When is the YEC God no longer the YEC God? That question came up in my recent thread on methodological naturalism and accommodationism. In that thread I argued that science falsifies the YEC God, because it shows definitively that the earth is about a million times older than the YECs believe. If the earth is old, then the YEC God doesn’t exist. There might still be a God, but not the YEC God, because the YEC God necessarily created the earth a short time ago. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be “the YEC God” at all!
Robin and Petrushka objected because they didn’t see “the YEC God” as being essentially YEC. In other words, they saw “the YEC God” as referring to a God who would still be the same God even if it turned out that he hadn’t created the universe several thousand years ago.
In short, I saw “the YEC God” as equivalent to “a God having YEC characteristics”, and they saw it as equivalent to “the God of the YECs, who might or might not have YEC characteristics”.
Of course, neither interpretation is correct in an absolute sense. Language is a convention, and “the YEC God” can plausibly be interpreted either way. However, I argued that in the context of the thread, it was clear how “the YEC God” was being used:
…I thought that readers would notice that I used the unusual phrase “the YEC God” instead of “God” or “the Christian God” or “Yahweh”. Since I took the trouble of adding the qualifier “YEC”, they would infer that there must be some significance to it. There was; I added it to indicate that my argument was confined to YEC Gods. What is the characteristic of a YEC God that distinguishes him from an OEC God or other Gods? The clue is in the qualifier “YEC”. He must have created the earth a (relatively) short time ago.
This leads to a counterintuitive realization: the entity we refer to as “the YEC God” is not necessarily the same as the entity that YECs refer to as “God”!
How can we resolve this apparent paradox? I think the key is to recognize that within our minds, “the YEC God” doesn’t really refer to a single possible entity. It refers to an entire set of possible entities, any of which would qualify as “the YEC God”. Likewise with “God”.
The set of possible entities encompassed by the word “God”, when spoken by a YEC, is larger than the set encompassed by the phrase “the YEC God” as used in the other thread. The latter is a subset of the former. Since they are not coextensive, they don’t mean the same thing.
There’s much more to be said about this, particularly about how God’s status as a fictional (or at best unknown) entity affects all of this, but I’ll leave that to the comments.
Alan,
Unlike WJM, I’ve been explaining how petrushka is getting it wrong. I’m not merely asserting it.
What I am missing is what the “it” is “in getting it wrong”. I still think you (and me too, most likely) are at cross-purposes.
Alan,
We’ve been through all of this before, and even petrushka admits that his logic was wrong. Do we really need to rehash it?
See my comment about ‘Yvonne Driscoll’:
That goes a bit beyond my argument.
I am not arguing for doublethink. I am not arguing that one can be a YEC and simultaneously believe the earth is old.
I would argue that one can be a YEC and simultaneously be aware that there is a great amount of evidence for an old earth.
People are a bit more complicated than that. People like to think that overwhelming evidence can be overturned. The most popular genre in literature is the detective story, and the heart and soul of detective fiction is innocence despite overwhelming evidence.
So there are people who can be aware of and even study geological evidence and still believe in a young earth. There have been people who have accepted the evidence and decided that God or Satan faked the evidence. I can clearly recall having this thought in 1956 at age 11. It may seem silly, but people have these kinds of thoughts.
There might be many avenues to rejecting keiths claim that the YEC god has been shown not to exist. The simplest is to deny that the evidence proves the case. You might say this is irrational, but all you can say for certain is that such people are betting against very long odds.
They would look at you and say you are betting against very long odds with OOL.
This might be the point where I get confused by your argument. I don’t think that keiths is saying anything about a YEC who accepts the correctness of geology and astrophysics. I suspect that very few if any YECs do.
The YECs that I, and I believe keiths, are discussing are those that make claims about reality (the universe is less than 10,000 years old, a global flood occurred in the past few thousand years) based on the god they believe in.
The YECs I know don’t care about the scientific evidence. They believe, like Ken Ham, that the Bible trumps science.
Their irrational beliefs do not change the fact that science does refute their claims and hence any god with those essential characteristics.
Am I still missing your point?
OK. But I’m tempted to ask where does this get us. A theory with no entailments is no theory at all. Who disagrees?
Alan,
Well, petrushka has gotten a lot of “its” wrong in these two threads, but this is the most recent:
My argument does not require “TRUE YECs” at all. I am simply claiming that science show us that the God I specified does not exist:
If you want to know why petrushka disagrees, you’ll have to ask him. I’ve already given you my best guess:
Well, it seems there is violent agreement about the ability some YECs have to believe things in the face of all evidence to the contrary!
I didn’t check to see if Dawkins had quote-mined Kurt Wise. 😉
Alan,
The theory does have entailments. If someone is breaking into my house and stealing my toothpaste, then the security cameras and the window and door sensors should show that. They don’t, so we conclude that “the person breaking into my house and stealing my toothpaste” does not exist.
Likewise, the YEC story has entailments which are not satisfied. We conclude that “the YEC God who created the universe 6,000 years ago and wiped out all but a favored few in a global flood” does not exist.
Why petrushka would dispute this is beyond me. You’ll need to ask him.
Alan,
Yes, that’s never been under dispute. Although Sal might drop in at any moment. 🙂
I was actually making a general point. Any theory must have entailments.
ETA I’ve been posting at Hunter’s blog concurrently on entailments.
You don’t watch many movies, I see.
The god you defined does not exist. I haven’t argued against that. I would argue that you have not defined the YEC god the way a YEC would do so.
I have tried to present two kinds of exceptions.
The YEC who believes scientific evidence is irrelevant does not accept your premise that certain kinds of evidence should be expected.
The YEC who believes scientific evidence is important, but who argues against your interpretation of the evidence.
What seems to be left is the YEC who accepts scientific evidence, agrees that it shows the YEC god does not exist, and continues to believe in the god which he knows to a moral certainty does not exist. I find this third YEC to be a bit implausible.
Alan,
Of course, but how is that relevant? What were you getting at with the following?
Do you think that a “theory with no entailments” is being discussed?
keiths,
I did. But you suggest, I suspect, that there are entailments to the claim that God created the Earth 6,000 years ago and I agree the theory is proven false by the evidence. And I’m still not sure what the essential point was that you wanted to make in your OP.
Alan,
Yes, and a theory can’t be proven false by the evidence unless it has testable entailments. Hence the emphasis on testability in science.
There were two OPs and two threads. In the first, I was making the case against methodological naturalism and accommodationism. I brought up the YEC God to show that science is perfectly capable of handling (and falsifying) supernatural hypotheses.
In this thread, I am asserting that the phrase “the YEC God” has at least two distinct meanings, that they are both plausible interpretations of the phrase, and that my statement about the nonexistence of the YEC God was entirely appropriate given the meaning I was using (and that I clearly indicated I was using).
petrushka,
So do I. So what?
That has no relevance to my argument. Again, how many times do I need to repeat myself?
As I said to Alan:
You’ve already agreed that you got it wrong about the toothpaste thief. If you deny the YEC statement, you’re making the same logical error all over again.
With petrushka’s challenges out of the way, I thought I’d rehash the major points of these two threads:
1. Methodological naturalism is unnecessary and inappropriate, because science is capable of handling testable supernatural hypotheses. It shouldn’t be arbitrarily excluded from areas in which it is perfectly competent.
2. The existence of specific supernatural entities (like the YEC God) can be investigated by science, provided that those entities are sufficiently well-defined (as when I introduced the YEC God into the conversation as “a YEC God who created the universe 6,000 years ago and wiped out all but a favored few in a global flood”).
3. The YEC God, as specified above, has been falsified by science.
4. NOMA-style accommodationists are being dishonest when they assure religious believers that their tenets belong to a separate magisterium and are safe from scientific challenge. The magisteria overlap and many beliefs, such as the belief in an immaterial soul, are not at all safe from science.
5. Even a simple phrase like “the YEC God” can have more than one meaning, and the meanings are not equivalent. At the very least, “the YEC God” can refer to “the God of the YECs” or it can refer to “the God with YEC characteristics”.
6. Each of those meanings encompasses a set of possible entities. The sets differ from person to person, and while they generally overlap, they are not coextensive, and therefore not equivalent.
Science can only test the real effects claimed to emanate from imaginary causes. There is no way to examine the imaginary.
OK
OK. This is narrowly and trivially ture. Those of us who think “The YEC God” is a laughably childish human construct hardly need the formal proof. Those convinced of the existence of “The YEC God” are hardly going to be swayed by logic.
Is this what accommodationists do? Reassure the religious? Secularism, properly instituted, guarantees freedom of religion and I fully support that. It does not stop us pointing out the absurdity of religious claims and arguments that can be tested (power of prayer etc).
OK. Human imagination is a wonderful thing!
So what?
Alan,
Science can test the entailments of hypothesized entities like the YEC God (a supernatural entity) or the Higgs boson (a natural entity). If the entailments are disconfirmed, then the hypothesis is falsified.
The people proposing the YEC God hypothesis don’t see him as imaginary, just as the people proposing the Higgs boson didn’t see it as imaginary. Science’s role is to help us decide what is real and what is imaginary. The Higgs seems to be real, but the YEC God doesn’t.
keiths:
Alan:
It’s neither narrow nor trivial. It took hundreds of years of scientific effort to falsify the YEC story.
Then I think your criteria need some adjustment. Far better to reject the YEC God because it conflicts with the evidence than because you feel it is “childish”.
Sure, but as Patrick and I keep asking, so what? It’s irrelevant to the issue we are discussing.
keiths:
Alan:
Absolutely. Here’s Stephen Jay Gould:
Alan:
So do I. What does that have to do with accommodationism?
Secularism doesn’t, but NOMA-style accommodationism does (cf Gould’s comment on souls).
keiths:
Alan:
Petrushka spent two weeks arguing with me because he didn’t understand that, even when it was repeatedly pointed out to him.
Apologies but my response above was somewhat curtailed by the missus wanting the long grass strimmed. Larry Moran posted about not being an accommodationist in a way that made sense to me a while ago but I am very lax about bookmarking so I can’t immediately find a link.
ETA Double curtailment! New comment will follow.
.
OK. Human imagination is a wonderful thing!
And I am not opposed to people having their own imaginings. None of this is of consequence unless someone feels empowered by their imagination to rule the world and ride rough-shod over anyone else’s imaginings.
ETA ?=>.
Alan,
Nor am I. You keep bringing that up, but no one here has argued for the suppression of religious beliefs, including YEC beliefs. Who are you arguing against?
In these two threads I have been arguing against methodological naturalism and accommodationism. Not only am I not arguing for the suppression of religious beliefs, I’m actually arguing (alongside believers, including ID proponents) that science is perfectly capable of testing religious beliefs in some cases.
Why not let science do its job?
Hi Keith;
I doubt we disagree on much. I don’t really buy philosophical and logical arguments unless they start and stay on the firm ground of reality.
Come on! When have I indicated that science should be restrained in any way? Though in these times of economic recession, the cost of pure research is acting as an economic restraint, I suspect.
I still insist that science can only study reality. There is no way to look at imaginary phenomena with scientific tools. Of course, where imaginary causes are alleged to produce real effects (ID’s designer would be an example – if any ID proponent were to give “the designer” some entailments) those real effects can (in principle) be observed. But those effects have to be observed before any scientific methods can be brought to bear.
petrushka,
Could you explain the relevance of that comment? I’m not seeing it.
Alan:
You haven’t, but advocates of methodological naturalism do. Hence the need for these two threads. I am not arguing for the suppression of religious belief, but I am arguing against needless restrictions on science.
Science can and does study hypotheses that turn out to be incorrect. Phlogiston wasn’t real, but science was able to examine the phlogiston hypothesis and falsify it.
Sure there is. The Ganesh-poofed 100 rupee note was an imaginary phenomenon, but we were able to falsify it scientifically — just like phlogiston.
Supernatural hypotheses can be tested by science, whether imaginary or not, as long as they lead to observable entailments. You may believe, as I do, that supernatural entities are imaginary, but that should be the result of our inquiry, not an assumption we make beforehand.
I understand that you don’t see it, and I’ve failed at great length to explain it.
petrushka,
Mung was mocking tjguy. Read his comment again with that in mind.
keiths,
I’m frustrated that we seem to be miscommunicating so badly and I must accept some blame for that. Let me try again. you write:
That’s fine. The problem for me is I see no restrictions. There are practical restraints and sometimes political and economic restraints but “needless restrictions”? What have you in mind?
Dear me! Phlogiston was a hypothesis intended to explain the process of combustion. It was replaced by a better scientific explanation. What does this have to do with restrictions on science?
I said:
which is simply and trivially true by definition. The supernatural is something that scientific instruments cannot detect. The only indication of supernatural entities is what people make up about them. But you say:
We really are miscommunicting. Your Ganesh example does not examine supernatural events. It examines rupees. Granted, had we our recording equipment set up and observed the event whereby the note “poofed” into existence, we have something to examine from the interface on, from the moment the event becomes real. Nothing will show on the recorders until a real event takes place.
You see! We don’t disagree. And I still wonder what you think is stopping anyone who wants to test out the real element of any supernatural claim that has entailments. I’m not making any prior assumptions that I can see.
Mockery works because it is true.
Keiths,
Not to beat this dead horse any more but you have not falfisied the existence of an omnipotent YEC God , since omnipotence is one of His defining characteristics.You have only shown that the scientific evidence does not support His existence.
An omnipotent being,by definition, is able to do anything that is logically possible. Creating a world whose origins are undetectable by our present day science is not logically impossible. Likely that would not even require omnipotence.
Unless you have a way to test the limits of omnipotence or that an omnipotent being is bound by the laws of nature which, by YEC definition, He created.
True. The scientific evidence does, however, disprove the existence of a non-deceitful YEC god.
I suspect that most YECs don’t want to open that can of worms. One reason many of them are YECs is because they feel that doubt about one part of the Bible throws the whole thing into doubt. Wondering what else their god might be deceiving people about is the first step down a dark and scary path.
petrushka,
Mung is mocking tjguy and pointing out that the truth remains the truth regardless of whether one is a committed YEC:
Mung is not supporting this claim of yours:
As I said before, that would make them OECs, not YECs.
Alan,
I understand what you’re saying, but I disagree with it.
Methodological naturalism, of course. It declares the supernatural to be off-limits to science. Here’s Robert Pennock, yet again:
Alan:
keiths:
Alan:
You claimed that “science can only study reality.” However, science was able to study (and falsify) phlogiston, which is not real.
keiths:
Alan:
velikovskys made a similar statement in the other thread:
I responded:
keiths:
Alan:
Methodological naturalism is stopping them, if they accept it. I think MN is a mistake. Hence these two threads.
I see two:
1) you are assuming that supernatural phenomena are imaginary, and
2) you are assuming “that science can only study reality”.
#1 should be the result of our inquiry, not an assumption. #2 is incorrect, as my phlogiston example shows.
Mung is not supporting this claim of yours:
As I said before, that would make them OECs, not YECs.
This claim of mine is that actual YECs do not accept a definition of YEC that can be disproven by evidence. If they did, they would be converted by your argument.
Your logic applies to a narrowly defined construct, but apparently not to whatever it is that YECs actually believe. What you are saying is “No True YEC” could believe simultaneously in the existence of scientific evidence and the existence of an entity that is logically excluded by the evidence.
The narrow definition of YEC makes your logic work, but actual YECs either think the science is wrong or the science is irrelevant.
Most people who call themselves YECs are not persuaded.
I’m not disputing your logic or your conclusion. I’m just saying that particular style of argument isn’t persuasive to the people it encompasses. Persuasion is orthogonal to reason.
petrushka,
Do we agree that your quotation of Mung was irrelevant, and that it doesn’t demonstrate what you thought it did?
I will admit that I don’t always recognize sarcasm at UD. That’s why we have the concept of Poe.
I misread Mung, but he wouldn’t have made his statement if it weren’t true.
velikovskys,
As Patrick notes, honesty is also a defining characteristic of the God that most YECs believe in.
That aside, any hypothesis can be rescued by the addition of ad hoc assumptions. I explained this to petrushka earlier:
I am not interested in whether YEC is right or wrong. I accept settled science and don’t worry about it.
What I am interested in is what makes people tick and why (and how) they hold beliefs. I try to avoid confrontational statements that don’t advance communication. It’s just a personal style.
If I disagree with you on anything, it’s the effectiveness of your arguments, not on their correctness. I present as evidence the fact that you have wasted pages and pages on these threads bullying someone who doesn’t even disagree with you on any scientific issue. You simply seem incapable of shifting gears and trying to figure out where I’m coming from.
petrushka,
Which is irrelevant because his statement doesn’t support your claim anyway. Agreed?
Do you deny that one can set up a chessboard in mid game?
Oh dear, you and I really are not communicating!
It is not a question of assumption. It is a question of definition. Let me try again. I am saying we can study whatever we like using the tools of science. But the limits of what we can study are in some respects quite clear and simple. We cannot escape the limitation of the past and future light cone of where we Earthlings find ourselves. This is not making any prior assumption. I assure you I would like to explore outside these limits using my tardis – but that is for my imagination.
This is far different from talking about phlogiston. Phlogiston was a word for describing the property of combustion. Humans invented a word, not a substance. Combustion is real; we just misunderstood the process, initially.Your Higgs boson example also has no bearing on the reality/imagination point that I am trying to make.
Your Ganesh thought experiment only studies the reality (?). The film of the “poof” event would certainly take some explaining and the “supernatural” element would remain unexplained. It would have nothing to say about whether a supernatural entity called Ganesh was the perpetrator.
Just try and clarify for me where you think I am limiting scientific enquiry by pointing out that there are physical and practical limits. (And who is to say they cannot change as improved techniques and tools become available.)
PS hit post button prematurely so numerous typos cleaned up.
Keiths:
Would you bet your life and the lives of any family members that it is impossible to break into a house without leaving evidence on a security system?
The major problem I have with your argument is that you are determined to prove a negative. You are arguing that you can prove non-existence.
I see variations of this in real life, and I think it is a dangerous way to argue.
It may look like I’m trying to defend a silly YEC argument, but I am defending what I think is an important principle.
petrushka,
These threads went on for pages because you kept disagreeing with me, which is fine. Yet in the end, none of your objections held up. Why are you trying to blame me for your intransigence?
Also, why is it “bullying” when I disagree with you, but not when you disagree with me, followed by immature outbursts?
I know where you’re “coming from”, and I’ve addressed your points several times, including in the OP itself. Why are you pretending otherwise?
petrushka,
No. Do you deny that phlogiston might have negative mass (or whatever other ad hoc characteristics are needed to rescue it)?
Can we nevertheless agree that phlogiston doesn’t exist, and that this is demonstrated by science?
Take a breath Keith. Consider the possibility you may have mistaken Petrushka’s point. Is it worth trying to clarify before saying “I know where you’re coming from”?
I asked you to paraphrase my argument and you declined. I deny that you have adequately addressed my argument. Whether you agree or not is up to you. Whether you have understood me is not up to you.
I have been trying to find common ground, and you are apparently trying to win.
That is very nearly the heart of the objection I have to your original argument. it seeks to win rather than to find common ground. As a result it is ineffective.
petrushka,
I think that science can demonstrate (though not absolutely prove) the nonexistence of hypothesized entities. Science has demonstrated the nonexistence of phlogiston. Do you disagree?
When I introduced the YEC God into this discussion, I carefully specified the God I was referring to:
I claimed that science has demonstrated the nonexistence of this God, and at one point (at least) you seemed to agree:
Are you having second thoughts?
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