John Cartmell wrote:

people. They are dangerous nutters with lots of money and the support of the
President of the USA.
This sounds to me like the typical paranoid, anti-American claptrap we
hear from the tabloids. The proponents of ID are not "dangerous
nutters". Al-Quaida are dangerous nutters with guns. PolPot was a
dangerous nutter. As was Hitler. These are scientists with scientific
views that happen to go against the flow of popular opinion. So let's
get some perspective on it eh?! But their new science does answer some
of the problems of mainstream science. I maintain that science has
never been harmed by people questionning it, since that is the
scientific method.

And before anyone dismisses me as a nutter let anyone supporting ID tell you
what experiment or observation might falsify their beliefs. That's the
requirement of any scientific theory and they are pretending that ID is
science.
The most famous example of irreducible complexity is the flagella of
various bacteria (as I'm sure you're aware). Now, recent scientific
advancements have suggested that the flagella could be broken into a
smaller sub-system. So let's say there are 30 pieces working together
that are irreducably complex rather than 40. To falsify ID, you would
have to show that the flagella (or at least one of its subsystems)
could have gradually evolved to its present state. Each previous
incarnation would have to perform a useful function, and each change
would have to be beneficial. If that can be shown, then this example of
ID would be shown to be false. Now I don't know how to do that
experimentally (not my field!), but just because you can't think of an
experiment to disprove something doesn't make it non-science.
I could level the same question back at you. What experiment or
observation could be done that would falsify evolution by natural
selection? Very difficult to observe, and very difficult to experiment
in.

And I think there is a case for arguing that if a pretty unprovable
theory (such as evolution) is held as unquestionable truth, that
qualifies as faith.

Regards,
Jon.