Not really, of course, that’s just click-bait – it is merely science. But at least one person has been turned from a dodgy path by, in part, considering the dissonance between his faith and scientific evidence. Non-UK residents won’t be able to hear this, but the essence is contained here.

It’s an issue that cross-references many familiar themes – religion, morality, homosexuality, science – so I thought I’d toss it into the arena.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-7zYBKgzfs

For discussion 🙂

Given recent posts here at TSZ challenging the validity of presuppositions and self-evident truths I thought the following list might be worthy of debate.

Presuppositions of Science

1. The existence of a theory-independent, external world
2. The orderly nature of the external world
3. The knowability of the external world
4. The existence of truth
5. The laws of logic
6. The reliability of our cognitive and sensory faculties to serve as truth gatherers and as a source of justified true beliefs in our intellectual environment
7. The adequacy of language to describe the world
8. The existence of values used in science
9. The uniformity of nature and induction
10. The existence of numbers

When critics object to the Logos as a presupposition and offer instead 10 other presuppositions, Ockham’s Razor flies out the window.

There’s been an interesting conversation at UD over self-evident truths lately. I think I’ve run up against the Uncommon Descent policy on dissent (don’t dissent), and the whole thing has devolved into “we are right” and “they are liars and also dumb.” But the underlying conversation was interesting, and I’d like to get some outside opinions on it. Especially KN, or anyone else with actual training in philosophy. I’m going to number positions for the sake of convenience, so that people with an opinion can react to any that interest them without feeling the need to engage them all. I’d love to hear where I’m wrong.

So as to my position:

1. I make mistakes. I know this as certainly as I know anything—certainly enough not to doubt it in practice. This shows that I do not have the ability to perfectly perceive error in my own thinking.
2. I cannot therefore be logically, absolutely certain of anything—not even that A=A. Because the faculties I would use to be perfectly, logically certain of that are the same ones that are not perfect.
3. I think the trickiest question here is whether I can be certain that “I think, therefore I am.” But even there, is the fact that I cannot imagine any counter-example because it’s perfectly true, or because I have an imperfect and limited mind? I can’t know without a perfect, limitless mind, so I have to say even here, it’s not logically absolutely certain. (But obviously practically certain, and I don’t doubt it in practice.)

Does that make sense?

Now as to StephenB and Barry Arrington’s position.

4. I think one major motivator of the “you’re a liar!” style of debate they’ve adopted is community identification. I’ve been thinking of this as building a wall. The point of the conversation is largely, not entirely, to show that “we think like this:” and “they think like that:”, or more pointedly, “look how stupid and ugly they are.” It makes it very easy to avoid questioning beliefs, because we cling particularly to those notions that separate us from them. It identifies and strengthens the community of us by redefining it in opposition to the ugliness and stupidity of them. And once that wall is built, it’s extremely hard to dismantle. Why on earth would you stop and seriously consider something a stupid and dishonest person says? And what would it say about you if you agreed with them? The wall exists to separate.
   1. This is not to say their positions are dishonest—I think they’re very upfront with their beliefs, and mean what they say.
   2. I think this is demonstrated particularly by BA’s habit of bailing out of a conversation and posting a new thread that very explicitly says look at how stupid and ugly those people are!
   3. I think I’m doing the same thing right now. I think that wall-building is wrong, but I don’t know how not to do it—especially as observing that someone else is building a wall is as good as laying a brick in your own.
   4. I can try to fight back against that by observing that walls exist to keep people in as well as out; the point is largely to have a bulwark against having to reconsider one’s beliefs and identity. So it’s important to ask, “Am I wrong?” Which I’m doing here, and attempting with some success to do in my own head.

Continue reading →

The movement against miracles was, not surprisingly, influential in the natural sciences. Simply put, if we’re not to appeal to miracles, then the world must have arisen naturalistically. This had a profound effect on the critical thinking, or lack thereof, of the time. Speculative hypotheses, with little basis in fact, enjoyed serious consideration and triumphant acceptance.

The bar was placed exceedingly low for such theories as pure conjecture became acceptable and celebrated science. Monumental scientific problems with the notion of spontaneous origins went ignored and evolutionary theories (from cosmological to biological) soon became “fact.”

Today strictly naturalistic, evolutionary, theories are a given. They simply are accepted as true, or as true as anything in science can be. And it also is a given that miracles are false. But what evolutionists prefer to overlook is that there is a causal relationship here. The latter made way for, and mandated, the former.

http://darwins-god.blogspot.com/2015/06/miracles-are-glaring-problem-for.html?m=1

I don’t want to mischaracterize Intelligent Design, but…

Kantian Naturalist and I have been hopscotching from thread to thread, discussing the nature of religious language. The main point of contention is the assertoric/disclosive distinction:  When is religious language assertoric — that is, when does it make claims about reality — and when is it merely disclosive, revealing attitude and affect without making actual claims?

I’ve created this thread as a permanent home for this otherwise nomadic discussion.

It may also be a good place for an ongoing discussion of another form of religious language — scripture.  For believers who take scripture to be divinely inspired, the question is when it should be taken literally, when it should be taken figuratively or metaphorically, and whether there are consistent and justifiable criteria for drawing that distinction.

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/349/6251/aac4716

We conducted replications of 100 experimental and correlational studies published in three psychology journals using high-powered designs and original materials when available.
…
Ninety-seven percent of original studies had significant results (P < .05). Thirty-six percent of replications had significant results;
…
No single indicator sufficiently describes replication success, and the five indicators examined here are not the only ways to evaluate reproducibility. Nonetheless, collectively these results offer a clear conclusion: A large portion of replications produced weaker evidence for the original findings despite using materials provided by the original authors, review in advance for methodological fidelity, and high statistical power to detect the original effect sizes. Moreover, correlational evidence is consistent with the conclusion that variation in the strength of initial evidence (such as original P value) was more predictive of replication success than variation in the characteristics of the teams conducting the research (such as experience and expertise).

In an interesting article by Peter Halligan and David Oakley in NewScientist it is suggested that even if

consciousness occurs too late [in the process of a human action] to affect the outcomes of the mental processes apparently linked to it…it provides an evolutionary advantage that developed for the benefit of the social group, not the individual.

http://www.researchgate.net/publication/280979559_Consciousness_isnt_all_about_you_you_know

I’m curious to get the thoughts of those here on this suggestion.

A question for those of you who believe in an omnibenevolent God but also in hell: How do you reconcile the two?

Some believers invoke the “free will defense”, but this makes no sense to me. It seems that God could easily save everyone, sending no one to hell, without violating anyone’s free will. Here’s how I described it recently:

It’s similar to a technique I’ve described in the past whereby God could have created a perfect world sans evil without violating anyone’s free will.

Here’s how it works:

1. Before creating each soul, God employs his omniscience to look forward in time and see whether that soul, if created, would freely accept him and go to heaven or freely reject him and go to hell.

2. If the former, God goes ahead and creates that soul. If the latter, then he doesn’t, choosing instead to create a different soul that will freely accept him and go to heaven.

Simple, isn’t it? Any omnipotent, omniscient and omnibenevolent God could easily come up with something like this or better, rather than sending billions of souls to hell with no chance of a reprieve.

Theists, how do you respond?

Our default position towards infidelity is that it is Wrong. I’m not here to argue otherwise, but the moral dilemma thrown up by this case is that someone has made it their business to interfere in the lives of strangers in order to promote their own moral stance. This has led to two (unconfirmed) reports of suicide, and the potential damage caused by a discovered affair is enormous. Of course, one can say the cheats should have thought of that in the first place, but we are calculating creatures, and the genuine, if naive, belief is that if the other party does not find out, no harm is caused. If you choose to expose a cheat, you are directly crystallising the potential harm, with no knowledge of individual circumstances.

Real people have real circumstances, and real desires, wants and needs. It is not always a simple black-and-white matter of ‘leave first’. While I don’t condone the actions of marital cheats, I find myself more incensed by the interfering, scattergun actions of these busybodies.

What punishment should be meted out to those who slaughter innocents?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oli0DTmPmGU

*Title changed to appease Mung 😉

I’ve not had any refutation / substantive critique from Christians and Sophisticated Theists(c) so I’ll put this here. Are they using ancient words wrong? Is the birth of Jesus story figurative? Does it matter to Christianity if it is not actually true? (I suspect its nearly as important as the resurrection)

Seems like there is substantial interest in discussing the existence and/or extent of Noah’s flood.

In the Alastair McKinnon paper (“Miracle” and “Paradox”) I cited in a recent comment, it is argued that miracles of a certain kind are impossible.  The impossible ones are the ones that would provide any evidence of supernatural objects or occurrences.

We can call any of those most wondrous miracles a “miracle1.”  Any other miracle, which would be more in the nature of an amazing coincidence, we can designate as a “miracle2.”  Note that there’s nothing about a coincidence that provides evidence of the supernatural (something beyond nature).  And what does it mean to be “supernatural”?  It means to violate a natural or physical law. Continue reading →

A couple of comments on another thread got me wondering about this.  In my own case, I’m re-reading Middlemarch (for a discussion at the Boston Athenaeum in September) and continuing my reading on the Russian Revolution. I’ve finished the The Great Russian Revolution, by V. Chernov, and am now into Agrarian Foes of Bolshevism, by O. Radkey.  Also finishing up D. Hausman’s Rationality, Self-Interest, and Welfare.

How about you?

http://www.cell.com/current-biology/pdf/S0960-9822(15)00743-5.pdf

Seems to fit in with recent threads.

His latest book, Faith Versus Fact, is
intended not to pile on the arguments
for atheism but to advance the debate
into its next round. It is a brief against the
faitheists — scientists and religionists
alike — who advocate a make-nice
accommodation between science and
religion. As with Michael Corleone’s offer
to Nevada Senator Pat Geary in The
Godfather Part II, Coyne’s offer to religion
on the part of science is this: Nothing.
This sounds more imperialistic and
scientistic than it really is, because Coyne
defi nes ‘science’ broadly, to encompass
any system of belief grounded by reason
and evidence, rather than faith. On
this defi nition, many of the humanities,
such as history and philosophy, count
as ‘science’, not just the traditional
physical and social sciences.

Coyne quotes several historical and
recent writers, particularly Carl Sagan
and the philosophers Yonatan Fishman
and Maarten Boudry, while adding some
examples of his own, to show how the
existence of the God of scripture is a
testable empirical hypothesis. The Bible’s
historical accounts could have been
corroborated by archaeology, genetics
and philology. It could have contained
uncannily prescient truths such as “thou
shalt not travel faster than light” or “two
strands entwined is the secret of life.” A
bright light might appear in the heavens
one day and a man clad in white robe and
sandals, supported by winged angels,
could descend from the sky, give sight
to the blind, and resurrect the dead. We
might discover that intercessory prayer
can restore hearing or re-grow amputated
limbs, or that anyone who speaks the
Prophet Mohammed’s name in vain is
immediately struck down by lightning,
while those who pray to Allah five times a
day are free from disease and misfortune.

On the ‘Evolving Complex Adaptations’ thread, a side-discussion arose with CharlieM over Behe’s ‘CCC’ argument. In summary, Behe places an event of probability as the upper bound or ‘Edge of Evolution’. If a specific single mutation has a probability of of arising in any one replication event, a specific double mutation has a probability of , a triple , and a quadruple – that is, if four independent changes must happen simultaneously before a particular step is achievable, then that step cannot realistically have occurred in the history of life on earth. Behe thinks he has found a case with a probability in the resistance to chloroquine in the malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum.
Continue reading →

http://www.wired.com/2015/07/crispr-dna-editing-2/

A little bit of this and a little bit of that. A new and cheap way to implement genetic engineering, and a way to bypass the usual rules of population genetics.

The stakes, however, have changed. Everyone at the Napa meeting had access to a gene-editing technique called Crispr-Cas9. The first term is an acronym for “clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats,” a description of the genetic basis of the method; Cas9 is the name of a protein that makes it work. Technical details aside, Crispr-Cas9 makes it easy, cheap, and fast to move genes around—any genes, in any living thing, from bacteria to people. “These are monumental moments in the history of biomedical research,” Baltimore says. “They don’t happen every day.”

…

ANY GENE TYPICALLY has just a 50–50 chance of getting passed on. Either the offspring gets a copy from Mom or a copy from Dad. But in 1957 biologists found exceptions to that rule, genes that literally manipulated cell division and forced themselves into a larger number of offspring than chance alone would have allowed.

A decade ago, an evolutionary geneticist named Austin Burt proposed a sneaky way to use these “selfish genes.” He suggested tethering one to a separate gene—one that you wanted to propagate through an entire population. If it worked, you’d be able to drive the gene into every individual in a given area. Your gene of interest graduates from public transit to a limousine in a motorcade, speeding through a population in flagrant disregard of heredity’s traffic laws. Burt suggested using this “gene drive” to alter mosquitoes that spread malaria, which kills around a million people every year. It’s a good idea. In fact, other researchers are already using other methods to modify mosquitoes to resist the Plasmodium parasite that causes malaria and to be less fertile, reducing their numbers in the wild. But engineered mosquitoes are expensive. If researchers don’t keep topping up the mutants, the normals soon recapture control of the ecosystem.

Push those modifications through with a gene drive and the normal mosquitoes wouldn’t stand a chance. The problem is, inserting the gene drive into the mosquitoes was impossible. Until Crispr-Cas9 came along.

Emmanuelle Charpentier did early work on Crispr.Today, behind a set of four locked and sealed doors in a lab at the Harvard School of Public Health, a special set of mosquito larvae of the African species Anopheles gambiae wriggle near the surface of shallow tubs of water. These aren’t normal Anopheles, though. The lab is working on using Crispr to insert malaria-resistant gene drives into their genomes. It hasn’t worked yet, but if it does … well, consider this from the mosquitoes’ point of view. This project isn’t about reengineering one of them. It’s about reengineering them all.

In the “Evolving complex features” thread, TristanM asks:

I’m curious what the group’s thoughts are on Jonathan Bartlett’s (AKA “JohnnyB”) argument about open-loops in the AVIDA program?

I haven’t studied Jon’s argument yet, but I think some of you have. What did you think?

Why I Love AVIDA – Detecting Design in Digital Organisms

Thoughts on Parameterized vs. Open-Ended Evolution and the Production of Variability

Irreducible Complexity and Relative Irreducible Complexity: Foundations and Applications