Precision in Nature: Evidence of God or Accidents?

[Youwerecreated]

Nothing there that could account for the water in the ocean, or that could increase the volume of that water causing a flood. That is what Genesis was referring to. It does not exist.

The water from the springs are coming from inside the earth and it was not just the fountains of the deep that flooded the earth there was constant rain. Plus if all the ice caps in the world melted how much land would be lost they say if they all melted it would cause the oceans to rise 200 to 250 feet.Think of all the coastal cities that would be no more.

I laugh at people that think there is not enough water on this planet to completely flood the entire planet. Just look at a world globe you can see that is simply not true.

 

[Youwerecreated]

Stone Age people were still people and had all of the talents and abilities that this implies. The answer to all of your questions is that if this explained things to a terrified population or was observed to help with a problem, then, yes, they "knew" these things.

I know nothing of the molecular characteristics of Tequila, but I know that it used to make Mrs. Code's clothes fall off and it it made me so sick once that I haven't ingested the stuff for 40 years.

My understanding of Tequila is on the level of a Stone Age person's understanding of most things. Nothing magic or mystical about it.

Out of curiosity, how are "the springs at the bottom of the ocean" described in the Old Testemant?

Job 38:16 Have you come into the springs of the sea, walking in the secret places of the deep?

The reason I asked is that there are many "Springs" of the deep that are volcanic in nature and are the sites of various life forms including tube worms and deep water shrimp.

Water springs in the ocean are not as notable to my knowledge which is very limited in this.

"Walking in the secret places of the deep"? Was somebody literally walking underwater in this passage?

Evidently God was because that is what he asked job let me post the whole passage.

Job 38:1 And Jehovah answered Job out of the tempest, and said,
Job 38:2 Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge?
Job 38:3 Now gird up your loins like a man; for I will ask of you, and you teach Me.
Job 38:4 Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Tell if you have understanding!
Job 38:5 Who has set its measurements, for you know? Or who has stretched the line on it?
Job 38:6 On what are its bases sunk, or who cast its cornerstone,
Job 38:7 when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy?
Job 38:8 Or who shut up the sea with doors, when it broke forth as it came from the womb?
Job 38:9 When I made the clouds its robe, and darkness its navel-band,
Job 38:10 and set My limit on it, and set bars and doors,
Job 38:11 and I said, You shall come to here, but no further; and here your proud waves shall stop.
Job 38:12 Have you commanded the morning from your days, and caused the dawn to know its place,
Job 38:13 that it might take hold of the ends of the earth; that the wicked might be shaken out of it?
Job 38:14 It is turned like clay under a seal; and they stand forth like a garment.
Job 38:15 And from the wicked their light is withheld, and the high arm shall be broken.
Job 38:16 Have you gone to the springs of the sea? Or have you walked in search of the depths?
Job 38:17 Have the gates of death been opened to you? Or have you seen the gates of the shadow of death?
Job 38:18 Have you understood the breadth of the earth? Tell, if you know it all!
Job 38:19 Where is the way where light dwells? And where is the place of darkness,
Job 38:20 that you should take it to its boundary, and that you should know the paths to its house?
Job 38:21 You know, because you were born then. And the number of your days is great.
Job 38:22 Have you entered into the storehouses of the snow? Or have you seen the storehouses of the hail,
Job 38:23 which I have kept for the time of trouble, against the day of battle and war?
Job 38:24 How is it, the way the light is distributed, and how does the east wind spread itself on the earth?
Job 38:25 Who has cut a channel for the flood, or a way for the thunderclaps;
Job 38:26 to cause rain to fall on the earth where no man is, a wilderness and no man in it;
Job 38:27 to satisfy the desolate and waste ground, and to cause the source of grass to spring forth?
Job 38:28 Has the rain a father? Or who has brought forth the drops of dew?
Job 38:29 Out of whose womb came the ice? And the frost of the heavens, who fathered it?
Job 38:30 The waters are hidden like stone, and the face of the deep is frozen.
Job 38:31 Can you bind the bands of the Pleiades, or loosen the cords of Orion?
Job 38:32 Can you bring the constellations in their season? Or can you guide the Bear with its sons?
Job 38:33 Do you know the ordinances of the heavens? Can you set up their rulership on the earth?
Job 38:34 Can you lift up your voice to the clouds, so that floods of waters may cover you?
Job 38:35 Can you send lightnings, that they may go, and say to you, Here we are?
Job 38:36 Who has put wisdom in the inward parts? Or who has given understanding to the mind?
Job 38:37 Who can number the clouds by wisdom; or who can empty out the jars of the heavens,
Job 38:38 when the dust is melted into hardness, and the clods cling fast together?
Job 38:39 Will you hunt the prey for the lion, or fill the appetite of the young lions,
Job 38:40 when they crouch in dens, and sit in the cover of their hiding place?
Job 38:41 Who provides food for the raven, when its young ones cry to God and wander about without food?

 

[Youwerecreated]

There are no springs of the sea int he secret places of the deep. This passage in Job repeats the same error as in 7 Genesis.

Wrong at the time of the writing of the scriptures springs in the ocean were not known.

You do not know how much water was contained within the earth and still is.

Liquid water coming from the sea vents is unlikely. The cocktail of gases that comes from the vents under the ocean is pretty toxic by our standards.

I posted a quote from a professor that say's otherwise.

 

[JimBowie1958]

The question of whether the 'fine tuning' of the universe for life is indicative of a Creator is answered by the answers we have from other higher order questions.

To those who believe that there is no higher intelligence that Created our universe, there can be no design and the 'fine tuning' is simply a matter of being the lucky ones who happen to be in the one universe out of gazzillions to allow sentient life and be able to ask how we came about.

To me this is similar to a situation where a poker dealer has dealt himself a Royal Flush on the first hand, then another on the second hand, and so on till finally the coincidence becomes implausible and one takes their money from the table convinced that the dealer is stacking the deck.

To those who know that dealers can be such 'mechanics' and stack a deck, it is obvious that he is cheating on the first hand, and one would justifiably ask how can they have the nerve to cheat so badly.

But in answer to our question and to dissuade the gullible still at the table, the dealer could ask, 'Hey, these kinds of coincidences do happen, and if they didnt, well, you wouldnt be here asking me about it, would you?'

Now if the dealers answer makes sense to you, then I have to ask how many consecutive hands of Royal Flushes would the dealer have to deal himself before one is convinced that the dealer must be cheating?

I would walk after the first one, after reclaiming my money.

Coincidences do happen, but how plausible and convenient such an appeal to coincidence maybe is different for each of us and we answer for our own consciences sake.

After all, we all will answer for ourselves and only ourselves one way or another.

 

[Dragon]

Wrong at the time of the writing of the scriptures springs in the ocean were not known.

You do not know how much water was contained within the earth and still is.

Liquid water coming from the sea vents is unlikely. The cocktail of gases that comes from the vents under the ocean is pretty toxic by our standards.

I posted a quote from a professor that say's otherwise.

If you did, then he is spouting nonsense just as you are.

What you are doing here is confirming once again that you have no intellectual integrity on this subject. Your beliefs are fixed and you will not question them with an open mind. As I said on the other thread, there is no point in discussing this matter with you, as, confronted with evidence, you will simply stick your fingers in your ears and deny.

Intelligent design, still less Biblical creation, is not falsifiable, therefore not a scientific theory, therefore not worthy of consideration. We properly reject it out of hand. As such, it is pointless for you to present what you consider arguments or evidence against evolution. Those arguments are all misguided, but there's no point in my demonstrating that, either, because it's irrelevant anyway for your purposes. If it were otherwise, if evolution were to be disproved, we would not be left with creation or intelligent design. We would be left only with a void.

Evolution, unlike ID, is falsifiable and it is possible that current scientific theory is incorrect, and not only possible but nearly certain that it is at least incomplete. But ID will not be worthy of consideration in any case, so you really have no good motivation for bothering to try.

 

[Dragon]

To those who believe that there is no higher intelligence that Created our universe, there can be no design and the 'fine tuning' is simply a matter of being the lucky ones who happen to be in the one universe out of gazzillions to allow sentient life and be able to ask how we came about.

To me this is similar to a situation where a poker dealer has dealt himself a Royal Flush on the first hand, then another on the second hand, and so on till finally the coincidence becomes implausible and one takes their money from the table convinced that the dealer is stacking the deck.

That might be a valid argument if we saw conditions right for life on ALL planets, or most of them. It is not a good comparison to a situation in which we find conditions right for life on only one. The anthropic principle holds: we are able to ask the question only because we live on a planet where conditions are right for life. On planets where conditions are not right, there is no life, and therefore no one to ask.

That's the scientific and logical answer to the attempt to find proof of God in the cosmos. There is a religious answer, too. The only proof of God we find is within, not without, and that is also where God is to be found.

 

[amrchaos]

ALTER2EGO -to- EVERYONE:

AGRUMENT #1 FOR AN INTELLIGENT CREATOR:

For the average person, precision indicates that an intelligent person guided the outcome. According to Webster's New World College Dictionary, the word "precision" is defined as follows:

"the quality of being precise; exactness, accuracy"


The reverse of precision is an accident aka a spontaneous event that happen by chance with no one guiding the outcome. Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary defines an accident as:

"a nonessential event that happens by chance and has undesirable or unfortunate results"


Scientific evidence shows there is extreme precision in everything around us in the natural world. This precision renders the evolution theory and the Big Bang theory mere fiction, for precision leaves no room for error or for accidental events. Take, for example, the first discovered 60 elements on the Periodic Table of the Elements of planet earth. Some of these 60 elements are gases and are therefore invisible to the human eye. The atoms--from which the Earth's elements are made--are specifically related to one another. In turn, the elements--e.g. arsenic, bismuth, chromium, gold, krypton--reflect a distinct, natural numeral order based upon the structure of their atoms. This is a proven LAW.

The precision in the order of the elements made it possible for scientists such as Mendeleyev, Ramsey, Moseley, and Bohr to theorize the existence of unknown elements and their characteristics. These elements were later discovered, just as predicted. Because of the distinct numerical order of the elements, the word LAW is applied to the Periodic Table of the Elements. (Sources: (1) The McGraw-Hill Encyclopedia of Science & Technology, (2) "Periodic Law," from Encyclopædia Britannica, Vol. VII, p. 878, copyright 1978, (3) The Hutchinson Dictionary of Scientific Biography


SIDE NOTE: Laws found in nature, as defined by Webster's New World Dictionary, are:

"a sequence of events that have been observed to occur with UNVARYING UNIFORMITY under the same conditions."


QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION:
1. Were it not for the precise relationship among the first 60 discovered elements on the Periodic Table, would scientists have been able to accurately predict the existence of forms of matter that at the time were unknown?

2. Could the precise law within the first 60 discovered elements (on the Periodic Table) have resulted by chance aka spontaneously aka by accident? Or is this evidence for the existence an intelligent Designer/God who guided the outcome?

3. Evolution relies upon things happening by chance aka at random. If evolution were a fact, how does it account for the Periodic Table of the Elements of planet earth in which the first 60 discovered elements are so precise, and so interrelated with one another, that it has been assigned the word "LAW"?

The presence of patterns, in themselves, does not credit the existence nor discount the existence of an intelligent designer. Nor does it credit nor discount the existence of process. Patterns and designs can occur at random, like in the formation of snowflakes. Unless you believe this Intelligen Designer is actually designing each and every snowflake(what is the point??) it is normally assumed such formations are of random chance or "accident" as some ID supporters would suggest.

On the otherhand, the presence of a questionable object in reality that lacks pertinent reason for existance could be used as evidence against a planned purpose or intentional design.

For example, the appendix in the human body lacks a well defined function in the Human organism. In fact, the Appendix is occasionally a dangerous organic construct that is connected to the Large intestines with the potential of rupture, thus killing the human being in question. So why did a Intelligent Designer, with intentions of creating living human beings, place the appendix in the Human body? Is this not akin to an automaker placing a bomb next to the fuel tank of his automobiles? Its existence lacks rational and is unlikely the product of a rational thinking entity. Why? A rational thinking engineer would not add parts to a creation that lacks some purpose. The Appendix lacks purpose and therefore is not a product of a intelligent designer(who we are assuming is at least rational)

I like to call the Appendix(as in the human body) a Q functional Organic Construct (Q-FOC). It is an organic construct that lacks a well defined function in an organism.(Thus the term q-functional. Its Function in an organism is questionable) The presence of a Q-FOC suggest that the organism was not well planned or "designed" but occured through a series or evolutionary(or de-evolutionary) processes and is not fully functional. It may have had a purpose, or there may be a future purpose once it is fully developed but currently lacks a function or purpose.

The existence of the appendix, which is a Q-FOC, suggest that the human body went through evolutionary processes and not intelligently designed.

This does not rule out the existance of a higher being in the process of creating the human organism, but it tends to suggest that this being is more artist than engineer. That is it allow flaws in its creation and the evolutionary process is a means of obtaining this entities artwork. But in no way, with the presence of Q-FOCs in an organism, can we claim that the organism is "Intelligently Designed". Instead, the term "Creative Art" is more descriptive.

 

[OohPooPahDoo]

I recommend the Harper's article, by a physicist and a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, that is highly supportive of your position:

In part:
"On one thing most physicists agree: If the amount of dark energy in our universe were only a little bit different than what it actually is, then life could never have emerged. A little more and the universe would accelerate so rapidly that the matter in the young cosmos could never pull itself together to form stars and thence form the complex atoms made in stars. And, going into negative values of dark energy, a little less and the universe would decelerate so rapidly that it would recollapse before there was time to form even the simplest atoms. Here we have a clear example of fine-tuning: out of all the possible amounts of dark energy that our universe might have, the actual amount lies in the tiny sliver of the range that allows life. There is little argument on this point. It does not depend on assumptions about whether we need liquid water for life or oxygen or particular biochemistries. As before, one is compelled to ask the question: Why does such fine-tuning occur? "


The accidental universe: Science's crisis of faith
By Alan P. Lightman
The accidental universe: Science's crisis of faith?By Alan P. Lightman (Harper's Magazine)

A: Multiverse

Thank's for falling into a little trap I set.....

I suspect that you don't understand what the "multiverse concept" implies: all of the 'facts' of science are no longer 'facts.'


The concept was made up by dolts who were afraid of what the 'fine-tuned universe' implies.

It wasn't 'made up' - it follows from the Einstein field equations and quantum mechanics.

And accepted by other dolts.

Shoe fit?


From chapter seven of Berlinski's "The Devil's Delusion,"...

"Dawkins, among others, has embraced the ‘multiverse,’ [the Landscape] idea, that there could be an infinite number of universes, each with some permutation of the natural laws of physics, vastly different from ours. Why, then, scruple at the Deity? After all, the theologian need only apply to a single God and a single universe. Dawkins must appeal to infinitely many universes crammed with laws of nature wriggling indiscreetly and fundamental physical parameters changing as one travels the cosmos. And- the entire gargantuan structure scientifically unobservable and devoid of any connection to expericnce.

Now, get this: Dawkins actually writes, “The key difference between the radically extravagant God hypothesis and the apparently extravagant multiverse hypothesis, is one of statistical improbability.”


Didn't understand what a mistake it was to write "A: Multiverse" did ya'?


What say you?

Dawkins? Eternal inflation is PHYSICS, not biology, and it was first proposed by Andrei Linde. And Berlinski is a biologist by training, isn't he? If you want to learn about cosomology, shouldn't you be more concerned what the physcists and cosmologists have to say?

Do you know what you are talking about? Please first go and study general relativity and quantum mechanics.

 

[Alter2Ego]

The question of whether the 'fine tuning' of the universe for life is indicative of a Creator is answered by the answers we have from other higher order questions.

To those who believe that there is no higher intelligence that Created our universe, there can be no design and the 'fine tuning' is simply a matter of being the lucky ones who happen to be in the one universe out of gazzillions to allow sentient life and be able to ask how we came about.

To me this is similar to a situation where a poker dealer has dealt himself a Royal Flush on the first hand, then another on the second hand, and so on till finally the coincidence becomes implausible and one takes their money from the table convinced that the dealer is stacking the deck.

To those who know that dealers can be such 'mechanics' and stack a deck, it is obvious that he is cheating on the first hand, and one would justifiably ask how can they have the nerve to cheat so badly.

But in answer to our question and to dissuade the gullible still at the table, the dealer could ask, 'Hey, these kinds of coincidences do happen, and if they didnt, well, you wouldnt be here asking me about it, would you?'

Now if the dealers answer makes sense to you, then I have to ask how many consecutive hands of Royal Flushes would the dealer have to deal himself before one is convinced that the dealer must be cheating?

I would walk after the first one, after reclaiming my money.

Coincidences do happen, but how plausible and convenient such an appeal to coincidence maybe is different for each of us and we answer for our own consciences sake.

After all, we all will answer for ourselves and only ourselves one way or another.

ALTER2EGO -to- JIM BOWIE 1958:

Excellent illustration! The point being, the poker dealer could not possibly have consecutive hands of Royal Flushes except by design--meaning he's doing it deliberately (cheating).

The same people in this thread arguing that precision in the natural world is not proof of an intelligent designer will readily admit that it requires an intelligent, well trained technician to build a working computer. Keep in mind that the precision in the natural work makes the computer look like child's play. In other words, these people are simply playing the fool.

 

[Dragon]

The same people in this thread arguing that precision in the natural world is not proof of an intelligent designer will readily admit that it requires an intelligent, well trained technician to build a working computer.

It also requires an intelligent person to create a workable club, crude stone hatchet, or simple digging-stick. It is not the complexity or the precision of the computer that makes it something that requires an intelligent designer, but simply the fact that it is a tool, in a category of things that we know ARE the product of intelligent designers. Something equally precise and elegant can (and does) emerge from nature without a conscious designer at all; specifically a computer could not -- or, more accurately, DOES not -- because there is no process in nature that leads to this outcome. (Well, other than the process of evolving the intelligence that in turn creates the computer, of course.)

 

[Dragon]

Here's a simple mathematical illustration for how nature can generate highly precise and complex outcomes without a conscious intelligence being responsible.

Say you have a process which, totally at random, places a dot on a piece of paper.

Say you have another process which removes the dot if it is not inside a certain boundary.

Say you have a third process which removes the dot if, with the addition of that dot, the collection of dots in a particular region exceeds a certain density.

Over time, the addition of dots at random and their removal by these two processes results in a highly complex abstract picture somewhat resembling a multi-shaded layer construction like a striped stone.

Now, exactly this process would need to be designed by a person, using computer software, but something very similar occurs in many processes in nature: a random generation of events feeds into a selection process that removes outcomes that don't match a certain parameter. That's exactly what drives evolution according to current theory, in fact. The random part is mutation, the selection part is natural selection, and the two together are believed to account for the change in life forms over time and generations.

Nor is evolution the only such process. Another example is the formation of crystals, in which random movements of molecules input into the selection of molecules according to a pattern of possible connections between them, ultimately generating a regular solid object.

What IS intelligence, after all? It is a refinement of a process in nature that does not seem very intelligent at all, namely trial and error, which is another way of thinking about selection. Our own brains operate by trial and error, but with two important refinements. One is the ability to conduct trials in the imagination rather than in real life, which lets us "try" various possibilities and eliminate the stupider ones before proceeding to real-life trials. The other is the ability to generate comparisons between two similar types of trial, and apply the lessons learned from one to the other. These refinements allow us to vastly accelerate the exact same trial-and-error process that occurs more slowly in nature, but do not change its basic quality.

What this means is that a similar level of "intelligence" to the outcome can be achieved by nature as we can achieve with our own minds, but much more slowly, and in fact all of the processes which seem at first glance to indicate the existence of a conscious, intelligent creator are very slow processes, doing the same sort of thing that we could do ourselves, but at a much more ponderous speed.

We would need to posit an intelligent designer if we saw a process happening that was not only as refined and precise as we can achieve ourselves, but also as fast. But we don't.

 

[Youwerecreated]

Liquid water coming from the sea vents is unlikely. The cocktail of gases that comes from the vents under the ocean is pretty toxic by our standards.

I posted a quote from a professor that say's otherwise.

If you did, then he is spouting nonsense just as you are.

What you are doing here is confirming once again that you have no intellectual integrity on this subject. Your beliefs are fixed and you will not question them with an open mind. As I said on the other thread, there is no point in discussing this matter with you, as, confronted with evidence, you will simply stick your fingers in your ears and deny.

Intelligent design, still less Biblical creation, is not falsifiable, therefore not a scientific theory, therefore not worthy of consideration. We properly reject it out of hand. As such, it is pointless for you to present what you consider arguments or evidence against evolution. Those arguments are all misguided, but there's no point in my demonstrating that, either, because it's irrelevant anyway for your purposes. If it were otherwise, if evolution were to be disproved, we would not be left with creation or intelligent design. We would be left only with a void.

Evolution, unlike ID, is falsifiable and it is possible that current scientific theory is incorrect, and not only possible but nearly certain that it is at least incomplete. But ID will not be worthy of consideration in any case, so you really have no good motivation for bothering to try.

Just admit it,you don't want to see the evidence for intelligent design so you base your view on miraculous supposedly unplanned accidents.

 

[Youwerecreated]

To those who believe that there is no higher intelligence that Created our universe, there can be no design and the 'fine tuning' is simply a matter of being the lucky ones who happen to be in the one universe out of gazzillions to allow sentient life and be able to ask how we came about.

To me this is similar to a situation where a poker dealer has dealt himself a Royal Flush on the first hand, then another on the second hand, and so on till finally the coincidence becomes implausible and one takes their money from the table convinced that the dealer is stacking the deck.

That might be a valid argument if we saw conditions right for life on ALL planets, or most of them. It is not a good comparison to a situation in which we find conditions right for life on only one. The anthropic principle holds: we are able to ask the question only because we live on a planet where conditions are right for life. On planets where conditions are not right, there is no life, and therefore no one to ask.

That's the scientific and logical answer to the attempt to find proof of God in the cosmos. There is a religious answer, too. The only proof of God we find is within, not without, and that is also where God is to be found.

So now you are saying someone has to be present to ask but they didn't have to be present to see evolution happen ? You are a funny guy.

 

[Youwerecreated]

ALTER2EGO -to- EVERYONE:

AGRUMENT #1 FOR AN INTELLIGENT CREATOR:

For the average person, precision indicates that an intelligent person guided the outcome. According to Webster's New World College Dictionary, the word "precision" is defined as follows:

"the quality of being precise; exactness, accuracy"


The reverse of precision is an accident aka a spontaneous event that happen by chance with no one guiding the outcome. Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary defines an accident as:

"a nonessential event that happens by chance and has undesirable or unfortunate results"


Scientific evidence shows there is extreme precision in everything around us in the natural world. This precision renders the evolution theory and the Big Bang theory mere fiction, for precision leaves no room for error or for accidental events. Take, for example, the first discovered 60 elements on the Periodic Table of the Elements of planet earth. Some of these 60 elements are gases and are therefore invisible to the human eye. The atoms--from which the Earth's elements are made--are specifically related to one another. In turn, the elements--e.g. arsenic, bismuth, chromium, gold, krypton--reflect a distinct, natural numeral order based upon the structure of their atoms. This is a proven LAW.

The precision in the order of the elements made it possible for scientists such as Mendeleyev, Ramsey, Moseley, and Bohr to theorize the existence of unknown elements and their characteristics. These elements were later discovered, just as predicted. Because of the distinct numerical order of the elements, the word LAW is applied to the Periodic Table of the Elements. (Sources: (1) The McGraw-Hill Encyclopedia of Science & Technology, (2) "Periodic Law," from Encyclopædia Britannica, Vol. VII, p. 878, copyright 1978, (3) The Hutchinson Dictionary of Scientific Biography


SIDE NOTE: Laws found in nature, as defined by Webster's New World Dictionary, are:

"a sequence of events that have been observed to occur with UNVARYING UNIFORMITY under the same conditions."


QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION:
1. Were it not for the precise relationship among the first 60 discovered elements on the Periodic Table, would scientists have been able to accurately predict the existence of forms of matter that at the time were unknown?

2. Could the precise law within the first 60 discovered elements (on the Periodic Table) have resulted by chance aka spontaneously aka by accident? Or is this evidence for the existence an intelligent Designer/God who guided the outcome?

3. Evolution relies upon things happening by chance aka at random. If evolution were a fact, how does it account for the Periodic Table of the Elements of planet earth in which the first 60 discovered elements are so precise, and so interrelated with one another, that it has been assigned the word "LAW"?

The presence of patterns, in themselves, does not credit the existence nor discount the existence of an intelligent designer. Nor does it credit nor discount the existence of process. Patterns and designs can occur at random, like in the formation of snowflakes. Unless you believe this Intelligen Designer is actually designing each and every snowflake(what is the point??) it is normally assumed such formations are of random chance or "accident" as some ID supporters would suggest.

On the otherhand, the presence of a questionable object in reality that lacks pertinent reason for existance could be used as evidence against a planned purpose or intentional design.

For example, the appendix in the human body lacks a well defined function in the Human organism. In fact, the Appendix is occasionally a dangerous organic construct that is connected to the Large intestines with the potential of rupture, thus killing the human being in question. So why did a Intelligent Designer, with intentions of creating living human beings, place the appendix in the Human body? Is this not akin to an automaker placing a bomb next to the fuel tank of his automobiles? Its existence lacks rational and is unlikely the product of a rational thinking entity. Why? A rational thinking engineer would not add parts to a creation that lacks some purpose. The Appendix lacks purpose and therefore is not a product of a intelligent designer(who we are assuming is at least rational)

I like to call the Appendix(as in the human body) a Q functional Organic Construct (Q-FOC). It is an organic construct that lacks a well defined function in an organism.(Thus the term q-functional. Its Function in an organism is questionable) The presence of a Q-FOC suggest that the organism was not well planned or "designed" but occured through a series or evolutionary(or de-evolutionary) processes and is not fully functional. It may have had a purpose, or there may be a future purpose once it is fully developed but currently lacks a function or purpose.

The existence of the appendix, which is a Q-FOC, suggest that the human body went through evolutionary processes and not intelligently designed.

This does not rule out the existance of a higher being in the process of creating the human organism, but it tends to suggest that this being is more artist than engineer. That is it allow flaws in its creation and the evolutionary process is a means of obtaining this entities artwork. But in no way, with the presence of Q-FOCs in an organism, can we claim that the organism is "Intelligently Designed". Instead, the term "Creative Art" is more descriptive.

You might want to rethink your position,it seems the appendix does have a purpose another argument for intelligent design.

What does the appendix do? finally an answer!
Published on October 8, 2007 at 9:39 PM·32 Comments



inShare.1







Researchers at Duke University Medical Center say that the function of the frequently discarded appendix, an organ often credited with little importance and often dismissed as having no significant function, does it seems have a role to play after all.

Researchers in the United States say the appendix produces and protects good germs for the gut by "rebooting" the digestive system.

The team of immunologists at Duke University Medical Center say the human digestive system contains massive amounts of bacteria most of which are good and help the digestion of food.

However the researchers say sometimes the bacteria die off or are purged from the intestines as in diseases such as cholera or dysentery.

According to the researchers, the appendix's job is to "reboot" the digestive system when that happens with the bacteria safely harbored in the appendix.

Many doctors believe the appendix is a vestigial organ with no function and is no more than a blind ended tube connected to the cecum, from which it develops embryologically.

The cecum is a pouch-like structure of the colon and the appendix is near the junction of the small intestine and the large intestine and has abundant infection-fighting lymphoid cells, which suggests it plays a role in the immune system.

The most common diseases of the appendix (in humans) are appendicitis and carcinoid tumors. Appendix cancer accounts for about 1 in 200 of all gastrointestinal malignancies.


What does the appendix do? finally an answer!

 

[Youwerecreated]

The question of whether the 'fine tuning' of the universe for life is indicative of a Creator is answered by the answers we have from other higher order questions.

To those who believe that there is no higher intelligence that Created our universe, there can be no design and the 'fine tuning' is simply a matter of being the lucky ones who happen to be in the one universe out of gazzillions to allow sentient life and be able to ask how we came about.

To me this is similar to a situation where a poker dealer has dealt himself a Royal Flush on the first hand, then another on the second hand, and so on till finally the coincidence becomes implausible and one takes their money from the table convinced that the dealer is stacking the deck.

To those who know that dealers can be such 'mechanics' and stack a deck, it is obvious that he is cheating on the first hand, and one would justifiably ask how can they have the nerve to cheat so badly.

But in answer to our question and to dissuade the gullible still at the table, the dealer could ask, 'Hey, these kinds of coincidences do happen, and if they didnt, well, you wouldnt be here asking me about it, would you?'

Now if the dealers answer makes sense to you, then I have to ask how many consecutive hands of Royal Flushes would the dealer have to deal himself before one is convinced that the dealer must be cheating?

I would walk after the first one, after reclaiming my money.

Coincidences do happen, but how plausible and convenient such an appeal to coincidence maybe is different for each of us and we answer for our own consciences sake.

After all, we all will answer for ourselves and only ourselves one way or another.

ALTER2EGO -to- JIM BOWIE 1958:

Excellent illustration! The point being, the poker dealer could not possibly have consecutive hands of Royal Flushes except by design--meaning he's doing it deliberately (cheating).

The same people in this thread arguing that precision in the natural world is not proof of an intelligent designer will readily admit that it requires an intelligent, well trained technician to build a working computer. Keep in mind that the precision in the natural work makes the computer look like child's play. In other words, these people are simply playing the fool.

Or a language like the genetic code.

 

[Youwerecreated]

The same people in this thread arguing that precision in the natural world is not proof of an intelligent designer will readily admit that it requires an intelligent, well trained technician to build a working computer.

It also requires an intelligent person to create a workable club, crude stone hatchet, or simple digging-stick. It is not the complexity or the precision of the computer that makes it something that requires an intelligent designer, but simply the fact that it is a tool, in a category of things that we know ARE the product of intelligent designers. Something equally precise and elegant can (and does) emerge from nature without a conscious designer at all; specifically a computer could not -- or, more accurately, DOES not -- because there is no process in nature that leads to this outcome. (Well, other than the process of evolving the intelligence that in turn creates the computer, of course.)

Where did intelligence originate from ?

 

[rdean]

With mysticism, it's all about "argument".

With evolution, it's all about "evidence".

See how that works out?

 

[Youwerecreated]

Here's a simple mathematical illustration for how nature can generate highly precise and complex outcomes without a conscious intelligence being responsible.

Say you have a process which, totally at random, places a dot on a piece of paper.

Say you have another process which removes the dot if it is not inside a certain boundary.

Say you have a third process which removes the dot if, with the addition of that dot, the collection of dots in a particular region exceeds a certain density.

Over time, the addition of dots at random and their removal by these two processes results in a highly complex abstract picture somewhat resembling a multi-shaded layer construction like a striped stone.

Now, exactly this process would need to be designed by a person, using computer software, but something very similar occurs in many processes in nature: a random generation of events feeds into a selection process that removes outcomes that don't match a certain parameter. That's exactly what drives evolution according to current theory, in fact. The random part is mutation, the selection part is natural selection, and the two together are believed to account for the change in life forms over time and generations.

Nor is evolution the only such process. Another example is the formation of crystals, in which random movements of molecules input into the selection of molecules according to a pattern of possible connections between them, ultimately generating a regular solid object.

What IS intelligence, after all? It is a refinement of a process in nature that does not seem very intelligent at all, namely trial and error, which is another way of thinking about selection. Our own brains operate by trial and error, but with two important refinements. One is the ability to conduct trials in the imagination rather than in real life, which lets us "try" various possibilities and eliminate the stupider ones before proceeding to real-life trials. The other is the ability to generate comparisons between two similar types of trial, and apply the lessons learned from one to the other. These refinements allow us to vastly accelerate the exact same trial-and-error process that occurs more slowly in nature, but do not change its basic quality.

What this means is that a similar level of "intelligence" to the outcome can be achieved by nature as we can achieve with our own minds, but much more slowly, and in fact all of the processes which seem at first glance to indicate the existence of a conscious, intelligent creator are very slow processes, doing the same sort of thing that we could do ourselves, but at a much more ponderous speed.

We would need to posit an intelligent designer if we saw a process happening that was not only as refined and precise as we can achieve ourselves, but also as fast. But we don't.

Someone would have to put the dot in place no ?

 

[Youwerecreated]

With mysticism, it's all about "argument".

With evolution, it's all about "evidence".

See how that works out?

Wrong there is more evidence of purposeful design then purposeful accidents.

 

[JimBowie1958]

To those who believe that there is no higher intelligence that Created our universe, there can be no design and the 'fine tuning' is simply a matter of being the lucky ones who happen to be in the one universe out of gazzillions to allow sentient life and be able to ask how we came about.

To me this is similar to a situation where a poker dealer has dealt himself a Royal Flush on the first hand, then another on the second hand, and so on till finally the coincidence becomes implausible and one takes their money from the table convinced that the dealer is stacking the deck.

That might be a valid argument if we saw conditions right for life on ALL planets, or most of them. It is not a good comparison to a situation in which we find conditions right for life on only one.

Why do you think that is true? The stats would suggest that it is practically a provedential event that life exists even on one planet.

The anthropic principle holds: we are able to ask the question only because we live on a planet where conditions are right for life. On planets where conditions are not right, there is no life, and therefore no one to ask.

But it entirely begs the question of why there is life in the places where it does exist.

Simply because life does not exist in one place it does not lessen at all the incredible unlikelihood it exists at all.

That's the scientific and logical answer to the attempt to find proof of God in the cosmos. There is a religious answer, too. The only proof of God we find is within, not without, and that is also where God is to be found.

That is a subjective assertion that is entirely absent any logic, reason or fact.

If you are comfortable with that, have fun.