Oolon Colluphid

Let me stop you right there Steve. The ‘truth’, for our Thia, is far stranger than any fiction. It’s not ‘goddidit’, it’s more like ‘spacealiensdidit’.

As I mentioned, our Thia is a fairground bell-ringing peg. No matter how hard you smack his ideas down, up he pops again a while later. He’s returned a couple of times now after swearing he never would again, and to be fair, he’s been a lot better (if no more educated in science) recently. But to see where he’s undoubtedly leading (hey Thia, prove me wrong! What exactly is your point?), let me plug the ideas he holds for him: come and see the wonders at <a href="http://www.thiaoouba.com" target="_blank">www.thiaoouba.com</a> .

(If you’d really like a laugh, do a search of this forum and last year’s archive of it on his membership number. You’ll see why he is now apparently taking a more circuitous route in hawking his nonsense. Thia, you do still believe that stuff, no?)

Cheers, Oolon

Jonesy

To Stpehen TB:

If you are asking about the 'Function' of the
entire Universe, then:

1. There either isn't one:

all the pure evolutionists win - everything is absolutely random and that's the end of the story.

2. There is one:

and at the moment, in the strong absence of any 'physical' evidence (I agree to the fact that no physical evidence that could be genuine exists) my opinion has strongly been influenced on this issue by this book, which, to me, although not proving 'physically' that the Universe has a function, does so very well when one considers just logic and intellectual argumentation:

<a href="http://www.thiaoouba.com/freedom.zip" target="_blank">http://www.thiaoouba.com/freedom.zip</a>

What it comes down is what I've said above: either no function to the Universe and hence no 'designer', or there IS a function which would then imply a designer. Although without physical evidence, I cannot (please help me to do this) go past the arguments in the book that I include the link to above.

(Note: that book only sits on the server of the <a href="http://www.thiaoouba.com" target="_blank">www.thiaoouba.com</a> website, but here, I only want to concentrate your attention on the book "The Freedom of Choice", the address to which is given above)

Please help me see how this book is bullshit, because I've read it many times and still could not find the argument of the author 'intellectually flawed'.

[August 09, 2002: Message edited by: Kevin Dorner - Links restored]

[ August 09, 2002: Message edited by: Kevin Dorner ]</p>

Oolon Colluphid

Ta-Daaah!

I do love it when my predictions are confirmed.

Oolon Colluphid

Thiaoouba, the Planet Thiaoouba's Navel Contemplation Attaché, wrote:

Thia, how many times do I have to tell you that there's plenty of things that are not "absolutely random"? Chemical reactions, gravity and thermodynamics spring to mind. As does the one that 'evolutionists' ascribe to: natural selection. Evolution is not a random process, because selection, by definition, is the antithesis of randomness. It picks a path through all possible designs, finding at each step only ones that work.

Therefore we are here because not one of our ancestors died young or failed to reproduce, though many many of their contemporaries did. We come from a very long line of success stories.

If you want more of a 'reason for being here' than that, it's off to the philosophy forum with you.

Oolon

Jonesy

why was the link deleted? I'm not advertising anything - just using the document that the link points to as part of my argument. Why don't you delete anyone else's links, such as links to, say 'The origin of species' - that would also classify as advertising on your interpretation, wouldn't it? Please consider the articel I have mentioned, in conjuction with my post and reply then - that article (www.thiaoouba.com/freedom.zip) is central to my argument. It is just like any link on the net (such as, eg. the link to the 'reducible mousetrap, etc...) - it explains things relevant to a person's post.

MOJO-JOJO

KC, this is where the "miracles of cancer disappearing without a trace due to lots of people praying for the patient" thing usually gets played.

Now if it were documented that someone with a severed arm suddenly grew an entire perfect arm without any possible physical or chemical explanation......then I might begin to entertain the notion that supernatural events do in fact occur.

MOJO-JOJO

Wow....and I though mainstream evangelists were nutty....

With more pseudo-science and quackery than most cult websites, this one deserves to be the new poster-child for Sagan's Book "Demon-Haunted World".

Jonesy

just one question: why do all of you keep on referring to <a href="http://www.thiaoouba.com" target="_blank">www.thiaoouba.com</a> as being a cult? Please, I would really like to know, perhaps (and no crap here) you could even persuade me to 'leave the cult' (but you would first need to explain to me why the website is a cult, as many of you said many times). I need you to point to specific features/items on that website that you could exaplain to me that these items/features make the website 'a cult'.

Writer@Large

The book is the same old rehashed "Intelligent Design" arguments Cretinists have been pushing for years, with a shiny New Age veneer that basically says "if you don't agree with my arguments, you must not be Intellectually Advanced."

Chalko's very first argument is flawed, and it doesn't get any better from there. He begins with one question (based on a faulty analogy), assumes you agree with his answer, and then plays the old "bait and switch"--he replaces the initial question with a slightly modified proposition ... and that's just in three short pages! [Pages 7-9, in case anyone cares.]

The gist (and I'm sure, Thia, you'll correct me if I'm wrong) is that:

a) life is too complex to have been random, ergo it must be designed [the irreducable complexity argument].

b) if life is designed, it must have a designer.

c) if there is a designer, he/she/it/they must be perfectly intellectual, because life is so complex that only a great intellect could do it.

d) such a great intellectual being would not undertake such a complex task as creating life with no purpose.

e) ergo, there is a purpose to life.

f) if we hone our intellect, we can discover the purpose.

It ends, of course, with a "suggestion" that the answers to all the questions the book proposes (i.e., what is the purpose?) can be found in "The Thiaoouba Prophesy." But since his initial premise--that life is too complex and must have been designed--is poorly argued and unsupported by any evidence, the rest of the book is meaningless and futile.

--W@L

Stephen T-B

Oolon - you are a very useful presence here. Thank you for your elucidation.