What neo-creationists get right

[I]n the debate over evolution, I also think creationists’ doggedness has to do with the fact that they make a few worthy points. And as long as evolutionists like me reflexively react with ridicule and self-righteous rage, we may paradoxically be adding years to creationism’s lifespan.

I think that the creationists’ doggedness has far more to do with the fact that their ideology comes first, and they mangle science to conform to that worldview. When “facts” are presented that can be falsified by just looking around, sometimes ridicule is the only option left. But there was much more in the article that bothered me, and to a greater degree.

Mr. Slack goes on to make four points. On the first two, I say this —
Yes, science is incomplete — I don’t think any competent scientist is claiming that there isn’t more to be found. This is true of all fields of science, and the “designer of the gaps” is a false dilemma. The complexity of the cell being unknown to Darwin also falls short and points out the misdirected nature of many arguments against “Darwinism,” (much like arguments against Einstein and relativity) because the theory has advanced quite far since the original proposal. I’ll get to the misuse of “faith” a little later on.

On to the third point

Millions of people believe they directly experience the reality of a Creator every day, and to them it seems like nonsense to insist that He does not exist. Unless they are lying, God’s existence is to them an observable fact.

That’s one of the problems with an unfalsifiable position. Everything is supporting evidence — green grass, the rising of the sun. I don’t think the analogy he gives is particularly apt, either. But more to the point, science does not insist that God doesn’t exist (though certainly there are scientists who insist that this so). But any insistence of a position that cannot be verified because it cannot be falsified is going to be ignored, i.e. not incorporated, by science. As the saying goes, the plural of “anecdotes” is not “evidence.” There are people who steadfastly believe that they are this close to making their overbalanced wheel produce net energy, or that relativity simply cannot be right. It matters not, though. Science shrugs its shoulders at belief. If nothing will convince you that your position is wrong, you simply aren’t doing science.

And the biggie

Which leads me to a final concession to my ID foes: When they say that some proponents of evolution are blind followers, they’re right. A few years ago I covered a conference of the American Atheists in Las Vegas. I met dozens of people there who were dead sure that evolutionary theory was correct though they didn’t know a thing about adaptive radiation, genetic drift, or even plain old natural selection. They came to their Darwinism via a commitment to naturalism and atheism not through the study of science. They’re still correct when they say evolution happens. But I’m afraid they’re wrong to call themselves skeptics unencumbered by ideology. Many of them are best described as zealots. Ideological zeal isn’t incompatible with good science; its coincidence with a theory proves nothing about that theory’s explanatory power.

You don’t need to be an expert in the field to accept something as being true, as this seems to suggest. That someone accepts evolution, or relativity, or quantum mechanics, or any other area of science as being true, they are accepting that there are people who study this, have figured things out, and have told others about their findings. There are a whole raft of things I don’t know about biology, but it is easy to find out that evolution is the accepted theory and some of the major reasons why this is so. You don’t have to know the details about adaptive radiation or genetic drift or even natural selection for this to be the case. I’m sure that my car runs on an internal combustion engine and has brakes and an air conditioning system, and even though I don’t have the expertise to fix these things it’s not because of a commitment to materialistic belief that makes this so. Other people have this expertise, and as long as the system is reasonably trustworthy, that’s good enough. I can go on and do what I do, and not have to rely on any divine faith that automobiles will continue to work.

Science is the same way. People study biology, chemistry, other areas of physics, etc. so I don’t have to, and I’m able to draw upon that to know a little about continental drift and plate tectonics, superconductivity, photosynthesis — a few of many things I could explain only superficially, but not anywhere near an expert level — and most importantly that science is the best way to understand the physical world around us. Sure, it’s helpful to know some of the specifics, so you don’t fall for the replace-the-spark-plugs-on-a-diesel scam, and that’s true of science, especially whenever the cdesign proponentsists trot out any of several dozen oft-falsified canards that “support” their position, or someone tries to sell you a perpetual motion machine. But none of that — absolutely none — has to come from a “commitment to naturalism and atheism.” It comes from smart people who know what they are talking about, who have put the theory to the test and amassed a whole bunch of evidence in support of it.

Acceptance of science as the tool for learning about nature requires only an observation of the world around us and what science has accomplished. But any ideology that purports to know the answer even before the question is asked, and chooses its “facts” to come up with that answer is fatally flawed. To label this acceptance as “faith,” as Mr. Slack does in the article is to fall prey to the equivocation all too common in these so-called debates. Faith because of the evidence and track record is simply not the same as faith despite the lack of the same.

It comes down to this: if your car is sputtering, where do you go to get it fixed? Do you listen to the guy who fervently believes that there are demons in your fuel-injector, or the dozen of mechanics — who have fixed cars before — who tell you otherwise? Smart people who do biology for a living tell me that evolution is how the diversity of life on earth is best explained. I’ve seen some of the evidence, and I know there’s a whole lot more. That’s not zealotry, and that’s not describing a blind follower.

There’s also this tidbit

Should IDers be allowed to pursue their still very eccentric and outlying theory? Absolutely. There must be room, even respect, for eccentricity in science; it can lead to great discoveries. Alchemy led to chemistry. Astrology to astronomy. Much more often, of course, it leads nowhere.

One should note that alchemy and astrology aren’t science (though at least astrology would be, according to Behe’s testimony in the Dover trial). IDers (and others doing things on the fringe) need to be held to the same standards as everyone who is doing science are.

Update: other takedowns at Recursivity and Pharyngula