FallentoReason 2.0

[FallentoReason]

To an extent, I actually do think it's all meaningless chaos, but things were set in place to allow for life to happen. Even life itself is chaotic. This is evident if one understands evolution properly.

What things, were they "set"? When were they set? How where they set? Who set them? In short, evidence?

The conditions for all of the "laws" of the universe to turn out the way they did.

By all means, let it out! I'm not a child. I can handle grown-up thoughts

I don't really think I would call it Intelligent Design what I tend to believe. I'm pretty sure Intelligent Design is more on the theistic side of things anyways, which is rather yucky.

See above. You may not like to think of it as intelligent design, but the minute you start to claim that things were "set into place to allow for......." that's where you've pointed the boat. In your case it's a designed "something". My ID comment was directed more at DP though, who referenced facets of human biology and saw intent. Sadly reading your comments about drugs is pretty damning, you're an ID'er amigo.......You seem to feel that an intelligence designed us for certain somethings and not for others -drugs in this case-....what would you call that? Let me ask you a question, considering that many substances can be dissolved in a solvent (harming, altering, or otherwise "destroying" those substances), does that mean that the creator of the cosmos is telling us that those things weren't meant to be treated that way?

Oh, woops. I read "@OP" i.e. original post. Well, I'll respond to this anyways.

I should have clarified more thoroughly what I meant by the drugs thing. So, in this day and age, it so happens that our bodies can't deal with certain substances i.e. drugs. I'm not saying that the Creator pre-defined everything so that 13.7 billion years into the universe we would be sitting here unable to consume drugs. Quite clearly, evolution is random and it could very well have turned out that we couldn't consume e.g. corn or something. Never was any of this planned out though. All I'm saying is that science can be used to understand what works and what doesn't in our current evolutionary state.

Answering your question: by all means, manipulate the world around you. Go one further and "dissolve" your teeth with cigarette smoke and alter your lung cells into harmful cells if you really want to. What I'm saying is that if there is a Creator, then it's logical to me that we can observe and experiment with the stuff it left behind to ultimately understand how to live better.

[Kirbmarc]

#1 reflects the atheist position in a nutshell.

No. The atheistic position (the naturalistic atheistic position, at least. Not all atheists are naturalists) is not about "blind luck", it's about life having adapted to the universe, not vice versa. So both your example and your ideas about atheism are deeply flawed, I'm afraid.

#3 is what I believe, which to me is the Deistic position, where the Creator set forth the processes that we see today: solar systems, evolution, terraformation etc. (and even the order we see in the periodic table and physics phenomena).

Your position implicitly assumes that earth was made for life, while it's life that adapted to earth. On a different planet with different conditions we could have different forms of life (for example a life cycle based on anaerobic bacteria). In a possible different universe with different laws of nature we could have different forms that could be considered "life" (silicium based or arsenicum based life).

You implicitly assume that the universe was made for life and from then you argue the existence of a creator. But what you need to properly assess is the idea of the universe being projected. Saying "it's obvious that it was" or ""when I look at nature I can't help but feel that it was part of a project" are not good answers.

Your hypotheisis is ultimately based on an emotional response, not on reason.

[pgrimes15]

. . . . to me the evidence in a way is saying you will not do drugs because the Creator never intended it to do you any good.

What about aspirin or caffeine or chemotherapy ? Seems a rather poor analogy.

Regards

Grimesy

[DeistPaladin]

@DP.....amigo...say it ain't so...you're flirting with ID man........I love you waaaaaay to much....my emotions are interfering with my ability to treat this notion of "intent" with the harshness it deserves....

I appreciate that but deism isn't ID. ID is Biblical Creationism with a thin disguise. I fully accept evolution as you could read in my post.

[The Grand Nudger]

@DP
LOL......Granted, granted, ID is very thinly disguised christian creationism. However, you don't -fully- accept any theory of evolution we currently have at our disposal, because none of them come packaged with intent bud...which is a pretty massive addition. The thing that mystified me about your post, was the transparency of your examples. Our biology, behavior, and civilization seem to you to imply intent? Granted....human intent. I don't know how else to take that, because the moment I start plugging "god" in before intent it all goes bat-shit in an instant. A god intended what, and how does our biology, behavior, or civilization lend credence to whatever that intent was?
(all of this of course means nothing if I misread the statement you made about intent)

@FTR
The conditions for all of the laws. Well, that's not incredibly specific. But that's okay. What about those conditions for all the laws required divine tinkering? Further, if we look down there are at least some laws you've exempted, specifically natural laws that are the mechanisms of evolution. Why are these laws not the tinkered laws? Still wondering about evidence btw.

I should have clarified more thoroughly what I meant by the drugs thing. So, in this day and age, it so happens that our bodies can't deal with certain substances i.e. drugs. I'm not saying that the Creator pre-defined everything so that 13.7 billion years into the universe we would be sitting here unable to consume drugs. Quite clearly, evolution is random and it could very well have turned out that we couldn't consume e.g. corn or something. Never was any of this planned out though. All I'm saying is that science can be used to understand what works and what doesn't in our current evolutionary state.

I wanted to set this right next to the statement that drew me in

To the contrary, I find that my Deistic inclinations enhance my experiences with reality. For example, the evidence shows that most drugs will destroy your body one way or another. That in itself is obviously something to take away and remember, but to me it's like the Creator is speaking and saying there's reason not to take those drugs because our bodies were never meant to be treated that way.

Now......I'm having trouble figuring out how the one statement (in bold) doesn't completely rob the other statement (in bold) of meaning. If nothing was planned out, if this particular expression of natural law is random and not tinkered with (even if others were - and I'll be honest...that would still be troubling-) then what exactly does it mean to have "meant" anything? Our bodies never having been "meant" for this or that? Onward and upward.

What I'm saying is that if there is a Creator, then it's logical to me that we can observe and experiment with the stuff it left behind to ultimately understand how to live better.

What about there being a creator would make that logical. Maybe the creator fucking hates you, and takes delight in watching you suffer. Maybe it set the all those laws for the purpose of a divine snuff film. Firstly, nothing that you wrote follows from "if there is a creator". Secondly, if we just removed the creator bit and all reference to it then is it somehow less logical to leverage and utilize the world around us " to ultimately understand how to live better" In this instance, like the other, the creator bit is bare assertion, nothing follows from it, and it is not required. Save yourself a step.

[DeistPaladin]

@DP
LOL......Granted, granted, ID is very thinly disguised christian creationism. However, you don't -fully- accept any theory of evolution we currently have at our disposal, because none of them come packaged with intent bud...which is a pretty massive addition. The thing that mystified me about your post, was the transparency of your examples. Our biology, behavior, and civilization seem to you to imply intent? Granted....human intent. I don't know how else to take that, because the moment I start plugging "god" in before intent it all goes bat-shit in an instant. A god intended what, and how does our biology, behavior, or civilization lend credence to whatever that intent was?
(all of this of course means nothing if I misread the statement you made about intent)

OK, just so we're clear, when you say "Intelligent Design", this is defined as a pseudo-science advanced by Creationists as an "alternative" to (and rejection of) evolution. It specifies that all beings were created in their current form. This is certainly not what I'm suggesting.

Evolution itself doesn't preclude God. What I'm thinking of is something along the lines of the Vorlons of Babylon 5 who, in this storyline, tweaked our evolution to create telepaths. In this case, tweaked us so we'd develop higher reasoning capability and potential for civilization.

[The Grand Nudger]

Right, tweaked us, intelligently designed us.

That's true, evolution doesn't preclude a great many things, but the current theories we have, and the evidence available to us...doesn't -include- a god tweaking us at any point, in any form-nor does it suggest an area where or when this might be required. That would be an addition you've made, that is not a part of our current theories. Again, making additions to a theory is not "fully accepting" the theory. You seem to be of the opinion that it's lacking in some way.

Why do you think that we were tweaked, is civilization really evidence of this (and how so..wouldn't we expect to find evidence of genetic tampering, you know, in our genes...not our buildings)? Isn't it less of a stretch to say that civilization is the way it is because of our biology, behavior.....our thinking minds? A product, not a goal.

[DeistPaladin]

Right, tweaked us, intelligently designed us.

Yeah, I understand what you mean but ID still has a specific definition. Perhaps a different term is in order. Actually, we already have one. It's called "deism" (with a lower case "d" as it is philosophy, not religion, btw).

That's true, evolution doesn't preclude a great many things, but the current theories we have, and the evidence available to us...doesn't -include- a god tweaking us at any point, ...

Interesting. I'd not thought of it that way. I still think that since evolution is neutral on the whole God issue, one could go either way. Again, this is philosophy, not science here.

Look at it another way, isn't artificial selection still "evolution". We bred dogs from wolves. We breed horses. We've grown bananas differently than they are found in the wild. This is still "evolution" AFAIK (someone who's a Biologist, please correct me if I'm wrong but it's my understanding that artificial selection involves the same mechanic as natural selection, just over shorter time spans).

Why do you think that we were tweaked

I thought I'd already answered that question. Instinct and so many things coming together in our evolution.

[The Grand Nudger]

Yeah, I understand what you mean but ID still has a specific definition. Perhaps a different term is in order. Actually, we already have one. It's called "deism" (with a lower case "d" as it is philosophy, not religion, btw).

I'm just ribbing you man.

Interesting. I'd not thought of it that way. I still think that since evolution is neutral on the whole God issue, one could go either way. Again, this is philosophy, not science here.

Well, it's not actually nuetral on the issue of our being tweaked by god. We have no evidence that this occurred, and we would expect to...and we know where to look.....

Look at it another way, isn't artificial selection still "evolution". We bred dogs from wolves. We breed horses. We've grown bananas differently than they are found in the wild. This is still "evolution" AFAIK (someone who's a Biologist, please correct me if I'm wrong but it's my understanding that artificial selection involves the same mechanic as natural selection, just over shorter time spans).

Sure, it's EbAS as opposed to EbNS. The underlying process is the same though the agent of selection is marginally different. We have evidence that we bred dogs from wolves, we have evidence that we selectively bred horses, we have evidence that we hybridized bananas (one of my favorites btw). How are these things similar to the un-evidenced tweaking by an un-evidenced agent that you've proposed?

I thought I'd already answered that question. Instinct and so many things coming together in our evolution.

Meh, perhaps I should phrase this more specifically...why do you think that these things are evidence of such a tweaking?

Instinct, if you're okay with this...isn't going to cut the mustard for me. If you absolutely have to keep the instinct card alive I'm just going to pull a contradictory instinctual card. We won't get anywhere that way will we? In any case, I'm going to call a spade a spade here, your instinct is your belief. You've eseentially said that your belief in this tweaker and tweaking is evidence of the tweaker and tweaking.

[FallentoReason]

@FTR
The conditions for all of the laws. Well, that's not incredibly specific. But that's okay. What about those conditions for all the laws required divine tinkering? Further, if we look down there are at least some laws you've exempted, specifically natural laws that are the mechanisms of evolution. Why are these laws not the tinkered laws?

Well the Deistic assumption is that it all eventually came from this divine being thing, so the reason for the forces of nature being the way they are is because they were made to be that way. So from the big bag, matter was going to act according to the laws that were set in place, eventually giving us a universe that we observe today. I don't really know how else to explain it...

As for evolution, I think it's all supported by "simpler" laws that made evolution possible in the first place via laws of physics etc...

Still wondering about evidence btw.

There's none to be found. Only reasoning based on what we observe today.

Arguably, my recent inclinations towards concluding that there's a greater being in a different dimension are affected by my "biological bias" where my cognition simply makes me arrive at this conclusion because I'm exposed to a world where the "painting" required a "painter". Or, I'm correct in being able to extrapolate what I observe and coming to a conclusion that is more or less true. I don't know which one it is, but all I have is my own thoughts and my surroundings as they are, but no evidence.

I should have clarified more thoroughly what I meant by the drugs thing. So, in this day and age, it so happens that our bodies can't deal with certain substances i.e. drugs. I'm not saying that the Creator pre-defined everything so that 13.7 billion years into the universe we would be sitting here unable to consume drugs. Quite clearly, evolution is random and it could very well have turned out that we couldn't consume e.g. corn or something. Never was any of this planned out though. All I'm saying is that science can be used to understand what works and what doesn't in our current evolutionary state.

I wanted to set this right next to the statement that drew me in

To the contrary, I find that my Deistic inclinations enhance my experiences with reality. For example, the evidence shows that most drugs will destroy your body one way or another. That in itself is obviously something to take away and remember, but to me it's like the Creator is speaking and saying there's reason not to take those drugs because our bodies were never meant to be treated that way.

Now......I'm having trouble figuring out how the one statement (in bold) doesn't completely rob the other statement (in bold) of meaning. If nothing was planned out, if this particular expression of natural law is random and not tinkered with (even if others were - and I'll be honest...that would still be troubling-) then what exactly does it mean to have "meant" anything? Our bodies never having been "meant" for this or that? Onward and upward.

Yeah, good point. I'll let you know right now that I'm fairly new to Deism and I haven't figured it out enough to explain myself coherently. Therefore I will most likely say things that contradict without realising, but that's ok because then you guys can help me see that and I can refine better what's logical and what isn't (in a philosophical sense more than anything... I think).

When I said "our bodies were never meant to be treated that way" I'm specifically speaking about this day and age. As of right now, our bodies can't cope with some substances. But like I said in the other bolded bit, this triviality (and I mean that in every sense of the word) about life wasn't planned out because I'm pretty sure that would imply this Creator stuck his supernatural hand into the natural world and messed around with it.

I think the "never" came from a place within me (like a gut feeling) that tells me science is saying I should not treat my body that way. The atheist might think, "yeah, I'm aware of that, but this is it. This is all there is and so I will choose whether I do drugs or not, because I might choose to live my only life in that way" which to me is fine I guess, but the "never" I speak of is not time related, but rather... hmm... let me try this: because science can be said that it is the tool to observe what was created by the Creator (in a Desitic framework of course), then it would make sense to trust that "science knows best". So the chemicals in drugs and our bodily composition were never meant to be together. No matter what the circumstance, the combination of those two will produce a negative effect (in light of evolution and wanting to survive). So I think the subtlety there with the "never" was that I was speaking in a scientific sense, that because of the way nature turned out to be, we can conclude that certain things will always consistently give us the same results.

Does that sort of clear up your question?

What I'm saying is that if there is a Creator, then it's logical to me that we can observe and experiment with the stuff it left behind to ultimately understand how to live better.

What about there being a creator would make that logical. Maybe the creator fucking hates you, and takes delight in watching you suffer. Maybe it set the all those laws for the purpose of a divine snuff film. Firstly, nothing that you wrote follows from "if there is a creator". Secondly, if we just removed the creator bit and all reference to it then is it somehow less logical to leverage and utilize the world around us " to ultimately understand how to live better" In this instance, like the other, the creator bit is bare assertion, nothing follows from it, and it is not required. Save yourself a step.

[/quote]

I think the above helps summarise what I see as the motivation behind wanting to use nature to our advantage. I think Deism in a way makes me take scientific discoveries more seriously because if we assume science is our way to understand what the Creator left behind, then there's hope(?) that it will show us the way to live as best we can. The atheist can obviously do the same without believing in a creator, but I can't help but see a more nihilistic outcome of "so what if (e.g.) drugs are bad"? To me, it's like there's someone out there saying "I told you so!" when I don't listen to what we have discovered, and that in a way gives me direction for my life. Call it a sort of placebo if you have to, because that could very well be the case I suppose.