Old and Interesting |
Intellegent Design -- Blah
5/4/2009, 5:05:22 PM
In a different universe, many millions of light years away, the head brain calls together his best engineering brains and tells them to design a caretaker for the new garden area he is creating. They come back with blueprints for a being exactly like you and me and are fired on the spot. We are far too defective to be created by anything involving "intelligent design." There can be no doubt we are the result of accidental chance.
Bob
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The loyal opposition sounds off
5/5/2009, 10:10:12 PM
OK, sorry Bob, but I do disagree with you on the scenario you outline above, too.
There is an argument against intelligent design to be made using the problems of the human body. The argument that works for me, though, is not that the design is poor. I would not say it is --I would say the design is unbelievably successful and fantastic with some faults. It is not the presence of the faults, compared to the successes they are virtually nothing, but their nature that makes a case against ID.
Both billions of years of blind natural selection and consciously guided selection could both be expected to produce stunning results. But the nature of the faults can also be expected to be different. The type produced by conscious processes might be difficult for us as conscious being to even pick out since they would probably reveal some of the limitations of consciousness itself. The types produced by natural selection might be expected to stick out like a sore thumb to our consciously directed inquiry.
Basically, we should be able to look at a tumor that is 6 inches across and putting pressure on the soon to be stifled heart and go, "Well, there's your problem," whereas the incredibly intricate, magnificently designed, but UNCONSCIOUSLY driven biochemical processes of the immune system will be able to go right up to the tumor and go, "Hmmm, nothing to see here, move along," (hope your heart can stand that much anthropomorphication) right up to the point immune system, body, and even tumor all die.
The immune system has done BILLIONS and BILLIONS of things amazingly right for year after year for this person as it has defended the person against a constant onslaught of infectious agents, every single one of which would have destroyed the individual like a piece of beef left on the counter without its incredibly successful work.
So I think it is that the faults are of a type you would expect from a non-consciously designed system rather than that there are so many of them that should be used in arguments with those promoting ID. To me it's important to split those hairs since the ID supporters are likely to split 'em if we don't.
The Masked Avenger STRIKES!
Tom Hall
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I am God
5/5/2009, 11:41:44 PM
And because I am infallible, and making man in my image, by God (sorry, by Me) it's not going to fall apart due to faulty construction.
Whoever, or whatever, takes credit the design of that monstrosity needs to go back to engineering school. I'm sure as #$%& not going to take credit for it.
Bob, er God. (Well they're close.)
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OK, down to earth
5/6/2009, 11:40:30 AM
Tom -- You are making my points. 1. Through the operation of evolution, anything that wouldn't work would be automatically discarded. If it didn't work it wouldn't be around to reproduce. So the result (in this case, man) would be pretty efficient. However, the small things -- like aching knees at 73 or an occasional tumor that sometimes causes death -- would slip by natural selection. 2. On the other hand, if an infallible god were directing the process, he would spot these minor infractions while skimming the original blueprint. Ergo, we can only be the result of "accidental chance."
Bob, er G--- (Ah, to heck with it.)
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Think the idea of a BBQ is great!
5/3/2009, 9:54:46 PM
Thank you Marilyn for the offer. I can bring my specialty: food purchased from a place where people know how to prepare food. And Bob, it is the Masked AVENGER. I'll forgive you THIS time.
Tom Hall
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Just Old |
???
5/4/2009, 3:51:01 PM
I'm sure it was something I did, my computer has been acting funky..I think I may have hit the refresh button because the message wouldn't send and that must have sent it again. No problem.
ciao!
Marilyn
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That was a blast!
6/1/2009, 12:50:51 PM
Thanks to all the Skeptics who made it to the BBQ Sunday, I enjoyed having you. Let's plan another one soon!
See you Sunday at the library,
Marilyn
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On religion becoming evil....again (next Sunday).
6/25/2009, 8:35:11 PM
Having volunteered to get some ordered comments together on Kimball's book, I thought I might try to have a few excerpts in multiple copies to give everybody at least minimal access to the text. If you have a copy, you might consider making note of any passage that strikes you as worthy of comment so we don't miss something important because I didn't pick up on it. Stay well - HH
Harrison Hartley
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More problems on the blog page.
4/24/2009, 12:59:41 PM
Cutting off long messages seems to be fixed. But we still have two problems. 1. It does not accept paragraph breaks. I know why but I haven't found a fix yet. (I did manually add paragraph breaks to Tom's extra long one just so it was readable.) 2. You guys who are getting double messages. When you click the "Send" button, it is supposed to dump everything in you message bucket. Apparently on some computers it doesn't. So for you guys, try this -- Click "Send", go back to the home page (use the "Home" button on the upper bar) then come back to the Blog page. Lets see if that works for now. Thanks.
Bob
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Thanks Bob!
4/24/2009, 8:15:50 PM
I'll detail the meaning of life a little later on. For right now I will add my thanks for all the work Bob has done. Everything looks great and I know this sort of thing takes a lot of work. Thanks!
Masked AVENGER
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Greetings, with apologies...
4/27/2009, 1:47:39 AM
The Absent Hartley Speaks: sorry I couldn't come Sunday (the 26th) as I had to be in KC and couldn't make it back in time. I'm game to help develop a blurb or other communication if you still would like me to present next month and would be free to meet w
Harrison
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Meeting/Get together at Marilyn's house
5/3/2009, 6:16:47 PM
Hi everyone,At the meeting today I offered to host a meeting at my house on June 7th. I forgot my mother was coming to visit that weekend, so I would like to do it the weekend before, that would be May 31st. Actually I was wondering if people would rather meet Saturday for a barbeque.
Marilyn Coate
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Me again
5/3/2009, 6:28:47 PM
I don't know why that message posted twice, I think I only sent it once..sorry.
radgirl64@hotmail.com
Marilyn
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Doubling?
5/3/2009, 11:33:05 PM
Don't know why those messages doubled. I'll see what I can do. Of course it could be they were just so good the web site couldn't resist. I did some testing and can't get a message to show up twice. If it happens again, let me know what keys or mouse
Bob
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