Basic Creationism Is Supported By Science

tas8831 · Jul 17, 2021

pitabread said:
Is OP going to come back and respond to any of the rebuttals or have they decided to abandon this thread?

Prediction: Abandoned to start a new but similar thread. Just like the 3 or 4 most prominent creationist posters currently on here.

Subduction Zone · Jul 17, 2021

tas8831 said:
If bare assertions are logical fallacies, then about 89% of creationist claims on this forum are fallacious.

Only 89%? That eight is awfully close to the nine on a keyboard.

tas8831 · Jul 17, 2021

Subduction Zone said:
Only 89%? That eight is awfully close to the nine on a keyboard.

I was going to write 99, but I thought I'd be gracious

FrumiousBandersnatch · Jul 17, 2021

tas8831 said:
What is it with these philosophers...

Goff:

Philip Goff is a philosopher and consciousness researcher at Durham University in the UK, and author of Galileo's Error: Foundations for a New Science of Consciousness. His research focuses on how to integrate consciousness into our scientific worldview.

Huh...
You'd think a philosopher might be able to "reason" that he's making the same mistake as the anthropic principle addicts.

Goff is quite a personable guy, but he doesn't appear to be an expert in either cosmology, physics or brain science (his view of consciousness is panpsychism). I don't think his Scientific American article is entirely free of bias - most multiverse models (including inflation) do involve many possible values of the physical constants, and a particular difficulty of String Theory is that it predicts an astronomical number of them without yet giving a way to find those of our universe among them.

The 'Fine Tuning' problem (or, the appearance of fine tuning as it should really be called), is mainly a matter of the unknown. A multiverse of one sort of another is an entirely reasonable (though unsatisfactory for some) explanation. Most cosmologists would prefer to find a reason for the particular values we see rather than rely on self-selection in a multiverse landscape.

On the other hand, we can simply accept that we don't yet know why the values appear to be fined-tuned. Certainly, the alternative to the known is not 'GodDidIt' - that's a false dichotomy; there are other possibilities, and there may be other explanations we are unaware of.

One argument against an omnipotent creator deity is the very nature of the cosmos we observe, including fine-tuning itself; a universe created by an omnipotent entity would not need fine-tuning to exist - nor would it need the unnecessarily low-entropy initial condition and other oddities we find. If the universe was created for humans, the vastness of the universe, with its hundreds of billions of distant galaxies, with their quadrillions of planets, is completely unnecessary. The solar system is more than sufficient to support us, and if some celestial interest is considered useful, our galaxy can do the job.

IOW, what we observe out there, and down here on Earth, is not consistent with what might be expected from an anthropocentric Abrahamic God, and while a disinterested deistic creator god is one hypothesis, there are others.

But, as I've pointed out before, the God hypothesis necessarily ranks at the bottom of the heap, due to its complete lack of explanatory and predictive power - unless someone can argue for it being a better explanation than the magic hypothesis ("It's magic!"), given reasonable criteria for a good explanation, in which case we can rank it second last.

Subduction Zone · Jul 17, 2021

FrumiousBandersnatch said:
Goff is quite a personable guy, but he doesn't appear to be an expert in either cosmology, physics or brain science (his view of consciousness is panpsychism). I don't think his Scientific American article is entirely free of bias - most multiverse models (including inflation) do involve many possible values of the physical constants, and a particular difficulty of String Theory is that it predicts an astronomical number of them without yet giving a way to find those of our universe among them.

The 'Fine Tuning' problem (or, the appearance of fine tuning as it should really be called), is mainly a matter of the unknown. A multiverse of one sort of another is an entirely reasonable (though unsatisfactory for some) explanation. Most cosmologists would prefer to find a reason for the particular values we see rather than rely on self-selection in a multiverse landscape.

On the other hand, we can simply accept that we don't yet know why the values appear to be fined-tuned. Certainly, the alternative to the known is not 'GodDidIt' - that's a false dichotomy; there are other possibilities, and there may be other explanations we are unaware of.

One argument against an omnipotent creator deity is the very nature of the cosmos we observe, including fine-tuning itself; a universe created by an omnipotent entity would not need fine-tuning to exist - nor would it need the unnecessarily low-entropy initial condition and other oddities we find. If the universe was created for humans, the vastness of the universe, with its hundreds of billions of distant galaxies, with their quadrillions of planets, is completely unnecessary. The solar system is more than sufficient to support us, and if some celestial interest is considered useful, our galaxy can do the job.

IOW, what we observe out there, and down here on Earth, is not consistent with what might be expected from an anthropocentric Abrahamic God, and while a disinterested deistic creator god is one hypothesis, there are others.

But, as I've pointed out before, the God hypothesis necessarily ranks at the bottom of the heap, due to its complete lack of explanatory and predictive power - unless someone can argue for it being a better explanation than the magic hypothesis ("It's magic!"), given reasonable criteria for a good explanation, in which case we can rank it second last.

One thing that creationists do not seem to understand is the claim "The odd of the universe forming by chance is one in 10^229. They make the mistake of assuming that atheists think that the universe appeared by chance. As you pointed out the fine tuning argument depends upon us not understanding all of the laws of physics. There were quite a few constants involved in that calculation, and we do not know why those constants have the values that they do. Some of them may rely on other constants. If that was discovered that would lower the odds. And this has happened in the past. An easy one to understand is Keppler's Laws of planetary motion:

The orbit of a planet is an ellipse with the Sun at one of the two foci.
A line segment joining a planet and the Sun sweeps out equal areas during equal intervals of time.
The square of a planet's orbital period is proportional to the cube of the length of the semi-major axis of its orbit

What are the "odds" of those laws forming the way they they did? When we did not know why those laws one could have calculated huge odd that they would have some other value. Newton came along not much later and his Law of universal gravitation explained why those laws had those values. The same may apply to many of the unknowns about our universe. All we can say right now is that we do not know why those values have those values. We do not even really know if other values are possible. That makes fine tuning arguments pretty much worthless.

FrumiousBandersnatch · Jul 17, 2021

tas8831 said:
How was 'wow, big number!" support for:

" This inherent improbability suggests God is the best explanation for statistical improbability observed in the world."

Quite. Sadly, as far as science is concerned, God is just one more hypothetical unknown, and given that the attributes commonly ascribed to it are not in any way compatible with the laws of physics, I'd suggest that it must be considered far more improbable than Lee Smolin's numbers for the universe (which we know exists).

FrumiousBandersnatch · Jul 17, 2021

SelfSim said:
Well, I wasn't going to make a post when Smolin's article came up, but now that the question about his 'scientific' opinions has been raised, I'd like to know why his claim supporting his argument is not an anthropic assumption?:
Just how is 'typical' not based on anthropic (and un-measurable) thinking?

Reminds me of those Boltzmann brain arguments...

FrumiousBandersnatch · Jul 17, 2021

tas8831 said:
Denial of Evolution Is a Form of White Supremacy

Wow! If ever a title needed some context...

Strathos · Jul 17, 2021

Just to clarify, are you defining 'basic creationism' as 'God is ultimately responsible for existence'? Because that's not how 'creationism' is typically defined in this forum. It's more along the lines of 'God created the earth and all the living things in it in their present forms in a short period of time, and they are not significantly different from their ancestors'.

Shemjaza · Jul 17, 2021

Strathos said:
Just to clarify, are you defining 'basic creationism' as 'God is ultimately responsible for existence'? Because that's not how 'creationism' is typically defined in this forum. It's more along the lines of 'God created the earth and all the living things in it in their present forms in a short period of time, and they are not significantly different from their ancestors'.

I'm pretty sure it's the standard bait and switch: IF "there is any doubt on any theory that doesn't require divine intervention" THEN "My specific, personal interpretation of creation and history is the only reasonable conclusion."

sjastro · Jul 17, 2021

SelfSim said:
In think Motl might be the 'Yang', (as in Yin/Yang), to Peter Woit, (the 'Yin')?
Except for his ad-hom style, (particularly in that attack on Smolin), I still don't mind him though .. He's one of the few who can actually strut String Theory, (whilst explaining it).

I wouldn't say that Smolin is crackpot, either.

Calling people nutcases (I'm one of them) who think String Theory is unfalsifiable is not my idea of someone who can strut String Theory.

Lubos Motl said:
Everyone knows that only nutcases are ready to suggest, with a serious face, that string theory could be unfalsifiable. Surely it is falsifiable.

I predict that the word "nutcase" is the only word that the nutcases will be able to comprehend and learn from this article: they will ignore the rest, thinking that they don't need it to be upgraded from nutcases to something else.

The Reference Frame: Falsifiability in physics

Incidentally Lubos describes himself as a Christian Atheist; there has got a quantum superimposition of states in this.

Bradskii · Jul 17, 2021

FrumiousBandersnatch said:
One argument against an omnipotent creator deity is the very nature of the cosmos we observe, including fine-tuning itself; a universe created by an omnipotent entity would not need fine-tuning to exist - nor would it need the unnecessarily low-entropy initial condition and other oddities we find. If the universe was created for humans, the vastness of the universe, with its hundreds of billions of distant galaxies, with their quadrillions of planets, is completely unnecessary. The solar system is more than sufficient to support us, and if some celestial interest is considered useful, our galaxy can do the job.

I think that it depends on how one approaches it. So many Christians point out the incredible complexity of life and say that only God could have have created it thus. OK, He's meant to be omnipotent, but why is it so complex? Why aren't we just animated mud? You look at the incredible diversity of life and Christians think of the wonder of God's creations - all creatures great and small. But I look at it and think that nobody in their right mind would possibly design something so brain tearingly complex just...because.

It has all the hallmarks of being completely and randomly produced without a scintilla of thought behind it.

Likewise the universe itself. It used to be believed that it was just this planet and some pretty lights, all banged together in a few days (did I say used to be?). Now that would make some sense if there was a God. And that we were the centre of everything. Would have made perfect sense.

But then we found out that we ain't the centre of it all. And that there were other planets. And other solar systems. Even a complete galaxy with billions of other solar systems. At that point, surely you'd start to scratch your head and wonder 'What the hell is all this for? Who is it for?'

Then we find that there are billions of galaxies. And then we find that there is probably an infinity of galaxies beyong anything we'll be able to acess. And if the elastic hasn't snapped by then, then I don't know what else could cause doubt.

And the usual response to this? 'Who can know the mind of God'. Aka 'I haven't any idea whatsoever'.

driewerf · Jul 18, 2021

Bradskii said:
I think that it depends on how one approaches it. So many Christians point out the incredible complexity of life and say that only God could have have created it thus. OK, He's meant to be omnipotent, but why is it so complex? Why aren't we just animated mud? You look at the incredible diversity of life and Christians think of the wonder of God's creations - all creatures great and small. But I look at it and think that nobody in their right mind would possibly design something so brain tearingly complex just...because.

It has all the hallmarks of being completely and randomly produced without a scintilla of thought behind it.

Likewise the universe itself. It used to be believed that it was just this planet and some pretty lights, all banged together in a few days (did I say used to be?). Now that would make some sense if there was a God. And that we were the centre of everything. Would have made perfect sense.

But then we found out that we ain't the centre of it all. And that there were other planets. And other solar systems. Even a complete galaxy with billions of other solar systems. At that point, surely you'd start to scratch your head and wonder 'What the hell is all this for? Who is it for?'

Then we find that there are billions of galaxies. And then we find that there is probably an infinity of galaxies beyong anything we'll be able to acess. And if the elastic hasn't snapped by then, then I don't know what else could cause doubt.

And the usual response to this? 'Who can know the mind of God'. Aka 'I haven't any idea whatsoever'.

Just to make a pedantic point; the discovery of other galaxies predate the discovery of other solar systems.
That doesn't nullify Bradskii's point.

Bradskii · Jul 18, 2021

driewerf said:
Just to make a pedantic point; the discovery of other galaxies predate the discovery of other solar systems.
That doesn't nullify Bradskii's point.

You might be right. I'll check on that...

Which didn't take long:

'In 1992, the first evidence of a planetary system other than our own was discovered, orbiting the pulsar PSR B1257+12. Three years later, 51 Pegasi b, the first extrasolar planet around a Sunlike star, was discovered. As of 2017, 2687 extrasolar systems have been found.' Wiki.

I was working on the assumption (never a good idea in the first instance) that systems were assumed to exist long before they were actually discovered. But yeah, it hasn't been very long since we were able to confirm that. Thanks for the correction.

Smarten up, Bradskii!

tas8831 · Jul 18, 2021

FrumiousBandersnatch said:
Wow! If ever a title needed some context...

Sure, but it is a legitimate source as it is from a 'journal'.

FrumiousBandersnatch · Jul 18, 2021

sjastro said:
Incidentally Lubos describes himself as a Christian Atheist; there has got a quantum superimposition of states in this.

AIUI Christian Atheism is a category of those that don't believe in a god or gods, but try to live by the moral teachings of Jesus. IOW they see Jesus as a great teacher of morality, but not as anything divine. It seems to be a growing category (more, I think, because people are identifying with it as a category than because their morality is changing, but I may be wrong). There is quite a continuum between atheism and religious belief - see 'Religion and Atheism, beyond the divide' by Anthony Carroll and Richard Norman.

Frank Robert · Jul 18, 2021

FrumiousBandersnatch said:
AIUI Christian Atheism is a category of those that don't believe in a god or gods, but try to live by the moral teachings of Jesus. IOW they see Jesus as a great teacher of morality, but not as anything divine. It seems to be a growing category (more, I think, because people are identifying with it as a category than because their morality is changing, but I may be wrong). There is quite a continuum between atheism and religious belief - see 'Religion and Atheism, beyond the divide' by Anthony Carroll and Richard Norman.

I am not sure it is a category but there are many atheists and agnostics that associate themselves with various Christian charities.

Job 33:6 · Jul 22, 2021

Bradskii said:
If you said that a specific person was going to play a specific machine and win the jackpot on a specific pull and she did, then I'd say that that had been designed to happen. So if Man is that specific person and this planet is where we're going to end up and now is the time, then yes. It's been designed.

If it's a random person and a random pull on a random machine, then someone at some time is going to hit the jackpot. So if we just happened to have evolved here and now then there's no indication that it's been designed that way and the odds aren't relevant.

What's interesting about this analogy of the person playing slots, is that it's just one person who pulls one time. Unlike the infinite monkeys on typewriters. It's not just some person [of many] at some time [also of many]. As far as we can tell, the jackpot was hit the one and only time.

Job 33:6 · Jul 22, 2021

Bungle_Bear said:
Probability calculations without knowing the boundaries of probability space are worthless. This universe exists - probability = 1. Unless you can demonstrate there are other universes, or that the fundamental forces can actually have different values, the calculation stops there. 1 in 10^229 is a number calculated from assumptions and guesses, none of which have evidence to support them.

New Tests Suggest a Fundamental Constant of Physics Isn't The Same Across The Universe

Here's an article that suggests that a universe could exist with different values for fundamental constants. This being our own in this instance.

Subduction Zone · Jul 22, 2021

Isaiah 41:10 said:
What's interesting about this analogy of the person playing slots, is that it's just one person who pulls one time. Unlike the infinite monkeys on typewriters. It's not just some person [of many] at some time [also of many]. As far as we can tell, the jackpot was hit the one and only time.

The "jackpot" has been hit many times. Man is just one product of evolution. We are not the only winner by a long shot.

Basic Creationism Is Supported By Science

Well-Known Member

Regular Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Regular Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

No one important

Regular Member

Newbie

Can you tell a green field from a cold steel rail?

a day at the Zoo

Can you tell a green field from a cold steel rail?

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Regular Member

Similar threads