BILL NYE VS KEN HAM: TONIGHT AT 7 PM

[Statler Waldorf]

Hey everyone!
Stat's back and he's necroposting.... well... almost!

I think my response was relevant to the topic, so no necroposting here. I was just busy and had a lot of material to respond to (imagine if you had four of me to respond to every time, scary huh?).

Thank you!
You are too, as long as you refrain from preaching and praying before you eat anything! :p

Several of my best friends are atheists and we have no problems getting together and having a good time.

It's evolution in action and within a human's lifetime!
Praise Darwin!!

It’s a form of adaptation (that interestingly enough was first pointed out by a creationist, not Darwin) that nobody disagrees with so I am not sure how it’s relevant to Common Descent.

Reduction?
As australopithecus climbed down from the trees to stand on two feet, it lost the nimbleness to move swiftly between tree branches, yes... but gained the ability to walk up-right... which led to other traits, one of the most interesting being speech.

Now you’ve entered the realm of story telling my friend. Why did Australopithecus climb down out of the trees (no this is not a chicken crossing the road joke lol)?
We see this all the time though, as we breed dogs and create new breeds we lose genetic information and can never breed them back to their parent breed.

Where you seem to see only reduction and "bad" stuff, I see redirection of resources. Some traits fall in favor of others which show more promise of survival and reproducibility.

I am not saying that the new traits are never beneficial, I am merely saying that they are due to a net loss in genetic information. In other words, the mechanism is traveling in the wrong direction; you need something that adds genetic information (and tons of it).

We are here... clearly, there's something wrong with that reasoning.

We are here only because Humans have not existed for nearly as long as you claim that they have; that is the whole point.

But it's not a reduction in functionality.

In genetic functionality it is. There are only one or two heavily debatable empirical instances where natural selection may have actually increased genetic information; the rest are all a net reduction.

you just had to take that bait!
Just because some of it is sort of right, doesn't mean it's all correct.

It was yummy bait. Well with the way some of the people talk on here I thought there was absolutely no evidence that supported scripture….

I think you're compounding two effects... mixing them up and throwing the result out there...
On the one side, we have the genetic material. It is subject to errors, even during the life of an individual.
Much of the genetic material for a given species is actually not representative of any physical trait... it's just some left over, some comes from viruses... I remember something ludicrous like some 90% of our genetic code is useless and so, any mutation on that part would yield zero results.

This reminds me of the old vestigial organs argument. I am afraid your information is a little outdated here. They are actually finding that there really is no such thing as “junk DNA” and that the entire genome is crucial to the organism’s survival. Pseudogenes actually produce proteins and are now known to switch off genes when they are not needed, or to increase their use, when more proteins are required. Another example is that “Junk DNA” originally thought to be the left-overs of viral infections has now been found to be crucial in the control of genes involved in blood cell production and producing proteins which enable the placenta to fuse to the uterus in pregnant mammals. Of course this is an accurate prediction that creationists made many years before.

This brings us to the phenotype, the physical implementation of the genetic code, resulting in arms, legs, wings, mouth, eyes, etc, etc, etc.
Here is where you may find the result of deleterious and non-deleterious mutations.
So, to sum up, the human species (and many others, if not all) can accumulate infinite mutations on some parts of the genes and zero mutations on others.... and remain human.

Can you give me an example of where natural selection has actually created a new multi-part and fully functioning structure (not removed one or duplicated one)? I am not aware of any myself.

If you accumulate sufficient mutations and the population manages to survive with them in place, you may get a new species... that's what happened to humans, all those years ago.

So the story goes, but the empirical evidence does not seem to support that being the case.

Present day humans are... what... 100 thousand years old, or so... before that, the population had a different name, perhaps we nowadays could breed with them... perhaps not... we can't know, they became integrated into the current population.

This timeline is not possible given the observed rates of genetic entropy; that’s the entire point of Sanford’s work. We’re actually degrading.

Don't know...
It seems it would take only 3% to turn a human into a chimp... but, as I said earlier, these 3% would have to be very accurately placed... which doesn't seem to happen very often...

Or 50% to turn a Human into a banana?

If I remember correctly that Chimp/Human similarity percentage has dropped in the recent years.

Faulty analogy, man...
If the population survives, then whatever mutations it has accumulated have served it right.
If a new mutation arises in an individual which is manifestly deleterious, then that individual doesn't survive to breed... the population remains without that particular mutation.

I liked my analogy. Now you seem to be acting as if Humans do not actually have “junk DNA” and that all of the mutations must actually serve a purpose or they get filtered out. Which is it?

And yet, here we are...

Indeed, meaning we have not been here for very long.

Maybe that measurement of entropy gain was somehow erroneous. I'd be more comfortable if the term entropy was used to refer to what it actually means... "genetic entropy" is probably a misnomer... what does it actually refer to? the degree of disorder of the genetic material? Do genes just shuffle around at random?

It’s a real form of entropy; it’s the rate at which properly coded genes degrade due to copying errors and outside factors. Anytime a certain code is being copied a person could measure a rate of information entropy. It’s very interesting, Sanford is a very well respected geneticist, and yet nobody has really presented any sort of refutation of his work on this subject. The silence is deafening.

What?!
I.... it...what?!!
That conclusion doesn't follow from the conditional statement... if it does, there's some twisted path to get there... care to elaborate?

I do not mind at all. As I have already stated, in order for any knowledge to be possible we must live in a Biblical universe. Therefore, in order for us to know that Jerusalem exists we must live in a Biblical universe. Think of all of the assumptions that must be true in order for a person to know that Jerusalem exists. Not a single one of these assumptions makes sense if we live in a purely material and natural universe. In fact, the only justification for any of these assumptions is that Yahweh exists. Jerusalem exists ergo Yahweh exists.

Again, it doesn't follow...
Bear in mind that perfect logic can yield wrong results.

I disagree, it absolutely does follow. If all of your reasoning is logically valid it would be impossible to arrive at any truth without also having true premises. The only way you can accidentally stumble upon truth in logic is if you’re forms are invalid somewhere. If the Christian conceptual scheme is logically consistent and hits upon any truth at all then the entire thing must be true.

Internal consistency is no guarantee of truthfulness.

Agreed, but only if the entire thing is false. If it is truly internally consistent you could not have parts of it that are true and parts of it that are false.

Would it help, if I throw in the Silmarillion?

Haha, no.

Oh, I'm sure that a few centuries of apologetics could get there!

You’d just end up with Yahweh; it’s unavoidable.

Stat would argue that the branch he's sawing off is nowhere near the one he's sitting on - right the way to shaking hands with the ground.

I have no idea what that sentence means. I’d simply argue, and correctly so, that Humans have not been around for very long.

Oh dear. My point couldn't have flown higher over your head, it seems.

Keep dreaming.

Let me try again, a little more slowly this time. Let's try to use an analogy:

Let's pretend for a moment that both of us try to enter a room but use different methods. My method is to use the door, open it, and walk in (metaphor for science) while your method is to close your eyes, imagine the wall that separates you from the room doesn't really exist, and try to walk through with all the faith you can muster (analogy for faith). I am able to successfully enter the room while you look silly continually bonking into the wall.

You’re begging the question. Forming some analogy where you arbitrarily chose science to be the method that works and faith to be the method that fails in no way proves that science actually works. I could just as easily propose the following…

We are both blindfolded and trying to enter a room. An infallible person told me that a door exists and I have faith in this person’s knowledge so I open the door and walk through the door entering the room. A bunch of scientists who are also blindfolded told you that no door exists so you happily keep running into the wall right next to the door all the time claiming you like the results.

Does this analogy prove anything? Nope, and neither did yours.

After the exercise, we discuss which approach was better. I argue that mine was because I was able to achieve the desired results while you were not. You retort that this is circular reasoning, saying that walking through a doorway "works because it works" and, after all, how could I really be certain I was in the room since I can't know anything if I don't subscribe to Walkthroughwallism.

How do you know science is achieving the “desired results” and who determines what the desired results are? Why does something “achieving the desired results” necessarily mean that it is accurately reflecting reality? So many problems.

You see, it's not just that science gives us what we want (our desires), it's that science CAN be used to produce results (practical application or perhaps you would say "ontological bearing on reality"). Because the scientific approach has practical application and predictive capabilities, it clearly gives us a superior method to understand reality than religious faith.

How do you know that something ought to possess predictable capabilities in order to accurately represent reality? In a purely material universe what is causing this sort of regularity? Sounds to me like you have faith that is the way things are.

I'd like to see that application of your beliefs in Yahweh. Can you lay on hands and heal the sick? Can you speak in foreign languages and be understood by a non-English speaker? Can you bring back the dead? Can you perform any of the miracles that people of faith in the Bible performed? Many Christians believe that prayer is a powerful force. The effects of prayer have been studied and proven as ineffective as talking to yourself. I would sincerely be interested in reviewing any evidence that you can offer that your faith produces anything but hot air and philosobabble.

Prayer is extremely effective; such “genie in a bottle” studies simply are misguided in their view of effectiveness.
I’ll give you an experiment you can try. Yahweh has promised that He will uphold His creation in a regular and predictable manner until the end of time (Genesis 8). This means that if I go outside and drop a stone today it will fall to the Earth the same as it did yesterday and will do the same tomorrow. I can now use this divine revelation to predict the behavior of dropped stones in the future. My faith in Yahweh has now given me predictable capabilities….now what are you going to do?

Additions are still changes.

Not to our understanding of what the original text says.

Not if the evidence comes from different sources, hence my analogy of writing a book and footnoting another book. The reason using books to support the assertions in other books is not circular reasoning is the books have different sources.

…and how do you know these other books are correct? More books? And these books? More books? And these books?

“What’s holding up the turtle that holds up the Earth?”
“More turtles of course.”

You've mentioned in previous posts that you've seen the movie "A Beautiful Mind". In the movie, Nash experiences vivid hallucinations of people, including his best friend, his friend's niece and a general. To him, these imaginary people seem every bit as real as the people in the real world. So how does his discern which of his sensory inputs are true and which are not? The girl never grows up. This fact is completely outside the norm of his experiences everywhere else in life. He is able to discern hallucinations by this contradictory data.

How does he know that girls ought to grow up? Is this something he experienced? Of course these experiences could simply be more hallucinations. He needed faith that his prior experiences were not illusory and he could use those to test his current experiences. Of course, according to you, if he liked his hallucinations then they would necessarily be real.

He might also know who is real based on which characters could actually affect other parts of his perceived world. Let's say his wife could bring him a glass of water but his friend could not. Maybe his hallucinated friend would offer excuses but he could not pick up a glass of water and bring it to him. This is also a good analogy of science being able to affect our reality but faith having no effect and hence why science is much more trustworthy than faith.

He could not hallucinate that his friend handed him a glass of water? Really?
Science requires faith in order to operate.

Now let's apply this understanding to a hypothetical situation where you and I meet face-to-face.

Scary thought.

I see you (sight). I hear your voice as we greet one another (hearing). We shake hands (touch). These are three separate but mutually supporting information sources that tell me you're real. Now let's suppose I saw and heard you but when I reached out to shake your hand, my hand passed through you as if you were an apparition. Now I become confused and begin to doubt my senses because of the contradiction. Or let's say you bid me farewell and flapped your arms and flew away. Again, this is outside my understanding of how reality works and again I have cause to doubt my senses that you were really there.

I am not seeing how this has anything to do with what we are discussing. You’re still possessing faith that your senses accurately depict reality by the way. Of course without a personal creator who created you and reality you have no reason to actually believe this.

It is the fact that my senses, memory and reason are internally consistent about the world around me and science and reason offer both prediction and application that we can conclude that science and reason are superior to religious faith and superstition. But even if reality weren't really real, if I were just a brain in a vat under a computer simulation, how would that matter? I would still be operating in the same world that operates by the same rules and your faith would be just as unable to either predict or affect how that world operates.

How do you know that your senses, memory, and reason ought to be consistent? In a purely natural universe there is no reason to think this way. Only if a rational god who created the world we live in also created you would you have justification for thinking this way. Again, my faith makes your knowledge possible.

I'm starting to worry about you. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over but expecting a different result.

That’s not the actual definition of insanity, and clearly you have never worked much with computers, women, or children if you truly believe that doing the same thing can never yield different results.

By now, you should be able to predict precisely how I'll respond because I've only tried to jackhammer this point into your skull.

Yes, as always you’ll begin whining about me doing things you also do. You certainly would not like debating you.

It doesn't matter what names you drop,

Did I simply drop a name or did I quote someone? That’s funny, I thought I actually quoted someone.

how many degrees they have or whether or not they agree with me on other things. It only matters what you or they can prove.

You can keep asserting that all you like but according to whom?

Do I really have to repost that scene from "A Few Good Men" one more time? I'm getting really tired of trying to drum this into your head.

I never grow tired of being able to use hostile witnesses against you. You seem to be the only one who actually walks into the trap on here though, it’s a shame.

Summary of what he offers: the "hey c'mon it's potential life" canard. Gee, I never heard that argument before.

Whether or not you have heard an argument before is irrelevant but that’s not even his argument. It’s life. Nobody can argue that life is not present from the moment of conception onward. You’re going to have to deal with that argument.

Actually, yes I did. But you just go on believing that my beliefs that "reality is real" are somehow equal to your beliefs about Jesus and that you can call it a draw because "shucks, it looks like we both have our own faith".

Reality is real? What a tautological statement. Of course reality is real but that’s not what we’re discussing. You have to justify that reality is knowable not that reality is real.

Repeated assertions of this kind will not make them true.

They are well supported by your complete inability to rationally make sense of any of your beliefs and my ability to easily do what you seemingly cannot.

Um, (1) I don't have "many times more axioms",

Yes you do, I have one, while you have more than half a dozen that I can think of off of the top of my head. That’s “many times more”.

(2) my axioms are justifiable,

Don’t assert it, demonstrate it….I’ll wait.

(3) your "axioms" offer neither prediction nor practical application and

I’ve already refuted this with my predictions about future stones dropping.

(4) your "axioms" are absurd on many levels.

Absurd how? Do not just assert it, demonstrate it.

You keep asserting that but have yet to explain, never mind prove.

You’ve already helped me prove it. You have no justification for your adherence to said assumptions. In a Biblical universe where we are the creations of the same rational god who created the Universe the basal assumptions would be a certainty. Done.

No, I'm not.

Sure you are, there is no reason to believe such assumptions are true in a godless universe. Only in a universe where we are the creation of a personal god who also created everything else do we have reasons for believing in such truths.

Funny alternate world you live in. Explain and then prove.

I already have, in the universe you espouse such assumptions do not make sense. You’re borrowing from the Christian conceptual scheme in order to argue against it. More precisely, anti-Christian Theism must presuppose Christian Theism and is therefore self-refuting.

God didn't say anything. Yahweh didn't say anything because he doesn't exist. Humans that wrote the Bible wrote:

Cute, but wrong.

Deut 21:15-17 If a man have two wives, one beloved, and another hated, and they have born him children, both the beloved and the hated; and if the firstborn son be hers that was hated: Then it shall be, when he maketh his sons to inherit that which he hath, that he may not make the son of the beloved firstborn before the son of the hated, which is indeed the firstborn: But he shall acknowledge the son of the hated for the firstborn, by giving him a double portion of all that he hath: for he is the beginning of his strength; the right of the firstborn is his.

You asserted that God said polygamy was “okay”, this verse never says anything like that. It simply is a rule for what to do if a polygamist has children from different wives. We have rules concerning what to do with the children of a man who murders his wife; this in no way proves that Americans think murder is “okay”. Do you have anything else?

If you're God, why regulate what you want to outlaw?

Because people sin, therefore rules need to be set up for when sins happen.

Yahweh's religion started with Abraham and it's the religion and its laws that we're discussing.

Nope, the Edenic and Adamic Covenants were first established between Yahweh and Adam, not Abraham. Start there.

Actually, the verse says that David DID violate Yahweh's will in the matter of Uriah, but never any other time.

Nope, it says David violated God’s commandments save that one example, not God’s will.

What part of that was unclear to you?

It’s perfectly clear to me; David violated God’s commandments one time. He violated God’s will many times.

The religion had changed, adapting to Greco-Roman traditions.

Prove it.

That's why we're discussing the OT. If the NT says otherwise, it means the big guy upstairs had a rethink... or it was written during a different era with different values. Either way, bringing up how things changed in the NT doesn't help you.

I fully realize you are going to have to cherry pick your verses out of context and isolated from other clearer verses, you’re going to have to start at Abraham instead of at the actual beginning with Adam, you’re going to have to claim that Deuteronomy 17 is about foreign women when it says no such thing, you’re going to have to fabricate stories about the Israelites emulating cultures that the utterly despised and so on in order to make your halfcocked theory even only somewhat absurd. However, since you’re debating with me you’re going to have to actually debate against my position which is that the entire Bible is God’s word, not only the Old Testament.

[quote='DeistPaladin' pid='629911' dateline='1395359296']
I don't know, you seem to continue to subscribe to WordorkHasBrainSomewhereism eventhough [sic] each of the words you have spoken onto him down the years, no matter what trajectory it took in between, has always pass totally unimpeded in one of his ears and out the other.

You waste a lot of time trying to justify the fact that you will never actually defend anything you believe; you’d save yourself a lot of time by just admitting that you cannot do so. Everyone has their shortcomings, but I am sure there are things you are good at...

What's frightening is that he's one of the most lucid and rational apologists to ever visit this forum.

I actually doubt that. You’re the only deist I have debated, so I guess that means you’re the most lucid and rational.

Oh, he has a brain, but I have a working theory that there's a tumor growing in it that's affecting his perceptions of reality to the point where he believes that he's a YEC.

Perhaps you’re actually a YEC who has a brain tumor convincing you that you’re really an atheist? Come on over to the winning side!

I am not sure if claiming some local pretenses towards rationalism while pathologically absorbed in an globally overwhelmingly irrational framework can count as lucid or rational.

The functioning of a brain is a combination of hardware, software and firmware. He may occasional exhibit the clock speed of an 8088, but he has shit for firmware. So occasional exhibition of only moderately embarrassing clock speed not withstanding, his ability to compute would still be severely embarrassing in a broken abacus.

So the overall ability of his brain for the purpose of undertaking brain-worthy activities relevant to this forum is maybe on par with the preserved brains of the mummified bog people dug up from the peat bogs of Scandinavia.

I think your brain needs to update its spell check software there toots. Kind of detracts from your insults a bit when you spell like you’re in the 3rd grade. Priceless.

I did state it in relative terms to the other apologists and remark how scary that is, as in this is the closest Christianity gets to being "rational".

And you are very good in comparison to the other deists I have debated.

It’s amusing how you guys always redefine the term “rational” to just mean “anything I agree with.” You have yet to actually point out anything truly irrational about my position; if it is really that irrational then what’s taking you so long?