Biological Design Argument?

[1AugustSon7]

Do sponges have a purpose?

This is rhetorical I hope.

Biological design arguments are convincing to open minded people; however, for those whose belief system militantly refuses to admit any teleology simply because it seems to indicate an Ultimate Intelligent Designer, then nothing will convince them that it is not just all happenchance. Aristotle had no problems seeing an utterly rational order underlying and guiding everything.

The various instruments (organs) of our bodies, for example, make no sense outside of their holistic contexts: a New Atheist might not be ashamed to say that he believes his heart utimately serves no purpose (however poetically crass that is), but none of them yet have had the cojones to claim that their brains serve no purpose.

 

[tonyrey]

rossum:

There is more to life than just the material.
2. Biology is the study of life.
3. Biology is an incomplete view of life.
4. Therefore mathematical calculations about life present an incomplete view of life.

1. Agreed.
2. Disagree. Biology is the scientific study of life. Hence biology is limited to the realm of science – it only studies those parts of life that are within science. God is alive, but cannot be studied using biology. We use theology, not biology, to study God.

Your concept of life is inconsistent with the Buddhist belief that physical events and spiritual events are closely interrelated - and modern medicine treats the whole person not just the body.

1. Agreed.
2. Mathematical calculation about biology does not present an incomplete view of biology.

Can the effects of hypnosis be analysed by mathematical calculation?

The topic is Biological Design. Biology is within science, and deals with chemicals like DNA and RNA. Where is the evidence of any non-human designer rearranging DNA and RNA? We have evidence of human designers doing just that. Where is the actual scientific evidence of any non-human designers doing it?

Did human designers arrange DNA and RNA in the first place? If not do you ascribe such a feat to blind processes? If so produce verifiable evidence.

5. The sharp distinction between the material and immaterial aspects of life is arbitrary and invalid.

The sharp distinction between the material and immaterial aspects of reality is one of the reasons for the great success of science. Science recuses itself from questions about whether YHWH or Vishnu is the true God of the universe, and concentrates on material things like studying electronics to make better computers.

The great success of science is restricted to sense data which are far less valuable and far less significant than spiritual reality.

6. Persons and animals are not purposeless machines.

But they do have mechanical aspects. Muscles and bones can be studied in terms of mechanical levers. These studies give useful insights.

Only into the mechanical aspects of life without giving any information about its value and purpose. The body is only a tool, not an end in itself.

7. Material reality does not explain its own origin or purpose.

1. Material reality does not explain spiritual reality.

1. Without spiritual reality material reality would not exist.

1. Spiritual development is more valuable and significant than material development.

How are these points relevant to biology? We are discussing biological design, not explains and integrates the verifiable, valuable and purposeful relationship between the material and immaterial aspects of life.
I already know that you are not Buddhist. How is this relevant to you providing evidence of biological design?

Without biological Design the spiritual Design of human beings would not exist. Can the mind have any effect on the body without the brain? Can the body be totally understood without the mind? Do thoughts, feelings and decisions have no effect on biological processes? Do psychology and biology exist in separate compartments? Can physical causes alone explain the physical development of the human race?

For a start Design explains and integrates the verifiable, valuable and purposeful relationship between the material and immaterial aspects of life. Spiritual and physical development are closely related. Our virtues and vices have a profound effect on both our mind and body - which is not accidental and which is recognised by Buddhists.

It appears to me that you have no real evidence beyond your own personal opinion, so you are blustering and thrashing around looking at irrelevancies in order to cover up your complete lack of relevant evidence.

Is the profound effect of our virtues and vices on both our mind and body merely my personal opinion?

Where is your evidence of your proposed designer manipulating RNA or DNA in biological organisms?

The crude notion of “manipulating RNA or DNA” is an anthropomorphic distortion of teleological explanation. Design entails creating, organising and directing the multitude of processes which lead to the formation, development and survival of living organisms. To attribute the immensely complex genetic system to random events is totally unrealistic and amounts to a deification of Chance yet for some mysterious reason spiritual development is supposed to occur independently of Chance. Such disparity requires explanation if it is to be convincing.

 

[nmgauss]

None! There are far more important aspects of reality. Do you base all your decisions on energy, mass, speed of light?
By detecting purposeful activity.
If they didn’t they wouldn’t survive.

BTW It would be far more to the point to refute my statements than ask unrelated questions…

You make these assertions without providing convincing evidence. When I ask you about evidence, you say it is unrelated?

In my view, having a dialog is better than a debate. For you, it is a contest, but for me it is informational whether I win or lose.

Every activity requires energy, whether it is light, heat, kinetic, electric, electromagnetic. I can envision light, heat, electricity, and electromagnetic energy being part of God’s arsenal. According to universal law, matter can be converted into energy. Thus in order for this energy to become available, there has to be matter somewhere. So, spirituality has to include matter somewhere.

 

[tonyrey]

There are far more important aspects of reality. Do you base all your decisions on energy, mass, speed of light?

By detecting purposeful activity.

If they didn’t they wouldn’t survive.

No response…

BTW It would be far more to the point to refute my statements than ask unrelated questions…

You make these assertions without providing convincing evidence. When I ask you about evidence, you say it is unrelated?

How are energy, mass, and the speed of light related to the topic of biological Design?

In my view, having a dialog is better than a debate. For you, it is a contest, but for me it is informational whether I win or lose.

Ad hominem.

Every activity requires energy, whether it is light, heat, kinetic, electric, electromagnetic. I can envision light, heat, electricity, and electromagnetic energy being part of God’s arsenal. According to universal law, matter can be converted into energy. Thus in order for this energy to become available, there has to be matter somewhere. So, spirituality has to include matter somewhere.

An illogical deduction based on the false assumption that all energy is physical - for which there is no evidence whatsoever.

 

[nmgauss]

Did the Designer design bacteria before viruses. If so, what is the purpose of viruses other than destroying cells in the bacterium and why is this good?

“Viruses are tiny packages of genetic material without a living cell enveloping them. The key to their power is the nucleic acid they possess. When a virus attacks and infects a vulnerable living cell, it pours its own DNA and/or RNA inside. Once inside, the hereditary material begins a virtual Coup d’état. It attaches itself to the cell’s existing DNA and sets up a new command system. Now, instead of producing substances the cell needs to survive, it is forced to produce viral nucleic acid. One cell can be used to create thousands of new, mature viruses. The fastest virus only needs 24 minutes to explode a cell and release new virus particles. Cells are damaged and destroyed with each new birth, and chaos is all that is left in the wake.”

 

[rossum]

Your concept of life is inconsistent with the Buddhist belief that physical events and spiritual events are closely interrelated

Shall we agree that you don’t give me lessons on Buddhism and I won’t give you lessons on Christianity? As I have said before, I am not discussing life, I am discussing biology, which is a more limited subject. This thread is about “Biological Design”.

Can the effects of hypnosis be analysed by mathematical calculation?

How is this relevant? I was not calculating the effects of hypnosis, I was calculating the effects of differential rates of reproduction. We can mathematically analyse the effects of differential rates of reproduction and get useful results from our calculations. Just because we cannot calculate X does not mean that we cannot make a useful calculation of Y.

The Bible does not tell me the name of Noah’s wife. Does that mean that nothing else in the Bible is valid because it cannot answer that one question?

Did human designers arrange DNA and RNA in the first place? If not do you ascribe such a feat to blind processes? If so produce verifiable evidence.

We have evidence of natural processes altering DNA, both of mutations occurring and natural selection. For mutations, see the Luria–Delbrück experiment. For an example of natural selection, see Haemoglobin C protects against clinical Plasmodium falciparum malaria.

Where is your evidence of the presence of a designer with the required abilities present at the relevant time and place?

The great success of science is restricted to sense data which are far less valuable and far less significant than spiritual reality.

Then I suggest you take up a life of prayer and contemplation, rejecting all use of the science which makes your computer possible. The existence of a $100 bill does not make a $5 bill useless. You are on very weak ground with this argument.

The crude notion of “manipulating RNA or DNA” is an anthropomorphic distortion of teleological explanation.

Then why did you ask me above about the arranging of RNA and DNA? I assume that you will now withdraw all your probability arguments about how unlikely particular arrangements of DNA or RNA are. All of those arguments you have now declared a “distortion” of the teleological explanation.

I am still seeing a lot of unsupported assertion and a distinct lack of evidence from you.

rossum

 

[Linusthe2nd]

Evidence please. You are assuming what you need to prove.

Sorry, that won’t fly. The fact that it holds for one universe is all we need. God just pushes the goal posts further down the field to no purpose except to erect a pseudo argument that doesn’t hold water - a red herring that most intelligent people recognize as such.

Evidence please. An eternal Multiverse does not need a cause, any more than an eternal God needs a cause. The Tripitaka tells me that the Multiverse is eternal and that no gods are eternal. I know that your scripture differs, but since we follow different religions that is only to be expected. Remember that I do not share a lot of your assumptions, particularly those that are based on the Abrahamic view of the universe.

Where did Hawking say that? All you are proving is that you have not read what he said carefully enough. All he says is that the universe contains zero energy.

You don’t have anything to bet with. Nothing has a soul:

“All the elements of reality are soulless.”
When one realises this by wisdom,
then one does not heed ill.
This is the Path of Purity.

– Dhammapada 20:7

Another point where Buddhism differs from the Abrahamic religions.

rossum

The evidence has been given to you hundreds of times on this thread. The trouble is you have " dug in your heels. " The evidence is evident to every man and every woman, the learned and the ignorant, it is no mystery. But for hard reasoning I refer you again to the works of Thomas Aquinas - all and any of them. Linus2nd

 

[1AugustSon7]

Did the Designer design bacteria before viruses. If so, what is the purpose of viruses other than destroying cells in the bacterium and why is this good?

“Viruses are tiny packages of genetic material without a living cell enveloping them. The key to their power is the nucleic acid they possess. When a virus attacks and infects a vulnerable living cell, it pours its own DNA and/or RNA inside. Once inside, the hereditary material begins a virtual Coup d’état. It attaches itself to the cell’s existing DNA and sets up a new command system. Now, instead of producing substances the cell needs to survive, it is forced to produce viral nucleic acid. One cell can be used to create thousands of new, mature viruses. The fastest virus only needs 24 minutes to explode a cell and release new virus particles. Cells are damaged and destroyed with each new birth, and chaos is all that is left in the wake.”

In the first place, viruses aren’t always bad or harmful anymore than bacteria necessarily is: bacteria can literally be vital for our survival. I recall reading some papers that posited a potential relationship between crib-death and excessively sanitized environments for newborns, the theory being that the unfortunate babes did not receive the necessary exposure to not only harmless but necessary bacteria that our bodies have a symbiotic relationship with and are needed for, e.g., properly breaking down and digesting food.

Viruses and parasites do not intend (are not naturally designed) to kill their hosts : that’s as much a catastrophe for a virus’s survival as it is its hosts’. In other words, viruses are not murderous by any stretch of the imagination. Today, of course, we have to worry about increasingly mutated viruses that are directly or indirectly man-made (super-viruses).

Teleology is unavoidable regardless in nature.

Your objection reminds me of the ones the pagans used to desperately contradict Christianity after the Empire officially adopted the religion: they would mock Christianity by talking about various diseases, ugly creatures, dangerous creatures (e.g., snakes) or instances of monsters or mutants to deny the Christian doctrine of the essential goodness, profound beauty, harmony, reasonableness and orderliness of Creation. Of course, anyone who studied biology and the environment in high school knows about the animal kingdom, biological hierarchy and harmony and knows its beauty and realizes that these things all come together to serve a whole: one man’s feared snake venom is another man’s potential cure for his terrible disease.

You should read Saint Augustine’s the City of God. Little has changed.

 

[1AugustSon7]

Shall we agree that you don’t give me lessons on Buddhism and I won’t give you lessons on Christianity?

Rossum,

My best friend, a former Mormon, converted to Buddhism also and so far both you and he demonstrate increasingly an acute viciousness and hostility toward everything Western and Christian, as also did a former friend of mine from high school who, after taking one of those post-high school tours of Europe for a few years, came back with a perverse malice toward everything Western and Christian. He also explained some neat tricks some Buddhist monk is supposed to have shown him in some Spanish Buddhist monastery that really impressed him as spiritual powers over the corporeal. One thing was certain though, there was something monstrously changed about him: he seemed all filthy inside. So far I have seen an unfailing relationship between Westerners converting to Buddhism and becoming vicious as a consequence.

I will give our Buddhist friends the benefit of the doubt and just say that in reality Westerners tend to sumper-impose their prejudices into Buddhism and simply use Buddhism as substitute spirituality in lieu of Christianity.

Finally, please realize the outrageous stupidity required for ANY man, ostensibly spiritual, to claim that there are no souls to be found in the corporeal world or order: rationality, logic or judgement is intrinsically immaterial of its nature and thus necessarily something spiritual. The text you cited is the thoughtless raving of either a dupe or a dunce.

 

[rossum]

The evidence has been given to you hundreds of times on this thread.

You have no evidence. All you have is “it sure looks designed to me”. Well I have, “It sure don’t look designed to me.” What actual scientific, biological evidence do you have? Personal opinions are subjective, and do not count as scientific evidence within biology. Remember, we are talking about biological design in this thread.

rossum

 

[rossum]

My best friend, a former Mormon, converted to Buddhism also and so far both you and he demonstrate increasingly an acute viciousness and hostility toward everything Western and Christian,

I think you will find that Charles Darwin was Western and, for a time, Christian. As to hostility to Christianity, many Buddhists, including myself, consider that Jesus was a Bodhisattva. That is high prise indeed, since Bodhisattvas are closer to enlightenment than gods.

Finally, please realize the outrageous stupidity required for ANY man, ostensibly spiritual, to claim that there are no souls to be found in the corporeal world or order: rationality, logic or judgement is intrinsically immaterial of its nature and thus necessarily something spiritual.

You are reifying various emergent phenomena. That is an error, and errors lead to suffering. If you try to drink the water you see in a mirage then you will suffer from thirst.

rossum

 

[inocente]

Rossum,

My best friend, a former Mormon, converted to Buddhism also and so far both you and he demonstrate increasingly an acute viciousness and hostility toward everything Western and Christian, as also did a former friend of mine from high school who, after taking one of those post-high school tours of Europe for a few years, came back with a perverse malice toward everything Western and Christian. He also explained some neat tricks some Buddhist monk is supposed to have shown him in some Spanish Buddhist monastery that really impressed him as spiritual powers over the corporeal. One thing was certain though, there was something monstrously changed about him: he seemed all filthy inside. So far I have seen an unfailing relationship between Westerners converting to Buddhism and becoming vicious as a consequence.

I will give our Buddhist friends the benefit of the doubt and just say that in reality Westerners tend to sumper-impose their prejudices into Buddhism and simply use Buddhism as substitute spirituality in lieu of Christianity.

Finally, please realize the outrageous stupidity required for ANY man, ostensibly spiritual, to claim that there are no souls to be found in the corporeal world or order: rationality, logic or judgement is intrinsically immaterial of its nature and thus necessarily something spiritual. The text you cited is the thoughtless raving of either a dupe or a dunce.

I love the idea that touring Western Europe gives one a perverse malice toward everything Western, as if the West starts at Kansas.

Let’s be clear that intelligent design started as a US political movement which attempted to overturn the US constitution and teach creationism as science, but instead got laughed out of court. Maybe all Christians in Kansas in 2013 sign up to design but that has not been the case in the rest of the world for two thousand years, much as design fans would like all Christians to be in their pocket.

I’ve only read the last few pages of this thread and was thinking how well rossum has remained charitable compared with some design fans. Finally, please realize that calling people stupid is not a rational argument, it just means you failed to understand.

 

[1AugustSon7]

I think you will find that Charles Darwin was Western and, for a time, Christian. As to hostility to Christianity, many Buddhists, including myself, consider that Jesus was a Bodhisattva. That is high prise indeed, since Bodhisattvas are closer to enlightenment than gods.

Meaningless fluff that evades the issue; notwithstanding, Charles Darwin’s great, great grand daughter sees no problems between Catholicism and Darwinism and is now an apologist, making (no surprise) quite a stir: catholicherald.co.uk/news/2013/06/13/descendant-of-darwin-becomes-a-catholic-apologist/

You can read her story in her own words here: I’m a direct descendant of Darwin, but I have discovered the beauty of the Catholic faith

Notwithstanding, even Darwin admitted the difficulties of a reductionist program that would eliminate teleology from biology, simply because especially living nature screams teleology through and through from beginning to end.

Finally, on this issue, biology is especially or in the first place the study of corporeal life, though obviously it must include a consideration of inanimate factors like the environment, soil, sunlight, water, salt and so on. Your arbitrary redefinition of biology is totally unscientific and completely unwarranted: a biologist would certainly be surprised to learn that he doesn’t study life.

You are reifying various emergent phenomena. That is an error, and errors lead to suffering. If you try to drink the water you see in a mirage then you will suffer from thirst.

rossum

What nonsense! You are the one in fact abstracting parts out of their necessary context and reifying them: you have done it incessantly with DNA and RNA that is perfectly useless outside of a living organism, just as it becomes useless inside of a dead cell; but now I am supposed to believe that you believe this procedure is some gross and fatal error?

Finally on this point: if you have managed, rossum, to explain conscious experience - much less our own self-awareness, free-will, intelligence and the faculty of the imagination- by recourse to a reductive materialist method such that precludes us from actually having to consider the conscious human experience the rest of us in our daily lives live and breathe, then bravo! I’m curious, though, why haven’t you claimed your Nobel Prize yet? Why are you keeping your solution to the most conspicuous problem in modern science a secret? After all, you are speaking as if it is simply scientific fact that the conscious experience of even animals can be explained in strictly materialistic terms without collapsing into outrageous absurdity; as if you were not, in fact, just mindlessly following the random diktat of some Buddhist-cum-Sceptic divine who had the rashness to proclaim that evidence of immaterial souls was completely wanting from reality or the physical world; and - behold! - the mystery of the dogmatic sceptic! To some he is the enlightened master of the paradox; for others, he’s a walking, talking (though perhaps not so much thinking) contradiction.

No, rossum: the mind-body problem is not so easily dismissed. Your conscious experience remains as utterly inexplicable in strictly physicalist or materialist terms as ever it has been: your consciousness is not a mirage and I beg you to drink from your own very real rationality before you mentally dehydrate and die as a consequence of drinking the salt water of mindless scepticism.

 

[inocente]

Meaningless fluff that evades the issue; notwithstanding, Charles Darwin’s great, great grand daughter sees no problems between Catholicism and Darwinism and is now an apologist, making (no surprise) quite a stir: catholicherald.co.uk/news/2013/06/13/descendant-of-darwin-becomes-a-catholic-apologist/

You can read her story in her own words here: I’m a direct descendant of Darwin, but I have discovered the beauty of the Catholic faith

In the second article she says “By the time I was in my teens Mum had become a Buddhist.”

Lauras’ mom was previously Catholic.

Laura also says “So when people ask “A Darwin and a Catholic?” what they’re saying is that I confound expectations. They expect an understanding of science and philosophy to be incompatible with religious belief. Inevitably, that makes me a target and people want to argue. It can feel unpleasant and unsought but abdicating responsibility for answering those difficult questions is not an option for a baptised Christian.”

Indeed.

 

[1AugustSon7]

I love the idea that touring Western Europe gives one a perverse malice toward everything Western, as if the West starts at Kansas.

Alright, inocente, seeing as you will finish your post by rashly accusing me of a failure to understand, let’s make something very clear right here: at no point did I claim that touring Western Europe gives one a perverse malice toward everything Western: this high-school friend’s exterior drift to Western Europe was a consequece of an interior desire (or movement of the soul) to seek out the new, the different or the exotic though, perhaps, I should have made that absolutely explicit rather than relying on people to make a common sense inference of what’s usually going on inside a young man fresh out of high-school who wants to take a sabbatical across Europe before going to college; or perhaps I was hoping the example of my other friend (who did not go to Europe but dropped his Mormonism for Buddhism) might have removed any inference that I saw some necessary connection between a physical locality and a spiritual conversion. I do not.

Let’s be clear that intelligent design started as a US political movement which attempted to overturn the US constitution

Let’s be clear that this is ridiculous and conspirational paranoia to boot. Teleology and the belief that the whole universe is rationally ordered goes back to possibly even before the Athenian constitution, let alone the American one. I think you might be in need of a history lesson that does not imply that time began when the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth.

and teach creationism as science,

Creationism!? Where? I’m always terrified that this zombie is going to crawl out of the closet and eat my brain!

but instead got laughed out of court

As did the inalienable rights and Justice due to murdered, guiltless children.

Maybe all Christians in Kansas in 2013 sign up to design but that has not been the case in the rest of the world for two thousand years, much as design fans would like all Christians to be in their pocket.

What on earth is your preoccuptation with Kansas about? Toto, this is not Kansas!

I’ve only read the last few pages of this thread and was thinking how well rossum has remained charitable compared with some design fans. Finally, please realize that calling people stupid is not a rational argument, it just means you failed to understand.

Maybe you should actually read the thread then: there is a reason why some posters on it have gotten rather tired of his feeble complaints, gross oversimplifications and reductionism, claiming that he has “dug in his heels” into a fixed belief. Or perhaps you have just rashly assumed that said posters are themselves ignoramuses and bigots (possibly all from Kansas) because the Enlightened rossum with whom you are powerfully impressed irresistibly banishes their benighted folly that they give up with him out of shame of their own supidity. Indeed, maybe you should send him to Kansas where he can work his magic and dispel the darkness of those obstinate Christians!

 

[1AugustSon7]

In the second article she says “By the time I was in my teens Mum had become a Buddhist.”

… And? Her brother would also deny all forms of organized religion. Laura deliberately chose to embrace her Catholicism.

Lauras’ mom was previously Catholic.

Yes I did actually read the article.

Laura also says “So when people ask “A Darwin and a Catholic?” what they’re saying is that I confound expectations. They expect an understanding of science and philosophy to be incompatible with religious belief. Inevitably, that makes me a target and people want to argue. It can feel unpleasant and unsought but abdicating responsibility for answering those difficult questions is not an option for a baptised Christian.”

Indeed.

Are you trying to make a relevant point here? Notice that Laura did not herself convert to Buddhism.

 

[nmgauss]

The evidence has been given to you hundreds of times on this thread. The trouble is you have " dug in your heels. " The evidence is evident to every man and every woman, the learned and the ignorant, it is no mystery. But for hard reasoning I refer you again to the works of Thomas Aquinas - all and any of them. Linus2nd

Can you help us by citing the exact reference?

 

[1AugustSon7]

You have no evidence. All you have is “it sure looks designed to me”. Well I have, “It sure don’t look designed to me.” What actual scientific, biological evidence do you have? Personal opinions are subjective, and do not count as scientific evidence within biology. Remember, we are talking about biological design in this thread.

rossum

You are using your own subjective opinion, however (“Well I have, ‘It sure don’t look designed to me.’”); and the evidence for design permeates every description (even by biologists) of actual biological (i.e., bodily ) life and behaviour, especially human activity that is always undertaken with some rational (even if imperfect) end (telos) in mind.

We don’t pretend a squirrel’s tail isn’t wonderfully suited for providing the squirrel with balance as he, e.g., climbs trees; we don’t pretend that a Great White Shark’s teeth just so accidentally happen to make shredding Seal meat rather easy. It requires a good deal of violence (some might just call it wilful denial) to sanitize all mention of teleological features from especially a description of the biological order, even down to the genetic level. The very words ‘organ’ and ‘organic’ come from the Greek word for ‘instrument’; hence Aristotle’s Organon is not about biology but provides the logical tools or instruments a philosopher needs to engage in philosophy and especially to detect and refute sophistic arguments, which are often by a dialectical process ultimately reducible to a self-contradictory statement: i.e., the philosophical instruments are provided and ordered to some other, higher end or purpose and are not ends in themselves. Indeed, Logic itself is not an end in itself but ultimately serves Truth, Goodness and Beauty (the Philosopher’s trinity) or, from a Christian standpoint and strengthened by revelation, Love (though to be sure Aristotle himself is supposed to have encouraged one of his students in his hypothesis that Love is the key to understanding everything).

DNA - the “blueprint of life” - makes no sense and is perfectly useless outside of the holistic context of a living organism: i.e., it exists to serve or fulfil some greater or higher end beyond itself and only within that context does it acquire meaning and value.

 

[Linusthe2nd]

Can you help us by citing the exact reference?

The short answer is to go back over my posts on this thread ( I’m not going to repeat them) and some of the others.

The long answer is " …ite ad Thomam…"

Linus2nd

 

[inocente]

Alright, inocente, seeing as you will finish your post by rashly accusing me of a failure to understand, let’s make something very clear right here: at no point did I claim that touring Western Europe gives one a perverse malice toward everything Western: this high-school friend’s exterior drift to Western Europe was a consequece of an interior desire (or movement of the soul) to seek out the new, the different or the exotic though, perhaps, I should have made that absolutely explicit rather than relying on people to make a common sense inference of what’s usually going on inside a young man fresh out of high-school who wants to take a sabbatical across Europe before going to college; or perhaps I was hoping the example of my other friend (who did not go to Europe but dropped his Mormonism for Buddhism) might have removed any inference that I saw some necessary connection between a physical locality and a spiritual conversion. I do not.

In that case next time I recommend leaving out the whole “after taking one of those post-high school tours of Europe for a few years” bit to be more accommodating to those of us not blessed with the ability to read minds.

Let’s be clear that this is ridiculous and conspirational paranoia to boot. Teleology and the belief that the whole universe is rationally ordered goes back to possibly even before the Athenian constitution, let alone the American one. I think you might be in need of a history lesson that does not imply that time began when the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth.

Creationism!? Where? I’m always terrified that this zombie is going to crawl out of the closet and eat my brain!

Thing is, Jesus never preached on any of this, it must have been way down on His list, so if it has nothing to do with salvation then it can’t have anything important to do with faith and therefore it’s purely a secular pastime.

*As did the inalienable rights and Justice due to murdered, guiltless children. *

Where did that get laughed out of court then?

What on earth is your preoccuptation with Kansas about? Toto, this is not Kansas!

I went to Kansas once, it was closed. Just pointing out that only around 4% of the world population is American, no biggy.

Maybe you should actually read the thread then: there is a reason why some posters on it have gotten rather tired of his feeble complaints, gross oversimplifications and reductionism, claiming that he has “dug in his heels” into a fixed belief. Or perhaps you have just rashly assumed that said posters are themselves ignoramuses and bigots (possibly all from Kansas) because the Enlightened rossum with whom you are powerfully impressed irresistibly banishes their benighted folly that they give up with him out of shame of their own supidity. Indeed, maybe you should send him to Kansas where he can work his magic and dispel the darkness of those obstinate Christians!

You write well.

But no, I’ve been on these design threads before and it’s all deja vu, reading two pages brought it all back, the carping and the insults.

In my first church the pastor banned discussion of evolution or design within church grounds because it has no bearing on our lives whatsoever, doesn’t put food in mouths, make the world a better place or get us to heaven, yet for some strange reason people get all angry and fall out. Understandable on a subject like abortion of course, but not for this. Imho.