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I have no idea what that even means. Which, I'm not entirely sure was unexpected.
I think you're implying that I can't embrace the miraculous. In which case, you've got the wrong person. And, for that matter, are not being particularly respectful to the many, many Christians who don't believe in literal creationism.
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If you are going to make the leap of faith and accept the Ressurection. Then, it is a logically consistent path to follow to expect to find the miraculous elsewhere. In the Ressurection we are asked to believe something that doesn't make sense, from any other human experience.
Once you agree to one miraculous proposition in the Bible, and that the Bible is the inerrant Word of God accepting other miraculous propositions logically follow. The question is how far you take it. Applying faith in the miraculous to the belief in 7-day literal creation is really not even taking that proposition to its true extreme.
A good part of the Creationist movement, generates momentum, not from evolutionists, but from the theologians that deny the miraculous, physical ressurection of Christ. Evolution is viewed as a slippery slope to the denial of the miraculous (even if it doesn't have to be)
quote:Originally posted by BannaOj: Squick, I don't think you are a bad person. However, your method of communication, is one that would cause most of the fundamentalist Christians that I know to disregard you before you said more than a few sentences.
[QUOTE] You can find more inconsistencies in the accounts of who saw Jesus when after his ressurection than you have in the first two chapters of Genesis.
Well, one guy names Jospeh Atwill interpretted that, in his book "Ceaser's Messiah", like this:
1. There is no history providence of the NT, beyond the letters that the first of the Biblical authors claimed where written years earlier, but which have never been dated to find out, some occurances of the name Jesus in Roman records (which was a name as common among Jews as it is in Mexico today), mentions of messiahs, which where crawling out of the wood work back then, and the Bible itself.
2. The progression of events and places in the Bible exacly mirrors the places and events in Josephus Flavius' history of the campaign of Titus Flavius. Example: Same lake and same sequence as in the Bible - Jesus, "I will make you fishers of men.", Titus, "Use your nets and spears to fish those Jewish rebels out of the lake."
3. Jospehus was an adopted member, originally Jewish and disillusioned about the militaristic stance of the Jewish nation and its waiting for the messiah prophicied in the book of David, which was a **military** messiah, not Christ.
4. Romans often wrote plays and other works in ways that on the surface have one meaning, but where if you know the Cypher, mean something else entirely. This can include works that cleverly hide who is doing what, until you puzzle out how the characters are connected. One possible example - In Josephus' history there is the mention that Mary is used like we do Jane Doe, or like some names where used in WWII to refer to certain women. As a generic term to mean, "Some Jewish woman."
5. The earliest forms of the NT have specific words used to describe "when" the events happened. Specifically, words that can precisely describe: "Before sunrise", "At first light", "As the sun crests the horizon", "Early morning" and "Mid morning", if interpretted in their strictest form.
His conclusion was that the resurrection wasn't describing the same events, but a series of events, with emotionally overwhelmed and superstitious people confusing each other for angels and spirits, after the first mary got lost in the dark, came across the wrong tomb and concluded that the messiah had arisen. This connects directly with a similar removal of someone from a tomb, reported with similar following events, in Josephus' history. Only in that case, the empty tomb was a result of them taking the body from it.
Interestingly enough, I was watching a special a few days ago on TV, which showed various murals about the ressurection. One of them, instead of showing the modern version of the story, shows Jesus' followers *carrying* his body from the tomb. Oops!
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quote:Applying faith in the miraculous to the belief in 7-day literal creation is really not even taking that proposition to its true extreme.
You're not addressing what was said then. I didn't say at any point that there is no reason to believe in literal creationism because it couldn't of happened because miraculous things don't happen (check out all the negatives in that puppy). What I said was that the two stories described are logically mutually exclusive and that there is no compelling reason in the Gospells to get the idea that they have to be literally true. Jesus doesn't say that they are true. His message is not altered in the slightest whether the accounts are literally true or not.
What you provided doesn't actually refer to anything specific. You could say that believing that Adam had the ability to fly is not beyond the limits of the miraculous things in the Bible. That doesn't change that fact that there is no reason to believe that he did and plenty of reasons to believe that he didn't.
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Thanks for the exchange. You are quite correct in pointing out that I failed to offer an alternative set of root definitions. I would have thought that "self" could be an agreed-upon conceptual defintion, and, then, that an intentioned action (kinda redundant) could be judged and labelled with the appropriate "ish" and "less". What you showed, was that the common usage of those terms was far from the logical linguistical one - that, right down to the dictionary definition, they are contingent.
And that's cool.
Not as cool as actually posing a question well, and then solving it, but almost.
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Who knows, maybe Cthulhu farted and created the world ? And we are all going mad in his dreaming.
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Pretty odd how we were discussing evolution, and now we've ended up discussing the Bible.
Sort of like how when ID theorists tried to get involved in the science standards, they kept trying to add the word "unguided" into the standards for evolution (without explaining if it was meant in a metaphysical absolute sense, or a limited process sense), against the objections of many of the scientists. Then, later on, they started complaining that the standards referred to evolution as unguided, apparently forgetting that it was their own allies who insisted it be there in order to caricature evolution as an anti-religious dogma.
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quote:Pretty odd how we were discussing evolution, and now we've ended up discussing the Bible.
Not odd at all to those familiar with the forum.
quote:Sort of like how when ID theorists tried to get involved in the science standards, they kept trying to add the word "unguided" into the standards for evolution (without explaining if it was meant in a metaphysical absolute sense, or a limited process sense), against the objections of many of the scientists. Then, later on, they started complaining that the standards referred to evolution as unguided, apparently forgetting that it was their own allies who insisted it be there in order to caricature evolution as an anti-religious dogma.
It's fairly insulting to suggest that this was done as part of some master plan.
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It's a fact, how can it be "insulting?" The term was added into the standards by ID proponents, over the objections of scientists. Then Dembski's people started harping on it's prescence in the standards, apparently forgetting who put it there.
That's pretty embarrasing. But it's not me being insulting: it's me pointing out how ID people often try to frame the debate to heighten the apparent conflict between religion and science.
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Sorry, the "this" I referred to was the diversion of the thread into a discussion of the Bible.
"pointing out how ID people often try to frame the debate to heighten the apparent conflict between religion and science" in connection with the diversion to the new topic is what was fairly insulting.
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The point is that as much as people assert that it isn't their religious beliefs that make them question certain facts, we always anyway end up debating the Bible and all sorts of brain-in-a-jar philosophies. But a discussion on the intricacies of music theory isn't going to end up debating Biblical literalism. What this suggests is that the preoccupation with singling out biology for assault has a lot more to do with Biblical beliefs then people seem to think.
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It might interest you to know that the primary people who have been talkin about the Bible are not "ID people."
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Jeepers Creepers, folks. I just read 'Forbidden Archeology's Impact' regarding the age of mankind. The author, Michael Cremo argues that contrary to popular scientific beleif, mankind is millions of years old.
Of course, to understand such novel ideas, one must immerse themselves in vedanta and Hindu idiologies regarding the Kalpas (or ages of mankind), the Hindus believe that we are in the year 5,000 of a Kali Yuga (or age of Kali) that will last many hundreds of millions of years.
Cremo has ample evidence to prove his point, which kind of proves my point... Folks gather round the wagons when it comes to philosophy and modern biology (and all it's subsciences like anthropology) is ultimately a philosophical point of view based on empirical evidence that can only be observed by a limited scope (the scope of modern science).
It is absurd to discuss the Bible scientifically. The book is a book on ethics and philosophy. It is also absurd to discuss scientific creationism because empirical evidence is certainly against a 'person' making the whole universe.
Now, if we take the science-fiction view, all things are possible and suddenly we are not strapped to narrow scientific approach. Thus, we can safely roam among the gods, looking for deeper answers to our existencial questions. But to teach science-fiction instead of science is a dangerous thing if one wants to train scientists.
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BTW, if you happen to know the person who made the universe, please tell him or her that I am very sorry, but that scientific evidence suggests that he or she does not exist.
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Actually, for an interesting argument in support of the claim that God/creator can be proven scientifically, see this essay by SF writer Robert J. Sawyer. I also recommend his book Calculating God.
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>Folks gather round the wagons when it comes to philosophy and modern biology >(and all it's subsciences like anthropology) is ultimately a philosophical point >of view based on empirical evidence that can only be observed by a limited scope> (the scope of modern science). > >It is absurd to discuss the Bible scientifically.
No its not. Such an argument amounts to, "We will believe any acheological evidence that suggests its true, but reject the stuff that doesn't.", the same with everything else. Before you start babbling about limited scope, you first have to define what those limits really are, based on something other than, "My mommy taught me to believe in ghosts, and I think I saw one some time." There is a saying in the computer industry, Garbage in, Garbage out. The human brain invents excuses for what it percieves *after* the fact. If you don't have sufficient knowledge or enough data to come up with correct conclusions, instead of coming up with "no" conclusion, like a computer would, you instead come up with ones that fit, however nebulously and in-exact, what you do know.
Worse, its is possible to induce malfunctions that produce false perceptions, feelings of paranoia, visions, the sense of ghostly presences in a room, feelings of oneness with the universe and everything and anything that people call spiritual. I.e., you can use empirically provable conditions to create experiences that supposedly fall outside the "scope" of empirical study. That right their should shoot holes in the entire idea that such things are outside of the scope of science.
Heck, to use your own science fiction example, the stories behind Battle Star Galactica or Star Gate SG-1 are more internally consistent than the religions they derive most of their stories from. Taken to the most logical conclusion, if such things are describable, they must be possible, so therefor there must be Goa'uld hidding out their some place. This is the fundimental problem with not discussing the Bible scientifically. Someone some place *is*, to try to prove it really happened. And unlike true scientists, they apply acheology, history, geology, etc. exactly the same way they apply religion itself, by picking and choosing when, what and how it applies. Your basically saying that even if they *found* the Summerian kings tomb that gave rise to the Noah myth, and found in that tomb evidence both of the actual events, the real boat *and* some mention that the predicessors of the Jewish faith talked to the guy, that would be irrelevant, because religion lies outside the scope of science.
First you have to prove that there is something outside of the known universe, not just imagine there is, then you can talk about how or if science fails to address it. Otherwise, its no more valid to argue that science can't adress some fundimental underpinning of the Bible than it is to argue that science can't quantify some underlying "truth" in Tolkien's works, or the legend of Zues.
Heck, one at least as rediculous argument recently involved the idea that black holes produce baby universes and that the reason intelligence exists in the universe if because the universe itself is an intelligent life form, which breeds more universes. It makes at least as much sense as God, suggests some scientific basis for how it all happened, etc. Of course, he also both quotes something Hawkings said, while completely failing to take into account Hawkings radiation, which proves that over time black holes evaporate, not spawn new universes. Point is, even before the rules of science where codified, people have been insisting that the very next thing over the horizon can "never" be proven, tested or examined by science. The only thing that this has been true for is a) religion, and b) known fiction. For me, I don't quite see the point of insisting the two are completely seperate things. Some people even go a step farther off the deep end and insist they really are the same things, but that the religion in them negates any fictitious aspect, e.g. Scientologists.
When you insist that X is untouchable and unchallengable, you not only create a blind spot in your own understanding, you start supplanting anything you find hard to understand or inconvenient with X, instead of looking for real answers. Like Behe, who, unwilling to understand "why" or "how" something developed, would rather claim it never did. History can be very interesting too, but there is hardly any point to trying to understand how the Jews got from A to Z, if someone insists that B through Y never happened and everything in their official version must be true. Then you get Christians that come along and do the same thing, by tacking even less provable stuff onto what everyone already insists should never be questioned.
A thousand years from now there will probably be some branch with their own fiction of the war of ID vs. evolution that insist they have proof God did it, and all the archeological evidence is just misinterpreted or lies, and they will have a book to prove it.
Hmm. Heard of Robert J. Sawyer.. Wasn't that the guy whose entire book was summed up in an equation you could plug some numbers in and get anything from the probability that God existed being 0% to 100%, all with no solid grounds to define what the right answer to any part was. Can do the same thing with the tooth fairy and I am sure children would come up with 90%+ odds of that existing too. lol
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quote:Originally posted by Kagehi: Hmm. Heard of Robert J. Sawyer.. Wasn't that the guy whose entire book was summed up in an equation you could plug some numbers in and get anything from the probability that God existed being 0% to 100%, all with no solid grounds to define what the right answer to any part was. Can do the same thing with the tooth fairy and I am sure children would come up with 90%+ odds of that existing too. lol
Did you read the Essay? I don't think Robert Sawyer is the guy you are referring to, and the analysis most certainly does not apply to the tooth fairy. Why don't you actually read the essay and judge it on its own terms.
[ February 20, 2006, 03:34 PM: Message edited by: David G ]
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Ok, I must have been thinking of someone else. There is a creationist out there with a similarly titled book who tried to invent an equation to determine the "likelihood that god exists".
However, with all due respect to Sawyer, whether or not science proves parallel universes or not, that won't prove any sort of God. Why? Well, the same science has dug up evidence that strongly suggests a) the early universe didn't have the same physical laws as now, b) they shifted a lot between then and now, and c) evidence suggests that those laws are "still" shifting, albeit at a rate so slow that most of the stars in the universe will burn out long before things like gravity show more than a 0.00000001% varience, or something like that. We are in the equivalent of a warm period in the universe, at some point thousands of billions of years from now we will likely end up with the universes equivalent of an ice age, while a few hundred billion ago the entire universe went through the equivalent of planet wide volcanism. Neither the universal volcanism or ice age are conducive to life. Forgive me if I got the numbers way off.
The only amazing thing is that the "livable" period will be such a huge span of time. It could have just as easilly been a few million years, or ten second. But the argument being made is basically one of some guy on a beach in the Carrabean saying, "I have heard of ice and volcanos, but never seen either. God must have made this place so water can't freeze and volcanos never happen." Umm, no.. Its simply that humans themselves might be extinct long before the drift in the physical laws render life impossible and we where not around when they drifted enough to allow it in the first place. The same science that this guy says will prove God by default, if there are no parallel universes, says "life wasn't always possible, and eventually it won't be again, we are just lucky to evolve near the 'start' of the period it is possible in, instead of near the end."
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The physical laws critical to Sawyer's analysis are the strength of the "strong nuclear force," the property of water such that it expands when freezing, and water's high surface tension. Is there any scientific evidence that these particular physical laws or properties are, or have been, shifting over time?
If the laws of the universe have been changing, and continue to change over time, such that there will be a near infinitie number of physical laws as they pertain, say, to the strong nuclear force and the properties of water, then for purposes of Sawyer's analysis, this would be no different than having an infinite number of universes.
However, if these particular laws are relatively static, or if there are not a near infinite number of variations, then the fact that our universe is changing would not alter the odds of our universe possessing these essential life-generating properties, which odds happen to be only 1 in 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000.
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Sigh.. Hard to argue with that sort of logic. The key point is that such drift, assuming all such properties are in fact interconnected, doesn't require some magic sky faerie with a screw driver "tweaking" it to fit, any more than ice melts because someone intentionally sits there and adjusts the temperature of a fire by 1/10000000th of a degree until it does, instead of just letting the heat radiate. Its an argument of, "I just can't comprehend such numbers, so it must be impossible!" No, its just unimaginably unlikely and no "less" likely than any single grain of sand having a unique shape. I hate arguments from incomprehension...
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Sawyer's argument, as I understand it, is premised in the belief that the universe was either randomly/arbitrarily constructed (no God) or constructed by an intelligent designer (God) who tweaked the properties of the universe to make life possible. If there is only a 1 in 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 chance that the universe possesses the various properties that make life possible, then it is more likely that the universe was constructed by an intelligent designer.
According to Sawyer, therefore, "[t]hose kinds of odds virtually demand the conclusion that someone did indeed tweak the parameters, carefully fine-tuning the universe's design."
How is this an "argument from incomprehension"? I don't think I understood your last post, Kagehi.
My children play with blocks with the various letters of the alphabet on them (one letter per block). They are usually scattered around the floor when they are done playing. But if I come into the room and find all of the blocks neatly arranged from A to Z, which is more likely: ONE - that they were randomly distributed throughout the floor and by chance they fell in order neatly arranged, or TWO - that someone with intelligence purposefully laid them out in order neatly arranged.
Now use the same example, but there are numbered blocks, with every number laid out from 1 to 10 to the 39th power. If you find them all neatly arranged in order, would you conclude that it was random or intelligently designed?
Another example: you hear a piano playing Mozart's "Emperor Concerto." What is more likely, that somebody is randomly hitting the keys or that someone is purposefully playing the piano with the intent to produce specific music? Is concluding that the latter has occurred an "argument from incomprehension"?
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This is quite a bit like the puddle saying "look how well I fit into my hole in the ground - it must have been designed especially for me!" It's true that we rely on water's properties for the kind of life we have; it is not true that this is the only possible form of life. Sawyer simply waves his hands and says "If X weren't so, we wouldn't be alive", which may or may not be true, but he has not demonstrated that some different lifeform wouldn't be. As for the strong nuclear force, his argument is, um, a little silly; if it were weaker, stars would contract more and still burn; were it stronger, stars would not contract as much (for the same amount of heat) - and still burn.
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quote:Originally posted by King of Men: This is quite a bit like the puddle saying "look how well I fit into my hole in the ground - it must have been designed especially for me!"
Is Sawyer's argument more consistent with my example of numbered blocks being laid out from 1 to 10 to the 39th power, or your example of water filling a hole in the ground? The physics of water flowing into a hole makes it probable for water to the fill hole randomly, as opposed to it having to be intelligently designed that way. But the likelihood that the blocks would randomly fall in order is very improbable.
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: It's true that we rely on water's properties for the kind of life we have; it is not true that this is the only possible form of life. Sawyer simply waves his hands and says "If X weren't so, we wouldn't be alive", which may or may not be true, but he has not demonstrated that some different lifeform wouldn't be.
Sawyer's argument addresses the likelihood not only that life would exist in this universe, but also the following: the existence of planets, the continued existence of the universe beyond the first few minutes after the big bang, and even the existence of multi-proton atoms (without which the only element in the universe would be hydrogen). For Sawyer's argument to be valid, must he first prove that there could be no life in a universe that exists for a few minutes, without planets, and with hydrogen as the only element?
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: As for the strong nuclear force, his argument is, um, a little silly; if it were weaker, stars would contract more and still burn; were it stronger, stars would not contract as much (for the same amount of heat) - and still burn.
I think you are confusing Sawyer's argument concerning the strong nuclear force for his argument concerning gravity. The strong nuclear force must be precisely what it is. Otherwise, there would be no multiproton atoms. Gravity has to be precisely what it is. Otherwise, planets would not form. I'm not sure how that argument is silly.
[ February 22, 2006, 02:07 PM: Message edited by: David G ]
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No, they need to be precisely what they are for "our" universe to exist. Its not impossible for some other circumstances to allow for one to exist that is different. Heck, just an anti-matter universe, where protons and electrons are reversed, is *possible*, and we can even create small amounts of it, which remains stable, as long as it in a vacuum and suspended where it won't bump into any normal matter. And I meant "incrudulity", I just couldn't think of the right term at the time.
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In any case, this is all pretty irrelevant to the situation anyway. The question of how, what or why something did or didn't create anything is *not* an issue that we can answer at this point and from the stand point of good science, saying someone with a screw driver tweaked things billions of years ago doesn't change *now* in any way. The problem is people that insist what we know about now is irrelevent, because it somehow contradicts the idea of the guy with the screw driver still being around and making sure it all still works, for which there is no evidence at all. We have wandered from stuff that has some critical consequences for science into stuff that amounts to, "Yeah, but what effect does any of that have on the real world, even if its true, since there is no evidence of "current" tweaking of that sort?"
Frankly, I don't have much problem with Deists, who like many of the founding fathers, don't insist that their magic sky faery is looking over everyone's shoulder and tweaking the world to fit humans, in complete contradiction to things like.. Global warming, lethal diseases, famine, drought, tornados, hurricanes, tsunamis, the very high odds of another planet killer asteroid being out there... Well, you get the point. lol
Short of finding more direct evidence, all "not" finding evidence of alternate universes really does is make us possibly lucky, it doesn't prove anything else.
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With all due respect, Kagehi, I don't think I understand your point.
Are you saying that a universe full of planets and multi-proton atoms would be just as likely to exist as our universe without the strong nuclear force and gravity being exactly what they are? If this is your position, then perhaps your belief in the possibility that such a universe could exist is less probable than the possibility that an intelligent designer created our universe.
Sawyer's argument centers around mathematical probabilities. If there is only one universe, then the probability of life existing in the universe randomly (as opposed to the universe being intelligently designed) is exceedingly unlikely. (As an aside, the term "intelligently designed" has nothing do whatsoever with the term "intelligent design" as used in the evolution debate.)
Also, what is "incrudulity"?
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quote:Originally posted by Kagehi: Short of finding more direct evidence, all "not" finding evidence of alternate universes really does is make us possibly lucky, it doesn't prove anything else.
The odds are 1 in 10 to the 39th power. That's pretty darn lucky. Perhaps that kind of luck is indistinguishable from God. More importantly, when science faces odds like that, it does more than just chalk it up to luck.
I understand that Sawyer's argument does not prove God's intervention in the world today. The point simply is that perhaps there is a place for science when it comes to thinking about God.
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Let's assume that the odds of a universe being friendly to life are really 1 in 10 ^ 39 against; and let us also assume that there is just one universe. In this scenario, would science have shown that there is a God?
No!
The reason is simple, and is tied to the nature of explanation. If we were to infer that their was a God because of the long odds against there being a life friendly universe, we would be invoking God by inference to the best explanation. So, for science to show that there is a God, it would need to show that "God created" was a better explanation than "it just happened".
We can get a better handle on this by considering what makes an explanation good. Various rules of thumb exist, eg, a good explanation is simple, but what they boil down to is, a good explanation is more probable than the alternatives. Specifically, if the probability of the explanation being true times the probability of the phenomena existing given that the explanation is true is greater than the independant probability of phenomena existing, then the explanation is good. In symbols, p(E) x p(P|E) > p(P|~E).
Now, if you have a look at our scenario, it gives us a very good reason to think that "it just happened" is a bad explanation. But it gives us no reason to think that "God created" is a good one. Specifically, it involves no calculation or estimate of the probability that God exists, and no calculation or estimate of the probability that God would create a life friendly universe if s/he did exist. Consequently it gives us no reason to think that "God created" is a better, or a worse, explanation than "it just happened".
This indicates that the explanation that "God created" simply cannot be a matter of science on current data. It may well not be a matter of science in principle, in that in principle it may be impossible to generate a scientific calculation of the probability that God exists, or of his or her motives if s/he does. It may simply come down to a matter of arational faith. Do you subjectively believe that it is very likely there is a God? Well then, by faith you accept that "God created" is a good explanation. Do you subjectively think a the existence of God is an unlikely hypothesis? Then by faith you think that "It just happened" is a better explanation.
Does this mean that, in this scenario, people who reject the existence of God are being peculiarly dogmatic? No. Odds of 1 in 10^39 against are small potatoes in the world of probability. The odds that a group of transistors and diodes will form a circuit capable of implementing a chess program are far longer than 1 in 10^ 39 against. The odds of an electronic circuit being capable of implementing "Windows" are longer by several hundred (if not thousand) orders of magnitude).
I know of two methods to attempt to estimate the probability of there being a God. The first claims to be science, but is not. It is Dembski's "Law of Conservation of Information" which asserts that Complex Specified Information is conserved. That means that the CSI of the creator must be at least as great as the CSI of the universe. As "complexity" by Dembski's definition is just the inverse of probability, then by the "Law of the Conservation of Information" the probability of the Creator must be equal to or less than the probability of the thing created. That is, if Dembski's Law was valid (it is not), then "God created" is necessarilly a worse explanation than "It just happened".
The other way is explicitly philosophical (but not religious, and not scientific). It assumes that the minimum complexity of a God is equal to or greater than the minimum complexity of a full Artificial Intelligence. This assumption can be motivated, but not proven. That is, I can give you good reasons to accept that it is true, but they do not amount to logical proof, or even proof on ballance of probability. In contrast, the contrary assumption cannot even be "motivated" as that term is understood by philosophers.
Using this estimate, it is clear that the probability of a God existing is much, much less than 1 in 10^39 against. So, even if we had scientific evidence that a life friendly universe is very improbable, and that there was only one universe, we would not have a scientific reason to believe that there was a creator; and if that was our only evidence, we would have a (weak) philosophical reason to believe that there was not a creator.
[ February 22, 2006, 07:27 PM: Message edited by: Tom Curtis ]
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Strong force : As written, Sawyer's thesis is, um, misleading, to put it kindly. OK, you can certainly adjust the strong force such that only helium exists, but to call the required adjustment 'slight' is to stretch the word rather out of shape. Likewise for making it weaker; and in this case, you can in any case adjust the electromagnetic force strength to compensate, which opens up a whole new universe of parameter space. I am willing to bet that this alone reduces that 10^39 by several orders of magnitude.
Incidentally, I'm deeply suspicious of that number. To get a probability of life being possible, you need to establish some range of parameter space in which it is (a tricky exercise in itself, because of the unknown-lifeforms argument I gave above), and then divide that colume by the whole possible volume. And how do you establish what the maximum value of any parameter is? Plain hand-waving, is how. The accurate statement of the problem, then, is that the probability is either zero (that is, some finite range divided by infinity) or else undefined (one infinity divided by another, with no information on how the limits behave.) The former is absurd; while the latter doesn't sell any books. Ten to 39 is just ridiculous, and possibly dishonest.
Which brings me neatly to my next point :
quote:Sawyer's argument addresses the likelihood not only that life would exist in this universe, but also the following: the existence of planets, the continued existence of the universe beyond the first few minutes after the big bang, and even the existence of multi-proton atoms (without which the only element in the universe would be hydrogen). For Sawyer's argument to be valid, must he first prove that there could be no life in a universe that exists for a few minutes, without planets, and with hydrogen as the only element?
In a word, yes. Who knows what kind of complex molecules you can make out of quarks, if their density is high enough? Protons, after all, are hardly the only kind of particles out there, as I should well know. Trust me on this, there are all kinds of analogies to chemistry that occur with the strong force, and these are incredibly much more rapid than the electromagnetic interactions that drive our kind of life. A few minutes could well be enough to produce lifeforms. In addition, since we are allowed to mess around with the fundamental parameters here, you can make the speed of light arbitrarily high; this, as Einstein will tell you, has all kinds of interesting effects on time, and can stretch those few minutes into what would seem, even to us, to be - well, any number you like, really.
And this is just playing around with the forces we already know about! Add forces that are cubic, one-over-r^1.5, exponential, sinusoidal, act in only two dimensions, universes with five or ten or 66.3 dimensions (ask a mathematician about that one)... The possibilities are endless. I mean, literally endless. The problem with these kind of probability arguments is that they are, bluntly, lacking in imagination to the point of utter, screaming dullness. People play around with one or two variables, and think they have discovered the end of variation! Simplifying a problem is all very well, but really, this isn't just removing air resistance - you've removed the actual cannonball that made the problem interesting in the first place!
Posts: 10645 | Registered: Jul 2004
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I cannot speak for Robert Sawyer, nor am I best equipped to defend his position, but here's my best shot.
In response to Tom Curtis: If there is only 1 universe and the odds of a life friendly universe are 1 in 10^39 against, then I see only two possible (logical) alternatives. Either the universe just happened (random creation), or it was created (intelligently designed). In other words, the opposite of, or only alternative to, "it just happened randomly" is that "it didn't just happen randomly." And if "it didn't just happen randomly," then what possibly did happen? The only logical explanation for a universe that did not just happen randomly is that some intelligent entity deliberately created the universe. Are there any other logical alternatives? I am genuinely interested in knowing whether you can conceive of any.
If you accept that there are only two possible alternatives (random creation v. intelligent creation), then would not logically the high improbability of one alternative render the other alternative probable? If there is a 1 in 4 chance that you draw a diamond from a deck of cards, it is necessarily the case that there is a 3 in 4 chance that you draw a heart, club or spade.
In response to King of Men: First: I am not a scientist and cannot defend the odds which, according to Robert Sawyer, were computed by Cosmologist Paul Davies. When I have time, I will try to research his work. In the meantime, 1 in 10^39 odds is beyond comprehension improbable. I don't think Sawyer's argument is undermined signficantly if we change the odds to 1 in 10^29 or 1 in 10^19. This is especially true if, in fact, there only are two alternatives for the creation of the universe (random creation or intelligent creation).
Second: I don't think you can successfully argue against the existence of an intelligent creator by establishing that life is possible/probable in any universe, no matter how it is constructed. Life is so incredibly complex. Would not the probability that life (and all of its complexity) randomly arises from any universe, no matter how elemental or exotic, still be incredibly low? In other words: that life is probable in any and every universe is, in and of itself, highly improbable.
EDIT: That life is probable AND RANDOM in any and every universe (no matter how exotic) is, in and of itself, highly improbable.
[ February 23, 2006, 10:45 AM: Message edited by: David G ]
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quote:If you accept that there are only two possible alternatives (random creation v. intelligent creation), then would not logically the high improbability of one alternative render the other alternative probable? If there is a 1 in 4 chance that you draw a diamond from a deck of cards, it is necessarily the case that there is a 3 in 4 chance that you draw a heart, club or spade.
The other logically possible alternatives are that there was no universe at all, or that there was a universe and it was not life friendly. It could very easily be that the odds that a universe just happened, given that it exists are approximately 1, but the odds that it be life friendly are 1 in 10 ^ 39.
Here is a consistent assignment of probalities which make it probable that the universe just happened:
Probability that there is just one universe: 1
Probability that there is a God: 1 in 10 ^ 200
Probability that the universe just happened: 1 - (1 in 10 ^ 200)
Probability that a universe that just happened also just happened to be life friendly: 1 in 10 ^39
Probability that a God would create a life friendly universe: 1
A posteriori probability that the universe just happened, given that we know it is life friendly:
(1- 10^-200) x 10^-39)/((1- 10^-200) x 10^-39) + 10^-200)
which is approximately equal to 1.
These figures are, of course, entirely hypothetical, but it is logically possible that that a life friendly universe just happened given that we live in a life friendly universe is a dead certainty. You just don't know unless you know the other probabilities.
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Tom, with due respect, I still don't understand how there are any more than two alternatives to which we can assign probabilities.
We are assuming 3 fundamental variables to be true: (1) that there is only one universe, (2) that the universe is life friendly, and (3) that the probability of a life friendly universe happening randomly is 1 in 10 ^39. Under these assumptions, either the universe just happened or the universe was intelligently designed.
Given the assumptions we are operating under, you cannot proffer as alternatives that there is no universe or that the universe is not life friendly. Those alternatives are inconsistent with the assumptions. You may, of course, challenge the assumptions. But doing so may be a matter for science (to prove or disprove), which is Sawyer's basic point: perhaps science has a role in the debate.
Under our assumptions there are only two alternatives, and for one (random creation) we have assigned a probability of 1 in 10 ^39. Therefore, the probability for the other alternative (intelligent creation) is (10 ^39 - 1) in 10 ^39. How can you, therefore, consistent with our assumptions, assign a probability of 1 in 10 ^200 that there is a God?
We agree that it is logically possible that a life friendly universe just happened. But if science proves that the odds of such a universe happening randomly is only 1 in 10 ^39, then it is necessarily true that the probability that the universe was not created randomly sky rockets.
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quote:My children play with blocks with the various letters of the alphabet on them (one letter per block). They are usually scattered around the floor when they are done playing. But if I come into the room and find all of the blocks neatly arranged from A to Z, which is more likely: ONE - that they were randomly distributed throughout the floor and by chance they fell in order neatly arranged, or TWO - that someone with intelligence purposefully laid them out in order neatly arranged.
Now use the same example, but there are numbered blocks, with every number laid out from 1 to 10 to the 39th power. If you find them all neatly arranged in order, would you conclude that it was random or intelligently designed?
In the example with the blocks, you know for a certainty that someone with intelligence with the ability to arrange the blocks does in fact exist. With that knowledge, the probability of the arrangement by intelligence is far greater than the arrangement by chance. If the children did not exist, then that dramatically changes your belief of whether it was randomly or intelligently arranged.
In regards to the universe, we don't have that underlying assumption of the existence of some intelligent being, at least scientifically. If an intelligent creator does not in fact exist, then the probability of intelligent creation is significantly less than (10 ^39 - 1) in 10 ^39, basically, zero probability.
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quote:Originally posted by camus: In the example with the blocks, you know for a certainty that someone with intelligence with the ability to arrange the blocks does in fact exist. With that knowledge, the probability of the arrangement by intelligence is far greater than the arrangement by chance. If the children did not exist, then that dramatically changes your belief of whether it was randomly or intelligently arranged.
Again, I am operating under the assumption that there is only 1 of 2 possibilities for how the blocks can be arranged: They were scattered randomly (by whatever force of nature), or they were arranged deliberately by an intelligent being. So if the children did not exist, either some other unknown person got into my house and arranged the blocks, or the improbable occurred - they randomly arranged themselves in order. But the existence of the children does not change the following facts: there are only two alternatives, and one is very improbable.
quote:Originally posted by camus: In regards to the universe, we don't have that underlying assumption of the existence of some intelligent being, at least scientifically. If an intelligent creator does not in fact exist, then the probability of intelligent creation is significantly less than (10 ^39 - 1) in 10 ^39, basically, zero probability.
But if science can prove that there is only one universe, then we can establish, scientifically, the probability that the existence of a life friendly universe occurring randomly is highly improbable. The existence of an intelligent creator, therefore, becomes highly probable - because there is no other logical alternative to a randomly existing universe.
Posts: 195 | Registered: Nov 2005
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Thanks King of Men, that is much more clearly what I was trying to say.
And David.. While I realize I mispelled "incredulity", I am starting the suspect that using "crud" in their instead wasn't far off..
quote:The only logical explanation for a universe that did not just happen randomly is that some intelligent entity deliberately created the universe. Are there any other logical alternatives? I am genuinely interested in knowing whether you can conceive of any.
Hmm.. That maybe something pre-universe as we know it was there and the universe was a direct result for a process from that? I mean the key problem here seems to be that only two options are being allowed for - "The universe is just one of a lot of them." or "It just popped into existence." Frankly, multiple universes doesn't remove God either, if you want to get seriously rediculous about it, but it does obliterate what we *describe* as a god. Then again, one that just made it pop into existence, then went on a lunch break for the rest of creation is also not what we define as a god. Why people find the idea, "Well, my magic sky faery might not be actively doing anything now, but I am sure he/she/it created it all.", as a) useful, b) relevant to anything or c) at all comforting, is beyond me...
However, one possibility not being allowed here is that natural processes in some other place gave rise to this one, with the subsequent loss of the original. Heck, since, as I said, we know that the physical laws shift, and we have no complete understanding of what those shifts actually produce or how they connect to each other, its *possible* that the unverse could become hostile to our life, but form some other, or even that the break down of things like strong nuclear forces might fracture space time in a way that "caused" the dimensions to restructure themselves and produce a new big bang of some sort. We simply don't know and the entire argument about what would, could or was possible under different physical laws, or any calculation that might be derived, assumes we do know what the heck happens in those cases.
I find it ironic that some people reading about the odds would even bring up the usual, "Well, you scientists think you know everything, but you don't know this.", in the same speech about how *they* know that no other kinds of life or universes can exist and they know how all the physical laws interact so completely that they can even makes such a prediction.
And again, science proving that there is only one doesn't do anything for the arbitrary nature of the probabilities being assigned. We would need a) evidence that something exists that can create universes in the first place and b) some concept of what was there "before" this universe existed, to say either that it just appeared somehow, or that anyone had to or could have created it. As several people have pointed out, all you do by suggesting that a God is necessary is apply an added level of complication, based solely on the rediculous assumption that because some religion defined a being that created everything (generall not true of all other religions), it must be a possible explaination.
Well, there are *other* alternatives in other religions, about half of them describing the event as an accident, due to something a completely disinterested and preoccupied being did without specifically intending to create the universe. None of which can be discounted by the standards you have to define the creator, without having evidence of what kind of creation took place. All you have is an assumption that "your" version is correct, not evidence that every other alternative is impossible. Thus by the same logic, one could conclude that its more likely that the creation myths here:
and other places, are at least as likely. Heck, some of them can even be bent to fit some of the theoretical models of universe formation, which the Christian version can't. The first one on that page, involving the Fairy Tradition is almost finctionalization of several multi-universe theories that make ours a fragment of some other larger universe, which got extruded from the original. If we want to talk probabilities, then the odds, of parts of that being true is far higher than a god that can't even get his people to write the correct order for the formation of the planets and the sun, never mind plants and animals, down correctly.
There is also some ancient one involving a serpent or such, which you could bend to describe as a worm hole, etc. Not to mention the Buddhist version, which basically just repeats the Big Bang in mystic terms. Where does the, "God as creator", one at all come even marginally close to having a higher probability than the thousands of far more, albeit probably accidentally, more scientifically accurate stories? I mean, if we really want to talk about which theory is more probable...
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I'm at work and can't really go into the nitty-gritty of a reply, but I do note that an extremely unlikely universe doesn't prove anything at all. It seems quite clear that any creator is going to be still more un-probable, so where did that come from? You've just shoved the problem one step up, in a way that makes you feel better. It doesn't answer any actual questions.
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In an effort to try to find some common ground on this issue, let's break it down like this:
PROPOSITION ONE: Can we agree that one of the following two alternatives are necessarily true and that there are no other alternatives exclusive of these two?
"The universe came into existence randomly/arbitrarily, or the universe did not come into existence randomly/arbitrarily."
PROPOSITION TWO: If you agree with PROPOSITION ONE, can we agree that the following proposition is necessarily true?
"If science proves that the odds of the universe coming into existence randomly/arbitrarily are 1 in 10^39, then the odds of the universe not coming into existence randomly/arbitrarily are (10^39 - 1) in 10^39?"
I would like to see whether we can agree at least on the foregoing propositions. Notice that I am not talking about God - for purposes of evaluating these propositions, let's remove God from the discussion.
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quote:Originally posted by Kagehi: And David.. While I realize I mispelled "incredulity", I am starting the suspect that using "crud" in their instead wasn't far off..
I actually did not make the connection and realize at the time that you mispelled "incredulity," but thought you might be referring to something else, which is a reflection of my occasionally very slow processing speed. I did not mean to condescend, but if it came off that way, I apologize.
I sincerly welcome your staunch opposition to Sawyer's thesis, as well as the opposition argued by TC, KoM, and others. I actually have not yet come to a decision in my own mind about the validity of Sawyer's thesis. But I find it very interesting to think about, and I am defending his position to the best of my ability just to see where the holes in his argument may lie. I am learning from watching this debate unfold.
Posts: 195 | Registered: Nov 2005
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David, your two propositions are necessarilly true and irrelevant to the discussion.
There are several relevant probabilities.
p(R) - the probability that the universe came into existence randomly or arbitrarilly;
p(~R) - the probability that the universe did not come into existence randomly or arbitrarilly;
p(G) - the probability that God created the universe;
p(L) - the probability that the universe is life friendly;
p(L|R) - the probability that the universe is life friendly given that the universe came into existence randomly or arbitrarilly;
p(R|L) - the probability that the universe came into existence randomly or arbitrarilly given that it is life friendly;
p(L|~R) - the probability that the universe is life friendly given that it did not come into existence randomly or arbitrarilly;
p(~R|L) - the probability that the universe did not come into existence randomly or arbitrarilly given that it is life friendly;
p(L|G) - the probability that the universe is life friendly given that God created it; and
p(G|L) - the probability that God created the universe given that it is life friendly.
In probability theory there is a simple theorem, Bayes Theorem, that relates these probabilites. Specifically:
p(R|L) = (p(R) x p(L|R))/p(L) (and equivalents)
We can take this formula further in two ways. We can notice that p(L) = p(L|R) + p(L|~R), so that if we had the relevant probabilities we could go further.
Or, we can recognise that we really don't care about the absolute value of p(R|L), but only its value relative to p(G|L) (or p(~R|L)). Noticing this we can subsitute out p(L) and determine the value of the following inequality, if we have the relevant probabilities.
(p(R) x p(L|R)) ? (p(G) x p(L|G))
Now this is your basic problem, you have a value for p(L|R). It is a very disputable value on a number of grounds, but I don't care about that. Your problem is that you cannot solve any of these formulas without at least two other values, nor the last without at least three other values. As a simple matter of mathematics it cannot be done.
Sawyer's scenario is entertaining because he asks, what if we discover that p(~R) = p(G) = (1 - p(R)). Well, interesting, but it still leaves us two values short for solving either for p(R|L) or the inequality (we still don't know p(L), nor p(R), nor p(L|G)).
Finally, you seem to have the mistaken belief that Davies' estimate is of p(R). It is not. It is explicitly an estimate of p(L|R); ie, the probability that the universe is life friendly given that it follows known physical laws and that the cosmological constants are chosen randomly.
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And, as I mentioned, that estimate is probably nonsense anyway, even within the constraint of following the known laws.
Posts: 10645 | Registered: Jul 2004
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quote:Originally posted by David G: In an effort to try to find some common ground on this issue, let's break it down like this:
PROPOSITION ONE: Can we agree that one of the following two alternatives are necessarily true and that there are no other alternatives exclusive of these two?
"The universe came into existence randomly/arbitrarily, or the universe did not come into existence randomly/arbitrarily."
Ok.
PROPOSITION TWO: If you agree with PROPOSITION ONE, can we agree that the following proposition is necessarily true?
quote:"If science proves that the odds of the universe coming into existence randomly/arbitrarily are 1 in 10^39, then the odds of the universe not coming into existence randomly/arbitrarily are (10^39 - 1) in 10^39?"
No, because this is an arbitrary number based on an assumption that we have sufficient information to make such a prediction. In fact, if we did have such, we would already have an answer. Since the odds must be predicated on sufficient information, and we do not have a sufficiently complete understanding of all the variables in how the universe even works, i.e. no unifying field theory, for one example, the data is incomplete. We can't point to the universe and say, X, Y and Z are irrelevant to the determination of this statistic, because in some critical ways we don't even know what X, Y and Z are in some case. Any odds given in such circumstances are like trying to determine the odds of finding a blue marble in every box on the planet, using a box of marbles from a company that only makes blue marbles. Fine, if you know that there are only blue marbles, but useless if there is even an assumption that other colors exist, or that it might just be possible for one to have "no" color.
Statistics based on incomplete information, or using the wrong data, are sometimes *worse* than merely guessing.
Posts: 58 | Registered: Jan 2006
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Oh, and more to the point, his "answer" for what the answer might be is the equivalent of finding one clear marble in the box and assuming someone some place makes clear marbles, instead of possibly that someone forgot to add the blue coloring to it when they made it. Though that stretches the analogy a bit.
Hmm. Maybe a better version would be a box of red rocks, and the assumption that someone some place must make red rocks, or they wouldn't be in a box?
Anyway, I think you get the point.
Posts: 58 | Registered: Jan 2006
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quote:Originally posted by Kagehi: In any case, this is all pretty irrelevant to the situation anyway. The question of how, what or why something did or didn't create anything is *not* an issue that we can answer at this point and from the stand point of good science, saying someone with a screw driver tweaked things billions of years ago doesn't change *now* in any way. The problem is people that insist what we know about now is irrelevent, because it somehow contradicts the idea of the guy with the screw driver still being around and making sure it all still works, for which there is no evidence at all. We have wandered from stuff that has some critical consequences for science into stuff that amounts to, "Yeah, but what effect does any of that have on the real world, even if its true, since there is no evidence of "current" tweaking of that sort?"
I couldn't agree more with you. Waiting for some Super High-Level Half-Elf Druid to save the world is silly. We must all gather round the Green bandwagon, Greenpeace, ELF, ALF, the folks who are doing the most damage to corporate mentalities and stop this irrational use of our world as a garbage can. Theologies can be discussed AFTER we save the world.
Posts: 379 | Registered: Jan 2006
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Well.. That is another problem in and of itself. Greenpeace isn't what it once was and many of the other organizations have corporate sponsorships that *don't* belong to those with global industries. And when you go to some rally funded by them, all you get is, "The same globalization that hurts our sponsors are hurting the planet!", never mind the fact that half the time the company being protesting is someone trying to feed people, cure diseases, etc, but happen to have a global market. The environmental movement got hijacked some time ago by corporations that don't give any more of a damn about the environment than the people being protested, but who, if those protested companies lost money, business opertunities or got more restrictions added to them, would benefit the sponsors. And they don't give a shit about how, or even if, any new restrictions have an effect at all, or even make sense.
Case in point, I am sure that this being a science blog, everyone can figure out what dihydrogen monoxide is. A while back Penn & Teller, for their show on Showtime, went to one of these rallies and managed to get about 70% of the people there, including the women who organized it, to sign a petition to ban it. At one time people considered the "science" behind environmentalism, now you are lucky of you don't have some clueless twit running the show that can't even figure out what water is, can't answer any questions about what is being protested and in the worst cases actually believe psuedo scientific BS, instead of basing their ideas on sound science. And even back *when* real science was used, some things implimented to try to protect the environment, like 100% fire prevention, later turned out to only endanger the wild life or cause even worse problems, including negatively impacting the health of the entire ecology. If they had thought about it, it wouldn't have been to hard to figure that lightning fires happened down through time and life probably adapted to deal with them, so preventing "any" was likely to have the opposite result from conserving anything.
What where once solid, science based, movements that try to change things, like Greenpeace, as turned into little better than psuedo scientific, corporate sponsored fools, who don't even see who is pulling their strings. And frankly, only the most radical and nutty members of Greenpeace, for example, are even still in the organization. The man who founded it left years ago, to become a park ranger, because he realized what had started to happen, and concluded he could do more good working "for" the federal government in parks, than following the environmental movment down the drain.
I am all for environmentalism, but those claiming to be about it, are now mostly clueless people who want to help, but know nothing about it, joining up with groups that if they bothered to look hard enough, are being pushed around and directed by the very corporate interests they *think* they are fighting. That is why I might seriously consider an alternative fuel vehicle, bioldeisel or solar panels on my house, but I won't be caught dead at most of these so called environmental rallies. If 90% of your "allies" are clueless idiots and the people organizing them take their cues from what can be traced strait back to a coporation, your not helping anything, your hurting it.
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Sigh.. Please forgive the numerous spelling mistake, especially in the last sentence.. Was trying to type fast because I thought I was going to be leaving shortly to go do a job for someone. Seems they decided to postpone it. Posts: 58 | Registered: Jan 2006
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These figures are, of course, entirely hypothetical, but it is logically possible that that a life friendly universe just happened given that we live in a life friendly universe is a dead certainty. You just don't know unless you know the other probabilities.
Then do away with the silly math games David. Just say that, yes, no matter who created the universe, if anyone, humanist principles tell us that the fact that we can beg the question leaves us with a simple conclusion: we know we exist because WE EXIST! Whether this is due to god is a yes or no question, but there is NO reason why God must in any way supplant scientific investigation into the origins of the universe. Arguing about WHY the universe allows us to exist is stupid, because the fact is, the universe could have existed 10^BILION times before, without life resulting, and it would have no effect on us. In fact, those events would have literally no consequence in our lives, since any trace of them would have been erased by the homogenizing effects of the gravity well of the early universe.
I agree with the earlier kagehi assertion about this whole "God answer," its something I've believed for a long time: Religions are VERY VERY VERY good at protecting themselves. A religion survives for thousands of years by adapting to current circumstances and recruiting according to the sensibilities of a new age. Modern religious institutions employ the most efficient means by which to gain members and keep members from leaving.
Frankly that's all it is. If you believe in your religion, fine, you might even be right, but you may be ignoring history, you may not be seeing your religion the way others do. Fact is, the Catholic church for instance has changed so drastically in 500 years that they spend a good amount of their time now dispelling the myths and prejudices they inspired and created in a different age. On top of that they continue to inspire and create new beliefs and ideas that will support the existance of the church in the future.
At one time the church could defend and support the practice of selling seats in heaven, and today they call that practice ludicrous. They call it ludicrous because they need to, to survive. If the world population would respond positively to a religion which suggested that people should be required to eat their own feces, I guarantee there would be large tomes of scholarly religious writings on the wholiness of human fecal sandwiches. I make this tasteless point to show that religions function no differently than other human beaurocracies: go where the money is, go where your needed and go where your wanted most.
Any person, even any religious person who understands history knows this simple fact to be true: If ID, creationism, or evolution, or all three, are the answers which well support the growth of a church, then they will BE the anwers before long. This is NOT a conscious process most of the time, it is like evolution, the strong shall live. If a church sprang up today that recommended the consumption of fecal matter, it would immediately die as a religion, the time would not be right for that.
Once again, I am sure many will react with a "PHEH! religious questions can't be judged in this way, what about GOD sir?" Well this is why religions survive, by NOT listening to people like me.
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quote:However, if these particular laws are relatively static, or if there are not a near infinite number of variations, then the fact that our universe is changing would not alter the odds of our universe possessing these essential life-generating properties, which odds happen to be only 1 in 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000.
There's no such thing as a near infinite number. Think about it.
Sorry if someone already mentioned that. I was reading down the page and couldn't help quickly pointing this out. As such, your entire argument, according to this apparent "logic" of yours, needs tweaking.
[ February 27, 2006, 12:18 PM: Message edited by: cheiros do ender ]
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