Re: Commentary: The Worst Argument Against Intelligent Design

On May 8, 10:20 pm, rokim...@xxxxxxx wrote:
On May 8, 7:02 pm, Jason Spaceman <notrea...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:





From the article:
------------------------------------------------
By Randal Rauser

Even its critics must grudgingly admit that intelligent design has
succeeded brilliantly in marketing abstract concepts by courting the
media and general public. But ask those critics whether it is good
science and many will go cross-eyed and begin frothing at the mouth. What
is it about ID that brings out the worst in some people? Alas, the
reasons are many, including the long and tortured history of creationism
and the courts. (Read Langdon Gilkey's Creationism on Trial for a
sampling as well as Ron Numbers, The Creationists.)

But a history of failed attempts to get equal time for creationism in the
classroom, as well as more recent attempts to do something similar for
ID, are no excuse for bad arguments. It is most unfortunate then that
many scientists, those who are supposed to be paragons of rational
thinking, often resort to school yard insults when it comes to ID (one of
the most memorable, and idiotic, being "intelligent design is creationism
in a cheap tuxedo").

Push beyond that penumbrial belt of sophmoric name-calling and you come
next to the really bad arguments of which there are sadly many. Here is
my candidate for the very worst: "Intelligent design is not science
because it doesn't provide any new information. It is purely negative."
According to this objection, legitimate scientific theories are
identified by being explanatorily productive and predictive, and ID is
neither.

In my view, IDs leading theorists have amply rebutted the charge by
showing that ID is both productive and predictive (the true nature of
"junk DNA" being a prime example). But even if we were to concede that ID
did not provide new insights into nature, the charge would still be
wholly spurious.
---------------------------------------------------

Read it athttp://www.christianpost.com/blogs/books/2009/05/the-worst-
argument-against-intelligent-design-08/ orhttp://tinyurl.com/idarguments

J. Spaceman
.

Real scientists do not have to resort to "insults."  The truth may be
an insult to the guilty, but it is still the truth.  Even "IDs leading
theorists" realized that they never had the science years before they
lost in court.  Just ask any creationist rube school board member or
legislator that ever claimed to want to teach the science of
intelligent design, just how much ID science they ever got to teach.
It is a plain and simple fact that any one that can verify.  This rube
can even get his local school board to teach the science of
intelligent design and watch how fast the switch scam comes in.  All
he has to do is look into reality and find out that IDs leading
theorists have been running the bait and switch on any rube that was
stupid enough to fall for the teach ID scam years before they lost in
court in Dover.  If he looks into the switch scam he will find that it
doesn't even mention that ID ever existed.  Same dishonest ID perps,
just a different creationist scam.

He could just take to heart the words of Philip Johnson.  The same
Johnson that has been called the godfather of the ID movement by the
other ID perpetrators.

QUOTE:
I also don’t think that there is really a theory of intelligent design
at the present time to propose as a comparable alternative to the
Darwinian theory, which is, whatever errors it might contain, a fully
worked out scheme. There is no intelligent design theory that’s
comparable. Working out a positive theory is the job of the scientific
people that we have affiliated with the movement. Some of them are
quite convinced that it’s doable, but that’s for them to prove…No
product is ready for competition in the educational world.
END QUOTE:

http://sciencereview.berkeley.edu/articles.php?issue=10&article=evolu....

Anyone still ignorant or incompetent enough to have fallen for the ID
creationist scam should note that Philip Johnson only made this
admission after the ID perps lost in court.  He quietly let the bait
and switch go down on all the creationist rubes before then.  They
should also note that he isn't appologizing for running a bogus scam
for a decade, but he is pointing the finger at those dishonest ID
theorists that never managed to come up with any ID science worth
teaching.  The ID scam was and is still golden when it comes to the
ignorant and incompetent, and it all would have stayed golden if they
just had any ID science worth teaching.

The only ID supporters left are the ignorant, incompetent and or
dishonest.  There are no other types left.

Ron Okimoto

I was originally going to write how I can't stand those bad arguments
against ID specifically because they allow the scam artists and their
well-trained parrots (not sure which Rauser is) to zero in on those
bad arguments and completely ignore the truly devastating ones, some
of which, as you note, were made by *IDers themselves*.

But on second thought I say "2 can play at that game". This is a war
of rhetoric, not science, so it's fair game to highlight the "bad
arguments against *anti-ID arguments*" like Rauser's. Of course *all*
"arguments against anti-ID arguments" are bad ones, but that's beside
the point. This is yet another opportunity to show how ID apologists
cherry pick, quote mine, define terms (e.g. "theory," "creationism")
to suit the argument, etc.

I'm not interested in getting an ID to reply to the original article,
but I encourage anyone here who has an interest to do so. There are
very few comments, so yours will be noticed. I especially encourage
everyone to ask Rauser and the pro-ID commenters whether they agree
with Behe on the antiquity of life and that humans share common
ancestors with other species. Form the approach of the article Iand
the favorable comments I'm guessing "yes" but I'm also guessing that
they'd rather not admit it because it's not good for the "big tent".

.

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