Why you should think that the Natural-Evolution of species is true

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buffalo said:
The above was just for a one functional protein. Now it gets worse for the folding.
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I am well aware.

That doesn’t change the fact that people will rationalize away the impossibly of it. That sort of argument won’t convince most people who believe in unguided evolution.
 
ProdglArchitect said:
I am well aware.

That doesn’t change the fact that people will rationalize away the impossibly of it. That sort of argument won’t convince most people who believe in unguided evolution.
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An honest person has to consider the improbability.
 
Improbability does not equate to impossibility.

Regardless of which side you stand on, you have to acknowledge that, however unlikely, it remains possible.

that possibility is what adherents of scientism latch onto.
 
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ProdglArchitect said:
Generally Braskii, as the person making the assertion that something was said, it’s up to you to provide evidence if requested. You can’t just claim something was said and tell the other person that they have to prove it for themselves.

If it was said, and it’s as easy to find as you say it is, then as the person making the claim you need to do the search and link to it.
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A fair point. And I almost always link to the source when I quote from a web page.

In this case however, I am pushing to see if Buffalo actually concedes that the founder of ID would make such a statement as I have quoted. To me, it is blazingly obvious that he would have.

As far as I am concerned, the point of this aspect of the debate is not to quote back and forth and cut and paste from this web page or that scientific journal and play forum ping pong but to actually find out what the other person actually will concede.

So generally, if I quote something and I want to find out if the other person believes it could be a factual statement, then proving that it was said in the first instance always results in the subject being dropped like a hot potato by the other person and we get no answer.

So in this case, I (may) have a direct quote from a reputable source, but I want to know if Buffalo accepts that the statement is true in itself. Or not, as the case might be.

If he accepts it, then there is no reason to prove it true (although I might). If he doesn’t, then that will indicate a position that he holds which is, as far as the founder of the movement which he supports, untenable.

So when I get a confirmation from Buffalo as to whether he considers the statement to be true or not is when I will (perhaps) confirm it to be true. Otherwise, I will continue to use it as a rejction of almost everything he posts.
 
ProdglArchitect said:
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buffalo:
Is intelligent design possible?
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Yes, but it demands a creator, which an adherent of scientism won’t accept since it can’t be proven scientifically.
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If you had said ‘an adherent of materialism’ then I’d agree. But scientism is a loaded word. It can cover atheist scientists or Christian scientists depending on your meaning.

Even a Christian scientist will accept that a creator cannot be proved scientifically. So if that’s all you are saying, then we agree.
 
By unguided I mean based only on naturally occurring mutations. Plenty of people have claimed that.
Bradskii said:
If you had said ‘an adherent of materialism’ then I’d agree. But scientism is a loaded word. It can cover atheist scientists or Christian scientists depending on your meaning.

Even a Christian scientist will accept that a creator cannot be proved scientifically. So if that’s all you are saying, then we agree.
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You’re right, it is loaded, which is why I used it. By scientism, I mean those who treat science as the soul source of all knowledge. By definition, this excludes anyone who believes in a higher power.

However, you and I do agree that God cannot be scientifically proven, though I say it’s because God is outside the scope of what science can measure.
 
ProdglArchitect said:
You’re right, it is loaded, which is why I used it. By scientism, I mean those who treat science as the soul source of all knowledge. By definition, this excludes anyone who believes in a higher power.

However, you and I do agree that God cannot be scientifically proven, though I say it’s because God is outside the scope of what science can measure.
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OK, but this means that a Christian doing science needs to confine himself or herself to those things that can be explained according to the observable order that God put into the created world.

If a miracle–that is, an action by God that is supernatural and above the regular observable order–occurred in the past, science cannot discover it. Science is stuck with assuming that the events or situations it is investigating are not miracles, but happened according to the regular order of the universe. This is not irrational, since of course science has come to be able to explain many things which were inexplicable in the past and to observe things which were considered impossible in the past. That doesn’t mean everyone doing science believes miracles are impossible. It means that scientists tend to believe that assuming a miracle when natural causes are still possibly responsible is an intellectual cop-out.

The activity of science is a bit like the adage “Pray to God, but row away from the rocks.” We know that God put order into the universe that can be discovered by people and used for the purpose of the wise stewardship that is our duty. We figure out what we can, treating questions as something we can solve. If it turns out we have been investigating a miracle that we could never have explained no matter how much knowledge about the natural world we gained, well, that’s the way things crumble, sometimes. There will have been knowledge of the natural world gained in the process of looking, and that is what the enterprise is about in the end, anyway.
 
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buffalo said:
Is intelligent design possible?
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It is, if and only if, there is a non-design source for the initial intelligence. You cannot have an infinite regress of designers designing the complexity inherent in any intelligent designer.

Intelligence is a complex property, and as such ID requires it to be designed. Hence ID is self-refuting since the intelligent designer itself requires an intelligent meta-designer to design the intelligent designer. For ID to succeed it has to admit that there is, or was, at least one non-designed complex, i.e. intelligent, entity in existence. That refutes the central claim of ID that complexity requires design.

Evolution avoids the problem by using a non-intelligent process to develop complexity incrementally. Creationism avoids the problem by positing an undesigned eternal God. The problem with the theological solution is that is bars ID from US Public School science classes, which was to whole point of ID in the first place.
 
rossum said:
Intelligence is a complex property, and as such ID requires it to be designed. Hence ID is self-refuting since the intelligent designer itself requires an intelligent meta-designer to design the intelligent designer. For ID to succeed it has to admit that there is, or was, at least one non-designed complex, i.e. intelligent, entity in existence. That refutes the central claim of ID that complexity requires design.

Evolution avoids the problem by using a non-intelligent process to develop complexity incrementally. Creationism avoids the problem by positing an undesigned eternal God. The problem with the theological solution is that is bars ID from US Public School science classes, which was to whole point of ID in the first place.
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One can teach about fossils and such and never have to mention evolution.
 
buffalo said:
For ID to succeed it has to admit that there is, or was, at least one non-designed complex, i.e. intelligent, entity in existence. That refutes the central claim of ID that complexity requires design.
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God is transcendent,
 
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This reminded me of my favorite Gary Larson comic so I had to stick it in here…please continue. I’m enjoying the discussion and just wanted to insert a humorous break 😇
 
Pattylt said:
This reminded me of my favorite Gary Larson comic so I had to stick it in here…please continue. I’m enjoying the discussion and just wanted to insert a humorous break 😇
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It’s a classic, Patty. Never fails to raise a smile (but being picky, it’s a Harris, not a Larson).
 
That is one of my all-time favorites.
(Right up there with the Darwin-relevant “Bummer of a birthmark, Hal”–which is Larson)

And of course:
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Right you are on Harris! His sig is even on the cartoon! Funny, I always remembered it as a Larson…I shan’t forget again!
 
Bradskii said:
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Aloysium:
I just wanted to describe how a pantheist, believing that nature is god, could also hold to the idea of intelligent design…
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Nonsense. We know how nature works. It doesn’t ‘poof’ organisms into existence, fully formed.
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Not sure what you are talking about. I’m the creationist, the “poof” guy, if you like.

Intelligent design, as far as I understand, simply states that there is an intelligent order to things, that there is something other going on than the random activity based on principles defined by the fundamental laws of nature. It fits a deistic and pantheistic understanding of how things are, in addition to a creationist perspective.
 
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