William Dembski: How To Be An Intellectually Fulfilled Atheist (or not) Part 2

[NevilleRhysBarnes]

Dembski's argument, summed up: Evolution hasn't yet accounted for every single biochemical pathway, so we have to immediately throw up our hands and say God did it.

Or we could just do some more research...

[mexico3210]

@NevilleRhysBarnes

Thanks for summing things up. I guess.

If it "hasn't yet accounted" for anything and "everyone in biology is an evolutionist," do you think it's reasonable to say "just do some more research"?

[NevilleRhysBarnes]

@mexico3210 No comprendo, Senor.

What do you mean, evolution hasn't yet accounted for "anything"?

[dlbattle100]

I can report a video for being hateful to religion, why can't I report it for being hateful to scientific truth?

[StLukey7]

there really is no such thing as an atheist. no one is that stupid!

[gregrutz]

@StLukey7 Everyone is born an atheist.

[jirris]

I find this problematic and telling. The fact that scientists can say "We don't know, but we have ideas" he finds unsatisfactory. He had a good grasp on evolutionary theory, but has no idea how science works. Science doesn't know everything, and in that he claims it is a failure. That saddens me and shows that he is educated enough to jump to conclusions without knowing what he's going on about or he's purposely misrepresenting things.

[paulinator61]

I can't believe in 2009 he's still dragging around the bacterial flagellum and mousetrap examples. These were debunked by Dr. Kenneth Miller in the 2005 Dover, PA court case.

I can't watch this any more, as I really like living in the 21st century.

[IloveYOUviruses]

evo imaginations: "it convinces them in the privacy of their minds" lol

[EastofForever]

the IQ of the guy below sits at @ 60 now.

[Orkaney]

I lost 15 IQ points just by watching this. )-:b

[IloveYOUviruses]

Maybe the universe just pop-ed into existance fully formed with life on it :) the chance is low, but consider an infinite number of possible universes!

[nonseans]

Funny. In this part, Dembski destroyed completely Behe's bacterial flagellum irreduceable complexity argument (with secretion type III system) and he still grasps it saying "show me the intermediates!". It sound like well known old song "show me the fossils". So, anyone still can feel as intelectually fulfilled as Dembski seems?

[ignatei]

بچه کونی الاغ

کون مادر و خواهرتو گاییدم, مادر قهبه

[lifeandphilosophy]

@nonseans

It appears that you are unfamiliar with Dembski's writings. Please do some research before blasting someone.

[nonseans]

@lifeandphilosophy I'm familiar enough with his speechings. Don't need anything more to know.

[lifeandphilosophy]

@nonseans

Really? If you had heard of his work you'd be familiar with his refutations to your straw man.

[nonseans]

@lifeandphilosophy And the only thing you can say is "if you would sth, then you could sth". If you would be wiser...

[onlinesid]

I don't know how people still believe evolution with the recent scientific findings against it.

[nonseans]

@onlinesid I'm looking forward this scientific findings, could you name a few of them?

[gabriele6sette]

Manatees pelvis must be further studied, I'm sure it has functions (e.g., at least it's something muscles are anchored to). Phylogenetic mapping is only the new wave in inventing descent trees: a good point is that it contradicts fossil based lineages.

Linnaeus organized living beings in a beautiful way based on similarities, which no creationist denies! He was a creationist, he used his brain, he saw similarities, he liked to define groups for the sake of it and to put order in biology.

[gabriele6sette]

Very similar embryos (trout, frog) develop from completely different gastrulas. Your gills are not even slits. Yes, sure, tooth producing genes ARE part of the divine plan, why not?

[gabriele6sette]

> most importantly phylogenetic mapping

Biased "science"! Please choose: whales come from hippotamuses (molecular "evidence") or from mesonychians (morphological "evidence")?

More below.

> your chromosomes are virtually identical to those of chimpanzees

So, why I'm so different? Maybe because of DNA your demigod Dawkins dubbed "junk"? Half of it is made of ERVs, related segments of which are found in UNRELATED species. They are functional, useful and we share only 7 of them with chimps.

[gabriele6sette]

> homology Non homologous genes produce homologous structures. > comparative anatomy Not enough space here, be content with homology (for now). >embryology Similar embryos "evolve" from completely different gastrulas. > atavisms Indeed a proof for artificial lineage! > vestigiality How would you terminate a human spine? Send me proposals for alternative coccyx design. > (most importantly) phylogenetic mapping Not most important, only longer to deal with in 500 characters. See my next reply.

[gabriele6sette]

We have sparse dots (the fossils) and you decide to connect them, but I will return to my boyish believe in evolution only when I see clear LINES in the fossils, not dots. You imagine lines between an extinct ape, yourself and chimps: free to do it, but it's your guess. As for me, I'm a man, not an ape, even if my chromosome are SIMILAR to those of a chimp. Similar doesn't mean equal. I see organisms have similar models, but this is not a proof of common descent.

[gotrootdude]

I'm a man. You, sir, are still an ape. We are similar, not equal.

[gabriele6sette]

I can see no chain at all, pure fantasy till now. A lot of fancy trees that change completely year after year and a lot of paintings and computer graphics, that's all. Homo Erectus was a man, Australopithecus was an ape, it wasn't even bipedal. Rodhocetus swam in the warm seas of evolutionists' dreams until they found it had substantial legs with which it walked far away from the whales they connected it with.

[gabriele6sette]

Surely not enough! I want nothing less than the footed whale, the bat-rat (or the rat-bat) and all the billion missing links, to belive in your religion. I want convincing ape-men, not monkeys like Lucy and co. Since this fantastic evolution requires millions of years, it is not observable by human beings, by definition, unless human beings live millions of years (but what a bore!). And the incapacity to explain life makes me very skeptic about all the other dogmas of your religion.

[gabriele6sette]

So all the mass of evidence you have is nylonase? That clear case of microevolution? Bring me the footed whale, instead, and I will bow to your god Dawkinks. Reproduce abiogenesis and I will kiss his holy feet too. Evolution is fiction, wishful thinking, it can't be observed: by definition. This debate will never end, it's a faith against another.

[LANSING52]

LOL

[ProudToBLoud]

Remember there is no demonstrated evidence of macro evolution by the processes of rm and ns that has ever been demonstrated or observed, there's no reason to believe that it can happen, you will never witness it and you will never read a paper where it was demonstrated by any process let alone natural processes,speculation, assumption, conjecture and supposition are no replacement for emperically observed evidence which there isnt any, evolution that is fine but darwinism is far more tentative.

[ProudToBLoud]

it depends on what your definition of evolution means, if it means the future is different from the past then it does meet the definition of evolution, if it is in how darwin means micro to macro evolution by the processes of rm and ns then no of course it is not a demonstration of that either, I cannot give you an example that thus no analogy of it happening, you cannot give me any emperical evidence where micro to macro evolution change was observed by rm and ns either, it fails at the start.

[ProudToBLoud]

1. it was just an example not a perfect example but an example none the less. 2. donexodus actually used that example for macro evolutionary change 3. It is impossible for me to fail because micro to macro change by the processes of rm and ns, has never ever been observed to occur, it is something that is the subject of speculation, conjecture and assumption, I perfectly well understand how evolution works for you that is not based on emperical observed evidence, sowwie.

[ProudToBLoud]

From the day you were born you have gone thru changes, there are mechanisms that caused those changes however you are still a human being and you will die a human being, you never became something new, you didnt evolve into something completly different, just because there are mechanisms that cause changes with you, they do not cause you to change into something else and there is no reason to believe that happens with anything else according changes happen within species and that is it.

[ProudToBLoud]

Ok i will give you an example because you are asking me, I am trying to keep this cordial it is not about being right or wrong, remember even as an agnostic and for the time i was an atheist i was skeptical of evolution, however do not take this the wrong way but i feel you believe in evolution for more than rational reasons but emotional too, now maybe you are right but i believe emotional reaosns are there, ok i will answer your question with an example.

[ProudToBLoud]

IM not anti evolution I am just skeptical of some of its claims, I always accepted speciation, I just am skeptical of its other claims, no goalposts have been shifted

Im trying to keep this cordial but you are attacking strawmen, I never said that there are not succesful instances of speciation, you can give me those all day, there is no succesfull instances of observed macro changes by the processes of rm and ns.

[ProudToBLoud]

Nope, I want to see an animal develop new beneficial stuctures by the process of mutation, you are either lying or misrepresenting what I am saying, in 70 years of experiments no new beneficial structures were created with fruit flies or moths only deformity and death, you can run away from the fact that the mechanism for macro change has failed in the lab , you can run but not hide.

[ProudToBLoud]

I never said speciation was not observed

I said mutations were not observed as have being the mechanism that caused that change with those lizards and at the end of the day they were still lizards, evolution has been demonstrated, sure at the speciation level, but that is not really evidence for what you are arguing for is it.

[ProudToBLoud]

You have failed to provide any evidence above speciation beyond personal credulity, you have failed to provide any evidence that merits refutation as you just offer proofs by assertion, Being called scientifically iliterate by you is like being condemned by arsonist for lighting a cigarette, ignorance and religion drive your belief in evolution and lack of awarness is plain to see, and that really does matter.

[ProudToBLoud]

Those lizards werent observed, the mechanism of mutation was not observed, they went back to the island later on but they never observed the mechanism and when they went back they were still lizards, when it comes to experiments to create new and benefical morphological change the experiments in the lab with fruit flies and moth lead to death and deformity, ignorance along with religion drives your belief in evolution and it matters.

[ProudToBLoud]

No religion does

Your arguments for evolution are anti creationism, even though I never argued for god, you also brought that up too, it is evidence of projection on your part, you somehow belief evolution being wrong is contingent on creationism and belief in god, religion drives your belief in evolution and it matters.

[ProudToBLoud]

What we observed with 70 years of mutation experiments in the lab is no new beneficial structures just deformity and death, you actually have faith in a mechanism where the emeprical evidence of mutation shows death and deformity and failed the lab test, to do that requires so much faith, religion drives your silly"chance done it"belief in evolution and it matters.

[ProudToBLoud]

Did you observe how the cell came into being?, have you ever observed information coming from non intelligent sources?

religion drives your belief in evolution and it matters.

[ProudToBLoud]

ahhhhhhh appealing to creationism again, now I never made any arguments for creationism but in your desperation you did, religion drives your belief in evolution and oh how it matters.

[ProudToBLoud]

No they operate outside of emepricism for evolutionary scenarios, remember empericism is what we observe happening with the 5 senses.

There is no reason to assume natural origins when we know that outside of dna information is a product of intelligence only.

[ProudToBLoud]

We can only appeal to time for abiogenesis, if scientists in my lifetime were able to create the stupiyingly complex cell with dna and the information contained within then i would don my hat to them and say that is the most amazing thing that has ever been achieved, however not only do i not see that happening, if they did create a dna information rich cell that would still be life coming from previous life, which would really still be biogenesis, life coming from previous life.

[ProudToBLoud]

"There is no religion in evolution, only the wealth of evidence. "

Oh but there is there are religious arguments about how god would have designed things and non emperical claims of how life evolved naturally, even if they are complicated scenarios with no emperical evidence for these claims,scientists operate outside of empericism and the evidence apart from speciation is based on faith based statements and inferences but is not based on emericism, religion drives evolution and it matters.

[ProudToBLoud]

No but it does because evolutionists use anti creationism to say evolution is true, while it is true that evolutionists say evolution does not deal with the origin of life, it is certainly related, after all for the evolutionists if life did not evolve and came into being fully formed then that means their evolution story is dead, thus whether evolution speaks to origins or not is a moot point, cont:

[ProudToBLoud]

it wasn't scientific self-correction that uncovered Reuben's fraud, but a bureaucrat at the hospital

[ProudToBLoud]

Does being skeptical of evolution= creationism because if it does then you are making it a religious argument, that means that evolution is your own creation story, because I never raised creationism or argued for it, it is a red herring and irrelevant to the discussion, but your obession with it does show that you hold to it for anti creation reasons rather than pro evolution reasons, religion drives your belief in evolution and it matters.

[ProudToBLoud]

"Twenty-three years later, the mother was convicted of smothering her five children. Scientific naïveté surely contributed to the false conclusion, but a forensic pathologist was not one of the reviewers. The faulty research in part prompted the National Institutes of Health to spend millions of dollars on a wrong line of research. " 23 invaulable years wasted and millions of dollars too but its ok because the science fetishists reasoning is that its ok in the end lol

[ProudToBLoud]

"None of the recent flawed studies have been as humiliating as an article in 1972 in the journal Pediatrics that labeled sudden infant death syndrome a hereditary disorder, when, in the case examined, the real cause was murder. "

[ProudToBLoud]

From ny times "However, even the system's most ardent supporters acknowledge that peer review does not eliminate mediocre and inferior papers and has never passed the very test for which it is used. Studies have found that journals publish findings based on sloppy statistics. If peer review were a drug, it would never be marketed, say critics, including journal editors"

[ProudToBLoud]

Mahoney found two things: First, reviewers were more likely to reject papers that did not support the theory they favored. Second, reviewers were on average more critical of the methodology in the papers that did not support their prior views---even though the methodologies were identical. That is, the reviewers in Mahoney's study held conflicting theories to a higher standard.

[ProudToBLoud]

"Consider this study by Michael Mahoney. He prepared two papers that were identical in methodology, but different in which theory the results supported. He sent these papers out for review by reviewers who had earlier expressed support for either the theory supported by the experimental results, or the theory refuted by the experimental results

[ProudToBLoud]

"The discrepancy between the number of scientists owning up to misconduct and those having been observed by colleagues is likely to be in part due to fears over anonymity, Dr Fanelli suggests. Anyone who has ever falsified research is probably unwilling to reveal it despite all guarantees of anonymity"

[ProudToBLoud]

"The findings, published in the peer-reviewed journal PLoS One, are based on a review of 21 scientific misconduct surveys carried out between 1986 and 2005. The results paint a picture of a profession in which dishonesty and misrepresentation are widespread"

[ProudToBLoud]

"And around 46 per cent say that they have observed fellow scientists engage in questionable practices, such as presenting data selectively or changing the conclusions of a study in response to pressure from a funding source"

Another flaw in the peer review process, you present flawed data because you want to win funding rather than present something that challenges the prevailing view, ahhhhh how great is the peer review process eh.

[ProudToBLoud]

ahhhhhhhh if there is fraud within an accountacy firm and an auditor discovers it, Then everything is A Ok, because it was corrected lol

[ProudToBLoud]

"It would be misguided indeed for Nature to have any competitor's sense of Schadenfreude over Science's experiences with two papers on human embryonic stem cells by Woo Suk Hwang and his colleagues. It is possible that we at Nature would have published the papers had they been submitted to us instead."

[ProudToBLoud]

This is just the tip of the iceberg, the scientific frauds that have been discovered and admitted to are almost surely dwarfed by the number that have successfully eluded the "rigorous" process of peer review

[ProudToBLoud]

I am just giving you a few examples here, lol, do you think I have time for your ignorance to list them all?

[ProudToBLoud]

Just google

"scientists fake data" then you will get the story,

there are many sources the times newspaper of london for one

[ProudToBLoud]

From nature

"Nearly half of the neuroimaging studies published in prestige journals in 2008 contain unintentionally biased data that could distort their scientific conclusions, according to scientists at the National Institute of Mental Health in Bethesda, Maryland.

Experts in the field contacted by Nature have been taken aback by the extent of the methodological errors getting through the supposedly strict peer-review systems of the journals in question"

[ProudToBLoud]

You dont even know what you are gassing about, Barbra mclintock was forced to publish her results informally, she is just one example of those that have been denied by the bias of the gatekeepers.

[ProudToBLoud]

Thats good that you brought up the subject of creationism because evolutionists spend more time attacking creationism which is a red herring but then evolutionists do spend more time making religious arguments against creation than providing the evidence for their naturalism, religion drives your science and it matters.

[ProudToBLoud]

A few lol, that one man alone had around 70 articles, and then there are countless ghost written drug trials that pass the peer review test and then those drugs go into the market, You do not even know how many mistakes go in and have not been discorved, 1 in 7 scientists admit faking data and that does not take into account the scientists that do not admit fruad themselves.

[ProudToBLoud]

"Reuben's fraud appears to eclipse even that of Andrew Wakefield, as hard as that is to believe. Indeed, I've never seen an example involving such a massive body of work so important to a field over so many years. It's truly staggering. A PubMed search shows that Dr. Reuben has over 70 peer-reviewed papers. "

[ProudToBLoud]

The confirmed articles were published in Anesthesiology, Anesthesia and Analgesia, the Journal of Clinical Anesthesia and other titles, which have retracted the papers or will soon do so, according to people familiar with the scandal (see list). The journals stressed that Dr. Reuben's co-authors on those papers have not been accused of wrongdoing."

[ProudToBLoud]

"a leading anesthesiology researcher has been accused of falsifying data and other fraud in potentially dozens of published studies.

Scott S. Reuben, MD, of Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, Mass., a pioneer in the area of multimodal analgesia, is said to have fabricated his results in at least 21, and perhaps many more, articles dating back to 1996. cont:

[ProudToBLoud]

"When a scientific study is conducted with rigor, it is generally submitted to peer review"

Yes and the reviewer takes it on trust that the person that has conducted the study has told the truth but as scientists have lied before bad science has passed the peer review process, secondly i gave barbra mclintock as an example which went over your head, you missed the point about the thuggery too, you are in no position to judge as you lack basic comprehension.

[ProudToBLoud]

rational,

I never said that peer review was a matter of vote, clearly you do not understand my posts or you are misrepresenting them, the point is that alot of scientists will go with what is in the peer review and ignore somebody that challenges it, bad science often gets into peer review and good science gets kept out, peer review resemble little more than union thuggery as barbara mclintock discovered.

[ProudToBLoud]

I can go thru a list if you want to show just how fallacious it is to appeal to peer review and appeal to vote.

[ProudToBLoud]

Peer review

LoL

peer review is little more than union thuggery, not only has peer review kept out good science but at the same time the so called vast majority of scientists have got it wrong while the scientists running against the grain turned out to be right, science is not a democracy and you appealing to vote is fallacious not science.

[urbanelf]

It's funny.... when he gives the example of there being no account of a complete evolutionary pathway between two biochemical systems one could just replace "evolutionary process" with "intelligent designer"... no design theorist has given a complete account of how a biochemical system was designed. It's all just stories.

For Dembski, design and chance have two different standards of evidence.

[ProudToBLoud]

andywaggott is an example of the level of sophistication the arguments for evolution come from the evolutionists.

[SEvangelicalSeminary]

Thank you for you ad hominem. Please comment again when you have a substantive critique.

[d4star]

This guy is a disgrace to Science, he talks utter drivel.

[andywaggott]

What an utter fraud.

[SEvangelicalSeminary]

Thank you for you ad hominem. Please comment again when you have a substantive critique.

[andywaggott]

Allow me to substantiate: He is a trained mathematician and yet he came up with his irreducible complexity theory based on very very bad maths. He made it up to support the idea that "god made everything". Rather than the evidence based science of evolution theory.

To give you an example of just how bad his maths was: I saw a car today with the reg plate of G427 EDY earlier today. Amazing, what was the chance of that, of all the millions of cars in the country, I happened to see that one. Tiny.