Dr. Angus Menuge: Creationist/Apologist

[DiskoVilante]

Tomorrow (Thursday, the 21st) Dr. Angus Menuge of Concordia University will be giving a talk at UCLA titled "Is Design an Illusion?"

Many aspects of the natural world appear to be designed. Are they? Or is the appearance of design only an illusion?
Darwinists claim that the origin, diversity and characteristics of living things can all be explained without reference to a designer. They argue that Intelligent Design is excluded from science because it violates a basic methodological rule: Methodological Materialism (MM, for short). MM excludes any conclusion incorporating a designer, no matter what the evidence. Is this a reasonable assumption?

From: http://www.calendar.ucla.edu/event_detail.cfm?MeetingID=156810


So, do you guys know of him? Do you know of his lecture style/what info he throws out there? Is he the normal run of the mill ID(iot)/Creationist?

I'm asking because some of my group, the Bruin Alliance of Skeptics and Secularists (http://bruinskeptics.org), will be attending the lecture and taking him to task at during the Q&A portion of the lecture. We're also thinking of handing out flyers with a link to www.talkorigins.org.

[UnrepentantSinner]

http://www.cs.cuw.edu/department/faculty/menuge.html

Personal Background:

I had a somewhat Christian upbringing with a mixture of Roman Catholic and Church of England elements. Whilst a teenager, I became an agnostic, but retained an interest in religion and continued to find religious answers more persuasive than secular ones. Whilst at University I met the woman (Vicki Lynn Hubert) who is now my wife. She drew me back to the church, and I became an adult confirmand of the Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod. This helped to heal the wounds of my heart, but I still lacked an intellectual foundation for my faith. It was here, whilst I was supposed to be doing research in basically secular philosophy, that an unplanned (by me) foray into the works of C. S. Lewis was crucial. It all started with Surprised by Joy.

My interests now are in promoting Christian teaching and scholarship, and developing my own meager talents in that direction. Interests of mine are currently C. S. Lewis, G. K. Chesterton, Christianity and Culture, and the battle for the Christian Mind (if you want to know what that is, get George Marsden’s The Outrageous Idea of Christian Scholarship).

You might need more than just links to T.O. for the sorts of folks this guy's going to attract.

[godless dave]

Well he starts off with a bald-face lie, so I'm going to assume his whole presentation is lies.

They argue that Intelligent Design is excluded from science because it violates a basic methodological rule: Methodological Materialism (MM, for short).

No one argues any such thing. "Darwinists" exclude a designer because there is no evidence of one.

[drkitten]

Well he starts off with a bald-face lie, so I'm going to assume his whole presentation is lies.



No one argues any such thing.

Er, no. Re-read the Dover case; that's almost exactly one of the arguments made (and that the judge found compelling).


While supernatural explanations may be important and have merit, they are not part of science. [cites omitted]. This self-imposed convention of science, which limits inquiry to testable, natural explanations about the natural world, is referred to by philosophers as “methodological naturalism” and is sometimes known as the scientific method. Methodological naturalism is a “ground rule” of science today which requires scientists to seek explanations in the world around us based upon what we can observe, test, replicate, and verify.

Or as the NAS writes (cited in the opinion):

“Science is a particular way of knowing about the world. In science, explanations are restricted to those that can be inferred from the confirmable data – the results obtained through observations and experiments that can be substantiated by other scientists. Anything that can be observed or measured is amenable to scientific investigation. Explanations that cannot be based upon empirical evidence are not part of science.”

ID is excluded because it violates that rule. Of course, the rule is in place because immaterial explanations cannot be based upon empirical evidence. But it's not a "bald-faced lie." It's actually a remarkably sophisticated spin on the well-reasoned Dover opinion.

[drkitten]

Forum wierdness, double post.

[godless dave]

You're confusing "the supernatural" with "a designer". If Menuge is like other creationists, this confusion was his goal. Here's what Menuge said:

They argue that Intelligent Design is excluded from science because it violates a basic methodological rule: Methodological Materialism (MM, for short). MM excludes any conclusion incorporating a designer, no matter what the evidence.

The NAS said something different:

Anything that can be observed or measured is amenable to scientific investigation. Explanations that cannot be based upon empirical evidence are not part of science.

The whole premise of ID is that there is empirical evidence of intelligent design. If there were, it would be in the realm of science. The "Darwinists" assert, quite correctly, that there is no such empirical evidence.