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Author Topic:   The Design Revolution by William Dembski
paisano
Member (Idle past 6422 days)
Posts: 459
From: USA
Joined: 05-07-2004


Message 31 of 68 (127199)
07-23-2004 10:59 PM
Reply to: Message 27 by Percy
07-23-2004 9:10 PM


Re: Dembski Raises a Good Point
So the evangelical is correct that my view of faith and science leaves no room for his God. I guess I have no answer to this quandry.
An answer to the quandary for yourself, or for the evangelical?
I understand the pickle that the evangelical is in. But it's a consequence of their theological presuppositions. Frankly, I'm not all that sympathetic if preserving those presuppositions requires intellectual dishonesty, whether intentional or inadvertent.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 27 by Percy, posted 07-23-2004 9:10 PM Percy has replied

Replies to this message:
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Percy
Member
Posts: 22391
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 5.2


Message 32 of 68 (127270)
07-24-2004 5:23 AM
Reply to: Message 30 by jar
07-23-2004 10:58 PM


Re: Dembski Raises a Good Point
This is so disappointing to hear. It seems that almost every Creationist who reaches prominence does so by playing to the home town crowd, telling them what they want to here, but at the expense of honesty and integrity. When they try to bring their message to non-Creationists their credibility is already exhausted by their history of contradictory and questionable claims.
The only prominent Creationist I can think of who has played it pretty straight is Behe. Except for his blind spot regarding irreducible complexity, his approach seems legitimately scientific.
Coincidentally, the latest Skeptic magazine arrived in the afternoon mail, and it included a review of the book Unintelligent Design which has a section on Dembski. The author addresses Creationist's tendency to grasp onto the non-negotiable assumption that there is a God who is active in the universe, feeling that it is central to their misplaced views on science. Dembski has this fault in spades, though I haven't commented on that particular paragraph. I'm going to have to be more circumspect on picking paragraphs to comment on, else next year I won't be further than chapter 2, and I'd end up with a hefty library fine.
None of us are perfect and we all have our little foibles in our approach to doing science, but this goes way beyond the pale and corrupts everything they do that they call scientific. It's no wonder no Creationist effort has ever made a scientific contribution.
--Percy

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Percy
Member
Posts: 22391
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 5.2


Message 33 of 68 (127273)
07-24-2004 5:39 AM
Reply to: Message 31 by paisano
07-23-2004 10:59 PM


Re: Dembski Raises a Good Point
I understand the pickle that the evangelical is in. But it's a consequence of their theological presuppositions. Frankly, I'm not all that sympathetic if preserving those presuppositions requires intellectual dishonesty, whether intentional or inadvertent.
I don't necessarily disagree, but do we want to take a stance that blames the victim? I don't think we understand the psychology of religious belief, but I think it probably safe to say that a Creationist raised in a Moslem culture would be just as devout and inflexible in his beliefs as he turned out to be in a Christian culture. The level of contradiction contained in those beliefs does not appear to be a factor for most Creationists. As is true for most people, and I include myself, their core beliefs are not open to rational assessment and modification.
Speaking about myself, my opinion is that I don't believe what I believe because I'm a better and more logical and rational thinker than Creationists, because debates with them over the years indicates this isn't true, but because that's just how I'm made. Not to be arrogant, but clearly science is right and I am right and Creationists are wrong. But it isn't something I can take credit for, just as others can't take credit for being able to dunk a basketball, multiply 10-digit numbers in their head, or win 38 consecutive times on Jeopardy (and counting).
--Percy

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jar
Member (Idle past 394 days)
Posts: 34026
From: Texas!!
Joined: 04-20-2004


Message 34 of 68 (127291)
07-24-2004 10:40 AM
Reply to: Message 32 by Percy
07-24-2004 5:23 AM


On CS Lewis
I happen to be one of those strange folk that have actually read much of what CS Lewis wrote. My signature is actually a CS Lewis quotation. But there are also facets of Mr. Lewis' writings where he can be every bit as unreasoned, every bit as iconoclastic as the greatest evangelical.
His work is a large body of material. That material was produced through an extended period when he went from being religious to atheist and then back to religious. Given that transition, you can find almost any point of view you wish somewhere in his writings.
In many of his works, he spends a long period slowly developing an idea. In doing so he often presents a very convincing case for a particular point of view, the best case he can imagine for that point of view, only to spend and equal effort and equal volume refuting that position.
That makes his material a gold mine for folk who wish to work from Authority. Mr. Lewis though would be the first person to say that you can not accept your beliefs based simply on authority, but rather you must reason, and examine the evidence in full.

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

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Brad McFall
Member (Idle past 5032 days)
Posts: 3428
From: Ithaca,NY, USA
Joined: 12-20-2001


Message 35 of 68 (127312)
07-24-2004 3:00 PM
Reply to: Message 2 by Chiroptera
07-23-2004 12:33 AM


I didnt know
Ooooooooooooooooooooooooh~~~

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Brad McFall
Member (Idle past 5032 days)
Posts: 3428
From: Ithaca,NY, USA
Joined: 12-20-2001


Message 36 of 68 (127313)
07-24-2004 3:12 PM
Reply to: Message 10 by Loudmouth
07-23-2004 1:20 PM


Re: ID a Scientific Revolution?
I havent seen it yet yet I am not in creationist circles. My feeling has allways been that iD will possibly revolve creationism (this issue of what we see above the radar screen) but it must first rotate creation science which is what the over statments are about. Internal creationist churnings often vail real truths that only those participating know. I almost got on Janent Partials America to talk with Dembski about Jersey elections but couldnt get through that day I wanted to talk so I havent really been able to tell if this really only what Johnson predicted would happen to naturalism this century. I see evidence that Phil is certainly more correct now than I had given him credit for but the science has gotten even more difficult to work through now that I know more and not less but ICR has maintained the same position aka ID over all these years and is a way to gauge changes. The problem is that creationism just does not have the money that standardizing science did and does thus when it comes to any organization of physical knowledge between biology and physics via chemistry or not the INTERNAL CREATIONIST repute about rock dating still gets more attention (NOT) for secular reasons but for what I might call ecumenical differences. I have not understood how to place Gitt's ideas in all of but now that I have Georgi's ideas and his communication that thermodyanmic differences of opnions are as trustworthy (not very trustworthy) as are different opnionins of entropy and information therethru I have lost my own interest in the necessity of naming any kind of this creationist promotion (either way (within creationism)) that I have pretty much broken with anything but the ICR old time conservatism" in any supersenuous regard.

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Brad McFall
Member (Idle past 5032 days)
Posts: 3428
From: Ithaca,NY, USA
Joined: 12-20-2001


Message 37 of 68 (127316)
07-24-2004 3:21 PM
Reply to: Message 15 by Percy
07-23-2004 4:37 PM


Re: Signs of Intelligent Design
IF-- the gldayshev thermostat WAS-- first built (in part or by concept in whole unawares) by Faraday,Wheatstone, Danneli and Henry in the mid 1800s by putting a soft iron core into a coil of copper attached to a pile and one man holding the cold and the other the hot end while the other two aruged whether magnetism "evolved" from thermoelectricity (after the men registered a spark on breaking the circuit) AND both Dyson and Dawkins (were (by inference) wrong to attempt a notional seperation of metabolism and replication WHILE ATP heat creates enough gradient to permit protein expression of sequestered metals to CAUSE topobiological cell differences on mitosis unfolding the country and garden of Mendel that selection can stabilize THEN THERE IS NOT ANXIETY HERE BUT ONLY REALITY NO MATTER WHICH CELL is plurIvocal in the search for meaning we conduct. Faraday knew where the "keeper" was and so do we the "trap".
Issues of tracing and invention and the future of economic cycling remain but the levels between supramoleucalar and deme might be fillable without needing necessarily to adjudicate the geographicalizations that might impose further restrictions on the man-made nature of/in the work ON THE BACKS OF PRIOR GENERATIONS OF STUDENTS.

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Percy
Member
Posts: 22391
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 5.2


Message 38 of 68 (127361)
07-24-2004 5:59 PM


More from the Preface:
Dembski writes:
Theism (whether Christian, Jewish or Muslim) holds that God by wisdom created the world. The origin of the world and its subsequent ordering thus result from the designing activity of an intelligent agent - God. Naturalism, on the other hand, allows no place for intelligent agency except at the end of a blind, purposeless material process. Within naturalism, any intelligence is an evolved intelligence. Moreover, the evolutionary process by which any such intelligence developed is itself blind and purposeless. As a consequence, naturalism makes intelligence not a basic creative force within nature but an evolutionary byproduct.
Dembski thinks intelligence is a basic creative force within nature? And the evidence for this? I guess this is one of those Creationist non-negotiable assumptions. Even the field of psychology, one of the softest of the soft sciences, has trouble defining intelligence, but Creationists want intelligence recognized as a force within nature.
There's a part of Dembski's argument that makes no sense at all to me. Isn't God supernatural? Then why does Dembski feel the need to include God in the natural scientific universe?
Naturalism is clearly a temptation for science...
A temptation? How about an imperative. We can only study what is apparent to our senses - that's the definition of natural. If you feel it in your heart or see visions in your mind, or if what you see is apparent only to you and no one else, then it isn't really available for scientific study. The alternative would have science accepting everybody's individual testimony without validation or cross-checking. Sounds like a recipe for chaos.
--Percy

Replies to this message:
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paisano
Member (Idle past 6422 days)
Posts: 459
From: USA
Joined: 05-07-2004


Message 39 of 68 (127390)
07-24-2004 10:14 PM
Reply to: Message 38 by Percy
07-24-2004 5:59 PM


Theism (whether Christian, Jewish or Muslim) holds that God by wisdom created the world. The origin of the world and its subsequent ordering thus result from the designing activity of an intelligent agent - God. Naturalism, on the other hand, allows no place for intelligent agency except at the end of a blind, purposeless material process. Within naturalism, any intelligence is an evolved intelligence. Moreover, the evolutionary process by which any such intelligence developed is itself blind and purposeless. As a consequence, naturalism makes intelligence not a basic creative force within nature but an evolutionary byproduct.
Aside from your objections, I think Dembski really is presenting a false dilemma here. In theistic evolution, the idea of underlying purpose is there, albeit perhaps materially inscrutable.
To deny that nature is stochastic is to ignore voluminous evidence. But stochastic does not imply purposeless. That's a metaphysical assumption.
Dembski's writings seem to have a consistent theme of trying to shoehorn science into a fairly rigid theology. He seems utterly uncomfortable with mystery, ironically resembling the strong atheists in that regard.

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jar
Member (Idle past 394 days)
Posts: 34026
From: Texas!!
Joined: 04-20-2004


Message 40 of 68 (127392)
07-24-2004 10:31 PM
Reply to: Message 38 by Percy
07-24-2004 5:59 PM


Moreover, the evolutionary process by which any such intelligence developed is itself blind and purposeless.
Well, not exactly. Intellegence that might develop does not seem to be purposeless, but rather that it has a purpose the continuation of the species. This actually is pretty much what we see when we look at intellegence no matter how we define it.
But again, that has nothing to do with Theism. Religion is not about intellegence, but about truth and reason, about morality and immorality. It has nothing to do with Evolution or Design. It is a red herring, a spurious argument, a slight of hand to direct the attention of the reader away from the facts.
Do you think you'll be able to get beyond even the Preface?

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

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SRO2 
Inactive Member


Message 41 of 68 (127447)
07-25-2004 7:54 AM
Reply to: Message 32 by Percy
07-24-2004 5:23 AM


Re: Dembski Raises a Good Point
Einstein was accused of said same (sorry, I don't recall the source). It was believed that he played to the "creationist" crowd whenever necessary because he was aware of where funding and noteriety are allowed or blocked.
A more recent episode was the developement of a potential primordial soup recipe, it's significance was quickly redacted by it's developers after pressure from the right in the media (in other words, the developers appeared to downplay the significance of it).
But lets face it, it's going to be quite a while before science can go about the business of science without interference from religion. It seems to happen on both sides of court too.

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PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 42 of 68 (127722)
07-26-2004 9:23 AM
Reply to: Message 27 by Percy
07-23-2004 9:10 PM


Re: Dembski Raises a Good Point
It seems to me that there are at least two options open.
Firstly from all bu the most liberal Christian view it is clear that God must intervene openly in human history - but that does not necessarily mean that there are such interventions - at least that we could detect in the overall history of life on Earth.
Then there is the view that God sustains and operates through the natural order - that there is no separation between the actions of nature and those of God.
Both of these allow the methodological naturalism of science without taking the further step into philosophical naturalism. Both place themselves outside Lewis'criticism - they leave a place for forces beyond naturalism but they do so by faith. And that is what is unacceptable to Dembski. Dembski demands a God whose existence is demonstrable - and moreover demands that the evidence for that demonstration must exist.

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NosyNed
Member
Posts: 8996
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 43 of 68 (127758)
07-26-2004 11:37 AM
Reply to: Message 41 by SRO2
07-25-2004 7:54 AM


Redaction
A more recent episode was the developement of a potential primordial soup recipe, it's significance was quickly redacted by it's developers after pressure from the right in the media (in other words, the developers appeared to downplay the significance of it).
References please.

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SRO2 
Inactive Member


Message 44 of 68 (127886)
07-26-2004 5:29 PM
Reply to: Message 43 by NosyNed
07-26-2004 11:37 AM


Re: Redaction
Damn it! This is gonna' tAKE FOREVER...I HOPE YOUR HAPPY!

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SRO2 
Inactive Member


Message 45 of 68 (127893)
07-26-2004 5:54 PM
Reply to: Message 43 by NosyNed
07-26-2004 11:37 AM


Re: Redaction
I think this is the one:
Try that again;
Yahoo
This message has been edited by Rocket, 07-26-2004 04:59 PM

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