Nature, God, and Reason

[George.]

Looks like we are going to miss Pope John Paul. The Rat looks set to backpedal from his predecessors recognition of the theory of evolution...

Leading Cardinal Redefines Church's View on Evolution (http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/09/science/09cardinal.html)


An influential cardinal in the Roman Catholic Church, which has long been regarded as an ally of the theory of evolution, is now suggesting that belief in evolution as accepted by science today may be incompatible with Catholic faith.

...

Opponents of Darwinian evolution said they were gratified by Cardinal Schönborn's essay. But scientists and science teachers reacted with confusion, dismay and even anger. Some said they feared the cardinal's sentiments would cause religious scientists to question their faiths.

Cardinal Schönborn, who is on the Vatican's Congregation for Catholic Education, said the office had no plans to issue new guidance to teachers in Catholic schools on evolution. But he said he believed students in Catholic schools, and all schools, should be taught that evolution is just one of many theories. Many Catholic schools teach Darwinian evolution, in which accidental mutation and natural selection of the fittest organisms drive the history of life, as part of their science curriculum.

Darwinian evolution is the foundation of modern biology. While researchers may debate details of how the mechanism of evolution plays out, there is no credible scientific challenge to the underlying theory.

...

"There is a deep and growing chasm between the scientific and the spiritual world views... To the extent that the cardinal's essay makes believing scientists less and less comfortable inhabiting the middle ground, it is unfortunate. It makes me uneasy."

What's next? Will they reconsider John Paul's pardoning of Galileo?

The article goes on to point out that this cardinal got his talking points from the evangelical pseudo-scientists who peddle "intelligent design." That is perhaps the most worrysome aspect of this. Will the Catholic Church under the new pope enter into an alliance with the evangelical fundamentalists to try to suppress truth and science? Will science be deemed incompatible with Christianity? If so, it looks like Western nations will have to choose between a secular future and a medieval one. :(

[ 08-02-2005, 11:02 AM: Message edited by: George. ]

[George.]

Cardinal Schonborn's essay is deliciously ridiculous at times:


...defenders of neo-Darwinian dogma ...

Any system of thought that denies or seeks to explain away the overwhelming evidence for design in biology is ideology, not science.
Oh, I see. It is scientists that defend "dogma" and defend ideology, not science. The fact that the very term "dogma" is a Church construct is to be ignored...


Consider the real teaching of our beloved John Paul. While his rather vague and unimportant 1996 letter about evolution is always and everywhere cited, we see no one discussing these comments from a 1985 general audience that represents his robust teaching on nature. Good thing we have the Cardinal to tell us which of John Paul's teachings were "robust," and which ones were "vague and unimportant..." even if the "unimportant" ones came eleven years after his initial "robust" position. :rolleyes:

John Paul II must be rolling over in his grave.

Heliocentrists, watch out - you may be next.

[Bob Cleek]

Ah... George?... "Intelligent design" has been a philosophical evolutionary concept for a long, long time. It doesn't preclude "evolution theory" as you understand it at all. Without precluding any of the current scientific theories, the discussion apparently involves whether "evolution" as we understand it is a result of purely random chance or some "intelligent design" by a prime mover of some sort. Now, I haven't read the whole article, which isn't available on the URL you posted, but it appears to be simply a sensationalist anti-Catholic headline designed to sell newspapers.

[Meerkat]

Christianity isn't relevent to much of anything anymore. That's why the concentrated remnants are screeching so loudly and trying to insist that their beliefs be made law.

[High C]

Obscurancy? Now that's evolution! :D

[Bruce Taylor]

Obscurancy? Now that's evolution! [Big Grin] "Obscurancy" is a good old word, and George is using it correctly. "Obscurantism" is more current, but a bigger mouthful (and not quite a synonym).

[High C]

I failed to find "obscurancy" in the online dictionary I use. I guessed it was a variant of "obscurity", but see now that it is an altogether different word, meaning to withhold info from the public.

Perhaps I should've used the word "devolution". ;)

[Meerkat]

Originally posted by High C:

Perhaps I should've used the word "devolution". ;) Don't strain yourself HiC! :eek:

Disingenuous comes to mind when I think of you, mon cher faux-naif! tongue.gif

[High C]

Hmmph, I am but a lowly high school dropout. I have to look those big words up. Faux-naif, indeed! :D

[Jack Heinlen]

Jesus offered himself to us. What did he teach? How did he die?

[huisjen]

Devolution is very real.

http://www.clubdevo.com/mp/images/discog/truth_dvd04.jpg

[PatCox]

Ah, Bob Cleek, the definition of "intelligent design" varies depending on who is using the term, and unfortunately, the flat earthers who believe the earth is 6000 years old and Genesis is to be taken literally have adopted the term and perverted it. It is one thing to say, as I believe you do when you use the term, that intelligent design refers to the entire cosmological view that the universe appears to have been set up in just the right way to produce life through evolution, it is another thing entirely to say that intelligent design is a valid scientific theory which explains observed events and therefore replaces and supersedes evolution as a scientific theory.

See what happens when you let literalists get there foot in the door.

[Bob Cleek]

Well, in my mind, there's this big pool table up in heaven and God made the break... that's "intelligent design"... the rest is evolution. Science tries to extrapolate the various tracks each ball took from a snapshot of the table taken at one moment or another after that break. Fact is, though, that HOW the earth or anything else came to be how it is today really doesn't make a bit of difference to the experience of the Divine here and now.

[ 07-10-2005, 11:11 PM: Message edited by: Bob Cleek ]

[skuthorp]

Maybe the church thinks that if it takes us back to the 15th century, re-instates the inquisition, we'll be able to oppose the muslims on their own terms, like burn a few at the stake?
:rolleyes: :cool:

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

I don't have access to the article. I can guess why Cardinal Schonborn says what he seems to say, but it's one of those priceless pieces of illogic:

Here's the syllogism:

Darwin says we evolved from animals

Animals don't have souls

People have souls

We could not have evolved from animals

[Sam F]

Throughout history the church has defended the truths of faith given by Jesus Christ. But in the modern era, the Catholic Church is in the odd position of standing in firm defense of reason as well. In the 19th century, the First Vatican Council taught a world newly enthralled by the "death of God" that by the use of reason alone mankind could come to know the reality of the Uncaused Cause, the First Mover, the God of the philosophers.

Now at the beginning of the 21st century, faced with scientific claims like neo-Darwinism and the multiverse hypothesis in cosmology invented to avoid the overwhelming evidence for purpose and design found in modern science, the Catholic Church will again defend human reason by proclaiming that the immanent design evident in nature is real. Scientific theories that try to explain away the appearance of design as the result of "chance and necessity" are not scientific at all, but, as John Paul put it, an abdication of human intelligence. (Cardinal Schönborn in the NYT OpEd)

It has been pointed out before on this Forum - There has been no change in the Church’s view on evolution. JPII and his successor are in perfect accord.

Here’s another syllogism:
The Darwinist believes that Darwinian Evolution must be true
The Church says that based on evidence, Darwinian Evolution isn’t true
The Darwinist can’t be wrong because his belief must be true
Therefore he must make up a silly caricature of the Church’s position, rather than grapple with the real thing. :D

As the good Cardinal said:
Any system of thought that denies or seeks to explain away the overwhelming evidence for design in biology is ideology, not science.

[Keith Wilson]

. . . . the overwhelming evidence for purpose and design found in modern science . . .What nonsense. The so-called “overwhelming evidence for purpose and design” simply does not exist, and is certainly not recognized by those who actually do the scientific work on which such claims are based. The Church may claim that based on evidence, Darwinian Evolution isn’t true, but this is simply false, as those who actually work with the evidence will all tell you.

The purpose of “intelligent design” speculation is as old as modern science, in fact probably as old as religion, although modern science gives it much greater urgency – to find incontrovertible proof of God’s handiwork, the fingerprints of the creator on the creation. In previous ages, when people understood less about the physical world, it was fairly easy to claim the hand of one deity or another in storms or earthquakes or other obvious natural events, but this has gotten more difficult lately , and those who try to do this are left with the God of the shrinking gaps. The gaps in our knowledge are still enormous, of course; our ideas of the universe have gotten much more complex and stranger over the past 500 years as we’ve learned more, but the events of ordinary day-to-day life are now pretty well understood, and God’s fingerprints are nowhere obvious. Thus “intelligent design”, an attempt to provide scientific evidence for the existence of a creator.

It’s silly, of course, and aside from being a perversion of science, is really human beings telling God what to do, and reducing him to something we can understand. Any God capable of creating a universe so vast and complex is quite capable of working in ways that we are not able to perceive, in fact in ways that are indistinguishable from natural processes.

[ 07-11-2005, 12:43 PM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

I really don't need Paley's Evidences, or cut price modern imitations of Paley, thanks.

And I don't have any problem at all with there being perhaps 11 dimensions. I see nothing un-Christian about that idea. As Calvin observed, if you can think of anything bigger, wiser or more complex than God, the thing you thought of in the first place was not God.

[George.]

Originally posted by Bob Cleek:
Well, in my mind, there's this big pool table up in heaven and God made the break... that's "intelligent design"... the rest is evolution. Bob, first of all, here is a link to the Cardinal's piece:

Finding Design in Nature (http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/07/opinion/07schonborn.html)

Now, what you describe is indeed an old philosophical hypothesis - the hypothesis of the primum mobile, or first mover. And you are correct, it does not contradict science, and is not contradicted by it.

What modern advocates of intelligent design claim is something quite different. They claim there is no such thing as natural selection - that God constantly intervenes in every step of the species formation process, which otherwise could not possible develop so wonderfully as it does.

In your pool table analogy, it is like saying that God not only made the break, but keeps putting his hands in the table and pushing the individual balls around, because nothing else can explain the "perfect" way in which they bounce off each other and go into the holes...

[P.I. Stazzer-Newt]

The current New Scientist has a fascinating article on this.

It's big - and really really dangerous.

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

That does it; I'm off to the newsagent.

[Meerkat]

"defended the truths of faith"
:D
As a matter of faith, any declaration is "true." That has nothing to do with the factual basis of the claim(s).

When "X declares", unless it's a statement of empirical fact, you can be pretty sure it's the start of some fairy tale. tongue.gif

[George.]

Originally posted by Sam F:

It has been pointed out before on this Forum - There has been no change in the Church’s view on evolution. JPII and his successor are in perfect accord.Sure - as long as you are willing to have JPII's position interpreted for you by someone who says that:


Consider the real teaching of our beloved John Paul. While his rather vague and unimportant 1996 letter about evolution is always and everywhere cited, we see no one discussing these comments from a 1985 general audience that represents his robust teaching on nature. This is absurd. If JPII's 1996 letter was "vague and unimportant," and yet it ended up being "everywhere cited" and misinterpreted (if you believe Schonborn), then JPII himself would have come out and said so.

But he didn't. He was happy to let people cite it for a decade as proof that the Catholic Church accepts the theory of evolution by natural selection - it was all over the press, all over the world. He never once contradicted this or denied that that is what he meant. And Schonborn had to wait till John Paul II was dead before he could come out and tell us that the former pope never really meant what he said. ;)

[ 07-11-2005, 01:03 PM: Message edited by: George. ]

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

Slightly off topic, but I would like to know Sam's view and I should think I might get it if I post on this thread. ;)

Over lunch today we fell into conversation over what was meant by Henry VIII of England's Pontifical title, "Fidei Defensor".

There being no definite article in Latin, the common rendering, "Defender of the Faith" is clearly wrong.

Can anyone offer a better?

[Meerkat]

How about "Faithful Defender"?

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> . . . . the overwhelming evidence for purpose and design found in modern science . . .What nonsense. The so-called “overwhelming evidence for purpose and design” simply does not exist, ... </font>[/QUOTE]You said that the sort of proof Sagan postulated in fiction would suffice. Is there any other proof at the genetic level that would do as well - besides an encoding of prime numbers?


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
[The purpose of “intelligent design” speculation is as old as modern science, in fact probably as old as religion, although modern science gives it much greater urgency – to find incontrovertible proof of God’s handiwork, the fingerprints of the creator on the creation... and God’s fingerprints are nowhere obvious. Thus “intelligent design”, an attempt to provide scientific evidence for the existence of a creator. I asked before and don’t recall receiving an answer – what is unscientific about postulating a non-human intelligence?

[P.I. Stazzer-Newt]

When I was a lad, the two bob bit had FID.DEF. on it - sometimes alongside IND.IMP.

Now it says (after I've changed my glasses) -
D.G.REG.F.D.

I half expected to find + All mod.cons. ;)

[ 07-11-2005, 01:36 PM: Message edited by: P.I. Stazzer-Newt ]

[sharpie]

Fidei; genitive case usually translated as "of faith" or "faith's").

Defensor; nominative case which includes definite and indefinite articles (the, a)as part of translation. Context often determines which article is to be used.

So, Defensor Fidei can be translated as "The Defender of the the Faith" or Faith's Defender.

[BrianW]

Christianity isn't relevent to much of anything anymore.That is your opinion, and maybe that of those you surround yourself with, but it doesn't hold true with the rest of the world.

In fact, just look at this thread, some folks are extremely worried about the Catholic Churches stance on evolution vs creation.

[Sam F]

Originally posted by BrianW:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Christianity isn't relevent to much of anything anymore.That...doesn't hold true with the rest of the world.

In fact, just look at this thread, some folks are extremely worried about the Catholic Churches stance on evolution vs creation.</font>[/QUOTE]Good point. A dwindling minority has good cause to worry, but evidently not good enough cause to re-evaluate its untenable position. ;)

[Meerkat]

Originally posted by BrianW:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Christianity isn't relevent to much of anything anymore.That is your opinion, and maybe that of those you surround yourself with, but it doesn't hold true with the rest of the world.

In fact, just look at this thread, some folks are extremely worried about the Catholic Churches stance on evolution vs creation.</font>[/QUOTE]Dwindling church attendence is not just a matter of my opinion, nor is the fact of the Catholics closing down parishes due to poor attendence.

[TomF]

Most of the mainline churches are closing down buildings, as attendance slumps. In Newfoundland, the Catholic church has chosen to also sell off church property, to pay for sexual abuse judgements.

[David W Pratt]

They do not seem to realize that science never believes anything. We (I'm a biologist) only accept that a theory has not been disproven. You can imagine a Nobel awaits the person who proves evoultion does not exist.
Also, the thing that keeps popping up in my, alleged, mind is, if it is intelligent design, where is it going?

[Keith Wilson]

. . . what is unscientific about postulating a non-human intelligence?It's entirely reasonable (and eventually testable) to postulate non-human intelligence somewhere else in the universe, but that's not what the proponents of "intelligent design" (creationism lite) are doing. Their "non-human intelligence" is the creator, (through no known mechanism) of the so-called "irreducibly complex" structures, i.e. God. So let's look at that hypothesis.

How can it be tested? Specifically, how is it possible to disprove the hypothesis? If it can't be disproven, it is faith rather than science.

Secondarily, what testable predictions can be made using the hypothesis? What should we expect to find if it's true? If it's false?

[ 07-11-2005, 02:55 PM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> . . . what is unscientific about postulating a non-human intelligence?Wellit's enterely reasonable (and eventually testable) to postulate non-human intelligence somewhere else in the universe, but that's not what "intelligent design" (creationism lite) is really doing. </font>[/QUOTE]Keith, I could as well say that Darwinian Evolution - It is "really doing" a justification of Atheistic Materialism. Atheism lite as it were...
That approach doesn’t work...

If it's scientific to search for intelligence among the stars, it's just as scientific to search for it here on earth.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Their "non-human intelligence" is the creator, (through no known mechanism) of the so-called "irreducibly complex" structures, i.e. God. So let's look at that hypothesis.

How can it be tested? Specifically, how is it possible to disprove the hypothesis? If it can't be disproven, it is faith rather than science. Let’s reexamine some central “scientific” Evolutionary tenets for testability:
For instance: The information contained in the first cell's DNA molecule was the product of only physical processes.
Can you test that?
How about the official Position Statement of the American National Association of Biology Teachers (NABT)
The diversity of life on earth is the outcome of evolution; an unsupervised, impersonal, unpredictable and natural process of temporal descent with genetic modification that is affected by natural selection, chance, historical contingencies and changing environments.
How can one test something that is ”unpredictable”?
Fact is that you can't test either statement and thus you’ve already proved an inability to test the central tenets of Evolution.
So that doesn’t work either because “if it can't be disproved, it is faith rather than science.”

[ 07-11-2005, 03:40 PM: Message edited by: Sam F ]

[Meerkat]

Originally posted by Sam F:
The information contained in the first cell's DNA molecule was the product of only physical processes.
Can you test that?
Why yes, yes you can! It's been done. tongue.gif

"Jesus Christ is the son of god."
Can YOU test that (empirically)? tongue.gif

[Keith Wilson]

Keith, I could as well say that Darwinian Evolution - It is "really doing" a justification of Atheistic Materialism. Atheism lite as it were . . .Utter nonsense. Again, ALL of science and ALL of technology, from physics to plumbing, deals with the physical world, determining truth through observation and experiment. It takes no position on supernatural causes because these by definition are not part of the physical world, and cannot be observed or experimented with. This is inherent in science and technology, and it’s the reason they work. It is not about meaning or morality. Again (and I’ve said it so many times everybody has probably gotten very tired of hearing it, but it’s true nonetheless) evolution is about the purely physical world, about what happened and how it happened. Evolutionary biology is no more inherently atheistic than welding, or structural engineering, or polymer chemistry. If one wishes to add the supernatural to one area of science, why not all of them?

However, “intelligent design” is most certainly religious; it tries to put a limit on reason in the investigation of the physical world. “This is a result of intelligent design” means that we can’t explain it, nor should we try. Almost all of those advocating intelligent design have an avowed religious purpose. You probably know about the infamous ”Wedge Strategy” paper from the Discovery Institute. (http://www.antievolution.org/features/wedge.html)


The information contained in the first cell's DNA molecule was the product of only physical processes.This statement contains several bad assumptions. Did the first cell have DNA? Almost certainly not. Was the first self-reproducing thing cellular? (calling it a “living” thing is problematic at that stage of complexity.) Almost certainly not. Thus the question is meaningless, like "Do the wings on bananas absorb orange happiness?"

However, let's leave that aside; Ockam's Razor, Sam. We have observed nothing other than purely physical processes. All observable physical phenomena in our world appear to be a result of purely physical processes. Why should we postulate something completely different than we have ever observed?


How can one test something that is ”unpredictable”?“Unpredictable” in that context means that one cannot predict the outcome of a long process of evolution in advance. That does NOT mean untestable. The weather is the result of purely physical processes, is it not? Yet it is currently quite impossible to predict the weather accurately two weeks in advance, much less years. However, we can form hypotheses about the mechanisms that create weather, and test them perfectly well through observation and experiment, even though the weather is unpredictable beyond next week.

Current evolutionary theory can CERTAINLY be disproved. It’s difficult at this point, of course, because of the enormous amount of evidence that has been accumulated. However, if you can’t think of fifty discoveries that would at least force major revisions, you’re not trying. It’s not testable by experiments in the same way that other theories are testable, (unless you have several million years to wait) but it is most certainly falsifiable. You can talk endlessly about how it’s just another form of faith, but it simply is not.

We’ve been here before, Sam and your arguments are no more convincing than they were the last four times. I really don't want to do this again.

[ 07-11-2005, 04:22 PM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[Bob Cleek]

Meercat asks: "Jesus Christ is the son of god."
Can YOU test that (empirically)?

Well, no. But why would one bother?

We do know that Christ was an historical figure. He did exist. This we know from both early Christian and non-christian historical writings.

We also know that he was executed and buried and that a significant number of people claim to have seen him alive thereafter, supposedly "risen from the dead." I can't say empirically that this is true. In fact, I'd have to say it was scientifically preposterous. What we do know, however, is that this notion took root and became a constant belief of millions and millions of people in the last two thousand years. My guess is that if the whole thing was just some sort of hoax, it wouldn't have lasted long as long as it has as a workable belief system.

As for human evolution, we do know that there is no chance that the fossil record will ever reveal the evolution of human consciousness beyond perhaps an indication of the historical appearance of tool making or the concept of an afterlife evidenced by burial practices. How do you empirically demonstrate the development of a concept of the afterlife? You don't and you can't.

How life evolves is really of no moment to the experience of the Divine. The Genesis story is simply a pre-scientific attempt to explain where a people came from, that question being a correlary to human consciousness. Better science is likely to provide a better explanation. Theology, on the other hand, looks to those first explanations for their theological truth, not their scientific truth. If one wishes to embrace a purely creationist explanation, they will likely have difficulty reconciling it with empirically derived scientific truth. If one wishes to embrace a purely scientific explanation for how we got here as we are today, they are likely to have difficulty reconciling it with a theologically consistent truth.

Point is, there is no need to reconcile theological truth with scientific truth. It's apples and oranges. Science will never be able to prove or disprove the existence of God and God could care less whether or not we are able to explain everything scientifically.

[P.I. Stazzer-Newt]

Bob, well said.

Various people keep pushing this sentence (or its converse):<hr>The information contained in the first cell's DNA molecule was the product of only physical processes.<hr>

Near as I can tell there was no information in the "first cell's DNA molecule".
Information is an abstract noun - not a physical entity.

[ 07-11-2005, 06:11 PM: Message edited by: P.I. Stazzer-Newt ]

[Bob Cleek]

And for those who believe that nature is totally random, DNA, as little as we presently understand it today, seems pretty organized to me!

[ccoffer]

I find it telling that Sam F is only answered on the semantic level.

Methinks he is defeating you, and you know it.

[skuthorp]

'. . . . the overwhelming evidence for purpose and design found in modern science . . .'

Yep Keith, wer'e still left with the god of the gaps. The more we know the more we dont. I still have no use for a god, I may be wrong, but in an infinite universe everything is possible. We should come back to this in 10,000 years or so if the species is still exaunt, but I have a feeling the arguement will still be the same, even if the name of the god different. ;)

[George.]

What Bob said - and said very well. It's refreshing to see a representative of the thinking majority of Catholics providing a counterpoint for the fundamentalist fringe.

I must observe one thing, though:


Originally posted by Bob Cleek:
What we do know, however, is that this notion took root and became a constant belief of millions and millions of people in the last two thousand years. My guess is that if the whole thing was just some sort of hoax, it wouldn't have lasted long as long as it has as a workable belief system.
You can say exactly the same thing about Islam's stories about Muhammed, his receiving the Koran directly from God, and his being taken up to heaven. Does that mean they are not a hoax?

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> Keith, I could as well say that Darwinian Evolution - It is "really doing" a justification of Atheistic Materialism. Atheism lite as it were . . .Utter nonsense. </font>[/QUOTE]Keith, you’ve missed the point. What was I saying in that passage you quoted?
It’s a response to your statement...
Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
...but that's not what "intelligent design" (creationism lite) is really doing.” You’re a priori reasoning is that you know that Intelligent Design is “really doing” religion. Do you really know that? Or is your response conditioned by pro-Materialist propaganda? It is just possible that the impetus behind today’s Intelligent Design might actually be flaws in Neo-Darwinism’s prevailing orthodoxy.

Now, why did I say: “that Darwinian Evolution - It is "really doing" a justification of Atheistic Materialism”? Because turn about is fair play. It is the same exact thing you said - that what’s happening on the surface isn’t the whole story; that there are ulterior motives and that they invalidate the whole project. But that is easily turned about...
Here’s something I really do know and have proved: That Darwinism is an expression of the Scientific Materialist philosophy of Darwin’s day. Like almost all ideas, one can not simply proclaim that it just is – that it sprung full grown from the brow of Jove. The fact is that Darwin’s ideas were a product of his time and influenced by Lyell’s Uniformitarianism. It is not “about what happened and how it happened” and his ideas aren’t just so. They must stand or fall on the evidence and that evidence, rather than growing to confirm Darwin, is destroying his ideas.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Again, ALL of science and ALL of technology, from physics to plumbing, deals with the physical world, determining truth through observation and experiment. Keith, a scientific study of my house’s plumping would reveal that it was the product of an intelligence, and that it was designed. Granted, it’s the product of an inept intelligence ;) , but the evidence nevertheless supports the design conclusion. Science didn’t have to say anything at all about there being a supernatural cause or not – just that the plumbing couldn’t have happened by chance. The calculation about the nature of the intelligent agency is scientifically off-the-books (so to say). In the same way, Intelligent Design needn’t speculate about the exact nature of the designer – nor is such a thing possible – but it can certainly seek evidence of that designer’s work.
Just because a scientific finding has religious implications is no reason to invalidate it. Lots of findings in astronomy have religious implications and Darwin himself does too, but no one calls them un-scientific on that account.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Evolutionary biology is no more inherently atheistic than welding, or structural engineering, or polymer chemistry. If one wishes to add the supernatural to one area of science, why not all of them? Welding, engineering and making plastics are not the products of “unsupervised, impersonal, unpredictable and natural process” but are the result of design. Your own examples betray you Keith.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />The information contained in the first cell's DNA molecule was the product of only physical processes.This statement contains several bad assumptions. Did the first cell have DNA? Almost certainly not. Was the first self-reproducing thing cellular? (calling it a “living” thing is problematic at that stage of complexity.) Almost certainly not. Thus the question is meaningless, like "Do the wings on bananas absorb orange happiness?" </font>[/QUOTE]Keith that’s a dodge and not a very good one either. You would have me believe that you can drive a car without first starting it. Postulating that an “RNA world”, or whatever else would substitute for DNA, doesn’t help a bit. RNA is quite complex enough to be exceedingly unlikely to have occurred by chance, aka “chemical evolution”
DNA exists. You have not explained its’ existence. Not only that, you can’t explain the first reproducing organism. That’s OK, I don’t mind if you believe it was the result of “unsupervised, impersonal, unpredictable and natural process”, but my faith is as good as yours.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
However, let's leave that aside; Ockam's Razor, Sam. By all means use that razor. Now balance the first reproducing organism’s DNA on it. Which is simpler - that it was designed or that it was the product of unpredictable natural processes?
You do remember Michael Behe’s calculations about there not being enough time in the Universe for such a thing to have happened by chance? So which is the simpler choice?
A designer or the impossible?


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
We have observed nothing other than purely physical processes. . But you say that ...

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
It's entirely reasonable (and eventually testable) to postulate non-human intelligence somewhere else in the universe... Why not just be consistent and say that if it’s scientific for an astronomer the search for evidence of intelligence, it is just as scientific for the biologist?


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
All observable physical phenomena in our world appear to be a result of purely physical processes. Why should we postulate something completely different than we have ever observed? Gee! I don’t know Keith, but the SETI project seems to be doing a good job postulating something it’s never observed. Should someone tell them that they’re being unscientific?
I’d hate to be the one to break the news – will you do it?


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />How can one test something that is ”unpredictable”?“Unpredictable” in that context means that one cannot predict the outcome of a long process of evolution in advance. That does NOT mean untestable. The weather is the result of purely physical processes, is it not? </font>[/QUOTE]Keith, meteorology is a science, but its application in predicting the future - as in weather forecasts – isn’t. Why? Because they repeatedly fail the test. Listen to your local weatherman if you don’t believe it. Once again your example betrays you.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Current evolutionary theory can CERTAINLY be disproved. No it can’t be disproved because it is an ideological philosophy, not science. Any discipline that needs the weight of the law to enforce its point of view is not science.
Or did a Federal court have to mandate that gravity is no longer optional?


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
It’s not testable by experiments in the same way that other theories are testable, (unless you have several million years to wait) ... Keith you’ve missed that point again. Even if I had a million years, how would that help?
Remember it’s an “unsupervised, impersonal, unpredictable and natural process” and is, at best, playing dice – but the number of dice is REALLY REALLY BIG and the numbers on their faces keep changing at random. Even taken at face value, your experiment will never come out the same way twice. Thus, you can’t test it experimentally. What sort of engineering would it be if you built a structure and sometimes it fell down and other times it didn’t and there was no way to predict which in advance? What sort of science would that be? Useless, that’s what.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
You can talk endlessly about how it’s just another form of faith, but it simply is not. You believe what you can’t prove. You call it science. Knowing what science is; I must call your belief, religion.

[P.I. Stazzer-Newt]

<HR>a scientific study of my house’s plumping would reveal that it was the product of an intelligence, and that it was designed. Granted, it’s the product of an inept intelligence [Wink] , but the evidence nevertheless supports the design conclusion <hr>

Exactly what series of tests might prove that?

[Sam F]

Actually, plumbing would be a pretty good example of irreducible complexity. It couldn't possibly have evolved gradually and without direction. An uncapped pipe would soon fill up your basement. A capped pipe would be useless... etc. You don't even want to think about drains that didn't go anywhere or that emptied out into the floor below. :eek:
And that doesn't even get into the hideous complexity of wells, pumps, power supplies and septic systems - all of which is child's play compared to what goes on in a typical living cell.

[George.]

Originally posted by Sam F:
You’re a priori reasoning is that you know that Intelligent Design is “really doing” religion. Do you really know that?

Yes, we do. Because you, Sam, are discussing and defending it, thread after thread - and the only ideas you ever discuss and defend here are religious ideas. ;)



... a scientific study of my house’s plumping would reveal that it was the product of an intelligence, and that it was designed. A scientific study of the solar system might be seen as revealing that it was the product of an intelligence, if you are so inclined. But from there to concluding that therefore there is no gravity, and the planets are kept in their orbits by the invisible hand of the designer, interfering on a daily basis, involves a totally irrational leap of faith.

[Meerkat]

Originally posted by Bob Cleek:
Meercat asks: "Jesus Christ is the son of god."
Can YOU test that (empirically)?

Well, no. But why would one bother?

We do know that Christ was an historical figure. He did exist. This we know from both early Christian and non-christian historical writings.
Actually, we do not know that Christ was an historical figure with nearly the same confidence that we know other people of that time existed, a couple of vague "non-Christian" references to the contrary.

Nor are there any first person eyewitness accounts of the final days and resurection. Best guess is that the first books of the bible came some 50-60 years after the alleged facts.

MEM's exist and persist because they manipulate the social instincts of people.

[P.I. Stazzer-Newt]

At the risk of repeating myself:
Exactly what series of tests might prove that?

Attempt # 1
<hr>
Actually, plumbing would be a pretty good example of irreducible complexity. It couldn't possibly have evolved gradually and without direction. An uncapped pipe would soon fill up your basement. A capped pipe would be useless... etc. You don't even want to think about drains that didn't go anywhere or that emptied out into the floor below. [Eek!]
<hr>

That does not answer the question, 2.5 out of 10.

[George.]

You are trying to get Sam to answer a tough question? You must be new here... :D

[Sam F]

Originally posted by P.I. Stazzer-Newt:
At the risk of repeating myself:
Exactly what series of tests might prove that?

Attempt # 1
...That does not answer the question, 2.5 out of 10.Maybe your question isn't all that clear. Let’s re-examine it:

Originally posted by P.I. Stazzer-Newt:
<HR>a scientific study of my house’s plumping would reveal that it was the product of an intelligence, and that it was designed. Granted, it’s the product of an inept intelligence [Wink] , but the evidence nevertheless supports the design conclusion <hr>

Exactly what series of tests might prove that?What exactly is supposed to be proved here:
That my house’s plumping is designed?
That its designer is inept?
You tell me exactly what you want and you’ll probably get the answer you seek.
Guessing won’t do it.

[George.]

I bet he won't...

[P.I. Stazzer-Newt]

The usual output of a "scientific study" is a paper fit for publication in "Nature" or similar peer reviewed journal.

When I asked;
Exactly what series of tests might prove that?

What I sought was the "experimental method" part of such a paper.

But don't feel too constrained - if you have access to the plumbing - then write the whole paper - and get it published.

TheOnion is not peer reviewed.

[Keith Wilson]

It is just possible that the impetus behind today’s Intelligent Design might actually be flaws in Neo-Darwinism’s prevailing orthodoxy.Read the wedge strategy paper. That comes from the Discovery Institute, not “pro-materialist propaganda”. One might reasonably conclude from the paper (and from your posts) that that they have religious motives.


Like almost all ideas, one can not simply proclaim that it just is – that it sprung full grown from the brow of Jove. The fact is that Darwin’s ideas were a product of his time and influenced by Lyell’s Uniformitarianism. It is not “about what happened and how it happened” and his ideas aren’t just so.This is truly silly, and appears to reflect a fundamental misunderstanding of science. Once again, evolutionary biology most certainly IS a description of what happened, and how it happened. Scientific materialism and every other philosophy that people have ever dreamed up are entirely irrelevant to its truth or falsehood. Like everything else in science, engineering, and technology, it is a statement about the physical world, and is objectively true or false irrespective of anyone’s beliefs. It is true or not whether Darwin and all other biologists are Atheist Scientific Materialists, devout Catholics, Unitarians, followers of Voodoo, Hindus, Mormons, Muslims, Methodists, Rastafarians, or just don’t give a sh**. Overwhelming objective evidence supports it, as everyone who works seriously with that evidence agrees.


Keith, a scientific study of my house’s plumping would reveal that it was the product of an intelligence, and that it was designed.

Welding, engineering and making plastics are not the products of “unsupervised, impersonal, unpredictable and natural process” but are the result of design.Again, stupefyingly irrelevant. The plumbing was designed, but the principles underlying it (hydrodynamics, fluid flow, metallurgy, design of threaded connections, etc.) were determined by observation and experiment. All of science and technology investigates the material world through these techniques. It is by no means necessary to assume supernatural causes in any of these fields. There is no difference between evolutionary biology and plumbing in this regard. If we are to abandon the rational use of observation and experiment in biology, why not in plumbing? In your house, perhaps, not mine.


DNA exists. You have not explained its’ existence.And the gaps just keep getting smaller and receding farther and farther into the past. When someone explains how DNA evolved from something simpler, you’ll back up and insert God into that gap in our knowledge.


Not only that, you can’t explain the first reproducing organism.Again, irrelevant. Neither can anyone else (yet). Evolution does not explain the origin of life, it explains how life develops into new forms through natural selection. No one knows how life first originated. This has nothing to do with Darwin’s ideas.


By all means use that razor. Now balance the first reproducing organism’s DNA on itAgain, (sigh :rolleyes: ) the first reproducing organism almost certainly did not have DNA. We have no idea what it was like, but it’s extremely unlikely that it resembled anything at all that exists today.


You do remember Michael Behe’s calculations about there not being enough time in the Universe for such a thing to have happened by chance?Behe's math is speculation, with no basis in reality, and subject to several fallacies, the most obvious being the much greater efficiency of the multi-step filter (about which we have had several discussions, and which you still don’t appear to understand). Another is the “retrospective fallacy”, which calculates the odds of one particular outcome, rather than of any outcome that will work. He has by no means demonstrated that anything is impossible without a designer, just that we don’t know how it happened; the standard argument from ignorance. "Irreducibly complex" merely means, "I can't figure out how to make it simpler."


. . . .the SETI project seems to be doing a good job postulating something it has never observed. Should someone tell them that they’re being unscientific?Nonsense. Those in the Seti project are not looking for supernatural anything. We have observed living intelligent beings (however limited) on our planet. We know that other planets exist (over a hundred have been observed at last count). It is entirely reasonable to speculate that intelligent beings may exist elsewhere. Again, all observable physical phenomena in our world appear to be a result of purely physical processes. Why should we postulate something completely different than we have ever observed?


meteorology is a science, but its application in predicting the future - as in weather forecasts – isn’t.Precisely. Evolutionary biology is a science that can’t accurately predict the future either. It can, however, like meteorology, describe accurately the mechanisms by which its processes operate. Unpredictability in this sense is expected, and casts no doubt whatsoever on the validity of the science. Not being able to predict the weather for August 12th a month in advance, much less for August 12th, 2318 casts no doubt whatever on the existence of cold fronts and the mechanism by which tornados and hurricanes form.


No, (evolutionary theory) can’t be disproved because it is an ideological philosophy, not science.Utter nonsense. It is a description of what happened, and how it happened, supported by enormous amounts of evidence, and by everyone who works seriously in he field. It has at times been used and misused to support one ideology or another, but that’s completely irrrelevant to whether it’s true or not. I can think of LOTS of discoveries that would put a serious kink in Darwinian theory. Why can't you? How about modern human fossil bones in Ordovician strata?


Any discipline that needs the weight of the law to enforce its point of view is not science. Or did a Federal court have to mandate that gravity is no longer optional?Obviously, gravity is not under systematic attack by religious groups who wish to substitute an alternative theory that is not based on observation and experiment, but upon their particular variety of religious belief.


You believe what you can’t prove. You call it science. Knowing what science is; I must call your belief, religion.Nonsense. Based on the evidence, evolution is by far the best description of how life developed on earth. It is a description of what happened and how it happened. It is not about meaning, not about morality, not about anything with which religion is legitimately concerned.

You may keep your little God, who has to tinker endlessly with the events on one small planet to make it come out the way he intended. You can if you wish, shrink back from the edges of knowledge and say “the designer did it”, and then you won’t have to try to understand any more. You can abandon your reason and say that there are some things we won’t try to understand, some things we just won’t think about. It’s your choice.

[ 07-12-2005, 01:15 PM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[Sam F]

Originally posted by P.I. Stazzer-Newt:
The usual output of a "scientific study" is a paper fit for publication in "Nature" or similar peer reviewed journal.

When I asked;
Exactly what series of tests might prove that?

What I sought was the "experimental method" part of such a paper.

But don't feel too constrained - if you have access to the plumbing - then write the whole paper - and get it published.
Whoa! All that buildup - for this? :D
That would be the Annals of Improbable research Mr. Newt, not the Onion though your question probably belongs with the Allium.

But even if taken seriously, the case for design in plumbing as opposed to undirected natural processes would only take a moment to consider. Imagine (if you have an imagination) an archaeological site in the far distant future. These ethereal non-human archaeologists don’t need plumbing and have no idea what it’s for. They’d see in the ruins, plastic drains, plastic cold water pipes and copper hot water pipes. These could be reconstructed and their function determined by experiment, but the questions would be – Is this the product of intelligence? What possible natural circumstance that would produce such a system? A naturally occurring pipe solvent that only adhered to the joints and dissolved nothing else? An environmental temperature sufficient to melt the lead “naturally” deposited in the copper pipe’s fittings, but not melt the adjacent plastic pipes? And that they would combine by natural selection into a functioning plumbing system? Yeah, all that could happen by undirected natural processes. You’d believe that... Right?
No. And it’s not likely that our hypothetical future archaeologists would ever arrive as such a conclusion either. They could determine scientifically that the plumbing had to have been designed.

[George.]

Keith, those guys from Discovery Institute are some scary freaks!

From their website:


Five Year Goals

To see the beginning of the influence of design theory in spheres other than natural science.

Twenty Year Goals

To see design theory application in specific fields, including molecular biology, biochemistry, paleontology, physics and cosmology in the natural sciences, psychology, ethics, politics, theology and philosophy in the humanities; to see its innuence in the fine arts.
To see design theory permeate our religious, cultural, moral and political life.
:eek:

Let this be a warning to those who think that ID proponents just have a beef with evolution by natural selection: that is only the first step for them. They want to impose their religious dogmas on all aspects of culture, including not only physical sciences, but politics, psychology, and the arts. A bunch of little Ayatollah wannabes.

BTW, the Discovery Institute is where Cardinal Schonborn got his talking points. Let's hope it's all just a trial balloon put out by the Vatican, and let's do what we can to shoot it down before the new pope decides to go ahead and ally the Catholic Church with these freaks. The prospect is enough to remind one of the Nazi-Soviet pact... :mad:

[Bob Cleek]

George wrote: "Originally posted by Bob Cleek: "What we do know, however, is that this notion took root and became a constant belief of millions and millions of people in the last two thousand years. My guess is that if the whole thing was just some sort of hoax, it wouldn't have lasted long as long as it has as a workable belief system."

"You can say exactly the same thing about Islam's stories about Muhammed, his receiving the Koran directly from God, and his being taken up to heaven. Does that mean they are not a hoax? "

I think the answer to your question, George, is "yes and no." Islam does not contain any new theological concepts. It is derivative. It is simply an amalgam of Judeo-Christian concepts and tribal Arabic polytheism. To the extent it embraces those truths, it is true. The essential theological contradiction in the Islamic view is that somehow "God made a mistake" and had to "fix it" by having Mohammed publish the Quran. Islam attempts to rewrite the salvation history of the Old and New Testaments in an Arabic tribal context while simultaneously rejecting the validity of the theological traditions which are central to the Old and New Testaments.

In the Judeo-Christian concept of salvation history, there is a direct line of descendancy carrying a relationship between man and God which begins with Adam, progresses to Abraham and from him through to Christ. God was present to Adam before the "fall." God did not abandon his relationship with man because of Adam's sin. God was present to Abraham, and to Moses. God was physically present to the Jews in the Ark of the Covenant and the Temple. And, through Christ, during his lifetime and thereafter in the Eucharist, physically present with all of us. For the Jews, the presence of God is hereditary. They are God's Chosen People. The promises made by God to the Jews are not revocable. Christ was an observant Jew by birth and remains an observant Jew forever. The redeemer of the world was born of the Jewish bloodline. The Jews are related to God.

For the rest of us not so blessed to be Jewish, through Christ, God generously created an "open enrollement period" for membership in his tribe and through the apostolic succession has provided a mechanism for us to experience his actual presence on earth even to this day.

While Islam embraces most of the teachings of Judeo-Christian scripture (there are actually more references to Mary, the mother of Christ, in the Quran than in the New Testament), it lacks a concept of the accessible presence of God. It rejects the validity of Judaism and Christianity in spite of their relationship with God descending in a direct line from the same relationship God established with Abraham.

In short, Mohammed cobbed together previous Judeo-Christian concepts and sold them as the plagarized "word of God" given to none other than Mohammed himself. No question that Mohammed was an historical figure. No question that he was a holy man. But there is nothing theologically "new" in Islam and it cannot, and does not, fit into the "theo-historical" time line of biblical salvation history.

Now, better minds than mine, have considered these matters (and I'm sure some here will) but that's how I see it, anyway.

Meercat said: Actually, we do not know that Christ was an historical figure with nearly the same confidence that we know other people of that time existed, a couple of vague "non-Christian" references to the contrary.

Nor are there any first person eyewitness accounts of the final days and resurection. Best guess is that the first books of the bible came some 50-60 years after the alleged facts.

Well, Meer, you might read Josephus, who is our best extant historical authority of the time. He got the Roman history of the time right. I don't know why his historical references to Christ as a Jewish revolutionary would have been uncharacteristically erroneous.

It seems to me that the earliest written books of the New Testament, such as the Acts of the Apostles, would indeed contain first person eyewitness accounts, or at least writings "as told to" by eyewitnesses. At that time, there would have been many around who would have said, "No way, that's not how it happened!" were that the case. Think about it. Fifty or sixty years? Would you say that we no longer have "eyewitness accounts" of World War II available to us today? I think not!

[P.I. Stazzer-Newt]

Well, here we have it:
<hr>

What possible natural circumstance that would produce such a system?

<hr>

An appeal to Ignorance used in place of a scientific proof.

A shame really - the ability to produce a reasonable formal proof of "Design" in a simple well known plumbing system might have been of value to the "Intelligent Design" fraudsters.

We are left with KW's god of the gaps.

There was an interesting article in N.S. on Evolutionary pressures in Cod on the grand banks. The theory being that the current "Throw Back The Little Ones" policy was leading to the cod maturing at a much smaller size - with limited spawning capacity so that the stocks would not recover as quickly as had been hoped.

One proposal was a dual mesh size trawl which would reject (and thus keep for breeding) large cod, small cod would escape from the smaller holes.

Thus we would eat only the middle sized - sort of Cod of the Gaps.

[ 07-12-2005, 01:47 PM: Message edited by: P.I. Stazzer-Newt ]

[George.]

Bob, I agree with many of your points. In particular, the description of Islam as an amalgam of Judeo-Christian concepts, packaged for consumption by tribal Arabs, is spot on, in my opinion. I believe Islam was "invented" by Muhammed as a tool to unite and motivate his conquering band of tribesmen. I believe he got the idea from seeing how effective Christianity was at doing the same for the Byzantine Empire.

I have some doubts about these, though:


In the Judeo-Christian concept of salvation history, there is a direct line of descendancy carrying a relationship between man and God which begins with Adam, progresses to Abraham and from him through to Christ.This "direct line of descendancy" is probably fictitious - added later by the evangelists to increase the credibility of Jesus. I believe it is also utterly absurd. If Jesus is the son of God, born of a virgin birth, then to accept a tracing his lineage through Joseph is a classic act of doublethink.


For the Jews, the presence of God is hereditary. They are God's Chosen People.
There is nothing in the Old Testament that indicates that God would ever create an "open enrollement period" for membership in his tribe. Judaism is a tribal religion of exclusion, and other tribes, peoples, etc., are portrayed as no better than vermin, to be exterminated without mercy whenever they get in the way.

The original Christians, in fact, were all Jews, and they did not think that "salvation" was available to non-Jews. Paul came up with that idea, and conjured up a rationalization for it, when he realized that the romanized Greeks were much more suceptible to Christianization than the Jews. He, in effect, switched targets, and altered the message to make it more appealing to the new audience.

So, like Islam, Christianity has also "rewritten the salvation history... while simultaneously rejecting the validity of the theological traditions" which are central to the Old Testament.

[Keith Wilson]

sort of Cod of the Gaps.
:D :D :D
I'm glad I wasn't drinking anything when I read that.

"Intelligent design" is, as far as I can tell, simply an argument from incredulity, Paley recycled. "I can't imagine how that could be other than design." It says more about the limits of its proponents' imaginations than anything.

An interesting speculation: Assume that there is creator God who wants the universe to turn out in a particular way. Which requires more skill and intelligence, setting it up so that it will run of itself and still produce the desired result, or continually tinkering with it through various supernatural interventions to get it right?

[George.]

Good point, Keith. Maybe it would be better called "incompetent design." ;)

[Keith Wilson]

Incompetent design - actually, a telling point against so-called "intelligent design" is structures that don't work very well because they've evolved from something else. The human male prostate, the appendix, wisdom teeth, humans' bad lower backs, the list is enormous. It would be a lot better to make bones out of aluminum; the chemistry wouldn't be that hard, but we didn't come by that road. Then there are vestigial structures; leg bones in snakes and whales, remains of the other toes in horses, eyes in blind cave-dwelling animals . . . "Evidence of a designer", my eye!

Yes, we need a test (other than ignorance) to determine if something was designed or not.

I wonder if Mr. Paley's watch is preserved in a museum somewhere? ;)

[ 07-12-2005, 02:21 PM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />It is just possible that the impetus behind today’s Intelligent Design might actually be flaws in Neo-Darwinism’s prevailing orthodoxy.Read the wedge strategy paper. That comes from the Discovery Institute, not “pro-materialist propaganda”. One might reasonably conclude from the paper (and from your posts) that that they have religious motives. </font>[/QUOTE]Keith what a short memory you have! I first read of the “wedge strategy” here on this Forum and said: “...assuming it's genuine, it sounds like a good plan. I love the "wedge" analogy because its one of Darwin's own. Somebody has a sense of humor there.”
And one might conclude from the facts of Darwinism’s origin (and your own posts) that Darwinists and you have ideological and philosophical motives.
How does that turnabout help you? Once again you don’t have any room to talk.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Like almost all ideas, one can not simply proclaim that it just is – that it sprung full grown from the brow of Jove. The fact is that Darwin’s ideas were a product of his time and influenced by Lyell’s Uniformitarianism. It is not “about what happened and how it happened” and his ideas aren’t just so.This is truly silly, and appears to reflect a fundamental misunderstanding of science. Once again, evolutionary biology most certainly IS a description of what happened, and how it happened. </font>[/QUOTE]Keith have you described where that first DNA came from? What happened there and how did it happen?
Am I the only one who thinks that Darwin’s ideas don’t mesh so well with modern science? No.
But I doubt that evolution by natural selection would have been inferred from molecular science, had Darwin never lived...(from The Way of the Cell by Franklin M. Harold, cell biologist)


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Overwhelming objective evidence supports it, as everyone who works seriously with that evidence agrees. Oops there’s that 4 billion flies can’t be wrong reasoning – and it’s not even correct! There are a few flies with decidedly different tastes.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> Keith, a scientific study of my house’s plumping would reveal that it was the product of an intelligence, ... not the products of “unsupervised, impersonal, unpredictable and natural process” but are the result of design.Again, stupefyingly irrelevant. </font>[/QUOTE]Well I agree, but remember you brought up plumbing and that’s your example!
Next time you want to illustrate an undirected, unpredictable, natural process I’d advise against using an example of design.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />DNA exists. You have not explained its’ existence.And the gaps just keep getting smaller and receding farther and farther into the past. When someone explains how DNA evolved from something simpler, you’ll back up and insert God into that gap in our knowledge. </font>[/QUOTE]Keith where was that gap before Watson and Crick?
It didn’t exist. This is a new gap for your belief. How about providing a Darwinian pathway for the evolution of a bacterial flagellum? You know, the what happened, and how it happened stuff. Oh, but that’s another new Gap isn’t it?


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Not only that, you can’t explain the first reproducing organism.Again, irrelevant. Neither can anyone else (yet). Evolution does not explain the origin of life ... </font>[/QUOTE]Vroooommm Vrooommmm goes the car. How did it start? According to you it’s irrelevant – and another yawning Gap. To anyone who actually has to drive a car, or wants to study one, it’s not quite so irrelevant.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />By all means use that razor. Now balance the first reproducing organism’s DNA on itAgain, the first reproducing organism almost certainly did not have DNA. We have no idea what it was like, but it’s extremely unlikely that it resembled anything at all that exists today. </font>[/QUOTE]More Gaps Keith? Your faith is touching, but you can’t prove a lick of it. How do you know that the first organism didn’t have DNA? I know about the “RNA world” theory and that doesn’t help either. Where did the first RNA come from? Nobody’s asking, eh?


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> You do remember Michael Behe’s calculations about there not being enough time in the Universe for such a thing to have happened by chance?Behe's math is speculation, with no basis in reality, and subject to several fallacies, the most obvious being the much greater efficiency of the multi-step filter (about which we have had several discussions, and which you still don’t appear to understand). </font>[/QUOTE]Oh yes, I understand it perfectly. Did you forget this exchange?

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
However, let’s say you have a different process, a multiple-step filter rather than a single-step filter. Let us say that you start from a random sequence. Each iteration you “breed” ten new sequences from the original, with each letter usually staying the same, but having a small chance of changing randomly. At the end of each iteration, we examine the new “child” sequences and pick the one that is closest to "Sam F and Meerkat do not agree." no matter how small the improvement. From this sequence, the closest of the bunch, we then generate new sequences of characters by the same rule, picking the closest to our desired sequence for the “parent” of the next generation. This is pretty easy to simulate on a computer, BTW.

With this process, which fairly closely approximates a vastly simplified version of Darwinian natural selection, depending on the rates of change one can reliably reach the target in less than 100 generations. If you assume one new sequence generated per second, that’s under 17 minutes.
Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
That alone completely refutes the point you quoted.
Originally posted by Sam F:
Well not really. The only way your process works is if you’ve pre-selected the trait you want to select for. But that’s a fundamental misunderstanding of how natural selection works. There is no master template for a trait to be filtered into.
Natural Selection exists in the here and now and can’t predict any structures needed. Any structure must be valuable now. To use the example of the blood clotting evolution – if one of the proteins used in clotting happened by astronomical chance to have been created by chance it would still be non-functional. Anything non-functional cannot enhance survival or justify the metabolic cost of producing it. Thus it’ll be selected against.
Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Another is the “retrospective fallacy”, which calculates the odds of one particular outcome, rather than of any outcome that will work. He has by no means demonstrated that anything is impossible without a designer, just that we don’t know how it happened; the standard argument from ignorance. "Irreducibly complex" merely means, "I can't figure out how to make it simpler." And retrospective fallacy only means I can’t refute it, therefore I label it a fallacy.
And a bad memory to boot! Your multi-stepped filter failed because it fundamentally misunderstands how natural selection is supposed to work - as demonstrated above.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> . . . .the SETI project seems to be doing a good job postulating something it has never observed. Should someone tell them that they’re being unscientific?Nonsense. Those in the Seti project are not looking for supernatural anything. </font>[/QUOTE]Who said anything about the supernatural Keith? Why do you have the hang-up about a designer being God? It wasn’t necessary for Francis Crick to postulate that – why should you assume that?


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />meteorology is a science, but its application in predicting the future - as in weather forecasts – isn’t.Precisely. </font>[/QUOTE]And that precisely undermines your example – but hey, it’s your example.
.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />No, (evolutionary theory) can’t be disproved because it is an ideological philosophy, not science.Utter nonsense. It is a description of what happened, and how it happened, supported by enormous amounts of evidence, and by everyone who works seriously in he field. </font>[/QUOTE]Do you think your talking to a Fundamentalist? Did you not learn anything from the Darwin thread? There is not an enormous amount of evidence to support Darwin. You boys did really poorly in providing evidence. No one could provide unequivocal evidence of Darwinian evolution taking place – or did you forget the paucity of evidence – evolution always seems to be happening elsewhere... “the extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists 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.”? (S. J. Gould)
Did you not listen to the fact that people with materialist world views, such as you are defending, have found the limitations of Evolution untenable? Are Francis Crick and Anthony Flew both idiots or are their concerns about Evolution legitimate?


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Any discipline that needs the weight of the law to enforce its point of view is not science. Or did a Federal court have to mandate that gravity is no longer optional?Obviously, gravity is not under systematic attack by religious groups who wish to substitute an alternative theory that is not based on observation and experiment, but upon their particular variety of religious belief. </font>[/QUOTE]And why not? Why is no one attacking gravity? That should be your clue.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />You believe what you can’t prove. You call it science. Knowing what science is; I must call your belief, religion.Nonsense. Based on the evidence, evolution is by far the best description of how life developed on earth. </font>[/QUOTE]Keith, saying things like “nonsense” or “utter nonsense” does not constitute proof of anything but your state of mind. You know perfectly well that I’m on record as saying:
“As time has gone by, the problems with Darwinian Evolution, rather than recede, have in fact multiplied. I predict that it will be replaced by some other Evolutionary theory that better accounts for direct observation.” Quite pretending that I’m a Fundamentalist! It won’t win you any battles fighting an imaginary straw man of your own creation.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
It is a description of what happened and how it happened. It is not about meaning, not about morality, not about anything with which religion is legitimately concerned.

You may keep your little God, who has to tinker endlessly with the events on one small planet to make it come out the way he intended. You can if you wish, shrink back from the edges of knowledge and say “the designer did it”, and then you won’t have to try to understand any more. You can abandon your reason and say that there are some things we won’t try to understand, some things we just won’t think about. It’s your choice.
You may keep your little pseudo-science. You can’t account for the first reproducing organism nor the first DNA. The paucity of fossil evidence is best ignored, so shrink back from those and hide in your “science” in the Gaps and then you won’t have to try to understand any more. You can abandon your reason and say that there are some things we won’t try to understand, some things we just won’t think about. It’s your choice. ;)

[Sam F]

Originally posted by P.I. Stazzer-Newt:
Well, here we have it:
<hr>

What possible natural circumstance that would produce such a system?

<hr>

An appeal to Ignorance used in place of a scientific proof.
Remember what the example is? Plumbing.
And your assumed appeal to ignorance - ignores the solder, the glue, the brand names molded into the pipe, not to mention the impossibility of the parts coming together into a coherent system via a Darwinian pathway.
But you call that "ignorance". :D :D

[Bob Cleek]

George wrote: This "direct line of descendancy" is probably fictitious - added later by the evangelists to increase the credibility of Jesus. I believe it is also utterly absurd. If Jesus is the son of God, born of a virgin birth, then to accept a tracing his lineage through Joseph is a classic act of doublethink.

George, I'm not talking so much about an absolute historical lineage, but rather a conceptual or philosophical one. The Old Testament story sets out the lineage and, in fact, is obsessed with it. Remember all those "begats?" IIRC, it is Matthew, the oldest and most Jewish of the gospels which begins with Jesus' geneology, validating the Old Testament prophecies that the messiah would be of David's line.

This isn't "absurd," because the Jews define descendence in terms of the matriarchial line. If your mother is Jewish and your father isn't, you are Jewish. The other way around, you're not Jewish. Still true to this day.

There is nothing in the Old Testament that indicates that God would ever create an "open enrollement period" for membership in his tribe. Judaism is a tribal religion of exclusion, and other tribes, peoples, etc., are portrayed as no better than vermin, to be exterminated without mercy whenever they get in the way

While your description of the Jews is a bit harsh, perhaps (although true at some periods in their history), it is true there is no "open enrollment period" as I described in the Old Testament. Such is not true for the New Testament. This is, of course, the essence of the most radical difference between the Old and the New.

The original Christians, in fact, were all Jews, and they did not think that "salvation" was available to non-Jews. Paul came up with that idea, and conjured up a rationalization for it, when he realized that the romanized Greeks were much more suceptible to Christianization than the Jews. He, in effect, switched targets, and altered the message to make it more appealing to the new audience.

As for original Christians, it is interesting to note that the extant Roman census data shows that there were about six million (coincidence? yea, probably) Jews in the Empire at the time of Christ. By about 300 AD, there were about one million people identifying themselves as Jewish, and about five million identifying themselves as Christians? Go figure! I would say that the Jews were more susceptible to seeing the sense in Christianity than anybody else.

Paul did indeed "open the doors," but not as you believe. The dispute Paul raised was over whether gentiles wishing to become Christian had to first become Jews. Paul said not. Paul wrote that the Jews were the rootstock and that the gentiles were merely grafted on to it. (Don't ask me for the cite... LOL) The Jews are still the "elder brothers" of the Christians. A Jew who is Catholic, by church doctrine, is still a Jew and still one of the "chosen." Paul's perspective is validated by the numerous instances in the gospels where Christ interacted with non-Jews, contrary to the accepted Jewish practice of the time and much to their consternation!

[ 07-12-2005, 02:49 PM: Message edited by: Bob Cleek ]

[Joe ( Cold Spring on Hudson )]

Whoa gee Sam I never thought of that :eek: , ya know you just might have a point there. ............. NOT !!! :D :D

How long ya think this thread will drag on ? :rolleyes:

[George.]

Originally posted by Bob Cleek:
... the Jews define descendence in terms of the matriarchial line. True. But what Matthew wrote is this:


Abraham begat Isaac; and Isaac begat Jacob... and Matthan begat Jacob; and Jacob begat Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ.
See? No matriarchial line. A patriarchial line of descent, with no mention at all of who begat Mary. Utter nonsense - if you believe in the virgin birth, that is.


While your description of the Jews is a bit harsh... I did not describe the Jews. I described the Old Testament's attitude towards non-Jewish tribes - which was as harsh as it gets.


... it is interesting to note that the extant Roman census data shows that there were about six million Jews in the Empire at the time of Christ. By about 300 AD, there were about one million people identifying themselves as Jewish, and about five million identifying themselves as Christians? That's very interesting. I didn't know that such Roman census data reached our days.

But I must point out two fallacies:

1) Between the time of Jesus and 300 AD is when the major insurgencies in Judea occured, which resulted in the slaughter of countless Jews, and the total destruction of Jerusalem, and the diaspora, including to non-Roman lands. That would account for a lot of the missing Jews, I should think... :(

2) If 6 million Jews became 5 million Christians + 1 million Jews, that means there was 0 population growth among Jews in 300 years.

[George.]

Originally posted by Sam F:
Vroooommm Vrooommmm goes the car. How did it start? According to you it’s irrelevant – and another yawning Gap. To anyone who actually has to drive a car, or wants to study one, it’s not quite so irrelevant.

Good analogy. To anyone who actually has to work in biology or medicine, or to study and research in these fields, not believing in evolution by natural selection is as much of a handicap as wanting to play football with no legs.

Sam, if you think you answer all of Keith's challenges so well, how about explaining why your "intelligent designer" let slip dumb mistakes like the appendix, and the coccix (tail bone), and remnant leg bones in whales, and too-narrow hips in women, and lower-back pain?

[Chris Coose]

The Catholic Church is almost better entertainment than the bilge. Near as comedic as Scott McClellan.

Fr. Guido Sarduci shows up on Air America and some other venues lately. I'll be keeping as ear out for that spokesman. He is their most reliable.

[Keith Wilson]

No, Sam, we've been over all this before many times. I certainly won't convince you, if the opinion of everyone competent working in the field won't. (Oh, right, I forgot, every working evolutionary biologist is just a "fly eating sh** ". :rolleyes: ) Your arguments are no better than they were last time. You'll have to go on by yourself; this is getting tiresome.

[ 07-12-2005, 05:00 PM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[George.]

Notice that Sam and Bob are in polar disagreement, but will not directly adress each other's position. Yet both are Catholics, and both outspoken. Me and my cousin against the world?

Remind me again, how many divisions has the Pope?

[P.I. Stazzer-Newt]

Sam is going to get a failing grade for the project.
Those of you (un)familiar with the format of an experimental protocol might enjoy this.

<iframe width=720 height=350 src="http://www.twinkiesproject.com/resistivity.html"></iframe>
Edited for spelling.

[ 07-12-2005, 06:58 PM: Message edited by: P.I. Stazzer-Newt ]

[Keith Wilson]

Oh crap, here we go again . . . :rolleyes:

About a multi-step selection filter:


The only way your process works is if you’ve pre-selected the trait you want to select for. But that’s a fundamental misunderstanding of how natural selection works. There is no master template for a trait to be filtered into.This is NOT true. The multi-step filter works whatever random sequence you pick as a "target". It is only necessary that each step in a given direction (exactly what direction makes no difference) be advantageous for the process to operate, and the odds to be vastly improved over single-step random chance. The simulation of natural selection is pretty exact.

The retrospective fallacy:

I draw five cards from a random deck. They are the three of hearts, the four of clubs, the six of clubs, the five of diamonds, and the seven of hearts. This makes a straight. The odds of drawing these cards are one in (52*51*50*59*48) or 1/311,875,200. Pretty long odds, right? Thus the chance of drawing a straight is 1/311,875,200 - except it isn’t; that’s the fallacy. The chance of drawing any five cards in sequence (straights and straight flushes) is actually 1/253.9, more than a million times greater than the chance of drawing those particular five cards.

That’s the retrospective fallacy, Behe’s fundamental error, and the reason that such calculations of the probability of randomly forming a particular structure are quite worthless. How may possible different ways are there of performing the same cellular function? One cannot know how many other similar structures would have worked for the same purpose. Any straight will beat three of a kind. On the molecular level, proteins that serve the same function may vary by 70 or 80 percent in different species, but they all work.

And as for “paucity of fossil evidence”, don’t make me laugh. We showed you an unbroken evolutionary sequence where the range of variation of each step overlaps the previous stage. We can show you whales with legs, dinosaurs with feathers, birds with beaks and teeth – None of them are enough. What would be enough? The fingerprints of the creator always seems to recede further and further away as we look closer and understand more.

Tell me, how can the “intelligent design” hypothesis – the creator did it – be disproved? If you can’t answer that, no one should ever take the idea seriously again, certainly not as science.

[ 07-12-2005, 10:10 PM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[Bob Cleek]

Hell, I don't know, George. LOL I don't think there's any dispute Christ was Jewish, is there?

I have no idea how many Jews became Christian Hebrews as they came to be known, but there does seem to be a fair amount of scholarly agreement that Christianity spread with the Jewish diaspora initially to Jewish communities throughout the
Roman Empire. Rome tolerated Jews, as have most empires who encountered them, for the usual reasons. They paid taxes. It was only the Palistinian Uprising that ended with the destruction of Jerusalem... which was some seventy years after Christ (and which is metaphorically addressed in the Book of the Apocalypse.) The rest of the dispersed Jewish communities continued merrily on. Many, historians believe, embraced Christianity without abandoning their Jewish roots. The tendency to stray from the Jewish tradition was resisted even some three hundred years later, when whoever was pope at the time (How should I know!) decreed a return to Jewish traditions in the Christian liturgy. (E.g. that communion bread had to be made only from unleavened dough.)

Regrettably, those who would see man's connection with God trashed have with some success always sought to divide Christians and Jews. There is no way that anti-semitism is anything other than a direct assault on the foundational roots of Christianity, much as many Christians themselves have promoted it. Recognition of the spiritual unity of Jews and Christians, each unique, but with relationships with God in continuity, makes a lot of what people struggle with these days much more understandable.

As for direct lines of succession, let's not get side tracked with semantics, and certainly not with mysteries like "virgin birth." Rather, take a look at the Old Testament messianic prophecies and compare these with the New Testament reports of Christ's life. Granted, one could argue they spun the facts to make it look like Christ was the messiah because he fulfilled all those prophecies. On the other hand, even assuming that he was just a well educated Jew who knew them all, there are too many instances where the reported acts just required the participation of way too many people, and the confluence of way too many circumstances, for it all to be a manipulation. Or so it seems to me.

I have to confess, I'm no theologian and certainly not one of Sam's measure. He lost me a long way back talking about plumbing. As I said before, if you set out to try to empirically prove the existence of God, you are as sure to frustrate yourself as if you try to theologically explain empiricism. All I know about plumbing is **** runs downhill and plumbers have to wash their hands before lunch.

I do find it interesting, at this point in their discussion, to consider the story of "Doubting Thomas" the Apostle. He was certainly an empiricist. When he caught up with the rest of the crew and they told him they'd seen the Risen Christ, he told them they were smokin' something and he wasn't about to believe it unless he poked his fingers in the nail holes. Now, it is said that Christ appeared and said, "Hey, Tommy Boy, have at it!" and Thomas was convinced.

It can hardly be that the evangelist who wrote that story had any intention of scientifically addressing empirical proofs for the divinity of Christ, but nonetheless, it seems Christ left us an indication that he understood the limitations of human deductive reasoning when he accommodated Thomas.

[ 07-12-2005, 10:09 PM: Message edited by: Bob Cleek ]

[Sam F]

Originally posted by P.I. Stazzer-Newt:
Sam is going to get a failing grade for the project.
Mr. Newt seems to believe that a scientist can't assess the practicality of applying a given methodology before he undertakes the task of applying that methodology. Surely he’ll give credit to scientists for being able to think!
As an example, does he insist that one need apply the scientific method to determine if this object is designed or the product of undirected unpredictable forces?
http://www.culture.gr/2/21/211/21125m/00/lk25m024.jpg
Is it reasonable to postulate that this object can have evolved via a Darwinian pathway? And yes, though highly simplified, it's plumbing... :D :D :D

[George.]

But Sam, that object did evolve through a Darwinian pathway...

You see, natural selection led to the development of a species of animal with nimble hands, a capable brain, and a taste for decoration. This species produced the object in question. It is a by-product of a particular species' evolutionary pathway, just like a bowerbird's bower, or a humpback whale's song.

Furthermore, earlier examples of pottery were less durable, and less pleasing to the eye. Over the centuries, potters tried different techniques. The ones that led to better objects were passed on to the next generation of potters, the ones that didn't were discarded. The art and craft of pottery thus evolved.

Or do you think that some really bright fellow suddenly decided, "I am going to design a vessel to hold liquids," and through a feat of intelligent design produced this from scratch, no antecedents, no gradual evolution of the technique:

http://www.mit-forum.de/kunstkabinett/catalog/images/2ae182_ChinVase.jpg

;)

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
... About a multi-step selection filter:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />The only way your process works is if you’ve pre-selected the trait you want to select for. But that’s a fundamental misunderstanding of how natural selection works. There is no master template for a trait to be filtered into.This is NOT true. The multi-step filter works whatever random sequence you pick as a "target". </font>[/QUOTE]Keith! Natural Selection does not and can not “pick a target”. The random nature of what is picked is of no consequence. The fact that you picked it out beforehand is of enormous consequence. Evolution can’t possibly do that. Everything selected for must have survival utility Now. Not later. Later won’t cut it and will be selected against because the organism is paying a cost for something of no utility. Once again you’ve picked an example of design and that’s not how Darwinian Evolution is supposed to work.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
... It is only necessary that each step in a given direction (exactly what direction makes no difference) be advantageous for the process to operate, and the odds to be vastly improved over single-step random chance. The simulation of natural selection is pretty exact. This contradicts the first part of the paragraph. Which do you want? Picked out before hand or “advantageous” now?
You can’t have both.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
The retrospective fallacy:
I draw five cards from a random deck... How may possible different ways are there of performing the same cellular function? One cannot know how many other similar structures would have worked for the same purpose. Any straight will beat three of a kind. On the molecular level, proteins that serve the same function may vary by 70 or 80 percent in different species, but they all work. For starters, you don’t know if any other combination will work. You can assume all you want, but you don’t know. Further, I challenge anyone to provide some other combination that works – that is an alternative architecture to life as we know it. Until then, that’s just wishful thinking. And wishful thinking isn’t science.
Once again, that’s not how Evolution is supposed to work. Every hand drawn has to provide a survival advantage. Explain how that works for the blood clotting system Keith. We’re not talking cards here but minimum function. Any given individual component of the clotting system is not functional without the rest and will be selected against. You’ve got to draw the correct hand of cards (and it’s a very large hand from a very large deck indeed) in the right sequence by chance on the first go.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
And as for “paucity of fossil evidence”, don’t make me laugh. I didn’t say that for nothing and not without authoritative support:

.. “the extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists 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.”Are you saying that S.J.Gould’s testimony makes you laugh?


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
We showed you an unbroken evolutionary sequence where the range of variation of each step overlaps the previous stage. Once again you are arguing with someone not present. Remember? I’m not a Fundamentalist. I don’t doubt that evolution of some sort occurred. I do very much doubt that Darwin’s explanation of the process is correct. If it were correct, there would be examples of fossil species gradually transforming into other species, but “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.”
You did not present the fossils. Darwinists used to take refuge in the hope of discontinuities in the fossil record. That hope was so intense that is saw discontinuities where none existed. Now that the search for these fossils has gone on for around 150 years, one could perhaps be forgiven for suspecting that they don’t exist.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Tell me, how can the “intelligent design” hypothesis – the creator did it – be disproved? If you can’t answer that, no one should ever take the idea seriously again, certainly not as science.
Just providing a plausible Darwinian pathway to account for the Evolution of Irreducible structures would go a long way toward disproving that hypothesis – and that doesn’t even require hard evidence. That still leaves the problem of chemical “evolution” to get to the starting point for life. Both of those are, at present, insurmountable problems.
Now just because you can’t provide either of those is not “evidence” that the hypothesis shouldn’t be taken seriously (you can leave me out of it, thank you) it is rather quite the reverse – that the Darwinist position is in grave peril of becoming a joke. That it needs legal protection is only further evidence of its inadequacy.

Keith, I have a suggestion: Why not just enjoy yourself for a bit and go read Calculating God by Robert Sawyer?
It’s as Liberal a book as you could possibly ask for - filled with all sorts of racial and ethnic diversity and the superiority of all things Canadian. You’ll like it and it addresses these very concepts in a way that even a Unitarian could love. smile.gif

[Ian McColgin]

I don't see how one can sneer at evolutionary theories and make a totally untrue remark like:

"Everything selected for must have survival utility Now. Not later."

For a species to survive and thrive, the net of all mutations must fit the particular and evolving environment. The net of all mutations, not each mutation individually. Take bears for example. The fur of the polar bear would be a deadly mutation for bears stuck in what is now Alabama. But even if every individual mutation had to have an immediate survival value, that does not establish whether or not there was any cosmic deliberation.

The later and not at all equivalent remark that "Every hand drawn has to provide a survival advantage" has some truth if we take "hand" to mean everything that happened to both the species and its environment. The total hand dealt, as it were. Again, the remark redounds with silence as to whether or not the total hand was planned or just happened.

Our world is filled with plants and animals that have many traits of little or no apparent survival value. Some of these are wondrously countered by another magnificent set of mutations, to the point where one might think there was a whole mousetrap rather than a paper clip. In other cases one finds species that failed elsewhere fitting a little evolutionary and environmental niche.

There is no more reason to posit "intelligent design" for biological processes than there is for inanimate material phenomena like gravitation. And no less. From the neo-Platonic fascination with number and harmony to Newtonian cosmo-theology, our species has at times become enchanted with the thoughts we hatch and the insights we find or create or whatever and sometimes think it points us to an Intelligent Designer or Greater Power.

But that sense of some divinity is not materially necessary. Our intelligence allows us to discern models and "natural laws" of predictive value. These are the findings of natural science - corrigible, incomplete, testable, improveable.

In their provisional way, the laws and theories of natural science work just fine whether or not there is a universal intelligence behind it all.

They work whether or not there was a cosmic watchmaker who made it all, wound it up, and now sits back to see what happens.

They work whether or not all material and non-material phenomena are part of a grand chain of being slowly growing aware of itself.

At the metaphysical level, study of the formal and final causes does not oblige a belief in an Intelligent Designer. Scientists in all fields can do equally good work whether or not they cotton to Intelligent Design or the Roman Catholic Church or Islam or atheism so long as they don't let that spiritual belief or disbelief affect their observation of natural phenomena. Which is exactly what we need to show that Intelligent Design, whether true or false, is not a scientific issue.

We might live in a Designer Universe but that hypothesis does nothing to advance our understanding of material phenomena. We might live in a Designer Universe but natural science can neither demonstrate nor disprove it.

I still await the Intelligent Design mob to attack the theories of gravitation with the same metaphysical confusion they use regarding theories of evolution. They dare not because their anti-scientific and in the deepest sense anti-spiritual anthro-centric conceits would then be too blatantly displayed. These people who want to sneak God into the biological sciences are really fabricating idols in their minds. They have entirely too little respect for spiritual experience.

[Keith Wilson]

I did read Calculating God and liked it very much indeed; in fact I've read several other books by Sawyer since. First class science fiction by a good writer, although he sometimes edges over into melodrama. Factoring Humanity was almost as good.

Once again, please give me an example of evidence that could disprove the "intelligent design" hypothesis (the creator did it). Would a plausible explanation of the evolution of the bacterial flagellum really do it, given that we probably won't ever know how it really evolved? It is, after all something that happened on a molecular level some 3+ billion years ago, and left no traces of the process. (BTW, there are simpler functional versions of the "irreducible" flagellum, with 33 proteins instead of 40). Based on history, I think they'd just pick some other structure whose origin we don't understand as "irreducible". An idea that cannot be disproved by evidence is not science.


These people who want to sneak God into the biological sciences are really fabricating idols in their minds. They have entirely too little respect for spiritual experience.YES! Once again, Ian has said it superbly. All of science, all of engineering, all of technology, learns about the physical world by observation and experiment. It is about what exists, and how it works. It is neither theistic nor atheistic, and is entirely compatible with either. The aim of the "intelligent design" project is to convince people that observation and experiment proves the existence of a creator, and to that end they make a travesty of real science, and diminish real spirituality.

[ 07-13-2005, 10:19 AM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[George.]

Originally posted by Sam F:
... the Darwinist position is in grave peril of becoming a joke. That it needs legal protection is only further evidence of its inadequacy.

Thanks for bringing up a very good point.

The theory of evolution by natural selection does not need legal protection. On the contrary, in the absence of any coercion, it is spontaneously accepted and taught in science classes throughout the world.

It is the baseless contestations of evolution, as well as quackery such as "intelligent design," that need legal protection. The only teachers that would even mention such pseudoscience to their pupils are those that have been coerced into doing so by laws and court orders.

Sam, here is a shoe that might fit you...

web page (http://www.woodenboat-ubb.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=5;t=024701)

[George.]

Originally posted by Ian McColgin:
I still await the Intelligent Design mob to attack the theories of gravitation with the same metaphysical confusion they use regarding theories of evolution. They dare not ...Not yet, but they plan to:


Twenty Year Goals

To see design theory application in specific fields, including molecular biology, biochemistry, paleontology, physics and cosmology in the natural sciences, psychology, ethics, politics, theology and philosophy in the humanities; to see its innuence in the fine arts.
To see design theory permeate our religious, cultural, moral and political life.
Fight them now, on evolution, so you don't have to fight them tomorrow, in physics, politics, and the fine arts.

[Keith Wilson]

Y'all realize that several of the main folks at the Discovery Institute (the wedge strategy people) were members of Rev. Moon's Unification Church?

[TomF]

I do not believe that the idea of "Intelligent Design" can be disproved, because it is predicated on a belief of how creation occurred, not (as in evolutionary theories) how creation developed once the ball started rolling.

As Keith has said repeatedly, this puts "intelligent design" and "evolutionary theories" into different categories of knowledge. One can believe in an Intelligent Designer AND in the utility of the scientific process to discover how creation works ... but they are beliefs about different types of knowledge.

[George.]

Tom, intelligent design could be interpreted as a theory about how creation occurred. If so, it would have no conflict with the theory of evolution by natural selection.

But, as put forth by proponents like the Discovery Institute and Cardinal Schonborn, ID is meant to explain how species evolve. It is specifically meant to refute the mechanism of natural selection. That is why part of their strategy is to question the theory of evolution. They do not want to complement it, they want to replace it.

[TomF]

Originally posted by George.:
Tom, intelligent design could be interpreted as a theory about how creation occurred. If so, it would have no conflict with the theory of evolution by natural selection.

But, as put forth by proponents like the Discovery Institute and Cardinal Schonborn, ID is meant to explain how species evolve. It is specifically meant to refute the mechanism of natural selection. That is why part of their strategy is to question the theory of evolution. They do not want to complement it, they want to replace it.Exactly.

ID conflates belief about origins (where some version of it is a legitimate opinion) with explanations of the development of creation. The original act of creation quite clearly stands outside time, and outside the realm of what evolutionary science(s) can examine. Trying to replace evolutionary theories with ID is a subterfuge, a reactionary attempt to re-infuse God into our understanding of the world.

An unnecessary subterfuge, in my view, as well as one which is couter-productive. Evolutionary models of the world's development do not rule out God ... they just don't rule God in either. When Science is done honestly, one always eventually bumps into the same walls over and over again: What happened to start the ball rolling (what's the prime mover?)? What's our responsibility, now that we have this knowledge? And honest sciences quite properly can't address those questions ... dealing as they do with the empirical, material world.

It's precisely those questions which point one to start looking for answers of a different sort, in a different realm of knowledge. Where some form of belief in an Intelligent Designer is a legitimate option.

But by conflating the two realms of knowledge, ID as it is promoted now makes for bad science, and worse metaphysics.

[Keith Wilson]

Tom, I'll say it again: Keep that up and (some)Christians are going to get quite a reputation for reasonableness around here. ;)

Science deals with the physical world, and proceeds by observation and experiment. It legitimately tries to answer questions like, "What is this?" "How did it get here?" "What is it made of?" "How does it work?"

Religion (and expanding a bit we'll include philosphy and ethics) tries to answer very different questions, such as, "What does it mean?" What is the right thing to do?"

When one tries to intrude into the other's legitimate domain, we have trouble.

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Ian McColgin:
I don't see how one can sneer at evolutionary theories... Ian, there is only one theory that’s in question: Darwinian Evolution. On the other hand, if "sneering" is the problem, then the Evolutionists share in it abundantly. ;)


Originally posted by Ian McColgin:
...and make a totally untrue remark like:
"Everything selected for must have survival utility Now. Not later."

For a species to survive and thrive, the net of all mutations must fit the particular and evolving environment. The net of all mutations, not each mutation individually.
Ian, if that statement is “totally untrue” you’ll have to justify your charge bit better than that. What’s the “net of all mutations” supposed to be? Some mutations are lethal. Some are so trivial that they have no measurable effect. Some produce a change in an organism that is either beneficial to survival or detrimental. This last category is the stuff of Evolution. It is possible for multiple, simultaneous mutations to produce a beneficial effect – but it is also extremely unlikely. The more multiple and simultaneous mutations required - the more unlikely it becomes. Any requirement that such a thing happen repeatedly becomes the functional equivalent of a miracle – that is, an impossible occurrence. That’s why Evolutionists never refer to them operating that way – or at least I’ve never read such a thing – until now.
Thus, practically speaking, one beneficial mutation happens at a time. Each mutation must confer some survival advantage or it will not be selected for. If another mutation comes along later that’s also beneficial, it too will be selected for and can add to the benefit of the original and so on... but there is no “net of all mutations” simultaneously occurring because they do not work that way - except in miraculous or near-miraculous circumstances. I could be wrong about this (standards have slipped alarmingly), but the last time I checked - relying on virtually miraculous circumstances is not generally considered a good foundation for reasoning that supports science.


Originally posted by Ian McColgin:
... But even if every individual mutation had to have an immediate survival value, that does not establish whether or not there was any cosmic deliberation. Establishing any “cosmic deliberation” was not the intention of the remark. Its purpose was to point out a flaw in reasoning used to support Darwinian Evolution. If one seeks to support a theory, the reasoning used should at least be consistent with it. Evolution does not and can not foresee the future. It is a here and now process. Any attempt to introduce forethought into an “unsupervised, impersonal, unpredictable and natural process of... chance, historical contingencies and changing environments” is futile and self-defeating.

[George.]

Originally posted by Sam F:
Evolution does not and can not foresee the future. Neither does meteorology. Therefore, it is not a valid science. Therefore, the weather is caused, not by impersonal natural processes, but by an "intelligent designer."

Which explains why, in the US, hurricanes usually strike the "red" states, whose inhabitants don't support efforts to combat global warming... :D

[Meerkat]

Mutations don't happen because they would be beneficial, they happen because they happen. What makes them beneficial is the enhanced survival ability of the mutant. That survival selects for the mutation.

Anyone who thinks this zoo of a mudball we live on is the product of intelligent design is crazy - or the intelligent designer is in remedial education! :D

[George.]

And most mutations are not beneficial. And detrimental mutations do not get immediately weeded out - it is a long process, spread out over many generations, producing countless handicapped individuals and sometimes causing much suffering. Think of all the hereditary diseases that are still with us.

You either have to believe that the mutations are random events, or that the "intelligent designer" is rather incompetent, or perhaps cruel...

[TomF]

On the contrary, Meer. It's just not ID as the ID proslytes would have you believe.

Dreaming up a system in which mutation occurs, in which complexity develops as a result, and in which natural selection will without an outside intervention lead to species that suit their current environments ... well, I expect that would take a bit of intelligence. And intelligence enough that once the mudball's set ticking, there'd also be no need to step in and adjust its workings.

The mudball is, after all, just a glorified, lovely gym. The gym and the equipment in it is good, but in itself is not the most important bit. What's really important is the training that such a facility lets us do, as we interact with it and each other. How we do that is the crux of it - whether we do so in ways that strengthen our consciences and souls, or not.

[Keith Wilson]

Or perhaps setting up a universe in which the physical laws are such and the constants are at precisely the right values so all sorts of interesting things happen.


For the garden is the only place there is, but you will not find it
Until you have looked for it everywhere and found nowhere that is not a desert;
The miracle is the only thing that happens, but to you it will not be apparent,
Until all events have been studied and nothing happens that you cannot explain.

W. H. Auden

[Sam F]

Originally posted by TomF:
It's just not ID as the ID proslytes would have you believe.
Ah, the problem is - just what do you believe ID adherents would have you believe? And why do you believe it?
Really Tom, you might want to investigate the writings of Michael Behe and William Dembski, before you characterize that as the Liberty Baptist version. Liberals aren’t supposed to stereotype. Right? ;)


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Or perhaps setting up a universe in which the physical laws are such and the constants are at precisely the right values so all sorts of interesting things happen.
Which places you squarely in the Intelligent Design camp, though one can't help but wonder at your determined defence of something not really believed. Hollus, the inhabitants of Beta Hydri III and the Wreeds all welcome you! smile.gif

[Keith Wilson]

Sam, I have NEVER said a designer was impossible. I have argued that the evidence of the evolution of life on earth most certainly does not prove the existence of a designer.

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Sam, I have NEVER said a designer was impossible. I have argued that the evidence of the evolution of life on earth most certainly does not prove the existence of a designer.Sure Keith, but you've also tended to reduce reality to the methods used to discover it.

[Keith Wilson]

To find out about the physical world, what else works reliably besides observation and experiment?

[TomF]

Sam wrote:
Ah, the problem is - just what do you believe ID adherents would have you believe? And why do you believe it?Sam, I believe that ID proponents at least here on the WBF would have me believe that God periodically intervenes in the physical processes of the world, perhaps starting one evolutionary chain of events, perhaps altering another, perhaps creating this or that condition ex nihilo.

I believe this because frankly, that's what I've understood you to argue. You're absolutely right in saying this is not an unthinking Fundamentalist position. You're not arguing for creation in 6 days. You're not arguing that evolutionary processes don't happen - in fact, you've regularly said that they do.

But I understand you to argue that evolutionary processes, by themselves, are insufficient to explain the development of the type of complexity we see. That it is necessary that God intervened in the physical world, to create/alter evolutionary paths (among other things).

That's consistent with the view you then expressed about your Faith - that Christianity is meaningless without miracles. My view, and my faith, differs.

[Sam F]

Originally posted by TomF:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Sam wrote:
Ah, the problem is - just what do you believe ID adherents would have you believe? And why do you believe it?Sam, I believe that ID proponents at least here on the WBF </font>[/QUOTE]Golly Tom! How many Intelligent Design boosters are there on this Forum?
I don’t read all that many threads, so maybe I’ve been missing something!


Originally posted by TomF:
... would have me believe that God periodically intervenes in the physical processes of the world, perhaps starting one evolutionary chain of events, perhaps altering another, perhaps creating this or that condition ex nihilo. Well an astronomer or physicist can say that things are created ex nihilo and evidently get away with it being scientific... however, I don’t know of any I.D. proponents that say any such thing. Remember, I suggested that you actually read Behe and Dembski. Why not start with Darwin’s Black Box? It’s quite readable and the author has charitably marked out the hyper-technical bits so that a non-technical reader can skip without missing the continuity of the argument.


Originally posted by TomF:
I believe this because frankly, that's what I've understood you to argue. You're absolutely right in saying this is not an unthinking Fundamentalist position. You're not arguing for creation in 6 days. You're not arguing that evolutionary processes don't happen - in fact, you've regularly said that they do.

But I understand you to argue that evolutionary processes, by themselves, are insufficient to explain the development of the type of complexity we see. Yes, Evolution is inadequate to explain observed phenomena. If it were adequate, I’d accept it as most likely true - but it isn’t. I didn’t abandon Darwin without reason.


Originally posted by TomF:
That it is necessary that God intervened in the physical world, to create/alter evolutionary paths (among other things). Think about this for a moment and fit Keith’s...

Or perhaps setting up a universe in which the physical laws are such and the constants are at precisely the right values so all sorts of interesting things happen.... into your definition and you’ll see that it fits the template of “create/alter”. That makes Keith, (in your view) a creationist – something I suspect he’ll vociferously object to!

This morning I ran across this paper:
In Defense of Intelligent Design (http://www.designinference.com/documents/2005.06.Defense_of_ID.pdf)
The similarities to arguments you’ve read here – if you’ve actually read them ;) – is not just coincidental. It’s proof that great minds think alike! No just kidding :D – it is proof that once one has left a ruling paradigm, its flaws become obvious to anyone who bothers to look.
I see he’s quoted the same passage from Gould that I have – it’s just too good to pass up! Though, IIRC, I found it in Johnson and had read something else like it in Gould’s own column in Natural History magazine – of which I read almost every one.
Also, Dr. Dembski uses a term that briefly expresses what I said to Keith: that he “tended to reduce reality to the methods used to discover it. The term is methodological materialism. Nice eh? I’ll have to save that one.


Originally posted by TomF:
That's consistent with the view you then expressed about your Faith - that Christianity is meaningless without miracles. My view, and my faith, differs.
Tom, this is not a “view” that people can reasonably disagree on. Historically, miracles were the driving force behind Christianity. Without miracles there’d have been no Christianity – Christ didn’t rise from the dead just because he missed his morning newspaper you know. Not believing any of it denies the very foundations of Christianity.
To a skeptic, the notion of a Christian faith without the supernatural is an extreme absurdity. You can get to the same place with ordinary Atheism and with a lot less bother.

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

I should start by saying that I don't find Intelligent Design necessary to my faith, any more than my father did. He would have been amused by the suggestion, since, as an undergraduate at Darwin's old college in Cambridge, reading Natural Sciences (biology), he had to take a compulsory paper on Paley's Evidences. (Later in life he found Teilhard de Chardin more persuasive.)

Having said that I don't find Intelligent Design necessary , I find that I am not persuaded by it.

The great majority of our DNA is redundant; it would be a poor designer who arranged this, but it is just the sort of result that natural selection would achieve.

[Meerkat]

ID is just another religious fairy tale.

[TomF]

Well Sam, at the seminary lots of folks holding different positions on miracles disagreed quite amicably. Proving that we don't have to fight religious wars unless we want to.

While I agree that the resurrection is the lynchpin of Christianity's early spread, Christianity was not the only religion going which boasted of miracles. In our first New Testament class, our professor read from a contemporaneous Greek account of a great Prophet who had a virgin mother, did miracles, died, and was resurrected.

And there are many things which were believed fervently in 1st century Palestine that don't stand up to modern science or scrutiny ... let alone modern techniques and understandings of how to write history. I don't believe, for instance, that semen is a seed planted in a woman's womb. Or that the sky is a large blue dome, which not incidentally forms the sapphire floor of God's throne room.

Does this make me un-Christian? No, but it does make me somewhat the product of my age.

In part, Keith and I are of the same opinion on the ID issue. I've understood him to say that a creator is quite possible, but he's seen no evidence that fingerprints have been left following the initial act of creation. I'd amend that myself, to say that I see God's fingerprints all over creation ... I see God's force being the impetus inside each seed, each wave etc. But God participates in creation through the ground rules God set out at Creation.

Also unlike Keith, I am not agnostic on whether a Creator started things off - but this is a matter for belief. Frankly, I attribute this to my experience of God's involvement in the non-material aspects of things - of my life, of the lives of others I know. It's terribly presumptuous of me, but I think that God rather intended things to develop in ways that present challenges, to give creation an opportunity to grow spiritually as it works those challenges out. Rather like why there's the opportunity for sin ... to allow us the opportunity to grow by wrestling.

Finally, I'm unclear if you're in fact arguing that I'm a closet Atheist. if so, that's rather presumptuous of you. Whether one "can" get to the same place being atheist, some of us don't.

T.

[ 07-14-2005, 12:49 PM: Message edited by: TomF ]

[Sam F]

Originally posted by TomF:
Well Sam, at the seminary lots of folks holding different positions on miracles disagreed quite amicably. One’s view of miracles can vary. The facts of history don’t. It makes no difference if one doesn’t believe in miracles to know that the first Christians did believe in them, witnessed them, and acted accordingly.


Originally posted by TomF:
While I agree that the resurrection is the lynchpin of Christianity's early spread, Christianity was not the only religion going which boasted of miracles. In our first New Testament class, our professor read from a contemporaneous Greek account of a great Prophet who had a virgin mother, did miracles, died, and was resurrected. So? One can find parallels between the Christ and any number of ancient sources including stories about Alexander the Great’s childhood.
Finding such parallels makes no more difference than citing the similarity of other nation’s leader’s life histories to disprove the existence of Napoleon.

As one of the enormous follies of folk-lore, let us take the case of the transmigration of stories, and the alleged unity of their source. Story after story the scientific mythologists have cut out of its place in history, and pinned side by side with similar stories in their museum of fables. The process is industrious, it is fascinating, and the whole of it rests on one of the plainest fallacies in the world. That a story has been told all over the place at some time or other does not prove that it never really happened; it does not even faintly indicate or make slightly more probable that it never happened. That a large number of fishermen have falsely asserted that they have caught a pike two feet long does not in the least effect the question of whether anyone ever did so. That numberless journalists announce a Franco-German war was merely for money is no evidence one way or the other upon the dark question of whether such a war ever occurred. Doubtless in a few hundred years the innumerable Franco-German wars that did not happen will have cleared the scientific mind of any belief in the legendary war of [18]70 which did. But that will be because if folk-lore students remain if at all, their nature will be unchanged; and their services to folk-lore will be still as they are at present, greater than they know. For in truth these men do something far more godlike than studying legends; they create them.(G.K. Chesterton, emphasis added.)


Originally posted by TomF:
And there are many things which were believed fervently in 1st century Palestine that don't stand up to modern science or scrutiny ... let alone modern techniques and understandings of how to write history. Tom, no miracle of any sort fits the Modernist methodological materialism because it reduces reality to the methods used to discover it. All you’ve said is they don’t “stand up to modern... scrutiny” because modern scrutiny has a priori refused to accept their possibility. This is a position based on ideology not evidence.


Originally posted by TomF:
I don't believe, for instance, that semen is a seed planted in a woman's womb. Then logically, you don’t believe in seeds...

seed (n.)
O.E. sed, sæd, from P.Gmc. *sædis, *sæda- (cf. O.N. sað, O.S. sad, O.Fris. sed, M.Du. saet, O.H.G. sat, Ger. Saat), from root *sæ- "to sow," from PIE base *se- "to sow" (see sow (v.)). Meaning "offspring, progeny" was in O.E., rare now except in biblical use... Seedy is 1440, originally "fruitful, abundant," meaning "shabby" is from 1749, probably in allusion to the appearance of a flowering plant that has run to seed.... and...

semen
1398, from L. semen "seed," from PIE *si-so-, reduplication of base *se- "to sow" (cf. L. serere "to sow," O.Prus. semen "seed," O.C.S. seme, O.H.G. samo; see sow (v.)).... for semen means seed and seed means to sow and thus be fruitful:

seminal
1398, "of seed or semen," from O.Fr. seminal (14c.), from L. seminalis, from semen (gen. seminis) "seed" (see semen). Fig. sense of "full of possibilities" is attested from 1639.
Unfortunately they didn’t teach that in the...

seminary
c.1440, "plot where plants are raised from seeds," from L. seminarium "plant nursery," figuratively, "breeding ground," from seminarius "of seed," from semen (gen. seminis) "seed" (see semen). Meaning "school for training priests" first recorded 1581; commonly used for any school (especially academies for young ladies) from 1585 to 1930s. Seminarian "seminary student" is attested from 1584.:D

Thus the Modernist mind creates a semantic difficulty where one doesn’t exist.

Originally posted by TomF:
Finally, I'm unclear if you're in fact arguing that I'm a closet Atheist. if so, that's rather presumptuous of you. Whether one "can" get to the same place being atheist, some of us don't. Well not quite finally... Tom. Do you know the difference between a Christian who doesn’t believe in miracles and an Atheist?
It is this: An Atheist can ignore Jesus because, if he did exist, he wasn’t the Son of God and was just a man like everyone else.
A Christian who doesn’t believe in miracles can ignore Jesus because he wasn’t really the Son of God – he was just a man like everyone else: with the distinction, if anything, that his mother was a woman of loose morals.
A distinction – but one without a difference!


Originally posted by TomF:
Does this make me un-Christian? No, but it does make me somewhat the product of my age. Christian scripture has something to say about products of the age –

18. Let no man deceive himself. If any man among you thinks that he is wise in this age, he must become foolish, so that he may become wise.
19. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness before God. For it is written, "He is THE ONE WHO CATCHES THE WISE IN THEIR CRAFTINESS";
20. and again, "THE LORD KNOWS THE REASONINGS of the wise, THAT THEY ARE USELESS."
21. So then let no one boast in men... (1 Corinthians:3)

[TomF]

Fine Sam. Have it your own way. The 1st Century of Palestine rocks!

Semen is a seed, and is in itself the sole requirement for procreation. No female DNA required. (won't homosexuals be surprised!)

The sky is an inverted blue bowl; the side we can't see from here is the floor of God's throne room. So those satellite weather pictures are bogus ... Sam, you're not in the path of Dennis or Emily are you?

Clearly to credit any knowledge about the world acquired since biblical times (i.e. to be the product of our age) is silly. And atheistic.

BTW, I agree with your quote from Chesterton. Don't make the mistake of assuming what you'd like to be true about me. But it still doesn't require ID intervention in evolution.

[ 07-14-2005, 02:57 PM: Message edited by: TomF ]

[Keith Wilson]

. . . no miracle of any sort fits the Modernist methodological materialism because it reduces reality to the methods used to discover it. This is a pretty turn of phrase which is essentially meaningless. Are miracles perhaps demonstrable by observation and experiment? Once again, what methods other than observation and experiment give us accurate information about the physical world?

And if you really think that Jesus's ideas are meaningless if he wasn't resurrected, you seriously underestimate the fellow.

[ 07-14-2005, 02:40 PM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[Sam F]

Originally posted by TomF:
Fine Sam. Have it your own way. The 1st Century of Palestine rocks!

Semen is a seed, and is in itself the sole requirement for procreation. No female DNA required. Tom, you're not being consistent. Is a wheat seed the “sole requirement for procreation”?
Any Medieval peasant would have known better! The other half of the equation was fertile soil!
It was even known by an obscure 1st Century prophet:

5. "The sower went out to sow his seed; and as he sowed, some fell beside the road, and it was trampled under foot and the birds of the air ate it up.
6. "Other seed fell on rocky soil, and as soon as it grew up, it withered away, because it had no moisture.
7. "Other seed fell among the thorns; and the thorns grew up with it and choked it out.
8. "Other seed fell into the good soil, and grew up, and produced a crop a hundred times as great." As He said these things, He would call out, "He who has ears to hear, let him hear."In first century, not to mention the first half of the 20th, no one had any idea of DNA – for male or female, plant or animal or the category "other". Why attempt to impose a modern technical and narrow view on words that had quite a deep enough meaning in the old days?
It has all the appearance of just looking for an excuse – or parroting someone who is.


Originally posted by TomF:
...Clearly to credit any knowledge about the world acquired since biblical times (i.e. to be the product of our age) is silly... But Tom think about what I’ve cite here on these pages. Think I don’t value modern knowledge? Can you make that charge stick – like epoxy?
I’d like to see you try. Instead I charge you (and most other moderns) with a failure to realize that people in the past weren’t fools. There were many things they didn’t know, but many things they knew that we’ve forgotten. And worse for us, there are many things we “know” - but don’t.


Originally posted by TomF:
...And atheistic. Go back and read what I said. Do Modernist Christians ignore Jesus' example or not? Do they not say he was a “good man” but nothing supernatural?
Well, we both know the answer, don't we? ;)


Originally posted by TomF:
BTW, I agree with your quote from Chesterton. Don't make the mistake of assuming what you'd like to be true about me. Do you think miracles possible? If not, what other conclusion is one to draw?
Careful about your answer though! You still want the Secularists to think you’re “reasonable”, don’t you? I lay away nights worrying about them thinking me unreasonable... :D :D :D


Originally posted by TomF:
But it still doesn't require ID intervention in evolution.Did you read Dembski’s paper that I linked? Try it. Read Behe when you get the chance. These people are not Fundamentalist wolves in sheep’s clothing.
It's the evidence Tom - not that some alternative theory that supposedly requires intervention. Whether ID is true or not, the problem with Darwinian Evolution is still the evidence.

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
... Are miracles perhaps demonstrable by observation and experiment? Once again, what methods other than observation and experiment give us accurate information about the physical world? Do things happen that science can’t explain? If it can’t explain it, did these things then not happen?


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
And if you really think that Jesus's ideas are meaningless if he wasn't resurrected, you seriously underestimate the fellow.Keith, Socrates ideas weren’t meaningless... but there is no such thing as Socratianity either. Why not? Because Socrates didn’t claim to be God’s son and couldn’t back it up if he had. Why? No resurrection and no miracles.

[Keith Wilson]

Sam, you know VERY well that "things science can't explain" (most of the universe, at present) are not even slightly the same thing as miracles demonstrable by observation and experiment.

Again: What methods other than observation and experiment give us reliable information about the physical world?

The existence of a popular religion based on someone's teachings is no test of their validity. There are lots of Muslims, lots of Confucians, lots of Buddhists; there used to be lots of followers of Huitzilopochtli, for that matter. And one could argue that the ideas of Socrates and Plato had nearly as much influence on the modern world as those of Jesus. Again, if you think that the divinity of Jesus is necessary for his ideas to have any validity, you understimate him.

Sam may repeat it forever, but it’s false. The problem with the neo-Darwinian synthesis is certainly NOT with the evidence, which is very good and getting better all the time. Despite folks on the fringe like Dembski and Behe, it is accepted, nay, enthusiastically endorsed by almost everyone working in the field (and please don’t call every working biologist a sh**-eating fly again :rolleyes: ). The problem with evolution through natural selection is that it does not prove the existence of God.

[ 07-14-2005, 03:48 PM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[TomF]

Are miracles possible? In my view, sure. God's not limited, except by himself. But they're not required - neither for my faith, nor for the development of diversity through evolution. In my view we're surrounded by miracles. The original action of creation was miraculous. And its continued working-out through the physical processes God set in motion is no less miraculous for being observable to modern empirical science.

I had a philosophy prof once who said "We can conceive of a time when we could understand material well enough to make a dead pigeon. But we won't be able to make a live one."

Finally, far be it for me to accuse the ancients of being fools - of course they knew things we now don't. Things about their physical experience, and things about humanity which show up uniquely within their context. We're not fools either, and we have a particular window afforded by our times. Presumably, just as the ancients would have things to teach us, they also might learn a thing or two gleaned from our experience.

[Sam F]

Originally posted by TomF:
Are miracles possible? In my view, sure. God's not limited, except by himself. Tom, Simple question:
Did Jesus perform any miracles or did he "limit himself" and not bother?

[TomF]

I can't tell, from here. Some at least could have happened - God's not limited.

The Gospels give strong accounts, but then that was the pattern of historical writing of the age. There are equally strong accounts of other reputed miracle workers.

Frankly, for my faith, it doesn't matter. Truly.

[Meerkat]

Originally posted by Sam F:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by TomF:
Are miracles possible? In my view, sure. God's not limited, except by himself. Tom, Simple question:
Did Jesus perform any miracles or did he "limit himself" and not bother?</font>[/QUOTE]First prove, empirically, that Jesus even existed. Since you can't do that, talk of miracles, ressurection and/or divinity are moot.

I can prove that Haysoos Martinez exists though... tongue.gif

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Sam, you know VERY well that "things science can't explain" (most of the universe, at present) are not even slightly the same thing as miracles demonstrable by observation and experiment. Keith you know VERY well I wasn’t talking about any such thing as what science doesn’t understand yet. The subject, in case you missed it, is miracles. You know what a miracle is, right?


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Again: What methods other than observation and experiment give us reliable information about the physical world? No problem with either. Let me reword what I said earlier to make it more understandable:
Are things observed that science can’t explain? If it can’t explain it, did these things then not happen?
And answer to these would be nice right about now...


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
And one could argue that the ideas of Socrates and Plato had nearly as much influence on the modern world as those of Jesus. Again, if you think that the divinity of Jesus is necessary for his ideas to have any validity, you understimate him. You’re not listening Keith. I don’t underestimate Jesus’ ideas. However I wonder what you think of some of them... Tell me what do you think about his idea that he was God’s Son or that he was sacrificed for the forgiveness of our sins?
Do tell me what you think about the validity of those ideas!

It is a historical fact that Christianity was founded on Jesus’ miracles.
Once again, there is no religion that states that either Plato or Socrates is the Son of God. For a good reason too –
Did either of those fine gentlemen raise themselves from the dead? No.
Did either cure the blind, make wine from water or walk on a room temperature lake? No. Did they claim to do any of those things? No.
I think by not seeing this crucial difference, you’re the one vastly underestimating Jesus.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Sam may repeat it forever, but it’s false. The problem with the neo-Darwinian synthesis is certainly NOT with the evidence, which is very good and getting better all the time. So it’s getting better all the time? You used to get mad at your school? Teachers that taught you weren’t cool? :D
But how come, if things are getting better all the time, new problems surfaced – such as the origin of DNA - which can’t be explained by Darwin? (And no, your designed multi-step filter certainly doesn’t help matters.)
How is it better that biochemistry has discovered new evidence of irreducibly complex structures for which no plausible Darwinian pathway for their development has ever been proposed?
Why is it that certain ideas are acceptable in other sciences, like astronomy or physics, but anathema to fossilized Darwinian orthodoxy?
Speaking of fossils... How come the new evidence of continuous fossil sediment cores across the K-T boundary, don’t unequivocally show Darwinian Evolution? That they exist destroys yet another the Science in the Gaps excuse about fossil record discontinuities and provides no assistance to poor old Darwin.
Oh, I forgot. Evolution is always happening elsewhere. Another Gap comes to the rescue. Right?
All of these are new problems were un-thought of by Darwinists in the theory’s first hundred years.
Sorry Keith, but you’re dead wrong about evidence getting better. It isn’t. You have to admit. It’s getting worse. It’s getting worse - all the time. ;)

[Sam F]

Originally posted by TomF:
...There are equally strong accounts of other reputed miracle workers.
Examples?

[George.]

Originally posted by Sam F:
You know what a miracle is, right?

Come think of it, I am not sure.

I have an idea of the Catholic Church's parameters to recognize a miracle, when judging whether someone is to be canonized (it requires at least two miracles attributable to the "someone").

But what is a miracle, theologically/philosophically speaking?

[Keith Wilson]

Sam, please stop quoting Stephen Jay Gould out of context. I'm sure he regretted writing those words for the rest of his life, because he CERTAINLY (by his own testimony) did not mean them the way you use them. I realize you take delight in using them in a cause which he spent much of his life fighting against, but it's neither accurate nor honorable. Dawkins often puts in a "creationist misquotation warning" by a passage which could be used in a way opposed to his intent; Gould should have done the same.

You may deny it, but everyone working in the field (with very very few exceptions) will agree that modern molecular biology has given immense support to Darwin’s' ideas of evolution through natural selection. You can say that every working biologist is merely following the herd because they’ve been brainwashed, a fly eating sh**, but it seems rather unlikely, to put it mildly. The mechanisms of inheritance, the mechanism of mutations, the way in which the base sequence in DNA codes for synthesis of proteins, the way in which DNA reproduces itself, the possibility of transcription errors, the way in which a gene sometimes acts in its own interest irrespective of those of the whole organism, the fact that EVERY living creature on the planet has the same genetic code, the idea of eukaryotic cells resulting from symbiosis, the fact that organisms are far more similar on a molecular level than they are on a macro scale . . . I could go on for weeks, but this thread would get even more tedious than it is already. Molecular biology has provided far better evidence in support of natural selection than Darwin ever had.

“Irreducible complexity” has never been demonstrated, just ignorance, and the argument from incredulity is worthless. Certainly there are things we don’t understand yet. We have no idea how life originated, although that's not what Darwin's theories are about. However, everything that has been discovered so far is entirely consistent with evolution through natural selection. You can pretend it’s otherwise if you like, but that’s simply not consistent with the facts.


And no, your designed multi-step filter certainly doesn’t help matters . . .Sam you very obviously didn’t understand my explanation of the way in which multi-step selection radically changes the odds. You have said you aren’t very good with math, but I’m beginning to suspect you don’t want to understand it. It does NOT depend on design. Any advantageous change will make it work.

You are arguing obliquely that miracles occur regularly but are ignored by scientists because they don’t fit their worldview, sort of self-censorship. That works for a while, but if they were demonstrable by observation and experiment, why hasn’t some enterprising young scientist won a Nobel Prize doing precisely that? Miracles are rare, obviously, but science successfully studies black holes, the Higgs boson and ivory-billed woodpeckers, things supposedly rarer by far. There would be no shortage of funding from religious organizations, who would be only too happy to have hard rigorous scientific research validating their beliefs. And nobody has done any good research? Could it be that they don’t exist?? Nah, impossible, where would Christians of your stripe be then?


I don’t underestimate Jesus’ ideas. However I wonder what you think of some of them . . . .Sam, that’s silly; I obviously am not a Christian, I don’t think Jesus was any more divine then you and me, and I find the idea completely absurd that his death somehow atoned for something that you or I may do. I think his followers' claims of miracles are almost certainly bogus. I also don’t think that those claims are important. This has nothing whatever to do with the subject at hand.

Answer the question please: Are there any methods other than observation and experiment that give us reliable information about the physical world?

[ 07-14-2005, 06:25 PM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[Meerkat]

" It is a historical fact that Christianity was founded on Jesus’ miracles. "

NOT!

[Bob Cleek]

I'm afraid you guys are still chasing your tails, although it is rather interesting and I commend you both for your dedication to intellectual exchange. If I might impertinently interrupt to suggest you start examining the question from the other end of the telescope.

Does evil exist? Where does it come from? What is it, if it really exists. And, importantly, if evil does exist, how does it exist outside the context of its opposite? If there is an "Evil," must not there be a "Good" for it to exist?

And from there, is the evil men do a product of random natural selection or something mystical inherent in the human psyche. How do you empirically measure human consciousness anyway. Does our sense of self mystically set us apart from the "lesser" animals or is it just something else that evolved?

[ 07-14-2005, 07:40 PM: Message edited by: Bob Cleek ]

[Bob Cleek]

By the way, Meer... on a different level of discourse, when you were a little kid, did you ever believe in Santa Claus? If so, did it make you feel good? Those of us who believe in God get the same feeling, sort of, in a grown up way. Even if it wasn't true, your Santa Claus fantasy gave you great joy. Religion is like that for a lot of us, and, if it happens to be really true... won't you be surprised!

[Victor]

Obduracy

[Meerkat]

Originally posted by Bob Cleek:
By the way, Meer... on a different level of discourse, when you were a little kid, did you ever believe in Santa Claus? If so, did it make you feel good? Those of us who believe in God get the same feeling, sort of, in a grown up way. Even if it wasn't true, your Santa Claus fantasy gave you great joy. Religion is like that for a lot of us, and, if it happens to be really true... won't you be surprised!Dead flabbergasted! :D

[Bob Cleek]

I guess that marks some sort of milestone, Meer! LOL Hey, I'm no holy roller, but I hedge my bets. It can't hurt. Besides, I got all my sinnin' out of my system years ago. Time to settle down, I 'spect. It's kind of a zen thing, ya know. Besides, like I said once before, any sailor who says he's never prayed his ass off in a blow is a damn liar!

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

So, Bob, you have accepted Pascal's wager!

Sam will be along in a moment, to point out that Pascal was a Jansenist, and as such, theologically unsound, being halfway to a Protestant, but I rather go along with your point of view, and I also like your pool table analogy.

[huisjen]

Originally posted by Bob Cleek:
It can't hurt. Actually, based on my personal history, I can tell you truthfully that it can.

Dan

[TomF]

Originally posted by George.:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Sam F:
You know what a miracle is, right?

Come think of it, I am not sure.

I have an idea of the Catholic Church's parameters to recognize a miracle, when judging whether someone is to be canonized (it requires at least two miracles attributable to the "someone").

But what is a miracle, theologically/philosophically speaking?</font>[/QUOTE]As I've said before ... our NT professor said (provocatively) that a miracle is an event that inspires faith. Full stop.

[P.I. Stazzer-Newt]

One of the perils in moving the rock up the hill is the range of things found living under the rock.

[George.]

Originally posted by Bob Cleek:
Does evil exist? Where does it come from? What is it, if it really exists.
Good question. What is "evil?" Can anyone come up with a universal definition of evil - one that does not depend on anyone's perception of harm being done to himself? ;)


Originally posted by Bob Cleek:
... is the evil men do a product of random natural selection or something mystical inherent in the human psyche?Natural selection does lead animals, including men, to do harm to other animals, when it benefits them. From the point of view of the one being harmed, that would be "evil."

Antelope think leopards are evil. Leopards thing antelope are lunch.

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Bob Cleek:

Does evil exist? Where does it come from? What is it, if it really exists. And, importantly, if evil does exist, how does it exist outside the context of its opposite? If there is an "Evil," must not there be a "Good" for it to exist?Good point Bob. Evil undeniably exists, though it’s a difficult thing to confirm by experiment ;) . It's a curious thing - and I can't begin to explain it - but for quite a few wobbly Christians, the "Problem of Evil" is a catalyst for lost faith. This has never made the slightest sense to me. If Evil disproves God’s existence, what does the existence of Good prove?
But for an Atheist, as I once was, the Problem of Evil can have quite the opposite effect. The experience of, and the knowledge of Evil undermines the whole world view based only on "observation and experiment that give us reliable information about the physical world"
Observation is of course a very flexible concept and one can certainly observe Evil and its effects, but observation is not discernment.

[ 07-15-2005, 09:15 AM: Message edited by: Sam F ]

[George.]

Originally posted by Sam F:
Evil undeniably exists... Define "evil," then.

[Keith Wilson]

the whole world view based only on "observation and experiment that give us reliable information about the physical world" (emphasis added)And who would that be? Not, me Mac. Give that straw man another whack!

http://sithoughts.mu.nu/archives/Strawman.jpg

And the question again, which I'm beginning to suspect that Sam doesn't want to answer:
What, other then observation and experiment, will give us accurate information about the physical world??

[Ian McColgin]

I remain mystified what the issues of good and evil have to do with such natural science issues as evolution, gravitation or capilary action.

Bob Cleek's benign existential denfence of his church is excellent and at least has the virtue of not misrepresenting any scientific or material phenomena, but it does not speak to the scientific value of GOG - God Of the Gaps.

The other posturings for "intelligent design" absolutely prove that the "theory" - not at all a corrigible, testable or useable theory but simply a metaphysical assertion - really is exactly and only about religious belief.

Scientists need to have values and a moral compass but, like theologians and philosophers, they also need to stick to truth. They should know better than to import what may be at least a bit true in how we find meaning and goodness in our lives into matters of mere physical science.

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Sam, please stop quoting Stephen Jay Gould out of context. I'm sure he regretted writing those words for the rest of his life, because he CERTAINLY (by his own testimony) did not mean them the way you use them. Keith, I very much doubt that you are correct. Mr. Gould is the co-inventor of Punctuated Equilibrium. Why did he and Niles Eldridge come up with that theory?
Because “the extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists 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.”
You’d have me believe that the observation that lead to the theory for which he is best known was a cause for regret!
Others merely use that same observation and arrive at a different conclusion – based in part on and building upon Gould and Eldridge’s failure to solve Darwin’s problems.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
I realize you take delight in using them in a cause which he spent much of his life fighting against, but it's neither accurate nor honorable. Keith, please describe the properties of “honor” using only “observation and experiment”. ;)


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Dawkins often puts in a "creationist misquotation warning" by a passage which could be used in a way opposed to his intent; Gould should have done the same. That he didn’t (AFAIK), despite ample opportunity, is further confirmation of my point. Thanks S.J.!


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
You may deny it, but everyone working in the field (with very very few exceptions) will agree that modern molecular biology has given immense support to Darwin’s' ideas of evolution through natural selection. You can say that every working biologist is merely following the herd because they’ve been brainwashed, a fly eating sh**, but it seems rather unlikely, to put it mildly. I suggest that you read the Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas Kuhn before you follow that line of reasoning further. He documents many complete reversals of scientific views - as even a slight familiarity with the facts of history will also show.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
. . . I could go on for weeks, but this thread would get even more tedious than it is already. Molecular biology has provided far better evidence in support of natural selection than Darwin ever had... However, everything that has been discovered so far is entirely consistent with evolution through natural selection. You can pretend it’s otherwise if you like, but that’s simply not consistent with the facts. Yes you could no doubt go on forever, but you still haven’t dealt with Darwin’s shortcomings. For instance, how did the first reproducing organism arise? Provide a plausible Darwinian pathway for the evolution of irreducible structures. Then there’s the absence of unequivocal fossil evidence supporting Darwinian Evolution... etc. Those are facts and they aren’t consistent with Darwin’s view of the Origin of Species.
Go ahead. Fix it for poor ol’ Darwin. What’s stopping you?


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
“Irreducible complexity” has never been demonstrated, just ignorance, and the argument from incredulity is worthless. More Science in the Gaps Keith. You know very well that a hope that someday someone will think up a solution is nothing but good old fashioned Faith.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />And no, your designed multi-step filter certainly doesn’t help matters . . .Sam you very obviously didn’t understand my explanation of the way in which multi-step selection radically changes the odds. You have said you aren’t very good with math, but I’m beginning to suspect you don’t want to understand it. It does NOT depend on design. Any advantageous change will make it work. </font>[/QUOTE]Keith you described a computer model where “a pattern works whatever random sequence you pick as a ‘target’.” Those are your words Keith. Natural Selection doesn’t “pick” anything as a target. One doesn’t have to know a lick of math to see the fallacy in pretending that if you “pick... a target” it isn’t by design.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
You are arguing obliquely that miracles occur regularly but are ignored by scientists because they don’t fit their worldview, sort of self-censorship. No, I am not saying that. Document it, please? Hint: I was referring to Jesus’ miracles as empirical proof of Jesus’ authority over nature. It has nothing to do with Intelligent Design.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> I don’t underestimate Jesus’ ideas. However I wonder what you think of some of them . . . .Sam, that’s silly; I obviously am not a Christian, I don’t think Jesus was any more divine then you and me, and I find the idea completely absurd that his death somehow atoned for something that you or I may do. I think his followers' claims of miracles are almost certainly bogus. I also don’t think that those claims are important... </font>[/QUOTE]Keith you disprove your own statements. You can not take Jesus seriously. Let me explain... All that we know about Jesus comes from eyewitnesses. These accounts were recorded in what became the New Testament. But you assert that “his followers' claims of miracles are almost certainly bogus” and call “completely absurd” Jesus’ own words about his purpose. In other words, you contend that they are reports from unreliable witnesses. There are obvious conclusions one must draw from unreliable witnesses in a trial or anywhere else... If they lied about all those miracles and what Jesus said, why take them seriously about anything else?


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Answer the question please: Are there any methods other than observation and experiment that give us reliable information about the physical world?
Keith there’s noting whatsoever wrong with that statement but realize that it beautifully illustrates the tendency to reduce reality to the methods used to discover it

You say that observation and experiment are the only things that give reliable information about the physical world. And that’s true in a sense, but it has limitations imposed by methodological materialism.
Let me give you an example: Do you love your wife? Let’s assume for the moment the answer is “Yes” (and I hope it’s true). Can you use observation and experiment to confirm that truth? I doubt it. But in defense, you can rightly say that Love is not part of the physical world and thus not part of the limiting reduction of reality to the physical world. True enough. But Love has decided effects in the physical world and you can determine it experimentally. Try this: Tell you wife that the answer to her question “Do you Love me?” is “No” and you’ll see some very impressive physical effects! Not bad for something that, according to your reductionist world-view, doesn’t exist

[TomF]

Sam, the problem with basing your faith on miracles is that there is sketchy external verification that what we currently would call a miracle (defiance of physical laws) ever took place. The greatest amount of evidence comes from within the Gospels, which are hardly unbiased sources.

That said, there is substantial consensus within NT scholarship that Jesus had a contemporary reputation as a miracle worker, and this is supported by brief (and somewhat disputed) references in Josephus and the Babylonian Talmud. That scholarly consensus is noted here (http://www.christianorigins.com/miracles.html), where we read that
...among NT scholars there is almost universal agreement that Jesus performed what he and his contemporaries regarded as miraculous healings and exorcisms. Many of these scholars, though, would not concede that Jesus actually performed supernatural feats. For example, though Fredriksen believes Jesus healed the sick, she also is adamant that she "does not believe that God occasionally suspends the operation of what Hume called 'natural law.'" Fredriksen, Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews, p. 114And Jesus was not the only attested miracle worker of the ancient world. Appollonius the Nazarene also had a following ... his followers eventually had a number of temples built throughout the Roman empire. The early Church worked hard to destroy all records of his life, because his sect was seen as a competing force.

Augustine even acknowledged that non-Christian miracle workers did surprising things, but argued that their actions were like those of the Pharoah's magicians. However "magical," these acts were not real "miracles" because their purpose wasn't to glorify God.

In fact, throughout the ancient world itinerant preachers and reputed healers were not uncommon. Many with reports of miracles to their credit. Now, as Chesterton implied, the fact that the stories were bogus (by our standards) doesn't mean that Christ's story is also bogus (by our standards). But it does come down to faith, rather than proof, Sam. I'm not aware of any extra-biblical verification of one of Jesus' own "natural miracles" (e.g. walking on water), or even of a healing or excorcism.

Can you provide a single non-Christian sourced verification or account of one of Jesus' "natural" miracles? Something perhaps written by a pagan Roman or Greek?

I'm left to conclude that while Jesus' reported miracles certainly drew crowds both in his lifetime and after, it is the experience of God by people of faith which kept the religion alive. Which has precious little to do with breaking the laws of physics or interfering in biological processes. It has much more to do with changing peoples' viewpoints, perspectives, and actions to reflect mystical experience.

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> the whole world view based only on "observation and experiment that give us reliable information about the physical world" (emphasis added)And who would that be? Not, me Mac. Give that straw man another whack! </font>[/QUOTE]Glad to hear it Keith.
Now about that straw man - let’s re-examine the stuffing you left out. Here’s the whole quote... The experience of, and the knowledge of Evil undermines the whole world view based only on "observation and experiment that give us reliable information about the physical world"... with the edited out parts in italics.
Now tell me Keith can you examine Evil by “observation and experiment”?
If you can’t, does Evil then not exist?
If it does exist, how do you know it if not by "observation and experiment"?

[George.]

Originally posted by Sam F:
Provide a plausible Darwinian pathway for the evolution of irreducible structures. Let's look at this issue closely.

ID proponents claim that certain structures, like the eye, have "irreducible complexity," and therefore could not have evolved by natural selection. Let's assume for a moment that it is so.

In that case, we are left with two possibilities:

1) Structures like the eye did evolve (remember, Sam claims to believe in some form of evolution), but while they were evolving they had no survival value - a half-formed eye is not useful. That would prove that they evolved independently of natural selection, since NS would have eliminated the useless structure.

2) Structures like the eye did not evolve at all, but appeared fully formed.

If 1 were true, we should have examples of half-formed, useless structures - not only in the fossil record, but also among extant species. There are none such out there. You will never find an animal walking around with a half-formed organ, which will become useful in another few hundred years, once the "design" process is done.

If 2 were true, we should have complex structures in the fossil record that suddenly appear, with no antecedents. There are none. Every structure for which there is a fossil record has a clear ancestry which shows its gradual evolution. We have no cases of fully formed organs suddenly appearing in the fossil record, while the immediate ancestor species had no hint of them.

So we can conclude that there is no such thing as irreducibly complex structures, either gradually evolved by an "intelligent designer" or created fully formed from scratch.

[TomF]

Very good, George.

Sam, about miracles ...?

[Sam F]

Tom, you said:
“There are equally strong accounts of other reputed miracle workers”
I asked for examples of such miracle workers.
You provided one: Apollonius. He was one of the Neo-Pythagorean philosophers. Which isn’t a bad choice, but he’s not really comparable to Jesus because, according to his biographer, Philostratus, he never made claims of divinity. “He believed that the "virtue" which he possessed was to be attributed to his knowledge of Pythagorean philosophy and his observance of its prescriptions. He held as a general principle that anyone who attained the same degree of wisdom and asceticism could acquire the same power.” No doubt he had a horror of beans (or politics) as well (pretty much the same thing when you think of it).
Incidentally, Philostratus wrote about Apollonius around 200 years after the fact and by historical standards, is not comparable to the near-contemporaneous accounts in the NT.
That Apollonius existed I don’t doubt, since 2nd-century Roman satirist Lucian, who in Alexander the False Prophet said:

He himself was professedly a public physician, but, as Homer says of the wife of Thon, the Egyptian, he knew
“Many a drug that was good in a compound, and many a bad one,”
all of which Alexander inherited and took over. This teacher and admirer of his was a man of Tyana by birth, one of those who had been followers of the notorious Apollonius, and who knew his whole bag of tricks. You see what sort of school the man that I am describing comes from!... though the context isn’t exactly complimentary.


Originally posted by TomF:
Sam, the problem with basing your faith on miracles is that there is sketchy external verification that what we currently would call a miracle (defiance of physical laws) ever took place. The greatest amount of evidence comes from within the Gospels, which are hardly unbiased sources. Tom you realize of course that to witness a miracle and be convinced is to become biased? There are exceptions of course and if we are to accept their witness, then we must accept Judas as authoritative. It would seem that it is Judas' witness that you accept uncritically.

But the principle that all NT sources are biased, while true, is of little value. You know that much of early European history was recorded by Christian monks like the Venerable Bede. Other chroniclers were in the employ of one secular power or other with their own biases. Shall we doubt any document’s authenticity on that account? Fell free if you like, but that that’s not very sensible. Discount all such witnesses – and it is pretty much ALL witnesses - and you’re left with; nothing.


Originally posted by TomF:
That said, there is substantial consensus within NT scholarship that Jesus had a contemporary reputation as a miracle worker, and this is supported by brief (and somewhat disputed) references in Josephus and the Babylonian Talmud. Only in a seminary could anyone come up with a statement of such blinding and hilarious arrogance! Truth based on consensus? I love it!


Originally posted by TomF:
Appollonius the Nazarene also had a following ... his followers eventually had a number of temples built throughout the Roman empire. The early Church worked hard to destroy all records of his life, because his sect was seen as a competing force. Well I don’t know how hard it worked to destroy all records of his life, since his biography has survived... which is more than you can say for most 1st Century figures. Perhaps that’s a slight exaggeration?

By the way, some modern mythmakers have suggested that Apollonius was actually the historical Jesus. Chesterton’s Godlike creators indeed!
However I wonder if Jesus would have said this:

For I discerned a certain sublimity in the discipline of Pythagoras, and how a certain secret wisdom enabled him to know, not only who he was himself, but also who he had been; and I saw that he approached the altars in purity, and suffered not his belly to be polluted by partaking of the flesh of animals; and that he kept his body pure of all garments woven of dead animal refuse; and that he was the first of mankind to restrain his tongue, inventing a discipline of silence described in the proverbial phrase, "An ox sits upon it." I also saw that his philosophical system was in other respects oracular and true. So I ran to embrace his teachings...
Originally posted by TomF:
In fact, throughout the ancient world itinerant preachers and reputed healers were not uncommon. Many with reports of miracles to their credit. Care to name them and document the circumstances and nature of those miracles and the claims of those performing those miracles? Apollonius doesn’t work very well for that.
I’m not asking for no reason you know... I hear that sort of thing all the time but when it comes down to brass tacks, the evidence turns out to be... shall we say? Rather tenuous.


Originally posted by TomF:
Now, as Chesterton implied, the fact that the stories were bogus (by our standards) doesn't mean that Christ's story is also bogus (by our standards). But it does come down to faith, rather than proof, Sam. I'm not aware of any extra-biblical verification of one of Jesus' own "natural miracles" (e.g. walking on water), or even of a healing or excorcism.There are many aspects of Bede’s The Ecclesiastical History of the English People without any extra-Bede verification. Do we thus discount what his history says?
The point being that just because it’s “biased” is no reason to automatically and utterly discount it. Practically no one uses that reasoning for other equally biased accounts.


Originally posted by TomF:
I’m left to conclude...It has much more to do with changing peoples' viewpoints, perspectives, and actions to reflect mystical experience. Tom, there are people who change viewpoints, perspectives, etc. to enhance a mystical experience all over the place. I can show you one down the Valley in New Market Virginia. Through him you can talk to his mystical dead Indian guide; Split Rock. I guess he’s a good Indian, but his financial advice is quite interesting...
But why anyone should believe in him, more than an equally mystical fellow on the other side of the Massanutten Mountain, is beyond me. What makes your faith in Jesus of any greater significance?

[Keith Wilson]

(Re Gould) You’d have me believe that the observation that lead to the theory for which he is best known was a cause for regret!No, I’d have you believe that he would disagree 100% with your misuse of his words. He spent twenty or thirty years fighting against the ideas you’re advocating.

Keith, please describe the properties of “honor” using only “observation and experiment”. The physical world, Sam the physical world. “Honor” is not a physical quantity, it is a type of human behavior, it is something that human beings do (or don’t do). So is evil.


I suggest that you read the Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas Kuhn.I’ve read Kuhn, may even still have a copy. He uses the replacement of Newtonian mechanics with Relativity as his central example, with a couple of other peripheral cases. Newtonian mechanics remains true, however, as a special case of relativity. Yes, existing ideas can be overturned. However, there is no new evidence which casts the slightest doubt on evolution through natural selection.


For instance, how did the first reproducing organism arise?Sigh . . here you go again. :rolleyes: Nobody knows (yet). It happened a very long time ago, and left no traces except hightly modified descendants. However Darwinian evolution is NOT about the origin of life, and thus the fact that we don’t know how life began is obviously not a shortcoming of Darwin.


Provide a plausible Darwinian pathway for the evolution of irreducible structures.The argument from ignorance again. “Irreducible” just means “I don’t know how to make them simpler”. Standard examples of “irreducible complexity” are the bacterial flagellum with 40 interrelated proteins and blood clotting with 10. Well, there are some living organisms that have 33-protein flagella, and 6-protein blood clotting. No reflection on Darwin at all, and an utterly specious argument.


Then there’s the absence of unequivocal fossil evidence supporting Darwinian Evolution.You didn’t like our forams? I don’t know how to get more unequivocal. We gave you exactly what you asked for, an unbroken transitional sequence, and you said it wasn’t good enough. What is?


You know very well that a hope that someday someone will think up a solution is nothing but good old fashioned Faith.Sure, faith. :rolleyes: Or just perhaps it might be an inference based on hundreds of years of experience. People have been thinking up solutions to previously unsolved problems for a very long time now. How long have we even known about the molecular structure of the flagellum, ten or twenty years?

You know very well that a hope that someday someone will think up theory that explains the fine structure of all matter is nothing but good old fashioned Faith.

You know very well that a hope that someday someone will think up a way for people to go to the moon is nothing but good old fashioned Faith.

You know very well that a hope that someday someone will think up something that explains heredity on a molecular level is nothing but good old fashioned Faith.

Your faith should work so well. But don’t worry, there will always be something we don’t understand, a gap in our knowledge into which you can put the creator.


One doesn’t have to know a lick of math to see the fallacy in pretending that if you “pick... a target” it isn’t by design.You seem to be working very hard not to understand. ANY characteristic that is advantageous for any reason will make the model work. Of course, the model is designed; it’s a model! The process is, however exactly analogous to natural selection, and requires no pre-selected outcome to work.


You can not take Jesus seriously.OK, fine, if you think by not believing he’s the “Son of God” or that he performed miracles, I’m not taking him seriously, so be it. By that definition, I don’t. I said I wasn't a Christian.


Not bad for something that, according to your reductionist world-view, doesn’t exist.Not MY worldview. I said that observation and experiment were the only reliable ways of learning about the physical world. Did I EVER say that the physical world is all that exists? Remember what I said was the legitimate (and quite large) domain of religion/philosophy/ethics? Whack that straw man!

Answer the question please: Are there any methods other than observation and experiment that give us reliable information about the physical world?

[ 07-15-2005, 01:12 PM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> (Re Gould) You’d have me believe that the observation that lead to the theory for which he is best known was a cause for regret!No, I’d have you believe that he would disagree 100% with your misuse of his words. He spent twenty or thirty years fighting against the ideas you’re advocating. </font>[/QUOTE]Believe? Of course you believe. No news there. But can you prove it?


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> Keith, please describe the properties of “honor” using only “observation and experiment”. The physical world, Sam the physical world. “Honor” is not a physical quantity, it is a type of human behavior, it is something that human beings do (or don’t do). </font>[/QUOTE]Honor: “the quality of being honorable and having a good name...”
Honorable: “not disposed to cheat or defraud; not deceptive or fraudulent; honest... showing or characterized by honor and integrity...
adhering to ethical and moral principles...”

But you accused me of being dishonorable:

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
I realize you take delight in using them in a cause which he spent much of his life fighting against, but it's neither accurate nor honorable ... and you have not proved it. You only believe it. If you’re to prove it, what other way besides “observation and experiment” would you use?
I should remind you that a charge of dishonor often has consequences in the physical world. In the not so distant past, such an overlap between the “domain of religion/philosophy/ethics” and the physical world occasionally had fatal consequences.
How does that fit into your contention that the two are separate domains?


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
I’ve read Kuhn, may even still have a copy... Yes, existing ideas can be overturned. Good! My point exactly... thus, Darwin’s existing ideas can be overturned. I’m glad you agree. Thanks.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
However, there is no new evidence which casts the slightest doubt on evolution through natural selection. A circular argument. Irreducible complexity doesn’t exist because we “don’t know how to make them simpler” therefore it isn’t new evidence. How do we know it’s not new evidence? Because we don’t know how to make them simpler...
A pretty handy excuse too, except the problem won’t go away. Darwinism purports to explain the development of life – but here it falls short - again.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />For instance, how did the first reproducing organism arise?... However Darwinian evolution is NOT about the origin of life, and thus the fact that we don’t know how life began is obviously not a shortcoming of Darwin. </font>[/QUOTE]Driving that car without starting it again? Don’t even know how it starts? Don’t even care? That’s not much of an understanding is it?
The start of any process is – for people like Anthony Flew and Francis Crick, it’s quite important – some (and they) would say it’s of primary importance.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Provide a plausible Darwinian pathway for the evolution of irreducible structures.The argument from ignorance again... No reflection on Darwin at all, and an utterly specious argument. </font>[/QUOTE]No pathway to any such structure’s evolution? Remember, I’m not asking for physical evidence of this – just a plausible way for it to have happened. Seems a pretty serious issue - if no one can even do that.
Once more your belief that Science will find a way – a science in the Gap is impressive, but it goes no further toward answering a valid scientific question: How did these structures evolve? I guess you’d rather not have anyone ask!


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Then there’s the absence of unequivocal fossil evidence supporting Darwinian Evolution.You didn’t like our forams? I don’t know how to get more unequivocal. We gave you exactly what you asked for, an unbroken transitional sequence, and you said it wasn’t good enough. What is? </font>[/QUOTE]One un-spectacular and quite irrelevant example was provided. Remember the w-i-d-e time jumps between specimens? With a continuous core, the gradual Darwinian transformation from one species to another should have been present. Why wasn’t it presented?
I can only conclude several things: Your memory of my critique is curiously vague and that the reason those scientists didn’t become candidates for the next Nobel Prize by presenting that time-lapse sequence is either that they entirely lack ambition or that the evidence doesn’t exist.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />One doesn’t have to know a lick of math to see the fallacy in pretending that if you “pick... a target” it isn’t by design.You seem to be working very hard not to understand. ANY characteristic that is advantageous fro any reason will make the model work. Of course, the model is designed; it’s a model! </font>[/QUOTE]Thanks Keith. That makes my point precisely. In the future, I’d advise not using examples of design to buttress the belief that evolution is an “undirected, unpredictable, natural process”


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Did I EVER say that the physical world is all that exists? Remember what I said was the legitimate (and quite large) domain of religion/philosophy/ethics? Whack that straw man!

Answer the question please: Are there any methods other than observation and experiment that give us reliable information about the physical world?
But Keith you just answered it:

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Did I EVER say that the physical world is all that exists? So of course your example is too narrow – or do you deny that telling your wife you don’t love her (from the domain of “religion/philosophy/ethics”) won’t have measurable effects in physical domain?
As for measurable... try my experiment and I promise I’d drive up with a truck and help you dispose of all your stuff scattered along the curbside. We can weigh it or something... ;)

[Bob Cleek]

Are there any methods other than observation and experiment that give us reliable information about the physical world?

This seems to be a self-answering question. Obviously, the physical world can only be perceived through the senses, i.e. "observation and experiment." On the other hand, the question presupposes that observation and experiment provide us with reliable information. Well, sometimes they do and sometimes they don't. Science disagrees on many, many points, as a result of the unreliability of various observation and experimental methodologies and the mechanisms for interpreting them.

For us, the "physical world" exists solely through our perception. It is a creature of our own making, at least as far as we understand it. However, given the magnitude of the physical world, as you call it, our ability to understand it is extremely limited. I doubt we have even scratched the surface as yet.

So, is a concept of the Divine simply a mechanism for "filling in the blanks" in our understanding of the environment in which we exist? Are we naught but great apes in awe of an electrical storm? Is that "God?"

I think not. There is more to our ablility to perceive than our senses alone. That faculty is enhanced and enabled by solitude. If you place yourself in a place with no distractions and no other people, a sensory deprivation chamber being the ultimate example, if you will, and ponder the question, "Am I alone?," I think most folks will end up convinced there is someone or something beyond it all which necessarily posits the reference point for identifying one's one existence. Without that, we would have no way to gauge who we are. I think this is what distinguishes us from other animals, no? The great apes likely still stand in awe of lightning. We, on the other hand, found our experience of lightning inconsistent with that something against which we posited our own existence and explored it further with a key and a kite.

Ah, and then there are "miracles." From a theological perspective, a guess you could call anything that inexplicably causes one to turn towards God a miracle. For some, such an event is inspirational. For others, simply an as yet scientifically unexplained event.

Take Christ's ascention into heaven as described in the New Testament. The Catholic Church's doctrine teaches that Christ ascended to heaven "body and soul." The scriptural eyewitness accounts describe it. However, we know that the human body is made of matter and we know that matter can travel no faster than the speed of light. If the teachings are true, they Christ is only two thousand light years away right now. Not that far. So where the hell is heaven? It's gotta be a place, because if Christ is going there bodily, it has to be somewhere where matter exists. Or is it? Can matter exist in a dimension we don't know about? I've never been able to reconcile this one with what I know of science. (Which isn't a whole lot, really.)

I DO know that there is a substantial collection of scientifically researched inexplicable "miracles." You don't have to quibble over whether or not Christ's miracles were real or simply card tricks. Miracles continue to occur today. Take Lourdes for example. Some folks believe the Virgin Mary appeared there and revealed a previously non-existent spring which has miraculous healing powers. Millions of people go there seeking a cure for what ails them. Some reported that they were miraculously healed and this, of course, created quite a stir. After a number of years, the hubbub having not died down, the French government (which is known more for its appreciation of science than for its appreciation of religion) set up a research institute at Lourdes to investigate these claims. This research outfit is not affiliated with any religious organization and has no religious bias. In fact, I believe a significant number of the research staff are atheists At present, the French scientific institute has identified some fifty or so "miracles" that they are not only unable to explain scientifically, but which are "scientifically impossible." Things like metastasized malignant tumors simply disappearing overnight... there on one xray and not on the next. Pretty amazing things. For some, they inspire spirituality. For others, scienfic curiousity. They seem to be miracles, nonetheless. Go figure?

[TomF]

Sam, while I haven't time to google up other reports of ancient miracle workers ... feel free to google them up yourself.

All I need to show is that Jesus was not considered to be unique simply because of his miracle working reputation. Appolonius was a reported miracle-worker, to the extent that Emperor Severus commissioned the biography you'd referred to some years after Apppolonius' death.

And as I also noted, Augustine acknowledged that pagan "magicians" exist - he largely didn't dispute their magic, just their motivations. Can we let it rest on his authority, if not Appolonius', that others were credibly thought at the time to break physical laws? So Jesus' uniqueness doesn't rest on his miracles. Others were believed to do similar wonders.

Which means that something other than simply the reputation for breaking physical laws was at the core of Christianity's spread ... and of the Christian religion.

Now, if Christianity rises or falls on whether Jesus actually fed thousands of folks for two separate loaves/fishes lunches, or whether he actually turned water into wine ... then I can see how you'd need to argue for periodic interventions through ID. Through perverse logic, I can see how if God has a penchant for breaking the laws God set up, that penchant will be indulged more than just in Jesus' days in Palestine.

If, however, God is seen as having designed the pool table, racked the balls, and then done the break ... and then to continue to be active in creation through maintaining the physical laws themselves, then this problem goes away. There's no need for ID, as the original design was pretty intelligent all on its own, and the designer's still working things out with us.

Why do you need ID, Sam?

[Keith Wilson]

Stephen Jay Gould spent twenty years fighting against teaching creationism as science. One can only assume he was sincere. Twisting his words to support creationism is not honorable, and I’ll thank you to stop.


Darwin’s existing ideas can be overturned.ANY scientific idea can be overturned. If it can’t be disproved by evidence it isn’t science. What evidence would overturn the “intelligent design” hypothesis: “the creator did it”?


Driving that car without starting it again? . . . it’s quite important – some would say it’s of primary importance.Perhaps, but IT’S NOT WHAT DARWIN”S THEORIES ARE ABOUT. They aren’t about protein synthesis, or the behavior of quarks, or the structure of stars, or the weather on Mars either. To say a theory doesn’t explain something it doesn’t try to explain is certainly no criticism.


I guess you’d rather not have anyone ask!What total nonsense. The claim of “Irreducible complexity” is precisely about not asking, saying “the creator did it” and leaving it at that. Yes, there are things we don’t understand. Irreducible complexity has never been demonstrated, merely scientists’ limited knowledge (about which there was never any doubt). I don’t think it exists. Please prove it if you can. Challenging me to explain something is not evidence.


Your memory of my critique is curiously vague . . . .Your critique was completely incoherent. Fossils were shown at various stages in time. At every stage, the range of variation in the individuals was wide enough that so that it partially overlapped the range of variation of the previous stage. Thus, at every stage, individuals could be found that were identical to those from the previous and subsequent stages. Therefore the fossil sequence shows continuous variation, whether or not you choose to believe it.


. . . not using examples of designThe behavior of the model accurately reflects reality, albeit simplified. It shows that a multi-step selection process, like that which occurs in nature, has very different odds than a random process. You appear to not be trying to understand the statistical point I made. If this is so, you are not being intellectually honest.

Answer the questions, please.

Are there any methods other than observation and experiment that give us reliable information about the physical world?

If so, what are they?

What evidence would disprove the “intelligent design” hypothesis, that “the designer did it”?

[ 07-15-2005, 04:00 PM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[Sam F]

Originally posted by TomF:
Sam, while I haven't time to google up other reports of ancient miracle workers ... feel free to google them up yourself. My point in asking is that tales of these First Century messiah/preachers circulate in academia and are taught as received truth; Jesus just being one of many, but like other urban legends they seem to evaporate when one tries to pin them down.
Apollonius was certainly no messiah and made no such claims, so he won’t do. It's not my job to do your work for you... Got any more?


Originally posted by TomF:
All I need to show is that Jesus was not considered to be unique simply because of his miracle working reputation. What did I say earlier about the definitive contrast between Socrates and Jesus?

Originally posted by Sam F:
Socrates didn’t claim to be God’s son and couldn’t back it up if he had. Why? No resurrection and no miracles. Who else performed that particular miracle? That is to say – resurrection?


Originally posted by TomF:
Which means that something other than simply the reputation for breaking physical laws was at the core of Christianity's spread ... and of the Christian religion. Yep, there’s something else all right: the promise of eternal life with Jesus as the first born in the new covenant. And why did the first Christians believe that? Because they observed it happen - They observed the miracle of the Resurrection. But you knew that, didn’t you?
So Tom, do you expect eternal life? If so, why?
If not, why bother?


Originally posted by TomF:
If, however, God is seen as having designed the pool table, racked the balls, and then done the break ... and then to continue to be active in creation through maintaining the physical laws themselves, then this problem goes away. There's no need for ID, as the original design was pretty intelligent all on its own, and the designer's still working things out with us. Tom, if God made the “first break” and did so in such a way that the Universe was designed to produce life and designed to produce humans; that is Intelligent Design. What else would you call it?
The only distinction – to use an antique image - is if the watchmaker designed my clock’s alarm to go off at 4 AM on a given day when he built it, or if he set the thing himself some time later... and that’s a difference? I don’t think so. It’s just make-believe that if one pushes an event far enough back in time (say 10-14 billion years ago) that one can pretend that the consequences are somehow better than if it happened more recently - 3.5 or so billion years ago.


Originally posted by TomF:
Why do you need ID, Sam?
I don’t. I never researched it until the Darwin thread – Darwin’s own flaws being sufficient all by themselves to raise plenty of doubts. So who needs Intelligent Design? Evidently biology does, unless the Darwinists get on the ball and start explaining things - instead of refusing to answer questions or claiming they aren’t valid questions or even worse, deliberately suppressing alternative explanations.
So long as Darwinists lack real answers and respond with evasions, someone else is going to explain if for them. What else could anyone expect?

[TomF]

Sam, Socrates is a red herring in our little sub-discussion. He was never hailed as a miracle worker, and never claimed to be divine. Our talk is about miracles.

Because you've claimed both that Christianity is meaningless without Jesus' miracles, and that Christianity spread because Jesus' miracle worker powers were considered unique.

Well, Blackburn finds more than 40 names of reputed miracle workers within Greek documents a couple of hundred years on either side of Jesus' lifetime, not including mere magicians. Some were clearly mythological ... these frequently include resurrections in their resume. But your comments about the early Church's approach to Jesus' miracle stories is apt here.
It makes no difference if one doesn’t believe in miracles to know that the first Christians did believe in them, witnessed them, and acted accordingly.And these 40+ are only the ones who got written up or made it to temple-cult status ... Presumably there were other, small-time healers and seers who maintained a local reputation. While not thick on the ground, no self-respecting mystery religion could do without one or two.

We get a hint of how pervasive the view was within the ancient world both from Augustine (who you've yet to deal with on this), and from St. Paul. Both of whom denounce false prophets or magicians ... for doing great works under false pretences. Augustine, as I've noted earlier, largely didn't dispute the magic, focusing instead on the intentions of the magicians.

So no. I don't stake my Christian faith on whether 1st century Christians believed in his miracles, or whether anybody else also had similarly taut wonder-working credentials. I don't credit most of the other miracle accounts, and they've got attribution credentials that aren't so different from Jesus'. And moving away from the West, the Daoist Adepts have a simply vast literature of eye-witness accounts of miracles. The volume and the attribution credentials simply dwarf the Gospels.

So the Christian has to find something else to hang the hat on, rather than simply miracles. There are other miracle shows ... it's the particular experience of God which is different. And impossible to empirically validate.

On another point ... ID ... don't bastardize things here Sam. Scientific evolutionary theories deal, as Keith has said ad nauseum, with the development of complexity ... and are silent on origins. ID conflates origins and the ongoing development of creation - positing periodic divine interventions which contradict the laws God set up.

Bob Cleek's image of creation with the pool table, and God doing the break (which you approved of when Bob said it) is explicitly only about origins. The divine pool cue hits the cue ball once, not repeatedly. It has nothing to do with ID as you've been presenting it ... and could be entirely consistent with Darwin.

[Bob Cleek]

Well, maybe we need to add a correlary to the pool table analogy. After God's break, it was man's shot. When man scratched, God steps in and spots the cue ball again... hence, Christ!

I'm also finding it curious that the skeptics limit themselves to questioning the reportage of Christ's miracles, but avoid the question of miracles in Christ's name which are claimed to occur today. Now, miracles aren't really all that important to me one way or the other, but I find those which have been examined and found inexplicable pretty amazing. We aren't talking about some Phillipino sleight of hand artiste supposedly removing gall bladders without anesthesia here, either.

************************************* (Cut and paste warning!)

The Catholic chruch does not regard miracles as proof of the existence of God, rather, it understands them as a message, a sign from God, and the Pope has declaired that miracles are a call to prayer and to seek God. In light of this realization, I present a few examples of hearlings from Lourdes:

A few examples from Lourdes The Marian Library Newsletter
No. 38 (New Series)
Summer, 1999

http://www.udayton.edu/mary/respub/summer99.html

On February 10, 1999, Msgr. Claude Dagens, bishop of Angoulˆme, France, announced that the cure which Mr. Jean-Pierre Bély, a member of the diocese, had experienced at Lourdes twelve years earlier, was truly "a sign of Christ." The bishop said, "In the name of the Church, I recognize and acknowledge in public the authenticity of the cure which Mr. Jean-Pierre Bély experienced at Lourdes on Friday, October 9, 1987. This sudden and complete cure is a personal gift of God for this man and an effective sign of Christ the Savior, which was accomplished through the intercession of Our Lady of Lourdes."

In 1984, Mr. Bély was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, and, by 1987, he was completely paralyzed. He was brought to Lourdes on a stretcher in 1987 as a participant in the October Rosary Pilgrimage. On the final morning of the pilgrimage, as Mr. Bély was anointed in the Sacrament of the Sick, he felt a "sensation of coldness" followed by "a gentle warmth" that seemed to fill his entire body. "Later, I took my first steps, just like a baby who is learning to walk."

Patron saints Index
Lourdes cures

http://www.catholic-forum.com/saints/stb06001.htm

Colonel Paul Pellegrin
3 October 1950
age 52; Toulon, France Post-operative fistula following a liver abscess in 1948. By the time of his pilgrimage in 1950, the condition had degenerated to an open wound that required multiple dressing changes each day, and showed no sign of healing. On emerging from his second bath in the waters, the wound had completely closed, and the condition never bothered him again. Recognized by the diocese of Fréjus-Toulon, France on 8 December 1953.

Brother Schwager Léo
30 April 1952
age 28; Fribourg, Switzerland multiple sclerosis for five years; recognized by the diocese of Fribourg, Switzerland on 18 December 1960

Alice Couteault, born Alice Gourdon
15 May 1952
age 34; Bouille-Loretz, France multiple sclerosis for three years; recognized by the diocese of Poitiers, France on 16 July 1956

Marie Bigot
8 October 1953 and 10 October 1954
age 31 and 32; La Richardais, France arachnoiditis of posterior fossa (blindness, deafness, hemiplegia); recognized by the diocese of Rennes, France 15 August 1956

Ginette Nouvel, born Ginette Fabre
21 September 1954
age 26; Carmaux, France Budd-Chiari disease (supra-hepatic venous thrombosis); recognized by the diocese of Albi on 31 May 1963

Elisa Aloi, later Elisa Varcalli
5 June 1958
age 27; Patti, Italy tuberculous osteo-arthritis with fistulae at multiple sites in the right lower limb; recognized by the diocese of Messine, Italy on 26 May 1965

Juliette Tamburini
17 July 1959
age 22; Marseilles, France femoral osteoperiostitis with fistulae, epistaxis, for ten years; recognized by the diocese of Marseille, France on 11 May 1965

Vittorio Micheli
1 June 1963
age 23; Scurelle, Italy Sarcoma (cancer) of pelvis; tumor so large that his left thigh became loose from the socket, leaving his left leg limp and paralyzed. After taking the waters, he was free of pain, and could walk. By February 1964 the tumor was gone, the hip joint had recalcified, and he returned to a normal life. Recognized by the diocese of Trento, Italy on 26 May 1976.

Serge Perrin
1 May 1970
age 41; Lion D'Angers, France Recurrent right hemiplegia, with ocular lesions, due to bilateral carotid artery disorders. Symptoms, which included headache, impaired speech and vision, and partial right-side paralysis began without warning in February 1964. During the next six years he became wheelchair-confined, and nearly blind. While on pilgrimage to Lourdes in April 1970, his symptoms became worse, and he was near death on 30 April. Wheeled to the Basilica for the Ceremony the next morning, he felt a sudden warmth from head to toe, his vision returned, and he was able to walk unaided. First person cured during the Ceremony of the Anointing of the Sick. Recognized by the diocese of Angers, France on 17 June 1978.

Delizia Cirolli, later Delizia Costa
24 December 1976
age 12; Paterno, Italy Ewing's Sarcoma of right knee; recgonized by the diocese of Catania, Italy on 28 June 1989

Jean-Pierre Bély
9 October 1987
age 51; French multiple sclerosis; recognized by the diocese of Angoulême on 9 February 1999

16/01/2002
Dr Raj Persaud

CAN science prove that God exists? Debate over this issue has been sparked again with the publication of the latest meticulously conducted clinical trial of whether praying for the sick assists their recovery.

**********************************************

Two previous large studies - the last one published in 1999 - seemed to find that, astonishingly, seriously ill patients in Coronary Care Units improved medically if they were prayed for. However, the latest study of 800 Coronary Care Unit patients, published in the prestigious journal Mayo Clinic Proceedings, found no significant beneficial effect of prayer.

This publication coincides with a call from some scientists to cease this kind of research. No matter how rigorously conducted, it could never reveal the hand of God. Dr John Chibnall a psychiatric researcher at St Louis University School of Medicine, says a key element of all clinical trials is testing the dose-response relationship. But what kind of God would give more help to patients who were prayed for 10 times a day, as opposed to those who were prayed for just once a day?

Even if the latest disappointing results of the research on prayer spells the possible death knell of this particular kind of investigation, there remains one last natural laboratory where science is still being used to investigate God - the remote town of Lourdes in south-west France.

Every year about six million people from around the world visit the town because of its reputation for miraculous healings of incurable illness. Despite the age of scientific rationalism we are supposed to live in, the numbers of visitors are going up dramatically.

And, astoundingly, the miracles are still happening. Jean Pierre Bely, a French man, was confirmed as recently as 1999 by two separate medical and scientific committees associated with Lourdes as having been cured of multiple sclerosis (following his pilgrimage to the town) in a way that was scientifically inexplicable - the science code for a miracle.

The sick first started turning up in substantial numbers in Lourdes from 1875. They were attracted by a report that a blind man could see again after bathing his eyes in a spring discovered by a peasant girl, who had been told where to dig for it by visions of the Virgin Mary. Eight years later a local medical bureau was established properly to check allegations of miraculous cures, in order to protect the reputation of the town from fraudulent claims.

Some cynics would say these independent doctors and scientists are merely collaborating in an exercise in maintaining the powerful image or "brand" of Lourdes. Yet this committee, which has since grown in size and sophistication, will now spend years checking individual cases, with up to 250 different doctors interviewing and testing a patient, before a claimed cure will be accepted as not explainable by science.

Even at the end of this exhaustive process, the case is then turned over to an independent international medical committee, where another set of doctors and scientists re-examine the case and conduct further tests. Then the phenomenon is finally submitted to a vote among the investigating scientists - as to whether any other explanation other than a miracle is plausible. For example, was the condition accurately diagnosed in the first place?

The final part of the process occurs when the Church is invited to decide whether it wants to pronounce that, since the cure is inexplicable scientifically, it is therefore a sign of God's intervention.

Given the scientific rigour of the process, Jean Pierre Bely had to wait a decade before his sudden ability to walk during a mass at Lourdes, despite previously suffering from a debilitating disease, was officially sanctioned as not explainable by science. The toughness of this scientific peer-review process explains why only 66 Lourdes cases since 1862 have made it to official "miracle" status.

It is intriguing that the Catholic Church puts up with such a small number of divine interventions, given that about 7,000 pilgrims have sought officially to claim that a miracle has happened to them since the medical committee has existed. Instead, the Church is relying on scientists first to validate the claim that an event cannot be accounted for by natural phenomena before religion proceeds to sanction a cure as a divine event. This would appear to be an implicit recognition by the Church that science is a privileged method for getting at the truth, a relationship with science that has never been officially acknowledged by religious authorities.

But if scientists and doctors can agree that some, albeit a small number of cases, are representative of phenomena beyond scientific understanding - is this evidence for something that exists beyond rationalism - in other words, proof of God?

Alexis Carrel, one of France's greatest physicians in the first half of the 20th century and a winner of the Nobel Prize for Medicine for his work on transplantation surgery, thought so. Carrel had been a sceptic and lost his Catholic faith before he went to Lourdes on an invalid train, out of scientific curiosity. He became especially interested in a woman he thought was too severely ill even to reach the goal of her pilgrimage. However, she made it to Lourdes, where her stomach was bathed in a pool and her large abdominal tumour soon disappeared - Carrel believed that he had witnessed a genuine miracle.

But sceptics such as the novelist Emile Zola famously asked why in Lourdes there are no piles of wooden legs alongside the crutches cast aside by those who had been supposedly cured, suggesting that these were not proper miracles, as they did not radically challenge fundamental laws of physics or biology.

There are many astonishing remissions of large cancerous tumours amongst the official miracles of Lourdes, though admittedly spontaneous remission of cancer is not unknown in the outside world. One study found on average about three spectacular cases each year are reported by surgeons in medical journals - another suggested that, depending on the particular cancer, up to one per cent might subside entirely of their own accord.

One theory is that spontaneous regression of a cancer represents a sudden mobilisation of natural host defence mechanisms. Since it is well established that our immune system is influenced by our emotional state, it is possible that strong emotions evoked by visiting Lourdes could have beneficial physical effects in suddenly galvanising an immune system to start attacking the cancer.

Two independent studies into spontaneous remission of cancer found psychological changes, occurring just before the physical disease began to improve dramatically, could be significant. Both found that resolving an existential crisis in the person's life, a dramatic change in life outlook and a reduction in anxiety and depression, seemed to occur just before the cancer started to resolve by itself.

Indeed, a British study testing at regular intervals the mental state of pilgrims to Lourdes found that up to a year later, the pilgrimage had produced significant reductions in anxiety and depression - an effect equivalent to the strongest anti-depressants. But it is this ability of science to explain away religion with advances in understanding of brain and mind which suggests that science could be more an enemy of God than an ally.

For example, another recent study found that by brain scanning the spiritual while they were meditating, it was possible neurologically to account for the religious sense of transcendence - oneness with nature or unity with God. The brain scanner showed that during meditation the part of the brain responsible for orientation of the body in physical space, the parietal lobe - near the top of the brain - went to sleep.

People who have suffered damage to this area have difficulty negotiating their way around their surroundings. The sense of a self as separate from your environment could reside in this part of the brain, so now scientists can explain why the sense of self disappears during religious states.

But does the relentless advance of science mean the universe of phenomena that remain inexplicable gets ever smaller and so religion should eventually disappear? Dr Patrick Theillier, the head of the Lourdes Medical Bureau, acknowledges that authentic "miracle" cures seem to be getting markedly fewer in recent years, as what lies outside of scientific explanation appears to ever diminish.

Today, people do not need miracles to inspire faith. In a recent survey of the spiritual beliefs of American scientists, 39 per cent of biologists, physicists and mathematicians said they believed not only in God, but also in a god who answers prayers. The highest rate of belief was found in the field of mathematics, the language of the sciences.

In fact, the most recent attempt to review the link between religion and health found that across 42 studies, involving nearly 126,000 people, highly religious people were found to be almost a third more likely to live longer, for reasons that still remain mysterious. The best scientific theory is that religious and spiritual practices engender positive emotions like hope, and limit negative emotions like hostility, and this has profound long-term hormonal and immune system benefits.

So it would seem that if you follow the latest science, faith is, oddly, still the most pragmatic approach to a long life - but you should only start relying on prayer after you have exhausted what medicine and science have to offer - after all, isn't that what the Church does in Lourdes?

Dr Raj Persaud is a consultant psychiatrist at the Maudsley Hospital in London. His BBC radio documentary The Miracle Men can be heard at http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4

Pretty wierd stuff from scientists, no?

[ 07-16-2005, 03:10 PM: Message edited by: Bob Cleek ]

[Keith Wilson]

On further consideration, I think I’ve somewhat misunderstood the point of the “intelligent design” advocates. Their fundamental idea is not that God intervenes in the physical world, but that biological science has detected this intervention. (They are very careful not to use theological language, of course, mainly to get around first amendment restrictions on advocating religion in public schools, but it’s a fairly transparent stratagem; we all know who their “designer” is supposed to be.)

So the two propositions are these:

God (or at least some supernatural intelligence) has intervened in the development of life on earth, and there is good evidence to demonstrate this intervention.

Or:

While God may possibly intervene in natural processes, we haven’t detected it.

Consider that even in our mundane daily lives we are much affected by “random” events. These are of course often not actually random, but they are the result of long and complex chains of events which as far as we know might as well be random. We can all identify (in retrospect) points at which very small changes would have made an enormous difference. Personally, I came within a hairsbreadth of going to a college 1500 miles from the one in Minnesota I actually attended; one can reasonably conclude that my life would have been very different if I had. Meeting my wife involved a chain of fairly improbable events, a tiny change in any one of which would have made an enormous change in the next 25 years.

Consider that much of evolution also operates by the accumulation of “random” events. There are points at which a miniscule change can completely change future events; thus the “unpredictability” that Sam gets so exercised about. A couple of scenarios from the evolution of just our species:

About three million years ago, an Australopithecus is hunting along the edge of the forest in what is now Uganda. Times are very tough, and the members of his band are near starvation. One of the children of the band is unusually intelligent, and has a mutation for increased brain size. The child with the mutation is your ancestor. There is a deer hiding in the shadows of the forest. The hunter doesn’t see him until the deer twitches slightly; he throws his spear, kills the deer, and all the members of his band survive until the next rainy season. . . . Or the deer doesn’t move, and some of the band of Australopithecus starve, including the child.

About 500,000 years ago, a band of Homo Erectus is moving up a mountain pass in what is now is now Western China. It’s cold and starting to snow, and the pass is difficult. The leaders are trying to decide whether to continue or turn back. Food has been getting scarce in the valley behind them, and the weather has been getting worse for a couple of years, but they aren’t sure what’s ahead. They perform a divination ritual using the shoulder bone of a rabbit. It falls upright, they decide the signs are favorable, and continue over the pass. After some months they descend onto the central plains of China, the first humans to ever get there. . . . Or, the rabbit bone falls upside down, and they turn back. The weather continues to get colder over the following years and centuries, and the passes are closed even in summer. Humans don’t reach central China for a very long time.

About 90 million years ago, a tiny shrew-like creature is hiding under some foliage, trying to avoid the notice of a small predatory dinosaur. That animal hiding under the leaves is your ancestor. The dinosaur is hungry and searches carefully, scanning the underbrush for signs of prey. As its eyes pass over the hiding place of the mammal, in the pattern-recognition circuits of its brain, the concentration of acetylcholine is slightly low at one synapse on one neuron, and it does not fire properly. The dinosaur doesn’t see its prey. . . . Or, the neuron fires, the dinosaur sees and eats the mammal.

A very large number of times throughout the history of life on earth, a DNA molecule has unzipped and with the help of enzymes, assembled nucleotides to replicate itself. As the individual parts assemble, sometimes it doesn’t go quite right. A base will get out of place, will shift one letter over in the code, or there will be some other transcription error. What causes this? In any individual case, we have no idea. Perhaps very subtle changes in the behavior of the individual electrons in the bases, maybe a high-energy photon striking at random, a physical displacement of the DNA chain, magnetic fields? Who knows? Still, things go wrong. Precisely how they go wrong in any individual case is entirely unpredictable (at least by us), but it is responsible for all of the current diversity of life on earth.

The point of the stories is this: There are innumerable ways for God to intervene effectively in the process of evolution. Slightly changing the behavior of one electron at precisely the right moment would in many cases be enough. Only the very grossest interventions would be detectable as anything other than the operation of natural processes, “random chance” if you will. The “intelligent design” advocates would have us believe that because of the existence of things was can’t yet explain, structures that are supposedly “irreducibly complex”, they have found evidence that proves exactly such an intervention. The dispute is not fundamentally about the flaws in Darwin or in current evolutionary theory. There are certainly flaws; every scientific theory is subject to revision as new information is discovered, and nothing made by human beings is perfect. The dispute is abut whether or not we have found good physical evidence of a creator, and whether the scientific evidence shows that we must believe.

[ 07-18-2005, 09:51 AM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[George.]

Originally posted by Bob Cleek:
If you place yourself in a place with no distractions and no other people, a sensory deprivation chamber being the ultimate example, if you will, and ponder the question, "Am I alone?," I think most folks will end up convinced there is someone or something beyond it all ...That may be true. And of course, that would be a very comforting thought for a member of a social species feeling vulnerable and alone. The "someone" is invariably a fatherly, caring someone, not unlike childhood memories of our actual protective fathers.

In other words, the fact that the mind creates such security blankets when stressed, using elements from actual experience, no more proves the existence of "someone" than the fact that most people engage in petty superstitions during anxious or uncertain times.

As for Lourdes: you list a number of "miracles," stretching back to 1950. All in all, less than one a year, on average. You also mention that six million people a year go there, many of whom presumably are praying for a miracle (BTW, I have been there). Question: how many apparently unexplainable cures occur in a population of six million people who do NOT go to Lourdes? Who are not even Christians?
;)
Unless you have a control group showing that such events occur exclusively in the context of Christian beliefs and practices, all you have shown is that a tiny percentage of those who seem incurably ill get better - attributable to any number of causes, from misdiagnosys to psychosomatic illness to physiological processes that medicine does not yet understand.

[Meerkat]

"An almost infinite number of times throughout the history of life on earth"

Almost infinite eh? How big a number is that? ;) :D

[Keith Wilson]

Humongous. Maybe even a gazillion. ;)

(I edited it out; yer right, it sounded stupid)

[ 07-17-2005, 06:54 PM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[P.I. Stazzer-Newt]

One, Two, Many.
Depends on the society.

[TomF]

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
The “intelligent design” advocates would have us believe that because of the existence of things was can’t yet explain, structures that are supposedly “irreducibly complex”, they have found evidence that proves exactly such an intervention. .... The dispute is abut whether or not we have found good physical evidence of a creator, and whether the scientific evidence shows that we must believe.Yes Keith, I think the ID claim ultimately attempts to do an end-run around the usual burden of proof within science.

As you've noted repeatedly, ID allows no way for the theory to be disproven. Or if there is such a way acceptable to the ID community, Sam has resolutely not identified it. Instead, the burden of proof has shifted.

A non-falsifiable theory is not a theory. It is a religious belief. In my view, religious belief (depending on the belief) is freqently a good thing ... but only when it's owned honestly.

[Bill Perkins]

Amen George ; Amen ! I think it's futile to oppose superstition with reason though ,you can never win the argument .What we need are legal safeguards to prevent the faithful from altering the contents of our textbooks .

[Meerkat]

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Humongous. Maybe even a gazillion. ;)

(I edited it out; yer right, it sounded stupid)I actually thought it was kind of cool... ;)

BTW, review your edit... &gt;grin&lt;

[Bob Cleek]

George, the "miracles" that were listed in my post were only the recent ones which were confirmed as "scientifically inexplicable" by some 250 scientists on the French commission that reviewed them. There were some seven thousand reported during the same time. All but sixty-six were discounted because of possible explanations such as you cite. I'm no scientist, but the "officially certified" cures are only the ones none of the scientists can explain at all. Odd stuff.

[Con LanAdo]

wow, another fine thread you got me in. Before i save this one, does anyone have a link to all the Saints?
About the demise of the CC, it's interesting to note that in Irland just a generation ago the believers were 99% while today it's down to 73% while the Potterist & other such ist's have risen to the height of an elf - roughly 43% of believers.
As much as i banter about with nothingness i'm probably with Mr. Cleek as i like to sometimes hedge my bets & feel good.

[Paul G]

Religion should be practiced at home a bit like masturbation i.e privately. No one should really know about it unless they are friendly and like to join in the fun. In this time honoured way a person could experience a brief moment of divinity, get to know themselves a little better and keep away from the rest of humanity who , quite frankly have the total s**ts with religious nuts.

The good cardinal is a good chap, he tows the party line and probably doest fiddle with children unlike the rest of the cloistered freakshow who are no doubt adept at the aforementioned art of self gratifaction. Occasionally the church coughs up a real saint and even more rarely an inspired mystic, but lets face it there aint gonna be a second coming, and the closest thing to intelligent design in the church is the collection plate. The church is out of date, out of step with most of the free thinking world and possible the most dangerous collection of screwed up eyewateringly sycophantic sexually suppressed lobster brained paedophiles out there.

Exactly where in the bible does it say anything that cant be interpreted ambiguously. How much is allegory? It simply a collection of hand me down stories by a few wild desert tribes that some bananaheads still think are relevant to todays world. Occasionally they turn up on their bicycles trying to save me, Intelligent design? not freaking snowballs chance in a deckchair on the pacific princess crossing the equator.

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Bob Cleek:
...the "officially certified" cures are only the ones none of the scientists can explain at all. Odd stuff.Good posting about contemporary miracles Bob.
I've seen the X-rays of Mr. Vittorio Micheli - before and after. There was nothing subtle about it and you didn't need a doctor's training to see that his hip had been eaten away entirely - There was no way he could walk because the leg attached to nothing. Mr. Micheli did not imagine his condition.
Afterwards the bone was completely restored. Simply Amazing!

It's one of the many times that such miracles were confirmed by observation, but that followers of pseudo-scientific Darwinian philosophy refuse to acknowledge.

[Ian McColgin]

Unexplained healings, miracles to some, occur in contemporary times in all nations. I'm not aware of any faith where unexplained healings have not occured. They have also occured when the patient espoused no faith, before or after.

So?

Anyone present during an unexplained healing, or chanting or praying or whatever, can either claim personal credit or credit on behalf of some greater power. Those claims do not establish that the person or power was the agency.

Nor do healings or other miracles have anything to do with the theories of evolution.

[George.]

Originally posted by Bob Cleek:
...the "officially certified" cures are only the ones none of the scientists can explain at all. Odd stuff.Bob, I agree that it is “odd stuff,” and quite possibly evidence that “there is more between heaven and earth…”

Where I disagree is when people use “miracles” (by the way, I am still waiting for a definition) to say that “therefore God exists and is exactly as my church says he is.” For instance, in the post above this one, Sam tries to imply that the Lourdes miracles are proof that Darwin was wrong. :rolleyes: Unless someone can show that miracles only benefit Catholics, or Baptists, or Shias, or whatever, such claims are worthless as validation of any religion.

And what I find further objectionable is that there is a god that has the power to heal the sick, but only bothers if people “pray” to him – sometimes, third parties, whose personal faith or worth is unrelated to the one being healed. What a petty egotist such a god would be!

[Sam F]

Originally posted by TomF:
Sam, Socrates is a red herring in our little sub-discussion. He was never hailed as a miracle worker, and never claimed to be divine. Our talk is about miracles. Tom you’re not that dense. Our talk is about Jesus. Why do you think I’ve been quoting his words? And the point isn’t Socrates – it’s the Resurrection.
“Who else performed that particular miracle? That is to say – resurrection?”
Who else? Which of the 40+ claimed, as Jesus did, to be God’s son? And backed it up by coming back to life after his execution? Did these fellows resurrect themselves a Jesus did?
I asked for names. I want documentation. Tell me about the clouds of witnesses surrounding these acts.
The one example you provided so far didn't fit the bill you know.


Originally posted by TomF:
... Presumably there were other, small-time healers and seers who maintained a local reputation. My great-grandmother was a small-time healer with quite a local reputation. Her “gift” was only transferable from parent to a child of the opposite sex and as her son wasn’t interested, it died with her. But no one (especially not her) would claim divine status.
That makes all the difference in the world.


Originally posted by TomF:
So no. I don't stake my Christian faith on whether 1st century Christians believed in his miracles, or whether anybody else also had similarly taut wonder-working credentials. So you accept the witness of Judas.


Originally posted by TomF:
...something other than simply the reputation for breaking physical laws was at the core of Christianity's spreadThe reason Christianity spread was the promise of eternal life with Jesus as the first born in the new covenant. And why did the first Christians believe that? Because they observed it happen.
You’d have us believe that these people were crucified, tortured and scapegoated for all and sundry problems in the Empire and they put up with if so that they could advance social programs? I don’t think so!
But you never answered the questions:

So Tom, do you expect eternal life? If so, why?
If not, why bother?

[Ian McColgin]

Are we at the point of using Jesus's putative resurrection as evidence for intelligent design?

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Ian McColgin:
Nor do healings or other miracles have anything to do with the theories of evolution. Missed the point?
Here it is: Darwinism is a philosophy. That philosophy is Scientific Materialism.
Keith has put it nicely when he said:

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
ALL of science... deals with the physical world, determining truth through observation and experiment. It takes no position on supernatural causes because these by definition are not part of the physical world, and cannot be observed or experimented with. (emphasis added)

If Scientific Materialism (which is the core of Darwinism) turns out to be untrue, then one can draw the appropriate conclusions about Darwin.
Of course I must add that that science “takes no position on supernatural causes” is, in the face of abundant evidence, false - unless Keith’s (and others’) vehement opposition to any non-materialist explanation is somehow not having a position. ;)

Incidentally, Mr. Cleek picked Lourdes because the results have been scientifically examined, which is something you cannot say for some bush miracle in the Congo or Bhutan. You should understand - it’s a Catholic thing – the Church likes to have miracles scientifically verified, rather than taking them on faith. That’s obviously something not required (or welcomed) by your run-of-the-mill faith healer.

It turns out that the evidence from Lourdes utterly refutes Keith’s philosophical materialism. As with my Love and Evil examples, we have clear observations of something non-material having verifiable physical effects. That could not possibly happen “if supernatural causes ... are not part of the physical world, and cannot be observed”
Well, the effects can be observed. In fact, Keith’s accurate condensation of Scientific Materialism is one of those propositions that no sane person would actually believe and act on for 5 minutes in his personal life. :D

[George.]

Originally posted by Sam F:
Tell me about the clouds of witnesses surrounding these acts.
It is interesting to note that not even the New Testament's authors claim there were "clouds of witnesses" to the ressurection of Jesus. Only the apostles and Mary Magdalene, if I recall.

Why would that be? Why would Jesus not appear in downtown Jerusalem, to be seen by disinterested witnesses? ;)

BTW, Sam, are you going to answer Keith's question? I think you owe him and all of us an answer, since you persist in using the very points he questions in your own argument.

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Ian McColgin:
Are we at the point of using Jesus' putative resurrection as evidence for intelligent design?The topic is Catholic Church Backsliding into Obscurancy, not Intelligent Design. While ID among other things has come up, it and the Resurrection are not directly related.
Of course if Jesus is what he claimed and if in fact he did come back to life, it makes the whole Darwinist enterprise nonsensical - but it's that anyway and doesn't require a messiah to point it out.
Nor does it require divine revelation to point out the original topic is faulty in its conception. The Church isn’t backsliding into anything since it was documented here on this Forum (before Benedict’s election) that John Paul II took the same position – though one that was widely misinterpreted by S.J. Gould among others. Check the archives and check the dates if you doubt it.

Edited to add the following which was posted on 12-03-2004 03:58 PM

Originally posted by Sam F:
...(I’ve put some bits in bold so you can be outraged without having to read the whole thing) ;) :

The Pope and Evolution

George Sim Johnston

In October Pope John Paul II delivered a message to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences regarding the theory of evolution. The document touched on a number of important issues—scriptural, epistemological, and scientific—which are of supreme importance to Catholics. Inevitably, it was the least newsworthy item in the Pope’s message—that the Church has no problem with evolution so long as divine causality is not excluded—which produced screaming headlines around the world. "Pope Vindicates Darwin!"

The Pope, in fact, did no such thing. The New York Times and other conduits of misinformation about the Church made the usual mistake of equating "evolution" with Darwin’s explanation of evolution. Darwin did not discover evolution; he simply proposed a mechanism—gradual change via natural selection—which made materialistic evolution seem plausible. The mechanism was, and is, highly problematic. Many paleontologists and biologists, while calling themselves evolutionists, assert that Darwinian selection cannot explain the big, complicated jumps between life forms, starting with the Cambrian explosion 550 million years ago. A recent example is Reinventing Darwin (read: Retiring Darwin) by Niles Eldredge, chief paleontologist at the American Museum of Natural History.

The Pope is aware of this controversy among evolutionists, writing that "rather than speaking about the theory of evolution, it is more accurate to speak of the theories of evolution. The use of the plural is required here … because of the diversity of explanations regarding the mechanism of evolution." And he goes on to reject the essence of Darwinism: "[T]heories of evolution which, because of the philosophies which inspire them, regard the spirit either as emerging from the forces of living matter, or as a simple epiphenomenon of that matter, are incompatible with the truth about man."

So the Pope objects to philosophical materialism masquerading as science, which is what we find in books by Darwinists. Pop scientists like Richard Dawkins and Carl Sagan start with a philosophical premise: there is no God. This allows them to embrace a teleological taboo which makes Darwin a winner by default. But their explanation of how the bacteria which appeared billions of years ago produced the incredible diversity of life we see today relies more on hidden postulates than empirical evidence. Darwinism in their hands really amounts to a counter-metaphysics planted like a foreign body in the heart of biology.

The Pope would have clarified matters greatly if he had repeated the observation of Catholic thinkers like Gilson that the real debate is not over evolution per se, but teleology. Either life forms came about by blind chance or they did not. Darwin’s theory is the only one available which purports to explain how Homo sapiens and other species are exclusively the result of natural forces. There are no other theories available which do not smack of vitalism, than which there is no dirtier word in the lexicon of Darwinists.

Evolution actually has an ancient Catholic pedigree. St. Augustine was an evolutionist, although hardly a Darwinist. In his second commentary on Genesis, he surmised that God had planted "rational seeds" in nature which had fructified in due course. This is evolution in the strict etymological sense of the word, an unfolding of what is already there, like an acorn turning into an oak. At the time of the Scopes trail, Chesterton remarked that Catholics were not at all involved in a battle which set biblical and scientific fundamentalists against one another. As usual, there was a reasonable Catholic center which allowed both science and theology their due competence.

It makes no difference whether man is descended biologically from some ape-like creature, so long as we understand that there had to be what the Pope calls an "ontological leap" to the first human person. This would have involved the direct intervention of God, who creates each rational soul out of nothing. Even the scanty paleontological evidence supports the scenario of man’s sudden emergence. Homo sapiens, fully equipped with art, language and tool-making capabilities, appears with dramatic rapidity in the fossil record. There is no evidence of an ape trying to draw reindeer in the caves of south France or fashion a flute in the manner of the Neanderthals, who were certainly part of the human family.

The confusion over evolution among Christians boils down to the question of how to read the creation account in Genesis. Here the Pope simply reiterates what the Magisterium has argued tirelessly since Leo XIII’s Providentissimus Deus. Scripture does not teach science, period. Genesis tells us what happened in the archaic, pre-scientific idiom of the ancient Hebrews. It does not tell us how it happened. We can learn what we can about that "how" from science, always keeping in mind that there can be no real conflict between two very different orders of knowledge: science and theology.

[ 07-18-2005, 10:51 AM: Message edited by: Sam F ]

[George.]

Originally posted by Sam F:
The Church isn’t backsliding into anything since it was documented here on this Forum (before Benedict’s election) that John Paul II took the same position... This BS has already been dealt with:


Originally posted by George.:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> Consider the real teaching of our beloved John Paul. While his rather vague and unimportant 1996 letter about evolution is always and everywhere cited, we see no one discussing these comments from a 1985 general audience that represents his robust teaching on nature. This is absurd. If JPII's 1996 letter was "vague and unimportant," and yet it ended up being "everywhere cited" and misinterpreted (if you believe Schonborn), then JPII himself would have come out and said so.

But he didn't. He was happy to let people cite it for a decade as proof that the Catholic Church accepts the theory of evolution by natural selection - it was all over the press, all over the world. He never once contradicted this or denied that that is what he meant. And Schonborn had to wait till John Paul II was dead before he could come out and tell us that the former pope never really meant what he said. ;) </font>[/QUOTE]

[Keith Wilson]

Darwinism is a philosophy. That philosophy is Scientific Materialism.This is COMPLETELY FALSE. Yes, Scientific Materialism is a philosophy. Some people have used evolutionary theory (incorrectly, IMHO) as an argument for that philosophy. Darwinism is a description of one aspect of the physical world: how life developed on earth, what happened and how it happened.

Sam, answer the questions, please.
Are there any methods other than observation and experiment that give us reliable information about the physical world?

If so, what are they?

What evidence would disprove the “intelligent design” hypothesis, that “the designer did it”?


About Lourdes: I don’t doubt that lots of people have been healed. The body’s mechanisms for healing itself, and their connection with the mind, are very poorly understood. For an example, consider that all drugs have to be tested against placebos because placebos work so well, and we have no idea why. I don’t doubt that in some cases, a trip to Lourdes would be very beneficial indeed. Is it a miracle? I don’t know.

[ 07-18-2005, 10:10 AM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[George.]

Since Sam objects to the title of this thread, I changed it to something that better reflects the state of the current discussion... smile.gif

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Darwinism is a philosophy. That philosophy is Scientific Materialism.This is COMPLETELY FALSE. </font>[/QUOTE]...and...

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Yes, Scientific Materialism is a philosophy. If...
Materialism is the philosophical view that the only thing that can truly be said to 'exist' is matter; that fundamentally, all things are comprised of 'material'...(from Wikepedia)
... then my statement can’t be “completely false”, can it? Or are you now postulating a non-material aspect of Darwinism?
Really Keith, don’t get so carried away with your own rhetoric! smile.gif


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Darwinism is a description of one aspect of the physical world: how life developed on earth, what happened and how it happened. But Keith, we’ve already demonstrated that isn’t so. Darwinism cannot, by your own admission, describe “how it happened” – or have you come up with an explanation of how the first reproducing organism arose since last Friday?
Darwinism doesn’t even do a good job of explaining “what happened” either - but that’s for another post...
This statement “what happened and how it happened “ is becoming a mantra for you, but unless you’re really aim for transcendence via meditation, I’d suggest something less nonsensical.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Sam, answer the questions, please. Keith they’ve been answered:


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Are there any methods other than observation and experiment that give us reliable information about the physical world?
If so, what are they?
Originally posted by Sam F:
Keith there’s noting whatsoever wrong with that statement but realize that it beautifully illustrates the tendency to reduce reality to the methods used to discover it

You say that observation and experiment are the only things that give reliable information about the physical world. And that’s true in a sense, but it has limitations imposed by methodological materialism.
Let me give you an example: Do you love your wife? Let’s assume for the moment the answer is “Yes” (and I hope it’s true). Can you use observation and experiment to confirm that truth? I doubt it. But in defense, you can rightly say that Love is not part of the physical world and thus not part of the limiting reduction of reality to the physical world. True enough. But Love has decided effects in the physical world and you can determine it experimentally. Try this: Tell you wife that the answer to her question “Do you Love me?” is “No” and you’ll see some very impressive physical effects! Not bad for something that, according to your reductionist world-view, doesn’t exist Your question is entirely too limited to encompass observed reality. Now, I’m obviously agreeing with the “observation” part of your statement, but observation is a fairly flexible term... But how does one experimentally verify something like Evil? How is it possible to go about “determining truth through observation and experiment” of the existence of Evil? You tell me. If you can’t determine that truth by experiment, is it false? Does Evil not exist?
Answer the question Keith.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
What evidence would disprove the “intelligent design” hypothesis, that “the designer did it”?
Originally posted by Sam F:
Just providing a plausible Darwinian pathway to account for the Evolution of Irreducible structures would go a long way toward disproving that hypothesis – and that doesn’t even require hard evidence. That still leaves the problem of chemical “evolution” to get to the starting point for life. Both of those are, at present, insurmountable problems. Come on Keith – I’m not even demanding hard evidence. Here’s your chance to refute Intelligent Design. (Well really more than a second chance since you’ve ignored this for some time.)
Now we both know that you can’t provide plausible Darwinian pathways for either Irreducibly Complex structures or for the chemical evolution of the first reproducing organism – no one has.
Why not just concede the point and be done with it?
That no one has come up with a plausible materialist explanation is not a priori evidence that the contrary is “faith-based” belief. Rather it is evidence of a Darwinism philosophy unable to answer the most basic scientific questions.
Why is it that Darwinists always dodge this point? Why is it that asking hard questions of Darwin’s theory is “unscientific”?
I thought science was supposed to be all about asking questions and looking for answers.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Are there any methods other than observation and experiment that give us reliable information about the physical world? You tell me Keith. Evil and Love both exist – or do you deny that?
If they do exist – how do you know it?
Answer please.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
About Lourdes: I don’t doubt that lots of people have been healed. The body’s mechanisms for healing itself, and their connection with the mind, are very poorly understood. More Science in the Gaps? Golly will those Gaps ever stop being used as excuses?

[Sam F]

Under the heading of Darwinism’s inadequacy in explaining “what happened”...

Originally posted by Sam F:
Your memory of my critique [from the Darwin thread] is curiously vague . . . .
Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Your critique was completely incoherent. Fossils were shown at various stages in time. At every stage, the range of variation in the individuals was wide enough that so that it partially overlapped the range of variation of the previous stage. Thus, at every stage, individuals could be found that were identical to those from the previous and subsequent stages. Therefore the fossil sequence shows continuous variation, whether or not you choose to believe it. Where is that Fundamentalist you’re directing your ire at? Not any around that I can see!

Where did I ever deny variation? My problem is that Darwin’s explanation doesn’t fit observed reality. And here’s where your memory fails you:
Please explain how the following from the Darwin thread is incoherent:


Originally posted by Sam F:
You know very well that if Darwin is correct, the fossil record for forams must show an unbroken and almost imperceptible change – as a time lapse film – of transformation of one organism into another. While the foram sequence is pretty good illustration of Punctuated Equilibrium or saltationism(!), it does most emphatically not prove Darwin’s mechanism of Evolution.

The sequence takes place over 6 1/2 million years but leaves out a ton of information.
Assuming an average spacing of .65 million years – we can’t say for sure what that spacing is - there should have been ample evidence that’s left out.
Since the fossil resolution is far greater than the period indicated, it should have been possible to show a complete morphing from one organism to another. That was not done. Why not?
How does that series demonstrate Darwinian Natural Selection? The how is not readily obvious. Merely providing a series like that is, of itself, unremarkable. I could go to any mountain creek hereabouts and pick out 10 rocks and show how one original form evolves into another. It would be valid too, which is not the necessarily case for that photo. Why? Because no forams were named, nor is an age distribution for each organism provided, it is impossible to check the validity of that photograph...

Actually the foram photo shows 10 separate species and does so in the old-fashioned stereotypical “progression” fashion. (The up-to-date way would be to illustrate a clade or otherwise depict “bushiness”.) To actually demonstrate gradualist Evolution would require a series of photos that clearly show that chronologically ordered organisms were almost indistinguishable from one another but showed incremental change over a many more specimens.

Now you haven’t addressed the central issue here. We know that the fossil resolution is far better than “ten million” years. IIRC, Darwin postulated a 300 million year gap between the Cretaceous and the Tertiary because he knew there wasn’t time enough for his gradualist view of speciation to have accomplished the changes observed across the K/T boundary. But it is now proved that no such gap existed. That hurts the “predictive power” of Evolutionary theory in a very bad, though tacitly ignored, way.
Since the resolution is in some cases only a few hundred years – as it is for early Tertiary forams, the evidence, one way or the other, must be available and it should be possible to prove it via “close observation.”
If that has been accomplished the evidence has not been presented here.

[George.]

No, Sam, you still have not answered Keith's questions:


Originally posted by Sam F:
Let me give you an example: Do you love your wife? Let’s assume for the moment the answer is “Yes” (and I hope it’s true). Can you use observation and experiment to confirm that truth? I doubt it. Let us concede that the emotion of love is part of the physical world. The real question is how can we the outside observers determine whether Keith loves his wife. How can we, other than through observation and experiment? Answer: no other way.

As for Keith himself, he may conclude that he loves his wife based on what he feels in her presence, or about her. And those feelings are something that he observes in himself - a fluttering heart, an urge to protect, a desire for closeness. He might even carry out an experiment, and spend some time apart from her to observe how he feels - such advice is often given to troubled couples who want to see if they still love one another. ;)

And outsiders could also determine whether most of these feelings exist within Keith, through observation and experiment.



Originally posted by Sam F:
But how does one experimentally verify something like Evil? How is it possible to go about “determining truth through observation and experiment” of the existence of Evil? You tell me. If you can’t determine that truth by experiment, is it false? Does Evil not exist? Define "evil." Then we can answer the question. If you mean "harm caused to others," it both exists and can be observed. If you mean the vague concept that fire-and-brimstone preachers use to scare their flocks into submission, it does not exist. If you mean something else, then define it.


Originally posted by Sam F:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
What evidence would disprove the “intelligent design” hypothesis, that “the designer did it”? Just providing a plausible Darwinian pathway to account for the Evolution of Irreducible structures would go a long way toward disproving that hypothesis ... That still leaves the problem of chemical “evolution” to get to the starting point for life. </font>[/QUOTE]A cheap intellectual trick. Instead of stating what evidence would disprove your pet "theory," you twist into demanding further proof of a competing theory - and then you go on to say that even that proof would not be enough!

Even if "Darwinism" were false, that still proves nothing about ID. Keith is asking you to state what evidence could disprove ID, not what evidence could prove natural selection.

[ 07-18-2005, 12:08 PM: Message edited by: George. ]

[Ian McColgin]

I thought the title term "obscurancy" was spot on the actual topic. The Roman Catholic Church appears to be making its stand against knowledge.

And against recognizing any knowledge of the different dimensions of knowledge.

Humans have knowledge of good and evil. Some need more knowledge. Moral knowledge is not the same as physical knowledge. Moral knowledge is not even the same as spiritual knowledge or aesthetic knowledge or political knowledge. Et cetera. There are overlaps of course and some may indulge themselves, with proofs neither pro nor con, in a sort of graduated ontology of knowledge with some orders being more important or more primordial or more true than others.

No matter how you order or consider the many dimensions of knowledge, there is nothing good or evil in gravitation or electricity or the evolution of the species. There is nothing in the physics of a cloud that establishes the wisdom of God.

At sea, in the mountains, most everywhere in the world, I have experienced physical events - storms, avalanches, sunrises, assisting a mare in foal - that certainly provided me the physical location of experiences of terror, exhalation, awe and all leading to the universal. The physical events themselves contain neither good nor evil. It's my incarnate consciousness, the imago if you will, that gives a vehicle for moral, spiritual and other utterly trans-physical dimensions of human experience.

Like most historical events or inventions, Jesus' resurrection was not a repeatable scientific experiment. Good and evil are not empirical aspects of Brownian motion. There is no moral or divine interest in two plus two equaling four in natural number arithmetic.

It is important to have various orders of knowledge correctly synched, as it were, with each other. The science we used to call moral philosophy cannot proceed on an economic assumption that India's cornfields will average 8,000 bushels per acre harvest next year.

Intelligent design is not a theory of natural science any more than the Apostle's Creed is a physics text. This is why none of the proto-neo-quasi-creationists can answer the question, "What would disprove ID?"

Maybe if God dropped off a tablet saying, "I didn't do it . . ."

The Roman Catholic Church now misrepresents historical facts such as what the last Pope actually wrote about evolutionary science. The Roman Catholic Church misrepresents physical facts such as the efficacy of condoms. The Roman Catholic Church conflates its supernatural doctrines with theories and findings in natural science. In these ways, the Roman Catholic Church is taking its stand foresquarely against all that's best in humanity and all that's liberating in divinity.

[Osborne Russel]

Originally posted by Sam F:
The reason Christianity spread was the promise of eternal life with Jesus as the first born in the new covenant. And why did the first Christians believe that? Because they observed it happen.How do you observe eternity?

[Keith Wilson]

Or have you come up with an explanation of how the first reproducing organism arose since last Friday?Darwinian evolution, as you know very well, does not attempt to explain how life began on earth. It also does not attempt to explain why you keep bringing up this irrelevant point as if it were a shortcoming of evolutionary theory.

You have NOT answered the questions. You have dodged around them, avoided them, asked me questions instead, but you have not answered them.

Sam, answer the questions, please.
Are there any methods other than observation and experiment that give us reliable information about the physical world?

If so, what are they?

What evidence would disprove the “intelligent design” hypothesis, that “the designer did it”?

[Bob Cleek]

Osborne, maybe you are observing it now! This thread is on its way to being eternal, it seems. LOL

[P.I. Stazzer-Newt]

You will be relieved to know I have long been of the opinion that speeches do not have to be endless to be eternal.

[George.]

Originally posted by Bob Cleek:
This thread is on its way to being eternal, it seems. Nah. Once it gets to 8 or 10 pages, we'll let it sink and start a new abortion thread... ;)

[Dennis M]

Ian said:

I thought the title term "obscurancy" was spot on the actual topic. The Roman Catholic Church appears to be making its stand against knowledge.

And against recognizing any knowledge of the different dimensions of knowledge.
The Roman Catholic Church now misrepresents historical facts such as what the last Pope actually wrote about evolutionary science. The Roman Catholic Church misrepresents physical facts such as the efficacy of condoms. The Roman Catholic Church conflates its supernatural doctrines with theories and findings in natural science. In these ways, the Roman Catholic Church is taking its stand foresquarely against all that's best in humanity and all that's liberating in divinity Ian, surely you were kidding when you said this.

The Church's position against evolutionary doctrine can be summed up quite easily: To the degree that folks accept/promote evolutionary theory as a totalizing worldview that explains the meaning of the world is the degree to which the Church will reject such a teaching as being contrary to both faith and reason. How simple can it get? Cardinal Schoenborn’s comments do not change this. In fact, when I saw Georgedot’s cry of outrage, I could not believe that he was rallying the usual suspects around a non-starter of a topic. Indeed, the Cardinal’s comments would only be a threat to those who bear allegiance to the materialist worldview.

Evolution is not a sufficient explanation for existence. Although it may illuminate certain mechanisms by which life came to be, it of itself is not the source or origin of life in the absolute sense (as the scientific materialists would have it). Further, science cannot offer an adequate explanation of life's meaning and purpose either. There is much that lies outside of the scientific field that is inaccessible to that form of knowing. Sam has demonstrated this quite well, although many can’t seem to grasp his point. If any of you have ever read Dicken's "Hard Times" and remember the section about Gradgrind and his "School of Facts," then you can relate to why science as the “only form of knowledge” is limited.

In this respect, the Catholic Church's teaching does more to preserve the orders of knowing (faith being a form of knowing)[see the encyclical "Fides et Ratio"] and the integrity of reason and science. "Gratia Perfecit Naturam" (grace perfects nature) is its motto, so to speak. And the Catholic Church does not abolish nature and focus solely on grace and so flee into angelism, or ignore grace and focus on nature ending up in a type of philosophical naturalism. No, it has the very difficult obligation and responsibility to understand nature in light of grace and therefore must give each order its proper due. For the Catholic Church, all of reality must be taken into consideration, not just a part.

This is not true for many whose motto seems to be “sola natura”. Such already argue from the standpoint that there is no God, that all is nature. But oddly enough, once one admits that all is nature, then even nature itself becomes malleable, a servant (really slave) in the hands of creatures endowed with reason. If nature is all there is, and nature has no reference to a divine origin and source, then why not permit artificial birth control and abortion? Why not redefine “sex” to include homosexuality as “normal”? (Shoot, let’s go for broke and redefine “is”! tongue.gif ) Heck, isn’t this the “best in humanity”? But what seems to grate many here is that the Church calls such positions irresponsible and so implicates many who hold on to them. It – the Church-- is a threat, not to right thinking folk, but to those ideologues who want to define God and nature according to biology, psychology, sociology, politics -- i.e., science.

[George.]

Originally posted by Dennis M:
... the degree that folks accept/promote evolutionary theory as a totalizing worldview that explains the meaning of the world is the degree to which the Church will reject such a teaching...
Agreed. Anyone who thinks that the theory of evolution "explains the meaning of the world" is deluded. And anyone who thinks that proponents of the theory of evolution are trying to say that it does is equally deluded.


...when I saw Georgedot’s cry of outrage, I could not believe that he was rallying the usual suspects around a non-starter of a topic. Indeed, the Cardinal’s comments would only be a threat to those who bear allegiance to the materialist worldview.
That is not so, Dennis. Cardinal Schonborn specifically claims that evolution by natural selection is not true, and goes on to defend "intelligent design," using talking points straight from the Discovery Institute's website.

Thus, his comments are a threat to the unbiased and objective teaching of science. A "materialistic worldview" has nothing to do with it.

In fact, here (http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/13/national/13pope.html) is an article about two Roman Catholic biologists who are concerned about what Schonborn said - concerned enough to have asked the Pope to clarify the Church's position, and to say:


"that scientific rationality and the church's commitment to divine purpose and meaning in the universe were not incompatible." It is crucial, their letter says, "that in these difficult and contentious times the Catholic Church not build a new divide, long ago eradicated, between the scientific method and religious belief."
One of them is Dr. Francisco J. Ayala of the University of California, Irvine, a former Dominican priest, and the other is Kenneth R. Miller of Brown University, a Roman Catholic who has written on the reconciliation of science and faith. Hardly people who "bear allegiance to the materialist worldview."



It – the Church-- is a threat, not to right thinking folk, but to those ideologues who want to define God and nature according to biology, psychology, sociology, politics -- i.e., science."...politics, i.e., science." Give me a break, Dennis! Politics is science? It would make much more sense to say: religion, i.e., politics. And I would like to see science untainted by either.

[Sam F]

It has become inordinately difficult even to begin to think about
constructing a naturalistic theory of the evolution of that first
reproducing organism(Anthony Flew)


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Or have you come up with an explanation of how the first reproducing organism arose since last Friday?Darwinian evolution, as you know very well, does not attempt to explain how life began on earth. It also does not attempt to explain why you keep bringing up this irrelevant point as if it were a shortcoming of evolutionary theory. </font>[/QUOTE]It works like this... start with some creature which evolved from some ancestor which evolved from some other ancestor and so on back to the primordial ooze. All of that is a result of “an unsupervised, impersonal, unpredictable and natural process”. That’s taught as fact in our schools and when we get back to the first reproducing organism, now you suddenly say: “STOP! Go no further! That’s irrelevant!”
Why is that Keith? Why should I stop? Isn't it the characteristic of a petrified orthodoxy to stifle discomforting questions? (That's petrified in both senses of the word ;) )
Ironically, you’ve only recently changed your tune on that and only when forced to it by an argument you can’t refute.
Let me remind you that you didn’t think it irrelevant when you said:

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
... it seems unlikely that a "functional DNA molecule” could form by what you call "random chance", just stirring chemicals together (and if you dare quote this sentence without what follows it would be conscious lying). However, IMO this is not evidence for supernatural intervention. It does indicate that we probably got to DNA by a pathway other than random combinations of chemicals, a pathway that involved simpler self-reproducing structures which could use the multi-step filtering process to select for more efficient forms. There were lot of molecules on earth, and a lot of time. I don't think it's at all unlikely that such a beginning could have happened purely thorough natural processes. “A pathway other than random combinations of chemicals, a pathway that involved simpler self-reproducing structures”? And what is it that you’re describing there?
An unsupervised, impersonal, unpredictable and natural process - in other words; an evolutionary process. Isn’t that correct?
So which is it Keith? When we get to the origin of the first reproducing organism is it Stop or Go? You’ve said both - That it is “Go” for evolutionary process and “Stop” because it’s irrelevant to evolution. Please make up your mind. Which is it?


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
You have NOT answered the questions. You have dodged around them, avoided them, asked me questions instead, but you have not answered them. Keith, you have all the answer you’re going to get unless you reply to my questions.
I’ve stated that your view is much too narrow and shown why. In “response”, you have not even acknowledged the proof nor answered some very obvious questions.
That’s not a very mature response Keith. You know that Evil exists and that therefore the methodological materialism inherent in your question fails - but are unwilling to admit publicly that you’re stuck.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
What evidence would disprove the “intelligent design” hypothesis, that “the designer did it”? Don’t expect me to do your work for you! :D
I’ve shown you how to do it. Do it. Or concede.
Or come up with some alternative... but unfortunately a non-darwinian solution isn't going to help your support of Darwin at all.
If Darwin can’t solve the problem, come up with some other explanation for Irreducibly Complex structures – though I can’t imagine how since you’ve stated that Darwin describes “the purely physical world, about what happened and how it happened.” So tell me what happened and how it happened!

[ 07-18-2005, 04:22 PM: Message edited by: Sam F ]

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Dennis M:
For the Catholic Church, all of reality must be taken into consideration, not just a part.
Thus the barque of Peter is piloted between the various shoals and reefs that lie in wait for the destruction of both civilizations and souls... the rocks of Materialism to starboard, the shifting quicksands Relativism to port, the secret whirlpool of Gnosticism left in her wake.

Hated by both Planned Parenthood and Klu Klux Klan, Atheists and New Agers alike... With enemies like that, who needs a better recommendation?
And of course, the Church avoids confusion about what "is" "is". Dennis! ROTFLHMO :D

[ 07-18-2005, 04:20 PM: Message edited by: Sam F ]

[Keith Wilson]

Further, science cannot offer an adequate explanation of life's meaning and purpose either.I completely agree. In fact I’ve written variations on this several times. That is not what science does. Science is not all we need.

Sam, however, has said that Darwinian evolution, the scientific theory about events in the physical world, is equivalent to Scientific Materialism, the philosophy. This is simply incorrect. When the Catholic Church opposes scientific materialism, one may or may not agree, but they are in their legitimate area endeavor and have every right to do so. That is not, however, what Sam is doing.


Don’t expect me to do your work for you!Cute, but a dodge. I am asking for a hypothetical piece of evidence that would disprove the intelligent design hypothesis, that “the designer did it”. This is not about the truth or falsehood of current evolutionary theory, which could certainly be disproved by new discoveries. I gave you one example, (modern human fossils in Ordovician strata) and can easily provide more if you wish. You are dodging. "Intelligent design" protests loudly that it is not religion but science, based firmly on observation and experiment. Any legitimate scientific theory must be able to be tested and possibly proved false. Can “intelligent design” be shown to be false?

Answer the question, please.

What evidence would disprove the “intelligent design” hypothesis, that “the designer did it”?


Evil and love, BTW, are things that people do, ideas for categories of human behavior.

Answer the question, please:

Are there any methods other than observation and experiment that give us reliable information about the physical world?

If so, what are they?


About the origin of life; nobody knows, as I've said way too many times. It's certainly an interesting field for investigation and speculation. It is NOT what Darwinian evolutionary theory is about.

[ 07-18-2005, 05:03 PM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[Sam F]

So silly Keith. If Intelligent Design postulates, as in Ockam’s Razor, that the simplest explanation for a given structure is that it was designed - the way to prove it false is to show how it could have come about through an unsupervised, impersonal, unpredictable and natural process. In other words how it evolved via natural selection.
This would disprove it immediately and is what I’ve said all along. Why you can’t see that is quite beyond any rational explanation.
The fact that you can’t provide such an explanation is not my problem. It’s yours.

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:

Evil and love, BTW, are things that people do, ideas for categories of human behavior.
So you don't believe in Evil do you?
Interesting...

[Dennis M]

George., I only read the first brief quote of Schonborn's at the beginning of the thread. Taken as it was, it was not objectionable. If he in fact has said what you claim, then he ought to be taken to task for unreasonableness. I will read over the links later.

Secondly, any Catholic worth their salt is going to believe that the world was intelligently designed. Sheesh! Fundamental to our creed is belief in God, Father and Creator of the heavens and earth. That is no surprise there.

Keith, I know you have propounded the theme that science cannot account for it all. From my standpoint, you seem to balk at explaining to Sam what other ways of knowing are legitimate. While you allow for "other forms of knowing", your conclusions about their veracity/efficacy tend toward agnosticism/skepticism. This, in my mind, leaves you open to the charge of scientific materialism. Sam pings you on this because it is inconsistent.

[Keith Wilson]

So you don't believe in Evil do you?
Huh? It sure seems real enough. Boatbuilding is also something that people do. One can see the results, just as one can with evil behavior. I don't think "Evil" has an independent existence outside of what people do, any more than boatbuilding does. I certainly believe in boatbuilding, occasionally even evil boatbuilding. (http://www.ncjetski.co.uk/) ;) I don't believe in the devil, if that's what you mean.

[George.]

Originally posted by Sam F:
Thus the barque of Peter is piloted between the various shoals and reefs that lie in wait for the destruction of both civilizations and souls... the rocks of Materialism to starboard, the shifting quicksands Relativism to port, the secret whirlpool of Gnosticism left in her wake.
And the wind of Obscurancy filling her Dogmatic topsails, as she heads for the lee-shore of Reality, just beyond the shoals of Reason, steered by that obstinate helmsman, Fanaticism...


Originally posted by Sam F:
And of course, the Church avoids confusion about what "is" "is". Dennis! ROTFLHMO :D Pope John Paul II was against evolution by natural selection, before he was for it... so says the one Born Beautiful, as the Rat remains silent... ;) :D

[P.I. Stazzer-Newt]

Empty rhetoric.

"Catholic Church Backsliding Into Obscurancy".

No its not. it is all as it ever was, it started in the slime and in the slime it has remained - when was it ever different.

That which is incapable of forward movement is likely to be incapable of backsliding.

Walking backwards for christmas --- acoss the....

[Keith Wilson]

If Intelligent Design postulates, as in Ockam’s Razor, that the simplest explanation for a given structure is that it was designed - the way to prove it false is to show how it could have come about through an unsupervised, impersonal, unpredictable and natural process. In other words how it evolved via natural selection. Ah, so the only way to disprove "intelligent design" is to explain "life, the universe, and ebsolutely EVERYTHING" in terms of some other principle. :rolleyes: Ockham's razor is not your friend here. "The designer did it" is no explanation at all! Who is the designer? How did he do it? By what methods, using what tools and techniques? Why haven't we found other examples? Why can't we do it ourselves? No, that really won't do. Try again.

What evidence would disprove the “intelligent design” hypothesis, that “the designer did it”?

Are there any methods other than observation and experiment that give us reliable information about the physical world?

If so, what are they?


[ 07-18-2005, 05:25 PM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[George.]

Originally posted by Sam F:
...the simplest explanation for a given structure is that it was designed...
"Simplest," as long as you have already proved scientifically that the "designer" exists, and is actively designing...



- the way to prove it false is to show how it could have come about through an unsupervised, impersonal, unpredictable and natural process.
Which has been proven, with ample and irrefutable evidence. It is called natural selection, and it is so self-evident that some obscurantists even call it a tautology. :D


Originally posted by Sam F:

This would disprove it immediately and is what I’ve said all along. No, it would not, because "could" does not equal "did." That some other theory could be true does not mean that your pet theory is false - only that it could be false. So you still have not provided a way to falsify your pseudo-science.

[George.]

Originally posted by Dennis M:
I only read the first brief quote of Schonborn's at the beginning of the thread. Taken as it was, it was not objectionable. If he in fact has said what you claim, then he ought to be taken to task for unreasonableness.
Thank you, Dennis. I knew I could count on you being reasonable. smile.gif

And I apologize - my link to Schonborn's op-ed in the NYT seems to now require subscription - it did not when I first posted it. But I am sure it is available elsewhere, unless the Church has deemed it best forgotten...


Originally posted by Dennis M:
... any Catholic worth their salt is going to believe that the world was intelligently designed. No doubt, and no quarrel from me - we may well disagree about the nature of the designer, but not about the beauty of the design.

But, as I and others have posted earlier, believing that the world was originally designed is not at all the same as believing that the designer has to constantly keep nudging it and poking it in order for it to work as planned...

[George.]

Some of the local leadership of the Catholic Church are among the most enlightened people on Earth. That is, in part, why the damned thing has been around for 2000 years, in spite of all the Borgias, Medicis, Sams, et al.

[Dennis M]

C223,

I did not say that Catholics believed in Intelligent Design as a science. I said they believe in an intelligent designer. (Edited to add: That would not have been St. Catherine of Sienna's in KC, MO, would it?)

George., what you propose about the design of the universe is akin to Deism, which is fraught with all kinds of problems. As a half-way house between religion and science, it proved untenable, and so many threw their hat into the ring of science as "the way, truth, and the life." In many respects, Deism was a precursor to logical/scientific positivism and the political and scientific atheisms that grew like fungi in the 19th and 20th centuries.

Sam: :D :D

[ 07-18-2005, 06:09 PM: Message edited by: Dennis M ]

[Ian McColgin]

I am ever so glad that Roman Catholics do not believe in Intelligent Design as a science.

Exactly.

[Keith Wilson]

. . . what you propose about the design of the universe is akin to Deism, which is fraught with all kinds of problems. As a half-way house between religion and science, it proved untenable . . .Oh come now! You're speaking to a Unitarian, you realize? Not all that untenable, thank you very much, and I just can't get myself to swallow all that mythology . . . ;) :D

The essential point of "intelligent design" is the claim that by observation and experiment, the methods of science, we have supposedly proved the existence of the creator. It's an attempt to co-opt the authority of science in a religious cause, just as the Materialists tried to use the authority of science in support of their philospohy.

[George.]

Dennis, I am glad to see that you find Sam amusing - many of us do. ;)

"George., what you propose about the design of the universe is akin to Deism, which is fraught with all kinds of problems. As a half-way house between religion and science, it proved untenable..."

I am not interested in half-way houses. But if what I propose is akin to natural Pantheism, I must say, it is up to those who think it ain't so to show me. And I assure you, I am open - very open, even eager - to be shown. But it must be a clear and well-lit way, no blind dogma, no historiographical superstition, no obscurantism.

[Paul G]

Any organisation has its enligtened leaders and its scum, the church is no different, except that it proclaims itself to be the paragon of enlightened virtue. Listening to Sam go on endlessly to some vain quasi intellectual debate over various useless philosophical points is laughable. On the other side, Keith represents open minded intelligent investigation, a measured approach that leads the way forward.

Sam is the churches murky obscuration in action, the only reason for "intelligent design" is control over people gullible enough to believe the churches line on the nature of the world. If one removes names and labels and simply observes the natural world there is a constant change, a flux of movement of which we are part, if there was no such thing as evolution we would not be here tappng away on computers. We as humans embody it on a daily basis. The church is a construct of man to attempt to make sense of the apparent randomenss and constant change, it represents security in an unstable world. For those like Sam that need it, fine, for me no freakin' way. As for God thats for each person to work out for themself. The good of the church is the good of man and likewise the foul deeds.

Intelligent design is an oxymoron, an all powerful creator would be sadistic to make a world such as ours. Intelligent design to create and condone such enormous suffering? Oh sure from the comfort of our safe little lives we can debate all we like about such a dumb arse intellectual concept. Those that devote their lives, church or not, to the upliftment of others, they dont spend their time on intelligent design because they see the way of this world lies in action not empty words.

[Dennis M]

Ian, as far as I know, Intelligent Design is not a science, but a philosophical position that demonstrates the limitations of science in drawing conclusions like: there is no creator/designer; or that life is simply the result of random chance. Such claims themselves are philosophical in nature and not the fruit of scientific investigation.

If I am correct in my understanding of what ID is, well, the arguments have been made for nearly 2000 years now and so it is "nothing new under the sun," as one biblical writer would put it.

George.,

It seems to me to be more reasonable to posit continued divine activity in the created order. We already know that contingent beings cannot cause themselves to exist. Neither can they hold themselves in existence. Since the created, contingent world is not a sufficient reason for its own being, then the non-contingent source of being must be holding things together, so to speak, which would mean that there is some type of intervention by a non-contingent source in the existence of things that are contingent.

Secondly, if things happened only by random chance, as in an evolutionary worldview, then Paul G's protest against the injustices and sufferings of life would make no sense. Why rant against an implacable force like nature, when we should just accept it stoically, retreat from as much suffering as we can -- like the Epicureans --and live in tune with the forces of nature like the Taoists? Why complain at all? It would seem to be a waste of energy and time. And it would make no sense.

Finally, we Catholics believe that since God created the world, it was created for a purpose and that what unfolds historically is not mere chance, but part of a larger plan of which we can only discern a part. Now I know that this leads to all sorts of questions and problems, but to save time, the logic follows thusly: If God created the world by means of the Word, and God's word does not return to him void, but he brings to fruition whatever he wills, then the events of history and science are not random and mindless events of chance, but manifest the workings of divine providence in them. Certainly, miracles can happen in such a world. But St. Thomas Aquinas considered these exceptions to the rule (as they are) and preferred to concentrate on what he called "secondary causes" that is that God works through the intrinsic design of nature, respecting the laws he built into it, rather than suspending those laws at every whim.

[Osborne Russel]

Originally posted by Sam F:
As with my Love and Evil examples, we have clear observations of something non-material having verifiable physical effects. That could not possibly happen “if supernatural causes ... are not part of the physical world, and cannot be observed”
False dichotomy. The rigid distinction between material and non-material is a construct of homo sapiens. Destroyed by E=MC2.

The distinction between natural and supernatural can now only be supported by magic.

[Osborne Russel]

Originally posted by Dennis M:

George., what you propose about the design of the universe is akin to Deism, which is fraught with all kinds of problems. As a half-way house between religion and science, it proved untenableSez who?

[Osborne Russel]

Originally posted by Sam F:
the simplest explanation for a given structure is that it was designed Unadulterated egotism. First, that the presumed explanation can be grasped by the human mind. Second, that it was designed not only to work, but to be graspable by the human mind, in order that the human mind might manipulate it. This reduces the universe to homo sapiens' toy box.

Meanwhile, if the shoe fits, wear it. The simplest explanation of middle eastern monotheism is that is was designed.

[TomF]

Originally posted by Sam F:
So you accept the witness of Judas. Sam, I will thank you to stop accusing me of denying my faith. :mad: It's the second time you've used that line against me in this thread, though I let it pass once. And don't patronize me with a piss-ant reply that somehow I've taken your meaning wrong ... or that it was "all you could think" from my oh-so-ambiguous writing.

Bullsh!t. My posts irked you, and you intended to write something incendiary ... Well, congratulations.

I'm one of a few Christians here who can be counted on both to disagree with some of your stances, and to do so with well-considered theological reasoning. It appears to threaten the hell out of your orthodoxy that a thoughtful and faithful Christian might disagree with Rome, but there are Protestants for a reason.

So keep a civil tongue in your head, and stop being such a pr!ck. While the Catholic church has legions of things to be proud of, valid points of view even on theology don't start and stop in Rome. They certainly don't start and stop with what's held in your head, or in mine. A bit of humility and respect is in order.

If you want to continue any conversations with me, I'll need an apology first. And a backhanded one will get you squat.

Tom.

[ 07-18-2005, 11:20 PM: Message edited by: TomF ]

[Keith Wilson]

We already know that contingent beings cannot cause themselves to exist. Neither can they hold themselves in existence. Since the created, contingent world is not a sufficient reason for its own being, then the non-contingent source of being must be holding things together, so to speak, which would mean that there is some type of intervention by a non-contingent source in the existence of things that are contingent.
Well, I knew there was a reason I went into engineering and not philosophy . . . Let me try to get a handle on this. “Contingent” in this sense means “depending on something else”, yes? While human beings are certainly contingent in that sense, requiring parents and a certain quite narrow range of conditions to exist, doesn’t calling the universe “created and contingent” presuppose your conclusion? How do we know the universe is contingent?

[TomF]

Keith, this is a theological perspective originating I believe with Anselm ... can't remember his dates.

Anselm's position was that the world continues to exist because God continues to regard it. Creation was not a one-off affair, but needs sustaining. The corollory being that were God's attention to lapse...

t.

[ 07-18-2005, 11:55 PM: Message edited by: TomF ]

[Meerkat]

Said Dennis:

Ian, as far as I know, Intelligent Design is not a science, but a philosophical position that demonstrates the limitations of science in drawing conclusions like: there is no creator/designer; or that life is simply the result of random chance. Such claims themselves are philosophical in nature and not the fruit of scientific investigation.One must ernestly disagree with this. Science, per se, does not draw conclusions (at least not in the sense of eternal truths). What it says about the notion of a creator/designer is that there is no evidence to support such a theory. Conversely, what evidence we have currently does support the theory that life arose from random processes.

Either or both of these theories could change tomorrow, given physical evidence to support them. Otherwise, they may stand forever - or be replaced by yet other, currently unknown, theories.

[Keith Wilson]

Ah, right.


When Brahm ceases to dream the Heavens and the Hells and Earth disappear.
Be content. Brahm dreams still.
The dreams come and go, and the nature of the dreams changes, but still Brahm dreams.Did you ever read "The Bridge Builders" by Kipling? One of his better short stories, IMHO.


(Krishna speaking to the assembled Hindu gods about the railroad) The wheels of the fire-carriages shout the names of new Gods that are not the old under new names. And Dennis, the latest incarnation of "intelligent design" certainly claims to be science, not religion or philosophy. I think this is mainly a strategem to get around the first amendment restrictions on religion in public school textbooks that removed earlier versions of creationism.

[ 07-19-2005, 12:12 AM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[George.]

Originally posted by Dennis M:
... the limitations of science in drawing conclusions like: there is no creator/designer.
Science has never concluded that. Nor could it, as Meerkat points out. Individual scientists might have concluded that, but when doing so they were practicing philosophy, not science - just as if a scientist concluded that Democrats are better than Republicans, he is practicing politics, not science.


...there is some type of intervention by a non-contingent source in the existence of things that are contingent.
This approach acknowledges that non-contingent things are possible. And it assumes that the universe is contingent. But if non-contingent things are possible, how do we know the universe is not one of them?


Why rant against an implacable force like nature, when we should just accept it stoically, retreat from as much suffering as we can -- like the Epicureans --and live in tune with the forces of nature like the Taoists? Why complain at all? It would seem to be a waste of energy and time. And it would make no sense.
You are perfectly correct. A hefty dose of stoicism is very healthy, in my opinion - far preferrable to the frustrated self-righteous attitude of many monotheists, who think that God is on their side but the world isn't - Islamists come to mind, but so do fundamentalist Christians.

But let us not forget that we are also part of nature, part of the "implacable force." There are things we can change through action, and those are worth ranting about, if only to mobilize people to act.


...God works through the intrinsic design of nature, respecting the laws he built into it, rather than suspending those laws at every whim.We agree, then. smile.gif

[George.]

Originally posted by Osborne Russel:
Meanwhile, if the shoe fits, wear it. The simplest explanation of middle eastern monotheism is that is was designed.:D

Osborne, every once in a while you come up with a pearl...

[Sam F]

Originally posted by TomF:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Sam F:
So you accept the witness of Judas. Sam, I will thank you to stop accusing me of denying my faith... </font>[/QUOTE]Don’t short change Judas. His reaction was perfectly understandable to the modern mind and in fact, the modern mind is entirely in concert with him.
I don’t doubt your faith whatever it is. It has been my observation that self-described Liberal Christians have abundant faith – far more than I could ever muster - but the question is - what do you have faith in?


Originally posted by TomF:
...I'll need an apology first... Tom, what you are saying is that I haven’t been nice. But Tom - and you should let this fact sink in for a bit – I am not nice. That’s because nice, as far as I can tell, has no value.

It hasn’t escaped me that while you are deeply offended by my conclusion about your faith, you have twice neglected to answer the question that might refute that conclusion:

Originally posted by Sam F:
So Tom, do you expect eternal life?
If so, why?
If not, why bother?

[George.]

Originally posted by Sam F:
...nice, as far as I can tell, has no value.

... you have twice neglected to answer the question that might refute that conclusion.
What a piece of work is Sam!

He finally managed to get Tom F to tell him off and call him a prick. Now he has an excuse to ignore Tom's posts, with the excuse that "he was mean to me." That was pretty much expected - we have seen this MO before.
;)

And as usual, he is utterly incapable of apologizing, or admitting a mistake. As infallible as the Pope, old Sam is, and all his statements are ex cathedra - even the unwarranted insults.

But to complain about someone neglecting to answer a question... someone get the man a mirror!

I feel sorry for any Catholics who do not think that nice has no value, and who are not self-righteous rude fanatical pricks, having to watch Sam denigrate their faith by presenting a vicious parody of it, post after post after post... :(

[Jack Heinlen]

How many times have you gentlemen been around this barn? What is the fascination with arguing these imponderables? You love and hate it at the same time, and it never seems to end well.

30

All truths wait in all things,
They neither hasten their own delivery nor resist it,
They do not need the obstetric forceps of the surgeon,
The insignificant is as big to me as any,
(What is less or more than a touch?)

Logic and sermons never convince,
The damp of the night drives deeper into my soul.

(Only what proves itself to every man and woman is so,
Only what nobody denies is so.)

A minute and a drop of me settle my brain,
I believe the soggy clods shall become lovers and lamps,
And a compend of compends is the meat of a man or woman,
And a summit and flower there is the feeling they have for each other,
And they are to branch boundlessly out of that lesson until it
becomes omnific,
And until one and all shall delight us, and we them.

WW

[TomF]

Originally posted by Sam
But Tom - and you should let this fact sink in for a bit – I am not nice. That’s because nice, as far as I can tell, has no value.Fine Sam. If you've no interest in being civil, then we're done. I'll talk around you when I post on this, or similar threads.

The door's open, if you discover that there is actually value in treating each other with respect.

t.

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> So you don't believe in Evil do you?
Huh? It sure seems real enough...</font>[/QUOTE]and

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Evil and love, BTW, are things that people do, ideas for categories of human behavior.That is interesting and more evidence of methodological materialism...
If evil is just what “people do” that presents several problems.
For example, if before WWII the allies had called Hitler’s bluff and threatened war rather than offered appeasement and Hitler had, as a result, abandoned his dream of a military conquest, would he then have not been evil? In other words, if someone is frightened into not doing evil, is he good?
The second problem is that if Evil is just one of many “ideas for categories of human behavior” then there’s no ought or ought not behind it and the idea of Evil is just “a matter of preference and choice, custom and habit.”
Is that your view?

On Love, I seriously doubt that it is something that “people do”. One may love another and not do anything. Indeed the concept of loving another solely for that person’s own sake has no “doing” involved at all. The fact of that love is a motivator for doing (or acting), not the acting itself.
As an example there are many instances of a person “doing” things that simulate the results of a motivating love, but are nothing of the sort:
“Honey do you love me?” she said.
He replied: “Well my sweet, you know that I love you because of all the things that I do... and I assure you in the most certain terms that the fact that you’ll inherit a boat load of cash when ol’ Daddy dies, has nothing to do with it.”
And when Daddy dies, "lover boy" splits with the cash. Right? Doesn’t that sort of thing happen?

But if love is something people do – and he did all the love stuff, and his behavior was consistent with the love hypothesis – was it love or something else?
Looks like your assumptions about Evil and love are not real at all, but another reduction of reality to the methods you use to observe it.

[Keith Wilson]

If Hitler had been prevented from starting a war and murdering millions of people, he would have done far less evil than he did. Would he have been less evil? If someone wants to do harm and is prevented, is he better than one who actually does it? Sure, why not? Ask those who would have been harmed. It certainly would have been an improvement in Hitler's case. Remember that thoughts and emotions, although more difficult than actions to observe directly, are also things that people do, and are no less real.

Are there any methods other than observation and experiment that give us reliable information about the physical world?

If so, what are they?

What evidence (short of explaining everything) would disprove the “intelligent design” hypothesis, that “the designer did it”?


[ 07-19-2005, 10:01 AM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[Ian McColgin]

Actually imponderables are worth arguing. These arguments expose the differences between small spirited petulent dogmatism and the grace of faith every bit as surely as they expose the differences between scientific and religious/philosophical knowledge.

[Sam F]

Originally posted by TomF:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Sam
But Tom - and you should let this fact sink in for a bit – I am not nice. That’s because nice, as far as I can tell, has no value.Fine Sam. If you've no interest in being civil, then we're done. I'll talk around you when I post on this, or similar threads.

The door's open, if you discover that there is actually value in treating each other with respect.

t.</font>[/QUOTE]But Tom, What do you mean by respect? Do you mean a mere courtesy? Or do you mean by that a deserved respect?
If it’s courtesy, that is being nice – you’re out of luck (as I readily admit).
If, on the other hand, you mean deserved respect, then I submit to you that I give my respect the old-fashioned way – Everyone gets the benefit of doubt but after that - You have to earn it.
A careful reading of your posting on this subject, (and I respect you enough to read carefully) lead me to conclude that you had chosen to agree with Judas’ conclusion about miracles. After all, do you think Judas believed in Jesus’ miracles or not? If he believed, he surely wouldn’t have acted as he did. He no doubt concluded that the “Jesus Event” was some sort of mass-hallucination and that Jesus was deluded or a fraud.

The simplest way to refute that conclusion was to say if you, as a Christian, expect eternal life or not.
If you are annoyed, as you clearly are, why pass up the opportunity to blow me out of the water Tom? By not doing so three times, you only reinforce the conclusion.

[George.]

Originally posted by Jack Heinlen:
How many times have you gentlemen been around this barn? What is the fascination with arguing these imponderables? You love and hate it at the same time, and it never seems to end well.
These are interesting discussions, Jack, in spite of Sam's efforts to disrupt them. Though we may often disagree, I find the exchange of ideas with Bob, Tom, and Dennis very thought-provoking. Although it may not seem so on the surface, my own thoughts evolve (no pun intended ;) ) and are enriched by these exchanges.

You yourself, being of a philosophical mind, could enjoy and enrich these discussions. I am sorry that Sam always seems to disrupt them with his dogma, his arrogance, and his mile-long posts. I feel it drives away a lot of people who would be interested in the honest intellectual exchanges that go on in spite of Sam.

TO be honest, I was hoping that since I started this thread, he would stay away from it. Unfortunately it did not work out that way.

[PatCox]

Keith,

My understanding is that jesus taught that how effective you are in implementing your sinful impulses has no bearing on your state of sinfulness. Thus when you look lustfully at a woman, you commit adultery, when you are angry at your fellow man, you commit murder.

The gulf in morality between the average man or woman, and Hitler, is tiny, compared to the gulf between humans and God. And therefore, absolute humility is necessary, at all times, regarding ones own moral status, and when avoiding the sinful impulse to judge others. Love is impossible without humility.

[TomF]

Originally posted by George.:
Though we may often disagree, I find the exchange of ideas with Bob, Tom, and Dennis very thought-provoking. Although it may not seem so on the surface, my own thoughts evolve (no pun intended ;) ) and are enriched by these exchanges.Couldn't agree more, George. As I said at one point to George Jung, I like discussing "hot button" topics because they are intimately connected with our identity, our understanding of ourselves and others. I too have had some changes in my worldview, thanks to these threads.

t.

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> If Intelligent Design postulates, as in Ockam’s Razor, that the simplest explanation for a given structure is that it was designed - the way to prove it false is to show how it could have come about through an unsupervised, impersonal, unpredictable and natural process. In other words how it evolved via natural selection. Ah, so the only way to disprove "intelligent design" is to explain "life, the universe, and ebsolutely EVERYTHING" in terms of some other principle. </font>[/QUOTE]But Keith I’m not demanding that you explain “absolutely EVERYTHING”. I’m asking that you explain only ONE THING: The evolution of the first reproducing organism.
There’s no creation-of-the-universe or laws-of-nature or formation-of-planetary nebulae or anything of the sort. I’m only asking you to explain the starting point of the theory you believe explains “absolutely everything” else in biology. Try as you may, this is not an unreasonable question nor is it unscientific. Why do you and other Darwinists persist in refusing to deal with a question that is a natural – one might say organic – outcome of Darwin’s theory?


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Ockham's razor is not your friend here.
Oh I agree that an encounter with ol’ Ockham can be a close shave, but we’re buddies. Remember I asked you earlier which is more likely:
There was “not ...enough time in the Universe for such a thing [DNA or equivalent] to have happened by chance? So which is the simpler choice?
A designer or the impossible?”

So far you have not presented a single plausible explanation for how DNA or any DNA-like chemical could evolve chemically, must less demonstrate that it actually happened.
Absent any such explanation we’re still left with the two choices:
A designer or the impossible?”


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
Who is the designer?...
No, that really won't do.Won’t it?
Let me ask you the same questions of the following artifact:
http://www.theplumber.com/images/greek.jpg

Who is the designer?

Without peeking... Can you tell me who designed that particular plumbing device?
Do you have to know who it was to tell it was designed?
No.

How did he do it? By what methods, using what tools and techniques?

You could no doubt imagine what tools were used, but likely never prove what they were exactly – it would be only your best guess.
In the case of life, a designer could have used a nano-technology assembler. Of course, just like the example above its impossible to know for certain what tool(s) were used but we can guess that it’s something like this:

Nanotechnology is an emerging manufacturing technology which will provide a very high level of control over the manipulation of matter. Machines, called assemblers, will be able to build things to atomic specification under programmable control. Their design and operation can be like robots and miniature factories, with levers, gears, bearings, electric motors, pulleys, cables, conveyer belts, and computers to coordinate their operation—all with parts of molecular dimensions.And (for fun) it could assemble something like this:
http://www.zyvex.com/nanotech/images/animatedBearingSmall.gif
which has an interesting resemblance to this:

http://www.arn.org/docs/mm/flag_labels2.jpg

Why haven't we found other examples?

There are occasionally found artifacts of which only one example exists. That’s not all that unusual, but in the case of life, examples abound.

Why can't we do it ourselves?

Not being able to “do it ourselves” is not all that unusual either. In fact, it’s quite common. 21st Century man isn’t omniscient you know.
For example there was a gold-smithing technique from the ancient world that nobody could do until someone figured out how in the late 20th century. When I was in school, it was still a total mystery. The task in science is to figure it out. It is NOT a requirement to know in advance. To make such a requirement is the antithesis of science.


Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
What evidence would disprove the “intelligent design” hypothesis, that “the designer did it”? Easy Keith, you already know how - just provide a plausible Darwinian pathway for a structure’s development or some other materialist explanation. That you can’t do so is not my problem. It’s yours.

[George.]

http://www.butterflyalphabet.com/images/posters/BA-Postera.jpg
Some obvious proof that butterfly wings were not only "designed," but that the designer used Latin characters - further proof of the supremacy of the Latin speaking church.

Although he also seems to have used Arabic numerals... ;)

Using Occam's razor, we can conclude that the simplest explanation for this is that someone painted those letters on the butterflies, after they were invented by humans, 2500 years ago. They could not possibly be the random result of identification patterns in these insect's wings, which only look like letters to us because we are biased to look for the familiar.

[Keith Wilson]

My point, Sam was not that you should be able to explain precisley how this hypothetical designer works, but to demonstrate that saying "the designer did it" is most certainly NOT the simplest explanation. It actually adds incalculable complexity to the explanation, and is in fact no explanation at all.

So if I understand you correctly, when someone comes up with a plausible explanation of the origin of the first self-reproducing molecules on earth that does not require supernatural intervention, "intelligent design" will be refuted, and will be consigned to the same dump as N-rays, the ether, phlogiston, and the four bodily humors?

[ 07-19-2005, 01:32 PM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[Osborne Russel]

Originally posted by Sam F:
I’m asking that you explain only ONE THING: The evolution of the first reproducing organism.What is the sound of one hand clapping? Which came first, the chicken or the egg? <<--- just kidding.

The first reproducing organism occurred when the lightning hit the soup. The right lightning hit the right soup in the right way. Big deal. A wrinkle in infinity. With or without God, it's a long time.

Most MEM'ers are only nominally so. They cruise along believing that a set of metaphors about love, surrender, and devotion are a good code to live by. They need not account for every new development in biochemistry or anything else. That doesn't make it a stronger code, it makes it weaker. Makes it defensive and ultimately desperate, as here, and as with the Muslims, frantically trying to turn back the clock to the days when the Church was the authority, period, about everything, period. The bad old days. I thought they were gone but the attitude is tenacious.

[ 07-19-2005, 02:07 PM: Message edited by: Osborne Russel ]

[Osborne Russel]

Originally posted by George.:
They could not possibly be the random result of identification patterns in these insect's wings, which only look like letters to us because we are biased to look for the familiar.Intelligent design is in the eye of the beholder. How could it be otherwise? Confronted with the inexplicable, these are the choices:

1. Give up and invoke an intelligent designer.
2. Keep looking for an explanation.

Mutually exclusive.

I knew the red state freaks were into ID. When did the Catholics adopt them?

[Sam F]

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
So if I understand you correctly, when someone comes up with a plausible explanation of the origin of the first self-reproducing [organism] on earth that does not require supernatural intervention, "intelligent design" will be refuted, ...Close but for two things: Notice the change in [ ]... and Intelligent Design does not “require supernatural intervention”. Do try to disabuse yourself of that notion – Life-long Atheist Francis Crick certainly didn’t believe in supernatural intervention, though he did believe there was evidence for a designer – so that assumption is just propaganda.

Let’s revisit yet again what I said on that subject back on page 2:

Just providing a plausible Darwinian pathway to account for the Evolution of Irreducible structures would go a long way toward disproving that hypothesis – and that doesn’t even require hard evidence.At that point, the theory would become much more unlikely, and, as I said, it would go a long way toward disproving ID. But remember, a plausible pathway (if one can be thought up), is only a plausible explanation, which is not the same a proof - but that's a lot better than anyone has provided so far.
Real proof (rather than mere plausibility) that the first reproducing organism could arise, by an “unsupervised, impersonal, unpredictable and natural process”, would largely finish off Intelligent Design. How could it not?
Wasn’t that what Darwin’s Evolution was supposed to have done? And wasn’t it successful? It was - that is - until late 20th century advances in biochemistry opened Darwin’s black box and spoiled everything.
Getting to that first reproducing organism is a mighty big hurdle and would help your cause enormously. However, Darwinism still has its other flaws which remain and still need to be addressed.
Such as how do you disprove this statement? Natural Selection operates by survival of the fittest.

[George.]

Keith, it is hopeless. Sam simply can't grasp the difference between proving natural selection and disproving intelligent design...

I'll try to help him out.

This is one of many things that disproves ID:

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/images/whale_leg.jpg

Here is another one:

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/images/tail.jpg

[Meerkat]

Since religious doctrines are generally trivially refuatable, how about something harder: refute the Scientific Method. Of course some are going to have to learn what it is in the first place, based on some of the posts in this thread/forum! ;)

[Keith Wilson]

Sam, it really appears you don't understand what disproving a theory with evidence means. I asked you for hypothetical evidence, observations of the physical world, possible new discoveries, new facts, not competing theories, which could show that the "intelligent design” hypothesis is false. A plausible explanation of the origin of life that does not involve a designer is just that, a plausible explanation; it cannot disprove the ID hypothesis. For example, human fossils reliably dated to 250 million years ago would require us to rethink everything we currently believe about the development of life on earth. This is not just someone coming up with a better theory; it is an observation, a fact, which can falsify a theory.

BTW, I understand that ID makes no overt claims about the nature of the designer. It’s tolerably transparent, however, and very obvious if one reads things like the Discovery Institute’s paper (which was not intended for public release). I seriously doubt you’re arguing for Panspermia.

And once again:

What evidence would disprove the “intelligent design” hypothesis, that “the designer did it”?

Are there any methods other than observation and experiment that give us reliable information about the physical world?

If so, what are they?


[ 07-19-2005, 03:34 PM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[George.]

Some things that would disprove the theory of evolution:

- the discovery of a single species that is totally unrelated to any other species.

- the discovery of a single species whose ancestry cannot be traced through the fossil record.

- the discovery of a structure or organ whose ancestry cannot be traced through the fossil record.

Things that would disprove natural selection:

- the discovery of a structure or organ that reduces fitness, but has survived for a significant period of time without atrophy.

- the discovery that there is no variation or mutations among the offspring of even a single species.

- the discovery that the survival rate of those with harmful mutations is not different from those with helpful mutations - even in a single species.

[Keith Wilson]

Thanks, George. Nicely done. I was working on a list, but yours is better.

One point - for very ancient structures, and those that as far as we know don't fossilize (i.e. the bacterial flagellum), there is as yet no fossil record.

[ 07-19-2005, 04:02 PM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[George.]

You are welcome, Keith. Let's hope that Sam, or some other ID proponent, can come up with a similar list. But, as we say in Brasil, have a seat while you wait... ;)

[George.]

Originally posted by Keith Wilson:
One point - for very ancient structures, and those that as far as we know don't fossilize (i.e. the bacterial flagellum), there is as yet no fossil record.True. But that disproves nothing. It only shows that our database is incomplete for some structures.

In order to disprove evolution, you would have to have a structure that does show up in fossils (e.g., a limb or skeletal feature), yet appears fully formed at some point in the fossil record, with no antecedents.

There is no "disproof of the gaps" in science. ;)

[Keith Wilson]

As we say in the US, "Don't hold your breath." :D

[Bob Cleek]

Well, yea, but the "fossil record" is haphazard at best. We keep filling in the blanks, but the creation of a fossil is such a chancey thing, and then, once a fossil develops, we have to find it. The fossil record is really a "connect the dots" game with some long lines between the numbered dots. We hope we know what the picture will look like, but it's always subject to change as we find other fossil "dots." The "gaps" are only gaps in our own knowledge, not in reality.

But does it really matter? The argument seems to be turning towards its tail at this point. There are many "proofs" for the existence of God. Each appeals or doesn't appeal to people in ways unique to the beholder. The strength of such proofs is measured only by the resistence of the person one is trying to convince. If one isn't disposed to admit they have been convinced, or are particularly resistant to being convinced, few, if any, arguments will succeed. Maybe God in his own way convinces each of us of his existence, or doesn't. And when God's proofs are rejected, he's probably just as frustrated as some in here have been.

That said, isn't it presumptuous to try to logically convince someone else of God's existence? I would think that God himself has the matter well in hand. As much as those of us who do believe might do to give God a hand in that respect would be to serve merely as examples of the love God has for all his creation.

But, to perhaps narrow the focus of the discussion, consider the five classical proofs for the existence of God first identified in the Summa Theologica.

The first and more manifest way is the argument from motion. It is certain, and evident to our sense, that in the world some things are in motion. Now whatever is moved is moved by another, for nothing can be moved except it is in potentiality to that towards which it is moved; whereas a thing moves inasmuch as it is in act. For motion is nothing else than the reduction of something from potentiality to actuality. But nothing can be moved from a state of potentiality to actuality, except by something in a state of actuality... it is therefore impossible that in the same respect and in the same way a thing should be both mover and moved i.e. that it should move itself. Therefore, whatever is moved must be moved by another. If that by which it is moved must itself be moved, then this also needs to be moved by another, and that by another again. But this cannot go on to infinity, because then there would be no first mover, and consequently, no other mover, seeing as subsequent movers move only inasmuch as they are moved by the first mover; as the staff moves only because it is moved by the hand. Therefore it is necessary to arrive at the first mover, moved by no other; and this everyone understands to be God.

The second way is from the nature of efficient cause. In the world of sensible things we find there is an order of efficient causes. There is no case known (neither is it, indeed possible) in which a thing is found to be the efficient cause of itself; for so it would be prior to itself, which is impossible. Now in efficient causes it is not possible to go on to infinity, because in all efficient causes following in order, the first is the cause of the intermediate cause, whether the intermediate cause be several, or one only. Now to take away the cause is to take away the effect. Therefore, if there be no first cause among efficient causes, there will be no ultimate, or intermediate, cause. But if in efficient causes it is possible to go on to infinity, there will be no first efficient cause, neither will there be an ultimate effect, nor any intermediate efficient causes; all of which is plainly false. Therefore it is necessary to admit a first efficient cause, to which everyone gives the name of God.

The third way is taken from possibility and necessity, and runs thus. We find in nature things that are possible to be and not to be, since they are found to be generated, and to be corrupted, and consequently, it is possible for them to be and not to be. But it is impossible for these always to exist, for that which can not-be at some time is not. Therefore, if everything can not-be, then at one time there was nothing in existence. Now if this were true, even now there would be nothing in existence, because that which does not exist begins to exist only through something already existing. Therefore, if at one time nothing was in existence, it would have been impossible for anything to have begun to exist; and thus even now nothing would be in existence - which is absurd. Therefore, not all beings are merely possible, but there must exist something the existence of which is necessary. But every necessary thing either has its necessity caused by another, or not. Now it is impossible to go on to infinity in necessary things which have their necessity caused by another, as has already been proved in regard to efficient causes. Therefore, we cannot but admit the existence of some being having of itself its own necessity, and not receiving it from another, but rather causing in others their necessity. This all men speak of as God.

The fourth way is taken from the gradation to be found in things. Among beings there are some more and some less good, true, noble, and the like. But more and less are predicated of different things according as they resemble in their different ways something which is the maximum, as a thing is said to be hotter according as it more nearly resembles that which is hottest; so that there is something which is truest, something best, something noblest, and, consequently, something which is most being, for those things that are greatest in truth are greatest in being... Now the maximum in any genus is the cause of all in that genus, as fire, which is the maximum of heat, is the cause of all hot things, as is said in the same book. Therefore, there must also be something which is to all beings the cause of their being, goodness, and every other perfection; and this we call God.

The fifth way is taken from the governance of the world. We see that things which lack knowledge, such as natural bodies, act for an end, and this is evident from their acting always, or nearly always, in the same way, so as to obtain the best result. Hence it is plain that they achieve their end, not fortuitously, but designedly. Now whatever lacks knowledge cannot move towards an end, unless it be directed by some being endowed with knowledge and intelligence; as the arrow is directed by the archer. Therefore, some intelligent being exists by whom all natural things are directed to their end; and this being we call God.

I don't think anyone has improved on Aquinas in all these years. If these don't convince a reasoning mind, there's no point arguing further.

[ 07-19-2005, 05:15 PM: Message edited by: Bob Cleek ]

[George.]

All those convince me, and yet they do not...

The "first mover," the "first cause," the "first governor..." and yet, who moved the first mover, what caused the first cause, who directed the first governor to come into being? The very nature of the argument argues for an endless recession into infinity.

Unless it is a metaphorical argument, which really argues that must be something greater than our limited understanding of the universe. In that case, I wholeheartedly agree.

I do not, however, agree that this "something" is necessarely an anthropomorphic god that gets a kick out of prayer, and out of befuddling us with occasional "miracles," and out of damning innocent people for all eternity...

[Ian McColgin]

And what has the proof or disproof for the existence of any god to do with natural science?

[Meerkat]

HEY! :mad:

[Dennis M]

Thanks to Bob Cleek for posting St. Thomas’ arguments for God’s existence.

Keith, number three is the argument, though you have seen it from me before. Please note, I was not presupposing created/contingent in my conclusion to the argument. Catholicism has always held that reason, unaided by the supernatural grace of faith, can come to the conclusion that there is a God – but God here is not meant as the “personal God of Christian faith” which can only be known through revelation, but more philosophically as the source and origin of all that exists. Because reason is ordered to knowing everything there is to know about everything there is, then even God can be known by reason (at least that God exists, but not the nature of God in this instance). Contingency, therefore, is discovered by rational inquiry into the world to be one of the conditions of creaturely existence.

Certainly, one could posit the eternity of matter and thereby avoid the problems that contingency raises. The Hindus do this but find that even created things are essentially divine. What is interesting about the Hindu answer to the question is that it is echoed in contemporary scientific theory with the constructs of absolute time, space, and etc. The absolutizing of what is contingent by scientists, however, is a type of backhanded proof of the correctness of St. Thomas’ and others’ labors, namely, that contingent beings must be rooted in something that is not dependent upon anything else for its own existence. Even a scientist’s science must be grounded in something greater than it in order for it to make sense. Consequently, while trying to avoid divinity, scientists in fact create a new one, nature, which is a form of pantheism, or reason, which is a form of self-divinization. I find it to be a fascinating phenomenon, because it demonstrates that scientists are, as Nietzsche would say, “all too human” despite their aspirations to be gods.


Meerkat said: One must ernestly disagree with this. Science, per se, does not draw conclusions (at least not in the sense of eternal truths). What it says about the notion of a creator/designer is that there is no evidence to support such a theory. Conversely, what evidence we have currently does support the theory that life arose from random processes.

Either or both of these theories could change tomorrow, given physical evidence to support them. Otherwise, they may stand forever - or be replaced by yet other, currently unknown, theories. Meerkat, I must earnestly disagree with you here, as you do with me. See my comments above about what it –science-- says about a creator/designer. Further, after the depredations of the Reformation and Counter-Reformation which did much to discredit religion as the best framework for making sense out of the meaning and purpose of life, science has sought to replace religion as the basis of life’s meaning. The Enlightenment gave much momentum to this movement which would bear fruit especially in the 19th and 20th centuries. Who can forget Laplace’s comment to Napoleon about not needing “that hypothesis” (God) in order to conduct his investigations. Let us not forget Fuerbach and Marx in the social and political sciences who, through their work say that “man is the God of man.” Of course, Comte, the Father of sociology, had already drawn that conclusion, and less than a century later, Freud would proclaim religion and faith to be neuroses and proclaim his own scientific method as the cure for such deformities in nature. Even Nietzsche would proclaim God’s death, so prevalent had this attitude become, but even he knew that he could not live without God, and so decided to make himself one. All of these are theoretical thinkers, but there are contemporary epigones: Sagan, Hawking, E.O. Wilson, to name some examples. Now all of us have probably read Huxley’s “Brave New World” and Orwell’s 1984 which offer some fictional account of the type of world one would live in should life be regulated according to science. Most sane folks would agree that such world’s were dehumanizing. Well, as you know, truth is stranger than fiction, and the 20th century is rife with attempts to organize life according to science which did not dignify humanity, but made that century one of the most murderous and grotesque in history.

So, given this, I am not so cheery about what “science per se” can do. When science is seen as the answer to all of humanity’s problems (as it has been for the last 200 + years, then the scientist becomes the high priest of the new learning. While science per se may not proclaim about a creator, that it claims things to happen according to random chance is unreasonable (see my note to Keith above), and is, by definition, contrary to science. Given that scientists have made claims about the meaning of life and the existence of God in the name of science and that these proclamations have not been a rarity does not incline me to change my mind on what you objected to.

George, we do not agree. Not until you see things my way, will I admit to agreeing with you. ;) Besides, we still have this pantheism issue from your post above floating around and unresolved. Why would you complain about ID and God being brought into science when a pantheistic position would in essence be the same thing? I don’t get it.

You said:
But let us not forget that we are also part of nature, part of the "implacable force." There are things we can change through action, and those are worth ranting about, if only to mobilize people to act.I have not forgotten that we are part of nature. I said that if nature is all there is, then there is no sense in protesting or mobilizing for anything. Nature will mow us down no matter and be just as unbending and uncaring whether we protest by not going gently into that good night, or by submitting meekly to the inevitable. But I would think that since we can know and control nature to a degree, that is make it our servant through science and technology, that this indicates that we are more than nature and cannot be contained by it. It would seem to me that our capacity to transcend nature and its limitations makes protest against injustice and suffering possible and even worthy. Of course, that raises the spectre of God and all, reason's capacity to know about God, science, as a reasonable exercise of that capacity and so forth. Seems we are back to square one.

[Meerkat]

Dennis; I see. You said something about science so it must be true?

Ok. :rolleyes:

[George.]

Thanks for your post, Dennis.


Because reason is ordered to knowing everything there is to know about everything there is, then even God can be known by reason (at least that God exists, but not the nature of God in this instance).
I don't agree that human reason can come even close to knowing everything about everything. I find this idea as absurd as a chimpanzee thinking itself capable of understanding how the zoo works and what it is for.


...science has sought to replace religion as the basis of life’s meaning.... Huxley’s “Brave New World” and Orwell’s 1984 ... offer some fictional account of the type of world one would live in should life be regulated according to science... the 20th century is rife with attempts to organize life according to science which ... made that century one of the most murderous and grotesque in history. Science has not sought to replace religion, or to find the meaning of life. Individual scientists may have done so - individuals entertain all kind of silly notions. Science only attempts to describe and understand the physical world we live in - no more.

1984, communism, and national-socialism were totalitarian political systems, not scientific at all. They used science to achieve some ends - so do democracies. But they did not use science to define those ends - they were defined politically.

Dennis, your statement practically begs for a reply such as "the 16th and 17th centuries were rife with attempts to organize life according to religion which ... made those centuries two of the most murderous and grotesque in history."


Why would you complain about ID and God being brought into science when a pantheistic position would in essence be the same thing? I don’t get it. It would not be the same thing at all. It would not require a supernatural being apart from nature. Nature as a self-organizing entity is not the same as nature designed by an anthropomorphic god.


...if nature is all there is, then there is no sense in protesting or mobilizing for anything. Nature will mow us down no matter...

...since we can know and control nature to a degree, that is make it our servant through science and technology, that this indicates that we are more than nature and cannot be contained by it. It is our nature to mobilize and strive to make out lives better. The fact that we will all die does not mean we should not strive to live well.

And the fact that we can control some of nature makes us little different from elephants or algae - different in degree, perhaps, but not in kind. It does not make us more than nature. Parts of nature "control" other parts.

[Osborne Russel]

Originally posted by Bob Cleek:

But nothing can be moved from a state of potentiality to actuality, except by something in a state of actuality... it is therefore impossible that in the same respect and in the same way a thing should be both mover and moved i.e. that it should move itself. Wrong. E=MC2.



There is no case known (neither is it, indeed possible) in which a thing is found to be the efficient cause of itself; for so it would be prior to itself, which is impossible. The division of the universe into causes and effects in temporal sequence is an intellectual tool of homo sapiens. The validity of the results depends upon on the results being constantly subjected to the most vigorous criticism possible, a methodology which will get you killed by middle eastern monotheists. Which makes their invocations of logic as proof of authority rather dubious . . .


Therefore, if at one time nothing was in existence, it would have been impossible for anything to have begun to exist; Infinity can contain everything and nothing simultaneously, or first one, then the other. If infinity is infinite, then it is absurd that it couldn't exist without God. Logic is logic, Padre.


there is something which is truest, something best, something noblest, and, consequently, something which is most being, for those things that are greatest in truth are greatest in being. There's no accounting for taste. Mold prefers cheddar to brie, perhaps, finding it noblest, truest, etc. It will be objected that mold's capacity to apprehend nobility and truth is limited -- as if humanity's capacities were not.


Hence it is plain that they achieve their end, not fortuitously, but designedly. Now whatever lacks knowledge cannot move towards an end, unless it be directed by some being endowed with knowledge and intelligence. No "end" or purpose is possible without someone to conceive it. Therefore if there is a purpose, there must be someone to conceive it. If you assume there is a purpose, you have not proved that there is a purpose, because assuming and proving are two different things.

This places middle eastern monotheism of asserting, and thus assuming the burden of proving, that not just the Garden of Eden, the Flood, Jonah and the Whale, the Revelations, the Law and the Prophets, but every single phenomenon in infinite time and space from the sub atomic to the intergalactic, are comprehended by a single unifying intention. Good luck!

[Dennis M]

George. said:
I don't agree that human reason can come even close to knowing everything about everything. I find this idea as absurd as a chimpanzee thinking itself capable of understanding how the zoo works and what it is for.George., I did not say that we were close to knowing everything about everything. I said that human intelligence is ordered to knowing everything about everything there is. This speaks to capacity rather than achievement, a capacity that the chimp certainly lacks.

You said:
Science has not sought to replace religion, or to find the meaning of life. Individual scientists may have done so - individuals entertain all kind of silly notions. Science only attempts to describe and understand the physical world we live in - no more.

1984, communism, and national-socialism were totalitarian political systems, not scientific at all. They used science to achieve some ends - so do democracies. But they did not use science to define those ends - they were defined politically.
Your statement belies a knowledge of history and the impact that ideas have on culture. The prevailing idea that has shaped Western civilization over the past 3 hundred years or so has been science. So much so, that thinking scientifically has been equated with right reason. Consequently, science has had the impact that I spoke of in my post and so I am inclined to disagree.

Further, and it is funny that where above you say "politics is science" you dismiss it as science in my post. As an organinizing principle, political scientific theories become the basis for organizing society. Marx had definite ideas about human nature and its meaning and purpose and he had definite ideas about how this human nature could be brought to full realization through the organizing of a body politic in which man was understood simply as "economic man." If that is not a reduction of existence and its meaning to science, then I don't know what is.

With respect to your explanation of pantheism. It is certainly not the same thing, as you point out, and it is the reason I disagree with you. The contingent condition of nature means that it cannot be God and giving nature divine status results from a failure to perceive reality as it is. Consequently, such a move, in my mind, is more "mythological" than Christianity's belief in the revelation of God in Christ -- a revelation which perfects the trajectory of human understanding to "know it all." And furthermore, your own pantheistic position with respect to nature makes your complaints in this post about Christians and ID questionable. By ascribing divinity to nature, you confuse "science and religion" even more so than the ID types, and especially Catholics who appreciate the real distinction between the two fold order of knowledge of faith and reason. Where Catholics would see faith and reason as distinct but not separate forms of knowing, a pantheistic view would not and thus reduce all knowing to science.

[George.]

Originally posted by Dennis M:
I said that human intelligence is ordered to knowing everything about everything there is. This speaks to capacity rather than achievement, a capacity that the chimp certainly lacks.
But I do mean that humans lack the capacity to understand everything - not just that they have not understood everything yet. We understand more than chimps (at least on some subjects), but we do not have the capacity to understand everything.



The prevailing idea that has shaped Western civilization over the past 3 hundred years or so has been science.
One could argue about that - trade and the seeking of wealth would be stronger candidates, in my opinion.

But in order to blame science for tyrannical governments and their atrocities, one would first have to demonstrate that before the Enlightenment, governments were kinder and wars were gentler. That is not the case, as attested by examples ranging from the Roman Empire to the Crusades to the Inquisition to the Thirty Years' War.

Furthermore, present regimes that are little influenced by science and reason are nothing to envy - would you care to move to Saudi Arabia, or the Congo, or Haiti?



... it is funny that where above you say "politics is science" you dismiss it as science in my post.
:confused:

I have not said that politics is science. In fact, I have argued just the opposite.


The contingent condition of nature means that it cannot be God and giving nature divine status results from a failure to perceive reality as it is.
As I stated before, I am not at all convinced that nature is "contingent." If God can be non-contingent, why can't the universe be non-contingent?

As for "failure to perceive reality as it is," you know well how I could respond... ;)


By ascribing divinity to nature, you confuse "science and religion" ...I do not ascribe divinity to nature. Perhaps you are imagining that I am a classical pantheist. I wonder, however, what exactly you mean by "divinity." If you define the term I can clarify my position.

[Keith Wilson]

How do we know that "nature" (meaning the entire physical universe, not just forests and mountains) is contingent? Is there any rational way to choose between the statments:
"The physical universe, as far as we know, has always existed", and
"The physical universe is contingent, therefore God must have created it?"


Consequently, science has had the impact that I spoke of in my post . . .Science, observation and experiment, is our best way of learning about the physical world. It is no more than that. If some people make it into a philosophy or a religion, if some people think that it can answer questions about meaning morality, well, people do lots of stupid things. Yes, science can be misused, and certainly has been. So can philosphy or religion. This has nothing to do with the ability of the methods of science to find the truth about the physical world.

On another tangent: I'm not precisely sure what "ordered to" means, as in "reason is ordered to knowing everything there is to know about everything there is".

Human beings are limited. We live a short time, our senses perceieve only a small portion of what exists, we live on one planet in a vast universe, and our brains are very limited in their ability to absorb, remember, and process information. We do pretty well for an evolved ape, and we've thought up some very clever ways to compensate for some of our limits (human language and culture, books, computers, instruments that measure things our senses can't). Can we imagine Reason in the abstract without these limitations, and say anything valid about it? I think not.

[ 07-20-2005, 01:08 PM: Message edited by: Keith Wilson ]

[Meerkat]

Said Dennis:

I said that human intelligence is ordered to knowing everything about everything there is. This speaks to capacity rather than achievement, a capacity that the chimp certainly lacks.What do you mean by "ordered" here?

What does it say about human intelligence that some will turn away from knowing more and replacing it with what amounts to superstition?

What makes you so sure about what Chimps lack? The more they're studied, the more human-like traits are discovered, including tool use. (Perhaps it's more apt to say that the more we study chimps, the more chimp-like human behavior starts to look! :D )

[Osborne Russel]

Originally posted by Dennis M:
God here is not meant as the “personal God of Christian faith” which can only be known through revelation, but more philosophically as the source and origin of all that exists.To divide all that exists from its source and origin is to make two of one. Two is the sacred
number of middle eastern monotheism. It is a human construct. It is the source of MEM's hatred of nature. You want it to be true because that is the only way there can be a God compatible with logic AKA science, which has taken some of the rough edges off of life and thus must be made Godly some kind of way, in order to enjoy continuing progress; but exactly because it cannot provide any final relief AKA "salvation", you still need a God to rescue you from "death and corruption" AKA contingency AKA nature.

You begin by making two of one and spend your life longing for them to be reunited, hating number two all the while for its stubborn existence. The MEM yin/yang is not black and white complementing each other, but black and white divided sharply and eternally at war, which white must win, or life has no meaning.


Because reason is ordered to knowing everything there is to know about everything there isOrdered, as in commanded? Assumes a commander; doesn't prove one. Or ordered, as in structured
so as to be capable of? If so, then this potential must be realized by man evolving into God. Is that your science, your religion, your religious science, your scientific religion, or what?

You want a reason capable of proving God. This raises the issue of blasphemy, which MEM deals
with by way of apocalypse AKA Judgment Day. God will end man before man becomes God. How
convenient. God creates not only the actors and the scenery, but a well-crafted plot for them to
play out.


Even a scientist’s science must be grounded in something greater than it in order for it to make sense. Consequently, while trying to avoid divinity, scientists in fact create a new one, nature, which is a form of pantheism, or reason, which is a form of self-divinization.It doesn't have to make sense, it only has to withstand scrutiny. Science AKA reason can't win the race with religion to get to a comprehensive description of eternity because it isn't even in the race. You presume a Creator separate from Creation, then criticize reason for being unable to describe one without describing the other.

As to self-divinization, see above.


Further, after the depredations of the Reformation and Counter-Reformation which did much to discredit religion as the best framework for making sense out of the meaning and purpose of life,science has sought to replace religion as the basis of life’s meaning.Science is not a subject capable of having an object. People are subjects. MEM was discredited, not religion. People (western) sought to replace their discredited religion (MEM) with science as the basis of life's meaning because MEM taught them to expect a basis of a certain character.

Now they find science can't do what MEM promised, and find the fault to lie with science rather than their expectations. Kind of like replacing the wheels on your car with propellers, because propellers work so well on outboard motors. It's not a defect in propellers that makes them poor substitute for wheels.

So people fly back to MEM. With time, the Dark Ages will return. The Islamic states may be ahead of the Red states for now, but the race ain't over.


The 20th century is rife with attempts to organize life according to science which did not dignify humanity, but made that century one of the most murderous and grotesque in history. That comes from making an MEM-style God out of Science.


I have not forgotten that we are part of nature. I said that if nature is all there
is, then there is no sense in protesting or mobilizing for anything. Nature will mow us down no matter and be just as unbending and uncaring whether we protest by not going gently into that
good night, or by submitting meekly to the inevitable.Here you state that there can be no meaning to human life not founded on human life outlasting
nature. Naked duality, and it produces a morality which cannot result in anything but hatred of nature AKA all that which gives indication of outlasting homo sapiens and thus usurping our promised seat beside the Kingdom Throne. A corollary is that non-human nature is not worthy of human concern; a rationalization of hatred.


But I would think that since we can know and control nature to a degree, that is make it our servant through science and technology, that this indicates that we are more than nature and cannot be contained by it. It would seem to me that our capacity to transcend nature and its limitations makes protest against injustice and suffering possible and even worthy.Fooey. Jackals control nature to the extent of their predation and are thus every bit as
transcendent as homo sapiens, which is to say, not at all. They protest against injustice (i.e.
they defend others when it is in their interest) and it is therefore fully as worthy as anything
any human ever did or could do.

[Osborne Russel]

Originally posted by Meerkat:
Perhaps it's more apt to say that the more we study chimps, the more chimp-like human behavior starts to look!More alarming to some than to others. Humans that is. Human study of chimp behavior brings knowledge of human behavior, ain't it a bitch. How come the prophets didn't prophesy it?

[Meerkat]

Very well said, Osborne! Have you studied Buddhism? smile.gif

There is not two, there is not one, there is only is. To believe that there is a dichotomy between oneself and nature is the first departure from the nature of what is (reality).

[Dennis M]

George., If politics is not science, then every college and university is going to have to stop teaching "political science" and call it something else. Are you agreeing with Aristotle, then, that politics is an art? If it is an art, and science has not had the impact I said it has had, then how, under the pressure of the last 300 years did it become a science?

You said:
But I do mean that humans lack the capacity to understand everything - not just that they have not understood everything yet. We understand more than chimps (at least on some subjects), but we do not have the capacity to understand everything. I knew what you meant when you wrote that. But if humans are not ordered to know everything as I claim, then why do humans create fields of inquiry that cover every aspect of existence and experience? Further, why does everyone on this forum have something to say on virtually every topic that emerges? And why is it that you post on quite a number of these threads that seemingly have no connection with one another. Your own behavior, it seems, proves my point, but given the vast range of disciplines that occupy human curiosity as a whole, my point is proven doubly! Why do you want to limit what human can and cannot know. And if you cannot know, then why say anything at all?

You say further:
As I stated before, I am not at all convinced that nature is "contingent." If God can be non-contingent, why can't the universe be non-contingent? One could argue that trade and the quest for wealth fashioned the foundational principles of the West in the last three hundred years. It would be a weak argument.

Non-contingency is the very definition of God or divinity. So, to call the universe non-contingent is to divinize it and endow it with god-like properties. Further, raising the question of how there can be anything at all if everything in our experience springs up and dies away leads to our positing some non-contingent source for existence. Since "nature" is part of the experience of springing up and dying away (human nature, animal nature, and etc.,), then nature cannot be non-contingent.

Finally, I did not say you were a classical pantheist. But even if you say "nature" is all there is, it is the same as saying nature is god. I pointed out the historical processes that lead to just such affirmations in a previous post.

[Dennis M]

Keith said:
How do we know that "nature" (meaning the entire physical universe, not just forests and mountains) is contingent? Is there any rational way to choose between the statments:
"The physical universe, as far as we know, has always existed", and
"The physical universe is contingent, therefore God must have created it?" Keith, why do you want to go "skeptic" on me here and then make a certain statement here
Science, observation and experiment, is our best way of learning about the physical world. It is no more than that. If some people make it into a philosophy or a religion, if some people think that it can answer questions about meaning morality, well, people do lots of stupid things. Yes, science can be misused, and certainly has been. So can philosphy or religion. This has nothing to do with the ability of the methods of science to find the truth about the physical world.

On another tangent: I'm not precisely sure what "ordered to" means, as in "reason is ordered to knowing everything there is to know about everything there is".

Human beings are limited. We live a short time, our senses perceieve only a small portion of what exists, we live on one planet in a vast universe, and our brains are very limited in their ability to absorb, remember, and process information. We do pretty well for an evolved ape, and we've thought up some very clever ways to compensate for some of our limits (human language and culture, books, computers, instruments that measure things our senses can't). Can we imagine Reason in the abstract without these limitations, and say anything valid about it? I think not.
?

How can we know or choose between those statements you ask about above? By use of reason, of course. Now, one either has confidence that reason corresponds to reality in some way and so can come to a true knowledge of that reality, or one does not. George., who stated above that we don't even have the capacity to know everything but only a little more than chimps represents a positive though unenthusiastic stance. But if we can know a little, can't we know a lot? If we can know a lot can't we have the capacity to know it all though we may not achieve the actualization of that capacity? Curiously enough, George. is one who seeks to have "intelligent" conversations on a variety of topics which implies that reason has some positive and fruitful relationship to the various topics discussed and these topics range over a spectrum of content both interesting and banal. If reason does not correspond to reality in anyway, then all our talk is meaningless chatter. Does it not occur to us that the very fact that we can ask a question about the world/universe/cosmos implies that there is an answer to it? And if we can ask the question about contingency, then we can answer it. If this is so, then why surrender reason to skepticism at the point when our very asking of the question manifests the nobility of reason and our capacity to know it all?

[Osborne Russel]

Originally posted by Dennis M:
Now, one either has confidence that reason corresponds to reality in some way and so can come to a true knowledge of that reality, or one does not. "In some way" could be one grain more than nothing or one grain less than infinity.


But if we can know a little, can't we know a lot? If we can know a lot can't we have the capacity to know it all though we may not achieve the actualization of that capacity? The human conception of reality does not capture reality like a butterfly in a net. It symbolizes it. Otherwise, a thing once "determined" to be "real" or "true" could never again be questioned. Can you provide an example of such a thing?


If reason does not correspond to reality in anyway, then all our talk is meaningless chatter.Reason is part of reality, for better or worse. Whether they correspond is a question that cannot arise without assuming they are in some way separate.


Does it not occur to us that the very fact that we can ask a question about the world/universe/cosmos implies that there is an answer to it? No.


And if we can ask the question about contingency, then we can answer it. If this is so, then why surrender reason to skepticism at the point when our very asking of the question manifests the nobility of reason and our capacity to know it all?1. Reason is skepticism, no surrender is called for.

2. The desire to know it all is not noble. By MEM's own terms it is arguably blasphemous. That's one reason Al Qaeda calls America the Great Satan.

[Osborne Russel]

Originally posted by Meerkat:
Very well said, Osborne! Have you studied Buddhism? smile.gif Only enough to get confused, except as to one vital point: the MEM paradigm of dualistic reality is not the only paradigm. This points to a way out of the corner into which western civilization has painted itself for several thousand years, most recently under the pernicious influence of MEM; formerly under the influence of all manner of crazy Middle Eastern crazy gods, MEM's forebears. The basic idea throughout has been to generate devotion out of fear and ignorance, sort of like heaping compost on the floor to heat your house. It works, to a degree, and if that's all you can conceive, I guess that's what you have to do.