Shining One wrote:
: Good Day Great Brain,
And good day to you, Little Brain!
I must congratulate you on one of your few attempts to actually deal with specifics in someone's post. Hence, I will respond.
>>>The fact is that modern physicists are usually extremely careful to distinguish between what is solidly known and accepted, and what is poorly known and only partially accepted, if at all. Furthermore,
: Furthermore? That is bunk: appeal to authority. It is also assuming your own axioms.
LOL! I've rarely seen a dumber statement. "Furthermore" is a conjunction. In and of itself, it cannot be "bunk", any more than the conjunction "and" can. A simple conjunction certainly cannot be "assuming your own axioms".
It's pretty obvious, Rex, that you've accumulated a certain amount of vocabulary in your creationist readings, but like a child wielding an M-16, you really have no idea how to use it. You just kind of spray out the words like bullets.
>>>Furthermore, Geisler ignores the fact that most cosmologists today accept the notion of a "big bang" in which our present, local space-time universe originated perhaps 14 billion years ago. And so it's something of a mystery why Geisler claims that most atheists believe that this universe was just "there" forever.
: Bunk!
What's bunk? My claim that "Geisler ignores the fact that most cosmologists today accept the notion of a "big bang" in which our present, local space-time universe originated perhaps 14 billion years ago"? Or my opinion that "it's something of a mystery why Geisler claims that most atheists believe that this universe was just 'there' forever"? In good, clear writing, Rex, instead of merely saying "bunk!", which conveys no information, you need to be specific and say something like, "The notion of 'there forever' seems to be inferred by atheists since they cannot explain a reasonable ‘first cause‘, so your opinion that Geisler's claim is a mystery is bunk." Of course, even that much clearer way of putting your thought is bunk.
: Appeal to the popular.
You obviously have no idea what that means.
: "There forever" seems to be inferred by atheists since they cannot explain a reasonable ‘first cause‘.
"Seems to be"? What kind of reasoning is that? Most atheists accept the "Big Bang" theory, and have since it became popular during the 1960s. A basic tenet of this theory is that anything that went before the Bang is completely unknown. Anyone even faintly familiar with the Big Bang theory knows this. But another basic tenet -- one on which much of Geisler's argument rests and which is another way in which his arguments are self-inconsistent -- is that our local space-time universe had a beginning. And if scientists say that our universe had a beginning -- which is again a fundamental part of Geisler's argumentation -- then they cannot be saying that it was "there" forever.
I seriously doubt that you comprehend any of this.
What appears to have happened is that Geisler managed to confuse the views of pre-1960s scientists with those of post-1960s scientists. In the 1960s, the discovery of the microwave radiation that was subsequently identified as a remnant of the Big Bang caused a revolution in cosmology. It was no longer really tenable to argue, as Fred Hoyle and a few others continued to do even 20 years later, that the universe was in "steady state". But plenty of scientists and philosophers of science, such as the Bertrand Russell that Geisler seems to like to quote, accepted the "steady state" universe idea until the 1960s. Geisler's mistake should now be obvious.
>>>Sort of ok, so far, except that Geisler -- like Watchtower writers -- fails to give proper source references.
: What kind of cheap shot is this?
It's not a "cheap shot". One of the biggest complaints about Watchtower Society writings -- as you know perfectly well -- is that its writers normally fail to give any source references. This makes it difficult or impossible for anyone to check up on their quotations. There is no reason that an author cannot give full citations. Indeed, Geisler gives full citations for several other authors in his article: Robert Jastrow, David Hume and C. S. Lewis.
: You are using the ex-JW aversion to the Watchtower in order to undermine Geisler in the eyes of the board participants! Ohh, I believe that is ‘ad hominim, right? You are manipulating us here. 'Poisoning the well', I believe.
LOL! Your man Geisler has been caught with his pants down and you're squealing like a stuck pig. I love it!
>>>Observation is only as good as what has been observed up to a specific point in time, and if new things arise, observations and conclusions based upon them will change accordingly.
: "All of the evidence is not in" for much of what science has discovered, right Alan?
Of course.
: Has any scientist actually’ observed’ macro-evolution
Of course. Macro-evolution is equivalent to speciation. We know of a number of examples of fairly recent speciation. For example, when the Americas were first colonized by Europeans, a species of fruit fly that in Europe colonized only the fruit of the mulberry tree came along for the ride. Eventually it split into two separate, non-interbreeding and non-interacting species -- one that continued to colonize mulberry trees and another that colonized only apple trees. In the Hawaiian islands, in a few million years, fruit flies have diversified from one or a few founding species into more than 800 species that are found nowhere else in the world. In various large African lakes like Lake Victoria, cichlid fishes have diversified from a few founding species to many hundreds in the various lakes in a few million years.
Now, of course, I know that what you really mean is, "has any scientist actually observed macro-evolution in a laboratory?" And of course, the answer is No, because what some people term "macro-evolution" doesn't act that fast. But the fact that it's observed in the far larger laboratory of nature proves that evolution does occur. And that the distinction between "micro" and "macro" is an artificial one that in reality does not exist.
: and can any rule out intelligent design by such observations?
Of course not. By the same token, The Tooth Fairy might have caused macro-evolution. Or perhaps Allah. Or Thor.
: If not, why do they insist on the ‘facts’ of evolutionary theory alone being taught or ‘accepted‘? Axioms, axioms, axioms!
Well, since I've given you examples of macro-evolution in action, your point is pretty well deflated.
>>>Not so. Fundamentally, Christians believe there must be a God because they learned it in childhood, or for emotional reasons they accepted the Bible and the Bible says there is a God, or any number of other non-scientific reasons.
: Straw man!!!!
I'm sitting here laughing at you. You really have no idea what such terms mean, do you?
What I said is confirmed by all sorts of studies performed by sociologists of religion.
: Who was the first person to observe nature and decide it must have a designer and who taught him to believe in a ‘god‘?
Fred Smith, living in Armenia in 4026 B.C. He figured it out on his own.
: “For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.“
Quoting scripture doesn't help your cause.
: It’s kind of like this, Great Brain: any cave man
So you admit their existence. That's a step in the right direction. Do you admit the existence of the recently discovered miniature Homo erectus fossils on the island of Flores in Indonesia?
: can see the INTELLIGENT DESIGN and sheer magnitude of nature, something many here have a tough thing realizing! LOL
Ah, I see. A fine example of "the argument from ignorance" in action. How then, is intelligent design manifested in engineering mistakes like having the retina of the mammalian eye inverted, such that the nerves lie on the business side of the incoming light, while the receptors lie on the opposite side such that the nerves must bundle up and dive through the retina, interfering with the incoming light and making a blind spot? That's a fine example of lousy biological engineering, and a fine example of how evolution retains structures (workable, even if non-optimum) over long periods of time. That a better solution can be found is proved by the eye of octopus and related animals: their retinal structures are built on sound engineering principles such that the nerves are behind the light receptors. How is it, then, that a Supreme Designer could manage to make the eye of a "lower creature" look like it was designed by a good designer, and the eye of his supreme creation, man, look like it was designed by evolution?
>>>They cannot possibly believe it for scientific reasons, since the existence of God cannot be proved scientifically.
: Wait a minute here; this is apologetics, i.e. reasoning that defends belief in God, did Geisler claim he was proving there is a God
Of course. That's the whole point of a book titled, Who Made God?
: or stating in scientific terms why he believes the scienctific evidence convinces him, or, many Christians?
Geisler, like virtually all Fundies, really has no use for science, except to the extent that he can bend it toward proving or otherwise supporting the religious notions he learned at his mother's knee.
>>>Furthermore, since today's science agrees that our local space-time universe (this is obviously what Geisler is talking about in his article) had a beginning, Geisler’s statement amounts to a claim that Christians believe there must be a God because of the scientific evidence.
: Straw man again and a unproven assertion!
Wrong as usual. My assertion follows inevitably from Geisler's own pronouncements and prior argumentation. Your next comments are simply pissing into the wind.
: You are getting scientific evidence that backs the presupposition of God's existence.
Is this supposed to be a coherent statement?
: He is simply arguing his point, just as you or anyone else would!
Is this supposed to be a rebuttal?
>>>But that is not only demonstrably untrue in the case of countless Christians, but Geisler and countless other Christians would strenuously object to it. So he isn't even aware that his statement --
Uh, what happened here, Rex? Had a bit too much of the bubbly?
AlanF
