Did Carl Sagan believe in Intelligent Design?

[Aquila]

I just watched this video of Carl Sagan explaining the "Drake Equation" about possible life on other planets in the universe.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RB_v99FSTYc&NR=1

But much of what he says seem to rely on the presumption that life would evolve like it has on earth. Isn't this subtly saying that he believes in a plan, not the ID of the religious Creationists, but an order nevertheless.

Similarly, all the people looking for beams from other planets with radio-receivers (the SETI project?) - don't they also assume a sort of intelligent design in the universe?

 

[Parsman]

No. The idea is that given similar evolutionary conditions similar life forms will develop.

 

[Third Eye Open]

But much of what he says seem to rely on the presumption that life would evolve like it has on earth. Isn't this subtly saying that he believes in a plan, not the ID of the religious Creationists, but an order nevertheless.

I think I'll call you Streeeeeeeeeeeeetch Armstrong.

 

[aggle-rithm]

But much of what he says seem to rely on the presumption that life would evolve like it has on earth. Isn't this subtly saying that he believes in a plan, not the ID of the religious Creationists, but an order nevertheless.

Since a number of useful biological structures (such as the eye) have evolved independently in several different places in the animal kingdom, it's reasonable to assume that similar useful structures will appear on planets with similar conditions.

 

[Skeptic Guy]

Not in the least. The Drake Equation is a convenient formula on which to base a discussion on the likelyhood of there being life elsewhere in the galaxy. It isn't a scientific formula and we may never know actual values for some of the variables, but it is useful in a limited way. But as Parsman writes, the formula is based on the same evolutionary assumptions we make for all carbon-based life.

Now, if there is silicon based life out there...well, that may be a different formula!

 

[Wowbagger]

The presumption of life on other planets is NOT the same thing as assuming there is a "plan" in place. Why can't life pop up in a bunch of places with no planner, whatsoever?

 

[Tubbythin]

Similarly, all the people looking for beams from other planets with radio-receivers (the SETI project?) - don't they also assume a sort of intelligent design in the universe?

I'm not sure how exactly. EM radiation exists regardless of the existence of life or not. The ability to encode it as a means of transporting information on the other hand requires a reasonable degree of intelligence. I don't see where the design bit comes from though.

 

[CapelDodger]

Similarly, all the people looking for beams from other planets with radio-receivers (the SETI project?) - don't they also assume a sort of intelligent design in the universe?

You might as well say that looking for evidence of plate tectonics on other planets assumes "a sort of intelligent design".

The laws of physics will throw out similar results in similar circumstances.

 

[Dr Adequate]

I just watched this video of Carl Sagan explaining the "Drake Equation" about possible life on other planets in the universe.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RB_v99FSTYc&NR=1

But much of what he says seem to rely on the presumption that life would evolve like it has on earth. Isn't this subtly saying that he believes in a plan, not the ID of the religious Creationists, but an order nevertheless.

Similarly, all the people looking for beams from other planets with radio-receivers (the SETI project?) - don't they also assume a sort of intelligent design in the universe?

No.

 

[ConspiRaider]

The thread title is deceptive, because we all have an understanding of what is actually meant by the term, Intelligent Design. Seems quite a lot unfair to correlate that term with Carl Sagan.

Since we have no ironclad proof (yet) of life anywhere else in the Universe other than here on this one tiny planet, then obviously when making suppositions of life "out there" - we use our knowledge of Earth life as a referent. Which means, regardless of the collective skills and intelligence of the persons doing the speculating, we could be way off in left field somewhere. Projection and assumption and supposition are all we really have, at this point in time. And, for the foreseeable future. That is, unless we happen to discover life in our solar system, outside of Earth.

Presumption that life on another planet evolved along similar patterns to our own, is NO corollary to the religious term of Intelligent Design.

 

[Undesired Walrus]

I miss Dr Sagan. I have a sense of longing watching that video.

 

[CapelDodger]

I miss Dr Sagan. I have a sense of longing watching that video.

His was one of the voices of my adolescent years - very evocative. James Burke's was another. David Attenborough's (thank Providence) is still to be heard. Secular saints, all. And now we have Richard Dawkins's voice - another secular saint.

The human race is mostly crap, but it's not completely crap.

 

[CapelDodger]

The thread title is deceptive, because we all have an understanding of what is actually meant by the term, Intelligent Design. Seems quite a lot unfair to correlate that term with Carl Sagan.

I think taking offence to it would be quite forgivable, but I doubt that's what Carl Sagan would have wanted. So we'll let this nitwit live.

 

[Aquila]

Thanks for your replies everyone.

You might as well say that looking for evidence of plate tectonics on other planets assumes "a sort of intelligent design".

The laws of physics will throw out similar results in similar circumstances.

Well that's exactly what I mean!

Aren't the laws of physics constant, in our solar system anyway? They have been around since the "beginning of time" (right?) and hopefully will be for ever. They were around billions of years before humans evolved, so aren't they part of the "plan" for all life?

Quote from CapelDodger:The thread title is deceptive, because we all have an understanding of what is actually meant by the term, Intelligent Design. Seems quite a lot unfair to correlate that term with Carl Sagan.

I admit that it was a deceptive thread title, but I did explain that I didn't mean the I.D. of creationists in the first post.

 

[Aquila]

The presumption of life on other planets is NOT the same thing as assuming there is a "plan" in place. Why can't life pop up in a bunch of places with no planner, whatsoever?

Scientists seem to think that intelligent life would only evolve on planets with the right conditions of light, water and food supply. I always thought that they are assuming that there is, or has been evolution on these planets, which follows the same method or "plan" (sexual or a-sexuual reproduction, chance genetic mutations, natural selection) that we see on earth.

But maybe you are right. Maybe there is life that has popped up in places that we would think were too hot or cold or dark to sustain life as we know it. And maybe there is no evolution on other planets, in other solar systems. Maybe time is completely different for any life there. Life and death could be on a much longer time-scale.

But philosophically, wouldn't it be true to say that the universe was one big intelligent organism? I don't have to believe in a separate creator of this organism, for it IS the whole thing. But maybe I'm in the wrong section. Caio!

 

[CapelDodger]

Thanks for your replies everyone.

You're welcome.

Well that's exactly what I mean!

You didn't make that obvious.

Aren't the laws of physics constant, in our solar system anyway? They have been around since the "beginning of time" (right?) and hopefully will be for ever. They were around billions of years before humans evolved, so aren't they part of the "plan" for all life?

The laws of physics aren't a plan. They're what sensible plans are based on.

Quote from CapelDodger:The thread title is deceptive, because we all have an understanding of what is actually meant by the term, Intelligent Design. Seems quite a lot unfair to correlate that term with Carl Sagan.

That would be better put as "Quoted by CapelDodger". What we have here is a communication problem.

I admit that it was a deceptive thread title, but I did explain that I didn't mean the I.D. of creationists in the first post.

It's not the specific design (or plan) that matters, it's the concept of design being involved in the first place. Which it isn't.

Stars, planets, plate tectonics, chemistry, life - they all emerge from the laws of physics, entirely unplanned, undesigned, and unintended. In short, my philosophy is that ◊◊◊◊ happens.

 

[Civilized Worm]

But philosophically, wouldn't it be true to say that the universe was one big intelligent organism?

No.

 

[Piggy]

His was one of the voices of my adolescent years - very evocative. James Burke's was another. David Attenborough's (thank Providence) is still to be heard.

Aye.

We must be of an age, CapelDodger.

Sagan's Cosmos series aired when I was 13, and it not only opened my eyes to the universe, it also let me know that I was not alone with my thoughts in the world, that other people, serious people, grown-ups, stopped and wondered about questions like "When I ride past a field of beans, for how long is a row of beans exactly perpendicular to where I am on the road?" (a question that had haunted me for years at that point, even if I couldn't have phrased it that way back then).

These men and women -- scientists, rational thinkers, skeptics -- became the DJ's of my intellect, beaming their pirate radio signals into my small room there on the dead-end road in a decaying milltown in the American Bible Belt.

I never met them, but because of them, my world was less lonely, less narrow, and more exciting than I had ever imagined it could be.

Comin' atcha from Cornell, Princeton, CalTech, it's the greatest hits of Einstein and Feynman tonight, boppers, relativity with a bullet, and stay tuned for some hot tracks from our expanding universe! Don't touch that dial, we're spinning all night, every night!

After reading their books, watching their broadcasts, I didn't just know something new. It wasn't anything as mundane as that.

No, after tuning in to their frequency, I would walk out into a different world, a world that had always been there, but that I never suspected had been waiting for me all along.

It was a world of wonder so profound that even the miracles of all the gods became a carnival sideshow by comparison, some cheap tent meeting fronted by faded pasteboard signs and worn-out banners.

"Listen, son," they whispered to me, "you are star-stuff and the world is a hall of jewels for your mind to explore -- but be quick about it, boy, cause there ain't no eternal mansions, no heavenly revelation. If you want the wonders of the world, they are yours. Go find them now!"

 

[CapelDodger]

We must be of an age, CapelDodger.

And, I think, of a type .

Comin' atcha from Cornell, Princeton, CalTech, it's the greatest hits of Einstein and Feynman tonight, boppers, relativity with a bullet, and stay tuned for some hot tracks from our expanding universe! Don't touch that dial, we're spinning all night, every night!

Comin' atcha with Leonard Cohen, Ten New Songs, on the CD player.

Feynman, another secular saint.

It was a world of wonder so profound that even the miracles of all the gods became a carnival sideshow by comparison, some cheap tent meeting fronted by faded pasteboard signs and worn-out banners.

"Listen, son," they whispered to me, "you are star-stuff and the world is a hall of jewels for your mind to explore -- but be quick about it, boy, cause there ain't no eternal mansions, no heavenly revelation. If you want the wonders of the world, they are yours. Go find them now!"

Believers live in such an impoverished environment, sad bastids. If I'd needed Billy Graham to give my life meaning I'd have topped myself in self-disgust.

I was born in '54, in a well-bombed multi-cultural city and a well-earned triumphant zeitgeist. A triumph that wasn't a gift from any god (or the US, for that matter) but was earned by determination and hard bloody effort. Decay was a thing of the despised 30's; we'd made our present, and were going to make our future. Screw any god's help; where were they when the chips were down? Absent WithOut Leave, that's where. Illusions.

My parents did make their future, and launched me on mine, bless 'em.

 

[Hokulele]

Aren't the laws of physics constant, in our solar system anyway?

Yep.

They have been around since the "beginning of time" (right?) and hopefully will be for ever.

Nope. Things are postulated as being pretty weird during the inflationary period, compared to what we see today. I guess you could say there were laws of physics in that time period, but until the 4 forces separated, I don't think you could call them the same as the ones current life is adapted for.

They were around billions of years before humans evolved, so aren't they part of the "plan" for all life?

I don't know. How exactly do black holes, quasars, and other features of the known universe "plan" for life?