I don’t think that science has disproven, nor even suggests, that it is unlikely that an Intelligent Designer was responsible for the world, and intended it to come into existence.
I don’t think that science has, nor even can, prove that divine and/or miraculous intervention is impossible.
I don’t think that the fact that we can make good predictive models of the world (and we can) in any way demonstrates that how the world has observedly panned out was not entirely foreseen and intended by some deity.
I think the world has properties that make it perfectly possible for an Intelligent Deity to “reach in” and tweak things to her liking – and that even if it didn’t, it would still be perfectly possible, given Omnipotence, just as a computer programmer can reach in and tweak the Matrix.
I don’t think that science falsifies the idea of an omnipotent,omniscient deity – at all.
I think that only rarely has this even been claimed by scientists, and, of those, most of them were claiming that science has falsified specific claims about a specific deity, not the idea in principle of a deity.
I do think that the world is such that IF there is an omnipotent, omniscient deity, EITHER that deity does not have human welfare as a high priority OR she has very different ideas about what constitutes human welfare from the ones that most people hold (and as are exemplified, for example, in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights), OR she has deliberately chosen to let the laws of her created world play out according to her ordained rules, regardless of the effects of those laws on the welfare of human beings, perhaps trusting that we would value a comprehensible world more than one with major causal glitches. In my case, her trust was well-placed.
I do think that the evidence we have is far more consistent with the idea that life and its origins are the result of processes consistent with others we see acting in the world, and not a result of some extraordinary intervention or series of extraordinary interventions, regardless of any question as to whether a benign or otherwise deity designed those processes with the expectation that life would be a probable or inevitable result.
I don’t think that it follows that, were we to find incontrovertible evidence of a Intelligent Creator (for instance, an unambiguous message in English configured in a nebula in some remote region of space, or on the DNA of an ant encased in amber millions of years ago) that that would mandate us in any way to worship that designer. On the basis of her human rights record I’d be more inclined to summon her to The Hague.
I think that certain theological concepts regarding a benevolent deity useful, inspiring, entirely consistent with science, and may reflect reality.
I don’t myself, any more, believe in some external disembodied intelligent and volitional deity, simply because I am no longer persuaded that either intelligence or volition are possible in the absence of a material substrate. But I do understand why people think this is false, and that consciousness, intelligence and volition are impossible, even in principle, to account for in terms of material/energetic processes, and I also understand that, although I think, for reasons that satisfy myself, that they are mistaken, the case is not an easy one to articulate, not least because of the intrinsically reflexive nature of cogitating on cogitation.
I think that “free will” is an ultimately incoherent concept; I think that the question “do we have free will?” is ill-posed, and ultimately meaningless. I think the better question is: Do I have the ability to make informed choices for which I am morally responsible?” and I think the answer is clearly yes.
Anyone else want to unload?
*high five*
I knew it was worth having this blog 🙂 Thanks, William. Any rapprochement is progress 🙂
No, I said the opposite – that until there were organisms that could photosynthesise there could be no “herbivores” because there were no “herbs”! And so until then the best fuel and building material source was other organisms.
And “plankton” include both photosynthesisers and not, so a plankton eater is not really either a herbivore nor a carnivore nor even an omnivore (only eats plankton!) So the words are limited in applicability to some feeders.
The evolution of photosynthesis btw must have had a huge effect on all other forms of life, and even on non-living properties of the planet, because of course, the byproduct of photosynthesis is oxygen. So suddenly organisms would have had to evolve to cope with an oxygen-rich environment, or go extinct. As a result most (but not all) modern organisms require oxygen, although for a few bacteria, it is still toxic, of course.
It’s potentially an extremely toxic chemical, because it is so reactive – much more reactive than carbon dioxide.
William,
Why not simply choose to believe they’re working and be done with it?
I don’t care if my beliefs are true
Well, that’s probably a major difference between you and scientists. Scientists typically do care that their beliefs (i.e., models of the world) are true (i.e., in reasonable accordance with physical reality). (I also think it is an ethical failure to not care; as Edwin Way Teale once wrote, “It is morally as bad not to care whether a thing is true or not, so long as it makes you feel good, as it is not to care how you got your money as long as you have got it.”)
I reject the Christian story because (a) there is no evidence for it (b) it doesn’t seem to, even remotely, accord with my experience of the world (c) it is incoherent and (d) I find it ugly, grotesque, and debasing. The fact that some people find it plausible, beautiful, and ennobling I continually find surprising, but then some people like Celine Dion and barbeque flavor potato chips.
Sorry Rumraket but you are adding constraints to what Lizzie said, she said that
“By weighing up alternatives and figuring out which will best serve my immediate or more distant goals.”
Then you are adding “understanding how our choices affect people around us, by putting ourselves in their place and modifying our choices accordingly. ”
Ok, more information to take the decision, but what makes you morally responsible?
Materialism (of dialectical or historical varities) was merely the ideology of over a billion people worldwide and part of the Party line in the Soviet empire. But, according to KN’s ‘naturalist’ sophistry, everybody miraculously gave up materialism after the Cold War? He would ask us to close our eyes and pretend it doesn’t exist! Pull-the-wool over peoples’ eyes, is KN’s strategy here…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Materialism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_materialism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dialectical_materialism
What does the ‘perhaps’ imply? You currently *do* advertise your views under the banner of ‘naturalism.’ Your screen name at TSZ testifies to this. What disguise do you think will hide this with ‘perhaps’? It is rather obvious and probably understood by most posters here who are also ‘materialists,’ ‘physicalists’ and/or ‘naturalists’ (by ideological orientation, if not open and outward confession) with the exception of a small few, including the blog’s founder.
Gregory,
I grew up in the Soviet Union. Went to school and to college there. I didn’t care much for the official ideology and its philosophical underpinnings. I failed my exam in philosophy and had to take it a second time.
You can hardly call me a proponent of materialism. I don’t give a flying fig about these other terms as well (naturalism or physicalism). In fact, I think that philosophy has outlived its useful life, for the most part.
shallit,
Well, do you care if your beliefs are really just a pile of meaningless swirls of chemicals? I am not asking this facetiously. Deep down do you really believe the one you love is really just a rock that just so happens to make messy copies of itself on occasion?
No. This is a silly caricature.
Even on a much simpler level, a diamond crystal is “just a rock.” However, not every rock is the same.
What ideology/ies are you a proponent of then?
I’ll admit I’m a proponent of ‘realism,’ more specifically, ‘critical realism.’ That’s just one among many ideologies I hold. Theism is another. I am certainly not an ‘objectivist’ (i.e. the ideology of the most well-known Russian-American of the 20c.). It’s normal for human beings to hold ideologies. What is problematic sometimes is for people to clearly express what ideas they actually hold and why they hold them and then to accept that categories of ideas (i.e. categorising ideas using ideologies or ‘labels’) have a valid place for communicative purposes.
I have met many ‘materialists’ (by orientation) who would intentionally or unknowingly self-deny being a ‘materialist’ if you asked them. Similar is true for evolutionists, Darwinists, fideists, deists, etc.
What do you exclude or save when you add ‘for the most part’? No doubt you are not suggesting wisdom (Sophia) has died or outlived its meaning and value for human life, are you? The Sophia tradition in Russia is fascinating, indeed, it is a robust field for western scholars who for many years knew next to nothing about it.
Sure, I’ve met quite a few Russians who walked away from philosophy after the end of the Union. But in truth, olegt, I know many more Russians who have returned to philosophy with open minds and hearts, willing to explore those ideas that were tactically denied them in the CCCP.
Indeed, the annual ‘day of philosophy’ is a very well-attended event at the main universities. This would be a surprise to ‘westerners,’ but then again, it is also not suprising that the evolutionism, creationism, IDT debate is so entrenched and ‘culture-war’ oriented there either.
The more we learn about piles of chemicals the more interesting they become.
Any informed materialism is not about things, but about relationships.
Things, in the historical sense of the word, do not exist.
Huh? A diamond is just a rock, that’s right. Why aren’t all rocks the same? Because some chance errors of replication, repeat more readily if the thing that is repeating likes things that are shiny?
Do you have any deep thoughts at all about why you exist, or do you just try to squint your eyes and not really think about it, much like you are doing here.
A diamond is “just a rock”, phoodoo? Really? Would you use table salt crystals to make engagement rings? If not, why not?
Liz, I see a lot of your friends here posting vague thoughts about well, humans are worth loving because they are human, or something like that, but I don’t really see the logic of their thoughts. What about you, can you answer sort of simply why a human life is any more important than a cockroach or a baloney sandwich?
I mean it doesn’t sort of baffle you that everything you think that is important or meaningful, is really just a by product (like an annoying side effect) of a chemical reaction? The notion of something being valuable is really just an illusion to make it easier for a chemical to continuing sticking together, correct?
I still don’t really get your believe. I assume you have thought about slightly more than Olegt has.
The physical mechanisms by which we came to exist are a completely different question than if there’s a reason why we’re here.
The theory of evolution deals only with the former. Philosophy and theology deal with the second. Don’t confuse the two areas.
Once again, let me try to discuss with you a subject which you seem indisposed to have thought much about. To ME life ISN”T just a bunch of molecules that have convenient shapes to stick together. But to atheist evolutionists that is what life is.
So value isn’t anything more than a convenient catalyst for more molecules sticking together and less degradation. Your brain is nothing more than the result of sloppy, slippery molecules, which stick together like an oil slick in a rancid pond. That is quite literally what an evolutionists argument boils down to.
Maybe we should all quit using chemicals to save our loved ones, combat brain imbalances, and, um, eat. Because how could mere chemicals keep us alive and well?
Of course it’s not “just chemicals,” which themselves are complex physical phenomena (which we do not actually understand per se, although we have fairly good models) interacting in vastly more complex chemical and physical bodies.
Glen Davidson
You have magic words that make it all so much greater.
Impressive.
Glen Davidson
You’re still confusing the physical mechanisms of life with any philosophical or theological attached “meaning”.
Sure I can. A human life is more important because it belongs to a human being, and human beings live meaningful lives on which they place great value. They want to see their children grow up, to achieve things, to enjoy things, perhaps even to make the world better for other human beings. This is not true of either a cockroach or a baloney sandwich.
It’s certainly not an “illusion” phoodoo. A junkyard of Boeing 747 parts is not the same as a Boeing 747, right? Even though not a single piece necessary to make a Boeing 747 is missing? Just because you can “reduce” a Boeing 747 to junk doesn’t mean that the Boeing 747 is no more than junk, and it is not an illusion that it isn’t – you can’t fly anywhere in junk and you can fly along way in a Boeing 747! I’ve been round the world several times in one myself! So just because we are made ofchemicals, which are made of atoms, which are made of subatomic particles, which, for all we know are made of tiny vibrating virtual strings of probability, doesn’t mean that is all we are, even though it is all we are made of. We have properties not possessed by our parts, just as salt has properties not possessed by sodium or chlorine, and sodium and chlorine have properties not possessed by salt. And human beings have properties not possessed by cockroaches or baloney sandwiches, and those properties include the capacity to take the point of view of another human being, to care about other human beings, and to care about their own lives and the lives of other human beings.
I would be surprised if Olegt disagrees with much of what I have said, but I’ll let him respond.
In my world, “belief” means “to act as if true”. So, I don’t really know what this question means in terms of how I believe things.
Not to this one.
If you are genuinely interested in understanding what people on this blog think, phoodoo, maybe you should start asking them what they actually think instead of offering laughable caricatures of their world views. That way, the dialog would be a lot more efficient.
To get you started, let me suggest reading an old essay by Phil Anderson, a great physicist, entitled More is Different. I will quote the main point he made, but you should read the entire essay:
A human life is more important than a cockroach or a baloney sandwich to another human. That’s because we’re social animals and have evolved traits like empathy for fellow members of our species. To a cockroach another cockroach (or possibly a baloney sandwich) is more important than a human. It’s all relative.
By this measure, taking what is potentially a placebo without question because it relieves your symptoms best is -morally equal to- committing fraud and swindling people out of their money for your own benefit?
I’ll pass on that particular moral system.
I’m wondering what “assume” means in your world.
I don’t think I put forth any ideology on this blog. If you asked me whether I believe in God, I’d say no. That makes me an agnostic, possibly with an atheist bend.
I don’t care for -isms, Gregory. “Darwinism,” in particular, is a silly term. It suggests that people follow the teachings of one man, which is sheer nonsense when it comes to science.
You might as well call mathematicians working on classical mechanics “Newtonians” or “Lagrangians.” Baloney! Mechanics has kept some ideas of Newton, but it has absorbed so much more since the 17th century: Euler, Lagrange, Hamilton, Lorentz, Einstein, and many others have made seminal contributions without which mechanics wouldn’t be what it is today.
Same goes for theory of evolution. Calling it “Darwinism” today indicates that a person has no clue how science works.
There are bits and pieces in philosophy that I find interesting such as philosophy of science. I liked Thomas Kuhn’s Structure of Scientific Revolutions. I have observed how new fields of study spring into existence in physics, so reading his historical account was quite interesting.
Incidentally, Kuhn was a physicist by training: he got a Ph.D. in theoretical physics with van Vleck at Harvard. He was a contemporary of Phil Anderson.
Whatever rocks their boat, Gregory.
No, that makes you an atheist.
Own it!
Patrick,
Yeah, upper left corner in that graph.
Good point. Atheist really does just mean someone who doesn’t believe in god or gods. It doesn’t necessarily mean someone who believes there are no god or gods. While that might sound like a technicality it’s actually a very important distinction.
Similar someone who opposes what is called Intelligent Design (me for instance) does not necessarily hold that there is no Intelligent Designer, merely that it is not a valid scientific argument or inference on the reasoning and evidence presented so far.
At least, that’s my position.
That’s my current view as well. I keep hoping that an intelligent design creationist will present an hypothesis that entails predictions beyond “At some time in some place some entity did something to some other thing for some reason.” That would be interesting.
Maybe 2014 is the year.
GUANO
I’m going to cut phoodoo a bit of slack as s/he is new. But phoodoo, please read the rules, here.
A few other people could do with a re-read too.
The fact that my actions have consequences and that I know about them.
I sure will. 🙂
GUANO
That word doesn’t mean what you seem to think it means.
It is an important distinction.
Furthermore, one can go a bit farther by suggesting that there is little evidence that any human has actually encountered a deity or deities, despite what they assert; in other words, one can and should be agnostic about what other humans say about deities.
As to the people who make up “science” to justify their sectarian version of a deity, I would add that this type of religion is among the worst that humans have produced. These are members of a would-be priesthood running scared of what might not be; and probably isn’t. It would take away their socio/political power.
On a more technical level, it’s also relevant to the subtle but important difference between “retaining the hull” and “falsifying your study hypothesis”.
Or between saying that evolutionary processes are supported by the data and saying that evolution is proven.
Is this to do with the Flood and Noah’s Ark?
lol
My use of ‘perhaps’ was only to indicate that in the past few weeks I’ve been pursuing a line of thought which calls into question my own commitment to “naturalism.”
Can you say more?
If you were part of a crack commando unit was sent to prison by a military court for a crime they didn’t commit and then you promptly escaped from a maximum security stockade to the Los Angeles underground where, still wanted by the government, you survive as soldiers of fortune – WHY WOULD YOU BY THE MOST UNIQUE, ICONIC AND EASILY IDENTIFIED VAN ON THE PLANET? IT MAKES NO SENSE. Likewise, why carry guns when no one can hit anything and it always devolves into a punch up at the end?
Yes, but at this point I’m more intrigued by whether Richard Hughes is going to do “Airwolf” or “Knight Rider” next.
Oh, the suspense!
SHE??? God is not a she. God is the dominat one and should more correctly be called He. As the man was made first and the woman identity fior the man. nature also makes the male about dominance.
Creationism is all about saying the sCIENCE has done by these few researches is wrong where it teaches against GEnesis or god’s fingerprints over everything.
Science is done by people and they are historically incompetent.
IS evolutionary biology a theory based on biological scientific evidence or is is a hypothesis with no biological scientific evidence but unrelated supporting evidence from other subjects or lines of reasoning from presumptions already held???
Where is the science??
Robert Byers,
Robert, a couple of things.
How do you know the bible is true?
Is all of it true?
I find your honesty refreshing but your misogyny distasteful.
God is a sexual being? What would that be all about? Have you really thought that through?
WIlliam,
I asked:
You replied:
This isn’t complicated, William. If you choose to believe that your beliefs are working, then according to you you will act as if your beliefs are working, which means you won’t need to change them, ever. You’ll save yourself all kinds of effort.
Of course it won’t be true that your beliefs are working, but you’ve already told us that you don’t care about the truth.
Neil, to Robert:
Saint Teresa certainly seemed to think so.