Biological Design Argument?

[rossum]

What I can’t figure out is the genetics of Jesus. By asserting that God had a son with Mary, in biological terms, he was automatically a male. In that case, women had no representative in heaven. If God is masculine and Mary was feminine, then the haploid part of God would have to combine with the haploid part of Mary to develop a normal real diploid human. Now the fact that in human terms, the chances of Mary having a son vs. a daughter were 50-50, how was it a sure thing that the child that developed in Mary’s womb would be a son? Would God have achieved its purpose if the child had been a female?

Perhaps we need to identify the correct Holy Prepuce and do a DNA sequencing? That might well produce some interesting results.

As to the sex of a child, that is determined by the father/sperm, so it would not have been much of a problem for God.

rossum

 

[buffalo]

Professor Behe’s Irreducible Complexity is a good example of how science works.

When Darwin wrote “On the Origin of Species”, he included ways to show how his theory could be falsified; falsification is important in science. Behe thought about what Darwin said, IIRC he actually quotes it in one of his books. Behe came up with his idea of Irreducible Complexity and proposed a hypothesis:
Irreducibly Complex systems cannot evolve.Other scientists took this away and tested it. Science is big on testing hypotheses. That testing produced some good and interesting work, for example Thornhill and Ussery (1999) and Lenski (2003). The result of this work was that Behe was partially right; IC systems cannot evolve by a direct route however they can evolve by indirect routes. Behe’s idea triggered some useful work and helped to refine the theory of evolution.

Behe then modified his hypothesis to reflect the results of the experiments. This is again correct science. If a hypothesis is badly wrong it is rejected. If it is not so badly wrong, then it is modified and retested. Behe’s hypothesis was partly correct, so he modified it. This was good science on Behe’s part. The modified hypothesis now reads:
Irreducibly Complex systems cannot evolve by direct routes and are unlikely to evolve by indirect routes.Work now concentrated on just how unlikely the indirect routes were. Behe himself has done work on this, see Behe and Snoke (2004). That paper indicated that a simple IC system could evolve in 20,000 years.

Behe was partly correct, and his correct observation has been incorporated into science. Further work, including Behe’s own paper, has shown that although it is more difficult to evolve IC systems by indirect routes that they can evolve within reasonable timescales. 20,000 years is not a long time over 3.7 billion years.

rossum

Not seeing where 20,000 years is even on the radar. Please point me to it.

But, we do see Behe’s work showing IC systems are a long shot.

 

[tonyrey]

I do not. The Buddhist material universe is intermittent. There are times when a material universe exists, and there are times when one does not.

Is there scientific evidence for this belief?

Is there any evidence for this belief?

[/QUOTE]

 

[rossum]

Is there any evidence for this belief?

It is a belief. Evidence is not required. The Buddhist description of the wider universe is not scientific and not relevant to biology.

You have not provided any evidence for your belief that the designer is active now. Where is your evidence, or are you prepared to admit that your belief is also not scientific?

rossum

 

[TheCuriousCat]

I don’t think any of those items need to be proven for the point to hold.

1. Jesus did not require a unique brain, perhaps every human being has some aspect of their brain ordered towards doing the will of God, which would mean that the ordering itself could not have arisen as an evolutionary advance ( Darwin’s contention was that every part of every biological species must have been the result of evolutionary advance in order for his theory to hold.) I am merely claiming that a brain (any human brain) that is ordered supernaturally to the will of God could not have that ordering as a sheer result of natural selection. It wouldn’t make Darwinian sense.

 

[Peter_Plato]

Peter Plato;10871276:

You just said something that wasn’t wrong. Awesome.

You have a quaint way with words. So patronizing and yet so patient.

If the a virgin birth happened, it would not only violate evolution, but everything that we know about genetics as well.

Where did God’s DNA come from? What did his genes code for? Does that mean he has a body, and if not, why is the DNA compatible with human DNA? Or did God not have a body, rather the DNA was it specially created for the event, and if so, then it isn’t really his is it? How could Jesus be truly ‘begotten’ if the DNA wasn’t his Fathers? Does God’s DNA have another half that Jesus didn’t inherit? Did Jesus inherit his mother’s or father’s blood type? How about eye colour? Would Jesus have been fertile? I mean, his Y-chromosome wasn’t human, would it work as normal?

Miracles, by definition, violate the laws of nature. Are you suggesting that no scientific theory is valid?

The “laws” of nature are not logically necessary. The apparent “laws” of nature are descriptions of the consistency in nature. That is all. There is nothing necessarily or logically binding about the “laws” of nature. Gravity may be a consistent fact about the universe, but gravity is not a logical necessity. Neither is anything else about nature.

 

[Jotto]

Gonzales’ book has unfortunately been rendered somewhat obsolete by recent discoveries of large numbers of exoplanets, many of which are sufficiently earth-like to render any argument based on the uniqueness of Earth moot.

See Planet Candidates for some of the basic data.

Please remember that discussion of evolution is temporarily banned, see stickies. Astronomy is fine, but moving into biology may cause problems.

rossum

The existence of exoplanets hardly antiquates Ganzales’s argument as what he is essentially arguing is that it is the various physical conditions in the whole of the universe that have made the existence of not only life on earth and every other planet where it may be found possible; but the very existence of a universe in which stars and solar systems can come to be.

Please say more about the discussion of evolution being temporarily banned as I am not familiar with what you are talking about here.

 

[Jotto]

rossum;10870124:

I do not. The Buddhist material universe is intermittent. There are times when a material universe exists, and there are times when one does not.

Is there scientific evidence for this belief?

Quantum physics theorizes with a good deal of evidence that what we know as “atoms” or “atomic particles” come and go constantly. All of which is to suggest that not only did God create but that he is continuously creating all that is.

 

[Jotto]

It is a belief. Evidence is not required. The Buddhist description of the wider universe is not scientific and not relevant to biology.

You have not provided any evidence for your belief that the designer is active now. Where is your evidence, or are you prepared to admit that your belief is also not scientific?

rossum

On the contrary, I think it has become quite clear that with its notion of impermanence, among other concepts, Buddhism is quite compatible with modern science including biology.

 

[prodigalson2011]

If the a virgin birth happened, it would not only violate evolution, but everything that we know about genetics as well.

New scientific discoveries themselves often violate everything we thought we knew before. But that is irrelevant, because the virgin birth does not violate evolution or genetics any more than cloning does.

Where did God’s DNA come from?

DNA forms the biological organism. God is not a biological organism and therefore has no DNA. Jesus did not have God-DNA. He was the mind of God in a human body. The mind of God, or God in general, is not a physical thing, ergo there is no “divine DNA.”

What did his genes code for? Does that mean he has a body, and if not, why is the DNA compatible with human DNA? Or did God not have a body, rather the DNA was it specially created for the event, and if so, then it isn’t really his is it? How could Jesus be truly ‘begotten’ if the DNA wasn’t his Fathers? Does God’s DNA have another half that Jesus didn’t inherit? Did Jesus inherit his mother’s or father’s blood type? How about eye colour? Would Jesus have been fertile? I mean, his Y-chromosome wasn’t human, would it work as normal?

Jesus’ human nature (i.e. DNA) came from Mary alone. Of course, the objection would be that in that case, he would have been a woman. But, as long as we’re considering something as extraordinary as a virgin birth, it’s not that much of a stretch to think that the intelligence that coordinated the entire event could have tweaked her chromosomes.

The reference to Jesus’ being “begotten” does not refer to the incarnation (i.e. his human birth) but his eternal nature. He is eternally begotten of the father. He was born of Mary. But He has existed from all eternity: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.”

You have to remember that Christians believe in both physical and spiritual realities. Jesus was a combination of human (physical) and divine (spiritual) natures. The human nature came from Mary; the divine nature, which is purely spiritual, came, obviously, from God, who by this mystery attached Himself to a fully human body.

Miracles, by definition, violate the laws of nature. Are you suggesting that no scientific theory is valid?

Miracles do not violate the laws of nature, they supersede them. The author of the law is not bound by it; it is bound by him.

As for your question, scientific theories are valid so far as they go, but as the staunch atheist philosopher Bertrand Russell himself noted:

*"It is obvious that if we are asked why we believe it the sun will rise to-morrow, we shall naturally answer, ‘Because it always has risen every day’. We have a firm belief that it will rise in the future, because it has risen in the past. If we are challenged as to why we believe that it will continue to rise as heretofore, we may appeal to the laws of motion: the earth, we shall say, is a freely rotating body, and such bodies do not cease to rotate unless something interferes from outside, and there is nothing outside to interfere with thee earth between now and to-morrow. Of course it might be doubted whether we are quite certain that there is nothing outside to interfere, but this is not the interesting doubt. The interesting doubt is as to whether the laws of motion will remain in operation until to-morrow. If this doubt is raised, we find ourselves in the same position as when the doubt about the sunrise was first raised.

The only reason for believing that the laws of motion remain in operation is that they have operated hitherto, so far as our knowledge of the past enables us to judge. It is true that we have a greater body of evidence from the past in favour of the laws of motion than we have in favour of the sunrise, because the sunrise is merely a particular case of fulfilment of the laws of motion, and there are countless other particular cases.

But the real question is: Do any number of cases of a law being fulfilled in the past afford evidence that it will be fulfilled in the future? If not, it becomes plain that we have no ground whatever for expecting the sun to rise to-morrow, or for expecting the bread we shall eat at our next meal not to poison us, or for any of the other scarcely conscious expectations that control our daily lives. It is to be observed that all such expectations are only probable; thus we have not to seek for a proof that they must be fulfilled, but only for some reason in favour of the view that they are likely to be fulfilled."*

It is fallacious to assume that simply because something has always been the case that it must necessarily always be so.

Christians, however, believe that scientific theories are perfectly valid as far as nature is concerned because we believe that God has created an orderly universe and, except in rare cases, leaves the natural processes therein to their own devices, since they are all, ultimately, HIS devices. They do what He intended them to do. Miracles, then, are not a violation of nature but a rare intervention by the Creator into His own creation. Does an inventor violate his invention when he modifies it?

 

[TheCuriousCat]

New scientific discoveries themselves often violate everything we thought we knew before. But that is irrelevant, because the virgin birth does not violate evolution or genetics any more than cloning does.

DNA forms the biological organism. God is not a biological organism and therefore has no DNA. Jesus did not have God-DNA. He was the mind of God in a human body. The mind of God, or God in general, is not a physical thing, ergo there is no “divine DNA.”

Jesus’ human nature (i.e. DNA) came from Mary alone. Of course, the objection would be that in that case, he would have been a woman. But, as long as we’re considering something as extraordinary as a virgin birth, it’s not that much of a stretch to think that the intelligence that coordinated the entire event could have tweaked her chromosomes.

The reference to Jesus’ being “begotten” does not refer to the incarnation (i.e. his human birth) but his eternal nature. He is eternally begotten of the father. He was born of Mary. But He has existed from all eternity: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.”

You have to remember that Christians believe in both physical and spiritual realities. Jesus was a combination of human (physical) and divine (spiritual) natures. The human nature came from Mary; the divine nature, which is purely spiritual, came, obviously, from God, who by this mystery attached Himself to a fully human body.

Miracles do not violate the laws of nature, they supersede them. The author of the law is not bound by it; it is bound by him.

As for your question, scientific theories are valid so far as they go, but as the staunch atheist philosopher Bertrand Russell himself noted:

*"It is obvious that if we are asked why we believe it the sun will rise to-morrow, we shall naturally answer, ‘Because it always has risen every day’. We have a firm belief that it will rise in the future, because it has risen in the past. If we are challenged as to why we believe that it will continue to rise as heretofore, we may appeal to the laws of motion: the earth, we shall say, is a freely rotating body, and such bodies do not cease to rotate unless something interferes from outside, and there is nothing outside to interfere with thee earth between now and to-morrow. Of course it might be doubted whether we are quite certain that there is nothing outside to interfere, but this is not the interesting doubt. The interesting doubt is as to whether the laws of motion will remain in operation until to-morrow. If this doubt is raised, we find ourselves in the same position as when the doubt about the sunrise was first raised.

The only reason for believing that the laws of motion remain in operation is that they have operated hitherto, so far as our knowledge of the past enables us to judge. It is true that we have a greater body of evidence from the past in favour of the laws of motion than we have in favour of the sunrise, because the sunrise is merely a particular case of fulfilment of the laws of motion, and there are countless other particular cases.

But the real question is: Do any number of cases of a law being fulfilled in the past afford evidence that it will be fulfilled in the future? If not, it becomes plain that we have no ground whatever for expecting the sun to rise to-morrow, or for expecting the bread we shall eat at our next meal not to poison us, or for any of the other scarcely conscious expectations that control our daily lives. It is to be observed that all such expectations are only probable; thus we have not to seek for a proof that they must be fulfilled, but only for some reason in favour of the view that they are likely to be fulfilled."*

It is fallacious to assume that simply because something has always been the case that it must necessarily always be so.

Christians, however, believe that scientific theories are perfectly valid as far as nature is concerned because we believe that God has created an orderly universe and, except in rare cases, leaves the natural processes therein to their own devices, since they are all, ultimately, HIS devices. They do what He intended them to do. Miracles, then, are not a violation of nature but a rare intervention by the Creator into His own creation. Does an inventor violate his invention when he modifies it?

Okay, here is the thing. I don’t have any interest in getting into a long theological debate.

My only reason for posting in the first place was to point out that the contention one poster made that somehow the divine mission of Jesus negated evolution was just plain wrong. That conversation, like so many discussions on this site, turned into a bizarre twisting path into the realm of absurdity.

I don’t think that there is any valid reason to think that Jesus was anything other than a man,and I don’t believe there was a virgin birth, so I haven’t put a lot of effort into getting to know the theology behind it.

I’m not actually confused about the philosophical underpinnings of science and empiricism. If I said anything that suggested I was, it was probably a result of writing in the heat of the moment.

I appreciate that you put a lot of effort into your post, and I think it was well written. You are clearly very erudite and put a lot of thought into what you say, but I’m just not the right audience. Sorry to be so blunt.

 

[tonyrey]

Quantum physics theorizes with a good deal of evidence that what we know as “atoms” or “atomic particles” come and go constantly.

There is a vast difference between an intermittent universe (“There are times when a material universe exists, and there are times when one does not”) and “**atomic particles **which come and go constantly”.

All of which is to suggest that not only did God create but that he is continuously creating all that is.

I agree!

 

[prodigalson2011]

Okay, here is the thing. I don’t have any interest in getting into a long theological debate.

Then I can’t help but ask what you’re doing on a Catholic philosophy forum?

My only reason for posting in the first place was to point out that the contention one poster made that somehow the divine mission of Jesus negated evolution was just plain wrong. That conversation, like so many discussions on this site, turned into a bizarre twisting path into the realm of absurdity.

Fair enough. Part of the post to which I responded caught my eye in passing and I felt compelled to respond for some reason.

I don’t think that there is any valid reason to think that Jesus was anything other than a man,and I don’t believe there was a virgin birth, so I haven’t put a lot of effort into getting to know the theology behind it.

Those two points are, of course, an entirely different conversation.

I’m not actually confused about the philosophical underpinnings of science and empiricism. If I said anything that suggested I was, it was probably a result of writing in the heat of the moment.

It happens.

I appreciate that you put a lot of effort into your post, and I think it was well written. You are clearly very erudite and put a lot of thought into what you say, but I’m just not the right audience. Sorry to be so blunt.

The question with which I opened this response raises its head again. To join a Catholic forum and not be interested in discussing the basic tenets thereof seems an awfully strange thing to do :whacky:

 

[rossum]

The existence of exoplanets hardly antiquates Ganzales’s argument as what he is essentially arguing is that it is the various physical conditions in the whole of the universe that have made the existence of not only life on earth and every other planet where it may be found possible; but the very existence of a universe in which stars and solar systems can come to be.

If you are placing design at the level of cosmology, then there is no impact on biology. Standard biology can work in this universe because the universe was designed in such a way that biology would work. There is no need for any further special intervention to make biology work. If biology requires extra intervention, then the universe is not fine-tuned, but sloppily tuned and requires further adjustment.

Please say more about the discussion of evolution being temporarily banned as I am not familiar with what you are talking about here.

See Temporary Ban on Evolution/Atheism Threads.

rossum

 

[Peter_Plato]

If you are placing design at the level of cosmology, then there is no impact on biology. Standard biology can work in this universe because the universe was designed in such a way that biology would work. There is no need for any further special intervention to make biology work. If biology requires extra intervention, then the universe is not fine-tuned, but sloppily tuned and requires further adjustment.

rossum

Your assessment above sounds more like a personal pronouncement than it does an evidential claim. Of course you provide no warrant for such an assessment and since you have no particular insight into the intentions of this designer you have extended yourself far past what you can possibly know about what would or would not constitute “sloppy” tuning, despite what you claim. It sounds like you have a personal distaste for any design that is open to further revision simply because you tend towards deism.

A cosmic designer may have had very good reason to remain “hands on.” This is not necessarily a sign of weak design. Are baby mammals, for example, less well designed animals because the parents must intervene for a much longer period than, say, cockroaches or maggots, which have the capacity to go it alone from hatching?

I have brought this example up before and you have never given a response to it. Is a piece of music of lesser ontological value than a watch because the musician must continue to produce it in order to keep it in existence? I can’t see why independence should be a reason to think one kind of creation superior to another.

 

[rossum]

Your assessment above sounds more like a personal pronouncement than it does an evidential claim.

No. It is inherent in the description “fine tuned”. If something is fine tuned to produce a result, then that result is inherent within the fine tuning and does not need further intervention. Anything short of that cannot be described as “fine tuned”.

Of course you provide no warrant for such an assessment and since you have no particular insight into the intentions of this designer

Nor has anyone. There have been claims made, but no supporting evidence provided.

A cosmic designer may have had very good reason to remain “hands on.”

“[Y]ou provide no warrant for such an assessment and since you have no particular insight into the intentions of this designer you have extended yourself far past what you can possibly know”

If the intentions of the designer are unknown, then neither of us, nor Dr. Gonzalez, can make any claims as to what the designers’ intentions were.

This is not necessarily a sign of weak design. Are baby mammals, for example, less well designed animals because the parents must intervene for a much longer period than, say, cockroaches or maggots, which have the capacity to go it alone from hatching?

What is your evidence that baby mammals are designed? You are assuming what you have to prove here. We are discussing biological design, so you cannot assume biological design as part of your argument. You must first show that biological design exists in the case of baby mammals.

rossum

 

[tonyrey]

Is there any evidence for this belief?

A belief for which there is no evidence is worthless.

Do you think evidence is necessarily scientific?

You have not provided any evidence for your belief that the designer is active now. Where is your evidence, or are you prepared to admit that your belief is also not scientific?

Design is constantly evident in biological processes which are purposeful unlike chemical processes. The latter provide a basis for life but they do not explain its origin, survival, plasticity, consciousness or development.

 

[rossum]

A belief for which there is no evidence is worthless.

Remember this.

Design is constantly evident in biological processes

And you have no evidence for this, it is just your opinion. We are back to “it sure looks designed to me.” Remember, “A belief for which there is no evidence is worthless”?

which are purposeful unlike chemical processes.

Biological processes are chemical processes. We can trace the chemical processes involved in transmitting electrical impulses along nerves to a muscle. We can trace the chemical processes which make the muscle contract when the electrical impulse arrives.

rossum

 

[nmgauss]

A belief for which there is no evidence is worthless.

Design is constantly evident in biological processes which are purposeful unlike chemical processes. The latter provide a basis for life but they do not explain its origin, survival, plasticity, consciousness or development.

Does design necessarily have to have a designer? Crystals and snowflakes can be beautiful, but they also seem to occur without any outside influence. The same goes for beautiful dormant volcanoes and snowcapped mountain peaks. How about Yosemite Valley? Was this designed by a designer?

 

[Peter_Plato]

No. It is inherent in the description “fine tuned”. If something is fine tuned to produce a result, then that result is inherent within the fine tuning and does not need further intervention. Anything short of that cannot be described as “fine tuned”.

This is a rather meager definition of fine tuning. Something could be fine tuned towards an ultimate end but have a kind of open architecture regarding other possibilities or conversely be fine tuned towards proximate ends and have an open structure regarding future possibilities. I am not clear that fine tuning is by definition a closed project.

You might argue that such a design lacks foresight, but if the design is intended to meet the needs of essentially free agents who are, themselves, creative determiners of their environment, then the purpose towards which the original design was purposed means that an open architecture was an aspect of the fine tuning.

Nor has anyone. There have been claims made, but no supporting evidence provided.

“[Y]ou provide no warrant for such an assessment and since you have no particular insight into the intentions of this designer you have extended yourself far past what you can possibly know”

If the intentions of the designer are unknown, then neither of us, nor Dr. Gonzalez, can make any claims as to what the designers’ intentions were.

What is your evidence that baby mammals are designed? You are assuming what you have to prove here. We are discussing biological design, so you cannot assume biological design as part of your argument. You must first show that biological design exists in the case of baby mammals.

rossum

I don’t need evidence that baby mammals are designed. Your argument is an “in principle” argument that designed things are “in principle” better if they need no further intervention. You used the exact same argument to argue that fine tuning (which is presumed to be designed) is "in principle” a better design if it requires no further intervention.

My point is hypothetical. Like the hypothetically fine-tuned universe - which you argue would be an ontologically better class of design if it were to require no further intervention - I am asking whether a hypothetically designed cockroach would be a better design, in principle, than a mammal simply because a cockroach requires no further intervention to maintain its existence?

To use another, less contentious, example. Are crafts or products of technology better, qualitatively speaking, because they are built strictly according to a previously existing design, in comparison to works of art that are created spontaneously or without a prior plan? Are the trades categorically better than the arts because they are constrained to a particular method, scheme or plan? I don’t see that.

Sounds to me like you are projecting Type A personality traits and perfections onto the Cosmic Creator as if the Creator must be a perfectionist about getting everything perfect (at least your determination of perfect) before setting about creating. Do you feel the same way about the children (if any) you created? They should follow your designated plan and if they don’t that reflects upon your capacities as their “father?” Are watches better than children, for that matter, if they can be wound up and walked away from?

Aren’t you treating the universe as if it were some huge clockwork machine? Why does God need to be constrained in that way? Why couldn’t the universe and creatures in it have been created with some measure of spontaneity, chance or dependency built into them with God tending them along the way? Perhaps the fine tuning is for our benefit alone, so we have some measure of security and are not overwhelmed by the infinite potential of God, until we are mature and free enough to experience and bear the boundless freedom and creativity of God.