Searching for GOD...

[torridon]

You will never understand my certainty from outside.
"Knock and the door will be opened unto you."  Matthew 7:7 (from the sermon on the mount)

Your rationale fails to account for people 'knocking' and getting no reply.  It also fails to account for people 'knocking' on other, rather different, doors but nonetheless getting some sort of similar experience.  Either way, you are not taking in the bigger picture, the diversity of experience, but instead projecting your personal experience as valid whereas that of others counts for less.

[torridon]

Sorry to sound patronising, sometimes it's easy to slip into thinking that intelligent design seems so obvious that anyone who denies it must be suppressing the fact of it.

Rain wouldn't be possible if the earth wasn't the right distance from the sun - it would either be ice or vapourize. Shall we say it has the appearance of having been designed ('made' prompts the question of how, which I don't know)? The alternative would be that it wasn't designed but came about by chance, which is fine if it were just one aspect, but there seem to be countless examples of apparent design. Really the only reason I can see for not believing in a designer is that we can't see one.

All you need is a little puddle :

http://commonsenseatheism.com/?p=12540

[bluehillside Retd.]

Spud,

Sorry to sound patronising, sometimes it's easy to slip into thinking that intelligent design seems so obvious that anyone who denies it must be suppressing the fact of it.

Rain wouldn't be possible if the earth wasn't the right distance from the sun - it would either be ice or vapourize. Shall we say it has the appearance of having been designed ('made' prompts the question of how, which I don't know)? The alternative would be that it wasn't designed but came about by chance, which is fine if it were just one aspect, but there seem to be countless examples of apparent design. Really the only reason I can see for not believing in a designer is that we can't see one.

You don’t sound patronising, just wrong. You’re making a basic error in thinking called circular reasoning. On the one hand you posit a god who intended us to be here all along, then you use the unlikeliness of all the conditions necessary for “us” to happen by chance as your evidence for god. 

Can you see the problem with that?   

[Spud]

On the one hand you posit a god who intended us to be here all along,

Did I?

[bluehillside Retd.]

Spud,

Did I?

Yes - otherwise your argument collapses before it begins (rather than afterwards). No god with a plan a priori makes you equivalent to the blade of grass on the golf course marvelling at how special he is because the ball driven from 400 yards away happens to land on it. So what though?       

[Dicky Underpants]

The alternative would be that it wasn't designed but came about by chance, which is fine if it were just one aspect, but there seem to be countless examples of apparent design.

Strange though that this 'designer' got the wiring of the octopus' eye so much better than the human eye. Let alone numerous other cockups. But that's all down to the Fall though isn't it?

[Spud]

Spud,

Yes - otherwise your argument collapses before it begins (rather than afterwards). No god with a plan a priori makes you equivalent to the blade of grass on the golf course marvelling at how special he is because the ball driven from 400 yards away happens to land on it. So what though?     

If I saw a jumbo jet and thought it unlikely to have been assembled by chance, would that be circular reasoning too?

[Nearly Sane]

If I saw a jumbo jet and thought it unlikely to have been assembled by chance, would that be circular reasoning too?

The reason you think a 747 has been assembled is the contrast with the natural. If you think the universe is assembled then your idea of design would disappear. This is just the watchmaker argument about seeing a watch on a beach and thinking it was designed. But if the universe is designed in thar way then you are seeing  a watch on a beach of watches and everything is a  watch so no way to recognise it. (Also works for finding a 747 on a beach)

[bluehillside Retd.]

Spud,

If I saw a jumbo jet and thought it unlikely to have been assembled by chance, would that be circular reasoning too?

Different argument to your rain mistake, but the analogy with complex life fails because jumbo jets didn't evolve from, say, Sopwith Camels. Once Wallace and Darwin gave us a process that removed incredulity from the picture reasoning people who had believed complex life implied a creator dropped the idea.

[Alan Burns]

All you need is a little puddle :

http://commonsenseatheism.com/?p=12540

Muddle thinking.
The environment needed to sustain a puddle is somewhat less complex than the highly specific environment needed to sustain life.

[Spud]

All you need is a little puddle :

http://commonsenseatheism.com/?p=12540

If the volume of rainwater that fell was the same as that of the hole (or maybe a bit more to allow for any that splashed out), and it all fell in the hole and nowhere else, puddle thinking would make sense.

[Spud]

The reason you think a 747 has been assembled is the contrast with the natural. If you think the universe is assembled then your idea of design would disappear. This is just the watchmaker argument about seeing a watch on a beach and thinking it was designed. But if the universe is designed in thar way then you are seeing  a watch on a beach of watches and everything is a  watch so no way to recognise it. (Also works for finding a 747 on a beach)

I can see your point, I think - but couldn't you contrast the cosmos with one that is heat dead? You could also contrast life with inanimate matter.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

Muddle thinking.
The environment needed to sustain a puddle is somewhat less complex than the highly specific environment needed to sustain life.

You’ve fundamentally misunderstood the point of the analogy. The point is that you fit your environment, rather than that your environment fits you. The complexity of the system involved is completely irrelevant.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Spud,

If the volume of rainwater that fell was the same as that of the hole (or maybe a bit more to allow for any that splashed out), and it all fell in the hole and nowhere else, puddle thinking would make sense.

Like AB, you’ve missed the point. The analogy illustrates the wrongheadedness of the puddle thinking the hole fits him, rather than the puddle fitting the hole. It’s the same mistake you made when you used the right amount of rain for you existence being significant. 

[Nearly Sane]

I can see your point, I think - but couldn't you contrast the cosmos with one that is heat dead? You could also contrast life with inanimate matter.

Neither of these are how we recognise design.

[Alan Burns]

AB,

You’ve fundamentally misunderstood the point of the analogy. The point is that you fit your environment, rather than that your environment fits you. The complexity of the system involved is completely irrelevant.

It is you who have missed the point.
The specific complexity needed to sustain life is entirely relevant.
A puddle can form by dropping any liquid into any shaped hole.
It is evident that life does not come to exist in any environment, otherwise we would have evidence of life on Mars, Venus, Saturn Mercury ... etc.

If Life did not exist anywhere else in the universe, would the puddle analogy still apply?

[Outrider]

Sorry to sound patronising, sometimes it's easy to slip into thinking that intelligent design seems so obvious that anyone who denies it must be suppressing the fact of it.

That gravity was a force pulling us towards a planet seemed so obvious that people accepted it, and because it worked in most situations it took some time for a better explanation to arise.  Intelligent design intuitively makes sense until anything more than a cursory glance at the detail, but the patronising bit isn't about making the claim, it's about the assertion that deep down we know this really, and we're just being recalcitrantly childish about it.

Rain wouldn't be possible if the earth wasn't the right distance from the sun - it would either be ice or vapourize.

And how many billions of planets are there out there at varying distances from various types of star with various elementary compositions... enough that there many only be a few billion planets out there in zones where liquid water is viable?  Just a few billion, maybe?

Shall we say it has the appearance of having been designed ('made' prompts the question of how, which I don't know)?

Shall we say, instead, that there's nothing inherent to it which precludes design, but equally nothing which leads to the conclusion?

The alternative would be that it wasn't designed but came about by chance, which is fine if it were just one aspect, but there seem to be countless examples of apparent design.

And billions upon billions of opportunities for those combinations to come about in the universe, even before we start to consider the possibility that this might not be the only universe out there.

Really the only reason I can see for not believing in a designer is that we can't see one.

Really, the only reason I can see for thinking there's a designer is because you have to try to maintain some link to an old book of fairy stories that's had its day.

O.

[Outrider]

The portion of reality which can be discovered in human scientific endeavours bears no comparison with the reality to be discovered by entering into a relationship with the ultimate source of all reality.

A bit like the voices of real people bear no comparison to the compulsion of the voices that only the schizophrenic can make out...  if it's only in your head and not in the world around you to be demonstrated, then how do you know it's coming into your head from somewhere else and not just a product of your head?

O.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

It is you who have missed the point.

Seems unlikely, but let’s see shall we?

The specific complexity needed to sustain life is entirely relevant.
A puddle can form by dropping any liquid into any shaped hole.
It is evident that life does not come to exist in any environment, otherwise we would have evidence of life on Mars, Venus, Saturn Mercury ... etc.

Nope, thought not. Forget life, forget puddles – try to focus in the point being made here: the point is that any “something” and its environment co-existing does not imply that the environment was put there for the convenience of the something. Got it now?

OK, back to life and to puddles then – the point here is that each is adapted to its environment, not the other way around. The relative complexity of each is for this purpose neither here nor there.     

If Life did not exist anywhere else in the universe, would the puddle analogy still apply?

Irrelevant, but yes.

[Alan Burns]

Nope, thought not. Forget life, forget puddles – try to focus in the point being made here: the point is that any “something” and its environment co-existing does not imply that the environment was put there for the convenience of the something. Got it now?

OK, back to life and to puddles then – the point here is that each is adapted to its environment, not the other way around. The relative complexity of each is for this purpose neither here nor there.     

So the analogy is meaningless.
How can you possibly use this analogy to discern whether a different environment was or was not purposely made for a different "something" to exist and survive in?

[Nearly Sane]

So the analogy is meaningless.
How can you possibly use this analogy to discern whether a different environment was or was not purposely made for a different "something" to exist and survive in?

You can't. That's your issue though because your claim , your burden of proof. Your post is an actual statement of why your position is flawed.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

So the analogy is meaningless.
How can you possibly use this analogy to discern whether a different environment was or was not purposely made for a different "something" to exist and survive in?

Dear god but you struggle. Again, but sloooooowly…

… the analogy explains that it’s a basic mistake in reasoning to assume that your environment was intended for you all along rather than that you are adapted for your environment.

Whether the “you” is AB or the puddle, and whether “the environment” is our planet or the hole the puddle sits in has absolutely bugger all to do with the legitimacy of the analogy. Will you please tell me that this has finally sunk in now.

Anything?

[Alan Burns]

AB,
 

Dear god but you struggle. Again, but sloooooowly…

… the analogy explains that it’s a basic mistake in reasoning to assume that your environment was intended for you all along rather than that you are adapted for your environment.

Whether the “you” is AB or the puddle, and whether “the environment” is our planet or the hole the puddle sits in has absolutely bugger all to do with the legitimacy of the analogy. Will you please tell me that this has finally sunk in now.

Anything?

You seem to be presuming that your analogy enables you to conclude that things naturally adapt to their environment.
They do in some cases, as illustrated by the example of the puddle.

But human creativity illustrates that "natural" environments can be intelligently manipulated to enable intentional outcomes, so your analogy is not universal.

[Stranger]

Not had chance to use the forum for a while, but to go back to the last point I made...

It's very obvious from your posts that you don't, but ignoring that for the moment, how do you know that the physical world can only do "reactions"?

The fact is that what you know is only about current science, and that is obviously incomplete. If you could make your notion of free will make logical sense, you couldn't possibly know that it might not be some, as yet unknown, aspect of the physical world. If you could make your meaningless mantra about "the ever present state of conscious awareness" into a logically self-consistent proposition, you would have to claim to known everything about the physical world to rule out a physical basis for it, not just what we have discovered to date.

As I said, you're confusing logical impossibility with the (unknown) limitations of the physical universe. If you really know that your version of freedom is impossible in the physical world, you must know that it's simply impossible, full stop.

Without the spiritual awareness of my human soul I would know nothing.

So, I make a substantive point point the limits of what anybody can know, and that your so called 'argument' assumes, and you counter it with a silly, thought-free, utterly baseless assertion.

You show no evidence at all of ever giving this subject a single moment of logical thought.

[torridon]

You seem to be presuming that your analogy enables you to conclude that things naturally adapt to their environment.
They do in some cases, as illustrated by the example of the puddle.

But human creativity illustrates that "natural" environments can be intelligently manipulated to enable intentional outcomes, so your analogy is not universal.

The usefulness of the analogy lies in its ability to expose a widespread bias in our thinking.  Spud's post a couple of pages back was a classic example of that mistake - basically the Earth being so improbably in some sort of goldilocks situation leads to the unwarranted and rather lazy inference that the situation was designed to be 'just right' for life on Earth.  It's always worth challenging lazy thinking.