Intelligent Design explains many follies

Spot the contradiction:

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Mutations are only assumptions and imaginary tools....Millions of mutations have been carried out on the fruit fly,

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This message has been edited by Chiroptera, 24-Feb-2006 12:31 AM

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"Intellectually, scientifically, even artistically, fundamentalism -- biblical literalism -- is a road to nowhere, because it insists on fidelity to revealed truths that are not true." -- Katha Pollitt

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(1) Some here seem to know precisely how the universe and inorganic matter can to be.

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As far as I know, it is only the Biblical literalists who claim to know precisely "how the universe and inorganic matter can to be."-

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I thought true science is the study and proof of cause and effect, not theory of how things came to be.

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If known cause-effects can explain how things came to be, then, yes, "true" science (as practiced by true Scotsmen) can legitimately speak of a theory of how things came to be.-

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It seems only ID believers are required to provide proof of ID, not those who believe otherwise.

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No one is asking for "proof". All anyone is asking for is good evidence that any biological system has been designed and produced by some intelligent entity. Personal incredulity is not good evidence.-

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All we can do is provide the logical argument that intricately complex inorganic matter, organic matter, and the universe "must" have ID.

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Logical arguments are fine, but in the end you need evidence for it to be considered science. If all you have is logical arguments you have a "philosophy", not science.

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"Intellectually, scientifically, even artistically, fundamentalism -- biblical literalism -- is a road to nowhere, because it insists on fidelity to revealed truths that are not true." -- Katha Pollitt

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True science is the study of cause and effect.

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Actually, "true science" is the study of observable phenomena, the development of theories and models to explain those phenomena, and the investigation of the implications of those theories and models.

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"Religion is the best business to be in. It's the only one where the customers blame themselves for product failure."
-- Ellis Weiner (quoted on the NAiG message board)

Damn. Modulous beat me to this. Oh well, I'll post anyway.

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True science is the study of cause and effect.

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Although this isn't what science is (it is but a small part of science), the theory of evolution does fit into this. Darwin saw certain effects: the geographical distribution of species, Malthusian population dynamics, and perhaps the Linnaean classification of species. He proposed a cause: natural selection acting on randomly occurring variations over a very, very long period of time. Now, assuming that this cause is correct we can predict new effects, like the existence of tranisitional fossils, the pattern of vestigial organs, and the pattern of atavisms that occur.

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"Religion is the best business to be in. It's the only one where the customers blame themselves for product failure."
-- Ellis Weiner (quoted on the NAiG message board)

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If you will read my complete statement, what you said is what I was trying to say in different words.

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I did read your entire statement. And what I wrote was in response to what I interpreted as what you were trying to say. Sorry if it wasn't an accurate interpretation.-

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Where I draw the line is in applying what we can actually observe and prove today, and declare that this definitely proves what happened in the past when it comes to understanding how organic and inorganic matter came to exist.

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No one is claiming that anything proves anything. All anyone is trying to do is develop theories that are consistent with known phenomena, and then to use the theories to predict as yet unobserved phenomema. If a theory makes a prediction and that phenomena is subsequently confirmed, then the theory is considered provisionally verified. However, some theories like common descent in biology, quantum mechanics in physics, and the periodical table in chemistry, have been verified in so many ways that it now seems silly to add the phrase "provisionally"; that is when a "theory" becomes a "fact". Common descent is a "fact" -- after 150 years, it has withstood every test thrown at it and has become stronger. It is still "provisional", it is not "proven"; it is still possible that new observations will result in its being discarded as a working theory, but after 150 years it seems very unlikely.-If by "organic matter came to exist", you mean abiogenesis (the origin of life on earth), then definitely nothing has been proven; we are only really beginning to understand what was happening on the early earth. If by "inorganic matter came to exist" you mean the origin of the universe, then nothing is even known; we don't yet have a complete enough understanding of the fundamental laws of physics to probe back to the exact beginning of time.

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"Religion is the best business to be in. It's the only one where the customers blame themselves for product failure."
-- Ellis Weiner (quoted on the NAiG message board)

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I have tried to show that those who believe in non-ID cannot show any more proof evidence that non-ID is the cause and effect of everything that exists....

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Then you have been wasting your time. No one is claiming to be able show any kind of "proof", nor is it the goal of science to provide "proof" an anything.--

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I'm still waiting for the non-ID proof.

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Then you'll be waiting a long time. Proof is for logicians and mathematicians. Nothing is ever really "proved" in the sciences. Although it may be that in the future there will be a tremendous amount of evidence for some particular mode where in life first arose on earth, or a great amount of evidence that shows how the universe actually originated. But you'll have to wait until that happens before someone can show it to you.

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"Religion is the best business to be in. It's the only one where the customers blame themselves for product failure."
-- Ellis Weiner (quoted on the NAiG message board)

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those who know that ID is behind existance

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Well, it is possible that ID is behind existence, and it is certainly possible that you know this to be a fact. However, your knowledge would then appear to be due to special revelation, because it isn't really based on evidence.

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"Religion is the best business to be in. It's the only one where the customers blame themselves for product failure."
-- Ellis Weiner (quoted on the NAiG message board)

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The proof lies in what is logically reasonable, and what is not logically reasonable.

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Actually, the "proof" (if proof is the correct word to use here) lies in what the evidence suggests. And there is an overwhelming abundance of evidence that all known species have evolved from a common ancestor. You can try to "logically" explain it away, but physical data always trumps logic. That is why modern science has been much more productive than the purely deductive logical methods used by the classical Greeks.-

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The ToE has no way to explain how, assuming a spark of life suddenly transforms inorganic matter to organic matter, this spark of life knows deterministically where it's going so that fully formed creatures are eventually formed.

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Perhaps true, but since no one claims that a "spark of life" knows anything, it is irrelevant to the discussion.

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"Religion is the best business to be in. It's the only one where the customers blame themselves for product failure."
-- Ellis Weiner (quoted on the NAiG message board)

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That's what ID is all about, and why it's the best and most reasonable answer to life's complex existance.

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Indeed, you are right. "Best" and "most reasonable" are subjective terms, and will depend on who is doing the judging. People who are willing to examine actual evidence and make logical inferences based upon the evidence are going to have one opinion as to what is "best" and "most reasonable". Creationists and IDists, who have an emotional commitment to a certain set of beliefs which they will not allow to be shaken, will have a different opinion.

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"Religion is the best business to be in. It's the only one where the customers blame themselves for product failure."
-- Ellis Weiner (quoted on the NAiG message board)

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A single atom with electrons, protons, neutrons, bosons, leptons, quarks, gravitons, etc. is an intracately complex structure that most reasonable people should say could not have happened without design.

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Why should most reasonable people agree with you on this? This is the essential point that you keep avoiding.

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"Religion is the best business to be in. It's the only one where the customers blame themselves for product failure."
-- Ellis Weiner (quoted on the NAiG message board)

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I know some here question my resume credentials....

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I don't. Your arguments are lacking in logical rigor. That can be seen simply by examining them. Your credentials are irrelevant.This message has been edited by Chiroptera, 04-Apr-2006 12:44 PM

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"Religion is the best business to be in. It's the only one where the customers blame themselves for product failure."
-- Ellis Weiner (quoted on the NAiG message board)

Not one thing in your post is relevant to evolutionary biology or abiogenesis. This is why we don't take you seriously on this subject. You don't seem to understand it enough to write a relevant and cogent post.

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"Religion is the best business to be in. It's the only one where the customers blame themselves for product failure."
-- Ellis Weiner (quoted on the NAiG message board)

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Biophysicist Hubert Yockey has calculated the probability of forming a single gene product (one that is functionally equivalent to the ubiquitous protein cyctochrome C) as one chance in 1075. 56 Given this probability, Yockey calculated that if the hypothetical primordial soup contained about 1044 amino acids, a hundred billion trillion years would yield a 95% chance for random formation of a functional protein only 110 amino acids in length (a single gene product).57 The universe is about 15 billion years old. This means that less than one trillionth of the time has passed that would be needed to make even one of the 250-350 gene products necessary for minimal life, or one of the 1500 gene products necessary for independent life.

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Not only copied, but john couldn't even bother to remove the footnotes from the cut'n'paste.What relevance does this have to the discussion, john? No one claims that cytochrome C formed from the random assembly of amino acids in the "primordial soup". Yockey has wasted his time, Dr. Rana's time (who had to read and quote Yockey's bogus result), your time, and now my time in calculating a number that has absolutely nothing to do with any scenario seriously contemplated by any real researcher. You are repeating a strawman attack on abiogenesis that has been discounted many times before.-

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These bacteria are believed to be the oldest organisms on Earth and quite likely reflect the complexity of first life on Earth and the minimum complexity of independent life.

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This is the problem. These bacteria might reflect the complexity of the last common ancestor of all extant life on earth. But these bacteria evolved from something simpler, which evolved from something simpler, which evolved from something simpler,..., until you have a very simple (and imperfect) replicator that was simple enough to come about through natural chemical processes in the "primordial soup" sometime in the first 10 million years or so after the Late Bombardment ended.Edited to remove a sentence that may appear to be an "attack on the messenger".This message has been edited by Chiroptera, 08-Apr-2006 03:25 PM

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"Religion is the best business to be in. It's the only one where the customers blame themselves for product failure."
-- Ellis Weiner (quoted on the NAiG message board)

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From my observation, when soeone has a technical background, and they are pushing for I.D. or creationism, in the vast majority of times, they have either an engineering background, or are into computers, where this concept is not part of the way things are done.

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Ha ha ha ha ha.I think it was crashfrog who pointed out that engineers work with things that are designed, and so they see the world in terms of design.Me, I have some mathematics training in a broad area called "analysis", where continuity is important; so it appears that I see the world as a large continuum with few, if any, discontinuities.

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"Religion is the best business to be in. It's the only one where the customers blame themselves for product failure."
-- Ellis Weiner (quoted on the NAiG message board)

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Since evolution cannot reasonably explain how the existing universe started from something smaller than a pinhead...

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Well, current theories of cosmology do explain very well how the contemporary universe is the result of "something smaller than a pinhead" -- it is where, how, and/or why the "pinhead" came to be that cosmology does not explain (and that may not even be a scientific question).-

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...prove how life developed into incredibly complex plant, animal and human life forms on earth...

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If by "prove" you mean "be confirmed through a massive amount of very good evidence in many different scientific fields using a variety of different methodologies", then you are wrong: the evolution of life on earth has been "proven" in this sense.-

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...Intelligent Design is and always will be the best explanation for the how of our existance.

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Completely wrong and illogical. Unless and until positive evidence in favor of ID is presented, then only alternative to the theory of evolution is to say, "I don't know why the world is the way it is."

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"Religion is the best business to be in. It's the only one where the customers blame themselves for product failure."
-- Ellis Weiner (quoted on the NAiG message board)