Tim Daneluk

[Joe Barta]

Barta

[Doug Miller]

Going even farther OT now... I've always thought this to be a particularly bizarre understanding of Genesis. The sun and the earth were not made, by this account, until the third or fourth "day" IIRC -- which makes it completely impossible that the first two days, at least, are literally "days" by the accepted meaning of the term.

[Tim Daneliuk]

My apologies. It was late when I wrote the post and I didn't check spelling closely enough. You have both the spelling and the meaning correct.

Just be careful. By, the "Bible", they mean the *autographs* - the original texts. Most all inerrantists agree that the texts have been corrupted to some degree over time because we no long have the originals, only copies. They thus heartily support activities like archaelogy, lingustics, and texual criticism as means to better understanding what the original texts contain. Pretty much all of them argue that such textual "corruption" is fairly minor and typically has little effect on the end meaning. So far, they've been largely vindicated (about the quality of the texts we have today) by this claim each time older and older texts are found that more-or-less confirm today's texts.

"Truth" does not "spring from nothing". What is "True" always depends on your rules for acquiring knowledge (your epistemology). An apple falls from a tree and we can describe that by the laws of physics only because we have an agree-to play book about how physics is done. But that is a very small issue of mechanics. The more interesting question is how the Universe in which the tree exists ever came to be. How is it that the law of gravity operates as it does? Why was there a Big Bang and where did the matter and energy therein come from? These are not questions of mechanism, they are questions of First Cause...

Your question has no simple answer, nor is there any "proof" - see my earlier post about the non-provability of axiomatic starting points. All I can give you is *my* take on it. You may- or may not find it responsive. Note that I am not trying to convert you or sell you anything here, I am merely responding to your question in the only way I can. I am a Theist - someone who believes in an Author - for several reasons:

1) Step back from the detail of biology, physics, or any of modern science and look at the Whole Picture we see so far - The Universe taken as whole. I know of no example *within* that Universe we're looking at where Something comes from Nothing. All Somethings have a First Cause - another Something or Someone that brought them into being. It thus seems reasonable to infer that the Universe itself had a First Cause.

The fact that anything exists implies it came from somewhere/someone/somehow.

2) Assume that every bit of Science we currently posses is *precisely* correct and without error. That is, assume that the Science we have today at all levels of certainty is right on the money. Even if that were thecase, Science is unable to answer the basic question of First Cause: How did the Universe as a whole come to be? Science is limited to questions of mechanism, it cannot address *cause* or *meaning* (which is why the IDers believe the philosophy of Science is broken). IOW, not how does it *work*, but how did the whole business even come to be in existence. There are several possibilities:

a) The Universe is a magical place and we can't reliably know anything about it. (If true, then Science is pointless because it may well just all be an illusion.)

b) There are versions of a) above that claim that knowing the First Cause is mystical/magical, but that we can still reliably know things about the mechanics of how it works. This always struck me as the "giving up before you've started" plan. Understanding Mechanism without giving thought to Cause reduces all of us to mere machinery. There is ample evidence that humans particularly are considerably more than just machines. Try accounting for aesthetics, laughter, love, hate, creativity, and so in in purely mechanical terms. Contemporary Science is mired down in this purely mechanical view of all things and keeps trying to produce explanations that would account for exactly these kinds of things, and they generally fail.

A human being is more than just a collection of cells programmed by DNA in the same way that a Bach Motet is more than just notes on a page: The whole is somehow greater than the sum of the parts, and purely mechanistic explanations are laughably inadequate to circumscribe this. There is something profound and transcendent about being human that cannot be explained away because we understand the "gears and pulleys" that make us what we are physically.

Theologians will tell you that this transcendent character of humanity exists because we "made in God's image". I think that's as reasonable a hypothesis as any.

There is a transcendent component to human experience. This suggests that there is a source of that transcendence that is larger than just the mechanics of life.

(BTW, one of the great inconsistencies within today's Science community lies in this very area. If you argue that mankind is purely a machine, you have no basis for moral law of any kind. If I'm just a machine, then the best/strongest/most fit machine should survive. There ought never be any reason for laws against murder and mayhem, because these are just the "best machines" conquering other machines. You cannot deny trancendence in the matter of mankind's essential character on the one hand, but demand transcendant moral law on the other.

Sure, a bunch of "machines" can all get together and decide that having some sort of legal system is in their own self-interest as a matter of survival, but any notion of "right" or "wrong" is utterly inconsistent. Yet, you'll find precious few Scientists to agree that there is no such thing as morality, nor any need for it. They pretty much all have *some* moral code by which they abide - and for a lot more reason than purely utilitarian self-interest in most cases I've met. Similar examples exist in other areas - how is it that mere machines can enjoy art or music, exhibit strong emotions, and so on. The core answer to this is that Science itself may well have to limit itself to understanding humanity in purely mechanical terms - unless, of course, the IDers can finally make their case. But *Scientists* don't have to do that. Many consistent and thoughtful Scientists will tell you that they use Science only as a tool to undersand Mechanism, but they personally remain interested in Cause and human transcendent experience because they too grasp that the whole is larger than the sum of the parts.)

c) The Universe has always been eternally existent. (Very unlikely, given the current understanding of the Big Bang which fairly compellingly argues for an event that began the Universe.)

d) The Universe has an Author. Someone/something/somehow made the Universe come to be. If that Someone/something itself had an Author, we have to repeat the logic (The Author had an Author who had an Author ...). Eventually you come to one of two possibilities:

There is an infinite progression of Authors - the so-called "turtles all the way down" theory.

There is an Ultimate Author that transcends time and terminates the "stack of turtles".

I don't buy "turtles all the way down" because if true, it leaves the question open as to how there could be an infinite succession of Authors.

The Ultimate Author subcase here makes more intuitive sense to me:

The fact that anything exists implies that someone/something brought it into being _and_ that there is an Ultimate Author behind it all that transcends time, space, and all known laws of the this Universe and all other possibly existing Universes.

Have I proven my case? Nope. You never can prove your starting points. But at the very least, I hope you are convinced that there is a thoughtful and measured analysis that leads to Theism that is not in any way inferior to the analysis that leads to the development of any other knowledge system like Science.

More to the point, I hope you embrace the idea that to truly "know" things, you need *multiple kinds" of knowledge systems. It's not *just* Science, or Mathematics, or Logic, or Theology, or Existential Experience, or ... we need to become knowledgeable, we need them *all*. There have been two great tragedies in human intellectual development. The first was to *divide* knowledge systems and pit them against each other: Theology v. Science, Reason v. Experience, and so on. The second was the emergence of philosophies in the 20th Century that were

*destructive* to knowledge. Deconstructionism and Post-Modernism are examples of worldviews that outright destroy knowledge by attempting to show that nothing can ever actually be known.

I hope this answers your question...

[Java Man]

Here's one scenario.

[Odinn]

On 2/13/2006 1:34 AM Tim Daneliuk mumbled something about the following: [ snipped the majority, just going to hit on one point here ]

Okay, so what is the First Cause for a god? Using your distinction above, all somethings (god is a something) have a first cause. So there is a first cause for god, where's the first cause for this something that created god? Where's the first cause for this something that created the something that created god? Where's the first cause for......?

Nope, see my question(s) above.

[Tim Daneliuk]

Go back and reread 2c and 2d for my take on this.

[Charles Self]

Come on down south and try to make the fundamentalists believe that. Jerry and pals believe what they believe and they ain't agonna change.

[Renata]

Amendment I of the Bill of Rights

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

In fact, public schools are making a choice based on this l'il ole amendment - to not support a particular religion's philosophies. It doesn't make secularism into a religion.

Not all religions on this earth espouse this idea of ID and teaching ID would thus "favor" that particular religion's views.

Until ID can fit under our established precepts of "science", it ain't science. Science doesn't claim to know all, or always be right, but it does have rules (testability, etc.) and ID fails in every one of those rules. Therefore, it ain't science.

Really, you ought to be worrying about the rest of the amendment these days...

Renata

-snip-

[Tim Daneliuk]

You'll notice that this is a directive to *government* to keep its beak out of private matters - religion in this case. There is no complementary instruction for it to *prevent* citizens from expressing their religious views within institutions they *pay* for (say, for example, a school).

Secularism *most certainly* is a belief system no different in kind than any other religion. Every time a school chooses a secular agenda, it chooses an epistemology, a values system, and a particular point-of-view about the world in which we live. For example, so-called "multi-culturalism" is a secular values agenda in that it conciously make no distinctions between the moral "qualities" of different cultures.

I'm not arguing against secularism here. I'm arguing that you cannot make choices in a public school setting without embracing

*some* values system and right now the schools have chosen secular values. This is as offensive to religious people as choosing Christian values and epistemology would be to an atheist. There is thus *no* way to run a publicly funded education program without violating the sensibilities of some significant portion of the population.

For the moment, (unless/until ID is established as legitimate Science) that's right. But espousing a purely matter/mechanical/naturalist view of knowledge is just as much a statement of belief. In both cases, these are inbound *assumptions* about how the world operates based on individual *belief*. You cannot argue against ID being permitted in the schools on the one hand and on the other defend the presence of materialist/naturalism on the other - its hypocritical. Either both belong in the school system (noting that, for the moment, ID ought not to be taught as "Science") or *neither* belongs in the school.

The root cause here is not ID or Scientific naturalism. The root cause problem is the fact that schools have been collectivized by means of government and can thus *never* satisfy the entire or even a significant percentage of the population's worldview.

I do. I worry about the 1st Amendment being violated by the politically- correct secularists who parade so-called moral "neutrality" and who hide behind code words like "sexual harrassment", "racism", and "hate speech" to restrict free expression. I worry about the 2nd Ammendment because it is under continuous assault by the drooling idiot Left. I worry about the 4th Amendment because it is under assault by every part of the political and cultural spectrum - the Right wants to peek in our windows, and the Left wants to confiscate private wealth. I worry about the neverending abuse of the Commerce Clause whereby government gives itself permission to intrude upon anything it feels like in some contrived claim to commerce.

Every single example I have cited here is really an example of one thing: The collectivization of our lives through government and the consequent erradication of the distinction between private and public matters.

[Joe Barta]

probable it is, but it's certainly a point to consider.

Joe Barta

[Joe Barta]

I've never agreed with this notion that somehow we humans are somehow "special" compared to any other life on the planet, or even to ANYTHING else anywhere.

Let's take it backwards... were Neandertals profound and trancendent? Whales? Dogs? Spiders? Earthworms? Amoebae? Bacteria? Organic molecules? Water molecules?

Certainly, some characteristics that define us as "human", such as creativity, love, hate, etc are either not present in "lower" animals or are present to a much less complex degree. I would argue that those characteristics that you use to place humans in a "special" category are nothing more than manifestations of our complexity.

Fast forward 100 million years and it's very likley that some future form of life may surpass human complexity and then humans will find themselves a "lower" animal.

All that said, if you are suggesting that there may be something "special" about "living things" in general, I would tend to agree with you... but I suspect that upon closer examination, the distinction between living and non-living may be less precise than we think.

Joe Barta

[fredfighter]

No. At best, that is only true for those scientists who believe (as a matter of Faith) in the sufficiency of Science itself.

The sufficiency of Reason, with respect to Science follows directly from the definition of Science. An understanding that is beyond Reason, is beyond Scinece. Certainly one may define a discipline that includes Science and considerations outside of Reason, but to avoid confusion that other dscipline should be called by a name other than 'Science'. Or, if one insists on thus redefining 'Science' then one should assign a new name to the old discipline.

Personally, I think that to combine science with metaphysics is less useful than to combine woodworking with politics.

[Tim Daneliuk]

I think perhaps we are talking past each other here. I only meant that the *efficacy* of Reason is presumed by Science. That is, Science presumes Reason to be efficacious and thus sufficient to do _everything Science wants to do_ (not that Reason is sufficient for everything in general). If this were not so, Science would be looking to add other mechanisms for knowledge acquisition like the IDers suggest should be done. But Science clearly is *not* looking for other such mechanism - it presumes Reason to be sufficient to its task.

[todd]

So, you're a vegan?

I think you're being incredibly optimistic to think that we'll be around in

100 million years.

todd

[Java Man]

I'm not sure it's realistic, either. However, at least some of the money China has loaned to the US government was once in the pockets of American consumers.

Rick

[Joe Barta]

Maybe this is a simplistic way to look at it, but there are huge variations in standards of living throughout the world. I think what's going on is a little "evening out" and I'm not sure that's such a bad thing.

Joe Barta

[fredfighter]

I understood. That is why I disagree.

Science does not presume Reason to be sufficient. Science is defined such that reason is sufficient

I do not agree that Science wants. Perhpas this is the crux of our disagreement.

Science is a specific method. If you change that method, you no longer have Science _by definition_. You may have a meta- method that includes science. The practice of medicine is an example of a meta-method that includs science. The practice of medicine is not, itself, science.

[Tim Daneliuk]

'Just curious - do you believe that the definition of Science is immutable and that Science cannot exist with any definition other than the current one (To your claim: Science and Reason are isomorphic). I believe that the definition of Science can change and we'll potentially can still have Science. I rather think that's more the point where we differ than anything...

[Odinn]

I did. It still doesn't match. You can't say you have to have a First Cause, then at some arbitrary point say it isn't needed. Either a First Cause is needed for everything, or the universe doesn't need a First Cause.

[fredfighter]

I believe the meanings of words can change so that someday the word 'science' may mean something different than it does today. The discipline itself, as presently defined, will still exist, at least

as an intellectual construct, even if there are no longer any practitioners. Certainly today the word itself mans different things to different people. I suspect you understand the esotheric definion presumed by my remarks.

A century ago, 'computer' was a job title for a human being. Now the same word is the name of a machine.

If we expand the definition of computer science to include musical composition we would have something quite different from what we call computer science today. Would it then it be appropriate to call a person with a degree in musical composition a computer scientist?

A couple of centuries ago "Natural Philosophy" was the name of the discipline we now call physics. My guess would be that if someone were to use the term "Natural Philosophy" for a current intellectual pursuit it would not be in any way an outgrowth of the Natural Philosophy of the 18th century.

If religious philisophy is incorporated into science, or vice versa is it not preferable to use a new word for the new construct, for example Christian Science or Scientology? (e.g. ditto for 'science fiction')