My Beliefs- GDR

No. What I'm saying is not a god of the gaps position.Science studies what we know. Without being a biologist I agree that the evidence for evolution and natural selection is convincing. However, as I said before, science may one day be able to create life chemically but that still won't answer the question of whether the process that enabled the evolutionary process in the first place was intelligent or not. This position is neither scientific or theological. If it is anything it is philosophical.

Still havent even learned to go by your own rules yet have you Onifre? its not a mattter of trying anything, its a matter of simply going by your own rules.Evolution like any other endeavor is simply an investigation, and not trying and seek out its source, is like saying everybody else has to demonstrate this point and go by this rule but us.Its intellectual dishonesy and lazinessthe first part of the laziness is actually describing a different area of investigation called abogenesis, seperating this from the actual investigative process, then saying we dont need to worry about but everybody else doesNot cool weedboy Just kidding about that designationDawn Bertot

and that right there is a gap. You are using only (that I've noticed) GotG and incredulity arguments. And when that question is answered (and it may well be answered this century) then what? Where will the intelligence fit then? What is the next gap you'll want to slide it into?You've moved the gap back to where there are still many unknowns. But a gap it still is.We don't even know enough yet to know if there is a gap. It may well be that only one universe* and set of rules is even possible. It may also be that the universe* has always been even if there are strong hints from the math that that isn't the case.* here 'universe' has moved beyond what we used to think of as "everything" to the 11 dimension setting that that is suggested by the math. The word "universe" isn't usable without qualification in the context we are discussing.In all of this the big mystery hanging out there which may remain even if "we" (I'm using the all inclusive "we" here but it sure won't be anyone with the IQ of the smartest person posting on this forum (with a couple of possible exceptions of which I am not one) wrestle string theory (or something else ) to the ground and get it to explain "everything" (all the laws of phyics ) is the question: "why is there something rather than nothing".Some consider that to be the deepest question of all and others who are perhaps just as smart consider it to be trivial and silly to even ask. But it's still there.

But that just isn't the case. For an atheist to say that genesis of the evolutionary process is another mindless process is just a much "science of the gaps" as it is for me to say that I believe that there was an intelligent agent involved.Even at that though, what would be the proof that the cellular life emerged without intelligent origins? You say that it may be answered this century. I assume you mean that someone will be able to create life from non-organic materials. Quite an accomplishment but all it will show is how it happened. It won't be able to tell us whether it took intelligence for it to happen the first time. It will only show that at least this time it did take intelligence. I'm not sure what you are referring to. I'd love to be able to move ahead a few centuries to see what science comes up with. My own personal speculation on why there is something instead of nothing is the possibility that you suggested. I tentatively believe that it always was. It is just that we only experience or perceive a small part of all that is.

QM isn't woo, it's been proven empirically - the fact that ordinary people don't understand it, doesn't make it woo. (Ordinary people don't understand TV either.) And anyway, what's that got to do with the price of pomegranates? A1. Because he's God. Doing anything he wants, is a defining charactistic of a God. You want a lessor god now?A2. I invoke the cart before horse protocol which you approve of:
you haven't proven that he can't do anything he likes and I know it in my heart that he can. I have formed that conclusion after extensive study of the nature of God. That's enough, apparently. And as I have outlined, It's our secular institutions that are responsible for whatever improvement in morality you think we are seeing. In those places where you think we are behaving better, belief in any sort of Tom is declining rapidly whilst our secular institutions are growing.You claim that our sense of justice is somehow proof of God. But our individual sense of justice is mostly our sense of vengeance; our secular laws prevent us from acting on our sense of justice - the eye for an eye thing is is closer to immorality than morality. It always amuses me that it's the christian right in your country that is all for hanging them high.Because you see absolutely anything as proof of the existence and influence of Tom - including, presumably, the decline in the belief of him in the areas that you see improvement - you won't be impressed with the argument that we are responsible for our own advancement. But it sure is hard for any objective onlooker to agree with you.And of course, even in the areas you think things are getting better, our nature has not changed. It would take very little for the progress we have made to disappear overnight - as we see from time to time during power cuts or flash riots. Only 70 years ago the world was on a knife edge, had Nazi Germany prevailed we'd be in a totally different phase now. Had the Cuban missile crisis gone the wrong way, you wouldn't be writing this. Who knows what's around the corner. It's wishful thinking again, I'm afraid.Go read Lord of the Flies or Philip K Dick's 'the Man in the High Castle'. Or look at the 'Never Again' memorial in the parade ground of Dachau concentration camp and then pick up any newspaper - you'll see, that 'Never Again' is a hope, not a promise. We weren't discussing Tom 'implanting a spark of knowledge in us' - whatever that might mean - we were talking about Tom directly intervening in our sense of morality. This kind of thing was done by an angel sat on your right shoulder back in the day. Now apparently it's by manipulating - well I'm not sure what - maybe you can tell me? Either way, interfering with our sense of morality is an interference with our free will (whatever that is.) A while back I went of a ghost tour of Edinburg - complete tosh, of course but good fun, all those dark passages, underground tunnels and Victorian murders. At the end the guide started spouting garbage about string theory and claiming it as proof of the existence of ghosts. Charlatans down the ages have piggy backed science to add credibility to their make-believe. It's just more snake oil - with added protem+ for shinier hair.Like you, the guide had no clue about the science. You also know even less about 'the nature of Tom' than the ghost tour guide knew about his ghosts. Just like him, you're just making this stuff up to suit your requirements.I've just returned from a visit to Flanders Fields in Belgium. Ypres and Passchendaile, the 1st World War cemeteries and the Ypres war museum. 550,000 men and boys lost their lives there. 1.5m fled Belgium as refugees. 10m died in that war. 'The war to end all wars' - but didn't. That's only 100 years ago next year.Where was your Tom then? A padre was killed, shot straight through his bible. Chlorine gas was used that killed everything from insects, to rats to horses to men. Where was that 'still small voice'? You can't answer that; no religious person ever has. The closest any came is to invent the fall and put the blame on us - but you don't believe that so you just try not to think about it, worrying instead about whether your Tom exists in another dimension - as absurd as counting angels on pin-heads.The first world war was started over Bosnia and Croatia - a conflagration which blew up again only a few years ago and is still smouldering. Religion and tribalism, power and control. Please don't tell me our morality is being guided by God - if it is he's a piss-poor leader and it's time we got a better one.

You have admitted there is no proof for an intelligent agency, therefore there is no either or in this case.The only thing being investigated is how it happened through natural processes. You can't point to any study investigating intelligent agencies. Your whole insistence on it being either natural or an intelligent agency is pointless.When you say it's either an intelligent agency or not, you are committing the logical fallacy of putting the cart before the horse - we've gone over this - because you don't have any objective proof for an intelligent agency.The ONLY thing there is proof of is, since the Big Bang, the universe and everything in it changes naturally. What intelligence? Some invisible being that you believe in because of a book your read? Yes there is, because there is no evidence of intelligent agencies, or fairies, or invisible unicorns.How flawed is your reasoning at this point?- OniEdited by onifre, : No reason given.Edited by onifre, : No reason given.

Hey, by all means go seek out the intelligent agency responsible for thunder, I'll go with the evidence that it's a natural process. Let me know how that works out for you. Well, you know, one area is chemistry and the other one biology. So it's different.- Oni

Is there any way we can perceive Tom's presence or influence on our moral behaviour?If Tom is literally imperceptible then how can you be doing anything other than inventing imperceptible Tom and his imperceptible influence? Science "rules out" Tom as the cause of morality in the same sense that science "rules out" Thor as the cause of thunder. I'm unclear as to which part of that you are disagreeing...?The scientific conclusion is that human morality as observed is a result of evolution by natural selection. I can cite various scientific papers to this end if that will help here?Your conclusion is that natural selection cannot account for human moral behaviour as observed and that Tom's influence is thus essential to explain that which is observed.Obviously your conclusion is not consistent with the scientific conclusion. How could it possibly be? You are making a false distinction. Socialisation and culture are part of the environment in which human evolution took place. The two things are inseparable and indeed mutually-enforcing when considering the evolution of morality. Not really. It's chemistry, physics, the origin of elements in stars, the Big Bang and the (possibly uncaused) origin of the universe or hypothetically the multiverse.The "turtles" stop where the evidence stops - Right? No. The evidence suggests evolution by means of natural selection. The evidence does not suggest evolution by means of natural selection plus some imperceptible tweaking by Tom.Yours inclusion of Tom is an unevidenced assertion whilst I am simply putting forward the scientific position regarding the origins of human morality.

quote:

---

but that still won't answer the question of whether the process that enabled the evolutionary process in the first place was intelligent or not.
  —GDR

---

So since it is just as much a gap thing for you are you saying you are doing theology of the gaps?We have evidence that the genesis of the evolutionary process can be through natural chemistry though. We don't have enough to be conclusive about it but there are no steps that can't be done through chemistry. The issue is which conditions support the steps and which specific steps were taken.There is a gap in our knowledge for sure. Until we close it we can only say we don't know how evolving organisms first arose. However, separate from that we do have evidence that there is high degree of certainty that it was a natural process. For one, the non-natural explanations have always failed in the past. For another we already have a number of the steps demonstrated in the lab. Not necessarily. When the experiments have been done so far one thing that is done is to try to create reasonable initial conditions and then let things run on their own without tinkering. Done this way if evolutionary processes arise they do so without intelligence intervening.If your answer to that is what about the intelligence to create the initial conditions then you are running off to yet another gap. This one goes back to the physics that forms universes. Not anything to do with evolutionary processes at all. Less than a century ago "universe" meant what we now know is the milky way galaxy. Once upon a time the newly discovered galaxies where termed "island universes". Then universe morphed into a word for all that we could see -- today this is the "observable universe" -- and universe meant that and all beyond it that was out of our light cone. Now "our bubble universe" might be term for that and "universe" might be all the bubbles there might be. We keep moving the definition of the word universe out and out to include more as we learn more. So in conversation one has to be a bit careful about what you are referring to.Edited by NosyNed, : correct dbcodesEdited by NosyNed, : No reason given.

I’m not arguing with the science of QM. I’m only saying that it isn’t at all what we would expect. So you who don’t believe in Tom now decides what he can and cannot do.Our world is a world of entropy. If Tom exists then he is limited by that.Yes you can believe whatever you want about Tom. The first point is if exists or not and then the second is about his nature and to a degree his capabilities. We are individually human and we come to our individual conclusions, just as we do about our human leaders. I’m not at all clear what you mean by secular institutions improving morality. However, I agree that morality is contagious and that it is spread by socialization. However, secular institutions that are doing well are very often the beneficiaries of a Judaeo-Christian heritage. If you are even right about fewer people believing in Tom why would you use that as evidence? I get roasted for appealing to the fact that there are many very well informed intelligent Christians. There sometimes seems to be rules that apply to theists but not to atheists, I do not claim that our sense, or more accurately our desire for justice is proof of God. I do see it though as a pointer towards Him.Personally I’m opposed to capital punishment for reasons that I’ve posted previously. Actually it is more my non-Christian friends that are in favour of the death penalty. However, even for those that are in favour of it, they are still seeking justice and in being human we are not going to be able to apply justice perfectly or consistently. There is no proof of Tom. I see Tom as working through our hearts and minds so yes to a large degree I believe we are responsible for our own advancement. I believe that we are able to love because he loved us first. I believe that Tom influences our hearts, minds and imaginations. That however isn’t knowable — there is no proof. Yes, I see many things as pointers towards Tom but essentially it looks the same whether you’re right or I am. Well those Nazis were thwarted. Then what happened after the war? Unlike after WW I the west, and in particular the US to their eternal credit, reached out and helped Germany, (at least West Germany), rebuild, which resulted in the Germans not only becoming allies but friends.Also I think that you take too short a view. Go back less than 2000 years and compare the most advanced civilizations then to those of today. At least our Sunday afternoon entertainment doesn’t involve watching people put to death either by wild animals or other humans. We don’t hang people on crosses to suffer long slow agonizing deaths while people stand around and watch. Our free will, at least as far as morality is concerned, allows us to make choices between on the one extreme total selfishness which involved taking pleasure in the misery of others, and total unselfishness which involves complete sacrifice possibly even giving up our lives for the benefit of others.My thoughts on it is that we do have instilled in us a sense of good and evil or right and wrong that is part of how we were made and maybe as part of the evolutionary process. I think you would agree that you have a conscience. I simply see that conscience as being the still small voice of Tom — a voice that we are completely free to ignore. Horrible things happen and people who horrible things. However if we weren’t capable of extraordinary evil we wouldn’t be capable of extraordinary good either.If this life is all there and you are right and there is no Tom then the evil of this world will never end until we do ourselves in and then there will be no ultimate justice. If I am right then there will be ultimate justice for those who inflict evil and for those who are the target of evil, whatever that looks like.

Natural processes exist. We know that and that is what science investigates. The root cause for natural processes is unknown. Your contention and belief is that because that is all we know empirically that is all there is. I believe that there is more than what we can know empirically. If you want to believe that sentient beings that are able to love, and build computers are simply the result of a very fortunate chemical combination of base metals happening strictly by chance, then you are able to generate a great deal more faith than I am able to muster, proof or no proof. It is a lot more than a book. Have I once referred to a book in the whole discussion about Tom. Very little.

If by "root cause for natural processes" you mean "what sparked this whole universe thing"... then sure, it is not currently known. But life is not the beginning. It is not a place where natural processes began to happen. It is nothing more than chemistry which began roughly 9 billion years after the Big Bang on perhaps many different planets - one we know for sure.So what are you suggesting, that it's been natural processes since the Big Bang and all of a sudden this invisible intelligence began the chemistry that started life? What you believe is irrelevant. What there is evidence for is what is relevant. If we paid attention to what everyone believed we'd be investigating all sorts of imaginary things. See, you continue to be confused. I don't believe anything. I only go where the objective evidence points to.I don't believe there is an intelligent creator guiding everything and I don't believe there isn't one. I don't "believe" in things.When we look at the evidence for how life began, it leads us to more evidence of how things function naturally. We discover new things all the time about the chemsitry of life. Same as with every other scientific endeavor. Can you name a scientific endeavor that hasn't gone that way?However, if there is ever objective evidence for an intelligent creator, then great, we can start to determine what the creator did. But until then, why put the cart before the horse just because you have a belief? I mean, if there is one thing we know for sure it's that everytime we look into what people claim god did it ends up being natural causes. Why is this case any different? Ignorance is truly blissful I guess.- Oni

There's loads of stuff in your last reply that I find ridiculous but it's all be done over many times so I'm just going to leave it be. But this is something we hear time and again and it just baffles me. It's an idea that's been passed down through the ages in a really shocking attempt to justify evil and suffering: It's so crazy it hurts.The reason people are capable of doing harm is because our entire global ecosystem is dependent on creatures eating other creatures. It creates hunter and hunted, fear and distrust, kill or be killed. Everything hangs on those emotions - it's literally life and death. Over millions of years those drives (and others) have made us what we are.Tom was a carnivore, not a vegetarian; his 'still small voice' is a scream.

When we sense our conscience giving us suggestions. It isn’t a case of inventing Tom. It is simply a case of considering the basis for our existence and coming to our own conclusions. We objectively know that we exist. If we decide to think about it we subjectively conclude that there is nothing but mindless processes responsible for our existence or we are the result of an intelligent first cause. There is no empirical evidence so it boils down to being a philosophical question.If we conclude that we are the result of an intelligent agent, (Tom), then we form our opinions of the nature of Tom. But science can’t rule out Thor as the god of thunder. Science can study the thunderstorm, the flow of electrons etc. It can tell us how thunderclouds form but it can’t tell us why thunderstorms or anything else exists. For that matter, science can’t prove that Thor didn’t cause a butterfly to flap its wings in Japan which eventually resulted in a thunderstorm here. We can study natural processes until the cows come home but that doesn’t tell us anything about whether these processes are from mindless or intelligent origins. We can only form our subjective conclusions on that based on something other than science. If human morality is simply by natural selection then you are discounting completely the influence of socialization, and that our sense of morality is cast in stone the day of conception. However, I know you don’t think that and would agree that socialization does have a major impact on our thinking in general and our sense of morality. If I am right and are conscience is the still small voice of Tom working subtly in our hearts and minds then that becomes an influence on how we develop socially. Yes really. As you point out it is one process after another. There was a process required for the BB. There was a process required for particles to form elements then compounds, gravity had to come form somewhere so that matter could form galaxies, stars and the planets, then a process that allowed for sufficient elements to be able to combine chemically, and then a process to form organic compounds, and then a process to form cellular life, and then a process to form intelligent life, and the a process to form sentient life, as well as the process to form sentient life capable of moral decisions.So your position requires that all of these processes just happened without any intelligent plan right back to a non-scientific process resulting in the BB or whatever else might be the beginning of the universe. You are a man of great faith. No, just more turtles. I don’t know whether evolution required tweaking or not. Francis Collins figures that the DNA trail for physical evolution shows that tweaking wasn’t necessary.From what little I understand we can show a DNA trail for natural selection when it comes to our physical attributes. As far as I know there is no DNA trail for morality and even if there is then science cannot tell us there aren’t other factors. Is it scientific that if we are raised in a socially loving environment that we are more likely, but not necessarily to grow up as loving adults? We know that to be the case.Yes, my assertion that Tom is involved is scientifically unevidenced is true. I have to draw my conclusions from something other than science as I have detailed all through this thread including the OP.

As I have pointed out several times, that isn’t the issue. Let’s assume that they have figured out a process in the lab how evolving organisms could have evolved. In the first place they might figure out one way which doesn’t mean there aren’t other ways, but that isn’t the point.The point is that with intelligence we then would have figured out a way that organisms could have evolved. They again, as in the case of evolution will have figured out the process. Your contention presumably would be that when this happened all those years ago without the intelligence it took this time.It does show that with intelligence it can be done. That it happened mindlessly is very different. It will have taken all these years to have figured out just the right chemical combination to make it happen and you are suggesting that it just happened that these chemicals just happened to combine in just the right was, and were able to form in a way that they were able to reproduce and start the whole evolutionary process that led to NosyNed. Boy you guys have a powerful faith. The chemicals needed a process - the elements needed process and so on. It took numerous processes before the evolutionary process could begin. If I am guilty of a god of the gaps rationale, then you are certainly as guilty of turning to science of the gaps. I can’t find what it was you were referring to with the quote about universe. I agree that I am unclear what they mean by parallel universes or dimensions. I’ve quoted this before but this was the headline in my copy of Scientific American a while back. Hidden Worlds of Dark Matter — An entire universe may be silently interwoven with our own. I know that the writers were not thinking about a way that Tom might be able to interact with us imperceptivity but it does present a framework to think about.