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Darwin Program - Does Dawkins annoy you?

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    #92
    Zombrex
    Closed Accounts Posts: 25,848 ✭✭✭✭Zombrex


    thebaldsoprano wrote: »
    If there were a God who didn't interfere with the natural but kept an eye on us and settled up in the afterlife, that alone is enough to break your statement.

    No, its got nothing to do with God. It is to do which knowledge and how someone goes about examining the natural world in a manner that provides the closes approximation to the true nature of reality irrespective of the hopes and desires of the individual.


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    #93
    wolfsbane
    Registered Users Posts: 5,980 ✭✭✭wolfsbane


    Splendour wrote: »
    Ahh, but it is not his crusade Santing. He is merely a channel through which the crusade is being operated. Why else would he be so adamant to speak out against Christianity?!

    I for one (Christian), actually feel sorry for Dawkins and see in him childlike quality. It's almost like he's trying to prove evolution to himself rather than his viewer and readers. He has been in my prayers many times. And just like Wolfsbane I don't worry a jot about him being against Christianity-after all God is bigger than Dawkins and who knows; God's hand could be right in the middle of it all...
    Yes, Saul of Tarsus springs to my mind when I listen to Dawkins. Maybe he is finding it hard to kick against the goads. May God have mercy on him, granting him repentance unto life.


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    #94
    thebaldsoprano
    Closed Accounts Posts: 827 ✭✭✭thebaldsoprano


    Wicknight wrote: »
    No, its got nothing to do with God. It is to do which knowledge and how someone goes about examining the natural world in a manner that provides the closes approximation to the true nature of reality irrespective of the hopes and desires of the individual.

    Alright then, their knowledge of such a God would be enough to break your statement.


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    #95
    Zombrex
    Closed Accounts Posts: 25,848 ✭✭✭✭Zombrex


    thebaldsoprano wrote: »
    Alright then, their knowledge of such a God would be enough to break your statement.

    Again it wouldn't, you are missing the point.

    Their understanding of such a god would be almost non-existent because such a God would be completely untestable and unexaminable, as is true with all supernatural


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    #96
    wolfsbane
    Registered Users Posts: 5,980 ✭✭✭wolfsbane


    AtomicHorror wrote: »
    Well if you take the line that abiogenesis resulted in lifeless materials becoming simple life which then evolved into man then that allows you to claim both to be true. "Muck to Man" evolution as J C would say.

    Since abiogenesis is a theory up for grabs, you can speculatively insert God :pac:
    The difficulty for kelly1 is that the RCC also specifies that Adam was not subject to bodily suffering and death. That would certainly be difficult to sustain in any understanding of the evolutionary process - unless one said evolution stopped when Adam was formed. I assume that also poses problems for the common understanding of evolution since the rise of man?


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    #97
    thebaldsoprano
    Closed Accounts Posts: 827 ✭✭✭thebaldsoprano


    Wicknight wrote: »
    Again it wouldn't, you are missing the point.

    Their understanding of such a god would be almost non-existent because such a God would be completely untestable and unexaminable, as is true with all supernatural

    Again, I'm not missing the point. Let's say someone with access to both the natural and the supernatural a long time ago spread the word.

    Again, statement broken. I don't think there's a way out of this one :)


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    #98
    Zombrex
    Closed Accounts Posts: 25,848 ✭✭✭✭Zombrex


    thebaldsoprano wrote: »
    Again, I'm not missing the point. Let's say someone with access to both the natural and the supernatural a long time ago spread the word.

    Again, statement broken. I don't think there's a way out of this one :)

    What do you mean "with access"

    Can you explain how someone tests or examines the supernatural?

    By definition the supernatural does not follow natural rules, modeling it or testing it is impossible and as such so is understanding it.

    You can look at it for sure, but that isn't the same thing at all.


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    #99
    wolfsbane
    Registered Users Posts: 5,980 ✭✭✭wolfsbane


    Wicknight said:
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by kelly1
    I read about one man who went into a deep depression for a few years after reading the selfish gene.
    Would you not blame Christianity for that, rather than Dawkins?

    Of course not. Each side has its view point Kelly.
    I caught the end of his show last night. He addressed the hope/purpose issue by reminding us that we are the descendants of a line of successful competitors going back to the beginning. None of our ancestors died before they bred, and some of their offspring continued that right down to us.

    This was supposed to give us a feeling of significance. But a moment's reflection tells us the exact same thing is true of the house-fly or the bacteria that lives under your toilet bowl.

    No wonder thinking people who believe such nonsense sink into despair. :mad:


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    #100
    thebaldsoprano
    Closed Accounts Posts: 827 ✭✭✭thebaldsoprano


    Wicknight wrote: »
    What do you mean "with access"

    Not being a religious person, I'll have to take a pass on that one.

    But just to re iterate things (again), if a group of religious people accepted that one person "had access" and followed his teachings about such a God, then that would be enough to break your statement.


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    #101
    Zombrex
    Closed Accounts Posts: 25,848 ✭✭✭✭Zombrex


    thebaldsoprano wrote: »
    But just to re iterate things (again), if a group of religious people accepted that one person "had access" and followed his teachings about such a God, then that would be enough to break your statement.

    No it wouldn't because they wouldn't know anything more about the natural world. They would just be following what someone tells them to do. The guy could be making the whole thing up. Or the god himself could be making the whole thing up. They know nothing more about the natural world and yet have their view of the natural world clouded by the superstition which they are incapable of figuring out if it is actually real or not.

    Even if everything the god tells them is true by virtue of accepting it rather than learning it means they have no idea if it is true and as such have no actual knowledge of world itself.

    Its like a friend telling you what a movie was about. He may be lying to you, you don't know because you haven't seen the movie. He may be telling you the truth but you don't actually know anything about the movie because you haven't seen it. All you know about is your friend.


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    #102
    thebaldsoprano
    Closed Accounts Posts: 827 ✭✭✭thebaldsoprano


    Wicknight wrote: »
    No it wouldn't because they wouldn't know anything more about the natural world.

    Is there something stopping them investigating the natural world by scientific means?
    Assuming there isn't your statement is broken.


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    #103
    Zombrex
    Closed Accounts Posts: 25,848 ✭✭✭✭Zombrex


    thebaldsoprano wrote: »
    Is there something stopping them investigating the natural world by scientific means?

    Yes that is the whole point, they have already accept things about the natural world from a supernatural source.

    There is nothing stopping them investigating other areas of the natural world that are not covered by the declaration from the supernatural source, but as I said that is just a fudge.


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    #104
    thebaldsoprano
    Closed Accounts Posts: 827 ✭✭✭thebaldsoprano


    Wicknight wrote: »
    There is nothing stopping them investigating other areas of the natural world that are not covered by the declaration from the supernatural source, but as I said that is just a fudge.

    So, if these 'other areas' were the entirety of the natural world, I take it then that believing in such a God wouldn't then affect one's views of it, which is in contradiction with your statement that this would be impossible.


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    #105
    robindch
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,417 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    wolfsbane wrote: »
    No wonder thinking people who believe such nonsense sink into despair.
    Except, of course, that most don't "sink into despair".

    I'll grant an unsettled feeling lasting perhaps five seconds, but one which is quickly overtaken by the sincerely awe-inspiring thought that one is related to every living thing on this earth in an unbroken chain of life stretching back something like three and a half billion years.

    And in terms of grandeur, that idea certainly puts into perspective the feeble creationist view of a trivial universe significantly younger than some of the trees that grow in it.


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    #106
    Zombrex
    Closed Accounts Posts: 25,848 ✭✭✭✭Zombrex


    thebaldsoprano wrote: »
    So, if these 'other areas' were the entirety of the natural world, I take it then that believing in such a God wouldn't then affect one's views of it, which is in contradiction with your statement that this would be impossible.

    Well yes, but if the "other areas" were the entirety of the natural world then someone wouldn't be using the supernatural would they? One wouldn't even be aware of the supernatural. A person cannot be aware of the supernatural unless at some point they believe the supernatural has fluxed the natural world.

    You are contradicting my statement by removing the supernatural from the issue, which doesn't make sense.


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    #107
    thebaldsoprano
    Closed Accounts Posts: 827 ✭✭✭thebaldsoprano


    Wicknight wrote: »
    Well yes

    Well, looks like we're finally getting somewhere...
    Wicknight wrote: »
    but if the "other areas" were the entirety of the natural world then someone wouldn't be using the supernatural would they? One wouldn't even be aware of the supernatural. A person cannot be aware of the supernatural unless at some point they believe the supernatural has fluxed the natural world.

    None of this has any relevance.
    Wicknight wrote: »
    You are contradicting my statement by removing the supernatural from the issue, which doesn't make sense.

    Yes, contradicting your incorrect statement was the idea alright. My argument showed one of your statements to contradict another one of your statements. Saying that "doesn't make sense" well, doesn't make sense.

    Oh, and btw, the link between the natural and the supernatural was clearly outlined.


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    #108
    Zombrex
    Closed Accounts Posts: 25,848 ✭✭✭✭Zombrex


    thebaldsoprano wrote: »
    None of this has any relevance.

    Of course it has relevance.

    My original statement was that if someone focuses on supernatural explanations for the world around them this hinders their ability to learn about the natural world around them. The example used was Newton's obsession with alchemy, which provided a pleasing supernatural view of materials that was also completely wrong, and it was this view that hindered Newton from actually learning about the materials he was working with.

    After all that your response is basically that isn't true if the person ignores supernatural explanations.

    I agree 100% with you on that :)

    It is as soon as someone brings in supernatural explanations that problems arise. If they ignore it with relation to all areas of natural world there isn't a problem. Looking to the supernatural hinders someone's ability to learn about how the natural world actually is.


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    #109
    thebaldsoprano
    Closed Accounts Posts: 827 ✭✭✭thebaldsoprano


    Hmmm, maybe not on reading your post again.

    Yeah, I don't doubt for a moment that the supernatural can cause problems, just that believing in supernatural things doesn't necessarily impair your understanding of the natural world.

    I guess if one looks for a supernatural explanations for natural phenonema, that's definitely a bad thing, but it's also perfectly possible to keep physical matters physical and spiritual matters spiritual, with very minor, if any overlap between them.

    Maybe Newton was just blowing off some steam in those furnaces :)


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    #110
    santing
    Registered Users Posts: 671 ✭✭✭santing


    thebaldsoprano wrote: »
    Firstly, Newton wasn't a chemist. I suspect his views on the area of chemistry in general were on par with his contemporaries at the time.
    Einstein not a chemist ? ... He has defined a law for photochemistry.

    http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_gx5216/is_2004/ai_n19132664


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    #111
    thebaldsoprano
    Closed Accounts Posts: 827 ✭✭✭thebaldsoprano


    santing wrote: »
    Einstein not a chemist ? ... He has defined a law for photochemistry.

    http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_gx5216/is_2004/ai_n19132664

    No, Dawkins wasn't a chemist :)


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    #112
    AtomicHorror
    Registered Users Posts: 5,888 ✭✭✭AtomicHorror


    wolfsbane wrote: »
    The difficulty for kelly1 is that the RCC also specifies that Adam was not subject to bodily suffering and death. That would certainly be difficult to sustain in any understanding of the evolutionary process - unless one said evolution stopped when Adam was formed.

    I'll leave that for the RCC to figure out.
    wolfsbane wrote: »
    I assume that also poses problems for the common understanding of evolution since the rise of man?

    Why would it?
    thebaldsoprano wrote: »
    Hmmm, maybe not on reading your post again.

    Yeah, I don't doubt for a moment that the supernatural can cause problems, just that believing in supernatural things doesn't necessarily impair your understanding of the natural world.

    As I suggested earlier, Newton might have asked more questions of the universe had he not simply decided that the underlying cause of the gravity and motion laws he had elucidated was simply the will of God. That was a mistake. The task was taken up by less gifted minds.


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    #113
    santing
    Registered Users Posts: 671 ✭✭✭santing


    thebaldsoprano wrote: »
    No, Dawkins wasn't a chemist :)
    Oops

    Well about Newton:
    Newton wrote and transcribed about a million words on the subject of alchemy, of which only a tiny fraction has today been published. Newton's alchemical manuscripts include a rich and diverse set of document types, including laboratory notebooks, indices of alchemical substances, and Newton's transcriptions from other sources.

    http://webapp1.dlib.indiana.edu/newton/


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    #114
    thebaldsoprano
    Closed Accounts Posts: 827 ✭✭✭thebaldsoprano


    AtomicHorror wrote: »
    As I suggested earlier, Newton might have asked more questions of the universe had he not simply decided that the underlying cause of the gravity and motion laws he had elucidated was simply the will of God. That was a mistake. The task was taken up by less gifted minds.

    Oh come on, we all know God is responsible for gravity/mass/whatever :D

    Yeah true, minds as gifted as Newton's are a rarity, but I'm not sure he'd have nailed it given the technology/literature available at time.

    But then again, who knows...


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    #115
    robindch
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,417 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    PDN wrote: »
    Adam Kuper, Professor of Anthropology at Brunel University: http://newhumanist.org.uk/974
    Kuper writes "So let us agree that memes exist[...]", so I think it's fairly safe to assume that Kuper does not assert that memetic theory is pseudo-science.
    PDN wrote: »
    Scott Atran, Research Director in Anthropology at the Jean Nicod Institute of the French Centre national de la recherche scientifique and author of "The trouble with memes".
    That paper is available as a download from here and while his exquisitely painful post-modernist prose does note some of the areas where debate is ongoing, he does not discard the idea (in fact, towards the end, he suggests memetics may be useful). He certainly doesn't refer to memetics as "pseudo-science".
    PDN wrote: »
    Maurice Bloch, Professor of Anthropology at LSE and author of "A well-disposed social anthropologist's problems with memes." in Robert Aunger's Darwinizing Culture (2000).
    Neither of whom seem to refer to memes as pseudo-science either (see here for example).
    PDN wrote: »
    I understand he is representative of many other anthropologists who find the comparison between genes and memes to be frustrating and unproductive, particularly the idea of them being self-replicating.
    I suspect that three things are going on here:
    • Biologists, being familiar with biology and genetics, seeing an opportunity to apply the same ideas elsewhere.
    • Anthropologists, being unfamiliar with biology and genetics, not really quite understanding what's going on and getting upset that biologists are invading what's traditionally been their territory.
    • Memetics are new -- only thirty years or so old -- and there is a lot of thinking being done, and still to be done, on the topic.
    From reading the above links, and other stuff previously, it seems to me that some anthropologists seem to be unnecessarily defensive of prior theories of cultural transmission and occasionally unreceptive towards some pretty interesting ideas which are coming over the fence from their friends in biology.

    I rather suspect that the greatest degree of accuracy lies at some point between, and probably closer to the general position of biologists, than that of any of the anthropologists you've quoted above (none of whom have referred to memetics as "pseudo-science" in anything that I can find).


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    #116
    wolfsbane
    Registered Users Posts: 5,980 ✭✭✭wolfsbane


    AtomicHorror said:
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by wolfsbane
    The difficulty for kelly1 is that the RCC also specifies that Adam was not subject to bodily suffering and death. That would certainly be difficult to sustain in any understanding of the evolutionary process - unless one said evolution stopped when Adam was formed.
    I'll leave that for the RCC to figure out.


    Quote:
    Originally Posted by wolfsbane
    I assume that also poses problems for the common understanding of evolution since the rise of man?
    Why would it?
    You think man is not evolving??


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    #117
    wolfsbane
    Registered Users Posts: 5,980 ✭✭✭wolfsbane


    robindch wrote: »
    Except, of course, that most don't "sink into despair".

    I'll grant an unsettled feeling lasting perhaps five seconds, but one which is quickly overtaken by the sincerely awe-inspiring thought that one is related to every living thing on this earth in an unbroken chain of life stretching back something like three and a half billion years.

    And in terms of grandeur, that idea certainly puts into perspective the feeble creationist view of a trivial universe significantly younger than some of the trees that grow in it.
    I'll stick with being the centre of interest in the universe, that it will be replaced to give us an eternal home, that all things were created for our service. I'll leave you to being brother to the bacteria. :D


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    #118
    santing
    Registered Users Posts: 671 ✭✭✭santing


    wolfsbane wrote: »
    You think man is not evolving??
    Well, looking at the last 500 years ... science has progressed, but mankind has degenerated.

    For instance, when Vondel (16th century Dutch author) wanted to write a play on Amsterdam, he read the Latin Aeneas a few time, "to get in the right mood." Name someone who would read the Aeneas today for leisure (in Latin!)

    Speaking about the Aeneas, the Iliad and many other greek plays where memorised by travelling poets and "quoted" on demand. That's a lot of learning to do! When we need to 5 and 2 together we need a calculator.


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    #119
    robindch
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,417 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    wolfsbane wrote: »
    I'll stick with being the centre of interest in the universe
    I suppose that's the appeal of creationism really.


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    #120
    robindch
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 24,417 Mod ✭✭✭✭robindch


    santing wrote: »
    Well, looking at the last 500 years ... science has progressed, but mankind has degenerated.
    Not in the slightest -- humans are living longer, learning more, having fewer children who are themselves living, doing less manual labour, travelling more, being in much more secure health, and in almost ever dimension I can think of, having a better and more fulfilling life.

    Am I right in thinking that you would like to take up life as an average Joe in 1508?


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    #121
    AtomicHorror
    Registered Users Posts: 5,888 ✭✭✭AtomicHorror


    Originally Posted by AtomicHorror
    Well if you take the line that abiogenesis resulted in lifeless materials becoming simple life which then evolved into man then that allows you to claim both to be true. "Muck to Man" evolution as J C would say.

    Since abiogenesis is a theory up for grabs, you can speculatively insert God :pac:

    Originally Posted by Wolfsbane
    The difficulty for kelly1 is that the RCC also specifies that Adam was not subject to bodily suffering and death. That would certainly be difficult to sustain in any understanding of the evolutionary process - unless one said evolution stopped when Adam was formed. I assume that also poses problems for the common understanding of evolution since the rise of man?

    Originally Posted by AtomicHorror
    Why would it?

    Originally Posted by Wolfsbane
    You think man is not evolving??

    Ah, sorry. I wasn't following you there. Man is still evolving, there's plenty of good data on that and absolutely no reason to assume otherwise that we have observed yet.


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