Panda's Thumb and "Panic"
Yesterday at Panda's
Thumb PvM (Pim van Meurs)
asked,
Doesn’t [John] West comprehend that in case of evolution, religious beliefs do not matter unlike with ID where the lack of scientific relevance and the entanglement with religion makes ID unconstitutional to be taught as science in public schools. [sic]
Doesn’t [John] West comprehend that in case of evolution, religious beliefs do not matter unlike with ID where the lack of scientific relevance and the entanglement with religion makes ID unconstitutional to be taught as science in public schools. [sic]
PvM didn't do us the courtesy of linking to West's
article; I
will. I have two comments in
response:
One, teaching ID in public schools is a straw man objection that should have been dropped sometime back during the Cambrian Explosion. ID leaders are not arguing for that, and haven't for a long time. I'm not going to bother telling that story over again, it's been told too often with too little effect. The head already hurts from banging against the brick wall of ID opponents who refuse to engage what we're really saying.
Two, van Meurs describes ID as lacking scientific relevance and being entangled with religion. The first of these is wrong and the second is distorted. The relevance question reminds me of Richard Dawkins's written response to the now-famous question asked of him in an interview,
"to 'give an example of a genetic mutation or an evolutionary process which can be seen to increase the information in the genome.'"
During the interview he did not respond to the question at all; that is, not until after a long, uncomfortable pause, and then asking for the camera to be stopped. Then he came back with an answer that had nothing whatever to do with the question that was asked. In his written response later, he said,
"It is the kind of question only a creationist would ask in that way."
He doesn't explain what was wrong with the the "way" the question was asked. It sounds more to me like he thought there was something wrong with the question itself. But shouldn't evolutionists be interested in searching for mutations or processes that can be seen to increase the information in the genome? Sure, it's a question that seems to arise from an ID perspective. Yet what about it is scientifically irrelevant?
And what's irrelevant about researching, say, the question of apparent irreducible complexity? Sure, there have been bare outlines of responses to IC (skeletal, hopeful, promissory responses), like Miller's Type Three Secretory System explanation to the flagellum. The TTSS explanation was inadequate in the first place, since it omitted so many steps, and left us with just a promise that there must be an answer for the rest. And now we're learning that the TTSS probably arose after the flagellum, which makes its usefulness in leading to the flagellum (shall we say) a tad doubtful.
Now, aren't there valid, relevant scientific questions here? (Dawkins did proceed in his article to respond to the information challenge question. It's doubtful how relevant his response actually is, however.) How can someone say ID is completely irrelevant?
Continuing with my second response to van Meurs, ID's so-called "entanglement with religion" may be relevant to public schools, but as I've already said, that's a straw man issue. I must also object to his implication that this would render a topic scientifically vacuous. The questions of consciousness and free will are entangled with religion; does that make them scientifically irrelevant? Religion (taken very broadly) is a near-universal human phenomenon. Isn't science interested in questions raised by near-universal human phenomena?
And clearly evolutionary science is also entangled with religion--or, if you prefer, metaphysics; since many evolutionists (including Dawkins) clearly insist on it partly on account of its (allegedly) providing a God-free explanation of life.
It seems to me that our friend PvM has resorted to the time-tested rhetorical strategy of sloganeering. His Panda's Thumb audience is conditioned to think religion is bad, science is good; not in regard to "meaning," or "values," as long as they are divorced from actual knowledge and thus rendered virtually effete, but in terms of knowledge itself. And van Meurs's use of the word "panic" in his blog post's title is worthy of nothing more than a disgusted smirk. Read West's article to see for yourself how much "panic" he's displaying. PvM is practicing emotional engineering here, mere sloganeering--with no content whatsoever.
One, teaching ID in public schools is a straw man objection that should have been dropped sometime back during the Cambrian Explosion. ID leaders are not arguing for that, and haven't for a long time. I'm not going to bother telling that story over again, it's been told too often with too little effect. The head already hurts from banging against the brick wall of ID opponents who refuse to engage what we're really saying.
Two, van Meurs describes ID as lacking scientific relevance and being entangled with religion. The first of these is wrong and the second is distorted. The relevance question reminds me of Richard Dawkins's written response to the now-famous question asked of him in an interview,
"to 'give an example of a genetic mutation or an evolutionary process which can be seen to increase the information in the genome.'"
During the interview he did not respond to the question at all; that is, not until after a long, uncomfortable pause, and then asking for the camera to be stopped. Then he came back with an answer that had nothing whatever to do with the question that was asked. In his written response later, he said,
"It is the kind of question only a creationist would ask in that way."
He doesn't explain what was wrong with the the "way" the question was asked. It sounds more to me like he thought there was something wrong with the question itself. But shouldn't evolutionists be interested in searching for mutations or processes that can be seen to increase the information in the genome? Sure, it's a question that seems to arise from an ID perspective. Yet what about it is scientifically irrelevant?
And what's irrelevant about researching, say, the question of apparent irreducible complexity? Sure, there have been bare outlines of responses to IC (skeletal, hopeful, promissory responses), like Miller's Type Three Secretory System explanation to the flagellum. The TTSS explanation was inadequate in the first place, since it omitted so many steps, and left us with just a promise that there must be an answer for the rest. And now we're learning that the TTSS probably arose after the flagellum, which makes its usefulness in leading to the flagellum (shall we say) a tad doubtful.
Now, aren't there valid, relevant scientific questions here? (Dawkins did proceed in his article to respond to the information challenge question. It's doubtful how relevant his response actually is, however.) How can someone say ID is completely irrelevant?
Continuing with my second response to van Meurs, ID's so-called "entanglement with religion" may be relevant to public schools, but as I've already said, that's a straw man issue. I must also object to his implication that this would render a topic scientifically vacuous. The questions of consciousness and free will are entangled with religion; does that make them scientifically irrelevant? Religion (taken very broadly) is a near-universal human phenomenon. Isn't science interested in questions raised by near-universal human phenomena?
And clearly evolutionary science is also entangled with religion--or, if you prefer, metaphysics; since many evolutionists (including Dawkins) clearly insist on it partly on account of its (allegedly) providing a God-free explanation of life.
It seems to me that our friend PvM has resorted to the time-tested rhetorical strategy of sloganeering. His Panda's Thumb audience is conditioned to think religion is bad, science is good; not in regard to "meaning," or "values," as long as they are divorced from actual knowledge and thus rendered virtually effete, but in terms of knowledge itself. And van Meurs's use of the word "panic" in his blog post's title is worthy of nothing more than a disgusted smirk. Read West's article to see for yourself how much "panic" he's displaying. PvM is practicing emotional engineering here, mere sloganeering--with no content whatsoever.
Posted: Wed - October 10, 2007 at 11:40 AM |
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Published On: Dec 06, 2007 01:04 PM
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