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Pro-Darwin Biology Professor...Supports Teaching Intelligent Design
Discovery Institute ^ | June 22, 2007

Posted on 06/23/2007 12:21:46 PM PDT by GodGunsGuts

Pro-Darwin Biology Professor Laments Academia's "Intolerance" and Supports Teaching Intelligent Design

Charles Darwin famously said, "A fair result can be obtained only by fully balancing the facts and arguments on both sides of each question." According to a recent article by J. Scott Turner, a pro-Darwin biology professor at SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry in Syracuse, New York, modern Neo-Darwinists are failing to heed Darwin's advice. (We blogged about a similar article by Turner in The Chronicle of Higher Education in January, 2007.) Turner is up front with his skepticism of intelligent design (ID), which will hopefully allow his criticisms to strike a chord with other Darwinists.

Turner starts by observing that the real threat to education today is not ID itself, but the attitude of scientists towards ID: "Unlike most of my colleagues, however, I don't see ID as a threat to biology, public education or the ideals of the republic. To the contrary, what worries me more is the way that many of my colleagues have responded to the challenge." He describes the "modern academy" as "a tedious intellectual monoculture where conformity and not contention is the norm." Turner explains that the "[r]eflexive hostility to ID is largely cut from that cloth: some ID critics are not so much worried about a hurtful climate as they are about a climate in which people are free to disagree with them." He then recounts and laments the hostility faced by Richard Sternberg at the Smithsonian:

It would be comforting if one could dismiss such incidents as the actions of a misguided few. But the intolerance that gave rise to the Sternberg debacle is all too common: you can see it in its unfiltered glory by taking a look at Web sites like pandasthumb.org or recursed.blogspot.com [Jeffry Shallit's blog] and following a few of the threads on ID. The attitudes on display there, which at the extreme verge on antireligious hysteria, can hardly be squared with the relatively innocuous (even if wrong-headed) ideas that sit at ID's core.

(J. Scott Turner, Signs of Design, The Christian Century, June 12, 2007.)

Turner on the Kitzmiller v. Dover Case

Turner sees the Kitzmiller v. Dover case as the dangerous real-world expression of the intolerance common in the academy: "My blood chills ... when these essentially harmless hypocrisies are joined with the all-American tradition of litigiousness, for it is in the hand of courts and lawyers that real damage to cherished academic ideas is likely to be done." He laments the fact that "courts are where many of my colleagues seem determined to go with the ID issue” and predicts, “I believe we will ultimately come to regret this."

Turner justifies his reasonable foresight by explaining that Kitzmiller only provided a pyrrhic victory for the pro-Darwin lobby:

Although there was general jubilation at the ruling, I think the joy will be short-lived, for we have affirmed the principle that a federal judge, not scientists or teachers, can dictate what is and what is not science, and what may or may not be taught in the classroom. Forgive me if I do not feel more free.

(J. Scott Turner, Signs of Design, The Christian Century, June 12, 2007.)

Turner on Education

Turner explains, quite accurately, that ID remains popular not because of some vast conspiracy or religious fanaticism, but because it deals with an evidentiary fact that resonates with many people, and Darwinian scientists do not respond to ID's arguments effectively:

[I]ntelligent design … is one of multiple emerging critiques of materialism in science and evolution. Unfortunately, many scientists fail to see this, preferring the gross caricature that ID is simply "stealth creationism." But this strategy fails to meet the challenge. Rather than simply lament that so many people take ID seriously, scientists would do better to ask why so many take it seriously. The answer would be hard for us to bear: ID is not popular because the stupid or ignorant like it, but because neo-Darwinism's principled banishment of purpose seems less defensible each passing day.

(J. Scott Turner, Signs of Design, The Christian Century, June 12, 2007.)

Turner asks, “What, then, is the harm in allowing teachers to deal with the subject as each sees fit?” ID can't be taught, he explains, because most scientists believe that "normal standards of tolerance and academic freedom should not apply in the case of ID." He says that the mere suggestion that ID could be taught brings out "all manner of evasions and prevarications that are quite out of character for otherwise balanced, intelligent and reasonable people."

As we noted earlier, hopefully Turner’s criticisms will strike a chord with Darwinists who might otherwise close their ears to the argument for academic freedom for ID-proponents. Given the intolerance towards ID-sympathy that Turner describes, let us also hope that the chord is heard but the strummer is not harmed.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Government; News/Current Events; Philosophy
KEYWORDS: academicfreedom; creationscience; crevo; darwinism; fsmdidit; intelligentdesign
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To: Texas Songwriter
Your arguments, when boiled down, seem to be:

The mathematicians can only model a system accurately when they understand and correctly deal with all the variables. To say that our mathematicians, generally untrained in either the biological or natural sciences, are modeling everything correctly is ludicrous. Are these the same mathematicians who proved the bumble bee can't fly? (I know that's a myth, but it contains a large helping of truth nonetheless.)

Here is a good example to check out. This researcher did testing of genetic networks which a mathematician would have said were very low probability events. He found the opposite. Here is his lecture: "For Making Genetic Networks Operate Robustly, Unintelligent Non-design Suffices," by Garrett Odell. This was a program on the Science Forum of the Research Channel (Dish Network Channel 9400). The original lecture was 2006, at the University of Washington. The website of the author is www.celldynamics.org. The lecture is available on the web at http://www.uwtv.org/programs/displayevent.aspx?rID=2513.

I am not sure what point you are making with the "moving from a lower species to a higher species" argument. Why should this prohibit evolution? Not that it is necessarily accurate, as evolution does not direct a species to change in the direction of a "higher species" anyway. Any species (say, modern humans) is changing the genome in hundreds of ways at each generation. Some of those changes may be in a "higher" direction, but that can only be determined after the fact, not in advance.

Finally, the first cause argument; circular reasoning at best. This boils down to: Every event has a cause. The universe itself had a beginning, so it must have had a first cause, which must have been a creator God. But this raises the question of what caused God. If God does not need a cause, then by the same reasoning, neither does the universe. And around and around we go.

1,481 posted on 07/22/2007 8:21:34 AM PDT by Coyoteman (Religious belief does not constitute scientific evidence, nor does it convey scientific knowledge.)
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To: betty boop; Texas Songwriter; hosepipe; marron; RightWhale; dougd
What a marvelous essay-post, dearest sister in Christ! Thank you oh so very much!

I’m glad you enjoyed reading Gowan’s speculations. Indeed, he should be on the list for the sheer elegance of his cosmology!

It seems to me that Gowen, Grandpierre, and (possibly) RightWhale are generally “on the same page”; but Lanza seems not to be.

Truly, Lanza’s speculations are a different breed as you say. If science were to buy into his speculation that physical reality doesn’t have an independent existence apart from its conceptualization of the human mind – then it might as well pull down the shingle and go home because it would have nothing to do.

Which reminds me of a comment that Einstein made relative to Niels Bohr’s understanding of the “observer problem”: [To paraphrase] “If Niels does not see the moon in the night sky, then for him, the moon does not exist.”

When I read this, I was immediately smitten by Einstein’s own notorious remark that “reality is an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.” LOLOL! Of course he was speaking of local realism, but it is the same type of overstatement.

But I think there is some truth to Lanza’s hypothesis, of an eminently practical nature: What most humans know about science consists of the descriptions of scientists. That is, language is “the coin of the realm.” Not nature, but its scientific description in language, is what hits the public ear. So to speak. The trick is we hope that the language and the reality it describes shall be in a one-to-one correspondence. But there is no guarantee of that.

So very true – and important for everyone to remember, e.g. the meaning of a word may change over time. Too bad that few examine the etymology of words – and translations.

Seems we spend a lot of time on the Religion Forum, negotiating between word concepts in Hebrew v Greek v Latin v English.

No doubt science has a similar problem at least up to the present age where English appears to be the “standard” for conveying theories. But perhaps that is changing. The Germans were the great scientists about a century ago – and if the US doesn’t wake up and reform our education system, it could well be that an Eastern country will overtake us.

And thank you oh so very much for sharing Gowan’s thoughts on Chardin and relating them to Grandpierre’s!

I should have warned you that Gowan’s father is the author of some popular new age book. But to me, that doesn’t matter a whit. His science will stand or fall on its own. After all, Einstein’s politics would not be acceptable to most conservatives – but that doesn’t make his theories any less valuable.

Chardin was ahead of his time vis-à-vis evolution and the Roman Catholic Church. After his death, the Church accepted evolution with the understanding that Adam was the first ensouled man instead of the first mortal man - and then published Chardin’s work. He was a scientist, too.

What he proposed in the evolution of the human consciousness is not radical by today’s standards. Both self-organizing complexity and cellular automata would suggest that outcome throughout nature.

That he would perceive evolution as a whole is also not radical – that is, after all, the point of the fecundity principle or life principle: the evolution of one – from individual cells to the biosphere to the cosmos.

The subsequent objections by TexasSongWriter were predictable. And truly there are a lot of theologies and philosophies out there which suggest that man can evolve (or quantum leap) into “godhood.” The musing even arises among Christians and Jews, from a misreading of certain Scriptures:

Then the Jews took up stones again to stone him. Jesus answered them, Many good works have I shewed you from my Father; for which of those works do ye stone me? The Jews answered him, saying, For a good work we stone thee not; but for blasphemy; and because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God. Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods? If he called them gods, unto whom the word of God came, and the scripture cannot be broken; Say ye of him, whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into the world, Thou blasphemest; because I said, I am the Son of God? – John 10:31-36

For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with [him], that we may be also glorified together. – Romans 8:14-17

As hosepipe is wont to say, Jesus Christ did not come in the flesh to start a new religion – but rather, a family – as we can see in the last two chapters of Revelation, the new heaven and the new earth. This is the Final Cause, the reason. God's Name is I AM and Alpha and Omega.

But that in no wise means that we, the adopted children of God, will ever rise to be equal with Christ – or the Father. It is not even possible for a created being to ever obtain much less contain all that the Father knows – or His power. Prideful ambition indeed lies, as TexasSongWriter suggests, at the root of sin in the Garden of Eden.

Thou hast been in Eden the garden of God; every precious stone [was] thy covering, the sardius, topaz, and the diamond, the beryl, the onyx, and the jasper, the sapphire, the emerald, and the carbuncle, and gold: the workmanship of thy tabrets and of thy pipes was prepared in thee in the day that thou wast created. Thou [art] the anointed cherub that covereth; and I have set thee [so]: thou wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. Thou [wast] perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee. By the multitude of thy merchandise they have filled the midst of thee with violence, and thou hast sinned: therefore I will cast thee as profane out of the mountain of God: and I will destroy thee, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire. Thine heart was lifted up because of thy beauty, thou hast corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness: I will cast thee to the ground, I will lay thee before kings, that they may behold thee. – Eze 28:13-17

Finally, I can’t thank you enough for that delightful essay on “social knowledge” and the example of Beavers vis-à-vis man – that Beavers share a common knowledge of dam construction, but individual men achieve individual levels of knowledge which are committed to a historical record in language – and is not evenly and inherently known to the collective and its progeny.

The intelligence of swarms has long fascinated me - the geometry of ants and bees for instance – but I had not considered this other, very important observation. Again, thank you!

And so, Gowen quite correctly deduces the following: “The complete understanding of natural law is [Chardin’s] Omega Point of the rational mind. Like the space program, it is the masterwork of a species rather than an individual.”

So now that we’re talking “species,” where does Darwinian evolution fit in? It seems to me that it has nothing whatever to say about the points Gowen raises, for it has no theory of (1) consciousness, intelligence; and as such (2) it has no theory of man.

So very true, dearest sister in Christ. Darwin narrowed his theory to the origin of species, he didn’t address the peculiarities of man – much less what life “is” or its origin. And yet so many today leap to the conclusion that he did and argue for and against something that is not “there.”

In that regard, it occurs to me that I left off a question from my earlier list of origin questions which remain open in science to this day:

1. Origin of space/time.

2. Origin of life.

3. Origin of inertia.

4. Origin of information.

5. Origin of conscience (sense of right v wrong, good v evil, etc.)

Again, I stress that the “unreasonable effectiveness of math” is God’s copyright notice on the cosmos.

Atheism can never be considered rational until all of the science origin questions have a plausible answer for an atheist to embrace --- and the mathematicians have a plausible explanation for an atheist to embrace so that he can declare the effectiveness of math in natural systems "reasonable."

The fool hath said in his heart, [There is] no God... - Psalms 14:1

To God be the glory!

1,482 posted on 07/22/2007 9:16:00 AM PDT by Alamo-Girl
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To: dougd; betty boop
Thank you so very much for posting your speculations! I look forward to betty boop's comments - and the comments of others!
1,483 posted on 07/22/2007 9:23:19 AM PDT by Alamo-Girl
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To: Coyoteman
Finally, the first cause argument; circular reasoning at best. This boils down to: Every event has a cause. The universe itself had a beginning, so it must have had a first cause, which must have been a creator God. But this raises the question of what caused God. If God does not need a cause, then by the same reasoning, neither does the universe. And around and around we go.

You have said it as well as I might...."if God does not need a cause, then by the same reasoning, neither does the universe". Lets examine that assertion. Creationists do not assert God had a beginning. Biblically He is referenced as everlasting to everlasting, the alpha and the omega. In Genesis the first chapter, In the Beginning, God.....created. Conversely creations and natualists (darwinists) agree that in the past the universe originated (big bang). There was a time when the universe was not. Christian belief is the same on that issue. In fact to deny the Law of Causality is to deny rationality. So, if one's assertion is that the cosmos had no cause there are many questions which must be answered regarding the thermal laws, the expanding universe observed, the red shift, background radiation measurements in the cosmos, the ripple effect of temperature of cosmic radiation, the theory of general relativity. All naturalist and creationists agree that these findings related directly to the universe. You say, I have an eternal God. You say you have an eternal universe. Your assertion of the universe as first cause requires examiation of the univererses' submission to the laws of physics. While it may seem logically possible that the universe is eternal, it does not seem to be actually possible. All scientific and philosophical evidence tell us the universe cannot be eternal as we are not at -273 Kelvin-so we are left with the only other option-something outside the universe is eternal.

I agree with the notion that models are often without thorough consideration of all variables. Darwins theory of evolution via natural selection is one of those models which keeps coming up lacking with concrete evidences.

Regarding my comments about evolving from a lower to a higher species, I used that terminology as it is extant in the literature today. The phylogentic tree is an artificial construct in and of itself....that microbes evolved to invertebrates then to primitive vertebrates and cartilagenous fishes then to amphibias, to reptiles, to birds and mammals. I knew you would know to what I referred and did not want to divert my comments regarding, moving from one species to another to another.

Finally, I will revisit your last sentence, as I know very little about bumblebees, though I do have 2 hives of European honeybees, and that is this statement: If God does not need a first cause, then by the same reasoning, the neither does the univererse. This is the point of all Nature Religions as my previous point makes. It is the anciet mysticism of the Hindu-everything, the universe is god, the Wiccan notion that all there is is Nature, (Wicca being Nature worship), Buddhism -(the universe is the collective Unconscious); Scientology and Unity- (the universe is an illusion and that is all there is. There is no reality), and many, many more occult and cults assert that the cosmos is God. It is, in fact, the god of Carl Sagan who stated on world wide television, "The universe is all there has ever been and all there ever will be." This is pantheism, not monotheism of Biblical teaching.

As we look at methods for evolving, natural selection, punctuated equilibrium, karma, wiccan naturalism incantations are all different tools to achieve this, "evolving to a higher species", if you allow me to use that phrase. The impromonteur of the natural sciences, having granted their affirmation to darwinism proscribes, in todays society, a respectablity to this idea of evolution, but without proof and without substantive evidence. This is the point of differentiation of Natualism and Supernaturalism.

The paleontologists are having to give way to the cell biologist and molecular biologist in the field of answering questions of the possiblility of darwinism. Those bones which I found tell me little more than homology and anatomy, perhaps inferred physiology. They say nothing about speciation. "Ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny" has been discredited by anatomists and embryologists worldwide. But the cell biologist have found a new world beneath the electron microscope so vast and so complex that it is unravelling old notions of gradualism and their 'statistical' probablility. Much has been stated on this thread regarding that subject, and I will not repeat.

Your last sentence is the most intriguing comment and is consistent with that old wiccan notion that the universe (nature) is all. (I do not mean that as a perjorative in any sense, please do not assume any disrespect). Out there, there is a Force (not a transcendent God), the pagan assets, which if understood will allow evolution to godhood. George Lucas could not have said it better than you. Only the tools change toward that end.

1,484 posted on 07/22/2007 9:34:48 AM PDT by Texas Songwriter
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To: Alamo-Girl
philosophies out there which suggest that man can evolve (or quantum leap) into “godhood.” The musing even arises among Christians and Jews, from a misreading of certain Scriptures: Then the Jews took up stones again to stone him. Jesus answered them, Many good works have I shewed you from my Father; for which of those works do ye stone me? The Jews answered him, saying, For a good work we stone thee not; but for blasphemy; and because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God. Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods? If he called them gods, unto whom the word of God came, and the scripture cannot be broken; Say ye of him, whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into the world, Thou blasphemest; because I said, I am the Son of God? – John 10:31-36

Alamo-Girl, you have astonished me. I am certain that you understand that as Jesus said ".....is it not written in you law, I said Ye are gods?", you know, I am sure, better than me, that Jesus was quoting Psalms 82:6 in which David writing under inspiration of the Holy Spirit said, "I have said, 'Ye are gods; and all of you are children of the Most High. But ye shall die like men, and fall like one of the princes'". This does not sound like God is affirming godhood for man. I must have misunderstood your statement to Betty.

Do I misunderstand you that you affirm this notion of God-hood for man, or am I misreading your statements?

1,485 posted on 07/22/2007 10:01:52 AM PDT by Texas Songwriter
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To: Alamo-Girl
[.. the mathematicians have a plausible explanation for an atheist to embrace so that he can declare the effectiveness of math in natural systems "reasonable." ..]

The most reasonable comment from an atheist should be...
"If there is NO God WELL there ought to be one"..

For; The source of all life and creation SHOULD BE intelligent..

1,486 posted on 07/22/2007 10:24:00 AM PDT by hosepipe (CAUTION: This propaganda is laced with hyperbole....)
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To: Alamo-Girl
I've also been ruminating on your origins list, struggling mostly with what you meant by 'information,' and now you throw in another. You make it tough to keep up ;->

As regards your original list of 4 origins, it strikes me that the first 3 are subsumed by the last - information.

I think the fundamental 'infon' of the non-animate cosmos is E=Mc2. Rewritten one way: Mc2 - E = 0 and another way: Mc2/E = 1 indicates that our cosmos is a binary proposition. Take away M or E or c and there is nothing. It is only that specific ratio by which this cosmos exists. Further, as my treatise above sought to illuminate, the spatial and energy aspects of the cosmos are correspondant as are the matter/mass and temporal aspects correspondant (geometrically proportional). Of course, there is also that curious numeral 2 thrown into the mix. It has long been a conundrum of science that the 'force' of gravity falls with the square of the distance. Not the power 2.00001 or 1.99999, but as closely as we can measure it, precisely 2.

In any event, I think 'inertia' (equivalently 'mass') has not a separate origin from space/time nor those origins from 'information' of which mathematics is a subset.

I think it fair to say that mathematics is the ONLY science of our inanimate cosmos.

This does not disallow other potential 'cosmi' involving other than energy, mass, the speed of light and '2', and it is interesting to speculate if our 'conscious'es, born into such an alternative cosmos could 'comprehend' it. It is possible to argue that our particular cosmos is just a happy accident. Given infinite proto-cosmic bubbles 'big-banging', eventually at least one occurs with a mathematics that 'works.'

However, back to our cosmos, mathematics is not complete in that is does not account for 'life' - and here I have to depart slightly from your verbage - it is not so much the origin of life per se, but the mere possibility of life. That is, mathematics has no room for "the whole being greater than the sum of its parts," which 'life' clearly is. So mathematics is at most a subset of the 'information' of this cosmos. A more complete 'inform-ation' would have to include how it can be that life even can exist, whether or not it actually 'happened'

I would at least add to your list 'the origin of (possibility of) 'consciousness/will' (if not equivalences then at least flip sides of the same coin) as I think such is qualitatively distinct from 'life.' It is not 'simply' (ha ha) a whole being more than the sum of its parts, but purposeful yet non-deterministic interaction upon mass/energy arrangement of the cosmos.

I'm not sure, but the 'origin of sex' (splitting of a life form into two mutually dependant genders) might also be a unique question to be answered. I can fathom no rational explanation why that should be more 'successful' than the more basic types of life reproduction, but neither can I see it as a fundamental or necessary in some way to the state of the cosmos as we know it. It certainly gives rise to 'communication' and therein may lie some 'purpose' of God.

And now you add 'conscience' which I will have to ponder separately.

1,487 posted on 07/22/2007 10:30:36 AM PDT by dougd
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To: Texas Songwriter; betty boop; hosepipe; marron
You are misunderstanding me. BTW, kudos to you for all of your wonderfully informative and well written essays and for sharing your insights!

Back to men evolving into "godhood."

That doctrine of man is a misinterpretation by some Christians, quoting those verses and others, that they are created as "gods" and/or can evolve into "gods." That is wandering beyond what the Scriptures actually say - which man tends to do with his doctrines and traditions.

Howbeit in vain do they worship me, teaching [for] doctrines the commandments of men. - Mark 7:7

It is true that Adamic man has the breath of God (neshama in Genesis 2) - that we are created in His image (Genesis 1). But we are not God and can never be God.

It is true that Christians are adopted into God's family (Romans 8) - but we are not The Father's only begotten Son, and we are not God the Father. Nor can we attain to that glory.

We are simply new creatures, made by His will not our own, and adopted into His family by His grace:

But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, [even] to them that believe on his name: Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. - John 1:12-13

As I'm sure you know, there are some who call themselves Christians who believe that God is flesh and bone, that He 'evolved' to become "a" God - and that man can do the same. This is a grievous misinterpretation of the words of God.

God [is] a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship [him] in spirit and in truth. - John 4:24

So also [is] the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption: It is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power: It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body. And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam [was made] a quickening spirit. – I Cor 15:42-45

Likewise, some have misinterpreted Paul's endorsement of the Greek philosophy here:

That they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after him, and find him, though he be not far from every one of us: For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring. Forasmuch then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man's device. - Acts 17:27-29

It is true that (Creation being ex nihilo) there is nothing of which anything can be made but God's will - either His creative will or His permissive will.

But there is only One Creator, One Uncaused Cause, One First Cause, One God, One Alpha, One I AM. Likewise, there is only One Final Cause, One Omega, One I AM, One Final Cause.

Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature: For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether [they be] thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him: And he is before all things, and by him all things consist. And he is the head of the body, the church: who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all [things] he might have the preeminence. For it pleased [the Father] that in him should all fulness dwell; And, having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, [I say], whether [they be] things in earth, or things in heaven.– Col 1:15-20

To extend the "live and move and have our being" Scripture into a doctrine that the Creation is God is a grievous misinterpretation of the words of God.

But at least those who believe - albeit in error - are trying. And for that, I thank God! After all, as Paul says they might haply feel after Him and find Him.

But without faith [it is] impossible to please [him]: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and [that] he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him. - Hebrews 11:6


1,488 posted on 07/22/2007 10:35:14 AM PDT by Alamo-Girl
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To: dougd; Alamo-Girl; betty boop
I see, I read your earlier syllabus also, sooo you don’t know what life is either?..
1,489 posted on 07/22/2007 10:39:12 AM PDT by hosepipe (CAUTION: This propaganda is laced with hyperbole....)
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To: hosepipe
The most reasonable comment from an atheist should be... "If there is NO God WELL there ought to be one"..For; The source of all life and creation SHOULD BE intelligent..

Indeed. Bears repeating.

1,490 posted on 07/22/2007 10:40:23 AM PDT by Alamo-Girl
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To: hosepipe

Nope. Not a clue. I can only say I have to believe it IS - fancying myself as one of its benficiaries, but couldn’t begin to define it beyond something more than the sum of it’s parts. But would also have to specify in what manner it is so, let alone why it should or is forced to stake out some small subset of instants of time over which to “be”.


1,491 posted on 07/22/2007 10:54:45 AM PDT by dougd
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To: dougd; betty boop; hosepipe; Texas Songwriter; RightWhale
Again, thank you for sharing your insights!

And sorry for throwing you a curve by adding “conscience” to the list of origins. Indeed, “consciousness” should be on the list. Though perhaps we need an expanded definition since many interpret consciousness to be awareness only and I would intend that the include decision processes. Perhaps like this:

1. Origin of space/time.

2. Origin of life.

3. Origin of inertia.

4. Origin of information.

5. Origin of conscience (sense of right v wrong, good v evil, etc.)

6. Origin of consciousness (including decision processes)

Getting back to information and math though. Although both science and math have their origins in philosophy – in today’s lingo, math is not science and neither math nor science are philosophy.

Information theory is a branch of mathematics – though I do see the argument that math is subordinate to information.

The origin of information theory is of course Shannon’s Mathematical Theory of Communications.

More specifically, information is the reduction of uncertainty (Shannon entropy) in the receiver (or molecular machine) in going from a before state to an after state.

It is the action, not the message. The message could be Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Einstein’s theory of relativity, gibberish, DNA – and could be in any language. The sender encodes, the receiver decodes.

Because of this (as with mathematics in general) – the theory is portable among all kinds of disciplines whether telecommunications, computing, molecular biology, etc.

But which came first, mathematics or information, may be moot. Mathematics is also a language, quite literally a universal language. In the Shannon model, the semiosis, the meaning derived from the encoding/decoding of a message, is beside the point of the model. But in our discussion of origins, the meaning of the message is the point.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. – John 1:1

Logos (Word) in the above is sometimes translated to Logic.

I do agree that the origin of inertia is tied to space/time but that is still an open debate. There are two basic mindsets – one avers that energy/matter is created by the expansion of space/time (my view) – and the other, that energy/matter causes the expansion of space/time.


1,492 posted on 07/22/2007 11:03:58 AM PDT by Alamo-Girl
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To: Alamo-Girl
Yes, that is what I was thinking you meant. Being a nerd - (BS in Information Engineering, in fact), I was fairly sure you were intending a somewhat larger connotation than that of Shannon.

Too, I agree with the possible confusion between 'conscious' and 'sentient' - the latter only 'self aware' while the former includes 'situation aware.' In fact I intend, when I use the word, more like an 'evolved' consciousness wherein willful action has developed (as a result of situational awareness).

As regards space/time versus energy/mass (which came first?) I think the question a silly creation of our 'chrono-chauvinism,' as are discussions of cosmic 'cause and effect.' There simply is no reality to an arrow of time in the physical (inanimate) cosmos. Space/Time and Energy/Mass are inseparable - flip sides of the same coin, each the sine qua non of the other.

That said, I think the concept of "Original Cause" WITHOUT simultaneously mentioning "Original Effect" (presumably, Creation) is on point. Cause alone does not imply some 'arrow of time.'

Too, lingual discussions of God are at best extremely difficult because language is such a poor and limited set of 'infons' by which to try to communicate the nature of God. Coupled with being so incredibly 'chrono-chauvinistic' it is almost doomed to failure - almost by necessity minimizing God into a lingually comprehensible conception - not far removed from God as a giant male human with a long white beard. Indeed, that is why I really appreciate your addition of 'Conscience." If anything is illuminative of God, it would be 'Conscientious Action."

We must bear in mind in such communications, that God has no need to be comprehended by us; rather we need to comprehend Him. Hence we need to be careful not to minimize Him into our possible conceptions. We may be able to observe some finite number of 'faces' of God, but should not be confused that we are observing the whole God by such observations.

1,493 posted on 07/22/2007 11:37:42 AM PDT by dougd
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To: Alamo-Girl; betty boop; Tactical; logic
[.. There are two basic mindsets – one avers that energy/matter is created by the expansion of space/time (my view) – and the other, that energy/matter causes the expansion of space/time. ..]

So then there is no mindset that space/time is not expanding but revolving?.. or moving about in a finite/limited space?.. Galaxies moving away from each other need not be in an expanding enclosure.. (in my mind)..

Course I don't accept the BIG Bang.. An "explosion"(Big Bang) seems to be for me just so obvious of a human "observation".. as to how a whole darned universe began.. NOT to speak of the fact the Big Bang can be traced to vestiges of Hindu thought(CYCLES).. You know; that there has been "many" Big Bangs.. not just one of them.. Hinduism is such a lame excuse for a religion(theory of life) anyway..

So I presently am considering an infinite past.. the eternal past.. After all I can't get my mind around eternity anyway.. If eternity is even possible then, I am comfortable with I maybe cannot concieve of it practically.. with the tools I have at hand..

The BIG Bang is just so Hollywood..

1,494 posted on 07/22/2007 12:13:54 PM PDT by hosepipe (CAUTION: This propaganda is laced with hyperbole....)
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To: Alamo-Girl
ps - I'm glad you brought up 'entropy' because I was not otherwise inclined to get into that briar patch.

Entropy is a bit of hogwash derived from both our 'chono-chauvinism' and rather small localized view of the cosmos.

All 'entropy' is (note that it is law of thermo-dynamics which alone should alert one to the limited scope of the concept), is an expression that electro-magnetic interactions (and I'm not clear enough of weak and strong forces to venture whether they too ought be included, or perhaps one and not the other) tend to be 'dis-organizing' influences on the arrangement of energy/mass. Whoop-do-doo. Whence is the 'organization' it tends to destroy. Clearly, in our perceived direction of time, gravity is at least one of those 'organizing' forces - the anti-entropic force not considered in thermo-dynamics. In reversed time, Gravity is the entropic force and EM the anti-entropic force. The "Law of increasing Entropy" assumes a 'cold' end of the universe - not a foregone conclusion it is safe to say. Sufficient universal mass permits gravity universal contraction and a 'hot' end. It may even be more like a spring repetitively expanding and contracting through 'big bangs/crunches.' So what is so magical about 'entropy' in an expansive direction when it is equally 'anti-entopy' in a contactive direction?

There is no real there there. "Entropy" is nothing more than a street sign to the expansive direction of time.

Communicational 'entropy' a la Shannon deals more with the quantum level 'randomnizations' but most curiously fails to consider the anti-entropic force of 'consciousness' without which 'communicational' information is irrelevant. I'll grant that he was trying to be inclusive about the 'meaning' of information by at least alluding to quantum level exchanges of energy packets among basic particles, by which 'forces' 'act,' and effect 'communication' among those particles, but I am hard pressed to say that 'communication' in that sense involves 'information.' It is more like a bank statement showing only numbers as deposits and withdrawals without any reference to the 'whoms' to or from which they were made. 'Proto-communication' at very best.

1,495 posted on 07/22/2007 12:14:50 PM PDT by dougd
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To: dougd; betty boop; hosepipe
Thank you so very much for your agreement and for sharing your insights!

It also troubles me when people anthropomorphize God - especially when they demand God must comply with the Law of the Excluded Middle or Law of Identity or Cause/Effect (the arrow of time.) Jeepers...

That is the first item on my litany of "observer problems" for the very reason you give. LOL!

Too, I agree with the possible confusion between 'conscious' and 'sentient' - the latter only 'self aware' while the former includes 'situation aware.' In fact I intend, when I use the word, more like an 'evolved' consciousness wherein willful action has developed (as a result of situational awareness).

One of my favorite mysteries is the existence of a hierarchical "will to live" in biological life - from a single cell to a functional system (such as cardiovascular) to the organism, the biosphere and perhaps even the cosmos. The cell certainly doesn't seem "selfish" to me.

And on top of this seemingly involuntary albeit cooperative struggle to survive is self will and collective will - both properties of consciousness (as we are discussing it here.)

1,496 posted on 07/22/2007 12:53:55 PM PDT by Alamo-Girl
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To: hosepipe
Thank you so much for sharing your views!

Truly it doesn't bother me when a correspondent wishes to embrace a view which is mostly outside the mainstream of science. Science after all was originally part of philosophy/theology.

In that regard, the CMB measurements in the 1960's determined that the universe is expanding and thus, there was a beginning of real space and real time. That was the most theological statement ever made by science.

1,497 posted on 07/22/2007 1:07:04 PM PDT by Alamo-Girl
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To: dougd
I must head out now, but will be back later.

In reference to your post, I just wanted to throw Vafa's f-theory and Wesson's 5 dimensions, 2 Times on the table. Both suggest that time is not a line but a plane. Past, present, future have no meaning beyond the observer traveling his "worldline" in four of the dimensions.

1,498 posted on 07/22/2007 1:10:57 PM PDT by Alamo-Girl
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To: hosepipe
SLAP SLAP TL you in there?... wake up man?..

In the "contest of ideas" you get points awarded for austere veracity, and deductions for propaganda laced with hyperbole.

1,499 posted on 07/22/2007 1:21:41 PM PDT by tacticalogic ("Oh bother!" said Pooh, as he chambered his last round.)
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To: dougd

Information entropy is only mathematically similar to thermodynamic entropy. They are not the same.


1,500 posted on 07/22/2007 1:37:59 PM PDT by RightWhale (It's Brecht's donkey, not mine)
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