Does ID Rest on Metaphysical Claims About Dualism?

_{Barry Arrington

December 15, 2015

Intelligent Design}

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RDFish seems to think so. I summarize his argument as follows:

The ID explanatory filter works as follows:

(a) The explanatory filter first asks whether the phenomenon is contingent. If it is not, then it is probably best explained as the result of a natural regularity.

(b) If the phenomenon is contingent, the filter asks whether it is complex and specified. If it is neither complex nor specified, then chance is the most viable explanation. While there may be false negatives, there can be no reliable design inference.

Therefore, under the explanatory filter design is inferred only after law and chance have been eliminated.

If physicalist monism is true, everything must be reducible to the operation of law and chance.

Therefore, if physicalist monism is true, the residual after the elimination of law and chance is always an empty set.

It follows that the ID explanatory filter sneaks in a base assumption of dualism.

Dualism is a metaphysical proposition that cannot be tested empirically. It follows that ID is based on metaphysical premises that cannot be tested empirically. And because one of its key assumptions cannot be tested empirically, ID cannot be considered a valid scientific hypothesis.

RDFish’s claim is wrong, and I will refute it with a simple thought experiment.

Let us assume for the sake of argument that physicalist monism is true.

Let us suppose that all life on earth dies out.

A million years from now an alien is exploring this barren planet and he finds Mount Rushmore and decides to apply the explanatory filter to it.

The alien concludes that the carving is highly contingent. It cannot be attributed to any law-like natural regularity.

The alien concludes the carving is specified. It is an image of four members of the former inhabitants of this barren planet.

The alien concludes that the carving is highly complex/improbable, i.e., one would not expect the images to be carved by chance processes (e.g., erosion caused by wind and rain).

Therefore, the alien concludes, correctly, that the best explanation for the carving is an intelligent agent carved it.

The alien’s design inference would be correct even if physicalist monism is true, because the plain fact of the matter is that Mount Rushmore was caused by an intelligent agent, i.e., an agent with the capacity to arrange matter for a purpose.

Not so fast, RDFish will probably argue. If physicalist monism is true, then the intelligent agents who carved Mount Rushmore where themselves the result of law/chance and acting according to law/chance. Therefore, the conclusion that Mount Rushmore was not ultimately the result of law/chance would be false.

But RDFish would be wrong. Design exists as a category of causation. To suggest otherwise is absurd and self-defeating. Not only does design exist, designers leave objective markers of design. Therefore, if RDFish is going to stick to his guns and say that design cannot be detected, he is stuck with this syllogism:

If monist physicalism is true, it is impossible objectively to infer design.
But it is possible objectively to infer design.
Therefore, monist physicalism is false.

How can physicalist monism be reconciled with the obvious existence of design as a category of causation? The following reasoning would apply:

Design, meaning the capacity to arrange matter for a purpose, exists as a category of causation.
The capacity to arrange matter for a purpose can be reduced to any force that is able to arrange matter in the present such that it will have an effect in the future.
There are at least two candidates for causal forces that have the capacity to arrange matter for a purpose. (a) intelligent agents who have immaterial mental capacity; (b) an impersonal non-conscious yet-to-be-discovered natural telic force.
The monist rejects the existence of intelligent agents with immaterial mental capacities, because the existence of such agents obviously entails dualism.
Instead, the monist can resort to the natural telic force.
If such a natural telic force exists, the existence of design as a category of causation is no obstacle to accepting the truth of monist physicalism.

This get us to:

If monist physicalism is true and a natural telic force exists, it is nevertheless possible objectively to infer design.
Therefore, design may be inferred under monist physicalism using the explanatory filter.
Therefore, ID does not depend on dualist metaphysical assumptions.

In summary, ID does not depend on dualism. As Dembski has observed, ID is compatible with a natural telic force.

The problem the monist has, of course, is that in order to account for the obvious existence of design, he can no longer say everything in the universe is reducible to law/chance. He has to say everything in the universe is reducible to law/chance/not-yet-discovered natural telic force. ID is OK with allowing such a natural telic force as a candidate for the source of design (and therefore does not depend on dualism). Obviously, however, based on observations of known intelligent agents, ID is also perfectly comfortable with dualism.

Comments

RDFish:
This is not sarcasm, I mean this perfectly literally. In my view, the origin of the genetic code is mysterious, and we have no explanation.
RDFish claims he doesn't know what it means to specify something. But then he brings up the genetic code. All on his own. Why bring up the genetic code, Mr. Fish? What does it have to do with specifying something? I think Mr. Fish knows more than he claims to know, or should I say, knows what he claims to not know.Mung_{December 17, 2015
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Mung, "Given that humans are made of matter, they share all sorts of traits with matter. Therefore matter is conscious." Great comment. Spot on.EugeneS_{December 17, 2015
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What we need is a long list of shared characteristics among all humans with "therefore consciousness" at the end. Then we could list all the shared characters humans have with other primates and also end with a "therefore consciousness" at the end. On down the line. Given that humans are made of matter, they share all sorts of traits with matter. Therefore matter is conscious. FishNonsense.Mung_{December 17, 2015
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FYI- The word "Design" in "Intelligent Design" denotes purpose, planning or intention. And not even Wm Dembski can get around that fact- that is assuming what RDFish said about Dembski is true (there has never been a reference to Dembski that supports RDFish's claims)Virgil Cain_{December 17, 2015
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RDFish:
I think you are afraid to debate the issues because you think you’ll lose.
You are afraid to debate me because you have already lost your first attempt.
Imagine we didn’t understand the Northern Lights, and I said “intelligence” was responsible for it.
Then you would have to actually make your case and when you couldn't you would be ignored. It is that simple.
Imagine an alien who had no brain, no body, no sense organs like eyes or ears, and no conscious awareness, no ability to learn new skills, and no ability to produce sentences in a general purpose language, but it could produce CSI including digital codes.
Imagine? LoL! Imagination is neither science nor a refutation.
If you refuse to answer that question,
What a dolt! If you refuse to answer my dumbass and irrelevant question you lose! RDFish, so stupid it brings down the IQ of the entire human race. Cheers, Virgil CainVirgil Cain_{December 17, 2015
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Cool so know RDFISH can know.... whate er happened to we can't know? Vertical interesting when something corrolates with RDfish's intentional state it is knowable when it conflicts it's undetermined. I call that intellectual dishonesty.Andre_{December 17, 2015
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D: Cf https://www.google.com/search?q=+specification+of+organisms+can+be+crashed+out+in+any+number+of+ways&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8 KFkairosfocus_{December 17, 2015
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kairosfocus @123 RE: my post @112 Thank you for the clarification. However, still I'm curious to know if the word 'crashed' that was quoted by Virgil Cain @102 was copied/pasted from another source or typed in manually. In the latter case the misspelling would make more sense, because it's easy to mistype any word. But in the former case, it would be interesting to know what source had that misspelled term already in. BTW, this is an exercise of simple investigative questioning, which is one of the subjects I'm studying these days, as part of a project I'm working on. Thank you.Dionisio_{December 17, 2015
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RDF, Obviously, "matter/energy" should read as "mass/energy" in my comment above. Cheers.EugeneS_{December 17, 2015
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F/N: I find intelligently directed configuration reasonable as a definition of design, and this implies purpose. Obviously, intelligence is minimally capable of purposeful configuration, and may be detected from credibly purposeful specificity of configuration that achieves functionality utterly unlikely by blind chance and necessity on the gamut of resources in our solar system or the observed cosmos. This is inductively established on familiarity with effects of chance, mechanical necessity and intelligence acting by design. Where complex and specific functionality, including code that programs or communicates contextually relevant meaning based on symbol strings, would be relevant cases. 500 - 1,000 bits of FSCO/I is adequate for such a threshold; config spaces being 3.27 * 10^150 - 1.97*10^301. Where, FSCO/I normally will come in deeply isolated islands of function in large config spaces as requisites of the right parts correctly arranged and coupled sharply constrains effective configs relative to the space of all potential configs. And, at the threshold, a search using up all available resources would be maximally small relative to the space, effectively not a search. And of course as searches are subsets of the config space, a secondary search for a golden search is in a space that is the power set of the first space.This may be empirically tested by seeking to show such entities arising by blind chance and/or mechanical necessity. The rhetoric of obfuscation and/or selectively hyperskeptical denial is in such a context tantamount to a backhanded acknowledgement of the strength of the case. In other words, what you have to do to deny or dismiss or becloud the point becomes a sign in itself. KFkairosfocus_{December 17, 2015
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D, the clip is from Dembski's NFL and it is cashed. KFkairosfocus_{December 17, 2015
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RDF, Obviously, I am speaking for myself. As regards your question to UB, I would say that what is minimally required of intelligence is being telic or goal-oriented. That includes the capacities of: planning, forethought and acting in the physical world in order to produce the planned result. Now, what is important. Because we want to start off with our physical reality being given with the 'default' causations of necessity and chance in it, in order to test for (extra) intelligence we need to establish some characteristics of the product of this intelligence that can be detectable in the physical world. These should be easily distinguishable from the products of the default causation. Remarkably, such characteristics can be established. It is functional complexity. I think you are wrong in saying that all we have is human intelligence to base our inferences upon. That is wrong because we also have animal intelligence. Whether or not they are related, is a different question. I don't think they are, BTW. What's important now, is that they appear to be substantially different with respect to consciousness. But even that is not all we have. We also have AI, which is human intelligence modulo consciousness. So I think that we can safely remove consciousness from this debate and use operational definitions that do not involve it but focus on the physical manifestations/effects of intelligence. Now about your examples of the Northern Lights etc. These effects are amenable to explanations involving only the default causation categories. Semiosis does not appear to, as it is non-physicalistic but symbolic, independent of gradients of matter/energy. If you empirically demonstrate that the presence of material symbols can be explained in a purely physicalistic fashion (i.e. ultimately as an effect caused by gradients of matter/energy), the semiosis argument will be debunked.EugeneS_{December 17, 2015
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Barry, "Design exists as a category of causation." That's it. That is empirical basis enough. Designers' actions are a factor independent of regularities of law or chance. In fact, design itself is a cause of regularities, for example, a deliberately unfair coin; design can also utilize existing regularities and chance. The only thing is I would use the term 'pragmatic utility' because it can be measured. Purpose cannot be measured and is therefore vague as a term. Whether or not design can be reduced to law and chance is a metaphysical issue. What is enough for empirical science, is it can be observed acting independently.EugeneS_{December 17, 2015
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Hi Upright BiPed, I'll make you a deal, UB. I think you are afraid to debate the issues because you think you'll lose. Please prove me wrong: I'll respond to you once again, to the best of my ability, but then you need to respond to my question. It's just ridiculous that I keep trying to discuss this with you and you just keep refusing to respond to anything I say. Here goes:
You make your statement (#2 above) knowing full well that there is an operational definition that you cannot contest. Your statement is false.
I believe the operational definition you refer to (it would have been nice to say what that was, so I don't have to go searching through these long threads to find it) was something about "having dimensional semiotic memory”. In other words, you identify this particular aspect of protein synthesis, and then as an operational definition of "intelligence" you simply say it must be able to produce that particular type of mechanism. Let me explain the problem with that. Imagine we didn't understand the Northern Lights, and I said "intelligence" was responsible for it. You asked what I meant by "intelligence" in that context, and I said I was using the operational definition "atmospheric luminosity generation capacity". Or, imagine we didn't know why Saturn had rings, and I said "intelligence" was responsible for it. You asked me what I meant by "intelligence" in that context, and I said I was using the operational definition "spatially-arrayed small-particulate orbital dispersal ability". See the problem? You're just picking a term that says it can create what you see in the cell, but it doesn't tell you anything about what caused that system to exist. If you want to use the word "intelligence", you need to show how you are supporting an inference to the sort of mental abilities normally associated with the word "intelligence", such as learning, language use, and consciousness. But you refuse to even try to do this, and that is why I say your work is superfluous (because we all already believe in IC structures in the cell) and your conclusions are meaningless (because while you use the word "intelligence" or "design", you don't say what exactly you are referring to, and your operational definition does not relate to the criteria normally associated with intelligence. OK, that is my answer to you. Now here is your question: Imagine an alien who had no brain, no body, no sense organs like eyes or ears, and no conscious awareness, no ability to learn new skills, and no ability to produce sentences in a general purpose language, but it could produce CSI including digital codes. Would you say this alien was "intelligent"? If you refuse to answer that question, it will be clear to me (and everyone else) that you really are afraid to engage in this debate, and instead you're just another ID rodeo clown hiding in a barrel, popping your head up with one-liners but unable to actually debate the issues. Cheers, RDFish/AIGuyRDFish_{December 17, 2015
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You make your statement (#2 above) knowing full well that there is an operational definition that you cannot contest. Your statement is false.Upright BiPed_{December 17, 2015
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cha-chingUpright BiPed_{December 17, 2015
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Let me guess - nowhere in your post will you contest the operational definition I gave you. You will claim victory in its place?Upright BiPed_{December 17, 2015
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Hi Upright BiPed, StephenB here says:
According to my philosophy, an alien who has no brain, body, sense organs, or conscious awareness cannot produce CSI
Would you agree with that? Of course you won't answer, but it is hilarious for him to say that after our discussion on SETI. Nagel is an atheist who argues that there is no evidence that a conscious being was responsible for the origin of life. Barry A here says:
I am saying that I agree with Dembski who (contra your assertion) agrees with Nagel. I admit that Dembski’s earlier reviews of Mind and Cosmos were more skeptical. But he had a change of heart.
So it looks like both Barry and Dembski admit that ID can't conclude a conscious designer, or any particular mental characteristics normally associated with "intelligence". Neither Barry nor anyone else can respond to my argument that undercuts the explanatory filter, since the dichotomy between "law/chance" and "intelligence" is a metaphysical assumption. This undermines Barry's and StephenB's definition of "intelligence" as "able to arrange matter for a purpose", since (according to Barry) the explanatory filter is what is supposed to enable the objective detection of purpose. So there you go. As these guys are getting tied into knots, I can see you aren't anxious to join the fray, which is why you won't actually engage these issues. Perhaps your strategy is the best available to you. :-) Anyway, you will never understand what I am saying and why it renders your work superfluous and your conclusions either meaningless or empirically untestable (or both). You won't say what you think the valid conclusions of your argument are, so it doesn't matter. Cheers, RDFish/AIGuyRDFish_{December 16, 2015
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2) There is no definition of “intelligence” that can be used to objectively identify “intelligence” in the context of ID.
This is flatly dishonest. I gave you an operational definition of intelligence. You could not contest it.Upright BiPed_{December 16, 2015
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Upright BiPed @109 Good point. Thank you. However, your interlocutor may not understand it, unless he's willing to. Not much you can do about that. The best explanation of anything may be misunderstood if the intended audience doesn't have the desire to understand it. In many cases, understanding may require the desire to understand. Although the desire alone may not be a sufficient condition in some cases. Other conditions might be required.Dionisio_{December 16, 2015
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Virgil Cain @102
And then there is No Free lunch pages 148-49
[...] The specification of organisms can be crashed out in any number of ways. Arno Wouters cashes it out globally in terms of the viability of whole organisms. Michael Behe cashes it out in terms of minimal function of biochemical systems. Darwinist Richard Dawkins cashes out biological specification in terms of the reproduction of genes. [...]

Is it 'crash' or 'cash'? Are both terms fine within that given context? Where did you copy the quoted text from? Did you type it in yourself? Did you copy/paste it from another source? Just curious. Thanks.Dionisio_{December 16, 2015
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RDFish:
And now apparently Barry Arrington agrees with me as well!
Fish gets his ass kicked up between his shoulders and acts like it was a great victory. Amusing. That, dear readers, is a variation on the Black Knight Taunt. Fish, never forget that at the end of this debate you capitulated and admitted my OP was correct. Not the other way around.Barry Arrington_{December 16, 2015
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@109 "Really? Your arrogance is seriously unjustified." UB, Don't you find it funny how atheists like Mr Fish arrogantly go on about science to try and argue against design when science itself has underlying presuppositions that are consistent with a worldview of design and not consistent with one of chance and when they go on about Law(order that can be discovered) they are chirping for something that is compatible with a design origin but not for a chance origin of the universe and compatible with the idea that humans were created with the ability to discover how the universe operates rather than the idea that human reasoning is an outcome of dumb luck. Don't you find it funny how they try and wrap themselves up in science and claim it for themselves when nihilism is more compatible with their position? UB, these atheists are funny with their misplaced arrogance.Jack Jones_{December 16, 2015
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For leucine to be the first in this sequence, it must be specified among the alternatives.
The root of our disagreement centers on the meaning and implications of the word “specified” in this sentence. Why won’t you tell me what you mean by “specified” in this sentence?
RD, your strategy is old, tired, and frankly stupid. You only want me to give you new words to argue with, grist for the mill, because you cannot deal with the words and context already given. You stand there pretending to be baffled about a concept that is known and understood across the entirety of science. We've passed out Nobel Prizes to those who figured it out. It's the basis of modern biology. I ask you a simple question and the first thing you do is hide behind a little bitty word. You demonstrate your fear in the most obvious way. Google Search “DNA specifies” 1,700,000 hits Google Scholar Title Search “DNA specifies” 126,000 hits
DNA Specifies Proteins – Nature Yeast mitochondrial DNA specifies tRNA… -- NBCI sequence of DNA nucleotides that specify -- Science A gene is a segment of DNA that specifies… – Biology Direct three-base codons that specify the sequence… -- phy-astr.gsu.edu specifies the amino acids -- biology.iupui.edu DNA specifies the nucleic acid sequence -- Evolution Dissected, Nelson - Page 123 each successive “code word” in the DNA specifies – Genetics, Hartl-Ruvolo - Page 22 information encoded in DNA specifies – Biology, Solomon-Martin nucleotides in our DNA specifies the order – Anatomy and Physiology, Clark DNA specifies the synthesis of proteins – lavc.edu DNA specifies the protein sequence – wisc.edu etc., etc., etc.
What could they all possibly mean? Who could possible know what “specify” means? - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - "what do you mean by specify?" Really? Your arrogance is seriously unjustified.Upright BiPed_{December 16, 2015
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"Law+chance may well prove to explain living systems" Law has no grounding on a worldview where the universe came about unintentionally. There is no reason to believe that any order can be discovered if the universe came about unintentionally and no reason to believe that reality can be correctly interpreted if the reasoning faculties came about by chance. "and there is no way to scientifically support" Incorrect The presuppositions of science are born of and consistent with a theistic worldview, they are not consistent with a chance position. Every time you go on about law and science and use words like scientifically then you are contradicting your position of the universe and your mind coming about unintentionally. By going on about science then you are embracing presuppositions that are consistent with a design origin for the universe and human reasoning and rejecting a chance origin of both. "the idea that conscious, rational agency was the cause" Is supported by the fact that life does not originate spontaneously in nature. The law of Biogenesis shows that life cannot have originated naturally. The ability to do science itself is consistent with a design worldview. The more you endorse science then the more you endorse presuppositions that are consistent with design and inconsistent with dumb chance for the origin of the universe and the human mind. Every time you go on about law then you are contradicting your faith that the universe came about unintentionally. You are trying to argue against design by accepting presuppositions that are consistent with design when you endorse science. Your feet are planted firmly in the air. You chirp for law even though it is inconsistent with a chance origin of the universe and then when it comes to the law of biogenesis then you ignore law. You fail on many counts Mr Fish.Jack Jones_{December 16, 2015
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Hi Andre,
I have to say, pages and pages of responses from RDFISH on his denial of what intelligent, intelligence and intelligent agents mean and yet his pages and pages of responses are still not a give away to him.
Yes, I have been making the exact same arguments on these pages for years. Apparently William Dembski has come around to agree with me (and with Nagel and James Shapiro and others who believe the same thing): Law+chance may well prove to explain living systems, and there is no way to scientifically support the idea that conscious, rational agency was the cause. And now apparently Barry Arrington agrees with me as well! It's quite satisfying, actually. Perhaps the rest of the folks here will understand these arguments someday. Cheers, RDFish/AIGuyRDFish_{December 16, 2015
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I have to say, pages and pages of responses from RDFISH on his denial of what intelligent, intelligence and intelligent agents mean and yet his pages and pages of responses are still not a give away to him. Then the constant harping that RDFISH just can't know.... Well RDfish how do you know that you can't know?Andre_{December 16, 2015
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Hi Barry Arrington,
I am saying that I agree with Dembski who (contra your assertion) agrees with Nagel. I admit that Dembski’s earlier reviews of Mind and Cosmos were more skeptical. But he had a change of heart. In his latest work on the matter (Being as Communion) he writes this of Nagel: Specifically, Nagel proposes to understand teleology in terms of natural teleological laws. These laws would be radically different from the laws of physics and chemistry that currently are paradigmatic of the laws of nature. And yet, as we shall see, such teleological laws fit quite naturally within an information-theoretic framework . . . I quote his proposal, given in Mind and Cosmos, here in full because it connects point for point with the account of information given in this book. Indeed, Nagel’s teleological laws are none other than the directed searches (or alternative searches) that are the basis of Conservation of Information . . . of this book.
I'd not read this of Dembski - I'd only read Dembski's previous comments and Nagels' responses - and I agree with you that here Dembski has backed off from his mentalistic connotations a great deal and is converging with Nagel's (and my own) views! These views of Dembski as expressed in your citation eliminate the complaints I've voiced regarding Dembski's other books, about Meyer's arguments and those of you and people on this forum. I have long argued for exactly the same point: Something that we do not currently understand is able to produce the sort of CSI we observe in biology, and whatever it is may be as radically different from today's understanding of physics and chemistry as modern physics is radically different from Newtonian physics!
RDFish: If so, then your theory of “Intelligent Design” is misnamed and misrepresented in books by Dembski SB: Nope. See above excerpt from Being as Communion.
As you just finished saying, this represents a change of heart on Dembski's part. The aspects of ID I argue against on this forum is not this new view, but rather the view represented by the explanatory filter, stating that a "rational conscious mind" was responsible for biological systems, and so on.
The bottom line, RDFish, is that Dembski has very much aligned himself with Nagel.
Honestly, I am very happy to see that! I have not gotten around to reading Being as Communion yet, but now I am more enthused about it. I'll be interested to see if he retracts his previous arguments that he contended were scientific but relied on dualism and overstated connotations about mental attributes.
Dembski’s conception of ID is perfectly consistent with Nagel’s natural teleological laws.
And that is consistent with my views as well, as I've said all along. We don't know what these "laws" may be, but Dembski is no longer saying that law/chance cannot account for CSI. It's just that the laws are likely to be very different from the ones we understand today.
Your assertion that Dembski disagrees with Nagel is simply wrong.
Again, as you said, what Dembski has said previously about Nagel's ideas was very critical.
And if that was all that was keeping you from agreeing with Dembski, then welcome to the ID movement Mr. Fish.
The Intelligent Design Movement is radically different from this new view of natural teleology. ID as presented by most authors - and defended by most people on this forum - is susceptible to the two arguments I presented here, as well as other arguments I've made elsewhere on this forum. Cheers, RDFish/AIGuyRDFish_{December 16, 2015
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RDFish: Is that what you are saying?
I am saying that I agree with Dembski who (contra your assertion) agrees with Nagel. I admit that Dembski’s earlier reviews of Mind and Cosmos were more skeptical. But he had a change of heart. In his latest work on the matter (Being as Communion) he writes this of Nagel:
Specifically, Nagel proposes to understand teleology in terms of natural teleological laws. These laws would be radically different from the laws of physics and chemistry that currently are paradigmatic of the laws of nature. And yet, as we shall see, such teleological laws fit quite naturally within an information-theoretic framework . . . I quote his proposal, given in Mind and Cosmos, here in full because it connects point for point with the account of information given in this book. Indeed, Nagel’s teleological laws are none other than the directed searches (or alternative searches) that are the basis of Conservation of Information . . . of this book.

RDFish: If so, then your theory of “Intelligent Design” is misnamed and misrepresented in books by Dembski
Nope. See above excerpt from Being as Communion. The bottom line, RDFish, is that Dembski has very much aligned himself with Nagel. Dembski’s conception of ID is perfectly consistent with Nagel’s natural teleological laws. Your assertion that Dembski disagrees with Nagel is simply wrong. And if that was all that was keeping you from agreeing with Dembski, then welcome to the ID movement Mr. Fish.Barry Arrington_{December 16, 2015
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RDFish: “Foresight”, however, doesn’t really make sense unless you assume conscious foresight. Computer chess games have goals. Don't computer chess games have foresight? I doubt they are conscious. The way I'm using it refers to running contingent assessments about the future based on what is currently known and acting on the best assessments toward a goal. How is that vacuous?mike1962_{December 16, 2015
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