A Jealous God: Science’s Crusade Against Religion

_{William Dembski

November 1, 2005

Religion, Science}

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Pam Winnick’s new book, A Jealous God: Science’s Crusade Against Religion, is out in stores. It provides a nice counterblast to Chris Mooney’s diatribe about the Republican/conservative hijacking of science.

Comments

Jboze, You are not seeing your assertions, so I will point them out. Prove these. "we know thoughts themselves are immaterial" "since we cant measure thoughts" "we cant see thoughts, we can show them on brain scans, we cant weigh them, they take up no space, etc. so, we come to the conclusion that theyre immaterial entities existing somehow in time and space." We can, and we do. Neural activity can be recorded, and happens in space (across a cells membrane) and time (as a varying signal). "why cant we measure thought" We do, and if you read the links I posted you would see this. "the conclusion from what we know of everything else in the world is that thoughts are immaterial and the brain is merely the tool used to express them." Prove this, please. Do not just assert it, prove it! "if what we know from everything else on earth tells us this" Such as? "the brain lighting up here and using energy over there- those arent the thoughts themselves, its merely the brain being used by the mind to express internall and externally the thoughts themselves. if brain equals thoughts- where are memories stored? are memories even stored at all? the visions you can conjure up in your minds eye (complete with smells, sounds, sights, etc) where are they stored in the brain? can we somehow remove these memories from the brain? where is the minds eye itself located?" Listen, refer to my post #26 for the memory part. Read up on long-term potentiation at synapses. As for the "minds eye", I suggest you look up occipital lobe in google or a textbook. Show me your mind! I am asserting that the brain is the mind. If you want to argue it is something external or not part of the brain, I suggest you get cracking on the evidence for that. You point is like saying, "I throw a light switch and the light goes on. I follow the wire from the switch to the light. I use a ammeter to measure the current in the wire when I throw the switch and the light goes on. However, all of that is the effect of space donkey's using energy fields to turn on the light!"testerschoice_{November 3, 2005
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how do you gather that the burden is on me? we know thoughts themselves are immaterial. we cant see thoughts, we can show them on brain scans, we cant weigh them, they take up no space, etc. so, we come to the conclusion that theyre immaterial entities existing somehow in time and space. brain activity can show up on scans as related to behaviors, but youre not seeing the thoughts themselves. if brain activity, which one can view, ARE thoughts thmselves, why cant we measure thought? why cant we show in different brains who has more of them...who holds more raw knowledge?? why cant we even read the thoughts somehow. you havent shown that neural activity indeed equals thoughts themselves. since we cant measure thoughts, since we cant control thoughts, since we cant label them individually or measure them individually- the conclusion from what we know of everything else in the world is that thoughts are immaterial and the brain is merely the tool used to express them. if what we know from everything else on earth tells us this must be the cause, we must go with this under you and others who share this view prove otherwise. the brain lighting up here and using energy over there- those arent the thoughts themselves, its merely the brain being used by the mind to express internall and externally the thoughts themselves. if brain equals thoughts- where are memories stored? are memories even stored at all? the visions you can conjure up in your minds eye (complete with smells, sounds, sights, etc) where are they stored in the brain? can we somehow remove these memories from the brain? where is the minds eye itself located?jboze3131_{November 3, 2005
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Jboze, As far as bonding goes, I am not a chemist or a physicist so I will leave it to somebody else to debate that. I know the limits of my knowledge. (hint hint)testerschoice_{November 3, 2005
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Jboze, Guess what, the activity is the thoughts. Lets look at the evidence, brain activity correlates and has been shown as the cause of behaviors. Behaviors are the expression of thoughts. You say that brain activity is not the thoughts themselves, well PROVE IT! The burden of proof is on your shoulders to show that brain activity is not thoughts. Your hypothesis requires the extra information (namely that something besides neural activity is causing thoughts), thus it is your responsiblity to prove it. From where I stand, there is no evidence for that assertion.testerschoice_{November 3, 2005
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tester- youre still left with the dilemma of why bonds depend on electrons and the various forces they depend on. unguided processes anywhere else in the world, wouldnt lead to self organization like this...positing that matter itself was created somehow (sorry, it wasnt created, it merely emerged from nothing) and that the matters properties automatically lead to the bonding of atoms together. youre still left with major problems in showing why and how this all came about. the world we know tells us that such bonds would have to be formed by laws and laws are written by intelligent agents. the laws themselves contain information content, which we know always comes from an agent that writes the program needed to do these things.jboze3131_{November 3, 2005
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bombadill- ive noticed that often times it has nothing to do with whats posted or the words in a post. sometimes, on my own site, wordpress puts certain things into moderation for no known reason. sometimes the same person can post 10 times and all but 1 will go thru, and the 1 that wont go thru includes no banned words, ips, etc. weird.jboze3131_{November 3, 2005
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also- youve never shown any evidence that thoughts ARE material. if each thought itself is material, each one a different particular entity- we should be able to count the number of thoughts someone has. we should be able to measure raw knowledge, or the amount of raw information in a brain (as one could do by showing how much ram a computer has). we cannot do that. we cannot identify thoughts themselves, only the workings of thebrain that express the thoughts to the physical world. ive not shown that thought are immaterial- but no one has shown that thoughts are, indeed material, which leaves us with the idea that thoughts ARE immaterial and intangible.jboze3131_{November 3, 2005
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Lurker, Please, read a textbook on QM or analytic chemistry before you make assertions that are foolish. Bonding of atoms is due to the electronic (by electronic I mean electrons) structure of atoms. It is an emergent property of matter. There is no reason to assume a designer over any other possiblity. Check out the anthropic principle and fine-tuning of physical constants and you will see what I mean. Basically, of course life and chemistry as we know it will develop in a universe that is conducive to it. If the universe were not, we would not be here to say otherwise.testerschoice_{November 3, 2005
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tester- youve pointed to no evidence that THOUGHT themselves are material and are reduced to brain. youve merely shown that behaviors use certain parts of the brain. as i said- the mind (the driver) needs the physical brain (the car) to express itself in the world we live in. youve simply shown that the car is being used by the mind. nothing youve posted to shows actual thoughts- they show how certain parts of the brain are used by certain areas of the mind. again- youve never pointed to evidence of thoughts, just the reactions in the brains to them. thats the same thing as showing that dopamine can make you happier- but all youre doing is showing that a brain chemical is used to ilicit feelings (feelings we dont see and cant show to be material in any way.) you cant show thoughts themselves...youre only showing the mind working on the brain, using it to express these immaterial thoughts to the outside world. a feeling of happiness isnt the same as 'im happy, and this is why...'jboze3131_{November 3, 2005
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I have considerable evidence I've been trying post here all day and have not been able to. Evidently the commenting system on this site blocks certain words or characters or something because I've tried repeatedly to type it in and post it... frustrating. Ah well.Bombadill_{November 3, 2005
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the fact that we even talk about the laws of physics, the laws of the universe- in any other field, wed automatically consider those things intelligently and purposely guided mechanisms/actions/creations. the fact that the universe came from nothing at one point and even formed these laws says a lot to me. i keep coming abck to the fact that in no other field of study would this be allowed...and it seems its only allowed in this field, because too many people want to proclaim that man is the end-all of all the universe...that the cosmos (im sorry, the Cosmos) is truly all there ever was, is, and ever will be. very narrow minded view to me- not to mention uttlery depressing and devoid of any meaning or value. and they want to proclaim more knowledge than we can ever possibly truly have (egos maybe?) and that this means the death of god (the end of rules maybe?) these issues have such profound philosophical and worldview implications, tho many will deny even this, that you have to take it all with a grain of sand in my view. and the side that wants to reduce all of life, consciousness, etc. is the side that has the burden to prove it. since, in our own experience, the things being discussed are, in any other field, always purposeless guided processes in which we know that a designer or intellingent agent creating was involved at one point.jboze3131_{November 3, 2005
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Jboze, Again with the assertions. I have provided evidence to back up my points, while the best you can do is continue to make your assertion that "thoughts are not material things" and "thoughts are intangible". Can you even back up these points beyond just stating them? Put your money where your mouth is and DEMONSTRATE WHY brain activity cannot generate thoughts. Repeating your point over and over is not evidence. I am open to the idea that the brain is not the only thing neccesary for thought, but my research and experience in the field show no evidence for why I should favor that hypothesis over say the quantum model or the pink unicorn theory of consciouness. Thoughts are the activity in the brain, that is what scientists have seen. Not only has neural activity been correlated with behaviors (and reported thoughts in human subjects) but it has also been shown to be causitive as well. In fact, the philosphical dialog by Eccles that you reference talks about this very point. The publications and evidence I have posted have refuted most examples you have brought up to support your position. I am starting to wonder if your position is based more on dogma and less on observation and experiment.testerschoice_{November 3, 2005
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What makes atoms bond? Did they teach themselves or are they following previously 'written' instructions? Show me a computer with a blank hard drive that can teach itself and I'll believe an atom can teach itself what to bond to and what to resist. I say the instructions were given prior.Lurker_{November 3, 2005
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the bonds that exist in atoms, i mean. the very nature of the bonds. the laws that make them possible. and no one is saying 'i cant imagine how it could' thus, a designer. everything we know from human experience tells us that a guided process, intelligence, purpose, etc. are needed for the things i mentioned. only in this realm of study can anyone posit that a purposeless, meaningless, unguided process can do what its claimed to have done. in any other field of study- the scientist would be laughed out of the room if he claimed the same thing. a fact that doesnt make much sense- if in any other field, this theory would be a joke...why in bioevo is it considered, by some, to be the only game in town? as for the "I" discussed- thoughts are not material things. brain activity can be shown with certain behaviors, but thats not the same as brain activity showing thoughts themselves- because thoughts are intangible, theyre not made of anything that we know of...and its unlikely that well ever find that theyre made of anything. you can posit that thoughts are imaginary- that its all an illusion, that its just brain activity, but showing parts of the brain lighting up during certain activities isnt the same thing at all. thoughts cannot possibly be reduced to matter and brain. if that were the case- we should see a future where scientists can read our thoughts and we will hook ourselves into each others feelings. you can never know what i feel at any given time- i might experience feelings that are so distinctly different from you, that if you could feel them yourself, it might seem like a totally different reality. you could never possibly measure that. how would you reduce such a concept to matter? what shape could it possibly take? if someone has ten times more knowledge than someone else, will there be a material difference in the brain? it surely wont weigh ten times as much, and it wont consist of any different cells or connections than the other brain. from what weve seen thru science- thoughts themselves, not the brain activities you speak of, are non-material, thus cannot be dealt with in a naturalistic manner of science. what you mention is the activity the brain goes thru (as the car) as the driver (the mind) is still unseen. the car emits energy, it makes motion- which you can detect, but the underlying mind (the driver) cannot be seen and you cannot measure these things (yet)...ive little doubt anyone will ever be able to do so.jboze3131_{November 3, 2005
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"I have a question: If human beings are born ignorant and die ignorant unless someone teaches them, how did human beings ever learn anything at all? Who taught the first man to control fire?" A similar question is 'Where did language come from?'. We all know language must be taught (see Chinese Room @ Wikipedia). A computer can't tell the difference between these two code snippets: 'L x W = Area' and 'Pi x D = Circ' because everything is just symbols. You and I know what each statement means because we have understanding while a computer only has syntax.Lurker_{November 3, 2005
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Jboze, Quantum mechanics goes against human experience, is it wrong because of that? Besides, the same criticism you make rejecting an argument against the supernatural can be leveled at your rejection of a mechanistic basis for "I". Just because you cannot imagine how it could be true (without any further study of the matter) does not make it untrue. It only means you need to do more experiments and observations to see if your model bears out. And if you are saying that atoms cannot form bonds without a designer, well then I know a lot of chemists who want to have a word with you.testerschoice_{November 3, 2005
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Bombadill, While I admire Eccles work (in fact my research centers around a part of anatomy he did much of his early work in), I have to say that I disagree with his statement. It is not because Eccles was lying, but that the knowledge simply did not exist at the time (1970s) for him to draw the conclusions he was making. Something that you do not mention in your quote is that this was his personal/philosophical opinion, not his scientific opinion. In fact, if one looks at his papers later in life, he clearly states that the brain/mind problem is material. http://www.pubmedcentral.gov/articlerender.fcgi?tool=pubmed&pubmedid=1502142 He utilizes quantum mechanical effects as part of the basis for consciousness (a hypothesis I have not seen substantially proven yet). While he does stop short of discussing self-consciouness, he does not discount it as being explainable by the mechanisms he has posited. Instead he says that it is just unique to humans, something which has been questioned by work on primates. As for the Penfield experiment, how does that disprove what I have previously stated on the matter? I stated previously that intention is separate from generation. Cortical motor control is divided into two regions, the primary motor cortex and premotor cortex. The primary motor cortex deals with the control of motor neurons in the spinal cord to generate movements. It receives inputs from the premotor cortex that deals with the planning of those movements. The premotor cortex recieves inputs from the frontal cortex and sensory association cortices, where it is suspected that intentionality lies. If Penfield is stimulating the proper motor cortex, then how would that interfere with intentionality? There is some ambiguity, I have never heard the term proper motor cortex, and it is not found in the literature. I am assuming they are refering to primary motor cortex since Penfield is most known for his work on motor humonculi (internal representations of the body) in primary motor cortex. Penfield's experiments do not contradict what I have said so far. Now, as for the point that propositions cannot be reduced to matter. I again return you to the examples given of human subjects undergoing fMRI studies and the correlation of neural activity with thoughts and perceptions. There is a great journal just for this, NeuroImage. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=JournalURL&_cdi=6968&_auth=y&_acct=C000006998&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=88470&md5=cb4f755bfed235acc6461d57daca9586 Check it out, every couple weeks another action packed adventure of correlating activity in the brain with behavior.testerschoice_{November 3, 2005
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then again- you might be saying no supernatural in the sense that you think god would be part of nature, thus not supernatural. no idea. if thats the case, and you werent saying that there is proof of what i said above, then thats a different story. i only mention that because i think you might have been one of the people before that said you believe in god but consider god to be part of nature. or maybe that was some others and not you??jboze3131_{November 3, 2005
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no one can say that there is no supernatural. its too convenient to say- oh, gosh, its just something that science hasnt figured out yet, but it will someday. thats too easy- you can use that excuse with everything, and its much like the god-of-the-gaps argument others would have such a problem with. that and its absurd to think that science is the only way to truth and knowledge, that science is the be all and end all of the universe. to say there is no supernatural with any certainty is to proclaim that the universe somehow spit itself into existence, formed bonds between atoms, created the laws of the universe, created life, formed planets, etc. everything we know of human experience tells us that these sorts of acts are never the result of blind, unguided accidents...so the evidence surely doesnt lend itself to the idea that you, or anyone else, can say with any amount of certainty that this is the case. the evidence, from our own experience, points to a guided, purposeful nature within the universe.jboze3131_{November 3, 2005
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There is no such thing as the "supernatural" - only that which we cannot *yet* comprehend. Every explanation certainly has a scientific explanation, it just hasn't been discovered yet. Quantum physics is one such example.mtgcsharpguy_{November 3, 2005
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What are you talking about, B?jaredl_{November 3, 2005
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Suggesting that propositions can be reduced to matter in the brain is like suggesting that the number 7 weighs 5 lbs.Bombadill_{November 3, 2005
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Isn't it simply induction on a sample of size one to postulate the existence of the "I" in another human's mind? Isn't that a fallacy itself?jaredl_{November 3, 2005
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The Penfield Experiment (Renowned father of modern neurosurgery): "Penfield would stimulate electrically the proper motor cortex of conscious patients and challenge them to keep one hand from moving when the current was applied. The patient would seize this hand with the other hand and struggle to hold it still. Thus one hand under the control of the the electrical current and the other hand under the control of the patient's mind fought against each other. Penfield risked the explanation that the patient had not only a physical brain that was stimulated to action but also a nonphysical reality that interacted with the brain." John C. Eccles (Neurophysiologist and Nobel Laureate): "I am constrained to believe that there is what we might call a supernatural origin of my unique self-conscious mind or my unique selfhood or soul."Bombadill_{November 3, 2005
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Testing 1 2 7. I have not been able to post all day. What gives!?Bombadill_{November 3, 2005
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"Who taught the first man to control fire?" Prometheus?MGD_{November 3, 2005
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"Ants make and follow trails. Bees can abstractly communicate the location of a remote source of nectar to other bees. Dogs piss on things to mark the extent of their territory." So you have seen ants and bees put in a maze and mark their way out, and dogs mark a maze with piss so they can find their way out?taciturnus_{November 3, 2005
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Dave, Do you really see no distinction between the way humans use fire and animals do? "None of my animals are afraid of controlled fires." So they get up and stoke the fire themselves? And they understand the fire enough to start it and control it? Or do they just sit near it because it is something warm? Do they use fire as a weapon the way humans do? Does your cat heat up its own dinner? "YouÃ¢â‚¬â„¢re giving individual humans far more credit than they are due. We spent hundreds of thousands of years without knowing how to control fire or use tools beyond sticks and stones. Humans are born ignorant and unless someone teaches them they pretty much die ignorant too. " And yet now we can control fire to the extent that it can propel us to the moon and we use tools like backhoes and digital computers. This is another distinctive feature of humanity: culture. Man can discover the causal principles of the world, technically master the world through them, then pass the knowledge on to future generations. I suspect that cat culture is pretty much the same as it was 1,000 years ago. I'd be willing to bet that cat culture will be the same 10 years from now despite the contributions of your own feline friend. Why is that? Might it be because cats can't learn the way human beings can? You dismiss the human ability to learn but its the very reason we have a culture and cats don't. I have a question: If human beings are born ignorant and die ignorant unless someone teaches them, how did human beings ever learn anything at all? Who taught the first man to control fire? Dave T.taciturnus_{November 3, 2005
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"Or, has anyone ever seen an animal leave a trail of bread crumbs or pebbles so it can find its way out of a maze?" Sure. Ants make and follow trails. Bees can abstractly communicate the location of a remote source of nectar to other bees. Dogs piss on things to mark the extent of their territory. Cats claw marks into trees as high as they can stretch. Other cats will come along, compare the height of the marks to how high they can reach, and use that to determine the chances of winning a fight over the marked territory. If the scratch marks are a lot higher than they're able to make they know it's a much bigger cat's territory they're trespassing on. When humans make marks to communicate to other humans it really isn't different in kind from what other animals do, it's different only in degree.DaveScot_{November 3, 2005
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I wasn't trying to say that house cats have the same sort of self-aware sense of the self that we as humans do. I do, however, think they have a complex mapping of the outside world stored within their brains. You can do a lot without resorting to "I" statements. Cat's mapping: man's footsteps -> food -> good woman's footsteps -> angry -> bad You don't need: "I" hear man's footsteps -> "I" get food -> "I" feel good "I" hear woman's footsteps -> "I" get swatted -> "I" feel bad I think you can have a large degree of "intellect" without self-awareness. I would also guess this all has a lot to do with the subject / object duality. Our mapping separates us from the outside world, whereas the cat's makes no such distinction. I think it's interesting that much of humanity's spiritual urges (Buddhism for example) seek to overcome this distinction. ((Please keep in mind that this is all just conjecture))cambion_{November 3, 2005
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