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stupid design™ seems sensible and sane, until you ask dumb questions like:
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leminkainen points out, "Intelligent design didn't create the TVs that televangelists speak through..."
it will be interesting to see how things progress when it finally occurs to the masses that stupid design™ doesn't offer them the things they've become accustomed to from the science & engineering family.
if it's a theory, what does it predict?after all, if it is supposed to supplant or supplement science, surely it ought to achieve similar things?
if it's a methodology, how do you do it?
as
leminkainen points out, "Intelligent design didn't create the TVs that televangelists speak through..."it will be interesting to see how things progress when it finally occurs to the masses that stupid design™ doesn't offer them the things they've become accustomed to from the science & engineering family.
geeky
(no subject)
There is intelligent design. God created the universe down to the last quark.
The means He chose to carry out that design is evolution.
It's only when one insists that intelligent design must conform to the literal text of the opening chapter of Genesis that one has to choose between intelligent design and science. Which is a needless insistence, since the literal text itself clearly indicates that it is not to be read in such a literal fashion. In fact, the only account of the physical creation of the universe is one verse in Chapter 2 which makes no attempt to describe how that physical creation took place.
oh, really?
the reason god is not in science, is simple - you cannot create a test to establish whether such an entity exists or not. that is a question of faith, not science.
i have training in both science and theology. i do not confuse them.
the literal texts of the collection of religio-political writings known as "the bible" (increasingly inaccurately derived from the greek singular "book") were written in a number of languages over a very long period of time. very few people alive can read them, let alone can ascertain compellingly which of the various competing texts ought to be included or excluded from the canonical collection. there is no universally accepted version of the collection, and has not been for centuries. as for interpretation ... and try to remember that most of the world is not christian of any derivation, and so do not look to any version of the aforementioned for solace, aggravation, or insight.
most of the so-called 'controversy' surrounding "intelligent design" arises out of a confusion between belief and logic.
science is founded upon the scientific method, whereby one attempts to ascertain knowledge about the physical universe though the application of rational logic to empirical evidence. "intelligent design" is only 'controversial' because it is not what it's peddlers claim it to be, and they insist otherwise.
it is certainly possible to ascertain knowledge about the universe by other means, but they are not part of science and must not be confused with it.
one of the more devious aspects of the "intelligent design" "debate" is the misuse of words like 'theory'.
theory has a specific meaning in science that differs from the common usage of the word. claiming that a scientific theory is 'merely' a 'theory' is fallacious and underhanded. scientific theories are not mere beliefs, they are functional models that are works-in-progress to explain how the physical universe we observe functions - and importantly, they attempt to predict things we have not yet observed and tested, and how we might go about observing and testing them. over time they get challenged, modified, and even replaced. but replaced with other models with the same purpose - to represent what we understand, and what we don't, and explain how to move the latter into the former.
"intelligent design" offers none of that of itself. it does add in the idea that the mind of 'god' matters. that's theology, not science. the two went their separate ways centuries ago. there is no reason a scientist cannot be motivated by their religious beliefs, but those beliefs are not science, or scientific.
as for debate, real debate, i have seen nothing much of that from the "intelligent design" camp. lots of chest-thumping and weasel-wording though.
so-called "intelligent design" is a belief, not a (scientific) theory.
(no subject)
Of course the most important quote of the article was "For science, the question of whether there was an intelligent designer is an unanswerable question. It's not a question that can be tested scientifically and, therefore, it's outside our domain. It becomes an issue of belief, not an issue of scientific fact."
Theology/Philosophy, not Science. [1]
Interestingly, a literal interpretation of the Bible is doing a tremendous disservice to those anthropologists treating the bible as a historical document (in the sense that much of Genesis is a collection or oral prehistory), who have come up with some interesting (and scientifically proveable) theories of very early human history.
[1] Which is not to say that these concepts shouldn't be taught together at the same institution, but people should understand the differences between them (eg. the "philosophy of science" is not "science"), and this is a very subtle thing that is lost on most people.
(no subject)
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having studied both science and theology at the same institution, i agree. doubly so re philosophy of science - though often the confusion comes from those confusing the philosophy with the science.
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the literal interpretation thingy is even more amusing when you consider how often the damn things have been rewritten, translated, etc.
if i had a time machine, there are two people i'd like to be able to bring to the current time and then take home again. and johsua ben joseph of <joseph's hometown> is number one on my list.