The issue of chance... (Evolution)

by George Jelliss , Crewe, Monday, June 01, 2009, 10:42 (5653 days ago) @ dhw

dhw claims that he has not written anything about "chance creating everything". He may not have used that exact phrase but he has certainly implied it. The following are extracts from his text: - The bottom line, then, for the militant atheist is that anyone who doesn't believe in the ability of chance to create all these hitherto non-existent, hugely complex (even in their most primitive form) organisms ... which require all the dazzling talents of human consciousness merely to unravel and comprehend ... is deluded. - Whereas belief in the creative genius of unconscious chance is...ah! Well,
maybe not rational. - The codes have been cracked. But could chance have created the codes? - an agnostic who finds it difficult to believe in the miraculous creativity of chance - it's hard to believe that life came about by chance, - I find all these concepts as incredible as that of chance-created life - the unbelievable creative genius of pure chance (= atheism); - the atheists' god of chance. - atheism (belief in chance). - Scepticism over the creative powers of chance - I have repeatedly objected to this attitude of dhw myself. He thinks chance is the atheist equivalent of god. I have pointed out that even most theists do not deny the existence of chance in the workings of the universe. Even an agnostic surely cannot deny the mathematically established laws of statistics?

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GPJ