h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

<Now: just please consider how any species could have "few traits". What is a "trait"? Is a short neck a "trait"? Is spots on the skin or fur a "trait"? How about breathing oxygen?
What i meant by a creature with few rtaits was a basic organism, developing into one with more traits or features, a higher organism.
i.e, few traits: jellyfish, slug, amoeba
more traits: dolphin, aardvark, cow

I am not so opposed to variation in a species, just not a single cell organism, with only the dna for a single celled organism, turning into my local doctor or even the sparrow thats sitting on my windowsill.


<...there is no such thing as "gene for a long neck". The interaction of various genetic codes which results in a particular neck length is much, much more complex than that. Sure, there are a few characteristics of some animals which can be narrowed down to specific genes - sickle cell anaemia, for instance. But the vast majority of characteristics, benign, malign and neutral, are the result of interactions far more complex than we can currently understand...>


I have simplified my arguement to make my point clearer. If i were to give full details, i would be here all century.

<"Lets say all the trees in the area are tall and only have edible branches at the top, which only the long necked giraffes can reach."

Another ridiculous assumption. You simply can't just "let's say" that. You've a herd of animals living there - there has to be a food supply...>

This is just for example, the short trees that the giraffes had fed on may have died out from disease, or they may have been over eaten.

<...if you're going to ASSUME the existence of god, then you might as well give up on science right now. If there's a god, and he can do anything, then all the laws of physics and chemistry and biology are just his little joke. He can ignore them any time he likes, so they're not "laws" at all. They're a lie designed to make intelligent people not believe in him...>

The laws of physics and chemistry and biology were put in place by God to keep order on earth and in the universe. If, for instance, there was no gravity, we would not survive, so God put it there to keep his creations in place. Also, you state that God could ignore them, and he can, altough it might screw up his world if he did. One example that would seem with our current knowledge of physics to be impossible is the flight of the bumblebee. Theoretically it shouldnt ba able to fly, but it can. Also there is a small fly that has one wing significantly larger thwn the other, (i forget thename of it, but i think it may have been in the "newe scientist" magazine a few weeks back.) which, according to the so called laws of physics should also not be able to fly, yet it does. With regards to the fooling intelligent people bit, there are many very intelligent people who have not been "fooled" and there are many respected christian scientists, for what its worth.


But did these chemicals actually have that long to do it in?


I suppose the same applies to your washing machine? (which, id imagine, is far less complex than the universe)

Possible, but unecessary.
And, depending on your view of genisis one, not in accordance with what He says.

"One example that would seem with our current knowledge of physics to be impossible is the flight of the bumblebee. Theoretically it shouldnt ba able to fly, but it can. Also there is a small fly that has one wing significantly larger thwn the other, (i forget thename of it, but i think it may have been in the "newe scientist" magazine a few weeks back.) which, according to the so called laws of physics should also not be able to fly, yet it does."

This isn't because of divine intervention, or some such nonsense. Just because it doesn't fit OUR laws of physics doesn't mean it doesn't fit the laws of physics. There are most certainly properties and formulas and stuff that we don't know about. Just because we haven't figured it out yet doesn't mean we WON'T.

"But did these chemicals actually have that long to do it in? " Yes. Are world has been around for billions of years, and a good part of it happened to have a primordial ooze covering the world. Now, some beleive that its been around much less tiem than that, well, that's their problem.

"The laws of physics and chemistry and biology were put in place by God to keep order on earth and in the universe." And you know this how? why?
Thats the creationists argument for why all these physics seem to work. hmm. 5 centuries ago and science was like heresy. but they were forced to accept it and had to incorporate into their scheme of things somehow. all very suspisouc and not very plausible. hmm...



btw have you ever jsut stopped and examined this whole god theory, just looked at its credibility without being biased by your view of the world?

It is not possible to examine anything without bias unless you have no beleifs. I have however considered it as unbiasedly as i can and it seems to be logical.

Si9mon, why are you even here?

I suspect you already know the truth, but want us to convince you further so that you can accept that which is contrary to your beliefs.

The Bible is largely manufatured by man, it may inclued some biased reportage of events but it is largely lies. It is not The Word of God.

The people who told you that simply want you to believe what they believe. The theories in science although in many cases as fervently upheld as truth by some old duffers are infact all up for improvement. The bee example you give is a very good one (although I seem to remember that recently that conundrum was answered) we dont understand everything, but what we do understand is that science is a better way of finding answers and understanding what goes on around us than simply relying upon The Word.

hi blicky,

<>

Well, he seems to have his own version of the truth.

<>

I would say that the bible is totally manufactured by man, as are all gods in the sense of us creating them in human form and putting them into stories (myths) that attempt to help us understand the mysteries of life.

I don't see any connection between science and religion. Science is an attempt to prove certain things about the world we live in, religion is an attempt to prove what we can never know. Hence, we do not need to 'believe' in science - we can either choose to accept or reject certain facts. But to believe in a god requires faith as I don't think there is any way of 'proving' that gods exist.

az

We each have our own version of the truth. We would not willingly act ina way we suspected was faulty.

What is happening to Si is that his knowledge is in conflict with his deeply held beliefs. He is having difficulty marrying what he is learning from evidence backed science to what he has always been told is true.

I feel for him its a tough position to be in because as well as having conflicts internally he will have to denounce his faith in front of those who have taught it to him.

He tells us he knows many christian scientists, well we all know of many gay people who are married with children; black people used to work for the security forces under the Apartheid regime in SA. Some people do manage to keep two contradictory things going all that tells us is that people sometimes do not feel strong enough in the face of social or other pressures to come out and say or act how they really feel.

I did not leave the church as soon as I became atheist.

blicky,

Perhaps it is the word 'truth' that gets stuck in my craw. I wouldn't say I have a personal 'truth' that I believe in, rather just some concepts that work for me as they fit who I am within this world.

That is what I meant about there being no connection between science and religion as I think one can be religious but still accept science since, although they are two different ways of living in the world, one does not preclude the other. At least I don't think so.

It probably boils down to how fundamentalist one is with their chosen religion. As christians, researchers like Jane Austin have no problem with accepting homosexuality as just another natural form of human love and Della believes in re-incarnation - neither of which are specifically condoned by the Christian Church. This is why I can never figure out what being christian means, as there seem to be so many variables and variations of christianity.

Not having any religion myself, yet somehow knowing a god concept exists, means I don't ever need anyone else to agree with me - I am very secure with my own god concept and as it is quite a personal thing I feel no need to have others accept what I believe.

az

Well for me at least being christian boils down to three main points you have to believe these even before the difficult bit of how do you have to behave as a christian.

1, Jesus died for our sins.

2, Christ was ressurected by the BigG's power/love.

3, That God created the universe.

All of these things look impossible but hey thats miracles for ya. However they appear in a book that we know to have been selectivly edited and also contains a lot of other information that has since been discredited by evidence from scientists.

So if the rest is looking false I feel its reasonable to hold even the plausible and nicer bits as being probably untrue given their extraordinary nature and the unreliability of the source.

I totally accept that people can do two different things even contradictory things but there will come a time when the two dont go together well. I can play rugby and football but there might be a time where I end up being asked by both teams to play at the same time. Without one necessarily being superior to the other I would have to decide which was going to be the greater influence.

Like me many can accept wo opposing things in their life but at some point must make a choice when the two things come head to head.

Part of the confusion is that there are so few fundamentalists and so many who make out they believe when they are too scared to tell the truth because they suspect that others expect them to be christian. The US in particular is caught in a mass hysteria feedback loop.

It always makes me laugh the way thanking the big G has increased at award ceremonies. Infact you could tell me the number of times he was namechecked at two ceremonies and I'd be able to tell you which was in the US and which was in the UK. All these people do it because its the done thing. They make films with nudity, sing about adultery and worship money and wealth in their wideos , train and work on the sabbath, but they all get an attack of religion in front of the press.

Si9mon:

Ooh, you really are a frustrating one. Most Christians are not worth the time or effort bothering with, but you seem to be SO close to actually using your brain that you're not a complete waste, so here goes...

"What i meant by a creature with few rtaits was a basic organism, developing into one with more traits or features, a higher organism.
i.e, few traits: jellyfish, slug, amoeba
more traits: dolphin, aardvark, cow"

But you already said you have no problem with the idea of traits such as speckles on frogs developing where there were none before. You KNOW that mutations can give rise to new traits. New traits don't necessarily crop up one at a time. They may not happen very often, but there has been an almost unimaginably long time for them to happen in, so we should not be surprised at the observed complexity of nature.

Also, what makes you think that a dolphin has more "traits" than a jellyfish? You have perhaps a rather narrow definition of what constitutes a "trait"...

"I am not so opposed to variation in a species, just not a single cell organism"

But why not? If a multicellular species can vary, what is to stop SCOs?

" with only the dna for a single celled organism, turning into my local doctor or even the sparrow thats sitting on my windowsill."

OBVIOUSLY not overnight. But a large part of the point of the difference between what you're gradually letting go of, and what you're hopefully groping towards, is the insight that a single celled organism CAN turn into your doctor, if you give it three or four billion years to do it in.

"I have simplified my arguement to make my point clearer. If i were to give full details, i would be here all century."

The problem is that your simplifications show that you don't understand what you're talking about. Simplifications are only good as long as they reflect reality. The image of the atom as a little solar system works as a simplification for the most basic chemistry, because it's easy to picture. But you don't go very far down the route of studying chemistry before it's explained to you that that's not how it is - that the simplification is WRONG in many important respects.

You seem to be under the impression that the simplifications you know are right. They're not. As a result, your point, while clear, is fatally flawed.

You might just as well build an argument in physics on the notion that mass is a constant under all conditions. Pleading that you're simplifying for the sake of clarity doesn't help in the face of the fact that your assumptions are wrong.

"This is just for example, the short trees that the giraffes had fed on may have died out from disease, or they may have been over eaten."

I repeat - in order to be any use, examples must make sense. Yours don't.

"The laws of physics and chemistry and biology were put in place by God to keep order on earth and in the universe."

If you assume that, then as I say, you might as well give up on science right away, because you're wasting your time and ours.

"Also, you state that God could ignore them, and he can, altough it might screw up his world if he did."

Are you somehow implying that god is not competent to intervene in the universe without catastrophic consequences? What about all the miracles he is supposed to have performed? These defy physics, and didn't seem to screw anything up...

"One example that would seem with our current knowledge of physics to be impossible is the flight of the bumblebee."

WHOAH. Hang on. Speak for yourself.

Maybe with YOUR current and woefully inadequate knowledge of physics, my boy.

Mine, on the other hand, is quite current, and quite consistent with the flight of the bumblebee. This is a common nonsense trotted out by people who don't know better.

The fact is that an early analysis of bumblebee flight showed that the wings were not large enough to lift the weight. However, this analysis was flawed because it made several hugely wrong assumptions.

Worst of the lot, it assumed rigid wings - bumblebee wings are NOT rigid, in fact they are hugely complex flexible surfaces, the very texture of which is adjustable on the fly (pun intended) by the bee's nervous system. This flexibility allows the wing shape and surface to warp and take advantage of a phenomenon called "vortex shedding" - something unknown to aerodynamicists of the time. This vastly reduces drag on the wing, and actually increases the effective lift generated.

Modern physics understands quite well how bumblebee wings work. The idea that we don't is an urban myth.

"With regards to the fooling intelligent people bit, there are many very intelligent people who have not been "fooled" and there are many respected christian scientists, for what its worth."

And there is not one, single scientists worthy of respect who allows their Christian faith to blind them to evidence. Sure, there are a few "Creation science" types - but they tend to publish each other's work, rather than bothering the proper academic journals.

"
But did these chemicals actually have that long to do it in? "

Yes, they did, and if you think they didn't, you might just as well throw all your science books in the bin because they are obviously all lies.

If you cannot accept the overwhelming evidence that the earth's age is measured in billions, not thousands of years, you have no use for science. Stick to superstition, if you wish, but don't pretend you understand anything science says.

"
I suppose the same applies to your washing machine? (which, id imagine, is far less complex than the universe)"

No "creator" was necessary for my washing machine. It is a mundane object built by a person. The interesting thing about it is that if you broke down it's WHOLE "evolution", it would take no more than ten thousand years. In that, it is qualitatively different than any living thing, because it is many orders of magnitude less complex.

All my washing machine required for its development was:
1. a proto-intelligent animal
2. a primitive culture that learned to smelt iron.
3. a culture which valued cleanliness
4. a culture which valued scientific investigation, which could discover electricity and how to harness it.
5. a culture which valued leisure over labour, and which sought to reduce the latter.

To suggest that something so very simple is in any way related to multicellular organisms is laughable, particularly as washing machines don't breed, mutate, compete for food, suffer predation or live in a dynamic environment.

The most useful advice I can give you is to stop thinking that the simplifications you keep falling back on are the whole story. Think not about what they explain, but what they DON'T explain. Seek the cracks where they don't conform to reality.

Most of good science happens in those cracks. Relativity came out of the cracks in Newtonian physics. Science celebrates the cracks, seeks to prise them open.

Religion papers over them and tries to pretend they aren't there.

If you think ignorance is bliss - carry on.

blicky,

Although it is pretty much universally accepted that life and the world as we know it was not *actually* created in six days (giving the big G a day off to rest) one can appreciate the mythological viewpoint and see it as such.

Previously, Romans and Greeks had all sorts of gods all over the place to try and explain their existence. So this newish christian God (which - tell me if I am wrong - did not become a 'christian' god until after the coming of Christ). Before that He was just another of the many gods going around.

In my readings of various myths thoughout the world it has always struck me how similar they all are. All of them have a 'creation myth' and there is often a 'flood myth' wiping out the previous sins of mankind. And we are talking about civilizations that had no previous contact with each other - yet they somehow came up with almost the exact same mythology. Curious, eh?

I think it is all about the human condition in that we are born with the knowledge that we are going to die, more than other animals have. And then we try to make a big fuss about it and then try to find some sort of 'meaning' for our lives.

I do agree with you that people 'thanking God' in ceremonies is quite silly. Perhaps all of those people truly believe in God, but I rather don't think so. It has become a socially accepted thing to do. Like when something good happens and I say to myself - oh, thank god! Or if I say - good heavens! These, to me at least, are just expressions with no connection to religion or my personal god concept.

az

Christians are allowed to believe in evolution, and most of us do. Evolution does not preclude God at all!

Allowed?

F

It's not that the flight of the bumble-bee defies the laws of physics, merely that the equations used by aerodynamicists don't give sensible answers when applied to the bumble-bee.

This is hardly surprising: the equations are meant to help design jumbo jets, not bees. The difference in scale between bees and 747's means that things like air viscosity, which can be ignored for the 747 are vitally important to the bee. It turns out that the bee's wing obtains an aerodynamic profile chiefly by means of the entrapped boundary layer of air surrounding it.

As a criticism of naturalism, the asymmetric fly is also a non-starter: the Luftwaffe flew a perfectly serviceable asymmetric observation plane (made by Blohm & Voss) on the Eastern Front in WWII.

hi Fathom,

Yes, exactly my question - allowed? Oh, how nice that they are allowed to do this.

Found this article this morning:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/pope/story/0,12272,1121962,00.html

Okay, it seems that this new guy who might become the next pope is a bit more tolerant of the 'real world' but it still seems such a backward way of thinking. To still tell married couples that they cannot use contraception . . . the mind reels.

az

In support of the debate, one is tempted to refer to a particularly fine edited entry.

A685055

hi Madent,

Yes, it is a good entry - I have read it before.

I think all religious mythology is quite fine in itself as there are often good stories to help teach people about life and stuff. Of course there are also a lot of quite scary and terrible stories, which I don't think children should be subjected to. The main problem arises when children are told this is TRUTH and not allegory. Adults can make up their minds whether they choose to believe in these things as fact, but I don't think it is fair to push these opinions on small children who have not yet learned to tell the difference between fantasy and reality.

az

...or anyone else who has not yet learned to tell the difference between fantasy and reality.

After all, why limit it to children?

F

Perhaps religious texts should carry a health warning:

Protect children: don't let them breathe your dogma.



F

"Si9mon, why are you even here?"
I
d just like to point out that if Si9mon leaves we realyl have nothing to talk about.