Asymmetrical Information

Um, I hate to break it to you, but you seem to have skipped the actual link. =)

I think I found the link: http://stuartbuck.blogspot.com/2004_03_01_stuartbuck_archive.html#107971328968454721

I should have put that in my first comment. Sorry.

You might also enjoy the exercise of reading this interview of Alan Charles Kors.

Also Steven den Beste's essay postulating the existence of a remote Deity he refers to as Fr-d.

Hmmm. Not so sure I consider this "a very fine example" of interesting argument, but I hope readers follow the links (to Leiter, particularly) that Buck provides. (I also hope readers don't take it that Lewontin, whom Buck quotes, is a proponent of ID.)

Baiting the neo-Darwinists (they aren't true Darwinists, since Darwin himself believed in ID) hasn't been dangerous for me, so far. I concentrate on getting them to admit that the Theory of Evolution is only that, a theory. It's fun to watch them being forced to concede that (a) it can't be proven, and therefore (b) it isn't a known fact.

Baiting the neo-Darwinists (they aren't true Darwinists, since Darwin himself believed in ID) hasn't been dangerous for me, so far. I concentrate on getting them to admit that the Theory of Evolution is only that, a theory. It's fun to watch them being forced to concede that (a) it can't be proven, and therefore (b) it isn't a known fact.

Of course evolution is a theory. So is gravity. Every scientific theory is a theory.

So what? I'm always amused by people who, in their ignorance of the nature of science, imagine that "admitting" that theories are "only" theories in some way weakens them.

The fact remains that evolution is the only existing theory about the origin of current biological diversity that's both scientifically useful or interesting, and consistent with the data. People are free to come up with alternatives to it, but it has to be a scientific one. So far none have.

Creationists may be right--there's no way to know, but that doesn't mean that we should be teaching creationism in science class--leave it for Sunday school.

Faulting scientists for dismissing supernatural explanations for natural phenomena is rather like faulting judges for basing their findings on the law, rather than, say, by examining the entrails of poultry, or sticking pins randomly in a Sears catalog. It's possible that some judges may do that, but at that point they have ceased interpreting the law, and are just makin' stuff up.

I think the nub of the arguement that Jane is making concerns the nature of empiricism. A 'scientific' theory is one that can be or has been tested by induction, inductive data at a nitty gritty level being sensible, see hear feel smell taste, experiences. An inductive test tests the proposition f(x)=y where x is a data set gotten through the senses, f being the theory, and y being the data set one will experience through the senses in the future. One does an experiment to see if your theory f does predict data set y for data set x, if it does spit out the right answer it is thus 'scientifically' proven.

The scientific method only works on go forward propositions, and since evolution is a theory about natural history it cannot be tested scientifically, it rests on metaphysical assumptions. All theories about the past are necessarily metaphysical. This doesn't mean that the metaphysical assumptions underlying evolution are stupid, but they are unquestionably metaphysical, and this really pisses scientists off. Mr. Simberg is wrong about it being a 'scientific' theory.... period.

Last but not least, if one defines 'useful' as being something one might want to know for some reason other than the thing itself is inherently interesting, but what one might be able to use it for on a go forward basis, like for developing a drug, evolution is useless.

The problem with intelligent design, as propagated by Johnson and Behe, is that it still posits a supernatural agent (in the creation of the cell mechanisms and machinery).

So if you accept ID, you positing that physical laws are not observed everywhere for all time; which undermines the basis of science. If a miracle that defied physical laws was possible then, why not now?

Let's keep physics and metaphysics separate. ID muddles them up.

cf. http://skepdic.com/intelligentdesign.html

The main reason why ID annoys scientists (I speak as one myself) is that it drags religion into an area where it does not belong. I could postulate that, due to Gawd and Intelligent Design, the universe began ten minutes ago, creating us and our memories and this topic and these comments as a means of fooling us of our continued existence.

This - and the claims of ID - definetely fail the Famous Laugh Test. ID you either believe as a matter of religous belief or not. It's not a body of knowledge, but a matter of faith.

To be only slightly snide, this level of belief should have you investigating the claims of Islamics everywhere. They too believe in an all penetrating religion.

and look where THAT idea has gotten us...

" There's no real way to gather evidence as to whether or not God caused humans or other life forms to instantly materialise at some unknown point in the past, so you can't mount much of a dialogue.

(Such arguments are, of course, very useful for baiting militant atheists/Darwinists, by forcing them to admit that they can't actually prove it didn't happen. This is amusing cocktail party activity, but somewhat dangerous for its instigator.)"

I hope at your next cocktail party, if someone suggests that price controls & confiscatory taxation to create a completely equal income distribution would in fact be economically efficient because the Great Spider God Arak-Yig will, in Her Great Wisdom (through Her Holy Alien Space Bats), alter our minds such that our marginal utilities would make this unlikely scenario so, that you would accept that the same ineffable metaphysical unproveability would make your objections as amusingly futile as your atheist friends objections to ID.

[Hey, if physical laws are up for grabs, so are economic laws. Turnabout is fair play].

jmct:
The scientific method only works on go forward propositions, and since evolution is a theory about natural history it cannot be tested scientifically, it rests on metaphysical assumptions. All theories about the past are necessarily metaphysical. This doesn't mean that the metaphysical assumptions underlying evolution are stupid, but they are unquestionably metaphysical, and this really pisses scientists off. Mr. Simberg is wrong about it being a 'scientific' theory.... period.

Nonsense. The validity of the theory of evolution is quite simple to test. For instance, evolution predicts that no mammalian fossils will be found in Precambrian strata. If you want to falsify evolution, go dig one up.

"While anybody is free to approach a scientific inquiry in any fashion they choose, they cannot properly describe the methodology used as scientific, if they start with a conclusion and refuse to change it regardless of the evidence developed during the course of the investigation."
–– Judge William R. Overton (McLean v. Arkansas)

What I don't get is the effort to get creationism and/or ID into the public school curriculum. Why can't creationists just accept that we teach evolution in schools because it's the best non-religious explanation we've got? What is the big deal?

The public schools teach stuff all the time that parents may not agree with. For that matter, they teach things that run directly counter to people's religious beliefs. Mormons believe the Americas were populated not only through overland migration from Siberia, but also through migration over water, from Palestine and possibly elsewhere. I remember coming home in third grade and telling my dad about the land bridge thing. He didn't march down to the local school board and demand the curriculum be changed to reflect the religious beliefs of the significant local Mormon minority. He just explained his religious beliefs to his own child in his home. What is so complicated about that?

If something is true, it can withstand contact with falsehood. If creationism is true, evolution doesn't threaten it. For that matter, I don't see much conflict between the two theories, unless you believe the Biblical "day" equals one rotation of an Earth that had yet to be created. If you do, well, see "land bridge" above.

Tom, you're preaching to the choir. I'm not an advocate of ID; I regard their claims as unproven and unprovable.

But that doesn't make them, as many of the more militant atheists will tell you, untrue--merely unlikely.

The problem with your example is that, unlike ID, it is concretely testable; we could implement such controls and find out if the spider goddess obliged. I consider the probability too unlikely to warrant experiment, but I can't say that it's flat-out impossible.

I think it's interesting to note that the decision by science to explicitly rule out non-materialistic explanations is, in fact, a decision, not a necessity. That's not an endorsement of ID. Personally, I find the idea that the Christian god, or any other god, created the universe most unlikely. I certainly don't think that any non-materialistic explanation should be taught in schools. But that doesn't amount to proof that the non-materialistic explanation is the right one; I thought it was unlikely to the point of impossibility that Bill O'Reilly would survive even one season, and there you are. And I think it's useful for us secular humanist types to make sure we aren't getting to smug about how much cleverer we all are than those neanderthals on the other side.

I think it's interesting to note that the decision by science to explicitly rule out non-materialistic explanations is, in fact, a decision, not a necessity.

This is, as I tried to point out above, untrue. It is a necessity. If you permit supernatural explanations for natural phenomena, you are not doing science. Stuart Buck even brings up this point, only to ignore it.

Now, you are free to explain natural phenomena by invoking supernatural forces, and you can even call it science all you want (so far as I am aware, there is no law, natural or un, against it). But it won't be science.

A better question to ask, if the whole discussion weren't so tiresome, would be why those who would depend on supernatural explanations insist on calling their investigations "science". It's because science has been (despite the nonsense by Lewontin, quoted by Buck) wildly successful, compared to other means of investigation, and those investigators seek to associate themselves with its success.

But as a more practical consideration, if scientists allowed themselves to consider supernatural causes (or, rather, if supernatural explanations were given equal weight to natural ones, in scientific investigation), the efficacy of scientific investigation would come to a crashing halt. Every time a scientist failed to account for some phenomenon, he'd declare that it was the will of God, and that would be that. Oh, someone else might come up with a materialistic explanation, but how could you tell the difference? What would it matter, if the supernatural explanation were given equal weight to the natural one? Maybe God made it only seem like the natural explanation was the cause, eh?

Bill Woods writes:

Nonsense. The validity of the theory of evolution is quite simple to test. For instance, evolution predicts that no mammalian fossils will be found in Precambrian strata. If you want to falsify evolution, go dig one up

Guess what ! Creationism and the '10 minutes ago' hypothesis (actually it's the '5 minutes ago' hypothesis from Bertrand Russell specially formulated to illuminate the limits of test by induction or the scientific method) both predict that too. Fact of the matter is that all three all predict the present exactly the way it is, their predictions are identical down to the position of the last quark or electron in space-time. Given that they're identical the only way to prefer one over the other is by seeing which one is more in line with your metaphysical axioms, or dogmas, test by induction won't work here. Science can't go here, unless you sneak in some metaphysical assumptions, either consciously of unconsciously and assume the logical necessities one derives from them must be true, and call them 'scientific'.

"Tom, you're preaching to the choir. I'm not an advocate of ID; I regard their claims as unproven and unprovable."

I'd aware of that. I'm just pointing out, as Angie does so eloquently above, that if you introduce a supernatural agent, unperceivable to the physical senses, into inquiry into the physical world, then you open the door to all sorts of (literally) nonsensical hypotheses.

"But that doesn't make them, as many of the more militant atheists will tell you, untrue--merely unlikely."

I'd object to the word "unlikely" here; it suggests that we're dealing in probabilities. But that isn't the case; a world where the supernatural intervenes with the natural is qualitatively different from one where the two intermingle. If there's "Unnecessary" or "unconvincing" might be a better word.

Also, how dare you question the power and benevolence of the Great Spider Arak-Yig. If she does not deliver paradise, then obviously we did not follow her commandments correctly.

Jane Galt:

But that doesn't make them, as many of the more militant atheists will tell you, untrue--merely unlikely.

Well, gee, science cannot prove that the claim that volcanos erupt because we haven't sacrified enough virgins to the God Prometheus is false, either. For all we know, that is indeed the reason why volcanos erupt. But it doesn't merit inclusion in public school science classes simply because science cannot disprove it. It doesn't have any merit, period. Neither does "Intelligent Design."

And by the way, who are these "militant atheists" who claim that science has proved that there is no supernatural world or no supernatural agency? I've never met one. I don't know of any.

I think it's interesting to note that the decision by science to explicitly rule out non-materialistic explanations is, in fact, a decision, not a necessity.

But science doesn't "rule out" "non-materialistic explanations." Such explanations are simply irrelevant to science. Any explanation that relies on supernatural agency to explain a natural phenonenon isn't science, it's religion.

And I think it's useful for us secular humanist types to make sure we aren't getting to smug about how much cleverer we all are than those neanderthals on the other side.

We are cleverer than those neanderthals on the other side. Or, at least, most of us are. I do wonder about those who count themselves amoung the secular humanist types but who seem to want to bend over backwards to indulge and defend the neanderthals.

"And by the way, who are these "militant atheists" who claim that science has proved that there is no supernatural world or no supernatural agency? I've never met one. I don't know of any."

Reminds me of a quote, attributed to Asimov, who was asked by a fan: "But what if there is a God who is beyond our science, knowledge and comprehension"

Answer: "Then he is beyond our science, knowledge and comprehension".

"And by the way, who are these "militant atheists" who claim that science has proved that there is no supernatural world or no supernatural agency? I've never met one. I don't know of any."

The den Beste essay which I linked above was written in direct response to militant atheists who had criticized him for his failure to thump on the absence of a Bible.

The scientific method only works on go forward propositions, and since evolution is a theory about natural history it cannot be tested scientifically, it rests on metaphysical assumption.

I'm afraid that's completely wrong. Evolution is not a theory about "natural history". It's a theory about how replicators change over time -- something which continues to occur today. It is no more a theory about "natural history" than astrophysics is.

Basically, we know for a fact that evolution happens, because we have observed it happening. We know for a fact that genetic traits are inheritable. We know for a fact that mutation occurs. We know for a fact that mutation can introduce new traits, some useful for survival and some not. We know for a fact that useful traits are passed down to the next generation with greater frequency. In other words, everything we know, and everything we have ever observed, is completely consistent with the theory of evolution. Furthermore, the theory of evolution has enormous predictive value -- to name one trivial example, it predicted the growing immunity of bacteria to antibiotics. So saying that it's "metaphysical" is ridiculous. It's as "metaphysical" as the theory of gravity.

Here's an parallel example: a woman is found dead, with a bullet-shaped lump of lead in the middle of a large wound in her head. The lump of lead has markings on it consistent with a specific handgun; the handgun was found in the hand of a man standing near the woman, with powder burns on his hand.

Now, the scientific explanation, based on our available scientific knowledge, is that the man shot the woman with the gun. The Intelligent Design (aka Creationist) explanation is that God put a lump of lead in the woman's head, burst open her skull, scorched the man's hand, and scratched the bullet to make it look like it came from the gun. The man is innocent; he's been framed by God.

j mct:

Get a grip, man. Your description of the phsyical world shows that you have read (maybe) a few issues of Scientific American. Don't claim a deep knowledge of physical theory if you know how to spell 'quark'.

That being said, I want to point out that an evolutionary process has been observed (and more importantly calculated) in the form of Big Bang/Particle Physics.

As far as this present universe is concerned, superstring theory will blow your hat off. I say mno more: this is not a scientific blog.

So what if there is evolution? No skin off my (or God's) nose. It's just the way things are, of ye of little faith.

triticale:

The den Beste essay which I linked above was written in direct response to militant atheists who had criticized him for his failure to thump on the absence of a Bible.

Um, Den Beste cites one (1) self-described atheist, an anti-abortion fanatic wingnut blogger called The Raving Atheist, who claims that atheism is "provable" and "true."

Where are all the others? Name them. Quote their statements to the effect that atheism has been "proved" to be true and theism "proved" false.

I don't understand the distinction some commenters are making between the natural and the supernatural. I would say the actual distinction is between the real and the imaginary. For example if and when evidence is found indicating that angels are real, science can study them and use them to explain certain observations just as science does with other strange things like neutrinos.

Now, you are free to explain natural phenomena by invoking supernatural forces, and you can even call it science all you want (so far as I am aware, there is no law, natural or un, against it). But it won't be science.

That is because, if I am not mistaken, you are effectively working within a Kuhn paradigm where the definition of "science" is not merely the postulating and refuting of hypotheses with empirical testing, but an overarching system of the naturalistic.

True 'science' stripped of any philosophical baggage admittedly DOES rely on naturalistic principles to test its hypotheses, but the inverse statement -- that anything naturalistic must be part and parcel of science -- is not self-evident. It's a nice way to shift the goalposts, but it doesn't get us any closer to addressing the debate.

In fact, James B. Shearer has provided us with a demonstration of what this kind of thinking leads to: natural is real, supernatural is unreal and imaginary (my paraphrase). And once that premise is accepted it becomes easy to apply it at any period of time, but that's merely a preferencial bias. The simple fact is that once we start speculating backwards, long before written history apparently, and trying to develop a coherent picture based on patchwork evidence, inference and speculation are de riguer. The process couldn't proceed without them.

But that gets us back into a problem of paradigm thinking -- what if the picture presented is consistent because all acknowledged intepreters thereof are committed in advance to the validity of the framework by which things are interepted? Once again we're back into the metaphysical; I think it's fair to say that a naturalistic explanation incapable of being proven wrong by empirics or witnessed historical accounts is no closer to understanding the 'truth' of what occurred than a supernatural explanation postulating the involvement of a deity somewhere. And if it could be objectively shown that BOTH points of view were quite wrong and some third explanation was actually the 'truth,' which of them came closer to discovering it? Neither; in that case both sets of proponents using their imaginations.

A better question to ask, if the whole discussion weren't so tiresome, would be why those who would depend on supernatural explanations insist on calling their investigations "science". It's because science has been (despite the nonsense by Lewontin, quoted by Buck) wildly successful, compared to other means of investigation, and those investigators seek to associate themselves with its success.

The idea of the scientist as a committed atheistic naturalist -- or at minimum, a dual-minded religious man who checks his metaphysical philosophy at the door of the lab and proceeds with 'currently accepted thinking' thereafter -- is of relatively recent origin. Many of the great scientific discoveries before (roughly) the time of Darwin and Lyle were in fact discovered by persons who did not consider their research and their beliefs to be mutually exclusive domains. That didn't prevent them from engaging in the activity of science, nor does it prevent someone from doing so now so long as the principle of testable hypotheses are upheld.

Or maybe (to pull an example that we are usually taught in low-level science textbooks, and one which by naturalistic accounts happened recently, relative to 4.5 billion years of earth-history) you can present to me the testable, falsifiable hypotheses that show (a) a clear mutual ancestor in the hominid line for both humans and apes and (b) the processes of subsequent divergence that led to the modern forms of both them and us?

Furthermore, the theory of evolution has enormous predictive value -- to name one trivial example, it predicted the growing immunity of bacteria to antibiotics. So saying that it's "metaphysical" is ridiculous. It's as "metaphysical" as the theory of gravity.

The juxtaposition of including this closing comment right after demonstrating just how broad that "predictive value" is in practice, as an attempt to disclaim metaphysical status(!), provided the bulk of my entertainment for the evening.

anaonymouse:

Or maybe (to pull an example that we are usually taught in low-level science textbooks, and one which by naturalistic accounts happened recently, relative to 4.5 billion years of earth-history) you can present to me the testable, falsifiable hypotheses that show (a) a clear mutual ancestor in the hominid line for both humans and apes and (b) the processes of subsequent divergence that led to the modern forms of both them and us?

Scientific "hypotheses" are explanations devised to account for observations of natural phenomena. The "hypothesis" that modern humans and apes have a common ancestor that lived more than 6 million years ago is supported by an overwhelming mass of genetic and paleontological evidence. The "process of divergence" from these ancestral species that led to modern humans and apes is primarily evolution by natural selection. Either of these "hypotheses" could be falsified by, for example, the discovery of overwhelming evidence that the earth is only a few thousand years old. Such a discovery seems highly unlikely, however.

As for your philosophical ramblings, if you really think the epistemic status of purported supernatural agents such as God, Tinkerbell or the Tooth Fairy is equivalent to that of natural phenomena such as rocks, trees and planets, fine. I think the claim is so obviously absurd it's not worth wasting time on.

In fact, James B. Shearer has provided us with a demonstration of what this kind of thinking leads to...

Actually, Shearer has an excellent point, which you have chosen to ignore.

People often refer to things like ESP as "supernatural". But if ESP did exist, it would operate by a set of rules which, in principle, we could discover and eventually exploit. It would therefore no longer be "supernatural", only a poorly-explored area of the natural world.

Shearer extends this characterization to angels, where I think he goes wrong. Angels (as they are generally imagined) would be an example of the truly supernatural---beings (or forces) who operate by no knowable (not just known) rules. And the reason they are not knowable is that supernatural forces make their own rules, by definition, or else they are not supernatural.

(I was going to say something like, "I feel silly discussing, in effect, how many angels can dance on the head of a pin." But the reason this is a cliche of futility is not because angels do not exist, but because the answer is, "as many as damn well want to." Being supernatural, they are in no way constrained by the size of the pin.)

A truly supernatural event would stand alone, having no precedent and apparently no cause. Multiple, similar events would not be related in any knowable way (except that they occurred), nor would they repeat in a way such that a pattern could be discerned.

If they did, they would not be supernatural, and instead we would call them, say, the laws of quantum mechanics, rather than God.

Actually, Shearer has an excellent point, which you have chosen to ignore.

Beg your pardon, what did I ignore? As far as I know the only presence I am deliberately ignoring is that of Don P (he may or may not have valid points to make, but I am not interested in entertaining his variety of general intellectual dishonesty today). Near as I can tell Mr. Shearer is offering that things which cannot be naturally observed effectively don't exist. As near as I can tell, you are arguing that he picked a bad example but really he made a bad statement: If something existed in the supernatural, we could neither confirm nor deny its existence with empirics. Real versus unreal is not the question because we would be trying to prove a negative. I think our views coincide there. But then let's take this:

A truly supernatural event would stand alone, having no precedent and apparently no cause. Multiple, similar events would not be related in any knowable way (except that they occurred), nor would they repeat in a way such that a pattern could be discerned.

That statement, only slightly altered, could just as readily apply to any historical event that was not carefully documented by an observer. We can infer and speculate on how things got that way using the available evidences, but the strength of our conclusions will depend, first, on whatever limitations (known or otherwise) apply to the evidence; and second, whatever underlying assumptions we used to get there.

The dilemma is in the weightings. Any given historical scenario will require using some evidence and some assumptions, but how much of each? Let me defend that with two examples. First, Dan's murder scenario from earlier:

Here's an parallel example: a woman is found dead, with a bullet-shaped lump of lead in the middle of a large wound in her head. The lump of lead has markings on it consistent with a specific handgun; the handgun was found in the hand of a man standing near the woman, with powder burns on his hand.

(Would that the evidence for origins were anything as clear-cut or recent as the scenario described! Dan would have done better to use a forensics case where a partial skull is found with an apparent bulletwound or some such. OTOH those are not always solved to the satisfaction of a court for obvious reasons, and either way the whole thing could be flipped around to ends he might like less: our knowledge that bullets do not normally materialize in the skulls of healthy people is taken as evidence that an intelligent entity was involved in putting one there.)

The described murder scenario is a beautiful example of a hypothesis weighted almost exclusively toward evidence. The event has occurred very recently, which ensures that all or most relevant evidence is preserved, and minimizes our need to infer about what could have transpired to alter the picture from what it "seems" to be. Evidence-Action-Consequence links, previously demonstrated by almost indefinite amounts of prior empirical observation, are available to seal the case. It is virtually airtight.

But what of the arisal of life in a past mainly undocumented save by geologic deposit and fossils? To take another example, consider the general pattern of life. The whole realm separates into classifications based on distinct sets of traits. Within these classifications are a great deal of variation, but the whole of life does not resemble a web. I can think of a couple ways this could be construed as "exactly what evolution predicts," but that's a testament to the theory's maleable explanatory power, not a falsifiable hypothesis. Equally perplexing is that this separation is largely upheld in the fossil record, i.e. the historical evidence. Darwin lamented the absence of countless thousands of transitionals and rightly noted it was perhaps a stronger objection that could be raised against his theory; thousands of fossil finds later and after many paleontological advances, the record still partitions this way, and some amazing speculation has arisen to explain it. (There is quite a bit of obfuscation on this point whenever the science is presented to the laypublic -- note John Rennie's response on the fossil objection in "15 Answers to Creationist Nonsense," Scientific American, July 2002. Note the abstract language of his dismissal; I daresay that, of the types he abstractly hand-waves, he couldn't name more than ten or twenty fossils that clearly fall outside of obvious taxonomic classification. Considering the available cast numbers to tens of thousands, that would not be impressive.) We find Gould & Eldredge proposing 'punctuated equllibrium,' for example. Richard Dawkins, in The Blind Watchmaker, recasts the punctuated equillibrium postulate (to convincing effect) as being an interpretation of fossil patterns left when advancing populations migrated away from less-advanced host populations. (I think I've got the broad outline correct, it's been a couple years since I read the book.)

The problem is that neither Gould & Eldredge nor Dawkins can demonstrate that their hypothetical is actually the way things occurred. That is to say, something like Dawkins' population migrations could be unvarnished fact or they could merely be the sort of fiction one dreams after having too much fried food and ale at the local pub. Intermediate forms ought to be a rule in the historical record if diversification arose in any manner comparable to the one that is presented as 'fact' even in elementary school science texts. That they are not tells us assumptions are being given great weight, which is nothing even comparable to the murder scenario we had earlier. This approach is eminently reasonable, from a rationalist point of view, but it does not make the naturalistic scenario any more probable than the concept that a deity was involved somewhere. With respect to the life-record, what some ID proponents would like to do instead is treat the separations as real, and see how far they can get on that basis.

There is nothing inherently unscientific about that approach, regardless of what beliefs motivate it. The empirical evidence (fossil record, in this case) remains the same, and the methodology of hypothesize and falsify is the very basis of science. However the assumptions -- which in either case are philosophy and not science -- have obviously changed to non-naturalistic, and for those who cannot break their minds free of a "naturalism IS science" mode of thinking, that is tantamount to heresy, fit only for amusement and periodic spasms of two-minute hate.

Angie Schultz, I am unaware that the popular conception of angels requires them to be all powerful and completely unpredictable. For example doesn't the phrase "on the side of the angels" imply angels have a side? However this is admittedly not something I have studied deeply.

In any case if angels are defined to be all powerful and completely unpredictable then it would seem clear that angels do not exist. For suppose angels exist and suppose I were to jump from a tall building. Since angels are all powerful they could grab me and lower me gently to the ground. Since angels are completely unpredictable it can not be safely predicted that they will not save me. However sadly experience shows that it is safe to predict that angels will not intervene in this case. So angels must not exist. More generally it would seem supernatural beings are either 1) not all powerful, 2) reluctant to intervene in the material world or 3) nonexistent.

anony-mouse, yes I would say supernatural beings which exist on some other plane of existence and never affect our world effectively do not exist. Is this controversial?

Doesn't the theory of Intelligent Design postulate beings which have affected the course of events in our world?

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