Board index ‹ Creation and Evolution

[Newbie]

Intelligent things do not require an intelligent designer. Given what we know right now about evolution and the universe, taking into consideration the vastness of our universe and number of possible habitable planets (including that we may not know other kinds of intelligent life form habitats), it is EXTREMELY LIKELY that molecules in once in a billionth case form very primitive life forms spontaniously without any supernatural help.

Of course we can't know this for sure, but given what we know and can/could prove in the future, this is our best assumption so far.

That's why proving that abiogenesis work in a lab is such a big case. Because if it could happen in a lab spontaneously (given the same ingredients that occur naturally and making the same environment) even in 1 experiment out of thousends, it is very likely that it could happen in nature given millions of years, and therefore billions of trial-and-error by laws of physics.

This yet best guess and future fact (I hope) would be proof that we do not NEED a designer, which disbands the logical reasoning that everything what seems to be designed needs a designer, therfore pointing flaws in logical reasoning like yours (in first posts) what leads to exactly the same question:
How God is likely to be real, given what we know?

But!

You can't use those arguments because they have flaws in them. If you still use them you woudn't be considered a worthy logical thinker, because you are using arguments that somebody else had prooven you false to be. You have to admit your flaws first, and then consider future discussion without them.

You can't use Bible either because it's man-made and provides circular reasoning: There is God because Bible said so, Bible is True because it is influenced by God.

You cannot use arguments that it's the largest religion. Making something the largest doesn't make it true. Some day ago all people were flat-earth believers, now they're close to zero. Some day ago all people belived that sun revolves around the earth, now we know it's the opposite. Those examples occur all the time, I can give you many more if you want. The point to critical thinking is not clinging to what you belive is true no matter what, but to update your knowledge given enough evidence. There is no shame to admit you might have been wrong all your life (I do it on daily basis actually )

You cannot give the arguments about miracles because all of them can be disbanded/explained and it is proven that most of them are false pattern recognitions and the rest of them are fakes. I could provide references but you insisted that I am giving links, so I won't.

The "religion is useful" argument is out of bounds. Useful thinking doesn't make the thinking true. Buddhism is useful—it doesn't make it true. Jewish thinking is useful but it doesn't make it true either. AND If you break down religion to a) belief in god, b) community, helping people and morality, it can make as well a) not useful and b) useful. Still, none of this provides any evidence of god's existence.

Given the above 5 statements and keeping them in mind let's consider some couter-religion reasoning.
Q: How easy it is for priests, bishops, popes etc. to control masses through the prism of religion? (eternal heaven & hell idea)
A: Piece of cake.
Q: If an organization fund school and have it in their possesion, how easy it is to manipulate information taught to students?
A: Piece of cake.
What leads me to:
Q: How likely it is to be that religion is nothing more than a mechanism trying to control our thoughts?
A: Very likely.
And:
Q: Would the world be worse without religion?
A: That's a tricky question. I would say christianity WAS in some way useful as it provided people a way of life given what they knew at that time. But on the other hand there were crusades, witch burnings, and killing free-thinkers who opposed "the institution". How do I view it? We still would be better off. In ancient times people already formed scientific communities. I would call them free-thinkers for the sake of my argument. There was a chance that they would grow and expand just as Christianity did but wasn't given enough resources and one more thing. They were not fighters. They were pacifists. Christians burned their work and buried them alive, just for the sake of "we know better what happened" or to keep power. Luckily, they can't do it right now

This is also why Christianity "lived" for so long and grew so much. If somebody opposed them they simply killed or imprisoned them. (Last religious war 17th century, killings in the name of faith up to this point)

This continues up to this point with creationists trying to bend their look on evolution as much as they can and Vatican already making theories without claims on extraterrestial life.

The problem here lies that we no longer need religion, we are grown up society, and we should stop beliving in santa claus already. We can do better. We can do science which works like magic, but instead of using our resources to learn more, we use them to decieve ourselves further.

That's why we have to fight, for the sake of our children's future.

[jimwalton]

Let's talk about intelligent design a little bit, and don't worry, I won't use any of the arguments you forbade. : )

Here's one way to express it (that doesn't even refer to the Bible or religion!!)

- Some natural systems (e.g., the human eye) are mechanically ordered (i.e., they exhibit the same sort of order as watches and other machines produced by human beings).
- Intelligent design is a very good explanation of mechanical order.
- No other explanation (or no equally good explanation) of mechanical order is available.
- Every instance of mechanical order has an explanation.
- Some natural systems were (probably) designed.

Do you see any flaws in that logic? Now let's try this: (another version)

- The productions of human contrivance are the products of intelligent design.
- The universe resembles the productions of human contrivance
- Therefore probably the universe is a product of intelligent design
- Therefore probably the author of the universe is an intelligent being.

Do you see flaws in that sequence? Which of those is untrue?

The basic idea is that we observe that several of the cosmological constants of the universe are incredibly fine-tuned. The basic idea that such an idea is perfectly compatible with and sensible, not at all surprising or improbable if God exists. A God would presumably want there to be life, and even intelligent life with which (or whom) to communicate and share love. It's probably and sensible that God would want fine tune the constants of the universe to accommodate human life. This all makes sense. On the other hand, the atheist claims these constants have their values by chance (not the result of anyone's choice or intention). It is not as probably, logically speaking, that the constants wold be as fine-tuned for life as we know it. Given theism, fine-tuning is expected; given atheism, fine-tuning is a remote chance. Therefore theism is to be preferred to atheism.

The various parameters of the universe (strength of gravitational force, the weak and strong nuclear forces, the rate of expansion in the universe, among many others) can take on various values, and there is probably no logical limit to the possible values these parameters could take. Almost all of the possibilities are not life-permitting; only a very narrow band are, and all of them must be in specific narrow bands to accommodate life as we have it. Certainly they all could, by chance, have assumed a value in a life-permitting range. but when we talk about probabilities and reason, this is much more likely on theism than on chance. Hence, again, fine-tuning favors the logic of theism over naturalism.

Logically speaking, theism is a better explanation of fine-tuning than any atheistic explanation, and is to be preferred, given the two choices.

Another point: Bayes' Theorem (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayes_theorem). The idea inherent in the theorem is that comparing the mathematical and logical probabilities of theism and atheism, given fine-tuning that we see evidenced in the universe, the probability of theism is greater than that of atheism, and is logically to be preferred.

In contrast, Darwinianism shows that life can be explained as a result of natural process, natural selection, and without need of a creator. But what Darwin has to so is an UNGUIDED evolutionary path that is not *prohibitively improbable*. This is where Darwinians have failed. They have not shown, for example, that it is not prohibitively improbable that, for example, the mammalian eye has developed from a light sensitive spot. They show us various eyes, lined up in a series of apparently increasing adaptive complexity, with the mammalian eye at the top. but that doesn't show that it's logically possible (that is, not prohibitively improbable) that later members of the series developed by natural processes from earlier members.

Evolutionary science doesn't evidence against design beliefs. It could be that these structures have evolved by unguided, natural processes, but that says nothing about a greater logic that would point to the possibility of design.