Reflectorites
Apologies this is late. I had a large Lab write up to do on the
Structure and Function of Plants (what an argument for Design!).
On Mon, 07 Aug 2000 16:35:07 -0500, Susan Brassfield Cogan wrote:
If Susan doesn't mind but I am going to keep using her old intials
"SB". If I used "SC" there would then be *three* "SC's" on the
List. I could use "SBC" if Susan wished.
>SJ>ID is not formulated so that it will be detected no matter what the
>>outcome. In the case of the origin of life, ID is always falsifiable if
>>naturalists can show that life arose from non-living chemicals.
SB>no, that would only prove that we could do what the designer did.
Susan is getting *ID* (i.e. as maintained by the modern ID movement)
mixed up with arguments from design in general. I don't blame her for this
because I get mixed up with it too! :-) Following my responses to Steve
Crawford's posts (and a response I am preparing to one of Richard's posts),
I am going to try to separate the ID movement's special meaning of
"design" from arguments from (and to) design in general.
From now on I am going to try to use "ID" only when I am speaking of the
ID movement's design arguments. I will use "Design" when I am speaking
of design arguments in general.
One big difference is that strictly speaking the ID movement is only trying
to establish *design*, not that there is any particular Designer. So
comments like Susan's above about the "designer" are going beyond the
scope of ID.
As I said in response to one of Steve Crawford's posts: "it is the Intelligent
*Design* movement, not the Intelligent *Designer* movement"!
>SJ>But if naturalists cannot show that (and they have been trying for nearly 50
>>years), and ID *can* show that experimentally that life can arise from non-
>>living chemicals by the intervention of intelligent human design, then ID
>>would be established as the only experimentally verifiable explanation to
>>date.
SB>but that would not *falsify* ID. Scientific theories must have concievable
>conditions under which they could be proved untrue.
So under what "conceivable conditions" could Susan's materialistic-
naturalistic origin of life position "be proved untrue"?
SB>For example if we *did*
>find a reliably dated fossil of a human in cambrian strata, that would
>prove evolution to be untrue.
This is such a weak test that Susan knows it is not ever going to happen.
Not even the YEC Flood Geology model has humans in the lowest strata.
Susan's so-called `test' is like a Christian saying that his belief in
Christianity would be falsified if he died and he did not wake up in heaven!
So what *risky* test does Susan propose for "evolution", such that if it
failed it, Susan would cease believing in "evolution"?
SB>So what would prove ID to be untrue?
Simple. Showing that unintelligent natural causes can do the job. If Susan
thinks that ID cannot be proved to be untrue, then she is effectively saying
that her materialistic-naturalistic position cannot be proved to be true
either.
In fact as Mike Behe points out, it is *ID* which is making the risky,
falsifiable predictions, not Darwinism:
"It seems then, perhaps counterintuitively to some, that intelligent
design is quite susceptible to falsification, at least on the points
under discussion. Darwinism, on the other hand, seems quite
impervious to falsification. The reason for that can be seen when we
examine the basic claims of the two ideas with regard to a particular
biochemical system like, say, the bacterial flagellum. The claim of
intelligent design is that "No unintelligent process could produce
this system." The claim of Darwinism is that "Some unintelligent
process (involving natural selection and random mutation) could
produce this system." To falsify the first claim, one need only show
that at least one unintelligent process could produce the system. To
falsify the second claim, one would have to show the system could
not have been formed by any of a potentially infinite number of
possible unintelligent processes, which is effectively impossible to
do. I think Professor Coyne and the National Academy of Sciences
have it exactly backwards. A strong point of intelligent design is its
vulnerability to falsification. (Indeed, some of my religious critics
dislike intelligent design theory precisely because they worry that it
will be falsified, and thus theology will appear to suffer another
blow from science. See, for example, (Flietstra 1998).) A weak
point of Darwinian theory is its resistance to falsification. What
experimental evidence could possibly be found that would falsify
the contention that complex molecular machines evolved by a
Darwinian mechanism?" (Behe M.J., "Philosophical Objections to
Intelligent Design: Response to Critics," Discovery Institute July
31, 2000.
http://www.discovery.org/embeddedRecentArticles.php3?id=445).
>SJ>However, if it is found that even a human level intelligence is not
>>sufficient
>>to create life from non-living chemicals, and naturalists still cannot show
>>that life arose from non-living chemicals, then ID theories that require a
>>higher than human level intelligence are still viable.
SB>all that means is that it hasn't been done *yet* or there are perfectly
>natural means that can't be reproduced..
So how could Susan's position ever be falsified?
SB>But the original question is what could conceivably prove ID false.
I have already answered that (see above). Now its Susan's turn. "What
could conceivably prove...false" Susan's materialistic-naturalistic position
that: "it hasn't been done *yet* or there are perfectly natural means that
can't be reproduced"?
>>This does not mean that
>>the Christian God has to be the Designer, but it does mean that some other
>>higher-level designer is possible. For example, it could still be some super-
>>human extraterrestrial or advanced human time-traveller, etc.
SB>yeah, yeah, yeah, nobody in the audience believes for an instant that that
>is the designer you expect.
I have never for a moment ever denied that I "expect" the Designer to be the
Christian God. But my point is that I could never claim that the Designer
*must be* the Christian God.
>SJ>The real problem for atheists like Richard is that they seem to be unable to
>>even *imagine* that materialism-naturalism could be false. Therefore they
>>rush in on the slightest pretext claiming that ID has either been
>>falsified or
>>is unfalsifiable. It never seems to occur to Richard that ID cannot be
>>*both* falsified and unfalsifiable!
SB>I'm sure we will hear from Richard on this point, but I think that ID is
>outside of science on account of it being religion. It's an assertion. It
>can't be proved or falsified, it must simply be believed--or not.
"ID" has proposed falsifiable tests that if they are falsified ID will be wrong
(see what Mike Behe said above about testing his Irreducible Complexity
ID claim.
And evolutionists have tried to falsify Mike Behe's Irreducible Complexity
by his own tests and have to date failed. But Behe (and I) concede that
they could succeed at any time.
But where are the falsifiable tests that would prove Susan or Richard's
atheistic faith in *their "religion" (i.e. materialistic-naturalistic "evolution")
wrong?
Steve
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"Molecular biology has been built upon the assumptions of physics,
chemistry and the other so-called 'hard' sciences: laws of great generality
and perfect stability do exist in nature; living things are governed by these
laws. Yet the study of natural selection stands outside this framework, even
though many students of the process begin as scientists and use the tools of
various scientific disciplines. Students of natural selection can have no hope
and no wish for eternal laws. Physicists can predict the next solar eclipse,
but no one can predict the next species. Trained as scientists but thinking
like historians, students or natural selection are pleased to accept the
contingent aspects of current and past life, the certainty that we will not
come this way again." (Pollack R., "Genes and history," New Scientist, Vol
127, No. 1733, 8 September 1990, pp.44-45, p.44)
Stephen E. Jones | sejones@iinet.net.au | http://www.iinet.net.au/~sejones
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