Naturalism is a priori evolutionary materialism, so it both begs the question and self-refutes

_{kairosfocus

October 19, 2010

Academic Freedom, Atheism, Darwinism, Design inference, Education, Evolution, Intelligent Design, Multiverse, Philosophy, Science}

Share: Facebook; Twitter; LinkedIn; Flipboard; Print; Email

The thesis expressed in the title of this “opening bat” post is plainly controversial, and doubtless will be hotly contested and/or pointedly ignored. However, when all is said and done, it will be quite evident that it has the merit that it just happens to be both true and well-warranted.

So, let us begin.

Noted Harvard evolutionary biologist Richard Lewontin inadvertently lets the cat out of the bag in his well-known January 1997 New York Review of Books article, “Billions and Billions of Demons”:

. . . to put a correct view of the universe into people’s heads we must first get an incorrect view out . . . the problem is to get them to reject irrational and supernatural explanations of the world, the demons that exist only in their imaginations, and to accept a social and intellectual apparatus, Science, as the only begetter of truth . . . .

It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that

we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door. [Emphases added.]

No wonder, a few months later, noted Intelligent Design thinker Philip Johnson aptly rebutted, in First Things:

For scientific materialists the materialism comes first; the science comes thereafter. [Emphasis original] We might more accurately term them “materialists employing science.” And if materialism is true, then some materialistic theory of evolution has to be true simply as a matter of logical deduction, regardless of the evidence. That theory will necessarily be at least roughly like neo-Darwinism, in that it will have to involve some combination of random changes and law-like processes capable of producing complicated organisms that (in Dawkins’ words) “give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose.”

. . . . The debate about creation and evolution is not deadlocked . . . Biblical literalism is not the issue. The issue is whether materialism and rationality are the same thing. Darwinism is based on an a priori commitment to materialism, not on a philosophically neutral assessment of the evidence. Separate the philosophy from the science, and the proud tower collapses. [Emphasis added.] [The Unraveling of Scientific Materialism, First Things, 77 (Nov. 1997), pp. 22 – 25.]

The matter is actually as simple as that.

In the end, that’s why there is so much heat and smoke rather than light in the controversy over Evolution, Creation and Design. For, much is at stake institutionally, educationally and culturally, and yet it turns on something so simple and obviously fallacious as aggressive materialist ideology-driven begging of worldview questions presented under the false colours of science.

Now, them’s fighting words, so let us justify them by citing what the US National Academy of Science wrote in the 2008 edition of their long-running pamphlet, Science, Evolution and Creationism:

In science, explanations must be based on naturally occurring phenomena. Natural causes are, in principle, reproducible and therefore can be checked independently by others. If explanations are based on purported forces that are outside of nature, scientists have no way of either confirming or disproving those explanations. Any scientific explanation has to be testable — there must be possible observational consequences that could support the idea but also ones that could refute it. Unless a proposed explanation is framed in a way that some observational evidence could potentially count against it, that explanation cannot be subjected to scientific testing. [Science, Evolution and Creationism, 2008, p. 10 Emphases added.]

Observe that ever so subtly loaded imposition: science “must” explain by natural causes. That is, by matter, energy, space, time, their spontaneous interactions on chance and mechanical necessity, thence what plausibly derives from that on the evolutionary materialist narrative, including life and intelligence.

Immediately, we should ask: just what is “natural”? And, right after that: why is it contrasted to “supernatural” (instead of say, “artificial”)? [More . . . ]

Comments

Matteo: Thanks for surfacing a key issue, how the design inference focusses on a key goal of science: truth. Ideologising science leads it away from being what science should be at its best:
the unfettered (but intellectually and ethically responsible) progressive pursuit of the well-warranted truth about our world, in light of observation, experiment, hypothesis, theorising, discussion among the informed, and empirical testing
Further to this, the identification and validation of reliable signs of intelligently directed configuration is not only a legitmately scientific activity, but it opens up the door to empirical testing of design inferences. Ironically, it is the a priori imposition of evolutionary materialism that begs the question and insulates the reigning orthodoxy from empirical test. Johnson is apt:
For scientific materialists the materialism comes first; the science comes thereafter. We might more accurately term them "materialists employing science." And if materialism is true, then some materialistic theory of evolution has to be true simply as a matter of logical deduction, regardless of the evidence. That theory will necessarily be at least roughly like neo-Darwinism, in that it will have to involve some combination of random changes and law-like processes capable of producing complicated organisms that (in Dawkins’ words) "give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose." The prior commitment explains why evolutionary scientists are not disturbed when they learn that the fossil record does not provide examples of gradual macroevolutionary transformation, despite decades of determined effort by paleontologists to confirm neo-Darwinian presuppositions. That is also why biological chemists like Stanley Miller continue in confidence even when geochemists tell them that the early earth did not have the oxygen-free atmosphere essential for producing the chemicals required by the theory of the origin of life in a prebiotic soup. They reason that there had to be some source (comets?) capable of providing the needed molecules, because otherwise life would not have evolved. When evidence showed that the period available on the early earth for the evolution of life was extremely brief in comparison to the time previously posited for chemical evolution scenarios, Carl Sagan calmly concluded that the chemical evolution of life must be easier than we had supposed, because it happened so rapidly on the early earth. That is also why neo-Darwinists like Richard Dawkins are not troubled by the Cambrian Explosion, where all the invertebrate animal groups appear suddenly and without identifiable ancestors. Whatever the fossil record may suggest, those Cambrian animals had to evolve by accepted neo-Darwinian means, which is to say by material processes requiring no intelligent guidance or supernatural input. Materialist philosophy demands no less. That is also why Niles Eldredge, surveying the absence of evidence for macroevolutionary transformations in the rich marine invertebrate fossil record, can observe that "evolution always seems to happen somewhere else," and then describe himself on the very next page as a "knee-jerk neo-Darwinist." Finally, that is why Darwinists do not take critics of materialist evolution seriously, but speculate instead about "hidden agendas" and resort immediately to ridicule. In their minds, to question materialism is to question reality. All these specific points are illustrations of what it means to say that "we" have an a priori commitment to materialism. The scientific leadership cannot afford to disclose that commitment frankly to the public. Imagine what chance the affirmative side would have if the question for public debate were rephrased candidly as "RESOLVED, that everyone should adopt an a priori commitment to materialism." Everyone would see what many now sense dimly: that a methodological premise useful for limited purposes has been expanded to form a metaphysical absolute. Of course people who define science as the search for materialistic explanations will find it useful to assume that such explanations always exist. To suppose that a philosophical preference can validate a cherished scientific theory is to define "science" as a way of supporting prejudice. Yet that is exactly what the Darwinists seem to be doing, when their evidence is evaluated by critics who are willing to question materialism . . .
GEM of TKIkairosfocus_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
11:27 PM
11
11
27
PM
PDT}

JAD: You have raised an interesting point, at 4 and 19, one well worth a specific response on the merits. Pardon my not having commented before (I am trying to deal with a national crisis on constitutional law):
“Science ‘must’ explain by natural causes.” Actually I’m okay with that, as long as we also are willing to concede that science cannot explain everything.
Unfortunately, the point of evolutionary materialism as an ideological agenda propped up by ideologised scientific research programmes is precisely to try to explain "everything." For such materialists, reality itself is constrained to matter, energy, space, time and their interactions under scientific laws and forces of chance and mechanical necessity. In that context, methodological naturalism serves as a stalking horse, a blind that hides the ideological agenda. And, to push that agenda, the a priori materialists routinely distort what designt hought actualy does: they present he matter as a contrast between natural and supernatural explanation, tothe detriment of the latter. But in fact, the true alternative ever since Plaoto's The Laws, Bk X [360 BC], is natural vs ART-ificial, and in that context, there are abundant signs that serve as reliable markers of art, or intelligently directed configuration. that is, design. So, the effect of methodological naturalism on origins science, is to bias the outcome by censoring out ahead of time the possibility that empirically reliable sings might point to art as the best explanation for say the digitally coded, funcitonally specific complex information in cell based life, or the fine-tuned balance that sets our observed cosmos at an operating point that enables C-chemistry cell based life. And, until we consistently expose and challenge the question begging imposition, and go on to point out that the evo mat worldview is also self-referentially incoherent [it undermines the credibility of mind and organised thought, necessarily including its own system of thought], the a priori imposition backed by the august presence of the Magisterium in Lab coats, will prejudice the outcome. Instead of falling for it, we should insist that science properly can empirically investigate our world by identifying and explaining in light of causal factors tracing to chance, necessity and intelligence. The explanatory filter, appropriately used on an aspect by aspect investigation of phenomena, is an excellent tool for that. GEM of TKIkairosfocus_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
11:18 PM
11
11
18
PM
PDT}

d --> A question-begging prejudice like that cannot be frankly acknowledged, so it is no surprise to see the trifecta fallacy of red herring subject-changing distractors, led away to strawman caricatures of "fundy ignoramuses" and onwards to ad hominems against said "backwards" people. e --> Similarly, no-one who seriously reads either Newton's General Scholium to this Principia or Query 31 to his Opticks could properly characterise him as arguing deism and God of the gaps as his main view on God and science. f --> Instead, his view is that of a sophisticated design thinker, as may be seen from a brief snippet from the latter:
Now by the help of [[the laws of motion], all material Things seem to have been composed of the hard and solid Particles above-mention'd, variously associated in the first Creation by the Counsel of an intelligent Agent. For it became him who created them to set them in order. And if he did so, it's unphilosophical to seek for any other Origin of the World, or to pretend that it might arise out of a Chaos by the mere Laws of Nature; though being once form'd, it may continue by those Laws for many Ages . . . .
f --> It seems Newton "pripsed" his successor to the Lucasian chair, Hawking, by a tad over 300 years. g --> Similarly, it is plain from the General Scholium [and a lot of Theology 101, easily accessible for thousands of years] that on a theistic view the miraculous is not the source of chaos that makes science impossible, but instead the creation by the God of order undergirds confidence in that ordered system of reality that finds expression in scientific law:
This most beautiful system of the sun, planets, and comets, could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an intelligent and powerful Being. And if the fixed stars are the centres of other like systems, these, being formed by the like wise counsel, must be all subject to the dominion of One; especially since the light of the fixed stars is of the same nature with the light of the sun, and from every system light passes into all the other systems . . . . He is eternal and infinite, omnipotent and omniscient; that is, his duration reaches from eternity to eternity; his presence from infinity to infinity; he governs all things, and knows all things that are or can be done. He is not eternity or infinity, but eternal and infinite; he is not duration or space, but he endures and is present. He endures for ever, and is every where present; and by existing always and every where, he constitutes duration and space. Since every particle of space is always, and every indivisible moment of duration is every where, certainly the Maker and Lord of all things cannot be never and no where.
h --> This is of course precisely the opposite of the caricatured deism that Lewontin would put upon Newton. Newton plainly thought in terms of inference to best explanation across Intelligence and art, chance chaos, and mechanical necessity. He saw that the evidence points strongly to intelligence as the "natural" best explanation. the one that would be persuasive to most people once there is a level playing field. i --> Similarly, the very point of the miraculous as a sign is that it stands out distinct fromt he ordinary course of events and points to an order of reality beyond the world. in short, miracles have to be rare and have to stand out from a predictable order of reality. j --> No wonder then that modern science began and was nurtured in theistic, Judaeo-Christian soil. For, theism gives confidence that the God of order created and sustains the world, which will be intelligible, indeed, he so orders it that its order points to his attributes, as Rom 1 roundly declares:
20 . . . since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse . . .
k --> So, what we are seeing is the imposition of a priori materialism, in part aided by loaded caricatures and distortions of the "natural" theistic alternative in our civlisation. l --> Which brings us back to the point being made by Johnson: "Imagine what chance the affirmative side would have if the question for public debate were rephrased candidly as "RESOLVED, that everyone should adopt an a priori commitment to materialism." __________________ State the matter straight and plain, and the proud tower at once collapses. GEM of TKIkairosfocus_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
11:00 PM
11
11
00
PM
PDT}

My two cents which is written in a form of some questions and dialogue. 1. Is it suitable to define "Natural" causes as what occurs without the input of primary causal agents? For example consider Newton's theory of gravitation. When he ( perhaps apocryphally ) considered the falling of an apple to earth, he created something. He was able in his mind to think of not the mass of the earth, not the mass of the apple, but mass as an inherent property of matter. Then he wrote down ( in the notation of the day ) F = G m1 m2 / r^2. Now the incredible thing about Newton's Gravitational theorem is that it is a thing. It stands on its own as a created object. It is not the paper it is written on or the ink that it was written with. It is an idea. The only possible way for it to be invented was to imagine the existence of objects of all different types of masses. Note that for most of those masses and distances, no actual "naturally produced" objects existed. In his mind he imagined objects of a continuum of masses. Note also that Newton's theory is not correct. It does not contain relativistic corrections, and imagines point particles instead of quantum wave functions. But it does not have to be correct to be a thing. For that matter, the Theory of Evolution is a thing. It can only be created by imagining all of the necessary transitional forms and OOL schemes that are not currently observable. It does not have to be correct, but it is also a thing. Also materialism is a thing. It is a certain viewpoint. It may or may not be right, but it is definitely a thing. The interesting thing, is that all of these objects: Newton's Gravitational Theorem, The Theory of Evolution, and Materialism lie outside the realm of natural causes. They can not be created without induction from only a few observables to the creation of a general statement. Its too bad then that science can have no comment on how these things came about. Its also interesting, that if we define "naturalism" as above, that the origin of the thing we call materialism, can not be studied by science. And the existence of the theory of materialism proves that things outside of materialism exist. But that disproves materialism. Thus it is easily seen that although materialism is a thing, the invention of it lies outside the realm of materialism, and it thus refutes itself. If the theory of materialism exists, it must be wrong. But I guess that was kf's point anyway.JDH_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
11:00 PM
11
11
00
PM
PDT}

Frost: Interesting thought. You are right that there is a stigmatisation going on, with the "demonic" supernatural serving as both a strawman and an ad hominem. In fact, in the immediate context of the last part of the quote, this is what Lewontin had to also say: ________________ >> With great perception, Sagan sees that there is an impediment to the popular credibility of scientific claims about the world, an impediment that is almost invisible to most scientists. Many of the most fundamental claims of science are against common sense and seem absurd on their face. Do physicists really expect me to accept without serious qualms that the pungent cheese that I had for lunch is really made up of tiny, tasteless, odorless, colorless packets of energy with nothing but empty space between them? Astronomers tell us without apparent embarrassment that they can see stellar events that occurred millions of years ago, whereas we all know that we see things as they happen. When, at the time of the moon landing, a woman in rural Texas was interviewed about the event, she very sensibly refused to believe that the television pictures she had seen had come all the way from the moon, on the grounds that with her antenna she couldn't even get Dallas. What seems absurd depends on one's prejudice. Carl Sagan accepts, as I do, the duality of light, which is at the same time wave and particle, but he thinks that the consubstantiality of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost puts the mystery of the Holy Trinity "in deep trouble." Two's company, but three's a crowd. Our willingness to accept scientific claims that are against common sense is the key to an understanding of the real struggle between science and the supernatural. We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, in spite of its failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door. The eminent Kant scholar Lewis Beck used to say that anyone who could believe in God could believe in anything. To appeal to an omnipotent deity is to allow that at any moment the regularities of nature may be ruptured, that miracles may happen . . . ______________________ He then went on to speak of how in ancient Chinese culture, a superior adept of magic could kill the demons, which are limited, and presented Newton as a champion of deism and the God of the gaps concept. And he then topped off (harking back to a debate in 1964 that Johnson also discusses) as follows:
The struggle for possession of public consciousness between material and mystical explanations of the world is one aspect of the history of the confrontation between elite culture and popular culture . . .
A few remarks are in order: a --> The contrast between the scientist's superior knowledge and the ignorance of a woman who does not know about how a TV broadcast could be made from the moon to her TV is a metaphor for the claimed ignorance of the populace driving a fundamentalist bigotry that rejects the "self evident" truths of science on origins. b --> But, a priori imposition is not a question of superior knowledge but of controlling ideology. c --> So, a further excerpt from Johnson's rebuttal is apt:
if materialism is true, then some materialistic theory of evolution has to be true simply as a matter of logical deduction, regardless of the evidence. That theory will necessarily be at least roughly like neo-Darwinism, in that it will have to involve some combination of random changes and law-like processes capable of producing complicated organisms that (in Dawkins’ words) "give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose." The prior commitment explains why evolutionary scientists are not disturbed when they learn that the fossil record does not provide examples of gradual macroevolutionary transformation, despite decades of determined effort by paleontologists to confirm neo-Darwinian presuppositions. That is also why biological chemists like Stanley Miller continue in confidence even when geochemists tell them that the early earth did not have the oxygen-free atmosphere essential for producing the chemicals required by the theory of the origin of life in a prebiotic soup . . . . The scientific leadership cannot afford to disclose that commitment frankly to the public. Imagine what chance the affirmative side would have if the question for public debate were rephrased candidly as "RESOLVED, that everyone should adopt an a priori commitment to materialism." Everyone would see what many now sense dimly: that a methodological premise useful for limited purposes has been expanded to form a metaphysical absolute. Of course people who define science as the search for materialistic explanations will find it useful to assume that such explanations always exist. To suppose that a philosophical preference can validate a cherished scientific theory is to define "science" as a way of supporting prejudice. Yet that is exactly what the Darwinists seem to be doing, when their evidence is evaluated by critics who are willing to question materialism.
[ . . . ]kairosfocus_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
11:00 PM
11
11
00
PM
PDT}

"So in conclusion, MN could, at least in principle, lead to an experiment that could demonstrate that life arose by natural causes alone. ID, on the other, hand cannot lead to such an experiment. If you think that is wrong, please explain how and why."
Is a bit like saying "Belief in perpetual motion could, at least in principle, demonstrate a perpetual motion machine. Statistical Mechanics and adherence to the Second Law of Thermodynamics, on the other hand, cannot lead to such an experiment." This doesn't count as a weakness of the Second Law, so why should your statement count as a weakness against ID? Why should ID be faulted for not having the ability to demonstrate the indemonstrable? Seems more like a feature than a bug to me.Matteo_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
09:26 PM
9
09
26
PM
PDT}

Earlier (#4) I very politely wrote: [“Science ‘must’ explain by natural causes.” Actually I’m okay with that, as long as we also are willing to concede that science cannot explain everything.] Apparently that ruffled some feathers. I think there is a case for methodological naturalism (MN), as long as we define MN as being distinct from philosophical naturalism (PN) or materialism. On the other hand, I do think that people with a commitment to PN are sometimes guilty of blurring the distinction. However, I think that I can rationally argue that there is nothing that we know about natural causes operating in a pre-biotic environment that can explain the kind of design that we see even in the simplest or primitive cells. We haven’t experimentally proven that it’s impossible that some unknown natural cause (x) is responsible for the design we see in the cell. Logically it is not possible to prove a negative. So the burden of proof shifts to those who claim that life is somehow the result of natural causes alone. Until they provide the evidence, (An experiment realistically simulating an a-biotic environment that actually does give rise to some kind of primitive life) they have only a belief about what happened. Can ID’ists provide an experiment demonstrating how some intelligence created the first living things. I don’t see how. However, they can give us a positive argument that the only thing that we know of that can presently explain certain features of the cell, such as it’s coded sequences, is some kind of intelligence. We know that intelligence exists in the universe. We are intelligent. However, it’s obvious that the intelligence is not us, so it must be some other kind of intelligence. I would also argue that logically it must be a more advanced kind of intelligence, since we do not yet know how to create life. Now is that a scientifically testable explanation? I don’t think so. However, I do think it is a better explanation than that somehow life is the result of natural causes. So in conclusion, MN could, at least in principle, lead to an experiment that could demonstrate that life arose by natural causes alone. ID, on the other, hand cannot lead to such an experiment. If you think that is wrong, please explain how and why.john_a_designer_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
07:07 PM
7
07
07
PM
PDT}

G, I am so glad to see you have your own thread here on this one. I really enjoy the depth of your posts and you unorthodox style of presentation. It enriches this blog to have a full range of styles and personalities. Congrats. In regards to the main quote:
. . . to put a correct view of the universe into people’s heads we must first get an incorrect view out . . . the problem is to get them to reject irrational and supernatural explanations of the world, the demons that exist only in their imaginations, and to accept a social and intellectual apparatus, Science, as the only begetter of truth . . . .
There are many problems when an academic fallaciously leverages the straw man argument of super naturalism against their opposition. First there is the issue of defining what the term supernatural actually denotes- which like the term evolution can have various different definitions. At any rate it is not being used in this case to discuss what the proper role of supernatural categories are to a proper scientific paradigm but in this case just to simultaneously stigmatise the word as it pertains to science and label those who hold religious or "certain" metaphysical beliefs as being "supernaturalists" in a similarly silencing way as being called a "racist" often does. That amounts to both a straw-man and an ad hominem attack combined in one. While he plays the supernatural card I think we can easily see the immediate flaw in his analogy of metaphysical explanations as to "demons" - in that he fails to distinguish between "sufficient" (ie good) metaphysical (supernatural in his words) explanations - and "insufficient" (ie bad) ones. To him all supernatural explanations are inadequate or even apparently EVIL. Thus, at the very least we can infer that he is indeed clearly afraid of supernatural explanations if to him they are equal to the evil manifestation and controlling power of demons. But purly naturalistic explanations of which he seems to esteem as the supreme paradigm of knowledge and truth, are as we know from direct experience always incomplete. Besides the inconvenient truth of Godel to formal logic and arithmetic or Heisenberg to physics there is also the simple practical problem of trying to get a human brain to fully comprehend the origin of all things (including its own question) through the countless dimensions of modern quantum physics (which in and of itself is arguably a metaphysical theory). Lest we forget though that Lewontin and his kind, almost always know and understand the flaws and weaknesses of their own beleifs from the get go, but yet still remain fully beholden to their own "religious" agenda which is to maintain the old naturalistic paradigm that rules out mind and intelligence a priori as primary causative factors- despite there being no demonstrable evidence nor sufficient reason for them doing so- and that is true bigotry- to barrow one from his playbook. And so the question that must be posed to Lewontin is 'what naturalistic reason or law can you site to support your faith in a purely, uncompromising, MANDATORY, materialistic naturalist approach to science? What law of physics proves that matter must be the primary causative factor in the origin of all, or any, thing? What law demonstrates that matter precedes mind? It is actually Lewontin's faith in his own particular brand of metaphysical dogma that truly sticks out as insufficient and thus so are his demands and expectations for science. There in lies the true nature of HIS problem, and the deceiving demon behind it too.Frost122585_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
07:03 PM
7
07
03
PM
PDT}

GP: Enjoy your break! Gkairosfocus_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
02:38 PM
2
02
38
PM
PDT}

KF: just a short message of copngratulations for your very good "opening post". I will be away for a few days, so to next week, and keep on!gpuccio_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
02:35 PM
2
02
35
PM
PDT}

Ah, Gentlepeople: First, thanks for some very kind words. I will try to live up to them. My thought on the "theory of everything" issue is that it is not that Darwinism at macro-level is a TOE like the holy grail of physics would be, but that it is a gateway theory for a worldview. Namely, evolutionary materialism wearing the lab coats of science. So, once it makes the worldview seem plausible [and from Darwin's own writings it was intended to do so from the outset], we see a worldview level paradigm entrenched and dressed in the holy lab coat as "science." In that context, under the label science, we see a cluster and cascade of evolutionary theories, models and narratives that mutually reinforce: cosmological, solar system, chemical, biological, socio-cultural, and now socio-technological. All of which are presented as "science" and even in some cases, as "fact" comparable to the fact of gravity. (Cf the discussion in the summary unit for the IOSE critical survey course, here.) Of course, somehow, the inconvenient fact that we did not and could not observe the remote actual past of origins is typically glided over in a discreet silence. A silence that covers over the fact that we are here dealing with the origins narrative for a worldview beyond the reach of empirically verifiable scientific knowledge. And where actual science is relevant through the method of inference to best explanation, the censoring power of evolutionary materialism cuts off working out the best of a true level playing field set of alternatives. For, as we see the denunciations of "supernatural" or "beyond nature" or "spooky" above doing, anything that may point where evolutionary materialism would not go is cut off and excluded a priori. Thus, we see the terrible impact of worldview level question-begging. And, as Johnson aptly pointed out, for those caught up in the worldview agenda, evolutionary materialism is confused for rationality itself. When, of course it is question-begging and self-referentially incoherent [as page 2 linked through that "more" develops]. That is why we have to expose the question-begging and highlight the self-referential incoherence of the evolutionary materialist world-origin narrative. Otherwise, we cannot do real science unfettered by a priori impositions. When we do such real science, we soon enough find out that intelligence is an empirical fact [fact no 1 for each of us], that real choice and decisions are foundational to such intelligence and the credibility of both reasoning and mind. Then, we see that if we are to trust induction to yield the sort of provisional warrant for knowledge that we are forced to by our epistemic plight as finite, fallible and inferring creatures, then we see there are many, many strong and empirically reliable signs of intelligence. When we turn such unfettered reasoning loose on the origins question, it immediately tells us that cell based life is riddled with information systems and complex, functional, digitally coded information of a type that has only one routinely and reliably known source: intelligence. I therefore find it amusing to see how there is now a scurrying around to excise the use of terms like code, information, information processing, nanomachines and so on from the vocabulary that discusses the cell. Somewhere along that line the hoary old saw is trotted out that these terms are metaphorical and thus analogical. Analogies of course are prone to breaking down, and so they cannot provide proof beyond all doubt. Sorry. Digital information and codes are pretty clearly defined ans that is what we see in DNA and RNA. Code reading and algorithms, with the molecular units that process them are what they are. We are dealing with sophisticated instantiation, not poetic analogies. Then, when we look at the parameters to get to a cosmos that is supportive of C-chemistry, cell based life, we find that it is extraordinarily fine-tuned around the observed operating point.there may be other possible modes for sub-cosmi that will provide other operating points, maybe on architectures and technologies that we do not yet dream of. (And BTW, a bit of news: Judaeo-Christian theism is a multiverse worldview, and argues for a different technology of life that can intersect with the C-chemistry world we see: spirit.) But, when I look at a class AB push-pull transistor amplifier circuit and see it is biased at an operating point that just happens to give great audio output, I do not dismiss the case as irrelevant to inferring design, because other operating points are possible. The same holds for a well-tuned control loop, and for many many other systems. Getting things that conceptually will work together into that finely balanced mutually tuned condition we call and operating point is a non-trivial design issue. Engineering design uses but is not reducible to block diagram algebra! So, the key issue in this post, is that we need to open the mindset so we can hear the empirical data speak for itself, without the censoring bias imposed by evolutionary materialism. GEM of TKIkairosfocus_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
02:31 PM
2
02
31
PM
PDT}

tg, there is so much more to 'what we sense' than can possible reduced to the 'natural' material world: There Is More - Inspirational Poem - video http://www.metacafe.com/watch/4102086/ There Is More Once I saw a very old Godly man who, being very near death, had Become deaf, blind and invalid; Yet somehow he glowed happily Then it occurred to me... There is more to see than the light we see with our eyes There is more to behold than to watch setting skies There is more to hear than the airwaves of sound There is more to stand on than to stand on the ground There is more to feel than what we can touch with our skin There is more to all things, things that come from deeper within Then I saw a miserly old rich man who had angrily driven away his family Now he was in a coma, in his mansion, with no one around who loved him Then it occurred to me... There is more to the hurt of a word than to sticks and stones There is more to people than just skin and bones There is more to a home than bricks, steel, and lumber There is more to waking up than rising from slumber There is more to riches than having gold piled high There is more to living than just being alive Then I saw a Godly young woman full of compassion Working with homeless people helping them get off the street Then it occurred to me... There is more to loving than the warmth of feeling good There is more to understanding than a fact being understood There is more to work with than the tools of our crafts There is more to cleaning up than taking a bath There is more to freedom than having no prison walls There is more to poverty than having no stuff at all Then I saw a bitter old man who angrily didn't believe in Miracles at all and thinks that this cold world is all there is Then it occurred to me... There is more to being dead than a body in a tomb There is more to being born than coming out of a womb There is more to heaven than all the stars above There is more to Jesus Christ than a distant example of God's love There is more to learning than books teach us in schools And there is more to walking with God than keeping TEN rules Then I got home at the end of the day Went into my room and quietly prayed Lord, If there is more than a lesson to my heart You could teach Would You teach me to see spiritually to add depth to my reach And Lord, If there is more than a gift to this world You might give Would You give the miracle that in all hearts Your light would live.bornagain77_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
09:44 AM
9
09
44
AM
PDT}

G, nice job. I refer to Lewontin's comment that "Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door." One of the many ways in which I find materialism to be incoherent is the idea that we only know what we sense. Although that is not often pointed out as an implication of materialism it most certainly is. If all that actually exists is comprised of matter and energy then all that we can know is what we sense. It has to be that way. It's true by definition. But we do know more than what we sense. We know of the Pythagorean theorem, for example. As far as I have been able to tell, the Pythagorean theorem is not visible, audible, gustatory, olfactory, or touchable. In other words, we cannot "sense" it. Yet we know of it. How is that? There is obviously something more to us than our five senses. The people who embrace this philosophical position are either willfully and deliberately ignorant or they just haven't thought about it very deeply. There is an immaterial world that is real and it is a world of minds (or souls, if you will) reason, laws, morality, information, and yes, God. Gasp. How people can be deceived by such utter nonsense as materialism/naturalism/physicalism is beyond me. As you and others have ably and relentlessly pointed out, their fundamental intellectual commitment is self-defeating. It's irrational in the extreme. It's so wrong it defeats itself without "us" having to defeat the truth of premises or attack the validity of their logic. Yet it persists, and persists. Go figure.tgpeeler_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
09:12 AM
9
09
12
AM
PDT}

Excellent post KF! A conversation between a questioner and a methodological naturalist. MN: Science must study only natural causes. Q: What does "natural" mean? MN: I don't know, but whatever it is, science must be exclusively about that. Now come on people. If you have any sense of humor at all, you have to love this.StephenB_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
08:57 AM
8
08
57
AM
PDT}

Above, I would submit that the first 3 isms - Marxism, Freudianism and Darwinism all lead to the 4th ism, Nihilism, if taken to their inevitable extremes, because they all stem from a materialistic premise. It's interesting though, that Marxism and Freudianism are out of the picture now - most forcefully because critics were able to see the end result, and to persuade the rest of us what that end result really was. It seems to me that ID critics of Darwinism, such as Philip Johnson are correct when they point out that we simply need to expose the materialistic foundations of Darwinism for it to equally fall with the rest of them.CannuckianYankee_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
08:27 AM
8
08
27
AM
PDT}

*theories of anything outside their respective fieldsabove_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
08:13 AM
8
08
13
AM
PDT}

@Cannuck marxism, freudianism, darwinism and nihilism are the 4 -isms that have contributed to much of the intellectual and moral descent of the west. They might be theories in their limited respective fields but as theories anything outside their respective fields they serve only as poor excuses to propagate specific socio-political agendas.above_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
08:12 AM
8
08
12
AM
PDT}

BA, "Clearly the definition of ‘natural’, that materialists have highjacked for their own ends, is not a ‘natural’ definition!" Brilliant!CannuckianYankee_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
08:00 AM
8
08
00
AM
PDT}

KF, Nice thorough job. So like with VJ, if you disappear for a while, we can assume you're working on something for us? :) I was reading recently the following from Ed Brayton's blog "Dispatches from the Culture Wars" from 12/08 regarding some remarks made here at UD by Steve Fuller: http://scienceblogs.com/dispatches/2008/12/steve_fuller_at_uncommon_desce.php Fuller was discussing how like Marxism and Freudianism, Darwinism is a 19th Century social theory, and has become a "theory of everything." Fuller (as quoted by Brayton): "The big difference is that Marxism and Freudianism - throughout their existence - have been contested (many would say decisively) by several alternative ways of organizing and interpreting the same body of data. In the case of Darwinism, this largely ended by 1950. However, it doesn't mean that Darwinism has somehow turned into something other than a 19th century social theory. No, it's simply a 19th century social theory with unusual clout. Indeed, Darwinism is really no different from Marxism and Freudianism in using its concepts as rhetorical devices for associating intuitively clear phenomena with rather deep and mysterious causes." Brayton's response: "I submit to you that anyone writing such gibberish in a freshman philosophy class would justifiably be flunked for it; this [ad hominem] has a PhD in the subject. The only ones who have turned evolution into a grand theory of everything are those religious enemies of evolution who use absurd rhetoric about "worldviews" and who fancy themselves (and everyone else) as soldiers in a holy war between God and Satan. These are the people who use the term 'evolution' to mean all of modern science and every possible non-theistic inference anyone has ever derived from it. To working scientists, evolution is no different from any other scientific theory. It is a testable, compelling explanation for a discrete (though very large) set of data. Evolution is no more naturalistic than any other theory in science, nor is it naturalistic in some qualitatively different way than any other theory in science. It does not explain, nor does it attempt to explain, "everything." It explains only what it is intended to explain and it does so very successfully." (I edited the offending ad hominem in []) It seems to me that while discounting worldview issues, the materialists are now denying the materialism of their own Darwinian theory. Seems like the way to go if you want to convince people you are truly on their side even if they are religious - well except for the fact that Brayton almost always resorts to disparaging ad hominem in his blog towards the "religious." That certainly won't win any converts. I would also submit that while perhaps Dr. Fuller may have seemingly, as Brayton pointed out, misconstrued Darwinism as a "theory of everything," it was the theory, which made all other materialistic theories palatable to the scientific elite, such that all other materialistic theories in scientific circles become synchronistically supportive of Darwinism - M-theory, RNA world theory, abiogenesis theories, etc. So in actuality, while Darwinism is just one branch, it is no less the main focus of a larger supportive methodology, which only accepts naturalistic inquiry (and I might add speculation), and which seeks to answer everything. In that, Dr. Fuller is right on the mark. Darwinism needs all the other materialistic speculations in order to succeed. Note: I realize that Brayton is not actually a scientist, but a journalist - nonetheless, he is responsible for popularizing Darwinism through his own blog, and through his involvement in forming Panda's Thumb.CannuckianYankee_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
07:56 AM
7
07
56
AM
PDT}

correction: How in the world is science going to build a coherent view OF 'natural’ causes,,,,bornagain77_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
07:54 AM
7
07
54
AM
PDT}

Well, “Science ‘must’ explain by natural causes.” How in the world is science going to build a coherent view natural' causes, if it artificially removes intelligent causation as 'natural'. In fact if methodological materialism/naturalism is the standard by which we must judge whether something is 'natural' or not, then the everyday intelligent conscious activity of humans is by definition 'supernatural' since the functional information generated by 'conscious' humans in their day to day goings (even on just 1 page of a written paper) greatly exceeds what can reasonably be expected to be produced by the 'natural' material processes of the universe over the entire history of the universe! Clearly the definition of 'natural', that materialists have highjacked for their own ends, is not a 'natural' definition!bornagain77_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
07:52 AM
7
07
52
AM
PDT}

“Science ‘must’ explain by natural causes.” Actually I’m okay with that, as long as we also are willing to concede that science cannot explain everything.john_a_designer_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
07:28 AM
7
07
28
AM
PDT}

KF, great inaugural post. I look forward to your furture posts as well. When I see your posts I think of the proverb "For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little."Barry Arrington_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
06:41 AM
6
06
41
AM
PDT}

kf, I keep wondering, "What is this purely material basis that materialists build their entire worldview on now that Quantum Mechanics has demolished any 'purely material' misconceptions for the basis of reality that we may have harbored in the past?" notes: Ions have been teleported successfully for the first time by two independent research groups Excerpt: In fact, copying isn't quite the right word for it. In order to reproduce the quantum state of one atom in a second atom, the original has to be destroyed. This is unavoidable - it is enforced by the laws of quantum mechanics, which stipulate that you can't 'clone' a quantum state. In principle, however, the 'copy' can be indistinguishable from the original (that was destroyed),,, http://www.rsc.org/chemistryworld/Issues/2004/October/beammeup.asp Atom takes a quantum leap - 2009 Excerpt: Ytterbium ions have been 'teleported' over a distance of a metre.,,, "What you're moving is information, not the actual atoms," says Chris Monroe, from the Joint Quantum Institute at the University of Maryland in College Park and an author of the paper. But as two particles of the same type differ only in their quantum states, the transfer of quantum information is equivalent to moving the first particle to the location of the second. http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2171769/posts Explaining Information Transfer in Quantum Teleportation: Armond Duwell †‡ University of Pittsburgh Excerpt: In contrast to a classical bit, the description of a (photon) qubit requires an infinite amount of information. The amount of information is infinite because two real numbers are required in the expansion of the state vector of a two state quantum system (Jozsa 1997, 1) --- Concept 2. is used by Bennett, et al. Recall that they infer that since an infinite amount of information is required to specify a (photon) qubit, an infinite amount of information must be transferred to teleport. Single photons to soak up data: Excerpt: the orbital angular momentum of a photon can take on an infinite number of values. Since a photon can also exist in a superposition of these states, it could – in principle – be encoded with an infinite amount of information. leading quantum physicist Anton Zeilinger has followed in John Archibald Wheeler's footsteps (1911-2008) by insisting reality, at its most foundational level, is 'information'. "It from bit symbolizes the idea that every item of the physical world has at bottom - at a very deep bottom, in most instances - an immaterial source and explanation; that which we call reality arises in the last analysis from the posing of yes-no questions and the registering of equipment-evoked responses; in short, that things physical are information-theoretic in origin." John Archibald Wheeler Why the Quantum? It from Bit? A Participatory Universe? Excerpt: In conclusion, it may very well be said that information is the irreducible kernel from which everything else flows. Thence the question why nature appears quantized is simply a consequence of the fact that information itself is quantized by necessity. It might even be fair to observe that the concept that information is fundamental is very old knowledge of humanity, witness for example the beginning of gospel according to John: "In the beginning was the Word." Anton Zeilinger - a leading expert in quantum teleportation: http://www.metanexus.net/Magazine/ArticleDetail/tabid/68/id/8638/Default.aspx Quantum mechanics Excerpt: The Everett many-worlds interpretation, formulated in 1956, holds that all the possibilities described by quantum theory simultaneously occur in a multiverse composed of mostly independent parallel universes.[39] This is not accomplished by introducing some new axiom to quantum mechanics, but on the contrary by removing the axiom of the collapse of the wave packet: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_mechanics The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics in the Natural Sciences - Eugene Wigner Excerpt: The miracle of the appropriateness of the language of mathematics for the formulation of the laws of physics is a wonderful gift which we neither understand nor deserve. We should be grateful for it and hope that it will remain valid in future research and that it will extend, for better or for worse, to our pleasure, even though perhaps also to our bafflement, to wide branches of learning. http://www.dartmouth.edu/~matc/MathDrama/reading/Wigner.html The Underlying Mathematical Foundation Of The Universe -Walter Bradley - video http://www.metacafe.com/watch/4491491 The Five Foundational Equations of the Universe and Brief Descriptions of Each: http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AYmaSrBPNEmGZGM4ejY3d3pfNDdnc3E4bmhkZg&hl=en The following site lists the unchanging 'transcendent information' constants of the universe: Systematic Search for Expressions of Dimensionless Constants using the NIST database of Physical Constants Excerpt: The National Institute of Standards and Technology lists 325 constants on their website as ‘Fundamental Physical Constants’. Among the 325 physical constants listed, 79 are unitless in nature (usually by defining a ratio). This produces a list of 246 physical constants with some unit dependence. These 246 physical constants can be further grouped into a smaller set when expressed in standard SI base units.,,, http://www.mit.edu/~mi22295/constants/constants.html Materialism compared to Theism within the scientific method: http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=dc8z67wz_5fwz42dg9 etc... etc.. etc...bornagain77_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
06:25 AM
6
06
25
AM
PDT}

kf Well done!! I credit P Johnson ( Darwin on Trial) for opening my eyes to the metaphysical underpinnings of Darwinism. I agree with PJ when he says that Darwinism is metaphysics disguised as science thus you are correct when you say "In the end, that’s why there is so much heat and smoke rather than light in the controversy over Evolution, Creation and Design. "For, much is at stake institutionally, educationally and culturally, and yet it turns on something so simple and obviously fallacious as aggressive materialist ideology-driven begging of worldview questions presented under the false colours of science." Vividvividbleau_{October 19, 2010
October
10
Oct
19
19
2010
05:35 AM
5
05
35
AM
PDT}

Prev 1 … 3 4 5

You must be logged in to post a comment.

Leave a Reply