Backwards in Tennessee, Creationism Creeps Into Classrooms (controversy, fence, solution)

[HistorianDude]

Originally Posted by GuyNTexas

Always playing word games, no matter the topic.

That's the first sentence in your post. In your very next sentence, you start playing word games. You must be the fasted hypocrite in seven states.

That said, the "uncaused cause" is the position I am explicitly arguing against. So you score no points arguing in agreement with me, even had your argument been competent... which it wasn't. You remain the unchallenged champion of bad analogies.

Originally Posted by GuyNTexas

Fusion reaction simply converts a portion of the combined mass into energy as calculated by E=mc2, and so long as that formula remains valid, your statement is invalid.

Exactly as I said. Insert "duh" here. I'm snipping the rest of your post where you continue to furiously agree with me on the relationship between matter and energy.

Originally Posted by GuyNTexas

Really .... and I suppose you will follow up with illuminating us with an actual observation of a singularity too? That would be a great trick since it's event horizon shields the theoretical singularity from actual observation.

A meaningless point that contradicts nothing I said and contributes nothing useful to the conversation.

Originally Posted by GuyNTexas

Really now? I would suggest that the concept of an "uncaused cause"" is only incompatible with itself, more easily understood by example, such as "an un-pregnant pregnancy".

Another completely incompetent analogy on your part. An "un-pregnant pregnancy" is internally contradictory and self refuting. An "uncaused cause" is not internally contradictory at all, it is simply in violation of the laws of nature.

Originally Posted by GuyNTexas

While "infinite regress" is totally incompatible with every theory you embrace and promote, while at the same time, claiming it is the only logical conclusion of the laws you are familiar with, which might be described as your logic of illogical conclusion, similar in nature to an uncaused cause.

I have read that sentence several times. I cannot make a shred of sense out what you are trying to say.

Originally Posted by GuyNTexas

Since we have not one real life example of anything related to material science which lacks a specific beginning ... including the existence of the universe, and of evolution itself, which claims that all life evolved from a common ancestor, directly insinuating a definitive beginning .... infinite regression is an unquantifiable, unjustifiable theory having no foundation in reason or logic.

Oh? Okay, then the challenge is before you to show us that this is true. Beginning with any one of these premises, explain how you will logically avoid an infinite regress:

1. All affects have causes.

2. Energy/matter cannot be created or destroyed.

3. Ex nihilio, nihil fit.

Originally Posted by GuyNTexas

Infinite regression is simply a paradox, and not a scientific explanation for that which lacks explanation.

Actually, there is nothing paradoxical about an infinite regress. It defies intuition certainly. But logically it is completely unavoidable. It is the only conclusion that can actually be reasoned to using the laws of nature. Even the Kalam Consological Argument ends up fully conceding that point.

Originally Posted by GuyNTexas

You see, the Big Bang theory, by nature, suggests a beginning to the universe at some finite point, using linear time to define this finite point for lack of a better measuring system.

Since all the laws of nature demand that it too have a cause, the Big Bang can no more suggest a beginning to the universe than a book on WWII can suggest that all history began in 1939.

Originally Posted by GuyNTexas

Yet, since time is really the calculations of movement through space, as measured using two reference points, time, as scientifically defined today, could not have existed until the alleged Big Bang occurred, since it is theorized that nothing other than the singularity itself existed before hand. Therefore, with only a single fixed point of reference, movement through space could not have been measured, and that lack of reference would suggest time didn't exist. And if time didn't exist ... but then did come into existence at some point, time itself also had a definitive beginning.

Hence... as I said repeatedly... the singularity was durationless. The time that existed prior to the Big Bang would have seamless flowed through the singularity uninterrupted. So no, time did not necessarily begin at that point at all.

Originally Posted by GuyNTexas

And if something has a beginning, it has to have a cause. If we accept the Big Bang theory as the cause for the birth of the universe, we must then naturally assume that something caused the Big Bang to occur ... and also for the existence of the singularity in the first instance in order to go bang, thereby dismissing the idea if infinite regression as an invalid construct.

Your usual fuzzy thinking reasserts itself there with a vengeance. How do you hallucinate that the cause of the Big Bang which (as all causes must necessarily precede their affects) must have temporally preceded it (hence confirming again that time must have pre-existed the singularity) offers any challenge to an infinite regression? By admitting a cause to the Big Bang you have merely moved one step further into the past along the chain of casualty.

You have rejected explicitly an "uncaused cause." Therefore you must also believe that whatever caused the Big Bang also had a cause. And it had a cause. And it had a cause...

And there we are again, right back to to infinite regress.

Originally Posted by GuyNTexas

I'll betcha you can come up with one to apply to the concept of an infinite God that always has existed and had no beginning or end?

Any objections to the concept of God do not come from any problem with the idea that he be eternal. There is nothing automatically objectionable in the idea.

The primary differences however are these:

1. An eternal God is an "uncaused cause," which you yourself started the post by rejecting with great flair. An eternal universe on the other hand is not an "uncaused cause." It is not a cause at all.

2. A God is a class of entity of a sort for whose existence we have no evidence. A universe on the other hand is a class of entity for which existence we have massive amounts of evidence.

3. An eternal God (as creator of the universe) violates natural law, specifically the laws of causation and conservation. An eternal universe obeys them with excruciating fidelity.

Originally Posted by GuyNTexas

And, most likely, you could find another for dismissing the possibility for spiritual existence ... the eternal spirit which is housed in the physical body that leaves at the moment of death and returns to it's true home in heaven ..... betcha you got a scientific explanation for why that form of infinite isn't possible!

Other than that we have exactly no evidence for such a thing? Why would I bother to try? There are a great number of things for which there is no evidence that I do not waste intellectual energy regarding. An eternal spirit is only one of them.

Originally Posted by GuyNTexas

You'd probably be surprised by how much that sounds like the explanation of God ... to the non-religious, casual listener.

Not at all. The resemblances are crystal clear. But we're not playing charades here. It does matter what they sound like. It only maters what they actually are.

[DentalFloss]

Originally Posted by HistorianDude

Again, at each step in that chain of fusion reactions, mass has been "destroyed." You will find a mass deficit after each one of those reactions, accounting for the vast amount of energy the reactions produce.

Yes, E=mc^2 and all of that. I understand WHAT you're saying, I'm not seeing how it's relevant to our conversation. (Disclaimer: I had a long, long day, so I might not see the Loch Ness Monster right now if it knocked on my door.)

I was merely observing that singularities are not uncommon in nature, and that we know of perfectly ordinary processes for their formation.

OK, but that says nothing whatsoever about the origin of the singularity that caused the big bang. The laws of physics themselves, and the 4 fundamental forces did not exist until some incredibly small, but greater than zero time after T=0.

First off, it depends upon an assumption that has already been rejected; i.e. that time has a beginning.

You may reject that assumption, but nobody else does. Before T=0 time, space, and matter as we know and experience it DID NOT EXIST, not here anyway. And infinite regression requires that this universe ends and starts a new one, which seems unlikely given expansion. Some billions of years in the future, there will likely be only space and subatomic particles, and even those may be ripped apart. Seems unlikely we'll be contributing to future universes.

Second and most importantly however... it is always "now." There "is" no past, and there "is" no future... both are merely concepts that we hold now, in reference to "nows" that no longer or do not yet exist.

Absolutely true. And, I think, it tends to validate my simulation theory, for if our consciousness exists outside of this universe, the only thing "real" here is what we experience in the now.

I don't know how many times I can make the point, and I am puzzled why you repeatedly seem to forget it; in an eternal and uncreated universe, matter/energy did not come from anywhere; it always was.

I don't understand your assertion. Declaring the universe eternally recursive is no different than declaring it created by a deity. Anything before T=0, roughly 14 Billion years ago is rank speculation.

[seattlenextyear]

The evidence for ID is: "whoa, DNA is like, totally complicated"? And that's supposed to be compelling. And if I don't accept that "evidence" I'M THE ONE who is unable to think critically?

You know what else is like, totally complex? Double rainbows.

All the way, across the sky....

[HistorianDude]

Originally Posted by DentalFloss

OK, but that says nothing whatsoever about the origin of the singularity that caused the big bang. The laws of physics themselves, and the 4 fundamental forces did not exist until some incredibly small, but greater than zero time after T=0.

How would you presume to know that?

Originally Posted by DentalFloss

You may reject that assumption, but nobody else does. Before T=0 time, space, and matter as we know and experience it DID NOT EXIST, not here anyway.

Not exactly. We know that at T=0 (i.e. within the singularity itself) time, space and matter did not exist. But since the singularity was durationless, that has no implication whatsoever for T minus anything.

Originally Posted by DentalFloss

And infinite regression requires that this universe ends and starts a new one, which seems unlikely given expansion. Some billions of years in the future, there will likely be only space and subatomic particles, and even those may be ripped apart. Seems unlikely we'll be contributing to future universes.

Isn't that contradicted by your own previous discussion of the universe as a net-zero energy quantum fluctuation? Wouldn't the "entropic soup" you describe there be a perfect medium for universal rebirth as the result of another such fluctuation?

I see no objection to an infinite regression here.

Originally Posted by DentalFloss

Absolutely true. And, I think, it tends to validate my simulation theory, for if our consciousness exists outside of this universe, the only thing "real" here is what we experience in the now.

We part philosophical ways here pretty dramatically. I do not believe our consciousness exists outside of our physical brains, let alone outside of the universe. I am pretty solidly convinced that mind is what brain does. It is a purely physio-electro-chemical phenomenon with no independent existence at all.

Originally Posted by DentalFloss

I don't understand your assertion. Declaring the universe eternally recursive is no different than declaring it created by a deity. Anything before T=0, roughly 14 Billion years ago is rank speculation.

It's not a controversial assertion, really. If it true that nothing comes from nothing (ex nihilo, nihil fit), then something must always have existed. And if something exists, there is a universe.

You are being unfair however to call it "rank speculation." Discriminating between different theories based on their conformance to what we actually know is a completely prosaic scientific exercise.

And it is definitely different from declaring a deity... assuming your conception of deity demands sentience. It makes no appeal to magic, it proposes no ad hoc class of entity of sort we have never seen, it conforms perfectly to the laws of nature as we know them, and it derives entirely as an exercise in reasoning from the evidence.

Other than all that, go ahead and call it "god" if you want to. Spinoza did. Einstein did too.

I note this one very important absence in your post. You make no genuine effort to argue against an infinite regress based on natural law or their logical implications.

[DentalFloss]

Originally Posted by HistorianDude

How would you presume to know that?

Found here:
The Planck epoch is an era in traditional (non-inflationary) big bang cosmology in which the temperature is high enough that the four fundamental forces—electromagnetism, gravitation, weak nuclear interaction, and strong nuclear interaction—are all unified in one fundamental force. Little is understood about physics at this temperature, and different theories propose different scenarios.

Me talking: Once again, the "frame rate" of the universe strikes. Between T=0 and T=5.4x10^-44 seconds everything was completely uniform.

Not exactly. We know that at T=0 (i.e. within the singularity itself) time, space and matter did not exist. But since the singularity was durationless, that has no implication whatsoever for T minus anything.

Time DID NOT EXIST. There is no such thing as time minus anything.

Isn't that contradicted by your own previous discussion of the universe as a net-zero energy quantum fluctuation? Wouldn't the "entropic soup" you describe there be a perfect medium for universal rebirth as the result of another such fluctuation?

Well, I haven't bought into the quantum flux argument, nonetheless beyond T=Big Rip, all matter (or potential matter) is too spread out to accomplish anything.

I see no objection to an infinite regression here.

Because I've yet to grasp the concept enough to object to it strongly. It seems so completely incomprehensible to not be worthy of argument. No offence intended.

We part philosophical ways here pretty dramatically. I do not believe our consciousness exists outside of our physical brains, let alone outside of the universe. I am pretty solidly convinced that mind is what brain does. It is a purely physio-electro-chemical phenomenon with no independent existence at all.

Before I respond to this, I'd like your detailed thoughts of the simulation theory, specifically how it solves so many scientific mysteries rather elegantly.

[TheCalifornianWriter]

Originally Posted by HistorianDude

Wrong.

You really should have read the link I gave you.

Here is it again:

Stephen Jay Gould, "Evolution as Fact and Theory" 1994

No, I read it. It was extremely leftist and was tailored to be given to people who were against you as an "informational pamphlet."

I actually used the definition of a scientific theory to determine my conclusion. The conclusion was, by the way, that it is a theory (which as YOU said is a work of progress) but only true until it can be found to be falsifiable.

Originally Posted by seattlenextyear

If you want to be schooled on how to teach critical thinking skills to students in the context of Biology, I'm happy to oblige. Hint: It doesn't involve telling them that a mythical being sitting on a cloud made all living things in 7 days and then planted fossils everywhere just to troll us.

You needn't teach children that. If they want that, they can go to a private school and get Religion classes there. Right?
All anyone sensible wants is that they not teach something like that at schools because there are other theories.
That, or teach all along side each other? You got a theory and want special clearance, eh? Prove it irrefutably, empirically and for good and in a way that will convince everyone...then ask.

[seattlenextyear]

Originally Posted by TheCalifornianWriter

You needn't teach children that. If they want that, they can go to a private school and get Religion classes there. Right?
All anyone sensible wants is that they not teach something like that at schools because there are other theories.
That, or teach all along side each other? You got a theory and want special clearance, eh? Prove it irrefutably, empirically and for good and in a way that will convince everyone...then ask.

The problem that in a Biology class, there is no rival theory to explain the diversity of life. In all of Biology, there just is no competing theory. In a Biology class, we teach students the state of Biology as it is best understood by the majority of biologists. You'd be hard pressed to find a mainstream, working Biologist who supports ID and who isn't Michael Behe.

Examples of actual competing theories and debates that we do teach: Where did mitochondria and chloroplasts come from (endosymbiotic vs infolding)? How should we classify slime molds (fungi, protists, animals, alien lifeform)? Should we be cloning things? What caused the extinction of the dinosaurs? These are all things that scientists do not agree on (although the endosymbiotic hypothesis is pretty well accepted now).

[GuyNTexas]

Originally Posted by DentalFloss

Before I respond to this, I'd like your detailed thoughts of the simulation theory, specifically how it solves so many scientific mysteries rather elegantly.

Before I jump into that ... the previous contentions of historydude that nothing outside the mind exists is perfectly consistent with his other misinterpretations of what can be readily considered plausible by one possessing an open and inquisitive mind.

But when one rejects everything outside physical material science as "magic" while embracing the seeming endless magical properties of material science ... you're arguing with a wall.

On to your "simulation" theory ... I'm afraid that I haven't seen your post regarding that, but I'm assuming you are alluding to the idea that material reality is not actually real, but a sophisticated virtual reality simulation?

Based on my own research of the matter, some form of that seems to be the MOST LIKELY scenario, which is another element of my basis for the rejection of Darwinian Evolution.

The fact that what we perceive to be material reality CANNOT be proven to exist at all, should be considered by the material scientists and not dismissed out of hand. The way our perceptions are formed is an elaborate illusion itself, with our eyes gathering sensory input which is then converted to electrical signals, which are then processed and that serves to recreate the appearance of physical reality inside our brains ... not only including the perceptions of the physical world around us, but also our own bodies. This isn't speculation or theory .. this is anatomical fact.

Given the level of complexity involved in this virtual reality creation inside our own heads ... it's not at all a large step to consider that we could literally be experiencing a "Matrix" like virtual reality simulation. This would go a long way in explaining that which material science fails to explain, which they invariably dismiss as not real ... like paranormal events ... ESP, etc. It would explain why a mother in crisis mode can lift a car off of her child, in what can only be described as a super human display of strength. Miracles, and prayer ... the idea that we create our own reality cannot coexist with material science, but does fit perfectly well with the theory of a "Holographic Universe".

To those who are totally immersed in material science are the ones naturally most inextricably attached to the illusion of physical material reality, consequently, even the idea that reality could be an illusion is summarily dismissed without a moment's consideration. That quantum physics prove that material reality and solid matter doesn't exist, means nothing to the materialists, as they pound their fists on their desks exclaiming the obvious nature of the desk being indeed solid matter.

Don't bother to remind them how their dreams can recreate these same sensations of physical existence in an artificially created world in the dream state. They are comfortable with the illusion and have no desire to analyze it.

[Dane_in_LA]

Originally Posted by TheCalifornianWriter

I actually used the definition of a scientific theory to determine my conclusion. The conclusion was, by the way, that it is a theory (which as YOU said is a work of progress) but only true until it can be found to be falsifiable.

I think you may be typing "falsifiable" when you mean to say "falsified". Because the ToE, like any sound theory, is eminently falsifiable - if Lord Kelvin had been right about the age of the Earth, that would have been it. It's just that it's never been successfully falsified.

But if you feel like taking a swing at coming up with falsification criteria for the Designer hypothesis, I'd be interested. What positive evidence would you accept as ruling out the existence of a Designer?

[DentalFloss]

Originally Posted by GuyNTexas

On to your "simulation" theory ... I'm afraid that I haven't seen your post regarding that, but I'm assuming you are alluding to the idea that material reality is not actually real, but a sophisticated virtual reality simulation?

Yes, precisely. Frankly, it's the only theory that I've run across that explains the science.

Based on my own research of the matter, some form of that seems to be the MOST LIKELY scenario, which is another element of my basis for the rejection of Darwinian Evolution.

Now you've lost me. The evidence for Darwinian Evolution is overwhelming, and if you look at it from the perspective of reality being a simulation, it makes even more sense. Create the rules of physics, which creates a scenario where the evolution of life is inevitable, add matter, and let "nature" take it's course.

The fact that what we perceive to be material reality CANNOT be proven to exist at all, should be considered by the material scientists and not dismissed out of hand.

Now you've found me. Reality is an illusion. Pay close enough attention to science and that becomes clear.