>Bertvan
>>>Considering the petty, childish bickering in which academics at universities
>>>indulge, if Baylor and this board are typical, why shouldn't the public
>take
>>>everything they say with a grain of salt? I'll accept the technical stuff,
>>>provisionally, but will view their interpretations as no more astute than
>>>anyone else's version.>
>
>Susan:
>>Argument and debate is the way science is done. It's the only way to
>>get closer and closer to the truth.
>>Which technical stuff do you accept provisionally?
>
>Bertvan:
>I have nothing against debate, although I can't imagine what any "debate"
>between you and I, neither of us scientists, would accomplish.
it's without plan or purpose :-) I do it because I enjoy it. I enjoy
the research I do to support it. I consider myself highly teachable.
The details of evolution are very easy to understand up to a point.
Microbiology and biochemistry both kind of leave me in the dust, but
paleontology, geology, and such, are relatively easy to grasp and are
(or should be) taught in high school.
Scientists do not object to evolution because they understand it. The
battles over evolution are fought by non-scientists who think
evolution has something to say about the human condition. I think
the scientists in the crowd need to speak up more. I think a lot more
people need to be educated about evolution so that they know
*exactly* what evolution does and doesn't say and what it does and
doesn't mean about life's meanings.
I strongly recommend you (and everyone) read "Finding Darwin's God."
It may change the way I approach the entire subject.
>At Baylor the
>faculty didn't want ID debated - not in the science department, not in the
>philosophy department, not in a special center to explore the relation
>between science and philosophy. They didn't want it discussed anywhere on
>their campus!
have you read any of Glen Morton's posts? They had a big conference
this summer on design. Baylor is a religiously-funded institution.
The design, if it is going to be discussed, will be discussed there.
The Polanyi Institute was set up to explore the relationship between
science and *religion* (not philosophy). Dembski's salary is not paid
by Baylor and he was doing the bidding of those who *do* pay his
salary. That is, he was using his affiliation with Baylor to spread
propaganda about design, *not* do research. If he had some research,
he needed to share it with his peers for review. That's how science
gets done.
It is clear that Dembski has been moved to the religion department
because what he does is religion, not science.
>If there were a couple of professors at Baylor who believed
>the universe is the result of design and teleology, rather than chance, do
>you suppose they would have dared speak up? Do you suppose there are
>scientists, untenured professors, at other universities who don't express
>criticism of "chance and natural selection" for fear of being denounced as
>"ignorant creationists" or "religious fanatics"?
It is my understanding that the majority--if not all--of the faculty
at Baylor are Christians. They believe that God Created The Universe.
However, the scientists on the faculty want to do *science*, not
promote the highly political agenda of the Discovery Institute under
the guise of doing science.
>The facts I accept about evolution are fossils which appear to be related in
>some way, perhaps by common descent. (Although some scientists are beginning
>to suggest it was from some 30 or 40 ancestors, rather than one.)
where did *they* come from? Did those 30 or 40 have parents?
>Organisms
>change over time, similar DNA produces similar morphology, and I have no
>reason to doubt accepted dating methods. I see no conclusive evidence
>indicating how evolution occurred. "Chance and natural selection" was
>Darwin's guess,
he wasn't guessing. He was reporting what he saw. This is the
introduction to Chapter 4 of Origin of the Species:
"How will the struggle for existence, discussed too briefly in the
last chapter, act in regard to
variation? Can the principle of selection, which we have seen is so
potent in the hands of man, apply in nature? I think we shall see
that it can act most effectually. Let it be borne in mind in what an
endless number of strange peculiarities our domestic productions,
and, in a lesser degree, those under nature, vary; and how strong the
hereditary tendency is. Under domestication, it may be truly said
that the, whole organization becomes in some degree plastic. Let it
be borne in mind how infinitely complex and close-fitting are the
mutual relations of all organic beings to each other and to their
physical conditions of life. Can it, then, be thought improbable,
seeing that variations useful to man have undoubtedly occurred, that
other variations useful in some way to each being in the great and
complex battle of life, should sometimes occur in the course of
thousands of generations? If such do occur, can we doubt
(remembering that many more individuals are born than can possibly
survive) that individuals having any advantage, however slight, over
others, would have the best chance of surviving and of procreating
their kind? On the other hand, we may feel sure that any variation in
the least degree injurious would be rigidly destroyed. This
preservation of favourable variations and the rejection of injurious
variations, I call Natural Selection. Variations neither useful nor
injurious would not be affected by natural selection, and would be
left a fluctuating element, as perhaps we see in the species called
polymorphic.
and I have no quarrel with those who find that a satisfactory "
The observations that he goes on to recount in the chapter have been
made again and again by thousands of scientists. In other words, it
has been subjected to peer review again and again.
>explanation. However, I see no reason to discourage people from looking for
>other explanations, such as Spetner's Lamarckism, Brigg Kleiss's horizontal
>transfer, James Shapiro's intelligent DNA, Intelligent Design, and Kauffman's
>self organization (which, to me, is the same as design.). Nothing you or I
>say could have any effect upon a scientific understanding of life. However,
>as long as you continue to insist that ID, or any criticism of "chance and
>natural selection", is merely a form of creationism, I can argue that it is
>not.
As always, you can argue anything you want. (Actually you sort of
announce your opinions rather than support arguments with facts, but
that's ok, I guess.) This, however, is another straw man. I've never
said that any criticism of variation and selection is creationism.
Nearly all of the critics of variation and selection are
creationists, but that's not the same thing. A creationists says in
some form or other "God did it, not nature." Even a Christian who
thinks that God created all of the universe *including* evolution is
a creationist of a sort.
ID is a form of creationism. ID says "Nature could not possibly
design itself. God (or somebody) did it." ID is not science. It's
religion. That's why Behe and Dembski wrote works for the public
instead of submitting their hypotheses for peer review. They *knew*
their ideas wouldn't last five minutes in front of a panel of their
peers. They can't fool fellow scientists and mathematicians who are
equally as educated as they are and they know it. They have a right
to their opinions. They have a right to their religion. But they do
not have a right to pass off religious faith-statements as science.
Susan
-- ----------I am aware that the conclusions arrived at in this work will be denounced by some as highly irreligious; but he who denounces them is bound to shew why it is more irreligious to explain the origin of man as a distinct species by descent from some lower form, through the laws of variation and natural selection, than to explain the birth of the individual through the laws of ordinary reproduction.
---Charles Darwin
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Wed Oct 25 2000 - 15:26:43 EDT