Posted on 07/16/2013 11:44:20 AM PDT by Heartlander
Darwin’s Doubt, the brand new New York Times bestseller by Cambridge-trained Ph.D., Stephen Meyer, is creating a major scientific controversy. Darwinists don’t like it.
Meyer writes about the complex history of new life forms in an easy to understand narrative style. He takes the reader on a journey from Darwin to today while trying to discover the best explanation for how the first groups of animals arose. He shows, quite persuasively, that Darwinian mechanisms don’t have the power to do the job.
Using the same investigative forensic approach Darwin used over 150 years ago, Meyer investigates the central doubt Darwin had about his own theory. Namely, that the fossil record did not contain the rainbow of intermediate forms that his theory of gradual evolutionary change required. However, Darwin predicted that future discoveries would confirm his theory.
Meyer points out that they haven’t. We’ve thoroughly searched the fossil record since Darwin and confirmed what Darwin originally saw himself: the discontinuous, abrupt appearance of the first forms of complex animal life. In fact, paleontologists now think that roughly 20 of the 28 animal phyla (representing distinct animal “body plans”) found in the fossil record appear abruptly without ancestors in a dramatic geological event called the Cambrian Explosion.
And additional discoveries since Darwin have made it even worse for his theory. Darwin didn’t know about DNA or the digital information it contains that makes life possible. He couldn’t have appreciated, therefore, that building new forms of animal life would require millions of new characters of precisely sequenced code—that the Cambrian explosion was a massive explosion of new information.
For modern neo-Darwinism to survive, there must be an unguided natural mechanism that can create the genetic information and then add to it massively, accurately and within the time allowed by the fossil record. Is there such a mechanism?
The answer to that question is the key to Meyer’s theory and entire book. Meyer shows that the standard “neo-Darwinian” mechanism of mutation and natural selection mechanism lacks the creative power to produce the information necessary to produce new forms of animal life. He also reviews the various post-Darwinian speculations that evolutionary biologists themselves are now proposing to replace the crumbling Darwinian edifice. None survive scrutiny. Not only is there no known natural mechanism that can create the new information required for new life forms, there is no known natural mechanism that can create the genetic code for the first life either (which was the subject of Meyer’s previous book Signature in the Cell).
When Meyer suggests that an intelligent designer is the best explanation for the evidence at hand, critics accuse him of being anti-scientific and endangering sexual freedom everywhere (OK, they don’t explicitly state that last part). They also claim that Meyer commits the God of the gaps fallacy.
But he does not. As Meyer points out, he’s not interpreting the evidence based on what we don’t know, but what we do know. The geologically sudden appearance of fully formed animals and millions of lines of genetic information point to intelligence. That is, we don’t just lack a materialistic explanation for the origin of information. We have positive evidence from our uniform and repeated experience that another kind of cause—namely, intelligence or mind—is capable of producing digital information. Thus, he argues that the explosion of information in the Cambrian period provides evidence of this kind of cause acting in the history of animal life. (Much like any sentence written by one of Meyer’s critics is positive evidence for an intelligent being).
This inference from the data is no different than the inference archaeologists made when they discovered the Rosetta Stone. It wasn’t a “gap” in their knowledge about natural forces that led them to that conclusion, but the positive knowledge that inscriptions require intelligent inscribers.
Of course, any critic could refute Meyer’s entire thesis by demonstrating how natural forces or mechanisms can generate the genetic information necessary to build the first life and then massive new amounts of genetic information necessary for new forms of animal life. But they can’t and hardly try without assuming what they are trying to prove (see Chapter 11). Instead, critics attempt to smear Meyer by claiming he’s doing “pseudo science” or not doing science at all.
Well, if Meyer isn’t, doing science, then neither was Darwin (or any Darwinist today). Meyer is using the same forensic or historical scientific method that Darwin himself used. That’s all that can be used. Since these are historical questions, a scientist can’t go into the lab to repeat and observe the origin and history of life. Scientists must evaluate the clues left behind and then make an inference to the best explanation. Does our repeated experience tell us that natural mechanisms have the power to create the effects in question or is intelligence required?
Meyer writes, “Neo-Darwinism and the theory of intelligent design are not two different kinds of inquiry, as some critics have asserted. They are two different answers—formulated using a similar logic and method of reasoning—to the same question: ‘What caused biological forms and the appearance of design in the history of life?’”
The reason Darwinists and Meyer arrive at different answers is not because there’s a difference in their scientific methods, but because Meyer and other Intelligent Design proponents don’t limit themselves to materialistic causes. They are open to intelligent causes as well (just like archaeologists and crime scene investigators are).
So this is not a debate about evidence. Everyone is looking at the same evidence. This is a debate about how to interpret the evidence, and that involves philosophical commitments about what causes will be considered possible before looking at the evidence. If you philosophically rule out intelligent causes beforehand—as the Darwinists do—you will never arrive at the truth if an intelligent being actually is responsible.
Since all evidence needs to be interpreted, science doesn’t actually say anything—scientists do. So if certain self-appointed priests of science say that a particular theory is outside the bounds of their own scientific dogma, that doesn’t mean that the theory is false. The issue is truth—not whether something fits a materialistic definition of science.
I’m sure Darwinists will continue to throw primordial slime at Meyer and his colleagues. But that won’t make a dent in his observation that whenever we see information like that required to produce the Cambrian Explosion, intelligence is always the cause. In fact, I predict that when open-minded people read Darwin’s Doubt, they’ll see that Dr. Meyer makes a very intelligently designed case that intelligent design is actually true. It’s just too bad that many Darwinists aren’t open to that truth—they aren’t even open minded enough to doubt Darwin as much as Darwin himself was.
With respect to paragraph two of my previous post I should have said if he is wrong, then he must repent lest he be forever “cast out” by the Lord Who sees into and knows our most secret thoughts and intentions. If however, Nagel allows his pride to be a stumbling block, eternity in outer darkness will be by his own choice.
News flash to Nagel: It is those who put God first (the meek), that shall inherit the Earth.
God gives man choice, and freedom to act on his choice. If he chooses that which is evil, ought we to blame God for this?
True.. no gun has ever killed a person or animal.. people do that..
No knife has ever cut anything.. no bludgeon has ever attacked a victim.. no poison has ever poisoned anybody..
No pool of water has ever drowned anyone.. no bomb has ever blown anyone up.. No rope has ever hanged anybody.. People do it for one reason or another.. People make choices..
But governments do because governments are not inanimate they are PEOPLE.... police and military do because they are people.. all manner of malafactors do because they are people..
GOD has little or nothing to do with it..
Evil comes from people in one form or another..
Even (most) disease is basically caused by wrong choices..
I saw the devil in the mirror this morning while I was shaving..
You might have noticed the rascal today as well.. sneaking around your house..
I think we need to revisit what we mean by pure chance, “bias,” and also the meaning of “S.” Regarding “S,” my definition — “the physical outcome as the effect of bias” — is trivially true but not complete, as a re-reading of White’s paper makes clear to me now.
Regarding chance: You asked, “Isn’t there no principle in pure chance, sort of by definition?” Yes, chance is by definition “unprincipled.” And yet, as Roger White observes,
Not so long ago, scientists suggested that the very earliest living organism was the result of a “chance collision of molecules” in a pre-biotic soup, where this was not meant to be incompatible with determinism. I think we have a good enough grip on what they had in mind: some simple molecules were shuffling about in the soup — much like shaking Lego pieces in a box — until they just happened to form a stable structure capable of reproduction. It is this kind of view that is being denied when contemporary theorists insist that life did not originate by chance.However, White avers that today, “there is almost universal agreement that life did not first come about merely by chance.”
The view which is almost universally rejected by researchers in the field is that the numerous and prima facie improbable physical and biological requirements for life all fell together just by a fluke, like so many dice tumbling out of a bag and landing all sixes…. The conviction that life did not arise largely by chance [C] is treated as epistemically prior to the development of alternative theories [i.e., it is the foundational premise that motivates their research in the first place and “even if their theories are shown to be false, they would retain this basic assumption”]…. The suggestion that the origin of life might be due to any kind of purposeful agency [BI] is not considered as a serious option, and does not play any explicit role in theorizing…. The kind of explanations of life’s emergence that scientists look for appeal to ordinary physical properties, forces, and laws [BN], having nothing to do with the purposes of any agent.Now, both BN and BI are forms of bias— in effect, against the C hypothesis. I believe this is what White means by “bias” — nothing more, nothing less. From either form of bias we would expect to see “a kind of robustness or stability” that is absent from C, acting on S, here redefined as the actual state of affairs that we observe. But science finds BI inadmissible as a form of bias, on grounds that it is “unscientific.”
So science is left with BN. According to Manfred Eigen,
The physical principle that we are looking for should be in a position to explain the complexity typical of the phenomena of life at the level of molecular structures and syntheses. It should show how such complex molecular arrangements are able to form reproducibly in Nature.According to Christian de Duve,
… unless one adopts a creationist view … life arose through the succession of an enormous number of small steps, almost each of which, given the conditions at the time had a very high probability of happening … the alternative amounts to a miracle … were [the emergence of life] not an obligatory manifestation of the combinatorial properties of matter, it could not possibly have arisen naturally.White wants to assess whether there is a “very high probability” that the requisite number of “very small steps” are the result of a non-intentional cause (BN). Or whether an intentional cause (BI) is the better explanation. He writes,
Does the fact that certain values are necessary for life make them more likely to be favored by laws? … While there is at least room to argue that a rational agent is likely to influence the physical parameters [“fine tunings” attributable to necessary yet arbitrary universal physical constants that must exist in order for life to occur] in order to allow for the evolution of life, to suppose that impersonal physical laws are likely to constrain the constants in this way can only be based on a confused anthropomorphism.He concludes that “Blind physical laws [(BN] are no more naturally drawn toward states of affairs with value than blind chance is.”
In assessing the probabilities of BN and BI, White relies on the methods of Bayesian statistics. According to José M. Bernardo of the University of Valencia,
Statistics is the study of uncertainty. Bayesian statistical methods provide a complete paradigm for both statistical inference and decision making under uncertainty. Bayesian methods are firmly based on strict mathematical foundations, providing a coherent methodology which makes it possible to incorporate relevant initial information, and which solves many of the difficulties faced by conventional statistical methods. The Bayesian paradigm is based on an interpretation of probability as a conditional measure of uncertainty which closely matches the use of the word ‘probability’ in ordinary language. Statistical inference about a quantity of interest is described as the modification of the uncertainty about its value in the light of evidence, and Bayes’ theorem specifies how this modification should be made. Bayesian methods may be applied to complex, richly structured problems, which have been fairly inaccessible to traditional statistical methods. The special situation, often met in scientific reporting and public decision making, where the only acceptable information is that which may be deduced from available documented data, is addressed as an important particular case. [Itals added]So, what does “a conditional measure of uncertainty” mean? The mathematical notation for this is
P(A | B)which translates into English as “the probability of event A occurring given that B occurs.”
White is asking whether P(S | BI) is more likely than P(S | BN) to explain what we actually observe about the evolution of S. As noted above, he sees little practical difference between C and BN; so he opts for BI.
In general, if BI raises the likelihood of S, then S confirms BI to at least some degree, and may thereby disconfirm C. But it does not follow that S confirms BN one iota. S confirms BN only if BN raises the likelihood of S.Which it doesn't appear to do.
I hope this further explanation helps.
You wrote:
It’s like (analogy alert!) one fish arguing that the fishbowl is so well suited to living that an external agency must have designed it that way, and another fish saying no, that’s just the way goldfish bowls are. From outside the bowl, of course, we know which is true; but I don’t think there's anything the fish could do from inside the bowl to determine it one way or the other.Forgive me if I think this analogy is a tad weak. For it puts fish and humans on the same “footing.” True, both are living beings. But of the two, only man is self-conscious, only man is capable of apperception. That is to say, man is aware, not only of events occurring in the "outside world" via perception, but of subjective. mental events as well, especially the internal processes of rational analysis that occur “inside his head.” There are psychologists who suggest that there is order and structure in apperception itself. A fish presumably is capable of perception. But no fish has a rational mind that possesses such structure.
Thank you dear HHTVL for your correspondence on these issues! You ask great questions, and “hold my feet to the fire” with graciousness that I much appreciate. Please forgive me for running on so long.
In fact, it appears that the Darwinian Theory of Evolution is no more than another way of describing the readily observable and obvious Theory of Natural Selection.
However, White avers that today, “there is almost universal agreement that life did not first come about merely by chance.”
I guess in this and the subsequent discussion, I'm not sure what he means by "merely by chance." And I'd like to know what the researchers in the field who "amost univerally reject" the idea of chance, mean by it. If in fact B_N is the correct explanation--if, in de Duve's words, the emergence of life is "an obligatory manifestation of the combinatorial properties of matter"--how do we distinguish it from chance? What does chance mean, if not something consonant with the properties of matter? In fact, if an occurrence doesn't reflect the properties of matter, didn't almost by definition not occur by chance?
Sorry, analogy alert again: Consider water. How likely is it that two hydrogen atoms should come together with an oxygen atom "by chance"? Not very, I should think--except for the way it's "an obligatory manifestation of the combinatorial properties of matter."
...to suppose that impersonal physical laws are likely to constrain the constants in this way can only be based on a confused anthropomorphism. He concludes that “Blind physical laws [(BN] are no more naturally drawn toward states of affairs with value than blind chance is.”
It seems to me that he's the one afflicted with anthropomorphism. Who says life has value? We do, of course. But who says the universe shares that assessment?
Forgive me if I think this analogy is a tad weak. For it puts fish and humans on the same “footing.” True, both are living beings. But of the two, only man is self-conscious, only man is capable of apperception.
True. But our self-consciousness is also in the fishbowl. IF "life arose through the succession of an enormous number of small steps, almost each of which, given the conditions at the time had a very high probability of happening," and IF self-consciousness is an emergent property of life once it has developed to a certain point, then can our internal processes really access anything outside the physical laws of the universe?
Bear in mind that I think there are a lot of physical laws we just haven't discovered yet that will prove to be the explanation for many of the things we now consider "supernatural" or "extrasensory."
Who says life has value? Well, the notion of objective moral values have been discussed has been considered by some of the greatest minds in history. The Nurenberg trials were not predicated upon German law but upon the notion of universal human rights. Human rights are derived from the idea that man is made in the image of God. There were no codified statutes which ordered those trials. Without universal human rights there are no human rights. Without objective moral law there can be no right or wrong, only convention. There is no land where murder is virtue and kindness us vice, Everyone knows (by natural law) that there are things which we can't not know. In other words there is objective moral law, and thus a moral Lawgiver. It is impossible to not know it is objectively wrong to kill one's offspring...it is not in our nature. Murders know it is wrong to commit murder. So swinging back to Nuremberg we see those same principles springing from the heart of man, not from the legal code. The latest movements of euthanasia and infanticide as well as fratricide increase in pace in our country. Rather than ringing alarm bells "atheists" are the front line promoters. ":Personhood" has become the rhetorical tool to slide past humanity. Of course, this is nothing new under the sun. Recall the nazi call of lebensunwerten Leben", life unworthy of life.
So, we recreate morality to suit ourselves. But who is we? If morality is created, not discovered, we are left only with the stong man with guns to determine right from wrong. So, in our time, abandoning the Truth of objective moral law, vice has become virtue. That which was considered dirty-minded is now treated as sexual purity. It has become cruel to believe and advocate too firmly that the sick should not be encouraged to seek death; The moral law, today has become the very emblem of immorality. We affirm " being judgmental" and "being intolerant" has been judged and will not be tolerated..
So, without the Moral Law, there are no human rights, no justice or injustice, . But our self-consciousness is also in the fishbowl. IF "life arose through the succession of an enormous number of small steps, almost each of which, given the conditions at the time had a very high probability of happening," and IF self-consciousness is an emergent property of life once it has developed to a certain point, then can our internal processes really access anything outside the . But our self-consciousness is also in the fishbowl. IF "life arose through the succession of an enormous number of small steps, almost each of which, given the conditions at the time had a very high probability of happening," and IF self-consciousness is an emergent property of life once it has developed to a certain point, then can our internal processes really access anything outside the physical laws of the universe? laws of the universe? way to measure moral differences, no way to know right wrong. no grounds for political dissent, and no rational for punishing wrong-doing.
We do, of course. But who says the universe shares that assessment?
The universe makes no assessment. The universe is not mind. Only mind 'assesses' the universe, not the other way around.
But self-consciousness is also in the fishbowl. If LIFE arose......and if self-consciousness is an emergent of life once it has developed....
Perhaps self-consiousness is in the fishbowl (universe) but is not of<>of the universe. That is to say it is not made of time, matter energy or space. It is separate and is not temporally-spacially extended. Once you step from a material cause to an emergent, non spatial, non material property you have entered that which is metaphysical. Collin McGinn asked: "How does mere matter originate consciousness? How did evolutionconvet the water of biological tissue into the wine of consciousness? Consciousness seems like a radical novelty in the universe, not prefigured by the after-effects of the Big Bang; So how idd it contrive to spring into being from what preceded it?" The darwinist/naturalist/materialist/physicalist owes science and theology an explanation of causal necessitation of consousness, mental properties, and nuniversal abstract entity. If they will not, they need to abandon their worldview of darwinist materialism. Consciousness is ontologically basic for theism since it characterizes the fundamental being. If consiousness is emergent, then it is derivative and supervenient, and both its finitude. So the metaphysical materialist needs to explain itself, or abandon all hope that their view has nay basis in reality.
I have interjected too much into your conversation. Sorry about that. Just a few thoughts on the matters which you are discussing.
Who says life has value? Well, the notion of objective moral values have been discussed has been considered by some of the greatest minds in history. The Nurenberg trials were not predicated upon German law but upon the notion of universal human rights. Human rights are derived from the idea that man is made in the image of God. There were no codified statutes which ordered those trials. Without universal human rights there are no human rights. Without objective moral law there can be no right or wrong, only convention. There is no land where murder is virtue and kindness us vice, Everyone knows (by natural law) that there are things which we can't not know. In other words there is objective moral law, and thus a moral Lawgiver. It is impossible to not know it is objectively wrong to kill one's offspring...it is not in our nature. Murders know it is wrong to commit murder. So swinging back to Nuremberg we see those same principles springing from the heart of man, not from the legal code. The latest movements of euthanasia and infanticide as well as fratricide increase in pace in our country. Rather than ringing alarm bells "atheists" are the front line promoters. ":Personhood" has become the rhetorical tool to slide past humanity. Of course, this is nothing new under the sun. Recall the nazi call of lebensunwerten Leben", life unworthy of life.
So, we recreate morality to suit ourselves. But who is we? If morality is created, not discovered, we are left only with the stong man with guns to determine right from wrong. So, in our time, abandoning the Truth of objective moral law, vice has become virtue. That which was considered dirty-minded is now treated as sexual purity. It has become cruel to believe and advocate too firmly that the sick should not be encouraged to seek death; The moral law, today has become the very emblem of immorality. We affirm " being judgmental" and "being intolerant" has been judged and will not be tolerated..
So, without the Moral Law, there are no human rights, no justice or injustice, . But our self-consciousness is also in the fishbowl. IF "life arose through the succession of an enormous number of small steps, almost each of which, given the conditions at the time had a very high probability of happening," and IF self-consciousness is an emergent property of life once it has developed to a certain point, then can our internal processes really access anything outside the . But our self-consciousness is also in the fishbowl. IF "life arose through the succession of an enormous number of small steps, almost each of which, given the conditions at the time had a very high probability of happening," and IF self-consciousness is an emergent property of life once it has developed to a certain point, then can our internal processes really access anything outside the physical laws of the universe? laws of the universe? way to measure moral differences, no way to know right wrong. no grounds for political dissent, and no rational for punishing wrong-doing.
We do, of course. But who says the universe shares that assessment?
The universe makes no assessment. The universe is not mind. Only mind 'assesses' the universe, not the other way around.
But self-consciousness is also in the fishbowl. If LIFE arose......and if self-consciousness is an emergent of life once it has developed....
Perhaps self-consiousness is in the fishbowl (universe) but is not of<>of the universe. That is to say it is not made of time, matter energy or space. It is separate and is not temporally-spacially extended. Once you step from a material cause to an emergent, non spatial, non material property you have entered that which is metaphysical. Collin McGinn asked: "How does mere matter originate consciousness? How did evolutionconvet the water of biological tissue into the wine of consciousness? Consciousness seems like a radical novelty in the universe, not prefigured by the after-effects of the Big Bang; So how idd it contrive to spring into being from what preceded it?" The darwinist/naturalist/materialist/physicalist owes science and theology an explanation of causal necessitation of consousness, mental properties, and nuniversal abstract entity. If they will not, they need to abandon their worldview of darwinist materialism. Consciousness is ontologically basic for theism since it characterizes the fundamental being. If consiousness is emergent, then it is derivative and supervenient, and both its finitude. So the metaphysical materialist needs to explain itself, or abandon all hope that their view has nay basis in reality.
I have interjected too much into your conversation. Sorry about that. Just a few thoughts on the matters which you are discussing.
“I have interjected too much into your conversation.” Ahh, but what a cogent dose to inject you’ve brought to the discussion!
Perhaps that may be the case, HHTVL. But what is the probability that a physical law will be discovered that can account for the plethora of extremely finely-tuned physical constants that are necessary for life to be possible in the first place?
(1) For instance, carbon. According to Dean Overman (in A Case Against Accident and Self-organization), the carbon atom is the fourth most common element in our galaxy. "Life would be impossible without carbon and yet because of the precise requirements for its existence, the carbon atom should be very rare." That's because its formation requires a rare triple collision called the "triple alpha process."
The first colliding step in this process occurs when a helium nucleus collides with another helium nucleus within a star. This collision produces an unstable, very ephemeral isotope of beryllium known as BE8 (BE9 is beryllium's stable form). When the unstable, short lived beryllium collides with a third helium nucleus, a carbon nucleus is formed.(2) Then there's the fact that the explosive power of the Big Bang is precisely matched to the power of gravity.
Astrophysicist Sir Fred Hoyle predicted the resonances (energy levels) of the carbon and oxygen atoms. The resonance of the carbon nucleus is precisely the right resonance to enable the components to hold together rather than disperse. This resonance perfectly matches the combined resonance of the third helium nucleus and the beryllium atom....
By his own admission, Hoyle's atheism was dramatically disturbed when he calculated the odds against these precisely matched resonances existing by chance. Hoyle wrote:
A common sense interpretation of the facts suggests that a superintellect has monkeyed with physics, as well as with chemistry and biology, and that there are no blind forces worth speaking about in nature. The numbers one calculates from the facts seem to me so overwhelming as to put this conclusion almost beyond question.
For the universe to form, the force of gravity had to match precisely the explosive force of the Big Bang. If the force of explosion was only slightly higher, the universe would only consist of gas without stars, galaxies or planets. Without stars, galaxies and planets, life could not exist. The matching had to be to the remarkable precision of one part in 1055. If the rate of expansion was reduced by only one part in a thousand billion, the matter in the universe would have collapsed back to a singular point after a few million years.Physicist Bernard Lovell has commented about this situation: "We have attempted to describe the early stages of the expansion of the universe but the description in terms of nuclear physics and relativity is not an explanation of those conditions. Formidable questions arise and it is not clear today where the answers should be sought: Indeed, even the scientific description of these queries produces the remarkable idea that there may not be a solution in the language of science."
"Why is the universe expanding? Furthermore, why is it expanding at so near the critical rate to prevent its collapse? The query is most important because minor differences near time zero would have made human existence impossible.... [O]ut of all possible universes the only one which can exist, in the sense that it can be known, is simply the one which satisfies the narrow conditions necessary for the development of intelligent life."Overman points to several other examples of cosmological constants necessary for the rise of life that appear to be "finely-tuned":
(3) "Delicate balance in strong nuclear force"A detailed discussion of each of these is beyond my present scope. But I'd like to comment on one of them because it is of particular interest to me, (7), the Big Bang's "defiance" of the Second Law of Thermodynamics.
(4) "Balancing of gravitational force and electromagnetic force"
(5) "Meticulous balance between number of electrons and protons"
(6) "Precision in electromagnetic force and ratio of proton mass to electron mass and neutron mass to proton mass"
(7) "Big Bang's defiance of Second Law of Thermodynamics and gravity's cumulative effect"
(8) "Delicate balance of values related to weak nuclear force"
(9) "Fine tuning in masses of particles, fundamental values and existence of unchanging types of particles required for DNA"
(10) "Precision in the agreement between abstract mathematics and the laws of the physical world"
As Overman writes, "The Second Law of Thermodynamics requires that entropy or disorder in the universe tends toward a maximum. The contents of the universe are becoming less ordered, and as the universe becomes more disorganized, less of its energy is available to perform work. Because the universe is running down, it must have had a beginning. The universe could not be dissipating from infinity. Reversing the observed process of dissipation, the Second Law of Thermodynamics requires a beginning and a very highly ordered beginning (one with low entropy). If the Big Bang is regarded as only a big, impressive accident, there is no explanation why the Big Bang produced a universe with such a high degree of order, contrary to the Second Law of Thermodynamics, especially considering the cumulative power of gravitating systems in the universe.... [I]n a 1979 calculation Roger Penrose computed that the probability of the observed universe occurring by chance is one in 10300" :
Overman writes:
Given a random distribution of (gravitating) matter it is overwhelmingly more probable that it will form a black hole rather than a star or a cloud of dispersed gas. These considerations give a new slant, therefore, to the question of whether the universe was created in an ordered or disordered state. If the initial state were chosen at random [i.e., by chance], it seems exceedingly probable that the big bang would have coughed out black holes rather than disbursed gases. The present arrangement of matter and energy, with matter spread thinly at relatively low density, in the form of stars and gas clouds would, apparently, only result from a very special choice of initial conditions. Roger Penrose has computed the odds against the observed universe appearing by an accident, given that a black hole cosmos is so much more likely on a priori grounds. He estimates a figure of 10300 to one. [italics added for emphasis.]Relating all this to White's concept of non-intentional bias (BN — which holds that the evolution of life is attributable to physical laws alone — it looks to me that the "undiscovered—yet" physical law that we are looking for to explain the situation would be some kind of law which accounts for the fine-tuning of the cosmological constants necessary for life itself.
But all of these constants are antecedent to the operation of physical laws. And ALL of these antecedent constants must work together for life to arise; so now we need a physical law that can order their interrelations.
Well, at least we know what sort of new laws to look for. The question is: Is it even possible that we will ever find them? What are the odds that such laws could exist? For the operation of physical law ensues after these constants already exist, not before.
To me, it seems much more likely that, as Sir Fred Hoyle says, some sort of superintelligence has been monkeying with the constants so to provide the means for life to emerge and exist, from the beginning. And this would be White's intentional bias hypothesis — BI.
Is there another alternative? For the facts of the case already clearly rule out "chance," C.
Just some thoughts, dear HHTVL. It's marvelous to think about such things. Thank you kindly for your participation in this conversation!
I think I understand your point, HHTVL. Though I did elaborate on it somewhat, in the above [brackets]. I need to ask you: Does the bracketed material reflect your own view?
It seems to me that every single human being who has ever lived, or is now living, "believes" — has faith — in something. That statement seems to me to be both uncontroversial, and incontestable.
The point is: In what does any given person believe? And how closely does it dovetail with, or correspond with, the actual Reality that we commonly perceive, in which we actually exist?
In the end, I suppose this all has to do with the "quality" of our belief.
If a person has "faith" in the idea that we live in a random, chancy universe, I would describe that situation as a very "low-quality" belief. For it doesn't really explain anything.
Don't downgrade yourself and your cognitive powers. You and me and everybody else are denizens of the natural order. But we are more than just that. For as rational beings, we have access to an order that transcends the purely natural. Please do not give that short shrift.
I'm grateful for your reply, HHTVL. Thank you!
In no way have you "interjected too much into [this] conversation." You are merely drawing out the implications of what is being discussed here....
And I agree with every word you wrote.
May God ever bless you dear Texas Songwriter, my brother in Christ!
Do you think that THOSE guys will be accused of not understanding the 2nd Law?
Like the rest of us have?
Seems like the evos are the ones without the understanding of the 2nd Law themselves.
We would be stopping short if we do not include in the search for some 'universal law' which derives the exquisite balance, if we do not also include the where/when of our mind and our spirit for these too are intricately woven into the fabric of what The Creator has Created. ... Put another way, the mind and spirit will also function by 'laws' of existence and life, and we have yet to even derive a clue on those where/when 'laws'.
Well, perhaps such folks, describing themselves as "Darwinian biologists," simply don't recognize that the Second Law applies to them (and to their field of interest), too.
Thank you so much for writing, dear sister in Christ!
WoW.. beautiful but extremely short detail of the life of a carbon atom.. a very interesting documentary could easily be made on this subject.. I hope all interested in this read your post.. I remember you going into with some detail a few years ago..
Most people I know have never considered such a thing.. “quality of faith” indeed.. The subject could be expanded into the almost pure miracle of where the earth is from the sun, how big it is, it’s make up of chemicals, the presence of a moon the proper size(for life) to exist and all that..
The earth farther or closer to the Sun life could not happen.. If the earth was just a little larger or smaller, life could not happen.. The earth with a different make up and arraignment of chemicals, life could not happen.. i.e. electrical field.. and more...
I propose there may be many other criteria in this mix I am ignorant of also involved.. It’s quite amazing quite literally no one knows what life actually is.. Living cells look exactly like dead ones.. What makes a cell alive and one dead.?. The answers I get for that are comical..
What “IS” God?... I suspect I don’t have the brain power to understand that.. Most people I know think atoms are little marbles rolling around other little marbles.. in some kind of structure.. which is a cartoon.. But most of them know nothing of string theory.. or Quantum thinking..
I say this harboring a secret desire for a tryst with Jessica Rabbit... so I’m not innocent either..
Shes not bad she’s just drawn that way.. I also love the Boop chick..
But if it isn't, I have a story to tell.
For the past ten years or so, I have been doing a little editorial work from time to time for a Hungarian astrophysicist with a passion for theoretical biology. His specialty as an astrophysicist is the Sun. Over time, he has recognized that the Sun shows evidence of certain critical aspects of biological behavior. I won't get into the details of his work here.
Suffice it to say, my physicist friend is keenly interested in "biological behavior." And his interest has been decidedly stoked by the work of the theoretical biologist Ervin Bauer (b. 1890 – d. ????), a fellow Hungarian one generation removed.
One of Bauer's greatest insights (it seems to me): "A living being, and only a living being, constantly works to maintain the greatest distance possible from physical entropy, which otherwise inexorably would set in by the natural operation of the Second Law of Thermodynamics."
Must leave Bauer's theory there for now. (Insufficient space and time.) I would like to talk about what happened to Bauer.
Ervin Bauer, in his professional career, started out with the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. But soon enough, he came to the attention of Soviet "science"; and they dragooned him into their own academy. Since Bauer's country was by then a wholly captured (and subjected) member of the Soviet Bloc, he had no right to refuse such a "great privilege."
He worked prolifically and contently for Soviet science for many, many years. Until the day he committed the crime of "political incorrectness," which drew the attention of Stalin himself.
I have no precise idea what Bauer's "sin" against Stalin might have been. Maybe it was simply that Soviet science, having been totally politicized in order to realize the fantasies of its totalitarian ruler, had been turned into a tool of Stalin's shifting desires and imaginings. What Bauer had been doing, in his theoretical researches, under those circumstances, was considered "reactionary," and thus "punishable."
Certainly Stalin's first tool of domination was the purge — the simple erasure of all opinion that did not accord with his own.
If actual men had to die for this, so be it. No sweat. Stalin was "worth it" — in his own mind, at least, just like in a L'Oreal cosmetics commercial.
Let me end here: I could not use the "death date" proposed by Wikipedia — 1938. (So I indicated it by "XXXX" in the above.)
New facts have come to light. Their bearing:
Ervin Bauer, together with his wife — the accomplished mathematician Stefánia Szilárd (the sister of the physicist Leó Szilárd) — were shot under Stalin's orders in 1947, in the course of a "routine" purge that involved other scientists, as well.
Makes you sick. Or at least, it does me.
Whatta devastating waste of human genius, of human life.
But my friend the astrophysicist carries on Bauer's work, Bauer's tradition.
My friends, do not despair! God's Truth will ever be OUTED! Nothing can prevail against it.
Thank you again, dear sister in Christ, for writing! All thanks and praise be unto our Lord!
Thank you!!!
All thanks and praise be unto our Lord!!!
I don't know how it is possible to think truly about ourselves and the world we live in without reference to Him and His holy Word.
Thank you so much, dear brother in Christ, for your magnificent observation!
Personally, I don't see any reason to expect that a bona-fide theory of Natural Selection is at all dependent on the doctrine of metaphysical naturalism, which is in turn predicated on the metaphysical doctrine of monist, deterministic, yet "chancy" materialism. (How does one make all such varied claims "add up?")
But such folk who promulgate such nonsense insist they are doing "science," by eschewing "philosophy."
Pul-eeze.... give me a break.
Separated from that background premise, Darwin's theory of natural selection might not be all that bad.
Thank you for your valuable insights, dear brother in Christ!
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