Intelligent Design

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Al_Moritz said:
Not ID in the typical “biological ID” sense if “irreducible complexity” and the like. In the sense that God is the origin of all creation, all creation is of course intelligently designed. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that constant interfering tinkering in the “biological ID” sense is required. After all, “biological ID” proponents have no problem whatsoever with straight physical evolution of the universe (formation of stars, galaxies, planets etc.). So why the selective resistance in being against straight biological evolution?

Of course, in classical theism God has perfect foreknowledge.
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As in ID, the philosophy, as follows?

God “breathed” the super language of DNA into the “kinds” in the creative act.

This accounts for the diversity of life we see. The core makeup shared by all living things have the necessary complex information built in that facilitates rapid and responsive adaptation of features and variation while being able to preserve the “kind” that they began as. Life has been created with the creativity built in ready to respond to triggering events.

Since it has been demonstrated that all living organisms on Earth have the same core, it is virtually certain that living organisms have been thought of AT ONCE by the One and the same Creator endowed with the super language we know as DNA that switched on the formation of the various kinds, the cattle, the swimming creatures, the flying creatures, etc… in a pristine harmonious state and superb adaptability and responsiveness to their environment for the purpose of populating the earth that became subject to the ravages of corruption by the sin of one man (deleterious mutations).

IDvolution considers the latest science and is consistent with the continuous teaching of the Church.
 
Gary_Sheldrake said:
Seeds fell off of trees and plants and took root to grow news ones long before there were humans or agrarian cultures to plant them. In fact, it is entirely possible that the reverse is true, in that perhaps plants developed sentient creatures such as us as a means of pollination and spreading seeds.

All the best,
Gary
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If so, that was another indication of an intelligent design, though it’s hardly possible the plant had the intelligence to do the designing. 😉

“The most incomprehensible thing about the world is that it is comprehensible.” Albert Einstein

The world is comprehensible because it was intelligently designed to be comprehensible.
 
Al_Moritz said:
Aah, but don’t confuse immaterial entities (souls) with material processes. Of course they are in no way comparable.
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They are comparable to the extent that both creations are miracles and both are intelligently designed to reflect the glory of God.
 
Charlemagne_III said:
The world is comprehensible because it was intelligently designed to be comprehensible.
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The world is comprehensible because we have evolved to comprehend it. Failures to comprehend the world will tend to be selected out by natural selection: “Oh look, there is a hungry tiger over there. I’ll go and say hello to it. Perhaps it would like to share my lettuce leaf?”

The anthropic principle is in play here.

rossum
 
rossum said:
The world is comprehensible because we have evolved to comprehend it. Failures to comprehend the world will tend to be selected out by natural selection: “Oh look, there is a hungry tiger over there. I’ll go and say hello to it. Perhaps it would like to share my lettuce leaf?”

The anthropic principle is in play here.

rossum
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An evolutionary produced brain is not a reliable truth detector.
 
buffalo said:
An evolutionary produced brain is not a reliable truth detector.
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Says someone whose brain was produced by evolution. Every part of your brain is present in a Chimpanzee’s brain, though the relative sizes differ. Chimpanzees can determine enough of the truth about the world to survive in it.

rossum
 
From Charlemagne III:
If so, that was another indication of an intelligent design, though it’s hardly possible the plant had the intelligence to do the designing.
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Good Morning Charlemagne: I enjoy your posts and I know that you can come up with some very good insights. On this particular matter, I don’t think you’re throwing your full intellectual heft at it. While it is certainly possible that there is intelligent design, I am simply pointing out that it’s not necessary. In the strange idea I shared on how plants could have developed animals like us to spread pollen and seeds, no premeditation or forethought or design is needed really. I can explain what I mean by pointing out that for a good many years, you have been operating your thyroid gland in just such a way as to allow all of your other metabolic processes occur within the parameters necessary to sustain the life of the organism you are calling Charlemagne. You are also making your heart to beat, and doing it with just enough pressure as to allow your other organs to function and for you not to pass out every time you stand up, but not enough pressure for you to blow a valve. You are executing extremely complex tasks such as thinking and processing sensory (name removed by moderator)ut and sharing ideas with me. You, and you alone are doing all of these things, and yet you have no idea whatsoever of how you’re doing it. You have no training in it. You weren’t instructed to do it, or educated in how to do it. You just did it.
The world is comprehensible because it was intelligently designed to be comprehensible.
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That makes sense if I think within the confines of certain acquired mental templates, but I would offer that people simply think they are comprehending it by applying linguistic tiles to what they see and sealing it with an epoxy of learned syntax. In truth, it doesn’t mean that we have the slightest clue what any of this is.

All the best,
Gary
 
rossum said:
The world is comprehensible because we have evolved to comprehend it. Failures to comprehend the world will tend to be selected out by natural selection: “Oh look, there is a hungry tiger over there. I’ll go and say hello to it. Perhaps it would like to share my lettuce leaf?”

The anthropic principle is in play here.

rossum
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Right, as if evolution would select for abstract understanding of mathematics, physics, chemistry and the process of evolution itself. Obviously, the world being comprehensible in the truest sense of the world involves all these, not the instinct of evading a hungry tiger.
 
Gary_Sheldrake said:
PS - thank you for having this discussion with me. I’m glad that you entertain ideas without being judgmental.

All the best,
Gary
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Interesting comment.

Just curious–when someone says, “I don’t think you’re right”, is that being judgmental?

And when someone says, “I agree with you!” is that considered “without being judgmental”?

IMHO: both are judgmental.

And I believe we are commanded to be judgmental.

Anyone who doesn’t judge is…well, a dopey lump on a log who goes through life without examining it.
 
Al_Moritz said:
So if God lets natural processes occur like balding or growing of hair without ‘intervention’, why should He not let evolution, another natural process that He created, run its course without ‘intervention’?
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Why should there be a presumption that natural processes and life are of one and the same nature or origin?

Certainly, it aligns well to the scientific method as a paradigm for making sense of the world, but why need we assume reality must fit the method merely because we have found the method useful?

I brought up, by way of analogy, how physics and biology might be related to each other here:
forums.catholic-questions.org/showpost.php?p=12569128&postcount=494

For the scientific method to be relied upon to provide the full account for human biological evolution requires a presumption that physics is the causal mechanism for life.

Science may presume that account in order to try to understand the relationship between physics and biology as an integral whole, but that does not mean the mechanistically causal view regarding explanatory sufficiency that science takes must be the correct one with regard to the origin of life.

It is legitimate, as far as I can tell, to ask the difficult questions concerning what science can or cannot demonstrate strictly using its own methods. However, it is just as legitimate to wonder why science refuses to broach questions that may be within its scope simply because science may find answers which disagree with or are difficult to reconcile with the naturalistic presumptions of some of its practitioners.

Search for complete truth ought to determine the method, the method should not determine the nature of truth.
 
rossum said:
Says someone whose brain was produced by evolution. Every part of your brain is present in a Chimpanzee’s brain, though the relative sizes differ. Chimpanzees can determine enough of the truth about the world to survive in it.

rossum
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Using common building blocks is a hallmark of design.

So can plants apparently and brainless microbes.
 
PRmerger said:
Indeed. I picture you as Happy. Or Sneezy.

But do you go through life judging?

I think the answer is: YES!
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Hi PR Merger: Happy would be nice. I’m pretty happy today. I woke up that way and couldn’t figure out why. Well, I took the day off, but I have been doing housework all morning, so I have no idea why I’m happy.

Anyway, I do go through life judging if we take the meaning of judgment to apply to discernment and coming to conclusions after applying reason. There are other applications of the term, and these are what I was referring to. For instance, the iteration of judgment that applies to passing judgment or to condemn.

I have learned over time to look the world with an open mind and consider possibilities, and while I apply judgment in practical matters such as hiring people or making organizational changes, I find it more and more difficult over time to come to judgment on existential matters. The more I think of such things, the stranger the world becomes.

All the best,
Gary
 
Gary_Sheldrake said:
Anyway, I do go through life judging if we take the meaning of judgment to apply to discernment and coming to conclusions after applying reason.
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Egg-zactly.

I have found, however, that there is a tendency by some to, er, judge others whom they find to be judgmental.

Don’t you find that deliciously ironic?
 
PRmerger said:
Egg-zactly.

I have found, however, that there is a tendency by some to, er, judge others whom they find to be judgmental.

Don’t you find that deliciously ironic?
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Yes I do find it ironic. But the more I live, the harder I find it to be judgmental about other people, or at least the more I examine myself, I find it hard to be judgmental about other people. I’m a real handful. 🙂
 
Al_Moritz said:
Right, as if evolution would select for abstract understanding of mathematics, physics, chemistry and the process of evolution itself. Obviously, the world being comprehensible in the truest sense of the world involves all these, not the instinct of evading a hungry tiger.
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I am suspicious of phrases like, “in the truest sense”, because they put me on guard against an imminent “No True Scotsman” fallacy. How can I, objectively, determine if something is “in the truest sense” without consulting you personally?

Some animals have been shown to have a basic understanding of mathematics: Eight animals that can count.

Monkeys drop things from trees onto predators, showing a basic understanding of gravity.

Science studies the material world, and evolution suits animals for living in that same world. In order to survive, they have to have a level of understanding of how the world works. Fear of heights is an obvious example. That can be seen as a built-in understanding of gravity.

rossum
 
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