Darwinists Running Scared
- Thread starter phildwyer
- Start date
How do the images produced by tunnelling electron microscopes come about then?phildwyer said:
"A stadium shaped corral made by iron atoms on a copper surface"
http://nobelprize.org/physics/educational/microscopes/scanning/gallery/9.html
Are you going to make the same claim about ultra-violet and infra-red light, because human eyes can't see them?
TeeJay said:
No mate, I'll say anything to your face that I've said on here. I just didn't want to upset you. Seriously, put yourself in my position: you've told me that you've had serious mental health issues. I know this kind of debate can be distressing for some people. From the tone of your recent posts (not all of them, just the recent ones), I suspect that you may be one of them. I don't want it on my conscience that I've made your health problems worse. That's all it is. Truly, I wish you all the best.
montevideo said:
The Absolute Idea in Plato (Hegel's term is "Geist", or "Spirit") is the source of the dialectic, that which makes the dialectic possible, hence originally outside it. But you are right in the sense that (again according to these thinkers, these aren't my ideas, more's the pity), Spirit needs creation in order to become self-conscious, and thus to exist "for itself," in Hegel's terminology. Thus Greek and Hegelian philosophy, like Christianity, envisage a kind of secondary Creator, in addition to the original principle. Plato calls this the "demiurge," Christianity calls it the "Son," Hegel calls it the "self-objectification of Spirit" among other things. So to answer your question, God would exist "in Himself" without us, but "for Himself" only through us. In short, He needs us as much as we need Him.
sleaterkinney
Well-Known Member
Why do you believe in something without any evidence?. If science came up with a way to explain our existance tomorrow would you throw all this rubbish away?phildwyer said:
Fruitloop said:
I subscribe to *a* theory of intelligent design, there are many of them, as you may be aware. I don't believe that evolution is caused, in the last instance, by "random mutation and natural selection." The final material cause of which we know is the collision of inconceivably distant galaxies, of which Darwin knew nothing. The question thus becomes: what caused those galaxies to collide? On this matter, science has yet to illuminate us, and I'm not holding my breath either.
You should check out Tiffany's _Toy Medium_ for a fascinating critique of science from a literary perspective. And I'd be interested to hear what you make of Latour--I find him extremely convincing. Laptop is a mate of his, BTW, but won't be drawn on the issue, slippery creature that he is.
montevideo
New Member
phildwyer said:
but how would you know this? Cows don't know this. For cows there is no god, for geraniums there is no god, we are the only source of god. You take away our (as individuals, a humanity, as a social beings) presense where does god go? More importantly where was god before our presense?
sleaterkinney
Well-Known Member
You're saying that "random mutation and natural selection." come about by "the collision of inconceivably distant galaxies" ?.phildwyer said:
montevideo said:
Well, as I said before, to answer this question we need to divide God into (at least) two aspects. Since you are probably most familiar with the Christian solution to this problem, let's call them the "Father" and the "Son" (I hope I don't have to point out that these terms are purely metaphorical). The "Father" is eternal, thus existed before us, but that is irrelevant for all practical purposes since we can know nothing of Him beyond the bare fact of His existence. The "Son" is temporal, is incarnated only through us, thus depends on us for His existence and could not exist without us. The precise relation between the "Father" and the "Son" is an extremely important, but for that reason almost incredibly fraught question, which has been the cause of 3,000 years of debate, numerous purges and pogroms, several revolutions, and quite a few wars. It might be best not to pursue this matter in the volatile environment of Urban75. You are entirely correct to say that there is no God for geraniums.
montevideo
New Member
phildwyer said:
i know as much about christianity as i do about any other religion. Thankfully.
But again how do we know the father is eternal & existed before us? If we can't know anything of him beyond the bare fact of his existence how do we know of his existence? What are we relying on?
We can offer oursleves up to martyrs of 'faith' (as do the disciples of marx & the disciples of science) but what are you giving that reaches beyond that? All we have are articles of faith, & it is this, i would suggest, that creates the progroms, the purges, the revolutions & wars. Everyone seems satisfied in their truth rather than curious in their doubt.
If this is the theory of macro-mutations in response to large-scale asteroid or comet impacts, then I think it's a diversion at best, and most probably complete hokum. I have some time for punctuated equilibrium, but the idea that against a background of steady variation at the cellular level, greater morphological changes might be selected for in times of rapid environmental change doesn't seem that contentious.
sleaterkinney
Well-Known Member
Ok,phildwyer said:
A) Evidence?
B) How are Comet impacts related to "the collision of inconceivably distant galaxies"
fractionMan
Custom Title
onemonkey said:"Darwin in 150 years out of date shocker"
But this just in...
"Evolution still shits on the Pope"
Now that's how you sum up a thread
I was wondering about this, given that it seems to be pretty much accepted that they are the result of the gradual clumping of matter left over from the creation of the solar system - particularly since the new data from Deep Impact (the probe not the shitty film).
Fruitloop said:
I'm pretty busy at the moment, so apologies in advance if I don't answer all your questions right away, either on this or other threads. Its not clear from this post whether you think that comet impacts themselves are "complete hokum," or the fact that macro-evolutionary changes resulted from them? Either way, you're wrong. And I'd hold onto punk-ek if I were you, its the only thing that holds Darwinian evolution together (although of course Darwin would have denied it). Evolution is not unidirectional, it does not result only from the competitive adaptation of individual organisms, in fact it is a dialectical* process resulting from the combination of organismic and environmnetal factors. I do hope you won't dispute this, it will save us an awful lot of time.
* see other thread in a minute.
montevideo said:
You really need to learn more about "religion," you'll find many of your assumptions overturned, which is often exciting. You raise a good and complex question here. Very briefly, from the fact that our knowledge is limited and conditioned, we can deduce the existence of unlimited and unconditioned knowledge: in technical terminology, the a posteriori implies the a priori. But by definition, we can know nothing *of* the a priori.
montevideo
New Member
phildwyer said:
so it's an article of faith? One which you ask us to believe. Fine. There must be something that allows us to be convinced of its validity (as you clearly are). What then is that something?
Ps i assume nothing of religion beyond what it asks of me.
sleaterkinney
Well-Known Member
A) How do you know it was a comet?phildwyer said:
B) Comets are bodies which orbit around the sun, not from distant galaxies. They would have no method of getting here.
Comet impacts seem not completely out of the question. The problem I have is with whether they could trigger any genetic changes that wouldn't have occurred anyway, or whether they just shook up the existing environment in a way that allowed new species to flourish in a way that they wouldn't otherwise have done. It's pretty clear that apex predators would have been the most vulnerable to sudden changes in the ecosystem and that their extinction would have had repercussions right down the food-chain. I don't see any need for punk-ek to consist of anything other than mutation and selection to account for differing rates of change, when the environment itself is subject to differing rates of change; it also seems obvious these two types of changes would be likely to co-occur.
Fruitloop said:
I'm not sure that I see the distinction between "allow[ing] new species to flourish in a way that they wouldn't otherwise have done" and "trigger[ing] genetic changes that wouldn't have happened anyway." Surely the former implies the latter? And I don't think anyone seriously disputes the K-T event these days, do they? Although the tenacity with which hardline Darwinists fought against it testifies to its incampatibility with Darwin's gradualism. I agree with you that punk-ek and gradual change would be likely to co-occur, but I think that punk-ek discredits, perhaps not Darwinism per se, but many of the illegitimate extrpolations from Darwin, notably sociobiology and evolutionary psychology.
exosculate
a stagger with a beat
TeeJay said:
A genetically significant change usually implies a better survival rate for the particular specie. As it becomes more dominant within the species.
exosculate said:
But genetic change is a relatively insignificant factor in ensuring species survival, compared to environmental changes. So the genetic changes that enable the dinosaurs to thrive, for instance, may well have contributed to their extinction following the K-T event.
exosculate
a stagger with a beat
phildwyer said:
On the contrary it is of fundamental importance. Consider many hundreds of potential genetic variation within one specie. Anyone of which could - given the right circumstances - be a saviour of the whole species at any time.
