Re: SETI and the Detection of ID

Seanpit <seanpit@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Nov 22, 3:00 am, j.wilki...@xxxxxxxxx (John Wilkins) wrote:

but sean thinks something that has a 100% failure rate is good
enough to try again. wonder if he recommends voodoo for his
patients. after all, that has a 100% failure rate, too.

I guess that's why it's used in forensics, anthropology, and SETI
sciences . . .

"The second part of Metaphysic is the inquiry of Final Causes, which I
report not as omitted, but as misplaced. For they are generally sought
for in Physic, and not in Metaphysic. And yet if it were but a fault in
order I should not think so much of it; for order is matter of
illustration, but pertains not to the substance of sciences. But this
misplacing has caused a notable deficience, and been a great misfortune
to philosophy. For the handling of final causes in physics has driven
away and overthrown the diligent inquiry of physical causes, and made
men to stay upon these specious and shadowy causes, without actively
pressing the inquiry of those which are really and truly physical; to
the great arrest and prejudice of science. For this I find done, not
only by Plato, who ever anchors upon that shore, but also by Aristotle,
Galen, and others, who also very frequently strike upon these shallows.
For to introduce such causes as these, " that the hairs of the eyelids
arc for a quickset and fence about the sight;" or "that the firmness of
the skins and hides of living creatures is to defend them from the
extremities of heat and cold;" or "that the bones are for columns or
beams, whereupon the frames of the bodies of living creatures are
built;" or " that the leaves of trees are for protecting the fruit from
the sun and wind;" or "that the clouds are formed above for watering the
earth; " or "that the thickness and solidity of the earth is for the
station and mansion of living creatures," and the like, is a proper
inquiry in Metaphysic, but in Physic it is impertinent."

Francis Bacon, De Augmentis Scientiae, Book II, chapter IV

Thank you for that.
I love Francis Bacon - his writings go to the heart of the nature of
science.

The next chapter, he writes:

"The operative doctrine concerning nature I will ... divide into two
parts, ... and as Physic and the inquisition of Efficient and Material
causes produces Mechanic, so Metaphysic and the inquisition of Forms
produces Magic. For the inquisition of FInal Causes is barren, and like
a virgin consecrated to God produces nothing."

You keep forgetting here that this discussion is not about final
causes or the supernatural or magic. It is about what natural
intelligence is capable of achieving vs. what non-intelligent nature
is capable of achieving. Telling this difference is the basis of SETI
and all other forms of ID theories which are very much a part of
modern science.

So we can add to your accomplishments that you can't read sources from
the 17th century...

Bacon says this: It's OK to use final causes (teleological thinking) in
explanation of biological and human behaviour. It's just no use in
physics and astronomy (the physical sciences of the day). You neatly
snipped the claim you made, that:

Not true. By saying that only intelligence at at least the human-
level of intelligence and creativity can produce a particular feature,
one is saying that no non-intelligent force of nature is likely
capable of doing the job. You see, the argument is that only ID can
produce a particular feature - - - ID and not any non-ID force of
nature.

Bacon's constraints mean that when you introduce design arguments
without a knowledge of the actual causes, you are led into fruitless and
shallow reasoning, and this is quite correct. To say that something is
designed, that it has a purpose, explains precisely *nothing* until you
give a mechanism of how it comes by that purpose.

In human behaviour and biology we have those explanations. Purpose is
imparted through natural selection in biology, and in psychology we are
working out the mechanisms by which purposive behaviour is produced. And
guess what? In no way does it require that there be an external
intelligence guiding actions.

Fundamentally, the claim that ID is *required* is so unnecessary that it
can be called a barren virgin even where Bacon thought it was
legitimate, in metaphysics.
--
John S. Wilkins, Philosophy, University of Queensland
scienceblogs.com/evolvingthoughts
But al be that he was a philosophre,
Yet hadde he but litel gold in cofre

.

Relevant Pages

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