Philosophy Now Forum

...in the irony void between Mr Can's ears:

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Oct 07, 2021 7:39 pmYou have remarkable faith. I would never believe a thing on so little data.

Ansiktsburk wrote: ↑Fri Oct 08, 2021 6:37 am Puberty blockers - whatever rocks you boat, and does not hurt other people, except their feelings of what is Proper.

Who is this post for? Are you addressing this to children behind their parents backs?

I aim this post at Immanuel Can who does not believe in evolution by natural selection see his 'arguments' with Vitruvius.

]Natural selection results in speciation.[/b] Darwin's observations of wild finches and also his own artifically selected pigeons are quite long ago. However we have modern and ongoing lab experiments. Speciation is defined as reproductive isolation.

Experimental results: The first steps of speciation have been produced in several laboratory experiments involving "geographic" isolation. For example, Diane Dodd examined the effects of geographic isolation and selection on fruit flies. She took fruit flies from a single population and divided them into separate populations living in different cages to simulate geographic isolation. Half of the populations lived on maltose-based food, and the other populations lived on starch-based foods. After many generations, the flies were tested to see which flies they preferred to mate with. Dodd found that some reproductive isolation had occurred as a result of the geographic isolation and selection for different food sources in the two environments: "maltose flies" preferred other "maltose flies," and "starch flies" preferred other "starch flies." Although, we can't be sure, these preference differences probably existed because selection for using different food sources also affected certain genes involved in reproductive behavior. This is the sort of result we'd expect, if allopatric speciation were a typical mode of speciation.
Fruit fly speciation experiment
Diane Dodd�s fruit fly experiment suggests that isolating populations in different environments (e.g., with different food sources) can lead to the beginning of reproductive isolation. These results are consistent with the idea that geographic isolation is an important step of some speciation events.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Oct 08, 2021 5:03 am

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Fri Oct 08, 2021 12:29 am Hi, IC. What do you think was the beginning of everything?

There are only two possibilities, really: either mankind is a product of cosmic accident, or man is the deliberate product of God's creating.

I suppose that is true in the sense that either God deliberately created us or else God did not. However, that still leaves open manifold possibilities. Perhaps there is a God who created the universe with the necessary physical laws in place whereby life was bound to pop up in it and then left it to run on its own. Or perhaps there is no God but rather we were created by a race of advanced beings who themselves went through evolution on some planet far removed from ours where transitional species did leave behind a full fossil record. Or perhaps God created us but the biblical account is completely wrong.

Do you believe the Hebrew Bible account is true or do you believe some other account (Hinduism perhaps) is true?

I'm a Christian.

That doesn't really answer my question. Do you believe in the account of creation in the Hebrew Bible or do you not? And if not, then what do you believe?

EDIT: Or are you agnostic with regard to cosmology as I am and not sure what to believe?

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Fri Oct 08, 2021 11:32 am Perhaps there is a God who created the universe with the necessary physical laws in place whereby life was bound to pop up in it and then left it to run on its own.

As Deism thinks, you mean?

Or perhaps there is no God but rather we were created by a race of advanced beings who themselves went through evolution on some planet far removed from ours where transitional species did leave behind a full fossil record.

A little far-fetched perhaps, but that would be what's called the "Panspermia Hypothesis." It has many problems, but perhaps the chief one is that it only moves the problem back one step, and doesn't solve it at all.

Or perhaps God created us but the biblical account is completely wrong.

There are other accounts of Creation, of course, scattered throughout the various religious narratives of mankind. One has to select among them, of course, to find which are more or less plausible, given the evidence.

Do you believe the Hebrew Bible account is true or do you believe some other account (Hinduism perhaps) is true?

I'm a Christian.

That doesn't really answer my question.

I thought it made the answer obvious: necessarily, it's "yes" to the first question, and "no" to the other -- if for no other reason, at least by process of elimination.

EDIT: Or are you agnostic with regard to cosmology as I am and not sure what to believe?

No, I'm not agnostic about that. The theological and practical implications of the question are actually so profound that I don't think a person CAN actually manage to be effectively agnostic about it. He can profess agnosticism, but cannot actually carry it off.

What I mean by that is that the question of our origins is one of such huge importance that it cannot be set aside, especially assumptively. A person who says, "I don't know where we come from" still has to get up in the morning and act as if he/she knows something about it. He has to take some assumption, in other words, if he's going to get out of bed at all.

And that's because the question of origins is so intimately tied to considerations like, "What am I?" and "What is my life for?" and "What are good and evi?" and "Where do I need to go with my life?" and "How do I sort out what is valuable action and what is abuse of my time and resources?" Since a person cannot take a single step without taking some answer to some of those questions for granted, the agnosticism he may profess simply cannot be lived out.

That leaves us with two types of people: those who know what assumptions they're operating on, and those who are only unconsciously operating on their assumptions. But not having any assumptions about our origins and nature is simply not an option for us. We are beings of Intention -- of volition, of will, of choice; therefore we have to anchor our intentions in some set of beliefs, whether implicitly or explicitly.

As a Christian and as a philosopher, I would argue that we ought to know the most we can about that set of assumptions by which we, personally, are organizing our own world, and make them as reasonable and likely to be true as we can.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Oct 08, 2021 3:22 pm

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Fri Oct 08, 2021 11:32 am Perhaps there is a God who created the universe with the necessary physical laws in place whereby life was bound to pop up in it and then left it to run on its own.

As Deism thinks, you mean?

Or perhaps there is no God but rather we were created by a race of advanced beings who themselves went through evolution on some planet far removed from ours where transitional species did leave behind a full fossil record.

A little far-fetched perhaps, but that would be what's called the "Panspermia Hypothesis." It has many problems, but perhaps the chief one is that it only moves the problem back one step, and doesn't solve it at all.

Or perhaps God created us but the biblical account is completely wrong.

There are other accounts of Creation, of course, scattered throughout the various religious narratives of mankind. One has to select among them, of course, to find which are more or less plausible, given the evidence.

I'm a Christian.

That doesn't really answer my question.

I thought it made the answer obvious: necessarily, it's "yes" to the first question, and "no" to the other -- if for no other reason, at least by process of elimination.

EDIT: Or are you agnostic with regard to cosmology as I am and not sure what to believe?

No, I'm not agnostic about that. The theological and practical implications of the question are actually so profound that I don't think a person CAN actually manage to be effectively agnostic about it. He can profess agnosticism, but cannot actually carry it off.

What I mean by that is that the question of our origins is one of such huge importance that it cannot be set aside, especially assumptively. A person who says, "I don't know where we come from" still has to get up in the morning and act as if he/she knows something about it. He has to take some assumption, in other words, if he's going to get out of bed at all.

And that's because the question of origins is so intimately tied to considerations like, "What am I?" and "What is my life for?" and "What are good and evi?" and "Where do I need to go with my life?" and "How do I sort out what is valuable action and what is abuse of my time and resources?" Since a person cannot take a single step without taking some answer to some of those questions for granted, the agnosticism he may profess simply cannot be lived out.

That leaves us with two types of people: those who know what assumptions they're operating on, and those who are only unconsciously operating on their assumptions. But not having any assumptions about our origins and nature is simply not an option for us. We are beings of Intention -- of volition, of will, of choice; therefore we have to anchor our intentions in some set of beliefs, whether implicitly or explicitly.

As a Christian and as a philosopher, I would argue that we ought to know the most we can about that set of assumptions by which we, personally, are organizing our own world, and make them as reasonable and likely to be true as we can.

I agree with Immanuel Can on all these counts. I guess IC would not agree with me that people can learn different ideas which they find to be more reasonable and then adopt these more reasonable ideas as their chosen faiths.

Belinda wrote: ↑Fri Oct 08, 2021 5:49 pm I guess IC would not agree with me that people can learn different ideas which they find to be more reasonable and then adopt these more reasonable ideas as their chosen faiths.

Actually, I'd not only agree, but would say it's the ONLY legitimate or sensible reason to believe a thing. A person should always go with the best information he/she has, and believe what he/she has best reason to believe is true.

Why else would anybody believe something? After all, if you know you're fooling yourself, then you don't really believe what you say at all, do you?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Oct 08, 2021 3:22 pm

Or perhaps God created us but the biblical account is completely wrong.

There are other accounts of Creation, of course, scattered throughout the various religious narratives of mankind. One has to select among them, of course, to find which are more or less plausible, given the evidence.

Is there any evidence for Biblical creation?

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Fri Oct 08, 2021 9:03 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Oct 08, 2021 3:22 pm

Or perhaps God created us but the biblical account is completely wrong.

There are other accounts of Creation, of course, scattered throughout the various religious narratives of mankind. One has to select among them, of course, to find which are more or less plausible, given the evidence.

Is there any evidence for Biblical creation?

No, but there is no evidence for the Big Bang. That is only an unproven hypothesis.

When I read the Bible, I separate the wheat from the chaff. I reason that the creation story is chaff but I don't discard the wheat.

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Fri Oct 08, 2021 9:03 pm Is there any evidence for Biblical creation?

I certainly see a lot.

But it's always amazing to me how some people can actually argue they see none. Having an alternate explanation for phenomena that ordinarily would powerfully suggest the attentions of a Creator can, I think, be used as a way of shutting one's eyes. Maybe that's the main function of Evolutionism: it lets one see things like design and morality, but pretend they could have "just happened" instead of being intentional productions of the Creator.

Look around you, Gary...what do you see? Do you look at this world, the complexities and beauties of nature, and at yourself -- your own mind, conscience and identity, just for a start -- and say that "accident" is the obvious explanation?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Oct 08, 2021 10:45 pm

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Fri Oct 08, 2021 9:03 pm Is there any evidence for Biblical creation?

I certainly see a lot.

But it's always amazing to me how some people can actually argue they see none. Having an alternate explanation for phenomena that ordinarily would powerfully suggest the attentions of a Creator can, I think, be used as a way of shutting one's eyes. Maybe that's the main function of Evolutionism: it lets one see things like design and morality, but pretend they could have "just happened" instead of being intentional productions of the Creator.

Look around you, Gary...what do you see? Do you look at this world, the complexities and beauties of nature, and at yourself -- your own mind, conscience and identity, just for a start -- and say that "accident" is the obvious explanation?

I get your point but, if its not accidental, what is it? Is there an unseen "force" screwing with our lives?

The reason I ask that is because I think there is.

jayjacobus wrote: ↑Fri Oct 08, 2021 10:55 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Oct 08, 2021 10:45 pm

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Fri Oct 08, 2021 9:03 pm Is there any evidence for Biblical creation?

I certainly see a lot.

But it's always amazing to me how some people can actually argue they see none. Having an alternate explanation for phenomena that ordinarily would powerfully suggest the attentions of a Creator can, I think, be used as a way of shutting one's eyes. Maybe that's the main function of Evolutionism: it lets one see things like design and morality, but pretend they could have "just happened" instead of being intentional productions of the Creator.

Look around you, Gary...what do you see? Do you look at this world, the complexities and beauties of nature, and at yourself -- your own mind, conscience and identity, just for a start -- and say that "accident" is the obvious explanation?

I get your point but, if its not accidental, what is it?

Well, Jay, if it's not accidental, it can only be one thing: purposeful or intentional.

That's a fundamental difference between the types of explanation. By definition, an accidental process does not have any teleological trajectory or dimension. The universe itself cannot have actual purposes, directions, intended outcomes, or objective values in it. It just happened by accident, so anything more to be said about it is purely fictive.

Is there an unseen "force" screwing with our lives?

That seems to put a fairly negative spin on things, doesn't it? The Gnostics thought there was a creator, but he wasn't the ultimate god; rather, he was what they called a "demiurge," a sort of lesser being that was capable of creating things but was either incompetent or malevolent, and in that sense, he was thought to be "screwing with" people's lives.

That's not the universe I would say we are in. It's just what they said.

And you can understand their perspective on that, I'm sure. Things do indeed seem to be "out of sorts," to put it mildly. I think there are few observations so generally and powerfully felt as the realization that things as they are presently are not at all as they ought to be. And what else can the term "screwing with" imply, but that perhaps you find that perspective not entirely unreasonable?

As you say,

The reason I ask that is because I think there is.

But let's think about that: because in itself, it's a surprising fact, isn't it?

What I mean is this: suppose things are "out of sorts," just as everybody's intuition seems to be telling them. In an accidental universe, the fact that we all feel that would surely be a rather odd thing, don't you think? How could things "ought to be" other than what they actually are? The universe's accidents aligned things in just this way; and here, on some chance mudball in one corner of the universe, a bunch of beings who probably rightfully shouldn't exist, since the odds are all against their existing at all, suddenly appear and say, "Hey, this is not alright!"

What can they mean? The universe is what the universe is. What could cause them to think they somehow "deserve" more or other than they have? And what weird mechanics in the universe would accidentally create such complaining little blobs? Perhaps the only answer that an accidental universe can provide is, "Shut up and take it in the neck." But of course, the universe itself doesn't even care that much, and couldn't respond to their complaint if it were even capable of wanting to.

In any case, their complaint has no basis and reaches no ear. The universe doesn't care if they feel hard done-by. That, too, is just an accidental product of chance and time. And there isn't even the chance of that great human cry being answered. Nobody's listening.

But what if it's not like that? What if the intuition that things are "screwed up" is not an illusion, but is an intuition of a reality? What if things were not supposed to be as they are? What if, in some sense, we actually do "deserve" something better, or at least some answer other than "Shut up and take it in the neck"?

What if things are not as they should be because we are not as we were intended to be? What if things are screwed up, not because the universe is indifferent to our cry, but because we have been indifferent to God? What if the power that created this universe and all the order and design in it, the power which sustains the universe itself, has been severed from us? And what if we feel our orphaning, and so we aren't at all unrealistic when we say, "Something is screwed up here," or "something is not as it ought to be"?

I could go on, but perhaps I'll pause, because that proposition is more than enough for us to ponder, and I'm sure you'll have further thoughts on that.

Belinda wrote: ↑Fri Oct 08, 2021 9:13 am I aim this post at Immanuel Can who does not believe in evolution by natural selection see his 'arguments' with Vitruvius.

]Natural selection results in speciation.[/b] Darwin's observations of wild finches and also his own artifically selected pigeons are quite long ago. However we have modern and ongoing lab experiments. Speciation is defined as reproductive isolation.

Experimental results: The first steps of speciation have been produced in several laboratory experiments involving "geographic" isolation. For example, Diane Dodd examined the effects of geographic isolation and selection on fruit flies. She took fruit flies from a single population and divided them into separate populations living in different cages to simulate geographic isolation. Half of the populations lived on maltose-based food, and the other populations lived on starch-based foods. After many generations, the flies were tested to see which flies they preferred to mate with. Dodd found that some reproductive isolation had occurred as a result of the geographic isolation and selection for different food sources in the two environments: "maltose flies" preferred other "maltose flies," and "starch flies" preferred other "starch flies." Although, we can't be sure, these preference differences probably existed because selection for using different food sources also affected certain genes involved in reproductive behavior. This is the sort of result we'd expect, if allopatric speciation were a typical mode of speciation.
Fruit fly speciation experiment
Diane Dodd's fruit fly experiment suggests that isolating populations in different environments (e.g., with different food sources) can lead to the beginning of reproductive isolation. These results are consistent with the idea that geographic isolation is an important step of some speciation events.

Evolution is the only supposed, "science," for which there is not one single observed example of the thing it is supposed to be the study of: one specie becoming a different specie.

It is interesting that you mention fruit flies. The correct name is, drosophila melanogaster, and they have been at the forefront of genetic research since 1910.

From Problems of the Evolutionary Hypothesis:

The most extensively studied eukaryote is the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster. With only 4 chromosomes and a reproductive cycle of 7 days, they have made an excellent tool for investigation. Used since 1910, when T. H. Morgan first started modern genetics with them, we have been able to study 4,940 generations.

Drosophila, over this time, have been exposed to just about every sort of mutant generator. Mutations have been found for almost all characteristics, the wings, color, eyes, thorax components, and many more. Certain genes that convey rapid mutations have been isolated. Drosophila come in every wing shape (including wingless), color and twisted up contorted variety. But in all this time, they have never shown any indication of being anything other than D. melanogaster.

In other words, there has never ever been observed a single case of one specie becoming a different specie even in those organisms in which it was most likely possible. Mutation is not speciation.

If one must assume an origin for species and must have an explanation for them, evolution is a plausible hypothesis, but that is all it is. It is certainly better than creationism or the absurd idea of intelligent design, but it is not science.

One main problem with calling evolution science is that assuming it prevents any real research into the true nature of the variation of the species, as pointed out in the quoted article:

It is stated by scientists today, that either humans "evolved" from previous, different animals by random mutations in DNA, or we were made by a God. It is never considered that both may be wrong, and there could be other explanations for speciation, a different explanation for the "fossil record." This is due as much to the blind—virtually religious—fervor of evolutionists as to the same religious dogmatism of the creationists. If one does not accept that something is possible, one does not, after all, go looking for it.

Those who embrace evolution do so with the same kind of blind faith in the high-priests of evolution as the religious do their own religious authorities. Both are superstitions and both are dangerous as premises for attempting to understand human nature.

RCSaunders wrote: ↑Sat Oct 09, 2021 1:18 am

Belinda wrote: ↑Fri Oct 08, 2021 9:13 am I aim this post at Immanuel Can who does not believe in evolution by natural selection see his 'arguments' with Vitruvius.

]Natural selection results in speciation.[/b] Darwin's observations of wild finches and also his own artifically selected pigeons are quite long ago. However we have modern and ongoing lab experiments. Speciation is defined as reproductive isolation.

Experimental results: The first steps of speciation have been produced in several laboratory experiments involving "geographic" isolation. For example, Diane Dodd examined the effects of geographic isolation and selection on fruit flies. She took fruit flies from a single population and divided them into separate populations living in different cages to simulate geographic isolation. Half of the populations lived on maltose-based food, and the other populations lived on starch-based foods. After many generations, the flies were tested to see which flies they preferred to mate with. Dodd found that some reproductive isolation had occurred as a result of the geographic isolation and selection for different food sources in the two environments: "maltose flies" preferred other "maltose flies," and "starch flies" preferred other "starch flies." Although, we can't be sure, these preference differences probably existed because selection for using different food sources also affected certain genes involved in reproductive behavior. This is the sort of result we'd expect, if allopatric speciation were a typical mode of speciation.
Fruit fly speciation experiment
Diane Dodd's fruit fly experiment suggests that isolating populations in different environments (e.g., with different food sources) can lead to the beginning of reproductive isolation. These results are consistent with the idea that geographic isolation is an important step of some speciation events.

Evolution is the only supposed, "science," for which there is not one single observed example of the thing it is supposed to be the study of: one specie becoming a different specie.

It is interesting that you mention fruit flies. The correct name is, drosophila melanogaster, and they have been at the forefront of genetic research since 1910.

From Problems of the Evolutionary Hypothesis:

The most extensively studied eukaryote is the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster. With only 4 chromosomes and a reproductive cycle of 7 days, they have made an excellent tool for investigation. Used since 1910, when T. H. Morgan first started modern genetics with them, we have been able to study 4,940 generations.

Drosophila, over this time, have been exposed to just about every sort of mutant generator. Mutations have been found for almost all characteristics, the wings, color, eyes, thorax components, and many more. Certain genes that convey rapid mutations have been isolated. Drosophila come in every wing shape (including wingless), color and twisted up contorted variety. But in all this time, they have never shown any indication of being anything other than D. melanogaster.

In other words, there has never ever been observed a single case of one specie becoming a different specie even in those organisms in which it was most likely possible. Mutation is not speciation.

If one must assume an origin for species and must have an explanation for them, evolution is a plausible hypothesis, but that is all it is. It is certainly better than creationism or the absurd idea of intelligent design, but it is not science.

One main problem with calling evolution science is that assuming it prevents any real research into the true nature of the variation of the species, as pointed out in the quoted article:

It is stated by scientists today, that either humans "evolved" from previous, different animals by random mutations in DNA, or we were made by a God. It is never considered that both may be wrong, and there could be other explanations for speciation, a different explanation for the "fossil record." This is due as much to the blind—virtually religious—fervor of evolutionists as to the same religious dogmatism of the creationists. If one does not accept that something is possible, one does not, after all, go looking for it.

Those who embrace evolution do so with the same kind of blind faith in the high-priests of evolution as the religious do their own religious authorities. Both are superstitions and both are dangerous as premises for attempting to understand human nature.

You really don't know much about anything, do you?

Vitruvius wrote: ↑Fri Oct 08, 2021 8:38 am

Ansiktsburk wrote: ↑Fri Oct 08, 2021 6:37 am Puberty blockers - whatever rocks you boat, and does not hurt other people, except their feelings of what is Proper.

Who is this post for? Are you addressing this to children behind their parents backs?

Suppose so. As well as to Parents, trying to mold kids into something that isnt in their "DNA". Being a parent myself I see too much of parents seeing their children as children and not evolving individual homo sapiens with individual traits and DNA to aknowledge.