Adherents of Intelligent Design (Scientists Among Them)

[Hardenbergh]

It appears that there have been some scientists that are at least open to the idea that the universe didn't just happen by chance. I've only mentioned two in this thread. There are many, many others.

I was just reading about Wernher von Braun, "former director of NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center and the chief architect of the Saturn V launch vehicle, the superbooster that would propel Americans to the Moon."

Von Braun’s faith

Von Braun, a life-long Lutheran, was a believer in intelligent design in the Universe long before it became a catch phrase and a lightning rod of debate.

“For me, the idea of a creation is not conceivable without invoking the necessity of design,” he wrote in a letter to the California State Board of Education in September 1972. He added, “It is in scientific honesty that I endorse the presentation of alternative theories for the origin of the universe, life and man in the science classroom. It would be an error to overlook the possibility that the universe was planned rather than happening by chance.”

While von Braun was careful to use the word theory with regard to the creation of the universe, in his mind there was no conflict or debate. The ability of Earth to sustain intelligent life, which in turn was capable of creating machines designed to explore the Moon and the planets was clear evidence to von Braun that man and his universe were the creation of God.

It was for that reason von Braun chose, with his advancing terminal illness, a modest gravestone to cite one of his favorite passages of scripture. His gravestone reads: WERNHER VON BRAUN 1912-1977 Psalms 19:1. That scripture is: “The heavens are telling the glory of God and the firmament proclaims his handiwork.”

http://www.thespacereview.com/article/656/1
http://www.adherents.com/people/pv/Wernher_von_Braun.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wernher_von_Braun
http://history.msfc.nasa.gov/vonbraun/index.html

I found another quote from Allan Sandage, an American astronomer and winner of the Crafoord Prize in astronomy (1991).

I find it quite improbable that such order came out of chaos. There has to be some organizing principle. God to me is a mystery but is the explanation for the miracle of existence, why there is something instead of nothing.

http://www.southcoasttoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070425/OPINION/704250342/-1/RSS23

In the above newspaper article, the Crafoord Prize is incorrectly spelled "Crawford." I checked it.

From Wikipedia:

At ago 60 he became a Christian. He responded to the question, "Can a person be a scientist and a Christian?" with 'Yes. As I said before, the world is too complicated in all its parts and interconnections to be due to chance alone."

In Lee Strobel's book "The Case For Faith", Sandage is also quoted as saying, "The most amazing thing to me is existence itself. How is it that inanimate matter can organize itself to contemplate itself?" (p 92).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allan_Sandage

Also in the South Coast Today article, a quote from Stephen Hawking.

Stephen Hawking concedes in "A Brief History of Time": "It would be very difficult to explain why the universe should have begun in just this way, except as the act of a God who intended to create beings like us."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allan_Sandage

This is a topic of discussion in the Dionysus Forums as well if anyone is interested in reading this topic or other related topics.

http://www.dionysus.org/forums/showthread.php4?t=124&page=4

[SomeGuy]

appeal to authority much?

[brodski]

appeal to authority much?


And Von Brauns authority at that, are there any other unconvinced Nazi war criminals which the ID proponents want to pull out for support ? (Ill see the OPs appeal to authority, and raise it an Ad Hom and a Goodwin!)

Also, I missed the part about Von Braun being a biologist.

[Ducky]

I found another quote from Allan Sandage, an American astronomer and winner of the Crafoord Prize in astronomy (1991).

I find it quite improbable that such order came out of chaos. There has to be some organizing principle. God to me is a mystery but is the explanation for the miracle of existence, why there is something instead of nothing.

http://www.southcoasttoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070425/OPINION/704250342/-1/RSS23

In the above newspaper article, the Crafoord Prize is incorrectly spelled "Crawford." I checked it.

Also in the South Coast Today article, a quote from Stephen Hawking.

Stephen Hawking concedes in "A Brief History of Time": "It would be very difficult to explain why the universe should have begun in just this way, except as the act of a God who intended to create beings like us."


From Wikipedia:

At ago 60 he became a Christian. He responded to the question, "Can a person be a scientist and a Christian?" with 'Yes. As I said before, the world is too complicated in all its parts and interconnections to be due to chance alone."

In Lee Strobel's book "The Case For Faith", Sandage is also quoted as saying, "The most amazing thing to me is existence itself. How is it that inanimate matter can organize itself to contemplate itself?" (p 92).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allan_Sandage

This is a topic of discussion in the Dionysus Forums as well if anyone is interested in reading this topic or other related topics.

http://www.dionysus.org/forums/showthread.php4?t=124&page=4




uh...ok let me start by saying that nestling the hawking reference in between two sections dealing with Allan Sandage, without noting on the second quote (the "from wikipedia") makes it appear that you're trying to say the quote about Sandage becoming a Christain at 60 refers to hawking. You may want to change that layout, it could be considered intellectually dishonest.

Secondly, the hawking quote is a bit of mining, since the rest of the context of that passage in that book is certainly not supportive of the intent of presenting that quote by itself.

You can read the context here. (http://www.holysmoke.org/cre014.htm) It certainly doesn't give any impression Hawking supports ID if read in full. here is a quote from that section of the book:

One possible answer is to say that God chose the initial configuration of the universe for reasons that we cannot hope to understand. This would certainly have been within the power of an omnipotent being, but if he had started it off in such an incomprehensible way, why did he choose to let it evolve according to laws that we could understand? The whole history of science has been the gradual realization that events do not happen in an arbitrary manner, but that they reflect a certain underlying order, which may or may not be divinely inspired. It would be only natural to suppose that this order should apply not only to the laws, but also to the conditions at the boundary of space-time that specify the initial state of the universe. There may be a large number of models of the universe with different initial conditions that all obey the laws. There ought to be some principle that picks out one initial state, and hence one model, to represent our universe.

[discusses weak and strong anthropic principles, and objects to the latter]

One would feel happier about the anthropic principle, at least in its weak version, if one could show that quite a number of different initial configurations for the universe would have evolved to produce a universe like the one we observe. If this is the case, a universe that developed from some sort of random initial conditions should contain a number of regions that are smooth and uniform and are suitable for the evolution of intelligent life. On the other hand, if the initial state of the universe had to be chosen extremely carefully to lead to something like what we see around us, the universe would be unlikely to contain any region in which life would appear. In the hot big bang model described above, there was not enough time in the early universe for heat to have flowed from one region to another. This means that the initial state of the universe would have to have had exactly the same temperature everywhere in order to account for the fact that the microwave back-ground has the same temperature in every direction we look. The initial rate of expansion also would have had to be chosen very precisely for the rate of expansion still to be so close to the critical rate needed to avoid recollapse. This means that the initial state of the universe must have been very carefully chosen indeed if the hot big bang model was correct right back to the beginning of time. It would be very difficult to explain why the universe should have begun in just this way, except as the act of a God who intended to create beings like us.

Read carefully.

[fishbait]

OK. You posted a list of well known scientists who are adherents of ID. This is common knowledge. Whats your point?

[Crossbow]

What a famous, and now deceased, scientist said 35 years ago may be able to provide a great deal of insight about his personal beliefs and such.

Howver, I think that one is much better served by using data that is current and up to date in order to formulate ones own personal beliefs and such.

[VulcanWay]

It is in scientific honesty that I endorse the presentation of alternative theories for the origin of the universe, life and man in the science classroom.
Any scientist who actually said those words needs to be slapped around (when referring to ID).

Certainly, science should explore all evidence including that which leads scientists to origins of the universe beyond the Big Bang and what have you. THAT is scientific honesty.

To say that ID should be taught in a classroom based on his opinion, with no real science to back it up, is laughable.

[Hardenbergh]

uh...ok let me start by saying that nestling the hawking reference in between two sections dealing with Allan Sandage, without noting on the second quote (the "from wikipedia") makes it appear that you're trying to say the quote about Sandage becoming a Christain at 60 refers to hawking. You may want to change that layout, it could be considered intellectually dishonest.

Secondly, the hawking quote is a bit of mining, since the rest of the context of that passage in that book is certainly not supportive of the intent of presenting that quote by itself.

You can read the context here. (http://www.holysmoke.org/cre014.htm) It certainly doesn't give any impression Hawking supports ID if read in full. here is a quote from that section of the book:



Read carefully.

I posted that quote in the wrong place. I should have looked it over again before posting it. I've fixed it. Thank you for noticing it.

I also saw the link you've posted earlier this morning. It shows the paragraph in Chapter 8 so that the reader can better understand Hawking's statement.

http://www.holysmoke.org/cre014.htm

[Jekyll]

OK. You posted a list of well known scientists who are adherents of ID. This is common knowledge. Whats your point?
Hawking doesn't believe in a God, he uses the word poetically.
Sandage doesn't talk about evolution. I'm not sure he's an adherent of ID (in the sense of disbelieving evolution or abiogenesis) either.

[Hardenbergh]

What a famous, and now deceased, scientist said 35 years ago may be able to provide a great deal of insight about his personal beliefs and such.

Howver, I think that one is much better served by using data that is current and up to date in order to formulate ones own personal beliefs and such.

Should we also discount everything that's been said by the philosophers of the ages just because they're in their graves?

[Cleon]

Should we also discount everything that's been said by the philosophers of the ages just because they're in their graves?

No, but then, I also would not consider Wernher von Braun to be one of the "philosophers of the ages."

[drkitten]

Should we also discount everything that's been said by the philosophers of the ages just because they're in their graves?

No, but discounting everything that they said that was way out of their field of expertise is appropriate. As was said earlier, "I missed the part about von Braun being a biologist."

[Mojo]

Well, rocket science isn't exactly, er, rocket science...

[JoeEllison]

Should we also discount everything that's been said by the philosophers of the ages just because they're in their graves?
No, we should discount the rather large volume of it that is pure junk. :D

[Crossbow]

Should we also discount everything that's been said by the philosophers of the ages just because they're in their graves?

There is slightly more to it than that!

If someone, anyone, has said something that was later shown to be wrong, well then that someone (regardless of their fame) is wrong about that something.

In 1972, von Braun was speaking from his own personal view and the best understanding of the data he had at the time. As for the present, there is a great deal more data about the scientific explanations for the origins of the universe and life here on Earth than there was 35 years ago, therefore if one is going to use the opinions of a famous scientist to show the validity of Intelligent Design, then that someone should get someone with more current credentials.

[Michael Redman]

Should we also discount everything that's been said by the philosophers of the ages just because they're in their graves?
If you understand why an appeal to authority is not a valid argument, then you shouldn't ask such a question. If you do not understand, this entire conversation is beyond you.

[fuelair]

Should we also discount everything that's been said by the philosophers of the ages just because they're in their graves?
If, by discount, you mean throw out, pay no attention to, NO - they are useful for studying thought and logic processes that can proceed from no or limited actual knowledge. On the other hand, if you mean we should actually use their models/thoughts - based as they tended to be on information and social/political systems that bound them - as statements of reality then, yes they should be discounted.