Ben Stein withdraws as UVM commencement speaker after outcry over intelligent design
posted at 8:54 pm on February 3, 2009 by Allahpundit
Ben Stein described the brouhaha over his selection as commencement speaker at the University of Vermont as “laughable” on Tuesday called the whole episode “pathetic.”…
“I am far more pro-science than the Darwinists,” Stein said later in an e-mail. “I want all scientific inquiry to happen — not just what the ruling clique calls science.”
Stein’s comments came a day after UVM President Dan Fogel announced that Stein, whom Fogel had invited to address UVM’s commencement in May, would not be coming after all. Fogel said that his selection of Stein generated an intense protest, that he received hundreds of angry e-mails over the weekend, and that after he shared these “profound concerns” with Stein, Stein “immediately and most graciously declined our commencement invitation.”…
Stein called the university’s response to the furor “chicken sh**, and you can quote me on that.”
“I like Dr. Fogel,” Stein wrote, “and feel sorry he is caught in the meat grinder of political correctness. My heart goes out to him. He’s a great guy trying to do his best in difficult circumstances.”
I don’t care that he’s a creationist any more than I’d care if he were a phrenologist. It’s goofy, but so long as he doesn’t turn the speech into a lecture on the subject, I’m willing to tolerate his eccentricity. What I wouldn’t tolerate is his egregious bad-faith attempt to equate Darwinism with social Darwinism. Why would an audience filled with scientists and science majors want to be addressed by a guy who believes “science leads you to killing people”? Better yet, why would that guy want to address them? It’d be like inviting a liberal who believes conservatism is inherently racist to guest-blog on Hot Air. I get enough flak for linking HuffPo occasionally in Headlines that I can imagine how that’d go down with our readers.
Exit question: Can it really be that we’re creeping up on 9 p.m. on the east coast without a post yet on this from LGF?
Blowback
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The case for thinking that instead of DNA only showing ancestral patterns, that it may only reveal shared building blocks.
Sames goes with proteins.
I’m no biologist, but I see the value of investigating this further.
DNA is very fascinating. I think it’s already turning the world upside down in relation to our concepts of race & ethnic groups.
Badger40 on February 4, 2009 at 12:54 PM
Actually, Madison’s right. I’m sorry. It’s only white women.
In that case, let’s bring in Limey and make it three.
Esthier on February 4, 2009 at 12:54 PM
How is that circular logic?
Ann NY on February 4, 2009 at 12:55 PM
http://hotair.com/archives/2007/04/05/the-god-of-the-bible-is-also-the-god-of-the-genome/
remembering back to a Bryan Preston post here at Hotair on the “God of the Genome”, he linked a great article he wrote on the Bible and Space Time Theory. The infallibility of Genesis, etc.
its linked at the bottom but now appears to be out of date…see if I can find it
jp on February 4, 2009 at 12:55 PM
I hear “I like it rough”.
MadisonConservative on February 4, 2009 at 12:56 PM
If you mean Stein “graciously declining” the invitation, I agree.
RightOFLeft on February 4, 2009 at 12:56 PM
you prove again and again what you are. and it ain’t pretty…
right4life on February 4, 2009 at 12:56 PM
Whoa, whoa…Madison don’t swing like dat, baby.
MadisonConservative on February 4, 2009 at 12:56 PM
Very much so. The Christian conservative thing is all an act. How else do you think I can afford to get online so often?
Am I? That’s certainly possible. Though I’d swear I remember right being the one to constantly call me an adulterer.
Esthier on February 4, 2009 at 12:57 PM
I do not think that some of the ID/creationists here understand what the term “peer reviewed” means.
The same problem occurs with 9-11 Troofers who try to get their “scientific articles” published in mainstream engineering and physics journals. They’re flatly rejected and laughed at at every turn by real engineers, physicists and scientists. They then pretend that they don’t need peer review, because the only peers that matter are the ones that agree with their baseless conspiracy theories and their belief in those theories. Nothing else – not science, not physical reality, not hard evidence, not even empirical observation – matters to them. They have their belief and they’re sticking to it.
In scientific study, you don’t start out with a belief and try to fit square pegs into round holes trying to bend “evidence” to fit that belief. If you do so, you’re doing it exactly backwards. That’s why there is this little thing in scientific study called a “hypothesis.” A hypothesis can be empirically and objectively tested, and can either be falsified or validated.
What would the creationist/ID hypothesis be, and how would one test it/falsify it?
Good Lt on February 4, 2009 at 12:57 PM
That can’t be good on the carpets.
TheUnrepentantGeek on February 4, 2009 at 12:57 PM
We need to get to 1000.
Creationism is not science. Science is the never ending search for how things work. We started out not knowing how anything worked and over time we started to learn things. There are things we know now, and things that we do not know YET. Just because we cannot figure out something now with our current level of knowledge does not mean we will not figure it out eventually. Creationism is a giving up. It’s premise is that something is too complex, we cannot figure it out, therefore it must be intelligent design. It is that throwing up of the hands that is unscientific. Just because we cannot figure out how a flagellum evolved right now just means we have more work to do. That’s what science is all about. That is why scientists don’t care too much for creationists. They want to call the search for knowledge off.
Finally, Evolution is a fact. There are “theories” on how evolution happened, but nothing can change the fact of the fossil record.
tommylotto on February 4, 2009 at 12:58 PM
I agree the mainstream science crowd says there is no censorship-but everybody has experienced it in all scientific venues.
I should see Expelled myself just to see what all the hubub is about.
Badger40 on February 4, 2009 at 12:58 PM
I’d make the argument that mathematics was discovered long before the modern scientific method was discovered, but honestly, what’s the point, other than pure debate? You’ve convinced me you are firm in your belief in your Creator, and I’m sure I’ve convinced you I’m an uneducated heathen (which is pretty accurate). Also, I’m tragically lazy when it comes to certain things, like typing and looking up things in books (which is where I choose to gain most of my knowledge). : )
I respectfully disagree with you, but you have given me something to think about.
Anna on February 4, 2009 at 12:58 PM
Aww, come on. You’ll learn to like it.
Yes, I know. My pinkish whitish skin is so repulsive. I can only tan so much.
Esthier on February 4, 2009 at 12:58 PM
Isn’t the world today populated with living machines of varying complexity (e.g., bacteria, amoeba, insects, mammals). We agree that they reproduce and pass their genetic material, with changes, to successive generations. Within species we’ve seen physical adaptations that are more compelling than a paper clip, yet a designer is not hands-on implementing those changes.
dedalus on February 4, 2009 at 12:59 PM
and we pass 1000.
TexasDan on February 4, 2009 at 12:59 PM
Nope, that was apacalyps, the one who also demanded an apology from each of us for…um…making humorous sexual innuendo on an open comments section of a political blog.
MadisonConservative on February 4, 2009 at 1:00 PM
Don’t worry. I wasn’t picking on you.
I agree with your summation. But I never like to go there with anybody bcs you can do it all day long & nobody gets a point across in the end.
Liberals & Conservatives use that hypocrisy pointing & it just wastes valuable time in my opinion.
Badger40 on February 4, 2009 at 1:00 PM
That’s what my cellmate said.
Never again.
MadisonConservative on February 4, 2009 at 1:00 PM
I hear “I’m desperate.”
Better than being pasty pale and freckled. Maybe that’s why he doesn’t like me either.
Anna on February 4, 2009 at 1:01 PM
Science doesn’t kill people, governments do. And in the 20th Century, more were killed by their own governments than foreign ones.
Laurence on February 4, 2009 at 1:02 PM
I hear “Calm down, tiger, we’ve got all night!”
MadisonConservative on February 4, 2009 at 1:06 PM
if you haven’t guessed, I’m done responding to you drivel…no more casting pearls before swine…just like I don’t respond to your ‘honey’ madisonwacko…
right4life on February 4, 2009 at 1:06 PM
But you just responded to it…
Good Lt on February 4, 2009 at 1:07 PM
newsflash: the fossil record does not support evolution…thus the need for punctuated equilibrium…
right4life on February 4, 2009 at 1:07 PM
It’s performance anxiety, dude.
LimeyGeek on February 4, 2009 at 1:07 PM
Vocabulary can be twisted, revamped over & over again, but this is the deal-
There ARE God fearing Christians out there who ARE conservatives and it is NOT an act.
I try & live my life by example. If I’m saying I believe in God, then I’m truly trying to show that in all of my life to everyone else looking on.
If I can’t do that, then I’m a fraud.
So Esthier, there are those of us out there that truly are willing to live by example.
These ‘fundamentalists’ I take are the Biblical literalists who don’t care what in the hell happens, they are still right no matter what & the rest of us opposing them will burn in hell forever.
I try on a daily basis to counter that culture of fear & loathing & ignorance.
So don’t give up on considering conservatism or even Christianity.
We are not ALL nuts.
Badger40 on February 4, 2009 at 1:07 PM
As a matter of fact, if you’ll read the description, it DOES reproduce. It goes into a cave alone, and comes out with another car. You need more details? Okay, the car backs up to the steel mill in the cave, where another car is waiting. The first car gives the second a jump-start. CO fumes from the cars triggers the release of molten steel from the steel mill, and petroleum byproducts from the oil refinery. The steel and petro-rubber somehow (using “stem-steel” and “stem-rubber” — beyond that we’re not quite sure how, though we can watch the parts form), following plans in the owners manuals in the glove compartments, form themselves into parts of the correct shape and size, and fit themselves together. There is some variability present in the offspring — a larger engine in this one, third-row-seating in that one — but regression to the mean prevents those variances from going very far. In no case have two cars been observed to produce a helicopter or a forklift.
RegularJoe on February 4, 2009 at 1:08 PM
Actual, the fossil record does tend to support evolution.
Newsflash: NOTHING supports ID/creationism.
Good Lt on February 4, 2009 at 1:09 PM
Yee-haw!
Speaking of nothing, I’ll check in on you cats later. It’s nap time (yay!), which means it’s chore time (frak). Have fun with the horse flogging.
Anna on February 4, 2009 at 1:09 PM
this is probably a waste of time….
is intelligent design testable
right4life on February 4, 2009 at 1:09 PM
So are you saying that since the scientific method is based on Christian principles that Christians should be allowed to violate those principles?
Not that I’d concede any of the points you made. I just think it’s funny that every time some modern idea is under discussion, from Democracy to donuts, a Christian will pipe up with something like “That’s a Christian innovation. KNEEL HEATHEN!” Well, that last part is usually implied, at any rate.
If I may point out, Christianity has been around for a couple of thousand years now. Considering that it took 1800 years for the enlightenment to take hold, it might be possible that, although many Christians contributed to remaking modern society, some secular concepts may just have contributed to the prosperity we enjoy. And this is high-grade blasphemy, but the theory of evolution might just be one of those secular concepts.
Go ahead and write your eugenics screed, I’ll wait.
RightOFLeft on February 4, 2009 at 1:10 PM
If you haven’t guessed, we could give a rat’s ass. Since you’re a joke, you don’t even need to be here for us to have fun with you.
MadisonConservative on February 4, 2009 at 1:11 PM
actually it doesn’t…get a clue…
right4life on February 4, 2009 at 1:11 PM
Yeah, but I’m not too worried about hers keeping up.
MadisonConservative on February 4, 2009 at 1:11 PM
yeah its helped save the planet by getting rid of ‘useless eaters’
right4life on February 4, 2009 at 1:13 PM
Are you discriminating against those of us that are?
Racist!
MadisonConservative on February 4, 2009 at 1:13 PM
Allahpundit!
You either haven’t seen Ben Stein’s documentary “Expelled” or you didn’t understand it. If you had, you would surely know that there is a significant difference between supporting theories of “Intelligent Design” and being a “Creationist” – which Ben Stein is not.
That is all.
joncoltonis on February 4, 2009 at 1:13 PM
werehawk on February 4, 2009 at 7:35 AM
Can you give me an example that such a mutation is common? With as many species on the earth it should be rather common. According to the time tables, man has been around for a while…and we have Blacks, Whites, Asian etc, yet despite all these isolated populations, put them together and you still get human kids.
The missing link doesn’t just apply to the human species.
Conservative Voice on February 4, 2009 at 1:14 PM
If the oil and fuel facilities are naturally occurring, in the same way that a food source is for an animal then the explorers could see how the auto might sustain itself and adapt to catching that food source. If the car was a carnivore the food source itself would likely adapt to keep from being, well, lunch.
If the explorers found a manufacturing plant on the island where someone had written “Kilroy Was Here”, it would argue for design. Especially, if the explorers found blueprints.
dedalus on February 4, 2009 at 1:14 PM
A simple Wikipedia search reveals nothing surprising about your “authoritative source” on :
According to Dembski, the scientific study of nature reveals evidence of design, and he opposes what he regards as mainstream science’s commitment to “atheistic” materialism or naturalism, which he believes rules out “Intelligent Design” a priori. His main proposal is that specified complexity, a type of information, is the hallmark of an intelligent designer. The mainstream scientific community rejects his ideas, with many leading scientific and scientific education organizations including the National Academy of Sciences, the American Association for the Advancement of Science and National Science Teachers Association rejecting intelligent design, describing it as “not science”, “lack[ing] scientific warrant” and “pseudoscience”, and his work has been characterised by prominent mathematician David H. Wolpert as “written in jello”. Mathematician, computer scientist and number theorist Jeffrey Shallit, a former teacher of Dembski’s, submitted in a court expert witness report that Dembski’s work should not be regarded as significant.”
Yup. A waste of time and pixels, this guy’s “work” is. This is a theology professor, and as such, he speaks outside of his expertise (which is obviously not evolutionary biology and science). What does this guy’s hatred of real science have to do with science?
Are there any scientific discoveries attributable to Dembski?
Good Lt on February 4, 2009 at 1:15 PM
Proof that evolution does not advance the species : Nancy Pelosi & Barney Frank and the fact that they are still in power. Are pitchforks too primitive?
Fuquay Steve on February 4, 2009 at 1:19 PM
Dude-your sarcasm & venom are getting old.
I read your link.
WHERE IS THE ACTUAL “TEST” that proves an Intelligent Designer (AKA a God) has made complex ‘stuff’?
While it may well be that someday we can ‘measure’/quantify supernatural phenomena (i.e. ghosts, or ‘feeling the Holy Spirit’ envelope you (which , yes ,I have felt before), right now there is no such test or device that can physically SHOW this.
We cannot reproduce it right now.
But I do not argue that it does not exist. I do not argue that it cannot somehow, someday be tested.
So scientists that cut off the debate right then are not open to supernatural phenomena being scientifically recognized someday.
I’m all for it if we can.
But right now, I don’t see IDers(AKA creationists) having come up with any concrete way to PHYSICALLY prove their ‘theory’.
God is great, but I don’t see any reason to inject ‘theological philosophy’ into SCIENCE as a methodical process.
Theology & philosophy are NOT methodical!
Badger40 on February 4, 2009 at 1:19 PM
If it were necessary for fully formed opposite sex organs to suddenly appear it would be a problem that evolution couldn’t currently explain.
dedalus on February 4, 2009 at 1:20 PM
Ladyboy eh? Kinky.
LimeyGeek on February 4, 2009 at 1:21 PM
I like nuts. All kinds. I even own some nuts-a can of cashews.
So I cannot be racist. Many of my acquaintances are nuts.
Badger40 on February 4, 2009 at 1:21 PM
a la the retort “I love blacks, but I couldn’t eat a whole one”
LimeyGeek on February 4, 2009 at 1:22 PM
They are the same thing.
inchdeep on February 4, 2009 at 1:22 PM
Allah! What is the record number of comments on a thread?
Will we have a Guinness record here soon?
Badger40 on February 4, 2009 at 1:23 PM
Snicker.
Or how about- I love blacks, I believe everyone should own one?
Badger40 on February 4, 2009 at 1:23 PM
werehawk on February 4, 2009 at 7:35 AM
To add, humans have also shared resources with monkeys, apes etc…since the dawn of time…so your isolation theory doesn’t hold water.
( same can be said about dogs and cats…same family, but they can’t mate and produce anything that can also produce )
So again the idea that there happens to be a male and a female born at the same time in the same area, who can’t produce with the species of their parents, only with each other…when multiplied by how many species we have…its nonsense.
Now if you want to say we share certain things in common with other species…fine. That is science. To say evolution happens within a species…yep, easily shown to be true. But the giant leap they make next take more faith than any religion. That species creating new species all happens by accident.
Conservative Voice on February 4, 2009 at 1:24 PM
Sometimes primitive is best!
Badger40 on February 4, 2009 at 1:25 PM
Ixnay the averyslay
LimeyGeek on February 4, 2009 at 1:28 PM
Look, you can’t just assert that regression to the mean will prevent evolution, then say, “See? It didn’t evolve in my example. Therefore evolution can’t happen.” The very principle under dispute is whether, after descent with modification, organisms will regress to the mean.
This is a little tricky, hopefully I can do it justice. In one sense, you’re right. Most organisms won’t stray far from the mean. Compare life now to life 3.5 billion years ago, and although the most complex organisms have been getting more complex, the most common and successful organisms — bacteria — have barely changed, at all. Successful mutations are very rare, and that’s borne out by the diversity of species we see today and in the fossil record.
Your analogy is starting from a high level of complexity — but none of the complexity is focused toward successful reproduction. Left alone on your island, it’s completely unpredictable what would happen, but it’s clearly not a good example for the history of life, and whatever logical results you can deduce from your thought experiment wouldn’t have any bearing on actual living organisms.
Finally, and most egregiously, evolution does not predict that — in keeping with your analogy — “a car will give birth to a forklift or helicopter.” In fact, intelligent design predicts that. Special creation might predict that. Evolution does not. Even in Gould’s “punctuated equilibrium,” the changes between generations are still considered small, it’s just that they happen over hundreds of thousands of years rather than millions.
So that’s a little wasted bandwidth to explain that your analogy really isn’t all that useful, especially considering that we have a fossil record of actual, living things that appear to have evolved.
RightOFLeft on February 4, 2009 at 1:28 PM
I’ll try to avoid the all too prevalent ad-hominem snark, yet I must respectfully suggest that you open your mind and expand your reading list, Mr. Starfleet Dude. I’ve provided several good places to start above. See my post above from which you quoted.
.
For your information the 1st creation story of Genesis 1:1 through 2:3 is consistent with modern Cosmology. Even the literary device of seven day works out if understood in terms of Special Relativity’s the time dilation from the densities of Planke Time to the our contemporary conditions at the dawn of human history … say 100,000 years or so ago. The anthropic retelling of the second Biblical Creation Story beginning in Chapter 2 reflects so many of the corruptions of human perspective as to offer us profound insight into human nature. The mythic story of Cain and Able in the third chapter is a stunning clear exposition of the foundations of all human culture on homicide.
.
Indeed, one finds few if any literary expressions which match the panoramic deception and malice as one does when one’s reading of Genesis 3:4-5 is informed by Girardian Theory. This is what we seek to hide from ourselves …
Mike OMalley on February 4, 2009 at 1:28 PM
any scientific discoveries linked to darwin, that he didn’t plagiarize from wallace?
and really what does evolution add to science? nothing, zero zip nada:
as coyne said:
its useless in medicine too..
link
right4life on February 4, 2009 at 1:28 PM
evolution cannot explain the evolution of the sexes at all…you will hear lots of jargon, but the bottom line is no one has a clue why male and female, and why and how they could evolve about the same time…
the whole process of ‘evolution’ is ridiculous…ever try to design something from the bottom up, and hope the elementary pieces fit together for form a complex function? we design from the top-down…we cannot even imagine a bottom-up process that works…
right4life on February 4, 2009 at 1:31 PM
oh yeah, to people like you ‘science’ is atheism. laughable.
right4life on February 4, 2009 at 1:31 PM
OK-here is an example of what you are saying is not out there.
Now this is one instance and perhaps by itself would not lead you to any change of mind.
Science is constantly adding to the data set. The more data, the more complete our picture.
We have only begun to explore the clues this planet hold.
How much data has been lost due to geologic changes in history?
The more findings, the more concepts will either change, or become honed.
So even my little link does not prove my point, but it does show we can go back & forth with single instances all day.
The proof is in the mass of collected data.
Better conclusions result.
Badger40 on February 4, 2009 at 1:33 PM
except the fossil record doesn’t show that.
right4life on February 4, 2009 at 1:33 PM
Wow…still goin’.
Two separate issues.
Id/creationism also doesn’t support the evolution of the internal combustion engine. That being said, evolution doesn’t support theory of the origins of the first popcorn ball.
Itchee Dryback on February 4, 2009 at 1:34 PM
And what’s with all this going into a cave? I appreciate the Freudian sensibilities of it, but why do these cars have to be such a bunch of puritans?
RightOFLeft on February 4, 2009 at 1:35 PM
Ah. I see. Darwin was just a dishonest plagiarist. Did nothing of note.
Nice try.
You didn’t answer the question. What scientific discoveries are attributable to Dembski?
Ah, yes. But praying is preferable to penicillin.
Gotcha. It’s a good thing you’re not a doctor.
Good Lt on February 4, 2009 at 1:35 PM
I have examined all the known superstitions of the world and I do not find in our particular superstition of Christianity one redeeming feature. They are all alike founded on fables and mythology. Millions of innocent men, women, and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined, and imprisoned. What has been the effect of this coercion? To make one half the world fools and the other half hypocrites; to support roguery and error all over the earth. The clergy converted the simple teachings of Jesus into an engine for enslaving mankind to filch wealth and power to themselves. They, in fact, constitute the real Anti-Christ.
- Thomas Jefferson
MB4 on February 4, 2009 at 1:35 PM
Dude. I’m covered.
My 5th G-grandpop who died in 1836 or so freed his like 7 seven slaves & left them ALL his stuff. Nothing to his kids.
I’m exempt from reparations.
Badger40 on February 4, 2009 at 1:37 PM
So what does it show? God hated dinosaurs? He needed on-the-job training?
RightOFLeft on February 4, 2009 at 1:37 PM
did you read the final paragraph of the study??
In addition, Friedman admitted to the National Geographic reporter that “Fossils from excavations in northern Italy and Paris revealed that the intermediate specimens once lived together with flatfishes having both eyes on one side of the skull.” The ancestor and descendent lived side by side. Doesn’t that make it a little questionable to conclude an ancestral relationship?
for more…
link
right4life on February 4, 2009 at 1:38 PM
link
right4life on February 4, 2009 at 1:39 PM
In software development OOP allows for a lot of bottom up design, which many developers favor over a top-down approach.
dedalus on February 4, 2009 at 1:39 PM
ID/creationism doesn’t provide an adequate explanation for anything. It’s a permutation of the book of Genesis and/or the creation myth from any of the world religions.
That’s the point.
Good Lt on February 4, 2009 at 1:39 PM
What did he say about mutations?
Racial differences don’t stem from mutations all that often I would wager.
I believe it is more akin to environmental pressures & genotypic ratios in a gene pool than anything, although I would say that some racial differences may indeed be mutations.
Badger40 on February 4, 2009 at 1:40 PM
This misses the whole point. I’ve cast our living earth into a model of steel and petroleum, to allow us to look at it “from the outside in”, so to speak. My point is that by looking at it, you wouldn’t have proof that there WAS a designer, nor would you have proof that there was NOT. But no one would be considered a fool or a heretic to consider that there might be. The fury of scientists these days, on the other hand, will not bear the most fleeting consideration that life on this planet might have been designed rather than spontaneously appeared. That is as closed-minded as any religious fanatic.
Fairly evaluating the possibility that life was created is not “unscientific”; on the contrary, failing to consider it is unscientific.
As for me, I happen to be a Christian. My own (non-scientific) experience utterly convinces me that God exists. I believe He created the universe, including the Earth and all life within it. But that belief is based upon faith, not science. I’m perfectly satisfied with that, and see no reason to reconsider until I see some evidence that it could not be so. Thus far, science has concocted some plausible alternative theories, but none that seem to me any more scientifically likely than my own belief (assuming even the POSSIBILITY — but not certainty — that any god exists).
RegularJoe on February 4, 2009 at 1:40 PM
No dedalus, you missed my point. If its “living” it is not simple, man can build no living thing from scratch.
Where are the simple machines, where can we find a pump created by natural forces, made from metal or some other non-living material? You advocate that natural forces make pumps because you believe organs like the heart were made by natural forces.
It sure is a lot easier to make them from metal, even man can do that, where are the ones nature made from non-living material?
How about a linear motor made by natural forces that is not made from protein? Muscles are machines, they are linear motors made protein, were are the ones natural forces made from non-living materials? Surely they must exist because many small parts needed to exist before the ultimate machine of life was manufactured.
If evolution is true and natural forces are able to make very complex machines from protein, then where are the less complex machines made from non-living materials that even man can make?
Maxx on February 4, 2009 at 1:40 PM
well as I said, darwin did help save the planet by getting rid of ‘useless eaters’
obviously dembski has done quite a lot to earn the hatred of darwiniacs like you.
evolution had nothing to do with penicillin…nice try.
right4life on February 4, 2009 at 1:41 PM
This proves nothing about the existence of a mythical, all-powerful “designer.”
Good Lt on February 4, 2009 at 1:41 PM
If evolutionary biologists would simply agree to stop teaching unproven and untestable extrapolations of known micro-evolutionary processes, I suspect that the ID theorists would recede into the background of modern society and be content to continue their studies in relative obscurity. However, since they won’t do that, the angry debate will continue.
NuclearPhysicist on February 4, 2009 at 1:43 PM
do you actually develop software? not a chance. if you develop an object, you have to have some idea what you are going to use if for, and use it with…how it will integrate into a larger system.
evolution says an object evolves…and then somehow fits in with a more complex function…with no top-down design, no intelligence…
how do all these biological ‘objects’ interface and work together? to think it ‘just happened’ is really a stretch…
right4life on February 4, 2009 at 1:43 PM
What scientific discoveries can I attribute to Dembski? This makes three times you have failed to answer this simple question.
So prayer over penicillin, then? That’s no prescription. That’s a death sentence.
Penicillin is a naturally occuring life form that evolved from single celled organisms over millions of years. That’s what it has to do with evolution.
Good Lt on February 4, 2009 at 1:43 PM
guess you’ll have to learn the hard way…
right4life on February 4, 2009 at 1:44 PM
I don’t know if anything that happens in the natural world is an “accident”. But that is neither provable nor disprovable.
Mutations may in fact not be accidents, but we wouldn’t really know.
Badger40 on February 4, 2009 at 1:44 PM
All my relatives were serfs and subjects. Where’s my check?
LimeyGeek on February 4, 2009 at 1:44 PM
Even here you fall short. The Bible story of the fall of Jericho is a literary re-presentation of an earlier proto-Israeli conveyance of historical “fact”. Jericho fell, the proto-Israelis conveyed that story of its fall by way of stylized re-enactment and mythic oral history. This was later first story was later re-worked into literary form. And as is the case with such things the actual dates don’t convey accurately.
Its a bit like learning your history of the Battle Gettysburg by listening to a storyteller who learned of this battle solely by much observing much later re-enactments of that battle.
Mike OMalley on February 4, 2009 at 1:45 PM
a LIFE FORM??? huh?? you really are uneducated…
right4life on February 4, 2009 at 1:46 PM
You better let Obama know you want a stimulus soon. Or you’re out of luck!
Badger40 on February 4, 2009 at 1:47 PM
Scientists don’t have a reference point for a designer. Some have faith that there is a Creator, but they don’t have a tool in their toolkit to measure how he interacts with the planet.
A doctor might pray for a miracle, but he is also going to prepare for surgery by taking into account every natural explanation for what is ailing the patient. If he performs surgery and leaves some of the mechanical work to God, we wouldn’t trust him.
dedalus on February 4, 2009 at 1:47 PM
Major transitions in biological evolution show the same pattern of sudden emergence of diverse forms at a new level of complexity.
Note that “sudden emergence” can be arbitrarily defined. Life has been around for 3.5 billion years (maybe slightly more or less). Given that kind of time frame, sudden emergence could be every 10 million years. Which is perfectly consistent with evolutionary theory. Not so consistent with the bible, or an all-knowing God. Ironically, followed to its logical conclusion, intelligent design disproves the existence of an all-powerful God.
RightOFLeft on February 4, 2009 at 1:48 PM
of course, the lack of transitions doesn’t matter…they are yet to be found!!!
the faith of the darwinist.
you can’t see it, in the fossil record, or lab, but you believe it…
and when asked to evolve something…you say you can’t because you need more time!!
its faith, nothing more.
right4life on February 4, 2009 at 1:50 PM
Hmmm… I guess they did blend together. Alright then, sorry, Right. I just can’t tell you two apart.
What’s weird is that I used to have freckles on my nose and cheeks. I don’t even remember when they went away.
Esthier on February 4, 2009 at 1:52 PM
So no evidence supporting your dangerously unscientific “theory,” then?
Thanks.
So penicillin was created by the snap of a finger, then? By some mythical, all-knowing, omnipotent, selectively-engaged sky being?
And what scientific discovery can we attribute to Dembski? You still haven’t answered this (because the answer is “none – he’s a theology professor.”).
Thanks. You’ve just convinced me of one thing – that you know practically nothing about science, and what you have ‘learned’ you ‘learned’ in church.
Good Lt on February 4, 2009 at 1:52 PM
Uh-no. Ancestral organisms have been known to live alongside descendant organisms.
Studies in genetics point to the human race starting out as African in nature-yet white lives alongside black.
Polar bears are descendants (off shoots) of the Grizzly.(brown? can’t remember)-they also are sometimes living alongside each other. They can mate, too.
This reflects the prevalence of subspecies characteristics in the existing gene pool.
Subspecies can often co-exist. They may be living differently, like using the habitat differently etc.
But they can live together.
It’s all in the gene pool.
Intermediate species may live on to produce a new species and you may still retain the existence of the original ancestral population.
Badger40 on February 4, 2009 at 1:54 PM
Lucky. What’s really weird is I don’t know when my kids spent enough time in the sun to get all their freckles. They’re lucky, the freckles are only on their faces – Tim and I are covered with them.
Looks like the thread is winding down… is there another interesting post on the main page?
Anna on February 4, 2009 at 1:55 PM
The point I have been making is that a resolution can never be agreed upon when the discussion involves the 2 separate topics.
There are creation stories that predate the book of Genesis, so I don’t know how that fits.
Its the anything thats the snag, isn’t it?
What is it exactly that you’re talking about. Creationism..by definition..involves an idea as to how everything first came to be.
Evolution is the process that happens after that point.
In that vein, science also provides not only an inadequate explanation for the origins, it offer zero information or even guesses at it.
Why is there necessarily a conflict between the two?
Itchee Dryback on February 4, 2009 at 1:58 PM
You know, of course, that there are transitional forms. Can’t you summon the good faith to even say that they’re disputed?
What I still want to know: what does the fossil record say about creationism? It contradicts biblical literalism directly, but if you retreat to a position of intelligent design, you’re left with a God of the sandbox. We’re just the latest action figures in the hands of a bored God.
RightOFLeft on February 4, 2009 at 1:59 PM
obviously you haven’t learned much of anything!
penicillin a life form!! too funny!
you just need to evolve some intelligence good luck!
right4life on February 4, 2009 at 2:01 PM
The only thing that the fossil record really supports is that different kinds of plants and animals simply sprang into existence at various times without the expected multitude of transitional precursor species. Thus, we have no real historical evidence that large-scale (i.e., macro) evolution ever occurred and no such events have ever been observed in recorded history. We also have not been able to force such macro evolutionary changes in the laboratory (even if we did, they probably wouldn’t count because they would support ID theory). So, why do we continue to teach such a grossly unsupported theory in the classroom? And, why isn’t it enough to teach the aspects of evolutionary theory that have an actual foundation of empirical evidence? It appears to me that such scientists are more devoted to discounting the existence of a God than they are to remaining scientifically objective in their work.
NuclearPhysicist on February 4, 2009 at 2:01 PM
Yes, it’s something like the game children play when they announce they aren’t talking to the person they’ve just talked to.
Very much appreciate it. Though you should know I was only joking. I’ve been a Christian as long as I’ve understood what the word means, and a conservative not long after that.
I’m not a great example of either at times, but I’ve been trying to sort things out for the last couple of years, learning what I actually believe versus what I was taught. It’s been very rewarding but not always pleasant.
Heh.
Esthier on February 4, 2009 at 2:02 PM
disputed by evolutionists…its why Gould came up with punctuated equilibrium…there just aren’t any…
how? we are actors on the stage…and God is the audience…if you will…
right4life on February 4, 2009 at 2:02 PM
BINGO!
right4life on February 4, 2009 at 2:03 PM
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