• Quick note - the problem with Youtube videos not embedding on the forum appears to have been fixed, thanks to ZiprHead. If you do still see problems let me know.

ID/Creationism challenge

randman said:
Read some of it a long time ago debating evos around the time of decision and made the same comments I am doing here.

If you understand how the law works, you wouldn't cite the decision as evidence of anything science-related.
Click to expand...

Ok, thanks. I guess I don't know enough about how the law works.
 
The very fact this was in court is evidence against the objectivity of evolutionism.
Click to expand...
Right, because side-stepping the entire peer-review issue and forcing Creationism into school classrooms (and it was clearly shown that that's what ID is--Creationism with another name), despite the fact that the overwhelming majority of scientists reject the idea and the fact that the idea is entirely based on religion (by the Disco Tute's own admission), makes something a REAL science!

The proper forum for science is scientific debate, in peer-reviewed journals and academic conferences. ID advocates strangely avoid putting their ideas forward in those venues. They prefer to act as a social movement, rather than a scientific one.

Yet somehow when real scientists call them out on this crap WE did something wrong. It really shows the level of honesty in our opposition.
 
We're to believe real science (you know, the real kind) exists purely among a small group of persecuted Christians largely located in America and Britain.
 
randman, what do you think about the Discovery Institute's Wedge Document?

(Oh, and I fully expect you to either ignore this question or respond with a complete non sequiter like "Well, the evolutionists have to resort to litigation...blah blah")
 
I am finding claims by ID folk that it's falsifiable. These appear to misunderstand falsifiability. When you actually test a hypothesis, you propose tests that will default to the opposite of your answer (the difference between supporting and corroborating evidence). That way, you don't keep getting "no effect" and count it as "your proposed effect."

Example:
  • Hypothesis: Ghosts hate hamburgers.
  • Test: Leave hambuger out overnight.
  • Result: Hamburger still there in the morning.
  • Conclusion: Ghost chose not to eat hamburger. Hypothesis confirmed.

We can also consider the "remove a flagellum" tests. You can cut off peoples feet and they will die. That's not support for the "human life resides in the feet" theory.
 
chipmunk stew said:
I love the idea pushed by creationists (and other woo-woos) that revisions and challenges to a theory make it weaker, rather than stronger.
Click to expand...

Repeated revisions to the predictions/assessments made by a theory is evidence of weakness in the theory.
If you determine the date of a fossil and then make "corroborating" measurements confirming the date, then an additional piece of evidence causes you to revise the date of your fossil so you make "corroborating" measurements that now confirm the new date... I'd say there's something wrong with the technique underlying your "corroborating" measurements, or at least that the measurements can't be shown to yield an objective date.
 
Philosaur said:
randman, what do you think about the Discovery Institute's Wedge Document?

(Oh, and I fully expect you to either ignore this question or respond with a complete non sequiter like "Well, the evolutionists have to resort to litigation...blah blah")
Click to expand...
I have absolutely no problem with it and think evos are working within an outdated materialist paradigm regardless.

On a different note, let's say, just for sake of argument, that what evos claim is true; that ID is an interjection of religion into science. Court precedents change over time. The militant secularism and some other lib notions of the past are changing.

Imo, the first amendment even if ID was as wacko as you guys claim, bans the government from prohibiting the free exercise of religion. By making an argument that ID or creationism is interjecting religion into science, eventually this will, imo, mean that your argument will lose. Because that's saying religion cannot be involved with science and so prohibiting the free exercise of religion.

For now, the courts have interpreted "separation of Church and State" as more of a hostility towards religion and so banned it largely in education though that has changed some with rulings allowing Bible classes in public school, etc,.....it's kind of a stupid rule as you cannot hope to be educated on history and literature and not be educated on the Bible whether you believe it or not.

So the establishment clause has been overly emphasized in a way that's not true to the text and actually is more seeking to enshrine secularism as a de facto established religion.

Eventually, these things will be overturned. There is nothing unConstitutional about teaching a religious view of science or anything else.

Now does that make America a theocracy.

But the lower court judge ruled on precedent which is generally what he is supposed to do. As anyone that watches the Supreme Court knows, precedent is overturned all the time.
 
AvalonXQ said:
Repeated revisions to the predictions/assessments made by a theory is evidence of weakness in the theory.
If you determine the date of a fossil and then make "corroborating" measurements confirming the date, then an additional piece of evidence causes you to revise the date of your fossil so you make "corroborating" measurements that now confirm the new date... I'd say there's something wrong with the technique underlying your "corroborating" measurements, or at least that the measurements can't be shown to yield an objective date.
Click to expand...
That's be true if you guys didn't always say the evidence has "proved" evolution. If that's been the case for decades, why the need for a constant revision of the evidence?

If evos admitted the weaknesses of their theory, revisions would be a normal part of real science, but that's not the case.
 
randman said:
Imo, the first amendment even if ID was as wacko as you guys claim, bans the government from prohibiting the free exercise of religion. By making an argument that ID or creationism is interjecting religion into science, eventually this will, imo, mean that your argument will lose. Because that's saying religion cannot be involved with science and so prohibiting the free exercise of religion.
Click to expand...

The cases are about interjecting religion into education. Free exercise of religion doesn't not give public teachers the ability to inject religion into unrelated educational subjects. In fact, it pretty solidly prohibits that.
 
randman said:
That's be true if you guys didn't always say the evidence has "proved" evolution. If that's been the case for decades, why the need for a constant revision of the evidence?

If evos admitted the weaknesses of their theory, revisions would be a normal part of real science, but that's not the case.
Click to expand...

Evolution is true. The Theory of Evolution is our best explanation for how it works. Sometimes our understanding of something is wrong, so we change part of it, and then it's more correct.

We've been revising the Theory of Gravity for a while too, does it make Gravity wrong? Should I be able to fly unaided?

Even numbers are merely a theory that's also being revised.
 
randman said:
Imo, the first amendment even if ID was as wacko as you guys claim, bans the government from prohibiting the free exercise of religion. By making an argument that ID or creationism is interjecting religion into science, eventually this will, imo, mean that your argument will lose. Because that's saying religion cannot be involved with science and so prohibiting the free exercise of religion.
Click to expand...
randman has completely degenerated into yet another Creationist at this point. "Not coddling my pet religion" is not the same as "favoring one religion over another". I mean, what YOU are proposing is shoving YOUR religion down the throats of MY children, yet you see no problem with that.

If evos admitted the weaknesses of their theory, revisions would be a normal part of real science, but that's not the case.
Click to expand...
Right, right--that's why the theory of evolution has been the same since Darwin.

Wait a minute.....
 
AvalonXQ said:
The cases are about interjecting religion into education. Free exercise of religion doesn't not give public teachers the ability to inject religion into unrelated educational subjects. In fact, it pretty solidly prohibits that.
Click to expand...
We're talking about the curriculum, right? Yes, the first amendment, imo, does and should be acknowledged to be able to include even religious arguments in the curriculum.

Moreover, it should regardless include accurate information (often does not) about evo theories AND THEIR WEAKNESSES.

If you are not presenting arguments against the theory in some depth and intensity, you are just indoctrinating students and not teaching them real science.

Real science education does not care if they believe the theory or not. In fact, true science in education would rather they not believe it, try to argue against it, if that results in their understanding the theory better. In fact, unless one takes a critical approach to the theory, one will likely never fully understand it.
 
ehcks said:
Evolution is true. The Theory of Evolution is our best explanation for how it works. Sometimes our understanding of something is wrong, so we change part of it, and then it's more correct.

We've been revising the Theory of Gravity for a while too, does it make Gravity wrong? Should I be able to fly unaided?

Even numbers are merely a theory that's also being revised.
Click to expand...
But physics classes in high school to at times discuss alternative theories on how gravity works. In physics, it's acceptable to challenge basic theories and even encouraged, including just about everything whether gravity, time, the nature of space, etc, etc,.....

When someone learns basic, classical physics, for example, they are told also that this is incomplete and doesn't work for quantum mechanics, etc, etc,....
 
randman said:
His background means nothing. How much litigation have you actually been involved with? If you think the courts are an accurate means of determining the validity of scientific ideas, you are sadly mistaken.

John Edwards made a ton of money over the pseudo-scientific claim that not giving C-sections resulted in severe development deficiencies in children, for example.


The very fact this was in court is evidence against the objectivity of evolutionism. I doubt you realize that but considering Darwinism has been preached in class-rooms, TV shows, science magazines, etc,....for decades, and yet still must resort to litigation to silence dissent is astonishingly good evidence the theory has major problems and is not rooted in a purely scientific approach to data.
Click to expand...
Denying religious crusaders the opportunity to cynically insert religious doctrine into public grade school science classes does nothing to silence dissent. It does, however buffer children from indoctrination and protect the principles of scientific pursuit within the classroom from a crass effort to undermine them.

If ID proponents wish to have their ideas accepted as mainstream science and taught at the grade school level, they have a long way to go before they have a) developed an actual theory and b) had it vetted by the harsh gauntlet of scientific scrutiny. So far it's proponents' efforts have failed in dramatic and embarrassing fashion.

If you think trying to shoehorn a fledgling idea into children's classrooms by political means when it's been roundly panned in the grown-up science world is a "scientific approach to data", then you have forfeited your standing to judge what is objective.
 
Religion is free to be involved in science if it meets the standards of that discipline. You can't walk into a math class and claim the integral of a function is a unicorn steak. As delicious as that sounds, it's not math. In no way is the scientific community restricting unicorn consumption-- it has nothing to do with science. That's like claiming a violation of constitutional rights if I can't play professional basketball. "My religion says I am tall. Therefore, any field that excludes me on the basis of height is restricting free practice of my religion...regardless of the clear and demonstrable standards of that field."

Arguments from incredulity are not science.
 
randman said:
But physics classes in high school to at times discuss alternative theories on how gravity works. In physics, it's acceptable to challenge basic theories and even encouraged, including just about everything whether gravity, time, the nature of space, etc, etc,.....

When someone learns basic, classical physics, for example, they are told also that this is incomplete and doesn't work for quantum mechanics, etc, etc,....
Click to expand...

Which means that they're replacing a poor understanding of science with a better understanding of science. This is the entirety of how science works.

It never replaces an understanding of science with solipsism or mythology.
 
I think we all know it's common to see secular and atheist people in favor of having classes in public school that teach about the bible and religion, but this includes learning about the myriad other religions in humanities past as well. This notion of a godless secular liberal machine wanting religion to be silenced is just another fantasy in Randman's persecution complex.

It's also now clear why Randman has been so reluctant to reveal how radical his ideas are about religion and science after almost one thousand posts.
 
No government ruling ever said religion could not be taught in schools, to the best of my knowledge. But perhaps I just don't know enough about the law. What is not permitted is to force kids to recite religious texts or to impose a requirement for religious activities, such as prayer, sectarian displays etc.

Why can't the evangelicals get this straight? It is not a difficult concept.
 
Olowkow said:
No government ruling ever said religion could not be taught in schools, to the best of my knowledge. But perhaps I just don't know enough about the law. What is not permitted is to force kids to recite religious texts or to impose a requirement for religious activities, such as prayer, sectarian displays etc.

Why can't the evangelicals get this straight? It is not a difficult concept.
Click to expand...

Quite true. My high school to this day has a prayer club anyone is free to join and participate in if they choose.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom