The creation/evolution thread got me wondering about what evidence for a young earth is being ignored by the geologists, evolutionists, etc. because it conflicts with the old earth theory.
I'm particularly interested in what any resident creationists find convincing, but if you're an old-earther and are scratching your head about something that doesn't seem to agree with that view, I'd like to hear that too.
Please pick on or two of the most compelling items, don't just copy a list from a creationist web site. I'd like to be able to look in-depth at a few issues rather than have copy/paste battles to see who can quote the longest list.
Posted by Teshi (Member # 5024) on :
This Site is headed "What are the most compelling scientific evidences for a young earth"; however, all these scientific evidences are exegetical (I learnt a new word from the site). This means they are all looking at the Bible and interpreting it in some way.
I know you said you didn't want a list, but according to that site, there is no scientific evidence that is not drawn from the Bible.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
She just started wearing a training bra and thinks that lawyers should strive for truth, even if it doesn't benefit their clients.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
Teshi: Many creationists claim that there is evidence for a young earth that is not drawn from the Bible. I am aware of many of the claims, but I'm hoping that someone who actually advocates them will be interested in discussing what they believe is the most compelling.
Javert Hugo: Huh?
Posted by Javert (Member # 3076) on :
quote:Originally posted by Javert Hugo: She just started wearing a training bra and thinks that lawyers should strive for truth, even if it doesn't benefit their clients.
Brilliant! Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
Earth is female, yes? Traditionally?
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
Ah. Thank you. Quite clever. Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
I'm assuming Kat meant to post that on another thread.
Posted by Christine (Member # 8594) on :
I've never heard any evidence for a young earth that didn't come from the Bible. I'd be very surprised if any exists, but I'm willing to be open-minded if someone has something.
But just out of curiosity, why is it so important to believe that the earth is only a few thousand years old?
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
quote:Originally posted by Javert Hugo: She just started wearing a training bra and thinks that lawyers should strive for truth, even if it doesn't benefit their clients.
Posted by Strider (Member # 1807) on :
Look at Kat's post as a direct reply to the thread title and not anything contained within the thread. Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:I've never heard any evidence for a young earth that didn't come from the Bible.
One example is the claim that the geologic structure of the grand canyon indicates that it was carved during a catastrophic flood, rather than through millions of years of erosion. This claim, while obviously inspired by Bibilical beliefs, can be examined objectively without referring to the Bible.
quote:But just out of curiosity, why is it so important to believe that the earth is only a few thousand years old?
Because, for Biblical literalists, if anything in the Bible is determined to not be literally correct, then everything in the Bible can be questioned.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
I think that's sort of putting the horse before the cart. Since the young earth theory came first, the question ought to be what evidence there is for the old earth theory.
From what I can tell, the old earth theory is almost entirely based on the unproven premise that evolution happens gradually over very long periods of time and that changes to the earth also happen very slowly over lengthy periods.
Those are ideas that are comfortable, so it's no big surprise that they were adopted, but there isn't much basis for them.
Basically, the physical evidence doesn't say one way or another how fast biological and geological changes have occurred.
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lisa: I think that's sort of putting the horse before the cart.
Which is the order they generally belong in.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
Lisa: Nonsense. The evidence for an old earth comes from physics and geology, not evolution theory.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:Basically, the physical evidence doesn't say one way or another how fast biological and geological changes have occurred.
Actually, the physical evidence indicates that certain processes take a certain period of time to occur. Those processes have been observed to operate at the same rate for all of recorded history.
The assumption then, is that those processes have always operated at those rates and attempts to induce the same processes to occur at faster or slower rates have failed.
Posted by Shigosei (Member # 3831) on :
I think the old earth theory predates the theory of evolution. It's largely based on radioisotope dating, and does not depend on biological evidence. In particular, the exact age of the earth is based more on metorites than earth rocks, since most of the rocks on the surface of the earth have been melted and reformed multiple times since the earth coalesced.
And yes, there are ways of getting around contamination of rocks with the daughter isotope -- in K-Ar dating for example, the argon isn't incorporated into the rock during formation because it's a gas and wouldn't stay inside the rock as it cools.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
Um, even by the admission of some young-earthers, most of the support of young earth creationism is just to say that it is true, because the Bible says so. It makes sense when you think about it -- the Bible is held to be the incontrivertable standard, to which a naturalistic methodology is irrelevant as a criticism.
As a result, the 'products' and 'holdings' of science are held usually to be fatally flawed or corrupted and it leaves too little real data to work with. All they do, to a great extent, is to attempt to debunk widely held theories and methods to say that there is a contradiction that proves these methods to be irredemably false. Whenever they try a different tact through the production of independent proof of a young earth, it's usually beaten down rather hard because these proofs are usually deeply flawed as a result of preconclusive bias and/or a lack of scientific literacy involved in their creation.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
Radioisotope dating makes tons of assumptions. What proportions of various isotopes were present at a starting point, for one thing. What can effect those proportions, for another. Do the proportions stay constant except for half-life decay? Can environmental factors have an effect? Sunspot activity? Volcanic activity?
And I'm a little skeptical about radioisotope dating pre-dating evolutionary theory. Do you have any evidence for that?
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
quote:I think the old earth theory predates the theory of evolution.
This is true. In fact, the geologic evidence that the earth was very old was a necessary precursor to the theory of evolution as we know it. There had been some theories similar to Darwin's before, but they had been dismissed out of hand because the earth wasn't thought to be old enough.
quote:It's largely based on radioisotope dating, and does not depend on biological evidence.
Maybe it is now, but it wasn't based on radioisotope dating back then.
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lisa: Those are ideas that are comfortable, so it's no big surprise that they were adopted, but there isn't much basis for them.
Comfortable? Even though they went against thousands of years of belief?
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
I'm willing to accept that young-earthers hold their beliefs for strictly religious purposes. If they concede that point (perhaps implicitly by not providing scientific evidence for their claim), that's fine with me.
Posted by Qaz (Member # 10298) on :
I found this by googling. AFAIK there is no authoritative answer for what creationists accept, but I wouldn't know.
quote:Originally posted by Lisa: I think that's sort of putting the horse before the cart.
Which is the order they generally belong in.
<groan> My bad.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by Jon Boy:
quote:Originally posted by Lisa: Those are ideas that are comfortable, so it's no big surprise that they were adopted, but there isn't much basis for them.
Comfortable? Even though they went against thousands of years of belief?
<nod> It's very comforting to think that as things are now, so will they be tomorrow. And that only follows from the belief that as things were yesterday, so are they today.
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
If you're interested, Lisa, there are numerous papers that have tackled the various potential problems with isotope dating and explain why it remains useful.
There's also the the particular strangeness that if there are such significant problems with radio isotope dating as to turn millions of years into hundreds or thousands of years, that distortion has worked identically with all of the overlapping radio isotope dating range, corresponds to the ages we'd expect based on geological strata models, et cetera. In other words, for radio isotope dating to be that wrong would require a confluence of probability beyond my imagination.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
The King Clone creosote bush in the Mojave Desert, being almost double the assumed YEC assumption of the world's age, would probably also be suitably stumped by such a confluence of probability.
Posted by Teshi (Member # 5024) on :
quote:I think the old earth theory predates the theory of evolution. It's largely based on radioisotope dating, and does not depend on biological evidence. In particular, the exact age of the earth is based more on metorites than earth rocks, since most of the rocks on the surface of the earth have been melted and reformed multiple times since the earth coalesced.
Before there was radioisotope dating and evolution, there were plenty of theories that the earth was older than specified in the Bible and other such places.
Before Darwin ever thought of evolution, geologists were divided over Catastophism and Uniformatism (led by Hutton and then later Lyell). Catastrophism, although not strictly Biblical, held that the world as we see it today had been created by series of 'catastrophies' and other major events (floods, huge sudden uphevels in the rock etc.). Uniformatarianism said that no such things had occured (although now it is accepted that at least some catastrophes happen, such as asteroid bombardement or huge bits falling off cliffs and mountains and thus allowing seas to suddenly drain, or ice ages, although it should be noted that many of these do actually fit in with the principal of uniformitarianism etc.) and that the world was shaped by the same processes we see at work today.
Uniformitarianism, for example, meant that mountains didn't spring up overnight. If they had been formed at the speed they were moving at the moment, clearly longer than a few thousand years would be required. Other rock formations told a similar story. As a result, the Earth was believed to be older than a few thousand years before Darwin packed his bags (taking with him Lyell's Principles of Geology) and got onto the Beagle.
Posted by Shigosei (Member # 3831) on :
Lisa, did you read my post?
quote:And yes, there are ways of getting around contamination of rocks with the daughter isotope -- in K-Ar dating for example, the argon isn't incorporated into the rock during formation because it's a gas and wouldn't stay inside the rock as it cools.
There are a number of other ways to deal with this, such as isochron dating.
As far as I know, there's some minor variability in decay rates, but nothing that could change 4.5 billion years into thousands or even millions.
MPH, you're right. It wasn't radioisotope dating, but as nearly as I can tell, geologists had already rejected the idea of the earth being a couple thousand years old.
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
They absolutely had.
Posted by Nathan2006 (Member # 9387) on :
I think most creationists use the flood as a reasoning that the earth is as young as it is. The argument is that it acted kind of like a giant catalyst for a lot of things... The trans-continental rift and seperation of the continents, climate change, ice age... Actually, if one is a creationist, he or she could argue that Global warming isn't anybody's fault, because it's really just iso-static rebound.
Conviently though, God promised not to send another one, so nobody can observe it properly to see what impact it would really have, or even how it happened. We can only theorize.
*** Edited for clarity ***
Posted by Javert (Member # 3076) on :
quote:Originally posted by Nathan2006: I think most creationists use the flood as a reasoning that the earth is as young as it is. The argument is that it acted kind of like a giant catalyst for a lot of things... The trans-continental rift and seperation of the continents, climate change, ice age... Actually, if one is a creationist, he or she could argue that Global warming isn't anybody's fault, because it's really just iso-static rebound.
Conviently though, God promised not to send another one, so nobody can observe it properly to see what impact it would really have, or even how it happened. We can only theorize.
*** Edited for clarity ***
He also conveniently got rid of all the extra water it would take to flood the entire planet.
[/quibble]
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
If he did do that, I'd say it's pretty darn convenient for all of us.
Posted by Javert (Member # 3076) on :
quote:Originally posted by mr_porteiro_head: If he did do that, I'd say it's pretty darn convenient for all of us.
I don't know. If Kevin Costner can survive on a planet covered in water, I think the rest of us have pretty good odds of survival. Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lisa: I think that's sort of putting the horse before the cart. Since the young earth theory came first, the question ought to be what evidence there is for the old earth theory.
From what I can tell, the old earth theory is almost entirely based on the unproven premise that evolution happens gradually over very long periods of time and that changes to the earth also happen very slowly over lengthy periods.
Then you need to do more research. Old earth theories were first proposed in the early 1800s, 50 years before Darwin, by geologists who had set out to find evidence for the Flood. Being honest scientists, they reported that they could not find any such evidence, but concluded that the Earth must be at least a few hundred thousand years old.
I further suggest that you consider the concept of varves. These are annual deposits of layers on lake bottoms. Now, there's no theory saying "This happens once a year", we can actually see it happen! It's like tree rings but the record lasts longer; and that record agrees with carbon dating out to twenty thousand years, which is as far back as we can find varves. Is this evidence, or not?
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
Why do you assume evidence will matter to someone who believes in their heart that their faith is true?
An interesting statement I've read lately, and I don't know how true it is: Debating beliefs as if they're scientific theories to be tested is useless, since people don't actually think of them that way.
It's a difference in worldview.
This, by the way, is not necessarily related to Lisa, so don't think it is, but it's something more in general.
No evidence will change the views of some people (again, going in general, not necessarily Lisa) because they simply do not care.
Posted by Avin (Member # 7751) on :
quote:Originally posted by MattP: I'm willing to accept that young-earthers hold their beliefs for strictly religious purposes. If they concede that point (perhaps implicitly by not providing scientific evidence for their claim), that's fine with me.
I hold my young-earth beliefs for strictly religious purposes and do not think it necessary that the young age of the earth be provable from secular assumptions, as I have stated here in the past.
quote:Originally posted by Christine: But just out of curiosity, why is it so important to believe that the earth is only a few thousand years old?
I don't believe that in itself is that important, but I do believe it's important to understand God's interactions with creation and particularly humans in the light that scripture presents it, in that God did not intend for death or resource scarcity to be the norm for creation, which is a requirement for any Old Earth scenarios. I believe those to have been introduced as a consequence of the actions of the first humans.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
...which your god, being omnipotent, knew about in advance and could easily have prevented. Not intended, pfeh.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
Yet that's not what the fossil evidence, the geological evidence, the astrological evidence, the DNA evidence, the historical and prehistoric human evidence (some of which predates the given date for creation in the Bible) etc, indicates.
If they did happen as you stated, it would be evident in creation. It would be quite obvious if your statement is the case. There's no reason, if your statement is correct, for the evidence to all be pointing towards a universe of scarce resources and death as the norm.
But it is. It simply is.
Why not come to the obvious conclusion? (and not that it was changed by God's actions. Why, if that is the case, would you trust a God who would create such a fraud? How could you trust a proven liar with the power to lie perfectly?)
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
Also: What King of Men said.
To expand upon it: Why would God allow anything like that to happen, if it wasn't the intention?
Omnipotence, anyone? Omnipotence. The power to do anything. (at least, anything logically possible.)
Think about that for a moment. You claim God is omnipotent. Omnipotent! All powerful! Able to do anything! He's the irresistable force! (if an irresistable force exists, then logically, there can't be an immovable object. That's what irresistable means, after all.)
And yet, God somehow allowed his plans to go awry.
How is that?
We go, then, to the key problem: God can, logically, only be two of these three things: omnipotent, omniscient, and good. This world, and its current state, makes it clear that God isn't working in it to save people, or to make justice occur.
Either he's all powerful, not all seeing and good (like an absent-minded father), he's not all powerful, but all seeing, and good (basically, doesn't have the power to make good happen), he's neither all powerful nor all seeing, but good (so, he can't see all injustice, and can't stop it) or he's all powerful, all seeing and evil (at least by human perspectives. If we saw a man watch someone die, who they could have saved, and willingly stand back and not allow it, would that not be evil? By that standard, God is no better.) The other possibilities exist too, that God is evil but not all powerful, but we don't need to get into that.
How is this reconcilable?
[ August 27, 2007, 04:53 PM: Message edited by: 0Megabyte ]
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:Why not come to the obvious conclusion?
Because it's not so obvious to people for whom young earth creationism is Truth with a capital "T". I an understand and respect that someone acknowledges a religious belief that the earth is only 10,000 years old and that any evidence to the contrary represents our own misunderstanding of the nature of the universe.
What chaps my hide are the people that claim that the preponderance of scientific evidence supports a young-earth view. I do believe that people who hold that view are, generally speaking, ignorant of science, dishonest, or both.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
quote:What chaps my hide are the people that claim that the preponderance of scientific evidence supports a young-earth view.
Who are these people?
And if you think so very little of them, why did you start a thread specifically soliciting these mythical people's opinions? It hardly seems like an act of good faith.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:Who are these people?
The entire staff of AiG, Duane Gish, Ron Lambert, Jay, etc.
quote:And if you think so very little of them, why did you start a thread specifically soliciting these mythical people's opinions? It hardly seems like an act of good faith.
I didn't say I thought little of all of them, I said they were either ignorant or dishonest. Clearly I think little of the dishonest ones, who have been shown why their science is flawed but refuse to acknowledge criticisms.
However, ignorant is not a negative characterization. I'm exceedingly ignorant myself on most subjects.
I was hoping to get some responses from those who honestly believe the science supports the young earth view so I could have a polite dialog on the subject and see where we end up, not on the question of young earth vs. old earth, but on a few of the scientific arguments for a young earth.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
There is no way I would want to have a conversation with someone who considered me either ignorant or dishonest or both off the bat.
Were you looking for a real dialog or just looking for a nice and vulnerable target? Considering your pre-formed, vehement opinion of them, it seems very much like the second.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Are you looking for a real dialog here kat? Because you appear to be a bit of a pot calling the kettle black.
edit: If you were aking your "Who are these people?" question respectfully, I very much doubt that you'd immediately, without waiting for a response, follow it up with an answer with "mythical people".
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:There is no way I would want to have a conversation with someone who considered me either ignorant or dishonest or both off the bat.
Again, I think you are putting too much negative value on "ignorant." When two people disagree on any subject, such that their conclusions are mutually exclusive, one or both of them is ignorant by definition.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:When two people disagree on any subject, such that their conclusions are mutually exclusive, one or both of them is definitionally ignorant.
I don't think that is true. When people disagree about facts, that could be said to generally be true (assuming that one person knows things that the other doesn't), but many disagreements center more around interpretations of facts.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:but many disagreements center more around interpretations of facts.
And if those interpretations (conclusions) are mutually exclusive? If I examine a piece of evidence and conclude 4B+ age and you conclude, from the same evidence, 6-10K age, is not at least one of us ignorant as to the true age of the earth?
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Then people have a different intrepretation. I don't see where ignorance enters in there. It's not a question of someone not knowing something, as far as I can see.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
It's a common fallacy to assume that if someone agrees with you, it means they don't understand or are not in possession of all the facts.
However, disagreements arise from more than this.
In this given instance, I'm still not sure what goal is for a dialog. You don't seem real willing to listen, and I've learned more from other posters are the specific scientific rationale for a very large number of years for the age of the earth.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
The fact is, evolution is a fact. To deny that fact is, truthfully, denying a fact as obvious as the fact that cars work, and drive down the road. It's denying something as obvious as the fact that nuclear power works, and that electricity works the way we know it does. It's as obvious a thing to deny as the internet.
You don't deny those things. The strength of evidence for evolution is just as strong as they. (and they aren't in the Bible either.)
There are, quite literally, millions of pieces of individual evidence for evolution. Millions. Many, many millions. And many things which evolution predicted, which have turned out to be true.
Denying it, in the eyes of one who's seen even a relatively small amount of the evidence, is about as nonsensical as denying the earth is round.
(edited to remove inflammatory comments)
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
*sigh*
I really just hoped to have an engaging discussion on supposed scientific evidence for a young earth. Of course I'm going to start from a position of extreme skepticism as I've made no attempt to pretend that I'm an unbiased agnostic on the age of the earth. I would expect that whomever put forth the evidence would be similarly biased in the other direction.
That shouldn't prevent us from being able to try to rigorously examine the evidence as much as a couple random people online can do and we can count on the peanut gallery to call us out if our biases are causing us to bend the evidence to our preconceptions.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
0Megabyte: I would caution you that since you have recently made an extremely difficult and life altering decision as huge as discarding belief in God and all religion. That since you were a strong believer in both, that you realize it seems fairly unwise to speak in such an overtly confident even arrogant manner about what is fact and what is not.
Far from me to insult your inteligence, and heaven knows I agree the evolution has enough evidence to be virtually a certainty. But please don't make the mistake I have seen many religious converts make. If it's wrong for a new convert to suddenly saturate their world with their new found faith and argue with all their friends that they are all fools, it's equally wrong for a new atheist to start scoffing and ridiculing the beliefs and characters of those who still believe strongly in religion.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
I take your word of caution, and appreciate it.
Before I read your response, I already acted to take some of what I deemed rude out of my most recent post.
As it is, yeah, it's a danger I definitely need to beware of, and it's good that you notice it.
Though I defintiely do not believe in God, and, through asking and listening, am still yet to ifnd any evidence, I should still respect that other people have different beliefs, and that I should respect at least those things that don't immediately fly in the face of evidence. (Such as, say, God's actual existence.)
That said, seeing people deny evolution so blatantly annoys me for a slightly different reason, the reason of seeing people deny obvious facts, which has always bothered me, and I will try to limit my words to that subject, and try hard not to attack belief in God itself.
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
quote:To deny that fact is, truthfully, denying a fact as obvious as the fact that cars work, and drive down the road.
Come now, you know that's not true. That evolution is a fact is in no way as obvious as the fact that cars work.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:That said, seeing people deny evolution so blatantly annoys me for a slightly different reason, the reason of seeing people deny obvious facts, which has always bothered me, and I will try to limit my words to that subject, and try hard not to attack belief in God itself.
You realize, of course, that they have the same opinion about your denying the "obvious fact" of God.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
Only becaues you don't look at the evidence every day.
I don't, either, of course, but if I was working in a lab, it would in fact be just as obvious. (at the very least because you can witness it with your own two eyes, and quite often in microorganisms!)
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
Thanks, Megabyte.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:Only becaues you don't look at the evidence every day.
Regardless of the reason, MPH is right. Evolution is not an obvious conclusion to those who haven't spent much time studying the evidence.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
Very big of you Megabyte. It's a rare person who can take censure and respond well. Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
Well, I'd already decided to do at leas tsome self-censure.
I'm sure that kind of helped my mood.
And yes, I admit to only a little bit of hyperbole.
But if you'd never seen a car before, I wonder if you'd believe that they work? That's actually an interesting question, I think!
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
To Matt:
Yes, I realize they think it's self evident too.
However... I request evidence, and they don't give anything.
And since I've studied the Bible at least a little, and know a lot about where it came from, it's harder for me to take "it says so in the Bible!" without a grain of salt, considering I also know it says a lot of other things, some of which are not historically accurate (not to say that that makes the Bible useless or invalid... it's just not in all places an historical document, it doesn't document things in the manner we expect from modern documents, regardless of its other virtues.)
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:However... I request evidence, and they don't give anything.
I have similarly been frustrated, but I started this thread in attempt to dig into an area which some people claim scientific support. The "you can't prove there is/is not a God" argument gets old, but I think the "the evidence shows that the earth is 6 thousand/4 billion years old" could be much more productive.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
True. In that case, I should probably be quite and stop bugging the thread, and let it get back to... whoever will or may come to give such evidence.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
For the record, since I've quoted Dawkins quite a bit on these forums, I'll switch to Gould this time who is known to be a bit more diplomatic:
quote: In the American vernacular, "theory" often means "imperfect fact"--part of a hierarchy of confidence running downhill from fact to theory to hypothesis to guess. Thus the power of the creationist argument: evolution is "only" a theory and intense debate now rages about many aspects of the theory. If evolution is worse than a fact, and scientists can't even make up their minds about the theory, then what confidence can we have in it? Indeed, President Reagan echoed this argument before an evangelical group in Dallas when he said (in what I devoutly hope was campaign rhetoric): "Well, it is a theory. It is a scientific theory only, and it has in recent years been challenged in the world of science--that is, not believed in the scientific community to be as infallible as it once was."
Well evolution is a theory. It is also a fact. And facts and theories are different things, not rungs in a hierarchy of increasing certainty. Facts are the world's data. Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts. Facts don't go away when scientists debate rival theories to explain them. Einstein's theory of gravitation replaced Newton's in this century, but apples didn't suspend themselves in midair, pending the outcome. And humans evolved from ape-like ancestors whether they did so by Darwin's proposed mechanism or by some other yet to be discovered.
Moreover, "fact" doesn't mean "absolute certainty"; there ain't no such animal in an exciting and complex world. The final proofs of logic and mathematics flow deductively from stated premises and achieve certainty only because they are not about the empirical world. Evolutionists make no claim for perpetual truth, though creationists often do (and then attack us falsely for a style of argument that they themselves favor). In science "fact" can only mean "confirmed to such a degree that it would be perverse to withhold provisional consent." I suppose that apples might start to rise tomorrow, but the possibility does not merit equal time in physics classrooms.
Evolutionists have been very clear about this distinction of fact and theory from the very beginning, if only because we have always acknowledged how far we are from completely understanding the mechanisms (theory) by which evolution (fact) occurred. Darwin continually emphasized the difference between his two great and separate accomplishments: establishing the fact of evolution, and proposing a theory--natural selection--to explain the mechanism of evolution.
- Stephen J. Gould, " Evolution as Fact and Theory"; Discover, May 1981
I'm just preemptively attempting here to establish that that the statement "evolution is a fact" could be spun in such a way to be seen as an "extremist" view.
However, the statement by itself is actually quite mainstream.
I've actually seen a president of an evangelical Christian organization hang on this statement in a really smug manner on a CBC debate as evidence of "intolerance", as if stating that "evolution is a fact" was somehow extremist and intolerant. Sigh.
[ August 27, 2007, 06:09 PM: Message edited by: Mucus ]
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
Such a misunderstanding only comes from an ignorance of science. That is, not learning about it, not bothering to understand the meaning of the basic words, the very worldview.
The difference between the vernacular for theory, and the actual phrase in science, is enough to be considered pretty much different words. And that is the best damn definition of the word fact I've ever seen, by the way, and fits what I call a fact perfectly.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:Originally posted by 0Megabyte: Why do you assume evidence will matter to someone who believes in their heart that their faith is true?
Lisa asked for evidence; I gave it. What she does is up to her. At the moment she appears to be busy worrying about dietary laws laid down 3000 years ago by people who would not know a bacterium from a Bactrian camel. Whatever.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
I saw this thread and thought, for the first time, "Where's Ron Lambert when you need him?"
Posted by Glenn Arnold (Member # 3192) on :
MPH:
quote:Come now, you know that's not true. That evolution is a fact is in no way as obvious as the fact that cars work.
In some ways it is. Humans spend a significant amount of energy and attention noticing the differences and similarities of a child to her mother and father. That's pretty basic evolution. Likewise for farmers or anyone who raises hybrid flowers or breeds animals.
quote:Originally posted by 0Megabyte: Why do you assume evidence will matter to someone who believes in their heart that their faith is true?
Because people convert to different opinions everyday. And not just about religious belief. I can remember being presented with evidence that glass was a liquid (by my father, who I had great faith in as a scientist) and later being presented with evidence that glass really is a solid, which controverted my belief, and which placed me in the position of having to realize that my father was wrong. Both of those conversions were difficult for me, and I can remember the cognitive dissonance that I experienced each time.
In reading this thread, it seems that 0Megabyte recently converted to atheism, which has me pretty confused, because it seems that someone who has gonve through that conversion would understand exactly why evidence would matter to someone who believes in their heart that their faith is true.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
It occurs to me that if young earth creationism is actually based on a literal interpretation of the Bible, genesis in particular, then the term "young earth creationist" could actually be expanded. It could actually be "young galaxy creationist" or "young universe creationist" depending on which the phrase "the heavens" refers to since it was created the day before the Earth.
Posted by The White Whale (Member # 6594) on :
Mucus, thank you for the Gould quote. It sums up my view of the evolution / creation debate very well. That man can use words like very few people can.
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
quote:Originally posted by 0Megabyte: But if you'd never seen a car before, I wonder if you'd believe that they work? That's actually an interesting question, I think!
The first time I sat in an airplane, I looked out over the enormous wing extending away from the fuselage, and thought, no way can this thing work. I mean, intellectually I knew it would, but it seemed inconceivable to me that this skinny little piece of aluminum would not snap right off if it tried to lift off.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by Javert: Conviently though, God promised not to send another one, so nobody can observe it properly to see what impact it would really have, or even how it happened. We can only theorize.
I suppose those old Jews who made the whole thing up were smart enough to realize that eventually people would be interested in repeatable experiments and deliberately put in that bit about no more floods just to mess you up.
quote:Originally posted by Javert: *** Edited for clarity *** He also conveniently got rid of all the extra water it would take to flood the entire planet.
[/quibble]
So... just for the record, you'd say that the Earth was never covered by water? Answer carefully.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
I'd say the Earth was never covered by water, and certainly not in a human timeframe.
Posted by Cashew (Member # 6023) on :
QUOTE We go, then, to the key problem: God can, logically, only be two of these three things: omnipotent, omniscient, and good. This world, and its current state, makes it clear that God isn't working in it to save people, or to make justice occur.
Either he's all powerful, not all seeing and good (like an absent-minded father), he's not all powerful, but all seeing, and good (basically, doesn't have the power to make good happen), he's neither all powerful nor all seeing, but good (so, he can't see all injustice, and can't stop it) or he's all powerful, all seeing and evil (at least by human perspectives. If we saw a man watch someone die, who they could have saved, and willingly stand back and not allow it, would that not be evil? By that standard, God is no better.) The other possibilities exist too, that God is evil but not all powerful, but we don't need to get into that.
How is this reconcilable? UNQUOTE
It's very simply and logically resolved in Mormon theology, without any huge leaps having to be made. This isn't meant to be a religious thread so I'm not going to go into details (I don't have time right now either). I'm still wanting to see some answers to MattP's original post.
Posted by Ron Lambert (Member # 2872) on :
Physical evidence for a young earth includes the findings of Creationist scientists that the rate of helium diffusion from granitic zircon is compatible with only thousands of years of diffusion, not millions or billions. (The radioactive decay of uranium in granite produces helium, which because of its small molecular size gradually diffuses out of the rock at a rate that has been measured by independent laboratories.) Here is a link to an article about this: http://www.creationresearch.org/crsq/articles/41/41_1/Helium.htm Also check the Creation Research Society website for related articles and updates. Go to the home site at: http://www.creationresearch.org and search on "helium diffusion"
Despite the loudly shouted claims to the contrary, this evidence has not been scientifically refuted. If someone says it has been refuted, follow the arguments, and see how it has been answered by Creationist scientists.
Over 30 years ago, Robert V. Gentry discovered many polonium haloes in granite which are lacking some of the outer haloes. (Actually they are globes, but sliced for microscopic viewing they look like haloes as the various stages in nuclear decay which discolor the rock take place.) For some of the outer haloes to be missing, and considering the extremely short half-lives of the radioactive decay elements involved, Gentry pointed out that the rock had to change from a liquid to a solid state in a matter of seconds. Here is a link to Gentry's website: http://www.halos.com/
Again, you will hear loud, red-faced shouts that the evidence has been refuted. It has not. Check any claims to the contrary, and see how Gentry has performed lab tests to refute the supposed refutations.
Another evidence involves the amount of sedimentation in the world's oceans. Quote: "Each year, water and winds erode about 25 billion tons of dirt and rock from the continents and deposit it in the ocean. This material accumulates as loose sediment (i.e., mud) on the hard basaltic (lava-formed) rock of the ocean floor. The average depth of all the mud in the whole ocean, including the continental shelves, is less than 400 meters. The main way known to remove the mud from the ocean floor is by plate tectonic subduction. That is, sea floor slides slowly (a few cm/year) beneath the continents, taking some sediment with it. According to secular scientific literature, that process presently removes only 1 billion tons per year. As far as anyone knows, the other 24 billion tons per year simply accumulate. At that rate, erosion would deposit the present amount of sediment in less than 12 million years. Yet according to evolutionary theory, erosion and plate subduction have been going on as long as the oceans have existed, an alleged 3 billion years. If that were so, the rates above imply that the oceans would be massively choked with mud dozens of kilometers deep. An alternative (creationist) explanation is that erosion from the waters of the Genesis flood running off the continents deposited the present amount of mud within a short time about 5000 years ago."
Link: http://www.creationresearch.org/creation_matters/pdf/2003/young_world2_rp.PDF (Note that Adobe Reader is required to read it.) This link brings you to an article that lists many physical evidences for a young earth/young solar system/young universe. You will be interested in reading the whole article.
And then of course there is the matter of soft tissue being found in "fossil" T-Rex bones. How easy is it to believe these fossils are at least 65 million years old? Link: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11385533
[ August 27, 2007, 11:32 PM: Message edited by: Ron Lambert ]
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:Despite the loudly shouted claims to the contrary, this evidence has not been scientifically refuted. If someone says it has been refuted, follow the arguments, and see how it has been answered by Creationist scientists.
The evidence was not refuted, the methodology was questioned and some of the primary criticisms remain unanswered. I've got to run for now, but I'll come back to this tomorrow.
Posted by steven (Member # 8099) on :
*quietly*
Ron, mud can compact under its own weight.
One other bit:
You can find quartz crystals that are as large as small cars. We know how long it takes to form crystals of that size. How? Because we grow quartz crystals for processors and other applications.
They wouldn't grow that big in space. It's too cold. Therefore, they formed here. Therefore, we know the Earth must be noticeably older than those crystals.
Creationists are deeply silent about this.
Posted by Ron Lambert (Member # 2872) on :
steven, the request was for physical evidence not derived from Scripture that supports the Biblical account of origins. Do you also want me to go through all the evidences claimed by evolutionists in favor of their theories and show what is wrong with them? I have done that on many occasions in the past, but then the evolutionists would claim that I am just trying to make a case for Creationism by finding fault with evolution arguments.
As for what you say about crystals, could you supply a little more precise information, with sources? Why do you say cold inhibits formation of crystals? (Try forming ice crystals without cold!) And what does that have to do with anything?
It is likely that for the time being, people will continue their devotion to whatever philosophical/religious traditions please them. Convincing them against their will, no matter how logically persuasive the evidence, will only leave them in a greater state of denial and defiance if they are already committed to evolution. And no, I do not acknowledge the same about Creationists. I find scientifically literate Creationists tend to be far more genuinely open-minded--people such as Dr. Robert V. Gentry who was agnostic and believed in evolution until he made his discoveries involving radiohaloes in granite. He had the integrity to refuse to be subjugated by the tyranny of the scientific establishment and its traditions, and went by the evidence--truly.
[ August 27, 2007, 11:55 PM: Message edited by: Ron Lambert ]
Posted by Javert (Member # 3076) on :
What is this scientific tyranny that you're talking about, Ron? I seriously have not seen it. Please give me examples.
Posted by Ron Lambert (Member # 2872) on :
Javert, you could only be unaware of the enormous current if you have only been swimming with it. See if you can get a job in science, a grant, tenure, if you let it be known you give the least bit of provisional credence to Creationism.
Posted by Javert (Member # 3076) on :
To creationism, yes. I understand that, because creationism has a stigma attached to it.
You seemed to say in your post that this tyranny was coming down on people who are against or want to test evolutionary theory because they think it could be wrong. That's what I disagree with.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
Sigh. Why is it always Biblical young earth creationists?
We never seem to get young earth Pangu believers (18,000 years+) or young Earth Hindu believers (millions of years). I could sure use the change of pace.
Posted by Saephon (Member # 9623) on :
In a sickeningly dry brainstorm of humor, I came up with this in my head today:
"Trying to persuade a creationist is like playing Dungeons & Dragons with an infallible dungeon master. You can dig up all the facts you want; they're just going to change the rules on you."
*dodges flamethrowers* I thought it was kinda cool Posted by Shigosei (Member # 3831) on :
Given that helium content in rocks is known to be highly dependent on conditions, and radioactive decay is not as dependent, a pretty strong case needs to be made that we ought to depend on helium diffusion instead of radioisotopes. In fact, even if the case for a "helium clock" were as good as that for radioisotopes, we would still need to figure out a way to decide between the two. The paper argues that there was a burst of very fast radioactive decay, resulting in the older ages we see today. Unfortunately, they don't say what sort of effect that would have, so that is not a testable conclusion at this time. What would the effects of sped-up decay be, according to their theory? What's the mechanism? Was there an accompanying change in either nuclear force, and did this apply to the earth only, or to larger areas?
I see that the paper also argues that even if there were an outside source of helium, the diffusion rates would still not permit the helium to be retained for millions of years. That assumes that the helium contamination wasn't recent. Apparently, you can test for it by looking for isotopes that wouldn't have been generated by the radioactive materials in the zircon. That would be the best way to shut up the critics: right now, I see a lot of back and forth about the possibility, and I'm puzzled as to why the experiment apparently hasn't been done.
The clincher, of course, would be to test a number of samples from a number of sites. If similar results can't be obtained from other zircon samples, then this site likely has some peculiarities. Keep in mind that lower bounds for the age of the solar system have been established using a wide array of rocks and dating techniques. Radioisotope dating has met this standard (see this PDF for an overview, or do your own search to find all the many papers out there), so it is not at all unfair to ask helium diffusion dating to meet the same standard.
I'm also vaguely aware of some astronomical observations of supernovae which seem to indicate that radioactive decay rates were pretty much the same back when the supernova happened, so there's some additional evidence for the constancy of radioactive decay rates in general. I will try to find that information later, and I will also look into the halo and sedimentation rate arguments.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
A point to consider is that speeding up the rate of radioactive decay will also heat the Earth, since heat is a byproduct of decays and has to be radiated into space to disappear. If you speed it up sufficiently to produce the amount of decay products we see in a mere 6000 years, you heat up the Earth to the point of melting iron on the surface.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Not if God blew on it.
Posted by Shigosei (Member # 3831) on :
No, that's where the floodwaters went Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Floodwaters don't help unless they are removed. And yes, yes, miracles can do anything, but the Creationists keep claiming to be doing science; if they have to put in "And then a miracle occurs" at any point, they've lost.
Posted by Shigosei (Member # 3831) on :
I was suggesting that God was using watercooling, and if the water boiled off, that solves both the heat problem and the where'd-the-water-go problem. That is, assuming the heat release and the energy needed to vaporize the water with enough energy to drive it into space were approximately equal.
Also, there would probably need to be an explanation of how the rest of the solar system managed to not melt, and the existence of relatively young rocks would also need to be explained.
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
quote:I was suggesting that God was using watercooling,
Perhaps because he was overclocking the system? Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
You'd still need to account for where the water goes after that. It's not going to disappear in a mere six thousand years - in fact most of it should still be orbiting the Earth. Also, I strongly suspect that we are talking about way more energy than is needed to vaporise a water layer only a few miles thick. Furhter, if the steam is hot enough to reach escape velocity, then the rest of the atmosphere should be too. Further, there are supposed to be humans on the earth while all this flooding is going on; how come they are not parboiled? Obviously, the answer is going to boil down to "Miracles".
Posted by Avin (Member # 7751) on :
MattP I respect your request for inquiry here and appreciate your desire to try to give people with a radically different perspective a chance to voice their thoughts, but I suspect you're not going to make much progress. It is hard to have the sort of dialog that I think you are looking for on an online forum. Note for instance the fact that I explicitly stated that my beliefs were based purely on trust in scripture and not on the available evidence viewed from secular assumptions, and the next three posts tried to address me with questions of why I cannot believe what I believe because of certain evidence. This obviously demonstrates the fact that I do not think the same way they do.
For the record,
quote:Originally posted by 0Megabyte: You claim God is omnipotent.
I claim what? Be careful about making assumptions about what other people claim when they have not claimed any such thing.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:Note for instance the fact that I explicitly stated that my beliefs were based purely on trust in scripture and not on the available evidence viewed from secular assumptions, and the next three posts tried to address me with questions of why I cannot believe what I believe because of certain evidence. This obviously demonstrates the fact that I do not think the same way they do.
That's why I asked for scientific objections in this thread. Even if I presuppose old earth and someone else presupposes young earth, we can discuss how the evidence does or does not fit either/both/neither of our conclusions.
Ron has gamely offered up a couple good examples. I will write a reply to the first one, but as I'm making an effort to synthesize the initial report, its criticisms, responses to criticisms, etc, I'll need to find a block of time to put together a response.
Posted by Ron Lambert (Member # 2872) on :
Shigosei, fair enough, I would like to see further research to ascertain the answers to the questions you raise. Such research does cost something, and Creationist scientific researchers typically are not very well-funded, lacking access to government grants, so it may take a while for them to do the research. Evolutionist scientists could do the research, if they are willing to be truly objective and report the findings without any selection or "cooking" of the data (which is what they accuse the Creationists of doing).
I recall reading about a year ago a report from a research team of astronomers in Hawaii that their observations of certain nebulae indicated that one or more supposed universal constants (like the Plank length, speed of light, etc.) must have been different at some time in the past. Let me see if I can find it (my old computer recently died, and I'm having to resconstruct all my old favorites reference links).
quote:Now, Lamoreaux, along with LANL colleague Justin Torgerson, has re-analysed the Oklo data using what he says are more realistic figures for the energy spectrum of the neutrons present in the reactor. The results have surprised him. Alpha, it seems, has decreased by more than 4.5 parts in 108 since Oklo was live (Physical Review D, vol 69, p121701).
That translates into a very small increase in the speed of light (assuming no change in the other constants that alpha depends on), but Lamoreaux's new analysis is so precise that he can rule out the possibility of zero change in the speed of light. .... And in March, Flambaum claimed that the ratio of different elements left over from just after the big bang suggests that alpha(s) must have been different then compared with its value today (Physical Review D, vol 69, p 063506).
Thus we see the issue is still open.
As I have pointed out in the past, changes in the speed of light could also imply changes in the rate of radioactive decay (which we already know can change drastically, on the order of a trillionfold, when matter is heated to the plasma state, as has been shown in the laboratory). So changes in the speed of light can imply changes in radioactive decay rate, and vice versa.
Yes, a period of increased nuclear decay rate would have an effect on earth's biosphere. I suspect those who suggest it would turn earth's surface into a molten state are exaggerating. I would suggest that the increased nuclear decay rate might produce a dramatic increase in genetic mutation. The book of Genesis mentions a special "curse" that was pronounced on the ground because of Adam's sin, which in turn resulted in thorns and thistles suddenly making an appearance. Creationists find it easy to see there might be a connection.
Just as "any technology sufficiently advanced is indistinguishable from magic," so also unusual and very subtle operations of natural processes may be indistinguishable from miracles. Of course, even if we can determine how God accomplished something extraordinary and amazing using very esoteric natural properties and processes, we still admit that He did it. If God does in fact exist, is the Creator, and does at times intervene by His own directed will, then that is not an unscientific proposition. Since it is a logical and viable alternative, it is not scientific to rule out this possibility completely. Rather it would be the arbitrary exercise of personal subjective prejudice, and therefore would constitute a failure of the scientist to be objective.
Posted by Shigosei (Member # 3831) on :
quote:You'd still need to account for where the water goes after that
Comets. *Nods sagely*
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:As I have pointed out in the past, changes in the speed of light could also imply changes in the rate of radioactive decay (which we already know can change drastically, on the order of a trillionfold, when matter is heated to the plasma state, as has been shown in the laboratory).
We know nothing of the kind. I believe you are confusing rates of decay with rates of fusion; they are totally different. Decay rates do not change when matter is heated.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
A further point: You quote misleadingly. Your quote has alpha changing by 4.5 parts in 108, which is a lot. The article has alpha changing by 4.5 parts in 10^8, or in other words, essentially zero. This would change the age of the earth from 4.3 billion years all the way down to 4.3 billion years minus a few hundred. Try again.
Posted by Christine (Member # 8594) on :
Is it just me, or has there been absolutely no scientific evidence put forward to suggest that the earth could even potentially be young? So far, all I've seen is feeble nitpicks made against the mountain of evidence for an old earth. Nit picking old earth theory does not make young earth theory correct.
I was actually curious to see some real evidence.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Well, fair's fair: Ron mentioned the polonium halos and the hoary old seabed-mud thing. I believe MattP is working on the halos, so I won't duplicate his effort; as for the mud, subduction is not the only mechanism removing it:
quote:Originally posted by TalkOrigins Some sediment deposited on the continental margin can become part of the continent itself if the sea level falls or the land is uplifted. Some calcium and organic sediments become biomass or ultimately dissolve. Some sediment becomes compacted as it deepens, so its volume is not indicative of the original sediment volume. Some sediment is "scraped" off of subducting plates and becomes coastal rocks.
The uniformitarian assumption in the claim is not valid. Tectonics involves ocean basins forming and spreading, but it also involves them closing up again (the Wilson cycle). When the basins close, the sediment in the oceans is piled up on the edges of continents or returned to the mantle. Much of British Columbia was produced when the Pacific Ocean closed a few hundred million years ago and land in the ocean accreted to the continent.
This is an old claim and has been debunked many times.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Oh, and by the way, nobody responded to my varves. Posted by MightyCow (Member # 9253) on :
Hey sailor, is that a varve in your pocket? Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by steven: *quietly*
Ron, mud can compact under its own weight.
One other bit:
You can find quartz crystals that are as large as small cars. We know how long it takes to form crystals of that size. How? Because we grow quartz crystals for processors and other applications.
They wouldn't grow that big in space. It's too cold. Therefore, they formed here. Therefore, we know the Earth must be noticeably older than those crystals.
Creationists are deeply silent about this.
We also "know" how fast stalagmites and stalactites grow. I've heard that used as evidence for old earth theories as well. The thing is, they've been observed to grow much faster. Which means that the slow formation takes place under certain conditions, while the quick formation takes place under others. I suspect the same may be true about the quartz crystals you mention.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
That sounds a great deal like believing unsupported theories because they are more comfortable.
[ August 28, 2007, 04:07 PM: Message edited by: Javert Hugo ]
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Sigh... We know how fast stalagmites of a given kind of rock grow. Stalagmites of that particular kind of rock have not been observed to grow any faster. Stalagmites of different kinds of rock have been observed to grow faster. Moreover, you cannot reason from "We've observed stalagmites grow faster" to "We've observed quartz crystals grow faster". (And note how specific I'm being. Ron actually mentioned ice crystals, as though that was relevant! Quartz, goddammit! Ice is a totally different creature and doesn't have anything to do with the matter!) Until you do, this is just handwaving because you prefer your own 'theory'.
And curse it, what about the dang VARVES!?
Posted by The White Whale (Member # 6594) on :
I find it hard to justify any other explination, especially after watching Planet Earth's exploration of the Lechuguilla Cave, and especially the Chandelier Ballroom. Wiki here.
It just makes sense to me. Crystals grow slowly. Extremely large crystals grow slowly, and can only be the result of millions of years of growth. Top that of with how that cave was formed, which took even longer, and a young earth just seems ridiculous.
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
Lisa: What evidence is there that conditions thousands of years ago were different enough to allow all these things (crystal formation, carbon-14 creation, and so on) to happen at different rates?
Posted by twinky (Member # 693) on :
quote:Originally posted by Ron Lambert: Shigosei, fair enough, I would like to see further research to ascertain the answers to the questions you raise. Such research does cost something, and Creationist scientific researchers typically are not very well-funded, lacking access to government grants, so it may take a while for them to do the research.
Didn't a creationist group just spend some US$35M on a creation science museum? Sounds to me like there should be plenty of independent funding available for creation science research...
quote:Originally posted by Ron Lambert: Yes, a period of increased nuclear decay rate would have an effect on earth's biosphere. I suspect those who suggest it would turn earth's surface into a molten state are exaggerating.
Not that King of Men needs my support, but that's not quite what he said:
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: If you speed it up sufficiently to produce the amount of decay products we see in a mere 6000 years, you heat up the Earth to the point of melting iron on the surface.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:Originally posted by The White Whale: It just makes sense to me. Crystals grow slowly. Extremely large crystals grow slowly, and can only be the result of millions of years of growth. Top that of with how that cave was formed, which took even longer, and a young earth just seems ridiculous.
Please be specific, here. Some kinds of crystals grow slowly, including the ones you are linking to. Ice, as was pointed out, can grow quite rapidly. A general statement like "crystals grow slowly" permits the creationist to point to those kinds that don't, as though they were relevant to the specific crystals we are discussing.
Posted by El JT de Spang (Member # 7742) on :
quote:Originally posted by Javert Hugo: It's a common fallacy to assume that if someone agrees with you, it means they don't understand or are not in possession of all the facts.
Best. Typo. Ever.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
OK, zircon helium diffusion:
In 2003 a creation scientist, Dr. D. R. Humphreys, and his associates presented a paper at a creationism conference which claimed that Zircons found in New Mexico contained too much radiogenic helium to be consistent with an earth that was billions of years old. Zircon are small crystals of a mineral found in igneous rock, contains the radioactive elements uranium and thorium. As uranium and thorium decay in zircons, helium is produced. The crystals that Humphreys studied were radiologically dated as approximately 1.5 billion years old, yet had very high levels of helium. Humphreys theorized that the high levels of helium indicate that the rate of decay was accelerated and indicated that these rock samples were substantially younger - on the order of 6000 +/- 2000 years by his calculations.
A number of scientific objections have been made to this conclusion and the methodology used to obtain it. I'll pick a couple of the the simpler arguments for brevity's sake.
1) Humphreys' diffusion data was generated with a lab vacuum rather than at the intense pressures one would expect at the depth where these zircons are found. That error alone can swing the results by orders of magnitude.
2) Humphreys arbitrarily excludes one of two similar sample sets because it did not fit their model. His explanation for that exclusion is nonsensical and mathematically incorrect.
3) In response to the above criticism, Humphreys claimed that "we could dispense with both samples [i.e., samples 5 and 6] entirely with no damage to our case at all. This is just another quibble about an inconsequential issue." However, with that sample removed the remaining dataset produces an average date of 5,100 +/- 5,000 years, quite a dramatic shift from his original figure of 6,000 +- 2000. This amount of volatility in the data indicates that his techniques do not yield consistent results and are therefore of limited utility. Attempting to correct his equations for poor assumptions and other flaws results in a peculiar date of 60,000 +/- 400,000 years.
4) The site where Humphreys' samples were collected is in close proximity to an area that is known to have high levels of extraneous helium. The levels measured approach or exceed the helium concentrations found by Humphreys in the zircons.
The most thorough discussion of this paper that I'm aware of can be found at http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/helium/zircons.html. It includes links to the original paper, the original criticisms, Humphreys' responses, and answers to those responses. As far as following the argument, I don't know of a site that takes it any further.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
All right, let's do some math. The Earth gets heat from two sources: First, the Sun, second, radioactive decay of heavy elements in its core. Let us consider potassium. At the moment, potassium decay accounts for roughly 10% of the incoming energy to the Earth's surface. (Source)
Now, potassium-40 has a half-life of 1.25 billion years. Let us reduce that to a mere one thousand years, speeding up its decay by a factor of a million or thereabouts, as is required by a young earth. Then the input of energy from this source, obviously, jumps by a factor of the same one million. This being so, we can ignore the other ninety percent of the energy input to the Earth's surface, and consider that the Earth is being heated only by potassium decay. You'll note that I am now taking the Sun completely out of the equation! So, the input energy to the Earth is increased by a factor of one hundred thousand. (That is, first I reduce by a factor ten to look only at potassium; then I increase that by a factor one million.) This obviously increases the surface temperature as well; the question is by how much. We can treat the Earth as a black body; its total radiated energy is then proportional to the fourth power of its temperature, or going the other way, its temperature is proportional to the fourth root of its radiated energy. So, when I increase the radiated energy by a factor of one hundred thousand, I increase the temperature by a factor of roughly 17. The Earth's atmosphere has a temperature (in Kelvin) of about 373; times 17 is 6341. Iron melts at 1808 Kelvin. I can, therefore, melt iron on the Earth's surface by increasing only the decay rate of potassium-40, never mind all the other stuff down there, and at the same time removing heat input from the Sun.
Exaggerated, pff.
[ August 28, 2007, 05:38 PM: Message edited by: King of Men ]
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
*golf clap*
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Actually, I take that back. Iron melts at 1808; it boils at 3134. The kind of fiddling with physical constants you need to get this sort of rapid decay will give you gaseous iron on the surface of the Earth. This is the sort of temperature you find on the Sun! "An effect on the biosphere", sheesh.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
Something I noted while reading up on the Zircons. The talkorigins site is well referenced and links to the creationists' original text. The creationist sites either make no mention of the criticism or cherry pick the items to respond to and refer to an anonymous critic rather than link to the full criticism.
Posted by twinky (Member # 693) on :
quote:The Earth's atmosphere has a temperature (in Kelvin) of about 373; times 17 is 6341. Iron melts at 1808 Kelvin.
This would melt granite, too (which melts about 100 K past iron, I think), so I suppose the earth's surface would indeed pretty much be molten.
Added: Your follow-up is well-taken. I'm not sure what the constituent elements of granite are when it's melted down, but I imagine most if not all of them would also be boiling by 6,341 K.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
...and even elemental carbon (the element with the highest melting point, at about 3800K)
Posted by twinky (Member # 693) on :
Actually, we shouldn't even be using the normal boiling points. Atmospheric pressure would be long gone by this stage. We could look at a phase diagram, but the only way the boiling and melting points are going to move in this scenario is down, not up.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
I suspect it's mainly silicon oxides, which will certainly separate into its constituent elements; silicon boils at 2628 Kelvin. In fact, diamonds boil at 5100K. I spoke inexactly when I said 'gaseous iron'; it would actually be a plasma, that is, the atoms would be stripped of their electrons. As I mentioned, these are the temperatures of the Sun's surface; solid objects are pretty much out of the question.
Posted by twinky (Member # 693) on :
All of this makes me wonder what kind of energy input would be required to make the Earth explode, Alderan-style.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Well, as it happens, I rather suspect that with this sort of heating, the average velocity of most nuclei would be quite a bit beyond the escape velocity. The Sun keeps together at these temperatures because it's so big; the Earth has a much shallower gravity well. You can certainly wave goodbye to anything lighter than oxygen, which would include stuff like carbon and nitrogen. Not to mention hydrogen; the only reason we have any hydrogen on the Earth is that it's bound up into heavier compounds. Gaseous hydrogen is light enough that even at the current temperature of the earth, its average speed is greater than the escape velocity and it tends to escape the atmosphere.
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
The power to destroy a planet is insignificant.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
That would require the creation model proposed by Last Thursdayism, which states that the world was created last Thursday.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:That sounds a great deal like believing unsupported theories because they are more comfortable.
Beat me to it.
Posted by Christine (Member # 8594) on :
quote:Originally posted by MattP: That would require the creation model proposed by Last Thursdayism, which states that the world was created last Thursday.
Good theory, although I tend to think the world was created the day I was born. It will be destroyed the day I die.
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
quote:Originally posted by mr_porteiro_head: The power to destroy a planet is insignificant.
That line always bugged me. I mean, what did Darth Vader ever do that compared to the destruction of Alderaan? I'm sure he killed scores of people in his career as a Sith, but we're talking billions of people and an entire planet turned to asteroid field in the blink of an eye. Let's see you do that with the Dark Side!
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
But remember Luke Skywalker blew up the death star in an instant with just alittle force guidance on a single photon torpedo.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Quite so; Darth Vader was correct, the ability to blow up a planet is indeed insignificant compared to the power of having the scriptwriter on your side.
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
Not only that, but as the investigative reporters Robot Chicken have shown, Vader couldn't even really force choke.
Posted by Dan_Frank (Member # 8488) on :
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: But remember Luke Skywalker blew up the death star in an instant with just alittle force guidance on a single photon torpedo.
Come on man! Photon Torpedoes are Star Trek.
Star Wars uses Proton Torpedoes! Get with the program! Posted by Shigosei (Member # 3831) on :
King of Men, your link has an error. It should probably read like this: Source. Also, it's behind a paywall. I can get it through university access, but it would be helpful if you could tell me the title so I can search for it. Thanks!
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Paywall? Curious, I found it from Google. Maybe SLAC has a subscription? Anyway, the title is "Earth science: Core values".
Posted by Nathan2006 (Member # 9387) on :
quote:Originally posted by Christine:
quote:Originally posted by MattP: That would require the creation model proposed by Last Thursdayism, which states that the world was created last Thursday.
Good theory, although I tend to think the world was created the day I was born. It will be destroyed the day I die.
It's possible, although, depending on when you were born, there could be some conflicts concerning how it came to revolve around me.
Posted by Foust (Member # 3043) on :
After so many years, watching YECers be smashed still brings a smile to my face.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dan_Frank:
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: But remember Luke Skywalker blew up the death star in an instant with just alittle force guidance on a single photon torpedo.
Come on man! Photon Torpedoes are Star Trek.
Star Wars uses Proton Torpedoes! Get with the program!
Is that really how it is?! I never picked up on the proton photon difference! Geez! That's got to be a loss of 10 maybe more geek points.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by Jon Boy: Lisa: What evidence is there that conditions thousands of years ago were different enough to allow all these things (crystal formation, carbon-14 creation, and so on) to happen at different rates?
You misunderstood me. I'm talking about different conditions in different places right now. There's a cave in Israel that got uncovered when some explosives went off, and a lot of the stalactites and stalagmites broke. They've since regrown at a much faster rate than had been expected.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
What is the name of the cave? Who predicted a slower rate than was observed and what criteria did they base that prediction on?
EDIT: I did try to Google something up about this, but I was not successful.
[ August 28, 2007, 06:23 PM: Message edited by: MattP ]
Posted by steven (Member # 8099) on :
"They've since regrown at a much faster rate than had been expected."
IF it's not literally tens of thousands of times faster, it means little. Even if it were only several hundred times faster, I might find it interesting. I doubt it's even anything as fast as that.
The simple fact is, cave stalactites are only tangentially related to quartz crystals. We know far more about growing pure quartz crystals than we know about forming crystals of any other rock type. Industrial quartz crystal growth is pretty darn precise--it has to be. Your computer processor is a quartz crystal. If it didn't work right, we wouldn't be having this discussion on this forum. We'd be talking in the town square.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Notice Lisa parachuting into the thread a page after her last comment, making a quick post that ignores not only all the discussion that's gone on since then but also the posts that directly addressed her last one, and leaving again. Is this honest argument, or rhetorical tactics?
Posted by steven (Member # 8099) on :
Lisa's Hatrack persona, nay, perhaps her entire psyche, appears to be predicated on the idea that, not only does she have special knowledge, she has special knowledge about everything, including subjects where she has done less study than many people who disagree with her.
If you understand that, you understand Lisa.
This idea didn't come from me, but from another Hatracker.
And, I gotta say, it's a rhetorical tactic.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Hum. Not to flame you, steven, but I must admit that I would have found that last post a bit (edit) less ironic if it had come from anyone else but you. Sorry.
Posted by steven (Member # 8099) on :
WE are so not friends, KoM.
[ August 28, 2007, 08:25 PM: Message edited by: Papa Janitor ]
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
I didn't say we were. As I have not chosen to have my name published on this forum, might I ask you to remove it from your post?
Posted by steven (Member # 8099) on :
Hell no.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
As you wish.
Posted by steven (Member # 8099) on :
Ooh, I'm impressed. He's about to deliver the other shoe. When is it coming?
[ August 28, 2007, 08:39 PM: Message edited by: Papa Janitor ]
Posted by Papa Janitor (Member # 7795) on :
It was a pretty simple and reasonable request, steven.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
I bet you two would be more civil if you found God.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: I bet you two would be more civil if you found God.
Remember God can only do all that CAN be done. He might be at an impasse when it comes to steven and KOM.
Joking aside, that was pretty ridiculous steven, I'm surprised to see you act that way. KOM shouldn't have to put up with that kind of nonsense.
Posted by steven (Member # 8099) on :
"t was a pretty simple and reasonable request, steven."
It was on the heels of a giant fecking unnecessary off-topic ad hom that had nothing to do with anything on the thread.
Do you realize who you're defending?
Really, you're going to defend him? Seriously?
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
*stays out of it*
Posted by Papa Janitor (Member # 7795) on :
*would have preferred to stay out of it, too*
While it's probably not the only thing on this thread that violates the TOS, it does violate them ("You agree, through your use of this service, that you will not use this BB to post any material which is . . . invasive of a person's privacy. . . ."). And as I said, it was a simple request.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Originally posted by steven: "t was a pretty simple and reasonable request, steven."
It was on the heels of a giant fecking unnecessary off-topic ad hom that had nothing to do with anything on the thread.
Do you realize who you're defending?
Really, you're going to defend him? Seriously?
Perhaps it was an ungenerous statement, probably even hurtful, but should you then in turn spit back some venom of your own?
If the statement is untrue, ignore it. Or call your accuser out on it in a respectful way. You're an enjoyable member of this community steven, I may not agree with everything you believe, but you seem like a good human being.
Am I wrong to think that of you?
Posted by steven (Member # 8099) on :
I couldn't give a crap. He acts like a dick about 70% of the time, consistently, and has improved barely a whit, if at all.
It's not like he didn't have a point, but....screw this place if I can't get some loyalty.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Well, to be fair, steven has a bit of a legitimate RL beef with me after what happened with the Price book. I feel a bit bad about that. I overestimated myself; I thought I'd be able to finish any book, no matter how boring, in a few days or a week at most. But comrade Price is just so utterly boring and incompetent that he alternately infuriates me and drives me to sleep. Still, I should have offered him his money back. In fact, let me do so now. Steven, if you'd like to send me your address, I'll send you a check for that 25 bucks.
Posted by El JT de Spang (Member # 7742) on :
It's not about loyalty, dude. It should be readily apparent that the mods here typically (9 times out of 10) side with the person who's in the right -- not the one they like better.
Posted by MightyCow (Member # 9253) on :
I hope you have a P.O. Box steven, or you'll have KoM outside your house handing out Atheist literature within the week!
Posted by steven (Member # 8099) on :
"It's not about loyalty, dude. It should be readily apparent that the mods here typically (9 times out of 10) side with the person who's in the right -- not the one they like better."
Maybe since Papa took over, I'd say that's more or less true. Before that, it was a GrenMe-banning, gritted-teeth, make-it-personal heavily-biased mess, about half the time. Surely you remember. It was a blessing to get a decent mod, even one that trashes me occasionally on your message board.
KoM, I'm still waiting for you to actually read chapters 15-20, and report on them, to get the rest of the money. What does it take to motivate you? Seriously?
Posted by steven (Member # 8099) on :
"I hope you have a P.O. Box steven, or you'll have KoM outside your house handing out Atheist literature within the week!"
I'm in Stokes frickin' County, North "By God" Carolina. We're too polite around here to kick out any such atheistic Norwegians, but he might feel out of place.
KoM at my house--now that would be funny.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:KoM, I'm still waiting for you to actually read chapters 15-20, and report on them, to get the rest of the money. What does it take to motivate you? Seriously?
Oh, I thought you realised I'd given that up. Meh, maybe I'll take another crack at it. But what I posted above is my honest opinion: Price is a sufficiently incompetent scientist that he actually enrages me when he's not putting me to sleep. This puts him in rather rare company, right up there with creationists and newagers. So, to answer your question, what it takes to motivate me is actual competence at writing and science.
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
What a totally ridiculous side-liner of an otherwise interesting thread.
Just for the sake of being on topic (not because I really think I'm adding something new) I've always found the young earth theory a little off-kilter. It seemed to stem from a desire to have personal beliefs be supported by science, in a proof that other scientific theories that contradicted that belief weren't true. It seems to me that if you think science is wrong in the first place then it's wrong. No need to try to then use it to support something you'd obviously believe science or no. But I could be totally off on that, and this thread certainly has shown interesting aspects, even if it hasn't convinced me as to the validity of the theory itself.
Hobbes Posted by steven (Member # 8099) on :
"Oh, I thought you realised I'd given that up. Meh, maybe I'll take another crack at it. But what I posted above is my honest opinion: Price is a sufficiently incompetent scientist that he actually enrages me when he's not putting me to sleep. This puts him in rather rare company, right up there with creationists and newagers. So, to answer your question, what it takes to motivate me is actual competence at writing and science."
So in other words, you're....not interested in good nutrition? I'm not talking about Price, specifically. I don't think he knew everything about nutrition, which is why I eat a mostly-raw diet. What I'm saying is this: if you think that the reason that the natives had better teeth and bones and no cancer, heart disease, strokes, diabetes, etc. on their traditional diets is exercise only, you're smoking crack. Sure, exercise is part of it. Maybe half.
Beyond all that, raw-organ-meat-eating and such are quite common in many countries. It's quite common in France and other parts of Europe, and I have quite a few online and RL friends from Europe who consider raw meat a great dish. Caviar, too, and good raw cheese. Granted, not a lot of folks will eat raw shrimp brains, but I know of a few who do.
I am not the only person who eats like this.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
I gave you my opinion of Price as scientist and writer. That does not have anything to do with my interest in healthy foods, raw or otherwise.
We now return to our regularly scheduled Creationism thread; if you want to start another Price debate, please find your own thread for it. I won't be posting in it.
Posted by advice for robots (Member # 2544) on :
I believe in the Bible, but I honestly don't think we've been given enough knowledge through scripture to really be able to make any claims about the hows, whats, whens, and whys of the earth's formation. In the meantime, science is doing a pretty good job.
Edit: OK, science has made great inroads into the whats and whens, and has given the hows the old college try. As for the whys, that's why I love my religion so much. Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
You make the completely unwarranted assumption that there is a why.
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
Well if he loves his religion, odds are good that he knows there's a why, it doesn't have to be assumed for him since he already knows what it is. I don't think he's saying that he expects everyone to agree with his why, nor to agree that one exists, merely that he's found truth and fulfillment in the answer he's received.
Or not, seeing as how I really have no special insight into what he was thinking, that's just what I would've been thinking had I made a similar post.
Hobbes Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
I would say that the #1 thing that compels people to believe in a young earth is the Bible. Is there any disputing this?
Having said that, for whatever reason lots of people don't count authoritative sources (like the Bible) as "evidence" itself, even though the Bible acts for Creationists pretty much just as any other sort of evidence would for believers in any other sort of theory.
Perhaps a better question might be "What's the most compelling evidence for thinking the Bible is 100% correct and 100% literal?" If that were true, then Creationism would definitely be true, even if there were no other "evidence" in its favor. Similarly, if it is NOT true that the Bible is 100% correct, I'm pretty sure there's not really much other reason to believe in Creationism.
Posted by Paul Goldner (Member # 1910) on :
"Having said that, for whatever reason lots of people don't count authoritative sources (like the Bible) as "evidence" itself, even though the Bible acts for Creationists pretty much just as any other sort of evidence would for believers in any other sort of theory."
ERm, no. Not even close.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Tres, consider the TimeCube guy. Are you seriously asserting that his webpage should be considered evidence for the TimeCube theory, and should be taken just as seriously as the Bible?
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
"Perhaps a better question might be "What's the most compelling evidence for thinking the Bible is 100% correct and 100% literal?" If that were true, then Creationism would definitely be true, even if there were no other "evidence" in its favor. Similarly, if it is NOT true that the Bible is 100% correct, I'm pretty sure there's not really much other reason to believe in Creationism."
To get to the crux of the issue, my own studies of the Bible (I've read most of it, and studied it, and continue to study it) have shown at least some evidence that it's not 100% accurate.
As I've mentioned elsewhere, it contradicts itself, has flaws, and is evidently the creation of many people over a large amount of time, by people with different beliefs, then edited together more than once, and eventually chosen from other books by other people as decidedly canon.
For me to trust it as an authoritative source on, say, the manner in which the Earth was created is a bit difficult for me, understanding the little bit that I do about its origins.
It has a ton of great things about it, but.. accurate history before historical times is not one of them. (some books are quite accurate history books... others that purport to be, aren't.)
Posted by advice for robots (Member # 2544) on :
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: You make the completely unwarranted assumption that there is a why.
That's where science reaches the end of the line for me. Not just ignoring the possibility of a "why" but consciously avoiding it...I guess asking "why" is not really inside the scope of science, and that's OK. But to me it really underlines the fact that science only leads to certain kinds of knowledge and is limited in what it can potentially produce.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
I wouldn't say that Science avoids the possibility of a "why." Science simply notes that a) a "why" is unnecessary; and b) there is currently no evidence for a "why."
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Yes, yes, but you are making two assumptions for which you have no slightest shred of evidence: One, that the question of 'why' is meaningful at all, and two, that your religion answers it correctly. I feel quite strongly that if a why really existed, then it would be possible to investigate it scientifically. Just for one thing, there are any number of possible gods who are nowhere near as camera shy as the various Christian ones; if one of those were shown to exist, then science would quite nicely have answered the 'why' question, just by showing that a particular religion had got it right.
Posted by advice for robots (Member # 2544) on :
No, I don't think science has equipped itself to answer "why" at all, and hasn't set itself up to look for the question in the first place. The question is avoided because science is a strict method of discovery and does not have the mechanisms to answer the "why" questions. "Why" is irrelevant to what science seeks, and thus science notes it as unnecessary.
If a god appeared on the science radar, science would turn it into a "what" and study it that way.
I would call it arrogant to say that I need scientific evidence in order to be able to ask "why," but I'm fully aware that "religion" is just as arrogant. What I'm saying is that science is absolutely necessary and integral to our existence, but that it's not the only method of discovery and shouldn't presume that it is.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:The question is avoided because science is a strict method of discovery and does not have the mechanisms to answer the "why" questions.
I disagree. Which "why" question which provably has an answer do you think Science cannot answer?
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
It is important to realise that "Shit happens" is an admissible answer for 'why'.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
I imagine that there are some people who cannot accept the Weak Anthropic Principle. Even though they'd never ask "why" their next-door neighbor won the lottery, they need to know "why" there's life on Earth.
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
"Science" isn't a person taking up and discarding theories and ideas and concepts, it's a method of discovery. Science of itself doesn't do anything. That includes avoiding a 'why?' question as well as making comments as to its relevancy. If you can determine a thing through the processes of deductive reasoning and gathering evidence, it falls under the perfew of science, and if it can't be determined that way then it doesn't. Obviously other methods are available for finding truth; not everyone on this board (obviously) agree that such methods lead to accurate results, but that they exist is certainly evident from the fact that several other members of the board (AFRs and myself, as an example) use them.
quote:Yes, yes, but you are making two assumptions for which you have no slightest shred of evidence: One, that the question of 'why' is meaningful at all, and two, that your religion answers it correctly.
Well that's not entirely true, he has evidence, you just don't like the evidence. Not having any, and not having any that convinces you are two very different things. And once a person is convinced of the 'why?' answer, the importance of that answer becomes self-evident (either in the affirmative or the negative, depending on your answer).
Hobbes Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:If you can determine a thing through the processes of deductive reasoning and gathering evidence, it falls under the perfew of science, and if it can't be determined that way then it doesn't.
My point is that there's nothing which can be determined that isn't determined through deductive reasoning and the gathering of evidence. If you can know it, Science can tell it to you.
Posted by Ron Lambert (Member # 2872) on :
MattP and King of Men, you have provided a good discussion of the issue of helium diffusion and its implications for determining the age of the earth's crustal rock. I will be interested to see if Humphries, et. al., will do further research or provide further rejoinders to the debate.
I suspect you are missing something when you assess the amount of heat in the planet's crust that would be produced by an exponential increase in the rate of radioactive decay. I do not see where you have taken into consideration how much of the radioactive material there is compared to the mass of the rest of the earth's crust. Also it has not been established what the length of time was that the accelerated radioactive decay took place.
A somewhat related question concerns the planet Jupiter. It is said to be emitting four times as much heat energy as it receives from the sun. Does this heat energy come from radioactive decay of elements? Does it come from gravitational compression? It just seems to me that if Jupiter has been there for billions of years, it should have cooled off by now, no matter what its source of heat.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
Which whys are we asking?
Why is the sky blue? (science can answer that.) Why do we feel pain? Why do things fall? Why did that person do that? Why do we like those ordered sounds we call music so much? Etc.
Science can answer all of those, to varying degrees. Right? I guess if its' the sort of "what's the reason for my existence, as opposed to one of the millions of brothers and sisters that were possible?" or "what's the purpose of my life?" etc... weak anthropic principle for the former, and the latter? Is there an answer to that?
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
quote:My point is that there's nothing which can be determined that isn't determined through deductive reasoning and the gathering of evidence. If you can know it, Science can tell it to you.
Well I suppose you could use a definition where that's true in a way. To me, when you learn something merely because someone told you so, that's not science. Of course you could say that it is, previous conversations or an existing relationship gives you grounds to trust this person on such and such. I guess when I find out that my roommate had a good day, but now has a lot of homework because he comes into my room and tells me, I feel that I've come into the possession of information (true or false) that didn't come to me by way of science.
Hobbes Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:Originally posted by Ron Lambert: I suspect you are missing something when you assess the amount of heat in the planet's crust that would be produced by an exponential increase in the rate of radioactive decay. I do not see where you have taken into consideration how much of the radioactive material there is compared to the mass of the rest of the earth's crust.
I did so right here:
quote:At the moment, potassium decay accounts for roughly 10% of the incoming energy to the Earth's surface.
That tells me all I need to know, namely the amount of energy I get from potassium. Whether that amount of energy is produced by one-half the Earth's mass, or three itty-bitty little grains of dust off in a corner, is totally irrelevant.
quote: Also it has not been established what the length of time was that the accelerated radioactive decay took place.
I did that right here:
quote:Now, potassium-40 has a half-life of 1.25 billion years. Let us reduce that to a mere one thousand years, speeding up its decay by a factor of a million or thereabouts, as is required by a young earth.
In other words, the radioactive decay is now supposed to have taken place over roughly 6000 years.
quote:A somewhat related question concerns the planet Jupiter. It is said to be emitting four times as much heat energy as it receives from the sun. Does this heat energy come from radioactive decay of elements? Does it come from gravitational compression? It just seems to me that if Jupiter has been there for billions of years, it should have cooled off by now, no matter what its source of heat.
Does that apply to the Sun as well? If not, then why shouldn't Jupiter have an internal source of heat, bearing in mind that it's almost massive enough to start fusing hydrogen just like the Sun does? You are basically saying, here, that you don't know what heats Jupiter but you don't believe in it.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:I guess when I find out that my roommate had a good day, but now has a lot of homework because he comes into my room and tells me, I feel that I've come into the possession of information (true or false) that didn't come to me by way of science.
Fine; and if I tell you that the Moon is made of green cheese, that's also information you didn't get by science. The point is that only science can verify the truth or falsity. Information as such is not very interesting. Random strings of numbers are full of information, in the mathematical sense.
Posted by Ron Lambert (Member # 2872) on :
King of Men, somehow I find it hard to accept that 10% of the incoming energy to the earth's surface is from nuclear decay of potassium. Does that include the ocean?
As far as the sun goes, James P. Hogan has been advocating some very interesting theories, including the proposition that the sun is not heated by nuclear fusion, but by accummulating the broadcast electrical energy flowing through space. He says that is also what gives Jupiter most of its energy.
I have a couple of initial responses to the paper by Kevin R. Henke, Ph.D. in which he criticizes Dr. D. R. Humphreys' published results of research done with helium diffusion in granitic zircon.
Number one, I strongly object to his basic complaint that Humphreys has no right to invoke "miracles" or some form of divine intervention and call it science. I have total and utter contempt for that atheistic mindset. If God does exist, and if He has in fact acted in a way that involved divine power, then finding evidence of this intervention is scientific, because it is what is true. It is absolutely dishonest to start out by assuming you will not consider this possibility, and it is sheer tyranny for Henke to demand that Humphreys or anyone else accept the proposition that anything that points to the existence and divine intervention of God is unscientific. The purpose of science is to resolve questions, choose between alternatives, not arbitrarily disregard one reasonable possibility simply because it is contrary to the personal philosophy of someone like Henke.
Since so much of Henke's assault on Humphreys consists and is clearly based on this very thing, I am led to have little respect for Henke as a scientist or as a man.
That does not mean I will disregard the substance of his criticisms of technique and analytical procedure in Humphreys' research. I would like to see substantive response from Humphreys to Henke's criticism. Though I can appreciate how Humphreys would be disgusted by the attitude Henke displays in his opening paragraphs.
Secondly, I would challenge Henke to do the research correctly. If he believes Humphreys, et. al. did it wrong, then let Henke show us all how to do it right. Assemble a team of people he feels are qualified, and perform the research in a way guaranteed to provide valid, unquestionably accurate results. Then let Humphreys criticize his findings and techniques, if he needs to.
There may be resistance to this, because of the chance it might prove the Creationists are essentially correct. It is easier for the zealous defenders of evolution to continue to resort primarily to ridicule and disparagement, sarcasm, and insulting metaphors. As long as the multitudes of earth remain under their sway, why invest in the time and expense of doing real science? Better to just give everyone the impression it is an unworthy consideration, an outrageous waste of time, to take anything the Creationists say seriously, or even look like they are.
But having the full facts about helium diffusion should be of interest to scientists, simply because it is a reasonable area of factual inquiry, that would yield information that could have wide application, as is true of virtually anything we can discover about the physical properties of the world we live in. But that is probably too idealistic.
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
quote:The point is that only science can verify the truth or falsity.
Well that certainly wasn't my point. We were talking about the gathering of information itself, not testing it. I was pointing out that it was possible to obtain information in other ways; which it sounds like you agree with. If that information is true or not is another question, one on which I really don't see us ever agreeing on, but hopefully now that you agree that information (aka evidence) can be obtained through non-scientific pursuits, you'll agree that AFRs did have "a shred of evidence" upon which to base his conclusion. I'm sure you think it was bad evidence, but that's, like said, not at all my point.
Hobbes Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
When I use the word 'evidence', I usually take it for granted that my listeners will know that I am excluding things that are not known to be true. If you say "X is evidence of Y", then it is a bit of a minimum assumption that you know X to be true! Otherwise the TimeCube webpage would be evidence for the existence of four corners to the Earth!
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:King of Men, somehow I find it hard to accept that 10% of the incoming energy to the earth's surface is from nuclear decay of potassium. Does that include the ocean?
And I find it hard to believe that zircons have too much helium. If you're going to go around doubting actual quantitative measurements, then there's no point in having the discussion. You have to assume that the other guy is competent enough to be able to measure the amount of helium in a rock, or energy input from a given source, unless you have really specific evidence to the contrary. If you don't think the number is accurate, go measure it yourself.
Apart from that, yes, the Earth's surface does include the ocean, but it doesn't actually matter to the argument. Even if the potassium input were only 3% of the total across the world (ie, drop by 70% to account for the oceans), the order-of-magnitude would still hold, and iron would still boil. Not to mention all the other sources of radioactivity. Honestly, I should not have to do this sort of trivial math for you; one part of intellectual honesty is to take the other guy's side for a moment, and figure out what is his answer to the first couple of questions you come up with. Especially if it's something that can be done by just reducing a single number by 70 percent!
Finally, touching your miracles: If you believe in them, fine, but no amount of science is going to be finding them. A miracle by definition cannot be measured. If the world sprang into being miraculously, five minutes ago, with all the evidence of age (whether you think that's 13.7 billion or 6000) that it has now, you would never be able to tell by any scientific test.
Posted by Ron Lambert (Member # 2872) on :
King of Men, let me just remind you of the way I would define miracles. They do not contravene natural laws or physical properties, rather they involve esoteric use so advanced and subtle that to us they are described as "miracles." I have in mind the statement that any technology sufficiently advanced is indistinguishable from magic. So any act of God can be measured, traced, deduced, found out. Etc. That does not preclude God excercising His power and making it happen according to His will. But when He did it, and the means by which He did it, are discoverable.
Did God create the earth's biosphere by means that took only six days, or did He do it by means of using evolution over eons? It is proper for science to seek to answer this question. Those who would deny the very inquiry as unscientific, are just bigots and control-freaks.
Posted by Shigosei (Member # 3831) on :
Here's the problem with miracles: they can be invoked to justify absolutely anything. I could just as easily say that there's more helium in those rocks because of divine intervention. The authors have no grounds for stating that a miracle caused an effect that they can't even prove happened, let alone was caused by God. It's the arbitrary choice of the authors of the paper.
There are still problems even if you make a rule that invoking a miracle is allowed only if it happens to keep things in line with your interpretation of the Bible. So invoking a miracle to explain the helium wouldn't be allowed because that would favor an old Earth, which you do not accept.
First, your interpretation of the Bible might be wrong. Let's face it; the Bible never comes out anywhere and says the earth is 6,000 years old. How can you correct your mistake if you handwave your mistakes away? Isn't that what you say people who accept that the Earth is old are doing?
Second, you might miss an interesting phenomena by chalking something up to a miracle and then ignoring it. Let's say the authors of the paper are right about the lead dating being off, but instead of invoking a miracle, they delve further into the Earth's geology and discover some natural mechanism that causes rocks to form with much less of the daughter isotope than we'd thought (yeah, I know that this wouldn't actually solve the problem, but just go with it for the sake of the argument). By refusing to invoke a miracle, they were able to make a new discovery. That is why it's better to just say, "I don't know" instead of saying "God did it." It has nothing to do with an atheistic mindset, and everything to do with not jumping to an unsupported conclusion.
Posted by advice for robots (Member # 2544) on :
Science is very effective in breaking the observable down into concepts we (i.e. really smart scientists, not nec. the hoi polloi) can comprehend and deal with. It produces knowledge in a strictly dictated form, e.g. the very rigid structure of a scientific paper, which calls for casting knowledge in a very well-defined way. It only “expects” a certain type, level, and quality of knowledge; that’s all it’s set up to accept. Anything that doesn’t fit comfortably into that is not immediately useful. Thus science might actually be one of the most human-dependant, human-centered realms of all. It’s very field-specific—experts in a field concentrate on their field and tend to want to explain everything based on their focus. Hence to an astronomist, perhaps, keeping the humans-are-an-important-part-of-the-universe viewpoint subdued is necessary to proper observation, but to a psychologist the only thing that matters is how people construct the universe around them. Like a superhero comic, where all the problems, villains, and tasks are tailored to the superhero’s powers, science sets up for itself problems it can resolve with what it has available, and measures its success according to very set requirements. Which is fine, and produces great results. The trouble is that sometimes everything else outside that narrow scope becomes irrelevant, heretical, not worth finding answers for, impossible to know, etc.
Posted by Leonide (Member # 4157) on :
quote:Even though they'd never ask "why" their next-door neighbor won the lottery, they need to know "why" there's life on Earth.
*nitpick*
People *do* ask why their next-door neighbor won the lottery...and often attribute the winning to things like "because God wanted them to" or "because they rubbed their lucky rabbit's foot before buying" or "because they used their birthdate numbers, and that birthday was special"
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
afr, you are repeating yourself. Are you going to answer the points that Tom and I raised?
Ron, it appears you have a rather different understanding of 'miracle' from mine. Can I suggest, in the interest of clarity, that you instead use the phrase "Deliberate intervention by powerful, intelligent beings, which nonetheless leaves a human-discernible trace"?
Posted by advice for robots (Member # 2544) on :
I'm responding to the gist of your statements rather than to the specifics. You keep saying there's no reason to ask "why" and I'm trying to put that in context.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
And you are wrong. Anything that can be studied at all, can be studied by science. If you consider guesses and handwaving to be of value, you are welcome to them; just don't expect to be taken seriously.
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
quote:Tres, consider the TimeCube guy. Are you seriously asserting that his webpage should be considered evidence for the TimeCube theory, and should be taken just as seriously as the Bible?
To a person who had reason to believe the TimeCube guy was an authoritative source who only says true things, yes. Again, whether or not you want to call it "evidence" is semantic, but I think if you believed the TimeCube guy to be infallible, the TimeCube guy's website would compel you to believe the TimeCube theory.
quote:If you say "X is evidence of Y", then it is a bit of a minimum assumption that you know X to be true! Otherwise the TimeCube webpage would be evidence for the existence of four corners to the Earth!
It is possible to know that it is true that "A says B". And from that you can argue "That A says B is evidence of B".
For example, it could be a factually known that "The TimeCube website says the four corners of the Earth exist." And from that you could argue, "That the TimeCube website says the four corners of the Earth exist is evidence that the four corners of the Earth exist." (Of course, unless you ALSO believe that the TimeCube website says only things likely to be true, that would be an invalid argument.)
Posted by advice for robots (Member # 2544) on :
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: And you are wrong. Anything that can be studied at all, can be studied by science. If you consider guesses and handwaving to be of value, you are welcome to them; just don't expect to be taken seriously.
All right, then. Thank you for an authoritative answer.
Edit: Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
Ron, to the extent that miracles are just unusual, but detectable, manipulations of natural processes, then science can contemplate those manipulations and take them into account. The evidence for such manipulations seems slim and proposing such manipulations by default when one reaches a point of ignorance seems lazy. You get a lot further when you say "I don't know" and keep digging than if you say "God did it" and stop.
There are many reasons that the zircons could contain more helium than radioactive decay at old-earth rates would account for. That decay rates were radically accelerated is an interesting theory, but given the body of evidence that is currently available for the mechanisms and rates of decay, it's a rather extraordinary one, particularly when there are a number of other explanations for the results they obtained which they have not investigated thoroughly.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:It is possible to know that it is true that "A says B". And from that you can argue "That A says B is evidence of B".
But as you point out yourself, this just puts the problem at a further remove: How do you know that A tells truth?
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
quote:How do you know that A tells truth?
The same problem exists for other pieces of evidence, though. If we find a fossil, how do we know it points to the existence of an ancient creature, rather than just some guy who buried a bunch of fossils he had molded?
I think the answer is that every piece of evidence must be combined with other pieces of evidence and other basic assumptions in order to logically conclude whatever we are aiming to conclude. In order to conclude that A tells the truth, you'd have to find some other evidence to support that conclusion. In the case of the TimeCube guy, I suspect there's no evidence he knows what he is talking about. In the case of the Bible, there are at least some people who think there is evidence to support the conclusion that the Bible is infallible. Although they may offer other pieces of so-called evidence (such as scientific discoveries they claim proves there was a worldwide flood), I strongly suspect their entire case rests upon the belief in the Bible as a trusted source. Without that central assumption, my guess is that any compelling case in favor of Creationism would collapse.
This is not to say Creationism is irrational. But I think if you want to seriously try to justify it rationally, you'd have to first try to justify the claim that the Bible is an authoritative source that we should trust.
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: And you are wrong. Anything that can be studied at all, can be studied by science. If you consider guesses and handwaving to be of value, you are welcome to them; just don't expect to be taken seriously.
Now that's just silly. Literature is not studied by science, unless you're expanding the definition of science quite a bit.
Posted by advice for robots (Member # 2544) on :
Well, it can be studied by science, but I'd hate to sit through that lecture.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
The parts of literature which can be studied, rather than simply experienced, are studied through a broad definition of science.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Now that's just silly. Literature is not studied by science, unless you're expanding the definition of science quite a bit.
I was sort of under the impression that linguistics was under a definition of science not unduly expanded.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:Originally posted by dkw:
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: And you are wrong. Anything that can be studied at all, can be studied by science. If you consider guesses and handwaving to be of value, you are welcome to them; just don't expect to be taken seriously.
Now that's just silly. Literature is not studied by science, unless you're expanding the definition of science quite a bit.
And in consequence, what is known about literature amounts to guesses and handwaving.
Posted by advice for robots (Member # 2544) on :
quote:Originally posted by King of Men:
quote:Originally posted by dkw:
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: And you are wrong. Anything that can be studied at all, can be studied by science. If you consider guesses and handwaving to be of value, you are welcome to them; just don't expect to be taken seriously.
Now that's just silly. Literature is not studied by science, unless you're expanding the definition of science quite a bit.
And in consequence, what is known about literature amounts to guesses and handwaving.
Huh? Are you serious?
What is "guesses and handwaving," by the way? That's the second time you've used it to end polite discussion.
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:Now that's just silly. Literature is not studied by science, unless you're expanding the definition of science quite a bit.
I was sort of under the impression that linguistics was under a definition of science not unduly expanded.
literature ≠ linguistics
Linguists do not generally study literature, and when they do it's not in the same way that literature professors do.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:What is "guesses and handwaving," by the way? That's the second time you've used it to end polite discussion.
Just what it says. Information that's not known to be true. Informed speculation. Can you think of a single nontrivial fact about literature that's known to be true even at the level of certainty that, say, biologists find?
Posted by MightyCow (Member # 9253) on :
quote:Originally posted by advice for robots: What is "guesses and handwaving," by the way? That's the second time you've used it to end polite discussion.
Whisper "MAGIC!" in a spooky voice and waggle your fingers in the air.
I also like to add, "I'm a POWERFUL Genie! Wooo!" for extra effect. Who isn't going to believe what a powerful genie tells them?
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:literature ≠ linguistics
Linguists do not generally study literature, and when they do it's not in the same way that literature professors do.
Linguistics is a study of language.
At times when studying language, linguistics study the composition and appeals of literature, and study the themes which create the composition of literature, the appeal, the psychological and emotive themes, so forth.
Since literature is studied in a scientific field which isn't a stretched definition of a scientific field I find it makes a most apt counterpoint to someone saying that 'literature is not studied by science.' In fact, since linguistics is the study of language, a very important part of that field would involve the inclusion of the study of the written form of communication.
Posted by advice for robots (Member # 2544) on :
quote:Originally posted by King of Men:
quote:What is "guesses and handwaving," by the way? That's the second time you've used it to end polite discussion.
Just what it says. Information that's not known to be true. Informed speculation. Can you think of a single nontrivial fact about literature that's known to be true even at the level of certainty that, say, biologists find?
Um, that at some point somebody wrote it? That the ink they used had a specific molecular composition? Is that what you're looking for?
I'm still trying to wrap my mind around the idea that the only things worth knowing about literature can be scientifically proven.
edit: wrong word!
[ August 30, 2007, 04:40 PM: Message edited by: advice for robots ]
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: [QB]
quote:literature ≠ linguistics
Linguists do not generally study literature, and when they do it's not in the same way that literature professors do.
Linguistics is a study of language.
At times when studying language, linguistics study the composition and appeals of literature, and study the themes which create the composition of literature, the appeal, the psychological and emotive themes, so forth.
Do you mean that linguists "study the composition and appeals of literature"? Because they really don't, or at least not with their linguist hats on.
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: Linguistics is a study of language.
At times when studying language, linguistics study the composition and appeals of literature, and study the themes which create the composition of literature, the appeal, the psychological and emotive themes, so forth.
Since literature is studied in a scientific field which isn't a stretched definition of a scientific field I find it makes a most apt counterpoint to someone saying that 'literature is not studied by science.' In fact, since linguistics is the study of language, a very important part of that field would involve the inclusion of the study of the written form of communication.
Are you in the field of linguistics? Because this does not match my experience. I started off majoring in English, and there are lots of courses in such programs that study literature's appeal, themes, meaning, and so on. Then I switched majors to English language (in other words, the linguistics of English) and never had another literature-centric course. There weren't any literature courses in my major or in the regular linguistics major. And none of my professors, as linguists, studied literature in the ways that you're talking about.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:Originally posted by advice for robots:
quote:Originally posted by King of Men:
quote:What is "guesses and handwaving," by the way? That's the second time you've used it to end polite discussion.
Just what it says. Information that's not known to be true. Informed speculation. Can you think of a single nontrivial fact about literature that's known to be true even at the level of certainty that, say, biologists find?
Um, that at some point somebody wrote it? That the ink they used had a specific molecular composition? Is that what you're looking for?
I did say 'nontrivial'.
Posted by advice for robots (Member # 2544) on :
I'm arguing that it doesn't matter. I don't care if there are "facts" about literature that can be proven to the same degree of certainty biology attains. That's not the point of studying literature. It's not even faintly encouraged. I say this as someone who graduated in English. And yet, there's still plenty to "know" about literature, plenty to gain from it, that is as indispensable to our society as scientific contributions are.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
I'm not arguing that people shouldn't read literature. I am saying that what we 'know' about literature is opinion and educated speculation, not fact, and that the same is true of any field where science is not used. If you want to argue that speculation is as valuable as fact in understanding the universe, go ahead. (In fact, that's apparently what you are doing.) I just want you to be clear on what you're saying.
Posted by advice for robots (Member # 2544) on :
You're kind of giving me a narrow playing field. I get to choose either fact or speculation as a route to knowledge? Well, I would say that I do value facts, definitely, but I don't generate knowledge by the facts themselves but by the context I'm in and the language I share with all the various communities I belong to. The facts don't mean anything to me until I can put them in context. How I put the facts together with other facts, observations, opinions, etc., is an always shifting, kind of gray space affected by the entire community and influences outside the community, tensions between communities, etc. That might be where "speculation" comes into play, because very little about how we arrive at actual knowledge is certain or provable, or able to be pinned down.
In short, I don't "know" anything strictly by provable facts. I can't generate knowledge that way. I generate knowledge by bringing it all, facts and "speculation," into meaningful contexts.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:I get to choose either fact or speculation as a route to knowledge?
Yes. That's pretty much how knowledge works. And before you think I'm being excessively flip, consider for a moment that the fine hairs you're splitting here are considerably finer than the core differences between religious and scientific epistemologies. Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:I can't generate knowledge that way.
That's very unfortunate for you, to be sure.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:In short, I don't "know" anything strictly by provable facts.
Yes you do.
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
quote:
quote:In short, I don't "know" anything strictly by provable facts.
Yes you do.
What? Please give an example of something you know strictly by provable facts.
Posted by Threads (Member # 10863) on :
quote:Originally posted by Tresopax:
quote:
quote:In short, I don't "know" anything strictly by provable facts.
Yes you do.
What? Please give an example of something you know strictly by provable facts.
What do you define as a "fact"? Is it something that is true beyond any reasonable doubt or is it something that can only be proven 100% true (like a mathematical proof)? It is a fact that the sun will rise tomorrow (at least in the places where it rises daily) by the first definition however not by the second.
EDIT: The reason I ask is because I suspect that you are using the second definition while Samprimary is using the first.
[ August 31, 2007, 03:46 PM: Message edited by: Threads ]
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by Tresopax:
quote:
quote:In short, I don't "know" anything strictly by provable facts.
Yes you do.
What? Please give an example of something you know strictly by provable facts.
I know that if I touch a burning hot plate, I will get burned. I can know this strictly by a provable fact.
There are going to be plenty of things in your life that you have learned through a similar manner, strictly through a process which is known strictly by provable facts. Assuredly.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by King of Men:
quote:Originally posted by Lisa: I think that's sort of putting the horse before the cart. Since the young earth theory came first, the question ought to be what evidence there is for the old earth theory.
From what I can tell, the old earth theory is almost entirely based on the unproven premise that evolution happens gradually over very long periods of time and that changes to the earth also happen very slowly over lengthy periods.
Then you need to do more research. Old earth theories were first proposed in the early 1800s, 50 years before Darwin, by geologists who had set out to find evidence for the Flood. Being honest scientists, they reported that they could not find any such evidence, but concluded that the Earth must be at least a few hundred thousand years old.
I further suggest that you consider the concept of varves. These are annual deposits of layers on lake bottoms. Now, there's no theory saying "This happens once a year", we can actually see it happen! It's like tree rings but the record lasts longer; and that record agrees with carbon dating out to twenty thousand years, which is as far back as we can find varves. Is this evidence, or not?
Not. It's based on unproven assumptions. It's like tree rings. It was assumed at one point that a tree ring was a year. Now we know that isn't always true. I don't know if that's the case with varves or not, but I don't find the assumption that "as it is now, so was it always" to be very impressive. There ought to be a name for that kind of fallacy.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
So in other words, you are suggesting that varves and carbon dating both change, in the past, at exactly the same rate? Because that's what you need in order for the two dating methods to agree, you know. This is special pleading, a form of fallacy which does have a name.
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
Rumpelstiltskin?
Hobbes Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Not. It's based on unproven assumptions.
If you're busy being so eager to throw out 'unproven assumptions' based on any potential errancies you can dredge up, then that sort of screws the whole attempt to rely on religious young-earth stories, unless there's blatant double-standards at work.
Posted by Morbo (Member # 5309) on :
Is there a name for the fallacy of hand-picking assumptions so everything matches preconceived notions?
Why is "things were different in the good ol' days" any more compelling than "as it is now, so was it always"?
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:... a tendency to search for or interpret new information in a way that confirms one's preconceptions, and avoid information and interpretations which contradict prior beliefs. It is a type of cognitive bias and represents an error of inductive inference, or as a form of selection bias toward confirmation of the hypothesis under study or disconfirmation of an alternative hypothesis.
Confirmation bias is an area of interest in the teaching of critical thinking as the skill is misused if rigorous critical scrutiny is applied only to evidence challenging a preconceived idea but not to evidence supporting the same preconception.
Posted by Morbo (Member # 5309) on :
Thanks Sam.
From your link:
quote: Morton's demon
Morton's Demon was devised by Glenn R. Morton in 2002[13] as part of a thought experiment to explain his own experience of confirmation bias. By analogy with Maxwell's demon, Morton's demon stands at the gateway of a person's senses and lets in facts that agree with that person's beliefs while deflecting those that do not.
Morton was at one time a Young Earth creationist (YEC) who later disavowed this belief. The demon was his way of referring to his own bias and that which he continued to observe in other YECs. With time it has become a common shorthand for confirmation bias in a variety of situations.
In fairness to YECs, everyone including me has their own irrational/unconscious biases. It's so much easier to spot them in others than it is to find them in yourself!
edit: and so, what are we left with? You have to choose some initial axioms or assumptions, or nothing will ever be accomplished. I guess you just have to rigorously minimize assumptions and test them when possible. Not that the vast majority of people (including me) decide things that way.
[ September 02, 2007, 04:31 AM: Message edited by: Morbo ]
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
To Lisa:
So, tree rings, you say, don't always show precisely a year?
What do they show, preciesly, and what factors change the amount of time that they measure?
Knowing this information allows for more accurate measurements, which is, of course, of vital interest.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
Further, how does the dating based on tree rings, with the new information and exceptions to the rules and so forth, match up with other forms of dating, such as carbon dating, geologic age, volcanic build up, astrological evidence, etc?
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: So in other words, you are suggesting that varves and carbon dating both change, in the past, at exactly the same rate? Because that's what you need in order for the two dating methods to agree, you know. This is special pleading, a form of fallacy which does have a name.
They only seem to agree because carbon dates that don't agree are thrown out.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:They only seem to agree because carbon dates that don't agree are thrown out.
source
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by 0Megabyte: To Lisa:
So, tree rings, you say, don't always show precisely a year?
What do they show, preciesly, and what factors change the amount of time that they measure?
Knowing this information allows for more accurate measurements, which is, of course, of vital interest.
But you can't always know what you want to know. "It's better to be roughly right than precisely wrong."
Here's one article. There are others. Google is your friend.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:They only seem to agree because carbon dates that don't agree are thrown out.
source
GIYF.
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
Wow, that article is funny. They argue that radiocarbon dating gives dates too young, in increasing amounts of error, the further you go back in time, then argue that this is evidence of a young earth.
I wonder how current dates, which already date from further back than the 6000 years they assert, being actually even older dates, supports the notion the earth is 6000 years old.
That's quite a feat of 'logic'.
The relevant quotation:
quote:The curve switches direction around 500 B.C., when radiocarbon ages begin to underestimate supposed dendrochronological ages. The discrepancy grows as we go back in time, so that by the fifth millennium B.C., radiocarbon dates are too recent by 800 years.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lisa:
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:They only seem to agree because carbon dates that don't agree are thrown out.
source
GIYF.
The burden of your statements is yours alone. I don't have to do your homework for you to find out whether or not your statement is tenable.
Of course if you're just essentially saying that you're not going to back up your statements that's cool for me too.
Posted by Paul Goldner (Member # 1910) on :
"They only seem to agree because carbon dates that don't agree are thrown out."
This is simply an ignorant statement.
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
quote:EDIT: The reason I ask is because I suspect that you are using the second definition while Samprimary is using the first.
Samprimary referred to "provable facts". Regardless of what definition of facts we are talking about, it is only provable if you can actually prove it. For instance, "the sun will rise tomorrow" may be a fact, but it isn't provable.
quote:I know that if I touch a burning hot plate, I will get burned. I can know this strictly by a provable fact.
What provable fact tells you this, without relying on any other unprovable assumptions?
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
It happened before, and you can prove something by demonstrating why and how it will happen.
The American Heritage Dictionary is with me on that point, at least. Anyone is free to drift into a philosophical netherworld where the burdens of how one defines 'provable' make it so that you can't even prove that anybody else exists or that you exist or that existence exists, but that reduces words like 'fact' and 'provable' into useless concepts in a fog of untestability, and if I'm not allowed to rely on unprovable assumptions that sorta entirely throws God out anyway and leaves the subject dead.
Since we're currently engaged in a scientific discussion, where we're using empirical claims (I can only hope, since it asks for the most compelling 'evidence' for a young earth) it behooooooves us to think of a subject as being true when proven, and that a fact is an observation that has been repeatedly confirmed and for all practical purposes is accepted as 'true.' (this, compliments of the criteria of the National Academy of Sciences).
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
"But you can't always know what you want to know. "It's better to be roughly right than precisely wrong.""
I agree. Which is why being off a few thousand or a few million years with not precisely perfect methods is far superior than being so precisely wrong as to give an exact date six thousand or so years ago for creation.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
But anyway, you're telling me that my desire to know the specific rates of change, for the sake of accuracy, is something I should not bother with, since I "can't always know what I want to know."
That's bunk! That's the kind of mindset which held science at a standstill for a thousand years, and one which, if we still held onto it today, would mean not only that we wouldn't be speaking now, but that I, and many others I know, wouldn't be alive today, thanks to the lack of medicine.
It takes work to learn, but that's something we must do! To do otherwise is a crime.
Anyway, as to the link you gave me, this I find interesting, in the assumptions section:
"Looming over all these assumptions is the idea that cross-checking with other archaeological information will confirm whether the radiocarbon date is “reasonable.” This introduces the specter of subjectivity."
This I pick out not because I cannot speak on the rest, but because it strikes my mind so heavily.
These people actually insinuate that cross-checking with other methods is not wise? That's just silly! Does cross-checking your data with other independant sources bring in a "specter of subjectivity" in other cases, such as, say, a second opinion of a doctor, or checking your readings in any other subject?
As for the tree rings section, this article addresses a single kind. I don't know if that's the only kind used, first of all. I don't know how accurate its information is, but I'll accept that, say, the particular kinds of trees mentioned have flaws, and aren't perfect. That these ones are used. That certainly doesn't mean they're useless.
This article, trying to plant doubts about them, speaks in broad terms about the limits, and mentions the factors which limit their usefulness somewhat, but doesn't go into much detail about how scientists deal with said problems. Not a very good means of discrediting it, if they don't even bother to mention what scientists do to deal with it, if at all.
That's a few things I notice. I'm not well read enough to know if the article's descriptions of carbon dating are perfect, flawed, or whatever. I don't know whether the measurements they mentioned are accurate or not, and I have not read the sources they give, so I can't really speak upon it. I can't gauge the accuracy of their claims.
Certain things I can tell, of course. The statement that 5000 years ago, the data can be up to 800 years off the mark is interesting. But how about when you go farther back? It doesn't mention how much, by their calculations, the data is off at, say, ten thousand or fifteen thousand years. Would their calculations state that, say, fifteen thousand years ago, the amount of error was nine thousand years?
I'd like to know, but I can't tell from what they show me. They don't show me how they gained this data, or what it comes from, and how it deals with dates beyond the age of the Earth. How am I to know how accurate it is in that case, if they don't show enough data, or even tell me how they came up with it?
That's for the equilibrium dating, or whatever.
As for nonequilibrium dating, they state that "Several creationists believe that the radiocarbon method may still be of some use, but only if we recognize that the Bible and nature record an instantaneous Creation and a cataclysmic Flood."
But the question is one of basics: Show the flood! Show evidence of the flood, show reasonable evidence that the flood did anything, and certainly, certainly, explain Noah's Ark, what with all the millions of animals that would have to be in said ark, whose dimensions are clearly stated in the Bible, and is simply, you know, not BIG ENOUGH.
Show evidence of the flood. Show why such conditions would create nonequilibrium conditions of radiocarbon dating.
Show how the flood would disrupt all carbon dating. Not just "it did" but HOW did it?
Besides not showing much of the science, math, or evidence involved in any of the subjects, this article just isn't explaining what makes them think the flood happened in the first place.
(Oh, yes. The Bible. God said so. Based on what evidence? What evidence is there that the Bible is precisely accurate? If you can't give that, then why believe what it says on this subject?)
This points out certain assumptions the nonequilibrium dating method would use. Basically, assuming that the rates of everything were changed by the flood? You need to prove a global flood happened first, or else this assumption falls flat!
I think the assumptions of, you know, scientists, that radioactive decay happens at the same or nearly the same rate, that the laws of physics were the same as they are now, etc, are a bit more tenable. But then again, I rather like speaking to you on the internet, whose existence is based on such simple assumptions.
Okay, later, we get into problems even with this dating system and the Bible. Really, now, when different books of the Bible contradict each other on basic points of history, why do you expect it to be a perfectly accurate historical record, again? (I've shown one strong example elsewhere. I can show others ,too, but if you ask I can cut and paste my first example, since my time is limited)
I have not been perfectly thourough, because I have no time to be, but this article again and again makes unreasonable assumptions without evidence. I think it's reasonable to assume that, say, the rate of decay in isotopes doesn't change much over time. I don't think it's reasonable to simply assume that the (unproven!) global flood caused them to change.
But those latter sorts of unreasonable assumptions plague this article! Why should I believe it, when they haven't given a case for its truth, other than, essentially, it's in the Bible? (whose accuracy hasn't been proven to me, at least in matters like this.)
To be fair, I could be biased. But I think the question of evidence for the assumptions of this article is not problematic.
The second to last paragraph of this thing says this:
"Both radiocarbon dating and dendrochronology face technical problems, and are loaded with uniformitarian and old Earth ideas. They assume that nature works today the same as it has worked for millions of years, yet the facts do not support this contention. Neither method should give us cause to abandon the facts of biblical history. "
I ask this, simply: Show me why the facts do not support the contention. What evidence is there that they do not?
It did not show in the article, and I scoured it as well as I could in this short time.
Could you enlighten me, Lisa? Or was my inability to find the evidence because it wasn't there? The assumption that nature works the same today as in the past... what evidence challenges this?
Of course, this article doesn't hide its own bias. It's steadfast in the belief that biblical history is "fact". I ask where their evidence for this assumption is. Of course if you assume it's true, this stuff might make some sense.
But you need some evidence for that assumption. What is it?
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
Ahh. No answer.
Well, I won't be surprised if you just think I'm simply dismissing it out of hand, without thinking about it.
But in the end, just as the harmony of the spheres and a flat earth hypothesis have been disproven, so has a 6,000 year old earth. At least, with enough clarity to convince me.
Unless, of course, God is a liar, having made the very light of the stars en route, so that it hints that the stars exist, when they did not.
With a fraudulent God, an omnipotent being who acts to decieve us, we couldn't know anything for sure, of course.
But then, why worship a liar?
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
So you think that's "lying". That's lame.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by 0Megabyte: Could you enlighten me, Lisa?
I don't care enough. I didn't even read through that whole link. GIYF. You're the one who cares about this subject.
Posted by Paul Goldner (Member # 1910) on :
"So you think that's "lying". That's lame."
Intentionally decieving people as to what reality is would generally be considered lying, yes
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:So you think that's "lying".
Why don't you?
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
quote:Originally posted by Morbo: Is there a name for the fallacy of hand-picking assumptions so everything matches preconceived notions?
Yes. "The Bush Administration's Case for Invading Iraq".
Posted by Ron Lambert (Member # 2872) on :
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: Ron, it appears you have a rather different understanding of 'miracle' from mine. Can I suggest, in the interest of clarity, that you instead use the phrase "Deliberate intervention by powerful, intelligent beings, which nonetheless leaves a human-discernible trace"?
I can live with that definition. It is essentially what I said, although I am not positing intervention in our history by some alien supercivilization, but intervention by God the Creator.
quote:Originally posted by MattP: Ron, to the extent that miracles are just unusual, but detectable, manipulations of natural processes, then science can contemplate those manipulations and take them into account. The evidence for such manipulations seems slim and proposing such manipulations by default when one reaches a point of ignorance seems lazy. You get a lot further when you say "I don't know" and keep digging than if you say "God did it" and stop.
MattP, you don't quite get the point I am trying to make. When we look at evidence for some unusual event or phenomenon and say "God did it," we do not stop. That is our starting point. "The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge: but fools despise wisdom and instruction." (Proverbs 1:7) Only evolutionists and agnostics and atheists stop at this point and reject utterly the reasonable alternative that there is a God and He does at times take an active roll interacting with us and our world. The Bible records these interactions of Divine Providence with man and human history and the physical world.
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson:
quote:So you think that's "lying".
Why don't you?
While I view the cosmogeny laid out in The Bible as myth, I don't think that a deity who created a universe with the appearance of immense age would be a liar (well, would necessarily be a liar, anyway), any more than I would consider a sculptor who employed a veristic style to be a liar, or the animators who eventually bridge the "uncanny valley" to be liars.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lisa:
quote:Originally posted by 0Megabyte: Could you enlighten me, Lisa?
I don't care enough. I didn't even read through that whole link. GIYF. You're the one who cares about this subject.
So, basically, you're going to call all conflicting evidence untrue, you're going to move the goalposts at a record pace involving the acceptability of evidence, and then you're going to refuse to answer any good questions about your own assertions. You're even admitting you don't care enough to fill yourself in on the details of the position you are contesting; you just start out with the assumption that it is untrue and let nothing challenge that.
You 'care enough' only to make blanket claims, but then suddenly your interest wanes the second it comes down to backing yourself up.
Evidence contradicting your view is met with demands for impossible perfection. Classic maneuver: if your opponent successfully addresses some point (geological record, varves, etc), then say they must also address some further point. If you can make these points more and more difficult or diverse then eventually your opponent must 'fail.' If nothing else, you will eventually find a subject that your opponent isn't up on.
This is related to argument by question. Asking questions is easy: it's answering them that's hard. People give you answers. You give pithy statements and leave it at that.
Unfortunately, it leaves you with an empty hand when debating in the framework of logic and evidence and all of that, because sharp-eyed folk like mr. megabyte will try to put it to the test and end up making your young-earth position seem completely unrelated to scientific methodology, despite the way you frame your position as being a model based on reason. It's not. It's unscientific and fallacious.
I know, I know, "Young-earth creationist standpoint found to be intellectually bankrupt, news at 11," big surprise, but y'know.
Posted by Ron Lambert (Member # 2872) on :
Noemon, I agree with your thinking that there is no justification for calling God a liar merely because He might create people and trees and planets and stars and galaxies and a whole universe with apparent age. He created all these things the way He wanted them to be. He wanted a mature man who could be His friend, so Adam did not have to begin as an infant. He created all the trees of Eden hundreds of feet tall, so Adam could be impressed by them and stirred to admire their sense of grandeur, and the God who made them. God created a universe with stable star and planetary systems so we would not have to wait for these things to form over long periods. He made the universe so that you could see the light from the stars and galaxies at one end of the universe to the other, because He wanted a universe filled with light, and not darkness. How He did all these things is a worthy question for our scientific inquiry.
One interesting question would be: Did the hundreds-of-feet tall trees in Eden have annual growth rings? I am not sure how to answer that. But perhaps it is a chicken-or-the-egg kind of thing. Oh yes, and did Adam have a navel? Probably not. Nor Eve. Her children were the first to have navels, I would expect. In the Resurrection, a fair number of us are undoubtedly going to seek out Adam and ask him if he has a navel. It will be one of many moments of levity as we begin the happiness of the future life.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
I agree with Noemon.
Posted by ElJay (Member # 6358) on :
Unless God has a navel, of course. Since Adam was formed in God's image, if God has a navel, Adam would too, even though it wasn't necessary.
Posted by Foust (Member # 3043) on :
There's a huge difference between appearance of age and appearance of experience.
I.e., did Adam have a scar on his knee from the time when he was four years old and fell on a rock? 'Cause figuratively speaking, the universe has plenty of scars from when it was much younger.
Appearance of age is one thing. But if God created this universe with appearance of experience, that is deceitful.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:When we look at evidence for some unusual event or phenomenon and say "God did it," we do not stop. That is our starting point.
That doesn't jibe with the most well known examples of "God did it." Behe, for example, keeps pointing at biological structures and saying "irreducibly complex", which translates more or less to "God did it", yet refuses to do any actual science to substantiate that claim or refute it. He does stop there.
The only reason we have plausible alternative theories for the development of these structures is that rather harder working scientists continued to research them. Behe said "God" and stopped there. The evolutionists, even if they had said "not God", kept working.
It's particularly damning to Behe's "God did it" case that many of those evolutionists do believe in God but they don't automatically invoke Him as a direct cause for any phenomena they do not yet understand.
Posted by Enigmatic (Member # 7785) on :
There seems to be an excessive amount of navel-gazing in this thread.
--Enigmatic
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote:Originally posted by ElJay: Since Adam was formed in God's image, if God has a navel, Adam would too, even though it wasn't necessary.
Only if "in His image" is literal. And for those of us who don't believe God has or ever had a physical body, that is obviously not the case.
quote:Originally posted by Foust: But if God created this universe with appearance of experience, that is deceitful.
Sez you.
Oh, and Enig, these are for you.
Posted by ElJay (Member # 6358) on :
Pssst. I was joking. Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
I know. But I've heard the exact statement made before by others -- who weren't joking.
Posted by Foust (Member # 3043) on :
Meh. If God created a house and told you the creation took place a few seconds ago, you'd expect certain things. If you walked inside and the walls were scorched like they had just been on fire, and in fact you could still smell smoke, you'd assume there had been a fire. But if God insisted that he had created the house right that second...
There's no way you could avoid some cognitive dissonance. Why would God create a new house with scorched walls and smelled of smoke from a fire that never took place? 'Cause that's the situation young earthers are stuck with.
You smell the smoke, you see the scorched walls, and are forced to say no fire ever took place.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
"Why" is a perfectly reasonable question. Assuming that the reason is to trick us is not.
And I say that as someone who considers the young earth theory to be quite unlikely.
Posted by Paul Goldner (Member # 1910) on :
""Why" is a perfectly reasonable question. Assuming that the reason is to trick us is not."
There might be ANOTHER reason, but if the young earth theory is true, in my mind, that would require that the creator be deceitful. There is no rational way to interpret the evidence available to us in the physical world to mean that the earth is fewer then billions of years old, so if it is, then our rationality is being deceived. Considering that a god that could create a young earth so that it appears to be ancient could create the earth to appear exactly the age that it is, that deceit must be intentional.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
Unfortunately, God doesn't seem to want to address the whys in this case. At least, he certainly isn't telling ME why the Earth has evidence of experience, as is mentioned.
And to Lisa:
What is wrong with you?
You make claims, then you ignore the arguements against them! You refuse to discuss them, you essentially state "it's so" and dismiss us.
The difference between you, and between scientists, is that scientists care about understanding, about evidence, and do not commit the evil of willful ignorance.
Yes. It's an evil. One of the greatest evils in the world. (believing without evidence isn't evil. We all do it, in many cases, myself including. I don't do so for God anymore, but we all do such things. It's just what we have to do.)
Willful ignorance, that closedness of mind, is EVIL.
Why don't you see it? It makes me incredibly sad, to see a decent person act in such an evil, and potentially harmful manner.
I'm sure I've said some rude things here, to you. Nothing I wouldn't say to a flat earther, but even so, it's rude.
However, your sheer intellectual dishonesty worries me.
What other parts of your life do you use this?
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
I say that God created the earth several billion years ago, but revealed His scripture in such a way that it appears to indicate a much younger earth. Why the scriptures would have an appearance of youth, I can't say. Posted by Paul Goldner (Member # 1910) on :
Brilliant, Matt Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:Only evolutionists and agnostics and atheists stop at this point...
More correctly, Ron, atheists and agnostics (and, I suppose, evolutionists) never get to this point, because nowhere will any of the evidence available to mankind suggest "God did it." So it's incredibly important that "God did it" is your starting presumption; without that baseless assumption, none of your other "science" makes any sense.
Posted by MightyCow (Member # 9253) on :
Clearly Satan wrote Genesis. Probably Ephesians too.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:Originally posted by MattP: I say that God created the earth several billion years ago, but revealed His scripture in such a way that it appears to indicate a much younger earth. Why the scriptures would have an appearance of youth, I can't say.
Quoted for sheer awesome!
Posted by Tarrsk (Member # 332) on :
quote:Originally posted by MattP: I say that God created the earth several billion years ago, but revealed His scripture in such a way that it appears to indicate a much younger earth. Why the scriptures would have an appearance of youth, I can't say.
Posted by MightyCow (Member # 9253) on :
You've convinced me. I'm a young Bible creationist.
As far as I'm concerned, the Bible has only existed for 50 years. Any references to the Bible before that time are simply misunderstandings. God created the Bible as it exists today (New Revised Standard Edition) 50 years ago and it only seems to our imperfect understanding that it's actually older than that.
Posted by twinky (Member # 693) on :
I think the weak anthropic principle can be applied to the question of whether a god creating the universe as it appears would necessarily be a deceiver.
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
How so, twinky?
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
50 years ago?
How about five minutes ago.
After all, in a universe with all hints of history, what makes that any less likely?
Posted by MightyCow (Member # 9253) on :
0Megabyte - It's 50 years. The tree in my back yard clearly tells me that it's 50 years. Disagree with God if you like, but enjoy hell.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
No, no, I can feel it myself. I can feel God's presence, and He tells me it was five minutes before the time I posted before. 3:26 PM, my time.
It's you who will enjoy hell, for I'm the one that God spoke to. The Devil spoke to you.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
You are all going to hell and the universe was created last thursday.
Posted by Javert (Member # 3076) on :
I have it from a very reliable source that the Universe will not be created until next Thursday.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
*twiddles thumbs*
Posted by Javert (Member # 3076) on :
Did I mention that Rivka is the one who will be doing the creating? She's obviously resting in preparation.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
In that case, would you mind writing a note to my boss, explaining why I won't be in for work tomorrow?
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
We can't. We don't yet exist.
Posted by ElJay (Member # 6358) on :
I knew none of you existed! HA!
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
Ah! ElJay will write me a note!
Posted by twinky (Member # 693) on :
quote:Originally posted by Noemon: How so, twinky?
If creating the universe in this manner was necessary such that human life could exist, then I'm not sure to what extent it counts as "deception" even if the universe is younger than it looks.
It's basically "if god hadn't created the universe this way, we wouldn't be here to observe it" instead of "if the universe wasn't this way, we wouldn't be here to observe it." Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
quote:It happened before, and you can prove something by demonstrating why and how it will happen.
It is impossible to demonstrate why and how anything will happen though. You can demonstrate why and how something DOES happen, because demonstrations occur in the present. But how would you ever know that it won't happen differently in the future, without relying on some unproven assumption that the future will operate just as the present does? How could you ever demonstrate anything about the future?
We can call stuff proven all day if we want to, but it seems to me that doing so becomes pointless if it is possible the thing we are calling proven might turn out to be false. For instance, it was fairly easy for the Bush administration to say Iraq had WMDs in the past, and come up with an explanation that they said demonstrates how and why Iraq will develop such weapons now and into the future. They tried to claim that constituted "proof". But as it turned out, there were no such WMDs. What good is calling something proven if the "proven" thing could still turn out to be completely wrong?
It does behove us to think of a conclusion as being true once we have proven it - but only if being "proven" actually entails being true!
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
quote:So it's incredibly important that "God did it" is your starting presumption; without that baseless assumption, none of your other "science" makes any sense.
Why is this assumption baseless? It is certainly supported by the narrative of the Bible, if nothing else.
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
quote:Originally posted by twinky:
quote:Originally posted by Noemon: How so, twinky?
If creating the universe in this manner was necessary such that human life could exist, then I'm not sure to what extent it counts as "deception" even if the universe is younger than it looks.
It's basically "if god hadn't created the universe this way, we wouldn't be here to observe it" instead of "if the universe wasn't this way, we wouldn't be here to observe it."
Ah, okay; that's an interesting thought. I misunderstood and was under the impression that you were saying precisely the opposite, which didn't really make any sense.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
One of the main things I hate about Hatrack of late is the tone of superiority. (Nor am I excluding myself -- I'm part of the problem too.) Yesterday alone you could feel superior about your scientific knowledge, your choice in music, your ability to speak English, your disdain for religion, or a few other things.
One of the main things I love about Hatrack is the consistent ability of many posters to truly work at understanding the other side.
twinky, that was very well put. Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Originally posted by MattP: I say that God created the earth several billion years ago, but revealed His scripture in such a way that it appears to indicate a much younger earth. Why the scriptures would have an appearance of youth, I can't say.
That truly was pretty awesome I gotta say. Though you said it in jest, I seriously like that phrasing. I think it's closer to the truth then some may believe. Though I would say it came out that way rather then God intentionally worded it that way.
----- As for Adam, belly buttons, and what not. Where does it ever say Adam just appeared as a man? For all we know he was created as an infant and raised in the garden by God. Actually I think Orson Scott Card said the last book he will ever write is a Pastwatch entry about the Garden of Eden.
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
quote:Originally posted by rivka: One of the main things I hate about Hatrack of late is the tone of superiority. (Nor am I excluding myself -- I'm part of the problem too.) Yesterday alone you could feel superior about your scientific knowledge, your choice in music, your ability to speak English, your disdain for religion, or a few other things.
:: laugh :: That's so well put! An air of haughty intellectual superiority is the armor of the intelligent-but-not-terribly-physically-impressive. I wore a really nice set of the stuff myself when I was younger, but these days I've mostly learned not to don it, I think.
Posted by El JT de Spang (Member # 7742) on :
Have you considered that it's because you've become more physically impressive? Posted by twinky (Member # 693) on :
quote:Originally posted by Noemon: An air of haughty intellectual superiority is the armor of the intelligent-but-not-terribly-physically-impressive.
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
quote:Originally posted by El JT de Spang: Have you considered that it's because you've become more physically impressive?
Well of course that's why! What did you think?
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
quote:Originally posted by twinky:
quote:Originally posted by Noemon: An air of haughty intellectual superiority is the armor of the intelligent-but-not-terribly-physically-impressive.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Originally posted by Noemon:
quote:Originally posted by twinky:
quote:Originally posted by Noemon: An air of haughty intellectual superiority is the armor of the intelligent-but-not-terribly-physically-impressive.
Noemon doing ----> alot does little to increase your actual physique, but it certainly would decrease intellectual superiority. Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade:
quote:Originally posted by MattP: I say that God created the earth several billion years ago, but revealed His scripture in such a way that it appears to indicate a much younger earth. Why the scriptures would have an appearance of youth, I can't say.
That truly was pretty awesome I gotta say. Though you said it in jest, I seriously like that phrasing. I think it's closer to the truth then some may believe. Though I would say it came out that way rather then God intentionally worded it that way.
It wasn't entirely in jest. I just had a minor epiphany that the same reasoning used in the "appearance of age" argument could be used to argue the opposite position.
Just as the young earthers look at the Bible and see a clear statement that the earth is only thousands of years old, I look at the earth and the universe and see a clear statement that they are billions of years old.
The young earthers that acknowledge the apparent age of the universe are conceding that this second statement is present, though they apparently give preference to what they see as a more explicit statement of age in scripture. However, if the entirety of creation, its appearance of age, and its appearance of experience are all also God's work, then God is presenting us with two apparently contradictory statements of age.
Given the admission that the universe has an appearance of age, and that we do not necessarily know God's reason for creating this appearance, I don't see how an assumption can be made that it's the observed universe's age that we are misinterpreting rather than the scripturally described universe's age.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by Foust: Meh. If God created a house and told you the creation took place a few seconds ago, you'd expect certain things. If you walked inside and the walls were scorched like they had just been on fire, and in fact you could still smell smoke, you'd assume there had been a fire. But if God insisted that he had created the house right that second...
There's no way you could avoid some cognitive dissonance. Why would God create a new house with scorched walls and smelled of smoke from a fire that never took place? 'Cause that's the situation young earthers are stuck with.
You smell the smoke, you see the scorched walls, and are forced to say no fire ever took place.
Right. But it would be informative. It would allow you, using your mind, to see what caused the fire (even though it didn't happen).
That may sound dumb to you, but even if the world is no older than 6000 years, we can properly treat it as though it is billions of years old. If God did His job right, then it's legitimate to extrapolate back beyond actual creation even if that prior time never really happened.
In other words, there isn't really the conflict that some of you think there is. Yes, the world is young. And yes, for purposes of scientific inquiry, you can treat it as though it were old.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:In other words, there isn't really the conflict that some of you think there is. Yes, the world is young. And yes, for purposes of scientific inquiry, you can treat it as though it were old.
And I'm perfectly happy with that position. It's consistent with the evidence AND with your doctrine. Win-win, I say. Of course it's philosophical position, not a scientific one, so the creation science folks are not about to accept it.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by 0Megabyte: And to Lisa:
What is wrong with you?
You make claims, then you ignore the arguements against them! You refuse to discuss them, you essentially state "it's so" and dismiss us.
Honestly, it's because you come across as shrill and uptight about the whole thing. And by "you", I don't mean you in particular, but you and KoM and others.
I think understand why you think this is an important discussion. Your recent conversion (if that's an okay term) to atheism is a big change, and you want to make sure that it's justified. If I'm wrong, tell me; that's just my perception.
From my point of view, when someone says something I think is untrue, I feel a responsibility to say, "I disagree". What I don't feel (necessarily, in all situations) is a responsibility to convince the person I'm disagreeing with that I'm right and he's wrong.
So why even bother saying that I disagree? I'm not 100% sure. Just to have it on the record, I guess. And so that something I think is untrue doesn't slide by unchallenged.
I think biology is a useful science. Genetics is useful and good as well. In order to make those sciences work, we have to deal with the world in front of us. That we see. If the evidence we see says the earth is billions of years old, I don't have a problem using that, even though I don't think it is. Because I don't see that as a contradiction.
I don't think T-Rex was hopping around in Eden, because there's no reason to think so. The discovery of fossils and remains of dinosaurs and the like is useful scientifically. I think God wants us to use our minds to figure things out about how His world works.
Paul and some others here have attributed mean motives to God for doing this. "It must be for deceit". I don't think so. I think it's to inform. What use is a world riddled with discontinuities caused by the creation 6000(-ish) years ago? What could we learn from that? Instead, God gave us a consistent world from which we can learn.
There are shrill people who have heart palpitations when someone says "This fossil is 2 millions years old." They need to learn to relax. And there are shrill people who want to burn the Bible because it says the earth was created less than 6000 years ago. Both sets of shrill people should pool their funds and get a king sized grip.
quote:Originally posted by 0Megabyte: The difference between you, and between scientists, is that scientists care about understanding, about evidence, and do not commit the evil of willful ignorance.
I'm against willful ignorance. But you know, you can't necessarily know everything. There's data we just don't have. It's nice to think that there's no such thing as data we don't and never will have, but it's kind of immature to think that way, don't you think?
I like history. Some history, anyway. I'd love to know more details about certain historical personages. But you know, there's just a limit to what can ever be deduced from the information that exists.
You will never know everything. It's a tragedy, but eventually you have to learn to live with it.
That's what I mean when I keep quoting John Dayton's line that "It is better to be roughly right than precisely wrong." One of the biggest flaws in scientific thought today is that the scientific method, which is a good and useful tool, is a means of determining truth. It can do that, but that's not what it's for, and it can't always do it.
Radiocarbon dating, for example, is based on a lot of assumptions. Fine. That makes it at best an internally consistent system. But those assumptions make it different than observable facts. So I point out that it might be wrong. You insist that I prove that it is wrong, otherwise I must accept that it's right. But that's a false dichotomy. Because I don't have to prove that it's wrong; only that it could be. Because I'm not out to prove my position to you. I don't feel the need to do so.
quote:Originally posted by 0Megabyte: Yes. It's an evil. One of the greatest evils in the world. (believing without evidence isn't evil. We all do it, in many cases, myself including. I don't do so for God anymore, but we all do such things. It's just what we have to do.)
See, and I disagree with this. Believing without evidence is evil. Refusing to pretend that certainty exists when it doesn't is an unfortunate foible, but it's not evil.
You should consider what certainty means. Human beings operate on the basis of degrees of certainty. I don't know with 100% certainty that there isn't going to be an 8.9 earthquake here later today, but I don't have to in order to go about my life normally. Anyone who claims they have 100% certainty about anything scares me. Particularly if they do so without evidence. That's fanaticism at its worst. And it includes fanatics for religion and fanatics against religion and fanatics for science and fanatics against science.
quote:Originally posted by 0Megabyte: Willful ignorance, that closedness of mind, is EVIL.
Why don't you see it? It makes me incredibly sad, to see a decent person act in such an evil, and potentially harmful manner.
How do you know I'm a decent person? I mean, I think I am, but I imagine most people do. If you think I'm acting in an evil manner, I wonder why you think I'm a decent person.
I disagree with you, is all. I have X amount of time on my hands, and I choose how to use it. Saying that I disagree with KoM and his varves is a reasonable use of time. Trying to convince him of it is not. In my estimation.
quote:Originally posted by 0Megabyte: I'm sure I've said some rude things here, to you. Nothing I wouldn't say to a flat earther, but even so, it's rude.
However, your sheer intellectual dishonesty worries me.
What other parts of your life do you use this?
I won't whistle you for the dishonesty comment, because I can see how frustrated you're feeling. I'm sorry to be the cause of it, but honestly, I'm not being willfully ignorant. I'm starting from a lot of different premises from you.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by MattP:
quote:In other words, there isn't really the conflict that some of you think there is. Yes, the world is young. And yes, for purposes of scientific inquiry, you can treat it as though it were old.
And I'm perfectly happy with that position. It's consistent with the evidence AND with your doctrine. Win-win, I say. Of course it's philosophical position, not a scientific one, so the creation science folks are not about to accept it.
When the "creation science" people can make their system work, I'll worry about it.
Posted by Reshpeckobiggle (Member # 8947) on :
Lisa: "I'm starting from a lot of different premises than you."
This seems to be the major disconnect. It is the cause of the Groupthink phenomena. The evolutionists/ancient earth guys are all starting with the same premises and cannot appropriately engage those who do not share them. We are all deficient in some way, because we don't think the same way.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:The evolutionists/ancient earth guys are all starting with the same premises...
More precisely, my starting premise is "things that happen have an observable effect." What's yours?
Posted by Reshpeckobiggle (Member # 8947) on :
Again, you're missing the point (we should really try to keep this on one thread.) You aren't starting with one premise, and I'm starting from a different one. We all have many different beliefs, and some of them, like the one you wrote, we're gonna agree on. But there are many others that we do not share.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
No. All my beliefs stem directly and inexorably from that single premise (and its parent premises, like "effects have causes" and "things happen.")
If you disagree with me, you disagree with that premise.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:The evolutionists/ancient earth guys are all starting with the same premises and cannot appropriately engage those who do not share them.
But Resh, you're not engaging in good faith. You ask for a level of evidence for our position which you are unwilling to meet with evidence from yours. You claim that an inability to provide a mutation-by-mutation recipe for the creation of an eye is evidence that evolution is merely a fanciful idea while at the same time putting forth no evidence at all for the process or discernment of design.
However, we do have mechanisms by which an eye could evolve and every major intermediate form of "eye" from a single light-sensitive cell to a complex articulated, focusing, eyeball can be found in species that exist today.
No, we cannot evolve an eyeball in the lab, and no, we cannot give you a few hundred thousand years of detailed history, but we also can't raise a mountain or move the continents around. We have to work with the evidence and time frames that are available to us.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson:
quote:The evolutionists/ancient earth guys are all starting with the same premises...
More precisely, my starting premise is "things that happen have an observable effect." What's yours?
I have the same one. But I have additional information that you choose to disregard.
If you see a ball rolling uphill with no one around pushing it uphill, it's absolutely reasonable for you to construct theories about why a ball might, in certain cases, roll uphill. If I, on the other hand, happened to have been told by the guy who jiggered the ball that he jiggered the ball to roll uphill, I can say that in this case, the real reason it was rolling uphill was because someone made it roll uphill.
If I tell you about it and you say, "Who the hell are you?" and refuse to listen, you'll go merrily on your way coming up with theories about uphill-rolling balls.
Now obviously this is a flawed analogy, because if it was God who jiggered the ball, there really would (or might, at least) be cases in which balls will roll uphill, since God generally does even miracles within the rules. But it still would have been God who did it.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: No. All my beliefs stem directly and inexorably from that single premise (and its parent premises, like "effects have causes" and "things happen.")
If you disagree with me, you disagree with that premise.
Wrong. If I disagree with you, I disagree with the idea that your premise is the entire story.
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
quote:More precisely, my starting premise is "things that happen have an observable effect."
This premise seems very wrong, though. There are things all over the world that I can't possibly observe, but that doesn't mean they aren't happening. And I strongly suspect there are things on the far side of the Universe that are happening which no human being could possibly be observing, yet that doesn't mean those things aren't happening. And there have probably been things that happened in history that have left no observable trace today, but that doesn't mean those things never happened.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by MattP: However, we do have mechanisms by which an eye could evolve and every major intermediate form of "eye" from a single light-sensitive cell to a complex articulated, focusing, eyeball can be found in species that exist today.
That's clearly untrue.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:But Resh, you're not engaging in good faith.
I've got to say, I found this extremely amusing.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lisa:
quote:Originally posted by MattP: However, we do have mechanisms by which an eye could evolve and every major intermediate form of "eye" from a single light-sensitive cell to a complex articulated, focusing, eyeball can be found in species that exist today.
That's clearly untrue.
Which part? The mechanisms, the intermediate forms, or both?
Posted by Strider (Member # 1807) on :
quote:Originally posted by Tresopax:
quote:More precisely, my starting premise is "things that happen have an observable effect."
This premise seems very wrong, though. There are things all over the world that I can't possibly observe, but that doesn't mean they aren't happening. And I strongly suspect there are things on the far side of the Universe that are happening which no human being could possibly be observing, yet that doesn't mean those things aren't happening. And there have probably been things that happened in history that have left no observable trace today, but that doesn't mean those things never happened.
things have "an observable effect", not "all things are observed".
just because you can't personally observe something happening in another area of our universe does not mean that it can't be theoretically observed. and it doesn't have to be with your eyes. if someone has a thought, you can't observe it visually, but the processes which produced that thought *can* be observed with instruments.
if something happens, something caused that thing to happen. rinse and repeat.
Posted by camus (Member # 8052) on :
quote:If I tell you about it and you say, "Who the hell are you?" and refuse to listen, you'll go merrily on your way coming up with theories about uphill-rolling balls.
No, most likely I would go to see how a guy that you can't see or hear was able to get the ball to roll uphill. If upon looking at the area I find that the ball is rolling up the hill because it likely had just rolled down a bigger hill, I'd doubt the accuracy of your invisible guy. If you say that your invisible guy intentionally made it appear to roll down a bigger hill when in fact he had really set up an amazing invisible contraption that is able cause balls to roll uphill while covering any evidence of its existence and interference, then yes, I would go merrily on my way coming up with theories about uphill-rolling balls.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:if someone has a thought, you can't observe it visually, but the processes which produced that thought *can* be observed with instruments.
Are these theoretical instruments? As far as I know, we don't currently possess that ability, either theoretically or practically. We can observe neuronal activity, but we really don't have any way of credibly claiming that this is a measure of all the processes that produce thoughts.
Posted by swbarnes2 (Member # 10225) on :
quote:If you see a ball rolling uphill with no one around pushing it uphill, it's absolutely reasonable for you to construct theories about why a ball might, in certain cases, roll uphill. If I, on the other hand, happened to have been told by the guy who jiggered the ball that he jiggered the ball to roll uphill, I can say that in this case, the real reason it was rolling uphill was because someone made it roll uphill.
Better analogy:
You see an ice cube tray, and some ice cubes. (For utter realism, let's make this a room that's below frezzing) The cubes are shaped nearly as closely to the shape of the ice cube tray pockets as is molecularly possible.
Next to the ice cubes is a sign that says "God told me to tell you taht he carved these ice cube with a blowtorch". (intentional typo)
You want to take the sign at face value, fine. But the rest of us will stick to what the evidence shows, which is 1) carving ice cubes with a blowtorch isn't going to work very well, 2) the known properties of water (when liquid, it fits a container perfectly, and when frozen, it retains its shape) are enough to completely explain what we see. It's just not logical to posit that some other agent for whom there is no evidence did it, espeically when the known physical laws tell us that it just didn't happen the way the sign said. Calling that agent God doesn't actually change that conclusion.
Posted by Strider (Member # 1807) on :
quote:We can observe neuronal activity, but we really don't have any way of credibly claiming that this is a measure of all the processes that produce thoughts.
what else is there?
But I'll concede that we can't pinpoint the specific neuronal activity that produces a particular thought.
My point was a more general point that there are lots of events that occur that can't be seen with the human eye. But that can be seen visually with the aid of an instrument or at least detected(whether it be a magnetic, electric, etc..) with other instruments. I have a problem with Tres's assertation that an inability to observe something, for whatever reason, necessarily means that it doesn't have an observable effect.
We can't see gravity, but we can observe and measure its effects. Whether we do or not, doesn't change the fact that the effect is observable.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:My point was a more general point that there are lots of events that occur that can't be seen with the human eye.
I got your point. However, you were presenting your assumption as a fact.
You can choose to believe in a materialistic universe, but it is a very big, though very common, mistake to think that science supports you in this.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lisa: And there are shrill people who want to burn the Bible because it says the earth was created less than 6000 years ago. ...
Exaggerate much?
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
If things happened that didn't have an observable effect, how would we know?
Posted by Strider (Member # 1807) on :
quote:I got your point. However, you were presenting your assumption as a fact.
You can choose to believe in a materialistic universe, but it is a very big, though very common, mistake to think that science supports you in this.
Like I said, I concede that specific point for now. But, I do think that the *aim* of science is to treat the universe as if my assumption is correct.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:You can choose to believe in a materialistic universe, but it is a very big, though very common, mistake to think that science supports you in this.
I'd be very interested in hearing how science supports anything but a materialistic universe.
------
quote:If things happened that didn't have an observable effect, how would we know?
We wouldn't. Ergo, they don't matter. That's why it's a premise and not a fact. Posted by Strider (Member # 1807) on :
quote:If things happened that didn't have an observable effect, how would we know?
We wouldn't.
So what's the point of talking about them?
edit - damn you Tom!
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:I'd be very interested in hearing how science supports anything but a materialistic universe.
I don't think you understand the nature of the objection, Tom.
Science supports neither assumption. Its explanatory power requires that the things that it studies to behave in a materialistic, deterministic way. However, there is no valid way of using this to claim that only things that occur in a materialist, deterministic way actually exist. This is a common espistemological error I've notived among evangelical atheists.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:Originally posted by Strider:
quote:If things happened that didn't have an observable effect, how would we know?
We wouldn't.
So what's the point of talking about them?
edit - damn you Tom!
I think this discussing is missing an important concept, that of discrimination.
Things can occur that have effects, but they are not observable unless we can discriminate them from other things.
In many instances, there isn't a way to tell the difference between a deterministic and non-deterministic system. From a rational and scientific standpoint, there often isn't any way to decide between these two options, so you are basically left with a blank area and a choice between two equally valid options.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
I will respond to more later, but this particular statement of Lisa's struck me.
"You will never know everything. It's a tragedy, but eventually you have to learn to live with it."
Are you kidding?
This means I'll always be able to learn something new! As long as I live, I will never run out of discoveries to make. That is the greatest gift this universe could possibly give me.
Posted by Leonide (Member # 4157) on :
Amen Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by MattP:
quote:Originally posted by Lisa:
quote:Originally posted by MattP: However, we do have mechanisms by which an eye could evolve and every major intermediate form of "eye" from a single light-sensitive cell to a complex articulated, focusing, eyeball can be found in species that exist today.
That's clearly untrue.
Which part? The mechanisms, the intermediate forms, or both?
The "every". Assuming that you think random mutations are the mechanism.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by Strider: if something happens, something caused that thing to happen. rinse and repeat.
Which, extrapolated fully implies God. Of course.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
" think understand why you think this is an important discussion. Your recent conversion (if that's an okay term) to atheism is a big change, and you want to make sure that it's justified. If I'm wrong, tell me; that's just my perception."
Most of what I'm talking about actually has nothing to do with my atheism. Some does, yes. But when talking about the Bible, talking about the evidence, and talking about evolution, age of the earth, etc, this has to do with something fundamentally more important than my religious beliefs.
It has to do with evidence. Science. Knowledge, understanding, the thing I care about in this world.
"There's data we just don't have. It's nice to think that there's no such thing as data we don't and never will have, but it's kind of immature to think that way, don't you think?"
This has nothing to do with science. Evolution, for example, is a theory, a set of predictions. And, furthermore, the predictions have been proven right millions upon millions of times, in many different fields.
That's a damn good theory. Theories aren't reality, but they're descriptions of reality. Perfect? Not at all. A single piece of evidence which is validly against evolution (a rabbit fossil in the Precambrian is all that's needed) disproves it, or at least requires new explainations that both account for all current data, and accurately predict future data.
We only know the smallest part of knowledge. Science makes that clear. But when it comes to the theories I've seen, they explain and predict so well that, as a provisional truth (nothing in science is anything BUT provisional) it's unbelievably excellent.
It's very possible God made the world with appearances of age. But even if He did, God made made that creation inperceptible to any humans looking it up. So, we base our understanding, if you're true, on what God put there, which just so happens to look precisely like what you'd find if life came about without any guidance at all.
Whatever. We can't KNOW for certain. But science isn't knowing for certain in the philosophical sense. We can't KNOW anything. But we can assume causes have effects, and the effects can be measured. And that underlying assumption has been very, very, very useful.
It's so useful I base my understanding of the world on their photons, atoms, chemical reactions and transfers of energy, on their gravity and phyiscs. It's how I'm talking to you, after all.
I suppose I trust it for two reasons. It works, is the gut feeling, the emotional side, and second, I agree with the premeses underlying it, and am shown precisely what they mean.
In the end, my frustration comes from the fact that the evidence, the effects, say one thing... while you say "no, that's not true" and then give no mechanism which can account for all of it, except something we could never prove either way.
---
As it is, I feel believing without evidence isn't, in and of itself, wrong, necessarily, because it's something we all must do. We must all make assumptions. We don't have perfect knowledge, and I dont have any more perfect knowledge than anyone else. With small things, such as "oh, I heard from a friend that the raccoons around here live in the trees, that that's where they always dissapear to during the day!" I don't have time or need to look it up, and prove it, seeing it for myself.
Accepting it as plausible with no real evidence is not a big deal. And I don't have time to check it out, honestly.
However, stuff you base your whole life around... that's something it's unwise to base on unproven premeses.
"But you know, there's just a limit to what can ever be deduced from the information that exists."
That's where we disagree. Everything which has effects can be observed. We are learning more all the time.
We will continue learning, and the thing is, we may very well never reach the limit. We may never understand everything, but we'll keep understanding more and more, as long as our species exists.
But if there is a limit, it's knowing everything. And once you know everything about the present, you can understand everythingin the past and everything in the future. But knowing everything in the present will take until the end of time.
What a pleasant, pleasant thought.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by swbarnes2:
quote:If you see a ball rolling uphill with no one around pushing it uphill, it's absolutely reasonable for you to construct theories about why a ball might, in certain cases, roll uphill. If I, on the other hand, happened to have been told by the guy who jiggered the ball that he jiggered the ball to roll uphill, I can say that in this case, the real reason it was rolling uphill was because someone made it roll uphill.
Better analogy:
You see an ice cube tray, and some ice cubes. (For utter realism, let's make this a room that's below frezzing) The cubes are shaped nearly as closely to the shape of the ice cube tray pockets as is molecularly possible.
Next to the ice cubes is a sign that says "God told me to tell you taht he carved these ice cube with a blowtorch". (intentional typo)
You want to take the sign at face value, fine. But the rest of us will stick to what the evidence shows, which is 1) carving ice cubes with a blowtorch isn't going to work very well, 2) the known properties of water (when liquid, it fits a container perfectly, and when frozen, it retains its shape) are enough to completely explain what we see. It's just not logical to posit that some other agent for whom there is no evidence did it, espeically when the known physical laws tell us that it just didn't happen the way the sign said. Calling that agent God doesn't actually change that conclusion.
Ignoring the fact that this was not a better analogy at all, your basic stance seems to be that if it can be explained without God, then it should be explained without God.
Fine. If that works for you, then cool. But please don't deceive yourself into thinking that it's actual proof of your position. It's just an arbitrary assumption, based on God's non-existence as a starting premise.
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
Lisa: if it is clearly untrue, could you provide an example of a major intermediate form for the eye that we don't know of a species having? Just a single counterexample will be fine.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by Mucus:
quote:Originally posted by Lisa: And there are shrill people who want to burn the Bible because it says the earth was created less than 6000 years ago. ...
Exaggerate much?
Now and again, Mucus. Now and again. But KoM has said that he'd lock religious people up. And he's not the only such person around. So I don't think I'm exaggerating at all. I didn't say that all atheists want to burn the Bible any more than I said that all religious people have heart attacks upon hearing about dinosaurs.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by 0Megabyte: I will respond to more later, but this particular statement of Lisa's struck me.
"You will never know everything. It's a tragedy, but eventually you have to learn to live with it."
Are you kidding?
This means I'll always be able to learn something new! As long as I live, I will never run out of discoveries to make. That is the greatest gift this universe could possibly give me.
And yet you accused me of being willfully ignorant because I say that there are some things you just don't know.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:The "every". Assuming that you think random mutations are the mechanism.
I did say every "major" form. For instance, we have light sensitive organelles within single-celled organisms (dinoflagelletes), a single light sensitive cell(or group of cells) in multicellular organisms (earthworms), groups of these cells in a depression (starfish), etc.
Posted by Strider (Member # 1807) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lisa:
quote:Originally posted by Strider: if something happens, something caused that thing to happen. rinse and repeat.
Which, extrapolated fully implies God. Of course.
Well, I think that the statement might break down when dealing with origins of the universe, but to automatically extrapolate "god" doesn't clear up any ambiguity. It just poses more unanswerable questions. And is a huge and unbased logical leap. As well as serving to stop questioning and learning. Assuming you were being serious.
Is it Dawkins that said something along the lines of "god exists in the gaps of science". Every time a gap is closed up god finds a new smaller gap to exist in.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by MattP:
quote:The "every". Assuming that you think random mutations are the mechanism.
I did say every "major" form. For instance, we have light sensitive organelles within single-celled organisms (dinoflagelletes), a single light sensitive cell(or group of cells) in multicellular organisms (earthworms), groups of these cells in a depression (starfish), etc.
I was wrong. I misread what you wrote and omitted the "major". I'll take your word that your claim is correct (though I reserve judgement on your definition of "major"). What I posted was based on something you hadn't said, and I retract it.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by Strider:
quote:Originally posted by Lisa:
quote:Originally posted by Strider: if something happens, something caused that thing to happen. rinse and repeat.
Which, extrapolated fully implies God. Of course.
Well, I think that the statement might break down when dealing with origins of the universe,
Why? Because it invades your comfort zone?
quote:Originally posted by Strider: but to automatically extrapolate "god" doesn't clear up any ambiguity. It just poses more unanswerable questions.
Sorta kinda like the Big Bang.
Everyone who accepts the Big Bang accepts a primal cause. Why does it bother you so much that the Primal Cause spoke to us?
quote:Originally posted by Strider: And is a huge and unbased logical leap. As well as serving to stop questioning and learning. Assuming you were being serious.
I don't see why it should stop questioning and learning. Those who want to stop questioning and learning will find ways and means to do so. They hardly need religion for that.
Posted by Strider (Member # 1807) on :
If you want to believe in god, fine. I just get annoyed when people default to god when there is a question that is currently unanswerable by science. People have been doing it for thousands of years, even geniuses like Galileo and Newton, and their default positions of "god did it" have always eventually fallen in the face of scientific inquiry. I see no reason to believe that the current unanswerable questions of the universe won't go the same route.
Answering questions of the origin of the universe scientifically doesn't necessitate that there doesn't exist a creator or a deity. I don't see why you should assert that unanswerable questions necessitate the existence of one.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:Everyone who accepts the Big Bang accepts a primal cause.
Those who do so are exceeding what the evidence actually shows. The "Big Bang" is an extrapolation back to a certain point in time that is consistent with the current observed structure of the universe. There is a point at which the scientific answer to "What came before that?" is "We don't know." To call the Big Bang the primal cause is not a scientific statement as it asserts an answer other than "We don't know" into an area where we truly are ignorant.
Posted by Strider (Member # 1807) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lisa:
quote:Originally posted by Strider:
quote:Originally posted by Lisa:
quote:Originally posted by Strider: if something happens, something caused that thing to happen. rinse and repeat.
Which, extrapolated fully implies God. Of course.
Well, I think that the statement might break down when dealing with origins of the universe,
Why? Because it invades your comfort zone?
Not at all. I mean that the statement that every effect has a cause gets a bit murky when dealing with the origin of the universe. Was there a big bang? What caused it? Did the universe exist forever? What does that even mean? Are we in a never ending cycle of collapsing and expanding?
It gets murky in the sense that we can't currently explain it. Maybe when dealing with events that happen outside of our space/time the whole concept of cause and effect needs to be reevaluated, or maybe the concept has no meaning outside of the known universe. Maybe a big bang can occur from a singularity in some way from a cause outside of our universe in whatever way things interact at that level. Maybe there are infinite amount of universes being created and destroyed all the time. And they can effect each other somehow. Maybe everything I just said is bogus, and there are countless other more plausible questions and answers. I have no idea, but the questions fascinate me.
My comfort zone is more than fine, my intellectual curiosity is peaked, and I don't see where in any of that it leads to the obvious conclusion of god.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lisa:
quote:Originally posted by Mucus:
quote:Originally posted by Lisa: And there are shrill people who want to burn the Bible because it says the earth was created less than 6000 years ago. ...
Exaggerate much?
Now and again, Mucus. Now and again. But KoM has said that he'd lock religious people up. And he's not the only such person around. So I don't think I'm exaggerating at all. I didn't say that all atheists want to burn the Bible any more than I said that all religious people have heart attacks upon hearing about dinosaurs.
See, KoM was probably being intentionally provocative, intending for someone religious to get riled up about it. The thing is, even if he was being serious, the Bible's support for YEC would be far down the list of his reasons for wanting to lock religious people up/burning the Bible.
Arguably, he would have many more reasons that he would consider more important Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:Which, extrapolated fully implies God.
I'm not sure why that would be the case, unless you think the Jewish God is the only Prime Mover possible.
quote:However, there is no valid way of using this to claim that only things that occur in a materialist, deterministic way actually exist. This is a common espistemological error I've notived among evangelical atheists.
Tell you what: you prove to me that non-materialistic, non-deterministic things exist, and I'll concede the point. *grin*
Posted by swbarnes2 (Member # 10225) on :
quote:Fine. If that works for you, then cool. But please don't deceive yourself into thinking that it's actual proof of your position. It's just an arbitrary assumption, based on God's non-existence as a starting premise.
It's not proof, in the sense that nothing is ever truly "proven" outside of math, but it is in that case, the logially superior position. Occam's razor...Your way requires believing that it's possible to carve ice cubes with a blowtorch, and that there exists a God, and that God actaully carved the ice-cubes...all suppositions. My way requires only the observable and well-verified facts of nature: the properties of water, and the fact that people can write signs.
If your car won't start, and it's out of gas, do you act based on the premise that God smote your car, or do you use the premise that cars won't run without gas, and act on that?
If you run your hair dryer and the vacuum, and all the electricity goes out, do you presume that God smote your house, or do you presume that a fuse blew, and act on that premise?
If you got sick with treatable, curable cancer, would you pray, or would you go to the doctor, knowing that you risk your life if you act based on the wrong premise?
I could go on. A whole list of common events where you would not actually proceed on the premise that God is directly reponsible, but you would always proceed on the premise that the physical phenonenon you are witnessing has a natural, physical cause.
So if you really want to claim that they are both equally valid, fine.
But I really doubt that an examination of how you act on a day-to-day basis would bear out the conclusion that you think both premises yield equally good results in the real world.
Posted by Strider (Member # 1807) on :
quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson:
quote:However, there is no valid way of using this to claim that only things that occur in a materialist, deterministic way actually exist. This is a common espistemological error I've notived among evangelical atheists.
Tell you what: you prove to me that non-materialistic, non-deterministic things exist, and I'll concede the point. *grin*
Ahhh....I'm having flashbacks of my afterlife thread. When do we start talking about qualia? Tres? Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:See, KoM was probably being intentionally provocative, intending for someone religious to get riled up about it. The thing is, even if he was being serious, the Bible's support for YEC would be far down the list of his reasons for wanting to lock religious people up/burning the Bible.
Although I understand why you might think so, I don't believe Lisa was referring to any particular statement of mine.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by swbarnes2:
quote:Fine. If that works for you, then cool. But please don't deceive yourself into thinking that it's actual proof of your position. It's just an arbitrary assumption, based on God's non-existence as a starting premise.
It's not proof, in the sense that nothing is ever truly "proven" outside of math, but it is in that case, the logially superior position. Occam's razor...Your way requires believing that it's possible to carve ice cubes with a blowtorch, and that there exists a God, and that God actaully carved the ice-cubes...all suppositions. My way requires only the observable and well-verified facts of nature: the properties of water, and the fact that people can write signs.
Occam's Razor is on my side. Not with your silly blowtorch and icecubes, because that didn't happen. But because God told 3 million of us publically, all at once, that He was there, and gave us a whole boatload of information. You have to either do backwards cartwheels to get around that information, or simply ignore it, to reach your atheist position.
You can't come up with a plausable way in which the Torah came into being if it isn't what it purports to be. It's been tried, and the lameness that is the Documentary Hypothesis is apparently the best that could be found. And it's not very good at all.
quote:Originally posted by swbarnes2: If your car won't start, and it's out of gas, do you act based on the premise that God smote your car, or do you use the premise that cars won't run without gas, and act on that?
Depends. Did God come down and talk to me along with 3 million people and say, "Oh, by the by, Lisa, I smote your car"? If so, I think I'd give it credence. If a dozen folks having dinner said, "Oh, happens that God stopped by and said He smote your car," I'd probably laugh. If some nutter in a cave came out and said, "Listen, an angel told me that God smote your car, and that I can have 70 virgins if I smite some more cars myself," I'd wonder what was in his hookah.
You want to lump all three scenarios together and imagine that they're comparable. They aren't.
quote:Originally posted by swbarnes2: If you run your hair dryer and the vacuum, and all the electricity goes out, do you presume that God smote your house, or do you presume that a fuse blew, and act on that premise?
I would hope that God would take the health risks involved in second hand smoting into account.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
Lameness of the Documentary Hypothesis?
Please do tell me of its faults! Since I'm not certain about it anyway, and I don't have as much certainty about that as, say, certain other things, I'm very interested to see your view on it.
Posted by Javert (Member # 3076) on :
quote:Occam's Razor is on my side. Not with your silly blowtorch and icecubes, because that didn't happen. But because God told 3 million of us publically, all at once, that He was there, and gave us a whole boatload of information. You have to either do backwards cartwheels to get around that information, or simply ignore it, to reach your atheist position.
Now, when you say "3 million of us", do you count yourself personally, or your ancestors? (I'm assuming this is from scripture, but I honestly don't recall where.)
In the case of your ancestors, I would ask if you have documented sources from 3 million people all saying the same story? Or, do you have a few sources that say God told 3 million people publically?
If the latter, Occam's Razor isn't exactly on your side.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by 0Megabyte: Lameness of the Documentary Hypothesis?
Please do tell me of its faults! Since I'm not certain about it anyway, and I don't have as much certainty about that as, say, certain other things, I'm very interested to see your view on it.
God, where do I even start. I did an entry called DH Stupidity on my blog over a year ago. I've been fighting it ever since I found out about it when I was a freshman in college. Well before I had so much as a glimmer of becoming observant. It's just dumb. And in all honesty, I don't know where to start.
Here's a thing I posted here called Torah 101. It doesn't address the documentary hypothesis directly, but it does address some of the methodology according to which the biblical text is meant to be read, and the documentary hypothesis explicitly ignores this in order to pull "contradictions" out of its nether regions.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote: You can't come up with a plausable way in which the Torah came into being if it isn't what it purports to be.
The Mormons say the same thing about the BoM, you know.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson:
quote: You can't come up with a plausable way in which the Torah came into being if it isn't what it purports to be.
The Mormons say the same thing about the BoM, you know.
Another fallacy. Two people say contradictory things; therefore, they're both wrong. Lame.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
And the Muslims/Koran...
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:Another fallacy. Two people say contradictory things; therefore, they're both wrong. Lame.
I think it was more of a "If you understand why you don't believe their claim, you understand why I don't believe yours." Or, alternatively, assertion is not necessarily equivalent to truth.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Originally posted by MattP: And the Muslims/Koran...
I've actually never heard a Muslim say the Koran was beyond Mohammed's ability to write it. I believe that it is certainly possible that they claim that, but is that really a general belief in the religion?
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:I believe that it is certainly possible that they claim that, but is that really a general belief in the religion?
Yup. Mohammed's illiteracy is trumpeted in the same way that Joseph's status as an uneducated farm boy is. It's a commonly stated proof of the divine origin of the Koran that no one has ever been able to write a Sura like those in the Koran. Heck, it's *in* the Koran:
quote:Sura 2:23 If you have any doubt regarding what we revealed to our servant, then produce one sura like these, and call upon your own witnesses against GOD, if you are truthful.
also
11:13 If they say, "He fabricated (the Quran)," tell them, "Then produce ten suras like these, fabricated, and invite whomever you can, other than GOD, if you are truthful."
11:14 If they fail to meet your challenge, then know that this is revealed with GOD's knowledge, and that there is no god except He. Will you then submit?
and
17:88 Say, "If all the humans and all the jinns banded together in order to produce a Quran like this, they could never produce anything like it, no matter how much assistance they lent one another."
[ September 04, 2007, 10:10 PM: Message edited by: MattP ]
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
About the three million: That's according to the same source whose trustworthiness is under discussion. Circular reasoning. There are any number of ways in which a document can claim to have 3 million witnesses, have strong error-checking, and nonetheless be wrong. For example, it might be written before the error-checking is put in place; it might also be edited so that the error-checking appears to have been there from the start. This is hardly very difficult.
In fact, Lisa, you are making the same assumption that you so often lambast us for: That as things are now, they were in the past. There is no reason to assume that the error-checking rituals were there from the start.
Posted by Ron Lambert (Member # 2872) on :
It is not just a matter of conflicting assertions about different source documents for faith. Some might take the knee-jerk, thoughtless route, and say they must all be wrong. But there is another possibility. Perhaps we should rather expect that if there are many counterfeits, there must be one that is geniune.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote:I would hope that God would take the health risks involved in second hand smoting into account.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:Perhaps we should rather expect that if there are many counterfeits, there must be one that is geniune.
Sure. And as soon as the learned advocates for each of these documents come to a consensus on how to determine which one is genuine...
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by MattP:
quote:Another fallacy. Two people say contradictory things; therefore, they're both wrong. Lame.
I think it was more of a "If you understand why you don't believe their claim, you understand why I don't believe yours." Or, alternatively, assertion is not necessarily equivalent to truth.
No, because they aren't the same argument. They are based on different things entirely. Joseph Smith was one man. Last I checked, one was less than 3 million.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:Originally posted by Ron Lambert: It is not just a matter of conflicting assertions about different source documents for faith. Some might take the knee-jerk, thoughtless route, and say they must all be wrong. But there is another possibility. Perhaps we should rather expect that if there are many counterfeits, there must be one that is geniune.
Oh, right. And because there are so many UFO sightings, one of them must really be aliens.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lisa:
quote:Originally posted by MattP:
quote:Another fallacy. Two people say contradictory things; therefore, they're both wrong. Lame.
I think it was more of a "If you understand why you don't believe their claim, you understand why I don't believe yours." Or, alternatively, assertion is not necessarily equivalent to truth.
No, because they aren't the same argument. They are based on different things entirely. Joseph Smith was one man. Last I checked, one was less than 3 million.
Yes, yes, but nobody except you believes the 3 million any more than we believe the golden plates.
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
What am I, chopped liver?
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
That was the plural 'you', indicating 'you Jews' rather than 'you, Lisa'. Civilised languages have a way of indicating this. English doesn't.
Anyway, while we're comparing numbers, how many golden plates does the Bible have? Joseph Smith has two, so I'd say that puts him two up, two being greater than zero.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Occam's Razor is on my side. Not with your silly blowtorch and icecubes, because that didn't happen. But because God told 3 million of us publically, all at once, that He was there, and gave us a whole boatload of information. You have to either do backwards cartwheels to get around that information, or simply ignore it, to reach your atheist position.
Occam's Razor weights completely unproven assumptions without a quantity of evidence sufficient to merit the claim?
Sir Occam would probably like to be informed of this change immediately.
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: That was the plural 'you', indicating 'you Jews' rather than 'you, Lisa'. Civilised languages have a way of indicating this. English doesn't.
Y'all.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lisa:
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: That was the plural 'you', indicating 'you Jews' rather than 'you, Lisa'. Civilised languages have a way of indicating this. English doesn't.
Y'all.
*snort*
Can we conversely refer to ourselves and those in the immediate vicinity as, "W'all?"
Posted by Lisa (Member # 8384) on :
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade:
quote:Originally posted by Lisa:
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: That was the plural 'you', indicating 'you Jews' rather than 'you, Lisa'. Civilised languages have a way of indicating this. English doesn't.
Y'all.
*snort*
Can we conversely refer to ourselves and those in the immediate vicinity as, "W'all?"
"We" works fine. English used to have different words for singular second person and plural second person, and it still should. Right now, "y'all" is the only way to do that.
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
quote:just because you can't personally observe something happening in another area of our universe does not mean that it can't be theoretically observed. and it doesn't have to be with your eyes. if someone has a thought, you can't observe it visually, but the processes which produced that thought *can* be observed with instruments.
This makes it very ambiguous what is observable and what isn't though. Is there anything we could think of that can't in theory by observed by some theoretical thing? Isn't it at least possible in theory that some God exists and can observe everything imaginable? Or isn't it possible that for any given possible thing we can imagine, we could in theory someday invent some instrument that could observe it?
quote:
quote:If things happened that didn't have an observable effect, how would we know?
We wouldn't. Ergo, they don't matter.
Isn't it possible for something to have no observable effect yet still be important?
quote:Ahhh....I'm having flashbacks of my afterlife thread. When do we start talking about qualia? Tres?
I'm pretty sure y'all already have, although not by name.
I suppose I should note that qualia is one major reason I disagree with Tom's assertion that unobservable things are not important. In fact, I'd argue the things that are actually important for their own sake are the things that we are calling "unobservable". Physical objects such as chairs, computers, solar systems, etc. are not important for their own sake (they are only physical objects after all.)
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:Is there anything we could think of that can't in theory by observed by some theoretical thing?
Nothing that exists and matters. But I can think of lots of irrelevant crap -- like "qualia" -- which can't.
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
What is your argument for qualia being irrelevant? Qualia includes both the feeling of happiness and the experience of pain - two things that I suspect most people would consider to be critically important to human affairs.
But aside from that, why couldn't there in theory be a way to observe such things like qualia? Science fiction has long hypothesized about the ability to see into another person's mind, for instance. Doesn't that seem at least as plausible as teleporting to the opposite side of the universe to observe the things happening there, which we'd otherwise have no ability to observe?
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:Qualia includes both the feeling of happiness and the experience of pain - two things that I suspect most people would consider to be critically important to human affairs.
Tom can correct me if I'm mistaken, but I believe his view is that such experiences are ultimately, in principle, quantitative ones. That is, there is a specific set of neurons firing in a specific order to produce an individual experience of happiness. We only consider happiness to be a qualitative experience because the process by which we experience it is too complex for us to map it.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Originally posted by MattP:
quote:I believe that it is certainly possible that they claim that, but is that really a general belief in the religion?
Yup. Mohammed's illiteracy is trumpeted in the same way that Joseph's status as an uneducated farm boy is. It's a commonly stated proof of the divine origin of the Koran that no one has ever been able to write a Sura like those in the Koran. Heck, it's *in* the Koran:
quote:Sura 2:23 If you have any doubt regarding what we revealed to our servant, then produce one sura like these, and call upon your own witnesses against GOD, if you are truthful.
also
11:13 If they say, "He fabricated (the Quran)," tell them, "Then produce ten suras like these, fabricated, and invite whomever you can, other than GOD, if you are truthful."
11:14 If they fail to meet your challenge, then know that this is revealed with GOD's knowledge, and that there is no god except He. Will you then submit?
and
17:88 Say, "If all the humans and all the jinns banded together in order to produce a Quran like this, they could never produce anything like it, no matter how much assistance they lent one another."
Learn something new everyday, thanks Matt. Incidentally a similar challenge is found in the Doctrine and Covenants, asking anyone to write their own revelation from God and to see if it stacks up with the genuine ones.
I can't link it off the top of my head as I can't think of any key words to search for but I am sure it's there. Apparently several people (Mormons that is) took up the challenge, none with very much success. I don't know anything about non believers attempting the feat.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
How did they judge success (or lack of it)?
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:I can't link it off the top of my head as I can't think of any key words to search for but I am sure it's there. Apparently several people (Mormons that is) took up the challenge, none with very much success. I don't know anything about non believers attempting the feat.
It's D&C 67:6-8
quote:6 Now, seek ye out of the Book of Commandments, even the least that is among them, and appoint him that is the most wise among you; 7 Or, if there be any among you that shall make one alike unto it, then ye are justified in saying that ye do not know that they are true; 8 But if ye cannot make one like unto it, ye are under condemnation if ye do not bear record that they are true.
According to the History of the Church, William E. McLellin tackled the task the evening after that text was revealed. His failure was considered by the council of High Priests to be a confirmation of the veracity of the D&C (then the "Book of Commandments")
I don't know about non-believers having attempted to meet the challenge, as most would likely consider it a fool's errand. The criteria for success is entirely subjective.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Originally posted by Mucus: How did they judge success (or lack of it)?
I wasn't there, I couldn't tell you. I do know that several of the attempts such as Thomas Marsh's were withdrawn by the author as they themselves admitted that they were not inspired of God.
You could check the writings for prophecies and observe if they come true. You can check them for doctrinal consistancy with previous works in the canon. You can also, (and I am not especially interested in discussing the validity of this method) pray about them asking God for confirmation whether the revelations were authentic.
edit: Matt seems to have found the passage, I forgot about McLellins attempt the evening of the revelation's...um.. revelation? I'm not sure what the text of the attempt said or by what criteria it was found to be fradulant. Thanks again Matt.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
Oh, so your focus is more on creating a new set of writings that other people and the author, could be convinced are a genuine set of revelations that extend pre-existing revelations (in your case, Mormon revelations).
This would be contrasted with my idea which was more creating a new set of writings that could convince other people (but not necessarily the author) that they are divine in origin (partially due to their "complexity"), but may or may not extend pre-existing religions.
Is this an accurate hypothesis?
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:Nothing that exists and matters. But I can think of lots of irrelevant crap -- like "qualia" -- which can't.
You're arguing your conclusion there, Tom.
In your theory of mind, this may be true, but you have no rational support for this. It is just an assumption you are making.
And, if it exists, free will is very clearly not irrelevant crap.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:In your theory of mind, this may be true, but you have no rational support for this.
Sure I do. That which has an effect has a perceptible effect. Premise 1.
You can say there's something wrong with the premise, but there's nothing remotely irrational with my position based on that premise.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:That which has an effect has a perceptible effect.
That's not true (see my earlier point about discrimination) and it is irrelevant to the point. Qualia, free will, and a host of other things can have perceptible effects.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
Your point on discrimination was this, correct?
"Things can occur that have effects, but they are not observable unless we can discriminate them from other things.
In many instances, there isn't a way to tell the difference between a deterministic and non-deterministic system. From a rational and scientific standpoint, there often isn't any way to decide between these two options, so you are basically left with a blank area and a choice between two equally valid options. "
Just because circumstances state that we cannot find it out in that particular case, does not mean the effect did not have a perceptibe cause. If it happened, it was caused by something, and even if, say, we cannot detect it yet, or we cannot measure the precise things (such as the physics of throwing a dice. Ugh.)
Just because we can't tell WHICH thing causes something, doesn't mean, first, that we never will be, or second, that it implies a nondeterministic universe, especially considering how much of it IS observed, and how much it just so happens to BE determinable.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
Anyway, what are these imperceptible qualia, and so forth?
And how is free will, a concept which is created by our thoughts, and stored in a physical location in the brain or on paper, which is merely a theory of activity, really, something that cannot be percieved?
The brain is complex, and makes many calculations, has many choices to make. It can decide things, but how is that beyond perception?
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
0Meg, I don't think you understood my point there. You've reversed the order.
I was talking about effects. In order for an effect to be perceptible, it needs to be discriminated against something.
Also, I'm not saying that things are definitely not completely deterministic and materialistic. I'm saying that there is no rational or scientific reason to claim that they definitely are. It's a statement of faith, not of rationality or science.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:And how is free will, a concept which is created by our thoughts, and stored in a physical location in the brain or on paper, which is merely a theory of activity, really, something that cannot be percieved?
I may have been somewhat imprecise. When I was talking about free will, I meant the reality of free will existing and the structures/aspects of reality that make it possible, not the concept.
However, limiting the existence of the concept of free will as "created by our thoughts, and stored in a physical location in the brain or on paper" is again arguing your conclusion. It only works if I accept your theory of mind and of how the universe works.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:The brain is complex, and makes many calculations, has many choices to make. It can decide things, but how is that beyond perception?
In a completely materialistic universe, the brain makes no choices. It merely responds to stimuli in a completely deterministic manner. Any perception of choice is an epiphenomenon.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Unless, of course, you choose to define "choice" in a way that grants the inevitability of the physical decision without obviating the reality of the choice to the "individual" experiencing it.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
That's what an epiphenomenon is.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
Show that we DO have free will, that it is anything BUT a concept.
You say in a completely materialistic (you mean deterministic?) universe, the brain makes no choices, and simply responds to stimuli.
Does this not describe our brains? After all, the stimuli are quite complex, and in many cases come from other parts of the brain. A memory crosses the mind, hearing a sound makes you think of a thought, a message is interpreted, and the sense of it is considered in a complex manner.
The brain is vastly more complicated than a modern computer. What makes you so sure perception of choice ISN'T completely deterministic (with a number of anomalous occurances, like mistakes and whatnot?)
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:What makes you so sure perception of choice ISN'T completely deterministic (with a number of anomalous occurances, like mistakes and whatnot?)
If the universe is entirely deterministic then there's no such thing as a mistake. Any so-called mistakes are the necessary result for the conditions present when they occur.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
I decide to move my hand just for the sake of moving it, of understanding HOW I make it move. I do this purposefully, and with intent to understand. Yet, this is the decision of my brain, or at least part of it, because due to current stimulus it wants to observe its own actions, at least to a degree.
Considering the specific makeup of this particular brain, the preexisting premeses, the information already within it, and its tendencies to consider its own existence and the manner in which it works, how are these actions that I choose to do NOT simply deterministic?
I do it because I do it, because I want to. (The I and the brain, I guess, are synonymous in this particular case, as it's the conscious mind choosing this, which is, of course, part of the brain.) But I want to due to the nature of my brain, the nature of myself, a physical entity.
I "choose", but how is that not completely deterministic, considering the basis of this particular brain adn its particular set-up?
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:What makes you so sure perception of choice ISN'T completely deterministic (with a number of anomalous occurances, like mistakes and whatnot?)
I'm not. I'll quote myself:
quote:Also, I'm not saying that things are definitely not completely deterministic and materialistic. I'm saying that there is no rational or scientific reason to claim that they definitely are. It's a statement of faith, not of rationality or science.
Belief in free will or in materialism is a choice (or perhaps the outcome of the total reinforcement contingencies). It is not something that can be determined by science or rationality, (edit:) at least with our current udnerstanding of these things.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
"If the universe is entirely deterministic then there's no such thing as a mistake. Any so-called mistakes are the necessary result for the conditions present when they occur. "
Good point. That's a much better way of putting it. But the word mistake is convenient. Shall I instead say, results that you do not anticipate based on your imperfect information?
A misfiring of a neuron happens, but I guess you're right, the mistake is the result of the previous condition, which is caused by all sorts of things.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
"Belief in free will or in materialism is a choice (or perhaps the outcome of the total reinforcement contingencies). It is not something that can be determined by science or rationality, at least with our current udnerstanding of these things. "
Perhaps.
But what science CAN and DOES do is examine the brain, and find that manipulating the physical brain itself can change many things.
Not just make you feel specific emotions, but make you desire to do something, or want to "choose" something, is that not right?
If manipulating the brain can effect the choices we make, and the choices we wish to make, what does that say about the nature of our choices?
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:I decide to move my hand just for the sake of moving it
No you don't. You only think that this is why you are doing it. You can't initiate action on your own. It is entirely driven from outside forces.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:Belief in free will or in materialism is a choice (or perhaps the outcome of the total reinforcement contingencies). It is not something that can be determined by science or rationality.
I'd add the caveat "at this time." Assuming we could actually observe, record, and recreate all of the physical processes involved in making a choice we may be able to determine that scientifically. However, that may never be possible to do.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:I'd add the caveat "at this time." Assuming we could actually observe, record, and recreate all of the physical processes involved in making a choice we may be able to determine that scientifically
Yeah, I threw that in in an immediate edit.
edit: I think it is important to note that the barriers here are not ones of incomplete knowledge or lack of precision, but of a theoretical order. It is, with our current understanding, theoretically impossible to apply science to this question.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
"No you don't. You only think that this is why you are doing it. You can't initiate action on your own. It is entirely driven from outside forces. "
I kind of said that later in the post.
In fact, the specific outside force was you discussing this thing.
But it's a useful shorthand to say "I decided to".
Of course, remember that the brain is not one single thing, but a collection of many different parts, all with different specific goals, or different tasks. Reading your post made me think about it, and cuased the part of my brain in control of such things to decide to move my hand, observing it and calculating the nature of itself.
Posted by Threads (Member # 10863) on :
quote:Originally posted by MrSquicky:
quote:The brain is complex, and makes many calculations, has many choices to make. It can decide things, but how is that beyond perception?
In a completely materialistic universe, the brain makes no choices. It merely responds to stimuli in a completely deterministic manner. Any perception of choice is an epiphenomenon.
Thats not necessarily true because there are non-deterministic aspects to our universe. Our brain could theoretically make use of such phenomena though we have no evidence that it does. The possibility cannot be ruled out, however, because we have so little knowledge on what makes us conscious in the first place.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
Which aspects were those again, Threads?
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
Just out of curiousity, I'd be interested in hearing from people how they think 'choice' differs from 'weighted random selection'.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:Our brain could theoretically make use of such phenomena though we have no evidence that it does.
And that brings up another somewhat unsettling possibility - that rather than being strictly driven by circumstances or choosing freely, that our choices are at least in part probabilistic events, driven by internal random number generators.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:Thats not necessarily true because there are non-deterministic aspects to our universe. Our brain could theoretically make use of such phenomena though we have no evidence that it does.
It would be possible for the brain's functioning to not be deterministic in this case. It could not, however, be said to choose anything.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:Originally posted by fugu13: Just out of curiousity, I'd be interested in hearing from people how they think 'choice' differs from 'weighted random selection'.
Well, in a deterministic universe, pseudorandom is the best you'll get.
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
"And that brings up another somewhat unsettling possibility - that rather than being strictly driven by circumstances or choosing freely, that our choices are at least in part probabilistic events, driven by internal random number generators. "
That would actually totally make sense, honestly. Cool.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:Just out of curiousity, I'd be interested in hearing from people how they think 'choice' differs from 'weighted random selection'.
Intentionality, I guess.
Posted by Threads (Member # 10863) on :
quote:Originally posted by 0Megabyte: Which aspects were those again, Threads?
Everything to do with quantum mechanics
Posted by 0Megabyte (Member # 8624) on :
Oh right!
Posted by Threads (Member # 10863) on :
quote:Originally posted by MrSquicky:
quote:Thats not necessarily true because there are non-deterministic aspects to our universe. Our brain could theoretically make use of such phenomena though we have no evidence that it does.
It would be possible for the brain's functioning to not be deterministic in this case. It could not, however, be said to choose anything.
Ok, yes, I guess you're right.
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
Ah yes, intentionality. Could you define that specifically as it would allow us to distinguish between the two, please?
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Let's be clear, though: A brain that does A instead of B because an electron, when tested, decides that it has spin up and not down is exactly as free-willed as a brain which does A instead of B because the classic electrical potential had built up in neuron Z. It may be unpredictable, but you cannot possibly argue that it is making actual choices.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:You can't initiate action on your own. It is entirely driven from outside forces.
I think that it is this perception that makes people like Tres (and, to some extent, Squicky) insist on qualia: the belief that in a deterministic universe, people have no freedom.
But this misses the point. In a deterministic universe of sufficient granularity, "people" are a fiction, and "freedom" a fiction that operates at the same level. To a random "person," their decisions are "free." It's only when those "people" are viewed on another level of granularity that the factors determining their behavior are identified.
I don't believe that this cheapens the human experience in any way. I suspect that people who stomp their feet and insist that qualia exist probably do. Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
quote:I think that it is this perception that makes people like Tres (and, to some extent, Squicky) insist on qualia: the belief that in a deterministic universe, people have no freedom.
I can't speak for Squicky, but this is not true for me.
On the matter of freedom, I think choice should be deterministic. I like to think I don't make my choices randomly. I like to think I choose to do the right thing, which in turn is determined by factors. So to me, free choice and determinism are not a contradiction; they go hand in hand.
As for qualia, the reason I insist qualia exists is because it is logically necessitated by the fact that I experience things. The only way I could believe otherwise would be to basically lie to myself and tell myself I don't experience anything when I know I do. It would much like trying to convince myself squares were actually circles. Even if the wider intellectual community were able to confuse themselves enough that they believed squares were circles, it would still be clear at least to me that squares by definition cannot be circles.
As for why I insist qualia is important, it is because all meaningfulness is derived from qualia, in my view. Anyone who seriously applied metaphysical materialism to everyday life would find it to be horribly, ridiculously, even impossibly impractical. It would be like those scenes from the Matrix where you only see 1's and 0's. You could find patterns in those 1's and 0's and you might even be able to absolutely predict what numbers would come next, but they mean absolutely nothing until you convert them into sights, sounds, smells, feelings, and other experiences. You could function mechanically under such a model since you could predict what numbers come next, but it wouldn't mean anything at all to you. (Fortunately nobody actually follows materialism in their everyday lives. Nobody walks up to a tree and conceives of it only as abstract atoms collected together. Nobody touches a burning hot stove and calmly thinks "my molecules are undergoing a reaction." I don't even think you could if you tried. We are forced to see the meaning of things, at least in everyday life - that's just how we are built. But when we invent abstract theories about the nature of the universe, we are capable of ignoring that meaning. And when we do so I think it ends up confusing us.) That's why I consider the issue of qualia to be important, rather than just some irrelevant phenomenon.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Tres, qualia when applied in that way are merely syntactical filters. And I do believe in those, as long as they're treated as properties of personal context and not fundamental objects with real existence in the universe.
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
I'm not sure what you mean by "merely syntactical filters". But I'd argue Qualia actually seems much more likely to be real than physical matter if our test for real existence is "having an observable effect." This is because we can directly observe the effect that qualia has upon us, since it occurs in our own mind. When you experience a shock of pain and your hand shoots away from the burning oven, you KNOW for certain that the pain has had an effect on you. In contrast, we can only observe the effects of physical matter indirectly. It is possible the stove caused you to feel that pain, or it is possible the stove wasn't burning and the pain came from your mind; it is unclear whether or not the effect actually came from the stove. (In fact you could just be dreaming about a burning hot stove, and there might not be any material stove there at all!)
Posted by twinky (Member # 693) on :
I haven't given much thought to "deep" stuff lately, I've kind of been on strike for the summer, but at the back of my mind I've been [mulling over] the statement: "Consciousness is the brain's way of estimating what it thinks it did."
I'm still not sure how I feel about it.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:This is because we can directly observe the effect that qualia has upon us, since it occurs in our own mind.
Qualia have no effect; that's one of the reasons they're not real. They are metaphors that are used to describe effects.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
Qualia affect me for sure. I'm getting very sleepy from this discussion about it Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Ah. But our discussion of qualia is making you sleepy. And if "sleepy" were a real thing, as opposed to a semantic description of something real, then qualia would be worth talking about. Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
*zzzz*
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
quote:And if "sleepy" were a real thing, as opposed to a semantic description of something real, then qualia would be worth talking about.
What is this "something real" that "sleepy" is a semantic description of, if not the qualitative experience of feeling sleepy?
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
The quantitative experience of sleepiness.
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
And what is that???
A quantity of something with no qualities is essentially nothing. Three bananas that can't be seen, touched, felt, or experienced in any way and which influence nothing other than other things that can't be seen, touched, felt, or experienced in any way is as good as zero bananas.
A trillion atoms sitting silently in some universe all by themselves is the equivalent of nothing if nobody is or ever will be around to experience anything out of them. That's because atoms themselves are just abstractions, they have no meaning other than their ability to explain the existence and functioning of larger, perceptible objects. They would exist, yes. But they wouldn't exist AS anything. That's that universe materialism proposes, I think - one where stuff exists, but isn't anything.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:Three bananas that can't be seen, touched, felt, or experienced in any way and which influence nothing other than other things that can't be seen, touched, felt, or experienced in any way is as good as zero bananas.
On this point, we agree. Where we disagree is whether "experience" -- or even "sense" -- is in fact something concrete. The ultimate flaw in the "qualia" argument is that it's totally irrelevant: a universe in which qualia "exist" is indistinguishable from a universe in which they are merely metaphorical.
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I'm not sure what the text of the attempt said or by what criteria it was found to be fradulant. Thanks again Matt.