Creationism--Proof ?

[questor]

Daytonturner, you have it! you understand it. most of the posters here cannot separate

the possibility of creationism from man made religions which may contain only ancient myths. the fact that man has a slew of religious beliefs and dieties has nothing to do with whether or not the universe had a creator. until one can wrap his mind around the abundant evidence of intelligent design, without thinking of an elderly man with a staff

surrounded by angels, this debate will not reach the level it deserves. when we have court cases concerning what will be taught to our children and the scientific community has taken a hard line on the issue, i would say they need to back off and take a look at their position. due to the vast amount of phenomenae we can't explain, i would say these non-creationists are certainly not using scientific principles.

[rockytriton]

I don't see how not immediately thinking that some super being created everything phenomenon that we can't explain is not using scientific principles. Though, I do believe in ID, I just don't think it should be taught in a science class, and I don't think people should argue with scientists about how they are so unscientific because they don't equate anything that they don't know to God.

[questor]

it seems that creationism can only be discussed by mentioning God. it seems that we can't think of creation without our minds immediately picturing whatever our conception is of God. that is why a thread on this subject gets moved to the Theology page as it should. can't we envision an absence of mankind, lets say a billion years after the big bang. at that point the universe was either created or just happened. what about that period. was there a creator of energy, matter, propulsion, gravity, dark energy, et cetera, or did all those things just happen? we can't imagine anything before the big bang, but something had to set off the event, or else it just happened. matter and energy were created or else they were stored somewhere in a vast storehouse. why do 1+1 equal 2? if they didn't the universe would not be orderly. did this just happen, or was it designed? why did gravity occur? without it the universe as we know it would not exist. does this speak of a random act, or does it hint of design? how can a scientific mind take a hard line against design when there are so many evidences for it?

[damocles]

This interested me so I respond to it,

 

So far I have found it frustrating that I have hardly touched on the subject of this forum Creationism – Proof.

 

(Body of the quoted text is in post #33 of this thread. Damocles.)

 

It is a rather interesting twist of fate that those who advocate for a creationist view will never know if they were wrong while those who advocate against such a position will never know if they were right.

 

Science is NOT law.

 

1. You observe something curious about which you seek the explanation of how it works.

2. You develop an explanation for the how.

3. Now you have a conundrum.

 

A. You promulgate your explanation of how and declare it is true and try to persuade others by argument. Lawyers do this quite well and often they convince others that the truth of how they present is indeed FACT.

 

They may even marshal formidable stacks of evidence: but lawyers are duty-bound not to; and averse to self-testing their explanations before juries. Lawyers by training are advocates. They are not scientists. They(rarely; as they are great creatures of the compromise and the settlement) work by an adversarial process of competing explanations in front of a judge and/or jury. One can only hope that in the competition of explanations the truth emerges; levels of proof notwithstanding.

 

But this is not SCIENCE.

 

B. You design a deliberate test to prove that your explanation for how is incorrect. Most likely, if you are a good investigator, your test will succeed and its back to the drawing board for a new try at explaining how. Eventually your how stands up to your(and your colleagues') test to prove a fallacy, and it becomes a tested explanation-still subject to negation at some future testing; if some bright investigator devises a fail test which succeeds in modifying or replacing your explanation.

 

That is science. It is a permanent condition of skepticism kept at abeyance by the "best" tested explanation available.

 

As a way of approaching reality, it is a philosophy. It is not a religion. Choosing B as an option for arriving at how does not make you an athiest, but you will look at intelligent design with skepticism.

 

4. What has this to do with this topic? It depends on your choice in the conundrum. Do you choose A. or B.? If you are a lawyer, you choose A. I am not a lawyer.

 

Most of the advocates of Intelligent Design argue the case like lawyers(positively) when they marshal fact for their explanation. They try to convince the jury of opinion by asserting positively that such a condition(Universe) is only possible if it was created by a designer. They do not TEST.

 

I don't care about that approach when it comes to SCIENCE.(See above)

 

5. Not one ID proponent has proposed an experiment or an observation which has a predictable outcome under controlled conditions which can be observed as a negation-of-proof test.

 

So. If you teach Intelligent Design in school at present, you put it where it belongs.......in philosophy/religion class along with materialism, humanism, and the other "isms". Not with the "ologies."

 

It is a question of intellectual approach. The proponents of ID claim a SCIENTIFIC status for their explanation to which they are not currently entitled. ID has not been presented by them under the rigors of a skeptical testing that shows even the possibility of a hypothesis negation.

 

6. To be valid science to be taught in school; I propose that the ID advocates test for God and prove that one does not exist. This is a simple preliminary negation test for ID.

 

If thay cannot prove that one does not exist, then they have a shot at cosmology.

 

Best wishes.

[daytonturner]

Thanking questor for his agreement with something I’m not quite sure I actually said.

 

My contention, through it all, is that there are enough shreds of evidence for and against creationism or for and against eternal universe, that one can look to it and draw a conclusion.

 

What I have not posited on this thread yet is that I don’t think most people do that. There is a “which-came-first, the-chicken-or-the-egg element.

 

For the most part, the people in the creationist camp are people who believe in God while the people who reject the concept of creationism are people who also do not believe in God. One can assume that the evidence from either of these groups is necessarily biased and unreliable because it is jaded by the predisposition of their God position.

 

People who believe in God look at the unexplained things of the universe and explain it away by saying, “God did it and will reveal the information about it someday.” People who do not believe in God look at the unexplained things of the universe and say, “We don’t understand, but we will figure it out someday.” Sorry, but I do not really see a lot of difference in those answers.

 

There does remain a question relating to what I would call neutral people. These would be people who believe in God but do not believe in creation or those who do not believe in God, but do believe in creation. My observations in this area may be limited, but I do not recall meeting or reading anyone whose position is a belief in God coupled with a disbelief in creationism. But I am aware of people who disavow any belief in God who at the same time believe in creationism.

 

The creationist looks at the universe and its complexities and thinks, this is far too complex to have occurred via a set or random, undefined, uncoordinated, undirected events. I am mostly convinced that the non-creationist view is mostly based on the concept that since there is no God, there must be another explanation.

 

It is also my observation that very few people look at the universe and say, “Why this is so complex, there is obviously no God,” but there are people who look at the universe and say, “This is so complex, there must have been a creator.”

 

I am also mostly convinced that there is no definitive evidence which could prove to a truly neutral person beyond a reasonable doubt that either of these positions is utterly true. There are people who are convinced byond a shadow of a doubt, but their convictions are not, generally, based on a careful and honest evaluation of the current physical evidence. I am sure many are convinced they have done so, but my opinion is that they are only fooling themselves and those who are likeminded with them.

 

To the extent that most of us are predisposed on this issue by our belief or lack thereof that there is a God, I cannot conclusively determine that either position is devoid of some religious influence.

 

That is, to me, the greatest flaw in the scientific position. It refuses to include in its list of possibilities the idea that some intellectual influence was instrumental in the design and construction of the universe and life forms as we know them.

 

One must question why a segment of our scientific knowledge base would want to exclude from its investigation a possibility that has not been scientifically precluded. It has only been scientifically excluded.

 

Even as a God fearing, Jesus loving, Bible toting believer, I can agree that among all the possibilities of the universe, it is possible that all of this is the result of a random, undirected series of events. I do not, however, believe that is how it happened. But my view is necessarily jaded by my belief in God.

[damocles]

Thanking questor for his agreement with something I’m not quite sure I actually said.

 

.......................................

 

People who believe in God look at the unexplained things of the universe and explain it away by saying, “God did it and will reveal the information about it someday.” People who do not believe in God look at the unexplained things of the universe and say, “We don’t understand, but we will figure it out someday.” Sorry, but I do not really see a lot of difference in those answers.

.........................................

 

I am also mostly convinced that there is no definitive evidence which could prove to a truly neutral person beyond a reasonable doubt that either of these positions is utterly true. There are people who are convinced byond a shadow of a doubt, but their convictions are not, generally, based on a careful and honest evaluation of the current physical evidence. I am sure many are convinced they have done so, but my opinion is that they are only fooling themselves and those who are likeminded with them.

 

 

Even as a God fearing, Jesus loving, Bible toting believer, I can agree that among all the possibilities of the universe, it is possible that all of this is the result of a random, undirected series of events. I do not, however, believe that is how it happened. But my view is necessarily jaded by my belief in God.

 

1. What is the problem in understanding? You have a hypothesis.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligent_design

 

2. You have a ready formatted preliminary test of negation.

"Develope a method for proving such an intelligence capable of designing this universe(god/gods) does not exist."

 

3. Failure to produce a successful result for (2.), once such a valid test is formulated and run, will yield the result that an ID hypothesis for the universe is a valid possible explanation subject to further predictive verification and testing.

 

What is difficult about this?

 

Unless the ID advocates need help from the scientists in formulating (2.) and they, the ID advocates, don't want the help for fear that the result might be one they won't like?

 

Best wishes:

[questor]

Science by definition means knowledge. knowledge means surety that a certain activity will occur in all cases and a pyhsical explanation of the mechanism can be described and duplicated by others. the word science also seems to encompass the ''ologies'', which are the studies of events which may or may not have been tested and described so the experiments can be duplicated. some of these subjects deal with events such as gravity, some aspects of quantum physics, dark energy, bosons, life, thought and many other entities which are predicted by math or intuition born of observation. these things have not been experimentally proved, but most have been predicted by theoretical mathmatics. there may be some things not addressed by math. what about life? what is it's sub-atomic

description? how does a thought occur? we know how it is transmitted, but do not know how it is formed. we have not yet achieved the technology to account for and explain every event in the universe. some day it may happen, but centuries may pass. if all events could be understood and explained and no spiritual component was observed and all aspects of the mechanics of the universe could be understood and duplicated by man--

then that would be the time to say that the universe occurred by non-creation. until SCIENCE, or knowledge and proof occurs we will never know the answer. there is no more science in the statement that there was no creator than there is that there was a creator. all things have not been proved, and indeed, some may be unprovable, but until proof occurs on one side or the other, both positions have equal weight.

as an aside, i would like to know the reasons why a non believer thinks the universe did not have a creator? anyone interested?

[damocles]

I have not seen anyone test the premise; that there is no god/gods, successfully, definitively one way or the other.

 

Until then, that argument(about god/gods), masquerading currently as Intelligent Design, is a religious one(faith based), not a scientific one(evidence).

 

Plain language.

 

Best wishes;

[questor]

Damocles, since you don't believe in a creator, and since you observe many unexplained and maybe unexplainable phenomenae around you, would you share why you reject the idea of a creator?

[damocles]

I have not seen anyone test the premise; that there is no god/gods, successfully, definitively one way or the other.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam's_Razor

 

Until then, that argument(about god/gods), masquerading currently as Intelligent Design, is a religious one(faith based), not a scientific one(evidence).

 

Religion;

http://www.answers.com/topic/religion

 

Science;

http://www.answers.com/topic/science

 

Plain language.

 

I have said this, now, three times?

 

Posted by questor

 

Damocles, since you don't believe in a creator, and since you observe many unexplained and maybe unexplainable phenomenae around you, would you share why you reject the idea of a creator?

 

What do you claim that I, as an observer, have seen? Have you looked through my eyes?

 

I ask this question. because you obviously have made the assumption that I will accept the error you present: that I have seen the same things you have. That is incorrect. No two observers see the same set of phenomena in the same order within the same frame of co-ordinates or interpret it, the phenomena, the same way.^1 However, I speculate that you think there are unexplained phenomena in this universe that are miraculous to me and defy explanation and that these are the same phenomena that convinced you of intelligent design. That we will at least share this in common?

 

No.

 

Unexplained; as in not described? Yes. Miraculous? No. If it transmits information to an observer, it can be detected, it can be measured, it can be analyzed as to its performance parameters. Given that, the scientific method can be applied to it.

 

For example; the bible-archaeology.

For example; stigmata-human physiology

For example; prophets and their predictions-history

For example; faith healing-basic medicine, epidemiology, psychology, sociology

 

If a god acts in the universe then he will leave easly detectable tracks in the cosmological history and we will find those tracks independent of human observer effect. Based on that PREMISE, we can predict future god events and LOOK for those. Call those "miracles" or as I prefer fortuitous violations of causality. No such tests or observations have been undertaken that has resulted in a successful demonstration of such an effect.

 

Occam's Razor.

 

^1 As to why you presented a false statement? It should be obvious why, but;

 

http://www.interaction-design.org/encyclopedia/demand_characteristics.html

 

http://www.alleydog.com/glossary/definition.cfm?term=Observer%20Bias

 

Best wishes;

[questor]

Damocles, i cannot speak for your thoughts or how you perceive phenomenae. i can speak for my own. the first thing one must do is ignore the religions of the eath created by man.

the second thing is to recognize it is undoubtedly early in the continuum of man's collection of knowledge. miracles, stigmata, supernatural perceptions have no basis in this discussion. it is entirely possible that the universe just happened to occur and life just happened by lightning striking an inert pile of amino acids, and all the matter

and energy and particles just happened to be available to produce the infinite universe, and the information for species replication just happened to appear at the right time, but it stretches my credulity. it is just as difficult to imagine a limited universe( what is on the otherside of the limit) as it is to imagine an infinite one. it seems logical for me to think that random begets random, since there would be no force to induce order. but order rules the universe. if it was all random with no planning, how did all the elements for math and the elemental forces just happen to occur, since the lack of any of them would probably prevent the universe from being. what is the force that lies beneath the sub atomic level that allows life? we can't see it, measure it or describe it, but we know it's there. what about gravity? we have no good description of it, yet it is pervasive throughout space.

the bottom line for me is that i cannot imagine such order coming from randomness. i cannot think of other observable elemental forces that exhibit randomness. everything has order and specificity. for me, these facts point toward intelligent design.

[damocles]

Questor?

 

I follow stream of consciousness better than most, but some readers need paragraph breaks at the thought breaks. Punctuation( an important grammar tool ignored at your peril) helps in establishing clear intent in written thought as well.

 

(Formatted by me for ease of reading. D.)

 

Posted by questor

 

Damocles, i cannot speak for your thoughts or how you perceive phenomenae. i can speak for my own. the first thing one must do is ignore the religions of the eath created by man.^1

 

the second thing is to recognize it is undoubtedly early in the continuum of man's collection of knowledge. miracles, stigmata, supernatural perceptions have no basis in this discussion.^2

 

it is entirely possible that the universe just happened to occur and life just happened by lightning striking an inert pile of amino acids, and all the matter and energy and particles just happened to be available to produce the infinite universe, and the information for species replication just happened to appear at the right time, but it stretches my credulity.^3

 

it is just as difficult to imagine a limited universe( what is on the otherside of the limit) as it is to imagine an infinite one. it seems logical for me to think that random begets random, since there would be no force to induce order. but order rules the universe. if it was all random with no planning, how did all the elements for math and the elemental forces just happen to occur, since the lack of any of them would probably prevent the universe from being.^4

 

what is the force that lies beneath the sub atomic level that allows life? we can't see it, measure it or describe it, but we know it's there. what about gravity? we have no good description of it, yet it is pervasive throughout space.^5

 

the bottom line for me is that i cannot imagine such order coming from randomness. i cannot think of other observable elemental forces that exhibit randomness. everything has order and specificity. for me, these facts point toward intelligent design.^6

 

 

Discussion of points.

 

^1 Then why did you make this statement?

 

Posted by questor

 

Damocles, since you don't believe in a creator, and since you observe many unexplained and maybe unexplainable phenomenae around you, would you share why you reject the idea of a creator?

 

You plainly claimed to know what I saw.

 

As to ignoring religion? Why do you insist on an Intelligent Designer? If you wish to separate religion from the discussion then you have to meet me on my home ground.

 

I have suggested a test for detecting the lack of an Intelligent Designer, and shown some tag evidence for which we should look to negate the premise. Parting of the Red Sea, and feeding five thousand men and their families from five loaves and two fishes would be indicators that something is going forth.....? A violation of local entropy on such massive scales without a corresponding release of heat?

 

^2 You wish to take this out of the discusion? The merits of religion are not what concern me. It is the positive claims of religion in events, explanations, and assertions, including the "religious" claims made by the ID advocates that I choose to subject to the scientific method. "Faith" is not testing a possible negation of a hypothesis. Setting up predictable outcome based tests that allow an observer to draw conclusions he can predict on a possible explanation he produced for a how based on those "religious" events, explanations, and assertions is what interests me.

 

^3 If that is the best evidence currently available to explain how and some ID advocates refuse to consider it in that fashion? Then they have a problem. I don't.(See below.)

 

^4 Suggested reading;

 

On self organizing systemology;

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-organization

 

On one possible pre-big bang cosmology;

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ekpyrotic

 

http://wwwphy.princeton.edu/~steinh/npr/

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyclic_Model

 

On the multi-verse as an explanation for fine tuning the universe to sustain life;

 

http://www.nyu.edu/gsas/dept/philo/faculty/white/papers/ftmu.pdf

 

An ID viewpoint;

 

http://www.doesgodexist.org/JulAug99/MultipleUniversesAndCreation.html

 

On quantum mechanics:

 

http://phys.educ.ksu.edu/

 

http://www.nap.edu/books/0309090512/html

 

Those will do for a start.

 

^5 After you digest ^4, you should understand that "life" is a seeming "self-organized" violation of local entropy based on some rather nifty chemistry.

 

^6 That some people claim to lack the imagination to see this universe as other than possible due to intelligent design, suggests to me an observer bias against, or a fear of the unknown.

 

I am quite comfortable with humans testing the hypothesis and assertions underlying ID to the best of their abilities with whatever means are at hand.

 

I am not afraid of the result, either way.

 

Best wishes:

[C1ay]

it seems logical for me to think that random begets random, since there would be no force to induce order. but order rules the universe.

Just because it seems logical doesn't mean that it's so. You're making an assumption that a force is needed to induce order. You should not assume, presuppose or leap to any conclusions based on observation alone.

 

if it was all random with no planning, how did all the elements for math and the elemental forces just happen to occur

We don't know. We're searching for answers to these questions. In the mean time we should not leap to any conclusions.

 

since the lack of any of them would probably prevent the universe from being.

Assumption again :Waldo:

 

what is the force that lies beneath the sub atomic level that allows life? we can't see it, measure it or describe it, but we know it's there.

No, we do not know there is any force that lies beneath the sub atomic level. We know that life exists, we do not know why. We are searching for the reason. That's all we can do for now.

 

what about gravity? we have no good description of it, yet it is pervasive throughout space.

Gravity is a property of mass. While a great deal is known about the properties of gravity, the ultimate cause of the gravitational force remains an open question while we search for a cause. For now we should just accept the fact that we don't know.

 

the bottom line for me is that i cannot imagine such order coming from randomness. i cannot think of other observable elemental forces that exhibit randomness. everything has order and specificity. for me, these facts point toward intelligent design.

The only facts you've posted is the fact that there are forces we cannot explain at this time with our current understanding of the universe. The fact that these forces exist or the fact that we cannot explain them does nothing to point to their cause of existance. That they exist and we know not why, provides no evidence for us to suppose their cause. To claim that they must be caused by this or that is nothing but a dream.

[damocles]

Clay?

 

You said it better than I did.

 

Best wishes;

[GAHD]

We know that life exists, we do not know why. We are searching for the reason. That's all we can do for now...While a great deal is known about the properties of gravity, the ultimate cause of the gravitational force remains an open question while we search for a cause. For now we should just accept the fact that we don't know...there are forces we cannot explain at this time with our current understanding of the universe. The fact that these forces exist...and we know not why, provides no evidence for us to suppose their cause. To claim that they must be caused by this or that is nothing but a dream.

I beleive I should note that this is the essence of science, the serach for the truth. Many beleive they have found the true truth, and so have their mental eyes fixed on what they know. Others look only for what they do not know, these are true scientists.

 

This is the essence of why the beleif in god as creator of all can conflict with scientific rational; thinking 'thank god!' instead of 'Now why did that happen?', in any given situation, is against the very nature of science.

[daytonturner]

Well, I see the science faction continues to retreat to its ultimate safe harbor, “We can’t explain it now, but we will someday.” Trust me, that carries even less weight with me than if I told you, “God did it.”

 

I found damocles' first post (No. 38) interesting from the aspect that he aligns himself with what I consider the school of science book on arrogance which suggests that science cannot be scrutinized by a reasoning process such as legal reasoning. (Not sure if this is because science is above reproach or if it is because science is incapable of being scrutinized by reasoning.)

 

In the case of hard science, such as two atoms of hydrogen and one atom of oxygen make one molecule of water, I could agree there is no need to go through some reasoning process to weigh the truth of that scientific fact. No one with a rational mind questions those kinds of things.

 

However, when it comes to matters for which there is disagreement and where information is skimpy and testing is either impossible or incomplete, then some process of weighing the known data should be employed.

 

When we discuss the idea of proof of creationism (and that would include disproof also), we face the unenviable task of discussing a topic for which there are very few, if any, hard facts to evaluate, but a lot of opinions and conclusory statements. Such information should not be summarily discarded but should be recognized for what it is. Seems to me that a lot of people in science class feel that because they label their opinions and conclusory statements as “scientific,” they should be accepted as unquestionably reliable.

 

I have not seen the scientific faction posit any actual FACTS that tend to disprove God’s existence. Conversely, I have not seen any religious poster posit any FACTS that tend to prove God exists. But that seems appropriate in a forum where everyone is coming from a position of “Don’t confuse me with facts, my mind is already made up."

 

What we have in this discussion is people who are weighing their own observations, beliefs and opinions and drawing implications through the filters of their pre-disposed position on whether God exists. I continue to contend that one’s view of God determines how that person views any of these other controversial topics. No one here seems willing to dispute that observation.

 

It is not my hope or expectation in posting here that I will somehow intellectually convince a non-believer to become a believer. I would be as much a fool to think so as the science faction would be in thinking they could undermine my beliefs.

 

My hope is that the science faction could recognize and admit that they are as close minded as they accuse religious people of being. Also, I suggest that science is not always exact, it is not always reliable and sometimes it is absolutely wrong. It is not 100 percent accurate.

 

Therefore, I find it unwise to place my complete trust in such a system and question the wisdom of those who would.

[C1ay]

Well, I see the science faction continues to retreat to its ultimate safe harbor, “We can’t explain it now, but we will someday.” Trust me, that carries even less weight with me than if I told you, “God did it.”

Are you saying we should know the answer to everything whether we do or not? Why advocate making up answers just because we're still learning about the universe?