Why Creationism is Nonsense

[WillMc88]

I went back to revisit them, and part way into the second one it suddenly announced "this video is no longer available".

Usually you can just refresh the page and it should load. It happens to me on youtube a lot.

 

[Kulindahr]

I understand what you're trying to say, but that's not a very good analogy for Creationism (or ID if you prefer). The reason we could recognize the cause of the tire tracks is because we know what a tire is, and we know that it can cause such tracks.

I'm assuming you're meaning to equate that with seeing something natural and knowing there must a creator, yet not knowing how this creator created this natural thing. The analogy already presumes that a creator exists, so it doesn't really work.

I didn't mean for the analogy to presume a creator exists; I was trying to demonstrate concluding that something caused a set of things we observe, but can't say anything further. That's what's happening with real ID: people look at what science has shown, and conclude that there is a Creator -- but recognize that very conclusion as a dead end, in terms of anything scientific.

The difference with Creationism is that they try to pretend that the proposition of a Creator serves as a piece of scientific information, and then they sneak in all kinds of crap that doesn't come from science in any way at all. ID as I learned it doesn't depend on any revelation whatsoever; Creationism pretends that revelation somehow provides a set of scientific data not requiring instruments, investigation, observation, quantification, or anything else normally associated with science.

For intelligent human beings, that's not only insulting to science, but to revelation.

 

[Kulindahr]

Usually you can just refresh the page and it should load. It happens to me on youtube a lot.

I tried that.

But after the first video, there was so much crap, I didn't really feel like pursuing it.

 

[Telstra]

interesting history of the bible

i think the bible or religeous texts are dangerous to children.
Do you think so ?

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZFrkjEgUDZA&feature=player_embedded[/ame]

 

[WillMc88]

I didn't mean for the analogy to presume a creator exists; I was trying to demonstrate concluding that something caused a set of things we observe, but can't say anything further. That's what's happening with real ID: people look at what science has shown, and conclude that there is a Creator -- but recognize that very conclusion as a dead end, in terms of anything scientific.

The difference with Creationism is that they try to pretend that the proposition of a Creator serves as a piece of scientific information, and then they sneak in all kinds of crap that doesn't come from science in any way at all. ID as I learned it doesn't depend on any revelation whatsoever; Creationism pretends that revelation somehow provides a set of scientific data not requiring instruments, investigation, observation, quantification, or anything else normally associated with science.

For intelligent human beings, that's not only insulting to science, but to revelation.

Ok that's true that some people do conclude that (for whatever reason), lol, but I'm finding it hard to respond to what you're saying because I wasn't aware that there is a difference between ID and creationism. They're synonymous. "Intelligent Design" was just a name to replace "Creationism" in hopes to get it taught in schools by making it seem more like science, when in fact they have the same premise and same conclusion: Everything seems created/designed, so there must be a creator/designer.

Or do you consider them to different? And if ID is dependent on providing scientific data requiring 'instruments, investigation, observation, quantification,' what data has been presented by ID?

 

[crzyrazn]

Re: interesting history of the bible

What I got from that is: man is dangerous to himself. Period.

 

[Kulindahr]

Ok that's true that some people do conclude that (for whatever reason), lol, but I'm finding it hard to respond to what you're saying because I wasn't aware that there is a difference between ID and creationism. They're synonymous. "Intelligent Design" was just a name to replace "Creationism" in hopes to get it taught in schools by making it seem more like science, when in fact they have the same premise and same conclusion: Everything seems created/designed, so there must be a creator/designer.

Or do you consider them to different? And if ID is dependent on providing scientific data requiring 'instruments, investigation, observation, quantification,' what data has been presented by ID?

Here's what I said earlier:

Just a comment on Intelligent Design:

It's my understanding that Intelligent Design did not sprout from Creationism. My first encounter with ID had nothing to do with Christianity; it had to do with scientists who had decided that there was overwhelming evidence for a Designer. Most has topped there, but I knew Buddhist and agnostic ID folks, besides some Christians. Indeed, more than one I met had been Christian, but on the weakness of the scientific evidence for identifying any particular Designer, had become a Deist; although he leaned to Genesis as the best candidate for telling about the Designer, he held that science couldn't take him any further.

That was the basic understanding among the ID people I knew: science held -- as a number of the Christian anti-Creationists mentioned in the videos assert -- overwhelming or vast amounts of evidence for a Designer, but once having reached that point, science effectively ended. A Designer of the universe isn't something/someone susceptible to scientific measurement; even if one set up recording instruments covering the globe, a record of a miracle could still be disputed, and at any rate wouldn't be repeatable. So using ID as a scientific tool was impossible -- and thus anything that follows the conclusion that there must be a Designer is not, cannot be, science.


At some point, Creationists hijacked the term as a way of trying to hide their agenda; now, it's very difficult (if not impossible) to find any real Intelligent Design material, material that doesn't pretend to be science, but which uses science to make educated guesses about the character and nature of the Designer.

I ran into Intelligent Design when the Creationists were calling what they did "Creation Science". The first books I read about ID didn't mention the Bible; they were arguments by agnostics and others setting out the case that had persuaded them to accept that there must have been/ must be a Creator. In discussions I had with others, any appeal to revelation for discerning the character of the Creator was forbidden; the idea was, having concluded from science that there must be a Creator, to see what, if anything, further could be figured out -- from science.

 

[WillMc88]

Here's what I said earlier:



I ran into Intelligent Design when the Creationists were calling what they did "Creation Science". The first books I read about ID didn't mention the Bible; they were arguments by agnostics and others setting out the case that had persuaded them to accept that there must have been/ must be a Creator. In discussions I had with others, any appeal to revelation for discerning the character of the Creator was forbidden; the idea was, having concluded from science that there must be a Creator, to see what, if anything, further could be figured out -- from science.

Ok thanks for reiterating. That would be a difference, ID is separate from specific religious ideologies. But the premises and conclusions of both are the same. As I said earlier, creationist/ID advocates claim that something seems created, so there must be a creator.

There's still no evidence brought forward by either group (if you really want to make a significant distinction between the two) that I'm aware of. Exactly what evidence did they find to conclude from science that there must be a creator? Basing a conclusion on something that "seems" created, without any evidence supporting that conclusion is not science. These ID..ists are simply starting with a conclusion and then attempting to find any evidence to support that conclusion. Again, not science.

 

[Kulindahr]

Ok thanks for reiterating. That would be a difference, ID is separate from specific religious ideologies. But the premises and conclusions of both are the same. As I said earlier, creationist/ID advocates claim that something seems created, so there must be a creator.

There's still no evidence brought forward by either group (if you really want to make a significant distinction between the two) that I'm aware of. Exactly what evidence did they find to conclude from science that there must be a creator? Basing a conclusion on something that "seems" created, without any evidence supporting that conclusion is not science. These ID..ists are simply starting with a conclusion and then attempting to find any evidence to support that conclusion. Again, not science.

Actually the "premises and conclusions" of ID (as I encountered it) and Creationism aren't the same: Creationism starts with the assumption that there is a Creator, and sets about to prove it; ID doesn't. The first ID book I read was a collection of essays by five different people who'd been agnostic, but had come to believe there was a Creator, not by reading any holy books or anything, but from their fields of science. As I recall, there were a number of different disciplines represented. I don't even know if I own the thing any more, but it was a good read; I recall some astrophysics, information theory, and evolutionary biology -- what the other essays were, I don't remember.

But as I said, the big difference is that the ID position acknowledges nothing as data except what science produces; Creationism wants to drag in fables (such as a literal six-day creation) and science fiction (e.g. a 10k y.o. earth), and force the scientific data to fit these pre-conceived notions.

Alas, in public discourse the point is moot now, anyway: the Creationist morons have hijacked the whole thing, and anyone of the old ID school has run for cover.

Just for interest's sake:
An ID friend and I once went to what was supposed to be a conference on Intelligent Design... and turned out to be a bunch of Creationists. During a break we got into a discussion, and one participant demanded to know, if we'd accepted that there was a Creator, why we weren't using Genesis to do science -- something evidenced by nasty questions we kept tossing out in the seminars. I said something like, Because Genesis isn't science, and this guy was like, God said it so it's data, and my friend said, You guys are all loons.
They couldn't grasp that while science might take some people to the conclusion that there's a Creator, that's as far as it could go. It doesn't enable any sudden leaps as to the authenticity of any claim to divine revelation, it doesn't suddenly bestow the status of scientific data on accounts not even written when there was a conception of such a thing, and it definitely doesn't surrender all the logical deductions and inferences developed over the centuries to someone's ignorant fantasy of what an ancient royal chronicle means.

I wish I could find the old Bloom County cartoon online, that expresses the basic view of most of the actual ID people I knew. The final panel has Milo and some others out in the meadow at night, and Milo is exclaiming at the stars something like, "The universe is just a little too orderly to be an accident!" To the group I was part of, the elegance and symmetry and orderliness of the universe spoke of the numinous.... but Creationists didn't grasp the beauty, and they killed the numinous; they seemed to us like statisticians counting the notes in a music score, never realizing there was a symphony.

 

[WillMc88]

Actually the "premises and conclusions" of ID (as I encountered it) and Creationism aren't the same: Creationism starts with the assumption that there is a Creator, and sets about to prove it; ID doesn't. The first ID book I read was a collection of essays by five different people who'd been agnostic, but had come to believe there was a Creator, not by reading any holy books or anything, but from their fields of science. As I recall, there were a number of different disciplines represented. I don't even know if I own the thing any more, but it was a good read; I recall some astrophysics, information theory, and evolutionary biology -- what the other essays were, I don't remember.

The basic idea behind both is still the same regardless. Perhaps the difference is how they reach the conclusion (so the premises and conclusions aren't necessarily the same). The creationist may conclude there is a god because he was raised believing it, he read it in a religious book, etc, and supports his conclusion, primarily, by saying that a thing SEEMS created. The ID advocate, according to what you said, decides that something SEEMS created, through his knowledge of whatever scientific field led him to this, and concludes that there must be a creator (god).

So in effect, the premise and conclusion are in fact the same, simply arrived at in a different order. The creationist here concludes first that a god exists, and his premise follows (Everything seems created, therefore, conclusion must be accurate), while the premise for the IDist is that, again, a thing seems created; therefore, he concludes there must be a creator. Any evidentiary support for that conclusion would be great, and I'd love to hear it.

I was wondering though, if they don't follow any certain religious ideology, as you said, what exactly do IDists believe about god, if anything?

 

[WillMc88]

I also wanted to add that I'm not saying that creationism and ID are necessarily the same thing. As you said earlier, they do have differences in how they approach the possibility of a creator.

 

[Kulindahr]

The basic idea behind both is still the same regardless. Perhaps the difference is how they reach the conclusion (so the premises and conclusions aren't necessarily the same). The creationist may conclude there is a god because he was raised believing it, he read it in a religious book, etc, and supports his conclusion, primarily, by saying that a thing SEEMS created. The ID advocate, according to what you said, decides that something SEEMS created, through his knowledge of whatever scientific field led him to this, and concludes that there must be a creator (god).

I think you're missing an important element: to the ID proponent, science is still science, and it led him to believe there is a Creator; to a Creationist, science is just something to be forced into the framework of divine revelation. To the Creationist, divine revelation is everything; science is just something to subordinate to it -- but to the ID proponent, divine revelation is a proposition totally unconnected to science. The ID proponent is at root a scientist; the Creationist at root has no clue what science is about (I've spoken at length with some who have multiple doctorates in science, and I can assure you that despite the doctorates, they're not scientists at all).

So in effect, the premise and conclusion are in fact the same, simply arrived at in a different order. The creationist here concludes first that a god exists, and his premise follows (Everything seems created, therefore, conclusion must be accurate), while the premise for the IDist is that, again, a thing seems created; therefore, he concludes there must be a creator.

I don't think so. To the Creationist, God is the premise -- that's his starting point. Science, really, is no more relevant to him than the family budget: they're both things to be made to submit to divine revelation. His only 'logic' is this: God is the Supreme Creator, so all knowledge has to conform to divine revelation. When Mr. Creationist looks at science, he isn't doing science, he's playing with a puzzle, and hammering the pieces in with a mallet to make the picture he wants.

To Mr. ID, though, science is science, and can't be compromised by trying to make it be something else -- indeed to Mr. ID, trying to make science conform to some alleged divine revelation would be an insult to the Creator, since one attribute of the Creator that all ID people I've ever heard of agree on is that the Creator isn't a liar, that we can attempt to think God's thoughts after Him by studying nature because it tells us truth.

I think it's revealing about Creationists' motivation here that every last one of them is at heart a theocrat: they want not only their doctrine, and their family life, and science, to "submit to God's Word", they want politics to submit as well. The Creationist's motivation isn't science at all, it's control! Science fills a societal niche in this age which used to be filled by priests and their doctrines; what drives Creationists is they want the authority back! They want to be able to speak, and have people nod (or bow) in assent, the way people do when (good communicator) scientists explain something. That's why the Creationists and the Religious Right are the same people: they want to be in control, they want to be the top dogs in every kind of authority.

ID people, on the other hand, just want to see where science leads them -- and when it can't lead them any farther, to see what hints it offers.

Any evidentiary support for that conclusion would be great, and I'd love to hear it.

What's considered evidence depends on the person. I'd love to hear what Dr. Miller considers evidence for a Creator, since he says there's "lots", and he obviously knows his stuff.

To me, it's how well the universe is tuned for critters like us to be here, starting with the universal constants... which in effect spell out all that the universe is. In fact, with regards to Creation, to me it is a far greater wonder that God should have established those constants in such a way that there would be stuff we call liquid water, thanks to the angles of the bonds of the atoms, and carbon-based life, thanks to the structure of the carbon atom, and it would occur on certain planets in just the right zone out from their star for that water to facilitate reactions with carbon to build molecules that replicate themselves, and that the way the planet formed would drive the building of mountains and oceans, and so on, than to think He made some sort of mental picture and POP! sprung it into existence. The latter version is a sort of MS Paint kind of God, who makes pictures and then brings them to life, but the former is a God Who can spin out a simple, basic set of rules, apply them to an eruption of being (energy/matter/spacetime), and be utterly confident that it will all bring forth just the certain sort of universe He had in mind. To me it's like the difference between sticking plastic flowers in a pot, and sticking a seed in a pot and ending up with flowers.

I was wondering though, if they don't follow any certain religious ideology, as you said, what exactly do IDists believe about god, if anything?

Well....
As I mentioned, one thing every ID person I've ever met or heard of believed that the Creator is honest -- which is why it irks them no end when Creationists claim that God put the fossils in the geological record to "test our faith". They/we believe He is honest because nature is "honest" -- approach with an open mind, and you can find the truth.
That's closely tied to the belief that the Creator is orderly -- everywhere we find order, in deeper and more beautiful ways than we often expect. For example, who would ever have guessed that every creature on the planet, already orderly in the balance of nature, would be based on not just the same helical structure, but that said structure would be built of nothing but the same four little molecules repeated in near-infinite variety?

There are fun arguments, too. I recall going 'round and 'round once on the topic of the plethora of species: is there such variety because the Creator loves variety, or is there variety because it's necessary for a biosphere? One could say that this variety was already aimed at in the universal constants, but that just begs the question... we're back to asking why He set the constants the way He did.

Then there's the question of whether this Creator would communicate to His critters, and if so, how. That's where the question of divine revelation comes in, because a lot of ID folks decide that any reasonable Creator with a universe that produces intelligent critters (which was evidently part of the plan) would want to communicate with them. So you play the game of, "If He communicated, where's the communication?", and that leads to considering the various claimants to be divine revelation... and that leads to endless arguments, though usually it comes down to one thing: since we got to this game by concluding from science that there is a Creator, which of all the creation accounts best fits what we know? I and a lot of others landed with Genesis, but that isn't universal; I knew an ID guy who was nominally Buddhist, but after pursuing this question, became a very serious Buddhist.

Of course to land with Genesis, you first have to grasp what's really going on with that collection of literature, because reading it literally is obviously incorrect.

... and that's another reason to despise the Creationists: they aren't even honest with their own "data".

 

[WillMc88]

I agree pretty much with everything you said about Creationists.

I don't think so. To the Creationist, God is the premise -- that's his starting point. Science, really, is no more relevant to him than the family budget: they're both things to be made to submit to divine revelation. His only 'logic' is this: God is the Supreme Creator, so all knowledge has to conform to divine revelation. When Mr. Creationist looks at science, he isn't doing science, he's playing with a puzzle, and hammering the pieces in with a mallet to make the picture he wants.

The premise is something that supports or helps supports a conclusion. You can't say that God is a premise, because it simply isn't. If you mean that 'God' is where creationists begin, and then go from there, you'd be right. But it's still their conclusion. They've just concluded from the outset that a god exists and don't really budge on the matter. Their premise for attempting to back that belief follows. And I conceded the point that creationists and IDists differ in that respect.

To me, it's how well the universe is tuned for critters like us to be here, starting with the universal constants... which in effect spell out all that the universe is. In fact, with regards to Creation, to me it is a far greater wonder that God should have established those constants in such a way that there would be stuff we call liquid water, thanks to the angles of the bonds of the atoms, and carbon-based life, thanks to the structure of the carbon atom, and it would occur on certain planets in just the right zone out from their star for that water to facilitate reactions with carbon to build molecules that replicate themselves, and that the way the planet formed would drive the building of mountains and oceans, and so on, than to think He made some sort of mental picture and POP! sprung it into existence. The latter version is a sort of MS Paint kind of God, who makes pictures and then brings them to life, but the former is a God Who can spin out a simple, basic set of rules, apply them to an eruption of being (energy/matter/spacetime), and be utterly confident that it will all bring forth just the certain sort of universe He had in mind. To me it's like the difference between sticking plastic flowers in a pot, and sticking a seed in a pot and ending up with flowers.

I love the fine-tuned universe argument, because it seems so plausible until you really think about it. If you're saying that life couldn't exist without the universe existing precisely the way it is, that's quite an assertion. It's entirely possible for many of the universal constants to have varied quite a bit and still sustain life. The fact that life is here now is only evidence that our universe's 'version' of constants allow for it.

Furthermore, just because the constants were in existence first and life, in certain, specific region(s), came after the fact, does in no way mean that this universe was 'made' this way to support life. I think Stephen Hawking said it best:

"in a universe that is large or infinite in space and/or in time, the conditions necessary for the development of intelligent life will be met only in certain regions that are limited in space and time. The intelligent beings in these regions should therefore not be surprised if they observe that their locality in the universe satisfies the conditions that are necessary for their existence."

 

[Kulindahr]

The premise is something that supports or helps supports a conclusion. You can't say that God is a premise, because it simply isn't. If you mean that 'God' is where creationists begin, and then go from there, you'd be right. But it's still their conclusion. They've just concluded from the outset that a god exists and don't really budge on the matter. Their premise for attempting to back that belief follows. And I conceded the point that creationists and IDists differ in that respect.

I don't see how you can call an a priori position a "conclusion". To Creationists, God is a given, a "fact" that doesn't need proof. They only play at "proof" because that's what people ask for, and they think that by playing the game they can win people over. God's 'existence' is an assumption more foundational than the existence of four "elements" was to Aristotle: that, at least, was derived from observation. It's far closer to a posited axiom for a mathematical system, a statement requiring no proof because it's set out as a defining condition.

Perhaps in a way they're trying to "back that belief"; I suspect a lot of insecurity on the part of many Creationists -- though it's a self-generated insecurity, based on erroneous approaches to ancient literature (and though Genesis may be more than ancient literature, it is never less than that).

I love the fine-tuned universe argument, because it seems so plausible until you really think about it. If you're saying that life couldn't exist without the universe existing precisely the way it is, that's quite an assertion. It's entirely possible for many of the universal constants to have varied quite a bit and still sustain life. The fact that life is here now is only evidence that our universe's 'version' of constants allow for it.

But what cause have we to believe that there are other universes? There's no science for that, it's speculation just as much as anything else from science fiction.

Furthermore, just because the constants were in existence first and life, in certain, specific region(s), came after the fact, does in no way mean that this universe was 'made' this way to support life. I think Stephen Hawking said it best:

"in a universe that is large or infinite in space and/or in time, the conditions necessary for the development of intelligent life will be met only in certain regions that are limited in space and time. The intelligent beings in these regions should therefore not be surprised if they observe that their locality in the universe satisfies the conditions that are necessary for their existence."

Well, either Hawking is thinking that the universal constants may vary by distance or time, or he's just wrong. The only way his statement works is to believe that constants are really just local values for variables, or that the entire foundation of science -- that the same 'laws' are at work everywhere -- is wrong.
The second line is merely a tautology; it explains nothing, merely saying that if there are observers, there must be proper conditions for there to be observers. Despite those fascinated by the anthropic principle, that is hardly profound; it's just a way of avoiding the question. But the anthropic principle can't apply to just pieces of the universe here or there; the manner of the universe's functioning was set at the moment of the Bang, and is thus the same everywhere -- electrons are still electrons, protons are still protons, and all the chemical activity which rests on those proceeds in the same way in every place.

 

[WillMc88]

But what cause have we to believe that there are other universes? There's no science for that, it's speculation just as much as anything else from science fiction

That statement has nothing to do with other actual universes. By saying this universe's 'version' of constants, I was referring to just that. Hypothetically, our universe's constants could have been different than what they are, and you can't say with any certainty that life still could not have formed. Many of the universal laws could vary quite a bit and still allow for life. No science fiction needed, friend.

Well, either Hawking is thinking that the universal constants may vary by distance or time, or he's just wrong. The only way his statement works is to believe that constants are really just local values for variables, or that the entire foundation of science -- that the same 'laws' are at work everywhere -- is wrong.The second line is merely a tautology; it explains nothing, merely saying that if there are observers, there must be proper conditions for there to be observers. Despite those fascinated by the anthropic principle, that is hardly profound; it's just a way of avoiding the question. But the anthropic principle can't apply to just pieces of the universe here or there; the manner of the universe's functioning was set at the moment of the Bang, and is thus the same everywhere -- electrons are still electrons, protons are still protons, and all the chemical activity which rests on those proceeds in the same way in every place.

I would think it's very clear that Hawking was in no way inferring that the laws of the universe 'vary by distance or time.' If he had then he surely WOULD be wrong.

"the conditions necessary for the development of intelligent life will be met only in certain regions that are limited in space and time"

^^^ This is referring to what you said earlier: "on certain planets in just the right zone out from their star for that water to facilitate reactions with carbon to build molecules that replicate themselves"
The fact that you are alive means that it should be no surprise you live on one of those 'certain planets in just the right zone.' If you weren't, you wouldn't be alive, and wouldn't be asking why you're in that habitable zone.

On a side note, why would you assume that the universe was 'fine-tuned' for life anyway? We make up a practically nonexistent percentage of matter in the universe. The overwhelming majority of space is completely uninhabitable and inhospitable to life, with only a single planet that we know of being capable of sustaining life.

Actually, I have a theory that our bodies were fine-tuned to create feces. If we didn't have mouths, we couldn't eat goodies. With no stomach or intestinal track, the food couldn't be broken down and transported to the rectum and out the anus (which also support the fine-tuned fecal theory). If any of these didn't exist, we couldn't crap, and there's no reason to think that the sole purpose of our body is to produce it should we? It's so fine-tuned!

 

[Kulindahr]

On a side note, why would you assume that the universe was 'fine-tuned' for life anyway? We make up a practically nonexistent percentage of matter in the universe. The overwhelming majority of space is completely uninhabitable and inhospitable to life, with only a single planet that we know of being capable of sustaining life.

Even a tiny change in many of the universal constants would result in a universe with no life. IIRC, both nuclear forces qualify, among others.

The fraction of the mass of the universe involved in actual life, and the number of planets we're aware of which have life, are irrelevant: the question is whether the basic conditions are tuned for life. Even the gravitational constant, according to something I read recently, couldn't be very much different without getting a universe without life.

Actually, I have a theory that our bodies were fine-tuned to create feces. If we didn't have mouths, we couldn't eat goodies. With no stomach or intestinal track, the food couldn't be broken down and transported to the rectum and out the anus (which also support the fine-tuned fecal theory). If any of these didn't exist, we couldn't crap, and there's no reason to think that the sole purpose of our body is to produce it should we? It's so fine-tuned!

That's not fine-tuning at all; it's very gross (pun intended).
Mouths aren't even necessary for producing feces; there are sea creatures which have no mouths which nevertheless produce feces. Nor is a stomach necessary; there are animals with digestive tracts without stomachs. Considering the mouth as a matter of fine-tuning for feces is comparable to saying that the fact that there's gravity means the universe is fine-tuned for life -- which isn't true; it's the specific value of the gravitational constant that's fine-tuned. The points would be analogous if we discovered that only a mouth with a diameter falling into a certain very strict range, with lips having a very specific strength, teeth of a very specific size and shape, and saliva with a very precise pH were all required to make feces.

Your illustration here is about as solid as this one:

 

[WillMc88]

The fraction of the mass of the universe involved in actual life, and the number of planets we're aware of which have life, are irrelevant: the question is whether the basic conditions are tuned for life. Even the gravitational constant, according to something I read recently, couldn't be very much different without getting a universe without life.

No, it's very relevant. If you're claiming the universal constants are fine-tuned for "LIFE", then why is there only such a small portion of the universe where life is able to exist? I recently read somewhere that the universe is much more 'fine-tuned' for the creation of black holes, rather than life. What makes life so special to the universe? The 'fine-tuned' assertion is merely speculation and borders more on philosophy than science.

And that analogy wasn't meant to be taken seriously, Lol. It's interesting that you say that about the gravitational constant, because I heard the exact opposite. Life functions very well in less gravity. And how can anyone assert that life wouldn't have evolved under those different conditions? I'll have to try to find that article again.

 

[Kulindahr]

No, it's very relevant. If you're claiming the universal constants are fine-tuned for "LIFE", then why is there only such a small portion of the universe where life is able to exist? I recently read somewhere that the universe is much more 'fine-tuned' for the creation of black holes, rather than life. What makes life so special to the universe? The 'fine-tuned' assertion is merely speculation and borders more on philosophy than science.

And that analogy wasn't meant to be taken seriously, Lol. It's interesting that you say that about the gravitational constant, because I heard the exact opposite. Life functions very well in less gravity. And how can anyone assert that life wouldn't have evolved under those different conditions? I'll have to try to find that article again.

Because size isn't relevant.

It's like having a zoo exhibit fine-tuned for a pair of Bengal tigers: the place would be huge, providing the range they need to roam, with all sorts of other living things... and here in one spot there's a pair of Bengal tigers. The fact that there aren't Bengal tigers everywhere doesn't establish that the exhibit isn't fine-tuned for them.

What matters is the tuning, and that's the constants.

I can't see that the universe is tuned much at all for the making of black holes; that depends really only on three constants -- the gravitational, the speed of light, and the expansion rate. You could change the others all around and still get black holes.

 

[bankside]

I got to thinking about this after my first response, and wanted to add something.

I don't know of any scientists who accept Intelligent Design as science. As I pointed out, ID (in the version before the Creationists hijacked it) is believed to be a conclusion that can be reached by science, but which is not itself science. An example comes to mind of tire marks on a curved road: one can conclude that the car's vector was such that the tires' traction was insufficient, so it slid and left marks -- but one cannot then conclude what its speed was, what kind of car it was, or who was driving. In other words, science can get you to a certain point, but not beyond it.

See, if you called it Intelligent Imagination or something, that would be great. But there is no way to get beyond a certain point except by means compatible with science. If science can't get you beyond a certain point, nothing can.

 

[WillMc88]

Because size isn't relevant.

It's like having a zoo exhibit fine-tuned for a pair of Bengal tigers: the place would be huge, providing the range they need to roam, with all sorts of other living things... and here in one spot there's a pair of Bengal tigers. The fact that there aren't Bengal tigers everywhere doesn't establish that the exhibit isn't fine-tuned for them.

What matters is the tuning, and that's the constants.

I'm not talking about size. I'm talking about abundance. Unlike your analogy of a zoo, we don't need the vast expansive universe to live. If the universe and its constants were fine-tuned for life, what's the point of all the superfluous matter? Your zoo would have to contain billions of other empty exhibits completely incapable of housing any life.

See, if you called it Intelligent Imagination or something, that would be great. But there is no way to get beyond a certain point except by means compatible with science. If science can't get you beyond a certain point, nothing can.

Exactly, it isn't science.