Cosmos: If anyone cares at this late date – Why Bruno was executed in 1600

_{Denyse O'Leary

May 26, 2014

Cosmology, News}

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Jay Richards, at Evolution News & Views:

Bruno’s execution, troubling as it was, had virtually nothing to do with his Copernican views. He was condemned and burned in 1600, but it was not because he speculated that the Earth rotated around the sun along with the other planets. He was condemned because he denied the doctrine of the Trinity, the Virgin Birth, and transubstantiation, claimed that all would be saved, and taught that there was an infinite swarm of eternal worlds of which ours was only one. The latter idea he got from the ancient (materialist) philosopher Lucretius. Is it any surprise, then, that, as a defrocked Dominican friar denying essential tenets of Catholic doctrine and drawing strength from the closest thing to an atheist in the Roman world, he might have gotten in trouble with the Inquisition? Yet a documentary series about science and our knowledge of the universe fritters away valuable airtime on this Dominican mystic and heretic, while scarcely mentioning Copernicus, the Polish guy who actually wrote the book proposing a sun-centered universe.

The reason is obvious once you see that Cosmos is not just good ole science education, but rather a glossy multi-million-dollar piece of agitprop for scientific materialism. As such, the biography of Copernicus, whatever its scientific significance, provides precious little fodder of the desired kind. Copernicus died peacefully in his bed just as his book, On the Revolution of the Heavenly Spheres, was hitting the bookstores (such as there were in 1543). And his most famous disciple, Galileo, despite being censured by the Holy See, died peacefully as well. So it falls to Bruno, who had no scientific achievements, to stand in as a martyr for science. I’d venture that virtually no one other than scholars of Christian history would even know the name of Giordano Bruno but for the propaganda machine of scientific materialism, which needed a martyr for its metanarrative.

Maybe, but the disappointing ratings show that the Cosmos remake is not a good advertisement for scientific materialism. The problem is, most people who would buy the idea don’t really want all the baggage, like Bruno, Gaia, and global warming. And the people who want the baggage are indifferent converts to scientific materialism: Darwin today Gaia tomorrow, panpsychism the day after.

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Comments

Ab: It seems at this stage, you have made up your conclusion ahead of time, and so will always revert there. I will simply note for record that when a moral transformation pivoting on fundamental attitude change is a necessary condition of discipleship, absence of evidence of that change after a reasonable time is evidence of absence of the necessary change, whatever someone may say. Also, all of this becomes so much of an attempt to imply that because some hypocrites wear Christian garb and because some who have professed Christian affiliation have done some awful things, genuine discipleship and its positive impact on culture, history and civilisation is meaningless or can be ignored and dismissed -- especially as it relates to the reality of a life-transforming encounter with God. That makes no more sense than to say that because counterfeit money exists genuine money is meaningless and can be dismissed. Underneath, I suspect there may lurk a version of a fallacy: as evil exists, there can be no God in the sense theism posits. However, first, absent God, there is no basis for differentiating good from evil, beyond the nihilist's credo might and manipulation make 'right.' In addition, you need to ponder Plantinga's free will defense, cf. skeletal outline here. KFkairosfocus_{May 30, 2014
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@Barb: "No, you are missing the point. Anyone who commits mass murder and claims to be a Christian is lying." I am not missing the point. Again, you have just made my point. It is a completely circular argument. A person could live a completely christian life for thirty years. Never steal, never lie, do everything that Jesus wanted people to do. Then one day, he goes out and kills a dozen people for no obvious reason. So, 30 seconds of non christian behaviour out of 985,500,000 and he is no longer a christian? "...studies have shown that alcoholism definitely has a genetic component" The operative word here is "component". Yes, there are genetic aspects to behaviour. It is known that higher testosterone levels are associated with higher aggression levels. And testosterone is definitely genetically linked. But there are also people with high testosterone levels who are not aggressive and people with low testosterone levels who are. So, yes, there is a genetic component to aggression, but it is not the same tight link that we see for other traits like eye colour or the ability to curl your tongue.Acartia_bogart_{May 30, 2014
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Mung,
Yet another non-sequitur. Shall we call them false teachers?
Not a non sequitur, but nice try. Seriously, go read the other thread. It’s been explained repeatedly, and I’m not cross posting here simply because you won’t let it go. Really, it’s getting pathetic now. Are you going to troll every single post I make here? Posted on the other thread, but obviously unread by Mung: http://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/1101989228#h=27:0-31:503Barb_{May 30, 2014
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Barb:
Except for the fact that Witnesses never claimed to be prophets. Your “argument” fails yet again.
Yet another non-sequitur. Shall we call them false teachers?Mung_{May 30, 2014
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Mung,
Interesting that you should bring this up. 15 Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. 16 Ye shall know them by their fruits. You see, we can know they were false prophets by their fruits. But the JW’s, while admitting the fruit was bad [the things they claimed would come to pass did not come to pass], deny they were false prophets.
Except for the fact that Witnesses never claimed to be prophets. Your “argument” fails yet again. Arcartia,
You just prove my point. By your own argument you are admitting that a Christian is incapable of committing mass murder because if they did, they would no longer be Christian.
No, you are missing the point. Anyone who commits mass murder and claims to be a Christian is lying. I can claim to be anything, but that doesn’t make it true.
No it doesn’t. There are certainly many traits that have a one-to-one relationship with a gene (or assemblage of genes), but much of the genetic work that is going on now is searching for genetic factors that increase your risk of (not cause) various symptoms, behaviours, etc.
Again, you miss the point. Science does routinely search for (and occasionally identify) genes that are directly related to behavioral traits: “Family, twin and adoption studies have shown that alcoholism definitely has a genetic component. In 1990, Blum et al. proposed an association between the A1 allele of the DRD2 gene and alcoholism. The DRD2 gene is the first candidate gene that has shown promise of an association with alcoholism (Gordis et al., 1990).” article about alcoholism And there is a "psycho gene" as well: article here Science does tell us that genes are at least partially, if not completely, responsible for behavioral traits. And this would be good for materialist atheists, because then they could simply do whatever they wanted (lie, steal, kill) and blame their “selfish genes” for making them do it. Personal responsibility would be absolved. And why not; after all, we are only dancing to the music our “selfish genes” play, right?Barb_{May 30, 2014
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@Barb: "Your second point also fails. Claiming something doesn’t make it true. Claiming to be a Christian is borne out, not by words, but by actions (see Matthew 7:21-23)." You just prove my point. By your own argument you are admitting that a Christian is incapable of committing mass murder because if they did, they would no longer be Christian. @Barb 78: "And science keeps telling us that there are genes for everything from alcoholism to violent behavior" No it doesn't. There are certainly many traits that have a one-to-one relationship with a gene (or assemblage of genes), but much of the genetic work that is going on now is searching for genetic factors that increase your risk of (not cause) various symptoms, behaviours, etc.Acartia_bogart_{May 30, 2014
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Timaeus: Good points, especially in the context that Jesus taught that not all who called him Lord would find his approval, but instead those whose lives were transformed through repentance and discipleship and so lived by his principles; most famously provided in the Sermon on the Mount. His brother James also pointed out that theology is not enough, saying how the devils believe there is one God indeed, but that does them not one bit of good, for they are in defiant rebellion. So, while yes, Christendom has some awful chapters in its history, that is not a peculiar characteristic of Christendom, but of rebellious and devilish men who hold power. A pretty universal problem. And, it is also the case that there is a serious problem with systems that undermine moral restraints, Marxism-Leninism- Stalinism being a capital example. KFkairosfocus_{May 30, 2014
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Barb:
Likewise, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. (NIV)
Interesting that you should bring this up. 15 Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. 16 Ye shall know them by their fruits. You see, we can know they were false prophets by their fruits. But the JW's, while admitting the fruit was bad [the things they claimed would come to pass did not come to pass], deny they were false prophets.Mung_{May 30, 2014
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Mung continues,
This is particularly the case if you are a member of an organization in which what was true yesterday may not be true tomorrow and yet may again be true the day after tomorrow.
Check the “Adam and Eve at Bryan College” thread; it’s all laid out for you there.
Claiming to be a Christian is borne out, not by words, but by actions (see Matthew 7:21-23). That may be true today, but if you’re a Jehovah’s Witness tomorrow’s “new light” might make it false. It’s not like they haven’t claimed in the past that Scripture has been mistranslated/misunderstood and that there is a “new truth.”
No, that’s true all the time. Actions speak louder than words. A Christian is not identified by cross jewelry or by carrying a Bible; he or she is identified by how he or she treats other people. This is in the Bible, Mung; surely you are aware of this point. Matthew 7:17: Likewise, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. (NIV) And again, see the other thread. It’s explained there and I don’t plan on cross-posting to every other thread simply because you cannot handle a Witness posting here and feel that every post I make has to answered with a snarky response. Really, get over it.
This verse, Matthew 7:21, provides a great example. This is one of those cases where the translators of the New World Translation have chosen not to render Kyrie (Lord) as Jehovah. Yet given their past record in changing the translation of this Greek word from Lord to Jehovah, this passage may be next on the chopping block!
That’s doubtful. However, congratulations on missing the entire point of the relevant verse you cited: God’s Son made clear that even those doing things similar to those commanded, but evidently in a wrong way or with a wrong motive, would never gain entrance into the Kingdom but would be completely rejected.—Mt 7:15-23. Your arguments are wearing thin. Congratulations on missing the entire point of what Jesus was saying!Barb_{May 30, 2014
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Barb:
Claiming something doesn’t make it true.
This is particularly the case if you are a member of an organization in which what was true yesterday may not be true tomorrow and yet may again be true the day after tomorrow. Barb:
Claiming to be a Christian is borne out, not by words, but by actions (see Matthew 7:21-23).
That may be true today, but if you're a Jehovah's Witness tomorrow's "new light" might make it false. It's not like they haven't claimed in the past that Scripture has been mistranslated/misunderstood and that there is a "new truth." This verse, Matthew 7:21, provides a great example. This is one of those cases where the translators of the New World Translation have chosen not to render Kyrie (Lord) as Jehovah. Yet given their past record in changing the translation of this Greek word from Lord to Jehovah, this passage may be next on the chopping block!Mung_{May 29, 2014
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bogart (95): The circular argument you are complaining about is, I agree, a bad one. But if you adjust the argument so that it is no longer circular, it becomes a serious one. And that is what I was doing. I was hoping you would respond to my reformulated argument, not the original bad argument. Anyone who denies that nominal Christians have committed atrocities simply doesn't know history. Lots of people who have been called Christian, and have called themselves Christian, have committed atrocities. But there is an ambiguity in the term "Christian." Does it mean, "one who assents to theoretical propositions *about* Jesus"? Or does it mean, "one who feels bound to live in accord with the teachings *of* Jesus"? We know that plenty of people who firmly accepted certain propositions *about* Jesus (e.g., the doctrine of Trinity) have committed mass atrocities, so obviously a "Christian" in the first sense can commit atrocities. However, I don't know of very many people who are Christian in the second sense who have committed mass atrocities. There is a disjunction between Christian theory and ideal Christian practice, because Christian theory is based on the metaphysical speculations of theologians, whereas Christian practice is (ideally at least) based on the teaching of Jesus as given in the Gospels. There are no examples in the Gospels of Jesus or other Christians forcing religion on anyone, or killing people of non-Christian religion, or torturing heretics, etc. All theological justifications of violence and tyranny come from theologizing about Jesus, not from living in accord with the teaching of Jesus. In the examples I gave of secular ideologies, however, this disjunction between theory and practice does not and cannot exist. For a Stalinist, Leninist, Nazi, etc., if it is good in theory it is also automatically good in practice. Therefore, the mass murder or imprisonment of "regressive" social elements is not an immoral deviation from the lofty principles of the original movement (as burning heretics was an immoral deviation from the teaching of Jesus); it is a praiseworthy and moral action for totalitarian rulers to perform. Thus, secular ideologies always justify mass murder, torture, etc. with a clear conscience, whereas no Christian can undertake such things without a nagging inner voice, asking, "But can such cruelty be justified from the words and actions of our Lord?" This is why a world governed by Christian principles (and no, I am not advocating that Christians take over the world by force or that Christianity be made a compulsory state religion) will always be better than a world governed by totalitarian secular ideologies. (The same might be said in criticism of not only of secular ideologies but of other religious traditions which -- at least in certain versions -- display a totalitarian mindset that justifies moral atrocities.) I believe that in certain past ages Christian rulers and legal authorities behaved in a totalitarian manner. The frequency of this has been greatly exaggerated in secular humanist propaganda, but it did happen, and I condemn it, speaking as a Christian to those past Christians who in my mind betrayed the teaching and life of Christ. However, I believe that the point that Barb etc. are making is not that the Crusades or Inquisition etc. did not happen, but that if we measure the atrocities of the 20th century by the moral compass by which the New Atheists routinely condemn the Inquisition, the Crusades, etc., the 20th century comes out much worse, and the 20th century was dominated not by Christian religion but by secular ideologies. The New Atheist critique of Christianity's ethical failures is one-sided and partisan.Timaeus_{May 29, 2014
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KF: Thank you for the links you provided in your comments #86 & 87.Dionisio_{May 29, 2014
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“I was not critical of religion. I was critical of people who claim that atheists are responsible for almost all mass murders and use the circular argument that Christians cant be responsible because if you commit mass murders you can’t be Christian.” The problem with that viewpoint is that it is rendered invalid by the facts. Atheists—as noted above in BA77’s post are responsible for more murders (including mass murders and genocides) than religious people are. History bears this out. Your second point also fails. Claiming something doesn’t make it true. Claiming to be a Christian is borne out, not by words, but by actions (see Matthew 7:21-23). Furthermore, mental illnesses (also a root cause of violent behavior, c/f Elliot Rodger) are not limited to religious or non-religious people.Barb_{May 29, 2014
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@Timaeus 22: "So what follows from your criticism of religion?" I was not critical of religion. I was critical of people who claim that atheists are responsible for almost all mass murders and use the circular argument that Christians cant be responsible because if you commit mass murders you can't be Christian. @Joe 69: "Natural selection is the elimination of the less fit from a population. Fitness is measured by reproductive success. And natural selection also pertains to behavior as behaviors can be inherited." No it's not, and no it doesn't. Natural selection is just the result differential proliferation of genes. Natural selection does not act on behaviours unless the behaviours are genetically based.Acartia_bogart_{May 29, 2014
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Jerad: Ought does not equal is. Please, bear that in mind. Ought is what we should do, is, what -- as finite, fallible, morally struggling and too often ill-willed -- we may and too often do. However, our wrong does not negate what ought to have been done. But we have become so confused that we need a blatant case to blow away the clouds of toxic smoke. That is why I have put on the table an undeniable case: the all too actual kidnapping, torture, rape and murder of a child. And I pointed out that if we chanced upon such we would find ourselves obligated to do all we can to stop the monster. Look at the responses above: refusal to face it squarely, trying to divert into blame games and recriminations. Which are marks of evasion and yet imply an admission that we are indeed morally governed by ought, which we find intelligible and binding. So, we need to face the implications: if OUGHT is real, we live in a world rooted in an IS that grounds ought. An inherently GOOD. Now, too, that which holds up a standard of straightness is not to be discarded because there are things that are crooked. Or even that straightness is a challenge. If we discard the straight, then the nearly straight, then the partly straight, then whatever gives a hint of needing to be straight or reminding us of the straight, things will simply get worse and worse, and the discarding of the straight will frustrate any attempt to get back to the straight. Which, BTW is exactly what happened with the cases you cited from those litanies of the sins of Christendom that are so often used to try to discard and dismiss the premise of ought. The straight was compromised by the powerful, wrong was done, revenge took over, worse and worse was done, ending in horror. Such behaviour is self defeating and even ruinous. And it often takes generations to set right. (And, yes, Christians struggle towards virtue and goodness [often termed spiritual growth], a most important practice that does us and the world good . . . struggling towards the right and the true and the good. And yes, if one claims to live in light but habitually walks in darkness, he lies by what he says and does. That's from the apostle John, and it means it is possible to falsely profess the Christian faith, which will come out from a habitual, comfortable walk in the wrong as the characteristic of one's life. A Christian faith influenced society will reflect that pattern: some, struggling to the right, many showing life transformation to the good -- which I notice objectors who trot out litanies typically duck or ignore -- and some making professions but being comfortable in evil.) That is why it is so important for us to acknowledge that we are under moral government, and therefore face the implication that at the root of reality, there is an IS that properly grounds OUGHT. And yes, it is a bitter pill for lab coat clad atheists to swallow: evolutionary materialism does not and cannot have any such IS. So, it is forced to borrow moral principles, reduce them to some sort of relativistic consensus, and hope we will all try to get along nicely. But, sooner or later the underlying amorality comes out when politically correct pressure groups find clever ways to make evil seem good. The abortion holocaust that is going on apace is a classic example where the innocent voiceless are slaughtered by the millions per year under patently hollow slogans about choice, and even rights. Where, we are now paying the price as a civilisation: blood-guilt, especially mass-blood guilt, is the most morally corrupting factor of all. That is why reasoning about morality and reform in our day is so fraught with confusion, blindness, hardness of heart and en-darkened understanding that leads many to cling to absurdities falsely substituted for the good, the true and the right. As a culture, we are rapidly reaching the point where we simply cannot collectively think straight. The march of folly that leads to ruin. Just look around. Of course, evolutionary materialism also undermines the reasoning, knowing mind. Haldane long since pointed that out:
"It seems to me immensely unlikely that mind is a mere by-product of matter. For if my mental processes are determined wholly by the motions of atoms in my brain I have no reason to suppose that my beliefs are true. They may be sound chemically, but that does not make them sound logically. And hence I have no reason for supposing my brain to be composed of atoms. In order to escape from this necessity of sawing away the branch on which I am sitting, so to speak, I am compelled to believe that mind is not wholly conditioned by matter.” [["When I am dead," in Possible Worlds: And Other Essays [1927], Chatto and Windus: London, 1932, reprint, p.209.]
kairosfocus_{May 29, 2014
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Piotr @ 72: H G Wells is actually pivotal to the ethical debate. And it is true that he studied Evolution under Huxley. Next, the issue here is not actually science but that facet of ethics commonly called science in society; informed by worldview considerations. As in, does evolutionary materialism have a foundation able to bear the weight of ought? From Plato in The Laws Bk X on, the consistent analysis has been, no. For the excellent reason that a world based only on atoms etc in space and time moved only by blind chance and mechanical necessity lacks any IS that entails OUGHT. As say Dawkins admitted, among many others. And on that issue of science in society, H G Wells was a master. If you doubt me, look at the sci in soc themes in War of the Worlds, Time Machine and Island of Dr Moreau. Indeed, in the first case, c 1897, he put his finger on the problems that would surface with Nazism. Right from the opening in Ch 1:
No one would have believed in the last years of the nineteenth century that this world was being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man's and yet as mortal as his own; that as men busied themselves about their various concerns they were scrutinised and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a microscope might scrutinise the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water . . . No one gave a thought to the older worlds of space as sources of human danger, or thought of them only to dismiss the idea of life upon them as impossible or improbable. It is curious to recall some of the mental habits of those departed days. At most terrestrial men fancied there might be other men upon Mars, perhaps inferior to themselves and ready to welcome a missionary enterprise. Yet across the gulf of space, minds that are to our minds as ours are to those of the beasts that perish, intellects vast and cool and unsympathetic, regarded this earth with envious eyes, and slowly and surely drew their plans against us . . . . looking across space with instruments, and intelligences such as we have scarcely dreamed of, they see, at its nearest distance only 35,000,000 of miles sunward of them, a morning star of hope, our own warmer planet, green with vegetation and grey with water, with a cloudy atmosphere eloquent of fertility, with glimpses through its drifting cloud wisps of broad stretches of populous country and narrow, navy-crowded seas. And we men, the creatures who inhabit this earth, must be to them at least as alien and lowly as are the monkeys and lemurs to us. The intellectual side of man already admits that life is an incessant struggle for existence, and it would seem that this too is the belief of the minds upon Mars. Their world is far gone in its cooling and this world is still crowded with life, but crowded only with what they regard as inferior animals. To carry warfare sunward is, indeed, their only escape from the destruction that, generation after generation, creeps upon them. And before we judge of them too harshly we must remember what ruthless and utter destruction our own species has wrought, not only upon animals, such as the vanished bison and the dodo, but upon its inferior races. The Tasmanians, in spite of their human likeness, were entirely swept out of existence in a war of extermination waged by European immigrants, in the space of fifty years. Are we such apostles of mercy as to complain if the Martians warred in the same spirit?
So, he turned the Aryan Man superiority notion on its head, by suggesting a case of superior and ruthless aliens reasoning to Englishmen as Darwin so coolly discussed in Ch 6 of Descent of Man, failing to confront then and there the moral hazard he brought out:
Man is liable to numerous, slight, and diversified variations, which are induced by the same general causes, are governed and transmitted in accordance with the same general laws, as in the lower animals. Man has multiplied so rapidly, that he has necessarily been exposed to struggle for existence, and consequently to natural selection. He has given rise to many races, some of which differ so much from each other, that they have often been ranked by naturalists as distinct species . . . . At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilised races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace, the savage races throughout the world. At the same time the anthropomorphous apes, as Professor Schaaffhausen has remarked, will no doubt be exterminated. The break between man and his nearest allies will then be wider, for it will intervene between man in a more civilised state, as we may hope, even than the Caucasian, and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as now between the negro or Australian and the gorilla.
I doubt that Darwin anticipated how a Hitler would run with those ideas after four years in the trenches in and around the infamous rape of Belgium -- a dry run for what would follow in the 1940's -- but the seeds are definitely there. A much wider concern is eugenics, and in Time Machine, Wells took this to an extreme to make a point: England's upper classes turned into sheep bred for the table by descendants of the lower classes. Island of Dr Moreu, is about ethics of science with a prototype mad scientist . . . now, a stock figure. Playing with the idea of transforming beast to man, via vivisection . . . doubtless meant as a speeded up evolution in the pre genetics era. (The book may have helped advance the anti vivisection cause.) So, Wells has more to say to us than we may recognise. KFkairosfocus_{May 29, 2014
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“Jesus’ followers are called to peace. When Jesus called them, they found their peace. Jesus is their peace. Now they are not only to have peace, but they are to make peace. To do this they renounce violence and strife. Those things never help the cause of Christ. Christ’s kingdom is a realm of peace, and those in Christ’s community greet each other with a greeting of peace. Jesus’ disciples maintain peace by choosing to suffer instead of causing others to suffer. They preserve community when others destroy it. They renounce self-assertion and are silent in the face of hatred and injustice. That is how they overcome evil with good. That is how they are makers of divine peace in a world of hatred and war.” - Dietrich BonhoefferMung_{May 28, 2014
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“Words and thoughts are not enough. Doing good involves all the things of daily life. ‘If your enemies are hungry, feed them; if they are thirsty, give them something to drink’ (Romans 12:20). In the same ways that brothers and sisters stand by each other in times of need, bind up each other’s wounds, ease each other’s pain, love of the enemy should do good to the enemy. Where in the world is there greater need, where are deeper wounds and pain than those of our enemies? Where is doing good more necessary and more blessed than for our enemies?” - Dietrich BonhoefferMung_{May 28, 2014
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,,,And here is evidence that quantum information is in fact ‘conserved’;,,,
Quantum no-hiding theorem experimentally confirmed for first time Excerpt: In the classical world, information can be copied and deleted at will. In the quantum world, however, the conservation of quantum information means that information cannot be created nor destroyed. This concept stems from two fundamental theorems of quantum mechanics: the no-cloning theorem and the no-deleting theorem. A third and related theorem, called the no-hiding theorem, addresses information loss in the quantum world. According to the no-hiding theorem, if information is missing from one system (which may happen when the system interacts with the environment), then the information is simply residing somewhere else in the Universe; in other words, the missing information cannot be hidden in the correlations between a system and its environment. http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-03-quantum-no-hiding-theorem-experimentally.html Quantum no-deleting theorem Excerpt: A stronger version of the no-cloning theorem and the no-deleting theorem provide permanence to quantum information. To create a copy one must import the information from some part of the universe and to delete a state one needs to export it to another part of the universe where it will continue to exist. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_no-deleting_theorem#Consequence
As well, besides providing direct empirical falsification of neo-Darwinian claims as to the generation of information from a material basis, the implication of finding 'non-local', beyond space and time, and ‘conserved’ quantum information in molecular biology on a massive scale is fairly, and pleasantly, obvious:
Does Quantum Biology Support A Quantum Soul? – Stuart Hameroff - video (notes in description) http://vimeo.com/29895068 Quantum Entangled Consciousness - Life After Death - Stuart Hameroff - video https://vimeo.com/39982578
Verse and Music:
John 1:1-4 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. Brooke Fraser – Lord of Lords(Legendado Português) - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rkF3iVjOZ1I
Supplemental note:
1. Consciousness either preceded all of material reality or is a 'epi-phenomena' of material reality. 2. If consciousness is a 'epi-phenomena' of material reality then consciousness will be found to have no special position within material reality. Whereas conversely, if consciousness precedes material reality then consciousness will be found to have a special position within material reality. 3. Consciousness is found to have a special, even central, position within material reality. 4. Therefore, consciousness is found to precede material reality. Four intersecting lines of experimental evidence from quantum mechanics that shows that consciousness precedes material reality (Leggett’s Inequalities, Wheeler’s Delayed Choice; Wigner’s Quantum Symmetries; Quantum Zeno effect) https://docs.google.com/document/d/1G_Fi50ljF5w_XyJHfmSIZsOcPFhgoAZ3PRc_ktY8cFo/edit
Verse:
Proverbs 15:3 The eyes of the LORD are everywhere, keeping watch on the wicked and the good.
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Quantum Information/Entanglement In DNA - short video https://vimeo.com/92405752 Coherent Intrachain energy migration at room temperature – Elisabetta Collini and Gregory Scholes – University of Toronto – Science, 323, (2009), pp. 369-73 Excerpt: The authors conducted an experiment to observe quantum coherence dynamics in relation to energy transfer. The experiment, conducted at room temperature, examined chain conformations, such as those found in the proteins of living cells. Neighbouring molecules along the backbone of a protein chain were seen to have coherent energy transfer. Where this happens quantum decoherence (the underlying tendency to loss of coherence due to interaction with the environment) is able to be resisted, and the evolution of the system remains entangled as a single quantum state. http://www.scimednet.org/quantum-coherence-living-cells-and-protein/ Physicists Discover Quantum Law of Protein Folding – February 22, 2011 Quantum mechanics finally explains why protein folding depends on temperature in such a strange way. Excerpt: First, a little background on protein folding. Proteins are long chains of amino acids that become biologically active only when they fold into specific, highly complex shapes. The puzzle is how proteins do this so quickly when they have so many possible configurations to choose from. To put this in perspective, a relatively small protein of only 100 amino acids can take some 10^100 different configurations. If it tried these shapes at the rate of 100 billion a second, it would take longer than the age of the universe to find the correct one. Just how these molecules do the job in nanoseconds, nobody knows.,,, Their astonishing result is that this quantum transition model fits the folding curves of 15 different proteins and even explains the difference in folding and unfolding rates of the same proteins. That's a significant breakthrough. Luo and Lo's equations amount to the first universal laws of protein folding. That’s the equivalent in biology to something like the thermodynamic laws in physics. http://www.technologyreview.com/view/423087/physicists-discover-quantum-law-of-protein/
That quantum entanglement, which conclusively demonstrates that ‘information’ in its pure ‘quantum form’ is completely transcendent of any time and space constraints (Bell Aspect, Leggett, Zeilinger), should be found in molecular biology on such a massive scale is a direct empirical falsification of Darwinian claims, for how can the quantum entanglement ‘effect’ in biology possibly be explained by a material (matter/energy) ’cause’ when the quantum entanglement ‘effect’ falsified material particles as its own causation in the first place? Appealing to the probability of various configurations of material particles, as Darwinism does, simply will not help since a timeless/spaceless cause must be supplied which is beyond the capacity of the material particles themselves to supply!
Looking beyond space and time to cope with quantum theory – 29 October 2012 Excerpt: “Our result gives weight to the idea that quantum correlations somehow arise from outside spacetime, in the sense that no story in space and time can describe them,” http://www.quantumlah.org/highlight/121029_hidden_influences.php Closing the last Bell-test loophole for photons - Jun 11, 2013 Excerpt:– requiring no assumptions or correction of count rates – that confirmed quantum entanglement to nearly 70 standard deviations.,,, http://phys.org/news/2013-06-bell-test-loophole-photons.html
In other words, to give a coherent explanation for an effect that is shown to be completely independent of any time and space constraints one is forced to appeal to a cause that is itself not limited to time and space! i.e. Put more simply, you cannot explain a effect by a cause that has been falsified by the very same effect you are seeking to explain! Improbability arguments of various ‘special’ configurations of material particles, which have been a staple of the arguments against neo-Darwinism, simply do not apply since the cause is not within the material particles in the first place! Or related note, encoded ‘classical’ digital information, such as what William Dembski and Robert Marks demonstrated the conservation of,
Conservation of Information in Search: Measuring the Cost of Success William A. Dembski and Robert J. Marks II http://www.evoinfo.org/index/
,,i.e. classical 'digital' information, such as what we find encoded in computer programs, and yes, as we find encoded in DNA,
Every Bit Digital: DNA’s Programming Really Bugs Some ID Critics - Casey Luskin Excerpt: "There’s a very recognizable digital code of the kind that electrical engineers rediscovered in the 1950s that maps the codes for sequences of DNA onto expressions of proteins." http://www.salvomag.com/new/articles/salvo12/12luskin2.php The Digital Code of DNA and the Unimagined Complexity of a 'Simple' Bacteria - Rabbi Moshe Averick - video https://vimeo.com/35730736
,,classical 'digital' information is found to be a subset of this ‘non-local' (i.e. beyond space and time) quantum entanglement/information by the following method:
Quantum knowledge cools computers: New understanding of entropy – June 2011 Excerpt: No heat, even a cooling effect; In the case of perfect classical knowledge of a computer memory (zero entropy), deletion of the data requires in theory no energy at all. The researchers prove that “more than complete knowledge” from quantum entanglement with the memory (negative entropy) leads to deletion of the data being accompanied by removal of heat from the computer and its release as usable energy. This is the physical meaning of negative entropy. Renner emphasizes, however, “This doesn’t mean that we can develop a perpetual motion machine.” The data can only be deleted once, so there is no possibility to continue to generate energy. The process also destroys the entanglement, and it would take an input of energy to reset the system to its starting state. The equations are consistent with what’s known as the second law of thermodynamics: the idea that the entropy of the universe can never decrease. Vedral says “We’re working on the edge of the second law. If you go any further, you will break it.” http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/06/110601134300.htm
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Piotr, not that you care for empirical evidence, as is abundantly clear from your stubborn refusal to deal with the evidence on its own merits (to the point of IMHO being blatantly deceptive), but in case someone else would like to know, the empirical falsification of Darwinism is as such. Darwinian presuppositions hold that information, (and even consciousness), is merely an ‘emergent’ property of a material basis, but it is now found that material reduces to an information basis: First, in explaining the empirical falsification of Darwinism, it is important to learn that ‘non-local’, beyond space and time, quantum entanglement (A. Aspect, A. Zeilinger) can be used as a ‘quantum information channel’,,,
Quantum Entanglement and Information Quantum entanglement is a physical resource, like energy, associated with the peculiar nonclassical correlations that are possible between separated quantum systems. Entanglement can be measured, transformed, and purified. A pair of quantum systems in an entangled state can be used as a quantum information channel to perform computational and cryptographic tasks that are impossible for classical systems. The general study of the information-processing capabilities of quantum systems is the subject of quantum information theory. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qt-entangle/
And by using this ‘non-local’, beyond space and time, ‘quantum information channel’ of entanglement, physicists have reduced both matter and energy to quantum information.
Ions have been teleported successfully for the first time by two independent research groups Excerpt: In fact, copying isn’t quite the right word for it. In order to reproduce the quantum state of one atom in a second atom, the original has to be destroyed. This is unavoidable – it is enforced by the laws of quantum mechanics, which stipulate that you can’t ‘clone’ a quantum state. In principle, however, the ‘copy’ can be indistinguishable from the original (that was destroyed),,, http://www.rsc.org/chemistryworld/Issues/2004/October/beammeup.asp Atom takes a quantum leap – 2009 Excerpt: Ytterbium ions have been ‘teleported’ over a distance of a metre.,,, “What you’re moving is information, not the actual atoms,” says Chris Monroe, from the Joint Quantum Institute at the University of Maryland in College Park and an author of the paper. But as two particles of the same type differ only in their quantum states, the transfer of quantum information is equivalent to moving the first particle to the location of the second. http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2171769/posts How Teleportation Will Work - Excerpt: In 1993, the idea of teleportation moved out of the realm of science fiction and into the world of theoretical possibility. It was then that physicist Charles Bennett and a team of researchers at IBM confirmed that quantum teleportation was possible, but only if the original object being teleported was destroyed. — As predicted, the original photon no longer existed once the replica was made. http://science.howstuffworks.com/science-vs-myth/everyday-myths/teleportation1.htm Quantum Teleportation – IBM Research Page Excerpt: “it would destroy the original (photon) in the process,,” http://researcher.ibm.com/view_project.php?id=2862
In fact an entire human can, theoretically, be reduced to quantum information and teleported to another location in the universe:
Quantum Teleportation Of A Human? – video https://vimeo.com/75163272
Thus not only is information not reducible to a energy-matter basis, as is presupposed in Darwinism, but in actuality both energy and matter reduce to a information basis as is presupposed in Christian Theism (John1:1). Moreover, this ‘spooky’ non-local quantum information, though at first thought to be impossible to maintain in ‘hot and noisy’ cells, is now found in molecular biology on a massive scale, in every DNA and protein molecule:
Quantum entanglement in hot systems – 2011 Excerpt: The authors remark that this reverses the previous orthodoxy, which held that quantum effects could not exist in biological systems because of the amount of noise in these systems.,,, Environmental noise here drives a persistent and cyclic generation of new entanglement.,,, In summary, the authors say that they have demonstrated that entanglement can recur even in a hot noisy environment. In biological systems this can be related to changes in the conformation of macromolecules. http://quantum-mind.co.uk/quantum-entanglement-hot-systems/ Quantum entanglement holds together life’s blueprint – 2010 Excerpt: When the researchers analysed the DNA without its helical structure, they found that the electron clouds were not entangled. But when they incorporated DNA’s helical structure into the model, they saw that the electron clouds of each base pair became entangled with those of its neighbours. “If you didn’t have entanglement, then DNA would have a simple flat structure, and you would never get the twist that seems to be important to the functioning of DNA,” says team member Vlatko Vedral of the University of Oxford. http://neshealthblog.wordpress.com/2010/09/15/quantum-entanglement-holds-together-lifes-blueprint/ Does DNA Have Telepathic Properties?-A Galaxy Insight – 2009 Excerpt: DNA has been found to have a bizarre ability to put itself together, even at a distance, when according to known science it shouldn’t be able to.,,, The recognition of similar sequences in DNA’s chemical subunits, occurs in a way unrecognized by science. There is no known reason why the DNA is able to combine the way it does, and from a current theoretical standpoint this feat should be chemically impossible. per daily galaxy DNA Can Discern Between Two Quantum States, Research Shows – June 2011 Excerpt: — DNA — can discern between quantum states known as spin. – The researchers fabricated self-assembling, single layers of DNA attached to a gold substrate. They then exposed the DNA to mixed groups of electrons with both directions of spin. Indeed, the team’s results surpassed expectations: The biological molecules reacted strongly with the electrons carrying one of those spins, and hardly at all with the others. The longer the molecule, the more efficient it was at choosing electrons with the desired spin, while single strands and damaged bits of DNA did not exhibit this property. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/03/110331104014.htm
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PS: D, you may want to glance here.kairosfocus_{May 28, 2014
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D @ 70: Well put, and a good read. I wonder if the objectors also took time to examine the already linked about one of the very concrete evidences regarding the rescuing, transforming impact of turning to God, as illustrated by the 12 step programme pioneered by Alcoholics Anonymous -- and yes, one of the co-founders spectacularly backslid, to the gleeful pouncing on by objectors; but over the decades, the pattern is a proved success as is the similar Teen Challenge pattern for drug addiction. After things like this and millions of lives transformed for the better that are easily accessible and patent to the willing, the sort of ill-tempered objections that we see too often . . . that try to pretend such is not real by trying to list a litany of the sins of Christendom rings rather hollow. And yes, where wheat has been sown, an enemy has sown tares. The Master, on being told this has said, no do not uproot the tares, that will also uproot wheat. Wait till harvest and we will separate wheat from tares, dealing with them as is appropriate. And yes, that is right there in the gospels, as is the challenge to bring forth fruit meet unto penitence. KFkairosfocus_{May 28, 2014
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Ab: You did as predicted. Take a conveniently tangential red herring, go off to a strawman, soak it in ad hominems, set alight to cloud, confuse, poison, polarise and distract. The trifecta fallacy. An all too well known common resort of too many evo mat advocates here at UD and elsewhere, when they have no good answer on the merits and do not wish to face that. Now, back on target, you have been unable to address the IS-OUGHT gap on your obvious worldview. Let's have Dawkins' statement and look back at the issues from the underlying absurdity of that amorality and subjectivism/relativism:
In a universe of electrons and selfish genes, blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people are going to get hurt, other people are going to get lucky, and you won’t find any rhyme or reason in it, nor any justice. The universe that we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but pitiless indifference . . . . DNA neither cares nor knows. DNA just is. And we dance to its music. [[ “God’s Utility Function,” Sci. Am. Aug 1995, pp. 80 - 85.]
So, now, you have a challenge; why are you so worked up over issues of good vs evil, and what does that imply about the foundations of your view of things vs those of reality? In short, you face the IS-OUGHT gap. There has to be a foundational IS capable of bearing the weight of OUGHT. And OUGHT of course is not equal to is, in a world of finite, fallible, morally struggling and too often ill-willed people . . . all of us . . . what we ought to do is always a challenge to what we do. And, so, the challenge to repentance and reformation thence transformation. KFkairosfocus_{May 28, 2014
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Joe: Here's what Mayr says in What Evolution Is (sometimes almost contradicting himself):
This unequal survival of individuals is due in part to competition among the new recombinant genotypes within the population, and in part to chance processes affecting the frequency of genes. The resulting change of a population is called evolution.
and
Evolution in sexually reproducing organisms consists of genetic changes from generation to generation in populations, from the smallest local deme to the aggregate of interbreeding populations in a biological species. Numerous processes, particularly mutation, contribute to these genetic changes to supply the phenotypic variation needed by selection.
The fact that the phenotype is the target of selection does not mean that emphasis on the fundamental role of genetic changes equals "reductionism" of the type Mayr didn't like. After all, sexually reproducing individuals do not produce faithful copies of themselves. They produce descendants who carry faithful copies of (some of) their DNA.Piotr_{May 28, 2014
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By the way Piotr, you are the one practicing pseudo-science! Disagree? Then provide the mathematical falsification criteria for Darwinism!bornagain77_{May 28, 2014
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Proclamation instead of reference? Are we practicing Greek science where we pronounce on how the world should behave instead of finding out how it actually does behave?,,, Moreover, neo-Darwinism (i.e. the central dogma), regardless of how fond atheists/materialists personally are of it, is falsified empirically: The Fate of Darwinism: Evolution After the Modern Synthesis - January 2012 Excerpt: We trace the history of the Modern Evolutionary Synthesis, and of genetic Darwinism generally, with a view to showing why, even in its current versions, it can no longer serve as a general framework for evolutionary theory. The main reason is empirical. Genetical Darwinism cannot accommodate the role of development (and of genes in development) in many evolutionary processes. http://www.springerlink.com/content/845x02v03g3t7002/ Does the central dogma still stand? – Koonin EV. – 23 August 2012 Excerpt: Thus, there is non-negligible flow of information from proteins to the genome in modern cells, in a direct violation of the Central Dogma of molecular biology. The prion-mediated heredity that violates the Central Dogma appears to be a specific, most radical manifestation of the widespread assimilation of protein (epigenetic) variation into genetic variation. The epigenetic variation precedes and facilitates genetic adaptation through a general ‘look-ahead effect’ of phenotypic mutations.,,, Conclusions: The Central Dogma of molecular biology is refuted by genetic assimilation of prion-dependent phenotypic heredity. This phenomenon is likely to be the tip of the proverbial iceberg,,, Even more generally, the entire spectrum of epigenetic variation, in particular various modifications of DNA, chromatin proteins and RNA, potentially can be similarly assimilated by evolving genomes.,,, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3472225/ Revisiting the Central Dogma in the 21st Century - James A. Shapiro - 2009 Excerpt (Page 12): Underlying the central dogma and conventional views of genome evolution was the idea that the genome is a stable structure that changes rarely and accidentally by chemical fluctuations (106) or replication errors. This view has had to change with the realization that maintenance of genome stability is an active cellular function and the discovery of numerous dedicated biochemical systems for restructuring DNA molecules.(107–110) Genetic change is almost always the result of cellular action on the genome. These natural processes are analogous to human genetic engineering,,, (Page 14) Genome change arises as a consequence of natural genetic engineering, not from accidents. Replication errors and DNA damage are subject to cell surveillance and correction. When DNA damage correction does produce novel genetic structures, natural genetic engineering functions, such as mutator polymerases and nonhomologous end-joining complexes, are involved. Realizing that DNA change is a biochemical process means that it is subject to regulation like other cellular activities. Thus, we expect to see genome change occurring in response to different stimuli (Table 1) and operating nonrandomly throughout the genome, guided by various types of intermolecular contacts (Table 1 of Ref. 112). http://shapiro.bsd.uchicago.edu/Shapiro2009.AnnNYAcadSciMS.RevisitingCentral%20Dogma.pdf Also of interest from the preceding paper, on page 22, is a simplified list of the ‘epigentic’ information flow in the cell that directly contradicts what was expected from the central dogma (Genetic Reductionism/modern synthesis model) of neo-Darwinism. How life changes itself: The Read–Write (RW) genome - James A. Shapiro - 2013 Excerpt: Research dating back to the 1930s has shown that genetic change is the result of cell-mediated processes, not simply accidents or damage to the DNA. This cell-active view of genome change applies to all scales of DNA sequence variation, from point mutations to large-scale genome rearrangements and whole genome duplications (WGDs). http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1571064513000869 James Shapiro on “dangerous oversimplifications” about the cell - August 6, 2013 Excerpt: "Depending upon the energy source and other circumstances, these indescribably complex entities can reproduce themselves with great reliability at times as short as 10-20 minutes. Each reproductive cell cycle involves literally hundreds of millions of biochemical and biomechanical events. We must recognize that cells possess a cybernetic capacity beyond our ability to imitate. Therefore, it should not surprise us when we discover extremely dense and interconnected control architectures at all levels. Simplifying assumptions about cell informatics can be more misleading than helpful in understanding the basic principles of biological function. Two dangerous oversimplifications have been (i) to consider the genome as a mere physical carrier of hypothetical units called “genes” that determine particular cell or organismal traits, and (ii) to think of the genome as a digitally encoded Read-Only Turing tape that feeds instructions to the rest of the cell about individual characters [4]." https://uncommondescent.com/news/james-shapiro-on-dangerous-oversimplifications-about-the-cell/ Modern Synthesis Of Neo-Darwinism Is False – Denis Nobel – video http://www.metacafe.com/w/10395212 ,, In the preceding video, Dr Nobel states that around 1900 there was the integration of Mendelian (discrete) inheritance with evolutionary theory, and about the same time Weismann established what was called the Weismann barrier, which is the idea that germ cells and their genetic materials are not in anyway influenced by the organism itself or by the environment. And then about 40 years later, circa 1940, a variety of people, Julian Huxley, R.A. Fisher, J.B.S. Haldane, and Sewell Wright, put things together to call it ‘The Modern Synthesis’. So what exactly is the ‘The Modern Synthesis’? It is sometimes called neo-Darwinism, and it was popularized in the book by Richard Dawkins, ‘The Selfish Gene’ in 1976. It’s main assumptions are, first of all, is that it is a gene centered view of natural selection. The process of evolution can therefore be characterized entirely by what is happening to the genome. It would be a process in which there would be accumulation of random mutations, followed by selection. (Now an important point to make here is that if that process is genuinely random, then there is nothing that physiology, or physiologists, can say about that process. That is a very important point.) The second aspect of neo-Darwinism was the impossibility of acquired characteristics (mis-called “Larmarckism”). And there is a very important distinction in Dawkins’ book ‘The Selfish Gene’ between the replicator, that is the genes, and the vehicle that carries the replicator, that is the organism or phenotype. And of course that idea was not only buttressed and supported by the Weissman barrier idea, but later on by the ‘Central Dogma’ of molecular biology. Then Dr. Nobel pauses to emphasize his point and states “All these rules have been broken!”. Professor Denis Noble is President of the International Union of Physiological Sciences.bornagain77_{May 28, 2014
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Barb:
“Designer babies” are already possible. And science keeps telling us that there are genes for everything from alcoholism to violent behavior, so why not?
Science tells us no such thing (as opposed, perhaps, to science reporters in the popular press). But we are talking about culturally conditioned patterns of behaviour, aren't we? As far as I know, neither religiousness nor atheism are biologically heritable. Violent behaviour may have a genetic component, but it's certainly to a great extent acquired and not heritable. If it is an innate predisposition, then it doesn't matter if the person in question believes in a god or not. Darwin defined natural selection in this way (emphasis mine):
Owing to this struggle for life, any variation, however slight and from whatever cause proceeding, if it be in any degree profitable to an individual of any species, in its infinitely complex relations to other organic beings and to external nature, will tend to the preservation of that individual, and will generally be inherited by its offspring. The offspring, also, will thus have a better chance of surviving, for, of the many individuals of any species which are periodically born, but a small number can survive. I have called this principle, by which each slight variation, if useful, is preserved, by the term of Natural Selection, in order to mark its relation to man's power of selection. [Origin 1959, p. 61]
and :
Any variation which is not inherited is unimportant for us. [p. 11]
Darwin's "variation" means a variable hereditary trait. He couldn't know what it was in molecular terms. Barb again:
I was quoting him as a historian describing the difference in morals and values after Darwin’s book was published. Reading comprehension is a wonderful thing.
You quoted him to justify your use of the cliché "survival of the fittest" (which is factually false, by the way: the beings that survive are not "the fittest" but merely "fit enough"; otherwise the slightest defect would be lethal). It wasn't a felicitous summary of the theory of natural selection even in the 19th century. How it was understood or rather misunderstood by lay people is not Darwin's fault. You might just as well blame Wagner for inspiring Hitler's sick imagination.Piotr_{May 28, 2014
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Piotr:
The real “competition” in biology is not between individuals, populations or species, but between alleles occupying the same genomic locus.
Mayr says otherwise in "What Evolution Is". No one should listen to Piotr over Ernst Mayr when it comes to evolution.Joe_{May 28, 2014
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BA: A change in the DNA sequence stays in your descendants forever (or at least until it is overwritten by a new mutation). An epigenetic change (methylation, histone remodelling) persist through a few generations at best (so their significance in fixing adaptations practically equals zero). They don't work in such a way that your acquired patterns of behaviour should be inherited by your children or grandchildren. And if your kids bear a strange resemblance to the postman rather than you, I am afraid epigenetic imprinting is not a likely explanation. The last link has nothing to do with heritability or evolution, and the last-but-one is patent pseudoscience.Piotr_{May 28, 2014
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