Terry wrote:
> Let's not forget that words have meaning, sometimes very
> technical meanings.
Yes. But lets not forget that the concepts behind those words also have impact on the world view.
I understand that the organization doesn't want to be considered part of Phil Johnson's network. But on the other hand by stating that we don't beleive in intelligent design, are we not throwing away the entire reason we are TEs rather than atheists?
>
> I am reminded of Dick Bube's discussion of the term Creation in his
> 1971 essay, "We Believe in Creation"
> http://www.asa3.org/ASA/PSCF/1971/JASA12-71Bube.html where he
> defended the use of the term "creation" and "creationist" yet
> distanced himself (and the ASA) from the young-earth creationist
> belief. Creation is too important of a Biblical concept to give up
> the term. Yes, we do still get lumped together with YEC's (and
> rightly so on the most critical questions), but that doesn't mean
> that we give up on the word or the attempt to clarify its meaning to
> the broader "secular" and/or atheistic audience.
And so is intelligent design too important a concept to give it away to the ID crowd. By doing this, we are saying to the world at large that we don't believe in intelligent design. If we don't believe that, then why not be atheists?
>
> Perhaps someone needs to take the lead and write a similar essay, "We
> Believe in Design" where we explain our belief in this concept that
> flows directly out of the doctrine of Creation, but distances us from
> the more technical use of the term "Intelligent Design" by Dembski
> and company. (Of course, the ASA welcomes IDers to our membership and
> to the inter nos discussion, but not all of us share these views as
> is evident from our response and from our critiques.) No doubt, our
> views will be lumped together with the more limited views of Dembski,
> just because we use the term "design" and believe in a "designer".
> Perhaps this is all that Denyse is saying. But we can distinguish
> ourselves from the Dembski view.
> I'm in full agreement with the view that we need to resist atheism
> and secularlism. But this debate is fundamentally a philosophical and
> theological debate--not a scientific debate.
Well, we are on the defensive in our approach, we are not making ourselves much different than the secularist in the approach being taken because there is a certain amount of truth on the part of the critics (both ID and atheistic) that the 'theistic' part of theistic evolution is nothing but an add-on, a sop thrown to the religious people. It makes no difference to how one participates in science or indeed in the greater theological and philosophic debate. And the posts of the past few days demonstrate that point
The scientific views
> that are being debated and that seem to be at the center of the more
> technical ID question are not the heart of the matter. That's why
> Christians (in the ASA and elsewhere) disagree over them. The belief
> that YEC or ID (in the technical sense) is in error does not negate
> the notion of Creation or Design.
I simply don't see anyone defending design in the ASA. Terry, you once said that I might be on to something when I have criticized Christians for having a heads-I-win; tails-you-lose apologetic. No one allows for the possibility that the Bible might be wrong. The YECs (heads-I-win) make creation true by denying science; most TE's here (tails-you-lose) make creation true by making the story mean something deeply symbolically true but not factually true. In my mind there is no rubber meeting the road of reality in either approach. And when it comes to ID, I am a creationary intelligent design ADVOCATE. I have written web pages on why I believe in design because if there is no design in this universe, (which frankly I see no one here arguing for--they give a lotof lipservice to the concept) then maybe atheism IS correct.
Your comment that the error of ID doesn't negate the notion of creation or design is good but frankly useless. Until we tell the world exactly where this design can be found, we are like the YECs who can't even agree on what geologic strata were deposited by the global flood. Something that can't be defined and defended (concept of Creation and Design) is not very useful in winning this broader philosophical and theological debate. The lack of some place to stand and point to design, reduces the theological debate to one of merely stating one's BELIEF.
>
> Once again, to say this is to risk being lumped together from the
> perspective of secularists with YEC and ID. So be it. But again we
> patiently try to clarify the issues and distinguish between science
> and philosophy/theology.
Maybe, but if we don't distinguish ourselves from the secularists what good are we?
>
> I, and many others in the ASA who share my persuasion have offered to
> work with Phil Johnson, Bill Dembski, Paul Nelson, Mike Behe, and
> others to resist philosophical naturalism and atheism, but nearly
> always they insist on a strategy that draws what we regard a dubious
> science into a central place in the debate. When we question this we
> labeled by the ID (technical) crowd as "compromisers",
> "brain-washed", "confused", "dozy", "irrelevant", "vacuous", etc.
> Their condition for working with us is that we remain silent
> concerning their questionable scientific claims in the interest of
> the bigger philosophical/theological claims. In the interest of
> truth, we can't do that.
I agree, most of the ID folk are not honest with the data any more than the YECs are. They are not interested in truly solving the issue, but then, if everytime we are criticized by the secularists for having theological beliefs we then deny the impact of these theological beliefs on the world and in the reality of creation (other than a warm fuzzy feeling), we can in no way be said to be useful. We become irrelevant and vacuous secularists. At least those secularists who don't believe in God or design are consistent and have a defendable viewpoint where the rubber meets the reality of the road. And they don't write letters to Nature decrying the charge that they are atheists, while we write letters to nature decrying the charge that we believe in intelligent design.
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