Do you believe in Creation...

[Crixus]

I've not waded through the whole thread yet, however I'm going to throw this out as I've seen a lot of "I don't beleive in creationism, because I can't take the concept of God seriously" statements so far.

You don't need a supernatural God for the universe as you know it to be a created artifact.

Transhumanist philosophers (which seem to count some of the most rabidly anti-religious thinkers I've seen to date amongst their numbers), seem to have snuck up on creationism from a secular-humanist back door! It is called the Simulationist Argument.

Basically it runs like this: If it is possible to create enough computing power (and through the use of nanotechnology, especially self-replicating assemblers, they think it is), then you can create essentially perfect simulated realities; that is, good enough that you would never be able to tell the difference should your mind be interfaced with one. If you can do that - they argue - then we'll end up simulating all kinds of alternate or experimental realities, and populating them with intelligent AI, for all sorts of purposes: research, entertainment, etc.

Then if you work out the statistics and probability, the implications come out to this: if it is possible to simulate artificial universes and populate them with intelligences (artificial, or "natural" intelligences interfaced with the simulation), then probabilities say that the most likely scenerio is that you current exist within a created, artificial, simulated reality. Of course, Occam's razor doesn't cut everything and this may just be a very cool sounding bunch of logical noise.

But if the argument holds, then chances are that you exist within a created universe.

Now, I don't know if I buy the argument, and I'm pretty damn skeptical about its claims, but I find it amusing that a group of staunch secular humanists seem to have hit upon a non-divine form of creationism.

The universe: "God's" great big Sim game

(of course, it this case "God" might just be some university student doing a thesis on comparative histories, or some such ...)

 

[Tarkus]

The Creationist argument is so full of holes and contradictions which they try to explain using flawed writings. The big problem is that the are enough wackos in the US, they voted for Bush twice didn't they; although the fix was in for the second vote, that let this thing get too far into the light and it will be a frosty day in hell (wherever that is)and I don't mean Michigan, before it goes away.

That was certainly 'a tad bit on topic'. The creationist argument is full of holes when they try to prove it scientifically. Never going to happen since it's basic premise requires magic. How do you scientifically prove that?

 

[serviceman]

4. I don't believe science can explain everything



Eventually science will explain everything, it will just take a very long time, because unlike religion, science requires proof. Repeatable proof.

 

[Tarkus]

What I'd like to hear is a clear explanation for the driving "change" factors of Mutation.....being that the Natural Selection angle has lost its luster.

Okay you'll have to trust me on the source but I am sure I can track down the citation if you want as it was on CBC a few days back... you'll also have to trust me that I am dumbing down the science here a bit not because I think you aren't smart enough to get the real thing but rather because the whole abstract is probably a couple of hundred pages.

Anyway one of the interesting side aspects of Global Warming, (let us not get into a debate as to what has caused this.. different debate... just accept that even GWB admits it is happening), is that climate zones are changing. Ie: what were temperate zones are becoming tropical etc. The issue here is that when that happens the seasons change in duration and start point. Now there are a species of mosquitoes that grow on the inside of a plant, the name currently eludes me, but ingrained into their DNA is the innate ability to figure out when fall is coming so they need to lay eggs in a manner that will survive the winter. The problem is that they are now in a situation where their DNA coding tells them to lay eggs too early and in natural selection being born too early or too late results in death.

However evolution is far too well balanced to let such a silly thing affect it so by "COINCIDENCE" (remember nothing about evolution is ever a direct consequence only ever a fluke that works out), some mosquitoes DNA is screwed up and thus they lay eggs early or late. In this case the study looked at what happened to these mosquitoes that in theory should have laid eggs and resulted in the eggs being hatched too early (because fall occurred later and thus the births occurred IN winter), and what they found, because mosquitoes go through hundreds of life cycles during the summer, was that the screwed up mosquitoes whose DNA incorrectly told them to lay eggs later were the ones that now populated the region. Natural selection had expressed itself, (remember it never occurs.. you cannot ever think anything is directly happening), and now the mosquitoes who were programmed to lay eggs later were now the dominant species.

Kewl eh?

The bad news is that unlike mosquitoes polar bears cannot replicate a new dominance sub-system in a year. Changes for large mammals and many other life forms takes hundreds to thousands of years and given the speed of global warming it is unlikely that there will be time.


Does that help?

 

[Tarkus]

I've not waded through the whole thread yet, however I'm going to throw this out as I've seen a lot of "I don't beleive in creationism, because I can't take the concept of God seriously" statements so far.

You don't need a supernatural God for the universe as you know it to be a created artifact.

(of course, it this case "God" might just be some university student doing a thesis on comparative histories, or some such ...)

Much deleted but interesting position. Some advanced physics doesn't quite agree.. string theory, tachyons etc. which suggest that our understanding of what constitutes a logical A - B - C structure may be faulted.

However I think you have hit on a very clever topic. God is presented in a all or nothing stance. If a Vorticon, (Orange Box reference here.. "Freeman.. BE ADEQUATE!".. what the hell does that mean.. "I dunno' just sounded like something a Vort might say?"), takes a piss in lake Ontario before he sets off to Mediocre 4 and a bit of his DNA meets a procaryote and they go out to dinner, (procaryotes never pick up the tab by the way), and 90 seconds later there are 400,000,000 of these single celled critters... when a few billion years pass and a bunch of guys looking to get laid behind the backdrop of some SPs who wonder 'I wonder how much money these guys really have?' on a board called TERB comes into play...

is that original Vorticon God?

I mean maybe he is? His plan for all of us? "Be adequate?"

 

[Tarkus]

42!

For another Einstein quote: "The word god is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honourable, but still primitive legends which are nevertheless pretty childish. No interpretation no matter how subtle can (for me) change this."

... and then roughly 2000 years later after they nailed a man to a tree for basically saying how great it would be if everyone would be nice to each other the answer to the question was found... it was perfect and it would work and no one would need to be nailed to a tree. Unfortunately at that very moment the Vogon Destructor Fleet destroyed the earth... 'the mice will be so upset'.

I am not an agnostic I am an atheist but I still find there is lots in the Bible worth considering... same goes for the Quoran and the Tanakh... mind you I am particularly fond of the Imagery Proverbs of ELP regarding Tarkus where apparently if I can avoid the Manticore I rule!

 

[Tarkus]

Dawkins! (SPIT!).

Has no-one read "The God Delusion" - Richard Dawkins? It was/is supposed to be a best-seller. Don't read it, whatever you do, if you think you believe in god. As for the origin of life (which occurred way before the first animals) read RD's "The Ancestor's Tale". The first things that could be said to reproduce didn't have DNA. DNA-based life started as bacteria. There was no "first creature". Even today, the major part of biomass is bacteria. Our ancestors were bacteria. The whole category known as "animals" is just a tiny twig in the whole tree of life.

I don't get this whole concept of trying to disprove the existence of God? I am full card carrying atheist and I think Dawkins is nothing more than virulent lecture circuit pimp. I have found him unable to distinguish between the concept of faith and the pragmatic. I can only presume he was an alter boy who never got his bag of chips along with the coke... (we all know the joke).

 

[Tarkus]

If we were created, then who created the Creator?
Who created the Creator's creator, and so on ...........

Why did the Creator wait so many hundreds of millions of years and multiple mass extinctions before creating humans?

Get over yourselves.
This planet was not created for our illustrious existence.

Ever wonder if you get in that philosophical circle jerk.. who created the Creator etc. that if you actually ever re-engineered back to Phase Zero that everyone would end?


"twilight music starts to play"

 

[papasmerf]

What I find as funny is how a few centuries ago you would have been considered ignorant if you did not believe in God. Now there are those who see science as a religion and consider those who believe in God are ignorant.

 

[OddSox]

I've not waded through the whole thread yet, however I'm going to throw this out as I've seen a lot of "I don't beleive in creationism, because I can't take the concept of God seriously" statements so far.

You don't need a supernatural God for the universe as you know it to be a created artifact.

Transhumanist philosophers (which seem to count some of the most rabidly anti-religious thinkers I've seen to date amongst their numbers), seem to have snuck up on creationism from a secular-humanist back door! It is called the Simulationist Argument.

Basically it runs like this: If it is possible to create enough computing power (and through the use of nanotechnology, especially self-replicating assemblers, they think it is), then you can create essentially perfect simulated realities; that is, good enough that you would never be able to tell the difference should your mind be interfaced with one. If you can do that - they argue - then we'll end up simulating all kinds of alternate or experimental realities, and populating them with intelligent AI, for all sorts of purposes: research, entertainment, etc.

Then if you work out the statistics and probability, the implications come out to this: if it is possible to simulate artificial universes and populate them with intelligences (artificial, or "natural" intelligences interfaced with the simulation), then probabilities say that the most likely scenerio is that you current exist within a created, artificial, simulated reality. Of course, Occam's razor doesn't cut everything and this may just be a very cool sounding bunch of logical noise.

But if the argument holds, then chances are that you exist within a created universe.

Now, I don't know if I buy the argument, and I'm pretty damn skeptical about its claims, but I find it amusing that a group of staunch secular humanists seem to have hit upon a non-divine form of creationism.

The universe: "God's" great big Sim game

(of course, it this case "God" might just be some university student doing a thesis on comparative histories, or some such ...)

So, we're all just a figment of someone's imagination? I can live with that...

 

[Crixus]

Eventually science will explain everything, it will just take a very long time, because unlike religion, science requires proof. Repeatable proof.

Actually, it seems likely that science possibly can't explain everything.

This is because it is based on logic (in theory at least - the progress of science is very human and fallible, but let us assume science itself is logical).

Logic is possibly limited by Gödel's incompleteness theorems. Wading through the morass of the theorms themselves is a pain, so many people have paraphrased it as thus:

Any axiomatic system cannot be both universally complete and internally consistent

There are a couple of possible interpretations here:

1. Gödel's made a brilliant and well thought out mistake (only portions of the theorems have been proven yet).
2. Gödel's theorems hold, but only apply to number theory (the field Gödel's was working in).
3. Gödel's theorems apply to any system of logical thought, but the failing is in the nature of logical systems. Reality itself is internally consistent and complete, but we can never devise a complete and consistent description of it.
4. The nature of reality is itself incomplete or inconsistent.

If it is the case that options #3 or #4 are the correct one, then science can never completely and consistently describe or explain reality.

It is kind of like the way we cannot yet reconcile the description of the behavior of matter at the sub-atomic level (quantum electrodynamics) and at the astronomically macroscopic scale (gravity); each of these two theories works very well at their own scale, but when you try and make them meet in the middle scale, they violently contradict one another.

So, it is very possible that science can't explain everything, except possibly in a patchwork grab-bag of working theories which don't agree with each other at every point. Physists working on quantum gravity theories and grand unified theories of particle physics don't like this possibility.

That doesn't imply that the universe was created, however, just to reach back to the original topic ...

 

[Crixus]

Eventually science will explain everything, it will just take a very long time, because unlike religion, science requires proof. Repeatable proof.

Take #2

Actually, science does not center around proof at all.

Science is a framework of testable theories which describe and predict, with varying degrees of accuracy and success. They are also theories that have not yet failed any of the tests thrown at them, but one might come along tomorrow to topple your pet theory.

See Karl Popper's thinking on scientific theories and refutability.

There has never been a scientific theory that is complete and "proven", just "good enough for what we need it to do now". For example, we know that Newtonian physics is wrong; Relativity and Quantum theories have predicted effects outside of Newton's physics, and experiment has demonstrated them. NASA still uses Newton's physics to get probes to the outer planets. It may not be completely correct, but for their purposes, it is "good enough".

 

[islandman4567]

if you don't believe in natural selection , all you need to do is look around.

look to dog breeders , horse racing , pigeons breeders, etc.

there was a national geographic documentary show on tv the other day that talked about pigeon breeders breeding for certain traits, they've been doing this for quite a few centuries now and its remarkable to see how far they can push a certain mutation.

there were some that could never survive in the wid anymore.

as for the original question, from what I've seen in my life so far, the creationists argument is weak and getting weaker with every new discovery made by science.

The guys telling their congregations that the earth is 5000 yrs old when there's so much contradictory evidence just amazes me.

this guy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ken_Ham#Beliefsthinks that humans were around in their present form when T-rex was running around.

 

[herames]

What has J Chirst done for us lately!?

 

[Crixus]

Crix';

By jove, I think you've got it.

There are still many things we take a fact/truth based on theory of the day, but it seems to work.

I'm not sure science requires logic all the time but it helps.

We believe anti-matter exists because of our observations of matter and it's actions requires there be anti-matter; although we have spent billions of dollars and tens of thousands of man hours and not found one speck of it. Logic/proof?

Is light a wave or a particle? Sometimes it act like a wave and sometimes it acts like a particle. Today the answer is yes. Tomorrow, who knows? Logic/proof?

Someone mentioned string theory. If someone can explain it or it's cousin, the double string theory to me without my eyes glazing over and rolling back in my head, please pleas point me in the right direction. I've even used it as a cure for insomnia and it works fast but hurts in the attempt. Quantum physics has never been a joy for me but I can look at a rainbow or the northern lights and be amazed.

My vote goes to Godel #4, followed respectfully close by #3.

Is Newtonian physics wrong or just incomplete?

Now back to the God particle. sorry had to say it.

Being human, I hate to disagree with people who agree with me, but here goes...

We find "specks" of anti-matter all the time. Or rather we create it in particle accelerators. Anti-matter is unlikely to be found "in the wild", at least for very long. It can be created in high-energy collisions, or as the result of exotic particle decay, but it doesn't tend to last very long as it eventually comes in contact with a member of its matter counterpart, and they both convert each other into photons (E=MC^2, remember?). We tend to store anti-particles in particle accelerators, zipping around in their own magnetically confined "track" until we need them to smash into other particles to see what happens. They are not a viable source of energy as it takes more energy to create them in an accelerator than we get out of them in mater-antimatter reactions.

Anti-matter is as real as apple pie - just a lot less common, and a lot more volatile.

Quantum effects - specifically the wave/particle duality of photons - is a demonstrable phenomenon as well, and one you can demonstrate in almost any high school physics lab: see the Double-slit experiment. We also use the positional uncertainty, and quantum tunneling, in quantum effect transistors, although don't expect to see those in your PC any time soon.

String theory is more problematic. It suffers from having evolved into a non-falsifiable set of theories (you can tweak the parameters of string theory so that the described universe fits almost any observable data about the universe, so you can never find a way to theoretically disprove string theory. See Karl Popper and falsifiability above), so many would say it has ceased to be a scientific theory, although it has many advocates still in theoretical physics.

---

My posts were meant as a thrust along the lines of "science is a lot more limited and a lot less complete than we think" and "science is of a different nature than most people think", but I still think science is a valuable tool. I don't reject science or rationality at all. For many purposes it is "the only game in town".

 

[Crixus]

Not once did I read from anyone here that science was a religion.

Science is not what most people think of as a religion, no.

Science is based on several assumptions, however.

1. The universe is governed by a set of laws
2. These laws are consistent
3. These laws are (relatively) simple, and can be comprehended by the human mind.
4. A complete understanding of these laws will lead to a complete understanding of the universe.

These are taken as axiomatic, without proof, and for most scientists and rationalists, not open to challenge or doubt.

This does sound an awful lot like faith and dogma

Now, I'm not saying such assumptions are wrong. I believe the same articles myself, but I recognize that the foundations of my "scientific faith" might just be as shaky as any other belief system.

So far science has a pretty damn good track record, though.

---

PS: For those of you of a literary bent, H.P. Lovecraft wrote an entire horror mythos based on the idea that the nature of the universe was incomprehensible to the human mind, and that great understanding of its true nature drove humans into depraved forms of insanity. Cheerful stuff.

 

[Crixus]

Actually science does require proof ... theories don't but good the theories give means in which they can be tested. Einstein is a very good example of this ... in every theory he presented he explained how it could be proven ... then left it up to other scientists to show this ... which over the years they did.

I must respectfully disagree.

Science requires evidence, not proof, as it can't ever find proof.

Scientific theories are not proven, but you are correct in that they are tested and testable. Einstein's theories are a good example of this. There are several phenomenon in which Relativity gives different predictions than Newtonian physics - the aberrations in the orbit of Mercury, for example - and numerous others. In every case, so far, Einstein has proved to be more accurate that Newton, thus relativity is a good scientific theory because

a) It is falsifiable, that is, we can think of situations that if X occurs, Relativity cannot be "true": e.g. take a particle with a short lifespan before it decays into other particles, accelerate it up to 99.9999% the speed of light, and see how long it takes to decay. If it takes the same amount of time as a particle moving slowly, then it can't be experiencing time dilation due to high velocity, and therefore Relativity can't be accurate.

b) So far, every test that we've come up with where we can do this, Relativity has passed the test. In the above example, such particles do last markedly longer, in proportion to the expected time dilation predicted by Relativity.

This does not mean that we can thus say, "there is no circumstance that Relativity will ever fail, because it has been proven to be true", basically because we've not tested it under every possible condition. It is conceivable that we could come up with a test tomorrow, in which the effects of Relativity don't hold up, in which case we have to say, "OK, Relativity is a good predictor in many cases, but it isn't the complete story, so we need to come up with a better theory which takes Relativity and new data into consideration".

This has already happened, somewhat: Relativity breaks down at the quantum level, as quantum effects overwhelm it, and its predictions don't hold true, so Relativity is - at best - incomplete. This is the reason theoreticians are working on theories of quantum gravity.

You can demonstrate that a theory is a good descriptor of reality, under certain circumstances, but you can never say that a theory is universally valid and thus "proven" as you can't test it under all circumstances.

It is a subtle, but crucial, difference, which speaks to the "solidity" of scientific knowledge.

Many people don't like there being any doubt underlying science.

----

You're right that creationism doesn't fall under science or scientific investigation, though. Basically because science is a descriptor of nature, and the issues of creationism fall outside nature, into a larger "meta-reality" (if it exists at all). It is like trying to apply the revenue Canada tax code to whether I should spend my income on going out for Indian food: a different, and non-applicable, issue entirely.

 

[Crixus]

Two quick comments:

1) Yes, that was my point as well: relativity breaks down at the small level: "Relativity breaks down at the quantum level, as quantum effects overwhelm it, and its predictions don't hold true". Also see my comments earlier in the thread about the "mismatch" between quantum and relativistic effects not "meeting in the middle".

2) I think you're right in that we're having a word breakdown here, not a disagreement about basics. I think what you are calling "proof" I would call "evidence for" (because proof implies - to me - infallibility, which I won't extend to any theory), but that we don't seem to be diverging in our beliefs radically.

 

[Aardvark154]

Arab Scholars knew that the earth was round 100s of years before the christian churches accepted it as true and they had the math to prove to within a few kms(+/- 1%), but they were heathens. What did they know?

I believe you confuse "flat earth" with geocentrism (the belief that the earth is the center of the solar system, and that the sun orbits around it).

That medieval Europe believed in a flat earth one of the great canards of the modern era. As Jeffrey B. Russell wrote "with extraordinary [sic] few exceptions no educated person in the history of Western Civilization from the third century B.C. onward believed that the earth was flat."


http://www.asa3.org/ASA/topics/history/1997Russell.html

 

[Crixus]

Isn't it that Newton's physics is right - but in our physical world as we know and live in?

So given our atmosphere AND earth gravity, it does follow a set of rules.

Even in outer space, there's such things as conservation of motion and inertia, etc.

Does relativity & quantum theories explain every day effects better or different effects?

I think it is a matter of how you view "right".

Do quantum electrodynamics and relativity describe things more accurately than Newtonian, even in daily life? Yes they do. For example, you actually do experience time dilation driving in your car to work.

Do you really care that you age 0.0001 nanoseconds less than your coworker sitting at their desk during your daily commute? Probably not. Likewise you probably don't care about the positional uncertainties of each and every sub-atomic particle in your coffee mug on your desk, as it is indescribably unlikely that coffee mug as a whole will suddenly teleport across the room (although mathematically it is a non-zero probability )

Newtonian physics - indeed any scientific theory's predictions - is never 100% accurate.

Almost any current working scientific theory is "right enough" under the specific conditions for which they were fashioned.