randomness

[Micaiah]

Lucaspa,
An interesting example. It sounds like what evolutionists say, but is it really what happens with evolution. One of the approaches to design is to make up a whole lot of options, and then try them out one by one. The ones that seem okay you keep working on. The duds you discard.

 

[sulphur]

The duds discard themselves.Survival of the fittest

 

[lucaspa]

Originally posted by Micaiah
Lucaspa,
An interesting example. It sounds like what evolutionists say, but is it really what happens with evolution. One of the approaches to design is to make up a whole lot of options, and then try them out one by one. The ones that seem okay you keep working on. The duds you discard.

OH THANK YOU, THANK YOU  What you described is natural selection, isn't it? 

You have just made a major point of mine:  all design is Darwinian selection!  Or, Darwinian selection is the only way to get design.  For "intelligence", the variations are originally made in the mind and tested mentally against the "environment" of what the intelligence wants.  After several rounds of this, making variations on the designs that fit the mental testing best, then an artifact is made.

So, Darwinian selection is a means to get design.  What matters here is that, although Darwinian selection can take place within the "mind" of an intelligent entity, it doesn't have to.  It works on its own as long as the conditions are met:

1. Variations (possible design solutions)
2. Environmental constraints such that not all variations can survive
3. Selection of variations that fit the environment
4. Preservation of the selected variations.

As it happens, these 4 conditions are present in biological organisms.  Therefore Darwinian selection is perfectly capable of designing them without direct manufacture by a deity.

 

[lucaspa]

Originally posted by Micaiah
I haven't seen anything yet to demonstrate how the beautiful world in which we live came about other than by the Creator.

Let's be precise on terms and goals here.  What do you mean by "came about other than by a Creator"?  Do you mean that each beautiful thing had to be manufactured in its present form by a Creator and placed here?  Or do you mean that you think there is a Creator and it could have used different material processes to get the beautiful world?

You said "how the beautiful world came about".  Both evolution and creationism are hows.

If you are looking to an alternative to direct manufacture in present form: then the answer lies in the processes discovered by science.  The beautiful blue sky is a result of light scattering.  The beautiful warm sun is the result of nuclear fusion.  The beautiful designs in biological organisms are the result of Darwinian selection.

 

[auswiq]

What Darwin found was an algorithmic process to convert Order to Design -- natural or Darwinian selection.  That broke the philosophy.

Okey doke; then from whence in terms of origin, did this linear process of  computing and arranging design from order come about, I then wonder?

Algorithms - a mathematical process -  hmm... wonder where the logical principles inherent in mathematical processes originally came from then?

The breaking at the bottom is that Chaos can organize to Order by the use of the physical laws.  Without any apparent intervention by a deity or "Mind".  For instance, dry heat amino acids and then add water or a saline solution and you get living protocells.  The organization comes from emergent properties of the amino acids and the chemical process.

Hmmm... chaos (Gk. xaos - Der. xainein to  gape; a yawning gulf) - I'd be real intrigued as to how a yawning chasm (a portrayal of Nothingness) can organize itself ultimately into intelligent beings, capable of contemplating such tantalizingly deep issues, which ultimately, will affect how we view ourselves and the way we run this world, for each other. Of course, the current connotation of the word 'chaos' has shall we say, "evolved" from its true meaning. Now, we are referring basically to systemless disorder. So, from whence, in terms of origin did this state of affairs come about - not to mention physical laws?  Got me curious as to how gaping emptiness or at best, non-teleological pandemonium produces laws which initiate and govern the processes that bring about order, leading to intelligent beings.

 

 

[auswiq]

" The breaking at the bottom " - hehe - just reminded me of my "cosmic diahorrea" quip, a few posts back

 

[chickenman]

how witty of you

 

[Micaiah]

there are so many perfect things in the universe otherwise we would not exist. why does it require agod

Sulphur,
I find biology fascinating, though my knowledge of the subject is limited. I see in biology the hand of a Creator. I know this isn't scientific, bu I saw the birth of three children. Each to me was a fantastic miracle, again the product of a Creator.

 

[chickenman]

Each to me was a fantastic miracle, again the product of a Creator.

surely that creation required the contribution of two creators

 

[auswiq]

Originally posted by notto
auswiq,

Why wouldn't God need a "designer" based on the criteria in your first post?

Answer: Because of the Omniscience/potence/presence of the Supreme Creator Himself - the I AM behind and before all existence.

 

 

[chickenman]

these are philosophical questions, not scientific ones

science doesn't pretend to know for certain from where the laws that govern the universe came - but lucaspa is correct- these laws allow for the generation of life, and intelligent beings without recourse to intelligence

 

[food4thought]

"The breaking at the bottom is that Chaos can organize to Order by the use of the physical laws. Without any apparent intervention by a deity or "Mind". For instance, dry heat amino acids and then add water or a saline solution and you get living protocells. The organization comes from emergent properties of the amino acids and the chemical process."

You forget that the amino acids of the correct chirality would never come into existance by random chance, because even the entire universe and every second of the hypothetical billions of years does not provide enough space, time, or atoms to be combined. The statistical absurdity of the possibility destroys whatever intelligently designed experiment you may have been referring to.

 

[sulphur]

So you can give a limit to chance.I do not think any mathematician would say that if you tossed a die 50 times the same number could not come up.

 

[Micaiah]

Some things have such a low chance of occuring that you would say they are impossible. For example, what is the chance of tossing a coin 100 times and getting 100 heads? Answer (1/2)^100. This is an event I would class as impossible.

What is the chance of dealing 13 cards of a pack in a specified sequence:
(1/52)x(1/51)x(1/50)x...x(1/40)x(1/39). Again that gives a small number and may be considered an impossible event.

 

[Pete Harcoff]

Originally posted by Micaiah
Some things have such a low chance of occuring that you would say they are impossible. For example, what is the chance of tossing a coin 100 times and getting 100 heads? Answer (1/2)^100. This is an event I would class as impossible.

What is the chance of dealing 13 cards of a pack in a specified sequence:
(1/52)x(1/51)x(1/50)x...x(1/40)x(1/39). Again that gives a small number and may be considered an impossible event.

What are the odds of my being here at this moment in time and posting this message at this very second? Probably small enough that it may be considered an impossible event.

This doesn't mean it didn't happen.

 

[notto]

Originally posted by Micaiah
Some things have such a low chance of occuring that you would say they are impossible. For example, what is the chance of tossing a coin 100 times and getting 100 heads? Answer (1/2)^100. This is an event I would class as impossible.

What is the chance of dealing 13 cards of a pack in a specified sequence:
(1/52)x(1/51)x(1/50)x...x(1/40)x(1/39). Again that gives a small number and may be considered an impossible event.

Only if you flip the coin 100 times. Why don't you take 100 people and have them start flipping their coins and continue to do it for say 1000 years. I bet at some point in there, you will flip 100 heads in a row.

Someone always wins the lottery, regardless of the odds that YOU will win the lottery.

Probability NEVER reduces something to being impossible, but always relates to the number of "chances" something has to happen.

The only way something is impossible, is if it never is given the chance to occur.

 

[Gracchus]

Originally posted by Micaiah
.

What is the chance of dealing 13 cards of a pack in a specified sequence:
(1/52)x(1/51)x(1/50)x...x(1/40)x(1/39). Again that gives a small number and may be considered an impossible event.

As a matter of fact, any sequence has the same probability.  I must thereby conclude (by your reasoning) that every shuffled deck of cards is impossible.  You are truly wonderful to have discovered what trained scientists have overlooked.

A very small probability does not make an event impossible. What is really impossible is that a creationist should be convinced by facts and logic.

 

[auswiq]

Originally posted by Micaiah
Some things have such a low chance of occuring that you would say they are impossible. For example, what is the chance of tossing a coin 100 times and getting 100 heads? Answer (1/2)^100. This is an event I would class as impossible.

And due to the influence of such "random" variables as the manner in which the coin is tossed/gravity/amount of coinspin from toss to landing etc. So what Im saying here is that what is interpreted as ' randomness' is in fact, the presence of other variables which in turn are part of the inherent laws of nature instituted by the Creator.

 

[lucaspa]

Originally posted by Micaiah
Some things have such a low chance of occuring that you would say they are impossible. For example, what is the chance of tossing a coin 100 times and getting 100 heads? Answer (1/2)^100. This is an event I would class as impossible.

What is the chance of dealing 13 cards of a pack in a specified sequence:
(1/52)x(1/51)x(1/50)x...x(1/40)x(1/39). Again that gives a small number and may be considered an impossible event.

I'm glad you used the coin toss example.  Because it lets me illustrate how the cumulative selection of Darwinian (natural) selection cuts down odds.

Start with 2^100 people and use a single elimination tournament.  Pair them up and have each pair toss a coin.  The ones that call heads stay (selected) and the ones that call heads are eliminated. Take the winners and do this again.  And again.  100 times. Absolutely guanteed that you get a person that called heads 100 times in a row. Now, you don't know which person ahead of time, but you absolutely know, by this algorithm, that one of them will. So, in 100 "generations" you have beat the odds.

Now, take the cards.  While the odds of dealing one particular hand is poor, the fact is that any 13 card hand can be used in a game of bridge, for instance.  So, for playing bridge, although dealing a particular hand has long odds, you don't need a particular hand for the task of playing bridge.

Thanks for illustrating the fallacy of the "odds" argument.

 

[lucaspa]

Originally posted by food4thought
You forget that the amino acids of the correct chirality would never come into existance by random chance, because even the entire universe and every second of the hypothetical billions of years does not provide enough space, time, or atoms to be combined. The statistical absurdity of the possibility destroys whatever intelligently designed experiment you may have been referring to.

1. You don't need amino acids of a particular chirality.  Mixed amino acids work just as well.

2. Amino acids don't form by chance, either.  They also are the result of deterministic processes.  And so are the atoms of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen that make up amino acids. They are the result of deterministic processes of nucleosynthesis within stars.

So, starting off with the hydrogen and helium that condense after the BB, you don't need miraculous intervention by deity.  The god-of-the-gaps required by your argument simply isn't necessary in the universe God set up.