afdave
Posts: 1621
Joined: April 2006
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JEANNOT WINS THE PRIZE MONEY ... DING DING DING DING!
Some people are finally comprehending my argument which supports the idea of an Intelligent Designer requirement for living things.
Let's review the high points ...
A good insightful question ... this guy understands where I'm headed ... Malum ...[quote]Dave, do you believe that, if our technology becomes sophisticated enough that we can build a car that could manufacture it's own replacement, we would have created a living entity? [/quote]
To which I answered thusly ... | Quote | We'd be well on our way, yes. And I don't think that day is too far away ... did you read the article on the Future of Industrial Automation? (Instead of just pooh pooh it like our professor friend did)
What are living things? (not including man) They are automatons ... automatic, self-maintaining, self-feeding, self duplicating robots. Are they not? Why could our technology not produce something like this eventually? |
Malum seems to think my movement in that direction is unintentional ... | Quote | | Dave does seem anctious to sacrafice the difference between living and non living on the altar of complexity. I'm sure this is not his intention but, even though I discovered this site less than a week ago, I've already noticed that Dave is often trapped by the unentional consequences of his assertions. |
Not trapped, Malum. This is exactly where I want to be.
And Eric is having some good thoughts ... | Quote | | So Dave, if Thomas Edison could have built a simple machine that was capable of building a duplicate of itself (which frankly wouldn't have been hard, even with 19th century technology), he would have created life in the lab? |
But it's Jeannot who wins all the prize money with this response to the following dialog ... | Quote | | Quote | [Eric]
Dave, do you believe that, if our technology becomes sophisticated enough that we can build a car that could manufacture it's own replacement, we would have created a living entity? |
| Quote | | [Dave]We'd be well on our way, yes. And I don't think that day is too far away ... did you read the article on the Future of Industrial Automation? (Instead of just pooh pooh it like our professor friend did) |
| Quote | | [Eric]So Dave, if Thomas Edison could have built a simple machine that was capable of building a duplicate of itself (which frankly wouldn't have been hard, even with 19th century technology), he would have created life in the lab? |
[Jeannot]If a machine is capable of duplicating itself by incorporating without our help elements of its environment, and is also able of producing slightly altered copies, then it could evolve and anything could happen.
I [sic] [he meant "it"] would be a living being to me. Organic molecules, cells, metabolism... don't matter to me. If something can reproduce and evolve indefinitely, it's alive or I don't see the fundamental difference. |
YES ... PRECISELY! YOU GOT IT! PLEASE EXPLAIN THIS TO THE OTHERS
Alas, you jumped to the wrong conclusion in the next sentence, but at least you got this part right. And what is that?
You admitted that IF humans could build a machine capable of duplicating itself by incorporating elements of its environment without our help, and is also able of producing slightly altered copies ...
... then there is no fundamental difference between the man-made machine and the biological machine.
Did you hear that, Russell? Jeannot disagrees with you. You keep insisting that there is an absolute difference between man-made machines and biological machines in your oft repeated mantra that "BUTTERFLIES REPRODUCE, WATCHES DON'T" but at least one person from your side now disagrees with you.
Actually, everyone would disagree with you if they thought about it long enough and were honest. Congratulations, Jeannot, for having some clear thinking!
LIFE / NON-LIFE DEMARCATION LINE WILL BECOME FUZZY WITH TIME
The truth is that, thanks to our high technology, we will be able to create machines which are more and more automated, self-fueling, self-maintaining, etc., and our manufacturing will continue to become more and more efficient until we reach the ultimate in manufacturing efficiency and are able to duplicate biological reproduction in our own technology.
We are headed to this future ... fast!
And when we get there, all of you folks will have a really hard time explaining how, on the one hand, it took some brilliant intelligence to produce the man-made self-duplicating, self-feeding, self-maintaining machine, but on the other hand, the very similar biological one made itself!
Whoo boy! That's gonna be ugly! Egg on many faces.
What are the conclusions here?
Again ...
1) There is no fundamental difference between a butterfly (or a bacterium) and a watch
2) The differences boil down to degree of technological sophistication, nothing absolute or fundamental. They use elements from the same periodic table. The same laws of physics apply to both.
3) In archaeology, if you find an artifact that resembles known creations of human technology (writing, pottery, etc.), you conclude that it had an Intelligent Cause, do you not?
4) In biology, we also find thousands of artifacts in every living cell that resemble known creations of human technology. Why would we rule out the possibility of an Intelligent Cause in this case?
Especially when the alternative idea, ToE, has ZERO experimental proof of new structures being formed by RM+NS. In fact, the opposite has been proven experimentally ... "speeded up evolution" on fruit flies only produced dead and mangled fruit flies, not fruit flies with new structures.
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* Notice that these four conclusions are separate from any discussion of Evolution.
* Notice that these four conclusions are separate from any discussion of Creationism.
* Notice that these four conclusions are separate from any discussion of Bible.
* Notice that these four conclusions are separate from any discussion of Teleology.
* Notice that these four conclusions are separate from any discussion of the Nature of the Putative Intelligent Designer - it could be an alien on some planet for all we know.
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Now ... let's see how many honest people there are on this board who can admit the truth of these four conclusions.
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QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
Russell ... | Quote | Chance=>Mutations
Mutations=>Cells
... is equivalent to ...
"Cells came by chance"
I notice that, in not being able to actually address the question, you have resorted to the nonverbal equivocation " => ". What's " => " supposed to mean? Is that as close as you come to admitting that you're wrong? It sure as he11 does nothing to salvage any pretense of honesty your little cartoon might have hoped to get away with.
Let me be clear. Your strawman characterization of the mainstream science position is intentionally, knowingly deceitful, and your pretending otherwise in indoctrinating impressionable young minds is reprehensible. |
I answered the question. I showed you where two leading evolutionists, Ayala and Crow both say that mutations are the ultimate source of variability. Do you want me to parse this for you? OK. Here's Crow ... | Quote | | "My topic is mutation. Mutation is the ultimate source of variability on which natural selection acts; for neutral changes it is the driving force. Without mutation, evolution would be impossible." |
"Without mutation, evolution would be impossible." How do mutations occur? By chance, right? So without chance, there would be no evolution, and there would be no cells. Therefore, "Cells came by chance" is truly what the "doctors from Oxford" are communicating to us. Notice the line does not say "The Doctors from Oxford say cells came by chance alone." If I had used the word "alone" I would have been mischaracterizing the Doctors from Oxford. But as the line is written, I am not. Is it a mischaracterization to say that "weathermen tell us that rain comes from storm clouds"? No. Are there other factors involved? Of course, but we are accurate in making this statement. Possibly the mental stress you are experiencing might stem from the fact that I have presented the truth about ToE in such an entertaining and visually pleasing way, that my little poem has become an international hit - #3 in a Google search for "the watchmaker" and #5 for "watchmaker". For those of you that have not seen it yet, click here
The Watchmaker Multimedia Dynamtion
Russell ... | Quote | Nerve cells have electrical cables, Russell ..
Oh do they indeed? Once again I guess we'll come down to one of your wacky definitions ("afdafinitions" if you will).
Nerve cells have extensions - axons and dendrites - along which a chemical/electrical membrane perturbation is propagated. But they don't conduct electricity, which I would imagine would be a minimal requirement for electrical cable. |
Well ... read this article then and try to explain away "electrical cable." | Quote | Electricity Makes It Happen
By Janice Valverde
When your brain is stimulated, brain cells send millions of fast-moving electrical signals along the pathways of your central nervous system. These paths are nerves that branch out into all your muscles. Whenever you move a muscle, it is powered by electricity running through your nervous system!
The Body Electric |
Is this another case of "science speak" where the author really doesn't mean what she says? Sort of like "error" doesn't really mean "error"??
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DAVE ANSWERS OLD QUESTIONS, DECEMBER 2006
A Few Currently Unanswered Questions for Dave
| Quote | (1) Why can't you provide a means of falsifying your "hypothesis?" This is your job, not that of others.
(2) You admit you've never seen the supposedly "inerrant" originals of the bible . So-first-how do you know they're "inerrant"? Because the admittedly flawed copies tell you so? And you believe them why? From PuckSR, p.124
(3) I asked you what was equivocal about the clearly discounted Tyre prophecy, and you all you have done is ignore my questions...for thirty days (from 7_Popes) p.124
(4) How is the dendrochronology for Catal Huyuk wrong?
(5) Who do you think had syphilis on the ark?
(6) If Noah and his little group were the only humans left, can you calculate for me the average number of children each female would have to have in order to achieve the population levels we have today...in 4,356 years?? |
OK. Let's knock out a few of these every day. If I already answered the question, I will give you a search term that will land you in the right spot in the discussion. This assumes you have downloaded the two AFDave CGH threads to text files on your computer from here.
AFD_CGH1
AFD_CGH2
| Quote | | (1) Why can't you provide a means of falsifying your "hypothesis?" This is your job, not that of others. |
This was discussed in early December (this month). Do a CTRL-F search of AFD_CGH2 for 'falsifiability' WITH the single quotes. Search "Popper" with no quotes for Deadman's acknowledgement. He says ... | Quote | This leads me to some very basic logic. If you choose to claim Popper's later revised version of falsification is untenable, that falsification is flawed, fine.
I will merely say this: the fact that evidence is CONSISTENT with a hypothesis can almost never be taken as **conclusive **grounds for accepting it....
BUT evidence that is INCONSISTENT with a hypothesis such as "the Earth is 6000 years old" or " A global flood wiped out 99.99% of all life on this planet 2300 years ago" ...evidence that is INCONSISTENT with that...provides solid grounds for REJECTING the hypothesis.
What I will say is that there is no way you have shown of even theoretically rejecting your hypothesis. This removes it into the realm of the metaphysical. It reduces logic to meaninglessness and tosses out epistemic consistency. |
Note that Creationism and ToE are on the same "epistemic ground." Neither can truly be falsified because they are historical inquiries. But we CAN (and I have) shown that much evidence is CONSISTENT with Creationism and INCONSISTENT with ToE.
| Quote | | (2) You admit you've never seen the supposedly "inerrant" originals of the bible . So-first-how do you know they're "inerrant"? Because the admittedly flawed copies tell you so? And you believe them why? From PuckSR, p.124 |
Evidence only takes people so far. You study living things and see that they change (micro-evolution). From this, you make a leap of faith and say that all living things were created by this mechanism. To me this is a big leap and a foolish one. I make leaps also, but my leaps are smaller and (in my opinion) wiser and more justified by the evidence. This is an example. I read the historical records contained in the Bible. I see that they are in agreement with archaeological finds and with secular history. I see clear prophecies in the Hebrew Scriptures, such as Micah 5:2, Isaiah 7:14, ch. 53, Daniel 9, Zechariah 9 and 13, etc. which were clearly fulfilled even though written hundreds of years before the fulfillment. I see the accurate portrayal of humanity in the Bible. And on and on I could go. In short, I see a collection of writings--the Bible--that is in a class by itself--supernatural it seems, which claims inerrancy. I have no reason to reject this claim and much reason to believe it, therefore I choose to. This is a leap, yes, but in my opinion, it is only a small leap based on a tremendous weight of evidence. Notice, however, that none of my discussion here at ATBC has hinged on "inerrancy." Here at ATBC, I only use the Bible's historical sections and treat it as one would ANY history book.
| Quote | | (3) I asked you what was equivocal about the clearly discounted Tyre prophecy, and you all you have done is ignore my questions...for thirty days (from 7_Popes) p.124 |
Answered long ago. Do a CTRL-F search of AFD_CGH1 for 'trinitysem' with no quotes and you will find this back in September ... | Quote | MORE FODDER FOR 7 POPES AND TYRE
http://www.tektonics.org/uz/zeketyre.html
http://www.trinitysem.edu/journal/prophesy.html
As anyone with an ounce of honesty and an ability to do Google searches can see, there are many explanations available in addition to the ones I gave from Josh McDowell, which may explain the Tyre prophecy. I cannot make a water tight argument supporting ALL things in the Bible. But you as a skeptic also cannot make a watertight argument refuting anything in the Bible. Are you willing to risk your eternal future with your skepticism?
The bottom line, as I have said before is ... if you want to be a skeptic, you can find a thousand ways ... but if truth is your goal, you can find that also ... What's your goal 7 Popes? Is it Truth? Or is it Skepticism? |
| Quote | | (4) How is the dendrochronology for Catal Huyuk wrong? |
Answered long ago. My answer is Dr. Don Batten's (quite successful plant physiologist) answer. Go to www.answersingenesis.org and search "dendrochronology". You will find his article.
| Quote | | (5) Who do you think had syphilis on the ark? |
Sheep, but they didn't have adverse symptoms (discussed already). www.trueorigin.org/virus.asp
| Quote | | (6) If Noah and his little group were the only humans left, can you calculate for me the average number of children each female would have to have in order to achieve the population levels we have today...in 4,356 years?? |
Yes. Actually, Henry Morris has already done so in The Biblical Basis for Modern Science in the chapter entitled "Babel and the World Population". Already discussed long ago (July 5). Do a CTRL-F search of AFD_CGH1 for the term 'c^(n-x+1)' with no quotes.
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OK? Are we happy now? So from this we see that ...
1) I have already answered many of the questions on this list already, so Deadman is wrong that they are "unanswered questions", and
2) I am not afraid to answer questions.
I will answer more tomorrow continuing through the list.
Have a nice day!
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A DILEMMA FOR THE COMMITTED NATURALIST
A Hi-tech alien spaceship lands on earth ... DESIGNED.
A Hi-tech alien rotary motor found in a cell ... NOT DESIGNED.
http://afdave.wordpress.com/....ess.com
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