Self-Defence Mechanisms in Nature.

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Hokomai said:
Natural selection is about genetic preservation. It explains only that a feature is preserved due to its effectiveness. It doesn’t in and of itself explain the existence of self-defence mechanisms in nature. The point is, something exists in nature that acts specifically for the preservation of an organism. That is goal-direction.
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It is absurd to expect natural self-defence mechanisms to cater infallibly for every individual and every contingency - as if God works with divine fiats rather than through natural laws.
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rossum said:
In Buddhism, all life also has a reason for being reincarnated. It failed to attain nirvana last time round. That is a small, local, individual reason; not the large all-encompassing God-sized reason that is being discussed here.

The interaction of the material world and karma is extremely complex, but from the Buddhist point of view, there are three components that go into making a ‘new’ human being: the mother, the father and the gandhabba – the remaining karmic load from the previous life. Science can only deal with the first two.
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That is precisely why Buddhism is incoherent! There are many small, local, individual reasons that exist in a void for no reason whatsoever…
 
tonyrey said:
It is absurd to expect natural self-defence mechanisms to cater infallibly for every individual and every contingency - as if God works with divine fiats rather than through natural laws.
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I do my best to avoid absurdity, so could you explain please why God would design natural laws in such a way?
 
tonyrey said:
A universe with natural laws is an essential basis for physical and rational existence.
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Perhaps so, but I was asking about the design, by God, of a system that led to the extinction of 90% plus of all species. I was asking this because of the assertion that there are things called ‘self-defence’ mechanisms in nature that somehow indicate design. Your response does not appear to address this.
 
tonyrey said:
That is precisely why Buddhism is incoherent! There are many small, local, individual reasons that exist in a void for no reason whatsoever…
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Your understanding of Buddhism is faulty. All of existence arises because of prior conditions.

rossum
 
rossum said:
My apologies for not making myself clearer. I was talking about the ratio in the population. More male babies are born, but they have a higher death rate than female babies. I was not talking about X/Y sperm ration, but male/female ratios in the population.
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No. That wasn’t what you claimed previously.

Let me assist you in refreshing your memory on what you have posted. I have highlighted the relevant part in bold:
rossum said:
Of course you are an accident. Even limiting it to just humans, how many sperm did your father ejaculate? What were the chances that the one particular sperm would succeed? There is a 50% chance you could have been of the opposite sex, since half of all sperm carry an X chromosome and half a Y chromosome.
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But credit to your persistence in twisting your own argument from sperm sex ratio prior to conception to population sex ratio post conception. :eek:
 
rossum said:
In Buddhism, all life also has a reason for being reincarnated. It failed to attain nirvana last time round. That is a small, local, individual reason; not the large all-encompassing God-sized reason that is being discussed here.

The interaction of the material world and karma is extremely complex, but from the Buddhist point of view, there are three components that go into making a ‘new’ human being: the mother, the father and the gandhabba – the remaining karmic load from the previous life. Science can only deal with the first two.

rossum
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Your still avoiding YOUR original premise 'That is that humans are an accident , that there is no purpose behind their existence. The rules YOU set destroy the fundamentals of Christianity.
 
johnnyjones said:
Your still avoiding YOUR original premise 'That is that humans are an accident , that there is no purpose behind their existence. The rules YOU set destroy the fundamentals of Christianity.
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There is not overall purpose. Each of us sets his or her own purpose. Some of those purposes are wise, others are not.

There is not reified, capitalised, ‘Purpose’ floating around in the background. One can accept the existence of beauty, without having to believe in the Cosmic Beautician to justify it.

Reification is a mistake, and the reification of purpose is just one of many ways of making that mistake.

rossum
 
rossum said:
There is not overall purpose. Each of us sets his or her own purpose. Some of those purposes are wise, others are not.

There is not reified, capitalised, ‘Purpose’ floating around in the background. One can accept the existence of beauty, without having to believe in the Cosmic Beautician to justify it.

Reification is a mistake, and the reification of purpose is just one of many ways of making that mistake.

rossum
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No “overall purpose”? You have no control over when and how you come into existence. You can’t set your own purpose as to your own inception .You suscribe to the accident philosophy which falls apart in the presence of sacred scripture.

“For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mothers womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made.” Psalm 139:13

“For I know the plans I have for you declares the Lord…” Jer. 29:11
 
Hokomai said:
Perhaps so, but I was asking about the design, by God, of a system that led to the extinction of 90% plus of all species. I was asking this because of the assertion that there are things called ‘self-defence’ mechanisms in nature that somehow indicate design. Your response does not appear to address this.
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If it had been 99.999999999% extinction - with one person left to make your point it might be valid. 😉 In such a hostile universe it is a wonder that life has endured so many vicissitudes for such a vast period of time - but then if one is determined to have a negative outlook everything looks black!
 
I was just wondering: since all things are essentially purposeless accidents – which means that they have no intrinsic or extrinsic reasons for being – well, I hate honey bees. Can’t we solve just that problem and kill them all off?

God bless,
jd
 
JDaniel said:
I was just wondering: since all things are essentially purposeless accidents – which means that they have no intrinsic or extrinsic reasons for being – well, I hate honey bees. Can’t we solve just that problem and kill them all off?

God bless,
jd
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Oh, and while we’re at it:

Spiders! Ugh! Let’s smoke them out wherever they hide, and kill all of them too.

Plus, I don’t know anyone who’s partial to earthworms. Death to all earthworms!

Worse than them: tree frogs! Horrible little slimy buggars they are! Death to the tree frog!

And, almost all plant life! They bollix up the planet; cause us to have to mow our lawns each week, and weed our gardens. Very few are pleasing to most of us. Can’t we simply kill off all the rest? We can keep just those few – just for our own personal aesthetic reasons. The rest, they must all go.

On second thought: why bother doing all that. Eliminate all human life. Give our little plots of ground back to our predecessors. We are of no use. We could start with . . . well, let’s not go there. (We’re already doing that, as best we can!)

God bless,
jd
 
DeepBlueSea said:
But credit to your persistence in twisting your own argument from sperm sex ratio prior to conception to population sex ratio post conception. :eek:
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To be fair though, you are focussing on one specific percentage value that Rossum quoted, and ignoring his larger point, which remains completely valid.

I call your “Please comment responsibly” and raise you a “Stop avoiding the issue.”
 
JDaniel said:
Oh, and while we’re at it:

Spiders! Ugh! Let’s smoke them out wherever they hide, and kill all of them too.

Plus, I don’t know anyone who’s partial to earthworms. Death to all earthworms!

Worse than them: tree frogs! Horrible little slimy buggars they are! Death to the tree frog!

And, almost all plant life! They bollix up the planet; cause us to have to mow our lawns each week, and weed our gardens. Very few are pleasing to most of us. Can’t we simply kill off all the rest? We can keep just those few – just for our own personal aesthetic reasons. The rest, they must all go.

On second thought: why bother doing all that. Eliminate all human life. Give our little plots of ground back to our predecessors. We are of no use. We could start with . . . well, let’s not go there. (We’re already doing that, as best we can!)

God bless,
jd
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Are you missing the point on purpose, or do you genuinely not get it?
 
wanstronian said:
To be fair though, you are focussing on one specific percentage value that Rossum quoted, and ignoring his larger point, which remains completely valid.

I call your “Please comment responsibly” and raise you a “Stop avoiding the issue.”
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I maintain that all her biology-related claims, big and small, are not based on scientific facts.

Distorting scientific facts to support a shaky notion of whatever philosophy she subscribed to is morally and scientifically irresponsible.

Not sure which “larger point” of hers you were referring to. I do not comment on her Buddhism philosophy because I am not in the position of doing so.

To reiterate, I maintain that my posts are relevantly addressing the issue raised by the topic of this thread.

May be you would like to contribute your thoughts on the issue raised by this topic too instead of sitting on the sideline judging my posts, which shows that your very act is precisely avoiding the issue.
 
DeepBlueSea said:
I maintain that all her biology-related claims, big and small, are not based on scientific facts.

Distorting scientific facts to support a shaky notion of whatever philosophy she subscribed to is morally and scientifically irresponsible.

Not sure which “larger point” of hers you were referring to. I do not comment on her Buddhism philosophy because I am not in the position of doing so.

To reiterate, I maintain that my posts are relevantly addressing the issue raised by the topic of this thread.

May be you would like to contribute your thoughts on the issue raised by this topic too instead of sitting on the sideline judging my posts, which shows that your very act is precisely avoiding the issue.
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Okay, since you need it spelling out:

In post 30, Rossum said:
rossum said:
Of course you are an accident. Even limiting it to just humans, how many sperm did your father ejaculate? What were the chances that the one particular sperm would succeed? There is a 50% chance you could have been of the opposite sex, since half of all sperm carry an X chromosome and half a Y chromosome.

There is a great deal of chance in the process.

rossum
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The point of Rossum’s post, of course, is that chance mutations, selected for by The Process Which Must Not Be Named, play a massive role in the formation and development of life - including defence mechanisms.

However, you just seized upon the 50% figure, quickly erected a straw man and proceeded to beat it to death while the actual argument stood nearby looking on with bemusement.

Whether 50% is the right figure or not, is irrelevant. It quite clearly wasn’t the point that Rossum was making. So please address the actual point, which is the demonstrable existence of chance mutations and how they are selected for (or not). If you dispute that chance mutations exist, please substantiate. If you dispute that chance mutations are selected for by TPWMNBN, please substantiate.

You note, in post 23, the difference between “pure chance” (out of n possible outcomes, each is equally likely to occur) and “directed chance” (some outcomes are more likely because of environmental factors etc.). I do not believe that Rossum is advocating the former. But accepting the latter does not mean that the least likely outcomes never occur. It can still correctly be called “chance” in the context of the discussion.

You seem to be very keen on “scientific facts,” so I’m unsure why you’re going against the overwhelming concensus of scientific opinion on this subject. What do you know that all the evolutionary biologists don’t?

BTW, the reason I haven’t joined in this thread in another capacity, is that Rossum is doing a great job - far better than I could do, since I have little patience with the sort of specious arguments that are becoming increasingly common from apologists on this forum. However, your decision to pursue the minutae of a percentage figure instead of responding to the real argument, prompted me to put fingers to keyboard.
 
DeepBlueSea said:
I maintain that all her biology-related claims, big and small, are not based on scientific facts.
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For your information, I am male, not female; see R.U.R. My claim that 50% of sperm carry and X chromosome and 50% carry a Y chromosome is correct and is based on scientific fact.

Wanstronian is correct in that you are latching onto peripheral issues here. Self defence mechanisms are just like any other natural mechanisms and can develop in just the same way.

rossum
 
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