On Creationism, ID, DI, etc

How about Karl Marx?

Not so much. He’s not even as funny as Zeppo. Where is this coming from?

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You don’t know that he contributed that particular definition, and in fact, his Dover testimony makes it pretty much certain that he didn’t, and that he didn’t think it was a good definition. (See Day 12 pm session, pp. 36-37.) His definition has always been connected with “purposeful arrangement of parts”, not “instantaneous creation.”

You had mentioned this before. It makes sense as you are fighting against ID almost irrationally. Marxism requires allegiance to the state so something like ID must be eliminated from education. I live near the NCSE, have attended one of their meetings and know there are about political indoctrination.

When I discovered an issue with evolutionary theory I was not an ID supporter as I thought it was simply a limited explanation that would impede science. I started to see merit to the argument after talking with Mike Behe and one of my Atheist friends making the point that it is an interesting competing hypothesis.

My interest in the merits of special creation is based on difficulty of the prokaryotic to eukaryotic transition and the Venn diagrams like the Howe others that are popping up now.

A good question, to which I don’t immediately know the answer.

However, a quick search found the answer in the Kitzmiller transcripts. The 1993 version to which Behe contributed did contain that definition.

Q. “Intelligent design means that various forms of life began abruptly through an intelligent agency with their distinctive features already intact. Fish with fins and scales, birds with feathers, beaks, and wings, etc.” And then if you could pull up P-1l, and go to page 99? Same definition as used there for intelligent design?

A. Yes, and this is the 1993 definition of Pandas.

I think you may have me confused with someone else.

And that’s paranoid nonsense.

Don’t be disingenuous. You are so far unwilling to admit that any two species are related to each other. The prokaryote to eukaryote transition has nothing to do with that, whatever you may be telling yourself.

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Who is testifying there? Was Behe asked about that? Because it’s an explicitly creationist definition. Doesn’t even both with a cheap suit.

This, even by Bill Cole’s standards, is a ludicrous non sequitor.

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First, I note that your reply included about twenty times as many words as would have been necessary for you to simply give your definition of “fundamentalism.”

Second, you have reproduced your original claim, so let’s look at it:

Now, what is “hard-core fundamentalism”, and how is different from garden-variety “fundamentalism”? And how is “fundamentalism” different from just plain “Christian doctrine”? You don’t say.

No, it’s not obvious, first because the only exhibit you introduced was a book not even published by Discovery, and second because I provided several counter-examples, of work published by Discovery since 2017, which are anything but “hard-core fundamentalism” by any definition of that phrase that I can imagine. You refused to respond to the examples. I thought lawyers believed in dealing with evidence. But I guess not all of them do.

In my view, Puck, you’re too concerned about winning arguments, and not concerned enough about writing with crystal clarity so that your meaning comes across to those who can’t read your mind.

If you don’t intend to explain the meaning of the terms you used, that’s fine – just stop replying, and I’ll get the message. But these continued long lawyer-like justifications of why you won’t define your terms are a waste of my time.

Not even the premise is correct. Under Marxism, the state is supposed to wither away, and all power is supposed to come from the bottom. That’s the most ridiculous thing I ever heard, and whatever it is, I’m against it.

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A quick search, indeed, since you failed to notice (see my reference above) that Behe said he did not think that was the best definition of intelligent design.

I don’t have the 1989 edition, but I believe John Harshman is correct. And the 1989 edition was produced without Behe’s involvement, so he was not responsible for the definition. Further, as I already indicated above, Behe expresses, at the very least, a mild disapproval of the definition.

Good point from John Harshman again.

I know he did not contribute that definition. Nor did anything I write suggest otherwise, so you’re either not reading carefully or deliberately distorting.

I’m not surprised you omitted both the actual testimony and a link to it, since when Behe was asked whether that definition was inaccurate, he did not say it was inaccurate.

Q. Matt, could you pull up pages 99 to 100 and highlight our favorite passage? That was the passage we spent some time on yesterday, " 5intelligent design means that various forms of life began abruptly through an intelligent agency, with their distinctive features already intact, fish with fins and scales, birds with feathers, beaks, and wings, etc." You said a few things about this passage. One is you don’t like it so much.

A. I certainly would have written it differently.

Q. You don’t think it’s an accurate representation of intelligent design?

A. I think intelligent design is described better elsewhere in the book.

But that was in 2005, after the definition came under critique, not 1993.

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He was. He said he would have “written it differently”, and that it was “described better elsewhere in the book”. When given an opportunity to say it was inaccurate, he did not do so.

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I see him as trying desperately to maintain the big tent and not offend any of his buddies. That’s not the same as agreeing with the definition. It seems more to be evidence that he disagrees but doesn’t want to say.

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This has nothing to do with creationism. It has to do with a lack of a solid test eliminating separate starting points as an alternative explanation.

Could well be. I don’t think he agrees with that definition. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t an accurate definition of intelligent design, just that it’s not what Behe himself believes.

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I know you didn’t say he contributed that definition, but you indicated that he contributed to the book, and you drew from that fact (“so presumably” is your connective, not mine) that he “had no objection to that definition.” I was not accusing you of saying the definition was his, but I was challenging the conclusion that “he had no objection to that definition.” The first step in my challenge was to say that we don’t know that Behe endorsed that definition in 1993 because we don’t know that he wrote that passage. The second step in my challenge was to point out what he said in the Dover trial.

I did not omit the actual testimony for any sneaky purpose (if I were trying to be sneaky, I wouldn’t have given the precise document and page numbers that people could check), and I didn’t give a link because I didn’t get it from the internet, but from a pdf on my computer.

And yes, I know that he did not say the Pandas definition was inaccurate, but the words you reproduce indicate at least a mild criticism of it. “I certainly would have written it differently,” is a mild and polite rebuff, but it’s still a rebuff. And we know from Behe’s other writings that he does not define design in that way. Finally, John Harshman’s observation is quite astute: Behe always, even back in 1993, accepted common descent, so it’s hard to imagine he could ever have agreed (without some serious qualification) with the definition you cite. So your point about the difference in dates is not relevant.

Whatever other people may have meant by “intelligent design” in 1993, the quoted words aren’t representative of the way Behe was thinking about it.

“Separate starting points” is just your obfuscatory buzzphrase for separate creation. Why so coy?

LOL. The irony of this particular sentiment is that a great affinity to the fundamental tenet of ID - namely, an external agency bending living things to its own ends - lies in Lysenkoism (the notion that a particular external agency, namely the state, could compel life to evolve, as it were, to meet the needs of the state).

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