Wednesday, June 14, 2006
Skeptical Psychologist Trashes ID
In Skeptical Inquirer (volume 30, Issue 3) psychologist Scott O. Lilienfeld opines that ID is:
'an armchair conjecture that has flown under the radar of peer review and has yet to generate a single confirmed scientific prediction.'
But against this:
1. ID is not an 'armchair conjecture', since it is open to empirical confirmation and falsification.
2. ID has not flown under the radar of peer review:
cf. www.discovery.org/scripts/viewDB/index.php?command=view&id=2640&program=CSC%20-%20Scientific%20Research%20and%20Scholarship%20-%20Science
3. ID has generated confirmed scientific predictions.
For example, ID theorists predicted that so-called 'junk DNA' would be less common than Darwinian assumptions led scientists to think. Increasingly, 'junk DNA' is being shown to be no such thing (cf. www.arn.org/docs2/news/junkdnaessential120802.htm). As biologist Jonathan Wells says: 'It could have saved us 25 years if an ID approach to "junk" DNA had been pursued back when it was discovered.' (www.arn.org/docs/wells/jw_reportfromwmu031401.htm)
'an armchair conjecture that has flown under the radar of peer review and has yet to generate a single confirmed scientific prediction.'
But against this:
1. ID is not an 'armchair conjecture', since it is open to empirical confirmation and falsification.
2. ID has not flown under the radar of peer review:
cf. www.discovery.org/scripts/viewDB/index.php?command=view&id=2640&program=CSC%20-%20Scientific%20Research%20and%20Scholarship%20-%20Science
3. ID has generated confirmed scientific predictions.
For example, ID theorists predicted that so-called 'junk DNA' would be less common than Darwinian assumptions led scientists to think. Increasingly, 'junk DNA' is being shown to be no such thing (cf. www.arn.org/docs2/news/junkdnaessential120802.htm). As biologist Jonathan Wells says: 'It could have saved us 25 years if an ID approach to "junk" DNA had been pursued back when it was discovered.' (www.arn.org/docs/wells/jw_reportfromwmu031401.htm)
