evolution, empiricism and purposeness (1)

8/14/2019 Evolution, Empiricism and Purposeness (1)

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EVOLUTION,

EMPIRICISM AND

PURPOSENESS (1)

Jess Zamora Bonilla

November, 2009


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MAIN MOTIVATION

Analysis of the use of some concepts from

philosophy of science in the arguments of

defenders of Intelligent Design (ID).

E.g.

-Scientific explanation and inference

-Information

-Structure and dynamics of theories, and relation to

empirical data


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DEMBSKIS

EXPLANATORY

FILTER

To explain a phenomenon P,

try first through necessity,

then by chance,and, if these dont work,

infer that P comes out ofdesign


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WHAT DOES EXPLANATION MEAN IN

THE EXPLANATORY FILTER

In empirical science, to explain is to provide a

theoretical modelthat allows to...

logically or statistically derive the explanandum

from assumptions about regularities andprevious contingentconditions


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In this sense, in order to be part of a REAL scientific

explanation, design must be included in a MODEL

indicating how the explanandum FOLLOWSfrom the

models assumptions

Design (as, by the way, natural selection) has tobe seen more as a promiseof explanation than as

an actualexplanation

The scientific value of these promises depends on

their success in helping us make new empirical

discoveries


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More importantly, necessity, chance and design are

by no means alternative types of explanation.

1: Necessityrefers to the existence of a regularity

that describes the way(i.e., the mechanism

through which)the phenomenon arises

(by the way, the theory of natural selection not doing so, is whatID defenders take as the main reason to reject it; but they dont

demand the same to ID)

Empirically given purposeful causes are just aparticular case ofnatural mechanisms of that kind

Design is a mere subclass of necessity (i.e., of the

notion of causal mechanism).


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Corollary:

There is no reason to infer that there are no natural

mechanisms (besides the natural mechanisms

purposeful agents consist in) that can produce

outcomes with specified complexity, since (known)

purposeful agents are just a kindof natural

mechanisms

This does not entail thatall existing purposeful

agents are natural,

only that the inference to design-instead-of-necesity

is not granted


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2: Chance enters in an explanation always as a

the indeterminate element(i.e., the stochastic

part) of the regularities employed (or of the initial

conditions measurement)

Any explanatory model produces a particular

statistical distribution of outcomes (i.e., it is a data

generation mechanism)

When, in other cases, we say that something isexplained through chance, what we really mean is

that it is NOT explained at all


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So, the right explanatory filter would look

something like this:

Phenomenon PExplained by someproposedmechanism

M1, M2, ..., Mn, ...?

(Mi = specific laws + specific random noise)

(some Mis being purposeful agents)

Yes?: OKNo? Then: P unexplained

(Nota bene: Dembskis filter would not leaveANYTHING

unexplained, what is unrealistic as a scientific method)

evolution, empiricism and purposeness (1)

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