Sharpshooter Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 You might be interested in reading God's Debris (A thought Experiment): http://nowscape.com/godsdebris.pdf Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heretic Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 Which is littered with nonsense designed to suppress one's critical thinking skills authored by someone who is pro-intelligent design. His view that evolution can't be right because of the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics is laughable. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sharpshooter Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 Uh...yeah....so because one is pro-intelligent design that automatically makes them nonsense? Maybe you should research more - here's a direct quote from Scott Adams: "I’ve been doing lots of reading on the subject, trying to gather comic fodder. I fully expected to validate my preconceived notion that the Darwinists had a mountain of credible evidence and the Intelligent Design folks were creationist kooks disguising themselves as scientists. That’s the way the media paints it. I had no reason to believe otherwise. The truth is a lot more interesting. Allow me to set you straight. (Note: I’m not a believer in Intelligent Design, Creationism, Darwinism, free will, non-monetary compensation, or anything else I can’t eat if I try hard enough.)" Second, did you actually read it or did you base your opinion on your own biased view? BTW: I didn't ask you to read it this time - I was talking to Eh! Team. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heretic Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 I read it....and it's hokum dressed up in basic sociology and junk science. The basic sociology in this book is things like the mind as an illusion generator, people taking comfort in collective and useful delusions, science as a belief system, the useful fictions in science becoming accepted as fact, and even the idea of god as a metaphor for society and environment. The pop science is almost everything he said about biology and physics. I was especially amused at the God-dust theory of gravity, which is Newtonian gravity in different language. Oh, and since you didn't care to quote Scott Adams full remarks, allow me to post what he said further along: Nonsense. Scientists are experts in their specialized field. And there's is no debate among the scientific fields as the the authenticity of evolution being the accepted truth about life on earth. There are NO two-sides to this. The fact that Adams allows for the two sides to seemingly have equal weight in his own mind allows us to see from where he was sitting when he wrote his equally pseudo-scientific philosophy novella, God's Debris. The fact that you hold it up as some kind of philosophical enlightenment or epiphany or revelation or uncovered truth or whatever, only serves the point that gullible people, who haven't bothered being educated in science, are susceptible to fall as intellectual prey to pseudo-scientific philosophizing rather than being able to use their critical thinking skills grounded on actual knowledge. If you had even a shred of curiosity for actual truth, you'd go and learn scientific fundamentals and not rely on the musings and thought-experiments of comic strip authors for your understanding about Thermodynamics or Evolution or Newtonian Physics, and whatever else Adams tries to twist into his fictionally based attempt to join philosophy and science, which is at the heart of what Intelligent Designers are attempting to do. They say they aren't Creationists, but they are. It's just that they have re-packaged themselves. Philosophy stopped giving us 'truths' long ago. There isn't anything new to be found in that discipline anymore. It's run its course. It's dead. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sharpshooter Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 Sorry, I like to look at the world with blinders off - so I enjoy reading all sources - not just those that suit my needs. Are you calling me gullible? Sorry - your hatred is clouding your judgement - I'm into science as much as the next guy. Now you're saying Philosophy is dead as well? Okay...whatever floats your boat... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heretic Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 There's a difference in reading for entertainment and reading for information. Sadly, you seem to confuse the two at times. God's Debris is fine if you read it purely for entertainment value and use it to ponder the 'what if's'....but it should not be read as a source to inform you about science or reality or as a rebuttal against the 'what is'. Evolution is the truth and reality of 'what is', and God has been shown to be an unnecessary actor or step in that process. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr. Ambien Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 I never said it was - I said it was interesting and thought provoking. Evolution is just a tool. It's a scientific theory that has been proven via science - but it is only part of the grand scheme of things. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heretic Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 If your reference to tool is a guide based on reality, you're absolutely right. If also by tool you were referencing Thor's hammer, another fantastic tool in abstract fantasy, you were absolutely right again.. in the same realm as this "grand scheme" which has no proven basis on the same plane of reality as science, or evolution, or the computer you're typing from to entertain us with such imagination. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sharpshooter Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 I never said it was - I said it was interesting and thought provoking. Evolution is just a tool. It's a scientific theory that has been proven via science - but it is only part of the grand scheme of things. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sharpshooter Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 "For millions of years, mankind lived just like the animals. Then something happened which unleashed the power of our imagination. We learned to talk and we learned to listen. Speech has allowed the communication of ideas, enabling human beings to work together to build the impossible. Mankind's greatest achievements have come about by talking, and its greatest failures by not talking. It doesn't have to be like this. Our greatest hopes could become reality in the future. With the technology at our disposal, the possibilities are unbounded. All we need to do is make sure we keep talking." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heretic Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 Yeah, it was known as evolution by way of natural selection. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr. Ambien Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 "For millions of years, mankind lived just like the animals. Then something happened which unleashed the power of our imagination. We learned to talk and we learned to listen. Speech has allowed the communication of ideas, enabling human beings to work together to build the impossible. Mankind's greatest achievements have come about by talking, and its greatest failures by not talking. It doesn't have to be like this. Our greatest hopes could become reality in the future. With the technology at our disposal, the possibilities are unbounded. All we need to do is make sure we keep talking." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sharpshooter Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 Maybe - but right now it remains a mystery - even to science. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sharpshooter Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 Talking is the main perpetrator of BS. Showing is far better. To indulge in the highly subjective, semi-awkward turn in conversation, mankind would do fine without speech.. speech is only one form of communication. Body language, sign language, gestures, writing -- it would obviously be a large adjustment, but mankind would be fine without speech. If you are interested in how speech and thought are concerned, I'm just wondering.. are you also thinking about why mankind makes up so many stories involving creators, prophets ,etc.? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heretic Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 Just some notes from those videos: The brain isn't mature until about age 20. So...with neurons being so poor, that means the following 2 statements can be made: If we were designed, then the designer didn't do a very good job If we have evolved, then evolution didn't do a very good job. The first act of science and the first act of religion are the same. That is, how we connect the dots. There has been arrogance on both sides. I also like his comment about bad science - that if you use science to disprove one thing in a religious text, then you can throw out the entire text, is just wrong - that's bad science. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sharpshooter Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 Just some notes from those videos: The brain isn't mature until about age 20. So...with neurons being so poor, that means the following 2 statements can be made: If we were designed, then the designer didn't do a very good job If we have evolved, then evolution didn't do a very good job. The first act of science and the first act of religion are the same. That is, how we connect the dots. There has been arrogance on both sides. I also like his comment about bad science - that if you use science to disprove one thing in a religious text, then you can throw out the entire text, is just wrong - that's bad science. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VICanucksfan5551 Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 Just some notes from those videos: The brain isn't mature until about age 20. So...with neurons being so poor, that means the following 2 statements can be made: If we were designed, then the designer didn't do a very good job If we have evolved, then evolution didn't do a very good job. The first act of science and the first act of religion are the same. That is, how we connect the dots. There has been arrogance on both sides. I also like his comment about bad science - that if you use science to disprove one thing in a religious text, then you can throw out the entire text, is just wrong - that's bad science. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heretic Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 We did evolve, we were NOT 'created'....and our evolution is based on survival of a particular species in a particular habitat against competition for limited resources, not about choosing the best engineering options available or possible. And his point regarding your last point is absolutely true. There are plenty of relevant and useful things in every religious text that people can and should use in their lives. Basically don't throw the baby out with the bathwater.....however, that doesn't mean that the baby splashing around in the bathwater was born of a virgin. The points that you need to pat attention to mostly though, is the point where he says that our brains have evolved to "create narratives out of disparate sensory experiences or facts.....This narrative process is the basis not just of religious faith, which is something that you find in every culture across the world, but is also the basis of scientific thought", then tie that into the point he made saying that science will go beyond that to at least falsify through evidence and observation whereas religion won't...in essence like he said religion will say, "Nope, that's my story and i'm stickin to it. That's my faith and i'm not going to subject it to those particular modes of inquiry". That should tell you much about what the basis of faith in your religion is for some and why your brain allows you to 'believe' in it, and why some of us have evolved past that, and why some haven't. It's not that there aren't moral truths in religion, it's that the rest of it cannot stand up to scrutiny. You gotta ask yourself, why you believe in the other mumbo jumbo then? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sharpshooter Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 Remember - just because some say "that's my story and I'm sticking to it" doesn't mean everyone is like that. Saying some have "evolved" past "that" is what he says about arrogance. Calling someone else beliefs "mumbo jumbo" is also the same. We did "evolve" and were "not created" is NOT a fact - unless you have a time machine and can go back and watch what happened on this planet...note, at the same time I am not saying that we were created is a fact neither. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nevlach Posted August 23, 2012 Share Posted August 23, 2012 Remember - just because some say "that's my story and I'm sticking to it" doesn't mean everyone is like that. Saying some have "evolved" past "that" is what he says about arrogance. Calling someone else beliefs "mumbo jumbo" is also the same. We did "evolve" and were "not created" is NOT a fact - unless you have a time machine and can go back and watch what happened on this planet...note, at the same time I am not saying that we were created is a fact neither. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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