ID the Future

ID the Future _{Podcasting on Intelligent Design and Evolution}

James Tour Interviews William Dembski, Pt. 1

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William A. Dembski
May 17, 2021}

Today’s ID the Future features Rice University synthetic organic chemist James Tour and intelligent design pioneer William Dembski discussing information theory, information as a meaningful reduction of possibilities, Shannon information versus specified information, and how natural selection has come to function as a God substitute for many scientists, despite the lack of evidence. The conversation is borrowed, with permission, from Dr. Tour’s Science & Faith podcast.

Latest Episodes

Herman Bouma: “It Was Like the Darwinian Gestapo”

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Herman B. Bouma
May 14, 2021}

On this classic ID the Future, attorney Herman Bouma tells host Sarah Chaffee the story of how his talk at a National Association of Science Teachers conference was canceled at the last minute. His planned talk highlighted how Darwin’s The Origin of Species set an example of engaging one’s scientific critics with civility and reason. The talk was accepted but then three conference officials shut him down the morning he arrived to set up for the talk, accusing him of promoting fake science. Darwin wrote that “I look with confidence to the future, to young and rising naturalists, who will be able to view both sides of the question with impartiality.” But if Bouma’s account is any indication, Darwin’s example—and his hope—weren’t much Read More ›

Physicist Eric Hedin Talks Entropy and the Origin of Life

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Eric Hedin
May 12, 2021}

On today’s ID the Future, host Eric Anderson sits down with Canceled Science* author and physicist Eric Hedin to discuss Hedin’s new book and, in particular, the book’s take on the origin-of-life problem. Hedin says the second law of thermodynamics poses a serious problem for the idea of a mindless origin of the first single-celled organism from prebiotic materials. Such an event would have involved a breathtaking increase in new information, and Hedin says that physics tells us pretty clearly that mindless nature degrades information; it doesn’t create it. Are there workarounds? Listen in as he explains why he’s not optimistic. And grab a copy of his new book to get his extended take. (*As an Amazon Associate, Discovery earns Read More ›

God Hypothesis Returns: Frank Turek and Stephen Meyer Report

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Stephen C. Meyer
May 10, 2021}

Today’s ID the Future episode features excerpts from a lively conversation with Frank Turek as host and Stephen Meyer as guest. The focus: Meyer’s new USA Today bestseller, Return of the God Hypothesis: Three Scientific Discoveries that Reveal the Mind Behind the Universe.* The two discuss the new book, and Meyer fields questions from the audience. The conversation originally appeared on Turek’s national radio show, CrossExamined, and the excerpts from that longer interview are used here with permission. (*As an Amazon Associate, Discovery Institute earns from qualifying purchases.)

William Dembski on the Gilmore & Glahn Show, Pt. 4

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William A. Dembski
May 7, 2021}

On this ID the Future from the vault, hear the final segment of Bill Dembski’s appearance on the Gilmore & Glahn radio show. Dembski and John Gilmore continue their discussion of advances being made behind the scenes in the overall scientific debate, and the inevitable demise of Darwinian evolution as the predominant theory in life sciences.

3 Questions for Friends Skeptical of Intelligent Design

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Tom Gilson
May 5, 2021}

On today’s ID the Future Tom Gilson–author, senior editor with The Stream, and occasional contributor to Evolution News & Science Today–tackles the question of how best to discuss intelligent design with friends and associates skeptical of ID. There is so much misinformation about the theory of intelligent design that many well-intended people reject not the actual theory but a silly caricature, a straw man. They don’t realize that ID is not an argument from ignorance but an inference to the best explanation based on positive evidence for design and negative evidence against competing materialistic explanations. It involves what is known as abductive reasoning, a standard mode of reasoning in the historical sciences. When in conversation with someone who understands none Read More ›

Brian Miller Talks Star-Crossed RNA Strands and the Origin of Life

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Brian Miller
May 3, 2021}

On today’s ID the Future, physicist Brian Miller continues his conversation with host Eric Anderson. Here they explore more problems facing the idea that life began as strings of RNA. In their discussion of the RNA World Hypothesis and the origin of life generally, they touch on ideas advanced by Jeremy England, Jack Shostak, Nick Lane, Helen Hansma, and others. One of several big problems with the RNA-first hypothesis underscored by Miller and Anderson: For it to have even a slender chance of working, you need prebiotic Earth to generate not one but two information-rich RNA strands, and they somehow need to find each other before falling apart, and do so despite the fact that they aren’t looking for each Read More ›

William Dembski on the Gilmore & Glahn Show, Pt. 3

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William A. Dembski
April 30, 2021}

On this ID the Future from the vault, William Dembski continues his conversation on the Gilmore & Glahn radio show. Host John Gilmore and Dembski, a philosopher, mathematician, and ID pioneer, cover a wide range of topics, including the state of the intelligent design movement, where the science is headed, Dembski’s controversial ID talk at the University of Chicago, and the growing number of prominent scientists and scholars who may or may not accept intelligent design but who insist that Darwinian evolution is a failed theory. The conversation occurred in 2015, so an exit question we can ask ourselves is, what remains the same about the evolution/design debate, and what has changed in the intervening six years?

Richard Weikart Reviews New Book on Social Darwinism

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Richard Weikart
April 28, 2021}

In today’s ID the Future historian Richard Weikart (Cal State Stanislaus) dissects a new Cambridge University Press book on social Darwinism by Jeffrey O’Connell and Michael Ruse. Weikart, author of Hitler’s Ethic, From Darwin to Hitler, Hitler’s Religion, and The Death of Humanity,* says that a major shortcoming of the new book is the authors’ attempt to put as much distance as possible between Darwin and eugenics thinking, and between Darwin and Hitler. The new book paints Darwin follower Herbert Spencer as the eugenics-championing bad guy and posits that Darwin and Darwinism had little or no influence on Hitler’s warped master race ethic. Weikart patiently highlights some key evidence to the contrary, statements front and center in Hitler’s writing. Did Read More ›

Stephen Meyer Defends His New Book to Cosmologist Brian Keating, Pt. 3

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Stephen C. Meyer
April 26, 2021}

Today’s ID the Future concludes the conversation between Stephen Meyer, author of the newly released USA Today bestseller Return of the God Hypothesis, and UC-San Diego physicist Brian Keating. In part three they discuss divine extravagance and the question of why, if the universe was made for humans, did it take so long before humans came onto the scene? From there Meyer turns to the evidence for intelligent design from the digital information embedded in DNA and RNA. Is this book just another intelligent design argument, similar to his previous two books? Meyer says it is that, but it goes further, combining an intelligent design argument with evidence from science outside the scope of ID science in order to draw some inferences about the nature of Read More ›

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