Orson Scott Card Strikes (out) Again

[weaktwos]

Orson writes an Op Ed again. This time on Intelligent Design.

Lame. He calls out the fallacies of the Darwinists by listing arguments that those who support evolution do not make. Card is a big fan of making the common man believe that there are elitist smart people out there who want the stupid people (if you're not smart, what are you?) believe that evolution is the correct theory just because we say so. However, supporters of Intelligent Design like to use bad arguments and bad science on the less intelligent person, and that seems more desirable because it can be explained in lay terms. Or something like that.

But, I must note that Card's point #5 does say: "They are very careful not to specify who or what the Intelligent Designer might be. So they are not advocating for any particular religion, or any religion at all. For all anyone knows, the supposed Intelligent Designers might be an alien species of mortal, ungodlike beings."

So, given that, have you accepted the Flying Spaghetti Monster as your personal Pasta and Sav(i)or?

Thanks to imlac for pissing me off with the Card link.

Comments

[reannon.livejournal.com]

Fascinating that there is such a wide dichotomy between Card himself and his work. His SPEAKER FOR THE DEAD is essentially a treatise against intolerance, fundamentalism and bigotry, and remains one of my favorite books.

And now I buy them on eBay instead...

[platostruth.livejournal.com]

He's a good friend of mine you know.

[weaktwos.livejournal.com]

Who? Card or the FSM?

[platostruth.livejournal.com]

Scott Card

[weaktwos.livejournal.com]

So, will you talk some sense into him, then?

[doccross.livejournal.com]

So, given that, have you accepted the Flying Spaghetti Monster as your personal Pasta and Sav(i)or?

I have felt the joy of His Noodley Presence in my life. His Marinara Coated will be done!

[torsoheap.livejournal.com]

Card is lame. I read Speaker for the Dead when I was young and found it even more condescending than Asimov's stuff.

He does make one good point: it is possible that a god or many gods or whatever put the system of evolution/natural selection into place. There is no way to disprove that. My hardcore Christian friend from grad school believes that.

These intelligent designers always try to use the argument that random evolution is not possible because systems are too complex. Well, you can assign a probability to each step happening individually and then multiple it by millions of years. Our problem is that we don't see the zillions and zillions of failures.

If our bodies were truly designed don't you think we'd be a bit more efficient?

[imlac.livejournal.com]

"He does make one good point: it is possible that a god or many gods or whatever put the system of evolution/natural selection into place. There is no way to disprove that."

Sure, but there's no way to disprove that the flying spaghetti monster did it, either; there's no way to disprove the claim that there is an invisible, intangable pink unicorn in the room. Just because you can't disprove something doesn't mean we have any rational reason to believe it, or that we ought to consider it fairly. Some claims are just prima facie ridiculous.

[torsoheap.livejournal.com]

I'm not saying that you have to believe it, but you should understand their viewpoint.

To be perfectly clear, I'm saying that I believe evolution and natural selection to be true, but I do admit there is a possibility that some higher force put the rules of evolution and natural selection in place in the very beginning. From what I understand, intelligent designers believe that evolution is crap and that everything you see is as intended.