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  #81   Report Post  
Robatoy
 
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In article ,
Tim Daneliuk wrote:

IOW, all the Science Establishment
has to do to shut up the IDers is to show
(experimentally) an primordial soup becoming
a reptile which, in turn, evolves into, say,
Ted Kennedy.


Funny stuff.

I think that's been proven. Didn't he crawl ashore at
Chappaquiddick?
  #83   Report Post  
Tim Daneliuk
 
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wrote:

Tim Daneliuk wrote:

...


This is not exactly right. *Some* Intelligent Design theories are proposed
as an alternative to Evolutionary Theory. There are however other
"intelligent design" theories (aka "authorship theories") that posit the
existence of an intelligent creator that operated *by means of evolution*.



Can you state a testable hypothesis that can be used to discriminate
between the operation of evolution by an intelligent creator, and
the operation of evolution without an intelligent creator?


No, probably not. But I can offer a rational conjecture that Something
has never been demonstrated to spring forth from Nothing and this
suggests that there is an authoring "Something". (This nothwithstanding
the particle argument someone else put forth earlier in the threat. This
is a conjurer's trick - the particles in question spring forth from
something - the context of the larger universe and the physics that
govern it). Moreover, even if the mechanism *is* entirely governed by
natural selection, the open question still remains: How did the laws of
physics that ultimately enable natural selection to even operate ever
come to be?

Incidentally, I don't think you can actually propose a testable
hypothesis that demonstrates full-blown evolution. The whole evolution
theory cannon be experimentally verified. Beyond the base mechanisms of
evolution (mutation, natural selection, et al) the "Big Picture" of
evolution is arrived at by means of inferrence and induction. These are
valid methods of science, but they are not, strictly speaking, testable.
IOW, you can test the pieces, but not the whole of evolutionary theory.
In fact, honest science always says, "This is our best theory ... *so far* "
in recognition of the limits of what you can "know" by induction or
inference.

This whole discussion is difficult because it has both a philosophical/
metaphysical component and a scientific component to it. The Science
community is mute on the metaphysics (to its detriment) and most of the
"author" theories like ID and Creationism do not do a good job of
separating the portions of their positions that are metaphysics and
which are claimed science. I think there is an really important "middle"
where these two communities should be meeting and talking to develop a
common language and point of departure for the discussion.


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  #84   Report Post  
Tim Daneliuk
 
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wrote:

Tim Daneliuk wrote:

wrote:


Tim Daneliuk wrote:


...

Then why is the Science community so terrified to led ID have it's day
in court (journals, conferences, etc.) and *refute* it? ...


Courts per se are not proper adjudicators of scientific theory.

IRT journals, conferences etc, they are typically specific to
certain specializations in particular fields. To accept
a theology-based (of any flavor or brand) paper into a zoology
journal would be like discussing evolution in a woodworking
newsgroup. It would be off-topic.


This argument is a red-herring.



No, it is spot on.


Science has a philosophy
of knowledge. That philosophy of knowledge is being questioned.
It is not a 'theology based' attack (at least not exclusively).
The attackers claim they have the ability to describe the
problems with today's scientific system and propose to do so
using *science* (not theology). They should be heard, and then
refuted or not.



"Intelligent Design" unless it is very ill-considered misnomer,
relies on the presumption of a divine being. That is the realm
of religion, not science.

A claim to be able to demonstrate intelligent design
scientifically, without theology is obvious double speak.



Then you're not reading the IDers I have. While many/most
of them *are* Theists, their science claims do not spring
from the presumption of the Divine. Quite the opposite,
they claim that observed complexity ("observed" by *science*)
cannot be adequately explained by proesses like mutation
and natural selection. They argue that the science drives
you to the presumption of an author, not the other way around.




Accepting off-topic papers into a journal or at a conference not
only dilutes the material being presented and utilizes resources
that were ostensibly budgeted for the specialty in question but
it also threatens to disrupt an otherwise scholarly and cooperative
atmosphere.


The IDers have made proposals that are specific within sub-branches
of science. Those narrow proposals should be evaluated within
their respective disciplines.



Do you suppose the the people working in those fields as editors
etc are of the opinion that 'ID' fundamentally lies outside of
their specific sub-branches of science?

I can certainly come up with an intelligent design theory
to explain physical phenomena, but I do not have the gall
to expect _Physics Today_ to publish it.


It depends on whether you are propsing physics or metaphysics.
The IDers attempt to do both and do not separate them well,
IMHO which is at least where some of the confusion lies.


Science has always observed aboundant phenomena that COULD be
explained by invoking some sort of intelligence making a choice,
for example between which molecules pass thorugh a membrane and
which do not.


You seldom see authors calling each other names, insulting their
integrity or questioning their motives when they disagree over
what glue to use on patio furniture. How does that compare to
Off-Topic threads?


You should read more history of Science. There has been *plenty* of name
calling, ad hominem attacks, questioning the virtue, honor, method, and
competence of one group of scientists by another.



Which has nothing to do with patio furniture.


I was responding you *your* initial point, "You seldom see
authors calling each other names ..."


There is a whole lot
of "Jane You Ignorant Slut" level of diatribe within the Scientific
community from time to time. Come to think of it, it's kind of how I see
them treating the IDers.



Which was my point.


Again, I am not defending ID, I am defending
the idea that they ought to be *heard* and evaluated openly and fairly
for their Scientific claims.



Like everyone else they have a right to express their opinions.
Also, like everyone else, they have no right to demand that anyone
in particular listen to them.

If the publishers of _Nature_ or whatever, do not want to publish
their articles or the sponsors of a conference do not want to
invite them to give their papers or have them put up posters that
is the right of those publishers or sponsors.

The 'IDers' have no right to demand that other people do any
damn thing at all for them.

No publisher or sponsoring organization has any responsibility
to let any particular fringe group appear simply in order to
satisfy your misplaced sense of fair play.



Absolutely right. But if the Science Establishment
refuses to hear them, then the Science Establishment jolly
well better be still when the IDers want their theories
taught in the schools as (possible) *science*. The heart of
the whole business culturally is that the Science Establishment
want's neither to hear/refute/affirm the IDers AND wants
them kept out of school. That's a foul in my book. If their
ideas are not science, than this needs to be demonstrated so
as to keep them off the science curricula. Ignoring them
or freezing them out of the discussion is just cheap tactics.



When a notion is rejected outright by mainsteam science
it is almost always because it is unmitigated crap in the
scientific sense, regardless of what social/political or
religious value it may have. Scientists are not terrified
at the prospect of someone flinging crap at them from a
podium so much as they are disgusted.


Nonsense. Most new Scientific theories go through a period of
outright rejection by the Science Establishment.



I can think of a few exmples but interestingly, nearly all
in the field of medicine and was outright rejected, not
by scientists, but by physicians. Ask any scientist in
any branch of biology that ever contributes to medical
knowledge and he or she will assure you that doctors are
not scientists.

There are also examples of scientists rejecting the notion
that certain engineering goals could be achieved, like
building a hydrogen bomb. But those are disagreements as
to practical applicability.

The law of conservation of energy and in particular the
concept of entropy were controversial but I'd have to look
into it further beofor concluding that they were 'outright
rejected'.

So how about some examples of scientific theories, outright
rejected at first, which were ultimately accepted?

Most new scientific theories that are eventually accepted,
and indeed, many that are unltimately rejected, are immediately
accepted as _scientifically viable_ from the outset.

Examples include the evolutionary theories of Lamarck, Wallace
and Darwin, the Copernican theory of the Solar System the
Corpuscular theory of light, Special and General relativity,
the Big Bang theory, quantum theory. Not everyone in the field
accepted them from the outset but they weren't rejected as
not appropriate for publication or debate.



OK, "outright rejected" was an overstatement on my part.
I should have better said, "met with considerable resistance
at first because of the inertia of the prevalent scientific
orthodoxy." Better?



"Mainstream Science"
rejects things because it has a vested interest (funding, prestige)
in the status quo.
So much so that there is a well-worn saying
in the community that "Funeral by funeral, Science progresses."



So well worn *I* never heard it befor.


Strange, you seem well versed in matter scientific. It is
a semi-famous quote. I'll see if I can find a cite.


The IDers may be dead wrong, *but they should be heard.* I am
trained in the Sciences, though my personal specialty is
more in mathematics.



Perhaps you are familiar with the story about the debate
on the existance of God between Diederot and Euler?


I am troubled by a discipline that claims
to arrive at knowledge by "objective means" and then scurries to
circle the wagons the first time an outsider shows up with
an idea that is fundamentally different than the current orthdoxy.



'IDers' are plainly not the only people whose philosophy has
been excluded from the public schools or scientific journals.

Lots of people who claim to to have theories based on sound
science do not get published. (Well a few self-publish on
UseNet). The obvious difference between those and the 'IDers'
is that the former generally do not have well-funded and
political and religiously motivated sponsors.

But sometimes they do. Back in the early 1980's there was
an attempt to force a more Bibically literal brand of
Creationism into the scientific literature and the public
schools. They also relied on legal arguments but died
back after a few setbacks in the court system. Whereas
'Creatiionsim' and the oxymoronic 'Scientific Creationsim'
were ckommonly heard back then, there was not one peep
about 'Intelligent Design'. While it may be that the
origins of 'ID' go back befor then, it was not until
that set back for America's Taliban wannabes that "Intelligen

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Design" began to get any publicity. Not, IMHO a coincidence.]


You prove my point. You just *can't* get through this without
going ad hominem - it diminished your argument considerably.


The bottom line is that 'Intelligent Design' is a plain
english statement of the existance of a designer.

Some religious sects for not speak their name for the Divine
Being for religions I do not quite understand. But I do
understand why the "Intelligent Designer" do not speak
the name for their "Designer". It for the same reasons
that some other cults won't tell you that the beleive in
(non-divne) extraterestrial beings.


More ad homina - not relevant or to the point.


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  #85   Report Post  
Tim Daneliuk
 
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wrote:

SNIP of interesting history of science

One supposes that Brahe had to express some opinion on
cosmology in order to get funding and to stay out of
prison so he did the best he could without drawing the
ire of the religious and political powers. An apt analogy
can be made to many of today's public school administrators.


A more apt analogy would be the modern working *scientist*
the overwhelming majority of whom feed at the public
trough. This is once of the principal sources of the
intertia in the science establishment IMO.

More history snipped

I stipulate your history is correct. I think you
are filtering the degree of resistance these new ideas
met with from within the establishment science of their
day because, in retrospect, they turned out to be right
(except for our pal Tycho). I rather think that the
turning points of science we're discussing here didn't
just get quietly accepted by the other scientists of
the day without some fairly pointed argument and resistance.


Here we do have a good analog to present day politics. The
new "Jewish Physics" is Evolutionary Biology. It is under
political attack, being demonized by a marginalized political
faction (in the present case one with religous roots) for
purely politcal purposes. Like their predecessors who found
scientists or at any rate, men who called themselves scientists
to criticize "Jewish Physics" these people support those who
present a superficially scientific challenge to Evolutionary
Biology, e.g. the "intelligent design" guys.


This is a vast overstatement of Reality. Evolutionary
Biology has had it say and its way in education and popular
culture without significant opposition for a long, long
time. The fact that anyone *dares* to now question it
hardly demonizes it. Your level of bunker mentality here
rivals the Evangelical Fundamentalists who also believe
that they are the downtrodden and oppressed in these
matters.

SNIP


"Intelligent Design" is just a reformulation of Creationism
in which the Creator "guides' the evolution of species rather
than creating them directly by divine will. It is pretty


That's not exactly the case. Some versions of "author"
theories accept evolution as a mechanism, some do not.


"Intelligent Design", like all theologically based philosphical
constructs rests on the premise of some sort of divine
intervention.


Again, you are overstating a strawman. The proponents of ID are
theologically motivated, without question. But they assert that their
*claims* are rooted in science. Why is it so painful to give them the
hearing necessary to refute at least the scientific components of their
claims? I do not get the visceral objection to this that you and others
in the community of scientists seem to have.

In my opinion, this visceral objection is not driven by science per se
but by the regnant personal philosophy of many people within the
community. A good many scientists are self professed atheists and/or
agnostics. It just kills them to consider the possibility that
the discipline to which they clung as a sole source of knowledge
may in fact be better served by means of metaphysical considerations.
So, they retreat to "Not on *my* watch, this isn't really science,
etc."

Once again, if the scientific claims of ID and all the rest
are *bad* science, it ought easily to be refuted. But refusing
to even engage makes the science estabishment look silly and
scared. In some perverse sense, refusal to engage with the IDers
as a matter of science is giving them more credibility in the
popular political debate than you think they deserve. Ponder
that a moment.


No scientific theory will or even can disprove
the existance of divine intervention. But no theory that is
dependant on divine intervention, is scientific.


Right, this is the standard argument for what science is and does.
I am asserting that this is a bad judgement call on the part of
the scientific community. Science without metaphysics will always
be blind in one eye. If more scientists understood metaphysics and more
theologians understood the methods of science I believe (but
cannot prove) that there would be a cross pollination of productive
ideas. I'm not arguing for the dilution of science here - I am
arguing for its *augmentation* . This is valid so long as everyone
involved understands the limits of each of these systems of thought.

The goal is not to promote better science or better metaphysics.
The goal is to better apprehend Truth by whatever means are most
appropriate.

P.S. Oh, and for the record, some of the theologians under whom I enjoyed a
portion of my education, had the *exact same* bunker mentality,
unwillingness to engage with their challengers, slavish adherence to the
methods they best understood, and all the other stuff that I've suggested
are bad practice on the part of the science establishment. It
seems that nothing is more 'sacred' than what you already believe ...





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  #86   Report Post  
Tim Daneliuk
 
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wrote:

Tim Daneliuk wrote:

charlie b wrote:
...


One of the arguements the ID folks present is
"this organism is extremely complex, too complex
to merely just happen by accident. therefore
it had to be designed by some intelligent entity".


That is their *conclusion*, but they claim they
have a Scientific case to make to support that
conclusion. We may well never know, because
the Science Establishment today it putting huge
resistance up (dare I say, with "religious" fervor)
to avoid having this debate.



What on Earth do you mean by "we may never know"? They
can certainly establish their own journals, societies and
hold their own conferences just like homeopaths, chiropodists,
astrologers and polygraphers have.

Nobody is silencing them any more than the Southern Baptists
silence a polymer chemistry by not inviting a chemist
to give a sermon about semipermeable membranes.


You are indulging yourself in some sly rhetorical tricks here
but it doesn't wash. The IDers are making claims of *science*
(or at least they say they are). "We will never know" whether
or not those claims are founded if there is no *scientific*
peer review of those claims. This is fundamentally different
than "not inviting a chemist to give a sermon about semipermeable
membranes." Because theology and chemistry are not both scientific
disciplines and thus not open to similar review processes. The essence
of the ID claim is that (at least part of it) is that it is *science*
so why shouldn't the existing infrastructure of science be called
upon to review it?

Just because an 'Iders' _says_ he is not religiously motivated
doesn't make it so. One only has to consider the rapant
dishonest of the overtly religious organisations pushing their
agenda to at least wonder if birds of a feather do not,
in reality, flock together.


Ad hominem

SNIP

Today, the ONLY supporters of 'ID' are the likes of Pat Robertson,
Oral Roberts (damn I wish that check had bounced) and their
minions. Even you don't claim to support ID, you seem only
to be arguing for 'equal time' based on some sort of misplaced
multicultural sense of fairness that might be appropriate if
they wanted to publish in YOUR journal but certainly not in
someone else's!


No. I'm arguing that specialists in a field are most suited
to evaluate claims made in/against their field.


You seem to believe that the 'IDers' at least honestly think
they have a legitimate scientific claim but the people you
are asking to publish those claims seem to have a different
opinion, that they are dishonest, deluded, or both.


No, I think the science establishment appears to be terrified
the IDers might have a point.


I certainly do not believe the 'IDers' are honest. I believe
they are as dishonest as their vocal political and religious
supporters.


You can believe what you like. Among any group of people, *including
scientists* there is wide variability in honesty, intellectual clarity,
and motivation. Dismissing the honor of an entire group of people
because you don't like what they say strikes me as pretty reactionary.


For example, evolution *within* a particular species,
over time, is demonstrable. But evolution from
less complex lifeforms to more complex lifeforms
is still undemonstrated. These upward jumps in
biocomplexity are *inferred* from observation, not
demonstrated by direct experiment. If they
were, the discussion about Evolution would
truly be over. IOW, all the Science Establishment
has to do to shut up the IDers is to show
(experimentally) an primordial soup becoming
a reptile which, in turn, evolves into, say,
Ted Kennedy.



And that is a self-serving argument because it purposefully
ignores the practical matter of the time required for the
process to occur.

A similar criticism can be made for many other natural processes
like plate techtonics or the stellar lifecycle.

Speciation is inferred from the fossil record and by extapolation
from the natural developement of varietals within a species just
like plate techtonics is inferred from the geological record and
by extrapolation from present day motion.


All true. The point here is that the science by direct experiment
is far stronger than science by inferrence or induction alone.
The science establishment appears to reject even the possibility
that IDers have a point to make, and is doing so on the weaker
of the methods available to science. All I have ever argued for
in this thread (and elswhere) is that, since no experimental
verification is possible, there needs to be a more open attitude
towards alternative explanations and the rapid destruction of new
bad theories as they arise.


If the AGU refused to accept "Intelligent Navigation" papers
on continental drift would THAT upset you?


If the claimants that were rejected argued that they had new
science to bring to the table and couldn't even get a hearing,
yes it would.

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  #87   Report Post  
Mark & Juanita
 
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On 29 Sep 2005 16:16:03 EDT, Tim Daneliuk wrote:

Steve Peterson wrote:

See http://www.cjr.org/issues/2005/5/mooney.asp and http://www.ncseweb.org/
for some information on evolution and "Intelligent Design." ID is at best a
pseudoscientific attempt to undercut teaching of evolution. It is big on


That may be true. Just bear in mind that postulating intelligent
design/creation is *not* the same argument as demanding a literal
reading of the Genesis account.

public relations and press coverage, but basically void of the key to the
scientific method, i.e. making testable predictions.


Then why is the Science community so terrified to led ID have it's day
in court (journals, conferences, etc.) and *refute* it? So far,
most of what I've found is members of the Science Establishment
taking ad hominem pot shots, not actually refuting the IDer methods
or claims.


Because it could potentially expose their own slavish adherence to a
certain orthodoxy and faith as well as the underlying first postulate that
relies upon suspension of all current laws of science and logic for the
initial genesis of the universe to which they pledge their allegience to
the laws of science and logic? i.e, one of the fundamentals of science and
logic is that for every effect,there must be a cause -- sometimes that
cause is not easy to unravel or identify (ala Locke), but there is a cause.
The fundamental tenet of current cosmology requires the suspension of that
scientific principle (Ex nihilo nihil -- from nothing, nothing comes) and
substitutes instead a non-causal event (from nothing, everything comes).
Until the adherents to this theory can explain the origin of their big bang
and its causitive agent, they have nothing more to stand on than any other
theology.


One quote from Darwin is telling (no, fred, I'm not going to list a cite
-- look it up yourself), when he was questioned regarding fundamental
problems with his theories was that yes, there were problems, but that his
theory was the best thing available that wasn't based on creation -- hardly
a scientific comment.





read the sites if you need actual information to counter such assertions as
"teach the controversy."

Steven Peterson, Ph.D.
Steve #564 on the Steve's List


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+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+

If you're gonna be dumb, you better be tough

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  #88   Report Post  
Charlie Self
 
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Mark & Juanita wrote:



One quote from Darwin is telling (no, fred, I'm not going to list a cite
-- look it up yourself), when he was questioned regarding fundamental
problems with his theories was that yes, there were problems, but that his
theory was the best thing available that wasn't based on creation -- hardly
a scientific comment.



Well, we might try another quote from Darwin: "We can allow satellites,
planets, suns, universe, nay whole systems of universes, to be governed
by laws, but the smallest insect, we wish to be created at once by
special act."

  #89   Report Post  
Robatoy
 
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In article . com,
"Charlie Self" wrote:

Mark & Juanita wrote:



One quote from Darwin is telling (no, fred, I'm not going to list a cite
-- look it up yourself), when he was questioned regarding fundamental
problems with his theories was that yes, there were problems, but that his
theory was the best thing available that wasn't based on creation -- hardly
a scientific comment.



Well, we might try another quote from Darwin: "We can allow satellites,
planets, suns, universe, nay whole systems of universes, to be governed
by laws, but the smallest insect, we wish to be created at once by
special act."


Man cannot create a worm, but we create gods by the thousands.

(somebody said that)
  #90   Report Post  
George
 
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wrote in message
ups.com...
You say that those great Scientists had to "kick Science to the
next level". In fact, they met with resistance not from the
Scientific community but fron politics and religion. It is
not Science that had to be kicked, it was non-Science that
had to be kicked and it often kicked back.


You'll want to re-think that one. Scientists have both politics and
religion - pretty much the same thing , belief over observation - and thus
do not operate in an intellectual ivory tower.

"God does not dice with the universe." Is a famous saying by a famous
physicist, but Heisenberg finally gained acceptance in spite of him.




  #91   Report Post  
Steve Peterson
 
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snip
IRT journals, conferences etc, they are typically specific to
certain specializations in particular fields. To accept
a theology-based (of any flavor or brand) paper into a zoology
journal would be like discussing evolution in a woodworking
newsgroup. It would be off-topic.

This argument is a red-herring.



No, it is spot on.

more snipping

Do you suppose the the people working in those fields as editors
etc are of the opinion that 'ID' fundamentally lies outside of
their specific sub-branches of science?

I can certainly come up with an intelligent design theory
to explain physical phenomena, but I do not have the gall
to expect _Physics Today_ to publish it.


still snipping

If the publishers of _Nature_ or whatever, do not want to publish
their articles or the sponsors of a conference do not want to
invite them to give their papers or have them put up posters that
is the right of those publishers or sponsors.

The 'IDers' have no right to demand that other people do any
damn thing at all for them.

No publisher or sponsoring organization has any responsibility
to let any particular fringe group appear simply in order to
satisfy your misplaced sense of fair play.



Absolutely right. But if the Science Establishment
refuses to hear them, then the Science Establishment jolly
well better be still when the IDers want their theories
taught in the schools as (possible) *science*. The heart of
the whole business culturally is that the Science Establishment
want's neither to hear/refute/affirm the IDers AND wants
them kept out of school. That's a foul in my book. If their
ideas are not science, than this needs to be demonstrated so
as to keep them off the science curricula. Ignoring them
or freezing them out of the discussion is just cheap tactics.


lots more snipping - trying to keep this short.
--
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Tim Daneliuk
PGP Key:
http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/


Putting aside the name calling, here are some considerations. The ID
"scientists" need to approach the problem scientifically if they expect
scientific acceptance. This means using the scientific method:
1. propose a hypothesis to explain a phenomenon
2. design experimental tests that show that the hypothesis does, indeed,
explain something that is not otherwise adequately explained by conventional
science
3. report these results through refereed journals and conferences. If 1
and 2 are proper and compelling, the results will be accepted, and hence the
hypothesis will be established.
4. keep in mind Occam's razor: the best explanation is the simplest one.

This process usually is iterated, with one set of results suggesting more
investigations. However, repeated assertions that "something" is too
complicated for natural selection to account for it does not constitute a
meaningful hypothesis or its experimental investigation. The ID advocates
have not yet built up a scientific case to insert into the science
curriculum.

IMHO
Steve


  #92   Report Post  
Tim Daneliuk
 
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Steve Peterson wrote:

snip

IRT journals, conferences etc, they are typically specific to
certain specializations in particular fields. To accept
a theology-based (of any flavor or brand) paper into a zoology
journal would be like discussing evolution in a woodworking
newsgroup. It would be off-topic.

This argument is a red-herring.


No, it is spot on.


more snipping

Do you suppose the the people working in those fields as editors
etc are of the opinion that 'ID' fundamentally lies outside of
their specific sub-branches of science?

I can certainly come up with an intelligent design theory
to explain physical phenomena, but I do not have the gall
to expect _Physics Today_ to publish it.



still snipping

If the publishers of _Nature_ or whatever, do not want to publish
their articles or the sponsors of a conference do not want to
invite them to give their papers or have them put up posters that
is the right of those publishers or sponsors.

The 'IDers' have no right to demand that other people do any
damn thing at all for them.

No publisher or sponsoring organization has any responsibility
to let any particular fringe group appear simply in order to
satisfy your misplaced sense of fair play.



Absolutely right. But if the Science Establishment
refuses to hear them, then the Science Establishment jolly
well better be still when the IDers want their theories
taught in the schools as (possible) *science*. The heart of
the whole business culturally is that the Science Establishment
want's neither to hear/refute/affirm the IDers AND wants
them kept out of school. That's a foul in my book. If their
ideas are not science, than this needs to be demonstrated so
as to keep them off the science curricula. Ignoring them
or freezing them out of the discussion is just cheap tactics.



lots more snipping - trying to keep this short.

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Putting aside the name calling, here are some considerations. The ID
"scientists" need to approach the problem scientifically if they expect
scientific acceptance. This means using the scientific method:
1. propose a hypothesis to explain a phenomenon
2. design experimental tests that show that the hypothesis does, indeed,
explain something that is not otherwise adequately explained by conventional
science
3. report these results through refereed journals and conferences. If 1
and 2 are proper and compelling, the results will be accepted, and hence the
hypothesis will be established.
4. keep in mind Occam's razor: the best explanation is the simplest one.

This process usually is iterated, with one set of results suggesting more
investigations. However, repeated assertions that "something" is too
complicated for natural selection to account for it does not constitute a
meaningful hypothesis or its experimental investigation. The ID advocates
have not yet built up a scientific case to insert into the science
curriculum.

IMHO
Steve



I more-or-less agree. There is a philosophical component to their argument
and a scientific one. They are not doing a good job of keeping these issues
separated...

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Robatoy wrote:

In article . com,
"Charlie Self" wrote:


Mark & Juanita wrote:



One quote from Darwin is telling (no, fred, I'm not going to list a cite
-- look it up yourself), when he was questioned regarding fundamental
problems with his theories was that yes, there were problems, but that his
theory was the best thing available that wasn't based on creation -- hardly
a scientific comment.



Well, we might try another quote from Darwin: "We can allow satellites,
planets, suns, universe, nay whole systems of universes, to be governed
by laws, but the smallest insect, we wish to be created at once by
special act."



Man cannot create a worm, but we create gods by the thousands.

(somebody said that)


In a related vein:

Q: What is the difference between God and a Surgeon?

A: God does not consider himself a Surgeon.

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Tim Daneliuk wrote:
charlie b wrote:

Tim Daneliuk wrote:

charlie b wrote:


If the scientific method is taught in religion and philosophy
classes and applied in class, maybe then "intelligent design"
might be discussed in science classes.

It *is* taught in religion and philosophy classes. Logic is formally a
part of Philosophy, not Mathematics. The Scientific Method is a
discipline rooted in logic and philosophical empiricism (also taught in
religion and philosophy classes). I say this having been educated in one
secular state university, one 'fundamentalist' private college, and
another Catholic private college. The theory of how science acquires
knowlege is of considerable interest to theologians and philosophers ...
at least the ones who taught me.



I'm betting you were taught by Jesuits right?


No. I am not Catholic nor do I have much patience
for the RC church on lots of different levels
(social, philosophical, political ...)


No surprise to me, having had a bit of Catholic education
myself.



One of the arguements the ID folks present is
"this organism is extremely complex, too complex
to merely just happen by accident. therefore
it had to be designed by some intelligent entity".


That is their *conclusion*, but they claim they
have a Scientific case to make to support that
conclusion. We may well never know, because
the Science Establishment today it putting huge
resistance up (dare I say, with "religious" fervor)
to avoid having this debate.


Astrologers claim they have a scientific case to make
that planetary motions affect human behaviour. I submit
that it is not at all inapropriate to deny them space
in Astronomy and Psychology Journals even though some
Astorlogers, unlike ALL IDers deny that there is any
metaphysical component or conclusion in their work.

Scientifically, ID is a nonstarter because it presumes,
invokes, or draws conclusions about a metaphysical influence.
Science by its very nature purposefully excludes metaphysical
considerations. Science is a search for physical explanations
for natural phenomena.




They overlook the billions of years of trial and
error that went into how that complexity developed.
If there was intelligent designer there wouldn't
be a need for multiple iterations of a design to
meet a specific environment/set of conditions.


You don't know that. It is entirely possible that
an intelligent designer incorporated evolutionary
processes into the development of the Universe.
It is possible that multiple iterations were
"created" to make the resulting system "adaptive"
so that best design wins - a sort of genetic
algorithm approach.


But that is cetainly NOT what is at issue with the ID.

Any number of scientists who are adherants of religions
that include creation mythology regard natural law as
having been written by God's hand. None-the-less they
recognize that science is the search for understanding of
those laws, not the identification of the author.

....


But even with 5 billion years of R&D, we
(males) still don't have hair that'll last
a lifetime , at least not me.


That's because we modern humans have the bad
manners to live long beyond the duration needed
to reproduce. A truly counter-evolutionary
behavior.


Not so fast. When grandparents assist in the raising of
their grandchildren the parents who are in the prime of life
are freed to expend more of their time on other matters
important to the survival of the species. Thus there
is an evolutionary advantage to long life which may outweigh
the cost in additional resources used to sustain that long
life.

--

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And God Said, Let There Be Light in Kansas
By Gene Weingarten
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, August 14, 1999; Page C01

Memo to: The members of the Kansas Board of Education

From: God

Your decision to eliminate the teaching of evolution as science.


Thank you for your support. Much obliged.

Now, go forth and multiply. Beget many children. And yea, your children
shall beget children. And their children shall beget children, and their
children's children after them. And in time the genes that have made you
such pinheads will be eliminated through natural selection. Because that
is how it works.

Listen, I love all my creatures equally, and gave each his own special
qualities to help him on Earth. The horse I gave great strength. The
antelope I gave great grace and speed. The dung beetle I gave great
stupidity, so he doesn't realize he is a dung beetle. Man I gave a
brain.

Use it, okay?

I admit I am not perfect. I've made errors. (Armpit hair--what was I
thinking?) But do you Kansans seriously believe that I dropped
half-a-billion-year-old trilobite skeletons all over my great green
Earth by mistake? What, I had a few lying around some previous creation
in the Andromeda galaxy, and they fell through a hole in my pocket?

You were supposed to find them. And once you found them, you were
supposed to draw the appropriate, intelligent conclusions. That's what
I made you for. To think.

The folks who wrote the Bible were smart and good people. Mostly, they
got it right. But there were glitches. Imprecisions. For one thing, they
said that Adam and Eve begat Cain and Abel, and then Cain begat Enoch.
How
was that supposed to have happened?

They left out Tiffany entirely!

Well, they also were a little off on certain elements of timing and
sequence. So what?

You guys were supposed to figure it all out for yourselves, anyway.
When you stumble over the truth, you are not supposed to pick yourself
up,
dust yourself off and proceed on as though nothing had happened. If you
find a dinosaur's toe, you're not supposed to look for reasons to call
it
a croissant. You're not big, drooling idiots. For that, I made dogs.

Why do you think there are no fossilized human toes dating from a
hundred million years ago? Think about it.

It's okay if you think. In fact, I prefer it. That's why I like Charlie

Darwin. He was always a thinker. Still is. He and I chat frequently.
I know a lot of people figure that if man evolved from other organisms,
it means I don't exist. I have to admit this is a reasonable assumption
and a valid line of thought. I am in favor of thought. I encourage you
to
pursue this concept with an open mind, and see where it leads you.

That's all I have to say right now, except that I'm really cheesed off
at laugh tracks on sitcoms, and the NRA, and people who make simple
declarative sentences sound like questions?

Oh, wait. There's one more thing.

Did you read in the newspapers yesterday how scientists in Australia
dug up some rocks and found fossilized remains of life dating back
further
than ever before? Primitive, multicelled animals on Earth nearly 3
billion
years ago, when the planet was nothing but roiling muck and ice and
fire.
And inside those cells was . . . DNA. Incredibly complex strands of
chemicals,
laced together in a scheme so sophisticated no one yet understands
exactly
how it works.

I wonder who could have thought of something like that, back then.

Just something to gnaw on.


© Copyright 1999 The Washington Post Company


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BTW, none of this has anything to do with George W Bush drinking,
but it is STILL off-topic.

This discussion now fall squarely within the subject matter of
talk.origins but I suppose people who want Scientific Journals
to publish papers about God are not going to be inclined at all
to moving this thread to a newsgroup where it belongs.

Not, I daresay, a coincidence.

Mark & Juanita wrote:
On 29 Sep 2005 16:16:03 EDT, Tim Daneliuk wrote:

Steve Peterson wrote:

See http://www.cjr.org/issues/2005/5/mooney.asp and http://www.ncseweb.org/
for some information on evolution and "Intelligent Design." ID is at best a
pseudoscientific attempt to undercut teaching of evolution. It is big on


That may be true. Just bear in mind that postulating intelligent
design/creation is *not* the same argument as demanding a literal
reading of the Genesis account.

public relations and press coverage, but basically void of the key to the
scientific method, i.e. making testable predictions.


Then why is the Science community so terrified to led ID have it's day
in court (journals, conferences, etc.) and *refute* it? So far,
most of what I've found is members of the Science Establishment
taking ad hominem pot shots, not actually refuting the IDer methods
or claims.


Because it could potentially expose their own slavish adherence to a
certain orthodoxy and faith as well as the underlying first postulate that
relies upon suspension of all current laws of science and logic for the
initial genesis of the universe ...


Which is an issue of cosmology, not evolutionary biology and I
daresay that NO Journal of nor conference on Evolutionary Biology
will or should accept papers on cosmology.


to which they pledge their allegience to
the laws of science and logic? i.e, one of the fundamentals of science and
logic is that for every effect,there must be a cause -- sometimes that
cause is not easy to unravel or identify (ala Locke), but there is a cause.
The fundamental tenet of current cosmology requires the suspension of that
scientific principle (Ex nihilo nihil -- from nothing, nothing comes) and
substitutes instead a non-causal event (from nothing, everything comes).
Until the adherents to this theory can explain the origin of their big bang
and its causitive agent, they have nothing more to stand on than any other
theology.


Aside from the confabulation I addressed above, it is clear that
you do not undersand the Big Bang Theory. Big Bang theory does
not presume that the Universe was preceded by nothing.

However, "Creation Science" does presume that God Created the
Universe, "from the void".

Of course, like most scientists, I don't have a problem with that.
Putting aside for the moment the question of whom is a scientist
and whom is not almost everyone who calls himself a scientist
does have a problem with religionist insisting that "God did it"
must be an acceptable element of scientific theory.

For crying out loud, any time someone runs accross something they
can't explain they can just declare that "God did it" and be
done with it. Science came into existance precisely because
some people decided to look for non-divine casuality.


One quote from Darwin is telling (no, fred, I'm not going to list a cite
-- look it up yourself), when he was questioned regarding fundamental
problems with his theories was that yes, there were problems, but that his
theory was the best thing available that wasn't based on creation -- hardly
a scientific comment.


Before explaining why your final statement is plainly wrong let me
proceed on the assumption that the quote is reasonably accurate
and suggest a probable context. Natural Selection and adapted
traits were readily understood and observed. The stumbling block
for evolution theory in the 19th Century was the issue of
inheritance. While selective breeding was understood to the
extend that it had becomea very useful process there was still
no underlying physical process that could account for the
inheritance of traits whether they had been selected for or
acquired.

This was equally a problem for Lamarck and Darwin. So probably
Darwin's remarks was in the context of THAT problem.

Need I point out how easy it would have been for either Larmarck
or Darwin to address that deficiency by modifying the second laws
of their respective theories to say:

"Those traits are passed on to the next generation by Divine
intervention."

Logically, their theories would then be proven but only if,
a priori_ you accept a logic that allows metaphysical intervention
in the material world. To their credit neither man resorted
to that, the oldest excuse for an explanation that is to be
found in the historical record. They had enough backbone (or
not enough chutzpah) to make such a claim.

So the statement attributed to Darwin: "yes, there were problems,
but that his theory was the best thing available that wasn't
based on creation" IS a very scientific statement.

Scentific theories are by their very nature the best explanations
for Natural phenomena that are independent of metaphysical
considerations.

Until you accept that, you reject science.

"God chose to do it this way" is not an element of a scientific
theory. It is an excuse to not do science at all.

--

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George wrote:
wrote in message
ups.com...
You say that those great Scientists had to "kick Science to the
next level". In fact, they met with resistance not from the
Scientific community but fron politics and religion. It is
not Science that had to be kicked, it was non-Science that
had to be kicked and it often kicked back.


You'll want to re-think that one. Scientists have both politics and
religion - pretty much the same thing , belief over observation - and thus
do not operate in an intellectual ivory tower.


No and I suggest you read what I went on to write about each
of them. If some contemporaries of Copernicus were reluctant
to accept the Copernican model, or spoke out against it, maybe
it was because others who did not were being burned at the stake.
That is not an example of scientists allowing THEIR politics
and religion ot get in their way.

Fact is, prior to Keppler's discovery of the laws of planetary
motion there was no scientifically compelling reason to prefer
a heliocentric model over a geocentric one. Kepler's laws
made teh heliocentric model more attractive becuase it then
had predictive value, albeit through correlation, not causative
considerations. The discovery of the law of gravity and the
developement of dymanics were needed to provide a sound
theoretical basis on which to prefer one over the other.

A reluctance to accept a new theory that lacks a sound scientific
basis to prefer it over existing theory unless and until such
a basis is demonstrated is not adherance to orthodoxy.


"God does not dice with the universe." Is a famous saying by a famous
physicist, but Heisenberg finally gained acceptance in spite of him.


Finally? In spite of him? Of the four papers cited for Einstein's
Nobel prize, three relied on quantum mechanics. That was in 1905.
At that time, Special Relativity, the only non-quantum paper cited,
was the theory most in doubt.

As Carl Sagan (hmm, I can hear booing and hissing in the penut gallery)
said:

They laughed at Galileo, they laughed at Columbus, they laughed at
Einstein and they laughed at Bozo the Clown too.

I'll just point out that it was religious zealots who laughed at
Galileo, competetors for state funds who laughed at Columbus,
Nazis who laughed at Einstein, and people who recognize a clown
when they see one who laughed at Bozo.

The latter folks, I daresay are the same ones who laugh at
"Creation Science" when they see "Intelligent Design".

--

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The question remains, unanswered: Is George Bush drinking?
(And how could you tell)


Tim Daneliuk wrote:
wrote:

Tim Daneliuk wrote:

charlie b wrote:
...


One of the arguements the ID folks present is
"this organism is extremely complex, too complex
to merely just happen by accident. therefore
it had to be designed by some intelligent entity".

That is their *conclusion*, but they claim they
have a Scientific case to make to support that
conclusion. We may well never know, because
the Science Establishment today it putting huge
resistance up (dare I say, with "religious" fervor)
to avoid having this debate.



What on Earth do you mean by "we may never know"? They
can certainly establish their own journals, societies and
hold their own conferences just like homeopaths, chiropodists,
astrologers and polygraphers have.

Nobody is silencing them any more than the Southern Baptists
silence a polymer chemistry by not inviting a chemist
to give a sermon about semipermeable membranes.


You are indulging yourself in some sly rhetorical tricks here
but it doesn't wash. The IDers are making claims of *science*
(or at least they say they are).


One of mistakes is accepting that the IDers are making
"claims of science", on their say so alone, and then extrapolating
from that to the conclusion that they are not getting their
articles published because they are being repressed by "Scientific
Orthodoxy".

Instead of invokig conspiracy therory, shouldn't you consider
the likelihood that they are not being published because their
papers do not rise to the standards, or conform to the subject
matter of the journals to which they are submitted?

Shouldn't you read a few of those ostensibly suppressed papers
and compare them to the articles that are being published in
those same Journals beofor accusing editors and peers about whom
you truly know nothing, of malice or iconoclasty?

"We will never know" whether
or not those claims are founded if there is no *scientific*
peer review of those claims.


What makes you think there has been no peer review? Maybe
those papers were went out for peer review and the peers
were uninimous in ther comments to the editors that the
papers were crap.

For that matter, can you be so sure than any 'IDer' actrually
submitted any such paper in the first place?


...
Just because an 'Iders' _says_ he is not religiously motivated
doesn't make it so. One only has to consider the rapant
dishonest of the overtly religious organisations pushing their
agenda to at least wonder if birds of a feather do not,
in reality, flock together.


Ad hominem


No no, that was guilt by association. It is not ad hominem to call
a dishonest person, a dishonest person.


SNIP

Today, the ONLY supporters of 'ID' are the likes of Pat Robertson,
Oral Roberts (damn I wish that check had bounced) and their
minions. Even you don't claim to support ID, you seem only
to be arguing for 'equal time' based on some sort of misplaced
multicultural sense of fairness that might be appropriate if
they wanted to publish in YOUR journal but certainly not in
someone else's!


No. I'm arguing that specialists in a field are most suited
to evaluate claims made in/against their field.


Evidently those experts when acting in their roles as
editors of Journals in their fields, or peers who review
those papers have concluded that the putative papers in
question are not appropriate for publication. So why
don't you accept their evaluation?



You seem to believe that the 'IDers' at least honestly think
they have a legitimate scientific claim but the people you
are asking to publish those claims seem to have a different
opinion, that they are dishonest, deluded, or both.


No, I think the science establishment appears to be terrified
the IDers might have a point.


I am by no means sure that I believe you.

Astronomers do not debate Astrologers or accept their
papers for publication in Astronomy Journals, the American
Lung Association does not debate the cigarette companies
or allow them to publish in their literature.

Simply engaging in the debate, no matter how ludricous or
indefensible the position of the opponent may be, lends
credence to the misperception that there is a controversy.

In science, there is no ID controversy because "God did
it that way" puts the issue outside of the boundaries of
science itself.



the discussion about Evolution would
truly be over. IOW, all the Science Establishment
has to do to shut up the IDers is to show
(experimentally) an primordial soup becoming
a reptile which, in turn, evolves into, say,
Ted Kennedy.



And that is a self-serving argument because it purposefully
ignores the practical matter of the time required for the
process to occur.

A similar criticism can be made for many other natural processes
like plate techtonics or the stellar lifecycle.

Speciation is inferred from the fossil record and by extapolation
from the natural developement of varietals within a species just
like plate techtonics is inferred from the geological record and
by extrapolation from present day motion.


All true. The point here is that the science by direct experiment
is far stronger than science by inferrence or induction alone.
The science establishment appears to reject even the possibility
that IDers have a point to make, and is doing so on the weaker
of the methods available to science.


No the ideas are rejected for publication in a scientific Journal
because they are fundamentally metaphysical in nature. (Or rather,
I presume they are. You have not yet shown that any ID article
ahs ever been written, let alone submitted for publication.)

Whereas Scientific Journals uniformly reject papers confabulating
metaphysics with physical reality there are plenty of Journals
devoted to Metaphysical Considerations that do not mind inclusion
of some physical considerations. The IDers can publish there.
Indeed, since the sine quo non of ID is the inclusion of a
metaphysical element, by your argument it is the metaphysicists
who are most competent to evaluate it. The Evolutionary biologists
freely admit to having no professional expertise in metaphysics.

....

If the AGU refused to accept "Intelligent Navigation" papers
on continental drift would THAT upset you?


If the claimants that were rejected argued that they had new
science to bring to the table and couldn't even get a hearing,
yes it would.


That arguement adn some above, demonstrate a profound of the
proces sof publication is a Scientific Journal.

Pretty much every paper that is submitted gets a hearing. It
doesn't get to trial (e.g. publication) unless it passes peer
review. Probably most don't make it to peer review for the
same reasons that most lawsuits are returned to the petitioner
by a clerk without even being reviewed by a judge.

Of course we (including you) won't know for sure unless we
see some examples of what you claim to be happening.

--

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Tim Daneliuk wrote:
...
I more-or-less agree. There is a philosophical component to their argument
and a scientific one. They are not doing a good job of keeping these issues
separated...


Do you suppose that maybe that makes it difficult for them to get a
paper accepted for publication?

--

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Tim Daneliuk wrote:
wrote:

SNIP of interesting history of science

One supposes that Brahe had to express some opinion on
cosmology in order to get funding and to stay out of
prison so he did the best he could without drawing the
ire of the religious and political powers. An apt analogy
can be made to many of today's public school administrators.


A more apt analogy would be the modern working *scientist*
the overwhelming majority of whom feed at the public
trough. This is once of the principal sources of the
intertia in the science establishment IMO.


That could become true if the 'science establishment'
backslides to the point where it must placate the
'religiosu establishment' to avoid a fiery demise tied
to a stake.


More history snipped

I stipulate your history is correct. I think you
are filtering the degree of resistance these new ideas
met with from within the establishment science of their
day because, in retrospect, they turned out to be right
(except for our pal Tycho). I rather think that the
turning points of science we're discussing here didn't
just get quietly accepted by the other scientists of
the day without some fairly pointed argument and resistance.


Perhaps you confuse pointed argumetn and other thorough
vetting _with_ resistance. Scientists accept new science
as fast as it can be shown to be correct. Most new science
is shown to be incorrect so of course scientist do not
rush to embrace new theory just because it looks like it
_might be_ correct. Scientists do not determine the correctness
of theory by argument alone, They require physical evidence
and THAT Mr Daneliuk is one of the most important features
that distinguishes science from metaphysics.


Here we do have a good analog to present day politics. The
new "Jewish Physics" is Evolutionary Biology. It is under
political attack, being demonized by a marginalized political
faction (in the present case one with religous roots) for
purely politcal purposes. Like their predecessors who found
scientists or at any rate, men who called themselves scientists
to criticize "Jewish Physics" these people support those who
present a superficially scientific challenge to Evolutionary
Biology, e.g. the "intelligent design" guys.


This is a vast overstatement of Reality. Evolutionary
Biology has had it say and its way in education and popular
culture without significant opposition for a long, long
time.


False to fact as any one who publishes shcoolbooks or
teaches biology to college freshmen can tell you.
The "Creation Science" movement had not yet died away
before the "ID" rebranding of it emerged and at the
time the creation science 'controversy' was created,
evolutionary biology was by no means ubiquitous in
the public schools. My Boss, a well educated man
had never heard of Lamarck before I mentioned him
in a conversation.

The fact is that the central theory of modern biology gets
short shrift at best in almost all the public schools.

The fact that anyone *dares* to now question it
hardly demonizes it. Your level of bunker mentality here
rivals the Evangelical Fundamentalists who also believe
that they are the downtrodden and oppressed in these
matters.


You, for example, are not merely 'daring to question'
evolutionary biology. You accuse 'the science establishment'
in general and in particular editors and peer reviewers
of supressing papers, claiming the motive for this
conspiracy is 'adherance to scientific orthodoxy'.
I daresay demonization is apt.


SNIP


"Intelligent Design" is just a reformulation of Creationism
in which the Creator "guides' the evolution of species rather
than creating them directly by divine will. It is pretty


That's not exactly the case. Some versions of "author"
theories accept evolution as a mechanism, some do not.


But that doesn't change the fact that the esential element
of each is "God did it".



"Intelligent Design", like all theologically based philosphical
constructs rests on the premise of some sort of divine
intervention.


Again, you are overstating a strawman. The proponents of ID are
theologically motivated, without question. But they assert that their
*claims* are rooted in science. Why is it so painful to give them the
hearing necessary to refute at least the scientific components of their
claims? I do not get the visceral objection to this that you and others
in the community of scientists seem to have.


Asuming for the moment that ID papers are being rejected, why
is it so hard for you to believe that they are being rejected
because they do not rise to the objective standards of the
journals to which they have been submitted.

You seem to be saying "So what if the paper may be a bad paper, how
could it hurt to publish it." Publishing a bad paper hurts plenty
and that is why journals have peer review.

Don't you think that the people suing school boards would sieze
upon the publication of any paper, no matter how bad or how
thoroughly disproved and present it as proof of an issue in
controversy?

The IDers are desparate to get a paper referring to GOD published
becuase they want to use it as a means of forcing religious
teaching back into the public schools.


In my opinion, this visceral objection is not driven by science per se
but by the regnant personal philosophy of many people within the
community. A good many scientists are self professed atheists and/or
agnostics. It just kills them to consider the possibility that
the discipline to which they clung as a sole source of knowledge
may in fact be better served by means of metaphysical considerations.
So, they retreat to "Not on *my* watch, this isn't really science,
etc."


I daresay that is the sort of approach you typically label
"ad hominem". However, I will point out that there are legions
of scientists who believe in God and practice a variety of religions
who also regard ID as unscientific.


Once again, if the scientific claims of ID and all the rest
are *bad* science, it ought easily to be refuted. But refusing
to even engage makes the science estabishment look silly and
scared. In some perverse sense, refusal to engage with the IDers
as a matter of science is giving them more credibility in the
popular political debate than you think they deserve. Ponder
that a moment.


The mere act of engagement lends credence to their claims.
If the AGU were to debate teh FLat Earth societ on the
issue of the shape of the Earth the papers the next day would
run the story under the headline "Shape of the earth debated,
opinions differ". An then the flat Earthers would argue
for the inclusion of their model into the public school
curriculum, or at least for the schools ot be llowed to
"Teach the Controversy" but not in the a class devoted
to consideration of current social issue but in the Science
Classrooms.

But the reality is that the IDers are worse than that. They
are afraid that teaching that it is possible to understand
something without invoking God will lead students away
from God and religion. If that happens, how woul Pat
Robertson keep his programming on the air?


No scientific theory will or even can disprove
the existance of divine intervention. But no theory that is
dependant on divine intervention, is scientific.


Right, this is the standard argument for what science is and does.
I am asserting that this is a bad judgement call on the part of
the scientific community. Science without metaphysics will always
be blind in one eye.


It may be argued that a person who approaches life ignoring
metaphysics is blind in one eye but a scientist approaching
science while setting aside his metaphysical beliefs is deaf
in both eyes.

If more scientists understood metaphysics and more
theologians understood the methods of science I believe (but
cannot prove) that there would be a cross pollination of productive
ideas.


THAT is not a problem.

I'm not arguing for the dilution of science here - I am
arguing for its *augmentation* .


Some people argue that silicone implants augment breasts.
Others argue that they merely enlarge the breasts without
augemntaion in any real sense. It is an issue incontroversy.

But there is no controversy as to whether or not silicone
IS breast tissue.

This is valid so long as everyone
involved understands the limits of each of these systems of thought.


But you repeatedly argue for a merger of the two, specifically for
the publication in scientific journals of papers pupoprting to present
scientific evidence for the existance of God.

--

FF

  #102   Report Post  
justme
 
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In article ,
says...
wrote:

Tim Daneliuk wrote:

charlie b wrote:
...


One of the arguements the ID folks present is
"this organism is extremely complex, too complex
to merely just happen by accident. therefore
it had to be designed by some intelligent entity".

That is their *conclusion*, but they claim they
have a Scientific case to make to support that
conclusion. We may well never know, because
the Science Establishment today it putting huge
resistance up (dare I say, with "religious" fervor)
to avoid having this debate.



What on Earth do you mean by "we may never know"? They
can certainly establish their own journals, societies and
hold their own conferences just like homeopaths, chiropodists,
astrologers and polygraphers have.

Nobody is silencing them any more than the Southern Baptists
silence a polymer chemistry by not inviting a chemist
to give a sermon about semipermeable membranes.


You are indulging yourself in some sly rhetorical tricks here
but it doesn't wash. The IDers are making claims of *science*
(or at least they say they are). "We will never know" whether
or not those claims are founded if there is no *scientific*
peer review of those claims. This is fundamentally different
than "not inviting a chemist to give a sermon about semipermeable
membranes." Because theology and chemistry are not both scientific
disciplines and thus not open to similar review processes. The essence
of the ID claim is that (at least part of it) is that it is *science*
so why shouldn't the existing infrastructure of science be called
upon to review it?

Just because an 'Iders' _says_ he is not religiously motivated
doesn't make it so. One only has to consider the rapant
dishonest of the overtly religious organisations pushing their
agenda to at least wonder if birds of a feather do not,
in reality, flock together.


Ad hominem


The reason that their claims are never reviewed is because they never
make any. All they do is state a few unfounded hypotheses with no
evidence or claim behind them.

If you doubt this then, please go ask ask a few. you will quickly find
out that they fall into two camps.

The first are the scientifically illiterate who wouldn't know a theory
if it bit them. These people simply regurgitate what they read in some
booklet somewhere, with as little understanding as a speak-and-spell.

The second are the morally bankrupt who know they do not have a
scientific leg to stand on, but hope that by spewing out a bunch of
techno-babble, that they can convince those in the first camp that they
aren't being fed a bunch of pure BS.


  #104   Report Post  
Tim Daneliuk
 
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wrote:

SNIP

A more apt analogy would be the modern working *scientist*
the overwhelming majority of whom feed at the public
trough. This is once of the principal sources of the
intertia in the science establishment IMO.



That could become true if the 'science establishment'
backslides to the point where it must placate the
'religiosu establishment' to avoid a fiery demise tied
to a stake.


Hey, if the science establishment wishes to not be
under the scrutiny of populist politics (which I think
we both agree damages science) it ought to find private,
voluntary funding for both research and schools.
Then no elected school board could dictate much of anything.


_might be_ correct. Scientists do not determine the correctness
of theory by argument alone, They require physical evidence
and THAT Mr Daneliuk is one of the most important features
that distinguishes science from metaphysics.


"Physical Evidence", huh? Well ... some of that is
pretty tenuous "evidence" arrived at by abstract modeling
and induction upon the slightest physical hints. The whole
Big Picture of evolution hinges on a lot of inductive steps
far removed from physical evidence. I cited one such
example previously: There is no direct physical evidence
showing a jump from lower- to higher biocomplexity. This
step is inferred from what physical evidence does exist.

Moreover, Science and Metaphysics both proceed from
undemonstrable starting points. They both assume their
foundational methods to be reliable and correct. There
is no a priori way to show one as better or more correct
than the other except, possibly, by means of utilitarian
arguments. Metatphysics too requires "evidence" just
not apparently of a sort your willing to grant has equal
status with "physical evidence".


SNIP

The fact is that the central theory of modern biology gets
short shrift at best in almost all the public schools.


Uh .. pretty much *all* thinking get short shrift in
public schools - they're *public* which means that by
their very nature their first allegiance is to
political forces and secondly to the NEA...



The fact that anyone *dares* to now question it
hardly demonizes it. Your level of bunker mentality here
rivals the Evangelical Fundamentalists who also believe
that they are the downtrodden and oppressed in these
matters.



You, for example, are not merely 'daring to question'
evolutionary biology. You accuse 'the science establishment'
in general and in particular editors and peer reviewers
of supressing papers, claiming the motive for this
conspiracy is 'adherance to scientific orthodoxy'.
I daresay demonization is apt.


That's not exactly the emphasis of my accusation. My
emphasis is that the science establishment, faced
with a political environment (public school) has appeared
to be running from the fight rather than confront it.
It makes some of us wonder just why. I do not attribute
any particularly Machiavellian motive to this at all.



SNIP

"Intelligent Design" is just a reformulation of Creationism
in which the Creator "guides' the evolution of species rather
than creating them directly by divine will. It is pretty


That's not exactly the case. Some versions of "author"
theories accept evolution as a mechanism, some do not.



But that doesn't change the fact that the esential element
of each is "God did it".


The essential elment of the *metaphysics* is "God did it",
but this is not necessarily presupposed in the scientific
claims of such theories - at least some of them. Moreover,
Science ought to remain completely mute to the statement
that "God did it" because it has nothing to offer in either
support or refutation. Whether the Universe operates by
magic, having sprung forth from a burst of smoke from
Nothing Whatsoever, or is the product of a creating God
involved in His creation at every quanta is not a question
Science can remotely address. This does not keep a good
many Scientists from treating Theists like idiot children.




"Intelligent Design", like all theologically based philosphical
constructs rests on the premise of some sort of divine
intervention.


Again, you are overstating a strawman. The proponents of ID are
theologically motivated, without question. But they assert that their
*claims* are rooted in science. Why is it so painful to give them the
hearing necessary to refute at least the scientific components of their
claims? I do not get the visceral objection to this that you and others
in the community of scientists seem to have.



Asuming for the moment that ID papers are being rejected, why
is it so hard for you to believe that they are being rejected
because they do not rise to the objective standards of the
journals to which they have been submitted.


Because I have read/heard far more ad homina commentary from
people defending establishment science than I have seen/heard
thoughtful refutation. This may be a knowledge problem on
my part. So, if you can direct me to a clear refutation of
ID that points out why it has no merit being considered as Science,
I'm all eyes ...


You seem to be saying "So what if the paper may be a bad paper, how
could it hurt to publish it." Publishing a bad paper hurts plenty
and that is why journals have peer review.


Oh c'mon. There are plenty of lousy or marginal papers published
in all manner of Scientific journals. Sometimes this happens
by accident, sometimes because the claims of the writer are
sufficiently opaque that it needs wider peer review.
Putting an ID paper on "trial" in a journal like "Nature" would
be good for everyone involved. It would require the IDers
to get their story clear and to the poing scientifically, and
the critics could line up to take their swing at it.



Don't you think that the people suing school boards would sieze
upon the publication of any paper, no matter how bad or how
thoroughly disproved and present it as proof of an issue in
controversy?

The IDers are desparate to get a paper referring to GOD published
becuase they want to use it as a means of forcing religious
teaching back into the public schools.


Again, the foul here is having public schools in the first place.
This is a debate much like the one about the Plege Of Allegiance.
These problems disappear when we quit abusing taxpayers to pay
for schools and let parents figure out which schools they
wish to fund themselves. This would also have the salutary
effect of elimination the anti-knowledge madrassas found in
most major universities's humanities and social science programs.



In my opinion, this visceral objection is not driven by science per se
but by the regnant personal philosophy of many people within the
community. A good many scientists are self professed atheists and/or
agnostics. It just kills them to consider the possibility that
the discipline to which they clung as a sole source of knowledge
may in fact be better served by means of metaphysical considerations.
So, they retreat to "Not on *my* watch, this isn't really science,
etc."



I daresay that is the sort of approach you typically label
"ad hominem". However, I will point out that there are legions
of scientists who believe in God and practice a variety of religions
who also regard ID as unscientific.


I would be grateful for a cite here.


I think we've pretty much beat this to death and will leave the last
word to you on the matter. I do appreciate the civil tone you've
maintained throughout...
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim Daneliuk

PGP Key:
http://www.tundraware.com/PGP/
  #105   Report Post  
George
 
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wrote in message
oups.com...


As Carl Sagan (hmm, I can hear booing and hissing in the penut gallery)
said:

They laughed at Galileo, they laughed at Columbus, they laughed at
Einstein and they laughed at Bozo the Clown too.

I'll just point out that it was religious zealots who laughed at
Galileo, competetors for state funds who laughed at Columbus,
Nazis who laughed at Einstein, and people who recognize a clown
when they see one who laughed at Bozo.

The latter folks, I daresay are the same ones who laugh at
"Creation Science" when they see "Intelligent Design".

Disengage yourself from the argumentative mode and read as if to understand
the writer, versus spin an unrelated set of paragraphs.

Every scientist does, in spite of your contention, have a belief set that
colors their skepticism and even denial of others' explanations of reality.
The source may be religion in the traditional sense, environmentalism, love
or hate of technology in general, tradition, even "political correctness" -
makes not a difference. The point is, nobody individually, nor science as
an entity, starts tabula rasa in evaluating observations. Wouldn't get far
if they did, because science presumes rules govern the universe, and they
use the rules as much to rule out as to predict.

Thus my choice of quotations. With Einstein, it was a dislike of
probability, or perhaps just a love of cause and effect that made him
disparage Heisenberg. That, and the term "God" were the reason I used the
quote. Sorry you missed it. Thought it was appropriate.




  #106   Report Post  
Odinn
 
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On 9/30/2005 8:03 AM George mumbled something about the following:
wrote in message
ups.com...

You say that those great Scientists had to "kick Science to the
next level". In fact, they met with resistance not from the
Scientific community but fron politics and religion. It is
not Science that had to be kicked, it was non-Science that
had to be kicked and it often kicked back.



You'll want to re-think that one. Scientists have both politics and
religion - pretty much the same thing , belief over observation - and thus
do not operate in an intellectual ivory tower.

"God does not dice with the universe." Is a famous saying by a famous
physicist, but Heisenberg finally gained acceptance in spite of him.


Actually, the saying is. "God does not play dice with the universe" (you
missed the word 'play'). This was in deferrence to Laplace's theory
that if at one time, we knew the positions and speeds of all the
particles in the universe, then we could calculate their behaviour at
any other time, in the past or future.

--
Odinn
RCOS #7
SENS(less)

"The more I study religions the more I am convinced that man never
worshiped anything but himself." -- Sir Richard Francis Burton

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  #107   Report Post  
 
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George wrote:
wrote in message
oups.com...


As Carl Sagan (hmm, I can hear booing and hissing in the penut gallery)
said:

They laughed at Galileo, they laughed at Columbus, they laughed at
Einstein and they laughed at Bozo the Clown too.

I'll just point out that it was religious zealots who laughed at
Galileo, competetors for state funds who laughed at Columbus,
Nazis who laughed at Einstein, and people who recognize a clown
when they see one who laughed at Bozo.

The latter folks, I daresay are the same ones who laugh at
"Creation Science" when they see "Intelligent Design".

Disengage yourself from the argumentative mode and read as if to understand
the writer, versus spin an unrelated set of paragraphs.

Every scientist does, in spite of your contention, have a belief set that
colors their skepticism and even denial of others' explanations of reality.
The source may be religion in the traditional sense, environmentalism, love
or hate of technology in general, tradition, even "political correctness" -
makes not a difference. The point is, nobody individually, nor science as
an entity, starts tabula rasa in evaluating observations. Wouldn't get far
if they did, because science presumes rules govern the universe, and they
use the rules as much to rule out as to predict.


OK, agreed.

I trust you will also agree that science as an institution and
scientists as people recognize this phenomenum to be a flaw,
even if they are blind to when they themselves personally
are guilty of it.

Which is why a major effort is made in science to adopt protocols
that protect against, among other things, observer bias.

It is also why there is peer review and why an editor of a peer-
reviewed Journal can justify returning without further comment,
a paper that alleges or draws conclusions about divine intervetion.
That is a pretty clear indicator that the author has crossed
the line between objectivity and religious/political beliefs.


Thus my choice of quotations. With Einstein, it was a dislike of
probability, or perhaps just a love of cause and effect that made him
disparage Heisenberg. That, and the term "God" were the reason I used the
quote. Sorry you missed it. Thought it was appropriate.


Understood. And thank you for the opportunity to elaborate further.

Please correct me if I am wrong but I do not think that Einstein
published his famous remark in a paper in a peer-reviewd journal.
Nor, I daresay did Einstein oppose the publication of papers in
Quantum Physics. Absent his own contributions to Quantum Physics
he almost certainly would not have received the Nobel Prize.

I am quite confident that, if called upon to review a paper
invoking as a natural mechanism or drawing a conclusions as
to divine intervention he would have recommended against
publication.

No one is arguing that scientists should not believe in God or
even be outspoken or religous issues even as they relate, in
a philosophic sense, to their work. The argument is that
a scientist should not intermingle religious explanations
with natural law itself. Religion and science are close
philosophic neighbors. Good fences make good neighbors.

Einstein never proposed "God does not play dice" as a natural
law.

--

FF

  #108   Report Post  
 
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Odinn wrote:
On 9/30/2005 8:03 AM George mumbled something about the following:
...

"God does not dice with the universe." Is a famous saying by a famous
physicist, but Heisenberg finally gained acceptance in spite of him.


Actually, the saying is. "God does not play dice with the universe" (you
missed the word 'play'). ...


Not to be too persnickedy about it but I expect it was first said
in German. Probably both of your translations are correct, since
'to dice' and 'to play dice' mean the same thing in English, the
latter is simply more commonplace, though my preference would be
the more anachronistic 'to cast dice'.

--

FF

  #109   Report Post  
Steve Peterson
 
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Thus my choice of quotations. With Einstein, it was a dislike of
probability, or perhaps just a love of cause and effect that made him
disparage Heisenberg. That, and the term "God" were the reason I used
the
quote. Sorry you missed it. Thought it was appropriate.


Understood. And thank you for the opportunity to elaborate further.

Please correct me if I am wrong but I do not think that Einstein
published his famous remark in a paper in a peer-reviewd journal.
Nor, I daresay did Einstein oppose the publication of papers in
Quantum Physics. Absent his own contributions to Quantum Physics
he almost certainly would not have received the Nobel Prize.

Keep in mind that the Nobel Committee just about had to give him the prize
based on his 1905 papers, but the one they cited was the explanation of the
photoelectric effect, the least revolutionary of the bunch. See
http://nobelprize.org/physics/laureates/1921/.

I am quite confident that, if called upon to review a paper
invoking as a natural mechanism or drawing a conclusions as
to divine intervention he would have recommended against
publication.

No one is arguing that scientists should not believe in God or
even be outspoken or religous issues even as they relate, in
a philosophic sense, to their work. The argument is that
a scientist should not intermingle religious explanations
with natural law itself. Religion and science are close
philosophic neighbors. Good fences make good neighbors.

Einstein never proposed "God does not play dice" as a natural
law.

--

FF

Editors of scientific journals would love to publish something as
revolutionary as ID, if the work would withstand peer review of its science.
So far, ID hasn't done so, and IMHO won't. What will happen is that
continued investigations will add more and more data that support evolution
by survival of the fittest.

The statement of the Steve's List of the National Center for Public
Education says:


Evolution is a vital, well-supported, unifying principle of the biological
sciences, and the scientific evidence is overwhelmingly in favor of the idea
that all living things share a common ancestry. Although there are
legitimate debates about the patterns and processes of evolution, there is
no serious scientific doubt that evolution occurred or that natural
selection is a major mechanism in its occurrence. It is scientifically
inappropriate and pedagogically irresponsible for creationist pseudoscience,
including but not limited to "intelligent design," to be introduced into the
science curricula of our nation's public schools.

I am Steve #564

See
http://www.ncseweb.org/resources/art..._2_16_2003.asp





  #110   Report Post  
George
 
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"Steve Peterson" wrote in message
nk.net...
It is scientifically
inappropriate and pedagogically irresponsible for creationist
pseudoscience, including but not limited to "intelligent design," to be
introduced into the science curricula of our nation's public schools.


"Inappropriate?"

"Irresponsible?"

Sounds like value judgment to me.

So who are these people who restrict what will and won't be taught or
thought? Do they demand full human sacrifice, or only information for open
minds?

Bad enough textbooks have to get a Nihil Obstat from the NOW, and an
imprimatur from the NAACP. Now we have to run it by your "list" too?




  #111   Report Post  
George
 
Posts: n/a
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Others disagree.

http://www.hawking.org.uk/lectures/dice.html

Mumble on.


"Odinn" wrote in message
...
On 9/30/2005 8:03 AM George mumbled something about the following:
wrote in message
ups.com...

You say that those great Scientists had to "kick Science to the
next level". In fact, they met with resistance not from the
Scientific community but fron politics and religion. It is
not Science that had to be kicked, it was non-Science that
had to be kicked and it often kicked back.



You'll want to re-think that one. Scientists have both politics and
religion - pretty much the same thing , belief over observation - and
thus do not operate in an intellectual ivory tower.

"God does not dice with the universe." Is a famous saying by a famous
physicist, but Heisenberg finally gained acceptance in spite of him.

Actually, the saying is. "God does not play dice with the universe" (you
missed the word 'play'). This was in deferrence to Laplace's theory that
if at one time, we knew the positions and speeds of all the particles in
the universe, then we could calculate their behaviour at any other time,
in the past or future.

--



  #112   Report Post  
Lew Hodgett
 
Posts: n/a
Default

Subject

More fish **** bull****.

It doesn't belong here.

Lew

  #113   Report Post  
Odinn
 
Posts: n/a
Default

On 10/1/2005 6:39 PM George mumbled something about the following:
Others disagree.

http://www.hawking.org.uk/lectures/dice.html

Mumble on.


"Odinn" wrote in message
...

On 9/30/2005 8:03 AM George mumbled something about the following:

wrote in message
groups.com...


You say that those great Scientists had to "kick Science to the
next level". In fact, they met with resistance not from the
Scientific community but fron politics and religion. It is
not Science that had to be kicked, it was non-Science that
had to be kicked and it often kicked back.



You'll want to re-think that one. Scientists have both politics and
religion - pretty much the same thing , belief over observation - and
thus do not operate in an intellectual ivory tower.

"God does not dice with the universe." Is a famous saying by a famous
physicist, but Heisenberg finally gained acceptance in spite of him.


Actually, the saying is. "God does not play dice with the universe" (you
missed the word 'play'). This was in deferrence to Laplace's theory that
if at one time, we knew the positions and speeds of all the particles in
the universe, then we could calculate their behaviour at any other time,
in the past or future.

--




Disagree about what? About it being "God does not play dice" instead of
"God does not dice"?

Quoted from the site that you posted.

Einstein was very unhappy about this apparent randomness in nature. His
views were summed up in his famous phrase, 'God does not play dice'.

Or disagree about it being in deference to Laplace?

Quoted the next sentence from the same site you posted.

He seemed to have felt that the uncertainty was only provisional: but
that there was an underlying reality, in which particles would have well
defined positions and speeds, and would evolve according to
deterministic laws, in the spirit of Laplace.


Now what is Hawkins disagreeing with me about again?
--
Odinn
RCOS #7
SENS(less)

"The more I study religions the more I am convinced that man never
worshiped anything but himself." -- Sir Richard Francis Burton

Reeky's unofficial homepage ... http://www.reeky.org
'03 FLHTI ........... http://www.sloanclan.org/gallery/ElectraGlide
'97 VN1500D ......... http://www.sloanclan.org/gallery/VulcanClassic
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  #114   Report Post  
 
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Steve Peterson wrote:
...
Please correct me if I am wrong but I do not think that Einstein
published his famous remark in a paper in a peer-reviewd journal.
Nor, I daresay did Einstein oppose the publication of papers in
Quantum Physics. Absent his own contributions to Quantum Physics
he almost certainly would not have received the Nobel Prize.

Keep in mind that the Nobel Committee just about had to give him the prize
based on his 1905 papers, but the one they cited was the explanation of the
photoelectric effect, the least revolutionary of the bunch. See
http://nobelprize.org/physics/laureates/1921/.


An excellent article but I disagree on one point:

While I, and certainly nearly every other physicist alive today
would not hesitate to declare the Special Theory of Relativity
to be by far the most important work published in physics that
year, most I daresay would consider his paper On the Photoelectric
Effect, to be much more important than the other two. Brownian
motion was already qualitatively understood, and his paper on
the Specific Heats of Salts, simply did not not have the far
reaching effects of either of the two.

As you probably know, in his paper on the Photoelectric Effect
Einstein resolved a ~50-year old conundrum that was so vexing
to Phyisics that it was called "The Ultraviolet Catastrophe".
By successfully applying quantum theory to the problem Einstein
cemented the rols of the quanta in theoretical physics.

--

FF

  #115   Report Post  
 
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George wrote:
"Steve Peterson" wrote in message
nk.net...
It is scientifically
inappropriate and pedagogically irresponsible for creationist
pseudoscience, including but not limited to "intelligent design," to be
introduced into the science curricula of our nation's public schools.


"Inappropriate?"

"Irresponsible?"

Sounds like value judgment to me.


Me too.

Dunno about you, but if my tax dollars are going to pay for
public education I want to get good value in return.

--

FF



  #116   Report Post  
Mark & Juanita
 
Posts: n/a
Default

On Sat, 01 Oct 2005 20:36:11 GMT, "Steve Peterson"
wrote:

.... snip


The statement of the Steve's List of the National Center for Public
Education says:


Evolution is a vital, well-supported, unifying principle of the biological
sciences, and the scientific evidence is overwhelmingly in favor of the idea
that all living things share a common ancestry. Although there are
legitimate debates about the patterns and processes of evolution, there is
no serious scientific doubt that evolution occurred or that natural
selection is a major mechanism in its occurrence. It is scientifically
inappropriate and pedagogically irresponsible for creationist pseudoscience,
including but not limited to "intelligent design," to be introduced into the
science curricula of our nation's public schools.


i.e., the theory of evolution has now been reduced to orthodox dogma, and
to dare question it is tantamount to heresy and shall be dealt with
severely.

FYI, there are numerous scientists with strong credentials who strongly
question the dogma of macro-evolutionary theory.

I am Steve #564

See
http://www.ncseweb.org/resources/art..._2_16_2003.asp







+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+

If you're gonna be dumb, you better be tough

+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
  #117   Report Post  
 
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wrote:
Steve Peterson wrote:
... See
http://nobelprize.org/physics/laureates/1921/.

An excellent article but I disagree on one point:



Apologies for misremembering the timeline. By 1921 EInstein
had published a great body of work more important than his
paper on the photoelectric effect. But outside of relativity,
I daresay his work on the photoelectric effect was the
most important.

--

FF

  #118   Report Post  
 
Posts: n/a
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Mark & Juanita wrote:
On Sat, 01 Oct 2005 20:36:11 GMT, "Steve Peterson"
...

i.e., the theory of evolution has now been reduced to orthodox dogma, and
to dare question it is tantamount to heresy and shall be dealt with
severely.


Even if that were true, it would be _scientific_ orthodox dogma
and therefor would be in its proper place in a science classroom,
along with other scientific 'orthodox dogma' like conservation of
mass and energy.

This, in contrast to 'ID' which being an orthodox religious dogma,
belongs in the religion classroom.

FYI, there are numerous scientists with strong credentials who strongly
question the dogma of macro-evolutionary theory.


All scientist who are worth a damn strongly question all sceintific
theory at every opportunity. Science is advanced by doubt. "God
did it." does not provide such an opportunity.

A list of biologists and an examination, in their proper context,
of their comments, might be illuminating.

--

FF

  #119   Report Post  
Bruce Barnett
 
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"George" George@least writes:

"Steve Peterson" wrote in message
nk.net...
It is scientifically
inappropriate and pedagogically irresponsible for creationist
pseudoscience, including but not limited to "intelligent design," to be
introduced into the science curricula of our nation's public schools.


"Inappropriate?"

"Irresponsible?"

Sounds like value judgment to me.


So who are these people who restrict what will and won't be taught
or thought? Do they demand full human sacrifice, or only
information for open minds?


Yes, let's teach voodoo, astrology, hex signs, tea reading, palm
reading, Tarot, water dowsing, spiritualism, psychometry, and
phrenology as valid forms of science and scientific thought in our
schools. Who really needs to understand concepts like "hypothesis"
"experiment" or "control?"

And be sure to use Road Runner cartoons to demontrate principles of
physics. We all know that if we flap our arms fast enough, we can
protect ourselves when we fall over a cliff.

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Bruce Barnett
 
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Mark & Juanita writes:

i.e., the theory of evolution has now been reduced to orthodox
dogma, and to dare question it is tantamount to heresy and shall be
dealt with severely.


The "theory" of evolution has predicted measured events millions of
times accurately.

No other theory can accurately predict what we measure with every
fossil we find.

If you have another theory that can be shown to be accurate 99.99999%
of the time, please submit it to a journal for review by peers.

For instance, if we find a horse-like fossil from rocks created in the
olicocege period, paleontologists can predict characteristics of the
fossil that they have never seen, even if it's a new variety. There
may be, and have been, surprises in the fossil record, as we learn
more and more. But the surprises are small. We don't see horses
suddenly changing from 2-legged to 4-legged creatures, or fossils of
Unicorns.

Your comment about questioning evolution being tantamount to heresy
is frankly silly. It's like questioning gravity. Facts are facts. The
parahippus came after the kalobatippus, which came after the
miohippus, which came after the epihippus, which came after the
pachynolophus, etc.

FYI, there are numerous scientists with strong credentials who
strongly question the dogma of macro-evolutionary theory.


It's okay to question it. Scientists can question everything. That's
what they do. But science is based on hypothesis and experiment. We
can use evolution to predict the characteristics of fossils of
different geological ages, including fossils of new and unexpected
types and categories.

ID has predicted nothing, and there is no way to measure its accuracy.

As I understand it, It tries to explain a LACK of knowledge. It tries
to say that between fossil A and C, there was no intermediate fossil.
So the theory can only be disproved one example at a time, and never
ever proved.

I can propose a theory that the universe was created at the moment of
my birth. This includes everyone "older" than I to be created
instantly with their apparent age, factual evidence, and memory, all
done by God for my benefit. (Something similar is done by literal
creationists, as light from stars millions of light years away must
have been created by God in transit on their way to earth.)

There is no way to disprove this theory I have proposed. That's
because it isn't science.

Perhaps those scientists who believe in Intelligent Design can
describe a way to test their hypothesis? I'd like to see this.

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