Wow, thanks so much for posting this Bill. Hope you faired ok in the aftermath of Beryl? I really like how you have synthesised the various concepts/definitions relating to this topic. I especially like the inclusion of ‘Capacities’. Does this new definition of ID bring it more in-line with Informational Realism? It would be great (speaking for myself at least) if you could use your classic golfing parable to help illustrate the subtle nuances of these suggested changes to the definition of ID. I really appreciated this parable to help my understanding of the metaphysics of information presented in your ‘Being as Communion’ publication. Thanks again, Jeff
I don't think this realistically gets us any closer to anything we could use in practice. If I offer you two smoothed pebbles, one of which was shaped by the action of the sea and sand, the other of which I tumbled at home in one of those polishing machines for the purpose of making jewelry, but which otherwise have indistinguishable form and physical properties, how would these information measures distinguish the designed pebble from the natural one?
Or as another example, how would these information measures allow us to distinguish between a footprint of my child in cement through an accident, and the footprint of that child we took in clay as a keepsake? They are both the same foot, pressed into hardening materials. I see no intrinsic properties of these footprints, nor any properties that inform any of your information metrics, which would distinguish the designed footprint from the accidental one.
Hi Matt. It's a long-standing point in the ID literature that intelligence can act to mimic natural/chance-based processes. With the smooth pebbles, they could be formed naturally in a running stream or artificially in a rock tumbler. In such cases, there may be no way to distinguish the two types of rocks. This is not a problem or inconsistency for design inferences or design metrics. It simply means that in the effect-to-cause reasoning that is inherent in the logic of design, there's no way to draw the distinction. But compare this to the same pebbles that spell our "John loves Mary" versus a random assemblage. Here the distinction between design and non-design is clear.
Similar considerations hold for your other example. In the same vein, I considered in one of my writings an embossed sign saying "Eat at Joe's" that falls over in a snow storm and embeds a mirror image of "Eat at Joe's" in the snow. The sign fell over by chance, but the message embossed in the snow traces back to an intelligent information act. It's the same type of example as you consider with your child's footprint. The sign could also have been deliberately imprinted on the snow. Design inferences depend on what features of design one is looking at, and the design inferential logic has certain built-in limitations. In any case, the new definition makes much clearer the role of externally applied information in comparison to internally generated information for systems. This, it seems to me, is an advance.
I’m not sure what the new definition of ID gets you.
The argument on design is currently not a rational one. Maybe a few are interested in a logical debate but nearly every atheist isn’t. And they are winning which is frustrating.
An atheist cannot provide a coherent argument for why anything exists let alone how such complex things such as life or Evolution happened. It just did according to them and that with natural selection wins the argument.
Since it is all about politics, then maybe a political approach is necessary. I suggest ID endorse Darwin and natural selection as part of ID. Darwinian ideas obviously fail for Evolution but they are wholly accepted by ID for genetics for many adaptations.
Make Darwin a poster boy for ID and show how his ideas can effect change within a species but that there is minimal to zero evidence that it works for a new species. Force the argument into a new area, the creation of novel proteins. They have no answer.
Also disavow Young Earth Creationism. ID is closely identified with this form of creationism. I asked a high school biology student recently about ID and he replied, you mean creation 6,000 years ago. That was the traditional defense of materialism 20 years ago and still is. This biology student knew zero about the origin of proteins and why it was essential for meaningful change to happen. I’m sure his instructor didn’t either. Natural selection is magical to them.
An excellent clarification and extention of the definition of intelligent design
Wow, thanks so much for posting this Bill. Hope you faired ok in the aftermath of Beryl? I really like how you have synthesised the various concepts/definitions relating to this topic. I especially like the inclusion of ‘Capacities’. Does this new definition of ID bring it more in-line with Informational Realism? It would be great (speaking for myself at least) if you could use your classic golfing parable to help illustrate the subtle nuances of these suggested changes to the definition of ID. I really appreciated this parable to help my understanding of the metaphysics of information presented in your ‘Being as Communion’ publication. Thanks again, Jeff
I don't think this realistically gets us any closer to anything we could use in practice. If I offer you two smoothed pebbles, one of which was shaped by the action of the sea and sand, the other of which I tumbled at home in one of those polishing machines for the purpose of making jewelry, but which otherwise have indistinguishable form and physical properties, how would these information measures distinguish the designed pebble from the natural one?
Or as another example, how would these information measures allow us to distinguish between a footprint of my child in cement through an accident, and the footprint of that child we took in clay as a keepsake? They are both the same foot, pressed into hardening materials. I see no intrinsic properties of these footprints, nor any properties that inform any of your information metrics, which would distinguish the designed footprint from the accidental one.
Hi Matt. It's a long-standing point in the ID literature that intelligence can act to mimic natural/chance-based processes. With the smooth pebbles, they could be formed naturally in a running stream or artificially in a rock tumbler. In such cases, there may be no way to distinguish the two types of rocks. This is not a problem or inconsistency for design inferences or design metrics. It simply means that in the effect-to-cause reasoning that is inherent in the logic of design, there's no way to draw the distinction. But compare this to the same pebbles that spell our "John loves Mary" versus a random assemblage. Here the distinction between design and non-design is clear.
Similar considerations hold for your other example. In the same vein, I considered in one of my writings an embossed sign saying "Eat at Joe's" that falls over in a snow storm and embeds a mirror image of "Eat at Joe's" in the snow. The sign fell over by chance, but the message embossed in the snow traces back to an intelligent information act. It's the same type of example as you consider with your child's footprint. The sign could also have been deliberately imprinted on the snow. Design inferences depend on what features of design one is looking at, and the design inferential logic has certain built-in limitations. In any case, the new definition makes much clearer the role of externally applied information in comparison to internally generated information for systems. This, it seems to me, is an advance.
I’m not sure what the new definition of ID gets you.
The argument on design is currently not a rational one. Maybe a few are interested in a logical debate but nearly every atheist isn’t. And they are winning which is frustrating.
An atheist cannot provide a coherent argument for why anything exists let alone how such complex things such as life or Evolution happened. It just did according to them and that with natural selection wins the argument.
Since it is all about politics, then maybe a political approach is necessary. I suggest ID endorse Darwin and natural selection as part of ID. Darwinian ideas obviously fail for Evolution but they are wholly accepted by ID for genetics for many adaptations.
Make Darwin a poster boy for ID and show how his ideas can effect change within a species but that there is minimal to zero evidence that it works for a new species. Force the argument into a new area, the creation of novel proteins. They have no answer.
Also disavow Young Earth Creationism. ID is closely identified with this form of creationism. I asked a high school biology student recently about ID and he replied, you mean creation 6,000 years ago. That was the traditional defense of materialism 20 years ago and still is. This biology student knew zero about the origin of proteins and why it was essential for meaningful change to happen. I’m sure his instructor didn’t either. Natural selection is magical to them.