Hoover Institute video on Mathematical Challenges to Darwin's Theory

[Brian2]

Sit through an hour of creationist apologetics? No thanks.

It's not an hour of creationist apologetics. Stephen Meyer is the only ID in the group (except maybe the interviewer)
David Berlinski is an atheist (or agnostic) I think and David Gelernter seems to be in between Meyer and Berlinski theologically.
Actually Stephen Meyer shows that intelligence is an inference of scientific evidence, and the 3 of them together seem to roundly condemn the bigotry in Western academia and science concerning Darwinism and say that the inference of a designer must be answered intellectually and not in the religiously bigoted way that it is answered in academia.

 

[Subduction Zone]

Is ID pseudoscience because it brings God into the equation?
Maybe regular science is pseudoscience because it presumes no God.
The whole thing of determining what happened in the past rests on one or the other of those presumptions. So why is the ID presumption pseudo and not the other?
The mathematics used in the video seems to point to the conclusion that the regular science presumption of no designer is wrong (from a probability standpoint). This does not mean that evolution is wrong, just the idea that it happened without a designer. So the mathematics is showing that a God is needed, not that evolution is wrong imo.
Occam's razor in this case would just go with a designer to overcome the mathematical problems OR just allow ID to be a non pseudoscience just as regular science with it's presumption of no God is not called a pseudoscience. God is not another problem that science has to fathom, God is still just something that is left to the theologians but allowed back into science just as the presumption of no God is allowed into science.
That way the theists in science and the atheists should be happy. (But that won't be the case of course)

No, it is pseudoscience because they have no way to test their claims or worse yet, because they lie about science that can.

By definition if your claims cannot be tested you do not have any evidence.

 

[exchemist]

Is ID pseudoscience because it brings God into the equation?
Maybe regular science is pseudoscience because it presumes no God.
The whole thing of determining what happened in the past rests on one or the other of those presumptions. So why is the ID presumption pseudo and not the other?
The mathematics used in the video seems to point to the conclusion that the regular science presumption of no designer is wrong (from a probability standpoint). This does not mean that evolution is wrong, just the idea that it happened without a designer. So the mathematics is showing that a God is needed, not that evolution is wrong imo.
Occam's razor in this case would just go with a designer to overcome the mathematical problems OR just allow ID to be a non pseudoscience just as regular science with it's presumption of no God is not called a pseudoscience. God is not another problem that science has to fathom, God is still just something that is left to the theologians but allowed back into science just as the presumption of no God is allowed into science.
That way the theists in science and the atheists should be happy. (But that won't be the case of course)

No. Spare us the false equivalences, please.

ID is pseudoscience for several reasons, but the chief one is that it relies on supernatural intervention at random points in the process to account for what we observe. Any theory that does that is incapable of making testable predictions, since the random interventions can in principle make any outcome possible. Furthermore, reliance on supernatural intervention as an explanation discourages curiosity and the search for explanations based on natural processes.

So, far from being science, ID is a science stopper.

ID was invented by a lawyer, Philip E Johnson, as a ruse to get God taught in US school biology lessons, as a piece of social engineering. It has no pedigree in science at all and now that Johnson is dead, I expect it to die as well. And a good job too.

 

[Subduction Zone]

It's not an hour of creationist apologetics. Stephen Meyer is the only ID in the group (except maybe the interviewer)
David Berlinski is an atheist (or agnostic) I think and David Gelernter seems to be in between Meyer and Berlinski theologically.
Actually Stephen Meyer shows that intelligence is an inference of scientific evidence, and the 3 of them together seem to roundly condemn the bigotry in Western academia and science concerning Darwinism and say that the inference of a designer must be answered intellectually and not in the bigoted way that it is answered in academia.

No, Stephen Meyer is a dishonest hack. As is Berlinski:

David Berlinski - Wikipedia

Both are associated with the creationist pseudoscientific Discovery Institute. You should be wondering why they did not publish in a well respected professional journal. It is not bigotry to require that people support their claims with evidence.

 

[Heyo]

Is ID pseudoscience because it brings God into the equation?

"After a searching review of the record and applicable caselaw, we find that while ID arguments may be true, a proposition on which the Court takes no position, ID is not science. We find that ID fails on three different levels, any one of which is sufficient to preclude a determination that ID is science. They are: (1) ID violates the centuries-old ground rules of science by invoking and permitting supernatural causation; (2) the argument of irreducible complexity, central to ID, employs the same flawed and illogical contrived dualism that doomed creation science in the 1980s; and (3) ID's negative attacks on evolution have been refuted by the scientific community. ... It is additionally important to note that ID has failed to gain acceptance in the scientific community, it has not generated peer-reviewed publications, nor has it been the subject of testing and research. Expert testimony reveals that since the scientific revolution of the 16th and 17th centuries, science has been limited to the search for natural causes to explain natural phenomena."
from Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District - Wikipedia

 

[exchemist]

It's not an hour of creationist apologetics. Stephen Meyer is the only ID in the group (except maybe the interviewer)
David Berlinski is an atheist (or agnostic) I think and David Gelernter seems to be in between Meyer and Berlinski theologically.
Actually Stephen Meyer shows that intelligence is an inference of scientific evidence, and the 3 of them together seem to roundly condemn the bigotry in Western academia and science concerning Darwinism and say that the inference of a designer must be answered intellectually and not in the religiously bigoted way that it is answered in academia.

Berlinski IS a cdesign proponentsist. He's a member of the Disco Tute, for God's sake. Gerlernter is a computer scientist, with no expertise in biology, who disbelieves in evolution, climate change and thinks women should not be in the workforce.

There was nobody on the panel to represent the relevant science.

 

[Subduction Zone]

Please note, three of the "experts" that the DI was going to have testify for them at the Dover trial were either pulled,or they quit on their own. They could probably see that the other side had real experts in the various fields helping them. Dembski was so frightened that he wanted his own lawyer at the deposition. The only one left was Behe, and we all know how he did:

ID Experts Withdraw from Dover Trial | ScienceBlogs

 

[Subduction Zone]

"After a searching review of the record and applicable caselaw, we find that while ID arguments may be true, a proposition on which the Court takes no position, ID is not science. We find that ID fails on three different levels, any one of which is sufficient to preclude a determination that ID is science. They are: (1) ID violates the centuries-old ground rules of science by invoking and permitting supernatural causation; (2) the argument of irreducible complexity, central to ID, employs the same flawed and illogical contrived dualism that doomed creation science in the 1980s; and (3) ID's negative attacks on evolution have been refuted by the scientific community. ... It is additionally important to note that ID has failed to gain acceptance in the scientific community, it has not generated peer-reviewed publications, nor has it been the subject of testing and research. Expert testimony reveals that since the scientific revolution of the 16th and 17th centuries, science has been limited to the search for natural causes to explain natural phenomena."
from Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District - Wikipedia

One has to feel sorry at times for the poor IDists, wait that does not sound right (IDiots? No, better go with IDists).

When they try to say "God did it" they get told that is not a testable claim. When they form their ideas scientifically, they get refuted. They lose either way.

 

[Brian2]

Berlinski IS a cdesign proponentsist. He's a member of the Disco Tute, for God's sake. Gerlernter is a computer scientist, with no expertise in biology, who disbelieves in evolution, climate change and thinks women should not be in the workforce.

There was nobody on the panel to represent the relevant science.

It was not meant to be a debate about ID verses something else. So your problems with it are strawman problems.

 

[Subduction Zone]

It was not meant to be a debate about ID verses something else. So your problems with it are strawman problems.

What are you talking about? All those people have is ID. They have no science that supports them.

Once again, if you want a scientific debate find the well respected professional scientific journal where they published these claims.

 

[Brian2]

"After a searching review of the record and applicable caselaw, we find that while ID arguments may be true, a proposition on which the Court takes no position, ID is not science. We find that ID fails on three different levels, any one of which is sufficient to preclude a determination that ID is science. They are: (1) ID violates the centuries-old ground rules of science by invoking and permitting supernatural causation;

On the video the idea of intelligence is seen as an inference from the evidence of science.
Are you (or whoever) saying that it is not allowed in science to hypothesise an intelligence behind the universe?

(2) the argument of irreducible complexity, central to ID, employs the same flawed and illogical contrived dualism that doomed creation science in the 1980s; and

That might be correct but finding possible mechanisms that disprove irreducible complexity does not mean that those mechanisms happened or that the time involved and probability for those things to have happened has been shown to be reasonable for the acceptance of those mechanisms.

(3) ID's negative attacks on evolution have been refuted by the scientific community. ... It is additionally important to note that ID has failed to gain acceptance in the scientific community, it has not generated peer-reviewed publications, nor has it been the subject of testing and research. Expert testimony reveals that since the scientific revolution of the 16th and 17th centuries, science has been limited to the search for natural causes to explain natural phenomena."
from Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District - Wikipedia

In history the winners set the rules and make the history.
That does not mean that all things are natural phenomena that can be explained by natural causes. Actually the invocation of natural causes in all circumstances is imo just as pseudoscience as the invocation of a God.

 

[Brian2]

One has to feel sorry at times for the poor IDists, wait that does not sound right (IDiots? No, better go with IDists).

When they try to say "God did it" they get told that is not a testable claim. When they form their ideas scientifically, they get refuted. They lose either way.

I don't that the idea of intelligence being behind coding systems has been refuted?

 

[Subduction Zone]

On the video the idea of intelligence is seen as an inference from the evidence of science.
Are you (or whoever) saying that it is not allowed in science to hypothesise an intelligence behind the universe?

To hypothesize requires a model that is falsifiable. Where is there model? What tests could possibly show that it is wrong?

That might be correct but finding possible mechanisms that disprove irreducible complexity does not mean that those mechanisms happened or that the time involved and probability for those things to have happened has been shown to be reasonable for the acceptance of those mechanisms.

Sheesh! You do not even know what arguments that they use. And no, we are not using an argument from ignorance. That is what Stephen Meyer does. What has been shown with irreducible complexity is that the claimed examples of traits of life that are irreducibly complex were shown not to be all that complex after all.

In history the winners set the rules and make the history.
That does not mean that all things are natural phenomena that can be explained by natural causes. Actually the invocation of natural causes in all circumstances is imo just as pseudoscience as the invocation of a God.

That is not exactly true. They may try to to make the history, but people often have this habit of trying to be honest. And now you have just demonstrated that you do not even understand the scientific method.

Would you like to go over the basics?

 

[Subduction Zone]

I don't that the idea of intelligence being behind coding systems has been refuted?

What? Are you talking about the bad analogy that Meyer uses? DNA is not actually "coding". It is similar yes, but he uses a very poor example. His claims have been refuted.

 

[Brian2]

No, Stephen Meyer is a dishonest hack. As is Berlinski:

David Berlinski - Wikipedia

Both are associated with the creationist pseudoscientific Discovery Institute. You should be wondering why they did not publish in a well respected professional journal. It is not bigotry to require that people support their claims with evidence.

David Berlinski is against evolution but does not support ID.
It seems like bigotry to call people dishonest hacks.

 

[Subduction Zone]

David Berlinski is against evolution but does not support ID.
It seems like bigotry to call people dishonest hacks.

Really? Then please show us what Berlinski supports. Since he works for the Discovery toot to he is all but guaranteed to be an advocate of ID.

I have seen him make very poor arguments against evolution in the past.

 

[Brian2]

No. Spare us the false equivalences, please.

ID is pseudoscience for several reasons, but the chief one is that it relies on supernatural intervention at random points in the process to account for what we observe. Any theory that does that is incapable of making testable predictions, since the random interventions can in principle make any outcome possible. Furthermore, reliance on supernatural intervention as an explanation discourages curiosity and the search for explanations based on natural processes.

So, far from being science, ID is a science stopper.

ID was invented by a lawyer, Philip E Johnson, as a ruse to get God taught in US school biology lessons, as a piece of social engineering. It has no pedigree in science at all and now that Johnson is dead, I expect it to die as well. And a good job too.

I can see why ID might be seen as a science stopper but that does not mean that science actually can answer all questions even if people are curious about natural answers.
For a theist in science things were intelligently designed and the refusal of a designer into science does in the end make science into a joke where the best naturalistic explanation that has been speculated is accepted over an intelligent designer for no other reason than presupposition.
Do you think that the idea that intelligence can be inferred from scientific evidence to be a good inference given that information always leads us back to a mind and not to a material process?

 

[Brian2]

No, it is pseudoscience because they have no way to test their claims or worse yet, because they lie about science that can.

By definition if your claims cannot be tested you do not have any evidence.

That sounds like any claims that says that God was not involved. This cannot be tested.
So this is who science is neutral on God.
But is it true that information always leads back to a mind and not to a material process?
If it is true then God is a serious scientific hypothesis, who may never be proven but serious proposed.

 

[Heyo]

I can see why ID might be seen as a science stopper but that does not mean that science actually can answer all questions even if people are curious about natural answers.

You seem to be confused about what science is and what science does. No scientist proposes that science can answer all question or that it should deal with all questions.
Science has limited itself to the natural world and to that what can be reproducibly observed. If it isn't science doesn't touch it with a ten foot pole.

 

[Heyo]

But is it true that information always leads back to a mind and not to a material process?

But is it true that there has never been an observation of a mind that wasn't the product of a brain?