| Subject: Wade A. Tisthammer |
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Date Posted: 04/ 2/05 3:55pm
In reply to:
Damoclese
's message, "Gnomes!" on 10/ 4/04 11:17pm
For sake of brevity I’ll trim some parts and try to zero in on the key issues.
>>I think you might be making hidden assumptions about
>>my assumptions.
>
>Then why do you keep comparing life to things we know
>are designed?
Which comparison are you referring to? I gave obelisk and robot examples, but none of them involved comparing life per se. They were just illustrations of how to rationally infer ID and why some objections don't work as advertised.
>>I assume you're referring to natural vs. artificial.
>>Hybrid scenarios could perhaps be constructed, but
>>beyond that what other possibilities are there?
>
>One is that there are things out there for which we
>don't currently have a category.
Like what? What life form out there could not fit into those categories?
>Nature might be one
>of those things on its own. It might "desire" order.
In that case, if there was no artificial intervention, then it would fit into the “natural” category I described above.
>Anyway, there are other possibilities besides it being
>a black and white issue between two extremes that may
>not even be representative of the reality of the issue
>in the first place.
I did mention the possibility of hybrid scenarios; I was explicitly clear that the two extremes weren’t the only possibilities.
>>Really? What other alternative is there? Artificial
>>processes presupposes at least some
>>intelligence.
>
>Define intelligence.
Main Entry: in•tel•li•gence
Pronunciation: in-'te-l&-j&n(t)s
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English, from Middle French, from Latin intelligentia, from intelligent-, intelligens intelligent
1 a (1) : the ability to learn or understand or to deal with new or trying situations : REASON; also : the skilled use of reason (2) : the ability to apply knowledge to manipulate one's environment or to think abstractly as measured by objective criteria (as tests)
>Does nature itself contain any
>intelligence?
Not that I’m aware of.
>>Perhaps so, but nonetheless this prediction has been
>>confirmed. How about you answer my question about how
>>long research on abiogenesis must continue, and how
>>long the prediction of ID theory could be confirmed,
>>before ID can be rationally accepted?
>
>The choice is not limited to Abiogensis or ID when
>Abiogensis fails. (if it does)
Really? Give me one other alternative. The only one I can think of is if life existed forever, but that’s been rejected on both sides.
>The answer to your
>question is that we persist in our current paradigm
>until someone can explain the evidence observed
>better.
Except that’s exactly what ID theorists claim. We have an old paradigm with some problems. We have a new paradigm that makes falsifiable predictions and solves (even predicts) the problems of the old paradigm. Why not call it better? Because we just don’t like it?
>ID thrives on explaining the absence of evidence,
>which is not how science proceeds.
ID thrives on the evidence that we do have: high information content of life, known chemistry etc. Again, you might want to pick up Mere Creation or The Design Inference. At least then you might be able to stop spewing out the same old rhetoric.
If you try hard enough, you could even charge physical laws with “this is not how science proceeds!” After all, those laws also make falsifiable predictions about things that won’t happen also. One could use the same rhetoric “absence of evidence is not evidence of absence” etc.
> It makes no predictions about what other
>things we might see should design be expected.
Pretending it doesn’t exist don’t make the predictions go away. I can talk about such predictions (e.g. message theory [more later]), and to confirm what I’m saying one book I suggest also is The Biotic Message along with Mere Creation and The Design Inference.
>It
>doesn't ADD anything other than explaining why we
>don't see a particular thing
And also why we do see a number of particular things (e.g. the known chemistry regarding RNA nucleotides; more later).
>>Why is that disputable? Natural mechanism =
>>non-artificial.
>
>Because you may not consider something that nature is
>responsbile for, say, a human making a painting, as a
>natural mechanism.
Well, whatever a human’s origin, the human-made painting is still artificially created.
>> How can you dispute the fact that the
>>beliefs I believe are what I believe?
>
>I don't. I dispute whether or not they are actually
>the case.
Well, I do believe what I believe.
> It's not rational to accept
>>a belief regardless of the evidence.
>
>Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
Again, the same old rhetoric…
>>The issue is how long we should put up with a troubled
>>paradigm before we give up on it. Humans sometimes
>>form scientific theories that are wrong.
>
>Sometimes they do. Do you have a theory that better
>explains the observable evidence?
Remember ID? That’s what’s being proposed as an alternative. Now again please answer my question that you have repeatedly avoided. How long research on abiogenesis must continue, and how long the prediction of ID theory could be confirmed, before ID can be rationally accepted? How long should the problems of the paradigm remain unsolved before we accept one that predicts those same problems?
>>That's not data. That's a facet of the theory. In
>>any case we could apply the same sort of "unexplained
>>questions" with abiogenesis and just about every other
>>theory, thereby invalidating them all. That surely is
>>a high price to pay.
>
>There are unexplained questions, and there are
>unexplained mountains of questions. ID theory isn't in
>the same league as Abiogensis as far as science is
>concerned.
Quite true. The questions for abiogenesis are far more serious, e.g. why the global disciplinary failure to find any way organic evolution could have happened?
>>>I didn't say to "rule it out".
>>
>>Fine, but then don't insinuate that this unanswered
>>question is any reason to reject ID theory.
>
>By the same token, it shouldn't be problematic for
>Abiogensis that it hasn't found a natural mechanism
>for the creation of amino acids for certain.
>
>If creation has no mechanism by which something is
>created, surely it too should be thrown out.
There are a number of problems with that. One you have to realize that different burdens of proof are there. Nobody denies that life could be artificially created, so demonstrating a means would serve little purpose for ID. Contrast to abiogenesis, where it is doubted that a means could be created by its critics. Second, a known mechanism for artificially creating life will certainly be created eventually. It’s only a matter of inevitable technological progress; it’ll inevitably be a moot point and is thus not a coherent criticism. Third, there are already some aspects of life that can be created artificially, but there aren’t any known means to produce naturally. Already human scientists can use chemicals to create amino acids and nucleotides. A chemist can take these building blocks to produce proteins and nucleic acids, and from this can even make RNA and DNA. So, there are known mechanisms for ID to work with, but there are no known mechanisms for organic evolution to produce RNA and DNA.
Why? Well there are a number of known chemical problems with the naturalistic scenario. For instance, the processes to get the components for the nucleotide are chemically incompatible. An intelligent chemist can make these nucleotides with ease in a laboratory thanks to artificial intervention, but undirected chemical reactions overwhelmingly produce shapeless goop and undesired products.
When it comes to the fact that ID has known mechanisms but abiogenesis doesn’t, would you still accept the old paradigm despite the confirmed, falsifiable predictions etc.?
>>WHY? I'm getting awfully sick of the avoidance of an
>>explanation here.
>
>Then you should read more carefully. The unexplained
>data (particularly with regards to whom or what the
>creator was) has within it the ability to topple or
>confirm the whole enchilada.
First, the identity of the creator is not data. Second, there are no known means to determine the identity of the designer scientifically. Third, you have yet to explain why the unknown identity has the ability to topple or confirm ID. Look back to my analogies of the robots on Pluto. Does the mere fact of not knowing who or what designed them make ID any less legitimate?
>The problem with ID theory is that this unexplained
>data is avoided, whereas science attempts to explain
>unexplained data.
That’s nice, except (1) it isn’t data, (2) no known scientific means to determine the identity of the designer scientifically, (3) the fact that we can’t identify the designer is not at all grounds to reject the theory…
>(even as we sit here, scientists are
>trying to find experiments and data to explain natural
>mechanisms by which life could arise)
Excellent. I hope they try vigorously.
>>
>>What golden rule?
>
>I was referring to the fact that just because
>something looks designed it doesn't mean it is.
Yep, but just because it looks designed doesn’t mean it isn’t designed.
>>Again, go back to my obelisk/robot examples. How well
>>does your objection work there?
>
>It works fine because we don't know with certainty
>that someone DID make those things. We know a
>SOMETHING made them.
Well, we know (with reasonable confidence) that the robots were intelligently designed, don’t we?
> It does, like
>>it or not, explain why we haven't found natural
>>mechanisms yet.
>
>So would a theory about evidence-stealing gnomes.
Ah, hence the title of your post. But I don’t think your theory is better than ID. Consider for instance your theory applied to the Rosetta stone or the robots on Pluto. It just isn’t as reasonable or straightforward as ID.
>>But I just provided one.
>
>If that's the best prediction that ID can make
>(explaining an absence of evidence) and that makes it
>viable, I think that ID is about to have serious
>competition with my evidence-stealing gnome theory.
See above on reasonableness and straightforwardness. And again it’s not the absence of evidence but the evidence itself. There is known chemistry, the known structure and organization of life (high information content etc.), not to mention the inference to the best explanation.
>>I suggest you read some ID material. There are a lot
>>of predictions that are testable that you seem to be
>>ignorant of. I already provided one example.
>
>Perhaps you'll be so kind as to give me TWO examples
Very well. The current form of ID appears to be “Message Theory.” Two notable predictions: we should find many similarities in life (because it was made by the same designer) and life would resist naturalistic explanation. It would predict the existence of multiple problems of naturalistic explanations etc.
>>Now you seem to be talking about ultimate origins. My
>>response would be this: what are the so-called
>>"extravagant" implications?
>
>If you posit a creator that made everything
Except ID doesn’t have that. It doesn’t do ultimate origins; you’ve strayed onto the ground of theism methinks.
>then you
>have to ask who made that creator, or else it always
>existed, and then you have to ask how it came by its
>magical powers, and why it would want to make
>something in the first place, and a host of other
>questions that matter always existing doesn't have to
>address.
I believe God never began to exist.
>
>>Second, mass existing
>>forever leads to metaphysical absurdities.
>
>A creator existing forever leads to metaphysical
>absurdities. ANYTHING existing forever doesn't make
>any sense
True, but I believe God is atemporally timeless and did not exist for an infinite period of time. Thus the problem is avoided under theism.
>>You just can't get the same
>>experimental results with that mixture.
>
>Says who?
Behe, among other scientists.
>>And it's now known the Miller experiment fails to work
>>in practice as it pertains to the early earth.
>
>The mixtures that came after Miller that produced
>amino acids that are supposed to mirror early earth
>don't though.
Except they didn’t mirror early Earth, remember?
>The meteorite from space that had
>proportions similar to what Miller and other
>scientists using different mixtures have had of amino
>acids doesn't hurt either.
So now you’re saying the amino acids came from space? Well, given current geochemical evidence regarding the early Earth it is at least more plausible than the standard Miller scenario.
>>Except that these "problems" are not problematic for
>>ID theory, in fact they were predicted. I think
>>eventually we might have to come to grips with the
>>fact that the current theory might be wrong.
>
>Except ID theory explains no observable specifics
>BETTER or AS WELL AS abiogensis does.
It explains why the observable specifics exist (e.g. the specific problems of abiogenesis), and it predicts that we would find at least something like them. Abiogenesis doesn’t; hence the claim that ID explains those observable specifics better. And there are reasonable limits when it comes to specifics. Maybe ID couldn’t predict the specific characteristics of various artifacts (or the robots on Pluto) beforehand, but nonetheless the predictions it does make are enough to make the theory rational. And ID would still explain the data better than naturalistic-origin theories.
>>If you say “yes” can you understand some
>>people’s belief regarding the unwillingness of some
>>people in the face of the evidence?
>
>I can understand why people might not buy the
>Abiogensis theory as it currently stands, and I
>certainly wouldn't ask them to lock, stock, and
>barrel. Abiogensis, like many other things in science,
>is simply the best thing we have at the moment to
>explain the evidence.
Despite the fact that ID explains and predicts the problems of the old paradigm? And besides, you haven’t answered my question. How long should we put up with the current theory’s problems? How many more decades of fruitless research in resolving the problems with the current paradigm should continue before accepting ID? Or should we just accept the paradigm no matter what? Is your answer “yes?” If it is, please remember the stuff I’ll be saying about tenacity in my next paragraph.
>If ID were to explain the
>evidence better or as well as Abiogensis, then perhaps
>people in the scientific community would consider it
>more seriously.
I doubt it. There is a little thing among scientists called tenacity. The current viewpoint is that the old paradigm will eventually resolve its problems and modern ID will be falsified. But that has yet to happen.
>>If the filter is used correctly, then yes.
>
>Correctly? How does someone use it "correctly?"
By putting accurate values and data into the filter.
>>There have been a lot of ID adherents that have denied
>>that charge (e.g. Behe). The burden of proof on their
>>dishonesty rests on you.
>
>By the same token, the burden of proof rests upon you
>to show that I'm disingenious about my
>evidence-stealing gnomes.
What do you mean disingenuous?
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