Will evolutionary scientists be left behind if they continue to dismiss the findings of ID?

Question

The sad fact for evolutionists is that ID researchers don't have to answer to them. The ID researchers will keep doing their research, and the evolutionary establishment cannot stop them, though it would like to.

Stephen Jay Gould (for example) - who appointed him the pope of Dawinist religion? NO ONE. Researchers like Stephen Meyer do not owe him or anyone else an explanation or an apology for what they do, and for what they discover.

Unfortunately, the evolutionary establishment will not tolerate any questioning of their most cherished theories. What ever happened to open-mindedness?

Love Jack

jonmc49 - yes there are serious questions on this site - and some of them seem to make oyu angry. Curious.

Stephen Meyer is a hack, but holds a PhD from Cambridge. How did he fool his dissertation committee?

http://www.myspace.com/driftsongs

Answer 1

No more than the desire to seek further knowledge and details regarding an important topic requires funding. The second question is kind of difficult to answer. My gut reaction is... no. Actuaries at insurance companies are probably the ones with the most direct interest in where and how bad climate change will be. This is part of the reason why insurance companies have stopped issuing hurricane insurance in the southeast and along the eastern seaboard.... because this risk is too high in light of not knowing for sure. I think industry should start kicking in because of self interest rather relying on the government to always do things for them. EDIT: I'm so glad that folks like FILTHYB don't make important decisions. The knee-jerk kicks to the head make it tough to think clearly. And if you could highlight where or how I haven't addressed your questions, I will add detail.

Answer 2

I've never come across ID proponents doing actual research. They can if the choose to, though. If they do, they need to publish their findings in peer reviewed publications just like all other scientists. Nobody will stop them, but like all other research, it will be questioned by other scientists. If it stands up against peer review it will eventually become accepted science. That's how science works.

There's no "Dawinist", or even "Darwinist" religion. And nobody appointed Stephen Jay Gould as any sort of pope. There are no popes in science, everyone's research is open to testing and falsification by any other scientist.

Answer 3

ID, "creation science" and creationism are a bunch of lies, as has been amply shown by many scientists in disciplines ranging from geophysics to molecular biology.

The evolutionary establishment as you call them have heard it all before. Far too many times. I do not know of an objection to the fact of evolution that has not been full-answered by scientists.

But these objections are trotted out to the ignorant and the deluded by lying fundamentalist pastors who know very well that they are not valid. Their congregations do not, often being of the type of folk that are born every minute.

Most evolutionists are no longer interested in replying to yet another lying pastor, deluded fool or ignoramus. Lie after lie, misinformation following misinformation, logical errors by the dozen, moronic error after moronic error.

The problem with the scientists is that their manners are too good. Far too few have called ID, creation science and creationism for what they are - lies and their proponents for what they are - frauds or fools.

By the way, Gould died a few years ago. What his attitude to Meyers might have been was his business. Nobody appointed him as an evolutionist leader, he was just one of hundreds of scientists and became well known because he had written a few more or less popular books.

Answer 4

You're treating evolution like it's one concept, and there's only one idea around it. It's called a theory because it's a generalized scientific model, not a singular process.

Of course evolutionary biologists should can and should be more open-minded. But the idea that all evolutionary biologists think one way is crap, they bicker amongst themselves plenty; Gould and Lewontin disagreed strongly between them themselves about how evolution occured. Ironically, ID has probably actually diverted attention and united old foes.

By the way, technically, it's not the theory of evolution, it's the theory of evolution by natural selection that ID and oppoenents bicker about. My point there is to remember when you're trying to frame "evolution" to be particular what you're talking about; ID is an evolutionary theory (theory in the literal sense though, not the scientific =).

Answer 5

The whole thing is simple ...
Evolution is evidence looking for an explanation where creation is an explanation looking for evidence.

The ID folks are simply creationists using a different name ... nothing changes. The greatest problem is their lack of courage to address the facts surrounding evolution. Those facts include a quickly closing gap in the fossil record ... existence of transitional fossils that, 40 years ago, had not yet been discovered ... But, the "big Cahoona(sp)" that they fail at is all of the DNA evidence that continues to be discovered and, of course, if organisms have similar DNA, they had to have a common ancestor.

Thank God for Darwin!

Answer 6

It has nothing to do with open-mindedness. Science isn't a feeling or an opinion, it requires rigor, protocol, and testing.

ID and creationists ideas don't stand up which is exactly why ID supporters do not follow the scientific method and do not publish in reputable scientific journals. ID cannot answer to science, so its supporters bypass primary, secondary, and even tertiary literature and pay to publish popular literature.

Much the same as you avoid answering questions directed at you by posing new questions, ID pulls the wool over naive peoples' eyes by placing the blame on a lack of open-mindedness of evolutionary biologists. Don't worry Jack, evolutionary scientists won't be left behind. It's the ID supporters that stand on the shaky ground.

Added: Stephen Meyer's PhD is in geology not evolutionary biology!

Answer 7

Okay, I doubt that you'll accept any of this, but from a rational mind, here are the facts:

Evolution is a fact. There are tons and tons of evidence to support it. Contrary to what most ID/Creationist texts claim, yes, we HAVE seen evolution in action, yes there ARE transitional fossils that show halfway points between two well-established species, and yes the Theory of Evolution has been successfully used, on many occasions, to explain things that have been observed in nature. By contrast, ID is NOT a scientific theory in any way, shape, or form. Here's why: ID pre-supposes the existence of an intelligent agent (and why don't we just call it what it is...God). But God, if he or she exists, is by definition a supernatural being. Science cannot prove or disprove the existence of a being who exists outside the realm of natural phenomena. Therefore, the very premise on which ID is based is unscientific.

ID "researchers" don't discover anything except ways to misquote the Theory of Evolution to make it sound like it's wrong or incomplete. They also try to lend scientific legitimacy to their ideas, but guess what? You can't do that! They don't understand what a true scientific theory is (especially the ones that whine that evolution is "only a theory"). A true scientific theory is testable and falsifiable. If you can provide ONE way in which ID can be tested, rationally, that doesn't rely on the pre-supposed notion that there is in fact an intelligent designer, and which isn't so full of methodological errors that a kindergartner would reject it as unscientific, I'll withdraw my criticism. And I don't suppose you'd be willing to consider, for even one minute, the possibility that your ideas of intelligent design are entirely wrong? You see, evolutionary theory has been put to the test time and time again, and every time it passes with flying colors. You would do well to read up on it before you start making absurd claims about how ID is somehow a competing theory.

It IS the burden of the IDer to prove their claims, or to stop making them. That's because evolution is so well-supported that overturning the theory will require a major boatload of previously unknown evidence. IDers don't have that, and unfortunately for them, every new piece of evidence that comes to light just lends more support for the Theory of Evolution.

You call evolutionary biologists close-minded, yet they have put their own theory through the wringer numerous times, and each time it has emerged triumphant, successfully explaining and accounting for entire volumes of natural observation. In reality, friend, it is IDers and Creationists who are close-minded; they build their entire arguments on flawed data and a few passages from the Bible, then balk when they aren't taken seriously in the scientific community. ID leave evolution behind? Hardly! Rather, it is the other way around...science marches boldly forward while those who can't accept the Bible for what it is, a book of moral philosophy embedded in allegorical tales...sit in the dark and pray for something to support their arcane ideas.

Good luck, buddy. I don't expect best answer for this, but you should at least hear it from somebody.

Answer 8

You young fellas miss the point completely.

Evolutionary theory is written using scientific principles- what you can see, what you can test, and what can be disproven. Can you do any of those things with God? If you could, we would have no need for faith.

ID takes something that many scientists accept (belief in a Creator), and attempts to circumvent scientific theory, because we can't test for God using the scientific method.

ID attempts to make us measure the immesurable with a yardstick, scale and thermometer, which is a way to place odd limits on your concept of God, too, btb; It's demeaning, and unprincipled, and makes for bad science.

As it stands, most Christian religions have accepted evolution anyhow, as the ultimate proof of God's work.

Finally, I'll say this. Scientists measure things using tools. Reporting back on the numbers is the scientific method. Unless you want God's physical dimensions, the scientific method is the wrong language to use.

Answer 9

Now I see you are attracting some of your sycophantic followers, who are just as deluded as you are. Stephen Jay Gould was a real scientist and though I did not always agree with him, I could respect his honesty.
Stephen Meyer is a liar and a hack.

I think Feral's answer sums it up nicely. Why don't you give your rant a break. There are serious questions to be answered on this site.

No, only your questions make me angry with their foolishness.

I fooled my dissertation committee, too. Thing is, I know I am a hack. Meyers thinks he is a genius!!

As for open mindedness. I think your mind opened up enough that all your brains fell onto the ground!

Answer 10

ID researchers have to "answer to" the scientific community as a whole: that is what "peer review" is. No scientific paper is accepted unless it has undergone peer review to determine whether its findings can be held reasonable.
So science is all about "questioning of their most cherished theories" - that's what research *is*!

It's not that "evolutionists" are trying to stop research into the details of evolution - it's what they themselves do after all. It is that ID is *not* science.
The major requirement of a scientific hypothesis is that it can be tested. And the propositions of ID cannot be tested: the participation of a supernatural force in the universe is outwith the remit of science, which deals *entirely* with the physical, natural universe.

Stephen Meyer, BTW, has an undergraduate degree in geology, and a PhD in the history of science. He is a "dry" researcher, who does not perform any actual experiments himself. His only science jobs have been ones directly funded by Christian organisations - not official research institutions.
Some of his published work (in the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington) has been retracted by the publishers because it did not meet their standards, it had not undergone peer-review, and had been "fast-tracked" into publication because Meyer had nepotistic and ideological connections with the editor. *Not* good science!
A selection of his 70 publications over 20 years from the Discovery Institute's website shows that only 4 are from actual peer-reviewed scientific journals (Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington, Trends in Ecology & Evolution, Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies, Journal of Rhetoric & Public Affairs, ), the rest are publications in newspapers, or are books that Meyer wrote himself.

This is, of course, an ad hominem attack, and doesn't neccessarily say anything about the quality of his research (excepting that, with a PhD in the history of science, he should know what a proper scientific hypothesis is).
However, he is one of the co-authors of the "Wedge Document" - a statement of the intentions of the Discovery Institute - which lays out that the aim of ID "research" is to "reverse the stifling materialist world view and replace it with a science consonant with Christian and theistic convictions" and to "affirm the reality of God." Its goal is to "renew" American culture by shaping public policy to reflect conservative Christian, namely evangelical Protestant, values.
Moving away from materialism means you are no longer performing science.