Grey/Alan Grey (have you decided which you would like to be yet?)

Now I know I'm right. Your introduction of a string of red herrings in the form of flying spaghetti monsters etc. is proof - if proof were needed - that the best you now can do is bluff and bluster ("as you seems to be struggling", "I can’t believe you can’t grasp this simple logical relationship.").

Logic is not on your side. In their summary of the survey, Gallup themselves separate the two - Creationists and IDers - through the rigour of their answer set. Remember the word "exactly" in the choice "God created man exactly how Bible describes it"? This alone is sufficient to separate the two camps.

Quoting Behe and Dembski (who he?) won't help you either, as Gallup chose ordinary citizens to survey, not pop philosophers.

But of course, you know this. You are simply carrying on the discussion in order to get the last word.

Pericles, gotta disagree with you here; ID really is that vague. (One of the main reasons it isn't science.) It's just the design argument being re-badged as a "theory". Anyone who believes an intelligence consciously and directly affected the biology of Earth's animals believes ID.

BOAZ, Most likely the guy is just some quack on the radio and I'm not going to go out of my way to check. But if it could be verified that his blindness was there up until that morning, no non-surgical medical efforts had been taken recently and cataracts in both eyes were gone, then I would conclude that there is no (known) natural explanation that was reasonable. Four possibilities: Some unknown natural cause. Actions of people hiding information from us. Actions of other natural beings (ie. aliens). Actions of supernatural beings.

#2 has the least plausibility. #3 is comparable to #4 in many ways except that existence of aliens is naturally expected and that supernatural beings could have a stronger reason for being interested in us. I don't know much about the nature of cataracts so I can't speak of the scope for #1, but I doubt it would be wide. On the basis that the speed of light might be an unavoidable limit, #4 seems barely most likely.

But within that, it is more probable (given the sparsity of the miracles and lack of objective evidence) that supernatural beings are just messing with us. If not, then considering the similar claims made in other religions I couldn't attribute it to one particular religion, regardless of the nuns.

In other words, showing that the cataracts disappeared would indeed suggest a higher power, but is by no means conclusive. Allusions could be made to the "god of the gaps". If such minor miracles could be shown to occur in different forms, in large numbers and with consistency re: religion then that would be much stronger.

But I doubt it happened, I'd expect a bit more publicity about it. And the nuns praying with him in pre-op, even though he was not Christian, seems dubious.

Who was it that said, "Even if I see it with my own eyes, I will not believe. The only conclusion I can draw is my etes are deceiving my brain."

Ha! And who was it who said that they human eye is irreducibly complex (or some other such doublespeak)? We've all just witnessed the eye devolve into an "ete"!

Jose: a double period would suffice, I reckon.

Response to sneekeepete: It's alot like life support.

Response to Grey: The definition or scope of science has hardly been challenged in this thread. If you find it ironic that my response is "science should be taught in science class", then so be it.

Response to Jose, who asks "Supposing ID is taught in science classes. How much time do you think would be spent on it? Two periods? A week?"

The relevant section of Genesis takes a few minutes to read. Apart from that, what can one do? Show students some fossils which the intellegent designer hid in the ground (or were they left off Noah's Ark) Carbon date the lab tables and discover they are +/- 20,000 years old?

From primary school, I remember a poem in "School Magazine", which implied that dinosaurs were left behind from Noah's Ark, and many of the students were so pleased when they worked out the meaning.

Would it be right to say that ID only claims to disprove evolution?

If this is so, fine. However, what does ID actually prove that sets it up as a science?

If ID is a science, what experiments can I perform to help prove it as a theory?

If ID is a science, what body of evidence does it rely upon to prove that something intelligent placed life on this planet?

For that matter, what intelligence does ID claim put life on this planet?

Can someone in the know on ID provide answers to these questions?