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>  Wagner gets taken out behind the woodshed and thrashed.

Oh boy.  Ouch.

Note throughout the posts, there is a focus on "randomness" versus the  
determined/intentional acts of an intelligent designer.

This whole idea of randomness continues to bother me, too.

There's a mechanism involved here; we call it randomness or chance, but  
it isn't the same kind of chance that gets you snake eyes three times  
in a row.  Nature didn't Oops!  stumble upon a horse.  Lucky Nature,  
lucky horse.  In this universe, with these physical laws, on this  
planet, with these conditions, a horse is perhaps the logical outcome.   
Perhaps our brains are too little to follow the complex course of  
causation, but calling it "chance," "random" or "accidental" implies to  
non-scientists that humanity is an unwanted abberation in the cosmos.

Last time I brought this up (I mentioned the similarities between the  
prehistoric American savannah fauna and present-day African savannah  
fauna [similar ecologies give rise to similar organisms]), I got  
swooped upon by some biologists, correcting me that evolution is, in  
fact, a "random" process.
But I hold my ground.  "Random" ain't the right choice of wording here.
Life isn't an "accident" the same way I dropped coffee on my  
colleague's lap. Regardless of whether there are invisible superheroes  
guiding our lives from outer space or not, this Universe has the  
capacity for Life as part of its inherent structure.

Y'know, language shapes perspective.

BTW--podcasts of radio shows produced by WNYC are not "free" as I said  
in a recent, unrelated post.  They're "listener-supported."  Let's get  
the language right.

__
JasonJayStevens
Exhibits Design + Fabrication at the Ann Arbor Hands-On Museum
[log in to unmask]
www.aahom.org

On Aug 5, 2005, at 9:51 AM, martin weiss wrote:

> ISEN-ASTC-L is a service of the Association of Science-Technology  
> Centers
> Incorporated, a worldwide network of science museums and related  
> institutions.
> *********************************************************************** 
> ******
>
> 	Yes, we've been round on this here and on Museum-l but I think this  
> (from a colleague may offer some cheer.
>
> <http://www.corante.com/loom/archives/2005/08/02/ 
> a_question_for_the_president.php>http://www.corante.com/loom/archives/ 
> 2005/08/02/a_question_for_the_president.php
>
> On Carl Zimmer's blog a debate in the Comments section has become  
> quite exciting.  There's an ID proponent, Charlie Wagner, who has been  
> making outrageous, illogical claims, and near the very of the page  
> (second comment to last, the long one by Tim Chase), Wagner gets taken  
> out behind the woodshed and thrashed.
>
> Martin
> -- 
> Martin Weiss, Ph.D
> Vice President, Science
> New York Hall of Science
> 47-01 111 th Street
> Corona, New York 11368
> 718 699 0005 x 356
>
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