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Re: [Phys-l] Intelligent designists fight back.



I think you are missing the point of Intelligent Design. It does not admit supernatural agents any more than Darwinism does. It simply looks at the usual evidence - fossil records, complexity of organisms, etc. - and concludes from that evidence that evolution cannot explain the full tapestry of what is seen - a non random, deliberate interaction of some kind is seen to be required. That process may come to a different conclusion than Darwinists, but it is no different in kind from the process followed by Darwinists. The step to appealing to a deity as the deliberate interaction is an entirely separate conclusion that is not demanded by ID.

ID proponents understand very well how science operates. It is mainstream scientists who are mistakenly dismissive of ID and who treat it as something unworthy of serious rebuttal. One cannot blame non-scientists for failing to conclude that in a comparison between Darwinism and ID, one is science and the other is not.

Ben Stein is a very clever and intelligent person. He has remarkable insight into the way education works and has shown this in the numerous parodies that he has presented of pedantic instructors. He also has an uncanny grasp of the workings of the financial world and has become very wealthy acting on those insights. I watch him often on the Saturday morning financial programs on Fox News. I have taken some of his advice and have reaped significant financial rewards from doing so. He is not an ignoramus. Obviously, neither is President Bush or numerous other highly intelligent people who see no reason to prefer Darwinism over ID. Rather, it is the science community who has to get off their high horses and come up with clear, easily understandable retorts to ID. Simply being dismissive is going to drive more of the general population into the ID court. They have seen scientists careen from Global Cooling to Global Warming - they have seen demands for banning DDT followed by unforgivable mass deaths of children in undeveloped countries because of the resulting surge in malaria - they will not accept nuclear power because scientists have created bombs from that science. Scientists have too spotty a history to take a believable condescending attitude toward ID that is readily acceptable by the general public.

Bob at PC - who sees evolution as the only viable explanation for the living world

(Please excuse the typos - my new wireless keyboard does not communicate with my new Vista computer very well.)

________________________________

From: phys-l-bounces@carnot.physics.buffalo.edu on behalf of John Clement
Sent: Fri 1/4/2008 3:34 PM
To: 'Forum for Physics Educators'
Subject: Re: [Phys-l] Intelligent designists fight back.



They hardly need to fight back when we have major presidential candidates
who disavow evolution, and a sitting president who does the same. How about
an anti-theocracy web site? Ben Stein obviously does not understand
science. It can't admit supernatural agents. When scientists do that,
research and development stops. Newton when he did not understand something
said that God arranges it, so others went on to do the calculations that did
not need to admit the "hypothesis" of a deity. The problem is that the
religious right equates this with atheism, which is absolutely false. Many
religious groups have made their peace with Darwin.

John M. Clement
Houston, TX




http://www.expelledthemovie.com/playground.php


bc, little scientist.
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_______________________________________________
Forum for Physics Educators
Phys-l@carnot.physics.buffalo.edu
https://carnot.physics.buffalo.edu/mailman/listinfo/phys-l