Hitchens addresses Intelligent Design (Introduction)

by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Tuesday, October 23, 2012, 17:37 (4415 days ago) @ dhw

dhw: [My agnostic balance is based]...2) on what I see as the utter impersonality of the cosmos and of Nature here on Earth, and on the inconceivability of a conscious mind that has existed for ever and is on such a vast scale that it can create universes.&#13;&#10;> &#13;&#10;> DAVID: Can you avoid the idea that something has to be eternal? One does not get something from nothing. The famous question, why is there anything?, has an answer. There has always been an eternal something.&#13;&#10;> &#13;&#10;> Agreed. The debate concerns whether that something is conscious or not.-And this is where I tie back in: David&apos;s case relies heavily on the notion that he can detect intelligence, and for that matter, so can the rest of us. -He could have a case, if it hasn&apos;t been demonstrated time and again, that our ability to test and discern intelligence has historically been extremely lacking. Who can forget this?-Or this?-> &#13;&#10;> Dhw: David, I think your &quot;wall of quantum uncertainty&quot; is a fine, scientific-sounding term for my agnostic picket fence.&#13;&#10;> &#13;&#10;> DAVID: But the fence has two sides and two areas, and as a boundary there is something in both of them. If the other side for you is the possibility of chance, remember chance is a concept, and is not material or energy. What is left is pure energy.&#13;&#10;> &#13;&#10;> This is casuistry. On one side is the concept of design, on the other the concept of chance. On one side is conscious energy, on the other unconscious energy.-David hits upon the fact I&apos;ve been driving at for some years here...-1. We lack a reliable test of intelligence.&#13;&#10;2. It is clear, that chance *has* played an integral role in our development. -It has been clear to me for some years, that the distinction between chance and design is false: Especially if randomness is a part of the equation. The fence isn&apos;t simply a position you wait at before deciding to go somewhere: The fence itself could well be the actual answer. We *know* chance had something to do with our development. An option hereby ignored is the one where there is a concrete mixture of chance and design: Maybe one or two major events were &quot;designed.&quot; How could you tell? <--And its that question that seems to me to begin resorting back to the &quot;brain in a vat&quot; reduction I started in regards to free will. &quot;How could you tell the difference between a free and unfree action?&quot;-The question here is nearly identical: How can you tell the difference between chance and design? What&apos;s the defining characteristic? What does chance even look like to begin with? (THAT I can answer, it&apos;s mathematical, but I want to hear you and David take cracks at this.)

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\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"

\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"