Intelligent (maybe), but far from perfect

With Batman's arrival, the Shadow's previous covenant is no longer relevant. Do not be swayed by the Shadow, follow only the words of truth in Batman.

You Batman literalists make it sound easy. Do we follow the old Detective Comics Batman or the subsequent Batman of the comic book series bearing his name? Is the campy Adam West Batman a legitimate authority? Does the Tim Burton Batman take precedence over the Joel Schumacher Batmen?These are important questions and should not be so glibly dismissed, in my opinion. I mean IMO.------------------
En la tierra de ciegos, el tuerto es el Rey.

While the interpretations of the Batmanical scholars may seem at odds with the text, any contradictions you see are a result of your own imperfections. Do not be tempted by the Joker into doubting the word of Batman. Unbelievers are a superstitious, cowardly lot.Personally, I find it amazing that a work with such a diverse spectrum of writers can survive for so many years, and maintain its consistency so strongly.

There is only one true Batman and he is Adam West. Only we priveleged True Believers will bask in the glory of his celestial Batoozy dance and you non-believers will be forced to watch re-runs of He-Man. Those who would degrade Adam West as "Campy" do so at the peril of their comics credibility. After all you have your thoery and I have mine but you cannot prove either so I must therefore be correct...after all the evidence for everything I have said is self evident.

What about Lewis Wilson though -- he was surely the
first Batman!?!Although I would follow THE Batman all the
way ........... to the bat-poles!!....and Julie Newmar was way better than that Pfiefer woman

I'm amazed the admins haven't come out in military outfits and said, "That's enough, that's too silly!"

Is it any sillier than what a lot of creationists post?

Ok..in repentence for contributing to dragging the thread woefully off topic (Adam West is the real Batman )...since there are a lot of people posting in this thread and it is an appropriate place for the discussion...can anyone think of a hypothetical piece of evidence that would favor design. In holmes thread we abandoned trying to come up with a testable hypothesis...the proponents of the idea cannot do this either...but holmes suggested dreaming up evidence that would suggest design over a natural evolution...anyone have any ideas?

As long as we're dreaming things up... some sort of genetic signature would help me. A clue that the designer is proud of his/her work and wants to make their involvement in the project known.What form this signature would take, I don't know.

The presence of a designer, perhaps? One with the power to create life?I mean, I wouldn't assume Mount Rushmore had been created unless I knew about the existence of designers with the power to carve stone. I.e. sculptors. Trying to infer a designer from a potential design - given the existence of designer-less design - seems backwards.

I am not advocating the position mind you...I am just wondering if anyone could even concieve of a type of evidence....we can tell when something is designed by humans i.e. clovis artifacts, Mt. Rushmore etc...so we do have some sort of criteria for human design...what would indicate it in a natural system.The genome is such a freaking mess it is more a wonder that it can replicate at all so all the self evident design the IDists talk about is not very evident...but I am still wondering what would make one pause and wonder.

I've said this before somewhere, and I'll repeat it here: I think we should discriminate between design per se and intelligent design. There is design in nature, no doubt in my mind about that. But it is emergent, not planned (as by an intelligence). The features we see emerging through evolution are solutions to problems posed by the environment. As such, they exhibit an engineering-type development. Problem: nectar too deeply buried in a flower. Solution: adjust tongue length. Problem: too much harmful radiation. Solution: add more pigment to skin. Problem: average jump too short to make it to the next tree. Solution: stretch skin between limbs a bit more.But the design need not come from an intelligent source. It can be demonstrated in computer models that blindly following some simple rules can create very 'designoid' structures and behaviour. There is the example of genetic algorithms, frequently mentioned in discussions like these. Another example is Conway's "Game of Life", a cellular automaton that produces truly amazing things from three very simple rules.Science has discovered the rules that govern evolution. It appears that the simple application of these rules can account for everything we see in living nature, without the need to posit the existence of an intelligent creator.Mostly, the arguments of creationist come down to incredulity, which is caused by ignorance. What creationists need to do is learn more about the rules, acquire some mental hygiene and take a good look at the abundant evidence.O, hell. Why am I bothering?P.S. Those Batmanists are heretics. Robinism is the true path.

Maybe part of the problem is using the word design at all?
From Websters..
1 : to create, fashion, execute, or construct according to plan : DEVISE, CONTRIVE
2 a : to conceive and plan out in the mind b : to have as a purpose : INTEND c : to devise for a specific function or end
3 archaic : to indicate with a distinctive mark, sign, or name
4 a : to make a drawing, pattern, or sketch of b : to draw the plans for
intransitive senses
1 : to conceive or execute a plan
2 : to draw, lay out, or prepare a design
- designedly /-'zI-n&d-lE/ adverb

​

All of these imply a pre-determined purpose for which there is no evidence even in the emergent structures we observe in nature. In addition there are plenty of fairly poorly evolved structures i.e. the potentially wasteful repetiveness of the genome, the crappy efficiency of oxidative phosphorylation, fairly error prone polymerases and DNA repair pathways to mention a few.

​

Designing is anticipatory i.e. I design something to work in a specific environment and then put my design in the environment. Evolution is reactionary...mutation maintains variation regardless of environment..environment puts pressure on the variants some of which are able to accumulate to higher frequency meaning a particular structure emerges over time without a preconcieved or even necessarily predictable plan.

​

Don't hold your breathe for an emergence of clean thinking or logic from the ID or creationist camps.....

​

Oh yeah..batman preceded Robin thus Robinism is heresy
All bow to the wisdom, might, and dancing ability of Adam West..the real Batman..
cheers,
M

​

[This message has been edited by Mammuthus, 08-20-2003]

{Sorry, posted twice by accident.}[This message has been edited by Parasomnium, 08-20-2003]

Your list of definitions includes only verbs, implying an 'actor'. I was thinking of 'design' as a noun. If every time you jump from a high tree in the general direction of a neighbouring tree you fly like a brick, then a new design of the skin between your limbs would be a pretty nifty idea, wouldn't it? Not to mention less painful. You wouldn't be bothered about the 'how', you'd just splatter yourself against a treetrunk instead of a planet, for a change. And you'd start wishing for the next improvement, being a bit more flight control. That's the 'design' I'm talking about. As I've explained, this design can come about without a designer, it's "gefundenes fressen" as it were, but it's design nonetheless, as in 'a solution for a problem'. Mmm... your description reminds me of some computer programmes I've had the pleasure of doing some maintenance on. I wonder what that means? There are exceptions, M. Take Zealot for example, he's at least trying. Don't believe everything they tell you... Catholicism preceded Protestantism. Ever tried to convince Protestants that they are the heretics, and not the Catholics?Robin rules.[This message has been edited by Parasomnium, 08-20-2003]