Intelligent Design

[Wolfram]

Well, it looks like the philosophical nihilists are at it again; the message below was in my inbox this morning.


Apparently, the zealots of negativity can't distinguish between "intelligent design" and sectarian doctrine, and believe (I suppose) that if you throw some steel, glass, plastic, rubber, zinc, sulfuric acid, etc. into a tumbling machine, a brand new Lincoln Continental will eventually emerge. Chaos, then, spontaneously becomes Order, as per the Gospel according to Sigmund Freud, Karl Marx, and a somewhat reluctant Albert Einstein ( Vincent Sheean called them "my three Jewish doctors").


Some books I found interesting regarding intelligent design were "The Phenomenon of Man" by Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (Harper, Row 1965), "The Freedom of the Will" by Austin Farrer (Charles Scribners Sons, 1960), and LeCompte du Nouy's classic "Human Destiny" (Longmans Green 1947).


Teilhard is difficult, but worth a "read."


P.


Dear Paul,
The religious right is once again launching a frontal attack on the Bill of Rights - this time by changing the curriculum in our public schools! Act Now! (http://go.care2.com/e/hPd/cI/EYc7)

Recently, a trial over "Intelligent Design" began in Pennsylvania, where school teachers are rebelling against a school board decision that forced them to teach creationism alongside evolution in their biology classrooms.

Send a letter to your governor to ensure that the separation of church and state and the integrity of science education are upheld in your public schools! (http://go.care2.com/e/hPd/cI/EYc7)

At issue in Dover, PA, is a new policy requiring all ninth-grade biology teachers to read a statement on "Intelligent Design" before teaching evolution lessons. The district is believed to be the first in the country to require such a disclaimer.

Studies show that American children are falling behind children in other nations in their knowledge and understanding of science. We simply can not allow science education to be watered down by zealots who seek to use our public schools as pulpits from which to teach ideology as fact, while denying teachers and students their basic right to religious freedom.

Religion undeniably has its place in American society, but that place is not our public schools! Take action! (http://go.care2.com/e/hPd/cI/EYc7)

http://dingo.care-mail.com/c2p/misc/Jenny_mini.jpg Jenny McKinley
Care2 & ThePetitionSite Team



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[Scronx]

Perhaps this would be a good place to finally ask the question, and perhaps others besides me are wondering: What is intelligent design, how is it different from evolution, what's the whole ruckus over it really about? I continue to see a lot ofitems about it but don't recall it ever having been elucidated to that extent.


Wikipedia hates it, which speaks well for it.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligent_design


Sounds to me like somebody's giving up on the fight for creation science and trying to work it from a new angle without the God factor. That could have its points although I was born a purist and plan to die one.

[TeeJay]

It seems redundant to use the words "intelligent " & "design" together
since design and can usually be proven to be the product of some
form of intelligence. A reverence for this intelligence, and a healthy
desire to live in harmony with laws set down by this intelligence
should be the basis for any good religion.
As I understand it, Christ tried to teach people ways to adjust their
minds for greater harmony to this intelligence, but without the
use of priests, or need for the prevailing culture. I believe this got
him in trouble. Edited by: TeeJay

[Scronx]

Well, that's it. If you/re going to just come right to the point, 2/3 of human busyness will be obviated forever. Yes, design unquestionably connotes a designer.......and since that covers every last atomic particle in the universe, atheists should have no further comment to make.


But they will, of course. They've gotten this far denying that 2+2=4 and building card castles of illogic, conjecture and fantasy re our origins -- so they're not going to quit now! To putthe overall pointanother way -- if there's no creator, the (fictional) big bang or whatever was an accident, and if that was an accident, everything that's come after it is too, right?


If I were an atheist, I would consider it redundant to say "he got into an accident in his Porsche." I guess we'd just have to leave a blank space in the English language everywhere the word "accident" would go smileys/smiley2.gifEdited by: nelson

[Wolfram]

When all is said and done, I fall back on one statement andtwo questions:


The old Greeks had a saying, "From nothing comes nothing."


Regarding the big bang, (a) how did that atom get supercharged, and (b) where did it originally come from?


I often think atheism and the denial of free will ("determinism") spring largely from a refusal to accept responsibility for our own actions--a convenient way to blame external factors.

[Scronx]

Whew, we're on a roll here! Yes to the above! In one of the more often reprised radio sermons of Dr. D. James Kennedy we learn that the original world schemers in England (was it Bertrand Russell and co.?) decided that the Christian God had to go because his decrees "interfered with their sex lives" -- meaning the Scriptures and Ten Comandments gave them too many guilt pangs (or something like them) over their barnyardmorals.


Y'all have heard me mention having recently re-established contact with an atheist pal I knew from age 11 through 25 or so -- today a very distinguished New England scientist -- and having Gotten Into It,socialist versus nationalist, creation sciencevs evolutionism, the works. His answers are just impossibly blithe. Re the big bang, I asked him whether it was no longer true that everything that happens has a cause behind it, and what do you think her said? He said this IS no longer held to be true, and gave several examples (in inscrutible scientific jargon) of physical occurrences that science conveniently rules self-generating. Well, he's a good bud in spite of it all -- and his comments are most education!


Think of that! The basic laws of thermodynamics chucked on the scrap heap, without a ripple of publicity about it. Seriously, wouldn't that be about tantamount to repealing the law of gravity?

[Marlow]

Years ago, I half-heartedly took a stab at junior college for acouple of semesters. I took a class on comparative religion. The original teacher was a true atheist. Only a couple of weeks into the class, his wife died and he left for the semester.


His stand in was on the opposite end of the spectrum, Catholic, having studied to be a priest before deciding he'd rather teach. He came at the class from an entirely differnet angle and set out with an experiment to prove God exists through cause and effect, logical reasoning.


Needless to say, he was ridiculed and shouted down by the class, consisting mainly of Gen X'rs who'd been raised by MTV. Sadly, I agreed with them at the time. I left the class, being disgusted that this man would shove his religious BS down our throats like that in an institution of higher learning.


Now I'd like to hear how his experiment turned out.smileys/smiley2.gif.


I've been reading more on Darwinism lately, trying to cast a critical eye on the Theory of Evolution taught as Gospel (ironic, huh?) in public schools that I was indoctrinated with as a kid.


Try reading Chesterton's The Everlasting Man for a humorous and witty critique of evolutionary theory from an Orthodox Christian point of view.

[Scronx]

Great stuff, Marlow. Chesterton is fascinating --is it he or Belloc that's an extreme anti-protestant? GKC's brother A.K. Chesterton was a fine nationalist-type writer. Rpove the existence of God from logic . . . . isn't it pleasantly ironic that for us, it's like proving logically that water or air exists for people who hotly deny it. But logic is a powerful evangelical tool. (Why not? It's a gift from our supremely logical God). When I was still a rootless, clueless baby boomer I found a little book by Bishop James Pike that "argued" the reader into belief.......ad it was a beautiful presentation. A shame Pike was such a mess in his life . . .


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_PikeEdited by: nelson