Category Archives: Theism and atheism

What is the evidence for “purposeful intervention”?

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FMM: Purposeful intervention is pretty much the opposite of random mutation.

FMM notes in the same comment:

 If there in nothing about an idea that distinguishes it from it’s alternative it seems to be superfluous.

So the idea is “non designed mutations” and the alternative is “purposeful intervention”.

Give that, and given FMM has not discarded the idea of purposeful intervention there must be something that distinguishes it from non designed mutations.

What is that distinguishing factor? What is the actual evidence for “purposeful intervention” regarding mutations?

And, more broadly, what is the evidence for “purposeful intervention” in any area of biology? Apart from, of course, wishful thinking.

If You are Going to Be a Christian, at Least be a Courageous Christian

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This is a follow up OP to my previous two where I’d challenged some of the common Christian views, such as the immortally of the soul  and the origin of evil.

At UD, I also questioned the suppose holiness of Billy Graham-who recently passed away-and the comparison of him to apostle Paul as well as Graham’s confidence that he was going to go to heaven to be with the Lord here.

It looks like that pushed some of the true Christians over the edge  at UD and consequently I was challenged to admit as being a closet atheist or as Truth Will Set You Free called me a/mat (atheist/materialist)…

41 Truth Will Set You Free February 25, 2018 at 8:16 pm

“J-mac @ 15: A/mats are cowards when they preach their a/mat faith as if it has some redeeming social value, which it doesn’t. Stop faking. You act and live as if life has ultimate meaning and value, but there are no such things in a/mat faith-based philosophy.

You are delusional, and you are the real coward. Stop lying to yourself. Embrace your a/mat nihllism.”

Continue reading →

Is Evil Inevitable?

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Dr. Michael Egnor is a well known neurosurgeon and an ID proponent who is affiliated with the Discovery Institute. He has been writing extensively on the theme of religion, such Thomistic dualism, the immortality of the soul, and recently on the prevalence/existence of evil. Here is a quote from his recent article entitled:

“Cosmic Fine-Tuning and the Problem of Evil”

“Theism predicts two things about evil: that it exists, and that we are not able to entirely comprehend it. Evil exists because the created universe is not God, but His creation, so it must of necessity fall short of God, who is perfectly Good. After all, if the universe were perfectly good, without evil, it would just be God. If the universe is God’s creation, then it must fall short of perfection, and it must contain evil, understood as the deprivation of good. So Goff is mistaken that theism predicts a perfect cosmos, free from evil. Theism posits a perfect God, and a creation necessarily short of perfection. Theism seems to have gotten this “prediction” quite right, because the cosmos is certainly short of perfection. Theism predicts evil in the world, precisely because God is Good and because the world is not God.” – Michael Egnor Continue reading →

Immortal Soul Anyone?

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At Evolution News and other, Dr. Michael Egnor has been writing extensively on the subject of mind, thought, consciousness and soul: here,  here, here , here , here and here.
It seems that all his efforts have been concentrated on the critic of the materialistic views of the origins the mind, thoughts and consciousness. To make the long story short, Dr. Egnor is convinced that with the exception of one type of thoughts, where some thought patterns have been detected in human brain by MRI, EEG etc., other types of thoughts, such as abstract thoughts, can’t be explained in materialistic terms and therefore they are directly or indirectly a solid proof of the existence of an immaterial soul or the Thomistic Dualism dogma propagated Thomas Aquinas  in the 13th century…

While there maybe a third explanation for this phenomenon, such as quantum consciousness/mind/thoughts, which I had already covered here , in this OP however, I would like to focus on another aspect of this issue:

Where did the idea of the immortal soul come from in the first place? Continue reading →

Do Atheists Exist?

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This post is to move a discussion from Sandbox(4) at Entropy’s request.

Over on the Sandbox(4) thread, fifthmonarchyman made two statements that I disagree with:

“I’ve argued repeatedly that humans are hardwired to believe in God.”

“Everyone knows that God exists….”

As my handle indicates, I prefer to lurk.  The novelty of being told that I don’t exist overcame my good sense, so I joined the conversation.

For the record, I am what is called a weak atheist or negative atheist.  The Wikipedia page describes my position reasonably well:

“Negative atheism, also called weak atheism and soft atheism, is any type of atheism where a person does not believe in the existence of any deities but does not explicitly assert that there are none. Positive atheism, also called strong atheism and hard atheism, is the form of atheism that additionally asserts that no deities exist.”

I do exist, so fifthmonarchyman’s claims are disproved.  For some reason he doesn’t agree, hence this thread.

Added In Edit by Alan Fox 16.48 CET 11th January, 2018

This thread is designated as an extension of Noyau. This means only basic rules apply. The “good faith” rule, the “accusations of dishonesty” rule do not apply in this thread.

The Fine-Tuning Argument – Kettle Logic on a Cosmological Scale

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As a relatively recent arrival here at TSZ, I am somewhat intrigued to still see the Fine-Tuning Argument in regular rotation.  It appears often in comments, but the two most recent OP’s that I have come across dedicated to the topic are Mung’s ‘The Wonder of Water‘ and RobC’s ‘The Big Numbers Game‘.

That I find the Fine-Tuning Argument completely unconvincing will not come as a surprise to anyone who has read any of my comments on TSZ.  But I think it is worth taking a moment to explain why that is as my reasoning differs slightly from that of others whose comments I have seen.  In a comment on the ‘Wonder of Water’ thread, Joe Felsenstein comes closest while referring to the ability of the Schrodinger Wave Equation to model all of the properties that we see expressed in Chemistry:

“If Michael Denton’s Intelligent Designer wants to fine-tune properties of water she has to do it by tinkering with the SWE. Which would mess up a lot else.”

Continue reading →

Five Proofs

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of the Existence of God

Philosopher Edward Feser has a new book out in which he puts forth five arguments for the existence of God. These are not the “Five Ways” of Aquinas so it might be refreshing to discuss one or all of these. At the very least this OP may introduce readers to arguments for the existence of God which they had previously been unaware of.

The five proofs are:

  • The Aristotelian Proof
  • The Neo-Platonic Proof
  • The Augustinian Proof
  • The Thomistic Proof
  • The Rationalist Proof

Continue reading →

The Mystery of Christianity: 1. The Problem of Evil

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Recently, we have been able to establish, reluctantly by some and without an official admission, that God could not have spared Adam and Eve from the consequences of their disobedience that led to sin, which resulted in aging, diseases, suffering, natural disasters outside of paradise and then eventually death… Continue reading →

The Idea of ‘Science’ “vs” “Religion’

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There’s a rather good article recently published on Aeon, “Why religion is not going away and science will not destroy it“. Since we often circle around the question of the relationship between science and religion, and since most TSZ contributors seem to assume the conflict thesis — that science and religion tend to, and perhaps even must, conflict — I wanted to bring this article to your attention. Discuss — or not!

Continue reading →

The Mysteries of Evolution: 4. How did we get here…

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…from: “having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one”?

Welcome all after vacation!

I have been reviewing many different articles recently and it hit me like a bolt of lighting: How did materialist who promote the Darwinian theory of evolution get to spontaneous emergence of life from what Darwin himself wrote in the Origin of Species:

“There is grandeur in this [natural selection] view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being evolved”

One would think that scientific, experimental evidence convinced Darwinists to change their mind… Unfortunately, just like many of my posts and comments have revealed, no such evidence has emerged…. So, my question is: what prompted the Darwiwnists to change the fundamental idea about the origins of life originally written by Darwin himself, if no evidence for such a change exists?

For VJ Torley: Christianity’s consistency with Evolutionary Theory, JB Peterson’s Interview

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Various creationists and ID proponents, myself included, have raved about the work of elite scholar and clinical psychologist Jordan B. Peterson who connected the rise of Christianity with concepts in evolutionary theory. His recent 2.5-hour interview was profound on many levels. I provide a link to the interview below.

Even though Peterson is an die-hard evolutionist, many ID proponents and creationists have said they were blessed to hear what he had to say. I know I was. Since I know VJ studied the topic of animal intelligence, I thought Peterson’s work might be of interest to him since Peterson ties the rise of Christianity to behavioral and neurological traits he sees deeply conserved in the mammalian kingdom.
Continue reading →

The Mysteries of Evolution: 1. Darwinian evolution is a non-random process

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During my research on consciousness I have come across more than a few of the so-called mysteries of evolution mainly uttered by Richard Dawkins who seems to have no problem at all that science has not been able to explain them in terms of evolutionary processes… (More of them in my upcoming posts).

What I’ve found really interesting was Dawkins’ public statements that Darwinian evolution and its main mechanism–natural selection–are non-random.

Really? Why didn’t he say so 40 years ago? Continue reading →

In Defense of Republican Atheism

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In a recent comment, Vincent writes that

However, I would argue that if we believe in human freedom, then that freedom has to include the freedom to bind oneself to a particular vision of humans’ ultimate good – whether it be one that includes God as its core or one which excludes God as a hindrance to unfettered liberty.

I’m very interested in theories of freedom and this idea of atheism as somehow involving “unfettered liberty.”

Continue reading →

‘Memetics is a Dumb Explanation’ says Dennettian ‘naturalist’

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The resident professional ‘philosopher’ of TSZ recently wrote this:

“’memes!’ is a dumb explanation.”

Yes, I agree! (Although that person doesn’t seem to know the difference between ‘memes’ and ‘memetics.’ – e.g. I don’t mind ‘memes’ used for popular shared internet links, but that’s not ‘memetics.’)

Well, given the weekend’s significance for a billion+, let’s ‘crucify’ memetics then. Why is ‘memetics’ a dumb explanation? And there’s no need to hold back with merely ‘dumb’. If one is an ideological ‘naturalist’, isn’t one forced into something like ‘memetics’ because they share the same materialist, naturalist, agnostic/atheist worldview as (chuckling at his own supposed lack of self-identity!) Daniel Dennett? Isn’t the built-in materialism of ‘memetics’ what made it so attractive to certain people and for the same reason obviously not attractive or believable to most others?

Continue reading →

Contradictions in the Christian Bible

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Contradictions are rife in the Christian bible. Here at The Skeptical Zone we have recently discussed those surrounding how Saul died. We’ve also noted the two conflicting accounts of Judas’ death and what he did with the thirty pieces of silver. There are dozens more.

The Skeptics’ Annotated Bible and The Thinking Atheist are two of several excellent resources on biblical contradictions and absurdities. The sheer volume of contradictions, though, is best demonstrated visually as is done at BibViz:

The creators of this site started with a cross-index of topics in the bible and pulled out those that contradict each other. You can click on the links to get more detail. As a bonus, the site includes references to the sections in the bible that contain Scientific Absurdities & Historical Inaccuracies, Cruelty & Violence, Misogyny, Violence & Discrimination Against Women, and Discrimination Against Homosexuals.

Obviously most Christians aren’t foolish enough to claim their bible is inerrant. Those that do, in the words of Desi Arnaz, have “got some ‘splainin’ to do.”

Who’s Skeptical of the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis?

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Is anyone here skeptical of the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis (EES) in biology/biological sciences? If so, why? If not, why not?

Background: A couple of days ago I interviewed one of the participants in the Royal Society’s recent ‘New Trends’ meeting (audios now available), who is obviously pro-EES ,as part of a nearly completed research project from the past couple of years.

My interviewee gave the (ahem) ‘brilliant’ answer of a stone when asked to speak about ‘things that don’t evolve’ (one of those interviewer places where it’s really hard to mask a delighted smile with neutrality!) after claiming not to understand the question: “What are the limits of evolution as a scientific theory?” (we had already been discussing its ‘possibilities’ and I explained earlier that I would ask both about the possibilities and the limits of evolutionary theories). Undergrad students around the world chuckle when they hear the Rock answer (as if geological evolution doesn’t exist in the minds of biologists)!

It’s just a ‘play of scales,’ after all, that slips us into the ‘evolution of everything,’ don’t forget 😉