Why intelligent design "proofs" are pointless

[Minimalist]

"Look! This apparent mechanism of biology appears to have been designed."

Except, it doesn't.

https://aaas.confex.com/aaas/2013/webpro...n5714.html

This symposium focuses on negative consequences of our evolutionary legacy. We examine the scars of human evolution in a number of areas, including orthopedics, obstetrics, dentistry, gerontology, diet, and nutrition. Far from a product of intelligent design, it is clear that human biology and behavior is the consequence of an evolutionary process that involved a number of trade-offs, which result in many of the problems associated with the current human condition.

Never give a creatard an inch. They'll take your whole arm.

[Ravenshire]

Creationist are not as stupid as we would like them to be. They are using ID, not to prove a specific gawd, but to attempt to wedge the idea of a gawd into science. Then they attempt to use other arguments to suport the idea that their particular gawd is that desigher.

Not a particularly good way to sway people who have at least a basic understanding of science, but effective with the ignorant.

[Mudhammam]

Moreover, the theist often states his or her case as an "argument from design" rather than "to design," the former obviously question-begging and the latter utterly impossible (and unconvincing since Darwin) to prove. I like David Hume's question and observation at the end of his Dialogues in which he says:

"Where then, cry I to both these antagonists, is the subject of your dispute? The theist allows that the original intelligence is very different from human reason: The atheist allows that the original principle of order bears some remote analogy to it. Will you quarrel, Gentlemen, about the degrees, and enter into a controversy which admits not of any precise meaning, nor consequently of any determination?"

---

Or William James, in his book Pragmatism, when he points out: "The mere word 'design' by itself has, we see, no consequences and explains nothing. It is the barrenest of principles. The old question of whether there is design is idle. The real question is what is the world, whether or not it have a designer--and that can be revealed only by the study of all nature's particulars."

---

Keep in my mind, it's not even apparent order within chaos that requires explanation--scientific laws do that just fine--it is the "brute facts" themselves that scream out for explanation. And here we can rest in the fact that theism offers no solution, not even a satisfactory evasion, to settle the ultimate question, "Why is there something rather than nothing?" (God postulated as nothing more than an additional and unnecessary "brute fact").

[Clueless Morgan]

But, sadly, those who advocate for ID don't realize how vacuous and lazy a position it actually is.

They may realize it and not care. I get the impression that ID wants to appear as if it is straddling a line between science and mysticism. It identifies what it sees as weak points in the theory of evolution and demands that those be explained satisfactorily. As long as they can keep coming up with proposed weak points, they can keep the con alive. There is no attempt at "defending" ID, since that might lead towards a religious discussion, and they want to avoid that because it could very well kill the whole idea of teaching ID in schools.

I'm willing to bet that upwards of 75% of the people who accept ID have no idea how lazy a position it is.

I'm not sure professional ID advocates (e.g. Michael Behe) think ID is a lazy position. And I'm not sure laymen realize how lazy a position ID is because professional ID advocates try to cultivate the image that they're doing lots of hard work.

(The other 25% would be made up of those who, as you say, may realize it and not care, and those who realize it, care, but have some agenda to push regardless, and all other options...)

Creationist are not as stupid as we would like them to be. They are using ID, not to prove a specific gawd, but to attempt to wedge the idea of a gawd into science. Then they attempt to use other arguments to suport the idea that their particular gawd is that desigher.

I don't think creationists or ID advocates are stupid, but I think do think that they use suspicious tactics to gain traction in much the same way a car salesman will give you the hard sell in order for you to not go home and research the clunker he's trying to sell you.

Not a particularly good way to sway people who have at least a basic understanding of science, but effective with the ignorant.

I know a gal that I would classify as having a basic-to-good understanding of science, but I know that she accepts ID, and that she doesn't accept evolution. Not even theistic evolution.

Having a basic understanding of science can mean nothing if you've got your god goggles on and properly calibrated.

[Minimalist]

but effective with the ignorant.

They've already got the ignorant.

[Anomalocaris]

But, sadly, those who advocate for ID don't realize how vacuous and lazy a position it actually is.

It's a standard theistic tactic: don't rigorously interrogate any claim that supports a given theistic presupposition.

That is called faith.

[Ravenshire]

Blind faith is a disease. Too bad there's no vaccination.

[robvalue]

There's one other thing that baffles me about intelligent design arguments.

Even if you believe that there is enough evidence to say the universe was designed, why does that in any way imply the creator is all powerful? Just because it can make something big and complicated, it can do anything? And knows everything? So much so that you then have to add caveats to take away some of that power to make it so it can even be consistent within itself.

So the argument fails all over the place, it requires a leap of faith to get to a designer, then another one to make up what the designer is. So why even bother with the middle step, since this is no argument at all.

[fr0d0]

We can know a lot a about a designer from the design. Even if that designer was natural processes, our exploration of the source takes the same form.

I also think dismissals of id can be quite lazy. Personally I'm anti id. I think it'd be lazy to dismiss it out of hand.

The question of belief in God is a whole other subject outside of this one. There I fully depart from the id crowd in that line of reasoning.

[robvalue]

Well, surely ID is a positive claim, and so has a burden of proof before it should be taken seriously? And since it has no good evidence whatsoever, it can be dismissed as more pseudo-science. We don't have to say that it isn't true, just that no evidence has been given to convince us that it is true. Just like the position of atheism. If any good evidence was being put forward, then myself and other sceptics wouldn't dismiss it right away. If there is actually any evidence I'm not aware of, I'd be happy to be pointed towards it. As far as I know all we have is nonsense about irreducible complexity, and "just looking at things" and saying they look created.

I don't agree that we can know about the designer from the design. We don't know how much of the universe they made, whether or not they set any natural laws, or whether they included trickery and safety mechanisms to stop anything we could find out telling us anything about the designer. They could design all life forms to be unable to learn anything correct about the creator. We can only at best make inferences, and they could never be tested since we have no way to test the creator in any way. So what we think we know may just be trickery.

You could say "we know they design", but that is just part of the claim that there is a designer. And even if they created something, it doesn't mean they did it on purpose or even were aware they did it. It could have been a side effect of something else.