Re: 2 questions about Inteligent Design vs Evolution

On 17 Aug 2006 10:15:49 -0700, boltzenator@xxxxxxxxx wrote:

jgrisham@xxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
boltzenator@xxxxxxxxx wrote:
Hello,

I would like to ask two questions related to Intelligent Design (ID).
It should be pointed out that this is not to make a case for or against
creationism. Personally I find evolution to be a rational and plausible
theory; still I cannot yet easily dismiss all ideas of a creative
entity (however it is defined). So I have one question for proponents
of intelligent design and one for its opponents.

1) I've seen many videos and read arguments about ID, and it seems to
me that the main argument of ID is this: Life is too complex and has
such a clear purpose that it could not have been a product of evolution
and natural selection. And so, just like a complex item like a watch
implies a watchmaker, so does life implies the existence of a creator
in the form of an intelligent being. Is this picture of ID correct?

No, that's Creationism. If ID were to be considered scientifically
valid, it couldn't jump to a conclusion (i.e., a creator). The ID
critics, both Creationists and Evolutionists, agree with that
definition, however it so clearly violates the scientific method as to
be ridiculous. Liberally speaking, Dembski suggested that life implies
intelligence and tried to establish some guidelines to intelligence
beyond primate brain size. Ants and bees demonstrate an intelligence
that supports colonies of millions of individuals and they don't
possess primate brains. Regardless of ID, we clearly need a more
rational approach to understanding intelligence.

If
so, then the creator himself must be a complex and purposeful being,
for it is of common acceptance that, if such a creator exists, he/it
must be more intelligent, more powerful and more complex than we are.
My question then simply follows: shouldn't the same line of reasoning
used by ID apply? Shouldn't that creator have his/its own creator?
Where does the chain end?

Since "the designer" is the manifestation of ID critics trying to
invalidate the ID arguments without dealing with them, I can't answer
that question.

2) My second question has to do with the particular faith I was brought
up with (Christianity), and the question will be perhaps better
answered by someone who was brought up in the Christian faith but later
succeeded in having a worldview free of any conception of God. Many
Christians claim that the Bible is free of contradiction, which I find
to be quite an incorrect claim (strictly speaking) because the Bible
has many internal literal contradictions and surely many accounts of
events and things that God did or asked to do, which, by today's
standards, we would consider incompatible with the nature of a
benevolent God as defined by Christianity. However, apart from those
literal and interpretative contradictions, I find it surprising that
the bible is not full of claims easily dismissible. It would have been
simpler if there were in the bible claims that later turned out clearly
proven false by science. For example if the bible had said things like
"the world is flat" or "God created man and woman first, then the
animals", then it would have been very easy to dismiss the whole thing
because it is a hard fact that the world isn't flat, nor did human
evolved on earth before animals. I expected the bible to be full of
misconceptions about the universe that should be pretty characteristic
of the ancient times when the bible was written. Am I ready too much
into this?

You titled your post as ID vs Evolution, however your question is
purely Creationism vs. Evolution. Ideally, ID has nothing to do with
the bible. Dembski avoids making any such connections. The noted ID
critic, Barbara Forrest, cites Dembski as making an off handed comment
about the book of John in the New Testament, however her citing info
leads to no such documented comment. This "she said/he said" assertion
is often requoted with the same useless citing data as some sort of
proof of Dembski's "true" feelings. For people who claim to be
rational, most of them are very poor fact checkers, when they're
predisposed to believe an outright lie.

As things stand, it seems to me that you can always come up
with explanations that interpret the bible in some ways that would make
things blur or even compatible with scientific fact. For example, about
the age of the earth (about 10000years in biblical term vs. few
billions of years according to science), one can simply argue that a
'year' in biblical sense is symbolic of a longer time period than a
normal year.
Of course, for an objective judge, any inconsistency and intrepretative
game is a good reason to dismiss Christianity/religion but I have to
say that I personally tend to look for hard proof of incorrectness.
Does anyone else find it surprising that there "seem" to be no hard
claim in the bible about the universe that have been clearly proven to
be wrong by science?
Are there such facts that I'm simply not aware of?

Like most people, you're looking at the subject too broadly. Science
doesn't answer all of life's questions. Neither does religion. In fact,
nothing does! You need to keep things in context. Science is one thing.
Religion is another thing. Politics, another. Stargate, another. Just
as you wouldn't expect George W. Bush to portray an alien on Stargate
or Yeal'c to join the president's cabinet as the Secretary of the
Interior, you need to keep things "in context".

How far can you push the "keeping things in context" approach? This may
work for some aspects of daily life, but there are fundamental issues
about which science and religion point to opposite directions. How do
you reconcile those? How do you keep contradicting claims in separate
'contexts'? For example, science seems to describe a universe that
doesn't need a creator god, which religion contradicts. Another
example: from my religious upbringing, I find it hard to imagine life
without an afterlife. Yet with my rational mind I look at animals and
us (humans) and see no major difference is the way we are and function.
We look a lot like most animals (eyes, hands, foot, ears...), we
function just like them (eat, digest, sleep, breath, red blood,
development, death...) etc., and yet, in my Christian faith and many
other faith systems, we humans have come to deeply believe that there
is an afterlife for us but not for our neighbors (the animals). How do
you keep those in 'context' and avoid looking at the subject "too
broadly"?

This is not just like politics vs. science. And in fact, if George W.
Bush starts claiming for example that his politics suggests that
increased greenhouse effect do not cause any danger to our planet while
science clearly suggests it does, then we'll have the same kind of
conflict between politics and science as we seem to be having between
science and religion.
It also seem to me that the issues involved may have profound
implications on our ways of life, and so, weather we like it or not,
these subjects have to be addressed.

It is so hard to get a rational discussion on this subject in
talk.origin. I am a newbie. I find some threads to be fascinating
discussions, but any threat touching on ID goes ballistic!

I am probalbly many times your age. I have faced your questions and
still do. I finally rid myself of the Christian yolk, well, almost,
but find the hall of mirrors, disconcerting.

Finally, if I accept the ID (without Christianity), I must ponder the
nature of this "Designer." Is it moral? Are we guinia pigs? Is this
a "reality show" for the entertainment of supernatural beings? Is
there reincarnation?

Well, enough. If you wish to explore the hot topic with me, just
remove "rem" from the email address.

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