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nice lead!

I've worked on a lot of leads, and far too many WP articles have bad leads, but this one is quite solid. Good work!

I fixed some punctuation. Periods and commas go within quotation marks, not outside them. ("This is right," but not "this".) Leadwind (talk) 04:29, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, it's evolved under a lot of selection pressure :-)
Unfortunately you're using a common but not universal American convention for punctuation in relation to question marks, see MOS:LQ for the agreed convention used on Wikipedia. Your good faith assistance is appreciated, but in view of the MOS I've undone the change. . . dave souza, talk 06:45, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Add new section to the article

A section should be added to the article mentioning atheistic intelligent design and it's proponents. 86.10.119.131 (talk) 20:58, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

That's what I used to think, but have accepted that the scope of this article is not that broad. I understand atheistic intelligent design, if there is such a thing (Raëlism? Probably too fringe.), belongs at Teleological argument. Yopienso (talk) 21:59, 27 March 2011 (UTC)
What is atheistic intelligent design? Is it something that has its own article? If so, we probably should add it to the disambiguation page. Raëlism already has a spot on this page, so it'd have to be different from that. -- MisterDub (talk &#149; contribs) 15:11, 28 March 2011 (UTC)
There is most probably a "tiny minority" of ID proponents that are atheists (subject to considerable ambiguity on whether their beliefs amount to 'ID' and 'atheism') but, per WP:UNDUE, we are under no obligation to mention them (even if we could find a WP:RS reporting on them). HrafnTalkStalk(P) 07:43, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
Before passing judgement on the idea, Hrafn, why don't we see what sourcing there is on it first, if any, then decide? Wouldn't you agree that it's better to make an informed judgement, than a prejudiced one? Cla68 (talk) 06:57, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
Cla68: I have read most of the scholarly works on ID (Numbers, Forrest&Gross, Peacock, etc), and keep myself abreast of the mainstream media reports on the topic. I am therefore already aware of what (reliable) "sourcing there is". I would suggest that you keep your unsubstantiated wild accusations to yourself in future. Wouldn't you agree that this would be better than getting blocked for your misbehaviour? HrafnTalkStalk(P) 10:43, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
While Cla68's rather blatant stirring and accusation of prejudice is neither collegiate nor conducive to improving the article, it's best not to rise to such bait. If Cla can find good sources, that will be helpful. However, like you, I've not seen anything significant in the reputable literature on the topic. . . . dave souza, talk 11:41, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
I don't consider pointing out that a personal attack was, (i) factually incorrect & (ii) against policy, is 'rising to such bait'. My opinion is that such malicious comments should either be rebutted or removed. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 12:13, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
It does indeed look like a personal attack, and clearly lacks validity. At best, it suggests that Cla is ill informed about the topic, and I'd hope that on reflection Cla will withdraw the suggestion so that this offtopic diversion can appropriately be redacted. . . dave souza, talk 13:30, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
As always, we need a reliable third party source showing the significance, if any, of "atheistic intelligent design" if there is such a thing. As is fully sourced in the article, ID is a religious view. A couple of proponents may have been described as having been atheists at some time or other, but a good source would be needed examining the validity and significance of such descriptions. . . dave souza, talk 09:56, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

As far as sightings of possibly-atheist, possibly-ID supporters in the wild, the field appears to be limited to this rather neglected blog, Bradley Monton (University of Colorado Philosophy Professor who recently wrote Seeking God in Science: An Atheist Defends Intelligent Design) & Thomas Nagel (who recently nominated Signature in the Cell for one of the 2009 Books of the Year -- it's unclear whether he supports ID, but does seem to have a bee in his bonnet about scientific reductionism). I think that counts as a "tiny minority". HrafnTalkStalk(P) 13:51, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

  • Dave and Hrafn, this article has a long history of notorious POV issues. Both of you are regulars here and appear, from what I'm seeing, to take the content of this article extremely personally. When someone brings up a possible uncovered facet of the topic, and you dismiss it out of hand, then that could give the impression that you two have a certain, limited perspective of this topic that doesn't allow room for differing perspectives. Before anyone could even produce any sources to support "atheistic ID", you were already trying to dismiss the idea. Cla68 (talk) 23:09, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
  • No Cla68, it is unwarranted personal attacks that I take "personally". Your characterisation of Dave and my own actions is inaccurate and ludicrously WP:POT and self-serving. When this topic was raised, I offered an initial opinion, which I have since backed up with facts and citations. You on the other hand have contributed ABSOLUTELY NOTHING positive to this thread -- but have rather focused purely "on the personalities of the editors contributing to the talk page" to the complete exclusion of "the topic of the talk page" -- in complete violation of WP:TALK. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 04:38, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

Raëlian ID

Raëlists claim both to be atheists and to believe in Intelligent Design. "The atheist 'Intelligent Design Theory' offers a rational solution to the age-old debate between God-believers and evolutionists."
This is covered in the Raëlism article: "Raëlianism is an atheist religion that believes, not in God, but in extraterrestrials." It should not be ignored here, imo. So we could revamp this article to cover "Intelligent Design" wherever it has a foothold, rename it so it covers only ID as espoused/endorsed by the Abrahamic religions, or add it to Teleological argument. My instinct is to intelligently redesign :) this article to include Raëlism and let the Intelligent design movement article cover the mainly, though not exclusively, Christian ID movement that actively pushes for creationism to be taught in American public schools, leaving Teleological argument free of any fringe stuff. Yopienso (talk) 00:27, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
See WP:FRINGE. Since I think there's no evidence whatsoever for aliens or ID, it would show how stupid ID is. However, we would be giving undue weight to the absolute tiny number of people who follow this crazy alien thing. And one more thing. Atheism is defined by not "believing" in supernatural beings. These nutjobs may not believe in the Judeo-Christian god, but they believe in another god. Silly.OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 00:50, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
Since ID itself is considered by WP and most scientists to be fringe, we don't have to worry about introducing a fringe group that propounds it, imo. That's why I'd like to see Teleological argument left untouched: it deals with philosophy respectable in an historical sense.
The Raëlists themselves claim to be atheistic and to believe in ID. Click on my link above; I copied and pasted directly from their site. Also see their book, Intelligent Design - Message from the Designers. We certainly don't have to believe their teachings in order to give them the coverage that is their due! To avoid undue weight, all that would be necessary in this article is a link to Raëlism. But we misrepresent the facts to deliberately omit them altogether. Yopienso (talk) 04:51, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
It's hard for me to get worked up one way or another, but you probably will get reverted unless you can point to some sort of talk page consensus. I can't even believe that these people exist. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 04:57, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
Mere existence is insufficient for inclusion in Wikipedia. The standard is third-party notice -- which Raëlian ID appears to have garnered little, if any, of. Even by comparison to the IDM, the Raëlian movement is fringe. Their WP:DUE is therefore probably bare notice -- I would however not be averse to the inclusion of a link to Raëlism#Intelligent Design in the 'See also' section. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 05:46, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
Raëlism#Intelligent Design (and more specifically Raëlism#Creation of life on Earth by extraterrestrials) appears to be sourced almost exclusively to 'Raël'/Claude Vorilhon's book Intelligent Design (with most of the remainder being to other Raëlian publications). There appears to be little to no third-party coverage. The closest would appear to be this article -- which makes no direct mention of "intelligent design" and only mentions Raëlism in passing ("Cult Bids to Clone Hitler for War Trial" is also third-party, but appears more than a little off-topic for here). Does anybody really consider that that section provides a legitimate basis that acknowledgement of Raëlian ID is WP:DUE in this article? HrafnTalkStalk(P) 04:51, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
@OrangeMarlin: irrespective of your beliefs, these people exist. They are the Clonaid people. Everything I do is always subject to reversion. I will abide by the consensus.
Here's what the Panda's Thumb says:
"His Holiness Rael endorses Intelligent Design The best part is, the "mainstream" intelligent design advocates really can't logically object to the Raelian argument, even though you know they want to, deep down. After all, Intelligent Design advocates are always telling us that one cannot discover anything about the designer based on the design, and that aliens are an equally acceptable alternative."
And from the "About.com" website:
"The Raelian Movement is a new religious movement and atheistic religion. . . Intelligent Design Raelians disbelieve in evolution, believing that DNA naturally rejects mutations. They believe the Elohim planted all life on Earth 25,000 years ago through scientific processes." Yopienso (talk) 05:47, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
Neither source is particularly prominent, nor gives Raëlian ID particularly prominence or depth of coverage. Nor do they give any indication that either 'mainstream' ID, or anti-creationists, take Raëlian ID in the least bit seriously. Therefore neither provide a rationale for anything more than a see-also link. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 06:13, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
There's no such thing as a consensus of one. Please revert your undo and let the process work. I myself just hyperlinked to Raëlism on the disambiguation page about an hour or so ago. The dab was there, but no hyperlink on the next page. My opinion is that the word Raëlism should appear on the article page. There may or may not be support for that opinion; the process will work if allowed to.
Time magazine, CNN.The New Scientist, and the LA Times. A Republican House committee heard testimony from Rael himself. His name or that of his cult is found many times throughout the document; his statement starts on p. 136. Yopienso (talk) 06:57, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
NONE of these sources mention "intelligent design", therefore none of them would appear to have even the slightest relevance to whether the Raëlism should be mentioned here. What they do in fact do is discuss Raëlism in the context of cloning -- so using them to attempt to get Raëlism discussed in this article, would appear to be highly tendentious. And no, I will not undo my reversion of your contentious edit lacking consensus. Such prominent placement is WP:UNDUE, as is equating Raëlism with the entirety of atheist ID. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 07:21, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
Why is this so critical? Again, ID is a fringe, unscientific theory, but it has a lot of relevance whether it's a court standing against creationism, along with the fact that creationists are trying to make it appear to be scientific. Raelism isn't even a tiny gnat in the ID world. And they do not propose an ID based on a supernatural being (the Judeo-Christian god), but on green-blooded aliens. That's not even intelligent design. One link, and let's move on. This isn't worth more than one paragraph of discussion. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 07:14, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

Here are some {{find}} templates. If anybody can find any prominent, reliable sources giving prominent/significant treatment of the topic of Raëlian views on ID, we might have something to discuss. Otherwise, this is a non-starter.

HrafnTalkStalk(P) 07:48, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

The crucial thing being third party sources as to the notability of this, if any. For info, Raelism is a fringe religion dating from 1974. As the Pandas link above shows, in 2004 they issued a little-noticed press release trying to jump on the ID bandwaggon. In late 2005/early 2006 their publisher Nova Distribution, contactable at publishing@rael.org, issued Intelligent Design: Message from the Designers By Rael. Its page iv information describes it as a "re-titled English Language edition in a newly combined re-translation and updated edition of Rael's three original French books", none of which mentioned ID in the title. So, they tried to cash in on some of the attention around at that time, but didn't even bother introducing anything new. Not worth a link as it's already covered in the disambiguation linked at the top of the page. . dave souza, talk 08:03, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
Robert Pennock wrote about them, apparently in his Tower of Babel, which I have not read. As nearly as I can tell, this page, under the rubric of Stephen Jay Gould, is an excerpt from that book, published by MIT. There are over 700 words dealing with Raelian ID. Here are a few: "A large international group—the Raëlian Movement—advocates just this ET-ID view. Like creationism, this is a religiously based movement that rejects evolution. Unlike creationism, Raëlianism denies supernatural divine creation. Raëlians promote a third view—that intelligent aliens landed here millennia ago in spaceships and formed all of life on earth, including human beings, using highly advanced genetic engineering. I think that if we investigate the question of intelligent design in this context it will be easier to see why the IDC conclusion is not scientific."
Yes, my second group of RSs merely confirms that Raelians exist, which OrangeMarlin couldn't believe. Aside from their own site and many, many spurious-to-questionable sites, the only RSs I'm aware of that discuss Raelian ID are the Panda's Thumb and About.Com sites I gave above and this one from Pennock. I do hate to ignore the Sensuous Curmudgeon, though. Whether or not it's a prominent RS, you guys would get a chuckle out of its treatment of Raelian ID. Check it out. I certainly bow to a consensus of three when there are only four participants. But I do want to remind Hrafn that consensus is not required for an initial edit. Yopienso (talk) 09:21, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
Tower of Babel has a ten page section on 'Extraterrestrial Intelligent Design' (pp233-242), devoted mainly to Raëlian views. It probably could serve the basis for a paragraph or two on the subject. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 09:43, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
A caution about this: Pennock discusses this in the context of "ID creationists' SETI analogy", for purposes of philosophical analysis exploring "a contrasting case that can highlight conceptual features that we might otherwise be blind to." He starts on pp. 233–234 by supposing, for the sake of argument, that we take ID proponents at their word in suggesting that we were designed and created by intelligent extraterrestrials, then intended devising a hypothetical "ET-ID view", but found the Raëlian movement advocating just such a view. So, this is something to discuss in the context of ID SETI arguments rather than suggesting that it merits attention on its own account. The first paragraph of the Intelligent designer section covers this case, with more detail in the Intelligent designer sub-article which would be the appropriate place for Hrafn's proposed paragraph discussing how Raëlism compares to ID. So, as a suggestion for this article, a new second paragraph could be introduced in that section, will add my suggestion below. . dave souza, talk 18:10, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

Proposed section

Extraterrestrial intelligent design

The Raëlian Movement was founded, in the early 1970s, by French journalist Claude Vorilhon (taking the name Raël), who claims to have been contacted by an alien, who conveyed to him that life on Earth was created by his race, the Elohim, as an experiment. Raëlians claim that the Bible contains a partial and corrupted version of this story (and think of their religion as being directly linked to Christianity). The name of their alien race translates from Hebrew as the plural of "God". Raëlianism teaches that evolution is a myth, and that the increasing complexity exhibited over time is due to improvements in these experiments, rather than by natural mechanisms. In the opinion of philosopher of science Robert T. Pennock, Raëlianism fulfils at least the minimal publicly-presented elements of intelligent design, simply with alien beings substituted for supernatural spirits or gods as the intelligent designers, and that Raëlians make many of the same bad arguments against evolutionary biology as creationists.<ref>{{cite book | last = R.T. | first = Pennock, | title = Tower of Babel: the evidence against the new creationism | publisher = MIT Press | location = City | year = 2000 | isbn = 0262661659 |pages=233-242}}</ref>

HrafnTalkStalk(P) 13:29, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, Hrafn, as discussed above I think that sort of detail is appropriate for the Intelligent designer article, and a shorter paragraph would be appropriate in this article. My suggestion follows, after an abridged version of the first paragraph of the section. . . dave souza, talk 18:31, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

Intelligent designer

Intelligent design arguments are formulated in secular terms and intentionally avoid identifying the intelligent agent (or agents) they posit..... Dembski, in The Design Inference, speculates that an alien culture could fulfill these requirements..... The leading proponents have made statements to their supporters that they believe the designer to be the Christian God, to the exclusion of all other religions.[n 2][n 3][32]

Various ID proponents, including the authors of Of Pandas and People, have proposed that SETI research looking for extraterrestrial intelligence illustrates an appeal to intelligent design in science. In 2000, philosopher of science Robert T. Pennock proposed that the Raëlian UFO religion fulfils at least the minimal publicly-presented elements of intelligent design, simply with alien beings substituted for supernatural spirits or gods as the intelligent designers, and t hat Raëlians make many of the same bad arguments against evolutionary biology as creationists.ref>R.T., Pennock, (2000). Tower of Babel: the evidence against the new creationism. City: MIT Press. pp. 229–229, 233–242. ISBN 0262661659.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: extra punctuation (link) CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)</ref></nowiki>

Note the additional page numbers in the reference. . . dave souza, talk 18:31, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
Are we seriously adding a paragraph to these nutters? ID is crazy enough, but giving weight to a tiny number of believers is really a violation of WP:UNDUE. I support a link, but this is way over the top. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 18:35, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
I agree, it doesn't seem appropriate. While I personally don't mind making ID appear even more ridiculous by setting up this association, WP:UNDUE still applies to super-fringe when compared to just normal fringe. Hans Adler 19:11, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
I find the idea of protecting an article on a fringe subject from a paragraph about a related fringe subject amusing. One paragraph seems altogether appropriate to me. At a minimum, we should provide a link directly to Raëlism or to Category:Raëlism. We have an article on the founder, others on prominent Raelians, one on the "religion," another on its history, another on its beliefs and practices, one on the foundation, one on Clonaid. I agree a mention in Intelligent designer is also appropriate. Yopienso (talk) 22:59, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
I'm having an amusing deja vu with regards to this conversation. A long time ago, I was editing Homeopathy with another editor. I wanted to delete something about homeopaths using a dilution of the Berlin Wall to cure something. I thought it was so ridiculous that I deleted it. The other editor, who is an admin and does a lot of work on science articles reverted me and left me a message that homeopathy is so silly, we may as well show how silly it is. I kind of agreed, but eventually we removed it (haven't read the article in awhile, so it might be there). Though a couple of individuals around here complain that I (and others) are POV about ID, that is not true. It would be POV to make ID seem even sillier by adding a fringe element of a fringe element. Without evidence, I'd have to say that 99% of ID believers understand that the intelligent designer is the Judeo-Christian god. The other 1% have a variety of beliefs about the designer, including some who think it's aliens. I'm sure we could find some that think it's Captain Kirk. So, yeah, protecting fringe beliefs from appearing on a fringe article seems all around crazy, but there must be some rule about "piling on". Again, I'm opposed to a full paragraph, but sentence that says something like "Other beliefs about the designer include aliens, Captain Kirk, etc. etc. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 23:14, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
Orange, from what I understand of WP's NPOV policy, we shouldn't appear to care either way how "silly" any idea or topic is. If we're editorializing on article talk pages about how silly the article's topic, or an aspect of the topic is, then I don't see how we can edit in an NPOV manner. Cla68 (talk) 01:29, 6 April 2011 (UTC)
Since I was talking about WP:UNDUE...oh wait, why bother.OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 06:04, 6 April 2011 (UTC)
"Amusing" is so much better than "annoying"! A sentence could be a good compromise. I still don't see a paragraph as undue weight in such a long article, especially since there are so many entire, amply footnoted articles on the cult. Yopienso (talk) 23:43, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

There's sense in that. From the Pennock reference, the main issue is the SETI claim, so how about adding to the Intelligent designer section a couple of lines (possibly spaced as a paragraph) as follows.... dave souza, talk 23:52, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

Of Pandas and People includes a common claim that intelligent design is as legitimate as SETI research looking for extraterrestrial intelligence. The Raëlian UFO religion is similar to ID in presenting anti-evolution arguments and claims that life forms were created by (alien) designer[s].

Reference to Pennock, as shown above. OTOH, maybe this isn't needed. . . dave souza, talk 23:52, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

Dave and Yopienso, I just wanted to say that your good faith efforts at collaboration, compromise, and cooperation on this topic are much appreciated and I think serve as a good example of appropriate and productive talk page demeanor and and discourse. Please keep it up. Cla68 (talk) 01:25, 6 April 2011 (UTC)
I'm with Orangemarlin on this one. Pennock's a solid authority, but the claim as proposed is undue weight here. He (Pennock) seems to be using it as a rhetorical "logic" example, without trying to imply or infer there's much real world association to ID. Professor marginalia (talk) 04:46, 6 April 2011 (UTC)
Dave's idea seems very satisfactory. I've revised his text for simplicity, to be inserted exactly where he suggests. Bold print indicates an addition to what currently stands in the article. Yopienso (talk) 06:51, 6 April 2011 (UTC)
I still think it's giving too much weight to this topic, but I guess a sentence shouldn't be too bad. I just wish that these articles didn't have to be a seine net for every wacko idea. Intelligent design is almost a trademarked idea of the christian creationists, so somewhere a line has to be drawn in the sand as to what doesn't belong. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 07:21, 6 April 2011 (UTC)
@ Orangemarlin, agree that this is very peripheral to ID and it's questionable whether we should try to cover every ID claim in this main article. At present I don't see a consensus for adding this, but have suggested a modification to Yopienso's suggestion below, further views welcome. . . dave souza, talk 07:57, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

Intelligent designer

Intelligent design arguments are formulated in secular terms and intentionally avoid identifying the intelligent agent (or agents) they posit..... Dembski, in The Design Inference, speculates that an alien culture could fulfill these requirements..... The leading proponents have made statements to their supporters that they believe the designer to be the Christian God, to the exclusion of all other religions.[n 2][n 3][32]

The authors of Of Pandas and People say the SETI search for extraterrestrial intelligence illustrates a scientific appeal to intelligent design. In 2000, philosopher of science Robert T. Pennock proposed that the Raëlian UFO religion provides a real-life example of an extraterrestrial intelligent design view that can be used to evaluate scientific support for an alien designer, concluding that Raëlians make many of the same bad arguments against evolutionary biology as creationists. ref>R.T., Pennock, (2000). Tower of Babel: the evidence against the new creationism. City: MIT Press. pp. 229–229, 233–242. ISBN 0262661659.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: extra punctuation (link) CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)</ref></nowiki>

Yopienso (talk) 06:51, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, Yopienso, I was hoping to keep it more concise but mentioning Pennock does show the context. The bit about evaluating scientific support is rather misleading as there is none, if we do agree to include this then a better formulation might be "In 2000, philosopher of science Robert T. Pennock suggested the Raëlian UFO religion as a real-life example of an extraterrestrial intelligent design view that makes many of the same bad arguments against evolutionary biology as ID creationism." It might also work to insert this in the first paragraph of the section, just after Dembski's suggestion of extraterrestrial designers. Can we review if there's consensus for this sort of mention? . . dave souza, talk 07:57, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

Intelligent designer

Intelligent design arguments are formulated in secular terms and intentionally avoid identifying the intelligent agent (or agents) they posit. Although they do not state that God is the designer, the designer is often implicitly hypothesized to have intervened in a way that only a god could intervene. Dembski, in The Design Inference, speculates that an alien culture could fulfill these requirements.[n 13] Of Pandas and People proposes that SETI research for extraterrestrial intelligence illustrates an appeal to intelligent design in science. In 2000, philosopher of science Robert T. Pennock suggested the Raëlian UFO religion as a real-life example of an extraterrestrial intelligent designer view that makes many of the same bad arguments against evolutionary biology as ID creationism.[ref Pennock]

The authoritative description of intelligent design,[n 13] however, explicitly states that the entire Universe displays features of having been designed. Acknowledging the paradox, Dembski concludes that "no intelligent agent who is strictly physical could have presided over the origin of the universe or the origin of life".[75] The leading proponents have made statements to their supporters that they believe the designer to be the Christian God, to the exclusion of all other religions.[n 2][n 3][32]

Example as suggested above by me, with the first paragraph split to show the ID aliens arguments in the first paragraph, and the paradox forming a second paragraph. Additions bolded, do others think this is excessive? . . dave souza, talk 08:14, 6 April 2011 (UTC)
I don't find this excessive; I think it works rather well, actually. Because extraterrestrials have been specifically mentioned by ID proponents as one possible designer and Raëlians support ID because it fits their world view, I think a brief mention of their religion is appropriate. One thing though, the statement "... SETI research for extraterrestrial intelligence..." sounds a bit redundant. I suggest striking the "for extraterrestrial intelligence" bit from the sentence entirely. Also, the second sentence doesn't seem to flow as well as I think it could. Perhaps changing the verb suggested to listed would help? Or the as soon after could be changed to is? Otherwise, I like the short, pointed mention of this possibility. -- MisterDub (talk &#149; contribs) 14:57, 6 April 2011 (UTC)
Excellent, Dave; inserting it there is even better. Yes, "SETI research for extraterrestrial intelligence" is redundant, for the reader's sake, but if SETI is hyperlinked, may not be necessary. Yopienso (talk) 15:44, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

How about a working in a wikilink to Directed panspermia? I think you will find that this is the accepted name for extraterrestrial design ideas.--Adam in MO Talk 19:50, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

Unless I am mistaken, directed panspermia is slightly different from Intelligent Design. Intelligent Design, at least as it is currently defined by the Discovery Institute, is an argument against the unguided process of evolution. The difference between the terms then is the creator(s) in an ID scenario creates each immutable kind separately, whereas the creator(s) in the panspermia scenario merely launches a vessel containing primitive life to a planet capable of fostering it. I'm not sure this article needs to have an explanation of this difference or even an entry on the disambiguation page for panspermia, but that's just me. -- MisterDub (talk &#149; contribs) 21:16, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

I'd be happy to insert the proposed section as most recently modified, but thought Dave was going to. Should I? Yopienso (talk) 02:54, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. -- MisterDub (talk &#149; contribs) 20:56, 8 April 2011 (UTC)
Hope I got it right! Yopienso (talk) 21:53, 8 April 2011 (UTC)
Looks good. Let's hope that a bunch of people don't try to add to that. Hold your breath! OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 22:38, 8 April 2011 (UTC)
Amatulic is refining, not adding to. Still, you didn't have to hold your breath long!
@Amatulic: Thanks for your contribution. The new insertion is based on "It is important to understand that Raëlianism fulfills all the elements that intelligent-design creationists set out to characterize their view, at least in the minimal version they propose for public consumption. The only difference is that Raelianism specifies that the intelligent designers were not supernatural spirits or gods, but alien beings from another planet. We thus have a real example of an ET-ID view. In all other respects, Raëlianism is very similar to standard creationism. . .they tend to follow the same negative argumentation strategy. Here it is online; it's the last paragraph. Your edit reads better and is factual, but omits the point Pennock and we were making: Here's an ID proposal that is not religious, but its arguments are as bad as the religious ones. Please note quite a bit of discussion and collaboration went into that edit. Please join us! Yopienso (talk) 00:58, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
Oh, I see you've reverted it, OM. Can we improve it? I should be doing other things right now. Yopienso (talk) 01:03, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
I love my initials. LOL. Yeah, Amatulic can come here and discuss it. Lesson 1 of controversial articles...discuss it first. We did. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 01:07, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
Here I am. I do follow discussion threads here, and participate from time to time. The problem with the text I changed was that when I read it, my first impression was that it blatantly presents a non-neutral point of view in Wikipedia's voice. The terms "bad arguments" (subjective term, not used by Pennock) and "ID creationism" (redundant, not a phrase used by Pennock) weren't appropriate as article prose, and misrepresented the source. That last sentence in the paragraph quoted above would have been fine to include instead.
Regarding Yopensio's statement Your edit reads better and is factual, but omits the point Pennock and we were making. I'm gratified by the compliment, but somewhat disturbed by the implication that "we" are here to make a point. We aren't. That isn't neutral. ~Amatulić (talk) 01:29, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
It's neutral to faithfully represent what a respected scholar says. It's not neutral to misrepresent what he says. If you had not read the talk page before editing the article, I'm sure you did not realize that we were seeking to express Pennock's idea in as few words as possible. In other words, I see where you're coming from, but the reason you're coming from there is because you didn't see the fuller picture. It's no compliment to be told you've omitted the central point made by the cited reference. In any case, we can work together for the best possible article. Again, welcome! Yopienso (talk) 01:37, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
You nailed the problem right there. No reader will "see the fuller picture" from having read this discussion. No reader should need to have the context of the talk page to understand the article. A reader (even me, scientifically trained and anti-ID) would see a Wikipedia article making judgmental statements in the prose. I did recognize the attempt to paraphrase Pennock, but the usage of non-neutral terms in Wikipedia's voice, that Pennock didn't use, made it seem like a direct quotation would have been better. ~Amatulić (talk) 01:49, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
Wrong and wrong: (i) it was explicitly in Pennock's voice (ii) the wording was almost identical to Pennock's (such that I was able to turn it into a direct quote with almost no change, and none to the contested phraseology). HrafnTalkStalk(P) 12:04, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
I was going by the quote Yopienso says the passage was based on, above, which used the phrase "negative arguments" (which are not the same thing as "bad arguments"). If you don't include subjective claims inside a direct quote, it gives the impression that Wikipedia, not the source, is speaking. That's a common editorial oversight. I see you made it into a quote. Excellent. I have no further problems then. ~Amatulić (talk) 22:03, 10 April 2011 (UTC)
Sorry for creating confusion. Thanks for your collegial spirit. Yopienso (talk) 23:00, 10 April 2011 (UTC)
That's WP:Complete bollocks Amatulić. The original version was "In 2000, philosopher of science Robert T. Pennock suggested the Raëlian UFO religion as a real-life example of an extraterrestrial intelligent designer view that makes many of the same bad arguments against evolutionary biology as ID creationism." How on earth can something that is explicitly described as what "Robert T. Pennock suggested" be considered to be "giv[ing] the impression that Wikipedia, not the source, is speaking", regardless of whether it is presented as a direct quote or an accurate (and very close) paraphrase? The reason I moved to a direct quote was more a 'so-close-so-might-as-well-go-all-the-way' viewpoint, rather than because I had any doubt whatsoever that my original material misrepresented either that it was Pennock's opinion, or what his opinion was. Yopienso does not have access to the full version of Tower of Babel (and never claimed that he did, the online piece he referenced only overlaps the first two pages of the ten I cited), I do. I would strongly suggest that, in the future, you WP:AGF by avoiding claiming misrepresentation of a source you do not yourself have access to. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 04:24, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
Hrafn, you're the only one here failing AGF. I had no problem including some version of this passage. The misrepresentation, as you can clearly see from this discussion, was based on Yopienso's quotation, and the passage did misrepresent that quotation. Mistakes happen. The problem is solved. Let's move on. ~Amatulić (talk) 18:02, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

Arbitrary break

Of course, we discuss this for a week, come to a consensus about the language, Yopienso is bold and makes the change. Then, someone complains and makes a POV change. Sigh. I reverted. Maybe they'll actually join in the conversation. Or not. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 00:59, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

That wasn't a POV change, if you actually look at what I changed. It was a change to remove POV. See my explanation above. ~Amatulić (talk) 01:31, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
We discussed it here. WE came to a consensus, including a buy-in from User:Cla68 who never agrees with me on anything, including the color of the sky. Anyways, you got another answer above, which is better.OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 01:40, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
It's commendable and also kind of amazing that consensus was achieved for an addition to this always-contentious article.
While consensus may trump truth, it doesn't trump policy. As a ridiculous example, if a handful of editors collectively agreed that this article should henceforth refer to ID proponents as "IDiots", then such a consensus has no value. In this case, your intent was true, your agreement that this text needed to be added was justified, but the concensus ended up with a wording that (a) misrepresents a source, (b) intrdouces a weasel-word, and (c) pushes a POV by introducing subjective or redundant phrasing. Can you honestly say you're satisfied with that, because you have consensus?
Fortunately, these problems are easily fixed with some minor tweaks (like changing "bad" to "negative"). I attempted to fix it earlier without the benefit of seeing what the source said, but you reverted it. I have made another attempt, this time being more surgical, now that I am familiar with the discussion above.
Typically my computer is off during the weekend. I'll be back Monday. ~Amatulić (talk) 11:29, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
Amatulić: what on earth are you talking about? The wording was very close to word for word what Pennock said (I've now turned it into a direct quote). How can this be "consensus may trump truth"? And what "policy" is it that states that material that is verifiable to a reliable expert source cannot be used? They are not "negative arguments" they are "bad arguments" -- "bad" as in based upon false premises and/or logical fallacies. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 11:53, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
I can confirm that the sentence "Raëlians make many of the same bad arguments against evolutionary theory as creationists." occurs literally on page 236 of the source, in the author's voice and as the first sentence of a paragraph, and that it is also an accurate summary of the material that follows in the source. Hans Adler 13:08, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
The change Hrafn made is perfect: a direct quote in the author's voice. Hrafn, the answers to your questions should be obvious, but I'll spell them out: The text originally misrepresented the quote Yopienso said it was based on, above. And it introduced loaded/subjective terms, for which the applicable policy is obviously WP:NPOV. Since you changed it into a direct quote, problems solved. Thanks. ~Amatulić (talk) 22:08, 10 April 2011 (UTC)
No Amatulić. The text NEVER "misrepresented the quote Yopienso said it was based on", because it was NEVER CITED TO THAT QUOTE! Yopienso did not originally draft that material. Yopienso did not have access to the source explicitly cited by that material. Therefore Yopienso was not in a position to say what specific quote it was based upon (so shouldn't have). Pennock is a philosopher, and therefore is an expert in the difference between a good argument and a bad one. Stating, correctly, that he suggested that Raelian arguments were bad ones, is explicitly in line with WP:ATTRIBUTEPOV (whether it is done as a direct quote or a paraphrase). Moving to a direct quote did not solve any problem, as there was no problem needing solving. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 04:49, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
Shouting now? Funny way you have of maintaining WP:AGF.
OK, my words about misrepresenting sources was based on a mistake. Mistakes happen. It's now corrected.
Any pair of fresh eyes would have seen problems. I fail to understand this after-the-fact resistance to improving the clarity and readability of the article by removing any last bit of ambiguity. There's a point when prose crosses over the line into editorializing, even when attributed. WP:ATTRIBUTEPOV says nothing whatsoever about including subjective judgmental phrases in prose, which is what happened here. Without the quotation marks, the passage appeared to be editorializing. Sure, call it bollocks if you like. But someday you may try asking someone who works professionally as a copyeditor (as I have in my past). The problem did need solving, and you solved it. Thank you. Clear, concise, unambiguous, compelling. Everyone his happy except you, for some reason. ~Amatulić (talk) 18:18, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
Amatulić: how can it be a problem to state that "Pennock suggested the Raëlian UFO religion as a real-life example of an extraterrestrial intelligent design view that makes many of the same bad arguments against evolutionary biology as ID creationism", when Pennock made these very suggestions? And why does it make any difference that "this doesn't appear to be a quotation"? There is nothing in WP:ATTRIBUTEPOV (or elsewhere AFAIK) that states that attributed POVs must be made as direct quotes, not paraphrases -- and paraphrases are routinely used in such situations. Your original removal was a hasty mistake -- and you simply compounded that mistake by taking the guess of somebody who did not draft the material at face value. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 18:48, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
Amusingly, your removal actually worsened the one inaccuracy of the insertion -- neither Pennock, nor my original formulation, explicitly mentioned ID in relation to the "bad arguments", but rather "creationism" more generally -- an inaccuracy exacerbated by your reducing "ID creationism" to "ID". Which again goes to show that you should not attempt to rewrite material attributed to a source without access to that source -- doing so is a violation of WP:V. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 18:55, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

Proposed deletions from the introduction

It is ridiculous and prejudicial to say of such a widely held theory that all of its proponents come from one institute, as the introduction clearly does.

I became aware of the theory by reading "The Intelligent Universe" which is an extropian/transhumanist tome inspired by the writings of Vernor Vinge and Ray Kurzweil, not inspired by some the institute mentioned, as the article baldly states in it's introduction. Garder, the author, was interviewed at length on NPR, reviewed in Time MMagazine, Wired magazine, and the International Journal of Astrobiology.

TIn other words that book (note title!) was widely read and discussed a few years ago, and for those wwho have not read it - it does not default to or support Christianity in the slightest. I would venture that the author is better known than the entire BOD of the institute mentioned.

Therefore, unless some rational explanation is forthcoming I intend to rewrite that part of the intro.

http://www.amazon.com/Intelligent-Universe-Emerging-Mind-Cosmos/dp/1564149196 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.59.192.81 (talk) 03:42, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

The difference between "proponent" and "leading proponent" is important, but ignored in your response.
In any case, feel free to be bold, but avoid original research and be sure to cite multiple sources. GManNickG (talk) 04:00, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
As GManNickG states, there is no indication that Gardner is a "leading proponent" of ID, or that he has any stature whatsoever in the ID movement. His works appear to be more related to fringe Cosmology (the Anthropic principle, Lee Smolin and the like) than to the contents of this article. The article arguably on the intersection of the two is Fine-tuned Universe. Third party sourcing linking his work to this topic would be needed for inclusion here. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 06:05, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

The leading also characterizes Intelligent Design, a concept that dates back to Ancient Greece at least, as "neo-creationism", and as "a contemporary adaptation of the traditional teleological argument for the existence of God". That's a complete mischaracterization of the subject. --Damiens.rf 20:14, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

Damiens, I think you're attributing too much to Intelligent Design. True, the general concept of life requiring a creating agent has been around a long time, but it was not coined "Intelligent Design" until recently. Instead, it lived on in religion and Philosophy as the teleological argument for a god's existence until it was dressed up as a scientific theory and labeled Intelligent Design. Reformulating creationism into secular and/or scientific terms, just as was done in this case, is the very definition of neo-creationism, so I don't quite understand how the descriptions you've mentioned aren't accurate. -- MisterDub (talk &#149; contribs) 20:51, 6 April 2011 (UTC)
This kind of confusion is common. I've wondered if this article shouldn't have a dab combined with the disambiguation along this line:
This article deals with Intelligent Design as construed (presented/publicized/what-have-you) by the Discovery Institute; for other uses, see Intelligent design (disambiguation).
Any thoughts? Yopienso (talk) 02:54, 8 April 2011 (UTC)Yopienso (talk) 02:58, 8 April 2011 (UTC)
Hmm... not sure. We already have a link to the teleological argument (For the philosophical "argument from design", see Teleological argument.), which addresses the exact issue Damiens and others have raised. I guess we could be more blatant about it, but I'm not sure how to keep the message concise and NPOV in such a case. I mean, "This article refers to the neo-creationist proposition rejected by the scientific community, for other uses see Intelligent design (disambiguation)." doesn't sound exactly kosher. I'd prefer to stay away from naming the Discovery Institute (DI) specifically, as people may not immediately associate it with ID (for those who know of ID, but not the DI). I wouldn't mind this kind of change, but I think the copy would have to be at least as clear and concise as the current bit about the argument from design. -- MisterDub (talk &#149; contribs) 21:22, 8 April 2011 (UTC)
When I first came to this page, I did not imagine "intelligent design" would be limited to the DI's version of it, and I've seen other newcomers likewise perplexed. I suggested a dab because I've found retitling to be a major edit not often accepted; this article could more clearly be titled, "Creationist intelligent design," but I'm not making such a bold suggestion. (Pennock, in . . .Babel, distinguishes it as IDC.) Meanwhile, I've thought of a better idea--on the talk page, have visible (not click-to-show) on "Article-specific editing notes" (not sure anybody ever looks at 'em) a notice such as, "This article deals exclusively with creationist ID." Or maybe just keep explaining to each newcomer one by one. Yopienso (talk) 22:12, 8 April 2011 (UTC)
I think I've mentioned this before, but I think this article was intended to be Intelligent Design™ of the Discovery Institute and xtian creationists, not intelligent design, generic version. The dab sounds like a good idea, so that this article doesn't get filled with every idea from alien seeding to the Borg. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 22:29, 8 April 2011 (UTC)
Yes, I believe that was the original intent, but that intent is not evident to a newcomer, who quite justifiably then concludes the article is too narrow. Eugenie Scott, as well as Pennock, calls the proposal this article covers "Intelligent Design" Creationism. That would be a useful identifier in a dab.
In response to the IP's comment, should this article provide a link in the panel at the right to the Anthropic principle? Yopienso (talk) 17:00, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
A DAB would not be appropriate. There is only one "intelligent design" that is noteworthy enough to have its own article, and that's the ID made famous by the Discovery Institute and its affiliates. But for the DI affiliates' push to supplant or supplement the teaching of evolution in high-school biology classes, the words "intelligent design" wouldn't even be widely used as a term for a type of teleological argument. Since it's been branded as a term for the DI's particular educational objectives and its related religious, socio-political advocacy in contemporary American society, the two cannot legitimately be separated.
..... I should also point out that the article on the teleological argument gets only about one-tenth the amount of traffic that this article gets, and much of that traffic is due to the link from this article to teleological argument. A DAB would inaccurately imply that "intelligent design" has some kind of "weight" standing on its own independently of both the Discovery Institute affiliates as well as somehow distinct from the argument from design, when in fact it does not possess any such self-supporting independence or weight as a philosophical term. ... Kenosis (talk) 17:28, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Centre for Intelligent Design

Someone just today created the article Centre for Intelligent Design and subsequently proceeded to make major modifications (now reverted) to the lead here, to give that organization prominence. It seems this is a new org, set up in 2010 in the UK. In casual googling, I find a lot of sites taking notice of this Centre, but I can't find any real evidence that it meets the WP:GNG or WP:CORP notability threshold. I have prodded it for deletion. If you disagree, feel free to remove the prod notice. The author has since added more references. Maybe OK now? Still no mainstream news coverage. ~Amatulić (talk) 20:20, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

There's been at least a couple of articles on it in the British press, so its notability is at least minimally established. Anupam seems to be doing their best to eliminate any WP:DUE criticism in the article. Apparently C4ID is a topic to be discussed without any reference to science or religion. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 07:09, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

Misinformation

I was recently reverted by User:Amatulic, who removed information on the religious views of members of the Discovery Institute in favor of a version which is completely false. The information I added on the fact that members of the Discovery Institute are also Jewish and agnostic was removed, despite the fact that it was supported by credible references. The current version now states that all members of the Discovery Institute are Christians, which is simply not true. I would ask respectfully, that this information is readded. Cheers, AnupamTalk 20:39, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

This would seem to be better argued on the Discovery Institute article than here. Even if there is a single (or a few) Jewish intelligent design believers associated with the public movement, it's widely independently described as Christian, and I am not aware of independent third-party coverage that describes the Jewish contributions to it. Our verifiable information policy favors using third party reliable descriptions rather than synthesizing our own. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 21:08, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
(Following myself up) If you have reliable independent third-party descriptions which cover this aspect, presenting hte references here would be an appropriate next step. Thanks. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 21:09, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
<ec> @ Anupam, your error is in asserting that the lead sentence concerned discusses all members of the DI, no matter how insignificant. That's not the case. The carefully sourced lead, based on reliable third party sources as required by verifiability policy, states "Its leading proponents—all of whom are associated with the Discovery Institute, a politically conservative think tank—believe the designer to be the Christian God." Some of the led have other faiths, though of course its arguable that Christians, Jews and Muslims share the same G_d. However, as shown by reliable sources, those who have developed and published the arguments have consistently referred to Christianity. Klinghoffer has only had a peripheral role, and Judaism & Intelligent Design - My Jewish Learning written by a rabbinical student (with a B.A. in history of science) looks more like a blog than a reliable source. Similarly, the recent and as yet unreviewed book cited regarding Berlinski notes his role as an iconoclast and debater, but effectively confirms that he hasn't produced any influential work. You seem to be trying to synthesise these brief descriptions to contradict better founded statements. . . dave souza, talk 21:31, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
As Dave has stated, the current version states two things in one sentence: the leading proponents of ID are Christians and the leading proponents are all associated with the Discovery Institute. It does not say that everyone associated with the DI is a Christian. I have previously mentioned changing the line in question to the Talk page (specifically due to David Berlinski, an agnostic Jew), but was told that the statement should remain as it is because he and others are merely proponents, not leading proponents. Unless you have information that a leading proponent belongs to a faith other than Christianity, the statement remains true. But perhaps we could alter the text to remove the ambiguity of leading proponent? The source in question uses this exact term though: "[i]n that vein, the writings of leading ID proponents reveal that the designer postulated by their argument is the God of Christianity." Perhaps even a qualifier would work? Something like, "Judge John E. Jones III found that its leading proponents--all of whom..."? -- MisterDub (talk &#149; contribs) 21:34, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
I would indeed classify Berlinkski as a leading proponent of ID by the way. He appears in the movie Expelled, in which he is often the center of discussion on Intelligent Design. Moreover, he has produced work on the topic, notably his recent book titled The Deniable Darwin. Stating that all of the proponents of Intelligent Design believe the Christian God to be the Intelligent Designer is simply not true. Thanks, AnupamTalk 22:00, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
Please note that "all proponents of Intelligent Design" is not the same thing as "leading proponents of intelligent design". In order to include Berlinski into the group of "leading proponents" you will need to provide reliable third party sources. Neither the movie nor the book referred to in your last post come anywhere near this requirement. How you or I or any other editor for that matter would personally classify him is entirely irrelevent. - Nick Thorne talk 22:16, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
He is a vocal critic of evolution, but not a leading ID proponent (e.g. "Berlinski shares the movement's disbelief in the evidence for evolution, but does not openly avow intelligent design..." from Berlinski's Wiki page). I think as far as leading proponents go, we're talking about Behe and Dembski as crafters of the "theory," rather than anyone merely presenting it as a viable alternative to evolution. This is why I think the term leading proponent could use some work. I'm fairly certain that Berlinski isn't even a proponent of ID per se, as he has criticized ID as well as evolution. -- MisterDub (talk &#149; contribs) 22:22, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

I tend to view Christianity, Islam, and Judaism as being branches of the same faith, with the distinctions being fairly trivial when viewed from the outside. Perhaps replace "Christian God" with "God of Abraham", if that doesn't push anyone's WP:OR buttons.—Kww(talk) 22:08, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

User:Kww, that is a good idea; thank you for your comments. How do you feel about David Berlinski being an ID proponent and an agnostic? With regards, AnupamTalk 22:13, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
We've considered that in the past, but the sources specifically refer to Christianity. Once again, Berlinski is prominent but seems to have had little significance in leading and directing the development of ID. . . dave souza, talk 22:22, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
BTW, LOL at the list of Berlinski's arguments cited in that book – similar if not identical to the recycled creationist claims used by Johnson in Darwin on Trial. . . dave souza, talk 22:28, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
Once more with feeling: It does not matter what Kww thinks, what you think or what I think, what matters is what the sources say. Provide reliable sources and you have an argument, otherwise just drop the stick. - Nick Thorne talk 22:26, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
I agree that the sources specifically refer to Christianity, but I don't think that "Christian God" == "God of Abraham" falls afoul of WP:OR. There's certainly no shortage of sources equating the two, and I don't see much of a reason to be specific. As for Berlinski's "agnosticism", I'd have to see a less self-serving source use that description. It smacks of "We have an agnostic on our side! That means it must be real science!" I just don't find the assertion credible, nor do I find the source disinterested.—Kww(talk) 22:29, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
User:Kww, according to The Best of the Public Square, "Berlinski is embraced by proponents of Intelligent Design for the persuasiveness and vigor of his arguments but also because he is an agnostic." Furthermore, I am not arguing whether Intelligent Design is science or not. I am simply questioning the misleading statement in the introduction that states that all of the proponents of ID believe in the Christian God, which is simply false in light of David Berlinski's agnosticism and the Judaism of David Klinghoffer, who is a Senior Fellow of the Discovery Institute]. With regards, AnupamTalk 23:15, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
Again, this basically states that the he is being marketed by the DI as an agnostic, and his self-description is quoted as being an "agnostic Jew", which smacks of oxymoronicism. I'm on your side with respect to expanding the lead beyond Christianity to include Judaism. I won't go further than that to state that there are people that don't believe in Abrahamic religions that endorse ID.—Kww(talk) 23:44, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
User:Kww, I support your assertion if that's the farthest you're willing to go. However, there are a multitude of other sources that testify to Berlinski's agnosticism (source). Moreover, it is not an oxymoron to be an agnostic Jew, as the latter designation refers to an ethnic group of people. I hope this helps. With regards, AnupamTalk 00:07, 12 April 2011 (UTC)
You both need to provide reliable sources per the Wikipedia WP:RS policy, and enough information to justify that the particular fact is noteable enough. See also our policy on giving minor facts or viewpoints undue weight.
Thank you. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 01:17, 12 April 2011 (UTC)
I'm not sure precisely what sources you require to support the substitution of "God of Abraham" for "Christian God", George. Is there any reason to doubt the terms are synonymous? If the statement was that all the ID supporters were Christian, that would be one thing, and it would be easily refuted by sources looking at David Klinghoffer. It's not. It's that the supporters identify the designer as the "Christian God". If they identify the designer as the "Christian God", they are simultaneously identifying him as the "God of Abraham".—Kww(talk) 01:33, 12 April 2011 (UTC)
Before taking time to parse the details of anyone's religious leanings, it makes sense to find multiple credible cognizant sources, free from conflict of interest and without self-serving bias, that say that person is a "leading proponent" of ID. As the lead is now worded, that is a central issue in need of support. __ Just plain Bill (talk) 01:42, 12 April 2011 (UTC)
User:Georgewilliamherbert, you are acting as if all Christians are unified in their viewpoints. I assure you that an Episcopalian will have much different views than a Southern Baptist. According to Perspectives on science and Christian faith: Journal of the American Scientific Affiliation, Volumes 59-60, "David Berlinski is an agnostic, secular Jew; William Dembski is an evangelical; Michael Behe is Catholic; Jonathan Wells belongs to the Unification Church; and Phillip Johnson is a Presbyterian." Stating that all proponents of Intelligent Design believe in the Christian God is not only an oversimplification but is also totally infactual. With regards, AnupamTalk 02:00, 12 April 2011 (UTC)
As previously pointed out, the lead does not say "all proponents of Intelligent Design believe in the Christian God." It says intelligent design's "leading proponents... believe the designer to be the Christian God." __ Just plain Bill (talk) 02:11, 12 April 2011 (UTC)
Anupam, please see WP:UNDUE. Let's not give undue weight to minority viewpoints. Oh wait, that's been said before. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 02:29, 12 April 2011 (UTC)
Exactly what does changing "Christian God" to "God of Abraham" give undue weight to? I'm as big of a policy wonk as anyone, and I can't figure out what that gives undue credence to.—Kww(talk) 03:06, 12 April 2011 (UTC)
It isn't about YHWH or Ahura Mazda or any other god. The undue weight is what would be given to the claim that anyone other than Behe and Dembski, for example, is a "leading proponent" of ID. Until that is well sourced, whatever beliefs Berlinski and Klinghoffer may hold are beside the point. __ Just plain Bill (talk) 03:29, 12 April 2011 (UTC)
Please read the references, notes 2 and 3. The judge in Kitzmiller v. Dover explicitly said in his written decision that: "the writings of leading ID proponents reveal that the designer postulated by their argument is the God of Christianity". William Dembski, Philip Johnson and other DI affiliates have explicitly said this, which is how the court arrived at this particular finding of fact. IIRC, for awhile this article said "the Abrahamic God", obviously inclusive of "the God of Christianity", but somewhere along the way participating editors decided to use the exact language set forth in the Kitzmiller decision, which is the way that passage has read in this article for most of its history. ... Kenosis (talk) 03:39, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

It should be pointed out that Klinghoffer is not a particularly prominent advocate of ID (I'd rate him around third tier), and that Berlsinski, although more prominent, explicitly disavows advocacy of ID itself (i.e. the idea that God the intelligent designer did it) in favour of simply promoting ID's anti-evolution arguments from within the IDM. But then, we've had this argument before. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 04:17, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

This discussion goes round and round and round. Bring reliable sources that don't give undue weight to extreme minority view, maybe we can talk about it. But right now, none have been shown to any of us. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 04:30, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

Agree -- third party sources confirming prominence of viewpoints should be a must for not-blatantly-prominent views to be included in the lead. In a recent version we had the Centre for Intelligent Design ("nothing more than a website and an office") cited in the lead. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 05:07, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

Natural selection guided by natural processes

It should be noted that there is a major error; natural selection _is_ a guided processes and follows on from the laws of thermodynamics and a amalgamation of other implications and ramifications in many areas of chemistry and biology as well. Thus, natural selection is not purely random, more pseudo random. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 110.174.129.21 (talk) 16:14, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

That's a good point, the error is made by ID proponents who use "guided" as code for "supernaturally guided" or "guided by God". To include that point in the article, we need verifiability from a reliable published source – the point sounds familiar, but we can't include our own original research. . . dave souza, talk 16:43, 29 April 2011 (UTC)
Guided is not only used by ID proponents to justify a supernatural agent, but it usually implies that there is a set path and/or goal to evolution; even physicalists can believe evolution is directed by natural processes to toward certain adaptations or species. -- MisterDub (talk &#149; contribs) 17:29, 29 April 2011 (UTC)
Are we talking here about something that needs to be corrected on this page? --Tryptofish (talk) 19:15, 29 April 2011 (UTC)
As far as I can ascertain, the only time NS is described as undirected/unguided/etc in this article, it is part of a direct quote. So this is probably not an issue "that needs to be corrected on this page". HrafnTalkStalk(P) 04:50, 30 April 2011 (UTC)
"Thus, natural selection is not purely random, more pseudo random..." No, it is random. it is not teleological. Thermodynamics "directs" the change in entropy of the system, which is in fact the differential change in its "directedness". In acting on the degree of directedness it does not itself act on the direction. And it is in an open system, that has a constant influx of disorder. An ecosystem much more resembles turbulence -- which is a scale-free pure noise-generating process -- than a pseudo-random number generator. In fact many statistics suggest that the ecosystem exhibits Self-organized_criticality. Kevin Baastalk 16:55, 9 May 2011 (UTC)
Natural selection is NOT "random", using the simplistic definition of "random" pervasively taken by creationist apologists (generally some form of independent uniform distribution or similar). Natural selection pretty much guarantees (i.e. ≈ 100% probability) that the results will be an improvement in adaptation, but generally does not make strong predictions as to what exact form these adaptations will take. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 17:31, 9 May 2011 (UTC)
If you are seriously going to argue that evolution is not a random, probabilistic process, but a deterministic, teleological one, then I'm not going to bother wasting my time with such nonsense. Kevin Baastalk 20:10, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Reminder: this is not a forum. Talk about improving the article with verifiable sources, or don't at all. Cheers. GManNickG (talk) 20:15, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Just so. For example, "I would say evolution talks about random chance and intelligent design expresses an order." Reiterating the creationist misconception that "The theory of evolution says that life originated, and evolution proceeds, by random chance." though proponentsists tend to misleadingly talk of "the Darwinian mechanism of natural selection and random variation" which isn't quite so wrong. But then they try to slide off into randomness.. as in But once someone accepts the fact that random evolution couldn't produce life on earth, it has to have developed some other way quoting from this rather interesting source. . . dave souza, talk 20:55, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Seamless integration of Enlightenment and Christianity

@ Charlesdrakew: Please revert your reversion of my reversion. (This is a bit humorous, no?) It was not in the lead.
12:47, 10 May 2011 Charlesdrakew (talk | contribs) (182,268 bytes) (Reverted 1 edit by Yopienso (talk); Too detailed for the lead. (TW)) (undo)
Thanks. Yopienso (talk) 17:26, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

Hi Yopienso, in turn you were reverting K's change as being rather detailed for WP:SUMMARY. The info removed was:
Howe (2007) observes that in early 19th century America “virtually everyone believed in intelligent design” when most Americans seamlessly integrated their Enlightenment with their Christianity. ref Daniel Walker Howe, What Hath God Wrought: The Transformation of America, 1815–1848 (Oxford University Press, 2007) p. 464 /ref
Since the science of the day in English speaking areas was closely integrated with natural theology that's not surprising, nor is it particularly informative about the modern ID which is part of the response to evolutionary ideas which only became popular in those areas after 1844. It's a complex area, and this brief remark from a source not readily available online seems both simplistic and uninformative.
That said, this review gives a little more from the book:
"As this chapter is written in the early twenty-first century, the hypothesis that the universe reflects intelligent design has provoked a bitter debate in the United States. How very different was the intellectual world of the early nineteenth century! Then, virtually everyone believed in intelligent design."
Doesn't include the enlightenment bit, and the reviewer follows it up with the very dubious comment that in 90% of the Western intellectual world, creationism "remains almost universally accepted." So, all a bit questionable. . . dave souza, talk 17:59, 10 May 2011 (UTC)
Hi, Dave. No, I was disagreeing with K that Rjensen's addition did not adhere to WP:SUMMARY. The book quoted was published by Oxford University Press and won a Puliter Prize; Howe is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. The author of the review you cite is either a nobody, or a somebody hiding behind a pseudonym. (Reading his comments, I'd guess the former.) The source is as solid as they come, and if it were unavailable online that would not diminish its usefulness as a RS. It is, however, available online. This immediately follows your quote; odd you didn't notice the word "Enlightenment":
Faith in the rational design of the universe underlay the worldview of the Enlightenment, shared by Isaac Newton, John Locke, and the American Founding Fathers. Even the outspoken critics of Christianity embraced not atheism but deism, that is, belief in an impersonal, remote deity who had created the universe and designed it so perfectly that it ran along of its own accord, following natural laws without need for further divine intervention.
This is part of the pedigree of the Discovery Institute's modern ID and therefore, by my lights, is appropriate in the history section of this article. What do you think? Yopienso (talk) 22:49, 10 May 2011 (UTC)
Google books isn't giving me that access, the additional words help clarify things. ID is strongly opposed to deism and particularly to belief in a universe "following natural laws without need for further divine intervention". Their premise is that God / Ye Designer makes empirically detectable interventions which are open to scientific investigation.
In contrast to ID, the theistic and deistic enlightenment thinkers believed in a first cause beyond scientific investigation, making laws in which secondary causes operated in a constant way open to empirical science.
In the 1830s, the period in question, John Herschel, "perhaps the most senior British scientific figure" praised an approach "as a way to find true causes, 'that mystery of mysteries the replacement of extinct species by others' should be due to natural causes as much as extinctions. So the origin of new species 'would be found to be a natural in contradistinction to a miraculous process'"[1]
Around 30 years later, George Frederick Wright, an ordained minister who was Asa Gray's colleague in developing theistic evolution, emphasised the need to look for secondary or known causes rather than invoking supernatural explanations. "If we cease to observe this rule there is an end to all science and all sound science." ref> Larson 2004 pp 110–111
These 19th century scientists were important figures in natural theology and believed strongly in an intelligent design as the first cause, but rejected the ID idea of supernatural science. . . . dave souza, talk 23:25, 10 May 2011 (UTC)
I fail to see any link between Enlightenment era Deism and modern ID, either in the citation or otherwise. To claim there is one without solid sourcing would violate SYNTH. By my lights, Deism and ID draw on a common source, rather than ID being a continuation of Enlightenment thought. I doubt that many, if any, of the adherents of Modern ID are Deists, except, possibly, when cornered. They almost uniformly believe in a supernatural God that directly intervenes in the world, unconstricted by the laws of nature. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 23:33, 10 May 2011 (UTC)
@Dave: The ID movement is a pseudo-scientific outgrowth of 19th-century natural theology. Darwinian evolution is a scientific outgrowth of the same. Certainly in an article titled "Intelligent design" that treats specifically the modern-day ID we would want to record that divergence. (Likewise, in an article tracing scientific thought from, say, 1600-2000, we would omit modern ID altogether.) Which brings me to. . .
@DV: You wrote, "By my lights, Deism and ID draw on a common source, rather than ID being a continuation of Enlightenment thought." Precisely! Therefore Howe's statement, ". . .in early 19th century America 'virtually everyone believed in intelligent design' when most Americans seamlessly integrated their Enlightenment with their Christianity," is pertinent to paragraph 2 of Origin of the concept. It's astonishing that you miss the link Howe provides:
As this chapter is written in the early twenty-first century, the hypothesis that the universe reflects intelligent design has provoked a bitter debate in the United States. There's the modern ID. How very different was the intellectual world of the early nineteenth century! Then, virtually everyone believed in intelligent design. Faith in the rational design of the universe underlay the worldview of the Enlightenment, shared by Isaac Newton, John Locke, and the American Founding Fathers. Even the outspoken critics of Christianity embraced not atheism but deism, that is, belief in an impersonal, remote deity who had created the universe and designed it so perfectly that it ran along of its own accord, following natural laws without need for further divine intervention. There's the Enlightenment-era Deism linked to it.
I propose the second paragraph be amended thusly:
Daniel Walker Howe observes that in early 19th century America “virtually everyone believed in intelligent design,” most Americans seamlessly integrating their Enlightenment with their Christianity. [Ref] Paley's argument from design in Natural Theology used the watchmaker analogy,[25] and such arguments led to the development of natural theology, the study of nature as a way of understanding "the mind of God". This movement fueled the passion for collecting fossils and other biological specimens that ultimately led to Charles Darwin's publication of On the Origin of Species in 1859.
What does everyone think of that? Yopienso (talk) 00:24, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
As I said in the edit summary of my last edit, it's not suitable for WP:Summary style. What is put forward in the proposed sentence is a vast overstatement and oversimplification of one of Howe's theses in the book, Howe observes at several points that essentially a synthesis of faith-based belief and reason-based thinking shaped 19th Century American life. See, e.g., these snips from the book. Dominus Vobisdu's point is also taken-- as he observed just above, the newly placed sentence which i removed is also original synthesis. It synthesizes two separate points Howe was making in the book, adding in Howe's point on p464, a casually made and very debatable point that in "the intellectual world" of the early 19th Century, "virtually everyone believed in intelligent design". Howe's two points can, I'm sure, be teased out separately here on the talk page, but my primary objection was, as I said, that it isn't suitable for WP:SS because by the time we render Howe's points faithfully we've added another virtual tome to an already excessively lengthy article.
.....I should probably add that the proposed sentence as written also fails WP:V--Howe did not say "most Americans" w.r.t. either "intelligent design" or seamless integration of "Enlightenment and Christianity". ... Kenosis (talk) 04:27, 11 May 2011 (UTC)


@Yopienso: What bothers me is your use of the word "pedigree". The source does not equate Enlightenment-era "intelligent design" with the modern concept, nor does it claim that the modern movement is a continuation of Enlightenment-era Natural Theology. I took Howe's statement to be tongue-in cheek, with the humor residing in the intentionally equivocal use of the words "intelligent design". As Dave said, the fact that intellectuals of the Enlightenment era believed in "intelligent design" is trivial, considering that they lived before any scientific discoveries were made that could challenge that belief. Furthermore, Enlightenment-era Natural Theology sheds very little light on modern-day ID, and vice versa. They do both share a source in Thomism and Aristotelianism, but they are not that directly related. The Fundamentalist theology and epistemology behind modern ID is indeed reactionary in nature, and a product of the beginning of the 20th century, and as such the very antithesis of Enlightenment thought, including Natural Theology. Any similarities are superficial, and at best of merely casual interest. Any claim of continuity would indeed be original synthesis. I still am not convinced that Howe's statement, ". . .in early 19th century America 'virtually everyone believed in intelligent design' when most Americans seamlessly integrated their Enlightenment with their Christianity," is pertinent to the article at all. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 05:41, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
  • "Pedigree" means "lineage." (4. derivation or background the pedigree of an idea)
  • "Link" and "equate" are not synonyms. You, for example, are presumably linked to Mitochondrial Eve. That in no way equates you with her. (Perhaps Ardi would provide a closer analogy.)
  • I believe Howe is quite serious; his footnote 48 reads, "I discuss belief in intelligent design during this period more fully in Unitarian Conscience, 69-82."
  • The charges of oversimplification are illogical: Wikipedia is replete with brief quotes from large, complex works. What we mustn't do is cherry-pick, and that is certainly not the case here, as evidenced by K's "snips." I would not object to omitting "most Americans seamlessly integrating their Enlightenment with their Christianity" for the sake of brevity, even though it accurately reflects Howe's thought on those pages. I am proposing the addition of 16-25 words, not of a "tome."
  • The contents of pp. 464-469 basically say nearly every American believed God designed the universe and that they had no problem accommodating scientific breakthroughs with their Christian beliefs.
For the record, here is some more from Howe: A devout Old School Presbyterian, [America's leading physicist, Joseph] Henry believed in the intelligent design of the universe and in the compatibility of reason with revelation; he enjoyed a close friendship with the conservative Calvinist theologian Charles Hodge of Princeton Theological Seminary. A capable administrator, Henry concentrated the Smithsonian's endeavors on scientific research and publication and turned its book collection over tot the Library of Congress. . .and founded the American Association for the Advancement of Science. . .
While the platform on which modern ID stands is indeed one that adheres to religious dogma above scientific inquiry, it seeks to restore and perpetuate what was, after all, "common knowledge" to our forbears. That this means scrapping or twisting the intervening scientific advances and discoveries is apparently immaterial to its proponents. The irony here is that, to quote a 2007 interview with Howe, in the 1800s "Religion provided a key incentive to scientific investigation, since virtually all scientists believed that the universe manifested intelligent design," while the modern movement stifles unbiased inquiry. Furthermore, the very ideas that gave impetus to the investigation were found scientifically faulty. This, I think, is noteworthy. Yopienso (talk) 07:23, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

The trouble is, you're going beyond the source in providing the comparison with modern ID which is essential to avoid misunderstanding. Unless that's something Howe examines in Unitarian Conscience, 69-82", but the problem remains. Howe's focus is on understanding the American situation in the early 19th century, not on grasping how ID deviates from that earlier understanding. The wording "most Americans seamlessly integrating their Enlightenment with their Christianity" hints at differences without explaining them to our readers who don't have that detailed historical knowledge or easy access to the book.
One thing seems odd, you summarise Howe as saying that nearly every American believed God designed the universe and that they had no problem accommodating scientific breakthroughs with their Christian beliefs. In Europe at that time some clearly did have problems accommodating scientific findings that conflicted with their beliefs, for example the emerging geology was hotly contested, and attempts to accommodate a worldwide Biblical flood largely failed between 1825 and 1830.
In some ways this section could do with trimming, or focussing more on the relationship of these past ideas to modern ID. WP:SUMMARY comes in as the articles linked at the top of the section go more into the general belief in design by a creator. If we do want to go more into the issue, Pennock's Tower of Babel is a better source for the relationship of the design argument to emerging science and to modern creationism including ID. . . dave souza, talk 10:05, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

How do you get that I'm "going beyond the source in providing the comparison with modern ID?"
As quoted above, "As this chapter is written in the early twenty-first century, the hypothesis that the universe reflects intelligent design has provoked a bitter debate in the United States." Surely that's modern-day ID!
Again here, "Only a few eccentrics worried about any conflict between scientific and religious truth, whereas today, the hypothesis that the universe reflects intelligent design has provoked bitter debate." This is Howe's idea; I'm just copying his words.
Here's from a review by Scott E. Caspar at MUSE (subscription required): "Howe’s intermittent asides to the twenty-first-century lay reader often illuminate an unfamiliar past world: it is instructive to imagine early nineteenth-century American economy and society against the conditions in developing nations today, or to recall that 'virtually everyone believed in intelligent design' in the 1820s and 1830s, when most Americans seamlessly integrated their Enlightenment with their Christianity (p. 464)."
This is simply the history of the origin of the concept; the American ID movement didn't invent the idea, but went back in time. They did invent some new "science" to challenge the new science. Yopienso (talk) 10:51, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
@Yopienso: You're going beyond the source because the source does not discuss modern ID at all. The brief mentions to it are peripheral at best to what he is writing about, namely Enlightenment-era theology. Howe does NOT state that 19th century Natural Theology was a direct predecessor of ID, which is what you seem to want to write. Modern ID arose out of the "Creation Science" movement of the 1960s, and draws very little from Enlightenment-era philosphy or theology; in fact it rejects these wholesale.
You seem to be confusing modern ID with the teleogical argument in general, which is not the subject of this article, and, indeed, has its own article. This article should deal exclusively with the modern ID movement, which really doesn't have that noble of a pedigree, being an incoherent and undeveloped mish-mash of ideas borrowed from various sources pieced together with little regard for internal consistency with the sole aim of deceiving judges, lawyers, politicians, school board members and the general public. It's more a philosophy of utility than a real attempt at real philosophy, or theology for that matter.
ID sources rarely invoke Enlightenment sources except to give their "theory" an aura of antiquity, stability and continuity. The person they most invoke is Paley, whose Natural Theology is diametrically opposed to their own beliefs, superficial similiarities nothwithstanding.
If you want to outline the history of modern ID, there is no real point in going much further back than the Creation Science of the 1960s and the court battles which ensued. There is no need to explain the development of the teleological argument in any great detail; interested readers can be refered to that article instead, and to the articles on Creationism and Creation Science. Casting the net too broad, which you are clearly doing in this case, does the reader a disservice by conflating diametrically opposed philosophical systems like Natural Theology and Theistic Evolution with modern ID. Those philosophies might be described with the words "intelligent design" sensu latu, but not ID, sensu stricto.
I agree with Dave that the section could do with some trimming. Indeed, the first four paragraphs of the "Origin of the Concept" section can be deleted in their entirity as they pertain mostly to the teleological argument in general, and not specically to modern ID. The section should begin at "Philosopher Barbara Forrest...." with no loss of information that is directly pertinent to the topic of this article. In fact, I believe I trimmed the section in the past before to exactly that point.
In short, an over-reaching history of the concept of "intelligent design" sensu lato is beyond the scope of this article, which should focus exclusively on modern ID. As far as modern ID is concerned, Enlightenment philosophy and Natural Theology are only distantly related, and not linearly at that. As Kenosis wrote, introducing philosophies from the distant past would require us to write a whole tome explaining the ways in which modern ID differs from them, both in content and in purpose. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 12:52, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
What do you think Howe means by "As this chapter is written in the early twenty-first century, the hypothesis that the universe reflects intelligent design has provoked a bitter debate in the United States."? If he does not refer to the modern ID that is the subject of this article, to what does he refer? Yopienso (talk) 17:13, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
It's only a glancing, off-hand reference to modern ID at best, and he does not expand upon it. Sorry, Yopienso, but that hardly qualifies as a "discussion" of modern ID on Howe's part. Howe is definitely not saying that modern ID is the grandchild of Enlightenment era thought (that's the SYNTH on your part). The link is very, very weak. Far to weak to deserve mention in this article. The more I read the quote, the more I'm convinced that Howe is very aware about his equivocal use of the words "intelligent design".
Furthermore, if you were to include this material in the article, how exactly do you think it would improve the reader's understanding of modern ID? The reader would be better served by referring him or her to the articles on the teleological argument, Creation Science and Creationism. Like I said, you've cast your net far to wide, way beyond the scope of the present article. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 19:45, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
OK, this poor horse has been flogged to death. A few parting comments:
Sorry I can't take the credit for originally inserting the quote.
We have here either a catalog of what's wrong with it, or a desperation to find something wrong with it: it's too detailed for the lead (It wasn't in the lead.), it's an oversimplification, it's synthesis (It isn't; it's a direct quote from a scholarly review of the source.), the word "pedigree" is a problem (Everything and everyone has a pedigree.), Howe was kidding (It's quite unlikely a scholar would joke in a book in a series from Oxford), I'm going beyond the source (I'm quoting a scholarly review on a reliable source.). We all have blind spots, and perhaps I'm not seeing this clearly; perhaps this is indeed a catalog of failings.
The disappointing bit was to see an experienced editor try to discredit the source because it's not online, and then say it's not accessible enough online. A dodge; my hero has feet of quite crumbly clay--alas! (Or maybe it's only a toe that can be daubed up.)
To answer this question: "Furthermore, if you were to include this material in the article, how exactly do you think it would improve the reader's understanding of modern ID?" The reader would understand why the idea is so pervasive--it's part of our heritage, maybe even our DNA. Any beginning anthropology or philosophy student knows mankind had universally posited some kind of intelligent design scheme. From there we show the reluctance of the ID adherents to embrace the development of a scientific understanding of the world. (May I add--the Bible-believing layman is not willfully obtuse, but believes the "science" he is taught by the ID proponents. It sounds very plausible if you don't know what they're talking about.)
You could be right that this info belongs in the other article.
Thanks to each for your gracious demeanor. Yopienso (talk) 23:30, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
Just wanted to chime in real quick-like about this latest information. I have to agree with Dominus that the material doesn't belong in this article, and I think it again comes back to conflating the colloquial usage of the term intelligent design, as it relates to the teleological argument, with the pseudoscientific "theory" of intelligent design. To me, it is quite clear that Howe is using it in the first sense, stating we have long perceived design in the natural world and concluded that this is evidence of a god's existence. Hence, the burgeoning rationalism of the Enlightenment did not conflict with the religious beliefs of most people, because the argument from design could be seen as objective evidence for a god. He does, however, briefly mention that this teleological argument is alive today and causing a ruckus in the unmentioned ID movement. Remember that the creationist ID is a "contemporary adaptation of the traditional teleological argument for the existence of God."
Furthermore, I think Dominus is correct that the first four paragraphs of the "Origin of the concept" section are excessive; that degree of detail should remain in the article on the teleological argument. We ought to replace these four paragraphs with a single one explaining the relation of creationist ID with the teleological argument, provide a link to the teleological argument (already there), and leave more in-depth information about this topic to its appropriate article. -- MisterDub (talk &#149; contribs) 15:59, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Now you've hit on something that may help remove the confusion from this article. Some of the comments above seem to ignore this line from the Origin of the concept section: Intelligent design in the late 20th and early 21st century is a development of natural theology that seeks to change the basis of science and undermine evolutionary theory. [My bolding.] Significantly, a footnote links to an essay by Dembski repudiating that interpretation. Perhaps the section should be recast to something somewhat like the following rough draft:

Origin of the concept
Further information: Argument from poor design, Teleological argument, and Watchmaker analogy
Whether the order and complexity of nature indicate purposeful design has been the subject of debate since the ancient Greek philosophers. In the early 19th century, Paley used the watchmaker analogy,[25] and such arguments led to the development of natural theology. Reasoning postulating a divine designer is embraced today by many believers in theistic evolution, who consider modern science and the theory of evolution to be compatible with the concept of a supernatural designer.
This movement fueled the passion for collecting fossils and other biological specimens that ultimately led to Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species was published in 1859. From here a fork in thought developed: scientists and many religionists adopted the theory of evolution, while others clung to a literal interpretation of the Bible that did not allow for that theory. Present-day intelligent design reaches back to early 19th century America when “virtually everyone believed in intelligent design.” [Ref] The movement has developed a large body of work that attempts to refute the theory of evolution. Etc., etc. Yopienso (talk) 03:56, 13 May 2011 (UTC)
I've gone ahead and abbreviated the first part of the "history of the Concept" section.
@Yopienso: Sorry, your version is far too detailed and over-reaching. Natural Theology, Theistic Evolution, the motives behind early bilogical research, and most particularly, our beloved dead horse Howe, do not belong here as they are only peripherally related to the topic. Far too peripherally to even warrant mention here.
Also, you don't seem to grasp the concept of SYNTH. Howe DEFINETELY does not even imply in the slightest that "Present-day intelligent design reaches back to early 19th century America". That is a gross misreading of the source. If, as you said, you have a "blind spot", this is where it is.
As I said before, there is no real need to mention anything about the history of present-day ID beyond the Creation Science of the 1960s and the court cases which ensued. Remember that the topic of this article is modern ID, not any old movement which can be considered "intelligent design" in the broadest sense of the term simply because it also, incidentally, used the teleological argument.
ID is, frankly, a mongrel of dubious and recent parentage, and it silly to pretend that it has papers at all, nevermind a noble purebreed pedigree.Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 05:01, 13 May 2011 (UTC)
My version, an abbreviation of what was considerably more detailed and over-reaching, was suggested as a springboard. You've taken quite a leap; I approve and applaud.
I apologize for a wording you quite reasonably misconstrued: Present-day intelligent design reaches back to early 19th century America when “virtually everyone believed in intelligent design.” "Reaches" here is a transitive, not intransitive verb, but that is not obvious to the reader. "Harks" would have been a far better choice. I meant it stands here and stretches backwards to pluck a relic from a shelf.
There is no synthesis in this sentence: Present-day intelligent design reaches back to early 19th-century America when “virtually everyone believed in intelligent design.” The adverbial phrase, "when 'virtually everyone believed in intelligent design'” modifies "early 19th-century America." That present-day intelligent design harks back to that day is substantiated in the article by The teleological argument on which modern Intelligent Design is based has long been advanced as a logical proof for the existence of a divine or supernatural entity that either created the universe, or at least set it in motion. (For the record, this is the "pedigree" of which I spoke. I've twice explained I was not ascribing a "noble purebreed pedigree" to ID. Please do not continue to suppose or allege I meant anything other than "derivation or background: the pedigree of an idea," as noted above.)
Do you believe this statement is factual? From here a fork in thought developed: scientists and many religionists adopted the theory of evolution, while others clung to a literal interpretation of the Bible that did not allow for that theory. ("Others" is too vague--should say "scientists and many others adopted the theory of evolution, while some religionists. . .") My question is about the fork. I ask because I'm considering inserting it in some fashion into paragraph 1.7 of Teleological argument. Yopienso (talk) 07:25, 13 May 2011 (UTC)
Oh, yes--does anyone know how to get rid of that white space left by the removal of the image of Plato? Yopienso (talk) 07:30, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

@Yopienso: How you went from my sentence:

"The teleological argument on which modern Intelligent Design is based has long been advanced as a logical proof for the existence of a divine or supernatural entity that either created the universe, or at least set it in motion"

to your sentence:

"Present-day intelligent design reaches (or harks) back to early 19th-century America when “virtually everyone believed in intelligent design"

is beyond me. It's clearly not supported by any source, including Howe. Well, Maybe Ian Barbour, in response to whom the DI's William Dembski wrote an article specifically explaining how ID is NOT a form of Natural Theology, stating:

"These days within the science-religion community, natural theology tends to be viewed as a disreputable enterprise that hearkens back to pre-Darwinian days and is now thoroughly passe. While I regard this judgment as unduly harsh, I also regard it as irrelevant to intelligent design. Intelligent design is not a form of natural theology".

Notice that he uses "hearkens" (he meant "harks", of course), the same word you proposed to use. Second of all, your sentence:

"From here a fork in thought developed: scientists and many religionists adopted the theory of evolution, while others clung to a literal interpretation of the Bible that did not allow for that theory"

is NOT factual, nor will you find many sources to support it. Modern ID, like all of modern Creationism, has its historical roots in the Fundamentalist-Modernist Conrtoversy of the LATE 19th and early 20th centuries. The Fundamentalist movement was profoundly reactionary, and thoroughly rejected Natural Theology, as well as any other form of "liberal" theology or philosophy from the Age of Englightenment. There was not a fork, but a complete break, with a new beginning that basically rejected anything that had occurred since the earliest years of the reformation.

You seem to imagine the history of American Christianity as gradually and continously progressing from the Pilgrims and Puritans to the modern day. However, it is marked by staggering discontinuities. Since the Age of Enlightenment, American Protestantism was convulsed and totally reshaped several times during the Second Great Awakening, the Third Great Awakening, the Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy, and the resurgence of conservative religious movements in the late 1970s and 1980s. Trying to trace a direct line, or even an indirect line, from modern ID back to any school of religious thought from the Age of Enlightenment would be an exercise in patience, if not futility.

I therfore think that there is no reason to even mention Natural Theology or any other Enlightenment-era school of thought, except in passing, as I have done.

Last of all, over the past six months you've been told by several editors, including me, that your concept of the topic of this article is too expansive. My reading of consensus is that this article should be tightly focused on Intelligent Design as promoted by the Discovery Institute, and not on any peripheral movements or philosophies that, again, happen to use or to have used the teleological argument in some way or another.

You seem to be clinging to the phrase "when virtually everyone believed in intelligent design", and, for the life of me, I can't figure out why. I hate to put it so frankly, but you have failed to convince me that Enlightenment-era Natural Theology and similar schools of thought have anything at all to do with modern ID at all, except perhaps in a very tenuous, trivial sort of way that does precious little to inform the reader about the topic of the present article.

Also, thanks for correcting my spelling mistake. Stupido! Stupido! Penitentiagite! Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 09:46, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

Since my further comments don't serve to improve the article, I've posted them on your talk page. Yopienso (talk) 09:08, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Origin of the concept trimmed

The trimming of the Origin of the concept section removed some duplication and use of primary sources or sources not explicitly related to ID in its modern sense. However, it's gone rather far. I'm reviewing tightening this section with the use of appropriate sources showing the relationship to modern ID. Pennock's Tower of Babel has good sections on this, but not all in one place which makes it a bit difficult. The Kitzmiller judgement and the testimony of John F. Haught both provide a useful overview. The section after Barbara Forrest's comments could also do with clarification, some of the more recent papers might prove useful. . . dave souza, talk 17:12, 14 May 2011 (UTC)
Ah, knew there was a good source somewhere. Biological design in science classrooms by Scott and Matzke will do nicely. . . dave souza, talk 17:29, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for that link, Dave; it's an excellent article. I read all the first part and skimmed the rest. Ours has been troubled by claiming on the one hand to be specifically about modern ID, yet including all the long history of the pervasive belief that the universe and its contents exhibit purposeful design. NCSE readily acknowledges this fact, whereas WP editors tend to deny it, thus creating confusion.
Long before the ID movement arose, creation scientists constantly invoked design arguments. Some deny this connection (48), but an extensive 1989 survey (50) of creationist literature notes the ubiquitous role of design: Etc.
As I noted above, that perception is "part of our heritage, maybe even our DNA." Scott and Matzke refer to former Christian arguments, but the perception extended beyond that. I have here on my desk an entirely secular book, Nature as Designer: A Botanical Art Study, printed by Van Nostrand Reinhold Co. in 1961. Harry Martinson unabashedly states in the foreword, "It may be that there are certain fundamental laws regulating design,. . .Nature, the sculptress, ponders and calculates." Certainly he means this in a poetic sense, not a religious one. Yet a religious person would quite naturally call nature "God." Yet our article does not accommodate this universal perception.
After hanging around this article long enough, I've realized it's intended to deal exclusively with the DI's ID. That being the case, let's remove and keep out everything else! A bust of Plato and discourse on Paley can only suggest the article is about the more general design concept, intelligent or not, religious or not, that is instinctive in the human psyche that has not been deprived of its innate esthetic sense. Combining the two only genders confusion.
Making this article exclusively about DI's ID seems to have been the original intent of the creating editors. As I've said before, I would have confined that to a subsection of Intelligent design movement, but since consensus is that the argument itself needs a separate article, we should leave everything else out. I would go so far as to rename the article "Modern-day intelligent design." Otherwise, it's offensive to people who know good and well Dembski and co. did not invent the notion. Imho, DV's nod to the great philosophers is appropriate, excellent, even, as an opener; the section then cuts straight to the chase. Yopienso (talk) 21:51, 14 May 2011 (UTC)
@Dave: I do realize that the trimming was quite radical, but as far as I can see, nothing I trimmed was actually directly related to modern ID, except in the most peripheral and trivial manner. It also gave the impression that the history of modern ID extends back further that it actually does, which is the 1920s at most. Before that, Creation Science in its present-day form did not exist. It would be extremely misleading to give the impression that ID is an outgrowth of Paley's Natural Theology. At most, modern Creation Scientists and ID proponents have borrowed some superficial elements of Paley's work, such as analogies, examples and terminology, while ignoring or even rejecting the core principals of his philosophy and theology.
I'm very much against tracing back the history of the concept in a way that implies continuity with earlier schools of thought. ID is very much an ad hoc, utilitarian mish-mash of elements plucked without context from various sources for the sole purpose of concincing the public and public officials to permit the teaching of Creationism in public schools. It would do the reader a great diservice to present ID as a coherent, developed and productive systematized philosphy with a long, continuous pedigree that includes philosophies from the Age of Enlightenment in particular.
For me, the operative word here is "continuous". ID is continuous on with the Creation Science of the 1960s, and ultimately the Creationism of the 1920s (George McCready Price, William Bell Riley and Harry Rimmer). They were motivated by biblical literalism of the Fundamentalist variety, which really does not have a predecessor in 19th century thought, being a complete break from and rejection of Historical Christian theology and philosophy since the earliest years of the Reformation.
I'm also against anything that could give the reader an impression that this article is about anything other than the Modern ID movement as promulgated by the DI. I'm also against rehashing the history of Creation Science, Creationism and the teleological argument on this page. These topics have their own pages, and that is where their respective histories should be detailed. The history of ID itself begins in the 1980s, and that's where the history presented in this article should begin, too.
As for references, Matzke is fine, and and is in full accordance with what I've just written above. However, since what I wrote is basically culled from the lead, it would be best to use the same sources presented there, and in the lead of the article on the teleological argument. I'm trying to figure out how to use the citation system used in this article without mucking it up. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 12:49, 15 May 2011 (UTC)
The section about origins is important, as ID's use of an ancient argument for the existence of God is significant in determining its religious roots, and more immediately it's worth clarifying very briefly the context you outline above. I'm working on it, with this reference in mind. Agree that we want this to be concise, but readers should be aware of the context from this article without reading and memorising other articles. I don't have the recent revision of Numbers which is cited for the lead, but the sources mentioned in this talk page section cover the same ground. . dave souza, talk 13:23, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

In progress

A work in progress, I've added information from these sources. There's also info on the ID response to the problem of evil, which essentially is to say that the intentions of The Designer are a matter for theology and outwith ID. . . dave souza, talk 16:05, 15 May 2011 (UTC)
Expert testimony in Kitzmiller stated the argument went back to Aquinas. This argument, the fifth of the "Five Ways" was the first that was widely known as the teleological argument. Why not use that? The key here is that it's an old religious argument given a snazzy new secular-sounding name, without specifying the presumed "designer" is "God", offered up as a "scientific theory" to try to satisfy the black-letter language of Edwards v. Aguilard, its alleged scientific status overwhelmingly disputed by the entire scientific community . Its precursors, the origin of the concept, go all the way back to the ancients but the argument itself goes back to the Scholastics, most notably Aquinas, and perhaps to a lesser extent, Averroes. We needn't quibble over whether it goes all the way back to Cicero or Plato or Socrates (Whether Artistotle proffered a teleological argument is debatable anyway and so is Socrates on this issue, and while Plato's Timaeus is generally taken by theologians as a teleological perspective, it seems to me we needn't get this specific. If extreme brevity is desired, it seems to me adequate to just say something to the effect that the argument "goes back to Aquinas" and just cite to the appropriate page of Kitzmiller
..... As to the notion recently proposed here on this talk page that somehow there's WP:Notability in the words "intelligent design" independently of Of Pandas and People, the Discovery Institute and several publications by its fellows, and the decision in Kitzmiller v. Dover, and the modern national socio-political and educational scuffle in the U.S., i.e. that a new topic called "intelligent design" can be carved out independently of all this, it is frankly ridiculous. The only notability of the term "intelligent design" derives from this modern American brouhaha, and this just is the way the author Daniel Walker Howe plays on it in his book discussed in the talk section immediately above. Despite that some have used the words "intelligent design" as a synonym for a teleological argument or argument from design, the phrase was brought into being as a term specifically in the context of advocating the teaching of creationism in high-school biology classes under the claim that it's a scientific theory, and that's its only reasonable notability today. It's why this article exists in the first place. ... Kenosis (talk) 19:49, 15 May 2011 (UTC)
I've included a reference to the Kitzmiller memorandum, Ruling pp. 24–25 (page nos. now corrected) but haven't noticed any statement that the Aquinas version was the first widely known as the teleological argument – was that in the testimony somewhere? Amyway, while I've not gone for extreme brevity, the context now shown seems important, any comments on that? . . dave souza, talk 20:15, 15 May 2011 (UTC)
Also note, I've dropped reference to Plato, Socrates et al. as the sources concentrate on Aquinas and Paley. The summary of Aquinas's argument is based on Pennock, but is reasonably close to this source. The main point seems to me to be a brief summary of their argument, and the impact it had on developing science. As is clear from these newer sources, "Enlightenment thought" means a theology resembling deism, with God as a distant lawmaker. The contrast with the repeatedly tinkering miracle monger of ID is now noted. . . dave souza, talk 20:37, 15 May 2011 (UTC)
The Kitzmiller testimony doesn't support that Aquinas' "fifth way" is the first widely acknowledged teleological argument. The decision, on p22 as you noted just above, says:

A. Intelligent Design Is a Classical Argument for the Existence of God
2. John Haught, a theologian who has written extensively on the subject of evolution and religion, testified as an expert for plaintiffs. He chaired the Department of Theology at Georgetown University, and authored thirteen books on the theological subjects. Three of those books deal specifically with the issues of evolution and religion. 9:4-5 (Haught).1 He explained that the argument for intelligent design is not a new scientific argument, but rather an old religious argument for the existence of God. This argument traces back at least to Thomas Aquinas in the 13th century, who framed the argument as a syllogism: Wherever complex design exists, there must have been a designer; nature is complex; therefore nature must have had an intelligent designer. 9:1 (Haught). Dr. Haught testified that Aquinas was explicit that this intelligent designer "everyone understands to be God." 9:7-8. The syllogism described by Dr. Haught is essentially the same argument for intelligent design presented by Professors Behe and Minnich, employing the phrase "purposeful arrangement of parts."

That's enough to support the statement that the argument goes at least back to Aquinas, leaving for another article such as that on the teleological argument the subtler, far more debatable points about whether the writings of, e.g. Augustine of Hippo's City of God, Cicero's De Natura Deorum, Plato's Timaeus, Aristotle's Metaphysics and/or Socrates' world view, constitute per se teleological arguments. ... Kenosis (talk) 23:01, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

To clarify, the current section states "The concept of intelligent design, the teleological argument, is one of three basic religious arguments for the existence of God which have been advanced for centuries (the others being the ontological argument and the cosmological argument). In the 13th century Thomas Aquinas argued ... The version formulated in 1802 by William Paley used the watchmaker analogy..." The others aren't mentioned any more. . . dave souza, talk 16:45, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Edit Summary

Hello Wikipedia

I am having trouble understanding some shorthand used in this page's edit summaries. What do all of these mean?

gr, will need some [[V's), pp-move, Rmvg, rv, Rvt

Why is there a character limit for edit summaries? Why not have a hide/unhide button for long edit summaries?

Also, why are the references out of order? Thank you WikipediaSwmmr1928 talk 16:05, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Hi, edit summaries are commonly noted as shorthand or jargon: gr usually means grammar, "will need some V's" presumably indicates a need for WP:V (verifiable) sources, Rmvg suggests removing something, and both rv and rvt are used when reverting to an earlier version. Don't know why there's a character limit for edit summaries, the References section shows links to inline citations, and are in the order they appear in the article. Hope that assists, we're all Wikipedia, you included. . . dave souza, talk 16:42, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
If you active "WikiEd" under your preferences (under the "Gadgets" tab) you can, iirc, make longer edit summaries. Guettarda (talk) 17:23, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
Why are some articles' references in the order they appear in the article and others in alphabetical order?Swmmr1928 talk 18:32, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
Inine citations, linked to these little numbers in the article like[3], always appear in order of use in the article. Sometimes they're shown in a separate Notes section, and references are listed alphabetically (by author) in a separate References section, as with my old chum Charles Darwin. There's a fair amount of leeway in WP:CITE guidance for editors to agree different ways for different articles, so we're not very consistent. So it goes. . . dave souza, talk 19:04, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
And why do some of the little numbers in the article have an 'n' in front?Swmmr1928 talk 19:16, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
Hey Swmmr, you probably shouldn't be asking these questions on an article talk page. I would suggest you ask your questions of myself (I can be abrupt, so please have a thick skin), or anyone else here at their own talk page. This area is for commenting about Intelligent design. However, glad you're asking these questions. I've been around for 6 years ( I think), and I know maybe 5% of the stuff around here. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 19:52, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
BTW, the little "n" is for a note rather than a citation. Intelligent design is so complex that some of the verbiage needs to be explained. I was, and continue to be, opposed to using notes. I think it's not a clean way to write a good article. But the evil ID cab forced it on me. LOL. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 19:58, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Question about Mainstream View Section

Why doesn't this article have a section for Criticism or Scientific rejection of ID similar to this article, which is not even pseudoscience? According to WP:Lede, greater detail is saved for the body of the article. Because there is no section allowing full detail for mainstream views, the pseudoscience obfuscates the description or prominence of the mainstream views and NPOV: Pseudoscience and related fringe theories is violated. Swmmr1928 talk 19:42, 16 May 2011 (UTC)


Swmmr1928 talk 19:29, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

A section of our neutral point of view policy cautions against splitting sections according to point of view, as this can leave one section showing fringe views unchallenged and all the responses to these views being segregated into another section, a sort of POV fork which is Not A Good Thing. . . dave souza, talk 19:36, 16 May 2011 (UTC) Oops, correct WP:STRUCTURE link.... dave souza, talk 19:44, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
This is not what I am proposing. Sorry I should have been more clear.Swmmr1928 talk 19:39, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
Swmmr, you need to indent so that we can following your answers and questions. If you're replying to someone, you post after that (and anyone else's comments) by indenting one more time than the previous comment. I added two indents for you. I've indented three times to reply to you. An indent is made by :. Each colon indents one tab stop. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 20:00, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
The problem is that fringe views are not challenged enough. There is not enough effort to follow NPOV: Pseudoscience and related fringe theories. Specifically, "Any inclusion of pseudoscientific views should be proportionate with the scientific view." I am sorry I do not have enough time to read all of the archives to review any previous compromises.Swmmr1928 talk —Preceding undated comment added 20:07, 16 May 2011 (UTC).
Swmmr1928, do you have anything specific you feel is omitted? The editors here have collaborated and worked diligently to make this a high quality article, explaining the details of ID while maintaining that it is pseudoscience, a form of creationism, and rebuked by the scientific community. In fact, this Talk page is often criticized for being unfairly biased against ID, rather than for it. Just going from memory, I'm fairly certain we have included information from reliable sources toward the end of most (all?) of the sections where claims from ID proponents are present, explaining why these claims aren't accepted by mainstream scientists. In this format, you first read ID's claims, then the reason for its rejection within the same section. As Dave Souza has explained earlier, this prevents a reader from getting a POV interpretation when reading select sections, since each claim is challenged in the section it is raised. -- MisterDub (talk &#149; contribs) 20:45, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
Do you see no further improvements to this article after it has achieved featured article status?
I interpret "Any inclusion of pseudoscientific views should be proportionate with the scientific view" to mean the number of sentences about the scientific view should be equal to the number of sentences about the pseudoscientific view. Simply one refutation at the end of the section does no suffice. Furthermore, you admit you include scientific views "toward the end of most (all?) of the sections where claims from ID proponents are present." This violates NPOV: Pseudoscience and related fringe theories, which tells us to avoid "back-and-forth dialogue between proponents and opponents." Instead, "try to achieve a more neutral text by folding debates into the narrative, rather than isolating them into sections that ignore or fight against each other." Swmmr1928 talk 21:28, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
It seems we're not understanding what you're requesting here. Could you please be more precise in exactly how we should improve this article? We already have multiple refutations at the end of these sections, at least where multiple, reliable sources exist. If you know of more sources that contribute to the article without belaboring the point, please add them. Also, we are "folding debates into the narrative" by refraining from creating a Criticism section (which is what we all assumed you were asking of us) and instead incorporating the information into its appropriate section. Since we are confused as to exactly how you'd like to improve this article, please be a bit more detailed in your responses to us (e.g. you'd like a new section entitled "This stuff here" created, you'd like section "A" to be placed after section "B" for readability, etc.). -- MisterDub (talk &#149; contribs) 22:03, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
Short answer is that this is a better article than that one :) A well-written article doesn't segregate out for- and against- sections. Instead, it incorporates all sources into a coherent whole. That has always been the goal we've been working towards on this article for the past six or seven years. Guettarda (talk) 21:09, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
You are misinterpreting what I am saying. I do not agree with what Dave souza thought I proposed: "leave one section showing fringe views unchallenged and all the responses to these views being segregated into another section. "I am trying to assume good faith, but do you not recognize the contributions before 7years ago? This article was created almost 9 and a half years ago. Swmmr1928 talk 21:28, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
Yep, I do know the history of this article - I've gone through most of the edits before 2005, and I've had it watchlisted since 2005. And before Duncharris (talk · contribs) started working to knock this article into shape around 2004/2005, it was truly bad. Guettarda (talk) 21:58, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
Swmmr, this is a misunderstanding: I interpret "Any inclusion of pseudoscientific views should be proportionate with the scientific view" to mean the number of sentences about the scientific view should be equal to the number of sentences about the pseudoscientific view. "Proportionate" doesn't mean equal space, but space according to prominence. Neutrality requires that each article or other page in the mainspace fairly represents all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint. Giving due weight and avoiding giving undue weight means that articles should not give minority views as much of or as detailed a description as more widely held views. See more at WP:WEIGHT. Obviously, an article about a fringe view will go into detail about it. Yopienso (talk) 22:07, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
Yes and it is clear to me that this article violates NPOV: Pseudoscience and related fringe theories by allowing

significant pseudoscience to "obfuscate the description of the mainstream views of the scientific community." Swmmr1928 talk 22:15, 16 May 2011 (UTC) The policy is not Any inclusion of pseudoscientific views should be proportionate in prominance with the scientific views, this is clearSwmmr1928 talk 22:33, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Proposals to improve article

paraphrase direct quote at the beginning of the article: "certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection"

The first sentence or at least the beginning of the lede should mention that Intelligent Design is pseudoscience and has been flatly rejected by the mainstream communities across the globe. Furthermore, include more prominently the interview:

7^ a b Phillip Johnson: "Our strategy has been to change the subject a bit so that we can get the issue of Intelligent Design, which really means the reality of God, before the academic world and into the schools." Johnson 2004. Christianity.ca. Let's Be Intelligent About DarwinArchived June 8, 2007 at the Wayback Machine.. "This isn't really, and never has been a debate about science. It's about religion and philosophy." Johnson 1996. World magazine. Witnesses For The Prosecution. "So the question is: "How to win?" That's when I began to develop what you now see full-fledged in the "wedge" strategy: "Stick with the most important thing"—the mechanism and the building up of information. Get the Bible and the Book of Genesis out of the debate because you do not want to raise the so-called Bible-science dichotomy. Phrase the argument in such a way that you can get it heard in the secular academy and in a way that tends to unify the religious dissenters. That means concentrating on, "Do you need a Creator to do the creating, or can nature do it on its own?" and refusing to get sidetracked onto other issues, which people are always trying to do." Johnson 2000. Touchstone magazine. Berkeley's Radical An Interview with Phillip E. Johnson at the Wayback Machine (archived June 9, 2007).

Swmmr1928 talk 22:17, 16 May 2011 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Swmmr1928 (talk • contribs)

I don't quite understand why the first sentence should be paraphrased: I find a direct quote defining the term by those who created it more than appropriate. Also, I was actually a little surprised to see that we've left the term pseudoscience out of the lead entirely; below is a suggested rewrite of the lead's second paragraph, specifically mentioning the rejection of ID as pseudoscience. Lastly, I don't feel that Philip Johnson's interview needs to be cited in the lead, but perhaps he should be mentioned as the father of ID ("He... is considered the father of the intelligent design movement.") in the "Origin of the concept" or "Origin of the term" sections (or both?). I don't want to put information in this article that more appropriately belongs to the one on the Intelligent design movement, and we already have his views later in the article (see the "Religion and leading proponents" subsection of the "Movement" section, and the "Creating and teaching the controversy" section).


References for new information:
[1] 82. David Mu. Trojan Horse or Legitimate Science: Deconstructing the Debate over Intelligent Design (PDF)
[2] n_14. American Association for the Advancement of Science. Professional Ethics Report (PDF)
[3] n_35. "National Science Teachers Association Disappointed About Intelligent Design Comments Made by President Bush"
[4] Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District: Whether ID is Science
[5] Stenmark, Mikael (2004). How to Relate Science and Religion: A Multidimensional Model. Grand Rapids: W.B. Eerdmans Pub. Co. ISBN 978-0802828231. pp187-188
You'll notice that I removed the prepositional phrase in a fundamental way from the modified second sentence (previously the first). I know we've discussed this earlier and decided to keep the term fundamental in it, but it just jumps out as very poor grammar. We can add it back (perhaps phrased better? :D) if others still feel strongly about its retention. -- MisterDub (talk &#149; contribs) 18:00, 17 May 2011 (UTC)
You might want to take a look back at prior versions of that second paragraph. Here it is

..... one year ago;
..... two years ago

The wisdom of the earlier version from two years ago was, in part that the first sentence covered both strategies of ID advocates, some of whom argued that it was a "scientific theory" under existing notions of what a scientific theory is, while others sought a fundamental redefinition of science to include supernatural explanations. As well, both of the prior versions to which I just linked were more explicit about the scientific community's response to the assertion that ID is a scientific theory. ... Kenosis (talk) 21:21, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

Poor design

I've reverted Amatulic's deletion of a sentence explaining that a creationist would explain poor design as a result of the Fall. I added a citation. Since the article is about ID, I believe the explanation is not only justified, but required. No matter that the Bible is not a scientific text; we are treating ID as pseudo-science. As always, if there's a consensus to delete, fine. Yopienso (talk) 22:09, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Have taken this back a stage, per my edit summary, as this is citing an unreliable source for what modern creationists would say, placed out of sequence in a mid 19th century context. Removed the following:
(Creationists would explain apparent "poor design" as resulting from the Fall of Man described in the third chapter of Genesis.) ref Luskin, C. (n.d.). Good theology and bad design or bad theology and good design?./ref
What's needed is a reliable secondary source on what answers ID proponents put to the problem of evil, in a paragraph showing it as a modern phenomenon. Given their equivocation about their bible roots, the Fall of Man doesn't seem likely to be their official explanation. . . dave souza, talk 22:25, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
Huh? The IDEA Center is the ID movement. The leadership comprises all the usual suspects. The ref goes to an article copyrighted 2011. (Can't say when it was written, but they've kept it up to date.) Primary sources are fine for saying what they say about themselves. The specific question being addressed wasn't the problem of evil, but poor design. Yopienso (talk) 22:38, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
I don't mean to be rude with my "Huh?" It's short for "I don't follow your logic." Yopienso (talk) 22:49, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
I didn't remove that statement because it was uncited, I removed it because it's a non-sequitur. It seems irrelevant that creationists would base an argument on a Biblical reference, because the whole purpose of ID is to distance itself from creationism by presenting what they consider to be scientific arguments. ~Amatulić (talk) 22:50, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
Except for the Wedge document and Teach the Controversy, you might right. Intelligent design, as determined by the courts, was a badly designed (pun intended) attempt to circumvent the Establishment clause of the First Amendment to the US Constitution. It's rather ironic that they try to make themselves out to be some philosophical/scientific theory, but we find out it's nothing more than an attempt to find a loophole to teach creationism. So, I'm going to disagree with your supposition. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 22:54, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
Orangemarlin, please don't editorialize on an article talk page, this is a place for discussing how to present this topic IAW our NPOV policy. I think Yopienso and Dave Souza, as usual, are making good progress at trying to resolve the issue. I would say to Yopienso and Dave that if you're going to use a primary source, then it needs to be attributed in the text so the reader knows whose opinion or statement it is. Cla68 (talk) 23:22, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
ROFLMAO. Wow, you do have a sense of humor. Damn that was fucking funny. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 23:35, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
Way to be civil, man. You're a shining example to all. 67.233.243.145 (talk) 14:36, 1 June 2011 (UTC)
Casey Luskin weasels about "theologists would say.." and isn't saying this is the ID answer. His argument is basically that Darwin and modern critics of creationism who raise the problem of evil are talking about theology, so he switches from ID mode to theologist mode and starts giving theological (not necessarily creationist) answers. Check our article, Plantinga has an alternative answer. Either way, it's theology and not ID. If we do want to get into the issue, we need a good secondary source discussing ID as a basis, rather than interjecting an apologia by one notably unreliable cdesign proponentsist. The issue could be discussed as an extension of the third paragraph in that Origin of the concept section, which already mentions the problem of evil, or as part of the Intelligent designer section. . . dave souza, talk 23:19, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
Casey Luskin is speaking for ID; his answer is the ID answer, or at least one ID answer. The subtitle of his article is "A scientific and philosophical assessment of supposed 'poor design' examples in the natural realm." He's not mainly talking about the problem of evil. Theology is so much a part of ID that it can't really be separated. (Perhaps not theology, strictly speaking, but religious talk, to be sure.) Doesn't your "cdesign proponentsist" recognize there is precious little difference between ID and creationism? Isn't that the point usually made on these talk pages about Kitzmiller? The Plantinga BLP has a section that presents his argument about the problem of evil, not about poor design.
For the record, I was referring to the section of Luskin's article that begins "The text of Genesis states. . ." One line: "Biblical theology predicts that in a fallen universe full of self-chosen evil, imperfection will be found."
Here's a secondary source (NCSE) that quotes Gish. "They may also raise the argument of poor design and vestigial structures; however, you can point out that this is a theological argument (the nature of the designer), not a scientific one. The examples of poor design show God's punishment for the sins of Adam and Eve."
But Amatulic, we find, did not delete for lack of a citation. Dave's ideas of rearranging sound good.
Right now I should NOT be on Wikipedia, so will leave this in everyone's capable hands. In about 8 hrs. I'll be offline for a couple of days. Yopienso (talk) 00:08, 31 May 2011 (UTC)
Rearranging sounds good to me too.
I want to point out that I removed the sentence almost immediately after it had been added. I didn't think that my action would generate any controversy here since the sentence was added without discussion in the first place. The sentence certainly didn't enjoy the status of being something long-standing in the article. I don't mind putting something like it where Dave Souza suggests, although I really don't see why this article should belabor a point that seems rather tangential to the main topic. ~Amatulić (talk) 07:50, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

I disagree with Yopienso's claim that Luskin's weasel-worded "theologists would say..." response can be attributed to ID in general. He phrased it that way for a very important reason. That is, if as an ID proponent, he used a creationist argument as his own, it would let the cat out of the bag; yet one more more bit of evidence that ID is nothing but creationism repackaged. So he uses a creationist reply, but in such a weasely way as to distance himself from that view (even though it's probably what he personally believes). Raul654 (talk) 15:07, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

While you make good points and I generally agree, you points rest on the latent assumptions that ID proponents, or more generally theologists, are
  • consistent
  • logical
  • not embarrassingly transparent in their duplicity
...and I would argue that the evidence does not support these assumptions, and thus the argument is based on false premises. Kevin Baastalk 21:17, 1 June 2011 (UTC)
Nowhere in Luskin's article does the phrase "theologists would say.." appear. Neither does the word "theologist" nor the phrase "would say." I assume Dave was very broadly and apparently confusingly (for those who did not look at the article themselves) paraphrasing Luskin's appeal to theology. Here is what he actually said:
Scientifically speaking, there is nothing to say that a designer must employ optimal energetic efficiency. But because their objection to intelligent design is theological in nature, only a theological answer can be given. Johnson, a Christian, makes the point that Gould pits his own reason against God’s and is writing the rules of what God can and cannot do. Both Gould and Dawkins employ a theology mandating that the designer must design all things to operate with maximum energetic efficiency. Because this objection is theological in nature, the theological answer must point out that no religious doctrine necessarily teaches that all things must operate at maximum energetic efficiency. Since Gould and Dawkins themselves invoke a theology to exclude intelligent design from their possible explanations of life, it is fair to use theology to rebut this challenge of the simple idea that life was designed by an intelligence.
Editors may agree or not that those are weasel words. What is undebatable is that Luskin is here speaking for the ID movement and that he expresses the belief that apparent "poor design," or what he calls "sub-optimalities," is a result of the Fall. The only question for us is whether or not to include this information. Yopienso (talk) 01:34, 2 June 2011 (UTC)
I'd say no, as I have before. I removed the weasel-worded sentence earlier because it seemed like a non-sequitur and had been added to the article only a few minutes before. Now that Yopienso has provided the actual quotation from Luskin above, I can see that it's a straw man fallacy. Gould and Dawkins don't "mandate" anything about a designer; in fact they argue against the notion of there being a designer at all. There's no need to include fallacious reasoning in this article. Doing so invites a flood of similar examples of fallacies (of which there are likely many), and this article is already too long. If there's a separate article covering the quality of arguments that ID proponents make, then we could put it there, but this article is already too long. ~Amatulić (talk) 01:55, 2 June 2011 (UTC)
I really have no problem with incorporating this information, but where would it go? Before its removal, the sentence was placed in the "Origin of the concept" section, to which I don't think it belongs. It seemed to be a thought-out refutation to a reference of a claim made only in passing. I think if we were to include it, we should have a new heading under the "Creating and teaching the controversy" section, where other, similar types of arguments are located. We'd first need to mention the argument from poor design, then add the sentence in question as a rebuttal. This may make the article too long, as Amatulic stated, but I must admit to being ignorant of policies regarding article length. If others also think the article would be too long, I'll support that decision. Otherwise, I see no problem with adding this new information. -- MisterDub (talk &#149; contribs) 17:54, 2 June 2011 (UTC)
  • A few comments: (i) IDEA Center, as the IDM's student network, is not a particularly prominent source, (ii) Casey Luskin is one of ID's less prominent, if most widely derided, spokesmen, (iii) the piece in question would appear to fail WP:SELFPUB -- particularly the central, unsubstantiated, claim that Dawkins' & Gould's "objection is theological in nature" appears to violate #1 "the material is not unduly self-serving" & #3 "it does not involve claims about events not directly related to the source". I would therefore object to its inclusion in the article.

    I agree that the 'Argument from Poor Design' probably deserves a mention, and would suggest that the 'Creating and teaching the controversy' could do with a major rewrite (and possibly a retitle and restructure), but would object to Luskin's inclusion there without a reliable WP:SECONDARY source giving context to his claims. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 04:46, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

As suggested earlier, I've found coverage of this issue in Pennock's Tower of Babel and on that basis have added a brief note to the Origin of the concept section, and a more detailed paragraph to the Intelligent designer section.[2] It seems to me that the argument from poor design comments on whether a designer / God exists, and on the nature of the designer envisaged by ID proponents. No objection to the Creating and teaching the controversy section getting a major rewrite (and possibly a retitle and restructure), but don't think this issue belongs there. . dave souza, talk 11:17, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

'Creating and teaching the controversy'

I would like to suggest:

  1. Retitling this section as 'Relationship with science and religion', as it goes well beyond the topic of simply 'creating and teaching the controversy'.
  2. Splitting up the overly-long prefatory section into a subsection on 'Creating and teaching the controversy', probably a subsection on 'Relationship with religion', and possibly some other subsections as well.

HrafnTalkStalk(P) 05:00, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

In general, that's a pretty good point, but "Teaching the controversy" is a top level point of the designs the DI had when creating ID, per the wedge document. As a cultural artefact, the entire point to Intelligent Design is teaching the controversy. I agree from a philosophical perspective, that component is secondary to the interaction between religion and science, but that's only one context. I suppose from a straw-poll point of view this idea gets my tacit support if done without diminishing the cultural relevance of "teach the controversy" in the article. i kan reed (talk) 14:40, 3 June 2011 (UTC)
Wow... this is an interesting one. You both have great points. Which is the least biased and neutral method? Since ID proponents seem to be the minority (not OR, based on stats in cites linked to this article), would it be more appropriate to use a term that is most commonly held for this topic? I'm not sure what that term would be... but even if it does not reference "controversy" in it's name, that can easily be covered in the first sentence or two of the section. Yeah, I'm not much help here... just noting some ID proponents see this as a controversy, while various others dont see any controversy (but instead see what else is touched upon in the article, various court cases, etc). ROBERTMFROMLI | TK/CN 19:42, 3 June 2011 (UTC)


I'm sorry but you would appear to be wrong. The Wedge document does not contain the phrase, and (in various readings of both the document itself and various sources that analyse it) I've found no indication that it is there implicitly either. Teach the Controversy#Origin of phrase traces its first use by ID to 1999, the year after the Wedge document was drafted, with it becoming the DI's "compromise strategy" in 2002 (Teach the Controversy#Overview). From memory, it was front and centre in the DI's campaign in Kansas in 2005, but its being explicitly described as "at best disingenuous, and at worst a canard" in the Dover decision later that year made it into a liability, and it has since been eclipsed by later catchphrases such as Critical Analysis of Evolution and then strengths and weaknesses of evolution. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 05:32, 4 June 2011 (UTC)
Hmmm, maybe we should delete update the 70,0000-byte-long Teach the Controversy article, then. It presently has 89 footnotes and was last edited by you less than a month ago. (Actually Smackbot came along behind you, but he doesn't really count.) I really don't care about what the section here is called, but a google of "Teach the Controversy" doesn't turn up much recent stuff. Most recent is a video from last year by A.C. Grayling. Thanks for the info; I thought this campaign was still alive and well, just as the lede suggests: "Thus, the Teach the Controversy strategy has become the primary thrust of the Discovery Institute in promoting its aims." Yopienso (talk) 06:07, 4 June 2011 (UTC)
If you looked more carefully you'd have seen that that edit was just for a tag, and that I haven't been a major contributor to that article (which I would suspect hasn't changed too much in the last few years. Looking even more closely, this source from the 'Shift in strategy' section explicitly talks about "the Disco Institute’s replacement for its failed 'teach the controversy about evolution' tactic" back in 2006. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 07:31, 4 June 2011 (UTC)
I would however admit that the 'Shift in strategy' is more than a little incoherent, both jumping backward and forwards chronologically all over the place, and being unclear as to whether the 'shift' in question is from full-thrated ID to TtC, or from TtC to (the even more watered-down) Critical Analysis of Evolution. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 07:48, 4 June 2011 (UTC)
My question, which perhaps should be on that article's talk page, (but it was raised in my mind here) is whether the last sentence or two of the lede should be updated to show the campaign is largely over. Best, Yopienso (talk) 20:31, 4 June 2011 (UTC)
You might have noted that when I "last edited" it, it was to place a {{dubious}} tag on that exact passage (which I have since deleted). To state that "the campaign is largely over" would (i) be at least slightly problematical, as the campaign was not so much abandoned as modified-and-renamed (successively to Critical Analysis of Evolution then strengths and weaknesses of evolution) & (ii) stating such would require an explicit WP:RS. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 04:19, 5 June 2011 (UTC)
Back to the subject at hand. After some reflection, I think it would be better with a more neuitral title than it has now, but that the relationship with science isn't the most important thing to cover in this section. I, personally, would go for "Intelligent design politics" or something similar, because that's the area that is really covered by the section. i kan reed (talk) 12:55, 6 June 2011 (UTC)
Except (i) the section does not contain much (any?) information on the political side of ID & (ii) the topic of politics better sits in the 'Movement' section (which is, or at least should be, about ID as a political movement). HrafnTalkStalk(P) 13:40, 6 June 2011 (UTC)
Both "Intelligent design politics" and "Relationship with science and religion" seem to be vague, inadequate descriptions. Simply titling the section "Teaching the controversy" might be more neutral, but does not address the documented fact that the "controversy" has indeed been manufactured. I see no need to change it. __ Just plain Bill (talk) 14:37, 6 June 2011 (UTC)
Except that 'Teaching the controversy' actually describes very little of the information contained in the section (its only relevant to the first two paragraphs). HrafnTalkStalk(P) 10:30, 7 June 2011 (UTC)
Which is why "Creating... the controversy" is an essential part of the title, since the much of the rest of the section describes how the "controversy" is in fact spurious. __ Just plain Bill (talk) 11:23, 7 June 2011 (UTC)
Not really -- the "creating" part only makes it relevant to slightly more of the material. Most of it is neither relevant to "creating" nor "teaching" the "controversy" -- but rather to ID's relationship to science and religion more generally. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 12:09, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

NPOV

"Intelligent design has not presented a credible scientific case and is an attempt to teach religion in public schools, substituting public support for scientific research."

The italicized part is never actually stated in the indicated source, and it is highly debatable in neutrality - ID is not itself a religion, and this phrase reads like a baseless attack. I highly recommend a change in wording of that part of the sentence, if not removal altogether. Random the Scrambled (?) 02:57, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

I believe that the justification for this inclusion is that the supreme court did in fact rule that ID is nothing but thinly veiled Creationism and that its only purpose was to teach Creationism in schools. Noformation Talk 03:44, 8 June 2011 (UTC)
It was a Federal District Court, but the logic still applies -- especially as a number of prominent academics have concurred, and IDers, in private and/or unguarded moments, have frequently admitted ID's religious nature. ID may not be "a [distinct] religion", but it is religious, so teaching it is "teach[ing] religion". HrafnTalkStalk(P) 04:49, 8 June 2011 (UTC)
Just noting that a subsequent edit by K deleted it. If it were to be added back, it would probably be best to add sourcing, pointing to the FDC ruling or to an academic source. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:41, 8 June 2011 (UTC)
It didn't really need to be there in the first place. The religious connection is adequately sourced and mentioned elsewhere all over the article, including the lead. __ Just plain Bill (talk) 21:20, 8 June 2011 (UTC)
Given: Accordingly, we find that the secular purposes claimed by the Board amount to a pretext for the Board’s real purpose, which was to promote religion in the public school classroom, in violation of the Establishment Clause. -Kitzmiller v. Dover The original phrasing is factually correct. ArtifexMayhem (talk) 22:40, 8 June 2011 (UTC)
I'm fine with this. True, that was the movement's original purpose, but the phrasing in that line made it sound like WP was attacking it - not so elsewhere in the article. Cheers. Random the Scrambled (?) 22:54, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

'Intelligent design’s long march to nowhere'

Although this was originally cited as a 'book' it appears to have been an article in the now-defunct Science & Theology News (www.stnews.org). The only copy I've been able to find of it online is on the site of www.freerepublic.com -- which is on the Wikipedia link blacklist, so the URL cannot be added to the article (or even linked to here). The original URL given, http://www.templeton.org/capabilities_2004/press02.html, appears to be totally unrelated. Given these problems, it'd probably be a good idea (if not essential) if another source can be found for this material. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 13:45, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

This is not informative, it is highly biased

the number one problem with this article is that it is highly liberal and is simply an attack on ID, for one thing the author goes off saying that its just trying to get creation into the textbooks when this is very much not the case, the theory of ID is saying that many things in the universe are best explained by saying there is an intelligent designer and that someone or something had to have put certain things in place, because none of us can explain how certain things happened and a lot of science's explanations were (excuse me) downright pathetic, the theory of ID is just a better way of explaining such things as where the first cell on earth came from, how the conditions of the planet earth are so unbelievably perfect that earth can sustain life, why water is the only compound in the universe that acts exactly the way it does (mind you without that life on earth would never happen in a million years) etc. stop putting your opinion into your articles and start putting some real solid facts into them, if science would do that more maybe humans could actually move on and discover stuff instead of avoiding all new ideas regarding the origin of man — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kurtimoose (talk • contribs) 07:11, 28 February 2011 (UTC)


You may think a lot of what you said is scientific, but that's because you don't know what science is. ID is not science. There is nothing wrong with calling ID creationism-in-disguise. No scientist adopts ID without being a believer first. ID does not present itself as a scientific theory. If you think it does, find out what a scientific theory is (as opposed to a regular theory).

---previous post unsigned--- — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.171.130.32 (talk) 00:44, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

Please cite the simulation that was done demonstrating what constants would or would not produce life. Science is about testability and predictive value. I'm not saying that ID cannot produce predictive value or cannot be scientific, but the style of argument you are using doesn't seem to indicate even a familiarity with how predictive value relates to science. To put it another way, your post seems more concerned with describing the horse races after the race is done than predicting which horses might win the next race or some other race whose outcome is yet unknown. The first is easy, and leads to just-so stories. The second is difficult. And the second is science. --Ryan W (talk) 04:57, 9 June 2011 (UTC)
There is PLENTY wrong with tagging all questions about current "consensus science" evolutionism as unscientific. There are valid questions, e.g. about the combinatorics of current hypotheses in evolutionary theory and e.g. how many times the current age of the universe it would plausibly have taken for certain structures to pop up "spontaneously". The numbers are staggering, and deserve to be considered before mindlessly accepting "consensus" answers which, on their face, do not seem plausible.
Real science does not progress by being satisfied with the current consensus. As astrophysicist Bernard Haisch likes to say, progress is made more by questioning answers than by merely answering questions. As for the current consensus view of how life originated, it should remind anyone who actually has a brain engaged of the popular cartoon showing an Einstein-like figure contemplating a blackboard full of equations, interrupted by the line "and then a miracle occurs". (Maybe there's a message there.) A fair and unbiased Wikipedia article on this subject should at least acknowledge that there ARE some scientific questions and arguments remaining to be answered about how life originated. Also, it is not sufficient, and not even accurate, to claim that the "intelligent designer hypothesis" cannot be tested. Insightful combinatorial calculations can shed light on how plausible it is that life originated randomly and not with some kind of purposeful direction or invention. And oh by the way, the combinatorial calculations could start with the substantial amount of "Species Design Engineer's Toolkit" genes that are now known to have been ALWAYS PRESENT in the genome.
In summary, it is highly biased to omit the legitimate scientific questions and conflate ALL opposition to current DOGMA with "Creationism" based on religious views. That is tantamount to making science itself into just another religion... perhaps we should dub this approach "Cretinism". —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.174.183.212 (talk) 14:13, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

ID actually defeats itself. If looking at the universe prompts you to say there must be a creator, I can look at a creator and say "he created the universe, designed the atom and the Platypus, he must have been created." Christian Space-God is omnipresent, omnipotent. That kind of greatness doesn't happen for nothing. Some proto-Xian Space God must have created him.

Chicken and egg. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 132.160.54.155 (talk) 07:49, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

Kurtimoose, if you care to read back through the extensive archives of this talk page (top right corner) you will see that pretty much every word of the article has been argued over in lenghthy discussions to arrive at a balance. A balance does not mean giving equal weight to arguments that do not have supporting evidence per WP:DUE.--Charles (talk) 09:39, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
Kurtimoose, the information in this article is obtained from many different sources corroborating the view that ID is not scientific, as its proponents claim, but religious in nature. Also, there is much deliberation when changes are proposed so as to prevent editors from expressing their opinions in the article. In light of Wikipedia's policies on due weight and pseudoscience though, we cannot present ID in any manner which would make it appear more accepted than it actually is. That said, I do think ID can qualify as a scientific theory; however, its proponents are clearly not interested in doing the necessary scientific work (research, experimentation, etc.) and instead continue to push an obvious, religious agenda. Perhaps, in the future, ID proponents will cease this trend and reshape ID into an acceptable scientific theory (by omitting the false dichotomy of designer vs evolution, for example), but we must present ID as it is, not as it could be. -- MisterDub (talk &#149; contribs) 21:25, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
Surely that would be a hypothesis, not a theory which requires extensive and unequivocal evidence.--Charles (talk) 23:45, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
It's an odd assertion that ID proponents don't "want" to do experiments. The reverse seems true. Many people in the scientific community are strongly opposed to ID related research. They are opposed to anyone in a position to do such research being considered legitimate. I am certainly not writing a universal affirmation of ID. But this particular criticism that ID advocates don't "want" to do research, in addition to making subjective assertions about motives, seems unfair as a universal assertion. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.171.130.32 (talk) 04:45, 9 June 2011 (UTC)
Actually, I use the term theory as Dr. Neil Tyson does: as a scientifically testable explanation of natural phenomena. The amount of evidence serves to distinguish between better theories and worse ones. Of course, ID isn't even scientifically testable as it is currently defined. -- MisterDub (talk &#149; contribs) 02:24, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

A reading of this article's talk page history shows that allegations of POV and bias are legion and recurring. In fact, when anyone asks me for an example of a long, biased Wikipedia article, I usually point to this one. Anyway, anyone reading this who agrees with me, please simply list specific concerns and make a suggestion, using a reliable source, on how to fix your concern. Cla68 (talk) 06:05, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

Cla68, I think these allegations are going to continue only because the topic is controversial. Sources which would make the article more NPOV are more than welcome, but we must take into account the fact that ID is regarded as pseudoscience because it is defined by its proponents as conflicting with an already well-established and incredibly well-supported scientific theory, though no evidence of its own can withstand scientific scrutiny. Additionally, ID proponents have attempted to circumvent the traditional, scientific methods for gaining acceptance by flexing their political might, which further illustrates their disregard for science as an evidence-based endeavor. In short, presenting ID as anything more than a failed hypothesis at best, and religiously motivated pseudoscience at worst, is itself very POV. -- MisterDub (talk &#149; contribs) 18:46, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

To anyone who believes this page is biased, I would like to redirect you to http://www.conservapedia.com/Intelligent_design. They have an encyclopedia that matches your world view better than wikipedia which supports facts. O76923 (talk) 00:18, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

  • Regardless of you suggestion to visit another site because of MY world view (which demonstrates your arrogance), I consider this article biased also. And not because I am an advocate of ID, Evolution, or Creationism. This page does not reflect the Socratic method of the dialectic. This page is basically a blatant refutation of I.D. Ya might as well call this page "Attack I.D." Now if any of you are going to tell me that I don't understand science you'd better be pretty sure of yourself as I can compare brainpans and advanced degrees with any of you.
  • It may seem biased to you and a "refutation of ID" because wikipedia is concerned with verifiability from credible scientific sources (for science articles) and Intelligent Design does not have any since it does not stand up to the evidence, and which is why the article is fine the way it is SuperAtheist (talk) 17:51, 26 April 2011 (UTC)
  • Whoa, let's keep this civil you guys. No need to broadly insult the intelligence or education of other editors, it doesn't help your point, and asserting baldly that the article is fine as it is discounts that anonymous here might have a point. More relevantly, if you can't point to particular ways in which the article engages in blatant refutaiton instead of informing more robustly, it's hard to make improvements or disagree in a sane, civil way. On the point of socratic method, you're making an argument, but the form of it is general, broad, and essentially impossible to debate. The whole article being wrong isn't even an invalid thing to argue either, but you'll have to do a lot better about identifying structuring that you disagree with. i kan reed (talk) 19:22, 26 April 2011 (UTC)

Look . . . IMO, Creationists could very well be hijacking ID as a way to sneak Creation into the schools. I don't particularly have a beef with some Creationism being discussed in Schools, BUT . . . the Supreme Court of America does! So it ain't going to happen.

And ya know . . . so what if most or all of the scholars at the Discovery Institute are Christians (which they're not). Some Christians think Evolution is just wonderful. TDurden1937 (talk) 23:03, 8 April 2011 (UTC)TDurden1937

Except that the modern concept of "intelligent design" is largely a creationist creation -- so cannot reasonably be considered to be "hijacking". You might be able to argue that they hijacked the teleological argument in order to create ID -- but then the TA was largely moribund when they came along, so there's not really anybody to complain. On the 'balance' question, I'd suggest you first read WP:DUE and then List of scientific societies explicitly rejecting intelligent design. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 17:20, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

Why do people keep using the low probability of life showing up "spontaneously" as an argument for intelligent design? Even if the argument weren't faulty since it's not "spontaneous" or "random", it's still wrong. If I throw 6 million die, the chances that they'll land in the configuration it did would have been astronomically low if calculated beforehand. However, it happened, didn't it? Intelligent design offers nothing and therefore the article isn't incorrect by treating it as pseudoscience and it's not POV. SuperAtheist (talk) 14:02, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Removal of irrelevant see also sections

How is Flying Spaghetti Monster relevant to Intelligent design? In addition, it was specifically stated on the Evolution talk page that intelligent design is in no way relevant to evolution. I will be removing the link to both Flying Spaghetti Monster and Evolution as the two are clearly irrelevant. I am leaving Argument from poor design and Intelligent falling as there can be an argument for their relevancy. Ryan Vesey (talk) 16:16, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

  1. "How is Flying Spaghetti Monster relevant to Intelligent design?" Read the (former) article. It states the relevance in its lead.
  2. "In addition, it was specifically stated on the Evolution talk page that intelligent design is in no way relevant to evolution." That does not mean that evolution is not relevant to ID -- relevance is not a reflective property. (See also my point above.)

HrafnTalkStalk(P) 16:23, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Your arguments do not support eachother. Just in the way that Intelligent design is a response to Evolution, Flying Spaghetti Monster is a response to intelligent design. Using your logic, Flying Spaghetti Monster should link to Intelligent design; however, intelligent design should not link to Flying Spaghetti Monster because "relevance is not a reflective property." Ryan Vesey (talk) 16:27, 11 June 2011 (UTC)
Both ID & FSM are cultural phenomena, not scientific theories -- thus both, unlike Evolution, will be treated by a cultural rather than a scientific metric. ID, which is widely regarded as pseudoscience, is irrelevant to the science of evolution (even if it is a response to it). FSM, which is a reasonably prominent parody of ID, is relevant to ID. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 16:36, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I would like to support the retention of the following links in this article's see-also section, they would appear to be relevant for the following reasons (and there has neither been discussion here, nor consensus for removal at Talk:Evolution, where it has been discussed):

  • Argument from poor design -- an argument against ID
  • Evolution -- which is what most of the arguments that make up ID are arguments against
  • Flying Spaghetti Monster -- "a satirical protest against the decision by the Kansas State Board of Education to permit the teaching of intelligent design as an alternative to evolution in public schools."
  • Intelligent falling -- "a parody of the intelligent design (ID) movement."

HrafnTalkStalk(P) 16:18, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Then why is it that no articles presenting an opposing view of Evolution can be found in the see also section of that talk page. I ignored my bias on the subject when I added Evolution to the see also section; however, other editors are unwilling to do the same thing on other pages. Ryan Vesey (talk) 16:22, 11 June 2011 (UTC)
Probably (I cannot state for certain because I'm not a regular there) because the editors on that article feel that adding WP:FRINGE views that have virtually no scientific acceptance to an article on a scientific subject would be giving WP:UNDUE weight or giving equal validity. And as I said above, "relevance is not a reflective property" -- that A is relevant to B does not necessarily mean that B is relevant to A. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 16:27, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

My arguments being said, I am going to leave these discussions and allow Wikipedia to crap on non-atheistic views if that is the goal of the project. Ryan Vesey (talk) 16:29, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

You are obviously unaware of theistic evolution -- evolution itself is a quite common "non-atheistic view". HrafnTalkStalk(P) 16:38, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

You can't compare this article with evolution. Evolution is a well developed scientific field which holds a central place in biology as a whole. ID is a political strategy to allow creationism to be taught in science classes. Creationism is actually discussed in the main evolution article, so there's no need for it in the "see also".

Intelligent falling is a parody of ID. FSM was invented in response to DI-driven plans to alter the science curriculum in Kansas. Both are responses to ID. The argument from poor design predates (and anticipates) ID. All of these are relevant links. Evolution probably should be linked directly in the article, rather than be in the "see also".

There are no realistic "rebuttals" of evolution. Nothing but a variety of fringe ideas. So it makes sense that there are no links to them. Though that, of course, is a matter for discussion at talk:evolution, not here. Guettarda (talk) 18:04, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

  • I'd also say that the links should be kept. It's worth remembering that having a "see also" link isn't in any way an expression of opinion or commentary. Rather, it is simply an acknowledgment that some (not all) readers might also be interested in that topic after reading this page. That's all. Thus, there is no reason for anyone to be offended by a link. It's just a navigational aid. --Tryptofish (talk) 00:35, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Atheists who believe in young earth?

This is not a forum
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.


Just had this ahaa moment. I won't be the first to have spotted it. But if all the evidence really DOES point to the Earth being about 6000 years old, then surely this must have been picked up by some objective scientists who happen to be atheists. Or who are Hindus or Buddhists. Why then is the account of the Universe which says that it is 6000 years old, if such an account is backed up by the evidence, not have more adherents among atheist and non-Christian scientists? Such scientists might not have any dealings with the Bible or even know of it. Their belief in a 6000 year old Earth would not be based on any religious teaching, it would simply be due to their having looked at the facts, and made up their mind accordingly. So where are they? Myles325a (talk) 07:54, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

While I think I can guess what you're getting at, WP:NOTAFORUM and ID isn't officially associated with belief in a 6000 year old Earth, though some hold that view. The biblical dating was introduced in the 17th century and dropped by Christian geologists before the 19th century. . . dave souza, talk 08:34, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

If you can point me to this evidence you speak of,I will become a fundamentalist Christian, sell everything I have and give it to the poor, open a church and live in Kansas calling people "fags" or "fag enablers" and try to convert as many as I can. But UNTIL I see all these "undeniable" and "objective" evidence, I will remain an atheist. Oh and TRY not to link to fundamentalist websites citing other fundamentalist websites which cite other fundamentalist websites + a few misquotes. ps: sorry, I don't know how signing off works and I don't have an account (yet). feel free to edit this with my IP or whatever.


Closing forum discussion. GManNickG (talk) 07:16, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

All?

I recently edited out the word "all" in the lead because it seems inconceivable to me that all leading proponents of intelligent design are associated with Christianity (do no Muslims believe in ID or something very similar?) let alone with the Discovery Institute (do all leading ID proponents in all countries associate with the DI?). No citation supporting the use of "all" was, or is, given. Despite this, my edit was reverted without discussion. Any views? Abtract (talk) 10:30, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

There is a proper citation. Do you have a source that states the contrary? Noformation Talk 10:35, 19 June 2011 (UTC)
And it was reverted. We've been through this before -- see Talk:Intelligent design/all leading proponents. The point is all LEADING proponents. The intelligent design movement is dominated by American conservative Christians -- so it is hardly surprising that there are no leading proponents that aren't American conservative Christians. And given that the DI is the vehicle chosen by a number of wealthy American conservative Christians to promote it, it is hardly surprising that it has attracted all the leading lights of the movement. HrafnTalkStalk(P) 10:56, 19 June 2011 (UTC)


http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/blog/2008/dec/22/atlas-creationism-adnan-oktar-harun-yahya

http://blogs.reuters.com/faithworld/2011/05/16/harun-yahyas-muslim-creationists-tour-france-denouncing-darwin/

http://www.utne.com/mind-body/The-New-Muslim-Creationists.aspx

http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2009/10/25/in_the_muslim_world_creationism_is_on_the_rise/

http://atheism.about.com/b/2003/07/12/hindu-creationism-vs-darwin.htm

http://www.bibleandscience.com/otherviews/cremo.htm

http://skepticblog.org/2009/01/18/chinese-creationist/

All? Abtract (talk) 11:34, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, all. All of the individuals and groups you have listed represent forms of creationism that have NOTHING to do with ID. Including Harun Yahya, who is a young earth creationist.Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 16:09, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
To expound a bit on Dominus' post, Intelligent Design is not synonymous with either Creationism or evolution skepticism. Instead, ID is a specific type of Creationism that is skeptical of evolutionary theory, and is therefore a proper subset of both. -- MisterDub (talk &#149; contribs) 18:09, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
Mmm, I see your point. Abtract (talk) 18:41, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
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