DNAunion: PART 2.
[...]
>>>Susan: Some Christians have no trouble weaving the details of the world
into their religion. Their god is merely larger than the world and science.
Other religionists are very threatened by those who examine the world in
detail and are afraid that something will be discovered (or has been
discovered) that will prove their religion to be untrue. I think you, and
nearly all creationists (and I believe that IDists are merely a subset of
creationists) are in the latter category.
[... see other post form PART 1]
Michael Behe, one of the leading Intelligent Design proponents, makes it
clear that he is not a Creationist.
"Many people think that questioning Darwinian evolution must be equivalent to
espousing creationism. As commonly understood, creationism involves belief
in an earth formed only about ten thousand years ago, an interpretation of
the Bible that is still very popular. For the record, I have no reason to
doubt that the universe is the billions of years old that physicists say it
is. Further, I find the idea of common descent (that all organisms share a
common ancestor) fairly
convincing, and have no particular reason to doubt it. ... Although
Darwin's mechanism - natural selection working on variation - might explain
many things, however, I do not believe it explains molecular life." (Michael
J. Behe, Darwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution, Free
Press, p 5)
Here are couple of quotes that support "my" definition of a Creationist.
"Because creationists believe that God created the universe, the Earth, and
life in 6 days 10,000 years ago, any science that contradicts that view -
including the big bang theory, the geologic timescale, and the validity of
radioactive decay as a measure of great age - is vulnerable, says Marshall
Berman of Sandia National Laboratories in New Mexico. "We have to realize
that this is an assault on all science, " he says."" (Bernice Wuethrich,
Scientists Strike Back Against Creationism, Science, Oct 22, 1999, p 659)
"In formulating its position on scientific creationism in Edwards v.
Aguillard, the Supreme Court cited the District Court in McLean v. Arkansas
Board of Education. According to the court, scientific creationism is not
just similar to the Genesis account of creation but is in fact identical to
it and parallel to no other creation story. Because scientific creationism
corresponds point for point with the creation and flood narratives in
Genesis, the Supreme Court found scientific
creationism to be a religious doctrine and not a scientific theory."
(Intelligent Design, William A. Dembski, InterVarsity Press, 1999, p248)
"Designer" is not equal to "Creator"
Because both Intelligent Design and Creationism involve some kind of a
"designer", then the two are often incorrectly claimed to be equivalent: that
is, the "Designer is the same as the Creator" fallacy is presented.
In fact, in one of my e-mail discussions, an anti-IDist put forth the
following simple argument in an attempt to equate ID with Creationism.
>>[Opponent]: A designer is a creator. Designer = Creator!
My logical response, which exposed the flaw in his line of reasoning, was as
follows:
>>>DNAunion: You are playing word games, so I will too. Chemical evolution
created life - that is your claim. Chemical evolution = creator! You are a
Creationist too!!!
Every scenario for the origin of life MUST have some form of a "Creator" - a
mechanism by which inanimate matter was transformed into living matter.
Therefore, using my "opponent's" warped logic, every person who holds that
life arose from non-life is technically a Creationist of some kind. Chemical
evolution's mechanism is purely natural, while the Creationists' mechanism is
purely divine. Intelligent Design states neither - it states that nature
itself is insufficient to accomplish the transformation, but that with the
aid of an intelligent agent (which does not have to be the Christian God, or
any God for that matter), the informational and probabilistic hurdles could
have been overcome.
The Creator in Creationism is not necessarily the Designer in Intelligent
Design: in one the "designer" MUST be a particular, divine being - in the
other, it could be an advanced extraterrestrial civilization. Thus, this
argument fails to establish an equality.
"Inferences to design do not require that we have a candidate for the role of
designer. … The conclusion that something was designed can be made quite
independently of knowledge of the designer. … The inference to design can
be held with all the firmness that is possible in this world, without knowing
anything about the designer." (Michael J. Behe, Darwin's Black Box: The
Biochemical Challenge to Evolution, Free Press, p 196-197)
Michael Behe states repeatedly in his book that the identity (as well as
other attributes) of the designer is not relevant to an intelligent design
inference - unlike Creationism, in which the identity of the designer/creator
is the absolute foundation upon which the "theory" is based. Try to get a
Creationist to accept a designer of life other than God - for instance, an
advanced alien civilization - won't happen! But an intelligent design
proponent would accept this scientific explanation (if evidence supported it)
because the identity and attributes of the designer are not central to the
design inference. Such a scientific alien explanation may contradict an
IDist's religious (theological) beliefs, but not his or her scientific (ID)
beliefs.
Is Behe religious? Yes, he is Catholic. But he does not state that the
designer is the God in which he believes. Catholics, Baptists, Jews, Hindus,
Moslems, etc. and even atheists, could all hold to the same intelligent
design ideology - it is not tied to a single religion or to any religion at
all (of course, each individual could attempt to assign an identity to the
designer based upon the individual's own personal religious beliefs, but at
that moment, science and intelligent design have been left behind and
theology has taken over).
This distinction in designers is "unpacked" by another prominent Intelligent
Design proponent, William Dembski.
"… it is mistaken and unfair to confuse intelligent design with scientific
creationism. Intelligent design is a scientific theory devoid of religious
commitments. Whereas the Creator underlying scientific creationism conforms
to a strict, literal interpretation of the Bible, the designer underlying
intelligent design is compatible with a much broader playing field. To be
sure, the designer is compatible with the Creator-God of the world's major
monotheistic religions like Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. But the
designer is also compatible with the watchmaker-God of the deists, the
demiurge of Plato's Timaeus and the divine reason (i.e., logos spermatikos)
of the ancient Stoics. One can even take an agnostic view about the
designer, treating specified complexity as a brute unexplainable fact.
Unlike scientific creationism, intelligent design does not prejudge such
questions as Who is the designer? Or How does the designer go about designing
and building things?" (William A. Dembski, Intelligent Design: The Bridge
Between Science &
Theology, InterVarsity Press, 1999, p252)
Is Dembski religious? Yes. Does Dembski write about religion in the above
book? Yes, but he does not mix religion with science (one should keep in
mind that he keeps theology and science separate, as the title of the book
suggests). His scientific evidences for intelligent design are based
primarily on information theory, probability, and logic. Dembski then leaves
the realm of science by assigning attributes to the designer based upon his
own personal theological and philosophical views.
In fact, if it is allowable to pigeonhole a scientist as a Creationist if he
or she believes in a personal God who answers prayers, then about 40% of
prominent scientists in the United States and 10% of those in the NAS
(National Academy of Sciences) are Creationists, based on a 1997 poll. Since
most of us would reject such high percentages of Creationism in mainstream
science, it appears the problem lies with the original assumption of
Scientist + Belief in God = Creationist. And therefore, it is a double
standard to accept their work and reject Dembski's solely because he mentions
God in a non-scientific manner. If one wishes to attack Dembski's science,
then that is what they should attack.
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