[Apologetics] Most Americans Feel Religion Is 'Under Attack,' Poll Shows

[Stuart D. Gathman]

On Tue, 22 Nov 2005, Dianne Dawson (actually an article Art sent) said:

> On the topic of intelligent design, the theory that the universe is so
> complex that it must have been created by a higher being, 56 percent favor
> the teaching of intelligent design or creationism, alongside the theory of
> evolution in public schools.

This is a gross misstatement of ID - seemingly designed to make it sound
ridiculous, as well as being flat wrong.  Straw men are sure easy to beat the
tar out of.

The ID thesis is that some choices made by an intelligence can be 
mathematically recognized and tested for - those with "specified complexity".
"Intelligence" literally means "to choose between".

Anthropic coincidences are not, in fact, examples of testable ID.
The disagreement with materialists is *not* over "complexity", but over whether
there really is such a thing as "specified".  In other words, is "intelligence"
real, or just our name for certain survival enhancing psychological
phenomena.

It is impossible to test for ID without agreeing on some sort of
absolute truth (higher being not necessarily required) as opposed
to accidents.  If a materialist philosophy is so thorough that there is no
intrinsic thought, meaning, truth or intelligence - only random complexity
and accidents, then there can be no ID.

-- 
	      Stuart D. Gathman <stuart at bmsi.com>
    Business Management Systems Inc.  Phone: 703 591-0911 Fax: 703 591-6154
"Confutatis maledictis, flamis acribus addictis" - background song for
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