Here.
We will not pursue that dispute here except to note that even if the case is made that ID could not count as proper science, which is controversial,[24] that would not in itself demonstrate a defect in design arguments as such. Science need not be seen as exhausting the space of legitimate conclusions from empirical data. In any case, the floods of vitriol in the current ID discussion suggest that much more than the propriety of selected inferences from particular empirical evidences is at issue.
7 comments:
methodological naturalism is not an external and artificial imposition on science but is the very essence of science itself-the empirical sciences are concerned with secondary causes and metaphysics with the first cause. The statement "God did it" may be true for everhything but is not scientific but metaphysical.
This is a legitimate position so long as you don't turn around and make the absence of scientific evidence for design as evidence of absence of design, and not a necessary feature of scientific reasoning itself. You have to the admit limits on science itself, and that is something a lot of people are not willing to do.
I find it curious too that those that demand teaching of ID in science classes do not also demand that Genesis 1 be taught in physics class room as well. After all, physics community has declared for the finite age of the universe and thus an instant when the Universe was created. The physicists are looking for non-agent (i.e. non-divine) means by which Big Bang might have occurred.
I imagine the reason why the Big Bang does not cause any controversy in the class room is here one has to frankly say "God did it". You could not beat about the bush with some unspecified designer. And since people still believe that "God did it" is not a scientific explanation, cosmology has managed to avoid this fight.
Gyan, what if some "secondary causes" are not physical causes? Rupert Sheldrake, for example, argues that there is extensive empirical data that cannot be explained by physical causes.
Dean Radin's short video is a good place to start.
Physical causes are a subset of secondary causes. For instance, psychological causes are nonphysical secondary causes.
Bilbo,
It seems to me that the experiments discussed in the Dean Radin video can also be used to show that prayer results in a statistical effect on the person being prayed for.
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