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This talk page is to discuss the text, photographs, format, grammar, etc of the ''article itself'' and '''not''' the inherent worth of Intelligent Design. See ]. If you wish to discuss or debate the ''validity'' of intelligent design or promote intelligent design please do so at or other fora. This "Discussion" page is only for discussion on how to improve the Misplaced Pages article. Any attempts at trolling, using this page as a soapbox, or making personal attacks may be deleted at any time.
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#Although at times heated, the debates contained here are meant to improve the Intelligent Design article. Reasoned, civil discourse is the best means to make an opinion heard. Rude behavior not only distracts from the subject(s) at hand, but tends to make people deride or ignore what was said.
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== References ==

{{reflist}}

== Entropy vs. Fine Tuning ==

Prior to my edits (which were reverted), the paragraph on Sewell's entropy arguments was under the heading Fine Tuning. This completely broke up the logic of the Fine Tuning section. The section was, previously,
Paragraph 1. Fine Tuning
Paragraph 2. Entropy
Paragraph 3. Fine Tuning, anthropic principle, intelligent designer.

Paragraph 2 on entropy totally breaks up the logic. Moreover, arguments from thermodynamics (entropy) have almost nothing to do with the Fine Tuning problem. The Fine Tuning problem relates to fundamental constants of the universe, particle masses, coupling constants etc., set at the Big Bang (or shortly thereafter). Thermodynamics is a whole other subject.

Therefore, the logical location for Entropy arguments is either:
A. in its own subsection, or
B. In the same category as Specified Complexity/Information Theoretic arguments.

I am fine with either putting it under A. or B. It should be pointed out that Specified Complexity makes reference to probability distributions, as does the statistical concept of entropy. The statistical concept of entropy, and the thermodynamic concept of entropy, are identical, although expressed in a different mathematcial formalism. The statistical concept of entropy comes out of information theory, and Specified Complexity presents itself as making contributions to information theory. Therefore, they are related, and could conceivably go under the same heading. However, I am fine with putting entropy under its own heading. But not Fine Tuning.

Secondly, I rewrote the arguments about how the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics does not apply to living things because they're not closed systems. I rewrote so the statements apply to living things in general, not just "people"-- the previous wording did not sound like scientific prose. ] 01:28, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

:More definite wording than "critics assert..." is needed here. The entropy argument is an ironclad declaration that the proponent is living in a reality-free zone, but it probably sounds convincing and logical to those who don't understand what entropy is. For those who ''do'' understand what entropy is, it's as plainly idiotic as stating that gravity is caused by tiny little men pulling on ropes. ] 01:46, 13 October 2007 (UTC)


I wonder about including this sort of nonsense in this article which is long enough already. I think these sorts of comments, which are common with ], should be included in ], which already has a section at , and also in ]. At most there should be a sentence or two in here with an appropriate link to the more extensive articles.--] 02:13, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
::Jim62sch and Dave Souza are familiar with the concept of entropy, and I am somewhat familiar with it as well, all of us having previously assisted ] in integrating into a couple of articles some more contemporary explanations of entropy than the traditional model originally related to heat engines. As to the 2ndLOT and its relationship to intelligent design articles, it's mentioned in this article only because it remains part of the debate about the antrhopic principle, which in turn is closely related to the FTU speculations, all of which are more-or-less thrown into the mix of arguments for the existence of God. This is as well connected to FTU as it is to specified complexity. But Dembski's speculations about specified complexity and complex specified intelligence are Dembski's original ideas, so it gets its own section, whereas the other arguments have been more intermixed in the general debate between those who see only chance at work and those who see intentional design or advance planning of some sort at work in the cosmos. The existing mention of entropy is already more than adequate, IMO, and I don't see the need to put the brief mention of entropy and/or 2LOT anywhere else except where it already is. Perhaps Jim62 and Dave have opinions about this? Anybody else? ... ] 02:16, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

:::As written in the article, there is no clear connection between 2ndLOT and the anthropic principle (AP). As I pointed out, the 1st and 3rd. paragraphs of the FTU section have a logical connection which is broken by sticking 2ndLOT paragraph between them. If there is a connection between 2ndLOT and anthropic principle, the article as written should hint at what that connection is. The way it's written now, that paragraph appears totally unrelated, and why is it between paragraphs 1 and 3? At the very very least, make the order of paragraphs 1,3,2, and then rewrite the entropy paragraph to hint or suggest what the hell connection 2ndLOT has with AP. ] 02:28, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
::::Wait just a second here. I just gave the connection right above. Dembski's argument is his original argument. The other arguments are at least equally related to FTU as they are to any other ID argument or teleological argument -- they all argue for the existence of God. I gave my opinion, and so have others here. And, it deserves only brief mention because it falls in the mix of teleological arguments commonly used by people arguing for the existence of God. Then, there is a separate question about the difference between science and philosophy or theology about the assertion of the existence of God, or, pardon me, intelligent designer, or pardon me again, intelligent design without any speculation about a designer, or whatever the argument happens to be in order to seek the goal of having this set of ideas taught in high-school biology classes. The section begins appropriately, to wit: ''"Intelligent design proponents also raise occasional arguments outside biology"''. That means it's an appropriate place for a brief mention that the nearly century-old 2LOT debate is among those occasionally raised arguments. ... ] 02:59, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

:::::Did you read what I wrote? Did you read the offending paragraph in the article? It does not make any difference whether you connect entropy to initial conditions at the Big Bang HERE. The question is, does the paragraph in the article make a logical connection to the other paragraphs IN THE ARTICLE. It does not. If the logical connection is that 2ndLOT is explained by anthropic principle, that should be IN THE ARTICLE.

:::::Next you suggest the section labelled "Fine Tuning of the Universe" should be a miscellaneous grab-bag of all "arguments outside biology". If so, then label this section Non-Biological Arguments instead. I repeat: this section AS WRITTEN IN THE ARTICLE not the discussion page, draws no logical connection between entropy and FTU, which is the name of the section. The fact that you vaguely remember there's a distant connection to the anthropic principle, and mention it on the discussion page, does not improve the article.

:::::Even in this case, the paragraph is s&*t. "people wouldn't be born and grow up as this, too, would be a decrease in entropy. However, people are able to grow..." This is not scientific prose. I tried rewriting it to sound professional and someone reverted that, too. "eliminating waste"? What does that have to do with entropy? Who's so in love with "people are born and grow up"?

:::::Second, you say "I gave my opinion, and so have others here." The only other opinion is that the whole subject should be dropped, not that entropy belongs under the heading FTU. ] 00:44, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

:::::: Moreover in that section you guys keep batting around, it says:
::::::: ] and other critics say both intelligent design and the ] of the ] are essentially a ];
:::::: ... but nowhere in any of the three references made does Victor Stenger say that ''intelligent design'' is a tautology. He '''does''' say that the weak ] is a tautology (as does many physicists/comologists) but he doesn't say that ID is a tautology. It's factually incorrect and unsupported, yet when corrected, gets reverted by the ] of the article. Raul, what you say is untrue. Often "good" (i.e. well-supported, factual, and NPOV) edits are reverted and replaced with partisan edits. And often by partisans whose expertise in even the basic science is limited. ] 01:42, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
::::::: Agreed. Raul is wrong. Good, factual, NPOV edits are instantly reverted by the owners.
::::::: As for the line about Stenger, it does not follow logically from the sentences before or after. Why is it there? It does not add much to the article. I would be happier with deleting that line altogether. ] 04:34, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
::::::::See ] below... ], ] 14:59, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

== The Intelligent Designer (proposed edit) ==

I think the logical progression in the lead paragraph to the "The Intelligent Designer" section could be clearer. I've broken the para up into its sentences:

*''Intelligent design arguments are formulated in secular terms and intentionally avoid identifying the intelligent agent (or agents) they posit.'' (Fair enough as an opening statement)
*''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.'' (This sentence is adding a further dimension to the first, but the link could be clearer - maybe add a "Nevertheless" to the beginning. Also, "they do not state that God is the designer" is simply repeating the information already given in the first sentence and is therefore unnecessary. The sentence would probably read better as: "Nevertheless, the designer is often implicitly hypothesized to have intervened in a way that only a god could intervene." Incidentally, I'm not sure about "implicitly hypothesized" - can one make a hypothesis by implication, or do you really mean "implied"?)
*''Dembski, in The Design Inference, speculates that an alien culture could fulfill these requirements.'' (The sentence is trying to say that Demski tries out the idea that the Designer might be a non-supernatural agent, but ... well, but what? Does Demski reject the idea of a non-supernatural Designer? We're not told in this sentence and the possibility is left hanging).
*''The authoritative description of intelligent design, however, explicitly states that the Universe displays features of having been designed.'' (This sentence is trying to answer the question raised by the preceding one, but it doesn't: the "authoritative description" states explicititly that the Universe was "designed": the crucial question remains unadressed, designed by whom, God or spacemen?)
*''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."'' (This is the real answer to the question raised in the sentence before the sentence before: Demski speculates that the Designer might be non-supernatural, but concludes (we're not told why) that "no intelligent agent who is strictly physical" etc etc. So the paragraph will erad better if the preceding sentence is deleted and these ermaining sentences are combined, to read: "Dembski, in The Design Inference, speculates that an alien culture could fulfill these requirements, but concludes that "no intelligent agent who is strictly physical could have presided over the origin of the universe or the origin of life."")
*''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.'' (This would read better if it were joined to the preceding sentence: "Dembski, in The Design Inference, speculates that an alien culture could fulfill these requirements, but concludes that "no intelligent agent who is strictly physical could have presided over the origin of the universe or the origin of life," and leading ID proponents have stated that they believe the designer to be the Christian God, to the exclusion of all other religions."

For consideration. ] 08:24, 13 October 2007 (UTC)


==Ownership of Article==
Why are certain editors reverting ALL edits that come along to the article? This smacks of ], which is not allowed. Misplaced Pages's strength is its changability, and edits should NOT be reverted merely because they occur. What is this, a protected page? You guys appear to be making it a ''de facto'' protected page through your heavy reversionism. ] 18:19, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
:Good edits to the article don't get reverted. (Example: ) The problem is that the vast, vast majority of the edits to this article - including non-vandalisms - are detrimental. ] 18:21, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
::A lot of arguments appear to be deemed as detrimental on account of being allegedly POV or by way of ] (which appears to be what ] used when reverting some edits of mine, which I have reverted back). It would help to explain how allegedly POV edits are POV. And, yes, my edits (I was in anon mode earlier) to the links section were there because the topics of ]s and ] were very germane to Intelligent Design as an argument. <nowiki></nowiki> &mdash; ] | ] 18:43, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
:::We're not talking about an N dimensional manifold, or the age-area hypothesis. Misplaced Pages is not a dictionary. It is not our job to explain basic English words like teleological. ] 18:59, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
:::Remember: ] 19:01, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
::::Did you wikilink ]? <nowiki></nowiki> &mdash; ] | ] 19:05, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
:::::No, that's an inappropriate (unrelated) link. We put an HTML comment in the Yom Kippur War article immediately afterwards explaining that it "materiel" was correct, and not to change it. Which is exactly what was done here with teleological, and yet people still ignore the comment. More to the point, teleological already links to something, and yet people insist on changing it anyway. It beggars the imagination. ] 20:02, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

==Intelligent design as a religious argument, as well as Discovery Institute==
I want to edit the first paragraph to compromise between those that consider ID to be religious and those that don't necessarily consider ID to be religious; that is why I inserted "arguably religious".

Item number 2. "The primary proponents, who are associated with the ], include people who" Vs.
"Its primary proponents, all of whom are associated with the ],"

The problem here is that the second version, which is the one people keep reverting back to, fails to define "primary", excludes the possibility that there might be people outside of the Discovery Institute also participating in the ID debate, and presumes to read the minds of those proponents from the Discovery Institute. Do we know ''for certain'' that ''all'' Discovery Instituters believe in the Abrahamic God? Also, I am leery of the word "all", because it tempts the ]. <nowiki></nowiki> &mdash; ] | ] 19:04, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

:I don't see any compelling need to state that ID is a religious argument, especially because ID's proponents go to great pains to avoid stating it as such. Inserting the word religious into the lead section would bring on more POV accusations, as it has in the past.
:Oh, and the word "all" in this context was discussed extensively and agreed upon. Naturally, there are other proponents. The fact remains, however, that the ''primary'' proponents are ''all'' associated with the Discovery Institute. -] 19:34, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
::Nonetheless, do all Discovery Instituters necessarily believe in God? Do we know that for sure? Link to the "extensive discussion"? ] 19:46, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
::And how do you know for sure that "all" primary proponents are from the Discovery Institute? And what about the word "primary"?] 19:47, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
:::The talk page archives are linked at the top of this page for anyone to peruse. If you want to re-tread over old ground, it's your responsibility to review past discussions. The word "all" and the ID proponents personal beliefs on the identity of the designer has been discussed to death. Please look through the archives before going further. I don't see how this discussion will result in any improvement to the lead section. -] 19:55, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
::::Well, I recommend taking out "all of whom", and inserting simply "who", because that's simpler and says essentially the same thing. ] 20:08, 15 October 2007 (UTC) I looked over the discussions already. Why not say "As far as we know, all"? ] 20:09, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
::::: Everything on Misplaced Pages is "as far as we know", more precisely, as far as we have found it attested in ]. --] 20:15, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
::::::The POV on this article is really poorly done. Look at the talk history if you want to see how the same problems have been repeatedly identified and repeatedly reverted by a group with clear agenda. ] (]) 20:04, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

(unindent) Hmm, possibly that sentence and the one following it could be combined with a different sentence break. For example: ''"Its primary proponents are associated with the Discovery Institute. While these advocates of Intellgent Design believe the designer to be God, they claim it is a scientific theory, and seek to fundamentally redefine science to accept supernatural explanations."'' That's what I'd propose. I'd like some others to weigh in before changing the lead, however. -] 20:20, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

:<p>Perhaps needless to say, the first paragraph is important to get in accordance with the verifiable facts of the matter about this topic. I've had a chance to quickly review Rickyrab's edits. 1) "Teleological argument" is important despite that some readers will need to learn more to distinguish it as a particular philosophical argument that has a meaning different from "theological". There's a wikilink to ] for the benefit of those readers who are confused upon first encountering it. 2) All proponents of intelligent design that meet ] with respect to this topic, plus many more that to varying degrees are further to the periphery of this topic of intelligent design, are either fellows or founders or close associates of the Discovery Insitute -- not some, not most, but ''all''. The association most commonly has been in the form of fellowship grants which have helped fund the main written publications involving intelligent design. In other words, intelligent design, according to the ], is not the product of separate independently operating individuals at different institutions, but is solely a product of persons all of whom are involved with the Discovery Institute and its progeny, the ] and the ]. As discussed many times before (in now-archived talk page discussion, linked to at the top of this page) with extensive arguments from different perspectives, there is not one significant, leading, primary, or centrally influential proponent who is not directly involved with the DI, CSC, and/or ISCID. 3) There is no need to add "religious argument" to the first sentence because the second sentence makes clear what intelligent design is according to the reliable sources, an argument from design, a.k.a. teleological argument, a philosophical argument which proponents are arguing is a scientific theory that should be taught side-by-side with evolution in high-school biology classes. The article then proceeds to explain in several levels of depth, with numerous citations both as verification and also as points of departure for readers to further pursue any research thay may care to do in whatever level of depth they may choose. ... ] 20:36, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

== Very simple style issues ==

Before I leave this page, I would like to go over two simple examples of ]-related style issues that IMO would improve the article.
* First, the edit I tried to make... It is only about avoiding the phrase "critics point out". I mean if I could understand the scaffolding objection, and I really suck at biology, then surely all our readers will be able understand it. There is no need to use language that appeals to authority when the argument can speak for itself.
* There is another annoyance in the paragraph before. Behe's "alleged" examples. Obviously, if his arguments are flawed, then his examples can't really be of irreducibly complex entities. According to ] you can make this clear, but in the space where ], there is ] in letting him finish his sentence. I would suggest, if you feel uncomfortable saying he presented examples of IC, to just write "examples of what he considered irreducible complexity" (modulo my bad English). Then in the next paragraph, you can clearly state that his examples are disputed, and so on...
There seems to be a certain fear that weakening the language, will weaken the argument. I don't think this is true. In my experience, good scholarly style under-promises and over-delivers, it is more pleasing to read when you don't feel pushed to accept this or that conclusion. That's all I really have to say on this, in retrospect, very minor issue! Best wishes, ] 13:53, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

: I completely agree. Especially: "good scholarly style under-promises and over-delivers". ] 18:04, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

::Instead of saying ''Behe presented the following examples of irreducible complexity...'' I would suggest ''Behe presented the following as examples of irreducible complexity...'' which neither states that the examples ''are'' IC, nor does it get bogged down in ]. <font color="006622">]</font><sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub> 21:02, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

:::Very elegant solution. I'm going to edit that one in. --] <sup>] ]</sup> 22:08, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

::::This is what you consider a consensus? Meh. ] <small><sup>] ]</sup></small> 00:47, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

:::::A complete lack of dissent? Yeah, seems like consensus among those who care enough to comment. So, do you have anything productive to add? --] <sup>] ]</sup> 00:58, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
:<p>Regarding the first of Merzul's points, the words "critics point out" were used towards being faithful to WP:NPOV. I do see Merzul's second point, in that "alleged" arguably carries a bit too much of a skeptical tone in the second paragraph of the section on irreducible complexity, because that paragraph is not dealing with the critics' view but is dealing with Behe's view. I wouldn't object to changing it to, say, "Behe's argued examples of..." or similar construction. ... ] 01:26, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
::You can see the wording I attempted to implement if you're interested. I'm not perfectly satisfied with it, but I can't think of anything better off hand. --] <sup>] ]</sup> 21:56, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

== Definate article in first paragraph ==

I agree with Kenosis: it should be "'''a''' 1987 United States Supreme Court ruling involving separation of church and state" not "the 1987 United States Supreme Court ruling involving separation of church and state" -- contra to Raul654's edit summary, we do not name this case until the next section, and it is highly likely that there was more than one "1987 United States Supreme Court ruling involving separation of church and state". Until it is named it is just one of many, so it is "a ruling" not "the ruling". <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 11:10, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

:Agree that as it was, it should be "a" case. However, it's easier in some ways for the reader to be told the case name at the outset, so in the interim I've changed it accordingly. By the way, an anon edit added " In the 20 years since Intelligent Design was first formulated," no rigorous test that can identify... By my reckoning it's 28 years, the source is actually 5 years old but still stands .. ], ] 13:38, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
::I was misreading the wikitext - I thought it was stating the name of the case (it should have). I agree with the sentence as it Dave has currently written it - explicitly identifying the case. ] 14:45, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

::I had assumed that the anon editor was dating from ''Edwards'' in 1987. 28 years would put its origin in 1979, which seems a tad early. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 14:14, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

== Ben Stein ==

Shouldn't he be mentioned here. Seems like he is a leading ID proponent and creationist. ] 13:51, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
:If you look in the history of this page, you will see he is mentioned a few times. And we have already altered his own article ] accordingly. And we started a new article, ] about his upcoming movie. If this movie becomes more than just a sidelight, it will probably get more mention in the ] article itself. For now, it is just a curiousity; the movie might flop and disappear immediately without a trace, for example.

:The problem is, we cannot put all topics in the main article. There is just too much. Some material has to go in subsiduary daughter articles.--] 14:08, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

:Ben Stein is a fairly minor ID advocate at this stage. He may become more prominent if his movie gets much attention, but whether it will is uncertain at this stage. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 14:33, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

:He's both a minor celebrity and a minor advocate. He's published no influential works, and no, Expelled does not count as a influential work. ] 17:07, 25 October 2007 (UTC)


== Christopher Hitchens ==

If we include ] as a noted theist, we must include ] as a noted atheist, since he has published as least as many non-fiction books.--] 08:26, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

:The suggestion that Stein be included in this article has already been soundly dismissed. Also, this article is not ], so your suggestion is ''completely'' irrelevant. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 09:31, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

== ] ==

An editor is attempting to contend (without anything in the way of substantiation, and against a stack of contrary evidence) that Behe is not a ]. Additional input may be helpful. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 10:47, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

An operational definition of 'pseudoscience' is needed. ] 16:06, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

No, it isn't. If we decide on an "operational definition" for X, and evaluate objects A, B, C against our definition, all we are achieving is original research. What ''is needed'' is a reliable source saying either that Behe is/isn't a pseudoscientist, or that his field is/isn't pseudoscience. <font color="006622">]</font><sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub> 20:47, 30 October 2007 (UTC)


No OR. We find a source that has a good definition. Are you people serious around here? OK get the source that says Behe is a pseudoscientist. go for it. ] 20:51, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

:Let's carefully read about what qualifies as ]. The key points are:

:* Our original major content policy, ] (NPOV) encourages editors to add undisputed facts, including unbiased accounts of various people's views. It has traditionally forbidden editors from inserting their own views into articles, and demands that Misplaced Pages balance the relative prominence of differing viewpoints based on their prominence in the relevant field.
:* Our ] policy (V) demands that information and notable views presented in articles be drawn from appropriate, ].
:* Compliance with our Verifiability Policy and our ] guideline is the best way to ensure that you do not violate our NOR policy. In short, the only way to demonstrate that you are not presenting original research is to cite reliable sources that provide information '''directly related''' to the topic of the article; the only way to demonstrate that you are not inserting your own POV is to represent these sources and the views they reflect accurately.
:* NPOV, V, and NOR are Misplaced Pages's three principal ]. Since NPOV, V, and NOR complement each other, they should not be interpreted in isolation from one another, and editors should try to familiarize themselves with all three.

] is well defined, there are so many reliable sources, etc. Can we move on? ] <small><sup>] ]</sup></small> 21:06, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

==Fine tuning Stenger==
Having had a look at the question of the Stenger references, I've not been able to find in the pdfs (PDF files) support for the tautology argument:
{{quotation|] and other critics say both intelligent design and the ] of the ] are essentially a ]; in his view, these arguments amount to the claim that life is able to exist because the Universe is able to support life.}}
His conclusions seem to be that "The fine-tuning argument and other recent intelligent design arguments are modern versions of God-of-the-gaps reasoning, where a God is deemed necessary whenever science has not fully explained some phenomenon.... The fine-tuning argument would tell us that the Sun radiates light so that we can see where we are going. In fact, the human eye evolved to be sensitive to light from the sun. The universe is not fine-tuned for humanity. Humanity is fine-tuned to the universe." and "theists make two contradictory arguments for life requiring a
creator..... In the fine-tuning argument, the universe is so congenial to life that the universe must have been created. But, if it is so congenial, then we should expect life to evolve by natural processes. In the second argument,... the universe is so uncongenial to life that life must have been created. In that case it is too unlikely for life to have evolved by natural processes and so must have been produced by an intelligent designer. But, then life could very easily have been an improbable accident." These points appear to me to be more worth summarising than the tautology argument, but perhaps someone can cite the supporting words I may have missed. .. ], ] 15:02, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

: Agreed. It sounds like not a claim of ''tautology'' but rather a claim of ''self-contradiction'', which is quite the opposite. A tautology, in the sense used here, is an empty truth, or a piece of circular definition; what is being asserted here is that the ID advocates contradict themselves by asserting that design is shown both by the hospitability and inhospitability of the universe to life. --] 21:36, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

::There's both a tautology and a ''pair'' of ''mutually'' contradictory arguments here. The tautology is of the type that if there's somebody living to argue that life is too improbable to exist by chance, then ''a posteri'' the probability of life existing is unity, no matter how low the probability of it coming into existence ''a priori''. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 01:46, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

:::Well, that's an argument against the anthropic principle in general, not specifically its application to ID. --] 01:48, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

No tautology. It seems that the universe and the earth specifically seem to be fine tuned as a great place for life to thrive. A great place for the seed to grow. Then there had to be the first seed planted from which all life sprung from. We can have a very fertile field in an area of perfect temperature and sunlight but with out say the perfect grapevine the field will produce nothing without the very high quality seed. You need both. ] (]) 23:01, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

== I see problems here: ==

Userfied -- "Any attempts at trolling, using this page as a soapbox, or making personal attacks may be deleted at any time." Originator of thread seems far more interested in sparking a general argument than in discussing and ''substantiating'', specific problems in the article. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 16:37, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

::If it looks like a troll, if it sounds like a troll, if it whines like a troll, it must be a troll, and they should never ever ever be fed. See ]. ] <small><sup>] ]</sup></small> 20:55, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

== This article seems biased. ==
{{hat}}
Seems unbalanced. Seems like it is more of an attack than an objective discussion. Seems like a proscecutor's closing statements. Does anyone else see this? <small>—Preceding ] comment added by ] (] • ]) 00:33, 31 October 2007 (UTC)</small><!-- Template:Unsigned --> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->

::Something seems unbalanced here, but I do not think it is the article...--] 14:30, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

: What if, objectively, we can tell that IDC is a sham designed to evade legal precedents concerning the establishment of religion in public schools of the USA? That should be part of the article, distressing as it may be to those who would prefer that the sham remained undetected.

: The kicker is that, yes, we do have that objective determination. --] 02:15, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

::The metaphor breaks down because the prosecutor's closing statements come ''before'' the verdict. And we ] have a ]. <font color="006622">]</font><sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub> 03:02, 31 October 2007 (UTC)
:::Civil trials involve plaintiff(s) or complainant(s) vs. defendant(s) or respondant(s). Unlike the 1925 ], no prosecutor was involved in ]. Twelve parents of high school students were the complainants, the school district and school board were the defendants. And of course there were opportunities for closing arguments in the form of written proposed decisions requested by the judge and submitted by both parties, which served as "closing statements". And the Misplaced Pages editors who participated in the process of forming this article have gotten plenty of guff from supporters of both sides. ... ] 05:34, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

:Warning: Reality may seem biased, especially to those starting with the preconception that truth = Jesus.
:Caution: Subject of article may contain nuts ;)
:...], ] 07:50, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

::Gee, did someone lose a pair of socks this morning? ] <small><sup>] ]</sup></small> 14:15, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

I do not believe that Jesus = truth but I feel the article is biased. Now if the present editors feel that ID is a sham to avoid legal precedents then say that in the article. It is easy for people to libel others under assumed names. I doubt that many of these editors would have the courage to make their convictions public using their real names yet Behe etc show that courage. Difference in character.

The article should be changed and be less anti-Christian and pro-atheist. Wiki is not a soapbox.] 16:03, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

:Jesus may not equal truth, but I'm pretty sure that ] = ] = ] = ] = a series of transparent attempts to troll the same articles over and over. —&nbsp;<font face="Verdana">]</font> <sup>'']''</sup> 16:37, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

: It's my real name on the edits I make here. --] 03:05, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
::Me too. --] 03:38, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
If I told the truth about Billybudski, I would be banned for violating ].--] 16:47, 31 October 2007 (UTC)'

:: You do realise that pro-atheist is a double negative?--THobern 20:00, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

I agree that this article reads more like an attack on intelligent design than a neutral description of what it is. I'm somewhat surprised by the number of personal attacks on this page. They seem to me to be an effort to intimidate those who disagree with the current POV of the article. I don't know the true motivation behind them, but I wonder why they occur so frequently. I am new at this, but don't most topics that have a controversy typically explain what the topic is in the introduction, indicate that there is a controversy, and then refer the reader to a "controversy" section. Why is this topic different? I guess my question is this, why is the definition of this concept written as a rebuttal of the concept throughout, instead of isolating the rebuttal to a single section. This would allow readers to be able to learn what the concept is intended to mean by those who created it, as well as to give appropriate voice to those who disagree with it. ] (]) 02:50, 17 November 2007 (UTC)
:What the concept is intended to mean by those who promote it is stated in the first paragraph. It may be a weakness that the article doesn't currently give the definition presented by those who created it: "Intelligent design means that various forms of life began abruptly through an intelligent agency, with their distinctive features already intact. Fish with fins and scales, birds with feathers, beaks, wings, etc." . . ], ] 08:46, 17 November 2007 (UTC)
:The article is unnecessarily hysterical in its bias, but at least in the right direction. The irony is that it's become impossible to spot the difference between creationists (sorry, "supporters of ID") on this board, and legitimate commentators, since any argument or edit against the article's polemical nature is treated as pro-creationist. This is not the first time this has come up, and it won't be the last. C'est la vie. ] (]) 22:54, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

Where else would one expect to find "attacks" (I prefer "challenges")by those few, but very vocal Christians who are so intolerant of anything that challenges the "Bible." I use quotes because the modern Bible was completely re-written, throwing out many books with which those MEN disagreed.--] (]) 17:41, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

::To those who think this article is biased: please pick one sentence, paragraph, or section; explain how it violates NPOV; and suggest what change would have to be made to ensure that - in your opinion - it would be NPOV compliant? ] | ] 19:59, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

:::Been there, done that and it exhausted me. Feel free to check the archives ] ] (]) 23:05, 17 November 2007 (UTC)


Phrenology (from Greek: φρήν, phrēn, "mind"; and λόγος, logos, "knowledge") is a theory

"Intelligent design is the assertion' it is more than an assertion

Something more like the following would be better.


The theory of intelligent design (ID) holds that certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause rather than an undirected process such as natural selection.

In a broader sense, Intelligent Design is simply the science of design detection -- how to recognize patterns arranged by an intelligent cause for a purpose. Design detection is used in a number of scientific fields, including anthropology, forensic sciences that seek to explain the cause of events such as a death or fire, cryptanalysis and the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI). An inference that certain biological information may be the product of an intelligent cause can be tested or evaluated in the same manner as scientists daily test for design in other sciences.

And as others have said. The article reads like an attack. ] (]) 22:52, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

:1st para ok, 2nd para "sucks" (apart from anything else, the comparisons assume an intelligent cause) ] (]) 23:16, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

:No Patonq, ID is ''not'' science, it does not "detect design", it merely ''asserts'' design as badly substantiated religious ] as to why "evolution couldn't have done it". '''None''' of the fields you mention use anything ''even vaguely resembling'' ID's purported "design detection" methodologies. So please put up ] before making these wild claims. The reason you ''misinterpret'' this as being an "attack" article is that ID is entirely ''vacuous'' (in the unequivocal opinion of the vast majority of the scientific community), and any article in keeping with ] will reveal this. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 04:28, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
::It's not a bad thing to explain why this article is not an attack here on the talk page, but that does not address the real issue. The problem that some are observing is that even if this article is not unfairly biased, it clearly gives some people the impression that it is biased. Ideally, the article should seem fair to everyone who reads it. Is there a way to make this article seem more fair without given undue weight to ID supporters? -- ] (]) 05:21, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

:::I suspect the problem is that anything short of a whitewash would seem "biased" to the pro-ID side. They quite simply deny that the scientific consensus has already passed legitimate judgement on ID, finding it to be wholly meritless. Given these fundamentally contradictory viewpoints as to the current state of reality, it is quite simply ''impossible'' to write an article that both sides accept as unbiased. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 07:46, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

::::The trouble is, life is so unfairly biased against ID supporters. I mean, just this year that nice Professor Behe produces a spiffy book explaining that HIV (you know, the virus involved in AIDS) hasn't evolved, and was rotten enough to point out that her research work involved evolving HIV, and that scientific papers from previous years showed just the evolution Professor Behe said wasn't there, and even provided a . Well, Professor Behe wasn't going to answer that sort of rudeness, but another professor , and only 105 days after first being told about it, that nice Professor Behe admitted that, well, HIV had evolved. And in response that other professor Behe to publish an erratum for his book, acknowledging that the statement in the book is wrong. I mean, how biased can you get? ... ], ] 08:31, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

It just seems from the tone of this article that the authors are trying to imply that the Discovery Institute and all associated with it are involved in a conspiracy to lie to the public to get a theocracy established in the US. And it seems to imply that Behe et al are incompetent, unknowledgeable, insincere, purposefully deceptive. All are involved in an evil attempt to overthrow science and the government and to change the US into a medieval theorcracy in which people will have not rights and must obey religious edicts. And then when they take over they will forbid scientific research and take away medicine, stop surgeries, shut off electicity and have everyone pray for hours every day. This is how it appears to me. Does anyelse see it this way? ] (]) 17:41, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
:Now, now, don't exaggerate. As someone who's contributed to the article, my understanding is merely that they want to defeat scientific materialism and its destructive moral, cultural and political legacies, replace materialistic explanations with the theistic understanding that nature and hurnan beings are created by God, see intelligent design theory as an accepted alternative in the sciences and scientific research being done from the perspective of design theory, see the beginning of the influence of design theory in spheres other than natural science, see major new debates in education, life issues, legal and personal responsibility pushed to the front of the national agenda, see intelligent design theory as the dominant perspective in science, see design theory application in specific fields, including molecular biology, biochemistry, paleontology, physics and cosmology in the natural sciences, psychology, ethics, politics, theology and philosophy in the humanities; to see its innuence in the fine arts, see design theory permeate our religious, cultural, moral and political life. There now, that looks much more modest. .. ], ] 19:19, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

:<p>According to the many ] that ] the information in this article, the attempt to propagate "intelligent design" into science classes is more like a ] rather than a blatant attempt to establish a theocracy. Similarly, any assertions in this WP article of intentionality by intelligent design proponents are quite well verified, in a number of the over-two-hundred citations including the body of evidence entered into the trial record in ], by public statements and writings of leading intelligent design proponents. Among the things Misplaced Pages is not: it is not a mouthpiece for public relations campaigns.<br>...... This article is quite closely in accordance with ] expected of Misplaced Pages articles. Ignorance about science such as confusing science with philosophy, theology or religion, is not a valid point of view, at least insofar as this article is about a topic invented in order to teach creation-based beliefs in science classes, and not an article about popular ignorance. As the WP article notes, the advocates of intelligent design, after the US Supreme Court ruled in 1987 that creationism could not be taught in public school science classes, merely changed tactics in attempting to achieve the objective of imposing a biblical perspective on the science that is taught in school by trying to make it into something that could be argued to pass muster as science. The court in ], upon examining the extensive evidence, found intelligent design to be a transparent tactic to insert creationist perspective into science. <br>...... Note that intelligent design advocates have used a multi-prong strategy in attempting to achieve this objective. Advocates have argued that ID is science according to existing notions of science, which, as stated in the WP article, the scientific community unequivocally rejects. And advocates have attempted to change the boundaries of science such that intelligent design might be included in what's regarded as "science". All this is thoroughly verified. <br>...... As to the notion that the article has some particular "tone", I wonder what that means, other than reflecting a person's preference that the article should be written differently and/or contain different information than it presently does. Please note also that it's been criticized from both sides of this controversial topic, for giving too much credence to the assertions of intelligent design advocates, as well as for giving inadequate credence to those assertions. And it could be written at least thousands of different ways, of which the way it's written is just one-- but it's the way that resulted from the collective efforts of many dozens of participants, several of whom know this topic just about as well as anyone on Earth. ... ] (]) 19:32, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

::"tone" is just a shorthand. IMHO the problems lie largely with the lead, and are fairly minor. Compare the current first few sentences of the lead with the alternative below.

<div class="boilerplate metadata" id="attention" style="background-color: #FFFCE6; margin: 0 5.0%; padding: 0 10px; border: 1px solid #aaa;">
::Intelligent design is the assertion that "certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection." It is a modern form of the traditional teleological argument for the existence of God, modified to avoid specifying the nature or identity of the designer.</div>

::compared to:

<div class="boilerplate metadata" id="attention" style="background-color: #FFFCE6; margin: 0 5.0%; padding: 0 10px; border: 1px solid #aaa;">
::Intelligent design is the assertion that "certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection." It is similiar to the traditional teleological argument for the existence of God, but does not specify the nature or identity of the designer.</div>

::IMHO the problems relate to too much inferences. I'm not, I might add, advocating any changes - been there, done that, life's too short - but while the lead remains in its current state, I doubt this arguement is going to go away for long. ] (]) 09:44, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
:::Duly noted, Tomandlu. But sorry, ID is not only ''similar'' to a teleological argument (aka "design argument") for the existence of God-- it '''''is''''' a teleological argument for the existence of God. Teleological arguments are perfectly appropriate for teaching theology or religion, or a relevant philosophy class. This is not an issue of tone, but of substantive content. ... ] (]) 11:57, 19 November 2007 (UTC)
::::Have you a source for "is similar to"? Note well the cited source – "ID is not a new scientific argument, but is rather an old religious argument for the existence of God.... The only apparent difference between the argument made by Paley and the argument for ID, as expressed by defense expert witnesses Behe and Minnich, is that ID's 'official position' does not acknowledge that the designer is God." Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District, citing John Haught, a theologian who testified as an expert witness for the Plaintiffs and who has written extensively on the subject of evolution and religion. ....... ], ] 12:38, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

:::::I would argue that both the actual version and my varient use the same source. The point I'm making isn't about facts but about slanting the statement of those facts. The current version is essentially stating that the modification is a deliberate attempt to obscure the religious nature of ID. IMHO we should not be making such a bold claim in the lead, irrespective of its truthiness... ] (]) 13:24, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

::::::Your argument is simply your argument, and as such is original research. Behe is comfortable with attributing the concept to Paley, your assertion of "truthiness" is a slur on an expert witness under oath. .. ], ] 13:33, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

:::::::Thanks for reminding me why I got bored of this arguement the first time around. My arguement isn't "my" arguement - it's a suggestion that we should limit the lead to the bald facts (which are damning enough IMHO), and let the reader make the correct and inevitable conclusions. Anyway, I'm out of here. Bye. ] (]) 15:22, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

<unident>The modification ''is explicitly'' a deliberate attempt to obscure the religious nature of ID:{{quotation|What I am not doing is bringing the Bible into the university and saying, "We should believe this." Bringing the Bible into question works very well when you are talking to a Bible-believing audience. But it is a disastrous thing to do when you are talking, as I am constantly, to a world of people for whom the fact that something is in the Bible is a reason for not believing it." ... "You see, if they thought they had good evidence for something, and then they saw it in the Bible, they would begin to doubt. That is what has to be kept out of the argument if you are going to do what I to do, which is to focus on the defects in their case—the bad logic, the bad science, the bad reasoning, and the bad evidence. -- '']''}}
<font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 16:58, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

Now some think this article is biased. It that mainly because there are 2 sets of opinions: those who feel that ID is not science and not testable and those that do? It that the main difference of opinion here? Is there a way to hit some middle ground here? ] (]) 13:20, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

:: No, it's between those who want the article to "limit the lead to the bald facts" and let the DI people and their supporters hang themselves and those who want to actively promote the case against ID in this article including the lead. It's between those who insist that anyone who accepts (perhaps from a religious/philosophical position) any notion of design (which, if taken any further, would likely lead to a teleological argument) must be in league with the DI when they say they are not and those who are not making such a conclusion of the DI=ID equivalence. It's between those who take the notion of ] seriously and those who want the article to leave no doubt that the official Wikipedian position is against ID. That's what it's about. ] (]) 02:41, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

::: Wiki's offical position is anti-ID? How did that happen? Now if some feel that ID is not science they could express their views in the article and then have the pro-ID people express their views. Isn't that the fair way to do it? ] (]) 15:18, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

::::See ] and ] – we don't express our views or present our own analysis, we accurately summarise ] giving the analysis of third party experts on the subject, journalists and historians. ... ], ] 17:19, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

But aren't both sides supposed to represented? ] (]) 19:13, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

:Follow ] as outlined at the top of the page, and provide ] of the opinions from ]. .. ], ] 14:08, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

:Both sides are represented. The first paragraph explains what ID is, per its proponents. The second paragraph explains what the scientific community thinks of ID (which is relevant, since ID claims to be a scientific "theory"). ] (]) 20:43, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

Only thing is that in the first paragraph 2 sources are from ID proponents and 6 from opponents.

And the of the first 18 sources only 3 are from ID proponents. Shouldn't they at least have chance to speak their piece at least in the first paragraph. I have not analyzed all the sources but it seem like 90% of them are from ID opponents. ] (]) 21:48, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

:You are absolutely right, Hignit. I can't believe people are actually arguing that this article doesn't violate NPOV. There is literally more material discrediting or debunking ID than explaining what it is -- and a whole lot more references doing so. This is nothing but a well-referenced treatment on the arguments against ID.

:Regarding the statement in the lead, "It is a modern form of the traditional teleological argument for the existence of God." It is simply not true, and I don't generally think that what expert witnesses in trials should be used as reliable references of fact. They are hired to persuade the jury. Intelligent Design is <b>not</b> by any means an argument for the existence of God. It is an argument for a different understanding of certain aspects of nature that is informed by the presupposition of the existence of God. I support the suggested change to the sentence listed above.

:Now, does anyone have any idea where I can find the encyclopedic treatment of ID that I came here to find? ] (]) 03:04, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

::Hignit, Erikmartin, etc: please read ]. Additionally, the imbalance probably also reflects the lack of ]s from the ID side. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 03:50, 26 November 2007 (UTC)
:::Well, the problem is more that we have plenty of sources of what the DI say, but what's needed is objective third party analysis of what they mean, and ID proponentsists commonly produce short deceptive statements that take a lot of explaining. The numerical "imbalance" reflects past demands for extensive substantiation of anything critical of ID. The claim that "Intelligent Design is <b>not</b> by any means an argument for the existence of God. It is an argument for a different understanding of certain aspects of nature that is informed by the presupposition of the existence of God." appears to be ], and contradicts statements by ID proponents as well as by critics, but you are of course welcome to put forward a ] for the statement. .. ], ] 09:38, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

I think there are a lot of reliable sources. And I agree with Erikmartin. It seems like all the editing is done by persons who are very much against ID. Should not a personal with a neutral attitude or even a postive attitude to it have some say in the way the article reads. A compromise? I think that is fair. ] (]) 14:04, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

:No bias. Article uses reliable '''third party''' sources. This article uses a good balance of DI sources and opposing sources, but predominantly relies on third party sources. That these sources are mostly critical, but not necessarily deathly hostile, of DI and ID is not unsurprising given its nature. The article should not rely on DI sources to provide it's backbone, this would introduce bias, and does not fulfill wikipedia's role as a '''tertiary''' resource.--] (]) 14:14, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

But most of the editors here are anti-ID and strongly anti-ID. I do not think there are any Pro-ID editors and most of the sources are from ID opponents. Look at the first 20 sources. About 90% are from very anti-ID people. How can a person who is on the opposite side of ID in a trial be considered an unbiased source. Which are the third party sources and what do you exactly mean by that? ] (]) 15:37, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

:You claim that the editors here are unable to write a balanced article, and you claim that there are a lot of reliable sources from which the article could be written. If you have evidence to support your assertions, please supply some. The article actually gives the "cdesign proponentsists" far more credence then they deserve - it assumes the fiction that they are honestly presenting their ideas...which, obviously, is just a fiction. But the fact that the DI are a set of dishonest charlatans does not prevent me from writing a good, neutral, accurate article. You have been repeating your assertions for days, but have refused to provide a single shred of supporting evidence. Come up with something, or quit wasting people's time. ] (]) 00:53, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

::I have present my case: and I think you are verifying it. Almost all the editors are very anti-ID. Are you saying Behe, and the others are charlatans? A good neutral article would give the proponents a chance to make their case. This article only shows one side. I think the first paragraph should be rewritten.
::Intelligent design is the assertion that "certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection.". In a broader sense, Intelligent Design is simply the science of design detection -- how to recognize patterns arranged by an intelligent cause for a purpose. Design detection is used in a number of scientific fields, including anthropology, forensic sciences that seek to explain the cause of events such as a death or fire, cryptanalysis and the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI). An inference that certain biological information may be the product of an intelligent cause can be tested or evaluated in the same manner as scientists daily test for design in other sciences.
::The above is how the proponents see it. You can have a seperate criticism section for those who do not feel that the above is correct. ] (]) 01:11, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

:::"''An inference that certain biological information may be the product of an intelligent cause can be tested or evaluated in the same manner as scientists daily test for design in other sciences.''" Indeed scientists have tested the hypothisis and found it wanting. It is almost univerally rejected as a possible expenation of life on earth by biological scientists worldwide. Having explained what Intellegent Design claims and having seen that it's claims are not accepted by science, it seems reasonable to then ask the question, why to supposidly intellegent people promote a hypothisis which has been cleary rejected by the scientific community. The article quite rightly looks at this aspect of Intellegent Design as well as the more obvious "what is it?" If the evidence available does not paint the proponents of Intellegent Design in a particually good light, who's fault is that? --] (]) 01:34, 28 November 2007 (UTC)


Yes Behe is a charlatan. Take a look at what his colleagues in his own department think of him on their website. Look at his testimony under oath. He is the laughing stock of the country, an embarassment. He has not done any science in a couple of decades. He is a joke, frankly. And repeating like a robot the nonsense about detecting patterns and SETI that the ] spews completely discredits you. Why not try thinking for yourself for a change instead of repeating what the nonsense these cretins are feeding you? I am an expert in detecting patterns and believe me, intelligent design is about pushing a religious agenda, and nothing to do with detecting patterns. What they have done is a complete scientific sham.--] (]) 01:53, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

:::Hignit: none of the fields you mention as "detecting design" make any use of ID hypotheses or principles, so using them as support is purely spurious. Behe and his ilk have been ''proven'' to be charlatans. They have been given over a decade to "make their case" -- all that they have come up with is arguments from ignorance, equivocation, hand-waving and cheap rhetoric. All of which has been thoroughly debunked by the scientific community. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 01:56, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

Hignit wrote:
*''I have present my case: and I think you are verifying it''
Nope. You made unsubstantiated allegations. And I showed that, despite the ''fact'' that these people are charlatans and snake oil salesmen, the article doesn't say this - in fact, it plays into the fiction that they are not. We must be willing to sacrifice accuracy for NPOV. Your allegation is that anti-ID bias is preventing people from writing an NPOV article. Again, I ask that you supply some shred of evidence for your allegation, or stop wasting people's time by making it.
*''Are you saying Behe, and the others are charlatans?''
Absolutely. That's a well-established fact.
*''A good neutral article would give the proponents a chance to make their case''
No, it shouldn't. This isn't a debating forum. Articles should be written based on notable secondary and tertiary sources.
*''This article only shows one side.''
No, it doesn't. It reports on notable views, in a balanced manner. See ] and ].
*''I think the first paragraph should be rewritten.''
That's what this page is for.
{{quotation|In a broader sense, Intelligent Design is simply the science of design detection -- how to recognize patterns arranged by an intelligent cause for a purpose. Design detection is used in a number of scientific fields, including anthropology, forensic sciences that seek to explain the cause of events such as a death or fire, cryptanalysis and the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI)}}
Now ''there'' you have a perfect example of what a Misplaced Pages article is ''not''.
*''Intelligent Design is simply the science of design detection''
**No, it isn't - this runs counter to just about everything I have read about ID.
**Do you have a source to support this assertion?
**We can't say "intelligent design '''''is'''''...the science of signal detection" - not when ID lacks the characteristics of science.
*''how to recognize patterns arranged by an intelligent cause for a purpose''
**If you're making a serious suggestion for a re-write of an article, try making it grammatically correct.
**ID isn't "how to recognise patterns" - on the contrary, Dembski's "filter" is just a small part of ID.
*''Design detection is used in a number of scientific fields...''
**Again, the assertion that ID is somehow like "anthropology, forensic sciences...cryptanalysis and the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI)" is unsupported by the facts.
In addition, none of this is supported by sources - we need reliable secondary and tertiary sources which are independent of the ID movement.

{{quotation|An inference that certain biological information may be the product of an intelligent cause can be tested or evaluated in the same manner as scientists daily test for design in other sciences.}}
* This is a bald statement unsupported by any sources.
* ''An inference intelligent cause can be tested or evaluated...''
** Perhaps, but no one has proposed a method by which it could be tested.
* ''in the same manner as scientists daily test for design in other sciences''
** Nope. It can't.

* ''The above is how the proponents see it. You can have a seperate criticism section for those who do not feel that the above is correct''
Have you read any of the links provided? Have you bothered to figure out how Misplaced Pages articles are written? Did you read any of this talk page, or maybe some of those big links at the top of the page? To begin with, '''''no''''', that is not how cdesign proponentsist "see it". Have you read a word of either of Behe's books? Have you read any of what Johnson wrote? Have you read any secondary sources ''about'' ID?

Equally important is that Misplaced Pages articles are not talking points juxtaposed with criticisms. That's not the way you write an encyclopaedia article. ] (]) 14:43, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

===Can't stand the heat===
{{quotation|Look at the first 20 sources. About 90% are from very anti-ID people.}}

I looked at the first 10 references. Note that references 5 and 10 are multipart, so it actually adds up to 20.
They break down as such (If someone wants to tabulate this go ahead):

*DI related sources: 4 (20%) Refs 1, 2, 8, 9
**2 DI, an IDEA and a Meyer & Nelson
*Hostile sources: 3 (15%) Refs 4, 5, 10
**List of scientists opposing intelligent design, 2 ] sources

*Neutral sources: 13 (65%)
**Kitzmiller vs Dover (Court decision, impartial by nature) - 5 (25%), Refs 3, 7, 9, 10
**Newspapers (again *generally* impartial by nature) - 5 (25%), Refs 5, 9 and 10
**Scientific sources - one journal, and the AAAS, critical but not hostile - 2 (10%), Refs 5 & 6
**The ACLU - independent organisation for civil liberties - 1 - 5%, Ref 5


Now I'm counting as a "very anti-person", someone who spends a good part of their time chasing down IDists and creationists. Someone such as ], ], or ]. If ID wishes to be included for scientific scrutiny, sources are not "biased" simply because they come from the scientific community. Further, if you want to claim conspiracies about the media and the court system ].

All in all 11 sources independent of each other. And the oevrwhelming majority are indpendent non-hostile sources. The second most represented source is the Di-itself (after the Kitzmiller decision). Again there is no bias other than reality.--] (]) 02:19, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

:And look at evolution page ... oh look, absolutely everybody agree with evolution theory! Just like in real world, NOT!!! <small>—Preceding ] comment added by ] (]) 10:58, 28 November 2007 (UTC)</small><!-- Template:UnsignedIP --> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->

::The claim isn't that everybody accepts evolutionary theory. Just that ''almost'' everybody who is a ] accepts it. ] (]) 11:26, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

::No such claim. Actually read ], particularly ] and ], "evolution is still a contentious concept." and "several denominations contain creationists who object to evolution, as it contradicts their literal interpretation of origin beliefs". Look it even talk smack of Darwin: "Darwin could not account for how traits were passed down from generation to generation". ZOMG.--] (]) 13:15, 28 November 2007 (UTC)


I really do not feel the need to respond to someone who is abusive as you are:

"Can't stand the heat - I hate dyslexic trolls; where's your conspiracy now bi-atch?)"



And if no one else agrees that you should not address me like that then obviously this is gang which will harrass anyone trying to go againt their POV pushing. Let us see if one person will correct on you bad behavior here. If not then this is certainly a setup. ] (]) 13:32, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

::As regrettable as the "bi-atch" comment is, I understand it completely. After a person has answered the same objection several hundred times, it gets very very tedious. And if these pages were not constantly patrolled, they would turn into religious tracts and recruiting tools for one particular religious sect or another. This is not what we want from an encyclopedia. If you want to write a religious tract, start a blog. Thanks.--] (]) 14:02, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

::: I have been polite and courteous and have gotten abused and now you are condoning it. If this was really a place where opposing views were fairly considered this would not happen. This behaviour happens when a gang of bullies want to protect their turf. It's all yours. The article is embarrassing. It so obviously a soapbox. You are not getting away with anything. It reaks and smells of bias. Enjoy yourself. ] (]) 14:29, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

:I think you have to review ]. Intelligent design purports to be a science. As such, we treat it as a science for evaluation purposes on WP. According to UNDUE and NPOV, we weight the pro ID and critical material roughly as the relevant fields of science do. By ], well in excess of 99% of the relevant scientists think intelligent design is nonsense. And therefore, about 99% of the material that WP includes should be critical of ID. By this measure, WP is actually not critical enough of ID.--] (]) 13:58, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
{{hab}}
The above discussion has already been covered by ] from this talk page, so please do not rehash it.<p>
I would also direct editors attention to the 'Points that have already been discussed' section in the Archivebox above -- which includes previous discussion on NPOV, differences between treatment in this versus the Evolution article, etc. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 14:36, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

== Not sure of this sentence ==

A derivative of the phrase appears in the Macmillan Encyclopedia of Philosophy (1967) in the article on the ] : "Stated most succinctly, the argument runs: The world exhibits teleological order (design, adaptation). Therefore, it was produced by an intelligent designer."

I do not like how it is written particularly, and when I look in the teleology article, I do not see the Macmillan Encyclopedia of Philosophy.--] 01:11, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
:I provided that quote, and can attest that is it as written in the ''Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' article on the "Teleological argument for the existence of God". The article on the ], although I provided much of the material around the same time in Spring, 2006, doesn't cite to the Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Any idea that the quote was referring to the Misplaced Pages article on the teleological argument is a result of someone else having put a wikilink within the quotation. I'll go ahead and remove that wikilink now. ... ] 01:36, 1 November 2007 (UTC) ... I instead adjusted the text to make clear that the WP article is referring to the EoP article rather than the WP article on ]. ... ] 01:48, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
:It would be good to put in a proper cite as well to this encyclopedia then, with ISBN number and publication information etc.--] 01:42, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
::TBH, I'm getting fatigued with the idea that WP:V ever meant dotting every "i" and crossing every "t" and adapting every old citation to a newly developed format. IMO, there are more productive things to do. But, since you mention it: Title = "Teleological Argument for the Existence of God" ; Publication = Encyclopedia of Philosophy ; Publisher = Macmillan Publishing Co, Inc & The Free Press, New York; Collier Macmillan Publishers, London ; Date = 1967 ; Author = William P. Alston ; ISBN = readily available online . ... ] 01:54, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
:::You are correct: There are many, ''many'' more productive things to do. ] 19:15, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
::::You don't mind that I'm anal retentive about citations and references? ] <small><sup>] ]</sup></small> 02:53, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

I can understand the desire for good citations. I can understand the desire to link these cited entries as carefully as possible to the relevant pages. I am less enamored with the automated tools everyone seems to love and seem so inflexible and unhelpful to me. I also can understand the desire to have article content that is comprehensible and accessible.--19:28, 1 November 2007 (UTC) <small>—Preceding ] comment added by ] (] • ]) {{{2|}}}</small><!-- Template:Unsigned --> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->

:They aren't THAT inflexible. And they are very useful for articles that cite one reference over and over again. Moreover, once a reference type is used in article, it's bad form to change it. TBH, references in the articles you write are difficult to use. I guess we can all be anal retentive or stubborn about different things. ] <small><sup>] ]</sup></small> 19:08, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

== The intro ==

I find the third and fourth paras of the intro a little odd. I am wondering if they couldn't be combined down into one, leaving the explanations of the casework below. I'm thinking along the lines of something like:

"Intelligent design was introduced after the Supreme Court ruled in '']'' that the teaching of ] in state schools was unconstitutional, as it was seen to be "advance a particular religion". In response, creation science works were changed to talk about "intelligent design" with no mention of a ''specific'' intelligence. This helped it to avoid the "particular religion" issue, thereby bypassing the ] that had been the basis of the Supreme Court decision. Efforts to have intelligent design taught in schools followed, which succeeded in ]. Another Supreme Court case quickly followed, '']'', in which the courts stated that intelligent design "cannot uncouple itself from its creationist, and thus religious, antecedents", and concluded that the it also violated the Establishment Clause."

This removes some of the history that is better left outside the intro, but leaves a complete story arc about where it came from and where it ended up. Specifics, like the books and dates, can be left below, and much of it already appears. This version also states ''why'' ID was introduced as a result of Edwards v. Aguillard. This point is missing both from the intro and the Overview section immediately following. The Overview does contain some information about the decision that suggested ID was a possibility, but again never really comes out and says it. I can't imagine anything more important to understanding the basic concept of ID.

] 03:39, 8 November 2007 (UTC)
:<p>The third and fourth paragraphs previously were one paragraph, focusing on the legal status of intelligent design. Then it was expanded in March 2007 to include a brief synopsis of the legal history leading up to the current legal status. The demand by several users to further expand the amount of explicit information in the lead led to a compromise that resulted in it being split up into two paragraphs around the beginning of October 2007, which seems to have resulted in a stable consensus for the time being. ... ] 05:22, 8 November 2007 (UTC)
::My main concern is that the article does not clearly spell out ''why'' ID came about. It's very good at telling us when, who and even where, but not the only question that really matters, ''why''. There is not a single mention of the actual wording in the EvA case that led to ID being a proposed solution. ] 12:55, 8 November 2007 (UTC)
:::Actually, the article makes plain in the third paragraph of the lead that the words "intelligent design" were used in response to ]. Similarly, calling intelligent design a scientific theory was in response to the language used by the Supreme Court about what is permissible to be taught in public-school science classes (specifically that ''"teaching a variety of scientific theories about the origins of humankind to school children might be validly done with the clear secular intent of enhancing the effectiveness of science instruction."'' ). All this is quite plain and verified by reliable sources, both in the lead, and in further depth in the "Overview" and several of the sections that follow. ... ] 03:56, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Although I agree with you in principle, the LEAD is the way it is through tremendous struggles for years. We cannot just change it with so many involved. Of course intelligent design was "created" in response to the legal situation in the US. We might even be able to find a few ] sources that claim this. However, there would likely be many who would fight desperately against this, since it casts creationism and intelligent design in a bad light, and it might take months to change the LEAD in this way. The discussion of the Dover case in this article might be excessive, but the LEAD is supposed to reflect what is in the article, and the Dover case is discussed extensively in the article. Perhaps later it might be pared back and more shifted to its own article, which already exists.--] 13:17, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

:"it might take months to change the LEAD in this way"
:Or it could take one mouse click and a cut-n-paste. We don't know, and there is only one way to find out. Let's at least ''try''!
:To date I have received (only) two opinions on this; both appear to agree in broad terms that there is something wrong with the intro, and that the article is missing (what I consider to be vital) information. Yet the same (two) posts suggest any changes should be avoided.
:The idea of the wikipedia is to write good articles, not to write controversy-free ones. I would argue that it's the most controversial articles that we need to try our hardest to improve, because the reader likely has few other resources that will even ''attempt'' to cover both sides of an issue.
:I understand that you're all very tired of flamewars, but these are unavoidable. I say this as a 30 year veteran of these debates (hi wes!) The alternative, doing nothing, is (IMHO) unacceptable. ] 18:00, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

You have a lot of experience here on WP, although more in time than in actual number of edits, at least on this account. I think it might be prudent to ask a few more people. However, if you make a big change like this, it might get a lot of attention. You better have plenty of cites prepared for any such changes; probably at least 3 in high quality sources, if not more. I would post the suggested change here on the talk page first but you are free to try whatever you want of course.

I personally am in favor of very slender LEADs with minimal detail. However, others disagree with me often. I have lobbied for a long time for a companion ] article which would have a simple LEAD and less compliicated text, but we have not tried this yet.--] 18:42, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

:Actually, having read over the ] article, it seems there is ample proof that the points above can be addressed, reach consensus, and stay in the WP article. All of the points I raise above ''are'' addressed to my satisfaction in that article. Of course it's LEAD is even longer, and suffers from a similar attempt to encompass an entire field within it, but at least the article isn't leaving out the entire reason for the modern concept. ] 13:25, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

== Should this be included somewhere? ==
Userfied to ], as Massachew has not demonstrated any relevance for this article. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 06:56, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

== Noetic cosmology link ==

I, and several other people, have removed a link from the ''Further reading'' to an article on ] cosmology, which was published in a conference proceedings in 2003. There are several issues: the linked article appears to be in violation of the article's copyright. Furthermore it does not really discuss intelligent design ''per se'', but is only tangentially related to it. Finally, it presents a new view of the rules governing life, which may constitute a ] issue. For myself, I don't think this belongs in the article. I'm bringing it here since the link has been added several times. Thoughts? --] 06:52, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

== Archivebox ==

Given the length of our archivebox, should we change to ] to save space? <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 07:19, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

:Could we have two archiveboxes (both collapsable). One for archives, and a seperate one for the "points already discussed"?--] (]) 07:13, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

::My impression is that the heading of the box is fixed as "Archives", so having two boxes would be confusing. If you can find an equivalent box template with an editable header, I can't see any reason why we shouldn't split them. As it's been a couple of weeks since I made this suggestion, and as nobody has objected, I'm going to go forward with it. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 07:29, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

:::I noticed that ] had a customised/non-template one that seemed to fit out needs, so have adapted it. If somebody is a whizz at creating templates, it'd probably be worth creating a standard template to do it. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 14:28, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
::::Nice--] (]) 14:29, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

==cdesign proponentsists==

Does anyone plan on doing an entry/article on this transitional intelligent design fossil? <small>—Preceding ] comment added by ] (]) 15:40, 14 November 2007 (UTC)</small><!-- Template:UnsignedIP --> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->

:It's covered in '']'', and arguably a brief mention in this article is appropriate – it's certainly come to public notice! .. ], ] 16:39, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

::With the ''NOVA'' episode bringing this phrase to public attention, do you think there might be enough material to merit an article for ]? ] 17:12, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
:::It's already mentioned in this article that the changes were made after ]. No need for a new article, I would think. It actually was only an interesting added twist on what Barbara Forrest had already thoroughly documented, which was the mass change of terminology from "creation" to "design" with no corresponding change in meaning in the text. Perhaps it deserves brief mention in the article on ]. ... ] 17:48, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

:Well, the phrase is mentioned in {{cite web |url=http://www.philly.com/inquirer/columnists/jonathan_storm/20071113_Jonathan_Storm___2-hour_Nova_reviews_Pa__intelligent_design_trial.html |title=Jonathan Storm : 2-hour 'Nova' reviews Pa. 'intelligent design' trial : Philadelphia Inquirer | 11/13/2007 |accessdate=2007-11-14 |format= |work=}}, and certainly caught the attention of some viewers, as this entertaining blog by an assistant professor of religion notes: {{cite web |url=http://exploringourmatrix.blogspot.com/2007/11/transitional-forms-as-evidence-for.html |title=Exploring Our Matrix: Transitional Forms as Evidence for Evolution: Tiktaalik and cdesign proponentsists |accessdate=2007-11-14 |format= |work=}}. I've added a couple of good NCSE references to this article together with a brief mention, and this is also good – {{cite web |url=http://www.ncseweb.org/resources/rncse_content/vol26/9141_my_role_in_ikitzmiller_v_dov_12_30_1899.asp |title=NCSE Resource -- My Role in <i>Kitzmiller v Dover</i> |accessdate=2007-11-14 |format= |work=}}. Looks promising, does anyone have access to the ''Nature'' review of the Nova programme? At the least a redirect to the ''Pandas'' article may be appropriate. .. ], ] 18:03, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

::WTF does "proponentsists" mean? Do we know who created this monstrous neologism? If so, summon Thanatos. ] 23:44, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

Pandas Thumb explains the *joke* well (it's true, does that make it not a joke?). In the rush to change all forms of "creationists" to "design proponents" a copyeditor made a mistake worthy of a grade 10 English assignment - he didn't highlight the whole word (obviously before the days of "Find and replace" function available on most word processors I've used - you guys are old)--] 00:03, 15 November 2007 (UTC)
{{cquote|Creation Biology (1983), p. 3-34: “Evolutionists think the former is correct; creationists because of all the evidence discussed in this book, conclude the latter is correct.”<p>
Biology and Creation (1986), p. 3-33: “Evolutionists think the former is correct, creationists accept the latter view.”<p>
Biology and Origins (1987), p. 3-38: “Evolutionists think the former is correct, creationists accept the latter view.”<p>
Of Pandas and People (1987, creationist version), p. 3-40: “Evolutionists think the former is correct, creationists accept the latter view.”</p>Of Pandas and People (1987, “intelligent design” version), p. 3-41: “Evolutionists think the former is correct, cdesign proponentsists accept the latter view.” }}


::::: Just cursious what was the former and latter in the above examples? And this blatant error was actually published? ] 21:58, 15 November 2007 (UTC)


Warrants inclusion in ] and ]. Can't argue with the fossil record on this one.--] 00:06, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

Yes in warrants addition. And a little of what they were referring to. It is hard to believe they could be so sloppy. ] 00:12, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

::::::ROFL! ] 22:50, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

==Link to simple version==
I wonder about this edit: . On the ] article and the ] article and other science articles with introductory articles, the link is given as part of an italic text above the article. If it is relegated to the list of languages, will it be accessible?--] (]) 23:14, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

==How NPOV is this page, really?==
How can sentence like "Others have concurred, and some have called it junk science." made it in the article? I'm sure there are some who have called evolution as junk too. <small>—Preceding ] comment added by ] (]) 10:52, 28 November 2007 (UTC)</small><!-- Template:UnsignedIP --> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->

:Go to the top of this page. There is a header-section marked "Please read before starting". Read it. This section links to a number of policy pages. Read them. They answer your complaints, which have been made by hundreds of creationists before you. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 12:05, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

:"Others" is referring to people of the scientific and education community, you know, relevant people.--] (]) 13:09, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

::Well, not everyone in the scientific and education community are relevant and not all of them called Intelligent Design 'Junk Science' (only those against it). I still think this article is clearly too biased. You got to be blind not to see it. <small>—Preceding ] comment added by ] (]) 10:27, 2 December 2007 (UTC)</small><!-- Template:UnsignedIP --> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->

] <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 10:36, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

== Article seems biased continued ==
Userfied to ] -- this has all been covered in the header section & 'Points that have already been discussed'. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 15:33, 28 November 2007 (UTC)


== Ok tell me what I am allowed to post on this page. ==
{{hat}}
What can I say so it will not be moved. Now should not other hear what I have to say? I think the article needs some changes. I am not allowed to say that on the talk page? ] (]) 16:59, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
:The problem is Hignit, what you are saying has been said 10,000 times before and answered. And people get tired of it. Since it is not constructive for the article, it is moved.--] (]) 17:06, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
:: But it has not been answered sufficiently for the many people who come upon the article for the first time and are struck by the clear anti-ID tone set by the article. Tomandlu said it well and, as I examine the link he provided, he said it repeatedly and was ignored by, what appears to be a group of like-minded editors who are determined to retain the anti-ID bias in the article. The lead of the article betrays its bias immediately. So, perhaps it has been asked and answered 10,000 times, but it has never been answered acceptably, and when someone tries to make the article less biased, those changes are always reverted. So, do not expect that 10,000 times will be enough. The article is clearly biased and that will never be acceptable to those who are not themselves so biased against ID. Just pointing to the talk page history and saying "we've been through this before" is insufficient, because you have not dealt with the actual bias in the article. At the very least, it violates ], but it is actually worse than that. ] (]) 18:54, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

:::Clearly, the only thing that will satisfy people such as yourself is to turn this article into a religious recruiting tract. There are many such articles and even entire wikis for this sort of thing on the internet. Please go to one of those to satisfy these urges. This wiki is not for that. It has different rules. Please respect our rules. --] (]) 19:59, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

:::: That is '''not true''' and the example of Tomandlu is the counter-example. In my own case (if that is who you mean by "people such as yourself"), I personally do not support ID, but it's still clear that the article is biased. I don't want a religious tract. I just want a dispassionate accounting of the facts, and as Tomandlu pointed out, the raw facts are sufficient to make ID look really bad. The article need not "nail the coffin shut" (as Tomandlu pointed out in the history). But, by simply relegating any critic to a religious nut (''"the only thing that will satisfy people such as yourself is to turn this article into a religious recruiting tract"''), you betray your own bias. You, Filll, are a biased editor.
:::: The issue here is not one of unbiased editors defending an unbiased article, it is one of '''biased''' editors defending their anti-ID POV in the article. It is simply an issue of power. The biased editors have sympathetic administrators who are willing to use their muscle to defend the POV in the article. It is you who are not respecting the rules, and the rule I would start with is ]. ] (]) 20:21, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

::: Yes 207 you hit it on the head: "when by simply relegating any critic to a religious nut". It is truly embarrassing that the tone of this article is so unscientific. ] (]) 20:38, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

::::: The facts themselves are biased against the whole concept of "intelligent design." It is not a violation of ] to write the article to reflect this. ] (]) 20:25, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

:::::: But it is wrong to misrepresent what IDers think ID is. I do not think any IDer thinks ID is science in the way Physics is science. ] (]) 20:38, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

::::::: So the cited statements within the article, wherein ID proponents are saying that this ''is'' science and should be taught in science classrooms as an alternative to established scientific theories, are all incorrect? Even when such statements are made by ID proponents while under oath in open court or when they appear in documents prepared and distributed by these same ID proponents? ] (]) 21:23, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

:An article's talk page is for discussing the article, not the topic of the article. Looking at past edits, it appears that you wish to discuss the topic (as well as rehash old ground that has been covered ''ad nauseam''.) As such, Hrafn was correct in moving your discussion to a private area, specifically your own user talk page. ] (]) 17:11, 28 November 2007 (UTC)


I was not discussing the topic I was dicussing the way the article was written. It does not accurately represent the situation ] (])

::If you want to persist in this, you will get nowhere unless you have a source in a neutral mainstream publication describing the situation in different terms. For example, find us an article in ], or the ] or the ] that states that a significant fraction of scientists in biology or paleontology (a significant fraction is like 30, 40, 50 percent or more) think that intelligent design is a viable scientific theory. If you cannot do that, you cannot make progress here.--] (]) 19:46, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

:Please note that comments and concerns like yours have already been covered numerous times, and they are all answered in the ], specifically: "]" and "]". In response to your question ''"Now should not other '''' hear what I have to say?",'' please understand that Misplaced Pages ]. Also, this Talk page is not a forum for "scientific progress". While science is always progressing, new scientific thought isn't explored and debated on Misplaced Pages, that would violate one of the core policies: ]. As for what you should discuss on this Talk page: Spelling or grammar problems. Improvements in article arrangement, flow, or clarity. Summarizing especially lengthy sections. Factual inaccuracies or missing relevant facts, but only if you can ] that provide ] and show relevance and notability (there is a very high probability that this ground has already been covered before, and some relevant facts have already been delegated to supporting articles to keep length under control), keeping in mind that the Discovery Institute is considered a ]. If you think a specific part of the article violates one of ], bring it up here. '''But first,''' '''''please''''' ''read the ]'' to see if what you're proposing has already been covered, because rehashing something for the nth time serves no purpose but to clutter this Talk page. Truth be told, I think my overly verbose response is cluttering this Talk page. =o) -] (]) 18:15, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

I don't get this. So this article cannot be changed? Now if enought people see it as biased can it be changed? If everytime a person who does not like the article has there comments removed then it will biasly appear that everyone is in agreement which they are not. This article seems very POV and seems like a soapbox for people who do not like the DI. I think people have a right to state here they do not like the article. Otherwise this is just a place to push a POV. ] (]) 19:13, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
: Think of it this way. If I state that most Christians have green skin and eat babies, would you let me change the article on ] to reflect this? Probably not, correct? Would you demand that I have a reference that proved my point? Probably, correct? And if I had no reference or citation for my claims, would you not tell me to not bother with my demands to describe most Christians as green baby eaters?--] (]) 19:51, 28 November 2007 (UTC)


::::That is exactly my point. What ID is should be accurately described and then if you want to say it is not valid go ahead. In this article it never state why IDers believe ID is. ] (]) 20:38, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

I have indefinitely blocked Hignit as another Raspor sockpuppet. ] (]) 20:44, 28 November 2007 (UTC)
{{hab}}
The above discussion has already been covered by this header section from this talk page, so please do not rehash it: ] before posting.

To quote Hrafn "I would also direct editors attention to the 'Points that have already been discussed' section in the Archivebox above -- which includes previous discussion on NPOV, differences between treatment in this versus the Evolution article, etc." ] (]) 03:11, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

:Given the frequency with which this header section is being referenced, I've created an <nowiki>{{anchor}}</nowiki> to it -- ]. This means that we can easily direct newbies and/or trolls to it without having to clutter up the talkpage with repeated copies. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 04:15, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

::Thanks for adding that. I cleaned up my edit to reflect the new link. ] (]) 05:10, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

== A misrepresentation in the article ==

From the article:

<blockquote>
''Leading intelligent design proponents have made conflicting statements regarding intelligent design.'' In statements directed at the general public, they say intelligent design is not religious; when addressing conservative Christian supporters, they state that intelligent design has its foundation in the Bible.
</blockquote>

The two statements following the italicized sentence do not conflict. For instance, the legal system prevalent in the US is certainly not religious, but nonetheless arguably has its foundation in the Bible. The italicized sentence should therefore be removed or corrected. My preference is for the former; doubtless the readers can judge the motivations of the cdesign proponentsists adequately enough themselves. ] 19:05, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

:This is at odds with the judgement of a federal court. If you feel so strongly, why not get a few million dollars together and try to challenge the court ruling? Otherwise, I think this is quite accurate.--] 20:49, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

:Actually the idea that the US constitution has its foundations in the bible is nothing but rightwing revisionist propaganda. The US constitution ''conflicts'' with the bible far more than it agrees with it. ] 20:51, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

:I concur. Neither statement implies the falsity of the other. Ideas proposed, inspired or endorsed by religious texts are not necessarily religious in themselves. ] 22:02, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps the sentences could be worded better. However, the truth remains that intelligent design, as a movement, is firmly rooted in religious ideas, motivated by religious beliefs, promoted by religious zealots, funded by religious donors, etc. The connections between intelligent design and religion are pervasive and extensive. Of course, one could in principle envisage an intelligent design movement and theory that was not connected with religion. However, this is not the reality that one observes, and we have mountains of evidence that they are deeply connected and intertwined. The only evidence we have to the contrary originates from the Discovery Institute itself, which then turns around and in the next breath, or in front of a different audience, declares that "of course intelligent design is about a religion /dominionism /injecting God into the public square /creating a Christian theocracy /etc. People in the public are too stupid to realize it" and so on and so forth... So please, give it a rest. We are not stupid, you know. --] 23:54, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

:I'm not saying there isn't any hypocrisy in the ID crowd. I'm just saying that the italicised statement is not supported by the claims following it. It should be reworded, replaced or removed. ] 08:12, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

I think the paragraph is accurate, but needs to be better cited: to prominent IDers saying, in at least two quotes of each claim, that it is and that it isn't religious. E.g.:
{{quotation|The world is a mirror representing the divine life... The mechanical philosophy was ever blind to this fact. Intelligent design, on the other hand, readily embraces the sacramental nature of physical reality. Indeed, intelligent design is just the Logos theology of John’s Gospel restated in the idiom of information theory.}}
Here's another good one for "it's religion:
{{quotation|The Intelligent Design movement starts with the recognition that "In the beginning was the Word," and "In the beginning God created." Establishing that point isn't enough, but it is absolutely essential to the rest of the gospel message.}}
KvD would probably be a good source for "it's not religion" quotes from them. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 09:43, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

:I think we need to be careful to distinguish between "X is religious" and "X is motivated/endorsed by religion". ID clearly isn't a religious claim. ] 10:08, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

::The above quotes don't show ID as being "motivated/endorsed by religion" they show it as being ''founded on'' religion, to the extent of having no meaning or purpose outside that religious context. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 16:16, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
:::'founded on religion' does not entail 'religious'. ] 16:40, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

::::"founded on religion, ''to the extent of having no meaning or purpose outside that religious context''" most certainly ''does'' entail religion. When something "is just the Logos theology of John’s Gospel restated in the idiom of information theory" it cannot help but be fundamentally religious. Can you tell be how a ] explicitly enunciated in the Christian ] is not religious? <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 16:50, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

:::::''""founded on religion, to the extent of having no meaning or purpose outside that religious context" most certainly ''does'' entail religion"''. No it doesn't. Whether a claim is a religious one is determined by its content, not its underlying intentions. Additionally, ID ''does'' have meaning outside a religious context. It doesn't make reference to any exclusively religious concepts, nor make any religious presuppositions. It makes a plain, perfectly meaningful statement about the universe, which just happens to be unfounded. ] 17:46, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

::::::I disagree with your bare assertion that "whether a claim is a religious one is determined by its content, not its underlying intentions." ID makes no "reference to any exclusively religious concepts" as part of a ] attempt to disguise its religious nature. I would argue that it ''does'' make religious presuppositions, specifically a rejection of ] in favour of ]. I likewise dispute your assertion that it "makes a plain, perfectly meaningful statement about the universe" -- as any positive assertion that ID may purport to make is vague (particularly on the who/how/when/why of the design) to the point of meaninglessness. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 02:02, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

:::::::''"I disagree with your bare assertion that "whether a claim is a religious one is determined by its content, not its underlying intentions.""'' Then what does it mean to be a religious claim? ''"I would argue that it ''does'' make religious presuppositions, specifically a rejection of "'' You are confusing its presuppositions with the presuppositions of those who birthed and support it. ''"I likewise dispute your assertion that it "makes a plain, perfectly meaningful statement about the universe" -- as any positive assertion that ID may purport to make is vague "'' And here you are confusing 'vague' with 'uninformative' (or possibly 'general'). ] 07:10, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

<unident>Ilkali:
#A claim that, while not making explicitly religious/supernatural assertions is still a religious claim if it makes no sense outside a religious context. An example is the claim that there has been a global flood within the last 10,000 years. This claim is only meaningful within the framework of a ] interpretation of ]. It is thus a religious claim.
#ID only makes no sense within any secular set of presuppositions -- it is the equivalent of the ].
#ID '''is''' vague -- it says nothing whatsoever about who/why/how/when/etc of the design. It has been found to be vacuous, completely meritless, without scholarly or practical use.
In any case all this seems to be complete hair-splitting. I am sick of it. We have judges, theologians, philosophers of science and scientists lining up to say that ID is religion. Unless you can come up with some ]s to the contrary, I see no point in discussing this further. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 08:08, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

:''"A claim that, while not making explicitly religious/supernatural assertions is still a religious claim if it makes no sense outside a religious context"''. This "makes no sense outside a religious context" thing is entirely idiosyncratic, and doesn't even apply to ID.
:''"ID only makes no sense within any secular set of presuppositions"''. You are confusing 'makes no sense' with 'has no utility'. ID is meaningful without a religious context, it's just not well-motivated.
:''"ID '''is''' vague -- it says nothing whatsoever about who/why/how/when/etc of the design"''. You are still confusing 'vague' with 'uninformative' (or possibly 'general'). If I tell you "I went to see a film yesterday", I'm not being vague just because I'm not specifying what/why/how/when/etc. See: ]. Additionally, vague claims are ''by definition'' meaningful.
:''It has been found to be vacuous, completely meritless, without scholarly or practical use''. Irrelevant.
:''"We have judges, theologians, philosophers of science and scientists lining up to say that ID is religion"'' What makes judges and scientists reliable sources on language and philosophy? Where are the reliable sources saying that ID itself is religious, rather than just a tool of the religious? ] 08:33, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

::Johnson, Dembski, Forrest and Kitzmiller for starters, as references given in the article. Where are the reliable sources saying that ID itself isn't religious, or are you just trolling without bothering to read the article? ... ], ] 10:32, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

:::I could argue about reliability of sources, I could argue about contexts of utterance, I could argue about analytic truth overriding external testament, but... forget it. It's obvious that I don't care about representing ID neutrally as much as you care about representing it negatively. This is a hopeless battle. ] 12:02, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

::::Odd isn't it how ID defenders can come up with bare assertions until the cows come home, but always give up the "hopeless battle" against the 'demonic darwinist evil atheist conspiracy' just when the're nailed down on substantiation. You can argue how many angels can dance on a pin as much as you like Ilkali, but until you can show them under a microscope, it's just so much ] ]-less hand-waving. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 12:50, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

:::::I'm ''one of'' those evil atheists, you moron. The fact that you'd assume I'm a creationist just because I disagreed with some wording neatly vindicates my decision not to bother with you and your ilk. ] 15:42, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

::::::What has been found, over and over and over on these talk pages of ] and ] is that ''only'' those who are religious fundamentalists or biblical literalists claim to be atheists here. I guess they think if they loudly claim themselves to be atheists, this gives their complaints some extra value.--] 15:52, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

:::::::Actually Filll it doesn't really matter if he's ]' biggest fan or ] in drag -- all we have from Ilkali is ''another'' bare assertion. No ]s in sight. It is ''that'', not his religious views, or lack thereof (whatever they may be), that is the issue here. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 16:43, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

<undent> As Hrafn stated, the biggest problem with intelligent design, and the biggest reason it is a threat to science, is that it ''demands'' that the list of causes accepted by science include '''magic'''. This does not necessarily have to be magic caused/ created/ produced by a god, but just some superior intelligence; an intelligent designer or group of intelligent designers. The only context in which this demand or requirement has any sense is if intelligent design is irrevocably rooted in religion, and is inseparable from religion.

The difficulty with requiring that we include magic in science is that it throws most of what we know out the window and is pure poison to science. For example, there is no reason to investigate anything we do not understand; it can just as easily be postulated as "it was done by magic". There is no reason to keep anyone in prison; a reasonable defense would be "the evidence was put there by magic".

This was exactly the approach taken by the Islamic world about 1000 years ago when they were world leaders in science, medicine, mathematics, navigation and many other technical areas. ] wrote ], introducing some of these very ideas into Islamic science, with devastating effects. One thousand years later, Muslim science is still in an awful state.--] 15:31, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

===Arbitrary break===
So the wording might have to be sharpened to make it more clear what the contradiction is. Obviously for legal purposes, the DI and its supporters claim that the "intelligent designer" is unknown and anonymous, and could even be a race of hyperintelligent space aliens. However, we all know from repeated quotes and other evidence is that they intend the intelligent designer to be God, and not just any God but the Christian God of the Protestant bible. So they are just being coy and possibly even disingenuous when they claim that the intelligent designer is anonymous or unknown or they do not intend it to be God. The agenda, as stated repeatedly, is to promote the literal reading of the protestant Bible and its incorporation into American culture in a more prominent way and even the establishment of a Protestant theocracy. This is why Muslim support for intelligent design is weaker than Muslim support for creationism. The Muslims recognize the covert nature of the movement and the misrepresentation and its true agenda, which they view as hostile to Islam (which it probably is, to be honest).--] 15:53, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

:I absolutely agree that the ID movement is disingenuous, and that this should be mentioned in the article. ] 16:40, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

I think you are misunderstanding a demarcation issue. Some things can be proven, predicted, or indictated by science and others cannot. Let's take the mulitverse theory. Now it does explain a lot but I hope you do not think it can be proven or disproven. We can predict fairly accurately if certain things have been designed without know who designed it. The ID people are openly admitting that their theory can never prove that 'God' did it. They are saying it is matter of faith to believe that 'God' did or 'evolution' did it. I think you are having a problem understanding this demarcation issue just as many do not understand that evolution does not include how life began. I issues can be confusing and it takes some out-of-the-box thinking to get them sometimes. ] 16:07, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

#I dispute that "we can predict fairly accurately if certain things have been designed without know who designed it ."
#These assertions appear to be both off-topic & ].
<font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 16:21, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
:BobLMartin, I have to disagree with you on several points. First, why do you believe that the multiverse can never be "proven or disproven"? Never is a long time, and you clearly do not know much about physics if would you make such a claim. Also, the use of the word "prove" here is a bit problematic, although I know what you mean; if you want proof, go to mathematics or logic. Proof is not part of science. Sorry. And I think your statements about what the ID movement believes and supports are inaccurate and not supported by cites, although one might be able to find some. And the provisional conclusion that evolution is a viable explanatory theory that makes accurate predictions is based on literally 100s of millions of pieces of evidence, from DNA, from the laboratory, from field studies and from fossils. It is '''not''' based on faith in any way shape or form. There are axioms in science, but the assumption of the correctness or dominance of theory of evolution is not one of them, and such a claim would only be made by someone who knows nothing about science, biology or evolution.-] 16:34, 2 December 2007 (UTC)


I see the point in some of the above discussion. If we visit say a moon of Jupiter and find remnants of ancient buildings and machines but no life forms we do not know who designed them but we would have to assume they were designed. And I think the multiverse theory is not falsifiable. Can we travel outside of our own universe? And I do not see where it has been proven that mammals came from reptiles. Show me the experiment. ] 00:40, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

:Who wants to bet this brand new editor (above) is a sock? Anyone? I'll give good odds. ] 02:29, 3 December 2007 (UTC)
::You would win that bet. I've indefinitely blocked Showerrug as a Raspor sock. ] 02:30, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

Bob L. Martin indefinitely blocked as another Raspor sockpuppet. ] 17:51, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

"the legal system prevalent in the US is certainly not religious, but nonetheless arguably '''has''' its foundation in the Bible"
:Has or Had? I would class anyone arguing the former (and advocating your first point, legal system is not religious) to be making the same sort of contradiction as the DI. ID has yet to seperate itself from religious dogma, see KvD, the proponents continually attempt to claim the otherwise, but not ].--] 07:03, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

On an experimental test of the ]: Please look at ].--] 15:47, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

== Cutting the cruft ==

A ] was a bit ''too'' ] in cutting some cruft. I reverted that edit, and will remove most of the material, keeping the essential parts thereof. ] 17:21, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
:Sorry if it was too much, but I do support trimming the fat. ] 17:23, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

:I agree that the information is relevant. I also agree that it a tad bloated. Perhaps we can trim it down to the basics and include a "see here for full article" link? ] 17:26, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
::I just trimmed a bit of the verbose fat. ] 17:30, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
:::Cool. I just did some more. ] 17:46, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

::Just a note: This '''is''' the full article. It has a horde of daughters. See ] <small>—Preceding ] comment added by ] (] • ]) 03:56, 5 December 2007 (UTC)</small><!-- Template:Unsigned --> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->


I do not think you have consensus for these changes. Please try to get consensus first.--] 17:53, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

:And I reverted your edit. Stop making wholesale changes to this article without discussing it on the Talk Page. I find it highly, highly suspicious that you registered today for an account and went about wrecking this article. Strange. ] 18:03, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

:: edit is wonderful. It is concise, gets to the key point (I.D. was found to be a creationist pig with lipstick and a pretty dress) and points the interested reader to the main article. ] 18:19, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

== Synthesis ==

Regarding , see ]. I think we need to cite somebody who applied this analysis specifically to Dembski's formulation. ] 20:50, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
:If the concensus is otherwise, of course feel free to revert. ] 20:51, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
::I've removed the subsection. It is indeed a POV in opposition to Dembski's ]. If John Allen Paulos had been arguing specifically in terms of the ] or ] argument, it might be different. But according to the copy of ''Innumeracy:Mathematical Illiteracy and its Consequences'' I'm looking at, Paulos wasn't arguing in this context. Thus, the section is an original synthesis. It's also fairly irrelevant to intelligent design. ... ] (]) 21:37, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
:::It's not synthesis unless two things are combined to draw an original conclusion. In this case, that is clearly not happening; there are two things, but they are not combined. The first paragraph looks like a fair representation of Dembski's ideas, and the second paragraph is certainly a fair representation of Paulos, since it is mostly a direct quote from him. It is entirely sourced and therefore it is not original. This would be original research if we added the obvious conclusion that can be reached from these two facts, but we have not done that because that would be drawing conclusions which is exactly what ] is meant to prevent. We present the facts and the reader draws the conclusions, that's how a fair article behaves. -- ] (]) 03:20, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

::::If they are not combined, what is their relevance together. Implied combined OR should be deleted on tyhe basis of irrelevency.--] (]) 04:03, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

:::::I wouldn't call it irrelevant. It is just as relevant as the creationist argument from improbability is relevant. Maybe that is a minor argument, but it seems worthy of mention in this article, and Paulos's ideas are clearly relevant from the other direction to balance the creationist argument. There is no such thing as implied OR. What one might call implied OR is just the reader drawing conclusions from what he reads, which happens with every good article. The a wikipedia reader is expected to use wikipedia for research; it's the editors who are not allowed to do our own research. -- ] (]) 09:17, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

:::::: Simple inclusion of quotes that were not originally related to intelligent design, in the article on intelligent design, constitutes a synthesis. There doesn't need to be a narrative analysis; if we include content in an article on intelligent design, which has not been related by any reliable source to intelligent design, then that's a synthesis (see ]). If the argument, and the counter-argument, have been related in published sources to Intelligent Design, they should go in. If not, it can't go in. ] says:
::::::: "In other words, that precise analysis must have been published by a reliable source ''in relation to the topic'' before it can be published in Misplaced Pages by a contributor." (their emphasis)
:::::: If neither Dembski's theories nor the rebuttal have been related to ID, then the section shouldn't be in. If only Dembski's theories, and not the rebuttal, have been related to Intelligent Design, then only Dembski's theories can go in - although it might be pertinent to say something like "although Dembski's Universal Probability Bound has attracted much criticism from mathematicians" or "Intelligent Design advocate William Dembski has applied his much-criticised Universal Probability Bound to intelligent design" and link to the main article on the Universal Probability Bound, where criticism applied to the UPB but not specifically related to ID should be.
:::::: As is often said on this page (though usually when the question is rather the other way round to this), we don't need to provide balance. We are obliged to present the significant views which have been published on all sides "fairly, proportionately and without bias". If no rebuttal to a specific point has been specifically published, then we don't include one; we are not obliged - indeed we are forbidden - go out and find one to apply ourselves. ] (]) 12:15, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
<undent> The "balance" we provide is established by NPOV#undue weight. It's questionable if this needs more than a very brief mention in the specified complexity section, and if such a mention is made it should be balanced by a mainstream view specifically addressing the argument. Try for starters. ... ], ] 12:33, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

We are forbidden to find and include rebuttals ourselves? Where is that written? Paulos's thing is clearly relevant in this case and it is on the subject of the section. How could it not be on related to the topic of improbability? Just read Paulos's quote and look at what it is talking about. Can you back up your claims with more quotes from policy? I ask because your claims seem pretty bold and unlikely. I doubt it says anywhere that we are forbidden from including rebuttals that were made without specifically referencing what they were rebutting. Paulos's statement was made in rebuttal to an entire class of misinterpretations of probability. That class includes Dembski's even if Dembski is not mentioned specifically. We're not claiming that Paulos mentioned Dembski; all we are saying is based on what Paulos and Dembski actually said and that is all that is required to make this not original research. I'm fairly certain that deciding what topic a work falls under and which articles should use any particular bit of scholarly research is entirely up to us as editors. Correct me with a link if I'm wrong. -- ] (]) 20:47, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
:See ]. ] (]) 20:53, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
::Unfortunately, that's not helpful. That sort of OR requires text that expresses an editors opinion in the article, but there is no such text in what we are discussing, so that does not apply here. -- ] (]) 22:03, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
:::Can a position be expressed implicitly (e.g., via juxtaposition) as well as explicitly? I think the spirit of the synthesis link is clear and we should not attempt to find loopholes. ] (]) 22:10, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
::::It's not our fault that the conclusion is so obvious from the facts. All we are doing is juxtaposing related facts, just like every article does. If you think those two facts together say something, that is your inference, and as long as you don't write that inference in the article it is not OR. -- ] (]) 23:35, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
::"''A and B, therefore C" is acceptable only if a reliable source has published this argument in relation to the topic of the article.'' The deleted section produced an argument using a source which is unrelated to the topic. Not good. Use the source I indicated above, or find another. .. ], ] 22:32, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
:::There is no "A and B, therefore C" here. Two positions are expressed, that's A and B, but no conclusion is drawn, so there is no C. We leave the C up to the reader to decided, just like any fair article should. -- ] (]) 23:35, 5 December 2007 (UTC)


::::If an argument is applied to a point, but not in the context of the topic it is irrelevant to this page. User TSP summarizes it nicely. Rebuttals to UPB that are not in the context of ID are not relevant to the ID page. To include them in this page is violating guidelines/policies on NPOV, OR and UNDUE weight. Implying a connection is as bad, if not worse, than providing your own uncited one.--] (]) 23:40, 5 December 2007 (UTC)
:{{quotation|1=] was a member of ] in his early life. The Hitler Youth was a children's paramility arm of the ], a political part whose ] program was responsible for the death of an estimated 200,000 people deemed "]".}}
:This is all "just facts", but everything beyond the first sentance is rather innapropriate on an article on Pope Benedict. And the details of Nazi Eugenics are not appropriate when dealing with just the HJ. "just the facts" is not as innocuous as it seems.--] (]) 02:40, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

::Where exactly does ] or ] say something that confirms your claims here? I'm not seeing it, so if you could point it out explicitly, that would be very helpful. I see your point about certain facts doing more harm than good, especially when it can be embarrassing for certain living people, but if UPB is noteworthy enough to have a section here then I think the relevance of Paulos's work is obvious to the topic of reasonable assumptions about probabilities. That's the topic of Paulos's work and that's the topic of a section on UPB.
::I am not at all convinced that ] is intended to prevent us from using any sources that did not mention ID in this article. What would be the purpose of that? In the pope example, the facts were obviously relevant and the only issues could be excessive detail or embarrassment. The problem is not that the details of Hitler Youth were found in a work that did not mention the pope, and if policy does forbid such details then why would it be hidden away in WP:SYN instead of being openly stated like: ''All sources used in an article must explicitly mention the topic of the article, and not merely contain facts relevant to the article''? If you could find a place where something equivalent to that is written, then I would believe you, but otherwise you seem to be stretching WP:SYN well beyond its spirit to apply to cases that do not even involve synthesis so you can exclude relevant facts. -- ] (]) 04:07, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
:::Fourth point in ] lead:{{quotation|Compliance with our Verifiability Policy and our cite sources guideline is the best way to ensure that you do not violate our NOR policy. In short, the only way to demonstrate that you are not presenting original research is to cite reliable sources that provide information '''directly related''' to the topic of the article; the only way to demonstrate that you are not inserting your own POV is to represent these sources and the views they reflect accurately.}}
:::Emphasis in original. The wording is not must "explicitly mention", but must be "directly related" to the topic of the article. This criticism is indirectly related, and therefore irrelevant to ''this'' particular article.--] (]) 04:29, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
::::That is a pretty good quote. Thanks for that. I guess maybe that means what you say it means, though I don't see how that rule furthers the goal of avoiding original research. I'd like further elaboration on the intention of the words "directly related", but this may be getting close to lawyering. Doesn't it make sense that Paulos's work is not original research simply because Paulos thought of it first? It can't be original if it has already been published. But in that case, what is the purpose of this rule about being directly related? Perhaps the concept of UPB is the link that directly connects Paulos's work with ID. I may ask about this on the OR talk page. -- ] (]) 04:54, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
:::::The originality lies in connecting Paulos to ID through Dembski. Dembski is a synthetic (created by you/an editor) link between the two unrelated pieces of published thought. It is an ''in''direct link, and as such, someone else has to make it before it is included in a wikipedia article. It doesn't have to be valid/true to go in wikipedia, it has to be verifiable from a reliable source. See ]. --] (]) 05:04, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
:::::::Does anyone have the context of the Paulos section? As I see it, it should be OK even if Paulos wasn't discussing Dembski specifically, provided that he WAS discussing the fallacy that "this phenomenon is so improbable that a supernatural agency must have been responsible" (which is relevant to ID, independently of Dembski). After all, this is the "Intelligent Design" article, not the "William Dembski" article. --] (]) 09:58, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
::::::Dembski is not sythesis, he is a real person who is probably not an editor of Misplaced Pages and certainly not invented by editors. He can publish whatever he wants and simply by that act of publication he is causing his work to not be original research when we included it in our article, and therefore not synthesis. Dembski made the link to ID himself and we are just reporting it, not inventing it. -- ] (]) 12:25, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
::::*I meant using Dembski as a link between ID and Paulos is a synthetic process.--] (]) 05:37, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
::::::: That's fine, as long as everything in the article is cited to a reliable source ''directly related to intelligent design''. The problem was that the section as removed didn't actually mention ID at all, whether the source did or not; so it was unclear that the material related to ID other than by original-research implication.
::::::: Of course, whether everything that can be sourced to have been related to ID is sufficiently ''notable'' in the context to be included in the article is a separate question, and I believe there are questions on that matter too (at least, whether it is significant enough in the field of intelligent design to deserve the depth of coverage it was previously given in this article). ] (]) 16:23, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
::::::::The section as removed did actually mention creationism, which is pretty much a synonym for intelligent design. Dembski's work is entirely for the purpose of providing evidence for intelligent design as I understand it. I haven't actually read his work, but I base my understanding on the Misplaced Pages article about his work. If you want to claim that UPB is not sufficiently notable to deserve a section in this article, I won't say you are wrong, however there definitely should be a link from this page to ], at least in the See Also section. -- ] (]) 22:19, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
:::::::::Creationism is not a synonym for ID. Marsupial is not a synonym for kangaroo. Information about marsupials goes on the ] page, not the kangaroo page.--] (]) 05:37, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

==Media articles==
The Media articles section had this addition, briefly: * A general article condemning intelligent design (Capital Weekly)

It's interesting to see how ID's being covered, though the reporter makes a common mistake in writing "For all intents and purposes, however, it is a phrase propagated by co-founder of Discovery Institute, Stephen C. Meyer." .. .. ], ] 13:49, 5 December 2007 (UTC)

:I don't think its a good article. Do we really need to link it? It's just some op-ed by someone (are they notable) that really doesn't bring any new cards to the table, and as you mention, maybe doesn't even bring the right sort of cards to start with.--] (]) 06:01, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

==POV issues?==
I just read this article, but it seems to me that it may be aimed at proving ID to be creationism, and not science, rather than simply describing it. The caption on Dawkin's picture as "intelligent design creationism"? One of the primary arguments of ID is that it is not specific to any one religious point of view, merely that we have been designed by an intelligence. And what about non-religious ID arguments, such as exogenesis? Whatever your POV on this, if the ID community disputes that it is teaching creationism, is it fair to use the term creationism to describe their views in an article? ] (]) 22:38, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
:Yes. ] <small>(] • ])</small> 22:45, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

::Yes.--] (]) 23:14, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

:::Yes, see the ]. ] (]) 00:04, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

:::: My personal reading of the ] -
::::: 'None of the views should be given undue weight or asserted as being judged as "the truth", in order that the various significant published viewpoints are made accessible to the reader, not just the most popular one. It should also not be asserted that the most popular view, or some sort of intermediate view among the different views, is the correct one to the extent that other views are mentioned only pejoratively.'
::::: 'The neutral point of view is a point of view that is neutral, that is neither sympathetic nor in opposition to its subject. Debates within topics are described, represented and characterized, but not engaged in. Background is provided on who believes what and why, and which view is more popular. Detailed articles might also contain the mutual evaluations of each viewpoint, but studiously refrain from asserting which is better.'
:::: - is that we shouldn't assert one of the views described as the truth, even if it is one supported by a court decision; I've already discussed this and found that others differ on the question, however. ] (]) 01:23, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
:::::This view (NO view) is not being asserted as true. What is being asserted true is that KvD (along with others, ''lots'' of others) find/found/have found ID to be religious in nature, and a subterfugeous and deceptive repackaging of old-school christian-based creationism that bases itself of many many fundamental misconceptions of science and reality. To overlook mentioning these significant findings, would leave this article very hollow and incomplete in describing what ID actually ''is''.
:::::Misplaced Pages is not asserting KvD is right, anymore than it is asserting DI is wrong. It is stating important facts such as "KvD found ID religious nature", "prominent science groups unilaterally dismiss ID as pseudoscience", "DI is the main espouser of ID", "ID is part of a wedge strategy", "ID is a teleological argument", "IDists seek to change the fundamental basis of science" etc. It states stuff. It sources this stuff. I can't find phrases like "ID is based on fallacy", "ID is stupid", "ID is wrong", or similar phrases that would explicitly damn ID. Anything close is attributed a particular critic or critical body.--] (]) 06:23, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
<undent>The article does not assert what is the truth. It does state the different views of different groups are, however. And your point is?--] (]) 01:39, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
: Isn't using the phrase "intelligent design creationism" in the encyclopedic voice, not attributed to any source, saying that Misplaced Pages believes intelligent design to be creationism? ] (]) 01:43, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
::No. It's used in several reliable citations given in the article make clear the direct connection, i.e. that ID is a subset of creationism. No additional citation is needed for each usage of this phrase. ... ] (]) 02:13, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
::: Whereas ID advocates dispute that (source: ). Do you mean that when a sufficient number of references supports the majority view of a dispute, the article may start using that majority view as an assumed fact? As I say, that simply isn't my reading of ].
::: (This isn't a ] issue; firstly because that relates to series of articles not relating to the dispute, whereas this is the article which is actually about the dispute in question; and secondly because the assumption is not necessary - "intelligent design" is available as an undisputed term with the same meaning, but not the assumptions, as "intelligent design creationism"). ] (]) 02:25, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
::::I'm sorry, but AFAIK Misplaced Pages is not properly a mouthpiece for public relations campaigns. The very purpose of attempting to divorce "intelligent design" from "creationism", as is already described in the WP article and cited to numerous reliable sources, was to attempt to satisfy the standard set by ] in order to teach intelligent design in science classes. The reliable sources including representative organizations of the scientific community, educational community and US federal court system have had their say on the matter, and it's clear that these sources disagree with the Discovery Institute's contention that ID is not a creationist or religious view. It might also be worth pointing out that the book ''Of Pandas and People'', the 1989 textbook that swapped the words "intelligent design" for the word "creationism" without any corresponding change in meaning, was the same book that students in ] were referred to as an alternative explanation for the educational content of their biology class. And so forth. ... ] (]) 02:57, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

::::: I agree that there is a huge volume of evidence in favour of one side of the dispute. I just don't agree that that means that Misplaced Pages should take that side.
::::: I absolutely see your point that there is significant evidence that one side of the debate is not being put in good faith, and the article should absolutely present that evidence; but I don't see anything in Misplaced Pages's policies saying that a belief, even one held with good cause, that one side of a dispute is in fact merely a 'public relations campaign' removes the requirements of the NPOV policy and allows us to take the other side of the argument. We should absolutely be clear on what the view of the scientific community, the educational community and the US court system are; but still, "Debates within topics are described, represented and characterized, but not engaged in." While the adherents of ID at least claim to believe that it is not creationism, I don't think that under the NPOV policy we should make the bald statement that it is. ] (]) 03:08, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

To me, referring to ID as creationism is similar to calling Democrats liberals and left-wingers interchangeably in an article. Maybe the terms are synonymous, but this would certainly be inappropriate. Democrats are liberal, and left-wing, but those shouldn't be the terms to describe them in an article specifically about the Democratic part. Maybe ID people all are theists and creationists, but it's inappropriate and confusing to use the terms interchangeably in an article about ID. I think it's especially inappropriate when the movement explicitly states that it is not creationism.

Hey, how about this: the article says that the scientific community, judges, and whoever else believes that ID is creationism. And then we refer to ID as ID throughout the article, rather than using the terms ID and creationism interchangeably? Any objections? ] (]) 04:56, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

{{quotation|the ID community disputes that it is teaching creationism}}
The ID community ''teaches''?.

Seriously: This entry '''states''' ID is creationism, it does not prove it. This article ''describes'' ID as creationism. And it sources those descriptions. The article states and attribute significant views of ID in formulating a description of ID, its activities, motivations, history, supporters, key concepts etc. It does not present a POV. It does not argue a case, present evidence, or even launch an attack. It certainly doesn't prove, or set out to prove anything. Encyclopedias don't prove stuff. They state stuff that's already been proven by somebody else.--] (]) 05:44, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
:Ah yes, ] as the cdesign proponentsists put it. For a detailed account of the expert opinions of historians, philosophers of science and theologians who describe ID as creationism, see ]. As that states on p. 35, the testimony offered by expert witnesses Behe and Minnich claimed that ID isn't creationism "primarily by way of bare assertion and it failed to directly rebut the creationist history of Pandas or other evidence presented by Plaintiffs showing the commonality between creationism and ID. The sole argument Defendants made to distinguish creationism from ID was their assertion that the term “creationism” applies only to arguments based on the Book of Genesis, a young earth, and a catastrophic Noaich flood; however, substantial evidence established that this is only one form of creationism..." Note also the policy ] "though a view may be spelled out in great detail, it must make appropriate reference to the majority viewpoint, and must not reflect an attempt to rewrite majority-view content strictly from the perspective of the minority view.", and the detailed policy in ]...... ], ] 08:25, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

:: Absolutely; the ID proponents' case is very weak, and the opponents' case very strong; and if we present both fairly this should be obvious to any intelligent reader. Nevertheless, in this article, which is the article about that dispute, we should not take a side or state one side of the dispute as fact; which is what we do if we use the term "intelligent design creationism" in the encyclopedic voice.
:: Undue Weight applies to weight - ''how much'' coverage should be given the non-majority views. It ''doesn't'' apply to ''how fair'' that coverage should be. Also, it primarily applies to articles not specifically about the dispute - so, for example, the ] article or the ] article shouldn't include much, if any content on intelligent design. However, when it is covered, as it should be on this page ("Minority views can receive attention on pages specifically devoted to them") then it needs to be done fairly - not presenting the minority view as the majority, but also giving the minority view a fair hearing by not presenting the majority view as fact or as Misplaced Pages's opinion.
:: ] in various sections describes how it is important to make sure that it is clear that the majority view is the majority view; but it is also at all times clear on where the boundaries of this lie; that this does not compromise the ''fairness'' with which we present minority views. For example, from the 'Giving equal validity section:
::: "Please be clear on one thing: the Misplaced Pages neutrality policy certainly ''does not'' state, or imply, that we must "give equal validity" to minority views. '''It does state that we must not take a stand on them as encyclopedia writers'''; but that does not stop us from describing the majority views ''as such''; from fairly explaining the strong arguments against the pseudoscientific theory; from describing the strong moral repugnance that many people feel toward some morally repugnant views; and so forth." (my emphasis)
:: In my view, using a term such as "intelligent design creationism", which presupposes the correctness of the majority view (if the ID proponents were correct that ID was not creationism, there would be no such thing as intelligent design creationism and Dawkins could not be a prominent opponent of it), goes beyond "describing the majority views as such" and into "taking a stand on as encyclopedia writers". ] (]) 12:19, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

== On use of phrase "intelligent design creationism" ==

"Intelligent design creationism" is limited to <s>two</s> three instances in the body of the article, both of which are direct quotes attributed to source.See ]
*"several authors explicitly refer to it as "intelligent design creationism"."
*" has written that the movement's "activities betray an aggressive, systematic agenda for promoting not only intelligent design creationism, but the religious world-view that undergirds it."
* "Richard Dawkins, a prominent critic of intelligent design creationism."
*::I just edited out a hyphen from this, which was messing my ctrl+F search; this is the only 'suspect' usage of the term. It has been previously discussed
*::The outcome last time was based mostly on the prevalent usage of the term by critics, including Dawkins, and therefore "intelligent design creationism" more accurately describes what Dawkins is against.
*::*Personally I feel "creationism" can, and probably should, be removed--] (]) 13:00, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

It is also included a further four times in the references as that is the title of the works in-there-listed.

If you wish to actually make a case for assertion-of-disputed-opinion-as-fact please find a different phrase.

The two cases of "intelligent design creationism" used within the article are clear statements of verifiable fact, not the assertion of a POV.
#Several authors have used the term
#Barbara Forrest is one such author

Thank you.--] (]) 12:47, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

: There's absolutely no problem with the quotes - expressing the views of prominent authors as their views is exactly what we should be doing. My problem, and GusChiggins21's above, is with the two image captions which use the term (sorry, I have been omitting the hyphen) "intelligent-design creationism" without attribution of the implied view to any source. ] (]) 12:55, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

::The two captions are easily solved -- simply put the ID=creationism aspects into direct quotes from Dawkins & Judge Jones respectively. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 13:01, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

::: I would be completely satisfied with that. If no-one else does, I'll go for a hunt for the relevant quotes (obviously, we need to establish that they did in fact use that precise phrase before we can attribute it to them!) later in the day (but now - work!). Thanks - hopefully this is a solution that everyone can agree is within both NPOV and its 'restricting clauses' (Undue Weight, etc.). ] (]) 13:08, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

:::I've re-captioned the Panda to a direct quote. Can anybody come up with one from Dawkins on the ID=Creationism equivalence? <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 13:12, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
::::The statement "The Kitzmiller case found compelling evidence that intelligent design is "creationism re-labeled""" looks fine, but I'm uncomfortable with "and thus that teaching it is prohibited in public school science classes." which should really be "and concluded that requiring that it be taught in public school science classes violated the ]. .. ], ] 14:27, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

::::: Hmm, I can't see anything in any of the Dawkins sources we link to or on the web, and I don't have Dawkins books on hand here at work.
::::: Is it possible that Dawkins actually never has used the phrase? Judging from our sources, its use is in a minority even among ID opponents; and while Dawkins' message is always forthright, his ''style'' tends towards the understated - it's possible that he balks from a phrase that seems to presuppose some of his conclusions. In, for example, , he uses "intelligent design" when he uses any term at all. In fact, he rarely even uses the term "intelligent design" - possibly because he is British, and the term isn't so widespread over here, although clearly he is addressing the proponents of the US movement - he usually just seems to refer to "intelligence" or "a designer". I'll try to find a chance to look through some of his books for the phrase, though - presumably most likely Climbing Mount Improbable (I don't actually have that one) or The God Delusion - The Blind Watchmaker is too early to use the phrase Intelligent Design at all (though it could be in the 1991 appendix).
::::: On an entirely un-balance-related matter, the Pandas and People caption is very long (] - "More than three lines of text in a caption may be distracting" - on my monitor, this caption is currently 18 lines) - need all that content be in the caption, or could some be left in the main text of the article?
::::: (edit conflict) ...and would be 20 lines (and visually longer than the section it illustrates) with Dave's suggested amendment. It is indeed very hard to cover a topic with completeness and accuracy in an image caption - this being the case, might it be best to reduce the image caption to a brief description like "The 1989 textbook Of Pandas and People, written for use in secondary school biology classes, was the first book on intelligent design." and leave the article itself to describe the controversy? ] (]) 14:49, 10 December 2007 (UTC)


*I have changed the Dawkins caption. I do not see it as appropriate to use the phrase there without violating POV. It does not promote extra understanding of the subject of the photo to use the phrase therein. I cannot find this elusive second caption related to Kitzmiller.--] (]) 01:59, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

==Unequivocal Consensus?==
Is is the general consensus of the scientific community, or unequivocal? Unequivocal implies that there is no dissent whatsoever, like the theory of gravity. It's certainly the general opinion, but there are some scientists who argue that ID is a scientific theory, with a hypothesis and predictions. Shouldn't this phrase be changed to something implying that there is a small minority that disagrees? ] (]) 18:22, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
:No, there are no reputable scientists who dispute evolution. Anyone who does is (almost by definition) not reputable. ] (]) 18:41, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
::There are surely some equally reputable scientists who argue that ] is a scientific theory, this has been discussed before with reference to definitions and been found accurate. .. ], ] 18:43, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
::: Michael Behe appears to be professor of biochemistry at an accredited university, which at least according to ] would seem to make him a member of the scientific community. Isn't it ] to say (in effect) "The scientific community unanimously agrees that ID is not a scientific theory, because no reputable scientist believes that ID is a scientific theory, because if they did, they wouldn't be a reputable scientist, because ID isn't a scientific theory"?
::: It's true that "unequivocal" doesn't exactly mean "unanimous"; it means "clear", "unambiguous" or "unquestionable". On the other hand, "consensus" already means something like "the clear opinion of a group"; so I'd expect an ''unequivocal'' consensus to be something a bit more - that the consensus is actually questioned by no-one, which isn't ''quite'' the case here. If we mean "clear", could we just change it to "clear consensus"? If the precise meaning of a non-technical word has had to be debated multiple times on a talk page, I'd tend to take that as an indication that it might be worth considering replacing the word with a clearer one. ] (]) 19:06, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
::::Yes, you're right that it is begging the question. Specifically, it's a ] argument, which is why I said "almost by definition" instead of "by definition" :)
::::As to Behe, he's not reputable. Every time he opens his mouth, he's proven wrong. (Like his recent comments about HIV/AIDS being evidence for ID), and he's taken to simply repeating the same old debunked claims again and again (like the mousetrap canard). Even Dawkins made some comment along the lines of "ID advocates like Behe, who look at a mountain of evidence supporting evolution, and say 'it's not convincing enough, show me more'"
::::But to get back to the greater point here, we'll keep the article at "unequivical consensus" because watering it down plays right into the creationists attempts strategy to mislead people into think that evolution has holes (it doesn't) or is somehow flawed (it isn't), or that evidence against evolution exists (it doesn't) or evidence supporting a competing theory exists (it doesn't). ] (]) 22:07, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

What is wrong with clear consensus? That is what it means. Would you prefer some other superlative? Something like the vast overwhelming majority? Well in excess of 99.9% of all scientists (in relevant fields)? The problem is, we want something that expresses the reality, but is succinct without the need for a lot of caveats and not too technical with numbers and data etc. This has been discussed over and over, and we always come back to leaving it alone. It is accurate. It is not too long. Why water it down? Why weaken it? What is your purpose?--] (]) 22:22, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

: I'd be happy with "clear consensus", and it seems to have been agreed that that is what we mean by "unequivocal consensus". Multiple people have come here, though, and said "doesn't this mean 'unanimous consensus'?" and presenting counter-examples (Behe and Kenyon, as PhD-holding professors at reputable accredited universities, would I think both conventionally be considered part of the scientific community). Even if dictionaries back up the meaning of "unequivocal" as "clear" rather than "unanimous", the fact that multiple people have independently questioned the meaning seems to me to indicate that it isn't the clearest possible use of words. I think that if we are accidentally using "unequivocal" instead of a more readily-understood term like "clear", then we should change to a simpler term to avoid the confusion that has repeatedly been demonstrated; if we are deliberately using "unequivocal" to imply "unanimous" even though that isn't quite supportable (except by applying the 'no true Scotsman' argument), then we should change to a simpler term to be honest. ] (]) 01:19, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
::"Clear consensus" does not convey the same meaning as "unequivocal consensus" (or "unanimous except for one or two people whose merits as scientists are debatable") ] (]) 02:03, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

::: How about 'overwhelming', which I think 'unequivocal' replaced (though after a gap with no qualifier at all. It's about as strong as 'unequivocal', and is perhaps a little emotive, but at least it isn't confusing. ] (]) 12:26, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
::: (Sorry, just noticed that Filll proposed this earlier. Yes, I would be happier with 'overwhelming'. My purpose is to stop confusing people.) ] (]) 12:29, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

:We also do things by consensus here on WP, and the unequivocal consensus was in several previous discussions of this issue was that "unequivocal consensus" was the wording that was most accepted.--] (]) 01:36, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

:: Indeed; but ]. ] (]) 11:45, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

:::Yes, but asking "has it changed yet?" every couple of months, without providing any new evidence, or demonstrating any actual understanding of what the words they are querying actually mean, is unlikely to change anything. Lacking any such new evidence or understanding, this continuous whining will tend to be regarded as ] by those who have answered the ''same'' old misinformed questions over and over before. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 12:59, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

===The meaning of "unequivocal"===
*] -]
**"singularly clear" -- I like that, it's a very good characterisation of the word's full meaning. :) <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 03:35, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

In threads questioning the use of the word "unequivocal", there seems to be a frequent undercurrent of ''misapprehension'' that the word means "unanimous" (e.g. "implies that there is no dissent whatsoever" above). '''It. Does. Not. Mean. This.''' It means "without equivocating" (taking its derivation), "(1) leaving no doubt : clear, unambiguous (2) unquestionable". It implies that there is no reservations/doubts/second thoughts whatsoever, not that there is no dissent. As such it is a far stronger word than "clear" and used legitimately here: there are no reservations/doubts/second thoughts whatsoever in the scientific community ''as a whole'' that "intelligent design is not science" -- which is why we see ''so many'' scientific associations making emphatic statements on the subject. The most that there is is ''dissent'' on this subject from a vanishingly small number who have defected ''from'' the scientific community ''to'' the ] community. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 02:59, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

: I know that it doesn't generally mean that (although 'unquestionable', in the context of a consensus, could be taken to mean 'questioned by no-one', which is not precisely the case). I just would prefer not to use a word for which there is such a widely-held misapprehension about its meaning. I don't think that people should have to look in dictionaries to understand non-technical words used in Misplaced Pages articles. ] (]) 11:45, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

::"Unquestionable" means (as a simple matter of etymology) "not capable of being questioned", which is not at all the same as "unquestioned" or "questioned by no-one". There are indeed people who question it, generally for religiously inspired reasons, but there are no scientific grounds on which it can be questioned, and it is therefore (from a scientific perspective) un-question-able, i.e. unequivocal. Yup, ''unequivocal'' is is ''unquestionably'' the right word. ] (]) 11:52, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
:For unequivocal, Chambers Dictionary gives ''unambiguous, explicit, clear and emphatic'', The Concise Oxford gives ''not ambiguous, plain, unmistakable.'' Nothing there about unanimous. Note also the linked articles: ] does not mean unanimous. ] notes that "Status within the community is largely a function of publication record." There has recently been comment on relevant records. Behe's status in his own department is spelt out at the university website.
:Equivocal is given by the Oxford as ''1. of double or doubtful meaning, ambiguous, 2. of uncertain nature, 3. (of a person, character etc.) questionable, suspect.'' For an example of equivocation see Casey Luskin's November 1, 2007, essay – "while biological structures may be scientifically explained via intelligent design, the structures themselves have no way of directly telling us whether the designer is Yahweh, Buddha, Yoda, or some other type of intelligent agency. Thus, in contrast to the professor’s incorrect accusation that this is part of a “strategy … to wedge ID into science classrooms,” ID’s non-identification of the designer stems from a scientific desire to take a scientific approach and respect the limits of science and not inject religious discussions about theological questions into scientific inquiry. In other words, using present knowledge, identifying the designer can’t be done by science. It is a strictly theological question, and thus for the theory of ID to try to identify the designer would be to inappropriately conflate science with religion." So that's why they want the "ground rules of science" (quoting Kitzmiller) changed to equate unexplained complexity or alleged improbability with "evidence" of an unknowable "designer". .. ], ] 12:07, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

''I don't think that people should have to look in dictionaries to understand non-technical words used in Misplaced Pages articles'' Although I am somewhat sympathetic to this view, the main articles in Misplaced Pages are generally aimed at a fairly high level of understanding and use fairly sophisticated language in general. That is why the word ] was used in this article.

That is why there is a movement afoot to produce simpler articles that are aimed at a slightly less sophisticated readership on Misplaced Pages. For example, we have ], and ]. We have ], and ]. We might eventually have ]. See and ]. In addition, there are articles on many of these subjects on ] which are aimed at an even lower level of sophistication.

What this means is that "complicated" words like "teleological" and "unequivocal" will remain in the main intelligent design article. What we can do, if there is consensus, is to wikilink the word "unequivocal" in the article to the wiktionary definition of ].--] (]) 14:27, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

: I don't think the two cases are the same. Teleological is a technical term, specific to the domain we are writing in. Domain-specific terms should be used, for clarity and lack of ambiguity but should be explained (]). 'Unequivocal' is not specific to the domain we're writing in; it's simply a an English word, but one which, as the repeated questions about this show, many people are unclear on the meaning of. This only reduces clarity and adds ambiguity. In my opinion this makes it not a piece of jargon that needs explaining, but simply an unclear choice of word which needs replacing.
: If "clear" is too weak, would "overwhelming" not serve the same purpose? I have no wish to weaken or change the meaning of the phrase as it is intended to be read, merely to remove the (presumably) unintended misinterpretation which multiple questioners seem to have read into it. ] (]) 14:48, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
::*]
::That would requiring some form of whelming (emotional overload? physical overpowerment?). This is a unequivocal statement, not an overwhelming one. It's not oevrwhelming anyone or anything. Please don't fix something that is not broken. Misplaced Pages is not responsible for user illiteracy.--] (]) 14:55, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

::: Fair enough. I just feel that, in an encyclopedia, causing repeated misunderstandings in its readership is a form of brokenness. ] (]) 15:02, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
I seem to recall that we had "overwhelming" for several months earlier this year, and wouldn't be opposed to its reintroduction. I agree that it's clearer to the general reader than "unequivocal". ] (]) 12:42, 15 December 2007 (UTC)
:Agree. ] (]) 19:52, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

== Major ID break through - Dembski has identified the designer! ==
"The Designer of intelligent design is, ultimately, the Christian God." - William Dembski, 12-14-2007. http://www.citizenlink.org/content/A000006139.cfm

I wonder why he did not publish this major ID discovery in a science journal instead of breaking this news to the Focus on the Family people? In the article he does not give evidence or even reasons of why the designer is the christian god, but I'm convinced he has a very solid scientific reason for it. I guess the lone Jewish and single "athiest" supporters of IDC will need to find a new home, or convert.

How should this unexpected IDC scientific discovery be incorporated into the article? <small>—Preceding ] comment added by ] (]) 22:43, 14 December 2007 (UTC)</small><!-- Template:UnsignedIP --> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->

:Here is an interesting question: Is he saying that the Christian God is the Intelligent Designer, or is he saying the Intelligent Designer is the Christian God? The first phrasing gives lie to the alleged secular purpose of ID; the second is abject ] as it replaces the Christian God with something else. (Insert scientifically engineered cackle of evil glee here.) ] (]) 00:35, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

::Heresy. It will feed their persecution complex if catholics hate them too.--] (]) 02:08, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

So we don't get accused of quote mining:
{{quotation|4.''' Does your research conclude that God is the Intelligent Designer?'''<br>I believe God created the world for a purpose. The Designer of intelligent design is, ultimately, the Christian God<br>The focus of my writings is not to try to understand the Christian doctrine of creation; it’s to try to develop intelligent design as a scientific program.<br>There’s a big question within the intelligent design community: “How did the design get in there?” We’re very early in this game in terms of understanding the history of how the design got implemented. I think a lot of this is because evolutionary theory has so misled us that we have to rethink things from the ground up. That's where we are. There are lots and lots of questions that are now open to re-examination in light of this new paradigm.}}

:::Since Dembski has determined the intelligent designer is the christian god, why not simply teach the christian bible in public science classes? <small>—Preceding ] comment added by ] (]) 03:57, 15 December 2007 (UTC)</small><!-- Template:UnsignedIP --> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->
::::Because that would be an unconstitutional establishment of religion? ] (]) 03:59, 15 December 2007 (UTC)
:::::According to a Time magazine article in their 22 March 2007 issue - - it is constitutional to have a class on Bible studies in U.S. public schools. But the classes must not be devotional or sectarian in character. The Bible must be studied as a cultural artefact like Shakespeare. And, the class certainly can not merge with the science class. Cheers! ] (]) 04:09, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

:::::Of course. This has always been true. I even support this. However, this is '''not''' what fundamentalists want. Otherwise, they would just do this and be done with it. Decades ago. No; there is something else going on here.--] (]) 04:24, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

This is hardly a "major ID breakthrough" -- ID advocates have been, ''as a matter of personal belief'', identifying the ID Designer with the Christian God since virtually the start of the movement. They simply discliam that the ''"science"'' of ID can make that identification. Nothing new here, so let's move on. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 04:19, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

:Not a breakthrough, but certainly a good reference to cite. Have we yet?--] (]) 04:24, 15 December 2007 (UTC)
I don't suppose this is a good time to think about re-opening the debate over "God" vs "Abrahamic God" vs "God of Christianity"? We now have a source, in addition to Judge Jones, for "God of Christianity", from the core of the movement itself. ] (]) 12:46, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

== Interview. ==

Have a look at Dembski's answer to question 4. It's at the least interesting. ] <sup>]</sup> 00:17, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

:Curses! Too late! ] <sup>]</sup> 00:17, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

== Nancy Pearcey quote ==

{{cquote|By contrast, design theory demonstrates that Christians can sit in the supernaturalist’s “chair” even in their professional lives, seeing the cosmos through the lens of a comprehensive biblical worldview. Intelligent Design steps boldly into the scientific arena to build a case based on empirical data. It takes Christianity out of the ineffectual realm of value and stakes out a cognitive claim in the realm of objective truth. It restores Christianity to its status as genuine knowledge, equipping us to defend it in the public arena.|20px|20px|], ''Total Truth'', pp. 204-205|}}
I think this statement leaves Dembski's recent quote in the dust. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 15:09, 15 December 2007 (UTC)


Along these lines, I would like to know how intelligent design can deny the supernatural and miracles and still reject materialism (from the last book, ]. I am missing something...--] (]) 15:49, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

:'Tis easy -- you just litter your arguments with God-shaped holes, and deny any scientific effort to fill them in with genuine research, and any theologian who points out their obvious God-shapedness. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 16:26, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

== So what? ==

Who are these people; Dembski and Pearcey? Folks who quote their "wisdom" as science need to give their ''academic'' credentials. The Pope's credentials were highly-scrutinised by the College of Cardinals, and for Roman Catholics his word is infallable, yet I doubt he would agree with much of the rubbish these anti-science neo creationists say.
I recall a priest in the 60's giving a sermon that dispelled any possibility of conflict between evolution and creation. He said the Bible is ''allegorical''--when man evolved to capability of reason (ergo the ability to ascertain right from wrong) was the day man was born. I have spoken to a number of biblical scholars, all of whom state that the bible books were edited and written many times in many languages in ancient times after being handed down verbally through many generations. The Bible deals with ''science'' very poorly.
::Our American Founding Fathers (in establishing a government free of imposed religion) remembered well the Jesus quote. When asked whether a coin belonged to God or to Caesar, "Render to Ceasar that which is Ceasar's, and to God that which is God's."

I find it hard to believe that any man who believes in a literal interpretation of every word of the "Bible" would listen to Nancy Pearcey.

From The Good Book:
I Timothy, 11-14: "Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection. But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence. For Adam was first formed, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression."

According to Apostle Paul, we men should never listen to a single word she (or any woman) says.--] (]) 19:59, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

P.S. My wife has read and approves of this message.

:As you would have realised, had you actually bothered to read the articles on them, both ] & ] are senior fellows at the ]'s ] -- the organisation that created ] and the ]. As such, they can be considered to speak authoritatively for it. Dembski is (along with ]) one of ID's principal theorists. Pearcey is a lesser light, but still fairly high up in the ID movement. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 02:29, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

== Nitpicking - Dembski as mouthpiece ==

From ]

"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"

Both references for this statement are quotes from Dembski (I added the latest one). Is it fair to use him alone to support a statement that "'''The''' leading proponent'''s'''" have zeroed in on Jesus³ as the designer. Surely there are quotes from other cdesign proponentists out there. And if there aren't, can we justify this statement as is?--] (]) 05:41, 16 December 2007 (UTC)
:There's also Pearcey's comment above. Also, I think Behe (and possibly Minnich too) made similar admissions in KvD. Johnson's almost certainly said something similar, but I couldn't tell you where. <font face="Antiqua, serif">]<sup>]</sup><sub>]</sub></font> 06:19, 16 December 2007 (UTC)
::I've added a refname link to the KvD p. 26 summary by Jones, which provides a reliable secondary source that "the writings of leading ID proponents reveal that the designer postulated by their argument is the God of Christianity." Reference 109 gives a more wooly statement from Johnson referring to the logos of St. John, Dembski is the most explicit we have to hand that it's Christianity. .. ], ] 09:08, 16 December 2007 (UTC)
::Pearcy is pulling a usual tactic of supporting a Christian basis for ID without specifically stating the designer must be "The Christian God". They are crafty.--] (]) 14:03, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

::: Might it be worth losing the "the" before "leading"? If that's going to stay, we really need to source, for every person who could be considered a leading proponent of ID, that they consider the designer to be the Christian god. ] (]) 13:40, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

:::: Poindexter's may be useful here. --] (]) 16:48, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

::::::None of those are as clear and explicit as Dembski's latest interview that reveals "The intelligent designer ... is the Christian God". It supports that the DI and other proponents are predominantly evangelical conservative Christians who perceive darwinism as a atheist amoral agenda, not science. Not the same thing.--] (]) 00:24, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

::::::POintdexter also has a collection of quotes in an essay , I think these are more sepcific in helping illustarte proponents identifying the desigenr as Jesus³ (also ).

Can we cite this?--] (]) 20:02, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

: It's self-published, by someone who doesn't appear to be a published author on the subject, and consists of claims about other living people who are not the author; so under Misplaced Pages's ] policy, it can't be used as a source. Where it is probably useful is as a reference to where to look for the original reliable sources that Poindexter quotes. ] (]) 22:39, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

:: I've removed the link to it; I accept that it seems a useful thing to refer people to, but both the Verifiability policy - "Self-published sources should never be used as third-party sources about living persons, even if the author is a well-known professional researcher or writer" - and the Biographies of Living People policy - "Self-published material may never be used in BLPs unless written by the subject him or herself" - are pretty clear that we can't use a self-published document as a source for alleged quotes from living people. If we verify that the published sources he cites really do say the things he says they say, and include them individually, that'll be fine. ] (]) 22:56, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

:::Yes and no. If we take this material from Poindexter, shouldn't we cite him? Sure, we should verify the accuracy of the quotes, but to take his quotes without acknowledging the source is, to some extent, claiming his effort as our own. Cite, but verify. ] (]) 01:05, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

:::: Mmm, perhaps (although obviously he holds no copyright in simply having collected the words of others, he has put effort in). However, I'm not sure we can refer people to the document itself, even if we have verified every part of its content as it currently stands, as it might later change and remains a self-published source containing details relating to living persons who are not its author, which we are explicitly forbidden by policy to use. If we use significant content from it, perhaps we could put something like "Some sources obtained from Brian Poindexter's "The Horse's Mouth"." after the sourced material. (Not sure how best to phrase it to make it clear that only a reference to the material was obtained from that source, not the material itself which we will by then have independently verified.) ] (]) 01:29, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

::::Agree with Guettarda here. This is self-published, but it is an aggregated tertiary resource. I only have mild reservations of protecting ourselves from quote-mining-by-proxy here.--] (]) 03:53, 17 December 2007 (UTC)


*"the exclusion of all other religions"
*None of the sources used in this instance support this part. I think "exclusion" may be too strong without a citation to the effect. We need hardcore evidence of exclusion of other religions. I think "refusal to acknowledge any other religion" or "no acknowledgement of any other religion" may be an acceptable movement. DI seems to avoid confronting this issue by saying "we are right" and not "they are wrong" when it comes to religion (a problem they don't have with science). --] (]) 04:02, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

] has suggested on more than one occasion that at first, they will use their "mere creation" big tent to get support from everyone, but after that success, he would favor a ] interpretation. I would expect that the fundamentalist ] elements would take over the movement with time, since they are the most radical and loudest and have the most at stake.--] (]) 15:34, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

: This debate seems to have stalled without ever really fixing the problem. The text still says, "Its primary proponents, all of whom are associated with the Discovery Institute, believe the designer to be God." However it is still cited only from Kitzmiller, which says "the writings of leading ID proponents reveal that the designer postulated by their argument is the God of Christianity." - not "the leading ID proponents", but "leading ID proponents", i.e. some; from Dembski, who only speaks for himself; and from the Horse's Mouth which is explicitly under Misplaced Pages policy an invalid source. At the moment, this statement (about living people) is still inadequately sourced. It would be adequately sourced if "the" were removed from the start. I'm still uncomfortable about The Horse's Mouth having been replaced without discussion of policies which appear to forbid its use. ] (]) 10:20, 18 December 2007 (UTC)
See Kitzmiller pp. 25 – 28: "it is notable that both Professors Behe and Minnich admitted their personal view is that the designer is God and Professor Minnich testified that he understands many leading advocates of ID to believe the designer to be God.... the writings of leading ID proponents reveal that the designer postulated by their argument is the God of Christianity. Dr. Barbara Forrest... has thoroughly and exhaustively chronicled the history of ID in her book and other writings for her testimony.. and the exhibits which were admitted with it, provide a wealth of statements by ID leaders that reveal ID’s religious, philosophical, and cultural content. The following is a representative grouping of such statements made by prominent ID proponents.... Phillip Johnson.. has written that “theistic realism” or “mere creation” are defining concepts of the IDM. This means “that God is objectively real as Creator and recorded in the biological evidence . . .” .. In addition, Phillip Johnson states that the “Darwinian theory of evolution contradicts not just the Book of Genesis, but every word in the Bible from beginning to end. It contradicts the idea that we are here because a creator brought about our existence for a purpose.” (11:16-17 (Forrest); P-524 at 1). ID proponents Johnson, William Dembski, and Charles Thaxton, one of the editors of Pandas, situate ID in the Book of John in the New Testament of the Bible, which begins, “In the Beginning was the Word, and the Word was God.” ... Dembski has written that ID is a “ground clearing operation” to allow Christianity to receive serious consideration, and “Christ is never an addendum to a scientific theory but always a completion.”... Professor Behe remarkably and unmistakably claims that the plausibility of the argument for ID depends upon the extent to which one believes in the existence of God... Professor Behe’s assertion constitutes substantial evidence that in his view, as is commensurate with other prominent ID leaders, ID is a religious and not a scientific proposition". That covers the primary proponents I can think of off the cuff. .. ], ] 13:23, 18 December 2007 (UTC)
:These examples are similar but not synchronous with the original statement. This statement has several parts that are not explicitly backed up by the sources '''provided in text''' with the statement
#"The leading proponents" - current in text references refer to statements by Dembski only.
#"made statements to their supporters" - this accurately describes Dembski's comments, and most comments being listed here by other leading proponents
#"they believe the designer to be the Christian god" - this accurately describes Dembski's comments; it does '''not''' accurately describe many other comments by other proponents. This statement requires a statement akin to Dembski's Q4 interview "I believe the intelligent designer... to be the Christian God". It is not the same as supporting biblical literalism, it is not the same as acknowledging a Christian basis for Intelligent Design. It explicitly requires acknowledgement that their belief is the designer is or has to be God.
#"to the exclusion of all other religions" - no source as yet provided has supported this statement. The DI seems very wary of criticisng others' religious beliefs (though ]). This statement requires a negative statement denouncing another creation myth (Norse, Hindu, Chinese etc.) as being incompatible with intelligent design.
:...--] (]) 01:06, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

==Directed ]?==
The idea that life came from other planets, or was created purposely by aliens is a design argument. Does it belong in the article? ] (]) 07:51, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

: Only if a reputable published source has made the connection between the two. ] (]) 14:10, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

:I'd say no, regardless. Raelian ID is a "design argument" as well, but we decided a long time ago to limit this article to DI-ID, both because it's the most common usage of the term, and simply to try to keep this article coherent and manageable. ] (]) 15:03, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

:: I agree that it shouldn't be covered here in any depth; but ''if'' we find that the comparison has been made by a sufficiently notable source, we should probably include a brief mention with a link to the relevant article. We've seen no evidence so far that this comparison has been made, however. ] (]) 15:07, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

:::Francis Crick proposed it. ] (]) 19:36, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

::There are many people who have proposed ] or other variants, such as ]. Obviously, in the book ] by avowed atheist ], something like this was also proposed (of course, not seriously, since this was a work of fiction).

::And there are other alternatives:
::*people travelled backwards in time to create life in the distant past
::*only our souls are from God, and our bodies are from the natural world (a form of ])
::*design by committee of superior intelligences rathern than one
::*only the initial abiogenesis was of Divine origin, and the rest is by natural mechanisms
::*this entire existence is an illusion (Something like ], or maybe ])
::*There is some unintelligent but unseen life force permeating the universe that creates life, sort of like ]
::*any of the ] of literally thousands of faiths and sects
::This can be like a parlor game; how many ways can you think of for life and its diversity to have been created on earth? The ] and other ]s that like to make it a choice of two possible origins are presenting a false dichotomy. There are literally an infinite number of possibilities to choose from.
::The basic problem does not come from the advancing of ID as an agenda; it is the anti-science baggage that it comes with. If it were not that ID has associated itself with anti-science proposals of various kinds, I think few if any would object to it. --] (]) 19:57, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

::: To be included in this article, any such proposal would not only need to have been notably made and recorded by some reliable source, but the comparison between it and Intelligent Design would also need to have been notably made and recorded by some reliable source. There's no need for us to play the game of 'what other things could plausibly be included in this article?' - we simply need to read the sources and see what things THEY compare to Intelligent Design. If we have no source in which a given concept ''n'' is compared to Intelligent Design, we don't even need to think about whether we should include it in this article. ] (]) 20:16, 17 December 2007 (UTC)


== Shorten the SD ==
::::Absolutely true. However, I am suggesting that even if one finds all kinds of reliable sources for these kinds of ideas, the place for them is probably not in this article, which is already pretty swollen. We are bursting at the seams just trying to cover the simplest theme; ID is promoted by the DI in the US as part of the ] to force science teachers in secular schools to proselytize for some very narrow interpretation of a handful of minority Christian sects using someone else's money, or suffer legal penalties. Just describing that alone is complicated enough that this article is already pretty long. All the related parts we could throw in here, like ID around the world, or historically what happened to ID in the 1800s, or all the varieties of ID or all the reactions of various faiths to ID, or any of dozens of other topics (only a few of which are covered in our daughter articles, since this is such a big job), just cannot be squeezed into this one article.--] (]) 21:43, 17 December 2007 (UTC)


The ] should be improved. One, the overall article is about the creationist argument. With this in mind we can describe ID as an "argument" and thereby give the potential reader the essence of the topic. But two, more importantly, "pseudoscientific" adds unnecessary POV. Would we be happy with an article title of ]? ''No''. But we do have various articles in ] and ]. Would any of the articles benefit from SDs that said "]"? Again, ''no''. Let's just say that ] is an argument and leave out the unnecessary "pseudoscientific" adjective. – ] (]) 01:16, 27 October 2022 (UTC)
::::: To a degree. Our approach should be simply to emphasise those things that reliable sources indicate are most notable about intelligent design. I'm uncomfortable with the idea that the article should have a narrative theme that it's trying to get across, and include or exclude things based on whether they aid that theme. For me, that's rather close to the boundary between trying to exclude the extraneous, which we indeed should, and choosing which facts to include in order to push a particular point of view, which we certainly shouldn't. ] (]) 22:41, 17 December 2007 (UTC)
:"'pseudoscientific' adds unnecessary POV". Can't see it myself. 'pseudoscientific' is used in the first sentence of the lede, so is clearly considered an integral NPOV element of the topic. As such, it merits inclusion in the SD; as ] says "These descriptions ... help users identify the desired article", so including 'pseudoscientific' functions to aid in identifying 'Intelligent design' as the article about the pseudoscientific argument. -- ] (]) 01:44, 27 October 2022 (UTC)
::I observe that the ] article on the simple English Misplaced Pages treats the subject drastically differently than this one and doesn't even mention pseudoscience. ~] <small>(])</small> 04:46, 27 October 2022 (UTC)
:::Misplaced Pages is not a reliable source. But maybe someone should change the ] article. I have experience there. Does one replace "pseudoscientific" by "stupid" or "wrong" to change it from English to Simple English? --] (]) 05:21, 27 October 2022 (UTC)
::::This is not a question of RS for either WP or Simple WP. (No matter what, the Simple ID article must be NPOV. And changes to the Simple article are best discussed there.) I "simply" ask that we remove the POV-laden "pseudoscientific" from the short description in this regular WP article. – ] (]) 05:02, 28 October 2022 (UTC)
:::::{{tq|This is not a question of RS}} Yes it is. You were trying to change this Misplaced Pages article based on what another Misplaced Pages article says, so you were trying to use the other article as a source for this one. --] (]) 05:17, 28 October 2022 (UTC)


::If something is science and looks like science, one does not need to mention that it is science. That is the reason why the "scientific" adjective is not used.
:::I am not saying we should not have this material on WP. I am saying we cannot have one article that includes everything. One article cannot be all things to all people. Thankfully, we can and do have other articles.---] (]) 22:48, 17 December 2007 (UTC)
::Pseudoscience is something that pretends to be science, so it looks like science but it is not science. That is the reason why the "pseudoscientific" adjective is used. --] (])
::: My concern is about the POV vs. NPOV tone of the SD. We can describe the article as "an argument about ...." and avoid saying it is "arcane", "former", "inaccurate", "irrelevant", "dismissed in scientific circles", "]", etc. The ] guidance says "avoid 'former', 'retired', 'late', 'defunct', 'closed', etc.." Removing "pseudo" helps us comply with this guidance. – ] (]) 04:42, 28 October 2022 (UTC)
::::No, it does not. Calling a pseudoscience "pseudoscience" is perfectly NPOV when reliable sources consistently call it pseudoscience. I think you need to actually read ] instead of just saying it. Also ], ] and ].
::::Also, the logic "the rules say we should avoid X, therefore we should avoid Y" leaves something to be desired. --] (]) 05:17, 28 October 2022 (UTC)
:::::If the words "pseudoscience" or "pseudoscientific" are to be replaced, I do appreciate Hob's suggestion to use the words "stupid" or "wrong" instead. - ]the ] 06:46, 28 October 2022 (UTC)
::::::@] You've failed to address the point I made in immediate response:
::::::'pseudoscientific' is used in the first sentence of the lede, so is clearly considered an integral NPOV element of the topic. As such, 'pseudoscientific' merits inclusion in the SD; as ] says "These descriptions ... help users identify the desired article", so including 'pseudoscientific' functions to aid in identifying 'Intelligent design' as the article about the pseudoscientific argument.


It would be nice to have many other things in the article, and people are always coming up with new ideas for things to include. However, the article is already a bit on the long side, and most of these other ideas have to be relegated to other articles.--] (]) 15:44, 17 December 2007 (UTC) ::::::You don't seem to have any issue with 'pseudoscientific' being used in the article itself, so your objection to it in the SD seems perverse. --] (]) 07:44, 28 October 2022 (UTC)


:] Can you put the existing SD alongside something proposed ? I am doubtful you will make headway for ], but a definite comparison might at least get a focus back to about being shorter. Cheers ] (]) 07:21, 1 November 2022 (UTC)
To answer Gus' specific point, while we're using the DI definition - "certain features '''of the universe''' and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause" (emphasis added) - design arguments solely about life don't come into the article's ambit. I'm also not sure that panspermia is a _design_ argument - at best, it argues that life is too complex to have developed naturally _on Earth_, not that it's too complex to have developed naturally _anywhere_. ] (]) 00:29, 18 December 2007 (UTC)
:I agree. The inclusion of the qualifier "pseudoscientific" is superfluous to the point that it reeks of bias.
:I don't think it's a battle worth fighting.
:Yes, the short description is… not short. Especially when you compare it to the length of the rest of the article. Further, some of its content is redundant with the body content.
:But it's not just the first sentence that has a POV problem. The entire short description—nay, the whole article—is marred with bias to the point that it to me looks not salvageable. And even if it were, it seems that it's guarded by a group of ideologues: fanatics who will pile on their fallacious rhetoric until the hope is sucked dry from you by the tyranny of their majority. ] (]) 10:19, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
::Yup, the tyranny of ]. <sarcasm warning>How sad!</sarcasm warning> ] (]) 11:43, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
:::Straw Man. I am ''not'' criticizing ]. When I say tyranny of the majority (which I definitely feel is happening on a large scale around discussion of this topic) I'm criticizing use of specific rhetorical devices and fallacious reasoning such as (but not limited to) ] and secondary implications such as ], overconfidence in conventional wisdom and secular orthodoxy, false sense of inerrancy, and myriad intellectual vices such as ] which you just used on me with your sarcasm.
:::I'm not without hypocrisy; I admit my previous comment used blatant ad hominem attack. But just because I indulged in intellectual vice for a moment doesn't invalidate my sentiment.
:::A new article need to be written about what ID really is at a fundamental level—a theory of the origin of life—outside of and disconnected from its social contexts. ] (]) 13:02, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
::::It isn't a scientific theory. Not even a scientific hypothesis. Because nobody took care to formulate it as a cogent scientific hypothesis. ] died without knowing the hypothesis of intelligent design. ] (]) 13:09, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
:::::That sounds like an appeal to ignorance. The theory is not valid because there hasn't been a person who has put it in a form that acceptable to you and the consensus/majority? Who is the authority on what constistutes a "cogent scientific hypothesis"? Why would we need Phillip E. Johnson to come back to life and do it for us? How do you know one is not already out there? ] (]) 13:35, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
:::::Wait you got me on another red herring there; I never claimed it to be a scientific theory. Which is why I think there needs to be a page presenting it without any claims of it being a scientific theory, similar to the page on the ]. Just because I am suggesting the theory—in and of itself—as not scientific does not mean that it is pseudoscience. On the contrary it would arguably call for it to be, by definition of pseudoscience, no longer labeled as pseudoscience. You don't see the ] theory labeled as pseudoscience. As should be the case with ID. ] (]) 13:45, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
::::::Big Bang, despite your protestations, ''is'' a widely-accepted scientific theory. For the metaphysical correspondent of ID, see ]. That, my friend, is a bona fide philosophical argument, but alas it has nothing to do with ]. ] (]) 13:49, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
::::::{{tq|That sounds like an appeal to ignorance}} Oh, the irony. ID itself is one huge heap of appeal to ignorance ("I tried to find a way how evolution can make things like X, and I failed"; insert every biological feature for X); it does not have any actual content beyond that. And that is the very reason why ID is no scientific hypothesis. You are talking to people with lots of experience debating "Cdesign proponentsists", and every time one asks one of them for the theory of ID, one gets crickets.
::::::{{tq|How do you know one is not already out there?}} The burden of proof is on the person who claims that it exists. Bring it here, and everybody will be baffled, stunned, and surprised.
::::::Independent of that, this is ]. Your claim of bias is commonplace for every article about any pseudoscience - see ] - and does not impress anybody. --] (]) 15:09, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
:::Sources are sometimes bias as well. Given that it is a controversial topic we should add further in the article that "it is considered by most scientists a pseudoscientific argument" given the right sources, but not in the opening paragraph. Is like if someone made the opening paragraph of ] to be "The gender pay gap or gender wage gap is the ALLEGEDLY difference between the remuneration for men and women who are working." - ] (]) 23:39, 29 December 2023 (UTC)
::::The thing is, all pro-Intelligent Design sources are notoriously unreliable, and "unbiased sources" are invariably accused and denounced as being negatively biased due to accurately describing Intelligent Design as religiously-inspired, anti-science flimflam. ] (]) 00:00, 30 December 2023 (UTC)
:::::I fully agree with you. Since the professional editors of the Encyclopedia Britannica didn't consider it appropriate to apply the label "pseudoscientific" to ID theory, it seems reasonable to avoid that in order to preserve neutrality. The better approach would be to neutrally include the statement by the US National Academy of Science saying that it isn't a legitimate scientific theory. I would argue that the term 'pseudoscience' is appropriately applied to theories like Flat Earth. Because ID has support from a number of scientists with relevant educational backgrounds, I believe it is more accurately categorized as 'fringe science' or 'questionable science' prominent supporters of ID include: award winning chemist Dr. Henry F. Schaefer III, professor of biochemistry Dr. Michael Behe, and Microbiology professor Dr. Scott Minnich. Further, a 2018 Pew Poll of members of the American Association for the Advancement of Science found that 2% of members believed humans had always existed in their present form, and another 8% believed that human evolution was guided by a supreme being. ] (]) 20:43, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
::::::Read the FAQ. --] (]) 12:57, 19 March 2024 (UTC)
::I created an account just to agree and complain about the rampant and abhorrent bias and POV narration in the article. While I do not subscribe to the belief myself, the rampant author judgments within is disgustingly transparent and, if I can be crass, immature and embarrassing to read to someone looking for information on the subject. When you have editors like Hob Gadling or Roxy the Dog using charged language like "stupid" to describe belief systems, it worsens the content of the site and makes this article read like the tangents of a lonely Redditor upset that they had to go to Sunday school when they were eight, rather than a source of information.
::For comparison's sake, the article on Scientology reserves such personal judgments, attributing labels of ingenuity and falsehood to third parties, not from the author's own original judgments. Similar belief systems are treated with more respect, but this one is marred entirely because of its prevalence in western culture.
::Such impartial author viewpoints are rampant throughout the article. A few keypoints of contention I noticed from a cursory search include the tangent of the Discovery Institution (cited from someone saying they're "a leader" because several members of the movement are "associated," as if there's any other article out there that pulls such vague weasel wording. To air out dirty laundry, it's very apparent that this is for the purpose of associating the article with conservative think tanks as a prelude, rather than as a detail later on in the history of the article, where such information should be placed). The line "Detailed scientific examination has rebutted several examples for which evolutionary explanations are claimed to be impossible." strikes me too (the preceding claims should be included in a summary, with these examinations placed in a proceeding criticism section. Such is the norm for most articles, but this one gets an exception because the editors REALLY want everyone to know their takes on it). "The Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District court ruling held the latter to be the case." line is out of place and only contextualized by scouring the references and notes before when this should have its own section, the line itself following what reads like original research on the dilemma of what the belief states. The article itself is littered with details that add very little ("A Discovery Institute report says that Charles B. Thaxton, editor of Pandas, had picked the phrase up from a NASA scientist, and thought, "That's just what I need, it's a good engineering term."") There is a separate article for that book; include the information there! In the section on concepts of the belief system, while generally more well-constructed, it still has its fair share of issues. The paragraph of "Critics point out that the irreducible complexity" is vague in referring to whom these critics are, which is embarrassing when the section on Specified complexity does this tactic of citing a vague "scientific community" correctly. The "Fine-tuned universe" paragraph has only one citation, and it doesn't even link to anything! The distinction of the ideology from the movement is made too little too late for how the article presents the relevance of the Discovery Institution...
::I could go on, but I have a feeling the people responsible for the poor state of the article have their heels dug in so deeply that they will refuse to acknowledge the myriad of problems within the article, so I'll abridge my grievances: the article is absolutely filled with author judgments more concerned with refuting the subject rather than presenting a clean, readable text, and as a result the article is filled with poor citations, clunky and out-of-place details, and an astonishing amount of frontloaded bloat. It has been an absolute chore to read this thing.
::I know this is going to be taken in bad faith to be misconstrued as "remove all criticism from the article," which is absolutely not backed up by anything I just said, so let me repeat that's not what I'm asking. I'm asking that the few people with self-restraint here actually structure the article to read like something trying to give an overview of the subject foremost, criticisms debunkings and all, in a clean, readable manner, and not like it was written foremost as a sloppy blog entry wearing the skin of an encyclopedia.
::] (]) 20:56, 12 September 2024 (UTC)
:::ID is a paragon of pseudoscience, according to ], and we have the website policy ].
:::About Scientology: we don't say that because that is a matter of judging intentions rather than judging facts. ] (]) 21:09, 12 September 2024 (UTC)
::::I would implore you to actually read the post you're replying to.
::::I do not care about validity of the subject matter (though I do think the "pseudoscience" label could benefit from a citation and end a lot of talk on this page if added, since one thing I keep seeing while reading posts here is that there's apparently a lot of sources calling it one). I'm discussing the poor state in which this article is written because it's entirely from people foremost interested in taking the ideology down a peg thinking they have article ownership and loading it with original research, to a point that it reads worse than other infamous pseudoscience topics. Similar articles have clear and lengthy sections for criticisms and debunkings that serve just fine. This one opts to make a massive mess of the subject. It's a badly written article.
::::You can agree or disagree with the subject, but from an objective point of view the article is a mess. If I find the energy/time, I'll clean up a lot of my grievances myself.
::::] (]) 22:10, 12 September 2024 (UTC)
:::::The tone can get copy/edited. But the fact that it is patent pseudoscience should remain inside the article, very clearly and unambiguously expressed. In that respect we have no choice, since website policy is binding. ] (]) 22:16, 12 September 2024 (UTC)
::::::{{tq|The tone can get copy/edited. But the fact that it is patent pseudoscience should remain inside the article}}
::::::For probably the third time now, I don't give a crap about that label. I would even agree that it should be there if it was sourced. My problem is the article is poorly written. I have given several examples demonstrating this, please actually read those instead of arguing against a point nobody is making.
::::::] (]) 22:48, 12 September 2024 (UTC)
:::::::Okay, to the point: criticism sections are dissuaded. Criticism should be spread inside the article, refuting each point being made by the pseudoscientists.
:::::::In other words: the fact that this article does not have a criticism section is a net positive, and the articles which do aren't good examples to imitate. ] (]) 23:02, 12 September 2024 (UTC)
::::::::{{tq|Criticism should be spread inside the article, refuting each point being made by the pseudoscientists.}}
::::::::Do you have a policy you can point to that illustrates that to be the case? This is one of the only articles I have seen on the site whose reading goes out of its way to meticulously try to debunk everything stated within it. This type of writing isn't employed in many other religious articles if at all, and reads choppy and unfocused.
::::::::] (]) 01:24, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
:::::::::]. ] (]) 02:05, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
::::::::::While I do honestly appreciate the attempt at giving a policy, the subject of this page should fall under an exception mentioned:
::::::::::"For topics about a particular point of view – such as philosophies (Idealism, Naturalism, Existentialism), political outlooks (Capitalism, Marxism), or religion (Islam, Christianity, Atheism) – it will usually be appropriate to have a "Criticism" section or "Criticism of ..." subarticle. Integrating criticism into the main article can cause confusion because readers may misconstrue the critical material as representative of the philosophy's outlook, the political stance, or the religion's tenets."
::::::::::In the case of this article, there are several instances where this kind of information is haphazardly placed about because of the lack of refrain. I listed one in the article trying to link the subject to a conservative think tank, but there are more.
::::::::::] (]) 02:47, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
:::::::::::ID is propagated by a Christian conservative think-tank. It's not some accidental detail of it, it is so by design. ] (]) 03:24, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
::::::::::::The section as worded reads like a clear violation of ]. A stronger relationship than "The leading proponents of ID are associated with" should be provided, and this information should be listed in the section regarding the movement. While the information is important to include, in its current state it's not important enough to include in the opening section, much less before the early history of the ideology before YECs.
::::::::::::] (]) 03:50, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
:::::::::::::Let me tell you something: the people who hate mainstream science already got the message that Misplaced Pages is against them. So, we're writing for a certain audience, not for everybody.
:::::::::::::Our bias is not concealed. People who love Misplaced Pages, love it for such bias. ] (]) 05:11, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
::::::::::::::This is an open encyclopedia, not your personal blog. I don't give a crap what windmill-tilting you seem to think is being waged against a couple hundred creationist nutjobs, the article is written like crap and I've given several clear examples and policies that showcase very specific examples.
::::::::::::::] (]) 17:37, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
{{od|::::::::::}} @] Rather than yell at clouds, it'd be better to positively address issues. Here's a small example with a big issue behind it: you say, "The "Fine-tuned universe" paragraph has only one citation, and it doesn't even link to anything!". The reason it (and many pseudo-links like it) doesn't link to anything is the big issue and it needs someone with your energy to address it. -- ] (]) 03:19, 13 September 2024 (UTC)


:While I do appreciate the invitation, and will probably take it up when I have more time on my hands, un
Panspermia doesn't involve design. Directed panspermia is more akin to agriculture/gardening (plant it and watch it grow) than engineering.--] (]) 00:43, 18 December 2007 (UTC)
:Judging byIsome of the rather... let's say "brash adamancy" of some of the regulars on this talk page i. I worry that such radical changes such as removing that problematic paragraph and rearranging the criticisms into a cleaner format would be misconstrued as trying to hide or mitigate criticisms against the subject matter. Rather than risk a one-sided edit war, it would be better for the people adding these text to just provide a proper citation and not make the article a complete mess.both carrying the article's current style, I suspect I may need to take your advice regardless.
:Well, the DI has definitely used panspermia as an example of the "intelligent designer" when they did not want to say "Christian God" for legal reasons.--] (]) 15:13, 18 December 2007 (UTC)
:] (]) 03:36, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
::quo Jones, p. 25, "Although proponents of the IDM occasionally suggest that the designer could be a space alien or a time-traveling cell biologist, no serious alternative to God as the designer has been proposed by members of the IDM" .. . . ], ] 18:08, 18 December 2007 (UTC)
:As the article is protected, I'm working at a proposed rewrite that cleans up some of the grievances I have with the page on my userpage. As of writing I have the introductory paragraph glanced at. If you're not being coy, I'd like honest feedback on my proposed changes.
:] (]) 18:10, 13 September 2024 (UTC)


::The ] of an article contains the summary of the body of that article. So, unless the version you are proposing is very closed from the current version, any new introduction not properly summarizing the '''current version''' of the article is likely to be a non starter. --] (]) 19:09, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
== Vagueness ==
:::{{tq|So, unless the version you are proposing is very closed from the current version}}
:::] I left commentary, including two explicit requests for citations.
:::] (]) 19:43, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
::::You are requesting a citation for "pseudoscience". But no citation is given, according to ]. So, yes, there is a reason why no citation is given.
::::I saw the changes you advocate for: the changes are minor, and often not compliant with ]s. About impartiality, see ].
::::Also, I don't see why ] should be provided for a ''hidden comment.'' ] (]) 00:26, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
:::::{{tq|You are requesting a citation for "pseudoscience". But no citation is given, according to WP:CITELEAD. So, yes, there is a reason why no citation is given.}}
:::::I believe the exceptions listed in ] are applicable here, given how contentious the label has been in these talk pages, and from the opening sentence of the article itself having ''five ''citations within it. Moving the fifth reference to specifically address the pseudoscience label adds no new citations to the lead and satisfies my complaint with that particular point. I ask in my suggestions for someone to provide a source since (1) I believe there may be a more readily-available source that could be used in its place, and (2) I typed it on mobile and don't like using the article editor for more than basic formatting.
:::::{{tq|I saw the changes you advocate for: the changes are minor, and often not compliant with WP:PAGs. About impartiality, see WP:FALSEBALANCE.}}
:::::I'm tempted to evoke ] here, as "and often not compliant with WP:PAGs" is possibly one of the most vague and thus irrelevant complaints that could be levied. I ask for forgiveness in being heated for a moment; the idea that a simple cleanup to the article, a cleanup in which I've not added anything to even hint at the validity of ID and attempted to avoid ] by retaining criticisms except in cases where it would be better to move information, is even remotely the same thing as trying to make a false balance is overly simplistic and a tad insulting. Misplaced Pages is not obliged to validate pseudoscience, I can agree and don't think either of us said otherwise, but it's also ] (much less ]) to make it a messy read or use the notion of bias existing to ] in ways that harm the objective tone and pacing of the article.
:::::The thing that really gets me scratching my head about all of this is that the sources and facts are against ID, so making a clearer article helps ID proponents none.
:::::] (]) 06:43, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
::::::] was a reply to {{tq|more impartially}}. You proposed minor edits, so I don't see those as either cleanup of the article or making the article more impartial. This all debate seems therefore as much ado about nothing. ] (]) 07:12, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
:::::::{{tq|WP:FALSEBALANCE was a reply to more impartially}}
:::::::I never asked for more impartiality, I described this as a perk of the cleanup. Please follow the conversation.
:::::::{{tq|You proposed minor edits, so I don't see those as either cleanup of the article or making the article more impartial.}}
:::::::I'll ignore the non-sequitur in that and reassert the context of what's happening: I am pulling teeth against a user who thinks ] means an author should argue against the subject of an article, and am being met with resistance for miniscule cleanups in the opening paragraphs. I would go through cleaning up the entire thing for its other myriad issues, but lack any trust that such exhaustive efforts would be met with anything besides someone violating ].
:::::::This debate being "for nothing" can be amswered with one question: what is going to happen if I try to get even those simple cleanups in the lead put in? I hope, in that front, I'd have made a stink for nothing.
:::::::] (]) 07:28, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
::::::::Well, friend, I'm only one editor, so I never decide myself the ].
::::::::] is an essay, meaning it is neither policy, nor guideline. ] on the other hand is website policy. So, obviously, website policy trumps an essay. ] (]) 08:05, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
:::::::::{{tq|Well, friend, I'm only one editor, so I never decide myself the WP:CONSENSUS.}}
:::::::::I'm really interested in what conversation you're having in which you're debating if ID is pseudoscience.
:::::::::It seriously is grating to read so many replies from you that fail to address even one point being brought up and instead go after some paranoia.
:::::::::{{tq|WP:NOOBJECTIVITY is an essay, meaning it is neither policy, nor guideline.}}
:::::::::That argument is on-par with the "evolution is just a theory" sound bite creationists love. summarizes a policy which reads {{tq|"which means representing fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, '''without editorial bias,''' all the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic."}}
:::::::::Emphasis mine. Meanwhile you're on here justifying an article littered with ] with {{tq|"Our bias is not concealed. People who love Misplaced Pages, love it for such bias."}} I
:::::::::
:::::::::{{tq|WP:PSCI on the other hand is website policy}}
:::::::::Is '''anyone''' here arguing that ID isn't pseudoscience?
:::::::::] (]) 19:33, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
::::::::::] requires a certain tone of the article. While you admit that ID is pseudoscience, you seek to soften the tone of the article. E.g. downplaying that it is essentially a movement propagated by a conservative Christian think tank. And that it caters to fundamentalist Christians and evangelicals, since Catholics and mainline Protestants made peace with the theory of evolution. And that instead of seeking to discover new objective facts in biology, it is essentially a ploy to introduce God in sciences, i.e. despite the boundaries established by Immanuel Kant, who said he had to deny knowledge in order to make room for faith. ] (]) 21:21, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
:::::::::::{{tq|WP:PSCI requires a certain tone of the article}}
:::::::::::I do not believe you are meeting that tone. You are going beyond meeting explaining that the content of the article is wrong and are more focused on a personal mission to debate everything within it with ]. There's several instances where you're barely citing scientific experts or explaining that the counterarguments come from these experts.
:::::::::::* "A sufficiently succinct summary of the argument from design shows its unscientific, circular, and thereby illogical reasoning" '''<-- This is ''your ''conclusion presented without a source'''
:::::::::::* "Whether this lack of specificity about the designer's identity in public discussions is a genuine feature of the concept – or just a posture taken to avoid alienating those who would separate religion from the teaching of science – has been a matter of great debate between supporters and critics of intelligent design. The Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District court ruling held the latter to be the case." '''<-- Debated by whom? This is the closing paragraph of a section, not the beginning summary. Don't just reference the court ruling in-sentence either, put its verdict at the end and cite the case.'''
:::::::::::* "Variations on the phrase appeared in Young Earth creationist publications (...) there in the first place."" '''<-- Move source 34 earlier, since there's a clear split in the paragraph where it stops referencing material from it and starts referencing material from 33.'''
:::::::::::* "Critics point out that the irreducible complexity argument assumes that the necessary parts of a system have always been necessary and therefore could not have been added sequentially." '''<-- I don't have anything suggesting needing fixed here, I want to point out that this paragraph is mostly good. The vague "critics" is part of the introduction, but even it's cited, and later on it starts giving names with specific arguments. This is good. This is how the article should read. There's a lot of sections that read like this, and I feel as if it would be unfair to leave them unrecognized.'''
:::::::::::* "Irreducible complexity has remained a popular argument among advocates of intelligent design;" '''<--- I say the paragraph is "mostly" good because of this line. This should be reworded or removed. It doesn't help the proceeding explicitly cited debunking, and it is redundant. You are presenting this idea first in the argument list. Narratively, this weight assumes that it's a popular argument (avoid weasel words too).'''


:::::::::::There are more examples, but I wish to move on. <!-- Template:Unsigned --><small class="autosigned">—&nbsp;Preceding ] comment added by ] (] • ]) 14:08, 19 September 2024 (UTC)</small> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->
Doing a bit of reading on the DI's website, I came across the claim that ID is completely compatible with universal common descent: . I get the impression that on many issues, to keep as many people as possible in the "big tent", the DI is quite vague, as in discussion of nature of the intelligent designer, ], ]/], ], ], etc. If they make it vague enough, they can get almost everyone in the "big tent", including assorted ]s, ]s, ]s, ]s, ]s and even some ]s and ]s.


:::::::::::{{tq|While you admit that ID is pseudoscience}}
However, when push comes to shove, they want to trot out these ridiculous attacks on evolution, and start spewing almost incomprehensible nonsense about ], ], ], ] etc (in the new book ], they apparently claim that intelligent design rejects the ] and ]s but also ] !!??). So no matter how hard they seem to want to disguise their agenda, when you wait long enough, or dig a little, you uncover raving ]s and anti-science bigots and ]s just beneath the surface. Not sure if references for any of this can be found, but it is somewhat interesting as I slowly start to find out what ] really is.--] (]) 19:00, 18 December 2007 (UTC)
:::::::::::This statement reads as if you're proposing that everyone who agrees with the scientific community should be okay with the sloppy article, which is ridiculous. It's entirely possible to be objective about a topic known to be false, and to criticize an article on the subject for its shortcomings.
:An entertaining apologia, they undermine the "compatibility" with common descent further down where they discuss human chromosome fusion, "This evidence is equally consistent with both human descent from an ape-like ancestor, or a completely separate design of the human species, and therefore does not offer decisive information regarding whether humans share a common ancestor with apes." Vague as ever, surprised they don't claim ID is fully compatible with atheism. Nice the way they approvingly quote from Charles Thaxton's Kitzmiller deposition – "I wasn’t comfortable with the typical vocabulary that for the most part creationists were using because it didn’t express what I was trying to do. They were wanting to bring God into the discussion, and I was wanting to stay within the empirical domain and do what you can do legitimately there." Ben Stein will be furious about keeping God out! .. . ], ] 22:04, 18 December 2007 (UTC)
:::::::::::{{tq|you seek to soften the tone of the article (...)}}
:::::::::::It is apparent you are not reading my posts, and came in here with a preconceived notion that everyone critical of the article's writing and structure must be a proponent of ID, and no amount of reasoning or given examples of the article's shortcomings will convince you otherwise.
:::::::::::Get this through your head. Sit down and read this slowly, multiple times if needed: '''I am not arguing about the validity of ID. I am addressing the writing of a poorly-constructed Misplaced Pages article.'''
:::::::::::It's as if you think not including the sources of these statement would make anyone susceptible to believing ID. When a lot of people see articles like this one, argumentized takedowns that use your own wording more than the scientific community's, they see someone with a personal grudge about the ideology and want to know why it made them so mad, and end up looking into it. Having names behind the statements make the content stronger and more reliable, which hurts ID more.
:::::::::::Instead of squabbling with you further, I'm going to begin making some minor edits to the article to fix some of these myriad issues.
:::::::::::] (]) 14:07, 19 September 2024 (UTC)


== Pseudoscience? Creationism? ==
Good point. The ] itself has invested a huge amount in keeping God out of their "science", for legal reasons, as the lawyer Ben Stein should realize. No wonder they are a bit unhappy with the way the film is being promoted.


Sir Fred Hoyle, staunch lifelong atheist - "hard" atheist -in his Omni Lecture at the Royal Institution, London, January 12th, 1982, had this to say:
Of course, you can explain any observation away including the sphericity of the earth if you are willing to keep adding ] to your model, and discard the ] of ]. The people in the Flat Earth Society offered a prize to anyone who could prove to them that the earth was not flat, and no one ever collected. They debated the foremost figures in science and academia and never "lost" a debate. They always had a perfectly good explanation for how every piece of evidence was consistent with a flat earth! That is why it is important to consider WHY a theory becomes accepted, and why some are discarded.
“The difference between an intelligent ordering, whether of words, fruit boxes, amino acids, or the Rubik cube, and merely random shufflings can be fantastically large, even as large as a number that would fill the whole volume of Shakespeare’s plays with its zeros. So if one proceeds directly and straightforwardly in this matter, without being deflected by a fear of incurring the wrath of scientific opinion, one arrives at the conclusion that biomaterials with their amazing measure of order must be the outcome of intelligent design. No other possibility I have been able to think of in pondering this issue over quite a long time seems to me to have anything like as high a possibility of being true.” ] (]) 23:30, 19 February 2024 (UTC)


When they make the tent sufficiently large, someone like me or ] become "believers" in intelligent design. Which works for a while until they start spewing unscientific nonsense, and then they lose a lot of people.--] (]) 22:22, 18 December 2007 (UTC) : Please read the FAQ at the top of the page. You could also take a look at ]. --] (]) 23:49, 19 February 2024 (UTC)
::See ] and ]--] (]) 00:12, 20 February 2024 (UTC)
:::Also see ]. -- ] (]) 00:29, 20 February 2024 (UTC)
::::And ] and ]. Your own thinking, as any other user's, isn't worth shit here. --] (]) 08:52, 20 February 2024 (UTC)


::I don't see a proposed edit in IP, but the FAQ does not include Hoyle since the article does not. Seems reasonable to discuss if Hoyle *should* be mentioned as a precursor in this article or at ]. The article does mention Paley which is far distant past and not as direct a link nor related to the ID concepts expressed in this article. I easily found reasonable cites in the history of ID that 'the term Intelligent design appears to have been coined from ', and a prominent criticism referring to specified complexity as a '' (about the probability of a tornado assembling a Concorde) -- so having a mention of the precursor and wikilink to ] seems reasonable. But ] use of probability common in scientific studies (although commonly problematic) is more the see-also wikilink than ] since presenting details of method and calculation is not properly termed "incredulity". So -- mention Hoyle here, in SC, or not at all ???? Cheers ] (]) 16:08, 22 February 2024 (UTC)
== Evolutionary Insufficiency ==
:::It's important not to conflate the argument from design with intelligent design. The argument from design posits that only an intelligence could have created the universe. Intelligent design OTOH posits that the argument from design is a scientific one and also that it can be bolstered through scientific research.
:::So Hoyle did not endorse ID. ] (]) 16:29, 22 February 2024 (UTC)
:::: ] - That the article does conflate the argument from design with intelligent design is a different topic than the question of whether to mention ] as a precursor - perhaps in the "Origin of the concept" or the "Fine-tuned universe" sections. And to the contrary, Hoyle is listed as a supporter of ID -- though again the question was whether to note him as a precursor, either here or at ]. To be precise the 'support' means as a precursor he preceded the ] by a few years with his own ideas of ], the argument of improbability and use of ] (similar to ]), his creating the ] metaphor, plus remarks about ], etcetera. His 1983 book "Examines the origins of life on earth, analyzes the Darwinian theory of evolution, and argues that life is the result of a deliberate plan." The 'support' does not mean he was a member of ] and as far as I've googled he made no comment at all about the IDM or court case -- at least nothing as famous as his originating the above concepts. Cheers ] (]) 15:24, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
:::::It's more accurate to say that ID advocates claim him as a precursor. ] (]) 17:52, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
::::::] - so to check, are you answering the question with a yes, that the article mention Hoyle and phrase it 'ID advocates claim him as a precursor' ? Cheers ] (]) 20:20, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
:::::::No, not unless reliable secondary sources routinely mention that ID supporters claim him as a forerunner. And even if they do, it doesn't give us licence to copy the quote above. The purpose of the article is to describe ID based on how it is reported in reliable sources, not to engage in advocating it. ] (]) 20:52, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
::::::::] - understood, although I hope you mean ] and ]. The ID proponents are obviously RS for what ID proponents say, as 'ID advocates claim him as a precursor' is objective fact. Second-party would be anti-ID such as NCSE and hence not reliable for what ID claims nor for ]. Third-party would be outside reporting such as - though I only see they reporting it as fact, not ‘ID advocates claim’ e.g.
::::::::{{xt|The term "intelligent design" appears to have been coined in its contemporary scientific usage by the atheist cosmologist Dr. Fred Hoyle, who in 1982 argued that "if one proceeds directly and straightforwardly in this matter, without being deflected by a fear of incurring the wrath of scientific opinion, one arrives at the conclusion that biomaterials with their amazing measure of order must be the outcome of intelligent design." The term "intelligent design" was also used by non-scientist James E. Horigan in his 1979 book Chance or Design? where Horigan used the term "intelligent design" and framed his argument as an empirical one, "without resort to biblical or other religious references," and without investigating questions about "ultimate purpose."}} Cheers ] (]) 16:58, 25 February 2024 (UTC)
:::::::::To assert that is reporting it as fact seems a claim too far. It appears in a guest blog by a creationist who begins his post thus: "Most Darwinists involved in the public debate today have one, and only one goal: To stifle free debate on this subject and thereby discourage you, the public, from scrutinizing the scientific evidence for yourself." -- ] (]) 18:44, 25 February 2024 (UTC)
::::::::::] well, among all the googles I had missed that header -- so the quote is showing one example of ID advocates saying Hoyle was a precursor and their mentioning the objective fact that "intelligent design" was a term Hoyle used a few years before. Anyway -- do you have a position about the question of how or if to mention Hoyle in article ? Cheers ] (]) 21:16, 25 February 2024 (UTC)
:::::::::::ID proponents are not RS for what ID proponents say, because each one is expressing his own opinion, not speaking as a spokesman for the movement.
:::::::::::The fact that Fred Hoyle put the words intelligent and design together in the 1960s doesn't mean he was advocating a belief system that developed decades later.
:::::::::::I don't know why you keep pushing this. Of course some things we cannot explain could be caused by ghosts. But that's beyond the realm of scientific enquiry. ] (]) 06:29, 26 February 2024 (UTC)
::::::::::::] Clearly what was published and that IDM mentions Hoyle of the 1980s is objective fact, the question was how or if to mention Hoyle as a precursor in article, which you have already responded to. Cheers ] (]) 15:03, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
{{od}} Hi Mark, you seem to be trolling and/or trying to ] an argument using primary or unreliable sources. Don't. . . ], ] 22:46, 25 February 2024 (UTC)
::] Hi Dave. I am asking a simple and obvious question — taking note of the IP (which indeed is objective fact and appears fairly commonly mentioned in IDM) to ask if Hoyle should be mentioned as a precursor in this article or at ]. I would prefer if a simple edit question could be easier with simple edit answers, but I suppose any controversial topic has this kind of difficulty of lots of off-question replies. Cheers ] (]) 15:19, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
:::Per weight, Hoyle only belongs in the article if mentioned in reliable secondary sources about ID. As WP:FRINGE says, "Points that are not discussed in independent sources should not be given any space in articles."
:::ID proponents would obviously have us believe that Hoyle endorsed their views. If he did, it would give them respectability. We would need a reliable secondary source to comment on that. ] (]) 16:19, 27 February 2024 (UTC)


:To summarize a conclusion to this subthread: There seems no interest and not much attention to the question, so Hoyle remarks exist and are said by IDM as coining the term "Intelligent Design" they later used, but the conclusion is to not include any mention. The thread question was not whether Hoyle endorsed ID, the question was more whether Hoyle should be mentioned as a precursor. The probability argument quoted by IP and/or Hoyle's use of the term "intelligent designer" seemed candidates for note either here or at ]. Hoyle notably had a probability argument against abiogenesis (]) although that was more generally for advocating cosmic panspermia (]), such as in the 1982 book 'Evolution in Space', rather than an intelligent designer of ]. Anyway, thanks for what input there was and over & out. Cheers ] (]) 18:28, 22 July 2024 (UTC)
] says that intelligent design is just another name for a much older theory called "evolutionary insufficiency" (in his 2005 debate with Nelson). Anyone know about this? Should it be in the article?-] (]) 00:56, 19 December 2007 (UTC)


== Intelligent design as an argument for Gods existence? ==
:Comment by ] (]) @ The Loom.
{{atop|The irony has already peaked with the initial comment and been explained with the response. Risking further irony levels would be reckless and might result in injuries as hapless Wikipedians hurt their ribs laughing at this complaint. ] <small><small>]</small></small> 14:12, 19 December 2024 (UTC)}}
:{{quotation|1=I'd like to make an observation on "intelligent design" in general. '''ID claims are aimed at obtaining a concession that evolutionary processes are insufficient to account for observed biological phenomena.''' After that, ID advocates hope that people will simply fill in with an "intelligent designer" of their preference to cover the gap. ID arguments are all of the negative variety: because evolution can't do this, you must accept that an "intelligent designer" did.<br><br>So, how do ID advocates wend their way toward finding '''evolutionary insufficiency'''? Do they identify phenomena with good evidential records of their origin and find that no natural mechanisms are able to cover the situation? No, they do not. ID advocates identify the systems that have the least evidence that can bear upon just how they might have arisen and whack on those. If evolutionary biologists don't have the evidence to work with, they certainly can't generate "detailed, testable pathways" that ID advocates like Rob claim it is their burden to produce. This is such a weak and pathetic strategy that the term I use for Michael Behe's arguments now is "God of the crevices". You see, Behe's claim to fame is to have '''taken the old young-earth creationist bleat of "what good is half a wing?" and bring it into the modern era of molecular biology, reborn as, "what good is half a flagellum?"''' Biochemistry, Behe says, is the basement floor, and there is no further place to go. Thus, the gaps Behe goes on about have a bottom, and are crevices.<br><br>Back in 2001, I was in a panel with William Dembski, and pointed out that the only way for ID to progress was to take up those case where there was evidence at hand. Things like the impedance-matching system of the mammalian middle ear and the Krebs citric acid cycle. Michael Behe was sitting in the audience at the time. Have ID advocates taken up those sort of systems for analysis? Not on your life.<br><br>"Intelligent design" advocates use Behe's "irreducible complexity" and Dembski's "specified complexity" as arguments to convince people to disregard theories which have some evidential support, and force acceptance of conjectures with no evidential support. It's a good trick, that. -March 26, 2004 11:54 AM}}
I have to wonder if the people writing this have a hidden agenda. ID proponents have never asserted who the designer is--it could be an Alien for all we know. The introductory sentence is very clearly biased and should be rewritten to be historically neutral. Intelligent design proper is a (pseudo)scientific theory that attempts to demonstrate that certain biological systems can be more adequately explained by theories of design. It is false to say that the theory is meant to prove God's existence--that is the philosophical argument from design. While I doubt the editors here are intellectually honest enough to change this, it is the truth. This article serves as proof as to why Misplaced Pages is an unreliable source for unbiased information. ] (]) 12:54, 19 December 2024 (UTC)
:bolding added to original--] (]) 01:16, 19 December 2007 (UTC)
:] did not do a very good job of hiding ''their'' agenda, trying to mask the teaching of creationism in US public schools behind a facade of "intelligent design". See ] for how a US federal court dealt with this "breathtaking inanity". ] (]) 13:35, 19 December 2024 (UTC)
{{abot}}


== Heads up. == ==Intelligent Design and the Law==
Got a link to this from ''Academia'', it's online as linked below, an article in Penn State Law Review . An informative overview, a long read. Possibly a useful source, but think we've already covered the points it make. . . ], ] 21:06, 21 December 2024 (UTC)
*{{cite web |first=Frank S. |last=Ravitch | title=Playing the Proof Game: Intelligent Design and the Law | website=Penn State Law Review – The Flagship Publication of Penn State Law | date=1 February 2009 | url=https://www.pennstatelawreview.org/print-issues/articles/playing-the-proof-game-intelligent-design-and-the-law/ | access-date=21 December 2024}}


::] Does not seem worth an independent mention here as it lacks ] in coverage or significant effect. Also, as you say, it seems somewhat a rehash from earlier works of Professor Barbara Forrest, Kitzmiller, etcetera and somewhat a subset of his more substantial book work Marketing Intelligent Design Law and the Creationist Agenda. There didn't seem to be any post-1990s events being reported or some new legal case or new viewpoint. I'd think the article should avoid repetition of the same content from lesser works -- this seems to show WEIGHT of the selections already used in this article rather than be something new. If you want suggestions, it might help to look at the results if the lead para were run thru an AI bias checker (e.g. ), or for new things not already covered in the article (though I don't think there are any). Cheers ] (]) 20:19, 6 January 2025 (UTC)
We finally have a pre-release review of ]: ] <sup>]</sup> 10:46, 19 December 2007 (UTC)
:::AI bias checker? Sounds awful. ] (]) 21:18, 6 January 2025 (UTC)
:::Some of what I got for lead-text: ''The text primarily presents ID from a critical standpoint. It does not include direct quotes or detailed explanations from ID proponents about their views. ... The text dedicates significant space to legal battles and political associations of ID proponents. This focus may overshadow the actual scientific arguments and counter-arguments related to ID. ... Lack of historical context for design arguments: While the text mentions that ID is a form of creationism, it doesn't provide a broader historical context for design arguments in philosophy and theology. This omission may lead readers to view ID as a purely modern phenomenon... The text mentions the Discovery Institute, describing it as a "Christian, politically conservative think tank based in the United States" that is associated with the leading proponents of Intelligent Design. This association with an authoritative-sounding organization may lead some readers to attribute greater accuracy or credibility to the Intelligent Design argument, despite the text clearly stating that it lacks empirical support and is not considered science. The authority bias could cause readers to overvalue the opinions of the Discovery Institute simply because it is presented as a think tank, potentially overlooking the scientific consensus against Intelligent Design.'' ] (]) 21:25, 6 January 2025 (UTC)
:::: "simply because it is presented as a think tank" There are numerous ]s, and most of them serve as ] organizations for their pet causes. Why would the reader assume that their views are reliable? ] (]) 11:57, 7 January 2025 (UTC)
:::::Many readers may not realize that an AI amounts to a ] engine, prone to hallucination. Many may not even recognize that they are reading AI output. ] (]) 15:53, 7 January 2025 (UTC)
::::::It does offer an easy way to get some outside views, something a bit more than the punctuation check of , also seen in and others. Cheers ] (]) 14:45, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
:::::::Unlikely. LLMs just imitate what humans write. --] (]) 09:32, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
::::::::I work with (and develop) deep learning algorithms, and I can confirm that they're not going to provide an 'outside view'. There's no guarantee they'll even provide an internally consistent view. They're not 'sometimes silly minds' the way a lot of people think about them. They're basically like parrots. They just repeat what they've heard in a way that sounds pleasing to them, with no consideration of what it means. ] <small><small>]</small></small> 14:25, 9 January 2025 (UTC)

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? view · edit Frequently asked questions

Many of these questions arise frequently on the talk page concerning Intelligent design (ID).

To view an explanation to the answer, click the link to the right of the question.

Q1: Should ID be equated with creationism? A1: ID is a form of creationism, and many sources argue that it is identical. U.S. District Judge John E. Jones III ruled that it "cannot uncouple itself from its creationist, and thus religious, antecedents", and Phillip E. Johnson, one of the founders of the ID movement, stated that the goal of intelligent design is to cast creationism as a scientific concept.

Not everyone agrees with this. For example, philosopher Thomas Nagel argues that intelligent design is very different from creation science (see "Public Education and Intelligent Design", Philosophy and Public Affairs, Vol. 36, no. 2, 2008). However, this perspective is not representative of most reliable sources on the subject.

Although intelligent design proponents do not name the designer, they make it clear that the designer is the Abrahamic god.

In drafts of the 1989 high-school level textbook Of Pandas and People, almost all derivations of the word "creation", such as "creationism", were replaced with the words "intelligent design".

Taken together, the Kitzmiller ruling, statements of ID's main proponents, the nature of ID itself, and the history of the movement, make it clear—Discovery Institute's protestations to the contrary notwithstanding—that ID is a form of creationism, modified to appear more secular than it really is. This is in line with the Discovery Institute's stated strategy in the Wedge Document. Q2: Should ID be characterized as science? A2: The majority of scientists state that ID should not be characterized as science. This was the finding of Judge Jones during the Kitzmiller hearing, and is a position supported by the overwhelming majority of the scientific community. Scientists say that ID cannot be regarded as scientific theory because it is untestable even in principle. A scientific theory predicts the outcome of experiments. If the predicted outcome is not observed, the theory is false. There is no experiment which can be constructed which can disprove intelligent design. Unlike a true scientific theory, it has absolutely no predictive capability. It doesn't run the risk of being disproved by objective experiment. Q3: Should the article cite any papers about ID? A3: According to Misplaced Pages's sourcing policy, Misplaced Pages:Verifiability, papers that support ID should be used as primary sources to explain the nature of the concept.

The article as it stands does not cite papers that support ID because no such papers have been published in peer-reviewed scientific journals. Behe himself admitted this under cross examination, during the Kitzmiller hearings, and this has been the finding of scientists and critics who have investigated this claim. In fact, the only article published in a peer-reviewed scientific journal that made a case for intelligent design was quickly withdrawn by the publisher for having circumvented the journal's peer-review standards.

Broadly speaking, the articles on the Discovery Institute list all fail for any of four reasons:

  1. The journal has no credible editorial and peer-review process, or the process was not followed
  2. The journal is not competent for the subject matter of the article
  3. The article is not genuinely supportive of ID
  4. The article is published in a partisan ID journal such as PCID
If you wish to dispute the claim that ID has no support in peer-reviewed publications, then you will need to produce a reliable source that attests to the publication of at least one paper clearly supportive of ID that underwent rigorous peer-review in a journal on a relevant field. Q4: Is this article unfairly biased against ID? A4: There have been arguments over the years about the article's neutrality and concerns that it violates Misplaced Pages's neutral point of view policy. The NPOV policy does not require all points of view to be represented as equally valid, but it does require us to represent them. The policy requires that we present ID from the point of view of disinterested philosophers, biologists and other scientists, and that we also include the views of ID proponents and opponents. We should not present minority views as though they are majority ones, but we should also make sure the minority views are correctly described and not only criticized, particularly in an article devoted to those views, such as this one. Q5: Is the Discovery Institute a reliable source? A5: The Discovery Institute is a reliable primary source about its views on ID, though it should not be used as an independent secondary source.

The core mission of the Discovery Institute is to promote intelligent design. The end purpose is to duck court rulings that eliminated religion from the science classroom, by confusing people into conflating science and religion. In light of this, the Discovery Institute cannot be used as a reference for anything but their beliefs, membership and statements. Questionable sources, according to the sourcing policy, WP:V, are those with a poor reputation for fact-checking or with no editorial oversight, and should only be used in articles about themselves. Articles about such sources should not repeat any contentious claims the source has made about third parties, unless those claims have also been published by reliable sources.

See also: WP:RS and WP:V Q6: Are all formulations of intelligent design pseudoscience? Was William Paley doing pseudoscience when he argued that natural features should be attributed to "an intelligent and designing Creator"? A6: While the use of the phrase intelligent design in teleological arguments dates back to at least the 1700s, Intelligent Design (ID) as a term of art begins with the 1989 publication of Of Pandas and People. Intelligent design is classified as pseudoscience because its hypotheses are effectively unfalsifiable. Unlike Thomas Aquinas and Paley, modern ID denies its religious roots and the supernatural nature of its explanations. For an extended discussion about definitions of pseudoscience, including Intelligent Design, see Pigliucci, Massimo; Boudry, Maarten, eds. (2013), Philosophy of Pseudoscience: Reconsidering the Demarcation Problem, University of Chicago, ISBN 978-0-226-05179-6. Notes and references
  1. ^ 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 Darwin. "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
  2. "I have built an intellectual movement in the universities and churches that we call The Wedge, which is devoted to scholarship and writing that furthers this program of questioning the materialistic basis of science."…"Now the way that I see the logic of our movement going is like this. The first thing you understand is that the Darwinian theory isn't true. It's falsified by all of the evidence and the logic is terrible. When you realize that, the next question that occurs to you is, well, where might you get the truth?"…"I start with John 1:1. In the beginning was the word. In the beginning was intelligence, purpose, and wisdom. The Bible had that right. And the materialist scientists are deluding themselves." Johnson 1999. Reclaiming America for Christ Conference. How the Evolution Debate Can Be Won
  3. Dembski: "Intelligent design is just the Logos theology of John's Gospel restated in the idiom of information theory," Touchstone Magazine. Volume 12, Issue4: July/August, 1999
  4. Wedge Document Discovery Institute, 1999.
    "embers of the national ID movement insist that their attacks on evolution aren't religiously motivated, but, rather, scientific in nature." … "Yet the express strategic objectives of the Discovery Institute; the writings, careers, and affiliations of ID's leading proponents; and the movement’s funding sources all betray a clear moral and religious agenda." Inferior Design Chris Mooney. The American Prospect, August 10, 2005.
  5. "ID's rejection of naturalism in any form logically entails its appeal to the only alternative, supernaturalism, as a putatively scientific explanation for natural phenomena. This makes ID a religious belief." Expert Witness Report Barbara Forrest Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District, April 2005.
  6. Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District, 04 cv 2688 (December 20, 2005)., pp. 31 – 33.
  7. ^ Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District, 04 cv 2688 (December 20, 2005)., 4. Whether ID is Science, p. 87
  8. "Science and Policy: Intelligent Design and Peer Review". American Association for the Advancement of Science. 2007. Retrieved 2007-07-19.
  9. Brauer, Matthew J.; Forrest, Barbara; Gey, Steven G. (2005). "Is It Science Yet?: Intelligent Design Creationism and the Constitution" (PDF). Washington University Law Quarterly. 83 (1). Retrieved 2007-07-18. ID leaders know the benefits of submitting their work to independent review and have established at least two purportedly "peer-reviewed" journals for ID articles. However, one has languished for want of material and quietly ceased publication, while the other has a more overtly philosophical orientation. Both journals employ a weak standard of "peer review" that amounts to no more than vetting by the editorial board or society fellows.
  10. Isaak, Mark (2006). "Index to Creationist Claims". The TalkOrigins Archive. With some of the claims for peer review, notably Campbell and Meyer (2003) and the e-journal PCID, the reviewers are themselves ardent supporters of intelligent design. The purpose of peer review is to expose errors, weaknesses, and significant omissions in fact and argument. That purpose is not served if the reviewers are uncritical
  11. "Statement from the Council of the Biological Society of Washington". Biological Society of Washington. Retrieved 2007-07-19.
  12. See also Sternberg peer review controversy.
  13. Wilkins, John (9 November 2013), "The origin of "intelligent design" in the 18th and 19th centuries", Evolving Thoughts (blog)
  14. Matzke, Nick (2006), "Design on Trial: How NCSE Helped Win the Kitzmiller Case", Reports of the National Center for Science Education, 26 (1–2): 37–44
  15. "Report of John F. Haught, Ph. D" (PDF). Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District (NCSE). 2005-04-01. Retrieved 29 August 2013.

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Shorten the SD

The WP:Short description should be improved. One, the overall article is about the creationist argument. With this in mind we can describe ID as an "argument" and thereby give the potential reader the essence of the topic. But two, more importantly, "pseudoscientific" adds unnecessary POV. Would we be happy with an article title of Pseudoscientific arguments about the creation of the universe? No. But we do have various articles in Category:Cosmogony and Category:Physical cosmology. Would any of the articles benefit from SDs that said "Scientific argument about such & such"? Again, no. Let's just say that Intelligent design is an argument and leave out the unnecessary "pseudoscientific" adjective. – S. Rich (talk) 01:16, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

"'pseudoscientific' adds unnecessary POV". Can't see it myself. 'pseudoscientific' is used in the first sentence of the lede, so is clearly considered an integral NPOV element of the topic. As such, it merits inclusion in the SD; as WP:Short description says "These descriptions ... help users identify the desired article", so including 'pseudoscientific' functions to aid in identifying 'Intelligent design' as the article about the pseudoscientific argument. -- Jmc (talk) 01:44, 27 October 2022 (UTC)
I observe that the simple:Intelligent Design article on the simple English Misplaced Pages treats the subject drastically differently than this one and doesn't even mention pseudoscience. ~Anachronist (talk) 04:46, 27 October 2022 (UTC)
Misplaced Pages is not a reliable source. But maybe someone should change the simple:Intelligent Design article. I have experience there. Does one replace "pseudoscientific" by "stupid" or "wrong" to change it from English to Simple English? --Hob Gadling (talk) 05:21, 27 October 2022 (UTC)
This is not a question of RS for either WP or Simple WP. (No matter what, the Simple ID article must be NPOV. And changes to the Simple article are best discussed there.) I "simply" ask that we remove the POV-laden "pseudoscientific" from the short description in this regular WP article. – S. Rich (talk) 05:02, 28 October 2022 (UTC)
This is not a question of RS Yes it is. You were trying to change this Misplaced Pages article based on what another Misplaced Pages article says, so you were trying to use the other article as a source for this one. --Hob Gadling (talk) 05:17, 28 October 2022 (UTC)
If something is science and looks like science, one does not need to mention that it is science. That is the reason why the "scientific" adjective is not used.
Pseudoscience is something that pretends to be science, so it looks like science but it is not science. That is the reason why the "pseudoscientific" adjective is used. --Hob Gadling (talk)
My concern is about the POV vs. NPOV tone of the SD. We can describe the article as "an argument about ...." and avoid saying it is "arcane", "former", "inaccurate", "irrelevant", "dismissed in scientific circles", "hogwash", etc. The WP:SDAVOID guidance says "avoid 'former', 'retired', 'late', 'defunct', 'closed', etc.." Removing "pseudo" helps us comply with this guidance. – S. Rich (talk) 04:42, 28 October 2022 (UTC)
No, it does not. Calling a pseudoscience "pseudoscience" is perfectly NPOV when reliable sources consistently call it pseudoscience. I think you need to actually read WP:NPOV instead of just saying it. Also WP:FRINGE, WP:PSCI and WP:FALSEBALANCE.
Also, the logic "the rules say we should avoid X, therefore we should avoid Y" leaves something to be desired. --Hob Gadling (talk) 05:17, 28 October 2022 (UTC)
If the words "pseudoscience" or "pseudoscientific" are to be replaced, I do appreciate Hob's suggestion to use the words "stupid" or "wrong" instead. - Roxy the dog 06:46, 28 October 2022 (UTC)
@S. Rich You've failed to address the point I made in immediate response:
'pseudoscientific' is used in the first sentence of the lede, so is clearly considered an integral NPOV element of the topic. As such, 'pseudoscientific' merits inclusion in the SD; as WP:Short description says "These descriptions ... help users identify the desired article", so including 'pseudoscientific' functions to aid in identifying 'Intelligent design' as the article about the pseudoscientific argument.
You don't seem to have any issue with 'pseudoscientific' being used in the article itself, so your objection to it in the SD seems perverse. --Jmc (talk) 07:44, 28 October 2022 (UTC)
User:Srich32977 Can you put the existing SD alongside something proposed ? I am doubtful you will make headway for WP:SDLENGTH, but a definite comparison might at least get a focus back to about being shorter. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 07:21, 1 November 2022 (UTC)
I agree. The inclusion of the qualifier "pseudoscientific" is superfluous to the point that it reeks of bias.
I don't think it's a battle worth fighting.
Yes, the short description is… not short. Especially when you compare it to the length of the rest of the article. Further, some of its content is redundant with the body content.
But it's not just the first sentence that has a POV problem. The entire short description—nay, the whole article—is marred with bias to the point that it to me looks not salvageable. And even if it were, it seems that it's guarded by a group of ideologues: fanatics who will pile on their fallacious rhetoric until the hope is sucked dry from you by the tyranny of their majority. Emilimo (talk) 10:19, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
Yup, the tyranny of WP:BESTSOURCES. <sarcasm warning>How sad!</sarcasm warning> tgeorgescu (talk) 11:43, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
Straw Man. I am not criticizing WP:BESTSOURCES. When I say tyranny of the majority (which I definitely feel is happening on a large scale around discussion of this topic) I'm criticizing use of specific rhetorical devices and fallacious reasoning such as (but not limited to) argumentum ad populum and secondary implications such as groupthink, overconfidence in conventional wisdom and secular orthodoxy, false sense of inerrancy, and myriad intellectual vices such as appeal to ridicule which you just used on me with your sarcasm.
I'm not without hypocrisy; I admit my previous comment used blatant ad hominem attack. But just because I indulged in intellectual vice for a moment doesn't invalidate my sentiment.
A new article need to be written about what ID really is at a fundamental level—a theory of the origin of life—outside of and disconnected from its social contexts. Emilimo (talk) 13:02, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
It isn't a scientific theory. Not even a scientific hypothesis. Because nobody took care to formulate it as a cogent scientific hypothesis. Phillip E. Johnson died without knowing the hypothesis of intelligent design. tgeorgescu (talk) 13:09, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
That sounds like an appeal to ignorance. The theory is not valid because there hasn't been a person who has put it in a form that acceptable to you and the consensus/majority? Who is the authority on what constistutes a "cogent scientific hypothesis"? Why would we need Phillip E. Johnson to come back to life and do it for us? How do you know one is not already out there? Emilimo (talk) 13:35, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
Wait you got me on another red herring there; I never claimed it to be a scientific theory. Which is why I think there needs to be a page presenting it without any claims of it being a scientific theory, similar to the page on the Big Bang. Just because I am suggesting the theory—in and of itself—as not scientific does not mean that it is pseudoscience. On the contrary it would arguably call for it to be, by definition of pseudoscience, no longer labeled as pseudoscience. You don't see the Big Bang theory labeled as pseudoscience. As should be the case with ID. Emilimo (talk) 13:45, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
Big Bang, despite your protestations, is a widely-accepted scientific theory. For the metaphysical correspondent of ID, see Teleological argument. That, my friend, is a bona fide philosophical argument, but alas it has nothing to do with science. tgeorgescu (talk) 13:49, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
That sounds like an appeal to ignorance Oh, the irony. ID itself is one huge heap of appeal to ignorance ("I tried to find a way how evolution can make things like X, and I failed"; insert every biological feature for X); it does not have any actual content beyond that. And that is the very reason why ID is no scientific hypothesis. You are talking to people with lots of experience debating "Cdesign proponentsists", and every time one asks one of them for the theory of ID, one gets crickets.
How do you know one is not already out there? The burden of proof is on the person who claims that it exists. Bring it here, and everybody will be baffled, stunned, and surprised.
Independent of that, this is not a forum. Your claim of bias is commonplace for every article about any pseudoscience - see WP:YWAB - and does not impress anybody. --Hob Gadling (talk) 15:09, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
Sources are sometimes bias as well. Given that it is a controversial topic we should add further in the article that "it is considered by most scientists a pseudoscientific argument" given the right sources, but not in the opening paragraph. Is like if someone made the opening paragraph of Gender pay gap to be "The gender pay gap or gender wage gap is the ALLEGEDLY difference between the remuneration for men and women who are working." - Barumbarumba (talk) 23:39, 29 December 2023 (UTC)
The thing is, all pro-Intelligent Design sources are notoriously unreliable, and "unbiased sources" are invariably accused and denounced as being negatively biased due to accurately describing Intelligent Design as religiously-inspired, anti-science flimflam. Mr Fink (talk) 00:00, 30 December 2023 (UTC)
I fully agree with you. Since the professional editors of the Encyclopedia Britannica didn't consider it appropriate to apply the label "pseudoscientific" to ID theory, it seems reasonable to avoid that in order to preserve neutrality. The better approach would be to neutrally include the statement by the US National Academy of Science saying that it isn't a legitimate scientific theory. I would argue that the term 'pseudoscience' is appropriately applied to theories like Flat Earth. Because ID has support from a number of scientists with relevant educational backgrounds, I believe it is more accurately categorized as 'fringe science' or 'questionable science' prominent supporters of ID include: award winning chemist Dr. Henry F. Schaefer III, professor of biochemistry Dr. Michael Behe, and Microbiology professor Dr. Scott Minnich. Further, a 2018 Pew Poll of members of the American Association for the Advancement of Science found that 2% of members believed humans had always existed in their present form, and another 8% believed that human evolution was guided by a supreme being. BeLikeBritannica (talk) 20:43, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
Read the FAQ. --Hob Gadling (talk) 12:57, 19 March 2024 (UTC)
I created an account just to agree and complain about the rampant and abhorrent bias and POV narration in the article. While I do not subscribe to the belief myself, the rampant author judgments within is disgustingly transparent and, if I can be crass, immature and embarrassing to read to someone looking for information on the subject. When you have editors like Hob Gadling or Roxy the Dog using charged language like "stupid" to describe belief systems, it worsens the content of the site and makes this article read like the tangents of a lonely Redditor upset that they had to go to Sunday school when they were eight, rather than a source of information.
For comparison's sake, the article on Scientology reserves such personal judgments, attributing labels of ingenuity and falsehood to third parties, not from the author's own original judgments. Similar belief systems are treated with more respect, but this one is marred entirely because of its prevalence in western culture.
Such impartial author viewpoints are rampant throughout the article. A few keypoints of contention I noticed from a cursory search include the tangent of the Discovery Institution (cited from someone saying they're "a leader" because several members of the movement are "associated," as if there's any other article out there that pulls such vague weasel wording. To air out dirty laundry, it's very apparent that this is for the purpose of associating the article with conservative think tanks as a prelude, rather than as a detail later on in the history of the article, where such information should be placed). The line "Detailed scientific examination has rebutted several examples for which evolutionary explanations are claimed to be impossible." strikes me too (the preceding claims should be included in a summary, with these examinations placed in a proceeding criticism section. Such is the norm for most articles, but this one gets an exception because the editors REALLY want everyone to know their takes on it). "The Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District court ruling held the latter to be the case." line is out of place and only contextualized by scouring the references and notes before when this should have its own section, the line itself following what reads like original research on the dilemma of what the belief states. The article itself is littered with details that add very little ("A Discovery Institute report says that Charles B. Thaxton, editor of Pandas, had picked the phrase up from a NASA scientist, and thought, "That's just what I need, it's a good engineering term."") There is a separate article for that book; include the information there! In the section on concepts of the belief system, while generally more well-constructed, it still has its fair share of issues. The paragraph of "Critics point out that the irreducible complexity" is vague in referring to whom these critics are, which is embarrassing when the section on Specified complexity does this tactic of citing a vague "scientific community" correctly. The "Fine-tuned universe" paragraph has only one citation, and it doesn't even link to anything! The distinction of the ideology from the movement is made too little too late for how the article presents the relevance of the Discovery Institution...
I could go on, but I have a feeling the people responsible for the poor state of the article have their heels dug in so deeply that they will refuse to acknowledge the myriad of problems within the article, so I'll abridge my grievances: the article is absolutely filled with author judgments more concerned with refuting the subject rather than presenting a clean, readable text, and as a result the article is filled with poor citations, clunky and out-of-place details, and an astonishing amount of frontloaded bloat. It has been an absolute chore to read this thing.
I know this is going to be taken in bad faith to be misconstrued as "remove all criticism from the article," which is absolutely not backed up by anything I just said, so let me repeat that's not what I'm asking. I'm asking that the few people with self-restraint here actually structure the article to read like something trying to give an overview of the subject foremost, criticisms debunkings and all, in a clean, readable manner, and not like it was written foremost as a sloppy blog entry wearing the skin of an encyclopedia.
OldManYellsAtClouds (talk) 20:56, 12 September 2024 (UTC)
ID is a paragon of pseudoscience, according to WP:BESTSOURCES, and we have the website policy WP:PSCI.
About Scientology: we don't say that because that is a matter of judging intentions rather than judging facts. tgeorgescu (talk) 21:09, 12 September 2024 (UTC)
I would implore you to actually read the post you're replying to.
I do not care about validity of the subject matter (though I do think the "pseudoscience" label could benefit from a citation and end a lot of talk on this page if added, since one thing I keep seeing while reading posts here is that there's apparently a lot of sources calling it one). I'm discussing the poor state in which this article is written because it's entirely from people foremost interested in taking the ideology down a peg thinking they have article ownership and loading it with original research, to a point that it reads worse than other infamous pseudoscience topics. Similar articles have clear and lengthy sections for criticisms and debunkings that serve just fine. This one opts to make a massive mess of the subject. It's a badly written article.
You can agree or disagree with the subject, but from an objective point of view the article is a mess. If I find the energy/time, I'll clean up a lot of my grievances myself.
OldManYellsAtClouds (talk) 22:10, 12 September 2024 (UTC)
The tone can get copy/edited. But the fact that it is patent pseudoscience should remain inside the article, very clearly and unambiguously expressed. In that respect we have no choice, since website policy is binding. tgeorgescu (talk) 22:16, 12 September 2024 (UTC)
The tone can get copy/edited. But the fact that it is patent pseudoscience should remain inside the article
For probably the third time now, I don't give a crap about that label. I would even agree that it should be there if it was sourced. My problem is the article is poorly written. I have given several examples demonstrating this, please actually read those instead of arguing against a point nobody is making.
OldManYellsAtClouds (talk) 22:48, 12 September 2024 (UTC)
Okay, to the point: criticism sections are dissuaded. Criticism should be spread inside the article, refuting each point being made by the pseudoscientists.
In other words: the fact that this article does not have a criticism section is a net positive, and the articles which do aren't good examples to imitate. tgeorgescu (talk) 23:02, 12 September 2024 (UTC)
Criticism should be spread inside the article, refuting each point being made by the pseudoscientists.
Do you have a policy you can point to that illustrates that to be the case? This is one of the only articles I have seen on the site whose reading goes out of its way to meticulously try to debunk everything stated within it. This type of writing isn't employed in many other religious articles if at all, and reads choppy and unfocused.
OldManYellsAtClouds (talk) 01:24, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
Misplaced Pages:Criticism#Avoid sections and articles focusing on criticisms or controversies. tgeorgescu (talk) 02:05, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
While I do honestly appreciate the attempt at giving a policy, the subject of this page should fall under an exception mentioned:
"For topics about a particular point of view – such as philosophies (Idealism, Naturalism, Existentialism), political outlooks (Capitalism, Marxism), or religion (Islam, Christianity, Atheism) – it will usually be appropriate to have a "Criticism" section or "Criticism of ..." subarticle. Integrating criticism into the main article can cause confusion because readers may misconstrue the critical material as representative of the philosophy's outlook, the political stance, or the religion's tenets."
In the case of this article, there are several instances where this kind of information is haphazardly placed about because of the lack of refrain. I listed one in the article trying to link the subject to a conservative think tank, but there are more.
OldManYellsAtClouds (talk) 02:47, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
ID is propagated by a Christian conservative think-tank. It's not some accidental detail of it, it is so by design. tgeorgescu (talk) 03:24, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
The section as worded reads like a clear violation of WP:AWW. A stronger relationship than "The leading proponents of ID are associated with" should be provided, and this information should be listed in the section regarding the movement. While the information is important to include, in its current state it's not important enough to include in the opening section, much less before the early history of the ideology before YECs.
OldManYellsAtClouds (talk) 03:50, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
Let me tell you something: the people who hate mainstream science already got the message that Misplaced Pages is against them. So, we're writing for a certain audience, not for everybody.
Our bias is not concealed. People who love Misplaced Pages, love it for such bias. tgeorgescu (talk) 05:11, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
This is an open encyclopedia, not your personal blog. I don't give a crap what windmill-tilting you seem to think is being waged against a couple hundred creationist nutjobs, the article is written like crap and I've given several clear examples and policies that showcase very specific examples.
OldManYellsAtClouds (talk) 17:37, 13 September 2024 (UTC)

@OldManYellsAtClouds Rather than yell at clouds, it'd be better to positively address issues. Here's a small example with a big issue behind it: you say, "The "Fine-tuned universe" paragraph has only one citation, and it doesn't even link to anything!". The reason it (and many pseudo-links like it) doesn't link to anything is the big issue and it needs someone with your energy to address it. -- Jmc (talk) 03:19, 13 September 2024 (UTC)

While I do appreciate the invitation, and will probably take it up when I have more time on my hands, un
Judging byIsome of the rather... let's say "brash adamancy" of some of the regulars on this talk page i. I worry that such radical changes such as removing that problematic paragraph and rearranging the criticisms into a cleaner format would be misconstrued as trying to hide or mitigate criticisms against the subject matter. Rather than risk a one-sided edit war, it would be better for the people adding these text to just provide a proper citation and not make the article a complete mess.both carrying the article's current style, I suspect I may need to take your advice regardless.
OldManYellsAtClouds (talk) 03:36, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
As the article is protected, I'm working at a proposed rewrite that cleans up some of the grievances I have with the page on my userpage. As of writing I have the introductory paragraph glanced at. If you're not being coy, I'd like honest feedback on my proposed changes.
OldManYellsAtClouds (talk) 18:10, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
The introduction of an article contains the summary of the body of that article. So, unless the version you are proposing is very closed from the current version, any new introduction not properly summarizing the current version of the article is likely to be a non starter. --McSly (talk) 19:09, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
So, unless the version you are proposing is very closed from the current version
It is, just a tad more streamlined, cleaned, and worded more impartially. I left commentary, including two explicit requests for citations.
OldManYellsAtClouds (talk) 19:43, 13 September 2024 (UTC)
You are requesting a citation for "pseudoscience". But no citation is given, according to WP:CITELEAD. So, yes, there is a reason why no citation is given.
I saw the changes you advocate for: the changes are minor, and often not compliant with WP:PAGs. About impartiality, see WP:FALSEBALANCE.
Also, I don't see why WP:RS should be provided for a hidden comment. tgeorgescu (talk) 00:26, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
You are requesting a citation for "pseudoscience". But no citation is given, according to WP:CITELEAD. So, yes, there is a reason why no citation is given.
I believe the exceptions listed in MOS:CITELEAD are applicable here, given how contentious the label has been in these talk pages, and from the opening sentence of the article itself having five citations within it. Moving the fifth reference to specifically address the pseudoscience label adds no new citations to the lead and satisfies my complaint with that particular point. I ask in my suggestions for someone to provide a source since (1) I believe there may be a more readily-available source that could be used in its place, and (2) I typed it on mobile and don't like using the article editor for more than basic formatting.
I saw the changes you advocate for: the changes are minor, and often not compliant with WP:PAGs. About impartiality, see WP:FALSEBALANCE.
I'm tempted to evoke WP:SARC here, as "and often not compliant with WP:PAGs" is possibly one of the most vague and thus irrelevant complaints that could be levied. I ask for forgiveness in being heated for a moment; the idea that a simple cleanup to the article, a cleanup in which I've not added anything to even hint at the validity of ID and attempted to avoid WP:POVDELETION by retaining criticisms except in cases where it would be better to move information, is even remotely the same thing as trying to make a false balance is overly simplistic and a tad insulting. Misplaced Pages is not obliged to validate pseudoscience, I can agree and don't think either of us said otherwise, but it's also not a place for authors to engage against the subject (much less focus on discrediting fringe theories) to make it a messy read or use the notion of bias existing to go on tangents about the subject in ways that harm the objective tone and pacing of the article.
The thing that really gets me scratching my head about all of this is that the sources and facts are against ID, so making a clearer article helps ID proponents none.
OldManYellsAtClouds (talk) 06:43, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
WP:FALSEBALANCE was a reply to more impartially. You proposed minor edits, so I don't see those as either cleanup of the article or making the article more impartial. This all debate seems therefore as much ado about nothing. tgeorgescu (talk) 07:12, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
WP:FALSEBALANCE was a reply to more impartially
I never asked for more impartiality, I described this as a perk of the cleanup. Please follow the conversation.
You proposed minor edits, so I don't see those as either cleanup of the article or making the article more impartial.
I'll ignore the non-sequitur in that and reassert the context of what's happening: I am pulling teeth against a user who thinks WP:NOOBJECTIVITY means an author should argue against the subject of an article, and am being met with resistance for miniscule cleanups in the opening paragraphs. I would go through cleaning up the entire thing for its other myriad issues, but lack any trust that such exhaustive efforts would be met with anything besides someone violating WP:OWNER.
This debate being "for nothing" can be amswered with one question: what is going to happen if I try to get even those simple cleanups in the lead put in? I hope, in that front, I'd have made a stink for nothing.
OldManYellsAtClouds (talk) 07:28, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
Well, friend, I'm only one editor, so I never decide myself the WP:CONSENSUS.
WP:NOOBJECTIVITY is an essay, meaning it is neither policy, nor guideline. WP:PSCI on the other hand is website policy. So, obviously, website policy trumps an essay. tgeorgescu (talk) 08:05, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
Well, friend, I'm only one editor, so I never decide myself the WP:CONSENSUS.
I'm really interested in what conversation you're having in which you're debating if ID is pseudoscience.
It seriously is grating to read so many replies from you that fail to address even one point being brought up and instead go after some paranoia.
WP:NOOBJECTIVITY is an essay, meaning it is neither policy, nor guideline.
That argument is on-par with the "evolution is just a theory" sound bite creationists love. summarizes a policy which reads "which means representing fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without editorial bias, all the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic."
Emphasis mine. Meanwhile you're on here justifying an article littered with WP:OR with "Our bias is not concealed. People who love Misplaced Pages, love it for such bias." I
WP:PSCI on the other hand is website policy
Is anyone here arguing that ID isn't pseudoscience?
OldManYellsAtClouds (talk) 19:33, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
WP:PSCI requires a certain tone of the article. While you admit that ID is pseudoscience, you seek to soften the tone of the article. E.g. downplaying that it is essentially a movement propagated by a conservative Christian think tank. And that it caters to fundamentalist Christians and evangelicals, since Catholics and mainline Protestants made peace with the theory of evolution. And that instead of seeking to discover new objective facts in biology, it is essentially a ploy to introduce God in sciences, i.e. despite the boundaries established by Immanuel Kant, who said he had to deny knowledge in order to make room for faith. tgeorgescu (talk) 21:21, 14 September 2024 (UTC)
WP:PSCI requires a certain tone of the article
I do not believe you are meeting that tone. You are going beyond meeting explaining that the content of the article is wrong and are more focused on a personal mission to debate everything within it with Original Research. There's several instances where you're barely citing scientific experts or explaining that the counterarguments come from these experts.
  • "A sufficiently succinct summary of the argument from design shows its unscientific, circular, and thereby illogical reasoning" <-- This is your conclusion presented without a source
  • "Whether this lack of specificity about the designer's identity in public discussions is a genuine feature of the concept – or just a posture taken to avoid alienating those who would separate religion from the teaching of science – has been a matter of great debate between supporters and critics of intelligent design. The Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District court ruling held the latter to be the case." <-- Debated by whom? This is the closing paragraph of a section, not the beginning summary. Don't just reference the court ruling in-sentence either, put its verdict at the end and cite the case.
  • "Variations on the phrase appeared in Young Earth creationist publications (...) there in the first place."" <-- Move source 34 earlier, since there's a clear split in the paragraph where it stops referencing material from it and starts referencing material from 33.
  • "Critics point out that the irreducible complexity argument assumes that the necessary parts of a system have always been necessary and therefore could not have been added sequentially." <-- I don't have anything suggesting needing fixed here, I want to point out that this paragraph is mostly good. The vague "critics" is part of the introduction, but even it's cited, and later on it starts giving names with specific arguments. This is good. This is how the article should read. There's a lot of sections that read like this, and I feel as if it would be unfair to leave them unrecognized.
  • "Irreducible complexity has remained a popular argument among advocates of intelligent design;" <--- I say the paragraph is "mostly" good because of this line. This should be reworded or removed. It doesn't help the proceeding explicitly cited debunking, and it is redundant. You are presenting this idea first in the argument list. Narratively, this weight assumes that it's a popular argument (avoid weasel words too).
There are more examples, but I wish to move on. — Preceding unsigned comment added by OldManYellsAtClouds (talk • contribs) 14:08, 19 September 2024 (UTC)
While you admit that ID is pseudoscience
This statement reads as if you're proposing that everyone who agrees with the scientific community should be okay with the sloppy article, which is ridiculous. It's entirely possible to be objective about a topic known to be false, and to criticize an article on the subject for its shortcomings.
you seek to soften the tone of the article (...)
It is apparent you are not reading my posts, and came in here with a preconceived notion that everyone critical of the article's writing and structure must be a proponent of ID, and no amount of reasoning or given examples of the article's shortcomings will convince you otherwise.
Get this through your head. Sit down and read this slowly, multiple times if needed: I am not arguing about the validity of ID. I am addressing the writing of a poorly-constructed Misplaced Pages article.
It's as if you think not including the sources of these statement would make anyone susceptible to believing ID. When a lot of people see articles like this one, argumentized takedowns that use your own wording more than the scientific community's, they see someone with a personal grudge about the ideology and want to know why it made them so mad, and end up looking into it. Having names behind the statements make the content stronger and more reliable, which hurts ID more.
Instead of squabbling with you further, I'm going to begin making some minor edits to the article to fix some of these myriad issues.
OldManYellsAtClouds (talk) 14:07, 19 September 2024 (UTC)

Pseudoscience? Creationism?

Sir Fred Hoyle, staunch lifelong atheist - "hard" atheist -in his Omni Lecture at the Royal Institution, London, January 12th, 1982, had this to say: “The difference between an intelligent ordering, whether of words, fruit boxes, amino acids, or the Rubik cube, and merely random shufflings can be fantastically large, even as large as a number that would fill the whole volume of Shakespeare’s plays with its zeros. So if one proceeds directly and straightforwardly in this matter, without being deflected by a fear of incurring the wrath of scientific opinion, one arrives at the conclusion that biomaterials with their amazing measure of order must be the outcome of intelligent design. No other possibility I have been able to think of in pondering this issue over quite a long time seems to me to have anything like as high a possibility of being true.” 2601:404:CB83:D50:44C8:EE37:6741:1F40 (talk) 23:30, 19 February 2024 (UTC)

Please read the FAQ at the top of the page. You could also take a look at Argument from incredulity. --McSly (talk) 23:49, 19 February 2024 (UTC)
See WP:NOTAFORUM and WP:SOAPBOX--Mr Fink (talk) 00:12, 20 February 2024 (UTC)
Also see Hoyle's fallacy. -- Jmc (talk) 00:29, 20 February 2024 (UTC)
And WP:RS and WP:OR. Your own thinking, as any other user's, isn't worth shit here. --Hob Gadling (talk) 08:52, 20 February 2024 (UTC)
I don't see a proposed edit in IP, but the FAQ does not include Hoyle since the article does not. Seems reasonable to discuss if Hoyle *should* be mentioned as a precursor in this article or at Specified complexity. The article does mention Paley which is far distant past and not as direct a link nor related to the ID concepts expressed in this article. I easily found reasonable cites in the history of ID that 'the term Intelligent design appears to have been coined from Hoyle and Horrigan', and a prominent criticism referring to specified complexity as a 'variant of Hoyle and Wickramasinghe's old claim' (about the probability of a tornado assembling a Concorde) -- so having a mention of the precursor and wikilink to Junkyard tornado seems reasonable. But p-value use of probability common in scientific studies (although commonly problematic) is more the see-also wikilink than Argument from incredulity since presenting details of method and calculation is not properly termed "incredulity". So -- mention Hoyle here, in SC, or not at all ???? Cheers Markbassett (talk) 16:08, 22 February 2024 (UTC)
It's important not to conflate the argument from design with intelligent design. The argument from design posits that only an intelligence could have created the universe. Intelligent design OTOH posits that the argument from design is a scientific one and also that it can be bolstered through scientific research.
So Hoyle did not endorse ID. TFD (talk) 16:29, 22 February 2024 (UTC)
TFD - That the article does conflate the argument from design with intelligent design is a different topic than the question of whether to mention Fred Hoyle as a precursor - perhaps in the "Origin of the concept" or the "Fine-tuned universe" sections. And to the contrary, Hoyle is listed as a supporter of ID -- though again the question was whether to note him as a precursor, either here or at Specified complexity. To be precise the 'support' means as a precursor he preceded the Intelligent design movement by a few years with his own ideas of life on Earth came from outer space, the argument of improbability and use of Information theory (similar to Specified complexity), his creating the Junkyard tornado metaphor, plus remarks about Fine-tuned universe, etcetera. His 1983 book The Intelligent Universe "Examines the origins of life on earth, analyzes the Darwinian theory of evolution, and argues that life is the result of a deliberate plan." The 'support' does not mean he was a member of Discovery institute and as far as I've googled he made no comment at all about the IDM or court case -- at least nothing as famous as his originating the above concepts. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 15:24, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
It's more accurate to say that ID advocates claim him as a precursor. TFD (talk) 17:52, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
TFD - so to check, are you answering the question with a yes, that the article mention Hoyle and phrase it 'ID advocates claim him as a precursor' ? Cheers Markbassett (talk) 20:20, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
No, not unless reliable secondary sources routinely mention that ID supporters claim him as a forerunner. And even if they do, it doesn't give us licence to copy the quote above. The purpose of the article is to describe ID based on how it is reported in reliable sources, not to engage in advocating it. TFD (talk) 20:52, 23 February 2024 (UTC)
TFD - understood, although I hope you mean Third-party sources and WP:WEIGHT. The ID proponents are obviously RS for what ID proponents say, as 'ID advocates claim him as a precursor' is objective fact. Second-party would be anti-ID such as NCSE and hence not reliable for what ID claims nor for WP:WEIGHT. Third-party would be outside reporting such as USnews.com - though I only see they reporting it as fact, not ‘ID advocates claim’ e.g.
The term "intelligent design" appears to have been coined in its contemporary scientific usage by the atheist cosmologist Dr. Fred Hoyle, who in 1982 argued that "if one proceeds directly and straightforwardly in this matter, without being deflected by a fear of incurring the wrath of scientific opinion, one arrives at the conclusion that biomaterials with their amazing measure of order must be the outcome of intelligent design." The term "intelligent design" was also used by non-scientist James E. Horigan in his 1979 book Chance or Design? where Horigan used the term "intelligent design" and framed his argument as an empirical one, "without resort to biblical or other religious references," and without investigating questions about "ultimate purpose." Cheers Markbassett (talk) 16:58, 25 February 2024 (UTC)
To assert that USnews.com is reporting it as fact seems a claim too far. It appears in a guest blog by a creationist who begins his post thus: "Most Darwinists involved in the public debate today have one, and only one goal: To stifle free debate on this subject and thereby discourage you, the public, from scrutinizing the scientific evidence for yourself." -- Jmc (talk) 18:44, 25 February 2024 (UTC)
Jmc well, among all the googles I had missed that header -- so the USnews.com quote is showing one example of ID advocates saying Hoyle was a precursor and their mentioning the objective fact that "intelligent design" was a term Hoyle used a few years before. Anyway -- do you have a position about the question of how or if to mention Hoyle in article ? Cheers Markbassett (talk) 21:16, 25 February 2024 (UTC)
ID proponents are not RS for what ID proponents say, because each one is expressing his own opinion, not speaking as a spokesman for the movement.
The fact that Fred Hoyle put the words intelligent and design together in the 1960s doesn't mean he was advocating a belief system that developed decades later.
I don't know why you keep pushing this. Of course some things we cannot explain could be caused by ghosts. But that's beyond the realm of scientific enquiry. TFD (talk) 06:29, 26 February 2024 (UTC)
TFD Clearly what was published and that IDM mentions Hoyle of the 1980s is objective fact, the question was how or if to mention Hoyle as a precursor in article, which you have already responded to. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 15:03, 27 February 2024 (UTC)

Hi Mark, you seem to be trolling and/or trying to synthesise an argument using primary or unreliable sources. Don't. . . dave souza, talk 22:46, 25 February 2024 (UTC)

dave souza Hi Dave. I am asking a simple and obvious question — taking note of the IP (which indeed is objective fact and appears fairly commonly mentioned in IDM) to ask if Hoyle should be mentioned as a precursor in this article or at Specified complexity. I would prefer if a simple edit question could be easier with simple edit answers, but I suppose any controversial topic has this kind of difficulty of lots of off-question replies. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 15:19, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
Per weight, Hoyle only belongs in the article if mentioned in reliable secondary sources about ID. As WP:FRINGE says, "Points that are not discussed in independent sources should not be given any space in articles."
ID proponents would obviously have us believe that Hoyle endorsed their views. If he did, it would give them respectability. We would need a reliable secondary source to comment on that. TFD (talk) 16:19, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
To summarize a conclusion to this subthread: There seems no interest and not much attention to the question, so Hoyle remarks exist and are said by IDM as coining the term "Intelligent Design" they later used, but the conclusion is to not include any mention. The thread question was not whether Hoyle endorsed ID, the question was more whether Hoyle should be mentioned as a precursor. The probability argument quoted by IP and/or Hoyle's use of the term "intelligent designer" seemed candidates for note either here or at Specified complexity. Hoyle notably had a probability argument against abiogenesis (Junkyard tornado) although that was more generally for advocating cosmic panspermia (Psuedo-panspermia), such as in the 1982 book 'Evolution in Space', rather than an intelligent designer of Directed panspermia. Anyway, thanks for what input there was and over & out. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 18:28, 22 July 2024 (UTC)

Intelligent design as an argument for Gods existence?

The irony has already peaked with the initial comment and been explained with the response. Risking further irony levels would be reckless and might result in injuries as hapless Wikipedians hurt their ribs laughing at this complaint. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 14:12, 19 December 2024 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

I have to wonder if the people writing this have a hidden agenda. ID proponents have never asserted who the designer is--it could be an Alien for all we know. The introductory sentence is very clearly biased and should be rewritten to be historically neutral. Intelligent design proper is a (pseudo)scientific theory that attempts to demonstrate that certain biological systems can be more adequately explained by theories of design. It is false to say that the theory is meant to prove God's existence--that is the philosophical argument from design. While I doubt the editors here are intellectually honest enough to change this, it is the truth. This article serves as proof as to why Misplaced Pages is an unreliable source for unbiased information. 104.158.206.172 (talk) 12:54, 19 December 2024 (UTC)

cdesign proponentsists did not do a very good job of hiding their agenda, trying to mask the teaching of creationism in US public schools behind a facade of "intelligent design". See Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District for how a US federal court dealt with this "breathtaking inanity". Just plain Bill (talk) 13:35, 19 December 2024 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Intelligent Design and the Law

Got a link to this from Academia, it's online as linked below, an article in Penn State Law Review Volume 113, Number 3, Winter 2008. An informative overview, a long read. Possibly a useful source, but think we've already covered the points it make. . . dave souza, talk 21:06, 21 December 2024 (UTC)

dave souza Does not seem worth an independent mention here as it lacks WP:WEIGHT in coverage or significant effect. Also, as you say, it seems somewhat a rehash from earlier works of Professor Barbara Forrest, Kitzmiller, etcetera and somewhat a subset of his more substantial book work Marketing Intelligent Design Law and the Creationist Agenda. There didn't seem to be any post-1990s events being reported or some new legal case or new viewpoint. I'd think the article should avoid repetition of the same content from lesser works -- this seems to show WEIGHT of the selections already used in this article rather than be something new. If you want suggestions, it might help to look at the results if the lead para were run thru an AI bias checker (e.g. here), or for new things not already covered in the article (though I don't think there are any). Cheers Markbassett (talk) 20:19, 6 January 2025 (UTC)
AI bias checker? Sounds awful. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 21:18, 6 January 2025 (UTC)
Some of what I got for lead-text: The text primarily presents ID from a critical standpoint. It does not include direct quotes or detailed explanations from ID proponents about their views. ... The text dedicates significant space to legal battles and political associations of ID proponents. This focus may overshadow the actual scientific arguments and counter-arguments related to ID. ... Lack of historical context for design arguments: While the text mentions that ID is a form of creationism, it doesn't provide a broader historical context for design arguments in philosophy and theology. This omission may lead readers to view ID as a purely modern phenomenon... The text mentions the Discovery Institute, describing it as a "Christian, politically conservative think tank based in the United States" that is associated with the leading proponents of Intelligent Design. This association with an authoritative-sounding organization may lead some readers to attribute greater accuracy or credibility to the Intelligent Design argument, despite the text clearly stating that it lacks empirical support and is not considered science. The authority bias could cause readers to overvalue the opinions of the Discovery Institute simply because it is presented as a think tank, potentially overlooking the scientific consensus against Intelligent Design. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 21:25, 6 January 2025 (UTC)
"simply because it is presented as a think tank" There are numerous think tanks, and most of them serve as propaganda organizations for their pet causes. Why would the reader assume that their views are reliable? Dimadick (talk) 11:57, 7 January 2025 (UTC)
Many readers may not realize that an AI amounts to a confabulation engine, prone to hallucination. Many may not even recognize that they are reading AI output. Just plain Bill (talk) 15:53, 7 January 2025 (UTC)
It does offer an easy way to get some outside views, something a bit more than the punctuation check of Grammarly, also seen in Quillbot and others. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 14:45, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
Unlikely. LLMs just imitate what humans write. --Hob Gadling (talk) 09:32, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
I work with (and develop) deep learning algorithms, and I can confirm that they're not going to provide an 'outside view'. There's no guarantee they'll even provide an internally consistent view. They're not 'sometimes silly minds' the way a lot of people think about them. They're basically like parrots. They just repeat what they've heard in a way that sounds pleasing to them, with no consideration of what it means. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 14:25, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
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