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Tangle Member Posts: 9509 From: UK Joined: Member Rating: 4.8 |
GDR writes: I take the parsimonious position that there is only one cause which is that there is an intelligent agency responsible for the whole shebang. Woah there boy! You take a far more irrational position than that! The deist position is at least semi-rational and can't be dismissed on evidence; yet. A god that kicks off a chain of events that ultimately arrives at us and takes no interest thereafter is *not* what you believe. Your problem is that we can now show that the processes of cosmic and biological evolution are natural ones, requiring no external intervention. Eventually we will show how the whole thing can start by itself, but possibly not in my lifetime and it will certainly be something I wouldn't understand. But there are already physicists that believe they can show this. And, I should point out before you complain, that at the point of creation, your god also requires the same explanation - what caused him? Just saying that he's the causeless cause is not an explanation. This is a quote from someone attempting to explain Hawking's position on the universe creating itself.
quote: Edited by Tangle, : No reason given.Je suis Charlie. Je suis Ahmed. Je suis Juif. Je suis Parisien. I am Mancunian. I am Brum. I am London.I am Finland. Soy Barcelona "Life, don't talk to me about life" - Marvin the Paranoid Android "Science adjusts it's views based on what's observed.Faith is the denial of observation so that Belief can be preserved." - Tim Minchin, in his beat poem, Storm.
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GDR Member Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 2.1 |
PaulK writes: It’s not.
That’s just changing the subject.PaulK writes: How am I limiting the possibilities for youi. I am simply asking the question of what is the process that kicked the evolutionary process off. You simply evade the question.
So let’s deal with the original point. You don’t get to artificially limit the possibilities available to me.PaulK writes: Just why is it disgusting. It seems that pretty much everyone here is allowed to make ad hominem against theists but heaven forbid the holy grail of atheism be questioned.
And to accuse me of rationalisation because I refuse to accept your diktat is pretty disgusting.PaulK writes: In other words you can’t answer the question . And to answer your question I think the idea that there is a process responsible for the process of evolution is daft.Here is a quote from the 2nd edition of Darwin’s Origin of the Species. From Darwin Online quote:Darwin’s answer to the question was the parsimonious answer. There was a creator. You however deny that there is even a question. GDR writes: In either case we look at what we know and come to a subjective conclusion. I have subjectively concluded that sentient life evolving through a series of mindless chemical processes is far less likely than there being an intelligent agency responsible for all of the processes. I know that Tangle would say that only gets us to deism. It is a different discussion to get to theism from deism.PaulK writes: We exist which is what we firmly know. Why is that? You seem to believe that the mindless particles that existed after the BB have just somehow come together and formed chemicals that combined into incredibly complex basic cellular life and then into sentient beings all by good fortune, and then call that rational.
However, my position is more rational which is the point of discussion. Your opinion lacks any firm basis.PaulK writes: Just read my last sentence. We have mindless particles ending up in sentient life. What clearer sign do you need? As I’ve said before, it is like looking at a car and then finding out that it was built on an assembly line and then declaring that the assembly line just assembled itself.
In the absence of any solid reason to think otherwise the ratio nal answer is yes. And in fact we do know quite a bit about these things and nowhere do we see any clear sign of intelligent agency. PaulK writes: The evidence is that there has been an evolutionary process. What process is responsible for it? As you don’t know, you simply evade the question.
So you say, but I don’t assume any processes without evidence. The idea that I believe in an infinite chain of additional processes is simply something you made up.GDR writes: I take the parsimonious position that there is only one cause which is that there is an intelligent agency responsible for the whole shebang.PaulK writes: No. You seem to make the assumptions that evolution on its own got us from what existed after the time of the BB to sentient life without requiring additional processes in between. That just isn’t rational nor evidenced. It requires agency. Mindless agency requires a separate agency every step of the way meaning multiple agencies. Intelligent agency parsimoniously requires only one agency. That isn’t parsimonious at all. My actual position is the parsimonious one because it avoids all the unnecessary assumptions of yours.He has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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PaulK Member Posts: 17825 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: It is. Since the answer has no relevance - and would have no relevance even if there was a sensible answer - of course it is changing the subject.
quote: By insisting that I have to believe in an infinite regress of course!And since I answered the question - after dealing with the real issue - your accusation that I evaded it is clearly false. quote: You’re making false accusations because my actual beliefs are inconvenient for your argument and you have to ask why it’s disgusting?
quote: Oh, the usual you can tell the truth about us but we can’t lie about you whining. Yuck.
quote: I gave a perfectly correct answer. Evolution is itself a process which will occur whenever the necessary conditions are met. To assume that there is a single process responsible for arranging those conditions is daft.
quote: That is not a parsimonious answer. And it is not even a process.
quote: By which you mean that I accept the scientific explanations. Seems pretty rational to me. And it’s not as if you have anything better.
quote: I suppose if you leave out all we know about what happened - including evolution - it sounds like a good argument. But that is an argument from wilful ignorance. Hardly rational.
quote: There isn’t a process responsible for evolution. That is an answer.
quote: No, I don’t. I simply point out that boiling all that down to a process is silly. There are a lot of things going on, from inflation, multiple generations of stellar formation, the formation. Of planetary systems, events within the system and events restricted to just the planets.
quote: So you assert, but the evidence is lacking,
quote: Bundling up a lot of assumptions into one single agency doesn’t help you. In fact it makes things worse for your position, at least with regard for parsimony. Assumptions should be as few and as modest as possible, not many grand and unnecessary assumptions that you happen to like.
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GDR Member Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 2.1 |
Tangle writes: Yes, I am a Theist. However there are two separate discussions. The first is an intelligent agency for matter which does not establish whether or not there is further involvement by the agency. You seem to accept that there is no evidence that argues against the deistic option.
The deist position is at least semi-rational and can't be dismissed on evidence; yet. A god that kicks off a chain of events that ultimately arrives at us and takes no interest thereafter is *not* what you believe. Tangle writes: Your problem is that we can now show that the processes of cosmic and biological evolution are natural ones, requiring no external intervention. So now you have taken the reasonable approach and agreed that cosmic evolution is not the same as biological evolution. I'll take you word for it that cosmic evolution happened naturally without any further interference from a cosmic intelligence. Biological evolution however then requires an agency in order to emerge within the cosmic realm. This certainly suggests that there was interference at some point in time that allowed this to happen. For that matter even after cellular life came into existence it seems reasonable to conclude that further agency was required to move from basic cellular life to conscious life and then to sentience. If we assume that then I suggest that in one way or another it is reasonable to believe that this intelligent agency isn't a detached agency. We can then come to our own subjective conclusions about whether or not that agency connects with us through our consciousness.
Tangle writes: And that is your belief. However, even if that proves to be correct it is again confusing process with agency. Eventually we will show how the whole thing can start by itself, but possibly not in my lifetime and it will certainly be something I wouldn't understand. But there are already physicists that believe they can show this. You quoted the article outlining Hawkings' position and yet the writer dismisses Hawkings' position in the last paragraph.quote:I'll be the first to admit that this article is well above my pay grade. He has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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Tangle Member Posts: 9509 From: UK Joined: Member Rating: 4.8 |
GDR writes: You seem to accept that there is no evidence that argues against the deistic option. Nope. I say that the deistic position can't as yet be disproven. Quite different. A god that doesn't intervene in our physical world and is totally invisible to us can not be shown not to exist. Can't be shown to be anything in fact. But is totally superfluous. But there's no requirement to do so as we have natural processes that show us that things happen naturally.
So now you have taken the reasonable approach and agreed that cosmic evolution is not the same as biological evolution. Uh? Of course they're different processes - when has anyone said anything else? There are million, billions, trillions of processes necessary to get us from the big bang to people banging drums. For our convenience we study the processes of life in a different discipline than the processes of the cosmos but that's arbitrary. They may in the end merge because in the end we're all built from stardust but for the moment science separates them.
I'll take you word for it that cosmic evolution happened naturally without any further interference from a cosmic intelligence. I'm not asking you to take my word for it; that's the science of it. Ask Polkinghorne he is at least in his own field there.
Biological evolution however then requires an agency in order to emerge within the cosmic realm. Uh?? Why??? We're made of the same stuff as the cosmic universe, science assumes that life is an emergent property. We even have a name for it - abiogenesis.
certainly suggests that there was interference at some point in time that allowed this to happen. It does nothing of the kind, that's purely a religious notion with no evidence to support it.
For that matter even after cellular life came into existence it seems reasonable to conclude that further agency was required to move from basic cellular life to conscious life and then to sentience. Again, no.
If we assume that then I suggest that in one way or another it is reasonable to believe that this intelligent agency isn't a detached agency. We can then come to our own subjective conclusions about whether or not that agency connects with us through our consciousness. All of that is pure invention. Inserting an unexplained cause as the cause is not an explanation. It's what religion has been doing for millennia and it's always been wrong. Edited by Tangle, : No reason given.Je suis Charlie. Je suis Ahmed. Je suis Juif. Je suis Parisien. I am Mancunian. I am Brum. I am London.I am Finland. Soy Barcelona "Life, don't talk to me about life" - Marvin the Paranoid Android "Science adjusts it's views based on what's observed.Faith is the denial of observation so that Belief can be preserved." - Tim Minchin, in his beat poem, Storm.
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Stile Member Posts: 4295 From: Ontario, Canada Joined: |
GDR writes: I'll take you word for it that cosmic evolution happened naturally without any further interference from a cosmic intelligence. Biological evolution however then requires an agency in order to emerge within the cosmic realm. I don't think you understand. Cosmic evolution IS the agency required for biological evolution to emerge. Cosmic evolution creates and distributes various elements through star creation/explosion and planet creation. Once you have a planet, with the various elements, and the various conditions created by "being a planet" - power from a sun, weather, elements... you now have the everything required in order for biological evolution to begin and continue to occur until the power or elements run out. We don't know every last detail of these processes... yet.But every detail we do know (and we know many) shows us that they all occur without any intelligent agency required. Extrapolating that the "last details" we do not yet understand will also show that no intelligent agency is required may be incorrect... or it might be correct.-but it is reasonable -and parsimonious -and based on all the available evidence -is not a "belief" (it is a tentatively held, reasonable extrapolation based upon all the currently available evidence.) Saying that the "last details" we do not yet understand will require an intelligent agency may also be incorrect... or it might be correct.-but it is unreasonable -not parsimonious -goes against the evidence, not based upon it -is a "belief" (a hope it's real, even though nothing actually shows it is required.)
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GDR Member Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 2.1 |
PaulK writes: All I'm asking is how evolution was initiated. I realize like Tangle said that the term is abiogenesis. Tangle says that eventually science will solve that puzzle. So if and when it does then the question is why and how did abiogenesis occur.
By insisting that I have to believe in an infinite regress of course!And since I answered the question - after dealing with the real issue - your accusation that I evaded it is clearly false. PaulK writes: My beliefs are inconvenient for your argument but I don't call them disgusting.
You’re making false accusations because my actual beliefs are inconvenient for your argument and you have to ask why it’s disgusting? PaulK writes: Well at least now you are agreeing that evolution required at least one previous process. However, you missed the point. Each process including evolution required a cause whether it be a mindless agent or an intelligent one. If a mindless agent is the cause the there needs to be a different cause every step of the way. If it is intelligent then there is only one cause required for each individual process.
I gave a perfectly correct answer. Evolution is itself a process which will occur whenever the necessary conditions are met. To assume that there is a single process responsible for arranging those conditions is daft. PaulK writes: There are huge gaps in scientific knowledge between the BB and sentient life. However science only answers the question of how things happened the way they did and not why they happened. I have no problem with the science.
By which you mean that I accept the scientific explanations. Seems pretty rational to me. And it’s not as if you have anything better. GDR writes: It requires agencyPaulK writes: Well of course it requires agency. The question is whether or not the agency is entirely mindlessly natural, or is there also an intelligent agency involved. So you assert, but the evidence is lacking,He has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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PaulK Member Posts: 17825 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: Tangle’s answer is contentious because he’d have to define anything capable of evolving as life and that’s not generally agreed. Viruses, for instance, evolve but are often considered to be excluded as living things. So the correct answer is that the conditions were met, and there is no single process that can be labelled as the cause. But that’s the answer I already gave.
quote: I didn’t call your beliefs disgusting either. It was your false accusations. So let’s chalk this up as another example of your less than honest approach to debate.
quote: Of course this admission is something you should have known all along. And your point is one I’ve already answered in my previous post.
quote: The gaps are being filled as we gain knowledge. But really if your argument is going to boil down to a God of the Gaps argument - and not even a good one - you haven’t got much of a claim to be rational.
quote: I don’t think so. If it is the working out of mindless processes where is the agency?
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GDR Member Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 2.1 |
Tangle writes: Of course natural processes happen. The question is whether or not there is intelligent involvement or not. Science can only examine what occurs naturally and it is a matter of belief whether or not those process es are the result of intelligence or not.
But there's no requirement to do so as we have natural processes that show us that things happen naturally. Tangle writes: I agree. I worded my response poorly.
I'm not asking you to take my word for it; that's the science of it. Ask Polkinghorne he is at least in his own field there. Tangle writes: There are million, billions, trillions of processes necessary to get us from the big bang to people banging drums.Tangle writes: So with all of the billions of processes, all requiring cause you have to insert an often unexplained scientific cause, as for example the cause for evolution. (abiogenesis) All of that is pure invention. Inserting an unexplained cause as the cause is not an explanation. It's what religion has been doing for millennia and it's always been wrong.He has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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GDR Member Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 2.1 |
Stile writes: Explain how you get from a mindless universe, held together by mindless mathematical laws to sentient life able to discover and understand those laws.
Cosmic evolution IS the agency required for biological evolution to emerge. Stile writes: I agree with that, but that is what science does. It investigates and draws conclusions about the natural world. We don't know every last detail of these processes... yet.But every detail we do know (and we know many) shows us that they all occur without any intelligent agency required. As a Christian I believe that God resurrected Jesus. Scientifically we understand that when you're dead and unless there is a resuscitation you stay dead. Science can say that the resurrection does not conform to scientific law. However, Christian understanding is that this was a one time event and that there is no appeal being made for science to support it. It is outside of scientific law. If one is a atheistic then the whole idea of resurrection is impossible. If however one is a theist then we are left to appeal to other sources and form our own opinion as to whether or not we accept that belief as historical. This is one instance, if correc, that this is something that if true would require divine intervention.He has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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GDR Member Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 2.1 |
PaulK writes: So now I'm dishonest, if not disgusting. I am trying to have an honest debate and doing the best I can.
I didn’t call your beliefs disgusting either. It was your false accusations. So let’s chalk this up as another example of your less than honest approach to debate. PaulK writes: Evolution filled a gap. If abiogenesis is scientifically explained it will fill a gap. However, the scientific explanation does not answer the question of why these processes exist as they do. How and why are two separate questions.
The gaps are being filled as we gain knowledge. But really if your argument is going to boil down to a God of the Gaps argument - and not even a good one - you haven’t got much of a claim to be rational. PaulK writes: The agency might be mindless or intelligent which is the question we're discussing. I don’t think so. If it is the working out of mindless processes where is the agency?He has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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PaulK Member Posts: 17825 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: It doesn’t look like an honest debate at all.
quote: There doesn’t need to be a why’ seperate from the how.
quote: Now that is an evasion. So what is this idea of mindless agency? Edited by PaulK, : No reason given.
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GDR Member Posts: 6202 From: Sidney, BC, Canada Joined: Member Rating: 2.1 |
PaulK writes: I have no idea what you are referring to. If this isn't an honest debate, (not that I see it as debate but as a discussion, and maybe that's the problem), maybe we should just agree to disagree. It doesn’t look like an honest debate at all.He has told you, O man, what is good ; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8
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PaulK Member Posts: 17825 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3 |
quote: Well we can start with your unjustified misrepresentation of my position, where you insisted that I had to believe in an infinite regress. We can go on to your attempt to use rhetorical trickery to justify that. Because let us be honest, asking about how evolution started was never going to justify it. Nor lead to any valid justification. And that continued with your false accusations of evasion because my perfectly valid answer wrecked the trick. Really, none of that is honest debate or discussion.
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Tangle Member Posts: 9509 From: UK Joined: Member Rating: 4.8
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GDR writes: Science can only examine what occurs naturally Science can examine anything that occurs in our physical universe. So far nothing has been found that requires a supernatural explanation. Science has continually explained the natural causes behind the supernatural claims made by religious believers. There is no reason why that process will not continue. Though we may be limited by the bounds of our own intelligence - we don't know that yet. There's no obvious reason why we should think ourselves able to understand everything. Maybe our machines will ultimately take it all the way? Certainly you and I will never know.
It is a matter of belief whether or not those processes are the result of intelligence or not. That is only (partially) true at the very beginning of all the processes - the big bang - and then only because we don't understand it. Yet. Given that everything we've ever examined is a result of natural causes, science's working hypothesis is that it all is. But the idea that a god is the original cause and intervenes no further is deism, which is not your belief. You believe that god somehow intervenes in undefined ways routinely in our universe - pulling the strings on unimaginable volumes of processes. A totally unnecessary fiction as we can see that the processes happen naturally.
So with all of the billions of processes, all requiring cause you have to insert an often unexplained scientific cause, as for example the cause for evolution. (abiogenesis) You're still not getting this because you're thinking like a believer, not a scientist. Abiogenesis is not a black and white moment - no life, then life. It's a gradient, a messy development spectrum. It will be impossible to establish a single point because at that level of organic development we're talking more about chemistry than biology. But we know from studying life now that it goes from relatively simple replicating chemicals to complex organisms. The processes that create all these life forms are natural. Two single cells from a man and a woman combine to eventually form an adult human being. Literally trillions of processes, each process kicking off the next - naturally. When one of these processes goes wrong because of an error in a gene or physical damage, development also goes wrong and we get malformations and even death. The processes we see working today, are the same ones that have been working for billions of years. They develop both complex organisms from 'simple' ones - people from single cells - and all life from 'simple' chemicals. We know this as fact and understand many of the processes. They're all natural.Je suis Charlie. Je suis Ahmed. Je suis Juif. Je suis Parisien. I am Mancunian. I am Brum. I am London.I am Finland. Soy Barcelona "Life, don't talk to me about life" - Marvin the Paranoid Android "Science adjusts it's views based on what's observed.Faith is the denial of observation so that Belief can be preserved." - Tim Minchin, in his beat poem, Storm.
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