Nature's Laws

[TheRealJoeFish]

Yeah, you're just playing with words and definitions now.

[Freedom4me]

Bullshit. You're going to need to cite something if you're going to tell us what we believe and how we think - especially after having it explained to you numerous times.

I know the definition of the word, "atheism" and atheism (and theism), is about as far from skepticism as one can get.

[The Grand Nudger]

I don't claim to have the ability to comprehend what it might be like to "know nothing about it."  I can, therefore, only respond to the "knows something" state of affairs.  If nature builds machines, my ability to (slightly) understand the concept of teleonomy tends to make me ask, where does this plan, purpose, and know-how come from?  I'm just taking note of the well observed fact that machines always seem to require a planner who has a purpose.  

Are you a machine? You must be, if you hope that this comparison holds and is somehow informative of your own state of being. Right? What can you tell us about those planners, with purpose. Are they all..in every instance you've observed....of a single species, for example? Our observations must (you're observing...of course - and you aren't interested in knowing nothing) lead us to the conclusion that life could not have formed in the absence of one of those human planners, with purpose....because, so sayeth you, they seem to be a requirement. I think, for our discussion..we could call him Steve. How does that sound?

Is that your contention...that Steve™ is required for life to have arisen? If not..why not? That -is- where your "well-observed fact" leads...after all.

[Thackerie]

Bullshit. You're going to need to cite something if you're going to tell us what we believe and how we think - especially after having it explained to you numerous times.

I know the definition of the word, "atheism" and atheism (and theism), is about as far from skepticism as one can get.

Apparently, YOUR personal definition of atheism is about as far from how most atheists define it as one can get.

[TheRealJoeFish]

I don't claim to have the ability to comprehend what it might be like to "know nothing about it."  I can, therefore, only respond to the "knows something" state of affairs.  If nature builds machines, my ability to (slightly) understand the concept of teleonomy tends to make me ask, where does this plan, purpose, and know-how come from? 

Well, on the most basic level, the plan/purpose is a result of how atoms fit together.  That dictates which molecules can form.  That, plus all the forces in the universe, dictated which molecules did form, and in what places, and with what energy.  Then these molecules fit together according to the rules. Turns out, the rules made some fittings-together more common or likely. These happened a bunch of times. And, some of the rules made it so that once one molecule happens, it makes more of them happen. Sometimes, two molecules aren't necessarily self-inducing, but when they got together and formed a bigger molecule, they were. And so on. That's a really basic conception, belying my absolute ignorance on the technical aspects of biogenesis, but there you go.

I'm just taking note of the well observed fact that machines always seem to require a planner who has a purpose.

This is just definitions. We've got to tighten up our meanings here. Most definitions of machine assume not a creation by an intelligence but a use by an intelligence. Is a hill a machine? No, unless someone rolls barrels down its length to get them to a loading station. You can't say, "it is observed that every machine has a planner," define something that we don't know to have been planned as a "machine," and then bootstrap the existence of a planner. It's nonsense.

[Cyberman]

Maybe if you gave us the definitions of atheism and theism that you're using (and scepticism, while we're on the subject), that way we're not talking past each other.

[Simon Moon]

Bullshit. You're going to need to cite something if you're going to tell us what we believe and how we think - especially after having it explained to you numerous times.

I know the definition of the word, "atheism" and atheism (and theism), is about as far from skepticism as one can get.

Atheism, for the vast majority of atheists, is a byproduct of our skepticism. 

Skepticism in practice, is simply disbelieving claims that are not supported by evidence and reasoned argument.

And I'm willing to bet that you use this method all the time. For example; do you believe in bigfoot, UFO abductions, the Loch Ness monster, etc? 

We just simply applied that method to the god claims, and the result is that there is insufficient evidence to justify belief. 

[Cyberman]

I'm guessing he looks both ways before crossing the street, instead of having faith that his particular pet god will miraculously part the sea of traffic for him.

[TheRealJoeFish]

I'm guessing he looks both ways before crossing the street, instead of having faith that his particular pet god will miraculously part the sea of traffic for him.

I think it was Asimov who said something along the lines of "the science vs. faith debate was settled the day churches started installing lightning rods"

[Esquilax]

I don't claim to have the ability to comprehend what it might be like to "know nothing about it."  I can, therefore, only respond to the "knows something" state of affairs.  If nature builds machines, my ability to (slightly) understand the concept of teleonomy tends to make me ask, where does this plan, purpose, and know-how come from?  I'm just taking note of the well observed fact that machines always seem to require a planner who has a purpose.  

But you haven't demonstrated that naturally occurring organisms are machines. You've made an analogy, pointing out some broad similarities between man-made machines and organic structures, but that's hardly surprising; a lot of the machines people build imitate nature in some way (I doubt the idea for wings on planes came out of nowhere, for example). Moreover, arguments from analogy do nothing at all to actually prove the premise at the heart of them, they simply seek to draw connections; I can draw an analogy between the flight of manned aircraft and bird flight, that doesn't mean that birds are mechanical and have turbines, nor that manned aircraft are made of birds. I'd have to go a whole lot further, including actual evidence in support of the similarities at my conclusion, before anyone would be justified in accepting that argument. Similarities in part do not necessarily extend to the totality of either set.

Playing around with definitions rarely gives one a pathway to truth. "I can analogize organisms to machines, therefore organisms are machines," is a ridiculous claim to make, because I can also analogize organisms to, say, M&Ms, but that doesn't mean that organisms are candies. At best, what you've done is created two categories, one filled with artificial machines that require designers, and one filled with organic machines that may not. In fact, why did you stop at "machines" in your argument? Because it's equally true that we've only ever observed artificial devices being designed, and not organic entities, isn't it? Doesn't that mean, by the same logic that runs your argument, that you have no observational reason to expect that organisms require designers?