Is the Religification of Science Damaging Its Progress?

[Jimmy Snyder]

When fighting the enemy, be careful not to become the enemy.

We have met the enemy, and he is us. Walt Kelly.

 

[Evo]

The point was: he didnt publish any ID papers, thus the 70 or so papers he did publish in peer reviewed scientific journals, were not about ID. He wrote a book though.

Not just papers, he also gave lectures on ID.

ISU professor argues for intelligent design
By William Dillon, Staff Writer
09/29/2005

CEDAR FALLS - Iowa State University Assistant Professor Guillermo Gonzalez was welcomed by a standing room-only crowd in Cedar Falls Wednesday, but his lecture on intelligent design in science was delivered to many already devoutly critical of the theory.

Gonzalez used the first 45 minutes of the Sigma Xi lecture to explain the theory of intelligent design, as well as his own theory that says the link between the conditions required for life and the conditions required for doing science on Earth are inference for design.

http://www.midiowanews.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=15300882&BRD=2700&PAG=461&dept_id=554188&rfi=8

Lists of his ID writings http://www.discovery.org/scripts/vi...y=author&searchType=all&includeBlogPosts=true

 

[PIT2]

One of the first questions of the night came from Hector Avalos, an ISU associate professor of religious studies and firm believer against the idea of intelligent design in science.

After the lecture, Gonzalez admitted he was "a little intimidated" to see Avalos at the public lecture. Avalos has invited Gonzalez numerous times to participate in a forum debate on the topic of intelligent design.
http://www.midiowanews.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=15300882&BRD=2700&PAG=461&dept_id=554188&rfi=8

Thats from the same source.

 

[BobG]

The opening post concerned the unfounded claim that Gonzales doesn't understand the scientific proces.

But as for Gonzales' credentials:

A distinguished science professor at a major American university has weighed in on Iowa State University's denial of tenure to pro-ID astronomer Guillermo Gonzalez, expressing astonishment at the result. According to Dr. Robert J. Marks, Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Baylor University:


Quote:
I went to the Web of Science citation index which is the authority on citations. Only journal papers, not conference papers, are indexed. There are lots of Prof. Gonzalez's papers listed. My jaw dropped when I saw one of his papers has 153 citations and 139 on another. I have sat on oodles of tenure committees at both a large private university and a state research university, chaired the university tenure committee, and have seen more tenure cases than the Pope has Cardinals. This is a LOT of citations for an assistant professor up for tenure. The number of citations varies with discipline and autocitations are included in the tally, but this is a LOT of citations for an Assistant Professor. A lot.

The Iowa State U. Astronomy department is here. Their big star is Lee Anne Willson, University Professor. A University Professor is a rank more prestigious than a full Professor. She is their star. Her top two papers are cited 99 and 86 times. And she has been at this for 33 years.

And then there's Steven D. Kawaler, a full Professor who is the Current Program Coordinator for astronomy. He has a nice citation record with tops of 243 and 178.

There may be reasons I don't understand for denying Prof. Gonzalez tenure, but scholarship is absolutely not one of them.

http://www.evolutionnews.org/2007/05...resses_as.html

I'm not sure how the citation numbers work. I know in the past, groups have been able to trash google and yahoo searches so that the first several pages are saturated with pro/con pages of the group (just search for Guillermo Gonzalez and see how many pro-ID sites pop up for one example).

Just running through the 176 citations of one of Gonzalez's articles, 34 were by a group of 3 (Santos, Israelian, & Mayor), 13 by Gonzalez himself, and 13 by a group with Debra Fischer. I didn't go through all of the names, but just counted a few that stuck out as being very common. That doesn't seem like the numbers are being manipulated to me, but I don't know what's normal. It wouldn't take more than a dozen people to inflate a person's citation numbers.

If Gonzalez was turned down because of his ID views, he wouldn't be the first professor to at least draw a lot closer scrutiny of his work because of an unpopular view. Ward Churchill was discovered to have falsified information, plagiarized the work of others, and improperly reported the results of studies, plus was found to be disrepectful of Indian oral traditions. His years of research misconduct went unnoticed until he compared victims of 9/11 to Nazis.

I'd be surprised if Gonzalez's association with ID had no impact at all in his being denied tenure. I'm not even sure that's unreasonable in spite of a university's desire to have its evaluations be seen as based solely on objective criteria. The image a professor gives a university has a real impact and it's a tough call balancing between protected speech and the monetary impact a highly visible professor can have on a university. It does diminish the air of academic freedom to the same level as any other institution that has to balance a checkbook.

 

[Evo]

Thats from the same source.

In other words Gonzales was caught "with his pants down"! I'm sure finding a professor that works in the same University that you work at showing up at a talk aimed at pushing Intelligent Design as science was his worst nightmare.

 

[arunma]

Interesting thread, mostly because it's close to home for me. I am a graduate student at the ISU physics department. In fact I'm in one of the astrophysics groups, and I just realized (after looking it up on the website) that Professor Gonzalez's office is just a few doors down from mine! Strangely, however, virtually everyone on this thread is more knowledgeable about this whole thing than I am. Aside from a short blurb in the local newspaper, this is actually the first I'm hearing about all this. Heck, I've never even met Professor Gonzalez.

Anyway, in regards to the OP. I agree that there's a sort of "religification" of science, but it rarely comes from scientists. Religious or otherwise, I've found that scientists tend to understand the abilities and limitations of science, and they don't treat it as a religion. There is, however, a growing number of non-scientists who have a strong interest in science. While I welcome interest in science, I've found that some people tend to get the idea that science can fulfill the same societal role as religion. Usually I just leave these people to their own devices, since they'll eventually discover the folly of such an approach. It is, however, unfortunate that such individuals give the general public the idea that science is some sort of comprehensive guide to the human condition.

As to the claim that Gonzalez doesn't understand science, all I have to say is that if someone has earned a scientific PhD, you'll have a hard time convincing me that said person doesn't understand science. Might he be misapplying science? Maybe, though seeing as how I'm not familiar with Professor Gonzalez's work, I really can't offer any meaningful comment either way. But I don't doubt that the professor understands science.

Alas, I probably won't get away without at least commenting on Intelligent Design. Personally I'm a religious person. I have a near-perfect church attendance record (for whatever that's worth), and if not for the fact that I believe in evolution, there are those who might call me "fundamentalist." What I'm trying to say is that I obviously have no difficulty with the idea of a divine Creator. The problem I see with ID, however, is that it's extremely ill-defined. Does ID say that the Earth is 6,000 years old? Does ID deny the observable process of biological evolution? Or does it merely make a theological pronouncement that God is responsible for creation? I'm not really sure, and not because I haven't done my homework. I've posed these questions to ID-proponents, and I never get a straight answer. Apparently, ID has a different meaning to different people. So how can we formulate ID as valid science when we can't even agree on precisely what ID is? And then there's the more important question: precisely how does one do research into ID? The very notion of doing ID research is not very favorable to religious people. It suggests that our level of religious faith should be based on our current scientific understanding. I doubt that the saints and theologians of old (=before the existence of science) would have agreed with such an approach.

So for those who didn't read everything I wrote above, here's the short version. Yes, some people do turn science into a religion, but not through any fault of scientists. No, Professor Gonzalez does not misunderstand science. And Intelligent Design = not good.

 

[Evo]

Hi arumna, thanks for that.

It seems Gonzales just does not meet the minimum criteria for tenure.

Aside from that, he is a driving force in a society who's goal is to undermine science.

The Discovery Institute Goals (of which Gonzales is a senior member) their "Wedge" document clearly states their purpose.

Governing Goals

To defeat scientific materialism and its destructive moral, cultural and political legacies.

To replace materialistic explanations with the theistic understanding that nature and human beings are created by God.

The social consequences of materialism have been devastating. As symptoms, those consequences are certainly worth treating. However, we are convinced that in order to defeat materialism, we must cut it off at its source. That source is scientific materialism. This is precisely our strategy. If we view the predominant materialistic science as a giant tree, our strategy is intended to function as a "wedge" that, while relatively small, can split the trunk when applied at its weakest points. The very beginning of this strategy, the "thin edge of the wedge," was Phillip ]ohnson's critique of Darwinism begun in 1991 in Darwinism on Trial, and continued in Reason in the Balance and Defeatng Darwinism by Opening Minds. Michael Behe's highly successful Darwin's Black Box followed Johnson's work. We are building on this momentum, broadening the wedge with a positive scientific alternative to materialistic scientific theories, which has come to be called the theory of intelligent design (ID). Design theory promises to reverse the stifling dominance of the materialist worldview, and to replace it with a science consonant with Christian and theistic convictions.

http://www.public.asu.edu/~jmlynch/idt/wedge.html

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

The problem I see with ID, however, is that it's extremely ill-defined. Does ID say that the Earth is 6,000 years old? Does ID deny the observable process of biological evolution? Or does it merely make a theological pronouncement that God is responsible for creation?

In spite of its name, Intelligent Design is not the theory that there is intelligent design in the universe. If it were, every scientist would have to be considered a proponent willy nilly by virtue of their search for the design. ID is the theory that the universe was designed by an intelligent being. If you have not heard this definition before, you are hearing it now. It does not say that the Earth is 6,000 years old. It does not deny the observable process of biological evolution. It does not make a theological pronouncement. It does not say that G-d is responsible for creation.

As far as I know, no one has proposed an experiment that would falsify it and as such, it is not science. Love is not science either. There are a variety of individuals with a variety of agendas that have latched onto this theory. To judge a theory, whether it be a scientific theory or otherwise, by the shortcomings of the people who promote it is known as arguing ad hominem.

As I am not a scientist, my personal view of ID may not be of much interest to you. However, for the record, I do not see as much design in the universe as scientists do. I see a great beauty, simplicity, symmetry, and intelligence in the models that scientists have proposed for the understanding of the universe, but when I look at the universe, I see error bars. As time goes on and scientific theories improve, those error bars shrink, but they don't go away. I imagine that see a fundamental chaos at the center. This means I have no reason to believe that there was an intelligent designer.

 

[arunma]

In spite of its name, Intelligent Design is not the theory that there is intelligent design in the universe. If it were, every scientist would have to be considered a proponent willy nilly by virtue of their search for the design. ID is the theory that the universe was designed by an intelligent being. If you have not heard this definition before, you are hearing it now. It does not say that the Earth is 6,000 years old. It does not deny the observable process of biological evolution. It does not make a theological pronouncement. It does not say that G-d is responsible for creation.

Actually I have heard that definition before. My main problem is that I've also heard several other definitions of ID. To some people it is six-day young Earth creationism, to others it is a more relaxed form of creationism, and then there's the Raelian version of ID.

As far as I know, no one has proposed an experiment that would falsify it and as such, it is not science. Love is not science either. There are a variety of individuals with a variety of agendas that have latched onto this theory. To judge a theory, whether it be a scientific theory or otherwise, by the shortcomings of the people who promote it is known as arguing ad hominem.

Yes I agree. But then, I'm not judging ID. If anyone were to ask me my opinion on ID, I think the best response I could give would be "inconclusive." At least classical creationism can be easily refuted by the near-indisputable evidence for biological evolution and other related phenomena. But ID is just too vague. Again, I'm all for saying that God created the universe. I wouldn't even mind teaching it in school (maybe that's why some people call me a fundamentalist), though in some sort of a religion class of course, not a science class. But how do you scientifically prove that God created the universe? This, I think, is the testable hypothesis that ID people have failed to provide.

Perhaps religious scientists should stop trying to push ID, and just address the issue of religion more often. After all, I doubt that anyone would complain about scientists saying that God exists and that people should obey him. After all, we in America pride ourselves in upholding the ethic of religious freedom. The problem here is not that some scientists are religious, but that some scientists may be advocating pseudoscience. Besides that, the ultimate goal of most religious people is to sway the non-religious to become religious. ID just seems like a highly circuitous way of accomplishing this.

As I am not a scientist, my personal view of ID may not be of much interest to you. However, for the record, I do not see as much design in the universe as scientists do. I see a great beauty, simplicity, symmetry, and intelligence in the models that scientists have proposed for the understanding of the universe, but when I look at the universe, I see error bars. As time goes on and scientific theories improve, those error bars shrink, but they don't go away. I imagine that see a fundamental chaos at the center. This means I have no reason to believe that there was an intelligent designer.

Actually, until the penultimate sentence of this paragraph, I agree with you. Granted, I'm a rather strange physicist, since most physicists see immense symmetry in nature. But to be perfectly honest, I find physics to be one of the more dubious of the sciences. Sciences like biology and chemistry have theories that are built on observation (i.e. you can see evolution through the fossil record, you can observe DNA, etc.). In physics, however, it's necessary to make educated guesses, until you stumble on one that predicts accurate results. Much like you, all I see is a bunch of error bars.

Now, by no means do I dislike physics. To be clear, I enjoy physics very much, and I wouldn't want to be in any other discipline (which is a good thing, since I'll be investing the next five years of my life to get my PhD in the subject!). But I wouldn't be surprised if half of all the models in physics turn out to be flat out wrong.

 

[Pythagorean]

Someday you guys will have to explain to me

1) why the crap posts get so many replies.
2) why they're not locked.

Best way to learn on PF: make a ridiculous claim so that people will vehemently prove their point to you (and thus, teach you).

Best way to not get limited (or no) responses: ask a question

 

[arunma]

Best way to learn on PF: make a ridiculous claim so that people will vehemently prove their point to you (and thus, teach you).

Best way to not get limited (or no) responses: ask a question

Well, in my last post I suggested that physics is all a bunch of lies. Have at it!

 

[moe darklight]

well I haven't read the ENTIRE thread, since it's growing like a fungus. but my opinion on the original post is pretty simple (this goes in general):

1) if the professor in question teaches a subject where his teachings would be infected by ID (like biology), then it would be ridiculous to hire him obviously.

2) if the professor is to teach an unrelated subject (chemistry, computer engineering), then I don't see a problem. He might be very knowledgeable on his specific area, regardless of his ignorance in another. It's the same as hiring an English professor who knows nothing of quantum mechanics, it shouldn't make a difference as long as he knows whatever he's teaching.

 

[Jimmy Snyder]

Actually I have heard that definition before. My main problem is that I've also heard several other definitions of ID. To some people it is six-day young Earth creationism, to others it is a more relaxed form of creationism, and then there's the Raelian version of ID.

If you call a tail a leg, how many legs does a cow have?

Yes I agree. But then, I'm not judging ID.

Sorry, that finger pointing stuff was not at you.

I find physics to be one of the more dubious of the sciences. Sciences like biology and chemistry have theories that are built on observation (i.e. you can see evolution through the fossil record, you can observe DNA, etc.). In physics, however, it's necessary to make educated guesses, until you stumble on one that predicts accurate results. Much like you, all I see is a bunch of error bars.

You go too far for my taste. I think physics is the best game in town. It is nature, not physics that has those error bars. In physics, they are shrunk smaller than they are in any other science. As for physics not being built on observation, I'm afraid I don't even know what you mean. Although the story of how Galileo dropped the balls off of the tower of Pisa is well known, I think the story of how he figured out the inverse square law is a better one to show how observation works in physics and more generally in science.

 

[Chi Meson]

Well, in my last post I suggested that physics is all a bunch of lies. Have at it!

Did you? I'm not sure if you understood your post at all! :sarcasm smiley: joking!

Seriously, being incorrect is not the same as lying. Being aware that models and theories could be incorrect is part of a responsible scientific attitude.

In light of recent posts, my opinion on the scientist in question has modified. While one may be able to follow established rules (set by the scientific community) in order to publish research papers in responsible, peer-reviewed journals, this does not itself prove that the scientist "understands the scientific process." But if that scientist can repeatedly publish papers that are cited and supported by a significant percentage of the scientific community, then the probability that this scientist "understands" the scientific process grows proportionally.

The problem I see with ID "as a science," is the response to the question "if a larger being created the universe, what created the creator?" The responses are of two kinds: "it is something that we cannot understand/something that is beyond us" and/or "the creator has always been there."

But these two responses can be applied to our scientific models BEFORE the insertion of "a creator." If ID folks truly thought that ID is science, then they should see that the scientific attitude should preclude such an insertion.

 

[Evo]

This seems to be a good place to end this thread.