Hunt's 2007 Critique of Axe

To support you further, academia not only says it is in principle possible to detect design (even supernatural design), but publishes and encourages literature which articulates this.

That last quotation though. :smiley:

Where is John Mercer when he is most needed? Now would be an appropriate time for his standard pedantic objection: “‘Academia’ doesn’t say anything. Only people can say things. One can speak about what individual academics say, but “academia” is not a person with a voice that can say anything.”

@Mercer

It’s nice to know that Tim Horton is not given to reckless overstatement.

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Genetic drift. Add that, and every single feature of every single organism that has ever existed on earth can be accounted for. Literally. No gods needed.

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Feel free to provide your positive evidence for the involvement of purpose, foresight, and intelligence in the history of biological life on Earth over the last 3.5 billion years. Or keep being the empty vessel making all the noise. I know where the smart money is.

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You can find such evidence in many places, including:

Michael Denton, Nature’s Destiny, pp. 1-418;

Marcos Eberlin, Foresight, pp. 1-147.

You could almost pick a chapter at random from either of these works, and find a treasure-trove of strong indications of foresight and intelligent design.

Anyone with a truly open mind on the question would be spontaneously interested in reading books that presented the pro-design side. But then, anyone with a truly open mind wouldn’t write things like:

People with open minds don’t write in hyperbolic style.

I don’t see any evidence. Please describe it here and provide references to the primary scientific literature. Citing ID-Creationist popular press books with unsubstantiated wild claims is the act of an intellectual coward.

People with honest character don’t quote-mine and lie about what other people actually wrote.

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Those books themselves provide references to the primary scientific literature that you are asking for. As do the four books of Denton recently published by Discovery. Copious references. But I don’t think you are interested in references unless they ones that tend to favor your own conclusions.

And by the way, the Denton book I cited is pro-evolution, and not creationist at all. You’d know that if you actually read any of it.

Then we have to wonder why you are not capable of doing this.

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I invested hundreds of hours in reading and digesting these books. I’m not going to spend hundreds more hours summarizing and explaining them to others who are too indolent, and too lacking in scientific curiosity, to investigate alternative theories for themselves. Anyone who has the large amount of free time that you and Tim Horton and others here evidently have to spend bickering on the internet about origins has time to read intelligent, well-argued books about origins. If you choose to spend your time arguing rather than reading, that’s your choice. But I’m not subsidizing your choice with my time.

And just as easy for you to read the original yourself. The difference is that in the first case, I do all the grunt work, and in the second case, you do. Guess which way it’s going to be?

I have spent time summarizing and explaining the evidence for evolution. It is interesting that people aren’t willing to do the same for ID.

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As have I and countless other pro-science posters on various C/E discussion boards. “Go buy the DI’s popular press propaganda books!” is the bog standard excuse used when the ID-Creationists like Eddie have nothing. We know it, they know it.

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Sorry, but genetic drift as an explanation of the history of life ultimately also rely on random mutations and selection

Fair enough.

Now maybe you can stop calling on us to subsidize your choice with our time.

We weren’t talking about summarizing evolution and ID; we were talking about books by particular authors. I have many times here summarized various positions and ideas for people. I have talked at great length about front-loaded vs. interventionist ID, for example, setting forth various ideas of Behe, Denton, Meyer, etc. But I am not going to go through particular books, presenting 1% of the evidence in the book, and watch people who have already made up their minds in advance (that there is and can be no design in nature) ridicule the evidence and then declare that they have won. Unless those people are willing to read the other 99% of the evidence, I’m not interested in talking to them about those books.

In history, in philosophy, in English, in sociology, in political science, in anthropology, it’s just standard that professors read lots of books, and they never complain about doing so. Only on sites like these do I find that professors don’t want to read books, but want five-minute summaries, so that they can make snap judgments without proper study and reflection. I don’t want to encourage that kind of intellectual shallowness.

@Timothy_Horton

Denton’s Nature’s Destiny was not published by Discovery, so you wouldn’t get the Cooties if you read it. So you don’t have that excuse. The real reason you won’t read it is is likely fear; you are, I suspect, afraid that there might be evidence for design in it that you can’t refute. So you keep yourself far away from it.

When have I ever asked anyone here to summarize a book for me?

Wrong. You claimed to have positive evidence for the Design of biological life. When asked to summarize that evidence and provide scientific references you deflected with “go read these ID books!” Sorry but no one is under any obligation in a scientific discussion to read unvetted popular press Creationist books full of ridiculous unsubstantiated claims. Real science isn’t done in the popular press, it’s presented in the peer-reviewed professional scientific literature. That’s why ID-Creationism pushers avoid the scientific literature like the plague and why you can’t provide a single piece of positive evidence.

I certainly have no aversion to reading but I do have a large aversion to wasting time on garbage pseudo-science. Before I retired I’d read 1 or 2 technical papers a week touching on many different aspects of evolutionary theory. In 40 years I never saw a single one with anything even remotely close to positive evidence for ID. You are making sure that record remains intact.

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Scientific discussion? That’s laughable. You certainly have never carried on any scientific discussion here. All you have ever done is invoke scientific authority. And I never said you had any “obligation” to read anything. You asked me for evidence for design. I pointed you to places where you could find it. If you aren’t willing to read those things, then you clearly weren’t the slightest bit sincere in asking for the evidence.

Before you retired from what?

LOL! Figures an ID-Creationist would whine because the primary scientific literature is used as the discussion reference source. Sorry if all you’re capable of understanding are anti-science propaganda garbage popular press publications. That’s why you know so little on the topic and why you make so many lame excuses when asked to summarize the ID-Creationist evidence here.

I asked you to summarize the key evidence in your own words and provide scientific references. You couldn’t do it so started with the usual lame excuses.

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Literature which you accept on authority, but likely don’t understand, since you never articulate it on your own, but merely say, “X says so.” Whereas others here – aquaticus, Glipsnort, Swamidass, etc. – actually explain the science in their own words. You never do. I suspect it’s because you can’t. I’ve asked you many times what your scientific training is, and you’ve steadily refused to answer. That, combined with the fact that you’ve never produced a single argument here that isn’t an argument from authority, tells me pretty clearly how much scientific training you actually have.