#44608: — 10/19  at  06:04 AM
Oh, great! Snorting coffee out your nose is no way to start the day.

#44609: John Wilkins — 10/19  at  06:41 AM
Just don't offer to debate ID with any heads of state who think it should be taught or you'll quickly find yourself under the attentions of their secreat service...

#44610: icecube — 10/19  at  06:43 AM
the links broken, but the article's still up on the site

#44612: — 10/19  at  06:51 AM
It should be made into an amicus brief - or at least an episode of a high-profile cartoon series. The Simpsons?

#44613: — 10/19  at  07:15 AM
As funny as I think it is, does this really support the evolutionist's case? After all, it was an intelligent agent wielding the bat. The creationist could simply have pointed out that his knee would not have broken withot the action of the scientist: the 'intelligent designer.'

#44615: — 10/19  at  07:37 AM
HalF, it isn't intended as an argument against the "design inference" per se, rather it's a demonstration that the rejection of "methodological naturalism" is a purely rhetorical move and the IDiots aren't, and can't be, genuinely committed to it when the chips are down.

#44621: — 10/19  at  07:55 AM
Steve,
Yes, I know that was the intent of the piece here. Unfrotunately, I think the point about methodological naturalism is undercut by having an intelligent agent breaking the kneecap. After all the creationist is perfectly correct, in this instance, by pointing to the intelligent designer of the broken kneecap: the scientist.

#44622: Alon Levy — 10/19  at  08:05 AM
The problem is that every reasonably intelligent person is a methodological naturalist when he has no emotional stake in what he's investigating (my favorite example is deciding which route to take to work), and almost everyone if not everyone is an ideologue when he has serious emotional stake in what he's investigating. Scientists aren't exceptionally immune to this.

That said, if the purpose of debate is to convince people, arguing ad baculum is a total failure. It's useful to demonstrate the scientific method as something ubiquitous in real life, although the best examples involve a situation where you don't know the answer at the beginning (e.g. finding out why your car broke down, but not hitting someone and asking him how he knows you hit him). However, this won't convince people who think that evolution is not scientific, or that ID is scientific, or that there is a legitimate controversy to be taught in schools.

Besides, if a scientist actually tried using that argument, the creationist could always shoot back, "I've just experienced your hitting me; did you actually experience evolution?" The scientist would have a hard time explaining that although evolution is inferred from fossil records, it's an inferred fact.

#44623: HP — 10/19  at  08:14 AM
HalF: Perhaps the demonstration would be more effective if there were a large number of blindfolded scientists randomly swinging baseball bats in the vicinity of the ID creationist?

#44625: — 10/19  at  08:34 AM
HP,
Well, those who support the idea of intellignet designers might like it.

In any case, if I were debating a creationist on the net, I certainly wouldn't link them to the article in question. I think they would be able to use it as ammunition against me.

On a more serious note, this does make me curious about the creationists' stance vis-a-vis methodological naturalism. I know they argue against it as an a priori commitment that keeps science from dealing with the supernatural, but are they totally opposed to any use of it? In other words, are they interested in limiting the use of methodological naturalism or totally removing it from science?

#44626: — 10/19  at  08:44 AM
One way of explaining the theory of kneevolution, I suppose...

#44628: — 10/19  at  08:54 AM
HalF, I think you're looking for a coherent philosophical position where, in fact, there is nothing but a handy rhetorical get-out-of-jail-free card. (I guarantee you they want their mechanics to employ methodological naturalism when working on their cars!) It's the same mentality on display in the rest of the "Republican war on science" as well. Facts are stupid things, to be freely disregarded when they conflict with either ideology or the narrow interests of business.

#44632: — 10/19  at  09:09 AM
And to be fair and non-political about it, I think there's plenty of the same thing in the Jermey Rifkin wing of the left. (I was a grad student at the time of the ridiculous recombinant DNA wars, which had the potential to set back US biology for decades; the escape was a narrow one.)It's just that at the moment the right is a much greater threat to science.

#44635: — 10/19  at  09:35 AM
What a nice descriptor: the reality-distortion field of their ideological crusade.

#44639: Krauze — 10/19  at  09:57 AM
Manual trackback:

"Would it help if he beat up a pillow instead?" at Telic Thoughts

#44655: Cog — 10/19  at  11:02 AM
I'm glad people here, at least, seem to understand that I was talking about methodological naturalism and not design per se. My post wasn't meant to convince creationists. It was meant to exorcise some of my frustration. I just want to address one objection here, which I thought of but didn't include in my original post:

Besides, if a scientist actually tried using that argument, the creationist could always shoot back, "I've just experienced your hitting me; did you actually experience evolution?"

First of all, every detective knows that human memories are notoriously unreliable. Repeatable experiments are much more reliable than memory or testimony, which is why they're given much higher priority in science and in court. Second, actually, scientists experience evolution all the time in the lab, so the answer is yes.

#44685: — 10/19  at  12:34 PM
"Second, actually, scientists experience evolution all the time in the lab, so the answer is yes."

Sigh. Indeed. I've just had to toss out several months work because the construct I was working with has a mutation that makes the protein inactive. Never trust DNA to stay the way it was when you started playing with it. Sequence early, sequence often.

#44734: Alon Levy — 10/19  at  03:32 PM
First of all, every detective knows that human memories are notoriously unreliable. Repeatable experiments are much more reliable than memory or testimony, which is why they're given much higher priority in science and in court. Second, actually, scientists experience evolution all the time in the lab, so the answer is yes.

I know that, but the people who buy into ID don't.

Trackback: Kneecapping Intelligent Design Tracked on: Resonant Information (68.224.223.13) at 2005 10 19 20:02:30
The Abstract Factory has posted an entertaining, if violent, fantasy of how a debate with a creationist might run. Quoting the Abstract Factory:Intelligent Design advocate: YEAAARRRRGGGHHHH! YOU BROKE MY KNEECAP! Scientist: Perhaps it only appears that I

#44770: — 10/19  at  11:04 PM
absolutely, totally UNfunny.