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zukiphile wrote:

axe wrote:

You don't "teach" a critique. Don't delude yourself, you know damn well that isn't the intention of people shoving ID into school curricula. You know as well as I do that it's Creationist in nature, and you're aware of its religious undertones. If ID were a legitimate critique of evolution -- and only that -- there would be no problem. But it's much more than that.

That strikes me as a frank statement of the basis for many of opposing questions about evolution in the classroom.

Significantly, it rests on an assessment of the intent behind the questions and an apprehension not that the questions themselves are objectionable, but that they are the camel's nose under the tent of biology classroom's nationwide being read bits of the Genesis.

Yes. I think most of the "honest" opposition to ID stems from that. I think we can all agree that most of the people pushing ID have a religious agenda, that's hardly a secret. Hell they even called it the "wedge" strategy, to cram God into schools. Not exactly subtle.

Axe, I also need to ask:

How the heck do you reconcile what you're saying here with what you said here:

The scientific community seems unwilling to leave any margin for error with Evolution, because 1) it's nearly impossible to prove, and 2) the only other scenario getting any airplay is of a religious nature, and I'd say most would commit seppuku before saying "God did it".

or this?

I don't think it's in the scientific spirit at all. I'd say it's disgraceful actually, up there with how they're shutting down all discourse on global warming.

http://www.npboards.com/thread/13371/is … of-science


And one final question.

You don't "teach" a critique.

Was that statement supposed to be serious?  Cause if that's the case, then I guess canadian schools are just vehicles for transmitting dogma.  Which wouldn't surprise me in the least. 

Qwinn

Last edited by Qwinn (07-02-2008 06:52 PM)

Qwinn wrote:

Axe, I also need to ask:

How the heck do you reconcile what you're saying here with what you said here:

The scientific community seems unwilling to leave any margin for error with Evolution, because 1) it's nearly impossible to prove, and 2) the only other scenario getting any airplay is of a religious nature, and I'd say most would commit seppuku before saying "God did it".

or this?

I don't think it's in the scientific spirit at all. I'd say it's disgraceful actually, up there with how they're shutting down all discourse on global warming.

http://www.npboards.com/thread/13371/is … of-science

I hope you aren't taking my criticism of ID as an exoneration of the evolutionist camp.. Because it isn't. They *have* been shutting down any discourse on the subject, which is why I said earlier in this thread that I would have no issue with ID if it were genuinely just a counterpoint for evolution, a critique of it. Unfortunately, it isn't.

Qwinn wrote:

And one final question.

You don't "teach" a critique.

Was that statement supposed to be serious?  Cause if that's the case, then I guess canadian schools are just vehicles for transmitting dogma.  Which wouldn't surprise me in the least. 

A critique is just that, it's an addendum to something. You don't take a critique and say "this is how things are", which is what the creationist movement wants to do. Why do you think they called ID a "wedge"?

axe wrote:

zukiphile wrote:

I have little doubt that some very few would like to see that.  I do think that sort is very rare.  Even if they weren't rare, I believe the bulk of those people homeschool, and for legal reasons, you won't see US biology curricula shift to an explanation of God for biological phenomena.

The anxiety about what these people can and will ultimately do seems overwrought.

An August 2005 poll from The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life showed 64% of Americans favoring the teaching of creationism along with evolution in science classrooms, though only 38% favored teaching it instead of evolution, with the results varying deeply by education level and religiosity. The poll showed the educated were far less attached to intelligent design than the less educated. Evangelicals and fundamentalists showed high rates of affiliation with intelligent design while other religious persons and the secular were much lower.[58]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligen … n_movement

I don't know about you, but I find that scary.

I don't find it scary for several reasons.

Your article mentions ID organisations that claim even higher support for teaching "creationism".  My experience is that discussing creationism/ID/evolution without defining what the terms mean is pretty fruitless.  People mean all sorts of different thinks by the terms and until you know what people mean by the term, you can't know what they are rendering an opinion on.

Your article notes something like "64% say god created man directly while 22% say man evolved from lower life forms" (it isn't a direct quote, but I think the gist is right) as if these things exclude one another.

Down here, boards of education are elected directly from our school districts.  If it were really true that "64% of Americans favoring the teaching of creationism along with evolution in science classrooms", then why did it take so long to happen, and then only in one midwestern berg?

As to the correlation of level of education with certain opinions, I resist the notion that this is because the longer one is in school, the more likely he is to have the right answer.  Unusual length of education also correlates positively to not voting, not understanding how markets work, and an undue tolerance of Stalin and Mao.

The correlation between creationism and fundies is hardly shocking, since these people will as a matter of dogma believe either literally or metaphorically that written in the Bible, including God's creation of man.  I suspect that many fundies believe that God created man directly the way many american RCs believe that abortion is wrong and they have a duty to follow magisterium, which is to say that they believe it unless they want to do something contrary.

Finally, not to sound cloistered, but if 64% of americans are creationists, why have I never met one?

zukiphile wrote:

You assert that belief in a scientific premise differs from a belief in any other premise...

No, I assert that a premise based in science is what belongs in a science class and a premise based on faith belongs in a philosophy class.

I also want to note that I see a lot of discussion but I have yet to see anyone present any evidence that would support the existence of a "Creator" or "Designer".


We . and by "We" I mean those of us who have this crazy idea that Science class is for actual SCIENCE...

WE understand that YOU, and by "You" I mean the proponents of Creation Science & Intelligent Design...



WE understand that YOU think that evolution is lacking. Thank you for your opinion.

However, your personal belief that evolution is lacking doesn't mean that you get to shove your religious beliefs into a science class.

It ALSO doesn't change the fact that your critique HAS been examined and has been found not merely lacking but actually laughable.


Finally, your attempts to disguise Creation Science by draping it with pseudo-science have failed. And they have failed not ONLY because your "theory" is so obviously not theory but religion that a blind man could see it in the dark; but ALSO because you so obviously haven't got the slightest idea of what you are critiquing.


Example, from this VERY THREAD:

Creation Science/Intelligent Design advocates sometimes try to claim that current evolution science still puts forward the Piltdown Hoax as a fact. This is of course nonsense as that hoax was uncovered over a half century ago. 60 year old textbooks prove nothing. Nor do more recent ones written by people who should be READING textbooks, not writing them.

The fact is that CS/ID advocated try to define evolution according to its colloquial meaning rather0 than it's scientific one, reducing their claims to straw men that appear to be UNAWARE of the ACTUAL claims of evolutionary biology of; let alone address them.

MC Escher wrote:

I also want to note that I see a lot of discussion but I have yet to see anyone present any evidence that would support the existence of a "Creator" or "Designer".

the implications of design are that there is then a designer...  That is the major difference between CS and ID.  CS argues from the creator back to the design -- ID argues from the implications of design back to a creator.

Note that in the purely scientific ID, there is no "creator" named -- just that there must be one.

MC Escher wrote:

We . and by "We" I mean those of us who have this crazy idea that Science class is for actual SCIENCE...

WE understand that YOU, and by "You" I mean the proponents of Creation Science & Intelligent Design...

Why the dichotomy?  That is of your own (and Scientism as an ideology's) making.

MC Escher wrote:

WE understand that YOU think that evolution is lacking. Thank you for your opinion.

However, your personal belief that evolution is lacking doesn't mean that you get to shove your religious beliefs into a science class.

It ALSO doesn't change the fact that your critique HAS been examined and has been found not merely lacking but actually laughable.

Nice try... I'd expect more from such a scholarly debator.  All you've done so far is exert your own particular fallacy.

MC Escher wrote:

Finally, your attempts to disguise Creation Science by draping it with pseudo-science have failed. And they have failed not ONLY because your "theory" is so obviously not theory but religion that a blind man could see it in the dark; but ALSO because you so obviously haven't got the slightest idea of what you are critiquing.

And you have just demonstrated that you fail to even recognize the major difference between ID and CS as detailed above.

MC Escher wrote:

The fact is that CS/ID advocated try to define evolution according to its colloquial meaning rather0 than it's scientific one, reducing their claims to straw men that appear to be UNAWARE of the ACTUAL claims of evolutionary biology of; let alone address them.

Creationism does this.  I don't see that ID really cares about all this stuff at all.  They're actually observing real data, and formulating real predictions based on that data.

Also, let's actually pin down a definition of evolution...  I'll leave that to you, seeing as you seem to have a decent definition in mind.  After all, how can we even have a decent debate when the terms are in flux?

At the end of the day, all you are doing is parroting Judge Jones -- and that court decision OUGHT to have raised the ire of a purported "true conservative" such as yourself -- but in this instance (and a few others of late) it would appear that you are rather, actually, left of center.

glfredrick wrote:

MC Escher wrote:

I also want to note that I see a lot of discussion but I have yet to see anyone present any evidence that would support the existence of a "Creator" or "Designer".

the implications of design are that there is then a designer...  That is the major difference between CS and ID.  CS argues from the creator back to the design -- ID argues from the implications of design back to a creator.

Note that in the purely scientific ID, there is no "creator" named -- just that there must be one.

As the popular saying goes, "Niggah Please".


I was born at night, but not LAST night.


I was alive AND paying attention when the "Creation Science" nippleheads decided to re-position their product and rename it "Intelligent Design".


And this nonsense about not naming a creator?

That qualifies for another and entirely separate "Niggah Please".


The very idea that you would would subscribe to a philosophy that REQUIRES a creator and then try to claim that it's actually science because you don't NAME the creator?

Should we stop paying attention to the man behind the curtain too?



In fact, forget all that...


You have yet to even prove that any putative flaw or hole in current evolutionary theory REQUIRES a creator/designer. In fact, you CAN'T.

If there's something that current evolutionary theory cannot explain, that doesn't mean that the ONLY answer is a creator. It means that they can't do it NOW.

And an ABSENCE of an explanation is NOT evidence that there isn't one.

Go ahead...

Ask Matt if you don't believe me.

Absence of Evidence is not evidence of absence.


And here come YOU idiots, putting forth this religious bullshit that you have slapped a scientific label on and claiming that YOUR idea is the missing explanation.



And let me be clear...

You're not an idiot because you believe in God or because you believe that God moves the universe...


You're an idiot because you don't actually UNDERSTAND what you've been arguing.

.


.


You see a problem in current Evolutionary Biology. You say; "Hey! It can't answer such and such question!"

And you're right. It can't.

And then you put forward this idea that you call "Intelligent Design".

Forget about the fact that the rest of us are supposed to pretend that ID isn't just re-packaged "Creation Science". Forget that completely.


You put forward ID as "The Answer".


Except it ISN'T the answer, it's the ARGUMENT.


You know what the answer is? The one you're putting forward? IT'S GOD, YOU FUCKING NIPPLEHEAD!!!

You concoct the HUGE argument about why Evolution is flawed, and then at the VERY MOMENT when you're supposed to put forth the answer by revealing your proof of the existence of THE DESIGNER; you punt!

"Oh... We don't NAME a designer... We just claim that you NEED one."



Well you know what you've got?


ALL argument, and NO substance.


Let me know when you are ready to present a METHOD OF TESTING YOUR HYPOTHESIS.

Then I'll stop laughing, and I'm sure that the whole of the scientific community will as well.

Sorry Quinn, but you have yet to demonstrate the capacity for original thought.

Therefore your question is most likely a rephrasing of something that has already been asked and answered.


You are encouraged to review the material until you understand it. While it is understood that this may take a significant amount of time, it's good for you.

Quinn -

The maximum effective range of an excuse is zero-point-zero meters.

If you want to prove that you DO have the capacity for original thought, then you'll simply answer the two questions; which really do no more than ask you to explain your own words.

MC Escher wrote:

zukiphile wrote:

MC Escher wrote:

No, I assert that a premise based in science is what belongs in a science class and a premise based on faith belongs in a philosophy class.

Which, again, simply assumes your own premise of what science is as its own conclusion.

I'm flattered that you think that I have so much power that I managed to convince practically the entire scientific community of the correctness of MY PERSONAL PREMISE; and do so SO EFFECTIVELY that they had already rejected Creation Science before I was even born.

As your demarcation article and its sources explained, you have not convinced the scientific community of your premise.

MC Escher wrote:

If there's something that current evolutionary theory cannot explain, that doesn't mean that the ONLY answer is a creator. It means that they can't do it NOW.

And an ABSENCE of an explanation is NOT evidence that there isn't one.

Go ahead...

Ask Matt if you don't believe me.

Absence of Evidence is not evidence of absence.

That is spot on.

The entire evolutionary narrative -could- be 100% correct, including a process by which dead material comes to life, its descendants compete, change, get bigger and more complex, vary into all sorts of different species, on and on until we evolve to the point where we find this sort of thing entertaining.  Missing transitional fossils or scientific rejection of spontaneous generation doesn't rule out that narrative.

Just because we don't have the evidence to support that narrative with certainty doesn't mean it didn't happen, just that it requires some faith to believe it happened.

zukiphile wrote:

As your demarcation article and its sources explained, you have not convinced the scientific community of your premise.

The entire evolutionary narrative -could- be 100% correct, including a process by which dead material comes to life, its descendants compete, change, get bigger and more complex, vary into all sorts of different species, on and on until we evolve to the point where we find this sort of thing entertaining.  Missing transitional fossils or scientific rejection of spontaneous generation doesn't rule out that narrative.

Just because we don't have the evidence to support that narrative with certainty doesn't mean it didn't happen, just that it requires some faith to believe it happened.

That you could make those two statements illustrates that at BEST you misunderstood the demarcation article and that you understand evolutionary biology about as well as most laymen understand the law.