Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id BAA21745 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Sun, 4 Jun 2000 01:44:03 +0100 Date: Sun, 4 Jun 2000 10:41:38 +1000 (EST) From: Dr ChRISTOPhER CLEiRIGh <chris@syrinx.com.au> To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Subject: Re: Fwd: [COMPLEX-M] "Intelligent Design" lobby Congress against Darwinism In-Reply-To: <MailDrop1.2d7j-PPC.1000602103151@mac463.wehi.edu.au> Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.21.0006041034160.31203-100000@kite.syrinx.com.au> Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
On Fri, 2 Jun 2000, John Wilkins wrote:
*|* The Intelligent Design people are a sophisticated form of Paleyesque
*|* creationist. They are attempting to have Darwinian thinking removed not
*|* only from the American (and by extension other countries') education
*|* systems, but also to remove funding for projects that assume Darwinian
*|* principles. This is the reason why they are taking a political approach
*|* - they call it the "Wedge strategy", to edge Darwinian theory out of
*|* scientific discourse.
*|*
*|* To this end they egregiously misconstrue Darwinian thinking. Dembski has
*|* argued that genetic algorithms cannot search large spaces (in defiance
*|* of all experience), and that selection cannot generate "information"
*|* (which is some sort of mystical property not exhibited by things that do
*|* evolve darwinianly).
*|*
*|* Behe denies that evolution can generate "irreducibly complex" systems
*|* for which the modification or removal of any component would make it
*|* non-functional, as if duplication and function shifts were unheard of.
*|*
*|* Phillip Johnson accuses scientists of the sin of "naturalism" (which,
*|* unlike the naturalistic fallacy in ethics, is the "fallacy" of assuming
*|* that all that exists is natural, when in fact what naturalism science
*|* exhibits is epistemological - it's been pointed out to him, and yet he
*|* repeats it). All are motivated by theology, and all have no interest in
*|* science except insofar as it serves that theology.
*|*
*|* To my mind this represents both an interesting social movement that is
*|* itself memetic - the reinvasion of a modified form of concept into an
*|* ecology (science) that had previously selected against it - and also a
*|* major challenge to the advances since Darwin. If they have their way,
*|* science will be prohibited by fiat from investigating certain things
*|* that offend theological presuppositions.
*|* --
*|*
*|* John Wilkins, Head, Graphic Production
*|* The Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research
*|* Melbourne, Australia
*|* <mailto:wilkins@WEHI.EDU.AU>
*|* <http://www.users.bigpond.com/thewilkins/darwiniana.html>
*|* Homo homini aut deus aut lupus - Erasmus of Rotterdam
Thanks for this and your earlier posting on the history of `emergence'
(and `supervenience'). I think I'll avoid talking about the ID people so
as not to replicate their memes.
regards,
chris
_________________________________________________________________
Philosophers' Syndrome:
to mistake a failure of imagination for an insight into necessity.
The Naturalistic Fallacy:
to equate what is with what ought to be.
_________________________________________________________________
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