what good is Intelligent Design?

Petrel

Please be more careful in your posts. You attribute a post by Craig by the Sea, the wonderful sea, to me. That is unconscionable.

Also I have been on the science forum and read the fairy tales posted there. I fail to see how anyone who claims to have been saved by the grace of God can embrace an atheistic philosophy/religion like evolution, unconscionable!

Are you a rocket scientist like Craig by the Sea, the wonderful sea?

 

Thrilling, I misattributed and misinterpreted the first part, and then you confirm my misinterpretation for me. . . Nothing if not predictable. So I'm unconscionably embracing atheist religion while claiming to be saved, huh? You certainly are a winsome person.

I'm not a rocket scientist, I'm an organic chemist (with a bioorganic focus), which is considerably more pertinent to the interpretation of the evidence in the natural realm that indicates where and when species arose. What are your qualifications?

 

The Second Law of Thermodynamics!

Have you seen the missing link on the GEICO ads?

 

Old Regular wrote,

The theory of evolution is neither a philosophy nor atheistic. The amount of "good scientific data" that supports the theory of evolution is so vast as to be immeasurable. And, of course, there is absolutely no good scientific data that refutes the theory of evolution. Is it just a coincidence that more than 99.9% of all Ph.D. biologist, many of whom are Christians, firmly believe in the theory of evolution?

 

Evolution in terms of changes from basic type to basic type defies all scientific data and relies instead on the presupposition that all natural events have natural causes and on interpretations of the data based on that presupposition.

Petrel, the argument I have heard (from Miller, personally, actually) regarding the flagellum being non-IC is an argument which relies on various proteins switching jobs and places in the cell at various times, without any reason to do so. You know that does not happen. I was amazed, listening to him, that any half-way intelligent and/or informed person could make the argument he was making.

At any rate, when all evolution beyond the simple variation known to happen has going for it is a bunch of 'maybe's' and 'what if's', it is time for some real science to be taught in the classroom. Forget intelligent design if that does not appeal to you. Why not present actual data to the kids and let them think out some of it for themselves?

Or is that too radical an idea?

 

That's an excellent idea! My guess is that if we raised a creative, inquisitive child in a box and taught nothing of religion and nothing of the theory of evolution, just taught the three R's and then presented the data from paper after paper showing the addition of information to a viral genome, the necessity of somatic hypermutation for a mature antibody response, the persistence of key genes throughout living organisms but with varying similarity among different organisms, the presence of viral inserts in some organisms in one place and their absence in another, and all of the other data that has been used to formulate the theory of evolution, that child would end up coming up with a theory of common descent with variation resulting in the lifeforms we see today.

Of course such an experiment would be spectacularly unethical.

I have said before that in order to reasonably critique the theory of evolution a person should have the educational equivalent of a college sophomore or junior biology major. I don't think that the average high-school student has the education or the mental discipline to actually evaluate the evidence like that (yes, I do have a low opinion of our education system). Most of the time evolution is taught in passing in biology class. The majority of high school students graduate without even having taken an introductory genetics class.

So yes, I think that it is a great idea to teach any topic by presenting the evidence and allowing the students to reach their own conclusions (as long as stupid conclusions are corrected, of course!) However, this requires a high base level of education for both the students and the teachers (many teachers have an extremely inadequate understanding of evolution) and a flexibility that is completely missing in the traditional classroom.

I am interested in homeschooling and would like to take an approach more like this with my children rather than putting them in a classroom that emphasizes rote learning. It's been my experience that kids coming out of such classrooms are prone to cognitive dissonance because they haven't had any practice integrating disparate facts into a whole. I think this is inevitable with any young person, but more common with people coming from classrooms where they aren't actually taught to think.

But enough of my rant about the public school system.

 

And who determines if the conclusions are 'stupid'?

 

Would you agree that "2 + 2 = 5" is a stupid conclusion?

I didn't know we were proponents of the postmodern notion that there is no such thing as "Truth."

 

Gee, seems to me that there are a lot of people here who put the ideas of men on a par with God's word.

You can say that your interpretation of the scientific evidence supports your interpretation of Genesis, but don't try to say that I have a flawed interpretation when I am taking God at his word and allowing the Bible to interpret itself.

I think it can be pretty easily shown that any interpretation of Genesis that incorporates evolution flies in the face of the understanding of mroe passages than just the one's contained in Genesis.

In Genesis we find the language (KJV) “and it was evening and it was morning the first day”, “it was evening and it was morning the second day”, etc. Every time the Bible refers to evening/morning, it is referring to a 24 hour day.

Let’s look further into the Bible to see more validation of a 6 day creation. Let’s look at Exodus 20:11 "For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy””. Now when the Lord said that to Israel, they were certainly within the time construct we know today, and He certainly knew they would take it as literal days, so to argue against a 6 day creation would seem to be an accusation that God was misleading his people here. By the way, God was an eyewitness to the actual event, unlike Darwin or any other scientist.

Also, Jesus did not argue with this or clarify it in any way in his teachings, though he certainly would have known if it was not understood correctly as far as timing. He did correct on other mis-understandings of the Sabbath, but not that one. Strange thing, if it is not meant to be understood literally.

Look at Psalm 33 for another reference. Look at verses 9, “For he spake, and it was done; he commanded, and it stood fast.” This would seem to contradict any idea that the heaven’s evolved from a big bang, or that the creatures evolved from primordial soup.

Evolutionists argue that everything got here by a process of building up through imperfect copies, with death happening all through the history. Strange that God would look upon it when it was done and call it “good”. Particularly if the case is as they believe, that everything is still evolving.

Add to that the fact that evolution has never been observed in nature (please don't bring in system that are designed to work using mutations, none of them actually change type) and I don't see a lot of support for evolution in the Bible.

 

Thank you, Dave.
Petrel, 2+2=5 is not a stupid conclusion. It may be wrong, but unless I know how the person is thinking, it is not stupid. There are number systems and ways of thinking that very well may result in 2+2 equalling 5.

There are some very clear thoughts among some very young people before we start telling them they are stupid...

If you plan on homeschooling, you are going to need a good deal more respect for the folks who think differently from you. Your children may well be among them.

 

Dave, how does what you posted relate to ID? Most of the ID leaders accept an old earth and many accept common descent. They accept that animal, plant and cellular death happened long before humans existed. Their main dispute is with natural selection. The ID leaders who are Christians (Drs. Dembski, Behe, etc.) typically advocate a figurative interpretation of Genesis and other creation texts.

 

Actually, I was addressing the argument that people who believe in creation are mis-interpreting Genesis 1-11.

As relates to ID, I don't think ID goes far enough. It is a valid point that ID only says that the evidence points to an intelligent designer and does not address who that designer was or what methods he used. It is not a strictly Biblical view any more than evolution is. By and large ID is similar to evolution in that they are trying to make guesses based on some incomplete information that can be gleaned from what has been created. It is arguing with evolutionists on the evolutionists grounds.

I would rather see biblical creation taught as a theory rather than ID. I would perhaps use some of the proofs that ID puts forth as physical evidence of it, but I would not subscribe to all of their theories either. Remember that the only eyewitness to creation is God and He has given us a firsthand account of it in Genesis. Anything man comes up with must be measured against that yardstick.

Many people who say they are Christians (I am making no judgement of whether they are or not, simply pointing out that not everyone who says they are, are), believe in this false understanding of Genesis. The language in no way suggests a figurative interpretation, and the rest of the Bible seems to validate the literal interpretation.

 

Well I don't see any support for a six day recent creation. The Bible can be interpreted figuratively to allow the physical evidence to stand, but if you force the Bible to be literal in this respect, you can't resolve the physical evidence. If you say that Genesis 1-2 is literal, you either have to accept God made everything leaving evidence of an old universe and common descent in order to trick us (the old "it's to test our faith!" hypothesis) or you have to bend over backwards trying to come up with some other explanation that explains all of the data--and no one has succeeded.

 

Petrel,

As far as leaving evidence of an old earth goes there are a couple other possibilities.

First, man's understanding of the evidence left may not be as perfect as we like to think. Remember that God says he made everything out of nothing, but spoke it into existence. He have no idea what by products the actual process may have caused as there is nothing in our knowledge to compare this to.

The second possibility is that it is a test. God has a history of testing men's faith. You can look at the well known example of Abraham being asked to offer Isaac as a burnt sacrifice for validation of that.

Look at II Thessalonians 2:11-12 "And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness."

Evolutionary theory ignores the possibility of God, as such it is a Godless theory that deceives those who will not believe the truth.

By the way, I know this is an end-time prophesy, but I would say we are getting pretty close to the end-time, and this is something that came up in relatively recent times. There is similar language. Isaiah also says something about this:

"He that killeth an ox is as if he slew a man; he that sacrificeth a lamb, as if he cut off a dog's neck; he that offereth an oblation, as if he offered swine's blood; he that burneth incense, as if he blessed an idol. Yea, they have chosen their own ways, and their soul delighteth in their abominations. I also will choose their delusions, and will bring their fears upon them; because when I called, none did answer; when I spake, they did not hear: but they did evil before mine eyes, and chose that in which I delighted not." Isaiah 66:3-4 (KJV)

I think it is a combination of both. We don't interpret the evidence correctly because of our imperfect understanding, and God will allow the delusion of those who wish to subscribe to this in opposition to His truth.

 

If God is trying to test our faith, than God is intentionally lying to us, which means God is not good.

 

Oh, another point on "common descent". If you view commonality as simply the inclusion of similar constructs in similar species, then that negates the proof for common descent. It is like saying that a Ford Explorer descended from a common ancestor of the Ford Mustang. There are virtually mirrored parts in the 2 vehicles, but both were designed individually and always existed uniquely, as did every other automobile.

We know this to be the case from observation, but for biological things that we didn't observe the manufacturing of, we look at similarity or sameness as evidence of "common descent".

 

Well, if you were to observe Ford Mustangs breeding and having baby cars and you were to observe a part get broken on a Ford Mustang and then observe its offspring Mustangs inheriting that broken part, and then observe finally years later an Explorer with that same broken part, than you might be drawing a reasonable conclusion to think that Explorers descend from Mustangs. Since cars don't breed at all, however, it's a bad analogy.

 

By whose judgment? Yours? How is it lying to you if God allows you to understand things incorrectly (that is not meant to be a personal you, but a general you). That is number one. Number two, Satan has some ability to sway men's minds and hearts, doesn't he?

God is righteous, and He also displays righteous wrath at times. Pharoah hardened his heart nine times, then God hardened his heart the tenth. Does that make God bad, or simply justified?

We do not see things perfectly. That is not God's failing, but our own. God wants us to live by faith, not apply man's theories to what God has said in order to change the meaning. That is very clear from scripture. We do not know God's thoughts, nor His ways. He is so far above us as to make us insignificant by comparison. Many warnings in the Bible about the affect of man's pride, as well.

The just shall live by faith.

 

I would say that it's arguing with scientists on materialist grounds. ID (at least the popular ID movement) seems to presume that nature is a competitor to God, and so if natural processes explain something, God must not be involved. Materialists point to the many explanations we have of how nature works and say there's no need for anything supernatural. ID advocates try and find holes in the natural explanations in which to insert a designer, which may or may not be God.

Theistic evolution, by contrast, doesn't accept that nature is a competitor to God. Instead, it accepts that God is the author and sustainer of nature, so what nature does is what God has endowed it with the ability to do. When we see marvels in nature, it's not necessary to find out how they defy nature; instead, we can accept that God is the one who made creation so marvelous. God can intervene in his creation as he chooses, but we don't have to pinpoint his intervention in the creation of tails on bacteria or other such things in order to prop up the belief that he is the creator of all.

There's no indication it's a firsthand account. But, there is another account that does claim to directly records God's words on the subject. It's in Job 38-39. Ironically, this account it generally taken figuratively even by YECs.

I certainly disagree, but since that has nothing to do with ID, I won't sidetrack the thread further than I have already.

 

Ah, but that conclusion would not be the correct one, now would it?

Have you ever observed these cars being made? Maybe they really do breed in those secret factories in Deerborn.

Seriously, the point of the analagy was precisely that. We know they don't breed because they are not biological. A biological entity is an extremely complex machine that was manufactured by someone who has the ability to manufacture living machines that can reproduce. The point I am making is that each was made according to his kind as scripture says. At that point no reproduction had taken place.

And if you spiritualize Genesis, then where is original sin? Was Adam an amoeba that sinned by eating something forbidden? Did original sin enter only after billions of years of evolution? Then why did all the death and destruction happen prior to original sin? How did God declare it good if it is still changing and was the result of massive death of imperfect antecedents?

Without the curse there is no basis for the gospel. How does that fit in to you're figurative Genesis?