Judge Says No to ID

Eh, in ten years we'll have outsourced everything. Our laundry will be done in Uzbekistan, our meals will be prepared in Kuwait, and our pointless forum dramas will be written for us by small Swazi children.

SO you've lived a milenia to know otherwise? There's no mention of Amoeba's in the bible. I just checked. No mention of computers either, therefore they mustn't exist. There's parts in the bible that say its perfectly fine to murder, pillage, rape, kill, beat women. I dont see anyone pushing for that part. The book was written in a time of science!! 2000+ years ago!! They had advanced knowledge back then. Ok, enough sarcasm. The bible was written by man. Man is quite Fallible, even if dictated to by a higher power. And Man is quite prone to ego trips. If I was writing a book of morals & rules, I'd try to keep it simple so anyone could understand. I'd leave parts vague and up to interpretation as well.

And yes, to teach ID in Public Schools is bound to offend one religion or another. I dont think the USA needs a religion war of its own.

The last time Religion & Goverment worked together people got burned...... literally. All in the name of God. Or A God.

ok everyone, let's just breathe for a moment..

Intelligent Design does NOT refer to "God did it".. regardless of whether it be Yahweh, Allah, Kronos, etc.. it refers to an existance of intelligence behind the design of biological life forms.

it could be a deity, or aliens, or even humans from another planet/time. this isn't a religious supposition!! i wish we could get past this "Bible this/Bible that" discourse.. it is not the basis for ID, it's the basis for Creationism. quite different.

also, if you want to prove to me that evolution is responsible, then you'll have to (by the same school of thought) show where the building blocks of life came from. the "Big Bang"? even at that, where did the materials in that pinpoint of universe-building materials come from? somewhere along the line, matter had to come from nothing.. and evolution requires that there be something for things to come from.

as far as proof of ID, as i've stated a couple times now.. we, mankind, has done this ourselves. Scientists create a virus that reproduces or Dangerous Virus made from mail-order kits., or how about this creation of organic life from inorganic life, A scientist creates life in the lab -- and trouble for himself?
all of these are examples of mankind creating some form of life. we have proved the possibility of ID because we have done it. it can be observed, it can be repeated.. it's not a theory, it's a fact. life can be created through means other than evolution.

remember, i'm not using this for any type of religious proof.. just that there exists the ability for intelligence to design life.

now, could someone kindly point me in the direction where i can observe, repeatedly, the evolution of life from basic sibngle-cell structures to highly complex structures?

leave religion out of this debate, as Ulrika has proven, it will easily discredit one's arguement simply because those opposed will automatically turn a blind eye and scuff it off as rhetoric. (no offense, Ulrika. simply stating a fact)

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of course, the next question would be.. ok, if ID is responsible, then where did that life come from? and so on and so on, back through time until we have that point of singularity that some evolutionists would call the "Big Bang" or that Creationists (not IDists) would claim that God started creating things. this is where none of us will ever know an answer. not observable, not repeatable, not provable.

but that's a whole other headache for a whole other debate. Earthly origins are child's play when compared to universal beginnings. ack!

Fair is fair: give me a time machine and some Star Trek "scanning for life signs" devices, and I'll take you back about 3.5 billion years and show you where the first replicators self-assembled on earth. Then, I hope you are really patient because we'll have to wait a few billion years until the complexity you are looking for becomes macroscopically visible. If you aren't that patient, we can go to the K-T boundary about 65 million years ago and you'll only have to wait a few million years to see speciation happen, but that won't be abiogenesis, so I fear it won't satisfy you.

As far as who designed the intelligent designer, you know it is turtles all the way down, don't you?

It really all boils down to this...

1. Evolution says absolutely nothing about what occurred before the beginning of the universe. It says nothing about creation or a creator, only about how the universe (specifically the "life" part of that universe) evolved. It uses science, or ability to measure, to explain how things work.
2. Creationism attempts to shove away all scientific work and force a story from a religious book to explain how the universe and life exists.
3. Intelligent Design accepts that evolution exists but wants us to believe it was guided by God (some kind of God) was in charge. It tries to force us to believe about things that are past our measurable grasp through science. It is a "belief".

Although that makes logical sense, Hank, and many religious people would agree with that as a natural harmony between science and theology. In fact, that's close to what I personally believe But Hank ... if only it were true, Hank ... no, you're mistaken.

Intelligent Design does not accept evolution. It states that there are minor changes that occur, but that every animals species was created at the time of creation. It denies the existance of the universe before 4500 B.C. It denies geology, astrophysics, evolution, radiological chemistry, paleontology, genetics, and probably a host of other sciences. It is utter crap. It is crap invented by stupid blind ultra-literalists who can't bother to understand that words may have subtle nuances and different interpretations, and that they may have their interpretation of The Bible totally frigging wrong.

/rant off

Yes it does, Cybin. God=Aliens=Designer=Whatever you want to claim the designer might have been. Changing the designer does not in any way change the basic premise. Evolution is to intelligent design as relativity is to "It's magic!" It's the scientific equivelant of a four year old answering a question with "because," as if that were a suitable answer all by itself.

This is actually a huge presumption, I think due to cultural biases we all have.

Why must there have been 'nothing'?

Nothing, is an *incredibly* rare, exotic and unusual state in the universe at any point. Even 'empty' space seethes with such energy as to force spontaneous particle pair creation, aeons distant from any nearby galaxy.

The 'big bang' almost certainly a conversion, phase change or other dramatic turning point, yes... but creation from 'nothing', or causeless? Absolutely no evidence to think that. Unless the 'big bang' is a god, but somehow I doubt a splattering of spacetime really counts as such.

Perhaps the cause was locked up in a region outside of our spacetime, or perhaps wasn't a 'cause' insofar as time and space in our space didn't exist yet... but... absolutely nothing?

Nothings, infinites and eternities are all human concepts that may not necessarily apply.

the distinction i'm making is that it's not necessarily some omnipotent being that snapped it's fingers to blink us into existance. my point is that there is merit to the thought that something may have had a hand in the construction of biology on Earth.

now, this is what ID is about. it's about studying our structures and observing what appears to be some sort of intelligent intent in such.

sure, for some it may imply that there is a God to which these things can be attributed, but it's not what it's stating.

there's a distinct difference between suggesting a spiritual being that said "be" (Creationism) and a race (human, alien, whatever) that was involved in biological construction from basic materials. one says we came from nothing, the other says we came from existing basic components that were assembled by the hand of a physical entity.

i'm not trying to say any hypothesis or theory is right or wrong, i'm saying that we can not assume that evolution is to credit for it all without exhausting all other possibilities.

What Chip says is true Cybin. It's precisely what the court ruled (see first post) as well.

~Ulrika~

it's not a presumption at all.. it's fairly logical.

fact: we are made of certain materials.
fact: those materials had to come from somewhere.
fact: the materials those matrials came from had to come from somewhere.

just follow back, smaller and smaller.. origins of origins. where is the begining? once you reach that beginning, the original materials.. we can still ask, where did those come from? if you can find an answer to that, you're still left with the same question..

where does infinity begin? where did the universe begin? what materials was it made from? and where did those come from? back and back again..

the answer is unfathomable to the human mind. even "nothing" would have had to have a beginning, yes? to our human minds, everything must come from something, yet logic dictates that something has to come from something else.

even if we blinked into existance from "nothing", then where in spacetime did that "nothing" exist? in a larger universe of which we are but one bubble? we still end up with the same questions and eventualities.. where did atoms come from? where did spacial existance originate? when did time start?

darn it.. i've tried to avoid thinking about this stuff ever since i attempted to figure out infinity after coming up with a model for perpetual motion. i think i need a drink.. lol.

It's amazing to me people are still discussing this in the year 2005.

Yes, I'm familiar with the Hawking/Preskill debate. I am also aware that prevailing wisdom, today, (and Hawking, himself) states that Hawking was wrong. http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn6151

That debate actually exemplifies why I don't trust "science fact" any more than you trust theology. Science is perpetually open to re-interpretation based on new findings, but is oft cited as absolute, unequivocal, settled fact.

Given that religion and philosohy operate outside of the bounds of empiricism, I don't understand your insistence on applying a scientific standard to these debates. Now that ID has been officially ruled as "religion," then it is now time to shift the debate from science to theology (or at least, philosophy).

Regarding Chip's suggestion, I say right on: Teach critical thinking skills! Since that's not likely to occur, I thought that one alternative might be to continue offering standard science curricula, but to add a high school-level philosophy course that could consider topics such as ID.

Strange, I've never heard anyone state that science is absolute, unequivocal, settled fact. In fact I've only ever heard the claim made from people citing it as a reason to distrust science. The fact that it's continually evolving as new discoveries are made is what makes it such a valid tool for understanding. Your claim would be accurate if you replaced the word "science" with the word "religion"

Now that ID is being pushed out of science courses, it's interesting to see how it's being repacked as philosophy. ID does not belong in schools, it belongs in church.

~Ulrika~

i'm honestly shocked by this statement, Ulrika.. do you really base your opinions on what a court says? are you actually saying, because a court system said so, then it's true?

i know you better than this.. you think for yourself and so do i. (that's why we can have such good debates, we actually think for ourselves around here! lol..)


so, in my opinion, the court is wrong on this point. ID should not be equated with religion by any stretch of the imagination. regardless of whether it should be discussed in schools or not is besides my point.

i'm not arguing the scholastic inclusion of ID, i'm simply putting forth that ID should be considered as a possibility. not even necessarily the only explanation, just that there may be some truth behind it. you can't say it's not possible, it may not seem probable.. and it certainly can't be proven at this point, but it can't be dismissed as false either.

just like evolution hasn't been proven to be solely responsible for all life on Earth. there's evidence that it's had a hand in what has transpired throughout our history, but we can't say that nothing else has influenced our existance either.

if we're going to be scientific about it, we need to consider all possiblities and we can't discount any unless it can be proven to be absolutely false. this goes both ways, nothing is proven without evidence and so far we only have partial answers due to partial evidence.

So, instead of God, or Flying Spaghetti Monster, or Santa, aliens may have made us. Reminds me of an eminently respectable author, who employed scientific method just as rigorously as ID's proponents... http://unmuseum.mus.pa.us/aastro.htm.

Call it whatever you like, ID seeks to provide a non-scientific, implausible on its face, irreproducible answer to questions that science is brave enough to admit that it cannot answer. ID proponents have an agenda, and that agenda is to force a wedge of superstition into our classrooms, to make room for their (insert name of religion/crackpot theory/drug-induced hallucination), because they cannot stand having people walking around believing that life could possibly be an accident.

And yes, the more finely you divide, the farther you go back, the harder the answers are to find. This does not mean that you construct answers out of whole cloth. This means you admit that you do not have the answers. Do I know for certain that there was a Big Bang? No, of course not. I also do not know for certain that Jimmy Carter was ever President, as that happened before I was alive, but it is reasonable to believe so, since his Presidency fits the evidence I've been shown. I do not know for certain that there is a person inside the purple felt costume, but I have difficulty believing that Barney is an actual dinosaur. Evolution fits the pattern of evidence that we currently have. Evolution does not presuppose the existence of God, aliens, FSM, or Cookie Monster guiding the development of life on Earth, because there is no evidence for this that fits scientific method, and therefore ID is not science.

ID is a last-gasp attempt at reintroducing religion into our classrooms. Fine, fine, you can say 'Hey, I'm not trying to define the agency at work, I'm just saying it's there'. And maybe you mean that. That does not change the fact that the staunchest supporters of ID in the classroom are people who will not be content with that alone. Those folks are the ones who want Evolution tossed out, and 'fiat lux' brought back in. I live in the buckle of the Bible belt, and I have to listen to people every single day saying, 'How can you look at the world around us and not believe in a creator?'. My response is 'How can you look at the world around us and manage to believe that there is one?'. Dealing purely with Evolution vs ID, how does ID explain congenital illness, the vermiform appendix, and George Bush's apparent ability to walk on his hind legs?

If we are the result of some outside agency's tinkering, I wish they'd done a better job. We're not terribly well-suited to our environment, we're prone to illnesses that are encoded into our genetic structure, and our genetic structure itself can be changed by exposure to mild levels of background radiation. Piss-poor design, if you ask me. Looks... just a lot more like the result of millenia of random alterations that managed to squeak by.

You can believe that life is a miracle. You can believe that life is the inevitable result of a big ball of rock and water forming near a big ball of burning hydrogen. You can believe that Elves from Proxima Centauri made us in test tubes. Believe anything at all that you like. Belief is not science.

See post #49. But, would you also assert that courses such as, "World's Great Religions" (a course I actually took in HS) are inappropriate for public school audiences? What about any form of discourse that explores the origins of life and/or the universe? Furthermore, I'm not the one re-packaging ID as philosophy; Judge Jones did that for me. I still think that apologists should be given some latitude to explore the scientific ramifications of ID, but that such exploration should (for now) be contained within the walls of the church or seminary.

Chip, in my view, the human experience extends well beyond the bounds of empiricism. You and I have previously gone rounds on this very issue, so no need to rehash the finer points. You've got to admit, though, that our friend Ms. Zugzwang rarely operates outside of a tightly constrained set of narrow syllogisms. Macro evolution, for instance, is not confirmed science fact, as much as you or she would wish to assert, otherwise.

I do not base my opinions on court rulings. We reached the exact same conclusion independently. This is significant because it relates to the Supreme Court case that separates church and state. By ruling ID religion repackaged, they are able to use the existing precedent.

*whew* I have got to pack! I'm going on vacation soon.

~Ulrika~

So, you are arguing that any theory, no matter how preposterous, only needs to be impossible to be proven wrong, in order to be granted some validity?

Fine. I propose that all life on Earth was, in fact, created by myself. Using abilities to travel through time and create organic structures, said abilities being granted by my forced eviction from this Earth and relocation to a planet under a red star, I will visit Earth in its infancy and set the whole ball in motion. Given that these things have not happened in my own personal timeline yet, nor in yours, save of course those events which I participated in which happened in the far distant past, there isn't much of any way for you to prove me wrong. Therefore, my theory is just as deserving of philosophical and scientific inquiry as any other.

The Designer in ID has to be a non-biological being from outside our universe. Not outside our galaxy, but our entire universe. Otherwise we would have to ask, how did the Designer evolve? Who designed the Designer? And that, of course, would lead to "Who designed the Designer's Designer?" and on and on. A non-biological being who exists outside time and space and who guides the development of life in our universe is pretty much one of the basic definitions of God. And if your answer to the question is "God did it" you're debating religion, not science.

Another thing to ask- Does it benefit the students in any way? Will it help with a future career? Does it give them "an edge" in today's highly-competitive job market?

The USA's educational system is screwed up enough already. Lets not add more messes to it.

hahaha, great line (and great post).

Quite the opposite. It is the unintelligent "accidents" of design that ice Darwin's cake.

A few examples might suffice. One thing you have to remember is the importance of embryology which takes one fertilized cell and builds a highly structured organism of about 10^14 cells. The reason embryology is important is that since adaptation by natural selection proceeds by typically single point random mutations (which are then culled non-randomly) each organism along a historic trajectory from there to here must be an improvement on its parent. Thus there are adaptations that would be a vast improvement over the current designs which are very unlikely to arise as the intermediate is necessarily worse than the hypothetical end.

One of my favorites is the wretched bad design of our criss-crossed airway and food-tract. Would an intelligent designer design a system so prone to death by choking that backup lockouts need to be added? You swallow food and your epiglottis shunts the trachea from lungs to stomach - most of the time. Whales can't choke on their food, but that was because their breathing path was heavily modified (as was the rest of them) on their trajectory from bear-like terrestrial ancestors.

Another one that points out how brilliant the designer was is watching the parent-offspring conflict present in utero. There's a problem with mammals: baby "wants" to divert as much resources from mom (without killing her) as it can. Mom "wants" to live to bear another child. So baby starts releasing an insulin-antagonist into mom's blood to keep her cells from metabolizing sugar - meaning more food for baby! This ain't good for mom, so she releases hormones which try to block the insulin-antagonist, baby makes more, mom makes more. As any competent chemist will tell you, when you raise titrating pairs of chemicals to severe levels, the system becomes very sensitive to minor perturbations. Enter "gestational diabetes" where mom is almost killed by this arms race of hormones from her own child. Smart design and kind of pulls at those maternal heart-strings of compassion.

Eyes have evolved independently at least eight separate times. The vertibrate eye has one glaring design defect. All the wiring and life support for the retina were placed between the light and the photosensitive bits. Kind of amazing that we can see at all. Of course the ganglia then have to be made awfully transparent and then need to plunge through in the "blind spot" which your brain then has to go through computational tricks to wipe out of the attendant hole in the image. Try getting that design approved for your next video camera.

Parasites and infections of all forms. Good for the parasite or pathogen - not so good for the host. Could an intelligent designer have created a world where there were none? Sure. Can natural selection create a world where there isn't? Probably not. Given that life on our single example has managed to take advantage of the miniscule energy disequilirium in rocks (lichens) a nice, big homeostatic organism is a field day for microbes - ask anyone with immunodeficiency. Even in a healthy human, the number of cells in your body that are "you" (i.e. have your genotype) is dwarfed by a factor of 10 or more by the number of cells in you that are not "you". Enjoy your lunch.

No; ID belongs in the realm of philosophy. However, philosophers are not prohibited from contemplating scientific premises.

And, although ID is technically "agnostic," Judeo-Christianity has, if nothing else, several thousand years of history on its side.

Finally, preposterous is in the eye of the beholder. Most of our modern widgetry would be considered "of the devil" if it were to be suddenly teleported back into the middle ages.