Why Creationism is Nonsense

[Kulindahr]

See, if you called it Intelligent Imagination or something, that would be great. But there is no way to get beyond a certain point except by means compatible with science. If science can't get you beyond a certain point, nothing can.

I guess you've never tried drugs.

The point of the name is that things look designed, and design implies intelligence -- thus, intelligent design.

Though a lot of creation is darned imaginative... so, "Imaginative Design"?

 

[Kulindahr]

I'm not talking about size. I'm talking about abundance. Unlike your analogy of a zoo, we don't need the vast expansive universe to live. If the universe and its constants were fine-tuned for life, what's the point of all the superfluous matter? Your zoo would have to contain billions of other empty exhibits completely incapable of housing any life.

Well, if you're talking a playground God, which is what the Creationists have, no, there wouldn't be all the other stuff.

But the point is still the constants, which appear to be very well tuned for giving a universe that will have life. That they also churn out vast t-volumes which don't harbor life is irrelevant -- all that is just by-product.

 

[WillMc88]

Well, if you're talking a playground God, which is what the Creationists have, no, there wouldn't be all the other stuff.

But the point is still the constants, which appear to be very well tuned for giving a universe that will have life. That they also churn out vast t-volumes which don't harbor life is irrelevant -- all that is just by-product.

Of course! Those are the by-products, not life!

 

[JustMe891]

a girl once stood up with intention and gravity in my philosophy of religion class and stated that dinosaurs never existed and that their "bones were placed on the earth to challenge the faith of his people and fool non-believers". at first i thought she was making a very sarcastic point, but i stifled my laughter after she shot me the look of death. i still find it hilarious and ridiculous that she even said that. can't remember the girl's name. i can see her face clear as day, though.

i personally believe that both are true on some level. do these have to be mutually exclusive ideas? i think darwin was a christian.

Darwin WAS a christian before he seen sense.

 

[JustMe891]

As a Catholic, The Church doesn't require us to believe that the Universe was created in a literal 7 days as the Fundamentalists do.

No, in this day and age no sensiable person would believe it, but then then again go to to any religious web site in the good old USA and they will tell you different.

God or GD loves you.

 

[hotatlboi]

I think you're missing an important element: to the ID proponent, science is still science

This is where you have missed an important element. To the ID proponent, "science" is not what it is to most other scientists, since most ID proponents will assert that ID is science.

ID is merely intuition, (something looks designed, so it probably is). There is no way to test it, or predict things about it, or even to gather quantitative evidence for or against it. So, ID is not science, it is more philosophy or theology. Yet many ID proponents will assert that it is science. The problem is their definition of science will have had to mutate from the accepted one to include such positions.

 

[Kulindahr]

This is where you have missed an important element. To the ID proponent, "science" is not what it is to most other scientists, since most ID proponents will assert that ID is science.

False, and false.

You're not talking about actual ID proponents, but about the moron "creationists" who hijacked things. Creationists start with a holy book and work backwards and then try to force science to support what they already believe; the ID proponent looks at science, as science, and concludes that there is/was a Designer/Creator.

ID is merely intuition, (something looks designed, so it probably is). There is no way to test it, or predict things about it, or even to gather quantitative evidence for or against it. So, ID is not science, it is more philosophy or theology. Yet many ID proponents will assert that it is science. The problem is their definition of science will have had to mutate from the accepted one to include such positions.

Again, you're confusing ID proponents with creationists who hijacked the ID label. Until the creationists took over, any ID proponent you asked would have conceded quite readily that ID wasn't science, that science could lead you to it, but it couldn't take you to further science. In fact some elegant proofs were shown that you can't possibly go from P(C) -- the proposition that there is a Creator -- to any sort of science, by the nature of things; roughly, it boils down to one of a few options:
a. C (the Creator) started things and now doesn't interfere; thus there will be no activity of C to measure in any fashion
b. C still runs things and keeps them in existence, in which case there would be no way to distinguish activity of C from other activity, because it's all the same thing
c. either (a) or (b) is true, but C pokes a finger in from time to time, in which case there will be no way to measure any activity of C, because such activity will not be predictable, so you can't set up ahead of time to measure it.

Option (c) fails only if there is a way to monitor everything, all the time, in all possible ways....


I recall a discussion of this once with fellow ID peoploe, and one guy interposed, "But the Bible says...." We all looked at him, looked at each other, shook our heads, and went back to talking, ignoring him. When he tried to butt in again, one guy told him quietly but firmly, "This is science, and the Bible is not hard data".

 

[hotatlboi]

ok well if you were not referring to all ID proponents, that's fine. You just said, "to the ID proponent" so it seemed like you were referring to all. But I suppose it has become kind of hard to tell who is really an "ID as science" and an "ID as philosophy/theology" person since they are using the same label now.

 

[Kulindahr]

ok well if you were not referring to all ID proponents, that's fine. You just said, "to the ID proponent" so it seemed like you were referring to all. But I suppose it has become kind of hard to tell who is really an "ID as science" and an "ID as philosophy/theology" person since they are using the same label now.

That distinction was in the context.

As for creationists who depend on Genesis, I still say the biggest reason it's nonsense is because Genesis doesn't support it. A good scientist will assess the data on the basis of what it is: as an example -- in geology, we did a lot of qualitative observations in our field journals, and one gal in the volcanology course occasionally put some of her observations into poetry. It was a great way to get across how she reacted to the particular formation or deposit, but it wasn't a suitable medium for doing any science from.
And for any scientific dependability, Genesis 1 & 2 don't even have the value of her poetry; they were never meant to, which can be told from the sort of literature they are.

So these poor twisted minds first take a perverted position from the holy book, and from it further pervert science. Back when it was called "Creation science", an ID friend and I -- both of us solid believers -- frequently chorused together on hearing the term, "... which has little to do with Creation, and less to do with science".

Since then, if anything, the creationists have gotten even worse.