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Dumbing Down Of America, 2
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Topic Started: May 12 2006, 11:46 AM (5,646 Views)
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bikemanb
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Jun 3 2006, 07:10 AM
Post #331
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Liberal Conservative
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This thread reminds me of the equine that has been flagellated to the point of loss of vital signs.
:deadhorse:
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Bill, Rita and Chloe the Terror Cat
For having lived long, I have experienced many instances of being obliged, by better information or fuller consideration, to change opinions, even on important subjects, which I once thought right but found to be otherwise.
Benjamin Franklin
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cmoehle
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Jun 3 2006, 07:17 AM
Post #332
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Chris - San Antonio TX
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Flagellum are also argued by IDers to be irreducibly complex and thus proof of ID, but that too has been debunked.
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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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bikemanb
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Jun 3 2006, 07:23 AM
Post #333
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Liberal Conservative
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Bill, Rita and Chloe the Terror Cat
For having lived long, I have experienced many instances of being obliged, by better information or fuller consideration, to change opinions, even on important subjects, which I once thought right but found to be otherwise.
Benjamin Franklin
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TexasShadow
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Jun 3 2006, 08:23 AM
Post #334
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Jane
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Flagellum are also argued by IDers to be irreducibly complex and thus proof of ID, but that too has been debunked.
has not
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"A conclusion is the place where you got tired of thinking."
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cmoehle
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Jun 3 2006, 08:51 AM
Post #335
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Chris - San Antonio TX
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Sorry, but I do not make idle claims.
The Flagellum Unspun: The Collapse of "Irreducible Complexity"
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...The principal claim made by adherents of this view is that they can detect the presence of "intelligent design" in complex biological systems. As evidence, they cite a number of specific examples, including the vertebrate blood clotting cascade, the eukaryotic cilium, and most notably, the eubacterial flagellum (Behe 1996a, Behe 2002).
Of all these examples, the flagellum has been presented so often as a counter-example to evolution that it might well be considered the "poster child" of the modern anti-evolution movement....
The flagellum owes its status principally to Darwin's Black Box (Behe 1996a) a book by Michael Behe that employed it in a carefully-crafted anti-evolution argument. Building upon William Paley's well-known "argument from design," Behe sought to bring the argument two centuries forward into the realm of biochemistry. Like Paley, Behe appealed to his readers to appreciate the intricate complexity of living organisms as evidence for the work of a designer. Unlike Paley, however, he raised the argument to a new level, claiming to have discovered a scientific principle that could be used to prove that certain structures could not have been produced by evolution. That principle goes by the name of "irreducible complexity."....
The utility of the bacterial flagellum is that it seems to rise above this "argument from ignorance."....
As Behe wrote: " . . . natural selection can only choose among systems that are already working" (Behe 2002), and an irreducibly complex system does not work unless all of its parts are in place. The flagellum is irreducibly complex, and therefore, it must have been designed. Case closed....
However, science has debunked this claim:
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The assertion that cellular machines are irreducibly complex, and therefore provide proof of design, has not gone unnoticed by the scientific community. A number of detailed rebuttals have appeared in the literature, and many have pointed out the poor reasoning of recasting the classic argument from design in the modern language of biochemistry (Coyne 1996; Miller 1996; Depew 1998; Thornhill and Ussery 2000). I have suggested elsewhere that the scientific literature contains counter-examples to any assertion that evolution cannot explain biochemical complexity (Miller 1999, 147), and other workers have addressed the issue of how evolutionary mechanisms allow biological systems to increase in information content (Schneider 2000; Adami, Ofria, and Collier 2000).
The most powerful rebuttals to the flagellum story, however, have not come from direct attempts to answer the critics of evolution. Rather, they have emerged from the steady progress of scientific work on the genes and proteins associated with the flagellum and other cellular structures. Such studies have now established that the entire premise by which this molecular machine has been advanced as an argument against evolution is wrong – the bacterial flagellum is not irreducibly complex. As we will see, the flagellum – the supreme example of the power of this new "science of design" – has failed its most basic scientific test. Remember the claim that "any precursor to an irreducibly complex system that is missing a part is by definition nonfunctional?" As the evidence has shown, nature is filled with examples of "precursors" to the flagellum that are indeed "missing a part," and yet are fully-functional. Functional enough, in some cases, to pose a serious threat to human life....
That's the gist of it. The advancement of the teleological argument Teryt has claimed is mere argumentum ad ignorantiam If interested in the details, follow the link. That paper debunks other ID claims as well
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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
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Jun 3 2006, 09:10 AM
Post #336
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Chris - San Antonio TX
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More debunking of irreducible complexity re flagellum, the eye, Venus' Flytrap, Pentachlorophenol, Hemoglobin, Blood Clotting System, and more: Answering the Biochemical Argument from Design, Irreducible Complexity and Michael Behe: Do Biochemical Machines Show Intelligent Design?, Irreducible Complexity Demystified.
That last source concludes:
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Irreducible complexity, intelligent design's closest brush with biology, is marked by three ironies.
- IC is supposed to be important because it cannot evolve. But it can evolve, in the same ways that anything else does.
- Not one of the impressively complex biochemical systems said to be IC by IC/ID proponents has been shown to be in fact IC and several are known not to be. The known cases of IC are simpler and their evolution is understood.
- Although the subject is religiously motivated, proponents have focused on bacterial flagella as the last hope for a highly complex IC system. This has the unintended consequence of making The Designer (aka God) responsible for serious diseases.
...Despite all this, there is a strong political drive to force public schools to misrepresent neocreationism as science. But misrepresentation is not acceptable. And it would be awkward to tell teachers to teach ID science when there isn't any. If it becomes politically necessary to teach something about the subject, the present essay contains material for several lessons. And if the plan is to teach 'the controversy', it would be proper to tell the students that there is no scientific controversy, although there is a public one. Books like Darwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution are surely part of the reason. Yet the widespread public acceptance of Behe's thesis is stark evidence that we need stronger science education, especially about evolution. (emphasis mine)
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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
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Jun 3 2006, 10:41 AM
Post #337
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Well there goes my "common sense" rubuttal, as I likely haven't received the proper education to use 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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teryt
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Jun 3 2006, 10:57 AM
Post #338
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Although the subject is religiously motivated, proponents have focused on bacterial flagella as the last hope for a highly complex IC system. This has the unintended consequence of making The Designer (aka God) responsible for serious diseases.
The answer: Can Intelligent Design (ID) be a Testable, Scientific Theory?
From this above page:
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What is the scorecard so far? Science tells us that:
1. There is no evidence for more than one universe or one creation event. 2. Examples of fine tuning continue to increase. Some parameters designed to within a part in 10120. 3. No other rocky planets have been found. Most planets found are large gas giants orbiting very close to their stars. 4. No other life found. SETI has been completely unsuccessful. 5. It is impossible to chemically produce many basic molecules required for any living system. 6. Neither the biochemical nor replicative pathways have been described. In fact, many scientists think that they could not have arisen by any naturalistic means. 7. Contrary to the expectations of evolutionary theory, the fossil record is replete with complex transitions and new designs whereas simple transitions (intermediates) are rare. Evolutionary theory would expect the opposite to be true and to be reflected in the fossil record. 8. Evolution predicts slow recovery following extinctions and that those recoveries will be filled by the species surviving the extinction event. However, the fossil record indicates rapid recovery with completely different designs and species appearing within a period of tens of thousands of years or less.
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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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teryt
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Jun 3 2006, 11:31 AM
Post #339
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From this page: Quotes from Scientists Regarding Design of the Universe
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Does science lead us down a road that ends in the naturalistic explanation of everything we see? In the nineteenth century, it certainly looked as though science was going in that direction. The "God of the gaps" was finding himself in a narrower and narrower niche. However, 20th century and now 21st century science is leading us back down the road of design - not from a lack of scientific explanation, but from scientific explanation that requires an appeal to the extremely unlikely - something that science does not deal well with. As a result of the recent evidence in support of design, many scientists now believe in God.
Fred Hoyle (British astrophysicist): "A common sense interpretation of the facts suggests that a superintellect has monkeyed with physics, as well as with chemistry and biology, and that there are no blind forces worth speaking about in nature. The numbers one calculates from the facts seem to me so overwhelming as to put this conclusion almost beyond question." (2)
George Ellis (British astrophysicist): "Amazing fine tuning occurs in the laws that make this [complexity] possible. Realization of the complexity of what is accomplished makes it very difficult not to use the word 'miraculous' without taking a stand as to the ontological status of the word." (3)
Paul Davies (British astrophysicist): "There is for me powerful evidence that there is something going on behind it all....It seems as though somebody has fine-tuned nature’s numbers to make the Universe....The impression of design is overwhelming". (4)
Paul Davies: "The laws [of physics] ... seem to be the product of exceedingly ingenious design... The universe must have a purpose". (5)
Alan Sandage (winner of the Crawford prize in astronomy): "I find it quite improbable that such order came out of chaos. There has to be some organizing principle. God to me is a mystery but is the explanation for the miracle of existence, why there is something instead of nothing." (6)
John O'Keefe (astronomer at NASA): "We are, by astronomical standards, a pampered, cosseted, cherished group of creatures.. .. If the Universe had not been made with the most exacting precision we could never have come into existence. It is my view that these circumstances indicate the universe was created for man to live in." (7)
George Greenstein (astronomer): "As we survey all the evidence, the thought insistently arises that some supernatural agency - or, rather, Agency - must be involved. Is it possible that suddenly, without intending to, we have stumbled upon scientific proof of the existence of a Supreme Being? Was it God who stepped in and so providentially crafted the cosmos for our benefit?" (8)
Arno Penzias (Nobel prize in physics): "Astronomy leads us to a unique event, a universe which was created out of nothing, one with the very delicate balance needed to provide exactly the conditions required to permit life, and one which has an underlying (one might say 'supernatural') plan." (10)
Vera Kistiakowsky (MIT physicist): "The exquisite order displayed by our scientific understanding of the physical world calls for the divine." (13)
Wernher von Braun (Pioneer rocket engineer) "I find it as difficult to understand a scientist who does not acknowledge the presence of a superior rationality behind the existence of the universe as it is to comprehend a theologian who would deny the advances of science." (24)
Carl Woese (microbiologist from the University of Illinois) "Life in Universe - rare or unique? I walk both sides of that street. One day I can say that given the 100 billion stars in our galaxy and the 100 billion or more galaxies, there have to be some planets that formed and evolved in ways very, very like the Earth has, and so would contain microbial life at least. There are other days when I say that the anthropic principal, which makes this universe a special one out of an uncountably large number of universes, may not apply only to that aspect of nature we define in the realm of physics, but may extend to chemistry and biology. In that case life on Earth could be entirely unique." (25)
BOLD EMPHASIS MINE
[SEVERAL QUOTES WERE OMITTED FOR BREVITY - SEE LINK FOR THESE]
I present these above quotes just as a little foundation to what we are talking about. Sure, this is just their view, and it doesn't present specific scientific validation, but I think it shows something which is going on in the minds of many of these noted people - worth at least something, wouldn't you agree?
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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
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Jun 3 2006, 11:56 AM
Post #340
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Chris - San Antonio TX
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- teryt
- Jun 3 2006, 11:41 AM
Well there goes my "common sense" rubuttal, as I likely haven't received the proper education to use it.
Common sense does enter the debate at the personal and the political levels of this debate. Such as, what is the practical value of teaching ID?
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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
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Jun 3 2006, 11:57 AM
Post #341
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I had to laugh when I read the last of this paragraph!
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Then there is the "argument from design"--the claim that nature is so wondrously fashioned that it must have been the handiwork of a Divine Artificer. The wing of the eagle, the shape of the orchid, the swiftness of the antelope: all these weren't produced by a beneficent deity, submitted 19th-century Darwinists, but by random mutation and natural selection. Since then critics of a religious bent have sought to show that the theory of evolution is false or incomplete. The biochemist Michael J. Behe has argued that gradualist Darwinian processes could never have given rise to the intricate molecular machines of life. Meanwhile, inside the Darwinist camp itself, "radicals" like Richard Dawkins and "pluralists" like Stephen J. Gould go at it hammer and tongs over the basic logic of the theory. Will Darwinism ever be proved wrong? The current debate is one of the most confusing I have ever tried to follow; at times it seems that no one can agree on anything, and that everyone thinks everyone else is a fool, if not a knave.
FROM: Science Resurrects God
Continuing the article: - Quote:
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Yet even if Darwin's theory is fundamentally sound--as I am convinced it is--that doesn't mean the design argument for God's existence is defunct. For in recent decades, physicists have noticed an astonishing thing about the fundamental laws of nature. The 20 or so parameters they contain--numbers governing the strength of gravity, the ratio of the proton's size to the neutron's, and so on--appear to have been fine-tuned so that, against astronomically unfavorable odds, conscious organisms could emerge. Make gravity the slightest bit weaker, and no galaxies suitable for life would have formed; make it the slightest bit stronger and the cosmos would have collapsed upon itself moments after the big bang.
The universe, as the cosmologist Fred Hoyle once remarked, looks like a "put-up job." Who but a Divine Designer could have twiddled with these 20 different "control knobs" until they were pointing at precisely the right values for the full array of life ultimately to appear? ("Design by wholesale is more grand than design by retail," one 19th-century American clergyman presciently commented.) Another conundrum for atheists.
And another laugher:
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Finally, consider the "argument from consciousness." How could sentience, self-awareness and free will arise in a purely material universe? They couldn't, maintained the 17th-century English philosopher John Locke: Consciousness must have existed from eternity, and the eternal mind must be God. In the 19th and much of the 20th century, this proposition came in for ridicule. When an organism's neural pathways grow sufficiently complex, materialists insist, their firings are somehow accompanied by consciousness. But despite decades of effort by philosophers and neurophysiologists, no one has been able to come up with a remotely plausible explanation of how this happens--how the hunk of gray meat in our skull gives rise to private Technicolor experience. One distinguished commentator on the mind-body problem, Daniel Dennett, author of "Consciousness Explained," has been driven to declare that there is really no such thing as consciousness--we are all zombies, though we're unaware of it.
Anyway, this doesn't necessarily prove anything (diversion perhaps Chris? sorry, couldn't resist), but some interesting & funny stuff as us "knaves" consider these lofty ideas.
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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
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Jun 3 2006, 11:59 AM
Post #342
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Chris - San Antonio TX
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- teryt
- Jun 3 2006, 11:57 AM
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Although the subject is religiously motivated, proponents have focused on bacterial flagella as the last hope for a highly complex IC system. This has the unintended consequence of making The Designer (aka God) responsible for serious diseases.
The answer: Can Intelligent Design (ID) be a Testable, Scientific Theory?From this above page: - Quote:
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What is the scorecard so far? Science tells us that:
1. There is no evidence for more than one universe or one creation event. 2. Examples of fine tuning continue to increase. Some parameters designed to within a part in 10120. 3. No other rocky planets have been found. Most planets found are large gas giants orbiting very close to their stars. 4. No other life found. SETI has been completely unsuccessful. 5. It is impossible to chemically produce many basic molecules required for any living system. 6. Neither the biochemical nor replicative pathways have been described. In fact, many scientists think that they could not have arisen by any naturalistic means. 7. Contrary to the expectations of evolutionary theory, the fossil record is replete with complex transitions and new designs whereas simple transitions (intermediates) are rare. Evolutionary theory would expect the opposite to be true and to be reflected in the fossil record. 8. Evolution predicts slow recovery following extinctions and that those recoveries will be filled by the species surviving the extinction event. However, the fossil record indicates rapid recovery with completely different designs and species appearing within a period of tens of thousands of years or less.
Yes, and what does ID tell us on any of that?
If the Designer is not responsible for disease, who or what is?
Science doesn't pretend to address these questions.
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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
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Jun 3 2006, 12:04 PM
Post #343
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- cmoehle
- Jun 3 2006, 05:59 PM
Science doesn't pretend to address these questions.
Good!
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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
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Jun 3 2006, 12:04 PM
Post #344
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Chris - San Antonio TX
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Teryt references "Quotes from Scientists Regarding Design of the Universe"
Apppeals to authority, arguing from unknowns, quoted out of context, on irreducible mystery, logical fallacies, a very typical non-scientific, religious approach.
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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
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Jun 3 2006, 12:06 PM
Post #345
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Chris - San Antonio TX
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- teryt
- Jun 3 2006, 12:57 PM
I had to laugh when I read the last of this paragraph! - Quote:
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Then there is the "argument from design"--the claim that nature is so wondrously fashioned that it must have been the handiwork of a Divine Artificer. The wing of the eagle, the shape of the orchid, the swiftness of the antelope: all these weren't produced by a beneficent deity, submitted 19th-century Darwinists, but by random mutation and natural selection. Since then critics of a religious bent have sought to show that the theory of evolution is false or incomplete. The biochemist Michael J. Behe has argued that gradualist Darwinian processes could never have given rise to the intricate molecular machines of life. Meanwhile, inside the Darwinist camp itself, "radicals" like Richard Dawkins and "pluralists" like Stephen J. Gould go at it hammer and tongs over the basic logic of the theory. Will Darwinism ever be proved wrong? The current debate is one of the most confusing I have ever tried to follow; at times it seems that no one can agree on anything, and that everyone thinks everyone else is a fool, if not a knave.
FROM: Science Resurrects GodContinuing the article: - Quote:
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Yet even if Darwin's theory is fundamentally sound--as I am convinced it is--that doesn't mean the design argument for God's existence is defunct. For in recent decades, physicists have noticed an astonishing thing about the fundamental laws of nature. The 20 or so parameters they contain--numbers governing the strength of gravity, the ratio of the proton's size to the neutron's, and so on--appear to have been fine-tuned so that, against astronomically unfavorable odds, conscious organisms could emerge. Make gravity the slightest bit weaker, and no galaxies suitable for life would have formed; make it the slightest bit stronger and the cosmos would have collapsed upon itself moments after the big bang.
The universe, as the cosmologist Fred Hoyle once remarked, looks like a "put-up job." Who but a Divine Designer could have twiddled with these 20 different "control knobs" until they were pointing at precisely the right values for the full array of life ultimately to appear? ("Design by wholesale is more grand than design by retail," one 19th-century American clergyman presciently commented.) Another conundrum for atheists.
And another laugher: - Quote:
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Finally, consider the "argument from consciousness." How could sentience, self-awareness and free will arise in a purely material universe? They couldn't, maintained the 17th-century English philosopher John Locke: Consciousness must have existed from eternity, and the eternal mind must be God. In the 19th and much of the 20th century, this proposition came in for ridicule. When an organism's neural pathways grow sufficiently complex, materialists insist, their firings are somehow accompanied by consciousness. But despite decades of effort by philosophers and neurophysiologists, no one has been able to come up with a remotely plausible explanation of how this happens--how the hunk of gray meat in our skull gives rise to private Technicolor experience. One distinguished commentator on the mind-body problem, Daniel Dennett, author of "Consciousness Explained," has been driven to declare that there is really no such thing as consciousness--we are all zombies, though we're unaware of it. Anyway, this doesn't necessarily prove anything (diversion perhaps Chris? sorry, couldn't resist), but some interesting & funny stuff as us "knaves" consider these lofty ideas.
So the designer is god.
Is it your God?
Who designed god?
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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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