Monday, December 14, 2015

I missed something in the Discovery Institute's Myth 8

I hate when I do this.  I was checking something in 'Ten Myths About Dover: #8, "Michael Behe Admitted that ID Is No More Scientific than Astrology" ' and caught a sentence that I guess I missed the first time through.  Here is little casey luskin's last paragraph:

"The problem with astrology is not that it could have fit the NAS's definition of a scientific theory, or Michael Behe's definition. The problem with astrology is simple: It's not supported by the evidence. After all, an idea that is "science" or "scientific" can still be flatly wrong."
Look at the second to last sentence:
"The problem with astrology is simple: It's not supported by the evidence."
I can't believe a member of the Discovery Institute (DI) could actually say something like that.  They must have had every irony meter shipped far out of state or else the rest of the world would have heard and felt the explosions.

So, to paraphrase, Astrology isn't science because it is not supported by the evidence, but -- according to the Discovery Institute -- Intelligent Design is science regardless of the fact there is no evidence supporting it.  Marie Antoinette anyone?

Does this mean I disagree with the DI's claims of having evidence?  I certainly do.  Even if you don't look at the religious motivations behind them, what have they shown as evidence?
  • The appearance of design
    [Which does not equate to the fact of design]
  • Examples of human intelligence
    [Which does not equate to their idea of Intelligent Design]
  • The creation of unsupported concepts like 'irreducible complexity' and 'complex specified information' and then using them as if they had meaning in their rationalizations[It's not enough to create a definition out of thin air, they have to support . . . with evidence . . . that such things actually exist and then try and use them to rationalize ID.  They keep forgetting that step.]
  • Arguments about the impossibility of evolution
    [Even if these arguments were true, that doesn't mean ID is true.  They present a false dichotomy, sort of if not evolution, then ID.  To be clear, I also disagree with their anti-evolution arguments.]
  • A Design Inference filter
    [That doesn't seem to be able to infer anything]
  • Re-writing history
    [Like the Sternberg Peer Review Controversy or trying to re-baptize folks like Alfred Russel Wallace  and Thomas Jefferson as ID proponents.]
What ID comes down to is opinion, wishful thinking, and unsupported conjecture.  What the Intelligent Design Movement comes down to is marketing not science.   It is marketing ID using any tactic available regardless how reprehensible their tactics are -- all for a strictly religious purpose.  What I find more than a little bit galling is when a DI mouthpiece makes ironic statements like this!  No wonder no one outside their religious compatriots takes them very seriously. 

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