Intelligent Design

In this exchange with Elizabeth Liddle, William J. Murray gives one of the most succinct and insightful rebuttals of determinism I have ever seen: Murray’s Argument: Determinists are no more capable of framing a determinist argument without using libertarian assumptions and phrases than Darwinists are capable of framing discussions of biology and evolution without using design assumptions and phrases. The determinist uses “we”, “I”, and “our”, and the acts of such agencies, as if they are libertarian commodities – first sufficient causes in and of themselves, ignoring the necessary causation of what produces the sensation of personhood and the sensation of choosing and the sensation of making contingent models. The sensation of self, thought, act, concept, reflection, choice and meaning Read More ›

Dr. Torley sometimes buries some beautiful stuff in the comment threads of his posts. I am determined to dig them out to display to a wider audience. Here’s one. In response to a comment on his free will post he writes: Thank you for a thought-provoking response. I have to say that despite the impressive level of argumentation, I was not persuaded that a determinist gains anything by taking responsibility for past mistakes. You offer the example of the two women, one of whom takes responsibility for her past while the other one does not. You appeal to a complicated metaphysic of alternative universes to justify your point that by taking responsibility for your past, you can change your future. Read More ›

Skeptical mathematician Peter Woit explains here (Not Even Wrong, August 18, 2011): The Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton announced today that Jim Simons and Charles Simonyi will donate $100 million to the Institute, in the form of matching funds for a $200 million campaign mainly aimed at increasing the endowment. For some idea of previous fund-raising by the IAS, see here. Simons and Simonyi have donated significant sums to the IAS in the past, including $6 million from Simonyi to endow a professorship for Witten. The IAS has about 25 permanent professors, with salaries reaching above $300K/year. To get some idea of the scale of the new endowment funds, if they all went to new permanent professorships (unlikely), the Read More ›

Who speaks for Biologos? Recently a divergence of opinion has arisen between Dennis Venema and others at Biologos over a literal understanding of Adam and Eve. Now a fresh question has arisen between Venema and a post by Mark Noll. Dennis Venema gives reasons over at Biologos why he came to reject intelligent design and accept evolution. From Intelligent Design to BioLogos, Part 4: Reading Behe He writes that ID ‘was an argument from analogy, ignorance and incredulity.’ Instead he was ‘looking for an argument from evidence.’ However, ID need not be seen as an argument from analogy, but is an inference to the best explanation involving univocal thinking. As Mark Noll writes, also over at Biologos, The Bible and Read More ›

In my previous articles [1] [2], I explained how infinite probabilistic resources lead to Hume’s problem of induction. In this article I explain how ID helps solve the problem of induction, and rescues science from infinite probabilistic resources. Read More ›