Is the argument from complexity a dead argument?

[IWantGod]

The argument from complexity goes like this…

A Biological system, of any kind, is soooooooo complex that it could not have evolved naturally from inanimate objects and is therefore the work of an intelligence mind.

 

[Usagi]

The argument from complexity goes like this…

A Biological system, of any kind, is soooooooo complex that it could not have evolved naturally from inanimate objects and is therefore the work of an intelligence mind.

Yeah, that one really doesn’t work.

There’s a slightly more nuanced one in recent years that claims certain biological systems (the eye is a popular example) feature “irreducible complexity” – that is, several simultaneous things have to occur in conjunction in order for the system to be beneficial at all, so the idea that it could have evolved by slow, single changes is suspect. Even that isn’t much accepted in the mainstream biology community, though, and examples of partial eyes that still provide an evolutionary advantage have been put forth.

 

[Confiteor_Deo]

It’s not a very convincing argument.

 

[IWantGod]

It’s not a very convincing argument.

Its not my kind of argument and usually i go for a naturalistic explanation. But…and i ask this to Usagi too

Can we seriously consider the idea that several parts working in conjunction with each-other to produce an organic moving system formed naturally from inanimate matter?

Isn’t even the most simplest organic system a bit too complex to be the work of nature alone?

 

[Usagi]

Well, it’s not as though people or even bacteria are alleged to have arisen directly from inorganic material. The usual explanation starts with complex organic molecules (which are made of the same atoms as everything else) and moves up through proteins to single-celled organisms and so forth. Even a single cell of a complex organism like us is supposed to have started as a symbiotic relationship between several simpler creatures.

 

[Aloysium]

Excuse my arrogance but to deny that the argument is valid is to reveal one’s lack of knowledge about science. Restating the often repeated phrase, the more one knows the greater the appreciation of how one knows nothing. We know nothing.

To the guy referencing the eye, not wishing you any ill, but lose your vision and really gaze in wonder at what was so easily overlooked, the miracle of the visual world.

While the physical sciences address the infinitely complex material structure of the world, one should keep in mind that science is a social phenomenon, and has everything to do with status, money, and power. How we live our lives determines how we experience it. I feel like the freaking rich man in the story of Lazarus. If one is dead inside, if one does not grow in the loving relationship with God, all one can see is an empty universe of things. That is what is experienced and communicated.

With all the great stuff, all the hurt, the wins and the losses, the isness of it all, life is so fantastically, stupendously, amazingly, so utterly WOW! that the sheer wonder of it all points directly to God.

I can see how the argument fails to reach those who cannot see. Those who do, they know it to be true.

 

[Lion_IRC]

I think it is a persuasive argument.

So do several atheists who try to use it in reverse - arguing that complex things like the evolution of life from non-life are so awesomely complex that if there was any Higher Being, which was the prior designer/cause, then that Being would likewise require a further explanation of its (His) awesome complexity.

In effect, they argue that complexity (in nature) is so complex that the further complexity needed to create it supernaturally would surpass some ‘ontological’ upper limit of possible complexity imposed by methodological naturalism. ie. Atheism/Naturalism.

You can’t refute the argument from complexity by asserting that God’s complexity is is too complex to fathom.

 

[Confiteor_Deo]

Its not my kind of argument and usually i go for a naturalistic explanation. But…and i ask this to Usagi too

Can we seriously consider the idea that several parts working in conjunction with each-other to produce an organic moving system formed naturally from inanimate matter?

Isn’t even the most simplest organic system a bit too complex to be the work of nature alone?

I doubt a nonbeliever will consider it to be too complex to be the work of nature alone. It isn’t a compelling argument in my opinion.

 

[Lion_IRC]

I’d hate to be the person who bears the persuasive burden of showing that pure chance was the best explanation for the complexity we observe.

That massive hurdle is probably why non-theists simply shirk the burden and go for the easier (and less convincing) rebuttal that what we observe isn’t really ‘complex’ and it’s not all that ‘special’ after all so why does it need explaining.

 

[josh987654321]

Not at all, in fact, just the opposite.

I think the argument from complexity is one of the strongest arguments. Hence why it’s often mocked or treated as if it were weak.

Just take a look outside, all this supposedly came about by blind chance? no design? no intelligence? and this blind, chance assembly of atoms happened to produce us? who in turn supposedly have the intelligence to somehow ‘reason’ that we are a mere blind, chance assembly of atoms along with everything else? I certainly don’t think so.

I hope this has helped

God Bless You

Thank you for reading
Josh

 

[womanatwell]

Dr. Douglas Axe just came out with a book about biological complexity called Undeniable: How Biology Confirms Our Intuition That Life Is Designed. He describes proteins, among which make up the components of photosynthesis. This is a very complex system and would have had to be in organisms from the beginning. This was no haphazard self-stringing of molecules in a pond. Atoms would have needed to work together from the start for producing energy to make cellular building blocks such as DNA and proteins to keep life going and reproducing.

Photosynthesis has many molecular machines which convert the sun’s energy into chemical energy. One of these machines is Photosystem I. This one biological machine of many needed for photosynthesis has 417 parts, all of which have to be put together right for the exact chemical reactions to occur. I have a picture of protein parts of Photosystem I pictured here (credits at the bottom of image).
(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)

The second image is a perspective of Photosystem I and the sub-units called amino acids with which just one of the parts needs in order to work. It is made of 755 amino acids. Amino acids are made of an average of about 20 atoms each (like carbon and hydrogen, marked in the box marked “Valine”). So this part is made of over 14,000 atoms in a specific structure among the other parts. Yet the whole Photosystem I is only one of several machines needed for photosynthesis.

(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)

The chemical energy this part of Photosynthesis produces is moved on to another cycle with its own enzymes (proteins) that take carbon dioxide from the air and make carbon-based building blocks such as more proteins, carbohydrates (which we eat and break down for our own respiration) and more.

You can get more information about Axe’s book and photosynthesis at my blog post:

womanatwell.blogspot.com/2016/07/undeniable-by-axe.html .

Molecules floating around in water are not life. They react as chemicals, but I do not believe they arrange themselves into organisms even after billions of years, just as they would not arrange themselves into brick houses or airplanes by themselves in that time.

In Romans 1, St. Paul talks about God’s creation in that He made it so that His divine nature and eternal power could easily be seen. I believe this is true when you really look at biological complexity.

 

[IWantGod]

Dr. Douglas Axe just came out with a book about biological complexity called Undeniable: How Biology Confirms Our Intuition That Life Is Designed. He describes proteins, among which make up the components of photosynthesis. This is a very complex system and would have had to be in organisms from the beginning. This was no haphazard self-stringing of molecules in a pond. Atoms would have needed to work together from the start for producing energy to make cellular building blocks such as DNA and proteins to keep life going and reproducing.

Photosynthesis has many molecular machines which convert the sun’s energy into chemical energy. One of these machines is Photosystem I. This one biological machine of many needed for photosynthesis has 417 parts, all of which have to be put together right for the exact chemical reactions to occur. I have a picture of protein parts of Photosystem I pictured here (credits at the bottom of image).
https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-stIUhDfw..._OrQUHhmG6BuzVAk65gCLcB/s1600/PhotoSysI02.jpg

The second image is a perspective of Photosystem I and the sub-units called amino acids with which just one of the parts needs in order to work. It is made of 755 amino acids. Amino acids are made of an average of about 20 atoms each (like carbon and hydrogen, marked in the box marked “Valine”). So this part is made of over 14,000 atoms in a specific structure among the other parts. Yet the whole Photosystem I is only one of several machines needed for photosynthesis.

https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-34SYD1iW...XMwfLOcKk5WWDUDQkEACLcB/s1600/PhotoSysI04.jpg

The chemical energy this part of Photosynthesis produces is moved on to another cycle with its own enzymes (proteins) that take carbon dioxide from the air and make carbon-based building blocks such as more proteins, carbohydrates (which we eat and break down for our own respiration) and more.

You can get more information about Axe’s book and photosynthesis at my blog post:

womanatwell.blogspot.com/2016/07/undeniable-by-axe.html .

Molecules floating around in water are not life. They react as chemicals, but I do not believe they arrange themselves into organisms even after billions of years, just as they would not arrange themselves into brick houses or airplanes by themselves in that time.

In Romans 1, St. Paul talks about God’s creation in that He made it so that His divine nature and eternal power could easily be seen. I believe this is true when you really look at biological complexity.

Interesting. I will certainly take a look.

But this is what i mean. A biological system would have to be complex from the very beginning. Evolution would be something that happens after such a complex system exists, not before. I find it hard to see how non-biological parts could spontaneously arrange themselves into a complex biological system that can reproduce.

 

[womanatwell]

Interesting. I will certainly take a look.

But this is what i mean. A biological system would have to be complex from the very beginning. Evolution would be something that happens after such a complex system exists, not before. I find it hard to see how non-biological parts could spontaneously arrange themselves into a complex biological system that can reproduce.

It would be extremely improbable for organisms to spontaneously form to the point of, as Dr. Axe says, impossible on a practical basis. If you would “try” all the possible combinations of amino acids to get a functional protein of 150 amino acids in length, only one in 10^74 (a 1 with 74 zeroes after it) would work to do a specific biological job. Dr. Axe pointed out that the total number of organisms that could have been supported on Earth so far even if it is billions of years old is 10^40. The number of tries is limited by this number, so even one new protein is improbable.Then, with each increase in complexity of an organism as you would have to have in evolution, you would need new proteins to do new jobs. Many of these are longer than 150 amino acids, decreasing their probabilities even more.

 

[Cheiron]

The argument from complexity goes like this…

A Biological system, of any kind, is soooooooo complex that it could not have evolved naturally from inanimate objects and is therefore the work of an intelligence mind.

Can I just point out that irreducible complexity is a comment on evolution? And evolution doesn’t say how you get life from inanimate matter. That’s abiogenesis.

 

[tonyrey]

The null hypothesis is that nothing exists - which is obviously absurd because there must be at least one being who is aware of existence. A more reasonable hypothesis is that there is more than one being - which tallies with the difference between reality and fantasy. Physical objects persist and resist efforts to ignore them whereas imaginary ones can be dismissed and rejected by anyone who is in a normal mental state.

Now comes the question of complexity which implies a multitude of different objects; otherwise they could not be distinguished. Even if they are identical in every other respect they must be in different locations. Yet complexity entails more than multiplicity because it implies there are relationships between objects. This need not be the case. There is no obvious reason for believing any relationships must exist. Chaos therefore needs no explanation whereas complexity does. So the argument from complexity is not only alive but also kicking! The only alternative explanation is that complexity is a physical necessity, a dogma based on faith rather than reason…

 

[Lion_IRC]

Can I just point out that irreducible complexity is a comment on evolution? And evolution doesn’t say how you get life from inanimate matter. That’s abiogenesis.

I think the reason evolution “doesn’t say” is because it doesn’t know.

The lack of a tested/testable abiogenesis theory is a huge knowledge gap.

And what we are left with is the two-pronged idea of random mutation and natural selection.

But I’m always skeptical when science invokes terms like random, spontaneous, singularity

 

[tonyrey]

Can I just point out that irreducible complexity is a comment on evolution? And evolution doesn’t say how you get life from inanimate matter. That’s abiogenesis.

Materialists believe living organisms have developed from inanimate matter. For them it is a continuous process from start to finish…

 

[tonyrey]

I think the reason evolution “doesn’t say” is because it doesn’t know.

The lack of a tested/testable abiogenesis theory is a huge knowledge gap.

And what we are left with is the two-pronged idea of random mutation and natural selection.

But I’m always skeptical when science invokes terms like random, spontaneous, singularity

Scientifically inexplicable coincidences do occur but to attribute **all **development to such events is unreasonable. It amounts to deriving order from disorder - which implies that the power of reason had an irrational origin!

 

[inocente]

Is the argument from complexity a dead argument?

Yes, it was never a live argument. It’s the fallacy of the appeal to ignorance - we don’t yet know the answer so that somehow proves god-dun-it.

Theologians call this kind of fallacious reasoning god-of-the-gaps (“gaps” meaning current gaps in knowledge).

The null hypothesis is that nothing exists - which is obviously absurd

Null hypothesis is a term from statistics. It refers to the common view of something, as opposed to the alternative hypothesis, which is what the researcher wants to test. The common view, the null hypothesis, is that the physical world exists, which would need to be falsified by anyone claiming otherwise.

I think the reason evolution “doesn’t say” is because it doesn’t know.

I think Cheiron’s point may have been that’s not what the theory sets out to do, just as it’s not something the theory of gravity sets out to do.

 

[o_mlly]

The argument from complexity goes like this…

A Biological system, of any kind, is soooooooo complex that it could not have evolved naturally from inanimate objects and is therefore the work of an intelligence mind.

As a scientific theory Intelligent Design is as strong or as weak as Natural Selection. As a philosophical argument, I believe Intelligent Design more powerful than Evolution in explaining the diversity of species on the planet.