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Date:      Thu, 29 Aug 2002 20:59:57 -0700 (PDT)
From:      "Neal E. Westfall" <nwestfal@directvinternet.com>
To:        Terry Lambert <tlambert2@mindspring.com>
Cc:        chat@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject:   Re: Why did evolution fail?
Message-ID:  <20020829204315.O37029-100000@Tolstoy.home.lan>
In-Reply-To: <3D6EE0FD.8FA2080@mindspring.com>

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On Thu, 29 Aug 2002, Terry Lambert wrote:

> > > Yes.  Starting from first principles, can you build a working
> > > light bulb?
> >
> > Seems a bit arbitrary to me, besides the fact that both are likely to
> > claim to be able to do this.  However, let's talk about those first
> > principles.  What if the reason that both can build useful things such
> > as lightbulbs is that one of the two options is relying on concepts
> > which only make sense given the other's worldview, and in fact is
> > borrowing those concepts from that other worldview?
>
> The Catholic Church had 1800 years to do it, and didn't.  Science,
> once formalized, did it in about 100.

As I'm not all that fond of the Catholic Church myself, I'll let that
one slide for now.  But the question remains, how is "science" by
*anyone's* definition even possible?  David Hume undermined the basis
of modern science when he pointed out that there is no rational basis
for thinking that nature will remain uniform.  Every attempted
(atheistic) explanation that I've seen assumes the uniformity of nature
and thus begs the question.

The scientific method has worked well in the past, but that has no
relevance to whether or not it will work in the future.  In a random
chance universe, anything is possible.  Given those presuppositions,
for all you know when you squeeze the tube of toothpaste in the
morning, strawberry jam will come out.


Neal



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