RufusAtticus

Denis,

You might also find <a href="http://www.christianforums.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=21275" target="_blank">this thread</a> interesting. It is where I say my views on the what "creationist" refers to.

Albion

I like that definition. I agree that the important division here is the one between "can be explained by natural processes" and "requires supernatural input" rather than the one between "believes in God" and "doesn't believe in God." Otherwise people like Kenneth Miller are creationists, and then things get really confusing. I don't really see why someone's personal opinion about deities should be the defining factor here, since science is supposed to be neutral on that one.

Denis Lamoureux

Dank,
You're absolutely right, and in fact I'm doing a neuro-theology class (sitting in, not teaching). In my estimation it's the final frontier. I do classic sci-rel stuff (Darwin, Galileo, evo-creat, etc), but I tell my students interested in sci-rel not to do what I've done but go on to neurscience & theology

However, I must underline I am not making a God-of-the-gaps argument--no interventionistic acts in my evolutionary biology. However, I am making an intellectual JUMP from the scientfic data to my metaphysics in the construction of my worldview. AND, DANK, WE ALL DO IT. Dick Dawkins does, I do it, and you do it. Welcome to the human condition. As Kant wrote in the _Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics_ (1784), "That the human mind will ever give up metaphysical researches is as little to be expected as we, to avoid inhaling impure air, should prefer to give up breathing altogether."

So on to your 'Comfort Blanket' argument or Marx's 'religion is an opiate' argument. Or if you want the latest terminology: Terror Mangement Theory (actually this is really great stuff).

We all put a thumb in our mouths and hang on to our blankets--theistic, atheistic, agnostic, etc. We have to for our own psychological stability--that's what a world view does. But, yea here I go again, here's the 'but', but who has got the best blanket of this show we call life?

Let's say there is a God. And let's say He/She reveals through nature (Intelligent Design in the classical sense, not this ID theory nonsense), and let's say He/She used an evolutionary process to CREATE (yes, note the professional use of the term 'create) a nest of neurological cells to give us a sense of morality. OK, if that's all true, and some one simply damn well doesn't want a God in the universe, then that individual is going to find E.O. Wilson's hardwired-for-God thesis very, very, are you ready for this? COMFORTING.

And believe me, I wrapped myself with that blanket for many years. It allowed me to function while I was doing my neighbor's wife . . .

Gonna admit you got a blanket, Dank?

Over to you,
Denis

Denis Lamoureux

Perfect!!! Now who told you that evolution wasn't goal oriented? Of course, that is the popular/common understanding. But who the hell in science has determined that evolution isn't goal oriented? What scientific test has shows evolution is dysteleological. I mean goodness gracious, does anyone in science want to make such a HUGE metaphysical assertion like that and then clothe it with the power this society gives cience???

Sorry to tell you RufsuAtticus . . . your metaphysical underwear is showing!

Respectfully,
Denis

RufusAtticus

The work of Th. Dobzhansky for one. All the evolutionary theory that I have seen and done has shown that. Stochastic models are a good example of the non deterministic out come of evolution. Genetic drift pratically guarantees that the outcome of evolution isn't predetermined. I'd be happy to work through a model with you.

Not as much as yours.

~~RvFvS~~

[ September 09, 2002: Message edited by: RufusAtticus ]

[ September 09, 2002: Message edited by: RufusAtticus ]</p>

Albion

So do atheists only find it comforting if there really IS a God? I mean, I think we've all heard until we're hearing it in our sleep that atheists simply want to be their own gods and don't want to be accountable to the god that really exists so they've constructed this edifice of atheism as an excuse for hating God. But the ones I've come across (apart maybe from the ones who are in a stage of reacting against a fundamentalist upbringing and really are using atheism as an escape) actually don't acknowledge the presence of God at all. I don't see what's so comforting about that.


And I don't really see what it has to do with the "doing my neighbor's wife" type of argument. This is beginning to sound a bit like the "atheists have no morals" stuff. i do hope I'm misunderstanding yuo.

mb

Hello Albion, I don't think this argument so much takes the form of "atheists have no morals" as it does "there is no intrinsic morality in atheism." So if engaged in behavior that offends your (God-given) conscience, for comfort you can seize on a worldview that regards such behavior as simply evolutionarily hard-wired. You may then argue that science necessarily leads to the conclusion that atheism is the only intellectually, scientifically teneble world view and tenaciously defend that belief (and I use the word "belief" advisedly here).

Denis Lamoureux

Hi,
That's fair, you bet. But all I want to point out is that WE ALL MAKE METAPHYSICAL STATEMENTS. And that's what they are--statements of BELIEF. They are not scientific, though they may appeal to science to inform them (eg, design arguments for theists; pain for atheistics/agnostics).

Evolution might be a teleological process.

Denis

RufusAtticus

Denis,

I think that if I stated that evolution disproves God or Christianity, I would be making metaphysical claims. However, simply recognizing that evolution is not goal-oriented is not making a metaphysical claim.

Sure evolution might be a teleological process, wherein God fiddles with the dice of the universe to get the outcome He wants. However, that is a position of Faith.

Of course, the accuracy of science cannot be determined by emotion, philosophy, politics, or religion.

~~RvFvS~~

Denis Lamoureux

[QUOTE]Originally posted by RufusAtticus:
[QB]
quote:
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Originally posted by Denis Lamoureux:

Perfect!!! Now who told you that evolution wasn't goal oriented? Of course, that is the popular/common understanding. But who the hell in science has determined that evolution isn't goal oriented?


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The work of Th. Dobzhansky for one. All the evolutionary theory that I have seen and done has shown that. Stochastic models are a good example of the non deterministic out come of evolution. Genetic drift pratically guarantees that the outcome of evolution isn't predetermined. I'd be happy to work through a model with you.

~~RvFvS~~

[ September 09, 2002: Message edited by: RufusAtticus ]

OK RufusAtticus,
I gotta go after you for this. Your justification for dysteleologlical evolution is based on "the work of Th. Dobzhansky" who died in 1975!!! And the biomolecular revolution starts in 1985 (HOX, evo-devo, etc)!!! Goodness gracious!

Theo certainly was a fine contributor up to the early 70s, but if you and I are going to called Xian fundies to intellectual accountability we gotta to clean up our own back yard. Theo is a perfect case study for the sociology of scientific knowledge. Steeped in positivistic categories he didn't have a hint of the post-modern epistemological revolution that was going on around him.

And regarding genetic drift, yes it's a reality and indeed a mechanism, but if you truly think that's this is all there is to evolutionary theory, think again. It's not that simplistic. Xian fundies think in simple categories like that. We are only just starting to understand some of the mechanisms, and there's a lot more to be said about their ontological status after that.

Denis