James Bond 3rd: You obviously don't understand ID. ID doesn't dispute that random mutations and natural selection play an important role in the evolutionary process. ID is about how a designer might employ and exploit these mechanisms to carry out a design objective. I think we can all agree on three basic points: random mutations occur and generate variability; natural selection culls this variability in terms of fitness. RM&NS are myopic (so myopic that Dawkins labels this watchmaker "blind"). From here, the teleologist asks a question - how can one use such facts to carry out a design objective? How does one design X such that RM&NS will eventually extract Y as a function of X? Who's to say that investigating such a question won't lead to a better understanding of biotic reality?
The fallback position will be the same argument from ignorance. "Since we can't see a designer, there is no design." When the ignorant chance devotees are asked what test did you apply to know if there was a designer, or design, they simply respond...we didn't find one, so the only observed data must be a consequence of ignorant chance. This position of building an entire scientific theory from an argument employing the fallacy of "argument from ignorance" is not genuinely a scientific position, it is a fallacious conclusion turned into dogma, and because of the many benefits of scientific discovery of modern science in ways to improve the quality of life to the sheeple of American, scientists and their theories are given a free pass. They don't have to follow the rules of logic, because the "scientists" are above logic. The argument from authority of scientists, which is often logically fallacious, now is ruling the minds of the sheeple. In fact, the existentialists who push purposeless evolution, can't even produce an argument that would demonstrate why a designer, or design is not as much of a logical possibility as ignorant chance. I think someone was spouting that 70% of the people polled rejected the idea of ID being taught in schools. Well, here is the deal. If people were thinking ID of the fundamentalist Christians, then that is one thing to reject. I would agree not to teach any particular religion or denomination of a religion. However, if ID is what I have been defining it as, as simply not ignorant chance, then I think you would see people begin to embrace this concept of ID. The ID I suggest doesn't make evolutionary theory false, it just puts it where it rightfully belongs, a set of observed processes of LIFE, not an explanation that LIFE is without meaning because no larger meaning is observed. There is no complex system that I know of that can be fully understood by examination of a part, no system that is fully understood by examination of a subset alone. No forest that is truly known and understood by examination of a tree. Oh, and while the following it is a strawman argument, it illustrates a point: The vast majority of Americans thought 2002 that there were WMD in Iraq because the "experts" in the field said they were there. Polls after the Bush and Cheney push, and Powell's fiasco at the UN, showed a very high percentage believed there were WMD in Iraq and that Saddam would use them on the US. Of course, now the polls have reversed. So, we have precedent for the people to be duped, or misled, or manipulated, or simply blindly following ignorant leadership. The bottom line is that non ID theory is: argumentum ad ignorantiam
Then explain to us why would the ID advocates want to teach ID as an alternative to evolution (not an alternative perspective on evolution as you state here)?
I am 100% in favor of teaching the observed processes. Then teach the children both logically possibly theories of what ultimately is governing these processes, either ignorant chance, or ID, and then let the kids decide which to believe...
z10: ID is simply not ignorant chance. teleo: ID doesn't dispute that random mutations and natural selection play an important role in the evolutionary process. It seems that you guys should debate each other instead of against science.
ZZZzzz: The ID critics have it backwards. There is no reason to go looking for a designer before one has reason to think something is designed. If you ask the ID critics what would cause them to merely suspect something in nature was designed they are stumped. They will accept nothing less than extraordinary evidence that proves design. They ridicule ID theorists for processing subtle clues and using them to make an intuitive, cumulative, circumstantial case for ID. But they have no problem with abiogenesis researchers processing subtle clues and using them to make an intuitive, cumulative, circumstantial case for a non-teleological origin of life.
James Bond 3rd: Does this mean you recognize we are not the same person? There is no contradiction here. One can accept the reality of random mutations and natural selection without believing that evolution is an entirely accidental/coincidental process. Random mutations and natural selection can indeed be incorporated into a teleological perspective. For contrary to Darwinian dogma, RM&NS can indeed be used to direct evolution towards a particular end. How? While it is a common opinion that RM&NS represent a truly random search, where all possible states can be tested and screened, this is not (IMO) really true. In reality, RM&NS are constrained by the initial state of the matrix upon which RM&NS are carried out. These initial states will serve as a channel for RM&NS searching out "paths of least resistance." And initial states that are complex will act as channels. Why? RM&NS will almost always redesign, tinker, exploit, and modify what pre-exists rather than invent something de novo. Thus, by beginning with complex states, you effectively rig evolution to favor certain trajectories over others.
This is just sheer nonsense. Do you know how neutral theory of evolution computes the speed of evolution?
It looks designed...and there is no evidence that it is not. We know man made computers can program random numbers, a simple task...so a programmed randomness is easily the work of a superior intelligence. Yep, ignorant chance...fallacious arguments from ignorance, fallacious appeal to the prevailing opinions of scientists... Yep, the whole package of indoctrination and dogma, and extreme resistance to even allowing children to hear a counter point of view.