Why the need for certainty ?

Religion and Secularism
61

@holmes

 

Well, crap. I created a response with some quotes and formatting and it was lost … this one time, I hadn’t created it elsewhere. So, I’m not going to waste time by recreating it. Dumb me.

Brief response:

The first time you asked what I would have done back then, you DID NOT include the qualifier that I couldn’t write. No matter… in writing or not, I know very well that my ability to relay happenings fades over time. I don’t need to be a journalist to know that.

And, of COURSE it matters whether a witness tells you directly, or whether information was related through a series of people.

Last, I’m surprised you didn’t comment on my being named after William Jennings Bryan.

62

Oh! The text came into my email.

So, here it is, but I am not bothering to reformat it. You’re not really reading for content anyway.

 

>>>>>>>

 

Did you forget what you asked me? First, it was this:
I do not see what else the writers of the NT could have done, can you? If you had witnessed the events yourself or known a person whom you trusted emphatically who had, how would you have recorded this? how would you have preserved that knowledge in written form?
Now you ask:
My question remains what would you have done (under the circumstances I mentioned, inability to write etc) to ensure the story was passed on to others?
These seem to me to be two different questions.

Trying to meld them with this, in response:
Well journalists did not exist 2,000 years ago so I don’t think you’d have acted as one. Imagine once again that you witnessed these events or knew someone well who had. Imagine in each case that you and/or the witness could not write.
…I’m also a woman, and also in a low “class.” So while I actually do know that there were no “journalists” then, I also know as a poor woman, my comments would count for nothing (the story of the women at the tomb excepted).

Anyhoo — I cannot UN-know the thing I’ve learned as a journalist, which is that THE LONGER I WAIT TO TELL SOMEONE SOMETHING, THE FOGGIER MY MEMORY GETS.

You don’t need to be a journalist to know this.
Whether a witness wrote down his/her experiences or narrated them to someone else who did, makes no difference to the veracity of what they claim to have witnessed.
Let me make sure I understand you, @holmes.

SCENARIO ONE: You see me at a coffee shop downtown, and I tell you, “I saw a giraffe on Main Street five minutes ago!”

SCENARIO TWO: You run into @Lausten at a coffee shop downtown, and he tells you, “@citizenschallengev3 told me back in 1996 that his neighbor’s aunt’s dentist had a brother whose friend’s wife’s uncle knew a fellow during the Vietnam War who said that @teebryantoo said she saw a giraffe on Main Street back when she was in grade school!”

In both cases, the story seems unlikely, but would you be any more inclined to believe one over the other?

(Note: Scenario Two isn’t meant to be analogous to how the Gospels were written. I am only testing your claim about witnessses.)

¯_(ツ)_/¯
…”Bryan,” after William Jennings Bryan, actually
I’m surprised you missed this Fun Fact about my name. I expected you to comment on it.

63

Hmmm, @holmes

You asked @citizenschallengev3 whether David Berlinsi “needs to learn about science.”

???

 

I would say, if he is going to comment on science, then yes, he does need to learn about it.

He isn’t a scientist. He has no more education or experience with science than I do, except for the months he spent as a research assistant.

 

David Berlinski earned his PhD in philosophy from Princeton University.

After his PhD, Berlinski was a research assistant in the Department of Biology at Columbia University for less than one year.

He has taught philosophy, mathematics and English at Stanford University, Rutgers, the City University of New York and the Université de Paris.


???

 

Edited to add, I see that he did become a “post doctoral fellow” in molecular biology at Columbia, but he still is not someone with lots of science background. He is a philosopher.

 
 

 

64

Holmes (@September 1, 2019 at 9:52 am) I don’t care about the person, I care about the words he formulates:

Berlinski: "what is clear what is clear is that

02:22

within family groupings there are

02:24

profound similarities in structure we

02:26

can say that

02:27

but whether they arise because of some

02:30

constraints in the in the circumstances

02:32

of life or because there’s a genuine

02:34

explanation in terms of a common end

02:35

it’s just we just don’t know"


It’s as though he has no clue of a fundamental rule that origins researchers established long ago. You can not understand an organism’s interior and it’s structure without also understanding the environment within which it exists. This is a rule that ascends to all organisms and even communities. All evolutionary change is environment driven. The words above are simply off the rails and leading folks into a fruitless intellectual abyss. Doesn’t matter who uttered them.

Berlinski: "explanation in terms of a common end

02:35

it’s just we just don’t know in many

02:37

cases the entire mammalian group of

02:42

animals for example all of the mammals

02:45

have many many properties in common why

02:48

this should be we don’t know for example

02:50

the the Penta pod nature of all extremities . . .

pectoral and pelvic girdles also obey

03:16

the rule of five they also obey the rule

03:19

of five where did this constraint come

03:22

from it’s not entirely clear.


It’s fascinating that in this modern age someone can discuss that stuff and totally leave out how genetics advances of the past half century have revolutionized how we can answer those “very serious challenges to evolution theory?”

Holmes, that video provided a perfect example of what I’m talking about when I say “opining about other’s opinions” - Whereas the scientific community is busy collecting the evidence it can - and trying to figure out how to collect the evidence that remains elusively out of their reach.

 

Science never promised an ultimate answer and it sure seems like you expect one. Holmes, is that an accurate representation of your attitude? If not, please do correct me.

 

65
Holmes (September 1, 2019 at 8:51 am)... They therefore subliminally carry the perception that all critics of evolution fit that mold, that’s a huge error.
It still doesn't justify expecting science to do philosophy.

What’s criticized is shoving this unknown whatever ID into the gap created by anything scientists can’t quite explain - as though an explanation is needed to make something real. And if they can’t explain it, you get to insert your pet ID.

I still haven’t seen Holmes offer a serious description of what ID is supposed to be - or what it has to offer us so far as understanding how our material world operates. Can he?

Oh the other hand, I have shown how the notion of some Intelligent Design is a human built-in reflex in the face of the incomprehensible complexity of life and it’s long history. It offers a place to park our overloaded brain after being overwhelmed by awe and puzzlement at the infinite folds within folds of harmonic complexity that is life. It is a notion for our hearts that has nothing to offer our intellectual need to better understand our physical world.

Holmes has yet to show us what it offers our Intellect or the process of science. I don’t think he can.

66
Sherlock Holmes Participant@citizenschallengev3

You’re getting upset again because someone is disagreeing with you, get over yourself.


No Holmes, try to read my words:

Holmes has yet to show us what ID offers our Intellect or the process of science. I don’t think he can.

You can’t even define ID, yet you believe playing all superior on me compensates for your vacuous demands of science???

 

67
Holmes September 1, 2019 at 1:12 pm: I disagree. He is actually commenting upon the fact that morphological similarities between various mammals cannot be used to demonstrate that they share a common ancestor. He makes clear that IF they did have a common ancestor THEN the morphological similarity is quite feasibly due to that fact, but we cannot use the similarity as evidence of common ancestry. This is the kind of fallacious logic that permeates so much of evolutionary writing today.
Oh so in your universe we're confined to morphological evidence and must ignore what genetics has taught us. Such as how genetics operates - which has been undergoing a bit of a revolution in the past couple decades - though you would seem to want us frozen back in the good old days of paleontology and reconstructing bones. How does that work?

The science itself is so far beyond that mumbo jumbo you got there, but you refuse to acknowledge that portion of the universe.

Holmes September 1, 2019 at 1:12 pm: Incidentally it is incorrect to say “All evolutionary change is environment driven” because mutation (of the DNA) is a necessary component, if mutation never occurred how could anything evolve? how could environment alone cause genetic changes? I thought you said you understood this stuff and I didn’t?
Excuse me: Evolutionary change is environment driven. It was stupid to use "all", I need to watch that.

What makes you think mutation is an isolated event independent of what’s happening outside?
What do you think makes a particular mutation become a game changer or to fad into obscurity?
Before ridiculing what I’ve shared, perhaps a little self-edification on your part would be in order. Might I suggest:

The Tangled Tree: A Radical New History of Life, David Quammen - {loosely built around the life and works of Carl Woese}

https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/The-Tangled-Tree/David-Quammen/9781476776637

“David Quammen proves to be an immensely well-informed guide to a complex story” (The Wall Street Journal). In The Tangled Tree, he explains how molecular studies of evolution have brought startling recognitions about the tangled tree of life—including where we humans fit upon it. Thanks to new technologies, we now have the ability to alter even our genetic composition—through sideways insertions, as nature has long been doing. “The Tangled Tree is a source of wonder….Quammen has written a deep and daring intellectual adventure” (The Boston Globe).

In The Tangled Tree, “the grandest tale in biology….David Quammen presents the science—and the scientists involved—with patience, candor, and flair” (Nature). We learn about the major players, such as Carl Woese, the most important little-known biologist of the twentieth century; Lynn Margulis, the notorious maverick whose wild ideas about “mosaic” creatures proved to be true; and Tsutomu Wantanabe, who discovered that the scourge of antibiotic-resistant bacteria is a direct result of horizontal gene transfer, bringing the deep study of genome histories to bear on a global crisis in public health.


 

68
Incidentally it is incorrect to say… -- Holmes
This is an example of requiring that when something is stated, you expect a complete thesis of the full context. Without that, you claim ignorance. You have been here long enough to know that CC knows the part that you filled in. He expects you know it, and you showed that you did. So he left out, not out of lack of knowledge, but lack of it being necessary. I will continue to point out crap like this until it stops. That you go on to defend Berlinski for doing exactly the same thing is infuriating.
69

Not surprised that you followed up this

There are a large number of very serious and seemingly insurmountable problems in areas like mathematics, information theory, biochemistry and so statistics. I’ve probably read far more pro-evolution science books than you have anti-evolution science books.
With a “lecture” from a guy from the Discovery Institute. I don’t dismiss him just for that, but here’s what I found in the 45 minute thing: He tells some stories of scientists being agnostic. I know they say that because that’s a legitimate scientific stance, not certainty, or inerrancy. But Berlinski claims these statements are only made when lights go down, off stage somewhere. Google will show differently. At the end of this bit, he says he told those stories because “their doctrine is poisonous”. He offers no evidence or even discussion of this, he just moves on.

About 35 minutes, he talks about Galileo and how he had no idea of quantum mechanics. Galileo called it “the book of Nature” and declared it readable. He was wrong about that. This says nothing about values. That science has not produced the answers Galileo hoped it would says nothing about how well science works, it shows that nature was more complex than Galileo expected.

Around 43 he says that science might indicate we have traits that are not expressed or needed, and “unused gifts have no place, no role to play in the struggle for survival”. Known as Wallace’s problem. That’s so wrong. Having a trait, a mutation, that is not yet needed, but then becomes needed because of a change in environment, is exactly the definition of natural selection. This is why Darwin’s trip to the Galapagos was so fortuitous. In that spot in the ocean, the winds keep shifting and the environment changes every few hundred years, but constant environmental pressures on those species.

In the Q&A, he says Darwin is 100% bogus. Thanks for the detailed analysis there.

I could say more, but what’s the point?

70

@holmes 1 of 2/ Re Berlinski:

I’m not really in a situation where I can watch or listen to a video right now.

But my point about him not being a scientist matters — at least in terms of my own interest in this topic. I just don’t care in his philosophy of atheism, nor of evolution.

I did look up “Devil’s Delusion,” and interestingly, one of the negative reviews came from a Christian who said:

The book was full of circular and non-circular logical assertions attempting to refute statements with words and pre-suppositions. Too much philosophy / too little hard science
 

Another said:

The book contains outrageous claims based on over generalizations such as atheists are to blame for nuclear arms when in fact people who identified as Christians actively participated in the development of such weapons. Like many who have a general idea about something they have not thought thru the details enough to understand why their conclusions based on general propositions are wrong.
This sounds a lot like what folks say to you, here. So.

 

Re. Evolution, science isn’t my thing. But when it comes to claims that it’s wrong…It seems to me that if natural selection was such a foundation of sinking sand, all this would be a problem:

 

Concepts and models used in evolutionary biology, such as natural selection, have many applications.[318]

Artificial selection is the intentional selection of traits in a population of organisms. This has been used for thousands of years in the domestication of plants and animals.[319]More recently, such selection has become a vital part of genetic engineering, with selectable markers such as antibiotic resistance genes being used to manipulate DNA. Proteins with valuable properties have evolved by repeated rounds of mutation and selection (for example modified enzymes and new antibodies) in a process called directed evolution.[320]

Understanding the changes that have occurred during an organism’s evolution can reveal the genes needed to construct parts of the body, genes which may be involved in human genetic disorders.[321] For example, the Mexican tetra is an albino cavefish that lost its eyesight during evolution. Breeding together different populations of this blind fish produced some offspring with functional eyes, since different mutations had occurred in the isolated populations that had evolved in different caves.[322] This helped identify genes required for vision and pigmentation.[323]

Evolutionary theory has many applications in medicine. Many human diseases are not static phenomena, but capable of evolution. Viruses, bacteria, fungi and cancers evolve to be resistant to host immune defences, as well as pharmaceutical drugs.[324][325][326] These same problems occur in agriculture with pesticide[327] and herbicide[328] resistance. It is possible that we are facing the end of the effective life of most of available antibiotics[329] and predicting the evolution and evolvability[330] of our pathogens and devising strategies to slow or circumvent it is requiring deeper knowledge of the complex forces driving evolution at the molecular level.[331]

In computer science, simulations of evolution using evolutionary algorithms and artificial lifestarted in the 1960s and were extended with simulation of artificial selection.[332] Artificial evolution became a widely recognised optimisation method as a result of the work of Ingo Rechenberg in the 1960s. He used evolution strategies to solve complex engineering problems.[333] Genetic algorithmsin particular became popular through the writing of John Henry Holland.[334] Practical applications also include automatic evolution of computer programmes.[335] Evolutionary algorithms are now used to solve multi-dimensional problems more efficiently than software produced by human designers and also to optimise the design of systems.[336]


 

Know what I mean? What do you think?

 

 

 

 

71
You clearly found the exercise stressful and upsetting and I can only assume that once again this was an emotional issue.
@holmes , you certainly hear @lausten 's comments in a strange tone of voice in your head. Is it possible you're the one who's emotional?
72
I have no idea what you’re waffling about now, all you quoted was…
Definition ellipsis: An ellipsis (plural: ellipses) is a punctuation mark consisting of three dots. Use anellipsis when omitting a word, phrase, line, paragraph, or more from a quoted passage.

Hope that helps. It cuts on excessive scrolling. Helps to make the conversation readable. You can always use search to find the full passage. You seem to have figured it out yourself, but still wanted to complain about it. Then you repeated yourself about CC being incorrect, and didn’t respond to what I said.

You clearly found the exercise stressful and upsetting…
This is your most common response. You asked for an intellectual discussion, but keep claiming we’re all upset. Quite a few facts have been presented, maybe if you responded to those.
You wrote “He was wrong about that.”
Galileo was wrong to say Nature was a book that could simply be read. It was the early sense of what science could do. We’ve since found it to be more mysterious than we expected.
You take issue with those of us who simply refuse to bow to the Darwinian dogma, why?
I take issue with your unwillingness to engage in a discussion using logic and evidence.
You missed the entire point of the talk too, it was to contrast how the modern scientific establishment protects its beliefs with the same ruthlessness as the Catholic church protected its beliefs from the threats perceived in people like Galileo, why does that upset you?

Darwin is bogus, just look at the scientific problems (the Cambrian explosion is simply one of many).


Can you see a contradiction here? You admit religion has in the past been dogmatic, and agree that’s a bad thing. I’m glad we agree on that. Then you turn around and dismiss Darwin as bogus, just like you dismissed a quantum theory of how our known physical universe came to be (just the one we exist in, the one that is 14 billion years old), and our responses to the Cambrian “explosion”.

At 1 hour 7 minutes, Berlinski dismisses a guy’s question, saying scientists are acting like a gang in the Bronx, just fighting for their side. You seem to have a similar view. As long as you see the world this way, there isn’t much chance of having a peaceful conversation with you.

73

Smithsonian Museum of Natural History

http://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-fossils/species

74

@blaire

I think @holmes has already seen quite a bit of scientific information such as that provided by the Smithsonian. That isn’t the problem.

75
Holmes, I wasn’t intending to debate evolution with you or advocate it’s opposite and I apologize if that was inferred. The reason I suggested the talk is that it intelligently reveals that the established “scientific community” protects its cherished and unquestionable dogma just as eagerly as the inquisition did in centuries past.
Guess you don't listen to many scientists lecturing on their topics of expertise. You really should broaden your horizon. Here are some great talks that reveal scientists to be quite willing to discuss the weakness in their work and they even honestly represent opposing ideas - what a concept!

If you want links - https://confrontingsciencecontrarians.blogspot.com/2019/08/diary-8302019-life-happens.html

 

August 10, 2019
Michael Russell - Emergence, serpentinization engine, electron exchange - What a scientist sounds like.

August 7, 2019
Jack Szostak - Origins, geochemistry to biochemistry - What a scientist sounds like.

August 4, 2019
Robert Hazen - Origins, mineral evolution - What a scientist sounds like.

August 24, 2019
Jeff Gee, Joanna Haigh - Earth’s Magnetic Force Field - What a scientist sounds like

August 23, 2019
David Bercovici - Origin of Plate Tectonics - What a scientist sounds like.

August 22, 2019
Caroline Beghein - Tectonics to Deep Earth Dynamics - What a scientist sounds like

August 20, 2019
Jason Morgan - history of plate tectonics - What a scientist sounds like

August 19, 2019
Plate Tectonics and Life - What Scientists Sound Like

August 17, 2019
Paul Hoffman - Snowball Earth explained - What a scientist sounds like.

July 29, 2019
David Attenborough communicator extraordinaire - Life on Earth, Living Planet

July 29, 2019
Ben Burger, Rocks of Utah - geology videos - What a scientist sounds like.

July 22, 2019
James Sadd, Earth Revealed - video geology course - What a scientist sounds like.

July 20, 2019
Nick Zentner’s Geology Video Collection - Washington state - What a scientist sounds like.

July 3, 2019
Wayne Ranney’s Geology Video Collection - Colorado Plateau Evolution - What a scientist sounds like.

 

76

Slander and ridicule against everyone that disagrees is the number one tool that folks like Holmes have at their disposal. Since constructively learning, or teaching, isn’t their actual intent, we get Holmes dodging all questions asked of him.

Feign superiority and dismissal of questions is not a serious response, it’s a deceptive tactic Dr. Holmes. Or should I just call you Ian? ;- )

Oh yeah, simple straightforward questions such as this attempt at simple discussion made in the spirit of Lausten’s suggestion:

 

It still doesn’t justify expecting science to do philosophy.

What’s criticized is shoving this unknown whatever ID into the gap created by anything scientists can’t quite explain – as though an explanation is needed to make something real. And if they can’t explain it, you get to insert your pet ID.

 

¿ I still haven’t seen Holmes offer a serious description of what ID is supposed to be – or what it has to offer us so far as understanding how our material world operates. Can he?

Oh the other hand, I have shown how the notion of some Intelligent Design is a human built-in reflex in the face of the incomprehensible complexity of life and it’s long history. It offers a place to park our overloaded brain after being overwhelmed by awe and puzzlement at the infinite folds within folds of harmonic complexity that is life. It is a notion for our hearts that has nothing to offer our intellectual need to better understand our physical world.

Holmes has yet to show us what it offers our Intellect or the process of science. I don’t think he can. (That’s like an invitation for an adult response.)


Too hot to handle doc?

77
It is, if you care to simply research the many deeply problematic scientific issues,…
You’ve said that more than once, but when given the opportunity, which is really any post, you put up a speech that is more philosophy than science. When I first started thinking about my beliefs, I realized I had only a rudimentary understanding of evolution. I read arguments, like the ones I posted earlier from the Kansas School Board meeting, and I couldn’t refute them or confirm them. So I read a variety things both pro and con. I didn’t just dismiss anything.
Lausten in a peer reviewed scientific paper do you think its appropriate to refer to the metastable false vacuum as being nothing, indistinguishable from nothing?
In the summary of a paper, yes. Because the people who can read and review that paper understand what he is referring to. Just like saying a proton orbits a nucleus. It’s not the same as a satellite orbiting the earth. You could say it’s “wrong”. Protons don’t orbit nuclei. But it’s the model, it’s the common understanding, it’s what we use to communicate and understand each other.

I’m pretty well convinced that understanding each other is not your goal.

78

@holmes

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(•ㅅ•) ||
/ づ

Actually, I have no interest in “debating evolution” with you, either. As I have already said, science isn’t a topic I’m really well-versed in.

You do seem to want to debate Darwin, though. Well, I have no personal feelings about him, as an individual. But when you say, “Darwin’s bogus,” it begs my question, which you ignored.

So let me ask again, very simply.

If I have a premise, and it’s incorrect, than the actions I take on that premise will probably be unsuccessful. Correct?

For example: Suppose I believed that babies come from pumpkin patches.

If I wanted to acquire a baby, I would look in a pumpkin patch. If I wanted to prevent birth defects, I’d water a pumpkin patch with vitamin water.

In both cases, my efforts would be wasted, since my premise was incorrect.

Are you following me…?

Now, whatever you think of Darwin, it is true that his theory has led to a wide variety of applications in today’s era. They include the following (I have shortened, very imperfectly, from long blocks of info. Please try not to get bogged down in every detail. Appreciate my wider point):

Biology (ecology, life history theory, annotation of genes, evolutionary developmental biology)

Artificial selection (genetic engineering, selectable markers, antibiotic resistance genes, manipulating DNA as in molecular biology, mutation and selection in modified proteins and new antibodies)

Medicine (antibiotic resistance, genetic disorders, pharmaceutical development)

Computer science (evolutionary algorithms, artificial life , engineering, automatic evolution of computer programs, design optimization)

All the above stuff is very complex…much more complex than my acquisition of a baby in a pumpkin patch.

@holmes, assuming Darwin is bogus, how do you account for all the apparently successful applications of a phony premise? (I am looking for your opinion, not a point-by-point debate on the theory of evolution or Darwin’s sainthood or lack thereof.)

79

CC, nice collection of links. I could treat them like some kind of semester of science.

The one on plate tectonics (which I’ve only seen the summary so far), reminded of something I’m looking for. I read once that one of the earliest geologists, before that was even a thing, was a Christian who was looking to confirm the Biblical age of the earth. He was rigorous in his gathering of evidence and somewhere along the line had to admit the Bible was wrong, but he launched the science of geology in the process. I’m probably getting the story wrong, so I’m trying to find an account of it again. Or was that one of those bogus stories on the internet that I should just forget about?

80
If you believe that in an academic physics paper “nothing” can be freely substituted for “something” and vice versa and you approve of that then I’m afraid we will never understand each other.
And around and round we go. How many times do we have to point that we are not understanding each other? I offered an alternative to the word "nothing". It was about no spacetime, no matter. You kinda of ignored that and pointed out that it's still an explanation of "something" that came "before". I agreed, and talked of expanding our definition of "universe" to include more than just what we can observe and theorize about up until a few microseconds into the Big Bang. I agree, there is something "outside" of this physical universe, something "created" it, so we need some other words for it. You are so smart, so astute, and probably also handsome. I understand you completely. So, now what?