Overwhelming evidence for Design?

[tonyrey]

1. Things exist.
2. There is no obvious explanation for their existence.
3. They need not exist.
4. It is unreasonable not to search for an explanation.
5. But what is an “explanation”?
6. An explanation increases our understanding.
7. What do we understand to begin with?
8. Nothing!
9. But if we understand nothing we cannot understand anything!
10. If we cannot understand anything we are wasting our time and energy!
11. To believe we understand nothing is self-contradictory.
12. If we cannot understand anything we cannot understand that we understand nothing!
13. Therefore we understand something!
14. How do we understand something?
15. By using our power of understanding!
16. How can we be sure our power of understanding is reliable?
17. We have proved our power of understanding is indispensable.
18. The success of science is further evidence that our power of understanding is reliable.
19. What else can we prove?
20. That we exist.
21. How do we exist?
22. We don’t understand how we exist!
23. Then how can we be sure we exist?
24. Because our power of understanding cannot exist by itself.
25. How can we be sure our power of understanding cannot exist by itself?
26. Because we have no experience of anything that exists by itself.
27. We also know we are responsible for the success of science.
28. What are we?
29. We don’t know!
30. Don’t we know anything about what we are?
31. There is no evidence the brain knows it exists.
32. We know we exist.
33. The brain cannot control itself because its activity is determined by physical events.
34. We can control ourselves and our environment.
35. The brain has no insight into the past, present or future.
36. We are capable of hindsight, insight and foresight.
37. Our body is subject to the laws of nature but we transcend the laws of nature.
38. All our knowledge is based on our thoughts, intuitions, feelings, decisions and sensations.
39. Our mind is our primary datum and sole certainty.
40. Physical reality is not the sole reality.

1. We infer that physical events occur from our sensations.
2. Our interpretation of physical events is deeply affected by our beliefs and values.
3. Therefore what occurs in our mind is far more important than physical events.
4. If we couldn’t control our mind we would be robots.
5. If we were robots our conclusions about reality would be unreliable.
6. The success of science proves our conclusions are very often reliable.
7. Therefore we can control our mind to a considerable extent.
8. Our power to control our mind cannot be explained by science.
9. Therefore science is an inadequate explanation of reality.
10. The most adequate explanation of reality recognises the power of the mind.

 

[Sair]

1. We infer that physical events occur from our sensations.
2. Our interpretation of physical events is deeply affected by our beliefs and values.
3. Therefore what occurs in our mind is far more important than physical events.
4. If we couldn’t control our mind we would be robots.
5. If we were robots our conclusions about reality would be unreliable.
6. The success of science proves our conclusions are very often reliable.
7. Therefore we can control our mind to a considerable extent.
8. Our power to control our mind cannot be explained by science.
9. Therefore science is an inadequate explanation of reality.
10. The most adequate explanation of reality recognises the power of the mind.

Why, if we were robots - assuming for the sake of argument that your assertion about our ability to ‘control’ our minds is meaningful in this regard - would our conclusions about reality necessarily be invalid? Perhaps we might then be unable to formulate more abstract explanations - whether valid or spurious - on the basis of such information as we received from the external world, but that would hardly render invalid our actual reception of such information, nor indeed our ability to act upon that information as if it were an accurate reflection of our environment. I’ve never understood this notion that our ability to receive and interpret sense data somehow depends upon an additional quality, some supernatural aspect, as if what our senses detect and our nervous systems process is all garbled and confused and has to be disentangled by some kind of magical pilot in order for us to function within the world.

I’m not sure you appreciate the irony of your position. Don’t forget, when you claim that “our power to control our minds” - whatever that means - cannot be explained by science, what you’re really saying is that it has not yet been explained in comprehensive scientific terms. It wasn’t that long ago that the process of evolution was unimaginable, that the transmission of disease by microscopic organisms was unheard-of, or that space travel was only the stuff of science fiction - just to name a very few inroads science has made into the explanation of reality. You are attempting to claim that these very successes are evidence of science’s limited scope when it comes to understanding our own essential composition.

 

[reggieM]

Just going back here a minute …

Why is that a prior commitment? I was a Christian for decades, born and raised. I had no such prior commitment. After the fact, looking at everything I could, all the evidence available to me, theology just scored a “zero” in terms of performative explanations and accountable epistemology. That doesn’t mean, a priori, that naturalism is true. It means that after reviewing everything out there, theology is sham that cannot perform, or even cohere, leaving the only performative players on the explanatory field the natural ones.

I found this confusing. First, you were a Christian for decades. Being a Christian is something more than adopting a philosophical stance. It’s a way of life - a practice and a relationship with God. Then you explain that you “looked at everything” you could. You looked at “evidence”. But you haven’t explained “evidence for what” or “evidence about what”. What kind of evidence did you expect to find in the practice of Christianity? You then explain that after “reviewing everything out there”, that theology cannot perform, but natural explanations can perform.

But you haven’t explained what explantions you were looking for, why you were looking for them and why you used theology for whatever you were seeking.

This is very important in practical matters. If you were looking for a way to achieve moral excellence, for example, it doesn’t follow that science is more accountable or has greater performative explanations.

Additionally, as a Christian you prayed and sought to do the will of God – as is a defined part of Christian life. It doesn’t follow that science offered performative explaintions as to why God answered your prayers and why He worked wonders in your life – as Christians commonly recognize.

 

[tonyrey]

Why, if we were robots - assuming for the sake of argument that your assertion about our ability to ‘control’ our minds is meaningful in this regard - would our conclusions about reality necessarily be invalid?

Is it meaningful in any regard? If so when and why?

Perhaps we might then be unable to formulate more abstract explanations - whether valid or spurious - on the basis of such information as we received from the external world…

How does a physicalist account for our ability to formulate more abstract explanations?

… but that would hardly render invalid our actual reception of such information, nor indeed our ability to act upon that information as if it were an accurate reflection of our environment.

There is vast difference between an animal’s reaction to its environment and a person’s interpretation based on insight and undestanding.

I’ve never understood this notion that our ability to receive and interpret sense data somehow depends upon an additional quality, some supernatural aspect, as if what our senses detect and our nervous systems process is all garbled and confused and has to be disentangled by some kind of magical pilot in order for us to function within the world.

A person’s life consists of far more than the reception and interpretation of sense data.

Don’t forget, when you claim that “our power to control our minds” - whatever that means - cannot be explained by science, what you’re really saying is that it has not yet been explained in comprehensive scientific terms.

That objection is based on the physicalist assumption that all personal activity is in principle scientifically explicable.

It wasn’t that long ago that the process of evolution was unimaginable, that the transmission of disease by microscopic organisms was unheard-of, or that space travel was only the stuff of science fiction - just to name a very few inroads science has made into the explanation of reality.

All those examples are of **physical **discoveries - which are to be expected given the unique and astonishing power of the mind which far outstrips physical activity.

You are attempting to claim that these very successes are evidence of science’s limited scope when it comes to understanding our own essential composition.

That objection is based on the physicalist’s assumption that persons are natural objects rather than rational, autonomous agents.

 

[tonyrey]

A person’s life consists of far more than the reception and interpretation of sense data.

I mean of course a person’s intellectual activity.

 

[reggieM]

Touchstone,
You’ve written a lot in your two previous replies. I took some time to consider your thoughts – and basically, I disagree with just about every point you raised. So, rather than just dragging this out, it’s best to look for some common ground and go from there.

Here is a single point that illustrates the problem and which makes it impossible for you to investigate the Catholic Faith – or even understand what it is. In fact, this point indicates that you cannot (as in are not able to) even understand what science is:

I stated:
Limiting the discussion to what physical science alone can evaluate is impossible and contradictory.

You replied:

It’s neither,

So that’s where we disagree. I see your view as irrational, self-contradictory and obviously false.

You explained further:

“what is science” is a function of what we can evaluate on the basis of evidence.

You provide a few options:

1. I must accept your definition of science as being true because you stated it.
2. Definitions of things can be evaluated using physical science alone.
3. Science creates definitions for you (as above) of what science is.
4. You can rely on physical science alone to evaluate philosophical axioms and the epistemology of science.
5. We can use physical science alone to explain the meaning and limits of empiricism.

You explain further:

I said:

Science doesn’t … generate it’s own epistemology – it is dependent on a philosophical structure for its own existence.

According to your statement above, it is possible to limit our discussion to what physical science alone can evaluate. So in reply to my statement that science cannot generate its own epistemology, you stated:

That’s what epistemology is – it’s the philosophy of knowledge and knowing. Science has its own epistemology – it cannot escape having one, as it’s entailed by its metaphysical axioms.

So, we have a circular argument and something that is incoherent. Science, supposedly, can evaluate its own first principles. You’re claiming that science can evaluate the correct meaning of words, the correct usage of language and the correctness of inferences that emerge from science.

You explain further by re-writing my statement:

Here’s how your statement reads, with this understanding in place:

Limiting evaluation to what we can evaluate is impossible and contradictory.

We should be able to use physical science to evaluate this statement. Or, as above, it’s impossible to evaluate either this statement or if you accurately re-wrote what I initially stated. Again, these are circular arguments and are contradictory. You’ve defined science as the only tool that can be used to evaluate things. You’d necessarily have to claim that science can evaluate the definition of itself.

Finally, you explain how we can recognize the truth of your claims:

Science only understands and processes natural phenomena and natural explanations, and this is governed by empirical observation. So it’s true-by-definition …

We have something which is true-by-definition. Again, according to your belief, we can evaluate whether this definition of science is accurate or useful – by use of physical science alone.

As I said – this is impossible, contradictory and irrational. Using your method of thought, you cannot understand anything at all. You can’t evaluate whether your definitions, axioms or conclusions are meaningful or consistent or true because you can only evaluate them by physical science – the nature of which is true-by-definition and not by conclusions drawn from physical science.

I can’t see any sense in trying to go farther in the discussion until you either reject your claim that we can limit the discussion to what physical science alone can evaluate, or you simply affirm that you hold an irrational and contradictory view on this.

 

[tonyrey]

Touchstone,
You’ve written a lot in your two previous replies. I took some time to consider your thoughts – and basically, I disagree with just about every point you raised. So, rather than just dragging this out, it’s best to look for some common ground and go from there.

Here is a single point that illustrates the problem and which makes it impossible for you to investigate the Catholic Faith – or even understand what it is. In fact, this point indicates that you cannot (as in are not able to) even understand what science is:

I stated:
Limiting the discussion to what physical science alone can evaluate is impossible and contradictory.

You replied:

So that’s where we disagree. I see your view as irrational, self-contradictory and obviously false.

You explained further:

You provide a few options:

1. I must accept your definition of science as being true because you stated it.
2. Definitions of things can be evaluated using physical science alone.
3. Science creates definitions for you (as above) of what science is.
4. You can rely on physical science alone to evaluate philosophical axioms and the epistemology of science.
5. We can use physical science alone to explain the meaning and limits of empiricism.

You explain further:

I said:

According to your statement above, it is possible to limit our discussion to what physical science alone can evaluate. So in reply to my statement that science cannot generate its own epistemology, you stated:

So, we have a circular argument and something that is incoherent. Science, supposedly, can evaluate its own first principles. You’re claiming that science can evaluate the correct meaning of words, the correct usage of language and the correctness of inferences that emerge from science.

You explain further by re-writing my statement:Here’s how your statement reads, with this understanding in place:

Limiting evaluation to what we can evaluate is impossible and contradictory.We should be able to use physical science to evaluate this statement. Or, as above, it’s impossible to evaluate either this statement or if you accurately re-wrote what I initially stated. Again, these are circular arguments and are contradictory. You’ve defined science as the only tool that can be used to evaluate things. You’d necessarily have to claim that science can evaluate the definition of itself.

Finally, you explain how we can recognize the truth of your claims:

We have something which is true-by-definition. Again, according to your belief, we can evaluate whether this definition of science is accurate or useful – by use of physical science alone.

As I said – this is impossible, contradictory and irrational. Using your method of thought, you cannot understand anything at all. You can’t evaluate whether your definitions, axioms or conclusions are meaningful or consistent or true because you can only evaluate them by physical science – the nature of which is true-by-definition and not by conclusions drawn from physical science.

I can’t see any sense in trying to go farther in the discussion until you either reject your claim that we can limit the discussion to what physical science alone can evaluate, or you simply affirm that you hold an irrational and contradictory view on this.

I recently made the point that Dawkins is a classic example of a scientist completely out of his depth who vainly attempts to extrapolate from biology to metaphysics, ethics and epistemology, sedulously avoiding issues such as the nature of truth, goodness and free will which would totally undermine his naive scientism.

In this case the extrapolation is from science itself - which still fails to solve the problem because it is also based on the unsubstantiated assumption that materialism is the only valid explanation of reality…

 

[greylorn]

Dawkins offers panspermia as a hypothesis that is at least plausible as a scientific rendering of the intelligent design intuition. He does not support or promote the idea, for just the reason you cite – there’s not a shred of evidence for such a visitation or seeding from aliens or other intelligence outside this planet.

But, that hypothesis AT LEAST can be posited in natural terms, as a natural phenomenon. As perfectly weak as that is, then, it’s a good example of what Intelligent Design thinking, where “God” is the designer, cannot even rise to. Dawkins allows that an intelligent design reference is possible in scientific terms – panspermia. It’s not a good case with evidence, but it at least is a natural explanation, amenable to examination and discovery by evidence (even if no such evidence exists currently). “God did it” is impotent in this regard.

The accusation is that Dawkins (et al) rule out intelligent design categorically, and dismiss design scenarios for biological life a priori. Dawkins points to the weak, but possible panspermia hypothesis to show that this accusation is false. He does and can provide scenarios where “intelligent design” would obtain in an evidence-based, scientific way.

It’s just the inchoate flavors of the design intuition that posit a supernatural designer that Dawkins understands to be fatally problematic from a scientific standpoint.

None of that commits Dawkins to sympathy for panspermia. It’s just a matter of granting what is possible as a scientific explanation, and what is not. Dawkins no more thinks DNA was designed by aliens than he thinks God did it. But he’s obligated, as we all are, to acknowledge that even if that scenario is completely bereft of supporting evidence, that scenario would be completely legit as a scientific answer if there WERE supporting evidence, which there logically could be. There’s no way in principle, by contrast to get to this same potential with the intuition that a “supernatural Yahweh did it”.

-TS

Your defense of Dawkins is disappointing. Let’s suppose that tomorrow morning a flying saucer appears on his front lawn, and a group of Little Green Men come out and confess, “Yep, you got it right, sure enough. WE created all life on earth.”

Were I invited to that little backslapping party, I’d ask the LGM, “So, who, or what process, created you little buggers?”

 

[greylorn]

It seems you are confusing reasoning with evidence. We reason on the evidence, but the reasoning itself is not the evidence, unless the subject is whether we are reasoning (in which case, our experience of reasoning is evidence to consider). We can ply all manner of conjectures, but this is not evidence. If your conflation of the two were to work out fine, we wouldn’t need any sense data to consider. “Evidence” for my purposes here should be understood to be observations that are contingent on extra-mental attributes of the world around us, not cognitive artifacts of reasoning. Reasoning is crucial, but it’s not dispositive regarding the state of the world outside our mind, on its own. Knowledge about the world obtains from reasoning against that outside information, information from the world outside the mind coming into our minds.

That’s what epistemology is – it’s the philosophy of knowledge and knowing. Science has its own epistemology – it cannot escape having one, as it’s entailed by its metaphysical axioms.

Yes, this is scientific epistemology. Natural explanations for natural phenomena. Science only understands and processes natural phenomena and natural explanations, and this is governed by empirical observation. So it’s true-by-definition that anything that science can “prove” (science doesn’t ‘prove’ as much as it “fails to falsify”) is empirical; that’s the only terms it understands for phenomena and for explanation.

This is also why it coheres and is performative. If science were to be lax about this epistemology, and accept “supernatural explanations” or “non-empirical evidence” as adjudicative, we’d go back to knowing nothing, and be left with nothing but theology.

No, unless you are saying that Yahweh is a natural entity that operates in a natural context that can be observed and modeled by science, in the way aliens can (or humans can be, and are studied, say in anthropological contexts).

Philosophically, we say it’s possible on the ground that the idea doesn’t entail a logical contradiction. The actuality of a God does not produce a logical contradiction, nor does the absence of a God or gods. So these are logical possibilities to consider. That is not to say we have knowledge that grounds any necessary and sufficient context for God to exist. It’s just not a divide by zero to consider, if provisionally, that a god exists, or no god exists.

-TS

All this blather about epistemology and reasoning from the evidence covers up some things which you seem unaware of, yet which are relevant to your beliefs:

• There is no evidence that the Darwinian explanation for species change, random mutations, can actually induce species change. (Variations within species, yes; new species, nope.)
• There is no evidence that random molecular events could have produced a viable living, self-reproductive cell.
• The odds that a single, small (900 base-pair) human gene could have arranged itself in the sequence needed to produce one useful protein are about 1.4 x 10[sup]-542[/sup].

There are about 23000 protein-producing genes in the human genome, and you do know that probabilities multiply?

i am not proposing this small subset of anti-Darwinist reality-checks as a way to bolster current religious theory. In my opinion, both are equally incorrect.

 

[tonyrey]

I recently made the point that Dawkins is a classic example of a scientist completely out of his depth who vainly attempts to extrapolate from biology to metaphysics, ethics and epistemology, sedulously avoiding issues such as the nature of truth, goodness and free will which would totally undermine his naive scientism.

In this case the extrapolation is from science itself - which still fails to solve the problem because it is also based on the unsubstantiated assumption that materialism is the only valid explanation of reality…

Of course it could be argued that all assumptions are unsubstantiated but some are far less substantial than others! This is a case in point.

 

[Touchstone]

Just going back here a minute …

I found this confusing. First, you were a Christian for decades. Being a Christian is something more than adopting a philosophical stance. It’s a way of life - a practice and a relationship with God.

Yes, that was my experience. I was raised in a devout Christian home, and while we might have edged into rudimentary philosophy in a series at church on apologetics or some such, or oohed and ahhed as we watch a debate feature William Lane Craig (!), Christianity was primarily a relationship for me, and a way of life, a matter of praxis.

Then you explain that you “looked at everything” you could. You looked at “evidence”. But you haven’t explained “evidence for what” or “evidence about what”. What kind of evidence did you expect to find in the practice of Christianity?

Well, something, at least. Something that I could at least reconcile with “a reasoned faith”.

You then explain that after “reviewing everything out there”, that theology cannot perform, but natural explanations can perform.

Yeah. A devastating discovery dawned on me, at one point, getting more into the science topics as a result of my software development work: what can I draw upon as theology that performs in the way all these other models and propositions do? Even giving theology a charitable margin, nothing. The more I looked, the more clear it was that it is completely impotent. No better than astrology.

But you haven’t explained what explantions you were looking for, why you were looking for them and why you used theology for whatever you were seeking.

I understand theology to be the study of religion, and man’s relationship to God. But when I looked at it critically, it was impossible to separate that idea from studying and developing my own self-delusions, and the systematic cultivation of my own superstitions.

I was looking for tools and relationships to something transcendent, divine, as that’s what I was told theology was. Under scrutiny, the compelling answer was that it was a means of fooling myself, and indulging my own intuitions, and assenting to cultural mores that dominated my social circles just to avoid being the kid who points out that the whole enterprise is a sham.

This is very important in practical matters. If you were looking for a way to achieve moral excellence, for example, it doesn’t follow that science is more accountable or has greater performative explanations.

It’s not clear that it does, but “performative” is an advantage that is valuable in a general sense. If you look at human morality in a similar way to the way we look at human health, for example – what ideas, policies, actions and principles promote and sustain human flourishing? – then theology is a failure, and has no epistemology that can even serve those questions. Science can at least entertain and address the question.

Additionally, as a Christian you prayed and sought to do the will of God – as is a defined part of Christian life. It doesn’t follow that science offered performative explaintions as to why God answered your prayers and why He worked wonders in your life – as Christians commonly recognize.

No that’s true, and I was one who could call to mind several “supernatural” or “miraculous” experiences in my life. Science couldn’t offer performative explanations when I did not accept that performance as performative. If it went against my superstitions, my superstitions won.

Religion, and Catholicism is quite exemplary of this, is a kind of index on human intuition, over and against objective knowledge. As a Christian, I clung to my superstitions and intuitions that I valued (and feared subordinating) over the kind of clear-eyed view of the evidence and the available explanations that overturn many of those intuitions. For me, it wasn’t until I valued knowledge – performative knowledge – over the intuitions I’d grown up clinging to and was raised to maintain a deathgrip on that mundane, plausible, but disruptive explanations got traction. I wasn’t “experiencing God”, but indulging my superstitions and conceits about myself and my place in the world. I shuddered to think of the prospects of a godless reality, and not just because of the kind of social approbation and hostility that kind of conjecture can unleash in the religious circles I grew up in, but because of the “loss of a fairy factor” that I now look back on as just growing up to a mature human being (if a bit late on my part).

Science is only performative and instructive if you let it be. It can’t compete with the intuition that is given priority. Until one is willing to be vulnerable to the implications of a non-self-indulged and self-exalting view of the world, science is just valuable as a matter of “cherry picking” – adopt what knowledge fits in the cracks in your superstitions. That is a practically workable way to live, and billions of people get by that way, many of them quite happily and successfully.

-TS

 

[Touchstone]

Touchstone,
You’ve written a lot in your two previous replies. I took some time to consider your thoughts – and basically, I disagree with just about every point you raised. So, rather than just dragging this out, it’s best to look for some common ground and go from there.

OK.

Here is a single point that illustrates the problem and which makes it impossible for you to investigate the Catholic Faith – or even understand what it is. In fact, this point indicates that you cannot (as in are not able to) even understand what science is:

[section elided for post length]

So, we have a circular argument and something that is incoherent. Science, supposedly, can evaluate its own first principles. You’re claiming that science can evaluate the correct meaning of words, the correct usage of language and the correctness of inferences that emerge from science.

No. Over and over now – here on CAF I have explained that science hangs on metaphysical axioms that, being axioms, bootstrap scientific epistemology and practice, and are not provided with justification. If you “argue for your axiom”, it’s not an axiom. Axioms are adopted because they are NECESSARY for some enterprise, needed to get the enterprise off the ground.

Science invokes the proposition that the extra-mental world is real and is intelligible through our senses to a sufficient degree that we can build performative models of that extra-mental world.

Scientific epistemology and practice are wholly dependent on this enabling metaphysical axiom.

You explain further by re-writing my statement:

Here’s how your statement reads, with this understanding in place:

Limiting evaluation to what we can evaluate is impossible and contradictory.

We should be able to use physical science to evaluate this statement. Or, as above, it’s impossible to evaluate either this statement or if you accurately re-wrote what I initially stated. Again, these are circular arguments and are contradictory. You’ve defined science as the only tool that can be used to evaluate things. You’d necessarily have to claim that science can evaluate the definition of itself.

No, and that trivially reduced to an infinite regress of justifications if you suppose that any epistemology must use itself to establish its epistemology. This is not how scientific epistemology obtains. Really, ask a scientist, or any philosopher of science. One must bootstrap an epistemology somewhere, and science does, see above.

Finally, you explain how we can recognize the truth of your claims:

We have something which is true-by-definition. Again, according to your belief, we can evaluate whether this definition of science is accurate or useful – by use of physical science alone.

That’s close. We define “true” with semantics that depend on the metaphysical axiom – the commitment to the idea that our sensory experiences are veridical to such a degree we can build models that can be evaluated against those experiences. That is, scientific metaphysics ground our definition of “true”. If one does not grant that the extra-mental world is real and that our senses are veridical to some substantial extent, then science will not be of any value or persuasive as knowledge to you. One must assess the semantics of “true” as grounded in scientific epistemology if one is critical about using the word.

As I said – this is impossible, contradictory and irrational. Using your method of thought, you cannot understand anything at all. You can’t evaluate whether your definitions, axioms or conclusions are meaningful or consistent or true because you can only evaluate them by physical science – the nature of which is true-by-definition and not by conclusions drawn from physical science.

If an axiom can be “untrue”, then it is not an axiom. An axiom is a proposition that is necessarily true for the context in which is deployed. That’s crucial, and a point you are clearly confused about, because your complaint boils down to a plea for an infinite regress of justifications, and/or a demand for an argument for the “truth” of an axiom. Both are divide by zero operations, here.

It’s easy to show yourself how confused you are on this. Just look at your own beliefs, the epistemic commitments and criteria you operate with, and ask what justifies that epistemology. Now for any justification, J, ask what in turn justifies J. Repeat this cycle until you understand the error you’re committed to above. And then this response from me should make strong sense.

I can’t see any sense in trying to go farther in the discussion until you either reject your claim that we can limit the discussion to what physical science alone can evaluate, or you simply affirm that you hold an irrational and contradictory view on this.

I make no such claims that discussion should be thus limited. Discuss what you like. My claim is that “true”, without a possible “false”, in principle even, is meaningless, inert, a trivial truth, nothing more than a tautology. Now, definitions and tautologies are very useful in their own right, but they are not knowledge, and so we should not confuse them for knowledge. If you want to talk about knowledge – and there are many topics to discuss which are not predicated on what is known or not known, or knowable or not knowable, then your semantics for ‘true’, ‘false’, and ‘know’ will need some substance. And for propositions which we call ‘knowledge’, if it can’t be falsified, even in principle, “knowledge” is euphemistic as a label there, against usage of the term where propositions which are possibly not true, non-knowledge, liable to being falsified by the dynamics and state of the extra-mental world.

-TS

 

[Touchstone]

All this blather about epistemology and reasoning from the evidence covers up some things which you seem unaware of, yet which are relevant to your beliefs:

• There is no evidence that the Darwinian explanation for species change, random mutations, can actually induce species change. (Variations within species, yes; new species, nope.)

I understand this to be claim like this: “Yes, there are inches, but you can’t just add a whole bunches of inches and get a mile!”. Variation is variation, and change is incremental, and lots of incremental changes can and do result in large scale changes when summed. Just as an example of compelling and accessible evidence of shared ancestry and species divergence between chimps and humans from that common ancestor, consider the orthologous ERVs we share – same locus. See here for example.

• There is no evidence that random molecular events could have produced a viable living, self-reproductive cell.

I agree. But no one supposes that “random molecular events” have done this. Biology is physics, and is complex interaction of chance and law. These do – demonstrably, all over the place – create novel structures and new information in combination. For example, it’s not a random accident that hydrogen atoms and oxygen atoms at certain temperatures, pressures, proximity, etc. combined to form H20. The atoms to move about in random ways due to Brownian motion, but yet, water isn’t just likely in those contexts, it’s inevitable, completely predictable. This is the interaction of natural processes, processes that integrate stochastic behaviors and “severe prejudice” toward certain outcomes.

• The odds that a single, small (900 base-pair) human gene could have arranged itself in the sequence needed to produce one useful protein are about 1.4 x 10[sup]-542[/sup].

Yes, the same odds that hydrogen and oxygen atoms will form up as H20 as a result of Brownian motion. It’s not even a serious objection, if you are omitting the suite of dynamics and time factors involved that facilitate the formation of water molecules. To suppose that the human gene assembled, as is, in one lottery draw, from random sequencing, is to deny that water could form by just jiggling around together – no chemistry involved, no valence affinities, ionization potentials, etc.

The human genome is considered to be the output of a billion year and more cumulative process, right?

There are about 23000 protein-producing genes in the human genome, and you do know that probabilities multiply?

i am not proposing this small subset of anti-Darwinist reality-checks as a way to bolster current religious theory. In my opinion, both are equally incorrect.

Well, if we throw out natural principles, and posit the genome or the water molecule as a random sequence, full stop, yes. But that’s not at all what science proposes to have happened, or happen all around us.

-TS

 

[Touchstone]

Your defense of Dawkins is disappointing. Let’s suppose that tomorrow morning a flying saucer appears on his front lawn, and a group of Little Green Men come out and confess, “Yep, you got it right, sure enough. WE created all life on earth.”

Were I invited to that little backslapping party, I’d ask the LGM, “So, who, or what process, created you little buggers?”

And Dawkins would say as much – and you can go hear him discuss this on YouTube, or his writings. This is the criticism that Dawkins launches at panspermia. It just pushes back the problem. But even so, if the question at hand is “how did biological life on earth come to be”, if the aliens are the first-order answer, that is the first-order answer. Dawkins is as quick as you or I to point out that it just begs the question of how the aliens came to be.

Nevertheless, whatever we may think of that problem, if we are focusing on the question of life on earth, those aliens (assuming the account is true, above) would be the proximal answer. Dawkins can’t dismiss that as a possibility, and neither can I.

-TS

 

[FurtherSuntime]

Sorry to interrupt the important discussing on the particle design idea. I noticed today a picture taken out in Colorado in the time of the vigil and realized it was not only so moving but, together with opinions in the atmosphere or space where the entirety of existence holds design in many ways

Here we see the great Angel having no choice but to actualize unity together with the offering and intensely genuine recourse to God. The presence in the …“I”…fellow member Gaber so often refers to is evoked in a collective together with genuine prayer in and by the depth of circumstance… Giving no choice to the great Angel always in praise of God but to unify in harmony and mysterious agreement… As we all can imagine another almost impossible truism to know in the struggle, sets a humbling realization of just how much the race needs this adoration of God in all the different representing ways in contribution to all in creation toward unity.

http://i.huffpost.com/gen/698414/original.jpg

 

[tonyrey]

1. The most adequate explanation of reality recognises the power of the mind.
2. Materialism rejects the power of the mind.
3. Materialism derives the mind from matter.
4. Materialism presupposes atomism.
5. Atomism claims persons are composed solely of atomic particles.
6. Atomism is a fragmentation of reality.
7. Atomism is restricted to analysis and excludes synthesis.
8. Atomism is restricted to the past and lacks a comprehensive view of reality.
9. Atomism substitutes causes for reasons.
10. Atomism deprives reality of value, purpose and meaning.
11. Atomism and materialism are self-refuting.

 

[JesuisSean]

PROOF of the existence of God would do the trick.

outersecrets.com/real/biblecode2a.htm

Unfortunately, the day has not yet arrived for proof to be accepted. The standard stupidity act of today, is to Reject Before Inspect.

 

[Sair]

I mean of course a person’s intellectual activity.

And I’ve asked this several times before, without receiving an actual explanatory response - of what does our intellectual activity consist other than the reception and interpretation of sense data, both from the external world and from the internal signals of our own bodies? Of what would thought consist in the absence of anything to think about?

 

[tonyrey]

… what does our intellectual activity consist other than the reception and interpretation of sense data, both from the external world and from the internal signals of our own bodies?

Our intellectual activity **includes **insight, hindsight, foresight, intuition, inspiration, prediction, inference, induction, deduction, abstraction, generalisation, differentiation, integration, invention, innovation, introspection, analysis, synthesis, contemplation…

Of what would thought consist in the absence of anything to think about?

“anything” implies that there are only things to think about. All our knowledge is based on our thoughts, feelings, intuitions, intentions, decisions and sensations.

The mind is a far richer and more fulfilling source of experience than material objects. The hypothesis that our intellectual activity consists solely in receiving, interpreting and reacting to signals is the logical - and self-refuting - implication of the materialist’s assumption that persons are biological machines.

 

[reggieM]

OK.
If you “argue for your axiom”, it’s not an axiom. Axioms are adopted because they are NECESSARY for some enterprise, needed to get the enterprise off the ground.

You’ve just argued for your axiom. You’re seeking to justify something by use of an argument. I can evalute whether what you have to say is meaningful or not – or whether it is true or not. All of this is done without use of physical science.

You claimed that the discussion could be limited to what physical science alone could evaluate. As I said, this is an obvious contradiction.

Science invokes the proposition that the extra-mental world is real and is intelligible through our senses to a sufficient degree that we can build performative models of that extra-mental world.

Scientific epistemology and practice are wholly dependent on this enabling metaphysical axiom.

Again, you’re giving a defense for the use of these axioms.

No, and that trivially reduced to an infinite regress of justifications if you suppose that any epistemology must use itself to establish its epistemology. This is not how scientific epistemology obtains.

This is why you cannot use science to evaluate what science is. This is why your claim that we could limit the discussion to what physical science alone can evaluate is false.
You continue to offer justifications and arguments which cannot be evaluated scientifically.

Really, ask a scientist, or any philosopher of science. One must bootstrap an epistemology somewhere, and science does, see above.

Now you direct me to “ask any scientist”. Yet another absurdity. I go ask “any scientist” and get an opinion and thus you prove your point (supposedly) and justify the axioms you’re defending and explaining. This, you claim, is how to limit the discussion to “physical science alone”. You’re claiming, apparently, that a single data point, a single opinion from any scientist is empirical data accessible to physical science.
I can tell you to ask any believing Catholic if God exists. Using your “scientific” method, that truth would then demonstrated clearly.

We define “true” with semantics that depend on the metaphysical axiom

We evaluate whether definitions are accurate, useful, consistent, clear, broad or narrow. You’re claiming that physical science alone can make these determinations.

If one does not grant that the extra-mental world is real and that our senses are veridical to some substantial extent, then science will not be of any value or persuasive as knowledge to you.

Again, another philosophical claim that destroys your notion that the discussion can be limited to physical science alone. Beyond that, it appears that you’re claiming that we have to accept the idea that the extra-mental world is real on blind faith alone. Apparently, we can’t evaluate that claim at all since it is axiomatic. So, as it happens, scientism reduces to dogmatism. Nothing outside of science can be evaluated and therefore the initial premises that lead to science have to be accepted without critical thought – blindly, as any fundamentalist does with a sacred text.
You mention “to some substantial extent” – thus providing a non-scientific measure. This kind of irrationality will continue through everything you have to say until you admit that you’re wrong. The discussion cannot be limited to what physical science alone can evaluate. You need to realize that and change your worldview. Or else, as I said, you can simply assert that your position is irrational.

One must assess the semantics of “true” as grounded in scientific epistemology if one is critical about using the word.

There we go again, one must evaluate the semantics. Here’s a direct contradiction to what you claimed. Unless I’ve misunderstood. You could, perhaps, take the word into a lab. Find its physical dimensions. Then find the physical connection from that word, wherever it exists in space, and discover its physical connection to “meaning”. You could then find the physical dimensions and properties of “meaning” also. Then you can measure that against other words that you’ve captured in nature somewhere and observe their physical dimensions. That’s how physical science can find the correct definitions.

If an axiom can be “untrue”, then it is not an axiom.

Prove that using physical science alone – as with the scientific method. If you can’t then you need to admit that you’re wrong.

I make no such claims that discussion should be thus limited. Discuss what you like. My claim is that “true”, without a possible “false”, in principle even, is meaningless, inert, a trivial truth, nothing more than a tautology.

You made a definite claim against a very distinct proposition. Now you’re changing it.

I’ll accept that you’ve been proven wrong but that you either can’t admit it or can’t recognize it.

Now, definitions and tautologies are very useful in their own right, but they are not knowledge, and so we should not confuse them for knowledge.

Again – another non-scientific claim which is either an axiom or not.
If an axiom, then according to you “it can’t be untrue” – and it cannot be evaluated.
If not an axiom, then according to you, it can be evaluated using physical science alone.

So, even the act of choosing whether your claims are axiomatic cannot be done using physical science alone. Your entire mental framework has been reduced to that which physical science alone can evaluate. Then you build that world on non-empirical philosophical premises which cannot be evaluated, apparently, and must be accepted on blind faith.

You’ve tried to deny the validity of philosophical principles, when you’ve actually shown the superiority of philosophy. Your claim that the discussion can be limited to what physical science alone can evaluate is denied by your blind-faith trust in metaphysical axioms. You can’t explain yourself without reference to non-empirical assumptions. You argue and defend your views by citing definitions of words, and then you ask me to get the opinion of “any scientist” in order validate the supposed truth of your definitions.

So, you can insist that you’re right and accept that your position is irrational. Or you can admit that you are wrong and accept that this discussion cannot be limited to what physical science alone can evaluate.