We cannot live by scepticism alone

_{Mario Lopez

March 5, 2009

Science}

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Scientists have been too dogmatic about scientific truth and sociologists have fostered too much scepticism — social scientists must now elect to put science back at the core of society, says Harry Collins.

Comments

mullerpr
Would your argument imply that it will be possible to attribute isolated code as coming from design, but self replicating code, like computer viruses, you will not be able to attribute to design because it self replicate or “breed”?
If you have, for example, a system that was originally designed but which had the capacity to change itself, and you let it do so could you then point to a given part of that system after many such iterations and say "that is designed"? Or would the fact that it "takes on a life of it's own" nullify that? As nobody knows how life begain the question is open.
Why does this appeal to authority sound that much like the way Galileo were treated by main stream thought of his day?
The point is Galileo was ultimatly proven right. If he had stayed silent we would never had heard of him. Publish or not, the choice is yours. However, don't expect your viewpoint to become the favoured one if you don't publish and allow others to examine your work and thinking.George L Farquhar_{March 8, 2009
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Passing by briefly again. I pause to note that evolutionary materialism is a very recent imposition on science by the C21 magisterium. It lacks both historical and philosophical warrant as can be seen form my always linked section E. (Newbies, click on my handle.) But also I will briefly highlight the core problem at work from George at 99 and 101:
It is impossible that a PDA could form complete in one step via the random search mechanism (search all of sequence space randomly) so favoured by Kariosfocus. Yet if the search space can be searched one step at a time where you start from a point already suitable for the operation in question then it’s then possible that the complexity you see is apparant design rather then actual design. Possible . . . . it depends on how you search the available space. If you search it randomly, whole universes will pass by before you find it. If you search nearby sequence space starting from a point where things already work, then it won’t take nearly quite so long. I notice you fail to address this.
A simple scroll-up to the remarks I made above will suffice to show that I have focussed not on the hill-climbing that GLF so hopes will account for the origin of functional complexity, but on the fact hat the islands of function are deeply isolated in the relevant configuration spaces. As I said, you have to get to the shores of an island before you can climb to the mountain-tops. And the config spaces for those islands -- as GLF has to acknowledge -- are vastly beyond astronomical. So, how does he "resolve" the problem? 1] He pretends I have not addressed the central issue -- explicitly misrepresenting what I have said. (Cf my always linked for my answer, GLF; that is the backdrop for ALL comments I have ever made at UD.) 2] He then proceeds to happily beg the question of getting TO shores of minimal function in config spaces that for credible first life start at 600 k bits or so of FSCI. 3] The better to do so, when he in 101 actually cited where I pointed tot he problem, he changes the subject to why don't you go publish a peer-reviewed article on it. Sorry, the Lewoninian a priori Magisterium has locked that door, GLF. Only materialistic plays are allowed in their Plato's Cave shadow-shows. I did not do that, you guys did. (And so, since I believe science should be about seeking the empirically anchored truth unfettered by dogmatic shackles, I have no interest in playing that game.) 4] Then he tries a turnabout: no-one nows how 1st life formed spontaneously through cahnce + necessity only,, so you go answer the issue. (Nope. We DO know how we get FSCI and how we get digital, algorithm-implementing computers as are seen in PDSs and the cell alike. Just the empirically based known best explanation is the one that the materialists do not want to consider: design. And, if no-one knows then why are students being misled that this is a pretty much solved problem, complete with highly misleading icons and just-so stories?) 5] He then presents us with the Dawkinsian notion that -- presto -- evident design is merely an illusion of design. (Sorry, GLF: until your side can show us a credible empirical case of functionally specific complex information of at least 1,000 bits capacity that forms by chance + necessity random walks to shores of an island of function -- without warmer-colder oracles or the like getting it wafted towards the islands -- we are confident that you have no answer to the formation of FSCI by chance + necessity only. Formation of FSCI by design -- including the active information of oracles thatbroadcast warmer-colder signals to non-functional configs -- is a routine observation or experience.) ____________ GLF, all you are doing is revealing that you have begged the material question, and are exerting selective hyperskepticism. In short, onlookers: selective hyperskepticism, again. GEM of TKIkairosfocus_{March 8, 2009
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StephenB [88]
—Adel: “he (Huxley) is using the word “wrong” in the sense of “incorrect,” not in the sense of “immoral.” Yes, that is true. Unjustified could mean, “one cannot make a case for it,” or “it cannot be justified.” In fact, let us assume that is the case. In such circumstances, he is appealing not to objective morality, just as you say, but to objective truth, in which case he still contradicts himself because he believes neither in objective truth nor objective morality.
You make an excellent point, but he may not have been contradicting himself. The word "objective" can mean more than one thing. I believe that you are using it in the sense of "having an actual existence independent of human minds." I suggest that Huxley was using the word in the sense of "based on observable phenomena." I get this from the quotation in question:
...it is wrong for a man to say he is certain of the objective truth of a proposition unless he can produce evidence which logically justifies that certainty.
If he didn't believe in "objective truth" in the way you think of it, would there have been a contradiction in his thinking?Adel DiBagno_{March 8, 2009
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George L Farquhar, Just two easy questions, that indulge your "Red herring" arguments: In #100 you said: "Except watches do not breed." Would your argument imply that it will be possible to attribute isolated code as coming from design, but self replicating code, like computer viruses, you will not be able to attribute to design because it self replicate or "breed"? (Remember this is a very strong comparison. Computer code and DNA code are literally the same thing in all coding respects as well as its ability to guide an action in a physical environment.) Then, In #101 you said: "If you can make your case, then make it. Get yourself published. Make your case in such a way that it cannot be dismissed. Provide evidence, propose expirements. Simply complaining about it on somebody’s blog won’t make a whit of difference, ever." Why does this appeal to authority sound that much like the way Galileo were treated by main stream thought of his day? And again I have to ask you to participate in the discussion at hand by making an argument that supports your flavor of skepticismmullerpr_{March 8, 2009
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Kariosfocus
But of course the material fact is that BOTH are well beyond the reasonable scope of search on the gamut of our observed universe.
And yet they both exist. So, it depends on how you search the available space. If you search it randomly, whole universes will pass by before you find it. If you search nearby sequence space starting from a point where things already work, then it won't take nearly quite so long. I notice you fail to address this.
h –> Moreover, I highlighted that the challenge — starting with a prebiotic soup — is to get to the shoreline of an island of function in the config space, not to hill-climb within that island.
Nobody claims to know how life started, exactly. So why don't you write up your understanding of the "challenge" in a way that other people can themselves challenge and potentially contribute something to overall understanding of the issue. Write a paper and submit it to a journal. If you have proof that getting to a shoreline of an island of function is impossible without telic help, then that's something that people would be very interested in reading.
Mere replication of RNA molecules is not good enough: you have to get to coded data and algortihmic function, with the associated organised nanomachines to do the job PHYSICALLY. No bait and switch just so story simplifications permitted.
So, a mere self replicator is "not good enough", presumably because that does not allow the impossible "random search of sequence space" that you claim is impossible?
There’s something rotten in the state of early C21 Institutional Science.
To be perfectly honest, whining won't fix it. If you want to make a difference there is only one club in town. Join it or continue to whine about it on the sidelines. If you can make your case, then make it. Get yourself published. Make your case in such a way that it cannot be dismissed. Provide evidence, propose expirements. Simply complaining about it on somebody's blog won't make a whit of difference, ever.George L Farquhar_{March 8, 2009
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Domoman
It seems to me that you do have your salt plain holding a PDA (that is, Earth holding life) amongst an otherwise barren planet (that is, an otherwise barren universe).
No. You would be right if there was only a single life form on the planet and there was no evidence of ancestors leading up to it. And in any case, you argue against your case here. Why does it appear that there is a barren universe (no life) and a single planet with life? If life was indeed designed would we not expect the universe to be teeming with life? What do you believe is the reason that it is not? Life could presumably be designed to exist in other places, such as the outer reaches of the Sun's atmosphere, the moon, interstellar gas clouds etc. Yet we don't see it. Why?
evolutionary accounts such as a lizard evolving into a bird have never been physically witnessed.
This reminds me of Gish's reply to everything "Were you there?" We've never witnessed the continents seperate, yet we are sure it happened. Murders happen and are not witnessed yet people still go to jail for them. How would you expect to "Witness" something that everybody agrees can take much longer then a single human lifetime? In addition, we've only really been aware of such things for only a small amount of time (a few human lifetimes). So the "were you there" objection is a poor one.
Animals therefore, as far as we can tell, may be just like a watch such as in Paley’s example.
Except watches do not breed.George L Farquhar_{March 8, 2009
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CJYman
How does replicating robotic and information processing machinery point to accidental development? How does evolution of such a system point to accidental development?
It's quite simple. It's about what is possible versus what is impossible. It is impossible that a PDA could form complete in one step via the random search mechanism (search all of sequence space randomly) so favoured by Kariosfocus. Yet if the search space can be searched one step at a time where you start from a point already suitable for the operation in question then it's then possible that the complexity you see is apparant design rather then actual design. Possible.
Can you even give an example (observation) of an information processing system such as that found in PDA having generated itself from only background noise [chance/statistical randomness]
No, because that's not how it works.
However, neither anything resembling instructional information states nor the processing of those states into function arises. Furthermore, nothing resembling self-replication arises. There are merely some instances of regularities in motion through grid space (again, akin to langton’s ant) — analogous to lawful motion such as planetary motion.
There are many replicators known in Conways game of life http://www.ics.uci.edu/~eppstein/ca/replicators/ In addition, it is Turing complete http://rendell-attic.org/gol/tm.htm and so I would image that "processing of those states into function" is possible, not that I really understand what you mean there.George L Farquhar_{March 8, 2009
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StephenB
Can you appreciate how you look obsessing over Tarot cards?
Your refusal to answer the question is noted.
ID is not a belief system, so it can accomodate all kinds of world views that acknowledge the reality of design.
Which includes Tarot cards, etc, apparently.
Meanwhile, the subject under discussion is the irrational nature of skepticism.
And yet when irrational beliefs are shown to be held on both sides of the aisle apparently only the views of the non-IDists are worth discussing? How convenient..George L Farquhar_{March 8, 2009
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OOPS: I meant SEVERSKY and Stephen et alkairosfocus_{March 8, 2009
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George and CJY: I have been rather busy elsewhere this morning on Hoyle's magnetic angular momentum transfer theory on solar system origins modelling. So pardon a bit of selective focus: Re: "ANALOGY" a --> It is a common assertion that the design inference is a "mere" analogy argument, similar to Paley's much derided and dismissed argument. (Indeed the ever reliably anti-ID Wikipedia has used the Paley Watch as its symbol for ID articles.) b --> Key problem: we have not an analogy but closely parallel instantiations of a common entity. A PDA embeds binary digital algorithmically functional, complex information. DNA embeds four-state digital, algorithmically functional, complex information. c --> The only difference of consequence is that 2-state elements compound the config space at 2^N, 4-state ones at 4^M. d --> In other words, it would be in principle easier to find PDA functional states by random walk based search and test strategies. (But of course the material fact is that BOTH are well beyond the reasonable scope of search on the gamut of our observed universe.) e --> Moreover, in each case the information functions on code based expressions of data structures and algorithms. f --> We routinely see such codes, algorithms and data structures created by intllligence, but have precisely zero instances of such being observed to originate by lucky noise. g --> And this is a point I raised at the outset when I started from the origin of life in whatever pre-biotic soup you may wish. It is also implicit in the challenge of major body plan innovations. h --> Moreover, I highlighted that the challenge -- starting with a prebiotic soup -- is to get to the shoreline of an island of function in the config space, not to hill-climb within that island. Mere replication of RNA molecules is not good enough: you have to get to coded data and algortihmic function, with the associated organised nanomachines to do the job PHYSICALLY. No bait and switch just so story simplifications permitted. i --> Also such RNA world hyps fail to face the problems of getting TO the RNA precursors, to homochirality and to avoidance of cross reactions to tar precipitation; which are the overwhelmingly likely result in real-world situations per experimental tests and observations. j --> Just check out Robert Shapiro's recent remarks, which also inadvertently apply to his metabolism-first models:
RNA's building blocks, nucleotides, are complex substances as organic molecules go. They each contain a sugar, a phosphate and one of four nitrogen-containing bases as sub-subunits. Thus, each RNA nucleotide contains 9 or 10 carbon atoms, numerous nitrogen and oxygen atoms and the phosphate group, all connected in a precise three-dimensional pattern. Many alternative ways exist for making those connections, yielding thousands of plausible nucleotides that could readily join in place of the standard ones but that are not represented in RNA. That number is itself dwarfed by the hundreds of thousands to millions of stable organic molecules of similar size that are not nucleotides . . . . The RNA nucleotides are familiar to chemists because of their abundance in life and their resulting commercial availability. In a form of molecular vitalism, some scientists have presumed that nature has an innate tendency to produce life's building blocks preferentially, rather than the hordes of other molecules that can also be derived from the rules of organic chemistry. This idea drew inspiration from . . . Stanley Miller. He applied a spark discharge to a mixture of simple gases that were then thought to represent the atmosphere of the early Earth . . . . [But] inanimate nature has a bias toward the formation of molecules made of fewer rather than greater numbers of carbon atoms, and thus shows no partiality in favor of creating the building blocks of our kind of life . . . I have observed a similar pattern in the results of many spark discharge experiments . . . . no nucleotides of any kind have been reported as products of spark discharge experiments or in studies of meteorites, nor have the smaller units (nucleosides) that contain a sugar and base but lack the phosphate. To rescue the RNA-first concept from this otherwise lethal defect, its advocates have created a discipline called prebiotic synthesis. They have attempted to show that RNA and its components can be prepared in their laboratories in a sequence of carefully controlled reactions, normally carried out in water at temperatures observed on Earth . . . . Unfortunately, neither chemists nor laboratories were present on the early Earth to produce RNA . . . .
k --> So, we are back full circle to selctive hyperskepticism:
(i) we observe a reliable source of FSCI -- intelligence, but that does not suit the objectors as "a Divine Foot" might sneak in the door -- tada, it is "irrational" to infer that design is a viable candidate for origination of the observed computer in the cell . . . (ii) but it is "rational" and "scientific" to assume or assert on just-so stories that run counter to the observed evidence, that blind forces in prebiotic soups could do what challenges the smartest minds today: design an autonomous, nanotech based self-assembling, self-replicating automaton.
There's something rotten in the state of early C21 Institutional Science. GEM of TKI PS: George and Stephen et al. I looked at someone's hyperventilating accusation that the remarks by the Huxleys were inaccurately cited and dishonest -- the usual quotemining rhetoric. This is what he cites as the "correct form" from Aldous Huxley's Ends and Means:
"For myself, as, no doubt, for most of my contemporaries, the philosophy of meaningless was essentially an instrument of liberation. The liberation we desired was simultaneously liberation from a certain political and economic system and liberation from a certain system of morality. We objected to the morality because it interfered with our sexual freedom [Cf Rom 1:19 - 32 and Eph 4:17 - 19]; we objected to the political and economic system because it was unjust [and of course we found out just how "just" the favoured socialist systems have been . . . and BTW, how does an evolutionary materialist objectively GROUND his notion of Justice on a theory whose root is "the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life"? or, is "justice" here -- a la Marx's analyses of class struggle -- simply ideological rhetoric (and I almost never use that term positively; here I am using it in its full Plato's cave manipulation form {interestying how usual discussions soften the bondage and manipulation} . . . ) to advance the power interests of the Huxleyan classes?]. The supporters of these systems claimed that in some way they embodied the meaning (a Christian meaning, they insisted) of the world. There was one admirably simple method of confuting these people and at the same time justifying ourselves in our political and erotical revolt: we could deny that the world had any meaning whatsoever." (p.273)
Do you see the self-referential incoherences and selective hyperskepticisms at work, onlookers? And BTW,t eh evangelist whom he excoriates for misquoting and misrepresenting has in fact aptly captured the essence of the statement by Huxley. So much for the rhetoric of quotemining.kairosfocus_{March 8, 2009
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Seversky: Here is the quote from Aldous Huxley: "I had motive for not wanting the world to have a meaning; consequently assumed that it had none, and was able without any difficulty to find satisfying reasons for this assumption. The philosopher who finds no meaning in the world is not concerned exclusively with a problem in pure metaphysics, he is also concerned to prove that there is no valid reason why he personally should not do as he wants to do, or why his friends should not seize political power and govern in the way that they find most advantageous to themselves. … For myself, the philosophy of meaninglessness was essentially an instrument of liberation, sexual and political."StephenB_{March 8, 2009
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Seversky: On the matter of Julian Huxley, each of us has one peace of evidence. I have Kennedy's quote and his word; you have a partisan's claim that Kennedy was a liar. I notice that you, too, are prepared to take that same tack. I had already visited that website that you refer to and it seems like a desparate attempt at damage control to me. Kennedy has a long record of public honesty, and he was on television for decades. If he was given to lying, someone would have discovered it long before now. My guess is that his critics waited for him to die before they dared to pull a stunt like this. In effect, I have two choices, either [a] The website is slandering D James Kennedy or [b] Kennedy was slandering Huxley. I choose the former, especially since another Huxley (Aldous) is also on record of looking for a pretext to justify sexual immorality. I gather that you read that part as well. Even at that, I didn't intend to get that much mileage out of this one issue, so I am ready to move on to something else. Skepticsm is easily refuted, and I don't need a quote from D. James Kennedy on a peripheral issue to confirm the point.StephenB_{March 8, 2009
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Hallo George L Farquhar, I am dissipointed in you, after I gave you the denefit of the doubt regarding the "harsh" critisism I placed in #67 you actually confirmed the rest of you discussion that you deserved all my critisism. It will be to your benefit to understand the following regarding your #66 and subsequint argument: If those statistics are the full complement of your argument that “IDists are not rational” (or what ever you insinuate) then I pity your subjectivist make belief world. The whole argument is that rationality is proven to be an objective truth outside the individual’s subjective belief systems regarding anything, including “astrology, horoscopes, fortune telling, Tarot etc.” Truth is something that through proper function we actually can achieve. What you need to show is that your view of rationality is not just the same as any of the things you declared that you don’t belief in. Can you do that within an internalist epistemology and a naturalistic perspective? Tell me what is your definition of rationality, logic and truth. I put it to you that, purely from the argument you tried to put together above, you have built no falsification for any of the IDist though generated in this discussion. You actually just set the scene to indict yourself as an irrational equal to fortune telling, if you cannot come up with a good non-IDist defense of your epistemology. Try with something that resembles an argument about what is discussed in this discussion, it will make you look like a participant.mullerpr_{March 8, 2009
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Domoman @ 89
Here’s the quote that Stephen gave mention to:
“[I suppose the reason that] we all jumped at the origin [of species] was that the idea of God interfered with our sexual mores.” | Sir Julian Huxley, Leading Evolutionist of his day and first Director-General of UNESCO
Ta-da! lol
The reason I suggested to StephenB that he look more closely at the provenance of this quote is that the only evidence it was ever said is a claim by the late D James Kennedy. If you read essays discussing investigations of the claim here and here you will find that no one has been able to substantiate the claim. It is also not clear whether Kennedy was lying when made and repeated the claim although we shall probably never know now. A charitable view would be that it was just an error of all-too-fallible human memory, a less charitable view would be that Kennedy was 'lying for Jesus'. How would that be judged against the natural moral laws that Kennedy would have undoubtedly espoused, I wonder? Would it be morally better or worse than the apocryphal Huxley quote?Seversky_{March 7, 2009
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78 George L Farquhar
"KariosFocus c –> Now, say you were instead to come across a functioning pocket computer; perhaps a PDA. Would you be more likely to infer to intelligence or to accident as its best explanation?" It depends. If I saw lots of little PDAs following along after Mother PDA, some of them slightly different (e.g. more ram, better resolution screen, somewhat awkward keyboard, one with half a working screen etc) then perhaps I’d suspect accident. If, however, it was on a salt plain on an otherwise barren planet, I’d suspect design.
While it may, although I highly doubt it, be possible that life could evolve, unguided, after its initial genesis, you're forgetting just that: its initial genesis. You said that if you found a PDA (which itself pales in comparison to even the simplest of cells) "on a salt plain on an otherwise barren planet, I'd suspect design." But what exactly do we see on other planets thus far? Planets that completely lack life, even microscopic life. Out of all the planets we have seen so far, none of them have we seen to physically have life. It seems to me that you do have your salt plain holding a PDA (that is, Earth holding life) amongst an otherwise barren planet (that is, an otherwise barren universe). You also stated:
Watchmaker analogy. One of the main critisisms of that analogy is the fact that watches do not replicate while biological organisms do and so you are less likely to ascribe what you percieve as design to something that had no possibility of being designed (by the nature of the enviroment you find it in or other similar facts such as that it had no means of self-duplication). Watches do not breed.
First off, this also misses the point I made above: life's initial genesis. But secondly, and more importantly, you think that the fact that organisms breed offers an escape to Paley's argument. However, there is a problem with that thought: scientists have never physically seen, even over years of constant study, the process of, say, a lizard evolving into a bird. Sure, organisms change, but for all we know, lizards may always only give rise to lizards, and birds may always only give rise to birds. So in this sense, breeding has not saved the day, nor countered Paley's argument, because as far as studies are concerned: evolutionary accounts such as a lizard evolving into a bird have never been physically witnessed. So the marvel that is a bird, may well be just as much a marvel of design as a watch is. One that cannot breed just as a watch cannot breed, that is, cannot breed in the sense of creating life that is anything other than a bird. Birds breed, but we do not know that they evolve (in the sense of giving rise to a completely new organism). Animals therefore, as far as we can tell, may be just like a watch such as in Paley's example. But even if we grant that animals are not a fitting analogy to Paley's, the first life on planet Earth definitely works, only it's more complex, and thus, magnifies the problem. PS: I'm not suggesting that evolutionists hold that birds actually evolved from lizards, but I use it as an easy example of illustration (one which closely resembles the idea of dinosaurs evolving into birds).Domoman_{March 7, 2009
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The alleged Julian Huxley quote about sexual mores seems to be based on a misquotation of Aldous Huxley falsely attributed to Julian and spread by the late D. James Kennedy. Kennedy's account changed. First he said he read the quote in a book by Henry Morris, and then later he said he saw Huxley say those words on television. But the quote has never been substantiated and in fact seems to be a distortion of a quote by Julian's grandfather Aldous: both misquoted and misattributed. That's what I found out from "a quick Google search."David Kellogg_{March 7, 2009
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Farquhar: "kairosfocus uses an analogy similar to the Watchmaker analogy. One of the main critisisms of that analogy is the fact that watches do not replicate while biological organisms do and so you are less likely to ascribe what you percieve as design to something that had no possibility of being designed (by the nature of the enviroment you find it in or other similar facts such as that it had no means of self-duplication). Watches do not breed." Exactly. When explaining life, you have more than just the watch analogy (functional inter-relation of parts) to explain. You now have highly improbable functionality (as per the watch analogy) instructional information processing (as per the PDA analogy) and the self-replication (to which our technology has not even advanced yet). So I ask again the questions which you conveniently ignored: "How does replicating robotic and information processing machinery point to accidental development? How does evolution of such a system point to accidental development? Why wouldn’t you suspect the “broken designs” to be the result of natural degradation and the highly functional informational architecture to be the result of previous foresight. Can you even give an example (observation) of an information processing system such as that found in PDA having generated itself from only background noise [chance/statistical randomness] and an arbitrary collection of laws [absent previous planning for future consequences on the part of an intelligent agent]? Can you give an example of an evolutionary algorithm generated by the same method?" Farquhar: "Have you heard of Conway’s game of life? Some simple rules and self replicators arise. No, it’s hardly as complex as a PDA but “information processing system” is somewhat vague." Extremely familiar with it. Downloaded it quite a while back. Makes interesting looking regularities as would any set of law and random initial conditions (much akin to langton's ant). However, neither anything resembling instructional information states nor the processing of those states into function arises. Furthermore, nothing resembling self-replication arises. There are merely some instances of regularities in motion through grid space (again, akin to langton's ant) -- analogous to lawful motion such as planetary motion. If you don't understand what instructional information or information processing (as it relates to the PDA analogy) is then we could discuss that further, however I would first appreciate answers to my questions above, which you completely ignored in your first response. I would just like to see the rationale behind your response and how you understand the basic non-lawful, yet also non-random informational structure of computation devices such as a PDA.CJYman_{March 7, 2009
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StephenB and Seversky, Here's the quote that Stephen gave mention to:
“[I suppose the reason that] we all jumped at the origin [of species] was that the idea of God interfered with our sexual mores.” | Sir Julian Huxley, Leading Evolutionist of his day and first Director-General of UNESCO
Ta-da! lolDomoman_{March 7, 2009
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---Adel: "he (Huxley) is using the word “wrong” in the sense of “incorrect,” not in the sense of “immoral.” Yes, that is true. Unjustified could mean, “one cannot make a case for it,” or “it cannot be justified.” In fact, let us assume that is the case. In such circumstances, he is appealing not to objective morality, just as you say, but to objective truth, in which case he still contradicts himself because he believes neither in objective truth nor objective morality.StephenB_{March 7, 2009
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Throughout this discussion, the essay by Collins seems to have been left in the dust. It seems to me that Collins is concerned with a much narrower question than philosophical skepticism as such. (As a major figure in the second wave, he's not even really against that -- he just thinks it's been distorted.)David Kellogg_{March 7, 2009
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----George L. Farquhar: "If ID, and individual ID proponents such as yourself refuse to, when asked and as I am asking you to, condem such things as Tarot cards and palmistry then you must appreciate how that looks?" Can you appreciate how you look obsessing over Tarot cards? Don't you know that it is a typical atheist strategy to reframe issues and distract attention away for the theme of the thread? You are not the first Darwinist to try that strategy. Go back and read the title of the post: We cannot live by skepticism alone. It has been situated in a sociological and scientific context. Now ask yourself who brought up the issue of Tarot cards and ask youself who it is that wants to continue such a discussion. You don't get to frame the issues that we discuss here. If Tarot cards are your thing, then go for it. Meanwhile, the subject under discussion is the irrational nature of skepticism. Since you have been studiously avoiding that subject, it seems reasonable to assume that you fall into that camp. Would you care to provide a rational defense for it. Seversky has been making a heroic effort so far, and he has not mentioned the occult even once.StephenB_{March 7, 2009
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-----seversky: “Like so many words, ‘wrong’ can mean different things in different contexts. We can say that claiming 2 + 2 = 5 is wrong without meaning it is immoral. We can say that driving the wrong way along a one-way street is “wrong” without meaning it is immoral - stupid, yes, but not immoral.” I agree. Wrong can mean either something goes against morality or it goes against truth. So, 2 + 2 = 5 violates the standard of truth, not the standard of morality. On the other hand, driving on a one- way- street may or may not be an immoral act. Technically it is an illegal act. Legality is not synonymous with morality. It if is done mistakenly, it is neither moral nor immoral. If it is done recklessly, it is immoral. If it is done to save a life, it is moral. -----“The other error lies in assuming that the statement (Huxley’s)“it is wrong” is always an appeal to an objective moral standard. It can mean that undoubtedly, but it can also imply an unstated qualifier such as “in my view”. I can go this far with you. Unjustified COULD mean, “one cannot make a case for it,” or “it cannot be justified.” In such circumstances, he is appealing not to objective morality, just as you say, but to objective truth, in which case he still contradicts himself because he believes neither in objective truth nor objective morality. -----“Actually, I did look up “Illustrations of the Tao” and there would seem to be room here for some measure of agreement between us.” OK ----“On that view, we would expect to find that most if not all human societies share certain basic moral precepts such as that unlawful killing or stealing from others is wrong. To that extent you could argue that it is evidence of objective morality or natural moral laws although I would view it more as an emergent property of humans when living in groups that promotes social cohesion and stability.” There would seem to be only two possibilities: [A] We discovered what was already there, that is, there is a morality proper to human nature, or [B] We created it, as you suggest. I have never known humans to create anything about which there was universal agreement. So, I have to go with [A] Further, if [B] is true, then there is no such thing as the “inherent dignity of the human person.” ---- ----“The problem with viewing common moral precepts as evidence of objective morality is that it suffers from the fallacy of selective reporting. It highlights shared moral beliefs while ignoring the significant differences. For example, as we all know, under Sharia law in certain Islamic states, adulterers may be stoned to death or thieves may have their hands amputated or women are not allowed out in public unless covered from head to foot. For some, though not all, Muslims these are fundamental issues of morality while most Westerners, whether Christian or not, find them abhorrent.” Not all aspects of all religions are in accordance with the standard. Sharia law violates the natural moral law by denying the inherent dignity of the human person. ----“Moral views also change over time. Is there any doubt that Christians of a thousand years ago would find some of the behavior of Christians to day quite shocking? And, without dwelling on it, there are many acts described in the Old Testament, both of the Jews and of God, that today we regard as deeply immoral.” The natural moral law never changes. The Ten Commandments apply to all persons at all times and in all places. So does the golden rule. If morality could change, it wouldn’t be morality. Cultural norms can change but morality cannot. ----“You might want to look a little more closely at the authenticity of that claim.” (Huxley’s claim that evolution freed him from sexual mores.) It is a famous quote. Just do a quick Google search. ----“As I understand it, outside of formal systems like logic, the truth of a statement about the world depends on the degree to which it corresponds with our observations. As limited beings it may be beyond our capacity to observe the world in detail sufficient to allow us to construct a perfect description or attain a perfect understanding of it, so while we are as we are, Absolute Truth might as well not exist.” We are certainly limited in our capacity to understand the world perfectly. On the other hand, we can understand the word in a rational way. If the logic of our minds does not match the logic of the world, then all is lost. That is what truth is, a correspondence of our minds with reality. Any rational discussion presupposes the existence of absolute truth. You believe, for example, that I am in error and therefore not in correspondence with reality. Otherwise you would not be disputing my points. If, as you believe, that I am in error, then it follows that you believe that I am going against the truth. Thus, you believe your position to be true and my position to be false. You do, therefore believe in absolute truth, which is, for you, that fact that there are no absolute truths. If you didn’t believe that point to be true, you would not be defending it. That was the irony I was alluding to earlier. So, absolute truth exists for both of us, except that I affirm it and you deny even as you make your appeal on its behalf.StephenB_{March 7, 2009
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Furthermore, you seem to be saying that Tarot cards etc "acknowledge the reality of design". How so? Do people who claim they can speak to the dead or predict the future also acknowledge the reality of design? Just where do you draw the line? Why won't you just condem them/it as ungodly charlatans and fakes?George L Farquhar_{March 7, 2009
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StephenB, Firstly you said of Tarot card reading:
ID is not a belief system, so it can accomodate all kinds of world views that acknowledge the reality of design.
And now you say
ID makes no comment about it one way or the other. There can be no contradiction about what one does not address.
It seems to me that if ID "accommodates" (your word) Tarot then it does not say Tarot cards are bunk! By accommodating something you do not call out the fact that it is a charade and false. If ID, and individual ID proponents such as yourself refuse to, when asked and as I am asking you to, condem such things as Tarot cards and palmistry then you must appreciate how that looks? No? I'm not asking you as a spokesperson for ID, just for yourself. Will you condemn such irrationality as Tarot and other similar superstitions? If not, why not?George L Farquhar_{March 7, 2009
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CJYman, kairosfocus uses an analogy similar to the Watchmaker analogy. One of the main critisisms of that analogy is the fact that watches do not replicate while biological organisms do and so you are less likely to ascribe what you percieve as design to something that had no possibility of being designed (by the nature of the enviroment you find it in or other similar facts such as that it had no means of self-duplication). Watches do not breed.
Can you even give an example (observation) of an information processing system such as that found in PDA having generated itself from only background noise [chance/statistical randomness] and an arbitrary collection of laws
Have you heard of Conway's game of life? Some simple rules and self replicators arise. No, it's hardly as complex as a PDA but "information processing system" is somewhat vague.George L Farquhar_{March 7, 2009
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----George: "Can you tell me, specifically, how ID “accomodates” Tarot card reading?" ID makes no comment about it one way or the other. There can be no contradiction about what one does not address. I thought you had absorbed that by now. A more relavent question would be why anti-ID partisans would put questions like that in their survery. They and you must have been shocked to find that atheist skeptics indulge in similar fantasies. Now can you address the substance of the thread, which would be the irrational nature of skepticism, which I gather is your world view.StephenB_{March 7, 2009
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Farquhar: "It depends. If I saw lots of little PDAs following along after Mother PDA, some of them slightly different (e.g. more ram, better resolution screen, somewhat awkward keyboard, one with half a working screen etc) then perhaps I’d suspect accident. If, however, it was on a salt plain on an otherwise barren planet, I’d suspect design." How does replicating robotic and information processing machinery point to accidental development? How does evolution of such a system point to accidental development? Why wouldn't you suspect the "broken designs" to be the result of natural degradation and the highly functional informational architecture to be the result of previous foresight. Can you even give an example (observation) of an information processing system such as that found in PDA having generated itself from only background noise [chance/statistical randomness] and an arbitrary collection of laws [absent previous planning for future consequences on the part of an intelligent agent]? Can you give an example of an evolutionary algorithm generated by the same method?CJYman_{March 7, 2009
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George: A quick note on my way out the door . . . You actually compound the problem of irrationality of inferring to spontaneous action of chance + necessity to create a computer; then enforcing same by Lewontinian a Priori materialism:
Our willingness to accept scientific claims that are against common sense is the key to an understanding of the real struggle between science and the supernatural. We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, in spite of its failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door. [NY Review of Books, 1997. Now made more or less official by the NCSE, NSTA NAS etc acting as Magisterium and co-opting Government officials to back them up . . . ]
. For, a self-assembling, self-replicating information system is a design at a level we can conceptually understand [Von Neumann anticiapted the function of DNA by several years in considering what sucha self-replicating automaton would need] but we have not as yet been able to design it. And to get that into a systemt hat stores explicitly only 600 k bits. Pterry tight coding I'd say. (Though a lot of the difference lies in the epigenetic hardware . . . ) GEM of TKIkairosfocus_{March 7, 2009
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Adel and Winston: You need to know the context, i.e Clifford's evidentialism, in the influential 1879 essay, "The ethics of belief." Excerpting from the opening words and down tot he core thesis: ________________ A shipowner was about to send to sea an emigrant-ship. He knew that she was old, and not overwell built at the first; that she had seen many seas and climes, and often had needed repairs. Doubts had been suggested to him that possibly she was not seaworthy. These doubts preyed upon his mind, and made him unhappy; he thought that perhaps he ought to have her thoroughly overhauled and and refitted, even though this should put him at great expense. Before the ship sailed, however, he succeeded in overcoming these melancholy reflections. He said to himself that she had gone safely through so many voyages and weathered so many storms that it was idle to suppose she would not come safely home from this trip also. He would put his trust in Providence, which could hardly fail to protect all these unhappy families that were leaving their fatherland to seek for better times elsewhere. He would dismiss from his mind all ungenerous suspicions about the honesty of builders and contractors. In such ways he acquired a sincere and comfortable conviction that his vessel was thoroughly safe and seaworthy; he watched her departure with a light heart, and benevolent wishes for the success of the exiles in their strange new home that was to be; and he got his insurance-money when she went down in mid-ocean and told no tales. What shall we say of him? Surely this, that he was verily guilty of the death of those men. It is admitted that he did sincerely believe in the soundness of his ship; but the sincerity of his conviction can in no wise help him, because he had no right to believe on such evidence as was before him. He had acquired his belief not by honestly earning it in patient investigation, but by stifling his doubts. And although in the end he may have felt so sure about it that he could not think otherwise, yet inasmuch as he had knowingly and willingly worked himself into that frame of mind, he must be held responsible for it. Let us alter the case a little, and suppose that the ship was not unsound after all; that she made her voyage safely, and many others after it. Will that diminish the guilt of her owner? Not one jot. When an action is once done, it is right or wrong for ever; no accidental failure of its good or evil fruits can possibly alter that. The man would not have been innocent, he would only have been not found out. The question of right or wrong has to do with the origin of his belief, not the matter of it; not what it was, but how he got it; not whether it turned out to be true or false, but whether he had a right to believe on such evidence as was before him . . . . To sum up: it is wrong always, everywhere, and for anyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence. ______________________ The history of ideas context of Huxley's remark as cited should thus be quite clear. As I pointed out and linked in comment 62 above, this evidentialism is multiply in error. Not least, it entails infinite regress on evidence; even if we were to take the "wrong = mistaken" view. And that view is not the historically warranted one. GEM of TKIkairosfocus_{March 7, 2009
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KariosFocus
c –> Now, say you were instead to come across a functioning pocket computer; perhaps a PDA. Would you be more likely to infer to intelligence or to accident as its best explanation?
It depends. If I saw lots of little PDAs following along after Mother PDA, some of them slightly different (e.g. more ram, better resolution screen, somewhat awkward keyboard, one with half a working screen etc) then perhaps I'd suspect accident. If, however, it was on a salt plain on an otherwise barren planet, I'd suspect design.
making random variation utterly unlikely to get to a functional state.
My dear fellow, I believe I can help you out here! The thing is, nobody believes that the sampling was random you see! Otherwise I daresay more people would have seen through the charade! It's the mutation with regard to fitness that's random you see! Once you assume a replicator is present then you don't need to sample everything as you are already in a place where nearby sampling will take you somewhere probably OK for you too! So I'm afraid your conclusions only appear to follow if you work under the misapprehension that it's all in fact done randomly!George L Farquhar_{March 7, 2009
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