Reflectorites
I apologise for the lateness of this response.
On Tue, 8 Aug 2000 02:31:19 +0100, Richard Wein wrote:
[...]
>>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.
RW>Well, I wasn't going to dignify Stephen's post with a reply. But since you
>ask, Susan... ;-
How *honoured* I am to have such a one as *Richard* to "dignify" my "post
with a reply"! :-)
RW>Stephen is making a very common error. He's confusing two things:
>(a) falsification of a hypothesis;
>(b) showing that the arguments in support of a hypothesis are invalid
I am not "confusing" anything. I am well aware that a distinction can be
made between a hypothesis and its supporting arguments.
Usually on this Reflector, in the case of ID, such distinctions are not made,
particularly by the evolution side. For example, if only one aspect of
creationism or ID (e.g. "a supporting argument") is claimed to be falsified
(or is unfalsifiable), it is assumed that the entire "hypothesis" of creation or
ID has been falsified (or is unfalsifiable).
RW>I've certainly never said that the ID hypothesis has been falsified. What I
>have said is that the alleged scientific arguments for ID (Dembski's and
>Behe's) have been shown to be invalid.
Well, since the Dembski and Behe's (together with Thaxton, et al's)
arguments at this stage comprise much of the scientific content of "the ID
hypothesis", to claim that their "scientific arguments" are: 1) "alleged" (i.e.
not even scientific) and 2) that they " have been shown to be invalid", is
tantamount to claiming that "the ID hypothesis has been falsified".
Or to put it another way, what does Richard claim is left of "the ID
hypothesis" if "Dembski's and Behe's" arguments are: 1) not even
"scientific" (i.e. "alleged"); and 2) "have been shown to be invalid"?
RW>As to whether I think the ID hypothesis is falsifiable, that depends on what
>precisely the ID hypothesis actually is. If the hypothesis is "an
>intelligent agent was involved in the origin of life on Earth", then I would
>say this is not falsifiable, because we can never have 100% complete
>knowledge of what happened in the past, so there will always be gaps in
>which IDers can claim that an intelligent designer was at work.
We don't need to have "100% complete knowledge of what happened in
the past". All that would be required is for origin of life researchers to
succeed in their task and demonstrate a fully materialistic-naturalistic
origin of life from non-living chemicals without the need for the guidance
or intervention of "an intelligent agent". Then "the ID hypothesis" that "an
intelligent agent was involved in the origin of life on Earth" would be
falsified.
RW>Far from rushing in to raise the subject of falsifiability, as Stephen
>claims, I rarely raise the subject, as, in my opinion, the falsifiability
>criterion is overrated. In this case, it was Steven Crawford who raised the
>subject, not me.
I must say I am surprised at this. My impression was that in the past
Richard has claimed at various times that ID has been falsified and at other
times that it is unfalsifiable. But I don't have time to go back and check so I
will have to take Richard's word that he hasn't. Therefore I apologise to
Richard if I have been unfair to him on this point.
RW>By the way, I note that once again Stephen has made the Freudian slip of
>treating "materialism-naturalism" as the complement of ID, despite his
>claims that the intelligent agent of the ID hypothesis is not necessarily
>supernatural. ;-)
Richard here makes a good point. The problem is that in the heat of debate
we all use the words "design", "Intelligent Design" and "ID"
interchangeably.
As per my recent posts to Steve Crawford and Susan, the Intelligent
Design (ID) Movement is about detecting *design*, not specifying who the
Designer is. It is the Intelligent *Design* Movement not the Intelligent
*Designer* Movement! The question of who (or what) the Designer is, is
strictly speaking outside of the scope of ID proper.
Generally speaking, by "Intelligent Design" and "ID" I mean the specific
program of the modern "Intelligent Design Movement", which aims to
demonstrate that there is some design in nature that is empirically
detectable (i.e. cannot plausibly be explained as anything other than the
result of intelligent cause).
Such "Intelligent Design" is conceded by the ID movement as not
exhausting the argument for design in general. There are at least three areas
of design that the ID movement does not address:
1. Dembski concedes that the universe as a whole may be designed but ID
does not address that:
"In its treatment of design, this book focuses not so much on
whether the universe as a whole is designed but on whether we are
able to detect design within an already given universe. The universe
provides a well-defined causal backdrop (physicists these days think
of it as a field characterized by field equations). Although one can
ask whether that causal backdrop is itself designed, one can as well
ask whether events and objects occurring within that backdrop are
designed. At issue here are two types of design: (1) the design of
the universe as a whole and (2) instances of design within the
universe. An analogy illustrates the difference. Consider an oil
painting. An oil painting is typically painted on a canvas. One can
therefore ask whether the canvas is designed. Alternatively one can
ask whether some configuration of paint on the canvas is designed.
The design of the canvas corresponds to the design of the universe
as a whole. The design of some configuration of paint corresponds
to an instance of design within the universe. Though not perfect,
this analogy is useful. The universe is a canvas on which is depicted
natural history. One can ask whether that canvas itself is designed.
On the other hand, one can ask whether features of natural history
depicted on that canvas are designed. In biology, for instance, one
can ask whether Michael Behe's irreducibly complex biochemical
machines are designed. Although design remains an important issue
in cosmology, the focus of the intelligent design movement is on
biology That's where the action is. It was Darwin's expulsion of
design from biology that made possible the triumph of naturalism in
Western culture. So, too, it will be intelligent design's reinstatement
of design within biology that will be the undoing of naturalism in
Western culture. (Dembski W.A., "Intelligent Design," 1999,
pp.13-14).
2. Demski's explanatory filter excludes natural law:
"The key step in formulating Intelligent Design as a scientific theory
is to delineate a method for detecting design. Such a method exists,
and in fact, we use it implicitly all the time. The method takes the
form of a three-stage Explanatory Filter. Given something we think
might be designed, we refer it to the filter. If it successfully passes
all three stages of the filter, then we are warranted asserting it is
designed. Roughly speaking the filter asks three questions and in
the following order: (1) Does a law explain it? (2) Does chance
explain it? (3) Does design explain it?" (Dembski W.A., "The
Explanatory Filter: A three-part filter for understanding how to
separate and identify cause from intelligent design," An excerpt
from a paper presented at the 1996 Mere Creation conference,
originally titled "Redesigning Science, The Real Issue, 16 May
1997. http://www.origins.org/real/r19602/dembski.html)
but every theist and even non-theist design advocate AFAIK would
maintain that natural law is evidence for design.
3. Dembski admits his explanatory filter could return a false negative (i.e.
allow cases of real design to slip through undetected):
"Consider first the problem of false negatives. When the
complexity-specification criterion fails to detect design in a thing,
can we be sure no intelligent cause underlies it? The answer is no.
For determining that something is not designed, this criterion is not
reliable. False negatives are a problem for it. This problem of false
negatives, however, is endemic to detecting intelligent causes. One
difficulty is that intelligent causes can mimic necessity and chance,
thereby rendering their actions indistinguishable from such
unintelligent causes. A bottle of ink may fall off a cupboard and
spill onto a sheet of paper. Alternatively a human agent may
deliberately take a bottle of ink and pour it over a sheet of paper.
The resulting inkblot may look identical in both instances, but the
one case results by chance, the other by design. Another difficulty is
that detecting intelligent causes requires background knowledge on
our part. It takes an intelligent cause to know an intelligent cause.
But if we don't know enough, we'll miss it. Consider a spy listening
in on a communication channel whose messages are encrypted.
Unless the spy knows how to break the cryptosystem used by the
parties on whom he is eavesdropping, any messages passing the
communication channel will be unintelligible and might in fact be
meaningless. The problem of false negatives therefore arises either
when an intelligent agent has acted (whether consciously or
unconsciously) to conceal one's actions or when an intelligent agent
in trying to detect design has insufficient background knowledge to
determine whether design actually is present. Detectives face this
problem all the time. A detective confronted with a murder needs
first to determine whether a murder has indeed been committed. If
the murderer was clever and made it appear that the victim died by
accident, then the detective will mistake the murder for an accident.
So, too, if the detective is stupid and misses certain obvious clues,
the detective will mistake the murder for an accident. In mistaking a
murder for an accident the detective commits a false negative."
(Dembski W.A., "Intelligent Design," 1999, pp.140-141).
So I will try to be more rigorous in separating the more specific "ID" from
the more general, arguments from design. In future when I mean the
general argument from (or to) design, I will try to just use the term
"Design" (capitalised), and when I mean the special argument for
empirically detectable design of the modern Intelligent Design Movement, I
will try to use only the term "Intelligent Design" or "ID".
However, I may still use the term "design" and "designer" (uncapitalised) to
mean either, depending on the context. But because I am a Christian theist
and I personally believe that the Designer is the Christian God, I will tend
to use the word Designer (capitalised) in both contexts.
I do this consciously, not only to be faithful to Him, but to avoid a charge
of duplicity in saying one thing and meaning another. I personally always
(unless the context indicates otherwise) maintain that the ID Movement's
Designer is the Christian God.
However, I cannot maintain, at least at the level of design that the ID
movement is specifically trying to demonstrate, that the Designer *must* be
the Christian God. Indeed, who the Designer is, is outside the scope of the
specific design that the ID movement claims to address. So in the context of
the ID movement I will try to speak only design, not the Designer.
I thank Richard for pointing out my " Freudian slip" and I hope this has
clarified my position.
[...]
Steve
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The failure of neo-Darwinian theory is therefore one of misplaced
emphasis. Evolution is seen to take place by the natural selection of
random genetic mutations; inherent in this assumption is that the
phenotypic variations corresponding to the genetic variations are equally
random. On account of this, one has no recourse but to assign to natural
selection the "creative" role in evolution." (Ho M.W. & Saunders P.T.,
"Beyond neo-Darwinism - An Epigenetic Approach to Evolution", Journal of
Theoretical Biology, Vol. 78, pp.573-591, 1979, p.589)
Stephen E. Jones | sejones@iinet.net.au | http://www.iinet.net.au/~sejones
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