Renewable Revolution

A frustrating basic pitfall:
The philosophers' final downfall.
They try and they try
But they can't reason why
The real world should make sense at all.

The latest ploy of "evolution deniers" is the notion of "Intelligent Design", being promoted as a "scientific theory" worthy of (a) replacing the theory of evolution, and (b) sitting alongside Newton's mechanics as one of the great ideas of science.

It has a few problems.

The Intelligent Design (ID) argument doesn't qualify as a proper scientific theory.
The ID argument has the trappings of a logical argument, but it is full of logical gaps and holes. It is "pseudo-logic".   

There is a lot more to read on this web page if one so desires...... 


https://www.lhup.edu/~dsimanek/philosop/empty.htm

Knarf,
Wrong thread. This thread is about the EXISTENCE, OR NOT, of God, not about evolution. Many evolutionists DO believe that God created this universe and uses evolution as his pet mechanism. Consequently, you are out of line bringing the "evolution denier" pejorative term into this discussion, pal.

But you never tire of trying to trash Intelligent Design, do you? How DESIGNING of you. 

If Knarf was a paramecium shaped, Chlorophyll based alien life form visiting this planet, this is the "logic" he would apply to Mt. Rushmore:   
 

Here Knark, just for YOU!   

Demarcation argument (Intelligent Design is not Science) take down  :emthup:

SNIPPET:

The use by evolutionary biologists of so-called demarcation arguments—that is, arguments that purport to distinguish science from pseudoscience, metaphysics or religion—is both ironic and problematic from the point of view of philosophy of science. It is ironic because many of the demarcation criteria that have been used against non-naturalistic theories of origin can be deployed with equal warrant against strictly naturalistic evolutionary theories. Indeed, a corpus of literature now exists devoted to assessing whether neo-Darwinism, with its distinctively probabilistic and historical dimensions, is scientific when measured against various conceptions of science.9 Some have wondered whether the use of narrative explanation in evolutionary biology constitutes a departure from a strict reliance upon natural law. Others have asked whether neo-Darwinism is falsifiable, or whether it makes true or risky predictions. In 1974, Sir Karl Popper declared neo-Darwinian evolutionary theory "untestable" and classified it as a "metaphysical research programme." While he later revised his judgment, he did so only after liberalizing his notion of falsifiability to allow the weaker notion of "falsifiability in principle" to count as a token of scientific status.

The use of demarcation arguments to settle the origins controversy is also problematic because the whole enterprise of demarcation has now fallen into disrepute. Attempts to locate methodological "invariants" that provide a set of necessary and sufficient conditions for distinguishing true science from pseudoscience have failed.10 Most philosophers of science now recognize that neither verifiability, nor testability (nor falsifiability), nor the use of lawlike explanation (nor any other criterion) can suffice to define scientific practice. As Laudan puts it, "If we could stand up on the side of reason, we ought to drop terms like ‘pseudo-science’…they do only emotive work for us."11

 Nevertheless, philosophical arguments about what does or does not constitute science continue to play a vital role in persuading biologists that alternative scientific explanations do not and (in the case of nonnaturalistic or nonmaterialistic explanations)  can not exist for the origin of biological form and structure. Indeed, demarcation criteria continue to be cited by modern biologists as reasons for disregarding the possibility of intelligent design as a theory of biological origins.12


If you aren't too bored by this topic, read the full enchilada at the link below. 

The Scientific Status of Intelligent Design:
The Methodological Equivalence of Naturalistic and Non-Naturalistic Origins Theories1
Stephen C. Meyer
Science and Evidence for Design in the Universe (Ignatius Press)
December 1, 2002

http://www.discovery.org/a/1780