Evolution: If mental illness helped us adapt, Michael Behe is right

I think that many mental disorders are just adaptive functions carried to the extreme. For example, OCD in its weakest form is nothing more than what we refer to as muscle memory. Ed George

Seversky states,

"That he and Engels thought that Darwin’s theory could be co-opted to provide scientific support for their political ideology doesn’t say anything about evolution’s scientific standing."

First, Darwinism, especially since Darwinists themselves refuse to accept any reasonable falsification criteria for their "theory", does not even qualify as a testable scientific theory in the first place, but is more realistically classified as a unfalsifiable pseudoscientific religion for atheists:

Darwin’s Theory vs Falsification – video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8rzw0JkuKuQ Darwinian Evolution Fails the Five Standard Tests of a Scientific Hypothesis - video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L7f_fyoPybw February 2019 - A few falsifications of Darwinian theory that are ignored and/or rationalized away by Darwinists https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/michael-behe-responds-to-the-hit-pre-publication-review-at-science/#comment-672984

Second, that the atheistic amorality inherent in Darwin's 'survival of the fittest' provides "scientific standing" for the atheistic amorality inherent in Marx's 'class struggle' and Hitler's struggle between races, is fairly straight forward. Darwin provided an amoral origin's myth with 'survival of the fittest' that is completely antithetical for a productive society at large since it directly undermines the golden rule of 'loving your neighbor as yourself' which is absolutely essential for a healthy society. Moreover, that 'survival of the fittest' amorality would be such a failure when applied to human society at large is actually another 'scientific proof' that evolution must be false as a worldview since it fails so drastically as a overarching governing worldview for societies at large:

"Of all signs there is none more certain or worthy than that of the fruits produced: for the fruits and effects are the sureties and vouchers, as it were, for the truth of philosophy" Francis Bacon - widely regarded as the founder of the scientific method,, a devout Anglican Christian

Seversky then tries to rationalize away the unmitigated horror of the hundreds of millions of deaths at the hands of Communism/Socialism by saying "So have the world’s religions over the millennia." I beg to differ, whereas Muslims and other religions may be said to be somewhat comparable to the unmitigated horror witnessed in Communism's 'atheism unleashed', Christianity has been the source of many blessings for the world and for the common man, i.e. Universities, Hospitals, Representative Government, Abolition of Slavery, Elevation of Women, Modern Science, etc.. Seversky then quotes Marx's 'opium of the masses' quote in full as if Marx'x extended ramblings against religion somehow justifies Seversky's initial insanity of quoting Marx in the first place. ,,, You just can't make this stuff up. Perhaps Seversky will next start quoting extended passages from Hitler's Mein Kampf or Chairman Mao's Little Red Book? Seversky then asks, "Did somebody prove atheism is insane when I wasn’t looking?" Yes, atheists themselves have proved atheism is insane. Apparently you did not read post 4 too carefully.

Don’t take Design proponents word for it, Darwinists themselves admit that they have ‘lost their minds’. https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/evolution-if-mental-illness-helped-us-adapt-michael-behe-is-right/#comment-673703

Seversky then again takes exception to me reiterating the fact that for him to quote Marx as an authority on anything is INSANE. Seversky says it is 'repetition'. But alas, grade school children learn many things through repetition. Yet, one seriously wonders whether Seversky will ever make it out of the grade school of what is self evidently true since he either refuses to, or simply can not, learn anything. Seversky then truthfully admits that "Atheists recognize the appearance of design in Nature", but then Seversky immediately tries to rationalize the 'appearance of design' away by saying something along the lines that the designer could be so advanced that we would not be able to recognize his and/or their design. And exactly how does that possibly explain what Seversky himself honestly admitted clearly appears to be designed. By Seversky's own criteria, Seversky has now rendered his own arguments against Design null and void since he can now never recognize whether something was Designed or not. i.e. His argument is non sequitur Hogwash!

non se·qui·tur noun a conclusion or statement that does not logically follow from the previous argument or statement.

bornagain77

Bornagain77 @ 8

March 3, 2019 at 4:45 pm Just Splendid. Seversky, quotes Marx, whose atheistic Communist philosophy for society was given a supposedly ‘scientific footing’ directly from Darwinism

Marx published in 1848, Darwin in 1859, so it's nonsense to argue that Marx was inspired by Darwin. That he and Engels thought that Darwin's theory could be co-opted to provide scientific support for their political ideology doesn't say anything about evolution's scientific standing.

Marx’s atheistic philosophy for society, i.e. Communism, has resulted in hundreds of millions of deaths.

So have the world's religions over the millennia.

And yet, despite such unmitigated horror, somehow Seversky finds Marx a worthy authority to quote from in regards to religion?

Only in the sense that his "opium" quote makes a good point. Here it is again in full:

Religion is, indeed, the self-consciousness and self-esteem of man who has either not yet won through to himself, or has already lost himself again. But man is no abstract being squatting outside the world. Man is the world of man – state, society. This state and this society produce religion, which is an inverted consciousness of the world, because they are an inverted world. Religion is the general theory of this world, its encyclopedic compendium, its logic in popular form, its spiritual point d'honneur, its enthusiasm, its moral sanction, its solemn complement, and its universal basis of consolation and justification. It is the fantastic realisation of the human essence since the human essence has not acquired any true reality. The struggle against religion is, therefore, indirectly the struggle against that world whose spiritual aroma is religion. Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.

Sounds like he'd actually have made a pretty good theologian if he'd been one of the faithful.

And Seversky does this to somehow try to prove that atheism is not insane???

Did somebody prove atheism is insane when I wasn't looking?

You just can’t make this stuff up! In case you had not noticed Seversky, quoting Marx as an authority for anything is itself INSANE!

Repetition doesn't prove anything either - even in caps.

In conclusion, it is not that Atheists do not see purpose and/or Design in nature, it is that Atheists, for whatever severely misguided reason, live in denial of the purpose and/or Design that they themselves see in nature

Atheists recognize the appearance of design in Nature. They also recognize it as having the appearance of design because it looks like stuff that we design. Would we so easily recognize the designs of some more advanced alien intelligence? Even more, why would an all-powerful and all-knowing God that has existed for all eternity design in a way similar to that of humans of the last couple of centuries? As Hume argued, design is evidence of constraint so how can it be evidence of a being whose powers are effectively unconstrained? Seversky

Just Splendid. Seversky, quotes Marx, whose atheistic Communist philosophy for society was given a supposedly 'scientific footing' directly from Darwinism:

Darwin on Marx – by Richard William Nelson | Apr 18, 2010 Excerpt: Marx and Engels immediately recognized the significance of Darwin’s theory. Within weeks of the publication of The Origin of Species in November 1859, Engels wrote to Marx – “Darwin, by the way, whom I’m reading just now, is absolutely splendid. There was one aspect of teleology that had yet to be demolished, and that has now been done…. One does, of course, have to put up with the crude English method.” Marx wrote back to Engels on December 19, 1860 – “This is the book which contains the basis in natural history for our view.” The Origin of Species became the natural cause basis for Marx’s emerging class struggle movement. In a letter to comrade Ferdinand Lassalle, on January 16, 1861, Marx wrote – “Darwin’s book is very important and serves me as a basis in natural science for the class struggle in history.” Marx inscribed “sincere admirer” in Darwin’s copy of Marx’s first volume of Das Kapital in 1867. The importance of the theory of evolution for Communism was critical. In Das Kapital, Marx wrote – “Darwin has interested us in the history of Nature’s Technology, i.e., in the formation of the organs of plants and animals, which organs serve as instruments of production for sustaining life. Does not the history of the productive organs of man, of organs that are the material basis of all social organisation, deserve equal attention?” To acknowledge Darwin’s influence, Marx asked to dedicate Das Kapital to Darwin. https://www.darwinthenandnow.com/2010/04/darwin-on-marx/

Marx's atheistic philosophy for society, i.e. Communism, has resulted in hundreds of millions of deaths.

Chairman MAO: Genocide Master (Black Book of Communism) “…Many scholars and commentators have referenced my total of 174,000,000 for the democide (genocide and mass murder) of the last century. I’m now trying to get word out that I’ve had to make a major revision in my total due to two books. I’m now convinced that that Stalin exceeded Hitler in monstrous evil, and Mao beat out Stalin….” http://wadias.in/site/arzan/blog/chairman-mao-genocide-master/

And yet, despite such unmitigated horror, somehow Seversky finds Marx a worthy authority to quote from in regards to religion? And Seversky does this to somehow try to prove that atheism is not insane??? You just can't make this stuff up! In case you had not noticed Seversky, quoting Marx as an authority for anything is itself INSANE! One of the chief attributes of many drug addicts is what is termed 'denialism'. i.e. The refusal to deal with reality as it really is. If any mental illness ever described Darwinists denialism is certainly it. Studies establish that the design inference is ‘knee jerk’ inference that is built into everyone, especially including atheists, and that atheists have to mentally work suppressing their “knee jerk” design inference!

Is Atheism a Delusion? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Ii-bsrHB0o Design Thinking Is Hardwired in the Human Brain. How Come? - October 17, 2012 Excerpt: "Even Professional Scientists Are Compelled to See Purpose in Nature, Psychologists Find." The article describes a test by Boston University's psychology department, in which researchers found that "despite years of scientific training, even professional chemists, geologists, and physicists from major universities such as Harvard, MIT, and Yale cannot escape a deep-seated belief that natural phenomena exist for a purpose" ,,, Most interesting, though, are the questions begged by this research. One is whether it is even possible to purge teleology from explanation. http://www.evolutionnews.org/2012/10/design_thinking065381.html Richard Dawkins take heed: Even atheists instinctively believe in a creator says study – Mary Papenfuss – June 12, 2015 Excerpt: Three studies at Boston University found that even among atheists, the “knee jerk” reaction to natural phenomenon is the belief that they’re purposefully designed by some intelligence, according to a report on the research in Cognition entitled the “Divided Mind of a disbeliever.” The findings “suggest that there is a deeply rooted natural tendency to view nature as designed,” writes a research team led by Elisa Järnefelt of Newman University. They also provide evidence that, in the researchers’ words, “religious non-belief is cognitively effortful.” Researchers attempted to plug into the automatic or “default” human brain by showing subjects images of natural landscapes and things made by human beings, then requiring lightning-fast responses to the question on whether “any being purposefully made the thing in the picture,” notes Pacific-Standard. “Religious participants’ baseline tendency to endorse nature as purposefully created was higher” than that of atheists, the study found. But non-religious participants “increasingly defaulted to understanding natural phenomena as purposefully made” when “they did not have time to censor their thinking,” wrote the researchers. The results suggest that “the tendency to construe both living and non-living nature as intentionally made derives from automatic cognitive processes, not just practised explicit beliefs,” the report concluded. The results were similar even among subjects from Finland, where atheism is not a controversial issue as it can be in the US. “Design-based intuitions run deep,” the researchers conclude, “persisting even in those with no explicit religious commitment and, indeed, even among those with an active aversion to them.” http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/richard-dawkins-take-heed-even-atheists-instinctively-believe-creator-says-study-1505712

Perhaps the two most famous quotes of atheists suppressing their innate ‘design inference’ are the following two quotes:

“Yet the living results of natural selection overwhelmingly impress us with the appearance of design as if by a master watchmaker, impress us with the illusion of design and planning.” Richard Dawkins – “The Blind Watchmaker” – 1986 – page 21 “Biologists must constantly keep in mind that what they see was not designed, but rather evolved.” Francis Crick – What Mad Pursuit

First off, contrary to what Dawkins stated, natural selection certainly does NOT explain the “appearance of design”

“Darwinism provided an explanation for the appearance of design, and argued that there is no Designer — or, if you will, the designer is natural selection. If that’s out of the way — if that (natural selection) just does not explain the evidence — then the flip side of that is, well, things appear designed because they are designed.” Richard Sternberg – Living Waters documentary Whale Evolution vs. Population Genetics – Richard Sternberg and Paul Nelson – (excerpt from Living Waters video) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0csd3M4bc0Q

Secondly, when just looking at a cross section of DNA, even before getting into the astonishing multiple overlapping coding within DNA, it is easy to see why Crick stated that “Biologists must constantly keep in mind that what they see was not designed, but rather evolved.”

Cross Section of DNA – google search https://www.google.com/search?q=cross+section+dna&hl=en&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&sqi=2&ved=0ahUKEwi4uLGe_ILdAhVI7qwKHXBPCncQ_AUICigB&biw=1600&bih=782#imgrc=_

Thus in conclusion, the Christian is well justified in trusting his intuition that the world is Designed. And the Atheists is found to be artificially, and without empirical warrant, suppressing, i.e. living in denial of, that same intuition in Design. As molecular biologist Doug Axe stated in his book “Undeniable: How Biology Confirms Our Intuition That Life Is Designed”, “Our intuition was right all along.”

“Our intuition was right all along.” https://www.amazon.com/Undeniable-Biology-Confirms-Intuition-Designed/dp/0062349597

In conclusion, it is not that Atheists do not see purpose and/or Design in nature, it is that Atheists, for whatever severely misguided reason, live in denial of the purpose and/or Design that they themselves see in nature. I hold the preceding to be confirming evidence for Romans1:19-20

Romans 1:19-20 For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.

And as mentioned in post 4, the consequences for atheists living in denial of reality, much like the drug addict, are devastating both mentally and physically. bornagain77

Could religious belief be viewed as a form of psychiatric disorder because the perceived benefits outweigh any harmful effects in the minds of its adherents?

If there wasn't such overwhelming evidence for the existence of an Intelligent Designer, yes. Unfortunately, for you, materialism is a non-starter ET

In drug abuse, addicts will persist with what is a demonstrably harmful behavior because it makes them feel good and that sense of well-being is worth more to them than almost anything else. Marx described religion as the opium of the people for much the same reason. Could religious belief be viewed as a form of psychiatric disorder because the perceived benefits outweigh any harmful effects in the minds of its adherents? Seversky

As should be needless to say, this denial of reality itself, via the denial of the reality of his own mind, has some rather drastic negative impacts on the Darwinian atheist: As Professor Andrew Sims, former President of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, states, “The advantageous effect of religious belief and spirituality on mental and physical health is one of the best-kept secrets in psychiatry and medicine generally.”,,, “In the majority of studies, religious involvement is correlated with well-being, happiness and life satisfaction; hope and optimism; purpose and meaning in life;,,”

“I maintain that whatever else faith may be, it cannot be a delusion. The advantageous effect of religious belief and spirituality on mental and physical health is one of the best-kept secrets in psychiatry and medicine generally. If the findings of the huge volume of research on this topic had gone in the opposite direction and it had been found that religion damages your mental health, it would have been front-page news in every newspaper in the land.” - Professor Andrew Sims former President of the Royal College of Psychiatrists - Is Faith Delusion?: Why religion is good for your health - preface “In the majority of studies, religious involvement is correlated with well-being, happiness and life satisfaction; hope and optimism; purpose and meaning in life; higher self-esteem; better adaptation to bereavement; greater social support and less loneliness; lower rates of depression and faster recovery from depression; lower rates of suicide and fewer positive attitudes towards suicide; less anxiety; less psychosis and fewer psychotic tendencies; lower rates of alcohol and drug use and abuse; less delinquency and criminal activity; greater marital stability and satisfaction… We concluded that for the vast majority of people the apparent benefits of devout belief and practice probably outweigh the risks.” - Professor Andrew Sims former President of the Royal College of Psychiatrists - Is Faith Delusion?: Why religion is good for your health – page 100 https://books.google.com/books?id=PREdCgAAQBAJ&pg=PA100#v=onepage&q&f=false

In fact, in the following study it was found that, “those middle-aged adults who go to church, synagogues, mosques or other houses of worship reduce their mortality risk by 55%.”

Can attending church really help you live longer? This study says yes – June 1, 2017 Excerpt: Specifically, the study says those middle-aged adults who go to church, synagogues, mosques or other houses of worship reduce their mortality risk by 55%. The Plos One journal published the “Church Attendance, Allostatic Load and Mortality in Middle Aged Adults” study May 16. “For those who did not attend church at all, they were twice as likely to die prematurely than those who did who attended church at some point over the last year,” Bruce said. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2017/06/02/can-attending-church-really-help-you-live-longer-study-says-yes/364375001/ Study: Religiously affiliated people lived “9.45 and 5.64 years longer…” July 1, 2018 Excerpt: Self-reported religious service attendance has been linked with longevity. However, previous work has largely relied on self-report data and volunteer samples. Here, mention of a religious affiliation in obituaries was analyzed as an alternative measure of religiosity. In two samples (N = 505 from Des Moines, IA, and N = 1,096 from 42 U.S. cities), the religiously affiliated lived 9.45 and 5.64 years longer, respectively, than the nonreligiously affiliated. Additionally, social integration and volunteerism partially mediated the religion–longevity relation. https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/study-religiously-affiliated-people-lived-religiously-affiliated-lived-9-45-and-5-64-years-longer/ Can Religion Extend Your Life? - By Chuck Dinerstein — June 16, 2018 Excerpt: The researcher's regression analysis suggested that the effect of volunteering and participation accounted for 20% or 1 year of the impact, while religious affiliation accounted for the remaining four years or 80%. https://www.acsh.org/news/2018/06/16/can-religion-extend-your-life-13092

It is easy to see why Darwinian Atheists suffer much more, both mentally and physically, than Theists do. Atheism undermines any claim that our lives can have any true meaning, value or purpose, in the first place. And as such entails a nihilistic view of reality where everything in our lives becomes utterly pointless.

Atheistic Materialism vs Meaning, Value, and Purpose in Our Lives - video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aqUxBSbFhog

Thus in conclusion, from simply the practical point of view of living a healthier life, both mentally and physically, the Atheist ought to rightly reject his insane atheism and adopt Christianity.

Matthew 13:15 For this people's heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them.'

bornagain77

Belief in Darwinism itself is a primary source of mental illness. If the billion-trillion proteins dedicated to the singular purposeful task of keeping a person alive for precisely a lifetime and not a moment longer (Talbott) does not constitute an irrefutably powerful inference to ‘top down’ design, i.e. to seeing the ‘purposeful arrangement of parts’, then all reason is lost and the atheist is drifting about in an Alice in Wonderland world of profound insanity.

It's Really Not Rocket Science - Granville Sewell - November 16, 2015 Excerpt: In a 2005 American Spectator article, Jay Homnick wrote: “It is not enough to say that design is a more likely scenario to explain a world full of well-designed things. It strikes me as urgent to insist that you not allow your mind to surrender the absolute clarity that all complex and magnificent things were made that way. Once you allow the intellect to consider that an elaborate organism with trillions of microscopic interactive components can be an accident... you have essentially "lost your mind."” ,,, Max Planck biologist W.E. Loennig once commented that Darwinism was a sort of "mass psychosis" -- then he asked me, is that the right English word? I knew psychosis was some kind of mental illness, but wasn't sure exactly what it was, so I looked it up in my dictionary when I returned home: "psychosis -- a loss of contact with reality." I wrote him that, yes, that was the right word…. Loennig and Homnick are still right. Once you seriously consider the possibility that all the magnificent species in the living world, and the human body and the human brain, could be entirely the products of unintelligent forces, you have been in academia too long and have lost contact with reality -- you have lost your mind. http://www.evolutionnews.org/2015/11/it_really_isnt100911.html

Don't take Design proponents word for it, Darwinists themselves admit that they have 'lost their minds'.

“(Daniel) Dennett concludes, ‘nobody is conscious … we are all zombies’.” J.W. SCHOOLER & C.A. SCHREIBER - Experience, Meta-consciousness, and the Paradox of Introspection - 2004 The Confidence of Jerry Coyne - Ross Douthat - January 6, 2014 Excerpt: then halfway through this peroration, we have as an aside the confession that yes, okay, it’s quite possible given materialist premises that “our sense of self is a neuronal illusion.” At which point the entire edifice suddenly looks terribly wobbly — because who, exactly, is doing all of this forging and shaping and purpose-creating if Jerry Coyne, as I understand him (and I assume he understands himself) quite possibly does not actually exist at all? The theme of his argument is the crucial importance of human agency under eliminative materialism, but if under materialist premises the actual agent is quite possibly a fiction, then who exactly is this I who “reads” and “learns” and “teaches,” and why in the universe’s name should my illusory self believe Coyne’s bold proclamation that his illusory self’s purposes are somehow “real” and worthy of devotion and pursuit? (Let alone that they’re morally significant:,,) Read more here: http://douthat.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/01/06/the-confidence-of-jerry-coyne/?_r=0 "The neural circuits in our brain manage the beautifully coordinated and smoothly appropriate behavior of our body. They also produce the entrancing introspective illusion that thoughts really are about stuff in the world. This powerful illusion has been with humanity since language kicked in, as we’ll see. It is the source of at least two other profound myths: that we have purposes that give our actions and lives meaning and that there is a person “in there” steering the body, so to speak." [A.Rosenberg, The Atheist's Guide To Reality, Ch.9] The Consciousness Deniers - Galen Strawson - March 13, 2018 Excerpt: What is the silliest claim ever made? The competition is fierce, but I think the answer is easy. Some people have denied the existence of consciousness: conscious experience, the subjective character of experience, the “what-it-is-like” of experience.,,, ,,, I need to comment on what is being denied—consciousness, conscious experience, experience for short. What is it? Anyone who has ever seen or heard or smelled anything knows what it is; anyone who has ever been in pain, or felt hungry or hot or cold or remorseful, dismayed, uncertain, or sleepy, or has suddenly remembered a missed appointment. All these things involve what are sometimes called “qualia”—that is to say, different types or qualities of conscious experience. What I am calling the Denial is the denial that anyone has ever really had any of these experiences. Perhaps it’s not surprising that most Deniers deny that they’re Deniers. “Of course, we agree that consciousness or experience exists,” they say—but when they say this they mean something that specifically excludes qualia. Who are the Deniers? I have in mind—at least—those who fully subscribe to something called “philosophical behaviorism” as well as those who fully subscribe to something called “functionalism” in the philosophy of mind. Few have been fully explicit in their denial, but among those who have been, we find Brian Farrell, Paul Feyerabend, Richard Rorty, and the generally admirable Daniel Dennett. Ned Block once remarked that Dennett’s attempt to fit consciousness or “qualia” into his theory of reality “has the relation to qualia that the US Air Force had to so many Vietnamese villages: he destroys qualia in order to save them.” One of the strangest things the Deniers say is that although it seems that there is conscious experience, there isn’t really any conscious experience: the seeming is, in fact, an illusion. The trouble with this is that any such illusion is already and necessarily an actual instance of the thing said to be an illusion. http://www.nybooks.com/daily/2018/03/13/the-consciousness-deniers/

For prime example of this insanity inherent in the Atheist's worldview, a supposed "expert" on the philosophy of mind, after much conscious thought, decides there is no such thing as conscious thought. :) i.e. Decides that he does not have a mind.

There Is No Such Thing as Conscious Thought Philosopher Peter Carruthers insists that conscious thought, judgment and volition are illusions. They arise from processes of which we are forever unaware By Steve Ayan on December 20, 2018 Excerpt: Peter Carruthers, Distinguished University Professor of Philosophy at the University of Maryland, College Park, is an expert on the philosophy of mind,,, ,,, in 2017, he published a paper with the astonishing title of “The Illusion of Conscious Thought.”,,, Carruthers explains,,,, "I believe that the whole idea of conscious thought is an error. I came to this conclusion by following out the implications of the two of the main theories of consciousness." https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/there-is-no-such-thing-as-conscious-thought/

The claim from Darwinists that consciousness is an illusion is simply insane. As David Bentley Hart states, “Simply enough, you cannot suffer the illusion that you are conscious because illusions are possible only for conscious minds. This is so incandescently obvious that it is almost embarrassing to have to state it.”

The Illusionist - Daniel Dennett’s latest book marks five decades of majestic failure to explain consciousness. - 2017 “Simply enough, you cannot suffer the illusion that you are conscious because illusions are possible only for conscious minds. This is so incandescently obvious that it is almost embarrassing to have to state it.” – David Bentley Hart https://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/the-illusionist

Furthermore, the claim from Darwinists that their conscious mind is merely an illusion undermines any and all explanations that they may have for anything else. In fact, the denial of mind renders all their other explanations for anything else illusory. As Maverick Philosopher states, "Consciousness is not only presupposed by the distinction between reality and illusion, it is also presupposed by the quest for explanation. For where would explanations reside if not in the minds of conscious beings?"

Consciousness is an Illusion but Truth is Not? - Maverick Philosopher - 2017 Excerpt: But here comes Danny (Dennett) the Sophist who asserts that consciousness is an illusion. Well, that is just nonsense,,, If consciousness is an illusion, then it is an illusion for consciousness.,,, Consciousness is not only presupposed by the distinction between reality and illusion, it is also presupposed by the quest for explanation. For where would explanations reside if not in the minds of conscious beings? http://maverickphilosopher.typepad.com/maverick_philosopher/2017/02/consciousness-is-an-illusion-but-truth-is-not.html

It is humorous to see how the claim that consciousness is an illusion plays out in the Atheist's attempt to explain the world at large:

Basically, because of reductive materialism (and/or methodological naturalism), the atheistic materialist is forced to claim that he is merely a ‘neuronal illusion’ (Coyne, Dennett, etc..), who has the illusion of free will (Harris), who has unreliable beliefs about reality (Plantinga), who has illusory perceptions of reality (Hoffman), who, since he has no real time empirical evidence substantiating his grandiose claims, must make up illusory “just so stories” with the illusory, and impotent, ‘designer substitute’ of natural selection (Behe, Gould, Sternberg), so as to ‘explain away’ the appearance (i.e. illusion) of design (Crick, Dawkins), and who must make up illusory meanings and purposes for his life since the reality of the nihilism inherent in his atheistic worldview is too much for him to bear (Weikart), and who must also hold morality to be subjective and illusory since he has rejected God (Craig, Kreeft). Bottom line, nothing is real in the atheist’s worldview, least of all, morality, meaning and purposes for life.,,, - Darwin’s Theory vs Falsification – 39:45 minute mark https://youtu.be/8rzw0JkuKuQ?t=2387

Thus, although the Darwinian Atheist firmly believes he is on the terra firma of science (in his appeal, even demand, for methodological naturalism), the fact of the matter is that, when examining the details of his materialistic/naturalistic worldview, it is found that Darwinists/Atheists are adrift in an ocean of fantasy and imagination with no discernible anchor for reality to grab on to. It would be hard to fathom a worldview more antagonistic to modern science, and indeed more antagonistic to sanity itself, than Atheistic materialism and/or methodological naturalism have turned out to be.

2 Corinthians 10:5 Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ;

bornagain77

AaronS1978 at 1 and VMahuna at 2, all worth reflection. But if Dr. Nesse is right, he is demonstrating the power of natural selection to "break or blunt," as Behe argues. Then how did the intricate, incomprehensible system of the mind itself come into being? Probably not that way. News

I tend to look at these things as variation from the Mean. Once you've got 100 million (let alone 5 billion) instances of something, you start getting noticeable numbers of individuals 6 or 8 standard deviations below (and above) Normal. So in a country with several hundred million individuals, you gotta expect a noticeable number of freaks and psychopaths. In "primitive" societies where you have perhaps 50 members in the manpack (half of whom are below the age of 15), an individual who "sees things" that others do NOT see might be viewed as a saint. And an individual who is openly antisocial and demonstrates it will get his head bashed in by the Tribal Elders. So strangers from over the hill who drop by whilst tracking a herd of wildebeest or something would see only a bunch of normal Joes who have some odd habit like eating their veggies before they savor today's scraps of meat. Weirdos would of course find it harder to attract a mate. vmahuna

So what I’m reading here is that things like depression and anxiety schizophrenia and bipolar disorder are just malfunctions and over reactions Of past normal emotions that helped us survive in the past? Does he know what he saying he’s pretty much saying that these disorders are defective versions of one’s normal emotions. Another words he is saying that the disorders are disorders of emotions we already had. So there disorders. So when these emotions aren’t malfunctioning they provide a survival benefit correct. So pretty much if you’re feeling normal you have a survival advantage because your emotions are under control and their normal so he’s pretty much talking out of his ass trying to use evolutionary psychology to explain s**t that is defective. Yay for evolutionary psychology the ability to explain anything for any reason and it always have an evolutionary benefit because everything in this world it’s just the illusion of design AaronS1978