Detecting design or intent in nature

[FatAndFaithless]

But how can your conclusion be "all pools of water are artificial" if you haven't examined "all pools of water"?

How do you know the speed of light in a vacuum is constant if you haven't measured the speed of every photon travelling through a vacuum?

For AlexK and Surge: Maxwell's equations don't tell you because then the question becomes how do you know the permeability and permittivity of free space are constants if you haven't measured those values for every point in space?

Because science doesn't make truth claims, woody. It makes tentative statements based on our best current model.

[Mudhammam]

You are shifting the goal posts here. In this thread I am not claiming that the universe is designed. I am claiming that the evolutionary system which resulted in you and I existing was designed or at least required a pre-existing intellect to exist. Why? Because every evolutionary system I have observed, which I also know the details of its origination, ALWAYS, either required an intellect to design it, or requires an intellect to be a component of it.

In another thread I did claim the universe appeared to be designed....but remember I said it wasn't designed for life but rather is was designed for emergent complexity.

Haha.. um. No.

1. Genetic mutations are random. By random I mean, as biologist Jerry Coyne writes, "mutations occur regardless of whether they would be useful to the individual."
2. "We can never argue back to any further conclusions about the ordinary world or our future experience which go beyond the data from which our inference began" (J.L. Mackie), for “our ideas reach no farther than our experience" (David Hume).
3. “Why go so far? Why not stop at the material world?” (Hume) After all, “an ideal system, arranged of itself, without a precedent design, is not a whit more explicable than a material one which attains its order in a like manner... To explain the origin of the DNA/protein machine by invoking a supernatural Designer is to explain precisely nothing, for it leaves unexplained the origin of the Designer. You have to say something like ‘God was always there,’ and if you allow yourself that kind of lazy way out, you might as well just say, ‘DNA was always there,’ or ‘Life was always there,’ and be done with it.” (Dawkins).
4. “There is no reason why mental order as such should be any less in need of further explanation than material order, and the claim that mental order in a god is self-explanatory is just the thesis.” (Mackie).

C'mon Heywood, at least try to be imaginative.

[Heywood]

You are shifting the goal posts here. In this thread I am not claiming that the universe is designed. I am claiming that the evolutionary system which resulted in you and I existing was designed or at least required a pre-existing intellect to exist. Why? Because every evolutionary system I have observed, which I also know the details of its origination, ALWAYS, either required an intellect to design it, or requires an intellect to be a component of it.

In another thread I did claim the universe appeared to be designed....but remember I said it wasn't designed for life but rather is was designed for emergent complexity.

Haha.. um. No.

1. Genetic mutations are random. By random I mean, as biologist Jerry Coyne writes, "mutations occur regardless of whether they would be useful to the individual."
2. "We can never argue back to any further conclusions about the ordinary world or our future experience which go beyond the data from which our inference began" (J.L. Mackie), for “our ideas reach no farther than our experience" (David Hume).
3. “Why go so far? Why not stop at the material world?” (Hume) After all, “an ideal system, arranged of itself, without a precedent design, is not a whit more explicable than a material one which attains its order in a like manner... To explain the origin of the DNA/protein machine by invoking a supernatural Designer is to explain precisely nothing, for it leaves unexplained the origin of the Designer. You have to say something like ‘God was always there,’ and if you allow yourself that kind of lazy way out, you might as well just say, ‘DNA was always there,’ or ‘Life was always there,’ and be done with it.” (Dawkins).
4. “There is no reason why mental order as such should be any less in need of further explanation than material order, and the claim that mental order in a god is self-explanatory is just the thesis.” (Mackie).

C'mon Heywood, at least try to be imaginative.

1. randomness is used by intellect in designed systems all the time. A craps game for instance. The dice roll occurs regardless if the result is going to beneficial to house or not.
2.My argument is based solely on experience and observation and doesn't go beyond that.
3. It is one thing to say a supernatural being explains evolution and another thing to say evolutionary systems require intellects to come into existence. You can falsify one proposition but not the other.
4. Some material processes require intellect. Why can't evolution be one of them?

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How do you know the speed of light in a vacuum is constant if you haven't measured the speed of every photon travelling through a vacuum?

For AlexK and Surge: Maxwell's equations don't tell you because then the question becomes how do you know the permeability and permittivity of free space are constants if you haven't measured those values for every point in space?

Because science doesn't make truth claims, woody. It makes tentative statements based on our best current model.

We are confident that the speed of light in a vacuum is constant because every time we measure it.....it turns out to be constant. We could be wrong though....However the more times we measure the speed of light in a vacuum and find it to be constant while never observing it to be variable...the more confident we become in our conclusion.

I claim that evolutionary systems either require intellects to design them or intellects to be a component of them. Falsify my claim by giving me an example of an evolutionary system which we know came into being without intellect. Until you do, why should I not consider my claim to be tentatively true since it is consistent with every observation I have made?

[The Grand Nudger]

You've been given examples. You've even been given -your own examples-. Asking over and over again won't actually change that......

Not that anyone has to falsify your claim to begin with.....that's really not how this works, you're getting sweetheart treatment - even though you clearly don't appreciate or deserve it.

[Heywood]

You've been given examples. You've even been given -your own examples-. Asking over and over again won't actually change that......

Hmmm....quote one of these examples I have been given.

It doesn't do any good to say that I have been given examples. You must show that I have been given examples or your claim is hollow and unconvincing.

[robvalue]

I think you need to learn more about evolution. Just your own observations isn't enough I'm afraid, not for conclusions you should expect anyone else to take seriously. Do you really expect you can out-think the whole of hundreds of years of science that easily?

[The Grand Nudger]

You can read, the thread is here for anyone to see...and you've been participating. Spare me, and spare yourself this particular line of bullshit Heywood. Perhaps you don't agree with the examples given, but you've been explicitly invited to flesh out that disagreement. I fail to see what more would be required of others.

Do work.

[Chas]

Certainly the simulators are systems designed for evolution occur. The "organisms" in them and their environment are designed. The choice as to which to reproduce is also designed pretty much in the same way artificially selection is used to change animals.

But the universe or even the earth does not show any signs of being a system designed for evolution. It is far too big, messy, and inefficient a place for life to occur to have been designed for reproducing organisms to evolve in. Evolution does happen within it, but it does not show any signs of being designed for evolution. Simply because a thing or process happens in a part of an environment is not evidence that the environment was designed for that thing or process. Wooden houses with central heat and plumbing are ideal habitats for carpenter ants and carpenter ant building. But they are not designed for carpenter ants, though I can certainly imagine some little intelligent Heywood ant arguing that it was.

You are shifting the goal posts here. In this thread I am not claiming that the universe is designed. I am claiming that the evolutionary system which resulted in you and I existing was designed or at least required a pre-existing intellect to exist. Why? Because every evolutionary system I have observed, which I also know the details of its origination, ALWAYS, either required an intellect to design it, or requires an intellect to be a component of it.

In another thread I did claim the universe appeared to be designed....but remember I said it wasn't designed for life but rather is was designed for emergent complexity.

Your argument reduces to everything you observe that was created by people was created by an intellect.

[Heywood]

You can read, the thread is here for anyone to see...and you've been participating. Spare me, and spare yourself this particular line of bullshit Heywood. Perhaps you don't agree with the examples given, but you've been explicitly invited to flesh out that disagreement. I fail to see what more would be required of others.

Do work.

If you are not going to back up your claim that I have been given an example of something that falsifies my claim, then I see no reason to believe you.

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You are shifting the goal posts here. In this thread I am not claiming that the universe is designed. I am claiming that the evolutionary system which resulted in you and I existing was designed or at least required a pre-existing intellect to exist. Why? Because every evolutionary system I have observed, which I also know the details of its origination, ALWAYS, either required an intellect to design it, or requires an intellect to be a component of it.

In another thread I did claim the universe appeared to be designed....but remember I said it wasn't designed for life but rather is was designed for emergent complexity.

Your argument reduces to everything you observe that was created by people was created by an intellect.

Can you show me an observation of an evolutionary system coming into existence that did not involve intellect? That is all that I am asking for someone to do. Should be simple enough if evolutionary systems come into existence without the involvement of intellects as you claim.

At least my claim is based on observation while your is based on whimsical thinking.

[The Grand Nudger]

Not -an example-. Multiple examples. If you'd like to see them again - you can reread the thread, just like anybody else. Unless and until you elaborate on the point of disagreement between yourself and those posters who have offered these examples - as you've been invited to do...what more can be done?