The watchmaker

[Kelly of the Phoenix]

You find a watch on a deserted beach. You pick it up, and notice all the intricate parts. That's an interesting watch...

Then you see the name engraved on it. That person is dead now, eaten by a shark. Or maybe they aren't. Maybe they just didn't like it anymore and tossed it. Or maybe the watch company dumped their trash on the beach.

This might help. The people that make watches...

Needs more Joe Raposo

Stands out from the beach, yes. I believe the beach is designed, yes, can you guess why?

It's designed by erosion, I guess.

you knew the watch was designed because you contrasted it to everything around it, which was not designed. Otherwise, the watch would have no significance to you in that regard. You also have evidence of the existence of watchmakers. You can go to a factory and see a watch being manufactured.
This argument has been debunked long ago.

Hell, a lot of gods even got their stuff like swords or lightning bolts or whatever thanks to crafstmen gods. The gods using the special magic things rarely ever actually designed them. They hired it out.

The direct evidence is the watch, however all you know or figure, is that it was made.
Then, you notice similar concept, and assume it isn't made. Where is the logic?

But who cares? It either tells time or it doesn't.

A naked Amazon indian out hunting birds with a blowpipe is suddenly confronted with a Google driverless car. Does he think it's just another animal?

A naked Amazonian would at least know what a boat or canoe is, and would most likely recognize the general concept that it is a transportation vehicle.

Again, only if you deliberately choose to ignore the spirit of the analogy by trying to be smart with words.

Analogies are usually made of words.

And you can still believe that physical man is the highest intelligence in the universe?

LOL. We are made in God's image, so what does that make God?

Do you think a BABY could tell the difference (to communicate which was man-made and which wasn't) between a watch and a rock?

I thought babies just assumed every object was a pacifier.

You could've skinned the rabbit and cooked it for supper, with gravy and potatoes. What a waste ...

Or breed it and have lots of suppers instead of just one.

No. I might have killed the only ancestor to millions of life forms.

Ah, been speaking to Q, have you?

 

[nPeace]

You assume the watch must be designed. However, you walk a little further inland and, in the middle of a forest, you find a tree from which hundreds of watches appear to be sprouting like flowers. Now what do you think?

Then the flower must have been designed. How else do you explain the complex, purposeful function of the watch... and the flower?

It's like you walk through a desert, and you find a well built, and furnished house - all wood. After a mile walking, you find a pile of logs, branches, twigs. We don't reason that that explains how the house got there. It's the same material, but it does not explain the stucture of the house.

Walking a distance further and finding a forest - of trees... of course, doesn't address the question either.

You still need to explain the seed that the tree (and flower) grew from. The complex process involved in the seed existing in the first place.
Interestingly, the processes required for the seed being able to produce the tree, the growth of the tree, etc., are more complex than the simple house. Yet, it took someone to build the house.
Is it reasonable to conclude that the most complex seed required no one to build it?

It seems more reasonable that someone was responsible for building the more complex things.
Hence, the Bible's simple statement is reasonable
Hebrews 3:4
For every house is built by someone, but God is the builder of everything.

 

[Subduction Zone]

Then the flower must have been designed. How else do you explain the complex, purposeful function of the watch... and the flower?

It's like you walk through a desert, and you find a well built, and furnished house - all wood. After a mile walking, you find a pile of logs, branches, twigs. We don't reason that that explains how the house got there. It's the same material, but it does not explain the stucture of the house.

Walking a distance further and finding a forest - of trees... of course, doesn't address the question either.

You still need to explain the seed that the tree (and flower) grew from. The complex process involved in the seed existing in the first place.
Interestingly, the processes required for the seed being able to produce the tree, the growth of the tree, etc., are more complex than the simple house. Yet, it took someone to build the house.
Is it reasonable to conclude that the most complex seed required no one to build it?

It seems more reasonable that someone was responsible for building the more complex things.
Hence, the Bible's simple statement is reasonable
Hebrews 3:4
For every house is built by someone, but God is the builder of everything.

Arguments from ignorance are never very convincing.

Do you really not.know why this is a terribly flawed argument?

 

[nPeace]

Ah, been speaking to Q, have you?

Q?

 

[nPeace]

you knew the watch was designed because you contrasted it to everything around it, which was not designed. Otherwise, the watch would have no significance to you in that regard. You also have evidence of the existence of watchmakers. You can go to a factory and see a watch being manufactured.
This argument has been debunked long ago.

How do you know that everything around was not designed? Where is that evidence to be found?

There is no evidence that anything ever builds itself. Therefore, the evidence we currently have, would lead us to infer that everything required a builder. The cause for their existence.

 

[Subduction Zone]

How do you know that everything around was not designed? Where is that evidence to be found?

There is no evidence that anything ever builds itself. Therefore, the evidence we currently have, would lead us to infer that everything required a builder. The cause for their existence.

Wrong on all accounts. The burden of proof is upon you to show evidence for a designer. Demanding that others provide evidence when you have none is a poor and transparent failure on your part.

And things make themselves every day without a designer. Did you skip out on sex ed in school? The stork "theory" is not taken seriously by anyone.

 

[nPeace]

If the beach is also designed, in what way does the watch stand out from the beach?

Do you understand that the analogy you're using assumes a contrast between the undesigned sand of an undesigned beach and a designed watch laying on that sand?

Otherwise, you've just got a watch in a sea of watches and no particular reason to point to one particular watch and say that it's special.


An a priori assumption, I'm guessing.

It's more a reasonable comparison.
If one finds a complex object, and understands, in fact, knows that that complex object did not come about on its own.
He can use reason and logic, to conclude that objects far more complex would also require a builder - one more advanced in understanding.

Also, since there is no known fact to the contrary - since it cannot be shown that things build themselves into existence, his argument from logic is sound.

 

[nPeace]

The direct evidence is the watch, however all you know or figure, is that it was made.
Then, you notice similar concept, and assume it isn't made. Where is the logic?

Clearly there is no argument against your logic. None.

 

[nPeace]

Oh, forget the watch. Deliberate misunderstanding is always the sign of defeat in a discussion.

A naked Amazon indian out hunting birds with a blowpipe is suddenly confronted with a Google driverless car. Does he think it's just another animal?

That one's a bomb. BOOM!
Thanks for the hard laugh.

 

[Subduction Zone]

It's more a reasonable comparison.
If one finds a complex object, and understands, in fact, knows that that complex object did not come about on its own.
He can use reason and logic, to conclude that objects far more complex would also require a builder - one more advanced in understanding.

Also, since there is no known fact to the contrary - since it cannot be shown that things build themselves into existence, his argument from logic is sound.

Then by that same "logic" your designer would require a designer as well. And your ignorance is showing again. When it comes to life there is evidence to the contrary. Your "logic" is far from sound.

 

[nPeace]

No, upon coming in contact with a watch FOR THE VERY FIRST TIME, a human being would only be able to guess that it was made - and even then ONLY based on (surprise surprise) comparison to all of the other objects in the world that we have experience with and understand were NOT MADE in the way a watch is "made". People have been trying to drill this point into your head in various ways throughout this thread, but the reply above implies that you still don't get it. YOU know a watch is made, because you have direct experience with watches in particular, but in general you have experience with many man-made, and many not man-made things... so you are able to tell the difference. Do you think a BABY could tell the difference (to communicate which was man-made and which wasn't) between a watch and a rock? If so, why do you think so?

So here we all are, all babies with respect to knowledge of the origin of the universe, and yet you come in asserting that the universe was created. That's the problem.

If we switch the watch with an UFO (unidentified fallen object), your reasoning still fails. The fact that we have never seen the object does not remove the fact that our knowledge of design in our own technology, allows us to infer that it was designed - only its advanced complexity in the design would lead us to think that its builders were more advanced.

 

[Subduction Zone]

If we switch the watch with an UFO (unidentified fallen object), your reasoning still fails. The fact that we have never seen the object does not remove the fact that our knowledge of design in our own technology, allows us to infer that it was designed - only its advanced complexity in the design would lead us to think that its builders were more advanced.

That is only because you are assuming that a UFO would be built in the same manner that we build today. Right now nothing that man makes comes near to the capability of a UFO. Interstellar transportation is impossible for man with our current technology. And the advances needed are so massive and all encompassing that a UFO may not look like anything built when it is finished. It may look like a cloud, or a rock formation, or even a strange looking life form that we could not recognize. Machines in the future may evolve just as man did. Nanomchinery may be self reproducing at some point in the future and that would open up a whole world of new "made things" that would not be recognized as us as such today.

 

[nPeace]

Wrong on all accounts. The burden of proof is upon you to show evidence for a designer. Demanding that others provide evidence when you have none is a poor and transparent failure on your part.

And things make themselves every day without a designer. Did you skip out on sex ed in school? The stork "theory" is not taken seriously by anyone.

Things make themselves every day without a designer. Fulllstop.
I cannot give you an example though. Fulllstop.
They just do. Fulllstop.

 

[nPeace]

Then by that same "logic" your designer would require a designer as well. And your ignorance is showing again. When it comes to life there is evidence to the contrary. Your "logic" is far from sound.

When it comes to life there is evidence to the contrary. Fulllstop.
I can't show you any evidence though. Fulllstop.
There just is. Fulllstop.

 

[nPeace]

That is only because you are assuming that a UFO would be built in the same manner that we build today. Right now nothing that man makes comes near to the capability of a UFO. Interstellar transportation is impossible for man with our current technology. And the advances needed are so massive and all encompassing that a UFO may not look like anything built when it is finished. It may look like a cloud, or a rock formation, or even a strange looking life form that we could not recognize. Machines in the future may evolve just as man did. Nanomchinery may be self reproducing at some point in the future and that would open up a whole world of new "made things" that would not be recognized as us as such today.

Point? Whatever it looks like... it was built.
Man evolved? Sure... after he was built.
What evidence is there otherwise?
Only speculation. Guesswork.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

It's more a reasonable comparison.
If one finds a complex object, and understands, in fact, knows that that complex object did not come about on its own.
He can use reason and logic, to conclude that objects far more complex would also require a builder - one more advanced in understanding.

Also, since there is no known fact to the contrary - since it cannot be shown that things build themselves into existence, his argument from logic is sound.

So God needs a creator?

 

[Subduction Zone]

Things make themselves every day without a designer. Fulllstop.
I cannot give you an example though. Fulllstop.
They just do. Fulllstop.

No, you are projecting your flaws upon others. Scientists merely look for evidence and analyze the evidence. Where is the evidence for your designer? None can be found that I know of.

By the way, if you can't give an example then you are almost surely bearing false witness against others. The Ninth Commandment is more than a ban on lying. If you attack someone, as you just have, then you need to be able to support that claim. It does not matter if you believe your claim, you could be wrong. That would make it false witness. As a Christian you should tread lightly when making claims about others.

 

[Subduction Zone]

When it comes to life there is evidence to the contrary. Fulllstop.
I can't show you any evidence though. Fulllstop.
There just is. Fulllstop.

There is no such evidence that I know of. And at least this time you are not bearing false witness against others. You are merely spewing nonsense. If you know that there is evidence then you can present it. It looks like all you have is mere belief and your belief is obviously wrong.

 

[Subduction Zone]

Point? Whatever it looks like... it was built.
Man evolved? Sure... after he was built.
What evidence is there otherwise?
Only speculation. Guesswork.

The problem is with the UFO example is that you might not be able to tell that it was built. You are once again assuming that it was built in the same way we build things. And no, man was never built. There is no evidence for that that I know of and you have not been able to provide any. Meanwhile I can provide evidence for man's evolution. But I am betting that "evidence" is a concept that you do not understand either.

And of course for a UFO all we would have is speculation and guesswork. Interstellar travel may very well be impossible. You brought up an example that requires speculation and guess work and when shown to be wrong you complained about that. That is highly hypocritical on your part. You should have just admitted that you used a poor example.

 

[nPeace]

So God needs a creator?

Can you give one reason why the beginning would require a creator?