Guillermoe has very quickly become one of our most ardent critics on these pages. That is why it was so interesting to watch him walk right into a trap that HeKS cunningly set for him. Here it is: THE TRAP Guillermoe: We know what designed Stonehenge: HUMANS!! HeKS: How do you know this? Guillermoe: PAST EXPERIENCE. We know humans build things because we have observed that they do. HeKS: How do you know it was humans rather than aliens? Guillermoe: Because our past experience proves that humans exist and does not prove that aliens exist, so it’s much much more likely that humans built Stonehenge. That allows us to say A LOT of things about the designers of Stonehenge. What Read More ›

Does flunking grammar make a student less adept at new technologies? Maybe. Distinguish between new technologies to build a career vs. those used merely to entertain oneself. If the Internet is a well-travelled sea, then Internet trolls are its brigands Trolls can potentially destroy reputations and careers other than their own. Note: Here at Uncommon Descent, we try to offer you a troll-free experience. What did students learn before 24/7 distraction was invented? The Ontario Readers First Book (1923-1938) taught self-respect, not self-esteem. Students: Get more value from online reading. It helps to note some basic differences between reading on line and reading in print. Hi tech parents know that overuse of Internet media changes thinking patterns It can mean Read More ›

New UD contributor HeKS notes: The evidence of purposeful design [–> in the cosmos and world of life]  is overwhelming on any objective analysis, but due to Methodological Naturalism it is claimed to be merely an appearance of purposeful design, an illusion, while it is claimed that naturalistic processes are sufficient to achieve this appearance of purposeful design, though none have ever been demonstrated to be up to the task. They are claimed to be up to the task only because they are the only plausible sounding naturalistic explanations available. He goes on to add: The argument for ID is an abductive argument. An abductive argument basically takes the form: “We observe an effect, x is causally adequate to explain Read More ›

For scientific materialists the materialism comes first; the science comes thereafter.  We might more accurately term them “materialists employing science.”  And if materialism is true, then some materialistic theory of evolution has to be true simply as a matter of logical deduction, regardless of the evidence.  That theory will necessarily be at least roughly like neo-Darwinism, in that it will have to involve some combination of random changes and law-like processes capable of producing complicated organisms . . . Phillip Johnson Johnson’s observation came to mind when I read HeKS comment to a prior post.  That comment recasts Johnson’s observation in terms of Bayesian priors.  It would be cumbersome to put everything in block quotes.  All that follows is HeKS: Read More ›

When someone says “the science is settled” one of two things is true:  (1) they know better and are lying; or (2) they are deeply ignorant about the philosophy of science.  Geraint Lewis, Professor of Astrophysics at the University of Sydney writes: . . . science is like an ongoing courtroom drama, with a continual stream of evidence being presented to the jury.  But there is no single suspect and new suspects regularly wheeled in.  In light of the growing evidence, the jury is constantly updating its view of who is responsible for the data. But no verdict of absolute guilt or innocence is ever returned, as evidence is continually gathered and more suspects are paraded in front of the Read More ›