Intelligent Design

Dr. Sewell’s post below generated a fairly heated debate, but it is not my purpose to address the substance of his claim or his opponents’ responses.  Instead, I was fascinated by a couple of the commenters’ calls for “compromise” between the ID camp and the NDE camp.  As a general matter, “compromise” is a very fine thing, and if there were more of it the world would doubtless be a better place.  But it seems to me that compromise does not fit in well with the quest for scientific truth.  If two mutually exclusive theories purport to explain the same data, one of them may be right and the other one wrong, or they may both be wrong, but no one suggests we should seek Read More ›

As you read this article from the Washington Post, ask yourself how far such research would get without enzymes and a host of other materials “borrowed” from existing life-forms. “From scratch” properly should mean “made only with chemicals available in a realistic prebiotic environment.” That’s not what we’re dealing with here. And even if we were getting back to chemicals available in a realistic prebiotic environment, could the same be said for the investigator inteference of Craig Venter and his colleagues? Wouldn’t it be safer to say that they are acting as intelligent designers and not as mere accelerators of existing blind evolutionary processes? Synthetic DNA on the Brink of Yielding New Life Forms By Rick Weiss | Washington Post Read More ›

In his 1956 book, “A Biologist’s View”, French biologist Jean Rostand wrote: “If it is true that neither Lamarckism nor mutationism [Darwinism] enable us to understand the mechanism of evolution, we must have the courage to recognise that we know nothing of this mechanism…Some people may perhaps feel that such a confession of ignorance plays into the hands of those who are still fighting the doctrine of evolution. But quite apart from the fact that the most elementary intellectual honesty demands that we should say ‘I do not know’ where we believe that this is so, I think that this doctrine is now so solidly grounded on its own merits that it needs no support from false advocacy. I must Read More ›

Recently, I received and published this comment on this post about Oxford mathematician John Lennox’s book, God’s Undertaker, from “curwen”:

As an historian, with some background in the cultural and social history of Darwinism, I’m interested in how philosophy effects scientific practice. In my search for current material on the subject, I ran across this post, and became interested in your blog.

I am interested in your opinion on this: in what ways would scientific practice change if materialism, as a philosophy of science, was eventually replaced by design? In other words, would research and experiment be structured differently? Would standards of evidence change? Does Lennox comment on this? I apologize if this is something you’ve already dealt with at length, so even if you responded with relevant posts that would be helpful.

I told curwen that it is an excellent question, and I’d answer it.

I am also going to ask around and post other answers.* (Meanwhile, here is mine below.) Read More ›

Friday Five: William A. Dembski by Devon Williams, associate editor, CitizenLink.org ‘Are there patterns in biological systems that would point us to intelligence?’ Leading scientist and mathematician William A. Dembski has devoted years to researching intelligent design. He is a research professor in philosophy at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and has been featured on the front page of The New York Times. He has appeared on numerous radio and television broadcasts, including Jon Stewart’s The Daily Show and ABC’s Nightline. Dembski talked to CitizenLink about his latest book, The Design of Life — which he co-authored with Jonathan Wells. 1. What is intelligent design? The study of patterns in nature that are best explained by intelligence. But the focus is Read More ›

Pope Benedict XVI has formally challenged governments to address the moral issue of placing humanity above the environment. He calls for political decisions to be based on sound science, not political agendas. His challenge to sound science over ideological pressures parallels issues in the origins debate. Note particularly the parallels between differing presuppositions versus consequences of Darwinism, Intelligent Design, and Creationism. The Pope’s message highlights the importance of sound science in following the truth wherever the data leads, versus political environmental movements with explicit or implicit agendas diverging from or running contrary to the data. ———————– UPDATE: The Pope’s message advocates responsible stewardship based on prudent policies undistorted by ideological pressures. The post title was changed to reflect the Pope’s Read More ›

Richard Dawkins has often expressed faith in the ease of evolving eyes. It shows what strong faith he has in the power of RM and NS. Although he was completely wrong about this, he still has immovable faith in the power of Darwinian evolution. This is because his speculations rather than being based on evidence, simply depend on his very fruitful imagination. Dawkins, Richard, Where d’you get those peepers? Vol. 8, New Statesman & Society, 06-16-1995, pp 29. “Serviceable image-forming eyes have evolved between 40 and 60 times, independently from scratch, in many different invertebrate groups. Among these 40-plus independent evolutions, at least nine distinct design principles have been discovered, including pinhole eyes, two kinds of camera-lens eyes, curved-reflector (“satellite dish”) eyes, Read More ›

In the post below Dr. Dembski brought the Abraham case to our attention and asked whether it is legitimate to fire an employee merely because of his beliefs as opposed to his job performance.  The discussion rapidly deteriated into speculation about possible reasons Woods Hole might have terminated Abraham for poor performance.  All of those speculations are idle and beside the point.  Dr. Dembski asked, “Is it legitimate to fire someone because of their beliefs?”  It is simply no answer to that question to say, “Well maybe they fired him for reasons other than his beliefs.” The purpose of this post is to attempt to focus the discussion back on the issue Dr. Dembski raised, which is a very profound issue in Read More ›

Paul Myers, in a recent post at the Panda’s Thumb, notes Chris Comer’s firing for publicizing a talk by Barbara Forrest. I’m still not clear about the details of the case, but if Comer’s firing were solely for supporting Forrest, this ought not to be. The ID community is committed to a culture of rational discourse, and that means freedom of expression for all parties to a debate. The point of interest in Myers’s piece, however, is this: he goes on to describe Forrest as “one of their critics the creationists most fear, so it’s not surprising that her name would elicit knee-jerk panic.” Since Myers sees ID proponents as creationists, presumably he means to include us here as well. Read More ›

* Can or should the State of Texas remain neutral on origin theories? * Can politicians enforce such a principle? * Would remaining neutral violate the First Amendment? Consider the following recent events that offer a remarkable contrast to the case of denying tenure to astronomer Gonzalez: ——————– State science curriculum director resigns Move comes months before comprehensive curriculum review.Click-2-Listen By Laura Heinauer AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF Thursday, November 29, 2007 “The state’s director of science curriculum has resigned after being accused of creating the appearance of bias against teaching intelligent design. Chris Comer, who has been the Texas Education Agency’s director of science curriculum for more than nine years, offered her resignation this month. Chris Comer is accused of misconduct, insubordination. Read More ›

Thank you DaveScott for the post below, which contains some of the most convincing material on the falsification of the anthropogenic global warming hypothesis I have seen yet.  I write this separate post to highlight this statement by Professor Carter, the scientist providing the data: “And I started with a picture on my title slide of a Salvador Dali painting.  I forgot to say that being a professional scientist, at the moment, is like living in a Salvador Dali painting.  You are surrounded by these exquisitely detailed scientific interpretations done by scientists who are fellows of the Royal Academy, leading scientists in the world, and they are nearly all imaginary.” I hope those of you who have wondered why we post Read More ›

I have been thinking about E. coli and their evolution. E. coli live in the gut. They are passed environmentally from parents to children. When humans and baboons had their presumed common ancestor ~ 20 mill years ago, that should be the last time when E. coli in our bowel had a common ancestor with E. coli in the bowel of baboons in the wild. The following study looked at Baboon and Human E. coli (1985). “The biotype data indicate that the amount and distribution of genetic variation in the E. coli among free-ranging baboon troops are similar to those in isolates from humans. However, E. coli isolates from baboons are able to utilize a greater variety of sugars as their Read More ›

In her post below Denyse is frustrated that the Darwinists are still refusing to admit the obvious about the Guillermo Gonzalez case — that the tenure process was a sham, the reasons used to justify denial of tenure were a pretext, and the decision to deny tenure had been reached before he even applied.  I understand Denyse’s frustration.  As a litigator, getting to the facts of a matter is integral to my job, and it never ceases to amaze me the extent to which people will lie or deny the truth, even when they are under oath and even when everyone in the room (except apparently them) knows what’s going on.  When I was a young lawyer this was especially irritating.  I Read More ›

Regents asked to consider e-mails By LISA ROSSI • REGISTER AMES BUREAU • December 4, 2007 “Advocates for Iowa State University professor Guillermo Gonzalez, who was turned down for tenure, called on the Iowa Board of Regents Monday to consider the e-mails that show faculty members at ISU were uncomfortable with promoting someone who advocated the idea of intelligent design. Gonzalez, an assistant professor in physics and astronomy, learned this spring he did not achieve tenure at ISU, essentially a lifetime appointment. His position expires at ISU in May of 2008. Members of the Discovery Institute, a Seattle-based organization that supports the discussion of intelligent design in classrooms, said the Board of Regents refused to allow certain e-mails between physics Read More ›

Organization attacks ruling to deny tenure E-mails suggest Gonzalez’s beliefs affected decision Kyle Miller and Ross Boettcher “Issue date: 12/4/07  The Discovery Institute, a pro-intelligent design organization, released portions of e-mails of ISU professors and administrators “conspiring” to deny tenure to Guillermo Gonzalez, associate professor of physics and astronomy, in a press conference in Des Moines on Monday. Casey Luskin, program officer for public policy and legal affairs for the Discovery Institute, said “thousands of pages of e-mails” obtained through an Iowa Open Records request from earlier this year hold statements pointing out a possible “hostile work environment” at Iowa State. Luskin said it points to a conspiracy to deny tenure to a “deserving professor” involving not only Iowa State Read More ›