Re: [asa] ID-Pure&Applied:(was : Collins' book is reviewed by the Arizona Or...

Don Nield wrote:

> On the other hand AppliedID refers to attempts by Behe and others to apply
> PureID to the real world. They need to do this in order to claim that
> their ID is science. In my view they fail on two counts. Firs, they do not
> know and cannot know the a priori probabilities that are needed. Second,
> they are unable to say any thing about how and when the design is
> implemented.
>

Iain already made some interesting points on Bayesian probability.
I'm not deeply imbued enough to understand the fuss, but Dembski's
basic point in "Design Inference" (as far as I could understand
it) was that there should be some minimum probability where some
event cannot be considered the result of chance. For that he claimed

    How big is N [what Dembski calls the "universal bound"]? Physical
    constraints strictly limit both the number of subjects that can
    exist at any one time and the speed with which any subject can
    generate specifications of events. Specifically, within the known
    physical universe there are estimated to be no more than 10^80
    elementary particles. Moreover, the properties of matter are such
    that transitions from one physical state to another cannot occur
    at a rate faster than 10^45 times per second. Finally, the
    universe itself is about a billion times younger than 10^25
    seconds (assuming the universe is around ten to twenty-billion
    years old). If we now assume that any subject ever specifies
    an event within the known physical universe must comprise at
    least one elementary particle, then these cosmological constraints
    imply that the total number of specified events throughout cosmic
    history cannot exceed

    10^80 x 10^45 x 10^25 = 10^150

    This is N.
    [W.A. Dembski: The Design Inference, Cambridge, Cambridge, 1998.]

So this is his claim, that an event that could be shown to be
less probable than 10^(-150) should be considered too unlikely
to be possible by chance alone.

My main problem with the claim is that, whereas it is claimed to
be objective, unlike card games or rolls of an ideal, fair,
randomly initial-conditioned dice, empirical probabilities have
a degree of subjectiveness. So the first problem is that
there would be arguments over how to calculate any probabilities.
Estimates from the ID camp would aim at generating the above criteria,
are often are done so with some questionable assumptions. However, I'm
not so sure that the denials of the above are done without questionable
simplifications. It is hard to judge some of the numbers, let alone their
correlations. And then there is our ignorance, that there may be some
pathway we didn't think of. So on top of all this, the improbability is
difficult to prove because it is a negative argument (not A, not B ...
not.... ).
The second problem is the "universal constant" itself. Though Dembski sets
a lower bound is fine, but does everyone agree with it? I suspect not.

Finally, there is the theological issue. If God is the type who wants
his "Intel inside" stamp placed everywhere and on everything,
we would probably be very much able to detect transitions where
you would have clear markers and their unlikelihood would be well
neigh measurable. We would not really need the Design
Inference per se, but anyway, that would add more weight to the
issue. For example, if God wrote comments on the genomes when
he made a transition of an organism, he could write something, and
that would be irrefutably the product of an intelligence were it found
as a clear unchanging "Intel inside" stamp. We don't see such an
imprint, so it would appear as though God does not work this way.

This is probably one of my biggest gripes with creationists too. If there
were at least a clear indication of a change in all the hydrogen lines from
stars 6000 yrs and say 7000 years, we would have some cause to listen
to their noise. Were this evidence also clear in the geological record,
there would be further cause to investigate their arguments. We see no
difference in the H lines over 10 - 20 billion years nor do we see any
indication of differences in rocks purportedly 6000 yrs old and those
purportedly older. A totally seamless transition only meant to confound
the intellectually honest scientist and send him to hell? Were I to deny
what I have seen with my own eyes and touched with my own hands,
surely I should neither trust the salvation promised in scripture were that
so. There's not even a blip to hang onto.

So I don't think the issue is whether one could infer design. It is a matter
of theology: who is God? What does God do? and what can we know about
God? And I guess that is your first comment about philosophy. Perhaps
God does not feel a need to "prove God's existence"; and so we must live
by faith.

by Grace we proceed,
Wayne

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Received on Sun Oct 8 10:14:32 2006