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What's so clever about 'intelligent design'?

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Published Date: 03 September 2008
By STUART RITCHIE
IMAGINE if, right here in the 21st century, there were people who denied the theory of gravitation.
Imagine if these people, not content to accept the scientific findings, were seeking to replace the theory of gravitation with one of "Intelligent Falling", which stated that, instead of gravity, objects are pulled towards the Earth by a powerful in
telligent force, perhaps known to some people as God.

Now imagine that these people were desperate to get the theory of intelligent falling put into the country's school curriculum, as a replacement for teaching pupils about Newton's theory of gravity, and their subsequent effect on modern science.

But surely that's preposterous? There's loads of evidence for gravity! How could any right-minded person deny all that evidence and want to teach children ridiculous nonsense? If you're thinking along these lines, you're starting to get a feel for the evolution/intelligent design controversy.

Some 150 years after Darwin published his Origin of Species, we find ourselves in a situation where his theory – one of the most well-supported by evidence in all science (some would say that it's the foundation of all biology) – is being vehemently denied by a vocal minority which, polls suggest, is growing.

This minority are variously known as creationists or intelligent design proponents, though the latter is the latest, more "scientific"-sounding euphemism. They are guilty of grossly misrepresenting science, spreading bogus ideas, and attempting to infiltrate our schools to further propagate their delusions.

Tomorrow at 7.30pm, you can join me Edinburgh Zoo for a discussion of the arguments that supporters of creationism and intelligent design use. We'll see just how drastically they get it wrong and how important it is to fight them. Along the way we'll hopefully learn a bit about what the theory of evolution is, what it isn't, and look at a tiny fraction of the vast evidence base that's been built up to support it.

Stuart Ritchie is President of the University of Edinburgh Humanist Society




Page 1 of 1

  • Last Updated: 03 September 2008 9:48 AM
  • Source: Edinburgh Evening News
  • Location: Edinburgh
 
1

Team Scotland,

FC UK No! 03/09/2008 13:11:06
I have travelled in Europe, The Middle East, North Africa and America. The USA is the only country where I kept my atheism to myself. It is our links to the USA make us vulnerable to this nonesense. The Neo-cons in the USA have been conducting a well funded anti-science campaign against climate change evidence (some of the senate reports on this issue appear to have been written in crayon). This has allowed a culture of pseudo science to develop there. Just as we absorb their violent gun-culture, expansionism, and far right economics, we have to accept that creationism comes as part of the package.
2

A Friend of Fernando Poo,

03/09/2008 14:04:40
#1: "Violent gun-culture"?

UK per capita violence on its way up passed US per capita violence on its way down as long as ten years ago, as admitted in Parliament by our then Home Secretary.

As for the guns: more and more US states have relegalised gun ownership and carry. Falling violent crime stats have accompanied this and violence fell more in those states which relegalised.

I'm all for tackling superstitious and unscientific beliefs, but let's not try to replace them with leftie anti-American drivel.
3

island,

Diracsea, Florida 03/09/2008 16:04:46
Not to mention the fact that ID isn't a "replacement for teaching evolution", rather, ID is complimentary to evolution, rather than a refutation of it.

So the author wants people to meet him at the Edinburgh Zoo so that he can profess his complete ignorance before the masses.

No worries though... because he does know who the perceived enemy is, and he'll be preaching to a choir of like minded liberals who don't care about this little detail since their motivation, just like the author's, is strictly political, hiding under the guise of science.

Which is exactly what they typically accuse the creationists of doing.
4

Team Scotland,

03/09/2008 17:56:48
#2 I did not say the Scots like a fight, we do. But to compare this with the huge disparity on gun violence is false. Gun crime deaths in the UK rarely go above 100 per year compared to many thousands in the USA. We have a fighting tradition because we are an alcohol dependent culture, to add guns to this mix might be funny from a distance but a 'Scottish Rifle Association'? No thanks?

#3 Thankyou for confirming the US origin of this concept.

Your claim is news to me. Can you please reference the peer reviewed work that supports your case.
5

island,

Diracsea 03/09/2008 19:15:38
#4 Sure, right after you reference the peer reviewed work that supports that "people [are] desperate to get the theory of intelligent [design] put into the country's school curriculum, as a replacement for teaching [evolution]" rather than a challenge to some of the more-weakly supported mechanisms of evolutionary theory that are automatically assumed to be unguided.

Then maybe you can explain how Cosmological ID works without evolution?

6

Team Scotland,

03/09/2008 19:47:58
#5 island

That will be no, you can't.

7

island,

Diracsea 03/09/2008 19:57:43
Team Scotland:

I can't what?

You made the bogus assertion.

I made none.

Duh
8

island,

Diracsea 03/09/2008 20:17:55
My mistake.

The *author of the article* euphemistically made the unsupported assertion that "people [are] desperate to get the theory of intelligent [design] put into the country's school curriculum, as a replacement for teaching [evolution]".

I simply called him on it.

Source please?

The DI's ID statement:
"Intelligent Design holds that certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection."

How does that preclude guided evolution?

Your politics is showing.
9

Team Scotland,

FC UK No! 03/09/2008 20:28:19
# 7 island,Diracsea

‘Not to mention the fact that ID isn't a "replacement for teaching evolution", rather, ID is complimentary to evolution, rather than a refutation of it.’

This is an assertion and it is a false one.

You can’t provide any peer reviewed body of work to back up your claim that ID should be mentioned in the same breath as Evolution.

Evolution has been postulated, reviewed, tested and physically observed by many thousands of scientists for 150 years and is now a scientific fact.

ID is not by any reasonable description, science.

It lacks;

- scientific method employed to test the assumption.

- collated data presented to be reviewed by peers.

- hypotheses (largely because they do not have any) to be reviewed by their peers.

- any theory built on tested hypotheses, along with their data be tested or refuted.

The rigours of science are replaced with

- Standing behind those who are doing the work and say "you missed a bit".

- Work aimed directly at the public via various pseudo-scientific institutions and campaigning web-sites.

- Of course when you scratch the surface there is no science only politics.

- Sloppy method or downright fraud.


Lack of Credentials:

- 'Scientists' are generally from a different discipline or practical areas related to but not themselves sciences.

- There are few if any top scientists in the field who support any aspect of their case.

- How many Nobel Prize winning ID 'scientists' are there?


10

island,

03/09/2008 20:34:57
Team Scotland, I see that you are hopelessly lost.

I am not arguing for ID.

Back up one post and get a clue before you make a bigger fool of yourself.
11

island,

03/09/2008 20:40:09
For example:

"Hopelessly Lost" said:
"You can’t provide any peer reviewed body of work to back up your claim that ID should be mentioned in the same breath as Evolution."

I never claimed that it should, but you can't read, rather, you erroneously read your own belief system into it.

I never asserted that "ID is a "replacement for teaching evolution"... lol

The author did.

LMAO!!!

I'm an atheist, a materialist, and a Darwinist, dude... but you're killing me with stupid... lol
12

Team Scotland,

03/09/2008 20:48:28
‘Not to mention the fact that ID isn't a "replacement for teaching evolution", rather, ID is complimentary to evolution, rather than a refutation of it.’

I merely took your assertion at face value. I did not state that you asserted anything other than stated in your own words.

Perhaps you should have made your position clear. You still have not done this.

The fact you resort to invective rather that clearly state your case does not suggest any real understanding of the subject.

(Trailer)trash talk seems to be more your level.
13

island,

03/09/2008 20:54:05
My position is expressed in crystal clarity for anyone besides yourself.

The author was speaking about the position that IDist take, not the validity of ID, idiot.
14

Team Scotland,

03/09/2008 21:05:29
13 island
As I said
(Trailer)trash talk seems to be more your level.

( I know I am an idiot) just to save you some typing.

Tip. If you are calling someone else an idiot you should really pluralize "IDist" in your sentence.
15

island,

03/09/2008 21:34:38
Team Scotland, you do not recognize that you have continually insulted my intelligence with every failure to address my statements in context with the author's unsupported claim about the IDists intent.

You continue to willfully ignore the clearly worded point that is wrapped in less subtle insults back at you.

Get off your ideologially righteous high-horse for two seconds and start over, while addressing something that actually got saidl... ***IN CONTEXT***... (so that you're not just insulting our intelligence), or I am done with you, sonny.
16

Conan the Librarian™,

03/09/2008 22:13:53
Everybody fall down in awe before the great Flying Spaghetti Monster.

Or we'll get the pirates on to you.

Har.
17

Team Scotland,

Jesus never existed 03/09/2008 22:16:45
You are claiming to be atheist, a materialist(????), and a Darwinist who has simply come on to this thread to take issue with the finer points of Intelligent(sic) Design as presented in the above article. No Darwinist or Atheist would give ID anything more then the short shrift it deserves.

It is easier to believe that you are in reality an extreme right wing old testament tub thumper who when asked to justify your assertion that ID compliments evolution, moved the goalposts. You have retrenched into a position of just being concerned that a concept you do not believe in is being (slightly) misrepresented.

Lying for Jesus, shame on you, granddad.
18

island,

03/09/2008 22:19:04
Wow, groupthink and insult without a single meaningful word. How telling of politically motivated fools who think that I support ID.

Your true blue colors are in full-bloom here, folks, and it has absolutely nothing to do with your concern for the integrity of science.

You are the worst kind of fanatics.
19

island,

I repeat for the weak of mind: 03/09/2008 22:23:44


The *author of the article* euphemistically made the unsupported assertion that "people [are] desperate to get the theory of intelligent [design] put into the country's school curriculum, as a replacement for teaching [evolution]".

I simply called him on it.

Source please?

The DI's ID statement:
"Intelligent Design holds that certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection."

How does that preclude guided evolution?

Your politics is showing.

Via your ***convenient*** ignorance of the facts.

Dishonesty is never in the best interest of science.
20

Team Scotland,

, www.DarwinistsForID.com - 03/09/2008 22:36:43
Oh! hello I thought you were finished with me. Do I put this down to stupidity or dishonesty?

"guided evolution" is simply a retrenchment under pressure but it is still unsubstantiated pseudo-science. To any rational scientific mind one is as ridiculous as the other. The fact you are promoting it even indirectly proves you have no understanding of science whatsoever. You are a creationist who lacks the courage to make your case honestly.

Is this you?

http://blog.ariffic.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/02/get-a-brain-morans1.jpg





21

Conan the Librarian™,

03/09/2008 22:40:02
19
http://www.venganza.org/about/open-letter/

Enjoy;-)
22

island,

03/09/2008 22:42:34
" It is easier to believe that you are in reality an extreme right wing old testament tub thumper "

No, I am very much pro science, and politically oriented people like you all continually prove that you stepping on the integrity of science with embellishments, lies, distortions that have no place in any scientific discussion. The reason that I take this position is because you monkeys continually destroy viable scientific possibilities in your zeal to fight your culture war.

You people don't get that you are just as bad for science as the IDists are because you have zero respect for science.

How's that for a non-deistic justification, fanatic?


" when asked to justify your assertion that ID compliments evolution, moved the goalposts "

.
23

island,

03/09/2008 22:50:22
Now the Scotlander argues as if I am supporting guided evolution, instead of arguing that the ID statement somehow precludes it.

AGAIN, I REPEAT:

The DI's ID statement:
"Intelligent Design holds that certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection."

How does that preclude guided evolution?

Better yet, how does the ID statement mean what the author claims that it means, that...

"people [are] desperate to get the theory of intelligent [design] put into the country's school curriculum, as a replacement for teaching [evolution]".

How do you translate that interpretion to "cosmological ID", for example, because you have to have the very first clue what you are talking about, before you can profess the right to give public talks about science, and I'm not seeing much of it here.
24

Team Scotland,

03/09/2008 23:00:47
"You people"

You decry those who oppose ID as 'liberals' and you think you are not political. That is quite funny, thanks.

You were given the opportunity to make a scientific case but have so far failed to do so preferring simply to resort to playground name calling. This is because you have no case to make.

‘Standing behind those who are doing the work and say "you missed a bit". ‘

As to my disrespect for science, unlike you I have read extensively on the subject of evolution. Partly form choice and partly because when studying Human origins as part of my Archaeology degree, we were expected to do a little more on Darwin owing to the fact that he was an alumni.

What viable scientific possibilities do you feel are being unfairly stepped on by “monkeys”?
25

island,

03/09/2008 23:03:19
"guided evolution" is simply a retrenchment under pressure but it is still unsubstantiated pseudo-science"

These guys might disagree with you, but their empirically defined hypothesis is science in its infancy that never has a chance when "free-thinking" neo-darwinian fanatics can't handle the deterministic implications of the evidenced plausibility:

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2004/09/30/2003204990
26

island,

03/09/2008 23:06:23
Yes, Scot, YOU PEOPLE and MONKEYS.

You are highly stereotypical when you are dishonest.

" You decry those who oppose ID as 'liberals'"

No, only dishonest liars who won't address the point in context, like yourself.
27

Team Scotland,

03/09/2008 23:06:37
"cosmological ID"

titter ye not, you really a champion for pseudo-science.
28

island,

03/09/2008 23:07:48
AGAIN, I REPEAT:

The DI's ID statement:
"Intelligent Design holds that certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection."

How does that preclude guided evolution?

Better yet, how does the ID statement mean what the author claims that it means, that...

"people [are] desperate to get the theory of intelligent [design] put into the country's school curriculum, as a replacement for teaching [evolution]".

How do you translate that interpretion to "cosmological ID", for example, because you have to have the very first clue what you are talking about, before you can profess the right to give public talks about science, and I'm not seeing much of it here.
29

Team Scotland,

03/09/2008 23:08:21
"cosmological ID" is the anthropic principle for the stupid.
30

island,

03/09/2008 23:11:32

"cosmological ID"
"itter ye not, you really a champion for pseudo-science."

Now the lamer tries to twist the context to indicate that I've said something that indicates that "i" support cosmological ID, rather than to answer the question.

I don't know when I've talked to a more evasive moron.
31

Team Scotland,

, www.DarwinistsForID.com - 03/09/2008 23:14:01
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz





32

island,

03/09/2008 23:16:18
The anthropic principle has more science in it than you will ever begin to grasp:

http://dorigo.wordpress.com/2008/06/23/

http://knol.google.com/k/richard-ryals/the-anthropic-principle/1cb34nnchgkl5/2

http://evolutionarydesign.blogspot.com/2007/02/goldilocks-enigma-again.html

http://evolutionarydesign.blogspot.com/2006/11/very-strong-anthropic-principle.html

33

island,

03/09/2008 23:17:35
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

WOW... I thought for a second that you were actually going to address the point, but NOOOOOOOO:

AGAIN, I REPEAT:

The DI's ID statement:
"Intelligent Design holds that certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection."

How does that preclude guided evolution?

Better yet, how does the ID statement mean what the author claims that it means, that...

"people [are] desperate to get the theory of intelligent [design] put into the country's school curriculum, as a replacement for teaching [evolution]".

How do you translate that interpretion to "cosmological ID", for example, because you have to have the very first clue what you are talking about, before you can profess the right to give public talks about science, and I'm not seeing much of it here.
34

Team Scotland,

03/09/2008 23:45:01

"AGAIN, I REPEAT:"

Yes you do

You are not making any points other than the writer has in your opinion has over egged the cake. This is only an issue if you feel ID has some merit, it does not. ID is not a science and has no place either replacing or 'complimenting’ Evolution.

I explained in some detail why ID is not a science. It does not adhere to scientific principals. You seem more interested in the politics of ID than its lack of scientific method.

Do you believe ID to be a science? If not why are you so offended by this article?
35

island,

03/09/2008 23:55:48
Scot, I clearly stated that I am offended by the abuse of the facts as they stand, not as I support or don't support them, but you are too ignorant to read what is written without inserting ID into my belief system as a pre-requisite for having a discussion with me.

That's because you want to argue against ID with an IDist, rather than to face the point that forces you to admit that it is politics at the expense of science, that motivates you.

I only repeat for the begged admission that an honest person would give... losers.

36

Team Scotland,

ID - six fingered science 03/09/2008 23:56:16
32 island,

My point is that "cosmological ID" is an idiots version of the anthropic principal. That says nothing about the anthropic principal itself.

Posting links is no substitute for knowledge or understanding.
37

Team Scotland,

03/09/2008 23:59:34
OK

Make your case

In what way is "it" politics at the expense of science
38

island,

04/09/2008 00:07:46
"Posting links is no substitute for knowledge or understanding"

Yeah, um, if you'd bothered to educate yourself, then you would have found out that a guy named Rick Ryals who goes by the pseudonym.... "island"... wrote them before an audience of people that typically includes a whole bunch of cutting edge theoretical physicists whom all know me too well... etc...

" That says nothing about the anthropic principal itself. "

No, but the anthropic principle, as it was originally formalized by Brandon Carter says a lot about you since it was an ideological statement against the dogmatic non-scientific prejudices that scientists commonly harbor, that cause them to consciously deny anthropic relevance in the physics, so they instead tend to be willfully ignorant of just enough pertinent facts to maintain an irrational cosmological bias that leads to absurd, "Copernican-like" projections of mediocrity that contradict what is actually observed.

He called their ideological bigotry, "anticentrist dogma", because it produces an equally bogus over-reaction to geocentric-ism and creationism.

Something that ya'll should really be able to relate to... ;)

39

Team Scotland,

04/09/2008 00:14:48
Education from you I do not need.

Tomorrows editions are out so I am off.

To come on to a Scottish newspaper from Florida for a minor point of order regarding a subject that is complete nonsense seems a little odd. However unfair an attack on ID it is not an attack on science because it is not a science. It is an (unfair to you) attack on a belief. There is no scientific issue here at all.

You have an agenda but in your attempt to hide it you have failed to make any case except in yoour own mind. You are I think, quite mad.

Say hello to Jebus

40

island,

04/09/2008 00:16:58
" In what way is "it" politics at the expense of science "

Okay, it's politics at the expense of science when theories like the previously referenced don't have a chance because everybody already *KNOWS* that guided evolution is only "pseudo-science", because defenders of ET automatically make the creationists leap of faith to find god in any admission that it has real scientific plausibility.

They do it because they over-react, ideologically:

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2004/09/30/2003204990
41

island,

04/09/2008 00:19:19
" Education from you I do not need. "

Yeah, you'd rather stay willfully ignorant of the fact that you are an ideologically motivated antifanatic, at any cost to science.

And I find it strange that any of you have the audacity to pretend to know enough to give a talk on it.
42

Darth Robo,

UK 04/09/2008 12:32:56
Left a comment yesterday but never appeared.

So, island. Still your usual condescending self, I see? Still can't get anyone to take your ideas of the anthropic prinicple seriously?

And you're still lying about the motivations of the IDer's Isee.

 

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