Rob Sheldon on the current trend to non-theist intelligent design (ID) theory

_{Denyse O'Leary

October 25, 2021

Big Bang, Extraterrestrial life, Intelligent Design}

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We’re talking about Harvard astronomer Avi Loeb, claiming at Scientific American that maybe advanced aliens engineered the Big Bang. He can’t say God did it. But he can say that They did it.

Hmmm.

When some people wrote privately to protest that this ET>Big Bang stuff is all just one space bunny too far down the cosmic path, I (O’Leary for News) pointed out in response that Neil deGrasse Tyson (here), Martin Rees (here), and Elon Musk (here) have also suggested that very thing.

Tyson and Musk have great name recko. And yet non-theistic ID is not endangering their careers?

Well, now theoretical physicist Rob Sheldon writes to offer some thoughts on the new-found popularity:

Avi Loeb is a product of post-1947 Israel, where ideology was always important. Enlightenment principles were not going to motivate you to farm the Negev. So instead of the monoculture of scientism, Avi learned how to frame his argument in the ideology du jour to maximum effect. His recent foray into alien ID is a calculated move, and related to his tenure at Harvard. You might say it is a flanking move on the Woke mob.

The Long Ascent: Genesis 1–11 in Science & Myth, Volume 1 by [Robert Sheldon, David Mackie]

Neil de Grasse Tyson is far less creative than Avi. He was a “new atheist” when that was in vogue, he’s switched to “alien ID” when that came up. I think he has a desire for the limelight, and instinctively moves where the lights are brightest.

Martin Rees could have been a solid astrophysicist with high profile graduate students. But his promotion to president of the Royal Society, Royal Astronomer and then to the House of Lords, means that his astrophysics must take secondary precedence to his politics. About the time that all these political posts fell to him, he started publishing pop-sci books:

Cosmic Coincidences: Dark Matter, Mankind, and Anthropic Cosmology (co-author John Gribbin), 1989, Bantam; ISBN 0-553-34740-3
New Perspectives in Astrophysical Cosmology, 1995; ISBN 0-521-64544-1
Gravity’s Fatal Attraction: Black Holes in the Universe, 1995; ISBN 0-7167-6029-0, 2nd edition 2009, ISBN 0-521-71793-0
Before the Beginning – Our Universe and Others, 1997; ISBN 0-7382-0033-6
Just Six Numbers: The Deep Forces That Shape the Universe, 1999; ISBN 0-297-84297-8
Our Cosmic Habitat, 2001; ISBN 0-691-11477-3
Our Final Hour: A Scientist’s Warning: How Terror, Error, and Environmental Disaster Threaten Humankind’s Future In This Century—On Earth and Beyond (UK title: Our Final Century: Will the Human Race Survive the Twenty-first Century?), 2003; ISBN 0-465-06862-6

As you can see, they range from the ID-friendly to the Politically-Correct. In all cases, they attempt to make the argument that science is relevant to politics and even can act as a savior for politics. Then in my view the alien-ID schtick is cynically a rhetorical method of getting a platform with the public to exploit for political causes.

Elon Musk has made a career out of selling his genius. For one example, his Tesla motor company has not yet broken even, and would not exist but for government subsidies. And the government subsidizes it because he is a great salesman, and he works his engineers to the bone, discards them, and recruits more engineers. As a salesman, it is important to be on the cutting edge of every movement. Like BitCoin. Not to stay there, but to make a bundle and move on. For Elon to support alien ID, means it is cutting edge right now, and of course, his support means it will soon be passe. Not because it doesn’t work, but because it’s been milked and there are other cows in the pasture.

All these men saw an opportunity. And the opportunity is the Fall of Modernism. It is the same opportunity we IDers have seen for 20 years now.

(All these views are mine, and are not to be construed as support for any individual. I have not received funding from any of these people.)

Readers?

Rob Sheldon is the author of Genesis: The Long Ascent and The Long Ascent, Volume II .

You may also wish to read: At Mind Matters News: Harvard astronomer: Advanced aliens engineered the Big Bang. Avi Loeb writes in Scientific American that when we humans are sufficiently advanced, we will create other universes as well.

Comments

ET: Ken Miller’s testimony on the alleged evolution of blood clotting is a lie. It is all documented. Barbara Forrest also lied. Just about every evo lied on the stand. It is all documented. Funny that no one appealed the decision then. A class of people is not a who. And the way they “know” humans didit is just cuz humans were around. Not quote scientific. Well, you're not an archaeologist are you? There isn’t nay scientific theory of evolution. There isn’t any research that demonstrates that prokaryotes can evolve into eukaryotes. There isn’t any research that demonstrates that single-celled eukaryotes can evolve into metazoans. You are just a willfully ignorant and very gullible fool. You still don’t even understand DNA. No one uses evolution by means of blind and mindless processes for anything. It is useless. You said that already, many times. Liar. No one has ever presented any peer reviewed paper that refutes any of ID’s claims. You are pathetic. Other opinions are available. In 0ver 150 years Darwin’s ideas are still nonsense. No one has shown that natural selection is the designer mimic Darwin envisioned. No one has shown there is a naturalistic mechanism capable of producing the diversity of life. Heck, thanks to evolutionary biology scientists don’t even know what determines biological form! You've said that many times before. More lies! It’s as if you are too stupid to actually post something that supports your ignorance. The question is: can I post something you won't just decry as lies and false? That's the real question: is it possible to falsify your view? The only articles in peer review that support evolution by means of blind and mindless processes are articles on genetic diseases and deformities. Your determination of what is and what is not scientific is just your opinion. So, in your opinion, the millions of papers and journal articles and books and talks and presentations produced that support unguided evolution you have just decided are wrong. But, that doesn't mean you are correct. You will never find any papers on any bacterial flagellum evolving by means of blind and mindless processes. Even if someone came up with a plausible, sensible, step-by-step way it could have happened you'd just say: no one was there to observe it so you don't know if that's how it happened. You don't believe in historical science unless it agrees with your views.JVL_{October 27, 2021
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JVL:
Sure, but this is the whole point of supporting peer review. Let others in your field take a shot at your personal idea or hypothesis. See if it stands up to that kind of scrutiny.
The only articles in peer review that support evolution by means of blind and mindless processes are articles on genetic diseases and deformities. You will never find any papers on any bacterial flagellum evolving by means of blind and mindless processes.ET_{October 27, 2021
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JVL:
Please point to a specific lie in the testimony at the trial.
Ken Miller's testimony on the alleged evolution of blood clotting is a lie. It is all documented. Barbara Forrest also lied. Just about every evo lied on the stand. It is all documented.
But not in archaeology. Who is just a class of beings or people that lived around a certain time.
A class of people is not a who. And the way they "know" humans didit is just cuz humans were around. Not quote scientific.
I’m not.
Liar. There isn’t nay scientific theory of evolution. There isn’t any research that demonstrates that prokaryotes can evolve into eukaryotes. There isn’t any research that demonstrates that single-celled eukaryotes can evolve into metazoans. You are just a willfully ignorant and very gullible fool. You still don’t even understand DNA. No one uses evolution by means of blind and mindless processes for anything. It is useless.
Nice rant
Only an ignorant coward would call those facts a rant. And here you are.
When I’ve done that in the past you just say it’s all lies and not true.
Liar. No one has ever presented any peer reviewed paper that refutes any of ID's claims. You are pathetic.
ID proponents have come up with shockingly little over the last 20 years.
That is your uneducated opinion. But what has blind watchmaker evolution ever done? Nothing. In 0ver 150 years Darwin’s ideas are still nonsense. No one has shown that natural selection is the designer mimic Darwin envisioned. No one has shown there is a naturalistic mechanism capable of producing the diversity of life. Heck, thanks to evolutionary biology scientists don’t even know what determines biological form!
>Contrary to loads of published research.
More lies! It's as if you are too stupid to actually post something that supports your ignorance. Obviously you are just a deluded and gullible fool. You cannot post any blind watchmaker research programs. You can't point to any research being guided by blind watchmaker evolution. All you can do is lie and bluff.ET_{October 27, 2021
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JVL
JVL: I’m just trying to get my mind around how the influencing works. It would all take energy and I can’t see where that energy would come from, how it would get focused, etc.
And yet we do know that intelligent design exists. There are physical things that resulted from our ideas; your posting is one example, an airplane another. We don’t know how ideas steer arms and fingers, but we do know that there is a pathway from design (idea) to physical representation.
JVL: I mean . . . if there is energy or mass just appearing from out of nowhere I would think we would be able to detect that.
We should consider the possibility that the physical laws are not-closed — as we now know wave functions can collapse in multiple ways and still be consistent with the laws. This opening, this window, at quantum level, may very well be the level at which intelligence steers things; without the possibility of physical detection.Origenes_{October 27, 2021
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JVL @33, > So . . . was Einstein right? Does energy = mass x speed of light squared? Sure, why not? This follows rather trivially from the metric of our space-time being ds2 = dr2 - dt2. See R.C. Henry "The Physics of our Universe" (https://henry.pha.jhu.edu/MULTIF2017_003.pdf) Sections 9-10.Eugene_{October 26, 2021
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JVL, "As far as I can see, ID is just not even close to developing as a discipline." Not if judged by how much money it has at its disposal. And with that goes all the trappings of an established discipline: textbooks, equipment, mainstream journals, grant money, university departments, and so on. With the realization that (alleged) evolutionary trees based on genes do not even come close to mirroring the (alleged) trees based on characteristics, evolutionists need to throw out every clade they produced prior to when? 2010? Now there's a field that is not gradually homing in on its goal!EDTA_{October 26, 2021
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Eugene: We don’t know, and apparently we do not even want to wonder. Well, I do!! Who wouldn't? This is my beef with all these QM (quantum mechanics) textbooks. “And then the wavefunction collapses randomly…”. Seriously? So where does this randomness come from? Where’s the dice and who throws it? No one wants to ask that question publicly. By the way, if “someone” (the Designer?) has control of that dice, then he can interfere in any process in this world, change the outcome, and we won’t even be able to notice the occasional “cheating”. However, this dice is surely out there somewhere. I ascribe to a different interpretation of that phenomenon but I agree it's an important question to ask. My humble understanding is that “energy” is just a particular conservable math quantity, which follows from the fact that all the corresponding equations are symmetrical around the time axis. In that sense energy is just math. So . . . was Einstein right? Does energy = mass x speed of light squared? What is amazing is that we have zero evidence that anything actually exists other than math and our own consciousness. Furthermore, we now have rather direct evidence that the elementary building blocks of our world do not actually exist other than in a pure math form. What arguments do find compelling along these lines?JVL_{October 26, 2021
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Seekers: Let me just try and catch up with you here. what your saying or implying rather, is that you (or “mainstream” scientists) have it all figured out. They’re just tidying up the detail’s so to speak. Not at all. Clearly I've not presented my view well or you've not interpreted it correctly. But then your previous posts go on to say that science should be provisional and open to change if and when the need arises. But your ranting comes off as if science has settled certain matters and it’s all in the journals and textbooks documented over the last 150 years. Sigh. What I am saying is that unguided evolutionary theory has a long and clear history of research and work and publications and discussion. And, obvious to anyone who has paid attention, the paradigm has had to shift a few times in the last 150 years as you would expect with a real scientific discipline. It's a real science doing real work and updating its view when new evidence comes around. Nothing in your rant gives any impression of an open and willing to change science based on ‘New’ evidence and data. (Which could overturn claims made in those journals and textbooks) Perhaps you should read a history of biology so you can see how views and thoughts have HAD to change. Also I believe you must be either ignorant or willingly blind to think that ‘People’, which does include scientists, cannot or are not idealogical and hold to they’re own biases, or maybe you only think ID scientists are capable of that . Obviously scientists are human beings and sometimes cling on to beliefs or views which have clearly been superseded. It happens. We're all fallible. But, slowly and sometimes painfully, mainstream science has been shown to eventually get it right. You can point to a number of radicals, dissenters who eventually got their views accepted and that's a testimonial to the methodology. Yes, sometimes it takes awhile, yes sometimes it goes a bit astray. But, in the end, it gets it right. Arguments and appeals to authority are not real arguments it’s very easy for a group of people to be victims of “Group think” and ignore or brush under the rug, any or all evidence conflicting with they’re interests. (Not claiming everyone is guilty of this). But I believe it reasonable to conclude that at least some people are guilty of letting they’re biases get the better of them. Sure, but this is the whole point of supporting peer review. Let others in your field take a shot at your personal idea or hypothesis. See if it stands up to that kind of scrutiny. If I have misunderstood or misrepresented you let me know and we can continue to dialogue. Also I must ask if you are so unconvinced of ID then why waste your time here? Isn’t they plenty of other things you could be getting on with. Just my two cents. A VERY good question. I think that in order to avoid just getting sucked into a kind of group think, a community where everyone just keeps agreeing with the common mindset, you have to challenge your own ideas and thoughts. I think that you owe it to yourself and those you disagree with to engage in a dialogue. You will find yourself examining your own beliefs much more stringently (as I have done many times over the years based on conversations I've had here) and you will be giving your 'opponents' their own voice. I will tell you right here and right now that I have changed my views based on discussions I've had with some individuals here or on their own sites. You will notice myself and ET butt heads a lot but he has changed my view of the idea of nested hierarchy and I no longer argue with him on that point. I have learned things from Upright Biped, Kairosfocus, and Bornagain77 even though we still argue like siblings. I don't know how they view our interactions but I promise you I do take it seriously.JVL_{October 26, 2021
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ET: And yet in 2005 evos had to lie and bluff their way through a trial. Clearly you are deluded. Please point to a specific lie in the testimony at the trial. No generalisations; find a specific lie. Who is a particular person. Forensics definitely thinks of it that way. And detectives flesh it out. But not in archaeology. Who is just a class of beings or people that lived around a certain time. But if who isn’t particular then why do you insist that ID gets particular? Hypocrite. I'm not. That's your misinterpretation which you think is a counterargument. Incorrectly. There isn’t nay scientific theory of evolution. There isn’t any research that demonstrates that prokaryotes can evolve into eukaryotes. There isn’t any research that demonstrates that single-celled eukaryotes can evolve into metazoans. You are just a willfully ignorant and very gullible fool. You still don’t even understand DNA. No one uses evolution by means of blind and mindless processes for anything. It is useless. Nice rant but you've already done that. Look, it’s obvious that you are just a clueless dolt with the mind of an infant. You can’t even stay focused on the topic. And you definitely cannot provide any peer reviewed science that refutes any of ID’s claims When I've done that in the past you just say it's all lies and not true. So why should I try again? IDists do that. Obviously you are just an ignorant jerk. ID proponents have come up with shockingly little over the last 20 years. A few non-peer reviewed books. A bit of this and that. While at the same time proclaiming that 'Darwinism' is on its knees and is just about to fall. In 0ver 150 years Darwin’s ideas are still nonsense. No one has shown that natural selection is the designer mimic Darwin envisioned. No one has shown there is a naturalistic mechanism capable of producing the diversity of life. Heck, thanks to evolutionary biology scientists don’t even know what determines biological form! Contrary to loads of published research. Since your denialist approach doesn't seem to be attracting a lot of new converts perhaps you'd like to try something different. Like proposing an ID research agenda.JVL_{October 26, 2021
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JVL @13 > Really. Where is that dice? Who is throwing it? We don't know, and apparently we do not even want to wonder. This is my beef with all these QM (quantum mechanics) textbooks. "And then the wavefunction collapses randomly...". Seriously? So where does this randomness come from? Where's the dice and who throws it? No one wants to ask that question publicly. By the way, if "someone" (the Designer?) has control of that dice, then he can interfere in any process in this world, change the outcome, and we won't even be able to notice the occasional "cheating". However, this dice is surely out there somewhere. >Where does the energy to throw it come from? Who perceives the result and how does that affect the wave functions? My humble understanding is that "energy" is just a particular conservable math quantity, which follows from the fact that all the corresponding equations are symmetrical around the time axis. In that sense energy is just math. What is amazing is that we have zero evidence that anything actually exists other than math and our own consciousness. Furthermore, we now have rather direct evidence that the elementary building blocks of our world do not actually exist other than in a pure math form. Whoever controls the magic dice (the one which collapses wavefunctions) controls this world.Eugene_{October 26, 2021
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Much of what passes as science today is merely speculation based on preconceived assumptions. And that speculation is ultimately based on FAITH that those preconceived assumptions are true. Atheists/Materialists/Darwinists have an incredible amount of FAITH in unproven, undetected, and even undetectable things.Truth Will Set You Free_{October 26, 2021
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JVL, Let me just try and catch up with you here. what your saying or implying rather, is that you (or “mainstream” scientists) have it all figured out. They’re just tidying up the detail’s so to speak. But then your previous posts go on to say that science should be provisional and open to change if and when the need arises. But your ranting comes off as if science has settled certain matters and it’s all in the journals and textbooks documented over the last 150 years. Nothing in your rant gives any impression of an open and willing to change science based on ‘New’ evidence and data. (Which could overturn claims made in those journals and textbooks) Also I believe you must be either ignorant or willingly blind to think that ‘People’, which does include scientists, cannot or are not idealogical and hold to they’re own biases, or maybe you only think ID scientists are capable of that . Arguments and appeals to authority are not real arguments it’s very easy for a group of people to be victims of “Group think” and ignore or brush under the rug, any or all evidence conflicting with they’re interests. (Not claiming everyone is guilty of this). But I believe it reasonable to conclude that at least some people are guilty of letting they’re biases get the better of them. If I have misunderstood or misrepresented you let me know and we can continue to dialogue. Also I must ask if you are so unconvinced of ID then why waste your time here? Isn’t they plenty of other things you could be getting on with. Just my two cents.Seekers_{October 26, 2021
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JVL:
Another way archaeology is not at all like ID: archaeologists are always looking for new data and examples.
IDists do that. Obviously you are just an ignorant jerk. In 0ver 150 years Darwin's ideas are still nonsense. No one has shown that natural selection is the designer mimic Darwin envisioned. No one has shown there is a naturalistic mechanism capable of producing the diversity of life. Heck, thanks to evolutionary biology scientists don't even know what determines biological form!ET_{October 26, 2021
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JVL:
You’d have to have been living in a cave without the internet for the past 30 years to think that.
And yet in 2005 evos had to lie and bluff their way through a trial. Clearly you are deluded.
Other opinions along with research and journals and experiments and textbooks and research agendas are available.
ID offers the only scientific explanation for our existence.
Archaeology ALWAYS gets around to the ‘general’ who.
Thank you for proving my point.
You keep wanting to insist that ‘the who’ is a particular person but NO ONE thinks that way ...
Who is a particular person. Forensics definitely thinks of it that way. And detectives flesh it out. But if who isn't particular then why do you insist that ID gets particular? Hypocrite. There isn’t nay scientific theory of evolution. There isn’t any research that demonstrates that prokaryotes can evolve into eukaryotes. There isn’t any research that demonstrates that single-celled eukaryotes can evolve into metazoans. You are just a willfully ignorant and very gullible fool. You still don’t even understand DNA. No one uses evolution by means of blind and mindless processes for anything. It is useless.
Nice rant.
Facts are not a rant, loser. Look, it's obvious that you are just a clueless dolt with the mind of an infant. You can't even stay focused on the topic. And you definitely cannot provide any peer reviewed science that refutes any of ID's claimsET_{October 26, 2021
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JVL, Are you actually looking to dialogue or simply to have an idealogical rant.Seekers_{October 26, 2021
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Another way archaeology is not at all like ID: archaeologists are always looking for new data and examples. They are in the field, in libraries, in repositories of historical records, looking at aerial photographs, read old books, attending conferences and talking to their peers about their ideas. They seek out and encompass new techniques and technologies. AND they admit when they get it wrong. Sometimes, that does take awhile, of course. But the discipline builds upon past work and new approaches. It's a pretty new intellectual field but in the last 150 years it has moved on leaps and bounds. What started out as a classical hobby carried out by self-taught book reading aristocrats has developed into a viable, scientifically supported discipline. Same with forensics. As far as I can see, ID is just not even close to developing as a discipline. There's just not much going on.JVL_{October 26, 2021
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ET: And that has nothing to do with the subject at hand. What is wrong with you? Just saying that the design says something about the designer and the designer tells you something about the design. We know the designers’ capabilities by what they leave behind. We would not infer the ancient people could build Stonehenge, for example, if Stonehenge didn’t exist. And lots and lots of other ancient structures. Consider ALL the evidence. Again, your willful ignorance and blatant hypocrisy are not arguments. I am right though, you never, ever quite clearly spell out when you think design was implemented for example. Why is it disputed? It definitely has never been refuted. You'd have to have been living in a cave without the internet for the past 30 years to think that. No one has any viable, scientific alternative to ID. No one. Other opinions along with research and journals and experiments and textbooks and research agendas are available. Oh, sorry, my bad: you guys don't have any of those. Archaeology never really gets around to the who. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH Archaeology ALWAYS gets around to the 'general' who. That's the whole point! That's why, in America, it's part of the Anthropology department. You keep wanting to insist that 'the who' is a particular person but NO ONE thinks that way and your argument is a massive straw man. There isn’t nay scientific theory of evolution. There isn’t any research that demonstrates that prokaryotes can evolve into eukaryotes. There isn’t any research that demonstrates that single-celled eukaryotes can evolve into metazoans. You are just a willfully ignorant and very gullible fool. You still don’t even understand DNA. No one uses evolution by means of blind and mindless processes for anything. It is useless. Nice rant. Maybe you should work on studying the design you've inferred and try and move on from there. Oh, I forgot, all those nasty, brain-washed scientists and academics and grant giving agencies and journal editors and journal publishers are liars and holding up the party line so they can keep collecting their pay checks. Even though almost none (as a percentage) of them have owned up to that hypocrisy. Even though most of them are not rich or famous or living a life of luxury. If only they would all just wake up and be honest then we could all get on with .. . . uh . . . what is your research agenda? I can't quite remember what it is?JVL_{October 26, 2021
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JVL:
Different designers would have different capabilities and that would affect or influence what they could accomplish and when.
And that has nothing to do with the subject at hand. What is wrong with you? We know the designers' capabilities by what they leave behind. We would not infer the ancient people could build Stonehenge, for example, if Stonehenge didn't exist. We would not infer the ancients had the capabilities to produce the Antikythera mechanism if we hadn't found it.
But you never quite get around to saying what happened and when anyway.
Again, your willful ignorance and blatant hypocrisy are not arguments.
You haven’t presented any science past your (disputed) design inference.
Why is it disputed? It definitely has never been refuted. No one has any viable, scientific alternative to ID. No one. The science of ID is in the detection and study of design in nature. That is in line with archaeology and forensics. Archaeology never really gets around to the who. Forensics may help get the who but usually that comes from detective work. The science of each is in the detection of intelligent design. You and yours have NOTHING, JVL. You don’t have a coherent argument. You don’t have any science to support your asinine claims. All you have is your ignorance and stupidity.
And all that grant money and textbooks and journals and academic positions and conferences. Yeah, mainstream evolutionary theory and research is coughing up blood, on it’s last legs, soon to be an ex-theory.
There isn't nay scientific theory of evolution. There isn't any research that demonstrates that prokaryotes can evolve into eukaryotes. There isn't any research that demonstrates that single-celled eukaryotes can evolve into metazoans. You are just a willfully ignorant and very gullible fool. You still don't even understand DNA. No one uses evolution by means of blind and mindless processes for anything. It is useless.ET_{October 26, 2021
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Yeah, mainstream evolutionary theory and research is coughing up blood,
:) Doesn't have blood because is a scarecrow .Sandy_{October 26, 2021
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ET: ID is not about the designer. That has no bearing on the subject at hand. Are you really that stupid? Different designers would have different capabilities and that would affect or influence what they could accomplish and when. But you never quite get around to saying what happened and when anyway. So you are proud to be stupid and ignorant of science. Got it. You haven't presented any science past your (disputed) design inference. People ask for clarification or extensions or even just some hypothesis and get nothing. Except a lot of whining about how ID is only about the design and how main stream scientists are so mean 'cause they have all the money and aren't sharing. IF the only conclusions you can make about the designer comes from examine the design then let's see if we can at least narrow down when design was implemented. We can do that with human artefacts after all. And knowing when design was implemented gives a lot of insight into how the design implementation developed over time. You and yours have NOTHING, JVL. You don’t have a coherent argument. You don’t have any science to support your asinine claims. All you have is your ignorance and stupidity And all that grant money and textbooks and journals and academic positions and conferences. Yeah, mainstream evolutionary theory and research is coughing up blood, on it's last legs, soon to be an ex-theory.JVL_{October 26, 2021
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ID can accommodate atheism because ID does NOT require a belief on God. What part of that is CD too stupid to understand?ET_{October 26, 2021
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chuckdarwin:
“Non-theist intelligent design” is an oxymoron.
Only to the willfully ignorant. Nice own goal.ET_{October 26, 2021
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JVL:
But when a atheist starts asking who the designer is you start getting your knickers in a twist and say that’s not part of ID!
ID is not about the designer. That has no bearing on the subject at hand. Are you really that stupid?
IF you really think that some alien come up with some kind of plan for the evolution of life on earth and implemented that plan a long, long time ago (and maybe tinkered around with the actual way things played out) and you can come up with a coherent argument for that with some solid evidence of such a being aside from that which you infer was designed then I think you’ll have something!
So you are proud to be stupid and ignorant of science. Got it. You and yours have NOTHING, JVL. You don't have a coherent argument. You don't have any science to support your asinine claims. All you have is your ignorance and stupidityET_{October 26, 2021
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#10 Kairofocus Admitting that there is a slight element of hyperbole in my initial comment, I do subscribe to the view that ID is, at bottom, a strictly theistic "worldview." If you buy into the design position as to the origins of the universe, there are only two possibilities, deism or theism. I subscribe to the former and reject the latter. In Stephen Meyer's newest book, he rejects deism in favor of theism, generally arguing that the designer had to intermittently input information to make life possible because the initial conditions of the universe did not have the constituent makeup to allow life to emerge. He argues, in a convoluted way, that this information could not be "front loaded," thus deism is rejected. I think this is an incorrect view of deism, a creator powerful and knowledgeable enough to create an entire universe is perfectly capable of anticipating and incorporating every possible contingency related to the origins of life from the get go. But that is an issue for another day. Because the leading proponents of intelligent design generally agree with Meyer's description, a strong argument can be made that theism and intelligent design are co-extensive to the exclusion of any other "world view." Because deism is explicitly rejected, that leaves only theism as the basis for ID. Now, I'm not naïve and understand that ID proponents, will argue that deists implicitly accept ID because, as the OP illustrates, ID folks are always trying to appropriate members from the dark side. But I reject that argument based upon the above. But what I was really getting at with my initial comment is the author's somewhat bizarre attempt to appropriate atheist's like Tyson, Reese and Loeb (set aside the author's childish personal attacks--he seems to have major heartburn with the way Elon Musk makes money) into the ID position because they admit to entertaining the idea that life on earth could have been seeded by ETs (shades of 2001: A Space Odyssey come to mind). While those theories explain life, they don't explain creation of the universe. Claiming, like some ID folks do, that ID can even accommodate atheism is ridiculous. That is akin to the vogue--and, once again ridiculous--notion of "Christian atheism" that I have heard a couple people in dark web circles claim. Perhaps agnostics (thus your Hoyle example) but not atheists.chuckdarwin_{October 26, 2021
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I mean . . . if there is energy or mass just appearing from out of nowhere I would think we would be able to detect that.
Atheists have a golden rule : what they don't understand do not exist .Sandy_{October 26, 2021
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Kairosfocus: In the case of God, it is more, the root of reality who created the cosmos and sustains it from moment to moment by his world of power — scientific laws, at their best think his creative and providential thoughts after him — will not have a problem with influencing it. I'm just trying to get my mind around how the influencing works. It would all take energy and I can't see where that energy would come from, how it would get focused, etc. I mean . . . if there is energy or mass just appearing from out of nowhere I would think we would be able to detect that.JVL_{October 26, 2021
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Eugene: and finally there is this dice, which someone somewhere throws every so often so the wavefunctions somehow produce these “physical objects” in our consciousness. Really. Where is that dice? Who is throwing it? Where does the energy to throw it come from? Who perceives the result and how does that affect the wave functions?JVL_{October 26, 2021
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Seekers: but the point is they are open about the possibility of an intelligence being accountable for the universe and life. Albeit in they’re own naturalistic way. I'm just wondering how all that would work. I don't see how asking where the energy came from is philosophical.JVL_{October 26, 2021
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JVL, let's refocus. If your "mind" is a mere matter of molecules in motion under the influence of blind chance and/or statistical necessity, constrained by the GIGO limits of blind programming on a computational substrate that makes you a jumped up ape from the savannahs of E Africa's Rift valley (and beyond, jumped up pond scum that solved the problem, somehow of self replication) etc, you are not sufficiently free to have trustworthy free reasoned views. It's just a matter of the outputs put out by the blindly programmed substrate under whatever GIGO driven circumstances. Self-referential, self-defeating absurdity, as Haldane highlighted and as Crick inadvertently implied. Even Darwin's monkey mind remarks cannot be confined to abstract speculation, logic and math are just that and undergird empirical sciences. Which Darwin pretty well knew or should have known. Once grand delusion is invited in, rationality collapses. And so, the first place to address mind-matter interaction is not oh how could some ghostly god interfere with the smoothly running mechanical machine, but instead, right there with your own attempted argument. the answer to which is, first, we are self-moved reflexive creatures and we can profitably discuss the Smith Model for a two tier controller cybernetic loop, something you have oftentimes studiously side-stepped. In the case of God, it is more, the root of reality who created the cosmos and sustains it from moment to moment by his world of power -- scientific laws, at their best think his creative and providential thoughts after him -- will not have a problem with influencing it. Your vision of God is strawmannish, in short. KFkairosfocus_{October 25, 2021
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CD, non theist ID is very much a reality, there are more worldviews than are dreamt of in your philosophy. On the world of life, there is no inference beyond, per reliable signs, we see intelligently directed configuration. this can be within the cosmos or beyond it, the modern design inference, from the outset [I here refer to Thaxton et al, TMLO], is indifferent. Cosmological design per many dozens of fine tuning objervations -- including some in the actual substance of remarks by key critics -- implies design that originated the laws, parameters and substance of our only actually observed cosmos. In a sense, that is distinctly and obviously beyond the cosmos, but how is an open question. For key example, Sir Fred Hoyle, pioneer of this thinking from the 1950's on, was a lifelong agnostic. Though, he did argue publicly that the C-atom is a fix and that the evidence implies monkeying with the basic laws and frameworks of the physical world. KFkairosfocus_{October 25, 2021
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