For your information, here is the one by Robert Koons.
Dennis L. Feucht
Innovatia Labs
14554 Maplewood Road
Townville, Pennsylvania 16360
(814)789-2100
dfeucht@toolcity.net
> > From: Robert C. Koons <koons@mail.la.utexas.edu>
> > Subject: philosophy of ID
> > Date: Thursday, October 09, 1997 1:25 PM
> >
> > I like Robin [Collins]'s approach very much. I tried to make some
similar points
> in
> > my report on the NTSE conference (which can be found at the NTSE web
site
> > -- see the URL below). There are two points that are especially
> important.
> >
> > 1. It is valuable to have more going argumentatively for ID than merely
> > justification by elimination (i.e., it can't be chance or necessity, so
> it
> > must be design). In particular, it is useful to be able to make a case
> for
> > design by appeal to the conscilience of evidences -- the ability of ID
to
> > unify and make sense of a wide variety of otherwise unrelated data.
> >
> > 2. The Aristotelian distinction between efficient causation and
> > final/teleological causation is an important one to bear in mind. From
> an
> > ID perspective, the efficient-causation question about observed
> irreducible
> > complexity (how did it get here?) is not an interesting one, while for
> the
> > materialist, it is practically the only question they can meaningfully
> ask.
> > This paradigm-relativity of interesting questions was already noted by
> > Kuhn. A new paradigm needn't succeed by the standards of success
> > incorporated in the old paradigm. Simply because we cannot give
> interesting
> > answers to the questions asked by Darwinists doesn't mean that we
cannot
> do
> > better science.
> >
> > I've noticed that most Darwinian biologists have accepted (without
> question
> > or reflection) the modern prejudice against final/teleological
> explanation.
> > There has been some interesting work on the logic of this topic in
recent
> > analytic philosophy, including Larry Wright's book, _Teleological
> > Explanation_. Some, but not all, of this work attempts to reduce the
> > concept of teleology to the workings of natural selection -- thereby
> making
> > Darwinism an a priori, conceptual truth! Other work, including
Wright's,
> > avoids making this mistake and deserves a closer look by ID theorists.
> >
> > As an illustration of both points, I'd like to point to some ideas
> > expressed by Hans Driesch (an early 20th century developmental
biologist
> > and "vitalist") in his book, _The Science and Philosophy of the
Organism_
> > (1929). Driesch argues that orthodox Darwinism can be decisively
refuted
> > by reflecting on the widespread phenomenon of regeneration of limbs,
> organs
> > and tissues.
> >
> > "Purely functional performances, such as nervous conduction, secretion,
> > muscular contraction, may be said to be "the same" throughout the whole
> > animal kingdom. But restitution is not "the same" everywhere; for the
> > regeneratio of a foot is the regeneration of a foot, the restitution of
> an
> > eye is the restitution of an eye, etc. Therefore, with regard to
> > restitution, a _particular_ apparatus must have been created by
> contingent
> > mutation and natural selection _in each single case_, according to the
> > Darwinian point of view. This is of a degree of improbability that
> > practically equals impossibility..." (p. 174)
> >
> > This illustrates both points -- by positing restitution as a phenomenon
> of
> > common design, the unification of many particular instances (of a foot,
> of
> > an eye, etc.) is achieved, which cannot be achieved by Darwinian
> > explanation. And, Driesch's point is not to offer an alternative
causal
> > mechanism by which this general phenomenon of restitution is first
> brought
> > into existence, but simply to posit a lawful generalization at the
> > teleological level.
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > Rob Koons
> > Associate Professor
> > Department of Philosophy
> > University of Texas at Austin
> > Austin, TX 78712-1180
> > (512) 471-5530; fax 471-4806
> >
> > Personal web page:
> > http://www.dla.utexas.edu/depts/philosophy/faculty/koons
> >
> > NTSE conference web site:
> > http://www.dla.utexas.edu/depts/philosophy/faculty/koons/ntse/ntse.html
> >