Over the past several days, I have been highlighting poster children of illogic and want of civility that are too often found among critics to design theory – even, among those claiming to be standing on civility and to be posing unanswerable questions, challenges or counter-claims to design theory.
I have also noticed the strong (but patently ill-founded) feeling/assumption among objectors to design theory that they have adequately disposed of the issues it raises and are posing unanswerable challenges in exchanges
A capital example of this, was the suggestion by ID objector Toronto, that the inference to best current explanation used by design thinkers, is an example of question-begging circular argument. Here, again is his attempted rebuttal:
Kairosfocus [Cf. original Post, here]: “You are refusing to address the foundational issue of how we can reasonably infer about the past we cannot observe, by working back from what causes the sort of signs that we can observe. “
[Toronto:] Here’s KF with his own version of “A concludes B” THEREFORE “B concludes A”.
(Yes, as the links show, this is a real example of the type of “unanswerable” objections being touted by opponents of design theory. Several more like this are to be found here and here, in the recent poster-child series.)
But, it should be obvious that the abductive argument pioneered in science by Peirce addresses the question of how empirical evidence can support a hypothesis or explanatory model (EM) as a “best explanation” on an essentially inductive basis, where the model is shown to imply the already known observations, O1 . . . On, and may often be able to predict further observations P1 . . . Pn:
EM = > {O1, O2, . . . On}, {P1, P2, . . . Pm}
Now, the first problem here is that there is a counterflow between the direction of logical implication, from EM to O’s and P’s, and that of empirical support, from O’s and P’s to EM. It would indeed be question-begging to infer from the fact that EM – if true – would indeed entail the O’s and P’s, plus the observation of these O’s and P’s, that EM is true.
But, guess what: this is a general challenge faced by all explanatory models or theories in science
For, in general, to infer that “explained” O’s and P’s entail the truth of EM, would be to commit a fallacy, affirming the consequent; essentially, confusing that EM being so is sufficient for O’s and P’s to be so, with that the O’s and P’s also therefore entail that EM is so.
That is, implication is not equivalence.
(One rather suspects that, Toronto was previously unaware of this broad challenge to scientific reasoning. [That would be overwhelmingly likely, as the logical strengths and limitations of the methods and knowledge claims of science are seldom adequately taught in schools and colleges . . . and to call for this – as has happened in Louisiana etc, is too often treated by advocates of evolutionary materialism with talking points that this is “obviously” an attempt to inject the Creationism bogeyman into the hallowed halls of “science” education.] So, quite likely, Toronto has seen the problem for the first time in connexion with attempts to find objections to design theory and has assumed that this is a problem that is a peculiar challenge to that suspect notion. But, plainly, it is not.)
The answer to this challenge, from Newton forward, has been to acknowledge that scientific theories are to be empirically tested and shown to be reliable so far, but are subject to correction in light of new empirical evidence and/or gaps in logic. Provisional knowledge, in short. Yet another case where the life of reason must acknowledge that trust – the less politically correct but apt word is: faith – is an inextricable, deeply intertwined component of our systems of knowledge and our underlying worldviews.
But, a second challenge emerges.
For, explanatory models are often not unique. We may well have EM1, EM2, . . . EMk, which may actually be empirically equivalent, or may all face anomalies that none are able to explain so far. So, how does one pick a best model, EMi, without begging big questions?
It is simple to state – but far harder to practice: once one seriously compares uncensored major alternative explanatory models on strengths, limitations and difficulties regarding factual adequacy, coherence and explanatory power, and draws conclusions on a provisional basis, this reasonably warrants the best of the candidates. That is, if there is a best candidate. (Sometimes, there is not. In that case, we live with alternatives, and in a surprising number of cases, it has turned out on further probing that the models are mathematically equivalent or are linked to a common underlying framework, or are connected to underlying worldview perspectives in ways that do not offer an easy choice.)
Such an approach is well within the region of inductive reasoning, where empirical evidence provides material support for confidence in – but not undeniable proof of – conclusions. Where, these limitations of inductive argument are the well known, common lot we face as finite, fallible, morally struggling, too often gullible, and sometimes angry and ill-willed human beings.
When it comes to explanatory models of the deep past of origins, we face a further challenge.
For, we cannot inspect the actual deep past, it is unobservable. (There is a surprisingly large number of unobserved entities in science, e.g. electrons, strings, the remote past and so forth. These, in the end are held on an inference to best explanation basis in light of connexions to things we can and do observe. That is, they offer elegantly simple unifying explanatory integration and coherence to our theories. But, we must never become so enamoured of these constructs that we confuse them for established fact beyond doubt or dispute. Indeed, we can be mistaken about even directly observable facts. [Looks like that just happened to me with the identity of a poster of one comment a few days ago, apologies again for the misidentification.])
So, applying Newton’s universality principle, what we do is to observe the evident traces of the remote past. We then set up and explore circumstances in the present, were we can see if there are known causal factors that reliably lead to characteristic effects that are directly comparable to the traces of the past. When that is so, we have a basis for inferring that we can treat the traces from the past as signs that the same causal factor is the best explanation.
Put in such terms, this is obviously reasonable.
Two problems crop up. First, too often, in origins science, there is a resort to a favoured explanation despite the evident unreliability of the signs involved, because of the dominance of a school of thought that suppresses serious alternatives. Second, there can be signs that are empirically reliable that cut across the claims of a dominant school of thought. Design theorists argue that both of these have happened with the currently dominant evolutionary materialist school of thought. Philip Johnson’s reply to Richard Lewontin on a priori materialism in science is a classic case in point – one that is often dismissed but (kindly note, Seversky et al) has never been cogently answered:
For scientific materialists the materialism comes first; the science comes thereafter. [[Emphasis original] We might more accurately term them “materialists employing science.” And if materialism is true, then some materialistic theory of evolution has to be true simply as a matter of logical deduction, regardless of the evidence. That theory will necessarily be at least roughly like neo-Darwinism, in that it will have to involve some combination of random changes and law-like processes capable of producing complicated organisms that (in Dawkins’ words) “give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose.”
. . . . The debate about creation and evolution is not deadlocked . . . Biblical literalism is not the issue. The issue is whether materialism and rationality are the same thing. Darwinism is based on an a priori commitment to materialism, not on a philosophically neutral assessment of the evidence. Separate the philosophy from the science, and the proud tower collapses. [[Emphasis added.] [[The Unraveling of Scientific Materialism, First Things, 77 (Nov. 1997), pp. 22 – 25.]
This example (and the many others of like ilk) should suffice to show that the objectors to design theory do not have a monopoly on scientific or logical knowledge and rationality, and that they can and do often severely and mistakenly caricature the thought of design thinkers to the point of making outright blunders. Worse, they then too often take excuse of that to resort to ad hominem attacks that cloud issues and unjustly smear people, polarising and poisoning the atmosphere for discussion. For instance, it escapes me how some could ever have imagined – or imagined that others would take such a claim as truthful – that it is a “lighthearted” dig to suggest that I would post links to pornography.
Such a suggestion is an insult, one added to the injury of red herrings led away to strawmannish caricatures and dismissals.
In short, there is a significant problem among objectors to design theory that they resort to a habitual pattern of red herring distractors, led away to strawman caricatures soaked in poisonous ad hominem attacks, and then set alight through snide or incendiary rhetoric. Others who do not go that far, enable, tolerate or harbour such mischief. And, at minimum, even if there is not a resort to outright ad hominems, there is a persistent insistence on running after red herrings on tangents to strawman caricatures, and a refusal to accept cogent corrections of such misrepresentations.
That may be angrily brushed aside.
So, I point out that the further set of problems with basic logic, strawman caricatures and personal attacks outlined in the follow up post here. Let us pick up a particular example of the evasiveness and denial of well-established points, also from Toronto:
Physics both restricts and insists on different combinations of “information”.
Why is the word information in scare quotes?
Because, believe it or not, as has been repeatedly seen at UD, many objectors to design theory want to contend that there is no algorithmic, digitally – i.e. discrete-state — coded specifically functional (and complex) information in D/RNA. In reply, I again clip from Wikipedia, speaking against known ideological interest:
The genetic code is the set of rules by which information encoded in genetic material (DNA or mRNA sequences) is translated into proteins (amino acid sequences) by living cells.
The code defines how sequences of three nucleotides, called codons, specify which amino acid will be added next during protein synthesis.
Hopefully, these examples should suffice to begin to clear the air for a serious focus on substantial issues.
So, I think the atmosphere has now – for the moment – been sufficiently cleared of the confusing and polarising smoke of burning, ad hominem soaked strawman caricatures of design theory to pose the following questions. They are taken from a response to recent comments (with slight adjustments), and were – unsurprisingly, on track record – ignored by the objector to whom they were directed.
I now promote them to the level of a full, duly headlined UD post:
1: Is argument by inference to best current explanation a form of the fallacy of question-begging (as was recently asserted by design objector “Toronto”)? If you think so, why?
2: Is there such a thing as reasonable inductive generalisation that can identify reliable empirical signs of causal factors that may act on objects, systems, processes or phenomena etc., including (a) mechanical necessity leading to low contingency natural regularity, (b) chance contingency leading to stochastic distributions of outcomes and (c) choice contingency showing itself by certain commonly seen traces familiar from our routine experiences and observations of design? If not, why not?
3: Is it reasonable per sampling theory, that we should expect a chance based sample that stands to the population as one straw to a cubical hay bale 1,000 light years thick – rather roughly about as thick as our galaxy – more or less centred on Earth, to pick up anything but straw (the bulk of the population)? If you think so, why (in light of sampling theory – notice, NOT precise probability calculations)? [Cf. the underlying needle in a haystack discussion here on.]
4: Is it therefore reasonable to identify that functionally specific complex organisation and/or associated information (FSCO/I, the relevant part of Complex Specified Information as identified by Orgel and Wicken et al. and as later quantified by Dembski et al) is – on a broad observational base – a reliable sign of design? Why or why not?
5: Is it reasonable to compare this general analysis to the grounding of the statistical form of the second law of thermodynamics, i.e. that under relevant conditions, spontaneous large fluctuations from the typical range of the bulk of [microstate] possibilities will be vanishingly rare for reasonably sized systems? If you think not, why not?
6: Is digital symbolic code found to be stored in the string-structure configuration of chained monomers in D/RNA molecules, and does such function in algorithmic ways in protein manufacture in the living cell? If, you think not, why not in light of the generally known scientific findings on transcription, translation and protein synthesis?
7: Is it reasonable to describe such stored sequences of codons as “information” in the relevant sense? Why or why not?
8: Is the metric, Chi_500 = Ip*S – 500, bits beyond the solar system threshold and/or the comparable per aspect design inference filter as may be seen in flowcharts, a reasonable quantification or procedural application of the set of claims made by design thinkers? Or, any other related or similar metric, as has been posed by Durston et al, or Dembski, etc? Why, or why not – especially in light of modelling theory?
9: Is it reasonable to infer on this case that the origin of cell based life required the production of digitally coded FSCI — dFSCI — in string data structures, together with associated molecular processing machinery [cf. the vid here], joined to gated encapsulation, metabolism and a von Neumann kinematic self replicator [vNSR]? Why or why not?
10: Is it reasonable to infer that such a vNSR is an irreducibly complex entity and that it is required before there can be reproduction of the relevant encapsulated, gated, metabolising cell based life to allow for natural selection across competing sub populations in ecological niches? Why or why not? (And, if you think not, what is your empirical, observational basis for thinking that available physical/chemical forces and processes in a warm little pond or the modern equivalent, can get us, step by step, by empirically warranted stages, to the living cell?)
11: Is it therefore a reasonable view to infer – on FSCO/I, dFSCI and irreducible complexity as well as the known cause of algorithms, codes, symbol systems and execution machinery properly organised to effect such – that the original cell based life is on inference to best current explanation [IBCE], credibly designed? Why, or why not?
12: Further, as the increments of dFSCI to create dozens of major body plans is credibly 10 – 100+ mn bits each, dozens of times over across the past 600 MY or so, and much of it on the conventional timeline is in a 5 – 10 MY window on earth in the Cambrian era, is it reasonable to infer further on IBCE that major body plans show credible evidence of design? If not, why not, on what empirically, observationally warranted step by step grounds?
13: Is it fair or not fair to suggest that on what we have already done with digital technology and what we have done with molecular nanotech applied to the cell, it is credible that a molecular nanotech lab several generations beyond Venter etc would be a reasonable sufficient cause for what we see? If not, why not? [In short, the issue is: is inference to intelligent design specifically an inference to “supernatural” design? In this context, what does “supernatural” mean? “Natural”? Why do you offer these definitions and why should we accept them?]
14: Is or is it not reasonable to note that in contrast to the tendency to accuse design thinkers of being creationists in cheap tuxedos who want to inject “the supernatural” into science and so to produce a chaotic unpredictability:
a: From Plato in The Laws Bk X on, the issue has been explanation by nature (= chance + necessity) vs ART or techne, i.e. purposeful and skilled intelligence acting by design,
b: Historically, modern science was largely founded by people thinking in a theistic frame of thought and/or closely allied views, and who conceived of themselves as thinking God’s creative and sustaining thoughts — his laws of governing nature — after him,
c: Theologians point out that the orderliness of God and our moral accountability imply an orderly and predictable world as the overwhelming pattern of events,
d: Where also, the openness to Divine action beyond the usual course of nature for good purposes, implies that miracles are signs and as such need to stand out against the backdrop of such an orderly cosmos? [If you think not, why not?]
15: In light of all these and more, is the concept that we may legitimately, scientifically infer to design on inductively grounded signs such as FSCO/I a reasonable and scientific endeavour? Why or why not?
16: In that same light, is it the case that such a design theory proposal has been disestablished by actual observations contrary to its pivotal inductions and inferences to best explanations? (Or, has the debate mostly pivoted on latter-day attempted redefinition of science and its methods though so-called methodological naturalism that a priori undercuts the credibility of “undesirable” explanatory models of the past?) Why do you come to your conclusion?
17: Is it fair to hold – on grounds that inference to the best evolutionary materialism approved explanation of the past is not the same as inference to the best explanation of the past in light of all reasonably possible causal factors that could have been at work – that there is a problem of evolutionary materialist ideological dominance of relevant science, science education, and public policy institutions? Why or why not?
The final question for reflection raises issues regarding the ethical-cultural implications for views on the above for origins science in society:
18: In light of concerns raised since Plato in The Laws Bk X on and up to the significance of challenge posed by Anscombe and others, that a worldview must have a foundational IS that can objectively ground OUGHT, how does evolutionary materialism – a descriptive term for the materialistic, blind- chance- and- necessity- driven- molecules- to- Mozart view of the world – cogently address morality in society and resolve the challenge that it opens the door to the rise of ruthless nihilistic factions whose view is in effect that as a consequence of living in a materialistic world, knowledge and values are inherently only subjective and/or relative so that might and manipulation make ‘right’?
(NB: Those wishing to see how a design theory based view of origins would address these and related questions, (i) cf. the 101 level survey here on. Similarly, (ii) you are invited to look at the UD Weak argument correctives here, (iii) at the UD Glossary here, at UD’s definition of ID here, (iv) at a general purpose ID FAQ here, (v) at the NWE survey article on ID here (the Wikipedia one being an inaccurate and unfair hit piece) and (vi) at the background note here on.)
So, objectors to design theory, the ball is in your court. (NB: Inputs are also welcome from design theory supporters.)
How, then, do you answer? On what grounds? With what likely consequences for science, society, and civilisation? END