On The Limits of Human Talent

Yes, I'm still going to defend it. Not necessarily God's word as I understand it, but any (western world) god. Secular science is masterful at not necessarily confronting, but driving by and ignoring the possibility of any god, thereby eventually arriving at atheistic explanations for some things, explanations which have no practical value, other than promote the atheist worldview. Well, I did a little sleuthing around the internet as you suggested, and here's the summary of the uselessness of Intelligent Design at a link that I quickly found, which goes along perfectly with what I remember seeing in discussions many times before in the past 8 or 9 years;

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That is what it means to make real predictions; if a "theory" predicts that anything can happen, it is not a scientific theory at all. Imagine if someone promoted a theory of rocketry by saying that no matter whether the rocket goes forward, backward, or nowhere, his theory will predict it. You would be quite justified in asking what on Earth his theory is good for, right?

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When you think about it, a theory which can predict anything is actually a theory which predicts nothing. An open-ended "prediction" which is incapable of ever saying "no, we won't see that" is absolutely, utterly, completely useless. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is "intelligent design" theory in a nutshell: completely useless.

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Other Essays - Why Intelligent Design Theory is Completely UselessSo concerning something like deep space "exploration", would the general public have a different opinion than the scientific community on just how useless it is? Common sense suggests they just might.What we see at the above link is put in a similar way at another site;

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A fair critique of the theory of Intelligent Design involves asking the question of practicality. What possible contribution can ID theory make to the world of scientific research? If it can't make any testable, repeatable, practical strides in producing data, then it will forever remain in the realm of philosophy rather than actual science.

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http://www.examiner.com/...ractical-use-might-it-have-part-1So when I say that the topic of this thread is to question the wisdom of allowing unlimited, untestable, unfalsifiable, useless and impractical exploration to go on just to satisfy a special interest, can't some areas of exploration that are going on today be held up to the same standards that ID clearly is/was? I don't think deep space exploration tells us anything about this natural world, because it's not testable, and not falsifiable, and is not part of this world. I think global warming is like a lot of things in science, a conclusion is first reached, then evidence is worked through backwards to come to that conclusion. The motivation is there, power and money. It only makes sense that, in a free society, a source of knowledge other than science should contribute to determinations of just what IS science, what should be explored using public funds. If only the scientific community is answering the question of what should be researched, the political process needs to answer some questions if free people are asking them, regardless of their education. This goes along with U.S. foundings, the intent of the framers. Scientific research leads to political decisions, which involve other sources of knowledge. As in questions like, how will the public and free markets react to those political decisions that scientific research led to, research that wasn't necessarily requested by anyone other than the scientific community (and their friends in one certain political party.) Ignore the scientific community would be more accurate. To pay attention to constituents who have the ability to look at the sky, feel the temperature with their bodies, and concern themselves with their society's finances. How people describe themselves isn't a very sure method to learn accurate percentages. Traditionally, it's still not in style to be an atheist. But that doesn't necessarily mean that atheism isn't drastically on the rise.

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Religiosity is on the decline in the U.S. and atheism is on the rise, according to a new worldwide poll.

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The poll, called The Global Index of Religiosity and Atheism, found that the number of Americans who say they are religious dropped from 73 percent in 2005 (the last time the poll was conducted) to 60 percent.

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At the same time, the number of Americans who say they are atheists rose, from 1 percent to 5 percent.

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http://articles.washingtonpost.com/...st-groups-new-atheistsSo non-religious Americans is 40%, with only 5% of them admitting atheism. It only makes sense if 35% would rather not face the stigma of a label, even though the label fits them well. The way they vote, the way they behave suggests who they are. My Pastor recently claimed that football stadiums have more people in them on a Sunday in the U.S. than do churches. I don't think that was true only a decade or two ago. All the countless atheist websites all over the net are getting their funding from somewhere. Best selling books by Sam Harris and Dawkins and dozens of others like them are being sold to somebody. And they want to be the sole arbiters of what knowledge is, and what will be politically done concerning their findings.

I'm pleased to inform you that scientists don't actually have more votes than anyone else. And each scientist has only one voice apiece. Now if people in our society tend to give scientists more credence on scientific matters, than they do to, for example, pastry chefs, then that's their choice. Stupidity isn't actually a method.

OK. My god just spoke to me. He says you should send me money. You're not going to question his word, are you? Ah, so when you said "uselessness", you meant ...... excuse me, I have to laugh a lot now.Yes, something which is "useless" in that sense is not science. I can't tell whether you're being willfully stupid or just ... stupid. ... or insane.Jesus, marc, what happened to you? Were you normal as a baby?

That's debatable, but it's also too far off topic here IMO. It can make comparable, if not better, predictions than can deep space telescope gazing. "Practical", applicable to astronomy just as much as it is to ID. Yes. I've seen the claim in this thread that we couldn't do all of our oil exploration etc. without the knowledge that the earth is billions of years old. I don't know why not. We don't need to be atheists to be able to dig.

But it still goes to the same place, the same distance away, and it has to support human life, a very complex undertaking. I just can't believe there's not at least some of the information from the Apollo program that could save some new design/redesign time and expense.

We'll add astronomy to the list of things you don't know about then. Once again, modesty requires me to point out that some theists understand geology too. They're not all stupid, and atheists aren't the repository of all knowledge.I would also point out that the ability to dig is not sufficient to find oil ... wait, I take that back, this could be funny. Marc, do you own a spade? Do you want to become an oil billionaire? Well, all you've got to do is start digging. When you make it rich, I'd like a 10% cut for giving you the idea.

Curiously engineering borrows from a lot of sources when doing design, and previous design is one of them. Just look at cars, something old, something new, something borrowed and something blue.Enjoy.

I'm beginning to see a pattern form, we'll see if it continues. If those who post here in any way represent the scientific community, it seems that actual history, whether it be from 2000 years ago, or 10 years ago, means nothing to them. I could tell you more about how science predicted we'd run out of oil by [about] 1950, or how science predicted we'd have mass starvation by the year 2000 if we didn't take drastic measures to curb population growth, but it would be from memory of printed information that I've seen in the past, some of it before there was a such thing as the www. It's factual, but if I can't document it for you, you don't believe it, or think that it can be revised to suit science's needs. It is what it is, it can't be undone from history, no matter how much the scientific community tries to kid itself, or school children, that it can.

You can't document it but it is factual because you say so? You expect this to be enough after the number of obvious mistakes you have made?

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Yes, I'm still going to defend it. Not necessarily God's word as I understand it, but any (western world) god. Secular science is masterful at not necessarily confronting, but driving by and ignoring the possibility of any god, thereby eventually arriving at atheistic explanations for some things, explanations which have no practical value, other than promote the atheist worldview.

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That isn't a defence. In fact it strongly suggests that the claim is a lie.

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Well, I did a little sleuthing around the internet as you suggested, and here's the summary of the uselessness of Intelligent Design at a link that I quickly found, which goes along perfectly with what I remember seeing in discussions many times before in the past 8 or 9 years;

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In other words "uselessness" means "useless as a scientific theory" rather than referring merely to practical uselessness. THat's an important distinction that you forgot to mention,

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So when I say that the topic of this thread is to question the wisdom of allowing unlimited, untestable, unfalsifiable, useless and impractical exploration to go on just to satisfy a special interest, can't some areas of exploration that are going on today be held up to the same standards that ID clearly is/was?

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The standard of "usefulness" you are talking about is "usefulness as a scientific theory" which is clearly only applicable to things which either are or purport to be scientific theories. So the reason for not applying THAT standard is obvious to anybody with an ounce of sense.Indeed, one of the purposes of exploration is to test theories. It seems rather silly to say that theories must be testable and then decry testing them as "useless".

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I don't think deep space exploration tells us anything about this natural world, because it's not testable, and not falsifiable, and is not part of this world.

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"The natural world" is intended to cover the entirety of nature, so rather obviously the observations made by exploration WOULD tell us something about the natural world.

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I think global warming is like a lot of things in science, a conclusion is first reached, then evidence is worked through backwards to come to that conclusion. The motivation is there, power and money. It only makes sense that, in a free society, a source of knowledge other than science should contribute to determinations of just what IS science, what should be explored using public funds.

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You seem to be confusing science with creationism.

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Scientific research leads to political decisions, which involve other sources of knowledge. As in questions like, how will the public and free markets react to those political decisions that scientific research led to, research that wasn't necessarily requested by anyone other than the scientific community (and their friends in one certain political party.)

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It is the job of scientists to convey the best and most accurate information they can. Setting policy is the job of the politicians. Human reactions to policies is obviously outside the scope of climate science, and can't be blamed on climate scientists by any reasonable person.

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Ignore the scientific community would be more accurate. To pay attention to constituents who have the ability to look at the sky, feel the temperature with their bodies, and concern themselves with their society's finances.

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Why would uncontrolled, imprecise and local observations give a more accurate view of conditions then the better controlled, more precise and wider ranger observations made by climate science ? Why would the state of societies' finances make any difference to whether the Earth is warming or not ?What you mean is that politicians should be guided by your selfishness, not by what is best for the society that they govern. That is a reprehensible view but I guess, all too typical of the American Right.

You're terribly confused and seem to be having a great deal of difficulty making distinctions that aren't at all subtle (a theme you continue in your next message, but I'll get to that in my next reply). You said there were other ways of gaining knowledge besides science, and now when pressed to tell us what they are you can only ramble on about things that definitely are not methods of gaining knowledge.I can see you're very concerned about the political decisions being made that are based upon some current scientific understandings (such as climate change), but if that's what you really want to discuss then you should propose a new thread or find an old one where that would be on-topic.--Percy

My God, are you ever confused! First you say science should avoid seeking information that might test God's word, and now you're saying that science should be more engaged in seeking information about God. Do even you know what you're trying to say? And it's telling you precisely what I told you it would be telling you way back in my Message 83, that Intelligent Design is useless as science, meaning that is incapable of extending our knowledge of the natural world. It's definitely not saying that ID isn't science because something has be useful (meaning of practical use) before it can be considered science.I explained how you're confusing two different contexts using the word "useless", Dr Adequate explained it, Shalamabobbi explained it, PaulK explained it, yet you continue merrily along with the same confusion - what is wrong with you? Are you daft? How can hypotheses and theories resulting from deep space exploration not be testable and falsifiable through further deep space exploration?You continue to harp on climate change, but unless it is an example of something science shouldn't research because it would test God's Word then you should stop, because it isn't on-topic. There are plenty of people here who love to discuss climate change with you - why don't you start a new topic?You also continue to confuse the practice of science as a way of gaining knowledge of the natural world with the political decisions based upon scientific knowledge. In fact, you continue to confuse almost everything. I hope you don't believe that non-religious Americans are actually atheists, with only 5% admitting it, because the question that was asked in the poll (Poll shows atheism on the rise in the U.S.) was this: Your paranoia is showing again, and this isn't the thread's topic.--Percy

Have you noticed that these bizarre paranoid ramblings have nothing whatsoever to do with the post to which you're ostensibly replying?

Predictions of when we'd run out of oil received significant public attention several times during the 20th century, but I don't think there was even any scientific consensus to this effect. I think Marc may be referring to predictions from the 1920s when he refers to running out by 1950. He should take a look at this article about past oil prognostications. He should in particular pay attention to this part: Marc, a couple questions for you:

1. Assuming, just for the sake of discussion, that a scientific consensus developed at some point in the past that we should have run out of oil by now, and that this consensus developed out of scientific research that relied upon forming hypotheses, gathering evidence, performing experiments, analyzing the results, and repeating and replicating the work, and that therefore the results represented the best thinking available at the time, what alternative method are you proposing that would be an improvement?
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2. What limits do you think should be imposed upon petroleum research, and more importantly, why?

--Percy

Some basic misunderstandings:To be useful in science means that a theory explains and describes natural phenomena.Recently, however, creationists have been using the terms "real science" and "useful" to differentiate the sciences they agree with from those they don't agree with.Evolution and all related fields are not considered real science or useful because they contradict particular religious beliefs.This is just one more attempt to redefine the language, a la "its just a theory."