Einstein would disagree with you guys on design. Perhaps he thought about it more deeply "“Your question is the most difficult in the world. It is not a question I can answer simply with yes or no. I am not an Atheist. I do not know if I can define myself as a Pantheist. The problem involved is too vast for our limited minds. May I not reply with a parable? The human mind, no matter how highly trained, cannot grasp the universe. We are in the position of a little child, entering a huge library whose walls are covered to the ceiling with books in many different tongues. The child knows that someone must have written those books. It does not know who or how. It does not understand the languages in which they are written. The child notes a definite plan in the arrangement of the books, a mysterious order, which it does not comprehend, but only dimly suspects. That, it seems to me, is the attitude of the human mind, even the greatest and most cultured, toward God. We see a universe marvelously arranged, obeying certain laws, but we understand the laws only dimly. Our limited minds cannot grasp the mysterious force that sways the constellations."
Very interesting. I would agree. However, it is important to not take one man's word for it. Is this an actual quote from Einstein? I think tesla believed too
He is talking about Ray "Banana man" Comfort ,who was a little red-faced when it was pointed out that natural bananas don`t look anything like the ones we have selectively bred to be easier to eat /peel. This Banana fits perfectly up my arse ! Praise the Lord !
@The Conservative Shame how you missed the point in the video - that is it isn't entirely random. Evolution does have a mechanism called natural selection, which isn't random. Regardless, it's what's called an equivocation. You're trying to suggest evolution is 'perfect' and not flawed, when in reality that just isn't the case. Personally, if I had ultimate power and knowledge, I'd 'design' it far better than it is. Is typing on a keyboard randomly to try and recreate Shakespeare analogous to life? It may be the case that randomly picking out numbers on a piece of paper and waiting to see if you win a lottery is a closer example. The vast majority do not win, but ever so rarely it happens. What are the chances of you, specifically, being born, going through your life and ending up posting a message here? We can come up with unfathomably low chances, yet are common every day events. It doesn't prove anything.
Scientific theory is Not the same as a general theory or a guess if you will,Gravity is a theory Relativity is a theory.If you do not know the difference. Then you are ignorant of the facts. Evolution is a fact deal with it.
+Scott Moore It is a theory rather than theorem. A general theory in dialect does mean the same thing (but often people have theorems and label it wrong) , it stems from the fact that philosophers proved no propositional true knowledge can be held indubitably. Thus a theory is the highest form for a claims explanation.
He's also a former Evangelical Christian now turned fundamental materialist and certainly not the most neutral voice in the debate. Just because people are intelligent or even academics (e.g. Richard Dawkins) does not mean they are not capable of bias / confirmation bias.
In fact, it would appear his case is not entirely dissimilar to my own case. When I began to lose my faith in my Christian religion, I started looking into all sorts of other claims like faith healing, psychic phenomena, psi abilities, witchcraft, etc, and other religions, Buddhism, Jainism, Hinduism, different sects of Christianity including Jehovah's Witnesses, Young Earth Creationism, Catholicism, Mormonism, and various forms of Protestantism. It was very disheartening to my young mind that there wasn't any "real" magic in the world. I started learning magic because I wanted to be able to create real magic. But, it was all just illusions, including all the spirit bound woo woo nonsense. And, Witchcraft, so disdained by my Christian fellows, was really no different. The only difference I could find was in specific ritual practice and the name of the deity or spirit being asked to do the bidding of the caller. Intercessory prayer is exactly like chanting and murmuring. Christians use talismans and tokens just like in witchcraft. Christians bless things and dis-spell evil in very much the same way as witches and wizards. If witchcraft is superstitious nonsense, then so too are all religions.
***** I disagree with Jake about Derren's biases. You are correct in pointing out that his biases should not be relevant. But, you are wrong about why. If, and when Derren's arguments are presented with evidence, reason, and probability, they can be objectified. This is, in fact, a key element of the scientific method in discounting biases (accounting for the potential and removing that as a factor).
From what I can remember, the abstract that was posted to me referred to removing residues, and when I got home from the libray I remembered what residues are-- they're short chains of amino acids within a protein-- so the ability to remove those from a gene and have the protein functional is a ludicrously sophistic way to try and disprove ID-- but I should be beyond amazement now.
Actually, father Christmas DID exist. The story of father Christmas actually originates from central Anatolia. A wealthy man in a village in Turkey, during the night of new years eve, would go around and leave small sums of money in the socks and shoes, traditionally left outside the front doors, of the poor. That's why in Turkey we still have a New Years Santa rather than a Christmas Santa. Also, not 100% about this point but, the tradition of leaving the presents in stockings actually originated from this same story. Whether he was an overweight white guy with history's most iconic facial hair is still, unfortunately, unknown.
Father Christmas was a real monk, who lived in Essex in the 16th century (his surname was 'Christmas') but Santa Clause (Saint 'klaus) was derived from St. Nicholas, who was, as anatolia2014 has said, from Turkey. That Nicholas became sainted, as a patron for: merchants, brewers, thieves, prostitutes, sailors, children, and many many more. As with all characters coopted into religious mythologies, his real story is laden with doubt. It's unsurprising, therefore, that the character of stories passed on through the generations, has continued to morph, as the centuries pass, through changing outfits and builds, into their contemporary guise, as a salesman for Coca Cola PLC :-D A man called Father Christmas died in Dedham, Essex on 30 May 1564: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QI_%28D_series%29#Episode_13_.22December.22_.28Christmas_Special.29 qi.com/infocloud/santa-claus
They forget to mention that the modern banana has been selectively bred by people to give it the characteristics we want. Nothing to do with a god at all.
Your 2nd question suggests that you have a pre-supposed view that the Bible is scientifically incorrect - this is so wrong and there are better men than us in that field who would strongly point out your error there. That apart - you should not throw the baby out with your blinkered thoughts bathwater. The attached link will show you that your 'all pretty sure' is built on very poor foundations: creation.com/modern-birds-with-dinosaurs
Some secular scientists are agnostic about the existence of some sort of God, but all are united in arbitrarily assuming that all phenomena can and must be explained naturalistically. The evolutionist Dr. Scott Todd wrote in the science journal Nature: “Even if all the data point to an intelligent designer, such a hypothesis is excluded from science because it is not naturalistic.”2 And this is what a leading evolutionary geneticist, Professor Richard Lewontin wrote: “We take the side of [evolutionary] science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs … in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism … . Moreover, that materialism is an absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door.” (NOT REAL SCIENTISTS THEN ?!)
A) One good point you’ve made is that the sheer fact that there are more non-functional configs than functional ones doesn’t tell you the distribution of them. I think it’s likely that functional ones are not distributed randomly throughout design space- a boat obviously has more in common with a car than with some assortment of the various parts of both of them attached together at random.
Men have an awful packaging design as well. I mean, c'mon! Right between the legs where ur balls can get crushed!!?!. Just flopping around all unprotected! My jewels are precious!
The 'Who Designed God' argument is a completely different issue as to whether God actually designed the universe in the 1st place, so Brown's opening comments are just him talking off topic guff. The evidence of 'Cause & Effect' all around us and has always been observed like gravity has.
you can't analyze causality in a point in "time" (if I may say time)where we don't even know if the laws of causality work in the same manner to begin with.
therealawakener7 not at all... if you are saying that there is a designer because life cant be created by it'self, than that 'designer' either has to have been created (which is impossible to test) or one would have to assume the designer could have been created out of nothing or has always existed (which, if you are considering that 'critical thinking', then there is no hope. you're just making things up to suit your ideas if you were to be doing that).
therealawakener7 if we are just going to assume things that dont have any evidence to support them, why try to learn in the first place? the assumption that 'it' always existed doesnt do anything but answer a question with an assumption based on nothing. you wouldnt do that with anything else, why with the idea of a creator?
You're going beyond cause and effect. We can say water runs downhill because of gravity but that doesn't mean that gravity has any intentionality. Whatever the "first cause" is (whatever first cause means) it will work out to be natural the same as everything. There is no evidence in the world we see for supernaturalism and no reason to assume it existed in the past.
1 It’s just a fact that the further apart two pubs are, the more sparsely distributed any pubs lying on the line that separates them, will be. I was pointing out that this is analogous to my claim that the further apart two functional configurations in ‘design space’ are, the more they will be separated by proportionally more non-functional configurations than functional ones.
There's not really much content in this. Derren Brown/ Dawkins/ Wiseman have a lot of useful points to make against Creationists but the issue of Intelligent Design in its broadest sense is much more nuanced than this simple discussion. We still can't verify if the universe itself is 'conscious' to some degree. We know that a higher order of mathematics and complexity governs our universe, with much of that still undiscovered - e.g. dark matter. "Intelligence" in this sense does not have to be personified into a god or a being. "Intelligence" can also mean a higher governing purpose to the universe.
***** We can both agree that biblical literalists are a joke and that Intelligent Design has been used to add credibility to their arguments. I repeat however, intelligent design in its broadest sense is more nuanced than this simple discussion. The biblical literalists / creationists defer to a governing deity within the universe; a personalized god. Yet, there are other people, scientists included, who believe something different to this and also invoke the term ‘intelligent design’. Take Albert Einstein and Max Planck. Both eminent scientists of their time: A quote from Einstein: “everyone who is seriously involved in the pursuit of science becomes convinced that a spirit is manifest in the laws of the Universe-a Spirit vastly superior to that of man.” A quote from Planck: “All matter originates and exists only by virtue of a force which brings the particle of an atom to vibration and holds this most minute solar system of the atom together. We must assume behind this force the existence of a conscious and intelligent mind. This mind is the matrix of all matter.” The nuance here - to point it out - is the nomenclature used for these underlying governing principles of the universe. Many scientists believe there is a form of intelligence governing the universe. That intelligence does not have to be pigeon holed as a typical monotheist interpretation of ‘god’. So when referring to the mechanisms that create order in the universe we see ‘god’, ‘spirit’, ‘cosmic order’, an intelligent ‘matrix’, ‘universal intelligence’ etc. being used. When these terms are used in this sense it becomes more palatable even for neo-Darwinists like Richard Dawkins. Have a look at what he has to say in reference to Einstein’s views. Dawkins is fine with Einstein’s definition of ‘god’ as a form of higher cosmic intelligence. What specifically do you mean when you say intelligent design? Does your definition accommodate this? Perhaps it is easier to talk about these nuances in the debate by jettisoning the rather loaded term of 'intelligent design' altogether.
***** I am not advocating "ID". Not sure if you get that. I also note, you didn't explicitly answer my question at the bottom. I will infer that "intelligent design" is too loaded with connotations relating to Creationism to be used freely for the purpose of examining broader questions. Creationists are an easy target for neo-Darwinists. Their arguments don't stand up, especially against academic heavyweights like Dawkins. But this whole debate is a distraction, in my opinion, to a more important debate. Again, this is where I refer to the 'nuance' of the debate. Neo-Darwinism, Dawkins, Derren Brown etc are all materialists as I suspect you are. Some would claim they are fundamental materialists or even evangelical materialists (oh, the irony). Brown certainly seems to do a lot of proselytising on that front. Listen to the start of the video, Brown refers to a designer being 'somebody' who has designed it. As I've stated before, this argument is useful for criticising Creationists but it's not that much use for examining the type of creative intelligence Planck and Einstein alluded to above. Another question for you to mull on. Is there a purpose to the universe? Or is it all just accidental?
***** An over-arching intelligence was evidently not too 'vague and woolly' for Einstein and Planck to be concerned with. Some nihilistic scientists or enquiriers may see no relevance in examining this 'intelligence' or to explore the question 'does the universe have a purpose?'. That's fine. They are more than entitled to this world view which you concur with. Ergo - we live in an accidental universe. Whilst it may seem unnecessary/ irrelevant to you many eminent scientists do embrace these questions and the notion that there may be higher organisational principles at work; that the world is not merely accidental. Scientists can also still be interested in this question and remain sceptical of an external 'creator' or 'designer'. Who's driving the bus though? If not something external, where does that leave us? Does that mean whatever 'is' the designer is somehow internal or part of us? This line of enquiry inevitably leads to examining the hard question of consciousness. The materialist, reductionist approach of Dawkins is very useful for bashing Creationists (and good fun to watch) yet it becomes rather impoverished when examining the nature of conciousness and how - if at all - it interacts with us. The materialist explanation is that consciousness is generated from within the brain. Eventually science will pinpoint the exact place. Some would call that common sense, others will call it scientism. The non-materialist viewpoint is much more diffuse and there are many different strands of the debate. Take a look at the work of David Bohm. One of Einstein's proteges and another pre-eminent scientist of the 20th Century. To him 'thought' or our consciousness is the ultimate source of everything. He believed that at a deep level matter and consciousness are actually one thing. So taken in this sense, consciousness is the 'designer'. Pretty much in line with the central tenets of Buddhism and Taoism by the way. (And no, they're not monotheistic religions than defer authority to an externalised deity.) The materialist dismisses this. Rubbish! Science will explain everything. Perhaps it will. In the mean time there are still fundamental questions of life/reality and the universe that remain unsolved. Dawkins et al. have an unwavering faith that science will come up with all the answers from a materialist point of view, despite the irritating evidence that continues to suggest that our reality may be more fluid than they would care to admit. With scientists in both camps the wider debate of what reality is, who/what creates it etc. becomes a clash of ideologies. The front line of that debate is where I am most interested in, not in the ID vs neo-Darwinist side show.
2 You made one good point against my argument, which I conceded- that non-functional arrangements are not going to be distributed randomly in design space. However, it is still true that, as with words, intermediate stages in an incremental transition from one to a significantly different other are unlikely to be functional because the constituent elements are unlikely to be configured with each other to provide a function.
1 As I remember, James’ argument was that by my own logic, the closer two functional configurations, A and B, are to each other, the greater will be the ratio of functional intermediates between them, to non-functional intermediates between them and therefore assuming an intermediate, AA, it becomes more likely that there’ll be proportionately more functional interediates between A and AA and between AA and B-
there is no Vick J? Really, check in the mirror, IS not, IS .. so, read: 27 God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us. 28 ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’ ACTS 17:27-28
To be a theist, one must suspend all logic, reason, sense and facts. Every fact, regarding our understanding of reality, always points away from supernaturalism.
Simon Hillawi As you progress through your life, those 'demons' will quiet down. You will be able to deal with them with that logic and reason, slaying them forever. Good luck and don't fret. Reading ANY holy text will actually help you to disbelieve in deities.
Simon Hillawi Fantasy is fun, just as long as it doesn't get supplanted for reality. Unfortunately, billions on this earth have a very hard time separating them in their indoctrinated mind.
The answer to these questions is something that can't be taken for granted- its not meaningless or unimportant and is something that human beings will try to answer as long as they exist, science is doing mankind a disservice by casting these questions aside as unimportant, 'cause they're probably the most important questions we'll ever ask.
''You've declared that you can't get from one point to a significantly different point via functional intermediaries without, as far as I can tell, backing this up in any way beyond your word analogy.'' Look again- I backed it up quite thoroughly-- not just with the word analogy, which is perfectly sound anyway.
I got a ring at a jewellery store there's one very strange thing about it...it fits on my finger...could this be created by god, surely he designed it for me as a gift.. Thanks god aka giant white man
+Martin Ward I have a gold ring that was shaped about 10yrs ago, but the gold was forged in the nuclear furnace in the heart of a supernova exploding star, probably about 5 or 6 billion years ago. Thanks Nature.
I have never denied (100 times over) the fact there may be a tiny number of apparent examples of gradual evolution that can be cobbled together from available fossils. What we did not see in this example from Eldredge is a gradual sequence of transitions when collecting up a cliff face. The fossils you referred to were taken from all over the place, and their subsequent arrangement into an apparent evolutionary scheme came with a healthy dose of Darwinian 'inference'.
As Gould and Eldredge pointed out, the 'gaps' have been filled with 'stasis' and the sudden appearance of novelty. Huxley was referring to obvious leaps in complexity that were evident even in Darwins time, such as the Cambrian explosion.
+~ Bright Romeo ~ Indeed. Why did God make extracting bacon from pigs such a big upheaval? He/she had the format almost perfect with bananas, so why can't other foods come in nice parcels like this?
The reason more and more scientists are supporting the theory of intelligent design is because things that contain extremely elaborate code - like the 2 BILLION+ string code in the DNA molecule and the mind-boggling degree of complexity in even the most simple cell, is because nothing in the natural world can be seen to produce anything even remotely close to it. Just because people don't WANT there to be a designer doesn't mean that there isn't one. Magic is magic. Intelligent design is intelligent design. To put an end to intelligent design all that needs to happen is for some scientist somewhere to show ONE instance of how anything remotely resembling life can come from non-life. Not just goo in the bottom of a test tube - actual life. Nobody has, and nobody will. Even the most simple form of life conceivable is more complex than the computer I am typing this message on. Yet some people think that something that complex can spring from some kind of chemical soup!! There IS a designer of the universe, and of life.
What you are basically doing here is closing your eyes, ears and mind and parroting the whole "irreducible complexity" spiel that your pastor taught you. I have to assume you are also believer in a 6000 year old earth.
Look up nonlinear dynamics, complexity theory, the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction, self-organization, emergent phenomena, chaos theory etc. Simple rules can indeed produce complex behaviours. You have just made the fallacy of incredulity. Try reading a book other than a collection of myths from some bronze age ignoramuses. You might actually learn something. More scientists are laughing at the theory of intelligent design than actually believe in it because it contains no actual science. It's a pseudoscience. If they want to hypothesize that there's some creator they need to say what this creator looks like, where it lives, what testable effects it has etc and they also need to come up with a null hypothesis so we would know what the experimental evidence would look like if such a creator didn't exist ie falsifiability. All these IDiots can come up with is a load of bullshit and dodge serious scientific questions.
+lambd01d Call it what you want, no naturally occurring process is going to come remotely close to developing a living organism. The reason so many scientists believe in naturalism is because they are subjected to a steady diet of brainwashing and a fear that if they actually recognise the case for ID there will be severe consequences academically. This is a fact and many eminent scientists have experienced it.
2 …it is true that the further apart 2 pubs are, as a general rule, the less dense will be the distribution of pubs in between them, and this is analogous to my claim that the further apart 2 functional configs are in ‘design space’, the more sparsely distributed will be any functional intermediates will be. If James’ counterargument can’t refute the pubs claim- it is obviously flawed, and can’t refute my claim either- regardless of whether my claim is otherwise soundly supported or not.
The point of the analogy is that, just as various parts can only work together in so many ways in order to provide function, a partial form of one of those exceptional configurations is more likely to be broken than a new functional configuration- and the more elements that are involved the more this principle applies because all the elements are co-dependent and basically, there's more to go wrong
It is so interesting and telling how Derren Brown has to presuppose "the possibility" of no designer to what he admittedly recognizes as the consistent evidence whereby a designer is what always comes with a design. Then, in order to try to give this merit, he moves to the silly argument of "infinite regress" to defend his reason for "no design" which is an argument only one with a philosophy built on naturalistic presuppositions tries to make. Infinite regress is something everyone must contend with. If Derren wants to attribute it to matter or energy or anything else in his "purely materialistic world" that's his faithful assertion built on a commitment to naturalism. It is not any more or less a problem or solution for a Theist attributing that which is infinite being an intelligence. And the banana thing......give me a break! If you want to be taken seriously as an Atheist, at least understand the real premise to the intelligent design theory. It has to do with the idea of whether or not science has the ability to point to something outside of naturalistic causes. If it doesn't, then it can never point to anything metaphysical by its very nature and restricted framework by which it reasons, leaving other disciplines the responsibility to answer the questions science can not answer because it is limited to one religious world view...naturalism. The intelligent design proponents argues against this. The intelligent design movement takes the position that science by way of inference can point to something metaphysical as a probable solution to the empirical evidence discovered through the scientific method which goes far beyond a banana fitting the grip of a human hand! So put the banana down.....if you do not even attempt to reference the real argument you choose to refute, you can not be taken seriously.
True, science can never, due to it's constraints, point to anything outside the observable as a cause for anything. But wait a moment. If I see a phenomenom and I can't CURRENTLY observe it's cause, that leaves us two options: A) The cause is something unobservable. B) The cause is something observable, but I haven't observed it yet. You seem to gleefuly jump into A, and with complete dishonesty claim it is the only option. And also claim you can observe what it is. Now, if you don't mind, can you provide any evidence that any claims YOU make about the UNobservable are true? I mean, I know you can say "magic man did it" or "magic sandwich did it" or "magic volcano did it" and succeed at showing how it might be an answer (I'm serious about all of those), but I wonder how you can distinguish that answer from a fantasy.
Alejandro Alcántara I am not at all jumping to “A” in the sense that science therefore can’t proceed to discover within its limits of option “B”. In fact, one who does not limit reasoning within the religious restrictions of “naturalism” but has come to understand the extremely plausible existence of an intelligent designer outside of the measurable patterns of science is engaged in recognizing the infinite solution as “God” instead of “material” giving way to proceeding with option “B” indefinitely. He is merely doing science as Newton and Kepler did. Therefore, knowing that the infinite regress means scientific discovery does not have limits to discovery even though point “A” is not only an option, it is as you say “unobservable.” This is only seen as “complete dishonesty” by those like yourself who believe science can’t “point to anything outside the observable as a cause for anything.” I think It can by way of inference which is always what science does when it moves from empirical evidence to theory. I agree with you that “magic man did it” or “magic sandwich or volcano did it” is not going to invoke you to get excited about its possible consideration. The fact that you suggest something like it will be what I offer you as a consideration shows me you are not listening to what I am saying and you are implying you have a stubborn unwillingness and fear to leave your cozy blanket of limited reasoning within “naturalism.” That is your religious prerogative. It also clues me in on the reason you insist I claim I can “observe what it is.” We distinguish these ideas of “fantasy” from true inferences toward “intelligent design” by recognizing all the evidence that points to information outside of these natural patterns we discover. This becomes a theory in the same way Neo Darwinism becomes a theory based on inferences. Please note that it moves to intelligent Design with both your options “A” and “B” fully intact without limiting science as it moves to theory. It is also testable in a way that moves toward probability of the theory as further discovery is made. The fine tuned universe, irreducible complexity (both molecular and within nature), digital coding within the cell, …..remember our competing presuppositions…..because these also move to philosophical considerations for me but not necessarily for you since your philosophical consideration is restricted to naturalism….the ontological arguments, cosmological arguments (especially those recognizing “first cause”) This itself will give a logical reason by which we can leave purely “materialistic” constraints and infer how all empirical evidence with the understanding of first cause being intelligence is in fact logical. Since the repeated patterns in nature are recognized as repeated patterns in need of information, first cause being an intelligence can be held up and preferable against the notion of accidental causality being the catalyst for that information very logically, again, unless you insist on purely naturalistic restrictions when moving from observable empirical evidence to theory. This can be demonstrated by the recognition that information is itself neither matter or energy but in turn comprises the non-material foundation for observable technological systems, works of art, biological systems, conscience, human expression, etc. Now, if you care to respond, I will probably observe how you will run all these through your philosophical presupposition of “naturalism”, insist that I have to also run everything through your religious presupposition of “naturalism” in order to be “logical.” This is where we will have a breakdown based on philosophy but not science.
david stecker Ok, I see you like the Chopra-esque "shotgun approach", which is launching a sophistornado of intrincate claims, and expect me to scramble, losing my breath, to put out all your fires. Not in the mood, sorry. Let's go step by step. (First of all, I am humbled by your astounding ability to self deprecate by calling me "religious" as an attempt at invalidation. That takes guts.) You claim " "...science can’t “point to anything outside the observable as a cause for anything.” I think It can by way of inference which is always what science does when it moves from empirical evidence to theory." Whoa, wait a moment. Let's clean up some of the sneaky words here. "when it MOVES from". No, no movement here, let's be clear. Scientific theories are systems of propositions that REFERENCE empirical evidence, in a model that both explains and allows predictions of some aspect of the objective world. Is that ok? So the scientific process uses inductive (not deductive) inferences to predict outcomes based on the understanding that the Theory provides. These outcomes may be a)events in the future or b) the discovery of concrete, unambiguous additional evidence, that are NOT simply the same aspect of the world that the theory is trying to explain. It is absolutely imperative that these outcomes are Observable. If they aren't there is no way to distinguish a Valid theory from Conjecture. And in the case of the "supernatural", wild and limitless conjecture. On this basis alone, I refute your claim that science can point to Unobservable claims. The whole point is to make predictions that one can Observe to falsify the theory. If the theory references an Unobservable component, there is no way to tell if it is actually that component as described in action, or something completel different. A theory that points to the unobservable is not a scientific one. By the way, I have no need whatsoever to claim that there is NO unobservable reality. I simply claim that, since it is (as defined) unobservable, it has no effect whatsoever in our existence, and any claim made about it, including it's existence, is irrational.
david stecker Now, a question from me: If you will, a simple, direct answer, will do. When you so produdly brag about your capacity to "reason outside of the constraints of naturalism", I take that to mean you "construct verifiable models of reality that include references to propositions which are unobservable". I assume, since you brag, that it is NOT "construct UNverifiable models of reality that reference unobservable claims", since that would be pretty much identical to fantasizing or hallucinating. But please correct me if there is another way to describe "reasoning outside the constraints of naturalism". If that's the case, how DO you know that the Causes you propose are really those and not any Infinitely Conceivable others? How do you falsify? (That is, check if your hypothesis are NOT false) For example, the origin of DNA definitely CAN possibly be a complex, very long, acumulative and, over all, Observable and Repeatable chain of chemical processes. If I propose one specific Chain of processes, I can put those to the test. See if they do or can, as I Imagine, have the effect I propose. If they don't, I have discovered that my Hypothesis was Wrong. How do you do that, when you can't see if your predictions come true or not?
Alejandro Alcántara So let me get this straight. You ask me a question. I answer the question. You accuse me of a "shotgun approach." Then you tell me you are not in the mood to respond and put out fires. But you are in the mood to ask me another question that my shotgun answer already addressed which you are not in the mood for. Now when I tell you this has become a waste of time, you will accuse me of not answering your question. Nevertheless, one thing we will both claim is that we are satisfied that the other is living in a fantasy world and deep within both of us, we understand by simple logic that one of us is wrong. Take care of yourself. I hope for you peace!
b) The 2nd thing I ought to make clear is that by ''cannot'' exist, I am not saying that without analysis it can be 'known' that there cannot exist a functional intermediate at any given point in the transition. My argument (which, I feel I have to specify again I *have* backed up, and doesn't amount to just saying this, as you'll no doubt try and imply again) is that there will likely *be* a substantial amount of non-functional configurations along a *large* transition.
C) I did not say that between any two configs there must be a non-functional one. I answered your point about multiple possible pathways elsewhere- the same argument applies to them all. I also answered your point re mutations that become advantageous at a later stage-this cannot help get you from one configuration to a radically different one because that would require a fortuitous accumulation of mutations, and without natural selection to preserve each step, that is inherently unlikely.
1. The original appeal of Darwinian theory is that it seemed to offer a mechanism that would leave a highly predictable pattern of gradual change in the fossil record. So much so that palaeontologists continued to search for that pattern, decades after they new in their heart of hearts that it had never existed. Evolution was then transmogrified into a vague theory that could 'explain' everything from perfectly gradual evolution to the near instantaneous appearance of novel adaptions.
when measuring electrons light is shined on the electron however when detecting the photons you can just put a photo-electric semi conductor that will give an electric current when light hits it. The point of the delayed choice quantum eraser experiment is to show that its not the detectors collapsing the wave but the fact that someone is trying to observe the result (quantum eavesdropping) on where what the particle does.
The different physical functions of different configurations, whether man-made or natural, are dependent *on* those configurations-as is the functionality in general. The different meanings of different words are dependent *on* the configurations of the constituent letters, as is the general 'meaningfulness' of the word. In both cases, both specific and general 'function' is dependent on the specific arrangement of the constituent elements-- therefore the analogy absolutely does apply.
Questions that are not properly addressed have a habit of coming back. When you answer my questions seriously and with integrity then I will have no need to repeat them
My view is perfectly stated in the documentary. The view is 1. The universe is created by an intelligent being. 2. consciousness is not part of matter, energy, space and time but exist in another dimensional layer above this. 3. This universe may be part of a simulation run by a creator, the evidence of quantum physics is showing us that at the fundamental level the particles in the universe behave like data in a computer, they exist at a meta level but are only rendered when observed.
The pub analogy was not meant to show that non-functional configs would tend to be sparsely distributed between any two functional ones, the more different those functional configs were, it was to show that a particular counter-argument of James’ -that all the gaps would be filled in because the probability of a pub/functional intermediate becomes *higher* the less distant they are from each other, is nonsensicle. I’m sure I’ve explained that to you.
B) However, even within those regions of design space that contain such clusters, there are *still* more non-functional configs than otherwise and it is still true that function of any config is dependent on the interrelationship of its constituent parts-if you change those radically- and even a half-way journey along a pathway to a *very* different config would amount to a radical change- those elements are unlikely to be configured in such a way as to provide a function.
"Your position of philosophical naturalism amounts to the a priori rejection of the possibility of intelligent design" "philosophical naturalism" is by definition "the a priori rejection of the possibility of intelligent design"
It's really the sequential information, digital coding and decoding, structure and design together that we can conclude prior conscious activity, since it has never been obeserved otherwise, and therefore extremely logical.
I think there is a bit of a misconception about 'evidence of god.' If there is a god, it exists outside of our reality, beyond our comprehension... That is accepted... Therefore why do people expect to see evidence of him in our reality? Any yes there is a lot of things happening by chance in the universe but that doesn't explain how everything came into existence
Gothams Reconing Actually it does. And if not entirely, we're on a good way for explaining that. Watch some Lawrance Krauss' lectures. You can think of bajillion things that an exist outside of this reality, are beyond our comprehension and therefore, you can't prove their existence. The question is what for?
2 By the logic of your counter-argument, regarding the pubs, because any intermediate pub, AA, between A and B will make it *more* likely that there’ll be more pub than non-pub space between A and AA and between AA and B and so on, there must be a continuous chain of pubs between any two pubs-in fact, pubs should cover the entire globe, or at least all dry land!
I agree that the further apart two configs are, the more nonfunctional configs must lie in between. But also the more functional ones. The likelyhood of a pathway between them relies on the density of pubs and the distance you can travel. Not the distance between any two pubs.
A flagellum consists of many of thousands of protein molecules of around forty varieties. The helical tail is made up from tens of thousand of molecules of the protein flagellin, for example. The flagellum could probably function without some of these tail proteins, but if the gene for flagellin were removed entirely, then no flagellin could be manufactured and the helical propeller wouldn't get built.
As for the transitional series, here’s your argument in your words: “there would be no reason to beleive that darwinian processes were responsible, because a smooth series of functional intermediates between significantly different forms is impossible” You’re saying that NS can’t produce such significant change because a CSFI is impossible. I’m presenting you with such a continuous series, therefor your argument against NS is refuted.
d) So... natural selection can only feasibly follow incremental pathways- I think you'll agree.. Therefore, *if* there is no possible continuously functional incremental pathway to be followed-- i.e. there aren't any in idealised 'design space'-- then natural selection cannot find one. So this is what I meant when I said that the fact that nonfunctional configurations are selected out by natural selection cannot select 'in' functional configurations at points where they cannot exist.
1 No-- his argument was, that if it is true- as I was arguing, that the further apart two functional configs are, the more sparsely distributed any functional configs between them will be, then the converse applies, and the any functional intermediates that there might be will make it *more* probable that there'll be functional intermediates between *those* and the original two-- and this process is iterative and will fill in the gaps.
3 it becomes *more* likely that the pubs between the pub in Manchester and the pub in London become less sparsely distributed, and pubs between Birmingham and London become even less so-until, by the logic of this argument anyway, the line drawn between the original two pubs would have to be chock-a-block with pubs.
It's rather like someone discovering a mountain with fossil fish at the top. We hypothesize that some mechanism must have 'lifted' the ground up to create the mountain. We then discover plate tectonics and show that at fault lines the ground gets lifted up. We then say "Here's the mechanism that can create mountains", and creationists say "They can create small hills, but you need to prove it can create mountains". I know it's another analogy, but I think this one actually fits what's happening!
Gould and Eldredge confessed we have few examples of transitional fossils in Punchuated Equilibrium. Animals remain unchanged for relatively long periods of time, then change rapidly due to a change in the environment. We have few examples of the relatively fast changes between the long periods of stability. We have many examples of gradual evolution, whales, humans, horses and there have been a few more presented to you in this comments section.
In the new scientific volume Biological Information: New Perspectives, Michael Behe has a paper titled "Getting There First: An Evolutionary Rate Advantage for Adaptive Loss-of-Function Mutations." This paper elaborates on some of Behe's arguments from his 2010 Quarterly Review of Biology paper, in which he reviewed molecular mechanisms involved in adaptations in microorganisms documented in the literature. He found there that such adaptations almost always involved loss or diminished function
I spent some time reading up on the history and philosophy of science because I was genuinely eager to understand how Darwinian theory, which I new to be deeply problematic, appeared to be immune from criticism. I would also definitely recommend Philip E. Johnsons Darwin on Trial. His exposition of the role of philosophical naturalism in propping up Darwinian evolution and abiogenesis remains a classic.
I didn't say that *all* of them would be, but the theory of macro-evolution by means of random mutation and natural selection is predicated on the acknowledged improbability of fortuitous macro-mutations or 'hopeful monsters'- hence the need to posit a mechanism whereby functional complexity is built be means of small incremental steps. If big leaps are necessary, then the theory does not hold.
Also, pro tip: When you get the error message from CZcams, copy your comment just in case, then refresh the page. You should find your comment has been posted despite CZcams's nonsense.
You are right to point out that someone may believe in 'common descent', while not believing that life's diversity and complexity arose via a mindless naturalistic process. The problem is that without a compelling naturalistic account of either life's origin, or life's diversity and complexity, i.e. without an explanation for that 'common descent' from a materialistic perspective, we are left with intelligent design as the most likely driver of the process. Are you happy with that?
ps. This latter word, in Hebrew, is "barasheet". In Hebrew, of course, it has the six letters mentioned. We translate this into English as "In the beginning". Hebrew is unique in that its letters actually mean something, independently of the words they go together to create. Oh, and the chariot wheels are independently dated to the 15th century BC; the Exodus was around 1440 BC.
c) And related to that last point, I am NOT saying that the clustering of pubs *proves* the clustering of functional configurations-- the analogy was only intended to show that your objection was flawed-- though, as I say, it's interestingly flawed, as it *seems* logical. I'd still like to know more formally where the error is, but error there most certainly is- otherwise nothing would be clustered. As I say, it's the clustering of *words' that I'm saying has the same *cause*.
Gould and Eldredge prayed at the same shrine as their Darwinian gradualist buddies, despite their differences. The problem is that while Gould and Eldredge thought they had found a convenient explanation that would explain away the fossil records lack of gradualism, unfortunately PE remains untestable speculation. The most interesting thing they did, and the most significant, was simply to expose just how few examples of gradual evolution existed, and the massive preponderance of stasis
Here's a quote from Niles Eldredge: "I tried in vain to document examples of the kind of slow, steady directional change we all thought ought to be there, ever since Darwin told us that natural selection should leave precisely such a tell tale sign as we collect our fossils up cliff faces. I found instead, that once species appear in the fossil record, they tend not to change very much at all. Species remain imperturbably, implacably resistant to change as a matter of course... "
b) As it goes, I do think that for most, if not all, large transitions the ratio of non-functional intermediates to functional ones is so large that the former are likely to be non-existent, but that is not a necessary requirement in order to rule out an incremental Darwinian pathway, which requires a fairly even and non-sparse distribution of possible functional intermediates.
Interestingly, the helical propeller / tail is built working from the basal body outwards. Each and every one of those tens of thousands of flagellin molecules is manufactured according to the information contained in the flagellin gene, brought to the construction site and then pumped through a hollow tube running through the center of the enlarging tail. When each flagellin molecule emerges at the distal end, it is correctly position with the help a special capping protein.
Whatever dominant pattern emerges from the fossil record, it will always be possible to accommodate the evidence retrospectively with various ad hoc naturalistic explanations. The fact that Darwinism is able to accommodate such diverse outcomes as the strictly gradualistic pattern (strongly preferred by Darwin himself, and by the evolutionary community for decades) and the too rapid to observe kind of evolution exposed by Gould and Eldredge, implies that Darwinian theory is infinitely flexible.
That probably explains why again and again they maintain that anyone who disgrees with the theory 'doesn't understand it' - which just amounts to saying 'you don't know why you're wrong' and is a case of begging the question.
* ''the further apart two pubs are, the more sparsely distributed any pubs along the line that separates the will be'' should have read, ''the further apart two pubs are, the more sparsely distributed any pubs along the line that separates them will *likely be* ''
@IDtakovr Lets go through this really simply for you- 1) macro evoultion (if it occurred) is big- so it takes a LONG time 2)microevoultion (if it occurs) is small- so it only takes a SHORT time 3) human life span is SHORT Now here comes the tricky bit so concentrate 4) humans would be incapable of observing anything other than micro evolution (because of their SHORT life span) Therefore your request/expectation - to observe macroevolution IS INCOHERENT
The real problem is that the closed system shouldn't change at all whether its observed or not. We all assume that if a tree falls down when nobody is in the forest to observe it, it will still make a sound. What do we do when we find out that it doesn't? Why should particles chose to act differently when observed? There is strong evidence that at a fundamental level the universe isn't purely materialistic. Science shouldn't just dismiss this 'cause it doesn't like the implications.
Your counter-argument to my claim that the further away two functional configurations are, the more sparsely distributed any intermediates would be, was to say that, if that were true, the reverse would also have to apply- the nearer they are, the less sparsely any intermediates would be- and so all the gaps would be filled in. The point of the pub/star analogies was to point out that if your argument was correct, nothing would be clustered- and they obviously are.
b) The problem is, that in this matter as in many others, the public are treated like children and are expected to be satisfied with simple answers, whilst you don’t generally get to the top unless you’re willing to tow the line. Of course there *are* very bright people, like Peter Atkins, who are unable to see the problems with the theory due to their ideological blinders.
Im of average intelligence but i stumbled across the quote "If a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it does it make a sound" and it really got me thinking about perception and reality. Made me think, if sound is vibrations that we decode through our senses in our minds then what senses are out there that we don't have and cannot percieve. To be honest I think we don't know shit.
Faith transcends reason - whether it is fact or fiction! 4 years ago I had an experience in my bedroom, I was praying to God in despair because I lost my job 3 days before, and I got an answer in that moment, the sensation i got was warmth/heat and a powerful light coming trough my body which lasted for maybe 10 seconds and I sensed an answer to my prayer which was: I am with you, trust in me. 2 weeks later I was back in the same job. Was it God? I believe it was. Did he design us, I believe.
I agree that there will various paths between two configs, A and B- just as there is more than one route you could take by changing one word into another, one letter at a time. However, the same argument applies to all possible routes- the more different the pairs or configs/words are, the less likely it is that there’ll be an incremental pathway between them that preserves function/meaning, and the likelihood diminishes for every possible route.
I did not assert that life's complexity "HAS to be intelligently designed". I asserted that intelligent design is (by far) the most likely explanation, given that intelligent agency is observed to have the power to generate computers, information processing systems and machines, whereas natural causes are never observed to create such things. Given this fact, ID proponents should be funded, and given ample opportunity to explore their ideas and complete on a level playing field with Darwinists.
Over 100 million fossils have been collected since Darwins time. By this time, palaeontologists are easily able to claim that they have a broadly representative picture of the fossil record. The problem for Darwinists isn't lack of fossils or detail, but the exact opposite. As I have already explained, where fossil preservation is at it's very best, we observe the sudden appearance of complexity and novelty, followed by millions of years of stasis. The problem for Darwinists is what we DO know.
product. Nobody sits there and looks at the configuration of turbine blades and says "This is the configuration we want the computer to come up with". THAT would be intelligently designing it. They say, "here's the things the computer can change, and when it does, the configuration can be tested immediately in a wind chamber and assessed for efficiency". This information is fed back into the system and the process repeated Amazing results are achieved far quicker than brute forcing the problem
c) This comment is out of order-- in at least one sense, but blame youtube's glitches. I had duplicates and while deleting them, somehow managed to delete all of the 'c's. Anyway, the gist of it was that while you could say that for any point it 'might' be functional- this is only true in a certain sense, and given that the precise pathway is not known. It wouldn't change the fact that, on average, each point is more likely to be non-functional than functional.
Remember, your claim is that NS can’t be responsible “based on the fact that there can't be, for the reasons I gave, smooth incremental pathways between significantly different functional forms. You’re trying to claim that NS can’t produce the change between disparate forms and functions because a CSFI is impossible while claiming that evidence of such a series doesn’t constitute a refutation. This is perplexing.
a) When said '' NS can therefore 'select in' nonfunctional intermediates that just cannot exist'', there's two things that I probably ought to clarify-- As I said before, by 'intermediates' I mean intermediate configurations that constitute a transition from one functional config to another, and which are each made by making small changes to the preceding one. I *don't* necessarily mean intermediates in an *actual* Darwinian pathway, which obviously *would* all be functional.
I run out of space to type but here's another video showing that its not the instruments measuring the electrons that cause them to become particles, its the fact that they're being observed that somehow causes the particle to collapse from its wave state into a particle state with a location in space-time. /watch?v=sfeoE1arF0I
To clarify, random mutation and natural selection are used in industry to design cars, airplanes, safety devices, kitchen appliances, the list goes on. You do understand the difference between artificial selection (i.e selectively breeding dogs) and natural selection (a change in climate causes the animals with least fur to die and therefore not breed) is that artificial selection has someone choosing artificial environmental pressures, where as in natural selection, the pressures are natural?
As to the pertinence of the analogy: it is true that the space between two pubs is not filled with other pubs, but how does this imply that the space between to forms can’t be filled by transitions that are only incrementally different from the preceding form? Now the next part. Here's what you just said: "I did not say that functional intermediates are impossible" Here's what you said last week: "a smooth series of functional intermediates between significantly different forms is impossible"
As I stated, and as Gould and Eldredge made plain: "The extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persist as the trade secret of paleontology. The evolutionary trees that adorn our textbooks have data only at the tips and nodes of their branches; the rest is inference, however reasonable, not the evidence of fossils...."
If you're prohibited from considering something as an option, the fact that you don't find 'evidence' of it can hardly be considered as evidence of its absence.
Well it wasn't what you said, but it was the logical implication of your counter-argument. You raised a valid point in your second sentence-- but I'm still dependent on the library till the weekend so will answer more fully tommorow.
If you want to attack an analogy on the basis that it doesn’t support my argument, rather than on the basis that it doesn’t refute James’ attempted refutation- the word analogy is the one you should be attacking.
As I've repeatedly pointed out the pub analogy was to show that Jame's counter-argument was flawed- it wasn't meant to be analogous in the sense that the *cause* of the clustering was the same as the cause of the clustering of functional configs. If you're talking about avoidance, neither of you have acknowledged that the pub analogy- which could just as easily be a star analogy, or anything else that is clustered, shows James' counter-argument to be clever nonsense.
2 The equivalent of your argument would be to say that; Because going a short distance from each pub makes it more likely that there'll be a pub within the next mile, any long distance in any direction can be subdivided into constituent short distances, in which there will likely be at least one pub for every mile travelled. This is obviously wrong.
I love how creationists hold science to such a high level of proof, and by that I mean it must explain absolutely everything about everything, but their own belief requires none. Science knows it doesn't know everything. Just because science doesn't know everything, doesn't mean science knows nothing. And just because science doesn't know everything, doesn't mean you can make it up.
As for the exist query thing, the reason I brought that up is because someone else said science has practically answered all the questions religion set to answer. That's like saying science has replaced philosophy- I countered that argument saying it hasn't and if it only looks at the universe in a purely materialistic way it probably never will. I would like to know the answer to these questions and I'm suer they're billions more people like me who would like to know the meaning of life too.
1 As I also said, the word analogy *is* intended to be an analogy in the sense that the clustering of functional configs has the same *cause* as the clustering of functional configs that I'm claiming exists for 'machines' and functional systems in 'design space'. There's nothing wrong with using analogies- how do you propose that we ascertain if the mechanism really *is* that powerful? I guess we could disprove it mathematically- and I think that's been done.
This is not quite what I said. I said we couldn't know where things were clustered, if they were. And if functional configs are clustered, why can't they also be more prevalent around 'filaments', if you will, or pathways between clusters?
a) No I did not say that functional intermediates are impossible. But if they are likely to become progressively less as compared to the number of non-functional intermediates the greater the transition is, then that is enough to make Darwinian explanations for large transitions implausible.
Nobody disagrees with the fact that out of the billions of random genetic mutations occurring every day, a few might be useful. We also agree that out of the billions of computer programming errors caused by electromagnetic interference, a few will be useful and will be preserved for their usefulness. What we never see, though, is major design sophistication arising from an accumulation of those errors in either case, like new biochemical machines or new operating systems...
Einstein would disagree with you guys on design. Perhaps he thought about it more deeply "“Your question is the most difficult in the world. It is not a question I can answer simply with yes or no. I am not an Atheist. I do not know if I can define myself as a Pantheist. The problem involved is too vast for our limited minds. May I not reply with a parable? The human mind, no matter how highly trained, cannot grasp the universe. We are in the position of a little child, entering a huge library whose walls are covered to the ceiling with books in many different tongues. The child knows that someone must have written those books. It does not know who or how. It does not understand the languages in which they are written. The child notes a definite plan in the arrangement of the books, a mysterious order, which it does not comprehend, but only dimly suspects. That, it seems to me, is the attitude of the human mind, even the greatest and most cultured, toward God. We see a universe marvelously arranged, obeying certain laws, but we understand the laws only dimly. Our limited minds cannot grasp the mysterious force that sways the constellations."
Very interesting. I would agree. However, it is important to not take one man's word for it. Is this an actual quote from Einstein? I think tesla believed too
He is talking about Ray "Banana man" Comfort ,who was a little red-faced when it was pointed out that natural bananas don`t look anything like the ones we have selectively bred to be easier to eat /peel.
This Banana fits perfectly up my arse ! Praise the Lord !
Stoney Lonsome
charlie brookers thoughts!
Stoney Lonsome lol!
ILikeZappa Classic Banana Man, Ray Comfort, haha
@The Conservative Shame how you missed the point in the video - that is it isn't entirely random. Evolution does have a mechanism called natural selection, which isn't random.
Regardless, it's what's called an equivocation. You're trying to suggest evolution is 'perfect' and not flawed, when in reality that just isn't the case. Personally, if I had ultimate power and knowledge, I'd 'design' it far better than it is.
Is typing on a keyboard randomly to try and recreate Shakespeare analogous to life? It may be the case that randomly picking out numbers on a piece of paper and waiting to see if you win a lottery is a closer example. The vast majority do not win, but ever so rarely it happens.
What are the chances of you, specifically, being born, going through your life and ending up posting a message here? We can come up with unfathomably low chances, yet are common every day events. It doesn't prove anything.
What is the probability of a functional protein existing by chance?
czcams.com/video/JQ3hUlU0vR4/video.html
Are you saying silicon heaven doesn't exist?! Where would all the calculators go?
+Pul5ar Of course silicon heaven exists, human heavan doesn't exist. That was made up so we wouldn't go nuts.
No there isn't, calculators just...die.
+Pul5ar
When my watch breaks, where does the time go, LOL. Yes, that's as daft as asking, when I die, where will "I" go.
Scientific theory is Not the same as a general theory or a guess if you will,Gravity is a theory Relativity is a theory.If you do not know the difference. Then you are ignorant of the facts. Evolution is a fact deal with it.
+Scott Moore
Theory meaning guess is simply an invalid bastardisation of the term. Theory does not mean unproved. Nor does it mean wild ass guess.
+Scott Moore It is a theory rather than theorem. A general theory in dialect does mean the same thing (but often people have theorems and label it wrong) , it stems from the fact that philosophers proved no propositional true knowledge can be held indubitably. Thus a theory is the highest form for a claims explanation.
What is this interview an extract from? I'd like to hear the whole thing.
He's a magician and illusionist isn't he. Says it all....!!
And he's a good deal more intelligent and studied than you.
He's also a former Evangelical Christian now turned fundamental materialist and certainly not the most neutral voice in the debate. Just because people are intelligent or even academics (e.g. Richard Dawkins) does not mean they are not capable of bias / confirmation bias.
In fact, it would appear his case is not entirely dissimilar to my own case. When I began to lose my faith in my Christian religion, I started looking into all sorts of other claims like faith healing, psychic phenomena, psi abilities, witchcraft, etc, and other religions, Buddhism, Jainism, Hinduism, different sects of Christianity including Jehovah's Witnesses, Young Earth Creationism, Catholicism, Mormonism, and various forms of Protestantism. It was very disheartening to my young mind that there wasn't any "real" magic in the world.
I started learning magic because I wanted to be able to create real magic. But, it was all just illusions, including all the spirit bound woo woo nonsense. And, Witchcraft, so disdained by my Christian fellows, was really no different. The only difference I could find was in specific ritual practice and the name of the deity or spirit being asked to do the bidding of the caller.
Intercessory prayer is exactly like chanting and murmuring. Christians use talismans and tokens just like in witchcraft. Christians bless things and dis-spell evil in very much the same way as witches and wizards.
If witchcraft is superstitious nonsense, then so too are all religions.
*****
I disagree with Jake about Derren's biases. You are correct in pointing out that his biases should not be relevant. But, you are wrong about why. If, and when Derren's arguments are presented with evidence, reason, and probability, they can be objectified. This is, in fact, a key element of the scientific method in discounting biases (accounting for the potential and removing that as a factor).
Greg S
Basically, what I told Jake applies to your arguments/assertions as well.
With Hitchens gone, and Dawkins being older than time, this guy has a huge opportunity to take a leadership role in the rationalist camp.
From what I can remember, the abstract that was posted to me referred to removing residues, and when I got home from the libray I remembered what residues are-- they're short chains of amino acids within a protein-- so the ability to remove those from a gene and have the protein functional is a ludicrously sophistic way to try and disprove ID-- but I should be beyond amazement now.
Father Christmas _does_ exist! How else do all those kids get presents on Christmas day?
do me a favour
Sean TzoH what favour do you need?
Actually, father Christmas DID exist. The story of father Christmas actually originates from central Anatolia. A wealthy man in a village in Turkey, during the night of new years eve, would go around and leave small sums of money in the socks and shoes, traditionally left outside the front doors, of the poor. That's why in Turkey we still have a New Years Santa rather than a Christmas Santa. Also, not 100% about this point but, the tradition of leaving the presents in stockings actually originated from this same story. Whether he was an overweight white guy with history's most iconic facial hair is still, unfortunately, unknown.
Father Christmas was a real monk, who lived in Essex in the 16th century (his surname was 'Christmas') but Santa Clause (Saint 'klaus) was derived from St. Nicholas, who was, as anatolia2014 has said, from Turkey. That Nicholas became sainted, as a patron for: merchants, brewers, thieves, prostitutes, sailors, children, and many many more. As with all characters coopted into religious mythologies, his real story is laden with doubt. It's unsurprising, therefore, that the character of stories passed on through the generations, has continued to morph, as the centuries pass, through changing outfits and builds, into their contemporary guise, as a salesman for Coca Cola PLC :-D
A man called Father Christmas died in Dedham, Essex on 30 May 1564:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QI_%28D_series%29#Episode_13_.22December.22_.28Christmas_Special.29
qi.com/infocloud/santa-claus
They forget to mention that the modern banana has been selectively bred by people to give it the characteristics we want. Nothing to do with a god at all.
Who does the breeding of that banana ? An intelligent designer - IT'S not RANDOM as in an unintelligent design theory driven by NOTHING!
Dave Benfield
Yeah, but it wasn't driven by a deity, either.
Ooooh look - no need for transitional fossil - birds and dinosaurs lived together !!!
creation.com/modern-birds-with-dinosaurs
Your 2nd question suggests that you have a pre-supposed view that the Bible is scientifically incorrect - this is so wrong and there are better men than us in that field who would strongly point out your error there.
That apart - you should not throw the baby out with your blinkered thoughts bathwater. The attached link will show you that your 'all pretty sure' is built on very poor foundations:
creation.com/modern-birds-with-dinosaurs
Some secular scientists are agnostic about the existence of some sort of God, but all are united in arbitrarily assuming that all phenomena can and must be explained naturalistically. The evolutionist Dr. Scott Todd wrote in the science journal Nature:
“Even if all the data point to an intelligent designer, such a hypothesis is excluded from science because it is not naturalistic.”2
And this is what a leading evolutionary geneticist, Professor Richard Lewontin wrote:
“We take the side of [evolutionary] science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs … in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism … . Moreover, that materialism is an absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door.” (NOT REAL SCIENTISTS THEN ?!)
A)
One good point you’ve made is that the sheer fact that there are more non-functional configs than functional ones doesn’t tell you the distribution of them. I think it’s likely that functional ones are not distributed randomly throughout design space- a boat obviously has more in common with a car than with some assortment of the various parts of both of them attached together at random.
Very eloquent explanation. Thanks Derren.
Watermelons have an awful packaging design.
You made me spit on my computer!
+muff man that made me laugh i must be a satanist lol.
Men have an awful packaging design as well. I mean, c'mon! Right between the legs where ur balls can get crushed!!?!. Just flopping around all unprotected! My jewels are precious!
The 'Who Designed God' argument is a completely different issue as to whether God actually designed the universe in the 1st place, so Brown's opening comments are just him talking off topic guff. The evidence of 'Cause & Effect' all around us and has always been observed like gravity has.
you can't analyze causality in a point in "time" (if I may say time)where we don't even know if the laws of causality work in the same manner to begin with.
therealawakener7 not at all... if you are saying that there is a designer because life cant be created by it'self, than that 'designer' either has to have been created (which is impossible to test) or one would have to assume the designer could have been created out of nothing or has always existed (which, if you are considering that 'critical thinking', then there is no hope. you're just making things up to suit your ideas if you were to be doing that).
KandaPanda What's wrong for now with just assuming for now, just as you have said, that 'IT' has always existed?
therealawakener7 if we are just going to assume things that dont have any evidence to support them, why try to learn in the first place? the assumption that 'it' always existed doesnt do anything but answer a question with an assumption based on nothing. you wouldnt do that with anything else, why with the idea of a creator?
You're going beyond cause and effect. We can say water runs downhill because of gravity but that doesn't mean that gravity has any intentionality. Whatever the "first cause" is (whatever first cause means) it will work out to be natural the same as everything. There is no evidence in the world we see for supernaturalism and no reason to assume it existed in the past.
1
It’s just a fact that the further apart two pubs are, the more sparsely distributed any pubs lying on the line that separates them, will be. I was pointing out that this is analogous to my claim that the further apart two functional configurations in ‘design space’ are, the more they will be separated by proportionally more non-functional configurations than functional ones.
'Your own personal experience can be so misleading' -Boom.
Top stuff Mr Brown.
I was the 322,223rd view of this particular video. Therefore, intelligent design is real. I mean, JUST LOOK AT THE SYMMETRY!
Hell, you're right Nick. I must start worshipping the great master Michael Behe, the Lord of buffoons...
What is the probability of a functional protein existing by chance?
czcams.com/video/JQ3hUlU0vR4/video.html
There's not really much content in this. Derren Brown/ Dawkins/ Wiseman have a lot of useful points to make against Creationists but the issue of Intelligent Design in its broadest sense is much more nuanced than this simple discussion. We still can't verify if the universe itself is 'conscious' to some degree. We know that a higher order of mathematics and complexity governs our universe, with much of that still undiscovered - e.g. dark matter. "Intelligence" in this sense does not have to be personified into a god or a being. "Intelligence" can also mean a higher governing purpose to the universe.
***** We can both agree that biblical literalists are a joke and that Intelligent Design has been used to add credibility to their arguments.
I repeat however, intelligent design in its broadest sense is more nuanced than this simple discussion. The biblical literalists / creationists defer to a governing deity within the universe; a personalized god.
Yet, there are other people, scientists included, who believe something different to this and also invoke the term ‘intelligent design’.
Take Albert Einstein and Max Planck. Both eminent scientists of their time:
A quote from Einstein:
“everyone who is seriously involved in the pursuit of science becomes convinced that a spirit is manifest in the laws of the Universe-a Spirit vastly superior to that of man.”
A quote from Planck:
“All matter originates and exists only by virtue of a force which brings the particle of an atom to vibration and holds this most minute solar system of the atom together. We must assume behind this force the existence of a conscious and intelligent mind. This mind is the matrix of all matter.”
The nuance here - to point it out - is the nomenclature used for these underlying governing principles of the universe. Many scientists believe there is a form of intelligence governing the universe. That intelligence does not have to be pigeon holed as a typical monotheist interpretation of ‘god’.
So when referring to the mechanisms that create order in the universe we see ‘god’, ‘spirit’, ‘cosmic order’, an intelligent ‘matrix’, ‘universal intelligence’ etc. being used.
When these terms are used in this sense it becomes more palatable even for neo-Darwinists like Richard Dawkins. Have a look at what he has to say in reference to Einstein’s views. Dawkins is fine with Einstein’s definition of ‘god’ as a form of higher cosmic intelligence.
What specifically do you mean when you say intelligent design? Does your definition accommodate this? Perhaps it is easier to talk about these nuances in the debate by jettisoning the rather loaded term of 'intelligent design' altogether.
***** I am not advocating "ID". Not sure if you get that. I also note, you didn't explicitly answer my question at the bottom. I will infer that "intelligent design" is too loaded with connotations relating to Creationism to be used freely for the purpose of examining broader questions.
Creationists are an easy target for neo-Darwinists. Their arguments don't stand up, especially against academic heavyweights like Dawkins. But this whole debate is a distraction, in my opinion, to a more important debate. Again, this is where I refer to the 'nuance' of the debate.
Neo-Darwinism, Dawkins, Derren Brown etc are all materialists as I suspect you are. Some would claim they are fundamental materialists or even evangelical materialists (oh, the irony). Brown certainly seems to do a lot of proselytising on that front.
Listen to the start of the video, Brown refers to a designer being 'somebody' who has designed it. As I've stated before, this argument is useful for criticising Creationists but it's not that much use for examining the type of creative intelligence Planck and Einstein alluded to above.
Another question for you to mull on. Is there a purpose to the universe? Or is it all just accidental?
***** An over-arching intelligence was evidently not too 'vague and woolly' for Einstein and Planck to be concerned with.
Some nihilistic scientists or enquiriers may see no relevance in examining this 'intelligence' or to explore the question 'does the universe have a purpose?'.
That's fine. They are more than entitled to this world view which you concur with. Ergo - we live in an accidental universe.
Whilst it may seem unnecessary/ irrelevant to you many eminent scientists do embrace these questions and the notion that there may be higher organisational principles at work; that the world is not merely accidental.
Scientists can also still be interested in this question and remain sceptical of an external 'creator' or 'designer'.
Who's driving the bus though? If not something external, where does that leave us? Does that mean whatever 'is' the designer is somehow internal or part of us?
This line of enquiry inevitably leads to examining the hard question of consciousness.
The materialist, reductionist approach of Dawkins is very useful for bashing Creationists (and good fun to watch) yet it becomes rather
impoverished when examining the nature of conciousness and how - if at all - it interacts with us.
The materialist explanation is that consciousness is generated from within the brain. Eventually science will pinpoint the exact place. Some would
call that common sense, others will call it scientism.
The non-materialist viewpoint is much more diffuse and there are many different strands of the debate.
Take a look at the work of David Bohm. One of Einstein's proteges and another pre-eminent scientist of the 20th Century.
To him 'thought' or our consciousness is the ultimate source of everything. He believed that at a deep level matter and consciousness are actually one thing.
So taken in this sense, consciousness is the 'designer'.
Pretty much in line with the central tenets of Buddhism and Taoism by the way. (And no, they're not monotheistic religions than defer authority to an externalised deity.)
The materialist dismisses this. Rubbish! Science will explain everything. Perhaps it will. In the mean time there are still fundamental
questions of life/reality and the universe that remain unsolved.
Dawkins et al. have an unwavering faith that science will come up with all the answers from a materialist point of view, despite the irritating evidence that continues to suggest that our reality may be more fluid than they would care to admit.
With scientists in both camps the wider debate of what reality is, who/what creates it etc. becomes a clash of ideologies.
The front line of that debate is where I am most interested in, not in the ID vs neo-Darwinist side show.
2
You made one good point against my argument, which I conceded- that non-functional arrangements are not going to be distributed randomly in design space. However, it is still true that, as with words, intermediate stages in an incremental transition from one to a significantly different other are unlikely to be functional because the constituent elements are unlikely to be configured with each other to provide a function.
1
As I remember, James’ argument was that by my own logic, the closer two functional configurations, A and B, are to each other, the greater will be the ratio of functional intermediates between them, to non-functional intermediates between them and therefore assuming an intermediate, AA, it becomes more likely that there’ll be proportionately more functional interediates between A and AA and between AA and B-
this video has become part of my collection of "Evidence that there is no God."
there is no Vick J? Really, check in the mirror, IS not, IS .. so, read:
27 God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and
find him, though he is not far from any one of us. 28 ‘For in him we
live and move and have our being.’As some of your own poets have
said, ‘We are his offspring.’
ACTS 17:27-28
WORD IS GOD ............ are there no words??... what do we write,etc.. Stones? hehe..oh mankind, wake up
To be a theist, one must suspend all logic, reason, sense and facts. Every fact, regarding our understanding of reality, always points away from supernaturalism.
Simon Hillawi As you progress through your life, those 'demons' will quiet down. You will be able to deal with them with that logic and reason, slaying them forever. Good luck and don't fret. Reading ANY holy text will actually help you to disbelieve in deities.
Simon Hillawi Fantasy is fun, just as long as it doesn't get supplanted for reality. Unfortunately, billions on this earth have a very hard time separating them in their indoctrinated mind.
The answer to these questions is something that can't be taken for granted- its not meaningless or unimportant and is something that human beings will try to answer as long as they exist, science is doing mankind a disservice by casting these questions aside as unimportant, 'cause they're probably the most important questions we'll ever ask.
''You've declared that you can't get from one point to a significantly different point via functional intermediaries without, as far as I can tell, backing this up in any way beyond your word analogy.''
Look again- I backed it up quite thoroughly-- not just with the word analogy, which is perfectly sound anyway.
"I argue there is a God, precisely because nature can proceed through chaos in no other way but regularly and orderly."
Immanuel Kant ( 1724 - 1804 )
I got a ring at a jewellery store there's one very strange thing about it...it fits on my finger...could this be created by god, surely he designed it for me as a gift.. Thanks god aka giant white man
+Martin Ward
I have a gold ring that was shaped about 10yrs ago, but the gold was forged in the nuclear furnace in the heart of a supernova exploding star, probably about 5 or 6 billion years ago.
Thanks Nature.
I have never denied (100 times over) the fact there may be a tiny number of apparent examples of gradual evolution that can be cobbled together from available fossils. What we did not see in this example from Eldredge is a gradual sequence of transitions when collecting up a cliff face. The fossils you referred to were taken from all over the place, and their subsequent arrangement into an apparent evolutionary scheme came with a healthy dose of Darwinian 'inference'.
As Gould and Eldredge pointed out, the 'gaps' have been filled with 'stasis' and the sudden appearance of novelty. Huxley was referring to obvious leaps in complexity that were evident even in Darwins time, such as the Cambrian explosion.
The banana argument makes no sense considering the number of other fruits. Just as little sense as this whole video.
+~ Bright Romeo ~
MANY evangelical christians are blithering idiots. I say that as a man who grew up in middle Tennessee.
LucisFerre1
The Japanese people I grew up around were dirty, therefore all Japanese people are dirty..
That's what you're saying. Anything else ?
+~ Bright Romeo ~
He said "many", you said "all".
... but nice try.
+Geno When someone says many, they end up believing that all are the same.
+~ Bright Romeo ~ Indeed. Why did God make extracting bacon from pigs such a big upheaval? He/she had the format almost perfect with bananas, so why can't other foods come in nice parcels like this?
The reason more and more scientists are supporting the theory of intelligent design is because things that contain extremely elaborate code - like the 2 BILLION+ string code in the DNA molecule and the mind-boggling degree of complexity in even the most simple cell, is because nothing in the natural world can be seen to produce anything even remotely close to it. Just because people don't WANT there to be a designer doesn't mean that there isn't one.
Magic is magic. Intelligent design is intelligent design.
To put an end to intelligent design all that needs to happen is for some scientist somewhere to show ONE instance of how anything remotely resembling life can come from non-life. Not just goo in the bottom of a test tube - actual life.
Nobody has, and nobody will. Even the most simple form of life conceivable is more complex than the computer I am typing this message on. Yet some people think that something that complex can spring from some kind of chemical soup!!
There IS a designer of the universe, and of life.
What you are basically doing here is closing your eyes, ears and mind and parroting the whole "irreducible complexity" spiel that your pastor taught you. I have to assume you are also believer in a 6000 year old earth.
+cnoconoir What ever you do just avoid the obvious and make silly comments. Why not answer my comments seriously like a grown-up.
The number of scientist believing in God is DECREASING, and not INCREASING, as you suggests. But nice try to give lies to the people, nice try indeed.
Look up nonlinear dynamics, complexity theory, the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction, self-organization, emergent phenomena, chaos theory etc. Simple rules can indeed produce complex behaviours. You have just made the fallacy of incredulity. Try reading a book other than a collection of myths from some bronze age ignoramuses. You might actually learn something. More scientists are laughing at the theory of intelligent design than actually believe in it because it contains no actual science. It's a pseudoscience. If they want to hypothesize that there's some creator they need to say what this creator looks like, where it lives, what testable effects it has etc and they also need to come up with a null hypothesis so we would know what the experimental evidence would look like if such a creator didn't exist ie falsifiability. All these IDiots can come up with is a load of bullshit and dodge serious scientific questions.
+lambd01d Call it what you want, no naturally occurring process is going to come remotely close to developing a living organism.
The reason so many scientists believe in naturalism is because they are subjected to a steady diet of brainwashing and a fear that if they actually recognise the case for ID there will be severe consequences academically.
This is a fact and many eminent scientists have experienced it.
2
…it is true that the further apart 2 pubs are, as a general rule, the less dense will be the distribution of pubs in between them, and this is analogous to my claim that the further apart 2 functional configs are in ‘design space’, the more sparsely distributed will be any functional intermediates will be.
If James’ counterargument can’t refute the pubs claim- it is obviously flawed, and can’t refute my claim either- regardless of whether my claim is otherwise soundly supported or not.
The point of the analogy is that, just as various parts can only work together in so many ways in order to provide function, a partial form of one of those exceptional configurations is more likely to be broken than a new functional configuration- and the more elements that are involved the more this principle applies because all the elements are co-dependent and basically, there's more to go wrong
It is so interesting and telling how Derren Brown has to presuppose "the possibility" of no designer to what he admittedly recognizes as the consistent evidence whereby a designer is what always comes with a design. Then, in order to try to give this merit, he moves to the silly argument of "infinite regress" to defend his reason for "no design" which is an argument only one with a philosophy built on naturalistic presuppositions tries to make. Infinite regress is something everyone must contend with. If Derren wants to attribute it to matter or energy or anything else in his "purely materialistic world" that's his faithful assertion built on a commitment to naturalism. It is not any more or less a problem or solution for a Theist attributing that which is infinite being an intelligence. And the banana thing......give me a break! If you want to be taken seriously as an Atheist, at least understand the real premise to the intelligent design theory. It has to do with the idea of whether or not science has the ability to point to something outside of naturalistic causes. If it doesn't, then it can never point to anything metaphysical by its very nature and restricted framework by which it reasons, leaving other disciplines the responsibility to answer the questions science can not answer because it is limited to one religious world view...naturalism. The intelligent design proponents argues against this. The intelligent design movement takes the position that science by way of inference can point to something metaphysical as a probable solution to the empirical evidence discovered through the scientific method which goes far beyond a banana fitting the grip of a human hand! So put the banana down.....if you do not even attempt to reference the real argument you choose to refute, you can not be taken seriously.
True, science can never, due to it's constraints, point to anything outside the observable as a cause for anything.
But wait a moment. If I see a phenomenom and I can't CURRENTLY observe it's cause, that leaves us two options:
A) The cause is something unobservable.
B) The cause is something observable, but I haven't observed it yet.
You seem to gleefuly jump into A, and with complete dishonesty claim it is the only option. And also claim you can observe what it is.
Now, if you don't mind, can you provide any evidence that any claims YOU make about the UNobservable are true?
I mean, I know you can say "magic man did it" or "magic sandwich did it" or "magic volcano did it" and succeed at showing how it might be an answer (I'm serious about all of those), but I wonder how you can distinguish that answer from a fantasy.
Alejandro Alcántara
I am not at all jumping to “A” in the sense that science therefore can’t proceed to discover within its limits of option “B”. In fact, one who does not limit reasoning within the religious restrictions of “naturalism” but has come to understand the extremely plausible existence of an intelligent designer outside of the measurable patterns of science is engaged in recognizing the infinite solution as “God” instead of “material” giving way to proceeding with option “B” indefinitely. He is merely doing science as Newton and Kepler did. Therefore, knowing that the infinite regress means scientific discovery does not have limits to discovery even though point “A” is not only an option, it is as you say “unobservable.” This is only seen as “complete dishonesty” by those like yourself who believe science can’t “point to anything outside the observable as a cause for anything.” I think It can by way of inference which is always what science does when it moves from empirical evidence to theory.
I agree with you that “magic man did it” or “magic sandwich or volcano did it” is not going to invoke you to get excited about its possible consideration. The fact that you suggest something like it will be what I offer you as a consideration shows me you are not listening to what I am saying and you are implying you have a stubborn unwillingness and fear to leave your cozy blanket of limited reasoning within “naturalism.” That is your religious prerogative. It also clues me in on the reason you insist I claim I can “observe what it is.” We distinguish these ideas of “fantasy” from true inferences toward “intelligent design” by recognizing all the evidence that points to information outside of these natural patterns we discover. This becomes a theory in the same way Neo Darwinism becomes a theory based on inferences. Please note that it moves to intelligent Design with both your options “A” and “B” fully intact without limiting science as it moves to theory. It is also testable in a way that moves toward probability of the theory as further discovery is made. The fine tuned universe, irreducible complexity (both molecular and within nature), digital coding within the cell, …..remember our competing presuppositions…..because these also move to philosophical considerations for me but not necessarily for you since your philosophical consideration is restricted to naturalism….the ontological arguments, cosmological arguments (especially those recognizing “first cause”) This itself will give a logical reason by which we can leave purely “materialistic” constraints and infer how all empirical evidence with the understanding of first cause being intelligence is in fact logical. Since the repeated patterns in nature are recognized as repeated patterns in need of information, first cause being an intelligence can be held up and preferable against the notion of accidental causality being the catalyst for that information very logically, again, unless you insist on purely naturalistic restrictions when moving from observable empirical evidence to theory. This can be demonstrated by the recognition that information is itself neither matter or energy but in turn comprises the non-material foundation for observable technological systems, works of art, biological systems, conscience, human expression, etc. Now, if you care to respond, I will probably observe how you will run all these through your philosophical presupposition of “naturalism”, insist that I have to also run everything through your religious presupposition of “naturalism” in order to be “logical.” This is where we will have a breakdown based on philosophy but not science.
david stecker
Ok, I see you like the Chopra-esque "shotgun approach", which is launching a sophistornado of intrincate claims, and expect me to scramble, losing my breath, to put out all your fires.
Not in the mood, sorry. Let's go step by step.
(First of all, I am humbled by your astounding ability to self deprecate by calling me "religious" as an attempt at invalidation. That takes guts.)
You claim " "...science can’t “point to anything outside the observable as a cause for anything.” I think It can by way of inference which is always what science does when it moves from empirical evidence to theory."
Whoa, wait a moment. Let's clean up some of the sneaky words here. "when it MOVES from".
No, no movement here, let's be clear.
Scientific theories are systems of propositions that REFERENCE empirical evidence, in a model that both explains and allows predictions of some aspect of the objective world.
Is that ok?
So the scientific process uses inductive (not deductive) inferences to predict outcomes based on the understanding that the Theory provides. These outcomes may be
a)events in the future or
b) the discovery of concrete, unambiguous additional evidence, that are NOT simply the same aspect of the world that the theory is trying to explain.
It is absolutely imperative that these outcomes are Observable. If they aren't there is no way to distinguish a Valid theory from Conjecture. And in the case of the "supernatural", wild and limitless conjecture.
On this basis alone, I refute your claim that science can point to Unobservable claims. The whole point is to make predictions that one can Observe to falsify the theory. If the theory references an Unobservable component, there is no way to tell if it is actually that component as described in action, or something completel different.
A theory that points to the unobservable is not a scientific one.
By the way, I have no need whatsoever to claim that there is NO unobservable reality. I simply claim that, since it is (as defined) unobservable, it has no effect whatsoever in our existence, and any claim made about it, including it's existence, is irrational.
david stecker
Now, a question from me:
If you will, a simple, direct answer, will do.
When you so produdly brag about your capacity to "reason outside of the constraints of naturalism", I take that to mean you "construct verifiable models of reality that include references to propositions which are unobservable".
I assume, since you brag, that it is NOT "construct UNverifiable models of reality that reference unobservable claims", since that would be pretty much identical to fantasizing or hallucinating.
But please correct me if there is another way to describe "reasoning outside the constraints of naturalism".
If that's the case, how DO you know that the Causes you propose are really those and not any Infinitely Conceivable others? How do you falsify? (That is, check if your hypothesis are NOT false)
For example, the origin of DNA definitely CAN possibly be a complex, very long, acumulative and, over all, Observable and Repeatable chain of chemical processes.
If I propose one specific Chain of processes, I can put those to the test. See if they do or can, as I Imagine, have the effect I propose.
If they don't, I have discovered that my Hypothesis was Wrong.
How do you do that, when you can't see if your predictions come true or not?
Alejandro Alcántara So let me get this straight. You ask me a question. I answer the question. You accuse me of a "shotgun approach." Then you tell me you are not in the mood to respond and put out fires. But you are in the mood to ask me another question that my shotgun answer already addressed which you are not in the mood for. Now when I tell you this has become a waste of time, you will accuse me of not answering your question. Nevertheless, one thing we will both claim is that we are satisfied that the other is living in a fantasy world and deep within both of us, we understand by simple logic that one of us is wrong. Take care of yourself. I hope for you peace!
b)
The 2nd thing I ought to make clear is that by ''cannot'' exist, I am not saying that without analysis it can be 'known' that there cannot exist a functional intermediate at any given point in the transition. My argument (which, I feel I have to specify again I *have* backed up, and doesn't amount to just saying this, as you'll no doubt try and imply again) is that there will likely *be* a substantial amount of non-functional configurations along a *large* transition.
C)
I did not say that between any two configs there must be a non-functional one. I answered your point about multiple possible pathways elsewhere- the same argument applies to them all. I also answered your point re mutations that become advantageous at a later stage-this cannot help get you from one configuration to a radically different one because that would require a fortuitous accumulation of mutations, and without natural selection to preserve each step, that is inherently unlikely.
1. The original appeal of Darwinian theory is that it seemed to offer a mechanism that would leave a highly predictable pattern of gradual change in the fossil record. So much so that palaeontologists continued to search for that pattern, decades after they new in their heart of hearts that it had never existed. Evolution was then transmogrified into a vague theory that could 'explain' everything from perfectly gradual evolution to the near instantaneous appearance of novel adaptions.
when measuring electrons light is shined on the electron however when detecting the photons you can just put a photo-electric semi conductor that will give an electric current when light hits it. The point of the delayed choice quantum eraser experiment is to show that its not the detectors collapsing the wave but the fact that someone is trying to observe the result (quantum eavesdropping) on where what the particle does.
The different physical functions of different configurations, whether man-made or natural, are dependent *on* those configurations-as is the functionality in general. The different meanings of different words are dependent *on* the configurations of the constituent letters, as is the general 'meaningfulness' of the word.
In both cases, both specific and general 'function' is dependent on the specific arrangement of the constituent elements-- therefore the analogy absolutely does apply.
Questions that are not properly addressed have a habit of coming back. When you answer my questions seriously and with integrity then I will have no need to repeat them
My view is perfectly stated in the documentary. The view is 1. The universe is created by an intelligent being. 2. consciousness is not part of matter, energy, space and time but exist in another dimensional layer above this. 3. This universe may be part of a simulation run by a creator, the evidence of quantum physics is showing us that at the fundamental level the particles in the universe behave like data in a computer, they exist at a meta level but are only rendered when observed.
The pub analogy was not meant to show that non-functional configs would tend to be sparsely distributed between any two functional ones, the more different those functional configs were, it was to show that a particular counter-argument of James’ -that all the gaps would be filled in because the probability of a pub/functional intermediate becomes *higher* the less distant they are from each other, is nonsensicle.
I’m sure I’ve explained that to you.
B)
However, even within those regions of design space that contain such clusters, there are *still* more non-functional configs than otherwise and it is still true that function of any config is dependent on the interrelationship of its constituent parts-if you change those radically- and even a half-way journey along a pathway to a *very* different config would amount to a radical change- those elements are unlikely to be configured in such a way as to provide a function.
"Your position of philosophical naturalism amounts to the a priori rejection of the possibility of intelligent design"
"philosophical naturalism" is by definition "the a priori rejection of the possibility of intelligent design"
It's really the sequential information, digital coding and decoding, structure and design together that we can conclude prior conscious activity, since it has never been obeserved otherwise, and therefore extremely logical.
I think there is a bit of a misconception about 'evidence of god.' If there is a god, it exists outside of our reality, beyond our comprehension... That is accepted... Therefore why do people expect to see evidence of him in our reality? Any yes there is a lot of things happening by chance in the universe but that doesn't explain how everything came into existence
Gothams Reconing If he doesn't exist in our reality, then why would he be relevant in our reality then?
Because causality. How could something utterly outside of our reality influence ours?
Gothams Reconing have you ever seen a fossil? i'd throw one at you but im afraid it might go right over your head.
Gothams Reconing Actually it does. And if not entirely, we're on a good way for explaining that. Watch some Lawrance Krauss' lectures.
You can think of bajillion things that an exist outside of this reality, are beyond our comprehension and therefore, you can't prove their existence. The question is what for?
Christopher Gillum Good one,lol:)
2
By the logic of your counter-argument, regarding the pubs, because any intermediate pub, AA, between A and B will make it *more* likely that there’ll be more pub than non-pub space between A and AA and between AA and B and so on, there must be a continuous chain of pubs between any two pubs-in fact, pubs should cover the entire globe, or at least all dry land!
I agree that the further apart two configs are, the more nonfunctional configs must lie in between. But also the more functional ones.
The likelyhood of a pathway between them relies on the density of pubs and the distance you can travel. Not the distance between any two pubs.
A flagellum consists of many of thousands of protein molecules of around forty varieties. The helical tail is made up from tens of thousand of molecules of the protein flagellin, for example. The flagellum could probably function without some of these tail proteins, but if the gene for flagellin were removed entirely, then no flagellin could be manufactured and the helical propeller wouldn't get built.
As for the transitional series, here’s your argument in your words:
“there would be no reason to beleive that darwinian processes were responsible, because a smooth series of functional intermediates between significantly different forms is impossible”
You’re saying that NS can’t produce such significant change because a CSFI is impossible. I’m presenting you with such a continuous series, therefor your argument against NS is refuted.
d)
So... natural selection can only feasibly follow incremental pathways- I think you'll agree..
Therefore, *if* there is no possible continuously functional incremental pathway to be followed-- i.e. there aren't any in idealised 'design space'-- then natural selection cannot find one.
So this is what I meant when I said that the fact that nonfunctional configurations are selected out by natural selection cannot select 'in' functional configurations at points where they cannot exist.
1
No-- his argument was, that if it is true- as I was arguing, that the further apart two functional configs are, the more sparsely distributed any functional configs between them will be, then the converse applies, and the any functional intermediates that there might be will make it *more* probable that there'll be functional intermediates between *those* and the original two-- and this process is iterative and will fill in the gaps.
3
it becomes *more* likely that the pubs between the pub in Manchester and the pub in London become less sparsely distributed, and pubs between Birmingham and London become even less so-until, by the logic of this argument anyway, the line drawn between the original two pubs would have to be chock-a-block with pubs.
It's rather like someone discovering a mountain with fossil fish at the top.
We hypothesize that some mechanism must have 'lifted' the ground up to create the mountain.
We then discover plate tectonics and show that at fault lines the ground gets lifted up.
We then say "Here's the mechanism that can create mountains", and creationists say "They can create small hills, but you need to prove it can create mountains".
I know it's another analogy, but I think this one actually fits what's happening!
Gould and Eldredge confessed we have few examples of transitional fossils in Punchuated Equilibrium.
Animals remain unchanged for relatively long periods of time, then change rapidly due to a change in the environment.
We have few examples of the relatively fast changes between the long periods of stability.
We have many examples of gradual evolution, whales, humans, horses and there have been a few more presented to you in this comments section.
In the new scientific volume Biological Information: New Perspectives, Michael Behe has a paper titled "Getting There First: An Evolutionary Rate Advantage for Adaptive Loss-of-Function Mutations." This paper elaborates on some of Behe's arguments from his 2010 Quarterly Review of Biology paper, in which he reviewed molecular mechanisms involved in adaptations in microorganisms documented in the literature. He found there that such adaptations almost always involved loss or diminished function
I spent some time reading up on the history and philosophy of science because I was genuinely eager to understand how Darwinian theory, which I new to be deeply problematic, appeared to be immune from criticism. I would also definitely recommend Philip E. Johnsons Darwin on Trial. His exposition of the role of philosophical naturalism in propping up Darwinian evolution and abiogenesis remains a classic.
I didn't say that *all* of them would be, but the theory of macro-evolution by means of random mutation and natural selection is predicated on the acknowledged improbability of fortuitous macro-mutations or 'hopeful monsters'- hence the need to posit a mechanism whereby functional complexity is built be means of small incremental steps.
If big leaps are necessary, then the theory does not hold.
Also, pro tip: When you get the error message from CZcams, copy your comment just in case, then refresh the page. You should find your comment has been posted despite CZcams's nonsense.
You are right to point out that someone may believe in 'common descent', while not believing that life's diversity and complexity arose via a mindless naturalistic process. The problem is that without a compelling naturalistic account of either life's origin, or life's diversity and complexity, i.e. without an explanation for that 'common descent' from a materialistic perspective, we are left with intelligent design as the most likely driver of the process. Are you happy with that?
ps.
This latter word, in Hebrew, is "barasheet". In Hebrew, of course, it has the six letters mentioned. We translate this into English as "In the beginning".
Hebrew is unique in that its letters actually mean something, independently of the words they go together to create.
Oh, and the chariot wheels are independently dated to the 15th century BC; the Exodus was around 1440 BC.
c)
And related to that last point, I am NOT saying that the clustering of pubs *proves* the clustering of functional configurations-- the analogy was only intended to show that your objection was flawed-- though, as I say, it's interestingly flawed, as it *seems* logical.
I'd still like to know more formally where the error is, but error there most certainly is- otherwise nothing would be clustered.
As I say, it's the clustering of *words' that I'm saying has the same *cause*.
Gould and Eldredge prayed at the same shrine as their Darwinian gradualist buddies, despite their differences. The problem is that while Gould and Eldredge thought they had found a convenient explanation that would explain away the fossil records lack of gradualism, unfortunately PE remains untestable speculation. The most interesting thing they did, and the most significant, was simply to expose just how few examples of gradual evolution existed, and the massive preponderance of stasis
Here's a quote from Niles Eldredge: "I tried in vain to document examples of the kind of slow, steady directional change we all thought ought to be there, ever since Darwin told us that natural selection should leave precisely such a tell tale sign as we collect our fossils up cliff faces. I found instead, that once species appear in the fossil record, they tend not to change very much at all. Species remain imperturbably, implacably resistant to change as a matter of course... "
b)
As it goes, I do think that for most, if not all, large transitions the ratio of non-functional intermediates to functional ones is so large that the former are likely to be non-existent, but that is not a necessary requirement in order to rule out an incremental Darwinian pathway, which requires a fairly even and non-sparse distribution of possible functional intermediates.
Interestingly, the helical propeller / tail is built working from the basal body outwards. Each and every one of those tens of thousands of flagellin molecules is manufactured according to the information contained in the flagellin gene, brought to the construction site and then pumped through a hollow tube running through the center of the enlarging tail. When each flagellin molecule emerges at the distal end, it is correctly position with the help a special capping protein.
Whatever dominant pattern emerges from the fossil record, it will always be possible to accommodate the evidence retrospectively with various ad hoc naturalistic explanations. The fact that Darwinism is able to accommodate such diverse outcomes as the strictly gradualistic pattern (strongly preferred by Darwin himself, and by the evolutionary community for decades) and the too rapid to observe kind of evolution exposed by Gould and Eldredge, implies that Darwinian theory is infinitely flexible.
That probably explains why again and again they maintain that anyone who disgrees with the theory 'doesn't understand it' - which just amounts to saying 'you don't know why you're wrong' and is a case of begging the question.
*
''the further apart two pubs are, the more sparsely distributed any pubs along the line that separates the will be''
should have read,
''the further apart two pubs are, the more sparsely distributed any pubs along the line that separates them will *likely be* ''
@IDtakovr
Lets go through this really simply for you-
1) macro evoultion (if it occurred) is big- so it takes a LONG time
2)microevoultion (if it occurs) is small- so it only takes a SHORT time
3) human life span is SHORT
Now here comes the tricky bit so concentrate
4) humans would be incapable of observing anything other than micro evolution (because of their SHORT life span)
Therefore your request/expectation - to observe macroevolution IS INCOHERENT
The real problem is that the closed system shouldn't change at all whether its observed or not. We all assume that if a tree falls down when nobody is in the forest to observe it, it will still make a sound. What do we do when we find out that it doesn't? Why should particles chose to act differently when observed? There is strong evidence that at a fundamental level the universe isn't purely materialistic. Science shouldn't just dismiss this 'cause it doesn't like the implications.
Your counter-argument to my claim that the further away two functional configurations are, the more sparsely distributed any intermediates would be, was to say that, if that were true, the reverse would also have to apply- the nearer they are, the less sparsely any intermediates would be- and so all the gaps would be filled in.
The point of the pub/star analogies was to point out that if your argument was correct, nothing would be clustered- and they obviously are.
b)
The problem is, that in this matter as in many others, the public are treated like children and are expected to be satisfied with simple answers, whilst you don’t generally get to the top unless you’re willing to tow the line.
Of course there *are* very bright people, like Peter Atkins, who are unable to see the problems with the theory due to their ideological blinders.
Im of average intelligence but i stumbled across the quote "If a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it does it make a sound" and it really got me thinking about perception and reality. Made me think, if sound is vibrations that we decode through our senses in our minds then what senses are out there that we don't have and cannot percieve. To be honest I think we don't know shit.
Faith transcends reason - whether it is fact or fiction!
4 years ago I had an experience in my bedroom, I was praying to God in despair because I lost my job 3 days before, and I got an answer in that moment, the sensation i got was warmth/heat and a powerful light coming trough my body which lasted for maybe 10 seconds and I sensed an answer to my prayer which was: I am with you, trust in me. 2 weeks later I was back in the same job. Was it God? I believe it was. Did he design us, I believe.
I agree that there will various paths between two configs, A and B- just as there is more than one route you could take by changing one word into another, one letter at a time. However, the same argument applies to all possible routes- the more different the pairs or configs/words are, the less likely it is that there’ll be an incremental pathway between them that preserves function/meaning, and the likelihood diminishes for every possible route.
I did not assert that life's complexity "HAS to be intelligently designed". I asserted that intelligent design is (by far) the most likely explanation, given that intelligent agency is observed to have the power to generate computers, information processing systems and machines, whereas natural causes are never observed to create such things. Given this fact, ID proponents should be funded, and given ample opportunity to explore their ideas and complete on a level playing field with Darwinists.
Thanks, I’ll look into that- probably next week, when I’m back online at home.
Over 100 million fossils have been collected since Darwins time. By this time, palaeontologists are easily able to claim that they have a broadly representative picture of the fossil record. The problem for Darwinists isn't lack of fossils or detail, but the exact opposite. As I have already explained, where fossil preservation is at it's very best, we observe the sudden appearance of complexity and novelty, followed by millions of years of stasis. The problem for Darwinists is what we DO know.
Thanks for the chat again.
Thanks for making that distinction between "an ID point of view" and one that's"fairly honest about the evidence".
product. Nobody sits there and looks at the configuration of turbine blades and says "This is the configuration we want the computer to come up with". THAT would be intelligently designing it.
They say, "here's the things the computer can change, and when it does, the configuration can be tested immediately in a wind chamber and assessed for efficiency".
This information is fed back into the system and the process repeated
Amazing results are achieved far quicker than brute forcing the problem
c)
This comment is out of order-- in at least one sense, but blame youtube's glitches. I had duplicates and while deleting them, somehow managed to delete all of the 'c's.
Anyway, the gist of it was that while you could say that for any point it 'might' be functional- this is only true in a certain sense, and given that the precise pathway is not known. It wouldn't change the fact that, on average, each point is more likely to be non-functional than functional.
Remember, your claim is that NS can’t be responsible “based on the fact that there can't be, for the reasons I gave, smooth incremental pathways between significantly different functional forms. You’re trying to claim that NS can’t produce the change between disparate forms and functions because a CSFI is impossible while claiming that evidence of such a series doesn’t constitute a refutation. This is perplexing.
a)
When said '' NS can therefore 'select in' nonfunctional intermediates that just cannot exist'', there's two things that I probably ought to clarify--
As I said before, by 'intermediates' I mean intermediate configurations that constitute a transition from one functional config to another, and which are each made by making small changes to the preceding one. I *don't* necessarily mean intermediates in an *actual* Darwinian pathway, which obviously *would* all be functional.
I run out of space to type but here's another video showing that its not the instruments measuring the electrons that cause them to become particles, its the fact that they're being observed that somehow causes the particle to collapse from its wave state into a particle state with a location in space-time.
/watch?v=sfeoE1arF0I
To clarify, random mutation and natural selection are used in industry to design cars, airplanes, safety devices, kitchen appliances, the list goes on.
You do understand the difference between artificial selection (i.e selectively breeding dogs) and natural selection (a change in climate causes the animals with least fur to die and therefore not breed) is that artificial selection has someone choosing artificial environmental pressures, where as in natural selection, the pressures are natural?
As to the pertinence of the analogy: it is true that the space between two pubs is not filled with other pubs, but how does this imply that the space between to forms can’t be filled by transitions that are only incrementally different from the preceding form?
Now the next part. Here's what you just said: "I did not say that functional intermediates are impossible"
Here's what you said last week: "a smooth series of functional intermediates between significantly different forms is impossible"
As I stated, and as Gould and Eldredge made plain: "The extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persist as the trade secret of paleontology. The evolutionary trees that adorn our textbooks have data only at the tips and nodes of their branches; the rest is inference, however reasonable, not the evidence of fossils...."
If you're prohibited from considering something as an option, the fact that you don't find 'evidence' of it can hardly be considered as evidence of its absence.
Well it wasn't what you said, but it was the logical implication of your counter-argument.
You raised a valid point in your second sentence-- but I'm still dependent on the library till the weekend so will answer more fully tommorow.
If you want to attack an analogy on the basis that it doesn’t support my argument, rather than on the basis that it doesn’t refute James’ attempted refutation- the word analogy is the one you should be attacking.
As I've repeatedly pointed out the pub analogy was to show that Jame's counter-argument was flawed- it wasn't meant to be analogous in the sense that the *cause* of the clustering was the same as the cause of the clustering of functional configs.
If you're talking about avoidance, neither of you have acknowledged that the pub analogy- which could just as easily be a star analogy, or anything else that is clustered, shows James' counter-argument to be clever nonsense.
2
The equivalent of your argument would be to say that;
Because going a short distance from each pub makes it more likely that there'll be a pub within the next mile, any long distance in any direction can be subdivided into constituent short distances, in which there will likely be at least one pub for every mile travelled.
This is obviously wrong.
I love how creationists hold science to such a high level of proof, and by that I mean it must explain absolutely everything about everything, but their own belief requires none. Science knows it doesn't know everything. Just because science doesn't know everything, doesn't mean science knows nothing. And just because science doesn't know everything, doesn't mean you can make it up.
As for the exist query thing, the reason I brought that up is because someone else said science has practically answered all the questions religion set to answer. That's like saying science has replaced philosophy- I countered that argument saying it hasn't and if it only looks at the universe in a purely materialistic way it probably never will. I would like to know the answer to these questions and I'm suer they're billions more people like me who would like to know the meaning of life too.
1
As I also said, the word analogy *is* intended to be an analogy in the sense that the clustering of functional configs has the same *cause* as the clustering of functional configs that I'm claiming exists for 'machines' and functional systems in 'design space'.
There's nothing wrong with using analogies- how do you propose that we ascertain if the mechanism really *is* that powerful? I guess we could disprove it mathematically- and I think that's been done.
Father Christmas! Gotta love the quirky differences between American and English terminology :P
This is not quite what I said.
I said we couldn't know where things were clustered, if they were. And if functional configs are clustered, why can't they also be more prevalent around 'filaments', if you will, or pathways between clusters?
a)
No I did not say that functional intermediates are impossible. But if they are likely to become progressively less as compared to the number of non-functional intermediates the greater the transition is, then that is enough to make Darwinian explanations for large transitions implausible.
Nobody disagrees with the fact that out of the billions of random genetic mutations occurring every day, a few might be useful. We also agree that out of the billions of computer programming errors caused by electromagnetic interference, a few will be useful and will be preserved for their usefulness. What we never see, though, is major design sophistication arising from an accumulation of those errors in either case, like new biochemical machines or new operating systems...