The Most Important Things From Eddie

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Thanks Joshua.

I’ll compromise with you. I’ll make each point 200 words or less. :smile:

First Question: Things I think the Peaceful Science community should know about ID, and should know about my position in order to interpret my posts properly:

  1. While the majority of ID people are anti-evolution (in the fullest sense, from bacterium to man), many of them affirm, or are open to, evolution in that extended sense. And that includes some of the most prolific authors, Behe and Denton, the latter heavily promoted by Discovery. So the charge that ID per se is anti-evolutionary is false.

  2. ID per se is a theory of design detection, and in itself has nothing to do with what should be taught in public school science. Some ID proponents are heavily involved in public school science debates, and Discovery as an organization has been involved in such disputes, but ID as such is a theoretical position on the causes of biological (and cosmic) order, not a political movement (even if the DI sometimes acts politically). All one has to do is read the works of Denton to see that ID arguments can be completely separated from American debates about high school science classes. There is no political or cultural stuff in any of his books.

  3. Discovery repeatedly advised Dover not to to ahead with its science policy. Discovery may be guilty of other things, but not the Dover policy. Discovery’s policy about ID in the schools is that it should not be mandated until such time as ID is more accepted in mainstream science and more high school teachers know enough about ID to teach it properly. If some fundamentalists are calling for ID to be taught as an alternative to evolution in the science curriculum, they aren’t speaking for ID, or even for Discovery – or for me!

  4. I personally am not opposed to evolution, not even from bacterium to man; nor do I think that evolutionary means are incompatible with God’s ends, or against the teaching of the Bible. I don’t read Genesis 1-3 as a news report from 4004 B.C. I think there is some figurative language in the Garden story, and I think that Genesis 1 is cosmological (in the original sense) rather than cosmogonic (in the sense of rivalling the Big Bang or some other theory) – about the structure and order of the world, not about the physical steps by which it emerged. So imputations of fundamentalist, anti-evolutionary motives to me are completely out of place.

  5. I don’t personally care whether or not anyone here accepts ID, and I intend to make no detailed arguments about irreducible complexity, information theory, etc. All those arguments are better made by others. I do care that ID is fairly represented, and not mischaracterized. So generally, if someone says, “I don’t think design is necessary to produce a flagellum,” I won’t enter the debate, certainly not in any detail, but if someone mischaracterizes what Behe says about the flagellum, I will. I will ask “show me where he says this” questions.

Second Question: What Will Help Peaceful Science Succeed?

That depends on Peaceful Science’s goals. I would like to see them more clearly defined. It is not that the statements offered so far are unclear, but that more is desired.

  1. If Peaceful Science’s goal is to bring atheists, creationists, IDers, TEs, etc. together into one big happy family regarding origins questions, there is a problem. The atheists (at least those who are doctrinaire atheists) will join hands with you in demanding “good science,” but they won’t really be interested in harmonizing science with Christian faith, or any theistic faith. So while I have nothing against atheists personally (some of my best friends are atheists), and have nothing against atheists contributing facts and arguments here, and pointing out scientific errors made by some Christians, I have not figured out what purpose they are to serve in the overall architecture of Peaceful Science. I need more understanding on this point.

  2. If Peaceful Science’s goal is to come up with a better synthesis of Christianity and good science than others have so far come up with, then I think it has a chance of success, because all Christians share certain things in common. Consensus will still be tough to achieve, but there is a common basis for dialogue – belief in God, and belief that the Bible is (in some sense) true. That doesn’t mean atheists can’t play a key role in PS discussions. In Lewis’s Space Trilogy, the unbeliever (agnostic?) MacPhee is a valued part of the good guys’ side, but the overall goal of the group is Christian. I’m not saying that anyone here should have to accept that Christianity is true, but only that if the purpose of PS is to achieve a Christian synthesis, then non-Christians and anti-Christians who participate will have to accept that, and not constantly buck against it.

  3. A practical point follows. When YEC and OEC folks read PS exchanges, how will they interpret the strong presence of atheist scientists who vigorously reject design in nature? Will they be turned off? Will this deter some of them from wanting to engage with PS? I don’t know the answer to this; I’m just pointing it out as a possible concern.

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