Bruce Barnett wrote:
Tim Daneliuk writes:


Science, in its current form, is unable to address the question of
"First Cause" - that is, Science is mute on the question of how the
Universe came into being in the first place. It is mute on the question
precisely because Science (in its current form) has chosen to take a
purely mechanical/materialist/reductionist view of the Universe. It
explains the observed Universe with the *assumption* that it has no
overarching purpose or design and, of necessity, can only be understood
at a detailed mechanical level.



I wouldn't say that. You claim Science makes the assumption there is
no purpose. You might as well claim that all scientists are atheists.
Both assumptions are wrong.


Science doesn't make the claim, just those who would misuse
it to promote their bias.

Science purposely AVOIDS making assumptions. Instead, it looks for
evidence of truth. Those that make assumptions can distort the
interpretation of facts. Look at all of the experiments that "prove"
ESP exists.


The complaint is exactly that. A distortion of the facts in the scientific
community. For example:

http://www.origins.org/articles/woodward_rusestore.html
Ruse, a professor of zoology and philosophy of science at the University
of Guelph in Ontario, Canada, was a key speaker at a seminar convened
to debunk "The New Creationism." Ruse had specifically been asked to
"refute Phillip Johnson's book, Darwin on Trial." (Intervarsity Press, 1991.)
Instead, he shocked his colleagues by endorsing one of its key points: that
Darwinian doctrines are ultimately based as much on "philosophical assumptions"
as on scientific evidence.

http://www.godandscience.org/evolution/locke.html
The first big problem with evolution is that the fossil record increasingly does
not, honestly viewed, support it, a fact that famous Prof. Steven Jay Gould of
Harvard has described as "the trade secret of paleontology."

Evolutionary theory claims that there once existed a whole series of successive
forms of the various organisms alive today. These supposedly changed by
infinitesimal amounts with each generation as they evolved into the present
varieties, so the fossil record should show these gradual changes. But it doesn’t.
Instead, it shows the sudden emergence of new species out of nowhere, fully
complete with all their characteristics and not changing over time.