#prediction

Even if we have a reliable criterion for detecting design, and even if that criterion tells us that biological systems are designed, it seems that determining a biological system to be designed is akin to shrugging our shoulders and saying God did it. The fear is that admitting design as an explanation will stifle scientific inquiry, that scientists will stop investigating difficult problems because they have a sufficient explanation already. But design is not a science stopper. Indeed, design can foster inquiry where traditional evolutionary approaches obstruct it. Consider the term "junk DNA." Implicit in this term is the view that because the genome of an organism has been cobbled together through a long, undirected evolutionary process, the genome is a patchwork of which only limited portions are essential to the organism. Thus on an evolutionary view we expect a lot of useless DNA. If, on the other hand, organisms are designed, we expect DNA, as much as possible, to exhibit function. And indeed, the most recent findings suggest that designating DNA as "junk" merely cloaks our current lack of knowledge about function. For instance, in a recent issue of the Journal of Theoretical Biology, John Bodnar describes how "non-coding DNA in eukaryotic genomes encodes a language which programs organismal growth and development." Design encourages scientists to look for function where evolution discourages it. Or consider vestigial organs that later are found to have a function after all. Evolutionary biology texts often cite the human coccyx as a "vestigial structure" that hearkens back to vertebrate ancestors with tails. Yet if one looks at a recent edition of Gray’s Anatomy, one finds that the coccyx is a crucial point of contact with muscles that attach to the pelvic floor. The phrase "vestigial structure" often merely cloaks our current lack of knowledge about function. The human appendix, formerly thought to be vestigial, is now known to be a functioning component of the immune system. ↗

— William A. Dembski

#biology #coccyx #darwinism #dna #evolution

I've ceased making predictions on things because we'll see how they turn out. ↗

— David Plouffe

#ceased #how #i #making #out

Would you bet your paycheck on a weather forecast for tomorrow? If not, then why should this country bet billions on global warming predictions that have even less foundation? ↗

— Thomas Sowell

#billions #country #even #forecast #foundation

Storytelling--that's not the future. The future, I'm afraid, is flashes and impulses. It's mode up of moments and fragments, and stories won't survive. ↗

— Dexter Palmer

#attention-span #future-prediction #storytelling #art

The fantastic advances in the field of electronic communication constitute a greater danger to the privacy of the individual. ↗

— Earl Warren

#computers #e-mail #individuality #internet #prediction

You cannot see the past that did not happen any more than you can foresee the future. ↗

— Madeleine L'Engle

#past #regret #family

The behavior of a human being in sexual matters is often a prototype for the whole of his other modes of reaction in life. ↗

— Sigmund Freud

#human-being #life #personality #prediction #reaction

As democracy is perfected, the office of president represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron. ↗

— H.L. Mencken

#elite #elitism #elitist #meritocracy #politics

A mathematician is an individual who believes that prophesying that his dog will die if he deprives it of food constitutes a prediction. ↗

— Bill Gaede

#gaede #god #mathematics #peer-review #physics

The groundhog is like most other prophets; it delivers its prediction and then disappears. ↗

— Bill Vaughan

#disappears #like #most #other #prediction