Please Take the Time to Understand Our Arguments Before You Attack Them

_{Barry Arrington
October 1, 2013

Intelligent Design

5}_{Categories
Intelligent Design}

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The comments our Darwinist friends put up on this site never cease to amaze. Consider, as a for instance, Kantian Naturalist’s comment that appears as comment 9 to kairosfocus’ Infographic: The science of ID post. The post sets forth a simple summary of the case for ID, and KN responds:

What I like about this infographic is that it makes really clear where the problem with intelligent design lies.

Here’s the argument:

(1) We observe that all As are caused by Bs. (2) Cs are similar to As in relevant respects. (3) Therefore, it is highly probable that Cs are also caused by Bs.

But this is invalid, because the conclusion does not follow from the premises.

KN has been posting on this site for years. He is obviously an intelligent man. He is obviously a man of good will. I will assume, therefore, that he is attacking ID as he believes it to be and not a straw man caricature of his own making. And that is what is so amazing. How can an intelligent person of good will follow this site for several years and still not understand the basics of ID? It beggars belief.

Maybe it will help if I explain ID using the same formal structure KN has used.

KN:

(1) We observe that all As are caused by Bs.

ID as it really is:

(1) For all As whose provenance is actually known, the cause of A was B.

Here “A” could be complex specified information or irreducible complexity.

B, of course, stands for “the act of an intelligent agent.”

In step 1 KN is actually not far off the mark. I have reworded it slightly, because ID does not posit there is no possible explanation for A other than B. ID posits that in our universal experience of A where its provenance has been actually observed, it has always arisen from B. Now, there may be some other cause of A (Neo-Darwinian evolution – NDE – for instance), but the conclusion that NDE causes A arises from an inference not an observation. “NDE caused A” is not just any old inference. We would argue that it is an inference skewed by an a priori commitment to metaphysical materialism and not necessarily an unbiased evaluation of the data.

KN:

(2) Cs are similar to As in relevant respects.

ID as it really is:

(2) We observe A to exist within living systems.

In (2) KN starts to go off the rails in a serious way. Here we have the tired old “ID is nothing by an argument from analogy” argument. KN is saying that the complex specified information in a cell is “similar in relevant respects” to the complex specified information found, for example, in a language or a code. He is saying that the irreducible complexity of any number of biological systems is “similar in relevant respects” to the irreducible complexity of machines.

No sir. That is not what ID posits at all, not even close. ID posits that the complex specified information in a cell is identical to the complex specified information of a computer code. The DNA code is not “like” a computer code. The DNA code and a computer code are two manifestations of the same thing. The irreducible complexity of the bacterial flagellum is identical to (not similar to) the irreducible complexity of an outboard motor.

ID proponents obviously have the burden of demonstrating their claims. For example, they have the burden of demonstrating that the DNA code and a computer code are identical in relevant respects. And if you disagree with their conclusions that is fair enough. Tell us why. But it is not fair to attempt to refute ID by attacking a claim ID proponents do not make.

KN:

(3) Therefore, it is highly probable that Cs are also caused by Bs.

ID as it really is:

(3) Therefore, abductive reasoning leads to the conclusion that B is the best explanation of A.

The Wikipedia article on abductive reasoning is quite good. [I have changed the symbols to correspond with our discussion]:

to abduce a hypothetical explanation “B” from an observed surprising circumstance “A” is to surmise that “B” may be true because then “A” would be a matter of course. Thus, to abduce B from A involves determining that B is sufficient (or nearly sufficient), but not necessary, for A.

For example, the lawn is wet. But if it rained last night, then it would be unsurprising that the lawn is wet. Therefore, by abductive reasoning, the possibility that it rained last night is reasonable. . . . abducing rain last night from the observation of the wet lawn can lead to a false conclusion. In this example, dew, lawn sprinklers, or some other process may have resulted in the wet lawn, even in the absence of rain.

[Philosopher Charles Sanders] Peirce argues that good abductive reasoning from A to B involves not simply a determination that, e.g., B is sufficient for A, but also that B is among the most economical explanations for A. Simplification and economy call for the ‘leap’ of abduction.

For what seems like the ten thousandth time: ID does not posit that the existence of complex specified information and irreducibly complex structures within living systems compels “act of an intelligent agent” as a matter of logical necessity. ID posits that given our universal experience concerning complex specified information and irreducibly complex structures where the provenance of such has been actually observed, the best explanation of the existence of these same things in living structures is “act of intelligent agent.”

KN, I hope this helps. If you disagree with any of the premises or the abuction that we say follows from the premises, by all means attack them with abandon. But please don’t attack an argument we do not make. That just wastes everyone’s time.

Comments

Hi RD Miksa,
Because we are not saying that “A precedes B” and “B precedes A” at the same time and in the same way. What we are saying, is that “If A, then A caused by B” and then “If B, then B caused by A.” So, A, then caused by B, then caused by A, then caused by B, then caused by A, and so on. There is a temporal distinction there. And thus, there is nothing logically contradictory about that chain.
That's right - I said in my last post that you can avoid this contradiction by an infinite causal chain, although that was a bad hypothesis for other reasons. But what I also said was that these two premises "stand in contradiction to each other when one considers the origin of either mind or CSI". And an infinite causal chain does not address the origin of either CSI or mind.
But they don’t. They just lead to an infinite regress, but such a regress is not logically contradictory (see above). You might try to show that such a regress is impossible, but you cannot claim it to be contradictory.
Again, the endless chain is not contradictory, but it fails to resolve the origin of mind or CSI. And no, these premises do not "lead to an infinite regress", because there are other explanations for the origin of CSI on Earth that do not involve mind at all.
So your objection against the endless chain of alternate causation seems to fail, because you are attempting to use a metaphysical point to doubt what our uniform and repeated experience tells us is the case, and you yourself admit that doing so is unjustified.
No, none of this is right. My objection to an endless chain of alternate causation is the same as yours should be of course - it's just a far-fetched theory that nobody takes seriously, lacks any evidence whatsoever, and fails to identify the source of either mind or CSI!
It cannot both be true that mind preceded CSI and that CSI preceded mind, even though in our experience those two things are invariably true.” Whoa!!! Remember, we are supposedly not interested here in what is actually true, but what we should believe based on the evidence of our uniform and repeated experience (even if it is not true in actuality).
Please, RDM, please pay attention to this: We have already, and at excruciating length, agreed that our experiential facts are true under the epistemology we have adopted (empiricism), and that empiricism excludes - does not consider - what metaphysical truths may lay beyond the realm of our experience. Thus when I say something is invariably true in this context, it clearly means that it holds true in our uniform and repeated experience. Please do no make me go through this again!
And thus, given that I can believe in an endless chain of alternate causation, then, given that such a chain is highly probable because it does not violate our uniform and repeated experience, I should believe it based on your own empiricism.
What? You can believe in anything you want to, but as I said if you believe in an endless chain of alternate causation simply because it doesn't happen to violate these experiential facts about mind and CSI, you will be quite alone, because nobody else I know would believe such a speculative hypothesis at all! There are other hypotheses that likewise do not violate these experiential facts of course, and some of them are not as far-fetched as your endless chain (such as that life on Earth came from life elsewhere). None of them warrant our empirical belief however.
Now do you see the problem that your combination of ideas and statements causes for you?
I have shown how our experience (our observations) render the a priori probability of both abiogenesis and ID low, and I have said that there is no further evidence for either hypothesis that would suggest either is true. I have explained that the theory that life on Earth comes from life elsewhere (let's call this "ET-ancestor" theory) is the least terrible theory that we have, but that one is still a very bad theory of origins (doesn't explain the origin of extra-terrestrial life, no evidence for it). Cheers, RDFishRDFish_{October 9, 2013
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Hi Vivid,
I mentioned this before but for me personally after all these years, going back to the ARN days,you have clearly articulated your position. As you should know I have great respect for you and its great to know where you are coming from. That is not to say you had not clearly articulated your position before but for whatever reason getting into this nitty gritty has answered many questions that have rattled around in my head from time to time.
Thank you again, Vivid. I will say that what I have articulated here is not really what I have most often been arguing on these boards. This interplay between mind and matter (or mind and CSI) that I've been discussing here is only one thing that I believe undermines the notion that ID represents an empirically supported theory of origins. I think there are actually even more important problems with ID, namely that it actually lacks a specific and coherent notion of what the term "intelligent" is supposed to encompass in the context of ID, and that the defense of ID actually rests on undemonstrable metaphysical commitments to dualism and libertarian free will.
Obviously you put a premium on empericism but you did mention somewhere up thread that you do not consider empericism the sole repository of knowledge.I would be interested to read what other sources of knowledge you do accept.
I do think however that empirically supported facts are special, and deserve higher regard. However, empiricism has nothing to offer regarding the most important questions to me (those involving origins, meaning, morality, and so on). And again, I believe it is critically important to have beliefs about these things anyway, and so it follows that it is rational to adopt or accept beliefs about these issues without good empirical reasons. I just maintain that it is very important to be explicit about this, and not confuse the status of our beliefs about origins, etc. with our empirically supported knowledge.
It seems to me if only that which we can empericaly demonstrate is objective fact, that position itself cannot be emperically demonstrated.
That's true of course - epistemology is one of many, many important things in philosophy that can't be solved by appeal to our experience.
Of course I am not telling you something you havent considered so I am interested in what you consider , if any, other knowledge (objective) sources. Thanks in advance.
I hesitate to use the word "objective" at all - that is a concept that can consume a lifetime of epistemological debate to attempt (and fail) to clarify. But with respect to how we justify our beliefs outside of empiricism, I think these justifications are actually post hoc rationalizations for beliefs we hold without compelling, rationally coherent supporting evidence. In fact, I have argued at length here against doxastic voluntarism: I do not believe that we have conscious, volitional control over what we believe and what we do not believe. What does this mean for us as humans in the world? First, that science should be (1) highly respected and (2) acknowledged as inapplicable for many important questions. Second, that we should acknowledge that for all the questions science can't help answer, while we can certainly hold and defend definite positions, we should always temper our certainty, be willing to entertain opposing views, and never claim that we are absolutely, certainly correct without possibility of error. Cheers, RDFishRDFish_{October 9, 2013
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RDFish
With regard to my point about CSI and mind, it is our experience that neither intelligence nor consciousness ever occurs without preceding CSI, so “mind” can be considered to mean “something that is intelligent and conscious”.
Your position is that intelligence and consciousness occurs with 'preceding' CSI. What do you mean by preceding? Your position would be clearer if you would have stated that intelligence and consciousness occurs in the presence of (or in combination with) CSI (the brain). What exactly do you mean with preceding? Does the brain (CSI) precede the mind? If so, is the mind something else entirely - immaterial perhaps?Box_{October 9, 2013
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Dear RDFish, First, I just and re-read most of your comments on this thread, so that was a refreshing remainder of your points. Now, you said: “It should be obvious that both of these things cannot possibly be true, any more than someone can lift themselves by their own bootstraps, because “A precedes B” and “B precedes A” are contradictory statements. Something obviously has to give.” You have phrased this incorrectly, and because you have done so, you think they are logically contradictory when they are not. And they are indeed not logically contradictory. Why? Because we are not saying that “A precedes B” and “B precedes A” at the same time and in the same way. What we are saying, is that “If A, then A caused by B” and then “If B, then B caused by A.” So, A, then caused by B, then caused by A, then caused by B, then caused by A, and so on. There is a temporal distinction there. And thus, there is nothing logically contradictory about that chain. So, for the ID debate: If CSI, then mind, then CSI, then mind, then CSI, then mind, and so on. There is nothing contradictory about that! You said: “It is pointless to attempt to constuct a deductive argument based on these facts of our experience, because as I’ve already shown they already stand in contradiction to each other when one considers the origin of either mind or CSI.” But they don’t. They just lead to an infinite regress, but such a regress is not logically contradictory (see above). You might try to show that such a regress is impossible, but you cannot claim it to be contradictory. And furthermore, even if you showed that a regress was metaphysically impossible, I would then remind you of something you said earlier: “Empricism holds that as long as something reliably appears to us to be material, or immaterial (or to be accelerating, or to be hot, etc) that is all we can say about it. We cannot then doubt our results because somebody somewhere could come up with a metaphysical claim that brings the veracity of our uniform and repeated experience into question.” So, on your view, empiricism holds that as long as something reliably appears to us, like that “CSI requires mind” and that “mind requires CSI”, that is all we can say about it. We cannot then doubt our results because somebody somewhere could come up with a metaphysical claim that brings the veracity of our uniform and repeated experience into question. So your objection against the endless chain of alternate causation seems to fail, because you are attempting to use a metaphysical point to doubt what our uniform and repeated experience tells us is the case, and you yourself admit that doing so is unjustified. You said: “It cannot both be true that mind preceded CSI and that CSI preceded mind, even though in our experience those two things are invariably true.” Whoa!!! Remember, we are supposedly not interested here in what is actually true, but what we should believe based on the evidence of our uniform and repeated experience (even if it is not true in actuality). And thus, given that I can believe in an endless chain of alternate causation, then, given that such a chain is highly probable because it does not violate our uniform and repeated experience, I should believe it based on your own empiricism. Now do you see the problem that your combination of ideas and statements causes for you? More to follow.RD Miksa_{October 9, 2013
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I should have written "based stricly on emeprical evidence I would say yes" Vividvividbleau_{October 9, 2013
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RDF
Would you care to comment, however, on the hypothesis that life on Earth is simply descended from life elsewhere? That hypothesis has a higher prior probability than the ones you’ve been discussing, since no experientially observed principles are violated
Although this quesion was not addressed to me I thought I would answer it anyway. Based strictly on emperical knowledge I would YES. Vividvividbleau_{October 9, 2013
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RDF
So in the end, it is my position on the matter which is only intellectually honest one: There is no empirically supported explanation for the origin of life on Earth; nobody knows how we came to exist.
I mentioned this before but for me personally after all these years, going back to the ARN days,you have clearly articulated your position. As you should know I have great respect for you and its great to know where you are coming from. That is not to say you had not clearly articulated your position before but for whatever reason getting into this nitty gritty has answered many questions that have rattled around in my head from time to time. Obviously you put a premium on empericism but you did mention somewhere up thread that you do not consider empericism the sole repository of knowledge.I would be interested to read what other sources of knowledge you do accept. It seems to me if only that which we can empericaly demonstrate is objective fact, that position itself cannot be emperically demonstrated. Of course I am not telling you something you havent considered so I am interested in what you consider , if any, other knowledge (objective) sources. Thanks in advance. Vividvividbleau_{October 9, 2013
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Hi Box, Good questions - it's always important to define terms that may be ambiguous in some context. For most of the discussion above I used the terms "intelligent" and "conscious" specifically, and gave definitions for those that distinguished between these two mental attributes. Later, for shorthand, I used "mind", which really might refer to either or both of those mental attributes. But later in the debate the distinction between intelligence and consciousness was not relevant to the discussion. With regard to my point about CSI and mind, it is our experience that neither intelligence nor consciousness ever occurs without preceding CSI, so "mind" can be considered to mean "something that is intelligent and conscious". As for "CSI", I mean generally what ID proponents mean, although I don't care to get into a discussion about how CSI might be quantified or made objective. I simply agree with ID proponents that the complex form and function we observe is something that demands explanation, and nobody has demonstrated rigorously that something like random variation and selection (or anything else) could possibly result in such systems given the age of the Earth (or even of the universe). Regarding if mind contains CSI: Let me be careful with the way I phrase this so as not to confuse. First, we observe that there is a reliable correlation between CSI and minds: minds are invariably associated with bodies that contain high levels of CSI. But the relationship is stronger than a mere correlation, because of what we know about the brain's role in storing and processing information. So I'd say in our shared experience, mind operates only in the presence of CSI, and there is also reason to believe that CSI is in fact necessary in order for mental operations to proceed. Cheers, RDFishRDFish_{October 9, 2013
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RDFish, How do you define 'mind'? How do you define 'CSI'? Does mind contain CSI? If not, why not?Box_{October 9, 2013
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Hi RD Miksa,
This is MY deductive argument, using RDFISH’s Statements / Ideas as premises, to show why RDFish, if he is to be consistent, should believe in an ID-type theory concerning the biological origins of CSI on Earth (even if that theory is not true in reality).
It is pointless to attempt to constuct a deductive argument based on these facts of our experience, because as I've already shown they already stand in contradiction to each other when one considers the origin of either mind or CSI. It cannot both be true that mind preceded CSI and that CSI preceded mind, even though in our experience those two things are invariably true. As far as an "endless chain of alternate causes", yes this would not violate the facts of our experience regarding CSI and mind, but it is a perfectly outlandish theory that has no evidence at all. But you keep ignoring the obvious point that there is a much better theory that also does not violate these facts of our experience, which is that life on Earth came from life elsewhere! Why is it you don't wish to consider this possiblity? In summary, if you insist on picking the best explanation for the origin of life on Earth, it clearly must be that it came from some other planet somehow. But that is a terrible theory too, since it fails to explain how life came to exist on that other planet, and how it got to Earth, and besides we don't have any evidence to support that it actually happened this way. So in the end, it is my position on the matter which is only intellectually honest one: There is no empirically supported explanation for the origin of life on Earth; nobody knows how we came to exist. Cheers, RDFishRDFish_{October 9, 2013
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OK, let’s start this again, and in enough painful detail that I hope there will be no confusion! This is MY deductive argument, using RDFISH’s Statements / Ideas as premises, to show why RDFish, if he is to be consistent, should believe in an ID-type theory concerning the biological origins of CSI on Earth (even if that theory is not true in reality). Onward (and given my own repetition, plus the fact that I am getting tired, I will present this version of the argument in my own words but with RDFish’s ideas)! PREMISE 1: As empiricists, when we validate our beliefs, we can consult only what we and others perceive experientially. So, the validation / justification for our beliefs comes from what we experience. PREMISE 2: All of our uniform and repeated experience has shown us that there is no mind without CSI (CSI requires mind). We have no experiences that counter this. PREMISE 3: All of our uniform and repeated experience has shown us that there is no CSI without mind (Mind requires CSI). We have no experiences that counter this. PREMISE 4: We experience that something with CSI exists on Earth (undeniable). PREMISE 5: If we are justifying our beliefs based on our uniform and repeated experience, then, given that ALL our uniform and repeated experience has shown us that there is no CSI without mind, then we must believe that that something with CSI from Premise 4 was caused by a mind because that is what all of our uniform and repeated experience has shown us (even if this is not true in reality). PREMISE 6: But if we are justifying our beliefs based on our uniform and repeated experience, then, given that ALL our uniform and repeated experience has shown us that there is no mind without CSI, then we must believe that the mind in Premise 5 was caused by CSI because that is what all of our uniform and repeated experience has shown us (even if this is not true in reality). PREMISE 7: But if Premise 5 is the case, and if Premise 6 is the case, then we must believe in an endless chain of alternate causation between mind and CSI (even if this endless chain of alternate causation does not exist in reality), because that is what we would logically and necessarily have to believe if we were consistently basing our beliefs on what we uniformly and repeatedly experience. CONCLUSION 1: Therefore, given the endless chain of alternate causation between mind and CSI that we must believe in if we are consistently basing our beliefs on what we uniformly and repeatedly experience (even if this endless chain of alternate causation does not exist in reality), then we must believe that ID is the cause of CSI on Earth, for all our uniform and repeated experience shows us that CSI requires a mind (no CSI without mind), and thus we must believe that the first CSI on Earth requires a mind to account for it (even if this is not true in reality). And therefore, we must believe in an ID-type theory of origins for the first instance of CSI on Earth (even if this is not true in reality). So now, is it finally clear why I say that when RDFish’s Statements are taken in totality and are put in a deductive argument, they logically and necessarily lead to the conclusion that “we must believe in an ID-type theory of origins for the first instance of CSI on Earth (even if this is not true in reality).” Someone? Anyone? Is this argument clear? Lol! RD MiksaRD Miksa_{October 9, 2013
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Hi RD Miksa,
And those are the Statements that you yourself INSISTED upon:...
Ah, one thing that may have introduced a miscommunication is the word "INSISTED" (or insisted :-)). You have a habit of saying that I "admit" things, which implies that these are things which do not support my position by I have no choice but which to accede to - i.e. things that I concede. But these facts of our experience are not concsessions that I make; they are facts which I have brought into the argument, and so I said I "insisted" rather than "admitted" that our experience was thus. I think you interpreted my use of the word to mean that I was positive that our experience proved that these things were absolutely and inviolately true (intelligent behavior is necessary to create CSI, and CSI is necessary to produce intelligent behavior). Of course that was not my intent. It should be obvious that both of these things cannot possibly be true, any more than someone can lift themselves by their own bootstraps, because "A precedes B" and "B precedes A" are contradictory statements. Something obviously has to give. The argument I have been making here is that we have no evidence by which we can decide which of these experientially observed things did not hold when life was originated, and that perhaps neither of them were. Would you care to comment, however, on the hypothesis that life on Earth is simply descended from life elsewhere? That hypothesis has a higher prior probability than the ones you've been discussing, since no experientially observed principles are violated (we know, after all, that biological systems do in fact reproduce). That seems to be the best hypothesis, even though that one too doesn't explain the origin of CSI, and we have no actual evidence that it is true. Given that both ID and abiogenesis violate our experience, do you agree that "ET life forms were our ancestors" is the best explanation for life on Earth? And do you agree that even that hypothesis does not warrant our belief, since we have no evidence that it is true? Cheers, RDFishRDFish_{October 9, 2013
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Dear RDFish, I know that you did not present your argument as a deductive one! I am the one that did that. But my point was that you clearly made certain Statements which were entirely legitimate for me to use as premises in a deductive argument of my own creation in order to show you where your own statements logically and necessarily led. And those are the Statements that you yourself INSISTED upon: namely, that in our repeated and uniform experience, there is "no mind without CSI" and "no CSI without mind." I used those Statements in a deductive argument to show that if we are validating our beliefs through experience, then the belief that we should hold based on those two Statements is that an endless chain of alternate causation between CSI and mind exists, and thus that ID for biological origins is undeniable. And as far as repeating yourself till you are blue in the face...trust me, I know the feeling! Lol! RD MiksaRD Miksa_{October 9, 2013
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Just so that you are aware, the reason that I keep using CAPS is because I am a half-wit and I don't know how to use bold or italics with this system! RD MiksaRD Miksa_{October 9, 2013
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Hi RD Miska,
I have to say, your last comments appear move the goalposts, deny premises that you have INSISTED upon, and confuse your position greatly.
That is entirely baseless, RDM. Everything we've said is right here on this page, and you can search all you'd like but you will not find that I have ever stated any commitment to any "premises" from which to draw deductive conclusions regarding origins. What you call "premises" are statements regarding our uniform and repeated experience, and I could not possibly have been more clear about that! I was very, very, very careful to explain that over and over again, for exactly this reason.
Well then, why did you use the word REQUIRES?
Mind requires CSI; CSI requires mind. This was my short phrase capturing what I have been explaining consistently throughout our discussion. We observe that intelligent behavior does not commence without pre-existing CSI AND that CSI does not appear without pre-existing intelligence. You attempt to take these (hopefully obvious) statements about our uniform and repeated experience and assume that I have offered them as premises in a formal deductive proof of something, which is not at all a fair interpretation of my position, given how often I've carefully qualified my remarks. You also accuse me of moving goalposts and denying statements I've made previously, when I have been so consistent that I'm sure I've bored whatever readers are still with us by my consistent repetitions :-)
So please, phrase your premises with precision or else the only result will be confusion (and I too will take this advice).
Yes, I'm sure I could always be more precise and clear, and I do endeavor to do that, and will redouble my efforts in the future.
But it does not matter what you think of the endless chain of alternating causation. If your premise are true, which you before INSISTED that they were,...
And again, I have never insisted that any "premises" were known to be true - I have insisted that our uniform and repeated experience we invariably confirm that there is no mind without CSI and there is no CSI without mind.
Just because you consider it far-fetched does not remove its logical necessity given the premises that you INSIST on.
I'm confident that any fair reader of our discussion will agree that I never proposed any formal deductive argument which concluded with certainty something or other about origins. Rather, I stated as clearly as possible what our uniform and repeated experience demonstrates, and showed how our experience indicates that mind requires CSI to exist and that CSI requires mind to exist, and how these facts set the a priori probability of both ID and "materialistic" theories of origins low, and how there is no good a posteriori evidence for any particular theory of origins, and so we ought to say that we don't know how life got started. Honestly, I'm boring myself by having to repeat this so many times :-)
No, what you said was that our experience shows us that “CSI REQUIRES mind” and that ““…EVERYTHING containing CSI is the result of intelligent action.” Are you now denying this and switching to improbability.
I will say that in this instance you do seem to be disingenuous. My arguments have been clearly and explicitly based on a priori / a posteriori probabilities from the outset, as anyone can confirm simply by reading this thread. I have not denied or switched anything, RDM. Let's continue to try and give each others' arguments the most honest and charitable interpretation possible, rather than putting words in each others' mouths, OK?
Because if you are, and yet you wish to remain an empiricist, you will need to show me some instances where I experienced CSI coming about without intelligent action, for it is only by doing so that you can counter our uniform and repeated experience that all CSI comes from mind.
And to continue my endless chain of repetition, in our uniform and repeated experience, CSI does not arise without intelligent action, and intelligent action does not arise without CSI. :-)
Except that goes against all our uniform and repeated experience, which is supposedly the very thing you use to validate your beliefs.
Please re-read what I said about this (@209):
RDF: What you fail to understand is that our experience can only determine the prior probabilities regarding hypotheses; we must evaluate hypotheses against the evidence (if we are being empirical) and determine the likelihood of their truth. Sometimes we judge things to have low prior probability but it turns that when we actually accumulate evidence they are true. And sometimes the reverse happens – things we believe are likely true turn out to be false. And what I believe is the case here is that none of our hypotheses have high prior probability or sufficient specific evidential support.
We have no uniform and repeated experience of the origin of life, quite obviously, and so our experience here is how we determine the a priori probabilities of our hypotheses about origins. Do you understand this? If so, you will realize that none of these facts of our uniform and repeated experience constitute "premises" from which we can logically deduce the correct empirically supported theory of origins!
You said:“No – again, it could be that terrestrial CSI exists uncaused.” Except that goes all our uniform and repeated experience.
Yes, so that hypothesis gets a low a priori probability. Do you understand? If I somehow lead you to believe that I was mounting a formal argument where I propose logical premises which are known to be certainly true and from which I could deductively infer specific conclusions regarding the origin of life, I apologize. But for the life of me I can't imagine how you or anyone else might get that from anything I've written. Rather, what I have consistently intended to show was that our uniform and repeated experience of minds and of CSI shows that neither ever exists without the other, and therefore any hypothesis that requires one to preceed the other is not likely to be true. Such a hypothesis could be true, but the only way we could empirically justify a belief in such a hypothesis (such as ID or abiogenesis) would be to acquire actual evidence that mind can operate without pre-existing CSI, or that CSI could arise without pre-existing mind. So, what about this: The hypothesis with the highest a priori probability is that life on Earth has descended from life elsewhere. This does not actually conflict with either fact of our experience regarding mind/CSI. However we have no evidence that extra-terrestrial life exists, or has ever existed, nor that life on Earth came from it, and so that hypothesis has languished for lack of evidence. Cheers, RDFishRDFish_{October 9, 2013
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Dear RDFish, You said: “I’m afraid you are confused about this.” And I am afraid that in this case, you are the one who caused the confusion. After all, how else should I have taken your statements: 1. “Our shared experience confirms that EVERYTHING containing CSI is the result of intelligent action.” And that “CSI REQUIRES mind.” And: 2. “But those exact same experiences confirm that EVERYTHING capable of intelligent action contains CSI.” And that “Mind REQUIRES CSI.” And remember, YOU INSISTED on these premises! So look, you need to be absolutely clear before we continue: are you now denying one of these premises? And if so, how are you denying it? Take care, RD MiksaRD Miksa_{October 9, 2013
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Dear RDFish, I have to say, your last comments appear move the goalposts, deny premises that you have INSISTED upon, and confuse your position greatly. Let me explain. I said: “1. We experience the existence of things on Earth that contain CSI. 2. Give your own premise the CSI REQUIRES mind, then you must, by a necessity of your own accepted premise, admit that the CSI that we experience as existent on Earth requires a mind to cause it.” You replied: “Actually what this means is that the a priori probability that terrestrial CSI originated without intelligent action is low, just as the probability that mind can exist without pre-existing CSI is low.” Well then, why did you use the word REQUIRES? If something requires something else to exist, then it needs it by necessity. Maybe you should have said “very likely requires it.” But that then changes the whole discussion. And note that it was also you that said the following: “…EVERYTHING containing CSI is the result of intelligent action.” So please, phrase your premises with precision or else the only result will be confusion (and I too will take this advice). Next, I said: “3. Now, it is true that, based on your premises, that mind REQUIRES CSI, but it is still the case that CSI REQUIRES mind.” You replied: “Both things are true in our experience.” So you accept that mind requires CSI and that CSI requires mind, which is exactly the premises I used in my argument! Next, I said: “4. So, given your own premises (that mind REQUIRES CSI and that CSI REQUIRES mind), then this back and forth between mind and CSI continues endlessly and without an arbitrary stopping point.” You replied: “I think you mean “without a non-arbitrary” stopping point. In any event, I think that hypothesis (an endless chain of alternating creation) is far-fetched and has no evidential support whatsoever, and I don’t know anyone who would believe it.” But it does not matter what you think of the endless chain of alternating causation. If your premise are true, which you before INSISTED that they were, they this endless chain of alternating causation is logically necessary. Just because you consider it far-fetched does not remove its logical necessity given the premises that you INSIST on. So, if you don’t like this endless chain of causation, then you only have one choice: deny one of the premises that you previously accepted. But if you do that, then be prepared for your whole argument to break down. Next, you said: “I said that this is what we experience, which makes the appearance of CSI without intelligent action improbable.” No, what you said was that our experience shows us that “CSI REQUIRES mind” and that ““…EVERYTHING containing CSI is the result of intelligent action.” Are you now denying this and switching to improbability. Because if you are, and yet you wish to remain an empiricist, you will need to show me some instances where I experienced CSI coming about without intelligent action, for it is only by doing so that you can counter our uniform and repeated experience that all CSI comes from mind. You said: “It is also the case, of course, that our experience confirms that intelligent beings do not spontaneously appear out of nothing,” Actually, our experience shows us that not a single thing ever comes from nothing (and our experience, in principle, could never show us that something could come from nothing). So this means that you are stuck. Either accept the endless of chain of alternating causation, or deny one of your accepted premises and admit that either mind or CSI is the stopping point. But if you deny one of your premises, then your whole argument falls apart, because your will be denying your own repeated and uniform experience, which was the very thing you used to create your argument in the first place. You said: “In the same way, it could be that terrestrial CSI exists as uncaused and necessary, and no intelligent action was involved at any point at all until intelligent beings (animals) existed on Earth.” Except that goes against all our uniform and repeated experience, which is supposedly the very thing you use to validate your beliefs. You said: “No – again, it could be that terrestrial CSI exists uncaused.” Except that goes all our uniform and repeated experience. You said: “You need to understand that I am saying there is no theory of origins that does not violate our uniform and repeated experience.” Yes, there is: an endless chain of alternating causation, which I showed is logical necessary to accept if all we are using to validate our beliefs is our uniform and repeated experience. It does not matter if you do not like this theory of origins, because it logically and necessarily follows from YOUR OWN position. So either change your position or accept it. Anything else is just being completely inconsistent. I said: “And this is why, given your own premises, you MUST be a proponent of Intelligence Design concerning biological CSI on Earth.” You replied: “But of course this isn’t true. All of these scenarios are just hypotheses that we make up, all of them violate aspects of our uniform and repeated experience, and none of them can be supported by any evidence at all.” I took YOUR premises and used them in a DEDUCTIVE argument to show that you, in order to be consist with everything you have said up to this point, would need to be a proponent of Intelligent Design concerning the origin of CSI on Earth. I am not talking about hypotheses, or probabilities, etc. It was a deductive argument. If the premises are true (and they are your premises), and if the logic is sound and valid, then the conclusion follows logically and necessarily. So I say again: either show me where my logic is flawed, or tell me which of the very premises you have insisted upon this whole time you now deny? You said: “And the intelligent action that caused the CSI could not exist unless the CSI that supports the intelligent action already existed.” Which is why the endless chain of causation follows from your premises. You said: “But compare these two hypotheses: 1) Terrestrial CSI exists uncaused and necessary. 2) Terrestrial CSI was created by a mind that requires additional CSI that is unexplained or exists uncaused and necessary. Both have equal explanatory power, but the latter posits more entities.” Except you were the one who claimed that CSI REQUIRES mind and that “…EVERYTHING containing CSI is the result of intelligent action.” And if what you claim is the case, then BY NECESSITY, we must posit mind as a cause of CSI. And Occam’s Razer says: Do not multiply entities WITHOUT NECESSITY. So if we have a necessity to posit them, which you say we do, we should posit them. Take care, RD MiksaRD Miksa_{October 9, 2013
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RD Miksa,
But you must note that at this point, I am using your premises in a deductive argument. So if the premises are true (and remember that I am using the very premises that you accept), and if the argument is sound and valid, the conclusion follows necessarily. You cannot rationally deny it.
I'm afraid you are confused about this. What you call my "premises" are statements that I have made about our experience. What you fail to understand is that our experience can only determine the prior probabilities regarding hypotheses; we must evaluate hypotheses against the evidence (if we are being empirical) and determine the likelihood of their truth. Sometimes we judge things to have low prior probability but it turns that when we actually accumulate evidence they are true. And sometimes the reverse happens - things we believe are likely true turn out to be false. And what I believe is the case here is that none of our hypotheses have high prior probability or sufficient specific evidential support. Based on our experience, it is improbable that mind could have existed before there was CSI, and it is improbable that CSI existed before there was mind. That's the case, and we have to deal with it. Picking one particular option and declaring that is where truth lies is not irrational, because it helps us as human beings to have such beliefs. But these beliefs are not empirically supported, and we need to be very clear about that. In any event, the hypothesis with the highest a priori probability is that life on Earth has descended from life elsewhere. This does not actually conflict with either fact of our experience regarding mind/CSI. However we have no evidence that extra-terrestrial life exists, or has ever existed, nor that life on Earth came from it, and so that hypothesis has languished for lack of evidence. Cheers, RDFishRDFish_{October 9, 2013
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Dear RDFish, But you must note that at this point, I am using your premises in a deductive argument. So if the premises are true (and remember that I am using the very premises that you accept), and if the argument is sound and valid, the conclusion follows necessarily. You cannot rationally deny it. So, you must either show me where my logic is invalid or unsound, or you must deny one of the very premises that you have, throughout this whole discussion, insisted upon. Take care, RD MiksaRD Miksa_{October 9, 2013
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Hi RD Miksa,
1. We experience the existence of things on Earth that contain CSI. 2. Give your own premise the CSI REQUIRES mind, then you must, by a necessity of your own accepted premise, admit that the CSI that we experience as existent on Earth requires a mind to cause it.
Actually what this means is that the a priori probability that terrestrial CSI originated without intelligent action is low, just as the probability that mind can exist without pre-existing CSI is low.
3. Now, it is true that, based on your premises, that mind REQUIRES CSI, but it is still the case that CSI REQUIRES mind.
Both things are true in our experience.
4. So, given your own premises (that mind REQUIRES CSI and that CSI REQUIRES mind), then this back and forth between mind and CSI continues endlessly and without an arbitrary stopping point.
I think you mean "without a non-arbitrary" stopping point. In any event, I think that hypothesis (an endless chain of alternating creation) is far-fetched and has no evidential support whatsoever, and I don't know anyone who would believe it.
Now note, in Comment 201, you try to pre-empt this endless chain by saying the following: “To understand why, simply recognize that there is nothing to support the assumption that the chain of causation extends beyond the immediate source of biological CSI.” But it is YOUR OWN premise that provides us with the support needed to support the chain of causation beyond the immediate source of biological CSI. You are the one that said that CSI REQUIRES mind and that “…EVERYTHING containing CSI is the result of intelligent action.”
I said that this is what we experience, which makes the appearance of CSI without intelligent action improbable. It is also the case, of course, that our experience confirms that intelligent beings do not spontaneously appear out of nothing, which is why theists usually say that God exists uncaused and necessary. In the same way, it could be that terrestrial CSI exists as uncaused and necessary, and no intelligent action was involved at any point at all until intelligent beings (animals) existed on Earth.
“One might assert that an intelligent being somehow existed prior to first life, and this being somehow produced the CSI we observe in biological systems.” But given your own premises, you would HAVE TO claim that an intelligent being existed prior to first life on this planet, and that this being produced the CSI that we observe in biological systems of the first life.
No - again, it could be that terrestrial CSI exists uncaused. You need to understand that I am saying there is no theory of origins that does not violate our uniform and repeated experience. To say that terrestrial CSI exists uncaused is not consistent with our experience, but neither is the claim that an intelligent being exists uncaused.
So it is not just that we “could” posit an intelligent being as the cause of the first CSI on Earth, but rather that, on your own premises, we MUST do so.
No, not at all. It is just as unlikely that this intelligent being popped into existence uncaused, or existed eternally or outside of time and space, than it is to posit that the CSI popped into existence uncaused, or existend eternally outside of time and space.
And this is why, given your own premises, you MUST be a proponent of Intelligence Design concerning biological CSI on Earth.
But of course this isn't true. All of these scenarios are just hypotheses that we make up, all of them violate aspects of our uniform and repeated experience, and none of them can be supported by any evidence at all.
Now, you also try to avoid this conclusion by saying the following in Comment 201: “Alternatively, one might assert that the CSI we observe in biological systems somehow existed prior to first life.” But then that CSI would need to be caused by some intelligent action / mind.
And the intelligent action that caused the CSI could not exist unless the CSI that supports the intelligent action already existed.
Because Occam’s Razor states that that we should not multiply entities beyond necessity. And yet, again, it is your premises that state that: “…EVERYTHING containing CSI is the result of intelligent action” and “CSI REQUIRES mind.” Yet if this is the case, if CSI REQUIRES mind, then it is necessary to posit a mind for the existence of CSI. And thus, you cannot employ Occam’s Razor to stop the chain of causation at some arbitrary point. For on your view, both CSI and mind are REQUIRED to account for each other, and thus both are necessary. Occam’s Razor, therefore, cannot help you choose one over the other.
First, please remember that I believe NONE of these hypotheses have any justifications at all. But compare these two hypotheses: 1) Terrestrial CSI exists uncaused and necessary 2) Terrestrial CSI was created by a mind that requires additional CSI that is unexplained or exists uncaused and necessary Both have equal explanatory power, but the latter posits more entities.
So, given all this, I contend that I have demonstrated my first thesis: On the basis of your own accepted assumptions and points, and in order to remain consistent, you MUST be an Intelligent Design proponent concerning the CSI existent on earth (although you can avoid being an Intelligent Design proponent about ultimate origins). Now, do you deny this? And if so, why?
Of course I deny this for all the reasons I've given. Simpler than all of these wacky speculations would be to say that life on Earth was spawned by life somewhere else, as many have hypothesized (e.g. Francis Crick, the Raelians). Of course there is no evidence for that either, and it leaves that extra-terrestrial life unexplained, but at least we don't have endless chains of alternating mind and CSI and so on. Cheers, RDFishRDFish_{October 9, 2013
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Dear RDFish, THESIS 2: On the basis of your own accepted assumptions and points, and in order to remain consistent, you MUST accept the existence of an un-embodied intelligent entity (mind) if you accept the one additional premise. Now, note that in Thesis 1, I demonstrated why your own premises require that the chain of causation between CSI and mind continue on indefinitely. There is no way for you to deny this unless you yourself deny one of the very premises that you previously claimed that you INSISTED on. For after all, as you say, “CSI requires mind” and “mind requires CSI.” These two premises, by necessity, create an endless chain of causation between them that cannot be stopped unless one of the premises is denied. But since you don’t deny these premises, then the chain of causation between the two is not stopped. So we have established, with certainty, that the acceptance of your two insisted upon premises guarantees an endless chain of alternating causation between mind and CSI. But how does any of this relate to the issue of an un-embodied mind? Well, there are two separate arguments, each with one additional premise, which will lead us to an un-embodied mind given your premises. ARGUMENT 1’s ADDITIONAL PREMISE: a. We have absolutely no uniform and repeated experience of the existence of any embodied minds (designers) other than human beings. At the same time, we also have empirical evidence that human beings did not exist until late in the stage of life on Earth and thus human beings could not have designed the life on Earth before their own existence. And yet, the chain of alternate causation between CSI and mind does not stop simply because of this fact. After all, as you say: CSI REQUIRES mind. Therefore, since the chain of causation between mind and CSI does not stop, and since CSI REQUIRES mind, but since we have no uniform and repeated experience of the existence of any embodied minds other than human beings, and yet we have empirical evidence that human beings could not be the minds that produced the first CSI on Earth, then we are invariably led to conclude that the first instance of CSI of Earth REQUIRED not only a mind to cause it, but an un-embodied mind. After all, if CSI REQUIRES mind, but if, on empiricism, we have no grounds to posit the existence of an embodied mind that can account for this first case of CSI, then we MUST posit the existence of an un-embodied mind to account for it. And simply saying “We don’t know” will not do. Why? Because CSI REQUIRES mind. If we are claiming that we know this (that CSI requires mind), then we cannot say “We don’t know” what caused CSI when we see an instance of it. So such a response of “We don’t know” illegitimately avoids the problem but does not answer it. So, again, from your own premises, and with the addition of one minor premise that is entirely justified given our uniform and repeated experience, we MUST posit the existence of an un-embodied mind to account for the CSI that we experience. ARGUMENT 2’s ADDITIONAL PREMISE: a. We have good empirical grounds to hold that there existed a time when no embodied minds could exist (the Big Bang). And yet, the chain of alternate causation between CSI and mind does not stop simply because of this fact. After all, as you say: CSI REQUIRES mind and mind REQUIRES CSI. Therefore, since the chain of causation between mind and CSI does not stop, and since CSI REQUIRES mind, but since we have good empirical grounds to hold that there existed a time when no embodied minds could exist, then we are invariably led to conclude that the first instance of CSI of Earth ultimately REQUIRES not only a mind to cause it, but an un-embodied mind. After all, if CSI REQUIRES mind and the chain of causation does not stop, but if we have grounds to posit a time when no embodied mind could exist, then we MUST posit the existence of an un-embodied mind (or minds) to ultimately account for the existence of the CSI that we experience. So, again, from your own premises, and with the addition of one minor premise that is entirely justified given our empirical evidence, we MUST posit the existence of an un-embodied mind to account for the CSI that we experience. So we have two arguments which, when combined with your own accepted premises, lead us to an un-embodied mind (or minds). Now, do you deny this conclusion? And if so, why? Thesis 3 to follow shortly. RD MiksaRD Miksa_{October 9, 2013
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Hi RD Miksa, As you attempt to "prove" that my statements compel me into various beliefs, remember that these things in our uniform and repeated experience (i.e. that mind requires CSI and that CSI requires mind) are what establishes a priori probabilities of various hypotheses, and do not by themselves strictly compel beliefs - especially when those beliefs have low a priori probabilities and lack sufficient a posteriori evidence, obviously. It is my position that because of these conflicting aspects of our experience (the mutual dependence of mind and CSI) there are no theories at present that can be justified as knowledge. Cheers, RDFishRDFish_{October 9, 2013
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Dear RDFish, THESIS 1: On the basis of your own accepted assumptions and points, and in order to remain consistent, you MUST be an Intelligent Design proponent concerning the CSI existent on Earth (although you can avoid being an Intelligent Design proponent about ultimate origins). Now why is this the case? Here is the argument: 1. We experience the existence of things on Earth that contain CSI. (This premise is undeniable given the combination that on Earth we experience things that appear to have minds (things capable of intelligent action) and your claim that Mind requires CSI. What this means is that we experience the existence of CSI exists on Earth, and this cannot be denied.) 2. Give your own premise the CSI REQUIRES mind, then you must, by a necessity of your own accepted premise, admit that the CSI that we experience as existent on Earth requires a mind to cause it. 3. Now, it is true that, based on your premises, that mind REQUIRES CSI, but it is still the case that CSI REQUIRES mind. 4. So, given your own premises (that mind REQUIRES CSI and that CSI REQUIRES mind), then this back and forth between mind and CSI continues endlessly and without an arbitrary stopping point. Now note, in Comment 201, you try to pre-empt this endless chain by saying the following: “To understand why, simply recognize that there is nothing to support the assumption that the chain of causation extends beyond the immediate source of biological CSI.” But it is YOUR OWN premise that provides us with the support needed to support the chain of causation beyond the immediate source of biological CSI. You are the one that said that CSI REQUIRES mind and that “…EVERYTHING containing CSI is the result of intelligent action.” You cannot just arbitrarily stop the chain of causation at your own personally desired stopping point. If CSI requires mind, and if everything containing CSI is the result of intelligent action, then the chain of causation MUST extend beyond the immediate source of biological CSI. You then say: “One might assert that an intelligent being somehow existed prior to first life, and this being somehow produced the CSI we observe in biological systems.” But given your own premises, you would HAVE TO claim that an intelligent being existed prior to first life on this planet, and that this being produced the CSI that we observe in biological systems of the first life. After all, remember, it is your position that CSI REQUIRES mind and that “…EVERYTHING containing CSI is the result of intelligent action.” So it is not just that we “could” posit an intelligent being as the cause of the first CSI on Earth, but rather that, on your own premises, we MUST do so. And this is why, given your own premises, you MUST be a proponent of Intelligence Design concerning biological CSI on Earth. Now, you can avoid being an Intelligent Design proponent in ultimate terms (given the fact that on your own premises, the alternation between CSI and mind appears to continue indefinitely and with no final decision between the two), but, again, given your premises, you simply cannot avoid being an ID proponent concerning biological CSI on Earth. Now, you also try to avoid this conclusion by saying the following in Comment 201: “Alternatively, one might assert that the CSI we observe in biological systems somehow existed prior to first life.” But then that CSI would need to be caused by some intelligent action / mind. And on and on the chain goes. It is your premises that create this endless chain, and it is your premise that demonstrates that the first case of CSI on this planet MUST have been caused by a mind. Finally, in Comment 201, you also try to invoke Occam’s Razor when you say: “Now, if I was forced to pick a “best” explanation here, I suppose it would be the latter [that CSI existed before the first life], because it is simpler [Occam’s Razor].” But Occam’s Razor is useless in this case. Why? Because Occam’s Razor states that that we should not multiply entities beyond necessity. And yet, again, it is your premises that state that: “…EVERYTHING containing CSI is the result of intelligent action” and “CSI REQUIRES mind.” Yet if this is the case, if CSI REQUIRES mind, then it is necessary to posit a mind for the existence of CSI. And thus, you cannot employ Occam’s Razor to stop the chain of causation at some arbitrary point. For on your view, both CSI and mind are REQUIRED to account for each other, and thus both are necessary. Occam’s Razor, therefore, cannot help you choose one over the other. So, given all this, I contend that I have demonstrated my first thesis: On the basis of your own accepted assumptions and points, and in order to remain consistent, you MUST be an Intelligent Design proponent concerning the CSI existent on earth (although you can avoid being an Intelligent Design proponent about ultimate origins). Now, do you deny this? And if so, why? Thesis 2 and Thesis 3 to follow shortly. RD MiksaRD Miksa_{October 9, 2013
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Dear RDFish, At this point, let me summarize my understanding of your position. And then, based on what I take to be your own points, I will demonstrate these three theses: 1. That on the basis of your own accepted assumptions and points, and in order to for you to remain consistent, you MUST be an Intelligent Design proponent concerning the CSI existent on earth (although you can avoid being an Intelligent Design proponent about ultimate origins). 2. That on the basis of your own accepted assumptions and points, and in order to remain consistent, you MUST accept the existence of an un-embodied intelligent entity if you accept the one additional premise. 3. That on the basis of your own accepted assumptions and points, there are reasons to prefer the Intelligent Design hypothesis to others hypotheses. So, with these three aims in mind, let me articulate what I take to be your core position: a) You are an empiricist, which ( in Comment 192) you claim means the following: “…when we validate our beliefs, we can consult only what we and others perceive experientially, while admitting that our experience may not in fact represent the true nature of underlying reality.” So, on your position, the validation / justification for our beliefs comes from what we experience. b) Concerning CSI, you INSIST (Comment 192) on the following claim: “Our shared experience confirms that everything containing CSI is the result of intelligent action.” You summarize this point (in Comment 201) as follows: CSI requires mind. Note your use of the following key terms: “…EVERYTHING containing CSI is the result of intelligent action” and “CSI REQUIRES mind.” Remember, these are your words, and they are the premises that you have provided. c) Concerning intelligent action (design), You INSIST (Comment 192) on the following claim: “But those exact same experiences confirm that everything capable of intelligent action contains CSI.” You summarize this point (in Comment 201) as follows: “Mind requires CSI.” Note again your use of the following key terms: “…EVERYTHING capable of intelligent action contains CSI” and “Mind REQUIRES CSI.” Now, these are the only points of yours that I need to make my argument, and they are, I believe, your main points as well. So, with these points in mind, let me prove my three theses in the next few comments.RD Miksa_{October 9, 2013
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RDM, very interesting argument in 188. Rather turns the attempted regress on its head. KFkairosfocus_{October 9, 2013
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Hi RD Miksa,
But note, at each step in this chain, it is always something capable of intelligent action (design) that CONTAINS CSI, not that CSI precedes this something capable of intelligent action. There is no alternation in this chain between CSI and intelligent beings, there is just a forever chain of intelligent beings CONTAINING CSI who cause each other. But it is always a chain of intelligent beings, not an alternating chain of pre-existing CSI and pre-existing intelligent beings. So, as far as I can tell, your two premises literally guarantee that something capable of intelligent action (design) exists. And remember, these are your own premises after all.
No, your distinction doesn't help. This relationship between CSI and mind is quite symetrical, and trying to set one above the other is futile. To understand why, simply recognize that there is nothing to support the assumption that the chain of causation extends beyond the immediate source of biological CSI. One might assert that an intelligent being somehow existed prior to first life, and this being somehow produced the CSI we observe in biological systems. Alternatively, one might assert that the CSI we observe in biological systems somehow existed prior to first life. Now, if I was forced to pick a "best" explanation here, I suppose it would be the latter, because it is simpler. But of course there is really nothing at all to recommend either of these speculations. Furthermore, even if the former assertion were the case and an intelligent being caused first life, unless you additionally posit that this intelligent being created its own CSI, you still must postulate CSI that preceeded that being. In my view, these sorts of arguments amount to counting angels on the head of a pin. It really could not be more clear to me that any result of this sort of philosophical/theological argument can't possibly be defended well enough to justify our belief. And that of course is why this debate has gone on for millenia without resolution - because nobody can actually tell what the truth of the matter is.
But at each point in the chain, a CSI containing mind is what is posited. And if that is the case, then again, something like ID is guaranteed.
No, again in order for a mind to exist in the way our experience confirms there must be CSI; this CSI needs to exist before a mind can commence designing anything. For example, the CSI for a human precedes the human's ability to design. But even if you want to argue that the CSI and the mind could be caused simultaneously, you end up with a regress that can be terminated in favor of CSI alone (which enables mind to exist), mind alone (which enables CSI to exist), or a mind containing CSI - and no way of deciding which of these possibilities is true. (And by this time, this pinhead is getting pretty crowded with angels!) Mind requires CSI, and CSI requires mind. There really is no way to break this symmetry.
Well, quite simply, that everything in our uniform and repeated experience shows us that things with minds only come from other things with minds, and that living things only come from other living things. But if this is the case, then, based on the weight of our uniform and repeated experience, we have every right to prefer an ID-type explanation (things with minds only come from other things with minds) than any other explanation.
I'm afraid this path isn't going to take you anywhere you want to go. We don't use our minds to design our offspring; we just build them the old-fashioned way with biological reproduction. So arguing that things with minds come from other things with minds is as arbitrary as saying that things with minds come from other things with ribosomes. I think this is a terrible argument.
RDF: “Sorry, but I don’t think this makes any sense. If you didn’t mean that we could make rational inferences to un-embodied designers, then you would not have argued the exact opposite. If you were using the terminology of materialism arguendo, to show me that even under materialism my argument failed, then (1) you would have said so, and…” RDM: I think I did say so. From my Comment 62: “if an un-embodied designer is even possible, as it obviously is, then the design inference could itself be so strong as to give us the grounds to infer such a designer. And I could provide numerous examples where this would be the case. So even if, for the sake of argument, it is admitted that our uniform and repeated experience supports materialism, it is nevertheless possible that a design inference, in and of itself, could be so strong that it overrides this uniform and repeated experience by the strength of its own evidentiary value.” Notice my use of the term “for the sake of argument.”
Yes, but you used material/immaterial terminology before that: You started that by saying that an un-embodied designer is obviously possible; right there I could say you are already "smuggling in the assumption" that materialism is false. And before that, in the same post @62, you said:
First, most people are either implicitly and explicitly dualists, so their uniform and repeated experience is of something immaterial (their mind) influencing the material (their body), thus giving weight to the claim that the immaterial can affect the material.
Here I could say you are "smuggling in the assumption" that dualism is in fact correct - otherwise if materialism was correct then what these dualists would REALLY and ACTUALLY be experiencing was only matter. But of course as I've explained endlessly now, people's experience is what it is, irrespective of the truth of metaphysical speculations.
Not really, because you admitted that, given certain conditions, a case of CSI (language) could lead you to posit the existence of an immaterial designer.
Not exactly, no, and it is very important to specify this exactly: It is not CSI per se, and not language per se, but rather evidence that something can learn or solve novel problems that indicates intelligence. Only when you added the qualifier that this entity was addressing me directly (a novel situation) does your scenario support the hypothesis of an intelligent being. And of course only your specific stipulation that no material designer was involved did the unlikely hypothesis of an immaterial designer become the most likely explanation. (And by the way, in you seemed comfortable talking about material and immaterial designers in that context without qualifying that you really can't tell the difference with smuggling in some metaphysics).
Are you trying to say that, given empiricism, and given our uniform and repeated experience that intelligent designers are embodied, then there is a low a priori probability of our ever being able to rationally believe an un-embodied and immaterial intelligent designer exists on empiricism (even if, in metaphysical actuality, one does with certainty)? Because if that is what you are saying, and if that is the outcome of such an empiricism, then so much the worse for this type of empiricism.
Of course I have said no such thing, and I've even said the opposite (@192): But science cannot tell us ultimate truths about the world. So I think as human beings we need to find the beliefs that feel right to us, but be very, very careful about trying to say that these beliefs are somehow objectively justified. So I think it is in fact rational to hold such beliefs; I simply point out that these beliefs cannot be justified by our uniform and repeated experience.
Given our discussion, and given that the standard definitions of “material” and “immaterial” usually associate these terms with what things are in reality, I do think that for clarity’s sake, we should avoid them.
That's fine - like I said, since I was never making any metaphysical assumptions in the first place, my argument isn't affected at all by excluding these concepts. Cheers, RDFishRDFish_{October 8, 2013
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For all, please note that the numerous "?" in my argument in Comment 195 were supposed to be right-pointing arrows, but for some reason the arrows did not come through. RD MiksaRD Miksa_{October 8, 2013
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Dear RDFish, You said: “No, here is where we get crossed up. I have clearly established, over and over and over again, that I am basing the discussion on our uniform and repeated experience, and not on particular metaphysical views. I could not possibly be more clear about this, and I have never contradicted this. Thus when I say that the prior probability of X is low, it should be perfectly clear that I am not talking about the ultimate metaphysical reality regarding X, or people’s religious beliefs about X, or one person’s idea about what X might be. Rather, I am speaking of our uniform and repeated experience of X.” Yes, but what I keep repeating over and over and over again, is that when you say that “the prior probability of X is low,” it at least appears that you are speaking about a thing’s real and actual probability of existing, for to talk about the prior probability of a thing, is to talk about its real existence. Please explain to me how you connect, in this case, the concept of probability concerning X, to our non-metaphysically committed uniform and repeated experience of X, without, in some way, making a leap from experience to metaphysical reality? Are you trying to say that, given empiricism, and given our uniform and repeated experience that intelligent designers are embodied, then there is a low a priori probability of our ever being able to rationally believe an un-embodied and immaterial intelligent designer exists on empiricism (even if, in metaphysical actuality, one does with certainty)? Because if that is what you are saying, and if that is the outcome of such an empiricism, then so much the worse for this type of empiricism. You said: “Our uniform and repeated experience of rocks, brains, and baseballs is that they are material objects. If you refuse to agree with this statement, we simply lack a shared vocabulary with which to discuss “material” and “immaterial” things, and so we need to eliminate these words from our discussion.” Given our discussion, and given that the standard definitions of “material” and “immaterial” usually associate these terms with what things are in reality, I do think that for clarity’s sake, we should avoid them. More to follow. RD MiksaRD Miksa_{October 8, 2013
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Dear RDFish, I said: “No, as I explained above, first I argued on your terms—for the sake of argument—to show that even on your terms a design inference to an un-embodied and immaterial conscious intelligent agent would be warranted, and now I am trying to show you that your terms are actually flawed, and thus that the inference to an un-embodied and immaterial conscious intelligent entity is much easier than you claim it is.” You replied: “Sorry, but I don’t think this makes any sense. If you didn’t mean that we could make rational inferences to un-embodied designers, then you would not have argued the exact opposite. If you were using the terminology of materialism arguendo, to show me that even under materialism my argument failed, then (1) you would have said so, and…” I think I did say so. From my Comment 62: “if an un-embodied designer is even possible, as it obviously is, then the design inference could itself be so strong as to give us the grounds to infer such a designer. And I could provide numerous examples where this would be the case. So even if, for the sake of argument, it is admitted that our uniform and repeated experience supports materialism, it is nevertheless possible that a design inference, in and of itself, could be so strong that it overrides this uniform and repeated experience by the strength of its own evidentiary value.” Notice my use of the term “for the sake of argument.” You said: “(2) you would not then conclude the existence of immaterial designers, which do not exist under materialism!” What I said was, even if I admitted, for the sake of argument, that our uniform and repeated experience SUPPORTS materialism. I was not arguing from a position that materialism was true, because then it obviously would have been absurd to claim that an immaterial designer could exist. You said: “No, I think really what has transpired is that when we started out, we both used the terms “material” and “immaterial” in the same everybody else does, all the time, and we were debating whether or not the evidence leads us to believe the cause of biological CSI is material or immaterial. Only when you saw that my argument supports the former conclusion did you begin to deny that we can meaningfully speak of evidence leading to such a conclusion.” Not really, because you admitted that, given certain conditions, a case of CSI (language) could lead you to posit the existence of an immaterial designer. And thus, as I said above, first I argued on your terms—for the sake of argument—to show that even on your terms a design inference to an un-embodied and immaterial conscious intelligent agent would be warranted, and now I am trying to show you that your terms are actually flawed, and thus that the inference to an un-embodied and immaterial conscious intelligent entity is much easier than you claim it is. More to follow. Take care, RD MiksaRD Miksa_{October 8, 2013
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Dear RDFish, You said: “In any event, the two premises that I’ve stated here (there is no CSI without mind, and no mind without CSI) tell us that neither of the explanations argued on these boards (ID or “materialism”) can possibly be true…” What is interesting is that we have also failed to take something into account in our discussion that is indeed relevant to it. If we are going to put such a high value on our uniform and repeated experience, then, in this ID debate, we must also add an additional piece of evidence, from our uniform and repeated experience, that will support ID. And what is this additional piece of evidence? Well, quite simply, that everything in our uniform and repeated experience shows us that things with minds only come from other things with minds, and that living things only come from other living things. But if this is the case, then, based on the weight of our uniform and repeated experience, we have every right to prefer an ID-type explanation (things with minds only come from other things with minds) than any other explanation. More to follow. RD MiksaRD Miksa_{October 8, 2013
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