Intelligent science vs. intelligent design

fls said:
I've seen this statement several times now. What does it refer to, cuz we prove negatives all the time?

Linda
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Try to look at it this way: there are several ways you might go about trying to prove that life can not have arisen on Earth without an intelligent designer. You show irrefutable evidence that the "primordial soup" never existed, and declare "therefore there must be an intelligent designer", but this is not true. It only proves that life did not emerge from the "primordial soup". It doesn't refute the idea that maybe life formed from abiogenesis occuring in the atmosphere. Or maybe aliens landed on this planet and bacteria from their planet hitched a ride on their spaceship. Or maybe a meteor impact brought all the necessities of life to Earth, and the energy of the collision caused life to form. There are nearly infinite possibilities. So, instead of trying to prove what cannot be, instead try to prove what is: that is to say, show evidence of your intelligent designer. This is what is meant when people say you can't prove a negative.
 
Linda: It goes like this: We can, when it really comes down to it, never really be 100% sure of anything. Basically, we can only say that there are no white crows because we have so far not seen one (that I know of, at least). But that doesn't mean one exists somewhere. It may simply not have been discovered yet. So, the scientific mindset may be open for one existing. Of course, the more crows we count, and the more of them that are black/dark grey, the more confident we can be that there aren't any white crows.

So, we're basically "proving" a negative mostly by giving evidence of a mutually exclusive positive. As long as the evidence supports the positive, we can assume it'll keep on doing so. Of course, as soon as some other evidence (which is also a positive, except it's a positive for a different direction) is brought up, one has to regard this.

So, technically, life on earth may still have been intelligently designed. Just that whoever did the designing (and presumably initial creating) hid the tracks so well we can't see them.

BUT, it's not our job to say that there is no evidence of a designer, therefore it doesn't exist. It is the job of the IDers to come with some actual, positive evidence that their Judeo-Christian god (which ID is really about 99% of the time, no matter how many times people like Behe lies about this) does exist and designed eyes, intelligence, etc.

So far, they haven't shown anything but pure speculation, and a lot of claims that have in fact been wrong. Mostly these claims are on the line of "The eye could not have evolved, because what use is half an eye?", which is a typical argument from incredulity. And arguments from incredulity don't cut it in science.



ETA: Oh, and if the plethora of answers seem a bit confusing, I'd personally go with HappyCat's post. I think s/he best explains what the ID creationists are really doing.
 
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immaterial said:
The very basis of ID is the active use of intelligence. The very basis of all science is the active use of intelligence.

So to say that science and ID are not compatible is ridiculous. ID is in fact more compatible with science than most other scientific subjects, since they share the exact same basis.
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You are commiting the fallacy of equivocation - you are using the word "basis" in two different ways in the same sentence and asking that we see the two uses as equal. The "basis" of ID is intelligence in that the thing that ID proponent's claim is that intelligent manipulation was necessary to create what we observe in the univerce. The "basis" of science is not that intelligent manipulation was necessary to create what we observe in scientific experiments. The "basis" of science is that observation allows us to better understand how the universe works.

The only thing that intelligence has to do with science is that intelligent people are more easily able to understand it. But we do not create science ever.

There is no "basis" to ID that shares anything with the basis of science. Your argument is illogical.
 
The phrase "proving a negative" is somewhat misleading, since there are many things that involve a negative that can be proven. I can prove that I did NOT commit a murder last night at 8pm in London, by providing sufficient evidence that I was not in London at that time.

What we actually mean is that you cannot prove the non-existence of something.
 
One has to dinstinguish between a universal negative and a non-universal negative.
 
Evolution is a science, because like all sciences, it is based on empirical evidence. Every single time, without fail, when a scientist looks for evolutionary explanations, they eventually find them, and are able to document them in precise detail.

Intelligent Design is never precise. It cuts off the explanation, before they even start trying to discover it.

Evolution has been witnessed a mountainous number of times: from small bacterium to large whales.

How often has the act of Special Creation been witnessed?

Evolution provides a testable theory, that has been tested positive to the point of being scientifically factual.

The only arguments Intelligent Design have provided are fallacious attacks. If you don't believe me, then give me some of their arguments, and I will show you why they are fallacies.
 
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ponderingturtle said:
That you can not prove that X can not happen, you can only show that it didn't happen. For example we can not prove that telepathy does not exist we can only make statements about individual claims and that they do not meet the criteria of for telepathy.

For example, I claim a rock is the most intelligent being on the planet, how do you prove that this is not the case? You can't, you demand I show evidence for my claim and back it up that the rock(whom I call Sir Tellingsby) is intelligent.
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I think I understand. What you were referring to is that in order to prove a negative, it is necessary to know what the claim is based upon. It's not that we can't prove a negative, but that we can't prove a negative that is unspecified.

Linda
 
immaterial

Pronunciation: "i-m&-'tir-E-&l
1 not consisting of matter
2 of no substantial consequence
 
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fls said:
I think I understand. What you were referring to is that in order to prove a negative, it is necessary to know what the claim is based upon. It's not that we can't prove a negative, but that we can't prove a negative that is unspecified.

Linda
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That is pretty much spot on indeed. And in the context of this discussion he IDers publically refuse to specify what exactly the "designer" actually is (although they really talk about the Judeo-Christian god most of the time), in the hopes that they won't have to produce positive evidence for it, and can keep on claiming that we can't prove this unspecified "designer" doesn't exist. Of course, they have been called out on this clearly unscientific approach many, many times, but creationists don't tend to let go of their lies easily, as you may have noticed.
 
fls said:
I think I understand. What you were referring to is that in order to prove a negative, it is necessary to know what the claim is based upon. It's not that we can't prove a negative, but that we can't prove a negative that is unspecified.

Linda
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No there are plenty of specific negatives we can not prove. There is a specific claim made about the rock(Sir Billingsby) in regard to its intelligence. But the flaw in this is that I am depending on you to show evidence that the rock really isn't smart instead of providing evidence that it is.

It is impossible to prove something is impossible, rather you show that there is no evidence that supports the thing and it is not needed. But you can not prove something doesn't exist, you can only prove that things exist. This is for general somethings, you can clearly state that say Jupiter is the largest planet in our solar system, and that there is not a larger one. Of course you could say that there is a bigger one that is invisible and such.
 
ponderingturtle said:
No there are plenty of specific negatives we can not prove.
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I didn't mean to imply that I was saying otherwise.

There is a specific claim made about the rock(Sir Billingsby) in regard to its intelligence. But the flaw in this is that I am depending on you to show evidence that the rock really isn't smart instead of providing evidence that it is.
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I'm not sure how well this works as an example. I can prove that the rock is not intelligent as you have given me a specific thing to test plus a specific concept to test for. I would only find it impossible if you decided to be uncooperative - you would not answer as to the presence or absence of specific indicators for intelligence, or you would not agree to the generally agreed upon indicators of intelligence. And maybe that is your point - that proponents of ID are uncooperative in that manner.

I understand the nature of the ID/evolution debate. What I wondered about was your particular choice of words. I'm still under the impression that I now understand why you said it that way. Yes?

It is impossible to prove something is impossible, rather you show that there is no evidence that supports the thing and it is not needed. But you can not prove something doesn't exist, you can only prove that things exist. This is for general somethings, you can clearly state that say Jupiter is the largest planet in our solar system, and that there is not a larger one. Of course you could say that there is a bigger one that is invisible and such.
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This seems to be back to the unspecified.

Linda
 
Araneus said:
The phrase "proving a negative" is somewhat misleading, since there are many things that involve a negative that can be proven. I can prove that I did NOT commit a murder last night at 8pm in London, by providing sufficient evidence that I was not in London at that time.

What we actually mean is that you cannot prove the non-existence of something.
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That is not good enough. You were in two places at once. You were in London at 8pm and you were elsewhere at the same time. Now prove me wrong.:D
 
fls said:
I didn't mean to imply that I was saying otherwise.



I'm not sure how well this works as an example. I can prove that the rock is not intelligent as you have given me a specific thing to test plus a specific concept to test for. I would only find it impossible if you decided to be uncooperative - you would not answer as to the presence or absence of specific indicators for intelligence, or you would not agree to the generally agreed upon indicators of intelligence. And maybe that is your point - that proponents of ID are uncooperative in that manner.
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Ah but sir Billingsby like god does not lower himself to your pathetic tests.

But that is basicly the idea, you need positive evidence because you can not have negative evidence of something. Now you can sort of have negative evidence by having positive evidence of a contrary idea,
 
Is... Is this guy arguing that intelligent design is part of science, because it's called "intelligent design"?

:eye-poppi
 
Lynx2174 said:
Is... Is this guy arguing that intelligent design is part of science, because it's called "intelligent design"?

:eye-poppi
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Yes, his arguement is that intelligence is the basis for science and it is called inteligent design after all. At least that was the innitial arguement that seemed to be presented, the thread then turned into the nature of negative evidence
 
ponderingturtle said:
Yes, his arguement is that intelligence is the basis for science and it is called inteligent design after all. At least that was the initial arguement that seemed to be presented
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[looks around in vain for immaterial]
It now seems that, unable to marshal any worthwhile arguments, the poster of the OP has fled. So much for reasoned discussion :rolleyes:
 
DeviousB said:
If you look round for something immaterial in vain, doesn't that mean it is there?
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Pedant :D

I don't think it's a double negative - but I accept that saying it's vain to look for an incorporeal thing is a statement of the bleedin' obvious. If it's insubstantial, looking round for it is bound to be a bit pointless :confused:

However, given that s/he's not here. this conversation is immaterial - in the sense of unimportant and irrelevant.
 
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