Date: Tue, 10 Sep 2002 08:43:26 -0700 (PDT) From: "Neal E. Westfall" <nwestfal@directvinternet.com> To: Terry Lambert <tlambert2@mindspring.com> Cc: Lawrence Sica <lomifeh@earthlink.net>, Giorgos Keramidas <keramida@ceid.upatras.gr>, <chat@FreeBSD.ORG> Subject: Re: Why did evolution fail? Message-ID: <20020909170759.M59679-100000@Tolstoy.home.lan> In-Reply-To: <3D7D2193.88E5546D@mindspring.com>
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On Mon, 9 Sep 2002, Terry Lambert wrote: > [...] > > > Why is it "completely irrational"? All it amounts to is that we > > > are willing to acknowledge that we don't know everything. > > > > Because no matter how well you dress it up, it amounts to the following: > > > > 1) Something came from nothing. > > We haven't gotten into the cosmological issues, so far, but if > you insist, we can. It does seem to be relevent, doesn't it? > > 2) Order came from disorder. > > Mathematically, we can prove this from the same axiomatic basis > that lets other mathematical operations work. Order *does* come > from disorder. And square circles *do too* exist. > At a fundamental level, the universe is quantized, > and this causes certain emergenet behaviours in matter. Really? What do you mean, when you say, "the universe is quantized"? And what do you mean by "certain emergent behaviours in matter"? You seem to think that quantum physics can do all things, like reconcile the irrational. To say that order comes from disorder, no matter how much you try to dress it up is still irrational. If, on the other hand, you mean there never was disorder in the first place, I can buy that. > We call > the properties that cause this "universal constants", like the > value of PI, the value of "e", the Planck length, etc.. We don't > have to define an origin for these numbers for them to make > themselves evident to us. Maybe you don't think so, but if you believe that then you can't count on them continuing to be constants in the future. We're right back to David Hume and the problem of induction. > > 3) Life came from non-life. > > This is actually a reasonable assumption, given empirical > observations. We have a number of stories to describe the math > of how this could be so. "Stories" seems to be an apt description. > It also begs the definition of "life"; > if you mean self-assembly of complex chemical compounds, we can > do this in a laboratory, under controlled conditions, creating > amino acids from conditions which simulate our best guesses at > those present early in the life of the Earth. The key phrase here is "under controlled conditions". Self-assembly is a contradiction. Moreover, no, I do not consider amino acids to be "life". > > 4) Intelligence came from non-intelligence. > > Our best theory is that intelligence is an emergent property of > complex self-regulating systems over a certain threshold density. This just sounds like so much baloney. Basically what you just said is that our best theory is merely the assertion that "intelligence emerged from non-intelligence." Yeah, I already know you believe that, but believing it and showing it to be the case are two different things. > Again, it begs the definition of "intelligence"; there are many > things you could mean here, and it's really hard to draw a boundary > line, and say, for example, "Chimps are intelligent, but mice are > not". Lets start with your own reasoning ability. To review, if you are a naturalist, all of your brain functions are due merely to physical laws acting on antecedent brain states. On your view, reason is an illusion, and you have no way of knowing whether or not your reasoning is sound, since all of it is due merely to the electro-chemical reactions taking place in your grey matter. You could never know that your views were right and that somebody else's views are wrong, unless you give yourself the priviledged position of being the only person for whom evolution granted perfect reasoning. Moreover, you cannot save reason by introducing randomness, as all this does is try to save rationality by introducing irrationality. Morever, whether or not you think reason is determined by physical laws or by chance, it is still determined, and has nothing to do with "sound reasoning" or "truth". > > 5) Morality came from the non-moral. > > Morality is a consensus definition based on collectivist ethics; > it's always externally imposed, which is how it differs from > ethics. We've had this discussion already. Yeah, I know, you don't believe in moral absolutes. I'll just point out one more problem with your view, and then drop it. You could never come to a meaningful consensus without reasoning, and since your reasoning is suspect due to the above, you could never actually come to any meaningful consensus. > > To believe in evolution (at least the non-theistic variety) you have to > > believe that things turn into their opposites. This is quite a departure > > from the notion of "rational explanation." > > I follow your arguments (even if I attempt to refute them); > however, even if we grant your 5 points as being totally and > complete irrefutably correct, they don't lead me to the > conclusion that "evolution is incorrect", they merely lead me, > as a collection of supporting arguuments, to a belief in a > creator. > > Believing in a creator is not the same thing as falsifying > evolutionary theory. No, it is not, but at this point I think you would do well to read Phillip Johnsons book, "Darwin on Trial". The philosophical and scientific problems with evolution are quite numerous. Neal To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
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