive

Are you of the school of thought that we have to know everything before we know anything?

I am making no such assumptions. In fact, that's the whole point. We have nothing to make assumptions as to what life would look like if life were separately created. Therefore, there is no expectation that life would fall into a nested hierarchy. There is only one process where we would expect a nested hierarchy, and that is evolution and common ancestry.

We can determine that evolution and common ancestry will produce a nested hierarchy from first principles. Also, we can observe living populations that are producing nested hierarchies through these mechanisms.https://genome.cshlp.org/content/17/3/293.full.pdfThis isn't speculation.It also isn't speculation that we observe a nested hierarchy.The only speculation we are seeing is that life was created by a deity.

There is evolution from common ancestor by natural processes alone, there is theistic evolution (the idea that evolution was helped along or guided by a deity) and there is seperate creation, where species have not crossed boundaries. And there is Dawkins outer space theory.If we would find and record species in a lab or on another planet, crossing boundaries that were forbidden by seperate creation, from single cell all the way to variety of complex life forms, then that would be falsification, for example.But I think it's pointless and a waste of energy to be speculating on data that does not exist. Better look at available data and see what scenario is most likely. Wouldn't you agree?

In sexual reproduction, any couple can start and produce a family tree. Whether all life evolved from a single cell ancestor or not.If you consider this nested hierarchy as sufficient evidence for common ancestry of all life, that is fine by me. Just don't push it down everyones throat as being an indisputable fact. You need more evidence for that.You seem to focus so much on this nested pattern. That is what I call, tunnel vision.

But the nested hierarchy IS indisputable fact. You can't show otherwise.You haven't disputed it. All you have done is bitch about it. You show no reasonable argument to call it into question and you most certainly have no alternatives.That fact is firmly stuck in your throat and you cannot dislodge it. What evidence that has been given you do you dispute? Other than rote "you're wrong" do you have any cogent reasons or evidence to dispute it? It is an important point of discussion. A nested hierarchy destroys ID. That is why the nested hierarchy is so much a part of these ID discussions through the decades. You try to call it into question in order to counter that destruction. Didn't work.

Those are some possibilities. Where do you stand exactly? I'm only pressing you because I have found that there as many variants of creationism as there are creationists, so it's not obvious precisely what you're arguing for. I don't want to get dragged into the weeds here, but just for the record, Richard Dawkins didn't originate the idea of panspermia and doesn't support it, describing panspermia as being "only slightly more plausible than divine creation.". i don't care for it either. Okay. So what boundaries does your version of multiple instances of special creation observe? How do we tell if they are supported or violated by observations?This is important because if evolution were true, we would also expect to see multiple nested hierarchies, as branches of the wider hierarchy.. After all, each smaller part of a nested hierarchy is another, smaller nested hierarchy. How do we distinguish between truly separate nested hierarchies and the branches of the wider nested hierarchy that is all life? Where are those boundaries exactly? Obviously everyone agrees in principle that we can only study data that exists.Where I suspect we disagree is in what we would call "speculation".It is not "speculation" to derive a testable hypothesis from the predictions of a theory and compare that hypothesis to observed reality.. That is, in fact, how the scientific method works.The Theory of Evolution makes a number of testable predictions. The existence of nested hierarchies is one of them. The non-existence of nested hierarchies would falsify the ToE. The existence of nested hierarchies in nature has been observed countless times. This is, by any definition, evidential support for the ToE. Can you provide similar support for whatever model you have in mind?Mutate and Survive

You just replied to yourself, which means that you are talking to yourself.

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Cantínflas: Y me dije a mí mismo, "Mismo, ... "

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Why don't you let us in on your internal dialogue? You appear to be highly conflicted. Perhaps we could help you sort things out.

Have I asked you to prove a pattern or to prove common ancestry?

What does it matter where I stand? Science is based on data.I don't think alien origin is likely. And all of life's complexity by evolution is not likely either. That is all that matters. Personal stance is irrelevant.You seem to make the same mistake as all evolutionists, thinking that making one or a few good predictions, means that the theory is correct. A theory needs to fit all data.Example: if a suspect is innocent, we can predict that he will say that he is innocent. We observe as predicted. Is that sufficient evidence for you that the suspect is innocent? No, of course not. A guilty suspect will often claim to be innocent as well.Next example: you stand 100 meter far away and measure sound level. Then you move one more cm away and measure again. You predict that sound level will keep dropping by same amount, every time you move another cm. And it does so as predicted. Is your linear model correct? No, it only works for small distances!If common ancestry only works to predict some nesting pattern, that may hold great value to you simpletons, but I'm not that easily impressed.

I like talking to myself

You won't be that dumb. Common descent is already an accepted scientific fact evidenced by thousands, millions, of data points. The preponderance of the evidence is clear. It is already proven.We, on the other hand, have nothing from you on your anti-evolution ID stance. That is where the discussion should be. But you have not (cannot) provide any such arguments and evidence.You complain that a bacterium could not evolve into the myriad of complex life we presently see and this planet. Why? What mechanism have you evidence for that would stop it?You ask us to believe in your ID. But you can't tell us what it is. You lie about evolution. You present no alternatives.You are not doing well in this self-imposed religious task.

Wow, such simple question and you still got it wrong.You had to pick one or the other.

Let me spell it out for you. The dispute is about common ancestry. The debate is not about whether or not we see a nested pattern.So you claiming that there is no dispute about nested hierarchy is just useless. But you don't even understand that now, do you?