Intelligent Design the Future

The website is beautifully -um- designed. Dembski's article is sure to shake the methodological materialist foundation of science. Just how exactly he wants to do science instead, is not clear.

It is not a problem that the site does not allow for comments, the arguments are so silly, they speak against themselves.

People who want to comment can link to IDtheFuture threads (i.e., set up discussions at ARN, ISCID, here, or at their own blogs). When our blog was being set up, we looked at the rather messy and content-light comments sections of various blogs, and realized that no IDthefuture contributor was going to volunteer for the unspeakably dull task of babysitting -- excuse me, "moderating" -- the comments.

Paul, how can you claim that it would be too difficult to do if you have never tried it?

Given the "open discussion" rhetoric that often comes from the C(R)SC, I figure that y'all would be willing to put in the effort to allow readers to comment.

I tried it, as one of the original moderators of the ARN discussion board. I had to set aside 90 minutes or more daily to read threads and respond to complaints, pleas to be have posting privileges restored, you name it. Tee-dee-ous. Anyone who has ever worked as a moderator knows exactly what I'm talking about.

Look, we debated the issue of comments or no-comments extensively, knowing that a no-comments policy would draw instant criticism, as it has. ;-) But given the choice of no blog versus a blog with no comments, we opted for the latter, hoping that the quality of the posts would draw readers anyway. I've got posts in draft form about Sahotra Sarkar's recent lectures on ID at the University of Chicago, irreducible complexity in the literature 10 years before Darwin's Black Box, Simon Conway Morris's recent thinking on ID, and so on. Good stuff. The community of people who care about ID, pro and con, is small enough that we all know where to go to have a chin-wag, if that's what we crave. Like here, for instance.

But you can be sure I'm glad I don't have to read all the comments here to look for craziness and offensive material.

I tried it, as one of the original moderators of the ARN discussion board. I had to set aside 90 minutes or more daily to read threads and respond to complaints, pleas to be have posting privileges restored, you name it. Tee-dee-ous. Anyone who has ever worked as a moderator knows exactly what I'm talking about.

— Nelson

Now -- here's an inadvertant example of what I'm saying. I just double-posted accidentally and need to plead with someone to delete the first of the posts (I took the opportunity to correct a typo and add an emphasis). Sorry!

And I'm ignoring your plea. See how not hard that was.

God forbid that Paul Nelson has yet more distractions, like moderating and contributing to a blog, that would delay publication of his masterpiece, On Common Descent. How's that coming, Paul? Or perhaps we should ask the ID theorists who are citing it?

God forbid that Paul Nelson has yet more distractions, like moderating and contributing to a blog, that would delay publication of his masterpiece, On Common Descent. How's that coming, Paul? Or perhaps we should ask the ID theorists who are citing it?

I've never met Paul Nelson but heard that he is a nice guy. Perhaps he is and I have no problem admitting it if he is. However, his assertion that their new blog contains good stuff makes one pause. This new blog with its so "modest" title opens with a post from Dembski wherein the Isaac Newton of information theory maintains that opponents of ID do not address the essence of ID advocates arguments but only discuss its meeting the definition of science. Really? Does Dembski count on the abject ignorance of his readers, pretending that there is no such books, as, for example Why Intelligent Design Fails where 13 practicing scientists analyze in minute detail the arguments of ID advocates (including Dembski) from the standpoints of their respective expertise? To my knowledge, Dembski is well aware of that anthology, but has never addressed any of the arguments suggested there. Likewise, he never responded to the detailed critique of his "ideas" suggested in many other publications, such as books by Niall Shanks, by myself, papers by Elsberry & Shallit, and multiple posts on TalkDesign, TalkReason, etc, etc, etc...

Of course, anybody familiar with Dembski's habits is hardly surprised by his post with its ridiculous assertions about the lack of substantial critique of ID, as it is just a mild case compared with many other tricks employed by this great mathematician-philosopher-theologian etc, etc, etc (just recall his post to Amazon wherein he anonymously praised his own book as allegedly an unbiased reviewer). In view of that, Nelson's statement about "good stuff" on their new blog sounds rather amusing. Perhaps he is a nice guy to join in a beer, but hardly a very reliable source of substantial information.

I deleted your duplicated comment for you Paul.

PS: Comments are tough. We've more or less gone with minimal moderation here at PT -- sometimes comments are well-reasoned and insightful, sometimes not. Having a login and a spam filter might fit the bill for you guys to minimize the trolling.

Paul, no doubt Dembski was merely jumping the gun when he "challenged" critics to read your manuscript. I am sorry to hear that you have not since overcome your own standards with regards to understanding common descent. Perhaps you have tried discussing your conceptual difficulties with evolutionary biologists? Oh, perhaps even on a blog?

Posts about cosmology/probability move to the bathroom wall.

Reed,

Sorry, I didn't see your request until after I posted. I'll cease and desist, so the discussion about why blogs should have comments can continue.

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Would someone please explain to me what happened to Prof. Davison's post about Leo Berg?

If this "editing" was done by one of the board administrators, I find it utterly inexplicable.

Paul Nelson

Thank you. I spent a lot of time preparing that post.

John A. davison

Paul,
The post on Berg was "disenvoweled" as they say. John Davidson always posts about his "interesting" alternative to evolution no matter what the topic, which is irksome to some. Personally, I find these quite amusing.
Since he always says the same thing, if I don't feel like being amused, I'll just skip it. I think this choice is better left to the readers.

If this "editing" was done by one of the board administrators, I find it utterly inexplicable.

The post on Berg was "disenvoweled" as they say.

Since he always says the same thing, if I don't feel like being amused, I'll just skip it. I think this choice is better left to the readers.

Actually, if anyone had been following Panda's blog, he'd know where to find any uncensored duplicates of Davison's mindless spam -- on the bathroom wall:

http://www.pandasthumb.org/pt-archives/000902.html

As far as possible, the integrity of comments will be respected [...]

If PT administrators just made two permanent comment sections alongside the Bathroom, off-topic posts to other sections would be drastically reduced. Those two sections would be

1 John A Davidson's Evolutionary Notions

2 Dave Heddle Stat Chat --"Just like regular statistics, but with no distributions"

Paul, how about you get the DI to enable comments on their blogs before you complain about how we manage comments here? Agreed?

Davison's comment was disemvoweled because he was trolling.

Comment #23014 Posted by Paul A. Nelson on April 2, 2005 07:32 PM Nothing in Prof. Davison's post about Leo Berg was offensive in the least. The "editing" of his post represents contemptible intellectual vandalism. Whoever butchered the post should restore the original version immediately, and apologize to Prof. Davison.

Davison's comment was disemvoweled because he was trolling.

Davison's comment was disemvoweled because he was trolling.

By the way Dr. Paul, I really look forward to your Ontogenetic Depth theory. Although CSI and IC have already destroyed Darwinism, I'm sure it will still be a valuable contrtibution.

Keep up the good work!
Timmy

No, Davison's post was butchered because (1) He hates us, and (2) he abused his power to spam. Davison should apologize to us.

So add a line to your Comments Integrity page:

We reserve the right to vandalize the comments of people we don't like.

You guys butchered Davison’s post because (1) you don’t like him, and (2) you had the power to do so.

— Paul A. Nelson

No, I think the rest of the comment integrity page, which you conveniently cut off in your quote mine, explains the ground rules fairly well. Or put another way:

We reserve the right to vandalize the comments of people who show little respect for the board, its participants, and its rules.

Maybe Davison would feel more welcome continuing his discussion on Berg with you at ARN. Or, if you feel Davison has such an important contribution to Common Descent, you would allow him a chapter in your upcoming book. No? Then, I've got a great idea. Allow Davison to contribute to IDtheFuture. One look at our bathroom wall should give you incentive to the same caliber contributions he could make to your blog.

Restore his post. And apologize.

So add a line to your Comments Integrity page: We reserve the right to vandalize the comments of people we don't like.

— Nelson

Ban Professor Davison if he violated the blog rules. That would be the proper course of action.

But "rules" of any sort are a transparent sham if the board administrators anonymously vandalize posts at their own whim. I note that "No, Paul" and "Where's Berg?" shows the courage of every abject coward by continuing his anonymous justification for the actions taken here today.

I've been trying to reach Wesley Elsberry by telephone to see if he stands by what has been done in this thread. I know Wesley pretty well, and I think the answer will be No.

Like Weinreich posing as Julie Thomas and Mike Gene? That kind of cowardice, Paul? Or perhaps you posing as Principle of Least Action on ARN? Or Michael Behe posting as Irish? Or Philip Johnson posting as Arm at the site *you* moderate?

LOL, hypocrisy at its finest.

By the way I am not an administrator of this board. Rather than deflect the issue, why don't you lead by example. Make Davison a regular contributor of IDtheFuture. Or does Davison shame your movement?

How dare you PT admins do that. At least J.A.D. was honest. It's not like he praised his own book anonymously on Amazon, or something.

Whoever butchered the post should restore the original version immediately, and apologize to Prof. Davison.

Posting as myself, I join Paul Nelson in being appalled at the editing of posts. Especially when the victim of this editing has no ability to repair the damage. I have no problems at all with declaring certain people to be engaging in spamming, denial of service, or other pointless irritation and removing their eligibility to continue this behavior. But please, do not alter what someone is permitted to post. It's far more chilling to honest participation to know someone might post idiocy under your name, than to know someone might rescind your posting privileges.

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What's your problem? PT doesn't permit dissent? They do so much more than your guys. PT links to DI critiques, you don't link to PT critiques. Let's talk about something substantive.

Why don't you guys have a theory yet? It's been over a decade. Does the DI maintain that ID is scientific? Are you doing experiments to verify predictions ID makes which evolution doesn't? That would be necessary to have a real science. Is it true that Dembski said he's become disenfranchised with the mathematical approach? Pray tell why? Will it concern you if the Wedge Document gets introduced in the Dover case? When ID is found to be creationism 2.0, and therefore unfit for science classes under the Establishment Clause, what will you guys change the name to this time? Do you have one picked out already, or will you all switch to advocating private/home schooling?

Why Timmy, odd of you to say those things. Did you forget to check your name or something?

Mr Scot,
Hacking websites is a federal offence. Enjoy your stay in Leavenworth.

Joe, we can only hope Dave is as good at Computar Haxoring as he is at biology.

DaveScot,

You orbit Dr. Davison like a cold, lonely, little moon.

Though he won't admit it here, I'm certain that part of him is actually embarrassed by your attention. Did you actually think that you would be doing Davison a favor by associating him with your dull, impotent rage?

DaveScot has been disemvoweled and banned for threatening to hack this site.

Ban Professor Davison if he violated the blog rules. That would be the proper course of action.

— Paul Nelson

But "rules" of any sort are a transparent sham if the board administrators anonymously vandalize posts at their own whim. I note that "No, Paul" and "Where's Berg?" shows the courage of every abject coward by continuing his anonymous justification for the actions taken here today. I've been trying to reach Wesley Elsberry by telephone to see if he stands by what has been done in this thread. I know Wesley pretty well, and I think the answer will be No.

— PN

Of course ISCID's comment and contribution policies as well as ARN's tend to be quite restrictive, where dissenting opinions are at the mercy of the moderators and people are banned for trivial infractions.

— PvM

eing a participant on both ARN and ISCID, I find your accusation baseless and without merit. The moderators on both boards have always been fair, and very patient.

This thread has turned into a foodfight, I vote we close it. Paul, Davison was miles off-topic (the topic of the "thread" was the "Intelligent Design the Future" blog), in addition to being repetitive of a million other Davison screeds/spam on the PT blog. The man is like a broken record. Given that the full comment was dutifully cross-posted over on the ever-popular Bathroom Wall, and apparently warnings and disemvoweling have been going on for some time before this thread, the oh-so-horrible fate of disemvoweling Davison experienced in this thread was neither cruel nor unusual.

[PS: On the generic topic of ups and downs of comments on blogs: If it were up to me, if I had unlimited time, and if I had any idea how to program a blog, I would require a login for all commentators (this is why UBB discussions tend to work better than blogs), and ban anyone who was unable to be well-reasoned and insightful. I think logins are what makes UBBs better regulated -- people have a "reputation" to keep rather than just continually changing names. As it is, I doubt PT could be easily re-engineered to have a login for comments. And obviously a lot of people like making comments on PT under the current system, even if we only have time to read a small fraction of them, let alone police them in anything other than a scattershot fashion.]

eing a participant on both ARN and ISCID, I find your accusation baseless and without merit. The moderators on both boards have always been fair, and very patient.