301. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #198203 by Quine on June 23, 2008 at 11:12 am

Hi decius,

I am sure there are folks as you have described. They tend to quote their abusers and defend them with terms from strong emotion. Sometimes that source is scripture itself and we have had types who cut and paste long chunks of scripture into the threads, and then go on and on about their emotional attachments to their imaginary friends.

The tx persona seems different. He is not slavishly representing some other, he is, as Steve has remarked, himself taking on all of the scientific community as if to stride the world of knowledge like a Colossus. There is megalomania on one hand, and just poking us for fun on the other. Anyone with another hand, please hold it up.

As for Steve's question of what to do, I think we are past the "demand answers" phase and have come to the "just ignore" end game. The Rev may continue to enjoy roasting him as far as I am concerned, because that really does not waste any of my time I would not have given over for entertainment, anyway. In the past couple of months I have put in time working to correct the vast world of tx misconception, but then shifted to just presenting to the observers of this thread things I thought would be interesting and helpful based on topics mangled by him. I may continue to do so, from time to time, but it stopped being for his benefit some time ago.

302. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #198174 by Quine on June 23, 2008 at 10:01 am

Steve, I think tx has fabricated a disingenuous persona exemplified by the little boy who pokes a bee hive with a long stick, just to see the reaction. Trying to analyze that persona is just going to elicit more poking. In order to make an interaction valuable there must be some level of honesty and respect for truth, which I just don't see in this case.

However, if you just want to have fun on your end of the stick, your time is yours to do with as you please.

303. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #198166 by Quine on June 23, 2008 at 9:51 am

Thanks, Barry, for the link to Blackmore at TED. I had not heard the proposed "teme" label although the ideas have been all over the transhumanist and artificial life groups for many years.

304. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #197931 by Quine on June 23, 2008 at 12:36 am

I think Darwin put "natural" in Natural Selection in part to indicate a process that could happen without agency. In this sense, it is linked to "undirected." From our viewpoint, the change from undirected to directed will result in a big step discontinuity in the rate of change, no matter the terminology.

However, from a "selfish gene" viewpoint, it could be a complete disaster (i.e. non propagation) as our intelligence allows us to modify and swap out genes such that future human bodies may predominately contain de novo sequences of DNA that code genes that have never existed before, and may even include inorganic symbiotic components.

Professor Dawkins has written about disposable survival vehicles for the preservation of the genes. We are looking [at] a future where the vehicles turn and use intelligence to make the genes disposable.

305. Richard Dawkins Public Lecture - Liverpool 08

Comment #197845 by Quine on June 22, 2008 at 6:48 pm

TeraBrat:

So why is it called a theory?

306. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #197815 by Quine on June 22, 2008 at 5:48 pm

Goldy, it is a big subject and takes me back into the ontological consideration of memes as mentioned by MPhil earlier. Information that is replicating outside of, but in parallel with, the gene pool of humans has reached a point where it can generate a feedback loop with, what is called in engineering, "gain in excess of unity." Kevin Kelly in his book Out of Control mentions what happens in simulations of evolution if a form of Lamarckian mechanism is introduced to loop experiential information back into the coding of the genome. The result is very rapid change. Douglas Hofstadter has asked the question, "Who will be we?" as a consequence of this kind of forward speculation.

However, here in these threads we have our hands full with the theories of natural history, and anthropology. If the general public understanding of the science of how we got here is possible to advance (even if only by tiny steps), then that should happen regardless of our position about what is "natural." Also we have to guard against a kind of naturalist fallacy along the lines of whatever "nature" does is the morally good thing to do.^[ref]

Memes and speculation about the future are very interesting to me, but this is just not the place to go very far in that direction. I may drop a big ontology comment on Mike's blog, or I may give in to the trend and follow Mike, Steve and Dr B. and start my own blog.

307. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #197766 by Quine on June 22, 2008 at 4:21 pm

Hi Goldy,

I do recognize humans as a part of nature, as opposed to the common theistic idea that humans are some kind of likeness of the divine that are in, but not of, nature. Your comment is correct in that any kind of selection that is not supernatural must be natural. That is why I use the capitalized form of "Natural Selection" to refer to the process published by Darwin which has, as a central theme, the lack of intention.

[Edited for phrasing]

308. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #197742 by Quine on June 22, 2008 at 3:22 pm

Jethro, slow down and think carefully for a minute. Two different things can both be bad. Believing things to be true without regard to evidence leads to trouble in the cases where what is believed turns out not to be true. I am not including the, also bad, case of reasoning from false premises when I appeal to action from reason. Religion tends to authoritarianism and extremism because faith is not subject to limitation by rational thought.

The phrase "onward march of evolution" is without meaning in the context of the history of Natural Selection, because we humans now have knowledge of, and hands on, our own genes. Evolution is going to happen, in the sense that the relative frequencies of genes in the species are always changing, but the concept of "onward" is a figment of retrospect. Does it follow that it would be a good idea to remove both malaria and the gene for sickle cell anemia from the gene pool? Obviously yes. Does that mean extermination of groups of people? No. We can go after genes without hurting anyone.

Natural Selection is the cause of how we got here. It is not our master. It will have less and less impact on the nature of humans as we understand how to take over from it. We have drives and desires that are the result of past differential opportunities for our genes to replicate. We have to deal with those in our daily lives, but they do not predestine us to "fall over into callous inhumanity." I choose not to be callous because I want to live in a world where people are not callous, and I take up the responsibility to promote that behavior in others. I hope you will too.

309. What Happens When a School Board of Religious Zealots Will 'Lie for Jesus'?

Comment #197660 by Quine on June 22, 2008 at 12:51 pm

Last year I went to visit some friends who live in a small town in rural Northern California. I had with me a copy of Monkey Girl: Evolution, Education, Religion, and the Battle for America's Soul, by Edward Humes, which also goes into the small town politics behind the Dover trial. My friends have a daughter in the local high school who gets flack from the believers. Her mother took the book into the back room and started reading while dad and I were talking technology in the kitchen.

Periodically, great explosions were heard in the back room when mom got to parts of the book were the local morons did the underhanded things they did. It just hit too close to home.

310. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #197602 by Quine on June 22, 2008 at 11:17 am

So, Jethro, what do you think when a follower of Allah says that someone who converts to your religion from Islam must be put to death, and justifies it because the will of Allah is "beyond my comprehension"?

From our viewpoint, people who relinquish reason are a danger to humanity itself. Have a look at this example.

(Also check out this new rap from Nick Gisburne.)

311. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #197574 by Quine on June 22, 2008 at 10:43 am

Jethro:

I accept that 'God' is by definition beyond my comprehension, and therefore is going to be mysterious to me, ...

312. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #197545 by Quine on June 22, 2008 at 10:04 am

Jethro, should the leadership of religious groups actively denounce the willful ignorance of the knowledge gained from science, or just look the other way?

313. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #197397 by Quine on June 22, 2008 at 1:00 am

Aren't there positions available in the poisonous snake handling profession?

314. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #197386 by Quine on June 22, 2008 at 12:15 am

The formation of the Hawaiian chain of islands is a very interesting record of geologic time. As you can learn on this page from the volcano study unit of the University of Hawaii, the chain has been formed as the Pacific Plate moves over a vent hole allowing molten rock to punch through the plate and form new land. As the plate moves along (over millions of years) it leaves a trail of extinct volcanoes on islands that are progressively being washed down into the sea by rain erosion.

Oahu gives a example where the volcanoes have not erupted for over a million years, so if sea level had covered the island in any time since then, there would be deposits on the surface, or tracks where those were washed into the sea. It is completely beyond any excuse from the YEC folks.

315. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #197365 by Quine on June 21, 2008 at 9:49 pm

Hi markg,

I, for one, appreciate the Ken Miller types because they do honest science. Not all agree, but as long as they leave the imaginary friend and the imaginary friend's revealed rules in church and not let that stuff cloud scientific objectivity, what they do in church is not my business. (I am assuming honest science folks don't do things like withhold medical treatment from their children, or offer them up as sex presents to the church elders, etc.)

I get the impression that the honest Christians who do know something about science are sick and tired of the ignorant (especially willfully ignorant) and dishonest types who make them look like morons, or worse (the Ken Ham type). When feasible, I think that the scientifically honest religious should be encouraged to clean up their own house by denouncing these attacks on the truth.

316. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #197353 by Quine on June 21, 2008 at 8:34 pm

Here is an excellent article for those interested in the evolution by human selection of teosinte into maize.

(After reading that I can't resist going down stairs and making some popcorn.)

317. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #197346 by Quine on June 21, 2008 at 7:53 pm

For those who do not remember high school biology class and moving the single celled Euglena around by shining penlights on their eye spots, here is a nice review with the connection to eye evolution, in general.

318. What Happens When a School Board of Religious Zealots Will 'Lie for Jesus'?

Comment #197305 by Quine on June 21, 2008 at 4:22 pm

Rod:

... just how much fodder a cow or horse eats in 40 days.

319. New discovery proves 'selfish gene' exists

Comment #197238 by Quine on June 21, 2008 at 12:18 pm

Rod, I will be interested in what you find out. The piece sounds like the writer did not really understand what was discovered.


[EDIT: OOPS!! word "not" got left out of original post.]

320. What Happens When a School Board of Religious Zealots Will 'Lie for Jesus'?

Comment #197219 by Quine on June 21, 2008 at 11:38 am

They found the "transitional fossil" between Creationism and Intelligent Design; I love it.

321. PZ Myers - Science and Atheism in the Blogosphere

Comment #197164 by Quine on June 21, 2008 at 9:11 am

Steve:

... and they say "Oh dear! I do look a twit, don't it? Terribly sorry to bother you".

322. Should Strident British Atheist Richard Dawkins Dictate Education Policy to US States? Barbara Forrest Apparently Thinks So

Comment #197003 by Quine on June 20, 2008 at 11:29 pm

Orwellian doublespeak.

P.S. Richard Dawkins isn't doing anything on this; we who come here are doing it. Some of us are in the US, even Louisiana.

323. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #196992 by Quine on June 20, 2008 at 9:13 pm

Just for fun, start with this view of the two Keck and Subaru telescopes from Google sat. Then, slowly keep clicking the zoom out button until you can see the whole island chain. (Note: no bathtub ring)

324. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #196959 by Quine on June 20, 2008 at 5:25 pm

Podaar, the observatory tour is truly awesome, in the literal meaning. Just be sure you get a vehicle that will not break down on, or slide off of, Saddle Road.

325. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #196884 by Quine on June 20, 2008 at 2:35 pm

When I was much younger, I read The Source by James Michener, which was inspired by the digs at Megiddo. It is a great book, and I often recommend it to young people who might not otherwise have any reason to be interested in archeology and the history of civilizations.

Megiddo sits up on a promontory with great views of the lowlands. It makes for good defense, but such places usually have the problem that the water supply is down in the valley. One of the engineering wonders of early civilization is the tunnel cut through rock under Megiddo to access a hidden water source that made the fortification more difficult to concur by siege.

The layers of human artifacts going back to 7000 BCE at Megiddo are above (more recent than) any significant local sedimentary deposition. So, we know that in the last 9000 years the site was never under the kilometers of water in the Noah myth. This matches all the other evidence around the globe, and it is hard to keep a straight face when anyone starts talking as if these myths are anything but the human expression of the capability and fondness for fiction. Go look at the rocks on the Big Island of Hawaii; Mauna Loa was thrown up from under the Pacific Ocean over, at least, a half a million years, and the sea level has never been at a higher mark on the mountain than it is right now. (Been there, checked that.)

326. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #196648 by Quine on June 20, 2008 at 9:31 am

Jethro, many here go with "goodness." See the letter from Dan Dennett thanking the goodness of all those who helped him when he almost died of heart disease. The problem is that the "worst excesses" you mention are facilitated by faith itself. When people are not required to justify their actions by reason, the system can drift anywhere.

Podaar, there's a mess in here, but no messiah.

327. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #196627 by Quine on June 20, 2008 at 8:54 am

Jethro, it might seem like a good thing at the start, assuming that you included all we currently know about the world from science and then added the faith elements about things we don't know. But then those faith items become dogma, and as new things are discovered in the future, you may be back in the conflict. Also, you still have the basic problem that different people will have different ideas on what the faith items should be; some will want to follow the shoe, while others, the gourd.

328. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #196281 by Quine on June 19, 2008 at 3:23 pm

Who are "we" in the transcend question?

329. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #196194 by Quine on June 19, 2008 at 12:45 pm

This is a definition of irreducible complexity isn't it ...

330. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #196186 by Quine on June 19, 2008 at 12:27 pm

Phil, I certainly do not think there is going to be a "knockout" to evolution. Darwin stuck his neck out (after 20 years of avoiding) and proposed a theory of both common ancestry (already proposed by his grandfather) and the mechanism of Natural Selection for the origin of all species. He recognized that the finding of any de novo species would be falsification to the universal application.

It is true that establishing that something had no ancestor seems very difficult, but is not conceptually impossible. Ever since the anthrax attack in the USA, environmental samples from our government buildings are being collected and tested to see if any "designer organisms" have been released. Of course finding one of these, and establishing that it had no ancestor, would not weaken the ToE in the slightest, and that extends to finding cellular life from space.

However, I think what Darwin had in mind was something like finding fossils of rabbits in the Precambrian rock layers.

331. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #196159 by Quine on June 19, 2008 at 11:28 am

Phil:

Quine

if a example could be found of a species that did not descend from some other, his theory would fall

Given an arbitrary number of missing links this is trivial.

332. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #196132 by Quine on June 19, 2008 at 10:34 am

There is a little step that has been glossed over (perhaps by intent). Darwin remarked that if a example could be found of a species that did not descend from some other, his theory would fall. The glossed over step is the idea that if something were found to be irreducibly complex then it could not have come from something else. We have discussed this before; it does not necessarily follow.

333. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #196110 by Quine on June 19, 2008 at 10:00 am

Mike:

To infer, however, that there - fundamentally - in the ontology of the world EXIST such things as moral values independent of the way humans relate to each other... moral values that are thus objective and not "merely" inter-subjective - that inference is entirely unwarranted.

334. Darwinists for Jesus

Comment #195799 by Quine on June 18, 2008 at 8:32 pm

There are two parts to the battle going on out there. One is over the ToE in science class, and the other is over the general delusion of religion. I will take any win in the first even when it does not directly impact the second.

335. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #195794 by Quine on June 18, 2008 at 8:16 pm

I was glad to hear that RtG is bringing his friends over here; the more the better. We have received enough testimonials from former believers to know that, statistically, some will be already riddled with doubt, but not be in a familial/social/employment position to admit it to anyone. Reading the discussions may help some of them come out.^[ref]

The discussion has caused me to think about design. People have a tendency to load a new definition onto an old word when it is easier than making a new specific word. In the technology of computer languages, this is done intentionally (called "overloading") to push the job of disambiguation (through context) of operations down to lower levels of a compiler. The word "design" is heavily overloaded, so confusion is easy in multiple contexts.^[ref][ref]

In some contexts, design just means a pattern, such as "what a nice design in that floor tiling." That would usually mean that the pattern is attractive, although in a slightly different context might refer to the plan for the way the tiles interlock mechanically. In both cases we would expect that there were designers involved, probably an art major for the pattern and a mechanical engineer for the interlock, but recent studies have shown that both could have been evolved by genetic algorithms in a computer simulation.^[ref]

This section of aqueduct will be a familiar design to those who have read any Roman history:


If you saw this structure from a great distance, you might be inclined to use your knowledge of the above to falsely conclude intentional design:

As Dr. B. mentioned, this could even be irreducibly complex, if taking away any part would make it fall.

Here is a picture of a structure (Giant's Causeway) that has been discussed earlier, which has had a long history of being mistaken as the design work of supernatural beings:


Complexity is not a measure of design. Hurricanes are so complex they are not within the exact modeling capability of any computer system, and are not expected to be so in the foreseeable future. This is because they are a mind numbingly complex (waaaay beyond "billions and billions") system of interacting molecules of air and water that emerge from just the right atmospheric and oceanographic conditions. They wield vast energy, have pattern and form, but no designer.

336. We Urgently Need Your Help Now!!

Comment #195587 by Quine on June 18, 2008 at 2:50 pm

I'm in.

337. Oystein Elgaroy - the Christian defender who became an Atheist

Comment #195572 by Quine on June 18, 2008 at 1:49 pm

First off, welcome Oystein I was glad to read this article and now have another data point for my theory about how useful McGrath is to us with those insightful enough to see through his snow job. I hope you will be here as we take on more assaults from the so called "fine-tuning" group.

Unfortunately, we had a drive-by from our own nattering nabob of nonsense, David R.:

The statement itself is also a statement of faith. Empiricism carries within itself a self contradiction. The self contradiction of logical positivism. The idea that you can only accept as the best explanation that which is emprical is itself an idea which is not empirical. In other words it is a faith statement upon which other positions are built.

Ah - the old incredulity argument (I can't believe) combined with the argument from authority (I am a scientist). There are of course plenty scientists who have no difficulty in believing in miracles and there is no logical contradiction in accepting that an almighty God can work miracles. Of course if you start of from the presuppostion that there is no such God then it is not difficult to come to that conclusion.

338. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #195197 by Quine on June 17, 2008 at 9:42 pm

Adams did not sound so lost to me in this Atheist piece or in his last interview.

339. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #195187 by Quine on June 17, 2008 at 9:04 pm

Brian, RtG was reduced to going around in circles after you called his bluff. What happened after that doesn't really matter. If he comes back no one is going to let him out of his hamster wheel unless he has some actual evidence to present (not likely).

340. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #195182 by Quine on June 17, 2008 at 8:53 pm

Then, well done!

341. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #195178 by Quine on June 17, 2008 at 8:45 pm

Wow! That was fast. Was there a much worse comment number 2 that we did not even see?

342. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #195173 by Quine on June 17, 2008 at 8:40 pm

Karda:

The answer is: yes.

343. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #195171 by Quine on June 17, 2008 at 8:38 pm

Oh dear, v00v deleted his/her first post. I thought we were going to have a new one.

344. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #195168 by Quine on June 17, 2008 at 8:32 pm

Karda, have you refined any of your ideas from a couple of months ago?

345. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #195158 by Quine on June 17, 2008 at 8:15 pm

First comment from v00v. Guess we are going over 8000 today.

346. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #195154 by Quine on June 17, 2008 at 8:07 pm

While I was having fun going through Flood videos, I came upon this one where Thunderf00t goes after Ben Stein. Enjoy!

347. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #195143 by Quine on June 17, 2008 at 7:39 pm

What constitutes reasonable certainty re the design influence in the past can be difficult. I have heard of one company growing plants for food (could have been tomatoes) that uses genetic modification to quickly get to the their target organism with broad testing, and then uses forced breeding techniques to get the actual product. They do this so they can say that there is no GM in the food. If you looked at the genes you could tell it was artificially selected, but you would not know the extent to which it was actually designed.

There is a flip side of this for the folks (who will go unnamed) who want you to believe that irreducible complexity implies design. But it is, again, flawed by the unknown past. Even if you could find a cell mechanism that fails if you remove or modify a critical set of parts, you do not know if, in the past, there were not other parts there as well. The presence of these other parts could have allowed the critical parts to be modifiable or substitutable at that time. Subsequent simplification (yes, natural selection can drop excess baggage) can then result in the irreducible state. This, however, is unlikely to stop the IDiots from continuing to press their argument from Irrefutable Perplexity.

348. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #195053 by Quine on June 17, 2008 at 3:43 pm

You have a specific refinement of the Socratic method, here, and you, Brian, are getting the attribution for the refinement and specific application.

349. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #195047 by Quine on June 17, 2008 at 3:35 pm

Perhaps Brian has shown us that we need a category prior to the "three strikes, you're out" position, somewhat equivalent to the "hostile witness" classification in the courtroom. I think it is a good thing to explain things for the benefit of those who come here, especially those who have been mislead by AiG and their ilk. However, if the behavior clearly indicates that a poster is not interested in learning anything new, the BE method should kick in and strikes should be counted for anything except positive evidence offered for the poster's position. They would be lucky if we only rolled them back to Hume, we could start them way back at Epicurus.

350. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #194949 by Quine on June 17, 2008 at 12:53 pm

RtG, as so often happens, was arguing from a combination of incredulity and the Sherlock Holmes Fallacy. It is a common folk idea that if you can punch holes in all other proposals, then what you propose is somehow true, even if you have no evidence. Of course, this assumes that all possibilities are known, which is always very much more than "all possibilities I can think of."

We still await the presentation of evidence.