Intelligent Design
POSTED BY: rue
UPDATED: Tuesday, August 16, 2005 17:04
VIEWED: 14833
PAGE 12 of 14
Science is the study of the natural world.
God or gods or godlings or spirits or ghosts or other such entities are in the realm of the supernatural. Any proposal that is founded on the supernatural is scientifically useless, by definition.
Science exists because the statement, "It's God's will," explains not a gorram thing in the 'Verse.
So we're all done with this foolishness now, right?
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The question of whether or not the universe is a haphazard event or something that developed from a nonrandom process is a fundamental issue at the core of the definition of nature. You’ve obviously made up your mind on the issue, as have many people. How you can do this escapes me, when the very nature of Intelligent Design, like many areas of theoretical science, doesn’t lend itself well to testing. Nonetheless, the question of whether the universe was created or is simply a random occurrence is a valid scientific question. Probably not one science will answer, but valid nonetheless.
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Qui desiderat pacem praeparet bellum.
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My theory is we're the science experiment of some "vastly superior" intelligent race of beings. I'll drink to the experiment lasting a good long while. 
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Citizen:
"In macro physics bodies tend to attract, in micro physics they tend to repel."
Can you cite a source on this?
And yeah, I know where Milly Ways came from, I just wanted to see the new flic end with it. I have the BBC version that includes most of them and was hoping the new one would be the same.
Atomkey.
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Finn:
Who were you addressing when you said:
"You’ve obviously made up your mind on the issue, as have many people."
?
The only way to test ID (if based on religion) is to die. If not based on religion, then yeah = it is not likely to be tested.
Why not just say evolution is a emergent property of some intelligent method that appears to take care of itself.
If everything is truly random, then we have no true choice in anything. Most people say that if everything is set (predestination) the same is true. But if everything is random, so are our decisions = even if we are not aware of it.
Maybe random = destiny.
Atomkey
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Well firstly its obvious with Macro bodies...
Just think of Gravity .
For a real world experiment, atoms are mostly empty space, ergo matter is mostly empty space. Does your hand pass through your table?
No, because the atoms of your hand and the atoms of your table repel each other.
From the following link:
Quote:
Though the positively charged protons exert a repulsive electromagnetic force on each other, the distances between nuclear particles are small enough that the strong interaction (which is stronger than the electromagnetic force but decreases more rapidly with distance) predominates. (The gravitational attraction is negligible, being a factor 1036[10^36] weaker than this electromagnetic repulsion.)
http://www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/Atomic-nucleus
Quote:
The nuclei in a molecule repel one another, since they are of like charge. This force of repulsion, if unbalanced, would push the nuclei apart and the molecule would separate into atoms. In a stable molecule, however, the nuclear force of repulsion is balanced by an attractive force exerted by the negatively-charged electron density distribution.
http://www.chemistry.mcmaster.ca/esam/Chapter_6/section_1.html
I haven't seen the movie, debating whether I will, because from what I've heard of it I think I might be dissapointed...
Maybe they're going to make all the books in too films, or were at least planning on doing that?
Q: What do you have when you are holding two little green balls in your hand.
A: Kermit's undivided attention.
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Quote:
Originally posted by NeutrinoLad:
Science is the study of the natural world.
God or gods or godlings or spirits or ghosts or other such entities are in the realm of the supernatural. Any proposal that is founded on the supernatural is scientifically useless, by definition.
Science exists because the statement, "It's God's will," explains not a gorram thing in the 'Verse.
So we're all done with this foolishness now, right?
Have you read any of the posts here?
Or are you mearly assuming that science as it stands is the absolute truth and that we won't findout one day that the supernatural can be explained through some scientific medium?
The first scientists were religous men, they didn't start science to refute god, but to try and get closer to him or them.
Supernatural, by definition, is something that science can't explain.
Q: What do you have when you are holding two little green balls in your hand.
A: Kermit's undivided attention.
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Citizen:
Amen... as I reach for my Ouija Board...
Atomkey.
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Quote:
Originally posted by Atomkey:
If everything is truly random, then we have no true choice in anything. Most people say that if everything is set (predestination) the same is true. But if everything is random, so are our decisions = even if we are not aware of it.
This certainly opens up a can of worms!
I've always been intrigued by this issue. People usually reject a deterministic understanding of reality out of hand because of its related concept, predestination. They feel it eliminates free will. But what of the alternative? As you point out, if events happen without cause, then our will is merely random. Hardly satisfying to those who reject predestiny, I'd wager.
I think the problem is the term 'free will'. I'm not sure anyone's ever been able to pin down a definition that didn't rely on vague supernatural assumptions (that usually lead to contradictions galore).
One of the things that occurred to me reading about Wolfram's Computational Equivalence principle, was how it really pulls the rug out from under predestiny. If most processes are already in the simplest state (ie no 'shorter descriptions' apply), then no amount of intelligence could ever predict their outcome, even an awareness of the state of every atom in the system wouldn't do it. This sort of makes the notion of predestiny meaningless.
I doubt that will satisfy those who reject determinism, as they are usually assuming a supernatural soul (somehow) free of causality. But I thought it was kind of an elegant reclaiming of free will without resorting to mysticism.
BTW, while we're (or is it just me?
) on the topic, has anyone here read Godel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid by Douglas Hofstadter? I'd think anyone tweaked enough to enjoy this discussion would really enjoy it.SergeantX
"Dream a little dream or you can live a little dream. I'd rather live it, cause dreamers always chase but never get it." Aesop Rock
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SergeantX:
Predestiny. I don't know Serg... Our history has taught many variations of predestination. Is the verse truly a deterministic paradigm? I personally lend that way. But I have no way to show it to be true.
I quote you:
"If most processes are already in the simplest state (ie no 'shorter descriptions' apply), then no amount of intelligence could ever predict their outcome..."
If we COULD predict everything, then our own 'system' would be a mute thing. What would be the point in doing anything since all things we would ever do would already be known? Perhaps we are in a determined state of random events that coordinate in order for use to NOT realize them? Maybe that's the point afterall. So we live our lives, thinking we are making 'free will' choices when in fact we are making choices that evolution has already determined for us.
After all is said and done = both the ID and Evolution foundations require something of us that we may have not yet considered; That one thing being = we have no choice but to participate! Think about it for a moment. If evolution is true = then we are doing (going about, waking, eating, sleeping, etc) at this moment what that 'engine' is meant to ultimately become. And if ID is true, so is the same. How can we say we now have any choice but to go about our own business?
A flower does not one day say to itself, I will not produce pollen. Unless of course ID or Evolution says it should be so - right? And when that happens (if that happens) - does the flower have a choice in the matter?
Atomkey
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