These are great comments. They actually dovetail in quite nicely with the way my re-write of this lesson is going. I especially your point about explaining the design inference in more detail and then applying it towards the study of the hurricane (along with the scriptural support for God’s sovereignty over the atmosphere) to “reform the godless science of naturalistic meteorology”! Truly demonstrating absurdity by being absurd!

I’m also using the example of Newton invoking intelligent design when faced with the complexities of celstial mechanics (how the planetary orbits remain stable when each tugs on the others as they make their way around the sun) to demonstrate how ID is a “science stopper” — even for the most brilliant scientists. Of course, when LaPlace picked up where Newton left off (using the calculus that Newton himself invented), he found the answer to the problem.

I was on the fence about the chemistry thing, but it looks like it should stay.

I want to add a few more comments. Great analogy about the periodic table! Make sure to keep that part, and maybe even draw out a little more emphasis on how our knowledge of chemistry is not helped in the least by simply detracting from the controversy over the standard theory.

I think in this video you assume way too much about what the average person knows about Intelligent Design. You need to explain, briefly, what they mean by “irreducible complexity” and possibly another term or two. Many people’s reactions, who haven’t studied this stuff, will be like that of my wife — “you dont’ believe in intelligent design any more?” It will be helpful to explain more explicitly that the doctrine of providence requires God at some level to be the intelligence behind the creation, but the Intelligent Design Movement (IDM) makes the hypothesis that God is the scientific explanation behind certain items in the created world.

And oh, by the way, if the Intelligent Designer is only clearly responsible for some of those more irreducibly complex structures, does that mean that all the rest were created by blind, purposeless chance? This is the philosophical bankruptcy of ID, that it minimizes God’s providence in most of creation in order to highlight it in only a few chosen examples.

You said something like: “since ID is used in biology, it should also be useful in meteorology too, shouldn’t it?” My first reaction was, “No, that’s a non sequitur.” Just because one scientific or philosophical paradigm works in one field, it wouldn’t necessarily apply the same in another. I think you made a pretty good case for it, however, pointing out the ID characteristics of a hurricane, but fundamentally I don’t think ID is a necessary requirement to each and every scientific field, any more than gene duplication is.

Now, another good point that you made which could overcome the above logical deficiency, is that the Bible itself describes weather in overtly theological terms. Give some examples of God creating the hurricane, the wind, the rain. Maybe the better way to approach it is a more mild form of “Let’s see what happens when we apply the ID philosophy to other scientific fields”, coupled with, “Look, taking the Bible overly literal as a scientific textbook seems to require Intelligent Design in meteorology, just like in biology. Let’s see if it makes sense. And by the way, why aren’t the ID folks concerned about reforming this godless science with the ID hypothesis, as much as they are concerned about reforming biology?” (It’s the same argument made elsewhere about geocentricity and why Christians aren’t concerned about the integrity of the Bible in those passages any more).

You’ve got it, Gordon. I have the same “flamethrower” tendency as well. I would add to your point that your audience is also those who simply do not know about these issues.

I think you’re at your best when you are congenial, smiling, and in the same breath laying waste to the other side intellectually.

I’m starting to think that lessons 10-14, which all have to do with evolution as science, and special creation as a folk-science (or pseudo-science), should be handled differently. Taking Jul’s concern from the previous post, I could start with the basic premise of evolution vs. special creation — much the way lesson 10 is now, but then move through the historic devlopments and show that as more and more is discovered, special creation becomes less and less tenable. The recent science of molecular genetics makes it all but irrelavent in the laboratory.

Then I could employ the tactic mentioned earlier: “look at how ID is playing on your fears of naturalism to keep your children 150 years behind the secular world when it comes to the life sciences”…etc… Wouldn’t it be better to deal with the difficult questions up front, prepare our children for sucessfull scientific careers, and send them out into the world with the credibility to be a part of whatever comes next? And we can still do this within the context of the Christian worldview education.

(Run for your lives, it’s my inner pedant!) Quakers aren’t technophobes. Maybe you’re thinking of the Amish?

Sort of like that nasty e-mail that you know you’ll never send, but you write it anyway and just keep it in your outbox for a few days

I don’t have the stones for that. I’d be way too scared of accidentally hitting send.

As I work on the final script, I’ll be incorporating these ideas.

God’s hand be on your thoughts and work.

But, as I am contantly reminded, those folks really are not my primary audience. Bill Dembski is not going to walk away from ID just because some unknown person makes a 7 min case against it. I’m sure he does very well for himself capitalizing on the ignorance of theists who have been led to believe that secular biology is godless. And me? I may as well be selling electrical appliances to Quakers!

No, my primary audience are folks who are on the fence. They are believers first and foremost, but might be uncomfortable with the rhetoric and combative tone that the various forms of creationism take with mainstream science. As good as it “feels” to turn the flame thrower on full blast, burning somebody to a crisp isn’t always the best to way to win an argument, even though “flame throwing” is my natural tendency.

My first few drafts of BTF were pretty harsh. My original part 4 had to be completely scrapped after I had already considered the manuscript complete. And that was after my own reviewers had already helped me to tone it down!

But like my cathartic buzzers of Lesson 8, starting out at the keyboard with “how I really feel” can sometimes calibrate my emotions for the final product. Sort of like that nasty e-mail that you know you’ll never send, but you write it anyway and just keep it in your outbox for a few days while you calm down and think about what really needs to be said.

There are a lot good comments here. As I work on the final script, I’ll be incorporating these ideas.

Gordon, I think the strength of you case lies in what you GIVE people rather than what you take away. You are giving a new narrative for Genesis- the ANE model. I can work with that, I can chew on that. You are also giving a historical narrative that illuminates the mistakes that our Christian forefathers have made in regard to scientific discoveries. Now I can relate myself to them. I can understand how and why they were mistaken and yet this does not undermine their Christian credibility in my mind. That makes it easier for me to realize that I’ve made these mistake too.

Now when you do need to take something away, like the notion of a young earth or the option of ID, you need build for your audience a theological narrative in its place. Explaining how our faith was never to be in creationism or origin theories but in the Sovereign Lord of creation. I know your theology and love of the God is strong. Point folks to the gospel as they wrestle with big adjustments in their understanding of beginnings. Show them how we needn’t throw away the baby with the bathwater. Remind them of the history narrative. Oh yeah, a heliocentric universe didn’t bring a death blow to Christianity. Maybe old earth evolution is just like that. Help folks digest this in a palatable way.

I’m not sure anyone needs to be the “enemy,” some folks deeply believe that faith falls apart if evolution is true. Give them a new narrative for without it they must hold tight to the old. Of course, I realize that some of this will come in Lesson 15 and I do look forward to reading that transcript. First and last impressions are very critical.

Have a great vacation.
Jul

I like what others have mentioned…

“expose on the irrationality of the philosophy of the people they learned it from”

“less offensive to treat the audience as victims of someone else’s misguided crusade”

… really, the average evangelical is not doing ID “research” or writing Answers in Genesis articles. The average evangelical is looking for answers about creation and evolution, he believes the Bible is true, and he is bothered by evolution, because it doesn’t seem to make sense in the context of Genesis. So the ID crowd comes along, gives him an alternative that they say is “scientifically sound,” and he goes for it. No fault of his own really, only a regular person trying to follow God the best he can, trying to hold true to the scriptures.

So your job Gordon, is not to beat down on the average, misguided evangelical, but to reveal the deception of the ID crowd. So to your audience you will need to appear and ally, and you will, in one sense, need to portray the ID crowd as the “enemy,” no the audience.

Important Note: I use the word “enemy” with great caution, because in the grand scheme of things, the ID crowd, even the YEC people, are still brothers and sisters in Christ. I would be very saddened if we took an “us versus them” position that divided our fellowship in the kingdom of God. However, in the context of science, I believe that ID theory is very much an enemy to good evolutionary theory and science. The reality is that the ID crowd is trying to discredit an established and important scientific theory, and even attack the character of the scientific community. And I cannot abide by that.