So to put it crudely: Okay, God is "undetectable" by physical means. But by the very same standard, so is the Common Ancestor so beloved to Darwin's evolution theory.What an excellent challenge! I do hope someone will engage - but I won't hold my breath. The typical correspondent these days won't touch such points at all.Robert Herrmann usefully points out that "Direct evidence for the existence of postulated entities means that the entities directly impinge upon human or machine sensors." Neither God nor the Common Ancestor qualifies in terms of this criterion.
So on what basis can we say, speaking as scientists, that the theory of divine Creation is in any way "inferior" to the theory of the Common Ancestor in accounting for the facts of reality (in particular, for the rise of life and its articulation in the biological diversity we see all around us)?
Both theories rest on indirect evidence. The question is: Which one best accounts for the evolution of the universe? (Not just the biota.)
Don't hold your breath--its a mug's game.
You folks are equating religious beliefs, for which there are no evidence, with science, for which there is evidence. You admit that god is undetectable and claim that the common ancestor is undetectable as well. That is a false comparison. There is no evidence for deities, while evidence pointing toward the common ancestor remains in the genomes. Its just a matter of working out the details. See the difference? Evidence vs. no evidence?
"Both theories rest on indirect evidence" it is claimed? False again. "Divine" creation rests on no evidence -- it is entirely a religious belief. That's why they call it a belief!
And the belief in divine creation is not a theory. In science theories are well defined--see my FR homepage for the definitions; religious beliefs do not meet the definition of a theory.
You guys should stick to metaphysics and those other squishy subjects. Leave science to those who are not trying to distort both the data and the methods in a vain effort to support their particular religious beliefs. (Mathematicians should leave well enough alone also. Mathematical models and calculations are only useful if they accurately and correctly represent the data. I know its only a legend, but the case of a mathematician proving a bumblebee can't fly is a worthwhile parable, and should be kept in mind.)
I don't believe in miracles, I rely on them..
If you knew me better you would also know that it is true.. I should be dead at lease 20 times that I know positively of.. I am an unlikely God believer.. Could be there are many other times I should be dead.. Its possible the same is true for you.. How do I know that?.. Well you are discourseing over this stuff. when I sometimes talk to the hooves of many sheeple.. You display a certain civil openess.. It is noticed..
[[Leave science to those who are not trying to distort both the data and the methods in a vain effort to support their particular religious beliefs]]
Hahahahaha- now I’ve heard everything- “Scientists don’t distort to fit their religious beliefs” hahahaha
[[There is no evidence for deities, while evidence pointing toward the common ancestor remains in the genomes. Its just a matter of working out the details. See the difference? Evidence vs. no evidence?]]
And how’s the evidence that conclusively shows common ancestry goign for you folks htese days? Not so well? So, what you’re saying hten, is that Common ancestry is still an evidenceless religious belief that somethign took place ‘in the past’, but that we ‘just don’t have the connections yet’... Religious a priori belief in Macroevolution (hiding under the blanket of science) vs. Science which studies actual empiracle evidence for ID - Psssst- You have no evidnece - just assumptions and imaginary scenarios abotu past unknowns - don’t kid yourself, Macroevolution is more a religious idea than the belief in intelligence behind life’s irreducibly complex systems. (and by the way- the bumblebee impossibility wasn’t nearly as implausible statistic wise as the biologically impossible Macroevolution is- not even close.
[[False again. “Divine” creation rests on no evidence — it is entirely a religious belief. That’s why they call it a belief!]]
False again, Divine Creation rests on the foundation of ID/IC- both of which are producible, testable forensic clues- somethign Macroevolution lacks
Among the disciplines involved in science, Mathematics and Physics are the most epistemologically pure in my view. Thus I find your dismissal of math to be quite revealing:
In universality and information theory, it easily "trumps" the DNA evidence for a common ancestor.
Nor do I share your sense of what makes mathematical models useful. An example quoted by Cumrun Vafa was that Einstein was able to pull Reimannian geometry off-the-shelf to describe General Relativity. Which is to say, the geometry was discovered long before the warped structure of space/time was posited.
Likewise today, Max Tegmark's Level IV Parallel Universe Model is the only closed physical cosmological model known to me. It is a mathematical model - radically Platonist - that every thing in space/time is actually a mathematical structure that really exists outside of space and time.
Every other physical cosmological model (inflationary theory, big bang, ekpyrotic, cyclic, imaginary time, multi-verse, multi-world, hesitating, et al) - crash and burn on the issue of physical causality. In the absence of time, events cannot occur. In the absence of space, things cannot exist.
IOW, if you dismiss both God and mathematical structures as "real" - you are stuck with no explanation for physical causality. OTOH, if you dismiss God but accept mathematical structures as "real" - you are stuck with no explanation for the origin of the mathematical structures.
To recap some open questions for science: