One-third of Americans reject evolution, poll shows

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Judas_Thaddeus said:
Do you really want to say that, really? OF COURSE Evolution has been empirically tested!

mnsta.org/position_statements.html#3
talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA202.html
** ID poster boy Behe ignores and dismisses empirical evidence**

And how is it that the evolutionary formed brain would have no conscience?

ID is the one that uses propaganda, something of which scientists ought to do more,
get the word out there more about evolution, because really scientists are too busy
studying all these important matters. Creationists just play around with their false
science, avoid getting checked by the Scientific Community, and just inject their
information all over the place in books, websites, unwilling to be scrutinized by
the real scientists.
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I know propaganda when I see it. And the above certainly is “biased and misleading ‘information’ used to promote a point of view.”
 
HansTrappist said:
Nonsense. Michael Behe is not a “creationist” in the manner you are abusing the term.
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That he lies and claims he is not does not make him not one.
Over numerous postings here you and numerous others of like mind have done nothing but attack and misrepresent Mr. Behe in an undignified yet strangely familiar manner.
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we’ve only been using his own words and his own admissions against him. That you refuse to accept even his words that contradict your conclusions about him just goes to show you disinterested in facts you are.
 
Peter_Plato said:
Apparently science will not “always” test and test. If “science” (as in a large portion of scientists) makes a consensual determination that there is no need to test, then testing will not occur.
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No, testing always goes on, that’s how scientists reach a consensus. They
would never make the decision that something no longer needs to be tested,
because that is how they come to their decisions on what right and wrong.
Peter_Plato said:
The case being made by “scientists” and several on this thread, including you, is that there is no need to test FOR design purely because a predetermination has been made that it is not testable because it is not falsifiable.
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Intelligent Design IS by its nature a non-falsifiable position, that is a fact. Scientists also
know well that ID is a religious position, which scientists won’t even entertain. ID is not a
science, it is anti-science. When IDists have something real, real scientists will be inter-
ested in listening.
Peter_Plato said:
What is interesting is that you claim that a proposition such as “God designed the universe” is not falsifiable and yet you claim, by faith, that it is true. So you have to admit that just because a proposition is not falsifiable, that alone is insufficient to make it false. The claim could still be true.

Yet if it could be true then it also could be false, which makes it, theoretically, at least, falsifiable.
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All I’m saying is that science has no position on God and anything that does is
not a science. God is not testable in the scientific sense, God is not a science.
Intelligent Design works no matter how much the state of being of the natural u-
niverse changes, because it isn’t based on the natural world; it’s not a science.

The point you are making there is entirely irrelevant.
 
Farsight001 said:
Because they are trying to invade schools and push real science out for their personal pet religious ideas, which needs to be fought against for the good of this country and for man.
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I had to laugh when Stephen Meyer debated a scientist from the west coast and this point was all the fellow had in his arsenal, while Meyer made dozens and dozens of “scientific” points. I am sure scientists can do better than this.

Here are some debates where they actually do make good points, but, on the whole, no better than those of Meyer.

signatureinthecell.com/debates.php

Do yourself a favour, listen to some of the debates with an open mind and see if your point above stands up as anything but a bias on your part.
 
Farsight001 said:
That he lies and claims he is not does not make him not one.

we’ve only been using his own words and his own admissions against him. That you refuse to accept even his words that contradict your conclusions about him just goes to show you disinterested in facts you are.
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You know more about Behe’s beliefs than Behe, himself, does?

Well done, you! :rolleyes:

And I thought our internal mental states were inaccessible to science…

…silly me.
 
buffalo said:
Behe - “Well, all a scientist has to do to prove me wrong is to take a bacterium without a flagellum, or knock out the genes for the flagellum in a bacterium, go into his lab and grow that bug for a long time and see if it produces anything resembling a flagellum. If that happened, intelligent design, as I understand it, would be knocked out of the water. I certainly don’t expect it to happen, but it’s easily falsified by a series of such experiments.”
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Again, an idea has to have some apparent validity to begin with to be falsifiable. Irreducible Complexity has none.
 
buffalo said:
For once, just argue the argument not the site. By the same token I want to verify evolution in an ID site. Makes no sense. 😦
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No. By the same token, you should want to verify evolution by seeing if it is accepted by the scientific community. That’s what’s fair. You just think there’s some ridiculous conspiracy to push evolution and keep other ideas out, so you believe it isn’t.
I am convinced you will not use your own reasoning to assess any arguments. And you will not accept ID the science until it is posted on an evo site. Fat chance of that happening anytime soon. :nope:
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No. He will not accept Id as science until it proves itself to be a science. One of the first things it needs to do is start operating experiments to test design. A critically thinking person SHOULD reject the idea that has no evidential support for it.
 
Judas_Thaddeus said:
I mean the following statement is true,
Quote:
Originally Posted by Farsight001 Because they are trying to invade schools and push real science out for their personal pet religious ideas, which needs to be fought against for the good of this country and for man.
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No, and here’s why.

The argument is an ad hominem because even if “they” were “trying to invade schools and push science out,” their “pet religious idea” might still be true; so it doesn’t follow that their ideas need to be fought against merely because of an ill-conceived plot by some to impose them.

What if SOME theist evolutionists concocted a plot to push their (your?) ideas into the schools, would that mean their (and your, possibly true) ideas should be fought against?

No, the truth of ideas and how we should respond to them is a completely separate matter from what some individuals have done to endorse or promote them.

Fanatical pro-lifers have killed or bombed abortion clinics. Does that mean a pro-life position should be rejected and abortion supported because of what these individuals have done?

If that were the case, the easiest way to nullify and falsify every good idea is to do something nefarious in support of it to turn everyone (well, at least shallow thinkers) against it.

This is the strategy of the gay lobby, by the way. Show that gay individuals are persecuted by bad people so their “gay” status MUST ipso facto be the good and right one.

Bad logic breeds bad results.
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HansTrappist said:
Scientific consensus does not determine scientific truth.
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No. But it does determine where the evidence as it is currently leads.
The empirical data is what determines scientific truth; scientific truth is independent of the consensus of the scientific community.
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And since ID has performed no experimentation and therefore has no empirical data to support it, you should stop trying to convince people its science.
Scientific consensus once told the world that there was this thing called the “ether.” James Clerk Maxwell even precisely calculated the ether’s density and coefficient of rigidity. But guess what? The ether never existed. It was a fairy tale.
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And yet, now many of the creationists and ID advocates are trying to bring that idea back. Thank you for proving our point. The scientific evidence we had pointed to there being an ether at one point in time, which is why the idea was promoted by scientists. Upon further research, they realized that they could not find or detect this ether anywhere, and decided to re-evaluate and do more experiments. Through this effort, the scientific consensus shifted and we now know, based on more information, that the evidence points to there not being an ether. This is how scientists function - go where the evidence leads.

And the Creationists trying to promote the ether idea again? Clearly going where the idea supports their conclusion, not where the evidence leads. Thank you for providing a great illustration of the difference between evolution and ID.
Just as the best physicists of the 19th century preached the fairy tale called “ether,” so Darwinists today preach this fairy tale that says random, chance processes are responsible for the irreducible complexity found in biology.
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No one said that. Again, random mutation AND natural selection working together, not random changes by themselves.
 
vz71 said:
Do you believe all of these things (grants and a place in history) would be incentive to keep status quo?
After all, these grants writing themselves are likely unraveling for others.
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We’ve already been over this. The people with grant money and awards are far more likely to give them to the people who can upset the status quo.
 
buffalo said:
So we have to do due diligence and test everything science proclaims on every side. As citizens we need to put them to the test, otherwise we believe what mortal men pitch us, ie propaganda. Remember, an evolutionary formed brain would have no conscience.

Testing - as in empirical testing? Evolution is not empirical.
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Really? Then why is it we have empirically tested it thousands upon thousands of times?
 
Peter_Plato said:
Apparently science will not “always” test and test. If “science” (as in a large portion of scientists) makes a consensual determination that there is no need to test, then testing will not occur.
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Of course that happens. When you’ve tested something enough already, there becomes little need to continue testing. No one has performed “falling apple” experiments for centuries now. Why? Because there is simply no need. We already know gravity works.
The case being made by “scientists” and several on this thread, including you, is that there is no need to test FOR design purely because a predetermination has been made that it is not testable because it is not falsifiable.
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And it has been repeatedly explained exactly WHY it is not testable, something none of you have even tried to argue against thus far.
What is interesting is that you claim that a proposition such as “God designed the universe” is not falsifiable and yet you claim, by faith, that it is true. So you have to admit that just because a proposition is not falsifiable, that alone is insufficient to make it false. The claim could still be true.
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Something being true does not necessarily make it scientific, though.
Yet if it could be true then it also could be false, which makes it, theoretically, at least, falsifiable.
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Simply having the capacity to be false is not what makes something scientifically falsifiable.
If YOU claim “God designed the universe” is true, then, for you it is capable of being falsified otherwise, you could not claim it to be “true” in any valid sense.
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And he can’t claim it true in a scientific context. That’s a very important distinction.
 
Peter_Plato said:
More propaganda. :rolleyes:
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Is that all you can do? When someone points out a fact, you just call it propaganda? If its just propaganda, then why are people actually trying to do it, as has been shown here several times? Why are creationists actively trying to take control of school boards to change the curriculum, which a few rather famous court cases resulting from their efforts? This is not propaganda. This is reality.
 
Peter_Plato said:
I had to laugh when Stephen Meyer debated a scientist from the west coast and this point was all the fellow had in his arsenal, while Meyer made dozens and dozens of “scientific” points. I am sure scientists can do better than this.

Here are some debates where they actually do make good points, but, on the whole, no better than those of Meyer.

signatureinthecell.com/debates.php

Do yourself a favour, listen to some of the debates with an open mind and see if your point above stands up as anything but a bias on your part.
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I’ve done this already. But I’ll make you a deal. As soon as you start taking the real scientists seriously and start listening to their side (there are several video and article links posted here that we both know you didn’t bother looking at, and a few more you simply offhandedly dismissed), then I’ll check those things out again, though I’ll be listening to them from a neutral non-propaganda-prone source so I know they’re not deceptively edited. I love how right there on the first line of the first video explanation, they call Meyer a Dr., but decline to refer to the professor he debated as a Dr. At least Kieth’s doctorate is relevant to the subject they’re discussing. Meyer got his in History.
 
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