I'm still waiting to see some sort of cogent counter-argument from Darwinists regarding ID. Here's a cool book review of one of their attempts. Well worth reading, in order to get a feel for the ad-hominem nature of most anti-ID arguments, as well as the reasonableness of the ID advocates at the Discovery Institute.
Oh, and Darwinist Peanut Gallery, I'm not calling the DI people reasonable because they are on "my side", I am on "their side" because I consider them reasonable. I wasn't always an anti-Darwinist. Okay? Ten years ago, I was with you, ridiculing "creationists" and theists. M'kay? Reasonable arguments changed my mind. Your unreasonable, beside-the-point arguments are failing to change it back.
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One of the best capsule arguments I have heard against ID as a scientific theory is this: ID supposes that life as complex as ours must have been designed. Being able to design means the designer has complexity comparable to, or greater than, the designed work. If the designer exists outside the universe, it is a deity, and science cannot analyze it. If the designer existed within the universe, who or what designed it, since the premise is that it is too complex to arise spontanouesly?
This leads into a broader area of uncertainty. Despite your earlier statements that you do not agree with New Earth Creationism, I am unsure what you *do* believe about the origins of life.
You do not believe Darwinian evolution produced the world. You do not believe the world was created 7,000-odd years ago. You believe someone or something (who or what?) designed or steered life (and what else?) using some mechanism (which one?). That is so vague it is neither provable nor disprovable. It is unreasonable to expect someone with a well-documented scientific theory (evolution) to bother debunking a hypothesis with such fundamental gaps.
The very reason that ID has had so much success to date is precisely because its advocates refuse to be clear about exactly what ID really means; everyone who wants to believe in it can find an interpretation that works for them. However, the defenses of ID to date are based on denying other explanations, so it is not science. When ID advocates are both clear and honest about what it means to them, the religious and anti-scientific essence of the position becomes clear. It is dishonest to expect someone to argue rationally against religion, since all religion is ultimately based on a faith that cannot be rationally argued.
Lest you complain that my comment is an "ad hominem" attack, note that I am not against IDers because they are not on "my side". I am against them because I consider their ID arguments unreasonable. The cure for that is simple: ID advocates must provide a clear and precise explanation of what ID actually means. I do not expect it to cover all the details, but identification of a designer and a design mechanism would be a good start towards making it as solid as evolution.
Thanks for commenting.
I don't find your capsule argument to be much of a stopper. The ID guys are arguing that design is detectable. I think they have good arguments for this. If the designer is a deity and science cannot analyze it, then so what? Does the world end? If the designer existed in the universe then does that change the observability that life is designed? Neither of these difficulties (and I don't perceive them as such) should have a bearing one way or another on the premise that the work of a designer is detectable. Nor on whether Darwinism itself is a ludicrous blind alley, unless that is, Darwinism is actually supported mainly by theological ("A competent God would not have designed this way!"), metaphysical ("I only believe in things I can detect with my five senses!"), and aesthetic ("What kind of God would have created such a haphazard, pain-filled, ugly world?") assumptions, which in my opinion, it is.
I don't doubt that the world is billions of years old and that the mix of life forms has changed over geological time. I believe that God, The Holy Trinity, Yahweh, created the universe and life. But who I think it was has zero bearing on whether or not design is detectable, so what difference does it make who I think did it? As for "mechanism", it is a category error to speak of Omnipotence using a mechanism. I assume you believe in the Big Bang (as do I). Why? What was the "mechanism" by which everything (including the laws of physics) came from nothing? Is "mechanism" even an applicable term for creation ex nihilo?
Maybe you're asking what I think would show up on the "video tape" of life's unfolding if we could watch it? The answer is I don't know.
If my Catholicism were based on a faith that cannot be rationally argued, I would not be Catholic. Why do you assume that many of the greatest minds of the last two millenia were just pissing up a rope?
I believe there is a good positive case for ID as an "inference to the best explanation". Even if it were not so, I believe that the ID movement's critique of other (i.e. Darwinian) explanations are pretty compelling. Between ID and Darwinism I find that it is the latter that is a betrayal of everything we know from the rest of science, as well as a betrayal of proper reasoning. In fact, I regard Darwinism as the greatest delusion that science has ever entertained.
Without a prior assumption of metaphysical naturalism, I find Darwinism's explanation of molecules-to-man evolution to be completely absurd and anti-intellectual.
Poor, benighted me. What a disgrace I am. No?
As for IDers providing a clear and precise definition, do you state your complaint after having read the primary ID works by Behe, Johnson, Meyer, Dembski, et al, or not? If not, then it seems to me that you really are NOT looking for a real definition. These guys also give reasons for why ID does NOT attempt to identify the designer or the mechanism. Why do you require something that ID doesn't even claim to offer? If metaphysical naturalism is not really supported by sound science (as a conclusion rather than as a bald assumption necessary to make Darwinism seem reasonable), then the demand for a "mechanism" is simply incoherent. This isn't to say that there aren't plenty of investigatable mechanisms at work in life that support its unfolding into new forms. Just that there's no reason to expect that some "mechanism" got the ball of life rolling in the first place.
If I believed in metaphysical naturalism, your arguments (and the arguments of Darwinists) would seem sound to me. But I don't. So they don't. As I said before, I don't think the arguments for Darwinism are very compelling absent a belief in metaphysical naturalism. That means that I can hardly hold Darwinism (speaking for all of Science) as a reason why I SHOULD believe in metaphysical naturalism. Maybe that means I'm stuck in a vicious circle of anti-scientific stupidity. Ah well, there's a growing amount of company over here where I'm sitting. We'll do all right...
Also, it's hard to see why I would regard your argument as ad hominem, since it clearly wasn't.
If there is design in a system, we can detect it. But if there is no design in a system, we can often detect design anyway. One famous example of this is the "face on Mars" photograph that was later shown to be a trick of the light. Humans are astonishingly good at finding patterns, even where there is no underlying pattern. As this applies to ID, specified complexity does not meaningfully distinguish between designed systems and evolved systems.
The point about identifying the designer is this: If the designer existed in the universe, how did the designer come about? (Either the designer was designed, in which case you have to ask by whom or what, or the designer arose spontaneously, in which case you have to ask why not us.) If the designer exists outside the universe, teaching ID in schools is a violation of the First Amendment because it is religious doctrine. It is even more specific when you specify that the deity is omnipotent.
Why do you think that molecules-to-man evolution is "completely absurd" without the assumption of metaphysical naturalism? We can observe deterministic physical processes that, reliably, produce successively more complex organic molecules. These processes are described by laws and theories that govern many other events. We can observe that, reliably, more efficient or better-adapted organic structures tend to propagate. The explanation for that is obvious. These two rules are all that are necessary for life to evolve. Why add an actively involved designer to the mix?
I see one form of religion (there may be others) that is approximately compatible both with a deity "designing" life and evolution: Namely, that the deity selects mutations, environment, or both, and steers life in the preferred direction, according to the rule-of-thumb that advantageous adaptations propagate. This interpretation differs from my beliefs as to the mechanisms selecting mutation and environment, but including those in "Darwinian evolution" is itself a category error.
The reason I said that faith cannot be rationally argued is that one critical component of religious faith is that it cannot be rigorously proven. I do not presume that I can convince you of metaphysical naturalism or atheism, since those are well within the domain of faith. Can you rationally argue that Islam is wrong where it disagrees with Catholicism, to the point where you can consistently convert steadfast Muslims?
"Humans are astonishingly good at finding patterns, even where there is no underlying pattern."
And, I suppose Darwinism (the whole idea of patterns of random mutation and natural selection) is somehow exempt from this dynamic?
"If the designer exists outside the universe, teaching ID in schools is a violation of the First Amendment because it is religious doctrine. It is even more specific when you specify that the deity is omnipotent."
Once again, how is this relevant to the detectability of design? Is your argument, "To say that we can successfully detect design could raise some uncomfortable political questions, therefore we cannot successfully detect design?" Somehow I don't find this compelling.
"We can observe deterministic physical processes that, reliably, produce successively more complex organic molecules. These processes are described by laws and theories that govern many other events. We can observe that, reliably, more efficient or better-adapted organic structures tend to propagate. The explanation for that is obvious. These two rules are all that are necessary for life to evolve."
Simply show me the experiments that have produced RNA or DNA (capable of producing functional proteins) from scratch using simple precursors, and I'll be a long way toward being convinced. So would most other ID people. Such a simple thing. So please quit hiding all of this alleged evidence!
Your two rules, on their own, are woefully insufficient to establish Darwinistic evolution as a logical certainty (which seems to be how you regard them). I've seen many Darwinists break down your rules into a set of 6 or 7 sub rules, which they think establishes the logical INEVITABILITY of Darwinism. They spell them out slowly for us benighted souls, as if only a retard would be incapable of seeing how Darwinism is as provable as the Pythagorean Theorem. They then proceed to ignore or shout down pertinent objections to the simple inevitability of their whole elegant, ironclad scheme. Poppycock.
If atheism is well within the domain of faith, then what establishes it? Not science. Why, then, the hostility to a Christian view of science and creation, which, for all you know, might be true? If atheism is a faith, why does it get to decide how science must work?
I didn't claim that faith could be rigorously proven, only that it can be rationally argued. I think it is quite possible to rationally argue for Catholicism and against Islam. Tough to reach steadfast Muslims, though, since their governments tend to frown on such things, to put it mildly.
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