Uncommon Descent Serving The Intelligent Design Community

Why can’t the ID people come up with evidence – evidence that doesn’t cause Darwinists to drive them from their posts?

Darwinian evolutionist E. O. Wilson insists that biology can do better than traditional faith, and meanwhile – in a fascinating passage that somehow signifies the passing of an old order – disses intelligent design.

Wilson insists that all the ID guys have to do is come up with “evidence” – so why don’t they?

The critics forget how the reward system in science works. Any researcher who can prove the existence of intelligent design within the accepted framework of science will make history and achieve eternal fame. They will prove at last that science and religious dogma are compatible. Even a combined Nobel prize and Templeton prize (the latter designed to encourage the search for just such harmony) would fall short as proper recognition. Every scientist would like to accomplish such a epoch-making advance. But no one has even come close, because unfortunately there is no evidence, no theory and no criteria for proof that even marginally might pass for science.

There is something almost obscene about a smug – and so they say – gentlemanly* prof sitting pretty at Harvard , writing this disingenuous garbage, in full awareness that none of his cowering colleagues will ask the obvious question: What happened to people who DID come up with evidence against Darwinism (and therefore maybe for intelligent design)?

What ABOUT Rick Sternberg, Guillermo Gonzalez, and Robert Marks? To say nothing of Mike Behe? Read More ›

The Deification of the Word Scientific, and How it Has Lost Meaning

While I was growing up during the 1950’s and 1960’s the word “scientific” was bandied about with abandon. Anything that was labeled “scientific” was immediately given credibility, because of the tremendous achievements of the hard sciences like mathematics, chemistry, physics, and engineering. There were phrases like “better living through chemistry” in advertisements. When I became interested in games-playing artificial-intelligence research I found books with titles like Scientific Checkers. In the 20th century the meaning of the word science took on almost the equivalent of the meaning of the word holy. Anything that was scientific was good and true, by definition. Anything that was unscientific was suspect at best, and probably the result of ignorance and nefarious intentions at worst. In Read More ›

Universe tunes itself

Paul Davies Tuesday June 26, 2007 The Guardian    Condensed Just why is Intelligent Design referred to as a “movement” when Multiverse is called a “theory”?  “The universe looks like a fix. But that doesn’t mean that a god fixed it. We will never explain the cosmos by taking on faith either divinity or physical laws. True meaning is to be found within nature. Scientists are slowly waking up to an inconvenient truth – the universe looks suspiciously like a fix. For 40 years, physicists and cosmologists have been quietly collecting examples of all too convenient “coincidences” and special features in the underlying laws of the universe. Change any one of them and the consequences would be lethal. Fred Hoyle once Read More ›

A Twist on the Infinite Regress Argument

In a previous post there was a vigorous debate about idnet.com.au’s suggestion that Craig Venter might soon manufacture a living organism from scratch. This comment caught my eye:  “OMG!! When Craig Venter produces a living organism, will this event trigger the infamous “infinite regress?” WHO DESIGNED CRAIG VENTER???” Indeed.  Assume for the sake of argument that Craig Venter actually succeeds in creating life in the lab (We’ll call them Venter’s critters or “VCs” for short).  Then assume the dreaded super virus comes along and wipes out all life on earth except for the VCs, who are immune.  Assume further that a million years passes and there are no traces that any living thing other than VCs ever existed on earth.  Then two aliens come along.  Alien 1 of 2 observes the VCs Read More ›