Evolution itself, as a mechanism, does not contradict religion.  But scientists’ related theories about the origins of the earth and humans could.

And there you have it. Heresy.

Just because a test has not been created to disprove creationism does not mean it is not a viable explanation.

And there you have it, too. If creationism/ID were a scientific theory instead of an explanation, a method to falsify it would be intrinsic. Then again, creationism is self-evidently ridiculous, so perhaps that satisfies the falsification requirement.

Why is gravity still a theory?

Like evolution, gravity is both a fact and a theory. If you question the fact of gravity, be my guest and help me improve the accuracy of the theoretical models by stepping off the edge of a cliff while we take some measurements, like the speed of descent and the splatter radius.

Wow, miraculous.

Right. That’s invading the creationist’s turf.

How do you do the little blue boxes around the text you are questioning or responding to?

“And there you have it, too. If creationism/ID were a scientific theory instead of an explanation, a method to falsify it would be intrinsic. Then again, creationism is self-evidently ridiculous, so perhaps that satisfies the falsification requirement.”

That’s not true.  The intrinsic falsification is to prove that there is no God.  But that is probably not for a science class.

I could say the same go ahead and embrace death and see what’s on the other side.  Then you will know who is right and who is not.  There are no tests of falsification for gravity.

Again the point to all evolutionist.  If you are truly wanting to present science in an unbiased fashion for educational purposes...present the flaws, kinks, holes in the theory.

First of all, I wasn’t aware of any holes in the theory of evolution.  It’s been working pretty well for the last 150 years or so.  Care to enlighten?

“Darwinists”, hell, let’s go out on a limb and call them scientists, don’t want something that is most definitely not a scientific theory being taught in their classes.  God forbid they should want to teach good science in their classes and not religion.

That’s not true.  The intrinsic falsification is to prove that there is no God.  But that is probably not for a science class.

That’s not true.  Falsification would be to prove that God did not create the earth.  There is no way to test that, so, no, it’s not for a science class.  There’s nothing intrinsic in ID “theory” that explains how to falsify it, so it’s not a real theory.  But you refuse to admit that it’s not a theory and so we keep having to hit you over the head with HOW IT’S NOT A THEORY.

There are no tests of falsification for gravity.

Um, if you ever dropped something and it didn’t fall, that would be a falsification.  People drop stuff all the time.

There are no tests of falsification for gravity.

Popper just rolled over in his grave.

Again the point to all evolutionist.  If you are truly wanting to present science in an unbiased fashion for educational purposes...present the flaws, kinks, holes in the theory.

I would say that is already occurring.  Much like advanced mathematics, science builds upon itself and without a proper foundation it is nearly impossible to advance the student to a level of logical debate.

What ID proposes is skipping the foundation and presupposing the logic behind it.  That is not science and can hardly be called educational.  I’m sure folks around here will get tired of me saying this but you cannot establish an unknown and work toward a known.

Undoubtedly some of our scientific hypotheses are flawed, but they are fully based on what we know and they are constantly revised and refined as we learn more.

lachaim said: If you are truly wanting to present science in an unbiased fashion for educational purposes...present the flaws, kinks, holes in the theory.

Any good science teacher will do just that- explain not only what we do know, but also the limitations of present-day science: what we do not know yet.

Evolution theory does have lots of holes in it.  Not surprising, since so much of it is historical, and it’s been a very long time since, say, dinosaurs ruled the earth.  But these holes are being filled, with more fossil finds and increasingly with genetic studies and biochemistry.  Some holes will probably never be filled: we will never have an unbroken line of fossils from the protochordate Adam to your Aunt Edna.  But more and more connections are being discovered, and your claim that “missing links have not been found” is incredible.  What constitutes a “missing link” for you?  Reptiles and mammals are different species, no?  We have a very good fossil line from reptiles to mammal-like reptiles to mammals, and taxonomists argue about where to draw the lines, because there are no obvious lines:
http://members.tripod.com/~Cambrian/Reptile-Mammal
That’s evolution, proven, unless God is lying to us with stones.

And it’s also true that there remain structures whose evolution is not completely understood- Michael Behe’s favorite example is the flagellum.  But even that example is now under fire-
http://www.talkdesign.org/faqs/flagellum.html
(warning- rather technical)

But all this, however interesting, is secondary.  The main objections to teaching ID as science are:

1) ID is not falsifiable.  You seem not to understand what “falsifiable” means:

There are no tests of falsification for gravity.

OK. Hold a brick above your toe and let go.  If the brick doesn’t fall on your toe, you’ve falsified gravity. (assuming you’re on a planet, not whirling around in a centrifuge, etc.)

2) ID is a particular religious viewpoint.  You’ve not answered Nunyabiz’ question: why ID, and not purple unicorns?  They make just as much sense, although I’m partial to the Invisible Pink Unicorm myself (proven through logic and faith- logic tells us She’s invisible, because we can’t see Her, but we have to take it on faith that She’s pink).

Others have already made these objections. Here are two more:

3) ID predicts nothing.  One test of a scientific theory is that it makes accurate predictions about things not yet observed- otherwise, it’s not a theory but just observation.  Darwinism has made many such predictions, starting with the famous one made by Charles himself- confronted with Angraecum sesquipidale, an orchid with a very long (if not quite a foot and a half) spur with nectar at the bottom, he predicted that there must be an as-of-then unknown moth with a proboscis long enough to reach the nectar.  That moth has been discovered, and the successful predictions of evolutionary theory are coming thick and fast now, including the fascinating hormonal tug-of-war between fetuses and mothers,
http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/haig/haig_p5.html
characteristics of the strange and wonderful naked mole rats,
http://www.google.at/search?q=cache:bvFIrMaKzqgJ:westgroup.icapb.ed.ac.uk/teach/social/sherman_02.pdf+predict+naked+mole+rats+eusocial&hl=de&client=firefox-a
and on and on.

What does ID predict?  That “things are really complicated and hard to understand”?  Duh.

But the fatal flaw in ID, IMHO, is that it is simply illogical:

4) ID claims to explain the origin of order, but does not do so.  The argument is that some living things are “irreducibly complex”, that is, no one part of them could have evolved on its own, so an Intelligent Designer is necessary.  First of all, saying something is IC is simply saying we don’t understand it yet- the difference between scientists and ICers being in their response to the unknown:
Scientist: “We don’t understand this.  Whoopee!  More work for us and our grandkids!”
ICer:  “We don’t understand this.  Better throw in the towel, and just say that God (the ID, aliens, etc.) did it.”
Secondly, and fatally, the supposition of an ID (God, alien mushooms, ad infinitum...) doesn’t explain the origin of order- it just postpones it, in a fully unmotivated way.  If we need to explain order, how can we explain an ordered ID?  Any possible answer (He was always there, She created Herself, It doesn’t have to answer to silly human logic, etc.) can be more simply applied to the physical universe, without fairy tales in between.

In conclusion- ID has no place in a science class, because it has nothing to do with science.  It would be fine to present it in social studies, along with Bishop Ussher’s date of Oct. 23, 4004 B.C. and the Scopes Monkey Trial, as examples of how religion can lead the unwary to sloppy thinking.

lachaim- to make a blue box, put [ quote ] in front of the quote, and [ /quote ] after, but without the spaces inside the brackets.

shana and deadscot- our comments crossed in cyberspace.  What you said too.

Allow me to clarify:
I was referring to holes in the theory (mechanism) itself.  I’d say it holds up pretty strongly given all the times it’s been tested and it’s still floating around.  And they do discuss the testing of it in science class.

Holes in the fossil record?  Things we haven’t worked out for specific animals? Hells yeah.  If we knew it all already then we wouldn’t have any studying to do!  Just because we haven’t found every last bone doesn’t mean the entire thing is bunk. 

I mean, you may never have dropped a piano off a building, but you prolly feel pretty sure that if you did, it would fall and make a really big crash, right?  It’s the same thing.  Even if you didn’t know what a piano looked like, you’d know it was gonna fall.

That’s not true.  The intrinsic falsification is to prove that there is no God.  But that is probably not for a science class.

And there you have it yet again. If the “falsification” of ID does not belong in a science class, ID itself does not belong in a science class.

Les, where’s the smiley for ROTFLPIMP?

Again the point to all evolutionist.  If you are truly wanting to present science in an unbiased fashion for educational purposes...present the flaws, kinks, holes in the theory.

Again the point to all creationists. If you are truly wanting to present religion in an unbiased fashion for educational purposes...present the flaws, kinks, holes in the theology.

Oh man, my sides hurt from laughing. This lachaim fellow is cracking me up. Man, if I had a dime for every time I’ve had these same poor arguments thrown at me.

lachaim, here’s a question for you: Name one field of science that uses Intelligent Design as its basis. There are several fields based on Evolution which would utterly fail unless Evolution is, indeed, a fact. I can’t think of a single field of science for which Intelligent Design is the foundation.

Oh man, my sides hurt from laughing. This lachaim fellow is cracking me up.

Indeed. I almost woke the baby.

lachaim, here’s a question for you: Name one field of science that uses Intelligent Design as its basis.[quote/]

Sure biology, chemistry, physics etc.  The reason for science, to know and be known (created in the image of God concept).  Humans have an innate need to know and be known.  We originate from an intelligent design.  The designer is infinite and so is the process of discovery.  Science came out of the need to understand and know.

Low-quality trolling. For shame!

lachaim, here’s a question for you: Name one field of science that uses Intelligent Design as its basis.

Sure biology, chemistry, physics etc.  The reason for science, to know and be known (created in the image of God concept).  Humans have an innate need to know and be known.  We originate from an intelligent design.  The designer is infinite and so is the process of discovery.  Science came out of the need to understand and know.

Wrong, wrong, and wrong… I would suggest that you really read “Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors” by Carl Sagan, but from your posts it’s clear that you aren’t interested in learning about science.  “Intelligent Design” and concepts like it are the anthesis of science.  They simply argue that the world is too complex to understand, therefore we shouldn’t even bother trying.  Just listen to the nice man in black give you a short book report every Sunday, drop money in the collection plate, and go back to the flock like a good sheep. 

Religion and science both sprung from the same desire of humans to understand the world around them.  Religions use deceit, coersion, peer pressure, and violence to promote their mythology.  They also use the promise of “eternal salvation” to those that follow them, and threaten “eternal damnation” to those that don’t.  A few religions don’t have as violent a history as the “Big 3”, but then that’s probably why they aren’t nearly as prominent.

Science is simply a better way of understanding the world around us.  Lightning went from the angry retribution of a god (Zeus) to a well understood phenomenon.  Disease went from being caused by demon possesion to being well understood (and treatable) via the development of ‘germ theory’.  The earth went from being in the center of the Universe to being a rather insignificant planet (1 of 9) orbiting an average star (1 of ~400,000,000,000) in an average galaxy (1 of ~1,000,000,000,000).  There are hundreds, if not thousands, of similar examples where science showed religious myths to be false.  Evolution is simply the latest in a long line of scientific theories that refute religious mythology.

Sorry to wake you up but ID is NOT used as a basis for ANY field of Science.

Without Evolution every single textbook and virtually all of the life Sciences would need to be completely rewritten as all have been based on Evolution 100% for 75-100 years.

ID is not a theory nor will it ever be.

100s of 1000s of Scientist performing millions of experiments, millions of observations, making 100s of predictions for over 150 Years and 95% of them ALL agree, and they are not wrong.
Science is universal, the theory, the methods, the outcomes etc. are the same in every country, in every language, Science is Science.
Religion however is completely different everywhere you go, there are at least 20 main religions with 1000s of variations, 1000s of Gods, even just within the Christian religion itself there are over 33,800 different Sects, so not only do Christians vehemently disagree with all other religions, in many cases you dont even agree with fellow Christians, that’s because what ALL of you believe is nothing but a mere fairytale with no basis in factual reality.

This Creationism Vs Evolution debate is ridiculous, its like teaching a dog to do calculus, will just frustrate you and piss off the dog.

elwed said: Low-quality trolling. For shame!

Indeed. I think we’re wasting our time here- not even a rudimentary grasp of science or the merest flicker of desire to engage in logical discourse.  Sucker that I am, though, I’ll give it one more try:

lachaim, you said:

We originate from an intelligent design.  The designer is infinite and so is the process of discovery.  Science came out of the need to understand and know.

So this is your explanation of why ID is science and should be taught in science classes?  Wrong.  This is religion.  You are of course free to believe whatever you want, but your religion, like all other religions, has no place in science classes in public schools.

My son just gave me a great quote.  “Blog debates are like competing in the Special Olympics even if you win you’re still retarded.”

Indeed. I think we’re wasting our time here- not even a rudimentary grasp of science or the merest flicker of desire to engage in logical discourse.

Not true.  Simply sharing my thoughts.

“Blog debates are like competing in the Special Olympics even if you win you’re still retarded.�

Talking to people is like competing in the Special Olympics.  Even if you learn something, you’re still retarded.

Reading a book is like competing in the Special Olympics.  Even if you learn something, you’re still retarded.

Studying a subject you don’t know that much about is like competing in the Special Olympics. . .

Yeah, your son really nailed it.  Solipsism is best.

Not true.  Simply sharing my thoughts

It’d be more generous on your part if you shared thoughts that had any sort of substance behind them. 

‘cause hot air ain’t that hard to come by.

Nowiser, you missed an obvious comeback:

“Thank you for participating.”

It increasingly looks like lachaim (who should correct the spelling) is covering a retreat. He or she is losing an argument in a big way, but waves it away as “I wasn’t debating, just sharing my thoughts”.

ROTFL.

What scares me the most about this is that in order to teach ID in schools, Creationists are insisting that science itself be redefined to accommodate them.  They seem to be insisting that their definition of what science is, and what a theory is, is just as valid as what scientist say it is.  This is nuts.

Ps.  Love this site

I’m almost inclined to let them have their way. As long as you teach your kids good science, they’ll have a competitive advantage.

Other than the obvious flaws in religion as a whole and xians attempts to validate what cannot be validated, I see their demands to “teach” ID in schools as another use of the system to parent their children. If ID is so damned important; teach it at home, go to more church, and practice your religion the way you try and force on the rest of us. It is not the responsibility of the government to teach your children the value systems, beliefs, or morals (or lack thereof) to your children. Send them to private religious schools. If you can’t afford it, teach your children the value of voting and the power of legislation to allow change. Religion is the job of the parent to teach and the role of the child to accept if they choose.

The biggest deception of all is that most of you don’t think secularism is a religion.  Guess what, the Supreme Court says it is.  So if you insist on sepration of church and state, then how can you teach secularism in public schools?  Or, is religion and church the same thing?  or is there really only one church, the Church of Jesus Christ (no relationship to Mormom or any other denomination), and the anti-church?  Isn’t it ironic that we base our entire science of evolution on the teachings of a man who starved himself and his wife to death, choosing to only eat “the food of the gods” sugar cane, believing that it held all of the nutrition necessary to sustain life.  Opps, he was wrong again.  Evolution?  The Big Bang?  So everything did begin in an instant.  Do creationists really believe in evolution, after all they believe we will evolve into immortatlity?  And do evolutionists really believe in creation, the big bang?  Or are we all wrong?  I vote for the latter.  If you want to know the truth, ask someone who was there for all of it; your Heavenly Father.

The biggest deception of all is that most of you don’t think secularism is a religion.  Guess what, the Supreme Court says it is.

Guess what, there is ample legal precedent to treat non-religion and religion on equal footing for the purposes of the First Amendment. Nothing new or noteworthy about that.

For some background information about the rationale behind this, have a look at

http://www.ca7.uscourts.gov/fdocs/docs.fwx?dname=opinion

and enter case number 04-1914 (Kaufman v. McCaughtry).

As for the proselytizing: Whatever makes you happy and doesn’t infringe on my own prospects for happiness, eh.

Let’s see what the dictionary has to say, shall we?

secularism:
1. religious skepticism or indifference
2. the view that religious considerations should be excluded from civil affairs or public education
3. a doctrine that rejects religion and religious considerations

(the American Heritage Dictionary, as found at dictonary.com; all italics mine)

You don’t get much more explicit than entry number 3. Just because religious fanatics only view through religion-colored glasses does not mean that the rest of the world does, too.