Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed

Well wasn't that bloody silly then?

 

Sound more reasonable than a big man in the sky no one has ever seen made animals, plants and the earth and the stars etc. And it was all in a week. I go for the turbulent and very different earth to the one we live on and some time over billions of years a single cell organism came into being. I wouldn't go so far as to say it has never happened since, it just may have happened so rarely as to be undetectable or could it be that the exact conditions have never recurred.

Note: - Rantings of uneducated Aussie over.

 

I'm no scientist, but Scott asks two very valid questions that haven't been answered. In order to better understand things I, too, am curious about the answers. Kow?

 

BTW, here's a great show on ID/religion vs. real science:

NOVA | Intelligent Design on Trial | Watch the Program | PBS

 

Wow Tetra, you have captured his holiness in all his glory, all hail the FSM and his noodle appendages, savor his deliciousness and rise up your forks to his meatBALLS.

 

Also, don't forget that the best way to honor and worship the FSM is to make a tasty, edible version of him:

Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories - One Hundred Percent EDIBLE Googly Eyes!

 

LOL.

I need to act like an adult?

I'm not the one with the imaginary friend. arty:



PS - your/you’re

 

Thanks for the apology. I understand that you think I was trying to be snarky & push your buttons. But that wasn't the case. I saw a couple questions that hadn't been answered (and looked like they were, as you say, ignored) and thought there was an area for discussion. You thought differently.

The problem I have with ID is that is starts with an untestable hypothesis ... that "certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection". (from the Discovery Institute) How can that claim be tested? It can be proved neither correct nor incorrect.

That's where the question about what knowledge could be gained. Knowledge is a very broad thing and there's many kinds of knowledge. Because I came home at the right time, I've gained knowledge that the neighbors across the street are engaged. But it's not science.

You state that "theories make tools to further scientific discovery". And I agree with that. But how is the intelligent designer theory being tested? What experiments are being done now to test whether that theory is correct. Proving another theory wrong doesn't prove yours is correct. If I prove that my hair isn't brown, it doesn't mean my hair is black.

Questions about inconsistencies in evolutionary theory are scientific. But you can't use them to prove an alternate theory without also presenting positive evidence. You can't use a negative to prove a positive.

This is the problem I have with ID being presented as science. All it seems to interested in is poking holes in evolutions without presenting positive proofs towards its own hypothesis. Until it does, it has no place in a science class. A theology class, maybe, but not a science class.

And I still think, however they were phrased, that Scott's questions were valid.

 

Do either of those concepts prove ID or lead toward proof that there's some kind of 'intelligent designer'? No, they don't. They raise questions and allows scientists to do further research into the evolution of organisms. But they don't prove that some 'intelligent designer' was responsible. Nor do they lead toward that concept. They find possible holes in evolution, but don't do anything to prove their own hypothesis.

This is why I stand by the assertion that ID is not science. It has a premise that inherently can't be tested.

 

For a while when I was in my teens I heard voices in my head when I was riding my bike on a long ride. I tried to hear what the voices were saying but I couldn't make it out. After it happened a couple of times I never had it happen to me again, not in 30 years since. I know there wasn't a person in my head and it was just my brain playing tricks on me. I also know no one has heard god talk to them, no one has actually spoken to god and there isn't a magic man who makes planets and empty space down to microbes and people. It's just the stories parents told their kids when they couldn't explain something. The power of prayer is in sorting one's priority and thoughts to work toward a goal.

I find evolution easier to believe than a magic man who was always there. Why couldn't the cosmos have always have been if the magic man could always have been? If an intelligence was needed to create living organisms then there must have been an intelligence to create the giant magic man.

I find it much easier to believe that over billions of years on one rock orbiting one star in billions in the cosmos a single celled organism came into being and from that one single cell came all life on this earth.
If you want proof of evolution then look no further than the common cold or flu virus, each year it circles the world always a little different to the last time. Who knows, maybe we all evolved from a cold virus?

Forgive me my rambling post.

 

Ramble on, Pat. Ramble on.

 

I simply don't like the idea of being able to discredit a branch of science because some religions don't think the Earth has existed long enough for it to be valid. Or that The Intelligent Designer put fake dinosaur bones into the ground to weed out the truly faithful who ignore contrary evidence.

Geology, for example, requires the Earth to have been around a long time too. Beat down evolution, then the same logic beats down geology. No drifting continents, no sandstone from ancient oceans, nothing. Everything just blinked into existence, including all the oil we'll ever burn, even if you can perform an experiment showing how plants could have aged into oil. Nothing valid except the Bible.

Nice world if you use said Bible to control others. Not so nice for the non-believers...

 

Well said =]

 

wildkow is a rather amusing fellow. He has called my definition of science too narrow, even though the definition I gave him is the definition commonly accepted by actual scientists. That's a key part of this debate. ID supporters want to use a different definition of science in order to make their arguments look reasonable. However, they have had to admit in court that their definition of science would allow for astrology to be considered scientific theory:Astrology is scientific theory, courtroom told - opinion - 19 October 2005 - New Scientist. When this has been pointed out, wildkow has ignored it.

wildkow also claimed that it looked like I was trying to be misleading when I mentioned the Cold Fusion debacle. I showed that he was the one who should be getting his facts straight. wildkow didn't apologize to me, though, and instead chose to ignore it.

ID is creation of the Discovery Institute, which isn't a scientific body by any stretch of the imagination. It's a religious and political entity that believes its purpose is to force their God upon us. I have pointed this out several times, but, instead of addressing it, wildkow has chosen to ignore it.

After pointing to the Dr. Gray issue as an example of scientific suppression, wildkow decided that he didn't want to get "sidetracked" anymore on it anymore after many of us pointed out that Fox News' initial report was off base. We have also pointed to how the Bush administration suppresses climate scientists all the time. However, once again, wildkow has chosen to ignore it.

wildkow chooses to ignore the facts because they are all very inconvenient.