Iolaus wrote:
Don't forget that such novel only becomes meaningful in the context of a well known designer or at least a defined language, meaning and intent when it comes to the audience. In the same way a spider could be said to design a web or a plant could be said to design a flower. It's only 'design' because we see its function and can talk about how it originates, or at least pinpoint a few causes of the whole web.
The point is, that the information cannot be duplicated by a random process. This is what complex specified information means. You don't go in after the fact and assign meanings to, say, tea leaves, after they have fallen into place. You have a language, and then you have symbols, and then you write a novel within that language. It is precisely the fact that it has meaning only within a language that gives away the novel as having been intentionally created by a mind.
Within linguistics this is seen quite differently though. The meaning contained in language, exposed by signs and signals, is only relevant because we
comprehend the sender and receiver, at least their intentions - connect to their multitude of causes to some extent. Without this, there's no meaning, not to literature, nor to RNA/DNA interactions.
So to infer "intelligent design" or "divine communication" is to claim knowledge of the designer, its intentions, as to create something meaningful to discern for science.
Now, we don't really know much about how spiders design their webs, and as to the flower, well, frankly I am not sure what your point was about it, except that you seem to say the plant designed itself.
The spider's web has its functions and from a certain perspective, its intricate structure can make one wonder about issues like design and beauty. Why do you think a work of literature is any different? Does the author really
knows why he's typing away? He could very well be oblivious of the purpose of his novel, or any lack of it even.
Again, I don't quite get your question, but we don't use terms like ultimate designer. Who knows who the designer was or what else is out there.
Well, there you go. You have intelligent design but no clue about any designer...
Perhaps you should think about how to detect 'design' this way. It's the same as with communication, language, signals.... you cannot talk about a message without describing the messenger at the same time. The message doesn't float in a vacuum. Neither does 'design'.
You have yet to refute that Intelligent Design is quite obviously a scientific inquiry, and you assume some sort of discomfort. What the hell do you mean by the functional desert of the scientific method?
"Intelligent Design" is not an inquiry at all when it comes to it. It's at the moment a rather minor uninteresting theory. Uninteresting
only because there's no path to falsification to the specific theory that is sought to be proven. Outside this narrow self-imposed straight-jacket science has put on, it can be
very relevant as inquiry of course.
The determination is dogged to hold on to that paradigm of life needing no help, and therefore a universe without any mind, a universe in which matter is the ground of being, all without explanation of any sort. And you speak of bias.
The universe is not given any properties like having a mind or an explanation, or 'needing help', until there's a
reason to give it as such. There's no intent to deny it these qualities, just the intent not to dress it up without any
positive theory in scientific sense. The 'bias' here at work is exactly part of the scientific principle, a bare bones principle in "true science" that is supposed to be neutral. And perhaps more acting like an ideal than something always realized in all scientific publicizing.
It's almost like a certain theology you earlier mentioned Galileo had to cope with. Could you give an example of such belief expressed so strongly in scientific articles by what you call 'Darwinists'
Yes, I'm sure I could. Mainly it is the idea that they understand what they are talking about when they assert that life evolved 'naturally' They evoke large numbers and deep time without actually examining statistics and finding out what the probabilities are.
Their numbers might be wrong, that's not the issue. The issue is that the model they propose is a viable one, it doesn't contradict itself and offers a road toward falsification and improvement.
It's one thing for an ID researcher to question a number or even to prove it to be bogus. But the challenge is to create a positive theory about some influence that could account for different numbers instead. The moment a 'mystery' is created by numbers not adding up, one cannot just default to the "strong suspicion" an intelligent force is involved.
I'm not sure what you mean about the intelligence not being phrased in a well defined way.
There's still a lot of work to be done to understand our own human intelligence and intelligence functioning in other animals. For now it's just a label that covers quite a lot of vague stuff. This is why it's fishy to speak of any "intelligent design" in relation to evolution theory. I'd propose they'd call it "research into new patterns in evolutionary processes" or something like that.
We can see the evidence of intelligence, certainly if it is a sort of intelligence which has properties similar to our own intelligence, without knowing much about it.
Or, we see patterns because we are a pattern seeking and displaying organism. A pattern is not the same as intelligence. Again, it's hard to define intelligence for cosmological purposes. It's possibly very anthropomorphic to see our own traits reflected in the things we observe. Projection occurs easily. Speaking animals, angry gods, man in the moon - can you not see the caution needed here?
You come to a planet on the Starship Enterprise, you see evidence of a prior civilization but all is dead, maybe like planet Mars. And you can see without resorting to belief systems, that there were intelligences at work, but they are gone and that is that. You need not know much about them or their natures or properties.
Again, this prior civilization can only be detected this way if it was sufficiently
similar to ourselves. If all constructs would be, for example, highly fractal instead of linear - it would be near to impossible to detect. Perhaps using mathematics, measuring up landmarks and suspect something.
And assuming they were indeed similar enough to detect- that instance we'd know already a lot about them. For example that they needed cities and roads, etc. That's a lot of information right there.
Now are you actually going to stand there and tell the Starship travelers that discussing the intelligence that once lived there is meaningless in terms of science?
A real Trekkie would of course right away suspect a holographic
trap set up by Q or the Romulans.
These are such tired old arguments, and guys like you come onto the blogs and bore the shit out of us with this sort of silliness which seems never to end. Trite, sophomoric arguments.
Lets just hope, for my sake, that you're just not willing to understand the arguments for some reason.
First, the ID people are not asserting anything about the intelligence, although some do believe it is the Christian God, some believe it is the Jewish God, some believe it is Allah, some are pantheists, some are agnostics, some are scratching their heads in wonder, and some believe in an endogenous intelligence.
If they do not assert anything, then what is there? They assert a design! A design says
a lot about the designer, his technique, possibilities, intentions, moods, skills, whatever.
What they specify is that it can design at least certain aspects of the life forms, and probably the universe as well.
Probably the universe as well! With science comes a certain type of humility, and what you write here implies a type of hubris that gets one kicked out of heaven!
But there is no demarcation between science and metaphysics. There is only reality, and the exploration of reality.
Science starts with proper demarcation, proper meaning having the optimal proportions in a given situation - the most fitting. If you want to explore the one reality, sincerely, you have to carve it up. And you really have to start with separating metaphysics. It's not easy to see why and how it's imperfect and ultimately
false to do so - but necessary nevertheless.