Intelligent Design

[buffalo]

Ain’t that the truth . . .

Well, sad as it is, only almost and not necessarily. My experience is that debating atheists on cosmological fine-tuning can be just as exasperating and futile (I have had my share of battles, espcially on atheist websites). But that’s a subject for another discussion…

Interestingly, on that subject many (not all!) atheists turn out to be just as much science deniers as creationists are on evolution *). One can of course have a vigorous and legitimate debate about the philsosophical outcomes, but not about the facts.

As the saying goes, you are entitled to your own opinions, but not to your own facts.

---

*) and in Victor Stenger they have their own atheistic equivalent of a Michael Behe on this issue, too

Junk DNA was a fact. No longer
Fossil record fact - abrupt appearance, stasis and variation within
Tree of Life was a fact. No longer

Need I go on?

 

[buffalo]

God designs the process, not individual species which come and go as environmental circumstances change. The infusion of the human soul is a different thing, but that is an immaterial entity that has nothing to do with evolution, which is a physical, material process.

Process requires information. He frontloaded His creation.

Species is a man made classification. With genetic studies we may find the code more relevant than morphology.

 

[DrTaffy]

Natural selection is a conservative process.

Per se, on its own, maybe. So what?

Natural selection of a large population over many generations with assortative mating and mutations is not a conservative process, and that is what we are discussing.

 

[Peter_Plato]

Precisely! What we have beeen saying all along, and what you would have realized if you had paid attention. It’s just that it does not need constant intervening by bypassing the simple working of natural causes to achieve complexity. No, God just lets things unfold according to the natural causes that He created and sustains at every moment.

Why would God go through the trouble of creating natural causes if He does not let them run their natural course by constantly intervening and superseding them??

Evolution is design – we don’t need the extra tinkering of so-called biological Intelligent Design for that.

If quantum physics points to the essential indeterminacy of matter at some subatomic level then it may be true that God does not merely notice the falling of hairs from heads or sparrows from trees but supervenes in all physical reality at its most basic level in a manner (crudely put) akin to animators creating and controlling the nodes or bones of every entity in animated sequences.

In other words, “natural causes” may merely be “viscous” in nature for the sake of practical consistency or ontological integrity - so, for example, that human beings can make some sense of it - when, in fact, there is no “essential” consistency in matter itself, but in the nature of God who actively determines every “node” and what it does.

Secondary causes are then “formal” constructs and completely contingent in the way the notes in a musical piece play off each other to achieve a kind of integral harmony and balance but are not necessarily connected to each other in a “causal” sense,

 

[DrTaffy]

DrTaffy;12566226:

And, again, as regards your first

demand that we have seen mindless things produce intelligent beings, we have answered that. You still whine that it is ‘unreasonable’ to expect you to meet the same standard, your own standard! That you demanded of us and that we met!

You have met no standard. You have no proof of anything. It’s all speculation, and whining speculation at that.

You carefully edited out the bit where I explicitly pointed out the standard we met. So added back in for all to see.

You demanded that we show where we have seen mindless things produce intelligent beings, which we did. Yet you consistently refuse to either admit that it was a silly, hypocritical standard or to meet it yourself by showing where you have seen intelligent beings created ex nihilo by an immaterial omnipotent being.

 

[Gary_Sheldrake]

That is one of the things I like about Buddhism. It makes a very clear distinction between internal realities and external realities. When we see a mirage, we see water. Inside our minds, that water is real. Externally, the water is not real.

Good Afternoon Rossum: I often wonder if the idea of there being an inside v an outside is nothing more than a perception. Likewise, I have seen no compelling evidence to suggest that there is such a thing as an “inside of our minds” because it is not necessary for our minds to be inside of anything. Our minds could be out there - all around us, and our brains could simply be receivers of thought and story lines as well as integrators that synthesize thought with sentient (name removed by moderator)ut. The idea that there is such a thing as your mind v my mind could simply be a trick of sentience. For instance, if our eyes, ears, mouth and nose were situated near our navels, we would have the sense that our minds reside near our navels.

I am suggesting that in all of the cosmos, it is quite possible that there is in fact only one mind, experiencing what it creates through incursions into dimentionality which would include creatures such as us. We get the idea that there is a you v me because we get wrapped up in a particular storyline that has a concrescence with the sensory (name removed by moderator)uts of a given permutation such as Rossum or Gary, when in fact Rossum and Gary are only apertures through which the one mind experiences temporal existence. And if it were to be true that there is such a thing as one mind that is pervasive throughout all things, I would say that this is what we have been trying to call God, and in the process we may have obfuscated our view of its true nature through cultural context and linguistic syntax.

Just some ideas.

All the best,
Gary

 

[buffalo]

Per se, on its own, maybe. So what?

Natural selection of a large population over many generations with assortative mating and mutations is not a conservative process, and that is what we are discussing.

Even in large populations it is conservative.

Here is the peer reviewed paper on Natural Selection:

Reductive Evolution Can Prevent Populations from Taking Simple Adaptive Paths to High Fitness

and

Interview WIth Lynn Margulis

And you don’t believe natural selection is the answer?
This is the problem I have with neo-Darwinists: They teach that what is generating novelty is the accumulation of random mutations in DNA, in a direction set by natural selection. If you want bigger eggs you keep selecting the hens that are laying the bigger eggs, and you get bigger and bigger eggs. But you also get hens with defective feathers and wobbly eggs. Natural selection eliminates and maybe maintains, but it doesn’t create.
and…
I was taught over and over again that the accumulation of random mutations led to evolutionary change — led to new species. I believed it until I looked for evidence. …

Metamorphosis Video Exclusive: Dr. Ann Gauger Discusses Limits of Natural Selection

In addition we now understand DNA actively fights against mutations going through several iterations of repair.

 

[Peter_Plato]

You demanded that we show where we have seen mindless things produce intelligent beings, which we did.

No, what you have shown is that intelligent beings have been “observed to” emerge from “mindless things” over a long period of time. But that is no different than the very slowed down 13.7 billion year long version of a rabbit “emerging from” a magician’s hat.

What is missing is a full accounting for how intelligent beings can possibly derive from mindless things in a way that demonstrates the actual mechanisms by which that “emergence” can be explained.

THAT you have not done.

It certainly isn’t shown merely by pointing to the magician’s hat (nature) and rabbit (intelligence) and saying, "See, there it happened! The rabbit has been observed to come out of the hat.”

The “how” has been completely left out of the accounting. It is required before it can be claimed that mindless things have been definitively shown to “produce” intelligent beings.

 

[Gary_Sheldrake]

Even in large populations it is conservative.

Here is the peer reviewed paper on Natural Selection:

Reductive Evolution Can Prevent Populations from Taking Simple Adaptive Paths to High Fitness

and

Interview WIth Lynn Margulis

And you don’t believe natural selection is the answer?
This is the problem I have with neo-Darwinists: They teach that what is generating novelty is the accumulation of random mutations in DNA, in a direction set by natural selection. If you want bigger eggs you keep selecting the hens that are laying the bigger eggs, and you get bigger and bigger eggs. But you also get hens with defective feathers and wobbly eggs. Natural selection eliminates and maybe maintains, but it doesn’t create.
and…
I was taught over and over again that the accumulation of random mutations led to evolutionary change — led to new species. I believed it until I looked for evidence. …

Metamorphosis Video Exclusive: Dr. Ann Gauger Discusses Limits of Natural Selection

In addition we now understand DNA actively fights against mutations going through several iterations of repair.

Very good points Buffalo.

 

[Gary_Sheldrake]

If quantum physics points to the essential indeterminacy of matter at some subatomic level then it may be true that God does not merely notice the falling of hairs from heads or sparrows from trees but supervenes in all physical reality at its most basic level in a manner (crudely put) akin to animators creating and controlling the nodes or bones of every entity in animated sequences.

In other words, “natural causes” may merely be “viscous” in nature for the sake of practical consistency or ontological integrity - so, for example, that human beings can make some sense of it - when, in fact, there is no “essential” consistency in matter itself, but in the nature of God who actively determines every “node” and what it does.

Secondary causes are then “formal” constructs and completely contingent in the way the notes in a musical piece play off each other to achieve a kind of integral harmony and balance but are not necessarily connected to each other in a “causal” sense,

These are very interesting ideas Peter Plato, however, I would point out that experiments in physics (such as Wheeler’s Delayed Choice experiment) only point to a possible primacy of consciousness over matter, or perhaps simply a strange interdependency between consciousness and all things material. I do not see how these ideas and their attending experiments require that we take the extra step of calling consciousness “God.”

We can easily observe that all of creation is fractal in nature, complexity and novelty growing and expanding outward like branches of a tree. This could simply an organic and living process rather than something that has a set design, and the consciousness or “God” behind it could simply be learning as it goes. If this is the case, we are simply the outermost branch or leading edge of consciousness or God at the nexus of space and time we call earth.

All the best,
Gary

 

[Peter_Plato]

These are very interesting ideas Peter Plato, however, I would point out that experiments in physics (such as Wheeler’s Delayed Choice experiment) only point to a possible primacy of consciousness over matter, or perhaps simply a strange interdependency between consciousness and all things material. I do not see how these ideas and their attending experiments require that we take the extra step of calling consciousness “God.”

All the best,
Gary

I wouldn’t identify consciousness with God, necessarily, so I fail to see your point.

Consciousness might be “light” in the subjective sense of what it is that allows reality to be apprehended by an intelligent agent, but that need not be essentially what God is.

 

[rossum]

A judge deciding what is science? :nope:

No. A judge deciding what the law allowed to be taught in a public school science class.

A judge deciding what is legal and what isn’t. What a novel concept.

rossum

 

[buffalo]

No. A judge deciding what the law allowed to be taught in a public school science class.

A judge deciding what is legal and what isn’t. What a novel concept.

rossum

Evolution is a philosophy and shouldn’t be in empirical science class either. Should be in mandatory philosophy class.

 

[rossum]

Even in large populations it [natural selection] is conservative.

It is conservative in static environments. It is not conservative in changing environments. Galapágos finch beaks changed under natural selection in a changing environment.

Where a population is well adapted to its environment, then natural selection is conservative. Where the population is not well adapted, then natural selection is not conservative and will drive the genome of the population towards making it better adapted. Such a situation can arise when a population moves to a new territory, or the environment changes.

Natural selection is currently moving elephants towards having smaller, or absent, tusks. Their environment has changed with the arrival of poachers. Large tusks, which used to be advantageous, as now likely to get you shot for ivory. Small tusks are advantageous, so natural selection is driving the change.

rossum

 

[rossum]

Evolution is a philosophy and shouldn’t be in empirical science class either. Should be in mandatory philosophy class.

You are incorrect. Evolution is a well established scientific theory, and has amply earned its place in science class.

The Dawkins style, “evolution justifies atheism” is indeed philosophy and does not have a place in science classes.

rossum

 

[buffalo]

It is conservative in static environments. It is not conservative in changing environments. Galapágos finch beaks changed under natural selection in a changing environment.

Where a population is well adapted to its environment, then natural selection is conservative. Where the population is not well adapted, then natural selection is not conservative and will drive the genome of the population towards making it better adapted. Such a situation can arise when a population moves to a new territory, or the environment changes.

Natural selection is currently moving elephants towards having smaller, or absent, tusks. Their environment has changed with the arrival of poachers. Large tusks, which used to be advantageous, as now likely to get you shot for ivory. Small tusks are advantageous, so natural selection is driving the change.

rossum

The finches returned back to what they started as. Peppered moths too. It is variation within.

 

[Peter_Plato]

No. A judge deciding what the law allowed to be taught in a public school science class.

A judge deciding what is legal and what isn’t. What a novel concept.

rossum

I don’t think judges are supposed to “decide” what is legal in the sense of creating laws or determining the content of science classes. Judges are supposed to merely rule according to existing laws.

The judge has no jurisdiction in terms of deciding what the content of “science” ought to be and especially not what science is. That would be under the auspices of departments of education and boards of education, properly constituted.

Giving judges the kind of authority required to determine what science is, is no different than giving them the power to decide what morality is, rather than the merely judicial role of deciding which legal or moral rules have been infringed upon at any particular time by particular parties.

Whether ID is science or not is not a legal determination, but a philosophical one. It ought to be debated and worked out by philosophers of science who have the expertise to build a cogent case one way or the other and then would be required to present that case in a way that settles the issue philosophically.

This was not a matter for a lone district court judge to rule on. It should be duly hammered out in the day to day grind of doing and teaching science and coming to understand what that enterprise entails.

 

[buffalo]

You are incorrect. Evolution is a well established scientific theory, and has amply earned its place in science class.

The Dawkins style, “evolution justifies atheism” is indeed philosophy and does not have a place in science classes.

rossum

Established by human consensus, which is not scientific. It is not observable, repeatable or predictable. It is the study of a one-time historic event. When it is observable, repeatable and predictable then I would be OK with it in science class. Unless you want to redefine science class, but then ID would get in too.

 

[Peter_Plato]

You are incorrect. Evolution is a well established scientific theory, and has amply earned its place in science class.

Does that place it beyond question or beyond critique? How can any theory be critiqued, or upheld, by merely silencing all discussion as to its adequacy?

That approach simply seems contradictory to the very enterprise of science. “We will not speak of alternatives or critiques of evolution theory because we have decided (via legal sanction) that it alone is properly scientific and no alternative views shall, henceforth, be allowed.”

Science theory determined by legal and dogmatic fiat, in other words.

Why would that approach be tolerated by any scientist in good standing?

 

[rossum]

The finches returned back to what they started as.

Yes. But they changed over time and the changes were driven by natural selection. The change was cyclical because the environment (the weather in that case) was also cyclical. Natural selection drove changes to follow the changing environment. The environment changed cyclically, so natural selection drove change cyclically.

Merely because it was cyclical does not mean it was not change. The cyclical part is not relevant. Natural selection was not conservative in that case, it drove change. Your earlier statement is not correct for all cases. Only in a static environment is natural selection uniformly conservative.

Peppered moths too.

Natural selection drove the change from pale to dark. Then when the air became less polluted it drove the reverse change from dark to pale. Natural selection in a changing environment is not a conservative force, it is a force for change. This has been shown by many examples. The deep sea is a relatively unchanging environment, and there change does indeed move very slowly.

Natural selection is not intrinsically conservative; it reflects the environment. Conservative in a static environment, a driver of change in a non-static environment.

rossum