One-third of Americans reject evolution, poll shows

[Judas_Thaddeus]

S.O.S. in the sand is merely “seeing” meaning in the letters when there is none there?



Next time you see SOS messages written, you can safely ignore them despite the fact that someone’s life might be in jeopardy?

Let’s see if God accepts the excuse that you considered it “just really complex pareidolia” and ignored it as unlikely to have been written by an intelligent human in distress.

Honestly, common sense seems to have gone out the window merely to deny what is patently obvious and hold dogmatically onto a preconceived, but clearly absurd, notion.

Which brings us to another issue: Intelligent Design proposes that we should be
able to recognize God’s part in Creation like we can recognize an SOS drawn in-
to the sand by a human. God is not a human. We can’t hope to understand that
anymore than an ant could realize that the ant farm she lives in could be an artif-
icial environment.

 

[Peter_Plato]

Which brings us to another issue: Intelligent Design proposes that we should be
able to recognize God’s part in Creation like we can recognize an SOS drawn in-
to the sand by a human. God is not a human. We can’t hope to understand that
anymore than an ant could realize that the ant farm she lives in could be an artif-
icial environment.

That would presume to deny that God has any interest in or capacity for making himself known to us by ANY means whatsoever, since “we can’t hope to understand” God at all. If God has an interest - and the Church seems to endorse the view that he does - then HE is the one who would have to choose the means to reveal himself rather than us accidentally hitting upon them.

It isn’t like the ant situation at all because we don’t create the ants, but the story is that God created us to “know, love and serve” him. If we can’t hope to know him (or his designs) then that leaves out the loving and serving parts, by default, since how would we know we were successfully doing either of those? We couldn’t. Period.

The fact is that** if** we are like ants, we are more like ants designed to know the ant farmer in the first place and are housed in an environment where the ant farmer has left all kinds of means open to the ants to come to “know” him. It would have to be a “set up” environment and MUST BE THAT precisely because the ant farmer is intimately aware of the challenge the ants are saddled with.

The point is that God, if he IS interested in humans beings, would have made himself known in nature and history, using ways and means that we potentially COULD access, such as, for example, becoming human himself.

 

[Judas_Thaddeus]

That would presume to deny that God has any interest in or capacity for making himself known to us by ANY means whatsoever, since “we can’t hope to understand” God at all. If God has an interest - and the Church seems to endorse the view that he does - then HE is the one who would have to choose the means to reveal himself rather than us accidentally hitting upon them.

It isn’t like the ant situation at all because we don’t create the ants, but the story is that God created us to “know, love and serve” him. If we can’t hope to know him (or his designs) then that leaves out the loving and serving parts, by default, since how would we know we were successfully doing either of those? We couldn’t. Period.

The fact is that** if** we are like ants, we are more like ants designed to know the ant farmer in the first place and are housed in an environment where the ant farmer has left all kinds of means open to the ants to come to “know” him. It would have to be a “set up” environment and MUST BE THAT precisely because the ant farmer is intimately aware of the challenge the ants are saddled with.

The point is that God, if he IS interested in humans beings, would have made himself known in nature and history, using ways and means that we potentially COULD access, such as, for example, becoming human himself.

All this talk of Design AND God then brings us back
to another important point: Intelligent Design is not a
science, it’s a religious/philosophical position.

Nature testifies of God, yes, Paul said it, but science is not the lens through which we look for God, not that Intelligent Design is a science in the first place.

 

[Peter_Plato]

Speaking of ants, I posted this reply in a thread on a similar topic about a year ago…

The link is here.

The post is slightly revised to account for this thread, but still pertains…

In Stephen Meyer and William Dembski’s formulations of the intelligent design argument there is no need to demonstrate the actual existence of the “actor” performing as designer, instead they rely on demonstrating that an activity itself can be shown to be impossible without an agent.

Both rely on demonstrating their claim using the idea of information as having either specified or functional complexity or both. They both demonstrate that in the case of the origin of life the insufficient probabilistic resources available to bring about the event (the origin of biological information in the cell that has highly specified and functional complexity) make the event impossible without some kind of intelligent agent.

As an example to demonstrate their reasoning, suppose you spend an afternoon observing the behaviour of ants milling about an anthole. After some hours you notice the dark colour and positioning of the ants on the light concrete appears to resemble the letter J. There is in some sense, a complexity in the shape of the letter J that makes it highly improbable, however, given the time you have spent observing them and all the random arrangements the ants have produced with their bodies, there is some degree of probability that the J appeared by chance, despite the fact that it has somewhat of a complex shape. No need to infer intelligence.

Now suppose you keep watching the ants at work and after a few minutes their bodies have taken the arrangement of the letters JUDAS. This becomes more intriguing to you because the shapes of the letters are not merely complex but also specific because, you notice that the letters match precisely and specifically the letters of your name. This specified complexity of the letters, makes it highly improbable that the event happened by chance. Are you justified in inferring some kind of intelligence behind the action of the ants? Is there a better explanation? Do you need to have evidence of the agent before being justified in claiming there is “some kind” of intelligence at play here? Doesn’t the degree of the specified complexity in the letters warrant an inference to an intelligent agent?

What if, as the afternoon continues, you watch the ants continue to build new letters on the sidewalk. As they work you recall that you tried to eradicate this anthill a week before using a pesticide that wasn’t as effective as you had hoped. An hour later the complete message from the ants comes through. It states, “JUDAS WE WILL INVADE YOUR HOUSE AT MIDNIGHT!”

Notice this complete message is not only complex, not only highly specified as it uses many letters from the English alphabet but it has taken on a new quality in that the letters precisely match a functional and intended purpose, I.e, to communicate with you in response to your failed attempt at destroying the anthill.

Would you not agree that any explanation not entailing some kind of intelligence would fail despite the fact that you have no evidence for an “actor” other than the message itself?

Dembski and Meyer would both argue, I think, that this event, having specified and functional complexity to a degree that the probabilistic resources available - time, nature of ant brains and ant behaviour, would make an inference to intelligence “of some kind” behind this event not merely highly probable but definite. You would have to conclude there is some kind of intelligent agent behind this event even though you have no idea who or what the agent is.

This shows that there are times that we are justified in inferring an intelligence, contrary to your claim, despite the fact that we have no independent evidence of the existence of the agent. The event itself is the evidence.

In his book Signature in the Cell, Stephen Meyer, develops a very cogent argument of precisely this kind to show that the complexity of the highly specific and functional information contained in cells could not have arisen without intelligence of some kind given the probabilistic resources available and the state of prebiotic chemistry and the laws of chemistry and physics. He provides strong biological, chemical and physical evidence throughout the book for a very difficult to deny conclusion.

 

[Monkey1976]

My point exactly.

It would, likewise, be easier to “hit” the exact sequence in terms of probability.

You didn’t bother to read the article, did you?

I did, and the point stands. As far as probability is concerned, there is nothing special about any given combination of coin flips, cards, lotto numbers, or proteins. All combinations are equally probable. The only thing special about the combination of proteins which give rise to life - from a purely empirical standpoint - is that it results in organisms which are able to calculate the probability of the particular combination of proteins that gave rise to them. A designer is not necessarily implied, just as purposeful intervention is not necessarily implied when a person draws a royal flush or wins the lottery.

It doesn’t matter how improbable something is once it has already happened. If it happened, then the probability of it ever happening is 1.

For the probability argument to have traction as a scientific - not philosophical - proof of a designer, then the probability must be shown to be zero. Not small, not remote, not miniscule, but exactly zero.

 

[Peter_Plato]

I did, and the point stands. As far as probability is concerned, there is nothing special about any given combination of coin flips, cards, lotto numbers, or proteins. All combinations are equally probable. The only thing special about the combination of proteins which give rise to life - from a purely empirical standpoint - is that it results in organisms which are able to calculate the probability of the particular combination of proteins that gave rise to them. A designer is not necessarily implied, just as purposeful intervention is not necessarily implied when a person draws a royal flush or wins the lottery.

It doesn’t matter how improbable something is once it has already happened. If it happened, then the probability of** it ever happening is 1.**

Nope once it happened, then the probability of it happening AGAIN (i.e., repeating) goes up to the calculated odds and is NOT 1.

The question is why did it even happen once with those odds in place to enable life? The odds of the same result happening again on the very next trial would make it impossibly unlikely.

With regards to anthropic fine tuning there are two ‘layers’ of cosmic events to account for.

The first is the fine tuning of the universe with over 30 cosmological constants, each having to have been specifically tuned to ALL of the others to bring about the possibility of organic compounds. The equivalent of winning more than 30 lotteries at the same instant each with all the “right” numbers because each constant “setting” MUST have been specified at the same instant (Big Bang) as all the other constants and tuned to all the others to enable the possibility of organic compounds.

Following THAT virtually impossible event, the genesis of life required the “creation” of a number of functional proteins from specified sequences of amino acids and the generation of DNA (genetic code) that specifies for the creation and replication of each of the necessary functional proteins. Another virtually impossible event.

So here we have a coordinated sequence of nearly impossible events occurring which would be very like those exact combinations of cards coming up not just once but repeatedly over and over to get the cosmos “just right” for life.

That would be like taking your first combination of hundreds of cards, specifying the next, getting it, specifying the next, getting it, etc. over and over again.

You really haven’t grasped what’s involved here.

 

[Monkey1976]

Nope once it happened, then the probability of it happening AGAIN (i.e., repeating) goes up to the calculated odds and is NOT 1.

That’s why I said “ever happening”. It already happened once, so the probability of it happening at any point in time is 1 based on observation.

The question is why did it even happen once with those odds in place to enable life? The odds of the same result happening again on the very next trial would make it impossibly unlikely.

With regards to anthropic fine tuning there are two ‘layers’ of cosmic events to account for.

The first is the fine tuning of the universe with over 30 cosmological constants, each having to have been specifically tuned to ALL of the others to bring about the possibility of organic compounds. The equivalent of winning more than 30 lotteries at the same instant each with all the “right” numbers because each constant “setting” MUST have been specified at the same instant (Big Bang) as all the other constants and tuned to all the others to enable the possibility of organic compounds.

Following THAT virtually impossible event, the genesis of life required the “creation” of a number of functional proteins from specified sequences of amino acids and the generation of DNA (genetic code) that specifies for the creation and replication of each of the necessary functional proteins. Another virtually impossible event.

So here we have a coordinated sequence of nearly impossible events occurring which would be very like those exact combinations of cards coming up not just once but repeatedly over and over to get the cosmos “just right” for life.

That would be like taking your first combination of hundreds of cards, specifying the next, getting it, specifying the next, getting it, etc. over and over again.

You really haven’t grasped what’s involved here.

I have. Everything you’ve posed here is a question of philosophy, not science. It doesn’t matter how astronomically remote the odds were - the necessary events happened. When we start asking “Why?”, then we’re into the realm where any answer is - to an objective observer - equally valid. From the standpoint of physics, it doesn’t matter why the electron has a value that supports our existence within the universe. It only matters what the value is and how it ties in with the rest of observable reality. Whether it was set by God, or Izanagi, or Shiva, or out of truly random chance is outside the purview of science. What is the consequence to any other objective measurement if the measured value was designed or not?

 

[Peter_Plato]

That’s why I said “ever happening”. It already happened once, so the probability of it happening at any point in time is 1 based on observation.

I have. Everything you’ve posed here is a question of philosophy, not science. It doesn’t matter how astronomically remote the odds were - the necessary events happened. When we start asking “Why?”, then we’re into the realm where any answer is - to an objective observer - equally valid. From the standpoint of physics, it doesn’t matter why the electron has a value that supports our existence within the universe. It only matters what the value is and how it ties in with the rest of observable reality. Whether it was set by God, or Izanagi, or Shiva, or out of truly random chance is outside the purview of science. What is the consequence to any other objective measurement if the measured value was designed or not?

You could use the same answer if I stood before you and dropped 100 dice in sequence, correctly predicting each one before it fell. You could claim that from "the standpoint of physics, it doesn’t matter why" I correctly guessed each one because “the necessary events happened” and that “we’re into the realm where any answer is - to an objective observer - equally valid.”

Which is to say precisely nothing of value or meaning except “I don’t want to commit myself to any answer.”

Fair enough, but just admit that.

 

[buffalo]

I did, and the point stands. As far as probability is concerned, there is nothing special about any given combination of coin flips, cards, lotto numbers, or proteins. All combinations are equally probable. The only thing special about the combination of proteins which give rise to life - from a purely empirical standpoint - is that it results in organisms which are able to calculate the probability of the particular combination of proteins that gave rise to them. A designer is not necessarily implied, just as purposeful intervention is not necessarily implied when a person draws a royal flush or wins the lottery.

It doesn’t matter how improbable something is once it has already happened. If it happened, then the probability of it ever happening is 1.

For the probability argument to have traction as a scientific - not philosophical - proof of a designer, then the probability must be shown to be zero. Not small, not remote, not miniscule, but exactly zero.

The probability is so small it makes it implausible.

 

[Monkey1976]

The probability is so small it makes it implausible.

The probability is the same as any other possible combination, just as the probability of me flipping 10 heads in a row is the same as me flipping HHTHHTTTHT. One is not more improbable than any other.

 

[Peter_Plato]

Weak, just weak.
It’s just really complex pareidolia, you see something that you per-
ceive as incredible, then you try to dig deep to find a meaning in it.

AND we are also quite aware of when we are doing so!

Let’s play a little game of “Designed or Not!”

http://www.theamazingpics.com/wp-co...ragon-Cloud-Hanging-Over-Athens-in-Greece.jpg

http://www.theamazingpics.com/wp-co...-Ground-to-Eat-a-Man-East-Coast-Australia.jpg

http://www.theamazingpics.com/wp-co...haped-Icicle-Snapped-in-Iceland-of-Course.jpg

http://www.theamazingpics.com/wp-co...Frog-in-the-World-Holding-a-Mini-Umbrella.jpg

http://www.theamazingpics.com/wp-co...ceful-Sleeping-Goddess-in-Heligan-England.jpg

http://www.theamazingpics.com/wp-co...a-Crashed-Airplane-Somewhere-in-Argentina.jpg

http://www.theamazingpics.com/wp-co...of-Park-Keukenhof-in-Amserdam-Netherlands.jpg

http://www.theamazingpics.com/wp-co...oke-Rising-from-a-Fire-in-The-Netherlands.jpg

 

[Peter_Plato]

The probability is the same as any other possible combination, just as the probability of me flipping 10 heads in a row is the same as me flipping HHTHHTTTHT. One is not more improbable than any other.

Unless, of course, it becomes very, very crucial to do so.

As when your very existence as “a thinking person who is capable of pondering the probability of” depends upon getting one of…

HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT
HTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHT
THTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTH
TTTTTHHHHHTTTTTHHHHHTTTTTHHHHHTTTTTHHHHHTTTTTHHHHH
or
HHHHHTTTTTHHHHHTTTTTHHHHHTTTTTHHHHHTTTTTHHHHHTTTTT

…only some exponentially more improbable set.

 

[Monkey1976]

Unless, of course, it becomes very, very crucial to do so.

As when your very existence as “a thinking person who is capable of pondering the probability of” depends upon getting one of…

HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT
HTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHT
THTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTHTH
TTTTTHHHHHTTTTTHHHHHTTTTTHHHHHTTTTTHHHHHTTTTTHHHHH
or
HHHHHTTTTTHHHHHTTTTTHHHHHTTTTTHHHHHTTTTTHHHHHTTTTT

…only some exponentially more improbable set.

For your own good, please don’t ever go to Vegas. The chance of any specified set appearing is identical. That one set is more “necessary” than others doesn’t affect the probability of that set appearing in the slightest. Dice have no memory - the chances of rolling a 6 are the same the first, second, tenth, and 3.5x10^234th time.

They very fact that I do exist says nothing about a designer in an empirical context, as the chance was not zero. To argue from probability that something must be the result of intervention, it must be shown that the probability of its occurrence without intervention is zero. Otherwise, it’s simply a needless invocation of a designer when none is required to satisfy the conditions.

If ID wants to be taken seriously as a science, then it needs to treat its arguments with the same rigor as any other science. If the promoters of ID want to use probability as their primary argument, then they need to show not that life is improbable, but that it is otherwise impossible - a probability of zero.

 

[Peter_Plato]

For your own good, please don’t ever go to Vegas. The chance of any specified set appearing is identical. That one set is more “necessary” than others doesn’t affect the probability of that set appearing in the slightest. Dice have no memory - the chances of rolling a 6 are the same the first, second, tenth, and 3.5x10^234th time.

They very fact that I do exist says nothing about a designer in an empirical context, as the chance was not zero. To argue from probability that something must be the result of intervention, it must be shown that the probability of its occurrence without intervention is zero. Otherwise, it’s simply a needless invocation of a designer when none is required to satisfy the conditions.

If ID wants to be taken seriously as a science, then it needs to treat its arguments with the same rigor as any other science. If the promoters of ID want to use probability as their primary argument, then they need to show not that life is improbable, but that it is otherwise impossible - a probability of zero.

Your argument is based upon a fallacy of retrospective determinism - that merely because an event happened it HAD to happen (thus your calculation that the probability of an event occurring after the fact is 1.) That ignores completely how and why the event occurred in the first place - which IS the shortcoming of your view.

By the way, I avoid any thought or impulse to go to Vegas precisely because I do understand a little about probability. It is precisely why I do not go, so I don’t see how that point has any relevance at all - at least not to bolster what you claim. It actually supports my view.

 

[HansTrappist]

All this talk of Design AND God then brings us back
to another important point: Intelligent Design is not a
science, it’s a religious/philosophical position.

Nature testifies of God, yes, Paul said it, but science is not the lens through which we look for God, not that Intelligent Design is a science in the first place.

Actually, Intelligent Design is Science: it begins with the empirical evidence and ends with the conclusion of design. Please note: Intelligent Design says nothing about the identity of the Designer; that is a question for Theology.

It is actually Darwinism that is not Science and is really just pseudo-science, Materialism really: Darwinism begins with the unsubstantiated, unproven claim that there is no Designer and that all reality is limited to the purely material. You see, Materialism was designed to exclude the Designer, but let’s not pretend that it is Science. I have never met a Darwinist that will admit that the Universe may in fact be Designed and that this Design may in fact extend deep into biology and that in fact it is possible to detect this Design via Science.

But, you see, God exists. God created the Universe. He designed the Universe. Therefore, He is synonymous with the Intelligent Designer. We shouldn’t be surprised that it is possible to detect the fingerprints of the Designer on the things he Designed.

Intelligent Design Theory is certainly Science because it’s conclusions are based solely on the empirical evidence.

True scientists follow the empirical evidence wherever it leads, even if it leads to the conclusion of Intelligent Design.

 

[Peter_Plato]

The probability is the same as any other possible combination, just as the probability of me flipping 10 heads in a row is the same as me flipping HHTHHTTTHT. One is not more improbable than any other.

A good analogy on the situation is the following…

Before you stands a bicycle thief with 30 or 40 locks on the ground, all opened.

You discover that the locks had been wrapped securely around the bike, but somehow the thief has successfully opened all of them one after the other.

If the locks had one or two dials of numbers, you might conclude that the thief was “just lucky.” However, if each lock had hundreds of dials and, still, the thief successfully and successively opened each one, I don’t think your answer would be, “Well, he got them opened so there was a probability of 1 that he would. I see no difficulty and no special skills involved.”

The fact that you don’t see this point puzzles me somewhat.

Hitting on just the right settings for cosmological fine tuning is exactly like hitting just the right settings for the dials on those locks. Any setting was possible, for each constant. Why were those precise settings (correct numbers on the locks) achieved instantly at the Big Bang?

Hitting the right amino acid sequences to obtain functional proteins were just like the bicycle thief getting the correct numbers on not just one, but many locks. Getting DNA code at just the right configuration to “open” the possibilities of replication and the potential for a variety of life forms, again, was like the bicycle thief getting the right combination of numbers from a huge pool of possible configurations.

Your answer…

… well it happened so it was just as likely as any random set.

The bike thief standing with a pile of opened, but impossibly configured locks, at his feet begs to differ with you,

 

[ringil]

I would personally love to see how those who accept evolution and the deniers are broken up geographically and by education. I wonder what this could tell us.

 

[HansTrappist]

I would personally love to see how those who accept evolution and the deniers are broken up geographically and by education. I wonder what this could tell us.

It would probably tell us nothing.

The veracity of any scientific claim is based solely on the evidence, not on geography, education or consensus.

There are many educated, well-bred individuals who believe in Darwinism. Take Richard Dawkins, example. But we know that they are dead wrong.

Our Catholic Faith requires that we believe in the Creator. It shouldn’t really surprise us that we find evidence for Him in the things He created by means of the tools He created.

God created Science so it should come as no surprise that Science points back to its Creator.

 

[buffalo]

The probability is the same as any other possible combination, just as the probability of me flipping 10 heads in a row is the same as me flipping HHTHHTTTHT. One is not more improbable than any other.

I want to specify you flip 100 heads in a row then alternate and flip 100 tails in a row. Keep doing it until are successful. How many years must you be doing this at 1 flip per second.

 

[buffalo]

I would personally love to see how those who accept evolution and the deniers are broken up geographically and by education. I wonder what this could tell us.

It may end up as an argument from authority. I get educated and the educators tell me what I should believe and then test my ability to repeat it back.