Steve:
>[Note the clever use of words by Scott contrastinge atheism with
young-Earth
>creationism, as though they are the only two alternatives. By admitting
that
>there is a "debate between theism and materialism" she "legitimate",
tacitly
>concedes they are opposites. But then she says any such debate between the
>two "shouldn't take place in the classroom", even thought materialism is
>to continue to be taught unopposed "in the classroom".]
Cliff:
>Intramural battles are the nastiest of all. But where are the battles between
>YEC and ID? I've never read of any such debates at all. This is why people
>think it's the same old religionists doing their same old thing.
A while ago, I was surfin' the web and found some ICR articles quite
critical of the ID movement. But you are right that there is no intramural
battle. This is because the ID movement refuses to engage in such battles.
And, IMO, this is wise. Many ID proponents make it clear they are not a
YEC, but don't want to argue the issue. Instead, they remain focused on
the only issue that defines who they are - those who propose that a valid
explanation of physical reality is incomplete without reference to ID.
Thus, they seem to practice what they preach and don't argue about tangential
issues.
Keep in mind that while all YECs accept ID, not all ID proponents accept
YEC. This asymmetry explains why YECs sometimes gripe about ID while
ID largely ignores YEC.
>If 'materialists' are the enemies of ID, who are the friends of ID? Will the
>average religious person embrace the agnostic view that 'Well, it might
>have been God, it might have been green scaly space aliens, who knows?'
Why not? Many religious persons accept Darwinism and if they can
incorporate Darwinian views into their religion it should not be hard
to incorporate ID views. Besides, I don't see this as an issue of evolution
vs.
creation or religion vs. materialism. As I have explained before, it's an
issue of teleology vs. non-teleology. Thus, any teleologist is likely to be
a friend of ID, although such friendship will be downplayed as long as ID
is publicly percieved/portrayed as a form of 'neo-creationism.'
>'ID'--is it really that good a term? In common parlance people speak of
>'designer clothes' and 'designer furniture', meaning custom creations
>by established artisans. In this sense, 'designer universe' sounds silly,
>it implies a universe that is particularly chic.
And in common parlance, 'natural' means 'good for you', such as
'natural foods.' Thus, since rape is the product of natural selection,
rape is good for you, right?
>Maybe the 'I', the 'intelligent' is the important thing. So a more logical
>construction, making 'intelligent' the substantive part, might be
>'designing intelligence'. But that's no good, because it shifts the focus
>back to 'who or what is this intelligence?'
I think of 'intelligent' is a way that distinguishes this design from that
of a blind watchmaker.
>I must presume that ID
>advocates much prefer a construction that puts the emphasis on the
>inexplicability (thus far) of complexities in nature, and avoids an
>emphasis on what they are really about.
Let me guess. If something is explicable, by definition, it entails an
explanation with reference to nothing more than physical laws, chance,
and natural selection. For some reason, ID is rejected as a plausible
explanation, thus ID necessary fails to resolve the inexplicable.
Of course, this reasoning begs the question. For example, maybe the
reason abiogenesis is inexplicable is *because* such explanations
ignore ID. From the ID perspective, the origin of life is not nearly as
inexplicable as it is for those whose minds are closed to ID. Sorry, Cliff,
but your observation is nonsense.
Mike
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Mon Feb 14 2000 - 08:44:31 EST