• DOI:10.1023/A:1012282323054
Corpus ID: 170765232

The Advantages of Theft over Toil: The Design Inference and Arguing from Ignorance

@article{Wilkins2001TheAO,
  title={The Advantages of Theft over Toil: The Design Inference and Arguing from Ignorance},
  author={John S. Wilkins and W. Elsberry},
  journal={Biology and Philosophy},
  year={2001},
  volume={16},
  pages={709-722}
}

John S. Wilkins, W. Elsberry

Published 2001

Philosophy

Biology and Philosophy

Intelligent design theorist William Dembski hasproposed an ``explanatory filter'' fordistinguishing between events due to chance,lawful regularity or design. We show that ifDembski's filter were adopted as a scientificheuristic, some classical developments inscience would not be rational, and thatDembski's assertion that the filter reliablyidentifies rarefied design requires ignoringthe state of background knowledge. Ifbackground information changes even slightly,the filter's conclusion will… CONTINUE READING

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