Kurt Wise: Dawkins' Honest Creationist

My goal is not to convince about a young earth. Rather, my goal is to encourage the acceptability of ID being a sratistically possible and reasonable option. Without this, i see no opprtunity to not conclude that universal common decent is fact (w a bend towards naturalism) which will sadly sow bitterness towards the idea of God.

When one allows ID, then when they see the argument in wise on the fossil record, they wont just shoot it down as ridiculous. Then perhaps the Bible which provides some very goodnews becomes a potential source of Truth.

You do realize that @swamidass , the owner of the site, as well as @cwhenderson , @dga471 , myself and others are all Christians and we accept evolution as a ‘fact’ right?

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It’s not semantics Greg. It was a flat out falsehood by a professional paleontologist who knows better.

How many other “semantic” falsehoods are in the presentation? Generally speaking when a witness is caught perjuring himself all of his testimony is considered invalid.

ID is allowed. There’s just zero positive evidence for it. Your YEC Noah’s Flood was disproven by geologists over 2 centuries ago. It warrants no place is a serious scientific discussion.

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I believe evolution is fact as well…micro evolution of kinds. I NEVER claimed to own the ability of judging people’s hearts. The apostle Paul says he does not even judge himself. I believe that there could be many Christians who believe in evolution. On the other hand, what i know of theology and thinking of the most revered godly christian men on the planet right now, we all believe that the philosophy of darwinian naturalistic universal common decent evolution is one of the most church damning accepted philosophies on the planet right now. Biologos was formed w an attempt to paste some christian semantics upon the philosophy thinking it might encourage seekers towards God. I believe it does the opposite long term…it will take a,person with interest in exploring claims of God and re ignite the same naturalistic philosophies that necessarily place God in the back of the bus, unseen and heaven forbid, forgotten

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And the Texas sharpshooter manages to hit his own foot.

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By comparison with the rest. But he does manage to quote-mine and distort his materials nonetheless. Todd Woods is more honest, but even he defends some pretty selective uses of data and sources.

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You’re saying that you’re one of the most revered godly christian men on the planet?

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I watched until just after that part. I found Wise very unpersuasive at that point. He was making assumptions that seemed unwarranted.

For example, a small population group might exist in a narrow niche, but leave very little fossil evidence. After further evolution, the successor population might then expand to where it leave a large amount of fossil evidence. Wise seemed to be assuming that the population size and likelihood of leaving fossil evidence would remain constant.

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When one is forced to adhere to a particular conclusion for scientific evidence, it becomes imperative to look only at the science that supports that conclusion.

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Exactly what Behe is doing with his latest ID propaganda book. ID-Creationism and intellectual honesty aren’t on speaking terms.

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Dawkins is referring to these types of statements made by Kurt Wise:

And:

Found here.

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Sorry. That came across wrongly and sounded self righteous. I did not mean to make me sound to be one of those. Rather, the ones who i recognize as having upstanding morals, handling of financial resources w integrity, and a God of Scripture focus first then others second are worthy of our listening ear.

Not sure if u can appreciate the ideal of the Christian life as not centered on self anyway. Check out 1 cor chs 1 and 2 if interested to learn the utter humility demanded in the life of any Christian.

But yeah, my semantic sounded a bit self righteous and thanks for pointing out.

Im curious how you disassociate “intellectual honesty” and ID creationism. Your belief is that when it comes not to medical research, but rather the history of our existence, you believe that to turn a blind eye to anything and everything that appears to be associated w a Designer is more intelligent? That makes no sense. I as a creationist and proponent of ID am interested to use my average intelligence to learn if various pieces of evidence seem to be of a sort pointing to manufacture by the natural or if this seems statistically irrational, be of the sort as created directly by God. In my average intelligence, i have concluded that the idea of mass energy forming from Something outside the natural is far more intelligent than to take a position of just shrugging my shoulders, looking the other way and fidgeting with insecurity and silence.

Science was developed by people of faith for the observation and study of God’s creation. Darwin led the way of removing God from the picture for the subjectives in naturalism to take His place. And he was even more honest than many today who seem hellbent to deny the thought that intelligence and creation science can be great partners.

Easy. Every ID-Creationist I’ve ever met has ignored the huge amount of positive evidence against their claims and instead merely regurgitated the same tired cherry-picked data and/or PRATTS. In my book that makes them not intellectually honest. An awful lot of people in the scientific community agree with that view too.

to say this creationist is honest is to say the others are not. A accusation . if we said this about them WELL…hmpt.
Its just stupid. They can’t intellectually handle us so they say we are dishonest etc etc.
On behalf of YEC everywhere I pLEAD NOT GUILTY. retract the comment or legal defamation proceedings will commence.(not really just kidding)
This WISE guy does think nature will prove YEC. He just means that the bible trumps human incompetence in looking at nature. its a careless way of speaking. don’t read into it.
Remember also folks geology is not biology. Its a subject of depositional events and is not to be trusted for fossils deposited within it.
Stephen Gould invented PE because the geology/fossils proved evolution did not happen if one read the fossils. It was a last ditch PLAN B.

I have thought deeply thru the series of discourse with many here. I dont think it is fair for both sides of the issue to tag this disagreement to a matter of intelligence. My last statement on this may not have been completely right on the issue of whose intelligent and whos not. Rather, i am growing to believe that these disagreements are more based upon a difference in our volition.

I am a Christian who has acknowleged that i tend to be quite self-serving and have chosen faith in God who forgives me from this through Jesus dying on the cross which is BY GRACE, without which my me-centered disposition called sin would just be amplified. When i chose to place my faith in such a God, which, judging by the laws entropy, must be quite a great and powerful God to be the Cause of this universe,it was as if i was illuminated to the beauty of His design and His creation where the greys of chance mutation were changed into colors of design. So when i, in my average intelligence recognize that science as determined that the cosmos had a beginning, and certain arthropods lowest in the fossil record have 5 tmes more species variation than exist to today, and the "irreducible"complexity of bio engines that if missing one part are completely disfunctional, i rejoice in my Creator. And i WANT or CHOOSE to look for design everywhere.

On the other hand, if a person like Darwin might have a negative emotion towards anything to do with this God, he might choose to interpret evidence through lenses that WANT or CHOOSE to interpret these absent of design.

Both of these options are not to say that one group is less intelligent than the other. I actually think that it is safe to say that the bottom group may take the top group to the cleaners over the issue of whose more intelligent. In life’s economy according to God in His Word, He suggests that a child like faith in Him as a good, powerful and sovereign God is most of value. This means that someone with a lot of intelligence may place so much hope in it, that finite lenses through which they see through might miss the eternal God (or the greatness in His Being) who has always existed, who transcends time, and who created the universe in a way that our science is only partly capable of understanding…the degree of which could be less than 10%!

I have noticed that Theistic evolutionists will say about guys like me, young earth creationists, that they wholeheartedly disagree with the science in this camp as quite unintelligent, but still want to give a little pat on our backs of respect that this is what we believe. They may even think that the unintelligence of certain worldviews make God into a deceiver if they are true. Problem is that in the card game that is being played here has a trump card or a full house, and that is God and His Word. I may not be interpreting early Genesis in an accurate way according what God intended, but on the other hand, what God intended and actually did could also be 100% the way i and others interpret it and this same God would have no obligation to produce exacting perceived evidence fitting to our feable, finite eyes as His creation.

5 posts were split to a new topic: Reforming Young Earth Creationism

I didn’t say ID-Creationists are not intelligent. I said they’re not intellectually honest. Intellectual honesty requires acknowledging positive evidence which refutes your claims and which you can’t explain even if it blows a hole in your stated position. It means not cherry-picking a tiny bit of evidence you can shoe-horn in while ignoring the rest which doesn’t fit.

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Your stated position is that humans evolved from the same ancestor as did the apes. If one is intellectually honest, why couldnt the pre ape have evolved from the human? Or the human to the ape to the so called “pre ape” Or why not consider that the human was created and has evolved on a micro level since, and the ape family lineage was created and has evolved on a micro level since? Why do naturalistic pathways for our existence have to be the only allowable scientific conclusion? And why do we even give science the claim of being the only capable means of determining the truth of existence? What if God created us in such a way that left an evidence trail that spins our scientific capabilities in circles to no where?

As a proponent of ID myself, i am equally glad to discover (to the best of our understanding) the mysteries of the natural as much as i am the discovery of the things that seem impossible for nature to pull off. That seems quite a bit more intellectually honest than full throttle materialistic naturalism at all cost.

Ultimately still, our attempt at intelligent honesty will always be governed by our volition. I believe the Bible holds the key to all truth. In it, in Romans 1 it states that all mankind are of sound mind and know our Creator exists because His creation is quite obvious. So all mankind are without an excuse. The goodnews is that God is not an oppressive God, but one who loves us and cares for us…and that means everyone. I used to think that my way of doing things was better therefore was resentful towards the idea of God who has a set of standards that He claims are best. Now that i have chosen God, i wonder to myself “what was I thinking to not have turned to Him sooner!”