Is ID properly pursued?

Intelligent Design

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An essay evaluating the concept:

• Introduction
• What it should be
• What it should not be
• Is Intelligent Design a faith?
  (edited 8/24/04 to add text in tan)
• Where it should be taught in school

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Introduction

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Stated simply Intelligent Design ("ID") is the concept that the universe is designed by an [active \ creative] agent and that there are, perhaps, observable traces, evidence of such design in the product of that work.

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This assumes a fair degree of development, capability, education and intelligence on the part of the observer. A "Poison Dart" Frog cannot look at a watch and discern that it is a designed object, and neither could a native person unschooled in the concepts of manufacturing such products ... yet he is capable and intelligent enough to discern the cause and effect (and how to make use of) the frog's venom. There are, in fact, historical documents recording where explorers showed watches and the like to such unschooled natives and the natives thought that they were magical objects rather than manufactured things.

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There are also natural formations, crystals and accretions and such, that appear to be the result of biological activity or to be the (fossils or similar) remains of life, when in fact they are naturally occurring formations. A kaleidoscope makes a random jumble of colored beads appear to be an intricate design when looked at in one particular way. An untrained "eye" or one that only looks in a particular manner, could easily mistake these as evidence of something they are not.

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The search for the evidence of design must be done by those with the most capable trained "eyes" free of constrained perspectives - the most open and complete knowledge of the physical workings of the universe and all it contains ... matter, energy, life. Anything less will likely lead to mistakes or a lack of understanding to see the actual fingerprints of design.

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Without as complete a base of knowledge as possible we could be looking at a watch with the mind of a frog, or we could be like a child, bemused by a kaleidoscope of pattern when there is none ... we could be unable to properly observe and evaluate the evidence before us.

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What it should be

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The concept of ID properly pursued to it's logical end, would use all the available evidence of all the available sciences in the search for evidence of the Designer. The concept of ID properly pursued, would include (but not be limited to) all the actual factual evidence for: physics (from sub-atomic particle, to cosmic inflation and string theories, to a 13.7+ billion year old universe, to the questions of the reality of dark matter and energy), geology (of a 4.55 billion year old earth formed from the stellar debris of previous cosmically generated materials, with layers of material organized by age and distribution by the forces of preceding tectonic, volcanic, sedimentary and other processes), paleontology (the organization of fossils found by the time and lineage relationships, the layered development that builds from single cells 3.5 million years ago to the vast complexity of modern life and finally to the many varied hominid lineages and relationships, to the array of branches of taxonomy and why they are branches and not a web of some kind), archaeology (the world wide variety and diversity of culture and artifact and development from the first humans to present day modern man and the complete absence of any evidence of hominid existence below the iridium layer that covers the earth from the impact event 65 million years ago ending the age of the dinosaurs, to say nothing of the lack of evidence of any "modern" humans before 10 million years ago), genetics (the study of genes, how they work and the genetic trees of life relationships they show), evolution (the documented changes of life with time from those first single cells to modern complexity, the phylogenic trees of life relationships, the process by which life changes, tries new features, adapts to new needs), xenobiology (considering the possibilities and possible variety of extraterrestrial life) ... as well as all the other disciplines of science, and including how all these sciences relate to and confirm one another even though they are based on different sets of data (the genetic tree matching the phylogenic one, the geological age matching the physics and cosmological age, etc.).

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The concept of ID properly pursued to it's logical end, must not only look at what current theories are used in the various sciences, but what new ones are being developed. For not only must ID properly pursued use all available information and accumulation of facts, it must use the latest accepted theories that best explain them or develop better explanations (alternate theories) that can be tested against these current existing theories to properly judge their relative validity. It must be inclusive, rational, and willing to look in every corner and cranny of existence.

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Denying the facts of any one science while embracing the facts in another would be hypocrisy, especially if done on a presupposition of any particular design, for the very element that is the evidence of actual design could well be the evidence denied.

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The development of something complex, such as the human eye, may appear to an unschooled mind as such a miracle of interconnected parts that one would find it hard to understand how the development could occur without divine intervention. But to a mind schooled in biology and evolution, the development of the eye is clearly an easy step-by-step process from a light sensitive skin patch to a fully articulated eyeball with lens, iris, retina and portion of the brain dedicated to assembling the whole mass of signals into a coherent picture and interpreting the result.

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To one astronomer the universe may appear a morass of chaos with no discernable order or purpose, while another may look at it as a maximizing of diversity, creating opportunities for the seeds of life to sprout in as many wondrous and myriad ways as possible. A universe where, on one small planet of such opportunity, the life we know started from the cosmic seeds of amino acids that were created by the giant nova death of the first superstars -- the chemical building blocks of life which are now known to pervade the depths of the universe with the potential to seed life wherever sufficient opportunity can be found. A universe, in short, primed and loaded for the multiple evolution first of life and then of the intelligence to understand it.

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The task at hand would be to understand the universe to the most complete scientific degree possible and then look for what would be evidence for design.

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The concept of ID properly pursued also should not be based on any set of preconceived notions of which or what god or flavor of creation may have been involved, but to incorporate all religious views, to look for common trends and experiences, for failing to do so is to bias the observer in the same way that leaving out any one of the sciences would limit the perceptions.

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What it should not be

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Not taking the concept of ID to its logical end would mean that leaps of faith would be needed to reach conclusions rather than logic, and as soon as that is required the scientific validity of the concept goes out the window and you get into the "god designed it that way to fool you" scenarios and ridiculous spirals of circular reasoning.

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Not taking the concept of ID to its logical end would mean that whatever is discussed is imperfectly realized, that some vital clue may have been missed, that the discussion is no better than Ptolemy with epicycles on epicycles on circular orbits around the earth: an erroneous view based on a limited information and a wrong belief.

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In this regard it appears that the concept of ID as it is commonly used is not being properly pursued - from Wikipedia.com: Intelligent Design (click):

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The theory of intelligent design (ID) holds that life and living things show signs of having been designed. ID's primary argument is that life is too complex to have simply "happened."

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Advocates of ID believe there is empirical evidence that an Intelligent Designer has been at work in the history of life, and that macroevolution of life, and particularly the evolution of humans, has been guided by that Designer. Members of the "intelligent design movement" are typically Christians (primarily Evangelicals, plus one prominent Unificationist), but ID itself does not specify the identity of the Designer.

(bold in the original)

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The focus of ID as commonly used has obviously been limited to only some scientific and religious inputs, and this is clearly narrow-minded and headed in the wrong direction. There appears to be an a priori assumption in the popular usage, that life on this planet was the main purpose of the whole universe wide design process, when there is no valid reason to conclude such a [biosphere egocentric] thing. There also appears to be an a priori assumption that humans on this planet are the ultimate end result of that universe wide design process, when there is no valid reason to conclude such a [species egocentric] thing.

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Advocates of ID can say that they don't specify who or what [the designer] is, however for it to accomplish what they claim, it must be able to act invisibly across interstellar distances or to periodically appear on earth, act, and then disappear at will without leaving any traces thereof, and be able to do either while violating time constraints for the speed of travel for all natural objects. That to me is supernatural behavior, and any being capable of supernatural action is de facto a god of some flavour. So whether you call the [active \ creative agent] a god or an supernatural alien is just a matter of semantic gamesmanship.

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This is emblematic of the false positions one gets into with the a priori assumptions of earth life in general and human life in specific being of any great importance in the grand scheme of things. This is typical of ID as it is commonly used.

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The focus of ID as commonly used is a very narrow and limited view: precisely what it should not be.

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Is Intelligent Design a faith?

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Yes. It assumes supernatural action by one (or more) designer(s), god(s) by definition (see particularly #2), of the universe. The actions of this designer are no different in concept than the supernatural actions attributed to the gods of various pantheons within the concept of many early religions. Which god(s) are involved and how active [it is\they are] in the day-to-day happenings of the universe or whether [it is\they are] even concerned with any of the life forms that evolve is not specified, but is open to be discovered. There is no dogma, no "Church of the Great Designer(s)" and no set of formalized ceremonies, offerings or suggested supplications, so it is not a formal religion, but it is still a statement of faith.

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In fact, when you compare the two you will see that ID, especially when properly pursued, is a form of Deism, a religion that also has no dogma, no church and no set of formalized ceremonies, offerings or suggested supplications:

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From Wikipedia.com: Deism (click):

Deism is the belief in a God based on natural religion only. It is concerned with those truths which humans can discover through a process of reasoning, independent of any divine revelation through scripture or personal revelation.

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Some Deists hold the belief that the universe was created by a God who then made no further intervention in its affairs, often expressed by the metaphor of the "Divine Watchmaker" who created a mechanism so perfect as to be self-regulating. Others share the theistic outlook that God is still active today. Deists do not believe in miracles or revelations.

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Deism was popular among thinkers of the Enlightenment such as Voltaire and the Founding Fathers of the United States of America.

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Thomas Jefferson is perhaps the most well known and outspoken of the American founding deists. Thomas Paine was also a deist, The Age of Reason being one publication which particularly expressed this view. Benjamin Franklin seems also to have shared components of this view.

(bold in the original, see webpage for links to other pages)

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Once you compare [what ID should be] and [what Deism is], you will see they are similar beliefs, and that the statements of Deism are more inclusive, complete, open and honest than what is commonly presented as ID. Deism can involve fewer assumptions about the level of supernatural activity of the "designer" than ID does, therefore ID (especially as commonly used) is a weak form of Deism (it relies more on "he did it" to explain things). It is very simple logic:

all A (Deism) = Religion
all B (ID) is a weak subset of A (or "all B < A" in normal logic symbology)
Therefore all B = Religion

This is not a matter of redefining religion but of recognizing it in the supernatural actions attributed to the design agent in ID.

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Where it should be taught in school

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[Deism\ID] has no input to what science should cover other than to be as open and inclusive as possible. As such, it has nothing to add to any science class. Science is used in the proper pursuit of [Deism\ID], not the other way around: physics uses math in its study of the universe, but the theories of physics are not taught in math class. The statement "god did it" (or "god may have done it" to be fair to atheists and agnostics) does not help in understanding any of the scientific theories and facts.

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Properly pursued [Deism\ID] is a religious philosophy. Thus the place for it in school would be in a religious philosophy class, an elective class. This class could also cover the history of deism and how it helped in the formation of the values embodied in the bill of rights and the constitution of this country, as well as covering the basic principles of logic and rational thought.

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Properly done such a class would have to discuss how all religions relate to scientific knowledge (ie - comparative religion rather than any single faith) and a complete understanding of "life, the universe, and everything" (Douglas Adams).

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EnjoyEdited by RAZD, : new sigEdited by RAZD, : updated format, signatureEdited by RAZD, : cleanupEdited by RAZD, : deleted reference to tan textEdited by RAZD, : use make make useEdited by RAZD, : link update

my apologies for stepping on any toes through inexperience with this forum and it's own protocols.the editing that I did on this presentation was to remove elements of html coding that did not work (bookmarks back and forth between sections), removal of links to my other sites (which was accidental), and to change colors so that they would be readable. the content is unchanged.peace?{Adminnemooseus says: Looks good to me. I think you cleaned things up pretty well, while I was preparing message 3. I think I mostly posted message 3 because I hated to have prepared it, only to not posted it.}[This message has been edited by Adminnemooseus, 03-16-2004]

I have some problems here. First off I agree that "since ID pretends to be a scientific idea, it ought to be pursuing it's claim to credibility by making predictions. Especially predictions that are contradicted by the non-designed universe idea. " - but I would say it needs to provide predictions that differ from predictions based on evolution.

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Now:

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"it is Darwin's notion of science that it explains everything" - where does Darwin (the man) enter into the science of genetics? Sub-atomic physics? Darwin is not the definer of science anymore than he is the definer of the science of evolution (which would exist today without his book and theories).

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"Evolution, of course, predicts that it's results will have the appearance of intelligence" - where does evolution predict the appearance of intelligence? It predicts that change will happen, but makes no prediction about the direction of the changes.

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"A bad evolutionist, for example, would take every prediction from a well-meaning ID theorist ..." - would be corrected by "good" evolutionists when the papers were peer reviewed. Having the same predicted results would mean that the "test" would not differentiate between the two and it would be useless as a paper while the ID version would be, once presented then the peer review process would uncover whether it was the true mechanism or not. This is a straw man argument btw, requiring a bad evolutionist to make it work.

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"Velikovsky successfully pulled off a proper strong inference test ... proceedure was not as proper as was Velikovsky's." - we can also talk about Ptolemy in the same vein, but it does not contradict that good science gets the results in the end. There were other problems with Velikovsky's theories, such as not matching the real evidence of the ice cores, but that is a different matter. Bad science is continuously being found and corrected. The record for corrections on the other side of the argument (ID, creationism, etc) is much poorer (I think the most I have seen on this kind of thing is AIG saying "we don't recommend using this argument anymore" or something similar). I do not recall the predictions for temperatures on Venus from my youth, only that it was the big unknown because of the cloud cover.

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" Here is another example of improper pursuit. That ID depends on the existence and involvement of some intelligent designer does not make it a priori a "faith" or unscientific hypothesis. " - on the contrary, you make no argument here, and nothing that contradicts the points I made. Deism is a faith, it asks less of its "divine watchmaker" than the ID concept does, seeing as ID (as commonly used) requires participation of the designer in the process of life on earth and Deism does not. Not only that, as noted in the post above, the "design action" by the designer is across interstellar distances and is instantaneous or nearly so, or it is by invisible undetectable agents -- action that qualifies as supernatural, and supernatural is all that is needed for the belief to be a faith (also see definition of god noted above). There are no atheistic ID people as far as I know.

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Your last paragraph makes little sense to me. Science is not decided in court, but in the field, it is not decided by lawyers, but by validation of predictions based on theories grounded on observations. If ID people want to be taken credibly they need to provide some science to go along with their claims.

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As a deist I have no problem with the concept that god got the whole ball rolling at the beginning point of the universe with the words "surprise me" ...

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Enjoy

ahaahahaaalooks like you covered the same points I did.I would only say that until ID provides some real science - theories, predictions, tests - it will remain a pseudoscience.

Evolution makes no prediction about what life on other planets or in other solar systems would be based on, but I would bet that DNA as we know it would be highly improbable yet not ruled out ... if the life is carbon based.

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What evolution would predict is that when life is found on other worlds that it will be subject to the same rules of change over time, natural and sexual (or similar?) selection, and accumulated change resulting in different life forms evolving from common ancestors.

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Creationism might predict a life format similar to earths if it wasn't so earth centric in regards to life. Are there biblical passages that everyone would agree refer to life on other worlds? (tall order I know, people so like to interpret to their needs). I know one person who claims heaven is on Uranus ("ABSOLUTELY I believe that THAT PLANET is where we all may very well end up If WE ARE REDEEMED ...") and another that claims the geocentric model of the universe is correct and all modern astronomy is a bunch of lies (both have high "nonsense quotient" worldviews).

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ID on the other hand claims to allow an "alien" designer, so and alien life format would not be excluded. I would have to bet that ID would let "anything goes" be the rule on this issue.

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The branch of science you are refering to is Xenobiology
Xenobiology - Wikipedia

"Xenobiology (or exobiology, or astrobiology) is the term for a speculative field within biology which considers the possible variety of extraterrestrial life.

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Although this is currently a speculative field, the absence of life in the rest of the Universe is a falsifiable hypothesis (though it is yet to be proven false), making Xenobiology a valid field for scientific enquiry.

Pursuing what ID might predict for life on other planets may also refer back to what it would predict for life on earth ... and where those predictions differ from what xenobiology would predict may give us a test of ID.

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Does xenobiology predict that all life on a planet must necessarily come from one ancient common ancestor? Does ID? Does ID predict intelligent life? Does xenobiology?

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Enjoy

Sorry, but I have to ask - is english your first language? I have trouble understanding your points, or even determining if you have any -- this seems to be stream-of-consciousness type writing that rambles all around an issue without addressing it.

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I will try to muddle through it ...

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First paragraph pretty hopeless imho, your conclusion "Instead you think the terminator with RNA is a old alien from california or you sought to polarize or you simply didnt need similarly to rail on "c"ism." does not follow from the paragraph or any preceding information. C'ism is earth centric, adamantly so whenever the issue of genesis is raised. Agreed, the people mentioned are extreme examples, but valid. You have not shown otherwise. I suggest you try that again: show how C'ism can account for life on other planets.

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Second paragraph a lot of tech \ intelligent sounding sturm und drang but little content when parsed. "Also you failed to indicated how the PHENTYOPE of any XENOS would NOT depend on such proposed clocks which if not a part of the synthesis havEEEEvos concieved AFTER the period of organacist emergence (sic!)" ... phenotype? clocks? emergence of what? If the assumption of xeno life is made does it need to be complicated by assuming a mimicking of earth life in any way? Occams razor says no: it is that simple.

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Third paragraph - total nonsense, congratulations.

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Why should I "hone my understanding" of an unsubstantiated and probably mistaken hypothesis? Let it put forth some science and I will look at it. Else it is of no more interest than Ptolemy.

no response to my response - message 7?Given your statement "I agree with your conclusion, but not with your approach, which appears to me to be 'improperly pursued.' So, the question becomes, 'How do we decide what is proper pursuit?' "could you suggest what you consider "properly pursued" ?

Are there no ID people about?(are they all in ohio?)

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand

I can wait, a little while ...no browser? have your tried downloading netscape browser (freee for the asking) I like it cause you can (1) set it to block pop-ups (IE doesn't) and (2) set it to only allow activeX to cycle once - you get the animations but they don't repeat (all IE does is block it and then tells you the page won't load completely ... turkeys)Netscape ISP HomepageI have 7.1 on this machine.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand

your point

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"Just giving credit to the earlist expression I know of of this mis-conception of science."

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still not clear - what misconception about what science? Science is built on the foundations of the validated science that has gone before regardless of who the author was ... as noted if Darwin had not published Wallace and others were on the same trail, it was only a matter of time once the blocks of evidence became visible from travelling the world.AND if

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"Evolution drives form and function "uphill" on the fitness landscape "

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then how do you explain mutations that appear, are selected for and then disappear only to evolve again --- which one is on the peak and which in the valley? How do you explain those pesky moths that change from white to dark to white with the flip of a smokestack?This is mistaking the appearance of a pattern for a design. Like a kaleidoscope looked at through one end makes the beads appear in a pretty pattern but looked at from the other end are just a random jumble, and the jumble is the actual state of the beads.Your

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"We would hope. But, at this level, the studies are not usually published "

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would be more to the point if the studies were made and submitted. To my knowledge that has not happened.I also would be more impressed with your good-cop-bad-cop argument if it weren't for the fact that a lot of ID people have been badboys: Wells goes before the Ohio state board and gives the same old argument that has been refuted before as if it is new and fresh and untested. Same with the examples of "irreducable complexity" given by Meyer - he didn't even have any new ones. --- the work has not been done to base a scientific judgement on to put in a paper, and they want to rush it into schools as the latest gospel: that's not just bad science, it is bad education about wrong science.And funny you should mention scientists and lawyers ... one of the Discovery Institute ID people is a lawyer.Finally, your

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" We cannot say that, just because a hypothesis contains a god of some sort, it is not scientific. That's up to the god."

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is a false application of logic: god has nothing to do with how we do science (good, bad or indifferent). The idea of science is that things occur due to natural laws that are subject to rational determination in a repeatable and consistent manner. Introducing supernatural whim into the function is like using dice half way through the weather report to see if it is going to rain on saturday. It may have results but it is not scientific because it is not based on the application of knowledge of the natural process. And it will never lead to an improved model for future predictions.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand

I apologize for any misunderstanding caused by not understanding. You will have to explain "Croizatist" to me as I am not familiar with the term and can find no reference to it. To me the standard literalist Cist position is that life is created on earth, period. Thus life on another planet would need to be explained by some mechanism that occurs since then. There are some wiggles on the issue ("other tribes") but they open up more cans than they worm out off. Eism on the other hand would posit that, wherever the conditions are right to create life, that evolution of that life would then occur in a similar manner to what we observe on earth. If you want to show that Cism is science then I would think you could find support from the Discovery Institute or it's brethren to let you do the work. The requirements to work for ICR may be tough to swallow for some but not for others and it may give you a forum. I would think that they have a grant program ....What are the Cist predictions for the failure of medicine?

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understandRebel American Zen Deist

Your "the competing theory" is wrong on three counts (1) evolution is not just one theory, it is many theories based on many facts, combined into a science, (2) there is no one possible version of "god did it" and (3) creationism is not a scientific theory as it offers no testable prediction that I am aware of. Feel free to provide one. This may sound like a semantic quibble, but it is just asking that Cism meet the criteria of science to be admitted to science. The scientific method is a way to demonstrate cause and effect without bias to the conclusions reached except cause and effect. In other words you define the peak to be whereever the surviving population happens to be so that your {drives form and function "uphill"} is self fulfilling.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist

This is a tautology. If I understand the rest of your rambling, scientists doing experiments are actually praying for the results that they then discover. A different kind of silliness that would not even qualify as a tautology.
Insulting too, but I doubt you would understand that.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist

just so you know "testable predictions" means that the tests can be repeated by anyone and get the same results. none of the things in your list qualify.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist

Yes it is, because you are defining the fitness based on the fitness, your example compares one at the outer variance level against the average fitness rather than some hard scale. In another condition the 10 gram bird could have the fitness advantage over the 12 gram bird and you would use exactly the same reasoning to show that it was optimal and the others were sub-optimal. This is not science. LOL the ignorance rolls on ... why do larger seeds "require" larger birds? Do you know of any variety of seeds consumed by any birds where some are too large to be eaten? This should be fun .... I am not insulted, except by the lack of knowledge of the process by which real scientists do experiments. The implication that scientists in general are praying for certain results is false on two counts, (1) most scientists just are not that religious or their faith does not involve prayer, and (2) this is in effect preconceiving the results of the experiment -- scientists will make predictions of results (as that is how theories are tested) but they end up wrong as easily as right, and every invalidated theory by such an experiment invalidates you claim.And, If you consider my implication that you would not understand an insult rather than a prediction of behavior based on experience that has since been validated (you continue with it) then you are insulted by your own behavior.As regards Dossey, I did a google and the first article on him (Science of Prayer, by Victor J. Stenger) had this to say: Omitting studies that show opposite trends to the thesis? Misrepresenting facts? To support religion? I'm shocked shocked to find that ... but hey: ... who is fooled?Enjoy your island of sub-optimal adaptation to the reality of the universe.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist