lpetrich

And they don't even try to describe intelligent design, state what they think intelligent design is.

In my research into the question of animal intelligent design, including such questions as whether beavers intelligently design their dams, I've concluded that doing intelligent design consists of constructing a mental model of what is to be designed, and then implementing that model.

Thus, if you wish to build a dam for a creek, you picture it in your mind and manipulate that mental picture until you have a satisfactory design for a dam, and then build that dam. You don't build it the way a beaver does, which is to be seized by some uncontrollable urge to place sticks and mud wherever you hear rushing water. This is worth mentioning, because William Dembski claims in "First Things", Nov. 2000, that beavers intelligently design their dams.

One hallmark of mental modeling is foresight; a designer will discover problems before doing the implementing.

And some evolution shows a remarkable lack of foresight. In our species, giving birth through the pelvic girdle is a good example; it's OK for laying lots of little eggs, but not for giving birth to some big baby.

There are also kludges that a designer capable of manipulating genetic material would likely prefer to avoid. Nutritional assistance from gut symbionts is a good example; at least as good as the bacteria that live inside of aphids' tissues. The genome of Buchnera has been sequenced some months back, and though it is closely related to enteric bacteria like Escherichia coli and Salmonella, its genome is reduced, with its biosynthesis capabilities being complementary to those of its aphid hosts. E. coli, by comparison, has essentially complete biosynthesis capabilities.

An entity capable of manipulating genes at will should find it an easy task to splice the appropriate biosynthesis-enzyme genes into the genomes of cows and horses and rabbits and termites and aphids and so forth, and have them expressed in suitable places.

The same thing applies to cell organelles that had originated by endosymbiosis, like mitochondria and plastids (chloroplasts, etc.). Other eukaryotic-cell organelles are produced directly from the cell material without having genomes inside; why not also mitochondria and plastids?

[ December 07, 2002: Message edited by: lpetrich ]

lpetrich

One curiosity that's been pointed out is that mainstream evolutionary biologists use much more teleological language than those would-be revivers of teleology, the ID theories, do.

MTyler8

One should consider I.D. as meaning "intellectual dishonesty". It is not in any way scientific, it is anti-science. Its a rehash of the old "god did it" explaination favored by primitive minds for thousands of years.How does it help the cause of science if, every time a researcher gets to a difficult point in a study, they throw up their hands and say "I don't understand this. God must have done it!"?

scigirl

Hey MTyler8,

Welcome to infidels! You can introduce yourself <a href="http://iidb.org/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=forum&f=43" target="_blank">here</a> if you so desire,

scigirl

thebeave

I.D. doesn't fit at all with what we know about how life got started and evolved here on Earth. However, it is not totally out of the question that I.D. could be an explanation for another civilization somewhere. For example, one day in the far, far distant future we could send a mission to Mars to populate it with reproducing, intelligent, not-necessarily-biological critters that we designed here from scratch to live in Mars' conditions. A future generation of these creatures might try to research their origins and, based on the evidence (or lack thereof) would conclude that they were the result of intelligent design, and not the result of abiogenesis and evolution. Just some food for thought to show that ID might have merit somewhere in the universe (just not here).

RufusAtticus

From my experience here are the crux of the ID camp's claims.
[list=1][*]It is possible to distinguish "intelligent" (read "not natural") design from "natural" design.[*]We have developed scientific methods of doing this.[*]We have applied these methods to biology and found that we are intelligently designed.[*]Thus evolution/darwinism/naturalism is false.[*]Therefore, God exists.[/list=1]

[ December 08, 2002: Message edited by: RufusAtticus ]

Shadowy Man

JusticeMachine:

I think of a theory in terms of the first definition.

And it seems, since no one can actually state what the theory of Intelligent Design Theory is, that there isn't a theory at all.

It's an Intelligent Design Hypothesis.

Skydancer

Hah. More like an Intelligent Design WAG.

DNAunion

DNAunion: I've been arguing along those lines for years, what I have referred to as either "Quasi" Directed Panspermia or ETID.

But I disagree with part of your first sentence:

DNAunion: How do we know for sure that the basic scenario you just laid out above didn't work the other way around, with some ETIs creating life in the form of bacteria and sending them here some 4 billion years ago? Can that possibility actually be completely ruled out? If so, how?

Straight Hate

Just a quick question if anyone will humour me: Do intelligent design proponents claim it explains life here on this particular planet, or something a bit more removed/fundamental like why atoms exist in the manner they do, and why the particles that make up those atoms exist in the manner they do?

From my perspective, the deist's position, while offering nothing tangible in the way of scientific advancement, is not as worthless as many of you believe. No? I'm searching for some clarity on this issue.