INDISPUTABLE Rational Proof That God Exists (Or Existed)

[Agnostic75]

Try consideration that you are told what you might be able to deal with.'

The topic is whether or not God has free will. The Bible says that God cannot lie. If you believe that God cannot lie, then how can you believe that he can change his nature?

 

[Thief]

The topic is whether or not God has free will. The Bible says that God cannot lie. If you believe that God cannot lie, then how can you believe that he can change his nature?

Like any Father...would he not say as the child is able to hear?

 

[Agnostic75]

The topic is whether or not God has free will. The Bible says that God cannot lie. If you believe that God cannot lie, then how can you believe that he can change his nature?

Like any Father...would he not say as the child is able to hear?

The Bible says that God cannot lie. Do you believe that God can lie? If you will not answer the question with a "yes," or "no," we have nothing further to discuss.

 

[Agnostic75]

Message to 1robin: Please reply to my posts #1734, and #1735.

Why must there be only one God? If God is omnipotent, perhaps there is only one God, but what scientific evidence do you have that God is omnipotent?

How can you know what attributes eternal naturalistic energy might have? Whatever attributes God might have, maybe eternal naturalistic energy has the same attributes, except for consciousness, and self-awareness like humans have, and like God supposedly has.

You cannot use science to claim that the universe was created for purpose. William Lane Craig says:

"The idea that the universe was designed for the purpose of man's existence is a theological claim, not a design inference. All the design argument asserts is that human life requires for its explanation an intelligent designer, whatever his purposes may have been, not that the universe was made for man."

If all that you are arguing for is the probable existence of an unknown God, I do no have any problems with that possibility.

By the way, you are in no position to question common descent based upon your own personal knowledge of biology. Most any expert would demolish you in a public debate on common descent. Michael Behe says:

"For example, both humans and chimps have a broken copy of a gene that in other mammals helps make vitamin C. ... It's hard to imagine how there could be stronger evidence for common ancestry of chimps and humans. ... Despite some remaining puzzles, there’s no reason to doubt that Darwin had this point right, that all creatures on earth are biological relatives.” The Edge of Evolution, pp 71–2.

It is amusing that you, a mere amateur, would presume to lecture Behe, and over 99% of other experts, on common descent. Regarding the relative handful of creationist experts, a good percentage of them accept the global flood theory, and/or the young earth theory, so their scientific opinions about other issues are questionable. Biblical literalism is not a rational basis for scientific research.

One study showed that in the U.S., 99.86% of experts accept common descent. In spite of that, you have said that all of macro evolution has problems. However, if those same experts accepted creationism, you would surely try to use that to your advantage in debates. I think that your suspicions are due primarily to the book of Genesis, not to your understanding of biology.

 

[Call_of_the_Wild]

Why must there be only one God? If God is omnipotent, perhaps there is only one God, but what scientific evidence do you have that God is omnipotent?

You are erroneously thinking that the omnipotence of God can be proven by some scientific experiment.

How can you know what attributes eternal naturalistic energy might have?

Well, name the attributes and we can discuss whether or not the concept defies logic.

Whatever attributes God might have, maybe eternal naturalistic energy has the same attributes, except for consciousness, and self-awareness like humans have, and like God supposedly has.

So you are basically admitting that "eternal naturalistic energy" is not consciousness and self-aware....yet it created humans that are consciouss, and self-aware. Absurd.

 

[Meow Mix]

So you are basically admitting that "eternal naturalistic energy" is not consciousness and self-aware....yet it created humans that are consciouss, and self-aware. Absurd.

The entire point of emergent properties is that they differ from the foundation from which they arise, though.

The objection above is sort of like saying, "So you are admitting that "clear sound" is not metallic or forked, yet it came from a metallic fork? Absurd."

 

[Call_of_the_Wild]

The entire point of emergent properties is that they differ from the foundation from which they arise, though.

Yeah but there are limits to what will arise. On a snowy day you look out your window and see a snow-angel in the snow posing with an arrow you wouldn't think that this happened by mere chance based on the randomness of the snow formation.

 

[Meow Mix]

Yeah but there are limits to what will arise. On a snowy day you look out your window and see a snow-angel in the snow posing with an arrow you wouldn't think that this happened by mere chance based on the randomness of the snow formation.

There's no reason why you should expect to, either, so this is a non-comparison. There are reasons why we should expect for things like consciousness to arise -- there are (grossly) known mechanisms; unlike the snow angel/arrow scenario.

To keep up the analogy, this is like saying "There are limits to what will arise. If spaghetti came out of a tuning fork you wouldn't think this happened by mere chance." Well, of course not, but that misses the point. We'd have a good reason to suspect someone tampered with it if spaghetti shot out the end; but assuming we knew nothing about acoustic properties, we'd have good reason to acknowledge that emitting phonons is indeed an emergent property of the metals forming the tuning fork (even though the metals themselves don't have this property under different configurations).

Emergence is all about configuration. Puree a brain and you won't have a mind anymore. So the question is "how did the brain acquire a configuration from which consciousness is emergently exemplified?" And we have an answer for that: descent with modification. Evolution. It's not a mystery like a snow angel with an arrow.

 

[Call_of_the_Wild]

There's no reason why you should expect to, either, so this is a non-comparison. There are reasons why we should expect for things like consciousness to arise -- there are (grossly) known mechanisms; unlike the snow angel/arrow scenario.

Its funny you mention that, because that is the same thing I say when I think about the universe and the origin of life, and since you just mentioned it, specifically, consciousness. If you start off with a big bang or whatever the case may be, at what point will you get consciousness? At what point will you get the ability to think and learn?? How could you get the ABILITY to think and learn, from something that DOESN'T have the ability to think and learn? That is why theism seems more plausible. We get information from an informat. Every time we see specifed information, it comes from an informat. Never fails.

On naturalism/atheism, what you have is a mindless and BLIND process, at which matter "came to life", and eventually managed to possess intelligence and give specified information. Makes no sense from where im sitting.

To keep up the analogy, this is like saying "There are limits to what will arise. If spaghetti came out of a tuning fork you wouldn't think this happened by mere chance." Well, of course not, but that misses the point. We'd have a good reason to suspect someone tampered with it if spaghetti shot out the end; but assuming we knew nothing about acoustic properties, we'd have good reason to acknowledge that emitting phonons is indeed an emergent property of the metals forming the tuning fork (even though the metals themselves don't have this property under different configurations).

See above

Emergence is all about configuration. Puree a brain and you won't have a mind anymore. So the question is "how did the brain acquire a configuration from which consciousness is emergently exemplified?" And we have an answer for that: descent with modification. Evolution. It's not a mystery like a snow angel with an arrow.

Evolution is a theory, not a fact. And you are assuming that the brain begat the mind, and on Christian theism, this is not the case. The mind exists independently of the brain on our view.

 

[Meow Mix]

Its funny you mention that, because that is the same thing I say when I think about the universe and the origin of life, and since you just mentioned it, specifically, consciousness. If you start off with a big bang or whatever the case may be, at what point will you get consciousness? At what point will you get the ability to think and learn?? How could you get the ABILITY to think and learn, from something that DOESN'T have the ability to think and learn? That is why theism seems more plausible. We get information from an informat. Every time we see specifed information, it comes from an informat. Never fails.

This goes back to the tuning fork analogy. Properties which arise from sources which do not themselves have that property are common, and there's a word for this phenomenon: emergence.

This is why your main point -- which goes something like, "How could consciousness arise from something non-conscious?" -- is curious, since we see property x emerge from object y (which lacks property x) all the time in nature.

On naturalism/atheism, what you have is a mindless and BLIND process, at which matter "came to life", and eventually managed to possess intelligence and give specified information. Makes no sense from where im sitting.

It perhaps might not make sense if the mechanism is a mystery to you. This is obviously going to come down to an evolution debate, as you've guessed. I'm just pointing out here that the metaphysics debate is settled: there is nothing wrong with a thing without some property (universe not being conscious) producing something with that property (life with consciousness) via emergence.

Evolution is a theory, not a fact. And you are assuming that the brain begat the mind, and on Christian theism, this is not the case. The mind exists independently of the brain on our view.

Scientific theories aren't guesses, and I'm sure you've seen this argument before so I'll be brief. That evolution is a "theory" doesn't mean it isn't factual any more than that mass attracts mass (Newton's Theory of Universal Gravitation) isn't factual; nor does it mean that the principles by which you're reading these words (optic *theory*) aren't factual.

The fact of the matter is that evolution as a mechanism -- including descent with modification as an explanation for biodiversity -- is a factual matter. That it occurs is fact, the mechanisms for how it occurs is what's called "theory" (and again, that still doesn't just mean "guess" any more than the engineers were "guessing" with optic theory to allow you to read these words through your monitor).

If you reject that minds are emergent of brains, then I'm curious as to how you explain the correlation between brain injury, disease, genetic anomalies affecting the brain, and other such things with personality changes, losing access to an aspect of one's mind (like memory), and so forth?

I understand that correlation doesn't necessarily imply causation, but correlations can establish causation under conditions where the correlation is used to extrapolate a trend (this is already the case with mental disorders as related to the physical brain) and if there is demonstrable counterfactual dependence associated with the correlation (this is also already the case with mental disorders as related to the physical brain).

 

[Call_of_the_Wild]

This goes back to the tuning fork analogy. Properties which arise from sources which do not themselves have that property are common, and there's a word for this phenomenon: emergence.

This is why your main point -- which goes something like, "How could consciousness arise from something non-conscious?" -- is curious, since we see property x emerge from object y (which lacks property x) all the time in nature.

Ok, so I would like for you to take me through the process of how/when consciousness would arise, if we postulate space,time, energy arising from the big bang. Take me through the process of when this matter will mysteriously come to life and begin thinking and processing information.

It perhaps might not make sense if the mechanism is a mystery to you. This is obviously going to come down to an evolution debate, as you've guessed. I'm just pointing out here that the metaphysics debate is settled: there is nothing wrong with a thing without some property (universe not being conscious) producing something with that property (life with consciousness) via emergence.

Well, judging by the fact that science still is unable to explain how life could have originated from non-living material, the metaphysics debate is not so settled. Before you can even begin to have consiousness, you must have life. And right now, science is scratching its head on this issue. Second, if the mind is independent of the brain, like I believe, then consciousness could NOT have come from evolution.

Scientific theories aren't guesses, and I'm sure you've seen this argument before so I'll be brief. That evolution is a "theory" doesn't mean it isn't factual any more than that mass attracts mass (Newton's Theory of Universal Gravitation) isn't factual; nor does it mean that the principles by which you're reading these words (optic *theory*) aren't factual.

Well, it is a theory base on there not being any evidence for it. And based on this the common designer hypothesis is more plausible than the common ancestor hypothesis.

The fact of the matter is that evolution as a mechanism -- including descent with modification as an explanation for biodiversity -- is a factual matter.

I agree, but there are limits to the modification. The large scale modification is what I question. Change over time is apparent, but there are limits.

That it occurs is fact, the mechanisms for how it occurs is what's called "theory" (and again, that still doesn't just mean "guess" any more than the engineers were "guessing" with optic theory to allow you to read these words through your monitor).

The "fact" is that things change over time. Not even a fool would deny that. The "theory" is the interpretation of the change, and how much of the change can or can not occur.

If you reject that minds are emergent of brains, then I'm curious as to how you explain the correlation between brain injury, disease, genetic anomalies affecting the brain, and other such things with personality changes, losing access to an aspect of one's mind (like memory), and so forth?

Those things effect the mind as it relates to the body. In order to be in physical bodies, God provided a mechanism for the mind to "dwell" in while in the body. So if something happens to this "dwelling place", the mind will be effected while in this "dwelling place". If you are in a car, you are using the car for transportation to get you from point A to point B. If the car breaks down for whatever reason, your means of using the car as transportation is tarnished. But once you remove yourself from the car, you are no longer bound by the car and its restrictions.

That is the same thing with the mind/brain.

I understand that correlation doesn't necessarily imply causation, but correlations can establish causation under conditions where the correlation is used to extrapolate a trend (this is already the case with mental disorders as related to the physical brain) and if there is demonstrable counterfactual dependence associated with the correlation (this is also already the case with mental disorders as related to the physical brain).

Right, there is only a correlation. Correlation does not entail origins.

 

[Meow Mix]

Ok, so I would like for you to take me through the process of how/when consciousness would arise, if we postulate space,time, energy arising from the big bang. Take me through the process of when this matter will mysteriously come to life and begin thinking and processing information.

This is a huge, huge topic -- one that I'm not sure whether or not I want to invest the time to get into given that you already reject two of the premises (that minds are emergent of brains and that descent with modification is a factual account of biodiversity).

You could start with a wikipedia article on the evolution of nervous systems overall for a gross idea of why such structures would arise through evolutionary processes -- from action potentials in early eukaryotes to diffuse nerve nets in cnidarians. (As mentioned on the page, it's interesting that sponges developed a different, but homologous, system). It's just a matter of evolutionary processes to centralize the nervous system over time -- which means a brain.

Accounting for the origin of the universe and Earth and life is extraneous and not really required for discussing the development of brains. Those are separate subjects.

Well, judging by the fact that science still is unable to explain how life could have originated from non-living material, the metaphysics debate is not so settled. Before you can even begin to have consiousness, you must have life. And right now, science is scratching its head on this issue. Second, if the mind is independent of the brain, like I believe, then consciousness could NOT have come from evolution.

Abiogenesis is an area of active research. It isn't entirely clear yet how it occurred, but it's beyond reasonable to concur that it occurred -- or if you prefer, could have occurred. Regardless, abiogenesis is irrelevant to evolution. Evolution still occurs even if prokaryotes were magic'd into existence -- which we have every reason to believe was not the case, anyway.

Well, it is a theory base on there not being any evidence for it. And based on this the common designer hypothesis is more plausible than the common ancestor hypothesis.

It's really hard to take seriously any accusation about "there not being any evidence for [common descent]." I say this with all friendly intentions, but that's just a red flag that either you're ignorant of the topic or your intentions aren't honest about the matter here.

If you want to get into an evolutionary debate about common descent, then we might as well just do it since we keep skirting around it. What -- in order to prevent any goalpost moving down the line -- would you consider convincing evidence for common descent? Should I just pick something random as an example?

I agree, but there are limits to the modification. The large scale modification is what I question. Change over time is apparent, but there are limits.

What mechanism do you propose that steps in to prevent "small scale modifications" from accumulating into "large scale modifications?" Because that's what you're proposing here: the only thing stopping that from happening must be some sort of mechanism that eventually stops the mutations. What do you propose it is? Why hasn't science discovered it?

The "fact" is that things change over time. Not even a fool would deny that. The "theory" is the interpretation of the change, and how much of the change can or can not occur.

The theoretical bit is still something more than the guess you're making it out to be. The fact is that I feel an attraction to Earth, the theory is that it's because mass attracts mass. Would you call that a "guess," or anything less than a fact in itself?

Let's just be clear right here and now that you're abusing the word "theory" to mean something less than it really means in science. Please really take that into consideration. If you think it's a POOR theory, then it must be for reasons other than being CALLED a theory (and then equivocating "theory" for the context used in everyday English outside of science) -- so what is that reason?

Those things effect the mind as it relates to the body. In order to be in physical bodies, God provided a mechanism for the mind to "dwell" in while in the body. So if something happens to this "dwelling place", the mind will be effected while in this "dwelling place". If you are in a car, you are using the car for transportation to get you from point A to point B. If the car breaks down for whatever reason, your means of using the car as transportation is tarnished. But once you remove yourself from the car, you are no longer bound by the car and its restrictions.

This is just going to come down to justification for the existence of minds external to brains.

Is there a chess program external to disks (or silicon chips, or any other conceivable computing device)? If I were to argue so -- and if there is every indication that chess programs are emergent of disks -- then I would need some very compelling evidence that chess programs are in fact not causally related to disks.

I assume you have such compelling evidence for this mind-without-a-brain proposition?

Or are you arguing from unjustifiable premises?

Right, there is only a correlation. Correlation does not entail origins.

I specified two scenarios in which correlation can be established to entail causation -- both of which are satisfied conditions for the brain-mind relationship. It is established there is a causal relationship, in other words -- unless you reject those two scenarios (and thus all of science, which uses those scenarios to establish causative roles from correlations as its main function )

 

[Agnostic75]

You are erroneously thinking that the omnipotence of God can be proven by some scientific experiment.

No. What other kinds of evidence do you have that there is one God?

 

[Agnostic75]

Message to 1robin: Please reply to my posts #1734, #1735, and #1744.

 

[Meow Mix]

No. What other kinds of evidence do you have that there is one God?

Here's Gödel's

(It doesn't work, but there it is)

More seriously, I doubt there are many theists who would go the empirical route in terms of attempting to provide evidence for one God. A majority of that is going to be ontological, such as the above.

 

[Call_of_the_Wild]

This is a huge, huge topic -- one that I'm not sure whether or not I want to invest the time to get into given that you already reject two of the premises (that minds are emergent of brains and that descent with modification is a factual account of biodiversity).

You make it seem as if it is a given that "minds are emergent of brains". But based on those that believe in mind/body dualism, this is not quite so evident.

You could start with a wikipedia article on the evolution of nervous systems overall for a gross idea of why such structures would arise through evolutionary processes -- from action potentials in early eukaryotes to diffuse nerve nets in cnidarians. (As mentioned on the page, it's interesting that sponges developed a different, but homologous, system). It's just a matter of evolutionary processes to centralize the nervous system over time -- which means a brain.

Well, judging by the fact that this link Human brain - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia starts off with (in the "evolution section")

"In the course of evolution of the Homininae, the human brain has grown in volume from about 600 cm3 in Homo habilis to about 1500 cm3 in Homo sapiens neanderthalensis. Subsequently, there has been a shrinking over the past 28,000 years."

So it is telling me the fact that the brain has grown, but it isn't telling me where the brain came from and where mental states came from.

Accounting for the origin of the universe and Earth and life is extraneous and not really required for discussing the development of brains. Those are separate subjects.

Granted, but still, there hasn't been a scientific breakthrough in neither. We don't know how life could come from non-life and we don't know how/why the universe came into existence from nothing. These are two seperate subjects but you can't have macro/micro evolution if the universe itself (which is contingent) wasn't fine tuned for human life. Evolutionists would like to just bypass the chemical, organic, cosmic, and stelluar evolution and just jump right in to th macro and micro evolution, when you cant even begin to get to macro and micro evolution without explaining the other types of evolution.

Abiogenesis is an area of active research. It isn't entirely clear yet how it occurred, but it's beyond reasonable to concur that it occurred -- or if you prefer, could have occurred. Regardless, abiogenesis is irrelevant to evolution. Evolution still occurs even if prokaryotes were magic'd into existence -- which we have every reason to believe was not the case, anyway.

Yup, we are still waiting for science to explain to us how life could come from non-life, and how could a mindless and blind process be able to do something that intelligent human beings aren't able to do, and that is create life from nonlife.

It's really hard to take seriously any accusation about "there not being any evidence for [common descent]."

I feel the same way regarding those that reject evidence for common designer. In fact, I feel the EXACT same way.

I say this with all friendly intentions, but that's just a red flag that either you're ignorant of the topic or your intentions aren't honest about the matter here.

I am quite familiar with the topic. I am also familiar with the fact that throughout the history of mankind, dogs have always produced dogs, cats have always produced cats, fish have always produced fish. There is absolutley no reason to think that long ago, when no one was around to see it, animals began producing different kinds of animals. If you believe this, then you are believing in the un-seen, which makes your belief system just as religious as mines. I admit that my belief is a religion, but you call your belief science, when the theory has not been proven using the scientific method.

If you want to get into an evolutionary debate about common descent, then we might as well just do it since we keep skirting around it. What -- in order to prevent any goalpost moving down the line -- would you consider convincing evidence for common descent? Should I just pick something random as an example?

Ok, so lets define what we mean. By "common descent", you mean that every living creature share a common ancestor with a species of animal from the past? Now, if that is the case, then I reject that, because this is not what the observational evidence show. According to the scientific method, observation plays a key role, and we've NEVER observed an animal producing a different kind of animal (such as dogs producing non-dogs, etc).

My belief is every "kind" of animal does share a common ancestor/descent. For example, all dogs that are alive today came from the first "dog" that was created. God created an original "specimen" from which all other specimens of that same kind were produced. That is why we have different variations of dogs....big dogs...little dogs...hairy dogs..tall dogs...short dogs....but they are all DOGS. My belief does not contradict the observational evidence, and that is that dogs produce dogs, cats produce cats, bears produce bears. That is the way it is now, and there is no reason to think that things were any different millions of years ago.

What mechanism do you propose that steps in to prevent "small scale modifications" from accumulating into "large scale modifications?" Because that's what you're proposing here: the only thing stopping that from happening must be some sort of mechanism that eventually stops the mutations. What do you propose it is? Why hasn't science discovered it?

The same mechanism that is stopping humans from being able to mate with bears and create "bearmans".

The theoretical bit is still something more than the guess you're making it out to be. The fact is that I feel an attraction to Earth, the theory is that it's because mass attracts mass. Would you call that a "guess," or anything less than a fact in itself?

So a theory can be true or it can be false, right?

Let's just be clear right here and now that you're abusing the word "theory" to mean something less than it really means in science. Please really take that into consideration. If you think it's a POOR theory, then it must be for reasons other than being CALLED a theory (and then equivocating "theory" for the context used in everyday English outside of science) -- so what is that reason?

Ok but the reasons why I think evolution is false is independent of how the word "theory" is defined.

This is just going to come down to justification for the existence of minds external to brains.

If you went to bed at night and woke up the next morning and found yourself in the body of your dog, and through the body of your dog you can see your body still lying in the bed. If you retain your human thoughts and self awareness....who are you? Are you the dog, or are you the human lying in the bed?

Is there a chess program external to disks (or silicon chips, or any other conceivable computing device)? If I were to argue so -- and if there is every indication that chess programs are emergent of disks -- then I would need some very compelling evidence that chess programs are in fact not causally related to disks.

The chess program is external to the disks. There is an obvious correlation, but the program isn't the disk, and the disk isn't the program.

I assume you have such compelling evidence for this mind-without-a-brain proposition?

Or are you arguing from unjustifiable premises?

If you woke up, and you looked in the mirror, and you saw that you were in your sisters body, but you retained your own self awareness and your own memories...who are you? Are you your sister, or are you yourself? This is similiar to the dog analogy above, but I would like for you to answer both and we can get in to depth afterwards.

I specified two scenarios in which correlation can be established to entail causation -- both of which are satisfied conditions for the brain-mind relationship. It is established there is a causal relationship, in other words -- unless you reject those two scenarios (and thus all of science, which uses those scenarios to establish causative roles from correlations as its main function )

There is a correlation between hot dogs and baseball games. But hot dogs aren't "part" of the game. They are not the same thing. One is not needed for the other to exist. They may share a relationship, but they both exists independently of each other.

 

[Meow Mix]

So it is telling me the fact that the brain has grown, but it isn't telling me where the brain came from and where mental states came from.

That's why I provided the link for the evolution of nervous systems. Action potentials (using calcium rather than the usual sodium and potassium) -- necessary for neurons -- first showed up in early Eukaryotes. Colonial Eukaryotes like Obelia actually propagate electrical signals through these and through epithelial cells between one another. Multicellular Eukaryotes such as Cnidarians (jellyfish and such) take it one step further with diffuse "nerve nets," which is essentially a nervous system without a brain.

Once species started to emerge with bilateral symmetry, it started being really advantageous for such diffuse nervous systems to centralize along a stem following the bilateral body plan. A brain would be the result of further centralization at one end of the body rather than equal distribution along the length of the body cavity.

Most of the stages of evolutionary development required for brains to emerge are still extant in various species around the world, such as the ones I described. (For an idea on what the centralization of the nervous system would have been like in various ancestors, you can draw an analogy with worms and even arthropods; which have nervous systems centralized along their body cavity and a very slight bulking of nervous material in one end -- a necessary step for brains to emerge should selection pressures call for it).

As for how thoughts emerge from brains, we're not entirely sure -- yet. Very recently we've been able to implant instructions into rat brains using biocircuitry -- which is creepy. But the point is that just because we don't understand possibly the most complex emergent phenomenon on the planet doesn't mean it's therefore magic; and this is especially the case when we're making very clear and obvious progress towards understanding how thought emerges.

Granted, but still, there hasn't been a scientific breakthrough in neither. We don't know how life could come from non-life and we don't know how/why the universe came into existence from nothing. These are two seperate subjects but you can't have macro/micro evolution if the universe itself (which is contingent) wasn't fine tuned for human life. Evolutionists would like to just bypass the chemical, organic, cosmic, and stelluar evolution and just jump right in to th macro and micro evolution, when you cant even begin to get to macro and micro evolution without explaining the other types of evolution.

The universe didn't "come into existence from nothing." That's not what Big Bang cosmology postulates. As a cosmology student I need to split hairs there, sorry (Yes, Stephen Hawking recently added to the confusion by asserting that "with a law like gravity, the universe can create itself from nothing." This is poor wording on Hawking's part: obviously, the universe didn't come from "nothing" if there was a law like gravity).

And actually, the sequence of events re: cosmic, stellar, and solar evolution are very well understood -- all the way back to the first Planck time after the BB event.

Yup, we are still waiting for science to explain to us how life could come from non-life, and how could a mindless and blind process be able to do something that intelligent human beings aren't able to do, and that is create life from nonlife.

From left to right, can you tell me exactly where green begins and where green ends?

Life, much like the definition of species, isn't a binary yes/no property. It's a fuzzy thing: we try to define it by a set of characteristics, such as "self-replicates," "seeks homeostasis," "response to stimuli," etc. Life didn't just appear in a puddle of slime one day -- there was no day where there was no life and then a following day where there was life.

This is because these characteristics of life were gradually selected in the chemical processes from the first self-replicating molecules. (And speaking of self-replicators, viruses are a good example of the fuzziness of "life" as a definitional property)

We have all but already created life both deliberately and by simply trying to replicate early Earth conditions -- what I mean by that is that we have observed things that exemplify some or even most of the qualities that define life -- we just don't have the privilege of time for the possibility of the rest of the qualities to emerge; and that's for several merely technical reasons (do you know anything about how much we have to guess about even folding proteins right now simply because we're so macroscopic compared to them?)

I feel the same way regarding those that reject evidence for common designer. In fact, I feel the EXACT same way.

Teleology is poor metaphysics, for one -- completely different things. Secondly, I don't deny the existence of "evidence for a common designer" outright -- I don't say "it doesn't exist." It just isn't very compelling.

I am quite familiar with the topic. I am also familiar with the fact that throughout the history of mankind, dogs have always produced dogs, cats have always produced cats, fish have always produced fish. There is absolutley no reason to think that long ago, when no one was around to see it, animals began producing different kinds of animals. If you believe this, then you are believing in the un-seen, which makes your belief system just as religious as mines. I admit that my belief is a religion, but you call your belief science, when the theory has not been proven using the scientific method.

All you're doing is setting yourself fuzzy goalposts though. If you were from a culture hidden in a hole somewhere and I showed you a great dane and a chihuahua, you would probably assign them different species names rather than the same.

There's also the matter that we have a very good understanding of evolutionary ancestors of some "kinds" of animals that are very different from their far future offspring: for instance, whales' evolutionary history is one of the most clearly understood and researched; and their ancestors looked a bit like wolves! But someone is free to use fuzzy goalposts and say, "Oh, but they're still mammals! Aha! Nothing really changed!"

There's no magical barrier stopping a chihuahua from being "not a dog" besides our minds, and more so for far future chihuahua progeny.

Look at this guy:

The "fuzzy goalpost" strategy here would be to say, "Aha! Even though this lizard has recently started evolving to give live birth, and a snakelike body plan is clearly advantageous to it in its habitat over lizard arms (ha look at those adorable things!), at least it's still a reptile! Its population is just changing within its 'kind'!"

...I'm not trying to insinuate you sound like that, I'm trying to be funny here. But can you see why this notion of "nothing evolves out of its kind" business is fuzzy nonsense?



I need to run, I'll get to the rest of the post later

 

[Agnostic75]

Edit: Deletion of duplicate post.

 

[Agnostic75]

Message to Call of the Wild: Do you object to Ken Miller's article on the flagellum, intelligent design, and irreducible complexity at The Flagellum Unspun? In addition, do you object to Jerry Coyne's article on evolution at There’s plenty of time for evolution « Why Evolution Is True?

Michael Behe said:

"For example, both humans and chimps have a broken copy of a gene that in other mammals helps make vitamin C. ... It's hard to imagine how there could be stronger evidence for common ancestry of chimps and humans. ... Despite some remaining puzzles, there’s no reason to doubt that Darwin had this point right, that all creatures on earth are biological relatives.” The Edge of Evolution, pp 71–2.

Do you object to that?

 

[gilligan8914]

Whether God is an all-knowing being, or a thoughtless being non-existent anymore, something had to start the first thing, the first science, and science cannot and will not ever explain the start of science, just as something cannot create itself. Before anything, there was nothing. Something transcendent, existent before anything, had to create the first something. That, we call God.

"Something had to start the first thing?" Why? There are cultures and religions that believe the universe has always existed. There is no proof that it has not.

"Just as something can not create itself." Why? We now know that outer space is not the empty void that we thought it was. It is occupied by particles that come into existence and destroy themselves on their own in tiny amounts of time. They are not around long but are around long enough to measure.

"Before anything there was nothing." Would you like to explain this in detail instead of just stating it? It has no scientific backing.