Some brief comments:
Larry Arnhart:
" This confusion in "intelligent design theory"--both affirming
and denying "recourse to the supernatural"--points to the fundamental
fallacy in the argument as arising from equivocation in the use of
the term "intelligent design." Both Dembski and Michael Behe use
the term "intelligent design" without clearly distinguishing "HUMANLY
intelligent design" from "DIVINELY intelligent design." We have all
observed how the human mind can cause effects that are humanly
designed, and from such observable effects, we can infer the
existence of humanly intelligent designers. But insofar as we have
never directly observed a divine intelligence (that is, an omniscient
and omnipotent intelligence) causing effects that are divinely
designed, we cannot infer a divinely intelligent designer from our
common human experience."
I've never understood ID as something that detects divine intelligent
design. As Arnhart notes, "We have all observed how the human
mind can cause effects that are humanly designed, and from such
observable effects, we can infer the existence of humanly
intelligent designers." (indeed, and as Michael Polanyi wrote,
"If all men were exterminated, this would not affect the laws of
inanimate nature. But the production of machines would stop,
and not until men arose again could machines be formed once
more.") Now, since we can infer the existence of humanly
intelligent designs, we ought to be able to infer the existence
of design at the hands of human-like agents, at least tentatively.
As I see it, that is as far as ID can go. If one wants to equate the
human-like intelligence with divine intelligence, it would seem that
they would need factors extrinsic to ID (faith, philosophical arguments,
etc.).
Daniel Falush:
"Here the author complains about the lack of any pathways or research to
support ID's theses. If one wants to provide a scientific alternative to
Darwinism then complaining about Darwinism is not enough.
" Intelligent design poses a direct challenge. In "Darwin's Black
Box", Michael Behe pays lip service to common descent but he did not
show that his ideas compatible with it and in practice they are not
(this is not the principal criticism that has been made of the book)."
How in the world is ID incompatible with common decent (CD)?
If that were true, genetic engineering could not exist. For example,
a transgenic mouse is related, by descent, to the population of mice
from which it came. But it also exists because its genome has been
manipulated by an intelligent agent. There is nothing in evolution
which serves as a barrier to intelligent intervention.
"Skeptics are free to complain about dogmatism but it would be much
more productive if instead they devoted their energies to developing
either (1) a version of ID theory that is compatible with common
descent"
That's easy. I currently constrain my ID views to the origin of life
on this planet. The original life forms, existing because of ID, then
evolve. Of course, despite the fact that non-teleologists really
have no alternative mechanism for the origin of life (in fact, we
really have no evidence that abiogenesis occurred by purely
non-teleological means), this ID position, that is clearly
compatible with common descent, is still dismissed with the
same flippant attitude. I have no problem with this, but it
shows that the problem posed by ID is not that it would
force us to abandon the fact, Fact, FACT of common descent.
"or (2) an empirically validated criterion for differentiating
organisms that do have a common ancestor from those that do not.
The first two chapters of Darwin's "Origin of Species", provide a
compelling argument that it will be impossible to find such a
criterion. I sincerely and genuinely wish the skeptics luck in their
attempts.""
Well, if we have no empirically validated criterion for differentiating
organisms that do have a common ancestor from those that do not,
then the cat is out of the bag. That is, the inference of common
descent in science is not tested against a null hypothesis. Thus,
if someone says, "X is related to Y by common descent," we need
to remember that such a claim was made without an empirically
validated criterion for differentiating organisms that do have a
common ancestor from those that do not.
Cliff Hamrick:
"Dr. Dembski, despite his claims of intelligent design as a
scientific theory, is not conducting scientific research. Science is
based on the principle of testable, falsifiable hypotheses. I will
give the proponents of intelligent design credit for having a
well-thought out, perfectly logical hypothesis that the universe and
the living things in it are too specifically complex to have arisen
by random chance alone. I agree with the premise of this hypothesis
and that has bolstered my faith in a divine power. However, it is
not scientific until some means of testing that hypothesis can be
shown. I have never seen, though Dembski and cohorts profess to
possess, any viable means of testing this hypothesis."
This sounds good, but remember the context. Science proposes
such things as 1. life originated by non-life through purely non-
teleological mechanisms; 2. the bacterial flagellum arose through
random mutations and natural selection; and 3. the reptile to bird
transition was driven by random mutations and natural selection.
Yet I have not seen any "tests" for the validity or invalidity of
these hypotheses.
I think it important not to conflate operational science with
historical analyses. The terms "testing and falsification" mean
something very concrete when trying to determine, for example,
which residues constitute the active site in alcohol dehydrogenase.
But when talking about origin events in ancient, unobservable history,
the whole notion of "testing" is quite different. Here, it becomes
more vague, more indirect, and essentially amounts to an "if, then"
scenario supported with circumstantial evidence. If that bothers
someone, complain to Nature and get busy inventing a time machine.
Mike
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