Chance v. Design Part 4 (Evolution)

by dhw, Monday, June 29, 2009, 08:16 (5424 days ago) @ xeno6696

Matt: I am determined to continuously challenge assumptions, beliefs, opinions, anytime I find a conflict might exist. So please...don't think I'm being hostile! - Good for you, and no, I don't think you're being hostile, and you needn't apologize. I do exactly the same as you, and if I find an argument unconvincing, I try to explain why. Sometimes this also comes out as a sort of unwitting aggression, but it's not meant personally. Ultimately, all of us are looking for some kind of tenable truth, and the purpose of this website is to see if we can join forces and learn from each other. Unfortunately, my own approach tends to be negative: I can only say why I don't believe. I also tend to think in very concrete terms, which is why I sometimes find your thinking hard to follow. But let me say straight out that I admire the breadth of your interests, your enthusiasm and your honesty. Only don't expect your pronouncements to go unchallenged! - For instance: you do not find abiogenesis and god to be "mutually exclusive". You say "I've spent a very long time studying not just science, but its philosophical underpinnings and there is absolutely no way to make that claim. Part of why I bring up (we'll call it my strawman deism) is that its view of the creator is absolutely no less valid than that of any other theological claim." I'm afraid the length of time that you have spent studying adds no weight to the argument. Nor does your use of the word "absolutely". If your strawman deist view is no less valid than that of any other theological claim, then the theological claim that abiogenesis and god are mutually exclusive is no less valid than the claim that they are not mutually exclusive, in which case you cannot say "there is absolutely no way to make that claim". I think you and Jason R. should invest in a pair of bullet-proof socks. However, the fact is that none of us have absolute knowledge, and so we can only exchange views on why some claims seem to us more convincing than others. - You wrote: "If you call yourself an agnostic, then you also have to consider the possibility of chance AND design. And then be able to weed out which is which, if you do so attempt to claim a creator in a physical sense." First of all, I don't claim a creator in any sense. I can only speculate on possibilities. But secondly, and far more importantly, we need to pin down what we're talking about here. I see chance and design (in a personal, not a theological sense) permeating everyday life, and I could argue that chance and design permeate evolution, with design possibly relating to a conscious external designer, and/or to the logical processes of natural selection. But where I cannot see "chance AND design" is in the origin of life ... those first self-replicating molecules that started it all off, with their vast potential for reproducible adaptations and unheard-of innovations, leading eventually to us. This, in our experience so far, is ... as Jason Rosenhouse pointed out ... unique. We have no point of comparison. You quite rightly say that "even attempting to place a probability is vacuous." So why bother? I agree with you again that all the answers are "best-guesses", but I see no way of guessing that those molecules were produced simultaneously by unconscious chance AND by a conscious creator. 

You say: "This is why I do not consider the complexity of life as a valid argument for a creator." Nor do I. I consider it as a valid argument for not believing in abiogenesis. And I consider it as a valid argument for saying: "I am not prepared to dismiss the idea of a creator." My agnosticism is negative: it consists of non-beliefs ... not beliefs or disbeliefs. - You wrote: "I still hold however, that one could argue that the universe's existence even if only from the big bang, then you can still attribute your ability to reason to God. Just not in the personal sense that most people ascribe to it." - The syntax of this argument is rather difficult to work out, but if I've understood you correctly, it's an argument against a personal God, such as the main monotheistic religions believe in. You and I have not yet discussed the personal qualities of a possible creator, though this has been talked about at great length earlier. We have been confined to the question of whether life came about by chance or by design, and I say if it wasn't by chance, there must have been a designer. Alternatively, if it came about by design, it couldn't have come about by chance. And conversely if it wasn't designed, it must have come about by chance. You disagree, and I cannot follow your logic, but that is as far as we have got. - In an earlier post, you said that you had finished my "treatise" (far too grand a word!). Thank you for doing so. I suspect that most people give up long before the end. As for revisions, I have been astonished and delighted at the response and at the high standard not only of argument but also of learning. Contributors like George and David especially (the best possible combination of atheist and theist scientists), BBella, Mark, John Clinch and yourself have far outstripped my own boundaries of knowledge, and I'm inclined to think that your/their contributions are best left to speak for themselves. But let's just see how the forum evolves!