The odds for God (Introduction)
by David Turell 
, Saturday, May 07, 2011, 19:23 (4928 days ago)
Contrary to Matt's approach, it is appropriate to figure odds for God from what we know about our physical reality and about the biology of life. Read this summary of an Oxford professor's book, "God's Undertaker--Has Science buried God?", by Prof. John Lennox. Note in this review numbers in the thousands are really ten to a power. The author apparently didn't know how to type them. Lennox is a mathematician/philosopher who doesn't follow Matt's reasoning at all. I feel vindicated, since I am not a math person!-http://www.mercatornet.com/articles/view/has_science_buried_god/
The odds for God: where is Matt\'s reply?
by David Turell , Monday, May 16, 2011, 01:11 (4919 days ago) @ David Turell
Matt: My entry was especially for you, since you strongly defend the position that giving odds for God, or origin of life, or the Big Bang is mathematically incorrect.
The odds for God
by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Friday, May 20, 2011, 22:41 (4915 days ago) @ David Turell
Contrary to Matt's approach, it is appropriate to figure odds for God from what we know about our physical reality and about the biology of life. Read this summary of an Oxford professor's book, "God's Undertaker--Has Science buried God?", by Prof. John Lennox. Note in this review numbers in the thousands are really ten to a power. The author apparently didn't know how to type them. Lennox is a mathematician/philosopher who doesn't follow Matt's reasoning at all. I feel vindicated, since I am not a math person! > > http://www.mercatornet.com/articles/view/has_science_buried_god/-Don't. He makes the same mistake as everyone else; that it's feasible to compute odds in the presence of asymmetric information. It's worse than a weather calculation. That entire article is practically a copy/paste of the same arguments we've discussed here, only this time from a mathematician. His analysis--and yours rests on the assumption that statistics can yield a proper result in the presence of asymmetric data. It can, but only in instances where the statistical model can be falsified. -The entire ID argument is fluff built around the fact that we don't know how abiogenesis happened. (Again I use abiogenesis to mean the event that sparked life from nonlife, however this occurred.) -A different tact: Actuarial analysis (I'm a programmer at an insurance company, mind you!) is in the business of computing the odds of some pretty far-out events; but these statistics are only computed upon actual data. You can't predict the odds of say, abiogenesis--when we don't posses the knowledge to replicate it. You can't compute odds without full knowledge of the system. Seriously. I'm not making this up. You take Lennox's argument to an actuary and he'll laugh you out of the room! -You can give it your best guess--Lennox's "weather prediction"--but the correctness of your prediction can only be determined by actually conducting the experiment. -As a side note, I recently saw a stab that discusses the "fine-tuning" for life in the universe. Looking at identical data, when you consider that life as we know it only exists on a fraction of the 4% of "normal" matter in the universe, you get a sudden picture that the universe is actually inherently hostile to life. NOT fine-tuned for life. -If you can draw two disparate conclusions from the same data, in math we call that an unsolved problem.
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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.\"
The odds for God
by David Turell , Friday, May 20, 2011, 23:54 (4914 days ago) @ xeno6696
A different tact: Actuarial analysis (I'm a programmer at an insurance company, mind you!) is in the business of computing the odds of some pretty far-out events; but these statistics are only computed upon actual data. Seriously. I'm not making this up. You take Lennox's argument to an actuary and he'll laugh you out of the room! > > As a side note, I recently saw a stab that discusses the "fine-tuning" for life in the universe. Looking at identical data, when you consider that life as we know it only exists on a fraction of the 4% of "normal" matter in the universe, you get a sudden picture that the universe is actually inherently hostile to life. NOT fine-tuned for life. > > If you can draw two disparate conclusions from the same data, in math we call that an unsolved problem.-We are 'finally' not 'circling the drain'! I understand your math point of view. I felt the article by Prof. Lennox, a college math prof, might remove you from your point of view, but you have explained yourself so I understood. Actuaries deal with real history. You are not willing to even attempt a math conjecture unless you have real history, which we will never have. Fair enough. But obviously, other mathematicians are willing.-As for your fine tuning comment; great way to look at it. But I take a reverse view of your point. Yes, the universe is a very hostile place, but its parameters do provide for a chance for life, and every Earth-like planet will probably have it at some point in its existence. This makes 'Earths' or only one Earth very unique, and perhaps planned for by the UI.
The odds for God
by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Saturday, May 21, 2011, 00:15 (4914 days ago) @ David Turell
A different tact: Actuarial analysis (I'm a programmer at an insurance company, mind you!) is in the business of computing the odds of some pretty far-out events; but these statistics are only computed upon actual data. Seriously. I'm not making this up. You take Lennox's argument to an actuary and he'll laugh you out of the room! > > > > As a side note, I recently saw a stab that discusses the "fine-tuning" for life in the universe. Looking at identical data, when you consider that life as we know it only exists on a fraction of the 4% of "normal" matter in the universe, you get a sudden picture that the universe is actually inherently hostile to life. NOT fine-tuned for life. > > > > If you can draw two disparate conclusions from the same data, in math we call that an unsolved problem. > > We are 'finally' not 'circling the drain'! I understand your math point of view. I felt the article by Prof. Lennox, a college math prof, might remove you from your point of view, but you have explained yourself so I understood. Actuaries deal with real history. You are not willing to even attempt a math conjecture unless you have real history, which we will never have. Fair enough. But obviously, other mathematicians are willing. > -It's not just a math point of view--you've referred to this a couple times in similar cycles. If I characterize you properly, you refer to the "math point of view" as that closed system that deals only in proofs, cold, stark, and pure logic? -My point is deeper than that. If you want to be able to compute the odds of any event, you need to have more information than "it's happened once." In terms of abiogenesis, we don't know if it only happened once, and it all "rolled downhill" from there--or "uphill" in your case
, or if it happened many many times, and through various combinations of those results, it rolled into something completely different. There is a complete gap in our knowledge here--worse, I would say, than the gaps you've referred to in the fossil records. Shapiro's book, and his comments since have simply reinforced to me that there's a big, black curtain here. Because of this, I simply don't find it intellectually honest to assert any odds whatsoever here. -> As for your fine tuning comment; great way to look at it. But I take a reverse view of your point. Yes, the universe is a very hostile place, but its parameters do provide for a chance for life, and every Earth-like planet will probably have it at some point in its existence. This makes 'Earths' or only one Earth very unique, and perhaps planned for by the UI.-You didn't address my main thrust however--that two equally logical claims coming from the same evidence simply points to the lack of a solution. (Here's where the more traditional "math side" enters...)-And I apologize about the 'fluff' comment... I just get tired when I see the same arguments repeated while ignoring what the real problem actually is...
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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.\"
The odds for God
by David Turell , Saturday, May 21, 2011, 01:40 (4914 days ago) @ xeno6696
> It's not just a math point of view--you've referred to this a couple times in similar cycles. If I characterize you properly, you refer to the "math point of view" as that closed system that deals only in proofs, cold, stark, and pure logic? -I don't know or understand math like you do. All I know is as you describe above. > > My point is deeper than that. If you want to be able to compute the odds of any event, you need to have more information than "it's happened once." -But if you know the requirements to put together DNA and/or RNA, and we do know their structure, what are the odds of it happening by chance. Can't that be computed?- > > As for your fine tuning comment; great way to look at it. But I take a reverse view of your point. -> You didn't address my main thrust however--that two equally logical claims coming from the same evidence simply points to the lack of a solution. (Here's where the more traditional "math side" enters...)-I understand that. But about my point above.... Can we calculate the chance for DNA?
The odds for God
by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Saturday, May 21, 2011, 04:56 (4914 days ago) @ David Turell
> > It's not just a math point of view--you've referred to this a couple times in similar cycles. If I characterize you properly, you refer to the "math point of view" as that closed system that deals only in proofs, cold, stark, and pure logic? > > I don't know or understand math like you do. All I know is as you describe above. > > > > My point is deeper than that. If you want to be able to compute the odds of any event, you need to have more information than "it's happened once." > > But if you know the requirements to put together DNA and/or RNA, and we do know their structure, what are the odds of it happening by chance. Can't that be computed? > -It can be computed--but there's a fallacy here. -Correlating that back to the "black wall" and further is folly. You admitted to me once that we're trying to reason back from today's life, and that we have no real reason to assume that life at or near the time of abiogenesis follows exactly the same rules or logic as life of today. -You will likely disagree with me, but computing based on your criteria above makes a series of assumptions that to me, seem unwarranted. Again, I come from the school--no--personal philosophy (since no school agrees with me) that we need to do EVERYTHING possible to perform abiogenesis. Shapiro and his contemporaries tried to limit themselves... there's no need for that limit. In programming, my methodology is "just make it work... then optimize." Same thing for this problem. Too many constraints... that's why I applaud work of this kind.-> > > > As for your fine tuning comment; great way to look at it. But I take a reverse view of your point. > > > You didn't address my main thrust however--that two equally logical claims coming from the same evidence simply points to the lack of a solution. (Here's where the more traditional "math side" enters...) > > I understand that. But about my point above.... Can we calculate the chance for DNA?-Yeah; but like I said before it's a "weather prediction." You're predicting based on incomplete information, assuming that you can extrapolate today's knowledge back 4Bn years. You assume that life at all junctures had to have identical property(ies) that we find in modern DNA. I don't think this is the case. -A good exercise for you here is to enumerate ALL of your assumptions. Fire them out and maybe I can weaken/strengthen some of them...-More importantly, does your computation mean anything when you can't falsify your conclusion? You've expressed reservations concering Popper, but his assessment of how science works fits with Kuhn's and I find no logical reason to abandon it... and in general it is the de facto standard that science operates by.
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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.\"