--- Cornelius Hunter <ghunter2099@sbcglobal.net>
wrote:
> George:
>
> Couple of points probably worth making:
>
> 1. The ID claim is that the evidence points to a
> designer, not necessarily to God. This is (I think
> it is safe to say) a consensus within ID.
The inference to a transcendent designer is quite a
bit different from the inference to a ordinary
designer. In the latter case we have independent
evidence which constrains the designer. In case of a
designer God, there are no constraints and appeal to
such a designer explains anything and thus nothin.
> But what does this mean exactly? Much to say here,
> but what I think everyone can agree on is the
> obvious: if there is a valid design inference, then
> there will be some who reject it, and others who
> accept it.
Or alternatively, lacking a valid design inference
there will still be those who accept it or reject it.
In other words, rejection of the design inference may
or may not point to its failure. But from a scientific
perspective there are good reasons to reject ID's
arguments.
> 2. Regarding the design inference, I wouldn't put it
> as you state it above. It is more like how Paley
> described it. We know what things designed look
> like, so when we see something like that we make the
> design inference.
We have NO familiarity what God's 'designs' may look
like. We may 'speculate' but to argue that we 'know
what things designed look like' is begging the
question, especially in biology where 'design' is so
rampant and so well explained by prevailing theories.
> How to make this objective? This is one facet of
> ID.
On the contrary, the 'specification' part of ID is
inherently subjective.
> 3. Another facet of design theory is that it makes
> way for new types of scientific research.
Begging the question. So far we have seen little
evidence of such beyond some vague claims.
> For example, in biology we can compare species
> according to many criteria (such as design) rather
> than restricting to an evolutionary tree.
Even though the evolutionary tree best describes the
data? What/how would ID have to contribute here
specifically>
> We can look for patterns that evolutionists do not
> look for, since they restricted to common descent
> and fitness as the drivers (not that ID rejects
>common descent--it doesn't, though some IDs do).
Evolutionists are not restricted to common descent and
fintness as the drivers. That's a flawed argument.
Lot's of speculations but little concrete examples.
Which explains my statement that ID is scientifically vacuous.
Received on Sun Oct 16 21:13:08 2005
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.8 : Sun Oct 16 2005 - 21:13:08 EDT