Creationism Logical or Illogical?

[Edella]

Saitia said...The "scientific method" is simply an intellectual yardstick we use to measure the observable phenomena of material creation. But being material and wholly intellectual, it is useless in the evaluation of spiritual realities and religious experiences.

While the scientific method is material and intellectual , it may be useful in the evaluation of religious experiences. For example,might measuring physiological changes during a religious experience give us information that is useful?I don't think it's completely useless.

As far as spiritual realities...I'm not sure I understand.

 

 

Cheers, Ed

[Biochemist]

Sorry, Science IS an exclusive club. If you want in, you have to be able to observe with integrity and think clearly.

...exclusive clubs don't interest me; nor are they a guarantee the members have integrity or are clear thinkers.

You might have noticed that you two are on different subjects. Pyrotex is defending the lack of dogma in Science (with a capital "S") whereas Satia is excoriating the endemic tendency for any individual scientist to be dogmatic.

 

I suggest that the lack of dogma in Science depends on the endemic dogmatism of individual scientists. Over time, new entrants in any field entertain opposing points of view, until they finally build their own dogmatic position. Then they die.

 

On the "fact" issue, I think I disagree with both of you. I do not think that facts are relative. I do think that the interpretation of facts is relative, and that the same fact is doomed to reinterpretation until the end of time. The appearance of relativism exists because reinterpretation of facts looks like a change in facts.

 

Nice posts, both of you.

[Saitia]

Hello Edella,

 

While the scientific method is material and intellectual , it may be useful in the evaluation of religious experiences. For example,might measuring physiological changes during a religious experience give us information that is useful?I don't think it's completely useless.

 

It's no small challenge to figure out just when a religious experience might occur, have the subject hooked up to whatever, and hopefully discover some anomaly not explainable by any other event; you certainly could gather some information for analysis. But I suspect it might be comparable to analyzing a shadow; i.e., looking at the dark to understand the light.

 

There's probably more than one good reason most spiritual experiences are ineffable; even though we know what we experienced is more real than anything our physical senses have ever provided us, our attempts to explain it with intellectual language just doesn't getter dun.

 

 

As far as spiritual realities...I'm not sure I understand.

 

You're certainly not alone!;)

 

Ciao,

--Saitia

[cwes99_03]

You might have noticed that you two are on different subjects. Pyrotex is defending the lack of dogma in Science (with a capital "S") whereas Satia is excoriating the endemic tendency for any individual scientist to be dogmatic.

 

I suggest that the lack of dogma in Science depends on the endemic dogmatism of individual scientists. Over time, new entrants in any field entertain opposing points of view, until they finally build their own dogmatic position. Then they die.

 

On the "fact" issue, I think I disagree with both of you. I do not think that facts are relative. I do think that the interpretation of facts is relative, and that the same fact is doomed to reinterpretation until the end of time. The appearance of relativism exists because reinterpretation of facts looks like a change in facts.

 

Nice posts, both of you.

I applaud you if I have understood this post correctly. Also Satia's post there was quite well thought out.

 

To say that it is a scientific fact that nothing can travel faster than c is a dogma of science. It cannot be proven through experimentation. All that can be proven is that nothing yet has been proven to travel at v>c. Many if not most scientists will argue that according to measurements made for the past 100 years it can be shown that it is impossible to exceed c, however, they would be simply ascribing to the dogma of Einstein etc. His studies have shown that his theories have been well written, and that by extending his theories nothing SHOULD be able to travel faster than c, but he nor anyone else has ever actually (nor I contest EVER actually be able to) prove this dogma. However, scientific theories have been based off of it since the early 1900s.

 

In similar fashion, a few religious theories were handed down for each religion and many new theories have been based upon these. How well founded any of these theories is, can only be determined based upon the evidence used to initially support those theories. That evidence is historical fact and religious writing.

 

Is the trinity dogma as true to the Bible say, as the speed limit of the universe to cosmological measurements of the night sky or the M-M experiment.

[Pyrotex]

It was a metaphor pointing out scientists have no appetite for crow. Let's let it go....It occurs to me, dear Pyrotexan, you just might be demonstrating above the same kind of arrogance that causes some scientists to wax dogmatic about their facts...In future, won't you be kind enough to include the pertinent quote that you feel shows what you claim I implied? ...Okay, I'll bite: When DO they expect it to be "the truth"?...But consistent logic tolerates the concept of truth alongside

the observation of fact, Pyro. Scientific materialism has

gone bankrupt... Consistency demands the recognition of the

activities of a purposive Creator...

My my my. Quite the blistering little tirade. Do you feel better now?

 

Never mind. Biochemist is right, as he often is. You were discussing the 'religion-like' dogmatism of certain scientists (persons) and I was discussing the historical lack of dogmatism in a seven century process of accumulating knowledge. There are many instances of dogmatic scientists, just as there are of dogmatic theologians. Some of them were real jerks! There are even instances of dogmatic scientific institutions, because they are made of fallible humans. But Science (with a capital S) is not a person or even an institution. "Dogmatic" is not an appropriate attribute to give to a long historical process.

 

There are any number of ways to build a metaphor of what Science is. I like Feynman's description of Science as "the accumulated wisdom of how NOT to fool ourselves". I also like Science as a "grand marketplace of Ideas". Ideas come and go. They have their followers and defenders and their enemies. But over many generations, the Ideas that resist all attempts to destroy or replace them, are the Ideas worth having. There were strong attempts to overthrow Einstein's ideas on relativity, as early as immediately after he published, and these attempts continue. It is NOT dogmatism that keep Einstein's Ideas in place. Attackers are encouraged, in fact, because if they succeed, we will have learned something new (and important) about the Universe.

 

The same can be said of the Big Bang Theory, which personally, I am not very fond of. I'm hoping the BB turns out to be some kind of cosmic optical illusion. But when scientists (as a general group) look at the astronomical evidence, what do they "see"? What does the evidence "look like"? It sort of looks like a sudden and violent expansion from a point source, and so we have coined the name "Big Bang"? Is it entirely obvious? No. Does such a Big Bang fit ALL the facts? No. Can the BBT be stretched and folded so that it does fit ALL the facts? Almost-to-yes. Do these stretches and folds in the BBT have proof? Many scientists will tell you No. I'm one of them.

 

So, what is the truth? I wish it was as easy as going to the bookshelf and looking it up in your leather bound KJV. But it's not. Scripture is hearsay. And interpretations of scripture without evidence is hearsay squared. Besides which, maybe you picked the wrong scripture. ;) Statements like "Consistency demands the recognition of the activities of a purposive Creator" are mere pulpit-logic, a thin veneer of logic over a morass of opinion, fear, hope, dogma and bafflegab.

 

Pulpit-logic is to Science what a teddy bear is to a well-made wrench and socket set. The teddy bear can comfort you, and maybe that's what you want. But don't try to change a tire with it.

[Eclogite]

And what do you use to validate your resoluteness?:)

Absolutely nothing. Resoluteness does not require validation. It is a consequence and refelction of behaviour.

 

If your uncertainty was really resolute, you'd eventually be wearing a cute little white coat and living in a rubber room.:lol:

On what basis do you assume I am not?

 

But your relative resoluteness is still a product of your reasoning mind

Rubbish. Reason has nothing to do with it. As noted above it is a behavioural characteristic.

 

May I ask a personal question?

Have you ever loved anyone?

If so, what is the evidence of your love?

Evidence is not required, unless love is being investigated as the subject of a scientific study.

[OmegaX7]

Hey Questor, christ you've started quite a storm with this. 23 pages??? Thats good. Einstein stated "Science without religion is lame, and religion without science is blind." I believe "both" are right. The physics that explain our being are just as valid as the scriptures explaination. The "Quantum World" is just as mysterious as the "The Great One's."

L8R - - - - OmegaX7.

[HydrogenBond]

Another take on creationism is not so much somebody's concept of God creating the universe, but things happening in an orderly way based on preexisting laws of nature. For example if one has a plasma of hydrogen and oxygen and cools it, it will always make water. This is predesigned in creation because of the laws of chemistry. If one was to ionize oxygen atoms and cool them, the electrons will always assume the same types of orbital positions. This was predefined even during the BB or at the very beginning of whichever cosmology scenario one wishes to use.

 

Maybe creationism is an intuitive hint of orderly evolution. There may be predefined paths for things to occur. Maybe these are the real laws of nature. Plants will always appear before animals, cells before multicellular, four legged creatures before two, etc.. Just because one is unaware of the logic behind an orderly predefined path does not mean it does not exist.

[mcsquared]

Another take on creationism is not so much somebody's concept of God creating the universe, but things happening in an orderly way based on preexisting laws of nature. For example if one has a plasma of hydrogen and oxygen and cools it, it will always make water. This is predesigned in creation because of the laws of chemistry. If one was to ionize oxygen atoms and cool them, the electrons will always assume the same types of orbital positions. This was predefined even during the BB or at the very beginning of whichever cosmology scenario one wishes to use.

 

Maybe creationism is an intuitive hint of orderly evolution. There may be predefined paths for things to occur. Maybe these are the real laws of nature. Plants will always appear before animals, cells before multicellular, four legged creatures before two, etc.. Just because one is unaware of the logic behind an orderly predefined path does not mean it does not exist.

 

 

 

Aren't we "intellectuals" too clever to see the woods with all the quantum trees in the way?

These debates beg too many questions, principally that the human mind is limited whereas a probability of a creator posits an infinite mind. Never the two shall meet. People are dying daily in their thousands and discovering or not the truth or otherwise of their faith and the full answer to the questions we who live on will still seek in vain for the remainder of our lives.That is why so many find their faith a valuable prop and guide to what they believe to be reality. God bless them!!

[HydrogenBond]

The path I took was to see if I could find a bridge between the two; creation and evolution. I assumed it is not one or the other but both together; orderly evolution. One of my early brain storming tricks was, for the sake of argument, to assume that the universe was created in a much smaller amount of time. Instead of 15 billions years, I only allotted myself 1 billion years to the reach today from the BB.

 

What happens, if one used this assumption, is that there is no room for random. Random is good for a slow boat universe because it helps one fill in the time. With this tighter time schedule, things have to become very orderred with each step setting the potential for the next step. This brain storming trick leads to some interesting theory for orderly progression. It is just theory; a human attempt to improve nature.

 

For example, why not have the original BB expansion set the potential for the immediate condensation of galaxies. If I just expand the universe into a cloud of hydrogen, the slowboat approach will need 5 billions years for randon and gravity to make star producing galaxies. I didn't have the luxury of so much time to let my workforces tinker and play. I needed to visualize something analogous to a expanding cloud of water vapor condensing into upteem water droplets style galaxies. I just saved 5 billion years by combining the first two steps. The combining of steps, saved time, and gave me a little more elbow room for life to form in an orderly fashion.

 

The next pass through the speed boat scenario, I needed to use practical science to make the speedboat possible. An artist sketch is fine but I also needed to engineer the speedboat using existing materials, or at least be able to extend techonlogy without getting too sci-fi. The water droplet theory was hard to prove, but the BB breaking up into bigger chunks instead of a atomized continuum was viable. It still allowed me to remain on schedule. There is now data that shows galaxies and stars were around in less than a billion years from time zero; no slow boat there.

 

Life was easier than one might think. The genetic general is ideally suited to admiraling the slowboat. There is plenty of room to randonly fill in five billions years. He can get drunk and weave back and forth dodging the icebergs. But I had maybe a hundred million years left and I needed a more sober skippy for the speed boat. His name was hydrogen. I used an increasing aqueous hydrogen potential to pull life into present. It is not cooincidence that the brain generates the highest aquoeus hydrogen potential with the human brain generating the highest of all the animals.

 

I am not saying that things evolved this way only that an orderred point of view was very helpful. If forces the imagination to find simple logical things that connect apparently separate phenomena. Random gives to much liberty to endless speculation. If the universe was always here, I could come up with a hundrend scenarios all by myself, because even fantasy would be randomly possible over infinite time.

[Saitia]

Absolutely nothing. Resoluteness does not require validation.

 

For a fellow who seems convinced he's uncertain about

even existing, the word "Absolutely" seems like hyperbole. :hyper:

Even if what you intellectually determine is "resoluteness"--

just a consequence and reflection of behavior-- what makes

you think your awareness and evaluation of that thought is as well?

 

It is a consequence and refelction of behaviour.

Even if it is just a consequence and reflection of behavior,

it's still made available to your conscious mind by it's own

self-awareness, which is not just a behavior.

 

 

On what basis do you assume I am not?

That a straight jacket would make it really hard to type,

and your spelling is top notch. :)

 

 

Rubbish. Reason has nothing to do with it. As noted above it is a behavioural characteristic.

 

"Rubbish"? Since you appear so certain about it,

let's look a little more carefully into what you're saying.

You say your resolute feeling is a result of mechanical behavior--

and therefore not conscious reflection on just how uncertain you

think you are, about. . . what was it? Yes-- your "uncertainty."

 

That all sounds reasonably thoughtful to me,

if not inconsonant and circular, rather than, what--

a result of behavioral intuition?

How is it different from a conscious conclusion?

Or a conscious decision, if you prefer?

 

If you make self-aware conclusions about things--

and I'll assume you do until you can say you don't,

which of course is itself a. . .

 

In spite of what you said concerning uncertainty--

were you to share ideas, like,

"I, Eclogite, in honor of granular minerals everywhere,

am going to impart my "behavioral characteristics" on

why I'm resolutely uncertain whether or not I exist,

and do this on the Hypography forum, and see what

happens"-- in the world I understand, that requires

reflective self-awareness; it's not a behavioral

reaction to the stimulus of mindlessly punching a

mechanical mouse around. You made a conscious choice.

 

But concerning your "resolute" conviction of "uncertainty";

do you say it also appeared in your mind as a reflection of

instinctual behavior?

To whom or what does this behavior belong?

 

Have you done no comparisons with the ideas of

others' concerning your arrival at uncertainty?

Or are all your friends and acquaintance's minds uncertain, too?

 

Does this mean then, you didn't bother to intellectually

think through and reject other alternatives-- i.e., mechanistic

materialism, spiritual ideas, and that you've taken on

your behavioral characteristic of uncertainty as a philosophy of living?:phones:

 

 

 

Evidence is not required, unless love is being investigated as the subject of a scientific study.

Let's use the word evidence a little less stringently then;

the origin of the word simply means "obvious to the eye"--

Does that mean your husband/wife just sort of nodded

when you said you loved her/him, and you accepted

their word?

 

Sounds very unscientific.:)

and far afield from logical creationism.

I'm going back to the topic before someone

is certain I'm off it.

 

 

--Saitia

[Rsade]

Lots of things happen without "causes." See vacuum fluctuation.

 

 

Wrong! Vacuum fluctuation cause is a virtural sea of particles that behave according to Quantum field theories predictions. Try again. NOTHING happens without a cause. This is a fact and a truism.

[cwes99_03]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but vacuum fluctuation is simply a modal response of the particles, and is completely predicted by quantum theories as being a random state of system.

[Eclogite]

Saitia, I can summarise my response to all of your questions and your observations too with a simple

I do not know.

 

That, after all, is my central point. I will add one further observation: you talk at least once about mechanical behaviour. I merely talked about behaviour, unqualified.

[questor]

how many totally random systems are currently known? if quantum is mathmatically pure, how can it predict a random state which is at odds with mathematical principles?

[InfiniteNow]

if quantum is mathmatically pure, how can it predict a random state which is at odds with mathematical principles?

Please refer to the "Uncertainty Principle." However, I personally hesitate discussing QM in the theology forum, and also in a thread about Creationism...

[questor]

Please feel free to explain the uncertainty principle and how its basis is known and proved and shows randomness.