In a message dated 9/20/2000 3:51:24 PM Pacific Daylight Time,
sejones@iinet.net.au writes:
<< On Mon, 18 Sep 2000 12:04:58 EDT, FMAJ1019@aol.com wrote:
FJ>I am looking
>forward to any attempt by IDers to address my arguments. ...
SE: They don't need to. FJ/Pim concedes ID's point that there is detectable
evidence of design in biological nature.
>>
If ID wants to argue that design includes natural selection as the designing
agency, then
that's fine with me. But then ID really has shown that ID can detect that
which we
already know or better that which we don't know since nothing can be excluded
a priori.
<< His disagreement is over the nature of the designer, i.e. the designer is
`intelligent natural forces' (whatever they are), which is outside the
scope of ID.
>>
Intelligent natural forces are for instance "natural selection".
"The "actualization-exclusion-specification" triad mentioned above also
fits natural selection rather precisely. One might thus conclude that
Dembski's argument establishes that natural selection can be recognized
as an intelligent agent. "
http://inia.cls.org/~welsberr/zgists/wre/papers/dembski7.html
<< FJ/Pim's `intelligent natural forces' have the added advantage in that
they
would destroy Darwinian explanations ("it wasn't random mutation and
natural selection, Prof. Dawkins, but `intelligent natural forces'"), so I
personally wish to encourage him in his search for these elusive (or should I
say virtual?) entities.
>>
You are incorrect to suggest that it wasn't random mutation and natural
selection.
<< May I suggest to FJ/Pim that he might watch re-runs of Sesame Street
for vital clues as to how to become aware of these `intelligent natural
forces'? :-)
>>
Non sequitor. I would suggest that ID'ers spend more effort on rebutting my
arguments
rather than ridiculing their own strawmen.
The issue is simple:
ID only identifies design by eliminating chance and regularity. They label
therefore intelligent design
to be that which has not been shown to be due to chance and regularity (law)
. But of course that only includes
regularity that we are aware of. What if we cannot identify or support with
data, a Darwinian pathway?
What would the filter conclude? What if we applied the filter to the
knowledge of medieval times. Would the filter
conclude design for instance in which we now know that it was regularity? My
argument is that it would for the same reasons people concluded design in so
many instances of ignorance.
But let's ignore this for the moment and continue the argument:
ID ends up identifying design (ignoring for the moment the issue of false
positives). Has ID identified the designer?
Nope. So how does it attempt to identify the designer?
Wesley Elsberry has in the past shown that:
"The apparent, but unstated, logic behind the move from design to
agency can be given as follows:
1. There exists an attribute in common of some subset of objects
known to be designed by an intelligent agent.
2. This attribute is never found in objects known not to be designed
by an intelligent agent.
3. The attribute encapsulates the property of directed contingency
or choice.
4.For all objects, if this attribute is found in an object, then we
may conclude that the object was designed by an intelligent agent.
"This is an inductive argument. Notice that by the second step, one
must eliminate from consideration precisely those biological
phenomena which Dembski wishes to categorize. In order to conclude
intelligent agency for biological examples, the possibility that
intelligent agency is not operative is excluded a priori. One large
problem is that directed contingency or choice is not solely an
attribute of events due to the intervention of an intelligent agent.
The "actualization-exclusion-specification" triad mentioned above also
fits natural selection rather precisely. One might thus conclude that
Dembski's argument establishes that natural selection can be recognized
as an intelligent agent. "
http://inia.cls.org/~welsberr/zgists/wre/papers/dembski7.html
So "one might thus conclude that Dembski's argument establishes that natural
selection can be recognized as an intelligent agent.". Therefore, since ID
does not identify the designer, it cannot exclude natural forces such as
natural selection as the intelligent agent. This shows that the term
"intelligent design" is not truely a placeholder for what is traditionally
known as intelligence or perhaps even design but for property "X", which is
infered through elimination of chance and regularity. The ID movement wants
to call this intelligent design but I would like to use the confusion of
equivocation and use it "X". So what does infering "X" tell us? Nothing
beyond what we already knew. "X" can have its origins in a natural process
or in a non-natural process.
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