Talk:Intelligent design/Archive 23

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Is omnipotence relevant?

The user Silverback continues to restore and add rambling sentences that ruminate on whether or not the "intelligent designer" is omniscient or omnipotent. I've offered my thoughts on this already (see "ID in relation to Bible-based creationism," above). As I read it, these bits are digressive, confusing, and reflect an eccentric personal POV. I think they should be reduced or eliminated for the betterment of the article, but I don't want to do that unilaterally since my attempts to integrate this material thusfar have largely been reverted. I hope some other users will look over the material in question (most of it is in the "Hypotheses about..." section) and hop in to arbitrate this. --BTfromLA 03:36, 21 Dec 2004 (UTC)

For what it's worth, I agree that such an issue is digressive. It's relevant, but it gets to a level of detail that an encylopedia article shouldn't try to tackle. --Theyeti 04:09, 21 Dec 2004 (UTC)

What is digressive about the issue, can you be more specific? I've cleaned up the clumsy language, which resulted from my attempt to add qualifying dependent clauses, in situ, to statements that were clearly false or over generalizations, especially the idea that ID makes no claims about the designer. Since most ID theory based on irreducable complexity, "claims" to accept existing fossil evidence, the irreducably complex mechanisms often came into existance at different specific points in time, therefore, the designer must have been present and available at those points in time, or new spermia arrived at that time, or the design was present but waiting to be expressed in the genome until the time of its appearance in the fossil record. There are other possibilities, but each possibility makes demands and implies temporial and other characteristics of the designer. Independently of this is the issue of whether the designer could be ominiscient and omnipotent. This is particularly relevant since the "conservative christians" mentioned earlier in the article, usually also hold the belief in such a creator and are unaware that such a belief may have to be abandoned if ID is true, or that such a belief may subject their ID design theories to greater scrutiny. Most controversial theories in wikipedia devote space to criticisms and counter arguments, and ID theory should not be allowed to escape a significant part of that criticism by allowing resort to a cause, the intelligent designer, which has the unusual characteristic of being available and capable whenever needed, yet escapes scrutiny by being otherwise explicitly ignored by the theory, despite the implicit characteristics that must be present to fulful each individual invocation, and the accumulated characteristics required to fulfill all the invocations.--Silverback 08:12, 21 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Omniscience (on the part of The Designer) is not relevant to ID. While it may be an assumption help by many, it is not a requirement of the concept. --DannyMuse 22:26, 19 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Let's be more scientific, "omniscience" and "omnipotence" is a "hypothesis" held by many. The finally tuned universe theory for instance hypothesizes an intelligent designer capable of anticipating the characteristics of a universe that would be hospitable to life, and assumes that was the motive of the designer. It is the statement in the second paragraph, about no assumptions being made that is incorrect.--Silverback 22:34, 19 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Silverback, I'm confused. It's hard to tell from the way you worded it, but it seems that you're agreeing with my point! (I added emphasis to your commentary above to highlight that). --DannyMuse 18:29, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

new bs.

i don't have enough reverts to fight this vandalism on my own. would anyone care to help me prevent our newfound friend from completely destroying this page and replacing it with his own ignorance and bigotry? Ungtss 17:38, 8 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Stay cool. Flaming, insults in edit summaries do not improve articles. Stirling Newberry 17:43, 8 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Stirling, your edits to the opening paragraph are reducing NPOV a lot, and you should undo them. It is customary to define and describe a subject first, before getting into the details of its criticism. For example, the idea that ID is a "wedge agenda", while reasonable, is just one POV that is denied by many ID adherents, and shouldn't be in the intro. Why did you capitalize "Wedge Agenda", by the way? --Yath 17:50, 8 Jan 2005 (UTC)

That statement is inaccurate. I am reporting the documentable POV of practicing scientists about ID, and attributing it to them. NPOV doesn't mean "don't say anything bad", it means "document who criticises, and for what reasons. Stirling Newberry 19:04, 8 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Stirling, I have to agree - the opening paragraph is highly problematic. The rest of your edits are very useful. Would you be willing to try and work out a compromise on the first paragraph? Graft 19:35, 8 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Because the article is insufficiently editorially biased and needs as much prejudicial rhetoric as possible.

Thank you anonymous troll.Stirling Newberry 19:04, 8 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Well, you dug your own hole, didn't you? Discarding accepted standards of neutrality in favor of well-meaning but misguided political ranting helps our POV least of all. Justifying this project with "if the shoe fits" and whining about "pure censorship" only makes you seem temperamentally ill-equipped for article writing. This is all the more depressing because many of your edits reveal an impressive breadth of knowledge.

But the logorrhea must stay out: Before even being permitted a complete description of Intelligent Design, we were subjected to rambling insertions dealing with associated political issues (the "Wedge Agenda") and the presentation of opposing judgments, however correct they are. ("the words 'fraud', 'sham' ... are used by practicing biologists")

Throughout, the article also became laced with shambolic editorial criticism in the authorial voice. ("it argues from ignorance, argues that absence of evidence is evidence of absence, and that insufficiency of current formulations of selection are sufficient to collapse the entire theory...")

Much has been restored since. In future, please make an effort to provide more measured contributions.--RBeschizza 06:15, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I second RBeschizza's comments. I have removed the following from the brief bullet-point summary of critical arguments. It may be that soem of this can inform the more detailed critical sections, but they make the "summary" unreadably long:

"*The ID movement's mathematics in published papers is flawed, that definitions of "steps of complexity" do not hold up under examination, that the restrictive assumptions made to prove that natural selection will not occur in certain populations does not fit observed biological populations.

Definitions of irreducible complexity are contradictory, do not reduce to a mathematical or comparable form, and that assertions of "irreducible complexity" are circular - structures are defined as irreducibly complex, and then this is used to prove the existence of irreducible complexity.
That supposed examples of "irreducible complexity" turn out to have entirely reasonable biochemical basis which could evolve in steps.
That the definition of steps in irreducible complexity do not correctly map to the fitness space of evolution, or of the alterations in the genome.
That assertions about "information" used in ID correspond to "low probability", which has been disproven by information theory. That is low probability states can also be low information states. (See A Mathematical Theory of Communication).
Invocation of intelligent agents is an explanation which raises more questions than it answers, particularly "unembodied" intelligent agents which do not need to conform to known laws of physics.
ID proponents consistently use of fatally flawed logical and mathematical arguments, obfustication, equivocation and straw man attacks.
ID attacks "naturalism" and "uniformitarianism" without sufficient evidence, or examining all reasonable natural explanations.
ID claims that "improbable" equals "impossible" and then procedes to definitions of improbable which are selected to maximize the appearance of improbability: particularly the appeal to "single selection", "random selection" and questionable assertions as to the mechanisms of selection."

Please remember that the goal of this article is to provide a brief overvue of the topic, not a comprehensive rehersal of all relevant arguments. There are separate articles for irreducible complexity, specified complexity, and many variants of creationist, evolutionary and theological arguments that are touched upon here. --BTfromLA 07:06, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Proposed new lead section

I've come over from peer review and decided to start at the top... I've rewritten the lead section in what hopefully is more NPOV and acceptable to all sides. I'm not going to jump in the middle of an edit war though, so I'll just post my proposal below and let you all run with it if you think it's an improvement on the current. Personally, I think it is. :) Bantman 07:13, Jan 9, 2005 (UTC)

The theory of intelligent design (ID) proposes that life on earh was deliberately designed by one or more intelligent agents. Advocates of the the theory claim that empirical evidence supports the conclusion that life on earth was deliberately designed. ID proposes that an intelligent designer is necessary to fully account for the adaptive complexity and diversity of life, because naturalistic causes are inherently insufficient.

The phrase "intelligent design" was first widely publicized by legal scholar Phillip E. Johnson in his 1991 book Darwin on Trial, though earlier references can be found in creationist literature. Johnson's argument, and a key tenet of the ID movement, is that philosophical naturalism is false. Since the publication of Johnson's book, a movement has coalesced around the theory of intelligent design; this movement has led an organized effort to advance ID in public and scientific circles as a legitimate alternative to naturalistic theories on the origin of life and evolution, and is known as the intelligent design movement.

The efforts of the intelligent design movement have been rebuffed by the vast majority of the scientific community, which widely considers the theory of ID to be worthless pseudoscience. ID has not garnered the support of any significant portion or subset of the scientific community; in particular, biologists nearly universally reject ID. Many scientists view ID as having been already so thoroughly disproven as to not demand further attention; however, it has attracted considerably more attention than might be expected for a theory with no significant support in scientific literature, probably due to the very public efforts of the intelligent design movement. In response to these efforts, ID has been repeatedly discredited in scientific literature.

i like it very much for the most part -- i'd just change the last sentence a little bit to include the possibility that it has been successful with the general public because many of us find it to be reasonable, rather than solely "due to the public efforts of the id movement." generally very well done, sir:). Ungtss 08:19, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Also, maybe a little more exposition on why it is rejected by scientists, e.g. "Some skeptics claim that ID is largely a cipher for more traditional forms of Creationism"? --RBeschizza 09:11, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Summary of Arguments against ID

Are you MAD sterling? That's absurd to have that many dot points under, a "SUMMMARY of arguments against ID". I strongly suggest reverting back to the original section, which was concise and to the point (as a summary should be). --Brendanfox 00:25, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)

The original summary was not concise, it was bowdlerize. If ID supporters want fewer bullet points, they can make fewer egregious errors of fact, logic, mathematics and good faith in their papers. Stirling Newberry 01:02, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)

friendly one, isn't he? Ungtss 01:52, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Brendanfox (or someone), please do revert that section. Stirling, whatever your familiarity with ID discussions, you evidently are not a professional writer. Wikipedia articles aspire to providing concise definitions of the topic at hand, and a brief introduction to the issues that surround it. Many of these issues are elaborated upon in linked articles, and can be pursued in greater depth through bibliographic citations and off-site weblinks. A summary that names general categories and does not extensively delve into specific details is not Bowdlerized--it is a summary. In general, the goal should be to pare away everything that is not required for a clear, bare-bones presentation of the material, and move details of sub-topics to their own articles (like irreducible complexity). --BTfromLA 01:55, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)

My such nice people we have here. Stirling Newberry 07:19, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)

perhaps one should take a look in the mirror first. none of the individuals opposing those edits (other than me) ascribe to ID. Ungtss 07:32, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)

What not-nice behavior are you referring to, Stirling? You have insisted on adding an absurd amount of clutter and brazenly POV language to the article (which was already overlong and digressive in my view). And your comments are often hostile or snide. I, and several others, have tried to point out why your additions are seen (by everyone here, far as I can tell) as causing more problems for the article than they address. (Although your contributions to the precision of the article are certainly welcome.) Untgss is correct, by the way--I have no interest in promoting ID, and as far as I know, he is the only participant here who supports the idea. If you are not just a troll--being deliberately outrageous to get a rise out of people--then please allow some others to edit the material, and allow yourself a little time to consider whether the edits might actually improve the piece. If you want to write a screed that rails on for page after page about the deficiencies of the ID proponents, this is not the appropriate venue. At this rate, we seem on track to have an article with four hundred bullet points followed by a catalogue of all possible disputes about the nature and abilities of God, gods and non-gods. Sheesh! --BTfromLA 08:49, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Gentlemen, I must insist that the name calling stop immediately. - Ta bu shi da yu 07:57, 13 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I agree that stirlings additions are pooly written. They also contain responses to arguments that are made in ID that are not documented here, especially the information theory stuff. Perhaps he should document the ID arguments before he responds to them, so his additions make more sense.--Silverback 13:29, 13 Jan 2005 (UTC)

NPOV?

Stirling, are you seriously claiming that "ID supporters are completely unreasonable, and are fellow travellers with anti-science causes" qualifies as a neutral point of view?

Dispute resolution--request for comments

The user Stirling Newberry has called for dispute resolution about this page, labelling it (in the notes attached to one of his repeated reversions of the article) to be a "bad faith fraud" and declaring that all the editors here "have no regard for factuality."

He has thusfar made no comments on the talk page that specify which facts are misrepresented. He has made aggresive revisions which have been partly reverted, on grounds (best I can tell) that the writing was extremely POV and wildly overlong.

Comments and suggestions from other editors or disinterested Wikipedians would be very welcome at this point. --BTfromLA 05:54, 13 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I have no interest in either side of this argument. I've not followed this, but here's an outsider's view on some small points. For example the first area of the revert wars: Critics of ID label it as "stealth creationism," a veiled attempt to introduce religious beliefs into scientific discourse.

The phrase should definitely be cited in this article, since it is often comes up in discussion of ID. However, rather than inferring intent with the phrase "veiled attempt" why not just stick with the facts, like saying, Critics of ID label it as "stealth creationism," since many creationists have taken to ID to support their argument, or something to that nature. Don't ascribe intent unless you can cite something more concrete. Fuzheado | Talk 06:33, 13 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Notice that whoever wrote that wasn't ascribing intent; they were pointing out that critics ascribe intent. — B.Bryant 05:42, 14 Jan 2005 (UTC)

It should be reasonably obvious by now that Stirling knows his contributions are not NPOV and that Stirling does not care. He is unaware, or unwilling to accept, that an encyclopedia article must be concise, descriptive, and written from a neutral point of view. I agree with his positions, but object strongly to his attempts to mold this article into a screed. His arrogant attitude to NPOV, his adversarial whining and his unwillingness to even discuss his edits, are fast becoming an object lesson in Wikipedia's weaknesses. --66.55.230.178 01:40, 14 Jan 2005 (UTC)

i agree with the above. he's clearly got an agenda and doesn't give a rip what anybody else thinks. i appreciate the willingness of those who don't support id to support npov so admirably in this case. thank you. Ungtss 02:35, 14 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I didn't find much to support claims of Stirling's NPOV writing on either the request-for-dispute-resolution or on the Talk:Intelligent design page. Going through the history for the Intelligent design article itself is more revealing. Although I agree with Stirling's general sentiment and dislike of ID arguments, his additions to the article and edit summaries sometimes seem deliberately inflammatory. The other regular posters seem to be trying to enforce NPOV standards, even when doing so conflicts with their own viewpoints. Incidentally, I'm of the opinion that strongly-worded POV arguments are highly ineffective in gaining converts.

Thank you very much for taking the time to look at some of the relevant reverts and rewrites on the page--it's the only way to really get a sense of the situation.

I'm not familiar with how these disputes are finally resolved; thusfar, the comments seem pretty consistent... what happens next? --BTfromLA 19:51, 15 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Despite the above consensus, evidence is mounting that the user Stirling Newberry is determined to continue his problematic behavior here, including his unwillingness to engage in civil discussion about the article with other editors, even those editors who agree with his views on this topic. (See recent edits to the article and his exchanges with other users elsewhere on this page.) I'd very much appreciate any proposals for a happy resolution to this problem. --BTfromLA 18:25, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Bracketing

"Organizations such as the National Academy of Sciences and the National Center for Science Education describe ID as pseudoscience which has been thoroughly debunked." Is this saying they "describe ID as (pseudoscience which has been..)" or they "descirbe (ID as pseudoscience) which has been.."? Mlm42 02:04, 17 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Who knows? Read over the talk page and you'll see the chaos these edits have caused. The fact they are so dreadfully written is the cherry on top.

Maybe.. but I think there's still hope to make this a coherent article. Mlm42 05:11, 17 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Shape of Earth: views differ

It is clear to me that Stirling Newberry's contentions are largely correct -- Ungtss is absolutely dedicated to gradually transforming this article into the form: "Shape of earth: views differ", completely regardless of the accuracy of that statement. BTfromLA and Silverback, by validating his edits, are implicitly collaborating with him. Until he is directly confronted and opposed by the community, the only possible result of this type of activism is a larger distance between the content of the wikipedia and the scientific consensus and the corresponding irrelevance of Wikipedia.--Goethean 18:22, 18 Jan 2005 (UTC)

um ... nobody is "collaborating" with anybody else. if you'll notice, my edits were MINIMAL before stirling came along with his bigotry -- the page was arranged primarily by those who disagree with ID but are interested in npov. as to your ridiculous analogy to flat earth, perhaps evolution should be compared to Spontaneous generation? flat earth flies in the face of demonstrable, repeatable evidence, and is held by only a tiny minority. id flies in the face of ... what? hypotheses about how the eye MIGHT have evolved? worldwide, support for creation + "evolution with God's help" outnumbers support for naturalistic evolution 10:1. this is no fringe view -- this is a major point of view among the general public that deserves fair representation. finally, as to your accusations of "advocacy," take a look in the mirror, bro. the rest of us are interested in npov. care to join us? Ungtss 18:00, 18 Jan 2005 (UTC)

That you have decided to flagrantly violate the rules simply to defend your POV is not an excuse. Stirling Newberry 04:14, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

To you, NPOV means: "views differ". You are the one that rejects the testimony of biologists, chemists, medical doctors, immunologists, cosmologists, astronomers, and every person working in the area of knowledge on which you are writing. The prevalent view among Madagascar villagers may be that the earth sits on top of a turtle. That doesn't have a great deal of bearing on the actual shape or location of the planet.

I will not join you in your quest to marginalize Wikipedia. That is the reason for this post.--Goethean 18:22, 18 Jan 2005 (UTC)

looking up NPOV, i find the following:

"The neutral point of view policy is easily misunderstood. The policy doesn't assume that it's possible to write an article from just a single unbiased, "objective" point of view. The policy says that we should fairly represent all sides of a dispute, and not make an article state, imply, or insinuate that any one side is correct."

followed by ...

"How are we to write articles about pseudoscientific topics, about which majority scientific opinion is that the pseudoscientific opinion is not credible and doesn't even really deserve serious mention?

If we're going to represent the sum total of "human knowledge"--of what we believe we know, essentially--then we must concede that we will be describing views repugnant to us without asserting that they are false. Things are not, however, as bad as that sounds. The task before us is not to describe disputes fairly, on some bogus view of fairness that would have us describe pseudoscience as if were on a par with science; rather, the task is to represent the majority (scientific) view as the majority view and the minority (sometimes pseudoscientific) view as the minority view, and, moreover, to explain how scientists have received pseudoscientific theories. This is all in the purview of the task of describing a dispute fairly.

There is a minority of Wikipedians who feel so strongly about this problem that they believe Wikipedia should adopt a "scientific point of view" rather than a "neutral point of view." However, it has not been established that there is really a need for such a policy, given that the scientists' view of pseudoscience can be clearly, fully, and fairly explained to those who might be misled by pseudoscience." Ungtss 18:36, 18 Jan 2005 (UTC)

you are in the minority on wikipedia. admittedly a particularly vocal and narrowminded minority, but a minority nonetheless. npov requires that pseudoscience be explained on its own terms, and criticized on the terms of its critics. Ungtss 18:36, 18 Jan 2005 (UTC)

...and your interpretation of that policy could be restated as "Shape of earth: views differ." No matter how outlandish an idea is, how disingenuously it has been put forward, or how dark the motivation for its appearance, you think it must be presented as if it were absolutely equal in validity to the most self-evident truth. This is not just bad policy, not just a formula to make Wikipedia worthless, it amounts to dishonesty.

Goethean has a valid point, Ungtss, and I have been meaning to bring this up once the Stirling business passed. Your consistent refusal to permit the ID topic to be flagged at the beginning as containing scientific claims that are rejected by the great bulk of scientists and to being embedded in political advocacy amounts to asserting a pro-ID POV. The aim of the ID movement is to have ID, which is not currently accepted as scientifically legitimate, treated as a scientifically legitimate alternative to evolution. Rather than admitting that goal up front, you want it treated as if the goal has been achieved. It is certainly possible to topple too far in the direction of a hostile or dismissive POV, as we saw with Stirling's edits, but I while I didn't revert it, I don't think your shifting my recent attempt to introduce the controversy at the top of the article (and I tried to do it as neutrally as possible) to the bottom of the intro is justified by anything but pro-ID POV. Happy to have others weigh in here. --BTfromLA 19:14, 18 Jan 2005 (UTC)

i don't think id is being treated as equal by any stretch of the imagination -- it is, in fact, explicitly flagged within the intro, and repeatedly throughout the text. my only question is whether it should be flagged before or after it is actually described. i think it's logical to summarize the idea, then where it came from, and then why the scientific community finds it to be ridiculous. the alternative is to criticize it in detail before it is described. which do you think is more npov? Ungtss 19:19, 18 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Please review that intro I put in a few edits back--It certainly doesn't criticize ID in detail, nor (in my view) does it hopelessly taint the ID claims. It simply announces that this is a set of claims that mainstream science does not accept and that are embedded in political, as well as scientific arguments. This is true, right? It introduces the context in which ID (as opposed to theistic beliefs in a designer that make no scientific claims) operates, and thus seems like an appropriate way to frame this topic. --BTfromLA 19:48, 18 Jan 2005 (UTC)

it read as critical to me -- it made it clear in the very first sentence -- before you even knew what id WAS, that the majority of scientists had rejected it, and it was a primarily political controversy. consider the geocentrism page. it starts with a description of the idea, and only after several paragraphs does it describe how the idea came to be debunked due to its flaws. why is this permitted? surely the idea should be flagged as pseudoscience and loads of ad hominem laid at the feet of those who still believe the earth is the center of the universe. do you see the issue here? this is an encyclopedia. it needs to describe ideas first and only later criticize them. we need to know what id IS before we're reminded ad nauseum that today's scientists have been trained to reject it without consideration. Ungtss 23:35, 18 Jan 2005 (UTC)

On the other hand, look at the Morphogenetic field article. The first clause is: "According to the biologist Rupert Sheldrake..." The hordes of New age hippies who embrace Sheldrake's theories -- and I have been in lecture halls full of them -- are never mentioned. There is only a description of an episode in the history of science and the merits and demerits of the theory. Yet you are never given the impression that this is accepted science. To me, it strikes the right note. --Goethean 23:49, 18 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Geocentrism has virtually no adherents today, and it is certainly not a recently-developed strategy to undermine the intellectual dominance of a secular worldview and and the science that is seen as supporting that dominance. But that's what ID is—read Phillip Johnson—and I can't see why there is anything wrong with making that clear up front. I don't have the quote with me, but someplace Johnson says something to the effect that the debate isn't primarily a scientific one, and a little exploration of the Discovery Institute's web site will make it clear that non-scientific issues are involved. I'm all for allowing the ID arguments (including the philosophic and political ones, which haven't much been explored in the article) to be presented in terms that the proponents would recognize and agree with—I don't think we're all that far apart on this—but I think that wanting the topic introduced as if it were a recognized scientific theory slides from NPOV into a pro-ID bias. --BTfromLA 00:06, 19 Jan 2005 (UTC)

i agree with your goals -- here's my suggestion -- we take the tone suggested my goethean -- we can delete everything in the article that implies either that ID is an accepted scientific theory, or accusations that ID is rejected by the "majority of mainstream scientists" and is "pseudoscience." we'll get rid of all the ad hominem on both sides, and leave just an encyclopedic discription of ID, without the politics. what do you say? Ungtss 00:42, 19 Jan 2005 (UTC)

<<and it is certainly not a recently-developed strategy to undermine the intellectual dominance of a secular worldview and and the science that is seen as supporting that dominance.>>

what makes you think it was recently developed? ID and Atomism have been battling it out since the beginning of time -- johnson's just the latest Paley. further, seems to me that macroevolution is just a recently developed strategy to undermine the intellectual dominance of the theistic worldview. a strategy which, in my opinion, is devoid of any scientific merit whatsoever. Ungtss 00:42, 19 Jan 2005 (UTC)

The idea that the universe was deliberately designed is a venerable one, of course, as for that matter is the notion that the goal of science is to understand the mind of God. While ID proponents may indeed partake of those longstanding ideas, "Intelligent Design," the subject of this article, is a self-defined movement that is less than twenty years old. It is not accurate to describe all belief in an intelligent designer as "intelligent design", any more than it is correct to describe all art that emphasizes a concept as "conceptual art." ID, like conceptual art, is an historical movement that occured in a particular context at a particular time. In the case of ID, the movement is ongoing. --BTfromLA 02:00, 19 Jan 2005 (UTC)

quite true -- so how do you suggest we make this article npov: by describing its ideas first, or by describing its rejection by scientists and political controversy first? Ungtss 14:42, 19 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Is it primarily a scientific hypothesis or political movement? Creationists say scientific; evolutionists say political. To me, the wedge document shows the political-cultural agenda that gave rise to this theory/hypothesis/idea/assertion.--Goethean 18:12, 19 Jan 2005 (UTC)

certainly it's both -- a view of life and the universe generally that is currently entirely excluded from scientific discourse ... and a political movement to get that view back into public discourse and education. perhaps we can find an npov way to describe its political side? something less, "these guys are here to brainwash everybody!" and more "these guys are trying to find a way to have their religious ideas fairly considered and represented in a secular context ... in the hope that once they enter public discourse, they will win on their merits." or maybe a representation of both? any ideas? Ungtss 18:30, 19 Jan 2005 (UTC)

That would be great as a paid advertisement for the Discovery Institute. --Goethean 03:21, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

if the facts alone, before all the meaningless ad hominem and proof by authority, serve as an advertisement, then perhaps the idea has merit. Ungtss 03:35, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

You seem to think that referring to the scientific method, science journals and scientists are a fallacious way to evaluate the accuracy of a scientific theory. Or perhaps it's Western logic that is hopelessly flawed by its dependence on the atheistic, materialistic mindset. --Goethean 03:45, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

i simply think the current paradigm definition of science is too narrow, due to the atheistic/agnostic bias prevalent (for the moment) in the scientific community. modern science arose within the creationist context, and is entirely consistent with it -- in fact, dependent on it. and if you think that atheism has won in the west, you're kidding yourself. Materialism gave us world wars, holocausts, eugenics, great purges, the psychological benefits of secular liberalism, and a fantastic period of baseless speculation regarding the origins of the universe, earth, and life. i ain't buying it. secularism makes no sense. Ungtss 13:09, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Proponents of ID call nineteenth- and twentieth-century biology "baseless speculation." Let's put that in the article. I have a feeling that Western science is looked at slightly more positively here in the Wikipedia compared to in your evangelical circles.

This Wikipedia article is not the appropriate place for your beachhead against modern science. Your motivations are now clear, and they are not objectivity or accuracy. They are to replace, in this little corner of the world, the consensus with your ideas about science. Get a blog.--Goethean 15:37, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

1) i'm not an evangelical, haven't been to church in years.

2) id do not reject ANY aspects of biology -- on the contrary, they pay SPECIAL attention to the DETAIL, and argue that the DETAIL infers a designer, rather than no designer.

3) beachhead my ass. it's npov, not spov. get your own blog. Ungtss 15:42, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Notable recent convert?

What's with the Notable recent convert section? It doesn't appear to be particularly encyclopedic. Why should the article care whether some former atheist has converted to ID? Particularly as he is not a biologist or scientist in any way. — Asbestos | Talk 10:19, 19 Jan 2005 (UTC)

As a former philosophy major and a former atheist, I find Flew's change of mind extremely interesting. But I agree that it should be reduced to a sentence or two and a link to the Flew article. We don't need a rah-rah paragraph for every walk to the pulpit.

Does this entail that if Henry Morris or some other major creationist flip-flops (an admittedly remote possibility) that it is also not noteworthy? Perhaps not, since Flew was never an explicitly anti-ID exponent, although I'm sure he ripped on Paley's teleological argument in his time. --Goethean 18:18, 19 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I wouldn't call it that noteworthy if Morris recanted, neither for an article on creationism nor evolution nor the debate. Flew doesn't deserve a paragraph either. Maybe one could do a list of noteable ID proponents containing Flew and add "(atheist converted to deism by ID arguments)" in his case. Same for Morris, should that happen. --Hob Gadling 18:52, Jan 19, 2005 (UTC)

tell me, stirling

1) would you mind justifying inserting redundant education material which is covered in greater detail (and significantly greater accuracy) on Creation and evolution in public education?

2) would you mind justifying long pov arguments in headers against id, but not in headers for id?

3) as was said in Far and Away, "i have no wish to fight you." but i will. your constructive edits are welcome, but your bigotry has no place here. Ungtss 16:04, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

More lies and insults. Obviously you think yourself above the law and the rules. Stirling Newberry 16:24, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

since stirling has not justified his edits and instead merely attacked with more vicious and fundamentalist fury, thoroughly ignoring the npov rules for pseudoscience, i ask that the majority carefully consider the content and purpose of these edits in an already bloated and back-and-forth article, and decide whether they are appropriate. Ungtss 16:30, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

<<Obviously you think yourself above the law and the rules.>>

odd, coming from one who seems to think he IS the law and the rules. Ungtss 16:32, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Stirling, you can see above where virtually all observers found your earlier editing to be inappropriate and counter-productive. Please don't continue in that vein. You have good information to bring to the article, and that is welcome, but if you make large and controversial changes, it is incumbent upon you to justify your changes on the talk page, and to engage in reasonably courteous discussions with those who differ or question your choices, assuming good faith on all sides. Why not try that? --BTfromLA 16:53, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Because ungtss is not engaged in good faith, nor was he from the beginning. Nor are you. Stirling Newberry 17:15, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

That's ridiculous. First of all, they are NOT the only two people editing this page. Second of all, regardless of THEIR behavior, YOU should always behave decorously. This is not some "ends justify the means" conflict. When someone asks you to justify your edit, do it. Period. If you can't do that, you shouldn't make edits. Graft 18:37, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Please see my recent post to the "request for comments" topic, above. --BTfromLA 18:54, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

well, fellas, wadduwedo now? Ungtss 19:42, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I've requested constructive proposals, above. I see that there is a procedure for formally presenting evidence and requesting community comment about a user's behavior, and another for requesting binding arbitration about problem users who do not respond to community consensus. I have no experience with those options, nor am I aware of all the rules and definitions pertaining to them, but my hunch is that either type of complaint would be appropriate in this case. Personally, I am reluctant to get that deeply pulled into this matter, and I'm hoping someone--perhaps somebody who hasn't been involved in these exchanges--can come up with an alternative solution. --BTfromLA 20:10, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Faith, good and bad

The whole intelligent design controversy is rooted in metaphysics and methodology. Much of which is inextricably linked to a priori assumptions (i.e., axioms or premises).

Materialists already think there is no God, and except for the insignificant minority of "open-minded materialists" they will reject any argument contradicting their axiomatic starting point. Hence, ID's suggestion that the origin of multi-cellular beings (particularly vertebrates and humans) could reasonably be ascribed to an intelligent being is anathema to them. So it's really hard for them even to tolerate expression of such an idea, let alone to entertain it as a "hypothesis".

Religionists (and yes, I am one) already think there is a God, and likewise tend to reject out of hand any argument that contradicts their faith. "Fossils prove evolution? Then the fossils must be fakes (or a test from God)." So goes the fundamentalist POV.

This article will remain turbulent and contentious until someone -- cleverer and more diplomatic than I am -- can identify and explain the hazy and/or hidden assumptions and thought processes of the various opposing sides. Larry Witham's recent book By Design is a valiant attempt to do just that. I wish I could get him to put his two cents in, here at Wikipedia, but published authors are notoriously hard to recruit. --user:Ed Poor (talk) 18:43, Jan 20, 2005 (UTC)

Now Ed Poor comes in and decides to engage in bad faith Larry Witham is highly sympathetic - one might even say sycophantic - towards ID. Merely one review among many for the above mentioned book from amazon.com

Reviewer: A reader

This overview of the intelligent design movement is guaranteed to drive certain people crazy. Foremost among them will be fans of Richard Dawkins's "The Blind Watchmaker" and other acolytes of the modern religion of Scientism. Not science, mind you, which requires an open, inquisitive approach to data, but Scientism, the slavish devotion to the god Theory. Darwin handed down his discoveries, the earth shook, the sky trembled, don't try to teach anything else in OUR public schools.

The problem, as Witham demonstrates in his work, is that there are a great many questions left unanswered by Darwin, most of them revolving around what Michael Behe calls "irreducible complexity." There is no need to resort to the thought experiment of finding a watch in a field, as Dawkins does in his attempt to prove that random selection is the only force capable of or sufficent to explaining the world around us.

Behe, cited by Witham, makes things much easier: a simple mousetrap, with only five working parts, cannot have come together over billions of years by any natural process known or suspected. Half a mousetrap is useless, as is four-fifths. Only the complete mechanism will function, and the odds of a mousetrap "evolving" are astronomically, vanishingly small.

(Which begs an interesting question: Does Dawkins, and by extension his fans the Priests of Darwin, actually believe that a mechanism as complex as a pocketwatch will appear before their eyes if they sit in a field waiting for sufficient eons?)

Witham approaches this fascinating area of inquiry as an intelligent layman, surveying the experts in the field with an eye to offering the reader as complete an exposition of the intelligent design question as possible.

Highly recommended, but only to those willing to have their eyes, and minds, opened wide.

Witham has also written several articles which uncritically present ID claims, and his blurb indicates his strong sympathy with ID. Since Mr. Poor entered this discussion by preaching good faith, and by threatening me for "breaking the rules" even as he presents a book which was written by someone who is all but an ID partisan and part of the "wedge strategy", I submit that he is not to be taken at face value, that he is not engaging in "good faith" but is, instead, merely presenting another face of ID supporters, in an attempt to frame the debate, as ID supporters do as between "Scientism" the religion and their own religion. This is not the point at issue with ID. I am deeply disappointed in his, at the very least, intellectually sloppy framing of the issue, and, at worse, intellectual dishonesty in presenting a book as neutral which is not. Stirling Newberry 02:26, 21 Jan 2005 (UTC)

well said. perhaps we should all put our heads together to find a way to do it right? seems to me we've got the gamut of opinions here ... maybe with a little teamwork we can do it right. Ungtss 18:50, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

proposed solution

1) i added irreducible complexity + specified complexity to the intro to be clearer that the issue is more than a philosophical one, and to balance out the ad hominem added by stirling to the end of the intro, which i left untouched.

2) i removed the education material, because i already took the pertinent parts out and placed them on the education page, and they are therefore redundant, as well as being largely inaccurate.

3) i removed the ad hominem arguments from the end of the "summary against" section, because they are all subject to ID ad hominem retorts, and neither of them improve the quality of the article.

4) i removed the pov arguments from the headers, because that is not appropriate or stylistically justifiable, and is applied only to the "anti-" sections.

any other immediate improvements are edits are welcome ... otherwise ... shall we vote on whether stirling's or my proposal is more npov? Ungtss 19:57, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I assume that when this vote is over, you will return to your work of editing the article to bring it more in line with your bias. --Goethean 20:40, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

What about Silverback's version, which had the political campaign talk up top? --Goethean 20:45, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

let's compare to the political campaign by the NCSE and NAS for the teaching of evolution. should that be at the top of the evolution page? Ungtss 20:58, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

See BTfromLA's previous comments:

Geocentrism has virtually no adherents today, and it is certainly not a
recently-developed strategy to undermine the intellectual dominance of a
secular worldview and and the science that is seen as supporting that
dominance. But that's what ID is—read Phillip Johnson—and I can't see why
there is anything wrong with making that clear up front. I don't have the
quote with me, but someplace Johnson says something to the effect that the
debate isn't primarily a scientific one, and a little exploration of the
Discovery Institute's web site will make it clear that non-scientific issues
are involved. I'm all for allowing the ID arguments (including the philosophic
and political ones, which haven't much been explored in the article) to be
presented in terms that the proponents would recognize and agree with—I don't
think we're all that far apart on this—but I think that wanting the topic
introduced as if it were a recognized scientific theory slides from NPOV
into a pro-ID bias. --BTfromLA 00:06, 19 Jan 2005 (UTC)

look at Communism and tell me if it starts with a discussion of the Communist party. look at Abortion and tell me if it starts with a discussion of the NOW. look at Christianity and tell me if it starts with a discussion of the Christian Coalition. get over it, man. npov doesn't only apply to ideas you like. Ungtss 22:49, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

You are comparing apples to orangutans. ID was not constructed due to the scientific insufficiency of the theory of evolution. It was constructed due to the theological insufficiency of the theory of evolution. --Goethean 23:16, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

1) you're wrong. the EYES you're looking at the screen with are telling you that chance mutation and natural selection are scientifically incapable of explaining the fact that you can SEE, and only by glossing over the profoundly complex and intricate nature of the eye can you manage to believe otherwise. Ungtss 23:22, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

2) even if you were right, christianity was not devised from the scientific method, nor was communism, nor was the pro-choice movement. they're all ideas grounded in an ethical basis. and in EVERY CASE, the IDEA is described before the political movement supporting it within the public sphere. why is ID any different?

Removing the section on recent converts

The section "a notable recent convert", is problematic and should remain out of the article for several reasons:

At present the section exaggerates the implications of Flew's statements. The most that can be said of Flew is that he is unsure. By claiming "Antony Flew recently converted to a theistic point of view (though not necessarily the Christian God), primarily on the weight of Intelligent Design." it overstates his conversion and makes an unsubstantiated hasty conclusion about his motivation. In communications with Richard Carrier, Flew has stated that he hasn't really decided what to believe and that he was unsure. In response to theists citing him in their favor, Flew calls his "recent very modest defection from my previous unbelief" a "more radical form of unbelief," and implies that the concept of God might actually be self-refuting, for "surely there is material here for a new and more fundamental challenge to the very conception of God as an omnipotent spirit," but, Flew says, "I am just too old at the age of nearly 82 to initiate and conduct a major and super radical controversy about the conceivability of the putative concept of God as a spirit." [1] See also: [2]
Such a section provides little value to the article or the reader. Vaunting "recent converts" is an appeal to authority, a logical fallacy. As such it has no place in an encyclopedic article. For balance should we start citing those significant theists who become atheists due to their understanding of science? No. Such a list is a pointless game of tit-for-tat and lessens the article.

Until these issues are properly addressed, I'm removing the section.--FeloniousMonk 22:37, 20 Jan 2005 (UTC)

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