A challenge for atheist (From Youtube)

[leroy]

Evidence for what, you've created some bizarre straw man based on your ignorance of species evolution.

Evidence for the claim that natural selection has on average a “preference” for complexity over simplicity.

Will you ever present your evidence?

Then publish your ideas, in a worthy peer reviewed scientific journal,

My ideas have been published; I am simply repeating what scientists say.

This idea of "progression" and "higher organisms" in evolution is now regarded as misleading, with natural selection having no intrinsic direction and organisms selected for either increased or decreased complexity in response to local environmental conditions
Evolution of biological complexity - Wikipedia

Increased complexity is not a necessary consequence of natural selection, but it does emerge occasionally, when mutations that increase complexity are favored over mutations that do not. That complexity-increasing mutations do not necessarily accumulate over time is apparent in many evolutionary lineages. For example, the longest living organisms on Earth are the microscopic bacteria, which have existed continuously on our planet for ≈3.5 billion years
Darwin's greatest discovery: Design without designer

 

[Sheldon]

Fine Tunning simply means that there are many values and initial conditions in our universe (force of gravity, size of the electron, electromagnetic force, cosmological constant etc.) such that if any of these values would have been a tiny bit different life would have not been possible

Yes I know, so not really fine tuned at all then, that phrase assumes or implies agency, but doesn't of course evidence it.

For example if the force of gravity would have been 1% stronger the universe would have collapse in a black hole shortly after the Big Bnag. (an dlife would have been impossible)

This is what is meant by FT, as you can note there is nothing “theological” in the definition. and scientists in general don’t disagree with the claim that the universe is FT

So the universe can support life, and if it were different it could, theoretically not support life, or least the kind of carbon based life we know of, so what?

So given this definition do you grant that the universe is finely tuned for life?

No, why would I?

Please quote a comment where I denied a scientific fact………….

Do you or do you not accept the scientific fact of species evolution? Obviously if I have misunderstood what I perceived as your denials of species evolution I will apologise for that error, well?

If you fail to quote such comment, I expect an apology for your false accusation.

Horse first then, then comes the cart see.

 

[Sheldon]

Evidence for the claim that natural selection has on average a “preference” for complexity over simplicity.

Will you ever present your evidence?

It's a straw man you have created, which part of that don't you understand? I already explained why, so who knows what you think ignoring the content of my post, and repeating your straw man will achieve.

 

[leroy]

So you'd expect to see a diversity of complex and simple organisms, and again this is precisely what we see? This pecking order you've imagined simply doesn't exist, as neither type is favoured, it is about how well they fit their environments. One the more complex life forms humans, are currently being held at the mercy of one of the simplest, a virus.

So you'd expect to see a diversity of complex and simple organisms

Wait , so are you saying that even the earliest life was nearly as complex as modern microbes?..........isent life supposed to be much, much simple in the ancient past? (say 3B years ago?)

This is an honest question, I really what to understand your view.

Do you think that ancient life was much simpler than modern microbes? Or would you say that life has always been as complex as there is today? (ignore multicellular life, just focus on microbes like bacteria)

 

[Sheldon]

My ideas have been published; I am simply repeating what scientists say.

I think I will need a citation before I'll believe that hilarious claim. Oddly enough I just checked every major news network, including the Catholic Herald and Al Jazeera, and not one of them has any news of your paradigm shifting claim, if only I could piece it all together.

 

[leroy]

Do you or do you not accept the scientific fact of species evolution? .

Please define exactly what you mean

 

[Sheldon]

Wait , so are you saying that even the earliest life was nearly as complex as modern microbes?

No.

..........isent life supposed to be much, much simple in the ancient past? (say 3B years ago?)

Is that English?

Do you think that ancient life was much simpler than modern microbes? Or would you say that life has always been as complex as there is today? (ignore multicellular life, just focus on microbes like bacteria)

Did you bother to read what I said?

Some more info here: <LINK>

Complexity does not donate design, this is a very tired old creationist canard.

 

[Sheldon]

Do you or do you not accept the scientific fact of species evolution?

Please define exactly what you mean

I mean, do you or do you not, accept the scientific fact of species evolution?

 

[leroy]

I mean, do you or do you not, accept the scientific fact of species evolution?

Define "species evolution " explain that *fact* so that I can tell you if I accept it or not.

 

[leroy]

I think I will need a citation before I'll believe that hilarious claim.

Well then read the citations that where provided in the very post that you are responding to.

 

[leroy]

It's a straw man you have created, which part of that don't you understand? I already explained why, so who knows what you think ignoring the content of my post, and repeating your straw man will achieve.

Its not a strawman (at least not an international strawman)


This is my understanding of your view (correct me if I am wrong)

1 you belive that the first living things where simple (much much simpler than any modern microbe)

2 this means that un average complexity has increased over time.

3 ) you belive that the process of random variation + natural selection is the main responsable for this increase in complexity.

4 this would imply that natural selection on average has a preference for complex life (otherwise the average complexity would remain consrant)


Please correct me if I am wrong . But it seems to me that you agree with all these points


Your burden proof is to show that points 3 and 4 are true

 

[joelr]

There is a challenge for atheist that has been circulating on youtube, this chalenge has basically two parts

Part 1

Define what type of atheist are you

1 God is like Santacluase, a character that is obviously fictional , we know that he doesn’t excist

Yahweh, Allah, Zeus and Krishna are obviously fictional.

2 God is like Aliens, he may or may not exist, “we don’t know” there is no conclusive evidence on either side, so atheism is simply the default answer

Which one of these 2 options is closer to your view? (or do you suggest a third option?)

Some God who is unknown is possible. we have no evidence but that doesn't rule out the possibility.

Part2

The second part of the challenge is to accept the implication of your selection

1 If you go for option “1” you do have a burden proof, you are expected to provide an alternative explanation for the origin of the universe, fine tuning, morality, free will miracle claims and all the stuff comonly attributed to God, in the same way I can provide an alternative explanation for presents in the Christmas tree

This is a huge fallacy. Because a powerful character in a myth (originally a storm warrior) was upgraded to supreme God during the Hellenistic influence, later upgraded to be outside the universe (astronomers realized there were no 7 heavens in outer space) and used Platonic omni-features to further upgrade this fictional being, because he didn't create th euniverse you expect alternate explanations? Do you see why apologist arguments are absurd? Our knowledge of cosmology is limited when it comes to big bangs. We do know black holes are real, the largest containing 600 billion sun masses. So an object containing the energy of a universe and all the spacetime isn't absurd. We do not need an explanation how these incredibly dense and energetic objects began. Since we cannot SEE BEYOND OUT CURRENT UNIVERSE!?
What is this? - "so if my fictional character who was slowly enlarged and made more powerful over the centuries didn't create the universe then you HAVE to tell me what did! Or else IT's DEFINITELY MY FICTIONAL CHARACTER WHO WINS!!" Insultingly stupid.

miracle claims

Miracle Claims - Uh, hmmmm, maybe the miracle claims are exactly the same as the thousands of other miracle claims from other religions? Or the millions of eyewitnesses of Sai Baba's miracles of levitation, healing and others, witnessed by followers, with their eyes, in the 19th century! Also fake.
The gospels are all using Mark as a source. Mark was trained in the only Greek writing school and shows the style of religious fiction that was taught at the time. Dying/rising demigods who resurrect in 3 days are a Greek model already seen in other religions. Since he was copying that and making his own spin obviously he had this demigod perform miracles.

fine tuning,

First you have to demonstrate the variables could be any other way? Can they be tuned? All of the laws emerged from one unified force so the fact that they work in conjunction isn't surprising.
Or we could have a multiverse with endless variations of physical laws. Stop putting God in every gap available? This could be one of the endless big bangs that had physical laws that would support life.

morality

Nope, we don't use morality from scripture. We have images of God despite a commandment saying we cannot. We have religious freedom, this violates the 1st commandment. Our society covets our neighbor and is the basis of Capitalism. Women are not silent in church, Romans is clear about this, they can only have a revelation but cannot comment on it until at home with husband. The morals used are morals already used from Greek and other cultures. The Biblical instructions about war are clear (with all other cities besides the 6 listed). All men die, women and children are your plunder. God gives this to you. We don't do that? We do not refrain from speaking to non-believers (Matthew)
This could go on and on. We do not get morals from the Bible. The golden rule, non-judgment, love of peace were taught by Rabbi Hillell before Jesus. Ancient Greek morals alone cover all these. Same with Hindu wisdom.
So yeaha, we have an answer to this ridiculous question.

2 if you go for option 2, you have to give miracle claims a fair shake, you can’t dismiss them by default.
You have to consider seriously the possibility of miracles. Or “god did it” answers.

Yes you could dismiss them. If one was on the fence about Yahweh being the actual God of the Israelites (really, God picked a tribe?), miracle stories could still be fiction written about the God. Especially when you can read all the text from other religions from the time and see similar claims and realize that they may be standard part of religious fiction. The odds that finally one version was actually real and the God did the same mundane miracles all the others claimed to do, very unlikely.

The problem is that many atheist compare God with Santa clause, but they don’t what to have a burden proof, the point of the challenge is to show that you have to choose ether one or the other

Total BS argument. No no one needs to explain morality or the big bang or self replicating chemicals? That is absurd. The Biblical cosmology was 7 heavens in outer space. The reason the sky was blue was because that is the cosmic ocean above heaven we can see. The stars and planets are below heaven. Their pi was wrong and there are no science, morals or things solved from this Iron Age book of mythology.
They needed blood magic to get anything done with God, had slaves and thought sacrifice was a good idea to vanquish a magical "sin-force" that people aquired over the year.
Luckily several animals, many baby animals were killed so their magic would erase the sin ffor that year. Finally a demigod provided a longer lasting sacrifice. This book endorses blood magic redemption.
Nothing in this book are explanations to anything. Not morality or anything else. It is ancient fiction then it becomes Hellenistic fiction.

 

[joelr]

Fine Tunning simply means that there are many values and initial conditions in our universe (force of gravity, size of the electron, electromagnetic force, cosmological constant etc.) such that if any of these values would have been a tiny bit different life would have not been possible

For example if the force of gravity would have been 1% stronger the universe would have collapse in a black hole shortly after the Big Bnag. (an dlife would have been impossible)

This is what is meant by FT, as you can note there is nothing “theological” in the definition. and scientists in general don’t disagree with the claim that the universe is FT

So given this definition do you grant that the universe is finely tuned for life?

(at this point we are only dealing with defintions)





Please quote a comment where I denied a scientific fact…………. If you fail to quote such comment, I expect an apology for your false accusation.

Fine Tuning argument / The best argument for the existence of God
this topic was already covered and mostly debunked without rebuttal:
Fine Tuning argument / The best argument for the existence of God


Scientists do not believe the universe was fine tuned for life.
Most planet orbits are unstable
Most places kill life instantly - heat-radiation-cold
Galaxy orbits eventually bring you near a supernova
We are colliding with Andromeda galaxy
Universe will wind down to oblivion
Earth has natural disasters, disease, asteroids, mass extinctions, 99$ of all life lived is extinct, it took 3.5 billion years to make multi cellular life.
Childhood Lukemia, hemophillia, sicke cell anemia and endless diseases follow life.

Some scientists claim the many worlds allows the universe to express all the possible variations. It's also not known that the laws of physics could come out different. We don't have enough information about physics right now. No scientists believe the universe is fine tuned for life. They believe we found ourselves in a universe where life is possible, that is all we know.
People looking to justify a magic creator are the only people selling this idea of fine-tuning. You haven't demonstrated anything that could or would fine tune a universe either?

But once again we do not have a full understanding of big bang physics when the forces emerged from a unified force. The fact that they split in a symmetrical way to support each other in some ways ins't surprising since they were part of a unified force?
If one thing were different than other things would also be different and it's possible there could still be a functional universe.

None of this suggests any of the Bronze Age Gods, who later became Hellenized and focused on individual salvation, were real Gods? Not even a little?

 

[leroy]

So the universe can support life, and if it were different it could, theoretically not support life, or least the kind of carbon based life we know of, so what?

Then the next question would be, why does the universe has the precise values required for life?.. ....... why would the fundamental laws of physics conspire to produce life permitting values ? If not design, what other alternavive do you suggest. ?


An analogy would be.
Imagine an arrow hitting the center of a bulls eye , this would be an example of fine tuning because if the distance, the angle, the speed, the mass of the arrow, the possition etc would have been a tiny bit different the arrow would have faild to hit the center of the bulls eye.


Now if you obsereve an arrow hitting the center of a bulls eye you will naturally conclude design / intention , even if you dont see the archer, even if you dont know where he came from and even if you dont have prior evidence for archers.

So the claim is that the FT of the universe is analogous to the archer example.

 

[leroy]

Fine Tuning argument / The best argument for the existence of God
this topic was already covered and mostly debunked without rebuttal:
Fine Tuning argument / The best argument for the existence of God


Scientists do not believe the universe was fine tuned for life.
Most planet orbits are unstable
Most places kill life instantly - heat-radiation-cold
Galaxy orbits eventually bring you near a supernova
We are colliding with Andromeda galaxy
Universe will wind down to oblivion
Earth has natural disasters, disease, asteroids, mass extinctions, 99$ of all life lived is extinct, it took 3.5 billion years to make multi cellular life.
Childhood Lukemia, hemophillia, sicke cell anemia and endless diseases follow life.

Some scientists claim the many worlds allows the universe to express all the possible variations. It's also not known that the laws of physics could come out different. We don't have enough information about physics right now. No scientists believe the universe is fine tuned for life. They believe we found ourselves in a universe where life is possible, that is all we know.
People looking to justify a magic creator are the only people selling this idea of fine-tuning. You haven't demonstrated anything that could or would fine tune a universe either?

But once again we do not have a full understanding of big bang physics when the forces emerged from a unified force. The fact that they split in a symmetrical way to support each other in some ways ins't surprising since they were part of a unified force?
If one thing were different than other things would also be different and it's possible there could still be a functional universe.

None of this suggests any of the Bronze Age Gods, who later became Hellenized and focused on individual salvation, were real Gods? Not even a little?

What if you look at the universe with your telescope and discover a cluster of stars.


Then you look closelly and note that the stars are arrange in such a way that they spell the first 3 verses of the gospel of john in 10 different languages


Would that count as evidence for God ? Yes /no why?

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

What would be fundamentally wrong if we say “God is the cause of the universe?” (or any other thing commonly attributed to God?)

For one thing, unless you establish that God even exists, it's not available as an explanation for anything.

In the case of the lottery

We know that lotteries exist and we know that people win the lottery every once in a while (in what way is this analogous to aliens?)

Aliens existing wouldn't violate any of our understanding of how the universe works. It might be something that's rare, but it's in the realm of possibility... like winning the lottery.

In the case of alchemy

We know what chemistry is, we know what chemistry can do, and we know that Lead cant react chemically and produce gold. In what way is this analogous to God?

We know this, do we?

There is no known mechanism - besides possibly some sort of nuclear reaction - to turn lead into gold. By the same token, there's no known mechanism for God to even exist, let alone create a universe or do anything else that you attribute to God.

To me a correct analogy would be

Atheist claim without justification that lotteries are not good expalnations, therefore “alchemy” is the answer, any objection would be refuted by simply saying “Oh that is a lottery of the Gaps argument” just because we don’t know yet how lead became gold, this doesn’t mean that it cant happen, and you cant simply invoke a “mysterious lottery” to explain the wealth of this rich man

Sorry - I don't follow your analogy.

It sounds like you misunderstand what calling out a "God of the gaps" is all about. When someone uses a God of the gaps, they aren't automatically wrong; they just don't have any good reason to believe that they're right.

Even a stopped clock is right twice a day; it's just that a stopped clock isn't reliable.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

What if you look at the universe with your telescope and discover a cluster of stars.


Then you look closelly and note that the stars are arrange in such a way that they spell the first 3 verses of the gospel of john in 10 different languages


Would that count as evidence for God ? Yes /no why?

It would be just as much evidence for a powerful wizard who likes to mess with people as it would be for God.

I suppose "God did it magically" would be one possible explanation, but it wouldn't be the only one.

Edit: though if it's only one person who "sees" this, I'd consider it evidence of mental illness - or maybe drug use - more than anything else.

 

[viole]

Fine Tunning simply means that there are many values and initial conditions in our universe (force of gravity, size of the electron, electromagnetic force, cosmological constant etc.) such that if any of these values would have been a tiny bit different life would have not been possible

And? If they had any other values then whatever those values produced would have been impossible if those values had been different. So, the whole argument reduces to a mere tautology. A triviality. If my parents did not mate that day, at that temperature, in that position relative to gravitational field, same with their parents, and their parents, etc. I would not be here. So? Did someone tune my parents, and their parents, and so on, to produce me?

So given this definition do you grant that the universe is finely tuned for life?

And again, if the values had been different, and produced something called X, that can arise only with those values, what does it mean to say that the Universe has been tuned for X?

Whatever the values are, that Universe would be tuned to produce things that can only arise with those values. Ergo, the whole argument is just a tautology. Like wondering why all bachelors are not married.

But I agree that it is the strongest argument for God

Ciao

- viole

 

[Yazata]

Hi Leroy. I realize that you are battling Sheldon. I don't have any interest in defending Sheldon, but the old biology major in me did find this thing you wrote interesting.

This is my understanding of your view (correct me if I am wrong)

1 you belive that the first living things where simple (much much simpler than any modern microbe)

I think that's very likely true. Even the simplest prokaryotes (bacteria and archaea) are almost fantastically complex when one gets into their detailed molecular biology. So the chances that they popped fully formed out of some "primordial soup" seems to me to be vanishingly small. That suggests that they are descendents of simpler precursers that no longer exist today (why?). If we speculate about what those hypothetical precursers might have been like, we get to things that probably don't deserve the title "living thing", such as naked chemical replicators (nucleic acid strands?) without cell membranes or any sort of protein synthesis or energy metabolism.

In other words, I hypothesize an extended period of chemical evolution that proceeded the advent of biological evolution, in which the structure and machinery of the simplest cells was hammered out.

2 this means that un average complexity has increased over time.

Yes, I think that's true of what we can tell of the history of life on Earth.

3 ) you belive that the process of random variation + natural selection is the main responsable for this increase in complexity.

Yes, that's my working assumption. I can't really say that it's something that I actually know, it's more along the line of an explanatory hypothesis. It's the best explanatory hypothesis that I know at this point, certainly the best at not raising more questions than it answers. (Explanations seek to reduce the unknown to the known and not multiply the unknowns.) It seems to be consistent with a huge body of observed evidence, from the fossil record to comparative genomics. But it isn't "proven" in any apodeictic (logically necessary) sense.

4 this would imply that natural selection on average has a preference for complex life (otherwise the average complexity would remain consrant)

It's probably wrong to say that natural selection has a "preference". That's anthropomorphizing things. But I do think that evolutionary processes tend towards greater complexity as time goes on.

If a chemical replicator is able to form many different chemical permutations, and if some of those permutations increase the ability of the replicator to successfully replicate and other permutations reduce that ability, then subsequent iterations/generations will increasingly display the successful permutations. These kind of changes are cumulative, they add on each other. That's how I imagine the first cells appearing.

Then if all the cells are doing is reproducing, new changes that enhance the reproduction will tend to accumulate. We see that with the bacteria and archaea, which have continued evolving down to the present. Their new innovations have generally been metabolic, the appearance of an amazing variety of new metabolic pathways that enable them to exploit new habitats.

That growing complexity needn't happen at a steady rate. We might see evidence that it doesn't in the "Cambrian explosion" (or the preceeding Edicaran period, where the plant and animal lines seem to have diverged and large multicellular organisms make a sudden appearance.) Cells had been living in colonies since the very beginning and colonies provided some advantages. But at some point developmental biology took off (stem cells) and the genetic code began to code sequential functional differences in the cells being reproduced as particular genes are turned on and off in order. So we start seeing organisms composed of organized functional collections of differentiated cells. And once the new innovation of developmental biology was in, we have multicellular life, Life 2.0, and we see a sudden explosion of new complexity: body plans, organs... the earliest ancestors of arthropods, molluscs, annelids, chordates all make a sudden appearance.

Your burden proof is to show that points 3 and 4 are true

It's not really a matter of "proof". All evolutionary theory is is an explanatory hypothesis. Evidence for it consists of how well it makes sense of what is observed in all of the biological sciences, from molecular cell biology to biogeography.

 

[leroy]

For one thing, unless you establish that God even exists, it's not available as an explanation for anything.

First : you didn't answer the question , you are suppose to show that stablishing God as the cause of the universe violates oor understandimg on how the universe works.....(like in the case of alchemy where if true this would violate our understanding of how chemistry works.

Second: you are basically saying that first i have to stablish the existence of God and then you will consider arguments for the existence of God. Honestly don't you see the circularity of your reasoning.

Aliens existing wouldn't violate any of our understanding of how the universe works. It might be something that's rare, but it's in the realm of possibility... like winning the lottery.

How do you know that ? How do you meassure "possibility"

There is no known mechanism - besides possibly some sort of nuclear reaction - to turn lead into gold. By the same token, there's no known mechanism for God to even exist, let alone create a universe or do anything else that you attribute to God.

There is no known mechanism for how the big bang could have occurred, nor for what created dark energy or dark matter, nor for how the pyramids in egypt could have been build.

So should we reject all that stuff just because we don't know the mechanism? Or is it case where this only applies to ideas that you personally dont like.

The point is that you can stablish the existence of something (or some event) even if you dont know the mechanism.

Sorry - I don't follow your analogy.

.

Using your logic:
You cant conclude that the man Got rich because ge won the loterry untill you stablish
1 that there is a lottery available in that specific place/time
2 that he bought a tiket
3 that he chose the correct numbers.

If you dont stablish all that, then Alchemy is the default answer for why he became rich.

This seems to represent your logic. Can you note the flaws of this reasoning?