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| Dumbing Down Of America, 2 | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: May 12 2006, 11:46 AM (5,654 Views) | |
| ngc1514 | May 30 2006, 01:30 PM Post #211 |
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Dictionary.com! Dang, why didn't I think about checking out Dictionary.com to see what "order" actually means? Now, Alan, I'm waiting for you to share your understanding of how your definition of order and the physical laws of the universe coincide. What "group" does gravity belong to? What are the "separate elements" of gravity? How is gravity "logical?" And how is gravity a "comprehensible arrangement" of anything? I think Wikipedia's article on order is far more interesting than Alan's simplistic definition. Interestingly, there is no apparent meaning to order, in terms of the universe and physical law, other than the opposite of chaos. Order can be used in scientific classification or in several different modes in mathematics, but there is nothing about order as it relates to how the universe is put together. Since the universe has always worked with and through natural laws, the universe has never been in a state of chaos. If you never have chaos, how can you say that you now have order? Umm... where in your definition does it say that order implies intelligence? Come on... you just made that up! No one has yet convincingly argued that order has ANY meaning in the universe around us, but you jump right over that little "uh-oh" to claim it now implies intelligence. Have you ever been to the beach and see the shells and pebbles laid out along the tide line in order of size? Was it intelligence or just wave action that ordered them so? How about the nice, orderly sequence of numbers in a repeating decimal. Was that intelligence at work or just the nature of the numbering system? No one, other than you, has ascribed order to evolution. How is the change in allele frequency of a gene over time an orderly system? "Also, the evidence of order in nature is compeling." Really? Compel me, Alan, compel me! First you need to define order and then show how it's compelling. I await your response. Your editorial on art was... um... unconvincing. |
Eric
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| abradf2519 | May 30 2006, 03:15 PM Post #212 |
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Gravity...If we didn't have it, we would fly off the planet! I think that's step 1 in the order of things.
Not mine, dictionary.com's!
This is just spin. Why do you have to pervert the definition to suit your scientific opinions? You can't say it is caotic, because this is indefencible. and you can't say it is orderly because this implies ID.
This is double talk. How can you have order and no intelegence behind it?
Me and billions of other people think order implies intelegence. If you crash your RV into a bridge abutment (God forbid!), will it naturally fall apart in order? No. But if you take it apart piece by peice, and put the parts in order of size, this implies intelegence because of the order.
There is an order there that you are not seeing. The shells wash up on the beach to break down into sand.
I don't ascribe to evolution, I just say there is evidence to support the theory.
I already did provide a definition. I wish I could compel you, I want to compel you, but your education and knowlege of how to defend evolution is getting in the way. Think beyond the talking points. What do you see when you look at nature? Caos or order? My guess is that you cannot answer the last question without a huge explination. Billions of people before you have said order.
You need to go look at some modern art. It really is garbage! |
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Alan Milan, New York, USA | |
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| cmoehle | May 30 2006, 05:55 PM Post #213 |
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Chris - San Antonio TX
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What is spin, Alan. If you make these sorts of claim and accusations, you ought to explain where and what and how it is spin. It is vacuous otherwise. "How do you personally answer this?" What? Please give some meaning to "orderly universe"? Please provide something not explained by science. You see, I divoce nothing, what you see is what you get from nature's laws, eveolution among them. You, on the other hand do divide the world in each and everything you say. You respond that intelligence implies purpose because we live in the results of the designer's purpose. Question, how do you connect our living, hardly flourishing, to a designer? What is the connection between the natural and the supernatural? Question, what evidence do you have, even if there is a design, that the designer would have a purpose? Question, use of the definite pronoun "the" belies your belief in who the designer is--just like those founders of ID, Johnson, Dembski and Behe. How does "survival of the fittest" imply intelligence and purpose? Incidently, "survival of the fittest" has little to do with evolution. It's a term Herbert Spencer coined for economics. Biologists use instead the phrase "natural selection". |
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Politics is the art of achieving the maximum amount of freedom for individuals that is consistent with the maintenance of social order. --Barry Goldwater | |
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| DocInBird | May 30 2006, 06:22 PM Post #214 |
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Carl Sagan was asked by Johnny Carson if he believed in God. Note: this is from memory, so I cannot guarantee that all of the wording is fully accurate. Sagan replied, "If you are asking, do I believe that there are certain underlying principles that govern the universe, then yes." Damn, do I miss this guy... |
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--doc Just Doc and Orson (German Shepherd) wandering around North America. | |
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| cmoehle | May 30 2006, 06:25 PM Post #215 |
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Chris - San Antonio TX
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Sagan's Baloney Detection Kit is quite useful. |
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Politics is the art of achieving the maximum amount of freedom for individuals that is consistent with the maintenance of social order. --Barry Goldwater | |
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| cmoehle | May 30 2006, 09:32 PM Post #216 |
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Chris - San Antonio TX
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I'm startng to wonder, after years of hearing about this Inteliigent Designer no one can explain using designs no one can test to create designs no one can describe for purposes no one can predict, if irreducible complexity isn't just irreducible mystery. |
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Politics is the art of achieving the maximum amount of freedom for individuals that is consistent with the maintenance of social order. --Barry Goldwater | |
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| teryt | May 30 2006, 10:31 PM Post #217 |
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I think that the only thing that will become solidified in your mind, is if you somehow meet this mysterious person. May we all be so fortunate. |
My Boast is Christ ![]() Soon to have MBA (I'll perhaps be smart then) Recovering Perfectionist Christian Hedonist | |
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| cmoehle | May 31 2006, 03:58 AM Post #218 |
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Chris - San Antonio TX
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So it is religious interest rather than pursuit of scientific knowledge you're interested in? You know I can respect that as your individual personal belief, have no trouble at all with that, that's what freedom of religion is all about. --So long as you respect my freedom as well and not denegrate me as unfortunate for not following your beliefs. Pushing those beliefs into the public square, insisting religion be taught in science classes, is another matter and deserves debate. |
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Politics is the art of achieving the maximum amount of freedom for individuals that is consistent with the maintenance of social order. --Barry Goldwater | |
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| teryt | May 31 2006, 06:53 AM Post #219 |
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Let's face it - this what it really comes down to: figuring out the bottom line or meeting whomever is in charge. If the designer just came forward and said, "Here I am, I did this," wouldn't that be the culmination of all of human existance & life on earth? "Insisting religion be taught in public classes,"? Well, we've been all through that, and those are your words. Just another viewpoint in my opinion, like evolution (which is a vigorously researched one). "So it is religious interest rather than pursuit of scientific knowledge you're interested in?" One is not mutually exclusive of the other.
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My Boast is Christ ![]() Soon to have MBA (I'll perhaps be smart then) Recovering Perfectionist Christian Hedonist | |
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| ngc1514 | May 31 2006, 07:09 AM Post #220 |
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Chaotic and order both have definitions. Systems - weather, smoke rising from a cigarette,, any of a number of non-deterministic systems - can be chaotic, but, at the bottom of the most chaotic system, there remain the physical laws of the universe. The system is chaotic on a large scale, but not small. I can say it's not chaotic because we are talking about small systems; how elemental particles act, how atoms act. I can also say it's not ordered because for there to be order there must also have been a preceeding unordered, chaotic system from which order developed. If there was never a state of chaos against which to measure the present system, how can you KNOW it's ordered? The universe isn't orderly or chaotic - it simply is. I'm not "perverting" the definition you so diligently dug up, but asking how this defintion applies to the discussion and universe at large. If it doesn't edify, it's not a very useful definition, is it?
Ummm... you are the one advancing the idea that the universe has order, not I. Fortunately, as a gentleman, I won't step through the door you just left gapingly ajar with your comment! Again, I offer my example of shells ordered by size at the tidal line. Wave action or intelligence?
You do realize that billions of people thinking something doesn't make it true. I'm sure Teryt will be able to help you understand the logical fallacy in your thinking. We have already accepted that large scale system can be chaotic. I'll be much more impressed when you show that tearing water molecules apart sometimes results in 2 atoms of hydrogen and one atom of oxygen and, at other times, you end up with 2 atoms of oxygen, one of hydrogen, 6 of helium and 2 of neptunium. Do you only get the boring H2 and O because of intelligence or because that's the way the universe works? And when you put them back together, you never end up with gold... just water.
Well, that analogy passed about 35 feet over your head. Alas, I mentioned the same analogy earlier in this message. Just ignore it before you give yourself a brainache.
Ah, it's education that gets in the way! In other words, compelling is easier when the other person doesn't know anything about the subject. Defending evolution is easy because all the evidence points to it. What do I see when I look at nature? Hmmm... tough call, Alan! You got me, Alan... I bleed, I bleed! Just kidding. I don't see either order or chaos - I see the universe as it is. A manifestation across billions of years and billions of light years, made up of billions of galaxies and hundreds of trillion stars all following the simple mathematical descriptions we call the "laws of nature." Sorry to disappoint you in being able to answer the question without a huge explanation.
A much more honest answer would have been "I don't understand what the artist was trying to say with this composition, and because I don't, I classify it as garbage." Van Gogh never sold a painting during his life - the art world considered his art to be garbage. Not sure about you, but I'd sure enjoy having some of his works (originals and not the prints we do have) on our walls. I never get tired of looking at his "Irises" or "Alle des Alyscamps" It was thrilling to stand on the very spot where Van Gogh stood when he painted Alyscamps. Pardon me for not accepting your art criticism or your science. |
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| cmoehle | May 31 2006, 07:30 AM Post #221 |
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Chris - San Antonio TX
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Teryt: ""Insisting religion be taught in public classes,"? Well, we've been all through that, and those are your words. Just another viewpoint in my opinion, like evolution (which is a vigorously researched one)." Um, my words were "insisting religion be taught in science classes". Please don't change my words and then argue your own--classic straw man. If you argue everything is just another viewpoint, that is moral relativism to the extreme. Viewpoints, I would argue, have value in context, here, science classes and public schools. ""So it is religious interest rather than pursuit of scientific knowledge you're interested in?" One is not mutually exclusive of the other." True, but in this discussion you have argued ID as science. Now you've changed positions, to a religious one. I'm just calling attention to that, and asking has that been your position all along. It is true, one is not exclusive. Not that it's a popularity contest, but I read last night where 89.6% of Chistians belong to major denominations that accept evolution. And it's well know many scientists are religious but have no trouble distinguishing religion from science. Another thing, do you realize there is one science, but a multitude of religions--one might argue as many as there are believers. Consider that for a moment, the ever bifurcation of dissenting religious beliefs. You know of course, that one result of evolution is speciation. Do you think that's the case with the evolution of religion? You know you could easily draw a sort of phylogenetic tree of that evolution. |
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Politics is the art of achieving the maximum amount of freedom for individuals that is consistent with the maintenance of social order. --Barry Goldwater | |
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| teryt | May 31 2006, 09:25 AM Post #222 |
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"Evolution of religion"? How 'bout the religion of evolution?
Nope - those were your words - cut & pasted from your posting:
Tag - yer it!
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My Boast is Christ ![]() Soon to have MBA (I'll perhaps be smart then) Recovering Perfectionist Christian Hedonist | |
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| cmoehle | May 31 2006, 09:45 AM Post #223 |
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Chris - San Antonio TX
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Ah, I see, you want to play linguistic games again. Style over substance. In your May 31 2006, 07:53 AM Post post you quoted me as say this: "Insisting religion be taught in public classes,"? I responded by saying "Um, my words were "insisting religion be taught in science classes". " Then you quote me the correct way and reveal your mistake. Are all your arguments so careless? I took the time to substantiate the evolution of religion, could you substantiate what you mean by "How 'bout the religion of evolution?" Then I'll entertain an answer. |
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Politics is the art of achieving the maximum amount of freedom for individuals that is consistent with the maintenance of social order. --Barry Goldwater | |
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| TexasShadow | May 31 2006, 11:07 AM Post #224 |
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don't know what Teryt will say, but I'll jump on this one because it's basically what my gripe is re teaching evolution in schools and further support of it throughout the world. it's presented as FACT. it's referred to as FACT.... by the media and, in general, the rest of the world. we who bothered to further our education, know that it's PROBABLY true, apparently true by the study of fossils, but not a proven fact yet. but for many many people, it's just a given, and it starts in school with pictures that present the imagery of man descending from the apes, etc. and this is the way that religion is taught to children. certain "facts" are presented as such.... no question about it, this is the way it is. |
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| ngc1514 | May 31 2006, 11:30 AM Post #225 |
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You are not differentiating between evolution and the Theory of Evolution. Evolution is fact and, for the umpty-umpth time defined scientifically as the change (come on, we all know the words to this song by now!) in allele frequency of a gene over time. The Theory of Evolution discusses the change in earth's lifeforms over the 3.5 billion years that life has existed on the planet. There are tons of data to support the theory, but it only takes one contrary observation to tear down the theory. Why do you think the Fundie Nutz were so excited at what they thought were human foot prints at the Paluxy River in Texas? Have you noticed that the only here people calling the Theory of Evolution fact is you, Alan and a few of the other non-evolutionay proponents? I've never called it a fact, Chris hasn't and I have yet to have any of those making this claim offer any evidence to support it other than the anecdotal. I know, you don't have the time or interest to show how the National Geographic showed it as a fact and how we evolved from apes. None of the ID/creationism proponents here have bothered to follow up their claim of evoution being presented as fact with a lick o' data. Odd. Maybe I didn't "further [my] education" enough? Whatcha think? |
Eric
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