Science ... NOT God ...

[Prestor John]

With the intellectual behavior I have seen from your average creationist? I'm left with no choice but to say yes.

No less intelligent than the "average" atheist.

 

[Prestor John]

Seriously? How? And what is "dust" in scare quotes supposed to mean?

I honestly don't know what a "scare quote" is.

I put the word dust in quotes because no one is exactly sure what material was used by God to form Adam's physical body. The word interpreted as "dust" may not be what we assume it is.

I like to err on the side of caution.

If Adam's physical body was made up of dust (as we interpret it to be) then any and all organic matter from any other creature could have been contained in it.

 

[Prestor John]

Yes, we all know what you believe. It is a pity that you do not try to know.

I know for a fact that you don't know all I believe in regards to the Creation.

Now you are trying to make it seem as if you know more about what I believe and know than I do?

Your arrogance is astounding.

 

[Prestor John]

How is that?

That's just his ego talking. Ignore it.

 

[NewGuyOnTheBlock]

Dust is comprised of fine earth particles and organic materials.

If Adam's physical body was made up of dust (as we interpret it to be) then any and all organic matter from any other creature could have been contained in it.

It is important to understand words as they are used in the circles in which they are being used. "Organic", in everyday language, tends to mean "relating to or derived from living matter". This is your understanding of "organic" in your claim. However, the scientific definition of "organic" is "natural matter or compounds with a carbon base". "Dust" has a carbon base, and is thus "organic". But having a carbon base does not infuse it with DNA.

 

[Prestor John]

It is important to understand words as they are used in the circles in which they are being used. "Organic", in everyday language, tends to mean "relating to or derived from living matter". This is your understanding of "organic" in your claim. However, the scientific definition of "organic" is "natural matter or compounds with a carbon base". "Dust" has a carbon base, and is thus "organic". But having a carbon base does not infuse it with DNA.

Are you claiming that DNA cannot be extracted from dust?

 

[ratiocinator]

I honestly don't know what a "scare quote" is.

See: Scare quotes. From what you said that's exactly how you were using it.

If Adam's physical body was made up of dust (as we interpret it to be) then any and all organic matter from any other creature could have been contained in it.

Well that should get some sort of prize for being one of the most contrived and absurd attempts to explain away clear evidence.

Unfortunately, despite being an obvious just-so story, it doesn't work. It's not that the human genome contains bits of other species' DNA, it's that it contains mutated, and therefore non-functional, bits of genes, and that (for example) we can use the exact mutations to establish a family tree of the great apes that corresponds to that which was deduced from other evidence.

And that is only an example of the of the genetic evidence for evolution. We could make the entire case for evolution from genetic evidence alone.

You have two options. Either your god, when it made humans out of this "dust", was careful about what bits of other DNA ended up where, in which case it was effectively setting out to deceive us, or it wasn't careful about it and you have the sort of incredible improbability problem that creationist like to (wrongly) suggest evolutionists have.

Oh, and how does your just-so story work for all the genetic evidence from other species?

 

[NewGuyOnTheBlock]

Are you claiming that DNA cannot be extracted from dust?

Yes.
Admittedly, I am not neither chemist nor biologist, so I could be wrong but that is my gut reaction and extrapolation from what little I do know about the topics.
Hmmm.
Does dust contain DNA? : askscience
https://www.quora.com/Can-DNA-be-extracted-from-house-dust
It appears that I may have been mistaken.

 

[Prestor John]

See: Scare quotes. From what you said that's exactly how you were using it.

You learn something new every day.

Do you believe I adequately explained why I placed the word dust in scare quotes?

Unfortunately, despite being an obvious just-so story, it doesn't work. It's not that the human genome contains bits of other species' DNA, it's that it contains mutated, and therefore non-functional, bits of genes, and that (for example) we can use the exact mutations to establish a family tree of the great apes that corresponds to that which was deduced from other evidence.

How is this information unfortunate or a counterpoint to the first Man's physical body being formed from "dust"?

And that is only an example of the of the genetic evidence for evolution. We could make the entire case for evolution from genetic evidence alone.

Go for it.

You have two options. Either your god, when it made humans out of this "dust", was careful about what bits of other DNA ended up where, in which case it was effectively setting out to deceive us, or it wasn't careful about it and you have the sort of incredible improbability problem that creationist like to (wrongly) suggest evolutionists have.

I believe that God is careful and precise in everything that He does. Including the Creation of the Earth and the formation of Adam's physical body.

Why do you assume He wanted to deceive anyone?

Could He not have simply used what material and information He had gathered to perfectly form the physical bodies His children were to inhabit?

Everything was planned and executed perfectly.

Oh, and how does your just-so story work for all the genetic evidence from other species?

I never claimed that what I had to say explained everything or even anything.

I have just not seen any reason to rule out the Creation event described in Genesis.

As far I as know, nothing we have discovered rules it out.

I believe that the Genesis account claims that Adam, and only Adam, had been created from the "dust".

The other creatures came from the sea or from the earth.

 

[Prestor John]

Yes.
Admittedly, I am not neither chemist nor biologist, so I could be wrong but that is my gut reaction and extrapolation from what little I do know about the topics.
Hmmm.
Does dust contain DNA? : askscience
https://www.quora.com/Can-DNA-be-extracted-from-house-dust
It appears that I may have been mistaken.

Anything is possible with the Lord.

 

[ratiocinator]

Do you believe I adequately explained why I placed the word dust in scare quotes?

Yes.

How is this information unfortunate or a counterpoint to the first Man's physical body being formed from "dust"?

It means that your "being formed from dust" is inadequate as an explanation for the evidence (unless your god set out to deceive people).

Why do you assume He wanted to deceive anyone?

Because what we have is (and, again, this is just one example) clear evidence that humans, chimpanzees, and gorillas evolved from a common ancestor, and are related to each other in exactly the way deduced from other evidence.

Could He not have simply used what material and information He had gathered to perfectly form the physical bodies His children were to inhabit?

Because the relevant bits of the genome are broken - they are genes that worked in our ancestors and have mutated so that they no longer work. It's by looking at exactly how they are mutated that gives us the evidence. It's exactly what you'd expect from the evolutionary relationships that we had already established from other evidence.

Moving to the other point I mentioned, why would a god want to put a mutated (non-functional) version of the gene for making egg yoke in the human genome, in the same place as it is in chickens?

These are things we would expect if life in general, and humans in particular, evolved, they are not things we would expect from miraculous creation (unless the creator wanted to fool us). This is how real evidence works - you look at the world and see which hypothesis is supported by what you find.

Did you even look at the article (Genesis and the Genome - pdf)?

Everything was planned and executed perfectly.

Doesn't look much like it.

I have just not seen any reason to rule out the Creation event described in Genesis.

As far I as know, nothing we have discovered rules it out.

Except for the overwhelming evidence that the universe and earth are very old, that life evolved on earth, that humans are a species of ape that share a common ancestor with the other great apes, and ultimately with all other life on earth.

 

[Subduction Zone]

I know for a fact that you don't know all I believe in regards to the Creation.

Now you are trying to make it seem as if you know more about what I believe and know than I do?

Your arrogance is astounding.

I don't need to know all that you believe . I only need to know enough. Your posts indicate a lack of understanding of reality. There is no arrogance on my part. That might be yours seeping out.

 

[Subduction Zone]

Anything is possible with the Lord.

I will grant that if a god is omnipotent he could do anything that he wanted to. But you propose a deceitful god. Why would you believe any of the claims of a deceitful god?

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

So why do I move goalposts? Because we always end at the bold parts.

No. We always end there, because you compulsively insist on moving the goalposts there.
It's YOU who's always going back to the subjective notions of liking and caring and ethical judgements of things, when the subject is rather just the mechanics of a thing.

It's YOU who always steers ANY conversation to that end point.

You have made subjective claims

I have not. You just like to pretend that I did. That's the strawman you compulsively use to aid in moving the goalposts.

What matters to you - truth, may not matter to me.

Then you have no business engaging in discussions regarding science.

We may even be unable to agree on what truth is

I'm 110% positive that it's impossible to agree with you on the definition of any word that you are able to load up with semantic obfuscating nonsense and/or are able to falsely equivocate literal and figurative or contextual meanings of words whenever you feel like it suits your (dishonest) argument.

Exactly the problem in conversing with you.
It's never clear what you are talking about.
You can ask me a question about a specific kind of "truth" and upon receiving my answer, you'll suddenly switch gears and respond with a different kind of "truth" in mind, confusing and derailing the argument into oblivion again.

It's what you do and what I have come to expect from you.

That is not different that people can't agree on what gods are.

Yes, it is. It is very very different.

The same with science. There is no single version of science.

No, not at all. You couldn't be more wrong. You could try, but you would not be succesfull.

Science, gods and truth are cultural products and that is it.

No. Gravity, germs and atoms for example, work the same in all cultures.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Dust is comprised of fine earth particles and organic materials.

Any of the genetic information from any of those creatures could be contained in the "dust" to create Adam's physical body.

I don't even know how to respond to this.
It's that absurd....................................................

So you think genes just "float around" in earth dust?

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Anything is possible with the Lord.

Yep.

The ultimate cop-out.

No matter what challenges your claims face, no matter what absuridities are being exposed within the claims, no matter what physical impossibilities it entails....

There's always the "god can do anything" cop-out.

Take the noah flood. It predicts massive geological evidence of massive flooding, as well as massive genetic evidence in the form of a universal genetic bottleneck dating to the same period as the geological evidence.
None of both exists. For any scientific claims about the world, that alone is enough to completely discard it.

Because you have an explanatory model of reality that makes testable predictions... the predictions don't check out... that means the model is wrong. So the model as is, gets discarded.

Off course science doesn't have such an ultimate cop-out.

In case of the flood, the defense is "sure, but god can do anything".
And creating a physically impossible flood that leaves no evidence and reducing all populations of all species to levels that would normally mean inevitable extinction, only to make their numbers bounce back without even any trace of a genetic bottleneck.... well, that certainly falls under "anything".


So yea, kind of hard to argue with such a ridiculous thing.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

No. We always end there, because you compulsively insist on moving the goalposts there.
It's YOU who's always going back to the subjective notions of liking and caring and ethical judgements of things, when the subject is rather just the mechanics of a thing.

...

Okay, I can do that within methodological naturalism.

The mechanics of objective and subjective as it relates to things.
We need a model of causality since this is about how a thing works in relation to the world.
So how do you explain objective in relationship to causality.
Objective: Definition of OBJECTIVE
- of, relating to, or being an object, phenomenon, or condition in the realm of sensible experience independent of individual thought and perceptible by all observers
- having reality independent of the mind

The causality is in both cases outside brains. In the first one it comes to brains and it is independent of brains in the 2nd one, so it is not about what goes on it brains.
I treat the mind as epiphenomenal and disregard souls and what not.
So what is subjective in naturalistic terms, it is a causality that comes from the replication of the fittest gene. Subjective is a biological phenomenon, which is connected to chemistry and physics.

So when you account from words you account for their truth, by including what caused them.
So the word "gravity" is caused outside the function of brains and thus is objective.
So what is the joke of this? The joke is that subjectivity is the mechanics of a thing, a brain. Subjectivity is a natural as gravity.
The difference is that where for as some words for what they are about, what they are about would be there without humans. Again e.g. gravity.
But not "when the subject is rather just the mechanics of a thing." All of these words in effect requires humans. We are not talking about how the world works. We are always talking how the world works in relationship to humans.

So let us talk about beliefs and their content as how they work. They are a state in brain, which causes further behavior. What they require to work as beliefs(content) are that they in effect cause further behavior.
Any belief(content) works as a cause, if it causes further behavior. That is the mechanics of beliefs.
Beliefs are causal processes in a brain and they are natural and a result of biology.

Now if you agree, we came move on to the mechanics of truth as a process in a thing(brain).

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Okay, I can do that within methodological naturalism.

The mechanics of objective and subjective as it relates to things.
We need a model of causality since this is about how a thing works in relation to the world.
So how do you explain objective in relationship to causality.
Objective: Definition of OBJECTIVE
- of, relating to, or being an object, phenomenon, or condition in the realm of sensible experience independent of individual thought and perceptible by all observers
- having reality independent of the mind

The causality is in both cases outside brains. In the first one it comes to brains and it is independent of brains in the 2nd one, so it is not about what goes on it brains.
I treat the mind as epiphenomenal and disregard souls and what not.
So what is subjective in naturalistic terms, it is a causality that comes from the replication of the fittest gene. Subjective is a biological phenomenon, which is connected to chemistry and physics.

So when you account from words you account for their truth, by including what caused them.
So the word "gravity" is caused outside the function of brains and thus is objective.
So what is the joke of this? The joke is that subjectivity is the mechanics of a thing, a brain. Subjectivity is a natural as gravity.
The difference is that where for as some words for what they are about, what they are about would be there without humans. Again e.g. gravity.
But not "when the subject is rather just the mechanics of a thing." All of these words in effect requires humans. We are not talking about how the world works. We are always talking how the world works in relationship to humans.

So let us talk about beliefs and their content as how they work. They are a state in brain, which causes further behavior. What they require to work as beliefs(content) are that they in effect cause further behavior.
Any belief(content) works as a cause, if it causes further behavior. That is the mechanics of beliefs.
Beliefs are causal processes in a brain and they are natural and a result of biology.

Now if you agree, we came move on to the mechanics of truth as a process in a thing(brain).

Yeah, you're not difficult to talk to at all.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

Yeah, you're not difficult to talk to at all.

Did you understand it?
I was talking about the mechanics of subjectivity in a thing, a brain.
Do you agree?
Do you disagree?
Is this not what you want to discuss, how humans work?
Well, before we get to religion, we need a basic model of beliefs and their content and how that works as the mechanics of a thing.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Did you understand it?
I was talking about the mechanics of subjectivity in a thing, a brain.
Do you agree?
Do you disagree?
Is this not what you want to discuss, how humans work?
Well, before we get to religion, we need a basic model of beliefs and their content and how that works as the mechanics of a thing.

None of it is relevant to the answer I gave to your question, all those posts ago.