Posing a Question
Dean
Doc Rampage sez:
Suppose Fred and Barney find a funny-shaped rock and Fred says that the rock is natural while Barney says that it is man-made. Fred can't just end the argument by saying, "I'm sorry, the theory that the rock is man-made is not falsifiable so that is not a scientific theory."
Is that right? If Fred does say that, is that science?
And by the way, do I have to be a raging fundamentalist Xtian to even pose the question?
/smirk off
If Barney says God created the rock, that is a different proposition.
In this example no one is, so the statement is falsifiable. In the case of ID, divine intervention is clearly stipulated, unless I seriously misundertand the argument.
Personally, as a Christian, all I need to explain intelligent life is the weak anthropic principle and an infinite universe.
More here.
I think they're probably wrong, but I'm astounded by how many people consistently mis-state their arguments or act like they're dangerous lunatics.
But this is getting off-topic.
And no, I don't think it's fair to say positing some kind of intelligent design is unscientific, as long as it doesn't stipulate divinity as the causative factor.
Unless I'm badly mistaken, it's actually well-accepted that it is. That's from
What I mean by this is that by saying something was made naturally provides no more information than saying it was made by God. So I guess the analogy is somewhat flawed all around, but analogies are never perfect. I think the point is that you can't just end an argument by saying something is unscientific. Also, what is and is not scientific can be classified more on a continuum rather than a yes/no response.
A theory is scientific to the extent that it can be tested scientifically, which sometimes takes some creativity. To say "I can't think of a way to test this scientifically, so it's unscientific" is not so much an argument as it is another way of saying you lack creativity or haven't tried very hard. Granted, there are some things that are difficult or impossible to test scientifically, but simply writing off something as "unscientific" often seems like intellectual laziness to me. Any theory could be called unscientific until it's been tested.
That said, I support the theory of evolution, and believe it to be more scientifically supported than intelligent design. For all I know, intelligent design has no scientific support at all, but my point is that just because it currently doesn't, does not mean that it always won't.
When I think about this, I'm always reminded of Freudian Theory. Generally, we're taught in experimental psychology classes that Freudian Theory is unfalsifiable, and therefore unscientific. But researchers exist who have been able to develop creative methods of testing some aspects of Freudian Theory. So, in that sense, it's not entirely unfalsifiable, and therefore, must be at least somewhat scientific, right? (Not to mention that a theory can be falsifiable, and thus scientific, but also wrong.)
What I notice in response just embarasses me as an an atheist and an empiricist--fairly rabid attacks on them, consistent mis-statements of their position, hurting people's careers, denying people tenure or the ability to publish, and worse. It's disgusting.
1) If God created the universe, would God necessarily be constrained by its laws? When a man creates artificial intelligence using computers, is man limited to the laws governing computer science? Or does man exist outside the limitations of some electronics in a box? The whole concept that a creator is constrained by his creation is logically ridiculous.
2) Is God required to subject himself to the analysis of men? In the Bible(or other religious texts if you prefer) God sets up the conditions under which he will allow himself to be known. Scientists (as distinct from science) propose a different set of conditions. Is God subject to man? Or is man subject to God? If man is not willing to approach God under the conditions set by God, then how will he ever come to know God?
3) There are many things which we know to exist that are known from observation and experience, but cannot be proven scientifically. Consciousness, Love, Anger, Hatred, Forgiveness, Envy, Greed, Lust, Desire, Ambition etc., etc. all are known to exist and to interact with the physical world. But science cannot explain any of these phenomena by the physical laws of nature.
In 1976, we were living in Ohio, and my father had a heart attack. His mother, living in 100 miles away in Dallas, woke up from a dead sleep, woke my grandfather, told him something was wrong with Jack, and insisted that he get up so they could call. Just how does science explain something like that?
Which brings us to this question: If there is no God, then why, throughout the history of man, has every single nation, culture, and people/or people group conspired INDEPENDENTLY to create the myth of a God? Just because God cannot be reproduced in the laboratory doesn't invalidate the experiences of man in history. Or does history and culture count for nothing in the scientific world?
How do we KNOW that Plato or Socrates existed? How do we KNOW that King George III, or Abraham Lincoln existed? We know because of the historical record written by contemporaneous witnesses and compiled and preserved by historians. How do we know that God existed and exists? We know because of the historical record written by contemporaneous witnesses and compiled and preserved by historians AND from the modern day testimony of those who have experienced God. What, pray tell, is the difference.
The arrogance of scientists sometimes astounds me. For many of them, there view of the world is so materialistically narrow that they lose any realistic perspective on life. I can give you examples of actual physical miracles that have occurred in my life. But I cannot just reproduce them on command. Is my life therefore invalid?
The Bible is the most historically vetted document in the history of man. You don't believe it? Read this. If we reject the historical accuracy of the Bible, why should we believe in any history? Or are the experiences of our predecessors of no value at all?
Certainly, the testimony of a single individual is not sufficient to establish anything. But just how many people must testify to eye witness accounts of events that defy the physical laws of nature before scientists will allow that some things may be beyond the understanding that can be derived from mathematics, chemistry or physics? 10? 20? 10,000? 20,000? 1 Million? How many? Are all of them liars? Have all of them been horribly decieved? Are none of them credible? Really? None? Are the ranks of the religious populated exclusively by the stupid, the credulous, and the manipulatively scheming?
You've linked to DI, and I think you are being a bit disingenuous to ID critics. Fairly rabid attacks? Nothing as bad as anyone here has levied on Noam Chomsky or Michael Moore.
Sorry, but not all minority opinions deserve to be championed.
That site doesn't seem to, but I don't know how representative that is of the ID community as a whole. Every IDer I know is a committed Christian and they think God did it. And I'm not saying they're wrong, just that it's a nonfalsifiable statement.
Nondivine ID should be testable, sort of. It's hard to control for the weak anthropic principle though. Given an infinite universe and that we have to be intelligent life to ask the question, how do you prevent anything, no matter how unlikely and seemingly requiring intelligent intervention, from the falling under the umbrealla of "had to happen for us to be here asking how it happened"? I guess the best way I can think of would be to find examples of "bioengineering" that weren't required to evolve intelligence, say in species of different branches from man.
I certainly agree all those attacks you mention are wrong. The IDers I know are some of the nicest, kindest people you would ever hope to meet and don't deserve vilification.
I agree that premise is flawed.
As to your first point, I compare God to a model railroader. They will go to significant effort rather than reach a hand inside the "universe" and cause a "miracle". I think, like a model railroader, God made the rules of his universe, and He likes them.
TallDave,
The universe may be infinite, but I keep hearing scientists speculating on the number of elementary particles which leads me to think the universe is not infinite. But even if it is, the mass to play with is not.
Yeah, I think you're right: the Universe's physical extent is infinite (and always has been) but its mass is not (and never has been), iirc.
The term ID is an attempt to get scientists to admit the patently obvious without having to subscribe to the particular tenets of any one set of religious dogma. I prefer not to deal in euphemisms, but it is amazing to see the extraordinary lengths so-called scientists to which some scientists will go to deny the observably obvious. But some scientists are invested in the faith of a "universe without God." To those, ID is as threatening to their faith as Christianity is to Islam.
To admit that there is the physical design of nature that belies a conscious intelligence behind it would undermine their nihilistic faith in the pointlessness of our existence. They have set out to prove that life has no meaning or purpose and that we are here by accident.
Ultimately, scientific resistance to ID is a matter of faith, not science. ID poses no threat to REAL science. It does not threaten the scientific method, at all. Rather, it is the insistence that science MUST have an explanation for ALL things that blinds some scientists to what is easily observable to the rest of us - including some other scientists.
Perhaps they were referring to the amount of particles in the observable universe.
Well put, but I would like to point out a few things in your post. To point #2, didn't God also grant freewill? If so, isn't it likely that He would become subject to analysis by men?
To point #3, each of the emotions you list might be explained by chemical reactions in the human brain which Evolutionists might claim are necessary fight or flight mechanisms which we have, through our own self-awareness, granted a spiritual quality.
Finally, to your point on historical record. To accept the Bible as pure truth is also to trust all of those observers who have written the stories of the Old and New Testament. Those keeping the history also tell us that not all of these people were in fact scientific. In fact, for many, many years, even questioning the "truth" of the Bible meant certain death. I simply must question it and the motives of those who have compiled and maintained it. And as to the history keepers themselves, aren't each of them subject to their own interpretations? How many times has history been reinterpreted to fit someone's fancy?
Personally, I'm not Atheist. But I also don't see much strength in your arguments, though they are put forth eloquently. I too find those who rail against God because they can't prove his existence rather silly. Surely a good scientist knows that there is more that we don't know then we do know.
Scott Harris is right. Both Evolution and Intelligent Design are ultimately religious. If you argue, e.g., that we were created by intelligent designers from another planet, somebody will inevitably ask: who designed the designers? Since you cannot have an infinite regress of intelligent designers designing intelligent designers, you must necessarily arrive at a Designer(s) who is (are) beyond time as we know it, i.e., eternal, Divine. Intelligent Design necessrily presupposes Divine Creation.
"So God [Elohim] created man in His own image, in the image of God created He him; male and female created he them."
-Genesis 1:27
Which, of course, evolutionists hate. Yes, they tell you, when testifying before legislatures or courts to get their throry taught in public schools, that you can be a Christian, a theist, and still believe in the theory of evolution. And I have known deep Christians who did believe in the theory of evolution, so, yes, it is theoretically possible, though much less so today.
But, if you ask the leading evolutionists when talking among themselves, they will tell you that, no, this belief in a God is a superstition, an insanity, a reactionary counter-revolutionary obstruction, which must be eradicated from the human race. The human race itself must cease to exist as it has throughout the millennia. (See C. S. Lewis, The Abolition of Man) We must evolve. We must be re-programmed by our enlightened social planners to fit the new progressive utopia. Man, they argue, is nothing more than a monkey with delusions of grandeur. These delusions must be wiped out. We must be stripped of our selfish pride so that we will bow down to our new "God", the State. Molecular biologist Jacques Monod explicitly stated that the discovery by James Watson and Francis Crick of the structure of our DNA proves scientifically that "man must accept that he is a mere accident". Richard Dawkins, the Ayatollah of the Evolutionists, has stated over and over again, as in his book The Blind Watchmaker, that there is no design, no designer, no creator, no God, no purpose, no meaning, no point, no value whatsoever to human life. We have seen the result already: abortion, euthanasia, eugenics.... (See C. Everett Koop's Whatever Happened to the Human Race?). Deny the Divine origin of man and you board the train to Auschwitz.
I know, I know, Objectivists will object to my argument that atheism necessarily leads to totalitarianism. Ayn Rand worshipped Man in the singular, the Individual not the State. I have defended her often here in Dean's World and I will continue to defend her whenever she is attacked. But I have concluded that Objectivism is incomplete without a theistic foundation. In this, I agree completely with James Keiffer and with E. Merrill Root. For Man to be Divine, he must be the image of a God not a monkey, Woman the image of a Goddess, of the Most High Goddess, the Queen of Heaven. That is my myth, my holy dogma. That is where I stand.
And I will not be dissuaded from it just because some militantly anti-theistic pseudo-scientist holds up a monkey's skull or a pig's tooth and demands "You must believe in this instead -- or else you are obsolete!"
Take, for example, forensics. You find a dead body. Did the person die of natural causes, or was he murdered by intelligent design?
The same with SETI. Are the weird radio signals we're receiving simply random background noise, or are they intelligently designed by an alien race attempting to communicate with us? The same is true of cryptography--is that random radio static, or are our enemies sending coded messages to one another?
As people have mentioned before, archeology. Is that funny-shaped rock JUST a funny-shaped rock, or was it intelligently designed and carved to serve a purpose (say, cutting meat).
There are plenty of other examples. In fact, there are whole fields of science that concern themselves ONLY with things that are intelligently designed: linguistics, information science, computer science, etc.
So why should intelligent causes be excluded from, say, biology? You have every right to the opinion that biology should only consider natural causes, but it's amazing how few people don't know WHY they believe that the study of biology should be restricted to natural causes. What is the reason for allowing intelligent causes in some fields of science and not others? What's the difference between archeology and biology that one is allowed to consider an intelligent cause and the other is not?
Most people say stuff like, "Well, if we allowed God into biology, the entire field would fall apart. We'd go back to the Stone Age, where people believed lightning was caused by Zeus and the sun rotated around the Earth." But is that true? After all, I don't think the fields of archeology, or forensics, or linguistics, or anything else, is in any way impaired because experts in those fields sometimes consider intelligent causes. As far as I can tell, archeology and forensics and the rest are getting along swimmingly.
As a side-note, some very prominent scientists are both IDers and very decided opponents of Christianity. Francis Crick springs to mind. (The co-discoverer of DNA? The Crick of Watson and Crick?) He hated Christianity, but eventually he got so fed up with trying to come up with a natural explanation for life on this planet that he gave up, threw in the towel, and wrote a book saying he believed that aliens seeded life on this planet. He is, thus, an IDer that preceeded the ID movement by several decades.
And I have known deep Christians who did believe in the theory of evolution, so, yes, it is theoretically possible, though much less so today.
Then I guess I must be much less so today. ;-)
Sorry, couldn't resist. Now to get back to holding my peace, and keeping my nose out of arguments where the heat-to-light ratio exceeds 10:1.
But when you stick God into the mix, as most IDers do, then you create a nonfalsifiable proposition.
Interesting discussion. Nice to see people can have this conversation without namecalling and etc.
I'm a Christian and I actually believe there was divine intervention of some kind, even if only to set the Universe in motion with laws that allowed us to evolve; my point is that such a supposition must be based on faith because it's nonfalsifiable.
I didn't expect you to react that way. Perhaps I should have said fewer, though I thought my meaning, the context, was clear enough. The faith of Christians such as yourself or those to whom I was referring is not any less now than it was then, but there are fewer such than there were then (in the 1960s and 1970s). The battle lines are more sharply drawn than ever today. Anti-theistic evolutionists such as Dawkins increasingly and more and ever more refuse to permit the possibility of a Creator, of anything Divine. They are becoming louder and ever more prominent within the evolution movement (yes, it is now a "movement" rather than a "theory", and very likely it was from the beginning, going back at least to Chesterton's day), their writings are being boomed and pushed and promoted throughout academia and the media. They insist that only evolution be taught in the public schools. They oppose all private schools, especially all religious schools, all vouchers.
They define "science" as "that which does not contradict atheism" or "that which contradicts theism". This goes back before Darwin, even before Marx, back to Auguste Comte and his philosophy of "positivism". Comte argued that history proceeds in a linear, progressive pattern from the "theological" (mythological) to the "metaphysical" (philosophical) to the "positive" (scientific). Today's "positivists" dismiss all ideas not strictly scientific, not provable or falsifiable in a laboratory, as "meaningless". It is not only false in their eyes to posit a God or a soul but "meaningless".
Comte was not only an atheist but a collectivist who coined the terms "sociology" (by which society would be organized and planned scientifically) and "altruism", the negation of the ego (self, soul) in slavery to the collective (the secular state, Comte's "religion of humanity"). A commenter here recently wrote of "Christian altruism". This is mistaken. The Bible nowhere speaks of "altruism" but of "charity" or "love" (Rand called charity the virtue of "benevolence" or good will, and she saw that love is one's response to one's highest values). Christ was an egoist at root, for He said:
"For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?"
-Matthew 16:26
That is the meaning of selfishness: Godliness. And that is the diametrical opposite of Comte's philosophy, from which proceeded all of today's collectivist "isms" such as Communism. Insofar as the teaching of evolution leads to Comte's secularist and statist utopia, I oppose it.
Well, simple: evolution is falsifiable because it must follow the laws of physics. Divine intervention isn't, because it doesn't.
Is that reasonable ?
In this discussion, one commentor tells us that scientific resistance to ID is a matter of faith and not science. He also ascribes the appellation, nihilist to some proponents of their specific thought processes. Is that reasonable ?. And then the discussion devolves into questions of falsifiability, divine intervention, Matthew 14:12, nondivine intelligences, sticking God into the mix, flawed analogy’s, and model railroading.
But the question was: Can Fred and Ralph get along scientifically ? I answer the question in the affirmative. And I’d suggest that it can be done without positing God nor making the ridiculous assumption that a 20 pound monkey somehow turns into an Albert Einstein. I am still on the learning curve of life and have yet to find a need or a reason to stop asking questions.
So I agree with Dean in that ‘academics’ with closed minds are not going to find the answers without more questions.
Before invoking God or not-God can academic freedom in teaching facilities be as open minded as a 12 year old grandson who actually knows the questions to ask ?
The problem is that laws of nature are theories too, and when one theory contradicts another, there is no a priori way to decide which one is wrong.
That is to say, since it isn't falsifiable, it isn't "scientific?"
Even Carl Sagan admitted that science presumes at least one metaphysical assumption: that the universe is lawful, and that (by careful observation and hypothesis) we can derive these laws.
The true irony here is that modern science is based on that metaphysical contruct, which is/was directly based on the Western/Christian idea that God created a lawful universe.
You can argue the concept in either direction. Hence:
-the universe is lawful, ergo God exists. Else there would be non-repeatable chaos.
-the universe is lawful, ergo we don't need God, since some sort of "lawfulness" is inherent in the space/time continuum.
The thing is, the second possibility begs the question: "why?" If one presumes God, then lawful behavior of matter may reasonably follow. On the other hand, how do you explain "why?" when you posit a purely materialistic universe?
I am reminded of an old joke. It seems that a philosophy teacher presented a final exam with a single question: "Why?"
-those who answered "why not?" got a B.
-those who answerd "because" got an A.
-everyone else got a C.
Heh.
Even Gary Larson picked up on it, although I can't find a copy of the cartoon now.
It was one of those classic Far Side cartoons, with two geeky scientists, and a blackboard full of equations entitled "The Origin of Life." In the middle of the equations, the phrase "and then a miracle occurs" appears, and we see one scientist saying to the other "Um, I think there's a problem with step 4, there..."
Am I saying this proves anything? No.
I am saying that the Christian/Western European concept of science began with the belief that there was a God, that he had created a lawful universe, one that was subject to human understanding and analysis.
I am also saying that belief in a lawful God strengthened the concept of observation/synthesis/hypothesis/test/repeat to the extent that it became an unquestioned Law of science, in the same way that various Laws of geometry became established.
Another problem with ID is that the materialist/science brigade pushes the (implicit) claim that most, if not all of the ID adherents are devout followers of Bishop Ussher. This is hardly the case. :)
It is now the official belief of the Roman Catholic Church that the general case of evolution is valid, as long as one posits a "divine spark" somewhere in the process.
Before any of the materialists take too much umbrage, let me point out that this is exactly what Arthur C. Clarke proposed in 2001, but no one said that was "unscientific," "religious," or bad science.
Apparently ET intervention is quite acceptable, but divine intervention is not.... :)
Sorry, I was just making a (perhaps somewhat cryptic) joke: if it is possible, though much less so today to be a deep Christian who does believe in the theory of evolution, then I must be [possible, though] much less so today, since I happen to be a committed Christian who has always been just fine with evolution.
The statement:
"Life shows signs of being intelligently engineered"
can be falsified merely by proving that natural selection can account for all known life. Which you would think biologists would want to do even without ID.
Some scientists are just cranky because they can't prove this.
Oh yeah. How is it possible to falsify natural selection?
Darwinian Evolution Incompatible with Catholic Faith says Cardinal and Author of Catholic Catechism
NEW YORK, July 11, 2005 (LifeSiteNews.com) – On July 7, after years of media-generated confusion, Christoph Cardinal Schonborn, a theologian who helped author the 1992 Catechism of the Catholic Church, wrote in the New York Times clarifying the Church’s understanding of human origins.
Schonborn unequivocally establishes that the Catholic Church does not endorse Darwinism. “Evolution in the sense of common ancestry might be true, but evolution in the neo-Darwinian sense - an unguided, unplanned process of random variation and natural selection - is not.”
Cardinal Schonborn, a close associate of both Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI, continued, saying, “Any system of thought that denies or seeks to explain away the overwhelming evidence for design in biology is ideology, not science.”
Finding design in evolution by
Christoph Cardinal Schönborn
Well, in those cases it was the laws themselves that were falsified by the evidence; that's why the physical laws we've discovered are so important and powerful, because they can be falsified. And when they are found not to be false they can be used to describe the universe. For instance, we know E=mc squared. If this were false, it could be proven. Since it isn't false, it provides a very useful device for calculating yields of matter-energy conversions like fission and fusion reactions.
In the case of divine intervention, you're stipulating an omnipotent deity not bound by any laws, thus claims regarding any actions it took are unfalsifiable.
Simple, by proving it can't account for everything biological around us. Like all falsifiable theories, all you need is one exception to prove it wrong.
Simple in conceptual terms, anyway. In practice, very difficult, at least at our current level of knowledge.
Divine intervention, otoh, is nonfalsifiable even in a conceptual sense, because there are no limits on what a divine intervener could do.
Of course, again, ID absent a divine intervener is falsifiable and just as scientific a theory as evolution.
ID does not equal divine intervention.
To disprove ID, all you would need to do is prove that natural selection can explain existing life forms. As you pointed out, this is possible conceptually, but not in practice at present.
This would disprove the fundamental claim of ID, but NOT divine intervention. But divine intervention is a strawman.
Joke, OK. I'm glad you didn't think I was questioning your faith. I know that you are a committed Christian. I have no problem with theistic evolutionists. I used to consider myself one for a long time, more or less. I never did care one way or the other about the theory of evolution. I never cared for the 6-24-day creation theory either. I don't see any difference between theistic evolution and intelligent design. The attacks on intelligent design have turned me against evolution more than anything else. That plus the fact that evolution has historically been associated with atheism, eugenics, etc.. Christians may accept the theory of evolution, but the most active, aggressive promoters of it, such as Dawkins, are usually militant atheists or anti-theists, and anti-humanists.
Look, guys, there's a huge difference between the ways scientists go about proving theories and historians go about proving theories. Take, for example, a historian trying to prove that the Battle of Waterloo actually took place. Can he put the Battle of Waterloo in a test tube and run tests on it? Can he measure it or analyse it? Does he have TWO copies of that moment, one as a control and one as an experiment? Of course not! In history, a theory is considered proven if it best fits all the available evidence, not if it can be demonstrated through repeated scientific experiments. One consequence of this is that historical theories do not need to be falsifiable to be considered perfectly valid theories.
Some historians, for example, have recently claimed that Abraham Lincoln is gay. How can we prove them wrong? The only way we can be absolutely, 100% certain is if we get inside Lincoln's head and monitor his thoughts. That is obviously impossible. So we'll never really know one way or another. The decision we must make, then, is not whether the theory can be proven or disproven, but whether it fits more of the evidence than a competing theory does.
That is where many people, evolutionists and IDers alike, get into trouble. The Theory of Evolution makes many claims, some of them scientific and some of them historical. Let me demonstrate:
SCIENTIFIC CLAIM: It is possible for an amphibian to evolve into a reptile without the aid of an intelligence. SCIENTIFIC METHOD: Stick an amphibian in a lab and expose it to a lot of mutagens until either it becomes reptilian or you give up.
HISTORICAL CLAIM: Sometime in the past an amphibian evolved into a reptile, completely without the aid of an intelligence. HISTORICAL METHOD: Examine the archeological record for signs of half-amphibian/half-reptilian creatures.
IF the scientific claim is true (personally, I'm unconvinced, but if you find it convincing) then you can go on to make a historical claim which we will NEVER be able to prove or falsify. Why not? Because we don't have video footage of the origin of this planet! Because we don't have a time machine that would allow us to travel back in time to that moment! And even if we *did*, we could still never conclude for certain whether the amphibian was evolving all on its own or whether an intelligence like a god was helping out. Maybe it just LOOKS like it's evolving on its own, but really aliens monitoring it from the other side of the solar system are making sure that the correct mutations take place to mold it into a form they like.
More in a second.
So the question we should be asking about evolution vs. ID is NOT whether each theory is falsifiable (because when it comes to the historical evidence, neither is, really), but which one best meets the archeological evidence. Evolution has the extra burden of proof in that it makes scientific claims that must be proven true before it can make a historical claim, but in the historical realm both theories carry equal weight.
Excellent on the distinction between science and history, which so many evolutionists miss. History deals with singular events, including the Battle of Waterloo and also including miracles, while science deals with that which can be replicated in a laboratory.
And why is this, if this indeed a purely scientific and not a religious issue, such a bitterly contested issue anyway? In physics, we have had those who described light as particles and those who described light as waves, and have come to see both as right in different contexts. Neither accused the other of violating the Wall of Separation of Church and State.
As those who created the scientific method believed, it was by studying nature and the universe more could be revealed about the Creator. This study was never supposed to supplant Scripture, but enrich it. It seems these has been a bit of role reversal. Plainly put, science cannot prove the existance of God. It's not supposed to . If the Bible itself cannot definitively reveal God how then can science? Have we forgotten 1 Corinthians 1:27?
Science taken by itself will never prove nor disprove God. Its very nature prohibits it from taking the next step to revealing the face of the Creator: faith. Are we, as Christians, forgetting about faith? Is not faith more important and enriching than any proveable fact?
Those who put all their faith in science will miss the point of science. Those who put all their faith in God do not need science.
I don't see how you can call it a strawman when the vast majority of IDers believe in divine intervention as the mechanism for ID.
Well, proof they COULD have evolved by chance doesn't prove they DID evolve by chance. It makes it the more likely explanation (since no one has ever seen any intelligence besides Man remotely capable of such intervention), but it doesn't rule out intelligent intervention.
Even non-divine ID really can't be entirely ruled out, which is why some scientists view it as a distateful deus ex machina. The other reason it's disliked is that it begs the question: what intelligence intervened? And no one has a good answer for that.
Lots of things are only indirectly testable. They're still scientific. For instance, the Big Bang, inflationary cosmology, stellar nuclear processes, etc.
Evolution predicts life forms gradually building in complexity over time, from very simple to very complex, with traits that help organisms survive being preserved.
So if, for instance, one found fossil evidence of mammals walking around before single-celled orgnaisms occurred, one would have to say evolution was wrong and ID was a more correct explanation.
When discussing the validity of ID, it seems to me that whether IDers believe in divine intervention as the mechanism is about as important as whether they like pistacchio ice cream. Either ID is valid or not.
I defined ID as I understand it:
"Life shows signs of being intelligently engineered"
If there are no such signs, I would consider ID refuted even though this does not prove that there was no divine intervention. For one thing, it would be hard to define any design as "intelligent" if it was proven that random mutations could achieve the same design.
Basically though, we seem to agree about ID as a scientific theory.