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Comment #136335 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 10:40 pm

Diacanu,

definitely... I mean, sometimes I wonder if these people would recognize a good argument if it shat them on the face. It's not like there aren't any. As I once said, Craig's philosophical apologetics have some good arguments. They're wrong - but at least interesting and intellectual.

As has been mentioned - Robertson's arguments are limited to "YES IT IS!!!" and "NO IT ISN'T!!!", as in

"The universe appears to be designed - but these facts show that this hypothesis is incorrect for all we know"

-"NO IT ISN'T!!!"

or

"Atheism isn't inherently nihilistic for the following reasons..."

-"YES IT IS!!!"

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Comment #136331 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 10:32 pm

Nevermind... I was just thinking that the exchange of ideas on Buffy wasn't influenced by what I posted... probably better that way. I would have missed that last part about "DILFs" - which was somehow disturbing... and goodness knows I wouldn't want to have missed that :)

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Comment #136326 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 10:25 pm

Seems I was interrupting a private coversation..
:/ - or rather :) ?

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Comment #136324 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 10:21 pm

As I was mentioning "Once more with feeling"...

I was actually quite impressed that they put in meter-changes in "Give me something to sing about" (4/4 with 7/8).

And yes, I'm crazy about such stuff.

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Comment #136322 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 10:18 pm

Anthony Head

... who has a very nice singing voice :)

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Comment #136319 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 10:15 pm

And yes, Hannigan is cute - not as cute as Trachtenberg though IMHO (somehow I despise the Dawn character nevertheless).

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Comment #136317 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 10:12 pm

To mention another TV series....

I feel like I'm in the twilight zone right now :)

Nah, never liked Buffy that much - too cliché and kitsch... BUT I thought the self-irony, the genre-parody elements were great.

Let's not talk about the acting - it isn't that important anyway...

And I simply loved "Once more with feeling"... actually, I can sing (and play) most songs by heart.


All in all - nice (very light) entertainment IMO - if you like it for the 'right reasons' that is :)

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Comment #136259 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 3:23 pm

Thanks, Storeo... Downloading now for later viewing.

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Comment #136238 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 2:55 pm

Dito, Steve.


Well said.

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Comment #136232 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 2:46 pm

And while we're at it, whatthe...

As long as you haven't bought or read the works I recommended... here's something for your reading pleasure:

http://www.scholarpedia.org/article/Intentionality

http://www.scholarpedia.org/article/Encyclopedia_of_computational_neuroscience

http://www.scholarpedia.org/article/Neural_correlates_of_consciousness

http://www.scholarpedia.org/article/Models_of_consciousness

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Comment #136230 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 2:42 pm

The causal closure of spacetime (thermodynamics) means that all effects in spacetime are caused by entities in spacetime. In short (and somewhat imprecise): Only physical entities or phenomena can effect physical phenomena... So a metaphysical god could not intervene in the physical world.

This is positive and fatal evidence against interventionist gods.

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Comment #136226 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 2:39 pm

2208 MPhil

I have read Daniel Dennetts Darwins Dangerous Idea in which he challenges John Lockes assertion that matter and motion can never, by themselves, result in mind. Dennett dismisses this argument by appealing to A.I. However, A.I is the creation of human intelligence therefore it is reliant for its existence on a intelligent cause.

You completely misunderstood the argument then. Just goes to show... and of course Darwin's Dangerous Idea isn't mainly about Consciousness.
The point he was making there was against dualism. And he's right.

1. Dualism is impossible
2. Dualism is insufficient - you need a material substrate to process information
3. We have very good theories of how the mind is the brain (or rather the function thereof)

Read "Consciousness Explained" or even "Kinds of Minds" and some works by the Churchlands.

Having shown that dualism is untenable and false, the argument for the evolution of minds is easy:

Consciousness and intelligence are essentially high-level processing of information with feedback. What these do is model the outside world and derive predictions from that.

An organism that can do this has a huge advantage over an organism that cannot.
In "Kinds of Minds" this gradual increasement of complexity in awareness in intelligence is explained brilliantly.

Every organism has discrimination mechanisms - most aren't conscious. A lock can discriminate the right key, a virus can discriminate a cell, bacteria can discriminate healthy from unhealthy environments - as shown by their behaviour (moving in a two-phase solution away from the slightly toxic and towards the nutritious)... none of this is conscious, or consciousness... but consciousness as we know it just different in degree, not in quality (although hugely different in degree).

Mount such discrimination mechanisms up - to higher complexity including feedback monitoring and manipulation.... repeat for millions and millions of years (evolution)... and you end up with human consciousness.

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Comment #136199 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 2:13 pm

Steve,

it's not as technical as Churchland's works... but it's very interesting nevertheless IMO... and as it was one of the first books I read on that subject, I value it immensely.

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Comment #136196 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 2:08 pm

Al,

Nothing does, thats why I was puzzled.

"Things" referred to dealing with slave trading and persecuting criminals in general.

I apologize for being oversensitive, as I said - it was unintentional.

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Comment #136185 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 1:59 pm

On the subject of "how could consciousness arise in a material universe", there is a wonderful book (probably the #1 book on my nonfiction list) by Daniel Dennett, called

"Kinds of Minds"

Very much recommended.

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Comment #136180 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 1:54 pm

I think I wasn't being oversensitive, as the first part of that sentence in combination with that second seemed to imply that I was ready and willing to hand over my civil rights to the government.

If that was not the intended meaning, I apologize for having misread you... it wasn't deliberate.

Before we get into this, I'd like to hear your opinion on the following:

-What are the rights of states in contrast to that of the overall government that would require a military force whose chain of command ends at the state level and not at the level above?

-Do you assume that "a well regulated militia" applies only to militia of and by the individual states?


EDIT:
Sorry, Bonzai and Cartomancer already asked that question.

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Comment #136155 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 1:39 pm

MPhil,



No, I was giving you a hard time.

You trust your government to deal with your rights at all times. You ready to sign that power over permanently?

Also, go read the 2nd Amendment and tell me what you think.

Excuse me?

All I am handing over (willingly) in this case is the right to persecute and trial offenders... sorry, but I don't want no "might makes right", law of the jungle, which would be the alternative to handing that particular right over.

I happen to be very much for the protection of civil rights. But I don't want laws that would do no good. I am not against the right to own guns (non-automatic) with a permit (a hunting licence or a weapon-ownership license - with strong restrictions on who can own a gun, where to store then and how to handle them).

I'm sorry but I don't think it was right to insult me that way. I do not renounce all my civil rights.

(And I did read the 2nd amendmend... actually, I read quite a lot of the american constitution.)

Can we please refrain from insults? I just wanted to debate, not throw feces at each other.

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Comment #136145 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 1:30 pm

AAARGG...

I am asserting that interventionist nonphysical gods CANNOT exist !

It's (for the umpteenth time) the causal closure of spacetime


....sorry about the tone, but noone seemed to be paying attention :)

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Comment #136140 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 1:28 pm

whatthe...

Oh please tell me you're not a dualist! I might feel obliged to ridicule you in front of everybody.

Dualism is impossible via the causal closure of spacetime, it is philosophically absolutely out of fashion... the problems are just insurmountable.

Furthermore - we have very very good explanations for the arise of intelligence and consciousness from evolution. Read some Dennett ("Consciousness Explained") and Churchland (Paul and Patricia)!

The claim you are making is one of philosophy of mind, the field I study. You might want to learn something about the field in which you make claims, otherwise you'll look absolutely ridiculous - as you did with that assertion.

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Comment #136135 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 1:23 pm

O please... the slave trade (assuming you mean the fact that people from eastern europe force women and girls into prostitution and smuggle them into western Europe) is being dealt with - with increasing effectiveness, through cooperation between the various international government agencies.

Furthermore... what does gun control have to do with that? Should a militia storm every brothel and erect an intelligence service to check the identities of the women there? The government deals with such things.

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Comment #136125 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 1:19 pm

Actually, "atheism" means "without god(s)", not "no gods".

But yes, theism is disproven by the causal closure of spacetime.

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Comment #136120 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 1:17 pm

I hope we atheists (at least those here in the board) can one day agree upon stating that interventionist gods are disproven (as per the evidence mentioned above).

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Comment #136111 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 1:14 pm

whatthe...

Atheism is not clearly defined. There is a lot of evidence against gods... as I mentioned before:


Occam's Razor takes care of deistic gods.
The first law of thermodynamics (causal closure of spacetime) takes care of interventionist gods as well as dualism.
The Contradictions in the descriptions of specific deities take care of them in addition to the above.

There is more, such as that every phenomenon that theist claim is unexplainable from outside theism is actually explainable and we're already pretty far ahead in that.... furthermore, theism provides no real explanations, but merely "elan vital"-hypotheses without any explanatory power.

Also, atheism can be viewed as merely the positive assertion that there is no rational justification for believing in deities... and for that, I have already provided evidence, in fact - conclusive evidence. Or it can be seen merely as the absence of belief in deities... but I don't subscribe to that, as I said. I subscribe to "There is no rational justification for belief in deities".

1474. US Treaty with Tripoli

Comment #136064 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 12:55 pm

The Borders in the European Union are open - controls are only made sporadically and following concrete evidence... Not to mention that the borders to the economically weaker eastern countries are not heavily patroled either. There is crime, there is drug smuggeling, there are all those things - And it's being dealt with...

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Comment #135918 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 10:53 am

Oh and when you've done that, proceed to demonstrate that the Bible is the true account of how all this happened and the true description of that creator. While you're at it, provide a strict, independantly justified method for coherent interpretation of the Bible.

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Comment #135913 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 10:51 am

Indeed, but look at my last post... the bible clearly says that you are condemned to hell unless you accept Christ as your saviour.

And again, please demonstrate the first four lemmata:

Lemma 1: The Universe was created
Lemma 2: The creator of the universe is an omnipotent, omniscient [and omnibenevolent] being
Lemma 3: This being, having created the universe continues to play a part in the development of the universe and all that is in it
Lemma 4: This being is specifically the deity of a particular sect of people living in one small section of one small planet circling around particular star out of 1011 others in one galaxy out of 1.5*1011 others.

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Comment #135909 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 10:47 am

Ah, but universalism denies the "truth" of salvation through accepting Christ as your saviour (see the quotes above)


And really, this is all idle speculation -
please prove the first four lemmata provided by epeeist before we proceed to the fifth.

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Comment #135906 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 10:44 am

Not necessarily. God does not exclude people.

Assuming your holy book of choice is the bible, chose one of the following:

You're

a)lying

b)ignorant

c)deluded

Proof?

"the children of the kingdom [the Jews] shall be cast out into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." (Matthew 8:12)

Jesus condemns the Jews for being "the children of them which killed the prophets." (Matthew 23:31)

"His blood be on us, and on our children." This verse blames the Jews for the death of Jesus and has been used to justify their persecution for twenty centuries. (Mathhew 27:25)

#

John

# People are damned or saved depending only on what they believe. 3:18, 36

# The "wrath of God" is on all unbelievers. 3:36

# John, with his usual anti-Semitism, says that the Jews persecuted Jesus and "sought to slay him." 5:16, 18

# John says that Jesus "would not walk in Jewry, because the Jews sought to kill him." 7:1

# No one could speak openly about Jesus "for fear of the Jews." 7:13

# If you don't believe in Jesus, you will "die in your sins" (and then go to hell). 8:24

# Jesus calls his opponents (the Jews) the sons of the devil. 8:44

# Once again, "the Jews" are accused of trying to kill Jesus. 11:8

# If you don't believe in Jesus you are going to hell. 12:48

# Jesus is the only way to heaven. All other religions lead to hell. 14:6

# John blames the Jews for the death of Jesus. 19:7, 12, 14-15

# "He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father."
If you follow Jesus' teachings, God will love you -- otherwise... well, you know. 14:21

# Those who do not believe in Jesus will be cast into a fire to be burned. 15:6

# Now that Jesus has come, non-believers have no excuse for not believing in him. 15:22

# John, with his usual anti-Semitism, says that the disciples hid in locked room "for fear of the Jews." 20:19


...oh well, I'm tired of copying/pasting... just look it up yourself:

Intolerance in the Bible

Cruelty and Violence in the Bible

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Comment #135900 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 10:35 am

hello,

well for starters I'm against retributive justice and against the death penalty.
Justice should be dispensed so as to minimize the harm done, protect society and give a chance for resocialization.

Also, you quoted only half of it:
"... and throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth"...

"fiery furnace", "lake of fire", "where the worm does not die and the fire is not quenched", "tormented with fire and brimstone"...

This is torture - worse than Auschwitz both in quality and quantity of torture.

And remember:

"The one who rejects the Son will not see life, but God's wrath remains on him"

Not acknowledging and worshipping God (and the fact that he is his own son) is a sin, the punishment for which is the above...

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Comment #135889 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 10:24 am

This page sums it up nicely - and mind you, it's a christian site:

Bible.org: What the Bible says about Hell

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Comment #135888 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 10:23 am

Where I got that idea of God?... Let me think... the Bible for starters. (Matthew 13, 41-43 for example)

Then of course by looking at the katechism of the catholic and protestant church...

...oh, not to forget from hearing a lot of Christians talk about hell...

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Comment #135887 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 10:20 am

A background in philosophy?

The kind of thinking you display here makes me doubt that you ever learned anything from studying it.

Where are the razor-sharp arguments?
You display sloppy thinking - wishful at best, deluded or stupid at worst

Let's hear your arguments - the premises first... I have a feeling that's where the BS starts.

Ever read Mackie, Quine, Lakatos or Churchland? (Or even more basic - Aristotle and Quine on Logic, Popper on critical rationalism, Carnap on Positivism, Lakatos on Empiricism...? Let me guess, a bit Aristotle and maybe an excerpt from Popper at best?)
No? Please do. You might learn something.

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Comment #135877 by MPhil on February 29, 2008 at 10:11 am

hello,

Well, that is the same as knowing God. You don't have to have anything to do with him if you don't want. He doesn't stop you. You can choose.

Yea, that's right... the freedom to obey and worship or suffer eternal torture in a celestial Auschwitz. Nice chap this "god" guy..

Unfortunately, there's thermodynamics - goodbye interventionist deities...
Unfortunately, there's Occam's Razor - goodbye deistic deities...
Unfortunately, there are the numerous contradictions in the descriptions of God in the Bible - goodbye Christian god.

Are we done? Or are you gonna pull some ad hoc ex post facto "it's metaphorical!!" bullshit?

1484. Turkey in radical revision of Islamic texts

Comment #135150 by MPhil on February 28, 2008 at 3:26 pm

That's the problem everywhere, isn't it... radical fundamentalist mentality. I think it's not necessarily dependant on religion (Islam), but more generally an outdated concept of pride and honor, which of course is reinforced by Islam.

There can be no real integration into a free, democratic society with such people. But this is also a huge problem with young people without migration background... it's a problem of the 'lower class'. In some areas and schools there isn't any problem, there is cooperation and understanding... but mostly, uneducated, low-income parents live in 'ghettos' where there is a "might makes right" mentality and a lot of violence. Furthermore, the parents and the media the children are exposed to through their parents leave them without proper education, intellectual as well as moral. Domestic violence levels are high, so are violent crimes.

But the people with migration background and inhuman, outdated conceptions of pride and honor aren't helping... these notions, this machoism is impressive to the children - who adopt it. The only way to solve conflicts they know is violence...

I really almost despair when I think of it. It's a vicious circle, it's a growing phenomenon and there's almost no escape for those who are already part of it.

1485. Turkey in radical revision of Islamic texts

Comment #135131 by MPhil on February 28, 2008 at 3:00 pm

epeeist,

believe me - I wish there were. The current waiting list for Bayreuth-citizens is 4 years I think - and it ain't cheap either. Friends of mine go there every year - lucky bastards. Some even house a few of the international artists that sing at the Festspielhaus.

All I ever managed was to get tickets for the dress rehearsals of Sigfried and Rheingold.

But if you're willing to wait a few years, why not get your order placed now? I think it's worth it and I plan on doing so once I am reasonably sure where I'll be in 4-5 years :)

Until then, there is a wonderful DVD-set of the 1976(-1980)"Jahrhundertring" with Pierre Boulez conducting and Patrice Chéreau as director.

I'd be happy to meet you here and give you a tour of the wonderful cultural artifacts in this city, like the Hermitage (http://www.schloesser.bayern.de/englisch/palace/objects/bay_as.htm) and the margrave opera (http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bild:Opernhaus_Bayreuth_2_db.jpg - http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/50/Opernhaus_Bayreuth_1_db.jpg)

;)

1486. Turkey in radical revision of Islamic texts

Comment #135105 by MPhil on February 28, 2008 at 2:31 pm

Anyways - I hope that the current movement to preserve/restore laicism as Attatürk set out will be successful...

1487. Turkey in radical revision of Islamic texts

Comment #135095 by MPhil on February 28, 2008 at 2:17 pm

Neither, I'm from Upper Franconia... Bayreuth to be exact. Maybe you have heard of it, it's the Richard Wagner-city, every year thousands of fans of classical music from around the world make a pilgrimage to the Wagner-Festspiele.

I assure you this is in no way personal for me - except of course in the what that everyone is little more sensitive to strereotypization when it concerns a group (however arbitrary) to which he belongs.

1488. Turkey in radical revision of Islamic texts

Comment #135078 by MPhil on February 28, 2008 at 2:03 pm

And there is of course a major difference between Germany and Austria on the one side, and countries like France and America on the other.

Germany and Austria don't have a history that is completely based on immigration, nor do they have colonies anymore - for the entire lifetime of this and the last generation. So, the concept of "being German" or "being Austrian" is more dependent on how 'rooted' you are in the region where you live and the local culture than on what your passport says. I don't assign any moral value to being born inside an arbitraryily defined area... but some do, and I think that's wrong. But the idea of cultural identity and social cohesion based on this isn't evil per se.

Of course there's a problem where it leads to prejudice and intolerance (except for intolerance of the 'enemies' of a free, constitutional society, which have to be opposed).

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Comment #135073 by MPhil on February 28, 2008 at 1:55 pm

I'm sorry if my sarcasm detectors are a little misaligned right now - I'm pretty tired :)

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Comment #135071 by MPhil on February 28, 2008 at 1:52 pm

You Germans sure are hard on people you think aren't German.

Now how am I to understand that generalization? Please tell me that wasn't meant seriously... I doubt you're capable of promoting false and malicious stereotypes.

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Comment #135066 by MPhil on February 28, 2008 at 1:48 pm

PMurdock,

See, I don't believe that there is "good and evil" - this is a cultural myth, a black and white worldview that has done immense harm, not least in American policy and its acceptance in the populace.

There are acts that do harm and acts that help (and neutral acts) - there are acts, policies and so forth that provide an obstacle to the survival of our species, or even life on earth, or to enlightenment - and there are acts, policies and attitudes that further these.

We have hard-wired instincts, emotions and agreed upon social norms from which we evaluate these. Sometimes conscious reflection can modify our motivations and our understanding, enhance it. And indoctrination can make it less compatible with reality.

So in this - and only in this sense - there is "good" and "bad"... but "Good and Evil" as metaphysical principles, effective 'forces' in the world? That is a completely outdated notion, and there's no justification for it.

1492. Turkey in radical revision of Islamic texts

Comment #135058 by MPhil on February 28, 2008 at 1:40 pm

Goldy,

You're right - I just wanted to point out that the term is no longer used. And as I said, obstacles to integration exist on both sides.

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Comment #135051 by MPhil on February 28, 2008 at 1:38 pm

But how do we decide what the right goals for our lives are? You say 'better with the ladies', but is that the goal? How do I even know whether bedding a lot of ladies is a good thing? It feels good, yes, but is it right? How would I know that?

How do you decide it when you are religious? Sticking exactly to the religious texts is going to be difficult, as all I know advocate conflicting moral views. So mostly, you will use your moral sense to interpret the religion.

Furthermore, the religious view of moral values as commanded by good are subject to a dilemma: Either God commands something because it is right independant of him, then ethics supersede god, and you don't need religion - or it is right because god commands it, in which case genocide would be right if commanded it (which he has done if you read the old testament, not to mention hell)

I suggest you read the excellent book "Ethics - Inventing Right and Wrong" by John Leslie Mackie.

Even if there were objective metaphysical - how would we know? They would be metaphysical entities of a very strange nature - somehow conencted with actions and emotions and dispositions, yet unobservable, unprovable, uninvestigable. In addition, all we know about moral behaviour tells us that there are no metaphysically objective standards, but that peoples and even individuals have sometimes extremely conflicting moral codes.

But there are "moral" facts - such as evolutionary stable strategies (ESS), which as the name says describe which behavioural strategies are evolutionary safe, stable. Assigning metaphysical objectivity to them would be a naturalistic fallacy however.

Fact is, noone could know for sure what these metaphysical values are or even if they existed - so the hypothesis that they exist is superfluous, Occam's Razor takes care of it.

But this doesn't mean we can't act 'morally' - everyone knows that we can. And all that is needed for this is empathy, which can be explained as specific mirror neuron activity. But we humans have even more than that. We can conceptualize, modify concepts at a high level and implement them.

Ever heard of first order ethical theories like Utilitarianism, Kantian virtue ethics, prima facie duties-ethics and so forth? None of them require any deity, in fact all of them are far superior to theistic morality.

I suggest you read up on them, and I really suggest you read that book by Mackie.

-Mike

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Comment #135034 by MPhil on February 28, 2008 at 1:17 pm

Goldy,
Noone is called a "guest worker" in Germany anymore. The term has faded out of usage almost completely. It was used specifically to refer to the people from Italy, Greece and Turkey (mostly) that were hired during the late 50s to late 60s when the German population couldn't provide enough workers for the rocketing economy, the "Wirtschaftswunder" and its consequences.
Those people are now in their 60s or even 70s - some went back to their countries of birth, others stayed and had children, who are now mostly parents themselves.

That is not to say that there are no obstacles to integration - erected both by the German government and economy and by the immigrants.

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Comment #134979 by MPhil on February 28, 2008 at 12:23 pm

Oh please - the "original spirit"? The prophet's "original values"? Gimme a break! The guy was a deluded, megalomaniacal crook - the hadith and koran are full of misogyny and worse things.
This is like the modern, modest, central European christianity... far from its roots, reading part of the moral Zeitgeist into its holy scripture to avoid being left in the middle ages.... and then selling it as a return to the "original values" and a more "accurate" interpretation. Bullshit, it's just the opposite and these people are hypocrites.

Still, I'm glad Turkey is doing this... now if only they were to strengen their Laicism again, as Kemal Attatürk, the father of the modern turkish nation intended (and this we know for a fact).

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Comment #134488 by MPhil on February 27, 2008 at 9:53 pm

I'm on my knees...although, that might be because of the extra strong Long Island Iced Tea I just drank :)

There you go and outwit us all in one stroke. Spoilsport!

:-P

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Comment #134482 by MPhil on February 27, 2008 at 9:27 pm

Brilliant!

1498. Feb 12th: Happy Darwin Day!

Comment #134480 by MPhil on February 27, 2008 at 9:26 pm

OK. So. Evolution provides a few explanations as why such complexity suddenly appears: an increase in the level of oxygen, fluctuations of carbon isotopes, small increases in genertic complexity. OK. All very interesting, but speculative.

Actually not speculative at all - at least no more speculative than the best theories any science can provide - and that means it's all we are justified to assume, and we're well justified to do so. The corroborations you mentioned are just a tiny fraction of the picture. All of modern science corroborates the story of evolution - everything we learn about the change in environmental conditions including continental drift for example. All of which is substantiated, not speculative.

I have a question, though. Before the appears of these multi-cellular life forms, all we have are soft-bodied worms. You can say that it is ebcause of the environmental conditions, or because the organisms did not leave fossilized evidence (due to whatever) - again, all very interesting, but specualtive.

You've got something mixed up. We have substantial evidence of the changes in environmental conditions, not only speculative assertions. The composition of isotopes and general elements in very old layers of ice, in glacier ice, in trees, in strata etc - they all tell us a lot about the changes in environmental conditions.
It is furthermore not speculative that these environmental conditions effect a certain selection pressure, it is a self-evident truth - let me demonstrate it through a thought experiment.

Imagine you have a bright green environment with predators and prey - they prey are green as well, so as to have a chance to reproduce while under the pressure from the predators. They avoid being seen by the predators that way.
Now imagine the environment turns red. What is going to happen?
The prey-species is going to be seen by the predators far more easily.

The pressure has just increased. They will go extinct.... But there's random mutation. One of these mutations causes red skin/fur/scales/feathers... what will happen to the individuals that don't have the redness-gene? And what will happen to those who do? Exactly - the green ones will decrease in frequency of occurance, the red ones will increase.

This is nonrandom natural selection in combination with random mutation. We know it's there - we see it happen (think bacteria developing immunity against antibiotics) In short: evolution.

But there's much more to it than that. Combine Darwin and Mendel and you've got neodarwinism - we can predict the frequency of traits! The Mendelian laws tell us how!
But there's still more! We know about DNA and RNA. Mendel supports Darwin, and DNA evidence supports both and actually provides us with a fundamental understanding of the mechanisms that make up Mendelian inheritance. All of these scientific discoveries are mutually supportive and together make up the modern understanding of evolution. Our meteorological, geological and chemical knowledge explains even what the environmental conditions were and how they caused the fosselization we find, the strata we find the fossils in and even the geological distribution.

We have what we have. So, all of a sudden, we see this. And then, with each successive layer, species start disappearing. How many species are said to be extinct today? I forgot the actual number, but somewhere in the 90s.

Doesn't this seem kind of suspect? Evolutionary theory says that we are all descended from the primordial soup. So, billions of years of bacteria, not much happening, then poof! All these complex creatures, and then they start disappearing. Doesn't the evolutionary tree posit a gradual progression, from the past until today? The progression we actually see is a sudden rise in complexity, and then a gradual disappearance.

Yes and no - it is gradual, we observe no leaps, but there are variations in the "speed" of mutation, environmental change and thus extinction and fosselisation. These are not assumptions made simlpy because they fit the theory of evolution - these are individually corroborated findings of other fields of science, such as chemistry together with meteorology and geology etc. The evidence is mounting up and mutually corroborating the respective theories in the fields - without being circular, because the corroboration is not ex hypothesi and contained to each individual theory, but mutual, inter-theoretic. The theories of other fields that corroborate the theory of evolution do not require or assume evolution, their inquiry is different... yet their predictions and findings corroborate it to an extremely high degree.


The theory of evolution is an integral part of modern science. You cannot just pick and chose, because they are mutually supportive. In fact, the theory is so successful that it revolutionized all understanding of biology.
We need only assume what we observe and know to be true - random mutation and nonrandom selection... and it all follows. Things that wouldn't make sense otherwise suddenly do.

That's the beauty of science. Much like Newton's laws revolutionized our understanding of the way objects behave: The movement of the stars, of apples falling from trees, of thrown balls - are all goverened by the same mechanism: Gravity!

And the same is true for evolution: The large-scale behaviour (where selective pressure is not self-controled, as humans in first world countries do) of individuals are outlined by the behavioural-disposition-controlling genes, which survived through evolution because they were able to withstand selective pressure... because they produce behaviour that maximizes fitness (chance of having surviving descendants).

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Comment #134468 by MPhil on February 27, 2008 at 8:48 pm

Do you think it is a satire that Christians want Harry Potter banned?

As a Harry Potter Fan myself, I'm all too aware that they do. But this is coherent with their ridiculous opposition to perceived 'promotion' of witchcraft. Believing that Jesus spoke English however is a matter of real-world fact, with the entirety of history and common sense actually providing positive evidence against it.

The Youtube link was scary, and I know that law (although I don't remeber its name either). I must say it did look staged, which wouldn't be a first for that kind of show. I may however just be completely unaccustomed to that kind of behaviour as it is almost (or even entirely) unheard of in nowadays Germany. But since having seen "Jesus Camp" and "Baby Bible Bashers", it seems to be possible.

Non of which would explain the blatant stupidity of believing that Jesus spoke Enlish though :) I mean there's being deluded, there's being ignorant and there's showing behaviour that (if taken seriously) would rank your IQ right below that of a cucumber.

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Comment #134463 by MPhil on February 27, 2008 at 8:32 pm

Bible like Hollywood - we're filled with apocalyptic visions of blood 'n' fire, then go buy a bag o popcorn during the intermission. (think Terminator)

Too true.
As a favourite German political comedian (and yes, contrary to what Stephen Colbert says, they do exist) of mine likes to say:

"You've got to realize this: For the faithful muslim, the presence of infidel soldiers in the Lands of the holy places of Islam is like having Taliban stationed in the Vatican for catholics. Just think - MUSLIMS!!! People who take their faith seriously - unimaginable for catholics. It's en vouge to make fun of Islam nowadays: "I'm cracking up! 72 virgins? Holy shit!"... well, I don't know what you believe in. How about virgin birth? Transsubstantiation maybe? Like to nibble on the saviour?"