Cambrian Explosion - Proof of Intelligent Design

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
221

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

Your worldview is no different than saying if Hitler won WWII the Holocaust would have been a moral good.

[/quote]

Your worldview is that the Holocaust wasn’t, in reality, an evil…
[/quote]

And no, you’re self-imposed standards don’t make it reality.
[/quote]

God’s self-imposed standards don’t make it a reality. They are no less subjective. [/quote]

You said the Holocaust was evil, in reality, because you defined it that way. Doesn’t sound very empirical to me.
[/quote]
The bottom line is there doesn’t seem to be any way for there to be objective morality.
Saying god says so, just moves the goalpost without proving objectivity.

Again, it’s the Euthyphro Dilemma. There is no resolution to it. Morality is subjective, and we’re stuck with it that way.
[/quote]

I’m not trying to prove it. I take it on faith that there is good and evil. Faith is human and reasonable to me.

But, in your worldview, you’re supposed to be the one seeking empirical proof for good and evil. Of course you circumvent that by somehow defining what is reality (holocaust IS evil) , when you don’t actually believe that evil exists in reality. Because, emotional stuff.[/quote]

I actually don’t know. There might be good and evil. Part of life in that way would be trying to figure it out. Not relying on some arbitrary rule book.

222

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

Your worldview is no different than saying if Hitler won WWII the Holocaust would have been a moral good.

[/quote]

Your worldview is that the Holocaust wasn’t, in reality, an evil…
[/quote]

And no, you’re self-imposed standards don’t make it reality.
[/quote]

God’s self-imposed standards don’t make it a reality. They are no less subjective. [/quote]

You said the Holocaust was evil, in reality, because you defined it that way. Doesn’t sound very empirical to me.
[/quote]
The bottom line is there doesn’t seem to be any way for there to be objective morality.
Saying god says so, just moves the goalpost without proving objectivity.

Again, it’s the Euthyphro Dilemma. There is no resolution to it. Morality is subjective, and we’re stuck with it that way.
[/quote]

So when you say that the holocaust was, in reality, evil…You and I are supposed to understand you don’t actually believe that, correct?

223

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

I actually don’t know. There might be good and evil.
[/quote]

I can respect that, actually. Have a good night.

224

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

Your worldview is no different than saying if Hitler won WWII the Holocaust would have been a moral good.

[/quote]

Your worldview is that the Holocaust wasn’t, in reality, an evil…
[/quote]

And no, you’re self-imposed standards don’t make it reality.
[/quote]

God’s self-imposed standards don’t make it a reality. They are no less subjective. [/quote]

You said the Holocaust was evil, in reality, because you defined it that way. Doesn’t sound very empirical to me.
[/quote]
The bottom line is there doesn’t seem to be any way for there to be objective morality.
Saying god says so, just moves the goalpost without proving objectivity.

Again, it’s the Euthyphro Dilemma. There is no resolution to it. Morality is subjective, and we’re stuck with it that way.
[/quote]

I’m not trying to prove it. I take it on faith that there is good and evil. Faith is human and reasonable to me.

But, in your worldview, you’re supposed to be the one seeking empirical proof for good and evil. Of course you circumvent that by somehow defining what is reality (holocaust IS evil) , when you don’t actually believe that evil exists in reality. Because, emotional stuff.[/quote]

Did I say I’m seeking empirical proof for good and evil? No. I said let’s assume it’s good to seek the well-being of conscious creatures and go from there. Empiricism starts from that assumption. We all have to lift ourselves up by our own bootstraps.

There is no avoiding that.

The question is, does it make more sense to follow the dictates of a 2000 year old book or to try to figure it out based on what we actually know about the world?

225

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

Your worldview is no different than saying if Hitler won WWII the Holocaust would have been a moral good.

[/quote]

Your worldview is that the Holocaust wasn’t, in reality, an evil…
[/quote]

And no, you’re self-imposed standards don’t make it reality.
[/quote]

God’s self-imposed standards don’t make it a reality. They are no less subjective. [/quote]

You said the Holocaust was evil, in reality, because you defined it that way. Doesn’t sound very empirical to me.
[/quote]
The bottom line is there doesn’t seem to be any way for there to be objective morality.
Saying god says so, just moves the goalpost without proving objectivity.

Again, it’s the Euthyphro Dilemma. There is no resolution to it. Morality is subjective, and we’re stuck with it that way.
[/quote]

So when you say that the holocaust was, in reality, evil…You and I are supposed to understand you don’t actually believe that, correct?
[/quote]
Did I say it was evil?

226

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

I actually don’t know. There might be good and evil.
[/quote]

I can respect that, actually. Have a good night.
[/quote]
If there is a god, he didn’t want us to follow a rule book. He wanted us to grapple with it ourselves. What’s the point to life if you have a rulebook?

227

[quote]Aragorn wrote:

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

[quote]smh_23 wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:
Because the universe comprises matter/energy that must’ve be set in motion - i.e. the Big Bang. The singularity, or whatever came first must have been created by something/someone immune from infinite regress. The matter/energy cannot be immune from infinite regress due to the first law of thermodynamics: matter/energy cannot be lost or created in a closed system.[/quote]

None of these arguments can be made without assumption, and few of them can be made without special pleading, which is why you will not find credible theist philosophers (Platinga, Craig, etc.) referring to their conclusions as proved, but rather “argued” or “strongly argued,” or “it is reasonable to believe X” and the like.

It is even possible that God exists and yet He exists beyond the reach of human reason and cannot be logically “proved” without assumption.[/quote]
Craig? Credible? LOL
[/quote]

Perhaps my assumption is wrong, but your posts give the strong impression that you do not see ANY theist as credible (I am not speaking of the CvE debate, this is philosophy), so singling out Craig is rather silly and you should just come out and say “all theists” like you said “all abrahamic religions” in another thread. Not thzt there’s anything wrong with that…but it does mean you can’t single one guy out.
[/quote]

Craig is a documented liar. If you watched the videos I posted you’ll see that. I can’t speak to all theists.

I do hate all Abrahamic religions. They’re death cults. And they all condone genital mutilation.

228

[quote]darsemnos wrote:
No. I said let’s assume it’s good to seek the well-being of conscious creatures and go from there. [/quote]

I really am going to bed…But, seriously? Haven’t you just lopped the legs out from under the supposedly more reasoned, empirical, and intellectual horse of atheistic morality? From emotionalism, to “/wink, /wink, let’s just assume the first things of the debate. I got a bit of the feels on it, anyways.”

229

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]darsemnos wrote:
No. I said let’s assume it’s good to seek the well-being of conscious creatures and go from there. [/quote]

I really am going to bed…But, seriously? Haven’t you just lopped the legs out from under the supposedly more reasoned, empirical, and intellectual horse of atheistic morality? From emotionalism, to “/wink, /wink, let’s just assume the first things of the debate. I got a bit of the feels on it, anyways.”[/quote]

As I said, we all have to pull ourselves up from our own bootstraps. Who has better bootstraps and why?

230

In fact, I suppose you didn’t. You said you could, because if you held that opinion, it would become reality. The Holocaust would then actually be evil. But you actually didn’t say it was evil. We are waiting for reality to be shaped. Sorry for the misread. You’ll have to wait for a further reply. Later.

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

Your worldview is no different than saying if Hitler won WWII the Holocaust would have been a moral good.

[/quote]

Your worldview is that the Holocaust wasn’t, in reality, an evil…
[/quote]

If I define evil is total disregard for the well-being of conscious creatures I can.

But it’s not truly evil in your worldview. It was part of god’s plan and his plan can’t be evil. And nothing in the world can happen that is not according to his plan. And no matter what, god will correct every injustice, so in the end, no one who doesn’t deserve evil to happen to them will be harmed. Every tear will be wiped from their eyes. Except your god will torture forever some people in his ovens. Even Hitler couldn’t do that to the Jews.
[/quote]

231

[quote]Sloth wrote:
In fact, I suppose you didn’t. You said you could, because if you held that opinion, it would become reality. The Holocaust would then actually be evil. But you actually didn’t say it was evil. We are waiting for reality to be shaped. Sorry for the misread. You’ll have to wait for a further reply. Later.

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

[quote]Sloth wrote:

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

Your worldview is no different than saying if Hitler won WWII the Holocaust would have been a moral good.

[/quote]

Your worldview is that the Holocaust wasn’t, in reality, an evil…
[/quote]

If I define evil is total disregard for the well-being of conscious creatures I can.

But it’s not truly evil in your worldview. It was part of god’s plan and his plan can’t be evil. And nothing in the world can happen that is not according to his plan. And no matter what, god will correct every injustice, so in the end, no one who doesn’t deserve evil to happen to them will be harmed. Every tear will be wiped from their eyes. Except your god will torture forever some people in his ovens. Even Hitler couldn’t do that to the Jews.
[/quote]
[/quote]

I try to be as passive aggressive as possible.

232

[quote]Dr.Matt581 wrote:

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

Well I am to some degree taking the word of a renowned physicist. Lawrence Krauss quoting Stephen Weinberg who said that most physicists don’t give god enough thought to know whether they believe or not, or something like that. They both know far more physicist than you or me, so I think their word has some merit.
[/quote]

Would you mind providing a link to this quote? I am familiar with Dr. Weinberg’s views on religion, he has never really kept them a secret, but I am not aware of him claiming to know what most physicists’ personal beliefs are. [/quote]

Can’t do that. My memory is only of Krauss quoting Weinberg in some youtube video. But I was able to find this:

http://www.chomsky.info/debates/20060301.htm

“KRAUSS: Many fundamentalists see scientists are rabid atheists, but in fact, as Steve Weinberg, a Nobel Laureate in Physics, says, most of them havenâ??t thought enough about God to responsibly address the issue of belief. God simply doesnâ??t come up in scientific considerations, so questions of belief or non-belief essentially never arise.”

I suppose I’m willing to take Krauss’s word here.

233

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

[quote]usmccds423 wrote:
^If that’s how you feel than that’s how you feel. [/quote]
It’s a feeling backed up by experience and knowledge of how the world really works. People get deluded. People hallucinate. Even today there are miracle stories that YOU don’t take seriously. Why should we take miracle stories that take place 2000 years ago any more seriously than you take many today?[/quote]

It’s your life, do what you want. Experience and knowledge only explain a tiny fraction of how the “world really works.”

How do you know I don’t take them serious. A lot of people do. Either way there is a distinct difference, The Son of God is not reported completing the miracle, which is what we have been talking about.

234

[quote]Aragorn wrote:

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

[quote]usmccds423 wrote:
^If that’s how you feel than that’s how you feel. [/quote]
It’s a feeling backed up by experience and knowledge of how the world really works. People get deluded. People hallucinate. Even today there are miracle stories that YOU don’t take seriously. Why should we take miracle stories that take place 2000 years ago any more seriously than you take many today?[/quote]

I think actually what he was addressing at the time was the stated notion that Jesus never proved he was God WHILE assuming all the things he did in the Bible did in fact happen. In other words the person that made the original comment–which he was replying to–was making the comment while assuming the Bible was telling the truth about his actions (I.e. reliable witness) This is different from the conmment that the Bible is unreliable after 2000 years, or that it was never reliable in the first place.

Assuming the Bible was telling it accurately, he raised the dead in front of a few dozen at least, maybe a hundred grieving witnesses, wine was for a large wedding, fed a couple thousand people, all while directly claiming he was God’s Son. In still other words, all the miracles were done in public with multiple witnesses and combined with statements, but this still doesn’t seem to be proof according to the original contention.

This is a different criticism from saying there is no reliable account of the actions. [/quote]

Astute as always Aragorn.

235

[quote]smh_23 wrote:
pat wrote:

What it does is take the best information science has to offer regarding the origin of the universe and calculate it’s probability for turn out this way versus the several quadrillion other ways it could have turned out. And based on the calculations design is more likely, but no it’s not a slam dunk. It actually doesn’t deal with God’s existence explicitly, it does not make a statement about God himself.

And as I said, this kind of thing is enormously problematic. It gets into the philosophy of causation, the philosophy of physical “law,” Laplace, QM, all of it. But I will save that, because I’ll wait for this:
[/quote]
I don’t think it’s problematic at all. It simply takes what science currently offers and does statistical and probability measures on it. It doesn’t get into causation or physical law. It assumes that the current science is true and works with that.
It’s what changed my mind about intelligent design theory. I used to think it was a desperate attempt of explanation. That in a universe so large, ‘winning the lottery’ so to speak was probable until I saw the numbers, which actually ruled out the lottery theory altogether.

It doesn’t deal with causal theories or anything like that. That is the realm of Cosmology, not Intelligent Design.

[quote]
I will try to find the study again. I happened to have some notes from previous research. But there is an enormous sea of bullshit you have to sift through with intelligent design theories to find the ‘good one’. When I have more time I will try to find the ‘good one’ and post the link.

…before I make my judgement and criticism. If you can find it, I mean. And no rush. The longer it takes you, the more actual, paid work I get done![/quote]

Yeah, me too. I am finding a lot of stuff on the probability of life occurring by chance, I am having trouble finding the origin of the universe, but I haven’t had a lot of time to look. I will keep looking when I have time, but I don’t have a lot of time so it may actually take me a while.

[EDIT: Fixed quote tags again]

236

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

Craig is a documented liar. If you watched the videos I posted you’ll see that. I can’t speak to all theists.

I do hate all Abrahamic religions. They’re death cults. And they all condone genital mutilation.
[/quote]

I’ll watch the videos. We’ll see if they change my view of him, which is that he is a good debater and a decent philosopher (not that he’s right).

237

[quote]pat wrote:

It doesn’t deal with causal theories or anything like that. That is the realm of Cosmology, not Intelligent Design.
[/quote]

They are related in a way that I am sure I will address once I see the material in question.

238

[quote]darsemnos wrote:

[quote]SexMachine wrote:
BTW - Dawkins criticises cosmological arguments by saying they rely on infinite regress(turtles all the way down) from which G-d is unjustifiably immune. However the quote above from Maimonides addresses that.[/quote]

It’s a copout. If god can always exist why can’t the universe(or multi-verse)?

Carl Sagan puts it rather diplomatically here:

The multiverse doesn’t solve the problem. It just kicks the can further down the metaphysical road. Why is there a multiverse, instead of nothing? Leibniz beat everybody to the punch with all these counter claims.
Eternal universe does not matter, infinite multiverse does not matter, it doesn’t solve the problem, it introduces fallacies.
If eternal universe is assumed as brute fact, you have a circular argument. The universe is, because it is.
If you introduce an infinite multiverse you can either introduce a circular argument, the multiverse is, because it is. Or you have an infinite regress which is also circular, but also nothing can be created because it never finishes.

The other problem with the multiverse, especially for science is there is not a single shred of evidence for it. There is nothing observable, there is nothing that can be measured, it’s at best a mathematical possibility, but has no basis in fact or reason. It actually has no scientific basis, it only has a mathematical basis.
I don’t have a problem with the postulation of a multiverse, but it’s technically not science since there is nothing to observe or measure. Without testability it’s only equations.

239

[quote]SexMachine wrote:
BTW - Dawkins criticises cosmological arguments by saying they rely on infinite regress(turtles all the way down) from which G-d is unjustifiably immune. However the quote above from Maimonides addresses that.[/quote]

What Dawkins argues are strawmen. He starts with some form of cosmological argument, makes it worse and then attacks the creation he fabricated. What Dawkins has going for him is he is a good writer, he is a terrible philosopher. Laughably bad. He takes claims nobody makes, says that theists actually argue the garbage he put forth.
I don’t know what kind of biologist he is, but he is a lousy philosopher. He really shouldn’t publish about topics he knows nothing about.

240

[quote]pat wrote:

The multiverse doesn’t solve the problem. It just kicks the can further down the metaphysical road. Why is there a multiverse, instead of nothing? [/quote]

Why is there a god, instead of nothing?