Dembski's latest rant

[Captain Ochre]

The dishonest word twisting just doesn’t stop with you, does it Captain?

Ho-hum. Another logical fallacy courtesy of the Tigster.
http://www.iep.utm.edu/f/fallacies.h...lex%20Question

CO:
As "naive" and "stupid" are listed as synonyms, it should be clear to you that Scott did present Americans as stupid where stupid shares the same meaning as "naive".
Isn't that obvious?

No, it is NOT obvious. Just because words MAY be substituted for one another in certain specific instances does not mean they CAN be substituted in EVERY instance.

Agreed, but since that has nothing to do with what I wrote, it might as well be a straw man fallacy. Maybe you should reread what I wrote?

If you are a right-handed golfer and hit the ball with a big left curve, you are a hooker. Hooker is a synonym for prostitute. Does that mean that everyone who curves their golf ball left is a prostitute?

Of course not. That would be a fallacy of equivocation. I strongly suggest that you reread my words:
As "naive" and "stupid" are listed as synonyms, it should be clear to you that Scott did present Americans as stupid where stupid shares the same meaning as "naive".
Isn't that obvious?
There's no excuse for you to derive a fallacy of equivocation out of what I wrote. No good excuse, I should say.

In the Scott case, it was clear that Dembski’s claiming “naïve” meant “stupid” was NOT what Scott had implied.

How was it clear, apart from your own stubborn insistence?

Claiming “naïve” meant “stupid” was clearly dishonest on Dembski’s part.

How was it clear, apart from your own stubborn insistence? Shouldn't the alleged clarity make the explanation easy, rather than providing you the excuse to avoid the explanation?

Your feeble attempts to defend him are equally dishonest.

So you say--though we seem to have experienced yet another Tiggy-sponsored drought of evidence.

I concede that you found a single instance on the web where naïve was listed a synonym for stupid. That is not a common usage.

It's common enough to also occur in Roget's International Thesaurus (Third Edition, Thomas Y. Crowell Company, 1962), and unless the usage is particularly uncommon, your caveat is irrelevant. When Dembski associates "stupid" with "naive" one cannot reasonably refrain from according him the benefit of the doubt regarding his use of the term as synonyms except by appealing to ignorance.

Interesting, that the very source you cited here http://thesaurus.reference.com/search?q=naive does NOT list “stupid” as a synonym for “naïve”

Main Entry: naive
Part of Speech: adjective
Definition: childlike
Synonyms: aboveboard, artless, callow, candid, confiding, countrified, credulous, forthright, frank, fresh, green, guileless, gullible, harmless, ignorant, impulsive, ingenuous, innocent, innocuous, instinctive, jejune, lamb, natural, open, original, patsy, plain, simple, simple-minded, sincere, spontaneous, square, sucker, trusting, unaffected, unjaded, unpretentious, unschooled, unsophisticated, unsuspecting, unsuspicious, untaught, unworldly, virgin, wide-eyed
Antonyms: experienced, sophisticated

Source:
Roget's New Millennium™ Thesaurus, First Edition (v 1.1.1)
Copyright © 2005 by Lexico Publishing Group, LLC. All rights reserved.

You're making the mistake of assuming that the average thesaurus is intended to be an exhaustive account of synonyms, AFAICT. If you wish to suggest the listing of the two as synonyms elsewhere is a mistake based on the omission you cite then you're making a rather weak case.

Check out the synonyms for "childlike" from the same source, which is the very definition they give for "naive":

Main Entry: childlike
Part of Speech: adjective
Definition: innocent
Synonyms: artless, childish, credulous, guileless, immature, ingenuous, naive, natural, simple, spontaneous, trustful, trusting, unaffected, unfeigned

http://thesaurus.reference.com/search?q=childlike

You'll find the same tendency in your bound thesaurus, I expect.
You would conclude that "unjaded" isn't truly a synonym for "naive", I suppose.

Scott used "naive". Dembski claimed "stupid". Dembski's actions were dishonest, no matter how many rhetorical tricks you pull.

Sounds like your mind is made up regardless of the evidence.

[Captain Ochre]

You're defending Dembski's BS again...I've explained already why Scott did NOT intend to call people stupid.

I suppose I'll have to do a treatment of your attempted argument in order to satisfy you. It's on the to-do list (probably for Monday).

It's got nothing to do with intelligence, but with the time, basically. For the full context and reason, just read that post again.


You seemed to have said before that Dembski was not trying to make it seem that Scott was calling people stupid (though you've been inconsistent on that):

I've only been inconsistent on that if you're equivocating (which of course would nullify the supposed inconsistency on my part, placing it on you).

...now you're going back on that, or did I totally misread what you said here?

and

Yeah, your interpretation seems to qualify as equivocal. Your side seems to think that "naive" not only wasn't intended as an insult, but that neither can it be taken as an insult. If it can be taken as an insult, then the result is that the comment was insulting even if it wasn't intended that way.

Let's look at context.

Your dodge is: You refuse to admit that there's a difference in the way that Scott used the word naive as opposed to saying the people are "stupid", even after Jugulum tries to explain it to you.

In order to avoid dodging I have to agree with his conclusion? Or did I miss something? Have you presupposed that I'm wrong or what?

"the pools of meaning intersect"? The ___?! The only reason they "intersect" is becuase you're refusing to look at Jugulum's explanation.

Baloney.

Of course if one ignores the context like that, the meaning will "intersect"! That's why we look at the context. That's something Dembski and you seem to not want to do.

I'm on record referring to the context, both to the context of Dembski's comments and in wishing that Scott's comments were available in their original context. The latter we do not have (as yet), and it is flatly unfair of you to suggest that I have ignored the context.

I'll cite the specific posts later if you find that your memory requires jogging.

[Tiggy]

I can't provide any rebuttal to you in any involved sense because you have not provided an argument.

Waaaa!! Waaaa!! I don't see any evidence!! Waaa!!

Somebody get that man a pacifier!

Gee Captain, getting frustrated because no one will buy into your rhetorical word-twisting follies?

Argument via weblink is against the forum rules. If Tiggy has a problem with the forum rules then he needs to take it up with a forum administrator.

Guess what Captain - at least one moderator DID review the thread, and this the relevant part of what he wrote

You are allowed to post some of the substantive material from an article there, then reference the particular article for further reading

Which is exactly what I DID do. I DID follow forum rules, which is why my posts were allowed to stand unaltered. That hasn't stopped you from bellyaching about it in every subsequent post though.

It's funny to watch you flop and squirm, deny facts just because you don't like them, and generally stick your foot deeper into your mouth. It was especially amusing to watch you exhibit your stupidity over the usage of synonyms. All your semantic games won't cover the flaccidness of your arguments Captain. You're a credit to Creationists everywhere!

- Tiggy

[Jorge]

If there's one thing I've learned about you Horhay, it's to never underestimate your stupidity.



So all you and ID have to do is show that the specific, particular protein that you claim to have calculated the odds of forming is the only one possible for life to exist.

Show us your work that demonstrates conculsively that all other possible combinations somehow prohibit life from forming.

Every time I deal a deck of shuffled cards the odds of getting a particular sequence is 1 in 52!, an incredibly small number. Still, every time I deal, the odds that I get get SOME combination of 52 cards is ONE.

Your incredibly moronic reasoning defies description.

- Tiggy

You're doing it again, Tiggy - asking me to waste my time on your sophomoric, shallow thoughts (assuming 'thinking' is what you're doing).

Pay attention, I'll try to go slow : it is a known scientific fact (as in fact, Fact, FACT!) that unless the precise sequence of amino acids occurs then the protein will either not 'fold' at all or will fold into a non-functional structure.

Now, you can speculate all you want that, say, sequence number 1,231,467,934 out of the 10³⁹⁰ in the sample space is also functional but the fact is that you're merely speculating, period. Be a good little scientist wannabe and at least try to stick to the facts, will ya.

And, yes, thanks for blessing us with that 'great revelation' that the probability that one element of the sample space will occur is 1 (ummm, that's actually a mathematical tautology, in case you didn't know). The fact is that we have one precise sequence out of the vast sample space occurring and that this sequence is the only one that'll work as far as we know. Again, stick to the facts!

Using your card analogy, why don't you right now write down a sequence of those 52 cards, then shuffle a deck thoroughly, and call us when the exact sequence that you wrote down appears.

Hey folks, waddaya think - will that keep Tiggy out of our hair at least until the next Ice Age?

Jorge

[Jorge]

I think, though, that naturalism does not say that we are looking for any ONE PARTICULAR sequence. There are a whole slough of other combinations that could have arisen, which may also have survived and gotten passed on to an extent. If you look for ANY particular sequence, you'll always come up with huge odds.


PS: I think I'll stay here for now! You guys are having too much fun over in the other thread for me to muck you up.

See post # 64, this thread, and apply that to yourself, Ilkee.

Jorge

[jason]

Hey Jason, where's that positive evidence for ID you said Dembski submitted?

And where's that scientific experiment that could falsify ID?

The Nobel Prize Committee is waiting!

- Tiggy

Wow that was a particularly brain dead response

Please quote in this thread where I said Dembski submitted positive evidence.

No wonder you have your panties in a know, you can't read.

And of course there is a simple experiment to falsify ID. Explain the setwise evolution of the eye. If it is a "fact,Fact,FACT" that only the "stupid ignorant or evil" would deny, then this should be trivial.

By comaprison there is no evidence that could falsify the naturalists creation myth.

Jason

[sylas]

And of course there is a simple experiment to falsify ID. Explain the setwise evolution of the eye. If it is a "fact,Fact,FACT" that only the "stupid ignorant or evil" would deny, then this should be trivial.

It is trivial, or comparatively so, in the sense that there are perfectly plausible stepwise sequences available. Darwin himself gave a quite competent defense of this possibility in Chapter 6 of Origin. Since then lots of others have spelt out more detail in various ways, and there is good evidence on some details of the actual sequence that did take place. The literature on this is enormous, and no one has ever presented any aspect of the eye that is unlikely to arise by some kind of accumulation of evolutionary change.

We're never likely to know every step that actually took place in history in full detail, any more than we can give the full history of orbits for bodies in the solar system, given the chaotic effects of multi-body interactions. No-one with any sense considers this a refutation of gravity; and similarly no one of any sense thinks you need to know the precise history to be confident of the capacity of evolution to produce a historical sequence. It is enough to know that there are plausible evolutionary pathways, or plausible gravitational interactions to give rise to existing motions in the solar system. That some people think evolution ought to be able to identify exactly the historical sequence that took place is pretty clueless.

Cheers -- Sylas

[Tiggy]

Please quote in this thread where I said Dembski submitted positive evidence.

I apologize. It was Calvinist4Him who actually made that claim, not you. My bad.

As Sylas has already noted, there is considerable evidence that eye development is the result of purely evolutionary steps. A PubMed search will turn up dozens of papers on the topic, if you are really interested. Somehow I get the feeling that you won't do any research, but merely stick to your uninformed denials.

Since your criteria for falsifying ID has been met, will you now concede that ID has indeed been falsified?

- Tiggy

[Tiggy]

Using your card analogy, why don't you right now write down a sequence of those 52 cards, then shuffle a deck thoroughly, and call us when the exact sequence that you wrote down appears.

Actually Horhay, I'll do the research the ID way! I dealt out 52 cards, and wrote down the sequence after the fact. Then I calculated the odds after the fact of that sequence, and they were fantastically low! Guess I should hold a press conferrence and announce that I have evidence of the Intelligent Card Stacker, right?

Calculating low probabilities and claiming them as evidence for design after the fact is worthless.

You still need to show that the protein structure you calculated the odds for is the only possible one that can support life. It could be that 90% of all combinations could support life - no one knows - but you're basing your claims that this particular protein sequence is the only possible one.

Of course you're way too stupid to understand this fatal flaw in your ID probability argument. The scientific community isn't so dense, however, which is why Bozos like you get laughed at.

- Tiggy

[aniso]

Captain, do I understand this correctly that you are actually debating the comparative definitions of 'naive' and 'stupid'? Saying they are the same? I don't have much time to read the thread all the way through, so I apologize if this is the wrong impression.

It's common enough to also occur in Roget's International Thesaurus (Third Edition, Thomas Y. Crowell Company, 1962), and unless the usage is particularly uncommon, your caveat is irrelevant. When Dembski associates "stupid" with "naive" one cannot reasonably refrain from according him the benefit of the doubt regarding his use of the term as synonyms except by appealing to ignorance.

On the other hand we can withold the benefit of the doubt from the person who used the term origianlly. Is that what you are saying?

You're making the mistake of assuming that the average thesaurus is intended to be an exhaustive account of synonyms, AFAICT.

And perhaps you are making the mistake of assuming that the definitions of synonyms are exactly the same.

Check out the synonyms for "childlike" from the same source, which is the very definition they give for "naive":

Main Entry: childlike
Part of Speech: adjective
Definition: innocent
Synonyms: artless, childish, credulous, guileless, immature, ingenuous, naive, natural, simple, spontaneous, trustful, trusting, unaffected, unfeigned

http://thesaurus.reference.com/search?q=childlike

You'll find the same tendency in your bound thesaurus, I expect.
You would conclude that "unjaded" isn't truly a synonym for "naive", I suppose.

My head hurts. Are you now saying that 'childlike' also means 'stupid'? Why do we so commonly get into arguments over semantics with YECs telling us what 'evolution' really is and what a 'theory' really means? Now we have to decide what 'naive' really means!

[ilkhani'tus]

See post # 64, this thread, and apply that to yourself, Ilkee.

Jorge

Jorge, Tiggy has already done what I was going to do...

Actually Horhay, I'll do the research the ID way! I dealt out 52 cards, and wrote down the sequence after the fact. Then I calculated the odds after the fact of that sequence, and they were fantastically low! Guess I should hold a press conferrence and announce that I have evidence of the Intelligent Card Stacker, right?

Calculating low probabilities and claiming them as evidence for design after the fact is worthless.

You still need to show that the protein structure you calculated the odds for is the only possible one that can support life. It could be that 90% of all combinations could support life - no one knows - but you're basing your claims that this particular protein sequence is the only possible one.

You see, the IDists and YECists I suppose, look at what we already have, and then say: "what are the chances of things turning out exactly as they are"?

Thing is, no evolutionist has said that things HAD to turn out the way they are. As for proteins and amino acids fitting, different amino acids could have led to different proteins, which then would have resulted in different forms of life.

The physical laws of chemistry allow many bonding arrangements among organic molecules. That is an established "fact". Jorge. What makes you think that only the proteins that currently exist are the only ones that could make life? Life like US maybe, but what makes you think that we're the only kind of life there is?

Look at the life forms around undersea vents. They don't even rely on the sun at all, unlike us. Their chemistry is markedly different.

Pay attention, I'll try to go slow : it is a known scientific fact (as in fact, Fact, FACT!) that unless the precise sequence of amino acids occurs then the protein will either not 'fold' at all or will fold into a non-functional structure.

Now, you can speculate all you want that, say, sequence number 1,231,467,934 out of the 10390 in the sample space is also functional but the fact is that you're merely speculating, period. Be a good little scientist wannabe and at least try to stick to the facts, will ya.

And, yes, thanks for blessing us with that 'great revelation' that the probability that one element of the sample space will occur is 1 (ummm, that's actually a mathematical tautology, in case you didn't know). The fact is that we have one precise sequence out of the vast sample space occurring and that this sequence is the only one that'll work as far as we know. Again, stick to the facts!

Not just one. Your last statment falls apart given that fact I just mentioned.

[ilkhani'tus]

Quote:
It's got nothing to do with intelligence, but with the time, basically. For the full context and reason, just read that post again.


You seemed to have said before that Dembski was not trying to make it seem that Scott was calling people stupid (though you've been inconsistent on that):


I've only been inconsistent on that if you're equivocating (which of course would nullify the supposed inconsistency on my part, placing it on you).

Let's see, in one post you seem to agree that he is saying that Scott is saying that people are stupid

You need to check your own writing for insidious twisting. Who said "stupid" where you put in between quotation marks? Didn't Demski provide her exact word ("naive")?
If you don't have Scott's exact words (as you appear to admit), then on what basis do you conclude that Dembski twisted them (let alone for inflammatory purposes)?

You imply that the words mean pretty much the same thing, even though others have quoted dictionary definitions to show that it is not the case.


and in another post, you say something different:

It seems to me that Dembski was explicitly placing Scott's comments in the context of his own writing on the subject. Rather than saying the Scott thinks that Americans are stupid (empty of context), Dembski is saying that the issues should not be considered too complex to warrant vigorous discussion both at the high school and popular levels.

and it's because I'm equivocating?

The best you can hope for, that I even hope for, is that I somehow misunderstood what you said.

Quote:
...now you're going back on that, or did I totally misread what you said here?

and




Yeah, your interpretation seems to qualify as equivocal. Your side seems to think that "naive" not only wasn't intended as an insult, but that neither can it be taken as an insult.

Only if we can take the context into account. Thing is, Dembski never left us any sodding context! So, we have no choice but to look over other of Eugenie Scott's writings. (That is, I believe, the article that I couldn't find earlier)

I've done that, and from what I can tell, she does NOT think that people are stupid!

If it can be taken as an insult, then the result is that the comment was insulting even if it wasn't intended that way.

Well, let's see, when Dembski puts words in people mouths that they didn't say, how can it NOT be taken as an insult, especially when the words he puts in their mouths makes the person in question look like they're looking down on others? That's slander.

Quote:
Let's look at context.

Your dodge is: You refuse to admit that there's a difference in the way that Scott used the word naive as opposed to saying the people are "stupid", even after Jugulum tries to explain it to you.


In order to avoid dodging I have to agree with his conclusion? Or did I miss something? Have you presupposed that I'm wrong or what?

Kind of like you and Dembski have presupposed that Scott called people stupid? Nope.

You're dodging was avoiding the fact that naive does NOT necessarily mean stupid. Aniso is trying to explain that to you now, I believe. Maybe you should look up those 2 words in a dictionary.

Here, let me do it for you:
naive:

Main Entry: na·ive
Variant(s): or na·ïve /nä-'Ev/
Function: adjective
Inflected Form(s): na·iv·er; -est
Etymology: French naïve, feminine of naïf, from Old French, inborn, natural, from Latin nativus native
1 : marked by unaffected simplicity : ARTLESS, INGENUOUS
2 a : deficient in worldly wisdom or informed judgment; especially : CREDULOUS b : not previously subjected to experimentation or a particular experimental situation <made the test with naive rats>; also : not having previously used a particular drug (as marijuana)
3 : SELF-TAUGHT, PRIMITIVE
synonym see NATURAL
- na·ive·ly or na·ïve·ly adverb
- na·ive·ness noun

stupid

Main Entry: 1stu·pid
Pronunciation: 'stü-p&d, 'styü-
Function: adjective
Etymology: Middle French stupide, from Latin stupidus, from stupEre to be numb, be astonished -- more at TYPE
1 a : slow of mind : OBTUSE b : given to unintelligent decisions or acts : acting in an unintelligent or careless manner c : lacking intelligence or reason : BRUTISH
2 : dulled in feeling or sensation : TORPID <still stupid from the sedative>
3 : marked by or resulting from unreasoned thinking or acting : SENSELESS
4 a : lacking interest or point b : VEXATIOUS, EXASPERATING <this stupid flashlight won't work>
- stu·pid·ly adverb
- stu·pid·ness noun
synonyms STUPID, DULL, DENSE, CRASS, DUMB mean lacking in power to absorb ideas or impressions. STUPID implies a slow-witted or dazed state of mind that may be either congenital or temporary <stupid students just keeping the seats warm> <stupid with drink>....

You seem to have a hard time realizing that those words do NOT mean the same thing:

You need to check your own writing for insidious twisting. Who said "stupid" where you put in between quotation marks? Didn't Demski provide her exact word ("naive")?
If you don't have Scott's exact words (as you appear to admit), then on what basis do you conclude that Dembski twisted them (let alone for inflammatory purposes)?

Now how "similar" do those words sound to you? Aniso was right. It's unbelievable that you IDers and YECists are constantly playing these IDiotic semantic games.

Or, as Jugulum had said in that thread:

Do you see the difference between "You're too stupid to understand this," and, "You'll need to study more of the groundwork before you can understand it"? Do you see the applicability of the distinction?

No bloody wonder the general public is confused about evolution, with all the tricks you people pull.


You had said that Jugulum could be right, but that you doubted it. On what basis did you doubt that naive and stupid had different meanings?

Quote:
"the pools of meaning intersect"? The ___?! The only reason they "intersect" is becuase you're refusing to look at Jugulum's explanation.


Baloney.

Total fact.

Quote:
Of course if one ignores the context like that, the meaning will "intersect"! That's why we look at the context. That's something Dembski and you seem to not want to do.


I'm on record referring to the context, both to the context of Dembski's comments and in wishing that Scott's comments were available in their original context.

Talk to your hero Dembski, since he never provided any context.

The latter we do not have (as yet), and it is flatly unfair of you to suggest that I have ignored the context.

Do you want to know WHY we dont' have Scott's comments (from that particular speech anyway) in her "original context"? Your hero, Dembski, as is typical of IDers and YECers, NEVER GAVE THE CONTEXT. No quotes, nothing! WE only have his word to go by.

Forgive me if that's not enough.

Now, since we don't have that, we can only go to some of her other writings.
In the first one, she talks about the problems that religious people may have with the theory, and she tells how it should be presented. Nowhere does she imply that people are "stupid".

In the second article, she mentions WHY people have a hard time digesting evolution, especially in oral debates.

second article

Now, there are ways to have a formal debate that actually teaches the audience something about science, or evolution, and that has the potential to expose creation science for the junk it is. This is to have a narrowly-focused exchange in which the debaters deal with a limited number of topics. Instead of the "Gish Gallop" format of most debates where the creationist is allowed to run on for 45 minutes or an hour, spewing forth torrents of error that the evolutionist hasn't a prayer of refuting in the format of a debate, the debaters have limited topics and limited time. For example, the creationist has 10 minutes to discuss a topic on which creationists and evolutionists disagree (intermediate forms, the nature of science [with or without the supernatural], the 2nd law of thermodynamics disproves evolution, the inadequacy of mutation and selection to produce new "kinds", etc.) The evolutionist then has a 5 minute rebuttal, followed by a 2 minute reprise from the creationist. Next, the evolutionist takes 10 minutes to discuss an agreed-upon issue, with the creationist taking the next five minutes, and this time the evolutionist gets the final 2 minute follow-up.

With this format, the audience is given digestible bits of information and is not overwhelmed by a barrage of impossible-to- answer nonsense. The evolutionist at least has a fighting chance to teach something about science and evolution.

© source where applicable

Note that she says right afterwards that creationists try to avoid this kind of debate.


Now....

The converstation seems to have overlooked the fact that Dembski quoted precisely the term used by Scott ("naive"). The context gives us no grounds for supposing that Dembski was attempting deceitfully alter the meaning of Scott's words.

The context (ie. none) gives us no grounds for supposing that Dembski was not attempting to alter the meaning of Scott's words. Especially when he uses different words than she did! You sure seem eager to give this man the benefit of the doubt, don't you, CO? A lot more than you're willing to give to Scott.

If the intelligence of the public is not questioned, then why wouldn't non-directed evolution do very well against ID in public debate? Can naivete in its most complimentary sense satisfy the purpose for which Scott employs it?

Yes, once you read out the Eugenie Scott quote about debating creationists that I have above, you'll see why.

Because evolution, despite what Dembski claims, is a complicated subject that covers many fields. At most, only a cursory scan of it would be able to be afforded the time. Otherwise, it'd soak up all sorts of class time.

If you're interested, this article may explain more of why it's hard to teach evolution in public.

article

Three unfortunate facts conspire to put most high school biology teachers at a severe disadvantage when challenges to evolution arise. First, few teachers are acquainted with the ever-evolving range of creationist arguments. Second, most teachers do not have enough background and training in the range of subjects and disciplines pertinent to evolution to respond effectively when parents or students confront them with those arguments. Third, teachers get little help from their administrators when creationists begin to make noise, because most administrators themselves do not understand evolution or its importance to biology cause they do not like controversy. Most administrators are more likely to compromise, or even capitulate completely to creationist demands, than they are to support their teachers or to protect the integrity of science. Many teachers, for example, have told me that their principals suggest that "it would be okay not to get to evolution" during the course of the school year, and others have told me that they simply avoid evolution because they do not want the controversy themselves, specially when their administrators fail to support them. It is, in fact, quite easy for teachers to avoid evolution, because most biology textbooks relegate the topic to one or two chapters, often near the end of the book, and do not integrate evolutionary perspectives throughout the program.

© source where applicable

I'll cite the specific posts later if you find that your memory requires jogging.

[Jorge]

It is trivial, or comparatively so, in the sense that there are perfectly plausible stepwise sequences available.

"Plausible" as per who's definition? Lemmee guess ...

Darwin himself gave a quite competent defense of this possibility in Chapter 6 of Origin. Since then lots of others have spelt out more detail in various ways, and there is good evidence on some details of the actual sequence that did take place. The literature on this is enormous, and no one has ever presented any aspect of the eye that is unlikely to arise by some kind of accumulation of evolutionary change.

I'll give you the benefit of the doubt in that you're being sincere & honest and simply say that you don't know what you're talking about. Concisely, aside from rabid speculation about how this or that 'could have happened', there isn't a clue (I've read many of these speculations and it's funny how they're filled with 'ifs' and 'maybes'). Those wanting to believe that the eye did evolve simply keep right on preaching that it did and pretend that no one notices that they're stark naked.

We're never likely to know every step that actually took place in history in full detail, any more than we can give the full history of orbits for bodies in the solar system, given the chaotic effects of multi-body interactions.

See Sylas, right there is an example of what determines your entire outlook in all these matters. Note how you say "any more than we can give a full history". Well, you are assuming that there IS a full history that needs acounting. And, furthermore, the full history that you have in mind is - what else? - Naturalistic. You are assuming the issue at hand! People such as myself have no "full history" to account for - the full history
(minus the details) has already been handed to us - "In the beginning God..."

Some details are worth seeking (so that we may build a better mousetrap) but seeking other details demands first an ideological position and the purpose is then primarily to seek support for that position.

No-one with any sense considers this a refutation of gravity; and similarly no one of any sense thinks you need to know the precise history to be confident of the capacity of evolution to produce a historical sequence. It is enough to know that there are plausible evolutionary pathways, or plausible gravitational interactions to give rise to existing motions in the solar system. That some people think evolution ought to be able to identify exactly the historical sequence that took place is pretty clueless.

"Clueless' to me are the people that think that because they have something that's "plausible" (a very slippery and one-size-fits-almost-everything word), that this is all they need in order to logically justify their position. This is especially a mind-boggling attitude when you consider the vast epistemic gaps that exist. IOW, aside from just being on the quicksand foundation of "plausible", they also have countless knowledge-gaps that have to be filled in with - what else? - faith (in Naturalism).

Jorge

[Jorge]

Yes, once you read out the Eugenie Scott quote about debating creationists that I have above, you'll see why.

I've stated this before, I think Eugenie Scott is a witch with an agenda that is simply impossible to miss.

She's perfect for the position she holds - just (barely) bright enough to have memorized the Naturalistic so-so stories yet dumb enough to recklessly parrot them with no thought about what she's doing. She's the ideal representative for an organization whose name itself is a blatant lie to the masses : The National Center for Science Education (NCSE).

Folks, the NCSE is NOT about "science education" - it's about the ideological agenda of keeping the creationist position OUT. What's that? You don't believe me? Here it is, straight from their home page :

"The National Center for Science Education (NCSE) defends the teaching of evolution in public schools. We are a nationally-recognized clearinghouse for information and advice to keep evolution in the science classroom and "scientific creationism" out. NCSE is the only national organization to specialize in this issue."

Ms. Scott fights tooth-n-nail every day to make sure that the NCSE lives up to their ideological agenda.
"Science education", yeah, rrrriiiiight!

Jorge

[Calvinist4Him]

I apologize. It was Calvinist4Him who actually made that claim, not you. My bad.

Let's backtrack shall we? You said the following to jason:

Tiggy

That's right Jason – Dembski and the ID circus haven't submitted ONE SINGLE SOLITARY PIECE OF POSITIVE EVIDENCE to support their pet theory. NOT ONE SINGLE SOLITARY PIECE. All we've EVER gotten is attacks on ToE, followed by the claim "if ToE can't explain it now, ID wins by default"

So post the positive evidence for ID, right here, right now. PUT UP OR SHUT UP.

Whining "read Dembski's book!!" is NOT positive evidence for ID

© source where applicable

I then responded to your response to jason with:

Calvinist4Him

It's funny you should choose the word "submitted" as if Scientists should "create" evidence. Anyway, we humbly submit that the existence of DNA is a positive evidence for the existence of a designer. We submit that the rich information, the necessary instructions for life, found in what is called "DNA" cannot be the result of chaotic brute chance, that the chances are so astronomically slim that believing in the slim chance over an intelligent designer is intellectually bankrupt if not "wishful thinking".

© source where applicable

Now, where in my response did I claim that Dembski has submitted positive evidence? I didn't make that claim, but I will make that claim now, and provide a quote from Dembski to prove it, even though you didn't respond to the positive evidence I submitted.

William Dembski

"Design is present in biology. Perhaps the most compelling evidence for design in biology comes from biochemistry....In Darwin's Black Box Behe presents a powerful argument for actual design in the cell. Central to his argument is his notion of irreducible complexity." - from pages 146, 147 of the book Intelligent Design: The Bridge Between Science & Theology

© source where applicable

So, you are wrong Tiggy.