No.

First of all, I debate strongly, and I debate hard.  If people want to debate a topic with me, they better be ready for a battle.  I don't take a weak stance in anything.  If it's worth debating, it's worth being forceful to get one's point across.  If I have a point, I'm going to run with it, and I don't care if I piss anyone off.  And if someone says something that's nonsense, such as this idea of creationism, I'm going to say so.  I'm going rub their faces in it and show them why they're wrong.

But if you want to talk about flaming, the act of just sniping this whole debate, take a look at the quote from Neko that started it all...

"sheeze... you're all a buch of hypocritical idiots.."

And then what followed was a slur of insults and objections to this debate... as if there's something wrong with debating in a debate forum.  And then when the conversation calmed back down, Neko came back and did it again!

Neko had nothing to say except to call us names and tell us how this all doesn't matter.  Again... this is a debate forum.  It does matter, otherwise why would we have a debate forum?!  I don't like being told that my debate doesn't matter by someone who isn't even going to participate, and I certainly don't appreciate being sniped by someone who I didn't even instigate a problem with.

Neko's comments were unwarranted and out of line.

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"Intelligent Design is not a theory. Rather it's an argument from ignorance. It's the assertion that "I don't know how life began, so there must be a God." It's an intellectual fallacy.
These "experts" try asserting that things are "too complex" or "too perfect" to have happened naturally, but they don't have any tests to show where there's a line where things start being "too perfect" to have happened naturally. All they have is an arbitrary assertion which is, much like everything in creationist logic, unsubstantiated."

   My bad, I should have said intelligent design was a "hypothesis". Clearly in scientific terms it is not a theory. This is the only point of yours I can conceed to. The rest of your arguement was nothing but equally unsubstantiated mud-slinging.

  "It's the assertion that "I don't know how life began, so there must be a God."

  Clearly you are not even FAMILIAR with Intellgent Design. Those that believe in it, and research on it are not christian or any other particular religion, nor do they even argue that the "designer" was neccessarily a "god"! Some are kooky enough to suggest that the "intelligent designer" they speak of could be a higher-level alien of some sort. Admittedly, that sounds rather stupid, but my point is this: you are aruing that ID is a stupid idea because it is based on religon. That is immature and small-minded of you to say, as well as flat out wrong.

And as for the tests? Wrong again. ID scientists have, and continue to study the structures of cells and genetic coding, essentially "messing with" these things to see how little it takes for the entirity of the organism's life to not exist. What they've found was that, not surprisingly, exteremely tiny, minute changes to cell and genetic structures result in not just lack of functioning, but lack of existance as an organism. More than birth defects or deformities- all organisms are so perfected and honed that one small change to structures cause an entire functioning organism to collapse. The possibility of an organism perfect enough to be stable when all odds are against that it even comes out fuctioning, are slim. Is this evidence conclusive? No. But it IS supportive evidence, which is more than creation scientists have.

 Lastly, I'd just like to say that I don't believe in Intelligent Design. Also, I'm an athiest. But I don't like seeing people trounce on the beliefs of others with no backing. I personally am sick and tired of those that assume that anything pertaining to religion or "god" must be out of ignorance. That is NOT true.

First of all, Batty, I appreciate you getting this debate back on track.  Hopefully, we won't be interupted anymore.  Now then...

"Clearly you are not even FAMILIAR with Intellgent Design."

Really?  Let's see what it is that I supposedly don't know...

"Those that believe in it, and research on it are not christian or any other particular religion, nor do they even argue that the 'designer' was neccessarily a 'god'! Some are kooky enough to suggest that the "intelligent designer" they speak of could be a higher-level alien of some sort. Admittedly, that sounds rather stupid, but my point is this: you are aruing that ID is a stupid idea because it is based on religon. That is immature and small-minded of you to say, as well as flat out wrong."

First of all, I've been around this controversy for a long time, and "Intelligent Design" is intellectually dishonest pseudonym for creationism.  It's a title that dishonest people like Duane Gish, and those working for Answers in Genesis like to use to hide the obvious religious nature of what they're trying to put in classrooms.  It's the same thing pushed by the same people, and only the name is different.
And even if it wasn't just limited to Christian fundamentalist dishonesty, the whole idea that one could infer design from complexity without even identifying the creator in the "theory" is intellectually bankrupt and dishonest.  It's bad investigation of origins, and it negates the very function of science.
It is stupid, and it's a childish practice, and it needs to be stopped.  It's an attempt of explaining "why" without finding out "how".  At its very foundation, intelligent design tries to infer a "truth" from a complete lack of knowledge.

"And as for the tests? Wrong again. ID scientists have, and continue to study the structures of cells and genetic coding, essentially "messing with" these things to see how little it takes for the entirity of the organism's life to not exist. What they've found was that, not surprisingly, exteremely tiny, minute changes to cell and genetic structures result in not just lack of functioning, but lack of existance as an organism. More than birth defects or deformities- all organisms are so perfected and honed that one small change to structures cause an entire functioning organism to collapse. The possibility of an organism perfect enough to be stable when all odds are against that it even comes out fuctioning, are slim. Is this evidence conclusive? No. But it IS supportive evidence, which is more than creation scientists have."

*sigh*  Oh, what test?!  What are they doing?  Poking and prodding and shrugging their shoulders?  "Heck, I don't know.  God must have done it."  That's not a scientific test.
Scientific tests hypothesize, predict, repeat, and observe.
What you're describing above is Michael Behe's irreducible complexity argument, which has been refuted so many times.  It's shameful that people keep trying to use this faulty logic.  Are these ID "scientists" making analogies to watches and mousetraps?  I bet that sounds familiar, doesn't it?  Yeah, read on...

What these people are encountering is not irreducible complexity; it's irreproducible irreducibility.  They're trying to wind the clock of evolution backwards, and when it doesn't work, they think they've proven something.  Evolution doesn't work like that, and you should know better.  Evolution doesn't start with absolute mechanisms like a mousetrap would.  It starts with simplified mechanisms that become more specified as mutation and selection occur.
For example, take the human heart.  The heart is a mechanism in the body that slowly evolved to its current function in the body as the body and the heart developed together through evolution to a point where the body cannot live without the organ.  Intelligent design approaches the situation as if the full complexity of the body evolved at once, and of course their tests reveal that they can't reduce the complexity of body by removing the heart without killing the organism.   The intelligent design "scientist" will try to conclude "See?!  If you take one part out, the whole thing stops working.  Irreducible complexity!"
There is nothing to their tests that prove anything.  But don't just take my word for it.  I suggest picking up some literature criticising intelligent design, particularly Richard Dawkin's "Behe's Empty Box".
Trust me, this stuff has been thrown out of mainstream science years ago and openly mocked ever since.

"Lastly, I'd just like to say that I don't believe in Intelligent Design. Also, I'm an athiest. But I don't like seeing people trounce on the beliefs of others with no backing. I personally am sick and tired of those that assume that anything pertaining to religion or 'god' must be out of ignorance. That is NOT true."

Listen to me.  It is ignorant to infer creation from complexity and a lack of knowledge.  It is also ignorant to hold one's personal religious beliefs over proven forces of nature, such as evolution.  Religion has been an obstacle of rational thought for centuries.  Every time a scientific theory was proposed, whether by Darwin, Copernicus, Bruno, Galileo, or any other, it's always been met with harsh and unwarranted opposition from religious fundamentalism.
It has been 150 years now since Darwin wrote "Origin of Species".  This is ridiculous that this is still a controversy.  I know, you're also an atheist and I'm preaching to the converted here, but evolution has been proven in every way possible, but the only thing that's keeping it out of public knowledge is religion.
Yes! If religion is the source of society's ignorance, then I think it's a problem, and it needs to be dealt with.  I'm tired of this.  Sure, I can't change the way people think or believe, and I wouldn't want to live in a society where anyone could do that, but the very least I can do is do everything in my power to get the information to them, and unfortunately that's going to involve confronting people about what they believe is true.
Intelligent design is nothing more than religious propoganda.  It's not even really about proving that a creator exists.  It's just a nonsensical attempt to refute evolution.  Look at the "tests" that you tried to show me.  Are they showing evidence of a creator?  No, they're trying to challenge evolution with irreducible complexity, and they should know by now why their "tests" aren't being accepted by mainstream science.
Intelligent design/creationism comes to the game with the idea, a priori, that if evolution can be destroyed (it can't), then their deity wins by default.  They haven't shown evidence for a creator, and they have no intention to.

Intelligent design is a pseudoscience, and we have a responsibility to the future of science in this society to clarify and expose the lies and misconceptions that ID stands for.  Period.

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Yes, religion holds back science. But science also holds back religion. All these scientific theories that debunk religion are only theories. Yes, they work in the real world because our world is based on these theories. Put down to a basic level, its like saying: "Because 2 + 1 = 3, 1 + 2 must equal 3 also." It works, but only because we make it work. 

 

(PS. Don't flame me, I'm against religion and science).

Spree.  This is the debate forum.  If you type something here, people are justified to challenge it.  Now, I'm not going to call you nasty names, but if you say something that I don't agree with, then I'm not going to hesitate to tear it down.  That's not a "flame".  That's called debating.  In the debate forum.  You can't claim immunity.

"just a theory"

Okay, I've got to attack that.  That is a prime example of the public ignorance toward science, and it's a direct result of the damaging affect that movements, such as intelligent design, are having on our society's concept of scientific by saying so.  As genuine as a person's devotion to their faith might be, the fact that a creationist is trying to subvert science in the process just so that person doesn't have to give up legends and myths cannot be excused.
Evolution is not just a theory.  It's no less a theory than the theory of gravity.  The fact that there's a scientific theory to explain the process of evolution does not negate that we know evolution is a fact of biology, and indeed it is.  We can see evolution is progress in species where populations reproduce rapidly and in large numbers, such as insects and micro-organisms.
Viruses do it too, although they're not organisms.  Where was HIV 100 years ago?

The best example of evolution in progress can be found when there are two species that are still capable of reproducing.  The pair of the horse and the donkey is a classic example of this, and it's a slap in the face to creationists, who've never given me a satisfactory answer to how these two animals can interbreed and yet be so different.  Both animals are well adapted and have unique features.
The most interesting thing about the horse and the donkey is in their DNA sequence.  While the chromosome number is rather irrelevant to the progressive nature of the species, it is interesting to point out that the horse has 64 chromosomes and the donkey has only 62.

Now some creationists would cry foul and just say that the donkey is just a "degenerate" horse, even though the donkey has some traits that the horse doesn't.  Well, okay.  If they want to play that game, there's also the Apo AIM mutation, which I invite you to read, because it identifies a specified advanced gene mutation that has been traced to a specific individual.

When you use say "just a theory", you're playing into the hands of scientific saboteurs.  Evolution is not "just a theory".  It's a fact of biology.  The process may be in dispute, which is why there is a theory, much like there's a theory of gravity to explain the fact of gravity.  That's what theories are meant to do.  They're meant to explain the known world.

Furthermore, while you are correct to be skeptical of anything you hear from either religion or science, I should point out to you that unlike religion, science is internally skeptical self-correcting.  Science doesn't claim to be dogmatic, and it will change or eliminate a theory if it fails to properly explain a natural phenomenon.  In other words, science will fess up when it's wrong.
Religion, however, will not do this.

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Okay, why is science true? Because thats what you've been told. Some people believe in religion for the same reason. You think science works. Hundreds of years ago religion worked in the same way science does now. How do you know in a couple of hundred years time science won't become obsolete to some new set of principals?

No, Spree.

Religion never worked the way science does.  It's the absolute opposite.  Religion is a presuppositive way of thinking, where evidence is irrelevant.  Science doesn't work a priori like that.  Instead, it works from the evidence and builds a theory.  And unlike religion, science isn't ashamed to self-correct and admit fault.  There is not one modern scientific theory that is not constantly being tested to this very day, with the exception of those theories proven false.

The problem here is, Spree, you're either arguing for the sake of arguing (which you've done before!) or you have no idea what you're talking about.  Science isn't that evil methodology that clones people-eating dinosaurs and creates killer robots like you see in sci-fi movies.  It's a tame and meticulous form of investigation, and it works much better than religion does in discovering the world.

Take, for example, forensic science.  Aren't you glad that people aren't being tried and sentenced the way the puritans did?  Remember the Salem Witchcraft trials?  Even though it was the colonial days, that's a blemish on our country's history.  I'd much rather let science dictate how investigations like that are done, especially if I'm the one on trial.

And how about all those diseases that aren't around anymore?  Boy, I bet you're happy medical science is a practice.  They used to think diseases were the results of being possessed, and the common practice was to exorcise the ill person and to pray.  It's embarrassing to note that this sort of thinking survives to this day.  Every time I read about some poor kid who died from an untreated illness because his Christian science parents wouldn't take him to a damn hospital, that makes me mad!  And it happens all the time!

If it wasn't for science, we'd still think the Earth was flat and that we were the center of the universe.  Science got us in the air.  Science put us on the moon.  Science built the stupid computer that sitting in front of you.  So YES!  That is why I trust science over religion.  Religion never did anything that expanded our knowledge of the world we live in.

If anything, it made it worse.

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Yeah, I'm not saying religion is the truth, I'm saying that it used to be the truth. You can't compare the truth of religion back then to the truth of science now because you weren't alive back then. I'm just saying that science is todays truth. That doesn't mean its right.

You say that science isn't afraid to correct itself.... do you have any idea how many times the bible has been re-written?

And yes, the present is so ****ing wonderful because we have science and we don't burn witches anymore. But you see, the problem with science is, it can be used to make bombs, and guns, and viruses.... Its being abused, just like religion was.

"You say that science isn't afraid to correct itself.... do you have any idea how many times the bible has been re-written?"

Why yes, as a matter of fact.  And the fact that it has been modified negates the very nature of what the Bible is supposed to represent.  It's supposed to be dogmatic and inerrant.  I know way too many people who may claim inerrancy in the Bible, but they wouldn't dare live their lives by Bible, because it's an embarrassingly dated code of ethics.  Whether they want to admit it or not, secular reason and empathy have become standard principles in how our society works, which is why the races and sexes have equality now, contrary to how it works in the Bible.

"And yes, the present is so ****ing wonderful because we have science and we don't burn witches anymore. But you see, the problem with science is, it can be used to make bombs, and guns, and viruses.... Its being abused, just like religion was."

Your rebuttal had nothing to do with which methodology is better at finding truth.  You're just complaining that there are bad people in the world that abuse these.  Your argument is nothing more than a red herring.  It's irrelevant to what I was saying.
I was giving an example of how religion is not a method for finding truth and that science is.  Such an example given was of people having a presupposition in the old days that illness must be the cause of evil spirits rather than what we know now thanks to medical science.  I was making a distiction between two different processes of thought: presuppositional (religious) and investigative (science).
I would appreciate it if you're are going to debate with me about which methodology is better at finding truth that you don't suddenly change the argument to something completely unrelated.

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I thought I'd used the word 'truth' enough times in the last post. Obviously not. Basic point I want to get across: Science is only true today.

Also, don't talk to me about not staying on topic, the original point of this thread wasn't about the methodology of finding truth.

There's not really any point in talking about "Truth" and science. They're not related topics. The laws of science are simple facts, or in some cases, approximations of facts. Some of these approximations are improved upon over time, but regardless, they remain constant. Newtons laws of motion, resititution and astronomy are still used. His theories are still used to explain facets of the particle theory of light. Science has not changed since 1600, nor will it change tomorrow. A better explanation of the world is all that will follow the rising sun with the next day.

"I thought I'd used the word 'truth' enough times in the last post. Obviously not. Basic point I want to get across: Science is only true today."

Well, that's not what I was saying at all.  I was illustrating that it was a better system for finding truth.  In fact, I'm pretty sure I said so several times.  And it doesn't matter what age it is, whether modern or the bronze age or whatever...  Science is a better system for learning.

"Also, don't talk to me about not staying on topic, the original point of this thread wasn't about the methodology of finding truth."

What did I say, Spree?  What did I say?  I'm aware that the original topic got pretty much buried, but this is all relative, since believing in a God falls into the faulty presuppositional system of faith, which I've demonstrated to be ineffective.  But what you did was far more blatant.
In your rebuttal to my previous point, rather than answering my point on science being the more logical methodology, you threw me a red herring about bad people in the world.  It didn't have a damn thing to do with what I was talking about.  I was talking about one thing, and you went off in a completely different direction.  You... red herring.

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"I thought I'd used the word 'truth' enough times in the last post. Obviously not. Basic point I want to get across: Science is only true today."

 

That is what's so great about it, Spree. For example, my chemistry text book was brand-new a year ago, but now, so much information has been gained and/or perfected that the book is obsolete. Science is forever changing and evolving and becomming more and more true. This is because it is based on the continuing progress brought about by new tests and discoveries. There are certain "theories" that were, in fact, wrong(phlogiston- look it up.). But the theories that have been tested and proven and accepted as law- such as that of gravity and evolution- will ALWAYS be right.

Ok, now back to someone of what Mr.Neil was saying with Intelligent Design.

You are totally on the ball there, mr. Also, another ho-hum intelligent design "proof" is that organisms are so perfectly evolved that something must have been behind it. The answer to this is obvious: the majority of species on this planet are extinct. Those that weren't so "perfect" died out. And seeing as thereby most species that have existed were "imperfect", then it is hard to argue that some "designer" perfectly created everything.

Also considering the size and age of the universe, probability states that species would eventually evolve properly somewhere.

But I wouldn't call most of the species on this planet 'perfect'.

Off ID for a second: Answer me this - if religion was debunked, how do you know science won't be? Are you psychic, Mr. Neil?

"if religion was debunked, how do you know science won't be? Are you psychic, Mr. Neil?"

*bangs head on keyboard*

I think you're, once again, getting science confused with scientific theories.  Theories can be proven wrong.  Science itself is not wrong, unless you think it's wrong to ask questions.  I'm going to assume you don't think that.

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