I have recently personally gained a number of very significant enemies in the last few years regarding ID - especially among the members of the "Discovery Institute" (
http://www.discovery.org/).
This is mainly because I have repeated toy describe them as a "fanatical religious cult", but oddly my only written ideas on this subject have been mainly I have been made within Australia.
While I do see there seems a fair balance of contributors, I am slightly concerned with the merits of what is aimed to be achieved here.
If, as Glen argues, we should be respectful of those holding "faith" views that cannot be validated in the physical world?
Should we not be instead informing and educating the genuine scientific views of the world based on available empirical evidence.
Perhaps, the opposite is true. Shouldn't those with "non-faith" positions have the very same respect from the ID'ers ?
Perhaps you might like to read the ID'ers view of teaching evolution ann ID in schools at
http://www.discovery.org/csc/scienceEducation/, under the article "Teaching About Evolution in the Public Schools: A Short Summary of the Law."?
As towards my own personal stand against ID, some of my views are;
For me, many of those who hold the views of
intelligent design (ID) are just religious extremists hell-bent on bamboozling the average Joe to enter into a second dark-age of ignorance and intolerance and are against genuine understanding of human social advancement or the human condition. Concerning to me is that if they do gain a strangle-hold in the Western-world, it is almost believable that they would soon derail the honest gains of science and be willing to take extreme measures against those who disagree - on the dubious grounds of heresy. (Think of Joan of Arc here)
The ID's say as their main caveat;
"
We are skeptical of claims for the ability of random mutation and natural selection to account for the complexity of life. Careful examination of the evidence for Darwinian theory should be encouraged,"
However, their agenda is broader, being in fact almost against anything in science have the word "evolution" associated with it. Ie. Cosmology, stellar evolution, astronomy, biology, psychology, and even animal and human physiology.
They also believe that the metaphysical constrains on the science makes them off limits to their religious views.
One specific example is about
stellar evolution - mainly to claiming it is wrong mainly because the Bible says "the stars are the same age". If you inspect a number of their web-sites - although indeed the biological and human evolution are attacked with some vigour - and so are those who adhering to stellar evolution.
Simply, compared to Darwinism, stellar evolution is probably beyond any real question - we see changes in variable stars all the time. So much so, that if the present theories were so wrong we would have to return to believe he Earth-centred system and just start again! The problem is that the Discovery Institute ACTUALLY BELIEVES that the Earth is 6000 years old, which was said to be started in 4004 B.C. (23rd Oct, 9pm) as calculated by Bishop Usher in the 15th Century. They say; Evolution must be wrong - whether you agree to it or not - because the evolutionary process cannot take less than 6 000 years. All observational and scientific evidence points clearly to the fact that the Earth is very much more than 6 000 years old.
Regarding the creation and nature of the stars, sun, moon and the heavens are often quoted by ID's from Genesis. Interestingly, there are revealed in the Bible with Matthew, Mark and Revelation about the biblical view of the nature of the sun, moon and stars. Those who believe in these aspects of eschatology during arrival of the so-called Great Apostasy, also agree Matthew 24:29; "
...that the Sun will be, darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven." This is also repeated in Mark 13:24; "
...the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light."
[The literal interpretation is also interesting. If we look in Isaiah 30:26, which says the same thing, it is said "
The light of the moon shall be as the light of the Sun", suggesting that the the light of the moon does comes by reflection of light from the sun. What is also interesting is there are 12 references to the moon and its light being extinguished, and 29 references for the stars to do the same.]
From these two earlier quotes, it is clearly sunlight will weaken in the last days, and this is often quoted as having an understanding of the geometry Earth, Sun and the Moon. However, what is not right, is that the stars falling from heaven is not even remotely possible.
ID's have no alternative, if the literal writing of the Bible is accepted,that this is true, but clearly the real world just isn't like this. If the sun is claimed to stop shining by natural processes (stellar evolution) in these remarks, then for it to do so would take more than one million years to do so just from the stored amount radiant heat held in the sun. Others in the 19th Century considered this as indication that the sunlight here was going to be extinguished by an interstellar nebula, like the Orion Nebula. Unfortunately, the density of these clouds is not great, and it was calculated by the late-cosmologist Fred Hoyle, that if this happened the sun would drop in brightness by 0.05% - thus not really noticeable!
So in my iew, either the ID is correct, or the whole science of astronomy is just a lie!
Another of my interests is the apocrypha book of Enoch; the deemed "secret", missing or hidden book. It is interesting to me that this once popular book was slowly hidden by the Christian Church because of the views on the structure and nature of the Heavens. The book was simply eliminated because it describes the geocentric view of the Universe - the Earth being the centre of all - holding the Aristotle's universe as being God's word. It is also the basis of the Catholic views on the order in Heaven of the angels, archangels, saints, etc.
From Enoch's point of view of God, everything is in a natural and supernatural order, mirroring the relationships between the old feudal pecking order of the god-given social need of authority over the whole population and the controlling means of a huge descending social order of any master to his servant(s).
(Some, for example like, the Jehovah's Witnesses have extended this to the 144,000 of them reigning with God - 12,000 from each of Israel's Twelve tribes - who will be the as deemed authorities 'rulers' over all those saved in heaven who will live in the presumed New Earth.)
It is the very essence of imposing one's religion on the rest of humanity, and the traditional means of religious control of the church on the state. From this view, The Bible is not only a religious or theistic book but a political one - and cleverly written. The text is the basis on the moral and humanistic control of individuals via a minority by the 'adherents to the faith', that cannot be challenged without eternal retribution from a presumed ruler in an unseen metaphysical realm.
This is the clearest example of improper interference by the Church is the imposing humanistic control on Christianity. If the ID followers want us to follow the absolute written interpretation of the Bible, then why cover up the book of Enoch (and other apocryphal books) when it clearly holds the wrong view of the cosmology of the world? Ie. If this is deemed not to be true, as it was by the Romans representing the Church in 324AD, then how can one accept the book of Genesis as being correct. Who decides that one book is based on the true doctrine and another is not?
ID or not ID, is that a real Question?
ID and Some Christian On Astronomy
Astronomy (ID Interpretation) On-line Resources
.
no prob alex 
even i fell off the rails (to coin a phrase) a few times. it happens. we thrown all sorts of obstacles in our lives and hopefully by the time we are adults we can distinguish right from wrong.
