Comments by Steve Zara

Comment #195109 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 6:34 pm

Comment #195103 by Kardashovel

I think it is about structural complexity. A crystal is regular, and has plenty of order, but it has no separate parts that seem to interact. Something has to have both structure and order.

To show "design" one would have to be pretty sure that the object you are looking at could not replicate with variation, and so be subject to selection. I think the voyager probe could be taken to pieces sufficiently to show that it could not breed or bud.

1802. God and Science Collide in Nation's Capital

Comment #195089 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 5:31 pm

The nature of evidence for intelligence is where phenomena are not naturally explicable (even in principle) after significant scientific scrutiny.

Wrong on two counts. First, you have to describe a method of determining how something is not in principle naturally explicable. Second, that does not get you to intelligence. It simply leaves you with inexplicable. Intelligence has to be independently demonstrated.

Sam Harris once said that if Jesus came and displayed sufficient supernatural power, any scientist in his right mind would believe, but according to you, what would prevent someone from raising their hands saying "prove to me that this will never be explained"?.

I disagree profoundly with Sam Harris.

Suppose you were someone from 1000 years ago, and someone said "My name is Jesus, and I shall show you a metal bird that booms as it crosses the sky". That would have been considered miraculous. We would now know otherwise.

The existence of simple and complex entities are both united under the umbrella of sufficient evidence, fallacious arguments will not change that fact.

No, they aren't sufficient evidence.

What does Darwin and natural selection have to do with abiogenesis?

Because Natural Selection showed for the first time that complexity can arise by itself, with no intelligent intervention. This is a general argument. It changes our views of all complexity, and means we always have to consider blind natural processes.

Intelligence was not a default position but rather a concluded position after working through less complex alternatives.

Then you don't understand complexity. Please give your estimate of the complexity of, say, the Christian God; eternal, all-knowing, all powerful. Now give your estimate of the complexity of even a single cell. The God answer has to be abandoned.

Hence the reason I use artificiality as the criterion for deducing intelligence in this debate.

You are profoundly mistaken. SETI signals aren't replicating entities. They can't evolve complexity. This is not the same thing at all.

1803. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #195078 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 4:54 pm

Comment #195074 by Brian English

It is largely my fault. I'm sorry. I have PM'd you, as I would love to hear your opinion on some things, but it isn't at all urgent.

1804. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #195073 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 4:45 pm

Comment #195071 by Frankus1122

Sorry Steve. I think I was on the wrong path there as to what Brian was doing.

Perhaps we need a special code, a sort of "wink at the audience" to indicate that something really clever is being done, so we can get our thinking caps on (those of us who need to) and watch carefully.

1805. Discussion between Richard Dawkins and Paula Kirby

Comment #195072 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 4:42 pm

Comment #195061 by mixmastergaz

But I also wonder where we go from here. If we accept the depressing thought that there are people with whom we can't reason (and Ive certainly felt like this from time to time) then how can we hope to make any progress from this point?

I don't think we can make any progress with them. But we can, I hope, work to contain the problem. We can educate, to show that creationism isn't simply an alternative view, those who promote it are anti-science. We can attempt to contain the problem, by pointing out that involvement of religion in public affairs is intrinsically anti-democratic. We can point out to people the full implications of religious idea, such as supernaturalism. We can show how absurd religious ideas are in public affairs (such with the analogy of presenting arguments in a court case, where statements of evidence-free personal beliefs are not considered useful).

I think there is plenty we can do.

The chap there said he didn't know what David Robertson's position on this was either!

That is very interesting to know.

1806. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #195027 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 2:56 pm

Comment #195021 by Corylus

Ah! This is why I love this site. I get educated.

What he was highlighting is that the argument from design does not work on its own terms.

It being Brian, it was going to be something clever.

The thing is, I had never seen this approach used before. I never knew this argument.

I confess I have deeply misunderstood an aspect of what Natural Selection achieves in terms of explaining things. It doesn't actually make the theist explanation redundant, as it already was. With a watch, we have step-by-step explanations possible for how people make them. Such explanations aren't possible for deities. We have to use phrases like "it was God's will" (which is not a logical argument).

So, Paley was wrong even to say "watch - therefore God".

*RtG was either to thick to understand what Brian ment by "logic" or too smart to play the game.

I was too thick. But at least I learn.

1807. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #195018 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 2:28 pm

Comment #195006 by phatbat

I can see what Steve is saying actualy.

Thank goodness. I thought I was going mad!

Comment #194998 by Paula Kirby

Perhaps it's time we stopped flogging this horse?

I am happy to agree to disagree.

1808. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194992 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 1:59 pm

Comment #194984 by Paula Kirby

No, I still disagree with you, Steve. It may have been acceptable before Darwin to assume that appearance of design was evidence of design. That's because there genuinely was nothing else to explain it with.

By conceding for the sake of argument that evolution could be rejected, Brian moved the argument back to before Darwin.

Or at least that is how I saw things.

We're simply not in the same situation as the pre-Darwinians, so that won't do any more. It wasn't actually a good argument for design, even before Darwin - more of a lazy assumption, really.

We are only not in the same situations as the pre-Darwnians if you accept evolution. In the discussion, lack of acceptance of evolution was allowed.

It was a lazy assumption before Darwin because of designer complexity issues, but that was not mentioned here.

Those are my thoughts, anyway.

1809. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194982 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 1:39 pm

Anyway, apologies to Brian. It was a great job. I was just attempting a post-match analysis to find out how the goals were scored, as it were.

1810. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194979 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 1:35 pm

It was clearly designed to a human. Nothing is ever clearly designed.

You go down to the molecular level and look at another "box of cogs" the flagellar motor I don't think you can use the same argument.

We need to distinguish between things which can replicate with errors, allowing appearance of design to arise through selection, and those which can't replicate, or which replicate perfectly.

It is the replication with errors that does the trick - it allows selection from variation.

1811. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194972 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 1:28 pm

You can't infer design without first identifying what the purpose of the designer would be.

I disagree. Let me give as an example the "Antikythera mechanism". It was a box full of cogs and gears found off the Southern coast of Greece. It was clearly designed, but it took a very long time to find out what its purpose was.

Anyway, if anyone wants to discuss further, perhaps PM would be better. I don't want to keep digging myself into a deeper hole in public.

1812. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194969 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 1:23 pm

Oh for heaven's sake, Steve. Think of all the poor electrons that you are needlessly torturing to come to grips with the idea that Brian simply called RTG's bluff.

That is what I thought he may have been doing. If so, fair enough. It did the trick!

1813. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194965 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 1:19 pm

Comment #194963 by Mark Smith

This is the sea-change which Darwin brought. Before him, it was entirely acceptable to infer actual design from the appearance of design. I thought that was what Brian was getting at anyway.

Precisely what I am getting at! It WAS entirely acceptable to infer actual design from the appearance of design before Darwin.

But what Brian did (I thought) was to concede, for the sake of argument, that we could move back to before Darwin and ignore evolution.

So where does this leave us? At a position where it is entirely acceptable to infer actual design from the appearance of design.

So, the appearance of design is indeed (in that case) evidence for a designer of some kind.

1814. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194954 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 1:00 pm

Your analogy would get as as far as, "It wasn't evolution, so it must have been something else" - NOT "It wasn't evolution, therefore God did it" - which is what RtG is claiming.

I think I was confused by this:

"make the case, using logic, for a designer"

If it had said "make the case, using logic, for your designer", then I would perhaps have understood.

Please excuse my slow uptake people. If a strategy has been successful, I would love to understand just how it worked.

1815. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194950 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 12:56 pm

I think what I am trying to say is that the third option: spontaneous appearance of species, only works if it is realised that the spontaneous appearance of a designer is far, far less likely.

Imagine this argument if we were talking about universes, not species. We use the Ultimate 747 argument to illustrate that it is inappropriate to invoke a designer. We don't (well, I don't anyway), say that there is no explanation for the origin of the universe at all.

1816. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194942 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 12:47 pm

Comment #194932 by Paula Kirby

Sorry, I am going to be a pest again :)

There is "design" in life. It comes from Natural Selection (even if a lot of it is really poor design).

The question is where does that design come from?

Because we know that nature can produce that design through evolution, we need no designer.

I think that any one of us, if we found a watch, would assume a watchmaker. It is only later, if someone said "little did you realise that the watch was a faulty replicator", then we would realise that Natural Selection could explain it all.

Anything else is as logical as saying "Well, Paula didn't murder that guy, so Steve must have done it." To convict YOU of the murder, it isn't enough to acquit ME of it.

That is true. However, as there is design (if there wasn't, there would be no problem for evolution by natural selection to solve), I don't think this is the same thing.

EDIT: for "design", read "appearance of design" above.

1817. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194931 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 12:30 pm

Sort of related, I found this really funny:
http://www.besse.at/sms/descent.html

1818. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194918 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 12:02 pm

Brian was asking for an alternate theory.

I didn't pick that up.

I saw Brian saying:

"make the case, using logic, for a designer."

RtG should have said "my logic is the same as William Paley's - design is evidence for a designer"

One can say that Paley's position was wrong, but it was certainly logical. However, it was shown to be wrong both by the complexity of deities, and independently, by natural selection. One of which was not mentioned, and the other was conceded.

I'll shut up about this. I have no doubt that RtG was handled well. I just have a lot of trouble figuring out what the conversation was about.

1819. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194902 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 11:34 am

Comment #194890 by Frankus1122

Having thought about it even more, I have lost it again.

If you were right, it sounds to me like there was miscommunication going on. One person asking for an alternate theory, another considering that the appearance of design, if there is no evolution, is evidence for a designer.

Sounds a bit like someone playing tennis trying to beat someone else playing football with the same ball at the same time.

I'll just shut up :)

1820. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194883 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 11:10 am

Comment #194882 by al-rawandi

Ah!

Sorry for being dense. I get it now. Unless you can say "this is how the supposed designer did it", it makes no sense. You have to logically explain the entire causal sequence - "God willed it" isn't enough.

That is a new perspective on this, at least for me.

Much kudos to Brian.

1821. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194881 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 11:03 am

The logic of natural selection seems to me to exclude compassion as part of the selection process - possibly even necessarily for the thing to work.

No, I think you fundamentally misunderstand. Natural selection is a force of nature. It doesn't even make sense to talk about including or excluding compassion. You would not talk about gravity being "kind" or entropy being "loving", after all.

1822. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194873 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 10:52 am

Comment #194863 by Frankus1122

I have to say I still don't quite follow the "BE".

Sorry if this seems dense, but I think there is something missing.

Spontaneous generation of species does look bizarre, in fact this was Paley's watchmaker argument.

The watchmaker argument was shown to be wrong by Darwin.

But if you concede for argument that evolution does not exist, then you are back with Paley's argument, and it doesn't seem absurd to use the existence of species themselves as evidence for a designer.

Of course it is, but you need to add something. That the designer is more complex than the designed. The nature of minds and their complexity was not considered at the time of Paley, so this would not have worked then (theologists considered that mind could be simple).

Am I missing something here? Does this argument work without consideration of the complexity of the designer's mind?

1823. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194828 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 10:07 am

omment #194824 by ReceivedTheGift

It's there for all to see.

Excellent! You can obviously point it out then.

1824. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194810 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 9:49 am

Comment #194807 by ReceivedTheGift

Trolled.

1825. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194805 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 9:46 am

Comment #194800 by ReceivedTheGift

I would love to see what logical evidence you have for the existence of a creator.

1826. Saving Us from Darwin

Comment #194789 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 9:24 am

It would be interesting if he could explain why he is allowed to dismiss other religions in this way, while atheists are not allowed to dismiss Jesus in the same way.

I believe he already has. Apparently God made him so that he could distinguish between truth and lies:

Comment #193856 by ketch22 on June 16, 2008 at 6:35 am

1. I am not a philosophy "expert" (if there can be such a thing), nor am I a neurology or science wonder. I am a hospice RN who I believe God gave enough intelligence to discern truth from lie.

Perhaps I have been wrong. Perhaps he has no special abilities. He is simply just far, far, far more intelligent than the rest of us.

1827. Saving Us from Darwin

Comment #194729 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 8:07 am

Remember, knowledge without wisdom makes you a fool.

Right. So God just didn't give you knowledge about how to detect truth, he also gave you wisdom about how to use this power. Probably a good idea. With great power comes great responsibility and all that. By the way, any chance that this power would turn up on a CAT scan? It would be of benefit to humanity to know how it operates.

Perhaps you could let us know how you "sense" truth? It would be useful to know how this is different from normal "gut feeling".

1828. Louisiana's latest creationism bill moves to House floor

Comment #194699 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 7:42 am

Comment #194694 by epeeist

Agreed, although I was a bit confused by it for a while, after all for a long time in history, the idea of a creator was thought more reasonable that the spontaneous appearance of species. The appearance of species by itself was considered sufficient evidence. It took evolution to show that it was not sufficient evidence. So, I didn't get the point of conceding no evolution for the sake of argument, as that surely gets you back to Paley's argument from design.

1829. Louisiana's latest creationism bill moves to House floor

Comment #194697 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 7:40 am

Comment #194666 by Shmeezers

And concerning Nietzsche, what he understood is that without God, there could be no binding, objective morality. That was my point. And objective morality makes complete sense.

Oh for goodness sake.

Why should anyone care in the slightest what "makes complete sense" to you?

It makes as much sense to a significant part of the world that women are inferior. Many, many people think that it makes sense to call black people inferior.

I am getting seriously tired of this kind of "projection". Because of what makes "complete sense" to me, I claim the right to declare that my views are the ones that are hard-coded into the fabric of reality. It is like people consider themselves mini-Gods, able to define truth.

1830. Louisiana's latest creationism bill moves to House floor

Comment #194674 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 7:06 am

Comment #194670 by Quetzalcoatl

I think there is even more work to be done than that!

One has to not only show that some absolute standard of morals exists, but that we can know what that standard is.

Otherwise, this is just a "Magic Map" scenario:
http://zarbi.livejournal.com/134308.html

(Incidentally, I think this is David Robertson's position - there are absolute morals, honestly, but it is just a bit hard to know what they are).

1831. Louisiana's latest creationism bill moves to House floor

Comment #194669 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 6:57 am

And as to the arrogance debate, I still think you guys are talking nonsense. Your desire to explain life using strictly materialistic theories is premised on arrogance. It is not so much that God' existence is not manifest (which it most certianly is), but you choose to rule it out from the beginning - by assuming a strict materialism. YOU ARE THE ARROGANT ONES. But this falls on deaf ears, because criticism is shunned by atheists.

Please explain how you demonstrate to someone that something that isn't materialistic exists.

It isn't arrogance to ask people to provide decent evidence for their claims, especially when their claims look like sock-puppetry (I want special treatment because my invisible friend says so).

Yeah, no one should question you, because you have all the answers.

Excuse me, but you claim to have the answers.

You claim to have special knowledge about what is and isn't materialistic.

Supernaturalism is a truly bizarre claim. It states that one can know with certainty that a phenomenon can't, and can never under any circumstances be explained in terms of an understanding of Nature, by anyone, human or otherwise.

I think that people who put forward supernatural statements should be asked to provide an explanation for how they have this ability.

Suppose I claimed to have an ability to fly. Would it be arrogant of people to be sceptical and ask for some evidence? I rate your claim of ability to discern the supernatural roughly equivalent to that.

1832. Astronomers find batch of 'super-Earths'

Comment #194664 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 6:40 am

Comment #194662 by Quetzalcoatl

As for the hydrothermal vent problem, the solution could be this: life could easily have got started within the mineral-laden rocks around the vents, and gradually worked its way to the surface.

That has actually been suggested as a mechanism for the origin of life. The rocks concentrate the organic compounds.

1833. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194642 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 6:00 am

I'll try and explain this to RtG at a level he might understand.

If a very small cell appeared out of nowhere, we would say "wow! That is strange. That was very unlikely".

If a bigger cell (an amoeba, say) appeared out of nowhere, we would say "Gosh! That is exceedingly strange; very, very unlikely".

If a mouse appeared out of nowhere, we would be truly shocked and the simply mind-numbing unlikeliness of it all.

Let's keep going.

If a blue whale appeared out of nowhere, we would simply freak out at the way-beyond-astronomical unlikeliness.

Imagine someone came up to you and said: "I have this blue whale at home." You would surely ask "where did it come from?". If they replied: "nowhere - it just appeared", you would think that not much of an explanation. You might think they were joking.

Gods are even bigger than whales.

1834. Saving Us from Darwin

Comment #194619 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 4:38 am

Oh dear. I have to confess RtG, ketch22 and clearmind are all running together in my mind.

When it comes down to it, it is the same level of argument....

"I haven't a clue about what complexity means so I will use it to justify God even though, of course, God needs no justification, so I am right. Really I am".

1835. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194607 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 3:55 am

Brian -

Superb job. Apologies for not realising your tactic earlier.

1836. Discussion between Richard Dawkins and Paula Kirby

Comment #194604 by Steve Zara on June 17, 2008 at 3:52 am

Comment #194123 by mixmastergaz

There can, of course, be diplomatic relations between Christians and atheists, and between Christans and those who believe in evolution.

However, this debate will give ammo to those who don't want such relations. This debate is with those who want to threaten science, and who consider atheism evil.

As we have discussed, there is no mechanism for useful communication.

Ask yourself - how would giving a platform to such people help "diplomatic relations"?

Let me give an example. I am gay. I don't think attempting to discuss the biological origins of homosexuality with some fundamentalists who think that I am evil and everything I do is wicked, would help relations with believers generally.

Particularly when whatever I said would be spun as "the general opinion of evil gay men everywhere".

1837. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194526 by Steve Zara on June 16, 2008 at 10:52 pm

Comment #194522 by Brian English

I wonder if it is David Robertson in disguise? It has the same offensive tone.

1838. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194517 by Steve Zara on June 16, 2008 at 10:40 pm

Comment #194514 by ReceivedTheGift

Sorry, you haven't met my requirements. No questions answered by me. I have better things to do. Any time you choose to back off from your narcissistic self-glorification, and admit you are merely human, just let me know.

1839. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194511 by Steve Zara on June 16, 2008 at 10:27 pm

Comment #194509 by ReceivedTheGift

I am so nice, I'll help you out here.

A third option (there are many more) is that species arose spontaneously out of nothing.

EDIT: Great minds link alike, Brian!

Now. Logical proof of a designer please. Premises, and reasoning.

1840. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194506 by Steve Zara on June 16, 2008 at 10:19 pm

I can't and will not accept that Macroevolution is a result of what you define as Evolution.

I don't think it is going to work, Brian. He won't relinquish his claim to have super science powers.

1841. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194499 by Steve Zara on June 16, 2008 at 10:13 pm

RtG, we've agreed to reject evolution.

Oops! Sorry.

Did not realise. I'll support your excellent strategy.

1842. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194497 by Steve Zara on June 16, 2008 at 10:09 pm

Comment #194495 by ReceivedTheGift

I already gave you a logical answer. What science has shown in the microbiology field, the complexity of life, in addition to seeing the wonders of the world, enables me to logically accept a designer.

No, that isn't "logic". That is just opinion. The opposing lawyer has Dawkins as a witness, and he says "no need for a designer", and he has described natural selection. The court was hushed as he gave his excellent presentation. Now it is up to you to convince the court otherwise.

Try again.

1843. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194496 by Steve Zara on June 16, 2008 at 10:08 pm

Comment #194492 by ReceivedTheGift

Now now. I said you needed to be nice. Bad manners like that isn't going to impress the judge, is it?

1844. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194493 by Steve Zara on June 16, 2008 at 10:07 pm

Comment #194489 by ReceivedTheGift

I support Brian's excellent request.

Imagine you are in a court case. A lawyer is demanding you provide proof to back your claim of design.

Go ahead... you have 12 sceptical jurers and a judge to convince. If you can't, or won't, it is quite in order for us to consider your testimony worthless.

1845. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194490 by Steve Zara on June 16, 2008 at 10:03 pm

Comment #194487 by ReceivedTheGift

I am not here to act as an information-on-demand service for you.

First, you have to act nicely. This should consist of admitting you don't have superpowers which make you more able to distinguish the scientific truth of evolution than people such as Richard Dawkins and Stephen J Gould. Admit that, and I am prepared to consider discussing things with you.

1846. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194480 by Steve Zara on June 16, 2008 at 9:50 pm

Comment #194477 by ReceivedTheGift

Seriously, are you posting for a joke?

1847. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194472 by Steve Zara on June 16, 2008 at 9:31 pm

I have known about "Zara" for years, but any picture is welcome.

1848. Astronomers find batch of 'super-Earths'

Comment #194467 by Steve Zara on June 16, 2008 at 9:18 pm

Comment #194464 by Goldy

But not the same species.

1849. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194466 by Steve Zara on June 16, 2008 at 9:17 pm

Incidentally, what is it with fundamentalist Christians and homosexuality? Why are they all so boringly predictable? They are seriously alienating a lot of potential supporters. When I have seen pictures of exhibits from creation museums, one of my first thoughts has been "how kitch!". Having gay-themed days at such places (get Pierre et Gilles to camp things up even more) and they would get some real money in.

1850. Astronomers find batch of 'super-Earths'

Comment #194462 by Steve Zara on June 16, 2008 at 9:08 pm

I only refer to destroying Earth to the point where human life is either so extremely difficult for us and many other animals to survive.

I have little doubt that humans will survive, in some form or other. No other animal species lives in the range of environments that we do, from mountains to deserts, from rain forests to ice.

What we could easily do is reduce the "carrying capacity" of the planet so that no more than a billion, or even fewer, could survive. Considering that a population of around 9 billion is forecast for a few decades time, that is going to "be a problem", and very soon.