Pigliucci Challenges Randomness (Religion)

by dhw, Wednesday, January 20, 2010, 13:00 (5208 days ago) @ xeno6696

MATT: If we think of the English language as an example, think of how much complexity surrounds such a very simple structure. [...] A Shakespearean play might be amazingly complex, but it is ultimately nothing less than repetitions of the same basic informational structure over and over again. How is life any different?-You have put this question to David, and perhaps he will have a different answer, but my own is that this seems quite a good analogy. However, maybe I'm missing something obvious, because in my view it supports David's thesis in two ways:
 
1) The so-called "simple" structures that form the basis of language had to be devised by intelligent minds. ("Simplicity" is a relative term. Nothing could be simpler than the wheel, but whoever invented it was a genius!)
2) The amazing complexity of a Shakespeare play, while based on those simple structures, again could not have been created without the workings of an intelligent mind.-If, then, you take language as being analogous to life, the building blocks may be simple, but putting them together to create a functioning system requires conscious intelligence. This is not, however, an argument against evolution. It's an argument against materialist abiogenesis.-
*** Thank you for your very helpful explanation of Pigliucci's line of thought. I'll have to get back to this next time round.