The "Theory" of Intelligent Design - is it science?

[Robin in Tx]

The point is that some look at the same evidence and come to different conclusions. There is nothing at all scientifically proven by similar bone structures found in hands and flippers. If some want to believe it is because they evolved from a common ancestor, fine... that is their belief but it can not be proven. That is my point. It can not be proven and it can not be disproven.

BTW, this is the first I've read of this entire conversation. I haven't been keeping up with posts of the last few days. And honestly, this is a huge waste of time because you and I are both starting from different premises. There really is no sense in carrying on further about this (certainly not for days!)... no one is going to change each other's mind .

[pixelroper]

Originally Posted by Phred

.. just for fun!

1. Nothing in the real world can be proved with absolute certainty.

true or the other worlds

[Eliana]

Originally Posted by Robin in Tx

Yes, I don't lump evolutionary theory into the same category as scientific theories that can be reproduced and tested (as defined in the excerpts you quoted). I recognize it more as a model, an interpretation of evidence. Not a tested, proven theory or a known truth/certainty that, by testing and observation, can be proven or disproven. Just like no one will ever be able to prove or disprove ID, I doubt anyone will ever be able to prove or disprove some of the problems with evolutionary theory.

Robin

A model, yes! That is one of the definitions of a theory:

"A theory is a logically self-consistent model or framework for describing the behavior of a related set of natural or social phenomena. It originates from or is supported by experimental evidence (see scientific method). In this sense, a theory is a systematic and formalized expression of all previous observations, and is predictive, logical, and testable"

As I said before:

"Evolution is a working model that explains observations and is consistent with the larger body of scientific knowledge. Components of that model have been tested - *extensively* and over many years - and the results have been published in peer-reviewed articles in reputable scientific journals (and both the reviewers and the journals are directly related to the field of study in which the experiments were done). This model has successfully predicted discoveries and results of future experiments."

It is at least as well supported as the Law of Relativity... or of gravity. They are models which explain observed phenomena, are supported by research and known facts, and have been the source of successful predictions. I do not understand the basis on which you differentiate amongst them. ...but this topic has been beaten to death, and I do not feel that you and I are communicating successfully here. Thank you for sharing your perspective!

[Phred]

Originally Posted by Robin in Tx

The point is that some look at the same evidence and come to different conclusions. There is nothing at all scientifically proven by similar bone structures found in hands and flippers. If some want to believe it is because they evolved from a common ancestor, fine... that is their belief but it can not be proven. That is my point. It can not be proven and it can not be disproven.

Well, that's not accurate. Quite a bit is proven by that similarity. And the similarity between the earlier fossils that also show the same similarity. But you're right. I could dig up every fossil from the beginning of time and you'd find a way to discredit it. So if you wish to take that attitude toward science, fine... I certainly can't change your mind. Funny thing is, you're also just as certain that God exists aren't you? Even though the Bible itself points out its a matter of faith. There's an irony here I just can't put into words.

BTW, this is the first I've read of this entire conversation. I haven't been keeping up with posts of the last few days. And honestly, this is a huge waste of time because you and I are both starting from different premises. There really is no sense in carrying on further about this (certainly not for days!)... no one is going to change each other's mind .

Aw now comon... we both love our kids don't we?

[Charon]

Originally Posted by Eliana

It [evolution] is at least as well supported as the Law of Relativity... or of gravity.

That may be a stretch. Evolution is not even in the same class of demonstrability as something like gravity (by which I assume you mean Newton's Law of Universal Gravitation -- that F=G*m_1*m_2/r^2). We (at least both phred and I) had discussed elsewhere that Newton's Laws are not really debunked -- they are just expanded upon and generalized. In locally Euclidean spaces to any sane level of accuracy, they are 100% true. Certainly that gravity exists at all goes beyond even the need for a science to establish it.

But, I would tend to concede your over all point that the theory of evolution (and the descent of man from apes, for instance) is pretty well-established. This is one key point on which creationism and intelligent design generally differ. You can consistently adhere to intelligent design and things like the descent of man from apes. I think you definitely have to reject the latter for creationism. Intelligent Design is a vastly weaker assertion about the physical world and nature than creationism is, and it has a lot more academic muscle driving it, I think.

[CherylCO]

Only because it hurts my brain. I am having so much trouble tonight keeping thoughts straight that I fear I'll look silly even in areas I have previously contemplated fully. Besides, I'm sitting here drinking a Corona and that's not the best thing for clear thinking. (Yes, this good little Christian creationist loves Coronas. Shhhh...)

Honestly, I don't think most of this list is "proof" for these things having evolved, though I do agree it suggests a logical explanation. In a sense, I can easily see how the lens one sees it through applies here. Meaning, the same thing you use for evolutionary proof can be seen as a logical extension of design. Same observation, different conclusion. Here's a few examples:

All life shows a fundamental unity in the mechanisms of replication, heritability, catalysis, and metabolism.

Yes. Most cars share something similar with lawn mowers because of the basic design. From an ID perspective, we'd certainly expect a designer to use the model that works for all designs. In fact, this can be turned upside down. There are some species that were separated in such a long ago time that it gets a little impressive how they managed to go in the very same logical direction, randomly. One example is the parallel evolving of sexual reproduction in mammals and plants. There are others within the animal kingdom too. An evolutionist may suggest it went the most productive way, and even there we obviously can't completely compare a flower romance to a chicken, but the coincidences are there enough that it sure can look planned too.

Common descent predicts a nested hierarchy pattern, or groups within groups. We see just such an arrangement in a unique, consistent, well-defined hierarchy, the so-called tree of life.

No argument. Even die-hard young earth creationists teach classification. As for hierarchy, some have more basic specializations than others based on their needs and defined place in their natural surroundings. I would expect an orderly Intelligent Being to be as orderly in this way as He is about the rest of the universe.

Different lines of evidence give the same arrangement of the tree of life. We get essentially the same results whether we look at morphological, biochemical, or genetic traits.

Same as above.


Fossil animals fit in the same tree of life. We find several cases of transitional forms in the fossil record.

The basic need for different speculations on punctual vs. gradual suggests the transitional forms are still a bit lacking here. Even when we find a "transitional form", it too often simply looks like a well designed creature to suit it's surroundings and that "transitional form" hung out for quite some time, like it was quite comfortable as a species, kind of like a platypus. There are still some huge gaps. Despite some thoughts on reptiles with feathers, we still have to go from reptiles with feathers, to four chamber hearts, to warm-blooded systems, to self-contained eggs with hard shells.

But mammals didn't come from birds, they came from reptiles and we're still lacking the huge numbers of transitional forms we'd need to take the reptile, give him fur, give him warm blood and a four chamber heart with very different lung structures, and placental births. We have lots of tree shrews but we're lacking in transitional forms which had to be around for some time in a working Darwinian model. It doesn't look so amazing when you look at the skeleton but if you look at the soft tissue and changes in the brain structure to support the changes, things look like they need a lot more transitions after all. The gap to go from reptile to fish is bigger than fins to feet, the move to a bird is bigger than scales to feathers, but a jump to a mammal from a reptile is a very large leap, skeletal structure aside.

The fossils appear in a chronological order, showing change consistent with common descent over hundreds of millions of years and inconsistent with sudden creation.

Most proponents of ID will not give you trouble with this. Only those with a young earth belief will but they could find you many instances where things didn't show up where they should according to the defined geological place they should be and are thrown out as an anomaly.

Many organisms show rudimentary, vestigial characters, such as sightless eyes or wings useless for flight.

Again, I'm not disputing, I'm only showing how different lenses will view such a thing differently. If an orderly creator used a basic working model of which to turn DNA off and on, this still falls in line with what was said above.

Atavisms sometimes occur. An atavism is the reappearance of a character present in a distant ancestor but lost in the organism's immediate ancestors.
We only see atavisms consistent with organisms' evolutionary histories.

This is still on the same line of thinking. It would be consistent, of course, if the DNA is present. It preserves DNA but it's the creating it people have trouble with.

Ontogeny (embryology and developmental biology) gives information about the historical pathway of an organism's evolution. For example, as embryos whales and many snakes develop hind limbs that are reabsorbed before birth.

I'd love to add something profound here but I fear it follows the same basic answer as above. You won't see a fish get a flower petal that gets reabsorbed. Yes, it would have things that are of a similar DNA sequence.

The distribution of species is consistent with their evolutionary history. For example, marsupials are mostly limited to Australia, and the exceptions are explained by continental drift. Remote islands often have species groups that are highly diverse in habits and general appearance but closely related genetically. Squirrel diversity coincides with tectonic and sea level changes (Mercer and Roth 2003). Such consistency still holds when the distribution of fossil species is included.

This is a place where random evolution can run into trouble. We have examples of critters that seemed to evolved very similar ways, which do not have a common ancestor. As mentioned above, this can be easily viewed as explained by a logical and consistent designer. Take the eye of an octopus. It is not anywhere in our history or even the history of a fly, yet it managed to get one structured pretty similar. It's not as cool as our eye but it has the same kind of parts, not to mention the sophistication one would need within the brain itself to read such signals. You will not find a common ancestor to develop such a fine thing slowly from in an octopus. It's closer to a clam and showed up a very, very long time ago. It has the cornea, lens, rods, optical nerves, etc.

Okay, this is fun and I'd love to go on but it's getting late and I've gotten nothing done tonight. My only point is that even such evidence is in the eye of the beholder, whereas I think you'd have trouble finding such wiggle room in other scientific theories.

Cheers.