Posted on 02/07/2005 8:16:39 AM PST by metacognative
He was suggesting to Marlowe that "heat" was all a spider existed for. His daughters carried insertable calometers around in their purses.
"WARNING: Beware of Low-Hanging Fruit"
The argument (for God) from design is so overwhelmingly obvious that God will hold us responsible for ignoring it:
Romans 1:20For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities–his eternal power and divine nature–have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.
Define "science."
Intelligent Design theory is based on reason. The natural sciences come under the aegis of reason. Science does not define itself. The definition of science comes from philosophy/reason.
This doesn't necessarily follow.
The natural world could have been damaged as a result of the Fall, or human nature could have been damaged by the Fall in such a way that it became newly vulnerable to various natural phenomena.
It's very difficult to argue that the natural world contains evils per se.
Metaphysical evil is the limitation by one another of various component parts of the natural world. Through this mutual limitation natural objects are for the most part prevented from attaining to their full or ideal perfection, whether by the constant pressure of physical condition, or by sudden catastrophes. Thus, animal and vegetable organisms are variously influenced by climate and other natural causes; predatory animals depend for their existence on the destruction of life; nature is subject to storms and convulsions, and its order depends on a system of perpetual decay and renewal due to the interaction of its constituent parts. If animals suffering is excluded, no pain of any kind is caused by the inevitable limitations of nature; and they can only be called evil by analogy, and in a sense quite different from that in which the term is applied to human experience. Clarke, moreover, has aptly remarked (Correspondence with Leibniz, letter ii) that the apparent disorder of nature is really no disorder, since it is part of a definite scheme, and precisely fulfills the intention of the Creator; it may therefore be counted as a relative perfection rather than an imperfection. It is, in fact, only by a transference to irrational objects of the subjective ideals and aspirations of human intelligence, that the "evil of nature" can be called evil in any sense but a merely analogous one. The nature and degree of pain in lower animals is very obscure, and in the necessary absence of data it is difficult to say weather it should rightly be classed with the merely formal evil which belongs to inanimate objects, or with the suffering of human beings. The latter view was generally held in ancient times, and may perhaps he referred to the anthropomorphic tendency of primitive minds which appears in the doctrine of metempsychosis. Thus it has often been supposed that animal suffering, together with many of the imperfections of inanimate nature, was due to the fall of man, with whose welfare, as the chief part of creation, were bound up the fortunes of the rest (see Theoph. Antioch., Ad Autolyc., II; cf. Gen. iii, and I Cor.ix). The opposite view is taken by St. Thomas (I, Q. xcvi, a. 1,2).
Whether in the state of innocence man would have been immortal?On the contrary, It is written (Rm. 5:12): "By sin death came into the world." Therefore man was immortal before sin.
I answer that, A thing may be incorruptible in three ways.
First, on the part of matter--that is to say... because it possesses no matter, like an angel...
Secondly, a thing is incorruptible in its form, inasmuch as being by nature corruptible, yet it has an inherent disposition which preserves it wholly from corruption; and this is called incorruptibility of glory; because as Augustine says (Ep. ad Dioscor.): "God made man's soul of such a powerful nature, that from its fulness of beatitude, there redounds to the body a fulness of health, with the vigor of incorruption."
Thirdly, a thing may be incorruptible on the part of its efficient cause; in this sense man was incorruptible and immortal in the state of innocence. For, as Augustine says (QQ. Vet. et Nov. Test. qu. 19 [Work of an anonymous author, among the supposititious works of St. Augustine): "God made man immortal as long as he did not sin; so that he might achieve for himself life or death." For man's body was indissoluble not by reason of any intrinsic vigor of immortality, but by reason of a supernatural force given by God to the soul, whereby it was enabled to preserve the body from all corruption so long as it remained itself subject to God. This entirely agrees with reason; for since the rational soul surpasses the capacity of corporeal matter, as above explained (76, 1), it was most properly endowed at the beginning with the power of preserving the body in a manner surpassing the capacity of corporeal matter.
Whether Adam in the state of innocence had mastership over the animals?
On the contrary, It is written (Gn. 1:26): "Let him have dominion over the fishes of the sea, and the birds of the air, and the beasts of the earth" [Vulg."and the whole earth"].
I answer that, As above stated (95, 1) for his disobedience to God, man was punished by the disobedience of those creatures which should be subject to him. Therefore in the state of innocence, before man had disobeyed, nothing disobeyed him that was naturally subject to him. Now all animals are naturally subject to man. This can be proved in three ways.
First, from the order observed by nature; for just as in the generation of things we perceive a certain order of procession of the perfect from the imperfect (thus matter is for the sake of form; and the imperfect form, for the sake of the perfect), so also is there order in the use of natural things; thus the imperfect are for the use of the perfect; as the plants make use of the earth for their nourishment, and animals make use of plants, and man makes use of both plants and animals. Therefore it is in keeping with the order of nature, that man should be master over animals. Hence the Philosopher [Aristotle] says (Polit. i, 5) that the hunting of wild animals is just and natural, because man thereby exercises a natural right.
Secondly, this is proved by the order of Divine Providence which always governs inferior things by the superior. Wherefore, as man, being made to the image of God, is above other animals, these are rightly subject to his government.
Thirdly, this is proved from a property of man and of other animals. For we see in the latter a certain participated prudence of natural instinct, in regard to certain particular acts; whereas man possesses a universal prudence as regards all practical matters. Now whatever is participated is subject to what is essential and universal. Therefore the subjection of other animals to man is proved to be natural...
Whether man had mastership over all other creatures?
On the contrary, It is written (Gn. 1:26): "That he may have dominion over . . . every creature."
I answer that, Man in a certain sense contains all things; and so according as he is master of what is within himself, in the same way he can have mastership over other things. Now we may consider four things in man: his "reason," which makes him like to the angels'; his "sensitive powers," whereby he is like the animals; his "natural forces," which liken him to the plants; and "the body itself," wherein he is like to inanimate things. Now in man reason has the position of a master and not of a subject. Wherefore man had no mastership over the angels in the primitive state; so when we read "all creatures," we must understand the creatures which are not made to God's image. Over the sensitive powers, as the irascible and concupiscible, which obey reason in some degree, the soul has mastership by commanding. So in the state of innocence man had mastership over the animals by commanding them. But of the natural powers and the body itself man is master not by commanding, but by using them. Thus also in the state of innocence man's mastership over plants and inanimate things consisted not in commanding or in changing them, but in making use of them without hindrance.
One can argue by obvious example that evil exists in the real world, but there can be no scientific explanation for its origin.
All true. My point is that the existence of so-called evils in the natural world is not an argument against The Designer or ID.
Hey, sometimes quantity creates a quality all its own. :-)
but this is a simple "Ya can't get something for nothing" point. Evolution breaks the second law of thermodynamics, period.
No, it's pretty simple: It takes energy to live. It takes energy to reproduce. There's no reason to think that it takes any more energy to reproduce with mutations than without. Whether the offspring have mutations or not, some of them will die before they have offspring. So neither the mutation part nor the natural selection part of evolution implies that any more energy will be consumed by all those evolving organisms than ones that don't evolve.
But whatever happens to them & their descendants, the 2LoT says they'll all need to eat to survive.
That's it. It's just that simple!
Or to put it another way: If I said that living organisms could survive without ever eating anything, that would be a "something for nothing" claim. But anyway, we're talking about life itself. This has nothing to do with evolution.
>> But whatever happens to them & their descendants, the 2LoT says they'll all need to eat to survive.Forget the eating thing, that's a Micro point and I'm talking Macro. lets look at the big picture.
Translation: "Forget that 2nd law of Thermodynamics thing that I had said before." Understood. Completely.
The Fallacy is that mutations can account for "Rust turning into Bicycles".
And the people who claim that "rust turns into bicycles" would be...?
I took a Book (If memory serves) called "Statistics and Evolution a practical approach" and used the calculations (By a scientist who believed evolution by the way) and built a calculation based on the number of mutations necessary to go from a paramecium, to a human, the book also had odds of a mutation being beneficial, dominant, non fatal, useful, all sorts of good stuff. I programmed this into three mainframe computers (hey they were the biggest, and best I could get to in those days)
3 Mainframe computers couldn't handle large numbers, eh? That would place your experiment at least 30 years ago I'd say. So, how many genes did you assume for the paramecium & for humans? What kinds of mutation did you allow in your calculations? Duplications, for instance? And did you allow for the fact that a modern paramecium is just as far removed from the last common ancestor as humans are? How many mutations did you assume could exist simultaneously in the respective populations? IOW, did you know that each human on Earth has something like 3 mutations in our DNA which our parents don't have?
Seriously, It'd be fascinating to see your work if you still have the printouts & source code.
and ran the program, crashed all three of them trying to figure the odds of that happening "Naturally"
Don't you hate when that happens? Yep, I bet they started smoking too, and their lights kept a'blinkin faster & brighter, and the line printer started spitting out paper & bouncing up and down, and it started emitting a startling stream of beeps & blips & screeches, and the technicians all started running out of the building in terror!
That happened on The Prisoner when Number 6 stumped the prison's brand new supercomputer by typing in "W-H-Y". And IIRC there was a Tarzan episode like that, too. And of course who could forget the classic Desk Set! ;-)
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