Okay, ID may be taught — But you don’t get to teach it!

_{William Dembski
December 16, 2005

Education, Intelligent Design

1}_{Categories
Education
Intelligent Design}

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

The latest edition of Jeffrey Bennett et al’s astronomy textbook The Cosmic Perspective (4th edition) is now out. Sure enough, “intelligent design” is in the index. Indeed, it gets a full page treatment (p. 714). Below is the scan of that page. Does this text provides a fair representation of ID? Hardly. It appears now that ID will indeed be taught in the science curricula of this nation, only ID proponents won’t be doing the teaching. Life is so unfair.

ID in The Cosmic Perspective

Comments

Logan says: "A question about slavery in the Bible: am I right in assuming that a person could become a slave by being taken captive in war, and by being born into slavery? If so, slavery was certainly not voluntary in Old Testament times." Where does it say that in the bible? Did you not read the previous posts? People chose to become slaves so that they could have a reliable way of living. Obviously, at times, foreign captives would become slaves because they couldn't have any other mode of survival. That was allowable as long as they were treated respectfully. Taken from the christian think tank: "In addition to the institution of Hebrew servanthood above, the Mosaic law has some material on two other kinds of servant/slave-type situations: captives of war and foreign slaves. There is not much material on these subjects, and, given the intention of the Law to differentiate between Israel and the nations, much of it falls into the exceptional category. The first case is that of war captives in Deut 20. The scenario painted in this chapter is a theoretical one, that apparently never materialized in ancient Israel. It concerns war by Israel against nations NOT within the promised land. Since Israel was not allowed by God to seek land outside its borders (cf. Deut 2.1-23), such a military campaign could only be made against a foreign power that had attacked Israel in her own territory. By the time these events occurred (e.g. Assyria), Israel's power had been so dissipated through covenant disloyalty that military moves of these sort would have been unthinkable. But the scenario involved offering peace to a city. If the city accepted peace, its inhabitants would be put to "forced labor" (cf. Gibeon in Josh 9), but this would hardly be called 'slavery' (it is also used of conscription services under the Hebrew kings, cf. 2 Sam 20.24; I Kings 9.15). If the city was attacked and destroyed, the survivors were taken as foreign slaves/servants (but the women apparently had special rights--cf. Deut 21.10ff) under the rubric of the second case (below)." God orders the Israelites to make a distinction between the Hebrew servants and the those of foreign nations. They were: Ã‚Â· Allowed to 'buy' (not take!) slaves from foreign nations around them [Note: these would NOT include the Canaanites, but would be from remote nations. This would make the incidence level of this extremely small, except in the case of royalty or the ruling class. In those days, rulers would often have slaves with special skills, such as writing, teaching, translation, but the lives of these 'slaves' would not be representative of the common "western" slavery under discussion.] Ã‚Â· The temporary resident situation would look more like the Hebrew institution (since the alien would be 'selling himself' as in that case). The main difference would be the absence of the "timed-release" freedom clauses, but the slave-for-life-for-love situation may have been what is behind the 'you CAN make them slaves for life' (implying that it was not automatic.). Ã‚Â· The temporary resident already performed more mundane tasks for the people, for example wood and water services (cf. Deut 29.11: the aliens living in your camps who chop your wood and carry your water. ), in exchange for escape from Egypt or from troubles abroad. But these aliens were not confined to some 'lower class' in the Israelite assembly, since it is obvious that they could rise to affluence and actually BUY Hebrew servants as well: "`If an alien or a temporary resident among you becomes rich and one of your countrymen becomes poor and sells himself to the alien living among you or to a member of the alien's clan, 48 he retains the right of redemption after he has sold himself. (Deut 25.47) As such, it looks more like the Hebrew institution than the 'western' version. Let me end with this quote once again: "Although slaves were viewed as the property of heads of households, the latter were not free to brutalize or abuse even non-Israelite members of the household. On the contrary, explicit prohibitions of the oppression/exploitation of slaves appear repeatedly in the Mosaic legislation. In two most remarkable texts, Leviticus 19:34 and Deuteronomy 10:19, Yahweh charges all Israelites to love ('aheb) aliens (gerim) who reside in their midst, that is, the foreign members of their households, like they do themselves and to treat these outsiders with the same respect they show their ethnic countrymen. Like Exodus 22:20 (Eng. 21), in both texts Israel's memory of her own experience as slaves in Egypt should have provided motivation for compassionate treatment of her slaves. But Deuteronomy 10:18 adds that the Israelites were to look to Yahweh himself as the paradigm for treating the economically and socially vulnerable persons in their communities." [HI:MFBW:60]Benjii_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
12:38 PM
12
12
38
PM
PDT}

Benjii asks: "Why does ID need to admit that the designer is supernatural?" Read the thread and follow the links. I've already addressed this question in excruciating detail. "Now let me ask you this, Keiths? Did you know that late eminent philosopher of science, Karl Popper, repudiated evolution for not being falsifiable?" Now let me ask you this, Benjii. Did you know that Popper realized his mistake and corrected it 27 years ago, as quote-miners always fail to mention? "Like Bill Dembski said in one post, itÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s ID that is falisifiable, not evolution." Particular claims of ID, such as the IC of the flagellum, are falsifiable. The designer hypothesis is not. See https://uncommondescent.com/index.php/archives/557 , beginning at comment #9.keiths_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
12:18 PM
12
12
18
PM
PDT}

keiths: "I took 1) DembskiÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s CSI ideas, and 2) the existence of CSI in the world, as my starting points. I thought things through and concluded that the prime designer must be supernatural, if DembskiÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s ideas are correct. You didnÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t disagree with my reasoning. So how am I not Ã¢â‚¬Å“following it [the evidence] wherever it leadsÃ¢â‚¬Â? " And earlier on keiths wrote: "As far as I can tell, Dembski holds that CSI in this universe always requires an intelligent cause. If so, this would rule out the spontaneous emergence of conscious life, even from Ã¢â‚¬Å“other material constituents.Ã¢â‚¬Â" You're making a typical, Darwinistic logical error: you presume that which you wish to demonstrate. If you ASSUME ("take", your word) CSI, and if you CONCEDE the presence of CSI in the world, then that makes ID correct, and Darwinism wrong. So what's left to prove? You're proposing to demonstrate the scientific legitimacy of ID via the demonstration of whether or not there is a God, and what kinds of attributes this God has. (This involves the whole realm of the supernatural. Science as we know it is not tractable in such a realm.) This is completely bass-ackwards. One of the "implications" of ID may be that there is a "supernatural" God (Dave Scott surely doesn't think so), but what is being proposed, and what is being presented as scientific, is the presence of CSI as a detectable crystallization, as it were, of intelligence. The demonstration of IC and CSI renders Darwinism useless. But through it all, CSI stands and falls on its own, and should be determined to be either scientifically true, or scientifically false using scientific means and argumentation, and nottheological mutterings. Again, you choose to ASSUME the very thing that needs to be demonstrated. That might work in the world of Darwin, but it doesn't work in the world of ID.PaV_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
12:11 PM
12
12
11
PM
PDT}

Keiths wrote: "I took 1) DembskiÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s CSI ideas, and 2) the existence of CSI in the world, as my starting points. I thought things through and concluded that the prime designer must be supernatural, if DembskiÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s ideas are correct." This argument is interesting, and not at all obviously flawed (although I and others would want to think about it some more). It is the kind of argument I expect Christian apologists will use to prove the existence of a supernatural designer, if Prof. Dembski's ideas do get widely accepted. If the argument is meant to force IDists to admit that they are talking about the supernatural, then it may turn out to be a bit superfluous, since Prof. Dembski and other IDists also support the "fine-tuning" argument. If the values of various physical constants referred to in the "fine-tuning" argument were set very early on after the Big Bang, then a designer capable of doing so (or even of existing at that stage) may well have to be "supernatural". I'm still not so sure what to make of this term, since I have no idea what "natural" means. Perhaps a "natural" designer is just one who needs a physical body composed of matter in order to operate, and a "supernatural" designer is one who does not need a body to operate? A question about slavery in the Bible: am I right in assuming that a person could become a slave by being taken captive in war, and by being born into slavery? If so, slavery was certainly not voluntary in Old Testament times.Logan_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
12:08 PM
12
12
08
PM
PDT}

DaveScot, If I understand your front-loaded version of the panspermia hypothesis, you're suggesting that a "seed" for all of life might have been planted on (or drifted to) Earth, and that all of the genetic information needed for the subsequent development of increasingly complex organisms was already present in the seed, just waiting to be "switched on". Is that a fair synopsis? If so, I see some potential problems with the idea: 1. In the case of the seed drifting randomly to Earth, the designers wouldn't have known in advance what kind of planet the seed would land on. The adaptations appropriate for one habitable planet wouldn't necessarily be the same as for another with different atmospheric pressure or composition, different ocean salinity, a different length of day, etc. Front-loading in this case would have to cover all possible target planets. 2. Following up on #1, how would the organisms "know" how to select the appropriate genetic information for the planet they were developing on? 3. How would organisms know when to "switch on" various chunks of genetic information? For example, how would the genes for the human brain remain "off" for billions of years, then suddenly turn on when needed? 4. Unexpressed genetic material is subject to mutation. Selection can't weed out the mutants, because it can only operate on genes that ARE expressed. Over millions or even billions of years, the unexpressed material would mutate so badly that it would be useless when it was finally switched on. Comments?keiths_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
12:03 PM
12
12
03
PM
PDT}

"However, if ID admits that it implies a supernatural designer, and is willing to specify some of his attributes, then it becomes falsifiable, and therefore testable as science (it still may not be good science, but at least itÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s science)." Why does ID need to admit that the designer is supernatural? All ID can do or say is if something is designer or not. When detectives investigate a death, they try to see whether there was a natural cause or an outside source that caused it. If they do, indeed, conclude that an outside source has been involved, they do so because of the design theoretic methods, not the attributes of the outside intelligence. That's the same thing with ID. Moreover, it's not so much if whether a theory is falsifiable or not, most philosophers of science are employing new criterion. Such as confirmable/disconfirmable. Now let me ask you this, Keiths? Did you know that late eminent philosopher of science, Karl Popper, repudiated evolution for not being falsifiable? How, then, can evolution be falsified? It seems that the mechanism is so disputed, that scientists set it in stone that it has occured. Most evolutionist don't even consider evolution to be a smooth gradual process. At that, it is still accepted as fact. Where's the falsifiability in that? Like Bill Dembski said in one post, it's ID that is falisifiable, not evolution.Benjii_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
11:52 AM
11
11
52
AM
PDT}

Dave, By the way, I can't avoid not disagreeing with the opposite of what you didn't say in your earlier post.keiths_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
11:38 AM
11
11
38
AM
PDT}

DaveScot in one post: "...I canÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t really disagree [with your argument]..." DaveScot in a later post: "I canÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t not agree with you about the old testament." C'mon, Dave, you can do it... "I a... a... ag... ag... AGREE with you, Keith." There... Now doesn't that feel better? :-)keiths_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
11:25 AM
11
11
25
AM
PDT}

DaveScot and Roger comment on my argument that Dembski's CSI ideas demand a supernatural 'prime designer': DaveScot writes: "Reading your comment about an infinite regress to an ultimately supernatural designer was interesting and I canÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t really disagree..." Dave, if you "can't really disagree", how about agreeing? :-) Dave continues: "So letÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s focus on the evidence at hand and leave the ultimate nature of God and the universe to the mystics for now." I'm not addressing the "ultimate nature of God". I'm simply pointing out that CSI demands a supernatural prime designer, and recommending that ID proponents admit that instead of pretending the theory is "not about God". "It might be Ã¢â‚¬Å“about GodÃ¢â‚¬Â for many, but for me itÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s not. ItÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s about the evidence and following it wherever it leads." I took 1) Dembski's CSI ideas, and 2) the existence of CSI in the world, as my starting points. I thought things through and concluded that the prime designer must be supernatural, if Dembski's ideas are correct. You didn't disagree with my reasoning. So how am I not "following it [the evidence] wherever it leads"? "If God did it or some other intelligence, so what?" It matters. See my reply to Benjii (comment #17 in this thread). Roger writes: "He [the textbook author] justifies that non-exclusion [of the possibility that God guided evolution] on the grounds that science canÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t preclude it. It is in the nature of science not to exclude it. Yet when IDerÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s keep the door open, you donÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t see them as sticking to the dictates of science, but being disingenuous." Hi Roger, I think you and Dave both misunderstand my reasons for emphasizing the "inherently religious" nature of ID. It's not that I think ID can't be science if it is religious; quite the opposite. I think ID NEEDS to become religious in order to be scientific. This may sound paradoxical, so let me explain. To be scientific, a theory must be falsifiable. ID, as I have argued in this thread, implies a supernatural prime designer, even if ID proponents don't want to admit that. If ID does not pin down at least some attributes of the supernatural designer, then it is not falsifiable (follow the link in comment #23 for an explanation of this). However, if ID admits that it implies a supernatural designer, and is willing to specify some of his attributes, then it becomes falsifiable, and therefore testable as science (it still may not be good science, but at least it's science).keiths_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
11:16 AM
11
11
16
AM
PDT}

No, you are free to do what you want. I, like Bill Dembski, would not consider bible apolegetics appropriate for this blog. That's why I said that if you have any further questions regarding the bible then you can check the website I gave you. I respect you as a skeptic, but your skepticism is not approriate for here. Why not go to an Christian forum and debate there. I took the time to answer you because I felt like stretching my apolegetics muscle. I love to defend my faith. Don't you?Benjii_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
10:59 AM
10
10
59
AM
PDT}

Its obvious that keiths is not going to use any scholarly, much less any reliable scholarly sources to justify his view. It's as I've already said, he's simply reads the Bible his own way. I don't really see that anyone ought give his objections the time of day.Dane Parker_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
10:33 AM
10
10
33
AM
PDT}

Benjii writes: "Can we stick to ID now and not bible apolegetics! If anybody else has further questions regarding the bible, then check out this website, Ã¢â‚¬Å“www.christian-thinktank.comÃ¢â‚¬Â." Benjii, You crack me up. You just posted 6 times in a period of two hours, trying to justify your view of the Old Testament. Now you suddenly want discussion to stop, before anyone can answer you. I guess it's okay for you to hold forth, but not the rest of us. To top it off, you slip in a plug for your favorite apologetics website while asking everyone else to leave apologetics alone. As Renard would say, you are priceless.keiths_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
10:14 AM
10
10
14
AM
PDT}

Can we stick to ID now and not bible apolegetics! If anybody else has further questions regarding the bible, then check out this website, "www.christian-thinktank.com".Benjii_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
09:44 AM
9
09
44
AM
PDT}

Slaves usually wouldn't leave by choice because they would be too poor to survive. They were probably paid and well fed before they can go out again.Benjii_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
09:40 AM
9
09
40
AM
PDT}

Right on Josh! Renard, Slaves would be in service for seven years as stipulated by the OT law. At the end of the term, in Deuteronomy 15: 12-18: "a man or woman, sells himself to you and serves you six years, in the seventh year you must let him go free. And when you release him, do not send him away empty handed. Supply him liberally from your flock, your threshing floor and your winepress. Give to him as the LORD your God has blessed you." This is nothing like New World African slavery. At the end of the term the slave would be provided with a lot of resources. Moreover, a family member or any distant relative could buy out the slave from bondage. Moreover, slavery in Israel was so good that at times a slave could stay a slave for the rest of his life if he chose too (Deut 15:16-17. In the end, keep in mind the Israelites were enslaved brutally in Egypt for 400 years, until God saved them. They know how badly they were treated. An d they knew that God would punish them if they mistreated their man and maid servants. I'll end this with a quote from a commentator: "Although slaves were viewed as the property of heads of households, the latter were not free to brutalize or abuse even non-Israelite members of the household. On the contrary, explicit prohibitions of the oppression/exploitation of slaves appear repeatedly in the Mosaic legislation. In two most remarkable texts, Leviticus 19:34 and Deuteronomy 10:19, Yahweh charges all Israelites to love ('aheb) aliens (gerim) who reside in their midst, that is, the foreign members of their households, like they do themselves and to treat these outsiders with the same respect they show their ethnic countrymen. Like Exodus 22:20 (Eng. 21), in both texts Israel's memory of her own experience as slaves in Egypt should have provided motivation for compassionate treatment of her slaves. But Deuteronomy 10:18 adds that the Israelites were to look to Yahweh himself as the paradigm for treating the economically and socially vulnerable persons in their communities." [HI:MFBW:60]Benjii_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
09:36 AM
9
09
36
AM
PDT}

no, keiths...i replied to your argument and explained how you were inaccurate in your picture of "slavery" of the bible. the founding fathers of the US owned slaves...its time that we follow your logic thru. if the god of the OT is morally bankrupt as davescot says and you seem to agree- then the founders of this nation are also bankrupt. and this was REAL slavery that you speak of, not the OT type that in no way mirrors the US version or european version of slavery. if someone recognizes the reality of something and demands humane treatment- as the founders themselves did (heck they did even less than the OT, they dont say to treat outright slaves humanely!), then what now? we can only conclude from your logic and that of others here that the founders were somehow morally bankrupt. if it goes for god of the OT, it goes for them as well since they were even worse in not demanding humane treatment of slaves, and slavery was actually SLAVERY to the founders.Josh Bozeman_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
09:23 AM
9
09
23
AM
PDT}

Benji Voluntary impies choice. So if a slave didn't enjoy the profession, and fancied a change, could he choose to resign?Renard_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
09:09 AM
9
09
09
AM
PDT}

DaveScot Re your comment #48. Front loading has the same anthropomorphic connotation as blueprint. Take out the references to front loading and I don't disagree with the rest of your comment. No-one has come close to a convincing natural explanation for abiogenesis. That abiogenesis occurred is confirmed by our existence. Until someone does, we can all put our own belief into the gap.Renard_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
09:04 AM
9
09
04
AM
PDT}

Davescot Perhaps you misundestand me, or I misundestand "panspermia". I assume it is the hypothesis that microbial spores could have travelled interstellar distances in space debris such as meteorites. If you allow this proposition, when and where life originally got started is widened from within the last 4 billion years somewhere on Earth, to include longer ago and other places. It does not begin to answer the question of how it happened. My feeling is abiogenesis will remain a philosophical question, unless life (independent of terrestrial life)is dicovered elsewhere, or someone manages to reproduce abiogenesis experimentally. How likely either eventuality is seems hardly worth debating.Renard_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
08:55 AM
8
08
55
AM
PDT}

DaveScot Blueprint is the wrong word because it implies a "mapping" correlation between the genome and the resultant organism (that there are encoded measurements for shape and size etc.). The DNA codes for proteins, some proteins produced by the HOX genes act as regulators on other genes, sheets of cells grow and differentiate under their control, and the embryo develops accordingly. There is no blueprint. Shades of the old "homunculus" concept. Rather than the misleading word, blueprint, Try, as I have often seen the suggestion, "recipe".Renard_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
08:40 AM
8
08
40
AM
PDT}

Keiths says: "Many (perhaps most) other Christians donÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t even know about the strange things in the Bible, like the slavery verses and the serial genocide. They imagine the Old Testament God as a stern but always loving and just deity. I think of this God as the Ã¢â‚¬ËœSunday School GodÃ¢â‚¬â„¢" The God of the old testament is the same one as in the new testament. Most christians do know about the God of the old testament and his character. You're dead wrong about that! Moreover, that wasn't any form of arbitrary genocide. The destruction that came from God in the old testament came about because of sin. For example, the Genocide that you are talking about probably refers to the Canaanites and the Amalekites. Why did the lord command such destruction? Simply look at this passage; After the LORD your God has driven them out before you, do not say to yourself, "The LORD has brought me here to take possession of this land because of my righteousness." No, it is on account of the wickedness of these nations that the LORD is going to drive them out before you. (Deut 9.4) The wickedness are as follows: Child sacrifice (with at least some of it in fire) Incest Bestiality Homosexual practices Cultic prostitution--both male and female In short, I could go on and on about this issue, however, this website pertains to intelligent design, not Bible apologetics. At any rate, most skeptics complain that God does nothing about evil. However, when he takes decisive action, all of sudden they look to fault God for his destruction upon sin. What a contradiction!Benjii_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
08:06 AM
8
08
06
AM
PDT}

As previous posts have stated, slavery was voluntary. A scripture in Exodus forbids the kidnapping and the enslaving of a person (Exodus 21:16). It says anyone who kidnaps another and either sells him or still has him when he is caught must be put to death. So obviously slavery was voluntary. This commentator supports my view: "A person would either enter into slavery or be sold by a parent or relative. Persons sold their wives, grandchildren, brother (with his wife and child), sister, sister-in-law, daughter-in-law, nephews and nieceÃ¢â‚¬Â¦Many of the documents emphasize that the transaction is voluntary. This applies not only to self-sale but also to those who are the object of sale, although their consent must sometimes have been fictional, as in the case of a nursing infant." [HI:HANEL:1.665] So your assessment of slavery was inaccurate.Benjii_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
07:56 AM
7
07
56
AM
PDT}

First, the JPS Torah Commentary [JPStorah, in loc] "This law-the protection of slaves from maltreatment by their masters-is found nowhere else in the entire existing corpus of ancient Near Eastern legislation. It represents a qualitative transformation in social and human values and expresses itself once again in the provisions of verses 26-27. The underlying issue, as before, is the determination of intent on the part of the assailant at the time the act was committed.Benjii_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
07:50 AM
7
07
50
AM
PDT}

Keiths your assessment of slavery is wrong. You didn't read the website well. Look at this: " The law allowed disciplinary rod-beating for a servant (Ex 21.20f), apparently under the same conditions as that for free men: If men quarrel and one hits the other with a stone or with his fist and he does not die but is confined to bed, 19 the one who struck the blow will not be held responsible if the other gets up and walks around outside with his staff; however, he must pay the injured man for the loss of his time and see that he is completely healed. If a man beats his male or female slave with a rod and the slave dies as a direct result, he must be punished, 21 but he is not to be punished if the slave gets up after a day or two, since the slave is his property (ksph--"silver"; not the normal word(s) for property, btw). Ã‚Â§ Free men could likewise be punished by the legal system by rod-beating (Deut 25.1-3; Prov 10.13; 26.3), as could rebellious older sons (Prov 13.24; 22.15; 23.13). Beating by rod (shevet) is the same act/instrument ( flogging (2 Sam 7.14; Ps 89.32). This verse is in parallel to verses 18-19. If two people fight but no one dies, the aggressor is punished by having to 'retributively' pay (out of his own money--"silver", ksph) for the victim's lost economic time and medical expenses. If it is a person's slave and this occurs, there is no (additional) economic payment--the lost productivity and medical expenses of the wounded servant are (punitive economic) loss alone. There was no other punishment for the actual damage done to the free-person in 18-19, and the slave seems to be treated in the same fashion. Thus, the 'property' attribute doesn't seem to suggest any real difference in ethical treatment of injury against a servant. Let's structure out the parallel: Aspect Two "Free-brews" (smile) Master/Slave Victim: Freeman Slave Perp: Freeman Master Extent: "Confined to bed" "cannot get up" (i.e., Confined to bed) Bodily Harm: Wounded to point of needing a 'staff'; Wounded to the point of needing medical attention and 'healing' [Unspecified, but sounds similar to the other case] Instrument used: Stone or fist Disciplinary rod (like elders used on criminals; and parents used on sons) Motive: "Brawl" Discipline Punitive Compensation: Loss of time; Cost of medical attention (paid in 'money'--'silver') Loss of time; Cost of medical attention (borne 'internally' - 'silver') If victim dies" Perp Executed Perp Executed" Free men could be beaten for certain penalities. Check out this quote from a bible commentator: "Benjii_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
07:50 AM
7
07
50
AM
PDT}

keiths, first and foremost, it should be noted that the Bible does not commend slavery; rather, it recognizes the reality of slavery. In the ancient world where slavery flourished, the Mosaic Law thus stipulated stringent guidelines such as a year of Jubilee in which slaves were released (Lev. 25:40). Also, slavery within an Old Testament context was sanctioned due to economic realities rather than racial or sexual prejudices. Because bankruptcy laws did not exist, people would voluntarily sell themselves into slavery. A craftsman could, thus, use his skills in servitude to discharge a debt. Even a convicted thief could make restitution by serving as a slave (Exod. 23:3). These are crucial points that should not be glossed over. What we see in the character of Jehovah of the OT is actually a patient God who in a sense, "accomodates" a very rebelious and hard-hearted nomadic people, and who chooses not to violate the free-will he has endowed his people with. Regardless of the moral bankruptcy of their decisions/laws. It's important to note that the NT book of Hebrews discusses in great theological depth, the "curse" of the OT law with it's regulations and how Christ redeemed us from that curse. (Hebrews Ch. 9). In doing so, he revealed the true heart of the Father. A heart often misunderstood due to the accomodation of a rebellious people formerly living under a curse. I see no contradiction or moral crisis in the behavior of the OT God. I see a patient God essentially saying, "Ok, if this is how you want things to be, then here are your guidelines... but make no mistake, your wayward hearts are grievous."Bombadill_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
06:52 AM
6
06
52
AM
PDT}

KeithS I can't not agree with you about the old testament. If it's the same God in both the old and new testaments that's one bipolar messed up God. It looks to me like someone recognized that the old testament was really morally bankrupt and did the best they could to correct it without alienating all those who believed it. That's what Christ did. I don't think for a second Christ was the son of the God of the old testament and I don't believe for a second that Christ believed he was the son of that God either. I think what Christ believed is he had to do what he had to do in order to change the world for the better and get the morally bankrupt old testament worshippers thinking about love, kindness, charity, and forgiveness. Christ tried to reconcile the old testament with a God of love and did the best he could but for the critical reader it really looks like a contrived transition.DaveScot_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
04:38 AM
4
04
38
AM
PDT}

Red Reader re comment 42 Outstanding!DaveScot_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
04:29 AM
4
04
29
AM
PDT}

keiths says:
" Josh, guess what? It IS about God. Notice that ID proponents are very careful not to exclude the possibility that the designer is God. "
Did you read the excerpt from The Cosmic Perspective cited in the header? Because the author is very careful in two locations in that one page not to exclude the possibility that God was involved in evolution. He justifies that non-exclusion on the grounds that science can't preclude it. It is in the nature of science not to exclude it. Yet when IDer's keep the door open, you don't see them as sticking to the dictates of science, but being disingenuous. Special rules for Darwinian critics. I've yet to see an objective argument where a Darwinist explained the justification for such special rules.
"RobG is simply pointing out that a finite designer of this sort (a technologically advanced extraterrestrial, for example) is itself an instance of complex specified information, and thus according to ID theory must also have a designer. Logically, there could even be a chain of designers: lifeÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s designer, lifeÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s designerÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s designer, lifeÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s designerÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s designerÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s designer, etc. Eventually, no matter how long or short the chain is, it must end with a Ã¢â‚¬Å“prime designerÃ¢â‚¬Â who is the ultimate source of the complex specified information that is being passed down the chain. This prime designer is either natural (i.e. part of the universe) or supernatural. If it is natural, then its complex specified information arose out of undirected natural processes, which ID says is impossible. This means that according to ID theory, the prime designer must be supernatural. This is why RobG claims that ID is inherently religious, even though the immediate designer of life could conceivably be a finite being of the sort described by Dembski."
And his logic is flawed. On can ask "ultimate" questions about the implications of scientific assertions without making such assertions "inherently religious". If we find scientific evidence for panspermia, it doesn't trouble "science" that it doens't answer the "ultimate" question about theism vs materialism.Roger_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
04:27 AM
4
04
27
AM
PDT}

Renard "Where we really part company is where you invoke front-loading. It seems merely to avoid asking real questions and moves things back to who did the loading." The truth isn't always what you want it to be. Ontogenesis is front-loaded. Phylogenesis appears to be front-loaded as well. The only difference is the timescale. Just because we don't know where the first front-loaded egg came from doesn't make it okay to assume it just appeared as if by magic from the random motion of atoms. That doesn't make any sense. Eggs don't just pop out of nowhere. That goes completely against every single bit of experience we have with eggs. Life today can presumably be traced back in an unbroken cell line to a single cell (vernacular egg) some 4 billion years ago. The trail goes cold there. To me, chance worshippers are no better than religious mystics who both pretty much at some point throw up their hands and say "and then a miracle happens" for it surely would be a miracle if a working cell as we know them came about from random chemical bonding.DaveScot_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
04:19 AM
4
04
19
AM
PDT}

Renard "Blueprint is the wrong word." Blueprint is precisely the right word but I'm willing to entertain your argument, should you choose to make one, as to why it is the wrong word. Feel free to support your position.DaveScot_{December 18, 2005
December
12
Dec
18
18
2005
04:09 AM
4
04
09
AM
PDT}

Prev 1 … 3 4 5 6 7 Next

You must be logged in to post a comment.

Leave a Reply