Evolution Vs Creation
Discussion
Gaspode said:
The fact that our thoughts are 'about' something does not disprove materialism, all it does is demonstrate that there are some aspects of consciousness that we do not yet understand.
The concept of final cause is an assumption based on the belief that 'there must be something' causing everything. As we learn more and more about the nature of reality, we find that our concepts of what is material need to be modified. Things that we we thought of as being physical particles now appear to be best modelled as regions of probability and energy density. Science has no problem with this.
Basing an argument on final cause is like basing an argument on the reality of an image in a mirror. Both appear to be present, but neither actually exist.
You seem to have a belief that logic is an impregnable system of thinking, that any conclusion based on true premises must be unassailably true. Here's a vey simple deminstration that logic is imperfect:
1. An object that travels from point A to point C must take a finite and exact amount of time to make the journey
2. A point B can be observed to lie exactly equidistant between points A and C
3. In order to arrive at point C, the object must first arrive at point B
4. The distance between A and B can be divided in half again
5. This process can be repeated indefinitely, giving an infinite number of halfway points
6. This means the object must pass through an infinite number of points in a finite time, which is impossible
The logic is sound, but the conclusion is invalid. We know this through observation of the real world.
Thank God he invented the Planck length or we'd never get anywhere. Somewhat like arguing with the terminally religious.The concept of final cause is an assumption based on the belief that 'there must be something' causing everything. As we learn more and more about the nature of reality, we find that our concepts of what is material need to be modified. Things that we we thought of as being physical particles now appear to be best modelled as regions of probability and energy density. Science has no problem with this.
Basing an argument on final cause is like basing an argument on the reality of an image in a mirror. Both appear to be present, but neither actually exist.
You seem to have a belief that logic is an impregnable system of thinking, that any conclusion based on true premises must be unassailably true. Here's a vey simple deminstration that logic is imperfect:
1. An object that travels from point A to point C must take a finite and exact amount of time to make the journey
2. A point B can be observed to lie exactly equidistant between points A and C
3. In order to arrive at point C, the object must first arrive at point B
4. The distance between A and B can be divided in half again
5. This process can be repeated indefinitely, giving an infinite number of halfway points
6. This means the object must pass through an infinite number of points in a finite time, which is impossible
The logic is sound, but the conclusion is invalid. We know this through observation of the real world.
DickyC said:
In my teens I was very ill. It started with a disastrous appendix operation that was repeated after a week or so to unkink my bowel twisted during the first operation. Unknown to anyone a mess was left behind inside me. Six months later I was readmitted to hospital. "Well, we know it's not appendicitis!!" Oh, how we laughed. I was taken in on a Friday and given tests and x-rays while I became more and more ill. Specialists were called. More tests, more x-rays. Nothing. The hospital called their most senior surgeon on Sunday evening. He felt there was one chance; they should operate, find out what it was and try to fix it. My parents were called back to the hospital to give their permission. The operation started at 1am and went on for several hours. Afterwards the team were exhausted but spoke to my parents. The surgeon was even-handed in his assessment but the anaesthetist drew my father to one side and was blunt with him. Cardiac arrest. My heart had stopped for many minutes. In his view I wouldn't live until the morning and if I did I would be a vegetable. Dad didn't tell my mother and had to bear it for hours on his own.
I, meanwhile, was having a fascinating time. After I was anaesthetised, there a very long period of nothing. Then I was walking along a tunnel. It was successive rings of black and white, each ring several paces long. It was dead straight and disappeared in a dot in the far distance. I wondered if it went on for ever. I walked and walked and walked for the longest time imaginable. I wasn't scared; my feelings were perfectly neutral. And then I was at the end. No real surprise, I'd just reached the end. There were huge old, wooden doors. Double doors. Huge. Unpainted. Oak, I guessed. Iron fittings. Like the doors of a castle. One was shut and the other very slightly open, the narrow gap revealing a rich blackness inside. I pushed on the slightly open door. It was incredibly heavy. I leant against it and pushed as hard as I could. The door moved very slowly. When the gap was just big enough I slipped through and stood just inside until my eyes became accustomed to the darkness. After a little while I could make out a long, narrow table around which sat twenty old men, maybe more. They were all nodding a silent welcome. They weren't happy, they wore expressions of concern, but they were welcoming me. I knew this was very serious. Very, very, serious. I turned back towards the door and the dream ended.
I woke up in Intensive Care without a care in the world. Morphine had turned my world into amusing shades of grey where every grey thing I looked at had its own distinct buzzing sound. I parents came in briefly and I asked what the hell the were doing there so early and I saw my grandparents pop their heads round the door and I thought how hilarious they all looked in green surgical coveralls, hats and masks. Why were they in disguise? I knew who they were.
After a couple of days I went back to the ward and the surgeon came to see me. He had an entourage of trainee doctors. I learned later he was held in the highest regard. He had operated during the Blitz in London with the hospital falling down around him. He asked how I was getting on and then said, "You had a great honour bestowed on you, young man." "Oh, yes, sir? What was that?" "When we opened you up, Theatre Sister passed out. She doesn't do that very often."
The mess left behind six months earlier had turned to gangrene.
There is no God. There is no after life. We beat all the other animals in the evolutionary race. That's it. We are animals that evolved and made stories to comfort ourselves as we gained our collective consciousness and began to wonder - as no other species is capable of wondering. Some strong speakers and story tellers exploited weaknesses to give themselves power, some to create order, some to ease the burden of what until recently was, for most people, a hard life.
There is no God. The black and white tunnel was my pupils hunting. The wooden doors were my dream version of the Pearly Gates. The old men were a mix of the Last Supper and the Board of Directors in Mary Poppins. My dream was my brain making me comfortable as I faded after cardiac arrest.
When they opened me up I was s
t and pus and gangrene. I was an intelligent animal that was sick being treated by intelligent animals with skills.
There is no Creator.
Great post Dicky and amazing little story, you have a great ability to make the words on the page come alive.I, meanwhile, was having a fascinating time. After I was anaesthetised, there a very long period of nothing. Then I was walking along a tunnel. It was successive rings of black and white, each ring several paces long. It was dead straight and disappeared in a dot in the far distance. I wondered if it went on for ever. I walked and walked and walked for the longest time imaginable. I wasn't scared; my feelings were perfectly neutral. And then I was at the end. No real surprise, I'd just reached the end. There were huge old, wooden doors. Double doors. Huge. Unpainted. Oak, I guessed. Iron fittings. Like the doors of a castle. One was shut and the other very slightly open, the narrow gap revealing a rich blackness inside. I pushed on the slightly open door. It was incredibly heavy. I leant against it and pushed as hard as I could. The door moved very slowly. When the gap was just big enough I slipped through and stood just inside until my eyes became accustomed to the darkness. After a little while I could make out a long, narrow table around which sat twenty old men, maybe more. They were all nodding a silent welcome. They weren't happy, they wore expressions of concern, but they were welcoming me. I knew this was very serious. Very, very, serious. I turned back towards the door and the dream ended.
I woke up in Intensive Care without a care in the world. Morphine had turned my world into amusing shades of grey where every grey thing I looked at had its own distinct buzzing sound. I parents came in briefly and I asked what the hell the were doing there so early and I saw my grandparents pop their heads round the door and I thought how hilarious they all looked in green surgical coveralls, hats and masks. Why were they in disguise? I knew who they were.
After a couple of days I went back to the ward and the surgeon came to see me. He had an entourage of trainee doctors. I learned later he was held in the highest regard. He had operated during the Blitz in London with the hospital falling down around him. He asked how I was getting on and then said, "You had a great honour bestowed on you, young man." "Oh, yes, sir? What was that?" "When we opened you up, Theatre Sister passed out. She doesn't do that very often."
The mess left behind six months earlier had turned to gangrene.
There is no God. There is no after life. We beat all the other animals in the evolutionary race. That's it. We are animals that evolved and made stories to comfort ourselves as we gained our collective consciousness and began to wonder - as no other species is capable of wondering. Some strong speakers and story tellers exploited weaknesses to give themselves power, some to create order, some to ease the burden of what until recently was, for most people, a hard life.
There is no God. The black and white tunnel was my pupils hunting. The wooden doors were my dream version of the Pearly Gates. The old men were a mix of the Last Supper and the Board of Directors in Mary Poppins. My dream was my brain making me comfortable as I faded after cardiac arrest.
When they opened me up I was s
t and pus and gangrene. I was an intelligent animal that was sick being treated by intelligent animals with skills.There is no Creator.
Edited by DickyC on Sunday 20th April 12:28
ali_kat said:
Wow Dicky!
Just wow x
It even impresses doctors. You'd think, with surviving cardiac arrest being a staple of TV and film drama, it was fairly common. In fact, the survival rate - in hospital - is only about 20% and of those a substantial number will have some measure of neurological disability.Just wow x
I was extraordinarily lucky.
DickyC said:
It even impresses doctors. You'd think, with surviving cardiac arrest being a staple of TV and film drama, it was fairly common. In fact, the survival rate - in hospital - is only about 20% and of those a substantial number will have some measure of neurological disability.
I was extraordinarily lucky.
Thank God I was extraordinarily lucky.
IainT said:
DickyC said:
I was extraordinarily lucky.
Nah, god has a plan for you to fullfil...
That's the great thing about atheism. If we're right, we haven't wasted time with worship, restricting our sex life, not eating certain foods and all the other banal inconveniences of god bothering. But if we're wrong, then we're straight into heaven as we've carried out god's plan for us to the letter. The god squad need atheists to test and strengthen their faith, and that's the job god has given me. And it's a task I've embraced with gusto.
ChrisGB said:
Captain Muppet said:
ChrisGB said:
rxtx said:
Didn't think so. It's not your fault you were indoctrinated Chris.
(Why do I feel like Robin Williams?)
On this basis, every atheist would have studied in depth the arguments for and against God, so would have a ready refutation of prime mover, final causality, immateriality of mind? Those exact things conspicuous by their absence in this thread and anywhere else.(Why do I feel like Robin Williams?)
Sounds like double standards to me.
The problem comes from either side beleiving they are right and thinking the other side is wrong.
I've written a new version of the Lord's prayer to end this silly misunderstanding, obviously something similar will have to be rolled out to the rest of the religions:
Dear God, if you exist, you're ace.
Nice trick with the creation and lack of proof.
Given that we don't know the rules we made some up and hope we got them right.
But lets face it, you'd have to be pretty cruel and arbitrary to judge us either way.
Thanks for all the cancer,
Amen.
If you allow logic as a way of knowing, if rational argument can give you the truth, then God can be proven to exist.
You don't need to allow logic or reason.
Sorry, yes I was using "evidence" as just measurable stuff, data, things. I accept that it does limit my sources of knowledge.
Assuming that what you say is true, and that you can use logic to prove God exists, what use is that knowledge?
How does knowing there is a God change anything at all?
Where does the moral guidance come from?
Given that I'll have to invest quite a bit of time and effort to accept your argument that there is a god it'd be nice to know why I should bother.
Gaspode said:
ChrisGB said:
So to sum up: thoughts being about something and final causality in general disprove materialism, the ideology most non-mystical atheists accept a version of. Yet people cling to materialism despite the evidence against it.
A logical demonstration of the existence of God is given, and I'm repeatedly told to give testable evidence of the non-material.
Which side is the loony fringe here?
Now that I'm beginning to "get" classical theism, its just amazing not how wrong atheists are, but how far they don't even suspect they could be wrong. It's no exaggeration to call it the mother of all superstitions, such is the grip it has on the masses.
Still if it gives you comfort that its all meaningless, irrationality and death in the end, go for it.
The fact that our thoughts are 'about' something does not disprove materialism, all it does is demonstrate that there are some aspects of consciousness that we do not yet understand.A logical demonstration of the existence of God is given, and I'm repeatedly told to give testable evidence of the non-material.
Which side is the loony fringe here?
Now that I'm beginning to "get" classical theism, its just amazing not how wrong atheists are, but how far they don't even suspect they could be wrong. It's no exaggeration to call it the mother of all superstitions, such is the grip it has on the masses.
Still if it gives you comfort that its all meaningless, irrationality and death in the end, go for it.
The concept of final cause is an assumption based on the belief that 'there must be something' causing everything. As we learn more and more about the nature of reality, we find that our concepts of what is material need to be modified. Things that we we thought of as being physical particles now appear to be best modelled as regions of probability and energy density. Science has no problem with this.
Basing an argument on final cause is like basing an argument on the reality of an image in a mirror. Both appear to be present, but neither actually exist.
You seem to have a belief that logic is an impregnable system of thinking, that any conclusion based on true premises must be unassailably true. Here's a vey simple deminstration that logic is imperfect:
1. An object that travels from point A to point C must take a finite and exact amount of time to make the journey
2. A point B can be observed to lie exactly equidistant between points A and C
3. In order to arrive at point C, the object must first arrive at point B
4. The distance between A and B can be divided in half again
5. This process can be repeated indefinitely, giving an infinite number of halfway points
6. This means the object must pass through an infinite number of points in a finite time, which is impossible
The logic is sound, but the conclusion is invalid. We know this through observation of the real world.
On logic, true premises and a conclusion that follows give is truth.
What is wrong in your example in point 6?
What is the first number after 0?
I think you need to reformulate. If I move my finger across a ruler from 1 to 2, it has moved over an infinite number of infinitely small spaces, or?
Moonhawk said:
ChrisGB said:
But discussions like these don't usually include a logical demonstration of something purely actual, which I've given. Matt and Iain accept the argument but disagree about what the prime mover is, but that's as close to a refutation we have.
What is the difference between assertion and logical demonstration? You are still just calling the argument names.
No need to prove a negative, just refute the argument. Or accept the irrationality of atheism.
Your "logical demonstration" includes many assumptions/assertions though which have to be taken as true for the argument to give you the outcome it has.What is the difference between assertion and logical demonstration? You are still just calling the argument names.
No need to prove a negative, just refute the argument. Or accept the irrationality of atheism.
Your assertions aren't logical demonstrations - they are merely statements of 'fact' that may not, in fact, be factual.
As for refuting the argument, what evidence would you accept to do so? I have pointed out the assumptions. If these assumptions are not taken to be true - the argument falls down, however many points in your argument can neither be proven nor disproven by their nature.
Edited by Moonhawk on Sunday 20th April 11:30
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