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

Relax and enjoy your Gosho


The rabbit in headlights look is more an incredulous ‘I can’t believe this person believes what they are saying’ look.

And when religious people turn on him he tends to smash them into the ground citing verifiable fact.



“His constant bleating” that sort of explains your view quite nicely.

It’s more head against a brick wall.





I have never seen or heard a religious person tear Dawkins apart ever on evolution or natural selection. The same old tired challenges come from the creationists and religious that have been roundly shown to be rubbish and yet they keep throwing them back at the scientific community.



At what sort of thing? Explaining the in and outs of natural selection or trying to explain that religion is man made bunkum?

Yes, good as he was, DNA was probably not as good at explaining natural selection as ...say... a distinguished and internationally rekowned professor of the subject.

I just want to make sure I get this correct:

They've quibbled that sufficient conditions in formal logic only apply if you believe in them or to put it as they put it: sufficiency is good enough for some people.

How do you frame the theory of evolution and observed biological complexity (or indeed any theory / observation for that matter) as an argument in formal logic? I'm having a go, but my formal logic is a bit rusty and I get too easily confused about which is P and which is Q.

The argument is: P implies Q when P is sufficient to say that in and of itself, knowing P to be true is adequate grounds to conclude that Q is true.

I'm trying to build up to explaining that if Q is false then the theory is falsified which means P is also false as it cannot explain an observed natural feature and requires modifying.

Help!

Gosho :

"I say: "Proof by empirical evidence is actually the only way we know to arrive at the truth."
They say simply: Not so."

And they're right! Proof by evidence isn't the only way to arrive at the truth. It is the only way I know to prove it's the truth though.


"I refer the honourable Ostrich to my earlier post, re: trying to debate evidence against faith is about as easy as trying to nail soot to a wall."

That's easy that is - I can even sell you this stock of nails perfect for the job. Hammered into shape by the teeny tapping of angels dancing on the end of every single pin

No, Dot Dot Dot, you know nothing about my views if you're extrapolating a picture from that one word. I've seen Dawkins 'debating' with the leader of Concerned Women for America. At one point he started banging on about how wonderful it was that a certain animal's jaw had evolved over the millenia.

A complete waste of time in the face of her beliefs and faith and disbelief in natural selection. He often looks like he's about to burst into tears when a particularly dogmatic religionist lays into him with their claptrap. He has no idea how to confront them, and neither do I for the reasons I've already explained and which have been demonstrated by Clive. So yes, I use the word 'bleating' because that's all he's got and he doesn't realise that it doesn't work. Adams, on the other hand, used simple common sense, not dogma.

'lo all,

Good spot on number 4, Dave.

>Your friend obviously has an hidden agenda.

As well as the blindingly obvious Creationist agenda?

>Theists do have evidence [of god], but it is not empirical - unless you experience it personally nothing we say or do will convince you of the evidence.

Call him on this at once. He (assuming it's a male Christian) doesn't accept the personal experiences of Muslims, Hindus, pagans, universalists, spiritualist, etc, etc. What he is actually saying is that his personal religious experience should count as evidence, even though it's obvious that no-one else's should.

You might also ask him what rules he thinks science should work by. Michael Behe fell apart on the witness stand in Dover because he couldn't come up with a definition of 'science' that included ID but did not include astrology.

But then again, I'm still clinging to the non-scientific, irrational belief that if you can make it obvious enough that they are wrong, these people might reconsider their ideas.

Gif

I will do so, but I suspect they've anticipated that in a way as I've already put a similar point to them. Their answer is bizarre and a morass of contradictions but like that's ever stopped them before now....

"Others claimed to have been divine revelation, but since their answers contradict one another, they can't all be right, so who do you believe?" [LJ]

"I believe all roads eventually lead to Rome." [L]

I think this means faith is faith is faith regardless of which religion. Now I know we'd all say "WHAT?" and cite the endless contradictions that must entail but it's their way of weaselling out of it.

Subjective truth of divine revelation is equal to empirical evidence (superior even because until you'd tried it you just *can't* know) and the many subjective truths are all reflections of one truth.

I'd ask how they reconcile such contradictory beliefs as direct experience of a single god (Islam), a triune god (Christianity), multiple gods (Hinduism) and a vague spiritual essence that may or may not be conscious. I'd also ask how they reconcile the belief that God supports the Palestinians with the belief that God supports the Israelis, or Catholics and Protestants, or Muslims and Hindus. Or whether McCain and Obama are both correct that God wants them to win the election... and so on, and on, and on...

Gif

And lets not forget that one is not saved unless one has been touched by His Noodly Appendage!

t.

>>"2) The microwave "background" makes more sense as the limiting temperature of space heated by starlight than as the remnant of a fireball."<<

http://xkcd.com/54/
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5d/Cobeslide36.jpg
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COBE

"Theory and observation agree".

This is an interesting thread I've been ing on, but I'm still as deeply confused as the day (several years ago) when I naively asked the guy stridently demanding that my occupation in the sciences necessarily means an absolute adherence to Atheism, "Must it be so cut and dry?"

Most of the early biologists were related somehow to the Church and if Mendel didn't have a problem reconciling his research with his religion, then why should I? It is apparent to me that the data support the theory of evolution rather than the strictest interpretation of Creation (the 6-days flat, one day vacation, a few thousand years back, no dinosaurs need apply version).

That doesn't mean we should not try to understand God's creation, our part in it, and our responsibility to it. In fact, an honest belief in Creation means an acceptance that God gave us brains to use and the intelligence to seek both knowledge and understanding. Honoring the God of our fathers means we should use our heads for something other than a hat-rack, and think of God as something other than the catch-all for blame. (Why are we sick? Is it God's Will, or did we pollute our drinking water? Hey, let's blame it on God, because it's so much easier than fixing the sewers or distributing medicine!)

That said, I have no idea how to win a debate with someone who has a knee-jerk dogmatic rejection of the vast and growing body of data compiled by the scientific community.


Happy Nerd

<>

they fear

they fear the argument

prove god exsists and qed he does not and dissapears in a puff of logic

the creator of this universe was so right about so much in his books
another round of pan-galactic garrgle blasters anyone

I'll have a pggb, please.


HN

Here you go



fancy another

No, thank you. One's plenty, thanks.

in that case how about a slice of lemon wrapped round a large gold brick

Sounds tempting. I could put the slice of lemon in my club soda, and pay off my mortgage.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/brunel/A934283

there you go faith is a product of evolution

with out evolution there is no faith

with out faith there is no god

darwin = god

This is a fascinating thread

We used to have an excellent Post series (archive at A14136680). Danny B would take conversations like this one and sum them up into a Post article. I'd like to have a go at sorting this one out for publication, too.

I'll probably need to draft up a page and ask you guys to take a look to make sure it all makes sense; obviously you'll be credited for your contributions to the thread. If anyone doesn't want their postings to be used, would you please let me know?

Rich

Ive drafted something up over at my test page, A14662730. Take a look and see what you think - I'll be looking to go with this in the next issue.