philosophy of science: meaning and functions (Introduction)

by Balance_Maintained , U.S.A., Sunday, September 16, 2018, 17:12 (2048 days ago) @ dhw

DAVID: And I keep presenting studies on how important the balance of nature happens to be.

DHW: The balance of nature is important for the survival of whichever species survive. When it changes, some of them do not survive. This is self-evident. As for the complexity of life, it has never been an issue between us, and for me is a major reason for not embracing atheism. You have both either forgotten or deliberately ignored the starting point of this discussion on the subject of purpose, which was the following exchange on Sunday 2 September at 14.11:

Dhw: (to David): I don’t think you have ever quite understood the reason why I am an agnostic. The explanations of life’s history offered by both theists and atheists are so full of Cambrian-style gaps that I cannot place my faith in any of them. I look for alternative hypotheses, such as cellular intelligence and a form of panpsychism, though even these are too tenuous for me to believe in. etc. etc.

TONY: Just a thought, but what seems to be missing in this thought process is 'purpose'. Evolution requires no purpose, and offers no meaning. I think something deep in humanity rejects this purposeless idea of existence. Yet we do not extend the idea of purpose beyond our own existence to say, what is the purpose of everything, not just our purpose. We can recognize the need for a designer to account for the complexity, but forget that designers do not design without purpose.

DHW: That is why I shifted the discussion to this thread. You wanted to talk about purpose, and now that we are talking about purpose, you want to talk about design!

Design and purpose go hand in hand, particularly when you are talking about the purposes of the designer.

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What is the purpose of living? How about, 'to reduce needless suffering. It seems to me to be a worthy purpose.